Cast in Chaos

by Michelle Sagara

  “He’s been talking like this for how long?”

  “Since he started painting the living figures,” Master Sabrai replied. The man sounded exhausted.

  She nodded. Started to turn. Stopped. She couldn’t understand what Everly was saying, but she didn’t need to; not this time. His voice had lifted, not in pain, but in confusion; his syllables had become longer and simpler. She tried to ignore it, found it harder, and looked at the shadows cast by the combination of buildings, strangers, and the sun she couldn’t directly see.

  “We need a date,” she said softly.

  Master Sabrai cleared his throat.

  “Master Sabrai?” Sanabalis prompted.

  “I believe I may have a rough approximation, Lord Sanabalis. It is not only Everly who has been subject to visions in the past day.”

  “Are they growing in number?”

  The answering silence was clearly hesitation. It was also Sanabalis’s problem. Kaylin continued to study the painting, moving from it up Everly’s arms to his face, his constantly moving lips, as if this combination would provide all of their much-needed answers if she could translate them.

  “They are growing, in both number and strength.”

  Without looking up, Kaylin said, “Is it as bad as the Oracles for the tidal wave were?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Not yet?” This time she did look up.

  “If it follows the same trajectory, every Oracle in the Halls, and everyone with the slightest hint of the Oracular gift will be having screaming nightmares or waking visions across the whole of the city within four days.”

  “So…we’ve got at least four days.”

  He stared at her as if her words made no sense. Sanabalis stepped on her foot before she could attempt to clarify them. She grimaced; she had enough dignity not to yelp out loud.

  Turning her attention back to Everly, she said, “I think Everly’s speaking for them.” She pointed at the strangers that he was continuing to bring to life. “I don’t think they speak our language, but I do think they speak whatever it is he’s been saying.”

  Sanabalis frowned. “With your permission, Master Sabrai, I would like to bring a Tha’alani operative to the Halls.”

  Once, this would have made Kaylin’s hair stand on end. Now she simply said, “Ybelline?”

  Sanabalis nodded.

  “When?” Master Sabrai said. He did not appear to be overly concerned by the request.

  “I feel it most relevant to bring her now,” was the Dragon Lord’s grave reply. “While Everly is still painting the strangers. You have a safe mirror?”

  “I do. In my office,” he added. There were very seldom mirrors in the rooms the Oracles occupied.

  They left Kaylin in Everly’s room. She grabbed a stool and sat outside of his visual range—not that he’d notice—while she watched him work. Had he been painting something sedate, it would have been soothing; there was something about the rhythm of his brushstrokes, the regularity with which he turned to his palette, the pursing of his lips as he considered—and discarded—splotches of color that admittedly all looked the same to her that was a silent music of gesture.

  But his babbling, his broken words, his sudden shouting, his anger, and especially his whimpering, were harder to ignore, because she understood them. Not the actual words, but the tone behind them. She’d heard frightened crowds before. Most of them hadn’t involved small children, which made this harder, because she knew better than anyone but a Sword, what a frightened crowd could easily become.

  Elani street.

  She glanced at the corpses she could see in the foreground of the painting now. Maybe a dozen, if the body parts were still attached to the rest of the bodies. Maybe more. This, she thought grimly, could be prevented. She knew roughly where these people would appear—if indeed she could assume that this painting represented any literal truth at all; certainly the last painting Everly had done that was as significant as this hadn’t.

  The door opened, and looking up, she saw Sigrenne, a bowl in one hand, the doorknob in the other. Sigrenne’s brows rose slightly when she realized Everly was not alone, but fell again when she saw who was with him. She headed into the room, and toward the little painter.

  “Is he almost finished?” she asked Kaylin. She was carrying what looked like a stew of some sort, everything in bite-size chunks that could be spooned into a moving mouth.

  “I don’t know,” Kaylin replied. “I think so.”

  “Good. It’s hard to get him to eat. It’s almost impossible to get him to eat while he’s—he’s talking.” She set the bowl down, ran a hand over her eyes, and added, “Those of us who work here would really appreciate it if you’d keep your possible disasters to a manageable scale.”

  “Bad?”

  “It’s been bad, yes. It’s going to get worse. And we’re understaffed.” Before Kaylin could ask, Sigrenne added, “We’ve the funding for staff, but it’s hard to find suitable candidates for work here. Most people don’t last a month under normal circumstances in the Halls. I don’t think they’d last a day, under these.”

  “I bet.” The significance of these two words was lost on Sigrenne.

  “We get a lot of applicants,” she continued, waiting with a spoon for some break in Everly’s speech, “but—” she looked very, very tired “—not everyone can work here. Not everyone can look at our Oracles and just accept them for who and what they are. And even if they could grow into that acceptance, they’re not going to do it now.”

  Moved by something she didn’t understand, Kaylin said, “You do good work here.”

  Sigrenne raised a brow.

  “I mean, important work. Necessary work.”

  “I know the Emperor thinks—”

  “Sigrenne, if not for the Halls the last time, most of the city would be underwater by now, and we’d have an insane Arcanist as ruler of the World.”

  “Off the record?” The weary matron asked.

  Kaylin grimaced. “Off the record. Hopefully off the Records here, as well.”

  “They’re recording all of his speech.”

  “Yes, of course they are. This would be,” she added wryly, “why I’m still a Private in spite of my many career successes.”

  Sigrenne did chuckle at that, and if it was a weary, exhausted chuckle, it was better than nothing.

  Ybelline Rabon’alani arrived and entered the room before either Sanabalis or Master Sabrai had cleared the door. She was much smaller than either, and she was neither severe nor intimidating, but something about her presence demanded a certain respect. Respect for the Tha’alani, on the other hand, took many guises. She walked directly to where Kaylin stood, and as she drew close, Kaylin automatically opened her arms.

  The Tha’alani castelord hugged her tightly, and stroked her forehead with the ends of her stalks as she did. You are well?

  Kaylin, who could barely control her words, had no control whatsoever of her thoughts, and they flickered by in a “best of” or, rather, “worst of” medley for Ybelline’s cursory inspection. Ybelline understood, and in any case, would not have been put off by simple thoughts, no matter what their content was, but she did stop Kaylin when Kaylin at last thought of Everly.

  These images, these impressions, the Tha’alani castelord studied carefully, as if Kaylin were a memory crystal.

  You’ve touched Everly before? Kaylin asked.

  I have, although it is not always I who comes here. The Oracles have their own fears, but they are not so accessible or so clear that they cause damage to touch or read.

  Then why did they summon you?

  She felt Ybelline’s wry grin a moment before it touched her lips. I believe both Master Sabrai and you, yourself, find my presence less alarming. Lord Sanabalis is an astute observer of human nature, when it suits him.

  And, she added, becoming more serious, if, as you suspect, Everly is somehow channeling an entire language, or snippets of one, it’s possible that whoever does ab
sorb Everly’s thoughts will have to work with linguists and translators in order to better decode them. Linguists and translators, like many others, are more…zealous…in guarding their thoughts, and they are more easily alarmed.

  Kaylin nodded and lowered her arms. Ybelline, with regret, withdrew her stalks.

  “I will have to touch the boy,” she told Master Sabrai. The Master nodded as Ybelline approached Everly. But here, Ybelline, ever sensitive, paused and looked fully at Sigrenne. She repeated the statement.

  Sigrenne nodded, and stepped back, still clutching the bowl of now-quite-cold stew. She was tense; Kaylin could see that—but in her defense, if it were needed, she would probably have been just as tense if Kaylin had approached Everly with the intent to touch or disturb him. Ybelline had obviously observed Everly before, even if she did not regularly interact with him. She stood at his elbow—not his painting hand—and watched his measured strokes, gauging their direction. After a few moments, she touched his shoulder gently, but firmly.

  He didn’t appear to notice, but then again, she wasn’t interfering with his painting, and as far as Kaylin could tell, anything that didn’t interfere with his painting was beneath—or more accurately, beyond—his notice. Kaylin wondered how Ybelline would initiate the more intimate contact, because as far as she could tell, it required them to be face-to-face, and Everly was likely to notice that the Tha’alani castelord was not his canvas. She hoped.

  But Ybelline did something unexpected. Instead of inserting herself between Everly and his canvas—or his palette—she stood behind him, loosely draping one arm around his chest. Everly wasn’t short, but he was very spindly. With her free hand, she lifted lank, straight hair from the back of his neck, exposing both spine and skin. Bending, she lowered her forehead until her stalks could fasten themselves to that neck. Everly didn’t seem to notice.

  Sigrenne did, and relaxed almost instantly. She offered Kaylin a wan smile. “It’s not safe to interrupt Everly when he’s painting, if it’s even possible. You can wrap him in a straitjacket and remove him from the room, but he keens and cries and slams his head against the nearest bit of floor or wall until you bring him back.”

  Everly continued to paint and babble; Ybelline continued to listen. Kaylin glanced at Sanabalis and cleared her throat. The Dragon Lord, taking the hint, looked back.

  “Are we staying?” She tried not to ask it pointedly, but it had been a long damn day, it was late, and she was exhausted. That she wasn’t also starving was more due to Sanabalis’s foresight than her own. That, and she still had to come up with something to mollify Ironjaw, or she was going to have trouble breathing, because technically she needed a throat for that, and she’d seen the color of his eyes.

  Before Sanabalis could answer, Everly’s babble broke off in a gasp—and then a high-pitched scream. Sleep forgotten, Kaylin turned back to him in time to see Ybelline tense and stagger, as well. She moved toward them both, and caught Ybelline’s arms—not Everly’s—steadying her. The stalks remained firmly in place, but for the moment, Everly’s brush was still.

  Kaylin examined the painting. It had changed. Not the composition; that remained the same. The crowd behind the detailed strangers had become, by broader and suggestive brushstrokes, more solid; their shadows suggested numbers beyond count. But the white space above their head was no longer entirely white. It was almost, but not quite, gray. It looked, at first glance, blank—like untouched canvas, waiting for paint.

  It wasn’t.

  And where Everly had painted, where he’d applied his solid, sensible colors, he’d now applied a partial wash of some sort—although how that worked with oil, Kaylin had no idea—and the workaday colors of Elani street, in a radius around that open, blank space, was now dimmer. No, Kaylin thought, as she leaned forward. Not dimmer. It had become, in one go, transparent. As if it were fading into nothing.

  Sanabalis joined her; she could hear the heavy tread of his steps. He stopped well back from Everly. After a moment, he said, “Private, I believe we are no longer required here.” His voice was grim and chill. Kaylin tore her attention away from the painting. She still supported Ybelline, who was stiff with shock beneath her hands.

  He started to speak, saw what she hadn’t mentioned, and stopped himself, but it was a close thing; his eyes were a blazing orange. He was not, however, angry; he was alarmed. “A few minutes,” he managed to say. “Master Sabrai, I require the use of your mirrors. It is, I consider, quite urgent. I will also require your estimate of our time frame.” Before Master Sabrai could speak, Sanabalis lifted a hand, cutting off the possibility of words. “I understand that the estimate will grow more accurate as the Oracles continue, but I believe I now understand what they presage. Your best approximation, in this case, will be good enough for our purposes.

  “Private, we will return for you when I am done. Attempt to be ready to leave, or you will find yourself walking home.”

  Kaylin, however, wasn’t worried about walking home; she was worried about Ybelline, and indirectly, Everly. Everly had dropped his brush. She turned to ask Sigrenne if this was his normal way of announcing that he was finished, and saw that Sigrenne’s eyes were wide with surprise—and concern. The older, larger woman darted forward quickly, rescuing the brush as if she were tending an actual injury. She set it to one side of his palette.

  “Ybelline,” Kaylin whispered, lips close to the Tha’alani’s ear. There was no response. Her eyes didn’t even flicker to the side. “Ybelline,” she said again, this time louder.

  “Kaylin, is this normal?”

  “No. Can you— If Everly’s not painting, can you reach him? Can you get his attention?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never seen him…drop his brush before. This isn’t something the Tha’alani is doing, is it?” she asked, her voice taking on an edge of suspicion that could easily fall into anger or hysteria.

  “No! You could spend the rest of your damn life looking for someone as decent—as caring—as Ybelline, and you wouldn’t find one. Whatever she’s doing, she’s doing in response to Everly—”

  “Can you make her let go, then?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know what’s safe to do—” Kaylin realized that her own voice was now dangerously close to the same edge as Sigrenne’s, and she forced herself to breathe deeply. Three times. We need her, she wanted to say—but it would be the wrong thing. Everly, for all intents and purposes, was one of Sigrenne’s kits.

  “Sigrenne—can you access Everly’s Records?”

  “Not from here.”

  Of course not. No mirrors. “Can you access them from somewhere else? I don’t want to leave. I know you don’t want to leave, either—but the Halls’ mirrors must be keyed. They won’t respond to me.”

  Sigrenne nodded, taking the same deep breaths that Kaylin had just struggled to master. They met each other’s eyes, and were it not for the difference in their ages, height, and coloring, they might have been looking in a mirror. Sigrenne’s lips quirked up in a grim, small smile. “You’ll watch them both?”

  “I’ll watch them,” Kaylin promised.

  Ybelline didn’t respond to speech. She didn’t respond to shouting. Neither did Everly. Their eyes were wide, and they stared straight ahead, like startled, terrified creatures. Ybelline had seen some of the worst that humanity had to offer; she’d faced it willingly. She’d seen her people’s torture, and she’d seen their deaths when they attempted to avoid the darkness and the insanity of the normal, human mind by disobeying the Emperor’s direct command. And she accepted it. Each time she was asked to read a mind, each time she was asked to go into a mind and ferret out information at the behest of the Imperial Service, she faced it again.

  But she had never been immobile with terror before.

  It had to be Everly, Kaylin thought grimly. It had to be. The alternative—that something Ybelline had seen had caused this—didn’t bear thought.

  Sigrenne came back obscenely quickly; Kaylin could he
ar her heavy, fast strides before the door opened again. She’d clearly run from Everly’s room to the nearest mirror—and back. But as she approached, she shook her head. “The only person who has ever—ever—managed to get Everly’s attention when he’s delivering an Oracle, Private Neya, is you.”

  Kaylin grimaced. “I think I promised Master Sabrai that I wouldn’t—”

  “Master Sabrai,” was the grim reply, “can get stuffed.” Sigrenne came to stand beside Ybelline. “Let me hold her arms. You try to reach Everly.”

  “If it upsets him—”

  “I’ll deal with upset,” Sigrenne said. “But he’s not painting, right now—and he’s still stuck in Oracular trance. I can feed him, but he won’t eat enough to survive. He won’t sleep. He won’t collapse until—” She shook her head. “Everly isn’t the only painter-Oracle the Halls have had. We have some idea of what will happen to him.”

  Kaylin transferred Ybelline’s arms—and the bulk of her weight—to the much larger Sigrenne.

  “She doesn’t weigh much, does she?”

  “Not much, no.” She walked over to Everly’s palette, and picked up the brush he’d been using. It was one of the wider brushes. “This was a lot less intimidating when he was working in charcoals,” she muttered.

  “What you did last time—”

  “It was a mostly blank canvas. He’d done some blocking sketches, but very little actual work. I was messing with the blocked sketches.”

  “How?”

  “Um.”

  Sigrenne, who was accustomed to dealing with the very strange commentary of the Oracles, didn’t even bat an eye; she waited.

  “I added a figure. Well, a blob. I’m not an artist, Sigrenne. This—it’s finished.”

  “It’s not.”

  “It’s pretty damn close, then.”