Geomancer twoe-1

by Ian Irvine

  There was a barrier beyond which she dared not cross. Tiaan could feel the energy there, unlimited amounts of it, a great, worldwide field intersecting with smaller fields surrounding the spire. How to draw from it without taking too much?

  As she considered what to do, Ryll let out a chicken-like squawk and crashed to the floor, where he began to twitch. This turned into a violent, uncoordinated thrashing. Had he driven himself over the edge, or had the creature taken over his mind? Should she stop, or keep going? What if she was just feeding power to the animal? Surely Ryll could stand more than it could. But could she?

  Sensing out a minor loop of the field, she tapped it and a flood of power surged into her. Too much. Her head felt boiling hot; she grew faint and had to hold herself up with her arms.

  Then, ever so slowly, a block began to dissolve, like a rock-salt door in the path of a flood. It softened, pinholed in the middle, and the current tore through it.

  ‘Yes!’ Ryll roared, kicked both legs in the air and lay still.

  The creature screamed, the sound reminding Tiaan of a woman who had gone insane in the breeding factory. The little beast convulsed and tried to tear the spikes off its tail. Colours chased themselves across it.

  Tiaan pulled off the helm. The flow of power ceased. She wobbled across to Ryll, thinking him dead. Strangely, that bothered her. They had been together for over three months, and in spite of everything, she liked him.

  His lips had coloured an oily green, the rest of his skin fading to grey. He was breathing. She sat by him, wondering if she should run for help. He did not look unconscious; more like asleep. The creature lay on its back, legs spread like a dead cat, though it was also breathing.

  Was this her chance? She staggered to the door. It was locked and her fingers weren’t strong enough to work the fingerlock. She pounded on the door but it made little sound on the solid metal.

  Tiaan went back to the bench. Ryll and the creature lay as before. There was nothing she could do. Taking up the globe, she saw that it was bent out of shape. Tiaan got out her toolkit and began to reconstruct it. The time passed quickly. It was good to be working with her hands again. She had not realised how much she’d missed that. When the job was done she lay on the floor and dozed.

  It was early morning when she woke and went to check on Ryll. He opened his eyes, giving her a warped smile. ‘You saved my life!’ His voice was a cracked rasp.

  ‘A life for a life,’ she replied more boldly than she felt. ‘I hope you remember that.’

  ‘I will.’

  He looked across at the cage. Lyrinx smiles were always disturbing but this one showed more tooth than most. ‘I believe we’ve done it, Tiaan.’

  She did not respond.

  ‘The snizlet and rrhyzzik have melded into one.’

  The backs of her hands prickled. ‘I only did it to save you; and myself,’ she muttered.

  ‘Look at the little beast. I don’t know what you did, but it’s worked. It may even grow to full size.’

  She prayed that it would not. He trudged to the cage, but had to prop himself up on the bench. The creature was up on its back legs, gripping the bars. Its snout was cocked to one side as if listening. It was bigger than before, and leaner.

  ‘I’m going to call it nylatl,’ said Ryll. Reaching for the meat bowl he dug a hole in a piece of meat with one claw, pressed in a pellet the size of a grain of wheat and tossed the meat through the bars.

  The nylatl stared at the food, turned it over and over on the floor and sniffed it carefully. Only then did it bolt the morsel in a single gulp.

  ‘What are you doing?’ asked Tiaan, keeping well back.

  He held up his hand, watching the nylatl intently. After taking two steps the legs on its left side collapsed. It fell down; its eyes closed. Ryll prodded it with a piece of metal. It did not move.

  He whipped off the cage, punched six tiny circles of flesh from the back of the creature and popped them in a jar of fluid. Ryll dug ointment from a jar with his fingers but, reaching over to put it on the wounds, he stopped, looking shaky. Resting both forearms on the bench, he said, ‘Ah, I ache all over.’

  A sharp pain cleaved through Tiaan’s head. She lost vision for a second and in that darkness smelled the nylatl, a hot odour like slightly-off meat.

  Hurt!

  As her vision came back, the nylatl kicked one leg, flipped upside down and sank its claws into Ryll’s arm.

  Hate!

  Before he could grab the creature it shot into the air and landed on his head. The back claws dug into his neck, seeking the joins between his skin plates. The claws of its front legs carved furrows across Ryll’s long brow, going for the eye-sockets.

  Ryll flung an arm across his eyes. The other hand flashed back, trying to rip the nylatl off his head. One of its poisoned spines penetrated his palm. Roaring in agony, Ryll snatched his hand away. Clear venom dripped from the spine. He tried again but the fearsome mouth took a piece out of his hand at the base of the thumb.

  Hungry!

  She watched, open-mouthed. Ryll tried to prise the creature off with an iron bar. It dug its front claws into his brow ridges and the rear ones into his neck, pulling its segmented body down over his skull like a cap. Venom began to seep from the down-pointing spines. Already Ryll looked disoriented. Soon those spines would plunge into his skull and inject their poison. Ryll would be dead and it would start on her.

  Brains! Ahhhh!

  Perhaps it was a paralysing venom and the creature would tear Ryll’s head open and eat the contents while he was still alive. She watched helplessly as the nylatl tightened its grip.

  FORTY-F IVE

  Tiaan ran to the locked door, screaming ‘Help!’ so hard that it hurt her throat. She pounded on the metal. There came no response. No sound could penetrate the thickness of iron. What could she do? It was whispering in her mind, the same thing over and over.

  Hungry! Hungry! Hungry!

  Ryll had managed, by reaching behind his head, to catch hold of the back of the creature where he could avoid the spines, though his arm was at such an awkward angle that he could not tear the nylatl off. He dared not use his other arm lest the beast gouge his eyes out.

  The nylatl arched its back, pressing another spine into Ryll’s hand. He clung on grimly but Tiaan could see he was weakening as the venom took effect.

  She ran around, looking for any kind of weapon. There was not much in the room – the lyrinx used few tools. Grabbing one of the glass and wire cages, she darted behind Ryll, planning to whack the nylatl off. It was the bravest thing she had ever done. If it went for her it would claw her face off.

  Tiaan lunged, swinging the cage with all her strength. The nylatl’s head twisted around, the blue tongue aiming a squirt of venom at her eyes. She ducked and the cage smashed against Ryll’s head. He grunted; the nylatl squealed.

  The venom splatted on the top of her head, burning straight through her hair. She ran for the water barrel, plunged her head in and scrubbed frantically. Strands of hair floated on the surface.

  Brains!

  She spun around, water pouring down her face. The nylatl was staring at her. Its claws lifted and dug in like a cat on an armchair.

  There was only one thing left to do, and it might well be worse than doing nothing. She crammed the helm on, grabbed the globe, oriented the long side of the amplimet so that it faced Ryll’s head and strove with all her might for power.

  Instantly the whispering in her mind grew to a mad shriek.

  HUNGRY! BRAINS!

  The nylatl’s thoughts crashed around inside her skull like a blind bat, full of incoherent rage. The forced integration must have broken its mind, but its was a deadly cunning insanity. The nylatl wanted to gouge its way into Ryll’s head and take over his body as its own had been invaded. It wanted to make her suffer too, as it had suffered in the integration. And it wanted to destroy and consume, as its own nature had been destroyed and consumed. It was full of malice.


  The spire’s magnetic lines of force whirled about her, but even as Tiaan drew power from the field she knew it could not work. That power, the kind that had been used to create the nylatl and make it grow, only fed the creature. She had to have something different, stronger. So strong that the beast would be completely overwhelmed. No choice but to use her fledgling geomancy again. This nylatl could not be allowed to live. If it could overcome a lyrinx so easily, what would it be capable of when it was fully grown?

  Down her senses went, to that hollow beneath the base of the iron spire of Kalissin, from whence the magma pool had retreated ten thousand years ago. The domed roof rock formed a series of concentric cracks under the weight of the spire, though the iron froth was still welded to the rock it had penetrated in its molten rise.

  To make the roof fall was far beyond her powers, or anyone’s. It might remain in place for another hundred thousand years before gravity finally pulled it down. But just the fall of a fragment into that pool in the distant depths would provide enough energy for her purposes. It might release more than she could handle, and then she would die. Tiaan hesitated, but only for a second. If she did nothing they would both die.

  Ryll groaned, breaking her concentration. He was on his back, kicking feebly. His head was covered in purple blood. The bent arm still strained but he was failing.

  ‘Help!’ she roared, but no one could hear.

  Bat’s claws scored through her brain, the nylatl trying to stop her. The pain was excruciating. Tiaan could barely see though it, with her strange, three-dimensional artisan’s vision, to that source below the spire.

  Her sight began to break up. Pinholes appeared in everything she looked at. They grew larger and through each she saw a nylatl’s staring eye. It was, despite her efforts, getting at her mind.

  Her geomantic strange-sight passed through half a league of solid rock, scanning across the surface of the dome, seeking a piece so precariously held that the gentlest of nudges would release it. She tried one, then another, but the meagre skills the Aachim had taught her were not enough. Tiaan began to panic. She had no idea what she was doing. It could not work.

  Ryll let out a ghastly, quivering shriek. She had to succeed. There – a small column of rock was jointed all around in a perfect hexagon, and it was almost cracked through at the top. She used what power she could gather from the fields but could not budge it. More! She drew more. Her head seemed to be boiling like a kettle. She felt the rock crack, but it did not fall.

  Tiaan lost focus. With the mad shrieking in her head, and Ryll’s cries and thrashing before her, she could not visualise the source.

  Her eyes sprang open. Ryll’s hand lost its grip on the nylatl and fell smack against the floor. The creature dug in its claws. One spine had pierced his scalp and was going up and down, trying to penetrate his skull. The nylatl’s skin was striped in brilliant reds, yellows and blacks, like a poisonous caterpillar. Ryll flashed in delirious, psychedelic colours.

  She could not waste a second. Tiaan found that hexagonal column again and suddenly she knew how to use it. The Principle of Similarity, one of the vital principles used by artisans, was the perfect choice here, for the rock column had the same shape as the amplimet. Power cascaded from the field into the crystal and she hurled it at the crack.

  It parted. Friction held the column for a moment, and then it fell. She drew power from its motion, just a trickle at first but increasing as it accelerated into the magma chamber.

  The bead of light in her amplimet swelled. A focussed beam burst forth. She directed it onto the nylatl. It was not bright enough to hurt it. Not yet. The nylatl arched its back. Ryll kicked weakly. The beam slipped off the creature.

  ‘Don’t move, Ryll!’ She hoped his hearing had not closed down. Her head felt eaten away inside. The nylatl began to struggle desperately.

  In her mind’s eye Tiaan could see the column falling as if she was watching it in slow motion. It accelerated toward that glowing pool of magma.

  Her head felt as hot as that magma; white heat licked down her backbone; every nerve fibre in her body was ablaze. Her senses were shutting down one by one. She could no longer feel her feet on the floor. The hot carrion smell of the nylatl vanished. Ryll’s agonised wails cut off. The shrieking chuckle of the creature faded away.

  Her sight began to break up at the edges; her eyes felt full of pinpricks. Tiaan clung grimly to sight; she must be able to see to aim. The last she saw, as her vision was going completely, was the nylatl arching up on Ryll’s head, preparing to hurl itself at the real enemy – her!

  The black column plunged into the pool, giving up its energy in a burst that blacked Tiaan out. She did not see the brilliant purple light that burst, fan-like, from the amplimet. She tracked the creature’s leap through the field. Just the edge of the fan caught the nylatl, burning the ends off its spines and heating its skin to blister point. Its overheated muscles spasmed, hurling it against the wall so hard that it was knocked senseless.

  She did not see the central pulse heat the wall to white-hot, until the metal ran down and puddled on the sloping floor. With an explosion of sparks the light burst through, carving a ragged hole to the outside. Tiaan saw and felt nothing. She lay senseless. The amplimet went out.

  There were shouts outside, the lock was forced and Liett scrabbled through the entrance, bent low, followed by Coeland. They stared at the destruction. A red pool of iron, large enough to fill a number of wheelbarrows, was congealing on the floor. Ash and cinders lay everywhere. The room was as hot as a sauna. Ryll crouched in a groaning, lacerated heap.

  ‘What happened?’ Liett shouted.

  One of Ryll’s arms twitched. Liett lifted his battered head onto her knee, wiping blood out of his eyes. She stroked his dull crest. He rolled his head and his eyes lit on the nylatl, lying against the wall. It was covered in pus-coloured blisters. Smoke curled up from several of the spines. Its skin was a bilious yellow. It looked dead.

  ‘It tried to kill me, Liett,’ Ryll gasped. ‘Tiaan twice saved me. Is she …?’

  Coeland bent over her. ‘She lives.’

  Ryll’s eyes widened in terror. ‘The nylatl moved. Kill it!’

  The creature shot past them, hurtled through the doorway and disappeared.

  ‘Sound the alarm!’ Ryll choked. ‘Find it, and destroy it!’

  Coeland and Liett went after the nylatl. Ryll forced himself to his feet, glancing at Tiaan, who lay as before. He eyed the hole in the wall, saluted Tiaan with a shaky hand and went out. The door slammed. The lock clicked.

  Tiaan felt her senses coming back in the same order as they had disappeared. She tasted blood from a bitten tongue. Her scalp throbbed. She smelt lyrinx blood and carrion. And something else – fresh air on her face. Cold air!

  The chance had come – the only one she’d get. She did not move as the lyrinx checked her, nor even as the nylatl got away and the two went after it. Only after Ryll had gone, locking the door behind him, did she climb to her feet.

  The smell of freedom made her eyes water, or maybe it was the fumes. She opened her eyes and saw nothing. Tiaan almost panicked, then the room brightened as if a lantern had been turned up and her sight was back.

  There was a gaping hole in the wall, large enough to get through. She put her head out. The metal was still hot but cooling rapidly. The spire, clotted here and there with rock, was steep, though not so steep that she could not climb down.

  She had to take the chance even if she was caught within minutes. Tiaan stuffed her devices into her pack and threw it over her shoulder. A bare blade lay on the bench, the one Ryll had used as a scalpel. She took that too. The amplimet was on the floor. Tiaan pressed it to her lips, gave thanks for the miracle and packed it away. Finally she put a finger in a clot of Ryll’s blood and wrote crudely on the wall, ‘Two lives! My debt is paid!’

  She doubted that it would stop the lyrinx from coming after her, but Tiaan wanted it to be on the record. If she was captured she would fig
ht them to the death. Better that than be forced to collaborate again, even for Minis.

  Laying a stool across the hot aperture, she crawled out and began to pick her way down. Tiaan felt hot and cold and shivery, an inevitable result of so abusing her talent. Still, she could walk, and climb, and defend herself if she had to.

  It was further than it looked, and steeper. And much, much colder. After months inside the unnatural warmth of Kalissin, Tiaan was quite unused to the winter cold. Yet even the outside of Kalissin was considerably warmer than the rest of Faralladell. It would be perishing on the other side of the lake. Out of sight of the aperture, she put on her mountain clothing.

  She hoped they had not yet caught the nylatl. With luck, not that she’d had much of that lately, it might be an hour or two before they discovered she was gone. Tiaan did not build up her hopes. The chance of getting away was remote.

  She tried not to think of the nylatl escaping. Tiaan could still see the look in its eyes as it prepared to abandon Ryll and leap at her. She would have no chance against it, if it got out.

  Not far to the bottom now. There was little likelihood of being seen from inside, for the windows were small and it was easy to keep away from them. Tiaan squinted across the lake but the mist-wreathed water blurred into the snowy shores beyond. There was no colour in this landscape. It might have been two leagues across, or five.

  It was approaching noon by the time she made it to the bottom of the spire, which rose out of a collar of angular rubble clothed in dense broad-leaved trees. They looked quite out of place here.

  The ground was warm – Tiaan could feel it through the soles of her boots. The air was too, though only near the ground. The wind blowing off the lake felt dank.

  She negotiated her way through shoulder-high ferns. Cushiony mosses lay underfoot and the forest had a moist organic reek she had never smelt before, though she associated it with the warm forests of the north. It was not far down to the water. When she reached it Tiaan looked back.

  The sun’s slanting rays passed between the cloud layers to paint the dark spire in reds and browns. Halfway up she saw her ragged escape hole. There was no sign of pursuit. Perhaps Ryll, honourable creature that he was, considered the debt repaid. Had he given her this chance?