Beyond the Wall of Time Page 31

  “You discount my two thousand years’ worth of experience.”

  “I do not. I just do not believe it is infallible. Second, your statisticians calculate a less-than-complete set of outcomes. While a particular action may conclude with fewer lives lost, the fear and hatred spread thereby adds to everyone’s burden. Millions of lives are subtly altered for the worse.”

  “Ah, yes, Stella, I have considered that. Show me but one way of measuring such harm and I will factor it into my calculations.”

  “Fool! Empiricism is not a sufficiently flexible philosophy to assess such things! Third, you increase the blot on your own soul with every action. You make yourself more susceptible to the most outrageous cruelty. And fourth, you load intolerable burdens on those without your scope of vision and experience. What of your statisticians? How do they deal with the fact that their calculations condemn innocent people to death? Do they enjoy long working lives, or do they beg to be retired after only a few years of service? How many of them commit suicide, I wonder?

  “And what of those chosen to live? I remember you putting a village to the sword in an attempt to cow me. Did your calculations consider the damage that did to your soul—or to mine? You may be able to live with the guilt, but I still wake imagining myself smothered in bloodied silks, having been forced to watch the impalement of men, the rape of women and the dismemberment of children for no more useful purpose than to make me your tool. Such an action has led inevitably to this moment, the moment where I reject you. Do you understand, Kannwar? Those people died in vain! Had they lived, I might well now be your willing queen! As it is, Kannwar, I wish to have nothing more to do with you. You have miscalculated. I care nothing for your fate.”

  She stood for a moment, breathing heavily, then strode swiftly down the road, her smirking guardsman at her heel.

  “Are you answered?” the Bhrudwan lord asked Noetos.

  “Yes,” said the fisherman. “But I judge the answer insufficient.”

  Arathé cried out then, her voice inarticulate in its desperation, and even Duon had trouble deciphering the spear of fear and panic that pierced his mind. She knew her father, and knew what he was going to do.

  Out came the man’s sword, drawn as swiftly as thought, and the first cut flashed at the Undying Man’s throat before anyone had a chance to act. Kannwar jerked his head back and the tip of the sword nicked his larynx. Within moments the blood of an immortal began to trickle from the wound.

  Another man came and stood beside Noetos. Cyclamere the Padouki, a mysterious ally of the fisherman’s through some prior relationship Duon had not quite understood, drew his own sword and began to strike against the seemingly defenceless man.

  Who proved not to be defenceless at all. He drew no famous weapon, nor did he create some counterattack from the air or another of the elemental forces of the world. He took a blow to the arm and another to the shoulder, both cutting him to the bone, before two men stepped forward to defend him.

  Bregor the Hegeoman, the man Kannwar had but recently struck down and healed in a time that no longer existed save in the memory. And Torve the Omeran, although Duon could think of no reason why he would defend a tyrant so similar to the Emperor of Elamaq.

  In the distance Stella turned to watch, a look of despair on her face. She had lied. She cared.

  Bregor faced Noetos with nothing more than a walking stick, while Torve had not even that: barefoot and unarmed—and unmanned—he took a strange stance in front of Cyclamere, forcing Kannwar backwards.

  “Why do you oppose me?” Noetos asked Bregor. “You know my cause is just. Or has he bought you? Are you still in Neherian employ?”

  “He could have let me die, but he didn’t,” Bregor said, his face white with fear. “Noetos, do not strike at this man. Any blow you land could end up killing yourself. You saw what happened to me.”

  “I saw,” Noetos said as he drew his sword back for a powerful blow. “Yet his tyranny must be answered. I am sure I will fail, but my actions may inspire others to try. One day he will fall.”

  His blow fell, and Bregor barely managed to divert its power away from his own arms. His stick splintered, and the end was sheared off and fell some distance away.

  Torve exploded in a flurry of movement, not fast exactly, but fluid, as though dancing between Cyclamere’s strokes. He rained blows at the swordmaster from every direction. Cyclamere withdrew a pace, baffled and more than a little bruised.

  “Was this part of your calculations?” Noetos called out to Kannwar.

  “Not at all,” the immortal replied.

  “Order them to move aside then. I do not want innocent blood shed.”

  “I follow no one’s orders,” Torve said. Was that anger shading his voice? Duon had never heard it before, had not believed it possible of an Omeran. “This man healed me. He saved my life. I do not love him, nor do I agree with him, but how can I do less for him in turn?”

  “This is perfectly ridiculous,” said Noetos, frustration spilling over into his voice. “You are being defended, coward, by people who are behaving morally and yet making exactly the opposite calculation that you would make in their place. They do not consider the thousands of lives forever safe from your possible future depredations should you be slain here today. Instead, they think only of their debt to you. Do your statisticians have a column for loyalty, coward? Or if they do, does it record only how such loyalty can be exploited?”

  “He can order me to move until he runs out of breath, Noetos,” Bregor said. “I will defend him in this. But there must come an accounting even for the Lord of Bhrudwo. Moral men and women must be given access to the calculations of his statisticians. Others must weigh the morality of his actions. You, Noetos, are not one of them. Step aside, lay down your weapon, see this adventure through to its conclusion and then observe Bhrudwans put this empire to rights. At the end we may still have an immortal lord, or we may not.”

  This brave but foolish speech was barely out of Bregor’s mouth before the Lord of Bhrudwo drew himself up. “You mortals think you can decide my future and the future of this land? I have suffered far more grievous challenges than yours and withstood them all! Where were you when the sorcerers of the Had Hills banded together in a thousand-strong cabal against me? I did not see you lining the parapets of newly built Andratan to help me throw back the grease-smeared hordes from Kanabar, who had laid the whole of the Malayu Basin to waste. Were you one of those who stood with me when I faced down the Most High himself in golden Dona Mihst? I have restrained myself amongst you short-lived maggots, but now the carcass upon which you feed bestirs himself. I am not dead. I have suffered you until now at the behest of the Most High. But no longer.”

  The Lord of Bhrudwo strode forward, his hands thrusting aside Bregor and Torve as though they were mere leaves, and began to swell. Larger and larger he grew, until he stood ten paces tall.

  “Larger target to hit,” Noetos commented to Cyclamere, and hefted his sword.

  Lenares never wondered where she found the courage. In fact, she did not consider her motivation for what she did “courage” at all. If pressed, she would perhaps have admitted to annoyance, even anger, but not bravery.

  Foolish, wasted words. These men wanted to strike at each other and in so doing ease their pain. All the words did was to make it easier for them to strike.

  Seeing this, she ceased her conversation with Mahudia and stepped forward, faster than light, and in an eye-blink stood between them.

  So this is magic.

  Yes, girl, said her true mother. But because it is magic, it comes at a price; a price which falls to me to pay. Please use it sparingly.

  Squeals, exclamations of shock, fear and wonder on their faces. Lenares tried to keep herself from enjoying the reactions of her friends. To them it would have seemed she simply materialised among the combatants.

  “Put your swords down,” she said, “and listen to me.”

  “Not until I’ve dealt with the U
ndying Man,” Noetos said.

  Lenares raised her gaze to rest on the bear-man. “Look at you, stupid man, choosing hate over love. Which is the better answer to the death and destruction of your family: to kill everyone around you, or to help someone you love regain life?”

  “Get out of my way, girl.”

  “No. Answer my question out loud for everyone to hear. Would you rather have the Undying Man dead or Cylene alive?”

  “But we cannot do anything for Cylene!” the bear growled.

  “We can, but I need you all to put down your swords. What is your answer?”

  “I’d rather have both.”

  One of the man’s friends called out to him, an older man with a round belly. “Come, fisherman, show us your heart. Which well do you draw from when you need strength—love or hate?”

  “What do you think, Sautea?” Noetos snapped. “You saw enough of me.”

  “I would have said ‘love’ without a doubt in the days you and I worked The Rhoos,” the older man answered. “But now, after what happened to Opuntia, I’m not so sure.”

  The big red-haired man sighed. “I meant to make this man’s death—or, more likely, my death—a gift to my daughter, to show her justice still exists in the world.”

  Arathé waved her arms around and mouthed noises. “I don’t want your gift.”

  “I never thought you would, child. But someone needs to show you that those that hurt without cause will have to give account of it.”

  Duon spoke. “Arathé reminds you all that there is one among us who has hurt thousands of people in the last few days without cause. He is busy hurting another as we speak.”

  “All right, all right!” growled the fisherman. “Lenares, show us what we can do to help reclaim Cylene from the Son. But I do not withdraw my interest in this man. He still has questions to answer and I reserve the right to press for those answers.”

  Lenares breathed a deep sigh, part relief, part apprehension. Time to begin. She turned back towards the village, now some distance behind them, and began to trudge up the road.

  “Everyone follow me,” she said.

  She had always enjoyed being the centre of attention. She well remembered the day she had demonstrated she wasn’t just a half-wit, that she could reason better than any of the other trainee cosmographers, better even than her teachers. Smarter than them all. She still brought that memory to mind whenever she felt sad or neglected. Mahudia’s look of surprise, followed by a deep pleasure, bathed her mind again now.

  But never had she been the focus of such illustrious people’s gazes. The most powerful magicians in the world had been gathered here, and Lenares Half-wit was the key. Without her, they could throw magic at Keppia and all he had to do was to hide deep in Cylene’s body, letting the poor girl absorb the blows until her body died—and then he’d be free. But she had a plan, she knew how to trap Keppia beyond the Wall of Time and, in so doing, free Cylene.

  She had a plan, but it was Mahudia’s plan. Mahudia had come to her, tug, tug, tugging on the invisible connection between them, the link between this world and the void. Even as the stupid fisherman and the stupider Undying Man had made ready to slash at each other—as if that was remotely important—Mahudia had whispered her plan to Lenares. Lenares wished it were her own plan, but she would never claim it as her own, no matter that no one else could hear Mahudia, no matter that her foster mother would not begrudge Lenares her moment of glory.

  “When I captured Umu,” she explained to her friends, “I thought I was being clever. I thought I had caught her by dividing the zero of the hole in the world into smaller and smaller pieces, until Umu was trapped and I could bind her. But what really happened was someone else from the void helped me. That someone says she is Mahudia, the Chief Cosmographer, who was killed by Umu.”

  Nearer to the village they drew, nearer to the ranting, wailing figure of Cylene. Behind Lenares came less than half the crowd. The remainder were obviously too frightened to venture any closer.

  “We are going to drive him out,” Lenares said, more quietly now, as they continued their slow march back towards Mensaya. “But not out into the world where he can do more mischief. Instead, we will drive him back along the conduit he uses to draw power from the void.”

  “How will we do this?” Kannwar asked. “And what conduit is this? I can see no conduit, not even with the eyes of magic.”

  “I can,” Anomer said. “My sister taught me to see the essenza in everything, the lattice that connects all things in the world, from which comes all energy and all magic. Cylene is a mixture of two essenzas, one white, one black; and there is a black cord stretching behind her, going up, up into the hole in the world and out of sight.”

  “There’s no ‘up’ or ‘down’ in magic,” Kannwar said scornfully.

  “Doesn’t matter whether we’re seeing a truth or a metaphor,” Anomer answered him, colour in his cheeks. “What Lenares says she sees is what I see. Are we both imagining it, Lord of Bhrudwo?”

  The man pursed his lips and did not offer an answer.

  “So,” Keppia said, as the remaining travellers, magicians to the fore, surrounded him. “You have come to save your friend. Go on then. I won’t put up a fight.”

  Mahudia, Lenares sent, her whisper travelling instantaneously along the tenuous connection to her mother. Now.

  The great storm had killed many thousands of people north of Patina Padouk; the huge earthquake and accompanying waves had ended the lives of many more. Mahudia had explained that the void pulsed with a myriad new stars, all once nodes in the wall of the world, now torn untimely from the pattern of life and cast into the ever-widening maw of the hole in the world. Many are still nearby, Mahudia had said to Lenares. They are frightened and they are angry. They have agreed to help us.

  Lenares waited, but saw nothing for some time. She ignored the threats coming from the monster’s mouth, watching for any change—and finally saw it: a pulse in the broad connection between Cylene and the quarter-sky hole in the world hovering above them.

  “What are you doing?” Keppia said, an edge to his voice.

  “Nothing,” Lenares answered him. “None of us is doing anything.”

  “Then what… is that you, Umu?”

  The pulse arrived at Cylene’s body and the thing’s mouth opened in a bellow. But it was Keppia’s voice, not Cylene’s, that came out.

  It is working, Mother, Lenares sent.

  Good, said Mahudia, her voice faint. Few here want the gods to break through into the world. They think of their loved ones still alive, and, apart from a few selfish ones, do not want them to die. And there are those who simply want revenge.

  Lenares glanced upwards and saw a multitude of stars glittering beyond the hole in the world.

  She returned her attention to the animated corpse before her and watched as the black began slowly to leach out of it.

  “Stop this! I will kill the girl, I swear I will!”

  “She is dead already,” Lenares said to him. “And we cannot stop what we did not start.”

  The monster began chuffing heavy breaths, undoubtedly summoning all his power. The conduit expanded still further as he drew on the void. The blackness began to return to Cylene’s body.

  “All you magicians!” Lenares commanded gleefully. Truly, she was the centre of the world at this moment. “Use your magic to see the dark essenza in this body before you. Pick at it, grasp it, and push it away from Cylene, towards the cord. Draw from those around you who are not magicians. Now!”

  At her command a dozen bright blue filaments snapped into existence, arcing towards the monster. Keppia threw back his head and howled.

  “He will flee,” Kannwar said. “We will have saved Cylene, but lost Keppia.”

  “He will not flee,” Lenares said. “This will weaken him so much that Umu could destroy him should he abandon Cylene’s body. This is his only chance. He will try to hold on.”

  Blue fire assailed the monster f
rom all sides, and the hungry conduit continued to suck at him. Around them people began to collapse.

  “Lenares! They’re dying!” someone cried.

  Oh, I never thought of that. “Stop drawing on them!”

  “It’s not us. Keppia is draining them dry,” said Kannwar.

  “Then some of you must protect them!”

  Instantly six of the blue arcs vanished and the bystanders were surrounded by a faint azure glow. Keppia roared and began to reclaim Cylene’s body.

  “Umu! Help your brother!” the monster shouted, his attention fixed on a row of denuded trees lining the side of the road. His sister, if she was anywhere within earshot, gave no answer.

  The very ground around them began to shrivel and crack as the warring magicians drained essenza from every source. Plants withered, grass collapsed into a grey mat, insects were fried where they crawled or flew.

  “I have never… been this deep… into magic!” the Undying Man said.

  “This is my world!” Keppia screamed as the black began once again to fade. “I belong here! I was tricked into leaving! You cannot dooooo this to me!”

  Lenares saw the moment Keppia gave up trying to remain in Cylene’s body and attempted to flee. All the black collected at the entrance to the cord—which was now as wide as Cylene was tall—and made to run, taking the cord with him.

  There came a faint cry from her own conduit, and at the same moment Keppia’s cord suddenly stiffened, locking more firmly into Cylene’s body. Keppia shrieked, then was jerked bodily into the cord, from where he fell upwards, twisting and jerking, towards the distant hole in the world.

  “Push!” Lenares cried.

  All the magicians united in one final effort, their blue fire pushing through Cylene and along the conduit. Screaming and cursing, Keppia vanished from sight.

  Amid the exhausted cheering, Lenares heard Mahudia speak. “Goodbye, child,” she said.

  “Goodbye?” A cold premonition bit at the cosmographer and she suddenly found it difficult to stand. “Why goodbye?”

  “If your sister is to live, Lenares, the conduit must remain open. Keppia no longer animates her body, after all. But if we leave the conduit open at this end, Keppia may return at any time to possess her anew. We can’t guard the conduit forever: the newly dead want to pass on. So I will wrap our conduit around Cylene’s, ever tighter, tighter”—the thin cord vibrated as she speaks—“until the merest trickle of magic flows down to Cylene.”