Glynn repressed a shudder at this reminder of Wind.
‘My father told me that was the incompleteness left by the Song of Making, but I was not so sure. Then the Song dealt me an unexpected shove, like you, and I left the path. When I tried to go back, I found my old life had grown too small for me – like a shirt that no longer fitted. I did not know whether to wear it until it stretched to fit me again, if it ever would, or to take it off and find a new life that might fill the emptiness that was still inside me.’
‘What did you do?’ Glynn asked.
‘What do you mean?’ All at once Solen looked angry, though for the life of her Glynn did not see what she had said to rouse him.
‘I … I just wondered if you went back to your old life or got a new one,’ she said, feeling stupid and defensive.
‘What is it to you what I chose? It is clear enough you despise me. It does not matter to me what you think.’
Of all the moody, irrational, bad-tempered pigs! Glynn counted to three, then stood up. Keeping her eyes on a spot between his eyes, she said flatly, ‘I never thought it did. I am going to bed.’
Lying in her bed and gritting her teeth half an hour later, she castigated herself for believing she and Solen had at last found some common ground. For a moment he had really seemed to understand her as Wind had. She scowled into the surrounding darkness. Get it through your head, she told herself savagely. Solen is not Wind. Not even half! He was an unpredictable, unreliable drunk and a stranger and she was absolutely on her own! The sooner she moved on the better.
That night she dreamed of Wind. She saw him take off his jacket and fold it, then lay it on top of his embroidered slippers. They were not things he had usually worn outside, and his movements had a slow, almost ritualistic air. He bowed, to what she could not tell, then he climbed up on the side of the bridge and raised his arms. All at once he was Solen, spreading his wings and rising into the air. She cried out to him to stay, but her voice sounded like a bird’s cry.
When she rose the next morning there was a chit from Solen saying he would not return that night because he had legion business. He had never left a message before, and she wondered if this was an oblique apology. She was less angry about their confrontation in the cold light of day. In retrospect she could see that his anger had been directed at himself rather than at her. If Solen was beginning to reexamine his life, she was not surprised that he did not like what he saw. Maybe he would decide to change. For his sake she hoped so, but it was not her problem and she resolved not to get tangled up in thinking about it.
That day Lev did not come in. The man who had hired him as proxy had returned. She was sorry. She had grown accustomed to the stocky little man and his wry sense of humour. Teesa barely spoke the whole day, and even Baltic appeared to have lost interest in her, while the man said not a word to any of them.
With nothing else to occupy her Glynn put all of her energies into the dig, and was rewarded by a hacoin at the end of the day. She was still uncertain about the value of individual coins, but she must have two hacoin by now. Waiting with the other minescrapers to be carried to the song cavern, it occurred to her that she was not so far from her goal. If she shifted out of Solen’s fell, she would have to start paying for her food and accommodation. On the other hand she could not stay in Solen’s fell simply because it was convenient. Especially since she had announced her decision to leave. If only they had been able to establish some sort of friendship.
Landing in the song cavern, she felt a rush of gladness to see Lev. He was clad as usual in grubby mine clothing. He must have been working another dig but he was now deep in conversation with Mallin. They were both frowning and Lev was making a chopping motion with one hand. He spotted her and waved, his lips widening in a familiar grin.
He said something to Mallin and then came over to Glynn. ‘You had a good day?’
She was about to nod, then it occurred to her she might just as well break her silence. ‘It was good enough.’ She kept her voice low and rasping as if she really had not spoken for ages.
Lev raised shaggy brows, and seemed more amused than surprised. ‘Well, well. So you can talk now. I wondered how long before you would speak to me.’
Glynn thought that was an odd way to comment on her recovery, but Lev was smiling so she disregarded a slight misgiving.
‘Come and have a drink with me,’ he said. ‘We will celebrate the return of your voice and my good luck at working three days in a row. The life of a proxy is not secure, to be sure.’
Glynn wondered suddenly why Mallin did not give Lev his own dig. She asked and for a moment he stared at her blankly. Then he shrugged and said he had once had his own dig, but that he had been unlucky at it. He broke off to press her again to have a drink with him.
‘I want to hear your story, finally.’
The prospect of another long, lonely night in Solen’s fell after a depressing day in the minescrape decided Glynn and outweighed her fear of giving herself away. Besides, her manufactured history had worked with Solen so she could relate it to Lev without fear.
‘I have to get this dust off me first,’ she said.
‘I would get the dust out of my throat before I bothered with the rest of me, but each to their own. Gard’s Nightshelter is in Gof cavesite, so you do not have far to travel from Porm.’ He drew a simple map in the dust with the toe of his boot, showing her which races to take to reach Gof. ‘The great cave is right in front of you when you come out of the race.’ He grinned. ‘You can choose the cirul since I have named the nightshelter.’
Glynn immediately wanted to change her mind, but she quashed her apprehension. Sooner or later, she was going to have to expose herself and it might as well be with someone she liked.
Solen’s fell was still in darkness when she arrived. Letting herself in, it occurred to her that the windwalker might have solved the problem of his responsibility for her by simply relocating until she left. Yet that would be a cowardly solution, and she felt instinctively that he was not a coward; how could he have saved her, if he was? Solen claimed his act had been impulsive, but didn’t that say something pretty decisive about his character? She thought of him as weak rather than cowardly.
As she lowered herself into the pool of hot water in the bathing room, she wondered how Lev had known she was staying in Porm cavesite. Probably Mallin had mentioned it.
There was no soap or shampoo, but the hot water revived her spirits. She had found a greyish wind suit slashed with yellow in a trunk with some other clothes. It was tight on her, and too short in the leg, but at least it was clean. It even looked rather dashing once she had donned boots and a musty-smelling cloak. She could not get the black stains from under her nails or out of her fingers but gave up, reckoning Lev’s hands must be worse.
Coming out of the bathing room, she was startled to notice a sheaf of sweet-smelling sether lying on the timber block that served as a table. She approached the blooms as warily as if they were a land mine, hoping they had been here when she arrived. Otherwise someone had wandered in while she was bathing. She could not find a message twig to say who had left them. It crossed her mind that Solen might have brought them, but she dismissed the idea as ridiculous. More likely Zeyar had sent them to Solen!
Making her way along the races, she was relieved to discover they were still well-peopled. A lot of the women she passed were wearing elaborate gowns under heavy cloaks, and Glynn stopped worrying about being mugged and started worrying that she might not be dressed appropriately. She would have to excuse herself by saying she simply had no other clothes but those Solen had lent her.
As soon as she set eyes on the nightshelter, Glynn knew she need not have concerned herself. It was little more than a beer hall in a cave. The establishment was obviously popular with miners because Glynn recognised more than a few faces. Most of the customers, male and female, looked as if they had not even bothered to wash or change before coming here.
She pushed her
way through the door flap.
Lev must have been keeping an eye out, for immediately she heard him shout her name over the roar of talk and laughter. To her relief, when she fought her way through the press to where he was sitting, he was alone. He had ordered her a mug of cirul to hold the seat, he said, indicating a coarse mug.
‘You look very clean,’ he laughed. ‘My apologies if this is a bad dram. But a dram is a damn dram, I say.’
‘I am so thirsty this could be … be water and I would not mind,’ Glynn rasped. She had almost said cat pee without thinking, and retrospective fright made her take a great gulp from the mug. She was certain her eyes bulged as the liquid fire she had poured down her throat seared its way into her horrified stomach.
‘Wh … what is this?’ she asked, eyes streaming.
He grinned. ‘I was told it is the best Fomhikan green, though it did look more brown than green to me, now I come to think on it. No doubt the fellow pouring the jugs topped it with some cheap racoin muck.’ He took a huge swig, draining his mug and setting it down with a sigh.
‘More?’
‘N … not for me yet,’ Glynn stammered, sipping the awful stuff and wondering if she dared pour it on the ground when Lev was not looking. No doubt this was what Solen drank. Which went some way to explaining why, when he was drunk, he looked like someone had hit him on the head with a hammer! And what was a racoin? Obviously a very small amount. Somehow she had to find out more about the Keltan currency.
Lev gave a bellow that nearly had her out of her skin. A harassed-looking boy carrying a jug forced his way towards them through the press of people. Glynn did not see what sort of coin Lev paid him to refill their mugs. She swore under her breath. She wanted to know what each mug cost, for while she was bathing it had occurred to her that the danger of giving herself away would be lessened if Lev was drunk by the end of the night. She would be free to ask questions, and tomorrow she could simply deny saying anything he thought had sounded odd, claiming he had misheard or misunderstood. Of course it depended on what a mug cost. She had brought all of her earnings, reasoning that if she could get any useful information, it would be worth spending the lot.
She lifted her own mug to her lips, and was pleased to see Lev follow her lead and drink again.
‘Agg,’ he sighed, settling deeper on his seat. ‘By the Horn, a person needs a dram or ten to forget the minescrape, else he would never go back down.’
Glynn smiled. ‘Well, you must drink a lot if you have been here as long as you say.’
Lev sighed. ‘Aye, I have and more fool I am for it. You never make that mistake, Glynna. Get the coin and get out. The minescrape will swallow your life up if you let it. Go home while there is a home to go to.’
Glynn frowned and was startled to hear the miner use her father’s pet name just as Solen had done, but maybe it was just the accent.
‘I have been in and out of the minescrape for a long time now, so I know the dangers,’ Lev went on. ‘You come here full of fire and you mean to earn your stake and get out. But somehow you stay and one day you look in the mirror and you see old age staring you in the eyes.’ He took a long swallow from his mug, then regarded her speculatively through watering eyes. ‘Mallin said you were staying with one of the windwalkers.’
Out of sheer nervousness Glynn drank some more of the brew. When she had stopped coughing she allowed that she was staying with Solen, but explained that they hardly knew one another.
‘I am … still somewhat confused from …’ she broke off and pretended to have another coughing fit.
‘Bittermute algae. I know. You must have been in the water for some time to have been so affected.’
‘I suppose,’ Glynn said, exaggerating her hoarseness to cover any lapse of accent. Her hands were slippery with sweat, which was absurd because she had told her story to Solen the night before and he had believed it. ‘I do not remember exactly how I got in the water. I was in a coracle doing some river casting. I had been drinking …’ She had modified the earlier version of her story, thinking it would be more likely that she would sleep her way into the middle of the ocean if she had been drinking.
‘Fomhikans,’ Lev murmured, grinning broadly.
Gaining confidence, Glynn continued. ‘I suppose I was washed down the Nivian and into the open water, then the coracle must have sunk on me. Next I know, I am vomiting water on a ship deck in the middle of nowhere. It was the windwalker I am staying with who pulled me aboard, and so here I am on Acantha.’
‘Lucky you didn’t wake up halfway down the gullet of a silfi,’ Lev said with a shudder.
‘I ended up in the minescrape because I am trying to earn a passage home.’ She had decided to simplify the end of her story and, in a way, it was no less than the truth.
‘Bad luck it was not one of the Vespians who dragged you aboard the ship, then they would have had to bring you home to Fomhika,’ Lev mused. ‘But why do you not simply call to your parents to send coin?’
Glynn launched into the story she had told Solen the previous night, but this time she made the uncle less a cold bully than an intolerant fellow with a temper. ‘I mean to earn my own way home because it will give him time to cool down.’
Lev nodded judiciously. ‘A sour sort he does sound, though Fomhikans are usually so easy-going. I suppose it was not being able to plantsing that soured him, like. What is your full name? Give it me slowly for I know you Fomhikans are fond of curst complicated names that twist a man’s tongue inside itself.’
Glynn had not thought to invent a name. ‘That’s one of the things I don’t remember. There are still so many annoying gaps in my memory; it is as if someone has gone into my head with a hammer and dug bits out.’
Lev shrugged. ‘Never trouble about it. The holes will fill themselves up in time, no doubt. It is not a bad strategy to build up a bit of longing in your uncle before you go back and face his music for it is bound to hurt your ears.’ He laughed at his pun, then sobered. ‘Thinking of it, having people making jokes of you constantly might curdle a person’s spirit.’ He turned to call for another refill.
Glynn was so relieved that he took her story at face value that she drank again without thinking. The liquid tasted slightly less horrible. She decided that was good enough reason to drink no more. Obviously the stuff had stunned her taste-buds.
Lev drained his refill almost in one long draught. ‘Thirsty work listening to stories. That was near as good as a balladeer could do.’
‘Let me pay for the next mug,’ Glynn said.
The smile vanished from Lev’s face. ‘What do you mean? Are you trying to insult me?’ he thundered.
People turned to stare and Glynn quailed, wondering what on earth she had done wrong. She said nothing, hoping he would quieten down.
‘You offered to pay for a mug when this is my invite!’ Lev went on, his voice rising. ‘You think I cannot afford it?’
She swallowed and said desperately, ‘Calm down, Lev. It … I wanted to make a toast and on Fomhika whoever makes a toast must pay for the cirul.’ She crossed her fingers that there were no Fomhikans sitting around ready to deny her invented tradition.
Lev’s fury evaporated as swiftly as it had erupted. ‘Oh. Well, my apologies for shouting at you,’ he said sheepishly. ‘Never heard of that custom but toast away. Hoy!’
The boy reappeared and stood patiently while they drained their mugs. Head swimming, Glynn watched him fill them again, then offered her little store of coin.
‘By the Horn, do you want to be attacked by ruffians? You must have almost a full nacoin there. Put all that away,’ Lev scolded, removing a quacoin from her and handing it to the boy. He rummaged in his apron and put three smaller coins on the table between the mugs.
‘Now, your toast?’ Lev said expectantly.
‘Uh …’ Glynn searched her spinning thoughts for something appropriate. ‘Let us drink to … to us both finding darklins.’
She held her breath to see how this
would be received, given that she had no earthly notion what a darklin was.
‘Aye,’ Lev said easily. ‘To darklins.’
They both lifted their mugs, but this time Glynn was careful not to let any of the potent alcohol get down her throat.
‘Course, as Teesa said, the chances of it are slim.’ Lev sighed, having upended his mug. ‘I tell you, though, it would be a toss-up whether I traded it or used it if I found one. All that coin would be a fine thing, but it would be something to be able to soulweave for a little, and see what is going to happen before it happens. Of course, I might accidentally see how I die!’
Darklins allowed a person to soulweave, Glynn thought. And soulweaving was what? Seeing the future? That meant the stones let you see into the future. It sounded as if they were worth a lot of coin.
‘Have … have you ever known anyone to find a darklin?’ she asked.
Lev nodded. ‘Once. A woman I knew found one and sold it for a fortune to the Draaka. She pays the best prices on Acantha for them. She buys all she can get. I have heard she even powders them to use in haven rituals.’ Glynn tried to look amazed, since that seemed to be the expected response. ‘Truly,’ Lev insisted. ‘The woman who found the darklin wanted to use it to see what was in her future, but her man was afraid of her looking into the Void; afraid of bumping into the Unraveller demon.’ Lev’s eyes flickered to Glynn’s face and she had the idea he was waiting for some sort of reaction.
‘Aham,’ she murmured ambiguously.
‘I guess I would trade it, too, but not to the Draaka.’ Lev had lowered his voice now. ‘I would sell direct to an Iridomi noble. They do not care about the future or demons. They only want the pleasures the stone bestows on anyone using it. Of course, first, I would have to get to Iridom to make the sale.’
‘Pleasures?’ Glynn murmured.
‘Aye. They do say the use of darklins improves the sensual pleasures if you are minded to use them at such a time.’