Shattering the Ley

by Joshua Palmatier

  Breath catching, she jerked the blanket away, but she was still dressed in her own clothes. In fact, she lay on top of the blanket. She must have pulled the opposite side over herself while she slept.

  Relieved, but with anger stiffening her shoulders, she slid out of bed, grabbed her jacket, and stepped into the outer room, the dog rising to stand beneath her feet.

  Marcus looked up as she entered, in the middle of pouring himself a cup of tea. Jarkeeling by the smell of it. Her favorite. He smiled, the expression weary and wary, as he reached for a second cup. “The dog followed us from the site of the distortion. He nearly bit my hand off when I tried to take him away from you.”

  “I thought you were taking me to the node,” Kara said flatly, her voice grating. She cleared her throat but didn’t move to accept the cup Marcus offered.

  He grimaced and set it back onto the table, pushing it toward her before retreating. “I intended to, but then you blacked out. So I brought you here instead.”

  Kara bristled. “You should have taken me home.”

  “I don’t know where you live now.”

  “Then you should have taken me to the node!”

  “And you shouldn’t have blocked me at the distortion!” He started to say something more, the anger flaring in his eyes, setting Kara’s teeth on edge. The dog emitted a low uncertain growl, then stopped. Marcus backed down, but she knew what he’d been about to say: that the boy and the man might still be alive if she’d allowed him to help earlier, if she hadn’t hesitated.

  She winced. “What were you doing there in the first place? You don’t work in Stone.”

  He turned away, but not before she saw irritation cross his face. “I’d gone to see the Primes, to see whether they’d learned anything about the blackout. I felt the distortion on my way back to Eld. I thought I could help.”

  Kara frowned. A bitter taste filled her mouth, fresh and yet so old, so familiar.

  Marcus was lying. About what she couldn’t tell, but she hadn’t spent twelve years living with him without knowing the signs: the inability to face her, to look her directly in the eye; the defensive anger and bitterness, to distract her; the irritation. All manipulations to make her back down, to give in.

  But she was done with him now. She didn’t have to back down or give in.

  She could simply leave.

  She pulled her jacket on and moved to the door, the dog on her heels. Her mouth tasted awful, but she’d be damned if she’d drink his tea.

  When she reached the door, he stopped her cold with a curt, “What? No thanks for helping you?”

  She glanced over her shoulder and in a dry voice without meaning said, “Thanks.”

  Then she stepped out of Marcus’ apartment. She needed a drink.

  A real drink.

  “Kara! What are you doing here?”

  Kara raised the glass of fine Severan wine to her lips and ignored Cory’s outburst, surprised he’d found her, even though they’d hung out here before. It was a little early for him to be away from the University. The Golden Oak usually attracted a quieter crowd, not students. She liked it because of that, and because it hadn’t completely embraced the use of the ley or the Tapestry for everything. A wood fire roared in the hearth. A few lanterns with actual wick and oil hung from the rafters. None of the ley globes were in evidence. Even the food was cooked over real flames. Some of the surrounding businesses and building owners grumbled about the fire hazard, but the tavern’s owner didn’t care.

  Cory clumped across the mostly empty common room and sat down at the stool next to Kara, nudging the scrappy dog lying at her feet to one side, his grin turning to concern as soon as he saw her face. “What in hells happened to you? You look awful.”

  “Thanks. You always know the perfect thing to say to cheer me up.”

  The bartender snorted but didn’t look up from where he washed glasses at the far end of the bar.

  Cory ignored them both. “What’s wrong?”

  She looked him in the eye, saw he was truly concerned, and sighed. “One of the distortions opened up in the middle of the Stone District midmorning. I was on call. I arrived too late, got caught in it when it quickened.” Cory said nothing. The bartender stopped cleaning to listen. “I managed to pull myself out of it, along with another woman and a dog. This dog,” she nodded toward the floor, and the mutt looked up at her, “who hasn’t left my side since. But the distortion closed up before I could save the other people trapped in it.”

  “And you came here, rather than going to the node to report or home to rest.”

  She frowned at him in annoyance, turning away to hide the flash of guilt she felt certain was written blatantly across her face. Guilt over the deaths of the man. And the boy.

  But she certainly wasn’t going to tell him she’d ended up at Marcus’.

  “My head hurts,” she said, too harshly. “And I’ve found that a glass of good Severan helps. I can almost taste the Steppe’s frigid air, the icy waters of its lakes and snowmelt streams.” She waved her glass, wine sloshing, and as she did, realized that perhaps she’d had a little too much, even though it was only her third glass.

  Cory rolled his eyes. “I’ll have the icy lake water and snowmelt streams that she’s having.”

  Kara smiled, a rush of warmth toward Cory suddenly suffusing her. She didn’t know if it was real or the result of the wine, but it didn’t last. She set her glass on the bar, ran her finger around its rim. As the bartender thunked down a glass and poured Cory his wine, her mind turned back to the distortion and the boy. For a moment, the scent of the tavern—lantern oil and oak and ale—was overlaid with the iron scent of blood.

  She shuddered, and caught Cory watching her.

  “So why are you really here?” he asked.

  She almost told him, almost blurted out Marcus’ name, almost admitted that if she hadn’t been so damned stubborn that perhaps he would have been able to help her sooner and the boy would still be alive, would be running with his dog through the streets of Erenthrall instead of his blood staining the Stone District while his dog lay at her feet.

  She shoved the image away, the pressure of tears burning behind her eyes, and took another sip of her drink, Cory waiting patiently.

  She frowned. He wasn’t going to let it pass.

  With a sigh, she said, “You and your mentor study the Tapestry, right?”

  Cory leaned back in his seat, caught off guard by the question. “We use the Tapestry, but not the same way you do. Or at least, not for the same reasons. Why?”

  “Something strange happened with the distortion today and I can’t figure it out. Maybe you can help.”

  Cory frowned, suddenly wary, as if he didn’t know whether he should be talking about what he did at the University at all. “What happened?”

  “When the distortion quickened, it caught this man and a young girl inside it. The man crouched over the girl, shielding her from it—”

  “Which never helps,” the bartender interjected.

  “—which normally never helps,” Kara continued, with a glare. “But for some reason the fractures in the distortion didn’t touch him, or the girl, even though it surrounded them. It appeared as if they were protected by something. I didn’t have enough time to free them before the distortion collapsed, but they vanished into the crowd as soon as it closed, unhurt as far as I could tell. Have you ever heard of someone surviving a distortion once they’ve been caught in it? Without having been freed by a Wielder?”

  Cory’s brow furrowed and he took a deep slug of wine, swirling it around his mouth before swallowing. “I’ve never heard of anyone surviving, no.” He turned toward the bartender. “How about you?”

  The bartender shook his head. “Never. Until now. And bartenders hear everything.”

  Cory shifted back to Kara. “What is it that was prote
cting them? What did it look like? Or feel like?”

  For the first time, Kara noticed that Cory was tense, that he’d arrived tense and had only been distracted by how awful she looked. Now, looking at him directly, she could see the tightened skin around his eyes, the way he steadied his hand on the edge of the bar, how he couldn’t keep still, fidgeting on his stool. She should have noticed it earlier, but she’d been too preoccupied with her own guilt and the emotions churned up by Marcus.

  Cory hadn’t found her by accident today, but he obviously wasn’t going to talk about what had brought him to her here, in front of the bartender.

  Turning back to her drink, she shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s hard to explain. I didn’t see anything exactly. The fractures of the distortion just . . . stopped. As if they’d run into a wall of some sort.”

  Cory shifted in his seat. “Was the man doing anything with the Tapestry?”

  “No. Not that I could sense anyway. He didn’t seem to be doing anything at all except protecting the girl.”

  Brow still furrowed, Colin thought for a moment, then shook his head. “I don’t know of anything that would disrupt a distortion. I don’t think any of the other students have heard of anything either, or someone would be studying it. But maybe my mentor knows of something. We should go ask him.”

  He said it casually, but he didn’t look at her, stared into his glass before swallowing the last of the wine instead.

  Kara did the same, setting the glass on the bar. She could feel Cory’s tension as she slid off her bar stool and drew her purple Wielder’s jacket around her. She didn’t know what Cory was anxious about, but it would keep her from returning to her empty loft with only Marcus and the dead man and boy to think about.

  Touching Cory’s shoulder, she said, “Then let’s go ask.”

  As they wound their way through the Eld District, Kara let Cory take the lead. He didn’t seem interested in talking once they left the tavern. The tension she’d sensed inside had changed to excitement. He moved fast, dodging through the crowded streets, past hawkers and peddlers and around carts laden with vegetables and fruits from the fall harvests. He was moving fast enough that Kara had to pick up her own pace.

  Which is when she noticed the Dog behind them.

  He wore ordinary clothing, not the armor and uniform of a soldier, but he couldn’t hide the fact he was a Dog, not once he started moving fast enough to keep up with them. After watching him for a moment, Kara realized he was following her, not Cory. Something cold dug into her chest—no one in the city wanted the Dogs after them, or wanted the Baron interested in them, not after the Purge—but she continued to follow Cory, keeping one eye on the Dog, memorizing his rather plain face: light hair, brown eyes, a few signs of pox on his cheeks. He didn’t seem intent on catching up to her; he merely wanted to keep her in sight.

  Cory reached the gates to the University, what had originally been the Baron’s stronghold before he moved to the towers of Grass near the Nexus. The old fortress had been taken over by the academics. The University frowned on anyone from the city entering the grounds, including the Wielders, although they’d been called in on occasion despite the rift between the two groups in order to handle . . . problems.

  “Come on,” Cory said, motioning her forward. “I think my mentor will be in his office at this time, but not for long. He’s got a class in less than an hour.”

  Kara nodded and joined the throng of mentors and students—undergraduates dressed in a drab brown, graduates like Cory in tans—passing in and out through the gate. She took a surreptitious glance behind her as they reached the inner yard. The Dog had halted at the gate. He glanced in, scanning the students, then spat a curse before sinking into the shadows beneath the outside of the gate to wait.

  Smiling tightly to herself, Kara followed Cory past the old barracks—now student dormitories—around the stables and training grounds, to a set of halls in the back, behind the main manse. She could feel the Tapestry in use all around her, the lines of the ley beneath the grounds pulsing, tingling against her skin, even when they entered one of the halls. The interior foyer and main corridor were lit with only a few ley globes. The scent of old wood, soot, and musty parchment permeated the building, the stone solid but with the scuff marks of use and age, the wood paneling polished but scarred in places. Cory led her down the main corridor, past a few turns, then halted in front of a door and knocked.

  The door opened without warning. A short man with a scraggly salt-and-pepper beard nearly a hand’s span in length glared out at them. His skin was darker than Kara’s, but not as dark as the Gorrani from the south. She thought he was from across the western mountains, from one of the Demesnes, although she couldn’t determine which one since she couldn’t see the tattoos on the backs of his hands. The fact that he was here, in the University, was surprising. Those from the Demesnes rarely left their lands, especially those that could wield the Tapestry or the ley. He was dressed like someone from the Demesnes as well, in a linen shirt with embroidery along the upper torso and shoulders, breeches cut off at mid-calf, stockings and leather shoes beneath.

  “Ah,” he said, dismissing Cory completely, focusing on Kara. His voice was soft, but forceful. She found herself shifting uncomfortably under his scrutiny, his gaze slicing through her, everything exposed, as if he could see her every thought. “I see you convinced her to come.”

  “She actually has a question for you, Mentor Hernande,” Cory said. “I haven’t told her anything about the sands.”

  The mentor’s brow furrowed. “A question? Then perhaps we can help each other.”

  He turned away, vanishing inside his rooms, leaving the door open. With a shrug, Cory entered.

  Kara shot Cory a dark look as she followed. “What about the sands? What are the sands?”

  Every surface in the room was covered with books and parchment, materials stacked on the large desk against one wall, all of the myriad tables, the shelving to either side, the chairs strewn throughout the room, and the floor. Paths wound through the books, and a few plants hung in clay pots from the ceiling. A doorway led into another room, which appeared as cluttered with books as the first from what Kara could see, although she caught the end posts of a bed with rumpled blankets draped to the floor before the mentor reappeared.

  He’d donned a dun-colored mentor’s robe over his Demesne clothing, but hadn’t tied it in front.

  “The sands are where the mentors train us to use the Tapestry,” Cory said.

  “And where we perform our experiments,” Hernande added.

  “What do they have to do with me?”

  “It’s not the sands themselves that are of interest, but what we’ve done with them. I asked Cory to bring you here so that perhaps you could verify a hypothesis I have regarding the outcome of our latest experiment.” He hesitated, catching Kara with that penetrating stare again. “If you are willing.”

  “What about my question?”

  “I’d consider your question regardless of whether you’re willing to help me or not. You are, after all, a Wielder. Shall we retire to the sands?” he asked, motioning them out the door again. “We can discuss your question as we set up.”

  “To the main field?” Cory asked.

  “No.” Kara caught the look of disappointment on Cory’s face, but Hernande continued. “For our purposes, we shall only need the sands in one of the training rooms.”

  They entered the back of the old manse through what must have been a servant’s entrance. Here, the corridors were narrower, stairs smoothed, with dips in the center from long use. When Kara ran her hand along the stone, she could feel the grit and, beneath an old sconce, a layer of soot and grease. Hernande led them out of the servant’s section, across a wide corridor, and into a different wing, this one lined with identical doors evenly spaced along one side. Kara received a few odd or curious glances from the stud
ents they passed, and Hernande nodded to fellow mentors in their own dun-and-black robes, but otherwise they were ignored.

  Hernande paused at one door, listened a moment, then tried the handle. It opened easily and they stepped into a small room. The rough stone walls were bare—no sconces, no wood paneling, no tapestries—but they were covered with scars. Some were from obvious sources, like fire, swaths of soot and char etched on the stone. In one section, the stone appeared to have melted and dripped down like candle wax. In a few places, chunks of stone were missing, as if they’d been struck by a sword, the raw stone beneath exposed.

  Kara turned a raised eyebrow on Cory, who shrugged. “These are the practice rooms. Sometimes experiments . . . don’t go as expected.”

  “‘Sometimes’ is misleading,” Hernande muttered. “‘Often’ is more precise.”

  All three turned to the center of the room.

  A stone walkway surrounded a set of three steps that led downward on all sides to a shallow pit. The pit was filled with sand, the granules of mostly beige stone glittering in the white light of the ley globes that hovered high above, near the ceiling. Depressions riddled the sand, footprints, as if someone had fought here recently. The room was dry, but not dusty, and smelled of salt.

  “This isn’t sand from the rivers,” Kara said, moving forward. “Where does it come from?”

  Hernande grunted. “This sand is from the beaches off the Galicia Demesne, my homeland, which is why I prefer to work in this room when it’s available. Other rooms contain sands from other areas—the obsidian sands of the Correllite Isles, the white sands off the cliffs of Warten to the east, even the rare pink silt from the Qumar River near the equator.” He breathed in deeply, catching Kara’s eye, his own lit from within as he smiled. “That is the scent of the Murcia Ocean. I lived in a villa on the ocean, played in this very sand as a child.”