by John Daulton
They swung so low she had to curl up her knees, pulling the rounded mass of Knot up against her belly as tightly as she could. He was heavy, and her toes clipped the fronds of several squat and bulbous palms.
In a long and graceful arc, so long and graceful that it would have appeared to an observer that it was quite slow despite the wind-whistling velocity, they swung across seventy spans of jungle floor and then back up again. At the top of the swing, Pernie let go of the vine, just as upward momentum waned. They hung there for a moment, for the barest time feeling as if released by gravity, then Pernie nudged Knot with a gentle telepathic threat, which had him opening by the time they began to descend, falling toward the next limb, this one a long, sturdy bridge provided by another of the massive kapok trees.
Knot landed softly, the strength of his little feet always amazing to her, and she came down without the least shock or jolt. In that same motion, they were shooting toward the tree trunk, and then down they went, around and around, spiraling their way down its fluted altitude in a winding trek that took them barely a minute to complete. Once again they were darting through the brush, silently but for the rare slap of leaf clusters that Pernie could neither duck nor leap.
Pernie blinked, looking into the mana again, careful not to touch it or stir it herself, merely looking, flitting in and out of that place as Djoveeve had taught her to do. It was the only way to win a fight with an elf, the old assassin had said, and Pernie had finally begun to believe. Watching the mana in this way was difficult, though, for it was like seeing in both positive and negative space, like watching lightning and trying to recognize both the shape of the lightning’s forks and the shapes formed by the darkness those blinding flashes outlined. Lose one, and you lose the other. Then you see nothing. Djoveeve had told her most humans couldn’t do it even if they tried. None could focus on two things at once—by now she’d heard that time and time again—but some, a few, could effectively alternate between, and Pernie was coming along just fine.
And so it was that she saw the shift in the mana again, barely, Djoveeve somewhere far at her back. She cast a scent illusion, the smell of herself and Knot, and she sent it spinning up a tree like an olfactory fireball. She set another upon a cluster of seedpods that were floating down a stream. For a time she wove back and forth doing the same sort of thing everywhere, perhaps a full five minutes, and with the speed of her insect mount, she covered a great deal of space.
When she was satisfied with her misdirection, she masked herself and her roly-poly ride in total silence. She covered their smells and then shrouded them in invisibility, then set out to the north, bent on getting herself that horned manatee.
Three weeks had passed since her injury, and Djoveeve had been tailing her ever since. The woman made no secret about why, and must have repeated fifty times that Pernie not mess with the sargosaganti. Djoveeve said it was because they were dangerous. Seawind, who had been something of a nag on that topic too, said the same. He explained over and over that they could not be tamed. But when Pernie asked if he had ever tried, he’d had to admit that he never had.
“Why not?” she’d asked.
“Because they are not to be trifled with.”
“But why?” she’d pressed.
“Because they are dangerous. And because they do not wish to be tamed.”
“How do you know? Have you ever asked one before?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know they don’t want to be?”
“Because it is known. They are wild things. They are peaceful and timid and, as you have seen, able to pin you to the beach easily and instantly.”
“But that still doesn’t mean they don’t want to be tamed. Not if you never talked to one before. And Kettle says that everyone is different, so even if one says they don’t like people, other ones might feel differently.”
At which point Seawind had turned his head slightly to the side, something of a bow in deference to Djoveeve, and said, “This is where you must deal with your own species.” Then he left the cave.
But Pernie didn’t care what they said. She knew she could do it, and now she needed to. She’d tamed Knot, and she was fairly sure she’d just completely escaped the current Sava’an’Lansom for the first time since she’d started trying. She looked into the mana and saw nothing at all that didn’t appear as it should. There were a pair of garrote spiders making webs across a spider-ape corridor high above, but that was all. Djoveeve was nowhere to be found.
Soon enough, Pernie found herself once more atop the cliff that looked down upon the favored beach of the sargosaganti. She stepped off of Knot and crawled to the edge, peering down through the grasses toward the beach.
There they were again, all of them, a whole herd of fat black-and-green sausages reclining in the late afternoon sun, only partially filtered through a thin haze that was common in the autumn months here.
The titanic mass of the alpha male stretched out on the beach like a fifty-span seawall of fat and flesh, the blotches of his rough hide appearing as if some painter had thrown a fit. Leaving her invisibility and other illusions in place, she stood and gripped her spear, once again point down, ready to strike. The big one was closer this time, and she thought she might be able to make it all the way onto its back if she got a running start. So she did.
She took several steps back, then ran full speed and threw herself off the cliff. She was going to be close with this teleport.
The rocks grew and grew in her vision as she fell. She watched patiently as she plunged downward, the wind whistling in her ears.
She spoke the words, the largest of the jagged black rocks only a half-hand’s width from her face, and then there she was in the middle of its back, the king of the manatees, her spear already plunging into its skin.
She blinked her eyes, looking into the mana, and saw it whirl only a half instant before the creature teleported itself away. She had just begun to drop toward the beach in its absence when she spoke her own spell, nearly as quickly as the sargosagantis had done, and once again she stood upon it, gripping her spear where it dug into its flesh. She fluttered her vision back and forth between sunlight and mana sight, watching the titanic beast gathering mana again. As it did, she drove down with all her weight upon her spear, pushing it even deeper into the blubbery hide. The great sargosagantis jumped across an incoming wave, ten paces out to sea.
Pernie was nearly underwater before she could speak the words again, and once more she was on its back.
It blinked away again.
She chased it, and again she drove down on her spear. She twisted the shaft with her hands, trying to drill down through its thick, fatty flesh. Her spear was already a third of its length in.
She watched back and forth in and out of the mana as she worked, her breathing coming quickly now. She saw the mana move and jammed down on the spear, wanting to hurt it, and still it got away.
Saltwater splashed into her mouth as she uttered the last word of her teleport, and again she set to work on the spear.
It jumped.
She followed. The spear was into the giant sargosagantis more than half the shaft’s length now.
The creature jumped again. She echoed the cast, this time pounding on the butt of her spear, hammering at it with her palm until what protruded from the sea beast’s fat bulk barely reached her knee. She saw it draw mana again, and she knew she would be too late. She leapt into the air anticipating its teleport.
It blinked away, and once again she started to fall, but she was halfway through the spell when it vanished from beneath her, so she caught it before she’d fallen far enough to even get her toes wet. She appeared on its back again, and this time she stomped on the butt of her spear as it was gathering mana again. It let go a loud huff that sprayed water in great clouds of mist, white sheets that blew back and soaked her from head to toe. It tried to escape again, twice more, and both times Pernie stomped on the spear and stole its focus away.
&n
bsp; Then it dove.
It was only then that Pernie realized that she was now well over a hundred spans from the beach, and the seabed now dropped precipitously away.
With a few powerful strokes of its wide, flat-finned tail, the sargosagantis was streaking like an arrow shot for the depths.
The force of the water rushing up at her swept Pernie right off its back, but she muttered the words even with a mouthful of water and teleported back to her spear, gripping it for all her worth as the monster sped into the darkening water at unfathomable speed. It was all she could do to hang on, flapping in the wake of its dive like a little human flag.
But she wasn’t going to let go.
She pushed her mind into the mana and strove to find the manatee’s will, its conscious thoughts and its mind. She just knew it had one. It had to be at least as smart as Knot.
She found it. She found fear and something that, in a greater intellect, might have evolved into hate. But it simply ran, and as with Knot, the only sense she got of its thoughts could be translated to an essential negative. It simply told her no.
Her ears were in agony as she was struck by the absolute intractability of that mind, the massiveness of its negativity, its conviction to run to the bottom of the sea. Then it blinked away from her in the moments that she’d forgotten to watch.
The air in her lungs began to burn, and she had to think twice about whether she should blink after it again with another teleport, but it was already nearly vanishing into the dark water below. It blinked a second time and was but a tiny bluish spot.
She felt herself making a gulping sound in her throat and chest. It felt as if someone had buried coals in there. She thought her ears might burst, they hurt so bad.
She looked up toward the surface and saw that it was very far away, the sun wearing a hazy blue veil. That was something of a surprise. She began to swim for the surface, stroking upwards with her hands.
Again came the spasm in her chest and throat. It occurred to her that she might not have enough air to make it up that far.
She mouthed the words of a teleport, expelling the last of the oxygen in her lungs. The sun still looked very blue up there when she reappeared. She kicked with her feet, wishing she could be rid of the boots she wore, now heavy and water soaked. She pulled with wide sweeps of her hands.
She tried another teleport, though she could only mouth the words.
Again her lungs convulsed. And a second time. She had to take a breath. She tried to pull upwards with her arms, but they wouldn’t move anymore, had become things of inert lead.
She really, really wanted to breathe.
Another convulsion. She had to breathe. She had to.
She looked up, saw that she had started to sink again. Everything in her mind told her not to breathe. Something in her heart told her that it would be okay. And besides, her body was starting to feel as if it burned.
She looked up, thought about … nothing. There was nothing she could do. So, with one last convulsion, she resigned herself to it. It hurt too bad not to. So she took a breath. The water burned like acid in her lungs. They hurt worse than the rest of her. But only for a while.
She watched with an odd curiosity as the sun began to blue again, the white wriggling of the surface growing darker and dimmer as she sank. She even, absently, wondered if she’d see the manatee again. But she never did.
Chapter 45
Altin looked up into the bright sun, now high above him. It was a hot day for this early in the year, and he wiped the sweat from his brow with a sleeve as he contemplated how tired he was. He could hardly believe how complicated the spell was for making engasta syrup, and even with the added benefit of his ring, it was still the labor of several hours to move all the components into place and transform them, merely to make one single tile of the stuff, just one, not even a half-span’s length on a side and less than a half a hand thick. While intellectually he’d understood the process to be laborious and expensive, it wasn’t until his third day working to build his own private platform that he began to fully understand why this particular activity had gotten the Transmuters Guild guildmaster elevated to the rank of second on the TGS council in recent months. If Altin found toting around heaps and heaps of stone, barrels of pitch, and wheelbarrows full of wisteria and blackroot, along with thirteen types of clay—one of which happened to be the very same as that which he had used to merge the crystals around Yellow Fire’s heart back on Red Fire—then he could hardly fathom what building enormous platforms in space must be like. And that was just the labor. The cost was frightening. A primary constituent was tar wood, which was absurdly expensive, and he’d had to bribe three people to get it, despite being the Galactic Mage and ostensibly—if not actually—working on the Queen’s behalf when requesting it. Yes, the desire to have a platform at Calico Castle was turning out to be a much larger project than he’d anticipated. It did, however, keep him near home while working on it, which made Orli and Kettle happy.
Kettle was just coming around the corner of the castle with a tray of mint tea as Orli dumped another load of roots at the base of the stone heap, which Altin had just meticulously stacked, as dictated by the spell. She too was covered with a film of sweat and dust, and the two of them plopped down atop the newly made stack of stone and watched Kettle’s approach eagerly.
“I thought the both of ya could stand fer a draught,” the woman said as she strode through the knee-high grass, a trail of flour dust blowing out behind her like smoke in the light breeze.
“Well, your timing couldn’t be better,” Orli said. “It’s warming up fast today.”
“Aye, it is. And a fine day it would ha’ been were it not what it is, what it’s about ta be.”
Altin looked around and thought it a fine day altogether, if warm for heavy work. “Well, what’s wrong with it?” he asked as he took a tall wooden mug filled to the brim with tea and chips of ice.
Kettle looked to Orli, who nodded, her cheerful expression dimming momentarily.
Altin saw the exchange between the two women and, glancing from one to the next, asked his question again. “What’s wrong with today? And what does ‘what it’s about to be’ mean? What am I missing?” He gestured back and forth between them with his hand.
“They’re all the same, aren’t they, dear,” Kettle said, her words directed at Orli in a way that made it seem as if Altin weren’t standing right there. “’Tis all the work and the duty, and ne’er a thought fer the livin’ bein’ done all ’round theirselves.”
Again Orli nodded and seemed perfectly aligned with whatever the mystery was.
“Oh for the pearls of String, what is it?” Altin asked. “Out with it, already!”
Kettle looked shocked that he’d said it, and Orli just shook her head. It was as if he’d said the most offensive thing.
“Pearls a’ String is the right of it,” Kettle said. “My little pearl is there on String. And do ya know what tomorrow is? Tomorrow is the day they stole her from me. The same day the two a’ ya were ta wed. And while there’s still something fer the wedding, there’s naught fer my wee girl. Yet here ya are, buildin’ yer fancy spaceship box, and not a thought a’ poor Pernie gone a whole year away.”
Altin resisted the urge to point out that they had already been over that topic what must have been a thousand times. Instead he looked to Orli, thinking she might understand. Pernie was fine. He was sure of it. If anything had happened to her, they would have gotten word. He’d even cast a divining spell to check on her a few months back, just to calm Kettle down. The indications were certain that Pernie was alive and, at least at the time, feeling fine. Orli’s expression didn’t exactly gush sympathy.
He gulped down the rest of the tea and put it back on the tray. “Thank you for the tea,” he said, then returned to his work. With rather more violence than he had before, he once again began mixing the various types of clay, preparing the blend for the treatment of the stack of stones and roots he and Orli
had made. Once it was coated with the mixture, he could convert it into another engasta syrup tile.
Perhaps as a show of mercy, Kettle changed the subject as she looked to Orli and asked, “So how’s yer friend Yellow Fire doin’ out there on that red world ya planted him in? Have ya had any luck with the magic takin’ hold?”
“Not yet,” Orli supplied. “Altin checks in on him every night before we go to bed, but it’s always the same. Still nothing.”
“Well, things take time,” Kettle said. “And no tellin’ what kind of time fer a critter such as they are, no doubt. What with the two a’ ya talkin’ about millions a’ years livin’ fer them things, it don’t seem too surprisin’ that they’d be a while gettin’ started again.”
Orli nodded. “That’s very likely true.” She turned to watch Altin adding water to the large tub where they’d been mixing clay for the last several days. “Which is why we won’t be doing anything rash to Blue Fire for a long time to come.” The elevated pitch of her voice made it clear who that comment was really directed to.
Altin glanced up from his work, his eyes shadowed by the angle of his head and his lowered brows, but he did not take the bait. They’d already had this fight several times. He’d given his word; Orli thought it was reprehensible. Both sides understood both sides perfectly. There lay underneath their relationship now the tension of that conflict. Orli had stopped complaining about waiting for their wedding anymore. Instead, on that front she seemed relieved. The timing of the wedding, past attempts and future dates, was not a source of trouble anymore.
However, he also knew that barbs like the one she’d just thrown were going to keep coming as long as they waited for Yellow Fire to wake up. That was a source of trouble still. She was still angry about Altin’s “threat” to kill Blue Fire, and she just couldn’t let it go. He understood. He didn’t blame her. It was the collision of two ideals. He also understood that she tried very hard not to say that kind of thing, and that mainly it happened when she was tired, which after several long days of labor under a hot sun and the frustration of having so many things, well, if not quite going wrong, not quite going right either, made such remarks nearly inevitable. The nature of tomorrow’s anniversary—combined with the fact that he had forgotten all about it—made it a certainty.