Wheel of the Infinite

by Martha Wells

  "Me," she said, and stood slowly.

  As soon as she stretched her senses toward it, it moved. It stood too and came toward her up the bank. A large dark shape, at least the size of a big man and roughly human-shaped, but its form seemed to flow and shift with the shadows. Maskelle frowned, staring incredulously. Water spirits were small, the size of children. They were little, gray-green creatures, dangerous to sleeping people or animals, but easily frightened by fire.

  The man beside her stood, his sheathed sword in one hand. "Magic would be helpful now," he suggested, eyeing the thing that stalked up the bank.

  "I'm not a wizard, I'm a priestess," Maskelle said, not taking her eyes off the creature. It’s not a water spirit. It was something new. Ancestors, what a thought. After all this time, I’d have sworn I’d seen everything. It was within thirty feet of them now and she hastily rearranged her plans. "Get it to follow you back through the trees."

  "Fine." He sounded exasperated.

  "It's not human," she cautioned him, as he started to move away.

  There was a lamp hanging from a post at the top of the water steps, one of those the factor's assistant had relit. As the shape from the river drew near it, the light reflected off and through it, as though the creature was made of black glass. The flame winked out as the thing passed.

  Her swordsman stopped long enough to say, "No, really?" before slipping away.

  Maskelle moved back into the trees, watching his progress. He went down toward the river, coming at the creature from the side and slightly behind it. She saw him bend and scoop up something from the ground, then shy it at the creature's back.

  Maskelle glanced upwards, appealing to the Infinite. He threw a rock at it. Rastim could have done that.

  The creature didn't so much turn around as reverse its direction, moving with the smooth rapidity of rushing water, abruptly closing the distance between itself and the man. He dodged backward, made sure its attention was focused on him, then bolted for the trees.

  Maskelle moved rapidly herself, tucking her staff back among the cypress knobs and running toward the compound. She went to the sloppy trader's wagon she had spotted earlier and found the large gourd tied to the sideboard. Sniffing it to make sure it contained lamp oil, she cut it free, slicing a finger in her haste and need for silence. Then she found a metal cup abandoned nearby and scooped up a quantity of coals from the banked fire.

  When she came back around the wagons, she saw the creature had halted at the edge of the trees, but the swordsman stopped and threw another rock at it, and it couldn't resist the challenge. It flowed forward, losing some of its shape as it crossed the invisible boundary into the forest.

  Very good, Maskelle thought. At least it behaved like a water spirit. Maybe it also scented the temple on the swordsman, just the way she had. She followed hurriedly as it moved further into the trees, wedging the gourd under her arm so she could work the cork out while still keeping hold of the cup, which was steadily burning her hand.

  She caught up to them just as her swordsman turned at bay in a little clearing. The creature rushed for him, still eerily silent, and he ducked and dodged, turning and catching it with an upward stroke of the siri that would have disemboweled a man. The metal split the black surface with no discernible effect. Rastim couldn't have done that, Maskelle thought, impressed.

  She crouched down, dumping gourd and cup on the ground, knowing he couldn't keep that up for long. She tore her sleeve off and shoved it into the open neck of the gourd, then held the cup up to it. This better work.

  She looked up in time to see her swordsman bowled over backward as the water creature rushed him. It towered over him, and she shouted, "Over here! You've got the wrong one!"

  It hesitated for a breath then rushed back toward her.

  She had time for the thought that it hadn't seemed to move this fast when it was after someone else. The rag caught when the creature was right on top of her and she slung the gourd into it, throwing the cup after it for good measure. The gourd dissolved when it passed through the creature's surface, the oil spreading out in a cloudy wave over it. She ducked an angry swipe from a limb, and for a moment she thought the oil hadn't had time to catch. Then fire swept up the surface and the creature tore away, thrashing and whirling.

  Maskelle scrambled back. The creature was a cloudy mass of dark swirling vapor, fire running in glowing rivulets over its surface. It heaved and struggled, losing more of its shape every moment, until it burst and vanished in a spray of water.

  Maskelle scrubbed the droplets off her face with her remaining sleeve. The water tasted muddy and foul, like the bottom of the river. Across the clearing, her swordsman rolled to his feet and came toward her. He stared at her, breathing hard, then said, "That wasn't enough heat to boil away all that water."

  Maskelle sighed. She would have preferred to be admired for her cleverness instead of questioned for her lack of logic. Sucking on her cut finger, she said, "That was its own stupidity. It panicked and dissipated itself." She shook her head. "It shouldn't have followed you in here, it should have stayed out there and made me come after it. But there's not much brain mixed into all that water." Thank the Ancestors for once. "It wasn't an ordinary water spirit, so we're lucky this worked at all."

  He looked down at the disappearing puddle, then knelt and ran his hand over the grass curiously, cupping the water in his palm. "How does it kill people?"

  "The little ones lay down on sleeping people and drown them. This one...could do just about anything it wanted, I think."

  He glanced up at her, then shook the moisture off his hand.

  Maskelle started to speak, but the words caught in her throat. The sense of alarm was urgent again, was more intense with every breath. Idiot, this was a distraction. "There's something else."

  He stood. "Where?"

  She was already running back toward the compound, crashing through brush and tripping over roots. She swung by the cypress to grab up her staff, then ran flat out across the open ground toward the Ariaden's camp. As she reached the edge of it, she heard the tailgate of a wagon creak.

  As soon as she rounded the bulk of Firac's wagon, she saw it. There was a figure standing on the now open tailgate of her wagon.

  She was too far away. The figure turned toward her, raised its hand. Then her swordsman tore around the back of Rastim's wagon, coming at the intruder from behind, catching it in a tackle and dragging it off the tailgate.

  She reached them a moment later. Her swordsman was holding the furiously struggling figure face down. Maskelle moved around, trying to get a better look at the intruder as he twisted his head back and forth in the wet grass, choking with rage. And it was a "he" she saw, and not an "it." He was dressed in torn and dirty trousers like a fieldworker and he was wire-thin, the bones standing out in his outflung arms. There were no old rank designs on the scalp beneath the stringy dark hair, and there was no disguising the rough and calloused skin from long hours at outdoor labor. One of his outstretched hands was clutching a small silver-glass globe.

  Maskelle's brows knit. "Bastard sons of pigs," she muttered. The Ariaden, the Mahlindi, the boatmen, everyone inside the post, they all would have been killed. She could feel the power inside the glass straining to break free, even as the fieldworker strained to break free from his captor. She stepped close and caught a handful of the boy's greasy hair. He twisted away and spat at her, but she had already seen what she needed to see. The pupils of his eyes were as silver-grey as the surface of the globe, opaque and solid, not like human eyes at all.

  Rastim tumbled out of his wagon and moved to stand beside her, scratching his head and looking down at their unwelcome visitor. Heads were peering out from the other wagons. She stepped back and said, "Kill him."

  There was a shocked word of protest from someone and Rastim stared at her.

  Maskelle ignored him, looking down at the man who had caught the boy, preventing him from breaking the globe and setting the curse loo
se on the compound. He hadn't bothered to draw the siri, which was sheathed again at his belt. He had his knees planted on the boy's shoulders, keeping him pinned to the ground.

  The others were silent now, aghast or baffled. The boy hadn't reacted to Maskelle's words, though she had spoken in Kushorit, except to make the same gasping, snarling noises he had made since he had been caught. Of course, in Teachings, the philosopher Arabad had theorized that speech was impossible without a soul. So the old fool was right about something, Maskelle thought dryly. I should write him a letter. She said, "Whoever sent him here tied his soul to the curse in the globe. He's already dead, his body just doesn't realize it yet." It was an old magic, older than the temples, and a foul one.

  Even though she had just told him to do it, the swiftness still surprised her. The snap of the boy's neck was audible. The swordsman stood, stepping casually away from the now limp body. She recalled that this was the third time he had surprised her, and according to all reputable authorities three was a highly significant number.

  She sat on her heels and pried the globe out of the boy's hand, bending the dead fingers back to work it loose. She turned it over curiously. The glass was free of defect, the silver-grey pigment blended with it evenly. She knocked it against the wagon wheel.

  The glass shattered and the contents spilled out on the grass. There was a general scramble among the Ariaden to move back. When nothing immediately disastrous happened, Rastim returned. "Dried snakes?" he asked, baffled. The globe had contained a bundle of what did appear to be small desiccated snakes, each no more than an inch or so long.

  "Not snakes," Maskelle said. "Tela worms." The wisps that looked like dried skin were actually their wings. They swarmed like bees and their poison burned into the blood and made the body jerk and spasm. A few of them could kill a large man in minutes. It would have been an unlovely death for all of them. "If the globe had broken while he was still alive, his life would have fed theirs and they would have swarmed over everyone in the camp."

  "Gah," Rastim said, or something like it.

  Old Mali, ever practical, was approaching with a straw brush and a small shovel. Maskelle nodded for her to go ahead and the old woman swiftly scooped up all the dried worms. "The fire," Maskelle said. Old Mali gave her a disgusted look, but took the shovel to the cooking fire anyway and tipped its contents in.

  Maskelle got to her feet again, unconsciously brushing her hands off on her robes. She turned and found herself eye to eye with the swordsman; they were exactly the same height.

  He was watching her with an air of irony. He said, "The priests sent him to kill you because you're a wizard."

  "The priests didn't send him," she said, mock patiently. "And 'wizard' is a barbarian word."

  He cocked an eyebrow at her, then suddenly turned, drawing the siri, facing the open area beyond the wagon. Maskelle stepped back, but she heard the footsteps and shouts a moment later. "Damn it, that's the post guard," she said.

  Rastim was at her elbow. "Hide the body?" he asked, worried.

  Maskelle hesitated. The Ariaden didn't look like much of a match for an armed troop, but their profession made them quick-witted and used to moving swiftly in concert. Having seen them in action when the upper-level scenery had started to come apart during the climax of the performance of Otranto in Hisak City, she had no doubt of their ability to hide a fresh corpse from even a determined troop of guards. "Yes, hide the body."

  Rastim whirled around and gestured quickly. Her swordsman hopped out of the way as Gardick, Vani, and Firac descended on the boy's body. They swept it away and into Rastim's wagon before the first of the guards came into view.

  There were about ten of them, surrounding the wagons at a run. The Ariaden, who knew what part they had to play, milled around near the fire, looking as if nothing odd had happened.

  One guard came forward and Maskelle went to meet him, leaning on her staff.

  If he was the captain, he was surprisingly young. And he had intelligent eyes, not something she was glad to see. He said, "There was report of a disturbance here, Revered."

  "Oh, you mean, the screaming and thrashing around? They were rehearsing their next theatrical, that's all," Maskelle said, smiling, gesturing casually back at the Ariaden, who were doing a good imitation of a disturbed henroost. A rehearsal in the middle of the night, after a grueling day's travel and a long play. At least it wasn't pouring down rain.

  Not surprisingly, this explanation failed to satisfy. He eyed her a moment, then said, "Who is that?"

  "What?" Maskelle glanced behind her and almost dropped her staff. She had fully expected the swordsman to disappear; he had had more than enough time. But he was standing a few paces behind her. He had, at least, sheathed the siri. "Oh, him." She looked back at the guard captain. "He's—"

  Rastim materialized beside her. "We hired him to protect us on the road."

  Maskelle bit her tongue and managed to retain her smile. She had been about to say that he was just another traveller in the compound, drawn by the commotion. She reminded herself to tell Rastim that she had been lying to authority before he was conceived.

  The guard captain said, "Then you don't mind if we look around?"

  "Not at all." Maskelle shrugged. Rastim gestured expansively. "Go right ahead." He turned and called to his men. "Search the wagons."

  So that’s how it is. Maskelle still kept her smile, despite the irrational urge to anger. She had planned for this, hadn't she?

  The other guards moved forward. Maskelle turned back to the wagons and found herself facing her swordsman again. He was looking at the guards with an intent expression that she had previously seen only on cats waiting for unwise lizards to venture out of woodwork, and he had his hand on the hilt of the siri. She waited until he met her eyes, and said, "Don't draw that."

  His expression said plainly that she was mad, but he took his hand off the swordhilt. Maskelle walked back to the fire, aware he was following her.

  He stood a pace behind her and to the side when she stopped by the fire, and she recognized it as the position someone who was acting as her bodyguard would rightfully adopt. Maskelle had only managed to keep soul and body together for the past few years by staying one step ahead of everyone else, or at least convincing them that she was. He had been helping her since she had found him with the raiders, and he seemed to think she should know the reason why. Pride and years of conscious and unconscious deception kept her from simply turning to him now and asking. Maybe pride, and maybe the fear that if she asked him, he would leave. It was almost funny.

  The post guards weren't all as diligent as their captain. Or as polite. Some of them were only desultorily poking around at the bundles and chests tied to the outside of the wagons, others were pushing their way inside. If that kept up, Maskelle was going to be very unamused.

  One of the men was trying to enter Killia's wagon and she was blocking him, trying to explain about the sick child inside. He refused to listen, grabbing her arm to shove her out of the way. Maskelle strode across the camp. "Leave her alone," she said, giving him a prod with her staff.

  The guard let go of Killia and stepped back, unhurt but startled.

  "She's afraid and I've just got her back to sleep," Killia was explaining, exasperated. "They can look in if they just don't wake—"

  It happened so quickly Maskelle didn't see it. She felt someone brush against her, and when she looked the guard was already on the ground, the bori club clattering off the wagon wheel. It was her swordsman who had pushed past her, who was standing with his back to her, between her and the guard who was now scrambling to his feet. The guard must have reached for her arm or, Ancestors help him, made to swing the club at her.

  The other guards were drawing weapons. She thumped the swordsman in the back to warn him, and he ducked as she swung her staff up.

  Unlike the river raiders, the post guards knew what that meant. They hesitated, and that gave the captain time to react. He ran between th
em, flinging up his arms and shouting, "Stop!"

  She realized her arms were trembling, and not from the weight of the staff. Her heart was pounding and the anger a lump in her throat. That was a little close, she thought, sense returning. She lowered the staff. She said, "You've searched. Now go."

  The captain shook his head, breathing hard. He said, "What's in that wagon?"

  "A sick child," Killia said, standing up and slapping the dirt off her pantaloons. She was too good an actress to sound angry, but the blood had drained from her face. "I told him he could look. I just didn't want him to climb inside."

  The matter was settled an instant later when a round, wan face peered over the top of the tailgate at them and whimpered.

  "See?" Killia said, dropping the tailgate and lifting the little girl into her arms.

  The captain sighed and waved his men away. Some of them had the grace to look foolish, though the one who had started the trouble was belligerent and reluctant to withdraw. The captain waited until he had walked away before he said, "Sorry, Revered. It was a mistake."

  "It was almost a deadly mistake," Maskelle told him, thinking, I’m not doing well at this so far. Haven’t reached the city yet and I’ve almost broken my oath twice.

  He stared at her a moment, uncomprehending, then shook his head and followed his men. As the guards returned to the post, Rastim let out his breath. Maskelle asked softly, "Where is he?"

  "Firac's wagon, in the lower bed."

  "I thought they put him in yours."

  "We did, but they were going to search it and we had to shift him."

  She shook her head. She hadn't seen them do it, though she supposed they had taken advantage of the distraction. "We'll give him a farewell tomorrow, after we cross the dike." A funeral on the eve of entering the Temple City was not auspicious. She went back to the fire.

  There was a very worried group of Ariaden gathered there. All told, they were not a prepossessing lot, but then for the Ariaden theater that hardly mattered. Killia hovered near the tailgate of her wagon, a blanket wrapped around her, obviously not wanting to stray too far from her child.