The Singer of All Songs (29 page)

‘Heron was Samis’s name for me, long ago.’ Darrow turned away, shoulders hunched.

‘Was that – that voice, was that
him
?’

‘He is close by,’ said Calwyn quietly. ‘Very close.’

Come. We must not linger here.
Halasaa set off, stepping lightly across the ruined paving stones. Trout hung back, thrusting his hands miserably into his pockets. Surely it was madness to obey that uncanny call. Walking with their eyes open, straight into a trap. He followed the others, but lagging further and further behind.

The attack came without warning.

From nowhere the ravens swooped down, in a black flurry of wings and savage beaks, cawing in wild triumph. Halasaa took the worst of it; helplessly he threw up his arms against the fierce beaks that thrust and thrust again at his eyes. As fast as one bird was brushed away, another dived to take its place, vicious, relentless, so that Halasaa was invisible in the midst of the dark storm of beating wings.

Darrow leapt into the fray, striking out blindly at the whirling ravens, but he could not beat them back; Tonno ran forward, tearing off his jacket and flailing it in front of him. ‘Calwyn!’ he roared. ‘Sing! By all the gods, why don’t you sing?’

Calwyn’s mouth was dry. She stepped back and swallowed hard; her mind was blank, not a single word came to her. The ferocious birds swooped and crowed, merciless; Halasaa had fallen to his knees, his arms wrapped about his head. Calwyn pressed her hands together and began to sing. At first only a hoarse croak emerged, but soon her song was strong and clear. This was different from singing to the bees, or even to the arakin: that was companionable, friendly, one voice to another. But this was a fight, her song a weapon to drive the birds back, and she felt the chantment strike through the air like the slash of a sword blade.

The ravens dodged and cawed; for a moment they whirled above Halasaa’s head in confusion, a black storm cloud, then they streamed away and vanished among the trees.

Tonno helped Halasaa to his feet.
Do not fear. I am unhurt.
Halasaa’s eyes were bright as ever, though his hands were shaking.
They would not listen to me.
He seemed bewildered, his serenity disturbed for the first time.
They would not listen.

‘We must be on our guard,’ said Darrow grimly. ‘This is not a friendly place.’

‘And we must stick together!’ barked Tonno, glaring at Trout, who had just caught up to them. The attack had been over in the space of a few breaths, and Trout had seen nothing.

‘What? What’s happening?’

‘Never mind that. Just stay close.’ Tonno shook him roughly by the arm; he looked ready to clip him over the ear, but Trout broke free.

‘All right, all right! There’s no need to get
violent
.’

‘I’ll show you violent, if you wander off again.’

‘Please!’ cried Calwyn. ‘Let’s keep moving.’The awareness of Samis close by, and the presence of power, made her head throb unbearably. She pressed her hands to her temples. ‘Come on.’

They continued along the broken road, with Calwyn leading the way. Rebelliously, Trout fell behind again, keeping out of Tonno’s sight; he preferred to risk Tonno’s predictable wrath than the unknown dangers that lurked up ahead.

As they walked deeper into the forest, Calwyn moved more and more hesitantly. At last she stopped. There were no more paving stones to mark the road to the city. ‘I can’t – I can’t find the way.’ She rubbed her wrists against her forehead. ‘It’s too – there’s too much
noise
.’ Under the trees it was as silent as ever; the cacophony was inside her mind. She appealed to Halasaa. ‘Do you know the way?’

But Halasaa shook his head.
It is dark to me now. I cannot see.

Tonno gave a sudden, sharp cry. ‘
There
!’ He plunged forward, and disappeared between the trees.

‘Tonno! Come back!’ cried Mica in alarm. As they’d walked, the mist had been imperceptibly thickening. With two strides, Tonno had now vanished completely.

Then they heard his voice ring through the grove. ‘This way! Come on!’

‘Tonno, wait!’ Darrow chased after him; when the others caught up, he was grippingTonno by the sleeve. Tonno tried to charge away.

‘I saw him, I saw him, I tell you!’ he panted. Sweat shone on his forehead, and his eyes were wild. He gave another desperate lunge; it was all Darrow could do to hold him back.

‘You saw Samis?’

‘No!’Tonno shook his burly head so vehemently that drops of sweat flew from his hair. ‘Not Samis –
Xanni
!’

‘Tonno,Tonno, listen to me!’ Darrow shook his friend, but it was like trying to reason with a maddened ox. ‘It is an illusion! Xanni is dead.’

‘In this place, who knows? Magic has more power here, you said. Mebbe the dead walk in these forests –
Look there
!’ And with a wild cry, he broke from Darrow’s grasp, his arm outstretched. They all turned. Calwyn gasped. There stood Xanni, a little way off; Xanni, with his mop of curling hair and his lop-sided cheeky smile, reaching out a hand toTonno.

‘My brother, my brother!’Tonno charged toward him, but the figure turned and dodged through the trees. An echo of laughter hung in the air where he had been, and Calwyn took a shuddering breath: surely it
was
Xanni. There was Xanni’s grin, Xanni’s laugh – But there was no time to think. Already Tonno had vanished under the trees, and Halasaa sprinted after him, with Darrow following.

Calwyn seized Mica’s hand. ‘Quick! We mustn’t lose them.’

‘We ain’t gettin lost if I can help it, not here!’

The two girls ran on and on between the ghostly trees, their feet silenced by the moss. They could hear Tonno blundering ahead, crashing into branches, imploring the phantom figure of his brother to slow down, to wait for him. Calwyn and Mica ran until they were fighting for breath, and the mist had grown so thick they could hardly see the way ahead.

After a long time, Tonno began to slow down, and his shouts became less frequent and more despairing, until they heard no more. Then they called to him, and elsewhere in the forest they heard Darrow crying out his name, and the silent call of Halasaa.

They stumbled acrossTonno at last, collapsed onto a fallen log, his head in his hands. Mica fell to her knees and took both his hands in hers. ‘Tonno, Tonno –’

Tonno looked up, his face streaked with tears. ‘I saw him,’ he said dully. ‘I saw him.’

Mica wrapped her arms around his curly head and hugged him roughly to her. After a moment,Tonno put his arm around her. ‘You’ll have to be my family now, lass,’ he said gruffly.

‘All right, then,’ said Mica, and her tone was so offhand, Calwyn had to smile, though she could see in Mica’s face how pleased she was.

She heard a footfall behind her: it was Darrow. ‘Halasaa!’ he called. ‘They are here!’ He turned to Calwyn. ‘Where’s Trout?’

‘I haven’t seen him since the birds attacked us.’ Alarmed, Calwyn looked around as if Trout might fall from the treetops.

Halasaa materialised out of the mist.
He is here.
He was propellingTrout before him with one brown hand on the boy’s shoulder.

‘For pity’s sake!’ said Trout irritably, shaking him off. ‘I wish you’d all leave me alone.’

‘I think, in truth, you wouldn’t like to be left alone here,’ said Darrow, unsmiling.

‘Well, maybe not,’ admitted Trout. He shivered. ‘What now? We’re not going to camp here all night, are we?’

Calwyn stood very still, her head tilted, and her eyes shut tight with concentration. ‘I know the way.’

Steadily, she began to walk. There was no confusion in her head now; the source of power called to her, clear and insistent, and very close. And Samis was there too, an unmistakable presence stamped on her awareness. She was conscious of the others, close on her heels, but they were faint sparks compared with the bright, terrifying flame that was Samis.

Suddenly the trees thinned out, and they were on open ground. But the mist still pressed against them from all sides, thicker than ever; they could scarcely see their hands in front of their faces. Calwyn stopped. The light that guided her had snuffed out, as if the choking mists swirled inside her mind.

Mica raised her hands and sang a spell for a breeze. Her voice rose clear and small in the dead silence, and the fog that eddied around them tore into shreds and was whisked away.

Mica lowered her hands, gaping in awe. They were standing in a ruined square; strange structures rose on all sides. There were slim silver towers, their tops hidden in the thinning mists, low silver domes that gleamed softly in the muted light, and broken-down stone walls, lined with moss. Slender trees thrust up between the paving stones. The place was eerily silent, abandoned.

This is Spareth. This is the Desolate City. Here theVoiced Ones dwelled,
and from this place they fled at last.
Halasaa bowed his dark head.
Here my people died.

‘Amazing,’ breathedTrout. Wide-eyed, he trotted across the empty square to the nearest of the polished domes, and Mica ran after him.

‘I ain’t never seen nothin like this before, have you?’ she whispered.

‘Never.’ Instinctively, they both kept their voices hushed.

‘What’s it all made of ?’

‘I don’t know. It looks like beaten metal, but –’ He brushed one hand against the silver wall. The surface was cool and smooth; he could see his own puzzled face shining dimly back at him. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Look out!’ Mica caught at his sleeve. ‘Calwyn’s off again, come on!’ She ran after the others, bare feet flying across the crumbled stones.

‘Coming,’ said Trout distractedly, but he lingered by the wall, knocking the burnished metal with his knuckles. Everywhere that stone had been used to pave roads or build walls, it lay crumbling and overgrown with moss. But the strange silver towers and domes still shone untarnished, untouched by time.

When at lastTrout turned to follow, the others were about to vanish down one of the ruined streets. He scampered after them as they strode past buildings with gleaming silver walls and no roofs, down one street, then another, and across another smaller plaza.

It was hard to imagine that these broad, silent streets had ever teemed with people. What kind of people had the Ancient Ones been, to design such structures, and what kind of equipment could have built them? They must have had extraordinary talents indeed – Deep in thought, Trout almost missed the turning that the others had taken, but he spotted them at last on the far side of another vast, empty square.

They were all standing at the foot of one of the soaring towers, so high that its top was invisible in the tumbling mists. Darrow gazed upward, frowning. ‘In here?’

Calwyn nodded. ‘He’s inside.’ She put her hands to her head; the awareness of power, close at hand, confused and very very strong, almost overwhelmed her. She could see from the look of strain on Darrow’s face, and from the way Mica reached out a sudden hand to Tonno, that they could sense it too. Only Halasaa was unperturbed, staring up at the tower with a look of wonder, but no dismay.

‘Where’s the door?’ said Trout.

Tonno growled, ‘Can’t see one.’

‘Of course not,’ said Darrow sharply. He held out one hand to the unbroken wall, and sang three notes, deep and commanding. Silently the wall shivered, and a circular opening appeared. Darrow threw back his head and strode inside. Halasaa darted in behind him.

‘Quick, in case it closes up again.’Tonno seized Calwyn and Mica’s hands and pulled them through the round doorway.

‘What if we’re trapped in there for ever?’ moaned Trout. But he was more afraid of being left alone outside than of going in with the others, so he scurried after them.

The doorway did close; the wall sealed behind them. They were standing in a curved low-ceilinged corridor, made from the same burnished material as the outside walls. Light glowed softly from an unseen source; their own blurred and startled reflections shimmered on the silver walls, like images seen through water.

‘What now?’ Tonno whispered, and his voice echoed around the walls, chasing itself up and back until they could hardly tell where the sound was coming from.

Trout held out a hand to the curving wall and tried to keep his voice steady. ‘This room must run right around the foot of the tower.’ –
of the tower – of the tower –
‘How do we get to the top?’ –
to the top? – to the top?
– came the soft mocking echo.

‘No,’ said Calwyn firmly. ‘We must go down, not up.’ –
not
up – not up –

‘What difference does it make?’ said Mica, loud and defiant. ‘There ain’t no steps, goin up nor down!’ –
nor down! –
nor down!

Trout fumbled in his pocket. ‘We should mark the place where we started out.’ He kept his voice low, but an unintelligible murmur rippled around the walls. Trout’s pockets were always crammed with odds and ends: pieces of string, nails, the fragment of fire-mountain that had fallen from the sky, a filthy handkerchief, a pocket knife, a slingshot, a fishhook. All these things tumbled out onto the floor, as well as the stub of chalk he sought. But as he bent to gather them up, Darrow shot out a hand. ‘Look there!’ –
there! – there!

The little piece of chalk was rolling slowly away down the corridor. Even as they stared, it disappeared around the curve, but they could still hear the faint noise of its progress. ‘The floor slopes!’ cried Trout. ‘
That’s
why there aren’t any stairs, the whole tower is a ramp!’ –
a ramp! – a ramp!

But Calwyn didn’t stay to hear his speculations. She had already set off down the silvery corridor, her plaits whisking behind her, drawn toward the source of humming power. Her hands were tingling, and clammy with fear; the sense of strong magic pounded in her temples like the beating of a great drum, ceaseless, terrifying. But she was compelled to go on, to draw closer.

The others followed, treading cautiously on the slippery floor, down and down, gradually but inexorably descending. Trout was right; the entire tower was one spiralling corridor, narrow at its top and broad at its base. But now they followed the spiral down below the base, beneath the ground, each spiral wider than the last. After a while it seemed to Mica that they had been walking for ever between the same curving walls, stretching on and on. She put out her fingertips to touch the smooth surface on either side, and her shadowy reflections reached out their wavering hands to touch their fingers to hers. The hum of power intensified as they went deeper; evenTrout and Tonno could feel it now.