by Jo Clayton
HARRA’S EYE CHURRIKYOO
KLUKESHARNA
Roaring with rage, Settsimaksimin landed on one point of a Hexa star; Simms came down at his feet. Maks clutched at Shaddalakh and gathered himself to snap out of this place wherever it was.
He was frozen there, Shaddalakh vibrated in his grip, but something blocked his access to the talisman. He gathered the remnants of his strength-threw all he knew and all he was into a bind-shatter Chant. His Voice was there. It made the dust jump. Nothing changed. The confusion of hums and whistles and other small ugly noises went steadily on around him. He’d never seen anything like this place. He understood nothing he saw, even less what he heard.
The dull gray light shuddered. Sparks came pouring into that dusty gray hell, shrieking as he’d shrieked. Geniod. He remembered them from the cavern.
Something caught them, something prisoned them in a glitternet of force lines above the dusty gray throne chair beside the Hexa. They quieted, he thought they were doing what he’d done, looking around, weighing their chances, deciding how to attack and free themselves.
The light shuddered again.
Palami Kumindri, her Housemaster Callam Cammam, another female figure. Simms gasped. “Esmoon,” he whispered. Finally the simulacrum of Musteba Xa, holding Massulit clutched against his bony chest.
Something snatched Massulit away from him, brought it swooping around to hover over Maksim’s head. His souls spun from the stone and fled back into him, swirling round and round in him, turning him dizzy with the euphoria of the Return.
When he recovered, the four of them were gone and the sack above the throne was jerking and jolting and brighter than before.
The light in that decaying dreadful room shuddered.
Brann appeared on the Hexa-point at his right, Tak WakKerrcarr standing behind her, his staff in one hand, his other hand resting on her shoulder. Massulit swept away from Maksim and rushed to her. She looked startled, caught it, stood holding it. “Maksi,” she said, “so this is why you didn’t answer the call-me’s.”
“That’s it. Tak.”
“Maksim.”
“Surprised to see you here.”
“Not half so surprised as I am.” He touched Brann’s cheek, returned his hand to her shoulder. “Seems to be one of the drawbacks when you grow fond of a certain turbulent young, lass.”
“Fond, hah!” Brann said. “You’re just a horny old goat.”
“That too.”
Maksim started to speak, shut his mouth as the light shuddered again.
Yaril and Jaril appeared at the next Hexa-point. They stood side by side, each with one arm about the other’s waist. Jaril held his free hand chest-high ivith Churrikyoo sitting on it. Two pairs of crystal eyes turned to Maksim, turned away; they chose not to greet him.
The light shuddered.
Korimenei appeared at the Hexa-point at Maksim’s left, a long-tailed beast on her shoulder. She wore Frunzacoache around her neck, the leaf within shining a brilliant green. She glanced quickly around, nodded as if she recognized what she was seeing, then she smiled at Maksim. “I missed you,” she said, “I thought you’d lost interest in me.”
“No, daughter mine, never that. Just unavailable as you see.”
“Take me as an apprentice?”
He laughed, a shout that filled the room with life and vigor and made its deadness even deader. “Kori, you don’t waste your opportunities, do you?”
“Doesn’t Tungjii say take your Luck where you find it? Well?”
“Of course I will. As you propose, so I accept. If we manage to get clear of this.” He looked round. “What is this place, anyone know?”
Brann sighed. “I forgot you hadn’t seen it, Maksi. Chained God. We’re in his body.”
The light shuddered.
Trago appeared on the Hexa-point beside Korimenei, frightened and uncertain. He held Harra’s Eye clutched tight against his chest and looked wildly around, started to speak to Korimenei, but didn’t; instead he bowed his head and stood staring intently into the flawless crystal sphere.
The light shuddered.
Danny Blue appeared with Felsrawg crouching at his feet. He flung out a hand and Klukesharna slammed into it. He stared at the talisman a moment, then looked round. “Family reunion,” he said. “Brann, Kori, Maksim, Changers. I was beginning to wonder if I’d see you all. It’s like trail stew, drop in the ingredients as before and stir vigorously. Simms, sorry to see you, man. Where’s the Esmoon? She ought to be here, seeing I’m infested with this thing again.” He held Klukesharna between thumb and forefinger and waved it about.
Simms chuckled, he was amused but there was an edge to his enjoyment. “Sucked up there,” he said and pointed at the glittersack; he was content to sit where he was at Maksim’s feet and didn’t try to stand. “I don’t think she’s enjoying it either.”
“Should hope not.” He reached a hand down to Felsrawg. “You gonna sit there or what?”
She moved her shoulders, looked disgusted. “I can’t get up,” she said. “I’m stuck here. Let me alone, fool.”
“Your call. Hey, Garbage Guts,” he yelled, startling Maksim and drawing a grimace from Brann. He was scowling at the broad sheet of milky glass spread across the front of the room. “What the hell’s going on?”
For several breaths nothing happened. Lights flickered, threads of god-stuff danced and darted, minor lightnings struck and rebounded. The noises got louder; though they weren’t music in any other sense, none of the euphony Maksim expected, there was a rhythm in those noises, a pulse not quite a heartbeat but similar; as they got louder, more demanding, their effect on him and the others intensified. There was a sense of something ominous getting closer and closer.
Maksim set himself to resist. He fought to tie into
Shaddalakh, fought to resist unnamed, shapeless demands the noises made on him. He fought the god.
##
Korimenei saw Maks stiffen, begin to gesture and chant. She couldn’t hear him. As if she were sealed off from him, a wall between them. She dropped and sat cross-legged with Ailiki in her lap, closed one hand about Frunzacoache, rested the other on the curve of the mahsar’s back. Frunzacoache shook. She thought she could hear it screaming with rage as it tried to touch her. When reaching for the realities didn’t work, she flipped through her choices and began trying everything she could think of to attack the forces holding her. She fought the god with everything inside her.
##
Brann leaned against Tak WakKerrcarr and struggled to draw energy from Massulit. Nothing. She reached for Yaril and Jaril. They were sealed off from her. Tak said losing them would put her in danger; she understood that now. She was powerless against anything she couldn’t touch; whatever stayed beyond the reach of her arms was safe from her. She ignored the pressure from the Chained God and concentrated on reaching the Changers. If they could make that bridge again, the Chained God would find his metaphorical fingers singed. She denied the god, denied his hold on her, refused to let him shape her acts. She fought the god with everything in her.
##
Danny Blue’s half-sires forgot their differences and fought the god. They were shadows of what they were, but they had their skills and their stubbornness. They poured all that into Danny; he fought the god with Daniel Akamarino’s will to freedom and Ahzurdan’s learning and his own rage. Danny clutched at Klukesharna, felt her quiver as she tried to break through to him and help him. He fought to reach her, he fought the god.
##
Jaril and Yaril raged as one; they struggled to reach
Churrikyoo, but could not, together they punched at the force holding them on the Hexa-point, they struggled to reach out to Brann, they could see her, they knew she was trying to reach them. Wordlessly, they merged into a single glowsphere with Churrikyoo floating in their core. Wordlessly, furiously, they fought to break free and suck the life out of the god.
##
Trago clutched at Harra’s Ey
e. He fought against being swallowed, but he knew so little about what was going on, he was, after all, only a six-year-old boy, the ten years he’d passed in spell might have been ten minutes. All he could do was deny and deny and deny. He could not relate to the woman who said she was his sister, she was a stranger. He didn’t want any of this, he was terrified and angry, the god made him feel sick when he looked at it, it was ugly, rotten. No, he shouted into the crystal, no and no and no.
##
The noises changed, the noises were a chant.
The Chained God chanted, gathering his forces, thrusting his will at them, a wordless spell or if there were words, they were sunk so deep in computer symbology and machine noise they were wholly unintelligible to mortal ears, even Danny Blue’s.
BinYAHtii appeared, hovered over the Hexa-center.
The glittersack opened, poured out the geniod.
BinYAHtii quivered, hummed with power, put out a pulsing red aura, calling, calling the geniod to it: hungry hungry hungry: Hunger Incarnate. A HUNGER greater than even the geniod’s. Demanding. Compelling.
The geniod struggled, screamed-and streamed in a river of light into the heart of the talisman.
BinYAHtii ate and ate, ate them all, its power song sinking into subsonics.
The river vibrated, distorted, took on one shape, then another, then was Palami Kumindri half submerged in the liquid light. “The Promise,” she screamed. “We obeyed in all things. The Promise. Pay us what you promised.”
The God spoke, hits multiple voices like a swarm of locusts buzzing. “This is MY reality. What made you think I’d let you eat it bare? You’ve lived well enough. I owe you nothing. I used you and now I purge you. Consider it the price you pay for the worlds you have destroyed.” H/it sounded prim and complacent. Wit drove the geniod into the Hunger of BinYAHtii until every fleck of light had vanished and the talisman glowed like a small red sun.
H/its power enormously increased, the god reached out and PUT HATS HANDS on them: *Settsimaksimin/Simmss *Brann/WakKerrcarr* *Yaril/Jaril* *Danny Blue/Felsrawg* *Trago* *Korimenei* Wit seized hold of them, turned them to face BinYAHtii. H/it seized hold of the Great Talismans and pulled at them, drawing the stone bearers with them into the heart of the Hexa, drawing them closer and closer to BinYAHtii, chanting all the time in its harsh insectile voices, faster and faster, the force in the machine words (if they were words) increasing, the rhythm more and more compelling.
They fought.
They struggled to join against him.
They could not touch, physically or psychically. The god held them separate, held them that way until h/it managed to bring them to the Hexa-center.
Maksim’s grand basso broke free suddenly, battered at the humming clicking tweeting chant, joined a moment later by the grand baritone of Tak WakKerrcarr, the Voices of Sorceror Primes at their most powerful, most urgent. They slowed the inward creep, they couldn’t stop it.
Closer and closer to BinYAHtii h/it forced them. Maksim’s arm jerked out, out of his control, he held Shaddalakh before him like an offering.
Danny’s arm jerked out, out of his control, he held Kiukesharna before him like an offering.
Brann’s arm jerked out, out of her control, she held Massulit cupped in the palm of her hand, held it like an offering.
Trago’s arms jerked out, out of his control, he held. Harra’s Eye between his two hands, held it like an offering.
Frunzacoache flew out from Korimenei’s breast, dragging her with it as it sought the middle, offering itself.
Yaril and Jaril dissolved from their sphere into twin bipedal shapes, moved side by side, each with an arm about the other’s waist, moved with staggering, reluctant steps toward the middle. Jaril’s arm stretched straight before him, Churrikyoo cupped in the palm of his hand, held like an offering to that demanding red Hunger throbbing at the Hexa-center.
Slowly, inexorably, resisting h/it all the way anyway they could, the stone bearers and their companions drew closer and closer to the HUNGER.
They touched it.
At the same instant the six talismans touched the seventh.
reality dissolves
ego-centers hover in a blinding burning golden featureless nothingness
hang disembodied, self-aware in only the dimmest sense
wait
are aware of waiting without being aware of time
are aware of waiting without being aware of purpose
are finally aware of otherness otherwhereness
six point-nodes of power tremble in a burning featureless nothingness
they begin to move
they swim toward certain ego-centers
they touch certain ego-centers, merge, with them
ego-centers sense imminent change which is a change in itself
no time has passed
an eternity has passed
nothingness EXPLODES
2
Danny Blue finished the step he’d started ten subjective years before and nearly tripped over Felsrawg who was crouching on the roadway in front of him. He took her hand, pulled her to her feet.
“What happened?” Felsrawg turned her head from side to side, startled by the strangeness around her. “Where are we?”
“Skinker world, from the look of it.”
‘•What?”
“Another reality, Felsa, I doubt you’re going to like it. No gods here.”
“Hah, that so. I like it already.” She shied as a skip went groaning past overhead. “What…”
Danny looked from her to the skip vanishing in the distance. What am I going to do with you, he thought. You’re a survivor, but it’ll take some doing to catch up on a good ten millennia of technological development between one breath and the next. He started walking; Felsrawg was still lost in shock and let him get several steps ahead. She gave a sharp exclamation and trotted after him; when she caught up, she walked beside him staring round with interest and uneasiness at an array of vegetation odd enough to start her licking her lips and touching the knives hidden under her long loose sleeves.
She shied again as a ground vehicle clattered past, the Skinker in it turning to stare at them from bulging plum-colored eyes. “Demon!”
Danny scratched at his stubble, sighed. His immediate future looked a lot more interesting than comfortable. “No demon, Felsa. You start acting evil to these Skinkers and I’ll thump you good. This is their world. You hear?”
She scowled at him, shrugged. “Demon,” she said stubbornly, but relented enough to promise a minimal courtesy. “Just keep them away from me. “ -
Gods, Danny thought, xenophobe on top of everything else. He ran a hand though his hair. Tungjii Luck, if I ever go back there, so help me, I swear I’ll put matches to your toes. He jerked to a stop as a tiny Tungjii sitting on an airbubble floated past his nose. The god twiddled hisser fingers, winked and vanished. Danny glanced at Felsrawg, but she was kicking along staring at a pair of hitsatchee posts planted beside an U-tree in bud. He stopped, felt the buds. They still had the fuzz on. Either he was coming back in the same season, maybe the same day in the season, or the time spent in that other reality had gone past between one blip and the next in this. He frowned at the sun. Not quite that fast. It was morning then, it’s near sundown now. If this is the same day, I bet La Kuninga is ready to snatch me… he grinned and smoothed his hand over his thick wavy hair… bald again.
The traffic got heavier; Felsrawg stopped twitching as the groundcars rumbled past, but she was still taut with a feeling half-fear, half-loathing. She kept snatching glances at him as if she expected him to turn into a slick skinned six-limbed hzardoid. When they reached the rim of the town, he stopped her. “Felsa, best thing for you is keep your mouth shut and do what I do. In a way it’s too bad the jump here gave you interlingue, there’s a lot to be said for dumbness covering ignorance.”
She gave him a fulminating look, but dropped a step behind him, even followed him into a ribbajit without corn-
ment. He dropped on the tattered seat, shifted over when a broken spring gave him a half-hearted poke. “Port,” he said and settled back as the jit trundled off.
Felsrawg spread her hand on her knee, exposing the skry rings, watching them from under her lashes.
Danny chuckled. “They won’t read, Felsa. This is a machine, it runs on batteries, not magic. Nothing stranger than a… um… a loom or a waterwheel.”
“There’s nothing to make it move and there’s no driver.”
“It moves, doesn’t it. Go with the flow, Fey.”
She was silent for several minutes as the ribbajit clunked around the edge of the town. “Why am I here, Danny?”
“You want me to explain the multiverse?”
“Fool! You know what I mean. You belong in this place. I don’t. “
He touched the pocket where Klukesharna had somehow inserted itself during the crossing between realities; he had a suspicion the thing had imagined some kind of link between him and Felsrawg just because she was standing beside him in that cave. Typical computer-think if you could even say a hunk of iron could think. “You do now. Better get used to it.”
“Send me back.”
“Can’t. There’s no magic here.” He said that flatly, giving her no room for argument. He believed it mostly, told himself that Tungjii’s wink was imagination, nothing more. The ribbajit clanked to a stop by the hitsatchee posts outside the linkfence that ran around the stretch of metacrete the locals called a starport. “We’re here,” he said. “Come on.”
“What’s here?”
“I don’t know. Let’s go see.”
##
A tall bony blonde woman with a set angry face was snapping out orders to a collection of Skinkers using motorized assists to load crates and bundles on the roller ramp running into the belly of her battered freetrader; now and then she muttered furious asides to the short man beside her.
