Quintessence

by David Walton

  "What?"

  "Tavera stopped hurting me. Instead, he brought in . . . he brought . . ." Matthew's voice broke. His attempt at bravado crumpled, and tears flooded his eyes. "He brought in a colonist, a man I barely knew, and shot him. He said he'd do it again and again until I cooperated." He swallowed hard. "After that, I talked."

  "Of course you did." She was amazed that Matthew had resisted them for so long. It revealed a strength beyond what she would have expected, beyond what she feared she would be able to withstand herself. "You had no choice. Those lives were more important."

  "I know. It doesn't make it any easier."

  "That morning at the church, before they took you . . . you said you'd found the answer that would allow us to go home."

  He nodded sadly. "I told them that, too. Remember the double box I built, with the void between the layers? In the inner box, bread would revert back to sand, gold back to sticks and stones. Just like they would at home."

  "But you found a way to prevent it."

  "It was quite simple, actually. I put a Shekinah flatworm in with them."

  She stared. "The worm made the difference?"

  "I found it by accident," Matthew said. "I was just testing different objects to see if any had a different effect. I think we've been wrong about everything."

  "What do you mean?"

  "We were treating light like it was just another thing quintessence could produce. But that's not right. Light is quintessence in its purest form."

  "Like the stars?"

  "Exactly. A void is a conduit to nothing, the absence of matter or energy. A star, or a Shekinah flatworm, is a conduit to another place, to the source of life and energy."

  "Then why don't we have quintessence back in England?"

  "I think we do, only it's diluted somehow, or not as pure."

  She shook her head. "The answer to everything. A worm."

  "Now they've been gathering all the worms they can and preparing a cargo to ship back home. Once gold and diamonds start arriving back in Eu rope, there will be no stopping the ships. They'll come here by the dozen."

  They heard pounding feet. The door crashed open, and Vaughan pushed into the room, followed by two soldiers. Each of them was holding a spearhawk beak. They spread out in the room, holding the beaks in front of them like divining rods. All three beaks pointed directly at Catherine.

  "Explain yourself!" Vaughan shouted.

  "About what? What's happening?" Catherine said.

  "We moved some of these beaks from the settlement to the ship, to give us warning of tamarin attack," Vaughan said. "Only we found that all of them were pointing toward the ship. As if the tamarins were already inside."

  "There aren't any tamarins in here," Catherine said. "And those beaks point toward any concentration of quintessence, not just tamarins."

  "Then explain to me why they're all pointing toward you." Vaughan smiled, clearly relieved that it was only Catherine and not a tamarin insurgence. "What are you hiding, cousin?"

  "Nothing."

  "Come, now. You and your father have discovered some device to store quintessence. You have it on your person. Give it to me."

  She shook her head. "There's nothing like that."

  "It will do you no good to pretend." He motioned to the Spanish soldiers. "I can have my men search you."

  Catherine pulled away as far as the chains that held her arms would allow.

  "Stay away from her," Matthew said.

  Vaughan pointed. "Juan. Luis. Search her. Let's see what she's hiding."

  Catherine shrieked and tried to pull farther away, but with her arms chained above her head, she couldn't even shield herself.

  "Don't you touch her!" Matthew shouted. He yanked at his chains, but he couldn't get free.

  SINCLAIR had never felt such pain. While Tavera sipped a glass of wine nearby, a soldier put a white- hot knife underneath his fingernails. Sinclair was no hero. He hated the Spanish, but if it came to a choice between helping them and dying, the choice was clear. He had to live. To lose it all now, so close to realizing his life's ambition, would be pointless. If others had to die— Parris or Gibbs or Matthew Marcheford— that would be sad. But he was the only one who could continue the work. No matter what, he had to stay alive.

  So he gave in. He told Tavera everything, from the failed attempt and Maasha Kaatra's death to his final success with Catherine. Tavera asked pointed questions, and sometimes seemed to know the answer to a question before he asked it, but Sinclair had no desire to be caught in a trap. He told the truth.

  He tried to describe the quintessence strands around Catherine and what he had done with them, but Tavera wasn't content with an explanation. "Show me," he said. Flanked by soldiers, they walked through the beetlewood trees toward the ship.

  "Where are the other guards?" Tavera asked a soldier on the dock.

  "Down below in the brig, my lord. Investigating a possible tamarin attack."

  "You've seen tamarins?"

  "No, my lord. The spearhawk beaks were all pointing that way. More

  likely an animal of some kind, or a large fish under the boat, but they had to investigate."

  They climbed the ladders down into the hold. Tavera burst into a cell. Sinclair, just behind him, caught a glimpse of the scene inside: Catherine Parris, chained to the ceiling by her arms, and two Spanish soldiers, grinning, their hands pulling at her clothes. She twisted away from them, and her hands slipped out of the chains. Clearly surprised, she nearly fell, but recovered and backed into the corner, wrapping her arms around her chest. The chains hung loose from the beam.

  "What's happening here?" The sharp voice was not a shout, but it drew everyone's attention to the doorway. Vaughan jumped back, startled, and Sinclair suspected that Tavera had not authorized this interrogation. Vaughan was the governor, of course, but everyone knew Tavera held the real power.

  "Leave us," Tavera said. He pointed to Matthew. "And take him out of here." Vaughan scuttled away like a cockroach in the light. The soldiers unchained Matthew and dragged him away.

  "It's surprising how much sorcery you find in a place, once you start to root it out," Tavera said in his oily voice. "How did you get out of your chains?"

  Catherine rubbed her wrists. "Get away from me."

  Tavera advanced. "I have the only key, so I know Vaughan didn't let you out. There's dark magic going on here. How did you do it?"

  "I don't know! I just pulled hard, and my hands came free."

  "We'll find out, no matter how long it takes."

  Catherine, visibly frustrated, started to show some fire. "I don't know! Check the chains; maybe they were rusted or something."

  "You know what sorcery is, don't you?"

  Catherine crossed her arms and didn't answer.

  "It's power that the devil offers in exchange for doing his work. And the devil's work is to claim soul after soul and lead them away from the Church. In Spain, we would sooner burn you alive than let you tempt others to heresy."

  She turned away. "That's barbaric."

  "It's merciful. The fires of the stake are nothing to the fires of hell. If, for instance, we could save you, in the blush of youthful innocence, from falling prey to your father's degradations, it would be worth any torment."

  "My father is a good man!"

  "Oh, in Spain your father would burn in a moment. The whole colony knows him for a devil worshipper."

  "He's not! He believes in finding the truth, not accepting what others tell him."

  "Careful. I've seen girls younger than you go to the flames. If they're lucky, their families have enough money to buy a pouch of gunpowder to throw at their feet. Otherwise, it can take hours."

  Sinclair lurked in the corner, apparently forgotten for the moment. He picked up a spearhawk beak from where it had fallen on the floor. He moved it back and forth, noticing how it always pointed at Catherine. He couldn't get it to stop pointing at her, even if he twisted it as hard as he could. Amazing
. "She doesn't know anything," he said.

  Tavera turned his pale blue eyes on him. "Defending a witch? That's grounds for suspicion, at the least."

  Sinclair shook his head. "There's something else going on here."

  "What is? You'd better explain yourself."

  Thanks to the quintessence water, Sinclair's fingernails had already grown back, but that just meant they could be pulled out again. The healing was complete, but he could still remember the pain. He started to explain.

  "Wait." Tavera turned to the soldiers. "Stay. Watch them closely." Then to Sinclair: "Come with me."

  They left the cell and retreated to the hold, which was rotten with weathered casks and worn sailcloth. Sinclair explained to Tavera about the beak. "It's as if she has a quintessence pearl inside her."

  "Like the tamarins?" Tavera said.

  "Like the tamarins, like the eels, like just about every animal here."

  "And now she emits the same energy."

  "Only greater. Like an ocean full of eels." Sinclair shook his head. "I have no explanation. It's like she's tapping into the stars."

  "Or like she's possessed by an angel."

  Sinclair gave him a quizzical look.

  "Why not?" Tavera said. "Demons are but fallen angels, and we know they can possess a man. What if she were possessed by an angel?"

  "You just accused her of heresy! Threatened to burn her at the stake!"

  Tavera waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. "What I want to know is, can her energy be harnessed? Could it be used for practical purposes?"

  "We've no shortage of quintessence pearls," Sinclair said, and then stared at Tavera as comprehension dawned. "You want to give quintessence powers to humans." Sinclair felt dizzy with the implications. It certainly was possible that with her own source of quintessence . . .

  "Think of it," Tavera said, his eyes alight. "Invisible soldiers . . . swords passing through them without harm . . . instantaneous communication through their minds. Our armies would sweep across the earth. The whole world would be brought under the Church in one glorious Christian empire."

  Sinclair would have laughed, if the thought of Tavera at the head of an invincible army wasn't so disturbing. In all their experimentation, they had never been able to give a human the abilities of the tamarins to turn invisible or walk through walls, nor the ability of other animals to make their bodies change texture or color or become as light as air. But what if those abilities came from having an internal quintessence pearl, connected to nerves and tissues and bone? If so, that implied that Catherine . . .

  He spotted a pair of Samson- mouse gloves lying on a crate. They were common around the settlement, and now on board the Spanish ship, too, since the sailors used them to lighten the loads of anchors and sails and barrels of ale. The gloves worked that way for most things, but never for lifting humans.

  "What are you doing?" Tavera said.

  "Let me back inside."

  Catherine stood when he entered. Without explanation, Sinclair put his gloved hands around her waist and lifted her. The gloves did their work— she weighed no more than a cask of wine. Expecting her full weight, he nearly knocked her head against the ceiling. She screamed and twisted, trying to free herself. He set her down, being more careful with her this time, and turned to face Tavera, unable to keep the astonishment from his face.

  Tavera studied her. Then he reached out and pushed her, a halfhearted shove that wouldn't have knocked over a child. She flew back as if hit by a cannonball, struck the far wall, and fell to the boards.

  Tavera laughed. He reached down and lifted her up again with one hand gripping her throat, a maniacal fire lighting his face. "One glorious Christian empire!"

  TWO soldiers stood guard in Catherine's cell to watch her. She tried to think, but her head hurt from the impact with the wall, and it was hard to concentrate. Her body felt all wrong. She was so light, she was afraid if she jumped, she might hit the ceiling. Master Sinclair had used a pair of Samson- mouse gloves to make her lighter. How? Had he discovered a way to transform human beings? She shuddered. For as long as they had been looking for the answer to that problem, the implications had never occurred to her. She could still feel the nauseating sensation of being lifted like an infant. When she walked, it felt as if part of her body were missing.

  And what else might be possible? Could a man be made so heavy he couldn't move? Or so light he floated away into the sky? Or transmuted into some other shape or material? She thought of men with swords for arms, or with extra limbs, or mutated into horrible shapes as punishment for crimes.

  Of course, not all of the applications were hideous. It would be convenient to be able to turn invisible, or to climb through walls, especially now. Catherine glanced at the wall next to her, her heart suddenly beating harder. The soldiers watched her. She leaned against the wall and pressed her fingers against it, willing them to pass through, but the wall resisted her touch.

  Perhaps she had to believe she could in order to do it. But she couldn't just believe in something she knew was impossible. Could she?

  It's true, she told herself. What ever Sinclair did to me, it made me special. I can walk through walls. I have to, if I'm going to get out of here. The tamarins can do it; I can too. The easiest thing in the world. I'll do it . . . now.

  She dashed forward and thumped stupidly against the wall. Angry, she yelled and kicked it, hurting her toe. The soldiers moved forward, alarmed.

  Catherine slumped to the floor and buried her face in her hands, feeling like an idiot. Her eyes stung and her throat hardened, and though she tried to keep them back, tears streaked her face.

  The door opened, and Francis Vaughan walked into the cell. "Don't cry, cousin."

  She stood, hugging herself, suddenly aware of how vulnerable she was. It was the middle of the night; Tavera would be back in the settlement asleep, and the soldiers guarding her would surely obey Vaughan.

  She held her head high and tried to act commanding. "I'm fine, thank you. You may leave."

  Vaughan shut the door behind him. "I'm your cousin. There's no need to be afraid."

  Her attempt at bravado crumbled. "Please leave me alone."

  "It could have been different, Catherine. For years, I watched you grow older and more beautiful. I asked your father for your hand, you know. But he laughed in my face."

  "Get away from me."

  "It's always been like that, hasn't it? You and your arrogant father. He could never consider me a suitable match. No matter how high I rose, I was never good enough."

  "You don't love me."

  "What do you know about it? You don't know what I feel. You don't know what it's like to have no money, no opportunities. For everything you want in life to be forever out of reach."

  "It has nothing to do with money or opportunities," she said.

  He cocked his head at her. "You're laughing at me, too."

  "No. I'm just telling you the truth."

  His hand shot out like lightning and slapped her across the face. "Even now, like this, you think you're too good for me."

  He blocked her way to the exit. She looked behind her, at the wall.

  If she was going to pass through it, now was the time. She grew suddenly angry, at the world, at men who thought of women only as objects for their own purposes. She charged the wall, determined to get to the other side even if she had to break it down.

  She went through. It was easy, like a Spanish bullfighter pulling away his red cloth as the bull charges through thin air. She fell flat on her face on the floor on the other side. And ran.

  She raced down the gangplank past the guards on the dock, ignoring their surprised shouts. They both had matchlocks, but she reached the tree line before they could fire. She ran among the beetlewood trees, grateful for the soft carpeting underfoot and the lack of undergrowth.

  She imagined Vaughan staring incredulously at the wall she had just run through, and a feeling of freedom and euphoria flooded her.
She tried another test, willing her body to grow lighter so she could run faster, and it worked. Her feet were bare, so she tried to make the soles tougher to protect her bare skin against twigs and rocks, and succeeded once again. Easy.

  Once she passed the beetlewood forest into a region with more varied foliage, she ran straight through any tree that blocked her path— a disconcerting sensation, but one that would put more distance between herself and any pursuers. After running for what seemed like an hour, but was probably much less, she stopped, breathing in gasps, a pain in her side. If only she could alter her body to make her lungs stronger and her muscles not so tired. As soon as she thought it, it happened. Her breathing became easy, and the pain disappeared.