The Fate of the Fallen (The Song of the Tears Book 1) Read online

  ‘Why so soon?’ Maelys liked to put unpleasant things off as long as possible.

  ‘We’ve little food and no wood. And if Jal-Nish sends his son to another prison, far away, or Cryl-Nish dies … it’s got to be now.’

  ‘Once we get there, we’re taking Fyllis to Mazurhize to see her father,’ said Lyma. ‘We have permission for that, before he dies.’

  ‘I’d like to see Father too,’ said Maelys plaintively, ‘for the last time.’

  ‘You can’t. You’ll be waiting in the foothills above Morrelune Palace.’

  Aunt Haga added, ‘During the visit Fyllis will wander off – no one would suspect an eight-year-old girl – and get Cryl-Nish out of his cell without alerting the wisp-watcher. She’ll lead him up and away to you.’

  ‘Then what?’ Maelys was appalled at the risk Fyllis would be taking. ‘And what happens if something goes wrong?’

  ‘Don’t worry about us,’ said her mother, as if Maelys’s only concern could be for them. ‘Fyllis will shelter us until we reach our hiding place.’

  Leaving me to fend for myself, Maelys thought. It didn’t seem like much of a plan. There had to be more that the sisters weren’t telling her. ‘Why risk trying to free Nish anyway? Why can’t we all go away together?’

  ‘To live like peasants in a mud hut, in terror of the God-Emperor’s whim?’ snapped her mother. ‘You forget where you come from, girl. Clan Nifferlin cannot bend to this evil man.’ She looked over her shoulder as she said it. ‘It’s our right and duty to recover everything we’ve lost. We owe it to our clan Histories.’

  Or die trying, Maelys thought. The sisters were obsessed with the clan’s heritage, and its fall. ‘Where am I supposed to take Nish? Assuming Fyllis succeeds, I mean?’

  ‘You’ll lead him up through the rice terraces to Cathim’s hut. You remember Cathim?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘He’s your third cousin on your father’s side; a great red-bearded bull of a man,’ said Aunt Bugi.

  ‘Him!’ Cathim had frightened Maelys when she was little, for he’d been so loud and hairy, so wild and boisterous, hurling her high and catching her only at the last second, roaring with laughter all the while. She couldn’t remember when she’d last seen him.

  ‘Cathim’s a good man. He knows the secret mountain paths, and where the hidden wisp-watchers are, too. He’ll take you and Cryl-Nish north to Hulipont, to Ousther.’

  ‘Who’s Ousther?’

  Again Aunt Bugi looked over her shoulder, and lowered her voice further. ‘He’s the leader of the Defiance; he’ll help Nish achieve his destiny and become the Deliverer.’

  ‘I didn’t know there was a Defiance,’ said Maelys.

  Aunt Haga smiled thinly. ‘What if the guards catch us?’ said Maelys. ‘What if something happens to Cathim? How am I supposed to defend us against armed soldiers?’

  Aunt Haga’s bony fingers caught Maelys’s chain and jerked the taphloid out from between her breasts. ‘With this, you little fool!’

  Maelys reeled. How had she known? ‘How?’ she said weakly.

  ‘I’ll tell you when you need to know.’

  Maelys’s heart was thumping. ‘Why do I have to go with Cathim, anyhow? I’ll just be in the way.’

  ‘Because once you’re safe in Hulipont, girl,’ said Aunt Bugi, ‘you’ll use your feminine wiles to bind Cryl-Nish to our clan, forever.’

  ‘What do you mean, bind him?’ said Maelys. Nothing they said made any sense.

  The aunts looked incredulously at Lyma. ‘But surely …?’ said Aunt Haga.

  Lyma shook her head. ‘Maelys …’ She trailed off, embarrassed.

  Haga thrust Lyma out of the way. ‘The tears came at a price, though it was one the God-Emperor paid willingly, for he had four sons and it didn’t matter that he could father no more children. Now only Nish survives and his father wants grandchildren desperately.

  ‘By binding Nish,’ she said, harsh as an old crow, ‘we mean getting his baby into your belly. Not even Jal-Nish will touch us once we’re his only family. Indeed, he’ll raise us higher than Nifferlin has ever been. And it’s all up to you, girl.’

  ‘If you fail in your duty, we’re dead,’ Aunt Bugi added, unnecessarily. ‘And you won’t have long to do it, for we’ll have to leave our new hiding place at the end of winter.’

  Horrified, Maelys put her hand over her mouth. Not only was Nish the last surviving son of the God-Emperor, but a mighty hero and an honourable man. Though she’d loved the stories she’d read about him, he was as far above her as the stars outreached the sparks in the fireplace. Besides, using womanly wiles to seduce and trap a man was wicked and deceitful, and her father had brought her up to be honest. But as her gaze fell upon little Fyllis – so innocent, so pretty, so vulnerable – Maelys knew she had to do it no matter how wrong it felt.

  ‘What if he doesn’t like me?’ she said plaintively. ‘He’s a man, isn’t he?’ said her mother. ‘One who hasn’t been with a woman in ten years. And you can be … attractive enough, when you make the effort.’

  ‘Well, I dare say she could be made presentable,’ said Aunt Haga, prune-mouthed. ‘For those who like that sort.’

  ‘After ten years in Mazurhize, a camel would look beautiful to Nish,’ Aunt Bugi said spitefully. ‘You do understand the feminine arts, don’t you, Maelys?’

  ‘I don’t recall Mother explaining those to me either,’ snapped Maelys, embarrassed. She knew about the physical act of mating, of course – no one could grow up on an estate, learning the care and husbandry of animals, without doing so. But of the arts between a man and a woman, of flirting, charming and seducing, she was painfully ignorant.

  ‘Oh, for goodness sake,’ said Aunt Haga, scowling at Lyma. ‘Come here, girl. And pay attention. I’m only going to say this once.’

  THREE

  Nish felt sure he was going mad. Weeks had gone by since the confrontation with Jal-Nish, but the same thoughts kept cycling endlessly through his mind and he could not get rid of them. How could he have been such a fool as to attack his father; and why, after all his planning and preparation, had he allowed Jal-Nish to get the better of him so easily? Why hadn’t he gone for the tears? Most alarming of all, where had that ungovernable rage come from? Perhaps he was more like his father than he’d thought.

  Closing his eyes, he tried to will himself to sleep, to forget for a few brief hours, though sleep inevitably led to a single dream – beautiful Irisis, perfectly preserved by his father’s sorcerous Arts in that crystalline coffin. From his first waking moment each day Nish longed to see her again, even in death, though the moment she appeared in his dreams he could focus only on the thin red line around her throat. There was nothing so lovely that Jal-Nish could not corrupt it, or use it to torment his recalcitrant son. Jal-Nish was right – how could the dead have a destiny? She was gone and he had to get over her.

  He could still feel echoes of the pain Reaper had inflicted on him, yet Reaper had barely touched him. Nish moaned and began to rock back and forth in the straw. The brief taste of freedom had only thrown his degradation into sharper focus. Every man had a weakness and Jal-Nish had found Nish’s. During the war he’d shown courage in the face of impossible odds; he’d endured pain and privations that would have broken many a man, but he couldn’t face the numbing nothingness of prison any longer. When strength was most needed, he’d lost it.

  What if he were to batter at the door until the guard came, then beg to be taken to his father again? If it would have done any good Nish would have done so, but Jal-Nish had sentenced him to ten more years and he never went back on his word. Besides, the choice his father offered would be just the same. He was trapped.

  The rage surged again; once more Nish gave way to it, and to dreams of violent, bloody revenge, but this time the urge to smash and destroy built up until it became uncontrollable. Had Jal-Nish walked into the cell at that moment, Nish would have torn him apart and laughed while he did it; he coul
d not have stopped himself.

  Once the rage had worn itself out, leaving him gasping in the stinking straw, the realisation sickened him. No matter what he’d done, Jal-Nish was still his father and he must not harm him. Besides, he couldn’t be beaten, and if Nish kept trying, it was going to drive him insane. There was no choice but to repudiate his ringing promise to the world, even though it meant betraying Irisis’s memory.

  He fell back in the stinking straw, overcome by despair.

  Someone passed by in the dark, though it wasn’t one of the heavy-booted guards. Nish’s ears, sharpened by isolation, picked up the rustle of soft cloth, the pad of small feet. He caught a whiff of soap, a kind he hadn’t smelt since he’d been sent away from home as a boy, and he almost choked at the memories it produced.

  The footsteps turned back. Something slipped through the bars, hit the floor with the tiniest tkkk and the visitor had passed by. Trick or trap? Nish didn’t move until his world settled back into its stony silence. He could barely make the object out. It was like a pale straw, or a rushlight, but why would anyone toss a rushlight into his cell?

  He was permitted light for a few specified hours a day, to read such instructional books as were deemed suitable – his father didn’t want Nish turning into a vegetable – but evening was lights-out and he’d be flogged if the snoop-sniffer caught him burning a rushlight.

  He picked it up, and could vaguely make out writing along it, though it was too dark to read the words. It didn’t feel like a trap, though. He checked that no watcher was observing him directly, made a careful spark with his flint striker to light his stub of rush from earlier, and examined the writing.

  I’m coming for you at the tenth hour. Be ready.

  The guard had changed a while ago so it was after six in the evening. Nish scraped the writing off and ate the crumbs, crushing the brief hope as he extinguished the light. It had to be a trap. His father was a sadistic monster who, in the early days of his reign, had allowed rebellions to fester and grow so he could have the pleasure of grinding people’s hopes into the dust. He wanted Nish to dream of escape, then exact a devastating punishment.

  Or did he just want to raise the hope and let it come to nothing? There was no end to his malice. Damn him, Nish thought. I won’t react in any way. I won’t even think about escape. I won’t!

  But he couldn’t stop himself.

  The minutes dragged as they’d never done before. Nish could tell the time from the sound the wisp-watcher emitted: a chilling, low-pitched whine every six minutes as it rotated to scan the stairs, then turned back to the corridor. The meandering snoop-sniffer dragged along the ceiling with a slippery slither, but the loop-listener at the other end of the corridor hung from its stand as silently as a corpse.

  The tenth hour finally came; nothing happened. Nish felt an urge to pace his cell, but stayed where he was in case watcher or listener detected the movement and became suspicious. He closed his eyes and lay back on the straw, cursing himself for falling prey to hope.

  Then it came again – that soft footfall and a waft of fine soap. Nish held his breath. Could it really be happening? Of course not. Yet if it were his father, something did not ring true. He searched his memories and eventually it struck him. It was the soap – children’s soap, the kind that did not sting the eyes – and only wealthy people could afford it. What was such a child doing in Mazurhize?

  The oiled lock turned smoothly, the door opened and someone small slipped through. It was a child, a slender, pretty blonde girl of eight or nine; he could tell that much by the pallid green glow emanating from the distant loop-listener. She came across, innocence itself, and held out her hand to him.

  ‘Will you come, Cryl-Nish?’ she said softly, though not so softly that the loop-listener wouldn’t hear.

  Terror clutched at his heart – for her. What reckless fool had sent her on this hellish errand? Jal-Nish wouldn’t hesitate to torment a child, or even kill one, and the prettier and more innocent she was, the more pleasure he would take in it. Since his maiming he’d developed a particular loathing for beauty and revelled in his power to destroy it.

  Nish could feel a moan rising in his throat, but choked it back. ‘Please go,’ he whispered, using a low, breathy tone that the loop-listener wouldn’t pick up from a distance. ‘I don’t want you to come to any harm.’

  She chuckled. ‘I know how to fool the watchers and the listeners, silly! Hurry up or we’ll be late.’

  Late for what? That traitor, hope, rose in him again, but he didn’t ask.

  ‘Oh!’ she said. ‘I forgot. Mother sent you these. They were Father’s.’

  She handed him a cloth bag. Inside were two pairs of knitted socks plus a pair of worn boots. He put them on. They were a good fit apart from pinching a little on the outsides, and it was this which convinced him that it was really happening.

  ‘Come on.’ She held out her hand.

  He took it and went with her. Nish knew they wouldn’t get away, but even a few minutes’ freedom would be a highlight in his unchanging existence.

  ‘What’s your name?’ he said as they reached the door.

  ‘Fyllis. Shhh now.’

  Her blonde hair was an aching reminder of Irisis, all they’d made together, and what they might have … He couldn’t think about such things; it was too painful. Instead he focussed on the child and for the first time in ten years forgot his own troubles. He was terrified for this slender, serious little girl, so proud of the job she’d been entrusted with, so oblivious of the risk. Fyllis couldn’t imagine what Jal-Nish would do to her, but Nish could.

  She edged through the door and turned towards the wisp-watcher. The filaments of its iris stirred and its black centre contracted to focus on them. Nish felt the painted target again, but on her this time, and his skin crawled as he imagined the alerts going off in the guardhouse and in his father’s palace.

  ‘It’s watching us,’ he said out of the corner of his mouth. ‘Run!’ Run where?

  Fyllis jerked his hand as if she were cross with him and kept walking, wearing a slightly vacuous smile. He kept on as well, for he couldn’t abandon her, whatever the next few minutes held. Besides, there was no turning back now.

  They passed beneath the wisp-watcher and began to climb the stairs, and only then did Nish realise that it wasn’t making its normal buzzing noise. Whatever it was seeing, it wasn’t sending it to other wisp-watchers, or to the tears. His heart surged – maybe this child could fool them, and if the wisp-watcher didn’t store what it had seen to send later, Jal-Nish would never know how Nish had escaped.

  He was running far ahead of himself. Mazurhize was thick with vigilant guards, and many other kinds of traps and defences. Perhaps Fyllis did have a talent for fooling his father’s uncanny devices, but she couldn’t conceal their escape from sharp-eyed human sentinels.

  At the top of the first flight, Fyllis stopped. Letting go of Nish’s hand, she made a tube with her curled fingers and peered through it, up the stairs and down, then along the dimly lit corridors. They were longer here, for each higher level was larger than the one below it. Shortly she took his hand again and continued up, repeating her action at the next level and the one after. Nish couldn’t imagine what kind of talent she was using. He’d been told that all Arts had been lost when the nodes were destroyed, save his father’s, but clearly that had been a lie. He found a little hope in that, too.

  At the fourth level, Fyllis peered through her rolled fingers again, started then snatched at Nish’s hand and hauled him along a dark corridor, almost running, until she came to a cell whose door stood ajar. She pushed him inside and crouched behind the door.

  ‘Shhh!’

  He was panting from the effort of keeping up – with a kid! Nish squatted down beside her, trying to breathe slowly, to control his rising panic.

  ‘You’re very smelly,’ said Fyllis.

  He was sweating, despite the chill. ‘Sorry, they don’t give us water for washing. What’
s going on, Fyllis?’

  ‘The aunties are making a fuss over on the other side.’ ‘Aunties!’ Nish had to restrain a peal of hysterical laughter. An attempted rescue by a little girl and a bunch of mad aunties? Was he dreaming a farce?

  She patted his hand, as if he were the child. ‘Don’t worry. They’re very clever.’

  He could see the disaster coming and there was no way to avoid it. Little Fyllis was going to die horribly, along with her ridiculous aunts, all their friends and associates, and every one of her relatives down to the fourth cousin. When his father made an example, no one ever forgot it.

  Something went thud, like a heavy weight being dropped some distance away. Fyllis began to count under her breath.

  ‘Where are we going?’ said Nish.

  She shook her head, kept counting, and when she reached thirty, crouched in front of him and put her hands over his ears. He didn’t ask what she was doing; he knew it wouldn’t make sense anyway.

  At forty, she screwed up her pretty face.

  And then the world fell in.

  FOUR

  Maelys knew something had gone wrong. The aunts had set off their only weapon, a long-hoarded rimlstone, and the brainstorm it had caused had faded ages ago. The rendezvous time had long passed but there was still no sign of Nish. Fyllis must have been caught, and the aunts too.

  She crouched in the dark, almost weeping with terror for them, and rubbing her throbbing temples. Aunt Haga had said that the brainstorm couldn’t harm anyone in their clan because of a peculiar gift they had, yet its implosion had been like boiling oil poured through a hole into Maelys’s head. That agony had passed in a minute or two, but now she had a splitting headache and her thoughts were fuzzy, as if she’d gone a night without sleep.

  On the good side, since she was hiding in the foothills half a league from Mazurhize, it must have hurt everyone down there far worse. She prayed that it had brought down Jal-Nish as well, though she didn’t think that was likely. If anyone on Santhenar were protected against the Secret Art, he was.