‘It will give our people something to remember until their last day dawns,’ Shraeve murmured.
Wain did not reply. She knew that what Shraeve wanted all these watching warriors to remember was that it was the Inkallim who had done this. What was about to happen would be a rich and nourishing symbol for the faithful, another story to add to the legends of the Children of the Hundred.
Out on the wettest ground, where sluices and pipes fed water over and through the huge dam and into the reborn Glas below it, some of the Inkallim turned back. Just six of their number remained with the uneasy, dishevelled horses. One of them climbed to the top of the dam and stood there for a moment or two, looking north. The breeze stirred his black hair. Wain could imagine the sight that greeted him: the great expanse of listless water and perhaps far out, at the edge of his vision on this cloud-bleared day, the broken remnants of Kan Avor standing proud of the lake. Satisfied, he went back down to the horses, and the great task began.
The Inkallim dug away the earth and turf from the face of the dam; bound chains about the great logs that ran through it; whipped the horses until they put all their huge strength into the effort to pull the structure apart. As time passed, many of the watchers drifted away. The horses laboured on, the Inkallim never paused. Timbers and rocks were scattered around the dam’s foot. Water trickled through until the ravens were up to their knees. An hour passed, and then a second.
The sound began softly. A seething, hissing, heaving rumble, it built over long seconds. To Wain it was the sound and feel of sun-loosened snow crashing down some far-away mountain slope. Pebbles and clumps of earth were shaken loose from the sloping dam wall. Like blood spurting from myriad tiny wounds, water was flowing through the dyke. The four great horses began to whinny in fear. They struggled against their chains; one bolted free and went pounding through the marshes in plumes of spray. The six Inkallim stood, gazing up at Sirian’s Dyke. One turned towards Wain, Shraeve and the score or so of remaining watchers and raised her arm in silent salute.
And then all thought, all senses, were submerged beneath a great roar as the fabric of Sirian’s Dyke began tearing itself apart. The seat of the rupture was deep and low in the dam, and it burst from its base, flicking rocks into the air and releasing jets and cascades of water. Billowing clouds of mist soared up and there was thunder as the centre of the dyke disintegrated and the river, freed of restraint for the first time in more than a century, burst in full, tumultuous flood down towards Glasbridge and the sea, bearing Inkallim and horses away in an instant.
Chapter 5
Vale of Tears
Few stories are now told of the time before the Huanin and Kyrinin, the Whreinin and the Saolin walked the world; the time when the One Race was alone upon the face of the earth, before they went to war with the Gods and were unmade. One that is remembered in some places is the tale of how the valley of the Dihrve came to be called the Vale of Tears.
Harigaig kept a herd of great cattle by the mouth of the River Dihrve. One day a daughter of his was keeping watch over the cattle as they grazed at the river’s edge. She lay down to rest beneath the Sun’s gaze, and the voice of the water sang her to sleep. Then Dunkane, an enemy of Harigaig’s from the north, rose up out of the river. He had walked along its bed from its source in the high mountains and come thus secretly to the heart of Harigaig’s lands. His had been the soothing voice of the river.
Dunkane stole the cattle and drove them away to the north. When Harigaig discovered the theft, he took up his club and his staff and set out to follow the thief. Dunkane had hidden his tracks, but Harigaig knew many words that were charms, for he had run with the Wildling’s Hunt as a child. He spoke to the rocks and the trees and the water, and they told him of his enemy’s path. Thus Harigaig found his cattle walled up in a valley in the Tan Dihrin, and Dunkane feasting upon them there. The two faced one another, and grew into giants whose feet broke cliffs and split boulders open. For a day and a night they fought back and forth across the mountains, until at the dawn of the second day Harigaig crushed Dunkane’s head with his club and slew him. He freed his cattle and turned to go south once more, but he had taken grave wounds and as he walked his life began to flow out from his body.
Now his family—his wife and his three daughters who would one day be the brides of the Gatekeeper—had followed after him, and they took him up and carried him south through the mountains and down the valley, and as they went they wept, for they could see that he would not keep hold of life. When they came to the sea, Harigaig was already dead. They took his body to a headland and cast it into the waves, where it turned to stone and became the island called Il Dromnone, which is, in a tongue long forgotten by all save a few tellers of tales, Isle of Mourning. And the tears shed on the journey of Harigaig’s wife and daughters had been so plentiful that the valley down which they had borne him was filled up with them, in great lakes and pools that lie there still. And that is how the valley of the Dihrve found its true name.
In the heart of Kolkyre, atop a mound ringed by a crenellated wall, rose the Tower of Thrones. A bleak grey spike of stone, it dominated the city that lay around it. For two hundred and fifty years this had been the seat of the Kilkry Thanes and from its chambers and council rooms they had, for much of that time, ruled over all the Bloods. The greater power now lay in Vaymouth, but the tower kept its name and the Thanes still dwelled within it.
The Tower of Thrones was already ancient when Grey Kulkain, who was to become the first Thane of Kilkry, made it his home and fortress amidst the chaos of the Storm Years. It came from a time before the Aygll Kingship was born; before even the last of the Whreinin, the wolfenkind, were slain and the Gods departed. Beneath the bustling streets of Kolkyre lay an older place, which here and there reached up through the surface of the city in the form of a derelict wall or a stretch of strangely paved road. The Tower of Thrones alone of all the works of that first city’s builders had survived intact. To some, its bleak perfection bore the mark of inhuman makers, and they called it, in hushed tones, the Spire of the First Race. For others, it had been the home of an unnamed human king who came long before the Aygll line, and whose reign and kingdom had passed from memory. Others still whispered of a forgotten na’kyrim lord who had raised it up with only the power of the Shared.
From a small, barred window high upon the tower’s western flank, Taim Narran could see over the city to the foam-flecked sea beyond. The wind was driving waves up Anaron’s Bay, piling them against the docks and quaysides of Kolkyre. Seagulls, grey-white curves against the dark water, were sliding across the wind. They were far away, and far below his lofty vantage point. There was a strange peace to be had from this distancing, Taim reflected, from being so aloof from the flow of events. He had been to Kolkyre many times before in his life, and until now its bustle and vigour—somehow more human and familiar than the chaos of Vaymouth—had been a pleasure. This time, his greatest wish was to be still, and separate, and apart from it all. He breathed deeply, savouring the sea tang borne up on the air.
A thick cough prompted him to turn away from the wide scene. Lheanor, the ageing Thane of Kilkry, was sitting and watching him. Long grey hair framed the Thane’s face. He was dabbing at his lips with a cloth.
‘Forgive me,’ said Lheanor, ‘I did not mean to disturb your reverie. It is a long climb to this chamber, and my old carcass protests.’
Taim smiled and shook his head. He gestured towards the window. ‘A beautiful view.’