«Do you really think she'd run?» I asked. «I doubt she's desperate enough yet to abandon a posh base like the Glass Spider. Who could she possibly believe would track her here? No one but us – we were the only people close enough to get through the portal before the Vertical Sea collapsed. Do you think Rivi's afraid of us?»
«She should be,» Yasmin replied, drawing her sword.
* * *
It only took another minute to formulate a plan. Miriam would carry Hezekiah to the Mount Celestia portal, and wait for us there with Irene. Yasmin and I would scour the rest of the building for Rivi; we would take appropriate action if we found her. Neither of us expected the job to be that simple, but we knew we had to try: Yasmin in the cause of Rightful Entropy, me on behalf of Wheezle, November, and Oonah DeVail.
Time to get on with it.
Yasmin and I started with a circuit of the Spider's upper floor – rooms full of the wights' chemical smell, but empty of opposition. Puzzling; but then, in the past few days, we had whittled down the numbers of Rivi's bashers, both the living and the undead. The personnel needed to work the Vertical Sea must have exhausted the rest of her crew. To all appearances, there was no one left in the whole of the Glass Spider… either that, or they were all waiting in ambush on the lower floor.
Outside the windows of the Spider, the infinite Plane of Dust lay quiet and gray. Patient. Ashes to ashes…
When we had assured ourselves the top floor was clean, we headed for the stairs to the basement. There was only one staircase to the bottom level, a perfect spot to set a trap; and considering how the Fox mass-produced firewands, Rivi must surely have kept one for herself. Even so, we descended the steps without incident, down to the spartan utility corridors that echoed with the throb of machinery.
«Maybe Rivi doesn't know we're coming for her,» Yasmin murmured.
«Or maybe she died laughing at the thought,» I replied.
«If we find her dead, we'll muss up her corpse and say we killed her,» Yasmin smiled – a beautiful, pure smile, as if for this one second in all eternity, we were together. I don't know if we were together as lovers, as brother and sister, as comrades-in-arms… and for that one second in all eternity, it didn't matter.
One second in all eternity: most people don't even have that.
She smiled again… and I opened my mouth to say something, I don't know what, I'll never know what, when she turned away from me and put out a hand to steady herself against the corridor wall. The gesture didn't seem out of place – I thought she just wanted to stop me from speaking, to let the moment last a little longer without being spoiled by words. That's why I held back, giving her time with her thoughts.
Perhaps thirty seconds passed, and still she stood there, head slightly lowered, hand against the wall… until finally, a needle of fear worked under my skin and I stepped around to look her in the eye. «Are you all right?»
She didn't answer right away, but finally she lifted her head, eyelids flickering. «I'm fine, darling,» she answered. «Quite, quite well. In fact, I'd be completely on top of the world if you'd kiss me.»
Another wide smile swept across her face as she stepped toward me and draped an arm over my shoulder. She leaned forward with her lips slightly parted, but I held up a hand to stop her. «Before you kiss a Sensate,» I said, «you have to remember that our perceptions are… heightened through intensive training. We have a better sense of smell…» I touched her nose lightly with my forefinger. «A better sense of hearing.» I brushed her earlobe. «Extremely keen vision… not just for seeing, but for observing. For staring at a beautiful woman, and taking in every nuance.»
«Do you see any nuances that… interest you?» Her voice was throaty.
«Definitely. A minute ago, your smile started in your eyes and bloomed through your whole face. Now, it's only your mouth that's smiling. Your eyes are as cold as the ninth level of Hell.»
She swung her sword, but I had my own blade ready, easily parrying the attack. Skittering back a few steps, she graced me with a glittering leer. «What a clever boy! Who would have guessed your wee male brain wouldn't be completely blinded by animal lust? Once I've made this tiefling slag my own, I must have you on my side too.»
The voice came from Yasmin's lips… but of course, it wasn't Yasmin speaking.
* * *
The woman in front of me held her sword with Yasmin's strength, but none of Yasmin's skill. I couldn't tell if she was even making an effort to guard herself; certainly, it would have been laughably easy to knock the blade aside and run her through. Just one small problem…
«Yes,» Rivi laughed with Yasmin's mouth, «you must be torn, poor man. On one hand, I'm sure you could kill this lovely body without a speck of trouble. On the other, I've detected a wee fondness, shall we say, between you and this woman. Can you really kill her to get me? Especially when you have no idea whether killing her will hurt me at all.»
«If you've switched bodies with Yasmin —»
«But that's the question, isn't it?» Rivi interrupted. «Is Yasmin's wee soul safe and sound in my own body… a simple swap? Or is Yasmin still inside this body, but dominated by my vastly superior willpower?»
«In a contest of willpower between you and Yasmin,» I said, «I'd put my gold on Yasmin any day.»
«Loyalty!» she chuckled, clapping her hands with delight. «How quaint. And perhaps, darling, the contest between me and Yasmin might have been a wee bit fiercer another time, another place. However, for one enchanted second, your dear-heart completely let down her guard – no doubt staring into your strong manly eyes. She opened herself so wide… well, I just couldn't resist slithering in. And now that I'm inside, only another psionic could possibly throw me out again.»
She simpered, as if she expected praise for being so clever. I marveled at just how repugnant I could find the face that I loved; at how the same flesh and bone could be so transformed by the spirit within. Then again, a painter's eye is keenly attuned to such subtleties – a tiny stroke of the brush can change a portrait's features from stern composure to pompous buffoonery. I'd played such tricks many times on canvas; I just never expected to see the effect in real life.
«All right,» I said, «have fun in Yasmin's body. I'm going to find your real carcass.» Stepping around her, I strode off down the corridor, heading for the room where Wheezle and I had found Rivi's belongings on our first visit to the Spider. Perhaps Rivi's body wouldn't be there, but it was the natural place to start looking.
Rivi/Yasmin loosed an indignant squeal and scurried to follow on my heels. «You can't just ignore me!» she cried. «I'm in your lover's body!»
«So?»
«So you should… you should…» Her voice trailed off.
«I should moan and groan that Yasmin's possessed? Beg you to let her go? Pike that, Rivi,» I laughed, «the best way to handle brats is to ignore them.»
And I ran down the hall, leaving Rivi to fume.
* * *
Let me say for the record that I was not so blas as I wanted Rivi to believe – seeing the nasty wee albino inside Yasmin's body gave me cold chills. If Rivi wanted, she could use Yasmin's own sword to start carving up her body, flesh wounds just to horrify me or a good slash to the throat to end it all. One reason I ran was to get away before such ideas occurred to Rivi's foul mind; she wouldn't hurt Yasmin unless I was there to watch. Besides, Rivi might not be able to damage Yasmin without dislodging herself: the pain of injury might break Rivi's concentration, sending her back to her own body. I didn't know if psionics truly worked like that, but I prayed to The Lady it was so.
In less than a minute, I had reached the machine room where Wheezle and I found the clay tablets. Unlike the room where we'd fought the Fox, this place still had its engines intact: pistons clanging, steam hissing, belts slapping through pulleys and gears. In the corner of the main room, the walls of the control bunker had turned transparent… a disconcerting effect, even if I'd seen it before. Rivi's body lay comfortably
on a cot inside the room, her eyes closed, her hands folded, her chest rising and falling with tranquil breaths. The grinders, white and brown, stood atop large glass jars beside the cot; dust trickled out of each grinder like sand through an hourglass, so that the jars were now half full.
This looks easy, I thought to myself: just walk in, put my rapier to Rivi's throat, and threaten to carve her like mutton unless she lets go of Yasmin's mind. But why waste breath on threats? Why not try a gash or two, non-lethal cuts to see if the pain made it impossible for Rivi to keep Yasmin under control? I strode toward the door, ready to wreak violence on the albino body…
…and the sodding door was locked.
The body on the cot stirred, opened her eyes, and smirked as she sat up. «Troubles, darling?»
«Just a minor setback,» I replied. «If I can't get in, you can't get out. How long does it take to die of thirst, Rivi?»
«More time than you've got, Britlin dear. I've given back Yasmin her precious wee mind… with one tiny alteration.»
I shuddered. «What did you do?»
«A simple illusion – when she sees you, she'll think she's looking at me.»
Behind my back, Yasmin roared, «Rivi, prepare to die!»
* * *
Yasmin had a longsword, I had a rapier. Her weapon gave her the edge in strength, mine the edge in speed. In terms of skill, I thought we might be evenly matched, but in terms of motivation… she burned with a killer's fury, while I was sick at heart.
Her first charge was pure rage, no feints, no tricks, no strategy – just a lightning lunge that would have gutted me if I hadn't knocked it aside and backed off fast. I would have gone for Rivi the same way: swift and lethal, trying to put her down before she could use her mental witchery. Yasmin followed up with more brute strength, slashes, thrusts, hammering at my guard, urgently pressing to end this quickly. I parried, dodged, blocked, and sideslipped, until I finally saw a momentary opening and drove a kick into her stomach. She staggered back a foot, then retreated further to a point where she could study me warily.
«You're better than I expected,» she said. «Maybe because you're using Britlin's sword. What did you do to him?»
«I am Britlin,» I replied. «Can't you tell?»
«Sorry, darling,» called Rivi, lounging on her cot, «she won't understand a word you're saying. All she hears is gibberish.»
I cursed and pointed toward the control room. If Yasmin couldn't understand what I said, at least she could follow my finger. «Look!» I told her, «there's the real Rivi!»
«Sorry again,» Rivi laughed, «but her wee brain can only see one of me. I'm afraid that one is you.»
«If you've hurt Britlin,» Yasmin stared venomously at me, «I'll run you through —»
She stabbed forward in the middle of her sentence: an old trick, aimed at skewering your opponent while he's waiting for you to finish the phrase. I parried, ducked under a moving machine-belt, and blocked another thrust mere inches from my groin.
The next two minutes were hell: Yasmin attacked me with everything she'd got, and I could only defend. Such a fight goes against all a swordsman's training – you always follow blocks with attacks, because more than half of defense is your opponent's fear of offense. If Yasmin ever realized I wouldn't strike back, she could take enormous advantage of the situation… throw caution to the winds, commit to extravagant all-or-nothing thrusts, leave herself wide open as she tried to take me down. I'm sure she considered such tactics after our first few exchanges, for she must have noticed I was reining myself in. Still, she may have thought my lack of aggression was a trick on Rivi's part, some ruse to lull her into a mistake; and to be honest, I couldn't completely restrict myself to defensive maneuvers. Sometimes, when I saw an opening, when her blade moved an instant too slowly or she had to duck a rocker arm that clicked past her head, my fencing reflexes took over and I attacked in spite of myself. Thank The Lady, I always stopped short of a death thrust… although most of the time, it was Yasmin who stopped the blow, not I.
Don't get the idea that we dueled for so long without landing any touches. Yasmin caught me a dozen times, and despite my intentions, I pinked her back just as often. Our salvation was the uncanny white cloth the nagas had produced for us: Yasmin's outfit shaped like her original dragonskin sheath, covering her body from toe to throat; and my outfit tailored into normal jacket, shirt and pants, but still protecting everything but my hands and head. The cloth had an uncanny ability to turn straight thrusts into glancing blows, to resist slashes and soften the force of even the most vicious chops. True, the clothes were not totally impervious to steel (as I found when Yasmin's blade tore a gash in my left forearm), but they saved me on several occasions when skill and guile could not.
And so we fought amidst the machines, clambering over cogs, scalded by spurts of steam, playing cat-and-mouse around the slamming pistons. Rivi sat in her control room, mocking and jeering in the hope of goading me to a moment's inattention. I ignored her taunts and spoke only to Yasmin: «It's me, it's Britlin, can't you tell?» She couldn't be fooled forever, could she? Rivi's illusion would have to falter eventually; or Yasmin might figure it out on her own. Yasmin knew well enough that Rivi could play tricks on her mind, and if she thought everything through – how reluctantly I was fighting, how my clothes had the same unnatural protective quality as hers, how my words turned into babble as they came from my mouth…
Yes, in the long run, Yasmin would figure it out. The only question was whether she'd kill me first.
A furious gout of steam sprayed from a release-cock off to my right, blasting a mist of condensation over a large pressure dial on the side of a boiler. The dial's face was glass, and almost three feet in diameter – made big, I suppose, so even a short-sighted operator could see if the gauge hit the red. The fogged-over glass gave me an idea… an idea that almost killed me, as Yasmin took advantage of my momentary distraction to make a vicious hack at my throat. I dodged back by the narrowest of margins, so close her blade trimmed my beard; then I spurred myself into a flurry of offense, driving her back almost ten yards until I forced her to duck behind a camshaft for protection.
She braced herself, expected me to press the attack. I didn't; now that she was safely out of the way, I ran back to the steamed-up dial and wrote with my finger, I'M BRITLIN.
The letters were abysmally blurred, partly because I was writing as fast as a panicked rabbit, partly because condensation is not well-suited for calligraphy; but I squinched out my message in dripping script, then stood back, waiting for Yasmin to look at it. She came forward cautiously, fearful of tricks… and even after she'd read the words, I could see she was far from convinced: this was just the sort of deception Rivi might use to hoodwink a gullible enemy. Yasmin didn't lower her sword, and the look in her eye said she might start the fight again any second. For the moment, however, she wasn't trying to put me in the dead-book. That was all I could hope for.
The real Rivi, still on her cot at the rear of the control room, couldn't quite see the fogged-over dial from where she was sitting. Now she stood up and came forward to the spot where the controller would normally sit, a place with a clear line of sight to the gauge. Her jaw dropped, her eyes widened, and she split the air with a screech of rage, so intense I swear I could feel it as tangible heat scorching the air. Yasmin gave a start, then turned her eyes in the direction of the scream. Her grip tightened on the butt of her sword, and she took a single step toward the control room.
«My, my,» I said to Yasmin, «looks like Rivi just fumbled her hold on you.»
«Hush,» Yasmin growled. «I'm fantasizing how lovely it will look to see fresh red blood on that scrawny white skin. A nice gingham effect.»
«Unfortunately, the control room door is locked.»
«I'll chew it open.»
«Don't – I like your smile.» Patting her on the shoulder, I whispered, «We have a way past locked doors as soon as he wakes up.»
«And what will Rivi do
to us in the meantime?» Yasmin demanded. «Make us kill each other? Make us into her slaves? We can't afford to wait for Hezekiah…» She stopped for a second, then continued. «…to come and save us from this mind-raping slag who just gloats inside that unbreachable control room…»
Yasmin's voice grew louder with every word, but I wasn't listening to what she was saying, anymore than she was listening herself. She was simply talking, ranting to hold Rivi's attention; because in the moment that Yasmin had fallen silent, Hezekiah, Irene, and Miriam had materialized inside the control room, appearing silently behind Rivi's back. Yasmin had recovered her surprise quickly enough to continue her tirade… and in mere seconds, I expected big-knuckled Miriam to punch Rivi's face through a control panel.
I should have known better.
Miriam stepped forward stealthily, fists coming up to the ready; but Hezekiah, Clueless boy, had somehow talked Miriam into giving him the firewand she'd acquired at the Vertical Sea. He aimed it at Rivi now, and shouted, «Surrender or I'll shoot!»
Despite the rumble of machinery all around us, I could distinctly hear the sound of everyone cringing.
* * *
Miriam leapt forward anyway, hoping to scrag Rivi before the nasty wee albino had a chance to react. Unfortunately, Rivi's tantrum had run its course, and she was ready to cause more trouble. Before Miriam could land the first punch, Rivi lashed out a blast of psychic force so powerful it rippled the air. The bolt struck Miriam square in the face, so hard it knocked her to knees… but she got up again after a long count of three, moving as stiffly as something undead.
I didn't like the blank expression she wore.
«Surrender!» Hezekiah cried again. «I really mean it.»
Rivi laughed at him. «You're going to shoot me with a fireball, are you? In this tiny wee room? Do you know the damage fireballs make in such a confined space? You'd be fried to a crisp yourself.»
Fire and Dust Page 36