She stared after him. Healed? ‘Yedan!’
He glanced back. ‘What?’
‘We cannot live here.’
‘No, of course not.’
‘But something is happening in Kharkanas-I don’t know if I can even go back there.’
‘Once she’s fully returned,’ Yedan said, swinging back, ‘the power should ease.’
‘She? Who?’
‘Don’t be obtuse, sister. Mother Dark. Who else arrives like a fist in our skulls?’ He resumed his search along the First Shore.
‘Errastas,’ she whispered, ‘whatever will you do now?’
Torrent scowled at the hag. ‘Aren’t you even listening?’
Olar Ethil straightened, gathering up her rotted cape of furs and scaled hide. ‘Such a lovely carpet, such a riot of richness, all those supine colours!’
The withered nut of this witch’s brain has finally cracked. ‘I said these carriage tracks are fresh, probably not even a day old.’
Olar Ethil had one hand raised, as if about to wave at someone on the horizon. Instead, one taloned finger began inscribing patterns in the air. ‘Go round, my friends, slow your steps. Wait for the one to pass, through and out and onward. No point in clashing wills, when none of it has purpose. Such a busy plain! No matter, if anyone has cause to quake it’s not me, hah!’
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She stared after him. Healed? ‘Yedan!’
He glanced back. ‘What?’
‘We cannot live here.’
‘No, of course not.’
‘But something is happening in Kharkanas-I don’t know if I can even go back there.’
‘Once she’s fully returned,’ Yedan said, swinging back, ‘the power should ease.’
‘She? Who?’
‘Don’t be obtuse, sister. Mother Dark. Who else arrives like a fist in our skulls?’ He resumed his search along the First Shore.
‘Errastas,’ she whispered, ‘whatever will you do now?’
Torrent scowled at the hag. ‘Aren’t you even listening?’
Olar Ethil straightened, gathering up her rotted cape of furs and scaled hide. ‘Such a lovely carpet, such a riot of richness, all those supine colours!’
The withered nut of this witch’s brain has finally cracked. ‘I said these carriage tracks are fresh, probably not even a day old.’
Olar Ethil had one hand raised, as if about to wave at someone on the horizon. Instead, one taloned finger began inscribing patterns in the air. ‘Go round, my friends, slow your steps. Wait for the one to pass, through and out and onward. No point in clashing wills, when none of it has purpose. Such a busy plain! No matter, if anyone has cause to quake it’s not me, hah!’
‘An enormous carriage,’ Torrent resumed, ‘burdened. But while that’s interesting, it’s the fact that the tracks simply begin-as if from nowhere-and look at the way the ground cracked at the start, as if the damned thing had landed from the sky, horses and all. Doesn’t any of that make you curious?’
‘Eh? Oh, soon enough, soon enough.’ She dropped her arm and then pointed the same finger at him. ‘The first temple’s a mess. Besieged a decade ago, just a burnt-out husk, now. No one was spared. The Matron took weeks to die-it’s no easy thing, killing them, you know. We have to move on, find another.’
Snarling, Torrent mounted his horse and collected the reins. ‘Any good at running, witch? Too bad.’ He kicked his horse into motion, setting out on the carriage’s weaving trail. Let the thing’s bones clatter into dust in his wake-the best solution to all his ills. Or she could just stand there and stare at every horizon one by one and babble and rant all she wanted-as if the sky ever answered.
A carriage. People. Living people. That’s what he needed now. The return of sanity- hold on, it dropped out of the sky, don’t forget. What’s so normal about that?
‘Never mind,’ he muttered, ‘at least they’re alive.’
Sandalath made it to the bridge before collapsing. Cursing, Withal knelt at her side and lifted her head until it rested on his lap. Blood was streaming from her nose, ears and the corners of her eyes. Her lips glistened as if painted.
The three Nachts-or whatever they were called in this realm-had vanished, fled, he assumed, from whatever was assailing his wife. As for himself, he felt nothing. This world was desolate, lifeless, probably leagues from any decent body of water-but oh how he wished he could take her and just sail out of this madness.
Instead, it looked as though his wife was dying.
Crimson froth bubbled from her mouth as she began mumbling something-he leaned closer-words, yes, a conversation. Withal leaned back, snorting. When she’d thought him asleep, she’d said the same lines over and over again. As if they were a prayer, or the beginning of one.
‘What’s broken cannot be mended. You broke us, but that is not all-see what you have done.’
There was the touch of a lament in her tone, but one so emptied of sentiment it cut like a dagger. A lament, yes, but infused with chill hatred, a knuckled core of ice. Complicated, aye, layered-unless he was just imagining things. The truth could be as silly as a childhood song sung to a broken doll, its head lolling impossibly with those stupid eyes underneath the nose and the mouth looking like a wound to the forehead-
Withal shook himself. The oldest memories might be smells, tastes, or isolated images-but rarely all three at once-at least in so far as he knew from his own experience. Crammed into his skull, a crowded mess with everything at the back so tightly pressed all the furniture was crushed, and to reach in was to come up with a few pieces that made no sense at all-
Gods, he was tired. And here she was, dragging him all this way, only to die in his lap and abandon him at the gates of a dead city.
‘… see what you have done.’
Her breathing had deepened. The blood had stopped trickling down-he wiped her mouth with a grimy cuff. She suddenly sighed. He leaned closer. ‘Sand? Can you hear me?’