Fugitives of Chaos

by John C. Wright

  Vanity said, "Colin's body before my brain. I am only missing a few days. I can function. If we get assaulted by—which one is it, sirens?—if we get assaulted by sirens, we have no defense."

  Quentin said, "Besides, we need Colin to do Vanity."

  Vanity and I both giggled, while Quentin looked puzzled. "What did I say?"

  I said, "Nothing, ah—nothing. So Colin is going to do Vanity, right?"

  Quentin looked at Victor, who shrugged. Victor said, "Colin, then Vanity. When we got aboard the ship just now, we all used what powers we had to check for bugs and spies and seeking spells, and Vanity said we were clean, at the moment. What happens the moment we are not clean? Remember in Amelia's story, how certain ap Cymru was that we would be found again. Why? Why so certain? We need to prepare for the next attack. An addendum to point four, the ring of Gyges. What do we do with it?

  Vanity also says it is clean, and Quentin detects no spells. I can see it is not giving off any radio signals on any wavelength."

  I said, "Can we do point two first? Colin might want a say as to where he is going to be living next."

  Quentin said, "Point five. What about our parents? Our families? Our homelands? Vanity's ship could take us there right now, couldn't she? They are experts at all this stuff we are just learning. But—there is a problem. A big problem. It is that important matter I was starting to discuss earlier, having to do with the oath I swore to Bran."

  Victor said, "We are out of England now. You swore not to hurt England. I do not see the application."

  Quentin drew a deep breath, and actually looked scared for a moment. Scared of Victor? But he was also looking at me. That was more than a little surprising. Even though, according to Boggin, I was the

  "dangerous one," I did not see how anyone could be scared of me.

  Vanity saw his expression. She laid her hand gently on his back and said, "Dear, maybe now is not the time. Let's wait till Colin is whole again, you know? Otherwise, we have to tell them twice, and stuff."

  For a moment I felt annoyed. It was obvious Vanity and Quentin had discussed something that they were keeping from the rest of us. Weren't we the Three Musketeers Plus Two? Why was there suddenly this barrier of silence splitting the group?

  Then I put my hand in front of my lips and suppressed a smile. I am sure my eyes were shining. What in the world was I thinking! And me, still wearing a wedding dress under my stolen clothes! What else could it be? What other secret surprise would two young lovers have to announce to their friends, that they wanted to keep hush until everyone could hear it at once?

  I smiled and patted Quentin on the shoulder, leaned in and gave Vanity a hug, "Oh, congratulations!" I said. "And I am sure you are making the right decision!"

  When I let go of Vanity, the look on her face told me I'd guessed wrong.

  Quentin was not so observant, and so he was saying: "It is a very tough decision, but I do think it is indeed the right one. I did not know you would be so happy about it, though, all things considered. Well!

  This is a re-lief…" Vanity touched his arm and gave him a little shake of the head. She said, "Later. After we fix Colin."

  7.

  Victor did not seem interested in talking about things not on the topic, and he was clearly not curious about what was up between Vanity and Quentin. All he said was, "Destinations? Remember, we can also pick unknown worlds. I'd recommend against it, because they are unknown."

  I said, "I can speak for Colin. Ireland. It's English-speaking. He thinks of himself as Irish."

  Quentin said, "But he's not Irish."

  I said, in a tone sharper than I wanted to use (okay, maybe I was still smarting about being left out of whatever secret Vanity and Quentin were sharing): "He picked Irish! That's the nationality he picked."

  Vanity said, "Do we all get to pick nationalities? I'll be Spanish."

  Her tone of voice was so light and gay that I had to laugh. So, I can't stay mad at her. I said playfully, "A Spanish redhead?"

  "Everyone knows the Spaniards are the most romantic people on Earth. Spanish women get to knife their unfaithful lovers"She said to Quentin, "Nemo is Latin. I guess that makes you an Italian."

  Quentin said, "Don't I get to pick, myself? The Ro-mani, whom you call the gypsies, retain the remnants of the Egyptian lore. All the true practitioners of the Art these days are Romani."

  Vanity looked at me. "What about you, Amelia?"

  "Easy," I said. "American. Neil Armstrong, Chuck Yeager, the Wright Brothers, and Sally Ride. What do they all have in common? Americans."

  "Yuri Gagarin was Russian," said Vanity.

  "Women in America carry guns and own businesses. They kick ass and they use rough language like

  'kick ass' and nobody looks cross-eyed at them. American women are the greatest."

  Vanity said, "Victor… ?"

  Victor said, "We are picking a destination, not choosing nationalities. This conversation is irrelevant"

  Vanity said, "Wherever we pick, we might be there for a long time. We may have to become natives. So which nationality would you pick, if you had to?"

  Victor decided to play along. He did seem more easy and relaxed than the Victor I knew. Of course, the Victor I knew had spent every minute of his life inside what he thought of as a prison. Maybe this Victor was new.

  He said, "Logically, from the way the question is asked, given that wording, only Amelia's answer is correct."

  "Thanks!" I said. "But how can there be a right or wrong answer to a question of opinion?"

  "The question was asked, which nationality would I choose? The question contains a false-to-facts assumption. Every nationality—with one exception—is something you are born into. It is not a matter of choice. One must be born Spanish to be Spanish, born Gypsy to be Gypsy. Americans are a self-selected group. Americans are people dedicated to a proposition that all men are created equal. It's a matter of choice."

  Vanity said, "Can I be Spanish-American, then?"

  I said, "If we are really going to pick a destination… ?"

  Victor said, "I don't mind being back on topic. Yes?"

  "I do not want to go to Australia."

  Quentin smiled, and said, "It is not really peopled entirely with criminals, any more than Cornwall is all smugglers."

  "A woman cannot own a gun there," I said.

  "Why is that important?" said Quentin. "I hope we're not planning to shoot someone."

  I said only: "The next Grendel gets it."

  There was a moment of dull silence after that.

  Victor said calmly, "I vote with Amelia. Only an armed man is free; anyone else is the ward or dependent of such a man. Besides, America is richer than Australia, bigger. Easier to blend in. We can hide."

  Vanity said, "Hollywood. Everyone in the world watches the movies made in America. We can be famous:?

  Quentin just laughed, and spread his hands. "The only people on Earth with no tradition and no lore, a people utterly cut off from the ancient masters. A land famed only for its materialism and lack of high culture. Fine. Not only am I outvoted, but we all are going to go wherever Vanity wants, because she is the only one who can steer the boat."

  Vanity sat down on the bench, closed her eyes, took a deep breath. She meditated for a moment, or maybe she slept, or maybe she entered another state of consciousness for which I have no name.

  The Argent Nautilus leaped about, and sped like an arrow in another direction.

  A ship—as huge as a city floating on the water—was spotted off the bow, came abreast of us, and was far astern in a matter of moments. I saw the giant ocean liner astern, a shadow on the bright horizon behind us, only a dot.

  Vanity smiled, opening her eyes. "I asked for the biggest ship I could find, heading for New York. The Queen Elizabeth II Do you think they'll pick up four kids and a bird in a stranded motorboat? They might make us work, but maybe we have enough money to pay for tickets. Ap Cymru gave us a lot. A whole lot. I wonder wh
y he gave us so much?"

  1.

  It was a palace.

  I found it hard to believe that mortal men, the same race that lived in such humble circumstances in the fishing village of Abertwyi, could construct something so fair, and yet so mighty in size. If someone told me later that it was the handiwork of immortal elves, or the proud sons of Atlantis, I would have been less surprised. Of course, it was made by Englishmen, who probably have more than a touch of the blood of magical races in them. How many a sailor out of Bristol brought back a mermaid as his wife, whose fishtail dropped off, replaced by legs when the church bells rang on her wedding day?

  Since the gods destroy the memories of men, we can be certain of no answer.

  And do not tell me the sea people don't lust for their air-breathing cousins ashore! I came so narrowly close to being Mrs. Grendel Glum I nearly choked.

  2.

  Our suite was gigantic, at least five hundred square feet. Was that normal for cabins, or did other people have smaller ones? It was done all in a tan-and-gold color scheme, with two marble bathrooms and a salon separate from the two bedrooms. There was a staircase. We had our own staircase in the suite.

  Aboard ship, there were at least three restaurants, a bar and grill, a discotheque, the most enormous swimming pool I had ever seen occupying deck after deck. My mind boggled at the idea of carrying, aboard a ship, a body of water large enough to row a boat across.

  And there was a beautiful, beautiful gymnasium. The spa occupied at least a third of the deck, and I would estimate the deck area to be at least a thousand feet stem-to-stern and one hundred feet wide.

  The vessel carried its own row of shops, and not just any shops. There was a Harrods on the promenade deck.

  A library. Did I mention that the floating palace had its own library? A theater. Both a film theater and a Broadway show production, as if we had already arrived in New York, and were carrying part of that metropolis with us.

  There was a statue made of gold in the middle of the restaurant dining room.

  There was a series of lectures being given by authors. I attended one, but it was strange to think of an author being alive, and not being Greek or Latin. The author talked about things I did not understand, and the other people in the audience laughed at his witty comments, which made no sense to me. I assume they all knew about things, famous people or events, I had not been told about.

  There was a parking garage for people who wanted to carry their cars across the Atlantic. I counted at least fifteen elevators, for people who did not want to walk up and down the ten decks. This vessel was taller than the Great Hall on the estate, taller than the church steeple in Abertwyi, taller than any building I had ever seen.

  And there was television! There was no one to stop you from watching it if you went over the one-hour-a-week limit. There were over one hundred channels. The television in the room had a little box you could hold in your hand and make it change channels and control the volume. Victor could lie on his bed, and did not need to hold the little box in his hand to switch channels; he could emit the signals from his nervous system.

  There was another television, just as large, with another little box, in our room. There was a telephone, so Vanity or I could telephone to the boys in the other bedroom, if we did not feel like shouting across the suite.

  I had read many plays in school, but I had never actually seen a play until the night Vanity and I went down to watch the show. There was dancing and music along with it, and the people sang to each other; I did not know whether that was normal for plays or not.

  Victor said our rate of speed was twenty-five knots. There was no chop, no sensation of motion, even when the seas got rough. You could lie on your bed, your enormous, enormous bed, and look out the porthole in the morning, and watch the rising sun come up red and gold over the sea, and watch the restless waves flow by, minute by minute and hour by hour, always changing, never changing.

  And as far as the eye could see, there were no obstructions, no obstacles, no one to block us or hem us in. The horizon was so far away, so very far away.

  I was in love with that horizon, and I never tired of looking at it.

  3.

  To get from the Argent Nautilus to the motorboat, Victor carried Quentin, who said his "friends" were made nervous by the sea, Mid would not come to his call. I carried Vanity piggy-back, because I could manifest my wings without touching her, even though she was occupying what seemed to be the same space.

  Vanity then closed her eyes and napped (or something) and told the silvery ship to go circle Antarctica. I waved good-bye as the ship sped away, swift as a seabird skimming the waves.

  We had a while to wait while the rescuing cruise ship traveled from the horizon to our position, and I filled up the time talking. I did almost all the talking, because they wanted to hear the details of everything that had happened to me that I had not had a chance to tell them before. I had a million questions myself, but kept putting off asking them, thinking I would have time later.

  As it turned out, I only had time for one question. "What happened to you all after Colin was flung by Miss Daw off the cliff? Where were you kept in jail for that week?"

  Quentin said, "Boggin breathed on Colin as he was falling and floated him to the ground. Rather nice of the old fellow, actually, considering that Colin was a would-be axe murderer."

  Victor said, "None of us were in jail for a week, or even a day. We all had our powers neutralized by Fell and Wren and Daw, and were subjected to one or more memory-blocking techniques."

  "Why was I singled out?"

  Victor: "They needed your keeper, Mr. Glum, and he was not available."

  Quentin: "Glum wasn't exactly inspired to help Bog-gin. Other things on his mind, you know."

  Vanity: "And later, he was in hospital, recovering from leg amputation."

  I wanted to ask them how they discovered this, but by that time, a motor launch from the ship was coming abreast of us, and we had to wave and shout and look lost.

  4.

  Our first chance to be alone did not come until sunset. We said good-bye to Miguel, who was very kind to us and did us favors. He wore a white jacket, and I am not sure what you call a butler or waiter at sea.

  A steward? A cabin boy? Whatever his rank, both he and everyone had been so very kind to us, it was hard to believe.

  In fact, I did not believe it. As soon as Miguel was out the door (and I looked "past" the door to see that he was moving away down the plushly carpeted corridor), I put my back to the door, and turned accusingly to Quentin.

  "You hypnotized them, didn't you? Captain Warwick and the others? The bursar."

  Quentin, Victor, and Vanity had finished their initial inspections of the suite. Vanity had ooh'd and ahh'd over the luxury, hopping and clapping her hands, while Victor had probed the walls with rays, looking for electronic bugs. Now they were all seated in an impromptu picnic in the middle of the carpet, pulling open the savory packages Miguel had brought us from the galley. There was food of a kind I had not seen before, with meat or fish salad rolled up into a flat unleavened bread. At least, I think it was bread.

  Vanity had already dropped crumbs on the carpet, crumbs someone else (not us!) was going to clean up.

  Victor was inspecting a bottle of soda pop, a brand he had not seen before, something with an Italian label in a green glass bottle.

  Quentin was also seated cross-legged on the carpet. He carefully brought his hands out from beneath his voluminous cloak, and twisted them in midair. One moment, his hands were empty; the next, he had the ring of Gyges in one hand and an exasperated-looking eagle in the other. The eagle was no longer seeping any blood. As far as I could tell from a one-glance inspection, he seemed entirely recovered from wounds which should have killed him nine times over.

  The eagle hopped from Quentin's hands and drove his beak into a sandwich, which was lying on a napkin on the floor.

  Quentin looked up. "It wasn't me. I d
on't have that art. I think chapter seven might tell me about the vapors and humors affecting the intellectual and passionate psyches, but even that would only influence moods, not control minds."

  I said, "Well, someone did something. Why wouldn't they just radio for a coast guard or something? Or call back to England and tell Boggin?"

  Vanity said, "There are a lot of people in England. I don't think they all know each other's names yet.

  Maybe after Christmas. Hey! Try these potato things. They have some sort of spicy stuff baked into them."

  Quentin said, "We did pay a great deal of money for a cabin that otherwise he had not rented out for this crossing. Besides, isn't it a law of the sea that one must rescue stranded blondes and redheads?"

  Vanity said, "They would have been quicker to pick us up if Amelia and I had been in bathing suits, like I suggested."

  I sat down and tried the potato things. They really were quite good.

  Victor said, "I did it. I used a cryptognostic technique on the captain. Every time his nervous tension levels started to trigger a glandular reaction, I interrupted the stimulus cycle in his hypothalamus.

  Whenever one of us spoke, or he looked closely at us, I lightly stimulated the pleasure center of the brain. I did not have long enough to establish a true operant conditioning cycle, but apparently it was enough to influence his judgment in our favor."

  I was upset by this news. "That's terrible! You can't go around tinkering with people's inner thoughts that way! What makes you any different than Corus, the brain-eraser? Or Dr. Fell?!"

  Victor said in a dismissive tone, "The process would not affect the judgment of people who did not make decisions on an emotional basis."

  I said hotly, "I think we need to discuss how we are going to use our powers, and whether normal people should be off-limits!"

  "Fine," said Victor, taking a bite of the wrapped-up food roll-thing. (Maybe it was a Mexican food?) He chewed and swallowed, and said, "Let us add it to the agenda right after point five, which I believe is tabled until we restore Colin. Restoring Colin is the topic that has the floor at the moment. Any theories as to why Quentin's true-shape charm is not working? Amelia… ? Anyone… ?"