Pathspace

by Matthew Kennedy

  Chapter 77

  Xander: “I would meet you upon this honestly.”

  Panting, he stroked the new everflame down, extinguishing the glowing point of blue, and tossed the metal disk into the box beside him. With a ringing SNAP a hammer came down behind him, cutting out another disk from the unhardened iron plate, whose surface was holed like a slice of cheese. Resting his weight on the table for a moment, the old wizard reached out blindly and snatched up another of the iron disks. He had no idea if it was the one just cut or one of its predecessors. No matter. He slapped it on the table and took another breath, trying to fight off a wave of dizziness as he strove to weave the pattern he needed.

  Sweat ran down into his eyes, the salt stinging them. He blinked and drew a sleeve cuff across his face. He had stopped bothering to count the everflames he was making. There was no point. If there were any extras, they could help heat homes in the winter to come.

  Lester's face swam into focus. “You'd better take a break, old man, before you fall down.”

  Xander tried to laugh and coughed. “Think I can't keep up with you?”

  “What I think,” his apprentice said, “is that you will be no good to us if you pass out now.”

  Xander stood up, holding onto the edge of the table. “Unless you've learned how to make everflames, I'm the only one who can do this.”

  “Then take some time and show me how.”

  “You're not ready. You're getting good with pathspace, sure. But making an everflame requires you to manipulate tonespace, and we don't have time for you to stop what you're doing and spend time learning that now.” Xander let go of the table and straightened. “Once we stop the invasion, you can consider starting on spinspace. Tonespace comes after that.”

  He could see Lester wasn't happy with his advice. The colt wanted to be a stallion. Xander tried to remember what it was like being so young. Had he been that impatient? Well, not quite...but that was because, back then, he had no one to be impatient with. You should be glad you have me to help you learn this stuff. I had nobody. Takes a lot longer when you have to figure it out all on your own.

  Still, he had to give the kid credit. His pathspace manipulation was really coming along now. He's gone from weaving invisibility to sculpting a swizzle on his own, a lot quicker than I did. Am I jealous of his quickness?

  “Look, I know you/re learning fast,and you want to know it all. And I want you to. I want to teach you all I've learned.” He paused. “If we live through this, I mean. If we do, you're going to learn things I've never mastered, never even heard of. But to get to that point, you'll have to survive. And not just you. People are depending on us to make a difference.”

  Lester sighed. “Tell me something I don't know.”

  “Oh, I'll tell you lots of things you don't know. But first you have to help prepare.”

  “Well, I'm all out of pipe for swizzles. What now, O wizard?”

  “I've got another idea. How good is your invisibility weave?”

  “Pretty good. But I have to keep re-weaving it if I move around, or I step into view.”

  Xander led him to a corner of the smithy where the smith had stacks of metal plate as tall as a man. An apprentice smith was striking one with measured, patients hammer blows, curving the metal like a section of a cylinder, or a drinking glass, so that the plate could stand on its own.

  “What are those for?”

  Xander ran his fingertips along the edge of one. “Shields. Henry, these need handles.”

  The apprentice smith with the hammer stopped hammering. “Yes, you said that before,” he grunted. “I figured it would be more efficient to curve the metal first, then cut the eye slits and rivet the handles on 'em last.”

  “Wouldn't wooden shields be a lot lighter?” asked Lester. “You could make them thick enough to stop arrows and crossbow bolts without making something so heavy for the troops to carry around.”

  “These aren't just to stop arrows,” Xander told him. “These are for hiding.”

  “What's the point of hiding behind one of those,” Lester wanted to know, “when you can see them a mile away?”

  “Watch.” Xander seized the curved tower shield, grunting with the effort of lifting the metal, and turned it so that the inner part of the curve faced the wall. Then he concentrated, weaving pathspace. The shield faded away.

  “This is what I want you to do with the others,” he told his apprentice, leading Lester around so that he could see the shield was perfectly visible from the back, at close range. “The trick is to weave the pathspace so that light coming from behind it curves around the shield and makes it invisible from the front, because you see what's behind it instead.”

  “I still don't see the point of it,” Lester complained.

  “Stand over there, and watch,” he told the boy, pointing to the middle of the smithy.

  Then he ducked behind the shield. “Now you can't see me.”

  “So? I can do that without a lot of iron.”

  “This isn't for you. It's for ordinary troops who can't weave their own invisibility. You'll only have to weave each one once, and then the metal will anchor the pathspace pattern, better than wood can, so it will last and ordinary people can use it..” He gripped the side of the shield and lifted it, taking a few steps toward Lester. “And they can move forward without having to re-weave the pattern. Anchoring the pattern in the metal lets you carry it around without constantly having to make and unmake it.”

  He un-wove the spell, letting the shield reappear closer to Lester, who finally looked impressed. “How many of these do we need?”

  “As many as you can make. Do them while you're waiting for more pipe.”

  He turned at the sound of hoofbeats approaching the smithy. Who could that be?

  A few seconds later Aria appeared at the doorway. “I need to have a word with you, wizard.”

  He stepped out of the smithy and followed her as she led him around the back of the building. “What is it? Is Texas on the move already?”

  “No,” she said. “This is personal.”

  “Well, as I've told you many times, you can tell me everything.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Yes, but you haven't told me everything, have you? Like why we have the same rare blood type.”

  Xander blew out his breath in a long whistling sigh. There was no point in denying anything now. Someone must have told her. The certainty on her face confirmed it.

  Aria looked left and right to make sure no one was within earshot of them. “I didn't want to believe it, even when Mother admitted it,” she said. “Did you love her?”

  Xander met her gaze. “I still do,” he murmured. “But I'm sure she explained to you why things had to stay the way they were. Rado and your legacy depend on it.”

  “On a lie,” she said. Her tone was bitter. “So you're ashamed to claim me.”

  “Hell, no. Anything but ashamed. If you were anyone else, you'd be my apprentice.” He took a breath. “You've no idea how hard it's been on me, being just the weird old man, the loyal advisor, instead of your father. But leadership needs continuity. Rado and Kristana needed you for an heir, and we decided – “

  “You decided. What about me? Don't I get a choice? It's my life! Not yours.”

  He sighed. “No, you don't get a choice, any more than I did. Deal with it. Fate chose me to be the wizard, and you to be the next Governor. There's no one to replace either of us.”

  “At least you have Lester.” She was silent for a moment. “And people used to choose the Governor. You know that. The Governor used to be elected by a vote.”

  Ah, to be young and idealistic again! “Yes, and someday they will again. That's the difference between your mother and the Honcho. She doesn't want to be an emperor. But that day has not come yet, and it never will...unless we are all strong enough to keep this continent from becoming an empire.”

  “Would that be much worse than what we have now?”

  “I think so. So
does your mother. And so did the General. We believe in his Dream.”

  “Maybe you do,” she said. “But you have another Dream, don't you? Your school for wizards. Something we've never needed before. Can you honestly tell me you wouldn't be working for the Honcho, if he'd let you build your school there? If you were there, you wouldn't have to waste time worrying about invasions, would you?”

  He pursed his lips. “Don't be too sure. He has enemies too.”

  “So you're worried about his enemies more than you are about ours? Is that it?”

  “No,” he said. “I'm more worried about his friends.”