"Are you angry with me?"
No answer.
"He was already there when I opened the window. I haven't talked to him since..."
"I know."
Jordan closed his mouth.
The streets around them were quiet, ominously so for how dark it was. It was even harder to find his way whilst wearing his cloak than it had been during the day; Yddris's cloak was black and blended with the shadows, making it impossible to follow. He had been reduced to following the sound of his tutor's footsteps and the smell of pipe smoke.
He said again, "Are you angry with me?"
Yddris said nothing, and Jordan sighed, giving up on that line of questioning. He didn't know where they were, or what Yddris had planned. He couldn't stop thinking about what Arlen had said; but Grace would tell him if something like that had happened.
Wouldn't she?
He jumped as a horse and cart rattled by, so distracted by his thoughts that he hadn't heard it coming. Yddris pulled him out of its path at the last moment, murmuring a greeting and an apology to the driver.
"Look where you're going, boy."
"I'm trying." He scowled. "It's difficult."
Yddris sighed. "We're almost there."
"Almost where?"
No response. Jordan clenched his fist at his side to remind himself not to punch him.
"Look, I've already said..."
"We're here."
Jordan stopped, blinking, and looked up. They were standing at the foot of a bridge, the Aven murmuring darkly all around them. Candlelight glittered on the water, but there were no boats on this stretch of the river and the lights on the other side were much sparser. Yddris led the way across, his footsteps loud on the stone path. In places the balustrade had broken away or crumbled and been patched up with wire fencing.
Something moved on the far bank. In his efforts to pretend the expanse of rushing water beneath them wasn't there, Jordan's fixation on the other side of the bridge meant that his brain registered the movement several seconds after he saw it, and when it did he stopped dead. His skin crackled at his alarm. Yddris's suppression of it was like a bucket of icy water over his head, much more jolting than it had ever been before. He gasped, and Yddris grunted an apology.
"Don't want it to know we're here," the man muttered, "Don't need you going up like a beacon on the bridge."
"What is it?" Jordan breathed, shaking himself out. The pricking sensation lingered, in the tips of his fingers and over his scalp.
"A demon," Yddris said. He didn't say it as though it was obvious, even though Jordan had realised it was the moment the question left his lips. "I believe it's a type of Wight, though it's hard to tell which from this distance."
"They come in varieties?" Jordan said, voice stilted. He had a vivid mental image of acid yellow eyes and vertical lids, blinking at him through the sockets of a skull that was not its own just before the magic ripped its way out of him...
Yddris nudged him, bringing him back to the present, but if the Unspoken knew what Jordan was thinking he was tactful enough not to say it. "There are five types of Wight. All you need to know at this stage is that they're all similar in size, all hunt in packs, and they can all be killed the same way."
Jordan's eyes travelled back to the far side of the bridge. There was no other movement, but the river seemed louder somehow, ringing in his ears like static.
"So there'll be more than one over there?"
"In all likelihood, yes," Yddris said, "which is why we are going to sneak past them and find something else."
He started walking again. His control over Jordan's magic was like a vice; Jordan could have sworn he felt it writhing under his skin, trying to get out - responding to the feverish heat in his face and limbs, the pounding of his heart. When they passed the Wights, he knew about it; he couldn't see them, but he sensed them somewhere nearby and jumped when something rattled on the next street. Yddris grabbed his wrist and pulled him along, faster and faster until they were both running; though Yddris's feet were silent and Jordan clattered along behind him, unable to see where he was going.
Yddris stopped. Jordan bent over with his hands on his knees, panting. His throat ached with strain, and though he had recovered from his Gift-induced fever days ago, the corners of his vision were swirling darkness and his head felt like it was filled with air.
He could no longer see the river when he straightened up and looked around. Yddris stood behind him, stock-still as if waiting for something. The houses around them were tumbledown, though some were clearly occupied; ramshackle buildings of crumbled brick and sheets of tin, some with their bare interiors exposed to the night and others in which candles and shadows flickered through gaps in the brickwork. Some houses were stacked on others in tottering piles. A vast mountain, the closest Jordan had been to one, loomed over the settlement, the last dregs of which clung to its base like so many tiny mushrooms. The mountain was rimmed with light from a dimming moon behind its peak, but the rock itself was brighter, shot through with veins of green. Jordan thought of the rocks back home which were slate grey until you turned them over and the inside glittered with delicate purple amethyst. He imagined that if a quake were to rend the mountain in two, it would look like that; emeralds and jade, exposed to the moonlight.
His skin prickled, and he turned just as a howl ripped through the night. He cringed and drew close to Yddris, who seemed unfazed.
"Relax, boy. It's too far away to smell us."
"I'll relax just as soon as I'm not surrounded by things that wouldn't think twice about crushing my head like a fucking grape," Jordan muttered. The surroundings were no longer absorbing. He glanced up at his tutor and added, "You don't know what a grape is, do you?"
"I will have to confess my ignorance on that one, but it sounds rude," Yddris said, ushering him along the street. Jordan snorted and allowed himself to be led along, just relieved that Yddris was talking to him again.
The quality of the housing didn't improve as they walked; in fact, it seemed to get worse. The houses with occupants grew sparser, and more than once they had to find a way around a collapsed house blocking the street. By the time they were standing in the shadow of the mountain, Jordan's legs ached from picking through rubble and his heart was pounding. They stood facing a large pile of debris that might have been a home once. A door lay flat on the ground nearby and it was scored through by claw marks.
"Where are we?" Jordan whispered, and winced as his voice broke the silence.
Yddris shushed him and pointed. It was too dark to see further than what was directly in front of him, and after a minute of squinting Jordan shrugged and shook his head.
The release of Yddris's restrictions on his magic felt like a hot, slow trickle down his spine. The pounding began again, the magic roaring up to meet him as if it had been trapped for years. Jordan winced, and then gasped as the city around him began to light up; all around him, writing was appearing on walls and a faint greenish mist tinged the whole view – and he could see, almost as well as if it was daytime. He looked down at the ruined door on the ground, and realised that the score marks ran straight through what looked like a rune, which glowed much more dimly than those on the few intact walls surrounding them.
"You see them?" Yddris murmured, and pointed again. Jordan froze.
There were demons picking through the rubble; dozens of them. They were the smallest Jordan had yet seen, and resembled misshapen, unnervingly fast tortoises. They swarmed over the ruins on stumpy legs with long-fingered hands which they used like spades, and their shell-like carapaces glowed faintly green in Jordan's new vision. Two of them, as he watched, got into a scrap, launching at each other with a faint clock sound and then hissing and scratching their way down the pile.
"Thralls," Yddris said, his voice barely audible. "Scavenger species. They pick over whatever the big boys leave. They'll leave you alone if you leave them alone, but if you provoke them they'll bite and whatever they bite will rot straight off you."
It was an effort not to go up in flames or throw up – he wasn't sure which felt more tempting – but with some determination he forced out through his teeth, "What are the marks on the walls?"
"Runes," Yddris said, "Deterrents. Some Unspoken specialise in architectural runework; the whole city has it. It's the reason you can sleep in a bed at night without fear of having your head chewed off. The runes on each individual building create a chain that activates at night, but if you break the chain it's rendered useless."
"But I shut the door on those demons at the inn..."
"It made a weak link. Takes a while for the chain to link back up after a break, and that gap was all they needed."
Jordan frowned. A small pack of thralls had appeared on the rubble, a mother and babies. They were cute, in a wrinkly, gross kind of way. He watched them for a moment, and then remembered where he was as something much bigger howled in the mountains.
Yddris stiffened beside him at the same time as the thralls in the rubble turned as one to look towards the mountain. Jordan turned as well, but seeing nothing, he turned back to find that every demon on the pile had vanished.
"We need to go," Yddris said, grabbing Jordan's arm in a grip that hurt.
"Why, what...."
He saw it. Drifting through the streets like a cloud of dark mist, something huge was heading vaguely in their direction. The only green light from it was a large spot somewhere in the centre of the cloud, throbbing gently – a heart?
"What the fuck is that," he whispered, and began running when Yddris did. It was much easier to run with the new magic-tinged vision; obstacles interfered with it in a way that made them more obvious than if he was staring at them in daylight.
He was soon out of breath, but Yddris, when he spoke, was breathing like he was just out for a gentle stroll.
"A note for the future," he said, "You see one of them, no matter how good you are, if you're not with at least two other qualified Unspoken, you do not take it on under any circumstances."
"What do you do then?"
"This is a practical demonstration," Yddris grunted. "You fucking leg it."
They came to a stop when Jordan was sure he was two steps from collapse. His vision wavered and flickered, and his head was a cacophony of roaring sound, muffling the world around him for several alarming minutes.
"What was that?" he panted, bending over with his hands on his knees as bile rose in his throat.
"Locally, it's just known as a Death," Yddris said. Jordan looked at him incredulously, and his tutor nodded. "Yes, it's that dangerous. It's a type of Geist – a soul eater. Eats spirit matter," he clarified as Jordan frowned, "They're all nasty, but that one... No, that one is very bad. And really shouldn't be out of the mountains this early in the season. Not a good sign that it is."
"Souls?" Jordan repeated. "It eats fucking souls?" He straightened up and looked around, only realising at the last minute that Yddris had reined his magic back in and he couldn't see again, "What kind of Satan's playground is this place?"
Yddris wasn't listening. The Unspoken was looking the other way, down a street that to Jordan's eyes disappeared into blackness three feet away. Before he could say anything, Yddris grasped his shoulder and steered him into the darkness. As they walked, the world lit up green again, runes in a spidery hand scrawling themselves over walls and doors. Jordan's breath caught; in a street where most of the houses were intact, the effect was mesmerising. He felt something deep inside him respond to it, thrumming through his core with a sense of belonging that was a fierce contrast to the alarm his rational mind felt at that revelation.
Both feelings vanished when he recognised the shape sitting at the bottom of the front steps of one house. The man was squatting, hugging his knees and whispering soundlessly to himself, totally oblivious to their presence. Jordan looked up, and saw that the front door of the house was open, its runes glowing so faintly they had almost vanished from sight.
"Night take me," Yddris murmured, hand clenching on Jordan's shoulder before letting go. The Unspoken moved past him, and Jordan hurried after.
He pulled up short when he saw the man's face. It was upturned; he was rocking gently on his step, his mouth forming words that made no sense. His eyes were gone.
"Fuck me sideways," Jordan near-yelled, scrambling backwards and planting himself on the ground with a jolt that made his spine ache. The world plunged into darkness as his magic roared to the surface and was dragged down again, dousing him like cold water, but Yddris said nothing. He knelt in front of the stranger, removed one glove and touched his face. He juddered and stopped whispering.
Yddris straightened. "There'll be others. Come on."
"No way."
Yddris's glare pierced him through even though he couldn't see it, but he planted his feet and stared up at the house in front of them as Yddris allowed him his night vision back.
"I'm not going in there," he said, voice wavering, but he managed to keep his magic under control for once. "What if there are still demons in there?"
"There aren't or we'd sense them. All the demons are out here. You'd rather be out here?"
Jordan clenched his jaw. As if on cue, he heard something howl. It sounded too close.
"What do you want me to do, boy?" Yddris said, "Leave this family to get chewed on by the next demons to find them? They're still alive. You think they deserve that?"
"No!" Jordan said, too loudly.
"Then what?" Yddris hissed, stalking towards him. Though they were similar in height, the Unspoken suddenly seemed much larger. "They've already had their souls and eyes stolen, and you want their dignity to go the same way? This is what happens to people when no one is there to protect them. We weren't here to protect them. But we will do what we can for them now that we are, do you understand?" Yddris paused. Jordan flinched as the man whipped around and then back again. "This is why we do what we do. So this doesn't happen. Look at him."
Jordan turned away. An iron grip clamped around his arm and dragged him back to the steps. It left him gasping, his arm immediately beginning to hurt, and then it reappeared around his jaw, forced him to stare into that ghastly, eyeless face. Tears stung Jordan's eyes.
"Let go," he muttered, voice muffled. "You're hurting me."
The grip didn't loosen. "Look."
Jordan looked. The stranger's face gazed up at him like a vacant caricature of a human, sockets a bloody mess, mouth forming words without sound or meaning.
He didn't remember the moment Yddris let go of him. His jaw ached but he barely felt it. His face was wet with tears he hadn't realised were falling.
There were three others in the house. The mother was dead already, thrown like a doll against the wall. A grandfather gaped blindly at the ceiling, tapping a rhythm against the floor with his cane and mouthing words with no sound.
The child Jordan carried from the ruins himself, cradled against his heart.
-
"Yddris?"
Kedrick was in a nightshirt when he opened the inn door, and Jordan heard Laurel call down the stairs from somewhere behind him. The child had long since fallen asleep in Jordan's arms, fists curled into the fabric of his hood. Somehow the toddler had escaped the worst fate, and though he would be stone blind for the rest of his life he at least had a soul to call his. Jordan entered the inn in a daze, and was only vaguely aware of Laurel prising the child from his arms and swaddling him in a blanket.
"I think there's still a cot in the attic," she said, as if from the bottom of a swimming pool, "He can sleep in there. Pa, can he go in with you?"
"Of course," Kedrick said. "Killian, warm up some of the goat's milk in a pan and we can feed him. Don't know how long he was there alone."
Jordan turned. The two men, the half-survivors, were seated together in one of the inn's booths. Yddris hovered near them, though his eyes were on Jordan.
"What's going to happen to them?" he asked. His mouth didn't feel like his own, but speaking brought the world into focus somewhat. "The men?"
"The Medica," Kedrick replied, "To live it out til the end."
"The end," Jordan repeated.
"You can't live long without a soul, boy," Kedrick said softly, "But at least they'll get a burial and a blessing."
"A blessing," Jordan mumbled, and laughed without humour. "A blessing."
He cried.