Full Circle (47 page)

The tree itself seemed unharmed. Everything was exactly the same; but the altar was gone.

Sorn sank to her knees and wept.

Ash, Safred and Martine went to the spot where it had been, and stared helplessly at the ground. Where had they taken him?
Then Martine knelt and brushed away some dirt. The toe of Cael’s boot. Safred’s face sagged with relief, and she looked a
decade older than she was.

“They have buried him,” Martine said. “As a mark of respect, I think. But the altar…”

“This is what the gods feared,” Safred whispered to herself. “The enchanter has broken the compact — the lower layer kept
the delvers out.” She turned and looked at Ash, green eyes wide in a white face. “We must defeat him and rebuild the compact.
Or the world crumbles for everyone, including Travellers.”

D
O SOMETHING
!” she screamed at the enchanter.

He shook his head, his mouth open, watching the wind wraiths with clear terror. Useless. The wind wraiths were closing in,
and someone by the stream yelled out, “Water sprites! There’s water sprites in the creek!”

On the edge of the plateau, the ground shifted slightly, as though something moved underneath. Bramble knew what it was. Delvers.
She was glad there was nothing to burn on the headland to tempt fire wraiths. They would head for the city. Then she was ashamed
of the thought.

Suddenly the wind wraiths paused in their arrow flight. She could hear their harsh shrieking even from here. They were protesting
something.

The gods had found help, Bramble thought. Safred? Ash? Where in the cold hells were they?

The fine trembling beneath her feet died out of the ground, and the world felt solid again. Almost. Something was still not
right. But the wind wraiths cawed frustration and wheeled again out to sea, and the water spirits let the cascade of the stream
take them over the cliff into the wild sea. Bramble took a breath, and looked at the enchanter. He smiled at her in relief
and she wanted to hit him more than she had ever wanted anything. But she couldn’t kill him yet. The compact had to be fixed,
first, and the ghosts laid to rest.
Then
.

Acton moved behind the enchanter, and Saker turned his head and nodded, as though Acton was one of his men. Of course he would
believe that of someone who had just saved his life, but Bramble wondered why Acton was letting him believe it.

“Where is Ash?” she asked Baluch.

He swallowed as though he found it difficult to talk. “He was helping the gods,” he said. “She isn’t happy about that.”

Too bad for Her, Bramble thought. She turned and noticed a parley group being led up the hill by a woman carrying antlers
as a sign of peaceful intent. Warlords, most likely. Yes, there was Thegan. It was a measure of how perilous their world had
become that Thegan seemed barely a threat to her now. She recognised Coeuf from Wooding, puffing and wheezing after the climb,
and Leof. It was odd to see him again, as if she’d met him in another life. He looked older, tired.

Flax motioned his ghostly allies back, to let the parley group through, and Bramble looked around for Acton. She found him
staring at the crowd with intent eyes. Assessing, as a commander sums up the situation before attacking. A female ghost moved
to his side and touched his arm. Asa! His mother. She hadn’t gone on to rebirth, had waited all this time… and Friede
was with her, greeting Baluch with mock astonishment at his advanced age. Baluch’s eyes were bright with tears and she touched
his cheek comfortingly.

Other people were greeting their dead — Thegan’s sergeant, even Thegan. He went to the band of warlord’s men and greeted them;
they stood straighter, and whatever he said made them feel proud. Then he motioned them back. That isn’t over, Bramble thought.
He’s the only warlord here with armed men at his back, now. He’ll use them, sooner or later. She looked at Acton to warn him,
but he was already watching Thegan, eyes narrowed.

Saker stepped forward, looked around at each member of the parley group, and said, “My name is Saker, son of Alder.” He indicated
the scowling ghost standing behind him.

“What do you want?” Thegan asked in a reasonable tone, as if he were in command of the parley. But Saker had Thegan’s measure,
she could see.

“Justice,” Saker said. “Justice for murder and dispossession that has lasted a thousand years.”

“There’s no justice this side of the grave,” Thegan said.

“Then we shall send you to the other side to seek it,” Saker said through gritted teeth. “My ghosts —”

Flax shook his head and raised his hand outwards against Saker, and so did the others with him. Saker stopped speaking, as
though waiting for them to move back.

The ghosts who had stood with Flax moved closer together to show their support. The parley now stood in a circle of ghosts.
As more ghosts came from lower down the slope to see what was happening, the circle widened to let them see, until it took
up almost all of the plateau.

Bramble watched Acton. He seemed to just stand there, but the ghosts on either side of him had moved back, without realising
it, she suspected, to leave him a little ahead. Baluch stood, as always, at his shoulder. The ghosts who had noticed Acton
looked at him as often as they looked at the enchanter and the parley group. None seemed to recognise him.

The parley leader laid the antlers at Saker’s feet, as though the warlord hadn’t spoken. “I am Ranny of Highmark, of the council
of Turvite,” she said. “I come to parley with the enchanter Saker, son of Alder.”

“I greet you, Ranny of Highmark,” Saker said.

“Saker, enchanter, we in Turvite seek to do no harm to you or yours. We ask for truce, so that a peaceful settlement can be
reached which is satisfactory to us both.”

“Our land was taken from us. We want it back. That would satisfy us.”

“All of it?” she said disbelievingly.

“All.” Saker looked disdainfully at her. He glanced behind him to his father, who was nodding approval.

“You would have to kill thousands of people,” Ranny said.

“Yes,” Saker said.

Bramble grew hot with rage, and then cold. She would gut this madman from stem to stern, and be doing the world a favour.
He spoke as though lives were nothing, as though he were Lady Death herself, with the right to pick and choose who would die.

The ghosts moved on the grass, some in excitement, but some in unease. Not all of Saker’s army wanted to kill. But that solved
nothing. At the worst — or the best — it meant an unending battle between Saker’s ghosts and the others, with neither side
vulnerable, neither side bearing any losses.

Saker sensed his army’s unease and turned to them, his face reassuring. “The world will become safe again, for us and our
blood,” he said. The Turviters who had been summoned during the last spell shouted silently at him, shaking their fists. They
shouldered their way through the crowd and came to stand behind Flax, their arms linked to block the path. Bramble realised
that Cael was one of them, and felt her stomach clench. He winked at her and she smiled a little back.

“Not all your army is of your blood,” Ranny said. “Not all obey you.”

Saker whirled. “Do you think I cannot winnow them out? Do you think I cannot send them back to the darkness beyond death?”

“Wouldn’t surprise me if you couldn’t,” Bramble spoke up. “As long as they feed themselves blood before sunset. Blood and
memory.”

He turned to her, his face white, and she fought down the urge to take out her boot knife and gut him. It wouldn’t solve anything.
She drew breath and let it out again.

Zel came up to Saker and laid a hand on his arm.

“Don’t matter,” she said. “Don’t worry about that. What matters is this: we’ve got the upper hand first time in a thousand
years, and we gotta use it right.”

The enchanter’s father nodded urgently, staring at Zel approvingly. Saker shook himself and stood upright, opening his mouth
to make some kind of proclamation.

There was a disturbance on the path leading down to the city. The solid ghosts of Turvite were moving aside, shoving each
other out of the way, as four people clambered up hastily.

Thanks the gods! Ash, Martine, Safred. And Sorn.

Sorn walked straight to Saker, still panting from the climb. She was more beautiful than when Bramble had last seen her, and
seemed stronger, somehow.

Sorn caught her breath. “Saker, son of Alder, do you respect the gods?” she asked in a gentle voice.

He drew himself up as though she had insulted him. “Of course I do!”

“But your actions have harmed them. Your spell — your last spell — damaged the compact.”

The enchanter paled and cast a look over his shoulder at the wind wraiths. They had pulled back, but they were still there.
He cleared his throat. “The compact was repaired. I felt it.”

Sorn shook her head. “Not fully. It will fragment again, soon.” She turned and motioned Safred forward. “Saker, enchanter,
greet Safred, the Well of Secrets.”

Safred paused, weighing her words. “If you continue, there will be nothing for anyone — for the Travellers you want to help,
the other inhabitants of this land, even the gods themselves. Is that what you want?”

Alder gestured vigorously, mouthing angry words. It was time to act, because apparently Acton wasn’t going to do anything.
Yet. Bramble nodded at Ash.

“Speak,” he said to Alder.

“If we can’t have the land as we should, no one will!” Alder shouted, in the deep voice of the grave. It made the words harsher,
and everyone recoiled, ghosts and humans alike. Except the smaller ghost at his side, who shook his axe. Saker looked stunned,
Acton thoughtful. The language lessons had worked well enough for him to understand Alder — their two languages were separated
mostly by changes in pronunciation.

“You can make them speak!” Saker exclaimed.

“Kill them all,” the small ghost said in the old tongue. Bramble bit her lip — that phrase brought back too many memories.

“When our land is regained, I will repair the compact,” Saker said. Martine and Ash and Safred all shook their heads immediately.
Saker turned to Ash. “You are lying.”

“No,” Ash said. “The compact is made of four spells, and needs four — four with power — to repair it. I can weave back the
water strand, Safred the air, Martine the fire. We need you to stop the earth spirits. But you need
us
. You’ll never do it alone.”

Ash looked up at someone over Saker’s shoulder, and Bramble saw his face freeze, then he nodded slightly at one of the ghosts,
an attractive woman in modern dress. She bowed slightly, mockingly.

He turned back to the enchanter, ignoring her. “We must work together.”

S
AKER STARED
at the dark-haired enchanter. A man of his own blood, but working with the enemy. He had spoken with authority and conviction.
Saker was sure he told the truth. He glanced up — the wind wraiths were closer. He shuddered at the thought of the compact
broken, but to work with the enemy, to delay their revenge… His father glowered at him, but above his father’s head were
wind wraiths, high in the sky, and they were closer, just a little, than before. From the harbour below, smoke rose. He shuddered
again, to think of fire spirits loosed upon his Travellers.

The ground beneath his feet seemed to tremble slightly, and the Well of Secrets caught her breath. “Now, Saker, enchanter,”
she said. “Or it all ends here.”

The shrieking of the wind wraiths grew louder and the water in the stream — were shapes there again?

The tall dark-haired woman stepped forward. “You need to know us,” she said. “I am Martine. This is Ash. Safred you have met.”

She reminded him of his childhood, when everyone in his village had had that dark hair and pale skin. He bowed a little, trying
to look formal, but feeling panic rise. If they were going to do it, let them do it now, before the wind wraiths broke through.
They were advancing, inexorably, no longer in a single arrowhead but in several lines, as though they were approaching along
rips in the spell. Attacking the weak points. His heart pounded hard in his chest. If they broke through, no agreement with
him would stand. They would spare no one, including him. Including Zel. He glanced at her and she nodded encouragingly. She
seemed to trust these people.

That gave him the courage to draw breath. “The compact spell ends just before the cliffs.”

“So we repair it from here, back into the land,” Ash said. He held out his hand and Saker hesitatingly took it.

He was used to grasping hands when he cast stones, but this was different. This was a kind of fellowship. Something he had
never known. He had never cast a spell with someone before as an equal. Only as Freite’s slave.

Martine took Ash’s other hand and Safred completed the circle. She began to sing: “Spirit of air, come not within my land
…”

Saker twitched and almost lost Ash’s grip on his hand. It was an unbearable sound, like the voice his father had spoken in.
A voice of power.

“Spirit of fire, come not within my land,” Martine sang. Her voice, thankfully, was human.

“Spirit of water, come not within my land,” Ash sang, also in the voice of the dead.

Saker felt weak in comparison to this young man. Not only an enchanter, but one who could make the dead speak, and spoke with
their voice.

Ash squeezed his hand and Saker cleared his throat. The five notes were awkward, as they didn’t quite fit the spell, so he
had to concentrate to put words and notes together. “Spirit of earth, come not within my land,” he sang, and knew his voice
sounded thready beside theirs.

They closed their eyes, and there it was, the compact spell resting deep in the earth, woven out of the earth itself, it almost
seemed, its layers distinct but closely adhering.

Ash squeezed Saker’s hand again, and Saker gathered his strength and directed the song to the deep cracks in the lowest layer.
He felt Ash follow him down to the third layer and sent his song into the fissures, which were growing. He sensed Martine
and Safred doing the same to their levels. It was difficult, much more difficult than raising the dead, but there were no
hissing spirits from beyond the grave to distract him. And to work a spell with others… to be in company with people
like him, to use power to build and strengthen, that was a new thing, and it filled him with a kind of joy.