The Curse on the Chosen (The Song of the Tears Book 2) by Ian Irvine Page A

its coils settling on
the ledge beside him, then Colm cursed.
    ‘What’s the matter?’ said Flydd.
    ‘Her weight’s gone off it,’ said Colm hoarsely. ‘She’s
fallen!’
    Light suddenly flared at Flydd’s fingertips, bright enough
to hurt Nish’s eyes. ‘You’ve got your Art back!’ he hissed.
    ‘Any fool can make a bit of light,’ Flydd said in an
imperious voice, rather higher than his usual tones, then stared at his
fingers.
    ‘Are you all right? Your voice –’
    ‘It’s nothing,’ Flydd said harshly, in his normal voice.
‘We’ve got bigger things to worry about than my state of mind.’ He studied the
coils of rope. ‘Maelys wouldn’t have been more than a span above the slab. She
won’t be hurt. She’ll try again.’
    ‘How could she fall with her harness on?’ Nish swallowed
hard. And she might be pregnant, with his child. There were times when he still ached for the child he’d fathered on
Ullii, a dozen years ago – a child killed in the womb by the foul sorcery
of Scrutator T’Lisp. Why had he let Flydd send Maelys down? ‘She must have been
attacked.’
    ‘She took the harness off,’ said Flydd. ‘Maelys has trouble
following the simplest orders.’
    Colm let down a couple of coils and they waited again.
    ‘About your Art –’ said Nish.
    ‘A tiny bit has come back – no more than a gifted
five-year-old might display,’ Flydd said without expression.
    ‘But you just said –’
    ‘I don’t want to talk about it!’
    Flydd allowed the light to dwindle to the feeblest of
glow-worm gleams. Colm sat rigidly upright, hands clenched into a knuckled knot
over the rope. Despite his harsh words, he did seem to care about her. Flydd
began muttering again, though Nish couldn’t make out the words. He rubbed his
knotted jaw. What was the matter with Flydd? That voice had definitely not been
his – it could have been a woman’s voice. What if the woman in red was
trying to take him over?
    Colm’s hands jerked, then again and again. ‘She’s back!’ He
came to his feet, feeling the rope, but frowned. ‘She’s trying to climb it. Why
doesn’t she tie on?’
    Flydd was staring down into the black hole. ‘She’s been
discovered.’
    The rope went slack. ‘She’s gone this time,’ Colm said
dully, and reached for his sword. ‘They’ve got her.’
    ‘Not necessarily,’ said Flydd.
    ‘We’ve got to go down,’ said Nish.
    ‘There’s no more defenceless man than one climbing down a
rope,’ said Flydd.
    ‘Maelys has been a good friend to me – a better one
than I have to her – and I will never abandon her.’
    ‘Nor I.’ Colm’s knuckles had gone white. ‘Despite …
everything.’
    Flydd sighed. ‘And sometimes I forget that I am no longer a
scrutator, but just an ordinary man. Of course I won’t abandon Maelys; I should
never have sent her down in the first place. I merely wished to teach her a
lesson.’
    ‘But … none of us could have gotten through,’ said Nish.
    ‘I lied; chimneys don’t narrow downwards; they get wider.
Even Colm could squeeze through with a bit of effort and a liberal coating of
swamp creeper goo.’
    ‘She’s braver than all of us put together,’ Colm said,
flushing in mortification.
    ‘Indeed she is,’ said Flydd, ‘for we’re men of action who’ve
spent a lifetime learning our brutal trade. It’s all new to Maelys, and very
hard, yet does she ever refuse a challenge? Come on.’
    ‘Where are we going?’ said Nish.
    ‘Down and in the back way: the first guarded way we came to.
Leave the rope.’
    ‘We may need it,’ said Colm.
    He tossed the rapier to Nish, who caught it awkwardly. It
felt good to have a weapon again.
    ‘If we haul the rope up, they’ll know we’re coming,’ said
Flydd. ‘If we leave it, they’ll have one more way to watch.’
    ‘Father has enough men to watch a hundred ways,’ said Nish.
    ‘Years ago I protected these caves against him; his men
won’t find their way through easily.’