—Corim Erik Vale,
Honorary Beta Rank Shael Dal
Bannor nodded and through the amazing powers of Dulcere the Kriar, the universe shifted. To his nola sight it was as if the threads of space kinked around on themselves, and for a brief instant two places in the void were the same. In that fraction of an eye-blink, the Kriar’s power bridged the overlap leaving them elsewhere. It happened so fast that he couldn’t perceive much beyond what she did. Unlike when Snowfire had transported them, this method of moving had almost no physical impact—merely a tingling on the skin and an odd ache felt behind the eyes.
They had reappeared in a vast cavern, or what looked like one until he realized the walls were metal. They stood in a raised circle about the height of a stair-step, the metal underfoot painted to resemble what looked a lot like a large target circle some twenty paces across. The circle lay about twenty paces from a rail that bordered what Bannor could only call a chasm. Bannor drew a breath as he craned his neck to look up. The chamber was so gigantic that the perspective made him lose his balance for a moment. It looked like a perfectly flat valley a half league across, with the further side looking like an impossibly large window looking out into a night sky filled with stars.
At the railing, the floor dropped away for what must be at least thousand paces. The details of the surface mere dots from their vantage. The ceiling was at least that distance or more up, the giant supports and trusses a maze-like pattern high above them.
Almost as startling as the chamber itself were the mammoth metal constructs sitting in several cradles across the valley floor. They looked like a monstrous cross between some bizarre bird and a leviathan from the depths of the darkest sea. The largest of these constructs easily measured a quarter league long. The biggest sailing ship he’d ever seen would easily float through one of the hatch openings he could see in the side of one of the behemoths.
The air had a caustic hint to it, the smell somehow flat and devoid of character. There was a low thrumming in the atmosphere, the metal walls vibrating with hidden power.
“Lords,” Ziedra breathed in awe.
“Carellion,” Janai muttered.
“Whoa,” Daena let out.
“Damn,” Wren said with wide eyes.
“What are those things?” Bannor asked pointing to the beasts.
“Void ships,” Corim said. “Kriar void ships.”
“They’re so big,” Janai said.
“They’re designed so whole communities can live in them,” Corim added. “To be sure, I’ve been in smaller cities. The amazing part is there isn’t much wasted space in them. A lot of the size is dedicated to storage, and to the propulsion.”
“Propulsion?” Daena repeated.
“What makes it move,” Corim explained. “On a sea-going ship, wind pushing against sails makes it travel. A void ship uses what I can only call magic to create a kind of energy that allows it to move.”
“They manipulate falling force,” Daena said. “I can feel it in the floor, and can see it in the wings of those things. The falling force is…” Her voice trailed off. “It’s not…natural. How odd.”
“There’s more kinds of force in that blue glow,” Wren said pointing to the window like wall on the far side of the chasm. “All of the air in this chamber is pressing against it.”
Dulcere looked around at them and raised an eyebrow.
“Just making something that size move is more magic than I ever imagined,” Bannor said with a shake of his head. “So, you said this place is a called a ‘way-point’.” He looked at the gigantic window. “We’re not even on the ground are we? I don’t see or feel the right threads here.”
“The way-point is a moon?” Wren asked.
“I didn’t understand half of what you said,” Bannor said. “But basically it’s a big round hunk of metal floating in the void.”
Dulcere smiled.
“Simple enough for me,” Daena said with a grin.
“Let’s get to it,” Aarlen said, looking around. “From here you can’t tell the place was over run.”
“You don’t think there are any warriors still lingering around?” Beia asked.
Dulcere stepped through gesturing everyone to follow. The group trailed along after her, necks craning as they looked around in wonder at this strange place.
The portal opened into a broad passage some ten paces wide with an arched ceiling and lit by a greenish light. Two low waist-high walls sectioned off two narrow strips of the corridor. Dulcere walked to the far side past the second and gestured everyone ahead of her. Aarlen and Beia at the front of the group stepped past her and accelerated down the hall abnormally fast. As he came up behind Wren, Ziedra, and Radian, he noticed that floor of the strip where Aarlen and Beia were walking was moving!
Ziedra paused, frowning at the ground which made a quiet rumbling sound.
“It’s safe,” Corim said coming up behind them. “I know it’s strange.” He stepped onto the moving surface and began drifting away down the hall. “See?”
Ziedra frowned. At her husband’s urging she stepped on, closely followed by Radian and then Wren, and they too started drifting away after Corim. Janai, Daena, and Senalloy were watching Bannor. He met Dulcere’s eyes briefly, and stepped onto the strange floor. He leaned forward to keep his balance and started rumbling along with everyone else. Janai and Daena stepped on right after him, followed by Senalloy and Dulcere. After the last person was on, Bannor noticed that the pace of their movement picked up gradually until it was at least as speedy as a fast jog.
“Well, I didn’t expect this,” he said to Janai.
“No,” the princess responded. She looked around at the metal walls rushing past. “It’s interesting and fascinating, but at the same time it seems so—forbidding and cold.”
“I think it’s pretty wizard,” Daena said. “Look at the things these Kriar can do! A road that walks for you; I’ve wanted that more than once!” She grinned.
“Better as in what?” Bannor asked.
“So, how many people actually live in this place?” Janai asked.
“Milady, pardon my bein
g forward,” Bannor said. “But I know nothing about your people. I see that young Radian has your semblance, but I sense that he is not of your people. He seems almost as foreign to this place as us.”
Bannor raised his chin a bit. “I take it then that while most of you are peaceful, that means the warriors are particularly fierce. You have too much of this artifice magic adapted for battle in you and on your person to be any kind pacifist. That black crossbow-like thing on your hip carries in it enough threads of energy to destroy a town.”
Dulcere looked down the device almost self-consciously. She put her hand on the grip.
Bannor shrugged. “Nobody likes a soldier—until there’s an army coming to take over your land. So, I suppose there are bigger versions of that,” He pointed to the device on her hip. “In those void-ships we saw.”
She nodded.
“These Baronian raiders, they came here looking for something—the Genemar—something we guess is a weapon. I am trying to imagine—if they overlook the weapons in those ships—how powerful this thing must be.>
“Oh,” Daena murmured. “Now, I see what you’re getting at.”
“They had several ships like those out there,” Senalloy said. “That’s how they came to this place.”
“That’s what I was thinking.” He looked back to Dulcere. “I’m simply trying to adjust to the scale of things.” He drew a breath. “Part of being a good tracker is knowing something about who or what you are tracking, and what their motives for being in a place are. Around my home, in the mountains, I often tracked poachers—who are basically lawless, lazy hunters, who tend to be sloppy and careless. I would not care about their hunting in my area except they used particularly cruel snares and traps—again lazy and lacking in respect for the animals.” He focused on Senalloy. “If, as Aarlen suggested, we use Senalloy as a model for these people, they move with purpose and order. They have great destructive capabilities, and kill without malice.”
“How do you know it’s without malice, Bannor?” Janai asked, staring at him with wide amber eyes.
He looked away from Senalloy. “It gets in the way of being a good soldier. These people are warriors. A warrior’s passion is their loyalty and dedication to a task. Anything else is a waste of energy.”
“You know, I don’t get that at all from Lady Senalloy, Bannor,” Corim said arms folded.
Bannor looked down. He raised his eyes first to Dulcere, meeting those star-filled black eyes. He did find the gold creature fascinating. There was an appealing tranquility in her aura, a confidence that was not overshadowed by arrogance the way it was in elders like the pantheon lords. His attention went back to violet-eyed and silver-haired Senalloy, big in every sense of the word. She had led a torturous existence, it was written in her threads. She was trying so hard not to be ugly. He found that trait to be an intriguing part of her. Corim didn’t realize what he was missing—this creature was seeking a sort of validation in trying to get the boy to feel for her. Proof that she wasn’t ugly? Not his business.
“Lady Senalloy, did I read the Baronians right?” he asked.
“You did not hear me object,” she answered simply. “Being a soldier is a life. If you live a long time, remorse is too much of a burden.”
“My understanding is that being a warrior is not an option for these people,” Bannor said. “From the highest to the lowest, cradle to grave—everyone fights. The only separation between the castes I’m guessing is who gives orders, who takes orders, and who gets to pick their assignments.”
Dulcere said.
He sighed. “That is what the Garmtur does. A person’s threads tell a story, the more I study them, the more I know about them in a general sort of way. It’s not like mind reading. It’s just impressions.” He looked up at Senalloy. “She was angry for much of her life, rebellious, and she carries those scars deep in her flesh and her spirit. A military machine abhors rebellion, she suffered a lot for it. She wants to forget, so she focuses on simple things—simple pleasures; good food, nice clothes, jewelry—” He focused on Corim. “You.”
The other warrior staggered as though he’d punched him in the chest.
Bannor turned his attention back to Senalloy. “Pardons, Milady. That was perhaps a bit too direct.”
The Baronian woman smiled. “I am far too old to be stung by the truth. I find your insight and sympathy refreshing.”
“I was forced to be a soldier too,” Bannor said. “I survived—my brother didn’t.”
Bannor felt a kind of a chill and noticed that Dulcere was staring at him. The woman did not appear angry or upset, just perplexed, like she could dig some secret out of him with those powerful eyes.
“Oooh nice,” Wren breathed ahead of them.
The ‘conveyor’ as Dulcere had called it, had brought them to a section of the passage that had long windows cut into the walls, looking out into a dazzlingly bright firmament dappled with stars and whirled lenses of white. The contrast of the void and the stars was so sharp and distinct, and the starlight so pure and constant that the splendor of it made his chest hurt. It was different from the complex beauty of nature, the sparkle of running water, the subtle distinctions of stone and plant, the shimmer and rustle of leaves and branches swayed by a gentle wind. In the lower half of their view was a radiant corona of light that could only be a day-star as viewed from further away.
Though the vision was not familiar to him, he felt drawn to it; a distant kind of affinity. Perhaps it was the Garmtur part of him hearkening back to the cradle of its birth.
“It’s like that time you took me astral traveling from my birth city,” Daena said in an awed voice. “It’s so…” Her voice choked off.
“What’s wrong, Daena?” Janai asked, rubbing the girl’s shoulder.
Daena wiped at her glowing green eyes and sniffed. “It—It just reminded me of how long it’s been since I thought about—about home.” She shook her head. “I never said goodbye, and I doubt anybody even realizes I’m gone.” She looked down. “It’s dumb, but I still feel bad. My aunts never wanted me. I was just a burden to them. I was a burden to everyone…” Her voice trailed off.
The princess put an arm around her and blinked up at her with amber eyes. “You’re not a burden to me.”
The young savant forced a smile and nodded.
“Daena,” Wren said. “You may have lost a home, but you gained a new one, and a lot of brothers and sisters. All of us are children of Gaea. We might growl at one another once in a while.” She gave Ziedra’s shoulder a shake. “But you can’t ignore our kinship, you can always feel it.”
Ziedra brushed at her long black hair and shoved her shoulder against Wren. “Who else but a sister could be so damn annoying.”
The windows ended and so did the moving walkway. Beia and Aarlen stepped off ahead of them. Aarlen touched the band on her wrist and in a flare of light the object transformed into a glittering single-edged blade. Beia reached up to Snowfire and the little dragon wrapped himself around her hand, his body transforming and lengthening into a long black scroll-worked blade. The two of them split up, walking opposite ways around the periphery of the large circular chamber.
Bannor didn’t know why the two were arming themselves until he saw the scorch marks on the floor. Though the air didn’t smell of it, he felt death. People had lost their lives here.
Wren said a word and a dagger appeared in her hand. Ziedra gestured, spoke a word, and a sheathed sword seemed to unfold from the air and drop into her outstretched hands. Radian made a fist and a brilliant lance of li
ght extended from his hand and formed a humming length of crackling energy. They too dispersed and started looking around the area.
Feeling his heart pick up tempo, Bannor pulled one of the axes off his hip.
Dulcere said.
Even as Dulcere was uttering the words, Corim was pulling out the sword on his hip. Senalloy removed a ring from her finger and the small item lengthened into a long wedge of what looked like glass. The thing had a handle on it like a sword, and the edges of it glimmered with wicked sharpness. When swung at speed, the transparent body would be all but invisible.
Bannor stepped carefully toward the center of the room, gazing first at the floor, then to the roof and walls. Many of the scorch marks were on the domed ceiling, obviously targeting devices that had been mounted in those positions. The function of the large hall was likely for administration, as there was a circle of counters near the center. There were many benches stationed around the hub area. Raised planters, filled with trees and foliage were situated at five points around the chamber, those having more seating and places to relax.
Bannor looked back to Dulcere. “How much cleaning up have they done here?”
The Kriar frowned.
Ziedra leaned down to one of the burned areas and stretched out her hand. “Battle magic,” she said. “How long ago did this happen?”
The dark-haired savant shook her head and let out a breath.
“How many warriors were on duty?” Aarlen asked, bending down to look at one of the benches.
Dulcere answered.
“Did the Baronians take any casualties?” Bannor asked.
Bannor’s attention was drawn away by the unusual sight of Ziedra drifting up to examine one of the burns on the ceiling. The woman seemed as at home in the air as she did on the ground. He’d seen grander things, but there was just something inspiring about that kind of freedom.
Reality's Plaything 3: Eternal's Agenda Page 10