Pathspace

by Matthew Kennedy

Chapter 22

  Xander: “weave the wind”

  The lad was progressing nicely, if gradually. Soon he could be relied upon to survive most confrontations, if only by concealing himself. Sometimes, Xander was hard put to repress his envy. If only I'd had the benefit of a mentor half as good for me as I am being to him. How much more might I have accomplished by now? But such thoughts were useless. And gods knew he didn't want the lad to have to learn as slowly as he himself had. There was no time for it.

  Each piece of the Tourist leftovers that Kristana's men brought him gave him a chance to puzzle out more of the magic technology, the psionic engineering of the aliens. So far he had learned pathspace from the swizzles, spinspace from the one everwheel they'd found in southern Wyoming, and tonespace from the coldboxes and everflames. The thing he had his heart set on, though, was finding the tissue regenerator that had been the undoing of the medical industry of the Ancients. He was hoping to learn the uses of healspace from it. If he could only find one and do that, he might have even more time to do what was needed. But he hadn't. He couldn't heal even the simplest wound, let alone undo the accumulated damages of aging, and so the best he could do was get his School up and running before he walked with his ancestors.

  Just now, though, he walked in the gardens, on his way to the rooftop. He paused to rub the leaves of a bush of peppermint and smelled his fingers.

  A flicker from up ahead caught his eye: another failing glowtube. Frowning, he strode up to a spot under it and reached out with his mind to re-sculpt the tonespace around the glass, combing the frequency distribution with deft touches until the tube lit up again with its usual steady blue-white radiance. Satisfied, he resumed his progress toward the staircase. He had already passed most of the mints, but now he paused at the planting of catnip that Aria kept for Otto. He reached out to break off a small piece for his cat and slipped it into a pocket of his cloak before continuing.

  When he opened the door to the stairwell, the air inside was colder than he had expected. Had autumn slipped by him already? Sometimes it seemed that the fewer years he had left, the faster they slipped through his fingers. But maybe it was well that they were nearly into winter. Surely the Honcho would think twice of attacking Rado when the snows made footing treacherous and the cold sapped muscles of man and horse alike.

  He emerged onto the roof and swept it with his eyes, seeking the lookouts. The nearest one was not far. Xander strode toward him, wrapping his cloak more closely about his aging bones.

  “Hello, Timothy,” he said. “Keeping warm, are you?”

  The lookout grinned. “That I am, sir. Whatever you did to the perch has helped more than I can thank you for. Last winter I almost froze my butt to it more than once.”

  “Oh, it was nothing,” said Xander. He'd put a faint everflame spell on the stone bench, a gentle warping of its tonespace so that there was always a warm spot for the man to sit on and a warm updraft to fend off the chilly breezes up here. It was the least he could do for the men who sat the lonely vigils up here. “Is the city quiet?”

  “As a grave, sir.” Tim turned his eyes back toward the southern horizon as he spoke. “As it happens, I've been expecting the latest world from the outposts any time now. I don't need to tell you, I get nervous when they're a minute late, considering everyone says Texas is overdue to try their luck against us again.”

  Tim eyed the water clock again. It was a simple affair, but Xander was justly proud of his innovations. Originally a sand hourglass, it now held oil warmed by a faint everflame spell so that the viscosity – and the clock's accuracy – would not be affected by the coldest blizzard. He'd had them tint bands of transparent colors parallel to the ends, so that as the top slowly drained by the dripping of the opaque oil, the lowest color glowing would tell the hour. The highest part near the top of the glass was colored red, then orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet, then red at the just above the constriction between top and bottom halves. Each hour of the watch could be easily read even in the darkest night by the miniature glow-tubes in the top and bottom. When Tim reached the end of his eight hour watch, and the entire rainbow red-to-red of the empty top was showing, his replacement could just flip the thing over and start over again.

  Finding good transparent tints had occupied the Court alchemist for the better part of a season, but everyone agreed it was well worth the effort. When needed, eight-hour watches could be split in half or any whole number of hours, for that matter. The crafters were turning them out as quickly as they could, calling it the Xander clock now. Some of them had told him privately he should talk to the Governor about getting a royalty for his idea – it could turn out to be a lucrative export. Xander didn't need to glance at the clock to know sunrise was near. Blue twilight had already lit the skyscraper. “No need to be nervous yet,” he told Tim. “They'll be able to use the sun-mirror in a few minutes.”

  At night the signals were sent with a glow-tube lit box with hand-operated shutters. Another of Xander's ideas; he'd gotten it from an old book on naval vessels of the Ancients, that had used a similar technique. But daylight was brighter than the glow-tubes, at a distance, so the outside surfaces of the controllable shutters on the signal box were mirrored. All they had to do was orient it correctly to reflect the sunlight from the East at sunrise to the north and flip the shutters open and closed in the same old Morse code.

  “Ah! There he is.” A orange light flashed three groups of five to get their attention. Xander fell silent as the distant fellow blinked them the morning report. As the blinking continued, he frowned. Movement spotted. Scouts.

  Tim turned back to him after the message ended. “Is this it, sir? Do you think their army is following the scouts they've seen?”

  “I doubt it,” said Xander. “But they could be, for all we know. If the Honcho is planning to invade, he's smart enough to either hit us before the snows make it hard, or else wait for Spring.”

  “By the time we spot his army,” Tim pointed out, “they could be within a day's ride of the borderlands.”

  “I know, I know.” Xander brooded on that and came to a decision. “Stay warm, Tim. I have to go tell the Governor. This news won't wait for the changing of the Watch. Keep an eye peeled in case they sight more troops.” He turned on his heel and strode off.

  He had to remind himself to take the steps carefully as he descended. Remember, your bones aren't as strong as they used to be, you old fool. I should have implemented that drop-chute idea a long time ago. One shaft and a good parachute would be faster than these damned staircases! But he had delayed working out the safety details to go out and find a new apprentice. If they had the motors of the ancients, they could get the building's elevators going again. But that might take many years. In the meantime a carefully-deployed drag chute and a safety net made of rope would have to serve. When he could take the time to get them to set it up, that is.

  His hasty footsteps ion the stairs alerted the dogs, who raised a racket that he had no time for. “Get out of the way!” he barked back at them, and leaped over them from the last few steps hoping he wouldn't crack his ribs against a locked door. As it happened, the guard was just beginning to open the door to investigate the barking when Xander crashed into it, knocking the door the rest of the way open and spilling both of them into the hallway. “Sorry!” he growled at the guard, as he sprang to his feet and dashed down the corridor to the Governor's rooms.

  Kristana was just coming out of her rooms to inspect the morning watch reliefs when he arrived panting at her door. “Lookouts report a scouting party heading north,” he wheezed. “I have to go check it out. The main army might not be far behind them.”

  “Take some men with you,” she advised him.

  “By the time we ride down there, they could be burning farms in the borderlands,” he told her. “By all means, send some men, but I can't wait for them. I can move faster by myself.” He whirled and sprinted for the stairwell before she could argue.

 
; Jon and Edgar were murmuring something to each other when he reached his quarters. They looked up and tried to engage him in conversation as he brushed them aside and unlocked the door. “No time now,” he said, as he reached for his staff.

  “Is it true that your new apprentice is going to be the one you've been looking for?” Edgar asked, anyway. “Will he last longer than the last one?”

  “He might,” said Xander. “If you keep him safe and keep him from leaving.” His fingers closed on the staff and he whirled and strode down the hall and out of their sight.

  Entering the stairwell, he ran up the stair again, without thinking about what would happen if he missed one. One thing he regretted about this 'scraper was that none of the windows opened. The ancients had worried about many things that had not come to pass with the fall of civilization, such as chemical and biological assaults.

  When he emerged onto the roof again, he stopped to catch his breath. Foolish of me to run up the stairs. I'm not a young wizard anymore.

  Timothy's relief had not yet come. The guard turned, surprised at his reappearance. “Did you forget something, sir?”

  “No,” said Xander, twisting the end caps off his staff and stowed them in a pocket of his cloak. A bass hum, or a deep whistle, came from the staff. “I keep telling myself I won't do this again,” he muttered.

  “Sir?” said Timothy. “Do what?”

  Before Tim could stop him, Xander leaped off the roof.