Gemworld

by Jeremy Bullard

  Many will die tomorrow. Maybe me.

  Thoughts of his own mortality stood out like a beacon in Reit’s mind, stealing his focus from all else. Who would watch over his “little” brother, should “big” brother be taken from him? Who would lead the Rebellion should el’Yatza fall? Question upon question presented itself to him for consideration, each with consequences more terrible than the last. What would become of Aitaxen, the Norwood Isles, the world? What would become of Delana?

  A sigh escaped his lips as he thought of his wife. So beautiful, she was. So strong. Of all the souls that had joined the fight against the Highest, she was the one least worthy of concern. He could swear she had a core of pure iron, powerful even without her fearsome amethyst magics. And yet, now that she’d come to mind, he could think of little else. Would she be alright? Would she be able to go on?

  “Don’t worry about her, brother. She’ll be fine,” Retzu said softly, reading his twin’s thoughts better than any mage could. “Should anything happen to you, I’d protect her with my life. You have my word.”

  “I know you would, Sticks,” he replied, his childhood nickname for his brother springing from his lips as easily as it had when they were young. “And while we’re on the subject—”

  “Not a chance. You can play Great King Almighty all you want to, but don’t try and pull me into it. You were always the one with delusions of grandeur, not me. Aitaxen is your cross to bear.” The twinkle in his eye belied his harsh words. Both men chuckled lightly, then fell silent again, thoughtful. Their attentions returned to the city lying sprawled out before them, seeing in its place a very similar city, half a world away.

  “Mother and Father would be proud of us, I think,” Reit said solemnly.

  Retzu nodded. “Aye, and Anika, too. She always loved a good fight.”

  Reit smiled at bittersweet memories that mention of their sister always evoked. “She did know her way around a horsewhip,” he agreed.

  The brothers shared a hearty, cleansing laugh, as much a toast raised to their lost sister as anything else. Finally, casting a last, wistful look across the harbor at the sleeping city, Reit embraced his brother tightly, murmured words of affection, then went to find solace in his wife’s arms for what might well be the last time.

  ***

  Another soul stood gazing at the solid walls of the city. In Keth’s eyes, the city would normally have looked no different at midnight than in the light of day—light that was nonexistent for him. Normally, the only way Keth would have known it was midnight would be the position of the powder blue moon fixed in the dead white sky, or the marked lack of activity in the city before him. With its people in bed and its guards at their posts, the city was a veritable ghost town, populated only by a few wayward spirits haunting the streets.

  A wave rolled through Keth’s body and across his vision, stirring him from his musings.

  He stood in the water—on the water—about a hundred yards out from the westernmost pier. The Seacutter floated at anchor behind him at almost twice again that distance, with her sister ships clustered around her. Her sails were furled, the folds gleaming white—not orange—against the moonlit sky, as it bobbed in the black water.

  He was one with the water, his body having taken on the characteristics of the matter he had merged with. He hadn’t even known it was “impossible” until he’d already done it. He grinned broadly at the memory, the movement sent ripples across his translucent face and throughout his body, dying long before they reached the lake at his feet.

  The trip down the River Rhu’sai had been swift, if boring. Once Keth had been briefed on his part of the operation—something that took all of an hour at most—there was nothing left for him to do but wait. But it wasn’t the constructive waiting that smithing involved, waiting with anticipation as the steel before you gathered a ruddy glow from the fire. This was just dead time, passing from one second to the next with nothing to show for the time spent.

  Magic had become a way of life for Keth over the past few months, and he had grown proficient at wielding it, so Jaren had ordered a break from his self-training for the duration of the ride downriver. Keth knew that it was meant to be a reward for all the hard work he’d done, but it felt more like punishment. He might have used the extra time to perform his shol’tuk exercises, but the ship’s deck was too cramped to perform them properly. He tried to find people to pass the time with, but it seemed that everyone was always busy. Reit, Retzu, and Jaren passed the journey tucked away somewhere, pouring over various battle plans. Miss Marissa, who’d finally broken somewhat out of the funk she’d been in, stayed locked up in her quarters, toiling away at some project or another. Rumor had it that it was some new type of signaling device, but with Harvest so close at hand, Keth would almost bet his last copper that it was a new weapon.

  That young Mandiblean—Gaelen was his name—spent most of his hours staring over the stern railing to some distant point upriver. Keth occasionally managed to trap him into a conversation, which always seemed to be going well until the conversation turned to magic. At the merest mention of Granite, Gaelen always seemed to remember something or another that he’d forgotten, and abruptly excused himself before Keth knew what hit him.

  That left Menkal. The old sapphire passed his time staring at the bottom of a mug of ale. After days of endless rocking and pitching on the waves, even that idea appealed to Keth, but Menkal didn’t think it a fit diversion for someone of Keth’s age. “You can join me for a drink when you get some hair on your chest” were his exact words. Never mind that he had hairs on his chest. Menkal made it abundantly clear that he wanted no tavernmates.

  One night, the boredom grew too much for Keth. He’d been restless, tossing and turning in his bunk, listening to the sounds of the waves lapping against the hull. He needed to do something. Anything, and he really didn’t care what. He needed a break from the idleness. Thinking a swim might help, he wielded, melting out of his clothes, except for his night shorts, and into the timbers of the deck below him. The distinct blue patterns of wood filled his vision as he melted down through the bulkheads, occasionally broken by the blue-black of iron reinforcements.

  He passed through the keel of the ship and into the river. But instead of the expected red patterns of the river water, he saw nothing. His vision had gone completely black.

  What?

  Maybe he melted straight into the riverbed? No. He should have at least seen the red patterns in passing, no matter how shallow the river was. Maybe the red patterns had been there, and he just failed to notice them. Besides, he wasn’t seeing the black, blue, and brown speckled patterns of the riverbed. Just black.

  At a loss to explain the darkness, he started to panic. Did melting with the water make him go blind? Would it stay that way? Bad enough that granite magic stole his primary sight from him. Had he lost his secondary sight now as well? He thrust himself further downward, frantic to get out of the water.

  He felt himself enter the riverbed, felt the many distinct forms of matter passing through his body, felt himself becoming one with them. As he sank completely into the mud, his vision flashed red, then cleared. The patterns of river rock, soil, silt, and other materials replaced the dead black of the water.

  Keth’s head cleared as well. And as fear left him, curiosity took over.

  Jaren had told him that magic is just like life. Everything has an explanation, from the sun crossing the sky to the great sea fish that breath air. And for once, Keth could relate to what the emerald was saying. His own Da had been prone to telling him much the same thing. Every question had an answer if one took the time to seek it out.

  Alright then. Fair enough. What just happened?

  When he entered the water, he remained one with his surroundings. He hadn’t expected that. No. That wasn’t quite right. He hadn’t actually given it any thought. He’d just taken it for granted.

  So if he had become one with the water, did it mean that water was Matter? No.
Impossible. Water was the province of Sapphire, not Granite.

  But why was it impossible? Water had dimension, didn’t it? It could be deep, wide, and long. He could touch it, and feel the resistance it gave, however slight. He could feel the rain on his face, the wind in his hair. Wasn’t that how Jaren had described the effects of Matter?

  Well, he shouldn’t have been surprised if water was Matter. Since when did Jaren—or anyone else, really—actually know anything about Granite? Like with most other things pertaining to his magic, Keth would have to figure this out for himself. Taking a deep breath—or he would have, if his lungs hadn’t been one with the riverbed—he willed himself upward.

  He left the riverbed slowly, entering the water head first. As he did, the expected red patterns came to life, speckled through with the orange patterns of various river plants and animals. A fluke? A magical hiccup, maybe? He wasn’t sure. Cautiously, he entered the river completely. As the tips of his toes left the silt, his vision went black again.

  Wait a moment. Not entirely black.

  Turning his head this way and that, he found nothing but darkness. Still something tickled the edge of his visual spectrum. He cast his eyes upward, and almost caught it. It was there, invisible, but just barely so. Curious, he willed himself up through the water.

  As he moved closer to the surface, the object became more defined. It grew brighter in his vision. The edges sharpened somewhat, took on a round appearance that shimmered rhythmically. Finally, he broke the surface of the river. Water rippled away from him, rippled through him, but he didn’t notice. He was completely captivated by what he saw above him.

  The moon, beaming in all its pockmarked glory.

  But the moon was white! And the sky was black?!?

  He didn’t understand. Was his multicolored nightmare over? Had the Crafter given him back his sight?

  Almost without thinking, he whipped his head around, seeking another reference point. The movement sent ripples across his vision, but again he barely noticed. He could make out the trees on the back of the river, the leaves grey in the moon’s feeble light. Closer, he saw the glittering gold of a sandy beach, strewn with debris from the waning tide. And floating just downriver from him was the brown and black forms of the Seacutter and her flanking ships, lit by the fires of the sentries’ lamps.

  Fire! He could see fire!

  He had to tell Jaren.

  He willed himself forward excitedly, barreling into the ship’s hold with a ripple of Matter. As he became one with the solid wood, the blessing vanished, and the curse reclaimed him. All around him, the distinctive blue-black glimmer of oaken timbers and cast iron rivets replaced moonlit darkness.

  He felt like weeping. For joy. For loss. He really couldn’t tell which. He just felt like weeping.

  He stood dumbly for a moment as the reality of the situation set in on him. But when it did, it hit him like a hammer. He, Keth, a granite mage with no qualified tutor, had somehow discovered something that no other granite in the world had—how to regain primary sight, if only temporary. How was that possible? Were granites so completely drilled on the differences between Water and Matter that no granite had ever become one with water? Or maybe the Granite Order did know about this, and have just been extremely tight-lipped about it. It wouldn’t be completely out of character for them, but why would they be so secretive about this power in particular? And how did it even work? What was so special about the water?

  Questions echoed back and forth throughout the recesses of his mind, loud at first, then growing to a deafening roar. Amidst the din of his own thoughts, two names floated to the top. Jaren and Menkal. They would help him find the answers, tell him what it all meant. They had to.

  His vision flashed slightly as he freed himself from the timbers and released the granite magic. Solid again, he wound through the crates that filled the ship’s hold and tore out into the empty hallway, on his way to find Jaren. A scant fifteen steps carried him from the hold to the emerald’s quarters, where he found Jaren sound asleep at his desk, an open tome serving as a pillow.

  The granite leapt into the room without the slightest shred of decorum. “Jaren! Jaren!” he urged with abandon, shaking the emerald roughly from his slumber.

  “But it’s Endweek, Mum... I don’t have t—” Jaren said blearily, slow to make the transition from sleep to wakefulness. “Wh-wha-what?”

  “Jaren! Jaren!” was all that Keth could cry. His tongue had gotten stuck somehow. No other words seemed to be able to shake themselves loose. “Jaren! I just-It’s-I-C’mere!”

  Keth dragged Jaren bodily from the chair and pulled the emerald down the hall after him. “When I ascended it happened so fast that I never thought that I would ever be the same again and I guess I’m still not but I was so mad back then because the mage didn’t tell me and Nanette and Ma and Da but then Sal helped me and you too and—”

  “Keth, what in blue blazes are you yammering on about?” Jaren shouted irritably as the granite practically dragged him down the hallway. Keth had finally unstuck his tongue, but now it was flapping uncontrollably.

  “I can see, Jaren! I can see! I ca-owww!” The granite’s words cut off abruptly as his forehead struck a low-hanging bulkhead.

  “Yes, of course you can,” Jaren remarked blandly.

  Keth’s hands flew to his forehead, trying vainly to contain the rising knot. Stars—the kind born of pain—danced in his vision as the lump beat out a fervent complaint.

  Jaren stood with his arms folded before him, staring dispassionately at Keth, not making slightest move to heal him. Just payment for the rude awakening. Keth tried not to glower as he continued down the hall, beckoning the emerald to follow.

  Keth led Jaren to a bathroom that had been set aside for the female passengers and their more delicate bathing needs. A porcelain tub stood on the far side of the room near the port hull, where a pipe allowed the tub to drain into the river. Ringing the tub were rows of sapphires and rubies, their activation runes inscribed between them on the silver strip that held them to the tub. He ran his hand along a length of the strip, igniting the runes and activating the magic. Water began to well up from the bottom of the tub.

  “I know you told me once that water was the province of Sapphire,” Keth started. “I’m not disputing that. But you also told me that matter was anything that could be measured in terms of length, width, and height.

  “Well, the other day, while we were boarding the ship, it started raining. Any other time, I would have passed it off as nothing extraordinary, and truly it wasn’t. But Retzu had told me to always keep an open mind, and to practice seeing the ordinary from a new perspective. It’s supposed to help me learn how to improvise,” he said by way of explanation. Jaren’s bare foot tapped the deck impatiently.

  Keth cleared his throat nervously. “Anyway, there I was on the railing, watching some of our people board when a single raindrop struck the rail. It was a fat raindrop, even for the summer storms, and it splattered where it hit the wood. Then I realized—it was fat.”

  “You’ve already mentioned this absolutely amazing fact,” Jaren said sarcastically, obviously missing the connection.

  “Don’t you see? It had dimensions, Jaren! Length, width, height-the same as matter.”

  “But water is not matter,” Jaren argued patiently, though not without a note of curiosity in his voice. Whatever else Jaren thought, he was interested in finding out where the granite was going with all this. “If Granite could wield the essence of Water, then why have we never heard of a granite mage doing so?”

  “Maybe it’s part of that super-secret society of theirs. Or maybe, like yourself, they’ve always viewed water strictly as the province of Sapphires. I dunno,” Keth shrugged.

  The water level in the tub reached the silver strip. As the wavelets lapped at the silver, the activation runes flared briefly, then died, canceling the spell.

  “But one thing I do know,” he continued, staring at the tub, “is
that whatever we may ‘know’ to be true, we can’t assume anything.”

  Keth rolled up the sleeve of his tunic and placed his hand into the water, wielding. His hand melted, merging with the water. In Keth’s sight, his hand took on the red pattern of water, though he could still see his fingers clearly outlined in the brown aura of granite magic. He willed the melting to encompass his whole body, and he watched as the red of the water consumed the orange-yellow of flesh and bone.

  Keth turned his eyes back to Jaren. The mage’s black gemstone eyes held the green aura of emerald magic as they followed the spell up Keth’s arm, then to his shoulder, then finally to his face.

  Had the melting allowed his lungs to draw breath, Keth might have laughed when he saw Jaren’s face go from its normal orange-yellow—minus two faint yellow teeth that the emerald had lost—to a deep golden tan, his brilliant green eyes wide and his jaw slack with utter shock...

  Now he did chuckle, the soundless, breathless movement sending waves through the man-shaped pillar of water that was his body.

  That discovery turned more than four thousand years of theory on its ear. It led to hours upon hours of speculation, debate, and experimentation for Keth and the Heads of Order. Not to mention Menkal attacking the young granite’s abilities with renewed interest, charging Keth to fill this or freeze that. Which suited Keth just fine. As boring as the trip downriver had been up to that point, this discovery proved to be just the thing to break up the monotony.

  Over the next thirty six hours, they came to the conclusion that Sapphire, like Emerald, actually borrowed its medium from Granite. Keth found that he could create water in its various states, though it was much easier to make ice than it was liquid water. He even enjoyed some small success in creating air pockets, but it was almost impossible for him to maintain something with so much empty space between its particles. In the end, it was determined that Granite, though it could emulate Sapphire as it did Emerald, could not wield its higher, more complex forms of magic.