Crusader (35 page)

The ball of light flew off his foot…straight down the blue-misted tunnel.

As it flew through the air, it transformed, until it took the shape of a white lily.

A portion of railing fell from above and struck Qeteb on the head. He grunted, and thrown momentarily off-balance,
he missed the chance to direct his power after the fleeing woman.

The tunnel wavered, and closed.

Qeteb went berserk.

By the time he’d finished, there was nothing left of Spiredore save a wisp of smoke and a pile of pitiable debris.

T
hey’d slipped through Qeteb’s fingers for the moment, but he knew they had not slipped far. Qeteb
knew
where the five had gone and, knowing, he could afford to wait. They would be going nowhere—and could accomplish nothing.

In the meantime he and his could grow stronger. Invincible.

Sanctuary.

Once Sanctuary was gone—and those within it, as their power consumed—there was nothing that could stop the Demons. They were six again, they controlled the power of the Enemy, and DragonStar and the five would be crushed like delicate spring flowers within Qeteb’s fist.

Qeteb had, for the moment, forgotten the virulence of that lily.

He laughed and strutted as he looked over the pile of debris that had once been Spiredore, his fists opening and closing with infinite patience as he moved, the mail of his armour creaking very slightly as his joints flexed.

Then Qeteb raised his head and gazed about. Behind him rose the Maze—the dark, glorious Maze, both his prison and his heaven—while to the north, west and south lay only the devastation of drifting ash and dead earth under the hopeless night sky.

And those eager to please.

There was one thing Qeteb could do to keep DragonStar’s witches out of mischief until he could give them his full attention.

He began to whisper, and about him the air filled with howls and screams as the demonic gibbered their approval.

There was little peace in Sanctuary. Urbeth was here, and while Urbeth said she could help them escape, Urbeth remained completely silent on the “how’s” and “wherefore’s”, and spent much of her time snapping and growling and making sarcastic comments about everyone’s state of readiness.

Axis spent as much time snapping back at her. The entire land—all that had survived Qeteb’s resurrection—was hidden here. Sanctuary throbbed with life, but it was life that lay only a moment away from total annihilation, and all that stood between them and that moment was Urbeth’s damned reticent aid and Axis’ need to get everyone and everything organised.

There may have been little peace, but what stunned Axis was the fact that there was utter calm. He’d always believed that peace and calm went hand in hand, but apparently not. Everyone within Sanctuary was now aware of the imminent danger, and everyone was aware that an escape was being planned—although not everyone was aware that, apparently, Urbeth meant to dump them (how? how? how?) in the frozen wastes of the northern tundra.

It was not only the Icarii, Acharites, Ravensbund and Avar who were aware of some of these things. The animal, bird and insect life also seemed apprised of not only the threat, but of the plans for escape. And of everyone, the exiled fauna of Tencendor seemed the calmest and the most organised.

Striding about Sanctuary supervising the loading of supplies that would continue through the night, Axis came across population after population of beetle, or millipede or butterfly, patiently clinging or clumping to baskets and panniers: none of the packhorses or mules seemed to mind
carrying a load of insects or even birds. Axis stood openmouthed with astonishment at the sight of one draughthorse standing, so covered with bats, that only his drooping head appeared from the shifting, squeaking (but not complaining) mass of grey and brown fur that had buried its myriad claws into his thick winter coat.

Several hundred carts were filled with dozing seals: cats, dogs and poultry snuggled with no hint of squabbling or rancour between the seals’ warm, gently heaving sides. Oxen, cows, mules and horses stood waiting yoked or collared to the carts, many with birds clinging to spines or manes. Elsewhere grouped herds of livestock or of wild creatures, each herd ignoring nearby animals even though under more normal circumstances they might be natural competitors or even enemies.

Ravensbundmen and women moved about among the animals, checking and adjusting the gear of those creatures yoked or collared to carts, murmuring and soothing any creature that appeared nervous and jittery. Axis had seen Urbeth talk to Sa’Domai earlier: undoubtedly the Ravensbundmen were the best adapted to working in the conditions that faced them, but they also appeared to be particularly suited to working and empathising with animals. Was it because they were hunters and used to the ways of wild creatures, Axis wondered, or simply because the Ravensbundmen were more than half-wild themselves?

Intermingling with everything and everybody were the fey creatures that had once populated the forests. Shifting shapes and colours, winking jewel-like eyes and horns, with strange, soft cries and gentle touches, the fey creatures slipped in and out of every pack and herd, spreading calm and even, Axis suspected, some sense of hope.

But, strangest of all the creatures that Axis saw, were the huddled creatures from Bogle Marsh. They were grouped so closely that Axis could not tell them apart. They simply formed one massive lump of grey, steaming flesh that
extended some thirty paces into the air and spread some sixty or seventy paces wide.

The entire pile was gently humming to itself: some strange, marshland melody that rose and fell in gentle, if gigantic, undulations over the other creatures about them.

Axis could feel it vibrating up through his feet, and was strangely soothed by its touch.

“Axis?”

He turned. It was Zared, looking cross and tired.

“Urbeth,” Zared said with more than a trace of aspersion, “has just had a new thought.”

Axis repressed a smile. He did not think it had helped Zared’s temper.

“She wants us,” Zared continued, “to pack some four or five hundred large, shallow bowls, as well three hundred barrels of potent malmsbury wine.”

Axis remained silent, although he let the question flood his face.

“I have no idea why!” Zared said, and gestured aside impatiently.

“Undoubtedly Urbeth has her reasons,” Axis said gently. “Zared…Zared, I know there is little I can say to help you. I know how you must be feeling with Leagh—”

“Do you?” Zared said, his eyes hard. “Do you?”

“Aye,” Axis said, “I do. Azhure and I fought apart much of our time, and I spent much of that time in agony wondering whether or not I would ever see her again. Do not blame me for the fact that currently I know she is safe.”

Zared visibly forced himself to relax. “I’m sorry. But…none of us are ‘safe’, are we? Azhure perhaps stands in as much danger as does Leagh.”

“As do you and I.”

“Yes,” Zared sighed. “As do you and I.” He swept his eyes about the scene before him, letting them linger briefly on the pile of humming Bogle Marsh creatures. “As does every creature in this gods-forsaken place.”

“I assume that Sanctuary has supplied the bowls and malmsbury?”

Zared sighed again, managing a rueful smile as he did so. “Oh, aye. The best quality malmsbury wine I have ever seen. I think you and I, brother, should broach a cask before morning.”

Axis grinned. “I look forward to it. I doubt overmuch if Urbeth will notice a glass or two gone.”

Once Zared had left, Axis continued his wander through the hordes slowly gathering for the exodus. He had a vague, very slightly uncomfortable feeling, almost as if he was looking for something, but not knowing what.

So he walked through the half twilight that, in Sanctuary, passed for night. As people approached him and asked questions, so Axis answered as best he could, but he did not seek out conversation. He knew that Azhure and StarDrifter awaited him back in their apartments—StarDrifter in particular had appeared anxious to discuss something with him—but Axis’ need to find
something
drove him deeper into Sanctuary and the milling hordes of peoples and creatures awaiting escape.

How many millions had DragonStar made him responsible for?

Axis felt an immense burden of responsibility literally weigh down on his shoulders and he had to force them back to stand straight. Even with Urbeth’s uncertain aid, could he pull this off?

And how did he feel about the Skraelings? Gods, he had
never
thought to have to face them again!

Then Axis stopped, stunned out of his thoughts.

What he’d been searching for so vaguely and uncertainly stood in front of him—as nervous and unsure as he was.

She was plain and brown and with the skittishness of the very young. She lifted her head and caught sight of Axis. She stilled.

Axis smiled, and held out a hand, moving very slowly towards her.

She did not move, although her black eyes rolled with her inner uncertainty.

Axis smiled, and touched her cheek.

She trembled, and he ran his hand down her neck.

A fine, brown, but very young mare of only three or four years.

Axis’ smile broadened. “You’re not quite Belaguez, but somehow I think you will do just as well.”

Suddenly he relaxed. He had a task, impossible as it might seem, and now he had a mount, as insignificant as she might appear. Life was falling together neatly.

Axis tugged at the brown mare’s forelock, and she lowered her head and gently butted him in the chest.

“’Er name’s Sal.”

Axis looked over the mare’s withers; a small, wizened man sat upon a bale of provisions on the other side almost hidden in the shadows of a pile of canvas-covered provisions rising behind him. His small body was hunched and rounded, his skin brown and splotched, his head covered only by several strands of drab hair, and his face so layered with wrinkles his bright brown eyes were all but hidden. His entire demeanour was generally plain and brown and drab, enlivened only by his mischievous eyes.

Apart from the incongruity of his eyes, there was something else about the man’s appearance that made Axis stare. This old man, plain and drab as he was, had Icarii features.

And his cloaked, hunched form looked as though it hid wings within the shadows at his back.

But what Icarii aged, or was plain and
drab,
for the gods’ sakes?

The man’s mouth twisted wryly as he saw Axis’ stare. “Yer recognise a fellow, don’t you?”

And what Icarii affected such common, country speech?

Axis opened his mouth, hesitating before he spoke. “You are Icarii bred, and yet you demonstrate none of the beauty and dignity of the Icarii. Why?”

A Traitor? A Demon?

The old man cackled, the sound curiously bird-like, and Axis moved slightly so his sword hand was free to move.

“Well, yeah, yer do be observant,” the man all but whispered, a secretive expression on his face. “I’ll give you that. But I were never Icarii-bred, no sir, not me. I claim no such pretensions!”

“You have Icarii features. You
must
have Icarii blood in you.”

The old man grinned slyly. “I do share my face and blood with your proud Icarii, man, but I’m not one of your flighty lot.”

Axis narrowed his eyes, his hand now resting on the hilt of his sword, but he said nothing.

The wizened old man seemed not to care. “Call me Da,” he said. “It’s as good a name as any.”

It was no name at all Axis thought. “Da” was the peasant word for father.

Da pointed a gnarled finger at the mare. “And she be Sal.”

“Well, Da,” Axis said. “You are a strange man—”

Da giggled, rocking back and forth on the bale.

“—and I would know more of you. And of your pretty brown Sal.” Axis had still not relaxed his grip on his sword hilt. There was only one thing he was sure of, and that was that this old man was not who he pretended to be.

Da put a finger to his pursed mouth, in a parody of thought. “Who do I be? And who do be Sal?”

Axis shifted, annoyed. The man’s affectation of country language was starting to grate.

“I do be a father,” Da said.

Father?

“I do watch over my children.”

Axis said nothing.

Suddenly the old man dropped his peasantish affectation, and looked Axis directly in the eye.

“I do the best for my children,” he said, “even when they demonstrate consummate stupidity. That, I swear, they got from their mother.”

Axis was caught fast by the man’s eyes, fierce and angry now.

Far away he heard Urbeth roar.

Da laughed. “From their mother, aye.”

Axis went cold. His hand dropped away from his sword. “What do you want?” he said.

“To give you a gift. To give the Icarii a last gift…and still a gift of flight, methinks.”

Axis was numb, still not quite believing whom he was talking to. “A gift?”

“’Er.” The man-sparrow nodded in Pretty Brown Sal’s direction, then turned his eyes back to Axis. “It’s not the first horse I’ve given you, you know.”

“Which—”

“Belaguez.”

And now Axis truly did go cold. He had acquired—there was no other verb to express it—Belaguez when he had just been appointed BattleAxe. One of the Axe Wielders had reported that there was a grey colt tied up in the palace courtyard, with no explanation save for Axis’ name engraved on the small brass plate sewn into the colt’s halter.

When Axis had walked into the courtyard to see for himself, a small sparrow had been foraging for insects in Belaguez’s forelock. When Axis had attempted to brush it aside, the sparrow had jumped onto his hand and run chattering up his sleeve to his shoulder before finally flying off.

Then, absorbed by the magnificent colt, Axis had paid no attention.

Now, he finally managed to recover his manners.

“I thank you,” he said, moving around Sal so he could bow in the sparrow’s direction.