Vengeance

beaten in front of you and you were so furious that you made a geyser burst from the wall. It washed the guard a hundred yards down the tunnel and broke both his legs.’

Shivers crept up Tali’s bare arms. Could it be true? She vaguely remembered a flood, then her mother shrieking and carrying her away …

‘You next used magery when you were eight — ’

‘No,’ Tali moaned, shaking her head furiously. ‘I know nothing about it.’

‘Three days after your mother’s murder the man called Tinyhead, whose real name is Sconts, was discovered crawling along a distant tunnel, bleeding from the mouth, nose, eyes and ears. He claimed to have been attacked by a horde of slaves, yet there was not a mark on him.’

‘It wasn’t me.’

‘You struck him down with a spell of your own devising. You nearly killed him.’

‘It’s not true,’ Tali whispered.

She had suppressed most of the memories of the worst day of her life, though she could remember the rage. She had directed it at the big man who had betrayed her mother, willing his tiny head to explode. Had she really done that to Tinyhead, through a stone door? The grotesquely bulging skull and ruined face, still engorged with blood ten years later, was evidence that she had.

‘Yet your gift mostly fails you. It let you down yesterday when you tried to save your only friend. That’s why you forced a girr-grub down Lifka’s throat and stole her uniform.’ Mimoy’s white-filmed eyes were on the red- brown loincloth.

‘How do you know all that?’ Tali whispered. Ah, the small, hobbling shadow she had seen earlier. ‘You’ve been following me.’

‘Watched over you ever since your mother was killed,’ said Mimoy. ‘And over her mother before that. Failed and failed!’

‘Why? Who are you?’ Perhaps Mimoy didn’t intend to betray her after all. Tali restrained the surging hope. First, she had to know the price.

‘Your mother died because she was weak,’ Mimoy spat.

‘How dare you?’ Tali cried, restraining an urge to slap the old woman.

‘Also your grandmother, and your great-grandmother and great-great-grandmother. All murdered; all weak! Are you going to let the enemy kill you too?’

‘No!’ Tali snapped. ‘I’m strong.’

‘The first time I saw your quality was when you attacked Lifka,’ said Mimoy. ‘The same ruthless quality that’s made me the oldest Pale in Cython. One hundred and nineteen yesterday.’

‘A hundred and nineteen?’ Tali echoed. In Cython, anyone who lived to fifty was regarded as old. ‘No one lives to that age.’

‘Not naturally,’ said Mimoy.

‘What are you saying?’

Mimoy shrugged her skeletal shoulders. ‘You’re going to do me a service.’

Could the old woman be genuine? Mimoy’s eyes gave nothing away, but any Pale to survive so long with the gift would be adept at concealing her thoughts.

‘My mother told me to trust no one.’

‘Sound advice to a gifted child,’ said Mimoy, ‘but it won’t keep you alive until breakfast. Do you remember what else she told you?’

‘You must find your … your …’ It almost choked Tali to say the forbidden word aloud. ‘You must find your gift, and master it. It’s the only way to beat him.’

The sucked-in mouth twitched. ‘You haven’t found it, have you?’

‘I’ve tried,’ Tali said grudgingly, ‘but nothing ever happens.’ Her fingers clutched at her frayed waistband. ‘I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.’

‘We have three kinds of gramarye,’ said Mimoy, and held up her splintered fingernail. ‘House vi Torgrist — ’

‘How do you know?’ Tali burst out. ‘Who — ?’

The wiry fingers pinched Tali’s lips together until her eyes watered, and held her for a painful minute. ‘I talk, you listen, yes?’

Tali balled her fists, then unclenched them. Had Mimoy come to help her? It must be so. ‘Yes!’ Damn you.

‘The old magery came from our ancestral homeland of Thanneron, now lost beneath the creeping ice, with the First Fleet that brought the Herovians to Hightspall. But none of magery’s three forms worked as well in Hightspall. The land fights it and it grows ever weaker.’

Mimoy turned her head to one side then the other, like a crow watching for a cat.

‘Is that why — ?’

Mimoy raised a hand and Tali broke off, touching her bruised lips. The vicious old woman was her only hope, but any help would be on Mimoy’s terms.

‘A few of the original houses, including vi Torgrist, possessed heritage magery — a subtle gift which can only be mastered by looking within oneself. Wizard training ruins it.’

‘So that’s what I’ve been doing wrong — ’

‘Are you as stupid as you look?’ hissed Mimoy.

Tali looked at her blankly.

‘Is your gift subtle?’

Blowing up Tinyhead’s head could hardly be described as subtle. The thought gave her strength.

‘There’s also traditional magery,’ Mimoy continued. ‘The study and practice of the lore under a master.’

Clearly, Tali did not have that branch of magery, either.

‘And finally, magery that comes from the use of enchanted objects. Spells any fool can set off.’

Tali had never seen an enchanted object. If there were any in Cython, their owners kept them well hidden. And that meant -

‘You may speak,’ said Mimoy.

‘If there are three kinds of magery, and I have none of them … I don’t understand.’

Taking Tali’s head between her wire claws, Mimoy pressed the blade-beak nose against Tali’s nose and stared into her eyes.

Tali tried to glare back but the pressure of Mimoy’s will was, like water squirting from a break in the Siphons, enough to wash her away. Turn aside, the eyes said. Don’t take me on, you little fool.

I may be young but I’m not a fool. And I won’t be beaten by you. Tali raised her chin and forced herself to meet Mimoy’s old eyes, to hold her gaze.

After a few seconds, the old woman drew back. ‘Stronger than I thought,’ she said grudgingly. ‘But are you strong enough?’

‘Yes, I am,’ said Tali, and the strength that Mimoy had drained away at the beginning came surging back. ‘I’m going to beat Tinyhead. I’m going to escape and punish the people who killed my mother — every one of them.’

‘Brave words,’ sneered Mimoy, ‘but how are you going to get away from the matriarchs?’

‘What have they got to do with me?’

With a disgusted snort, Mimoy turned and headed for the door. ‘Useless after all.’

Tali watched her go, not understanding. ‘Wait,’ she cried, realising that the old woman had given up on her. ‘Where are you going? Don’t leave me — ’

Mimoy turned and struck Tali across the face. ‘Never beg!’

She rubbed her stinging cheek. ‘I’ve never even seen the matriarchs. Why do they want me?’

‘Wil the Sump told you.’ Mimoy dripped scorn. ‘Have you no brains at all?’

‘He called me the one. What did he mean by that?’

‘You don’t know?’

‘How could I know? I’m not psychic.’

‘It means,’ gritted Mimoy, ‘that after many years of searching, the matriarchs finally know the name of the