Lokant

by Charlotte E. English

  As if his weight gave it more substance than it might otherwise have enjoyed, Tren’s rock remained stationary as another Change passed. He stayed where he was as the moon’s light darkened to deep green and a dense evergreen forest took the place of the savannah. When the tower had been visible before, the reigning landscape had been an undulating whistworm meadow clustered with floral bushes, and Tren was hoping that the light would change to the purple he remembered quite quickly. So he waited on.

  But the third Change rolled around; the evergreen forest shimmered and vanished, and instead of the gentle meadow he was hoping for came a dull grey light and a rocky landscape.

  And barely twenty feet from where he sat roamed a muumuk.

  His first thought was a kind of gratitude that no muumuks had yet wandered into the Seven Realms through the unstable rogue gates. The creature was easily three times as tall at the shoulder as he was, its body so large and heavy that the ground shook when it moved. Its hide was a dull bronze colour, its eyes buried under folds of loose skin. This led to a lack of precision with its vision that boded ill for anything that managed to get under its enormous feet - and the muumuk tended to be willing to eat anything that it happened across.

  And of course it was lumbering its way directly towards him.

  He slid off the rock, trying to be quiet. Its vision might not be spectacular, but he had no idea whether its senses of smell and hearing were any better. Would it follow him? He opted to hide rather than run and tucked himself against the side of his rock that was furthest away from the muumuk. Drawing his sorcerous Cloak around himself, he prayed that sufficient shadow covered the ground here to allow him to blend in.

  Slowly, far too slowly for his liking, the muumuk lumbered past his hiding place and away. He held his posture for some minutes more, wondering as he did so about the mysterious Changes in this world. When the light altered and this landscape faded, what happened to the creatures that populated its surface? Where did those enormous muumuk beasts go? And why was he himself not carried with them? As far as he knew, no one had yet produced a satisfactory answer to that question. It was one of the many mysteries of the Off-Worlds.

  He stood up at last, shrugging a dusting of mud off his coat. The Changes were still coming fast in the Lower World of Ayrien; he’d waited barely an hour between each one so far, so as near as he could judge he had perhaps half an hour before the next. He had nowhere to go, and in fact he had no wish to go far, or he may take himself out of sight of the tower once it did finally emerge. So he sat down again with his back to his faithful rock, and waited.

  But before he’d been seated many minutes his attention was caught by an odd flicker of movement ahead of him. He tensed, fighting the temptation to stand in order to see better. If it was another dangerous beast, he didn’t want to draw attention to himself.

  But it didn’t look like one. The movements of the tiny figure more resembled the smooth two-legged gait of a fellow human. He watched intently as the figure grew steadily closer.

  Certainly a human, and a female one he guessed. Fortunately he was still Cloaked; if she looked his way she would see nothing but a dark patch of shadow at the base of a tall rock. He waited, hoping she would come close enough for him to see her face; but after travelling towards him for a time she veered away to the right and slowly vanished again. All he could determine about her was that her hair appeared to be brownish.

  For a moment he considered following her. It was rare to encounter other humans down here. Was she a herbalist, here to harvest the unique plants of Ayrien? Part of a summoner exploration party? Or was she connected in some way to the mystery he and Eva pursued?

  But while his real errand remained uncompleted, could he afford to chase after this lone figure on the mere hope that she was relevant in some way? He paused a moment in indecision, and as he did so the grey light drained away and a purple radiance bathed the ground instead. Tren stood up, all thought of the mysterious woman forgotten. As he watched, the rocky terrain pulsed and vanished; in its place emerged the soft hills and meadow grass he’d been hoping for. Whistworms emerged from their burrows and began crawling up the stalks, hoping to reach the fragrant blossoms that crowded the low-growing bushes. After a brief check for threats - he didn’t know for sure that the muumuks wouldn’t still be wandering this new environment - Tren climbed his rock again and stood tall, shading his eyes against the silvery light of the larger, constant moon that shone perpetually overhead.

  For a heart-pounding instant he thought that the tower was gone. Therein lay the potential for disaster; it hadn’t occurred to him that the building might not re-emerge with the meadow, and what would he do if it did not? He had no possible means of determining where it had gone.

  But no: his observation was merely hindered by a touch of mist that clung to the cool ground. He spotted the indistinct image of a tall, thin structure some way off and his heart leapt. Jumping down from his rock, he aimed for it at a run.

  When he arrived at the base of the tower, his heart beating hard with exertion and his shirt sticking to his skin, he discovered another problem. He’d forgotten that the peculiar building had no door or other discernible means of entry. What had Eva done last time? She had caused the stone itself to form a ladder by some method that remained somewhat unclear to him.

  Running his fingers over the stonework didn’t help. He felt nothing but cold stone, fixed and immutable. Mustering his will, he tried again, pushing harder at the blocks. Eventually, tiresomely slowly, the stone softened the barest bit under his hands and the tip of one finger sank slightly into the rock...

  ‘Can I help you with something?’

  The voice, female and waspish, cut through the silence like a whip and Tren jumped back, staring around for the source. Leaning out of the window near the top of the tower was the woman he’d seen earlier, her chestnut-brown hair loose around her face.

  After a moment’s scrutiny, he recognised her as the same woman who had wandered into Eva’s study and taken Andraly Winnier’s memoirs.

  ‘Um,’ he stammered. ‘I might have knocked, if you had a door.’

  She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘You’re the book thief.’

  ‘What? You’re the book thief.’

  ‘I can’t steal what was mine in the first place.’

  ‘That was your book?’

  ‘By virtue of the fact that I wrote it. Have you come to steal it again?’

  She wrote it? Tren thought that through. ‘Then you’re Andraly Winnier?’

  ‘Yes,’ she snapped.

  ‘You were friendlier before.’

  ‘I didn’t have a runt of a human male sticking his fingers in my stonework at the time.’

  ‘Runt?’ Tren pulled himself up to his full, six-foot -and-a-bit height.

  ‘All right, you’re a beanpole, but in years, boy, you might as well be about three. What do you want?’

  Tren sighed. What was it with imperious older women casting aspersions on his age? He was twenty-five, not twelve.

  ‘I was wondering what became of the book,’ he replied. ‘And I had some hopes of reading the parts that I didn’t get to study before.’

  She considered him for a long moment, her face unreadable. ‘You’ve some nerve,’ she said at last.

  He spread his hands apologetically. ‘The matter’s urgent.’

  ‘Oh? What matter?’

  He considered for a moment before he spoke. ‘The matter of Llandry Sanfaer and her draykon friend,’ he said, hazarding everything.

  Her eyes narrowed again. ‘You’re a friend of Llandry Sanfaer?’

  ‘Er. Sort of. I mean, we’ve met, though I don’t think she was in any condition to remember me at the time.’

  Andraly Winnier made a sound of disgust and disappeared from the window.

  ‘Hey, I - wait -’ She was gone. Tren subsided, cursing inwardly. He looked around, seeking some other way to reach the distant window, but then the stonework crunched oddly and
a line snaked its way through the blocks, forming a door. It opened to reveal Andraly standing on its other side, glaring at him.

  ‘Hurry up,’ she said.

  He hurried.

  ‘I thought this tower belonged to someone else,’ he said a little later, sitting uncomfortably in Andraly’s workroom at the top of the building. She sat easily in a rocking chair on the other side of the room, keeping her pale eyes fixed on him. He’d had no luck guessing her age or anything about her. Her face was neither young nor wrinkled; her eyes gave nothing away.

  ‘Oh? Upon whom did you obligingly bestow ownership of my home?’

  He winced. ‘Look, I know the circumstances of my arrival weren’t ideal, but I didn’t mean any harm. Could we drop the acidity?’

  She smirked. ‘You were planning to break in.’

  ‘I didn’t know it was your house! I thought it belonged to an Ullarni sorcerer I’ve reason to dislike.’

  Her eyes opened a little wider at that. ‘Ullarni? Why would you think that?’

  ‘Because it’s practically on the doorstep of a recurring rogue gate that opens into Orstwych, right on the Ullarn border. I followed the sorc down here and I thought that this must be something to do with him. Especially when we found an istore ring in here.’ He flicked a hand at the floor not far from his chair, pointing out where the object had lain.

  ‘We?’ Andraly prompted.

  ‘I was with Lady Evastany Glostrum at the time.’

  Her face cleared. ‘Ah. That’s interesting.’

  ‘Is it?’

  She shifted in her chair. ‘Were you also the person who turned all my belongings upside down?’

  It was fair to note that the place was a lot tidier than it had been last time he’d visited. ‘Um, no. It was a mess when we got here.’

  Andraly rolled her eyes. ‘I really need to work on my security. That ring wasn’t mine, by the way. I’ve never had such a thing in here. I suppose my first uninvited guest made himself at home here - I found a number of objects that didn’t belong to me - and then my second intruder stole from both of us.’

  Tren sighed. Her repeated use of words like “stealing” and “intruder” and “thief” was making him nervous. ‘Look. Griel killed one of my friends. He was also responsible for the death of one of Lady Glostrum’s friends. We felt we had reason to do as necessary to catch up with him.’

  ‘Griel?’ Her brows lifted.

  ‘The sorc.’

  ‘Hmm. A bad character to get tangled up with. Poor judgement.’

  Tren sat forward, electrified. ‘Oh? What do you know about him? We’ve hardly been able to find out anything.’

  She shook her head. ‘Nor would you; his kind tend to be well camouflaged. Well, I suppose I must forgive you for your thievery, even though I did have to travel an awfully long way to get my book back.’

  ‘That’s true. How did you know where to find it?’

  She gave him a withering look. ‘There are ways, book thief. I’m not foolish enough to leave my life’s work lying around without any means of tracking it should it happen to wander off.’

  Tren was silenced.

  Andraly resettled herself, crossing her legs. ‘So. About Llandry Sanfaer. How are you mixed up in her business?’

  ‘I don’t know about that,’ Tren said. ‘It’s my turn to ask some questions. Who are you? If you wrote those memoirs - all of them - why do they span such an impossibly long period of time? And what’s your interest in Llandry?’

  She smiled. ‘That’s asking far too much. Pick one.’

  He shook his head. ‘All or nothing.’

  ‘You do realise I have you at a disadvantage, yes? You’re locked in my tower without obvious means of escape.’

  Tren shrugged. ‘If you were really inclined to take exception to me, you could’ve kept me out in the first place.’

  ‘Fine. Tell me your story first, then we’ll talk about mine.’

  ‘You’d better keep that promise.’

  She arched a brow. ‘Or what?’

  ‘Or... I’ll unalphabetise all your books.’

  Her eyes flicked to her perfectly ordered collection of tomes, then back to Tren’s face.

  ‘Start talking. Begin by telling me your name.’

  Tren complied.

  It took some time to relate the entire tale to Andraly. He began as far back as he could, with the emergence of Llandry’s istore jewellery wares at the Glour Market and the subsequent uproar it had caused. Andraly nodded impatiently through most of this, suggesting that she knew that part of the story already, but she didn’t interrupt him until he began to relate the part he and Eva had taken in the tale. Then she frequently questioned him, picking minute details to verify or clarify, and his pace of narration slowed dramatically.

  But when he talked of the circumstances of Llandry’s first metamorphosis, she listened with rapt attention. Her eyes were faraway, as though she were adding his information to her existing store of knowledge. When he had finished the questions started up again, and he answered them until his throat was sore from talking.

  At length she sat back, staring at the ceiling for some time.

  ‘I can see we should have talked to one of you before,’ she commented at last. ‘Though we were unaware that anyone else had been closely involved in the business save Griel and his wife.’

  ‘So you do know them.’

  ‘Something like that.’

  Andraly stared at Tren for so long that he began to feel uncomfortable.

  ‘It’s your turn to start talking,’ he reminded her after a while.

  ‘Not here,’ she said, standing abruptly. ‘I think I’ll take you somewhere more secure.’

  Tren stood too, feeling uncertain. ‘Er. That sounds great, but where are we going?’

  She grinned wickedly. ‘I really think my colleagues would like to meet you.’ Her fingers fastened around his wrist with a fiercely strong grip, making him gasp with sudden pain. Before he had time to raise any further objections, her image wavered and she blinked out of existence.

  And he, helpless, was dragged along with her.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Pensould was still angry.

  He had been flying at an enraged speed for so long that Llandry felt ready to drop, but he showed no signs of slowing. And he wouldn’t speak to her.

  Pensould, please. I’m sorry.

  No response. Llandry wasn’t sure he had even heard her. He had blocked her out completely, intent on his crazed search. Ever since he had learned of the extinction of the draykon race, he had grown steadily more urgent in his quest to bring them back to the worlds; now, having seen, and failed to halt, the fate of a fellow draykon - its bones exhumed and scattered - he was unstoppable.

  Pensould...

  His voice roared in her mind. Do not distract me now!

  Tired, saddened and angry, Llandry at last rebelled. She was not bound to Pensould; if he no longer wanted her, she was more than happy to go her own way. She slowed her pace and began to circle downwards, her exhausted wings screaming for rest. Pensould’s huge blue-scaled form gradually disappeared into the distance.

  She came to rest on the ground and stayed, motionless, for some time. She felt as if it would never again be possible to launch her sizeable draykon form into the sky. How Pensould found the stamina was beyond her.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t understand his rage, though the duration of it alarmed her. She too suffered enormous discomfort - and guilt - at what they had witnessed. What rankled the most was that they had arrived too late; had they reached the grave sooner, they might have been able to prevent the initial plundering of the beast’s bones. The skeleton could have been restored instead of broken up and taken away. How many other draykon graves remained undiscovered? And how many more had already been stripped bare?

  She understood his urgency. It was only that she, still a fledgling draykon, lacked the physical strength to keep up with Pensould. And she did wish he w
ouldn’t be so very angry with her.

  A gust of air buffeted her and Pensould dropped from the sky. His head snaked out, his teeth snapping dangerously close to her hide.

  When I said “do not distract me” I did not mean you were free to leave!

  Llandry fluffed her wings in a shrug.

  What are you doing? Get off the ground!

  Resting.

  There is no time for rest!

  Then do not fly so fast! She bared her teeth at him. I am not coming with you.

  His only response to that was a roar. She hunched her shoulders against his fury, her body shaking.

  And that is why! she screamed at him when he’d finished. I am not owned by you! You may not abuse me, roar at me and wear me out and then expect me to remain with you.

  He put his face close to hers and bared his long teeth. We will rest, he said finally. For a little while. He bumped her neck with his nose. Recognising the gesture as an apology, albeit a poor one, Llandry sighed. When Pensould curled up his large body and tucked his head under one wing, she arranged her smaller body against his and hid her eyes. He was maddening; his pleasant moods were beguiling, but his rages were truly frightening. Would his fits of anger subside once his quest was achieved? She would give him the chance to prove himself more pleasant than otherwise; but she couldn’t allow him to control her.

  Having made this resolution, she fell asleep.

  When they went on again, Pensould set a more sustainable pace. His anger had dissipated while he slept, and his mood now was more subdued, even dejected, though his drive remained undiminished. They hunted. Llandry had not yet grown used to the draykon style of dining; raw meat was no substitute at all for her mother’s cooking, but she was hungry enough to eat anything. Pensould gobbled his food, barely giving her enough time to finish her meal before he drove them on again. She didn’t know where he was going, but she didn’t trouble to ask.