The Golden Torc

by Julian May

  "Felice! For God's sake! You gotta do better than that—it's just piddling through! Plane out that friggin' gradient!"

  She drooped, still clutching the balloon cables. The protective bubble attenuated. Around them, heat rose. With it came a smell of rock dust and molten minerals.

  "Tired. So tired, Steinie."

  "Get on with it! The rock underneath is busted to hell along the main fault. Keep going! Hit the sucker, I tellya! The rock'll rupture from water pressure if you just get the cut deep enough. Can't you see that with your damn X-ray vision?"

  She didn't reply, didn't even cuss him out, only swayed a little with her eyes shut and her little bare dirty feet trying to grasp the gondola's padded rail.

  He screamed at her. "Do it, you almighty bitch! You can't just stop. You said you could do it! God—you said you could do it!" The car rocked with the vehemence of his rage, his fear, his shame. Oh, shame.

  Felice was nodding slowly. Somewhere, the strength she needed might be found.

  Call for it, seek it. Search it out among these infantile, asynergic sparks of life-force that are Earth's Pliocene Mind. The two-in-one (now oddly separate) refuse you, as you knew they would. And the many-in-All so much farther out, who had also helped before on the River Rhône, now withhold and try to show you other ways. But you have chosen and it must be, and there is one other source of the energy, so bright, so early-rising, who will not turn away. Here then is a better Unity for you, here is power to brim your height and depth and breadth at least until the end. So you accept. The energy comes. You harness it with your creative metafunction; mold, compress, convert. And then you hurl it down...

  With no metapsychic shield in place, the balloon caught the full force of the shockwave and was thrown far up and away. Stein gave a great shriek and so did another. Bodies inside the gondola flopped as helplessly as dolls, crushed against decamole surfaces, against bruising human flesh and bone.

  Deafened, Stein and Sukey struggled together in the tossing basket. Neither could help the other. The tough envelope billowed, struck the hot grid of the generator but rebounded unscorched, whirled in a vortex. Spiraling upward, the balloon broke free at last from the storm-cell of ionized turbulence. What had been a distorted, kiting scarlet blob smoothed and reexpanded. It sailed in the high thin air, slowly descending to its altitude of equilibrium.

  Stein dared to rise, to look out.

  Below, the waterfall of the western ocean flowed.

  All of the smoke and dust was streaming over the Atlantic, making it easy for him to see what they had done. The gap in the isthmus widened even as he watched. Brown and yellow rocks on either side appeared to melt like sugar in the torrent's press. To the east, the cataract outflow poured into the Empty Sea across a front nearly ten kilometers wide. A blanket of mist, grayish tan from suspended dust that muddied the droplets, hid the Alboran Basin floor.

  He heard Sukey's voice. She climbed to her feet and stood beside him. "Where—?" she asked.

  He said, "She might have been able to fly. Like Aiken could. Try with your golden torc."

  She pressed the warm collar, looking down at the streaks of wrath streaming westward from the sundered isthmus. Unless the surface winds shifted, no one at Muriah would see the smoke.

  "There's nothing, Stein. Nothing."

  The balloon continued its descent. Seeming not to have heard her, he consulted the instruments. "Three-five-two-eight meters, heading oh-two-three. Another airflow up here. Pretty close to the direction we want to go." He manipulated the heat generator.

  "Steinie, I've got to tell Elizabeth!"

  "All right. Just her. Nobody else."

  The balloon attained equilibrium. The ground-speed display told of their progress, but it seemed to the man and woman that they hung motionless in the clean blue sky.

  "She doesn't answer me, Stein. I don't know what's wrong! My farspeech isn't very strong, but Elizabeth should be able to receive it on the human mode—"

  He gave a sudden start, grabbed her by the upper arms. "Don't you try calling the others!"

  She squirmed. "Stop it, Steinie! I didn't. Nobody else can—" She gaped at him. He was opening one of the lockers, taking something out. "Oh, no," she whispered.

  "I love you. But you can't stop it. Even without Felice to break the dam, the flood's going to happen. The whole nightmare wiped out. Elizabeth ... if she's still there, she'll save herself. You don't have to worry about her. You don't have to worry about any of them anymore."

  Cold metal touched her neck. Her vision of him, of the anguish-scarred and merciless Viking face, blurred with her tears.

  "Don't be afraid," he said. "It's better this way."

  With great care, he slid one blade of the steel cutters behind her golden torc. He began to close the handles. The double levers worked.

  Brede! her mind cried. Bredel

  The shorn torc fell away, hurting. But even with its loss the reply came:

  Be at peace Little Daughter it will happen as foreseen.

  6

  THE SECOND DAY of the Grand Combat initiated the first of the battles to the death: the Low Mêlée, also known as the Contest of Humans. In the time before the opening of the time-gate, these preliminary fights had served to showcase the talents of novice Tanu warriors of special expertise; but now only gray-torcs took part in them. Hundreds of male gladiators and a small number of gray women contended in elimination bouts that featured every conceivable form of martial art. One section of the ritual battlefield was partitioned into smaller courts so that the spectators could savor the blood sports at close range. The bookmakers had their finest hour; but a groan went up from human and Tanu fans (especially the Finiah refugees) when it was announced that two of the top-ranked gray contenders had been scratched. Neither Stein nor the infamous Felice appeared in the lists and no explanation was given for their absence.

  The fighting continued from dawn until noon, accompanied by much festivity and culminating in a bloody free-for-all symbolic of the original character of the event. Victorious grays who were without injury retired to prepare themselves for the High Mêlée on the morrow, where they would join the silvers and golds and veteran gray warriors in the ritual war pitting Tanu against Firvulag. Battered gladiators who had acquitted themselves well in the tournament were escorted by redactors to the medical pavilions, where they joined the recuperating warrior-maids in the Skin wards. The handful of badly wounded losers who still lived and the cravens were sequestered in a handsome glass structure resembling a box-seat section canopied in silver and black cloth, which stood at the far southern end of the battlefield on top of stout scaffolding. Its walls were transparent and unbreakable.

  In theory, the remaining time of the Second Day was devoted to choosing Combat leaders by means of the manifestation of powers—after which the Foes separated for a final War Feast and invocation to the Goddess prior to the start of hostilities at sunrise. In practice, the great captains had all been selected hundreds (or even thousands) of years ago and now merely stepped forward to dare any upstart to usurp their privilege. If a challenge was forthcoming, both parties might manifest their metapsychic powers on the spot and be judged by the battle-company of their race. The reigning champions also had the option of dueling contenders with both weapons and metafunctions at any time during the High Mêlée.

  As overall losers in the previous year's Combat, the Firvulag presented their captains first. The regal platform was expanded into a much larger Dais of Challenge with the two Kings and noncombatant nobility enthroned well back out of range of any stray thrusts. Rivals were supposed to confine their psychoenergetic coups to one another—but accidents had been known to happen; and so a squad of shield conjurers from the PK Guild took up positions around the perimeter of the stage to protect the crowd with an invisible wall. The Tanu Marshal of Sport then introduced the Firvulag Great Ones, who simply stood forth and then retired to applause from the triracial assembly when no challenges came from the
ranks.

  The presentation of the Firvulag leadership was swift, almost perfunctory. Medor, Ayfa, Galbor Redcap, Skathe, Nukalavee the Skinless, Tetrol Bonecrusher, Bles Four-Fang, Betularn of the White Hand, and finally Sharn-Mes all accepted plaudits and stood down unchallenged. Lastly, in a major but fully expected break with the tradition of recent unhappy years, the Firvulag Battlemaster was proclaimed by King Yeochee. Not Sharn the Younger, who had undertaken the thankless job during the past twenty Combats—but Pallol One-Eye himself.

  The irascible old First Comer, gigantic in his full suit of obsidian mail and monstrous crested helm, ascended the Dais of Challenge to tumultuous acclaim. There were many—Tanu and Firvulag as well as human—who had never seen his power manifested. Others, now that he had returned to the Combat after his long absence, jested that his faculties must surely have atrophied from disuse. No one dared challenge him; but as a technical neophyte he was obliged to demonstrate his primary metafaculty before the assembled field.

  Pallol stood with legs wide apart and spike-studded arms flung out. He leaned back so that he appeared to be gazing directly at the high sun. His visor remained shut but the hushed onlookers knew, nevertheless, that it hid not one eye—but two. The right was a normal orb having an iris colored deep red. The left was of a color unfathomable, usually shuttered behind a patch but now beyond doubt naked and dreadful.

  Clouds summoned by the awesome creative power of the old ogre materialized in the sky. They were thick and dark and low-hanging, with unnatural ruddy lightning blinking in their depths. The black-armored monster did not move. Of its own volition, his helmet visor slowly opened.

  Twin purple discharges scorched down from the clouds into Pallol's gauntleted palms, begetting a shattering clap of thunder. From the gaping helm a coherent scarlet beam blasted skyward, carving a tunnel through the cloud in the manner of a cannonball punching through a snowbank. The sun illumined Pallol's Eye. His visor closed. The sky brightened to blue.

  "Slitsal, Pallol!" cried the chivalry of the Firvulag. "Slitsal, Pallol Battlemaster! Slitsal!"

  King Yeochee arose from his throne and roared out, "We confirm Pallol One-Eye as Battlemaster, to defend our racial honor in this Grand Combat!"

  Thus ended the Firvulag manifestation of power, and the Tanu prepared to take their turn upon the Dais of Challenge. At this point in the proceedings in years past, many of the Little People among the spectators had tended to drift away discourteously, being by that time of the day ferociously hungry as well as sweltering in their armor or heavy clothing under the Mediterranean sun. But on this occasion the Firvulag held their places. The grapevine had promised a widespread shakeup in the Tanu hierarchy and none of the Little People wanted to miss the fun.

  Things began tamely enough as the lowest-ranked among the Tanu Great Ones ascended to acclaim. Bleyn the psychokinetic hybrid was unchallenged, and after him came Alberonn Mindeater, another mixed-blood who had earned his place at the High Table through creative mastery in battle. And then there stood forth Lady Bunone Warteacher in her silver-green armor and hawksbeak helm, and Tagan Lord of Swords—these two being most directly responsible for the training of the gray-torc warriors and cheered most loudly by the humans and hybrids in the crowd.

  After the fighting specialists came the Guild Presidents. These could, by ancient custom, delegate a Combat deputy if they were not inclined to take to the battlefield in person. Any challenge, however, would have to be answered by the principal in a manifestation of power.

  The Marshal of Sport announced: "The President of the Guild of Redactors, Dionket Lord Healer!"

  Unarmed and empty-handed, the gaunt figure in simple scarlet-and-white robes ascended the dais.

  "Is there a challenge?"

  There was not. Dionket gestured and a tall warrior wearing ruby armor came and stood beside him. "I delegate Lord Culluket the King's Interrogator as Second Redactor, to defend our Guild's honor in the Grand Combat." The two retired to cheers from Tanu and humankind. The Firvulag hummed mockingly.

  "The President of the Guild of Psychokinetics, Nodonn Lord of Goriah!"

  The rosy-gold one came forward, not to claim leadership as Lord Psychokinetic, but to await challenge. There was none, of course, and so he delegated his brother Kuhal Earthshaker as Second, since he himself would undertake the role of Battlemaster. As the two stepped down the Tanu cheers were louder, the human distinctly subdued, and the Firvulag humming more vicious.

  "The President of the Guild of Coercers, Sebi-Gomnol Lord Coercer!"

  The crowd noise chopped off.

  King Thagdal rose from his throne, diamond armor ablaze. "Our dear son Sebi-Gomnol having been gathered unto Tana's peace, we declare the Presidency of the Guild of Coercers vacant and call for aspirants to stand forth in this manifestation of power."

  Imidol the sapphire titan mounted the dais to howls of Tanu acclamation. Then came another tall form, his blue armor and helmeted head cloaked and hooded in dull-bronzen brocade. The Marshal of Sport cleared his throat.

  "Awful King and Father! Noble battle-company of the Tanu! Here before you aspirant stand Lord Imidol—"

  Cheers and jeers.

  "—and Leyr the Banished, predecessor to Sebi-Gomnol in the Presidency of the Guild of Coercers."

  Gasps and hoots came from Tanu and Firvulag alike as the bronze fabric fell away. The deposed Lord Coercer stood decorous beside his louring young rival.

  For a long moment Thagdal was silent. He had known what was in the wind, of course. And thousands of years ago on far Duat, another unseated and exiled Great One had dared to attempt a comeback, so there was precedent. He addressed the two: "Will you manifest here and now or will you duel?"

  And Imidol responded, as was his right as a member of the High Table, "We will duel unto the death in the High Mêlée at such moment as the Goddess may choose. "

  Tanu spectators applauded stiffly while the Little Folk whooped and screeched at the evident discomfiture of the Foe. The blue-armored coercers stepped down.

  "The President of the Guild of Creators, Aluteyn Craftsmaster!"

  The stout old Tanu in the jeweled caftan came forward as the Marshal called for any challenge. Gulls flew overhead, uttering creaky cries in the ensuing silence. A light eastern breeze blew Aluteyn's silver-vermeil hair and long mustaches back from his stony face. He glared over the heads of the vast crowd and seemed to contemplate the pale lagoon that lapped the White Silver Plain in shallow harmlessness.

  "I challenge," said Mercy.

  The crowd opened for her. She came up to stand facing Aluteyn, wearing for form's sake a delicately wrought suit of parade armor, silver-lustre glass all embossed and enameled with green ornamentation and inlaid with emeralds. Mercy's head was bare except for a narrow emerald diadem, and her glorious red hair floated free.

  "Awful Father! Lord Creator! Noble battle-company!" cried the Marshal. "Here before you challenging stands Lady Mercy-Rosmar of Goriah, wife to Nodonn Battlemaster."

  "Will you manifest," Thagdal inquired, "or will you duel?"

  "I will manifest," declared Aluteyn Craftsmaster. "Let the Kral be borne forth."

  The ceremonial cauldron, which Creator Guild personnel had kept covered at one side of the dais, was placed between Mercy and Aluteyn. The Firvulag throng was now almost out of control, straining close to the platform on their side of the field and making an uproar of derisive twitters, growls, and a deep bourdon drone of humming that now reached a crescendo of maddening whole-tone intervals.

  The chain of silence was shaken again and again. Finally Mercy was able to speak.

  "I, Mercy-Rosmar, call upon Aluteyn Craftsmaster to devastate if he can the creation I will manifest here before you."

  She and the old man confronted each other across the huge kettle, arms extended. An emanation like a wispy rainbow began to stream from Mercy's mailed fingers. In response, a flood of blackness flowed out of the Craftsmaster's hands, enveloping not only the small colored
whirlwind but Mercy and the entire cauldron as well. The Tanu spectators gave a triumphant shout. Torced humans and Firvulag groaned and hissed.

  The black tide swelled into an inky amoeboid blob. Beneath it, the side of the platform nearest the Firvulag commenced to fizzle and flame as though the white stone were being attacked by some ectoplasmic acid. The Little People shrank back as the PK shielders made a gesture.

  Aluteyn laughed.

  But something was glowing within the dark mass like a rare green star emerging from a coalsack nebula. The blackness thinned. Mercy reappeared, poised in vapor above the dissolving dais, and the cauldron was there with her. She glowed more brightly. Her rainbow vortex spun into the depths of the Kral and started something to sparkling and tinkling down there. The black tide went splashing back to menace its creator.

  Aluteyn cried out. A great thing like a hammer of night came smashing down on Mercy and the Kral. But this creation of the Craftsmaster, like the other, frittered away to impotence. Mercy's rainbow tornado now rose from the cauldron and grew until it was more than four times the height of the Lord Creator. It began to show thickening clots of multicolored light. Aluteyn caught it in a huge black net and pounded it with psychoenergies, trying to force it back into the kettle or turn it upon the woman. But it eluded him. It expanded and solidified high above the heads of the throng...

  And manna rained on Tanu and Firvulag and humans alike. The air was filled with a soft hailstorm of rainbow bubbles, countless thousands of them, which when seized and broken open released sweetmeats, cold fruits, rich little cakes, and a whole cornucopia of other delicious edibles that were greeted with jubilant enthusiasm by the famished spectators of all three races.

  "Slonshal, Rosmar! Slonshal, Rosmar Lady Creator! Slonshal!"

  She stood with lowered eyes, having fully restored the dais, with one silver hand resting on the brim of the empty cauldron. The mob was still yelling and grabbing, for never before at the Grand Combat had any creator produced fully tangible organic matter that endured instead of quickly fading away. (Mercy's astral hors d'oeuvres were far from illusory; the stomachs of the throng testified to it!) And so her talent was hailed not only for its novelty but also for its practical value.