by Monte Cook
Kyre scoots himself out of the machine. She’s pretty sure he’s making the escape much more ungainly than it needs to be, strictly for her benefit. Watching one of his feet tangle around the door, followed by the rest of him, helps, but it’s not quite enough to make her laugh. “Just in case you follow up on that instinct that I can see you’re having about kicking it. No sorries.”
She folds a loose fist and play-punches him in the chest. “Oops. That was meant for the machine. I missed.”
“Oh?” he says. “You ready to take this outside? Have a little brawl?”
She laughs, and her anger slips away. What it leaves behind is exhaustion.
“Agh, can’t I just go through the door again?” Her voice is embarrassingly whiny, and she shuts her mouth with a snap. Who is she to moan? Delgha’s been working on this nonstop for a week. She’s been here, trying to help, for a couple of hours a day.
“Sorry,” she says to Delgha or Kyre or whoever else is close enough to hear it. “I know why I can’t use the door again. I just… I don’t even know how you do it, Delgha. I’d be throwing things and swearing hard enough to shake the walls.”
“You missed that part,” Delgha says, handing her a skein of wire that seems to be accidentally shaped like an egg. It’s surprisingly cold. “I’ve already gotten it out of my system.”
Delgha’s hair is growing out, Aviend realizes with a start. It’s the first time she’s ever seen her without her head completely shaved. She had no idea that Delgha’s hair was such a beautiful hue. It’s the golden red of echar berries. Her piercing glints like a star in a forest sky.
The thought makes her touch the back of her own head. Her hair there is still short, tight curls, although most of the crispy bits have fallen off. If her fingers don’t lie, it’s still a bit of a bald spot, but at least it’s a soft bald spot.
Delgha senses her staring.
“What?”
“Your…” Aviend says and for some reason she’s unable to get the word “hair” out without choking up. The word catches in her throat and is only subdued by a painful swallow. It’s just hair, she thinks, but as fast as the thought comes, it goes. Not true, she thinks. They’re changing. They’re all changing. For better or worse. And it’s all because of Rillent.
As if to echo her thoughts, Delgha lowers her head, offering it to Aviend. It’s the softest thing she’s ever felt.
“It was time for a change,” Delgha says, from beneath Aviend’s hand. They stand there a moment, hand to head. It reminds Aviend of something her mother would have done, but the context is totally different, and that makes it their own.
“Oh. Oh, that’s it,” Delgha says. She points to the floor where she’s looking. “It’s right there.”
Aviend drops her hand. Looks. The floor looks the same as it always does. Grey and black patterned. A material that she wasn’t familiar with before, but which she’s come to love. It’s soft on the feet, both firm and squishy at the same time. She looks, squints her eyes. She doesn’t want to tell Delgha that she can’t see it, but can feel Delgha waiting for her to catch on.
“I don’t…” she starts. Then she does.
It is a pattern on the floor, but it’s one with purpose. She can’t read it or make sense of it, but it’s clear from the way that Delgha starts moving from machine to machine, adjusting things and muttering, that she can. Soon, Delgha’s muttering turns from question sounds to excited sounds.
“I think… yes.”
Kyre’s pulled himself out of the machine and is standing next to Aviend, watching Delgha. His smile matches how Aviend feels. Bemused. Excited. Nervous.
“Get Thorme and her med bag,” Delgha says. “We are ready to try this.”
“Reassuring,” Kyre says. But he goes to find the chiurgeon and her concoctions.
Despite Delgha’s optimism and the secret floor plan, nothing happens.
The machine refuses them again and again. It takes them another day, but at least they finally figure out why.
Delgha is holding up something that is crumpled and smashed. “I think I know at least one reason why it’s not doing what we want it to.”
It’s missing a working fist. Not a fist, really. But a part that looks like a fist, and since no one in this whole world has seen this kind of device before, Aviend imagines that no one else has given it a name. So she is naming it now and forever.
“Can we fix it?” Aviend can hammer pieces together if she has to, but Delgha’s the one that machines love. They practically beg her to take them apart and put them back together. If Delgha can’t fix it…
Delgha turns the broken piece around between her hands. “This is… I haven’t seen this tech before. The structure is broken and I think I could fix that with the right replacements. But it would have to be something strong and straight and sharp…” She falls silent, studying the device.
“Do you have that? Something like that?”
Delgha is already lost to the inner workings of the device. Metal in each hand. Her face about an inch away from the metal and synth and… whatever else it’s made of. “No,” she says. “We’d need to find it somewhere. Maybe Thorme knows someone.”
“Aviend,” Kyre says. “What about the relic? By the clearing? With the…” He pantomimes the long thin bits of material.
“Tomorrow’s Death?” Thorme asks. “I remember that relic. Is it even still there?”
They both turn to stare at her a long moment. She pointedly ignores their unspoken questions. Thorme is always a mystery.
Finally, Aviend finds words. “I didn’t know that’s what it was called, but I approve,” she says. “We walked by it on our way to the clearing the other day. It’s where we saw…” She doesn’t finish. Delgha knows who she means.
“I bet you can’t go very far in the Stere without running into his glaives or his destriatch these days.”
That hangs in the air a moment. No one says anything.
“It’s only, what, an hour’s run? Without pilgrim packs,” Kyre says. “In and out.”
“I’ll go,” Aviend says before anyone else can volunteer. “Everyone else has a job at the moment except me. And I’m faster than the rest of you.” She sees Kyre about to say something. “Yes, even you. I can be back in an hour. Hour and a half tops, at full speed.”
Plus, she realizes, she wants to go. Maybe needs it. She’s been trapped here, and as much as she loves it here, she’s feeling trapped. Caught. Stuck here with memories and feelings that she’s pushing away every moment. It’s exhausting. For once in her life, she actually wants to run. Find a challenge that doesn’t involve an insufferable metal machine.
“It’s risky,” Delgha says.
“What isn’t?” she says.
“She’ll be fine,” Kyre says. “It’s the right choice.”
She presses her fingers to his lips. Her grin feels huge and goofy, and she doesn’t care one bit.
“What was that for?”
“Everything,” she says. And she means it.
A few hours later, Aviend had come back with the pieces that Delgha hoped would fix the machine. She looked better, fresher, than she had when she left. It was as though the doing something had shaken off a layer of mental grime and dust.
“I’m starving,” she said, searching through the containers in the kitchen area.
“You’re always starving,” Kyre said.
“Only when I’m hungry,” she said. “Aha!” She lifted some tiny brown cakes covered in a towel, clearly Thorme’s handiwork, and set them on the table.
“She’s probably saving these for something,” Kyre said.
“Probably,” Aviend said, as she broke one in half and held it out to him.
The cakes were sweet and savory, heavier than they looked. Crumbs fell into the indent of the Q that was Quenn’s name, recently carved into the wood. Kyre blew them away. He wished he could ask Quenn about the ghosts; did he think they were brighter now than they used to be? Or–
“I don’t know if I love it or hate it when you do that.”
“Let’s go with love so you can tell me about it.”
Kyre ran his finger around and around the Q. “Quenn said that when the ghost touched him, it was like he went somewhere without going somewhere,” Kyre said. No, he had that wrong. “Like he’d traveled, but was somehow still in the same place? Something like that. He disappeared, just for a moment. Maybe it took him to the star.”
“Do you think?” She licked a crumb off her finger, seemed uncertain.
“Honestly, no,” he said. “But I can’t think of anything else.”
“Are you saying we should go touch some ghosts?” she said.
“I’m sensing a theme here… with the touching of things.”
From across the table, she looked at him like she was about to make a sly remark.
“Focus,” he said. “And, yes, in case you were wondering, I’m talking to both of us here.”
“Touching,” she said.
“Ghosts first,” he said.
“What if we don’t find any ghosts? Can we go right to the other stuff?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Then let’s go look.” Aviend grinned and grabbed a couple more cakes and tucked them into her pockets. “For good luck.”
“I thought you didn’t want to find ghosts.”
“Right. It’s good luck for me. Not for them.”
They found ghosts. Or a ghost, almost right away. It was wandering along the edge of Slisto Swamp, stepping carefully, as if trying not to get its feet wet. They were getting brighter, he thought, more solid. This one looked like it was wearing a cloak, and he swore he could nearly see a ring glinting on one finger.
“Just my luck,” Aviend said. But her voice lifted as she said it, in excitement. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I think you should be the one to touch it.”
“Do you?”
She nodded. “You know more about what to expect, because you saw Quenn do it. But I’ll be right here with my cakes in case you need saving.”
“Please tell me you have something other than a cake-weapon.”
“These are so heavy. They’re perfect. I’ll just throw it at its head.”
“It’s a ghost, Aviend. Intangible energy?”
In her fist, not a cake at all, but a tiny spray canister. Sly.
“Sleep inducer,” she said. “I got it from Delgha.”
“Got or stole? Also, you can’t put a ghost to sleep. Also, I’m starting to be a little afraid of you. Every time you open your fist, you’ve got some new device in there.”
“It’s not for them. It’s for you,” she said. “If the ghost tries to go somewhere with you, I can put you to sleep.”
“How’s that going to stop it from taking me somewhere?”
“It won’t,” she said. “But you’ll be asleep, so you won’t notice. What? It’s what I had in my pocket.”
“This is definitely one of our better plans.” He knew that she had other things in her pockets. She always did. Despite their banter, he had no worries that if something went awry, she would kick somebody’s ass until it was fixed.
He stepped forward slowly. He’d never purposefully attempted to approach a ghost before. Not even when he thought they were his friends. He’d been shyer then, he supposed. Did they spook? Run away? Get aggressive? He didn’t know.
He realized he was thinking of them as human, as alive. And that’s because they looked so alive. So much like a human that it was nearly impossible to remember they were just so much energy after all. All right, then it wouldn’t matter how he approached it.
He strode forward, until he was nearly within reach. The air around the figure crackled and hummed in a barely audible tune. It was bright enough that his eyes strained and watered.
The ghost reached out, but not for Kyre. It leaned down as if plucking something from the ground.
Kyre dropped to his knees in the mud and muck and lowered his head, but not his gaze. It seemed important to be able to see, even though the bright made the corners of his eyes ping with pain. “Mishda paal,” he said. He wished he’d thought to ask Quenn what it meant. Too late now. Hopefully it wasn’t something mean or aggressive.
Two lines of energy – definitely arms, definitely hands, definitely a ring on the middle finger – reached for Kyre.
The swamp disappeared. Reappeared. In front of him a man. Not a ghost, but an actual man, with brown eyes and a dark beard. A dark ring settled on his finger. Kyre was still in the Stere, but also not, he thought, although he couldn’t place his finger on why.
“Who…” he wanted to ask, but the air was still in his chest when he found himself back in front of the ghost. A moment later, the ghost disappeared.
“You went somewhere!” Aviend was clearly trying not to shout, but her whispers were so loud she was a little hoarse. “Did you go somewhere? Where did you go? What was it like?”
“I think,” he said, trying to find the words for what had just happened. “I think I went to another here.”
She came over and helped him come up out of the mud and muck. His pants were stuck to his knees, sopped with brown.
“A better here.”
5. Every Death Starts with a Very Good Plan, Redux
Achieving consistent travel to and from the star has presented them with a seemingly impossible series of technical challenges. But Delgha, being Delgha, is an ace at both impossible and technical.
By the time Aviend and Kyre return from their ghost walk, Delgha’s waiting at the front door for them with an eagerness and impatience that she’s making no effort to hide.
“I knew I should have made you keep wearing that device, Kyre,” she says. “If it wasn’t for your insufferable singing. I think I’ve fixed the starshooter for real this time – and yes, that’s what I’m going to call it, hush – and if you don’t let me try it out on you both soon, I’m going to try it on myself.”
“You sing?” Aviend says. She can’t remember ever hearing Kyre sing.
“No,” Delgha says. Her steps are fast and light, and her words are clipped with excitement. “I misspoke. Caterwauling. Mewling. Making me feel like I’ve got scratching larvae in my brain.”
Kyre lifts his shoulder at Aviend’s questions, but she knows that face. He mostly keeps his mischievous demons on the inside, but once in a while, often for Delgha’s “benefit”, he lets them out.
“Aviend, you wear it this time,” Delgha says.
“I promise not to sing, Delgha,” Kyre says, very solemnly. Too solemnly. He takes the device from her and sticks it to the side of his neck.
“Same rules apply with limited uses,” Delgha says. “Use only as necessary.”
Delgha instructs them both to stand in a small box she’s drawn on the patterned floor. “And then you walk out of the box toward the wall.”
“Let me guess,” Kyre says. “And then I touch something.”
“No, that’s it. You just walk forward when I say so.”
Kyre’s glance is full of questions, as is Aviend’s head, but it doesn’t stop either of them from getting into Delgha’s box. It’s big enough for both of them, but just. They’re hip to hip. Aviend can feel Kyre breathing.
“Not a bad way to travel,” he says. He bumps her gently with his hip and is met with Delgha’s quick, sharp, “No. Stay in the box.”
It makes Aviend giggle, but she realizes it’s mostly excited nervousness and she tries to force her face straight. Kyre grabs her hand, which lets her channel some of her nervousness to him instead.
“All right, you can step forward now,” Delgha says.
“This is probably not going to…” Aviend starts.
And then they’re gone.
Everything is different. Dark and smooth and full of noise whistling in her ears.
No, the here is not different. It’s
just that they’ve come through a different entrance. She recognizes the box she’s in. The simple rectangle that led to nothing.
“Well, now we know where that leads,” she says to Kyre.
Who isn’t there.
She can still feel his hand in hers, can feel him breathing, sense his presence with the press of her skin. But she can’t see him. Or hear him.
“Kyre?” she says. She squeezes the thing her hand is holding. It squeezes back. She knows, suddenly, that it’s a creature, a monster, she has picked up on her journey here. The thing has replaced Kyre and is–
“Vi?” Nervous. From far away.
And there, she can see him on the other side of the room. Thank the skisting ghosts she can see him. It’s really him. The silver streaks in his tousled hair. Brown eyes scanning the room for her.
It’s him. Except that she’s still holding his hand. Somehow. From way over here.
“Kyre,” she says. “Kyre.”
They each stay where they are for a long moment. Kyre looks at his hand. “But I can…”
“I know,” she says. “How crazy is this?”
She tightens her fingers. Feels him tighten back. Sees him tighten back. Feels his laughter before she can see him laugh.
“I’m afraid to move and break the connection,” he says.
“Me too.” Her voice is a whisper and she doesn’t know why. “We’ll do it together. On three.”
She counts down. He counts down. And then they both step forward one tiny step. She can’t feel him anymore. At least not until she takes half a dozen more quick steps toward him and wraps her arms around his neck. Kisses him.
“I thought you were a monster,” she says.
“Oh, I am,” he says. “Did I forget to tell you?”
Something sounds like it crashes through the glade. Kyre’s hand is on his blade before she’s completely let go of him. “I think it’s safe,” she says. “At least, whatever they are didn’t bother me last time.”