Chapter seventy-five

The Bell Tower at Melloreis

 

Potentilla stood up from where she had been sitting cross-legged on the floor. She smiled broadly.

‘Can you hear that?’ she asked the room in general.

Fred made a face. Kath shot a look in his direction. Rem stood and cupped a hand to his ear. Hardacre frowned.

‘I’m not sure that I can hear anything, Lieutenant’ he said

Kath was pretty certain that Potentilla wasn’t an officer, but she thought it best to keep quiet.

‘Really?’ said Potentilla, astonished, ‘how can you not hear it?’

‘Hear bloody what, you scrawny elf?’ grunted Fred

She looked around at the group, incredulous.

‘The bell’ she said, ‘the bell’

She spun round to see each of her companion’s reactions, and one by one they shook their heads. She looked a bit shocked.

‘Well, that’s odd’ she muttered.

She walked to the door and put her ear close to it.

‘Kath, come here’ she demanded

Kath shrugged and joined Potentilla next to the door.

‘Put your ear against the door’ Potentilla requested, nodding.

Kath heard absolutely except the pink noise. This was getting silly.

‘There you go!’ said Potentilla triumphantly, before Kath had a chance to speak.

‘She can’t hear anything and…’ said Fred, ‘you’re losing your marbles’

Kath shook her head sadly.

‘I really can’t Tillie’ she said, ‘I’m sorry’

‘You humans…’ sighed Potentilla, ‘I don’t get it…’

Her voice trailed off. Then she had another thought.

‘It must be the door’ she exclaimed, ‘we’ll open it and then you’ll hear’

Hardacre walked over to Potentilla and did exactly as Kath had done.

‘I’m afraid that you’re the only one who can hear anything, Lieutenant’ he said, after a lengthy, slightly pantomimic, attempt to listen.

‘Open the door then’ demanded Potentilla, ‘then surely you’ll be able to hear for yourself’

The others looked at Hardacre, but no-one else spoke.

‘We’re going to have to go and get Viola, anyway’ pointed out Potentilla. 

Hardacre stared at the door.

‘Can you open it just a crack, Dr Fielding?’ he asked, ‘just in case…’

 ‘Well, I could try’ said Kath, uncertainly.

Fred opened his mouth, but as he had no other plan it scarcely seemed worth speaking.

Kath pulled the rod out of her bag. It crackled in the Dwarven Magic field. 

‘Everyone be ready to react to any attack’ said Hardacre, ‘Dr Fielding will open it only for a split second’

‘Of course…’ murmured Kath.  She gestured at Potentilla.

‘Can you make sure that the door doesn’t swing open too rapidly, Tilliie?’

Potentilla nodded happily.

‘And everyone must listen’ she insisted.

Kath held the rod up and rapidly pulled out the three notes of the triad. The door began to swing open towards them, but Potentilla expertly blocked its motion with her foot.  

Everyone (except Potentilla, of course) were astonished to hear a single bell ringing in the late afternoon. It sounded like the clearest, purest note that any of them they had ever heard. It gave them hope.

‘See!’ said Potentilla, triumphantly.

‘Open it a little more Lieutenant, if you would’ said Hardacre.

Potentilla slid a hand on to the back of the door and swung it inwards about a foot – which was not exactly what Hardacre had in mind. In front of them was an entirely empty stairwell, with the light illuminating it beginning to fade slowly into evening.

‘Master Healer’ said Hardacre, very quietly ‘can you scout up to the top of the stairs?’

Rem nodded and squeezed past Potentilla with surprising agility. Moving almost as quietly as Viola would have done, he climbed up the stairs and disappeared for a minute or so. Then they saw him coming back towards them. He had a grim look on his face and tears in his eyes.

‘The Bell is killing the enemy. It is very bad, it hurts Rem’s heart. Rem must tend to them’

 

***

Rem and Potentilla picked up their weapons and led the rest of them up to the top of the stairs. The sight that greeted them was appalling. It seemed that most of the kinaam had fled the city, but around the Bell Tower a brand new pile of dead bodies had accumulated. Kinaam maimed by the Bell were crawling to the edges of the city, desperate to get away.   There was no sign of any of the human enemies.

Rem went to see if he could help any of them, despite Hardacre’s pleas for them to stay together. Hardacre took Kath and Fred towards the Tower.

The stench of seared flesh was almost unbearable as they picked their way over the new pile of bodies. They realised now that the power of the bell was to tear asunder those close to its ringing – the pile of fractured bones that they had seen earlier were not just the result of nine-hundred years of decay. There were thousands of corpses and the sight of so many dead Tlaxacans was in no way cheering.

‘This is a brutal way to fight an enemy’ said Kath, her face as pale as death.

Hardacre nodded, his eyes half closed. The power of Quiena’s weapon made him in equal parts awed and afraid. He spoke very softly.

‘But what a brutal enemy and how effective a weapon. This is the life and death of empires…’

They stumbled haphazardly to the base of the tower, feeling giddy and appalled by the carnage.  Even Potentilla was subdued for a while. Rem came running after them, jumping over the bodies as if they were hot coals, and every now and then stopping in the vain hope that he would find a moving, living body that might be healed. He came up close to Hardacre and put his hand to his forehead.

‘Too many, too hurt’ he said softly, ‘I will try to help later. But now need to help group. I forgot my duty’

Hardacre looked into his face.

‘Master Healer, your duty is to heal. You never need apologise for trying to save lives ’ 

Kath was pressed against the wall of the tower, cowering from the sights behind her. She looked longingly up at the tower. They needed to get up there as soon as possible.

‘How are we going to attract Viola’s attention?’ asked Kath, ‘she’ll never hear us call’. By now her entire body was buzzing with the need to escape from this dreadful place.

Hardacre frowned. He reluctantly began to consider what spells he knew that might attract Viola’s attention. While he was pondering this, Potentilla notched an arrow and fired it straight at the bell. The arrow arced upwards and struck it full on. There was an odd ping sound and then the bell stopped.

‘You’ve killed her’ cried out Kath, but then Viola’s face appeared, craning over from the space in the bell tower wall. Potentilla grinned hugely.

‘Thank the Emperor!’ Viola shouted down.

‘Gods be praised!’ answered Potentilla, repeating the ancient formula without thought.

‘How can we get up?’ asked Kath urgently.

Viola looked down on them uncertainly.

‘Is it safe to stop ringing?’ she asked. 

‘Yes,’ shouted up Hardacre, ‘I’m sure that it will be fine for a minute or so. We need to get inside as soon as possible…’

Viola ran down the stairs and let them in.

The first thing that Hardacre did was to relieve Viola of ringing duty. Kath took over and sat on the floor pulling the rope up and down. It was very easy to ring, which, perhaps, was not entirely surprising. 

Hardacre looked carefully at Viola. She looked tired but pumped up. Her face was red and she was panting.

‘Are you feeling well?’ he asked her.

‘Not entirely’ she said, her words tumbling out rapidly and a little awkwardly, ‘it’s all been a bit much. Once I started to ring the bell I really felt compelled to carry on. I’m very pleased to have been relieved – perhaps we can do it in shifts?’

Hardacre gestured to Rem, who led Viola away downstairs to check her out.  Rem’s expression was hard to read, but he was clearly not happy.

‘How does it feel to ring it, Dr Fielding?’ asked Hardacre

Kath smiled up at him. Her eyes were dilated and sweat was forming on her brow.

‘Euphoric’ she said, ‘and very strange. Exhilarating. It’s like everything is running very fast’

‘I’m not volunteering’ muttered Fred

Hardacre inspected the dead elves on the floor. Their clothes had almost completely withered away but it was clear from the coloured fabric that remained that they had been Visneorian soldiers. It seemed that they been ringing the bell when they’d died.

‘What do you make of all this, Dr Fielding?’ asked Hardacre.

Kath giggled and stood up, still pulling the bell rope.

‘It’s a big bell, Laurie! And it makes a big noise. A really nice, big noise’ 

Hardacre leant over and grabbed the bell rope. The ringing stopped momentarily. He was shocked – no-one had used that name to refer to him since he was about nine.

‘Dr Eccles. I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to take over after all’ he said, gesturing towards the big human.

Fred glared at him, but grabbed the rope anyway. He began to pull it very hard. After about five rings a strange look came over his face; a look that none of his companions had seen before. The edges of his lips began to curl upwards. His ringing became a soft, almost elegant, swinging of his arms and he slowly settled down onto the floor.

Hardacre shook Kath very gently. Kath’s grins slowly subsided. Hardacre waited for a few minutes until Rem and Viola had returned. Viola looked essentially back to normal, but Rem still looked grim. However, he was clearly pleased to be busy helping.

‘Viola is fine. The bell effects appear temporary. It odd though’

‘More than odd’ said Hardacre, ‘it’s immensely powerful and potentially extremely dangerous’

‘But not more dangerous than the Tlaxacan army’ pointed out Viola

Kath looked up at the bell. It just looked like an ordinary bell to her. She really needed to conduct some diagnostics.

‘It’s saved our skin’ she said, ‘so, I think we should thank Viola, oh, and Quiena.’

‘You don’t think that it’s dangerous, then?’ asked Hardacre.

‘Oh yes’ said Kath, ‘amazingly so. It looks like a desperate measure designed for desperate times’

‘And these are…?’ asked Viola, slightly impatiently. 

‘We’re ringing the bell’ said Hardacre, flatly, ‘and we’re obviously right to do so.  I’m just uneasy about it’

Rem was staring down into the darkening city. Slowly the corpses and struggling enemies were being hidden from view.

‘It is a great instrument of war’ he said, ‘made to survive a great assault. I know that. But it is at best necessary wickedness. Such hurt and evil is made by Whitecloak. He is only villain here. However, I hate this bell’

Hardacre touched him on the shoulder.

‘We don’t need you to ring the bell’ he said, ‘there are enough of us to do it without you’

Rem looked surprised. He turned.

‘You think that I am without stain?’ he said, ‘of course not true – we all responsible for war. We not notice evil growing and when we finally notice we not stop it. Then great hurt is done to everyone by everyone and killing starts. I will ring bell – when it is my turn.’

‘Rem’ Kath said, ‘they are like animals –they’re not like you at all, or like your tribe’

Rem stared at Kath and then at Hardacre.

‘They are cursed. Are all you clever elves and humans so stupid that you cannot see that?’

The rest of the party looked puzzled. Fred continued to rock back and forth lost in a little world of reverie.

‘Cursed?’ asked Hardacre, ‘what do you mean’

‘Whitecloak take some southern race of human-like creature, then he cast big spell on them make them his slaves. They no longer think for themselves. Have you seen their eyes?’

Everyone murmured. They all had seen the kinaam’s eyes – white and lifeless.

‘So – can they be cured?’ asked Hardacre, astonished.

‘I don’t know’ answered Rem, ‘but I will try to find out’

The light had completely failed now. Viola lit a lantern and placed it on the floor in front of the bell. Fred murmured a little ‘thanks’ and continued to pull the rope back and forth contentedly.

The bell rang on; loud and clear.