by C. T. Rwizi
Salo turns sharply around to face the thing that spoke. He could swear the voice came from just behind him, that he felt the breath on his nape. There is nothing there now. His bones tingle with awe and wonder and sheer terror. “What do you mean?” he demands of the trees. “What is this place? What’s happening?”
Look again.
He turns around once more and comes face-to-face with a great cube of pure crystal rotating in the air on multiple axes. The sphere of fire hangs above it like a crown jewel, infusing its crystal interior with an ethereal red light.
Years ago, when he could finally understand the writings in his dead mother’s journal, he realized that what he was looking at was the framework for an Axiom so extraordinary it warranted its own name: the Elusive Cube. The writings described radical arcane theories and ingenious methods of cipher manipulation and prose construction—all the tools an inventive reader might need to carve their way to this Axiom.
And now it is spinning in front of him. The Elusive Cube, supposedly the ultimate Axiom, the impossible Axiom, capable of accessing all six disciplines of Red magic, unparalleled in efficiency. This is the culmination of years of work, the thing his mother died for, the thing for which she betrayed him.
He can feel each of its six sides vibrating strongly with a different arcane energy. One side burns with red flames: Fire craft. Another side churns with winds, frost, and lightning: Storm craft. Yet another glitters with illusions and light bending: Mirror craft. A fourth side is the color of flesh: Blood craft. A fifth side has thick roots spreading across its surface: Earth craft.
As for the sixth side . . . a vortex of malleable force. Space and time warping around it, threatening to suck him in and crush him with its many secrets. Void craft.
For a long time Salo watches the Axiom, appreciating how terrifying and undeniably powerful it is. Some people would kill to wield such a thing, but he starts to wonder if this is all there is to his mother’s obsession.
Is this enough to turn a loving mother against her own son?
He thought he’d found the answer to the mystery of her betrayal, but now, looking at the Cube, he realizes that his search never ended. Surely there has to be more to the story.
“Why am I here?” he says.
You must remember. Wisps of blue smoke drift within the trees, following the voice. Gaze upon the source and know the fires that warmed your ancestors. Sink your feet into the earth and know the soils that hold their bones. Remember.
“What are you?” he asks the moving smoke, and then more reverently, “Are you a malaika? A servant of the heavens?”
The trees rumble in displeasure. I have been called many things—I have been many things to many peoples—but never a servant.
Salo turns around, following the voice. “Then what are you? What am I doing here?”
You are here to begin.
“To begin what?”
To remember. Pledge yourself to this source, and your eyes shall be opened.
“But how do I—”
The answer slips into his head, and in an instant he knows. He feels himself going down on his knees in the glade and turning his face up to the burning sphere above the Cube, the source that will grant him its power, and his lips seem to speak on their own. “I pledge myself to these fires, which warmed the faces of my forgotten ancestors.” He grabs a fistful of the red earth underfoot. “I pledge myself to these soils, which hold their bones. I pledge myself to . . .”
The words that he knew not a moment ago slip away from him like water sluicing off the blade of an oar, leaving nothing but the trace of an incipient migraine. He winces, grasping for the words with his mind, but they vanish into oblivion.
That will have to do, the apparition says. For now. The pledge cannot be spoken in full. Not yet. Not here. Not until you remember.
Salo doesn’t know what any of that means, but something is different. Somehow, he now feels connected to everything in this forest—the soil, the trees, the source, the Cube. Strangely, though, he senses that the connection isn’t nearly as deep as it could be. A substantial blockage is in the way, like a film covering his eyes so that he views the world only in blurry detail. Pain lances through him when he tries to focus on the blockage, so he lets it be.
Then his arms change. He watches as they acquire elaborate networks of metallic lines that meander from his elbows to the tips of his fingers, throbbing red with power from the source—his cosmic shards. Halfway along either forearm is a single ring, conspicuous in that it encircles the arm and is thicker than all the other lines. He will have to acquire more of those rings to become more powerful, through meditation, spellwork, and lunar rituals. But he feels that his shards are exquisite all the same, that having them is like seeing more colors than he knew existed, like tasting things no ordinary tongue can taste.
To his side, the apparition finally steps out of the trees, once again wearing a loincloth of hide and wielding an embellished spear of blue metal—a bright cobalt blue similar to the hue of his skin. For all Salo knows, this strangely beautiful specter might have once been a warrior chief. His angular face is a living sculpture hewed from the finest lapis lazuli. His eyes catch the light like sapphires one moment, then clear diamonds the next, changing as if on a whim. They bear an aspect of timelessness, and when they lock on Salo, he feels he is staring into the face of a god.
He has never seen those eyes quite so clearly, but he has definitely seen them before.
“You,” he breathes, staying where he’s kneeling on the ground. “You were in the Carving.”
Something hidden gleams in the apparition’s gemlike eyes. Somehow he speaks without moving his mouth, and Salo nearly shudders at the sound of his voice, so clear and yet so distant and cold. A part of me was. Just a small part, but enough.
A troubling thought occurs to Salo. “Did you . . . did you possess me?”
I needed you to bring me here.
“But why?”
I cannot tell you that here. You must find me elsewhere. You must remember, and then you must find me.
Movement in the trees catches Salo’s eye. When he looks, he sees a pall of black smoke drifting into the clearing, growing thicker by the second. Gripped by urgency, he looks back up at the apparition, this entity whose presence feels as old as the stars. “What am I to do, great one? What do you want from me?”
Our time here is at an end, the apparition says. Find me elsewhere. Remember.
“But where should I find you?”
The smoke has engulfed much of the glade, though the apparition’s arresting eyes still shine at him with unnatural brilliance. Somewhere along a scarlet road, past a gateway beneath a red star. It shines far beyond your horizons. Your path there has been set; now you must walk it.
Salo tries to speak, to tell the apparition that none of this makes sense, but the smoke swallows his words before they leave his mouth. The glade is already becoming a distant memory. His dwindling awareness coalesces around the apparition’s voice.
Time is not on our side. You must walk the path your mother would have walked. She was to be my last chance; now, my hope is with you. Find me. Remember.
And all becomes dark.
PART 3
THE ENCHANTRESS
ISA
MUSALODI
Storm craft—magic of the elements
Channeling the moon’s essence into artificially inducing weather phenomena, such as winds, frost, and lightning. Used by rainmakers to irrigate fields.
—excerpt from Kelafelo’s notes
“Ah, daylight. Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“It is, Aago.”
“Even so, it is a lie.”
“A lie? But how can it be a lie?”
“Because now the stars are hidden from you, an illusion that might tempt you to think you’re bigger and more important than you really are. The stars put things into perspective.”
14: The Enchantress
Yonte Saire, the Jungle City—Kin
gdom of the Yontai
The Enchantress is entertaining a textile merchant in her parlor when the crimson jewel on her necklace vibrates. Casually, she rests a hand on the jewel. I’ll be there in a moment, she thinks to it, and the vibrations still.
She goes on to take a sip of shaah from a porcelain cup, all the while watching her guest from above the teacup’s rim. He’s perusing the squares of different fabrics laid out on the table sitting between them. The look in his eye is the kind a starving man might inflict on a roasted sirloin steak he suspects might be poisoned.
The Enchantress smirks inwardly and takes another sip of her spiced tea. The merchant, a member of the Yontai’s jackal clan—one of the kingdom’s eleven clans of KiYonte-speaking people—is an insider in his headman’s court. She lured him here on the pretext of discussing possible cooperation in a new business venture; judging from the wariness with which he examines the cloths in front of him, he’s likely realized that there’s considerably more at stake than money.
Finally he lifts his gaze off the table and slowly shakes his head. “I have been in the textile industry for three decades, but I have never seen anything like this.”
He caresses one of the sample fabrics, a square of pearlescent silk with subtle fractal patterns that move and pulse with light. Each of the samples in front of him, in a range of different textiles, has its own design of moving patterns—spinning flowers and geometric shapes, birds in flight and animals on the hunt. No such cloths have ever been seen on this side of the Jalama. Not until now.
“Truly, it’s like they’re woven of light,” the merchant breathes, but then he retracts his hand from the table with an astute look in his eye. “Forgive me, Your Highness. I struggle to believe you’ll simply hand me the blueprints for the looms. Surely you’ll want something in return.”
The Enchantress waves his concern away. “I’m only indulging my curiosity, nothing more. I adore your textiles, you see—the patterns, the textures. I’m excited to see what you’ll do with this technology.” She has mastered the art of speaking the local language like a woman from a northern tribe, so her accent is appropriately guttural.
“But why choose me?” the merchant says. “I’m not the biggest player in this industry. I only sell locally. My biggest competitors, on the other hand, export to all the Redlands. Why not go to them?”
She is not surprised that he should ask her this. He’s a smart man and an even smarter merchant, and men like that see everything in the binary of give-and-take; one without the other is either a fraudulent scheme or, worse, charity. “Your biggest competitor is Saire owned, is it not?”
The merchant grunts. “The elephants own all the banks, so it’s easy for them to raise capital. But they’re not as generous to everyone else. Doesn’t make it easy to compete with them.”
“No, it does not.” The Enchantress gently sets her teacup on the table. “But don’t you think it’s time that changed? In fact, I suspect the winds of change are already stirring, and who knows: perhaps an intelligent man like yourself could stand to gain if he positioned himself correctly.”
By his smile and the sharpness that briefly flashes across his eyes, the merchant reads the subtext loud and clear. “I’d welcome such a change with open arms, Your Highness, but I’m a practical man, and as any practical man would tell you, not even the strongest winds can move mountains.” The ruling clan is well protected, and so long as that protection remains, nothing anyone does will make a difference.
“You’d be surprised,” the Enchantress says, making sure to meet the merchant’s eyes. Do my bidding, and you won’t have to worry. “But we digress.” Breaking eye contact, she picks up her shaah and sips. “I’d like to get this technology out there, and I think your firm would be a great place to start. Of course, it would require a significant investment on your part, at least at first. I know how costly it can be to procure enchanting services from the House of Axles, and the charms these looms will require are especially complex. But with some guts and perseverance”—the Enchantress smiles—“I think this could be quite lucrative for you in the long run.” And then she lets her smile falter slightly for effect. “However, if you feel you’re not up for the challenge . . .”
“Nonsense.” The textile merchant sits up straighter, and the look in his eye says, I will do anything you want. “No one is more up for it than I, Your Highness.”
“Then it’s settled. I’ll have the blueprints delivered to you and you alone.” With that, she rises to her feet. “Now I must beg your pardon. I’d walk you out, but I have an urgent matter to attend to.”
He is all smiles as he gets up from his sofa. “It’s no worry at all, Your Highness.” He bows graciously. “I’ll see myself out.”
She leaves him in the parlor, feeling satisfied with how the meeting progressed.
He isn’t the first merchant she has offered a significant edge over a competitor of the ruling clan; she has offered designs for superior climate control, superior refrigeration, carriages with superior suspension—all in strict secrecy and to well-established merchants who hold sway in the courts of the headmen she seeks to influence. The textile merchant, for example, will now be an indirect but powerful link to the Jackal, whom she knows harbors no love for the elephants.
The groundwork is almost complete, but the merchant was right. I cannot change things if I have mountains standing in my way.
Even if she breaks the ruling clan’s hold on the kingdom’s economy, it won’t matter unless the true source of their power is also pulled from underneath their feet. And that is why I need help.
She wanted to do this on her own, to prove to herself and to everyone who’s ever underestimated her that she is far from the victim she once was. But her pride cannot blind her from the greater objective. In the end, winning the Great War must supersede every other concern.
The train of her carmine-and-indigo robe sweeps the patterned marble floors as she makes her way through the halls of her palace. Lush interior gardens fill the air with their earthy scent, like stolen pieces of the jungle. She is still amazed that such luxury can exist here, in what should be—at least according to what she thought she knew about the so-called Red Wilds—a squalid cultural vacuum inhabited by a primitive people. Indeed, she has had to renounce her preconceptions in the face of evidence to the contrary. They may not be as advanced in technology as the rest of the world, but this city alone has demonstrated an architectural sophistication and a mastery of pure magic that has at times left her speechless.
The world is right to fear this place, she thinks, for there is great power here.
Inside her private chambers the Enchantress reclines on a lounge chair and prods the centerpiece of her golden necklace with her thoughts. The crimson jewel—a synthetic quartz stone saturated to the atom with the moon’s essence—thrums in response, and she lets herself relax, closing her eyes.
Instantly, the metaform operating in the crystal’s high-speed lattices responds and begins to weave her consciousness into a mental construct that takes shape around her from the ground up, rising like a vivid dream. Soon she finds that the lounge chair has been transported into an open circular pavilion built on the highest peak of the tallest mountain range in the world.
Balls of fire are raining from the twilight skies, thousands upon thousands, each leaving a stream of smoke and flame in its wake. A man stands silhouetted against the skies in the foreground, leaning against one of the pillars encircling the pavilion with his back toward the Enchantress. His is the kind of stillness that suggests he could wait for a thousand years.
A shiver of worry runs through the Enchantress, and she briefly second-guesses herself, but then she remembers her priorities.
I need his support if I’m going to move mountains.
She gets up from the chair and slowly walks to the edge of the pavilion, where the world drops into steep, jagged snow-covered slopes that spread away into the slight curvature of the distant horizon. The
sight still leaves her queasy, even though she knows it is only a construct.
“So. You’ve finally decided to remember me.”
In such constructs, where minds can be entangled even across great distances, communication is by thought. But the metaform running the construct can be directed to vocalize this communication. What the Enchantress hears as the man’s voice sounds like something that might belong to a cold-blooded monster if it could speak.
The Enchantress reminds herself not to be afraid. “Hello, Prophet. Thank you for agreeing to meet me.”
“But how could I not? I was worried when I heard my favorite prodigy had gone missing.” Prophet finally looks at her. “Imagine my surprise when I learned you’d snuck off to the world’s back end. I’m interested to hear what tale you will spin for me.”
While the Enchantress has manifested in the construct as she is, Prophet is a god-king in a white hooded robe over a full suit of gold-plated armor. Atop the hood sits a golden crown, with two horns like those of a young ram curling out on either side. His face is an empty void. The Enchantress knows he’s interfacing with a metaformic jewel just like hers wherever he is.
“I couldn’t risk telling anyone I was coming here.”
“And why not?”
“You would have tried to stop me.”
“For good reason, Enchantress. The law is clear: there is to be no contact between the hinterlands and the outside world. If you are caught, I will not be able to protect you from the consequences.”
The Enchantress stares at the fires raining ruin upon the world far below. “If the Veil fell today, the world would unite against our Master, and all would be lost. But with your help, I can brew a war that will shake the foundations of the earth and crack the heavens open. That’s what I’m doing here.”
Prophet chuckles, and it comes out as a bloodcurdling roar. “Ah. So you want my help. I should have known.”
“I can’t do it on my own.”