Heir of Stone (The Cloudmages #3) (46 page)

Ennis climbed slowly over the stone wall and back onto the road. He put Treoraí’s Heart in one hand as he approached the litter bearer. The stench of the creature made Ennis want to gag. The thing stared at him, snarling softly in the back of its throat, its mouth slightly open and exuding the odor of raw meat. Ennis touched the bearer’s arm with his free hand—he could feel the Arruk trembling, the finely-scaled flesh slick with a sheen of oil. The blue ghosts wailed in his mind, making Ennis’ head pound. He felt the surging power of the cloch rising up, and he took it, shaped it, sent it lancing forward into the Arruk.

The thing gasped. It howled, lifting its head to the sky. As Ennis stepped back, gasping as he pulled himself out of the Arruk’s mind, the creature’s body quivered, every muscle going tight and strained. It made a horrible, strangling sound and fell over. The other bearers and the two servants all scrambled back a few steps; the master—Kurhv Ruka, Ennis knew now—leaned forward curiously. He said something in a soft voice, looking at Ennis.

Ennis released the cloch, showing the Arruk master his empty hands again. “I can do this for you,” he said. “I can do this to those who oppose you. Together, think of what we could do.”

The Arruk was staring at Ennis thoughtfully. The blue ghosts were moving, and for a moment Ennis resisted, feeling himself fall out of the dance, but the fright of what might happen if he lost the pattern here made him move again. Without the pattern, anything might happen. Without the pattern, he would almost certainly die, alone. Without the pattern, he would not achieve the destiny he’d glimpsed.

He showed the Arruk his empty hands as he walked to him, stepping carefully around the body of the dead bearer. The stench filled his nostrils, and the top of his head was barely higher than the Arruk’s waist. Ennis reached toward the Arruk, his breath fast and his heart pounding. He touched the scale-armored stomach—the Arruk staring down without moving—then his own chest. He looked beseechingly up at Kurhv Ruka. The blue ghost said nothing, but Ennis licked his lips and forced himself to speak. “Together, Kurhv Ruka? You and me? Do you understand?”

For a moment, Ennis thought that the Arruk did not. Kurhv Ruka went to his litter and sat down again. He gestured to the three remaining bearers, and then spoke to his servant, who placed the master’s long weapon alongside him, then—looking distressed—stood beside the pole that had been the dead bearer’s. The master’s gesture to Ennis was unmistakable:
come sit here with me.

Ennis went to him as the blue ghosts faded and the world returned in all its normal hues. He sat next to the master on the litter. The Arruk barked an order, and the bearers and servants reached down to pick up the litter as Ennis steadied himself on the cushions. He smiled up at the Arruk. “You really stink. Did you know that?” he said to the master. “My name is Ennis Geraghty.” He tapped his own chest. “Ennis Geraghty.” He touched the Arruk’s chest. “Kurhv Ruka?” he asked.

“Kurhv Ruka,” the Arruk grunted in assent.

As the Arruck gave his answer to Ennis, the bearers set off at a trot, the litter swaying and rocking gently with their motions.

They left the body of their companion laying in the road, unmourned.

The Arruk didn’t have settlements—or rather, they seemed content with the remnants of the towns they’d captured. Ennis and Kurhv Ruka were borne to a village that might once have been picturesque and quaint, but was now changed. There was a market in the town square, but the booths seemed to sell only flyblown carcasses of unidentifiable animals and drying sticks of what might have been herbs. Only Arruk walked the streets now, and the lanes were littered with droppings and foul-smelling puddles. The Arruk seemed to have no domesticated animals—Ennis saw several other litters carrying Arruck dressed in leathers similar to Kurhv Ruka’s, though with other designs and insignia; other entirely naked Arruk—all branded with a circle on their hips, Ennis noticed—acted as beasts of burden, carrying huge bundles on their backs or pushing wheeled carts that were obviously of Daoine manufacture. The doors and shutters had been ripped from all the houses, the entrances and windows open to the air. The windowboxes, which had evidently once been bright and alive with flowers, were overgrown with weeds and filled with dead and brown stems, but brilliant colors were splashed on the stone walls, adorned with what Ennis assumed were words painted in an oddly curlicued alphabet. The town shimmered in the sunlight, painted in vivid hues.

Ennis could see immediately that other Arruk deferred to Kurhv Ruka. He saw several of the warriors carrying their pole arms, and their snouts wrinkled as the litter approached, as if they scented Ennis. They looked in Ennis’ direction to snarl threateningly until they saw that he was seated beside Kurhv Ruka. Then their demeanor would change: the snarls faded from their snouts, and they stared, heads slightly lowered and their weapons pointed carefully away from the litter.

After a time, Ennis realized that all the Arruk he’d seen seemed to be adult males. There were no female Arruk here—either that or they were so much like the males that there was no discernible difference to Ennis’ eyes—and no young.

They were carried through the center of the town to a temple on a hill just outside. This had once been consecrated to the Mother-Creator—the symbols carved on the lintel were similar to those on the temple in Dún Laoghaire. But there were no Draíodóiri here tending the temple or performing the services, though the pale brown stains that covered the walls near the archway looked suspiciously like old blood, and Ennis wondered if it might not be that of the priests who had once lived here.

Arruk guards stood near the temple’s entrance, and as the litter was placed on the ground and Ennis and Kurhv Ruka dismounted and stood up, another Arruk, this one dressed in a warrior’s leather marked with a sun half-covered with cloud, emerged from the dark interior. The Arruk blinked once at the sunlight, showing translucent eye coverings, then his snout wrinkled as he glared at Ennis. He snarled something to Kurhv Ruka that sounded decidedly aggressive. Kurhv Ruka spat back harsh syllables, his claws extending out from his fingers.

The blue ghosts came . . .

They appeared strongly here, surrounding Ennis and sliding over the confrontation between the two Arruk. With most of them, he saw the two Arruk leap at each other and begin to fight, and in each of those futures he saw that Kurhv Ruka would lose and that his own form would be lying on the ground dead immediately afterward. Ennis peered frantically around him toward the other blue ghosts, looking for the pattern that led to another conclusion, that would bring him closer to the future he’d glimpsed so long ago in Talamh an Ghlas. For a moment he despaired, for he was surrounded by images of his own death, so dominant that they obscured everything. Ennis shivered, frightened now as the two Arruk continued to spit and growl at each other, as other Arruk warriors, seeing and hearing the conflict, started to gather around. He was enclosed in a circle of them now, their scent overpowering and sour-sweet, their scaled bodies a forest around him that blocked off sight of anything else.

The blue ghosts were starting to fade, and he still hadn’t found the pattern. Ennis started to sob, the sound of his distress lost in the louder conflict near him. Kurhv Ruka took a step toward the other Arruk, his claws slashing out at the same time.

Ennis saw the pattern finally. With a grateful sob, he let himself fall into it, let himself merge with the blue ghost, hoping the vision would last long enough for him to survive this . . .

“Wait!” the blue ghost called out, and Ennis let himself shout with it. He pushed forward between the two Arruk. He could hear the breathy gasp that was Arruk laughter at the sight: a human boy, his head just reaching Kurhv Ruka’s abdomen, his skin pale and unprotected, no claws on his hands or feet, no ripping incisors gleaming in his mouth, no weapon at all in his hands. They laughed, including the warrior who had confronted them. It snarled something at Kurhv Ruka, who backed away with a gesture toward Ennis. The warrior gave another laugh and reached down, snatching at Ennis’ clóca, the claws digging into the cloth and drawing blood from Ennis’ arm. He gasped at the pain, but the blue ghost didn’t cry out, so neither did he. The warrior held tightly to him, shaking him as he ranted. Kurhv Ruka replied calmly. The gold-flecked irises of his eyes watched Ennis.

Ennis saw the blue ghost that was himself touch Treoraí’s Heart under his léine; he followed the motion and opened the cloch . . .

Treoraí’s Heart was growing stronger with every use, or perhaps he was slowly learning how to use it. Through the Heart, he slid himself into the body of the other person, and there—an intruder—he simply released the wild energy inside them, letting it explode outward. There was no careful guidance and no subtlety. Perhaps it was easier his way—certainly where Mam could heal but one person a day, he could take the life of more. Many more.

Once, he’d asked Mam how it felt to heal people, and she told him how with the Heart she
became
the person she touched, that she could find the hurt or injury and carefully direct the mage-energy to repair it. It was different for Ennis; he might hear the thoughts of those he touched or feel them, but there had never been the sense of merging with them. He was always separate, always himself, always held at a distance.

“It’s because you’re what you are,”
Isibéal whispered to him as he touched the cloch now.
“Your mam had true empathy. She thought of others first . . .”

“You killed mam, and I killed you,”
Ennis answered.
“That’s fair. I’ll kill the ones who killed Da and Gram and everyone else, too. The blue ghosts showed me, but I have to do what they say. That’s all. It’s not me doing this. It’s them.”

She responded, as always, only with mocking laughter. Below Isibéal, though, he thought he heard another voice sobbing.

In the cloch-vision, the warrior who held him was a radiant shell of yellow, a false sun. Ennis took a handful of the mage-energy and followed the connection of the Arruk’s hand on his arm into the glowing shell of his body. He could feel the pounding of the creature’s heart like the beating of a low, massive drum:
toom, toom, toom.
He was surrounded by the webbing of muscle and ligament, veins and arteries. With the connection came the creature’s words, also: he still heard the hissing, spitting speech of the Arruk with his ears, but inside his head the words became ones he could understand. “. . . you think that this bluntclaw pup will take me more than a moment to kill, Kurhv Ruka? You’re weak. You’re deluded. You are less than the piss of the lowest.”

He heard Kurhv Ruka’s reply as if through the warrior’s ears: “I told you, Noz Ruka.” Ennis wondered whether the two Arruk were related, to have the same last name. If they were, there was no affection between them. “I accept your challenge, and this Perakli—this bluntclaw—will be my champion.”

Noz Ruka coughed his derision. He shook Ennis as easily as if he were one of his sister’s dolls, and Ennis clutched Treoraí’s Heart harder.
Not yet...
The blue ghosts were unmoving around him. “You’ve finally gone mad, Kurhv Ruka. No wonder the Kralj broke you to Ruka.” With that, Ennis realized that what he’d thought of as Kurhv Ruka’s family name was instead a title. He wondered what else he didn’t understand, and that made him cling even tighter to the blue ghost. “Now I’ll break you further. You’ll take the brand of the lowest after I kill the pup.”

“Then kill the pup, if you can,” Kurhv Ruka answered. His golden eyes were on Ennis. The blue ghosts moved, taking Ennis with them.

He was still holding the mage-energy. Now, in the mage-vision, he opened his hands and let it blossom outward like an awful, deadly flower. He watched it rip through Noz Ruka’s body, watched the power rip muscles from their attachments and shred organ and tissue, the blood boiling and erupting from torn vessels, bones shattering like a pottery mug hurled on rocks. Ennis could see the enormous agony rippling through the Arruk—a shell of blue sparks rising around him—and Ennis released the cloch as if it were a glowing coal, not wanting to share that pain the way his mam had.

“Killing is only healing gone mad . . .”
Isibéal intoned.
“It’s easier, so much easier . . .”

Noz Ruka gasped and the talons that held Ennis opened; he tumbled away from the Arruk, sprawling in the mud. Noz Ruka’s snout was lifted to the sky and he
howled,
keening like a maddened dog. He coughed, gulped, and then spat out an enormous clot of bright blood, spattering Ennis and the Arruk nearest him and causing the crowd around them to push hastily back. Noz Ruka shivered, his body frenzied, his clawed hands twitching and clutching at nothing. He howled again, spewing more blood; his bowels loosed at the same time.