Darksong Read online

  ‘That is not a question I can answer at this time,’ the Vespian woman said coolly. ‘It will depend upon whether I am sent by the direct route to Myrmidor from Vespi, or via the Sheanna isles.’

  ‘I thought, as Myrmidor was closer …’ Ember stammered, unable to control the tremor in her voice. Her lessons with the soulweaver had taught her that the tidal Sheanna islands were the most remote land mass on Keltor. It would take at least two weeks to reach them and, for Ember, that might mean unthinkable pain and perhaps death if the growth of the tumour was fast enough. The doctors had said that once the pills stopped working, she might have as little as two weeks left, and she had certainly been on Keltor more than two weeks. Somehow Alene’s treatments had not only withdrawn the pain, they had arrested the growth of the tumour, but Alene was not aboard and Ember’s instincts told her that she did not have much time.

  Something in Ember’s expression caused the other woman to soften slightly. ‘I expect that we will go straight to Myrmidor. Sheanna has little trade in this season. I will go to my father as soon as we dock and when I have made my report and received my orders. If we are to go direct to Myrmidor, the journey will be only a matter of a few days.’

  Bleyd groaned loudly and they both looked over at him. Curled in a foetal huddle facing the wall, the Fomhikan was completely covered by a quilt that one of the shipmen had thrown over him. Bleyd rolled over with a muffled groan and Ember could not help a hiss of horror at the sight of his face. But at least the filth and the bruising and swelling around his nose and split lips made him unrecognisable as the handsome brother and protector of the heir to the Keltan throne.

  ‘No doubt your companion would prefer to be left in peace, Lady, but those wounds need cleaning,’ Revel said evenly. She strode across to an ornate section of the smooth panelling that lined the cabin and slid open a section, taking out a wad of cloth and several jars from a recess. ‘They are not officially approved Iridomi medicaments, but they will serve.’

  Ember nodded. Her studies with Alene had taught her that traditionally, Iridom island had the sole licence from the Holder to produce the medications dispensed by white cloaks on all of the islands. But these days Iridom olfactors were rumoured to be more interested in producing cosmetic unguents and pleasure drugs than medicines, and what little they did produce was scarce and expensive, and tended to find its way to the islands that its chieftain favoured politically, rather than to all septs equally. It was no surprise that Vespi had devised its own bootleg medications and Ember supposed the other islands did the same. A wise ruler would never have permitted such vital things to be produced by a monopoly, but Tarsin was anything but wise.

  ‘Use green salve when the wounds are clean,’ Revel instructed. ‘Where the wounds are not clean, and you cannot get them clean, tip on this yellow powder.’ She was setting the pots down on a table, and Ember chided herself to pay attention. ‘The red salve is for very deep cuts. It is a binding agent. You push the edges together and hold it until it seals. But only seal wounds that are clean. When he wakes, put this white powder in a mug of water and give it to him. It will dull the pain.’

  ‘Where will I get water?’ Ember asked.

  Revel indicated another section of the panelling behind which was a reservoir with a small ornate tube capped at the end, and waved at a brazier where the water could be heated. Handing Ember a metal bowl she said, ‘Put some of the white powder in the warmed water to clean the wounds. I will send someone down with food in a while. For the time being, you should stay below deck.’

  Ember nodded obediently, and Revel eyed the opaque veil that hid her face with faint exasperation. Then one of the shipfolk called her and she left.

  Ember refused to let herself become introspective again. Filling the bowl with water, she set it over the brazier. Fortunately she had seen the myrmidons operate the larger brazier in the soulweaver’s apartment in the cliff palace, so she knew what to do. Leaning down to open the tiny flue at the base of it, she was hampered by the cloying draperies she wore. With an exclamation of irritation, she wrenched off her veil and replaced it with the half-mask Alene had fashioned in case she was forced to remove her veil. The soulweaver had bidden Ember keep her blind eye covered at all times because, ironically, the unusual silvery shadowing of the pupil caused by her tumour was identical to the silverblindness of soulweavers, who were only ever blind in both eyes. To be marked this way in one eye would reveal her as a stranger; a visitor from another world. Strangers were not uncommon on Keltor, but to be marked a stranger in these times would be very dangerous since many regarded them as disguised demons from the Void. Only the soulweavers of Darkfall and their followers believed that strangers were people drawn accidentally to Keltor through a portal created to summon, from another world, a legendary hero called the Unraveller.

  Bleyd was breathing loudly through his mouth and Ember guessed that his nose was broken, but it was hard to tell with the nostrils so swollen and clogged with blood. She had a brief recollection of the first time she had seen the dashing Fomhikan sweep into Alene’s rooms. He had been wearing an elegant green cape and matching boots the same shade as his laughing eyes. He had looked at her, unveiled at Alene’s request, though not unmasked, and had ceased to smile, thereby unveiling something of his own. Ember had seen that look of dawning devotion too many times before to be mistaken about its meaning. Of course he had not understood her avoidance of him, and she could not possibly have explained what she had not understood herself, then.

  But that elegant courtier was not this beaten and wounded man. Now, Bleyd was no more than a person in need and to answer his need did not require that she feel anything for him as a man other than compassion. So Ember reasoned, ignoring dark Ember’s hollow observation that compassion was merely another sign of her new and dangerous vulnerability.

  Ember forced herself to concentrate on the Fomhikan’s injuries. Aside from his right eye, which was a mere red slit in a great red bulge, there was the possible broken nose and numerous cuts and grazes on his face. Pulling the quilt down, she undid the ties along the front of his clothes, baring his upper torso. Neck and shoulders were unmarked and the bones felt straight and regular, but one arm wrapped loosely in rags emanated a sickly odour. Ember had noticed the smell as she helped him up the steep stairs in the cliff cells. She did not think it was broken, nevertheless it was with trepidation that she began to unwind the ragged bandage. After several layers she could go no further because the material was glued to the flesh by dried pus and blood. Retching a little, she cut away what she could, using a small knife from the wall recess before turning her attention to the leggings, which were also stuck in places to his skin. On one knee, the bandage was so stiff with congealed blood that she dreaded to see what was under it. No wonder Bleyd had leaned so heavily on her. No wonder he had fainted! She felt slightly faint herself.

  Using two towels to protect her hands, she carried the bowl of heated water to the bed, and scooped some of the white powder into it. Using the wadding she saturated the bandages that would not shift, and then left them to loosen as she washed his face.

  The water gave off a pungent steam that reminded her of the smell of wet eucalypts. It must have stung because Bleyd groaned and tried to turn away. Ember held him with little effort. She was not strong, but he was terribly weak and, after a slight struggle, he lapsed into a deeper stillness.

  Before long the water was a dirty reddish-black. She tipped it out and refilled it to heat. Bleyd’s face was now as clean as she could get it. She thought his nose might not be broken after all, though it looked as if someone had slit one of the nostrils with a knife. His eye was another matter.

  She looked at the array of bottles Revel had given her. Red for deep cuts, white powder for pain, yellow powder for wounds that would not come clean and what was the other? Green salve for clean wounds.

  She dared not put any of them on the eye wound. Steeling herself, she lifted the eyelid and peered under it. T
he white was completely bloodshot and the pupil was turned deeply back into its socket and was awash in yellowish mucus. She could not see if there was a cut on the eye so she settled for dribbling warm water gingerly into the socket until the pus was cleaned away. She would have to ask Revel what to use. She left the split lip, too, because she had no idea which of the powders and salves were poisonous, if any. But she put green salve on his nose and ear, sprinkled yellow powder into a cut where she could see grit imbedded in the flesh and pressed a deep gash on his cheek together after dusting it with the red powder.

  She moved down his body methodically. From the pattern of the bruising he had been punched repeatedly and hit with something like a truncheon. He moaned, though she hardly touched him, and she wondered if he had cracked or broken ribs as well.

  Bathing the bandages on his arm again, she was finally able to lift them. Her stomach turned, for underneath were savage burn blisters which had broken open and were obviously infected. She bathed the area and then slathered it with green salve, trying not to imagine how the burns had been inflicted. He had been cut several times on the other forearm and she debated the red powder but decided on yellow in case there was dirt inside.

  His groin and genitals were savagely bruised but the skin was not broken. She had never seen a completely naked man other than in paintings, but Bleyd’s injuries prevented her feeling embarrassment. His knee, once she had managed to remove the sodden bandages from it, looked as if it had been smashed with a hammer. It, too, stank of infection.

  Bleyd twisted away from her hands again as she bathed it and then covered the clean wounds with green salve.

  When she had done all she could, Ember tried to turn him, but she was simply not strong enough. She realised that she had never done so much for another human being in all her life. Sinking down on the edge of the bed, she found that she was trembling and nauseated. She drew a blanket up high over Bleyd to hide his face which, now clean, might be recognised, wondering what kind of person would be capable of torturing another person to this extent. It was cruelty to the point of insanity. Was it possible that Tarsin had ordered this?

  Thinking of the Keltan ruler made Ember wonder how he would take her disappearance. He would connect it to Bleyd’s escape from the citadel palace, of course, given they had vanished at the same time and from the same place. But as Ember and Bleyd would be seen as enemies, people would be likely to imagine that she had been kidnapped to prevent her visioning further. Feyt had suggested this. But no one would think to look for them at sea, since ruffians employed by the Shadowman were to lay a trail indicating that Bleyd had fled inland. Anyi’s continuing presence on Ramidan would be regarded as evidence that his brother had not left Ramidan, too, since all knew how protective Bleyd was of the young mermod.

  Tarsin would have no idea what had happened. He would not have known that the green legionnaires assigned to escort Ember to the cells had been given secret orders to kill both Ember and Bleyd, and make it look like a murder–suicide, and if he had questioned the legionnaires, they would have been able to tell him nothing of what happened.

  Ember hardly knew what to make of her escape. The strange manbeast who called himself Ronaall had intervened because, for some unfathomable reason, it was important to him that she live.

  ‘I swore an oath and you are part of it,’ he had once whispered inside her mind.

  She could not imagine what his oath might be, except that it must concern the saving and protection of strangers, but his intervention had allowed her to rescue Bleyd. She no longer tried to tell herself that the manbeast was some sort of hallucination. How could she, when this was the third time she had communicated with him, and the second time he had saved her life?

  Whatever he is, he was as real as I am, Ember thought. Then she shivered, remembering the first time he had rescued her, and the way his golden cat’s eyes gleamed as he said softly, ‘We are both of us dreams, Lady.’

  A dizziness assailed her, and she sat up hurriedly, fearful that she would fall into another visioning swoon. The trouble was that, unlike proper soulweavers, she had no control over her seguing. It could happen at any moment, without warning. She saw much that she did not understand at all, as well as important things like Glynn falling from the cliff.

  I know who I am now, but I still know too little, Ember thought.

  Her mind returned to the citadel palace and the events that might be unfolding there. With luck, Tarsin’s legionnaires had found the false trail and were scouring the wild part of the island for the poisoner and his prisoner. But perhaps Tarsin was, even now, dispatching a message to Vespi to detain the Stormsong and all aboard, for his emissary, Asa, had seen Ember helping Bleyd from the cells. And he had more to report than that.

  Ember shivered, remembering how Asa had torn away both her veil and mask and had gaped in genuine amazement, seeing the single silverblind eye that marked her a stranger. If he told Coralyn, who was his true mistress, she would guess at once that Ember was trying to reach Darkfall and was likely to travel with Bleyd. She would contact her own green legionnaires stationed in all ports on the way to Myrmidor, with instructions to find them both and kill them.

  But maybe Feyt had managed to keep her promise to silence Asa. Ember did not doubt that the myrmidon was equal to the grisly task of disposing of the emissary, given that what Asa had to reveal would put the soulweaver in danger, too. Feyt would do anything to protect Alene. But what she would do and what she could do might be two different things.

  Ember stiffened at the sound of footsteps outside the cabin, but it was only Revel with a tray of food. She said sourly, ‘This is not shipmistress work but I do not want my people poking around down here for their own sakes.’ She gave Bleyd such a pointed look that Ember’s heart sank. The shipmistress had recognised him after all.

  Setting down the tray, Revel crossed to the bed and drew back the blanket. ‘You cleaned him up well.’

  ‘Only on one side, for I could not turn him,’ Ember admitted.

  Revel tried to haul the Fomhikan over but he moaned loudly. ‘Perhaps something is broken inside. Come. We will turn him between us.’ They rolled Bleyd slowly onto his stomach and Ember peeled back the shirt. Revel shook her head in disgust at the mess of fibre and flesh beneath. ‘He has been whipped with his shirt on. The wounds will almost certainly be infected.’ She watched Ember refill the bowl of water and set it to heat before asking, ‘Why do you hide your face behind masks and veils?’

  ‘I do not wish the scars of my illness to be seen,’ Ember answered with careful truth. By now she was well able to affect the slightly stilted and formal manner of speech used by upper-class Keltans and, thanks to Alene, she had enough general knowledge of the islands and their various customs not to give herself away as a stranger. Revel was loyal to Darkfall, but Feyt had warned Ember to trust her secret to no one save the myrmidon leader, Duran, whom she was supposed to find at the myrmidon training academy on Myrmidor.

  ‘You saved Tarsin’s life,’ the Vespian shipmistress said now, and there was no praise in her tone. She bore no love for the Holder and Ember did not blame her. It was impossible to understand the soulweavers’ stubbornness in upholding his rulership of Keltor. It was true that Tarsin had periods of clarity, but he was clearly unstable mentally and emotionally. Worse, he had come to loathe the very soulweavers who had elected him; in particular Alene, whom rumour said he had once loved.

  ‘Wiser if you had stayed silent,’ the shipmistress muttered, predictably, when Ember made no response.

  ‘Perhaps, but would you be able to watch a man drink poison and say nothing?’ Ember asked coolly.

  Revel scowled. ‘This man tries to poison Tarsin and you save Tarsin. Now you save the would-be poisoner.’

  ‘Bleyd did not try to poison anyone. Coralyn and Asa did it and made him their scapegoat,’ Ember said.

  ‘The Iridomi bitch-chieftain would poison babes to have her way, but this does not alter the fact that yo
u and the Fomhikan make an odd pair. In my experience, things that do not match cause sparks, and sparks start fires which can burn up a lot of things …’

  ‘All we want is to get to Myrmidor.’

  Revel only said, ‘When we dock on Vespi, it will be best if you are not seen.’

  ‘I agree,’ Ember said, becoming annoyed at Revel’s stubborn brusqueness. Did the woman imagine she wanted to see the sights?

  Revel smiled humourlessly. ‘Don’t waste your chilly tone on me, Lady. The great water is the coldest thing in the world and I am handfasted to it.’

  Ember refused to be cowed. Quite possibly her life, and certainly Bleyd’s, depended on Revel keeping her bargain with the soulweaver. ‘You agreed to take us to Myrmidor but now it sounds as if you want to change your mind.’ This was provocative because it was a matter of pride to Vespians that their word was their bond, aside from the binding legal nature of journey-bonds.

  ‘I agreed to carry you there,’ Revel snapped. ‘The Fomhikan was not in any bargain or binding. I did not know who he was when you brought him on my ship, and it would break no bond if I hand him over to the honorary contingent of green legionnaires stationed on Vespi. You can be sure they will be happy to have him.’

  ‘But you would betray me in exposing him, and that would break your bond with Alene,’ Ember said quietly, careful not to sound triumphant. Revel was trapped between her loyalty to Darkfall and her anger at being saddled with an unexpected and dangerous additional passenger.

  The Vespian woman gave her a shuttered look. ‘Just remember, if you are seen while we are in port, it will be out of my hands.’

  Ember finished cleaning Bleyd’s lacerated back as best she could, then she dusted it with yellow powder and left the suppurating wounds uncovered. She had forgotten to ask Revel which salve to use on the eye, but the swelling had subsided slightly, so perhaps bathing it had been enough.