Chapter seventeen

East of the Great Wall

 

After the Wall gate closed Kath sat for several hours staring at it. She knew rationally that no-one would come, but she still half hoped that a miracle would happen. Eventually, as night fell, she had to find somewhere to rest and so she lay down at the base of the Wall and tried to keep warm.  The hours passed slowly, she was very cold, and the problems that lay ahead of her crowded around.  She pushed to the back of her mind the grim reality that she might well die out there.

 

In the morning she got up and conducted an external and internal inventory. She had the clothing she was wearing, a sturdy cloak, her tools, her travelling clothes, a few coins in her pocket, the gate key and some parchment. Things like food and bedding, however, were back with the main party.  Without those things she couldn’t imagine how she would be able to get much further – and there was no way of going back through the Wall now that Potentilla had the rod. In turn, any forward progress required food, shelter and directions. However, she was on the right side of the Wall and was determined to find a way.

Kath had no map and so no real idea where she was. The landscape east of the Wall was much as on the other side: open bramble scrub, with very little cover, studded with stones.  She realised that she was now wandering through a huge plain, trying to pick out the remnant of the old imperial road. This was difficult because the path was now criss-crossed with animal tracks, or had been erased by the action of the wind, rain and vegetation. She had no idea if this way led anywhere, but if it did, then she needed to get there soon.

 She plodded on until about midday and then stopped to look for food. There were some small streams with fish in them, and although the water was easy to drink it proved a lot more difficult than she had expected to catch the little shimmering trout and dace. Eventually she found a pool with small fish and an even smaller crayfish and she wrapped them up in her cloak – hoping eventually to find a way to cook them and somewhere to shelter. 

The day dragged on and hunger and tiredness began to play tricks on her. She became convinced that she was being followed, even though when she stopped to look she was never able to see anyone. The old track seemed a bit more distinct as she travelled east – not exactly clear, but at least the only path that could be easily followed. It also began to slope gently downwards as it fell off the plateau to the north and west. The walking was easier here and she made good progress throughout the afternoon.  Just as the light was failing it seemed that she could see a smudge of something, poorly defined, on the horizon, but then the sun set and she was left with her cold, wet, fishy dinner.  

She scouted around in the twilight, collecting any plants that looked vaguely edible. Then she placed all the food that she had collected, including the fish and crayfish, onto her cloak, which she had laid out onto the ground. She went looking for anything that might burn; there were fragments of dry bramble everywhere but they were painful to pick up. Eventually she found a small group of birch trees and was able to gather kindling and some logs. She took these back to her little pile of food and pondered fire-making.

She’d seen it done a thousand times or more, with a tinderbox, or in the case of certain show-off elves, pyromancy (she recalled how irritating Lucius had been, clicking his fingers expertly and rolling a small ball of fire on to the kindling).   Without tools, however, she was at a loss. She tried rubbing the smaller sticks together, but they refused even to produce some smoke. After half-an-hour of this she began to face the prospect of raw fish, and wondered how crunchy an uncooked crayfish would be.

There was a rustle in the darkness. She suddenly felt very vulnerable and alone. 

She looked up. It was now pitch dark, but she could see a small light bobbling, a stone’s throw away. She tensed and wondered what she could use as a weapon. She grasped for a stone, found one, and froze.

The light, now clearly recognisable as a torch, came inexorably closer and closer. The torch bearer slowly solidified into a small humanoid figure. Kath was tensing herself to either run or strike.

‘Have you not know how make fire? Alone in darkness, no fire at all, you see in dark?’ growled the figure in bad Ethian.

Kath dropped her stone.

‘What that?’ said the figure, holding up its torch. The light revealed both Kath’s and the figure’s face. Hers must have seemed milky pale and ethereal in the half light, while the figure’s was dark, with a huge bulging jaw and a large flat nose.  Kath also realised that he was about four foot tall, and about as round. He wore a ragged grey tunic, re-stitched at least a dozen times, and over that an equally shabby short grey cloak. She’d never seen anything like him before in her life.

‘Who are you?’ she spluttered.

‘Me, Rem – I have fire!’ he shouted, jumping to where Kath had laid her twigs and logs. He was laughing.

‘You make bad fire, very crap’

Kath took a step backwards and wished she’d kept hold of the stone. At the same time she felt ashamed of her fire.

‘What do you want?’ she asked.

Rem pointed at the fire.

‘Help light fire. Eat!’

He knelt down and took a large match out of his pocket. Then he carefully lit it with his torch. After a few seconds fiddling with the tinder the fire was burning.

‘More wood – get!’ he said, ‘these bad herbs. Stupid human in dark’

Kath ran away, back towards the birch stand that she had collected firewood from earlier. From there she watched the squat creature conjure up a blazing fire, throw the plants that she had collected away, and begin to gut the fish, expertly with a small knife. A thought struck her.

‘Hey, you’re stealing my food!’ she yelled

Rem looked up and chuckled. It sounded like a big cat purring very loudly

‘Your food, not my food…’

‘…Where you go?’ he shouted, standing up.

‘Leave my food alone’ she muttered.

‘What you say?’ he asked loudly, staring into the darkness, ‘…This food not worth eating for Rem. Your food. Back you come…’

Kath waited.

‘Please’ he said.

Kath was astonished.

‘What?’

Rem beckoned to her, laughing.

‘Rem polite very.  Rem good person’

Kath found a stick that was as pointy as possible and stepped out of the birch stand.

‘Where did you learn that?’ she asked, approaching him slowly.

 ‘Rem learn human way from friends. Rem like human. Rem hate elf’

Kath held the stick up in front of herself and walked back towards Rem.

‘Put that knife down’ she said

Rem hesitated.

‘Please’ she added

Rem smiled a rather twisted smile.

‘See. Good human. Say proper thing. Get what want’

He wiped his knife on a cloth and put it back into his rough bag. His arms were as long as his legs and he did everything at a distance, leaning over to shift the position of his bag so that he was between it and Kath.  He looked rather like a crane fly – he had spindly appendages and a fat little body.

They sat in silence for a little while. Then Rem handed Kath a barbecued fish. Kath took it and bit it experimentally.

‘Fish poor, but will not kill’ he reflected, nodding.

‘I’m pleased to hear that’ said Kath, chewing on a mouthful of small bones.

Rem watched Kath eating. He seemed to be assessing something.

‘Why you eat things you hate?’ he finally asked.

‘It’s all I could find’

He shook his head quizzically. This answer didn’t seem to satisfy him.

‘I’m lost’ she explained.

He looked around the circle of light thrown out by the fire. The shadows seemed to hem him in and for a second he looked very small.

‘Very stupid place get lost… very stupid’

Kath felt even more anxious.

‘Why?’ she asked.

‘Elves near’. He pointed down the long sloping hill.

Kath tried to look out through the night. She could see nothing but the circle of light, the shadows, and beyond that the pitch darkness.

‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

‘Big town, bad elves, not go near. Elves kill human, kill Rem. Elves hate everything.’

He pointed at himself and then her. She shivered in the warmth of the fire.

‘No they don’t’ she suggested, cautiously.

‘These elves do. They really do!’ he said, ‘these Elves of the White Devil. We watch them’

‘Of the White Devil?’, she asked.

‘Yes – he control elves. He baddest.  Spill so much blood’ Rem whispered.

Kath couldn’t resist asking the question that she had wanted to ask from the moment she had seen him.

‘What are you then, Rem?’

‘I am a Rem, not Rem. I have not name like that in your words.’

He thought for a moment.

‘But you call me Rem. Name good.’

Kath nodded.

‘We live that way’ he explained, pointing to the south, ‘in plains beyond great road’

‘So why are you here?’

‘I go long way fast. I watch.’

‘You’re a scout?’

Rem looked puzzled.

‘What that word? I not know it’

‘You look for things? Keep an eye on everything?’

‘Yes, that ‘scout’ is it?

Kath nodded again.

‘Word good’ he said, and to Kath’s astonishment he took out a small badly bound book overflowing with greying papers, sorted quickly through them, picked one and placed it on a rock. Then he fished out a black stone, sharpened to a point, and wrote the word ‘scout’ down in Ethian with a flourish and then added some lines down in a hieroglyphic script that she didn’t recognise.

‘I learn person language’ he explained proudly.

‘How, though?’ she wondered aloud.

‘From people from Amansk. Speak they people language together’

‘What do you mean?’ 

‘Traders, Amansk – they people going down north south road’

Kath knew all about Amansk, but she had no idea that there were human merchants this far south.

‘What are they doing here?’

‘They trade with Algharians and my tribe, a small bit’

‘So, you learned Ethian from them?’

‘Yes – they tell me this language speak everywhere by human’

Kath nodded.

‘And me not learn Elf language. Elf language stinks’ he said

‘What is the name of this town that scares you so much?’ asked Kath

‘It is Portalis’ – he waved in its general direction again.

‘Do you know a way past it?’

He nodded vigorously.

‘I know all ways’

‘So,’ Kath said, speculatively, ‘do you know how to get to Melloreis?’ 

Rem glared at

‘Why go there? It bad white magic’ he spat, for a moment lapsing back into what was presumably his own language ‘hlexctl ackar – taint’

Kath wondered what that was, but didn’t like to ask.

‘I need to look at something there’ she said, ‘in Melloreis’

Rem shifted uncomfortably.

‘I not go there, but can show way. Show way close, then go I.’

He hesitated.

‘But Rem need thing. Rem help you, not help others self’

‘I have a few coins’ said Kath, emptying her pocket.

Rem examined them carefully, and then threw them back to her.

‘No good. Not gold, only copper. Not use with Amansk merchant’

Rem thought for a long time and then picked up his paper again.

‘You know human speech good’ he paused, significantly. This was clearly important to him, ‘I take you – you teach me’

Kath examined her possibilities and then realised that there was only this.

‘I agree, it’s a deal’ she said quietly, ‘and now put out your hand’

Rem lifted his long arm up.

‘Why?’ he asked.

‘In Eth, we shake on it.’