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<title>Mythlands - Chapter 9</title>
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<h1>9</h1>
<p>
He sat gaunt and brooding in Midthorn Keep on the high wooden chair that had long served as the Chief's seat. The Redthorn seat.
</p>
<p>
The man who was once Cadwil and was now known as Mandrake had one bony elbow on a polished wooden arm where gargoyles and snakes intertwined in a polished
tangle. His eyes, black as coal in a greying face, were hooded and his mouth was turned down, carving deep fissures on either side. He was shaking with a
fine rage, trembling like a harp string wound tight. The black bearskin robe around his shoulders shivered in a dark-spiked harmony.
</p>
<p>
The dark stone walls threw his anger back into the hall as if it had weight of its own, making the air feel suddenly tense and solid. Around the walls,
staying close to the shadows, eyes watched, but no-one spoke. All heads were down or turned away. Catastrophe was in the air.
</p>
<p>
Mandrake tried to speak, but for a moment his throat was locked by his fury and all that came out was a click and a little gasp. He drew in a breath and
when he spoke again, his voice was like shards of glass.
</p>
<p>
"You <em>lost</em> them." The words echoed back from the stone. "You lost <em>her</em>!"
</p>
<p>
Two Scree troopers stood in front of him, heads bent, grey faces thick and tense. One of them shifted his weight from foot to foot, dumbly nervous. In this
light his rough skin looked like dried fish scales.
</p>
<p>
"They took down to the River," the captain said, voice like shingle on a tide-washed beach. "We flushed her out in the forest. Herself and two pups that
was with her. Human boys they was. But they fought."
</p>
<p>
Mandrake's brows came down, like black ledges shadowing those dark eyes. The two furrows deepened on either side of his mouth. Even in the corners the
watchers could hear his teeth grind.
</p>
<p>
"Oh, they <em>fought</em> you." Sarcasm oozed like poison from a sting. "See if I have this correct."
</p>
<p>
He reached out a bony finger. The nail on it was long and horny.
</p>
<p>
"And correct me if I'm wrong," he said, voice even quieter and loaded with menace. Everybody there knew he meant<em> if you dare.</em>
</p>
<p>
"So. Brave soldiers. Here was a troop of you, fully armed, and with your hounds and bristlebacks. Am I right?"
</p>
<p>
The Captain nodded slowly, narrow head bobbing.
</p>
<p>
"So you heroic warriors meet a girl and two boys in the forest, and they <em>fought</em> you."
</p>
<p>
Another nod. The Scree captain scratched his ridged brow with a thick horny hand. He did not recognise sarcasm.
</p>
<p>
"That's the way it were, sir."
</p>
<p>
"And these <em>children</em>, tell me, did they fight well? Did they fight like <em>soldiers</em>?"
</p>
<p>
The Scree scratched again, as if he could hook the memory out from the front of his brain with a horny nail.
</p>
<p>
"They killed a tusker," he growled. "Bowed it dead. An' two troopers. It was dark and they had the vantage on us."
</p>
<p>
<em>"Of</em>
course, brave Captain. I imagine they did," Mandrake said, very softly. Out along the walls, behind the thick pillars that stretched up into the darkness
above, the figures crowded closer together, each trying to stay out of sight. They had heard Mandrake's voice take on that silky quality before. It was
like the stillness in the air before the lightning strikes. And Mandrake could strike like a viper. His voice was low and almost kindly now. But they all
knew it would begin to rise with his anger until the walls started to shiver,.
</p>
<p>
"A girl&#8230;." he said. "and two boys. That would have been a <em>big</em> advantage."
</p>
<p>
"We never 'spected them to fight, Sir Lord. Just cubs like them."
</p>
<p>
"Just cubs, lost in the forest and then you lost them. You lost <em>her</em>. Three months you've been scouring moor and hill and when you find her," he
raised his hand, waggled his fingers. "&#8230;. you let her slip away."
</p>
<p>
"They reached the river, Lord Mandrake." The Scree captain was slow, his voice like grinding rock. A big black sword stuck like a cross above his head,
jammed in a shoulder scabbard. His arms were like beech-tree roots, grey and gnarled. The black eyes under his narrow forehead flickered left and right,
wilting under Mandrake's anger. "They reached the river and one trooper drownded. He went in an' never came up agin."
</p>
<p>
"Good enough for him," Mandrake said. "You should all have drowned if you knew what was right."
</p>
<p>
He drew himself up and walked round the back of the high chair. The walls here were festooned with spears and lances and shields and swords, spoils of old
battles from times past. On the stone behind the chair, the new flag was stretched from side to side, red on black, a red dragon with the man's skull. The
mark of Mandrake.
</p>
<p>
"So, <em>tallowfingers</em>. You let them <em>slip</em>. And what happened next? Tell me. Tell me.""
</p>
<p>
"They reached an islet in the river. It was too deep to cross."
</p>
<p>
Mandrake froze. He took a slow breath. When he spoke his voice was even slower. "Did you <em>try</em>? Did you cut a tree and build a <em>bridge</em>? A <em>raft</em> perhaps?"
</p>
<p>
The captain gulped. It hadn't crossed his mind. The Scree avoided water, except for the melt that came down from the snows high on the Scree Crags.
</p>
<p>
"The flow were too strong Lord Mandrake. But we sent a wolfhoun' after them. And a fish came up and ate it down. Up from the water and ate it all down so
it did."
</p>
<p>
"So, I'm getting the picture here. Despite your precise orders, you let her go because of a bit of water and a&#8230;a&#8230; <em>fish</em>? You expect me
to believe that?"
</p>
<p>
The Fomorian shrugged his brawny shoulders, making the chain mail rattle on the scabbard. He dithered on his feet, one foot to another, visibly withering.
Beside him, his second in command growled.
</p>
<p>
"They lashed logs and floated away."
</p>
<p>
"Of <em>course</em> they lashed logs and floated away." Mandrake's voice was rising now. The blade was sharpening. "Of <em>course </em>they did. Because
they <em>thought</em> about it. The idea <em>occurred</em> to them. They used their <em>brains</em>.
</p>
<p>
"And you?" He rounded on the second man. "What have you got inside that ugly Scree skull of yours? Maggots? Faggots? Sawdust and sand?"
</p>
<p>
"I can't swim," the Scree grunted.
</p>
<p>
Mandrake looked as if he would strangle in his own blood. His pale face suddenly went beetroot red and all the veins in his temples stood out like snakes.
He leant against the wall, both hands gripping the stone as if he wanted to tear it down. His finger found the lip of one of the old shields and he
snatched it down in a fury.
</p>
<p>
"I would have drownded," the Scree said, and everything in the hall went very quiet. Mandrake shuddered, visibly, like a volcano set to erupt. With one
violent wrench the shield ripped off the wall and he spun with it in both hands. It came down like a hammer on the head of the Scree trooper. The boss
caught him square on the forehead with a sound like a gong. It reverberated from all the high walls.
</p>
<p>
The Scree blinked, staggered back a couple of steps, raised a slow hand to its forehead where a gash suddenly appeared to fill with dull blood. Mandrake
raised the shield again, jumped both feet off the floor and brought it down again with such force the Scree's knees buckled. The black eyes widened so far
they looked like they would pop out and roll on the rough cheekbones. Beside it, the leader's hand darted automatically to the big sword on his back..
</p>
<p>
A low groan went up from the observers around the walls. Bodies drew back into the shadows behind the pillars.
</p>
<p>
Mandrake dropped the shield with a clang and the Scree trooper sank slowly to his knees and then, in slow motion tumbled forward to hit the flagstones with
his forehead with the sound of a hammerblow.
</p>
<p>
Mandrake turned away, almost casually, reached the wall again, raised one hand and gripped the pommel of a broadsword. He was grinding his teeth, trembling
with utter rage. The observers shrank deeper into shadows. Mandrake turned, whirled like a ballerina and caught the Scree captain between shoulder and chin
with such ferocity that the grey simply head flipped off and thumped to the floor, bounced and rolled under a table.
</p>
<p>
The Scree lifted its hands up to where its face should have been.
</p>
<p>
Mandrake watched, eyebrows raised, his colour fading now after the exertion, but he was still shaking as if a little earthquake was running through him.
</p>
<p>
The Scree's calloused hands and thick fingers dabbed at where the face once was. Blood was flowing in freshets down its squat chest. Under the table, the
mouth on the head opened and closed noiselessly, the eyes fixed on Mandrake, who cocked his head, as if caught now by something of passing interest.
</p>
<p>
Very slowly, the Scree's knees buckled. It fell forward and the hands shot forward to hit the ground. More blood spilled out of the pulsing hole between
its shoulders. Under the table the head groaned loudly.
</p>
<p>
The headless Captain crawled a few feet on the flagstones, leaving bloody trails with its hands and knees, then flopped forward to the floor, feet
twitching. Under the table, the head grunted, but no words came out, and its eyes closed with a little snap.
</p>
<p>
Up above, where small windows drew light in across the rafters, there was a scrabbling sound, then a faint swish of wings. A big black bird circled down
from on high, fluttering in the beam.
</p>
<p>
"Oh my," Mandrake finally said. He touched the head with the toe of his shoe. It wobbled on its ear. "As I thought, no brains at all, but they do take a
lot of killing, what you think?"
</p>
<p>
No-one responded to the question. Nobody dared speak.
</p>
<p>
The roak flapped down and alighted on the carved back of the high chair, opened its beak, turned its head from side to side. Its eye sockets were gaping
and glistened with liquid. It fixed a sightless gaze on Mandrake.
</p>
<p>
He cocked his head, much in the way that he'd looked with fascination at the headless Scree, and then he twitched. He turned slowly and the watchers in the
shadow of the pillars saw the colour of his eyes begin to change from black to red. His skin took on a greyer hue, as if shadows were rolling underneath
the surface and the fissures on either side of his thin lips deepened into dark crevasses. His eyes seemed to shrink back under the eaves of his brows
until they could not even be seen..
</p>
<p>
"<em>Lost them</em>."
</p>
<p>
The voice that came out of his mouth was not Mandrake's own. The watchers edged back further. He was changing again, and when he did that, it was a fearful
thing. He twitched spasmodically, as if touched with disease or pain. The blind roak's claws scuttered on the high chair. The light from the high window
faded and a darkness swelled in the air, as if night were suddenly fallen.
</p>
<p>
"<em>Lost them</em>." Mandrake's voice was just a rasping croak. He swung his head, mouth twisting into a grimace.
</p>
<p>
"<em>Lost them. Lost them</em>." He was muttering to himself in his strange new voice, one that was old and dusty and cracked. "Fools. <em>Fools!</em>" He
twitched as if a fly had buzzed his ear.
</p>
<p>
"<em>Lost the girl and lost </em>him<em>!</em>"
</p>
<p>
The roak hunched silent and black and motionless now.
</p>
<p>
His face rippled and twisted, became Mandrake again. "I've hunted her for months."
</p>
<p>
"<em>She has eluded us for months</em>," the grating scrape of voice came again. His face contorted and ran like wax, mirroring the alteration in timbre
and tone. "<em>Us and those creatures I harnessed</em>.
</p>
<p>
Another ripple moved across his skin. "We will catch her."
</p>
<p>
"<em>You catch her</em>," he scraped. "<em>You catch </em>him<em>. He's the one that we want. He carries a thing I need. </em>Bring him<em>."</em>
</p>
<p>
"He's but a boy. What's his worth to us? Who is he?"
</p>
<p>
"<em>An old enemy</em>," the cackling voice said. "
<em>
Old, but we remember him and his kind. Now is our day for revenge. My roak eyes followed them down the river, but they fought. Children. A litter of
mongrel pups and they fought your Scree and my roaks. Fought and killed them. And they had help
</em>
."
</p>
<p>
"Help," Mandrake asked himself. "Who helps them?
</p>
<p>
"<em>That we cannot see</em>," he replied. "<em>But they will suffer. Send your Scree. Like locusts. Burn every bush, every tree. Turn every stone. Smell them out, </em>sniff<em> them out. </em>Burn <em> them out. </em>Smoke<em> them out. </em>Spell <em>them out. But take them and </em>bring him<em>!"</em>
</p>
<p>
Mandrake cocked his head again. "What do we want him for? A boy, my Scree say. Two worthless boys."
</p>
<p>
"<em>Two boys and a girl</em>," the hag voice came back. " <em>Bound together for what we don't know, but he carries a key and I will have it. I will lay his kind waste and rule all worlds."</em>
</p>
<p>
There was a long pause. "<em>And you will have your spoils</em>."
</p>
<p>
"The girl," Mandrake said. "I must have the girl."
</p>
<p>
"
<em>
She is nothing to us save that she stands between you and the seat, so long as she walks. But she is bound to them now. I can feel it. I feel a
foretelling come to pass
</em>
."
</p>
<p>
Mandrake turned, as if to an invisible listener, his face contorting, changing colour. "I never heard of any prophesy on <em>boys.</em>"
</p>
<p>
His shoulders narrowed, became hunched. Shadows swelled in his face. " <em>Trust me man-draco. I have given you riches. I have given you power. I will give you more, and you will rule this Temair and all its lands.</em>
</p>
<p>
"<em>But bring me that pup. I smell a fate here. At the crossing of two roads. He has wandered across me and I feel his touch. I </em>will <em> have him</em>."
</p>
<p>
The hag voice rose, sharp and brittle as glass underfoot. "<em>Muster the Scree. We send the roaks flying tonight. They will show us where."</em>
</p>
<p>
Mandrake straightened and the shadows that had filled the room with gloom began to lift. His twisted features began to ease out and swell back to what they
had been like before. His hunched form elongated until he stood beside the high seat, one arm on the carved backrest. The roak cawed once and took off in a
whirr of black, circled up and out of the high window and the shadow that had entered to room with the bird slowly evaporated.
</p>
<p>
Mandrake leant on the seat, breathing hard.
</p>
<p>
The waiting people slowly came from behind the pillars, saying nothing, watching only as Mandrake's face untwisted like wax and went back to his normal
sallow leer. His eyes were closed, but when he opened them again, the red light in them was gone.
</p>
<p>
"Get me the Captain of the Marches," he bawled. "Get him to me <em>now!</em>"
</p>
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