The Lord of the Sands of Time

by Hubbert, Jim

  Despite her astonishment, Miyo maneuvered to one side of the beast. As it raised the scythe, she struck with all her strength, but the branch merely shivered from the impact. Then a tremendous blow knocked her flat.

  “Kan!”

  Kan threw himself atop Miyo, shielding her with his body. The scythe opened his back. To Miyo, everything seemed to be taking place in some other world.

  “Kan…”

  “Quickly…” The boy tried to speak.

  “Kan?”

  “Go quickly…” A whispered groan. Bright blood welled up from the gash, pooling on his back in a crimson lake. The mononoké emitted a creaking sound. It might be tiring, but it showed no signs of breaking off the attack. Again, it raised its club. Before it could strike, Miyo hoisted Kan’s slender frame onto her back and fled, stumbling forward as she ran.

  “You think I’d leave you?” she yelled.

  She heard a series of sharp cracks, the mononoké raking the standing timber as it advanced. Its footfalls swept closer with horrifying speed. Miyo plunged forward, staggering, stumbling, slipping.

  Something hissed close by her ear. Miyo crouched lower, to crawl, scrabbling on all fours, climbing the slope, her pulse hammering. She gasped for air and pitched forward, eating a mouthful of dirt. She felt the rush of air as giant legs planted themselves on either side of her.

  Miyo could see the western ocean shining in the distance. She looked up at the belly of the beast as it stooped over her. Strange, she thought. To die like this. We could have gone the other way, over the far side of the ridge.

  Was this retribution for daring to leave her realm?

  A sudden sequence of huge booms split the sky over her head. The shockwave pressed her flat against the earth.

  “Bolt fire ineffective. Target appears to have withdrawn voluntarily. No counters, traps, or criticals. I’d say this is a rather low-grade RET, a newborn Reaper.”

  “Spare me the commentary. Any nests in the area? What about FETs?”

  Two voices—one female, one male—but Miyo understood nothing they said. Her terror was unabated. Whatever it was that had brought down that roar like thunder over her head, it could only be another mononoké.

  She struggled with bleary eyes to peer around her. The monster was gone. In its place stood a man, tall and powerfully built. He was arrayed like a soldier, encased in soot-blackened armor webbed with cracks. A helmet completely covered his head, its visor concealing his face. In his right hand he gripped an enormous sword. He was clearly the source of the male voice but was like no man Miyo had ever seen.

  “Both humans are viable. The female has minor injuries. The male has lost a considerable amount of blood. Loss of consciousness in six minutes.” Again the female voice, but no one was there. The soldier approached and spoke to Miyo.

  “Let me help the boy.”

  Miyo could not understand him, but she knew he was no threat by the way he held his sword, low and casually. All she could think of was Kan. She eased him onto the ground. The horrible wound on his back seemed far beyond help, but she tore a strip from her hem and tried to bandage him.

  “Subject may survive one hour if blood loss is halted. If he’s to be left here, antibiotics are required.”

  The female voice. Miyo glanced up. To her amazement, the voice seemed to be coming from the sword—and the man looked to the sword as he answered.

  “Later. What about FETs?”

  “None detected, not even a comm net. This suggests that the RET has not been fully activated. Probably a stray,” said the sword.

  “It may be a stray, but it’s also a threat. Location?”

  “Thirty-five meters from your position and holding. O—look out!”

  A log hurtled from the trees, striking the soldier like a battering ram and flinging him through the air. The sword flew out of his hand and plunged into the ground, inches from Miyo. The mononoké scudded out of the woods and onto the ridge. It pounced on the soldier.

  “Sword!” As the soldier shouted, the monster’s heavy club swung down. With astonishing speed the soldier sprang to his feet, out of harm’s way. He touched his hip and a swarm of small stones flew at the beast and exploded in a flurry of detonations. The mononoké flinched for just a moment, then advanced as if it had hardly noticed. Swinging club, then scythe, then club again, it pressed the attack.

  “Throw me, woman.” Miyo was transfixed by the fighting, but when she heard the voice of the sword she wheeled in surprise. It spoke again.

  “Throw me to him. Now!”

  The blade was huge, gently curved. The spine was milky white, but the edge was transparent and shone with a blinding radiance. This was nothing like Kan’s sword, neither in make nor material. And it spoke!

  “Quickly, woman!”

  “Give me Cutty!” As sword and soldier called out to Miyo in the same moment, she understood. She wrenched the sword from the soil, marveling at its unexpected weight, and took a running start before flinging it through the air. Turning through its arc, the sword plunged grip first toward the soldier, who sprang to catch it.

  The blade flashed white.

  The giant’s upraised club arm dropped away like a stalk of grass beneath a razor. The swinging scythe shattered like glass. As the mononoké staggered, the sword swept across its belly. The soldier leaped atop the creature and hacked at the bug-like head, severing it from the body. Then he plunged the sword into the creature’s neck and twisted it. “Burn!” he roared.

  From the stump came a hissing sound like hot iron plunged in water, then a thin plume of smoke. The dismembered behemoth toppled backward as the soldier jumped down from it. The soldier stowed his sword in the sheath across his back and walked over to Miyo.

  Surely this was some waking dream. How could Miyo have defeated such a being? She might have needed a hundred soldiers or more, and a stout fort. They might have lured it into a deep pit. That was the only defense she could imagine. Yet this man took mere seconds to cleave the horror into pieces. Miyo knew no other legend to match it, and so she knew him, the ancient sage whose word was proclaimed throughout Heaven and Earth. There could be no other answer.

  “You are…the Messenger? Of the Laws?”

  The soldier spoke over his shoulder. “Language.”

  “There seems to be some vowel shift relative to the root stream, but the language is still recognizable as archaic Japanese. Shall I translate?”

  “Confirm the era and I’ll do it myself. Chronocompass reads two, four, eight CE. Yours?”

  “The same.”

  The soldier nodded and spoke to Miyo. “I am Messenger O. Do you understand?” O. The word for king, Miyo thought. “I understand. You are Messenger…O.”

  “I bring tidings of war.”

  Miyo lifted the hand she’d been pressing against Kan’s wound and bowed her head deeply. “Messenger O, I thank you. You have delivered us.”

  “Save it for later. Let’s have a look at the boy.”

  Miyo wordlessly yielded her place beside Kan. The Messenger leaned over the boy and touched his wound. Miyo caught a glimpse of blood-soaked white muscle through a gap in the bandage and reflexively turned away. After a few moments she looked back. Her eyes widened when she saw that the gash had been closed by a thin film.

  “His wound…” Miyo faltered.

  “There’s nothing I can do about the blood. He needs rest,” said the Messenger.

  “I have no words to thank you.” Miyo knelt, touching her forehead to the ground. Her eyes brimmed with tears of relief, but in another part of her mind she was beginning to feel uneasy. How would her ministers react to the coming of the Messenger, creator of the Laws? No doubt she would have to perform a divination to determine whether this event was propitious or not. But would tortoise shell or deer bone divination be enough? For an event of such momentous importance, someone might demand a sacrifice divination—the beheading of a condemned prisoner, with the future gleaned in the splash of blood.

&
nbsp; And Miyo would have to preside over the sacrifice. There is no need to go that far, she thought. Miyo wanted to avoid a sacrifice at all costs. The Messenger stood.

  “Tell me, woman. Is this your country? Are you a slave?”

  “No.”

  “An outsider? Do you know anyone living nearby? I need information on local geography and the state of affairs in this country. Do you also call this place Mount Shigi?” asked the Messenger.

  “Shiki. I know no one near here.”

  “You must know the way down the mountain, at least. I need to find a village. Show me the way.”

  “Why?”

  “I came to meet the ruler of this land. He must prepare for war.”

  Miyo looked up at him. The ruler? Did the Messenger say he had come to meet not officials of state but the nominal ruler? If so, there might be a way out—a way to force her ministers accept him. What she needed was to link this strange occurrence with everything she had learned over the years. It just might work. No—she was certain it would. After all, if this were a matter for divination, why had she not foreseen it?

  “Messenger O.” Miyo stood tall and looked straight into his eyes, so as not to be intimidated by his towering presence. “I am no foreigner. When I spoke before, I meant that I am not a slave.”

  “I see. A princess, then?”

  “No. I rule.”

  Miyo wiped her cheeks with care, revealing the tattoo of the shaman. She opened her tunic, exposing one breast, and drew forth the palm-sized bronze mirror. Carried as proof of her identity, this was the first time she had actually used it. She drew herself up, as if pronouncing an oracle, and solemnly spoke the name she had been given by kings and ministers.

  “I am Himiko, Ruler of Wa, Friend of Wei, Queen of the land of Yamatai.”

  They waited until dusk to set out. In the early morning hours they reached the capital of Yamatai, on the plain of Makimuku. They had traveled under the cover of darkness so that no one would see the imposing visitor, but that was not the only reason for the secrecy. The Messenger had to be received at the palace in a fitting manner. It would not do for him to slink inside.

  Miyo’s plan was this: First, she would conduct a divination at her own initiative, proclaim the oracle, and dispatch a party to the mountains. There, as predicted, they would discover the Messenger. Perhaps they would see signs of his power in the mononoké’s dismembered corpse. That way, the ministers would be unable to raise objections to receiving him. All in all, this was far better than telling them she had stumbled on the Messenger during the course of an outing.So Miyo did not return directly to the palace but brought the Messenger to kinsmen of Kan on the outskirts of the capital. Kan’s people received their unexpected visitors with astonishment, but when they saw Kan, borne on the Messenger’s back and gravely wounded, they dropped everything to tend him. Miyo watched silently from a corner of the tiny pit-house as Kan’s relatives boiled water, wiped the child clean, ground healing herbs, and applied a poultice to his injuries.

  While they nursed Kan, his father and white-haired grandsire glanced frequently at the visitors. Miyo ignored them, pretending not to notice. But the Messenger—sitting hunched over in the confines of the tiny hut—seemed nervous. “Queen Himiko,” he whispered.

  “Miyo.”

  “Miyo. You rule this land, don’t you? The court physicians, or your maidservants? Couldn’t they just as easily—”

  “The ruler of Wa does not leave her palace. The ruler does not leave, therefore neither do the court physicians.”

  “Of course…but can’t you tell them the boy was attacked outside the palace?” He glanced at the old man, who was taking care not to look at them directly. “Can you trust these people?”

  “Far better than my own ministers. We’ve known each other long, since I was a mere child.” For a brief moment, Miyo’s thoughts wandered back twenty years, to a time before the chiefdoms chose a shaman queen to rule over all. She had been the daughter of a village headman, covered with mud, playing hide and seek in the grass. Her family was very close to Kan’s, and they had showered her with millet cakes and gifts of fruit.

  Traces of that closeness endured, and when Miyo made one of her frequent visits, Kan’s people received her warmly, without question. But now a barrier of reverence and fear divided them. Miyo was here not as friend, but as sovereign; now too there was the Messenger. Plainly this was someone extraordinary. And so as ever—if not so much as with her maidservants, who dared not even meet her gaze—Miyo was cut off from the warmth of human tenderness.

  The firelight showed some color returning to Kan’s pale face, where not long ago he had seemed to be at death’s door. The Messenger turned to Miyo, who was staring fixedly ahead. “I think he’s out of danger.”

  Miyo took the hint. She rose to her feet. “Let’s go outside. It’s too crowded here.”

  They stepped outside and crossed the moat that encircled the cluster of houses. The chorusing of frogs enveloped them. No star gleamed through the thin cloud cover. The grainy moon, almost full, cast a gentle glow over the paddy fields. The Messenger sat down on the embankment.

  “Agriculture is far ahead of schedule,” he said quietly. “You’re diverting the Yamato River, aren’t you? That wasn’t supposed to happen till the Edo era.”

  “Eh-doh?”

  “Far in the future. But this whole area—it’s very impressive. You should only just be starting to carve cropland out of the silt. Overall, I’d say this is three centuries, in some ways, maybe thirteen hundred years ahead of the root chronology.”

  “I detected fore-and-aft rigged oceangoing vessels with keels in the harbor at Suminoé. The technology of seafaring is a millennium ahead of schedule.” Miyo heard the sword’s voice, but did not ask what it meant. Her lack of understanding frustrated her, but at the moment there was something she had to know.

  “Messenger O, what did you mean about preparing for war?”

  “Ah. That. Well, you must fight, or you will lose.”

  “Lose what?” asked Miyo.

  “In the near term, your lives. Ultimately, your species.” The word of the Laws, thought Miyo. Disaster is inevitable. Join hands or die. The Messenger turned to look at her. “You don’t believe me?”

  “Who is the enemy?”

  “They come from beyond this world. We call them ETs. Like the one you saw today, but traveling in packs. What you saw was real. So you must believe me.”

  “But everyone knows the mononoké are real,” said Miyo.

  “Do they, now?”

  “Many tales are told of them, in Wa and in the Chinese empires. They are terribly strong. Merciless monsters, yet not invincible, not like the spirits one can neither see nor hear. We people survive only because we continue to slaughter and vanquish them. But today was my first encounter with one. The village headmen say a plague of the beasts happens every few decades.”

  “They’re right.” The Messenger pounded a fist on the flat of his hand. “Wonderful. Excellent. If people in this era see things as you say, my task will be that much easier. Sometimes all I have to do is mention the creatures and people start making ready to flee. That’s not going to help. My message is this: the ETs must be destroyed. Instead of fleeing in fear, we must annihilate them.”

  “But why?” Miyo slowly ran her eyes over the soldier’s well-muscled body. “Did you not dispatch it with ease? Why not do the same with the rest?”

  “I could—fighting them individually. The one I killed was a stray, separated from the pack. Probably from a colony that arrived in ages past. What you saw today was nothing compared to the terror of the horde. Don’t you have records of anything like that?”

  Miyo paused, then spoke. “Yes. They say the empire of the Hsiung-nu, in the far west of China, was destroyed by them. The Hsiung-nu joined forces with the surrounding kingdoms to stop a huge army of mononoké, but were wiped out. It seems our good relations with Wei, Kushina, and Roma came out of this. I never believ
ed the story myself. So it was true after all.”

  “Very.”

  Miyo shuddered. An army of mononoké, strong enough to annihilate an empire? These were grim tidings indeed. “If these creatures are so frightful, I don’t see that we have the strength to vanquish them.”

  “No, it’s possible. They don’t come in force initially. First they build small nests and build up their numbers. To find and destroy a nest before they’ve had a chance to multiply is within your capabilities. Cutty will handle search and location. I need you to mobilize your forces. But first you must learn to make steel. Bronze swords like the boy’s won’t do at all.”

  “We know about steel,” Miyo said. The Messenger turned, his posture betraying disbelief. Miyo was glad of his astonishment, but checked herself from rejoicing. “Much steel was produced in Isumo, but it was forbidden. The mountains were left barren and rain washed down the poison. Is there a way to keep the poison from escaping?”

  “No. Even if there were, we can’t afford to worry about your environment. I want you to lift the ban and start producing as much as you can. Well, well. So you know about steel.”

  The Messenger nodded slowly, seemingly satisfied. Miyo suddenly sensed a deep fatigue behind his words and gestures, something she hadn’t noticed by day. The weariness didn’t seem physical—he’d carried Kan fifty ri, almost fourteen Roman miles—and she’d had trouble just keeping up with him. As far as physical fatigue was concerned, she needed rest more than he did. No, this was something deeper, a weariness of the soul. On impulse, Miyo leaned toward him. “Don’t you ever take off your helmet?”

  “Of course.”

  The Messenger turned toward her, grasped his close-fitting, bell-shaped helmet with both hands and lifted it off. Miyo was astonished to see a wiry, masculine face covered with stubble, close-cropped hair the color of dry grass, deep-set eyes, and a prominent nose. As he peered at Miyo—she couldn’t be certain in the darkness, but even his eyes seemed to be of some pale hue—the Messenger cocked his head amiably. “You don’t seem surprised.”