Elu did not dream that
night, much to her relief. It was to
the smell of cooking bacon that she awoke to: Nim had already woken, and was
preparing their breakfast; Azuril was outside, feeding the horses. It was still dark outside, except for a
pinpoint of light hovering like a spluttering torch over the horizon.
“Ah,” Nim greeted her, quite affably as Elu sat up,
rubbing her eyes. “I was just about to get you up myself. There’s no time to be wasted in bed. As soon as we’ve finished eating we should
leave. Shouldn’t outstay the host’s
welcome, should we.”
Elu agreed with a nod, remembering the cool look on
the face of the farmer’s wife. She
pulled on her various layers of tunics, shivering all the while. By the time she had finished Azuril had come
back in, and was warming his hands by the fire. As usual he said nothing, and Nim made no greeting to him. It was as though they had a pre-arranged
agreement that they didn’t need to exchange words at all.
They ate, mostly in silence. The bacon was good, but the gruel that went
with it was only just bearable, and the bread was going stale. Once they had finished they cleared away
quickly, and packed their belongings, making ready to leave. Dawn was now fully upon the white,
glistening lands. Feeling refreshed and
newly optimistic now that the light of the sun was above them, they mounted
their horses and set off.
It had stopped snowing, and the layer of snow upon
the ground was crisp, fresh and deep.
There was a pleasantness to crunching through the yielding flakes and
snow crystals, to sniffing the bracing air of the new morning, even to eating
breakfast on the road. Nim kept up a
merry stream of conversation as they led the horses out of the stables and back
out onto the track. Even Elu was
feeling relatively light-hearted as they started the journey and began to leave
the farm far behind. Ralling was
frisky. It was breezy, but the wind was
not cold. Overall the general mood of
the group was one of cheer and confidence.
The trail to Mosdren led south
through the heart of Rofaçilin. It was
a well-beaten track, often used by both travellers and traders alike. As Nim had foreseen, the flat terrain soon petered
out and was replaced by dry, rocky land.
Elu did not relish the thought of a bumpy ride all the way down to
Mosdren, but Nim seemed nonchalant, even cheerful about it; certainly her
suspicious attitude of the day before seemed to have been forgotten. Instead she launched into a detailed and
knowledgeable history of the lands they were now riding through. She was a proficient storyteller, and Elu
found herself listening with interest despite herself. It amazed her that Nim knew so much about
this country, and she wondered whether Azuril had had anything to do with it.
So while they rode, with the cold forming red on
their cheeks and the wind in their hair, Elu found herself learning even more
than she had learnt about the country she had been brought up in, Éadan. According to Nim, often in the past this
arid land had been an affliction and an irritation to the people of
Rofaçilin. When the first peoples had
settled there, they had found the northern plains parched and barren, and not
conducive for growing the rice and root vegetables that were the staple diet
further west. Only wheat would take to
the soil in these less fertile parts, but the harvests were never as large as
they had been for the people of Éadan, or the southern kingdom of Nomeir. Many farmers starved in the winter, and many
migrated to the friendlier regions in the south. Those who stayed to battle it out in the north could only watch
by as their cousins in the south became richer and richer, while they grew
poorer and more disillusioned. It was
after the War of the Sundering, when riots and rebellions were threatening all
the known kingdoms of Fithandani, that the situation came to a head. The north-south divide was standing on the
brink of outright civil war, when the then king of Rofaçilin announced a
project to irrigate the northern plains, which was named Ebírdan, or the Green
Plan. Unfortunately, this involved
diverting Izin Z’asalki, a land-locked sea to the east of Rofaçilin, which also
happened to be the home of the Asalki.
When the channeling of Izin Z’asalki was put into
motion, the Asalki retaliated with a fearful vengeance. With spears and javelins they marched into
war with the unprepared Rofaçilinians, and fought with the mad brutality of
wild Amazonians. The king was furious
that his project had been halted in such an untimely manner, and sent out the
bulk of his forces to deal with the problem.
The Asalki fought with bravery and skill, but their numbers were simply
too few. Outnumbered and outmatched,
the small remnant of their people were forced to flee to the west, where they
found their new abode in the underground caves of the Calliss Plateau. As Queen Zvazdra had told Elu before, their
population – and indeed their spirit – never recovered.
“I
can’t believe that the people of Rofaçilin could have been so cruel!” Elu
exclaimed, after Nim had finished her story.
“They had lived through cruel
times,” Nim returned with a grimace. “Let’s not forget that the War of the
Sundering had only passed by a couple of hundred years before. Its terror had still been burnt into the
consciousness of those whose great-great-grandparents still held those times
within living memory. The king had only
wanted the best for his people – fairer lands, greater prosperity, a home to be
proud of – and to him the Asalki were probably just a primitive race who were
getting in the way of his ultimate goal – his dreams, if you like.”
“They were not primitive,” Elu
objected, “And it still doesn’t excuse near genocide, does it?”
Nim sighed. “Sometimes things are
not so clear cut as we suppose them to be.” Her tone was a moralizing one,
which annoyed Elu since Nim wasn’t exactly a saint. “One day you’ll learn to
understand.”
Elu scowled and hid her face in her
hood. She didn’t like Nim speaking to
her as though she was a child, and she didn’t like the way Azuril was riding
just nearby and leaving her to put up with it.
More than once she turned his way to beg for his assistance, but only
just managed to check herself. His
wrinkled face, she noticed, was more lined and anxious than ever. She supposed he was thinking over the
troubles that they had discussed the night before. Not for the first time she wondered what his real form looked
like, and what he really was.
They encountered two travelling
bands of Aksees that day, much to Nim’s astonishment and suspicion. Although they were painfully thin rag-tag
groups, sightings of Aksees in this area had always been rare. The first band had been almost dead by the
time that Elu and her group had dealt with them. The other was in much the same state, but fiercer. They had been hiding under an outcrop of
gorse bushes and rock, planning to ambush the group as they rode by. Nim had caught sight of them just as their
leader had launched himself clumsily towards Ralling. The horse fell, but just missed the edge of his rusty blade. Before Nim or Azuril could come to Elu’s
aid, three more band members had struck out from behind the rocks. Elu found herself dealing solely with the
leader of the pack, who was eyeing her pouch and her clothes ravenously. There was no doubt that this creature was
mad. Unlike the other Aksees she had
seen, this one was starved to the point of insanity. Flecks of white froth had gathered at his mouth, and through the
rags of his tunic she could plainly see the contours of his ribs. But his eyes were not dull, like those who
have not fed or drunk for many days.
Instead they were alight with a savage, blazing fire, as though lighted
by something cruel and feral. This was
not a brutality fed by starvation or depravity. It was something else she could not tell.
Elu took out her sword with a
shaking hand, widening her stance ready for an attack. Not even the sight of the sword was enough
to deter the creature. He snarled at
her, taking in every inch of what she had to offer him. Her knees almost buckled at that searing
gaze.
“Food!” he roared, white flakes of
foam spurting from the dark cavity of his mouth. “Give!”
The words seemed to recall some dark
instinct within him. In a split second
he had charged at her, baring the rusty blade with an unexpected
swiftness. There was no time to think
of Nim or Azuril, or whether they too had been attacked. She thrust forward with her sword, cutting
deep into the flank of the Aksees that charged at her. But he hardly seemed to notice. Raising his own knife he leapt into the air
like a wild beast, baring down on her like a bear. She had a frightening image of a man, from another realm and
another time, vaulting into her with the grace and fluidity of a seasoned
warrior. It was like a memory being
relayed in slow motion, unfolding itself before her with the clarity and
certainty that she had experienced it before.
Instinctively, out of fear and something else – repulsion? – she brought
out her dagger and slashed desperately at the face of the image coming at
her.
It connected, with the easiness of
stabbing through butter. With horror
she saw that she had cut through not the shadow of some unknown warrior, but the
face of a starved and manic Aksees. The
face roared, its eyes bulged – blood splattered on her cheeks. But the creature would not retreat. Its desperation now was too great for any
sense to break through it. Food, it
wanted food. It wanted sustenance. It wanted to kill.
Lifting the rusty knife again, it
struck at Elu. She shifted, but the
blade caught the edge of her shoulder.
Pain glittered across her world like the sharpness of snow. It was with a blind instinct that she drew
her sword back and tore it into the stomach of the foul creature on top of
her. Then again, as anger and vengeance
clouded her brain. She did not know how
many times she brought the blade back, only to thrust it forward again. She hardly knew when it was that the beast lay
dead. When the rage had passed, and her
mind slowed itself once more into reality, she realised what she had done. Pushing the corpse away from her, she sat
up, her head spinning. Nim was above
her, offering her hand. Azuril was
standing nearby, inscrutable. The
bodies of three other Aksees lay bloody in the snow.
Elu stood, steadied by Nim’s strong
hand. Not a word was said – nothing
needed to be said. The stink of blood
was on her, and she gagged with it, a terrible nausea flooding over her. It was not the first time she had killed;
yet somehow this time had been different.
She did not know whether it had been her in control, or some other,
deeper, darker part of her brain.
“It’s never right,” Nim told her
quietly, as Azuril dragged the bodies out into the underbrush. “But sometimes
you have no choice.”
Suddenly, Elu understood. She turned aside and vomited into the snow.
The next few days were dull and
miserable. After the scuffle with the
Aksees there was only one further attack the day after. Luckily this band was weaker than the others
they had encountered so far, and Nim was able to finish them off by
herself. Elu had no inclination
whatsoever to lift her sword against any other species, and could hardly get
the memory of that yellow-eyed face, slit open to the bone, from invading most
of her daytime thoughts. She had been
unable to stop pondering the brutal and irrational way in which she had
murdered him; for indeed it had seemed nothing short of murder to her. It was as though her mind had flickered out
like a candle and had been replaced by something else – instinct? No, something darker and gut wrenching. She could not explain it, but it haunted her.
After a while Nim had tired of her
despondent mood and rudely informed her that there was no use in brooding over
it, and that she would need to get used to it if she wanted to stay alive. So Elu left her thoughts for the night,
which of course didn’t make the situation any better.
The city of Mosdren had effectively
been built on the border of the north-south divide, which was still a
noticeable divide, even after the four thousand or so years since the War of
the Sundering had come to its brutal conclusion. Perhaps tellingly, Mosdren itself had been built on the southern
side of that invisible border, where the richer farmers were able to make their
living, and where the country gentry dwelled.
Elu guessed that the arid ground would have given way to more fertile
pastures, but the thick sheet of snow hid the evidence from her. The snow flurries had given way to
full-blown blizzards, which had slowed their journey down considerably. The locals had been unsympathetic and
disagreeable for the most part, but since the previous evening larger
farmsteads had unfolded over the horizon, and the people who lived in these
wealthier abodes were far more congenial.
Nim’s mood, as always, had been
quite merry and sociable; Azuril had said little throughout the journey; and
Elu was feeling cold, dirty and exhausted.
She longed for a bath with a passion she had not thought possible. She still felt contaminated from the blood
and gore of the Aksees she had slain, and was anxious to soak the disconcerting
feeling out of her. So it was indeed a
welcome sight when the city of Mosdren unfurled itself from the dewy morning
vista.
“And never a more pleasant sight
there was,” Nim spoke with relief as its towers and turrets slowly became
discernable. Elu strained her eyes to
see this first glimpse of the capital city of Rofaçilin. Lifting a hand to her forehead she gazed
over into the distance. As they neared
their destination, the tiny needles that were the city spires seemed to uncoil
before them. First the towers, straight
and spindly; and then the clusters of buildings; buildings upon buildings, so
many that they seemed to rise like some great grey mound from the bowels of the
earth. Elu held her breath. Never had she seen a city so large! Even Grimhabim paled in comparison to it!
“I’ve never seen a city so big!” she
could not help but exclaim.
“It is true,” Nim spoke up, lifting
her hand too to see the silhouette of the city, bathed all around in a deep
grey mist. “Mosdren is the largest city in Fithandani. There are many that have called it a country
unto itself, hidden within the walls of a town. It is in reality the only city throughout the whole of the
kingdom.”
“The only city?” Elu repeated in
surprise.
Surprisingly, Azuril answered her.
“The rich and the wealthy never
wished to establish themselves in the north,” he explained, his voice quite
pleasant. Elu momentarily wondered
whether Nim would be surprised at that. “They wanted to be in the south, where
the farmers there would be able to produce enough to cater for their needs. So they centred themselves in Mosdren. Many farmers became rich serving their
rulers, and some were granted titles and the many manors that you will see in
the south.”
“But then how did Mosdren become so
big?” Elu queried, looking up at the imposing shadow before them. The mists were clearing, and the city was
beginning to sparkle in the sunlight.
Surely that wasn’t gold on that tower over there?
“Others came to the city, mainly
from the north, seeking to curry favour from the rich,” Azuril continued. “But
many were disappointed, and settled around the palaces and castles of the
aristocrats, having no choice but to make their living as best they could. Now Mosdren is divided into two parts –
Inner Mosdren, where the nobility live; and Outer Mosdren, where the middle and
lower-classes live.”
“Not only that,” Nim continued with
a wry smile, “but Outer Mosdren eventually became so vast that it had to be
divided into another four districts, North, East, South and West. Each district has its own administration,
its own law enforcement, its own superintendents. That makes it a terrible place to manage – which many people use
to their advantage.” She passed Elu a sly, sardonic smile. “It a den of filth
and debauchery. Outlaws, murderers,
lechers, thieves, fugitives – they all gather here. That’s what makes it such an inviting little home for me.”
Elu didn’t like the sound of this
Mosdren at all. She was beginning to
regret her decision to come here after all.
Azuril caught her look and suppressed a laugh.
“Take no notice of her,” he
addressed Elu, “it’s not as bad as Nim would have you believe.”
“Oh, it’s worse than I would have
anyone believe,” Nim retaliated, her mouth twitching humorously as she noticed
Elu’s look of horror.
They arrived at the city gates just
as it was beginning to snow again.
While Nim’s countenance was one of relief and joy to be back home, Elu’s
was one of awe and wonderment at the size of the city gates. It was at least six fathoms tall, and
another six wide. An impressive array
of guards had been stationed outside the front, garbed in antelope brown and
gold, their spears and lances glinting brightly in the pale sun. As the three horses approached, they seemed
none too pleased at Elu’s arrival. When
they had reached the line of soldiers, Nim reigned in her horse with a smile.
“Well now, my fine men, we are
looking a jolly bunch today, aren’t we?” There was an overly sarcastic tone to
her voice that Elu did not like. She
hoped that the guards did not take offence.
They looked unfriendly enough as it was.
The guard nearest to them ignored
her words.
“Back so soon, Nim?” he spoke dryly
“Come here to stir up your usual trouble, eh?”
“Now, now Mr. Smithers,” she chided
him mockingly “that’s no way to greet an old friend now is it? I’m quite harmless really, you know that.”
“What about that disturbance you
caused at the Arm and Leg last
month?” he rebuked her sourly. “That got you banned from the whole
north-eastern district! Why should we
let you in at all?”
“That wasn’t my fault!” Nim replied
hotly, and she was about to say more when Azuril laid a warning hand on her
shoulder, stopping her from speaking.
“That’s enough, Nim,” he spoke
softly before turning to the guards. “I understand your reluctance to let us
in, but I know of no decree that has forbidden Miss Nim from entering the
north-western district. As it is, we
have come here on business – not the kind that would cause a disturbance, mind
you. I shall keep an eye on her and make
sure she behaves herself.”
Nim looked ready to argue, but Elu
saw the tension in Azuril’s hand as he grasped her shoulder, and the older
woman remained quiet. The guards, for
their part, were still looking at Nim rather suspiciously.
“Well,” spoke their leader at last,
“we know we have nothing to fear from you Master Grinda, and if you promise to
keep the wildcat in hand then we’ll take your word for it. But who’s that girl there, the one on the
brown stallion?” The man nodded in Elu’s direction, who shifted uncomfortably.
“My apprentice,” Grinda replied without hesitation, his tone neutral. “She’s a simple thing from Éadan, found her after her village had been sacked. Not good for much, but she can strike up something of a tune at least. You can have a listen to her on the lyre if you want.”
The guards were already looking disinterested,
and they declined the offer with grunts and mutterings.
“Very well,” said their leader
again, “You may enter. Just keep out of
trouble.” He glared at Nim as he did so, then motioned for the gates to be
opened.
“Of course, sir,” Nim mumbled under
her breath.
The streets of Mosdren were filthy,
grey and crowded. Already Elu was
beginning to feel that Nim’s estimation of the city had been something of an
understatement. The cobble roads were
lined with refuse, rats and excrement.
The people were dressed in rags and most were painfully thin. Children would run up alongside their
horses, begging for clothing, food and money.
As they rode past, Elu could see their parents lurking in dark doorways,
hungry expressions on their sallow faces. Men walked past, their daggers ready at their belts, leering at
both Nim and Elu openly. Some had women
with them, women whose faces were painted with clumsy hands, laughing,
clown-like. The stench of the place was
almost stomach turning.
“How can people bear to live here?”
Elu murmured. Nim grimaced at her.
“Circumstance,” she answered in a
low voice. “They find themselves here, they hate it, and they want to work
themselves out of it; then they get used to it, and they think: ‘Well maybe it
isn’t so bad after all…’”
“Is that what happened to you?” Elu
asked, passing her a sidelong glance.
“In a way,” Nim muttered, but looked
unwilling to say more.
They decided to stop by a tavern and
buy some food to eat and a bath. Elu
had wanted to point out that they had barely enough money for a loaf of bread
let alone a meal, but seeing the determined expression on Nim’s face, she
decided not to question her. The woman
seemed to have her own means and her own resources.
They tethered their horses in a nearby stable, then
made their way to the inn, which turned out to be a noisy, crowded timber-built
house. It smelled of a rank mixture of
alcohol and tobacco. Elu did not like
it at all. The inn in Welle had been of
the quiet, rustic type, and even then Elu had not ventured into it much. This one was rowdy and boisterous and full
of unsavoury people. There were drunks
and lechers and women of dubious reputation.
Having never experienced these types of people first hand, Elu’s first
instinct was to feel intimidated. She
didn’t much like being leered at and shoved about by the surge of people. Nim however batted not an eyelid at any of
it. She went straight to the bar,
bearing Elu quickly in tow.
The proprietor of the inn was a
portly man with greying hair in his fifties.
Though he did not seem overly pleased at Nim’s appearance, he greeted
her as warmly as any.
“Ah, back again are we?” he welcomed
her with a lop-sided grin “I was beginning to worry about you, Nim. You were away longer than usual.”
“I ran into some trouble,” Nim
returned conversationally, leaning an elbow on the bar “But it was nothing that
I couldn’t sort out without much trouble.
I brought back some lovely little trinkets with me.”
The man’s eyes lit up.
“Do they happen to be green and very
shiny?” he asked eagerly.
“Indeed, they do,” Nim replied with
a clandestine little smile “And perhaps I could trade one in for a little food
and drink…”
The man grinned widely.
“Well, I’ll just see to it that you
get the best table in the house, along with today’s speciality, served up
specially by my Lali herself.” He glanced over at Grinda, who nodded, then Elu
who was hovering behind Nim’s shoulder, a pained expression on her face as a
drunk brushed past her. “I take it it’ll be a table for three this time?” he
asked in a lower voice.
“Oh yes, I almost forgot!” Nim
started. She nodded at Elu “This is Elu
Eldeen. Elu this is Genmar. Elu is Grinda’s new apprentice, Genmar.” She
lied just as expertly as Azuril did.
“I see,” the man nodded “It’s a
pleasure to meet you Elu. No doubt
we’ll be hearing some of your songs over the next few days.” He turned back to
Nim with a smile. “I’ll have your meals ready as soon as possible – just as
long as you have the…” he made a vague little gesture with his fingers.
Nim dug into the pouch slung from
her belt, and brought out one of the glistening verda stones. It was only a
small crumb of stone, but its glittering brilliance in the light of the musty
room was enchanting. Still, it didn’t
seem worth three big meals to Elu, and though she knew that Nim had far bigger
gems in her pouch, she kept her mouth shut very firmly indeed.
The man literally pounced on the
stone, and once it was in his hands he looked upon it in glee. Then his smile faded and deposited it into
his pocket, shooting Nim a knowing glance.
Raising his hand, he clicked his fingers with a loud snap and called out
to the back kitchen behind him.
“Lali! Three suppers for my friend Nim here! And make it quick too!” He then looked to Nim. “Follow me.”
They were led to the quietest corner
of the tavern (which wasn’t very quiet according to Elu’s standards, but it was
better than nothing in the circumstances).
There sat a large polished oak table that had nevertheless was covered
in stains and burns and other such things.
“Make yourselves comfortable,” the
man said, even going so far as to hold out Elu’s chair for her. “Your meals
will be ready in no time.”
Once they were sat and the man had
hurried back to the bar, Elu leaned forward to the older woman and whispered
urgently.
“You had bigger stones than
that! That little one you gave him was
hardly worth his effort!”
Nim laughed uproariously.
“Yes, but he didn’t know that, did
he! And I just saved myself quite a lot of expense there.”
“But that’s cheating!” Elu cried
shocked.
“No, it’s business,” Nim replied
quite seriously “And it’s what I do best.”
It was not long before the three
dinners arrived and they were all thankfully eating. Elu had not realised how much she missed a warm supper in her
stomach – she had not had one in so long that she had almost forgotten what it
felt like to eat one. The meal was so
large that none of them, starved as they were, could fit it into their bellies. When they had finished, Nim sat back in her
chair and sighed.
“Now I feel ready to take on the
world again!” she exclaimed merrily “That was sorely needed! I think I’ll go and have that bath now.”
When they had finished bathing and
had rid themselves of the dirt of travel, Nim led them back to her house. Outside the air was thin and chill, and the
snow was sporadic. The sky was pale and
cloudless. Nim looked thoughtful as she
walked onward; her face, almost locked inside the hood of her cloak, was dark
and her eyes were narrowed.
The streets they walked became
narrower and dingier. They turned from
what seemed to be the main marketplace and into a little uphill cobble
street. When they had travelled a good
few yards down the unlevelled road, Nim stopped.
“Here we are,” she said.
Elu looked up.
The building was of grey brick and
strangely nondescript. The windows were
dark – whether they were shutterless or not Elu could not tell. The door was unpainted, and of coarse, dark
wood. Nim produced a key from one of
her many pockets and stabbed it into an old rusty lock. With a creak, the door gave way to a hallway
and a set of rickety stairs. It looked
cold, drab and dark inside.
“Up here,” Nim told her comrade
blandly, and began to climb the stairs.
After a short moment, Elu entered, followed by Azuril, who pushed gently
at the door behind her. It shut with an
ominous clarity.
From what she had seen so far Elu
did not expect much from Nim’s home.
Still, she journeyed up the steps, and followed her friend through
another old and noisy door. There she
stopped, for Nim stood in the dark doorway and groped for a lamp that hung on
the frame. With deft fingers she
produced flint and tinder, and soon the lamp was glowing brightly. She turned, smiled cheerfully.
“Well, here we are!”
Elu stepped past the threshold at
her friend’s beckoning gesture. She was
pleasantly surprised. The once dark and
unpromising room was inviting and cosy.
It was a small room, but quite adequate for one person. At the far wall stood a hearth and grate,
and to the left a table for meals and other activities, laden with many
half-opened books. A window was there,
looking out on to the cold world of the city, tall enough to show an azure
patch of sky. Nearby, a stove for
cooking, and other utensils; to the right, a cupboard and a well-stocked
bookcase; further up a bed, covered with a warm, faded quilt.
As Elu stood in wonder at the homely
little room – it reminded her of her own cottage in Welle – Nim moved the
hearth and began to light a fire.
“It’s not much, I know,” she
admitted cheerfully “but when you spend most of your time on the road, things
like that hardly matter.” She paused to examine the flames now kindling in the
grate. Satisfied, she spoke again. “Make
yourself at home. I’ll have some tea ready
for us; once I have the water boiling, that is.”
Once the fire was ready, and they
were sitting by the hearth drinking mugs of hot tea, Elu felt a lot warmer, and
her spirits were higher. She had no
idea what Azuril planned to do next; and from the grim look on his face, it
didn’t seem as if he was going to tell her any time soon. Nim was fidgety and wouldn’t stop talking;
there was obviously something bothering her as well. After a while, they all began to feel tired and decided it would
be best to rest for the night. Nim had
the spare bedding rolled out in front of the fire, and graciously offered Elu
her own bed. Elu had thanked her for
the uncharacteristic gesture, but Nim informed her that she would not be
sleeping in her own rooms that night.
“I have some…business to attend to,”
she informed Elu vaguely. “I probably won’t be back until the morning. You might as well make use of the bed while
you’re here.”
Elu involuntarily bristled at the
blasé tone of the older woman, but said nothing. She, for one, was glad that Nim wouldn’t be around for the
night. Besides, she wanted to speak to
Azuril in private.
Nim left in great haste and with a
preoccupied expression on her face.
There was something about her behaviour that troubled Elu, but she
couldn’t pinpoint where exactly her misgivings lay.
“Do you think she’s going to be all
right?” Elu asked of Azuril, who was sitting casually smoking his familiar old
pipe by the fire.
“I expect she will be,” he answered
lightly. “She knows how to take care of herself – she always has done. I wouldn’t worry too much about her.”
“I’m not worried about her,” Elu
replied. She had little enough sympathy
for the girl. “I was just wondering…Well, what do you think she’s up to?”
“I don’t know. Probably gambling or something of the sort.”
Elu wrinkled her nose in
distaste. She was beginning to hope she
wouldn’t have to stay long in Nim’s company. “Well,” she began, deciding to
change the subject, “what do we do now that we’re here?”
“Tomorrow we talk to the king,”
Azuril answered shortly, blowing out a cloud of smoke. “I’m well acquainted
with Morçant, and he will listen to me.”
“And after that?” Elu asked.
“After that…well, we shall see. I haven’t had time to think on it yet.” He
cast his eye on her. “Enough questions.
I suggest you sleep now. It has
been a hard journey, and I plan to leave at dawn tomorrow. After we speak to Morçant, I don’t want to
waste anymore time before we leave for Nithall.”
There were more questions Elu wanted
to ask, but didn’t have to energy to.
Azuril was right. She was
exhausted and needed to sleep. With a
sigh she got into Nim’s bed, glad for the feel of a mattress beneath her
again. Nithall, she thought to herself
as she closed her eyes. Eldeen had told
her of it once. That was the land of
the sephira, Ifith’s native country.
She wondered about the boy king Aldarith, now grown to manhood, and
–according to Ifith at least – a slothful, indolent king. How would he react to Azuril’s news of a
tûrkal army? She was doubtful that he
would want to be bothered with a war against those of a race so far away. It was while pondering on these many
questions that Elu finally slept.
She did not dream, but there seemed
to be a sensation deep within her that was brimming to the surface. It was as though she felt Mirulas, or his
spirit, ghosting on a distant wind from a land far away. It seemed to speed past her – or perhaps it
was that she sped past it – and away, lost, gone forever. Try as she might she could not regain a
sense of that consciousness that she had lost.
Then the darkness enveloped her and she was alone. The aching bitterness of that aloneness
filled her like a sponge full of holes.
With ghostlike arms she held onto herself, falling, weeping.
Then other emotions coursed through
her, one on top of the other, crowding into her as though wrangling for her
attention. Desire, hate, fear,
betrayal, guilt, need – all these things passed through her, rending through
her like a physical attack. She gasped,
pained to the core by these paradoxical passions. For they were passions,
almost bringing her to the brink of both agony and ecstasy. A name formed on her lips; a name borne out
of both longing and beseeching, with a need for both fulfillment and
forgiveness. For a moment it hung
there, like a perfectly formed single drop of water waiting to fall and greet
the earth, waiting to spill itself into the whole.
“…É…”
She awoke.
The distance between that single
name and her own consciousness seemed to launch itself away from her as though
propelled from a tightly coiled spring, there one moment, gone in a
second. Its significance lost to her,
she was only left to muse what it would or could have meant. She sat up in a shaft of watery sunlight, as
though physically starting after the thing that had fled her. What welcomed her instead was the voice of
Grinda-Azuril, who was, as usual, already up and out of bed.
“Good morning, Elu,” he greeted her
somewhat jovially.
“Good morning,” she answered
slowly. Even as his words clamoured for
room in her brain, the last memory of that elusive name was pushed out,
dispelled, never to be recovered. She
could hardly even remember why it had seemed so important.
“I have made you a little
breakfast,” Azuril continued, not seeing her look as he busied himself with
packing his small belongings. “Once you are ready we shall leave.”
Elu sat up, running her hands
through her knotted hair. On closer
inspection of her unfamiliar surroundings, she noticed that Nim was still nowhere
about.
“Where is Nim?” she questioned,
feeling vaguely uneasy.
“I’m not sure,” Azuril returned,
“She didn’t come back last night. I
expect she had a little too much to drink, and spent her night at the
tavern. Now,” and he handed her a plate
of what looked to be lukewarm porridge. “Eat up.”
After a less than satisfactory breakfast they were
ready to leave. It was just as they
were about to walk through the door, several footsteps were heard hastening up
the stairs, and then Nim herself came crashing through the threshold, cheeks
flushed, breath laboured.
“Here she is!” she cried
triumphantly, and for a short moment Elu thought she was shouting to herself.
“She’s in here!”
The answer to Elu’s confusion was
made clear when several armed guards in brown and gold livery stormed through
the door. All at once Elu was caught up
in a swirl, a flurry of glinting metal and grasping hands. It was while before she knew that it was she
that they wanted, and that she was able to struggle.
“What’s going on here!”
It Azuril’s voice, shocked,
anxious. Elu could not see him as the
soldiers encircled her and tied her wrists together from behind, but she knew
that he was somewhere nearby.
“We’re arresting her in the name of
his Majesty, the king,” spoke a scar-faced guard from beside Elu, “And you’d do
well to mind your own business!”
All at once Elu understood two
things – that Nim’s suspicions had been greater than she had first imagined;
and that the errant thief had betrayed her.
Sudden desperation coursed through her.
“There must be some mistake,” she
exclaimed, “I haven’t done anything!”
“We’ll see,” spoke the scar-faced soldier again, stripping her of her dagger and her sword. “We know how to deal with your sort. Take her away.” He gestured to his men, who thrust Elu towards the doorway. Despite her alarm she knew better than to fight against them. They were the sort of men who wouldn’t have any compunction in using violence if she resisted them. Suddenly, everything seemed to lose all clarity, all sensation. Colours faded, sounds leaked away like water, movement slowed to a lethargic dullness. First she saw Azuril’s face, pale, lined and outraged; then she saw Nim’s face, wordless, almost wondering. In a short moment those two faces seemed to loom before her, old and familiar, as though they had been marked in mind long before she had even known them physically. And stranger too, behind their two faces lurked many more, unreadable and veiled in shadow, half- conscious, half-knowing. Even as she perceived them, hidden as they were, they turned to her as though welcoming her, inviting her to something. A sense of awe snaked its way through her as the faces – Nim and Azuril’s clearly overt, the others dark and covered – called to her, making themselves known with names she did not understand. Magician, Temperance, Justice, Hermit, Emperor, Empress, Devil, Hanged Man…Over and over the names sounded themselves, ghostly whispers from a place she could not tell, beloved, familiar; laced with the promise of meeting, communing, helping, touching, loving her. Then the door banged shut, and the vision was gone; the face of her destiny was lost.