“The Homeland, as I once understood it, does not exist,” Gloristar began. “There is no distant shore where the righteous go. There is no existence beyond this one.”
“Okay,” Ard said, seating himself heavily on the edge of the table. “Let’s just get the discouraging bit out first, then.”
“I am the true Homeland,” Gloristar said, “and any who become like me can find this perfection. I am what was once called Othian.”
“We’ve been calling you a Glassmind,” said Raek.
“Is Othian a Trothian word?” Quarrah asked.
“It is from a language that precedes Trothian,” she answered. “It is the pure language that revealed itself to my mind at the time of transformation. In your tongue, Othian would be translated to mean one who is like the gods.”
“The gods…” Ard leaned forward. “What do you know about them?”
“Only what I learned from the renna spire on the seabed,” she replied. “The gods attempted to keep humankind contained. A portion of the people strayed beyond the borders and were inflicted with Moonsickness. Using dragon teeth, they transformed themselves into Othians. A great battle ensued, and the gods took those who had not transformed and created these high islands, filling in the rest of the world to drown the rebellious Othians.”
Ard clenched his fists in frustration. None of that was new. Gloristar’s surprise arrival should have brought all the answers he craved.
“But what happened to the gods?” Ard pressed. “Why is there no mention of them in Wayfarism?”
Gloristar shook her head. “That knowledge, among much else, was kept from me at the time of my transformation.”
“Kept from you?” Quarrah asked.
“By one who calls himself Centrum,” said Gloristar. “He was the first Othian in existence.”
“I don’t understand,” said Ard. “All the original Othians swam up from the depths. Ships unseen,” he quoted the historical reference. “Their race devolved and they turned into Trothians.”
“Yet I am here,” she said.
“Yeah, but you came later,” said Raek.
“And Centrum was before me.” Gloristar looked at each of them with her burning eyes. “He began the next wave of Othians, of which I am second.”
“So somebody figured out Metamorphosis Grit before Portsend?” Raek asked.
“It would seem so,” answered Gloristar. “All I know is that Centrum had already transformed before Portsend Wal came to my rescue at the Realm’s Moonsickness farm. Centrum was waiting for me.”
“You met him?” Quarrah asked.
“Not in the traditional sense.” Gloristar reached up and tapped a finger on her temple, sparks sizzling from her fingertips. “He was waiting for me here.”
“What did he say?” asked Ard.
“He told me we needed to join forces,” she replied. “To end civilization as we know it.”
“And I’m hoping you said, ‘No thanks’?” Ard checked.
“He told me that our minds must be aligned for this to happen.” She closed her terrible eyes again. “I resisted. He tried to kill me.”
“When?” Quarrah asked.
“After the transformation,” she said. “The night of the Cataclysm.”
“I don’t understand,” said Ard. “We were with you.”
“So was Centrum,” Gloristar said, opening her eyes. “He was with me in the throne room. And in the Old Post Lighthouse. He was in my mind, trying to extinguish my existence like the flickering flame of a candle.”
“You didn’t say anything,” said Ard. Not a word about her mental battle. What had she been going through?
“I didn’t understand it,” she replied. “I knew Centrum had information that I needed, but he would not yield it unless I submitted to him.”
“Well, it sounds like you did the right thing,” said Raek. “This Centrum fellow sounds like a real piece of slag.”
“You beat him?” said Ard. “Or is he still in there?”
“When that beam fell in the lighthouse, it cracked my skull.” Gloristar lowered her head to show the fractures. “After that, I could no longer hear him.”
“You think that crack broke the link between your minds?” Ard asked.
“Yes,” she answered, “though I am fortunate the damage was not more extensive. As an Othian, I am close to immortality. Age and disease have no hold on me, and my skin is too thick to be pierced by ball or blade. Shattering my skull is the only way I can taste death. If that beam had injured me any more than it did, I would not have recovered.”
“Hah!” Ard exclaimed. “That’s what I call a lucky break.”
“Ugh.” Quarrah shook her head at the pun.
“Too soon, Ard,” said Raek disapprovingly.
“What do you mean, too soon?” he retorted. “She’s been alive for two years. It’s not like her skull is suddenly going to cave in.”
“Do you think Centrum is still out there?” Quarrah asked, getting them back on track.
Gloristar nodded. “I have little doubt of it. But the fact that you have heard nothing from him gives me hope. It means he hasn’t completed the Sphere.”
Ard felt a chill pass through him, his mind begin to tingle. “You said something about it that night,” he said, voice soft. “When Shad Agaul died on the throne, Quarrah asked if there was anything you could do to help him. You said—”
“Not until the Sphere is complete.” Gloristar nodded. “Centrum was tempting me. He told me if we united, we could complete the Sphere. Then life, death, and time itself would be ours to shape.”
“The Sphere.” Ard squinted in puzzlement. “What is it?”
Gloristar drew a deep breath. “It is time and space perfected through an Othian.”
“I’m afraid I don’t follow,” said Raek.
“Imagine time as a line,” Gloristar began, drawing her finger through the air. “Events unfold, days unfold, in a linear fashion—one thing after the next.”
“Yep,” Raek said. “I’m with you so far.”
“But sometimes, time is circular.” Gloristar looped her finger backward.
“You’re talking about a Paladin Visitant,” said Ard.
“You know their true nature?” she asked, surprised.
Ard glanced at his companions. “We have it on good authority.”
Gloristar raised her hairless eyebrows. “This will simplify my explanation, then. Time becomes circular when a Paladin Visitant successfully appears at a point in the past. But that resets the timeline, starting a new line going forward.”
“Right,” Ard said. “Linear. Circular.”
“But what happens to the other lines?” Gloristar asked. “The timelines that were? Or the ones that might have been?”
Ard shook his head. “They don’t exist. There can be only one timeline. This one.”
“Yes,” said Gloristar. “But once the Sphere is complete, time can roll forward. And backward. And to either side.”
Ard slowly reached up and grabbed the sides of his head. What was Gloristar even describing? This was pure madness. A scripture from Wayfarist Voyage suddenly made sense to him.
Though we struggle in a line, the circle saves, and the sphere governs all.
“So you’re saying,” Raek said slowly, “that if Centrum builds his little Sphere, he could roll us all over to a different timeline? A timeline where he likes things better?”
“Not exactly,” answered Gloristar. “Life can only exist in one timeline. This one. Centrum referred to this as the Material Time. When time circles backward with the appearance of a Paladin Visitant, the Material Time begins anew from that point. The previous line is erased, becoming one of an infinite number of shadow timelines where things are Immaterial.”
“Sparks, that hurts my brain,” Ard admitted. He’d had four years to iron out the idea of circular time. It was what had scared King Pethredote into killing the dragons. He’d tried to eliminate any possibility of another Palad
in Visitant resetting the Material Time and turning this one into an immaterial shadow.
“I can’t wrap my head around this Spherical idea,” Ard continued. “If things only exist here, what benefit would Centrum gain by having time roll sideways into an immaterial shadow?”
“I do not fully understand it myself,” Gloristar replied. “As I said, he blocked much from my mind. But he promised me that Spherical Time would usher in a new era of limitless power.”
“You believe him?” Ard asked. “You think something like that is possible?”
“I do,” Glorisar answered solemnly. “Wayfarism teaches something very similar. A time when anything would be possible. When wealth would be found in overabundance, and death would have no power.”
“The Homeland, right?” Quarrah asked.
But Ard shook his head. “She’s talking about the Final Era of Utmost Perfection.”
“That is the time when all living souls will dwell in peace upon the Homeland,” explained Gloristar.
“Well, I don’t like it,” Raek declared. “Sounds like utmost horror to me—time rolling this way and that…”
“How does Centrum plan to complete the Sphere?” Quarrah asked.
“He withheld that information from me,” Gloristar answered.
“Surprise,” muttered Raek.
“But I know he can’t do it alone,” she continued. “Wherever he is, Centrum will try to create more Othians. And when he does, that will be the beginning of the end of human civilization.”
“Hedge Marsool,” Ard whispered.
Quarrah’s eyes grew wide. “He told us he knows how to make more Othians. Flames. What if he created Centrum in the first place?”
Ard nodded. “It’s possible. Even likely. And it makes the job that much more important. We get him a dragon and he doesn’t create more Glassminds.”
“Spark the job!” Raek cried. “I don’t trust anything Hedge Marsool says. Here’s another idea—kill Hedge and deal with Centrum when, or if, he ever shows himself.”
“If we kill Hedge, we lose the chance to find out what else he knows,” said Ard. “Or who else knows what he knows. And right now, he has us at an advantage with that Future Grit.”
“Future Grit?” questioned Gloristar.
“That’s what we’re calling it,” he said.
“We’re not committed to the name,” Raek cut in.
“Anyway,” continued Ard, “we think it’s a new liquid Grit type that allows our unwanted employer to see what we’re going to do before we do it. Have you heard of anything like this?”
“No,” replied Gloristar.
“We’re not even sure it’s a thing,” said Quarrah. Why was she fidgeting so much?
“It’s definitely a thing,” Ard rebutted. “I snagged a vial of it off his belt.”
“You snagged a vial of something,” Raek corrected. “And now we’ll never know what it was because you smashed it on the deck of the Shiverswift.”
Quarrah let out a self-satisfied laugh over that.
“What effect did it have?” Gloristar asked.
“As far as I could tell,” said Quarrah, “the only thing that Grit did was create a look of pure stupefaction on Ardor Benn’s face.”
This time Raek burst out laughing, and Ard stood up, trying to regain control of the conversation.
“I think we digress,” he said. “The point is, we can’t abandon Hedge’s demands now. Come on, Raek. We’ve never been ones to turn our backs like that. We continue with the job. Especially now.” He reached out and shook the backpack on the table. “All our hard work came right back to us. If that isn’t a sign that we should continue, I don’t know what is.”
I always had a strong grasp of my role in things. It only started slipping when I finally admitted that others had more to offer.
CHAPTER
16
Nemery woke with a start, even though Mohdek’s touch had been gentle. She was surprised to see that the sun was up, though it hadn’t been bright enough to awaken her between the shade of the trees and the thick storm clouds overhead. Either that, or she’d just been really tired.
“I told you not to let me fall asleep, Moh,” she scolded.
Silently, Mohdek pointed across the grassy slope to a line of figures descending from Goldred’s Scramble. But Nemery quickly counted nine of them, instead of the eight sets of footprints they’d seen going up.
“Legien Dyer is with them.” Mohdek answered her unasked question. She squinted at the hikers, but couldn’t see faces at this distance. Yet one thing was true, even if she couldn’t see it.
“They’re Moonsick,” she whispered, as if the truth of it were hitting her for the first time. “All of them.”
Nemery had seen her share of Moonsick people during her time on Pekal. Blind and mute, their wanton violence falling on anything that moved. And even sometimes things that didn’t.
She’d had to put down a handful of them. They were terrible, frightening creatures, with bruised skin thick enough to stop her arrowheads. Their blood-red eyes were the most effective targets, as brutal as it sounded. Perhaps it was callous of her, but she always felt like she was doing them a favor by snuffing out their miserable existence.
But Nemery Baggish had never seen anyone so fresh into Moonsickness. These nine hikers walked like civilized people, their eyes and minds not yet tainted. Only a few hours in, they would still have their voices. But Nemery didn’t fool herself. They were dying. An awful, torturous death.
“This was a mistake,” Mohdek said. “We should have rescued that young woman last night when their numbers were fewer.”
Nemery shook her head. “We talked about it, Moh. We have to see how this plays out. If she really has something that could save people from Moonsickness, isn’t it worth sticking around to watch?”
“I fear you place too much faith in this Glassmind cult.”
“Faith is too strong a word,” replied Nemery. “I’m just curious to see what happens. Besides, we’ve got time. We can follow them for days, so long as we rescue her before those Bloodeyes get ripe and start tearing the group apart.”
She gathered her quiver and began tying it around her waist. “We need to get close enough to hear what they’re saying. I’m going back to the boulder.”
“In broad daylight?” Mohdek cried. “You’ll be noticed for sure.”
“Then we cut through these trees and sneak up on them from the downhill side,” she proposed.
Mohdek nodded. “All right. But we need to act fast.”
Nemery pulled on her pack and bow. “I’m just waiting for you.”
They moved deeper into the trees, the scent of dust and pine filling her senses. The forest quickly grew dense, the crisp air untouched by today’s sunlight, still clinging to night’s chill.
In the dim lighting, Nemery let Mohdek take the lead, picking their path carefully through the thick underbrush. They moved straight downhill at a slow and steady pace before hooking back around, following a ravine until the camp came into view through a tangle of branches.
She and Mohdek shed their packs in the ravine’s bottom. Here, the canopy of trees was thin enough that a crusty bank of snow had fallen through, lying untouched by the summer sun. They crawled up the slope on their bellies, finally cresting the side of the ravine just in time to see the hikers reach the campsite.
“My friends!” called the man leading them. He was tall and well built—the figure of a man who took exceptional care of his body. His skin was browned from the sun, and his sandy-colored hair was cropped short. He looked to be roughly the age of Nemery’s father, though her papa hadn’t been nearly as robust when she’d last seen him. Despite this man’s militant stature, his face was friendly, and his expression warm.
“Herald Garifus!” Carpen greeted the man with a firm embrace. “How do you feel?”
The two men pulled apart and Nemery could see that Garifus Floc was smiling. “We have slept among the dragons,”
he announced to the campers. “And we have discovered that they snore.” This was met with boisterous laughter from both hikers and campers.
He’s trying to keep everyone at ease, Nemery realized. The man was charismatic, she’d give him that. A man like that could certainly gain hundreds of followers. But Nemery didn’t think he was charming enough to hike all the way to Pekal’s summit to get Moonsick…
“Hold on. Who is this?” Trenchy pointed a finger at the rear of the group. From her spot, Nemery could barely make out the worn face of Legien Dyer.
“The father of our very own Feltman Dyer,” introduced Garifus. “He came all this way to join us on the summit.”
Legien didn’t protest. Had he already lost his voice? Or maybe he had simply said everything he could, with no more words to spend. Maybe he’d finally come to terms with the fact that he couldn’t save his son. Too late now. Legien Dyer looked like a broken man—physically and emotionally.
“I thought Feltman said his father died,” replied one of the other campers.
“He will.” A young man stepped forward. The physical likeness to Legien Dyer was immediately obvious to Nemery. “Soon enough.”
“Peace, Feltman,” said Garifus, reaching out and placing a hand on the lad’s shoulder. “The Moon has taken him the same as us. He will undergo the transformation at our side.”
“But he’s not one of us,” said a woman standing next to Legien Dyer.
“Would the Prime Isless forbid any worthy person to reach the Homeland?” Garifus rebutted. “Would she deem him Settled because of his love for his son? Legien Dyer may not be one of us, but he has sacrificed everything to come this high. One day soon, every commoner will join us. Why not begin today?”
“But how will we know if he’s worthy?” asked another woman.
“The Homeland will judge him,” replied Garifus. “But come! Let us speak of more hopeful things. The hour is finally at hand, my friends. Take a moment to remember the faithful who have tried before us.” He bowed his head in reverential silence. “But the Homeland has smiled upon us, and this morning’s outcome will be more favorable. I feel it in my bones.”
The Last Lies of Ardor Benn Page 26
