"...'ll
have run out of black sand before this is done.
Her wounds are healing, Frostfire, are you sure you want to take this
further?"
"Yes. Do what must be done."
"Very
well. Hand me that flint knife – no, the
other one - it has to be sharper than moonlight or the incision won't be clean
enough."
"She's
twitching."
"That's
because she's coming round. Turn that
dial up a little and she'll soon begin to drop off."
"Is that
high enough?"
"It
should be. We'll give her a moment
before I make the cut. Is the sand prepared,
Dimsun?"
"Here. I could only find three Sixwing
feathers."
"They'll
have to do. Ah, there we are, she's
starting to sink back into obliv..."
Sarah woke up
with a start, surprised to find herself sitting upright on a stone table in the
middle of a room which looked like a strange mixture of laboratory and
primitive temple. Thick glass phials of
coloured liquids and jars of various powders and compounds seemed to cover
every surface, alongside assorted stone blades and other, more obscure implements. Hanging from the rough-hewn walls, however,
were any number of primitive tapestries and leather thongs strung with bones,
teeth and feathers. One of them held a
rusted cog like some kind of talisman.
Sarah blinked
and then the memory of the conversation she had overhead hit her and, in a
panic, she began searching her body - wrapped only in a rough linen cloth - for
any signs of cuts or other damage. There
was none: no sign of her injuries from before, nor of anything else.
A dream?
Footsteps sounded
just outside the room, coming from the other side of a curtain hung across a
doorway. The curtain parted and a short,
almost mole-like figure entered the room.
She had seen such creatures in the streets outside, each looking a bit
like a moving, moss-covered boulder.
This one was carrying a slate, upon which were an assortment of
drab-coloured items which she assumed must be clothes. The creature said nothing, only presented the
slate, placed it near the edge of the stone table, and then turned to leave.
"Wait!"
Sarah called, but the creature continued to trundle on out through the curtain
and into the corridor.
Sarah pulled
herself up of the stone table, barely noticing as she did so how there was no
pain in her ribs, or her leg, and began to dress as quickly as she could. The clothes that had been left for her
consisted of a brown tunic and a set of brown robes and were rather oversized,
but with the leather cord that came with them she was able to tie them up into
some semblance of acceptable vestments and run out through the curtain into the
corridor beyond.
The
slow-moving creature was already at the end, turning to the left even as Sarah
called after it. She ran to follow,
ignoring the string of curtained doorways to either side of her that could have
contained anything at all.
When she
reached the corner she saw the creature again, this time stepping through
another curtain into another room.
"Hey there!" she called as it vanished, before hurrying to the
doorway herself.
Pushing the curtain
inside she stepped into a small, surprisingly cosy room of wooden furniture,
exotic ornaments and trinkets and, above all else, books. There was a lit fireplace in one wall, making
the air feel over hot, but still not as bad as it had been 'outside'. The creature she had been following stood to
one side of the small space, preparing another slate, this time with food. On the other side of the room, seated in a
wooden chair plumped up with feather pillows, sat a tall, spike-tailed monster
wearing clothes rather similar to her own, a necklace of bones and with eyes
that smouldered black and orange like a crude-oil fire. As soon as she saw him, Sarah froze and began
to work out how quickly she might be able to escape the way she had come. There had to be a way out through that
corridor somewhere.
"You
won’t get any response from him," the monster said in tones that rumbled
deep and old, "Dusty there has been with me for nearly half a century and
Mosskind that old tend to develop fixations.
He won't listen to anyone else's voice."
“And you are?”
Sarah asked, warily.
“They call me
many things, the Great Shaman, the Miracle Healer, the Master of the Black
Sands… all foolishness, really,” he seemed to smile, his teeth were razor sharp
and perfectly white, “you can call me Shadowsmoke, for that is my name and,
sometimes, names are all that matter.”
He uncurled a
clawed hand towards her and it took Sarah a moment to realise that he was
indicating that she should speak.
“Go on,” he
prompted, “what is your name?”
“Sarah,” she
replied.
“Good,” he
smiled again, “I don’t like it when I don’t get to know the names of my
patients and customers. Frostfire didn’t
think to tell me when he brought you here.
He is impatient. He didn’t even
wait to see you fully recovered.”
Sarah found
herself relaxing a little, just a little, in Shadowsmoke’s presence. There was something strangely grandfatherly
about the stone-skinned creature and, despite herself, she wanted to like him. As the mist of fear and suspicion began to
clear away she realised that she had a million questions bubbling to the
surface of her mind.
“Have a seat,”
Shadowsmoke offered, gesturing to another wooden chair just across from him.
Still somewhat
wary, Sarah approached it slowly, keeping an eye on the Shaman at all times,
before settling into the chair and finding that the pillows made it rather
comfortable, even if it was a little too close to the fire. At the other side of the room Dusty finished
his preparations and carried the slate of food over. Sarah examined the mixture of cold meats and
cut fruit. Shadowsmoke nodded and so she
took a smaller slate from one side and piled it high with morsels. Once she was done Dusty took the slate and
left through the curtain.
“Go on then,”
Shadowsmoke said after Sarah had satiated the hunger she had barely realised
she had, “ask your questions. I can see
you have many.”
She didn’t
know where to begin, but after a moment she managed, “Where is this place?”
“Do you mean
this room, this district, or this world?
Frostfire told me you have travelled especially far to be here.” He smiled again. It was both strangely comforting and unsettling. “Well,” he said, before she could answer,
“This is my study, in the district of Ashvault, one of the few safe havens left
to the Stoneskins of Shadow.”
More questions
followed in the natural flow of inquiry and response. Sarah began to learn about the Stoneskins and
about the war they had had with the Humans, on and off for millennia, in the
great world city that was Shadow. She
heard about the connection to her world and about the initial Breakthrough ten
thousand years before and the attempts by Stoneskin and Human alike to recreate
it ever since. In his deep, rumbling
tones Shadowsmoke told her about the brief alliance some of his tribe had had
with the president of the Noble Society, Doctor Rosetta Barkham and how that
had led to the two Slatewings escaping into Larksborough before the Silverspire
returned to Shadow.
“My boy… a
friend killed one of them,” she admitted.
“It has always
been thus between Humans and Stoneskins.
We do not get along easily.”
“I thought
they were going to kill me.”
“I doubt they
would have – Slatewings are usually scouts and rarely act directly against an
enemy. That’s probably why they took so
long to confront you in the first place.
If they were going to do anything, I suppose, they might have tried
kidnapping you. They can be quite good
at interrogation.”
Sarah
shuddered.
“But even if
the Slatewings were relatively harmless, there are many Stoneskins who kill a
human on sight. The bad blood between
our kind goes back far too long and resentments are high. Some tribes regularly invade nearby human
districts.”
“And what of
the tribes here?”
“We tend
towards all things and none. A mixture
of freethinkers and dabblers, berserkers and zealots, the Stoneskins of
Ashvault have always been hard to predict.
Frostfire’s alliance with the Noble Society was typical of the kind of
schemes dreamt up beneath the mountain, but, as will all plans of the
Stonekind, it was doomed to failure from the start.”
“And what does
he want with me now?”
“His
intentions are clear. I could read them
in the fires of his eyes, but I don’t have to.
He has spoken plainly with me and I see no reason not to do so with
you. He seeks revenge.”
“And he thinks
I can help him because of my connection to Ellis, is that right?”
“Ah, yes. The Construct.”
“Why does
everyone keep calling him that?”
“Because that
is what he is. Ellis Graves, as you know
him, was the centrepiece of Doctor Barkham’s plan to recreate the Breakthrough,
an artificial lifeform capable of bridging the gap between the worlds.”
“An
artificial… Ellis was created on Shadow?
But… I remember when he first arrived in Larksborough and… his family…”
“I don’t claim
to understand Rosetta’s Philosophy, but I believe those were all part of the
Construct too, illusions created to help him fit in in the new world, to adapt
and become part of it so that when he was summoned back he would rip a whole
through to Shadow and that, through that disturbance, the Silverspire would
reappear.”
The heat in
the room seemed to have increased and Sarah found herself feeling lightheaded
again. It was all too much to take
in. How could Ellis, the boy she had
loved and lost, be anything other than a real human being? How much of what she had experienced with him
had been fake? Had their relationship
been real, or was that part of the schemes of this Doctor Barkham as well?
“Are you
feeling okay?” Shadowsmoke asked from what seemed to be a long way off.
“I just….”
“It is a lot
to take in, I understand. Perhaps you
should rest for a while until Frostfire comes back. It will be cooler in the other room.”
“Yes,” Sarah
replied hazily, “that would be…”
She felt
herself falling forward and, for just a moment before the blackness hit, it
seemed like she was glowing.
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