“I don’t know what’s got into your generation. You got no trust. You got no respect.”
“And not much patience with bullshitters, either,” I admitted. “I’ve got journals to write. Not to mention worries to worry.” And food to eat. I was hungry again. Much as I ate when I was walking the ghost I should have gotten too fat to waddle.
I joined my in-laws beside their fire. Mother Gota dished me up a bowl of whatever it was she kept simmering in her pot. Nobody said anything. I had not talked to them much lately. They had begun to suspect that I was not real social anymore. I wondered why the old woman would not do her cooking inside. Thai Dei and I had set her up a whole private suite in our ever-expanding dugout but she would go inside only when the weather turned foul or it was time to sleep.
Thai Dei did most of the work on our shelter. There was not much else for him to do. He was not involved in the schemes of his mother and Uncle Doj.
“Thank you,” I told Mother Gota as I finished. “I needed that.” I could not compliment her on her cooking. If ever she did screw up and make something palatable she would not buy the real thing. She never did claim any culinary skills.
“You,” she said, initiating conversation, which she did rarely, “Bone Warrior, you are wary of crows? They are significant?” Her Taglian was abominable. I spoke Nyueng Bao much better but she would not do me the courtesy. I suppose that would, somehow, lend legitimacy to my relationship with Sahra.
I stopped trying to make sense of Mother Gota’s thinking years ago.
I responded in Nyueng Bao. “They carry messages sometimes. They spy. We know this. Mice and bats do the same. Those who use the animals aren’t our friends.”
I exceeded myself telling her that much. Croaker would not be pleased. But I was fishing. It would be nice to find out what she knew or suspected. Sometimes she just could not help showing off.
“I have seen owls in the night, too, Stone Soldier. They do not behave the way owls should.”
I grunted. That was news. And it told me that if owls were being used and no one else had noticed, then the old woman was a lot sharper than I had suspected.
“Last night many crows came and went from the shining fortress.”
I looked at her more closely. Last night. While Thai Dei and I were in town with the lost boys. While she was traipsing through the night with Uncle Doj. She had seen something that I missed. Maybe.
Crows had been scarce near Overlook lately. Longshadow had taken a dislike to the dark harbingers. His crystal turrets were surrounded with nasty little spells that worked like trapdoor spiders, striking when birds came too close.
“That’s interesting,” I said. “That might be something new.”
“There have been crows before. But never so many.”
“Uhm.” What went on in there last night that Soulcatcher found so interesting? I had seen nothing abnormal today. It might be worth checking.
Maybe I was being worked. Maybe Uncle Doj and Mother Gota were bound to start checking out the oddities they had noticed about my behavior in recent months. Maybe they were getting ready to do whatever Croaker suspected they were going to do. If he did anything more than just suspect.
He suspected everybody of something.
“The one who flies went out last night, Soldier of Darkness.”
“Ah.” She was trying to manipulate me. She knew I hated those enigmatic titles first employed by her father, Ky Dam. The old Speaker never explained them and Mother Gota would not waddle where her dad had refused to tread. “That is interesting.” There had been no aerial sightings of the Howler for a while. He liked to use spells of concealment when he was aloft, though.
She wanted me to ask questions so she could toy with me and frustrate me. The information she had given was all I was going to get. Right now.
I refused to play her game. I turned to Thai Dei. “Did I just get promoted to honorary member of the tribe?”
He shrugged. He seemed mildly surprised that his mother had told me anything at all.
I did not rush right over to visit Smoke. If that was what the old woman wanted I meant to disappoint her in a big way. I tended to chores, helped Thai Dei work on our dugout, ate again, drank plenty, worked on the Annals for a while. I could change nothing that had happened during the night. And whatever that was, it had not been so earthshaking that it was an immediate threat.
One-Eye actually made it easy. Shortly after sundown he came over with a clay pot. “Soup’s ready,” he said. He sloshed the pot’s contents. The stink of a really bad beverage quickly filled my dugout.
“All right!” I got up and followed him into the darkness.
53
“That was a stroke of luck, you showing up just then,” I told One-Eye. “I needed to get away.” I relayed what Mother Gota had told me.
“How would she know that?”
I told him about spotting her and Uncle Doj during the night. “Maybe they spotted me, too.”
“Thai Dei could’ve told them.”
“I guess.”
“You think it’s important?”
“They make a special point of making sure I know, I’d better check it out. I didn’t notice anything when I did my routine snooping.”
One-Eye grunted. He looked thoughtful. “Goes to show you. No matter how well set up we are we’re going to miss stuff because we don’t know what to watch for.”
Which was true. Things could be right there in the open and even with the advantage Smoke gave me I could miss them if I did not know to look.
There just was not enough time to look everywhere all the time.
I suggested, “Why don’t you take some of your magic potion over to my in-laws? Screw up their thinking for a while.”
“Thought they didn’t touch the stuff.”
“They’re not supposed to. But I’ve seen Thai Dei take a tummy-warmer a time or three, to be sociable, and his mother would’ve developed a taste for it if Uncle Doj hadn’t been there most of the time we were in Taglios. She’d sneak a few pints whenever he was away. She hasn’t had a chance since we’ve been on the road.”
“Very interesting.” The little black man started rustling around. “Tell you what. I’ll just go over there and keep them company while you’re out. I’ll tell them you’re working.”
He left before I finished my preparations. He lugged a slimy old wooden bucket with him. I muttered, “I got to get him to talk to Swan.” Willow Swan made bad beer, too, but he did know a little about the brewer’s art. Compared to One-Eye’s product Willow’s was ambrosia.
There was very nearly a warmth to Smoke when I took hold of him, as though some part of him sensed that he was no longer alone and was pleased. I took him directly to Overlook, sliding backward in time as we went, avoiding the ruins where the fires burned so I would not see myself. I had to shuffle forward and backward to find Mother Gota’s crows. They were visible only briefly and were never obvious. They streaked in from the north, high above the fortress, then plummeted into Overlook like falling stones. There were no more than a dozen so any message they carried, either direction, would be severely limited. I expected greater numbers from what my mother-in-law had said.
I followed the last one down. The flock did not go near Longshadow’s glowing towertop, where the Shadowmaster labored late over some esoteric text. They plunged into the darkness of a courtyard and entered the fortress through a door standing just a crack ajar. They muttered among themselves, uncomfortable with where they were. A sharp cry, broken off, nearly spooked them.
A voice whispered. I could see nothing but the vaguest shape in the darkness but recognized the Howler’s aborted cry. I did not understand a word he said. I did not understand the crows, who took turns making noises that might have constituted a message. For me the critical piece of information was not included in the body of the message but in the existence of the message.
Soulcatcher and Howler were communicating.
I ran back in time another hour
. Howler did nothing but sit there and wait. I jumped forward, planning to bracket him till I found something else interesting.
I had to advance only a few minutes beyond the arrival of the crows.
They stayed only briefly. Then Howler rustled back into the darkness. I drifted along behind him, tracking him by ear and by smell. Even in the ghostworld Howler had an air about him.
He stayed in darkness, away from routes Longshadow might use, till he reached a particular door. He knocked, which surprised me. Howler was the kind of guy who just invited himself in.
Narayan Singh opened the door a crack. Howler fought down a shriek. He was developing a talent for silence. Singh stepped back and allowed him to enter. Howler slipped in like a diminutive Deceiver on a deadly skulk. “It’s time,” he whispered.
Time for what?
Singh knew. He went to the Daughter of Night immediately. The kid was hunched up in front of a small fire, fanatically transcribing that first Book of the Dead. Looked to me like she was almost done. But who knew how long a book it was?
Singh seemed unsure how to approach the girl. He seemed unsure about a lot lately. He was close to superfluous and knew it.
Lady always would have a use for him, though.
He got the girl’s attention. Gods, she was getting spooky! There was an aura about her, something you might call a glow of darkness. In that light her eyes seemed to shimmer like those of a big cat stealing toward your dying campfire. You were drowsing and she was hungry.
“It’s time,” Narayan told her, his whisper barely strong enough to stir the air.
The child nodded curtly. She made a tiny gesture. Narayan bowed, backed away.
There was no doubt who was in charge here, who ruled and who obeyed. Nor any doubt that she was herself controlled by a determined power. She extended her writing hand to Narayan for help rising. It was a claw she could not relax. Her legs were too stiff to unfold on their own. For a moment I pitied her, forgetting she was no true child.
Howler returned to the corridor. He drifted along ahead of Singh and the girl, scouting. Those two insisted on a lamp, which troubled Howler deeply. He muttered and fussed the whole time they were doing their sneak.
By a tortuous route that avoided Longshadow, the garrison and the enclave still held by Lady’s soldiers, Howler led them to an unguarded piece of wall overlooking Kiaulune. Fires were burning down there. I was down there with Thai Dei, cold and disappointed with myself for having been dumb enough to insist on the eyewitness view.
I did not tag along in real time. I skipped forward, compressing events. Howler’s destination was a small carpet concealed atop a domeless tower otherwise not in use. It was a new carpet, smaller than those we had seen before, black as the night around us. More evidence that you cannot know everything that is happening unless you want to spend every minute watching. I had not seen Howler working on this carpet.
With no words exchanged the three lifted it, walked to the edge of the parapet, lockstepped right off into space. They clambered aboard as they fell. Narayan moaned softly, eyes closed. The Daughter of Night was not impressed.
Howler took control in time not to smear them all over the rocks and wreckage below. He began sliding gently along just a few feet above the ground, trying to keep solid objects between himself and Overlook.
I took a quick look at Longshadow.
The Shadowmaster was restless. He had left his studies to stare vaguely toward Kiaulune. He sensed that something was happening but could not determine what.
Howler was playing around behind his ally’s back.
I almost lost the little shit. I had to go back to the moment I left him to pick him up again. Soon afterward he drifted past a band of Mogaba’s guerrillas in the ruins. The guerrillas did not see him but sensed him and panicked, thinking one of the Shadowmaster’s pets was on the prowl. The racket they made drew the attention of nearby Taglians. The soldiers saw something shadowy drifting through the darkness. They wasted no time getting off a volley of fireballs.
Howler changed tactics.
He put on a burst of speed and employed a spell of concealment neither of which he wanted to do that near Overlook. I would have lost him then had not chance favored me.
A wild fireball clipped the corner of the invisible carpet, which began to smolder. The spell of concealment did not include the glow as long as I stayed close.
Howler hauled ass. But he did stay so low that brush scraped the underside of his carpet. At one point he ploughed through some tents and clotheslines in one of the Prahbrindrah Drah’s division camps. He was less concerned about being noticed by our side than by his own.
The race brought on a mild sense of exhilaration. I did not notice it immediately. Then it hit me that I was feeling more emotion than usual. Eventually I realized what I was feeling was some feeble spillover from Smoke.
Sometime during the flight we passed close enough to Uncle Doj and Mother Gota to be noticed but I saw no sign of them. We also swept over my own headquarters close enough to startle the sentries and horses.
I was not entirely surprised when Howler headed for a certain snow-choked canyon. Smoke did not notice until we were close enough to watch Howler land in front of a waiting Soulcatcher amidst an explosion of terrified crows.
In my amusement at the birds I relaxed just a little bit. And Smoke rebelled. She is the darkness.
What?
That was not me. But it did not happen again.
I backed out and up and away, content to go back to my flesh with the knowledge that Howler and Soulcatcher were up to some treachery that included Narayan Singh and the Daughter of Night.
The mood Smoke exuded now, if so feeble a thing could be called a mood, was terror.
And terror was out there roving the night, though it was not the terror that haunted my spirit steed.
I caught a whiff of corruption as I moved toward my flesh. I saw nothing. I stopped, experimented, moved in a direction away from the invisible source.
Maybe it caught a whiff of me. The stench grew stronger suddenly. I felt a sensation as of something onrushing. Light flickered in the ghostworld. I saw Kina’s hideous face for an instant, looking directly toward me. But her eyes were blind. Her nostrils flared as though she was trying to catch my wind.
Smoke’s terror might have been what she smelled. He fled in total panic. She is the darkness.
It was more feeble this time but it was there. It was not my imagination.
54
The Old Man did not seem surprised to hear that Soulcatcher might be up to something with Howler. “I wasn’t counting on it but it seemed like a possibility,” he said. “They’ve worked together for ages. We may have Longshadow by the nuts.”
“Somebody better have him by something if he controls the Shadowgate. The other thing is...” How could I put it?
“Other thing?”
“Smoke is showing signs of personality. I think.” I told him what had happened.
“Damn! We don’t want him waking up now.” He thought for a while. “I don’t see how we can stop it if it’s happening.”
“Better see One-Eye about that.”
“Send him over. Wait! Don’t leave. Tell me about the part of the fortress where Singh and the girl hide out.”
It turned out this was more than a passing interest. He wanted maps.
I had that part of the place charted already. All I had to do was get the drawings from One-Eye’s dugout. I brought the little wizard along. He kept grumbling about being wakened in the middle of the night. Once the Old Man had what he needed I shut the curtain to Smoke’s alcove and went off to bed, leaving them to their schemes.
I did not escape Kina just by getting back to my flesh. She was waiting in my dreams. No sooner did I lie down than I found myself in the place of bones. Sahra was waiting.
I had no trouble recalling that she was an illusion. She looked nothing like the Sahra who lived so miserably at the Vinh Gao Ghang temple
. This one was too young, too unworn, despite her pallor and the neck crook characteristic of a Deceiver victim.
I had begun to suspect that Kina was slow and unimaginative, although extremely powerful. How had she gotten the angle on Lady?
It was true Lady had not known what she was up against. And ignorance is a chink in the armor a knowledgeable enemy can exploit at will. And, of course, Kina was Queen of the Deceivers.
It no longer mattered how Kina had fooled Lady. What mattered now was that she did not fool me.
That thought left me unable to pretend that I was being deceived. I was not kind to the false Sahra.
Her flesh corrupted and melted right before me. The perfume of Kina, which was the stink of dead bodies, assailed me. A shadow in the grey distance coagulated into a four armed black dancer a hundred feet tall whose pounding feet threw up clouds of bone dust as she stamped and whirled. Her fangs dripped venom. Her eyes burned like dark coals. Her jewelry of bones clattered and rattled. Her breath was the breath of disease.
The Daughter of Night rode upon her shoulder like a small second head. She was excited as a child making her first trip to the county fair.
Kina was not pleased with Murgen.
Armbones lifted out of the litter, grasping with fleshless fingers. Sahra’s skeleton stumbled toward me. I willed myself away and, behold!, I drifted up and backward a few feet. I willed myself again and moved again, not far, amazed that I had control and bewildered because I had not tried to exercise it before.
Kina stopped dancing and stomped toward me. Her fangs grew longer. Her six breasts dripped poison. She put on another pair of arms. The Daughter of Night bounced excitedly on her shoulder, immune to the lure of gravity.
I willed myself away.
I had control but that was not my world. I could not run away faster than the world’s creator. A great gleaming, taloned black hand swooped down. I dodged. A claw brushed me. I spun ass over appetite into darkness.
And I was in the cavern filled with old men caught in spiderwebs of ice. I drifted along past faces I not only knew I knew, I remembered the names that went with them.