Alchymist (35 page)

However,
when they had wandered more than forty leagues and seen not a soul, one day
Flydd began to fall behind. Around dusk, Nish turned to say something to him,
only to discover that the scrutator was just a dot on the horizon.

Nish
sat down to wait for him, but resting was too pleasant. There was no pain in
it. He drove himself back to the ailing figure.

'What's
the matter?'

'My
leg,' Flydd gritted. 'I can barely lift it.' In a few hours his left thigh had
swollen to twice the size of the right, and the wound had become an inflamed,
weeping sore.

The
dust cloud was moving in a south-westerly direction.

The
spyglass resolved it into a large column of soldiers, set to pass a league or
two north of him. He made signals with his coat until his eyes were raw, and
eventually a small group broke away from the column, heading in his direction.

Nish
watched the riders with a feeling of mounting terror. If the army belonged to
the scrutators they would torture him publicly, to serve as a lesson to others.
For malefactors in every profession or trade, an ironic and appropriate death
had been prescribed, and each victim's fate was subsequently written into the
Histories, so that all would know that justice had taken its merciless course.

Nish
could not forget poor Ky-Ara, the clanker operator who had gone mad with grief
at the loss of his machine. He had killed another operator then run renegade
with the man's clanker. Flydd had ordered the clanker dismantled before
Ky-Ara's eyes and every part of it fed into the furnaces. Ky-Ara had been
forced to destroy the controller hedron himself, but instead had called so much
power into the crystal that it had burned him from the inside out.

Nish
was used to death, in all its forms and horrible finality. He hoped he could
face his with dignity intact; he had to, though it would not redeem him. The
Histories would describe his folly and inglorious end for as long as they
endured. He would be a cautionary tale for the children of the next twenty
generations. The only consolation would be that he had done his best.

A
horseman trailing a blue banner galloped towards the foot of the hill. Three
others followed. Nish waved the coat and trudged down to meet them.

'Did
you put out the fire?' Flydd rasped as Nish passed by.

'It's
an army. I signalled them and riders will be here shortly.'

'If
you're wrong you won't have to worry about the scrutators. I'll kill you
myself!'

Nish
avoided Flydd's eye and kept going. At the base of the hill he stood on a
fallen tree trunk, waving as the soldier with the banner raced up. Nish vaguely
recognised the fellow, a pitch-black, good-looking man with a halo of frizzy
hair and a nose as hooked as a parrot's beak. What was the name? Tchlrrr, of course.
He'd accompanied Nish on that humiliating embassy from General Trout to the
Aachim Nish felt his face grow hot at the thought of it.

Tchlrrr
grounded his pole. Two soldiers trotted forward, followed by an officer in a
cockaded hat, and another pair of soldiers. The uniforms were familiar.

'Who
are you?' called the first soldier. 'Why did you signal us?'

Nish
took a deep breath. 'I'm Cryl-Nish Hlar. My travelling companion is Scrutator
Xervish Flydd, and he is sorely wounded. Without the service of a healer he may
die.'

'C-Cryl-Nish
Hlar!' stammered the officer in the middle. 'I've often w-wondered what
happened to you. Come down.'

Nish
practically fell off his rock. The officer was Prandie, one of the lieutenants
of General Troist. Nish had saved Troist's twin daughters, Liliwen and Meriwen,
from ruffians near Nilkerrand, a hundred and fifty leagues to the north, and
subsequently rescued them from a collapsing underground ruin. The army must be
Troist's, which meant that, for the moment, he was safe.

'Lieutenant
Prandie,' he said. 'I'm so very glad to see you.'

No
questions were asked. The soldiers rigged a litter between their horses to
convey a weak but querulous Flydd back to the main force. Nish rode behind
Tchlrrr, keeping well out of the scrutator's way, and within the hour they had
joined the column. Flydd was placed in a wagon pulled by one of the clankers,
and Troist's personal healer called to attend him. Healing was a mancer's Art
these days and had advanced rapidly during the war, so Nish had hopes that she
could save him.

Nish
was taken into another clanker, where he lay on the floor and tried to sleep,
though that was hardly possible with the bone-jarring shudder of the machine,
and the squeals, rattles and groans of its metal plates against each other.
Clankers lived up to their name. However, he did doze, to be shaken awake in
the late afternoon. Finding good water, the convoy had stopped for the night.

'General
Troist wishes to see you, surr,' said an aide.

Nish
got out the rear hatch and looked around, rubbing his eyes and feeling more
than a little anxious. Shortly General Troist appeared, a stocky, capable man.
His sandy curls were longer than before, and tousled as though he'd been
running his hands through them all day. His blue eyes were bloodshot, his
uniform the worse for wear, but the soldiers saluted him smartly. Troist drove
his troops hard, but not as hard as himself, and he took care of the least of
his men before attending to his own needs. They loved him for it.

'It's
good to see you again, Cryl-Nish,' Troist said. 'Come this way.'

Nish
followed, sweating. True, he had saved Troist and Yara's daughters, twice, but
there had also been that unpleasant scene at Morgadis with Yara's sister. Mira,
and the fiasco of his embassy to the Aachim camp. Every success was matched by
a failure. And no doubt Troist already knew of Flydd's fall, if not Nish's own.

They
went up the line to Troist's command clanker, a great twelve-legged mechanical
monstrosity the size of a small house, with a catapult and two javelards
mounted on the shooter's platform. Nish had never seen one like it. Troist
offered him a seat, an oval of slotted metal with an embroidered cover
depicting a vase of bluebells, cheerfully but amateurishly sewn. The work of
his daughters, no doubt. Troist was a methodical general, but a sentimental
father.

'What
are you doing here, Cryl-Nish?' Troist asked, holding out a leather flask of
ale.

Nish
took a careful sip, not sure what to say. The general knew his duty and, if
that required him to give Nish up, he must do so whatever his personal
feelings. I was sure you'd know all about it,' he said obliquely.

Troist
frowned. 'Know what? Tell me straight, Cryl-Nish, I don't have time for
foolery.'

So he
hadn't heard. Nish saw a chance to save himself, and Flydd, if he could just
put things the right way. 'The great battle at Snizort, weeks ago.'

'I
knew there was going to be one, but I've not heard how it went. There's been no
news from the south in a month, so I brought my army this way to find out.'

'No
news at all?' said Nish. The scrutators prided themselves on their
communications; it enabled them to control the world.

'The
lyrinx locate our messengers from the air. They've also worked out how to track
our skeets and kill them. It's next to impossible to get messages through to
garrisons along the Sea of Thurkad. Were you at the battle for Snizort?'

'Yes,'
said Nish, 'though not as a soldier. I was held prisoner bv Vithis the Aachim.'

'You
two have come a long way on foot, with such injuries.' He was studying Nish as
if he suspected something had gone unsaid.

Nish
wasn't sure how to proceed. If the general discovered what had really happened,
he might clap Nish in the brig and deliver him up to the scrutators. But if
Nish lied . ..

He
took a deep breath. 'I must be completely honest with you, surr, no matter what
it may cost me. The Snizort node exploded, destroying the field, and after that
the battle went terribly wrong, for neither our clankers nor the Aachim's
constructs could move.'

'I
knew something was amiss,' said Troist, rubbing his lower belly, for he
suffered with his bowels. 'Tell me all that has happened.'

Nish
related the tale of the desperate battle at Snizort, the failure of the node
and the consequent slaughter, the scrutators saving what remained of the army
with their airborne mirrors, the underground fire and the abandonment of
Snizort by the lyrinx. He hesitated, then told the rest, including Flydd's
slavery and his own condemnation by his father, the escape, his folly which had
caused the death of Mylii and the loss of Ullii, and his father's mad quest to
attack the lyrirrx. 'That's all, surr; he said finally, 'save for a secret to
do with the node—'

'I
don't want to know any mancers' secrets, lad,' said the general. 'Go on.'

'I've
been condemned by my own father, surr, and Scrutator Flydd by the entire
Council. We fled for our lives, and now you have us . . .' Nish could think of
no defence, nothing at all. 'You must send me back in chains, I suppose.'

'I have
no orders concerning you, Cryl-Nish, and must rely on my judgment. In the past
you served me well. I haven't forgotten that.'

Nish
blushed to think of his flight from Mira's house with his trousers about his
ankles. 'But there was an incident at Morgadis . . .'

'A
misunderstanding on your part, Mira tells me. She was mortified that you fled
her home in terror of your life, but I'll leave her to explain when next you
meet. She's suffered terribly, my wife's sister, and can be emotional.. 'He
grimaced. To Troist, such feelings were a private business. To matters that do
concern me. You say that the surviving army is being led into greater peril.’

'My
father, Jal-Nish ... I don't know how to say it, General Troist, but his
injuries have transformed him. He's a bitter man, full of hate and rage. He
even condemned me—'

'You
told me already.' Troist turned away, his mouth hooked down. 'How any father
could do that to a son — the man is surely a monster. And you say Ghorr
required it of Jal-Nish, to prove his worth? How can that be? Duty is
everything to me, yet such deeds shake my faith in our leaders.'

'After
the battle, the lyrinx withdrew south-west from Snizort, towards the Sea of
Thurkad/ said Nish. 'My father plans to hunt them down, once he's dragged our clankers
to the nearest field, and surely he's done that by now.'

'Where
would that be?' Unrolling a canvas chart, Troist spread it on a table.

Nish
heard shouting outside, then the rear hatch was jerked up and Flydd appeared in
the opening, swaying on his feet. His face was grey-green, his lips blue and he
was clearly in great pain. It had not improved his temper. A young woman in a
healer's cap clutched at his arm but he pushed her away.

'I'm
Scrutator Xervish Flydd!' he rapped. 'You are General Troist?'

'I
am,' said Troist, leaping to the hatch. Are you sure you're—'

'Surr,
I implore you,' cried the healer, tugging at Flydd's sleeve. He fixed her with
a glare of such ferocity that she drew back, twisting her fingers together.
'This is most unwise. You risk—'

'You've
done your work, now leave me be!' snapped Flydd. 'The fate of the world hangs
upon my stopping Jal-Nish. Your coming is timely, General Troist.' He tried to
pull himself up but let out a gasp and fell against the sill of the hatch.

Troist
and the healer lifted him in and guided him to a seat. Behind Flydd's back
Troist beckoned the healer, a sturdy young woman in her mid-twenties, blonde of
hair and blue of eye, with worry lines etched across a broad forehead. She sat
in the shadows, looking troubled.

'You
didn't think so a few hours ago,' Nish said quietly.

'And
I'll make you suffer for disobeying my order,' Flydd snapped. 'Out of the way,
boy! The men have work to do.'

Nish
moved back next to the healer, feeling empty inside.

'I
value Cryl-Nish Hlar's counsel, surr' Troist said evenly. 'He has served me
well on more than one occasion.'

'And
failed you disastrously on others, no doubt,' said the scrutator curtly. 'To
business.'

'If
you would take the rear seat for the moment, surr,' said Troist. 'Cryl-Nih was
briefing me on the situation at Snizort and I value his account.'

Nish
sat up, astonished. It was unheard of for anyone, even a general, to defy a
scrutator. Of course, Flydd was now ex-scrutator, but it would be prudent to
avoid offending him. What kind of a man was Troist, to stand up for someone who
was of no further benefit to him?

'More
than you fear the just wrath of the scrutators?' Flydd said menacingly. He was
unused to defiance and did not like it.

'I do
fear the just wrath of the scrutators, surr/ said Troist, 'as any sane man
would. I even fear the wrath of those who are no longer scrutators, should I
meet one of them.' His eyes held Flydd's and, though Flydd played the game of
staring him down the general did not look away.