Tianoman pulled a face and followed suit.
Quilla was more sedate and cautious. To the left of the dining area he discovered an empty chamber, which did not surprise him. What caught his attention was a dulled silver square set into the wall opposite the glass front. In the square was a recessed handprint, five fingers spread wide. He called Declan over.
The Siric warily put his own hand over it, but the fit was awkward. Nevertheless, he pressed down.
“I saw something similar on Beacon. There are sensors behind the plate to read the unique print of a hand, like a signature, and the door, or whatever, opens.” He pulled his hand away. “Not for me, obviously.”
Teighlar was intrigued. He put his hand into the depression; nothing happened. “I wonder what is on the other side.”
Tianoman and Sabian returned. “We can’t go beyond the stairs,” Tianoman said, and pointed at the hand device. “There are quite a few of those in the walls.”
“Keys and locks,” Quilla murmured.
“That’s what we figured. Oh, there’s a dormitory type bedroom leading off from the stairs, with beds and all.”
“Does someone want us to stay?” Tristan mused.
“Looks that way,” Teroux said. He headed back to the dining room to eat.
When the women returned - clean, washed and smelling good - they tried the handprint device, but nothing opened or closed.
Everyone sat to do justice to the fare.
THEY WANDERED THE CITY in pairs and discovered many things, some by omission.
Rose and Teroux found a play park and thus discovered children were once welcome in the city.
Tianoman and Saska found a building that was clearly a bank and discovered the name had been removed. Money, in some form, changed hands here and something did not want to reveal the city’s name. In fact, they found other signs of names removed; they all did.
Tristan and Caballa, wandering arm-in-arm, discovered the aqueduct system and were amazed at how clean the water was and how well maintained the system. Everything in the city was in perfect order. High technology, yes, but also magic. Time should have left its mark on a landscape of buildings thoroughly abandoned.
“Or never lived in,” Quilla suggested to Declan as they walked from place to place. “A city waiting for a people.”
Dechend and Teighlar were wordless in their discoveries.
Grinwallin was fair indeed, a city of rock, stone and love, but this was the fabric of imagination, a fairy-tale. They found hospitals, schools, theatres, parks, universities, many varied businesses, a zoo without animals, sports facilities, apartment buildings, the varied requirements of most cities, but here all was empty, spotless and of the highest quality.
“Soulless,” Dechend murmured.
“A showpiece to failure?” Teighlar muttered.
Sabian and Maple were together, but neither gave much attention to the other. The city took everything. Roads and streets were broad and lined with trees. Flowers were in profusion, but were oddly artificial.
“No insects,” Maple said. “No birds. That is why they appear unreal.” He bent to smell a flower and was surprised. “It smells real.”
“It is all real,” Sabian remarked. “Just static.”
“How old, do you think?”
“No idea. Very old.”
“What power source lasts indefinitely?”
“Only magic,” Sabian murmured.
They found mansions and gated grounds. Palaces and landscaped gardens. Mazes and bridges. Cobbled squares and vine-covered gazebos. They could wander at will and yet most buildings were closed to them, each with a dulled silver square and handprint requiring a hand that fit before admission was granted.
As the city darkened to night, lights came on, and they came on everywhere. Every building lit from foundation to apex. Every road, street, park and square flooded with light. Buildings that appeared closed were transparent to view, as glorious inside as they were on the outside. Plants and fountains could be seen inside, murals, paintings and patterned rugs.
Awed and amazed the team headed back to the building permitting entry, there to find a new meal.
They sat to eat and talked most of the night away.
Chapter 51
Home is where the heart is.
~ Yes, a truth
Time Realm
THEY WERE WORDLESS AS the mighty cliffs neared and wordless still when the boat bumped against a jetty in a deep-water harbour at the foot of those cliffs.
The quiet in the surrounds was surreal, as if waiting for reaction.
As they climbed out, Elianas said only, “Boots.”
Torrullin jerked, his gaze so far away it was doubtful he even heard, but a moment later Elianas trod with booted feet on the great and winding stairway cut into the ancient cliffs. They ascended with measured tread, hearts hammering rhythms that were not quite in sync. Different expectations led to, well, difference. Neither knew what to expect.
The stairs levelled off and then there was a slight incline of smooth, emerald grass before they broke out onto the height.
NO BREATH.
Every expectation. Hearts beat out the same rhythm.
It was not a house or a palace, a keep or a villa. It was a dwelling that hugged the contours of rock and land, where waterfalls fell inside and pools tinkled and sparkled. A host of levels, some with airy chambers, others with wide boardwalks over running streams.
There was no glass, no railings, no protection. There was only nature and man’s willingness to adore it, live intimately with it.
Trees threw shade, trees towered, and vines clambered riotously over roof, wall and rock, binding all into one.
Still wordless, they closed in, crossing a bridge over an amber-hued pool filled with tiny golden fishes, and into an atrium where the plants had grown wild, throwing jade shadows over them. Water sprayed out in fine mist.
They entered a wide space where tapestries hung on walls and flowers peeked cheekily from rock niches.
It began then.
Change.
Torrullin halted first.
His skin was white. Absolute astonishment could remove the veneer of comfort, of being able to deal with difference, and memory. Real memory.
“Here you were brought to me, Elianas the youth of talent come to train with the Lord Sorcerer.” One hand splayed across his chest.
“It was raining that day and the rain came in, puddles, wet, getting colder, and you looked at me as if the sun was shining,” Elianas whispered.
“It stormed that night, the lightning striking rock, and you revelled in it.”
“Because you were unafraid. When the bridge caught fire you laughed and I, all gods, loved you for it. I loved that you could be unafraid.” Elianas swallowed.
Torrullin’s eyes were silvery. “This is my home, this is the only place I was ever free in, and this is your home also, our home, Elianas.”
Elianas cried out, “Why here? My god, why were we brought here of all places? This is from another time! This cannot ever be real.”
“To remember,” Torrullin said. “I remember.”
Elianas closed his eyes.
“It is real, for memory is.” Torrullin sighed. “You betrayed me, Elianas.”
Elianas fell to his knees.
“And thus I betrayed everyone,” Torrullin murmured. “We made a pact. I would forget, if you would remember.”
“Yes.”
Torrullin stared down. “We abandoned them.”
Elianas looked up. “We terrorised them.”
Torrullin looked away. “So much anger, hate and disappointment. It was not meant to be like that.”
“Are we different now?”
Torrullin leaned down to lift the man to his feet. “I hope so. By the gods, I hope so.” He drew Elianas carefully into his arms. “I have missed you, my brother.”
Elianas rested his head on Torrullin’s shoulder. “And I have missed you.”
&nbs
p; “LOWEN WILL NOT BE here.”
Torrullin stood at the edge of a cantilever over a dark pool. He stared into the depths mesmerised.
“Lowen cannot know of this place,” he added.
“No.” Elianas stared out over the ocean, remembering, remembering.
“It was cursed, we were cursed,” Torrullin continued. “No one could come here.”
“The Darak Or and his creature.”
“Nemisin sought power because he was afraid of me,” Torrullin said.
“We took some of it from him; we mitigated his influence.”
“Too little, too late. And you paid the price, not I. My time to pay has come now.”
“Do not say that.”
“It is true. I now understand Lowen was taken from me, to me, by me. As you were.”
Elianas pulled his gaze from the ocean and rested it on Torrullin. “You are no longer a Darak Or; you are Elixir. You do not pay, my Lord; you restore.”
Torrullin looked away. “I told Saska you have no magic, can you believe that? You, my star apprentice.”
“Your only apprentice, as I recall.” A ghost of a smile.
“You are not an apprentice, Elianas. You are a master.”
“Therefore a formidable team, and they quailed before us.”
“Yes, and thus the city waits.”
“It can be redeemed. You put that mechanism in place.”
“We will still be cursed.”
Elianas shrugged. “Then so be it.”
Torrullin put his hands in Elianas’ hair and drew him close. “What do you want to do first? How do we choose now? What is more important? What do we need more? The city or Lowen?”
“I want you, as you are now, all to myself.”
Torrullin wholeheartedly agreed. “The city, then. It gives us a little more time before Lowen is between us.” Torrullin smiled and released. “The city, though, can wait until morning. Right now I want to remember. I need to know who I was and who you were to me.”
He walked away.
Elianas did not move for a long time.
TWO HOURS LATER ELIANAS found Torrullin where he thought to find him.
In the space most exposed to the elements. This had been the sorcerer’s bedchamber. Site of rest, comfort and peace, and place of terrible confrontation. He sat cross-legged in the centre, his body covered in geometric patterns of sunlight and shade.
As Elianas entered, Torrullin said, “I wish it was storming.”
“Make it so.” Elianas sank into a similar pose beside him.
“No, no more manipulation.”
“Torrullin, you went back in time to meet Nemisin soon after becoming Enchanter, on the heels of a prophecy. While something written, the expectation of it, can veil the view - still. How did he not know you? Gods, I cannot think of another with your presence.”
A light laugh answered him. “Nemisin fortunately saw what he thought to see. The darkness in me was minimal then. I was more Rayne than Torrullin.”
“Lucky. It could have gone wrong.”
“I realise that now.”
“Nemisin was often blinded by his ambition,” Elianas muttered. “The Valla was under his nose all along. Had he been a better man, he could have stopped you.”
“Us.”
“Yes, us.”
“Perhaps, but the blame lies not with Nemisin, and you know it.”
“The blame is mine.”
“No, it is not.” Torrullin’s fingers twitched.
“I betrayed you.”
“It does not matter now.”
“It matters,” Elianas said.
“It mattered then.”
Elianas did not push.
Torrullin knew he needed to push, albeit in a different direction. “Do you seek vengeance for what I did to you?”
“The short answer? No.”
“The long answer.”
Elianas shrugged. “At first I was too devastated to realise how I hurt you. Then I thought I deserved it. Later I hated you for what you did, and could not understand how many had to stand in my place. You had to hurt me, not them, and yet that was not the way of it. Oh, you hurt me, but by another route, and only later did I see it was the only way you could prove to me my betrayal devastated you also. You dared not harm me, for then you would harm yourself. I do not like it and I do not think you acted correctly, but I do understand. Vengeance? Never.”
“Then why did you help me?”
“To hurt you.” Elianas added, “It was not vengeance; I was lashing out. We were selfish.”
“And now?”
“Now we restore.”
“This place, that city, it does not exist anywhere but here. It is real in memory, but how can restoration have worth?”
“If it did exist beyond this realm, would you seek to restore?” Elianas prompted.
“Yes.”
“It has worth, Torrullin.”
“Perhaps.” Torrullin sighed and unbent his legs, rose and stretched. He wandered to the edge. “This place will go on forever in this realm, in this time.” He stared outward, over wild garden, over blue sea. “It is empty, it will always be empty. One day, when all is gone and nothing is new, this will be home once more.” He paused and then added, “Always there will be a place for you; this is your home, too.”
“When nothing is new, yes.”
Elianas’ dark eyes were unreadable.
A STORM BREWED UP early evening and vented as darkness descended.
It lasted no more than an hour, but it drenched the high land spectacularly. Torrullin sat in the elements, absorbing the power, and Elianas sat beside him, hands twitching and filled with tension.
Halfway through the unleashing, Torrullin turned his head. Memory revealed moments like this in the past. He saw Elianas’ profile lit by lightning and read there the signs. He knew the signs.
He did what he did in those past ages. He removed his tunic and presented his back. Long minutes passed and then Elianas’ hands and mouth were on his skin, warm, searching. It went no further than that, and it never had. He did not respond.
That was the fine line between them.
NEITHER WAS HUNGRY.
Sustenance was now of the mind, the heart, the soul. They wandered around the elemental dwelling in silence, memory made ever more real in fresh insight. Together and apart they wandered, drawing unstintingly upon that sustenance.
It would be hard to leave again.
Then, when it could no longer be avoided, it was time to leave.
As they were about to transport out, a point in time, a consensus wordlessly attained, Elianas laid a hand on Torrullin’s arm.
“Wait. I need you to know this. If ever you are lost, if I am missing, seek this place. Find it again.”
“Missing?”
“I am just saying. I will know to find you here, and it works the other way, too.”
“We are out of time, actual time, Elianas. Finding this again will not be easy.”
“I know.”
“Then why?”
“Because our home is an answer.”
“And the question is?”
The dark man loosed a sigh. “Us.”
“Elianas, the city …”
Immediately shutters veiled the dark man’s expression.. “We deal with what we find. Just remember this place, no matter what happens.”
“As if I could forget now.”
It was a reference to the night, the storm, hands on skin, and Elianas gave him a searching gaze.
“It is time to go.”
IT WAS OVERCAST IN the morning and rain threatened.
The city did not appear oppressed by the weather. It was a city of light and could thus never be dark.
Quilla sat on one of the park benches before ‘their’ building and was deep in thought. The others came and went, to eat, to use the bathroom, to talk, to go off exploring, to return to make contact, but Quilla sat on.
He listened to the stones.
<
br /> The stone the buildings were constructed of did not sing, but they possessed another manner of communication. Their vibrations had pattern and rhythm and that was what he listened to. The vibrations were coded, a mixture of technology, magic, time and emotion, and he floundered in a sea of conflicting messages.
It would not prevent him attempting to find clarity.
The birdman pushed external distraction out, even the peripheral awareness of the others, and tunnelled his concentration to specifics.
The others noted the fierceness of his meditation and chose to leave him alone.
Gradually they dispersed, except Declan, who perched on a boulder, equally deep in thought. Near him was a plaque where the name of the city had been smoothed over. He stared at it periodically, as if searching for an answer in a lack of name.
Thus it was they were only two in proximity when Torrullin and Elianas came; they were also so deeply away they remained unaware.
FOR TORRULLIN AND ELIANAS, remembrance restored their power; they transported in.
Or perhaps restoration was due to their familiarity with the domain they now traversed, be it of memory or reality. Whatever it was, they had power returned and they came to the place where they sensed a greater warmth, and there discovered Quilla and Declan.
It meant the others were in the city also; they had hoped to find it deserted. The team headed west too fast.
Perhaps witnesses were required.
After glancing at each other, in complicity, Torrullin ambled over to Quilla and rested his hand on the birdman’s shoulder.
Initially startled, Quilla then broke from his reverie to look up. Relief flooded into his face.
“Torrullin, thank the gods. You made good time.” He paused, sensing undercurrents. “Any news on Lowen?”
Declan, hearing the birdman’s voice, focused. He was about to smile when the strangeness in both Torrullin and Elianas arrested him. He approached, breaking out into a sweat.
Lore of Sanctum Omnibus Page 52
