‘I am.’
‘I’m Coaxial Tasko, called the Wretched. The doeki are yours. I’ve given the mystif some supplies to set you on your way, but please … tell nobody you’ve been here.’
‘He thinks we’re bad luck,’ Pie said.
‘He could be right,’ said Gentle. ‘Am I allowed to shake your hand, Mr Tasko, or is that bad luck too?’
‘You may shake my hand,’ the man said.
Thank you for the transport. I swear we’ll tell nobody we were here. But I may want to mention you in my memoirs.’
A smile broke over Tasko’s stern features.
‘You may do that too,’ he said, shaking Gentle’s hand. ‘But not till I’m dead, huh? I don’t like scrutiny.’
That’s fair.’
‘Now, please … the sooner you’re gone the sooner we can pretend we never saw you.’
Efreet came forward, bearing a coat, which Gentle put on. It reached to his shins, and smelt strongly of the animal who’d been born in it, but it was welcome.
‘Mother says goodbye,’ the boy told Gentle. ‘She won’t come out and see you.’ He lowered his voice to an embarrassed whisper. ‘She’s crying a lot.’
Gentle made a move towards the door, but Tasko checked him. ‘Please, Mr Zacharias, no delays,’ he said. ‘Go now, with our blessing, or not at all.’
‘He means it,’ Pie said, climbing up on to his doeki, the animal casting a backward glance at its rider as it was mounted. ‘We have to go.’
‘Don’t we even discuss the route?’
‘Tasko has given me a compass and directions,’ the mystif said. ‘That’s the way we take,’ it said, pointing to a narrow trail that led up out of the village.
Reluctantly, Gentle put his foot in the doeki’s leather stirrup and hoisted himself into the saddle. Only Efreet managed a goodbye, daring Tasko’s wrath to press his hand into Gentle’s.
‘I’ll see you in Patashoqua one day,’ he said.
‘I hope so,’ Gentle replied.
That being the full sum of their farewells, Gentle was left with the sense of an exchange broken in mid-sentence, and now permanently unfinished. But they were at least going on from the village better equipped for the terrain ahead than they’d been when they’d entered.
‘What was all that about?’ Gentle asked Pie, when they were on the ridge above Beatrix, and the trail was about to turn and take its tranquil, lamplit streets from sight.
‘A battalion of the Autarch’s army is passing through the hills, on its way to Patashoqua. Tasko was afraid the presence of strangers in the village would give the soldiers an excuse for marauding.’
‘So that’s what I heard on the hill.’
‘That’s what you heard.’
‘And I saw somebody on the other hill. I swear he was looking for me. No, that’s not right. Not me, but somebody. That’s why I didn’t answer you when you came looking for me.’
‘Any idea who it was?’
Gentle shook his head. ‘I just felt his stare. Then I got a glimpse of somebody, on the ridge. Who knows? It sounds absurd now I say it.’
‘There was nothing absurd about the noises I heard. The best thing we can do is get out of this region as fast as possible.’
‘Agreed.’
Tasko said there was a place to the north-east of here, where the border of the Third reaches into this Dominion a good distance - maybe a thousand miles. We could shorten our journey if we made for it.’
That sounds good.’
‘But it means taking the High Pass.’
‘That sounds bad.’
‘It’ll be faster.’
‘It’ll be fatal,’ Gentle said. ‘I want to see Yzordderrex, I don’t want to die frozen stiff in the Jokalaylau.’
‘Then we go the long way?’
‘That’s my vote.’
‘It’ll add two or three weeks to the journey.’
‘And years to our lives,’ Gentle replied. ‘As if we haven’t lived long enough,’ Pie remarked.
‘I’ve always held to the belief,’ Gentle said, ‘that you can never live too long, or love too many women.’
5
The doeki were obedient and surefooted mounts, negotiating the track whether it was churned mud or dust and pebbles, seemingly indifferent to the ravines that gaped inches from their hooves at one moment, and the white waters that wound beside them the next. All this in the dark, for although the hours passed, and it seemed dawn should have crept up over the hills, the peacock sky hid its glory in a starless gloom.
‘Is it possible the nights are longer up here than they were down on the Highway?’ Gentle wondered.
‘It seems so,’ Pie said. ‘My bowels tell me the sun should have been up hours ago.’
‘Do you always calculate the passage of time by your bowels?’
They’re more reliable than your beard,’ Pie replied.
‘Which direction is the light going to come from when it comes?’ Gentle asked, turning in his saddle to scan the horizon. As he craned round to look back the way they’d come a murmur of distress escaped his lips.
‘What is it?’ the mystif said, bringing its beast to a halt, and following Gentle’s gaze.
It didn’t need telling. A column of black smoke was rising from the cradle of the hills, its lower plumes tinged with fire. Gentle was already slipping from his saddle, and now scrambled up the rock face at their side to get a better sense of the fire’s location. He lingered only seconds at the top before scrambling down, sweating and panting.
‘We have to turn back,’ he said.
‘Why?’
‘Beatrix is burning.’
‘How can you tell from this distance?’ Pie said.
‘I know, damn it! Beatrix is burning! We have to go back.’ He climbed on to his doeki, and started to haul it round on the narrow path.
‘Wait,’ said Pie. ‘Wait, for God’s sake!’
‘We have to help them,’ Gentle said, against the rock face. ‘They were good to us.’
‘Only because they wanted us out!’ Pie replied.
‘Well, now the worst’s happened, and we have to do what we can.’
‘You used to be more rational than this.’
‘What do you mean: used to be? You don’t know anything about me, so don’t start making judgements. If you won’t come with me, fuck you!’
The doeki was fully turned now, and Gentle dug his heels into its flanks to make it pick up speed. There had only been three or four places along the route where the road had divided. He was certain he could retrace their steps back to Beatrix without much problem. And if he was right, and it was the town that was burning up ahead, he would have the column of smoke as a grim marker. Pie followed, after a time, as Gentle knew it must. The mystif was happy to be called a friend, but somewhere in its soul it was a slave.
They