Witch king, p.29
Witch King, page 29
Ramad let out his breath, visibly regaining control of himself. He said quietly, “You either trust me or you don’t, Kai.”
It was Kai’s turn to snap. “Do you want the answer to that right now? Ow, Dahin, what are you doing?”
Dahin was trying to force something like a spiky cuff around his ear. “This way we’ll be able to hear each other if you need help.” He held up a lump of what looked like clay. “And you need to stick this in your nose. Try not to swallow any of the water. It has odd properties, like preserving the corpses. And it’s also full of things like olive and nut oil and animal fat, from the lamps and kitchens and things.”
“It isn’t about trust, Ramad.” Ziede took up the argument while Kai was distracted, in a voice that made it clear this was her final answer. She accepted another ear cuff from Dahin, with a wince of disgust. “It’s not possible. It will be difficult enough with just me and Kai.”
Trying not to look at the water, Kai got the ear cuff into position, wincing as the spike was apparently supposed to jab into the back of his ear. The air device on his chest was oddly heavy for its size and pulling on his neck. “Why does everything Immortal Blessed have to hurt?”
“I ask myself that all the time.” Dahin adjusted the chest thing and did something to the mesh part that made it glow a little brighter. “That will help you see once you’re in the water. Just press here to adjust it, and here to control the weight, when you want to go down, or come back up to the surface. Ziede can use this light.” He handed her a flat disk with a crystal inset. He stepped back. “You’d better go. Are you both ready?”
In answer, Ziede spun air into a dome, a miniature whirlwind that pulled at her tunic and pants. The wind-devils couldn’t go underwater, but she could contain the well of air around her for a limited time.
Kai looked past her to Ramad, who said, “I apologize. Just … take care.”
Kai wanted to be exasperated, but somehow he wasn’t. “It’ll be fine,” he said. Before he could think too hard about what he was about to do, he shoved the clay up his nose and stepped off the roof.
He plunged into the cold water and managed not to gasp in a mouthful. He pressed the part of the chest device that controlled the weight, and it pulled him gently downward.
The water darkened until it was broken only by the Immortal Blessed lamp. Panic bubbled up and he suppressed the urge to rip the straps off; down was the way he needed to go, the device was only doing what he had told it to. His lungs seemed to have air in them though he wasn’t breathing; it was very different from just holding his breath. He was very glad for the clay in his nose because the slimy sense of the water against his lips and skin was bad enough.
Ziede drifted down beside him until her bubble of air bumped against the dark shape of a balustrade. The hand light Dahin had given her glowed and her clothes swirled like she was caught in a miniature storm. Kai managed to move his arms in a way that pulled him through the water to give her room.
Through the pearl, and a heartbeat later in a whisper from the ear cuff, Ziede said, We didn’t account for Kai’s nonexistent ability to swim.
Hah, all we need to do is walk. Kai half bent, half curved downward, to direct his chest lamp toward the bottom. He and Ziede were still sinking, glimpses of their surroundings caught in the edge of the shaft of light: drifts of weedy moss, a piece of another balustrade, a giant clawed hand that turned out to be a petrified tree. They should be dropping to an open court but he couldn’t see the bottom yet.
In his ear, Dahin whispered, “Kai, are you sleeping with that man? I can count the number of times Bashasa spoke to you that sharply on the fingers of one hand. If half of them were missing.”
That wasn’t true. Kai and Bashasa had argued, just not where anyone else could see. Bashasa had had a keen awareness of Kai’s often uncertain position among the Arike and the Rising World alliance, and he had done nothing to make it more difficult. To some Kai had been the link to the Witches who were so vital to defeating the Hierarchs. To others, just a weird and particularly dangerous hanger-on. Kai guessed the spiky thing would act like a pearl and thought toward Dahin, Are you saying this where he can hear you?
“No, of course not. These work mind to mind.” Dahin’s voice changed from a whisper to a loud echo, like he was shouting into a bone funnel. “Is everything all right so far? Good.” Back in the soft whisper, he added, “That was me talking aloud. I don’t want him to know how this really works. Anyway—”
Ziede interrupted, We can sort this later, when we’re not so concerned with drowning.
Kai saw a solid mass below and stuck his arms out to slow his downward motion. The paving of the court was covered in something discolored and oozy that looked nothing like creek or riverbed mud. As he landed, it drifted up around his bare feet in a low cloud. Ziede’s bubble drifted to a halt just above the disturbed surface. So here we are again, she said wryly.
Kai’s memory of how easy it was to get lost in here was only too vivid. And that had been in daylight, when he could actually see past a narrow band of Immortal Blessed light. With the wall at their back, he at least knew which direction to start in.
Ziede moved ahead into the court. It’s this way. I think.
Kai followed her. She had spent far more time in this maze of courts and corridors than he had. He would like to banish the whole time from his memory, except that this was where he had met them all. Ziede, Tahren, Dahin, Salatel and Arsha and Telare, Nirana, Hartel, Cerala. Bashasa.
I don’t want to be here, it hurts too much, he thought, and felt a thread of sympathy from Ziede. Dahin, picking up something from the ear device, said, “Are you all right?”
Still fine, Kai told him. Just memories.
Despite trying to move carefully, they stirred up mud and filth from the buried paving. In the cloud of muck, Kai didn’t see the archway out of the court until Ziede made an “oof” noise as her bubble bumped into the wall. She turned, caught in his light, her tunic and the ends of her scarf drifting a little, buoyed by the air around her. She found the opening and they swam and floated through, then lost what little light made it down from the surface of the murky water. It was much colder now and Kai was glad they hadn’t let Ramad come; it was bad enough for him and Ziede but a mortal wouldn’t have lasted long, and might have been made ill even from limited exposure to whatever was in this foul oily soup.
Even with Dahin’s Immortal Blessed devices, Kai would never have managed this without Ziede. Her memory of this place was obviously clearer than his, but then she had spent more time here, risked everything to be here, helping Bashasa plan. He concentrated on following her, his light catching walls, wide doorways, broad windows. Well under the weed mat now, the dark outside the range of their lights was absolute. At the least the water was so poisonous it wasn’t full of snakes or gar. “Still there?” Dahin said in his ear, with the echo in his voice that told Kai he was speaking aloud. “Everything all right?”
It’s fine, Kai replied. If you like dark and hostile.
Ziede added, It’s not that much worse than when we were here the first time.
“It’s funny because I know you’re not joking,” Dahin replied.
Then something about the water changed. Kai wasn’t sure if it was something audible, or a sensation through his wet clothes and frozen skin. He turned, sweeping his light around, and realized the wall they had been following was gone. Then he caught sight of something dark and skeletal—Another dead tree, preserved in the water like a bug in resin. Then another, and another. They were in the open court close to the entrance to Bashasa’s hostage quarters.
Kai, don’t fall behind, Ziede said. We’re almost there.
They passed through two archways and then finally into an enclosed corridor. It didn’t get any lighter when they came out into a larger space. Kai’s lamp shone on a fountain, the outlines of what had been planting beds, a familiar doorway. The scene was coming back to him, the phantom shapes buried under the rot resolving into the place he remembered. This was the open fountain court where Kai had killed Cantenios. Ziede, you’re brilliant. I couldn’t have found the way here.
I’m surprised I remembered it so well, she admitted, floating above the fountain. I thought I’d done such a good job of banishing the whole thing from my mind.
Kai made his way to the fountain. His body was about here. Desiccated when Kai drained his life, held down by heavy fabric and leather and metal ornaments, he didn’t think it would have floated or drifted far. He moved cautiously, leaning down toward the ground. This made his feet lift up so his whole body was tilting down. The weight thing built into the Immortal Blessed breathing device seemed to center on his midsection. It was strange and awkward but let him reach the ground with his hands without his feet disturbing the thick layer covering the paving stones.
He felt carefully along through the slimy muck, until he found something that felt lumpy, like bones buried under mud. Exactly like bones buried under mud. Even moving so slowly, a cloud of debris rose up toward his face. He spread his hands, searching for the finding stone by feel. Bones emerged from the mud, metal ornaments, a wrist cuff, a jeweled pin for a veil. He moved further out, circling all around the body.
Dahin’s voice said sharply, “Kai, remember to breathe. The device won’t work if you don’t breathe.”
It’s not here. Kai’s heart sank all the way down into the murk. I can’t find it.
Ziede’s voice was calm in a way she only sounded when something was going horribly wrong. He would have dropped it, wouldn’t he? If he was holding it in his hand.
In the background, in that odd echo, Kai heard Dahin say to Ramad, “They can’t find it.”
Kai circled further out from Cantenios’ body, kneading his way through the mud. Ziede crouched on the bottom of her bubble, as close to the ground as she could get, directing her light on his hands. He didn’t throw it, Kai muttered in frustration. Could someone have taken it?
“The water might have moved it when it flowed into the court,” Dahin said. “Or … one of us, one of the Arike might have accidentally kicked it. I remember being terrified and everyone running around like we were all on fire.”
He was right. Kai swallowed past the taste of foul mud in his throat. We’ll have to search the court, the fountain, maybe the adjoining rooms. If it wasn’t nearby, there was no way they would have enough air.
They were so close to having what they needed to find Tahren. It was maddening for Kai and had to be worse for Ziede. But she kept her calm expression, her brow furrowed as she thought it over. I have an idea, she said. We need to clear the muck off the paving.
Can you do that and keep your air bubble? Kai asked her. He was intensely aware of the heavy mat above their heads. If Ziede started to drown, sheer terror might give him enough power for an intention to drive a hole through it to the surface, but he would just rather not have to.
Hmm, no, unfortunately. Sitting on her heels, Ziede floated in her bubble, one finger pressed to her lip, dark eyes narrowed in consideration.
Dahin added, “I don’t have anything to do that. All the work I’ve been doing is on the wall, and it’s better to remove the residue in small patches.”
Ziede nodded to herself. If I go back to the surface, I could make a wind violent enough to move the water under the weed mat and stir all this up. You’d just need to keep the mud up away from the floor.
Kai started to chew on his lower lip in thought and remembered at the last moment to keep his mouth tightly shut. It would have to be an intention; it was impossible to draw a cantrip down here under water. And everything was tainted by the influence of the Hierarchs’ Well, and the residue from the water intention that Kai had misused to cause the flood. Whatever he did, it would have to be a pure intention. Something not much different from the push he had been thinking of to break a hole through the mat. We’ll try it, he said.
I’ll go up, she told him. Just be careful. Once you find it, if you’re not sure of the way out, I’ll come back and get you.
I’ll be fine, Kai told her. Hurry, so we can get this over with. Ziede turned in her bubble and glided out, moving faster now that she was certain of the way.
Through the echoing earpiece, Dahin was explaining the plan to Ramad. Kai let his feet rest on the fountain rim and prepared the intention, assembling a design that would use the water motion Ziede would provide to lift the muck gently upward.
Through her pearl, he felt the moment of relief when Ziede got past the mat and was able to surface. “I can’t see you,” Dahin said.
I’m closer to the Temple Halls, Ziede reported. I need a little distance from the target.
Kai stopped listening to them, needing all his concentration to make the design as gentle as possible. If he got this wrong, it would make it impossible to see anything in here. Finally, he said, I’ve got it. Whenever you’re ready.
Ziede whispered, Now, Kai. The wind must have risen abruptly; he heard Dahin’s startled exclamation through the earpiece. “I forgot what that’s like,” Dahin commented.
The mud stirred right before Kai felt the current. The force of it shoved him back against the wall. The sediment and debris lifted up from the floor, flowing away into the open doorways or washing up and out over the high walls. More flowed in from the corridor entrance. Kai hadn’t eaten anyone’s life for days, and had no reserve of power. He was going to have to do this the hard way. He braced himself and opened his mouth.
Panic, a choking sensation, and a truly horrible taste gave him all the pain he needed for the intention. The muck and the force of flowing water froze in place, then pushed upward out of Kai’s light, toward the darkness overhead and the mat.
Kai had to swallow the mouthful of water. Wrestling his stomach for control was hard, but the hot flush of nausea passed. He bent all the way down and used his light to scan the now clear paving. Rechecking the places he had already searched, he went over the remains of the body, the rim and inside of the fountain, the nearest planting beds. He expanded his range, using the squares of the paving stones to keep track of his progress.
Then in the doorway on the west side, Kai’s light caught a mud-covered lump, trapped against the raised edge of the sill. He pounced, the weight of the water slowing the motion to a crawl, but his hand closed around the lump. He felt the shape of the obsidian disk under the grime. It was cold—colder than the water that had filled this dark cavern for so long. Dahin, Ziede, Kai said, relief making his heart pound. He had been so afraid they wouldn’t find it, that somehow it would be gone, so afraid of failing Ziede, losing Tahren. It’s here. I have it.
There was no answer. Kai went still, realizing how long it had been since one of them had spoken, and how odd, how uncharacteristic that they had both been so silent. He touched Ziede’s heart pearl.
No answer.
THE PAST: THE EXODUS
The Tescai-Lin of the Enalin is mistakenly thought of as a ruler, but the title translates roughly in Arike to “Great Sage.” The Tescai-Lin is a moral authority and advisor to the myriad holders of governance in the territories of Enalin, who are themselves chosen by acclaim. The Enalin are often long-lived, not unlike Witchkind, but are not immortal. Not much has been shared as to the selection of the Tescai-Lin, whether the person may be born to the position or chosen in some way. Howsomever, they are a figure of primary importance to the Enalin character.
—Journey Through the Lands of Enal and Old Nibet, by A Wandering Songseller
Kai hit the water back first and plunged under the surface. Thrashing, tangled in sharp branches, he realized he had blundered into a tree drowned by the flood. He kicked his way free and surfaced, coughing and sputtering.
The windows above gushed waterfalls. Kai managed to flail and paddle toward the far end, the gallery Dahin had swum to. The walkway was well under now, the water lapping the bottom of the windows. Kai climbed through one and dropped down into a broad corridor with a stream running along the floor. He shoved to his feet and started toward where he had left Ziede and Tahren, the direction he hoped Dahin had taken.
Shouting and the clash of weapons led him to the broad stairs where the legionaries had waited to attack Bashasa and the other hostages. At the bottom of the steps, the barred doors were knocked off their hinges and there was fighting in the big hall just beyond. It sounded as if it was moving away. Well, it’s a shortcut, Kai thought, and went down the stairs.
By the time he got down to the hall and started across, the fighting had shifted to another corridor. The stone-tiled floor was littered with legionary bodies and stained with blood and viscera, so he supposed things were going well. He went toward the court on the far side.
As soon as he stepped out into the wan daylight, strange mortals ran toward him, all dressed in light-colored caftans and robes, all armed with short spears. Kai backed toward the doorway and dropped into a defensive crouch. A sudden shout halted the attackers. A large person in blue-green and silver shouldered through and Kai recognized Tescai-Lin, the Enalin Light. In Imperial, they said, “Leave off. This is Bashasa’s demon.” The others backed away immediately. Tescai-Lin added, “I take it you were successful.”
Kai straightened up and shoved his dripping hair back. “The other Hierarch’s dead.” He untied the veil from his belt and dumped the head on the floor at Tescai-Lin’s feet.
For a long heartbeat, the Light just stared down at it, their expression blank except for a tightening around the mouth. The other Enalin leaned forward to see, their faces showing amazement, consternation, disbelief. Uncertain suddenly, Kai realized this head could be any random mortal killed in the palace. He should have brought more proof, somehow, though he had no idea what that would be. He said, “I don’t know how to prove it’s a Hierarch. I—”
“No, I recognize her.” Tescai-Lin’s voice was cold. “It’s the one that came to Water Mountain. You agree, cousin?”
