Kill the Dead by Tanith Lee (beach read book txt) 📕

clean and faintly pink, flushed pinker as the sunriseburned down on them.

Myalsat on the bank some yards away from her, gnawing his nails. He did not look ather beyond intermittent, furtive glances. Eventually, he swung the musicalinstrument around on its sling into the crook of his shoulder.

Hemade a song for Ciddey Soban. He did not know how beautiful it was. But theinstrument had been wetted by his career through the stream, and some of thestrings sagged and gradually became flat. If his father had been with him, Myalwould have been beaten.

Inthe end, Myal stopped playing. He put his arms around the instrument, huggingit tightly, and watched the stream going by.

Anhour or so later, the cold in his still dripping boots and shirt started towriggle its way under his ribs and spine. He sneezed and rubbed his hand acrosshis eyes and stood up. And found he was standing on one of Ciddey’s smallshoes.

Hewalked away from the stream slowly.

He could hear cows mooing like bassoons across thecurves of the land. The odour of turf and flowers became an irresistible seriesof irritations in the passages behind his nose and throat, and he sneezed againand cursed himself and the world, and trudged once more toward the easternsnarl of the road.

CHAPTER FOUR

Fivemiles east of the village, the landscape began to flow steadily downward. Deepvalleys appeared and shimmering ravines. Trees like poles, each with a solitaryrounded cloud of foliage smouldering at its top, led in avenues along thecrests of ridges, or by the misty lanes of faraway, indeterminate rivers.

Somewherein this country, by night, Parl Dro had slept, wrapped in his black mantle. Theweather had been soft and warm, turning cold only as the dawn approached. But afew hours after sunrise, the heat came back, smilingly, as if its absence mightbe overlooked.

Onthe morning wall of a farm, a skinny child sat, dangling its legs among thevines. When it suddenly saw the black-clad man striding his long lame stridesdown the road, the child slunk into a thicket. It sprang out at him as hepassed.

“Giveme some money!”

Drodid not look at it. “Why?”

“Ihave the magic sight,” said the child. “I’ll tell your future. Give me atwenty-penny piece.”

Drostopped. He looked at the child. It was a girl with sun-bleached hair. He threwher a twenty-penny piece, spinning it lazily from his height to hers. Shecaught the coin, and said, “I know who you are. I thought you were a legend.They said you’d be by this way sometime.”

“Whosaid?”

“Theyall did. For years and years. Now I’ll tell you. Watch out. Before and behind.You’ve got a lot of enemies.”

“HaveI really?” said Dro.

“Butnot me,” said the child. “I think you’re lovely.”

Sheran away along the wall. Rosy dust puffed from the ground as she went. The soilwas more acrid here, and powdery.

Atnoon there was an inn that sold wine and golden cheese. Peaches ripened on thewalls. A blind dog sunned itself, and whined when Parl Dro’s shadow slid overits back.

Inthe afternoon, the road shifted to the south. A thread of track beat oneastwards, but faded in a molasses-coloured wood as the sun began to wester.When he emerged from the wood, the land sloped down to a loop of one of themisty rivers. A ruined fortress stood dreamily in the loop, melting into thesky as sunset condensed the air. A village lay along the river’s edge. It hadthe usual wide street, supplemented by a couple of others almost as wide. The sewage-dispellingwater courses appeared to discharge into an area of marsh that strained out ofthe river to the north. A dab of smoke coiled from the roofs. Some fishingboats lay, themselves like spread fish, side by side on the shore.

Thepremonition he had been having, inchoate but persistent, was now so strong Droavoided the village completely. He walked instead diagonally, clipping themarsh. A causeway of pleached bricks went through mud and strips of water, outonto the baked meadow in the loop of the river where the fortress was.

Theouter walls had crumbled. The inner had a lovely smoothness, sanded down by theelements. Some earl or princeling had lorded it here one or two hundred yearsago, master of the river. Nobody much came here now. No paths were worn acrossthe meadow. Not even goats or sheep had been pastured, for the grass was virginand proud. Probably the village reckoned the fortress to be haunted. It hadthat look to it, secretive, smoky. Only a ghost-killer like Dro could have toldfor sure that there were no ghosts. It was just an empty shell.

Awind blew up along the river, and the chill came back with the dusk. Dro set afire inside the lee of the inner wall, where a staircase went up into a vaultof sky. A wild apple tree had rooted in the earth by the stair, with precociousgreen fruit on it. He put a couple to bake out their sourness in the ashesaround the fire.

Ahuge owl, soundless, like a paper kite, sailed over the meadow to its hunting.

ParlDro sat against the wall. He had only to wait awhile. He was alert, but verystill. It was a knack of his, one of many disciplines, to be able to turn offawareness of time, and all superfluous senses, resting them, as he rested thecrippled leg. Every day of walking on the roads was a day of fighting thatpain, and every respite brought a dizzying relief. Done in, he paid littleattention to either condition or cause.

Then,through half-closed eyes, he saw a woman mantled in gold hair, leaning to hisfirelight. She was very real, but when he raised his lids, no longer there.

Thechild at the farm had triggered certain memories, one familiar and crucial. Hethought about it, turning the past over in his mind, as he waited for thepresent to catch up to him.

Hisfather had been a soldier in some small border war big enough to kill him. ParlDro’s mother had died a while later, when he was about four years of age. Thelocal landowner kept a house where homeless children might grow up inreasonable conditions. When he was ten, Dro was already working in the