by John Daulton
She hoped maybe they would run off when they got into the thicker part of the jungle, but they did not. They kept up with perfect ease, each of them running up and over obstacles. At one point, the one on Pernie’s right had to run off into the distance to get round the curve of stone that slowly rose up and became at first a sheer cliff and then a slick overhang for a time. But it came back when Pernie swam farther along. It ran right down the rock face once the overhang became simply vertical again, like a spider on a wall, and when the wall of stone diminished and became low, moss-covered bank again, it scrambled along as if nothing inconvenient had happened to it at all.
The creatures stayed with her for the better part of what she gauged to be an hour, until finally the little stream meandered its way into a large pool, gently tumbling down a short slide of rocks, over which Pernie slid before being dumped into the pool. She saw that three other streams all joined here, and it was with some hope that she looked back to see if her many-legged assailants were finally going to be thwarted by this watery impasse.
Sure enough, both of them were atop the slope of stone, neither willing to get their feet wet apparently, and both staring down at her, waving their eyes on those long, sinuous eyestalks, and emitting their strange twittering. She wondered what they were saying to one another as they looked down. She hoped they would remember not to mess with her again.
Suddenly, as if startled, they both spun and ran away, the movement so fast their turning and departure made them look like vanishing puffs of smoke. Pernie laughed. Finally. She also realized as they ran off that she could see again, and had been able to since she’d teleported into the creek. That was a fortunate accident, she thought. It must have been the powder in her eyes, she realized. What else could it be?
A nasal, keening sort of sound spun her around to look behind her. Four giant creatures, a little bit like dragons but standing on just two legs, stared across the pool at her. The smallest of them could not be less than three spans high, and the largest one was pushing five. They seemed to balance upon their tree-trunk legs, sort of stooped and tilting forward, with long tails that thrust out rigidly behind them and moved slowly side to side. Like the insects that had just been chasing her, these too had eyes that moved on long stalks, though not so long proportionately as the bugs’ had been, and all eight of those eyes watched her as she trod water considering her new predicament. She moved herself farther away, daring a glance down to see how deep the pool was. It was clear enough to see the bottom, no more than four spans deep. The big one could wade right in and get her if it wanted to.
She slowly swam away from them, backing toward the opposite edge of the pool. Another nasal whine sounded from behind her. She turned to see another one of the monsters standing there. It stalked back and forth along the edge of the water, gnashing its teeth hungrily. From the side, she could see that it had stubby little wings on its back, like the wings of a bird that’s just been hatched, wings that didn’t seem to have grown with the rest of the creature.
This one roared at her as it made its way back and forth along the edge of the pool. It continued to do so for quite a while. Roaring and pacing. She couldn’t get out downstream now either.
Pernie looked back and forth from the four to the one. Hardly any difference when it came down to it. Four or one, she couldn’t get past any of them.
She looked back up the way she’d come, from atop the waterfall. She didn’t think they could get up that. Maybe she could teleport again.
She closed her eyes and tried to remember what she’d done all those other times. What she’d done to get out from under those wide, flat bugs with all their gripping legs. What she’d done to get to Master Altin when the orc attacked.
She thought and thought and thought. But nothing came. Still she trod water in the center of the pond. She cursed Master Grimswoller for not teaching her how to use her teleportation magic. He’d been too busy teaching stupid healing instead. Healing flowers. Who cared about stupid flowers? Teleportation was real magic. It was magic like Master Altin had. He was the greatest teleporter in all the world, a Z-ranked teleporter, the highest of the high. Nobody had that much power. And she was going to be his apprentice one day.
Maybe after she finished learning how to be the Sava’an’Lansom. That wouldn’t be so bad, learning that. They could teach her that first. Then she could go back and finish off that Earth woman, Orli Pewter. Pernie might have missed with the blaster when she tried to shoot Orli last time, but next time there wouldn’t be an elf to save her. Then Pernie could marry Master Altin as soon as she was old enough. She figured that would be pretty soon anyway.
The loud gnashing teeth of the strange dragons turned her toward the bank with the four monsters on it. There were figures moving all over them. It took her a moment to realize it, but it appeared that the monsters had suddenly broken out with a terrible case of elves. The four beasts, in that span of time Pernie had spent in thought, had contracted the outbreak and were now crawling with elves, who filled the beasts’ leathery hides full of spear holes.
Pernie watched in awe as a score of elves dispatched the monsters so quickly it was as if the great creatures were but likenesses of themselves, illusions easily dismissed with the prod of a spear point. They hardly had time to snap their jaws or swing their mighty tails around before they were all dead.
And in the next set of breaths, four of the elves, just four, ran around the pool, leapt the stream, and set themselves on the lone creature on the other side. It was dead in just over twelve seconds.
Pernie smiled as she watched. They were wonderful killers. She’d never seen anything like it except in those few moments she’d watched the Queen’s assassin, Shadesbreath, do his work fighting to free her in the stairway beneath Tytamon’s rooms. There was a grace to their brutality that moved her like music, a song in harmony with her very soul. Not that she understood such things in such terms, of course, but she felt them, deeply. She was affected by what she saw as others are affected by great art or profound philosophy.
By the time the elves were pulling her out of the water, she was laughing, just this side of hysterically.
Chapter 3
Sir Altin Meade stood beside his fiancée, Orli Pewter, staring openmouthed at the Queen. Her Majesty, Queen Karroll of Kurr, sovereign of all humanity on planet Prosperion, glared back down at the two of them from her throne, her expression implacable, cold as the marble columns rising to the ceiling high above. “Absolutely not,” Her Majesty said as she summed up her decision. “The fact that Director Bahri or anyone else in the Northern Trade Alliance or, frankly, anyone on Earth at all is willing to consider this idea is appalling. The Hostiles killed hundreds of thousands of people on their world too. I cannot fathom what the man is thinking. Perhaps he isn’t. He is a kind soul. I gathered that about him immediately. Kindness is a fine thing, but when it is not convenient or prudent to practice it, I do not.”
Orli swept a strand of platinum-blonde hair out of her eyes with her hand. The movement of her head, shaking incredulously as it had been for the last several minutes, kept putting the strand there. “But Your Majesty,” she said. “How can you say no after all that Blue Fire has done for us, for everyone? If it weren’t for her, both our worlds, Earth and Prosperion, would be destroyed. We remain alive because of her, and yet she is lying out there in space right now, all alone, in pain. Suffering. Surely you can’t intend to just leave her there like that.”
“I know very little of pain that can be suffered by these living planets of yours, Miss Pewter. The only one of my experience, your Blue Fire, has, in the end, done far more damage than good to humanity. You credit her with our salvation, but to be frank, were it not for her actions to begin with, all those people back on Earth would still be alive—not to mention the entire lost population of that other planet, what was it called, Andalia? I believe your sympathies are misplaced, if not entirely, certainly to a ponderous degree—though I’ll grant they do spea
k to your kind heart in their way, much as Director Bahri’s do.”
Orli began to speak again, but Her Majesty cut her off.
“Miss Pewter, that will be all. I’ve made my decision, and you begin to press the limits of your privilege, even as the …,” the pause was long as the Queen’s eyes narrowed, her face taking on a cunning, almost predatory, aspect for the span of a single heartbeat, before returning to its normal stoic state, “… as the fiancée of the Galactic Mage.” Were it possible to fling dung at a word with the inflection of one’s voice, it could be said such was done at the reference to their continued state of betrothal.
Altin noted the tone, and by his posture, and the long breath of air that slowly escaped his lips, the Queen knew full well his displeasure, as did all the courtiers along the edges of the great chamber. Such was the nature of that sigh that many of the silk-bedecked lords and lace-beplumed ladies all stopped in their own private conversations to watch should Her Majesty’s wrathful scepter be made to fly. The War Queen, as she was known throughout the land, was not one to be sighed at like some child beneath the impatient eye of a beleaguered parent, and such was the nature of Altin’s long and audible breath. They all paused, some slinking behind the protection of a colonnade, others behind the armored figure of a nearby officer of the army or the Palace Guard, watching and awaiting her certain ire.
“By the gods, Sir Altin,” erupted the Queen as if on cue. “Don’t you dare blow that insolent wind at me. I say, I will have you in chains if you make another such. Your title does not give you privilege to breathe your discontent at me.”
Altin made a prudent inclination of his head. “I’m sorry, Your Majesty. My frustration got the better of me.”
“I should say it did. You are fortunate that I adore you so, or I might have had to sic my elf on you.” She glanced back over her shoulder to a space of wall behind her golden throne, which to all present appeared simply that, a space of wall, the veined amber hues of polished marble beneath the royal coat of arms. Despite the vacancy, all in attendance also knew who stood there—or at least who likely stood there—for that was the place where Shadesbreath waited in attendance to the Queen as her Royal Assassin. It was impossible to say if he was present or not, as always, but the mystery was, as Her Majesty often put it, “part of his charm.”
“Thank you,” Altin said, swallowing his irritation. She normally didn’t put him through this sort of thing, which proved that she was still angry about the wedding that he and Orli had “tried to deprive her of.” For what else could the derisive sneer have been?
And that might be of some use to him. If Her Majesty was still in a mood about his and Orli’s having evaded her attempts to throw them a huge gala wedding—which she still held as a possibility now that he and Orli had been forced to put off their wedding aboard the spaceship, what with Pernie’s abduction barely a week ago—perhaps he could turn the misfortune into something of an advantage after all. “I am grateful for Your Majesty’s lenience” was all he said.
“As you should be,” said the Queen. “Now do be a good boy and go help your teleporter guildmates. I want my space-post network under way. I’m in a fit of anticipation awaiting the absolute colonization of outer space. My diviners do nothing day in and day out but look for possibilities. I can hardly contain my enthusiasm. I feel as if I am twenty again.”
“Indeed, Your Majesty,” Altin said. “The work has begun, and the Transportation Guild Service offices are abuzz with activity as we speak.” Orli shifted uncomfortably next to him, her own agitation palpable. “However, My Queen, if I might be indulged a moment further on both regards, I would like to point out that there are issues of security involved with setting up TGS offices all across the galaxy. As you know, space travel is dangerous. It seems to me that the best way to ensure the safety of our people out there—particularly those manning the small TGS offices you intend to set up for our Earth friends—is to make as many allies, as many good, strong allies, as we possibly can. Which certainly means that we should make them out of all the known species that occupy our ….” He turned to Orli, his brow furrowing as he struggled for the word. “What do you call our part of space?”
“Sector,” she supplied.
“Yes, our sector.” He turned back to the Queen seated upon the dais above them on her golden throne. Were it not for the crimson velvet cushions, she, in her golden plate mail armor, might blend right in with her chair. Perhaps that was by design. “My point, Your Majesty, is to say that I believe, as your Galactic Mage, that the most prudent course to ensuring the fastest and most thorough expansion of Her Majesty’s influence and power throughout the stars would be to secure such relationships as are possible, whenever possible. Given that Blue Fire is one of only four planets we know about that supports any kind of life, it seems beyond essential that we do what we can to secure to our bosom as quickly as possible that rather significant twenty-five percent of them that Blue Fire represents, especially as hers is one that is still home to an intelligent species.”
Her Majesty scowled down at him, her eyes narrowed to slits, and for a time, the movement in the galleries, which had just begun to relax and murmur again, once more tightened up behind the columns and armored folk. But then, just as the storm had begun upon the royal brow, it vanished, replaced by mirth. “By the gods, Sir Altin, you’ve been in Crown City too long. You’re starting to sound like one of us. I think I liked the barefooted country boy better. At least I could see him coming when he thought to manipulate me.”
“It appears your vision is still fine, My Queen.”
She laughed again. “Oh, dear, but you really are turning into a syrupy denizen of politics, aren’t you? You’re going to be as bad as Vorvington soon.” This, of course, reddened the face of the pudgy Earl of Vorvington, who stood in the gallery not far from the throne, as he regularly did.
Altin smiled, his head tipping sideways and his eyebrows rising to acknowledge the truth of it.
“Fine, Sir Altin. I will indulge your idea to a point, though I will not give my approval for it. Besides, I’ve already spoken to Director Bahri about this issue. He has given his qualified permission on the condition that you not attempt to move the other Hostile’s heart or whatever it is you have planned until all the dead Hostile orbs, their husks as it were, are removed from the Earth’s solar system. Is that not correct, Miss Pewter?”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Orli said. “That was his condition. That, and that the NTA has emplacements built there before we try. He wants us to be ready to destroy the heart chamber again if things don’t go according to plan.”
“I believe you are forgetting his final condition,” she said, a saccharine smile upon her lips.
“Yes, Your Majesty. There was one more. He also insisted that we do nothing without your consent.”
“That is correct. And, my dear, your plan needs a lot more … massaging, before I will consider it.” She shot a glance at Altin that suggested his suspicions about her motives might be right. “I will, however, grant you permission to attempt to convince me again when you have put a little more work into the idea, something besides the great bleeding of that kind heart of yours, Miss Pewter. I think you ought to do a good deal more looking into what it is you plan to do. You say you want to bring Yellow Fire back to life, but do you even know if the host world, the Hostile you called Red Fire, is truly dead? You say that Yellow Fire has merely been dormant for a million years, that Blue Fire’s mate was just sleeping after some sunny accident rather than truly dead. And if we suppose it to be so, then what’s to say that Red Fire hasn’t simply been dormant these last five months since you say you blew him up? What evidence do you have that your explosives worked? Or, for that matter, that any of what you plan to do next will work as well?”
Altin started to answer for Orli, his mouth opening reflexively, but he shut it without speaking. He had no way to confirm that the Hostile world known as Red Fire, the world responsible for over a m
illion human deaths, was truly dead. The orbs attacking planet Earth had all stopped moving, their angry red colors turned to ashen gray. That had seemed like evidence enough, but perhaps it was merely circumstantial at best.
“Yes,” said the Queen, seeing the same expression on both faces before her. “You don’t know a great deal. And while my gratitude to Blue Fire is as vast as the galaxy itself, I think the two of you ought to go gather the facts before you press me for my permission on such a poorly planned and poorly researched epic undertaking. Make sure it’s dead, Sir Altin. With absolute certainty. As the Galactic Mage, that is most assuredly your jurisdiction. And find out if the yellow one is actually still alive. I hardly think it befits my position to endorse an idea that is barely half-baked, wouldn’t you agree?” Again came the cunning look, flitting as it did like a flung dart meant for Altin alone, the faintest narrowing of the royal eyes. She smiled, barely perceptibly, and the light coming through the stained glass windows high above glinted beneath those lowered eyelids.
Orli started to say something, but stopped. Altin was glad of that. Clearly she realized they’d just gotten Her Majesty to move from absolute “no” to something approaching a maybe.
“You are, as always, quite right, My Queen,” he said. “Thank you, Your Majesty.”
“Oh, stop it,” the War Queen said. “You and I both know those words taste like bile upon your tongue. If I truly wanted another Vorvington, I’d simply get myself one. Miss Pewter, what is it your people call that duplication process I’ve been reading about? Was it cloaking? That can’t be right?”
“Cloning, Your Majesty,” said Orli with the first vestiges of a smile.
“Ah, yes, that was it. Cloning. I believe I would rather have the NTA scientists whip me up a whole batch of fat Vorvingtons than see you turned to another fawning courtier, Sir Altin. Gods know I’ve more than enough backstabbing and arse kissing as it is.”
