Drogoya: Book 3 Circles of Light series (51 page)

For a man of his bulk
(although that was somewhat reduced since his stay in the Oblaka
caves), Volk could move surprisingly lightly and stealthily. His
hunting knife was held low in his right hand, his left eased up the
latch on the concealed gate. He waited patiently, all senses alert
for any untoward sound or movement, but nothing stirred. He
squeezed through the gate and moved to the barn door. It was open,
as it had been when he’d left. In fact, as far as he could see,
nothing had changed – no sign of intruders or marauders. He looked
into the barn and noticed that the smell of horses and hens had
already faded. He sniffed hopefully. No, the smell of mint still
seemed to be haunting him, but perhaps he was getting used to
it.

Volk scurried across
the open space, his heart hammering. He leaned against the door,
fumbling for the large iron key in his coat pocket. The door opened
silently on its well oiled hinges and Volk stepped inside. He
strained to hear anything that might suggest any other presence but
heard nothing at all. He checked the inn from the main cellar and
its hidden addition, right up to the attics, and found all exactly
as he’d left it. He grunted to himself. Just showed Valoon folk had
a lot more sense than those southern dirt grubbers then. Hunters
was always sharper than farmers – smelt trouble long before it
arrived.

He hurried to fetch the
horses in to the stable, pulled down hay for them and fetched water
from the pump. He settled himself in the loft above the horses and
waited for dawn. He’d been plagued not only by the smell of that
dratted herb these past days, but also by a dream. He set no store
by dreams – daft things, like fortune telling from tea leaves and
such. But this one came back and back.

He scowled: just
thinking about it made him fume. But here he was, out from the
safety of the Oblaka with Light knew how many madmen dashing about
the countryside, looking for two brats he’d seen in a dream! He’d
just head back to the Oblaka in the morning and tell those
Observers and Kooshak and whatnots that the land seemed safe enough
to him.

‘No you will
not!’

Volk sat up so fast he
hit his head, painfully, on the sloping roof beam. He swore
viciously and a horse stamped in its stall below him. That’s all he
needed – hearing voices. Old fool. He froze as he clearly heard
female laughter. Then the voice spoke again.

‘You will collect those
children Volk or I’ll spoil every single brew you ever make in the
future.’

It was as well that
Volk was alone – he presented an unprepossessing figure. Mouth
agape, clothes stuck with hay, hair on end and wild eyed. He heard
laughter again and pinched himself, hard, to see if perhaps he’d
dozed off and was having another crazy dream. He rubbed his leg
where he’d pinched it and reluctantly admitted to himself that he
must be awake.

‘Who are you?’ he
managed to croak.

‘You know full well old
man. You must reach those children tomorrow. They are exhausted,
terrified, hungry and one is hurt. They have walked from
Syet.’

Volk closed his gaping
mouth with a snap. ‘Quite a walk,’ he replied with masterly
understatement.

‘They have gone too far
to the north and are nearer to the higher pass than the lower on
the Gara. You must find them tomorrow.’

‘Special are
they?’

‘All children are
special.’ The voice sounded chilly. ‘But yes, one of these is very
special.’

‘Do they know that I’m
coming? Surely they’ll hide, or have you told them?’

There was such a long
pause, Volk wondered again if he’d dreamt the
conversation.

‘I – cannot risk direct
communication with the girl. Cho Petak can sense two powerful minds
linking, but he would pay no attention to us speaking as we are
now.’

There was another,
shorter, pause before the voice spoke again.

‘Their names are Tyen
and Mena. If you think they are nearby, hiding from you, call their
names. Tell them you come from Finn Rah, and the Oblaka, and they
will trust you.’

Volk sneezed as the
smell of mint filled the hay loft. He cursed and sneezed
alternately until he fell suddenly asleep.

High on the western
shoulder of a spur of the Gara Mountains, Mena wriggled free of
Tyen’s still sleeping body. A north wind poked icy fingers through
the rags which were all that remained of her shirt and trousers.
But at least she was slightly better off than Tyen. She had been
better fed and clothed when they fled the Menedula and more used to
living in the countryside than a town or a city.

Their journey was
taking longer than she’d hoped. Twice they’d had to hide when
groups of creatures – she couldn’t believe they could still be
called humans – had blocked their direct route. Cries and shrieks
ahead gave them time to hurry to the side of their chosen path and
creep into rocky hidey holes. The second encounter delayed them for
a whole day when eleven such creatures settled themselves for a
prolonged halt below where the two children lay hidden. The smell
of meat cooking was torture to them, although Mena knew she
wouldn’t have been able to eat any of it – stars knew where such
creatures obtained their meat. Tyen had buried his face in his arms
and shivered and shook with both fear and hunger.

They had been two days
without food by then and that had been three days past. There was
plenty of water – a thousand tiny streamlets cascaded and muttered
down from the retreating snowline, but Mena knew they must find
food in the next few hours. And three days ago Tyen had slipped and
fallen some way down a scree slope, wrenching his knee
badly.

There was sufficient
light now for Mena to see what she hoped was the pass shown on her
map. They would have to climb perhaps five hundred paces or more
through thin snow to reach it and she had no idea if the trail then
dropped down to the other side or meandered on at that high level.
She looked down at Tyen’s thin face and tugged his arm.

‘Come on. We’ve got to
cross the pass as soon as we can now. Come on Tyen. We must be
nearly there.’

Tyen moaned but
struggled up to stand wobbling on his left foot. His right knee was
swollen and bent to keep his foot clear of the ground. Mena pulled
his arm across her shoulders and gripped his waist. Somehow she
dredged up a smile.

‘You can do it Tyen.
We’ve got this far, we’ll soon be safe.’

It took until midday
for them to reach the entrance to the pass and as they moved onto
the flatter ground a wind screamed through to batter against them.
They were ankle deep in brittle snow and the wind hurled grains of
the snow against them, scouring their unprotected skin. Tyen stared
into Mena’s eyes.

‘Get us through as
quick as you can. Drag me or leave me, but we can’t last long in
this.’

Tears had frozen his
dark lashes into clumps around his eyes and Mena knew it was the
pain from his leg as much as the vicious wind that caused his
tears. They struggled forward, half bent against the force of the
wind, and rounded a bend in the rock canyon. It was the sudden
easing of the brutal gale that made them pause and look up. Another
fifty paces and the ground seemed to fall away. Mena tightened her
arm round Tyen.

‘We’re nearly through,’
she began, when they both heard a noise.

They looked at each
other, their fear written on their faces.

‘Is it a bird?’ Mena
whispered.

Tyen shook his head,
concentrating on the sound. ‘It’s a song – everyone knows it.’ He
looked to Mena to explain this oddity.

Mena struggled to make
her brain function.

‘Whoever it is, they
must be all right. Those other – things – just made noises, they
never whistled songs.’

They stared at each
other, then Tyen pushed her away slightly and leaned against the
ice covered rock wall.

‘You’ll have to go and
see. You can run back if it’s something bad.’

Mena took two steps on,
then both children froze again.

‘Children! Can you hear
me yet? Tyen and Mena! I’m Volk come to find you. Be not feared,
I’ll take you to Finn Rah!’

Mena glanced back at
Tyen’s trembling form and hurried on to the end of the pass. She
peeped cautiously round the last high rocks and stared down. A man,
so portly that she was amazed he could climb so high without just
rolling off the mountain, was plodding up towards her. He halted,
his breath puffing out in white clouds, and looked up. A huge smile
split his face.

‘There now,’ he said in
a tone of enormous satisfaction. ‘Old Volk found you then, didn’t
he? Come little one, where’s the lad?’

Cho Petak sat in his
hidden room near the place where the Weights of Balance hung in
their impossible suspension deep in the Menedula. He breathed with
difficulty, his lungs bubbling with fluid. He was calm now though,
after a brief and previously never experienced bout of despair.
Faced with the rapid failing of this body at last, Cho had panicked
to think of actually having to unbody. He remembered Grek’s acid
remark that he, Cho, had been too long embodied. In his spasm of
panic, he had flung out a command for Grek’s immediate attendance
but he had been unable to locate him. And the recent disappearance
of the child from the Night Lands had enraged Cho, making his
ancient heart trip in its failing rhythm.

He was now calm and
thinking rationally. Used as he was to a human body, he would have
little difficulty taking another. He gave a cough of amusement
thinking of the contortions of those bodies possessed by his
released servants. Such long years – centuries – they had been
bodiless and had forgotten how restricted movement could be when
one’s essence was confined within such a cumbersome frame. No, he
would have no problem taking another body for his use, but he was
undecided whether it would be wiser to do so or not.

There might be
difficulties now – so many humans in the immediate area at least,
had either been taken over or, more likely, destroyed. If he sought
a still fit body further afield, it would take time to make it walk
back here, and he needed to be here for a while yet.

That female child must
have perished. He had found no sign of her mind signature in or
around the Menedula for a distance of twenty leagues, and she could
never have travelled further than that. There was no indication
that any of the maddened populace had found a way in to the
Menedula, therefore the child must have somehow slipped out. Again,
he had searched the gardens with every means at his disposal but
found no clue to where she’d crept away. Once outside the
Menedula’s protection, she would be an easy catch for any hungry
predator. An annoyance, but of little real importance to Cho’s
plans.

Rhaki, that fool with
an overweening sense of his own brilliance, caused him increasing
concern. Yesterday, Cho had not been able to block Rhaki and thus
communicate solely with D’Lah. He reluctantly suspected that Grek
had been correct: D’Lah was too long entwined with the other’s
essence and Rhaki was now apparently the stronger of the two. That
would have to be dealt with before too much longer.

But now he must summon
enough energy to move this wreckage that housed him and let it die
somewhere else than in here. The Sacrifice levered himself to his
feet and crept to the door. He tottered along the passageway,
leaning frequently against the black walls to suck some air into
his tortured lungs. The final door, and he sagged against the jamb.
Unbodied, he would be unable to press fingertips to the secret
trigger mechanism to reopen this door. He closed his eyes in
exasperation then fumbled at his belt. The ritual knife hung as
always from its silver chain, and his gnarled fingers seemed to
take an age to pull it free.

At last he unhooked the
knife from its chain and dropped it on the floor. He pushed it with
his foot between the door and jamb and let the door close against
it. He jiggled it briefly until the blade’s tip was all that
protruded. He nodded and murmured a soft string of words in a
language of another world and the slightly misaligned door edge
shimmered. Now anyone coming in here would see a smooth wall, even
looking with power such as Offerings or Observers could
command.

A final struggle to get
to his official reception room and Cho let his body slump into a
chair. He took a last gasp of air and freed himself from the flesh
he had forcibly sustained for all these centuries. He was
momentarily disorientated and had to concentrate on maintaining his
position beside the corpse of that once strapping farmer’s son.
Seeing how he must have appeared to others caused him amusement.
That body really had become disgusting. Already it appeared to be
shrinking, deliquescing as he watched.

The disorientation
became a flash of euphoria. He had forgotten how it felt to move
wherever he wished, whenever he wished, without having to
anticipate the pain such a movement inevitably brought. Abruptly he
stilled from the wild whirl he’d allowed himself. He summoned
Rhaki, and sent another command for Grek. There was work to be
done, and at the most, Cho had calculated that there would be only
two sidereal years in which to do it.