The Third God (59 page)

‘The cries?’

Carnelian knew Morunasa would find out everything soon enough. ‘Dragons are coming here from the north.’

Morunasa’s eyes narrowed to slits, then he passed close enough for Carnelian to be able to smell the blood oozing from his open sores. He followed him down a level, then into a stable wider than the others, in the back of which lurked counterweights and cables. There was a pale thing lying on the ground. For a moment he had the impression it was one of the Sapients, but the flesh, though starved, was firmer. He looked and recognized Osidian’s face, as thin as it had been when he had had the fever. He stooped to touch him and recoiled from the marble cold of death.

‘He lives,’ slurred Morunasa. His eyes rolled up as if he had just been stabbed. The dark irises descended. ‘He is with our Lord.’

Unmasked, Carnelian knew his face must be betraying what he thought of Morunasa’s god. He reached out again and, taking Osidian’s arm, shook him. Osidian released a groan, but did not wake. Carnelian felt the wetness on his fingers and turned to see them dark. He wiped the blood on his robe, fearing, irrationally, that he might have touched not only a wound, but also one of the maggots.

‘He shouldn’t be woken.’

Carnelian glanced up. ‘I’ve no choice. Will you help me carry him up out of here?’

Morunasa regarded him with a glazed expression, so that Carnelian had to repeat his question. The second time, Morunasa nodded.

Carnelian watched Poppy as she gazed, frowning, on Osidian’s skeletal face. He and Morunasa had laid him out upon the cobbles within the shelter of the leftway monolith, round to one side of the entrance so that his face could be seen neither from the leftway nor from within the watch-tower. Carnelian had left him unmasked because he feared his mask might smother him. For what Poppy was doing, the Law demanded death, but he imagined only Aurum would dare attempt to enforce it. If Aurum did, Carnelian would immediately hand him over to the justice of the Lepers.

Waiting for Osidian to wake, they had watched the shadows lengthen across the camp below. Now, beyond the monolith, everything was bathed in the reddening gold of the dying day. Carnelian had concealed Osidian’s bony body and its wounds beneath a blanket. The mask he had used to hide Osidian’s cadaverous face from Lily was lying on the ground beside him. The gold face seemed to have been flayed from what was little more than a skull. Seeing how Osidian had suffered stirred feelings in Carnelian of guilt, of loss, of rage. He glanced into the shadows of the cistern chamber where Lily was waiting with her Lepers. Against the objections of her people, she had given in to his plea that they should be patient at least until the morning. A tiny twitching in Osidian’s thin lips gave the impression he might be talking to someone in his dreams. Carnelian had tried many times already to wake him, without success. This sleep was the brother of death.

Morunasa had reacted with anger when he discovered his Marula had abandoned their posts to the Lepers. Carnelian had told him that they had done so in obedience to his command and that, besides, the warriors could not have withstood the Leper numbers. He suspected that Morunasa was not appeased but had bade him return below to wake the Oracles. Both knew that they might well play some pivotal part in the next day’s events.

Everyone was waiting for Osidian to wake, but there was no certainty he would choose to climb up from the depths in which he wandered, lost. Even if he did, what hope was there he would have found what he sought?

Hearing voices, Carnelian started awake. Night had fallen. He must have dozed. A muttering was coming out from the cistern chamber that was punctuated now and then by a raised voice. Listening, he was sure he could hear the rumble of Fern’s voice. Carnelian sat up and reached for his mask, instinctively knowing Fern must soon appear. He paused with it in his hand and glanced at Osidian’s, smouldering darkly on the ground. He put his mask down and leaned back against the monolith. Fern had the right to see them both.

A dark shape appeared in the doorway beneath the toothed edge of the raised portcullis. Poppy rose and moved towards Fern as if to give him a hug of welcome, but she halted and let her arms fall. ‘What news?’

Fern gave no answer and, though his face was in shadow, Carnelian sensed his gaze was on Osidian. ‘Has he revealed how we might win the battle?’

‘We’ve not yet been able to wake him,’ Carnelian said.

‘He has the worms in him?’

‘He does.’

Silence.

‘Will he wake in time?’ Fern asked at last.

Carnelian was only too aware of what Osidian had done the last time he had awoken from such a sleep. ‘I don’t know.’ He peered into Fern’s shadow face, yearning to see him clearly. ‘Tell us what you’ve seen.’

The shadowy figure shifted. ‘Mid afternoon we saw dragons approaching from the north. After sending you word, we rode south to the next tower. We climbed it and waited there until nightfall. When I was certain they’d formed a camp around the forward tower, we returned here.’

‘So it’ll be tomorrow?’

‘If we choose to fight.’

Carnelian’s chin sank into his chest as he contemplated what the next day might bring. Perhaps a battle. Perhaps the Lepers would take Aurum and leave. Whatever was to come, there would be losses.

As Fern began turning away, Carnelian could not suppress panic that he might leave tomorrow, that he might go for ever. ‘Please, Fern . . . please, stay here with us.’

The man became inanimate shadow. Then the shadow approached so that the light from within the tower found the contours of his form. Poppy moved aside, exposing a space beside Carnelian. ‘I’ll fetch you a blanket,’ she said and darted into the tower.

Carnelian sensed Fern standing there, but did not want to look up in case their eyes should meet. Poppy was soon back. Fern accepted the blanket from her, wrapped it about his shoulders, then sank down beside Carnelian with his back against the monolith. Intensely aware of the warm pressure against his shoulder, Carnelian regarded the sky. The ribs of the watch-tower black against the stars seemed the branches of some massive baobab. His heart remembered the time so long ago when he and Fern had shared a blanket in the Upper Reach. He turned his head enough to see Fern’s profile. He was gazing up at the night sky. Carnelian wondered if Fern too was remembering that night.

Carnelian jerked awake and saw an ice face pulled into a silent scream. Its eyes, fixed on something beyond, communicated their terror to him. Osidian, releasing a stuttering gasp, raised the gleaming bony shard of an arm to point at the sky. Carnelian gazed up, expecting some horror to fall on them. For a moment he saw only the black arms of the watch-tower ribs, but then he saw the moon. A diamond scythe so sharp it felt as if it might slice through his eyes. He looked back to Osidian, who had subsided, mumbling. Closed, his eyes seemed to have sunk back into the silver mask of his face. Carnelian became aware Poppy and Fern were staring at Osidian too.

Just then a hail of tiny flutters on his face made Carnelian throw up his hands in alarm. Masked by his fingers, he could feel the pinpricks on his skin. It was not, as he had feared, an assault of flies. With a delicate hiss, something blowing on the breeze was striking him. He was disturbed by the memory of the sporestorm he and Fern and Poppy had endured on their way to the Koppie. This was only blown dust. Squinting against the delicate hail, he saw his friends had covered their heads with their blankets. Osidian seemed dead again. Carnelian hunched his blanket up, pulled it over his head, then settled back to sleep.

Waking once more, Carnelian sat up. Osidian was standing there with the camp pouring its undulating dark reflection over his mask.

‘It is an omen,’ Osidian said, his Quya a whisper.

Carnelian glanced around; not only the leftway, but everything below was in strange shadow. On both sides of the monolith, the leftway was dusted red, the colour collecting in the cracks between the cobbles like dried blood. More of this rustiness clung to the folds of Poppy’s blanket. He shook his own blanket and filled the air with it. ‘The dust?’

Osidian turned his mirror face slowly towards Carnelian. ‘The breeze,’ he sighed.

Carnelian moved to stand beside him, squinting against the dusty air.

‘It is my Father’s breath urging me to Osrakum.’

Carnelian was lost for a moment, contemplating the pale tendons, the corded veins in the arm and hand with which Osidian was holding his mask before his face. He wondered at where Osidian was getting the strength to stand. He focused on what Osidian had said and understood. ‘The rain wind.’ It was true. The wind had shifted. It was coming from the south-west. He should have realized that when he had woken during the night.

‘Why did you wake me?’

Carnelian regarded him. ‘Jaspar is here.’

He expected some kind of agitation, but instead Osidian gave a languid nod as if his mask were too heavy for him. ‘I saw him in my dreams.’

Carnelian indicated the dusty mass of the Lepers stirring below. ‘I gave them control of this tower. I have put you, my Lord Aurum and myself in their power. If you cannot convince them we will be victorious . . .’

Osidian gave another, slow nod. ‘Your precautions, Carnelian, were unnecessary.’ He shifted into Vulgate. ‘Today we’ll annihilate our enemies.’

Carnelian was uneasy at his certainty. He glanced round and saw Fern was awake, angry and disbelieving. ‘How will we do that, my Lord?’

‘Summon the Lord Aurum and I shall tell you.’

Calculating that it could do no harm, Carnelian asked Fern if he would fetch the old Master. Unease was bright in Fern’s eyes, but he went. Carnelian looked round for Poppy, but she was gone. He could not be sure how much she had heard, but he could hope she had gone to urge Lily and the Lepers to wait just a little longer.

Slaves struggled to help their master across the brassman up onto the leftway. As Aurum straightened, his slaves cowered away. He approached, hobbling. Watching him, Carnelian wondered again at his condition. Osidian sketched a gesture of concern. ‘Is my Lord strong enough to command today?’

‘Imago has come?’

‘We shall engage him before midday.’

The old Master seemed to grow more massive in his black cloak. ‘My will shall provide me with the strength my body lacks, Celestial.’

Carnelian thought that both his allies looked frail.

Gingerly, Osidian crouched and ran a thin finger through the red dust. ‘This is Imago’s line.’ Facing its mid-point, he traced what seemed a smile and from its centre dragged two fingers back to make a double line. ‘This is how we shall destroy the Ichorian.’

As he explained, Carnelian was noticing how the crescent matched the moon Osidian had pointed to during the night. Though the tactics were fascinating, he wondered whence they really had come.

Aurum’s mask regarded them. ‘And you are convinced, Celestial, this novel tactic will break Imago’s line?’

Osidian gave a slight shrug. ‘If it does not, then it is we who will be destroyed.’

Carnelian saw another objection. ‘Will Jaspar not realize what we are preparing for him?’

Osidian made a smiling gesture with his hand and turned towards the camp. Dust blowing against his mask collected its red powder upon lip and brows. ‘Behold my Father’s breath.’

Carnelian nodded, understanding. ‘You intend that we should come at him with the wind at our backs?’

‘We shall raise a red twilight that shall conceal our storm from him until it is too late.’

Carnelian pondered the appearance of the rain wind that very morning, wondering if he dare believe it really was an omen. Ultimately it was not he but the Lepers who must believe. ‘What about those who will fight upon the ground?’

Osidian winnowed the dusty air with a dismissive gesture. ‘They merely have to withstand the Ichorian aquar until we have broken through.’

Aurum was nodding. ‘If their huimur fail, the rest of the Ichorian will break.’

Osidian’s ‘merely’ was making Carnelian fret, but he knew that quizzing him further would not help gauge the threat to the Lepers. Osidian’s plan was akin to hazarding all on the flight of a single arrow.

‘My huimur tower is not equipped for such a battle, Celestial.’

‘That is why, my Lord Aurum, you shall be commanding your legion from my tower.’

Carnelian waited for Aurum to object to this. When he did not, Carnelian realized that, of course, the Master really had no choice. Though commands would be issued to his legion in his name, it was Osidian who would in truth command them. ‘And you would have me command the Qunoth huimur, my Lord?’

Osidian turned to Carnelian. ‘If my Lord would deign to do so?’

Carnelian considered that it was Lily and her Lepers who ultimately would have to make that decision. ‘I shall go, my Lord, to begin the marshalling of our forces.’

Osidian’s hand made a crisp affirmation. ‘I shall remain here long enough to determine with my Lord Aurum how best we might communicate our tactics to his commanders.’

‘Celestial,’ Carnelian said and, bowing, turned towards the monolith.