Voice of the Lost

CHAPTER FOUR

Medair, on her hands and knees, found leaves and dirt beneath her palms. Her eyes struggled to adjust to the sudden absence of warm magelight, and in the aftermath of so many disrupted gates she was slow to process the sounds of surprise and distress. Forcing herself to unsteady feet, she fetched up against rough bark. A tree, where one had not been. Or, rather, she was no longer outside the walls of Athere, where the flat swathe of grass was covered in blood and bodies. Instead, the moon peeped through a thick canopy of leaves. There was a steady murmur of magic, and a stiff, cold breeze carried the scent of wood smoke. The knees of her trousers were damp and a drop of icy water scored her cheek. It had been raining.

"Where are we?" It was Ileaha’s voice, as startled as Medair felt.

"Don’t summon a light," Cor-Ibis said. "Not until we know where this is."

This coming from a man who, as their eyes adjusted to the darkness, proved to still be glowing steadily. After a pause, the Keridahl continued. "Who is here?"

"I am," said Kierash Islantar, just the tiniest note of uncertainty in his voice. Someone inhaled and even Medair felt a twinge of dismay to know that Palladium’s heir had been stolen away to wherever this was. He was so close Medair edged almost automatically away, then stopped, staring up through a break in the canopy.

"And I," said N’Taive, the Herald of the Mersians. Medair had not seen her among the small group trailing Cor-Ibis and the Kierash, but she recognised the lilt of her voice.

"At your command, Keridahl," said Liak ar Haedrin, at the same time as Avahn’s quiet: "Here."

"Kaschens las Cormar and an Serentel," said the voice of a stranger, confident and female.

"At your command," concluded a young man, presumably Kaschen an Serentel. The gate had evidently scooped up a couple of soldiers.

There was a pause, and Medair knew they waited for her to speak. She felt so remote from them, from everything. She had admitted her name, she had used the Horn, and become an unspeakable thing, drenched in blood. What was there left for her?

But remaining silent was no longer an option.

"I am here," she said, close to whispering. "Here in Decia, if that truly is Castle Gyrfalcon."

Through the trees she could see a jagged hill, a sharply vertical mound of ragged stone and rubble surmounted by weirdly glistening black stone. A dark castle whose myriad windows were outlined by an orange glow. The shape of it was very like the castle where Duchess Trienne had received her so graciously. Yet this was the stuff of nightmares: grim, unwelcoming and sinister.

"Falcon Black!" The Mersian Herald’s voice was stiff with dismay.

"Decia, but not imprisoned," Avahn said, rapidly reviewing the situation. "Why did those summoned by the Horn spare Estarion? And why, after sending us through a gate to Decia, did he leave us outside the castle and unguarded?"

"The forests around Falcon Black are bewitched," Herald N’Taive said. Her voice, once so stalwart, quavered. "Haunted, spelled, trapped. No army dare approach the Cloaked South’s stronghold."

"Even so, to leave us loose…"

"Possibly the many gates we disrupted skewed the one which succeeded," suggested Islantar. The Kierash had recovered his equanimity, his voice steady.

"Sending us to the moat instead of the dungeon?" Cor-Ibis did not seem convinced, but he moved on briskly. "Only a supremely powerful artefact could have produced so many gates, and they are not always predictable. Whatever the case, we are in unfamiliar territory, and our very appearance proclaims us enemy. Avahn, Kel ar Haedrin, you will protect the Kierash. Keris N’Taive, if this forest is trapped, we need to know as much as you can tell us about it, and quickly."

"Of course." Herald N’Taive regained a little of her composure. "My Queen sent me here several times, before Estarion broke the Compact. To the south there is farmland and Taedrin City is not far to the east. North and west, as well as immediately around the castle, is forest with a single road east, heavily guarded. The last time I was at Falcon Black, there were wild stories that Estarion had started hunting criminals through the western forest. More challenging sport than his usual fare. It was true. It pleased him to take me as witness–" Her voice wavered.

"I have not seen Falcon Black from this angle, so I can only guess that this is the northern forest, which is denser, and forbidden to everyone. A shield against invasion from the north. It is said that the enchantments which protect the forest directly about the castle extend into the northern reaches."

Medair shifted uneasily. It was as if the Mersian Herald didn’t want to describe the dangers of the forest exactly, for fear of summoning them up.

"It has been a long time since any army approached from the north, not for fifty years or more. There were few survivors from the attempt. They spoke of losing their companions because of poor weather, and of something which snatched the soldiers, one by one, before they even came within sight of Falcon Black."

"What of smaller groups? An army is a large target." Cor-Ibis sounded distracted. The glow which emanated from him was not powerful, just enough to make him visible, and she could not make out his expression as he turned his head to look up towards the castle.

"Of those known to have dared in the last ten years, only one has returned. Five months after setting out, haggard, gravely injured and not remembering a moment after he ventured into the forest."

"Then the road’s the safer way out," Avahn said, thoughtful but undaunted. "It might be guarded, but it’s better than trying to head north when it’s obvious Decia has set powerful defences."

"Won’t those defences be more concentrated about the castle?" Ileaha asked.

"Very likely," Cor-Ibis said. "I agree that the risk must be less than venturing through this forest. East to the castle’s entrance – the point where the road begins to ascend. We can hope that such a well-frequented place will prove to be less deadly."

"And beyond that point? A well-guarded road is not so easy to pass as a set-spell whose trigger you can detect and avoid." Cor-Ibis' glimmering form was briefly eclipsed as Avahn moved towards him. "And past the road? We are in Decia."

"The road must wait until daylight, at the very least," Cor-Ibis agreed.

"And I know of one who will aid us, in Taedrin City," offered Herald N’Taive. "If we can reach her, we have shelter, resources."

"Is it at all viable to build our own gate, Illukar?" Avahn asked.

"Between us, when we have recovered, we could do that. I have a rahlstone, though it must be nearing the limits of its use. However, it is unlikely that we could complete a gate before being set upon, and we cannot even make an attempt tonight, nor, I fear, tomorrow. Too much of our strength has been spent in battle. Until then, we need shelter, a defensible position and more information with which to plan our next move. Fortunately, we are not all obviously Palladian."

"And Estarion?" the Kierash asked, speaking after a long silence. "Estarion, who is mad enough to summon wild magic when his plans for victory go awry? Estarion who we believe holds an artefact capable of summoning gates of unlimited power and frequency?"

"And who may be hunting us as we speak," Cor-Ibis finished, composure steady in the face of so many obstacles. "I have not overlooked his threat, but I wish to see the road first. If its guards are easily avoided – as they may be, when Decia’s forces are surely in disarray following the mass departure to war – then I will be able to send you on to Taedrin City while I attempt Estarion. But your safety must come first, Kierash."

"Palladium must come first, Keridahl," Islantar said, stiffly. "We cannot turn aside from Estarion’s threat, not even if it were my mother’s life at risk."

"Perhaps." Cor-Ibis' tone suggested that Islantar would be sent to safety no matter what his objections. "In either case, our first move must be to shelter."

"Falcon Hill is pocked with a maze of caves and caverns," N’Taive suggested. "I saw dozens of entrances on my previous visits. Estarion is rumoured to have chambers within, and I know that one entrance is guarded, near the top of the road. I would not care to venture deeply into any of them, but there are enough shallow depressions to at least get us out of this damp."

"Where we can discuss this further," Cor-Ibis said. "And, if you will agree to it, Keris an Rynstar, to examine the rest of the Hoard of Kersym Bleak."

"The rest–?" Avahn repeated.

"I took away more than the Horn, Avahn," Medair replied. She knew Cor-Ibis well enough to have expected that he would stop ignoring the implications of the hoard linked to the legend of the Horn when the situation required it.

"Of course." Avahn’s voice was rich with self-disgust. "Well, I’ll beat myself over the head about that later. Shall we get on?"

"Close together," Kel ar Haedrin suggested. "And slowly."

They moved towards the understated beacon provided by Cor-Ibis and it seemed to Medair that she had taken no more than two steps when the pulse of magic so densely present in the forest altered.

"It’s reacting to us," Cor-Ibis said. "Be alert for anything."

"Mist," said one of the kaschens, the no-longer confident female. It closed around them with startling speed, a dense cloud rising from the ground, curling and twisting in the wind.

"Clasp hands," Cor-Ibis said, his voice as muffled as a man speaking from beneath ten blankets. Medair thought he said something further, but could not make it out. The mist closed around her like a cage.

Reaching out, she tried to find Islantar, who had been closest, but her fingers touched only icy vapour.

"Hello?" she said, then repeated herself, more loudly. Her voice sounded distant to her own ears, and she could hear nothing from those who had been only a few feet away moments before. She was alone in a still and silent world of white, the wind cut off as completely as the Keridahl.

Being literally muffled made Medair feel far less detached from the question of present and future. Resisting a panicky impulse to run forward groping for her companions, she stood still, attempting to orient herself. She had been facing Gyrfalcon Castle – or Falcon Black, as Herald N’Taive called it. If she could somehow continue in a straight line, she should find her way to the hill’s base.

Spreading her arms wide in the hopes of encountering the others as she moved, Medair took two steps forward. Her right fingers brushed something and she gasped, but it was only the bark of another tree. It was fortunate that Falcon Hill was a large target, as she doubted that she could keep to a straight line through thick forest. She could only hope to head in the same general direction until she found something other than trees and mist.

Concentrating on keeping to a straight line, Medair walked directly into someone’s back, merely a dim shape through the shrouding mist. Her heart leapt in fright, even though she knew it had to be one of her companions. A face came close to hers, the outline barely recognizable as Avahn.

"Medair," he said, voice muted even at close range. A shape loomed at his shoulder, easily identifiable by the faint luminescence which clung to him. They formed a loose triangle, both Cor-Ibis men taking one of her arms, as if the mist might snatch her away.

"You were closest to Kierash Islantar, Keris," said Cor-Ibis. His clasp on her wrist seemed unnecessarily firm. "Can we hope to retrace your steps?" he continued, and she took reassurance from his businesslike tone.

"He was directly before me," she replied, shaking her head uselessly in the gloom. "I walked through the place he had been standing and there was no-one in reach."

"The mist disorients as well as obscures," Cor-Ibis said. At close quarters, the glow of his skin clearly revealed his drawn face. Had he rested after the enormity of the shield-casting? The set-spells he’d cast on the wall could have been prepared over the last handful days, but more likely only in the previous few hours. And then he’d released them in rapid succession, each instance an additional drain on his reserves. They were in the heart of Decia, and he had none of the advantages of his adept’s strength.

Nor did he quite retain his usual calm, not with Palladium’s heir brought to the enemy’s stronghold. "The Kierash could be two feet from us and we would not know. A dispell may help, but I doubt it could vanquish this mist."

"If it cleared a small area, we will at least be able to collect any others, like Medair, who have not travelled far."

"Avahn, are you as close to having exhausted your reserves as your cousin?" Medair asked, trying to make out his face in the tiny amount of light Cor-Ibis emanated.

"Not quite." She thought he smiled. "It’s not often I can expect my casting to be more powerful than yours, Illukar."

"Just do not overestimate your reserve," Cor-Ibis replied, looking about them as the mist seemed to close more tightly, filaments of white threading through strands of hair escaping his once neat plait. "If you do not have another set, cast quickly, before they move on."

Avahn nodded, releasing Medair’s arm but staying so close his elbow brushed her as he made rapid passes. A dispell did not take long to cast, but every moment gave the others the chance to move out of range. While Avahn worked, Cor-Ibis cast a set spell mageglow, which gave the cloaking mist a warm glow but by no means cut through it.

A rush of air accompanied the activation of Avahn’s dispell, and they found themselves at the centre of a large dome beneath the mist. Standing at the very edge, in the direction Medair was facing, was the Mersian Herald. She held an arm protruding from the mist and Medair felt Cor-Ibis' grip on her own arm tighten as N’Taive pulled a young Ibisian woman dressed in the uniform of a kaschen into the clearing. There was no trace of Islantar, Ileaha, Kel ar Haedrin or the other kaschen.

"Do you have rope?" Cor-Ibis asked, already moving beyond his disappointment to practicalities. His voice seemed loud in the absence of the mist.

Medair nodded, and opened her satchel. Avahn crossed the clearing to take a firm grip on the Mersian, scanning the edges of the mist as he went for any more disembodied limbs. Then the dome collapsed, instantly cutting Medair and Cor-Ibis off from Avahn and the two women.

After a moment’s complete stillness, Cor-Ibis took the rope Medair had pulled too late from her satchel, coiled it first about his own waist, then bound a triple loop about Medair.

"Could you cast another dispell?" she asked.

"I could, yes. But I will not risk spell shock at this juncture. Avahn will take them to the castle and, if the AlKier is with us, we will be able to meet near the road after this mist lifts."

"If any of them still have their bearings," she pointed out as he took her hand.

"The castle is heavy with power," he said. "More than enough for Avahn or Islantar to detect, even through the hazing effect of this forest’s enchantments. Kel ar Haedrin, the other soldier and Ileaha, however, will need a great deal of luck." He started forward slowly.

Medair was certain that she would remember this short journey as the worst in her life. Falcon Black had not been far away, but pushing blindly through a dense wood on a cold, damp night was a nightmarish experience, exacerbated by the cottony silence which buried even the rustle of fallen leaves beneath their feet. It made her feel impossibly alone, reminding her endlessly of the world which had been twice cut away from her.

The rope binding her to Cor-Ibis did not help: snagging on bushes and branches. At one time it stopped them in their tracks as it caught firmly on some invisible obstruction. Medair prayed silently to Farak to guide Ileaha and the others safely and tried not to think of the obstacles which lay ahead of them, even if they could reunite.

Clear air.

Medair let out her breath, barely suppressing a cry at the suddenness of the change. Cor-Ibis had brought them to a corridor between the steep, jagged base of Falcon Hill and the smothered forest. The mist formed an improbable wall, only a few tendrils venturing into the open space. The moon, high in the sky, lit the corridor like a festival light.

After endless blind stumbling, Medair found the sudden transition wholly disorienting. The sharp wind cut through her clothes while barely stirring the white wall from which they had emerged. The back of her neck ached with tension, and she took slow, steady breaths to try and quell her shaking.

Cor-Ibis dismissed his mageglow, then produced a swatch of cloth from within his demi-robe. Dabbing at a bleeding scratch which stretched from the corner of his eye down his cheek, he surveyed their surroundings. Medair had not fared as badly, though her hands were marked with tiny slashes and there was a painful welt on the side of her throat. She was cold and damp, with no hope of a hot bath or warm bed in the near future.

Cold, at least, she could try to do something about. She fished a thick jacket from her satchel and then her lambs wool cloak for Cor-Ibis, who donned it without comment.

"Should we wait for the others?" she asked, her voice sounding loud and unfamiliar to numbed ears. She started to untwist the rope about her waist.

"No. Even if we could be sure they had not reached this point before us, this is too exposed." He was gazing upwards to towers and walkways, then noticed her untying the rope and held out a deterring hand. "We may need to retreat to the mist, if there are patrols or watchers."

They had barely started circling east when they discovered the first cave, the opening nearly ten paces across and twice Medair’s height. A gate of dull black metal blocked the way, and Medair could see little in the inky blackness beyond the bars. Then she heard something move within, and backed away. The gate appeared to be designed to raise up into the rock and there was a faint scent of animal, not wholly unpleasant.

"Something which snatches," Cor-Ibis suggested. "Whoever is meant to raise the gates when the mist descends has not been attending his duty."

Medair stared at his cool profile, then continued walking. She felt a brief resistance on the rope before he too moved away from the cave.

"Had you been in Decia, before the Conflagration?" she asked, turning her mind from the ordeal she had just endured and whatever was within that cage. There were too many things she couldn’t bear thinking of.

"Not officially."

More shape-changing. "Was it as…foul?"

"No. Estarion was simply a greedy man. Competitive, domineering, but not cruel. A capable leader, although he left much of the practicalities of his rule to his sister, preferring to treat and deal and scheme for expansion. He had a hatred of losing, for it rocked his belief in his own superiority. It is not altogether surprising that he was arrogant enough to turn to wild magic, though I might wish I had anticipated it."

"Why would he remake Decia into this?" she asked, staring up. The castle was like the backdrop to a mummer’s play: lowering, evil, and wrong.

"I doubt he had any thought of transformation. Certainly no considered scheme of any would-be conqueror need include the resurrection of the Mersians' capital, or the creation of inland seas – or gods. Estarion merely opened a door."

"If he does so again, what determines if there’ll be another Conflagration, or the creeping blackness which took Sar-Ibis?"

He didn’t answer, looking ahead at another cave closed off with an iron gate.

"This is different," Medair said, stopping some distance from the gate and wrinkling her nose at the rank scent. A high, whining growl whipped into the night, redolent with hunger and frustration, and Medair was hard put not to step back. "Not what was in the last cave."

"No. I do not recognise the cry, but this is obviously a predator. The last cage was not a meat-eater, unless I miss my guess. Perhaps food for this one, or for some other purpose." He took her arm and they edged past the cave, then several more without gates as they made their way around to the eastern face of Falcon Hill.

A ramp stretched down from the southern corner of the hill toward the road east. Medair and Cor-Ibis, at the northern corner, were able to gaze directly along the ascent as it rose through two blockhouses to the massive castle gates. Great braziers on either side of the gates held tapering mounds of fire, reminding Medair inevitably of the Conflagration. Orange light gleamed off brass bindings. Both of the blockhouses were also alight, huge bowls of leaping fire on the flat roofs of the watching posts, casting the heavy portcullises below into deep shadow.

"The road east is likely also blocked," Cor-Ibis said. "When the moon drops the shadow of the hill would shield us most of the way to the first fortification, but we will not risk going so close. That rock bluff three-quarters of the distance along is ideal, for we will need to cross unseen in the morning."

"Through the forest again?"

"That remains to be seen. We will need to keep to the edge of the mist along here."

That was hard, to step back into the muffling chill, and walk almost wholly submerged. The corridor, clear of both mist and trees, drew her toward exposure, but though the watching-posts were distant, whoever manned them would surely have been alerted by the rise of the mist. Anyone striding along the gap would be asking for notice.

Before reaching the spur, Cor-Ibis stopped again.

"Can you climb this?" he asked, gazing across the corridor to the shadowy rocks rising upward.

The hill was not a sheer wall, closer to ladder than slope, but the sharp-cut moonlight created inky shadows which would make footing more than uncertain. "Probably," she said, touching the rope which bound them. His faint glow was nothing in the mist, or even the corridor, but would stand out against the black and silver of the rocks.

She tried to make out what it was he was looking at, and thought she could see a darker outline directly above. The prospect of finding a place to shelter for the night did not cheer her, not when she would be alone with Cor-Ibis.

Before heading up, they took advantage of the muffling quality of the mist to relieve themselves, then Medair coiled the rope and tucked it back into her satchel. The ascent proved relatively easy, though Medair’s shins gained several bruises in the process because they could not risk going slowly.

Keridahl-glow did little to help Medair navigate the cave entrance, which gave them room to move side by side, but not quite enough for Cor-Ibis to stand upright. He motioned for her to wait, and felt his way blindly forward, head lowered. She could see from the way he bent further that they had not found anything sizeable.

"The base is almost level," he said, returning, "but it lowers and narrows, and I believe ends shortly beyond the point I could reach." He glanced at a spike of rock on the ramp side of the cave’s entrance, which cut off view of the watching-posts. "We will wait here for dawn."

Medair turned to practicalities, because there were an overwhelming number of things she did not want to think about. They could not stand comfortably in the cave, and the fact that Cor-Ibis had not cast a simple night-sight enchantment told her how very near the edge of exhaustion he was. She groped in her satchel, knowing she would have to stand guard while he rested.

Bedrolls and blankets served to pad the uneven floor, and they sat on the rim of the cave entrance to eat the modest meal fished from the depths of Medair’s satchel. Dried fruit, nuts and stale biscuits. But now that they were out of the wind, and were no longer focused on moving, black memory threatened to crush her. The weight of it was exhausting. How long had it been, since she had woken? She’d lost track of time after the Horn.

"Do you want to go through Bleak’s Hoard tonight?" she asked, searching for some useful occupation.

"Describe it to me."

Medair made a soft noise in her throat. No small task. "There are twelve rings," she said. "No, eleven now, since the invisibility one shattered. One gives strength, along with recklessness. One controls animals – much in the manner of the vellin spell. One teleports the wearer to a place within sight. I haven’t the sensitivity for divination, so the others remain unknown, just as I don’t know the function of four bracelets, seven swords, twelve knives, sixteen amulets, and a necklace and crown which appear to be part of a set. There’s a shield-caster which will cover, oh, a circle four feet in diameter. Dozens of small objects – a set of cards, tiny scales, statuettes – which I never even attempted to understand. The necklace and crown, one of the swords and a statuette are all so extraordinarily powerful that I wouldn’t suggest even taking them from my satchel. Any strong mage in the castle would sense them, for they proclaim their power almost as loudly as the Horn."

"Divination would best be left for the morning," Cor-Ibis said. If he was surprised at how little she knew about the Hoard, he didn’t reveal it. "When our minds are clearer and it is possible to see without attracting attention with mageglows." He lifted one faintly shining hand, perhaps ironically. "Do you have strength enough to cast wend-whispers, Keris? We can try to coordinate rejoining in the morning, though it will not be a simple matter, particularly if the mist rises again."

"To Avahn and Ileaha, yes. The Kierash, perhaps the Mersian, I will try." While not a complex spell, a wend-whisper required an exact mental impression to mark the recipient.

They settled the wording of a brief message, and Medair lost herself to the precision of casting. It was worth an attempt, though there was no guarantee the bubbles of words she was creating would reach even Avahn and Ileaha. Wend-whispers were described as relentless butterflies: they would keep on until they found their goal, but their course might be far from linear, and any careless foot could crush them. With their missing companions so close by chances should be high, but the cloaking mist would be poorly designed if it did not interfere with exactly this sort of communication.

"Could you cast a trace, if we can’t find them?" she asked, when the last of the messages blundered into the night.

"I might, with some difficulty, establish a link to those most familiar to me without having some object of theirs to focus upon. The chances of failure are high."

Medair stiffened. He had lifted his hands, and his fingers brushed her collarbone, her throat, then found the cord of the invested spell she wore.

"You have worn this long enough that I could use it to trace you if we are separated," he said, lifting it over her head. "My chances certainly increase when you are not wearing it."

He slid the ward into his robe. Then, after the most minute of pauses, reached out and took her hands in his.