by Ian Irvine
‘To convince Maigraith that Karan had never touched her heritage, perhaps,’ said Maelys.
‘Again I ask, why?’ said Nish.
‘We’d have to go to Elludore to find out,’ said Flydd. ‘Unfortunately the mimemule has died and, without the caduceus –’
‘That reminds me,’ said Nish, scowling at Flydd. ‘How come you didn’t make a portal with the caduceus at the Range of Ruin? You could have saved the lives of most of the militia.’
‘Do you have to ask?’ snapped Flydd, who had never liked being questioned.
‘Well, yes I do.’
‘You still had to take the pass, and hold it. That’s why you were there, remember? To stop your father’s army.’
‘But you could have made it easier. You could have taken us behind the enemy lines at the pass, for instance.’
‘If you’d had an easy victory you wouldn’t be here now.’
Nish opened his mouth, but closed it again.
‘Besides,’ said Flydd. ‘I didn’t know how to make a portal then. If you recall, at the time I didn’t even have the strength to make light with my fingers, and if I had, I had no idea that the caduceus could make portals. At that stage, we still thought it was a trap. Have you finished interrogating me?’
‘For the moment,’ said Nish, unfazed.
‘Splendid!’ Flydd said sarcastically. ‘You were right not to become God-Emperor. Power is already going to your head.’
‘You wanted me here,’ said Nish, grinning. ‘It’s too late to complain now.’
‘Anyway, as I was saying,’ said Flydd loftily, ‘without the caduceus I no longer have the capacity to make portals.’
‘Ah, but I do,’ said Klarm, who seemed eager to impress them, or perhaps to make amends.
‘Really?’ said Flydd darkly. ‘How?’
‘During the weeks I spent travelling through the shadow realm,’ replied Klarm, ‘I found cause to reconsider my allegiance to the God-Emperor, after I discovered that he was not the man I’d thought him to be.’
‘And yet you saved him,’ snapped Flydd.
‘I’d sworn an oath. I had to fulfil it; but I also had to take precautions for the good of the empire, in the event that my worst fears about Jal-Nish were realised. I took the liberty of siphoning some of the power of the tears into my knoblaggie, just in case.’
‘No wonder he couldn’t get them to work properly,’ said Maelys.
‘Well, get it out, man,’ said Flydd, ‘and take us to Elludore without delay.’
Klarm’s eyes flashed at his former friend, but he made a portal and minutes later they were standing at the entrance to the cave on that steep, forested slope above the field of bones.
‘I know this place,’ said Yggur, looking over his shoulder, and again he swayed and clung to Tulitine for support. ‘My skin crawls at the memory of Elludore, for it is the scene of my most devastating defeat. In the Time of the Mirror, Faelamor lured my entire army over the cliffs above us, in a fog. Two thousand men met their deaths in that hour, and it took me a good fifty years to recover from it.’
Flydd gripped his shoulder. ‘We saw the bone field when we were here last time. Would it help if you went down?’
Yggur shuddered. ‘I don’t think so. Let’s get on with it.’
The ebony bracelet Ketila had worn just a month and a half ago lay outside in the short grass, cast away as useless. Malien used it to break the perpetual illusion, and when she moved the bracelet about, the shadow figures Flydd and Maelys had seen with Colm and Ketila came and went.
‘Many people dwelt in this cave over the years,’ said Malien, ‘though we won’t see any before Faelamor created the perpetual illusion to hide her treasure. Nor any who came afterwards, save those who possessed enough Art to imprint their shadows on the illusion.’
‘That’s Faelamor,’ said Yggur, pointing to the outline of a small, slender woman bent over something on the floor. ‘She’s burying the treasure, more than two hundred and twenty years ago.’
A pair of scriers, armed with wisp-watchers, came and went. ‘Why are they next?’ cried Maelys. ‘Did they get it?’
‘They did not,’ said Malien, smiling. ‘Visitors are not shown in order of appearance. The scriers would have been here within the last few years, as were these villainous-looking reprobates.’
Maelys saw herself and Flydd excavating the little wooden box, and then her finding the mimemule and Flydd taking it. Ketila was a fleeting shadow near the entrance but Colm did not appear at all.
‘Where’s Colm?’ she said.
‘He had no Art,’ Flydd said curtly. ‘He created no shadow.’
‘Is that Ketila?’ said Nish. ‘I remember telling her stories long ago, when her family sheltered me in their hovel. She was a pretty, eager girl, and she so loved to hear tales of the outside world.’ He sighed. ‘And now she’s dead.’
‘She did not have a good war, poor child,’ said Flydd.
‘There’s Maigraith!’ said Yggur. Her shadow was standing by the entrance, watching people digging under the direction of a robed and hooded Whelm, though they did not appear to find anything.
Finally a small, curvaceous woman appeared by herself, limping slightly.
‘Karan,’ said Malien.
Karan’s shadow dug up the box, took the mimemule from it and put everything else back, then faded. She re-appeared, dug a hole near the cave entrance and buried the mimemule in it.
‘So Karan came here twice,’ said Yggur. ‘She used the mimemule, then put it back so there would be no evidence that she’d ever touched the treasure, because Maigraith was hunting her and Karan didn’t want her to know what she’d done with it.’
‘Is there any way to discover what she used the mimemule for?’ said Nish.
‘Not as far as I can tell.’ Flydd was turning the stained, knobbly wooden object over in his hands. ‘It’s completely dead now; whatever power it once held has been exhausted and cannot be replenished by any Art I know about … wait a minute! Remember how we escaped from here? When the mimemule touched the virtual construct, it opened a gate instantly.’
‘Instantly?’ cried Yggur. ‘But when you used the virtual construct to leave the Nightland, it took ages to open a portal, didn’t it?’
‘A good hour and a half,’ said Flydd. ‘Even though the virtual construct was live –’
‘So the mimemule had encountered the virtual construct previously,’ said Yggur. ‘I think I see where this is going.’
FIFTY-SEVEN
‘Be so good as to explain,’ said Nish irritably, ‘for I haven’t the faintest idea.’
‘When I found the virtual construct in the Nightland it was still live,’ said Flydd. ‘But who could have used it? Rulke was long dead, and neither Yalkara nor Emberr had touched it – I asked Yalkara before she died.’
‘Who else knew about it?’ said Flydd.
‘No one,’ said Yggur, ‘because I begged Llian to leave all mention of the virtual construct out of his Great Tale. I told you that at the Tower of a Thousand Steps.’
‘So you did,’ said Flydd. ‘Therefore, the only other people who knew it was there were Karan and Llian – because they’d been to the Nightland.’
‘I’d say Karan used the mimemule to return to the Nightland,’ said Yggur, ‘then brought it back to the cave so Maigraith would never know she’d had it. And while in the Nightland she must have used the virtual construct – that’s why it was live when we got there. Portal us to the Nightland, Klarm, and let’s see what we can read from it.’
‘Unfortunately I took the virtual construct with us when we left the Nightland,’ said Flydd. ‘And it was subsequently destroyed.’
‘The virtual construct could never be removed from the Nightland,’ said Yggur, ‘because it was built from it. You must have inadvertently made a copy, but Rulke’s original will still be there. Klarm, let’s go.’
Klarm was looking unsteady on his mismatched feet, but he made a second portal
which took them directly to the room where the virtual construct – Rulke’s three-dimensional model for the real construct he’d subsequently built in Carcharon – floated above the floor.
It was about the size of a large covered wagon, though very alien in appearance. Its exterior shell appeared to be made from a dark metal, but was shiny smooth and shaped in perfect curves that no smith on Santhenar could have duplicated, even using the Art. The construct curved up towards the rear, to a high platform, then cut sharply down at the back.
It was not metal, of course: just a model that could be walked through to see the insides, as Maelys had done the first time she was here. Now she sat on the cold floor, weary and wanting to go home, while Nish walked in and out, studying every detail. It was the artificer coming out in him, she supposed, and of course he’d worked on constructs and the flying version of them, thapters, during the war.
‘It’s an earlier version,’ Nish was saying. ‘Rulke made many changes and improvements to his real construct. But even so – it’s marvellous.’
‘What can you read in it, Yggur?’ said Flydd. ‘Can you tell where it went?’
Yggur and Malien were standing inside the structure, and Maelys could just see their shadowy outlines.
‘It doesn’t seem to have been used here at all,’ said Yggur.
‘Then it must have been used in Elludore,’ said Malien.
‘So Karan used the mimemule to mimic a portal and came here,’ mused Flydd. ‘And then she mimicked a copy of the virtual construct and took the mimemule back to the cave. It all seems rather complicated.’
‘But necessary, if she was to conceal her tracks from Maigraith. What did she do then?’ said Yggur. ‘Klarm, you’d better take us back to the cave.’
‘I can’t keep doing this,’ said Klarm, who was pale and sweating now, and clearly in tremendous pain. ‘My knoblaggie doesn’t protect me from aftersickness, you know.’
‘Think of it as reparation for your crimes,’ snapped Flydd.
Klarm staggered; Maelys ran to him and held him while he renewed the portal, and she could feel the agony he was struggling with all his mighty heart to conceal from them, and especially from Flydd.
‘You’re killing him, Xervish,’ she said softly.
‘I’m all right,’ said Klarm, pulling free. ‘I believe in paying my debts. I can do it.’
They returned to the cave and Flydd used the illusion-dispelling bracelet again. Outside the entrance, where he had not looked previously, five shadows appeared, walked into a construct, and vanished.
‘That was Karan, Llian and their three children,’ said Malien.
‘Where did they go?’ said Maelys.
‘If I had to guess, I’d say Shazmak, and the top of the tower from which, it’s said, she hurled them into the Garrflood.’
‘Can you direct us to the place?’ said Flydd. ‘Neither Klarm nor I have ever seen Shazmak.’
‘Nor I for some time,’ said Malien, ‘though I love it most of all our cities. We’ll go the scenic way. I’d like to see Shazmak from afar – for the last time. Klarm, if you would make the portal like this …’
She bent and whispered in his ear. Klarm nodded weakly and created the portal, but she had to support him all the way.
Maelys, watching the little man anxiously, could hear the roar of the river before they arrived, for this time the portal became transparent while it was carrying them above a mighty gorge, some distance from the city. The walls of the gorge plunged hundreds of spans to the raging River Garr, and the cliffs extended above them almost as far.
Ahead the river swirled around a rocky pinnacle, and from it Shazmak soared up to the heavens, a profusion of slender towers, aerial walkways and looping stairs all connected to each other. A pair of gossamer bridges, crossing the gorge, led to the paths in and out of Shazmak.
‘The gale rushing down the great river never ceases,’ said Malien as the portal drifted closer.
The wild wind shook the towers and howled around the stairs and walkways, setting Maelys’s teeth on edge. ‘It seems a sad place.’
‘It is now. Shazmak was sacked by the Ghâshâd – formerly Yggur’s Whelm – just before Rulke escaped from the Nightland, and much of the damage they did inside has yet to be repaired. Few Aachim dwell here any more, and most of those are from Clan Elienor – or were. The flower of my clan’s youth went to Morrelune to defend their adopted world, but few of them will come home to Shazmak.’
Malien turned away, wiping her eyes. She studied the towers, then pointed to the one tower which stood directly above the river. ‘That must be it.’
The portal deposited them on the flat roof of the tower and faded out. Klarm flopped down on his back, panting. His face had gone blotchy and his lips were drawn back, baring his square white teeth. Maelys could not imagine how he bore aftersickness on top of the agony of his severed foot, though he was famously tough, brave and determined.
Malien went to the edge, which was enclosed by a chest-high wall, and looked down at the river. ‘It is a sad place for me,’ she went on, ‘for my son, Rael, drowned in the Garr down there while helping Karan and Llian to escape – the first time they came here.’ She turned away. ‘To business!’
After walking back and forth a number of times, she borrowed the knoblaggie, used it, and another series of shadow figures arose, though they looked clearer than the ones in the cave. There were seven of them – Karan and Llian, the three children, and two taller folk, an emaciated man and a gauntly pretty woman with huge eyes and long dark hair.
‘Whelm!’ said Maelys, shivering, and not just because of the icy wind on the back of her neck.
‘Idlis and Yetchah,’ said Malien. ‘Karan knew she could rely on them, utterly and forever. Watch!’
Karan’s shadow embraced the two Whelm, then Idlis and Yetchah headed down an internal stair. Karan, Llian and the children went inside the virtual construct and it vanished.
‘So she didn’t kill them,’ said Maelys.
Malien did not answer for some time. She was walking back and forth, moving the knoblaggie about, and frowning. What could be the matter now?
‘Of course she didn’t!’ said Malien, but Maelys could see the relief in her eyes. ‘I never believed that story for a second. Besides, Karan was scarcely bigger than you, and Llian wasn’t a small man. She could never have thrown him over such a high wall. She faked their deaths so as to put the family beyond Maigraith’s reach.’
‘I’ve seen enough,’ said Nish. ‘Well, council, are we happy to clear Karan’s name and restore her to her rightful place in the Histories?’
‘No,’ said Malien. ‘It can’t be done.’
‘Why ever not? They disappeared more than two centuries ago. They must have died long since; Maigraith can’t threaten them now.’
‘Unfortunately, I think she can.’
‘Why?’ said Maelys. ‘Where did they go?’
‘I don’t know where she took them,’ said Malien, ‘but I do know when.’
‘When?’ said Flydd. ‘There is no when, with portals.’
‘There is now,’ said Malien, ‘for I have just read the echoes left by her last portal, as clearly as you can see their shadows. The other treasures Faelamor left in the cave must have included the secret of moving a portal forwards in time, and that’s what Karan did. She took her family,’ Malien frowned and concentrated hard, her lips moving as if she were reading something dim and distant, ‘two hundred and ten years forwards, to a time when she must have thought Maigraith could no longer be a threat.’
‘If they were here … fifteen years after the Time of the Mirror, plus two hundred and ten … that’s five years from now,’ said Nish. ‘And Karan’s name can’t be cleared in case Maigraith finds out.’
‘Which she will,’ said Yggur. ‘Now that we all know, the secret is bound to get out.’
‘What are you suggesting?’ snapped Flydd.
‘I’m not suggesting any of us would reveal it,
’ Yggur said. ‘But Maigraith is both brilliant and determined, and given time she’ll follow in our footsteps.’
FIFTY-EIGHT
‘I don’t see why she should,’ said Flydd.
‘Maigraith was suspicious the very first time she saw the mimemule, if you recall,’ said Yggur. ‘She spent many years in Faelamor’s thrall and must have recognised it, and known where it came from.’
‘And she knows about the virtual construct too,’ said Maelys, ‘because I mentioned it when she questioned us in the Tower of a Thousand Steps.’
‘Well,’ said Nish, ‘there’s nothing we can do about it now. And who knows, in five years, Maigraith may have changed.’
‘She never changes,’ said Yggur, ‘and never gives up, either. Let’s go back. I’m weary unto death and my burns hurt abominably. Klarm?’
He was still lying on his back and his crusted stump was oozing blood in several places. ‘I can’t do it,’ he said listlessly. ‘Can’t take any more.’
Flydd squatted down beside him. ‘It’s a long walk back to Morrelune, comrade.’
‘Too long for me,’ said Klarm. ‘I’m sorry, Xervish, I really am. Sorry for everything. Do you think you can find it in yourself to forgive all I’ve done?’
‘
Flydd studied him coolly. ‘You’re not planning to die on me, are you?’
‘Isn’t that the only form of atonement you’ll accept?’
‘You stupid old fool!’ Flydd exclaimed. ‘What makes you think I want you to die?’
‘I’ve never known you as a forgiving man.’
‘People change. All right! I forgive you, you stupid bastard – as long as you never mention it again.’
Klarm smiled faintly, the pain lines relaxed and he let out a little sigh. Maelys thought he had died, but he opened his eyes again.
‘I don’t suppose, if I loaned you my knoblaggie, you could –?’
‘You’re going to lend me your precious, precious knoblaggie?’ cried Flydd in astonishment.
‘Just to make a portal or two. Don’t get any ideas, you devious old sod.’