Читать книгу The Melded Child - Rebecca Locksley - Страница 9

In the dead land, shadows flew above Jindabyne and the stench of rot filled her nostrils. The shadows grew into birdlike things the grey-blue colour of veins with three wings and long misshapen necks. Their cruel black eyes glittered. Twisting their necks down at a painful angle, the bird things gouged their beaks into Jindabyne’s shrinking flesh, leaving deep red gashes. Stringy red flesh dangled from their beaks as they pulled them up out of her. Their ice-cold claws dug in as they gulped the flesh down.

Suddenly someone threw open a door and light blasted the shadows away. Birdsong rang out bright and loud and the clean smell of sweet-oil overpowered the stench of rot. Jindabyne’s eyes opened to see a man was leaning over her with his hands on her face. His healing power smoothed into her like warm, golden honey and for a moment she relaxed into it.

Only for a moment.

Braids interwoven with feathers. Sweet life! A Mori!

“What...? Where am I?”

“You are in the Mori camp,” said the man kindly. “Rest now. You were exhausted and shocked.”

He held a slightly salty drink to her lips. She was lying on a bed of skins and, above her, a huge canopy was stretched between trees. Its sides were open to the sky, and she could see four little green parrots chewing on the sweet-oil nuts in one tree. The sight of them busily climbing round the branches was very comforting. She didn’t want to think about the reason she needed comfort.

Then she felt the cold weight around her neck. An iron collar to prevent her from using her magic. She was a helpless prisoner. Olga! Where was she?! The man did not try to stop her as she scrambled up from the pile of skins. A group of Mori were standing outside the tent and they turned to stare at her.

“Where’s my daughter?” she stammered.

“Your daughter?” said a contemptuous voice speaking Mirayan. A tall dark-haired young woman stepped out from among the watching Mori. From her almond shaped eyes, she must be half-Tari; a very beautiful young girl but her expression was ugly. “How ironic that we now keep you from you daughter, Jindabyne Tari.”

“I’m sorry? What do you mean?”

“You don’t know me, Jindabyne? Alyx Verdey?”

Jindabyne could only look at her uncomprehendingly. She knew that Verdey was the name of the Mori ruling house but this girl was far too young to be the queen.

The girl made a contemptuous noise. “How well you feign innocence! Bring her!” she said to the others and two strong women seized Jindabyne’s arms.

“Where’s my daughter?” she cried as they dragged her across a clearing towards a huge enclosure made of skins. “Olga! Olga!”

She thought she heard a child calling out but before she could be certain, the women were hustling her along a corridor with cloth walls and no roof.

“Where are you taking me?” she cried to them in trade talk.

“Shut up!” snarled Alyx, who was striding before them. The corridor opened up into a wide enclosed space. At the end of this space was a tent open at one side and floored with beautiful skins.

The young girl went over to three who sat on stumps of wood at the centre of the enclosure and took her place behind them. Two were Mori, a woman and a blindfolded man dressed in fine skins, hair decorated with bright feathers, and carrying staffs banded with copper. The central figure was a woman, though she wore breeches like a man. It was impossible to tell anything else about her for a black hood like a bag with slits for eyes covered the woman’s head.

The hooded Queen! Even in the seclusion of the women’s quarters Jindabyne had heard of the sinister queen of the Mori. A woman who never showed her face, a ruthless sorceress who had reunited the Mori tribes after their defeat at Wolf’s hands, and who had forced the Mirayan settlers from their homes in the forest. She was rumoured to be a Tari, which accounted for why the Guardians favoured her so unfairly. Wolf had once told her that the Queen was so hideous that she hid her face. Wolf had hated the Mori Queen.

“Jindabyne! It is you!” cried the hooded woman.

This woman must know her from the forgotten time, but she did not sound as if it had been happy knowledge.

“Lady,” said Jindabyne politely, curtseying and trying to hide the fear swirling in her gut as best she could.

“So now you are in my power.”

“Have we met before Lady?” She couldn’t stop her voice from trembling.

“How can you have forgotten?” snarled the Queen. She leapt up from her seat and suddenly she was on Jindabyne, her hands grabbing her shoulders, shaking her roughly. “I have not forgotten. I will never forget you and how you handed us over to him.”

“Who lady? Please forgive me! I remember nothing of the past,” Jindabyne cried. The woman had stopped shaking her. Her eyes glared through the slits of her hood. Over the woman’s shoulder, young Alyx Verdey hovered, her face tense and fearful.

The Queen threw Jindabyne to the ground.

“My sisters told me of the mindblast,” she said, spitting out the sour words. “You lucky bitch. I remember everything. Every damned thing.”

“Lady, if I wronged you, I humbly beg pardon,” cried Jindabyne. “Please forgive me. I was another person then.”

The Mori woman was at the Queen’s side, dragging on her arm talking to her urgently in a language that Jindabyne did not understand. The queen let herself be pulled away before suddenly turning back.

“Have you really forgotten me Jindabyne? I find that very hard to believe.”

She ripped the covering off her face.

Jindabyne gasped. Before her stood the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. Utterly, utterly, breathtakingly lovely. How could she have forgotten her?

As she stared in open mouthed amazement, the woman’s eyes widened and the glaring hatred on her face changed to bitter amusement.

“So! Marigoth was right,” she said, her mouth twisting wryly. “Or I am less memorable than I thought.”

“Lady, I am sorry,” cried Jindabyne wringing her hands. “I always suspected that I did wrong in the past, but I am different now and willing to make amends.”

The savagery of the woman’s glare did not make her any less beautiful. For a moment Jindabyne thought she was going to leap on her again, but then she slumped back onto her seat.

“Take her away!” she said her voice heavy with disgust. “I cannot bear the sight of her.”

“Lady please!” cried Jindabyne, as the guards dragged her away. “If you wish revenge... Do not harm the others. They are innocent of any harm to you.”

Alyx found herself laughing mirthlessly at the irony of it all.

That was the great ruthless mage, Jindabyne? That weak cringing woman who was still apologising as she was dragged beyond the enclosure walls. Aunt Marigoth had said she was changed but that ... She was more Mirayan than Tari.

Alyx’s mother let out a roar of rage and leap from her seat shaking her fist at the sky.

“Sweet life! Why have you blessed her with forgetfulness when I remember everything?” Alyx, Warleader Inez and Shaman Jark sat open mouthed as Queen Elena, normally so controlled, kicked savagely at her tree stump throne, screaming curses until she was exhausted and panting, her fists still clenching with rage. Then suddenly she threw back her head and laughed.

“Oh no!” breathed Inez, a sentiment Alyx silently echoed. Laughter on the edge of hysteria - this couldn’t be good.

“Oh I was a fool,” cried Elena. “I was a fool to hope for vengeance. The past is dead and done for.” Her face was bitter as she turned to the others, but she looked sane enough.

“Bring the boy to me, Alyx.”

The two young men, Alain Seagani and Serge Madraga, had been kept separately from the other Gibadgee prisoners so that they could not tell them of the terrible pollution of the rivers. Both Seagani and Mirayan had long coveted the Mori’s sacred forest and should they hear that the Mori were so short of water and game that they would very soon be forced to migrate to the foothills of the Gen Mountains where there were still unpolluted springs, their tribesmen were certain to take advantage of it. Most of the Gibadgee party would probably be blindfolded and set free on the edge of the forest but some other fate awaited the two young men.

Alyx felt queasy as she watched the guards untie Serge Madraga from the tree where he’d been bound. Her mother had the ability to command complete devotion, indeed love, from anyone who saw her face. Her Tari aunts had called this “the gift of fatal beauty.” Those who looked upon Elena, especially men, lost all sense of self-preservation which was why her mother kept her face hidden as much as possible. Only Tari showed any resistance to her power.

Alyx had hated the few times when her mother had used her face to enslave people. So unfair. So ... un-Tari. Was she about to enslave Wolf Madraga’s son, by showing him her face? Alyx wanted vengeance as much as her mother did, but this didn’t seem right.

But her mother always knew what she was doing.

Alyx ordered Serge Madraga to be brought to the Queen.

“Where’s my stepmother? Why have you separated her from her child? It’s inhuman,” demanded Madraga. Always the Mirayans demanded. Alyx hardened her heart. He was her enemy and deserved no mercy just as his father had shown none when he had murdered her father!

“When I was her age, you Mirayans separated me from my mother and beat me if she did not comply with your demands,” retorted Alyx. “Don’t tell me what’s inhuman. Bring him!”

When she entered the royal enclosure, Alyx was relieved to see that her mother was again wearing her hood. The Queen addressed the Mirayan coldly in his own language.

“So! A peaceful party travelling through the forest?”

“Yes, Highness,” replied the Mirayan. “We mean no harm to the Mori and are very anxious to be on our way.”

“Of course you are,” said the Queen tartly. “We have heard of the political upset in Lamartaine and mindsearching your followers has confirmed it. I imagine the Mori would not be high on your list of enemies at the moment.”

Dismay flickered briefly over the young man’s face.

“Those who seek us may be inclined to come into the forest after us,” he said. “It would be far less trouble for you if you let us go on our way.”

“And the least trouble of all if we just handed you over to your uncle. We might even win his friendship.”

“My uncle would never make an alliance with natives,” snapped Serge. “He hates you all.”

“Yes, indeed,” said the Queen. “The return of Lev Madraga seems to have coincided with some interesting changes. Were you aware that your uncle Lev has a leaning towards death magic?”

The Mirayan had clearly not known of it, and it was news to Alyx, too. Did her mother suspect this boy’s uncle of being behind the desecration of the rivers?

“What are you talking about? He would never...! A Madraga would never soil himself with such things!”

“It seems I know your uncle better than you do for he has most assuredly dabbled in the past,” said the Queen. “According to your followers, your Uncle has accused you of killing your father. Of course, the penalty for this would be your death, which would leave your little sister the only Madraga left. And your Uncle in the position to take over as Regent on her behalf.”

The Mirayan’s face showed humiliation. He bowed his head and took a deep breath before speaking very carefully.

“I do not know my uncle’s plans. But I know he is keen to war on the Mori, Lady. The nobles were full of talk of it. They blamed the Mori for my father’s murder. So it would serve you better if my companions and I were let free to organise resistance and keep my uncle busy.”

“Perhaps. Or perhaps you would just take advantage of our weakness. We have no reason to trust Mirayans.”

Serge blinked, obviously not understanding what she meant.

Her mother laughed softly and shook her head. “You are not your father’s equal, are you boy?”

The Gibadgee flushed, opened his mouth to protest against the taunt, closed it again, and then, with a visible effort, relaxed his face until he looked almost dignified.

“Since I am your prisoner, I can’t stop you insulting me.”

“Very good!” laughed the Queen. “Perhaps you do have some sense after all. Now it’s like this. Something terrible has happened to our river.” She paused. “It is death magic, but despite the rumours I am no mage and our Mori mages have not the skill or the power to make our river whole again. Your stepmother is a Tari mage. She can help us heal our river and unless she wishes to see your little sister blinded and crippled, she will.”

“You cowards! You don’t have to threaten Olga,” cried Serge angrily. “My stepmother would be willing to help in any way she could. The state of the river distressed her beyond measure.”

The Queen shook her head. “Foolish boy. Your Uncle will eat you alive. Don’t waste your time with talk and anger. You are in my domain and I can do with you as I wish. You will tell your stepmother what I want.” She waved her hand dismissively.

“Why not ask her yourself?” snapped Serge, obviously furious at her dismissal.

Alyx’s hair stood on end at the sound of the fury in her mother’s voice as the Queen said, “I never wish to set eyes on that woman again. Take him away! Now!”

The Mori had heeded Olga’s cries and brought her to the tent where they were keeping Jindabyne. Exhausted by her upset, she lay fast asleep in her mother’s lap with her hand tightly clasping Jindabyne’s, and did not even awaken when Serge came in.

“Yes! I will help them,” said Jindabyne, speaking softly in Mirayan so that no one could hear her. “It is the only thing I can do. I have already discussed it with some of the shamans here.”

“That woman is your enemy,” hissed Serge. He leaned close. “Surely we can escape somehow.”

“No,” said Jindabyne. Her sense of self-preservation told her that she should be worrying about the Queen and what had happened between them in the past, but it was so unimportant compared to the horror of that polluted river.

The life force was mighty -- a great circle that bound the whole world together. Surely it was more powerful than the magic that had befouled the river. Yet witnessing that red gash in the land was like watching a leech crawling up an arm, watching its narrow pointed head questing in the air. Like a leech this red gash would sap the life force if it were allowed to continue unchecked.

“You must leave me here, Serge. You must get out of the forest and start organising against Lev while there’s still time. I’ll be safe enough. The shamans favour me and Queen is also Tari. She, too, loves the life spirit. She won’t kill me.”

Jindabyne had no idea what the queen would or wouldn’t do. She could only hope their shared race meant something.

“She really is Tari? She was more aggressive than I would have expected.”

Jindabyne was relieved to realise that Serge had not seen the Queen’s face. There was something dangerous about the Queen’s beauty - she had felt her will being sapped by it. That was another reason why Serge must get away. Had Wolf seen the Queen? He had spoken as if he had. When? How? Why had he lied to her about the Queen’s face?

“What’s to stop her killing you once you’ve served your purpose? What makes you think she holds to your shared religion over her own wishes?” hissed Serge.

“It’s more than just a religion. It’s part of us. This is a secret and you must never speak of it to anyone. The Queen cannot kill me without feeling my death herself. And that journey into death harms us Tari - can even drive us mad.”

“Sweet Mir, you Tari are very strange!” said Serge wonderingly. He was thoughtful for a moment. Then he said, “You can be harmed in many ways without being killed. And there is nothing to stop others killing you.”

“Healing the river is more important than my life. The life spirit in me knows that.” She touched Serge’s arm gently. “Without your father my life does not seem to matter so much. But yours does. You must leave me.”

“What about Olga?”

Jindabyne sighed and touched Wolf’s sleeping daughter’s cheek lightly.

“I think she will have to stay with me. She will slow you down if you take her.”

“The Queen uttered threats against her.”

“I know, but I think they’re empty. She just wishes to frighten us. I injured her once.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. It was in the time before I can remember. Serge, I truly think Olga’s safer with me.”

Serge nodded unhappily. He could see all the complications of trying to escape with Olga but was ashamed at how much he wanted to leave her behind.

“That half-Tari girl, the princess. She said something about ... She said that when she was Olga’s age we Mirayans separated her from her mother and beat her to make her mother comply.”

“Which Mirayans?”

“She didn’t say. People have often asked me why my father honoured the treaty so loyally when it was so unpopular. Was there something between him and this Queen?”

A horrible thought came to Jindabyne’s mind. “That was because of the Guardians surely,” she said softly.

If Wolf had seen the Queen’s face... But Wolf would never harm a child to control its mother.

She could not share these suspicions with Serge.

“Serge if you ever have the opportunity to see the face of this Queen, don’t take it. She was once very beautiful but someone wounded her grievously. She covers her face because she cannot bear to have people see such terrible wounds and she would never forgive you if you saw them.”

Serge was silent.

“Did you wound her?” he asked at last.

He had taken up her lie up so quickly that his question confounded her.

She turned away, trying not to let her relief show. “I truly cannot remember. I hope not. Just get away from here, Serge. It’s me they really want. You get that bastard Lev for both of us. And for your father.”

It was only after he left her that Jindabyne remembered the Guardians. They were all powerful Tari mages. Surely the river pained them as it pained Jindabyne. So where were they?

Just after dawn the following day, Alyx was shaken awake by Didier.

“The young Mirayan’s gone,” he said. “We’re going after him.”

“What about the Tari woman?”

“She and the child are still in their tent. Several of the Gibadgee tried to escape last night. The young Mirayan must have got out while we were busy with them. He’s got the other man with him.”

“Curse him! Just let him get lost in the forest and die.”

“I wish we could,” Didier looked grim. “But we can’t risk him getting out and telling the Mirayans of our problem.”

The escapee’s tracks were not hard to find. The two men had left the camp in the predictable direction - heading west towards the forest border, but they hadn’t been stupid enough to travel in the dark. The Mori quickly found the place under a stand of ferns where they had spent the night. The freshness of their tracks showed they hadn’t been gone long. They must be relying on speed.

Soon Alyx, always fleet of foot, was joggling along the path with six Mori hunters behind her.

Around mid-morning, Didier shouted, “Stop! They’ve left the path.”

Alyx, a little ahead of the others, stood where she was uneasily scanning the forest.

“There he is,” yelled someone.

As Alyx swung round to give chase, she caught a glimpse of movement in the trees ahead.

“No,” she shouted. “This way! He’s here!” She took off after the man, who was sprinting away down the track like a startled animal.

The Mirayan ducked through some tree ferns, sending the branches whipping back at her as he ran. She leapt after him, sure footed over the rough ground, dodging the slashing branches. He was so close now she could almost ... He ducked away from her grasp. With a final burst of energy she threw herself forward and grabbed his legs. They fell together in a bone-jarring, struggling heap.

He was hitting at her, trying to push her away, but she held on with gritted teeth while he thrashed and kicked around. He was so strong, he flipped her over easily and suddenly she was under him and he was bent over her with his fist raised.

He stopped, his face shocked. For a moment they stared at each other. What blue eyes he had! He was really very good looking.

As she opened her mouth to scream, he clapped his hand over it. She kicked and struggled trying to bite and break his hold. Then suddenly he was off her. Two of the hunters had him round the neck, twisting his arms behind his back.

“You have to let me go. The resistance! I have to ...” shouted the Mirayan struggling between his two captors.

“Do you think we’re fools?” shouted Alyx, scrambling to her feet. “You just want to tell your friends that we’re weak so that you can prey on us.”

She longed to hit him so much that she had to turn away quickly.

“Damn you! You’re digging your own graves!” shouted the Mirayan. “You have a peace treaty with my father which I would honour.”

Alyx turned and looked at him. “Mirayans have no honour,” she spat at him. “Your father was a rapist and a murderer.”

As she walked away, she heard a sickening thwack one of the others hit the Mirayan.

“You lay your dirty Mirayan paws on the Forest Child again, you’ll die,” she heard one of them snarl.

Alyx started to run blindly. Away from the Mirayan, away from her tribesmen, away from everything. But the past kept pace with her.

She had vague happy memories of her father - the smell of leather, the feel of his cheek pressed against hers and of wriggling and giggling at the prickliness of his beard. When she was six, Serge Madraga’s father, Wolf, had raided their summer gathering at Fleurforet and killed Alyx’s father. Alyx clearly remembered huddling among the other children at the top of the stone tower while her mother and the other women fired arrows out of the windows. She remembered watching her mother cry and a grey dawn full of smoke and black clad men who loomed over her like birds of prey. They were forced onto a ship where a fat man hit her mother and even Alyx’s desperate bites and screams couldn’t stop him.

The rest was hazy. Tall women dressed in black with white veils over their faces, her mother crying, a beating that she knew was unjust. She didn’t want to remember that time. She knew from what Didier had told her that Wolf Madraga’s liege lord, Alexi Scarvan, had taken them prisoner, that he had raped and beaten her mother and that he had had Alyx beaten to make her mother more co-operative.

She also remembered a tall cold-eyed Tari woman, who must have been Jindabyne, taking her away from the black and white ladies to a small cosy wooden room which proved to be on a boat. A nice man had played ball with her and spoken to her in halting Mori. She had asked him where her mother was and he had told her that she would see her soon. He’d kept his promise too. He had such kind blue eyes, just like that Mirayan boy, Serge, and she had really liked him. Later she learned that he was Wolf Madraga, her father’s murderer.

She was still shaking with emotion, when she charged blindly into camp and almost knocked over a messenger crouching on the path gasping for breath while a woman splashed water on his face.

The woman turned to Alyx. “The Mirayans have come into the forest with their mages and are heading this way. You mother wishes your attendance.”

Everywhere people were seizing weapons, gathering up belongings and loading supplies into packs. Being semi-nomadic the Mori were used to moving camp. They were just doing it faster than usual.

Alyx raced into the enclosure where she found her mother hooded and ready to travel.

Her mother seized and hugged her. “You found the boy?”

“He was no trouble. But the Mirayans - where do you want me? I don’t want to hide this time.”

“I have an important mission for you, Alyx.

Alyx knew what was coming.

“No!” she hissed. Having lived most of her life in tents, Alyx had learnt long ago to argue with her mother in a soft voice to prevent the whole camp from knowing their business, but this didn’t mean she wasn’t furious. “You’re sending me away again, aren’t you? How am I to learn...?”

“Alyx! Please listen! The Mirayans are not much danger. We will just melt into the undergrowth and pick them off as we usually do. The river is the true danger.” Elena put her hand on her daughter’s cheek. “I have discussed the situation with the shamans. They all agree that the best plan is to take that Tari Woman to the source of the river where the sickness begins.”

“Mother!” wailed Alyx, forgetting about possible eavesdroppers. “Please!”

Her mother pulled off her hood. “Do as you are bid Alyx! I order it! Select your warriors and go.” Her face softened. “Please! My dear, this is the most important task. The only vital task. If we can cleanse the river we have little else to fear. The forest can protect us as it always does. But one of us should go with That Woman to see that she does not weave a spell over the Mori. You know how much they revere we Tari.”

Alyx scowled, knowing her mother was right. Elena kissed her brow.

“Alyx, it would be irresponsible for my heir to risk herself against the Mirayans. We should separate so that we are not captured or killed together. We are the last of the royal Verdeys.”

Alyx nodded and bent her head. She was the heir, and must be responsible. Always responsible.