Suddenly, the order and symmetry of the whole structure became apparent to her. Each of the thousands of rings had a definite purpose. The machine could channel the effort of many with little power and combine it to be stored in the massive ring below or fed out from the top. She began to feel the pull of the rings near her; they were hers and were calling out to her to become part of the machine, more than just an observer.
Knowing that it was all part of trap made no difference to her. This was just one more step that had to be taken in the hope that her power was strong enough. There was no way of knowing what would be involved or how it could be done, but she was sure that if she fought for control of the machine and won, then she would be able to rescue Paul. Slowly she let her mind take control of the rings in front of her.
Angus positioned himself so that he could see Lynella. He set the two soldiers to work on the door behind them, slowly cutting away at the wood around the hinges. It was made of oak and appeared to be exceptionally thick, but he could think of nothing else that could be done. Maria and James were positioned against the wall, a short distance to either side of the door, watching for the attack that seemed inevitable. After several minutes, however, nothing had happened. Finally, one of the monks got up from his chair at the machine, and left the room giving no indication of being aware of anything other than his usual routine.
‘She has started to move in. We must attack now. It will be easy to co-ordinate our movement; the surge of power will make the lights bright.’ The monk had moved quickly, once out of sight of the intruders and was now standing below the Abbot. Turning towards the senior guard, the Abbot said, ‘It is essential that you take that man who is standing close to her, before he has a chance to break her contact. Be ready to move in a few minutes.’
Lynella was first to sense the attack. Then the lights blazed. The gentle hum of the machine rose to a roar which echoed around the cavern. She was trapped; unable to escape to reality and break the link.
Angus ran towards the steps up to the chair. The monastery guards rushed in and attacked. He turned, drawing his sword, fighting back. But he was being forced back, away from Lynella. He joined the others around the door. They turned, parrying every blow. The guards fell back. More came, running around the machine to join them. Not moving forward, but closing the trap.
Lynella tried to focus her power, to escape. But she was tired, focus never came. Every effort dissolved into the absorbing mass of the machine. She felt desperate, betrayed by the other identities in the machine. She had been so close to them. She picked the strongest and attacked. Releasing a surge of power. Within seconds one of the monks lay dead in his chair, his six rings melted into a glowing pool on the floor of the chamber.
The other monks cut their contact. The lights went out. The darkness was complete. The noise from the machine stopped, total silence, followed by a scream. Angus's sword had made contact as he thrust it towards the place where he had last seen a monastery guard. He charged towards Lynella's chair, swinging his sword wildly at the guards. He couldn’t find the steps. Men were running in all directions. The Abbot's voice rang out, ‘Re-make contact’, and then after a pause, ‘We must have lights.’
One monk tried to obey. The enormous and chaotic power killed him in an instant. The whole section closest to him was destroyed. The lights flashed. Spheres exploded, showering molten fragments. Angus saw the direction and ran towards the steps. Feeling Lynella's hand, gripping the arm of the chair. Hearing her deep, rasping breathing. He slapped her face to try and break the contact. Trying again and again, shouting at her in desperation. Lights came on. The guards had lanterns, moving close. He grabbed her shoulders and shook her violently. Lynella gasped and looked up at him, a frightening distant smile, no trace of recognition.
He shouted again, ‘Lynella, wake up!’
The reply came, ‘Go!’
‘You must come with me.’
‘Go, now.’ This time her voice was stronger and showed signs of anger.
‘Break the contact. You don't need the machine.’
‘I shall make you go.’
An iron ring, as heavy as a man, flew out of the machine, close above his head. As he ducked, it flew around the room and passed above where he had been moments before. He was forced down the steps, the ring went lower. Screams rang out as it hit people on other sides, tearing through flesh, never deflected from its path. Then, it orbited the machine just above floor level, preventing any further contact with the girl, gathering speed. With the speed came a howling noise.
The lanterns shone on the blur of motion. The monks produced heavy keys to open doors. The ring seemed to sense that its prey was escaping and spiralled outwards in pursuit, killing the slowest. Angus saw the door open and rushed towards it, gathering Maria and James with him as he went. They ran forward, trying to keep near the walls to avoid being recognised in the dim light.
The ring sparked as iron hit stone as it reached the outer wall. It moved upwards. The Abbot fled. The heavy wooden gallery dissolved into a shower of splinters. Spiralling on up to the roof it hovered momentarily above the centre of the machine and settled down towards the floor behind Lynella's chair. Then, in one final burst of energy, it shot out of the door behind her, decimating the fleeing crowd, crashing through the outer doors of the monastery and flying out across the plain to the source.
Standing near the wall, Angus was covered in blood as the ring passed straight down the centre of the corridor. Nobody showed any interest in him as he ran towards the light showing through the broken doors.
Chaotic surges of energy now swept through the power lines to all parts of the monastery. Lighting globes flashed brightly before bursting, metal objects flew about, small rings flew down the corridors, leaving dead and injured behind them. Panicking, everybody fled outside into the early dawn, carrying their casualties. Angus was swept along.
22
Paul lay in his bed listening to the hum. It had become part of his life in his cell with its bare rock walls. It was almost like being on ship, but easier to live with. On ship, when the fusion ring was firing, the high frequency noise of the drive penetrated to every part of the structure and every person in it. It was alien and inhuman and almost everybody needed headache cures after a major manoeuvre. This hum in the monastery was totally different. It was human. When he had finally persuaded the Abbot to let him see the machine, he had seen why. His amazed reaction to it seemed to have been the final proof that he had nothing immediate to offer from his knowledge of technology. After that, his life had been much easier. His assumed future as a potential hostage was bleak but the present was quite comfortable.
The hum had become louder and the lights had come on brightly. It was strange to think of this power coming from people. It seemed cruel for them to have to sit there pouring it in, almost as if they were beasts of burden doing the work for others. They never complained though; they all said that they enjoyed it. Once they had been trained and learned how to stop it assuming control, it was almost like a special social occasion. They could apparently communicate with each other through the machine in a way that let them share thoughts and concepts with total clarity. It also helped them develop and control their strange defensive auras. They seemed contented with their lot.
He looked around his cell. He now had a small but comfortable bed and a desk and chair. On the desk were the books which he had been able to borrow from the library. They clearly found the comments that he made about them sufficiently interesting to make it worthwhile giving them to him. His only difficulty was trying not to show how much he treasured them. The stories of ancient mages, wars and dragons were so incredible that, just a few months ago, he would have dismissed them as fiction. Seeing Lynella's magic, however, had convinced him of the truth of them and made every detail a challenge to fit into the puzzle of this planet.
He looked sleepily at his watch and realised something was wrong. The lights had come on more brightly than ever
, but it was still the middle of the night. Next to his watch, the bracelet on his wrist was now a familiar sight. Its ancient runes made an interesting contrast with the digital display. He smiled as he remembered what he had read about marker bracelets. He was wearing tokens which identified him as one of the senior followers of a powerful mage, and Lynella was the mage. She certainly had a fine sense of humour; it was easy to see why the steward had gone grey trying to look after her.
At that moment, the lighting sphere went out completely. This disoriented him. It had never gone out before; it had become the one familiar object which was always there, night and day. Several times he had piled up the furniture, but he could not reach it. He could only stare at its glassy surface and try to understand how it worked, but each time he had given up, no wiser than before. It just glowed. He looked up, but the darkness was so intense, he could not even be sure he was looking in the right direction. Then, as Lynella launched her second attack, it flashed, bright as the sun. He turned his head away just as globe exploded. Glowing shards of glass flew out. He jumped up, shaking them out of his hair and throwing them off his blanket. He dressed in the darkness and waited.
The sounds from outside grew louder. He heard screams in the distance and then running and shouting. He heard the crash as the ring burst out through the main doors. More running, screaming, moving away.
Suddenly the bracelets on his wrists came to life. At first, it was as if a wave of energy had passed through them on its way around the monastery. It seemed to pause just for an instant before moving on. Then it came back, pausing longer this time. Next time it came back it stayed. He felt the humming vibration of the machine in the bracelets. They grew warm to the touch. The books had said that they were a means for a mage to communicate some of their power to others. Her knew Lynella was out there, somewhere, wanting him to move. He knew about electromagnetism and he knew what the old books said. He started to experiment. He held his wrists out in front of him. The air between them started to glow. He used the light to move towards the cell door.
The door was made from a single sheet of dull grey metal with traces of rust on it. He tried holding both bracelets against it. At first nothing happened, but then he saw the same blue glow start to come from the metal near the mid-point between them. Slowly it brightened, turning purple and then finally red. The bracelets themselves started to get hot but just as he was about to snatch them away he saw the surface of the door melting where it was glowing red. Ignoring the pain and slowly sliding his wrists across the surface he found that he could cut a slot and soon formed a circular hole large enough to reach through with his arm. Waiting for the metal to cool, he poured water from a jug over his scalded wrists, and then reached through and slid back the bolt and opened the door.
In the corridor, waves of power were surging around him. The spheres above him flashed on and off, the hum in the bracelets pulsed as they passed by. There was no sign of any guards, just the noise of people fleeing along the main corridor.
He had to find some way of telling Lynella that he had finished what he was doing and wanted to move. He formed an image of her in combat with another power, a mortal battle between two great mages. He had no comprehension of the actual battle that she was fighting against herself and the seduction of the machine, but his image gave him the patience that he needed to compete for a small part of her attention.
He slowly raised his hands, held them in front of him. There was no light. He touched them together. There was a spark and a faint light returned. He walked into the guardroom where several corridors met. The devastation was appalling. One of the guards lay dead, blood seeping out of a wound on the side of his head and there was more blood on the floor. He was violently sick. He sat on the chair and held his head in his hands.
The cause of it all was nowhere to be seen. The dead guard had not even drawn his sword to defend himself. Picturing all kinds of dragons stalking the empty tunnels looking for survivors, he retreated to his cell and held his hands well apart, extinguishing the light.
Suddenly the light between them flickered and then the light in the guardroom did the same. Lynella obviously wanted him to go there. Perhaps she didn't know about the dragons. He waited. Everything went quiet around him for a few seconds; he heard the last few stragglers moving in the main corridor as he waited for something to happen. He felt a brief rush of air in front of him and sensed movement. Cowering, he brought his hands up to defend himself. The light came on and he saw a small ring, not much bigger than his bracelets, floating in the space in front of him.
As an offering, it looked small and insignificant, dull grey and motionless against dull grey walls. As a weapon, its deadly effectiveness was given away. Dried blood clung to its inner surfaces. Again, he had to pause and consider what was being sent to him and how he should use it. Lynella's powers were not unbounded. While just holding it in stasis was an achievement, he doubted whether she could find out much about the environment around it. She had presumably been able to send it to him because she knew his position from his marker bracelets. If it was to go anywhere and do anything, he would have to learn how to use it. Stepping forward, he saw runes covering the surface. He guessed that this must mean that Lynella could identify its field in some way. This was how she located it and moved it around.
Taking hold of it, he found that the field held it fixed in space. Remembering the effect of touching his bracelets together he touched one of them against the ring. Obediently it fell to the floor. He picked it up and, apart from being warm to the touch; it felt like any other ordinary metal object. Putting it down, he moved his wrists around. The light between them was working but the ring did not move. He tapped his bracelets together in frustration. This was a powerful weapon; he had seen that it could kill but he had no idea how to use it.
It moved very slowly at first, just spontaneously lifting itself off the floor and circling round him. Then it moved faster and faster, until it was a blur of motion. When he moved, it moved with him. To check that he could do it, he touched his bracelets together once and it stopped. Three more times and it started again; three more and the orbit grew larger. At last, he had a weapon to fight with and he moved out along the corridor to escape.
Setting out along the centre of the deserted passageway, he moved confidently with the ring in a wide orbit around him. The light from the bracelets revealed more scenes of random killing and destruction. Noises in the distance made him believe that other rings were still at work in other parts of the monastery. He hoped that they were being controlled to keep away. There was no defence against them.
Rounding a bend in the corridor, he saw movement. He crouched instinctively towards the wall, forgetting the protective ring. Metal hit stone, the energy in it was dissipated in a massive spark which arced back to the bracelets, leaving him staggering back in pain. When he tried to start the ring moving again, its movement was hesitant, less controlled than before. He guessed that Lynella had suffered more than he had when he had misused the power she gave him.
He moved forward with caution, following the wall in darkness, the ring in his hand. He saw a lantern ahead. A small group of people loading an injured man onto a stretcher. He heard the sound of running feet and an armed man with a blazing torch arrived shouting, ‘Get back!’
‘What from... Where?’
‘Get back from under the power lines!’
He grabbed one of them and threw him back towards the wall.
‘What power lines?’
‘The things up there that go to the lights.’
The group started to move.
‘The rings are flying under them. Keep away from underneath them and move out’
He ran on towards Paul to spread his message. As he passed, he shouted, ‘Get moving. Outside.’
Paul started to obey but, at that instant, one of the rings came along the corridor. As it approached, the whistling noise it made suddenly stopped and it paused in mid-air just in front of t
hem. The soldier grabbed at it. It would not move.
‘Come on. Help me!’
Paul pretended to help as best he could as the guard tried to take the ring. He wanted to tell him that it was only one of thousands in the machine that could probably be used if needed but knew that his accent would betray him. After struggling for a few moments, the guard looked up.
‘Hey you're...’
Before he had a chance to finish his sentence, Paul ran. As he ran, he tapped his bracelets together. He heard the guard running after him and then a cry of pain. He turned. The ring had followed him and was in stasis again, but now it had fresh blood on it. The guard had been in its path and now lay on his back, dead. His chest had been torn open by the ring as it passed straight through his body.
He hoped that the group with the injured man had not seen what had happened. He moved towards them. They scarcely looked up as he passed by. Soon he reached the main corridor. Pausing at the entrance, he saw the lights flash on for a few seconds before a ring flew past. There were only a few people to be seen and they were well clear of the track under the power line. Looking towards the centre of the monastery he saw little activity, just small groups gathering up the last of the injured to carry them out. No noises could be heard from the main hall. Looking in the other direction, he saw monks who appeared to be co-ordinating the evacuation. As he watched, he saw that small groups were being despatched to search every room. Nobody was fleeing in panic anymore; this was an organised total evacuation. The Abbot clearly wanted everybody out before he counter-attacked. Paul wanted to try to tell Lynella what was happening, but he knew he could never reach her and, as he waited, he felt a strong pull on his bracelets towards the entrance. She obviously wanted him out and had given him the means to get there.
The lighting spheres had gone out again, the only illumination came from the lanterns. The width of the corridor was just visible from where he was, and he could see points of light extending into the distance.
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