Alchymist (54 page)

Nish
went to one knee and took the sword, which was unusually heavy for its size. 'I
don't know what words I'm supposed to say,' he said in a hoarse voice. 'Thank
you for arriving in time. And for the honour, surr. I hope I prove worthy of
it.'

The
honour is mine,' said Troist. 'Were there more like you. Cryl-Nish, we would
have won the war long ago. Rise up. Lieutenant Hlar. Salute your men.'

Nish
stood, saluted the general in the correct manner, with sword in hand, then
raised it high in the air and carved a salute, north and south, east and west,
to the soldiers he'd fought beside all day. And to the ones who had not
survived.

Letting
out a roar that hurt his ears, they began to chant, 'Cryl-Nish Hlar! Cryl-Nish
Hlar!' and beat their weapons on their shields, and did not stop until they had
roared themselves hoarse.

It
would have been the greatest day of Nish's life, had it not been for the
thought of all their dead. And his.

Later
that afternoon, Flydd drew Nish aside, questioning him about the fate of his
father, and how Jal-Nish had used the tears. When Nish had finished, the
scrutator said, 'We'd better ride up there.’

Nish
had been expecting that. Flydd would have to see for himself, and try to find
the tears, or discover what had happened to them.

'Now?'
Nish said.

'Later.
There are still too many lyrinx about. Get some sleep. We'll go in the night.'

Flydd
woke him at midnight. It was cloudy and drizzling as they mounted and headed
out, without a solitary guard. Flydd said it was better that way. They crossed
the ford and he led them carefully up the valley, with lengthy stops where he
sat his horse, sniffing the air and listening to the night.

'I
believe they've gone,' Flydd said. 'The enemy don't linger around battlefields
filled with their dead, and this one has cost them dear. Come on.'

It
was not far off dawn when they reached the cliff-bound upper end of Gumby
Marth, where the command area had been. They hunched under an overhang of
limestone, out of the wind, to await the light. It was cool enough for the
breeze to carry little taint. Nish hoped they would be well gone before the
heat of the day ripened the dead.

'You
must be feeling rather grim,' Flydd said.

'In
truth, I don't know what to feel. I'm glad Father's out of his misery, and I
suppose it's better this way, for everyone. He was an evil man, and becoming
more wicked everyday. Had he lived . . . And yet, despite all he did to me, he
was still my father and now I have none.'

'Its
a loss for any man. I still remember the day I heard the news about mine . . .'
Flydd sighed, rummaged in his saddlebags and brought out a large silver flask,
which he offered to Nish.

Nish
took a healthy swig and promptly choked. 'That's strong!' His eyes began to
water.

A
stiffener!' Flydd leaned back against the stone. 'It'll set your belly right
for the job.'

He
raised the flask to his lips but, despite his words, did not drink. It was just
growing light. The grey cliffs separated from the grey sky, the lower valley
from the horizon, the rocks from the dry grass. The brown earth from the humps
and mounds made by the dead.

Wisps
of fog hung in hollows and along the course of the streams. The scene was grey,
dank and utterly, utterly dismal. Nish wanted to weep. 'So many dead, and all
for the folly of one man, one scrutator. My father!'

It
took more than one man's folly to create this disaster,' Flydd. 'You might as
well ask how the Council came to have such power, yet lack the ability to use
it wisely? Or how they delegated it to such a flawed man?' 'Or gave it to one
so corrupt as Ghorr in the first place?' said Nish.

'He
was a good man once,' Flydd reflected, 'but too ambitious. When his time was
up, Ghorr couldn't let go, and perhaps it suited the power behind the Council—'

When
I mentioned that the other day, you put your fist in my mouth.'

Clankers
have ears, Nish. As I was saying, Ghorr refused to step down. He had the
statutes of the Council changed to allow permanent tenure and that, I believe,
was the first step on his path to corruption. The Council became unaccountable,
even to itself. Others followed Ghorr's path and, once they grew old, many took
the path of renewal, or rejuvenation — making their bodies young again. It's an
evil I've sworn never to undertake.

'Not
all survived it, but those who did soon had such power, such knowledge and
experience that no one could better them. Instead of working for the security
of the realm and the good of all, they became obsessed with maintaining control
over everything. Power became more important than winning the war — indeed, the
scrutators needed the war. It was their excuse to tighten the screws ever more,
and in our terror of the enemy we allowed them to do so. Once that happened,
Santhenar was on the road to ruin.

'It
was only recently that I realised where we'd gone wrong, but by then it was
much too late. The lyrinx had entrenched themselves and were outbreeding us.
The war was no longer winnable.'

'What?'
Nish leapt to his feet. 'You're joking.'

'I
wish I were. Short of some brilliant breakthrough, it's already been lost.
That's a secret that must never be revealed, Nish — the effect on morale would be
disastrous; yet another reason to keep everyone in the dark. But the more you
clamp down, the more people look for ways around it. Take your friend Mira, for
example.'

'You
know Mira?'

'I
know she communicates, by skeet, with a network of like-minded people all over
Lauralin.'

'Does
the Council see them as enemies?'

'No,
or they would have been eliminated by now, for all that they include many
important and powerful people. But they are watched, very carefully, and if
they make one wrong move it will be the end of them.'

'Not
Mira, surely,' said Nish. 'She's already lost a husband and all three sons to
the war.'

'She's
safe for the moment. The Council have finally realised that, in seeking to
control everything, they lost control of the war. Unfortunately, they're not
capable of doing anything about it.'

'Are
you saying that we're doomed? That we might as well give up?'

'there
are always things that can be done, if you have the wit and will for it, and
the arrival of the Aachim has changed the balance. We've a better chance than
we had before they came, but there's greater danger, and more uncertainty. I

know
only this: if we are to have any chance at all, this millstone of stinking
corruption, the Council of Scrutators, must be eradicated. Ah, here comes the
sun. Let's go.'

Hundreds
of scavenging beasts had come out of the hills, and they did not look up from
their grisly business as Nish and Flydd went by. Thus far they'd made little
impact on the dead; there were simply too many.

Nish
led Flydd to the former command area. He hardly needed to explain — the
evidence of Jal-Nish's folly was clear enough, in the cleanly truncated bodies
of the officers, the amputated limbs, the tents and even clankers shorn neatly
in two by that bladed disc of white light. Many of the bodies had been fed on
by the lyrinx, and since then by the scavengers that slunk around Nish and
Flydd in circles, not daring to take them on, but not planning to be driven
from their feast either.

'Here's
General Tham,' said Flydd. 'And Grism beside him. Both good men we'll find
impossible to replace.' The scrutator shook his head in incomprehension. 'Such
unbelievable stupidity. He destroyed the entire command structure of the army,
wiped them out in a second. Why did he assemble them all in one place? What can
he have hoped to achieve?'

'I
suppose he wanted to make a display of his cleverness,' said Nish, answering
the first question. 'Father was ever like that.’

Flydd
squatted by the war chests and began to pick up the coins. 'We'd better take this
back. Disaster or no, armies on the march burn gold and silver. Do you recall
where Jal-Nish's tent was?'

Nish
pointed up the hill and told Flydd what to look for.

There's
not much to be seen. I'll leave it to you, if you don't mind.' He did not want to
go near. Nish especially did not want to see that booted foot again. He busied
himself collecting the coins.

Flydd
walked around and around, holding his hands out parallel to the ground.
Stopping at the shredded tent, he pressed his palms against the surface of the
broken table, then squatted by the splinters of the box that had held the
tears. Picking up a splinter he ran his gnarled fingers up and down it,
sniffed, closed his eyes, spun around and tossed the splinter whirling into the
air. It fluttered to the ground. He picked it up, sighted each way along it,
then grunted.

'The
tears are gone,' he said over his shoulder.

They
were the last thing on Nish's mind, for he was quite preoccupied with his
memories. He poured a double handful of gold into the chest. 'Where?'

'I
can't tell, nor who took them, though my guess would be that lyrinx with the
golden crest. If so, they're safely across the sea by now, where even the
scrutators can't get them. Hello — what's this?'

He
picked up the bloodstained platinum mask. 'I'll take this with me.' He looked
around. 'You mentioned your father's boot and foot.'

Nish
felt ill just thinking about it. 'It was just over there, beyond the tent
poles. I should bury it.'

'It's
not here now. The scavengers—' Flydd looked around. 'Hoy!'

A
hyena-like creature had the booted foot in its mouth and was slinking up the
hill, ears lowered. Flydd bent, picked up a stone and threw it, awkwardly but
accurately, at the creeping beast, striking it in the ribs. The hyena let out a
howl and dropped the foot. Flydd ran after it but before he got there the hyena
took it up by the shank. It tossed its head and the boot went flying off.

Flydd
reached for another stone but the scavenger was off, creeping into the bushes
below the escarpment, and they saw no more of it. The scrutator retrieved the
boot, inspected it carefully and let it drop.

'It's
his, all right. The man is dead, the tears gone beyond our reach, and perhaps
it's better that way. It's hard to imagine the lyrinx doing any greater harm
with them than the scrutators would have.'

'They
matter, then?'

'Oh,
they matter. Why don't you sit down in the shade you look exhausted. I just
want to check again, to make sure.'

Flydd
collected a handful of splinters from the tears' box and began to pace up and
down, tossing them in the air one by one. 'Hello?' he said sharply.

Nish
looked up, too tired to be curious. 'What's the matter?'

'Eiryn
Muss has been here.'

'Does
that matter?'

The
other day I sent him posthaste to Gnulp, and this isn't on the way. Why did he
come here?'

Nish
didn't have the energy. He found a tree that fitted the shape of his back,
leaned against it and closed his eyes . ..

Flydd
said little on the way back, and Nish kept his silence, there was too much to
think about, not least his own future. The moment when Jal-Nish had forced
Nish's hands down into the tears had been a life-changing experience. Until
then he had been a prisoner of events, and preoccupied with himself. But on
touching the tears he'd had an insight into what the world would be like under
Jal-Nish, and it was not pretty. Now. Nish realised, he must begin to shape
events to his own ends, ends that were against everything the scrutators
represented. In that he stood alongside Flydd.

How
was he to do it? For all his heroism on the battlefield, Nish could not see
himself as a soldier. Even were he to rise high, he would spend his life
prosecuting the war. But this war he knew already, would not be won on the
field of battle. Xervish?' he said tentatively. 'What?' Flydd replied absently.
'What is it, Nish?' Nish looked down at his boots, not knowing how to put it.
'I know I've been a damn fool more often than not. I've done enough stupid
things to condemn me for a lifetime, and made some disastrous blunders . . ?

Indeed
you have,' said Flydd. There was a gleam in his eye and a hint of a smile on
his whiskery lips. 'I can't think when I last met such a callow, feckless fool
as you. I'm sure I never have.'

'But
. . , even so, I think I've displayed a few positive qualities as well—'

'I
dare say,' the scrutator said carelessly, 'though it doesn't do to dwell
overmuch on such things, lest you be thought big-headed.'

'What
I meant was—'

'If
you want something, lad, then spit it out. Name the reward you require and it
shall be yours. Is it coin, or high honour, or a brace of comely—?'

'I
want to serve you, surr,' Nish burst out.

'I
don't need a manservant. I may be decrepit but I'm still capable of wiping—'