by J M D Reid
“Crystalman,” groaned Dajouth. “That’s what you’re hearing, ain’t it?”
Ōbhin, over his pounding heartbeat, heard the distant thud with the vibration. Something large and heavy trudged near them. A cold, slick sweat broke out across his flesh. Avena was out there with the impostor. What if they ran into a crystalman?
“Elohm’s blessed Colours,” Dajouth whispered. “Not another one of those Black-cursed bastards. We barely survived the first.”
“This worry has been gnawing at my mind,” Dualayn said. He unslung his pack and opened it. He produced his map and pointed at a building he had marked on it. Crystal Sheriff Hall. “The crystalmen were created for law and order. They must have survived the death and collapse of this city and are still continuing their work.”
“Three thousand years later?” muttered Ōbhin.
“Jewelchines, theoretically, can run forever. They will continuously be recharged by the Tonal Harmonics. The crystalmen were built to either have jewelchines that can power them all day long or to operate in shifts.” Dualayn shifted. “The only limiter in lifespan is corrosion of the metal wires, but they have theirs buried inside the jewelchines or are using gold, which doesn’t corrode.”
“So this Crystal Sheriff Hall is their base?” Ōbhin asked. “So we need to avoid it.”
“We need to reach it. That’s where they are controlled.” Dualayn looked up, tracks of sweat clearing streaks through the gray dust on his pudgy face. “We cannot defeat them in a fight. We were lucky you brought the ceiling down. We have to deactivate them. If they find us again . . .”
Ōbhin nodded. “Okay, how do we get there?”
“If we veer a little to our right, that should take us to it,” Dualayn said.
“Uh . . .” Dajouth glanced out a broken window into the dark. “I think that thudding’s comin’ closer.”
Fear squeezed Ōbhin’s chest. “Lights out. No moving.”
The three jewelchine lanterns snuffed out. Darkness crashed over Ōbhin. Black’s weight pressed him down on his belly. His cheek rubbed into the dusty floor. The sounds of ragged breathing surrounded him. He was trapped beneath the earth again. Just like that day.
Panic fluttered through him.
He wanted to see. He moved his hand before his face, saw nothing. No flex of his wiggling fingers. His breathing increased into ragged wheezing. His heart fluttered with the intensity of an avalanche crashing down the mountainside.
The floor shook.
THUD! THUD!
The crystalman stomped closer. Light bled through the dust-smeared window. Scarlet and green. It didn’t bring any relief. Death stomped closer and closer. His sword was useless. He couldn’t hurt it. Couldn’t fight it.
If it found them . . .
Diamond beams flooded on. The intensity blinded Ōbhin. He closed his eyes as the brilliance poured through the window. Light, it turned out, had just as much weight as darkness. It pressed down on his body, crushing him.
The crystalman stood right outside their building.
Chapter Twenty-Five
The thudding retreated.
An explosive exhale burst from Avena, her hot breath swirling around her hand. She pulled it away from her mouth, her need to sneeze dwindling. She rolled onto her back, panting as the darkness deepened. The glow from the crystalman dwindled as it marched farther away. The tingles in her digits retreated.
“Elohm be praised,” Bran groaned. She heard movement.
“Don’t move,” Avena hissed. “Don’t turn on the lanterns. Let’s make sure it’s far away from us.”
“Yeah,” Fingers answered, his voice hoarse and tense. “Elohm’s Colours, I almost pissed myself.”
Avena understood; her insides felt liquefied. She could have soiled her pants in a whole manner of different ways. She pressed up from the floor, the dust tickling at her nose. She sneezed three times and groaned, her shoulder throbbing from the violent expulsions of air.
“I can’t hear them any longer,” Bran said. The door creaked. “I think we can go on.”
Avena hated agreeing with the impostor. “Yeah. One lantern for now. I wished we had diamond torches and not lanterns.” Torches shone light in one direction instead of all of them. “Maybe we can rig up a cover for the lantern, so it only illuminates forward.”
“Maybe,” said Fingers. “But with what? I don’t have any spare clothing.”
“Just socks,” she said. Her hand swept through the darkness until she found her lantern.
Brilliant light flooded the area. She winced against it, eyes squeezing shut. It shone through her eyelids, a red glow that still hurt. She looked away from it and opened them again, blinking a few times as they adjusted.
They crept out of the building, Avena’s ears straining for sounds. They moved slowly, no one stepping heavily. Every step was placed with care. They found a branching tunnel. The crystalman had come from straight ahead and had gone left past them. Luckily, going straight and away from the crystalman was where they needed to go.
Patches of ruby became more common as they crept forward. The veins came every ten or so cubits, each thicker than her torso. They preserved the tunnel’s original look, the pipes along the ceiling, the walls made of mortared blocks. They found a rat once, frozen in mid-scurry through the tunnels.
Crystal spiders lurked in recesses in the walls, scurrying away from their light. She felt their beady eyes peering out at the interlopers. Her hairs stood on end. The tunnel ended at a jagged break and spilled out onto a street almost entirely made of ruby. The buildings around them were transmuted, with only small gaps of normality between the transmuted city.
“We must be near the epicenter,” Avena said, “of whatever caused this.” Flashes of her dream rippled through her mind, the melting of reality.
“Poor bastards,” said Fingers, nodding to the figures frozen in the jeweled street.
There were hundreds of them; men, women, and children. They looked frightened, their final moments captured on crystalline faces. Some held hands as they ran. A mother cradled a swaddled infant to her chest. A few of the carriages were in the road, their window panes made of ruby so thin they were translucent, revealing the shadows of the occupants inside.
The rubble above them seemed to be held up by poles that ran along the street with ruby wires strung between them. A few chunks of rock had fallen past the makeshift supports and crashed down to the street, some shattering a few of the statues.
Avena shuddered as they threaded their way through the frozen horde. A boy lay on his belly, struggling to stand while his father bent to help him. A woman supported a man who looked to be limping. Their clothing was strange, the women in dresses that fell to their mid-thighs and were often sleeveless. Others wore pants that fit them tight, hugging legs and buttocks. Men wore pants, some with shirts, others had jackets. A girl in a smock rode her father’s shoulders. She looked behind, her awe captured on her cherubic face.
Every step broke off another piece of Avena’s heart.
“What caused this?” Bran whispered, voice hoarse, his eyes gleaming wet. He stared down at a kneeling woman sheltering two small children with her body.
“The Shattering,” Avena answered.
Fingers looked lost as he gazed at a young woman being pulled along by a man. She’d lost one of her heeled shoes, her skirt’s swirling frozen forever.
Avena touched his arm. “Fingers?”
“She just . . . reminds me of my wife,” Fingers said, voice thick. “She’s got that same nose, you know.” He glanced at her with red-rimmed eyes. “Same cheekbones.”
“It’s not her,” Avena said. “Your wife’s fine. She’s back at your village.” With the miller, Avena thought. Happy without you. After Miguil betrayed her with Pharon, Avena understood the bitterness a cheating lover or spouse could engender. “Let’s keep going.”
“Yeah,” he croaked.
They left behind the crowd, passing the last few stragglers ru
nning from the transformation. The buildings on either side of them were all ruby, their tops lost to the destruction that had buried the city. Some final cataclysmic event had plunged the city underground and allowed the Upfing Forest to spread over it.
Fatigue gnawed at Avena’s muscles. A hollow pit rumbled in her stomach. She wanted to keep going, driven more by her fear for Ōbhin. She wanted to find him before the crystalmen did. She needed to reunite with him more than she needed to fix her mind.
Finding the antenna wasn’t worth the dangers. Not with those things lumbering around.
She glanced at Bran. He looked weary, too. He wiped sweat from his forehead with the padded sleeve of his gambeson. He’d lost his backpack, but they still had hers and Fingers’. Not enough food to last them more than a few days, and their two aquifers wouldn’t produce quite enough water. They would be pushing themselves.
As fatigue mounted, she wanted to push herself through it and keep marching down the crystallized road. They passed scarlet buildings, the roofs buried. Signs led them on. They were approaching the Hall of Assemblage. From there, they could head towards the Hall of Communication. Ōbhin would be fighting his way through the ruby ruins to it.
“We should camp,” Fingers said. “Choose a building, let’s hole up in it, and get some rest.”
“Has it been a day?” asked Avena. “How long have we been down here?”
Fingers shrugged. “I need the rest.” He studied her. “I’m not as young as I used to be and not too stubborn to admit it.”
Indignation flared through her. “I’m not stubborn.”
Bran snorted in laughter. “I remember when you bullied your way into training with us.”
“I didn’t bully my way in,” she snapped, rounding on the impostor. The fact he knew that disturbed her. “I insisted, and Ōbhin recognized the wisdom in training me.”
“He recognized a battle he’d lose,” Fingers said. “How ‘bout that building? Looks good to me.”
“Sure,” Bran said and darted over on his long legs.
“Fine,” Avena said. “We should set a watch after we eat then douse the lanterns.”
“We’ll be in the dark,” whined Bran. A noticeable shudder of fear ran through him. Was it acting, or was the thing repulsed by the dark?
“Let’s cover the lantern and leave a slit so we get some light,” said Fingers. “If we face it away from the door, it should be fine. I don’t think I can sleep in pure darkness. Not down here.”
Avena relented.
The building had no intact door. They entered and found more statues, a family huddling beneath the table, the father in front, his children behind him held in his wife’s arms. Avena blinked back tears as they passed deeper into the house into what appeared to be a kitchen. Half a loaf of bread sat on a cutting board, the knife resting beside it. Glasses and plates lay nearby, covered in square shapes, slices of bread with maybe meat or vegetables sandwiched between.
All rubyfied.
*
The crystalman’s light swept over Ōbhin.
He lay flat, terrified to move. The crystalman tinkled like wind chimes as it scanned the room. Every ringing ding washed a cold wave of fear through Ōbhin. The skin of his arm crawled. A prickling sensation crept towards his wrist.
A pale spider moved across his skin, rustling the fine, dark hairs on his forearm. Revulsion rippled through him. It glittered in the light scanning the room. Its every step itched his skin. He wanted to bat it away.
Panic nibbled at his guts. Were other spiders crawling over him? He felt prickles tickling across his skin. Was a nest of the skittering things scurrying over him? Had they gotten beneath his leather jerkin? He wanted to thrash, to smack the filthy things away.
He squeezed his eyes shut. The spider neared his wrist and paused. A tremor raced through his arm, fighting to knock it off. Chimes tinkled. He couldn’t move. He had to stay still. His jaws clamped tight against a primal snarl.
Leave! screamed through him. Leave us alone! Niszeh’s Black Tone! Disharmony curse you and your creators! Leave! Leave! LEAVE!
The spider resumed its crawl. The back of Ōbhin’s neck tingled. Was another creeping up to his hair? His breathing quickened. Unmanly terrors, shameful fears, swept through him. He wouldn’t flinch. He would endure.
He’d once kept watching through a blizzard, guarding his post at the palace. Snow and cold hadn’t stopped him. He’d endured it wearing only his winter sherwani, a long jacket that fell down to his knees, made of the finest Raqob wool, and heavy winter gloves, dyed the majestic purple of the warrior. An honorable hue to wear.
Not the filthy sable on his hands now.
The spiders itched all over his body. He wanted to scream. He forced slow breaths. The scanning lights bled through his eyelids. How long should it take the crystalman to search? Either it would notice them or move on. It had to pick one of those options.
Leave! Attack! Do something!
The lights snuffed out.
THUD! THUD!
The crystalman lumbered away. Ōbhin bolted upright, his hands slapping at his body. He smeared wet guts across his arm; one spider dead. He slapped at the others, voice cracking. He remembered his dead friend Carstin’s fear of the damned things and understood why the man had once thrown his blankets into the fire in a panic.
“What’s wrong?” Dajouth asked.
“Black-cursed spiders!” snarled Ōbhin.
“Elohm’s blessed Colours,” Miguil groaned. “They’re in here?”
“They are everywhere,” said Dualayn calmly. “We need to find the Crystal Sheriff Hall. It is our only hope. We must deactivate them. If we are caught again . . .”
Ōbhin nodded, his fear retreating. The spiders were gone. Dead.
They crept out of the building and moved through the street. It wasn’t long before they found the strangest sight yet: a vein of ruby slashing across the ruined tunnel they wandered down. Dualayn paused, touching it in awe.
“Transmutation,” he whispered. “It was thought impossible. Scholars in Abriss often delve into alchemy. They’re always seeking a way to turn common stones into jewels. Diorite into emeralds or andesite into sapphires. Things like that. And yet . . . This has changed everything. The stone walls and floor, the metal pipes.”
“There’s another one,” Miguil said, lifting his lantern and hurrying down the hallway.
Ōbhin limped after. His foot felt stronger by the hour, but still had a burning ache. Soon, they came across a second line of ruby rippled across the hallway. He glanced at it and frowned. They both seemed to point back in the same direction. Radial? Do they all come from the same point?
“This is clearly unintentional,” Dualayn continued. “It’s haphazard. Some force unleashed. Perhaps this is what caused the Shattering.”
“Or it was done by that scaly demon we saw,” Ōbhin said. He pulled off his glove and touched the transition from crumbling stone to smooth ruby. Hard, slick.
“Elohm’s blessed Colours,” breathed Dajouth. “There’s a piece of a person here. A foot that ends at a sheer line. It’s in a shoe. All ruby.” He held it up in his left hand. The orange glow of his healer bled through the bandages of his splint. “He must have been running when this happened.”
“Poor bastard,” Miguil muttered. He drew the four points of the prism before him.
“Let’s keep going,” Ōbhin said.
“Yes, yes,” said Dualayn, rising. “I hope this effect hasn’t struck the Hall of Communication.”
A new fear added to Ōbhin’s worry for Avena.
As they pressed on, they found more transmuted structures until it grew so thick, everything was ruby. They emerged from a building onto a street crowded with statues. They were packed in, all fleeing in the same direction, running from the effect.
Chimes rang. White light sprang on.
Ōbhin cursed and threw himself back into the building, pushing Miguil with him. They all pressed against the walls as
the crystalman plodded closer. Ōbhin’s face tightened. Has it been standing stationary? Niszeh’s Black Tone, did we activate it?
His stomach churned with bitter acids, but the automaton stomped by without stopping. It marched up the street and then its sounds retreated as it moved farther away. Ōbhin swallowed, mouth dry. He shook as he stepped out onto the road, Miguil muttering behind him.
Dualayn led them across the street, through the frozen people running in terror, and down an alley. The collapsed debris above their heads was held up by the tops of transformed buildings and streetlamps. The transmutation made things easier to move around.
On the other side, they opened onto a vast lawn, perhaps a park. The jeweled blades of grass twinkled in their diamond lanterns. In the center of it where there were no supports, the debris had buried the park, but along the edges was a line of some sort of broad-leaf trees holding up the rubble.
Another crystalman rumbled down a side street. They couldn’t tell if it was a new one or one they’d seen. They crouched behind a wall of low hedges trimmed to form a boxy barrier. They waited with bated breath in the dark.
When it lumbered away, they crept down to another street. They could hear faint thuds echoing in the distance, reverberating through the place. They peered down the street. A large building lay reduced to ruby rubble. What remained of it was still standing, shattered pillars with stubby and broken arms like trees shorn of their branches, and had been transmuted into gleaming jewels. People seemed to be fleeing from it, caught up in the explosion.
“That’s the Wave Resonance Beacon,” said Dualayn as he paused to read a sign. The letters could just be made out in the diamond lamplight. They were slightly raised from the surface. “Perhaps the epicenter of this calamity.”
“What does that mean?” Miguil asked. “Wave Resonance Beacon?”
“I am not rightly sure,” admitted Dualayn. “I think it was a means of strengthening the Tones. Of enhancing their effects. Perhaps with so many jewelchine engines in one place, they absorbed so much harmonic resonance that it weakened its strength in this area. Jewel engineers have always thought of it as a resource you could never deplete, but that is not how the laws of entropy work. Energy, you see, is just the potential to do work. It is never lost, just changes into different forms.”