“You could suddenly do magic, and they sent you to the Wandless Academy…?” Ben said. “After this?”
“I didn’t tell anyone…not then. I thought that the best place to hide would be in the last place anyone who had any suspicions about me would think of looking, and that was the place where no magic was permitted, by decree.”
Terry snorted. “And little did you know that you were at the source,” he said. “Because of the Nexus.”
“Maybe that’s why we broke through at the Academy,” Tess said thoughtfully. “None of us knew about the Nexus then. But it might have been what gave us the push into the virtual world.”
“I guess that’s how Diego de los Reyes fell into it,” Thea said, nodding. “Without the pure chance of something like him being in precisely the right place to…”
“Before we get to Diego de los Reyes,” Ben said. “This Alphiri thing.”
“What about it?”
“Well, I don’t get it,” Ben said. “I don’t know what the fuss is with this Diego guy, either. I mean, all that they might really have wanted was not so much to buy you as buy whatever it is that you could do. And as far as Diego is concerned—he isn’t even really alive, is he? How can they possibly hurt him?”
“You think we should just let the Alphiri have him?” Tess said.
Ben shrugged. “It might even help matters,” he muttered. “At least he wouldn’t be our responsibility anymore. And why do we care what happens to him, anyway? He’s just a ghost. And one that seems more than capable of taking care of itself.”
“I wouldn’t wish the Alphiri on anyone, not even somebody like Diego. Especially not someone like Diego,” Thea said passionately. “We might have choices; what are his?”
Ben gave her a smoldering look. “You might find out if you stop trying to make them for him,” he said.
“I guess it would depend on what the Alphiri wanted the magic for,” Magpie said, stirring.
“They sent the Nothing,” Thea said grimly.
Ben stared at her. “Are we certain about that?” he said at last.
“Yeah, was it actually proved?” Tess said. “I know there was lots of speculation, but I don’t know if I ever saw it stated outright anywhere.”
“They sent it. Big Elk told me that much.”
“Big Elk?”
“That’s a story for another time,” Thea said. “But the Alphiri want to assimilate the magic, not just use it. This time the trade they have in mind is far more fundamental than their usual bargain—they don’t just want access to a tool, they want to become it—they want the magic. For themselves. They want to be magic, not do magic. Doing this for them, on their behalf, it would not be a job—it would be—” She shuddered once, briefly, calling to mind the avid gaze of the Alphiri who had been waiting for her in the woods behind her home last summer, who would have spirited her away if she had deviated an iota from the trade agreement that they had already entered into.
“The people you call the Alphiri are a long-lived race, and they existed long before your kindred emerged,” Cheveyo said unexpectedly. “Their culture has endured for a span of time that would seem fabulous to you. They look upon humans as mayflies, ephemeral things, here one moment and gone the next. But humankind has spun a cocoon of dreams and magic for itself, and even when they vanish, as all things do in their time, that will remain behind, a memory of magic. When the Alphiri go…they will leave nothing. It is as if a cold wind will have swept in the wake of their passing, erasing the tracks they have left in the sand. They have been seeking magic for hundreds of years. Thousands. One thing after another, one failure after another. They may see a twilight approaching, and that could mean…that they are getting a little more desperate to find the spark that will let their memory endure after they are gone. They are running out of time. Your race, my children, is the closest they have come to finding something that they could take into themselves, call their own.”
That was the longest speech that Thea had ever heard Cheveyo make. And yet it was not enough, because his final words left behind…a question.
“Why?” she asked.
“In too many ways,” Cheveyo said, “your kind and theirs are far too alike. It was too long ago to be certain—perhaps Grandmother Spider might know. But it would not surprise me to learn that in the distant past they were gifted with magic, too, and that it is the memory of having once possessed it that drives them—and that they might serve as a warning as to what your people might become if you squander the gifts that you have been given.”
“So you didn’t say anything to anybody,” Ben said, staring at Thea. “Nobody? What if the Alphiri did come to the school and try and snatch you away?”
“No portals,” Magpie said, “and if any of them had wandered onto campus, just like that, someone would have noticed, stopped them, asked questions…”
“So—you hid,” Ben said, ignoring the interruption, focused completely on Thea. “Fine—but then, what made you tip your hand? I remember when the Nothing came—people said that magic fed it, not stopped it—and yet there you were, plotting to defeat it with magic…”
“But nobody knew that kind of magic existed,” Thea said. “And they didn’t know how to stop it. Maybe that was just the desperation of the Alphiri taking form—but that might have let them succeed, in our world. If we couldn’t stop the Nothing, which the Alphiri made from sucking out our magic, who knows what we would have been left with? It was Cheveyo who told me, when I was here, that the one thing I took with me from this place is knowing what battles to fight, being able to choose the place to make a stand—and I did that. And it worked.”
“And now the Alphiri knew that you were awake,” Magpie said slowly. “The Double Seventh thing, I mean. They were waiting for it, trying to trigger it, so that they could somehow claim it, but you stepped in their way, and now they knew you could do things.”
“But you didn’t tell anyone,” Ben objected again. “How come the Alphiri knew and nobody else did?”
“Corey did. And there is still a bit of a mystery as to whether or not I actually had a bunch of gift-bearing Faele at my birth or not—apparently my father forbade it, but my mother kind of winked at it, and if they knew, then the celestial sphere would have been ringing with it. The Faele are not what you might consider to be trustworthy with something you might want kept a secret.”
“That’s not fair, they’re tricksters but that kindred has their own sense of honor,” Magpie objected. “Look at the Woodlings—they’re a Faele kind—and Signe did something that breached that honor sufficiently for her to be exiled for it.”
“But Corey meant to get something for the knowledge,” Tess said. “The king of tricksters, and honor wasn’t any part of that. Do you know what they offered him?”
“We probably never will,” Thea said. “Although that cube we brought back when we got Beltran might have something to do with it.”
“Cube?” Magpie said blankly, and Ben looked lost again.
Thea sighed. “Later.”
“Did the principal know about you?” Ben asked suddenly, clinging to his own agenda with stubborn tenacity. “About what you could do?”
“Um, we had to tell him. I had to tell my parents. After the Nothing, I went home and had to come clean. And then when I showed them the ability to step between worlds…through a computer…that changed everything, again. It was kind of agreed that the Academy was the safest place for me, for the time being,” Thea said carefully.
“Right there with the Nexus,” Terry said.
“And then the spellspam started,” Tess said suddenly. “And they all knew you could do magic stuff with computers. And when the Washington mages came in…that’s why Luana had a bee in her bonnet that the whole thing was you.”
“How did they find out?” Ben said. “Did you guys tell your uncle?” That to the twins, whose uncle was, after all, the head of the Federal Bureau of Magic.
“No, my father sent the
m in,” Thea said. “Nobody counted on Luana being such a jerk about it, and then she made it worse. And then the spellspam began to come thick and fast. Humphrey May had the idea that Professor de los Reyes might be the best person to find out more about my gift.”
“It was a good idea, at least in theory,” Terry said. “He is one of the best mages we’ve got, and he also happens to know a great deal about computers.”
“But he never showed any signs of being able to trigger anything magical with a computer,” Ben said.
“Well, no—but as it turned out, it was his lapse of judgment with the Nexus that did trigger the rest of it.”
“Now we come to Diego,” Thea murmured, staring into the fire.
“I don’t really know what happened there,” Terry said. “Maybe this is where you get to fill the rest of us in…and then I’ll tell you guys what I think is going on with the spellspam.”
2.
THEA GAVE THEM AN abbreviated account of the eventful few days at the Elemental house. She was aware that she was leaving things out—details that might have been important—but somehow she was not quite ready to share the vision of herself and Diego in that mirror, the feeling of the two of them being somehow alike, a spark of recognition, even an astonished sense of the first stirrings of a warmth that shaded from sympathy into friendship. She just gave them the bones of the story, as Larry had given it back at the house—the details of Beltran’s birth, of Diego…was it Aunt Zoë who had called him a lost soul?
“I’m not sure how Corey found him,” Thea finished, “but he must have been looking for an alternative to me—and Diego shines out there like a star. So far as I can tell there are only the two of us…”
“But it’s different,” Magpie said. “Diego exists only in that twilight place of green light and shadows. He can’t change worlds like you do. Would the Alphiri want that?”
“He could manipulate magic,” Thea said, “and they can manipulate computers. They didn’t have to go searching anymore for arbitrary magic, which may or may not have served their purposes. If they could find someone who could channel it into a computer, then they could use that in any way they wanted to—and it would be cheap for the price.”
“But then why didn’t they grab Diego a long time ago?”
“They had no clue, just as we didn’t,” Thea said. “There was no Diego—just Beltran…”
“Diego was in the perfect position—he had a living twin through whom he could manipulate our world, and he had access to the second Nexus,” Terry agreed. “But without that living link—it would be impossible…”
“But that isn’t right,” Ben said. “The spellspams came from all over the place, after they first began; there had to be other people doing this, too, and not through a Nexus supercomputer…”
“Copying, and sending on, much as the Alphiri might have wanted,” Terry said. “All the original stuff came from one source—Diego. And the early ones were really weak. The first person who saw one got the full brunt of the spell, and then it was spent. It was like lighting a firecracker. Almost exactly like it, in fact—I kept on stumbling across the empty shells of them, after, when I was doing clean-up.”
“How did you know they weren’t just your garden-variety spam?” asked Magpie, diverted. “I mean, there’s thousands and thousands of those, so in the aftermath, weren’t they just the same thing?”
“Spent fireworks smell,” Terry said with a quick grin. “It wasn’t hard to tell. But he got better, and quickly—they got more and more sophisticated.”
“But they were all practical jokes, to one degree or another,” Thea said. Diego’s voice came back to haunt her—I was only having fun. He was completely alone, adrift in an empty universe, and depended on Beltran even for the outlet for his frustrated and pent-up intelligence. No wonder, when Corey found him, that he lapped up the attention…
She became aware that Terry was speaking, and shook herself out of her reverie.
“…that’s what I meant.”
“Sorry,” Thea said. “Run that by me again?”
Terry shrugged. “When you went to look for Diego and then the Alphiri showed up—he’s lost his connection, with Beltran being out of the picture, but there’s been more spellspam coming in, even after his connection to the computer was apparently shut off. He must have stockpiled them in the memory, and set a trigger, so if he got cut off, things would go on without him, at least for a while. That, and I have my suspicions…”
“About what?” Thea asked.
“It’s just…he might have left a trail for himself, somehow, a back door,” Terry said. “And also…things might be getting worse, in a hurry. He has no reason to play anymore—he knows he can do this, and get things done by doing it. What if he starts sending out stuff that isn’t just practical jokes anymore?”
“The last one Mom told me about,” Tess said. “It had something to do with shapeshifting, or something like that. Apparently those who got nabbed by it tended to…well…you know, change into the most inconvenient possible thing at the worst possible moment, like turning into a goat or a mushroom just as you’re about to go on a date, or have to go and take some important exam…”
“That’s still a practical joke, “Thea said. “It doesn’t do lasting damage.”
“You’re still defending him,” Ben said.
Magpie gave him a strange look. “You make it sound as though she’s on his side,” she said.
“Well, she sounds like it,” Ben said. “His, against…against us.”
“You sound as though you’re jealous of him,” Magpie said.
“But the spellspams are getting pretty nasty, and who knows how long one stays in the shape of that goat or that mushroom—or what it will do to you,” Terry said. “And besides, that’s just one of maybe half a dozen that came up in the last twenty-four hours. It’s out of hand. I’m not sure, right now, what I fear more—that he’s set himself up so that he can go back into the computer and take control of this thing, or that he has permanently shut himself out of it and we have to clean up a mess we barely understand.”
“Where is this person you speak of, right now?” Cheveyo said quietly.
They had almost forgotten he was there.
“That’s just it,” Thea said. “We don’t know.”
“You left him in his place, though, didn’t you?…Him and the Alphiri?” Ben said. There was an odd sharpness in his tone as he spoke, as though he resented having to mention Diego at all.
“I came straight back,” Thea said. “With Corey.”
“You left him alone with the Alphiri,” Ben said.
Thea’s heart did a funny little lurch at that. “Yes,” she said in a thin voice. “I did. I had to get back to the house, before Corey got loose again.”
“He might have chosen to go with them, then?” Cheveyo asked.
“That’s what the professor and Uncle Kevin have gone to find out,” Tess said.
“A bargain is a bargain,” Cheveyo said. “If the Alphiri can show that they have made one, it might be hard to undo it. And if you don’t, you stand in grave danger of what the Alphiri will be able to do next.”
“You think there might still be a chance to turn it?” Thea said.
Cheveyo considered this for a moment. “It all depends on the timing, and you don’t know how long ago any of this really was, Catori, because you’ve been on the Road a lot in the past couple of days, and time…time tends to run differently there. If you can find this other mage you speak of, this boy you call Diego, and talk to him before the Alphiri have a chance to make their case, it might still be possible to change the course of events.”
“But how on earth are you going to find him?” Magpie said, turning to Thea. “You basically vanished from his sight, taking someone he did trust at some point—are you going to be able to wander back in there at will? And you’re going to have to do it at precisely the moment you left, if it’s going to do any good. You have to be there b
efore the Alphiri have a chance to seal any bargains.”
“I know how to get his attention,” Terry said.
“We’re listening,” Tess said.
“He made it his thing to send out this spam,” Terry said. “What if we send one?”
“Tell me you’re joking,” Tess said, flushing a hectic red. “Mom and Uncle Kevin will flay you. Besides, you said you didn’t know how exactly he did…”
“I didn’t, in the beginning—but now I have a pretty good idea—and there’s at least one Nexus computer where I don’t need Professor de los Reyes’s permission to access what I need. I can do the basic logistics, don’t worry—but it would need you, Thea, to set it. You are the only one who has met him. You know what will bring him out.”
And betray him, all over again…
“You asked for advice,” said Cheveyo suddenly, getting to his feet. He made a single imperious gesture when they all began to scramble to follow him and everyone subsided back onto their skins. “It would seem to me that your quarry is a spirit who is searching for a place to stand on true ground, and I think that it would be well for you to choose that ground. He might not have realized until now just how important this thing that he does really is. He may have started doing it simply because it made him feel more real. The Alphiri have negotiated harder bargains than this. They have had thousands of years of practice. If you can get back this lost child of your race, you should do it—and if you cannot…” He looked at each of them in turn, a piercing glance from those luminous dark eyes. “If you cannot, then it may be your task to make sure the Alphiri do not own him,” he said, and his voice was low and level. “And you will have to do whatever achieving that task may ask you to do.”
Worldweavers: Spellspam Page 24