Part 9 (2/2)

Bon's first act as they rushed across the uneven ground of the ruined settlement was to look back. Through the spa.r.s.e trees, past the tumbled buildings that hid subterranean secrets, he could see the gentle slope of the valley's side. He scanned left to right and back again but could see no sign of movement. That did not mean they weren't there. It only meant that the slayers were either moving covertly, or were already too low down to the valley floor for him to see them.

If that were the case, they were closer even than Juda had hinted.

Bon thought of Venden, why he could be here, how ... and it made no sense! If he'd been arrested and deported, Bon would have surely heard news of that. If the Guild of Inventors had turned him in for his seditious thoughts and opinions, there would have been at least a whisper of events, and more likely a shout. The Guild's public face projected a crisp clean image, though any organisation that old surely possessed dark secrets. They would have taken advantage of the revelation that one of their most promising students had betrayed his religion and country, and that he had been discovered and expelled because of those crimes. They would have made an example of him.

It was always something smaller, Bon had believed. A kidnapping by his Guild tutor, a murder, his body thrown into the river.

And now Juda, a stranger, said that he was here.

Bon had so many questions, but hardly any breath with which to ask them. They would have to wait. It had been three years, and now it would have to be a little while longer.

But the mere thought of his son being here a the possibility, however remote and unlikely a had galvanised Bon, and he felt a newfound urgency surging through his muscles. Juda led, Leki followed, and Bon followed her, enjoying the impact of his feet against the soil because that grounded him, relis.h.i.+ng the burning in his lungs as he drew shallow, fast breaths because that told him he was still alive and striving to remain so.

Beyond the ruins the landscape changed, becoming less uneven and easier to navigate. Easier for them, too, Bon thought, and he risked another glance back.

Three Skythians stood atop one of the ruins, slouched now and unmoving as they watched the escapees fleeing across the fields. Bon had seen gargoyles similar to these on the taller Fade churches of New Kotrugam, statues of Kolts cast into the walls of G.o.dliness to evoke the power of faith over faithlessness. One of them stood straighter as if he or she had heard a noise, turned its head, and- Bon tripped and sprawled, grunting as he stumbled against a fallen tree trunk and struck it with his left shoulder. He rolled and came to rest on his back. Leki pulled him up again.

'Juda's not slowing.'

They stood, Bon shaken, and Juda was sprinting away from them.

'Don't look back!' Juda said. He'd s.h.i.+fted his direction slightly, and now ran even faster. 'Every ... moment counts. Got to get ... somewhere.'

They sprinted side by side after Juda. He led them across the undulating fields, places where perhaps the residents of the ruined village they had just left had once grown crops and tended their cattle, but which now were wild. Small creatures scurried through the gra.s.s away from them, heard but unseen. Startled birds took flight. Bon's heart thundered with exertion and fear, surprise and excitement. Memories of his son came unbidden and with a flaming intensity. But the timescale of these memories was confused. Because I always want him with me, Bon often thought. Because I never want to let him go.

'Ahead,' Juda gasped. Even he was panting now. 'Those trees ... we need to get in there before ... they see us.'

'Red fruits?' Leki asked, and Bon saw the trees she meant a short, squat, branches heavy with what from this distance looked like an abundance of red apples.

'Not fruit,' Juda said. 'Run.'

The trees grew in a wide clump at the edge of the river's flood plain, and beyond the copse Bon could see the hillside rising out of the valley, speckled with rocky outcroppings and swathes of purple and brown heathers. As they closed on the trees he risked another glance back, and they had run so far that it took him a few moments to place the ruined village.

'Hurry!' Juda said. He was beneath the first few trees now, leaning against a trunk and looking around in a panic, and Leki joined him, pressing her forehead against a tree and breathing hard.

Bon walked backwards towards them, scanning the valley floor until he made out the humps of the tumbled village. The three Skythians were still there, stick figures atop one of the humps. If he hadn't known what they were he'd have thought them bushes or trees.

They fell out of sight, as if startled.

And then he saw the slayers.

He dropped to the ground and crawled backwards beneath the tree canopy, only standing when he was well within their shade.

'They're so fast,' he said softly. And they were. They seemed to be outrunning their shadows, loping across the gra.s.sland like the red lyons Bon had seen in captivity in New Kotrugam. From this distance it was difficult to make out any detail, but they moved with an inhuman gait. They pounded the ground with heavy feet, as if it too was a target.

'Find sticks,' Juda said. 'The longer and thicker, the better.'

'We're going to fight them with sticks?' Bon said.

'No. Here.' Juda lobbed a stick at him, and Bon s.n.a.t.c.hed it from the air, wielding it and feeling like all the G.o.ds' fools in one.

'Those aren't fruits,' Leki said. She'd been looking up, not across the plain at their pursuers, and now Bon followed her gaze.

'Stark blight eggs,' Juda said. He found another stick and handed it to Leki, who took it without looking. 'I was once close to the Engine I told you about, and I credit the worst pain of my life with driving me to where it lay hidden. One of these ...' a he nodded at one of the s.h.i.+ny red eggs, hanging very much like fruit, but spiked for protection and slightly opaque. There was something moving inside a '... burst against my cheek. The thing inside slithered down my neck and got caught in my collar, and by the time I plucked it out and threw it over the cliff it had stung me enough times to drive me mad. When I regained consciousness I was on the beach, close to-'

'f.u.c.k the Engine for now,' Leki said. 'What do we do here?' She was looking past Bon urgently, and he glanced over his shoulder. He could differentiate between the male and female slayers now. Evil and ugly in different ways.

'They're weak and disorientated when they emerge,' Juda said. 'But that doesn't last for long.' He knocked one of the bulging red eggs with his stick, and when it split open he ran.

Bon had an instant to see what came out, and to try and make out what it was. He'd never heard of stark blights, and the glimpse he caught gave him few clues as to what species they might be. There was a flutter of what could have been wings, the snap of a beak or claws, the sinuous remnant of a neck or body. Pale red, streaked purple, fluid accompanied it to the ground as it slipped from its egg, like a haze of gas easing it down. Moments after it hit the gra.s.s it gave a cry or a growl, like serrated metal grinding across stone, and then Bon was following Leki and Juda into the trees.

They ran line abreast, careful not to stray into each other's paths. The eggs were everywhere, and the problem wasn't so much aiming as avoiding them with other parts of their bodies. They hung heavy and low from some of the lower branches, and Bon had no wish to touch them with his hands or bare forearms, or his face. He watched the ground for obstructions, swung the stick, felt it striking branches and leaves and eggs, saw the things falling from the corner of his eye, and ran on, listening to their deep scratching calls as they stirred behind him.

They reached a clearer area where a rough circle of stones surrounded a flat rock. Whatever it had been was long lost to antiquity, but Juda paused and turned, eyes wide as he looked past Bon and down through the woods. Bon and Leki followed his gaze.

The woods sloping downhill to the plain seemed tainted red. The air hung heavy with it, a drifting mist that was staining trees and lower plants a light pink. Floating through these faint clouds, the stark blights.

'Won't they just run around?' Leki asked.

'This close to us, I'm hoping their caution is lessened,' Juda said. 'Hoping they're blinded by ...'

Juda was staring at Bon again, but now his eyes were wider. 'Keep still! And don't-'

Bon felt movement in his hair. He slapped at it with his hand, and the stark blight wrapped filaments around his fingers, stinging the back of his hand, his palm, his wrist, and he could feel its toxins pumping along the veins in his arm, a slick of heat that set fire to his hand and moved quickly up towards his elbow.

He glared at Juda, trying not to scream.

Leki came at him, then Juda. Though Bon knew they were talking he could not hear, because his heart was thudding so hard it was all he heard. His treacherous heart, pumping the fury about his body and setting fires.

Bon dropped his stick and fell, thinking, Not again! And as he felt the power of the scream leaving his throat the pain exploded, and his heart beat him into darkness.

Chapter 8.

breaking Darkness was closing, and Juda felt the familiar madness readying to take him. He had often cursed his heritage and the tainted sleep it gave him, but he would never curse the magic that aggravated the condition. Especially now, when the man he carried might lead him to discover the greatest source of magic there might be anywhere in the world a a dead G.o.d, risen.

Juda had smoked his final scamp cigar, and if they had time he could have searched for more scamp growing between the moist roots of trees. He was sure he had seen some moths fluttering from leaf to leaf as they'd worked their way uphill. But there was no time.

If they did not reach the gas marshes by nightfall, and find somewhere to hide away, it would be the end. He could not accept the end when he was so close to a new beginning.

Juda had never been a strong man, but his strength and stamina now came from a bitter determination. Bon lay slung over his right shoulder, head nodding against his back as Juda planted foot after foot and lifted himself up the hillside. Leki was behind him, helping him as much as she could by pus.h.i.+ng against his lower back. She was not so much lifting him as propelling him forward, and her effort aided more than he could have hoped. It was the physical contribution that helped, but also the simple fact that they had the same aim. Juda had always been a loner, but he was finding this company pleasing.

Wrench Arcs craved no company save that of magic. Perhaps, after all, he had some way yet to go.

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