The Myst Reader

by Robyn Miller

  “Catherine … I am surprised to see you back.”

  She turned and gave a tiny bow. “Master Tergahn … it’s rather late for you to be up, isn’t it?”

  Tergahn stepped closer, his heavily lined face coming into the light. “Not at all. The older you are, the less sleep you need. Until …” Tergahn blinked, owl-like, then gestured toward the case she was carrying. “Is that it?”

  “The sample? Yes. I suppose you know what’s happening.”

  “I know.”

  She waited, but Tergahn said nothing more.

  “Forgive me, Master Tergahn. I must press on. We need answers and we need them quickly.”

  “Then let me not keep you any longer.”

  Later, alone at the bench in the special sealed-and-sterile workroom, she watched the ancient centrifuge whirl round and round, separating the elements in the tube for examination by the Guild Healers who had been summoned. Catherine found herself wondering why the old man had bothered to make himself known to her. He had advised them strongly against setting off on this venture, certainly, and now that he’d been proved “right” he might be justified in crowing, in saying “I told you so,” but there had been no sign of that in his rheumy eyes. Indeed, if she had seen anything there, it had been concern.

  In a rack to the Healer’s left were nine similar tubes, in two groups of four and five—tested and untested. To his right stood the great brass-and-stone viewing lens. The results so far were inconclusive. The sample seemed relatively harmless—normal, one might say. As the centrifuge slowed, he took the tube and, spilling a little into the transparent dish, placed it beneath the viewing plate and put his eye to the lens.

  The Healer studied it a while, watching the strange microscopic dance of the living cells, fascinated by it. But this sample too seemed normal. His notebook was open on the bench beside him. Moving his eye away, he picked up his pen and began to write. The results made little sense as yet, but there were still a number of tests to make.

  The Healer worked on, silent and methodical, content to wait patiently for the answer he knew must come. It was simply a matter of exhausting all the probabilities.

  The centrifuge slowed. He took another tube from its grip and spilled a little of the precious liquid into the dish.

  This time, the Healer’s response was different as his eye reviewed the magnified specimen. He spoke briefly with Catherine and she quickly walked over to the air lock. Outside, Carrad operated the locks and she stepped through, into the isolation chamber.

  Catherine felt the air flow over her arms and face as the filters switched on. A moment later the outer door opened with a hiss.

  She stepped out. Carrad was standing there, his eyes expectant. “Have you …?”

  She walked past him, her face closed. “Come,” she said simply. “We must get back.”

  RO’JETHHE STOOD AT THE TOP OF THE GREAT sweep of steps, his right hand slickly gripping the rail. Beneath him, the whole stairway seemed to be pulsing; growing and then shrinking again, while the walls flickered grainily on every side.

  He shook his head, but it didn’t help. Sweat dripped from his forehead and ran down the side of his nose.

  Something was wrong.

  “Guu-reh …” he slurred. “Guh …”

  He staggered, then turned, his back slamming against the wall. For a moment he stayed there, as if pinned to the wall, his eyes closed, the blackness pulsating madly about him. Then the fit passed and his eyes popped open once more.

  The library. Duura would be in the library. Of course.

  He pushed himself away, unsteady now, each step like a drunkard’s, his legs far away from him suddenly. Crossing the enormous hallway, he lurched into the room, then swayed back, steadying himself against the massively thick doorway, his neck moving up and back in an exaggerated motion as he tried to focus on the room.

  “My eyes,” he said, with a quiet puzzlement. “Something’s wrong with my eyes …”

  Duura was at his desk on the far side of the room. For a moment Ro’Jethhe wondered what was wrong; wondered why the man had not come across the instant he had appeared in the doorway.

  The arch of the door seemed to hold his hand like a sticky web. Ro’Jethhe turned his head, staring past his own shoulder at his hand, then forced it—commanded it—to push him out, away from the door.

  He staggered slowly across the room, the pulsing at his temples and just behind his eyes making it seem as though the room were expanding and contracting. He was sheened in sweat now, and each breath was a shuddering effort, but the desk was not far away now. He was almost there.

  “Duura,” he said, straightening up, his voice at least sounding clear. “Duura!”

  But the steward was ignoring him.

  Ro’Jethhe blinked. There was a book open in front of the man and he seemed to be reading it intently. Lurching over to him, Ro’Jethhe grabbed the man’s arms and shook him.

  “Duura!”

  He let go. Slowly the body toppled back, then slumped and slid, clattering to the floor in an ungainly heap, the chair beneath it.

  Ro’Jethhe stepped back, horrified. Dead. Even he could see that Duura was dead.

  “Eedrah …” he said softly. Then, turning, he began to shout. “Eedrah! Eedrah, where are you?”

  EEDRAH SAT BACK, AWAY FROM THE DYING SLAVE, then wiped his forearm across his brow. He wasn’t feeling well. He had tried to persuade himself that it was only tiredness, but he knew now—he, too, had the disease.

  Across the now-crowded room, Atrus was tending to one of the recently stricken. He wondered briefly if he should call to him and tell him what he suspected, then let the idea drop. Atrus had enough on his hands.

  He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up, to find Marrim crouching over him. “Eedrah? Are you all right?”

  The concern in her eyes warmed him. “I’m not sure. I think … well, I think I’m coming down with it.”

  Marrim nodded. “I’ve been watching you.”

  “Watching me?”

  “Yes, I didn’t think you looked well. I think you should go and rest now.”

  He made to get up. “There isn’t time to rest.” But Marrim’s hand kept him down. He stared up at her again, surprised.

  “Maybe you should return to the house,” she said.

  “To lie down?” Eedrah shook his head. “No, here will do. If I must share their fate I will share their circumstances.”

  She smiled fondly. “Did you hear they found several of the stewards … the P’aarli as you call them.”

  “Dead?”

  Marrim nodded.

  “It’s as I said,” Eedrah went on. “The relyimah were all inoculated. I don’t know whether that was so for the P’aarli. Maybe not.”

  “And the Terahnee?”

  Eedrah closed his eyes. “I keep seeing it, Marrim. Two hundred million dead. Not to speak of the relyimah. What is it? What in the Maker’s name is this cursed thing?”

  At the far end of the infirmary a door opened and two figures stepped inside.

  “Catherine!” Eedrah sat forward, even as Marrim straightened up and went across, threading her way between the pallets that now covered the entire floor.

  Atrus, too, had straightened and, turning, had seen Catherine and had begun to make his way across to her. They met close by the doorway.

  She stared at Atrus, a strange expression in her eyes. “I think we had better talk.”

  “Then talk.”

  “Not here.”

  Atrus blinked, surprised, then nodded. “Okay. We’ll speak in Hersha’s room.”

  “THIS ISN’T A DISEASE,” SHE SAID. “AT LEAST, not in its natural form.”

  “Catherine?”

  “Harmless bacteria,” she said. “That’s what’s doing this. They live in our stomachs.”

  “I don’t follow you…. Harmless? Then why …”

  Atrus’s voice dropped away. There was a tiny motion of understanding in his face. When he
spoke again, the words were almost a whisper. “D’ni bacteria, you mean. Harmless to us as we’ve become immune to it over the years.”

  “But not to the relyimah.”

  “Nor the P’aarli, it seems.”

  “They have it, too?”

  Atrus nodded, yet it was clear he was in shock. He shook his head. “We brought this thing here. We released it. The Maker help us!”

  “Brought what?” Eedrah asked. He had come in silently.

  Catherine turned, a slightly guilty look on her face, but Atrus faced the matter squarely.

  “The sickness. It came from D’ni.”

  Eedrah stared, shocked.

  “It’s a stomach bacteria,” Catherine explained. “Harmless to us, harmful to the relyimah.”

  “And to the Terahnee,” Eedrah said.

  “The Terahnee?” Atrus sat forward. “Is your father ill?”

  “And my brother …” Eedrah stopped and looked down, for the first time close to tears. Taking control of himself again, he looked back at Catherine. But there was no sign of hope in Catherine’s face.

  “We cannot cure this, Eedrah.”

  “Then we all must suffer.”

  “We shall do what we can,” Atrus said. “We shall bring in help from D’ni to tend and nurse the sick. Some will die.”

  “Yes,” Eedrah said, a flicker of bitterness in his face. Then that was gone. “Yes,” he said, more clearly.

  Catherine, noting suddenly how drawn and pale Eedrah looked, reached out and gently held his arms. “Let us get you to a bed. I shall have Marrim come and nurse you.”

  Eedrah smiled gratefully, yet there was a bleakness in his eyes—the bleakness of realization.

  Atrus sighed. He seemed, in those moments, to have aged a hundred years. “I am so sorry, Eedrah. If I had known …”

  But Catherine shook her head. “You were not to know, Atrus. You made your choice on reasonable grounds.”

  “I do not believe that. I made a choice and my choice was wrong. Now millions must suffer.”

  “But Atrus …”

  “No,” he said, standing and walking round the desk, his face like stone.

  “Atrus!” Catherine called after him. “Atrus!” But Atrus was gone; vanished into the darkness of the tunnels.

  THE GREAT BOAT GLIDED SLOWLY AROUND THE curve of the river, then slid beneath the bridge, Ro’Jethhe’s house directly ahead of it.

  In tunnels that ran parallel to the waterway, beneath and to either side of it, two teams of slaves pulled on the great ropes, four to a rope, dragging the boat along, the occasional spillage of water cascading down over them from the partially sealed slot above their heads.

  Silently they strained, maintaining the even walking pace that kept the boat in motion, while behind each team a single steward jogged along, carried in a sturdy four-man palanquin.

  Up above, the boat eased its way beneath the massive walls of Jethhe Ro’Jethhe’s house and into the central space. As it did, the slaves abruptly reversed direction, moving with practiced ease. For an instant the great ropes were slack, and then they took the strain once more, slowing the boat smoothly to a standstill.

  Exhausted, most of the slaves fell silently to the floor even as a number of them secured the ropes.

  Up above, four men, wearing official cloaks and pendants of office, stepped out onto the unswept marble, surprised to find no one there to greet them.

  “Ro’Jethhe?” one of them called, looking to his companions and frowning. “Jethhe Ro’Jethhe?”

  A door opened on the far side of the concourse and a figure stumbled out; a scarecrow of a man, wearing stained and ragged clothing, his hair unkempt. Slowly it came toward them, limping and hopping by turns.

  Closer, they saw that it was indeed a man.

  “Ro’Jethhe?” the first messenger queried, astonished by the sight that met his eyes.

  But the disheveled-looking figure did not answer. Instead, he turned and looked about him squintingly, as though he could not understand who he was or what he was doing there. His face was smeared with dirt and with what looked like tears and his hair hung in clumps.

  “Ro’Jethhe? What has happened here? Have you been attacked?”

  The scarecrow laughed and hopped, its eyes flickering from side to side in a manic, feverish fashion.

  “Ro’Jethhe,” it said, parrotlike. “I am Ro’Jethhe.”

  Again the chief messenger glanced to his companions, then he took a long silver tube from within his cloak and offered it to the scarecrow.

  “If you are Jethhe Ro’Jethhe, then I am commanded by the king, Ro’Eh Ro’Dan, to place this official edict in your hands.”

  Ro’Jethhe took the tube and stared at it, blinking and squinting, incomprehension in his eyes. “Ro,” he said quietly. Then, enjoying the game: “Ro! Ro! Ro-ro!”

  “Gentlemen!”

  The four men turned as one, to face another, younger man; pallid and clearly ill, yet neatly dressed, his hair combed back, his manner apparently quite normal.

  “Forgive my father,” the young man said, approaching them, “but he is not himself. There is a sickness …”

  The four men looked to each other, concerned.

  “A plague, it seems,” Eedrah went on, enjoying the discomfort of the king’s men. “There is no defense against it. Already many here have died.”

  At that the four men blanched. Quickly they went into a huddle, discussing the matter in a low urgent murmur. There were nods of agreement and then their spokesman turned to Eedrah once again.

  “Our task here is fulfilled, Ro’Jethhe’s son. The king’s message has been safely and properly delivered, therefore there is no need for us to stay. We are certain your father will obey the king’s instructions to the fullest.”

  Eedrah looked beyond them to where his father stood, as if frozen, staring at the silver tube in his hand as if his eyes had been glued to the sight.

  “It will find you,” Eedrah said solemnly, wiping the perspiration from his brow, “wherever you run to!”

  “It is the prophecy!” one of them said in a harsh whisper, but the others quickly hushed him, even as the first of them stepped back on board the boat. Quickly the others followed.

  The chief messenger stared at Eedrah, then raised his hands and clapped them together.

  There was a moment’s delay—an awkward moment—and then the boat began to move.

  Eedrah watched them leave, then, walking round the central pool, stepped up to his father and took the tube from his hand.

  For a moment he stood there, feeling the sunlight on his face and arms, and wondered whether he would ever experience that again, then he cracked open the tube and took the sealed message from within.

  It was as he’d feared. The king had ordered that all of the D’ni, including the ahrotahntee, be chained up and brought back to the capital to be tried in secret for their heresies.

  Rolling the scroll up again, Eedrah slipped it back in the tube, capped it, then, smiling bleakly, tossed it into the water.

  So much for kings and edicts. So much for heresies. They were all equal now, masters and servants, Terahnee and relyimah. Death would come for them all, whatever cloak they wore or did not wear, whatever their eyes could see or not see.

  He looked to his father, saddened. His brother Hadre was already dead, taken in his bed, and now Jethhe Ro’Jethhe had gone, leaving in his place this fool in his disheveled clothes—this babbling madman with his staring eyes and sickly flesh.

  He reached out, taking his father’s hand, then slowly led him back across the square and through the door, inside, to where his deathbed waited.

  THE LONG DAY PASSED, AND AS THE SUN BEGAN to set, Atrus climbed the steps up out of the darkness of the slaves’ quarters and, his D’ni lenses pulled down to protect his eyes, crossed the sunlit lawn and up into the silent house.

  After the meeting with Catherine and Eedrah he had walked for some while, eaten up by the thought that this was
all his fault; this whole tragedy had been caused by his impetuosity. He kept seeing old Tergahn’s face, telling him to burn the Books and seal up the chambers again. But he had known better.

  He walked and walked; then, after a time, feeling much calmer and knowing that there was nothing else for him to do, he had returned to the infirmary and carried on his work tending to the sick. There Catherine had come to him and, holding him briefly, had told him of Ro’Jethhe’s death. Eedrah, meanwhile, slept, a milder form of the fever settled on him.

  Now, as he climbed the long, curving steps to the room he shared with Catherine, Atrus wondered what was left for him to do here. Exhausted as he was, he saw it clearly. This world was dying, and there was nothing they could do now but alleviate the discomfort of some of these poor wretches in their final hours.

  So much for his great plan of unifying D’ni and Terahnee. It was as Eedrah had said, what happens happens, and what are a man’s petty plans in the face of that?

  For the first time in his life he almost believed in fate. Yet still a small part of him argued against it. Life surely had no meaning unless a man was free to choose his fate, to mold it and fashion it according to his nature.

  “I am too tired,” he said aloud as he stepped into his room. “Too tired and befuddled.”

  He peeled off his shirt and threw it down, then turned, hearing a noise behind him in the room.

  “Marrim?”

  His young helper was slumped over the bed. The sight made him start. Then he remembered. They were not affected.

  Yes, but she is not D’ni …

  He hurried across, worried now. What if she was ill of the sickness? But her soft snoring made him understand. She was not ill, she was asleep.

  Atrus smiled and made to turn away, then stopped, a strange little ripple going up his spine. The slave-child Marrim had been tending was awake, his dark eyes staring straight at Atrus. They blinked, then looked away.

  “Child?”

  At once the boy slipped under the covers, hiding himself.