A squall swept up from the south, dumping five minutes of heavy rain on them. Lightning flashed once, high up within a cloud; a rumble of thunder shook the ground. The rain died to a steady drizzle. Tali’s stomach rumbled. She pulled her belt in another notch.
“Do you know anything about this fellow they mentioned — Deadhand?”
“Never heard of him,” Holm said faintly. He did not look well.
“What was the name of the place?”
“Garramide.”
“Do you know where it is?”
He did not reply.
“Should we go there? What do you think, Holm?”
“I’m going to have a little rest. Wake me when we get there.”
Tali followed the range north, walking their horses along stream beds and across expanses of flat rock in an effort to disguise their tracks, and at sunset she holed up in a cave in the southern range. After tethering the horses where there was grass and water, and screening the cave entrance with a dense stack of bushes, she lit a small fire, checking twice to make sure no glow could be seen from outside. Holm was still poorly and she had to repeat her healing twice before, finally, he slept soundly.
Having slept so much in the past few days, she was wide awake. It was smoky in the little cave, but pleasantly warm, and for the first time since her escape from Cython she felt safe. No one knew she was here and their trail would be difficult to follow; though, sooner or later, a determined search must locate them. She had to be ready, and it would help if she knew what Lyf was up to.
Her previous seeings had been involuntary — either due to blood loss or to the effects of the heatstone helmet. But once before, when she had been in the Abysm trying to steal his pearl, Tali had seen Lyf at a distance, via magery. Could she use her newly recovered magery to see him again?
It proved easier than she had expected — she saw him the moment she looked. Tali drew back, afraid to go on. Had her unconscious visions of him in his temple created a mental pathway that allowed her to slip straight across? That could be dangerous. Such a pathway might reveal her to him. But she had to take the risk.
“Go through it all again,” said Errek. “In case we’ve missed something.”
Lyf related the tale of how the Five Heroes had betrayed him and Axil Grandys had hacked his feet off with the accursed blade.
“They bundled me up in a rug, disguised me with magery, then rode like fury to the Catacombs of the Kings and walled me in to die,” Lyf concluded.
Why didn’t you fight back, she wondered. You might have been an inexperienced king, but you were also an adept with the greatest magery of all at your disposal. Why didn’t you use it to save yourself?
“And you have no memory of what happened to the key?” said Errek. “None at all?”
“It was in its hiding place,” snapped Lyf. “No one knew it but me, and it’s not there now. It’s not in the temple.”
“Then someone took it — probably Grandys.”
“But he never used king-magery; he never even found where it had gone.”
“Perhaps he took the key when he searched the temple, but did not know what it was.”
“After all this time, we’ll never know.”
“There may be those in Hightspall who would know,” said Errek. “There’s a man outside you need to talk to.”
“Who?”
“The historian mage, Wiven.”
Lyf went to the temple door, unbolted it and said, “Bring him in.”
A little old man was brought in. His dark face was as wrinkled as a prune.
“You are Wiven?” said Lyf, after the guards had gone and closed the door behind them.
“Yes,” he said in a reedy little voice.
“Yes, Lord King!” corrected Errek.
Lyf waved a hand at him, irritably.
“I’m told that few people know more about the history of magery, and the time of Lyf’s death, than you,” said Errek.
“No one knows half as much as I do,” said Wiven. “What do you want?”
“What happened to the contents of the temple after Lyf’s disappearance?”
“It was raided in the night. Everything was taken.”
“Who raided it?” said Lyf.
“Axil Grandys.”
“Why? What was he looking for?”
“No one knows,” said Wiven. “But — ”
“Yes?”
“It was rumoured that he was looking for a talisman.”
“A talisman?” said Lyf. “Why?”
“Grandys’ own magery relied on them. Maloch, for instance, is a great talisman.”
“Did he find one?”
“Since he never found the lost king-magery, it’s assumed he did not.”
“What happened to the contents of my temple?”
“No one knows.”
Lyf recalled the guards. “Take him out. Far enough that you don’t defile the temple.”
The little old man was hauled out. There was a brief scuffle, a reedy cry, then the thump of a blade cleaving a head from a neck. Tali winced.
Lyf closed the door, bolted it and moved well away. “Another dead end.”
“A poor choice of words, in the circumstances,” Errek said drily. He looked around. “What’s that?”
Had she been discovered? Tali broke the link and opened her eyes. So this vital key was definitely gone, probably taken by Grandys, but how could anyone find it after all this time?
Suddenly ravenous, she went through Holm’s pack, discovered a map which she put aside for later, then took out their remaining food — a chunk of fatty bacon, an onion, a couple of cups of oatmeal and some unidentifiable pieces of dried fruit. Tali had never cooked a meal but how difficult could it be? She chopped everything into small pieces, put it in the pan with some water and set it on the fire.
“I hope you’ve got an appetite,” she said, on waking Holm an hour later. “This is the last of the food.”
Holm eyed the grey, oily mess without enthusiasm. “What is it?”
“I’m calling it stew.”
“What’s in it?”
“All we had of everything.”
“Boiled?” he cried. “Even the bacon?”
“Um,” said Tali. “Isn’t that how you do it?”
He sighed and took a cautious spoonful. “Oh, well, I dare say it’ll be nourishing.”
“Isn’t that what people say when the food is horrible?”
“Did I say that?” he said with an innocent twinkle. He tasted, tasted again. “It’s not too bad… considering. Didn’t your mother teach you to cook?”
“In Cython, the kitchen slaves do all the cooking.”
They finished their stew in a companionable silence. The fire died low. She put more wood on.
“What now?” said Holm.
She debated whether or not to tell him about her seeing of Lyf and Errek, but decided to put it off a bit longer. “Er… about my magery?”
“Yes?”
“Have I made my choice? Between healing and destruction, I mean?”
“By healing me?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t think so. The choice can’t be any little old thing.”
“I wouldn’t call healing you a little old thing,” she exclaimed.
“Neither would I, but I’m biased. Here’s how the king’s choice used to work, according to what I’ve read in the history books. You have to choose either to do a great healing, such as saving a life that could not be saved any other way. Or a great destruction — taking someone’s life with magery, for instance, or destroying something vast, valuable or vital.”