Rebellion: Tainted Realm: Book 2 (57 page)

“And now it is,” said Tali. “What’s the flaw in the defences?”

“Water.”

“I don’t understand.”

“We need water to drink, and cook with, and bathe in,” said Rezire, “but we can’t carry it up a thousand feet from the river.”

“How do you get it?

“Fans inside the top of the tower draw the misty gorge air in through slits in the stone. An array of condensers extract water from the air, and it’s piped down to tanks on each level of the spike.”

“Why is that a flaw?”

“An attack on the slits at the top of the tower could make its way all the way down the tower.”

“What kind of an attack?” said Tali.

“Remember how the gauntling attacked my boat after Lizue was killed?” said Holm.

Tali stared at him. “Fire?”

“Fire.”

“Can’t you block the slits?” said Tali.

“We could, if we had people stationed up there,” said Rezire. “But it takes an hour to do so…”

“And the gauntlings can attack in minutes,” said Holm, “if that’s their intention.”

“If you turn off the taps,” said Tali, “it’ll stop fire coming down the pipes.”

“However if the top level of Tirnan Twil should be set alight,” said Rezire, “burning books and embers will cascade down through the ladder holes. There’s no way to seal them.”

“Then you’ve got to stop the gauntlings.”

“I don’t know how.”

Tali tore at her hair. Could Rezire be that obtuse? But then, he was a man of learning. Battle and bloodshed wasn’t real life to him, as they had become to her. War was something he read about in dusty old books. She looked to Holm to take the lead but he waved a hand as if to say,
continue
.

“You have defensive magery, don’t you?” said Tali.

“We used to, devices of great power brought from ancestral Thanneron, but they failed long ago.”

“They failed?”

“The land fights back. Most of the old magery has failed. Everything fails in the end, even steel and stone…”

Rezire sounded resigned, accepting, and she could not comprehend it.

“Not Tirnan Twil!” said Tali. “Send men up to the tower top, armed with bows and spears.”

“What would they do?”

“Attack the gauntlings. Drive them away from the air slits.
Hurry!”

Rezire went to the ladder hole and shouted orders. Tali looked out the window at the circling gauntlings.

“Are they carrying riders?” said Holm.

“No.”

“So what are they doing here?”

“They could be just spying for Lyf.”

“Then why so many of them? One would be enough to shadow us here.”

“I’ve ordered my most reliable people up to the defences,” Rezire said dolefully, “but I fear it will do little good. Those attributes that make a good fighter are of little value in our work.”

“Then you’d better tell your people that they don’t have much time to escape – just in case it is an attack.”

“Tirnan Twil is our home, our hope, our life, our future.”

“If the gauntlings attack the air slits, some of your people may die.”

“Everyone dies, Lady Tali.”

“Not before their time.”

“If Tirnan Twil’s time has come, so has ours.”

He trudged off, bent-shouldered and flat-footed.

“You’ve been very quiet,” she said to Holm, who was looking up through the window.

“I’m wondering why the gauntlings are circling the tower. If they knew you were coming here – and presumably they’ve been spying on us from on high – why didn’t they try to capture you on the way?”

“And carry me to Lyf?” said Tali. “I don’t know.”

“Wait a minute,” said Holm, staring at her. “I don’t think they’re under Lyf’s command at all.”

“Why not?”

“He wouldn’t order them to attack this place with you inside. That would risk losing the master pearl.”

“Then who is commanding them?”

“No one,” he said grimly.

“I don’t understand.”

“We talked about gauntlings after Lizue was killed, if you recall. They’re troublesome, rebellious creatures, and Lyf would never send them out on attack without a rider to command them.”

“Well, what do
you
think is going on?”

Holm took another look. “I think they’ve turned renegade. I think they’re out for revenge because you killed Lizue and gravely injured her gauntling. They’re not attacking Tirnan Twil for itself – they’re trying to kill you.”

“Sounds a bit far fetched.”

“Gauntlings are vengeful, malicious and not entirely sane – madness is the bane of many kinds of shifters.”

Tali checked on the gauntlings. “They’re circling in towards the top of the spike. If they are planning to attack, it won’t be long. Should we go up and help?”

“By the time we haul ourselves up another eight hundred and fifty feet of ladders, any attack will be long over.”

“Then I’ve got to choose, right now – healing or destruction.”

Holm said nothing.

“If I use it for destruction, what will happen if I need to heal someone to save their life?”

“I suspect you won’t be able to heal anyone with magery, ever again.”

“I don’t know how to decide.”

“If you freeze because you’re afraid of the future, you’ll never make
any
choice. You’ve got to choose now.”

Tali had been through this before, before healing Holm’s skull. Her frantic gaze fell on the scars on his brow and nose. “If I do choose destructive magery, could it undo the healing magery I did on you?”

“Possibly.”

The gauntlings were using their little arms to heave barrels out of their panniers.

“They’re going to attack,” she said without turning around.

No answer. He had gone.

If she did not act, some of the people of Tirnan Twil were bound to die. She had to bring down the gauntlings, and if she could it would be a
great destruction
that would set the course of her gift forever.

Tali began to prepare for a magery greater than anything she had ever used before. She had to stop two dozen gauntlings and she only had minutes to do so – assuming that she could draw enough power, and focus it at such a distance. The way magery was failing everywhere, that was debatable.

But she was
the one
. This was what her gift was for and it was part of the great battle of the age. She reached deep, found power, then, in her mind’s eye, located each of the twenty-four gauntlings.

They were arcing out and around and back in towards the spike, the single vulnerable point of Tirnan Twil. Their paths resembled a flower with twenty-four perfect petals.

She was about to direct her power at the gauntling coming in from due south, intending to burn its wing mounts away and send it plunging two thousand feet to the base of the gorge, when the image in her inner eye blurred. Then, ever so slowly, it changed.

Tali was staring at a man’s face. A face that was familiar even though it was out of focus. A large, florid face. Shudders ran up her back and sweat dripped from the palms of her hands. She had seen that face in the Abysm, and the impossibly contorted body. Lyf had turned his greatest enemy to black opal and hurled his body into the Abysm. But the expression on the man’s face was different here. He wasn’t screaming in agony. He was roaring with rage.

The sweat froze on her palms. Her tongue filled her mouth and a weight on her shoulders was crushing her to the floor. Grandys was dead, turned to stone nearly two thousand years ago, so why did she keep seeing his image? Was it some kind of omen, like Rix’s painting that had divined the future?

Was she some ignorant peasant, fearfully reading the sky for omens? No, she was the Lady Thalalie and the fate of many rested on her making the right decision.

Grandys’ furious face vanished. Tali drew on her magery, focused it to a killing spell and checked out the window. But the sky was empty. She was looking up at the spike when flames burst out of dozens of slits near its tip, forming another beautiful red flower there, a deadly crimson one. She was too late. The gauntlings had attacked the tower’s weak point and fire was roaring out of the condenser slits.

And if Rezire’s people could not stop it from setting the top level alight, the embers would cascade down the ladders, level by level. Tirnan Twil had nothing to stop it coming all the way down.

“Can’t you block the slits?” said Tali.

“We could, if we had people stationed up there,” said Rezire. “But it takes an hour to do so…”

“And the gauntlings can attack in minutes,” said Holm, “if that’s their intention.”

“If you turn off the taps,” said Tali, “it’ll stop fire coming down the pipes.”

“However if the top level of Tirnan Twil should be set alight,” said Rezire, “burning books and embers will cascade down through the ladder holes. There’s no way to seal them.”

“Then you’ve got to stop the gauntlings.”

“I don’t know how.”

Tali tore at her hair. Could Rezire be that obtuse? But then, he was a man of learning. Battle and bloodshed wasn’t real life to him, as they had become to her. War was something he read about in dusty old books. She looked to Holm to take the lead but he waved a hand as if to say,
continue
.

“You have defensive magery, don’t you?” said Tali.

“We used to, devices of great power brought from ancestral Thanneron, but they failed long ago.”

“They failed?”

“The land fights back. Most of the old magery has failed. Everything fails in the end, even steel and stone…”

Rezire sounded resigned, accepting, and she could not comprehend it.

“Not Tirnan Twil!” said Tali. “Send men up to the tower top, armed with bows and spears.”

“What would they do?”

“Attack the gauntlings. Drive them away from the air slits.
Hurry!”

Rezire went to the ladder hole and shouted orders. Tali looked out the window at the circling gauntlings.

“Are they carrying riders?” said Holm.

“No.”

“So what are they doing here?”

“They could be just spying for Lyf.”

“Then why so many of them? One would be enough to shadow us here.”

“I’ve ordered my most reliable people up to the defences,” Rezire said dolefully, “but I fear it will do little good. Those attributes that make a good fighter are of little value in our work.”

“Then you’d better tell your people that they don’t have much time to escape – just in case it is an attack.”

“Tirnan Twil is our home, our hope, our life, our future.”

“If the gauntlings attack the air slits, some of your people may die.”

“Everyone dies, Lady Tali.”

“Not before their time.”

“If Tirnan Twil’s time has come, so has ours.”

He trudged off, bent-shouldered and flat-footed.

“You’ve been very quiet,” she said to Holm, who was looking up through the window.

“I’m wondering why the gauntlings are circling the tower. If they knew you were coming here – and presumably they’ve been spying on us from on high – why didn’t they try to capture you on the way?”

“And carry me to Lyf?” said Tali. “I don’t know.”

“Wait a minute,” said Holm, staring at her. “I don’t think they’re under Lyf’s command at all.”

“Why not?”

“He wouldn’t order them to attack this place with you inside. That would risk losing the master pearl.”

“Then who is commanding them?”

“No one,” he said grimly.

“I don’t understand.”

“We talked about gauntlings after Lizue was killed, if you recall. They’re troublesome, rebellious creatures, and Lyf would never send them out on attack without a rider to command them.”

“Well, what do
you
think is going on?”

Holm took another look. “I think they’ve turned renegade. I think they’re out for revenge because you killed Lizue and gravely injured her gauntling. They’re not attacking Tirnan Twil for itself – they’re trying to kill you.”

“Sounds a bit far fetched.”

“Gauntlings are vengeful, malicious and not entirely sane – madness is the bane of many kinds of shifters.”

Tali checked on the gauntlings. “They’re circling in towards the top of the spike. If they are planning to attack, it won’t be long. Should we go up and help?”

“By the time we haul ourselves up another eight hundred and fifty feet of ladders, any attack will be long over.”

“Then I’ve got to choose, right now – healing or destruction.”

Holm said nothing.

“If I use it for destruction, what will happen if I need to heal someone to save their life?”

“I suspect you won’t be able to heal anyone with magery, ever again.”

“I don’t know how to decide.”

“If you freeze because you’re afraid of the future, you’ll never make
any
choice. You’ve got to choose now.”

Tali had been through this before, before healing Holm’s skull. Her frantic gaze fell on the scars on his brow and nose. “If I do choose destructive magery, could it undo the healing magery I did on you?”

“Possibly.”

The gauntlings were using their little arms to heave barrels out of their panniers.

“They’re going to attack,” she said without turning around.

No answer. He had gone.

If she did not act, some of the people of Tirnan Twil were bound to die. She had to bring down the gauntlings, and if she could it would be a
great destruction
that would set the course of her gift forever.

Tali began to prepare for a magery greater than anything she had ever used before. She had to stop two dozen gauntlings and she only had minutes to do so – assuming that she could draw enough power, and focus it at such a distance. The way magery was failing everywhere, that was debatable.

But she was
the one
. This was what her gift was for and it was part of the great battle of the age. She reached deep, found power, then, in her mind’s eye, located each of the twenty-four gauntlings.

They were arcing out and around and back in towards the spike, the single vulnerable point of Tirnan Twil. Their paths resembled a flower with twenty-four perfect petals.

She was about to direct her power at the gauntling coming in from due south, intending to burn its wing mounts away and send it plunging two thousand feet to the base of the gorge, when the image in her inner eye blurred. Then, ever so slowly, it changed.

Tali was staring at a man’s face. A face that was familiar even though it was out of focus. A large, florid face. Shudders ran up her back and sweat dripped from the palms of her hands. She had seen that face in the Abysm, and the impossibly contorted body. Lyf had turned his greatest enemy to black opal and hurled his body into the Abysm. But the expression on the man’s face was different here. He wasn’t screaming in agony. He was roaring with rage.

The sweat froze on her palms. Her tongue filled her mouth and a weight on her shoulders was crushing her to the floor. Grandys was dead, turned to stone nearly two thousand years ago, so why did she keep seeing his image? Was it some kind of omen, like Rix’s painting that had divined the future?

Was she some ignorant peasant, fearfully reading the sky for omens? No, she was the Lady Thalalie and the fate of many rested on her making the right decision.

Grandys’ furious face vanished. Tali drew on her magery, focused it to a killing spell and checked out the window. But the sky was empty. She was looking up at the spike when flames burst out of dozens of slits near its tip, forming another beautiful red flower there, a deadly crimson one. She was too late. The gauntlings had attacked the tower’s weak point and fire was roaring out of the condenser slits.

And if Rezire’s people could not stop it from setting the top level alight, the embers would cascade down the ladders, level by level. Tirnan Twil had nothing to stop it coming all the way down.