The Shades of Time and Memory

by Storm Constantine

  Pellaz nodded. “It might sound strange, but I know little about these things.” He grimaced. “I don't know how my body works. Why the hell is that?”

  Sheeva smiled gently. “Don't worry, few hara do know – yet.”

  Pellaz frowned. “Why not? Isn't it the most important thing?”

  Sheeva leaned back in his chair, tapped the desk in front of him. Perhaps he didn't want to be giving this lesson. Pellaz didn't blame him, but he wanted his question answered. “Wraeththu had a lot of growing up to do, you know that,” Sheeva said. “For a long time, we were all children, whatever our ages in physical terms. Only now are we rediscovering abandoned yet essential skills and discovering new ones. We are no longer playing in the ruins, tiahaar. The dust has settled, and we are standing around, blinking in the sunlight. Now, we must rebuild. We do not need the kind of medicine that humans had, because our bodies are more efficient at healing themselves. But sometimes, as in Caeru's case, intervention is unavoidable, because so much physical damage has been done. We are learning about our bodies, and how they function. This learning cannot simply be academic, because it is impossible to explain in academic terms exactly how we reproduce. All you need to know for now is that the conception chamber is the main aspect that sets our reproductive method apart from that of human females, whose foetuses were, of course, conceived in the womb that bore them. I, and many other, suspect that this organ has functions beyond mere reproduction, but ultimately there is much we have yet to understand about such matters.”

  “Thank you,” Pellaz said. “I appreciate your time in telling me this.”

  “You're welcome.”

  “How badly is Rue damaged? How is this going to affect him?”

  Sheeva breathed in deeply through his nose. “The area in the Tigrina's body that corresponds to an actual womb has suffered great trauma. At some point in the future, he will need further reconstructive surgery. I will do what I can in respect of repairs, but it's doubtful he'll be able to host a pearl again. He should, however, be capable of normal aruna in a soume sense.”

  “Do whatever it takes,” Pellaz said.

  “Mostly, it's up to him,” said Sheeva. “Caeru has the power to heal himself on mental and emotional levels, which of course affects the physical body. I am simply the mechanic. I repair physical breakdowns.”

  “I have been told you are the best.”

  Sheeva inclined his head. “I was appointed here because of my reputation, and I will do all in my power to uphold it.”

  “Is there anything I can do?”

  “Stay with him tonight, tiahaar. Give him your strength. It is the best medicine.”

  Pellaz returned to the room where Caeru lay motionless on his low bed. The healers were still chanting softly, their palms upraised to direct energy into their patient's body. Pellaz stepped inside their circle and knelt on the floor. The chanting trailed off and one of the healers said, “Tiahaar, we respectfully request you allow us to work in peace.”

  “Go,” Pellaz said.

  “What?”

  “Leave this room. All of you. Go.”

  The healers were silent, watching him.

  “I am Tigron,” Pellaz said. “This is my consort. I will heal him.” He dismissed the other occupants in the room from his attention and sat cross-legged beside the bed. He drew back the sheet that covered the cage over Caeru's body. All the time, a mantra churned in his mind: don't think of Orien, don't think of Orien.

  He removed the cage. The chief healer made a protest, but Pellaz only snarled at him. “Get out.”

  Pellaz placed his hands, palms down, the tiniest distance above Caeru's savaged flesh. Sheeva had done an exemplary job in patching him up, but it was still a foul mess. Pellaz summoned the power from the centre of creation to flow through him. He directed it into Caeru's body.

  For a while, he remembered the time, so long ago, when he'd tried to heal a terrible wound on his friend Cobweb's leg. He remembered the feeling of the energy then and how weak and sporadic it had felt in comparison to what he could achieve now. Images of the past flickered across his mind's eye, but, gradually, the flow of energy took him deep into trance and then he did not think at all.

  Late the following morning, Vaysh, the Tigon's aide, came to Caeru's room in the Infirmary, because the staff were concerned that Pellaz would not leave the Tigrina's side. They had summoned Vaysh to reason with Pellaz, who ignored anyhar else who tried to speak with him.

  Vaysh's voice, harsh and commanding, at least permeated the fog of trance in Pell's mind. He heard somehar say, “Pellaz, wake up. Come back to Phaonica. Let the hara here do their job. You're in the way.”

  Pellaz raised his head and saw Vaysh standing at the door. His red hair looked shocking against the pale colours of the room.

  “Pell,” Vaysh said. “Get up.”

  Pellaz could no longer feel his hands and arms, although he could sense that the healing energy still coursed through them strongly. At some point during the night, he had actually allowed his fingers to rest on Caeru's wounds. Pellaz remembered, vaguely, that he had been involved in a battle: a fight with Caeru's will, because he had only wanted to die. Pellaz hadn't allowed that to happen. He'd had to work healing on several levels, but it wasn't over yet. Caeru himself was still unconscious. Pellaz dismissed Vaysh from his attention and closed his eyes, concentrating once more on the task in hand.

  “Pell.”

  He heard Vaysh cross the room, felt a hand upon his shoulder. Pellaz was fizzing with power: it took hardly any effort to use some of it to hurl Vaysh back towards the door. He landed in an undignified heap.

  Vaysh scrambled to his feet and spat, “Why are you doing this? Don't tell me you care!”

  “Get out,” Pellaz said, in a low voice. To emphasise his displeasure, he hissed like a furious cat.

  Vaysh stared at him for some moments, then left the room without another word.

  Some time later, Ashmael Aldebaran arrived. Pellaz had lost the capacity to speak, but still locked gazes with Ashmael for what felt like a long time. After this, the general said laconically to somehar unseen behind him, “Leave him. Scoop him up when he passes out.”

  This occurred some time in the early evening. Pellaz didn't know what happened, only that he woke up around thirty-six hours later in another room in the Infirmary. He was instantly alert, full of energy. A healer came to his side, offered water.

  “Does he live?” Pellaz asked.

  The healer nodded. “He is awake, tiahaar.”

  Pellaz drank the water in one gulp, then got out of bed.

  Long gauzy drapes blew softly in the breeze that came in through the open windows. Wooden chimes tocked rhythmically in the draught. Caeru's eyes were open: he stared at the sky. Pellaz sat on the edge of the bed. They had covered Caeru with a sheet again, and his hands rested on the cage. His fingernails were still crusted with dried blood, as was his hair. The bruises on his face were already fading, because a har heals quickly, but tubes still emanated from beneath the cage, draining out fluid. Some wounds, being fundamental, were slower to heal.

  Caeru turned his head slowly on the pillow. “I saw you,” he said. “I saw you with me in the darkness. You were shining.”

  Pellaz reached out and touched Caeru's face. “How do you feel?”

  Caeru grimaced. “I don't feel anything. I don't hurt. I just am. They gave me something to drink. It was bitter. It took all feeling away.”

  “Do you want anything?”

  “Yes. The truth. They won't tell me. How bad is it?”

  “Bad,” Pellaz said softly.

  Caeru swallowed. “No more harlings for me, not inside me. That's it, isn't it?”

  Pellaz nodded his head slightly. “It seems that way.”

  “Has it all gone? I don't know. Tell me. What else won't I be able to do again?”

  “The surgeon has repaired most of the damage. It will heal, in time. You are still har, Rue.”

  “I lost
our child.”

  “You didn't lose it. Somehar took it from you.”

  Caeru pressed the fingers of one hand into his eye sockets. There was a thin streak of dried blood on his arm too. “I didn't want the pearl,” he said. “Don't you understand? I did it for you, but not for myself. Have I made this happen?”

  “No,” Pellaz said. He took Caeru's hand in his own, pulled it down from his face. “Did you see you did this to you?”

  Caeru shook his head. “No. Who would want to do anything like this?”

  “Are you sure you didn't see?”

  “Yes.”

  “No suspicions?”

  “No! Don't even think it.”

  “Has Cal been to see you?”

  Caeru looked away. “I asked for him. They told me he is not in Immanion any more.”

  Pellaz closed his eyes. “Thiede,” he said, a prayer, a plea or a curse: he could not tell.

  “Cal didn't do this to me, Pell,” Caeru murmured. “You don't have to worry about that.”

  Pellaz uttered a low growl. “I will find who did, I promise you. And when I do, I'll rip their guts from them. I promise you that, as well.”

  “We weren't meant to create that pearl,” Caeru said. “Somehar stopped us.”

  “I know,” Pellaz said, “which means it was more important then even I thought.”

  “Who, though? Who would hate us that much?”

  “I'm not sure it's hate,” Pellaz said. He let go of Caeru's hand and stood up. “They should clean you up. It's not right. They should clean your hands and your hair.”

  “Show me the damage,” Caeru said. “I have to see. I had to wait for you to come before I could bear to look at it.”

  Pellaz paused for a few moments, then leaned down and drew back the sheet. Caeru raised himself up on his elbows and looked down at his belly. Through the narrow bars of the protective cage, the wounds looked much better than they had: a strange map of stitches and black crusts. His stomach appeared sunken, as if a great part of him had been hacked away.

  Caeru lay down again. “If you had not been here, I would have left this life,” he said.

  “I know,” Pellaz said. “I wouldn't let you go.”

  “Why? You don't love me. We are not chesna. You could have been free.”

  “I will go to Galhea,” Pellaz said, “and I'll take Terez with me. There is work to do. When I return, I will visit you. Be home by then, Rue. I hope to bring you news at that time.”

  “Why?” Caeru insisted, ignoring all that Pellaz had just said.

  “I didn't want you to die,” Pellaz said. “Make of that what you will. I can offer no more.”

  “Thank you,” Caeru said. “I will help you, Pell, whatever happens.”

  Pellaz nodded thoughtfully. “I'll have them clean you up,” he said. “I'll send Vaysh to you. He can sit with you.”

  “Vaysh,” Caeru said dully. “Is that because I'm like him now? Barren? Is he going to talk to me about that, try and make me adjust?” He laughed bitterly.

  “No,” Pellaz said. “It's because Vaysh is trained to protect a har, which is more than can be said for our so-called security staff. But that is not your concern. Just get well again.”

  Chapter Eight

  Calanthe har Aralis came to his senses in darkness. He sat up. He could hear his own breath, and from the way it echoed sensed he was in an enormous building or cave. He could see nothing. Puzzling thoughts flashed through his mind. They will travel to the city of winds and ghosts. There are jewels there, amid the rubbish.

  Before he'd woken, he'd seen his son Tyson, so like himself. He had seen Pellaz, too bright to look upon, like a white hot flame.

  Where am I?

  He almost laughed aloud at the clichéd question. What could he remember? A meal in a restaurant in Immanion. Low tide, the reek of sea weed, the smell of fish simmering in spices, tart wine. He could not see the face of the one who sat opposite him. He could hear a voice, but not the words. He could remember a feeling of relief, of unburdening himself, feeling like he'd been understood. He remembered things making sense, like a door opening on a room he thought he'd never find. After that, a blank. He must have been drugged, knocked out, but there was no pain in his head, no sense of sluggishness. He had no idea what had happened to him and yet felt emotionally numb. He could not be afraid. It was like a dream.

  And then, a pinprick of light in the immense darkness ahead of him. It zoomed towards him, growing in size, until it bobbed in front of him, a sphere of radiance the size of his head.

  “Am I dreaming?” Cal said to this phenomenon.

  The sphere pulsed a little, as if it were breathing. Cal heard a voice in his head. No more than any other har, Calanthe.

  “What is this place? Why am I here?”

  It is a hidden place, at the end of a lonely back road of the otherlanes. You are here to be of use to your kind, for there is none other like you. You will remember soon the conversation that took place in Immanion, and the agent who persuaded you to come here. The journey was made without sedim. It has disoriented you, but this will fade.

  “Who or what are you?”

  I am Perdu.

  Cal thought this name should be familiar, but couldn't remember why. “What are you?”

  Living essence, as you are.

  “Then manifest. I will not talk to a ball of light.”

  The sphere contracted until it was a blazing mote of brilliance, then exploded with a dazzling display of sparks. Cal shielded his eyes for a moment, sure that sizzling particles had burned his face. He could smell cordite. Light had come into the space he occupied, light which illumined rather than concealed. He saw an almost unimaginably huge chamber, like a temple, its domed roof veined with organic struts and beams. He saw a floor of what looked like polished obsidian. Standing upon it in rows were bowls of radiance on tripods seven feet tall. Beyond them, ranks of tall pillars disappearing into the distance, like the reflections of in multiple mirrors. At last, his reluctant consciousness focused on the tall figure before him. He was wary now, knowing what he'd see: the slanting catlike eyes, the mane of blood red hair. Thiede.

  “Am I dead?” Cal said. “Is this your revenge?”

  Thiede concealed his hands in the wide sleeves of his indigo-coloured robe. “We cannot die that easily. You already know that, I believe.”

  Cal got to his feet. “I have sensed you, Thiede. Often. What I mean is, now I'm here, can I ever go back?”

  Thiede smiled. “Yes. I do not seek revenge. There is nothing to warrant it.”

  “Then why have you brought me here? To get me away from Pell again? I suppose that's it.”

  Thiede shook his head. “Not at all. You are here to finish what was started, what the Kamagrian started for you.”

  “Which is?”

  “To become Tigron, worthy of the title.”

  “Is Opalexian part of this?”

  “In some regard. We were so wrong, Opalexian and I. But we are learning, as you will. I needed to bring you here, because I cannot manifest in your realm. This is not just because you banished me, Cal. It was expedient for others that I was removed. Part of a greater plan, of which I was entirely ignorant. If I return to Immanion, there is a strong chance that my presence would be sensed and I would be destroyed, utterly, my essence erased from space and time. Opalexian knows this now too. She hides, she fears. They could come for her also, in the guise of an assassin or liberator. Who knows?”

  “What are you talking about? Be clear with me.”

  “Wraeththu is under threat,” Thiede said. “Grave threat.”

  “From what?”

  “From the enemies of those who made us.”

  “Who made us?”

  Thiede smiled again. “The gods,” he said. “As everyhar believes.”

  “I don't. I think the answer is more prosaic than that.”

  “We have much to discuss,” Thiede said. “I will show you my realm, my humble home. You ar
e safe here, as your son will be.”

  “Tyson, I saw him. Is he in danger?”