Osidian smiled. 'You see how we are in perfect understanding.'
'Will you sleep among the Plainsmen tonight?'
Osidian shook his head. 'Among my Manila.'
He rose and Carnelian followed him. Carnelian watched him walk away, the Marula warriors in his wake. As he began crossing the river, they remained behind. Carnelian watched him for a while and then, weary and demoralized, he turned his face towards the knoll and the Plainsmen.
Carnelian found Fern in the camp and drew him aside to talk to him.
The Master knows we intended to kill him.'
Fern paled.
'You're safe unless you move against him.' 'Ravan too?' asked Fern.
The Master seemed unaware of him, but we should keep them apart.'
Carnelian saw Fern was looking down to where the Manila had made a camp around the anchor baobabs. He turned to look at Carnelian. 'Are more of them coming up?'
Carnelian gave a nod.
'The Master intends to use them against the tribes, doesn't he?'
They are more dependent on him than are the Plainsmen.'
Fern's gaze fell once more upon the Manila camp. 'We must attack them while we still can.'
Carnelian took hold of Fern's shoulder and pulled him round. 'Shall we do it now when they will see us coming or shall we wait until darkness when the Master will be with them and hope he does us the favour of not setting a watch?'
Fern backed away from Carnelian, upset. 'Why can't we surprise them at night as you did at the koppie of the Darkcloud?' And when Carnelian gave no response, 'Would you have us help him lead us all into ruin?'
Carnelian frowned. The best we can do now is pray that a chink opens in his armour that will allow us to strike.'
'And what if that never happens?'
Carnelian had no answer to that.
'My brother was right,' said Fern, bitterly. 'We should have destroyed the Ladder and taken our chances in the Earthsky when the Master came at us with Manila.'
Carnelian did not want to reveal how right Ravan had been. If Fern knew what chaos the Lower Reach was in, it might encourage him to go through with the ruinous attack on the Marula. The failure would be bad enough; far worse would be Osidian's reprisals.
Fern looked at Carnelian with pleading eyes. 'We must do something, Carnie.'
'We can stay alive. As long as we live, there is hope.'
Fern became suddenly weary. 'At least tomorrow we'll be leaving this accursed place.'
Something about Carnelian's silence made Fern regard him with narrowed eyes. 'You're staying behind.'
Carnelian had to nod. 'He wants me here.'
Fern's eyes grew fierce. Then I'll stay with you.'
'No. You must go. Together we are a danger to each other: apart we will still have a chance.'
The screaming from the Isle of Flies made it impossible to sleep. Intermittendy, it would come trembling through the blackness. Each stuttering, tortured sound forced Carnelian to imagine what was being done on the island. The silence following was almost worse; a long suspense of waiting for the next scream. Pressing his hands to his ears made no difference. He rose and paced about. Others were suffering too, with moans, turning, sitting up. Someone stirred a fire to blazing life. Carnelian huddled round it with others seeking blind oblivion in the flames. Attempts were made to tell stories, but it was impossible to listen to anything other than the cries. 'Accursed,' groaned Fern.
Ravan turned on Krow. 'Do you still adore your precious Master?'
Krow drew his knees more tightly to his chest.
Ravan turned his rage on Carnelian and Fern. 'If you'd listened to me, none of this would have happened.'
Carnelian felt ashamed. There was a wild look in Fern's eyes he could not bear. He sank his head between his knees as he had done in the funeral urn, pressing them hard against his ears, trying not to hear his inner voice telling him that all this was his doing.
Eyes kept turning from the fire to peer past the utter blackness of the island, yearning for dawn. Ravan was the first to see the trail of light snaking across the river to the shore. Soon everyone was staring, possessed by the fear that the Oracles were coming for them.
They're… they're on the riverpath,' said Ravan.
Men were rising all around him and Carnelian joined them.
'Let's go now,' someone pleaded. 'Let's not wait for morning.'
'We'd lose our way in the darkness,' said Fern.
'Our spears…' said a voice edging on hysteria.
Sparks began appearing at the corner of the baobab forest. As more and more torches came from the river-path, their glow became bright enough to cast monstrous shadows from the trees towards the knoll.
The impaled man,' groaned Ravan.
They watched tall shapes weave in among the torches and then the screaming began again, but this time it was nearby, coming from the heart of the torchlight. That close, the Plainsmen could hear every ragged note. Some began to whimper. Horror gripped Carnelian's mind. The shrieking took on a panting, shrill, animal sound and they saw, lit from below, something twitching being hoisted up. Then one by one the torches snuffed out, leaving the animal noises to carry from the thing they had lifted aloft.
Men around Carnelian were crying. 'Make it stop,' someone prayed. 'Dear Father, make it stop.'
Carnelian snatched a spear and ran down the knoll towards the sounds. As he drew nearer, his legs weakened so that he had to slow to a walk. He felt each shriek like a cut. Coming nearer he fought for the courage to raise his eyes. Against the stars he saw a man impaled, his transfixed body shaking, his head beating against the tip of the idol's tongue erupting from his shoulder.
Quickly, Carnelian blinked his eyes clear, trembled the spear blade over the thin and quivering chest and, praying it should find the man's heart, he thrust. The blade caught and, snarling, he twisted it hard through the ribs. The impaled man let out a hacking sigh and then, silence.
Carnelian fell, adding his vomit into the filth. Blind and deaf, he was barely conscious when the Plainsmen came to carry him back up to their camp.
A black man with pits for eyes having his throat cut. The blade in Aurum's hand slowly slicing round. The Master's white face had the same bored expression it had had when he had burned the ant nest in the Naralan. Carnelian hated those misty blue eyes. A licking at his toes made him look down, then jump back in horror from the spreading blood. He reached out to touch Aurum, pleading that he stop the cutting lest they drown. The eyes that turned to look at him were the old Master's but they were peering from Kor's branded face.
Carnelian wrenched awake. Sweat congealed on his skin. A face swam into his vision. Fern. Carnelian grabbed him into an embrace and would not let him go. On the journey to Osrakum, he had tried to save a Maruli who had looked upon his face only to have the man make an attempt upon his life. Which was when Aurum had slit his throat.
Carnelian released Fern. His friend stared as Carnelian grasped his own throat and felt the scar of the rope. Was the dream a warning that he must not conceal Ravan's mutiny from Osidian?
'It's over now,' whispered Fern.
Carnelian could not understand.
Thank you,' said Fern.
'For what?'
'For ending that poor bastard's suffering and ours.' Carnelian remembered killing the impaled pygmy.
Dawn was creeping from the east, its birth finding silver in the streams that fell around the island. The morning was still too thin to dispel the horror.
'Leave with me,' pleaded Fern.
Carnelian stared at him.
The sky blushed. The Plainsmen were rising, whispering as they got ready to leave.
Fern's face was filled with concern.
Wan-faced, the Plainsmen crept around as if there were people in the camp they were reluctant to wake. Carnelian saw with what bright hope and yearning they glanced up the escarpment towards the Earthsky.