The Lodestone Trilogy (Limited Edition) (The Lodestone Series) (100 page)

Shann wondered what pain it could be talking about. “What do you mean, ‘a way out?’”

Alondo waved a hand toward the end of the alley. Shann followed with her eye. What she had taken to be a dead end was in fact a fence in which there were two doors, set side by side.

“The left door is your way out,” Alondo explained. “It will take you straight back to the Dais. You will not become a bearer, but neither will you have to face your pain.”

Shann steeled herself. “What lies behind the other door?”

“Boxx says it is not permitted to tell you, exactly. However, if you enter the right-hand door, then three things will happen. You will meet a person you do not wish to meet. You will remember that which you would rather forget. And you will uncover a truth you would prefer not to have known.”

“What does all of that mean?” Shann asked.

“Boxx says it cannot say any more. Even by revealing this much, it is…bending the rules to the breaking point.”

Shann rolled the three “clues” around in her head. They were cryptic, but to be honest, they didn’t really sound that bad. Not when you considered what the others must have gone through. Alondo and Patris suffering from borderline exhaustion–Rael with his ruined tunic and stunned expression–Keris with her multiple injuries; they each looked as if they had come through a battle of some sort. By contrast, the experiences Alondo was describing did not seem to go much beyond harsh words. If that was all it involved, then she had faced far worse.

Alondo had mentioned a “deep pain” that she and Lyall shared. She didn’t like the sound of that. However, the fact was that they only needed one more component carrier. If she could manage to pass her particular trial, then Lyall would not have to face his.
I can’t let him down.

Alondo struck a series of chords on his sabada, yanking Shann out of her reverie. “I’m sorry to interrupt, Shann,” he said, “but the soldiers will be here any moment. The place where you are now is like an artificially created eddy–a backwater of this reality. You are about to be swept away again downstream. You must decide your path.”

Her mouth was a determined line. “I have decided. I must go through the right-hand door.”

Alondo nodded slowly. “Boxx says it is not surprised at your choice. It wishes you success. It says for you go through now. Quickly.” Alondo’s attention returned to his instrument. He picked out a tune, humming it to himself as he played.

Shann heard raised voices once more. She glanced over her shoulder. The voices were drawing closer. In front of her, the doors at the end of the alley were of plain overlaying slats of wood, quite unremarkable. She quickly stepped up to the door on her right, placed a hand on the latch and then hesitated. Her journey had begun in Corte. Yet this “eddy” was not Corte; at least, it was no part of her hometown that she remembered.
When I step through this door, where will I be?

She turned back to him. “Goodbye, Alondo. And thank you.”

The musician did not raise his head or reply. Her heart felt a slight wrench as she lifted the latch and stepped through.

~

She was standing in a small upstairs room. The effect was most disconcerting.
How can a door in a back alley lead directly to an upstairs room in a house?
Still, Alondo had told her that the other door led directly back to the Dais, and that made about as much sense, so perhaps she shouldn’t be surprised. What was just as perplexing was a strong undercurrent of familiarity–a feeling that she knew this place from somewhere. The memory was an insect, fluttering at the edges of her consciousness, yet tantalisingly just out of reach.

The décor of the room was simple. Homely. Rough, unadorned plaster walls. A wooden floor. A single chest. A single small bed. A child’s bed. The door creaked, making Shann jump. She spun around to see a tall figure dressed in black. Keris.

‘You will meet a person you do not wish to meet’.
Well, that part of the prediction has come true, at least,
Shann thought wryly. “So,” she began, “what’s your part in all this?”

The woman’s eyes were bright points in a perfectly proportioned face. She ignored the question. “Do you know where you are?”

Shann took one further look around the tiny bedroom. “No,” she confessed.

“This is your parents’ house where you were born,” Keris informed her, “and this is your room.”

She’s right. This was my room.
Her distrust of the former Keltar reasserted itself. “Why have you brought me here?”

She knew as soon as she said it that it was a ridiculous question. No-one had forced her to choose the door that led to this place.

Keris looked her up and down once, making Shann feel as if she had just been closely examined and found wanting. “Follow me.” The tall woman whirled around and exited the room without waiting for a response. There seemed nothing to be gained by obduracy. Shann let out her breath slowly, then joined Keris on the upper landing.

There was a loud commotion coming from downstairs. Shann wanted to ask about it, but she held her tongue. As they reached the foot of the stairs she saw that the central living area was filled with people. There were eight or nine of the Prophet’s soldiers in their distinctive iron-studded leather armour. Shann reached for her staff instinctively and felt a restraining pressure.

Keris’ long, slender fingers clamped around her wrist. “Wait,” she commanded.

Shann’s flash of resentment was extinguished by a woman’s cry. Her eyes darted between the soldiers’ legs. A man and woman had been knocked to the ground and were being roughly manhandled. The woman was slender and spare-boned, her face screwed up and her arms held out in supplication. The man’s arm gripped her shoulder protectively. He had a lean, haunted look. Shann’s voice cracked. “Wh…what’s happening?”

“Do you not recognise your parents?” Keris said matter-of-factly. “This is the day they were taken–the day you were left alone.”

The soldier band milled around, ignoring the woman’s pleas. Shann felt her throat constrict. “I…I don’t understand. Why don’t they see us?”

“They will not react to you unless you react to them,” Keris explained. “That is how this place works.”

Shann heard a whimper off to the side. A scrawny girl. Short, dark hair. Puffy eyes. Tears streaking her face.
Is that…me?

The soldiers dragged the two adults to their feet. “Please…my daughter,” the woman was saying. A burly soldier standing nearby seemed to notice the tiny figure in the corner for the first time. He raised an arm and cuffed her with the back of his glove. The little girl staggered back, clutched her cheek and howled, her whole body wracked with sobs. Shann raised a hand to her own cheek.
You will remember that which you would rather forget.

The group of soldiers shoved the girl’s parents toward the front door. Moments later, the child was left all by herself. Her eyes were screwed shut and she wailed uncontrollably. Shann felt her heart melt. She desperately wanted to throw her arms around her younger self, to comfort her. She started toward the sobbing little girl, but Keris got ahead of her. “Come, there is something else you must see.”

Shann impaled her with a look of pure resentment. The tall woman’s face softened. “She will be cared for. There is nothing you can do for her. Come.”

Reluctantly, Shann turned away from the disconsolate waif and allowed herself to be led out of the house and into the bright light of the afternoon suns.

The detachment of soldiers was standing by a wooden cart with three bound “tribute” captives seated in it. Rough hands held the girl’s parents securely. Her mother was weeping silently now, her face a mask of resignation. The soldiers appeared to be waiting for something. Suddenly, three figures rounded the corner–two more soldiers, and at their head, a tall athletic figure clad in the ebony tunic and flying cloak of a Keltar. The face was fresher, but there was the same severe expression framed by a dark flowing mane.
“She is you,”
Shann exclaimed.

“A younger me, yes,” Keris said.

Shann’s fists opened and closed. Her breathing grew short.
You will uncover a truth you would prefer not to have known.
“You…you were responsible for taking my parents away.”

Keris was standing at her shoulder. “I was a newly appointed Keltar. Fiercely zealous. Driven by higher ideals, or so I thought.”

The young Keris had taken charge, and was shouting instructions at the soldiers who were pushing the two latest tributes in the direction of the cart.

“My parents,” Shann demanded. “Where did you take them?”

“They will be taken to one of the ore camps in the Southern Desert,” Keris replied. “You mother will die two turns later–your father, not long after.”

Shann’s eyes blazed with fury. She reached over her shoulder and drew her staff. “Not if I set them free.”

Keris leaned forward and whispered closely into Shann’s ear, so that Shann could feel the woman’s breath. “Now listen to me. Listen very carefully. If you attempt to save them, there will be…consequences. If you are killed, your parents will still die and you will have sacrificed yourself for nothing. If I die or am disgraced by losing tributes, then I will never rise to a position of prominence at the keep. I will not be sent on the mission to track you down, and so will not encounter the Chandara or receive the message from the past. You, Lyall and Alondo will all die in your attempt to free the captives at Gort and the Prophet will complete his weapon, leading to the extinction of the Kelanni people. The only safe course is for you to do nothing.”

“I can’t just watch while they are dragged away to their deaths,” Shann rasped.

“You cannot save them.” Keris’ voice sounded in her ear like a death knell.

“Get away from me.” Shann began running toward the cart. She expected the older Keris to give chase–to try to stop her by force. But the former Keltar made no move to restrain or follow her.

I cannot let you do this again. Not again.

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Chapter 37

Shann sprinted toward the contingent of soldiers. Her hand was at her neck control as she ran, scanning for lodestone deposits.
You cannot save them.
Of course, the woman would naturally try to protect her former self, to dissuade Shann from acting. Yet she was the same person who had been responsible for the deaths of her parents and so many others. Shann had clearly been brought here for one purpose, the chance to free her parents and to right a terrible wrong.
You will not stop me.

The soldiers turned their heads, seeming to notice Shann for the first time. Their hands went to the hilt of their weapons and stopped, frozen by indecision. The girl bearing down on them bore the cloak and staff, the trappings of Keltar, the sworn servants of the Prophet. To disobey was inadvisable. To attack one would be unthinkable.

“Restrain her.” The soldiers had no time to react to the young Keris’ order before the girl barrelled into them, swinging her staff.

The words of Lyall penetrated Shann’s determined anger. “
Use the wood and the flat of the blade.”

She struck one soldier in the midriff, knocking the breath out of him, then brought the other end of her staff up and struck another–a woman–across the temple. Shann’s cloak flared and she leapt away before either of them had hit the ground.

She gained height, then pushed against a second deposit behind her and sailed over the cart, pirouetting in the air as she did so. She did not want to make the prisoner cart the focus of the battle. There was too much of a risk that some of them might get hurt.

With the flush of combat, Shann’s wrath subsided and her mind began to think more clearly. Her initial surprise attack had been effective, but her advantage was gone. The soldiers now had their wits about them, and they had orders to take her down. She was safe as long as she remained airborne, but as soon as she engaged them on the ground, she could easily be outmanoeuvred and swamped by so many.
Their Keltar.
She was the key. If Shann could defeat her, then the remaining soldiers would probably scatter, and she could free her parents and the others without further opposition.