Chapter Eleven Lettle
Chapter Eleven
Lettle
Lettle opened her eyes and realised that she must still be in a dream.
‘Ajax?’ The obeah stood over her, concern emanating from his green eyes. He mewled softly and rested his head on her chest.
‘What a lovely dream, I’ve missed you so.’ She ran her hands through Ajax’s fur.
‘It’s not a dream, Lettle,’ Dart said behind her. Ajax raised his head so she could sit up, but as soon as she did her head began to pound.
‘Dart? What happened?’ The Wayfarer was rubbing his beard so vigorously she thought it might just fall off.
‘You fell through the pool of water that was concealed with human magic.’
‘The fourth fall.’ Lettle laughed for a bit longer than perhaps she meant to.
‘Careful now, don’t stand up too fast,’ Mortah said.
Lettle poked her tongue out. ‘Why does my mouth taste like camel dung?’ She giggled. ‘Camel dung, camel dung, camel dung.’
‘I had to give you nerba root to bring you round. You might feel a little…strange.’
Somewhere in the back of her mind Lettle acknowledged that nerba root was a stimulant, which, despite the pain, accounted for her slight mania.
‘I feel amazing,’ she said. Then she looked at Ajax. ‘You’ve always been with me, haven’t you? Ever since we left Mosima.’ The obeah dipped his head.
Oh, Rayan. You foolish, lovable man. She didn’t realise she’d spoken out loud until someone behind her said, ‘And who is Rayan?’
The voice sounded like Alder, but also not like Alder. The accent softer, with more of a staccato inflection.
She turned to look at him. He leaned back against the wall of the cave, his ankles crossed in front of him.
His hands rested on his lap as though he were relaxing on the shore of a lake, and not in some strange underground room.
The eyes that looked back at her were Alder’s, yes, but the grey in them seemed almost silver, touched with an intensity that was not entirely sane. His smile was lazy, almost taunting.
Whether it was the drugs, or her own discernment that brought her clarity, she knew with certainty: ‘That is not Alder.’
‘Something’s happened to him,’ Mia said. She sounded on the verge of tears.
‘They are afeared of me,’ Alder-who-was-not-Alder said. Even the way his lips moved was different. ‘Ought I not be the one frightened? To find strangers in my home?’
‘Alder, what is the last thing you remember?’ Mia asked urgently.
‘Are you a jester? Or merely a fool? I have told you again and again, my name is not Alder.’
‘What is it, then?’ Lettle asked.
The man who was not Alder didn’t answer.
‘Could he have struck his head?’ Mia said. Her denial of the situation was laughable–so Lettle did laugh.
‘I assure you that I am trim,’ he said.
Lettle couldn’t stop looking at his mouth, and the odd sounds that were coming out of it.
‘You sound so strange,’ she said.
That unsettling smile again. ‘It has been many years since I last spoke to another.’
‘That’s not true, you spoke to me just a moment ago,’ Mia’s voice warbled with fear.
Dart wrapped his arms around her. Even though the act was supposed to be comforting, Lettle could see how tightly he held onto Mia, as though she held him up.
Should I be sad too? Maybe the drugs have affected me more than I realise. The thought was fleeting as another question occurred to her.
‘Where are we?’ She looked around. The hole they had fallen down had landed them in another cave, but she could not see the end of it.
‘It was once a sanctuary,’ Alder whispered. ‘But it ceased being that centuries ago.’
‘Were you born here?’ There was no way Alder had lived past her thirty-three years.
His laugh was dry and grating. ‘You could say that.’
Mia began to moan, low and bereft. ‘Where has Alder gone?’
The man who was not Alder looked at Mia and said, ‘So he is beloved, this Alder?’
Mia winced, tears leaking from her eyes. ‘Yes, very much so.’
‘It is good that I am loved beyond these walls.’ His sorrow pierced some of Lettle’s euphoria.
‘Who are you?’
Mia moaned again. And suddenly, through the haze of the drug, Lettle recognised the tone of her cry, unique to one condition. Both she and Mortah said at the same time: ‘The babies.’
Mia fell forward onto her knees. ‘It hurts so much.’
‘Are the babies coming early?’ Dart asked. He shook like a leaf in a breeze. Though she knew him little, it still seemed odd to see the Wayfarer shaken so.
‘Dart, help me lower her to the ground.’ Mortah’s command seemed to give him strength and he moved quickly to guide Mia down.
Lettle watched, her hands still clutching Ajax’s fur, the room spinning ever so slightly. Like a boat, she thought. A gentle voyage down the river.
She heard Mortah speak quietly to Mia, though none of the words truly seemed to permeate Lettle’s mind. ‘I’m going to have to examine you,’ Mortah said.
‘Will it hurt?’
‘I’ll be gentle.’
Mia whimpered beneath Mortah’s touch but it was over quickly.
‘Are the babies OK?’ Mia asked.
‘Yes, there is a little bleeding, but I don’t think you’re in labour.’
Mia let out a slow breath. ‘The pain is easing.’
‘Good, but I still think we should get you back to the midwives. They’ll know more than I do.’
‘You are not a midwife?’ the man who was not Alder asked.
‘No,’ Mortah replied before Lettle could. ‘But all Nomads who are as old as me learn a little something about healing over time.’
The man suddenly brightened, and Lettle almost jerked backwards from the sudden change of expression. He seemed to experience extremes only, and right now, he shone like a ray of sun.
‘You agree then, time and intelligence are entwined? One cannot pass without the other?’ It was such a strange question, and Lettle wasn’t sure how Mortah would respond.
‘No, I know many people whose intelligence only lessened with time, and not the other way round. I think perhaps knowledge will always increase, but certainly not intelligence. That must be earned through willingness and study, and even then some people end up stupider than before.’
Mia laughed then grimaced and held her belly.
‘I’m not sure I’ll make the journey back to Caperly,’ she admitted. Her skin had turned pale and Lettle knew she was in more pain than she was letting on.
‘You speak of the city in the mountain?’ Alder’s eyes narrowed.
‘Yes, our home,’ Dart said, then he turned to Mia. ‘I’ll carry you if I have to, but we should leave—’
The sound of grinding rock rattled Lettle’s eardrums, drowning out the rest of Dart’s words. She watched in shock as the stairs that led to the pool churned as though made of mud and then melted away into the earth.
‘No one leaves,’ Alder said quietly.
‘Did he just remove the stairs?’ Lettle asked, checking that the others had seen what she had.
‘He did.’ Mortah’s lips pulled taut in fear.
Lettle had only seen power like this once before–from the Jani dynasty.
Dart rounded on Alder. ‘Whatever you did, undo it.’
‘No,’ he said.
Mia groaned again.
‘Can’t you see she needs help?’
‘Give her the drugs you gave that one.’ Alder pointed at Lettle.
Mortah looked horrified. ‘No, it would be too dangerous for the babies.’
‘Then we must all hope she is not labouring,’ Alder said. It was such an un-Alder thing to say that Lettle lost all patience.
‘Who are you?’ she shouted. ‘Where has all your compassion gone?’
He seemed to be considering her question. ‘I think it faded, like all things, with time. I don’t miss it.’
Lettle was shocked into silence for a second. Nothing made sense about this new Alder. ‘You really aren’t him, are you?’
‘That’s what I’ve been trying to say.’
Mia let out a whimper and Dart said, ‘Please, whoever you are, just let us out.’ The Wayfarer was crying as he cradled Mia’s stomach.
Alder frowned then turned to Ajax and said, ‘Maun’aant farjav a’ant galur?’
Ajax growled low in his throat before dipping his head.
‘Turfaan al’hudah la eeftah.’
Again Ajax nodded.
Lettle’s mouth hung open. ‘You’re speaking the human language, aren’t you?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
She rummaged in her pack and withdrew the grimoire, thrusting it under his nose. ‘Can you read this?’
Her heart beat so fast she thought he must be able to hear it.
Alder’s expression changed from guarded to frenzied and he reached for the grimoire, but Lettle snatched it back before he could touch it. ‘Where did you get that?’ he asked.
‘It doesn’t matter. Can you read it?’
‘Tell me where you got it.’ His mouth had twisted into a snarl, his eyes widening in horror or fury, Lettle couldn’t tell.
Mia’s heavy breaths were like a ticking clock in the background and it gave Lettle an idea.
‘Let them go and I’ll tell you everything,’ she said.
Alder looked at Mia, his eyes wild, but Lettle wasn’t sure he was actually seeing her.
‘Do you really want to have the death of twins on your hands?’ Her question seemed to permeate his mania and he jerked, his eyes filling with sudden tears.
‘Twins?’ he whispered.
‘Yes,’ Mia said with the fierceness of a protective mother.
He turned on his heel as quickly as his emotions had changed and beckoned to them. ‘Come.’
Lettle was the first to follow, Ajax matching her pace. Despite her trepidation, she couldn’t deny she was a little excited about finally getting answers.
Mia leaned heavily on Dart, with Mortah by her side. The three of them shuffled after Lettle.
She smelled the wildflowers before she saw them.
Sweetpea and camomile, mint and hemlock; the aromas of their blossoms reminded her of meadows on the Bleeding Field where the war had long passed by.
The bodies that had once fallen fertilising the battlefield into something far more beautiful than the bloodshed that had come before.
The light was what she noticed next. With her fraedia crystal behind her now, the warmth of a new light source filled the cavern the deeper they went. The moss on the rockface turned to ferns the closer they got to the light, until the pathway opened up to a whole new cavern.