:That is the border,: Florian replied warily. :It wasn't always like that. Before the war with Ancar, it looked just like the border between Valdemar and Rethwellan, but once Ancar tried to bring an army across it, that was what sprang up. Anyone who tried to cross it was forced back. Anyone who tried to drive their way in with magic—died. I've heard that there are some very select traders who are allowed to come and go between here and there, but they are a close-mouthed lot, and they won't talk about anything that they've seen over there.:
"I thought they had an envoy at the Valdemar Court," An'desha observed.
:They used to, a very long time ago. Not anymore.: Florian let out his breath in a sigh. :It's tradition to keep their suite ready for them, but no one has come to claim it in anyone's lifetime.:
Karal swallowed as he contemplated that shimmering wall of—of—
Of power, that's what it is. Pure force. And I'm supposed to walk across it? And anyone who tried to cross it is dead!
What was more, he was supposed to walk across it right now. There couldn't be more than a mark to go until the next wave was upon them!
"Come on," he urged as his hands shook. "We have to get moving now. We haven't got any time at all to spare!"
To set an example, he urged poor, tired Trenor into a clumsy trot, sending him down the valley, through the knee-high grass, and up the ridge. The wall just loomed larger and larger—it didn't change at all except for the continuous rippling of the surface as he drew nearer to it. He sensed An'desha and Florian at his back, but the sheer power of the wall drove them mostly out of his thoughts.
There wasn't time for finesse, for study, for anything other than what he was already doing—running headlong into the thing, and hoping that it didn't decide to kill him, too.
Fear held him rigid and made a metallic taste in his mouth. He closed his eyes and shouted at Trenor to drive him the last few spans remaining—
—opened his eyes again, just as they actually reached it, and passed into it—
Something seized and held him.
****what?****
He could not move, not even to breathe. He was surrounded by light, yet could not see. He could only wait, while whatever it was that held him examined him, inside and out.
****Priest?****
Was he a Priest? An'desha had named him "priest," but it had been in jest. Or had it? Solaris had named him "priest," but he thought it had merely been expedience. What had he done to earn the name?
****ah****
Suddenly, it let him go. He found himself still in Trenor's saddle, looking at An'desha and Florian through a curtain of rippling light that seemed thinner here than elsewhere.
:It is thinner. That is so we can reach them,: Altra said, urgently. :It is coming, Karal, take your position. Don't just stand there thinking, move!:
He tumbled off Trenor's back and took the stance he'd been coached in, bracing himself and holding both his arms out and up.
:Now. Into the trance I taught you.:
Obediently, he spoke his keywords and fell into a light trance; not so deep that he was unaware of everything around him, but too deep for him to move on his own now. He wasn't sure what was going to happen after that; Altra and An'desha hadn't gone into it—
A fraction of a heartbeat later, he realized why they hadn't gone into it. If they had, he'd have been too terrified to go through with it all.
From Altra's side, a torrent of power poured into him; from Florian's, another. There was something in him that managed to join those two streams of energy and actually hold them—even though from his point of view, it was like the one time he'd foolishly mounted an unbroken stallion. He was not controlling the power—it was permitting him—briefly—to hold it!
Then An'desha somehow reached out to him from across the border, and the two streams of power that had been made one found their outlet.
Now An'desha did something with that energy that Karal could not see, and could only sense, very dimly, as a blind man might sense a mighty fortress being built beside him. He arched his back and closed his eyes to concentrate on holding the power steady—the longer the power "permitted" him to hold it, the more control he actually had over it.
It was not easy, and he sensed something else. If he slipped, it was going to do terrible things to him, and if he survived the experience, the likelihood that he would regret surviving was very high.
He no sooner had that unsettling revelation than the disruption-wave hit.
It was worse than all the others combined.
The ground heaved and buckled under him, as if this was the earthquake that would end the world. He went entirely blind, but not in the sense of being immersed in total darkness. Instead, there was nothing to see but color and light, swirls and whirlwinds and cascades of color and light. The light was something he could hear; it roared and rushed in his ears. The color had flavors; iron, scorched stone, and copper. Somewhere out there he knew that Florian and Altra were still pouring energy into him; he felt it, hot and primal, deep inside him—and An'desha needed that power. So he held to it, even when the light turned into a million serpents that threatened to crush him, even when the colours tried to wash him away, right up until everything collapsed and he was all alone in an unending darkness, and he knew he would never, ever find his way out again—that was when he faltered.
Fear overcame him; he felt the power slipping through his tenuous grasp.
I can't take this! he thought, gasping in panic. I can't do this! This was for someone like Ulrich, not me! I can't—
His control slipped a little more, and he flailed in confusion.
I don't even know what I am anymore.
His heart raced in panic, and he wanted Ulrich. He wanted to be like Ulrich.
Then from deep within him came a feeling of conviction, of responsibility, too strong for even fear to shake.
I have to. There's no one else.
He held the power, though it writhed and threatened to escape. He ignored his confusion, fought his panic, and held.
Then, as suddenly as it began, it was over. Abruptly, he found himself back on the Valdemar side of the barrier, knee-deep in dead grasses, staring into An'desha's eyes from a distance of no more than an arm's length. How he had gotten there, he had no clue.
:The other breakwaters are up,: Florian said, his voice so faint with exhaustion that it might have been nothing more than a whisper of Karal's own thoughts. :All three are joined. The Iftel border is part of it all. We did it, Karal.:
Karal sat down in the grass; Altra was already lying down beside him, completely drained, one very flat Cat. "We did, didn't we?" he said, wonderingly.
:Ah.: That was Altra. :I believe that I will lie here for a while. A month would be good. Maybe two. How do you manage with the limits of these bodies?:
"I manage very well, thank you," An'desha replied sharply. "I had a taste of doing without one, remember? Don't complain."
Karal decided that Altra's idea of lying flat was a good one. He felt—he felt as if someone had filled him full of light, then drained him; as if someone had turned him inside out, left him under the desert sun for a while, then turned him right-side out again.
:There is help coming,: Florian said. :A Herald on circuit. Just rest now, until he comes.:
"We did it," he said again, wonderingly.
:We did. The barriers will hold for now. We have bought some breathing space.:
Breathing space. Time. He blinked, and looked up at the blue sky. Maybe a little rest. All three sounded impossibly good.
Never mind that he was truly going to be the Karsite envoy now, a position he didn't want, and wasn't sure how to fill. And never mind that there was a young engineer back in Haven who made him think very uncomfortable and yet delightful thoughts.
There was still the Imperial army out there—and no telling what they would do. Karal himself was now a potential major target for them. And the cataclysmic mage-storm was yet to come.
But at the moment, it doesn't matter. For now, they had time—and a little time—and each other—could be all they needed.
--2 Storm Rising (1995)—
version 2.0. spell checked, compared to original, formatting. Completed January 11, 2004.
Storm Rising includes black and white illustrations by Larry Dixon.
All the black & white interior illustrations in this book are available as 8' x 10" prints;
either in a signed, open edition singly, or in a signed and numbered portfolio from:
FIREBIRD ARTS & MUSIC, INC.
P.O. Box 14785 Portland, OR 97214-9998 Phone: 1-800-752-0494
Time Line by Pat Tobin.
Maps by Larry Dixon.
Dedicated to Teresa and Dejah
One
Grand Duke Tremane shivered as a cold draft wisped past the shutters behind him and drifted down the back of his neck. This was a far cry from Emperor Charliss' Crag Castle—which, though outwardly austere, was nevertheless replete with hidden comforts. Even his own ducal manor, while primitive by the standards of Crag Castle, was free of drafts in the worst of weather. Tremane closed his eyes for a moment in longing for his own home as yet another breath of ice insinuated itself past his collar. It felt less like a trickle of cold water and more like the edge of a knife blade laid along his spine.
More like at my throat. That cold breath of air was the merest harbinger of worse, much worse, to come. That was why he had gathered every officer, every mage, and every scholar in his ranks here together, all of them crammed into the largest room his confiscated headquarters afforded.
Who did they say had built this place? A Hardornen Grand Duke at least, as I recall. His own manor boasted many rooms grander than this, and better suited to gathering large groups of men for a serious discussion. The tall windows, though glazed, were as leaky as so many sieves, and he'd been forced to block out the thin gray light of another bleak autumn day by having the shutters fastened down across them; and although fires roared in the fireplaces at either end of the room, the heat went straight up into the rafters two stories above his head, where it was hardly doing anyone any good. In happier times, this wood-paneled, vaulted hall with its floor of chill stone had likely played host to any number of glittering balls and entertainments. The rest of the time it had probably been shut up, given that it was a drafty old barn and impossible to keep at a reasonable temperature. Tremane glanced up at the exposed beams and rafters above him; they were lost in the shadows despite the presence of so many candles and lanterns on the tables that the air trembled and shimmered just above the flickering flames.
The massed candles must be putting out almost as much heat as the fireplaces; too bad none of that heat was reaching him.
Dozens of anxious faces peered up at him. He was seated on a massive chair behind a ridiculously tiny secretary's desk up on the platform where musicians had probably performed. It was uncomfortably like a dais, and he was well aware that such a comparison would not be lost on the Imperial spies in his ranks. Right now, though, that was the least of his concerns. The primary issue here was a simpler one: survival.
He stood up, and the murmur of incidental conversation below him died into silence without the need to clear his throat.
"Forgive me, gentlemen, if I bore you by stating the obvious," he began, concealing his discomfort at addressing so many people at once. He had never been particularly adept at public speaking; it was the one lack he suffered as a commander. No stirring battlefield speeches out of him—he was more apt to clear his throat uneasily, then bark something trite about honor and loyalty and retire in confusion. "Some of you have been involved in other projects at my request, and I want you all to know our current situation as clearly as possible, so that nothing has to be explained twice."
He winced inwardly at the awkwardness of his own words, but there were some nods out in his audience, and no one looked bored yet, so he carried on. Officers formed the bulk of his audience, massed at three long tables in front of him, dark and foreboding in their field uniforms of a dark reddish brown—the color of dried blood. Some wag had once made the claim that the reason the field uniforms were that color was to avoid the expense of removing stains after a battle. As a sample of wit, it had fallen rather flat; taken at face value, it might just have been the truth.
To his right and left, respectively, were his tame scholars and the Imperial mages; the latter in a variation on the field uniforms, looser and more comfortable for middle-aged and spreading bodies. The former, as civilians, wore whatever they wished to, and were the sole spots of brightness here. He addressed his first summation to mages and scholars both, rather than to the officers. "Although the Imperial forces have not met with any active opposition since we pulled in our line and took a fortified position here, we are still in hostile territory. Everything to the west of us was completely unsecured when we broke off all engagements, and I would not vouch for Hardornen land to the south and north of our original wedge. Hostilities could break out at any moment, and we must keep that in mind when making plans."
Grimaces from the scholars and mages, grim agreement from his officers. The Imperial wedge meant to divide the country of Hardorn into two roughly equal parts, to be divided still further and conquered, was now an Imperial arrowhead, broken off from the shaft and lodged somewhere in the middle of Hardorn. And at the moment, he only hoped it was lodged in such a way that it could be ignored by the populace at large.
"We have been cut off completely from Imperial contact ever since the mage-storms worsened," he continued, giving them the most unpleasant news first. "We have not been able to reestablish that contact. I must reluctantly conclude that we are on our own."
There were not many in his ranks who knew that particular fact, and widened eyes and shocked glances told where and how the news hit home. They took it rather well, though; he was proud of them. They were all good men—even the Imperial spies among them.
Are any of them still in contact with their overseers in the empire? I'd give a great deal for the answer to that little question. There was no way of knowing, of course, since anyone who was an agent for Emperor Charliss would be a better mage than he himself was. Charliss was too canny an old wolf not to cover that contingency.
Another draft of cold licked at his neck, and he turned the fur-lined collar of his wool half-cape up in a futile attempt to keep more such drafts away. It was the same dulled red as the uniforms of his men; he wore what they wore. He had a distaste for making a show of himself. Besides, a man in a dress uniform covered with decorations made far too prime a target.
"The mage-corps," he continued, turning to nod at the variously-garbed men seated at the table nearest him, "tell me there is no doubt but that the mage-storms are worsening rather than weakening. As you have probably noticed, they are having an effect on the weather itself, and they will continue to do so. That means more physical storms, and worse ones—" He turned a questioning glance at his mages.
Their spokesman stood up. This was not their chief, Gordun, a thickset and homely man who remained in his seat with his hands locked firmly together on the table in front of him, but rather a withered old specimen who had been Tremane's own mentor, the oldest mage—perhaps the oldest man—in the entire entourage. Sejanes was nobody's fool, and perhaps the mages all felt Tremane would be less likely to vent his wrath upon someone he had studied under. In this, his mages were incorrect. He would never vent his wrath on anyone telling him a harsh truth—only on someone caught in a lie.
Sejanes knew that and looked up at his former pupil with serenity intact. "You may have noticed what seems to us of the Empire to be unseasonable cold, and wondered if we are simply seeing weather that is normal to this clime," the old man said, his reedy voice carrying quite well over the assemblage. "I assure you all, it is not. I have spoken with the local farmers and studied what records are available, and this is possibly the worst season this part of the country has ever encountered
. Fall struck hard and early, the autumn storms have been more frequent and harsher, and the frosts deeper. We have made measurements, and we can only conclude that the situation is going to worsen. This is the effect of the mage-storms upon an area that was already unstable, thanks to the depredations of that fool, Ancar. The mage-storms themselves are growing worse as well. Put those things together—and I'd just as soon not have to think about what this winter is going to be like."
Sejanes sat down again, and Gordun stood up; about them, looks of shock were modulating into other emotions. There was remarkably little panic, but also no sign whatsoever of optimism. That, in Tremane's opinion, was just as well. The worse they thought the situation was, the better they would plan.
"We've flat given up on restoring mage-link communications with the Empire," he said bluntly. "There isn't a prayer of matching with them when both of us are drifting—it would be like trying to join the ends of two ribbons in a gale without being able to tie a knot in them." His face was set in an expression of resignation. "Sirs, the honest truth is that your mages are the most useless part of your army right now. We can't do anything that will hold through a storm."
"Just what does that mean, exactly?" someone asked from the back of the room.
Sejanes shrugged. "From now on, you might as well act as if we don't exist. You won't have mage-fires for heat or light now or in the dead of winter, we can't transport so much as a bag of grain nor build a Portal that'll stay up through a single storm. In short, sirs, whatever depends on magic is undependable, and we can't see a time coming when you'll be able to depend on it again."
He sat down abruptly, and before the others could erupt with questions, Tremane took control of the situation again.
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