“But there were, Trin.”
“Were there? All right, then tell me why you’ve taken Jem under your wing. Tell me it’s because you want to be his friend.”
Taehrn’s jaw clenched, his lips folded inward. The silence dragged.
“Just as I thought,” Trin said. “You’re stringing him along because you think he might be useful.”
“He is dangerous, Trin.”
“That might be true, but I don’t care. I trust that kid and I’ll do anything I can to help him. You know why? Because he’s a friend, and to me that means something.”
Shrugging, Taehrn stepped away from the crenellation. “Believe what you wish, Trin, but that boy is friend to none. He is a liar to his core and any friendship between you is imagined.” Taehrn turned, and walking to the heavy door, he pulled it open. He spoke with a final look. “Do not claim that I did not warn you. I know how precarious your own relationship with reality is.”
“Oh, But-” – the door slammed – “-cher take you.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Sybil opened her outer lid then the second. Better or worse? The room was still too bright; the heat difference on this world was not as extreme as the world she had created, so everything blurred together on the spectrum. Instead of two extremes, I need a narrow middle. Gods, if only there were a reset switch. I should have altered the second lid instead of the lens…
Sybil closed her eyes and thought. She hated the idea, but there was a good chance she would need to completely redesign them as she had done once before. But that could take days… who knows how long I spent designing the last ones.
“Mama, can we go yet? My eyes hurt.”
“Not yet, Tin. Go back to sleep if you can.”
“But you’ve been working forever.”
“Oh, hush now. Your sister is still asleep, so it can’t have been more than a night.”
“But it’s so hot here,” Tin complained.
“Yes…” Sybil pondered. “It is, isn’t it…” Their bodies are used to the cold… so maybe I need to reduce the exposure on the low end and widen the spectrum on the high end. The birthright hummed as Sybil decided on a course of action. Her eyes tingled as the receptors changed. She opened her eyelids to a dark room. Tin sat on the floor as a mass of orange light. Iri lay beside her, curled into a ball and snoring peacefully. Much better. A Bit more sensitivity on the low end I think.
She made the change and the room’s contours sharpened. Finding herself in a room she recognized, Sybil gasped.
“What? What is it, Mother?”
“This is my old laboratory… We’re at the university.” With chairs, tables, crates, and burlap sacks piled along the walls, the room looked like nothing more than a storeroom, but she recognized it regardless. The crown molding of red shale – carved to form a frieze of arches – over the gray brick was too distinctive. The reds and grays weren’t quite right, but she had spent too much time in this room not to recognize it. But maybe…
“Where’s that?”
Sybil frowned. Fearful that her daughters might pine for a world they couldn’t have, she had kept her stories of Trel to a minimum. It had always seemed cruel to tell them of a paradise they might never see, but now that she was here… she regretted it. She had denied them a world of wonders, an entire history, and family that might be rediscovered. Love and friendships, family and exploration, they could have it all. They could finally have everything Sybil had wanted for them. A life. A real life. Gods, we may have lost our world… but perhaps a life’s work is worth this.
Sybil smiled to her daughter. “Do you recall the twin sister I told you of? Your Aunt Galina?”
“Yes, Mama.”
“Well, this is where we grew up. My childhood home is only half a city away.”
“What is a city?”
Sybil laughed. “I will show you, daughter. It is a much better thing to see than to hear about.”
“Can we go now?”
“Hmm, not yet,” Sybil hummed. If I had a guide I could fix their eyes to see it all properly. They can’t go out into this world without the colors of life. I won’t allow it. “We are not quite ready, but I promise it will be worth the wait.” Standing, Sybil stretched to relax her leg muscles. Her eyes found the door. There’s a good chance I might find a fresh set of eyes out there… “I am going to step out for a bit, Tin. When your sister wakes, please let her know that everything is okay.”
“You’re leaving without us?”
“I will be back soon, dear. It shouldn’t be hard to find someone to help us, and then I can fix your sight.”
“But I want to go, too.”
Sybil smiled. “I know, but it will hurt your eyes. The sooner I go, the sooner I can help you.” As Sybil placed her hand on the doorknob, she had a frightening thought. “And Tin,” she said, “while I am gone, don’t try to fix it yourself. In fact, it would be better if you didn’t use the birthright at all.”
“I won’t.” Her disappointment was poorly veiled.
“Promise me?”
“Promise.”
“And Iri?”
“I won’t let her either.”
“Good girl, I will be back soon. Love you.”
“Love you too, Mama.”
Unhitching the latch, Sybil pulled open the door. Round pebbles poured through the open door in the clicking avalanche of a pile of stones. Surprised, Sybil jumped back a step. There weren’t many, only a trickle of shuffling rocks that skid across the floor. When the pebbles settled, she bent to study them. They weren’t rocks, but buttons of every type and shape. Round ones, square ones, some of carved stone, and some of fashioned metal. She could see buttons of porcelain and others made of polished gems, or inset with gold and diamond, but most were of wood. Simple, carved, and painted.
“What was that sound, Mama?” Tin asked.
“Nothing, dear,” Sybil said. “I’ll be back soon.”
Brushing them aside with her foot, Sybil saw where the buttons had come from. Someone had piled them along the wall outside her laboratory. It was not the only pile. There were buttons everywhere, stacked in little mountains like a hoard of gold coins. A narrow walkway of slate flooring cut its way through the trove, winding between the piles and down the hall.
Closing the door, Sybil drew a heavy breath and took in her surroundings.
The halls were dark, with little heat, but her memory managed where her eyes could not. She had walked this hall a million times and knew it by heart. At the end of the hall, a left turn would take her to her old chambers, a right would take her to the front hall and the path outside. The buttons encouraged her. She wasn’t certain how long she had been away, but it would have appalled her to learn that her colleagues had abandoned the university. A storage room was better than emptiness.
As she approached the intersection, a flash of light blinked once from the rightward corridor, stinging her eyes and blinding her momentarily. Ahh, Sybil moaned, not quite right. Easing her lids open, she continued her steps. A voice mumbled in the next room as another light sparked into life, this one dimmer and more manageable, flickering like a candle. The first light had contained the feel of the birthright, but not the second. Flint scraped on steel and she realized that whoever had skipped into the front hall was lighting torches.
Reaching the corner, Sybil felt a spark of power; this emission was not skipping, she didn’t recognize the residues. A man’s voice echoed around the bend. “Marriage to Quill. Hmm, yes, not me, Sailor…” Another spark. “Yes… didn’t kill Indaht. That was the boy.” A third spark. “Aha! Really? That one was mine? I am him? Of course, it makes so much sense…” the voice trailed away into a fit of giggling. “Me?” the voice asked. “Yes me,” the same voice answered. Peering around the corner, she saw the man. In what she knew must be a blue hat and robes, Dydal leaned over one of the button piles, studying a small copper button held at eye level.
“Dydal?”
The gangly man
righted himself with a scowl. “You are not allowed in… S-… Alchemist? Is that really you?” The man’s face relaxed, the scowl turning to excitement.
“It is. I am back, Dydal. And you can call me Sybil. There is no need for formality between us.”
“Yes,” the man nodded, tossing the button onto the pile. “Of course, it has just… been so long. I did not expect to see you.”
“I… I know what you mean.” Spreading her arms, she motioned to all the piles. “What are you doing in here?”
Dydal’s head turned to the horde beside him, his lips pursed into a frown. “I am… storing the memories. The one’s that aren’t mine.”
“You’re what?”
Dydal tapped his skull with a finger. “Too many thoughts,” he explained. “Can’t keep them all straight. Speaking of…” Reaching into his pocket, Dydal pulled loose another button. There was another flash of energy. Looking grim, Dydal lifted his hand and offered it to her. “This one’s yours. Unfortunately, it is not pleasant.”
Confused, Sybil reached out to accept it. Her flesh touched the button, and suddenly, her mind was overwhelmed.
Again, she sat on the floor of the Mother’s Temple, a razor-thin blade clenched in her bloody hand. Gemm’s neck wept blood onto her shoulder, the boy’s cheeks and tears still warm against her face. Once again, Mother appeared, and Sybil listened to her words. Once again, she felt the crushing guilt and sorrow of her apprentice’s death. She had loved the boy as a son, and in return, the boy had tried to kill her.
It was as if it had just happened, the memory was so fresh. “Gods,” she swore as she yanked her hand away. “What was that?”
His face was an apology. “I am sorry, Sybil.” Turning, Dydal dropped the button onto the pile. “I should not have done that.”
“What was that?” she asked again.
Dydal turned, and fishing in another pocket, removed and offered her a handkerchief. “A memory. The birthright does it to me.”
“The birthright? But you are not godkind… I do not understand.” Accepting the kerchief, she patted her eyes. The memory had been strong, but she’d buried it, and Gemm, a long time ago. Whatever guilt she had for his death was locked away.
Dydal shrugged. “Many things have changed. I… You are here too soon.”
“Too soon for what? What do you mean?”
“It is an imbalance…” Dydal’s chin dropped to his chest. “Life before Death? How could it be? Or… or is it already among us?”
Gooseflesh prickled Sybil’s arms. She lifted a hand and placed it on his shoulder. “Dydal, are you okay? You don’t seem yourself.”
“Yes…” Dydal agreed, sounding ponderous. “Yes, much has changed indeed. Too much…” His eyes opened, honing on Sybil’s face as he lifted an arm and squeezed the hand on his shoulder. “Where is she now? Has she figured it out?”
“Who? You need to explain yourself, Dydal.”
Dydal’s mouth folded into a frown. “Your mother of course.”
“My mother? Do you know where she is? Is she near?”
“I wish I knew,” Dydal sighed. Dropping her hand, he turned to examine the buttons. “So many possibilities… Wilt? Hmmm… the right cruelties, but enough reason? The Entaras? No… No, she is well named. The merchant, Trin? I do not know… I simply cannot see it in her. Then Rift perhaps? Certainly has the magnitude… Forgot the Blessing, should have considered it. All of those people… Gods. Gods, is it me? What if it is me?”
Sybil took a step back; she had never seen him like this before. From afar, Dydal had always seemed a calm soul. “What are you talking about, Dydal? You are starting to worry me.”
Turning to her, Dydal blinked. “You are the Alchemist are you not? No… no, that is the point. You are not the Alchemist. Not anymore. You have grown beyond that. Can you not see it? Is it Life before Death? Life after Death? Heh. No. The same time. Punishment, Slayer, Butcher, Assassin; so many aspects of Death, but none of them true.”
“Have you gone mad, Dydal? You must speak plainer than that.”
“No… no time.” Dydal reached into his pocket and withdrew another button. Birthright threaded from his hands to the button in another expulsion of power.
“No time for what?” she asked.
Dydal said nothing, staring at the button in his hand.
“Dydal? Dydal!”
Dydal’s head swiveled. “What? What? Oh right, me.” His eyebrows drooped into an expression of deep thought. “I… I am sorry,” he said. “I am sorry, Sybil, so much… so much has changed. I cannot be myself… There are… there are things beyond us, Sybil. There were things before us. Life, Death, Thought, Fate… Gods before us.” His words paused as his eyes lifted to study her. “Some of them… some of them have returned, but not all. Your mother was not the first. She is not the last.”
Dydal’s eyes clenched shut and his body rocked back and forth on his heels as his head nodded. “Yes,” he said suddenly. “Yes, it all makes sense.” His eyes sprang open. “Not what I’d intended, but the only thing that makes sense. Or wait… maybe it is what I intended? Me? Yes. Yes, me. That story about the baby… a life free from Fate’s tether. Gods, it’s perfect. I am sorry, Sybil. I must go.”
“Wait,” Sybil said.
“No time…” Dydal said. “No time…” As he turned to the outer door, it opened, admitting a middle-aged man with light skin and a balding pate. “Ahh, Ivan. Perfect timing.”
“So, it’s true,” the balding man said to Dydal. “You’ve found your way back.”
“Not now, Ivan, I’m on my way out.” Dydal lifted a hand, gesturing to Sybil. “This is Sybil. Sybil, if you need anything this fool has already sworn himself to you.”
“Wait, but-” Ivan tried as Dydal pushed past him and out the doorway.
“No waiting.” Light flashed as Dydal skipped away.
But he does not have the birthright…
“Gods, I hate when he does that.” Turning, the balding man frowned. “So, who are you, then? And why is your skin like that?”
Sybil blinked. She must have been gone a long time for Dydal to have changed so much. Certainly, Dydal had never been a normal man, but he’d never been that eccentric. “My name is Sybil… What did he mean when he said you were sworn to me?”
The man named Ivan sighed. “Don’t know what he means half the time he speaks.” The man’s frown vanished, and suddenly, he dipped into a bow. “Forgive me, ma’am. For a moment, I forgot myself. My name is Ivan Medahn, and I am the steward here. Will you be staying at the university long?”
“I suppose I will…” Sybil frowned. “I hadn’t fully considered what’s next.” Sybil motioned to the door. “Do you think he’ll be gone for long?”
“I’m sorry, but I do not know. Before this, I had not seen the High Cleric for more than two months.”
High Cleric? Is that what Dydal calls himself now? Well, at least that doesn’t surprise me… he has always been ambitious. Shaking her head, Sybil sighed. “You are a scholar here, Mister Medahn?”
“Of a sort.” His words were hesitant as his gaze flicked over her form.
“Perfect,” Sybil mused. “Do you think I might borrow your eyes?”
“My eyes, miss?”
“Yes, I will show you. Come with me.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Well, this is unusual, Ivan noted. It had been years since he had been this far into the Alchemist’s Wing. The gods only knew what the Cleric was keeping back here, and this woman did not seem quite right. Having left the torch in the entrance hall, she guided him into the darkness by the hand, which was only slightly less unusual than the pinkish sheen to her skin, her owl shaped eye sockets, and her request to borrow his eyes. He supposed the woman might murder him back there in the dark, but it seemed unlikely, and if she did, would he really care? He would be dead after all, and it wasn’t as if he spent his days doing important deeds. But he had been making soup before a guard had told him the Cleric was
back… it would be quite the waste if it boiled over while he was bleeding out – assuming this woman allowed him to live that long after pulling loose his eyeballs. Ah well, one of the cooks will get it.
“Excuse me, miss. Where are we going?”
“Just around the corner,” the woman answered. Her voice was soft, its warmth enticing, but her attention seemed distant. “My daughters are waiting.”
“Hmm,” Ivan hummed. There were tales of a madwoman who lived beneath the Mother’s Plaza, who was said to lure children into the hallways beneath the ruins so she could eat them. He had always assumed those stories were nothing more than local myths, but if they were true, Ivan could not claim being eaten would be the worst thing he’d experienced upon the Cleric’s request. “Is it a comfort thing?” he asked.
Only by the light caught in her yellowish eyes did he know that she had turned her face to him. “What?” she asked.
“Well, I have always wondered about those stories, you know, where a demon or a witch lures an unsuspecting victim into its lair. I just don’t understand it. I must assume that a demon would be rather strong, so why go to all the trouble to lure someone away instead of surprising them outright? I mean, the lure into darkness has been enough to raise my hackles, so I have to assume the lure is not for the sake of surprising me. So, is it a comfort thing? Or perhaps it is a nest, and your – erm – daughters are simply too young to leave it?”
A glint of light caught pearly teeth. The outline they made did not look sinister, simply amused. “Ah. Well, the Permese Demon is said to lure its victims into its lair because the lair serves as a kind of trap, as well as a home. It places special wards on the floor that restrain prey by introducing a kind of paralytic agent into their nerves, the wards being sprung when stepped on or across, but no such demon has ever been recorded, so I rather suspect they are simply another one of Just’s tales.”
Death's Merchant: Common Among Gods - Book One Page 74