Shan, Darren - Cirque Du Freak 10 - The Lake of Souls

My eyes returned to Kurda Smahlt, as they had so often since we'd pulled him out of the Lake. He was extremely pale and thin, his hair untidy, his eyes dark with fear and pain. But otherwise he looked exactly as he had the last time I saw him, when I'd foiled his plans to betray the vampires to the vampaneze. He'd been executed shortly afterwards, dropped into a pit of stakes until he was dead, then cut into pieces and cremated.

Kurda felt my eyes upon him and glanced up shamefully. He no longer shook, though he still looked very uncertain. Laying aside his plate, he wiped around his mouth with a scrap of cloth, then asked softly, "How much time has passed since I was put to death?"

"Eight years or so," I answered.

"Is that all?" He frowned. "It seems much longer."

"Do you remember everything that happened?" I asked.

He nodded bleakly. "My memory's as sharp as ever, though I wish it wasn't — that drop into the pit of stakes is something I'd rather never think about again." He sighed. "I'm sorry for what I did, killing Gavner and betraying the clan. But I believed it was for the good of our people — I was trying to prevent a war with the vampaneze."

"I know," I said softly. "We've been at war since you died, and the Vampaneze Lord has revealed himself. He …" I gulped deeply. "He killed Mr Crepsley. Many others have died as well."

"I'm sorry," Kurda said again. "Perhaps if I'd succeeded, they'd still be alive." He grimaced as soon as he said that, and shook his head. "No. It's too easy to say 'what if' and paint a picture of a perfect world. There would have been death and misery even if you hadn't exposed me. That was unavoidable."

Harkat hadn't said much since we'd sat down — he'd been studying Kurda like a baby watching its mother. Now his eyes roamed to Mr Tiny and he said quietly, "I know I was Kurda. Buthow? I was created years before … Kurda died."

"Time is relative," Mr Tiny chuckled, roasting something that looked suspiciously like a human eyeball on a stick over the fire. "From the present, I can move backwards into the past, or forward into any of the possible futures."

"You can travel through time?" I asked sceptically.

Mr Tiny nodded. "That's my one great thrill in life. By playing with time, I can subtly influence the course of future events, keeping the world on a chaotic keel — it's more interesting that way. I can help or hinder humans, vampires and vampaneze, as I see fit. There are limits to what I can do, but I work broadly and actively within them.

"For reasons of my own, I decided to help young Master Shan," he continued, addressing his words to Harkat. "I've laid many plans around that young man, but I saw, years ago, that he was doomed for an early grave. Without someone to step in at vital moments — for instance, when he fought with the bear on his way to Vampire Mountain, and later with the wild boars during his Trials of Initiation — he would have perished long ago.

"So I created Harkat Mulds," he said, this time speaking to me. He swallowed the eyeball he'd been cooking and belched merrily. "I could have used any of my Little People, but I needed someone who'd cared about you when he was alive, who'd do that little bit extra to protect you. So I went into a possible future, searched among the souls of the tormented dead, and found our old friend Kurda Smahlt."

Mr Tiny slapped Kurda's knee. The one-time General flinched. "Kurda was a soul in agony," Mr Tiny said cheerfully. "He was unable to forgive himself for betraying his people, and was desperate to make amends. By becoming Harkat Mulds and protecting you, he provided the vampires with the possibility of victory in the War of the Scars. Without Harkat, you would have died long ago, and there would have been no hunt for the Lord of the Vampaneze — he would simply have led his forces to victory over the vampires."

"But I didn't know … that I used to be Kurda!" Harkat protested.

"Deep down you did," Mr Tiny disagreed. "Since I had to return your soul to the past, I had to hide the truth of your identity from you — if you'd known who you were, you might have tried to directly interfere with the course of the future. But on a subconscious level, you knew. That's why you fought so bravely beside Darren, risking your life for his on numerous occasions."

I thought about that in silence for a long while, as did Harkat and Kurda. Time travel was a difficult concept to get my head around, but if I overlooked the paradox of being able to send a soul from the future into the past to alter the present — and didn't question how it was achieved — I could see the logic. Kurda had betrayed the vampires. Ashamed, his soul remained bound to Earth. Mr Tiny offered him the chance of redemption — by returning to life as a Little Person, he could make amends for his foul deeds.