Through the Fire and Flames Read online

earth. The Court.

  The Second Realm, then. Home after a fashion. At very least, he felt more at home here than he had for a month. Had he really been away from home so long?

  Yes. Vessit. Dora and Keshnu. He blinked, shook his head even though he knew it was a mistake. The resulting thump from his fatigue headache centred him. He'd have to be careful what he stared at while he was here. Certainly avoid Clearseeing.

  Taslin stood a few feet away to his left. Oddly, she looked no more natural here than she had in the First Realm. Her return home had clearly done much to restore her - she seemed a creature of flesh and blood again, rather than mist and magic. Even if she was actually a creature of mist and magic. Somehow, it was reassuring to have her seem so solid in such a strange landscape.

  A chill ran through Rel. He cleared his throat, and when the Gift-Giver didn't look round immediately, asked in a small voice, "Keshnu?" The name flitted out on butterfly wings, circled his head once, close enough to have him flinching, and fell twitching to the floor.

  Fine silk hissed gently as Taslin turned. She wore a wise smile, a light in her violet eyes. Nothing could soften the angles of her face, but her compassion made them passionate rather than fierce. She lifted her arm, twisted her hand through some hidden fold in Realmspace, and produced a perfectly-formed yellow flower-bud, petals curled tightly together. It filled her palm, and the air around it seemed alive with subtle motion.

  Rel frowned. What was she showing him? If they hadn't managed to get Keshnu through the Sherim... He tried again. "Where's Keshnu? We didn't lose him?"

  "This is Keshnu." Taslin shook the flower. "Here, he can begin his own healing, and I can carry him by our logic rather than yours."

  "Oh. Um..." Rel got his thoughts back together while the dark smoke of his meaningless noise dissipated. "He's alright, then?"

  For a moment, Taslin's face turned stern. "For now. He is on the path to recovery. We must still get him to the Court."

  Rel leaned forward, pushed himself to his feet despite the pain in his hands. His head spun as he came upright, vision clouding with crazier spots of colour than any the Second Realm had produced so far. A hand on his arm steadied him, and when he managed to blink his eyesight back to life, Taslin was peering at him with tension in her face. The flower - Keshnu - was nowhere to be seen.

  She said, "How is your logic?"

  "I don't know if I'm going to be much use from here on." Rel rubbed his forehead. "If I'm to make it to the Court and back, I'm going to need some help."

  "Once we get to the Court, I can help you. I've found a route which will not tax you too much, I hope."

  "Help me? How?" Despite himself, Rel knew his tone was harsh, incredulous. The only thing we know is that we know nothing, he reminded himself. He needed to trust Taslin, not to mention stop wasting her time.

  Again, the Gift-Giver treated him to a kindly smile, a gentle reminder of her vast and unfathomable age and wisdom. "It is not knowledge we make widely available, but it is possible for a human to sleep in the Second Realm, if one of my kind watches over your dreams. The rest is not perfect, and certainly not a long-term substitute for sleeping in the First Realm, but it should be enough to steady you."

  Rel took a deep breath of the Second Realm's tasteless not-air. His eyes prickled and threatened to cloud over again, but the sensation passed. Sleep in the Second Realm? Slowly, he bowed his head. Get Keshnu to the Court. Start to make amends. Then worry about his own well-being. Speaking to the floor to keep the words from launching at Taslin, he said, "Alright. Lead on."

  The Gift-Giver nodded. "My turn to watch over your journey. Follow exactly."

  She set off at a steady walk across the dreary plain, stride sure and head held high. Pale skin and white corset seemed to shine in the ambient, sunless, directionless light of the Second Realm. Her skirt, tightly-fitted across long, fine legs but stretching smoothly to accommodate her step, shimmered as it moved, and her lustrous crimson hair swayed to match her hips.

  Rel knew it was dangerous to let her appearance fool him - she'd as good as admitted to designing herself to manipulate human males - but he had to stare at her feet anyway to make sure he trod exactly in her footsteps. It was impossible not to admire the shape of her when you watched her this closely.

  Guilt rose alongside the inevitable comparisons to the real women in his life. Mother, and half of Federas besides, had been so sure that he and Dora would eventually get together, but the Four Knot was too tied to her work. Too bony, too angry. Uncharitable to think of her that way, after all she'd given, but it wasn't like he didn't respect and admire her in every other way. She just wasn't attractive.

  She'd probably have laughed in his face at the thought of settling down with him anyway. It wasn't often that she laughed at him, but usually there was a woman involved. Even Taslin had drawn her mirth, now he came to think of it. For a moment he smiled, but the memory turned sour too quickly. Without that row he might never have helped Rissad escape and set off the chain of events that had left Dora trapped.

  That had led to this weary journey, too. The ground had begun to turn into a slope, curving up and growing gradually steeper. Taslin handled the shift in terrain with effortless grace. The way she leant into the hill gave her the air of a predator on the prowl, her shoulders and back rippling like a cat's. Rel managed not to curse as he stomped over the surprisingly treacherous ground.

  The sky was changing too, heading for a dark blue. As they climbed, it grew deeper and deeper until the edge where it met the rising ground grew difficult to pick out. The hill grew steeper, until finally even Taslin had to lean down and scramble with hands as well as feet.

  Out of the corners of his eyes - and he tried not to look, focussing hard on the next step instead - Rel could almost feel the land beginning to curve away from him. The edges of the sky pressed the world away. Not downward, because gravity was still pulling him back downhill, but in much the direction gravity would have been pulling if gravity in the Second Realm made sense.

  That was a thought too far. Rel winced as a hot line of fatigue burned through his brain. A warning shot from impending burnout. He gritted his teeth and concentrated on finding the next safe hand-hold on what was rapidly becoming a cliff-face. Taslin went up it like a spider, joints poking out at odd angles and fingers gripping effortlessly.

  Still, she did an admirable job of holding to Rel's struggling pace. His hands ached, and every time he reached upward, he caught a glimpse of the already-cracking burn-blisters on their backs, glistening with lymph. It made it very hard to ignore the pain, but at least the calluses on his fingertips were holding up.

  Just as the 'ground' began to reach vertical, Taslin leaned into the face and vanished. Her impeccable dignity broke for just a second as her legs wriggled above Rel's head, but then she was gone. There was no obvious hole in the rock, but it wouldn't be the first time a route in the Second Realm had required him to push through a cliff. The question was where exactly the right spot to try was.

  A pale hand, somehow both strong and as delicate-looking as Pevan's, reached out of the grey rock. Taslin's voice, steady but potent, said, "Take my hand. Be careful."

  Rel found firm footholds, suddenly conscious of a hot ache in his Achilles tendons and a sickening tingle across the soles of his feet that warned of slipping. The hand he reached up towards Taslin's trembled.

  Her wrist made tiny ripples in the stone of the surface. When Rel's straining fingers reached her palm, she lowered her hand awkwardly and seized his wrist. Her grip seemed to mould itself to his bones, bending in ways no human hand could. She pulled upwards and forwards, and Rel did his best to launch himself to follow.

  The cliff face splashed over his head like a gust of strong wind, leaving his hair tingling. With Taslin's help, he found himself belly-down on the ledge, legs still dangling over the cliff. The surface was smooth and cold, the cave dim and claustrophobic but natural in appearance. Looking back, there was no sign that the c
ave mouth was invisible from outside. He couldn't even feel the membrane of it where it had to be bisecting his waist.

  Taslin was hunched on hands and knees in the passage ahead. She had perhaps a foot of clearance above her head, a little more than a foot either side of her shoulders. Her hand slipped from his wrist, trailing along the outside of his hand and his fingers - he winced as she stroked his burn - before letting go.

  He pulled himself the rest of the way into the cave, mirrored Taslin's pose as best he could. The weight on his hands was uncomfortable - beneath the sting of the burns, there was an ache that felt like his bones were all fusing together at the wrong angles. Still, they needed to keep moving. He gestured for Taslin to lead on, and she nodded.

  Watching her turn around in such a cramped space was eye-opening, and close to nauseating. Somehow, she twisted and crawled under her own armpit, her back wriggling like an eel's. For a few moments, she almost seemed to walk her legs around the ceiling of the cave until they came back to the right way up. Somewhere in the middle of Rel's brain, his logic groaned under the strain.

  Progress down the passage was surprisingly easy, though. It tilted forward slightly so that they were gently descending. The floor grew smoother and smoother, and if Rel's knees started to ache, at least they didn't get