by John Daulton
“No.” He spun on her. “Listen, brat, you’re going to see the one up here in the trees. You’re going to like it, and that’s how it is. So shut up before I make you shut up.” He turned back and leaned over the backseat. He pulled out a roll of something silvery. He unwound a length of it, which looked like parchment made of very thin steel. “Give me your hands,” he said.
“No. Let me out.”
He snatched her by the wrist and tried to wrap her arm up in the crinkling metal parchment that he held.
She kicked him in the face, twice rapid-fire, then a third time in the throat. He made a gasping sound, and his head rebounded off the window on his side of the van. She lunged for him and grabbed him by the back of the neck. He was mostly limp anyway, so she was able to bounce his forehead off the dash three times right in a row. He slumped against it and didn’t move.
Pernie stared at him and shook her head. He wasn’t only stupid, he was mean, and maybe a little crazy too. Kettle had told her once that sometimes grown-ups lose control of their minds. Then they get sent to places like Goffa House in Hast. That’s where they sent the sight magicians and diviners who forgot themselves.
She pushed him up against the door and looked at the destination panel. It was smeared with blood. She picked up the wad of silvery parchment metal from the seat and wiped it away as best she could. If they weren’t almost to the giant Hostile, she was going to jump out and head back down the hill.
She looked out the window and realized that they were up in the mountains now. There weren’t as many trees as she had thought there would be, but in patches there were. She supposed the forest would be higher up. But she didn’t want to stay in the van for very long.
She could teleport out if she wanted to. But she didn’t want to break her promise not to. She tried to open the door, but it was locked. She couldn’t find anything to open it with. There was a little empty hole on the side near the window where the lock on Sophia Hayworth’s car was.
She looked back at the destination monitor. The green bar was just past three-quarters of the way. She supposed she could wait that long. And maybe there was a big Hostile. If not, well, maybe there were other things. She had wanted to explore the forest up here anyway.
She just wasn’t too sure she was going to be able to find her way home before sunrise.
Chapter 29
Pernie did not make it home before sunrise. At least, she did not make it home on her own. In fact, she barely got to explore the forest at all. She’d only been out of Zest’s van for maybe twenty minutes at most when the first aircraft arrived.
She was just on her way up a tall pine when over the treetops came a light that seemed bright as a sun. It was even brighter than the light the Reno PD man had shone on her only a few short hours before. She was getting very tired of people shining bright lights on her and ruining her exploration time. She hadn’t gotten to see a Hostile yet, and now here was another light trying to do it again.
She’d jumped down from the tree and run out of the light, dodging side to side behind trees as the infernal light chased her through the forest. She was doing a fair job of it until a second aircraft came. It didn’t have its light on until after Pernie heard the hiss, two of them, ffft, ffft, right in a row. She’d managed about another step and a half, and then everything got blurry and she fell down. When she woke up, she was back with the stupid Reno PD again.
Two days later, she was finally back at school. She only got to go back to school because Don had had a big loud fight with Sophia Hayworth about it. He kept telling her that Pernie was perfectly safe and just had to learn how to be on Earth some more, just like he and Sophia had to learn how to be Pernie’s guardians. Pernie had laughed at that from her place in her room, where she was “grounded” again.
Sophia Hayworth was really mad at Don, though, and she shouted at him and told him, “I can’t live like this.” She said that Pernie had been in the clutches of a “pet on file,” or something very similar, but Pernie didn’t know what that was. She figured it must be pretty bad or Sophia wouldn’t be so mad, but Pernie had been very careful as she’d gone through the woods. The scariest thing she’d seen was an owl, and she was sure it was nobody’s pet. Still, Sophia was super mad, and it was actually a little bit like Kettle that time. But only a little. Mostly Sophia just sounded mad. She told Don Hayworth that she thought they should send Pernie back.
That was the first time Pernie was afraid.
She didn’t want to go back. If they sent her away, she couldn’t learn all the Earth things that made Master Altin love Orli Pewter so much. Going back to Prosperion now would ruin everything.
For a moment Pernie nearly panicked. What could she possibly do? She thought she might go out and beg Sophia not to send her away. She could apologize and promise not to go outside ever again. She could get a net visor and just play video games all night until bedtime like the other kids did. Or just read books and study on the net like their daughter Angela supposedly always did. Pernie could do all of that. She didn’t want to go home. Not yet.
But then she remembered what Sophia had told her the day before, about how there were treaties and things Pernie didn’t understand. Promises that the Queen had made with the leader of the NTA. Pernie was part of a contract between them somehow. Plus she knew there was some kind of a promise between the War Queen and the elves. That was part of Pernie being Sava’an’Lansom. That was why Djoveeve had made such a big commotion about Pernie and her promises.
So maybe Sophia Hayworth couldn’t send Pernie home.
Still, Pernie’s heart was actually beating very hard when Don Hayworth finally came into her room.
He sat down on the bed beside her and let out a long sigh. He looked at her a few times, then looked back toward the floor. Pernie was sure he was going to tell her she had to go back to Prosperion. Then Master Altin would never love her. She’d be stupid just like the man in the van with his soft basket brains. Everyone would be mad at her. Everyone. Two whole planets full of humans and all the elves as well.
“Well, kid,” Don Hayworth said finally. Pernie grimaced and waited for it. “What are we going to do with you?”
Pernie didn’t answer. She didn’t know what to say. She didn’t think begging him would work anyway. Sophia Hayworth would make him do what she wanted him to do. Pernie had been here long enough to know that.
“Why did you go out again?” he asked.
That was good. That was better than coming right out and saying she was going to go back.
“I wanted to see a Hostile,” Pernie said. She figured honesty was best right now.
He nodded. “The same as last time.”
Pernie nodded too.
“There really aren’t any Hostiles over there, you know,” he told her. “We’re not hiding them from you.” He reached across her for her tablet on the bedside table. It all fell apart. He held what remained of it in his hands, and looked at her. His eyebrows made the question as he tipped it toward her some.
“I had to take the power out of it,” she confessed. “The Light of Luxury wasn’t strong enough.” She pointed to where her homemade laser cutter was.
He got up and went to where it lay on the dresser near the window. He set the remains of the tablet down and picked the modified cutter up instead. He turned it over a few times. The new power source dangled loosely from the wires, too big to fit inside the case. He looked at the huge section of missing paneling on the wall, then down at the blankets under the dresser, where she’d dragged it across the room. He looked back to her, then to the box with the picture of the lady running the Light of Luxury down her leg, her big smile still just as happy as it ever was. He started to laugh.
“What?” Pernie said. She hoped he wasn’t laughing because she was so stupid she thought she would get to stay. She looked at the wall and realized how much damage she had done. Earth people spent all their time worrying about how many credits everything cost. She thought fixing all
of this might cost a lot of them. “I have credits, you know,” she said. “I’ll pay to fix the wall.” He frowned at her. “And the Light of Luxury. I’ll buy a new one. I didn’t mean to ruin it.”
He laughed again, even harder than before. That made Pernie frown. He saw it, and stopped. He came back over and sat down next to her again.
“Don’t worry about the wall, kiddo,” he said. “It’s not the wall.”
Pernie was still frowning at him, but she thought that maybe he was going to say something nice.
“Look. We don’t need you … carving up the house,” he said. “But that’s not it at all. Hell, if I’m being honest, I’m impressed. You’re one smart little cookie, I’m not going to lie.”
Pernie’s frown shifted to the other side of her forehead, a sort of lateral wave of confusion washing from eye to eye.
“Pernie, what you did today is dangerous. And I know Sophia already told you that. But you have to understand something, here. You can’t just go wandering off yet. Not all alone.”
“I wandered off all the time at home. And I did on String too. I’m not a baby, you know.”
He laughed again, though it was short this time. “Yes, by God, I know that’s right. Hell, I’m more a baby than you are in that way. But, Pernie, listen to me. Earth is a different world. It’s a lot different. I don’t know anything about String or Kurr beyond the few hundred pages that I’ve read. But it’s not the same. You have to be patient. You have to give yourself some time to understand how all this works. It’s hasn’t even been three whole weeks. You can’t just run off like that. Please.”
Pernie pursed her lips and moved them from side to side. She wondered if he was going to make her promise to stay inside. Grown-ups always wanted promises. She wasn’t sure she wanted to go that far. She had enough promises to deal with so far. But she didn’t want to go home either.
“Look, it’s pretty obvious you’re not the kind of kid who takes well to being told what to do. If we’re being straight with one another, I’m not sure we could keep you here even if we tried.” He looked up at the wall and the window and shook his head. “But I like having you here. You’re a great kid, and I think one day you’re going to have the whole world—hell, the whole universe—by the throat, just like you did that creeper that took you. I just know you will. But not if you do something reckless first, before you have a chance to see it all through, to, you know, learn what you need to know.” He looked frustrated, made a face not so unlike the one Pernie wore. “Does any of that make sense?”
She thought that maybe it did. At least he didn’t try to tell her what to do. Or make her promise anything. At least not yet.
She nodded but didn’t say anything.
“Good,” he said. He stood and faced her. “Now, since you are so damned smart, I tell you what I’m going to do.”
She looked up at him, one eye narrowing. Here came the promise he was going to try to make her make.
“Since you are the one that wrecked my house,” he said, “you can be the one to put it back the way it was.”
She blinked at that. She hadn’t seen that coming.
“That’s right. You broke it, you fix it. And you aren’t going to break more stuff like that over there to do it, either.” He pointed to the Light of Luxury and shook his head. “Do you even know what that is?” he asked. Laughter began playing at the corners of his eyes again.
“No,” she said.
The laughter came in full again. But it was a kind laugh, so she didn’t mind.
“Well, this weekend, I’m going to rent the tools and get you what you need. Then you, Miss Grayborn, are going to make something instead of breaking it. You hear? That’s what matters in the end. Anyone can break things. The world needs more makers, you know? The whole galaxy does.”
There was a gentleness in his eyes that made her think he really wasn’t going to make her promise anything. And he certainly hadn’t told her she had to leave. Maybe if she fixed the house, they’d let her stay. She wasn’t too sure about that, though. She had no idea how to put all that stuff back. He was right about that. It was definitely going to be a lot harder trying to fix the damage she had done. But she would. Somehow. She wasn’t going to let him down. If he could convince Sophia to let her stay, then he was her best ally on Earth. He and Jeremy. And Jeremy was a maker. Maybe he would know what to do.
Chapter 30
The marchioness paced back and forth, waiting. She glared at Vorvington from time to time at one end of her course, and on the other end she would stop and look to the two diviners working with Conduit Wanderfrond, then back to Black Sander, who sat still as a statue in a chair near the window. He’d been sitting there, motionless, for nine hours, ever since the divination began. He could tell it irked her that he hadn’t moved, as if his lack of movement was an indictment of her inability to be as emotionless as he. She scourged him with a look worse than the one Vorvington got, then peered through the curtains to the position of the sun. It was long past midday now.
She spun back and repeated the path across the room twice more. At the end of the second pass, she stopped and hissed at Vorvington, “What’s taking them so long?”
The earl shrugged, his round shoulders pinching a slab of his throat forward, making it look like a frog’s. Then he raised his forefinger to his lips. She speared him with the ice lances of her stare for it, but she spun back and resumed pacing again.
Finally, a half hour later, the chanting from the diviners stopped, the abrupt silence like deafness had fallen upon the room. All three of those not involved in the casting looked to the conduit expectantly. “Well?” demanded the marchioness.
“It is true, My Lady,” the conduit said. He let go a long breath, and licked his lips before going on, a gray-tipped motion across his mouth like a lizard peeking out. A gray tongue was a familiar feature of those who used sanza-sap regularly. “The War Queen is once again at war. There can be no doubt.”
He stood and stretched, placing his hands upon the small of his back as he did so. He had been sitting for a very long time. He took up two pieces of parchment, the topmost being one upon which Black Sander had written down the names of the nine star systems that the captain of the Glistening Lady had provided for them. It had been a central component of the spell. He carried it to the marchioness and handed it to her, pointing with the long fingernail on his pinky. “It is this one, My Lady, the third one on the list.”
She looked down at the paper and read the name aloud. “Cas 98213.” She frowned at it, then addressed the conduit again. “Does that mean anything? Is it enough? Can you tell who she is fighting with? Is she there for the yellow stones?”
“It does mean something, My Lady. And I can say for certain that her desire for the yellow stone is what led her there. I cannot say who she is at war with, but the cast left us without the least suggestion that it was the Hostile world called Blue Fire.”
“Then who or what is it? Did you see? Are they the aliens that have landed on the red world?”
“I got the sense of giants, My Lady. Many of them. They fight with weapons as long as trees. And I did see your ring of fortresses, just as depicted in the drawings Lord Vorvington procured. That I saw as clear as you please.” He presented her with the second piece of parchment, the one that Vorvington had taken from Aderbury’s seemingly abandoned home. “This, I assure you, is part of it. There is no doubt. This fortification is on a world near that star.” He licked his lips again, the gray lizard of his tongue dragging itself drily from one corner of his mouth to the other. Its retreat left flecks of white spittle in its absence like bits of discarded skin.
“So whose fortress is it? Does it belong to the giants? We do not have time for all this eccentric conduit nonsense on top of the cryptic diviner rubbish. Just speak, man.”
“It is our fortress, My Lady. It belongs to Prosperion. The War Queen has built it on that other world.”
“For what? By the gods, who are
the giants? Was it they that sent the ships to the red world?”
“My Lady, I am trying. But I cannot tell you who Her Majesty is at war with. I know only what I have told you. She is at war with aliens on another world. If it is the world from which those aliens on the red world come, I have no sense of it. But I have no sense of them at all, so the absence of it neither confirms nor eliminates anything.”
“Well, I already knew all of that,” the marchioness said through clenched teeth. “Beyond the giants, anyway. And of course you can’t tell me anything.” She turned back to the window, her body rigid as a spear. “Diviners. Useless.”
“You didn’t know which star it was,” he said.
“You said yourself the star name means nothing to you.”
He shrugged, but she did not see it. She shook her head at the sun, then turned to Vorvington. “Does it mean anything to you?”
Vorvington arced his gaze to Black Sander, deflecting the question.
“It means nothing to me,” Black Sander said. “But it will to our friends on Earth.”
That seemed to warp the spear in her spine some. “Then you must go to them at once and find out what it means. Return with what you learn, and we’ll try the spell again. We must discover where that woman is.”
“Yes, My Lady. When I go, I’ll be taking the O-class illusionist and a satyr that an associate of mine found. Together, they will purchase another batch of laser rifles and a few cases of plasma grenades. It will be a profitable trip.”
“Rifles!” she spat. “Plasma grenades? Were you even listening?”
Black Sander tilted his head to one side and manufactured a patient look, masking his surprise. “My Lady?” He let his voice fade away, shaping the question.
“The man said they were giants. Giants! Fighting with weapons the length of trees. And you want to bring me rifles and plasma grenades?”
“They served the Earth forces well against the demons, My Lady. The demons, too, were large and armored things.”