SpikeFeather’s mouth slowly opened. He had thought about everything else but the children’s eventual destination. “Ah…Sigholt?”
“Easily done, SpikeFeather, for these waters empty into the Lake of Life herself. Now, if the children would like to step into the boat…” and he motioned to the first ranks of children impatiently.
“But they will not all fit, Ferryman,” SpikeFeather began, then he saw the Ferryman smile and indicate behind him.
“Perhaps you did not notice these, SpikeFeather.” Ranged behind the Ferryman’s boat, each with its lights glowing gently, were a dozen more of the craft bobbing gently, all connected by ropes.
SpikeFeather nodded, and waved the children forward. Slowly, but with growing assurance, they stepped calmly into the boats. The Ferryman got out of the first boat as the children settled themselves down, waited until all the boats were full and not a single child remained unseated, then turned to SpikeFeather.
“Your life, SpikeFeather,” he said, and placed his hand over SpikeFeather’s face.
The birdman tensed, but he was not afraid. He did not think the Ferryman would demand a painful death. He waited, holding his breath, but nothing happened.
Exhaling slowly, he finally opened his eyes. Between the Ferryman’s outstretched fingers he could see the ancient Charonite’s face stretched in a crazy grin.
“What did you think I was going to do?” the Ferryman cackled. “Smite you between the eyes with a hitherto well-concealed mace?”
He dropped his hand and smiled at SpikeFeather. “A life, SpikeFeather, and you thought I meant to take your life!”
“Well, what do you mean to do?” SpikeFeather said, furious. He had been prepared to meet his death with dignity, and he did not like the laughter with which his gift was greeted.
You are right, SpikeFeather TrueSong. Forgive me.
The Ferryman straightened, sober, and placed his hand back over SpikeFeather’s face. “SpikeFeather,” he said. “I meant only the use of your life. A life is a priceless thing, but only if it walks and breathes. A life snuffed out is worth nothing at all. Do you understand?”
SpikeFeather nodded slowly under the Ferryman’s fingers. “You want me to offer you the use of my life.”
“Yes. Good. But your life will still largely be your own. SpikeFeather, I would make use of your life to aid the Charonites. We are few now, and our own lives are bound to these waterways. But we have knowledge, much useful knowledge, and I think that it is time we shared some of it. You are yet a young birdman, but in some years I will summon you back to the waterways. And then I will teach you. Will you accept that?”
SpikeFeather nodded again as the Ferryman dropped his hand. “I accept, but I thought you taught Axis all you knew?”
“I taught him many things that he needed to know,” Orr said, “but I certainly did not teach him everything. The rest I will pass on to you, SpikeFeather TrueSong.”
SpikeFeather felt his eyes fill with tears. “Thank you for my life, Ferryman.”
No. I thank you for your life, SpikeFeather. Then he turned and settled himself in the lead boat, folding his cloak about him.
“Ready?” he called to the children, and they nodded dumbly, overawed by the Ferryman.
“Well, then,” he said, “let us go,” and the boats moved of their own volition towards the archway in the far wall. As they went, the Ferryman looked over his shoulder, and SpikeFeather thought he could see the gleam of a smile beneath his hood.
As the first boat passed beneath the archway SpikeFeather heard one of the children speak.
“Ferryman, do you mind if we sing?”
“I would be honoured,” the Ferryman said, and to SpikeFeather’s mind, it sounded as if he truly was.
He spiralled up and up, hardly having to work himself, letting the warm wind that rose out of the depths of the world lift him further into Talon Spike. After reaching the lower chambers of the complex, it was only another hour before he was standing in the all-but-deserted Assembly Chamber of Talon Spike.
Here, seated calmly and quietly, were some eighteen hundred Icarii who, the members of the Wing informed him, refused to leave Talon Spike. The rest had gone.
SpikeFeather strode into the centre of the violet-veined, golden marble floor, horrified by the group’s obvious intention to die. His eyes circled the Chamber, able to name every face he saw. At the last one he stopped.
RavenCrest SunSoar, Talon of all the Icarii, slowly rose to his feet. He was dressed in the royal violet robes, and he wore the jewelled torc of Talon about his neck. Beside him BrightFeather sat calmly, also in her robes and jewels of office.
“We have decided to die here,” RavenCrest said. “We were all born here, and we are all Elders. Here we will also die.”
“RavenCrest—” SpikeFeather began, but RavenCrest held up his hand.
“We will not flee, not from the life we have known. There is a new world, a new order out there, but we do not think we want to be part of it. Maybe the Gryphon will come, maybe not, but whatever happens, here we will remain.”
“RavenCrest, there is no need for this. All can escape. If you but follow me—”
“No,” RavenCrest said, then he reached behind his neck and undid the jewelled torc. “I believe that Axis has handed FreeFall back his heritage. Give this to my son. He will be Talon now, and he will be a great Talon. I wish I could have seen him again, SpikeFeather, but that was not to be.”
“Stars damn you!” SpikeFeather screamed, refusing to take the torc. “This does not have to be!”
“This is how we want it to be,” BrightFeather said softly from her seat. “Don’t we all have the choice to do what we will with our lives? If we choose to die, can you stand there and say we are wrong?”
SpikeFeather sobbed, blaming himself for their intransigence, but he could not fault them. Not when he had freely offered his own life to the Ferryman. “Please,” he begged, going down on his knees, his red wings spread out behind him. “Do not do this!”
RavenCrest knelt before him and cradled SpikeFeather’s face in his hands. “Go, SpikeFeather. Take your Wing and go. Here, take this now,” he pressed the torc into SpikeFeather’s reluctant hands, “and keep it safe for FreeFall. Kiss him for me, and kiss EvenSong too, and berate them fiercely if they have not already married. SpikeFeather, promise me that when these wars are over, when all the death is done, the Icarii will come back here, and light funeral pyres in our memory, and wipe the blood from the walls and reconsecrate this place in the name of the Star Gods and in the name of those who have lived here and died here and were happy here.”
SpikeFeather lifted his head back and screamed, but RavenCrest spoke over the echoes.
“Promise me this, SpikeFeather, promise me that above all others you will reconsecrate this wondrous place, which has nurtured us and loved us, to MorningStar SunSoar, my mother, for above all others, she was beautiful and beloved.”
Axis and Azhure were bathing in the waters of the Lake of Life, laughing gently beneath the light of the moon, when they turned their heads, astounded.
Floating towards them across the Lake were thirteen boats, each filled with softly singing children.
The Ferryman was nowhere to be seen.
44
THE CLEARANCE OF ICHTAR
The six hundred Icarii children were boarded out with families in Lakesview. Most families had taken in one or two children, keeping brothers and sisters together; now the children spent their mornings at school with the Acharite children (and there had been a flurry trying to find the desks and stools to accommodate them all) and their afternoons exploring the fragrant hills surrounding the Lake. They did not seem to miss their parents overmuch and never complained. When SpikeFeather arrived back in Sigholt he talked with many of them, and he told Axis that he thought they had been changed by their trip through the waterways of the UnderWorld.
Axis wondered what Orr had said to them, and wondered further if he ha
d taught them anything. But the children only looked at him with puzzled eyes when he asked, and eventually he stopped worrying, smiled, and told them to run and play.
Axis had been upset but not entirely surprised by SpikeFeather’s news. RavenCrest had never been comfortable with the changes that Axis’ presence brought, nor with the knowledge that he lived during the time of the Prophecy of the Destroyer. Axis fingered the jewelled torc that SpikeFeather handed him, his eyes thoughtful.
“Perhaps if I go north myself,” Azhure said. “Perhaps I can persuade them to leave.”
“No,” Axis said, raising his eyes. “No. I cannot spare you. How long would it take for you to travel north and then return?”
“I could find the entrance to the waterways,” she said, trying not to believe him but knowing he was right.
“And where is it?” Axis gestured out the window over the Lake. “I do not know, and yet I know more about the waterways than any other here. SpikeFeather?”
“StarMan?”
“I presume you tried to persuade RavenCrest to leave?”
SpikeFeather was silent. How to put into words his frantic appeals? “I tried,” he eventually said, and Axis nodded, seeing the pain in his eyes.
“Azhure, you were never particularly close to RavenCrest. If SpikeFeather could not persuade him, then you surely could not. He has made his choice, and those with him.” He sighed, and gave the torc back to SpikeFeather. “RavenCrest entrusted this to you, SpikeFeather. Keep it safe…for when it is needed. When…when we know…I shall send for FreeFall. He will have to tear himself from the Island of Mist and Memory and assume his regal duties. There is nothing we can do about Talon Spike. We have warned, and SpikeFeather has saved the majority, but there is nothing we can do.”
He sent a silent query to Azhure, wondering if there was, in fact, anything she could do about the Gryphon, but she shook her head and turned away. She would know when it was time to hunt the Gryphon, and it was not yet. Those remaining in Talon Spike would have to cope without her.
If the mountain was attacked.
And Azhure truly did not want to go north at the moment. There was a feeling growing in her blood that she would be needed to the east within a month or two, needed to hunt something…something other than Gryphon. Something connected with Faraday.
Artor still lurked to the east, and while the death of RavenCrest, BrightFeather and the other Elders was heart-wrenching, if Artor were to stop Faraday it would be disastrous. So Azhure held her peace. Besides, there was too much work to be done in Ichtar.
From the end of Raven-month Axis embarked on his mission to reclaim Ichtar. He made careful use of farflight scouts to the north to make sure that the Skraeling host had indeed drawn back to the extreme north, then he ordered that the province be cleared of any remaining Skraeling nests. Bands of men some thousand strong were sent on expeditions through the province to scout out nests. Farflight scouts went with them to report on their progress, and by mid-Hungry-month Axis received word that several small nests had been discovered and had, with minimal casualties to the troops, been destroyed. Hsingard had been one of the major breeding grounds for the Skraelings, and Azhure had already cleared it.
Axis remained in Sigholt until the second week in Hungry-month when word reached him that one of the bands of nest-destroyers had stumbled upon a series of nests so extensive they could not hope to destroy them.
“Where?” he asked the farflight scout.
“In the northern Urqhart Hills,” the scout replied.
“In the mines,” Rivkah said. She had been standing at the window in the map-room of the Keep, and now she turned to look at Axis. He kept his eyes firmly on her face, refusing to be distracted by the growing mound of her belly. In the month since he had been home, neither he nor Rivkah had ever discussed her pregnancy.
“The mines there are the most extensive, and the richest, in the entire range of hills, Axis.” Rivkah sat down at the table and Axis’ eyes relaxed slightly. “Searlas once boasted to me that their shafts stretched into the ground for over half a league, and their tunnels extended many leagues under the hills.”
“There could be tens of thousands down there,” Azhure murmured, and she glanced at the hound lying at her feet. “The men will not be able to touch them without being eaten themselves.”
Axis looked at her, his eyes smiling. “Azhure, it has occurred to me that we have been sitting here safe and warm, cradled in Sigholt’s loving mists, when Belial and Magariz brave the dangers and reap the excitement of the Skraeling chase. Soon they shall be the stuff of legends, and we the forgotten heroes.”
She grinned. “We are growing fat with idleness, my love.”
“Shall we hunt?” Axis whispered, and Azhure felt her blood leap. The northern Urqhart Hills would be only a few days’ ride away and the hunt would take but the space of a night. They could be home in just over a week.
Rivkah, watching them, realised they had forgotten the existence of every other person in the map-room.
“We hunt,” Azhure replied, her eyes locked with Axis’, and he smiled slowly. “We hunt.”
She sat back in the saddle, feeling the beat of the Star Dance every time she swayed to Venator’s stride, and looked over to Axis, loving him. He rode relaxed and easy, clad in his fawn tunic and breeches with the crimson cloak flying back from his shoulders and the bloodied sun blazing across his chest. Azhure thought she had not seen him looking so relaxed and confident, nor so vigorous, since the ride south through Skarabost towards Carlon.
Save the Alaunt and their horses, Axis and Azhure were alone.
They had been riding two days now, and the northern Urqhart Hills loomed in the distance. They would reach them tonight.
Mud spattered the horses’ legs and bellies, and made for uncomfortable sleeping, but both Azhure and Axis revelled in the mud for it meant that Gorgrael’s hold loosened, and the winter slid still further north.
Ahead of them the Alaunt streamed, their noses close to the ground.
“Another two hours’ ride,” Axis said. “Ho’Demi tells me they wait in the first of the passes.”
Ho’Demi led this particular force, and if Ho’Demi was not willing to go down those mines then the danger must be great indeed.
Azhure nodded. She had caught the shadow if not the substance of Ho’Demi’s thought to Axis. “Has he lost any men?”
“Five or six, apparently among those who were the first to investigate the mines. Azhure, are you sure you can do this?”
Axis’ eyes were troubled, and not without reason. From the sketchy reports they’d received so far, it seemed that the nests in the northern mines might prove more extensive than those Hsingard had concealed…and Azhure had shared with him her feelings of exhaustion after that particular hunt.
She smiled to herself. “I will be well, Axis. I, we, have both grown in the last month. And,” she tossed her head and laughed, revelling in the wind through her hair, “this will be the first time we have fought together in months.”
So wrapped were they in each other, neither noticed the black speck circling far above.
Ho’Demi leapt to his feet as he heard the rattle of horses’ hooves. “StarMan, Enchantress!” He held out his hand to help Azhure from her horse, but she jumped down even as he stepped towards her.
“Ho’Demi.” Azhure took his hand briefly, then stood aside so Axis could greet the Ravensbund chief. Ho’Demi looked behind them, frowning. All he could see were the Alaunt nosing about the campsite.
“Where is your force?” he asked. “These mines are going to take at least five thousand men to clear them.”
Axis grinned at Azhure, then clapped Ho’Demi on the shoulder. “Five thousand, my friend…or just Azhure and myself.”
Ho’Demi’s eyes widened. “StarMan, you cannot mean…!”
But Axis returned Ho’Demi’s stare flatly. “Do you doubt us, Ho’Demi?”
The Ravensbundman dropped his eyes instantl
y. “No, StarMan. I did not mean to question, but…”
“Ho’Demi,” Azhure took his arm. “Tell us about these mines. Have your Chatterlings provided any useful information? Do they have cousins awaiting below who could help?”
They sat down before Ho’Demi’s fire, the ground mercifully well drained on these slopes. About them the troops huddled at their own fires, but their eyes were riveted on the StarMan and Enchantress, and the whisper quickly spread that the two would clear the mines themselves.
“I am afraid the Chatterlings have been relatively unhelpful, Enchantress. They are of opals only, and they say that the emeralds and diamonds mined here were dead gems, with no heart or soul. Will they help? No. The bargain was that they help in the Murkle Mountains, and now they hunger only for their new home. They will be of no use.”
“No matter,” Azhure said lightly, and fingered the Wolven by her side.
“Tell us what you know,” Axis asked, and Ho’Demi drew a rough sketch of the mines’ layout in the earth before them.
“The shafts are not vertical, but slope down steeply for several hundred paces before they branch out into tunnels. There are five mines here, all have one main shaft, and all are interconnected via their tunnel systems.”
“So…five exits,” Axis said. He raised his eyes. “Azhure?”
“Do you know where the Skraelings are concentrated, Ho’Demi?”
“Yes, Enchantress. Here, here, and here.” He pointed to the central three mines. “The top tunnels are free, but the lower ones, those over fifteen-hundred paces deep, are littered with hatchlings and eggs.”
“And adults?”
“Yes. Many of them. This must be one of the most heavily guarded nest-sites.”
Axis leaned back and gazed at the Ravensbund Chief. “Give me an estimate.”
“Of adults? It is hard to say, StarMan, for none of us lingered to take a census, but I would say there must easily be eight to ten thousand adults, and thirty times more younglings in various stages of growth.”