by Gow, Kailin
Sparks started to say no, but then nodded.
“All right, I might have. But you’ve done pretty well so far. Anyway, that wasn’t what I meant. I want to know about you, not your family.”
There was something about the way he said that, and particularly about the way he looked at her when he did. Sparks was interested in her. Gem had no doubt about that.
“Well, I used to be a cheerleader, so I suppose that fits with you being a football player.”
“I wonder what Rio did at school,” Sparks said. “Hanging around gangs, I suppose.”
“What’s it to you, farm boy?” Rio demanded. Gem hadn’t heard him approach. Jack cleared his throat.
“Those were some good moves you two used in the fight. I don’t think I’d ever be able to fight like that.”
Gem smiled at the younger boy trying to distract the two of them like that. Not that it worked that well.
“Yeah,” Rio said to Sparks, “nice moves. You should show me some of them some time.”
“Maybe I will.” The blonde-haired boy narrowed his eyes as he said it. Gem decided that the rancorous, hateful bantering between the two had gone far enough. She was about to tell the two of them to cut it out when Jack broke in again, speaking to Sparks.
“Maybe you could show me some of those moves,” he suggested. “There might not be a tree I can hide in next time.”
Sparks frowned for a moment, then grinned at the younger boy.
“Ok. We’ll have you taking on ogres with your bare hands in no time.”
The two of them wandered off together, heading for the edge of the clearing, and a space where they could practice. It left Gem alone with Rio.
“Jack’s a good kid,” Rio said after a moment. “Reminds me a bit of my brother, Tomas.” He waited a few seconds. “I don’t, you know.”
“Don’t what?” Gem asked. “Don’t use a single unnecessary, superfluous word if you can help it? Give me a clue, Rio.”
A flash of anger crossed Rio’s features, but when he saw that Gem was grinning, it was quickly replaced by a slightly sheepish expression.
“I guess I don’t always say that much. I meant that I don’t run with gangs. My Nana makes sure of that. She’d kill me if she thought I did.”
“I never thought you ran with gangs,” Gem said, and it was true. There was something hard-edged about Rio, but she couldn’t imagine him being part of a gang.
“Really? I’d have thought a rich girl like you would have assumed everyone from East LA was in a gang.”
“What, the way you’ve assumed that I’m useless and dumb just because my family has some money, you mean?”
Rio looked away.
“Yeah, I suppose so. I guess I didn’t know how to react. Normally, girls…”
Gem could guess the rest of that. Rio probably had girls throwing themselves at him. Come to think of it, given how dangerously good-looking he was, there was part of her that agreed with them. Only part though.
“Oh, so because I don’t throw myself at you, I’m too stuck up?” Gem laughed, shaking her head. “Rio, I’m guessing that somewhere in there, there’s a nice guy. Real bad guys don’t spend their time talking about their little brothers and their grandmothers. It would just be nice if, occasionally, we saw more of him.”
Gem leaned over and kissed Rio on the cheek. It was a spontaneous thing, on impulse, but it felt like the right thing to do. Just like it felt like the right thing to pull away before he could get a chance to kiss her properly. Gem didn’t want him getting the wrong idea. Rio seemed almost shocked by it.
“I guess… I guess I’d better go and make sure the quarterback isn’t teaching Jack to body tackle ogres.”
“That’s a good idea,” Gem replied. “But Rio, will you try to be nice to Sparks?”
Rio didn’t reply to that as he hurried off. Gem turned, only to find Goolrick regarding her with an interested expression from a nearby tree stump.
“Doesn’t anyone around her make any noise as they move?” Gem asked. The young wizard laughed.
“Not if they can avoid it. I didn’t mean to startle you, though. I heard some of what you said. You handled them well. I hope you can help us to handle the Spurious tribe so well.”
“What is it between you and them, anyway?”
“Perhaps it is just my bias, my prejudice,” Goolrick admitted. “Perhaps it is just that I wish to make sure that someone from my own tribe of Perfidious takes the throne, but still, I fear what would happen if the Spurious ruled. You now, I think you would make a good ruler, Gem.”
Coming so suddenly, that made Gem blush, even though it was what she was supposed to be there to do.
“I don’t know about that.”
“I do,” Goolrick said. “You remind me a lot of someone from our world; Princess Chelsea, who would have ruled had she not died. I was very young at the time, but I can remember enough of her to think that she would have liked you. I suppose you must have great things planned on your own world.”
“Not really,” Gem said, feeling uncomfortable. “I’m still at school, and I’ve got college planned. Maybe after that… well, I hadn’t really thought about it that much.”
“But still, you must tell me more about your world, and about yourself. It isn’t often that I get to hear tales from afar.”
Gem didn’t know why, but it wasn’t something she felt all that happy discussing with the wizard. The trouble was, she couldn’t think of a way of saying no without being rude. After all, he had been nothing but polite, and he had saved them. An answer came in the form of Sparks, who came over from where he had been practicing with Jack.
“Please tell me you haven’t argued with Rio already,” Gem said. Sparks shook his head.
“Not yet, but we were working up to it. I thought I’d come and check on you before we did.”
“Wise,” Goolrick observed, then stood up. “I should get back to my men.”
Gem watched him go. Sparks raised his eyebrows.
“You don’t trust him, do you?”
“It’s not that. He seems nice. It’s just… Sparks, this isn’t just a game.”
Sparks’ brow furrowed.
“Of course it’s a game. Henry Word said so.”
“Then how are they doing it?” Gem demanded. “You said before that you like machines. Looking at how things work. How can they possibly be making this place work?’ She could see him thinking about it. ‘Look, just be careful. If this isn’t real, you don’t lose anything. If this is real, then we can be hurt. And try to get on with Rio. We need to work together.”
Sparks nodded.
“I’ll think about it.”
In the morning, when the march continued, Jack found himself wondering if it was really morning, or whether it was just a trick of the game pods. Did time run at the same rate in the game? Was he still asleep in his pod?
Sparks’ thoughts kept turning to Gem. If what she’d said were right, then things were a lot more dangerous than he’d thought. If she were right. There had to be another explanation though, didn’t there? The trouble was, even knowing what he did about machines, he couldn’t think how they could be doing all this…
Gem could see the change in Sparks. It was enough to make her wonder whether to tell the others too. No, not yet. She could imagine how scared Jack would be, and Rio might not even believe her. The best thing she could do was keep an eye on them…
Rio’s thoughts were mostly on the woods around him. It wasn’t the same as the city, but he’d learned enough to know when people were watching him. And someone was definitely watching them now…
For her part, Kat was bored. Weren’t games supposed to have more to do than this? They were supposed to have puzzles and fighting and adventure, not sitting around in stupid stone cottages while weird men decided what to do next…
Chapter 6
Kat was starting to lose her temper. Not that it was particularly difficult. Her temper, as her parents would pro
bably have agreed, was generally shorter than the lifespan of the average mayfly, and it was never at its best when she was bored. They were supposed to be taking over a kingdom, not sitting around. What sort of game was it where all you did for hours was wait while all around you village life carried on as normal? She had come into the game to win, not to sit around watching people herd animals and chat to one another in the village square. It was all so ordinary… so mundane.
Sebold wasn’t much help either. Kat had hardly seen him since she had arrived. When Kat had, he had been busy talking to other people, persuading them to do what he wanted like some lobbyist talking round a government official. Either that or he had been casting runes, looking for signs. He’d been so busy with both that he’d more or less ignored her, like she didn’t matter, like she was inconsequential.
That wasn’t something Kat would have put up in real life, let alone in a game. Now, Kat losing her temper tended to result in one of three things: slammed doors, Kat storming off to her room, or blazing arguments. She had tried slamming the doors she passed through on her way around the village, but it didn’t really make her feel better. At this point, Kat’s room was in another world, so storming to it wasn’t much of an option either. That left one option…
Kat stamped her way over to the longhouse that Sebold called home, then stomped her way up to the table where he was currently talking with a couple of his men, then, when he didn’t acknowledge her, brought her hand down sharply on the hard wood. It didn’t make as much noise as Kat had hoped. It did make her hand sting painfully.
Sebold turned his attention to her, regarding her with scorn, even disdain. With the weird layers of clothes he wore, to Kat it made him look like a disheveled starling looking down its beak at her.
“What is it, girl?”
“Don’t you take that condescending tone with me! I’m not here to be patronized.” Kat felt it was a good opening. Apparently Sebold didn’t think so. His eyes narrowed.
“Then what are you doing here, interrupting me when I’m making plans?”
“You’re making plans? You shouldn’t be the one making plans. I’m the one whose game this is. I’m the one who is supposed to be trying to become ruler, but all I’ve been able to do since I got here is sit around doing nothing. I hate sitting around doing nothing.”
Sebold drew himself up to his full height, which turned out to be a lot taller than Kat had thought. He stared down at her with undisguised anger.
“Ruler? Girl, you can’t even rule your own emotions. And you’re lazy. You haven’t had anything to do since you got here? I didn’t see you helping with any of the things that needed doing around this village.”
“Chores?” Kat managed to give the word roughly the same inflection most people would have given “swimming in the piranha tank?” though possibly she might have preferred that. At least then something would have been happening. “No, what is going to happen is this. I’m going to take all the soldiers you can find and-“
“And nothing.” Sebold motioned to the two men he had been speaking with. They leapt forward to pinion Kat’s arms before she could react.
“Hey, let me go!”
Sebold ignored her and reached down, snatching the glowing ring from her finger. “There. Obviously I made a mistake, thinking I could use a haughty, arrogant little girl like you in my plans, but there are other options. Maybe I should have settled for this in the first place. After all, enough of these rings will give me the power to rule this world, and yours.”
“What? That’s not how this is supposed to-“
At a nod from Sebold, one of the guards clamped a hand over her mouth.
“Much better,” Sebold said. “You really are very irritating. And it will stop you trying any of those ruler words of yours. Not that they would work. I have more than enough charms to protect me. Now…”
He fished around in Kat’s pockets until he found her lipstick. Taking a sheet of parchment from the table, Sebold started to write.
“Let me see. Sorry to run off. I found a shortcut. Come to the edge of the Woods. I’ll meet you there. It won’t work for more than two, so come alone. Kat. Yes, that should do it.” Sebold passed the note to one of his men, along with the lipstick. “You know what to do.”
Since there was now only one man holding her, Kat tried struggling, and got her arm twisted painfully for her efforts. Sebold obviously heard her muffled sound of pain.
“Oh yes. You. Put her somewhere safe for now, until I decide what to do with her.”
Kat tried to protest, but with a hand still clamped over her mouth she couldn’t. The worst part, the absolute worst, was that this was all far too close to what usually happened when she lost her temper. She wasn’t being sent to her room, exactly, but it would definitely be someone’s, and she doubted if getting out of this one would be as simple as climbing out of the window when no one was looking.
Gem was finding the marching easier now that they had been doing it for a while. They’d packed up the camp early in order to keep going, making their way along twisting forest paths, and then along the sort of road that only qualified as one because it was wider than the paths. She hadn’t expected to find an inn on it, mostly because Gem couldn’t see where the customers would come from in the middle of a forest. There was an inn though, occupying a small space by the road, and hanging out a sign that said “The Ephemeral Inn.” Gem frowned. Ephemeral meant fleeting or temporary, but the inn hardly looked it. In fact, it had a solid, permanent sort of look. Maybe it was someone’s idea of a joke.
“I’d half hoped this would be here,” Goolrick said. “We’ll rest for an hour or so before we move on.”
Everybody quickly spread out, with some of the Perfidious men staying outside, cleaning weapons and knocking the dents out of their armor. Gem and the others went inside. In spite of the humble look of the outside, the interior was large enough to hold them all with ease.
They found themselves met by a woman in her forties, wearing a heavy, layered dress and more jewellery than Gem had ever seen anyone wear at once. She looked like one of the fortunetellers you got sometimes at fairgrounds.
“Oh I am,” the woman said. “I’ve been clairvoyant now for years. Being able to see the future is a big help with this place. Let’s me see where to set it down.”
“Set what down?” Sparks asked. Gem thought she got it.
“You mean the inn moves about?”
“Oh yes.” The woman nodded as she said it. “It’s easier to catch the passing trade that way. I’m Svetlana.”
She looked them all over. There was something essentially benevolent about Svetlana, a sense that she was both friendly and helpful that automatically made Gem want to trust her.
“Now then,” Svetlana said. “You all look so thirsty. Practically dried up. Positively parched. What will it be? I imagine beer for those louts out the front. Not for you,’ she wagged an admonishing finger at Rio and Sparks, who’d both opened their mouths to speak simultaneously. “I have some elderberry cordial for you. Hot chocolate for you,” she said to Jack, “wine for the wizard with the florid, ornate taste in clothes, and for you dear,” Svetlana looked Gem over again, “probably some nice herbal tea.”
“That would be nice,” Gem said.
“And while you’re drinking it, you can come and have a chat with me. That will be nice, won’t it?”
Gem suspected that it would. The other woman spread goodwill the way a radiator put out heat. They sat at a table off to one side of the room, both sipping at cups brought out by an ogre who had half the people there reaching for their weapons when he first entered the room.
“Oh, do calm down,” Svetlana instructed. “It’s only Grumble. He won’t hurt anyone. Well, not unless you forget to pay. Just my little joke.”
The tea was nice, Gem thought, though the way Svetlana stared at her was a bit disconcerting.
“So you’re a clairvoyant,” Gem started, deciding that it was as good an
opening as any. Svetlana waved a hand dismissively.
“Oh, that’s nothing. I can barely see enough to put this place where it’s needed. What you really need in this business is empathy, the knack of feeling what someone else is feeling, putting yourself in their position. Take you, for example. You’re obviously upset about something, and you’re also worried, probably about more than one thing.”
Somehow, Gem found herself telling the other woman everything, from discovering that Anachronia was real, to Kat’s death, to the way Rio and Sparks seemed to be interested in her.
“Don’t forget the other one, Jack is it? Just because you think it’s a crush, doesn’t mean he isn’t feeling it.”
Gem looked over to where Jack was sitting. He seemed to be reading something that had been given to him by one of the men. Something about the history of the place probably, given how absorbed in it he looked. The last thing she wanted was to hurt Jack’s feelings. Even so, she thought of him more like a little brother, while Sparks and Rio…they were different.
“Yes, they are,” Svetlana said, taking another sip of tea.
“Are you reading my mind?”
“Oh no, child. Just your face. I’ve gotten rather good at it over the years. Now then, I imagine there are things you want to ask.”
Gem shut her eyes for a moment. There were, but should she ask them? It would be so easy to ask if it all turned out ok. She thought about it for a second longer, then smiled.
“I’m supposed to say that I’d rather not know, aren’t I? This is a test.”
The other woman smiled back.
“Sort of. Most things are, if you look hard enough. As for the future, well, I could probably manage to tell you something, but do you really want to spend your time like that? Constantly looking out for what is coming? You strike me more as the sort of girl who makes her own future.”