She broke down, and Zabrze held her and rocked her and told her how much he loved her.
I realised why Nzame had left her alive, and had left the dog alive to reveal her. He had wanted Zabrze to know of the suffering of his children. The full horror. It was not enough that they should just die.
We sat in a silent circle, watching, witnessing, sorrowing with and for them, until Layla and Zabrze sat up and wiped their eyes.
Then Holdat served us the evening meal, and that touch of normality did us all more good than a single word or look of compassion, and I thought that Holdat was wasted as a cook.
Despite all she’d been through, all the despair she’d suffered, Layla retained a sweetness that was humbling in its purity. After we had eaten she kissed and thanked Isphet and myself, and smiled and kissed Isphet again when Zabrze told her that she was his wife. She cried for Neuf, but she had experienced a good deal of death over the past months, and I think she thought that Neuf’s death in the Lagamaal Plains was a gentle passing compared to the many others Layla had shared.
46
FETIZZA ran amok as we slept. She must have done, for when I awoke it was to find the square and surrounding streets puddled with water, and spears of rock jutting towards the sun. Houses had reverted to their mud-brick, tiles to their ceramic glory, and reed…well, to reed.
Frogs choralled from the river.
“Threshold,” Boaz said to Zabrze.
“Tomorrow,” Zabrze said. “We’ll go down tomorrow.”
I think he wanted to spend a day of peace with Layla. Just one day, before we confronted the full horror of Nzame.
So we spent the day about Setkoth. As we’d thought, and as Layla had confirmed, many if not most of its people had fled north to En-Dor.
Others had not been so lucky. Layla said she was aware, locked in her stone, that the stone-men had shuffled through Setkoth day and night for weeks, searching for live flesh to drive down to Nzame.
“I would hear screaming, and the thud of stone feet,” she said to me. “And I would hear…feel, I don’t know…hear Nzame screaming for food. He had to be fed every day.”
She was quiet for a minute or two, and I tightened my hold on her arm. She was a lovely girl, in character as much as feature, and I was not much older than her. I wished I could have come through my trials with as much grace as Layla had.
“I lay awake for a long time last night,” she said, and she smiled at me, blinking in the sun. “I listened for the frogs. I never realised before now how beautifully they sang.”
I studied her carefully.
“And when Holdat served my supper last night, I swear that the ladle he used whispered to me.”
“Layla…Layla, you must speak with your stepmother soon. I think she has a great many things to teach you.”
“Yes.” Layla squeezed my arm. “You and she both, I think.”
“You have been much altered by your experience,” I remarked.
“I have been illumed,” she said. “Isphet is going to be very good for this realm and this people.”
After that, there was not much left to say.
One more day. One more day and it would all be over. One way or another. Boaz was so introspective he would hardly speak, but the manner in which he made love to me that night did all the talking that was necessary.
Sweet, loving, bitter, sad. Goodbye. I could feel it.
I walked the summer meadows of Viland again, locked in dream. Cool grass brushed my ankles, fragrant flowers teased my senses.
I wandered, alone, afraid, trapped. Waiting.
He slithered across the meadow towards me, snake-like yet man-formed.
Go away. Go back. I will kill him!
“I can say nothing to deter him.”
Fool! You have not even tried! Take him away, Tirzah! Flee to Viland before I decide to vent my wrath on you!
“You tried that, with Zabrze’s children, and failed.”
That was nothing but a diversion…did you like what I’d done to those children? Did you appreciate it?
“You could not touch Layla’s sweetness, Nzame. Her purity remained untouched by your stain.”
He hissed. Go back! Go back!
“Why? Do you fear us? Is Boaz going to destroy you?”
I told you before, bitch. There are only two options for him. He fails and dies, or succeeds in dragging me through to Infinity where he will spend eternity locked in my embrace.
And in that instant realisation hit me. I understood why the Song of the Frogs was so important. Why the Soulenai had insisted Boaz be able to use it. My mouth dropped slowly open.
Tell him to go back! There are no other options! Tell him –
I was so stunned at my own discovery I paid Nzame no attention. My mistake.
He seized me by the hair and dragged my head back. I tried to scream, but nothing came out.
Tirzah, listen to me well. He intends to meld with me, use the power of the One within Threshold to meld with me and drag me through into Infinity.
But, sweet Tirzah, there is a trap he does not yet know about. Shall I tell you? Yes, yes I shall. Tirzah, you and he are so closely bound in power and in love that should he meld with me there is a chance that for an instant he will give me an opportunity for escape.
He paused. I was sobbing with terror by this stage. How could I have been so foolish as to relax about this demon?
Where, Tirzah? Where? Into your womb, Tirzah. I think I shall grow me new strength in your womb. For a single instant when Boaz merges with me his bond with you will provide me with a bridge…a bridge to that tiny, fragile, vulnerable body you harbour in your womb. What shall you do, Tirzah, when you wander bereft as Boaz lingers in Infinity and I grow in your womb? What shall you do? What shall you do? What shall –
I screamed and screamed, rocking up with such force I hit my skull on the head of the bed.
Boaz grabbed me. “Tirzah? Tirzah?”
I couldn’t reply. I covered my face with my hands and sobbed.
“He lies, Tirzah. Whatever he said, it was a lie.”
“Boaz –”
“Don’t believe him.”
“Boaz, would you come back with me to Viland if I asked you? Would you –”
“Tirzah!” He forced my hands from my face so he could stare into my eyes. “Tirzah,” he said more gently. “If I leave Nzame to grow in Threshold nowhere will be safe. I must go in tomorrow. I must.”
“Will you come back, Boaz?”
He was silent, dropping his eyes.
“I know what you will do. I believe what Nzame told me, for it makes sense. You will use your power as a Magus to drag him all the way through into Infinity.”
“I will not be trapped, Tirzah.”
“No,” I said bitterly, “you will not be trapped in Infinity, Boaz, but you will be trapped in the Place Beyond.”
I knew what the Song of the Frogs meant. Boaz would use the power of the One to drag Nzame through to Infinity, then use his arts as a Necromancer and the power of the Song of the Frogs to escape from Infinity to the Place Beyond. But there he would remain. There was no pathway from the Place Beyond back to here.
“Sometimes,” Boaz said, “we have to take what we are given. Tirzah, I am so very, very sorry. But it is the only way.”
I lowered my head and wept. “I want a husband alive and trapped in my arms, not dead and at peace with his father!”
“Tirzah –”
“Boaz, I’m pregnant.”
“You can’t be!”
“The damage you did was not permanent. I healed, slowly, but I healed.” I tried to smile. “This baby we conceived while we were training in the Abyss. Boaz,” tears threatened, and I took a moment to blink them away, “Nzame said that if you melded with him, our shared love and power would create a bridge between you and me, and Nzame said he would take refuge in the baby. He said…he said he would grow within my womb while you…while you…”
“Why didn’
t you tell me earlier?”
“It took me over two months to believe it myself, and then I thought you would insist I remain behind in the Abyss. And then…well, there was so much happening about us…”
“Tirzah, I don’t know if he’s right or not. I just don’t know. But to be safe, it would be better if you –”
“No!”
“Tirzah, listen to me. If he is right…do you want to grow Nzame within you? Give him physical form? Rid yourself of the child, Tirzah. You must.”
“It is all I will have left of you,” I whispered. “All. Don’t make me do this. Please…”
“Oh gods, beloved. Do you think I want you to discard this child?” He slid his hand down over my belly, feeling for the life within me, cradling it gently. “A child is the greatest gift you could give me, but I cannot risk you like this. Nor could I submit a child of mine to the horror that enveloped Zabrze’s children.”
“Boaz…don’t make me…please…”
He said nothing, but folded me in his arms.
“Please…”
47
WE were silent in the morning. What do you say to someone you love and will lose that day? There are no goodbyes possible.
Everyone was still and silent, as if our mood had spread throughout Setkoth. Zabrze had found several river boats, and Boaz and I boarded the first of them with Zabrze, Isphet, Iraldur and a unit of soldiers. Other soldiers boarded the boats behind us.
But I did not think soldiers could help us very much this day.
Layla stayed behind, as did Kiamet and Holdat. I left the Book of the Soulenai and the Goblet of the Frogs with them. What need would I ever have of them again? What comfort could they give but bitter reminders of the man I had lost?
The oars dipped and bit into the river, the frogs chorused, and I think I hated the entire world at that moment. Isphet came to talk to me but I threw off her hand, and walked to the prow. I had four or five hours left. Four or five.
Boaz joined me and we stood silently, looking forward.
“Do you know,” he said softly, “that I loved you from the moment you carved those frogs in the glass in Setkoth?”
I remained silent, bitter. The breeze whipped hair about my eyes, and I twisted it back behind my ears with sharp, jerky movements.
“We sat there, opposite sides of the table, the glass connecting us, seeding love. I wonder what it thought, beloved, at the touch of both our hands?”
I bit my lip, determined not to look at him.
He sighed. “Tirzah, I wish it could have been different for you and me. I wish we had met as water-carrier and laundress, and then nothing would have stepped between us.”
A stray Juit bird rested among the reeds, and I wondered what it was doing here. Had Fetizza’s influence spread so far that the lake was free? Or did the Juit bird sit here, waiting for Fetizza’s magic to release the lake and marshes?
“We could have danced through the spring festivals on the banks of the river and spent a drunken night amid the reeds.”
I smiled despite myself, then bit it back.
“I would have begged your father for your hand, and he would have sat back and pretended to think about it. But he would have agreed, for water-carriers are ever the good catch for young laundresses.”
Damn him. Damn him!
“And we would have married under the summer solstice, and you would have grumbled at the number of children I gave you to trip your feet to and fro the wash trough.”
He took a deep shaky breath. “But all of that was denied us, Tirzah. We were Magus and slave, and so I spent months maltreating you, and caused you more pain than any person should have to bear.”
“Boaz –”
“And now I shall cause you further pain. Tirzah, can you forgive me for all I have done and will do to you?”
“Stop it! Boaz, you and I would have made a worse water-carrier and laundress than we did Magus and slave. I don’t want to talk. Please. All we will do is sadden these last few hours.”
“I think nothing can sadden them any more than they will be, Tirzah,” he said, but he held me in silence for a long time and we watched the river slide by.
The stone was thick and callused the closer we slid to Threshold, and I thought that Lake Juit must still be entombed. Was Memmon still wandering demented the path between river and house? I shuddered, and Boaz’s arms tightened.
“And what I regret most of all is what I must ask you to do to our child. Tirzah, I do not want to pass into the Place Beyond knowing that Nzame grows safe and secure in your womb. I could not bear that. Please, I beg you, I don’t want to leave you with Nzame.”
“I will do as you ask, Boaz. I promise.”
“Thank you,” he whispered. “Now I know that our sacrifice will be worth it.”
Stone-men wandered the banks, moaning. Not many, and the soldiers could deal with them.
Before us reared Threshold, looking cruelly beautiful, alive, vibrant, growing.
Waiting.
Its shadow winked.
Gesholme had crumbled to piles of stone rubble about it; Nzame wanted nothing to spoil the view of the river. The pyramid did not look very different from the one we had fled from; the golden capstone glinted in the sun, the plates of blue-green glass shone, and the dark mouth still yawned.
“Brother…”
Zabrze, stood behind us, uncertainty welling in his eyes. “Brother, are you sure you can succeed?”
“Yes, of course I am,” Boaz said, and managed a confident smile. “From this afternoon you shall have your realm back, Chad-Zabrze.” He clapped Zabrze on his shoulder, then strode past him towards the landing.
“Tirzah?” Zabrze asked. “Will you stay here?”
“No,” I said. “I am going to see this through.” And I likewise pushed past him.
Zabrze knows, too, I thought. Somehow he knows.
Isphet caught me up. “Tirzah?” Her fingers were sharp about my elbow. “What is Boaz going to do?”
Boaz was down on the landing now, watching impassively as a group of ten soldiers disabled the three stone-men who wove our way. He looked so beautiful, clad in a simple white robe with his hair combed back. Tonight, if all went well, he would rest with the Soulenai.
If all went well.
“He is going to trap Nzame into Infinity,” I said. “And then he will use the Song of the Frogs to escape to the Place Beyond.”
“But that will mean –” Isphet stopped as she saw the look on my face.
“Yes, Isphet, I know exactly what it will mean.”
She stared at me, then nodded. Isphet was not going to waste time on useless platitudes, and for that I was grateful.
“Then let us see this through, Tirzah. Let us share the witnessing.”
I took a deep breath, inclined my head, and we walked off the boat arm in arm.
The Magi were planted about Threshold. Hundreds of their black forms greeted us as we walked down the avenue, waving to and fro, moaning Nzame’s name, their feet merged to the ankles with the black, glassy rock that had spread out from Threshold’s skirts. They looked like a garden, neatly planted, and I supposed in a manner they were.
No stone-men bothered us once we’d passed the wharf.
Nothing bothered us save Nzame’s throbbing presence.
As we drew closer to Threshold we saw that it was not entirely as before. The pyramid had grown in size. It was almost twice the height and circumference it had once been. And behind the plate glass writhed eyes, thousands of them, and hands and faces pressed against the glass for an instant and then dissolved away into nothingness.
All the souls of those Nzame had eaten. Trapped forever in the glass of Threshold.
We stopped some twenty paces from the ramp that led to its mouth.
I felt sick and faint. I could not believe that Boaz was going to walk up that ramp and into Threshold.
Boaz looked at Zabrze, and nodded, then he turned to me. He wrapped his arms about
me and pulled me close. I clung to him as tightly as I could, wanting to scream at him not to go, not to go in. Oh gods, don’t leave me like this, don’t go, don’t go…
“I have lived my life in the thrall and service of this beast,” he said very quietly. “It is fitting that I end my life, and its life, in this manner.”
He tipped my head back. I could hardly see his face through the blur of my tears. “Oh Tirzah, please don’t cry. We will meet again, you and I, in the Place Beyond. There we will spend eternity. Please, Tirzah, please smile for me.”
I tried, gods know how I tried, but I could not do it. I buried my face in his chest and sobbed anew, loathing myself that I could not smile for him.
Hands gripped my shoulders and pulled me back.
Zabrze.
“Goodbye, Tirzah,” Boaz whispered, and kissed me softly, then he was gone.
Nzame raged. We could hear him, we could feel him, and somehow we could also feel Boaz walking through the
corridors, walking up and up, walking forward into the Infinity Chamber.
I don’t know how he survived that far. Perhaps he managed to use his powers as either Magus or Necromancer to fend off Nzame, but eventually he walked into the bleak, dreadful Infinity Chamber.
Fool! Doomed fool! Go back! Go back!
The faces and hands pressing against the walls of Threshold became even more frantic, the shapes of their noses, foreheads and chins bulging through, their hands beating, pressing, seeking escape, escape…
Nzame screamed, wordlessly now, and I let Zabrze hold me tight.
The faces and hands disappeared, and were replaced with bloodied writing wriggling across the entire outer walls.
Within, Boaz had activated the Infinity Chamber.
Energy buzzed up through the soles of my sandals, and each of the Magi planted down the avenue and about Threshold tipped back his head and screamed.