desecration.’
‘You think they’ll exact revenge?’ said Tiiraj.
‘They are the ClawBound. And humans have attacked the temple of Yniss.’
‘But-’ began Elyss.
‘I know,’ said Auum. ‘But those threats are of no concern to the ClawBound. They consider those enslaved in our cities to be capable of defending themselves. This is an attack on the centre of our faith. And they will avenge it.’
Auum could see that his students either didn’t understand him or didn’t believe him.
‘Study Lysael’s texts,’ said Onelle. ‘Better still, talk to her when you are next in Katura, if she’s still there. It may only be a hundred and thirty years since the first ClawBound pairing was forged, but the minds of the Bound elves are already so far beyond what we understand that you cannot apply your notions of sense and intelligence to them.’
‘Nevertheless, we must try and stop them,’ said Auum.
‘How?’ asked Tiiraj. ‘We can’t track them. How do we know where they’ll go?’
‘A good question.’ Auum spread his hands. ‘Anyone care to volunteer an answer?’
Elyss responded first. ‘They’ll want to make a statement. Something that’ll be seen quickly by the humans and make them sit up and take notice.’
‘Good,’ said Auum. ‘Malaar?’
‘Something of high value, then. Pelt hunters or rare plant gatherers?’
‘No,’ said Auum. ‘Men’s money has no meaning to the ClawBound. Think. Wirann?’
‘A high-density operation, then. Something close to Ysundeneth.’
Auum nodded. ‘Right. Why Ysundeneth?’
‘It is their power base,’ said Wirann. ‘It’s home to Ystormun.’
‘Good,’ said Auum. ‘Gyneev, if you were ClawBound where would you attack?’
‘Logging on the River Ix,’ said Gyneev without hesitation. ‘It’s heavily guarded, there are high numbers of slaves and guards, and it’s the greatest desecration of the rainforest.’
Auum knelt, Onelle and his students following his lead.
‘Tais, we pray.’ Auum placed one palm on the stone and the other he held to the sky. ‘Yniss, hear me. Beeth, hear me. Bless the ground on which the TaiGethen must run. Show us our path and guide us as we seek to stall the hand of your servants, the ClawBound.
‘Shorth, hear me. Let those sent to your embrace this day by the malign hand of man feel the grace of their passing and the welcome of our ancients. Let those men who stand before you feel the full force of your fury.
‘Ix, hear me. Guide Onelle’s hand. Bless her work and swell her spirit as she rebuilds the order of the Il-Aryn. Open their eyes to the control of their power. Speed them to strength so they may stand by us to throw down the evil of man.
‘I, Auum, ask this.’
Auum rose after a moment’s silent contemplation. Onelle stayed in prayer a while longer. When she stood, tears were in her eyes once more.
‘Ix cannot deliver me more adepts. Only Yniss can do that.’
Auum nodded. ‘I hear you, Onelle. Elyss, Malaar, you will travel with me. Tiiraj, you will lead Wirann and Gyneev. Guard the temple. Don’t leave here until I return.
‘Tais, we move.’
Chapter 3
Anyone who wondered why the elves did not seek to attack Ysundeneth sooner was not present the moment Ystormun killed our beloved Katyett.
From A Charting of Decline, by Pelyn, Arch of the Al-Arynaar, Governor of Katura
There had come a time, and he couldn’t remember when, when he made a game out of it. It was the only way to manage the pain. Manage… no, that was the wrong word. Endure, that was it. The game was to identify exactly which organ, muscle or bone hurt the most on his occasional journey to the temple of Shorth in Ysundeneth.
It began with taking a breath. That was difficult. Something to do with the fragility of his chest muscles, apparently. The problem was they were locked solid, so his ribcage wouldn’t rise and each breath was like a pathetic gasp. That pain never won the day though, it was too regular, too easy to forget.
While he was climbing the stairs in a more tortuous fashion than ever before, he compiled a shortlist to consider on the long, long shamble from the stairs to the panoramic chamber at the far end of the corridor.
His head, now there was a new entrant. Ystormun had done something to stop deterioration in his brain function. He had no idea whether it had worked or not but his head was pounding away as if his brain was trying to get out through the top of his skull. His left hip was a candidate too, the result of his last attempt on his own life.
He’d thrown himself down these very stairs and broken every bone in his left leg and a few others besides. Most had been readily healed with spell and splint but his left hip was a total mess. Shattered and cracked, he was told, beyond what magic could heal, and it made every pace agony, with fire racing down to his foot and sheeting across his lower back.
It didn’t help that his muscle atrophy appeared to be accelerating. He would have welcomed it but for the fact that it made Ystormun cross and liable to experiment in other painful ways to halt the decay.
Today, he couldn’t put the arthritis in his hands and wrists on the shortlist because his stomach was so blindingly painful. He hadn’t eaten solid food in almost twenty years, since his digestive system developed problems with anything larger than a pea. But this morning he’d woken in a puddle of diarrhoea and with cramps twisting his guts. A spell had calmed the cramps but had left the sort of pain he associated with a sword thrust through the stomach when the blade was being turned in the wound.
He reached the top of the stairs and rested against the wall while he assessed the walk he still had to make. His guards, Ystormun called them helpers though they offered little help and were clearly there to stop him attempting suicide again, waited behind and to the side of him.
‘No contest, really,’ he said to none of them, his voice hoarse over his dry throat and drier lips. ‘Today it’s the guts.’
‘We’re already late,’ said one of his helpers. He couldn’t remember the man’s name. He didn’t remember all that much these days. ‘The master does not like to be kept waiting.’
‘Well you know where he can stick it. Master. Pathetic sycophants, the lot of you.’
He moved on up the corridor, ensuring his movements were as laboured and slow as he could possibly manage. The sighs and muttered curses of his helpers gave him some tiny mote of satisfaction. There was little enough he controlled these days. Briefly, he considered soiling his clothes. He had regained control of his bowels since this morning but they didn’t know that. He decided against it. The look on their faces would almost be worth it, but the cleaning up wasn’t. It was a weapon to be used sparingly.
He liked to imagine the sun moving across the sky, albeit buried behind banks of rain-bearing cloud much of the time, while he made his agonising progress to his meetings with Ystormun. In the early years these meetings had happened every day. Not any more. And he was thankful to whichever elven god might be listening for that.
It wasn’t that Ystormun had tired of the experiment itself — and how he prayed for the day that he did. No, it was more that Calaius’ ruler had become more of an overseer, having delegated the day-to-day drudgery of keeping his subject alive to junior mages. It was unfortunate that the juniors were so diligent in their work. He shouldn’t have been surprised. Ystormun didn’t handle disappointment terribly well.
One of his minders opened the door to the panorama room and its glorious views across eastern Ysundeneth and into the ruined rainforest beyond the River Ix. The sun was bright for the moment, bathing the long airy room with glorious light. It was a fresh and bright scene quite at odds with the room’s single occupant.
Ystormun was sitting in a high-backed black leather chair behind a huge polished wooden desk. Paperweights
