The Tower of Bones (30 page)

It wasn’t just Mark and the Ship. Mo was changing. She was growing rapidly, her body maturing. Even her face was maturing. She bore less and less resemblance to the girl he had first met at his grandfather’s sawmill. He was coming to realise that there was a good deal more to Mo than he would ever have thought possible, back in those early days of getting to know one another. He recalled that extraordinary moment when his own life was endangered with the Legun incarnate at the battle of Ossierel, and Mo had put herself between him and the Legun. How brave her small figure had stood there, unprotected by any oraculum, by anything at all, and how certain her girlish voice had sounded:

I am Mira, Léanov Fashakk – the Heralded One.

Her stance had appeared insanely brave in the circumstances. The Legun had switched all of its malice to her. Alan recalled how Mo’s face had glowed, spectral with light. That foolhardy behaviour had almost cost her her life. It had taken the healing power of the goddess Mab to save her. What had that meant? What might Mo know now that she wasn’t telling him?

Alan exhaled. He probed the Wastelands north of them, sweeping far and wide with his oraculum.

‘You’re looking for Kate?’

‘Looking, but never finding.’

‘Can you detect nothing of her?’

‘Not a thing.’

‘It doesn’t mean—?’

‘That she’s dead? I don’t think so. I’m sure I’d sense that, even from the other side of the world.’

Mo changed the subject. ‘The Gargs – do you think they’re holding back because this place is a trap?’

Alan shrugged. ‘The Kyra chose it because it would be easy to defend. We’re surrounded by mountains.’ He looked to landwards, regarded the surrounding landscape again. To put it more accurately, they were enclosed within a bowl of volcanic calderas. The bay itself was probably the result of some huge past volcanic explosion, the headlands and the bay in between all that was left. The only way inland was through marsh and bog. When the wind was blowing from that direction you could smell it.

‘But you don’t seem so sure.’

‘I’m far from certain about anything.’

The arrival of the fleet had hardly been secret. They had coasted for a full day looking for a suitable vantage along cliff faces and hill-studded bays dense with Gargs. They had inspected their settlements, some in cliffs pockmarked with caves, others in strange conglomerations atop cliffs with jagged, stony projections.

A loud noise, like the screeching of tormented metal, sounded from the Temple Ship, a shockwave so powerful it swept out in a ripple through the surrounding ocean and buffeted Alan’s and Mo’s faces as it swept outwards through the air. Alan hugged Mo, strongly, protectively, as they stared at the Ship with a shared alarm.

‘What are you going to do, Alan?’

‘I’m going to find Kate.’

‘When?’

‘We set out tomorrow. At first light.’

‘Whoaaaahhh!’

Snakoil Kawkaw barely had time to yank himself out of the hidey hole before the hole itself began to disappear. He watched it melt out of existence with utter disbelief, its walls and floor lapping and whirling, as if a few liquids were being stirred into the soup of a boiling pot. He was forced to leap out of the ferment, heedless of where he might land, before it consumed him.

‘Hellfire and abomination!’

He landed in a great tumble of rope at the base of what had, until seconds earlier, been the middle mast, but which was already well on its way to becoming another pool of soup. His left foot was caught up in the change. ‘Heeeaggghhh!’ he wailed as he saw his great toenail disappear. With a shriek he snatched away the toe itself, which had barely escaped, hoisting his entire leg into the air, where he rubbed at the toe now swollen as a ripe plum, and throbbing like a boil.

What in the darkest bogs of reason was going on?

He felt as if he had spent half his life in that cramped hell-hole. What meagre rations he had managed to wheedle from Porky Lard had run out by the second day and he had suffered such hunger he had sucked on rope for the rank residue of its oil. And for what? For every goat of a
sailor to abandon ship as soon as it laid anchor in this miserable cove, surrounded by black rocks in the shape of shark’s teeth, a reef-baited shallows mean enough to rip your guts out now you were forced to swim for your life. It was the last thing anyone would have expected, a contemptible dereliction of all that was supposedly held dear by the fish-gutters and witch warriors – indeed, judging from the slithering and squeaking companions that were abandoning ship with him, right down to the last bilge rat.

And the most embarrassing admission was that he had watched it happen – watched and done nothing about it for almost an entire day. When he should have been over the rail in the previous night. And now, while dodging the madness of the changes, he was seeing spectres – at least one for certain. He had seen clear through it, like pipe-smoke, hanging around the wheel. Though consumed by dread he had skulked nearby so as to hear the monstrous chattering of this demon, at a time when the last of the fish-gutters and Shee-witches had taken to the boats, leaving just Duval behind, the huloima scum who had waited for all others to depart the Ship so he could hold a lengthy conversation with the very demon.

What Kawkaw overheard had heightened his panic.

The fish-gutters were planning to hand over the Ship to this demon, who intended to change its form back to the raptor shape it had taken over Carfon harbour. Why the demon would want to do that, other than for devilment,
was a mystery to Kawkaw. But there was no mystery as to the implications. Every chip of wood, every fibre of rope or sail, would be melted into that same infernal soup. If he continued to hide on board he would be subsumed, to be reconstituted in some twirl of feather, or some sausage of gut, or a piece of tailbone.

Why, in the way of things, should happenstance so threaten him? Poor old Snakoil Kawkaw, who, if he had been allowed to take his due place in society would, no doubt, have been the very pillar of rectitude! Anyone could be virtuous if the world rewarded you as you so righteously deserved. Yet through no fault of his own he had been robbed of every aspiration and fortune at every twist and turn.

Is it my fault, then, that the blessed gods of chance had turned out to be the most mischievous of devils?

A hundred yards away, in a world enviably tranquil to his present eyes, the huloimas, Duval and the girl, were making their way down from the black escarpment. He’d watched them preen at the top, glorying in the sunset. That excremental youth and that imp of a girl who had proved so bewitched you couldn’t even land a good kick on her arse but she floated away from it like a leaf on the breeze. How had she escaped the warlock in Isscan? Ratspelts! Every last one of them! For a moment rage so possessed him that Snakoil Kawkaw forgot his predicament until, with an almighty groan, the spell-bewitched deck under his feet began to waver and soften.

‘Hell’s bleeding entrails!’

He had no option but to hurl himself bodily over the rail without the opportunity to check whether it might be jagged rocks or freezing water he would encounter at the end of his tumble.

By early night, sheltered from the shore winds behind a stony horseshoe of the same black rocks, Alan and Mo joined Ainé, Milish, Siam and senior figures from the Shee and Olhyiu in dining on conserved provisions from the stores and huddling around a fire of driftwood. All were aware of Alan’s intention of setting out for the Tower of Bones at first light. This first exploration couldn’t possibly involve the entire army of Shee. It would have to be a much smaller expeditionary force. But just how far should they go before waiting for reinforcements?

Many thought the plan decidedly risky. Success or failure might be determined by whatever contingency they discovered on the ground. Neither would relent and so there was no agreement.

‘I will head out tomorrow,’ Alan insisted, ‘even if I have to do it on my own.’

‘There is no question of that,’ the Kyra countered. ‘Though it contradicts every grain of common sense, you will be protected. But I must insist that the bulk of Shee stand by at the ready to follow on at any time I deem it necessary, and certainly before there is any attempt at an attack on the Tower.’

‘And what,’ asked Qwenqwo, ‘if we find this plan to be impractical?’

‘If such proves to be the case, then our entire purpose here will be put at risk.’

Alan nodded, looking the Kyra in the eyes. ‘I’m sorry, Ainé. I know that everything you say makes perfect sense. But I know – I sense it so strongly that I haven’t any doubt about it – that Kate’s life is at stake.’

‘Our mission in these lands is not merely to defeat the Witch, but also to destroy the Tyrant of the Wastelands. What will become of that mission if the Mage Lord is lost on a fool’s errand even before we begin?’

‘Can we compromise on this? Have the army of Shee make ready to follow on, by all means. In fact it would make sense to make it obvious. We know that while they don’t make any move to attack us the Gargs are watching every move we make. If they realise the expeditionary force is small, they might decide to attack us long before we reach the Tower.’

The Kyra sighed, clearly unhappy. ‘I have the feeling,’ she declared, ‘that the Gargs refrain from attacking us because they know something that we do not. Let us hope we don’t pay a heavy price for an ill-prepared adventure.’ She climbed to her feet and, accompanied by an apprehensive looking Milish, departed the gathering.

Alan gazed over at Qwenqwo, catching the reflection of the flames in the eyes of his friend as the dwarf mage met his gaze, then shrugged his shoulders and settled
down to a drink with the elders, sharing their pipe tobacco and content to wait and see what the morning brought. There would be neither criticism nor hesitation from that indomitable quarter.

Alan’s attention was drawn by a glance from Mo, her eyes turning in the direction of the youthful shaman, Turkeya. She whispered, ‘He is desperate to go with you tomorrow. But Siam wants him to stay behind.’

Siam was just as apprehensive about the plan as the Kyra. It was easy to understand Siam’s concerns for his only son. Alan signalled to Turkeya and Mo to join him, heading off for a short walk along the shore. By now the moon was out, only a night or two off full, its silvery light glimmering on the cusps of the waves. Their ears were full of the hissing rapture of the surf against the black shingle.

Turkeya showed little interest in their surroundings. ‘The other boys would laugh at me when I was growing up. The son of Siam, yet it was obvious to everyone that I was never likely to become a warrior. I was too awkward and sensitive, better at hiding than fighting. But in my heart I recognised that I had no craving to kill things, even when hungry. I could survive without the dead rabbit or pigeon if it meant I could watch them at courtship, or at play. There was an ache in my heart that was answered by life, whether in the grasslands, or the forest – even the oceans.’

‘Warriors,’ Mo spoke softly, ‘aren’t always the answer, even in war. There are other things besides fighting.’

Turkeya lowered his head, his lips tight-pressed.

Alan nodded. He faced Turkeya, the two youths close to the same gangling height. ‘I guess that what Mo’s trying to say is that there’s more than one way of making a difference. My mom taught me that. You shouldn’t be ashamed to care about life. You have a natural empathy with the world. You and Mo – you’re alike in that way. Mo understands where you’re coming from.’

‘You think of me as my father does. You see Turkeya, the idiot, whose very sister laughed at how he would hide when danger threatened.’

Mo shook her head. ‘You have qualities more important than fighting. We have plenty of fighters. We have only one shaman.’

‘None respects me as shaman. They think I am too young, too clumsy.’

‘Oh, Turkeya, it was you who saved us from the gyre. Your people respect you,’ Mo insisted. ‘Siam is proud of you.’

Alan saw the disappointment in Turkeya’s eyes. He put his arm around his shoulders and directed the young shaman’s attention to a cluster of figures a short distance further along the shore. Turkeya recognised the Kyra among them, her stature recognisable even in the moonlight. She was on her knees in the volcanic grit, a smaller figure held between her hands.

‘What’s happening?’

‘The mother-sister is saying farewell to the daughter-sister.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘It’s their custom – the Kyra thinks she’s heading to her death. She is passing on her memories while she can.’

Turkeya’s eyes grew large and his head fell, as if only now did he truly understand the risks that Alan, and the expeditionary force, would face. But then, lifting his head again, he spoke softly, but insistently.

‘I’m still coming. And Mo will insist on coming too.’ Turkeya glanced at the girl, who nodded quietly. ‘Tell him, Mo.’

‘Turkeya is right – I sense it.’

‘What do you sense, Mo?’

‘That you will need us.’

Alan’s breath caught at the shriek from overhead. A Garg’s cry, from a spy circling overhead even in the dark! He thought about something the Kyra had said: that perhaps the Gargs held off from attacking them because they knew something that the company did now know.

Kate clenched her eyes shut against the mad rush of air yanking back her hair in a taut stream behind her face. Clinging for all she was worth to the dragon’s neck, at any moment she expected to hit the water in a heart-stopping plunge. But then the headlong descent slowed and, with a powerful flapping of wings, they landed with the lightness of a feather. Only now did Kate dare to open her eyes to discover that Driftwood was perched on a ledge of rock a few yards above the surf. The skin of her face felt raw from friction with the briny air.

‘Did you have to scare me half to death?’

‘Witch has spies. Must not discover here.’

Waves broke against jagged rocks close enough to splash her feet as she alighted from the dragon’s body, still trembling with fright. She had to brush the hair from her eyes to take a good look at her surroundings. What, she asked herself, was so special about here? Then she noticed a
narrow cleft in the rock, which led off the ledge into what appeared to be a cave. Kate bit her lips, squinting at the cleft. She edged closer, peering into the opening, but all she could see was darkness. Sniffing, she could smell nothing. She tried straining her ears as well but could hear nothing other than the sea breezes wailing like banshees through the rocks.