Chapter Naked

How long have I…? Where is this? And what is that disgusting taste in my –

Oh I knew it.

‘Quit…quit it Haylis…’ Feeble murmurs of an old man.

‘The medicine’s supposed to make you sleep,’ snaps a very loud voice, ‘so get back to it.’

‘Why…why am I eating med…med…’

‘Heatstroke and severe dehydration – in winter!’ comes the cheerful response.

‘My…arm…can’t feel…’

‘It’ll visit in a few weeks. Just stay still and sleep.’

That sounds terrifying. ‘You didn’t…cut…cut it off…did you?’

She responds by flicking a finger at my elbow. That bolt of lightning, like being stabbed in a cluster of nerves with a harpoon, is no phantom pain.

‘Argh!’

‘Stop crying, you’re not even the one badly hurt.’

Much of the foggy nonsense dissipates at that. Images of Kathanhiel kneeling naked in a pool of fire come rushing back – that was no dream.

‘Is – is she alright?’

‘Recovering,’ Haylis says. ‘Her…fever...is so much worse this time. All night she spent sitting in a barrel – the second one because the first dried up in an hour. Her skin is…her skin is –’ she shivers, ‘– all cracked and…broken up…’

Sitting up puts the world on a trampoline. One brief look at a jagged hole on the far wall (hastily patched up with wooden boards) is enough to bounce everything sideways.

‘No, you stay put.’ With a one-fingered bump on the forehead she sends me pillow-bound.

Booming footsteps; a huge eye peeks inquisitively through one of the many holes in the wall.

‘Don’t go anywhere,’ Haylis says as she pulls out her silent bells again.

I spend a confused two minutes looking around the room, which seems to be the centre cabin of our carriage with all the interior walls torn down. At some stage black soot had everything covered, but the many streaky wipe marks hint at the rigorous cleaning that had driven it back. Rigorous but non-effective.

Next to a broken door is Kathanhiel’s shattered wardrobe. Her once neatly folded shirts are scattered about like colourful rags. The crystalline cuirass sits in a corner, dull and unpolished, and the arced gauntlets that had shone so brilliantly are holding down a pile of straw, which by the looks of it is being used as a bed.

Kathanhiel wouldn’t sleep on there; she would set it alight.

At that thought the idea of lying down for another second becomes intolerable.

‘Where is she?’

Haylis turns around as the little giant moves away from the gap. ‘On the roof.’

‘And…inside a barrel?’ What an absurd image.

‘Oon’Shei made a lookout for her so she could stay in it up there.’

‘Why? Couldn’t she just sit inside or – ’

The rest of the sentence gets swallowed up by her expression: that of not wanting to tell the bad news but knowing that it’s unavoidable.

This trip had once seemed so distant and adrift: the ambush, the rioting crowd, the history of Talu, even the swarming dragons, nightmares incarnate – they were like elements in a story told by a brilliant bard, enthralling, exciting…but always out of reach, as if I’m still sitting in a tavern somewhere, listening to the bit where a character named Kastor is for some stupid reason trying to rescue the horses as the dragons try to eat him.

All that just sounds stupid now, because heroes such stories are supposed to be indomitable, compassionate, beautiful, have a sense of humour…well, not disputing any of that, but she’s also allowed to suffer. Don’t know what made me think that she doesn’t need anyone or anything – real people are never that perfect.

Ah…

So this is why I’m here.

‘Can you get me onto the roof?’ I ask.

Haylis raises an eyebrow. ‘Why?’

‘We have to talk to her. She’s not…she’s not thinking clearly. Can’t really explain it but I’m really scared after...after…do you know what I mean? The next time the dragons come she might…I don’t know what she’ll do but it won’t be good for her.’ The memory of Kathanhiel clutching the burning sword against her chest is making my stomach turn. ‘Kaishen is eating her. There’s no other way to put it. It’s like she thinks the sword is a…a…’

‘A person,’ Haylis finishes, her eyes looking everywhere but at me. ‘She talks to it in her sleep.’ My face must look horrible for her to hastily add: ‘It only started after we ran into Talu, but it’s…it’s…I didn’t want to say anything because she must be under a lot of pressure and when you’re stressed it’s easy to –’

Stressed. Naked, burning, crying-her-eyes-out kind of stressed. And I thought she would never need anything from anyone.

‘We have to talk to her. You have to help me Haylis – I don’t even know where to start.’

She nods after a moment’s consideration. ‘You’ll do the talking, right? You’re better at this…feeling stuff…than I am.’

What a strange thing to be complimented on.

Looking up from her makeshift cot of moulded mud, Oon’Shang waves at us (‘She’s happy to see you awake,’ Haylis says, ‘and hopes that you won’t faint so easily next time.’) as her brother carefully set us down on the roof as one would a pair of kittens.

During my spell of unconsciousness the coach had moved further up the highway, and it now stands in the middle of what resembles the inside of a fireplace. Blackened earth and blasted trees flank the road on both sides and stretch forever into the north. Tired smoke, several days into its leg, struggle half-heartedly to rise against the insistent rain.

The highway itself is mostly intact, the sturdy pavement charred but unbroken. Conspicuous piles of ash sit at close intervals, poorly mimicking the shapes of wagons and people that have met a fiery end.

The back half of our coach, where the horses were, had been stripped of walls. A large pile of ash-mingled straw now sits on top of the chassis – Oon’Shei’s bed, probably. Hearing Bobby’s neighing causes some elation; the animal, seemingly unbothered by this dreary landscape, is picking on a tiny patch of unburnt grass on the roadside and swishing its pretty tail.

I look up.

Kathanhiel is sitting naked inside a water-filled barrel that had been lodged into the roof, with her arms hanging out on either side. By her left hand is the obsidian bow, dark and inert; by her right is the still glowing blade of Kaishen, on which she taps incessantly with the nail of her index finger, sending up puffs of steam. Her skin no longer has that cracked-and-burning look, but prominent red lines are still riddled all over her back as if she might shatter at the lightest touch.

At our approach she looks around, and seems to wake up from an open-eyed dream. ‘Kastor? What are you – you shouldn’t be moving around yet.’

Smiling is inexplicably difficult. ‘I’m alright now. It’s no big deal.’

She spend one long second looking amused. ‘Had an epiphany? You’ve the look of one who is about to give a lecture.’

Should just dash off this awkward roof and stuff my head under a pillow – or a guillotine – but I speak. It’s the only thing I could do. ‘I-I want you ask you a few...I mean I have a few questions I want to ask you about if-if you have time, my lady...about...um...before?’

Behind me, Haylis stifles a giggle.

‘Must you? Could we not carry on as we are?’ Kathanhiel asks softly, putting her face against her knees, ‘I had wished for this quest to end before ever needing to...explain. Is it not enough for us to simply slay the Apex? Must we speak of the irrelevant past?’

Before I could answer she laughs at herself. ‘Of course we must. Everyone is depending on me yet I am a scared little girl drowning in a barrel. I’ve not grown up at all, not since...’ She points Kaishen toward where the sun sulks behind the clouds, ‘…not since I inherited this sword from my master. It’s been ten years. Can you believe it?’

Rain streaks down the flawless blade, turning to steam before ever reaching the hilt.

She speaks so very softly: ‘Hero of the Realms…they never called him that. People would brush shoulders with him on the street and they’d yell for him to get out of their way. He always apologized for such trivial cruelties; at the Ford we’d had to say sorry ten times a day. Never understood that. Still don’t.’ Her arm trembles as the red heat creeps up to her elbow. ‘How he must’ve had that look on his face when I chose Talukiel. How disappointed must he be, seeing me like this.’

Kathanhiel looks surprised as Haylis suddenly grabs her arm. Her left hand shoots out, impossibly fast, and breaks Haylis’ grip in an instant by twisting her wrist all the way around.

‘You can leave it alone,’ Haylis says through gritted teeth. ‘We don’t need Kaishen right now so you can let it go!’

Kathanhiel immediately withdraws with a look of self-loathing. ‘Sorry I-I-my mind is adrift. Are you hurt?’

‘We have to talk about this. You’re in no condition to –’

Lightning flashes across the sky. With grey thunderheads stretching from one horizon to the other, it’s difficult to see what’s up there; one blink and I would have missed them.

There are hundreds of winged shadows lurking in the clouds.

The rolling thunder couldn’t mask the iron defiance in Kathanhiel’s voice. ‘Not yet. Our quest is not done.’