The Curse on the Chosen (The Song of the Tears Book 2) (69 page)

The Whelm moved to stop them but the Numinator raised her
free hand. ‘The prisoners may go,’ she said with a fixed smile. ‘Why should I
feed useless mouths? You, too, Flydd and Yggur. The lot of you may go,
save Maelys
.’

‘If I have to stay,’ gasped Maelys, finding it hard to
breathe, ‘at least give me something in return – to help them fight the
God-Emperor.’

The Numinator frowned, then nodded. ‘Everything has a price,
even you. Beg your boon, and if it’s within my power I will provide it.’

‘Tell them where to look for the antithesis to Jal-Nish’s
Profane Tears.’

‘You asked me that before,’ said the Numinator. ‘I do not
know, though … all knowledge collected by the God-Emperor’s spies passes
through Gatherer. Look within the tears.’

‘Thanks!’ Maelys muttered. They’d come all this way and lost
so much, for nothing. Perhaps the antithesis did not exist, and there would be
nothing with which to fight the God-Emperor.

The Numinator inclined her head, as if Maelys’s thanks had
been genuine. She wasn’t looking at her, though. She was staring at Yalkara,
defying her enemy to take her on.

Yalkara stood with her arms folded across her breast,
waiting, but for what?

The Numinator sniffed the air and looked around sharply.
‘What’s that in your hand, Flydd?’

‘A little focus, to help me create the portal,’ he said, too
hastily.

She raised the roiling flask. ‘You may be able to hold
ordinary chthonic fire, Flydd, but were I to smash this flask, its contents
would sear the flesh from your standing bones, then eat the bones as well.
Show me what’s in your hand
.’

He opened his hand to reveal the dirty little ball of wood.
‘It’s just a mimemule …’

‘Ahhh!’ sighed the Numinator, as if a precious secret had
been revealed. ‘But there is no such thing as just a mimemule. There is only
one
mimemule, and that is it.’

‘How can you tell?’ said Maelys.

‘It is the mimemule Faelamor brought to Santhenar from
Tallallame when she came here, thousands of years ago. I would know it
anywhere.’

Yalkara stepped forward and stood next to Maelys, studying
the dirty wooden ball. Maelys shrank away and Yalkara smiled grimly. The last
of the prisoners had passed through the portal now; it began making a soft
thrum-thrumming
. Colm, Chissmoul and
Flangers stood beside the entrance; the Whelm were arrayed in a semi-circle
behind the Numinator with the sorcerer Zofloc standing before them.

Yggur gestured. Flangers and Chissmoul jumped in, though
Colm remained to the side, fists clenched around the black hilt of a jag-sword.

‘
My
mimemule,’ he grated.
‘It was left to Karan, and after she murdered her family my branch of the clan
inherited all that remained. I am the sole heir; the mimemule is mine.’

‘I don’t care who lays claim to it,’ said the Numinator,
though there was a strange, feverish light in her eyes which hadn’t been there
before. ‘Hold it up so I can see.’

He did so and she stared at it for a full minute. ‘And
you’ve used it, what, seven times?’

‘Only three times,’ said Flydd. ‘Once to open the portal
from Dunnet, once down below, and now.’

‘I also used it,’ said Maelys, ‘when I killed the flappeter.
And you made our furs with it, Xervish.’

‘I read seven times,’ said the Numinator. ‘Five times
recently, and twice a long time ago.’

And Rulke’s virtual construct had also been used before,
Maelys remembered. By whom?

‘Where did you find it?’ said the Numinator.

‘In Faelamor’s treasure cave in Dunnet,’ said Flydd. ‘Just
as it is told in the
Tale of the Mirror
.’

The feverish light grew. The Numinator’s eyes reflected the
chthonic flame as though it burned inside her. What had the mimemule told her,
and why did it matter so much?

‘I spent ages in that cave during the Time of the Mirror,’
she said. ‘I know it well. Karan refused to claim her treasure and, despite the
perpetual illusion, the cave was soon looted. I went there after her death but
nothing remained.’

‘The mimemule wasn’t with the box that had contained the
treasures,’ said Maelys. ‘I found it buried in the dirt.’

‘Well, it wasn’t there when I came,’ said the Numinator. ‘I
dug up the floor of the cavern to make sure.’

‘Someone took the mimemule and later replaced it,’ said
Flydd. ‘So what?’

‘It is one of the most precious artefacts of all,’ said the
Numinator. ‘Why take it, then travel all that way to bring it back?’

Flydd shrugged. ‘To leave it for its rightful owner?’

‘Me!’ Colm hissed.

‘Go through, Colm,’ snarled Flydd.

Colm’s jaw knotted and for one terrible moment Maelys
thought he was going to cut Flydd down, then he whirled and jumped into the
portal.

‘I think I’ll take a little trip to Dunnet.’ The Numinator
held out her hand for the mimemule. ‘Come, Maelys.’ The flask of chthonic fire
shook ever so slightly; the Whelm were tense as wire.

‘Now, Flydd!’ Yalkara roared.

Her left arm snaked around Maelys’s waist, lifted her effortlessly
and threw her into the portal. As Yalkara dived after her, the wind tumbled
them away, head over heels.

The Numinator swung the flask at them but Flydd and Yggur
jumped in together. The portal began to close and she couldn’t get to it in
time. In furious silence she hurled the flask at the side wall of her eyrie,
where it burst, spraying distilled fire everywhere. She drew power from the
white fire, clapped her hands and vanished, and the Whelm with her.

As Maelys was fired along the portal, the Tower of a
Thousand Steps exploded into a million shards of chthonic-fire-riven ice which
were blasted up in a churning mushroom cloud. Fire-ice began to fall onto the
Island of Noom and the frozen surface of the Kara Agel.

And Maelys could tell that it was going to feed on the ice,
and grow and spread, until white fire had consumed every speck in the Antarctic
realm of Santhenar.

 
FORTY-NINE

Gi winced every time she looked at Nish, for his whole
face was swollen and the black bruising had spread up beneath both eyes and
halfway across his right cheek. He was squatting in the mud with his
commanders, Hoshi, Gi, Clech and Forzel, eating handfuls of raw, mouldy grain,
for Boobelar’s worst followers had fled in the night with all the good food. He
had about four hundred and fifty men left, of which a hundred were so ill with
dysentery that they could barely walk and certainly couldn’t fight.

They were eating the grain raw because they dared not light
a cooking fire this close to the pass, even if they could have made the
saturated wood burn. They still had a few haunches of meat but it was so foul
that eating it raw would have been a death sentence.

‘We’ve got food enough for one more meal,’ he said quietly,
‘but I’m not sure what to do. If Curr
has
betrayed us, attacking via Liver-Leech Pass will put us between the jaws of
Father’s pincers. Yet if we retreat, the enemy can surge down and sweep us off
the sides of the mountain. Whatever we do, it’s bound –’

‘Don’t say it,’ said Gi with an anxious glance at the
miserable troops, who were huddled further down the slope. ‘If you don’t say
it, it won’t have as much force. If we retreat, we’ve lost. But if we continue
the attack there’s a faint chance we might succeed, and … if I have to die, I’m
not going to die running away.’

Nish’s stomach churned from the worst breakfast he’d had
since escaping from his father’s prison; it fumed in his belly like quicklime.
Might they succeed? He thought it most unlikely, but Gi was right; attack was
their only hope. ‘Let’s put it to the vote, shall we?’

‘Let’s not,’ said Clech, the fisherman. He rubbed his
lantern jaw with fingers scarred from his fishing lines, and his gentle eyes
met Nish’s. ‘You’re our commander; we trust you. Give the order and we’ll
follow it, whatever it is.’

Nish didn’t think he had ever been that trusting, and he’d
known more bad commanders than good ones, yet his militia were fighting for
their country and their families, and nothing could better stiffen the backbone
and fortify the quaking heart. He hoped he wouldn’t betray their trust. No, he
told himself, I won’t, no matter what.

‘All right; we attack.’

He sent the ill troops down in a staggering line, sure that
he would never see any of them again. The able-bodied, all three hundred and forty-seven
of them, headed up the razor-edged roof of the world, crossed the ravine at a
natural rock arch and climbed along the left-hand ridge of a valley shaped like
a steeply tilted oval bowl, in the incessant, teeming rain. The rain was cool
at this height, which was a pleasant change. The humidity wasn’t as stifling
but his clothes still chafed with every movement. Above them towered the
ominous white-thorn peak, pointing to the heavens like a warning finger.

‘Are you sure this is only the wet season?’ Nish grumbled.
‘It feels like the
really wet
season
to me.’

‘When the really wet season gets here, you’ll know it,’ said
Forzel, rubbing at a mark on his hand. He always looked his best, and even here
his clothes appeared to have been freshly washed. ‘The rain beats down so hard
that it drives the hairs back into your skull and out your chin. In the really
wet season, even women and children have whiskers.’

Nish smiled; Forzel was always talking nonsense.

‘It’s a wonder The Spine hasn’t washed away,’ said Hoshi.

‘The faster it falls down, the faster the stone giants in
the cracks of the world push it up again,’ said Forzel. ‘Careful where you sit
down; you might get a pointy rock right up the –’

‘What’s that?’ hissed Nish. He’d caught a faint flicker-flash
from the lower side of the bowl.

‘It’s the
turn back
signal,’ said Gi, sheltering her eyes from the rain.

‘It could be a trap,’ said Hoshi.

‘Anything could be a trap,’ said Nish, ‘but I’ve a feeling
this isn’t. We’re going down – this way.’

They descended a stony, moss-covered slope then crept into
the rainforest covering the floor of the valley, heading towards a small oval
clearing. He left the militia well above it and continued alone. The sodden
ground squelched with every movement, like a sponge made of peat.

At the upper side of the clearing he stopped, alert for a
trap. Nothing moved; nothing seemed suspicious, though an army could have been
hidden in the forest below him and he would never know it.

He took a deep breath, which hurt his broken nose
abominably, walked out into the open, and waited. Shortly a woman stopped at
the lower edge and stood with her arms folded, watching him. She seemed
familiar so he went closer. From a distance she could have been Tulitine’s
daughter, for she had the same tall, slender figure; rather more upright,
though, and much younger. Not yet fifty.

‘Who are you?’ Nish said as he approached, for the likeness
was uncanny. ‘Are you Tulitine’s daughter?’

She laughed, and it was like Tulitine’s laughter, too, though
lacking the hoarseness of the old woman’s voice. ‘My children are long dead. I
am Tulitine.’

Nish gaped. ‘It’s a very fine illusion.’

‘It’s no illusion. I used the Regression Spell to turn back
my age. Once it wears off I’ll pay dearly, but for the moment I’m forty-five
again – younger than you look, incidentally.’

Nish touched his swollen face. He had never heard of the
Regression Spell; nor had he been aware that Tulitine could use the mancer’s
Art. ‘How did you catch us?’

‘I used another charm, of unrelenting stamina. Because of my
heritage I see well in the dark –’

‘What heritage?’ Tulitine herself was an enigma enclosed
within a paradox.

She went on as though he hadn’t spoken. ‘I’ve walked day and
night for four days, without stopping. You must turn back, Nish. Whatever
happened to your clearsight?’

‘It hasn’t been much in evidence since Vivimord took me to
Gendrigore, but it was never reliable.’

‘I’ve often wondered why your wits seemed so dull.’

Nish wasn’t offended. She’d always had an acid tongue but he
didn’t think she meant it. But then, maybe she did. And maybe she was right.

Tulitine lifted his scarred hand, studying the restored skin
there, which had grown steadily darker over the past weeks. ‘I didn’t notice
this when I dressed your hand a month ago.’

He explained about the cursed flame, and Vivimord’s blood
dripping onto his hand.

‘And you did that, even though Flydd tried to stop you?
You’re a fool punished by his folly. The blood formed a bond between you and
Vivimord, and with it he fashioned an enchantment that still dulls your wits,
even now he’s gone. I’m not sure I can remove it completely.’

Her cool fingers tapped a lengthy pattern on his brow; she
whispered something; he felt a sharp pain behind his eyes and the enchantment
faded. The pain of his broken nose also eased a little.

‘Who are you, Tulitine?’ he said as they climbed to the top
of the clearing, slipping on the wet grass. ‘Are you one of the great mages of
ancient times, hidden for centuries?’

She shook her head. ‘I was hidden for a long time, but for
my own protection.’

‘Who would want to harm you?’

‘We have more important things to talk about, Nish. I know a
spell or two, not because I have a great gift for the Art – I don’t
– but because I was taught by the best, for my protection. I’ve lived a
humble life, and I never wanted to excel at anything save healing. I had a
calling for that – it was my way of making good.’

It was an odd thing to say. ‘Why? Had you done something
terrible?’

‘Not I.’ They were at the top of the clearing now. She
preceded him into the gloom under the trees, then turned to face him. ‘And I
was greatly loved,’ she said as if in afterthought, ‘which was worth more to me
than a hundred lives of the mighty.’