“Let that be a lesson to you, then,” the proctor said, turning away.
Not bothering to protest, Roan finished repairing his pencil and went back to his essay. Words came slowly but steadily. He framed his sentences with care, stressing a point here, erasing an embellishment there. With a flourish, he planted the final period on the page. There, that hadn’t been so bad.
Thick black type appeared underneath his neat handwriting.
EXPLAIN “DEVICE” it said.
Roan put down everything that he knew or speculated about the Alarm Clock, including his impression of the sound of its bells and the perversion to the land its passage caused. He mentioned the half-squirrel-half-cardinal they had seen.
EXPLAIN THE DANGER TO THE SLEEPERS,the paper demanded.
Impatiently, Roan wrote what he knew or thought he knew about Awakening, and Changeover, and the belief of the historians about what would happen if all seven provinces went through Changeover at once. He drove the pencil, filling page after blank page. When he finished with that question, there was another. And another.
DISCUSS IN DETAIL THE LEGEND OF THE HALL OF THE SLEEPERS. INCLUDE SPECIFIC EXAMPLES FROM HISTORICAL DOCUMENTATION.
Roan felt himself beginning to sweat. Why did they have to ask that? He hadn’t made a formal study of the Sleepers, apart from the required reading in school, but that had been years ago. He had picked up much of what he knew from casual reading and listening to learned discussions among his father’s colleagues. He had to concentrate. The fate of the Dreamland rested on his answers. If he was trapped here, Brom would carry out his nefarious experiment, and everything would disappear. How could he concentrate on philosophical questions? Don’t panic, he thought. Think. Consider. He wrote down what he did know, or could remember with accuracy having heard. The question made him examine his own beliefs, leaving him to wonder if he knew anything at all, or if everything was imaginary, as some of the philosophers insisted. The answer ran four and a half pages. At the end he wasn’t sure if anything he’d written made sense.
More questions followed, becoming more specific. WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF THE DREAMLAND AS IT PERTAINS TO THE SLEEPERS? He found himself feeling anxious because he had to leave the space blank beneath several. As his nervousness grew, so did the pile of paper under his hand until it was more than five hundred pages thick. What would happen to him if he didn’t know the answers? Would they keep him in this tower forever? Would he really serve detention for the rest of his life? He had to get out and join his friends in pursuit of Brom. He took a deep breath, and wrote more furiously.
WHY WAS THE PRINCESS LENORA TRAVELING WITH YOU? WHAT ARE THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE PALACE GUARD IN SITUATIONS OUTSIDE THE PALACE? DIDCUSS THE RELATIONSHIP OF A SOVEREIGH TO HIS/HER LIEGEMEN. DO YOU THINK A DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT WOULD BE MORE CONDUCIVE TO FREE INTELLECTUAL EXCHANGE?
Outside the window, the sun was going down. The city of Reverie went on about its business, seemingly unaware that a great wrong had been done the world, and that villainy was being allowed to be free. Roan worried about Leonora. He stopped to fidget with his pencil and stare up at the gaslamps on the wall. The Night was taking Leonora home to the palace. Would the king be very angry with her? With him? Would her having run away destroy Roan’s chances of marrying her? The test paper seemed to read his mind. ADMIT IT, it said when he looked down, YOU ONLY WANT TO MARRY THE PRINCESS SO THAT YOU MAY BECOME KING OF THE DREAMLAND.
“No, it isn’t like that at all,” Roan said, frustrated. The ruler smacked down on his hand, and his pencil went flying.
“No talking!” the proctor snapped.
Roan curled his hands into fists. How dare they question his love? What conceivable business was it of theirs? What an insult to the princess to have anyone think she was the means to an end, instead of the end in itself. Not even to mention the slight against his loyalty. He seized the second pencil and started writing, telling off his unseen inquisitors in no uncertain terms.
But writing down all the reasons why he loved Leonora helped to make them clear in his own mind. Why did he love her? Roan suddenly felt less anxiety, and his thoughts cleared. He knew how to answer this question. How simple. He only had to tell the truth. Leonora was unpredictable, intelligent, challenging, devoted, compassionate, and responsible. Those were only labels. How could he tell anyone that when he looked at her, his breath caught in his chest; if he exhaled too hard he would break the soap bubble of the moment, and she would vanish. To him, she was sunshine and the sweet scent of roses, and all other precious intangibles. It would have been illogical not to love her. The test papers melted away until there were fewer than ten.
Roan scratched away quickly. EXPLAIN, DISCUSS, the paper demanded. Roan explained his feelings, and discussed how he had grown from thinking of her as a childhood pal, albeit royal, to being her ardent admirer. How lucky he was that she cared for him in spite of his strange sameness, gave him hope that they might have a future together. She believed in him when he lost faith in himself. Leonora had grown up into a complex and wonderful woman. Look how well she had adapted to life on the road. He chuckled to himself about what it would take to get an “A” in romance. She’d be a straight-A student. And he? Ah, he did the best that he could. Warmed by thoughts of her, he filled page after page.
The test required him to write a love poem, at least eight lines in iambic pentameter. Not only could he remember what iambic pentameter was, but he tossed off the verses as if he was a bard.
The pile of paper melted away under his hand, until there was only one page left. EXPLAIN THE NATURE OF LOVE AS IT APPLIES TO YOU. Roan’s thoughts were flowing now, and no more questions appeared. When he finished this one, they would have to let him go.
He scratched down his memory of the first time he knew he was in love with Leonora, how she had looked at him, and he had known suddenly that he was changed forever. He could recall it as if it had just happened. In that moment he had been exalted and humbled—
The pencil hissed on the page, and Roan examined it. The point had run down to the wood. He took up his penknife to sharpen it, and shaved away scrap after scrap of wood. Though it was still three inches long, there was no lead left inside. He put it aside, retrieved the other from the floor, and continued writing. Only two paragraphs to go.
The second pencil turned into a feather pen. Roan sought about for an inkwell, but could find none. The top of the desk was black with the spilled and dried ink of dozens of schoolboys in the past. He tried using influence to gather it and wet it, but it refused to pool. He dabbed at it several times, but couldn’t get more than a dot’s worth. Time was running away. Brom was marching toward the northeast with the Alarm Clock. When it went off, it wouldn’t matter how many of these questions he got right. He needed ink. What could he use?
In desperation, he plunged the point of the feather pen into a vein on the back of his hand. Roan winced as the blood welled up, but he filled the nib from the flow, and kept writing. Hurry, he thought. Hurry.
“. . . And because I know that she loves me, too, I hope some day to ask for her hand in marriage.”
Triumphantly, he jotted the final period.
The proctor appeared at his side and gathered up the sheaf of paper.
“Your time is up,” the austere voice said.
“I am finished,” Roan said, leaning back in his chair and clamping his handkerchief down on his bleeding hand.
“Don’t be impertinent,” the proctor said, turning away and vanishing into thin air.
Roan rose from his desk to stretch. His backside, knees, and wrist were all stiff, but he felt good. His mind had been stretched, too. What a load of old history he was carrying around in his memory. He was surprised at all that he had been able to remember. Even better, he had been able to tell someone exactly what it was he loved about Leonora. He only wished it was she he had been able to tell. It was almost certainly for the best that she had been sent back to Mnemosyne. She would be safer at
home, but he would miss her terribly. When this mission was over, and the Dreamland was safe, he wanted to take her aside to somewhere private, and explain and discuss all the things he had learned about himself and her, with maybe just a little bit of sweet clarification.
Roan paced to the window and looked out over the city of Reverie. To his astonishment, the sun was rising. The test had taken him all night. How far had Bergold gone in that time? And Brom? Where were they? Had the battle been fought without him?
How much longer until they graded the exam and let him out? He paced the small room for a while, feeling as if he would go crazy with impatience. He made himself sit down at the little desk and stretched his long legs out in front of him. He would wait patiently. Fingers of light crept to the edge of the stone sill. Roan watched them until they reached all the way to the inner edge.
WHACK! The noise of the ruler smacking down on the desktop roused Roan from a sound sleep. It was full daylight now, and dust motes danced in the bright sunlight coming in through the window. He looked up into the disapproving face of the proctor.
“You are acquitted,” the thin voice said, although the mouth was drawn down at the corners. “Your answers were satisfactory. Not highly satisfactory, but satisfactory. You may go.”
So the world would have to be saved by an average to good student, not a perfect scholar. Roan wasted no time finding and arguing with whoever had graded his essay. He collected his belongings, and left the city by the north road.
“Sir!” A voice hailed him as he passed over the north bridge, identical to the bridge at the south side of the city. Roan looked in the direction of the voice. A young man with a fresh, pink face and light brown hair and wearing camouflage fatigues stood out from the tree where he had been resting. “Private Hutchings, sir. I waited for you. Corporal Lum said you’d need an escort. Was it very bad?”
“Bad enough,” Roan said. “But now I’m eager to be on the way.”
“Right you are, sir,” Hutchings said.
He put forefinger and thumb in his mouth, and whistled. Roan heard the jingle of harnesses. Cruiser and Hutchings’s regulation steed trotted out of the brush.
“He was waiting for you outside the courthouse,” Hutchings explained, as Roan patted his white beast’s soft nose, and felt in his pocket for a sugar lump. Cruiser nickered and crunched the offering happily. “Didn’t want him locked in the local pound as abandoned.”
“Thank you,” Roan said, swinging up into the saddle. Cruiser whiffled at him softly, and twitched his tall ears. “How many of the others stayed with us?”
“Everybody, sir,” Hutchings said, with pride. “We’re a team, we are. They’ve all sent you their good wishes. Are you ready to ride? I’ve got breakfast we can eat while we travel. Corporal
Lum said he was going to leave a trail for us. Do you think Master Brom left behind any spies or traps for us?”
“Count on it,” Roan said, spurring Cruiser into a trot. “Keep thinking he’ll be two steps ahead of us, because he is.”
Chapter 26
Taboret felt the undercurrent of worry as they shot out of Reverie. Brom had had them make their escape as silently as possible. They had muffled the sound of the motorbike engines as far as the city limits, when the pent-up noise escaped in a mighty roar. By the time anyone had realized they were gone, all there’d been left to catch was dust. Oh, why hadn’t Roan outsmarted them? They’d be nicely arrested now, and sent back to Mnemosyne all safe and sound.
She knew she wasn’t the only one who was afraid. Brom was insane. She stifled the thought as soon as it appeared in her brain, but felt it echoed faintly through the link. Who else had thought so when she did? Taboret let her eyes slew around. Basil must have. Riding at the fore of the Alarm Clock with his shoulders bent under the weight, his head was tilted down just a little more than necessary, to keep anyone from looking directly into his eyes. Who else? Carina? Gano?
But it was a dangerous guessing game to play. Taboret felt an unmistakable chill, and knew the chief scientist himself was looking at her. She didn’t even have to turn around to see. She put rebellious notions straight out of her head, and concentrated on riding five feet—no more, no less—behind Gano’s green steed. Conformity, obedience, and speed were all that was required of her.
Carina’s mount gathered itself to jump a pothole in the road, and landed heavily on the other side, its tires flattening. Bolmer’s, behind her, balked at the gap, and went around it, pushing Glinn’s steed out of line. Taboret was surprised, because it was an easy jump. Instantly, she felt disapproval surge through the link.
“Halt!” Brom shouted. “Bolmer, what is wrong with your motorbike?”
“It’s getting tired, sir,” Bolmer said, revving the handlebars of his bike. It let out a low rumble.
“I noticed it hasn’t been keeping up with the others so well. It could be metal fatigue.” “I’ve noticed a similar weakness,” Glinn said. “Should we be concentrating on incubating new steeds? We have more paperclips.”
“Only if we can breed them straight into motorcycles,” Mamovas, the specialist in inanimate biology, said. “New bikes would go too slowly. Now that the Crown knows where we are, we need to keep moving fast.”
“Knew where we were,” Brom said, firmly. “Besides, that dolt of a police chief did not want to get involved. By the time word comes back to him from the Crown with definite orders to follow us, we will have finished our experiment.”
“Well, the steeds are doing all they can,” Glinn said. “They may have reached the limits of their ability.”
“Then it is time for the next stage,” Brom said. “Plan Sixteen. We will combine them into a single unit, capable of carrying all of us and the Alarm Clock, thereby putting less stress on any single unit. Let us get off the road and prepare the crucible.” They bumped off the road into the heavy, sweet-scented brush, rumbling over reeds and marshy patches. Surprised frogs jumped in every direction to get out of their way. As they rolled into a relatively dry clearing, Glinn raised his hand for them to halt.
“Everyone but Maniune and Acton,” Brom said. “We will need them to remain mobile to guard our passage.”
The mercenaries withdrew to a dry patch to watch, while the others dismounted and stood in a circle around the motorcycles. Taboret took the hands of the people on either side of her. Basil was very short today, standing only waist high to her, and Carina was very tall and bulky, like an oak tree made human. Taboret felt as if she might teeter over leftwards at any moment, but Carina’s strong arm held her upright.
“Plan Sixteen,” Glinn announced, giving them time to call up the memory of its specifications in their minds. No cribbing from notes now. “Mass transportation.”
A haze rose from the swampy ground to envelop the motorcycles, and quickly turned into a whirlwind. In Taboret’s mind’s eye, she saw a buslike vehicle, a horseless carriage with big wheels and padded seats. No, she had overstepped the specs. Someone else’s thoughts corrected hers. Plan Sixteen called for the very minimum of comfort and the maximum of efficiency. The seats had a thin layer of rubber on them to keep passengers from bouncing out. The spinning wind whipped at her cheeks, dragged at her clothes. Inside, the curved forms melded into one large, dark blob that shrunk, melded, then grew outward, acquiring protuberances and angles.
The power ceased to flow. Taboret sensed that someone had broken the circle. She let go of her companions and turned to look. The whirlwind died down at once, revealing a vehicle.
That was the only name she could give it. It wasn’t like anything else she had ever seen. Nor did it match the diagrams that Brom had had them learn before they left Mnemosyne. This was similar, in a perverse way.
On a bed of multiple wheels was a roofless platform on which were arranged leather seats. One would not sit down on them; rather, they would have to be straddled like the backs of rocking horses. In front of each was a kind of metal crossbar to hang onto—all that was left of the motorcy
cle handlebars. The seats were arranged with three pairs on either side of an empty aisle large enough for their luggage and the Alarm Clock. From a quick glance around, she knew she wasn’t the only one dismayed by its appearance.
“It will have to do. Load up, and we’ll be on our way,” Brom said, outwardly unaware of their disapproval. He hopped up on the platform. Hiking the skirts of his robe out of the way, he swung his trousered leg over the saddle at the front of the vehicle. “There is no time to lose. Our pursuers will be delayed only so long in Reverie.”
Taboret could tell at once that the vehicle wasn’t a success. It didn’t have the completed feel of any of their camps or even their artificial nuisances. She hated the way it looked as if it was constructed of spare parts. Instead of riding with dignity past other travelers, she’d be afraid they’d laugh at her.
She felt the faint discomfiture of the others as they took their places. Glinn sat down beside her on his hobby-horse seat, and grasped the metal handlebars. Taboret glanced up at him, and he smiled at her. She was glad he was nearby. He always seemed so confident. On Taboret’s other side, the Alarm Clock hunkered under its canvas covering, a malign lump.
Brom set his foot down on a large floor pedal. The combined engines below the platform jerked into a loud roar, and the vehicle lurched forward. It was so large it had to be turned in a wide circle, mowing down the marsh reeds. Taboret observed as the vehicle crossed its own path that it had four rows of tires underneath, suiting it for heavy duty, though not grace.
Sprays of murky water rose around the edge of the platform to either side. Brom had difficulty at first in steering the makeshift transport. Like the dozen bikes it comprised, it seemed to want to go in several directions at once. When he was finally able to direct it in a straight line, he aimed it back toward the road.
There was now no question that they would have to stay on the main highways all the way to the mountains, Taboret thought. Lucky there were only small habitations between here and there. They’d be easy to follow, and hard to forget. She hoped to the Sleepers, if they existed, that the King’s Investigator would get free and catch up with them in time. But how would that be? When the scientists had pulled out of Reverie, the mob was howling for his blood for the supposed abduction of the princess. He might be lynched, or imprisoned forever. She had heard the legends about Roan, how he had escaped from some terrifying adventures in his time. She hoped he’d pull through this one, too, and quickly.
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