The Night of the Swarm

Thasha cornered him against a fallen tree. ‘I could kill you,’ she said. ‘You just mucking stood there! Couldn’t you see how bad he was getting?’

Pazel nodded.

‘Look at me, you sorry-’

He kissed her, gently at first, then with abandon, his hands under her clothes, his hips pressing hard against her. Thasha gasped; her arms went around him, and for a moment she did not know if she was struggling or urging him on, helping him free of his trousers, giving in to his need and her own. His eyes were half-shut, he was devouring her with kisses, how could she stop him, how could she keep these boys from pain?

‘Thasha-’

‘Stop talking. Stop talking.’

He had a hand between her legs; she had her shirt up so that her breasts could touch his skin. This was the end, they were ruined. She was going to scream.

He was still. She hadn’t screamed but her mind had gone elsewhere. Those were only his fingers, his fingers; she had lost all restraint but he hadn’t, thank Rin. Her mind was racing, bliss and sadness and memories and mad notions of her destiny, all bent by the prism of his touch. That wanton girl, Arunis had cackled. Not everything he’d said was a lie.

Warm rain on her shoulder: Pazel was crying. ‘Neeps wanted this,’ he said.

‘Maybe. Yes.’

‘I was trying not to hate him. I was so angry I could barely breathe. I couldn’t look at the two of you.’

‘It’s not his fault,’ she said.

‘I know, I know. And it doesn’t matter, either. If it helps him somehow I don’t care what you do.’

They still had not moved. ‘It wouldn’t help him,’ she said. ‘Making love doesn’t protect you from the mind- plague.’

‘Maybe it does, though. Maybe he senses something. Like animals do when they’re sick.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘If this were enough, humans would still be here, wouldn’t they? Besides, he and Marila did it eight times-’

‘Eight?’

‘That’s what she told me.’ Thasha kissed his cheeks, his eyelids. ‘Pazel. . you were in nuhzat, just now.’

‘What?’

Appalled, he tried to break away, but Thasha held him tight. ‘Hush, hush. It was over in seconds. But I saw your eyes change, turn solid black like Ramachni’s. It was beautiful, you were beautiful. That’s when. . I stopped thinking.’

He was barely listening. ‘It’s the second time it’s happened to me,’ he whispered.

Thasha knew that only dlomu could experience the nuhzat, that waking trance with its visions and powers, its fear. Dlomu, and in the rarest of cases, humans who had been raised by them. Or loved them. She knew also that Pazel had slipped into nuhzat in the temple at Vasparhaven. He had told her that much. But he had told Neeps more — and Neeps, in his disordered state, had babbled some of it to Thasha.

‘You were with a dlomic woman,’ she said, hoping she didn’t sound accusatory.

‘No!’ said Pazel. ‘I mean, yes. But not with her, not like this. I can’t explain.’

She did not like the change in his voice, or the way his eyes stared past her as he spoke. ‘Anyway,’ he added, ‘I’m not sure she was a dlomu.’

‘What else could she have been?’

Pazel hesitated. ‘A spider,’ he said at last.

‘You’re insane,’ said Thasha. ‘Or I am. Oh credek. Pazel, listen: we can’t do this any more. Not until we’re safe somewhere. You know that, don’t you?’

His answer was a kiss. She returned it, not caring if the kiss meant yes or no, for the blackness was flickering in his brown eyes again, and her youth was her own and not Erithusme’s, that was as certain as his beauty, his urgency, the rising of the sun.

She turned from him again.

‘It’s too dangerous,’ she said. ‘This time I wouldn’t have stopped.’

‘I didn’t stop,’ he said. ‘I just — it was just-’

‘Oh, Pitfire.’ Thasha stepped back, lowering her shirt. ‘That’s it. I can’t end up like Marila. You have to promise me you’ll stay away.’

He laughed, reached to touch her again. Glaring, she caught his hands.

‘Night Gods, Thasha,’ he said. ‘A few minutes ago you wanted to kill me because I was keeping away. Listen, stop worrying-’

‘Oh, why should I worry? You listen, you blary ass. This time we got lucky. The first time I kept my head. No more.’

He was fumbling with his trousers, which were literally held up with string. Loving him desperately, she gripped his chin and raised it.

‘Promise.’

She was quite certain about what she was doing. Pazel, however, managed to surprise her again: he turned and rushed down the hill in the direction of the raft. Suddenly she realised that he was limping. You idiot! she thought. Why did you let him climb the hill?

She closed her eyes. His stubbornness had left her shaking with rage. When she looked again Pazel had vanished in the fog.

Once more she bolted after him. She had no clear idea of what would happen when she caught up — tears, apologies, violence? Aya Rin, don’t let him fall on that leg.

She reached level ground. The fog was now so thick that she could see just a few trees ahead of her, and only realised she was nearing the shore when the earth grew sandy among their roots. Where had he gone? She drew a breath to shout, but some instinct for caution made her hesitate. She rushed forward to the river’s edge. There was no one in sight. Had they descended the wrong side of the island? Of course not, there was the raft, and-

Pitfire!

Thasha drew her knife, whirled into a defensive stance. The raft was destroyed. The vines cut, the bladder- mushroom slashed — and the Nilstone gone. The ropes that had secured its sacking trailed in the water. Footprints surrounded the raft, a confusion of footprints, radiating in all directions from the shore. She could see no other sign of the party.

As ever in a crisis, she thought of Hercol, his wisdom and severity. Her mind became clear. She bent low beside the nearest footprints. River water was trickling into the heels, softening them even as she watched. The prints were only seconds old.

She turned at bay. Now she heard it: a wide, dispersed sound, as of many persons or creatures moving in near-silence. The heart of the sound was at too great a distance to be coming from the island itself. The shore, then. Or other boats. Whatever it was, the party was no longer alone.

Thasha stepped carefully away from the raft, then turned and darted along the shore, putting distance between herself and that unseen host. She had taken no more than ten steps when Pazel materialised out of the fog.

‘Don’t move, Thasha,’ he hissed.

Pazel was stock-still. And the next instant she saw why. A hrathmog stood facing him, gripping a huge, double-bladed axe. Water dripped from its black fur; long white fangs showed in its mouth. The shoulders beneath the crude leather jerkin were enormous.

The creature’s eyes were fixed on her, now. It stood head and shoulders taller than either of them. She held her breath, muscles twitching with apprehension. The hrathmog fingered its axe.

Then Pazel spoke: a single word in a hard, guttural tongue such as Thasha had never heard. The creature gave an uncertain reply, its voice like the growl of a bear.

‘It’s afraid of us — afraid of humans,’ Pazel murmured in Arquali. ‘It said it didn’t know this island belonged to the Lost People. That it was ordered here by its chief on the far shore. That it’s sorry for disturbing our rest.’