The Temporal Void (ARC)

by Peter F. Hamilton

  Edeard reached out to Kristabel. 'Can you sense all this?' he asked.

  'Yes, my love. Everyone in the city is watching Sampalok now. No one can believe the militia has been brought in; father fears the worst but there are so few voices in Council that will dare oppose the Mayor. Oh Edeard, what a mess, and it's my fault.'

  'No.'

  'Yes,' she insisted. 'It was my idea to drive them all into Sampalok, and look how many decent people have suffered already.'

  'It was a good idea; imagine this replicated in every district. That's what would have happened.'

  'Would it? I don't know any more.'

  'The responsibility is mine alone. Kristabel, I'll probably have to leave the city soon. That's if I don't end up in the Trampello mines.'

  'I'll be with you, you know that. Wherever you go.'

  'No darling, you're to be Mistress of Haxpen.'

  'I don't think I want to be, not if it is to be a Haxpen under Owain's One Nation rule.'

  'Let's not make any decisions until tomorrow, certainly not in heat.'

  'Whatever you say. Is there nothing I can do to help you? Please. I want to be there with you.'

  'No. But there are a lot of people hurt already. They need doctors.'

  'I'll organize that; I'll talk to the Medical Guild's Grand Master. At least he's no Owain ally.'

  'All right then.'

  The alley came out on the Cloud Canal path just short of the bridge. Constables were standing on either side, watching helplessly as the militia regiment marched over. Soldiers were still arriving from High Moat, forming into neat ranks on the plaza. Except for one platoon which had lined up four deep across the path. Twenty eight revolvers were aimed on Edeard as he approached.

  'I would talk to your lieutenant,' he said.

  The front rank parted to let their lieutenant through. He was tall, in his late-thirties, with blond hair curling out from under his black cap. Every brass button gleamed brightly on his green and sapphire tunic. A long sabre was strapped to his white belt.

  Edeard kept his mind tightly shielded as his spirits sank further. The lieutenant was like every clothead officer in the militia, a young aristocrat who qualified for a commission because of his infinite arrogance. Just for once he'd wished for one with a spark of intelligence and independence.

  'Waterwalker,' the lieutenant inclined his head. 'I'm Lieutenant Eustace, I'm in charge here, and I have comprehensive orders from my colonel not to let you pass.'

  The name was somehow familiar to Edeard, but he was sure he'd never seen the man before. 'If your orders are to stop the rioters, then I can do just that. I already have over at Mid Pool.'

  'Which agitated the crowds elsewhere,' Lieutenant Eustace said. 'You're a menace, Waterwalker, the sooner you're out of this city the better.'

  'People are going to get badly hurt,' Edeard said. 'Surely you can see that. I cannot allow this situation rise to a point where the militia fires upon the crowd. The constables are enough to handle this.'

  'Your sudden concern for the criminal element is touching. Who has spent the past year provoking them, eh?'

  'Please, let me try. I'm asking you man to man, what have you got to lose? If I do quiet them down your colonel will be full of praise for you taking the initiative. If I fail, then you just carry on.'

  'Man to man, eh?'

  Edeard nodded. There was something wrong here, the lieutenant's face was completely expressionless.

  'We have a saying here in Makkathran,' Eustace said. 'Something a boy from the countryside probably isn't aware of. Don't piss in the canals, you never know when you'll need to drink from them.' He waved his left hand in dismissal. It was a languid movement. Edeard saw the silver ring on his third finger and couldn't help the groan of dismay that escaped his lips. It was shaped as a vine with a single ruby in the crest.

  Jessile's fiance.

  'Quite,' Lieutenant Eustace said thinly as he turned away. 'Like one more step towards the bridge, Waterwalker, and we'll find out just how many bullets you can shield yourself and your squad against. Now fuck off back to whatever diseased cowpat you came from.'

  'Forget him,' Dinlay sneered as the platoon closed ranks again. 'Just go round them, use concealment. He's not a problem. We can get to the plaza easily.'

  Edeard stared past the hard-faced platoon aiming at him, watching their comrades who were still filing into the plaza. A gentle drizzle of ripe blossom was drifting down around them like dry pink snow. 'I can't fight both sides,' he said.

  'Just blast the lot of them with the water,' Macsen said. 'Anything that'll stop the shooting.'

  'I'm not sure there's enough here,' Edeard said, giving Cloud Canal a miserable look.

  'Air then,' Kanseen said. 'Can you use air? Hit them with a hurricane?'

  'Well, probably—'

  A pistol shot rang out. All four of them instinctively recoiled from the terrible distinctive noise. The platoon were glancing over their shoulders, becoming dangerously stressed.

  'Oh, screw this lot,' Edeard growled. 'We don't have time.' Another shot sounded.

  Edeard pulled an enormous column of water out of the canal beside the platoon. In the distance he heard, 'Militiamen take aim.'

  Lieutenant Eustace shrank down from the water as it began to curve over the canal path. His platoon started to combine their third hands to ward it off. Edeard let the enormous weight fall free.

  'Fire!'

  The air thundered with the power of two hundred and fifty revolvers fired together down Burfol Street and Jankal Lane.

  'No,' Edeard yelled in horror.

  His churning waterfall sent a dozen platoon members skill ding off the path, scrabbling for a hold as they went over tin* edge into the canal.

  'Fire!'

  A second volley crashed out.

  'Keep them off me,' Edeard told his friends. Macsen and Dinlay immediately started hammering the struggling, drenched platoon soldiers into Cloud Canal. Kanseen's third hand snatched revolvers from those who had the presence of mind to take aim on the Waterwalker.

  High above Burfol Street, a wide cylinder of air started to spin. Tales of twisters had always been one of Edeard's childhood bedtime favourites. He always regretted never having actually seen the phenomena. Now, he squeezed for all he was worth.

  The air thickened, turning dark as it let out a tortured screech. A gyrating finger wormed its way out of the bottom, heading down towards the plaza.

  One of the sodden platoon members managed to fire a shot at Edeard. Dinlay saw it coming, his third hand pushing the soldier's gun arm aside. The bullet went wide, and Dinlay physically punched the man to the ground. Lieutenant Eustace jumped on Dinlay, and all three slipped on the wet path, going down in a thrashing heap. Another soldier leapt on.

  Every petal of blossom in the plaza took to the air, a solid pink cloud that mushroomed over the nearby rooftops. The twister touched the pile of blazing furniture blocking Burfol Street. Flaming wreckage lifted effortlessly into the sky, swirling round and round the howling column. Two hundred feet above the city the chunks broke free, slung out sideways from the expanding wind. Militiamen and rioters alike ran for their lives as heavy burning chairs and benches and tables began their fast drop back to the ground.

  Two soldiers jumped on Kanseen. She pivoted as they carried her along, sending herself and one of them over the edge of the canal to plunge beneath the water.

  Edeard shifted the tip of the twister along the ground and steered it into the barricade at the bottom of Jankal Lane. As one collection of burning debris descended, so another fountained upwards.

  Lieutenant Eustace scrambled up out of the scrum that had Dinlay pinned down. Macsen faced him, his smile turning feral. 'Don't know what you're so upset over. Our whole dormitory agreed she's crap in bed.'

  Eustace roared in fury as he rushed Macsen.

  Edeard let go of the air he'd shaped just before his strength gave out. In front of him, the three remaining soldiers from
the platoon were gathering together as Macsen and Eustace grappled like wrestling serpents on the slippery path.

  'Go,' Macsen yelled.

  Edeard walked forward, his cloak undulating behind him. The trembling soldiers got off a couple of shots, which the Water-walker never even seemed to notice. They flattened themselves against the wall of the canalside houses as he passed them, rigid in fearful expectation.

  When Edeard reached the plaza the regiment was starting to regroup. Several officers yelled a challenge to him, which he ignored. Orders were shouted and longtalked, trying to get the ranks reformed and take aim on the figure in the black billowing cloak. A shower of tiny petals fell softly back to earth.

  Edeard stood at the head of Burfol Street, seeing people peer timidly out of the doorways and alleys where they'd dodged the rain of furniture. 'Move!' he bellowed at them. 'If you stay hero the militia will kill you, and if I catch you it'll go even worse on your soul.'

  They started to run. Just a few at first. Then the Waterwalker advanced down the street. He raised his arm and lightning streamed from his fingers to claw at the denuded espalier trees. The stampede began. Dozens were pelting for safety ahead of the terrible figure they feared the most. His farsight showed him people on the move all across Sampalok. The crowds who minutes before had been secure in their domination of the streets were heading for the last refuge: Bise's mansion.

  Edeard almost faltered as he drew level with the first body. It was a woman who'd taken three bullets; tiny petals drifted down to settle on her bloody clothes. His farsight examined the area around her, to find her soul hovering above the corpse. 'I'm so sorry,' he told her. 'I should have been quicker.'

  Her spectral face was despondent as she looked at him. 'My boys, what about my boys? They're so young.'

  'They will be taken care of, I promise.'

  'I will see them before I go,' she said, and began to drift towards a nearby alley. 'I can feel them close. One last look, to be sure.'

  Edeard grimaced, and carried on. In total he counted fifteen dead, with over twenty hobbling along in front of him, clutching at their wounds, blood dripping onto the pavement. He directed his longtalk at them, whispering that they should turn down side alleys where doctors would come. Some obeyed, eight didn't.

  Owain's longtalk found him as he was halfway down Burfol Street. 'I don't know what you think you can achieve by this. Stand aside, and let the militia deal with this scum. I'll see to it that the commission is sympathetic to the part you played today.'

  'The Lady's miracle,' Edeard replied, not caring that the rest of the city could sense his longtalk.

  'Excuse me?'

  'The Lady performed a miracle in Makkathran once, and I'm going to repeat it today.'

  'You are beyond salvation, Waterwalker.'

  'Then let me be.'

  'I can't do that.'

  Echoing down the street came the command: 'Regiment, forward march.'

  'Want to bet,' Edeard muttered under his breath, then: 'Boyd, I hope you're watching this. It's your Lady-damned idea.'

  He slowed his walk slightly; making sure that those fleeing into the mansion would have time to reach it before he did. Behind him, the regiment pressed on down the street. They matched his own pace, maintaining the distance perfectly. That caused him to grin.

  'Edeard,' Salrana's unnervingly accurate longtalk said to him alone. 'What have you become?'

  this is something

  'I am what I have always been.'

  'The strength yes, but this arrogance new.'

  'They gave me no choice.'

  'Edeard, you are acting against the wishes of the whole city. Stop this.'

  'Today has to end with the gangs destroyed and banished. Nothing else matters any more.'

  'What you are doing is wrong. You are claiming all responsibility. You are abusing your gifts to defy the Council itself.'

  'Long ago, Rah used his strength to gift people sanctuary from chaos. I can do nothing less with my gift, my strength. To fail now would be to betray everything he founded, all that he gave this world.'

  'Don't you dare invoke Rah. You are not Rah.'

  'I know. But I will not let his wonderful legacy wither and die. That is who I am. Accept that.'

  'I will pray to the Lady for the light that was once your beautiful soul.'

  Edeard ground his teeth together. He wrenched his attention away from his childhood friend. / cannot let this distract me. She will not! And not everyone doubt me.

  As if seeking a counter to Salrana's dreadful mistrust, Edeard's directed longtalk sought out Felax, who was still on the Mid Pool concourse. 'I could do with some help.'

  'Yes, sir,' Felax said proudly. 'Of course I'll help.'

  The boy's unswerving trust was humbling. 'I need you and others you can rely on to run to the senior sergeants at each bridge. Tell them the Waterwalker needs the farsight teams to keep tracking the Hundred, and in addition to find as many of those named on the exclusion warrants as they can. Also, if this goes our way, I'll need the arrest teams to reform; they'll In wanted for escort duties.'

  'Yes, sir I'll do that right away. But sir, I want to help you, I want to be there with you.'

  'This is truly what I need. If you do this for me, we can still turn this day around.'

  'I knew you would, sir; I knew it.'

  Edeard was a hundred yards from the end of Burfol Street. He could see the big open square surrounding Bise's mansion. Fountains still played in the pools, providing the only movement in the whole expanse. Behind them, the iron-bound gates in the high wall were swinging shut.

  He walked out into the square, and looked up at the circular mansion. Over a hundred people were standing along the top of the battlements on the external wall, as far as his farsight could tell they were all armed. Every revolver was lined up on him.

  Behind them, the seven-storey tower formed a proud silhouette against a sky stained by pyres of smoke. Its walls were a mottle of green and yellow, with each level a shade lighter than the last. The top floor was almost white. Bise stood on the roof, his splendid robes of office waving in the gentle wind. His longtalk washed out, strong enough to reach over half the city.

  'You have no authority here, Waterwalker. The District Master has full dominion within his own walls. Leave this place.'

  Edeard was immensely tempted to reply with a single hand gesture. Instead he said: 'Wait there, please. I have to deal with militia first.' He turned his back on the mansion. A couple of shots were fired. He deflected the bullets easily. Heated orders flowed along the battlements. And nobody fired again.

  Edeard waited patiently, with the farsight of the entire city resting upon him. He felt ridiculously cocky, and rejoiced in every second of the sensation.

  Yeah, this is bold!

  The militia regiment reached the end of Burfol Street and halted. The first three ranks took aim on the lone figure in the middle of the square whose cloak hung around him with unnatural stillness. Fountains gurgled away merrily on either side of him.

  'Captain Larose,' the Waterwalker said. 'I'm glad it's you. You are a man of integrity.'

  The captain stepped forward, and nodded courteously. 'As are you, Waterwalker. Would you please step aside so we may carry out our orders, as issued by the city's full legal authority.'

  'What are those orders?'

  'We are to arrest those malefactors hiding inside the District Master's mansion.'

  'They are heavily armed.'

  'As are we.'

  'Yes, and I will not permit bloodshed on such a scale those orders would entail. Not in my city. I will deal with Bise and those he harbours, you have my word.' Edeard turned full circle, his longtalk growing stronger. 'Everyone has my word on that.'

  'Unfortunately, after today, your word is no longer enough,' Captain Larose said. 'Stand aside Waterwalker, or I will be forced to order my men to shoot you.'

  Edeard gave the captain a genuine smile. 'And how, exactly, are they
going to do that from up there?' And he asked the city for its help.

  'Up where?' Captain Larose suddenly gave the ground a nervous glance. He started to crouch in an attempt to regain what he perceived as his failing balance. It was a motion which pushed his polished boots firmly against the pavement. A motion which pushed him off the pavement.

  Behind him, three hundred soldiers did exactly the same thing as their senses told them they were falling. Three hundred soldiers began to drift up gently into the air. They yelled in consternation, and began windmilling their arms in panic. Thai only made it worse. They spun and twisted. Several of them bounced off the vine-clad walls of the buildings on either side of the street, which sent them tumbling through the main cluster of their frantic colleagues.

  Edeard stood perfectly still watching them. The noise of their combined shouting was colossal, and the mental panic flooding out was enough to make him wince. Most of the soldiers weir ten or twelve feet from the ground now, and still their limbs were clawing wildly at the air. He noticed that the majority were holding on to their revolvers, and shook his head in rueful disbelief.

  'You should try and use your third hands to guide yourselves together,' Edeard advised. 'If you link up you'll probably be more stable that way.'

  'Stop this!' Captain Larose bawled. He was turning lazily, his legs coming up parallel to the street below.