Tetrarch (Well of Echoes) by Ian Irvine Page A

He clicked his tongue in vexation.
    ‘I’m sorry, Nish,’ she wailed. ‘I tried really hard.’
    Ullii never lied or exaggerated, and was so sensitive that walking in those boots must have been agony. There was no possibility of her wearing them again. Nor could she go any distance in bare feet. It was too cold.
    ‘Climb onto my shoulders, Ullii. I’ll carry you.’ She probably would not like that either but there was no choice.
    She did so willingly enough, and once up there she smiled. ‘I can smell you, Nish.’ Lifting the blindfold, she peered down the front of his shirt.
    ‘Whatever makes you happy,’ he muttered. She was no heavier than a ten-year-old but even that was a hefty burden to carry down the mountain.
    By the time they reached the balloon, whose basket was wedged between two boulders, he was drenched in sweat and Ullii’s smile was broader than ever. Setting her down in the weak sun, he lay beside her.
    ‘I love you, Nish,’ she said.
    Had Nish been standing up, he would have fallen over. All he could do was gape. Ullii never made remarks like that. What did she expect of him? He could hardly reciprocate. He liked Ullii, cared for her, and many a night had lain awake burning with desire for her sweet little body, but he could never, except perhaps to get that desire fulfilled, have said that he loved her.
    Taking her hand, he drew it to his lips. She shivered and her eyelashes fluttered. He could have screamed with frustration. Why now, when he could do nothing about it? To hide his confusion, he climbed up to look at the balloon, ignoring her little whimper. Tonight, he thought. When everything is prepared.
    The gasbag was flaccid, though being formed around a series of struts and stretched wires, it maintained its shape. The air inside had gone cold and he would have to burn the brazier for at least half a day to lift off. First he must gather fuel, for all he had was a large flask of distilled tar spirits. It was useful for burning wet wood but could not be used by itself in the brazier, or the explosion would have blown balloon and boulders back up to Tirthrax.
    There was little fuel here, just scrubby heath and a few patches of grass. If he filled the basket with the stuff, it would barely lift the balloon. No time to waste. He headed for the nearest patch of vegetation.
    By the middle of the afternoon, Nish had gathered a great mound of shrubbery. As he’d expected, it burned quickly, generating plenty of ash but little heat. After an hour the balloon was almost as flaccid as when he had started. Already he had exhausted the closest supplies of fuel. What if the witch-woman (as he thought of the Matah) was already on her way?
    Forcing down panic, he considered other options. The rocks were hung with feathery strands of lichen. Perhaps if he tied that into bales and soaked it in tar spirits? Nish began collecting the material but soon gave the idea away. It took an hour to gather a small bag of lichen and it weighed nothing. There could be no heat in it either.
    By then the sun was going down. The sky was clear; the night would be cold and they would need a fire; more precious fuel wasted. He trudged off for another armload of scrub.
    On his return Nish could not find Ullii anywhere. He felt like screaming, but did the sensible thing and lit the fire before he went looking for her. She was not far away, just down the slope at their original campsite. Ullii had discarded her mask in the evening and was drawing on a slab of sand-coloured rock with a black lump of pencil-stone.
    ‘I wish you’d told me where you were going,’ he said irritably.
    For once she did not cringe. ‘I knew where
you
were.’ She gave him such a sweet smile that it was impossible to be angry with her.
    ‘Come up. It’s time for dinner.’
    He followed, admiring her figure. Nish prepared dinner, a gruel made of mashed and boiled grains for her, since she could not bear any kind of strong flavour, and much the same