The Key to Starveldt (11 page)

‘Quetzals,’ said Sylvia, answering the unasked question. Evidently, Solace and Laine weren’t the only ones staring. ‘I cannot think of a comparable Earth species that still exists. A distant fifth cousin of your prehistoric dinosaur birds, perhaps? In any case, they are native to this place.’ She waited a moment, allowing them all one last look. ‘But we did not come here to sightsee. Look.’

Ahead and slightly to the left was a rising slope of grass, dotted with clumps of white flowers and crowned with a thicket of tall, pale-wooded trees, their blue-green foliage rippling softly. From where they stood, it wasn’t possible to see where the grove eventually ended: only where it began. Through her Trick, Laine knew that it was inhabited, but not by whom. She shivered.

‘The satyrs’ grove,’ said Sylvia, tilting her chin. ‘Gateway to the Castalian spring.’

‘You won’t come in with us?’ asked Paige, her hazel eyes wide as a child’s.

‘No. The journey is yours from here.’

‘Well, thank you for bringing us, anyway,’ said Manx, earning himself a small smile. Sylvia turned to go.

‘Wait,’ said Jess, surprising everyone except Laine. ‘Please. The Castalian spring. Why have I heard of it?’

The guard stopped, but didn’t move her head. ‘On your world, there is a story about the spring, an old story. They say a winged horse born from the splash of demon’s blood on sea-foam created it to slake his thirst. His hooves struck open the stone of a sacred mountain, and liquid truth flowed out like water. Now it is both here and not-here, protected by the custodianship of the Rookery. The spring is beautiful, but I do not advise you to drink from it – not undiluted, anyway. Mortal flesh is not strong enough for the purity of truth.’

And then she was gone, striding away as though her words held no more weight than ordinary air, her silver rifle winking like a trickster’s eye. It wasn’t until the guard was almost gone from sight that Laine realised she hadn’t caught a single thought of Sylvia’s. That, too, was something to wonder about.

‘Come on, then,’ said Evan, breaking the silence. He looked at Laine, his face unreadable. ‘You’re the one who knows this place.’

‘I’ve never been here before,’ she said softly. ‘I met one satyr. I learned some names, and traded for nepenthe. That’s it.’

She knew she was stalling, but even with the others staring at her, she couldn’t make herself walk forward. Then she felt Solace brush a hand against her elbow. The vampire’s eyes were dark and strong, like pools of swirling oil.

‘Lead on, Laine,’ she murmured.

Whatever Solace had intended, the words came out a command. Helpless to do otherwise, Laine obeyed.

For the first few minutes, the satyrs’ grove proved conspicuously absent of satyrs – or, indeed, of anything other than eeriness. Except for the nervous tramping of their own unsteady group, Solace saw no sign of life.
Should I be reassured, or worried
? she wondered. For once, the Vampire Cynic had nothing to offer.

‘I don’t like this,’ Paige muttered, stumbling over an awkwardly angled tree root.

‘Luckily, I don’t care,’ Laine shot back. She was slightly ahead of everyone, apparently having taken Solace’s suggestion of leadership to heart.

‘Perhaps you should,’ Evan said, with an unfamiliar twist in his voice. Laine faltered, but didn’t turn.

Solace turned and looked at him. ‘Sharp,’ she told him, not quite reproving.

‘I know. I’m a very bad man.’ He tried to grin, but failed and ended up sighing. ‘
Very
bad. Also about nine kinds of an idiot.’

‘And this is new, how?’

‘It isn’t,’ he admitted. ‘I just felt it needed mentioning.’

Solace tried to gauge his mood and failed. ‘What the hell is up with you today, anyway?’

‘You mean, apart from everything that happened in Sanguisidera’s dungeon and us being in a pocket dimension with quetzals?’

‘Oh. Well, yeah. Apart from that.’

Evan was about to answer when a shriek from Jess cut him off. The group came to a halt, staring at the source of her alarm. Solace gulped, unable to fathom how the creature had snuck up on them. They had been alone, and then he was there, stepping out from behind a crooked tree with no more sound than a shadow. Paige made a noise somewhere between whimpering and laughter.

‘Satyr,’ Manx breathed.

His horns were the colour of old ivory, if ivory could be as iridescent as the inside of a shell, sweeping backwards and round again from either side of his forehead. Large brown eyes devoid of pupils stared imperiously down from above a flat, goatish nose. His skin was the colour of coffee, dark against the startling iron-grey of his dreadlocks. Silvery hair curled on his bare chest, with his navel visible above the point where his human half segued into his goat-jointed legs, their shaggy, black-brown fur liberally marked with grey. His hooves were the size of plates, streaked with green moss and old mud, and his proud gaze was fixed squarely on Jess.

‘Seer,’ he said, revealing teeth that were large and uniformly rectangular, like those of a horse. ‘What purpose have you here?’

‘No purpose,’ Jess managed. She pushed her shoulders back, but her voice still quivered. ‘Why? Should I have?’

‘All creatures have purpose.’ His focus swung to the right, centring on Laine. ‘And you, thought-thief. Did you hear me coming?’

‘I didn’t,’ Laine replied, ‘but I can hear you now –’ she paused, ‘– Salesian.’

‘Hm.’ The satyr’s lip curled. ‘A pretty trick. Our warden here, Liluye, the Singing Hawk,
she
has a gift with names. I doubt that you share her talent, briefling. Tell me –’ he turned to Solace, ‘– what are you doing here?’

Solace stared back at the satyr, who Laine had named as Salesian, and realised that she was unafraid.

‘We’re looking for some nepenthe,’ she said.

‘Oh?’ Salesian cocked his head, amused. ‘For what purpose?’

‘To find our way forward.’

‘But you have a seer,’ the satyr pointed out. ‘And in any case, our brew is a poor substitute. Mostly, it only takes the drinker sideways in time. Rarely does it go back, and forwards even more seldom. Use the tools already at your disposal, blood-daughter, and forget this idea of borrowing ours.’

‘I can’t see.’

The rasped words came from Jess. Salesian’s eyes narrowed as he contemplated her anew.

‘Your vision is clouded?’

‘It is.’

‘You are afraid of what it might show you.’

‘No!’ said Jess. ‘I just –’

Salesian waved a hand. ‘Your excuses are of no concern to me.’

‘What is, then?’ asked Evan. His jaw was set, clearly angry on Jess’s behalf and tense with the desire to keep his sister safe.

For a long moment, Salesian stared at the empath, his face motionless. Though the grey of his fur and dreadlocks hinted at an advanced age, the skin of his face and body was olive-smooth.

‘The truth of you,’ he said at last. There was an odd light in his eyes. Abruptly, he lifted his head, listening for something. The nape of Solace’s neck tingled with warning as, with a rustle, a dozen more satyrs materialised from nowhere and everywhere, encircling their group. No two of them looked alike. One tall male with a broken horn sneered at them, his blond hair tied into hundreds of thin braids that hung to his hocks, each one strung with what appeared to be microchips. A black-furred female with Asian features wore a leather cuirass studded with thorns, while beside her stood another female, her short hair dyed in vivid stripes of red, blue and purple. She wore an ordinary black singlet, the edge of which reached to the top of her white and tan fur. Though Salesian by himself hadn’t frightened Solace, the sudden, silent arrival of so many of his fellows sent a shudder through her skin.

Without speaking, her friends all crowded in close to one another, forming an outwards-facing circle of their own. As Solace brushed shoulders with Evan and Manx on either side, she wondered if they were about to be attacked.

‘We will have the truth,’ repeated one of the satyrs. His gleaming skin, several shades darker than Harper’s, was set off by the light stripes on his jetblack horns. A single-bladed axe hung from his hip. Stepping forward, he addressed all of them, but his eyes lingered on Laine.

‘We will not trade you nepenthe, thought-thief. Not again. But as you seek guidance, we will take one of your number to the Castalian spring. Unless you are afraid?’

Behind her, Solace heard Jess and Harper murmur their discontent. Laine, who stood at Manx’s right, turned to look at her. The psychic’s mouth was a tight line, her eyes bright, and suddenly Solace felt absolutely certain that the satyr who’d spoken was Feyez, who Laine had originally met in Newtown. A queer ripple shook her skin with the knowledge. That made three times that she and Laine had connected unintentionally: first at the house, then during the conversation with Liluye after she’d encountered Grief, and now again, in the satyrs’ grove. What did it mean? Had Laine’s powers suddenly grown stronger, that she could reach Solace’s mind with so little effort? Or was Solace herself the one who had changed? Either way, it was a riddle for later; Feyez was waiting. Though Sylvia’s warnings about the spring were still fresh in her mind, a part of her was curious as to its potency. Besides which, the others were only here because of her. The least she could do was spare them any more hazards.

‘I’m not afraid,’ she said. ‘I’ll drink.’

Feyez raised an eyebrow. ‘You? I had assumed the seer –’

‘No.’ She cut him off quickly, before either Jess or Evan could gainsay her. ‘I will.’

Salesian exchanged a glance with Feyez, then scraped his hoof against the floor of the forest. ‘Then it is settled. The blood-daughter comes with us. The rest of you, stay here.’

‘Solace.’ As she went to move away, Manx gripped her wrist. His mismatched eyes were full of concern. ‘You’re sure about this? You heard what Sylvia said.’

‘I’ll be fine.’ Gently, she pulled away from him, turning to face the others. ‘Really.’

‘What about us, though?’ asked Paige, throwing a frightened glance in Salesian’s direction. ‘How do you know we’ll be fine with
them
?’

‘I don’t,’ said Solace, ‘but I’m guessing Laine and Evan do.’

‘Huh.’ Paige hugged herself. Then, in a deliberate exclusion, she turned her shoulder towards Laine in favour of addressing Evan. ‘Well, then? Are we safe?’

Evan chose to ignore her rudeness. ‘I don’t feel any bad vibes, Paige. They’re fierce-looking, yes –’ he stole a glance at Feyez, ‘– but if they wanted to hurt us, I don’t see why they bothered to talk at all.’

‘Vampire!’ It was the punk-haired female, calling her away. ‘Come with us.’

‘Coming,’ Solace replied, but still her friends remained cautious.

‘It should be me,’ Jess said, her voice touched with unfamiliar hesitancy. ‘Even the big guy said so. I’m the one who let us down.’

Solace reached out and touched the seer briefly on the arm, feeling awkward about the contact, but convinced of its necessity. ‘That may be the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you say. Just stay here. I’ll be fine.
You’ll
be fine.’

This time, it was Feyez who called, ‘Come!’

‘Luck,’ whispered Electra. Solace smiled in thanks and nodded to everyone a final time. Her heart pounding, she turned and moved towards the punk-haired satyr. She was tall – they were all tall, Solace realised – and approval showed in the alien planes of her face.

‘Good,’ she said. The two of them walked side by side. The satyr’s gait had an odd bounce to it, a jerky rise-and-fall that came from the strange shape of her legs. Up close, Solace could see that her guide’s nose, ears and navel were all pierced with silver rings, while her cream-coloured horns were each wound round with a series of knotted, rainbow-coloured cords. Such small observations went a long way towards easing Solace’s worries, but as they joined Salesian and Feyez, she still found herself unable to disregard the latter’s axe.

‘They called you Solace,’ Salesian said, as the four of them headed away through the trees. ‘The thought-thief has already given you my name, and, I suspect, that of Feyez. Am I correct?’

‘Yes,’ said Solace, glancing at the female, ‘but, uh, I don’t –’

‘Quin,’ the satyr supplied.

‘Right.’ She gulped and grinned. ‘Nice to meet you.’ When neither of her companions said anything further, she ventured a question. ‘So. How far to the spring?’

‘Not far,’ said Feyez, without looking around. ‘For us.’

‘Oh,’ said Solace.

After that, they walked in silence.