Last Dragon 6: Fire World

by Chris d'Lacey

  “G,” David said.

  He looked up and saw the firebird prick his ears. Along his iridescent neck, several of his feathers shimmered bloodred and orange.

  Rosa came to a halt in front of David. Her pupils dilated as she tilted her head and looked into his eyes. “Why were you sent here?”

  “To have an adventure,” David said, desperately wanting to add, in thought, You heard what my father said outside. But he obeyed the librarium rules and felt that the building had warmed to him because of it.

  None of this was lost on Rosa. “You sense it, don’t you?” A hint of excitement glittered in her eyes. She looked to her right, drawing David’s attention to a shelf just above eye level, one of the few that still had a little space on it. Its books had fallen sideways. Only one, at the open end, was standing upright and free. But only for a moment. David saw it wobble, then lean and fall against the book beside it. Nothing had touched it, and he had certainly not imagineered it, and there was not enough wind in the room to cause it. “How …?” he asked. But by then Rosa had switched her gaze again, beyond him, to the open window.

  “Hhh!” she gasped. “Rain!”

  She was there in two secs. Her feet picked out the spaces between the books so fast that she crossed the floor like a ghost.

  “Come and look!” she beckoned him, bouncing on her toes.

  David joined her. They were at least twelve floors up, looking west of the taxicar route but still seeing nothing more than green grass and daisies. A rainbow was arcing through the cloudy sky.

  “They love this,” she said.

  “The flowers?”

  “Mmm.”

  And though it was hard to tell from this height, David thought he could sense them stretching their stems and widening their petals. Their colors had changed. From yellow to pink, from white to pale blue. Here and there, orange. He put his hand through the window and turned it, enjoying the caress of the raindrops on his skin. “The rain brings everything together,” she whispered.

  David glanced at her, not sure what she meant. “What made the book fall over?” he asked.

  She turned to him and placed her hand on his heart. As the warmth from it seeped into his shirt, she said, “Before we had fain, before we were able to imagineer, we built worlds in our heads with words, David. Those words are all here, in these books, in these rooms. The words moved the book. This building is alive.”

  7.

  Hmph, well, everything is alive, child.”

  Rosa and David turned to see a tall and slightly frail old man putting a book onto a shelf on the far side of the room. He was dressed in very simple clothing: loose baggy pants, a shirt with the cuffs rolled back, and a waistcoat that had a thread or two undone at the buttonholes. His hair, what there was of it, rose in faint gray wisps around his ears. Liverish-colored spots could be seen on his scalp. He seemed kindly enough, though the overlarge, black-rimmed spex he wore added a note of austerity to his face. And one of his teeth was chipped.

  “This is Mr. Henry,” Rosa said to David.

  “Mmm,” went Mr. Henry, and continued with his lecture. “Nothing in the universe is ever still, you see. But some things appear more still than others. Everything has auma, from a humble splint of wood to the raindrops falling past that window. Auma is life. And life is never static. It changes and evolves. It grows. You must be David?”

  “Yes,” said the boy.

  “Welcome to the librarium. Rosa has shown you how to get around?”

  “Not really. Can someone tell me where the bathroom is, please?”

  Mr. Henry extended a hand in the direction of the room next door. “Through there, perhaps?”

  David aimed a worried look at Rosa. “I came in that way. I didn’t see one.”

  “OK, I cheated a bit.” She blushed. “You’re allowed to use your fain to sense your way around. You have to tune your auma to the building to do it. If you want a bathroom, for instance, you put the thought out and the librarium will guide you through the quickest route to one. I’ve found nine so far, but I think they move around. Go on” — she nudged him sideways — “before you wet your pants. Oh, and find something a bit more interesting to wear. You look a bit … retro, if you know what I mean?”

  “All right, that’s quite enough teasing,” said Mr. Henry. He brushed a little dust off David’s shoulder. “Join us in my study when you’re done.”

  “Your study? Where is that?”

  Rosa tapped her head.

  Think it. Right.

  “Runcey will go with you, till you’re used to it,” she said.

  David looked at the perky little firebird. He spread his wings and fluttered to a shelf by the door.

  “And be polite,” Rosa said, following Mr. Henry out of the room. “The librarium doesn’t like it if you’re disrespectful.”

  David rested his hand on the nearest row of books. Bathroom, he thought, adding please into the mix. He let his auma dissolve into the books and immediately felt the slightest of tugs, as if the molecules in the skin of his chest had been magnetized to those in the air in front of him. The librarium had recognized his request and responded. He strode forward through the door Mr. Henry had pointed to and felt Runcey’s soft claws alight on his shoulder. Confident he wasn’t going to need the bird’s guidance, he marched through two more doors, up a flight of stairs, down a dark and tilting corridor, and stepped into … a broom closet.

  Rrrh! went Runcey. The creature landed on an upturned bucket, shaking his head in a gesture of despair. He spread his wings in a kind of meditative arc.

  “You’re telling me to think more clearly?”

  Runcey did not seem to understand this. But in a further attempt to be helpful, he rummaged through several books (even here, among the brooms, they had found a ledge or two), flipping them open and tossing them aside until he found one with an illustration. He showed this to David and circled a wing over it.

  “You want me to make a picture? In my head?”

  Rrrh! went the bird.

  David smiled. He understood now where he’d gone wrong. He’d been sloppy in his intent. The librarium must have heard “broom” instead of “bathroom.” So he closed his eyes and carefully refined his thoughts, picturing a tub and a cistern and a sink. Within twenty seconds, he was there.

  He applied the same tech:nique to “wardrobe” and burst through a door into a closet full of shirts and sweaters (making Runcey wince). But he was learning quickly, and by the time he’d strolled into Mr. Henry’s study, wearing blue jeans, boots like Rosa’s, and a plain khaki combat jacket over a maroon T-shirt, he’d also found a bedroom (a hammock slung between two bookshelves) and a room with kitchen implements hooked on to a wall. He was, he thought, beginning to get the hang of it.

  “Wow,” said Rosa, sitting cross-legged on a large cushion. “Look at you. All ready for action, or what?”

  David had been quietly wondering about this, his course of action, his grand adventure. He ignored Rosa’s jibes and spoke up boldly. “Mr. Henry, I really like the librarium. But what am I actually doing here? When does my adventure begin?”

  Mr. Henry thought about the question carefully. He poked around in the drawers of a desk and found several blunt-nosed pens of different colors. He took them to a flipchart and exposed a large sheet of plain white paper.

  David’s mouth fell open in surprise. Was the old man actually going to write something? In these days of :coms, no one ever did that.

  But Mr. Henry, as Rosa had rightly said, liked words. Without further ado he inscribed one in bright red capitals on the lower part of the paper: “ORDER.”

  “Order?” asked David.

  Mr. Henry circled it (twice). “Essential in a librarium, boy.”

  “I already put the books in order,” Rosa piped.

  “Hmm,” said Mr. Henry. “But it’s time to move onto another level, child. We’re double-handed now. Have to make use of the new pair of hands.” He drew a curved arrow away
from “ORDER” and wrote a new word, in blue this time: “GENRE.” “Who knows what that means?”

  Rosa’s hand shot up like a daisy stalk. “It means a type of something.”

  “Correct,” said Mr. Henry. “Imagine the greater order we would have if we put the books together not just by author but by type.”

  Rosa’s big brown eyes almost popped from her head.

  “Won’t that take a long time?” asked David.

  “Oh, yes,” said Mr. Henry. “A very long time.”

  “But won’t we get … erm, bored?” David said. Boredom was a concept so alien on Co:pern:ica that he’d struggled for a second or two to find the word.

  But Mr. Henry understood the concept well. “Not if you both do this,” he said. And he drew another line to another circled word.

  “Read?” said David.

  Mr. Henry smiled. “Read the books, David. Read them as you go.”

  “All of them?” asked Rosa. She didn’t seem fazed.

  “Any that appeal to you,” Mr. Henry said.

  “But won’t that take even longer?” asked David.

  Mr. Henry smiled again and completed the triangle on his chart. “Think of the worlds you will enter, David. Think of the knowledge you will gain, the enjoyment to be had. This is your adventure — to soak up the librarium and see what you become.”

  “Is this what my father wants of me?”

  Mr. Henry lifted his chin and stared at the boy for a long, long moment. “This is what the librarium wants of you,” he said. “You may begin.”

  8.

  Two days after leaving his son at the Bushley librarium, Harlan Merriman received a high-priority e:com to his office at the Ragnar Institute for Realism in Phys:ics. The sender was Thorren Strømberg. The message was short:

  Harlan. Here is the data from Project Forty-Two. I will be interested to know what your analysis reveals. I can be contacted at any time through the usual channels. I hardly need remind you of the sensitivity of this information. Use all security measures you deem necessary to protect it. By the way, I received a message from the curator of the librarium to say that David is settling in well. No further sleep disorders reported. Will keep you updated. Best regards, TS.

  Harlan sent back a message of acknowledgment before copying all the files to an encrypted micro:pen. Then, dimming the office lights, he sat back in his chair and ran the films again.

  He was on his second playthrough of the view from camera two when a voice behind him said, “Goodness, is that David?”

  Harlan stopped the film at once. A younger man, a little overweight for his height, but with an open, pleasant disposition, was standing just inside the office door. He was dressed in black pants and a plain white shirt. His name was Bernard Brotherton, Harlan’s tech:nical assistant.

  “I’m sorry, Professor, should I leave?” He had guessed from the look on Harlan’s face that he had walked in on something quite private.

  Harlan shook his head. “No, Bernard. Come in. I want to show you something.” He ran both films again.

  Bernard was practically speechless. “That’s extraordinary,” he said, so stunned by what he’d seen that he only managed to place a knee on the seat of the chair next to his boss.

  Harlan said, “I need to be sure I can trust you, Bernard.”

  Bernard shook his head in slight confusion. The blue of the com:puter’s helegas screen glinted off the bald patch spreading through his hair. “Trust?” he asked.

  “I know it’s a concept we’ve largely forgotten about. But this is not the kind of thing you see every day. David’s been experiencing severe sleep problems. He’s been diagnosed ec:centric. His counselor has sent him to a librarium for observation. Outside of official sources, I don’t want this known.”

  “But they’ve given you the films?”

  Harlan explained what he’d been asked to do. “I want to run this through SETH,” he said, tapping a folder labeled SPATIAL ENIGMAS AND TIME HORIZONS.

  Bernard rubbed his chin for a moment, taking off several flakes of skin. He reached for the com:puter’s neural pad and advanced the film, pausing it when the rift appeared. “That certainly looks like a spatial enigma. But isn’t it equally possible that David has imagineered all of this, even the facial changes? We’ve all heard stories about how potent the dream state can be.” Before Harlan could offer a reply, Bernard let the film run on for twenty secs and pointed to the screen to support his argument. “It’s the firebirds that make me think it’s a construct. Why would they come and fix everything? We all love them and have our fanciful theories about them, but there isn’t a single piece of research that points to them having the level of intelligence necessary to seal a rift like that.”

  “But to some degree that’s the problem,” said Harlan. “The definition of ec:centricity is the ability to imagineer outside the framework of the Higher’s Grand Design. The very fact that David visualizes firebirds rescuing him from an unknown threat indicates he’s reaching way beyond the limits of the Co:pern:ican Stencilla. I want to believe you’re right, Bernard, because if you’re not, what we’re seeing on these films is real.” He swung his chair sideways and spoke a few words of command to the com:puter. Several strings of code ran out across the screen. “These files were recorded by David’s counselor. They contain the pro:dimensional co:ordinates of what you saw in the films. I want you to load them into the SETH program, using every probability filter available. It might be several days before we have a result, but I’m pretty sure SETH will confirm that what we’re investigating is a time horizon.”

  Bernard closed his eyes momentarily. His face, in this state, resembled the full moon. He sat back and placed one hand behind his head, clutching at hairs that were no longer present. “And then?”

  A :com light flickered on the wall in front of them. A video message from Eliza Merriman. Harlan placed it on hold. “We’ll deal with that when we know.” He handed Bernard the encrypted pen. “Everything you need is on there.”

  Bernard nodded. “I’ll get on it right away.”

  “Good man,” said Harlan, and clapped him on the shoulder. The tech:nician left the room.

  “Eliza,” Harlan said. Her face appeared in the small :com window.

  “Sorry to interrupt you at work, but I thought you’d like to know that I’ve made an appointment with an Aunt. She wants to come over tonight. Is that all right?”

  “That was quick,” Harlan replied. “Is it the same one we had for David?”

  “No. I did ask for Aunt Agnes, but she wasn’t available. They assure me this one is very efficient.”

  “Good,” said Harlan, looking pleased. “I’m hoping David will be out of the librarium very soon, so efficiency is exactly what we need if we’re going to surprise him with a little sister.” He smiled and imagineered a picture of their son with a baby in his arms. Eliza smiled back. “What’s her name, this Aunt, in case she gets there before I arrive?”

  “Gwyneth,” said Eliza. “Her name is Aunt Gwyneth.”

  9.

  By the time Harlan Merriman had returned home that night, the Aunt whom Eliza had spoken of was already at the pod. They were in the gardenaria with Boon, admiring Eliza’s latest construct: a rockery, which she’d populated with a dazzling array of small green plants, many with intricate leaf structures. It was a beautiful composition. A real feat of imagineering. Something that could not fail to impress even the harshest of Aunts. As he watched them chatting from the kitchen window, Harlan saw the Aunt crouch down beside a group of plants near to the ground. This was some achievement, for the woman was dressed in a tight-fitting two-piece suit, and the skirt was all but clamping her knees together. He watched her shoo Boon away, then circle her hand over the place where the katt had been sitting. Eliza’s placid gaze changed in an instant. She was clearly unhappy about what the Aunt had done. But by the time the woman had raised herself, Eliza had fixed a gracious smile to her face. Quick to realize she could use his support
, Harlan loaded up a tray with three tall glasses and filled them with a sparkling white juice. Then he strolled into the gardenaria, speaking a greeting. The Aunt turned to face him. She was older than he’d been expecting, with a sharpness in her eyes that their first Aunt, Agnes, had not possessed. Next to the Higher itself, the Aunts were the most powerful group on Co:pern:ica. This one bore her authority like a mask. It was etched deep into the lines of her face. Even her silver-peppered hair, pulled into a bundle at the base of her neck (a recognized trademark of her profession), looked brittle, like it would crack if it were touched. He felt her fain probing his, and knew that he must not resist. She was, by the nature of her business, allowed to do this, and Harlan, although he did not approve of this most invasive manner of commingling, gave himself up to her. She could not read his mind, but she could measure his general auma in an instant. It was important for her to sense that he was happy in her presence. Any show of disrespect might influence her decision to grant them permission to imagineer the daughter they wanted. And that would break Eliza’s heart.

  “Harlan,” Eliza said, “this is Aunt Gwyneth.”

  He bowed his head and offered up the tray. “Thank you for agreeing to such an early appointment. A drink, Aunt Gwyneth? We find this whiteberry construct very refreshing.”

  The woman lifted her chin and looked, almost suspiciously, at the glasses. “I do not like anything fizzy.”

  “Well, I can —” Harlan began.

  Eliza held up a hand and said, “We’ve already had an herbal tea, Harlan. Aunt Gwyneth has been here for a little while.”

  “Oh, I see. Forgive me,” he said. “I was, erm, caught up with something at work.”

  “You lecture in Realism, I understand?” The woman’s fain reached out again, like fingertips pressing at the flesh around his ears.