Vergence

by John March

  He used a far-sensing to track the shifting patterns in Addae's castings, trying to understand each as it unfolded. None felt familiar to Ebryn. The power wrapped tight around Addae, as close as a second skin, as intense as a violent gale, and as bright to him as looking directly into sunlight.

  Addae returned and stopped in front of Ebryn, showing two rows of brilliant teeth, his breath slowing almost at once. “It is good to run once more, my friend, in a place without such a number of people, and the iron.”

  “Yes, you start to forget how crowded the city is until you return to a place like this, although I imagine this is very different from your homeland in Epitu. I expect you have no forests or sea.”

  “In the place where I live with my people we have no sea,” Addae said. “Far away, beyond the mountains, where the lands of my people end, there is a great sea. I went there once when I was a boy. I did not go back. My people do not live there.”

  Ebryn surveyed the ruins along the side of the hill. Once there had been a sizeable settlement here, he realized, and the location looked good enough for a small town.

  “I wonder what happened to the buildings, and the people living here?”

  Addae made a sharp clicking sound with his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Look closely. You will see all the people died, or they fled together. Look here, and here — this wall and that fell all at once, in the same manner.”

  “How can you tell?” Ebryn asked, stepping onto a knee-high pile of rocks.

  Addae turned over a rock, revealing something which looked suspiciously like a roofing slate. “It can be seen the stones of this wall have fallen together here. Each wall is as this one, do you see?”

  “It looks like they've all been crushed from above?”

  “Yes, my friend.”

  “I'll ask Cormer. Perhaps we'd better get started on looking for the token,” Ebryn said.

  He looked back towards the placid sea with a pang of longing. He'd ridden down to the beach below the Conant estate at least one day each week for years. As much as he missed some of the people he'd left behind, the lack of a forest for riding and a sea to swim in, cost him more.

  Nothing of interest lay within easy reach of the hill, and mindful of the instruction to keep their exploration brief, he reluctantly turned to look amongst the fallen walls for something to take back to Brydeline.

  Addae joined him, and together they swept back and forth inside the ruins. Ebryn rummaged around near a low wall for a fragment of stone, and eventually found something he thought felt right, a small chunk of rock he could hold in the palm of his hand, a piece of the wall which had fallen to the ground. He didn't know if there should be more to the selection than random choice, but he dutifully took his piece to Cormer and Brydeline, and they seemed happy enough with it.

  When they'd all gathered back around their instructors, Addae holding something resembling a root as long as his forearm, Brydeline turned and led them back through the between.

  Sooner than expected, the small party found itself back in Vergence, stepping neatly into the same garden, at almost exactly the same spot they'd left from. Brydeline turned to them without any hint of fatigue on her face, and smiled. “Simple really, when you have mastered the art.”

  “Good,” Cormer said. “That went well. Now, for our following lessons, we'll be breaking into smaller groups. Each group will be taught on a different day for the next four weeks. Forward from here, we are going to have you initiating and guiding your own journeys, so please ensure you bring your piece of Guele with you when you return.”

  He read out their names in turn from a list, and assigned each to either a day at the start or middle of the week, or one at the end. Ebryn and Addae were both assigned to the last group, with a handful of other students.

  When he'd finished, Cormer rolled up the paper. “To begin with, each group will be lead by either Brydeline or me, and one or two other senior members of our order, until we have confidence in your abilities.”

  It wasn't until he returned to his quarters that Ebryn remembered, too late, his question about the ruins in Guele. Inside, he found a note slipped under his door, addressed to him in Plyntoure's hand-writing, containing a few lines of neat script with a name for Addae — the last known person Khet'Tuk had seen before leaving the Aremetuet order.

  The walkways were busy with people who passed quickly, hoods drawn up, avoiding their eyes. Ebryn picked his way carefully past small mounds of rotting rubbish and reeking puddles of waste, covering his nose against the smell in the worst places. Addae walked behind him where the space narrowed.

  They followed the wrong path, losing themselves a few times, before realising the “Chuble” was a small river flowing through and under the centre of the district, and not a lane as they'd expected. Eventually, Addae bribed a passer-by for directions.

  He and Addae found the money trader hidden in a back street, amongst dark, tangled lanes and tall buildings, in an area called the Chubles, a small dingy set of rooms with stained windows, almost hidden from the street but for an iron-wrought sign bearing the name Shiggle And Son above three rusting disks, which, Ebryn assumed, were there to represent coins.

  Inside, a bleak light filtered through the cleaner patches in the windows. Addae ducked to pass under the door, and stooped to avoid brushing his head on the ceiling. A pouch-faced man with yellowing eyes watched them carefully as they navigated past tables piled with strange assortments of objects, taking in their cloaks, and broaches. He stood behind a makeshift counter, which sat square in front of an open archway to a second room.

  A second man sat at a narrow table, just in sight, in the back room, carefully counting coins and writing on a long piece of parchment. He had long greasy black hair with a thin bony face, and teeth which protruded past his lips.

  “Are you Mister Shiggle?” Addae asked.

  “That's right, and what can I be doing for such fine fellows as yourselves?” Shiggle asked, narrowing his eyes.

  “We are seeking a person,” Addae said. “We do not know the manner of his appearance, but his name is Khet'Tuk.”

  Ebryn noticed Shiggle's assistant look up at the name, but not a muscle moved on Shiggle's face.

  “Never heard of him. What you want him for?” Shiggle asked.

  “I wish to learn from him,” Addae said.

  “S'cuse me, Master Shiggle, I was needing to be doing business at the back,” Shiggle's assistant said, standing up and miming a squatting motion.

  “Go on then,” Shiggle said. “Mind you're quick, or I'll dock you.”

  “Are you sure you don't know him? We were given your name,” Ebryn said.

  Shiggle looked back over his shoulder, and Ebryn could almost see him realising he was alone with two strangers, one of them very big.

  “I don't know who you've been talking to, but they're lying. I don't know any Khet'Tuk. Never have. You can't just come around here accusing me. I've got protection.”

  Addae looked every bit as baffled as Ebryn felt. He had no idea what Shiggle was talking about. He wished they'd waited for Sash. She'd have understood what Shiggle was saying.

  “Protection?” Ebryn asked.

  “You best be careful. I'm paid up with Kylnes. Any trouble and he'll hear about it.”

  Outside they retraced their steps, walking side by side down the narrow street.

  “What do you think?” Ebryn asked. “Do you think he's lying?”

  “He has not been truthful,” Addae said.

  “What are you going to do now?”

  “In my land there is a saying,” Addae said. “To have sense from a soldier, speak to his king. I will speak with this man called Kylnes. First, we must find him.”

  “Isn't he the owner of The Etched Man?”

  “Well, my friend, that is where we shall go—”

  Mid-sentence, Addae nudged Ebryn into a gloomy alleyway they were passing. “There is one who follows us,” Addae whispered.

&nb
sp; They walked into the dark passageway a few steps and Ebryn looked up to find Addae was gone. By his side the hollow, shell-like semblance of a dust-brown cloak strode along, a loose-edged glamour bound to look like the form of Addae from the rear.

  “Walk onwards,” the glamour grumbled.

  Moments later, Ebryn heard a panicked squawk behind him, and turned to find Addae wrestling a figure dressed in a dark full-length cloak near the entrance of the alleyway.

  “It's Shiggle's assistant,” Ebryn said.

  Even beneath a hood, the bony cheeks and protruding teeth were obvious.

  “You let go of me, you're hurting me arm,” the man said.

  “Why are you following us?” Ebryn asked.

  “I don't mean no harm, honest. Except I heard you was talking to Master Shiggle about one called himself Khet'Tuk.”

  “What do you know about Khet'Tuk?” Addae asked.

  “You helps me some, and I helps you,” Shiggle's assistant said, holding out his free hand face-up.

  It took Ebryn a few moments to understand the man expected to be paid for the information. Reluctantly, he felt in his money bag, extracted the smallest bronze guilder he could find, and dropped it onto the palm of the waiting hand.

  The hand remained open face-up, the lone coin looking lost in the dirt-creased palm.

  The man looked at Ebryn with a hurt expression. “How's about a bit more, so I gets something for me arm what's sore, and for the trouble what I had remembering for you?”

  Ebryn frowned, but reached into his bag again, and dropped three more coins into the outstretched palm.

  “That'll be it,” Shiggle's assistant said, giving Ebryn a skeletal grin. “The man you'll be wanting is Phar Salsa. Shiggle, he's a broker, see, buys and sells stuff. That Khet'Tuk was wanting too much, more'n Shiggle could get his hands on, so he passes him to Salsa for a tip and a favour.”

  “Where is this man called Phar Salsa? Where can we find him?” Addae asked.

  “Can't say, but you find him easy, and don't say I told nothing, right?”

  Ebryn nodded, and Addae released him. In a moment the thin man had disappeared back into the stream of people walking along the main road.

  “What do you think — do you trust him?” Ebryn asked.

  “I cannot say, my friend. I will seek answers to this question — a man who lends great sums will be known from one side of this great city to the other.”

  Maps

  FLA WATCHED the playwright Teblin scribble a scene change on the section of script he held, mouthing words silently, tugging at his beard as he struggled with a line. The round-faced man had a loud, sometimes annoying voice, and a personality big enough to fill up the huge open-air playhouse all by himself.

  He'd found a place half-way up the stalls, on one side of the theatre, where he could remain concealed. From here, he could see nearly the entire stage, and part of the wings, behind the side curtain. Fla sat hunched in the shadows, through long hours of practice, watching Sashael. He moved only when he must, to find food or relief, and to work loose the cramping pain in his leg and back muscles.

  He seldom returned to his underground home now, except to sleep at night, his experiments abandoned, the cages in his rooms emptied of animals. Wherever Sashael went, he followed, drawn from his night-time world to her daytime one. Much of her day she spent here, practising for the play, to be ready in time for the opening performance in the afternoon of the festival of stilts.

  The play seemed tortuously lengthy to Fla, with a complicated plot, and pointless conclusion. But it kept her conveniently in one place most working days, concentrating on her illusions, while he drowned in her beauty.

  Teblin paced back and forth across the stage, trying new lines, before cursing and moving to sit on the edge, with his feet dangling a yard above the ground. Sashael had joined the actors, standing half inside the far wing curtain, where they waited for him to finish.

  When it became clear they wouldn't be resuming any time soon, Leon approached Teblin, bending over to speak quietly, their heads almost touching.

  After a few moments Leon placed an arm around Teblin's shoulder in a one-armed hug. When he stood, he shook his head at the others — rehearsal over for the day, it seemed.

  Fla clambered to his feet, steadying himself with his staff, and used a casting to wrap the shadows around himself — a glamour of shade and silence, nothing like invisibility, but powerful enough to turn casual eyes away as he made his way down to the street. At the top of the steps, he turned back, leaning on the back of the uppermost bench to ease the pain in his hip.

  Sash had gone.

  Fla hurriedly scanned the faces below, trying to find her, risking a far-sensing to feel into the parts of the theatre he couldn't see, trying to locate her distinctive presence. He found no trace of her inside.

  He turned quickly, ignoring the sharp, lancing pain in his knees, extending his senses further out — beyond the confines of the building, until he found her in the street outside, moving around the side of the theatre building in the direction of the centre of the city.

  Fla cursed inwardly. Usually she left at a leisurely pace with the other members of the acting troupe, giving him time to get downstairs, and follow her towards the claws.

  His chest constricted at the thought of losing her for the rest of the day. A flicker of caution quickly extinguished in the face of his desperate desire. A rarely used casting lifted Fla up into the air, propelling him high over the roof, an ungainly clot of dark robes scattering flocks of roosting leatherwings, before dropping softly back to the cobbled street below.

  Sashael set off towards the circle road, a hundred paces ahead of him, walking at a determined pace, and Fla soon realised she meant to go to the library. He ground his teeth, knowing she would quickly outstrip him.

  As a student and apprentice, he'd studied while his fellows played — delving into hidden corners and dark secrets, developing skills to match any of the masters. Power and knowledge he'd carefully guarded, concealing his burgeoning talents like a miser hoarding a sack of gold.

  Master Brack sensed it, and Orim, who saw him as clearly as anyone, suspected more. Yet he knew he couldn't risk using castings to keep pace with her on the quieter streets of the inner city, as he might in the more crowded quarters.

  He'd barely eaten in a day and a half, trying to conserve his dwindling supply of coins. Those Orim had given him for guarding Ebryn were all but gone, and now he must decide between paying for a symor to carry him, or risk losing track of her.

  Ebryn looked up, surprised when Sash walked through the library doorway. He'd been nearing the end of a game of drake and ducks, steadily losing piece after piece to Hoi. Ben-gan hadn't been in any of his usual places that morning, and Ebryn had conceded time to play a round with Hoi while he waited.

  He felt oddly unsettled seeing her, as if she'd walked in on him in the midst of doing something illicit or shameful. Sash spotted him at once and changed direction, smiling broadly as she steered past the jumble of tables and chairs.

  “I thought you might be hiding away in a dark corner. I hoped you'd be reading out here, or something,” she said, her eyes passing over the game board and the collection of captured playing pieces on one side.

  “What are you doing here?” Ebryn asked.

  “Teblin stopped rehearsals for the day, so I came to see if you had time for a break.”

  “Um … yes,” Ebryn said, ignoring the look of disappointment on Hoi's face.

  “First, before we go, I want to see if there are any recent maps of the city.”

  “To see where the other spikes are?”

  Sash laughed, and eased into the chair next to him. “Am I that predictable?”

  “No,” Ebryn said. “I've been meaning to find one — to see the placement of the spikes myself.”

  From the corner of his eye he noticed Suru Hava and Tuk Myre looking at each other.

  “Wait until your game's over,” Sas
h said.

  “I'm going to concede,” Ebryn said to Hoi. “We already know who's going to win.”

  “I'll take the young fellow's place,” Sevoi said, making Ebryn jump as he spoke. He'd approached so quietly from behind them, he almost seemed to have appeared from nowhere.

  Sevoi dragged a chair to the end of the table, next to Hoi, and sat down.

  “My, my. Such a rare thing to have you all to ourselves, without Ben-gan dragging you off to do who knows what in the dark corners. A chance to get to know you better,” he said, leering at Sash.

  Sash looked at Ebryn. “Ben-gan?”

  “He's been showing me where to find the books I need,” Ebryn said, avoiding her eyes.

  A sly smile appeared on Sevoi's face. “It's such a thing to see the one at the beginning, and the one at the end of our kind's troubles, working together.”

  “What do you mean?” Sash asked.

  “Careful, Sevoi,” Suru said sharply, glancing up from her book.

  Sevoi held up one arm and tapped on his sevyric manacle with his nails. “Now, now Suru. It's hardly a secret. Our friend here is the only one able to rid us of this stuff, and Ben-gan the only man who knows how to create it.”

  “Ben-gan made all the sevyric iron?” Sash asked. “Everywhere?”

  “Yes,” Sevoi said through a thin-lipped smile. “Every single piece is from the hands of the great Ben-gan. Didn't you know this is his great secret?”

  “There's more to it than that,” Suru said repressively, giving Sevoi an acid look.

  “Like what?” Ebryn asked.

  Suru let out a heavy breath and closed her book, motioning them over to her table.

  “I don't want to shout. There is no secret here, but it's a subject best discussed little, and then quietly. Many in the orders know too little of the history of this city, and they're too ready to pass judgement on what they don't understand.