Riddle of the Seven Realms

by Lyndon Hardy

  The sentryman frowned, but made no attempt to follow. Through squinting eyes, he watched Astron slowly march down the slope. Astron forced air into his constricted lungs. The strange thrill blossomed into delicious triumph. He ran his tongue over his teeth, trying to savor every aspect of the feeling.

  He had succeeded in getting past the guard, but not with a display of strength, as would one of his clutch brothers, or even with the knowledge of the cataloguer. He had woven an appearance of reality and it had been accepted.

  He looked at Prydwin standing near the circle of djinns as he approached and then at Nimbia and Phoebe pacing nearby. Astron reached over his shoulder and grabbed the topmost of the prickly pollen grains from his rucksack. “The seeds for your planting, my queen,” he said. “May your thoughts grow and prosper.”

  Nimbia’s eyes widened in surprise and then she smiled. She said nothing, but pointed to the ground at her feet where Astron was to dump his burden. Astron removed the pack from his back and glanced again at the opening into Prydwin’s realm. He saw the dancelike battle continue with an almost glacial slowness. A few spans away, the hunched figure of Finvarwin squinted at the motions with what looked like unwavering concentration.

  “You see the vitality of the combat, my high king,” Prydwin said. “It intensifies rather than diminishes.”

  “Enough,” Finvarwin rumbled. “Let us see the offering of the cloaked ones who come from far away.”

  “Yes.” Prydwin waved the demon ring to opaqueness. He stared at Nimbia’s cloaked form and smiled. “I too have curiosity about this new creation—indeed, the creation and creator both.”

  Nimbia tugged at the corner of her hood and turned away. While everyone watched, she took a position in front of the ring. After a moment, she gestured that she was ready. Astron saw her drop to the ground, coiling into a tight ball and pulling her arms around her knees. Without speaking, she began rocking herself back and forth. For more than a hundred heart beats, nothing happened. Then a tiny spark of painfully brilliant red burst into being in the precise middle of the ring.

  Nimbia screamed as if in pain and then forced a hearty laugh from deep within her chest. The amplitude of her rocking increased as more peals rang from her lips. She tossed back her head and the hood fell away to reveal her golden curls.

  Astron felt a twinge in his stembrain. There could be no doubt about who she was. He saw two of Prydwin’s sentrymen snap to alertness and step forward with daggers drawn. But their hillsovereign waved them to be still. With the broad smile still on his face, he struck an exaggerated pose of complete ease.

  Nimbia’s agitation increased. With a violent tug, she flung aside the cape and rose to her feet. Her laughter turned to tears. With violent sobs that racked her body, she raised her arms toward the ring, imploring the grayness to dissolve away.

  She had known that the disguise would not long be effective, Astron realized in a flash. Her identity could not be hidden when so much passion was required for what she must do. There had not been time to create before the judging. It had to be done while all the others watched. And yet, she had come, rather than slink away to safety in the brush when her underhill was attacked. It was her duty, she had said, her duty to those over whom she was the queen. Astron shook his head. Such a thought would be completely foreign to the prince to whom he owed his fealty.

  The pinpoint of light expanded sluggishly into a small disk, pushing against the gray void. The circumference seemed to tremble in a series of spasmodic expansions and contractions, oscillating in a complex rhythm, but slowly growing in diameter. When the disk had become the size of a small melon, Nimbia nodded to Astron, pointing at the pollen at his feet and then the disk.

  Astron grabbed one of the harebell grains and lofted it at the vibrating circle. The aim was good, and it struck near the center, but bounced back at his feet. Of course, he thought quickly, transporting solid matter between the realms was a hard task for even the strongest of djinns. It was the reason why Elezar had sent him to the realm of men in the first place.

  He motioned to Phoebe to pick up the pollen and try where he had failed. Phoebe frowned in confusion at first, but then understood what must be done. Her lob struck the disk near the edge, but apparently close enough to what Nimbia desired, because the circle exploded into a blaze of color, expanding to banish all of the gray.

  “An empty palette,” Prydwin called to Finvarwin. “There is nothing there. As soon as Nimbia releases the pressure of her thoughts, the creation will collapse back into the void.”

  “Nimbia, here?” Finvarwin turned his attention for an instant away from the ring.

  Nimbia ignored the taunt and directed Phoebe to continue tossing the pollen into the ring. The wizard hurled another grain and then, with increasing speed, began throwing more.

  Astron watched the orbs as they sailed through the ring and seemed to strike the disk of red. Each seemed to transform as it flew. The prickly spines grew and bent at right angles, forming transparent squares of yellow; the bulbous central body wasted away so that only the boxes remained. Like checkerboards with some of the cells cut away, each pollen grain deposited a haphazard pattern of connected squares in the new realm, some with only two or three components, others with dozens or more.

  Then, after the last grain thrown had been transformed, there was a sudden pulse of light. The plane of red shifted to a brilliant blue. But more importantly, Astron noticed, the patterns of squares had all simultaneously transformed as well. Some had vanished; new ones had appeared. The background pulsed a second time, shifting back to red and then again oscillating to blue. With each shift, the patterns of boxes transformed—some dying entirely, others growing in grotesque and complex ways, seemingly spawning children that evolved on their own.

  Astron watched fascinated as the patterns unfolded. He concentrated on the simple ones that cycled through a series of repeating shapes and then suddenly saw the law that governed the behavior. He looked at Nimbia in admiration, struck by the clean simplicity of what she had done. Each square lived or died in the next cycle, depending on the number of its neighbors. With two, it remained from one oscillation to the next; otherwise it vanished. New squares were born according to a similar rule.

  The elegance of the creation swept through him. He felt a great longing to plant a seed grouping of cells himself and see what would happen and to watch the pattern live and die. It was exactly the type of thing that would satisfy the cravings of the fey. Nimbia had created a most unique realm with a vital life force all its own. Surely Finvarwin would see the merit of what she had done.

  Astron looked back at Nimbia and saw her collapse into a heap. “I call this the realm of the conways,” she panted in almost total exhaustion. “It is a universe based upon—”

  “I apologize for the wasting of your time with meaningless competition,” Prydwin interrupted. “This is no better, Nimbia, than your offering the last time you were called forth.”

  “It is worse.” Finvarwin squinted into the ring of djinns. “I see nothing but the dull repetition of red and blue. A well-defined realm, it is true, but one that bores after the briefest of inspections.”

  “But it is indeed my best!” Nimbia tried to regain her feet, but could not find the strength. “Look at what is there, Finvarwin. How can you so lightly dismiss what I have done?”

  “Nimbia.” Prydwin smiled. “Surely, even with the cloak, you must have known I would suspect—an unknown hillsovereign who mumbles to the high king only the minimum necessary to be granted a turn to present, an unknown hillsovereign indeed!”

  Prydwin turned to Finvarwin. “You have already granted me the boon of Nimbia’s underhill, venerated one,” he said. “What additional might I expect now that I have won the wager doubled?” He turned and called back up the hill. “Sentrymen, seize them. This time she will not escape.”

  Astron looked at Finvarwin but saw that the old one was unmoved. He swayed slightly on unsteady limbs but otherwise d
id nothing to explain his decision.

  “No!” Nimbia cried out. “A second punishment will only add injustice to the first. It is not the fault of those who have dwelt in my underhill that these creations have failed to find your favor, Finvarwin.” Slowly she extended her arms trembling from exhaustion, offering her wrists for bondage. “If any payment is to be made, it is the duty of their queen and no other.”

  “What, this is Nimbia?” Finvarwin said. “The hooded queen and she are one and the same?”

  Astron watched Finvarwin’s squint deepen as Nimbia struggled to stand. The hunched figure reminded him somewhat of Palodad, physically infirm yet continuing as he had for perhaps eons before. Age should have brought increased wisdom and the ability to judge better what his senses presented to—

  Astron stopped in midthought. The explanation burst upon him. “He cannot see!” he shouted to Nimbia. “He can no longer discern detail—only large movements and general shapes. Finvarwin has judged your creations inferior because he never noticed the structures of what was really there.”

  Astron’s thoughts raced. Just as in his experiments, sharpness of vision in a living being was a matter of lenses and bending light. He remembered the book of thaumaturgy and the many interesting diagrams it contained. Dropping to the ground, he began pawing rapidly through the contents of his pack, looking for what might give Nimbia one last chance.

  With a surprising nimbleness, he fashioned some bits of copper wire into two small circles, connected them with an arc of metal and then attached longer straight segments on either side. He grabbed at one of the large flat leaves near the stream bank and tore it into two disks that fit over the rings of copper, hoping the oozing sap would hold them firm. With a last segment of wire he punched a tiny hole in the center of each of the green disks.

  “Here, try these.” He raced up to Nimbia’s side, extending his construction forward for Finvarwin. “Place them astride your nose and over your ears. The scene will be dim but a pinhole works as well as the finest correcting lens. I have tested the effect in Nimbia’s underhill and seen how sharp the focus can be.”

  Astron’s hood flew backward as he ran, but he was too excited to care. Finvarwin must see Nimbia’s creation as it was meant to be viewed.

  “The demon,” Prydwin shouted suddenly in recognition. “The one who kept Nimbia from me, as was my due at the last competition. Challenge him, pipers, make him submit to our collective will.”

  Astron grimaced. The memory of his last ordeal sprang frightfully into his mind. And within their circle, there would be no way he successfully could resist.

  “Like this.” Astron demonstrated with the glasses and then thrust them into Finvarwin’s hand. He started to say more, but felt a sudden compelling jolt. Staggering under crushing pressure, he sagged to his knees.

  Through glazed eyes, he watched Finvarwin, with agonizing slowness, bring the strange object to his face. Astron pushed forward a resistance against the mental onslaught; but deep in his stembrain, he knew he would fail. His thoughts became sluggish, compressing in ways that were distasteful and bizarre. He saw the sentrymen racing closer, and among them Kestrel pounded down the hill with the rest.

  “This is most amazing!” Finvarwin exclaimed. “There is more to your creation, Nimbia, than I first suspected. Yes, look at it—most clever, far more elegant that what Prydwin has offered to be compared.”

  “What is the ultimate precept?” Astron shrieked. “What law is supreme over all the rest? How does one start a fire in the realm of daemon? The prize for winning—the answers I must know.”

  “No, I am the winner.” Prydwin swiped at Finvarwin’s glasses, knocking them to the ground. “Do not be misled. It is some sort of demon trickery.” He looked quickly about the glen. “Yes, there are four altogether. Get them all, the one still hooded and the other sprinting down the hill. Get them all while I reestablish contact with my realm of reticulates. Look again as you have before, my high king, and you will see.”

  Astron struggled to think what he should do, but he felt his being compressed into nothingness, all the sharp corners of his essence being smoothed away. With a dull thud, his head sagged to the wet earth. In a strange detachment, he noticed Kestrel being shoved to earth near his rucksack and Phoebe thrown beside it.

  “Be careful, Prydwin,” Astron dimly heard Finvarwin say. “Even a hillsovereign must abide by the decisions of the high king.”

  “I will accept no punishment for the likes of this,” Prydwin growled.

  “First, a competition that has been fairly won deserves its just reward,” Finvarwin continued, “and then we will see what additional judgments are appropriate besides.”

  The high king paused briefly and cleared his throat. “Realities are no more than bubbles,” he said. “That is the most profound truth that I know. If there is an ultimate precept, then somehow that knowledge must be a component part.”

  Astron tried to pull meaning from Finvarwin’s statement but he could not. All he could do was focus on Prydwin’s strident voice.

  “There shall be no reversals of opinion, I say. If I cannot have Nimbia, then neither shall she have me. Quickly, sentrymen, I command you—all of them through the flame.”

  Phoebe’s scream blotted out what Finvarwin said next. The last thing that Astron remembered was a sensation of being lifted and then being hurled through the air.

  PART FOUR

  The Two Realms Of Symmetry

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Rotator’s Move

  KESTREL shook his head, trying to force his thoughts to order. The disorientation was not as great as the first time he had travelled between realms, but it was there, nonetheless. He felt Astron’s pack slide from his grip and crunch into a sea of sand that surrounded him as far as he could see. Vaguely, he remembered grabbing at the pollen sack as he was hoisted from the ground by Prydwin’s sentrymen and bodily tossed at the ring of djinns. When he hit the plane of the vertical circle, he had felt a tremendous deceleration, like a ball of cotton hurled into a vat of thick molasses. The pack was almost wrenched from his grasp, but somehow he had held on and burst through to the scene that lay beyond.

  He sat at what looked like the edge of a desert oasis. Astron lay crumpled at his side apparently unconscious. By Kestrel’s feet was a placid circle of clear water with a diameter about twice the height of a man. He felt the rough bark of a tree at his back and saw five more arranged around the periphery at the vertices of a perfect hexagon. Phoebe wallowed to alertness in front of the tree directly opposite his own, trying to get her bearings. Next to the wizard, Nimbia slumped in a disarray of tunic, leggings, and cape.

  A path of crushed white stones radiated away from each of the trees into the distance, across a featureless gray plane, vanishing in an indistinct horizon that blurred the separation of ground and air. A gentle breeze bathed the left side of his face and, just as in the realm of the fey, he could see no sun, only a diffuse light that seemed to come from all directions.

  Kestrel cursed himself for being so impetuous. But then what else could he have done? When Prydwin called his sentrymen down to Finvarwin’s rock, there had been no option but to bolt from cover to offer what aid he could. Phoebe had been in danger, and he could not just idly stand by.

  But there had been too many. Like a sack of flour, he had been hurled through the circle of djinns into the realm of Prydwin’s creation. Dazed from the jarring impact, he had watched helplessly as the others followed. Before any of them could stir, the portal back to the realm of the fey clouded and then closed.

  Kestrel started to rise in order to see farther from the oasis, but felt a great weight that resisted his motion pressing downward on his back and legs. He increased his effort and managed to stand, although his body twitched from side to side from the buffet of small unseen forces.

  “Stop,” Phoebe cried from across the pool. “Stop whatever you are doing. Somehow you are pulling me upward. I cannot move freely on my own.
”

  Kestrel looked again at Phoebe and saw her more or less erect but hunched forward and grasping toward the ground with empty hands. He felt his own fingers suddenly start to wiggle. Then, when Phoebe flung her arm backward to clutch at the tree behind her, his own body followed in an almost perfect imitation. Kestrel frowned and released the tension in his legs. He collapsed to the ground and saw that Phoebe did the same in unison.

  “Somehow we are bound together,” he said in amazement. “There is great resistance when our motions do not imitate one another. What kind of strangeness is this?” He glanced quickly to his side. “Astron, wake up! Explain what is going on.”

  Kestrel saw the demon stir slightly and, out of the corner of his eye, Nimbia move as well.

  “It is the realm of reticulates,” Kestrel heard Nimbia say in an exhausted voice. “Prydwin considers it one of his two masterpieces, despite the eternal strife and pain.” She drew in a deep breath. “The effort to create is exhausting. Give me a moment to regain my strength, and I will explain more.”

  Astron coughed and raised his head. Kestrel saw his nose wrinkle in puzzlement and then his dark eyes dart about the gray landscape. “Symmetries,” he muttered, “like the hexagon of trees and the four of us at opposing vertices.”

  “Yes,” Nimbia said. “This realm abounds in things that look the same under reflections, rotations, and other complex rearrangements. That is the way it was constructed. Actions that build symmetry are reinforced; those that break them are strongly retarded.”

  “Most interesting,” Astron said. “I even have difficulty holding my mouth shut when I listen to you speak.”

  “You saw the battle before Prydwin shifted the view to this isolated node.” Nimbia’s voice rather than increasing in strength grew still more faint. “This realm is one of violence; we must be away.”