She had frozen in place – obviously she was still wary of him. He found his anger came almost without warning after Drephos’s death, a roiling well of frustration and impotence constantly churning inside him. ‘I didn’t mean to—’
‘No, I understand.’ He stood up abruptly, eyes darting to his armour laid out on a cloak as though they were mourners at its funeral. His snapbow lay alongside. ‘So the Apt aren’t allowed to dream, is that it? Our humdrum lives don’t qualify.’
She had heard the fire ebbing in his voice as bitterness crept in to steal away his genuine aggression. ‘Actually, that is what I meant, only not quite, and I spoke hastily. When I would talk about dreams, though . . . my dreams mean something. Inapt dreams do, if they can only be interpreted.’
He snorted. ‘Dreams mean nothing. They’re just our minds stirring all the thoughts we’ve had. So you come to me babbling about Che, so I dream of her.’
‘Just so.’
Her dismissal only aggravated him more, although even he was asking himself, What do I possibly want out of this conversation? Where am I trying to take it? ‘I wouldn’t have—’
‘If I hadn’t come along to bother you, yes,’ she finished. ‘And I’d tell you I didn’t ask to and that I’m only here because you’re still connected to Che, because she’s still in your mind like a ghost. But you don’t believe any of that, so why are we going over this again? Let’s get to this Spider place of yours and then you can go . . . wherever, and I can go wherever else.’
‘And where would you go?’ he demanded of her.
She looked up at him with those pale, irisless eyes. ‘North. If I head north for long enough, I don’t think I can fail to hit the Commonweal.’
‘Hundreds of miles.’
‘Hence “for long enough”.’
‘You’ll be dead or a slave or raped before you even hit the Lowlands.’
For a moment she stared into the fire, breathing deeply, and he thought she was pondering those fates, but belatedly realized that she was summoning her composure to deal with him without losing her own temper.
‘What do you suggest I do, Totho? Why are you trying to bind me to you?’
‘What? I’m not—!’
‘Everything you’ve said has “Stay with me!” shouting out loud between each word. Only I didn’t think I was such a catch.’
He knew that should only make him angrier but, confronted with that, the rage refused to venture forth. His own knowledge of how unreasonable he was being caught up with him, and he was suddenly out of easy explanations, vacillating, opening his mouth, then shrivelling before her cool, shrewd stare.
At last she said, ‘Che. It’s Che, then.’
‘You think that, just because you—’
‘I’m a link to Che, yes. Or isn’t that it? Tell me what, then.’ And, when he wouldn’t answer, ‘What did you dream?’
He blinked at this sudden turn. ‘She was in a dark place,’ he said.
‘Well, that’s true. Congratulations, you’re obviously Inapt and a prophet.’
‘I’ve been a lot of bad things in my time, but Inapt isn’t one of them.’ At last he sat back down, feeling somewhat more collected. ‘Just that: a dark place. Like when I found her in the farmhouse cellar after the Battle of the Rails. Got herself into trouble again, and it was down to me to save her.’
‘And you did.’
‘I thought I had, at the time.’ He tested his fragile composure and found that it would take his weight. ‘But she was playing me, all along. The Moth bastard had her, and she loved him, but it didn’t stop her leaning on me when it suited her.’
‘Perhaps she thought you were a friend.’ Maure poked the fire speculatively.
‘A friend. Right.’
‘I couldn’t even say that much for myself, I don’t think,’ she said softly. ‘Just some hireling magician who did her a favour once, but she got me out of there. And all the country between here and the Commonweal will be a joy to cross, believe me, if I never see the Worm again. Although, if I understand correctly, that’s no guarantee.’
‘Because this Worm has a way out.’
‘Right.’
A long pause followed. Totho took a swig from his water skin, and Maure chewed on some hard biscuit they had acquired.
‘If you could help her . . .?’ he began eventually.
‘I owe her a great deal,’ Maure told him. ‘If it meant something as simple as me sticking my hand out and hauling her from a hole, I’d not hesitate. Though I’d like to think I’m a decent enough type that I’d do that for most people. ‘
‘But if you could—?’
‘No.’
‘But—’
‘I will not go back to that place, Totho, not even to help Che. You don’t know. You can’t know what it was like. I don’t even know how long I was down there, without the sun, surrounded by the earth, and without my skills – and with all that I ever made myself into just stripped away. I was going mad, Totho. Not even for Che, no.’
‘But you could.’
She rounded on him furiously, demanding, ‘Are you judging me?’ and froze, staring at his face. ‘You’re not, are you?’
‘No,’ he confirmed.
‘I’m not talking about this any more.’
‘Fine.’
She turned her back on him, almost theatrically, shoulders hunched as though awaiting a blow.
‘She was in a dark place in my dream,’ Totho repeated. ‘She was in pain, in fear. She was calling out.’
‘Your name?’
He stared murderously at her back. ‘No,’ he spat, at last. ‘Not my fucking name. Of course not my name. Why ever should she call for me?’
Twenty-Three
There came a night where the following morning – or its sunless surrogate – would see them putting Che’s plan into action, to whatever extent that was even possible. In the Hermit’s high cave they sat around a fire that burned with salt colours, whilst outside the world of the Worm waited for them, ready to break all their hopes against its vast scale and its uncaring brutality.
Then the Hermit shuffled into the back of his cave and returned hesitantly with a jar of something that reeked like paint. He held it out to Orothellin, who took it almost reverently.
‘Is that supposed to be wine?’ Tynisa demanded.
‘Approximately.’ The huge man took a draught, his eyes creasing about the sudden tears the taste had pricked there, before handing it over to her.
Tynisa had never drunk much wine, and the mere smell of the stuff made her gag, but everyone was watching her now, Thalric especially. It was like being back at the College, engaged in some ridiculous student dare – only then she herself had always been the one to set the stakes. And now I have become merely a follower, somehow.
She took a half-mouthful, and that almost overpowered her. The sharp, acrid taste was so much the antithesis of wine that she felt almost awed to be in its presence. ‘Did this . . . did this come from the surface?’ she demanded of Orothellin. ‘Have you been saving this for a thousand years?’ She would have believed it.
For a second the Slug-kinden just goggled at her, but then something happened to his mournful, majestic face and he exploded into a belch of laughter. ‘Thousand-year wine? Not even my people would drink thousand-year wine! No, no, the Hermit brews it from—’