“What do you think happened to the water? Why did Entudenin go dry?”
Achmed smirked. “Are you mistaking me for Manwyn just because we’re in the same city?”
“Hardly. She’s ever so much more pleasant than you are.” Rhapsody shuddered, remembering the Oracle’s hideous laughter, her unprovoked taunting of Ashe, her ugly prophecies.
I see an unnatural child born of an unnatural act. Rhapsody, you should beware of childbirth: the mother shall die, but the child shall live.
Ashe had been furious at his aunt’s words. When he demanded an explanation, Manwyn had thrown puzzling words at him as well.
Gwydion ap Llauron, thy mother died in giving birth to thee, but thy children’s mother shall not die giving birth to them.
There had been something else, but Rhapsody could not remember what it was, almost as if it had been plucked from her memory.
She blinked and found Achmed’s mismatched eyes staring at her. Rhapsody shook her head to drive the memory away.
“If I wanted to ask a Seer about what happened to Entudenin, it would have to be Anwyn,” she said. “She’s the one who sees the Past. I think I’ll pass, thank you. I’d rather ask you, even if you can only give your opinion. What offense do you think was committed that caused the Fountain Rock to run dry?”
Beneath his veils she could tell he was smiling. He turned and stared up at Entudenin. “The offense of a mineral clog, or a shifting of strata within the Earth.”
“Really? That’s all?”
“That’s all, at least in my opinion. Have you ever noticed, Rhapsody, that when something miraculous and good happens it’s a gift from the All-God, but when something baleful or terrible takes it away, it was man’s fault? Perhaps everything that happens, good and bad, is just random chance.”
“Perhaps,” she said hastily. She pulled out the journal and began thumbing through it. “Rhonwyn said the child’s location was Yarim Paar, below Entudenin, didn’t she?”
Achmed nodded, not looking away from the fossilized geyser. “Listening to you pry the names, ages, and locations of those demon brats out of that lunatic Seer was torture.”
Rhapsody chuckled. “I’m sorry. It’s not easy to get information from someone who can’t remember who you are from moment to moment, because she can only see the Present. A heartbeat later the Present becomes the Past and she can’t remember what she said, let alone what you said. And if you think Rhonwyn was bad, be glad you didn’t meet Manwyn.” She leaned forward and tried to peer over the domes of the buildings toward the Oracle’s crumbling temple, but could not see the minaret. “The fountain square is the direct center of the city. Do you think ‘below’ meant south of the square?”
The Firbolg king shrugged, trying to concentrate. The heartbeats were muffled now, swallowed by the hum of human traffic, the whine of the winter wind through the narrow alleys, the haggling of the women, the cacophony of merchants in the marketplace shouting their wares. Added to this was the muffling of the veils that were worn by almost everyone in Yarim to keep the blowing dirt from the eyes and nose.
His chest was still aching from the shock of the arrhythmia, the jolt of dissonance that his heart’s rhythm had experienced when the second pulse had ricocheted off it. He understood what Rhapsody meant about namesongs, songs of one’s self; the way that she could attune her music to something’s true name. Her musical lore worked in much the same way that his tracking ability did, locking both of them to the unique vibrations that each individual emitted. He had always known how vulnerable he was when matching his own heartbeat to another’s. It made him wonder what her exposure was as well.
He could still hear both rhythms, distantly. There was such an infinitesimal amount of blood from the old world in the makeup of the children that he hardly should be able to hear it at all. One of the heartbeats was fainter and more intermittent than the other.
“One of them—the first one—is at the southeastern edge of the city,” he said finally. “As for the other one, it could be anywhere.”
Rhapsody adjusted the veil in front of her face nervously. “That doesn’t inspire great confidence.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be angry. It’s just that your ability to track these children is the only hope we have of finding them.”
Achmed took her elbow and drew her away from the dry fountain. He led her to a sheltered alcove in a side alley, and after checking to be certain they were alone, leaned close to her ear.
“I should have explained this to you long ago,” he said in a voice so low as to be barely above a whisper. “You do not understand the difficulty in what you are asking.
“On the Island, I could find and follow any man’s heartbeat easily. Like finding my way through a familiar forest, there was uncertainty, there were perils, but I knew where they were, and how to cope with them. That ability vanished, and with the exception of those who were also born on Serendair, I can no longer do that. I can match heartbeats with you, and Grunthor, and a handful of First Generation Cymrians. That’s all.”
His voice dropped even lower. “Hunting F’dor was always more difficult and rare; as you know, I’ve never held a real one in thrall before. It’s a combination of my blood-gift, and the racial ability of the Dhracians, that may—I repeat, may—allow me to do it this time, assuming we can extract the demon’s blood from these children.
“Whenever a F’dor spirit came forth from its broken vault within the Earth, it took an initial host. It had to be a fairly powerless one, like a child, or a weak man, because it can only subsume a host weaker than itself, or at best as powerful as it is, and when it is first out in the air of the world it is weak. Blood is spilled—perhaps just a drop, but there is a bond of blood each time. It needs that blood to tie it to a living entity. That blood becomes the demon’s own. Even as it grows, that blood remains its own, though it is mixed and tainted and diluted with the blood of each new host it takes on.
“The F’dor who fathered these children was a spirit from the old world. It doubtless had many hosts on Serendair. We know it has had even more since it has been here.” He stopped, and they both turned their heads at the sound of giggling. A group of children, mistaking them for lovers nuzzling in a back alley, stared for a moment, then scattered at the ferocious look in Achmed’s eyes, the only of his features visible. He scowled, then returned his lips to her ear.
“Given how powerful we know it is now, it has doubtless masked what might have begun as one drop of blood with the blood of hundreds, perhaps thousands of other hosts. Then it made the Rakshas. It mixed the blood of feral animals with that of its human host. The Rakshas impregnated the mothers of these children, diluting the content of the F’dor’s blood even further.
“So understand—to me, the signature of the F’dor’s blood in the veins of these children is like a whiff of perfume I have smelled only once before. You are asking me to find that odor in the air of this town, amid all the other scents here. And the person who wore that perfume wore it a month ago.”
“Well, he probably hasn’t bathed in the intervening time, if that helps,” Rhapsody said lightly. Her green eyes sparkled, then grew solemn. “I’m sorry to put so much weight on your shoulders. What shall we do next?”
Achmed sighed and leaned away, standing upright again. “We’ll head southeast, and see what we find. And if we can’t find this child, or any of the others, we’ll have to make do with the one or ones we can find, even if it’s only the baby we know will be born in Tyrian nine weeks hence. You have the exact time, date, and place for that one. All I need is a small amount of pure demon’s blood.”
“And abandon the others to their damnation? To the Void?”
Achmed didn’t blink. “Yes.”
“You would really do that?”
“In a heartbeat, so to speak. Now, come. Our chance to find this thing grows slimmer with every moment that passes.” Achmed put out his hand, gloved in a thin leather sheath, and R
hapsody took it. Together they crossed the alley and disappeared into the depths of Yarim Paar.
5
Tile Foundry, Yarim Paar
Omet did not like the new apprentice.
Under normal circumstances, Omet was busy enough that he would be hard pressed to have even noticed the new apprentice. As an apprentice himself in the tile foundry, two years away from his journeyman’s year, work was endless and life sleepless. He didn’t have time for opinions, or sentiments, or anything else that might distract him from remembering to check the temperature of the slip as it cooked, or getting up every two hours to stoke the fires of the ovens through the night with peat and coal, dung, and, sparingly, wood.
The red clay of Yarim had been of little use for raising crops, but it made wonderful tile. In its heyday Yarim had produced most of the utilitarian drainage and paving stones that built the great Cymrian cities, as well as the mosaics and ceramic tiles that decorated them. Yarim had adorned itself in the grandest pieces, from the glistening fountainbeds that surrounded the duke’s palace to the walls of the Oracle’s temple. Even now, in its declining years, with the availability of the water necessary to make it limited, Yarim still produced both tile and pottery for export.
The enormous foundry was the city’s largest building outside of the various government facilities and the temple of the Oracle. It stood, partially empty, at the outskirts of the city to the southeast, near the largest interprovince thoroughfare. Caustic black smoke from the fires that burned night and day hung heavy in the air above and around the building and the nearby streets, making it difficult to breathe, so there were few other buildings, and no residences near it.
When Omet’s mother had apprenticed him to the proprietor of the tileworks, she had known full well the life to which she was sentencing her son. The foundry’s owner, a diminutive woman of mixed human and Lirin blood by the name of Esten, was known by sight or name or reputation not only through all of the province of Yarim, but west in Canderre and south in Bethe Corbair as well.
Esten’s small physical stature was in direct opposition to her social one; publicly she was the owner and operator of Yarim’s largest foundry. Even more commonly known was her position as chief of the bloodthirsty Raven’s Guild, a coterie of blacksmiths, thugs, and professional thieves that ruled the dark hours in Yarim.
Despite her ferocious reputation, Esten’s face was a pretty one, an exotic countenance with angular lines and high cheekbones, probably owing to her Lirin blood. That anyone had even seen it at all was a testament to her status in and of itself, since most women in Yarim took the veil. Most striking of all that face’s features were the eyes, dark and inquisitive like that of the bird her guild had been named for. Those eyes always held a hint of amusement, even when they were black with anger, and were more piercing in their stare than an ice pick. Omet had decided at the meeting where he was chosen as an apprentice that he would always avoid their gaze if at all possible. The few seconds he had been the target of it had made him fear he would lose his water onto the floor at her feet. It was of little surprise to him that his mother had not come to visit him once in the five years since then.
For the most part he had managed to avoid Esten’s notice. She came every new moon to check the progress of the tunnel, and when she did he made certain he was busy feeding the slave children or stoking the ovens so as to eliminate any encounter but a chance one.
Perhaps his decision to remain away from her notice had been an error in judgment. Ever since Vincane, the new apprentice, had been pulled from the tunnel and promoted to work beside Omet and the others, he had gone out of his way to endear himself to Esten, to curry her favor in a dozen slavish, obvious ways that had turned Omet’s stomach. Those antics had seemed to have turned Esten’s head as well; now she favored Vincane, brought him small treats and tousled his hair, laughing and teasing him. There was something in Vincane’s eyes, something dark and inquisitive that mirrored Esten’s own, and it served to place him in a position as her pet.
It was not this favored status that bothered Omet. Rather, it was the cruel streak that Vincane displayed without reprimand, occasionally toward Omet and the other apprentices, but mostly toward the slave children.
For the most part, no one saw much of those children. Food and water were handed down the shaft several times a day, always as a reward for making their quota of clay. Fifty buckets of clay came up, one pail of water was lowered down. One hundred buckets of clay came up, one box of food went down. Up, down, up, down. Such was the life of a fifth-year apprentice, hauling the hook-stick up out of the well, dumping the clay, tossing the pail back down again, occasionally bestowing a little bread and broth on the small dark beings that scrambled like rats at the bottom of the shaft and in the tunnel beyond. In between they handed down the hods of finished tiles and mortar, all the while minding the furnace and the ovens, checking the huge vats of clay slip as it baked in the sweltering heat, ringing the bell to summon the journeymen from the separate annex in which they lived and worked when their special firings were finished.
Vincane had been one of those slave children himself until recently. A ragtag orphan like all the others, purchased or stolen from wherever he had come from, he had shown remarkable stamina in the digging, and more—he had a resistance to pain that seemed almost inhuman. Omet had seen him once put his hand directly into the kiln itself and pull forth a rack of greenware tiles without flinching as his hand grasped the red-hot wire. That, and a willingness to betray the small secrets of his fellow slaves—they had widened the tunnel a few hands’ widths for extra sleeping room, they had hidden the broken pieces of a trowel instead of turning it in—had endeared him to Esten, and had given him the singular opportunity to escape the tunnel and come to work for her as an apprentice.
At first the journeymen had feared the slave children would begin turning on each other to see if they could obtain the same promotion, and that chaos would disrupt the digging, but Esten had nipped that possibility in the bud easily. Any uproar whatsoever would result in Vincane coming back down into the tunnel, she had announced sweetly during the slave children’s monthly airing. And he would be allowed to bring some of his toys. The slaves had eaten their meal even more quietly than the moment before she spoke, their all-but-blind eyes glimmering in terror.
Omet felt no particular compassion toward the plight of the slave children—his own life was nothing to be envied, after all—but even he was appalled at the cruelties Vincane employed. A pallet of food would be handed down, eagerly clutched at by two dozen filthy hands, to be discovered to contain only two hard rolls and scraps of rope left over from the packing area. Vincane’s high, shrieking laugh at the bloody riot that ensued had caused Omet to go cold, even in the reflected heat of the ovens.
It seemed whenever Vincane was responsible for hoisting the hods that dragged the diggers up for their monthly feeding and airing, at least half of them would be bloodied in the process, battered against the tiled walls of the well or accidentally dropped out of the hod and stepped upon. Anguished wails or fisticuffs would break out whenever he was in the midst of passing out the monthly rations, to Vincane’s wide-eyed protestations of innocence, followed by self-righteous accusations. It bothered Omet greatly that Vincane’s eyes glittered even more excitedly while watching the accused slave child being thrashed after his indictment, bothered him so greatly in fact that he sometimes considered knocking Vincane backward down the shaft when the new apprentice was off his guard.
Vincane had even gone so far as to cut Omet’s hair as he slept as a joke; he had tossed in the throes of horrific dreams all the long night, visions of Vincane hovering over him with a knife, grinning, to wake in a loose mane of his own hair, slashed in uneven swaths across his pate. Omet had thought about giving Vincane the beating he deserved, but decided that, even if he were to emerge victorious, it would attract Esten’s notice, and that was something Omet sought never to do. So he swallowed his fury and shaved the
rest of his head completely bald, finding it cooler in the heat of the furnaces anyway.
The only misstep he had seen Vincane make was the time he had chosen to urinate in the drinking water bucket before handing it down, thinking this to be great fun. He had his back to the doorway, and had not noticed that Esten had arrived early for her monthly inspection of the tunnel. The wasting of water was a crime in Yarim Paar, and though Esten chose to disregard a number of common laws herself on a daily basis, apparently this was one about which she felt strongly.
She had seized Vincane by the ears from behind and twisted them violently, almost ripping them free of his head in the process, following the action up with a resounding box on both sides of his bleeding head. Vincane had learned from that experience and had not repeated his joke, at least as far as Omet had noticed, though he had not seemed to even notice the pain.
Even those things that could be seen as positive attributes about Vincane somehow or another always turned fetid. Unlike the other apprentices, Vincane had no compunction about hauling out the bodies of the slave-child miners who died in the tunnels, dragging them out of the hod and back to the furnace in the wing of the foundry where the journeymen slept.
Esten had decreed that the secondary furnace, the journeymen’s furnace, would be used as a crematorium since the unfortunate day when one of the slave boys had made the mistake of attempting escape during the monthly airing. Esten had hurled him into the largest main kiln and slammed the door shut. The stench afterward had been minimal, but the slip had been affected by the additional moisture; six racks of tiles were ruined, and so from that time on Vincane would use only the furnace in the far wing for disposal of slave-child bodies. Omet had once gone back to see what had taken him so long, and had retched upon discovering what Vincane’s ritual before cremation had been.