Sara Douglass – The Axis Trilogy 3 – StarMan

She heard a movement behind her, then a hot hand grasped her shoulder.

/ have her! Gilbert thought exultantly. Another heartbeat and I’ll have her . . . deadl “Take your hand off the Lady!” a voice hissed at his side, and Gilbert, who had recent experience of such things, recognised the sound of power. But he gritted his teeth and tightened his hand. Faraday had to die, and he was not going to relinquish his grip when he was this close.

Surely the power that whispered in his ear was no match for the power Artor had given him. He reached within himself, seeking Artor’s vengeance. His eyes glowed red.

“Release her!” the voice commanded, stronger now, then a heavy-booted foot scrunched suddenly down on his own.

Gilbert gave a squeal of pain, let slip the power within him that he had only barely touched . . . and let Faraday go.

Faraday was turning to see who wanted her with such persistence, when the hand fell from her shoulder and she was free.

“This way, my Lady,” Culpepper said. “I shall order that a hot bath be prepared for you as soon as we reach my house.”

“Ah,” Faraday sighed blissfully. “A bath!” She forgot the crowds still jostling about her and let the Mayor lead her down the path he had cleared.

Gilbert, almost retching with pain, and sure that every bone in his foot had been broken, finally looked up. A heavy peasant woman, coarse-skinned and lank-haired, stood before him, hands on hips, her face suffused with anger.

“Leave her alone’.™ she hissed, and Gilbert heard the power again.

“Do you think you can stop me?” he said, and now power surged through his own voice. “Do you think to stop the great god Artor? Are you good enough for that, witch?”

Her face paled and she took a step back. “Leave her alone,” she repeated, but now her own voice was not so sure. “The Mother protects her.”

Gilbert smiled nastily, and the woman turned on her heel and disappeared into the crowd.

Artor was displeased. Gilbert had been so close, so close!

The bitch would be lying cracked and broken in the gutters of Arcen were it not for your stupidity, Gilbert!

Gilbert cowered in his room in The Trader’s Rest, grovelling as close to the wooden floor as possible. “She has a helper, Blessed One! A nasty woman. A fiend herself, I think!”

You should have been prepared, Gilbert.

“Oh, I will be now, Lord.”

You should have reached into the power I gave you sooner,

Gilbert.

“Oh, I’ve learned my lesson, Blessed One.”

If you’d taken your Brothers she could be dead by now. They could have distracted the . . . fiend ,.. while you killed the woman.

“I will use them in future, Great God. She does not frighten me.”

Nevertheless, good Gilbert, I shall have to give you more power, I think. I had not counted on the fiend.

“Oh, no!” Gilbert whimpered, his fingernails digging up splinters from the floor.

Good Gilbert. Accept my benevolence.

Chitter, Chatter From Jervois Landing Axis slowly moved his army west towards the Murkle Mountains. He would have moved faster, but the thought that if he was wrong, if he committed too fast to the west he would leave both southern and northern flanks dangerously unprotected, kept him hesitant.

He wanted confirmation, and he wanted it fast. But it seemed he would get neither.

“For the Stars’ sake, Axis,” FarSight CutSpur said, wrapping his ebony wings about him for extra warmth as he stood in the knee-deep snow, “tell us what it is you think!”

Axis sat Belaguez silently, hunched deep inside his cloak, his eyes fixed on some distant point to the west.

Belial glanced at Magariz, both men as cold and miserable as Axis, then edged his own horse closer to Axis.

“You must tell us what it is you think . . . what it is you plan, Axis,” he said. “Dammit! Why lead us west like this?”

Axis finally moved. He gathered up Belaguez’s reins. “Meet in my tent tonight,” he said, and booted the stallion forward. “FarSight, bring all the farflight reports from the Murkle Mountains that you have.”

The tiny tent was jammed with the three men and the Icarii Crest-Leader, but at least it was out of the wind, and the crowded bodies gave off their own heat. Soon clothes and feathers steamed and men unwound scarves and peeled off gloves.

“I think he’s hiding in the Murkle Mountains,” Axis said, and raised his eyes to meet those of his commanders.

“The Murkle Mountains?” Magariz asked. “I know little about them.”

“Few do,” Axis replied, “because few go there. I have some knowledge only because one of my cohort commanders came from a hamlet close to their skirts. Generations ago, perhaps even as long ago as old Tencendor, the Mountains were slightly warmer, and more rain fell. People lived there then. More importantly, for our cause at least, generations of miners tunnelled deep into the mountains after opals. Now the mines are abandoned.”

“And perhaps not,” Belial said. “Axis, what made you think of the Murkle Mountains?”

Axis shrugged. “A trifling thought as I drifted towards sleep, my friend. But listen to me,” his voice warmed with enthusiasm, “it would be the perfect hiding place, surely? Those abandoned mine shafts would be enough to hide an army, and Stars knows the Skraelings love dark, hidden places underground.”

“And they’re the perfect place to spring a trap!” Belial said. “Whether we went south or north from Jervois Landing, our unknown adversary would be able to attack our rear. And it’s the last place we would think to look.”

“It was the last place we thought to look,” Axis said dryly. “FarSight. I asked you to send farflight scouts west. Their reports?”

“Not reassuring, Axis. Several scouts have been over the Mountains, but there is nothing but blasted peaks and shadowed valleys. Nothing lives on those Mountains.”

“But what lives inside them?” Axis insisted. “Where else can he be?”

“Axis,” Magariz said. “What if the Skraelings are in these mine shafts? What do we do? Go in one by one with torches? Or ask, politely, if they would mind coming out to meet us in gentlemanly battle?”

For some time there was silence. None of the commanders envied Axis his leadership.

“Ho’Demi?” Belial finally asked. “Have you heard from him?”

Axis shook his head. “When he needs me to know, then he will contact me. But he is somewhere in the Murkle Mountains. Deep.”

Ho’Demi had brought five men, good Ravensbundmen, into the depths of the Murkle Mountains with him. All five were now dead.

Ho’Demi wanted to contact Axis – had wanted to contact him for two days past now – but power filtered through these Prophecy-damned shafts and tunnels, and whatever it was shielded Axis’ mind from Ho’Demi.

Perhaps it was the cursed rock that hung in countless thousands of tons above him, perhaps it was the dark power of the as yet hidden Skraeling force, but Ho’Demi was not sure.

But home was overrun by Gorgrael’s pets, and now Ho’Demi wondered if these shafts were infested with them, too.

After Axis contacted him, Ho’Demi had moved his small group of scouts into the Murkle Mountains. They had found an abandoned mine shaft easily enough and had carefully eased their way down it. Ancient iron ladders still clung to its walls, and Ho’Demi had thought they would snap and kill them all, but the rust had held together, and they’d reached the floor of the first shaft safely. Faint light permeated from the opening far above, but within paces of moving into the first of the tunnels even that was lost. This darkness was so thick it seemed to live, and it moved about them with a fluidity that would do a Ravensbund dancer proud.

None had liked it, but the StarMan had asked them to investigate, and so they dampened their fears and moved deeper and deeper.

Ho’Demi allowed no light. He was sure that the Skraelings’ silver eyes would glow, even in this darkness, and that his men would hear their whisperings; Ho’Demi had never known a totally silent Skraeling. So they moved through dark, they ate dark and they breathed dark, because Ho’Demi wanted the Skraelings to have no warning. He wanted to get his men out alive.

But one by one, his men had been taken, dragged away in utter silence into the perpetual night of the abandoned mines. Those in the front would suddenly realise that the rear man was gone, and none would know at what point he had disappeared.

Ho’Demi had eventually gone to the rear himself, but within an hour the front man had been taken, then the remaining man, and then Ho’Demi had been left alone in the dark. Utterly, totally lost.

If he could, he would have escaped this hell, but at some point he had become so disorientated that now he only crawled through the shoulder-high tunnels. Even death would be a release.