by Lyndon Hardy
“But wait,” Farnel said. “Do you not understand? I offer you instruction, freely given so that you may become a master.”
Jemidon bolted into a run and headed down the path of crushed stone. He gripped the brandel tightly to prevent it from swinging and called back over his shoulder, “My destiny lies elsewhere. I can feel it. When I return, it will be with sorcery restored.”
“But how?” Farnel yelled.
“I must find Drandor on Pluton and learn what he knows. Examine the contents of his tent. Listen to the imp when he babbles about the lattice and his master, Melizar. Yes, the lattice, Melizar, and the Postulate of Invariance.”
PART TWO
The Postulate of Invariance
CHAPTER SIX
The Whispers of Memory
JEMIDON paused before he entered the courtyard gate and looked back to Pluton’s harbor. The passage from Morgana had been uneventful and the contrast between the two islands more or less what he had expected. The population of Morgana was small, barely enough for a viable community to support two dozen masters and cater to the lords when they came once a year. Pluton, on the other hand, was an active trading and financial center, a stopping point for the traffic between mainland Arcadia and Procolon across the sea, and the nexus for the interisland traders that flitted up and down the archipelago.
The harbor was crowded; several ships lay at anchor in mid-bay, awaiting their turn for a berth. The piers jutted into the dirty water with regular-spaced precision from two arms of land that gently curved into an enclosing circle. A small opening led to the unprotected sea outside the bay. Through the gap, one could follow the shipping lanes to the heartland of Arcadia, which lay beyond the horizon.
A narrow road that ringed the shoreline was a tumult of wagons, dust, and shouting drivers. Small boats pulled by oars and even a few biremes slid over the glassy water, dashing between the waiting ships, moving people and messages too important to delay onto the crowded shore.
Two smaller islands poked above the bay’s surface, one covered with trees except where it had been cleared for an elegant estate, and the other rocky and bare, pockmarked with the dark entrances to deep caves that came to the water’s edge.
All around the ring of shore, the land sloped abruptly upward to a circle of hills. Jemidon’s eyes followed the landscape as it rose. Rough-planked shacks stood adjacent to the wagon road. In the tier behind, single-storey mud-brick boxes painted white crowded together. Above them, the larger structures of brick and iron marked the exchanges and countinghouses that distinguished Pluton from all the other islands in the chain. On the topmost slopes leading to the hillcrests were the manor houses of the wealthy—polished stone, fine-grained woods, and patches of cultivated greens towering over all the rest.
But his search would not take him to the hilltops, at least not initially, Jemidon thought. The advice of all the other passengers was to seek out a divulgent when he first came ashore. Information was a commodity on Pluton like everything else, and he could find out whatever he wanted if he could afford the price.
Jemidon patted his now much lighter purse and frowned. If not, he would have to hope that he could find an old acquaintance who would be disposed to offer him aid.
Augusta! How would she have remembered him? One of the merchants on shipboard had mentioned the name in connection with something called the vault in the grotto. Could she be the same? Unbidden, the whispers of memories flooded back…
“But I can wait no longer, Jemidon. Please try to understand,” he heard the voice from the past say.
“We have forsworn all others, Augusta.” Jemidon remembered his reply. His heart had been pounding and his palms sweaty, but he had tried to show an outward calm. “You do not care for this Rosimar’s rough manner. I can see it in your eyes.”
“But he is already an acolyte, Jemidon. The guild on Pluton has offered to teach him the mastery of magic there. And he has asked me to go with him. Pluton, Jemidon, Pluton! Center of the islands and focus for trade. Why, in a single day there will be more excitement than this outland has in a year.”
“And is that so important?” Jemidon asked softly. “When I am with you, the rest does not matter.”
“Ah, Jemidon.” Augusta smiled, placing her hand lightly on his. “Your sweet words are always a delight. But one must be practical as well. You are only a neophyte; the training of an initiate takes three years more before you can pass to acolyte, let alone a master. I know that within a year I would be longing for the silks, cold fruits, and prestige that the woman of a master magician could command. Rosimar gives me that promise; from you, I can see nothing for a long time to come…”
Enough, Jemidon growled at himself. He covered the old hurt and pushed it away. It would do no good to dwell on opportunities already lost. He was now seeking the robe of a sorcerer, tracking down a trader and a slave girl. He would find out if the Augusta of the vault in the grotto was the one he knew only if he must.
He wrenched his attention back to the courtyard in front of him and scanned its interior. It was large and noisy, crammed with stalls and partitions around the periphery. The scene reminded him of the bazaar that had flourished on Morgana a fortnight ago; but here the structures were more permanent, made of stone and wood rather than canvas and paper. Each was decorated in gaudy colors. Hawkers at the entrances called out what could be exchanged inside. With long ceremonial daggers, they pointed to hastily chalked lists on panels that swung out over the milling throng. From time to time, scurrying messengers flitted through the crowd to erase an entry or change a price.
“For the name of lady Magma’s lover,” one called, “I have been offered twelve tokens. Does anyone on Pluton desire to know it more?”
“Gold from the west in exchange for grain,” another shouted. “Two brandels per bushel. Trade now while my purse is still full.”
“A barge for the southern kingdoms will sail on the tide,” a third said. “How much for a one-hundredth share?”
At the far end of the court, on a board flanked by pages in silken hose, were listed the trading rates for metals and staples around the world. Gold, silver, wheat, stone, spices, and slaves all had entries scripted in bold black numerals. Below the board sat the changers, huddled between their huge scales and weights. Next to them were the assayers, with rows of reagent bottles and shelves crammed with specimens. Jemidon saw a richly dressed merchant exit from the freshly painted cubicle directly ahead and perfumed ladies duck to enter an equally elaborate facade to the left. He looked down the row and walked toward an entrance smaller than the rest. It had no hawkers outside, but the faded panel of fare was crammed with entries in a small, nervous script. “Tomorrow’s departures,” the first read. “The true age of the high prince,” the second said. “The size of Procolon’s fleet,” the third proclaimed.
Jemidon ducked through the low opening and saw a room crammed with furnishings. Stools short and tall were pushed against shelves sagging from the weight of leather-bound books. Scrolls of parchment lay unwound on the floor, weaving a coarse tapestry between small chests and smooth boxes bolted shut with massive locks. Two oil lamps on the far wall shone above a high table with chairs on either side. Hunched over a ledger like a mantis watching its prey, a thin and gangly figure mumbled as he scanned entries and made small notes with a quill.
“Tomorrow Gandis will pay twenty tokens for the name of Trocolar’s latest partner. And since I bought it from Brason for sixteen, that is a profit of four. Sixty-seven tokens for the week. Two thousand eight hundred and twelve in all. Ah, if only the election were another month away, Cumbrist would not have a chance. Three thousand at the most; he could not be worth a brandel more.”
“I seek information,” Jemidon said when the other did not look up. “And I think I will not be able to afford the surroundings that the other divulgents seem to offer.”
The man behind the table jerked to attention. His elbow bumped the bowl of ink onto the sawdust floor. “Calm yourself, Benedic
t, calm yourself, or it will be Cumbrist for sure.” He breathed deeply as he watched the ink sink into the ground. Then, focusing on Jemidon, he motioned to the empty chair. “I am Benedict, pansophical divulgent,” he said. “Ask me anything and I will know. Gossips of the guilds are a specialty. Futures of the exchanges with generous guarantees. For a copper, the use of the seat is yours.”
Jemidon halted just as he was lowering himself into the chair. He pushed it aside in irritation. “An unthinking way to treat a potential customer,” he growled. “It makes one want to try somewhere else.”
“You will find none charge less than a copper,” Benedict said. “Everything on Pluton has a price. And besides, you need look no further. Anything you wish to know, I will tell.”
“Then what of a trader called Drandor?” Jemidon asked. “How much for where he is now?”
“For two coppers I will speak my fee.” Benedict centered the ledger on the table. “How soon do you wish to know?”
“You have heard of Drandor?” Jemidon exclaimed. “What luck on my first try! Then what of Delia, the slave girl with the golden curls? Is she still safe? Who is the partner Melizar? Has he interceded on her behalf?”
“One at a time,” Benedict said. “For someone who begrudges the copper for a chair, you talk as if your purse were full. Show me your assay so that I will know you are worth my time.”
“Assay?” Jemidon shook his head. “I have come to this exchange directly from the harbor.” He furled his brow. “And even that cost two coppers for the directions.”
“What, no writ certifying your worth?” Benedict asked. “Not a single token in any of the vaults? Then why are you here? It cannot mean you seriously intend to trade.”
Benedict stopped and his eyes widened. He quickly snatched the ledger from the table and raced to the wall. Jemidon saw the divulgent stuff the book into a large box on the floor and slam shut the lid. A flash of painful blue light sparked from the container as it closed. The air crackled and hissed. Jemidon caught the pungent smell that came with a storm.
“Forever protected, save by my command.” Benedict shot back a triumphant look. “No hammer can dent the walls, nor can the box be moved from where it sits on the floor. And unless I am calm, even my words will have no effect. A knife at my throat will not force entry if I do not wish it so. A small strongbox as those of magic go, but effective nonetheless. You will have to try your thievery on one who is not so fortunately secured.”
“I will take nothing here that you do not freely give,” Jemidon growled. “And if I must have some piece of paper before we can talk, then tell me how one is obtained and I will be back.”
Benedict paused, eyeing Jemidon critically, but a roll of drums outside in the court stopped him from speaking. He hurried back to the high table and grabbed a belt from a shelf. It was plain leather and buckled on the side. In the very front, it looped through a row of small columns that butted together and protruded with thumb levers. Buckling the belt around his narrow hips, the divulgent dashed past Jemidon and through the opening. “No more time to weigh your merits,” he called. “The court is full, and many will want to wager on the outcome with less than a full token.”
Jemidon turned to follow, his annoyance growing with each step. He flung aside the curtain, but then stopped as he sensed the sudden change of mood in the courtyard. Except for the drumbeat, the throng was quiet. The jostle of bodies had ceased, and all eyes were on the center of the court. A pathway had cleared itself back to the rate-board. From behind the changers marched a small troop of men-at-arms. The first two pushed the crowd farther back on either side. Behind them came two lines of three, supporting a huge gleaming box on their shoulders.
The coffer was a perfect cube of glistening metal, polished to such a smoothness that Jemidon saw the surrounding scene reflected better than if by the finest mirror. Along the top edge, just below a row of hinges, he recognized the arcane script that magicians had chiseled into the side as part of the ritual of formation. Near one bottom corner, a small pipe protruded from the interior. Except for these, nothing else marred the clean and rigidly flat surfaces.
A whisper of anticipation started through the crowd as the next in the procession came into view. Jemidon stood on tiptoe to look over a shoulder and saw a man with eyes wide with fear, his hands secured behind his back and his neck circled with iron. From the heavy black ring, a chain ran to a second prisoner, similarly bound, and then to a third. The last was a woman, clad only in a thin chemise, stumbling barefooted after the others.
As the procession stopped in the center of the court, the men-at-arms set the cube on the ground and flung open the top face with a crash. Two more guards struggled forward underneath the weight of a pair of huge sandglasses. The last brought up a ladder, placing it against the side of the box. The top rung came to rest near the rim, well above the height of Jemidon’s head.
“The men are worth nothing, but for the woman, ten tokens,” someone shouted.
“Twelve,” another countered, “and one of my own in trade.”
“A brandel that the bidding will not go above fifteen,” a third called out.
“Ten coppers that she will plead before it is finished.”
“A token and three that the first glass will be done before the contraction,” a woman in an embroidered gown next to Jemidon said to her companion. “A token and three coppers against your token plain.”
The man accompanying her nodded and pulled a gleaming coin from a pouch. The woman produced hers and then frowned as she searched through her purse for the rest.
“Perhaps I can be of assistance to my lady.” Benedict suddenly appeared and patted the mechanism strapped to his waist. “Brandels for tokens, coppers for silver galleons, dranbots from the south, regals of the inland. I can change them all. Only one extra for a fee, and whatever you have can be transformed into another.”
The woman nodded and reached a final time into her purse. “All copper and silver,” she said as she dumped a pile of brass and tin into Benedict’s palm. “I expect to wager more before it is done.”
With a speed that Jemidon could hardly follow, Benedict inserted the coins into the slits in the top of the device at his waist. As the metal clattered downward, he tripped the levers near the bottom and his palm filled with another collection, different from the first.
“May your wagers be perfection,” Benedict said as he handed the money back to the woman. With a slight bow, he darted away into the crowd.
“Eighteen has been bid, but the debt is thirty-five.”
Jemidon turned his attention back to the center of the court. A man-at-arms with a red surcoat over his mail paced around the cube, shouting to the crowd.
“Expert trader Trocolar’s due is thirty-five, and he will accept no less. Speak now, else the justice of Pluton will run its course.”
The crowd again fell silent as the guard made a final circuit of the box. He jerked his thumb upward and the prisoners were goaded onto the ladder at spear point. The first reached the top and hesitated, but one of the guards prodded him over the side. Jemidon heard a muffled thud as he hit the bottom and saw the chain pull tight on the one who followed. When the woman reached the top, she turned and looked out over the throng.
“Trocolar,” she shouted hoarsely, “Trocolar. I cannot pay him, it is true, but my spirit will not rest until he suffers the same, if ever he becomes short even by one token only, then I charge your judgment to be no less than what you have prescribed for me.”
With her chin thrust out defiantly, she turned and leaped in after the others. Two of the men-at-arms grabbed the lid of the chest and arched it up over the hinges to clang shut. A blue flash like the one from Benedict’s strongbox cut through the air overhead. Low-hanging banners about the court seared and smoldered, turning black along a thin horizontal line at precisely the height of the top of the coffer. One of the glasses was tipped over. As the sand began to fall, the crowd broke into another round of spi
rited betting.
Jemidon looked about, puzzled. No shouts could be heard coming from the box, nor any pounding on the walls. In perfect silence, it stood gleaming in the high morning sun. He watched the sand drain from the glass and, just as the last grains emptied, the starting of the other.
“There are three this time, rather than the usual pair,” Jemidon heard someone say. “That is the reason. Without her, it would have long since been over.”
“But the pressure does not relent,” another replied. “Three coppers that we will not see the turning of another glass.”
A sudden shimmer caught Jemidon’s eye, and he glanced back at the cube. He saw the walls vibrate as if struck by a hammer and then a sudden jerking movement as they simultaneously contracted. Jemidon blinked at what he had seen. The cube was still perfectly formed as before, but, with no excess material or visible seams, it had shrunk to half its former size.
With a sickening feeling, Jemidon realized what was going to happen. Before he could turn away, the cube jerked a second time and then again. With each movement, it halved its dimensions, confining its contents closer together in smaller and smaller volumes. The vibrations of the walls intensified, so that a low-pitched hum filled the air of the courtyard. Drops of reddish pulp appeared at the end of the pipe at the bottom. With the next constriction, it gushed in a steady flow. Bits of cloth and shattered bone swirled out onto the courtyard. A thick, stringy liquid added its stain to the sunbleached blotch that was already there.
Jemidon turned away and staggered back through the entrance to Benedict’s cubicle. On Pluton for less than an hour, and already he wanted to be away. He thought of the tangle of three bodies as they were cramped together and the woman’s face that he had seen just moments before. He sagged into a chair, shook his head to clear the images away, and tried to focus on why he had come.
After a moment, he heard the slide of the curtain and looked up, thankful for the distraction as Benedict entered.