His words transformed into a terrorised yell as Nortah’s boot connected with his rump, sending him into an untidy, flailing tumble. Vaelin watched Nortah count off the seconds until the youth’s screams came to an abrupt end.
“A hundred feet or so.” Nortah gave a bland smile. “Unnerving but hardly fatal. After you, brother.”
“I assume you’ve calculated a return route through the sewers,” Vaelin said. “And a likely source of wine.”
“What would be the point? I have no coin, as you said.”
“Then you won’t object to going first.”
He met Nortah’s gaze. The long-standing resentment that had so possessed him during the voyage was dimmed now, replaced by something Vaelin felt to be worse. Shame and defeat, he concluded, turning away. They could fight, he knew that. Nortah had recovered some strength and skill on the Sea Wasp but he was still far from his former self. It would be possible to send him tumbling in Sehmon’s wake. But then what? The road they faced was long and he couldn’t spend every step of it worrying his brother might seek out a drink.
“Have a care of the tea seller,” Vaelin sighed, crossing his arms. “He’s likely to take exception to your presence.”
“No more persuasion for me?” Nortah enquired in genuine surprise. “At least a punch or two.”
“I’ve brought you as far as I could. I was a fool to think I could save you. Before she died Sella made me promise to try. And I did, brother. But a drunk is a drunk. It’s time I allowed you to be what you are.”
He crossed his arms and leapt, legs straight as a spear-point as the slope carried him into the gloom.
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
His descent ended in a splash and the chilly embrace of water deep enough to cover his head. A short plummet brought his boots into contact with something hard and he kicked, propelling himself upwards. Breaking the surface he found himself in a pool of rushing water, the current conveying him towards a broad cave-like opening. The force of it was too great to swim against and, seeing no other avenue of escape, he allowed himself to be carried into the open air. The water flowed into an oddly straight river with banks of shaped stone rather than earth. He was propelled along it for several yards until the current began to abate and he saw the dim shadow of Alum on the bank, crouching with his hand extended. Vaelin caught hold of the Moreska’s wrist, grunting his thanks as the hunter helped haul him from the water.
He surveyed his companions, taking note of how badly Erlin, Sehmon and Ellese shivered in the night air. “We need to light a fire,” he told Chien. “Dry off.”
“No time,” she said, settling her pack on her shoulders and hefting her staff. “Walk until dawn, then the sun will dry us.”
“W-where’s Lord Nortah?” Ellese chattered.
Vaelin smoothed a hand through his hair to work out the damp, glancing back at the opening in the base of what he saw to be a sheer granite cliff at least seventy feet high. “He won’t be . . .”
A faint splash sounded and Nortah emerged into the moonlit flow a few seconds later. Vaelin and Alum hauled him from the river, where he spent several seconds retching on his knees. “Think I may have swallowed some of that shit water,” he gasped.
“Then vomit as you walk,” Chien told him before setting off along the riverbank at a brisk pace. “And do it quietly.”
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
Chien allowed no rest, maintaining a punishing pace along the riverbank. By the time the sun rose above the broad expanse of cultivated fields to the east, Vaelin reckoned they had covered at least ten miles. During the trek, the course of the river hadn’t altered by a single inch.
“It’s not a river,” Erlin said when Vaelin asked about its curiously straight appearance. “Merely a minor branch of the canal network connecting Hahn-Shi to the lake lands twenty miles north. They in turn feed the canals that trace all the way to the capital.”
“So we just follow this to our destination?” Vaelin asked.
Erlin winced as he looked at the rising sun. “Not for much longer. The Dien-Ven don’t bother patrolling the minor canals, but we’ll soon be nearing the locks. Then I suspect things will start getting complicated.”
Chien finally came to a halt about an hour past sunrise, climbing the grassy verge fringing the canal, shading her eyes to