‘It might be an idea to get a move on,’ said Tobry.
‘I’m not going quietly!’ Rix drew the enchanted sword that he had once feared, and now was his mainstay against the foe at journey’s end. Raising it high, he roared, ‘Ride, ride, or the whole world is dead!’
Hours later they stopped at the lookout where they had rested briefly on the way to Precipitous Crag, over a week ago. Smoke and fumes hid both the Vomits and Caulderon now, though the sky was clear to the south and the red moon rode high, reflecting off a white ocean for as far as they could see.
‘The sea ice clamps around the coast of Hightspall like a fist,’ said Tobry. ‘The end can’t be far away.’
The nightmare almost choked Rix. ‘How can it be the end? Why are we being punished? What have we done wrong?’
No one had an answer.
They navigated the narrow valley in the brooding darkness under the blood-bark trees, the hooves making little sound in deep snow, then left the horses next to the boulder-studded strip of open land where the caitsthe had attacked.
Tobry wiped icy sweat from his forehead. His terror of shifters could not be contained. And perhaps he’s still blaming himself for letting me down last time, Rix thought, which was absurd. Tobry never gave less than his all.
As they were crawling through the vine thicket, Rannilt let out a little, hoarse cry. ‘I can smell blood.’
They scrambled out into the open, next to the looming bulk of the Crag. It was frigid here. Tobry’s lips moved in what looked suspiciously like a prayer, surely the first that had ever crossed his disbelieving lips.
Let it not be Tali’s.
CHAPTER 79
The horses wore goggles, and so did Tali’s guards, lighting their way with black-light lanterns that reeked of magery. They did not speak all the way, and neither would they answer Tali’s questions, but she could smell the fear on them. They wanted to go to Precipitous Crag no more than she did.
What if Cython was planning genocide? There might be nothing to come back to — no Tobry, no Rix, no Rannilt, nor the chancellor himself who, despite his failings, was the main hope of Hightspall.
But if she did love her country, if she could give Hightspall a chance, she had to try. How could she take Lyf on, though? Tali did not know where to begin.
She reminded herself of her other victories against impossible odds, but her disquiet only strengthened. Rix and Tobry were powerful and experienced, yet they had nearly died here. How could she survive when she had no idea how to combat her enemy? The heatstone gave her no confidence — she might break it and nothing happen.
When they dismounted below the cave entrance in the early hours after midnight, mounting terror turned her bowels liquid. Even had her magery been in full flower she would not have been ready to take on Lyf.
‘What am I supposed to do?’ she whispered.
There was no way of knowing what defences he had inside, or what forces he commanded here at the centre of his power, though she knew he had shifters penned below. Even had she been armed she could not have fought such creatures.
‘Why ask us?’ said the taller guard, a muscular blonde with shoulders like a blacksmith. She handed Tali a small pack containing food, drink and the heatstone. ‘You’re
‘You’ll still be here when I come out?’ asked Tali.
‘We have our orders,’ said the other guard, who was compact and had a cap of black, dancing curls. ‘Go!’
She shot a crossways glance at the tall guard and Tali saw fear in their eyes, skilled fighters though they were. They crawled through the vine thicket and disappeared. She was on her own.
Hunching down out of the keening wind, she tried to plan. The chancellor might be desperate but he wasn’t reckless; he would not have sent her here unless her chance of succeeding outweighed the risk of losing her. Tali took comfort from that thought — until she remembered that he did not know about the master pearl. He would never have risked it.
It was perishing here, yet the cave was worse: it was breathing out air frigid enough to shatter iron, a bone-aching cold that sucked the resolve from her. How could she hope to beat a wrythen who had surmounted death for two thousand years and was driven by such implacable purpose? A wrythen who possessed an ebony pearl and knew how to use it?
The master pearl had to be cut out of living tissue. If he knew she was here, he would try to take it. Or would he? If he could extract the pearl himself, why had he directed Tinyhead to carry her to the murder cellar in Caulderon? Why involve others and take such a risk of being robbed of the pearls — as, indeed, he had lost three of them? Perhaps he could not take them himself.
She edged down the passage at the rear of the cave. She had no lantern but there was enough light for an underground dweller like herself to see by. Ahead, the centre of the passage was heaped with broken stone where Lyf had brought the roof down and knocked Tobry out. The caitsthe’s corpse was gone but she could smell its blood.
She shoved her arms deep into her fur-lined pockets and was veering left where the rubble was lowest when she felt a shivery pain in her shins and heard an outraged whisper,
Tali shot around, staring into the gloom. Rix had hurt the wrythen here and driven it off. Were the words and the pain just an echo of Lyf’s trauma, or did he know she was coming? Was he already sharpening the knife?
She went on, so cold that a deadly lethargy, almost impossible to fight, was creeping over her. Every surface was glazed with pearly layers of ice, so slippery that it was a struggle to walk. She did not recall Tobry mentioning ice; the change must have come since he was here. But why? Could Lyf be behind the ice packs encircling Hightspall? No, that was absurd; no man could wield such power — could he?
At the maze of passageways she put the spectible over her eyes and saw, by the faint twinkle of magery, which path to take. She lurched on and reached the junction Tobry had mentioned. One way led down to shifter pens but her hackles rose at the thought of going near them. The other plunged to an uncanny cavern where the wrythen dwelt. But which was which?
The air was so cold it carried no scent. Because it felt right, she took the glassy-walled path, which became a steep set of steps leading down beyond sight. In the semi-darkness, where the stone beneath her could barely be distinguished, she had to concentrate on every step.
After taking three steps she knew it was too easy. Where were the shifters, the alarms and traps? Lyf had been outraged at Rix and Tobry’s trespass, so why didn’t he show himself?
Tobry had said the stairs ended in mid-air, but this one ran down into a space she struggled to understand even when it resolved into a tall chamber that resembled an upside-down flask bent around and through itself. It felt unnatural, though Tali could not see it clearly enough to know why. She measured each step, careful to make no sound. Lyf could be anywhere, watching from the shadows, hiding within the wall, preparing to strike.
Her heart was beating erratically — racing one minute, deathly slow the next, and sometimes missing beats altogether. Her blood seemed to be thickening in her veins, her heart fighting to pump at all. She swung her arms, clenched and unclenched her fists, though it did not help.
Statues ringed the circular top of the chamber, at least a hundred of them, all dressed like the images of kings and queens she had seen in Cython. Their eyes followed her, and she sensed both rage and curiosity, though none moved, none spoke.
She reached the bottom of a twilight world, turned left and gazed about her in wonder. It was like being inside one of the glass retorts she had seen chymisters carrying in Cython — was that symbolic? — though this one was upside-down with the bulb high above her and the broad neck curving down, flattening at the base where she stood and sweeping up again to pass,
Away to her left towered a platina-distilling apparatus a good twenty feet high. Three chairs shaped like
