In the Earth Abides the Flame (20 page)

Phemanderac nodded enthusiastically. 'Aside from your last point, I think you're exactly right.

Unity is everything, unity is the key. How to achieve it in such a divided land as Faltha?' One look at the philosopher's face was enough to tell the question was rhetorical; the man from Dhauria thought he knew the answer and was working the Company into a position where they could see it also.

'Perhaps this saying of Phemanderac's is symbolic, and we are making the mistake of interpreting it literally.' Leith leaned

forward as he spoke. 'The Jugom Ark is symbolic of the unity Faltha needs, which will come from the Hand of God, originating in Firanes. Well, we've already spoken of unity, and we came from Firanes. Maybe we've already done all that is required of us, and things are going wrong because we remain where we are no longer needed.'

Leith could see the others considering this for a moment, then Phemanderac shook his head.

'Plausible, but not in the nature of riddles. They are intended to be interpreted literally, if their code can be broken. The objects they mention are specific objects, their places are specific places, their people specific people, and so on.

'Let me add some more information. Buried in the Archives of Instruere are five ancient books, counterparts to five found in my homeland, and originating from there.' He reached into a pocket, and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. 'In one of those books I found a further riddle, which I've copied:

Shaft of steel shot through with strength, Burning will of Mighty Name, Rod to rule o'er all rebellion, Making nations whole again.

Hidden from rebellious hands, Free from every fleshly claim, Through the air, over water, In the earth abides the flame.

'The riddle is about the Jugom Ark, the shaft of steel; its function is emphasised, that of bringing unity; and it is now hidden in a specific location, the clue to which suggests we need to go through air, over water and into the earth to find it. I am convinced of its existence.

Though I suspect it has no magical powers of its own, it has that most elusive of powers - the ability to command unity, to bring enemies together as allies, to rally nations under its banner.

If we could find this Arrow, we would be able to convince the Council, the kingdoms and the people to unite behind our cause.'

Phemanderac spoke quietly, urgently, and the shed was silent save for his pressing words.

'I spent many hours reading obscure journals and writings in the Archives, and learned more than I cared to know about the government of Instruere, the entrapment of merchants who used false weights and measures, and the mediation of boundary disputes. In amongst all this, though, I found a journal written by Bewray of the House of Saiwiz, one of the First Men and the founder of Nemohaim, the most mysterious of the Sixteen Kingdoms of Faltha. According to the Domaz Skreud Bewray was given charge of the Jugom Ark when Furist and Raupa both coveted and fought over the precious thing, and took it away southwards with him when the First Men divided into northern and southern factions. But exactly where? Did he take it to Nemohaim?

'The answer was buried in the pages penned by Bewray. He founded the capital now named after him but, according to his account, he never lived there. Instead he went inland, accompanied only by his family and bearing the Jugom Ark, following the valley of the Neume, determined to travel to Mulct and make his home there. However, he was ambushed by bandits, and his children were slain. He kept the Arrow from his captives, but was forced to flee further inland, and decided that it had to be placed beyond the reach of friend or foe.

Eventually, he made his way to the Almucantaran Mountains.'

'Kantara,' murmured the Haufuth. 'It couldn't be.'

'What?' Phemanderac spun around and grabbed the big man's arm. 'Where did you hear that name?'

'Kantara is no secret!' the Haufuth said, surprised by the philosopher's vehemence. 'Everyone knows about the legend of Kantara. It's a favourite tale of our children.' The others nodded in confirmation.

'What is this legend?'

Stella spoke. 'Kantara is a fantasy place, a place of peace, a castle surrounded by a quiet village and open fields, a place in heaven where good children go who die an untimely death.

Once in a hundred years Kantara comes to earth, coming down from the clouds, and then mothers and fathers can visit their children again. No one ages in Kantara, no one dies; but no one can find it, no matter how hard they look, except for a day and a night once every hundred years.' She sighed. 'As children we used to paint pictures of the castle of Kantara, wreathed in mist, nestled on the clouds, with children looking longingly from the battlements, searching the horizon for their fathers and their mothers.'

'So Kantara is no secret? The hiding place of the Jugom Ark a story for children?'

Phemanderac scratched his head. 'Perhaps that has proved the best disguise of all. Turned into a legend, people believe it doesn't exist.'

'Kantara is the hiding place?' Kurr inquired. 'Are you sure this again is not symbolic?'

'Having listened to this children's tale, I am sure that Bewray created this myth as a most effective hiding place. Your explanation of the Kantara story makes it even more likely that substance lies behind the myth.'

'Let us understand this correctly,' the blond-haired Hermit said. 'The journal of Bewray names Kantara as the resting place of the Jugom Ark, is that so?'

'Indeed,' Phemanderac replied.

'But does it tell us how to find this elusive place?'

'It does. Kantara lies at the head of the Vale of Neume, a great white castle on the slopes of Hawkshead, nestling between the Sentinella. According to his journal, Kantara is a real place.'

'The Sentinella?'

'Two great peaks, said to guard the Arrow,' said Phemanderac. 'Though how two mountains might guard anything I was not able to ascertain.'

The Hermit shrugged his shoulders. And where specifically in Kantara is the Arrow to be found?'

'1 have no idea; the journal does not say. For this we will have to rely on the riddle.'

'So you suggest that the next stage of our mission is to find the Jugom Ark?' Indrett asked quietly.

Phemanderac nodded. 'I don't think your endeavour is yet complete. You must find it, and with it unite all Faltha against the coming invasion. Why else was I brought across the deserts from Dhauria if not to aid you in this fashion? The kings, the Council, the people will listen when the Jugom Ark returns. They'll have to, the people will make them listen. At the very least, you must find it so that no others can make use of it for less lofty purposes.'

Outside the wind picked up, bringing rain with it to buffet the little shed.

'Are there others searching for the Arrow?' Kurr asked.

'Not that I am aware of,' the philosopher answered, 'though I expect your movements will be monitored, and you may find that others guess your purpose unless you cloak it with deepest secrecy.'

'There's an implication in your words I hope I do not misinterpret,' said Perdu. 'You encourage us to use the Jugom Ark to bring unity to Faltha. If I understood the conversation properly, you suggested the riddles say this task is reserved for the Right Hand. We've heard the Hermit speak of his inner voice, and he thinks one of us here in this room is the Right Hand. Are you really certain the Right Hand is to be found within the Company?'

Outside, the breeze had dropped; the morning was sultry, thick, heavy, building up perhaps to a storm in the afternoon. There was no noise apart from the patter of intermittent rain.

'I am,' Phemanderac stated finally. 'At least, I believe the Right Hand lies within the Company, but it is not a specific person. Let me explain.'

The previous evening, Phemanderac told them, he had fallen asleep by the fire in the basement, his veins pulsing with a thought sown into his mind earlier in the day. 'It has possibly been there for weeks, perhaps as far back as Adunlok, when I first heard Leith's story and his answers to my questions about the Right Hand. And it has taken me all this time to realise what was right under my nose from the start. How foolish one can be! How blind!'

The thought that had come to his mind that afternoon, the one which had continued to preoccupy him, had been this: a hand has five fingers. That was all. A hand has five fingers.

Then he thought about the Company, and those who originally set out from the Lowly Vale on the Cape of Fire: Leith, Hal, Stella, Kurr and the Haufuth ... a hand has five fingers ... and suddenly the Right Hand of the Most High was staring him in the face.

The Right Hand was not one person. It was this core group of the Company, a group whose destinies were intertwined in some special way. A Hand made up of five fingers, each weak on its own, but together able to take a powerful grip on Faltha and set her to rights.

He tried to dismiss the thought, challenging it in a hundred ways. What about Mahnum and Indrett? They were also from Louka. They were but the foil that drew the Right Hand out of hiding, the prize that taught the Hand to cooperate, to close around its quarry. What had the Company achieved? Nothing except that which had been done through the Right Hand.

Surviving the Roofed Road had been through Stella of the Hand. The healing of the Hermit: the Haufuth of the Hand. The defeat of the Bhrudwan warriors: Kurr's plan. Stella brought down a Lord of Fear with a stone. Leith delivered the final blow. How many people could claim to have slain one of the Lords of Fear? Kurr and the Haufuth led the Company. Had he, Phemanderac, really rescued Leith from the Widuz fortress, or had it been the other way around? The philosopher was no longer sure. One thing was certain: their common adventures were forging the Loulean peasants into a formidable weapon. There could be little doubt.

They were the Right Hand of the Most High.

For Leith the morning was taking on a dreamlike quality. He was tired, desperately tired, and weary of spirit. After the night in The Pinion, and the flight from the tenement, what he really wanted to do was sleep. The air was so close in the wooden shed, stifling the members of the Company, and Leith noticed others -Mahnum, Kurr, Perdu, the Haufuth - struggling to keep their heavy-lidded eyes open. Leith could not believe this 'Right Hand', this supposedly mighty warrior, would be found in their ragged band of villagers. The Bhrudwan, perhaps; but he was not the greatest of warriors even in his own land. How could Achtal hope on his own to vanquish the brown horde to come? Stab them all to death with the Arrow?

Now Phemanderac moved on to tell them of the Five Books he had discovered in the Archives of Instruere. He explained his theory that each book contained a personality, an aspect of the Right Hand. The Sun book, full of fair songs of hope, he matched with Stella.

The bittersweet nature of the Mariswan book, containing the 'Song of Losian', gave him some pause; but eventually he read the personality of Leith in its pages. The Book of the Clasped Hands, with its blunt statements and sweeping summations, instantly reminded him of Kurr, without doubt. His personal favourite, the Golden Arrow book, carried within it many of the observations on life he had heard in the last few days from the lips of the Haufuth. Its laws were tempered with the kind of love Phemanderac had seen the big headman show. And the Book of the Wave, containing a treatise on appropriate government, exemplified by the righteous judgment executed on the Vale, was one he wished he could show to Hal. Five books, five fingers, one Hand.

Could it be? Was the world of ancient prophecies relevant to this small group of people hiding in a smelly storage shed? At what point had they walked out of their sensible, predictable world? If they could defeat Bhrudwo's elite and recapture Mahnum and Indrett, then perhaps

... if only they weren't all so tired ...

Foilzie returned just before noon to find the shed silent. For a brief moment she feared the worst. Tugging the door open in haste, she found the Company sprawled over the sheepskins, the soft-woven rugs and the sacks of cotton, all fast asleep. The old woman beckoned to the tall bald man beside her; they entered the shed, and closed the door behind them.

A lowering iron-grey sky hung threateningly behind the Bhrudwan army as it was put through its paces. The nervousness was palpable. From the most recent callow conscript to the general, a grizzled old man with blackened skin and steel for muscles, every member of the largest army ever assembled felt fear at the presence of their master. Like a living organism it moved back and forth across the sandblasted valley, not faltering for a moment when the flash of lightning and rumble of thunder gave way to a stinging, slashing rain; shedding a few soldiers here and there like flakes of dead skin, but completing drill after drill with a dreadful precision that struck awe into the small knot of observers on a rocky knoll. And in their midst a tall, black-draped figure exulted, raising first one arm, then both to the sky, as though drawing down elemental forces to his aid. Though the general knew it must be coincidence, he was almost ready to believe his master directed the storm, and he knew his army would so believe. Thus the legend would grow, giving courage to the fainthearted, inciting fearful respect in the ranks. Such fear, such courage would be needed to harness so vast, so diverse an army. The last drill concluded, the last shout echoed, the rain ceased as though shut off by a valve. The black figure stepped forward, held his sword high in his only hand, and a harsh cry of triumph swirled in the sultry sky. The trials were over. The invasion was about to begin.

'THESE ARE THE ONES,' Foilzie said softly.

'These?' the man said, puzzled. 'How could ones such as these ...'

'What were you expecting? Unshaven, armour-girded warriors, swearing and cursing, fighting their enemies even as they sleep? These dear ones are doing things impossible for those of great strength. The stronger and more famous they become, the less suited they will be for their mission.'

'So it is our job to . ..'