Alchymist twoe-3

by Ian Irvine

  Three air-floaters, and a fleet of commandeered ships, criss-crossed the Sea of Mists for days until she found him again, but before Flydd could be taken he was rescued by a stolen air-floater in which Ullii recognised the knots of FynMah and Irisis. They flew out of range and, though Ullii lost the individuals, she was able to track the air-floater's crystals into Meldorin before they vanished yet again.

  Ghorr held a furious conference with his fellow scrutators before heading to Lybing, the capital of wealthy Borgistry, in his remaining air-floater. There a number of the scrutators disembarked to continue prosecuting the western war. Ghorr's air-floater took to the air again, heading north across the Great Chain of Lakes, then east past the Ramparts of Tacnah, forbidding gateway to the Great Mountains. The country began to make distinctive patterns in Ullii's lattice, for they were reversing the route by which she'd come west with Flydd and Irisis last spring. Dread grew in her as she recognised their destination. They were heading for the scrutators' hidden bastion of Nennifer, between the Great Mountains and the arid depressions that lay to the north.

  Nennifer, the most frightening place in all Lauralin, appeared before them. It lay on a narrow rim of plateau with the mountains rearing up, thousands of spans high, to the east, west and south. The northern side of Nennifer was truncated by a monumental cliff, a thousand spans high, at the base of which lay an oval of sunken land, the Desolation Sink, as desiccated and lifeless as the Dry Sea itself.

  'Why are we going to Nennifer?' she whispered. The very stones it was built from were imbued with the odour of the scrutators, and it was full of wicked, cruel people.

  Ghorr gave his vulpine, snaggle-toothed smile. 'I have plans.'

  'Nish and Flydd are gone,' said Ullii. She no longer knew what to do about them.

  "They killed your brother and must be punished. You'll find them, Ullii, and we'll do the rest. Nennifer is where we design the weapons of tomorrow. Two hundred and twenty-three mancers work night and day, utterly devoted to inventing new devices of terror. Four hundred and seventy artisans make controllers for these weapons, and find ways to draw on the fields ever more efficiently. A thousand artificers, and three thousand smiths and other workers, build and test these devices. Five hundred and thirty-five draughters create the plans and patterns that will be used by our manufactories, across the breadth of Santhenar, to make innumerable copies. We have made many breakthroughs since you left us so .., precipitously.' Ghorr chuckled at his meagre wit. Ullii and Irisis had escaped through a tunnel that discharged over the precipice into the Desolation Sink.

  'Our workers are already designing the mighty craft that will take us back to Meldorin,' he went on, 'in a force so powerful that the lyrinx will flee in terror. Then you will find our enemies again, Ullii, wherever they've hidden. We'll take them with overwhelming force and destroy this burr in my side for good.

  'In the meantime,' he continued, 'there's another way for you to help me.'

  They were alone in his room. Ullii felt trapped in every possible way. Why had she listened to the voices? Why had she imagined she could use this monster to gain her revenge? She was not strong or clever, but weak and insignificant. All she'd done was put herself back in prison, and this time she had no friends to take care of her.

  'Yes?' she whispered, for even had she the strongest will in the world, the bracelet on her wrist would not allow her to say no.

  'Tell me how you magicked Irisis out of her cell last spring, without opening the lock or setting off my alarm. And how you translated Flydd's air-floater, in an instant, from a thousand spans above Nennifer to the end of the tunnel where you and Irisis were hiding.'

  That had been her own precious little secret that not even Flydd had understood. Her lattice was her own creation, the world she retreated to when the physical world failed her. It was the one place no one else could go. Was even that to be taken from her?

  Don't know!' she said mulishly, keeping her eyes firmly on the floor.

  His hand went under her chin, jerking her upright. He looked like a mature, handsome man but up close his skin was shiny and pinkly smooth, like baby skin on top of scar tissue. The feel of it, the softness clinging to those underlying ropy ridges of flesh, made her shudder with disgust. He tried to appear in his prime but Ullii's lattice told her what lay beneath the surface. He was old and rotten inside.

  'Don't play games, Ullii. Do you want me as a friend, or as an enemy? It would not be wise to incur my enmity.'

  She had often had this nightmare, after the first visit to Nennifer, and still she'd given herself up to Ghorr. Why, why had she put on the bracelet? Why hadn't she tested it first? Because it had been so cunningly designed to trap her that it did not even show in her lattice. The scrutators were too clever for her, as they had been too clever for Mylii.

  'I have cunning mancers here, Seeker,' he resumed when she did not reply. 'Men and women who know how the mind works, even a mind as special as yours. And they know how to break it! They can go deep into your mind, Ullii. They can learn everything about you. They can make lattices of their own — or take yours from you.'

  'Make another one' she muttered, trying to look away. Though she tried to deny it, her greatest fear was losing her precious lattice and being unable to make another.

  'They won't let you. So, Ullii, are you going to tell me how you managed it? How did you free Irisis?'

  If she told him, surely he would leave her alone. 'I held the magicked lock in place and turned the lattice around it,' she said simply.

  He stared at her. 'That's nonsense.' But, after chewing over it for a minute, he reconsidered. 'You turned the lattice? Did you translate the air-floater the same way?'

  'No. I just moved its knot, and Xervish's, in my lattice.'

  'Astounding! If I hadn't seen it happen I would not have believed it. You can't tell me any more, can you? You simply don't know what you did. But I'll have the secret out of you, and then there won't be anything I can't do.'

  His eyes dissected her, then he swept out. And Ullii knew he would get the secret out of her, if he had to take her apart to do so. He was the most evil man in the world. Worse than Flydd, worse than Nish. And she was going to find them for him, so he could destroy them. She could not do otherwise -there was no way she could fight Ghorr.

  And once she did find them, it would be her turn to suffer.

  Forty-seven

  Dirty, ragged and weary to the point of exhaustion, Tiaan approached the hidden city of Tirthrax. Three weeks had passed since her escape from the Aachim nets on the shore of the Sea of Thurkad. She had no idea why she'd come back, only that there had been nowhere else to go. But surely, after the crimes she'd committed, Malien would turn her over to the Aachim. Vithis could be here already.

  She was so overcome by guilt that Tiaan gave only passing thought to her reason for fleeing Tirthrax previously — the amplimet's communication with the great node here, and the thawing of the perilous Well of Echoes, which had been frozen in place long ago. Despite her fears, the amplimet had given her no trouble on her long journey. It was hardly glowing now, and did not change as she neared Tirthrax. She wondered if it wanted to come back. Or if she'd exhausted it.

  It was a hard climb up the slopes of the mountain, and many times Tiaan thought she would have to complete it on foot, for the construct was now a battered, limping thing. Each morning, when she unlocked the hatch and set off again, it was slower and more erratic. There was any amount of power this close to Tirthrax, far more than the amplimet could draw, but the construct could no longer use it.

  Yet, despite everything, she'd made it. She crept up the ragged track, carved out by the great glacier, to the lip of the broken hole in the side of the mountain. It looked the same as when she'd left here at the beginning of spring. Tiaan stopped outside. Tirthrax was a place of bitter memories. Here, little Haani had died and her body had been sent to the Well. Here, Tiaan had made the fateful gate. Here. Minis had rejected her.

  T
hat's all in the past, she told herself. Go on. She inched the construct up and over the top. The vast cavern, just part of one level of the grand city, yawned before her. Tiaan stopped abruptly.

  Malien stood in the middle of that open space, arms folded across her chest, watching her with those cool green eyes. Though an old woman, Malien was as strong as anyone Tiaan had ever met. She was kindly by nature, yet could be hard as Stone when she had to be. How would Malien treat her now?

  'I've been expecting you,' Malien said evenly. 'Take the construct down to the very end of this level and leave it there.'

  Tiaan did so. Whatever Malien ordered, she would do. Whatever punishment Malien imposed, she would suffer it without complaint, though it could not make up for the harm she'd done Minis, or Malien's own Clan Elienor.

  She stopped near a spiralling staircase, withdrew the amplimet and climbed down. Her breath steamed in the frigid air and she felt a trifle light-headed. The city was high up and the air thin.

  Malien indicated a small table to one side, set with a cloth, two plates, knives and forks. A round loaf, freshly baked, sat on a wooden carving board. A variety of meats, cheeses and preserved vegetables had been arranged on a platter. 'Sit down.'

  Tiaan sat. Malien carved slices of bread, sprinkled them with golden oil from a glass jug, and handed the platter to Tiaan. She took two slices, Malien one. Tiaan selected a fragrant cheese. Malien poured wine into silver goblets, handing one to her. They ate.

  'Why have you come back?' said Malien when Tiaan's plate was empty. Her voice was without expression. Tiaan could not tell if she was pleased, indifferent or enraged.

  'I had nowhere else to go. And you said — you once said to call on you, if I needed help.' Tiaan's palms were sweaty.

  Malien inclined her head in acknowledgment. She regarded Tiaan steadily. 'Your back is better, I see.'

  'You heard about that?'

  'Urien sent messengers here. They told me you'd broken it, though that doesn't seem to be the truth.'

  She thinks I'm a liar. 'It was the truth. I broke my back when the amplimet made the thapter crash near Nyriandiol, but in Snizort the lyrinx flesh-formed it together' Tiaan shivered at that memory.

  'Why would they do that?' Malien asked.

  'They were using me in a patterner, to pattern a great torgnadr, or node-drainer. My affliction hindered the patterning, so they fixed it.'

  'I see.'

  'You can look if you like,' Tiaan said hastily. 'The scars are still there.'

  'I can tell truth from lies, Tiaan. How is it now?'

  'It still troubles me, especially at the end of a long day.'

  'But better than the alternative, I dare say,' Malien said with a wintry smile.

  Tiaan did not need to reply. She would never forget those months of paralysed helplessness in Nyriandiol and Snizort. 'You look different, Malien.'

  'How so?'

  'Not so — younger,' she corrected hastily. 'There seems a little more red in your hair, and your face isn't as lined …'

  Malien picked up the metal platter, brushed away the crumbs and examined her face in it. 'I was just serving out my time when you first came here, but I have a purpose now. That can rejuvenate us, for a little while.'

  'What purpose?' Tiaan said curiously.

  'Keeping you out of trouble, for one thing.' Malien changed the subject. 'You escaped from Vithis?'

  'I had no choice. When Urien's messengers returned from speaking to you, he would have had me killed.'

  Malien laid down her slice of bread. 'Why do you think that?'

  'To prevent me telling anyone else about the secret of flight 'But he doesn't have the secret. No one knows, save you and me.'

  Tiaan's mouth fell open, 'But surely …? You did not tell them?'

  'Why should I?' 'They are Aachim.'

  'We were sundered from them thousands of years ago, and no matter how we may yearn to go back, Santhenar is our home now. We are our own people, Tiaan. We broke the clans in ages past and will never return to that futile struggle for supremacy. Besides, our Histories tell us to beware of Inthis First Clan, and especially of men like Vithis. He sounds too much like Tensor, and Pitlis before him, for my liking. Both were great men, but also great in folly that brought ruin upon kind. I would never put such a treasure into his hands.' 'He may be on his way here now. I…I hurt Minis during my escape — I may have killed him. I dared not stop to find out. And others certainly died. And then …' Tiaan felt so ashamed that she could not meet Malien's eye. She'd taken the easy way out and regretted every moment since. 'Yes?' Malien said mildly.

  'The people of Clan Elienor were good to me while I was under their guard. And I escaped, knowing they would be punished severely.'

  'Was your parole asked for, or given?' 'No.'

  'Then your conscience is clear. Indeed, after they get over their initial dismay, Clan Elienor may feel a certain admiration for you, for outwitting them.' 'But Minis …'

  Malien sighed. 'Disaster follows you everywhere you go, and that's something I must think about. You'd better tell me about it. Start from the day you left here.' That took all afternoon, several pots of tea, another meal and, late that night, a tot or two of liqueur from Malien's private stock. At the end of it, she said, 'For such a gentle young woman, you certainly have a talent for mayhem.' 'If Vithis had not held me against my will …If he hadn't been planning to—'

  You don't need to explain.' Malien leaned back, pressing her fingers against her lips.

  'There's one more thing.'

  'Go on.'

  'I did a foolish thing, Malien. Minis swore on the ring I made him — this ring — that he would do everything in his power to save me. And …'

  'What?'

  'I didn't believe him. He's so weak. I tried to reinforce his vow for him. I — I swore by the amplimet—' Malien started. 'I swore by the amplimet that if he failed me, he'd rue it all his remaining days.'

  'That was . . , not wise, Tiaan.'

  Tiaan could see that she was disturbed. 'And surely, if he's alive, he does rue it.'

  "'He may. So Vithis will track the amplimet and eventually discover that you came here. I won't be able to hold him back.'

  'I'd better get going,' said Tiaan. 'I was expecting that. And, of course, the Well of Echoes—'

  'It's stable now. I had a painful struggle after you left, before I tamed it, and more than once I thought it was going to defeat me. But what the amplimet did once, it may do again, and more quickly. It may have grown stronger too. Tell me, did it communicate with any other nodes?'

  'Yes, at Nyriandiol and Snizort. But not since the Snizort node exploded.'

  'I heard about that,' said Malien, shaking her head. 'Was it a unique problem, with that node, or might all nodes be at risk? I must take advice on the matter.’

  'Is it safe for me to stay till the morning?' Tiaan said wistfully. 'I so long to sleep in a bed and not be afraid of what's out in the dark, hunting me. I've not felt secure since I left here.'

  'You may sleep in perfect ease. In the morning we'll leave Tirthrax for somewhere safer.'

  'You're coming with me?' Tiaan could not keep the joy out of her voice.

  'Someone has to look after you,' Malien said dryly. 'Go up.

  Your old room is ready and I've laid out clean clothes for you.'

  How did you know I was coming?'

  Vithis sent a skeet, ordering me to hold you if you came back. And indeed, where else could you have gone?'

  'Where are we going?'

  'To my own people, though I'm uncertain of the welcome either you or I will get there. Bathe and rest in security. I'll keep watch, if that comforts you. We're going to Stassor in the morning.'

  Tiaan took out the amplimet, the other crystal, the helmet and the tesseract, and did as she was bade.

  Malien woke Tiaan only minutes before dawn. To Tiaan's surprise, she was ushered into a different construct, which Malien had repaired during Tiaan's absence. Tiaan reached
for the controls, discovered they were completely unfamiliar, and drew back. Malien motioned Tiaan into the seat beside her, took hold of a padded yoke and the machine lifted smoothly into the air.

  'It flies!' Tiaan exclaimed.

  'What we did together last winter rekindled my longstanding interest in the secret of flight. I feel quite rejuvenated.'

  'Where did you find another amplimet?'

  'I didn't. I use the Art in an entirely different way, if you recall. I've done so all my life. I found my own path to controlling a thapter.'

  Tiaan was stunned. 'How long have you had this one working?'

  'Three months, more or less, though I've tinkered with it nearly every day, improving it in various ways. Learning how to make your thapter fly was the hard part. Once we'd discovered that secret, making another was easy.'

  'You once said you only had a minor talent for such work.'

  'I dissembled. I've a very considerable talent, although for most of my life I've avoided using it.'

  'Why, Malien?'

  'You don't know your Histories well, do you?'

  'Not of your time.'

  'When I was young . . , well, younger, at any rate, I was partner to Tensor, a brilliant man but one whose obsession led the world to the abyss. The war, and the invasion by the lyrinx that led to it, arose out of his folly. Because he was obsessed with devices, I swore not to use my talent, and for more than two hundred years I have not.'

  'And now?'

  'Times change, and so must we, to suit them. Not using my talent for the cause I believe in would be just as great a folly.'

  'Does Urien know about your thapter?'

  'No. I had warning of her messengers, so I made sure it looked innocuous. Even had they gone inside, they could not have flown it. It's designed to be controlled by my mind, and mine alone.'

  'What if I were to put in my amplimet?' said Tiaan forlornly. She'd thought, after coming to Tirthrax, that she might obtain another set of carbon whiskers and diamond crystals, and make her construct fly.

  'I wouldn't want to risk my life that way. Should it become necessary, I'll make changes so you can fly it.'