Shalafein. .
Suddenly she wished Lukien were here with her. She had learned to love the brooding knight. She wished Gilwyn were with her, too, but he was away in Jador as usual. All the happiness blew out of her like a wind.
I am a poor kahana, she told herself.
At once Faralok came alive in her brain. He said with his usual alacrity, We are watching the stars.
White-Eye smiled at the intrusion. Usually Faralok did not speak so directly to her. Such conversation was unnecessary. She saw things as others saw them, with only the slightest delay while the Akari interpreted them for her mind to digest. At first it had been awkward, but Minikin had been a good and patient teacher. Now, White-Eye was perfectly matched with her spirit, as fluent with him as she was with her own language.
‘Yes,’ she said aloud, ‘I am sorry, Faralok. I was thinking.’
Thinking useless thoughts again.
‘No. I was thinking of Gilwyn.’
And how useless you are to him.
‘Well, yes,’ White-Eye admitted.
It is stupid to think so. You are here because you must be here. Gilwyn Toms can look after Jador.
‘But I am Kahana,’ said White-Eye. She wasn’t looking at the stars any more, but rather around in annoyance.
You are Kahana here in Grimhold as much as you would be in Jador.
White-Eye sighed. ‘Faralok, I miss Gilwyn.’
There was a pause as the Akari considered this. That is different, then.
Faralok had been a young man when he died. Like many Akari, he had been a summoner, able to commune with the dead of his race. It was what had given the Akari their strange magics, and it was what Minikin had learned from them when she’d first discovered Grimhold. All the Akari were dead now, but not all of them had been summoners, and that was why there were relatively few of them to help the Inhumans. White-Eye considered herself blessed to have Faralok. Now more than ever, with floods of Seekers coming across the desert, she was grateful for his help.
Eager to change the subject, White-Eye pointed her dark face back toward the sky. Almost at once, the image of the stars bloomed in her mind. ‘There,’ she said, pointing at a cluster of pulsing pinpoints. ‘Is that a constellation?’
That is Tesharar, the horseman, replied Faralok. Look to the bright star near the top. Do you see his head? And the three stars to the left, his sword.
It was imagination, not magic, that let White-Eye see the horseman. ‘Yes, I see it,’ she said. ‘Oh, that’s very good.’
They were all good, these Akari constellations, and White-Eye loved to watch them and hear Faralok’s legends. The constellations all had stories, and Faralok was a good storyteller. She often wondered what he had been like in life. Learned, certainly, like all the Akari summoners. But thoughtful, too, and patient. Sometimes, he reminded her of Gilwyn.
Together they enjoyed the stars until White-Eye grew too cold to continue. As she turned, she heard a figure making its way up the turret’s spiralling stone stairwell. She had left the wooden door open on its heavy hinges, and on its threshold appeared a terribly hunchbacked man. One would have expected him to walk with an ungainly gait, but this man moved with sureness and grace, hopping out of the stairwell to face White-Eye.
His name was Monster. He was middle-aged and bent with bone troubles, but his smile lit the night. White-Eye had no use for torches or candles. With Faralok’s help she could see everything, including the spotted cat in Monster’s arms. Once, she had hated calling this gentle fellow by such an abhorrent name. Minikin had reminded her that Monster had chosen his name himself, and that slurs could not hurt him.
‘Kahana,’ said the man. He gave a bow that would have been impossible if not for supernatural help. ‘I was asked to find you. Mistress Minikin is arriving.’
The news heartened White-Eye. In the language of the north lands she said, ‘Minikin? She’s here?’
‘Very nearly, Kahana.’ Monster softly stroked his cat as he spoke. ‘Sir Lukien is with her.’
‘And Gilwyn? Has he come too?’
‘I’m sorry, Kahana, no,’ replied the hunchback. Although Monster was not Jadori — he had come to Grimhold from Nith as a child — he preferred calling the girl by her title. ‘Will you be coming? If you are busy. .’
‘No,’ said White-Eye. ‘I am finished here.’
Monster smiled and stepped aside for her to pass. As she did he held the door open. Like everything the hunchback did, he did so gracefully. White-Eye thought about this as she made her way toward the stairs. With the enormous strength his Akari gave him, Monster could have easily ripped the door from its iron hinges.
By the time Lukien and the others reached Grimhold, night had long since fallen. The fortress itself was almost impossible to see in the darkness, designed by its Akari builders to disappear into the mountain, but the kreels had no problem finding their home, and Lukien had only to ride his horse carefully and follow the uncanny reptiles. Carlan, the boy they were bringing to Grimhold, had fallen asleep during the ride, but when they finally reached the fabled stronghold the trumpet-blast of welcome roused him. Grimhold materialised like magic out of the darkness, taking shape out of the wall of rock, its turrets coming alive with light, its great, foreboding gate lifting on its stout chains. It was a scene Lukien had never gotten used to, and as the gate parted to reveal Grimhold’s secret folds he felt the same shiver of anticipation he saw now in Carlan’s face. Despite his blindness, the sandy-haired five-year-old teetered on the back of the kreel, awestruck by the furious noise of the gate and the soaring sense of Grimhold. Behind him, Minikin kept him from falling and happily chuckled at his surprise.
‘What is it?’ asked the boy.
‘This is Grimhold, Carlan,’ replied Minikin. ‘Your new home.’
The boy’s blind eyes widened dreadfully. ‘Oh. .’
Laughing, Lukien sidled his horse up to the boy. ‘Do not worry, Carlan. It is not as bad as it may sound.’
‘Not at all,’ said Minikin. ‘You’ll be happy here.’
Carlan didn’t seem convinced, but Lukien wasn’t concerned. It had taken him a good while to become used to the amazing place and its inhabitants. As the gate reached its apex, he could see some of those inhabitants now. Like the very first time he had come to Grimhold a year ago, they appeared out of the darkness like misshapen wraiths, bathed in torchlight, lining the galleries and ledges of the great hall, frightening even in their joy. Frightening still, after a year of knowing them and calling them friends. For a moment, Lukien was glad that Carlan could not see. There were blind among the Inhumans, certainly, but there were also others with far more gruesome maladies. Among the albinos like Ghost there were hunchbacks like Monster and one-armed men like Thorin, dozens and dozens of them who had been brought to this place over the decades to find peace in Grimhold’s protection. Before its discovery and renaming as ‘Mount Believer’, it had been fabled that Grimhold was a place of monsters. Once, Lukien had believed the tale. Getting to know these good folk had changed his mind considerably, though, and now that he wore the Eye of God he was one of them. He was Shalafein, their Great Protector.
At the threshold of the iron gate stood Greygor. He too was a protector of Grimhold, titled Guardian of the Gate. He was an immense man, like Minikin’s Trog, and as mute as the bodyguard, too, but by choice. Unlike Trog, Greygor had a tongue. He simply rarely chose to exercise it. He wore black armour with spikes and a helmet that he seldom removed, letting his long dark hair flow out from under it. Once, Greygor had been employed by a princeling, but he had loved a woman in the princeling’s harem and so had been horribly maimed for his crime. Nearly every bone in his body was broken, and was broken still, held together by Akari magic and a powerful spirit that gave the giant guardian enormous strength and stealth. It was impossible for Lukien to imagine the pain Greygor constantly endured, but the big man carried it quietly and without complaint, happy only to be of use to Minikin, who had saved him from death and uselessness.