The Sword of Feimhin (12 page)

The closer he observed the nightmare landscape, the more he became aware of what might have been lines of force, dimensions within dimensions, etched in that acid-green phosphorescent light. He was reminded, in a way, of the strange lines of structure and purpose he had witnessed in Penny's mind. And everywhere he saw the wraith-like beings, the spectres that moved like ghosts in and out of the shattered doors and windows. He saw alien shapes, slithering and slouching. He heard whispers; the faintest suggestion of communication. There were spectral horrors rising, slithering and flying in a three-dimensional matrix of dark energy – things with unbelievable shapes sucking, or fang-filled mouths utterly out of proportion to the rest of their bodies, like marine creatures hidden depths of the oceans appearing in the lights of diving craft.

Mark and Nan had returned to Earth with no real purpose other than to convince themselves they were still alive. When one had been consumed by Mórígán, the goddess of death – when you bore her trademark oraculum – it was somehow logical to do this. They they had realised that Padraig was missing, along with the Sword.

Padraig was the hereditary keeper of the Sword. He knew more about it than anybody else. It was the importance of finding Padraig that had brought them here. But now they were here, now he knew that his native city was under such overwhelming attack by what he was now witnessing, Mark felt a rising urge to do something about it. But what could he do when he just didn't understand anything that was going on?

Now, more than ever, he was certain that there were bizarre patterns to everything that was going on here in London.

That's it. That's what Henriette brought me out here to see. But who, or what, is Henriette, and why is she offering to help me?

‘Where on Earth are they all coming from?'

‘No from de Earth, Dahlin'.'

‘From where, then?'

‘All wheres an' nowheres.'

Mark thought about what that ridiculously cryptic statement might mean. ‘Just how dangerous are they?'

‘Hah!' She cackled. ‘Dangerous enough.'

Mark felt gooseflesh creep over his entire body.
Something gross, something monumentally terrible, was happening here. Had he not experienced life on Tír, he would have thought he was losing his mind, but now he knew better. He was being forced to perceive the city changing. The city of his birth was being invaded by what ordinary people would think of as monsters. It had become repulsively alive – a vast reptilian organism, all glittering scales and angles, flashing in a greenish threatening light.

He had no idea as to its nature, no knowledge of whatever he might do, even through the oraculum, to stop it.

‘Henriette – you're telling me that all of this, this other place, these monstrous beings – it's all happening because of the Sword of Feimhin?'

‘Dat's your name for it.'

‘If I understand you right, all of this stuff. These things. The Razzamatazzers. They're part of something bigger? They're gathering here for a purpose?'

‘Dey waitin' for de comin'.'

‘The coming of what?'

‘De comin' of de Sword.'

She was her jovial self again, Henriette Boleyn – Bo-laine. Mark was conducting a mental exercise. He was taking not one, but half a dozen steps backwards. He was asking himself if this was real. He was asking himself if this would matter a month from now. He blinked and looked at Henriette walking by his side. He blinked again and stared at her statuesque figure that refused to evaporate into the
air of fantasy. She was studying him back, with a knowing half-smile.

‘Grimstone – he's behind all this?'

She laughed, showing her pearly white teeth. ‘You learnin', Dahlin'.'

‘Who do you serve?'

‘De same dark lady as you.'

‘Mórígán?'

‘Uh-huh.' She pulled a blade out of the ebony walking stick and poked the sharpened tip among the charred rubbish to one side of a burning heap. The tip was steaming in the thickening rain. She spiked one of the diaphanous flying creatures. Sprite or not, it looked fleshy enough on the end of her blade.

‘Grimstone,' she intoned in a low-pitched hum.

‘What about him?'

‘He conjuring it all up.'

Mark stared at her. He saw something deeper in her expression, an intensity. ‘What is he conjuring up?'

‘Openin' doors into de dark.' She seemed to caress the words with her mouth, her tongue, her lips, so he almost saw the syllables.

His thoughts raced. He was only beginning to grasp how it was all linked: Grimstone on Earth and the Tyrant on Tír. Grimstone was serving the Tyrant's purpose here just as his preceptors, his legions, served his purpose on Tír. Grimstone had always been serving that same purpose, even when he had adopted Mark and Mo as children. And
that meant that anything Mark and Nan could do here and now to oppose Grimstone, might help Alan, Kate and Mo in their fight against the Tyrant on Tír. If only Mark could communicate with them.

‘I need to know if Padraig is still alive. I need to know if he's here.'

She laughed, burying the spiked creature in the red embers underneath the smoking ash. She held it there like a potato roasting on a stick, then brought it to her nostrils as if to smell the meat.

‘Tell me how to find him.'

‘Dey's folks who can help you, folks who go up against Grimstone. Find de people who call themselves de Resistance.'

‘How do I find them?'

‘You have a friend – an' I don't mean Nan. A being of magic who brought you here in his belly.'

Mark was dumbfounded. ‘You mean the Temple Ship?'

The Gargs really did have a secret weapon up their sleeves: they could wear you out with tedium. The deliberate time wasting of King Zelnesakkk in arriving at any kind of decision with regard to Garg assistance was becoming increasingly stressful for Alan. And Qwenqwo appeared to be feeling the frustration even more than he was. ‘Wars,' he laughed, ‘are said to be won or lost on the preparation.' He took a swig from his flagon. ‘Methinks that was penned by the losers.'

The dwarf mage's strategy was to ease his boredom by exploring the liquors of the Eyrie people. He was adept at it – trust Qwenqwo to discover that they enjoyed a wide range of alcoholic beverages, many of which, to his delight, had been woven into their fondness for ritual. Alan had even caught the Fir Bolg attempting to convince the cantankerous old Mahteman to partake in a pipe filled with baccy – to Mahteman's hissing indignation, whose use of
the leaf was restricted to shamanic purposes. Qwenqwo then confessed to Alan that he was lonely, not merely for his own people but for the company of a woman.

‘A woman?'

‘Think you that I was not married some two thousand years ago, when the dark queen, Nantosueta, ensnared my people in the Vale of Tazan.'

Alan was momentarily dumbstruck. He recalled, from the tales of his grandfather, Padraig, that the Fir Bolg women had fought shoulder-to-shoulder with the men. But it just hadn't occurred to him before now that Qwenqwo hadn't just lost his father and warrior companions, but also his wife and family.

‘I'm sorry, Qwenqwo.'

‘Hah! Apology accepted.'

It reminded Alan that he also missed Kate, even though their separation had only been for a week or two. What must it be like for the redoubtable Fir Bolg, whose separation had extended for thousands of years? Even so, he couldn't imagine what was keeping Kate from rejoining him. She had taken advantage of his exhaustion after the destruction of the Tower of Bones to take off on the basis of some utterly daft idea: the notion she could save the Momu and an entire doomed race. Over these days of frustration with Zelnesakkk, he couldn't help but think about that night when they had lain in the warmth close to the communal fire after they had returned from the meeting of the Momu. They had shared a blanket, and now, he
thought, to wake with Kate's head on his arm, her warm presence pressed against him, her green eyes full of love, that was what he wished for more than anything. Instead, to add to his gnawing impatience with the Gargs, he found himself constantly fretting about Kate's safety.

He called her now – he cast her name through the oraculum of the First Power embedded in his brow. But, as ever, there was no answer.

He felt the dwarf mage try to press a flagon of liquor into his clenched right hand. Qwenqwo was sitting cross-legged by his side and proficient, it seemed, at reading his mind. He whispered the words, ‘A man's balm,' as he passed it over.

Alan shook his head and pushed it away. For his friend, baccy and liquor were the twin balms for every worry.

Below them, in the great sweep of the bay with its thousand islands baking in the sun, a proliferation of new sails were hoving to from Carfon, bringing gifts from Prince Ebrit for the Garg king and queen, as well as supplies of food and siege weaponry that could be employed straight off the decks. These included trebuchets that could hurl rock and blazing pitch for half a mile, blunderbusses that could shoot shrapnel capable of decimating any enemy foolish enough to poke their heads above defensive walls, and giant crossbows that fired steel-tipped bolts that would penetrate even the thickest armour. There were many other weapons he was less familiar with, the equivalent of the
heavy artillery in the armies back home, he guessed. And then came the trained soldiers to man, prime and work them. Other ships had the sleek lines and banks of oars that bore the distinct trademark of the Shee, ferrying in yet more warriors to add to the growing army camped over many miles of shore.

This war, when it eventually came, would be vicious and bloody, and fought on both land and sea.
They're depending on me
, Alan thought.
And I've got absolutely nowhere in persuading the Garg king
.

Earlier that morning he had had his first sighting of onkkh: enormous flightless birds that would be deployed with their high-walled baskets of burden, to carry food and shelter for the marching army. The beasts were at least twice the size of the ostriches back home, with powder-blue heads and necks. Their scaly heads were crowned by a bony ridge that ran back from the root of the beak over the entire bowl of the skull, and the whole was crested, like the helmets of Romans, by tufts of golden feathers. The beak, if it really was a beak at all, was enormously thick and flattened at its working ends, reminding Alan of an old coal scuttle. No doubt it was an adaptation for feeding in the arid grasslands that were said to be the beast's natural home. The body was the only other part to be dressed with feathers, which could become haughtily puffed up, like a showy bustard, when the animal was riled. The whole of the beast was decorated with jagged greens and grey flashes, and scored with custard yellow. The heavily-feathered shoulders and chest formed a
broad curve that ran back from the base of the neck to the huge rump, so dense with feathers they obscured any evidence of a tail. The onkkh, both males and females, had to be kept apart or they fought one another like overgrown fighting cocks. But the same toughness and endurance made them ideal for the arduous ascent and crossing of the Flamestruck Mountains, a formidable range that lay between them and the outer defences of the Tyrant's capital city, the infamous Ghork Mega.

Alan said, ‘Hey, Qwenqwo – is that flagon still on offer?'

He heard the dwarf mage's throaty chuckle as it was pressed back into Alan's hands, and this time he had no hesitation in taking a deep swig, feeling the fiery shock of it hit the back of his throat.

He was still worrying about a confusion of problems, when he became aware that the Kyra and Bétaald were closing on him, approaching from his left, while Mo and Turkeya were also heading his way, more distant yet hurrying with what looked like an equally urgent purpose.

He climbed to his feet, ready to greet the Kyra and her spiritual adviser, who arrived first.

Thank heaven for the shock of the fiery liquor; it helped Alan to abandon his frown and return the welcoming smile on Bétaald's handsome face. The soul spirits of the Shee were great cats and Bétaald's was surely a black panther, in whose sunflower eyes he saw the reflection of his own concerns. Of all the Shee, Alan respected Bétaald more than any other. Though she was, these days, a few inches shorter
than Alan himself, he recalled how she had impressed him with her calm dignity and intelligence from their very first meeting.

Bétaald assessed him openly now, her nostrils twitching with the scent of the liquor, which would be all too apparent to her cat senses, her eyes lifting to the powerful pulsation of the ruby oraculum in his brow.

‘Mage Lord Duval.'

‘Alan.'

‘Alan – I see that you are positively throbbing with anticipation of the coming expedition.'

‘More like my head is spinning with frustration at the many delays.'

‘An anxiety shared is an anxiety halved.'

‘I could certainly do with sharing a little of it. You're still confident about this landwards approach?'

‘The Kyra and I have discussed it at length.'

‘I'd appreciate your reassurance.'

‘I know that you fear the mountain approaches, but we could not possibly attack Ghork Mega from the sea alone. The entire coastline within fifty leagues north or south of the city is massively fortified. The attrition would be terrible before ever we breached the sea wall defences – if it were possible to breach them at all.'

‘Landwards it's going to be a hell of an undertaking.'

‘One in which we must be sure of the help of the Eyrie People.'

Alan sighed. ‘I don't know what more I can do.'

‘Then I would advise that you reconsider what we have learnt about the Eyrie people. They are surprisingly spiritual – and something else – a virtue perhaps that we witnessed even in the battle for Ossierel.'

‘What?'

‘Have you ever seen fear in them?'

He shrugged. ‘No.'

‘Then fear is not what keeps them from helping us.'

‘What then?'

‘Perhaps they need to sense something in you as leader – not power alone, but a sense of purpose they can identify with. A sense of destiny, perhaps?'

Alan wasn't quite sure what Bétaald meant by a sense of destiny, but even as he was thinking about it, Mo and Turkeya joined them. Mo was smiling but Turkeya looked flustered, irritated. Whatever it was, they could barely contain their excitement. Turkeya came up close then looked around, even though there was nobody nearby except a few urchins from the Olhyiu camp. Nevertheless, Turkeya spoke in a whisper. ‘We've made a discovery.' He blurted it out quickly, almost silently, as if whatever he had to say must come first, before anybody else spoke another word.

Mo punched Turkeya on the arm.

Alan hesitated. There was such an intimacy to the act that it took him by surprise. He knew that Mo and Turkeya had long been friends, but he hadn't realised just how close they had become. This new Mo, a couple of inches off six feet, was still growing. She bore little resemblance to the Mo he
remembered from their first meeting at Padraig's sawmill in Clonmel. She was also whispering now, breathless with excitement. ‘Oh, Alan, we have to keep it absolutely secret.'

‘What?'

Alan saw more than excitement in Mo's face.

‘Something the Gargs have been hiding from us.'

Her glowing hazel eyes met Alan's directly, impressing the importance of her words on him. And now she whispered urgently, her lips close enough to his ear for him to feel her breath. ‘They have a magician, who advises them. He's known as Magtokk the Mischievous.'

‘A magician?'

‘Hush!' Mo tugged on his ear to bring it back to within whispering distance. ‘He's also known by other names. But the important thing is that Magtokk is hated by the Tyrant – so far as we could tell it's because of his magic, or his knowledge, or maybe both.'

‘Bétaald – did you hear?'

‘I heard.'

‘Hush.' Mo turned to warn Bétaald in turn. ‘Sorry. But we really do need to whisper the name.'

‘What's going on, Mo?'

But Bétaald halted the conversation with a gesture. She signalled the nearest Shee, who scattered the nearby urchins. One of them stayed and appeared to be deaf, but one of the others, a girl with sun-bleached bedraggled hair, dragged him away into the hustle and bustle of the camp, with its proliferation of crates and tents.

The company decided it best to move themselves, discovering a quiet little depression between some grassy dunes. They sat cross-legged in a circle, thirty yards or so from the surf beating on the fine white sand, blinking away the sand grains that were blowing into their eyes.

Alan looked at the shaman. ‘Turkeya?'

‘Don't ask me – I don't believe a word of it.'

Mo
tsked
at Turkeya. ‘The Gargs don't want us to know about Magtokk.'

‘What's so important about him?'

‘He's very old – one of very few survivors from a race of magicians. The Tyrant feared their knowledge so much he had them exterminated.'

Alan stared in bewilderment at Mo.

‘Aye – and maybe it's a pity he failed,' muttered Turkeya.

‘Fortunately for us,' Mo glared at Turkeya.

Turkeya muttered: ‘I can well believe that he is known as Magtokk the Mischievous!'

Mo dug Turkeya in the ribs. ‘He – if he really is a he – can take on whatever form he wants.'

Alan didn't know what to make of what Mo was telling him, but Bétaald was nodding at him. He said, ‘Bétaald?'

The Shee adviser replied, ‘I had assumed such beings – Magtokk the Magician – to be no more than a romance, a whimsy of fables.'

Mo said, ‘Take no notice of Turkeya. Iyezzz made a point of introducing us in secret as Magtokk has been tutoring him.'

Turkeya wiped his nose on his sleeve and shrugged, still reluctant to believe anything about the magician. ‘I know that he bites.'

‘Mo—'

Turkeya interrupted. ‘Oh, he's a joker. He took the form of a monstrous monkey when we met him.'

Qwenqwo was listening, enraptured, while lighting his pipe. ‘I, too, believed the legends of a wizard race belonged to fairy tales. Yet my father, Urox Zel, did talk of mischievous shape changers.'

Mo shook her head, growing red in the face with frustration at their incredulity. ‘I think that Mahteman has been using him.'

Alan put his arm around Mo's shoulders. ‘For goodness' sake, what does all this mean, Mo?'

Mo's eyes sparkled with excitement. ‘I think he's more than just a tutor to the Prince. He's magical and wise as well as mischievous. And the reason Mahteman has been keeping his presence a secret is because he doesn't want us to know what's about to happen.'

‘What is about to happen?'

‘A solar eclipse.'

‘If you're stupid enough to believe it,' piped in Turkeya.

Alan thought for several moments about what Mo had told them. ‘Mo, please explain?'

‘It's true. And what's more, Mahteman knows all about it.'

‘My God! I'm beginning to understand. The Gargs are so superstitious.'

‘And that scheming Mahteman – he's planning to use it to his advantage,' said Qwenqwo.

‘So that's it! Iyezzz – he's been trying to tell me. And Shah-nur-Kian too. They've been hinting at some kind of omen.'

Qwenqwo nodded. ‘If I know Mahteman – he'll have persuaded the King to wait for a sign.'