“The One is my battle alone,” said Maximilian. “Axis, do as Ishbel says.”
“Be careful of her,” Axis said to Ishbel. He tipped his head at Inardle. “She deceived me too easily, the treacherous bitch. Trust not one word she utters.”
Then he was gone, running upward past Ishbel and Maximilian, and vanishing down a side corridor. Inardle crouched on the stairs, her eyes wary as they followed Axis, then she looked at Ishbel, one hand rubbing at her bruised wrist.
Ishbel lifted the hand she’d used to scatter the blood and laid it against Maximilian’s cheek. “What can I do to aid you?” she said.
“Nothing,” he said. “This must be my battle.”
Ishbel nodded, accepting it. “Then be careful, and come back to me.”
Maximilian kissed her cheek, and was gone down the stairs.
“Now there’s just you and me,” Ishbel said to Inardle. “What shall I do with you?”
Axis had taken two turns down the corridor, racing for the Strike Force’s quarters, when StarDrifter appeared from a doorway.
“I have an idea,” he said to Axis, taking his son’s arm as he spoke low and rapid.
The One rose slowly through the stairwell that wound upward from the very pit of Elcho Falling. He was climbing with more caution than he had initially, and had stopped singing.
The Lord of Elcho Falling knew he was here. The element of surprise had vanished.
“I rise to greet you,” the One whispered, his obsidian eyes gleaming.
Then he jumped in surprise as thick, dark blood spattered over his face, neck and chest.
Chapter 2
The Twisted Tower
Within the Twisted Tower, Josia was horribly aware of the crisis in Elcho Falling, but he was so stunned by its sheer suddenness, as by the strange appearance of the cat, that momentarily he was incapable of rational thought, let alone action. He gaped at the open door of the tower, then he gaped at the red tabby cat, now investigating a table on the far side of the ground floor chamber, then he looked at the stairs rising upward.
He had to see what was happening. He needed to get to the window in the top chamber.
Josia closed the door, then tried to grab the cat. He had no idea what the cat represented, nor if it boded good or ill, but he didn’t want to leave it on its own. He lunged once, then a second time, and a third, but the cat scampered out of his reach each time.
“Damn it,” Josia muttered. He looked again at the stairwell, increasingly distraught at what he felt emanating from Elcho Falling, then made a decision.
The cat could wait.
Josia turned for the stairs.
“Stay,” said a voice behind him.
Josia turned about, feeling as if his heart had literally thudded out of his chest into his throat.
A tall naked man stood behind one of the tables. He was an older man, having a strong beak-nosed face under greying dark hair with intense deep-blue eyes that stared unwaveringly at Josia. He radiated assured power, and Josia felt his knees weaken with despair.
“I am the One’s companion,” the man said. “I have been sent to murder you — yet once more — and to destroy this fabrication of memory.” He waved a hand at the crowded interior of the Tower.
“Neither my death nor the Twisted Tower’s destruction will harm Maximilian,” Josia managed to say.
“Ah, but they will eat away at his confidence,” said the man. “The One leaves no stone unturned. He is determined to destroy Maximilian and Elcho Falling completely this day.”
“Who are you?” said Josia. His heart thudded less violently now, and he stared at the man, who was moving across to another table. There was something about him. . .
“You do not know?” the man said, lifting a bundle of folded linen from the table, shaking it out and winding it around his hips to cover his nakedness. “Ah, do not worry, Josia. I am sure that Maximilian has long retrieved the memory from this piece of linen. He shall not notice the cloth’s absence.”
The man gave a slight, secretive smile. “The memory involves the construction of the strange columns on the ground floor of Elcho Falling, if I am correct.”
“Gods,” Josia whispered, grasping at the edge of the nearest table for support as the realisation of what this man was flooded him. “You are a Persimius, come to betray Elcho Falling and its lord.”
The man grinned. “Come to betray, yes, but not Elcho Falling, to which I owe my complete loyalty. And, yes, I am Persimius. You do not recognise me, Josia?”
He stepped forward, his handsome face still smiling widely, holding out his hand, and Josia forced himself not to shrink back. He still couldn’t think — on the one hand he could sense the desperation inside Elcho Falling, could sense the One inside Elcho Falling, yet on the other he had this apparition advancing on him. Josia did not know what to think, nor know what action to take next.
The man stopped in front of Josia. “Oh for the gods’ sakes, man! Come to your senses! You must know me! I am Avaldamon Persimius, father of Boaz, ancestor of Ishbel, former companion and now betrayer of the One, come to do what I can for Maximilian and Elcho Falling. Now, will you stop cringing against that table and give me your hand, to stand with me to save what we can of the situation?”
Chapter 3
Elcho Falling
StarHeaven SpiralFlight shrank against the wall of the common room where the Strike Force had gathered late yesterday. She was half covered by the bodies of two of her Strike Force comrades, their blood soaking into her clothes and the feathers of her wings. She lay very still, the only sign of life her darting eyes.
One of the bodies lying heavily atop her was that of her commander and friend, BroadWing EvenBeat.
StarHeaven didn’t know what to do.
The Strike Force had been awake and weaponed. The news of the disaster of Maximilian’s death — on top of the continued apprehension caused by the arrival of Armat’s massive army and its penetration into Elcho Falling — had dismayed everyone. BroadWing had expected Axis to launch an attack, or maybe mount a defence against Armat’s attacking army, but since the time they’d been informed of the terrible news of Maximilian’s death, there had been no further orders. They’d stayed gathered in the massive common room, talking, pacing, arguing now and again, wondering.
And then, literally out of thin air, they had started to die.
Bodies had sliced open, limbs were hacked free, heads tumbled from shoulders.
They were under attack by invisible assailants.
BroadWing had realised instantly it must be the Lealfast. He’d shouted at the Strike Force, trying to gather them into a defensive huddle in one corner of the common room. Everyone had grabbed at bows and swords, or whatever was to hand.
BroadWing’s efforts, as those of his command, were mostly in vain. The Strike Force had been scattered over the entire vast chamber when they were attacked, and now, impossibly, the Lealfast filled the air above and between them.
Stars, StarHeaven had thought, there are well over ten thousand Lealfast within Elcho Falling, and barely a thousand of us.
The Strike Force had fought back as best they could, striking out blindly into the air. Lealfast visibled as soon as they were wounded, and the air was so thick with them that the Strike Force managed to hit many with their arrows or swords even by aiming blind.
But as soon as one Lealfast was wounded, a score or more invisible ones took his or her place.
And they fought so well, so professionally. StarHeaven had thought them infantile amateurs previously, but now she realised they had been pretending; that everything the Lealfast had done and said had been meant to deceive Maximilian and Axis, and Elcho Falling itself, so that the Lealfast could accomplish this treachery.
It appeared nothing could be done to counter the Lealfast offensive, and nothing could save the Strike Force. StarHeaven had contacted Axis, although thinking he could do little, but then . . . then suddenly, strangely, the Lealfast had visibled,
spattered with dark, stinking blood.
Yet visible was worse. Visible meant that now StarHeaven could see that the entire space just above head height in this great vaulted chamber was filled with Lealfast, that there was an entire nation of them here to murder every last Icarii.
It was worse being able to see them, because then StarHeaven could understand that there was no hope, and that all the Icarii would shortly be dead.
One of the Lealfast hovered directly above her, and saw that her eyes moved. His mouth curled into a smile as he recognised yet another target for his sword. He lowered a little closer to StarHeaven, who was now too numb even to cower, raised his sword arm. and then stopped, puzzlement and anger etched across his face. He stared at StarHeaven, then looked about.
“Where have they gone?” he called out, and StarHeaven saw that all the Lealfast looked about in confusion.
StarHeaven, Axis said in her mind, do as I say, and do it now.
Axis stood with his father StarDrifter on the floor below the chamber where the Strike Force were being slaughtered. He had his hand on his father’s shoulder, sharing strength and support as both worked the enchantment which had confounded the Lealfast, but he was staring at Egalion, captain of the Emerald Guard.
“You have no idea what you go into,” Axis said, glancing behind Egalion to where hundreds of the Emerald Guard stretched down the corridor. Axis didn’t know much about the guardsmen, only that they were Maximilian’s personal guard and that they had some vague connection to the gloam mines known as the Veins where Maximilian had spent seventeen years imprisoned during his youth and early manhood.
“I have every idea,” Egalion said. “You have no idea where we came from and what we can do. You and your father cannot keep this enchantment going much longer by the look of you, and someone needs to deal with the Lealfast. I and mine stand here ready to do so. Let us.”
Axis had no choice. Egalion was right, this was a horrendously difficult enchantment to keep going against a race of creatures who commanded the Star Dance in their own right, and who were likely to literally see right through it at any moment. And there was no one else. Georgdi and his men were fighting further down in Elcho Falling, where another contingent of Lealfast had attacked their quarters, as also those of the Isembaardians within the tower.
He gave a short nod. “Go. And for the stars’ sakes, watch out for the Strike Force — they will be huddled against the walls.”
StarHeaven had called with her power to the Enchanters still living among the Strike Force, telling them to have all Strike Force members stay as close as possible to the walls of the chamber. She hoped most would manage it — they had been closely grouped against the walls anyway, in their pitiful defence.
She looked again at the Lealfast. They had drawn back a little on the air, still staring about, now very angry.
Axis and StarDrifter had used the Song of Mirrors against them. It meant that whatever the Lealfast looked at, all they saw were their own reflections mirrored back to them. It was disorientating and dangerous, as individual Lealfast could not even see each other, let alone the members of the Strike Force.
But the enchantment was a very difficult one, and StarHeaven could sense StarDrifter and Axis struggling. She drew in her breath, then very quietly added her voice to those of the StarMan and his father.
Within moments she heard three other Enchanters among the Strike Force lift their voices as well.
There was a movement at the main door and the room filled with men in emerald jackets. Quite suddenly, the Lealfast were being cut from the air.
Chapter 4
Elcho Falling
The One grimaced at the blood spattered over his face and chest. He tried to flick it off, then to rub it away, but no matter what he did the One could not remove the bloodstains from his glassy flesh.
He resolved to put it from his mind, and continued his climb. Within minutes, he thought, he would leave the subterranean basement chambers behind and emerge onto the ground floor of Elcho Falling.
Then the One would see what was what.
He could sense the Lealfast deep within the citadel, and could sense the death that seeped down through the levels above him.
It was all very pleasing.
The One stepped up, turning a corner in the twisting stairwell. and walked directly into a wall.
He stopped, frowning. The stairs led directly into a wall? How could this be? The One glanced behind him.
There was a corridor running off to the left ten or twelve steps down.
It hadn’t been there previously.
Now very, very cautious, his every sense alerted, the One stepped down to the corridor and peered along it.
It stretched for about twenty paces before it terminated in a closed door.
The One looked up at the wall closing off the stairwell, then back along the corridor.
Power was at work here.
He made his decision, and walked confidently along the corridor to the door.
He laid a hand to the handle, then opened it.
There was a stone wall behind it.
The One slammed the door shut, cursing. He turned on his heel, meaning to walk back to the stairs, then stopped in his tracks.
There was a strange creature standing halfway between the One and the stairwell. It had the appearance of a tall slim man, wearing simple breeches and a jerkin, but the creature radiated such an aura of otherworldliness about him that he was obviously not human.
“You are a part of Elcho Falling,” the One said, realising what the creature was. “Flesh of its flesh.”
The creature inclined his head and shoulders in a slight bow. “I am indeed, my lord. I am one of Elcho Falling’s servants.”
“Good,” said the One. “You may escort me from this maze.”
“I am afraid —” the servant began.
“Clear my passage!” the One said.
“I may not,” said the servant.
“You may not?” the One asked, his voice dangerously quiet. He took a step forward. “You may not? Do you not, as does Elcho Falling, recognise my blood? I am of Elcho Falling itself, of its master’s bloodlines, and I am bound to Elcho Falling in the same way as is its lord. Clear the way before me.”
The servant’s expression stayed bland, neutral, even though the One had now advanced within two paces.
“There has recently been some considerable trouble with the Lord of Elcho Falling’s blood,” said the servant. “The blood of his child, carried by Ravenna, was used to effect a betrayal of Maximilian and of Elcho Falling. We are now wary of Maximilian’s bloodlines. They have been used for treachery once. They might be so used once more.”
The One’s eyes narrowed. ‘We’? And what in the world did the creature mean about blood effecting a betrayal?
There was a step behind the servant, and the One’s focus shifted.
Maximilian Persimius was walking down the corridor toward the One.
StarHeaven, emotionally and psychologically battered by the events of the past quarter of an hour, spent several heartbeats just staring before she realised what was happening.
It was the Emerald Guard. Hundreds of them had filled the chamber and were attacking the Lealfast. In itself, that was hardly surprising, for Axis or Maximilian would have thrown whatever they could to the Strike Force’s aid, but it was the manner in which the Emerald Guard fought which astonished StarHeaven. There were so many of them filling the floor of the chamber, fighting with the winged creatures in the air above them. By rights it should have been a debacle: guardsmen striking each other as often as they struck a Lealfast; stumbling over and into each other as they fought the enemy above, their arms and shoulders colliding; those who had bows unable to set arrow to string within the jumble of colliding bodies; those with swords unable to swing effectively for a strike; all horribly vulnerable to the marksmen in the air above them. . .
But it was not like that at all.
It wa
s instead supernaturally graceful. Everything about the Emerald Guard’s attack — their movements, their absolute uncanny certainty about where each of their encircling colleagues was and what he was doing and what he would be doing in two heartbeats time — was otherworldly. StarHeaven could scarcely credit the skill and coordination of it, and she was quick to realise that a supernatural skill of some kind lay behind it.
No ordinary human could move that instinctively, that surely, with such a degree of foreknowledge of the movements of everyone about him.
The Lealfast still held the advantage — they were airborne after all, and the Song of Mirrors that had blinded them had finally disintegrated enough that they could see their attackers — yet even so they could not hold their own against the Emerald Guard. Like the guardsmen, some of the Lealfast fought with the bow, some with the sword, but StarHeaven saw none of their arrows or sword strikes reach their targets.
There were so many Lealfast crowded into the chamber that they filled almost the entire airspace. That meant their lower ranks were within striking distance of the guardsmen’s swords, while arrows shot from within the guardsmen’s ranks reached the Lealfast in higher planes (and those very arrows seemingly shot with foreknowledge of where Lealfast bodies would be at any one instant, flying straight and true to their target through the jumble of bodies in the air).
StarHeaven’s respect for the Emerald Guard, a cohort of men she had previously all but ignored, soared to celestial heights.
“You are amazing,” she whispered.
Ishbel had taken Inardle back to the main command chamber. There, while Inardle had sat on a stool, casting occasional glances toward the windows and wondering if she dared make a dash for them, Ishbel had produced a clean gown from one of the antechambers and had re-clothed herself.
Then she sat down opposite Inardle.
“What is happening?” she asked Inardle.
Inardle took a deep breath, now studying her hands fidgeting in her lap.
“The Lealfast are attacking,” she said.