The Night of the Swarm

Her accent was a bit like Cayer Vispek’s. Yes, he thought. Erithusme was born in Nohirin, a Mzithrini land.

She squinted at him, perplexed. ‘Can’t you talk?’

He was about to answer, but he stopped himself. Let her do the talking. Let her explain why he shouldn’t hate the sight of her. But the woman only clicked her tongue and stomped towards him. Before he could decide whether to fight or flee she slapped one bony hand over his eyes, and when she lowered it the Demon’s Court was changed.

There were columns, now, and a partial roof. There were heaps of sand and masonry. A wall with chains and shackles. Stone benches so old and worn they looked like waxworks left out in the sun.

‘This is how the Court appeared in the days when I wielded the Stone,’ she said. ‘They kept prisoners in that corner, over there; if you look carefully you can still find their teeth. I am glad the selk cleared all this rubbish away.’

‘Why did you bring it back, then?’

‘I needed something to sit on. The ground may do for tarboys, but not respectable ladies like me.’

She laughed. Pazel did not. The woman shrugged and walked to a bench.

‘Let us get down to business,’ she said. ‘Time has stopped outside the Court, but it is passing for you and me — and for them, especially for them. Watch out for the fire.’

‘What do mean? What fire?’

‘The one directly behind you.’

He turned: not five feet away stood an iron cauldron on three stout legs. Within it a few small logs crackled spitefully. The smoke rose straight as a plumb line to the heavens.

‘The fire is our timepiece,’ she said. ‘We may talk as long as it burns, and no longer. Come and sit beside me.’

Pazel stood his ground. The mage looked at him with some irritation.

‘I am not some lurking spirit, boy. I have not spied on you two. A little of her knowledge and emotion reaches me, faintly, like noises through a wall. Otherwise I have had nothing to do with her.’

Liar, he thought. Aloud, he asked, ‘Where are they?’

‘Deep in the earth,’ said Erithusme, ‘and you should be glad of that, because what we are doing would be impossible if they were anywhere else.’

‘What are we doing, exactly?’

‘Thasha is experiencing the anguish that results when a part of oneself leaves the flesh. Ramachni and Lord Arim are protecting her. And I–I am a soul without a body, a soul who has hidden in Thasha’s body for seventeen years, deaf and mute. I could not speak with Ramachni, or the selk, or the few other vital allies the Ravens have yet to kill. Not even, maddeningly, to Thasha. But tonight, and tonight alone, I am free to speak with you. To help our cause if I can.’

She pinched her arm. ‘This flesh is illusion, of course. I can manage illusion even without a body, in this exceptional place.’

Pazel walked slowly to the bench. ‘I don’t believe you’re a part of Thasha.’

‘Nor am I.’

He felt a surge of relief — but then the mage tossed her head back, laughing like a crow.

‘Ridiculous idea! Of course, Thasha is a part of me. And only a tiny part, a cutting from a sprawling vine. The fact that the girl has a body, and that I destroyed the one you’re gaping at when I hid from my enemies within her — those are incidentals, nothing more.’

‘You’ve been trying to steal Thasha’s body,’ said Pazel, hating her. ‘I’ve watched the whole blary struggle. You’ve been clawing at her from the inside, trying to get out.’

‘No, Pazel. Thasha has been begging me to come out.’

‘What?’

‘From a few hours after she slew Arunis. Waking and sleeping, in her thoughts and her dreams. She knows that I must rejoin the fight — and so do you, if you are honest with yourself.’

‘We’ve managed without you. We killed Arunis without you.’

The mage looked at him silently. Pazel met her gaze, not at all sure if he were defending some vital truth or simply making a fool of himself. They had also let Arunis unleash the Swarm.

‘The job must be done, boy,’ she said, not unkindly. ‘It is worth the sacrifice of a life. Any life.’

‘Isn’t that just what you’ve planned, you and Ramachni? For Thasha to remember, to welcome you back, with your twelve hundred years of memories? To die, in other words?’

Erithusme laughed again, but now the laugh was bitter. ‘A genius,’ she said. ‘He’s seen right through our wicked hearts! Listen to me: Thasha Isiq was never meant to die — but I was.’

He stared at her, dumbfounded. The old woman sighed and rubbed the back of her neck. ‘Thasha Isiq’s mind has two chambers. The first is where her soul resides. It controls her body, her senses; it is entirely in charge. The second chamber is my deep refuge, my cave. I am free to leave it — but should I do so anywhere but here, where time is at a standstill, I should be dispersed like smoke on the wind: truly dead at last. Of course you’d like that.’

‘I wouldn’t,’ he said.

‘Just look at your face. Why, you’d break into song. You and Macadra, and the ghost of Arunis, and the Night Gods waiting to settle Alifros when the Swarm has done its work. I can read a face, boy. I know you wish me death.’

Pazel turned and walked to the cauldron. The fire was much lower, a shrinking blossom in a grey wreath of ash. ‘You can’t read my face,’ he said. ‘In fact I’m not sure what you can do, except talk and lie.’

The mage’s eyes flashed, but Pazel found he truly wasn’t afraid. She had her plans. She’d keep to them. Tossing insults back at her wouldn’t change things.

After a moment Erithusme dropped her eyes. ‘We should not quarrel. We are allies in the greatest fight since the Dawn War. The fight I was thrust into twelve hundred years ago, when I was little older than you. Before I ever suspected I might be a mage. No, I cannot die just yet. And neither can Thasha Isiq.’

She jabbed a bony finger at him. ‘Watch her. She is tempted to destroy herself. She thinks that if she drowns or suffocates it might let me return, but that is not true. It would be the end of us both.

‘And it would indeed kill Thasha if we attempted to share one consciousness — to merge into a single, undivided being. As you guessed, her soul would simply drown in mine. She is indeed a little cutting from my ancient stem, you see. But that cutting has grown roots and leaves and branches. It came from me, but ultimately you’re quite right, boy: it is not part of me any longer. Her soul is tiny, but complete in itself. How did you know?’

A silence. The mage looked him up and down. ‘Never mind that,’ she said. ‘Just listen, for the love of Rin: Thasha’s soul and my own must dwell in separate chambers, always. But we can still pass in the hall.’

‘The hall?’

‘Between the two chambers of her mind. Between the seat of consciousness and my darkened cave.’ She spread her hands. ‘There, now you have it. The great nefarious plan came down to this, boy: that our souls would trade places, until this damnable fight is won. Sit down, will you?’

Pazel just looked at her. ‘Trade places, until we deal with the Nilstone?’

‘Until I deal with it.’

‘And what then?’

Erithusme looked away, gazing at the suspended leaves, the frozen figure of Thaulinin on the hilltop, the untwinkling stars. ‘Then,’ she said heavily, ‘I concede the truth of what her mother told me at the start: that it is time for my long life to end. Then I leave both chambers to Thasha Isiq, and let the wind take my soul where it will.’

‘You promise that?’

She shot him a startled look. ‘I promised to let Thasha choose freely.’ An awkward silence fell. Something’s missing, Pazel thought. Is she lying, or just holding something back?