They were in a Blue Seas Resort motel room in the town of Broome on Australia’s far northwestern coast. He had placed Capie’s stasis field on one of the queen-sized beds in the room so that he could keep a close eye on her. Daneel’s quantum computer was sitting on a small desk, while the yokai mirror was perched on a window ledge leaning up against the room’s single window, facing outward so that Ariel-Leira could see the beach road and the ocean beyond. From all that Paul could tell, the mirror woman was still having the time of her life with all of the new sights available to her.
Sitting on the end of the bed, Paul solemnly studied Capie’s face. It suddenly occurred to him that the field might have been a temporary spell and that, as such, it might have collapsed when separated from its creator. However, as it turned out, that obviously had not been the case.
He shivered in realization that he had not considered that possibility the previous day, when he had sent Hamadi onward to Cartier Island and had kept Capie with him, thus separating the two of them by 7,000 miles. If the presence of Hamadi had been necessary to sustain the field and if Capie had been injured or even killed by the sudden collapse of said field—
Luck had worked in his favor. This time. But it had been stupid of him not to have considered it and taken precautions.
On the other hand—a new thought occurred to him. Maybe the other wizard’s talisman was the answer. Paul had kept it with him, except during that interval in time in Tibet, during the trip into Rutog, when he had left it with Capie, Daneel, and the mirror woman. For that quick trip, he had taken McDougall’s talisman instead. So, yes, Hamadi’s talisman had been near Capie ever since Paul’s arrival at the castle. The talisman could well be linked to the stasis field, especially considering what Ariel-Leira had explained to Paul that it would take to get Capie out of the field.
He sighed heavily, rocking back on the bed. All those things were secondary right now, even Daneel’s death and the causes thereof. He needed to focus on what should come next.
Capie looked very unnatural, not moving, not even breathing. Watching her, Paul’s feelings were very decidedly mixed. He was immensely relieved to have her back with him, naturally enough. Her…shall it be said, ‘temporary absence’…had been so traumatic for him, painful even now to even think about. It was like having a piece of him hacked off with a meat cleaver.
To see her like this though, suspended in time in the stasis field was nearly as traumatic. He wanted so much to reach out and hold her, to touch her, to reassure her that everything was alright and that everything from now on would continue to be alright.
Turning back to regard his wife, Paul struggled with his feeling of unease, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. For some reason, he found it very difficult to swallow.
“You know, honey,” he said, admiring yet again her beautiful face. “I finished dealing with Hamadi last night. I’ve got him and his Oni encased in stasis fields just like yours, stashed away on Cartier Island. Well, that’s not quite correct. They are no longer on the island but are tucked away in an excavated cavern fifty feet below the coral reef that surrounds the island. No one is ever going to find them in that location.
“I learned a lot about the casting of stasis spells in the process,” Paul patiently explained. “And I am pretty confident that I can now get you out of your stasis field without risking your life. I was very anxious to do just that last night, right after I tucked Hamadi away. However, both Merlin and Ariel-Leira stopped me. Both of them convinced me to wait. Indeed, they both advised me that the removal ceremony should take place in a familiar location that is dear to you, such as in a house where you have lived.” He sighed. “And when both of them agree on something, then it’s probably a good idea for me to listen to what they’re saying.
“You see, they know—and I do as well—that you have been through a very traumatic experience. I don’t know exactly what you saw when Hamadi took you captive. You might have seen some of those kids that you went to save get killed. Or not. But at the very least, you were held prisoner and interrogated. And, when you come out of stasis, I will have the unpleasant task of telling you not only that some of those children in Israel were killed but that Daneel too died and that he died rescuing the two of us.
“I know how hard that is going to hit you, how devastating the news will be for you. You will need all the help and support that I can give you. I wish that I could take you to your home in Illinois before I take you out of stasis. I totally agree that your house there would be the best possible location for the ceremony. But I’m sorry. That is just not possible. Even the rental house in San Jose is not an option. And even the York hotel in Kalgoorlie won’t work. Not enough open floor space available there. The best that I can do for you will be Warehouse 13. So, right after we leave here, I will take you there.
“Know this, CB, my sweetheart: I love you more than life itself. I would spare you any further heartache, if I could. And I will do all in my power to help you after you are released from this spell. Rest easy for now. As soon as I can get you to Kalgoorlie, we will tackle this hardship together and help you through this time of great trial. I will be with you, always and forever.”
• • • •
The stage for the ceremony was set. Capie and the stasis field rested in the center of the largest space available in Warehouse 13, lying on the concrete floor.
Around the perimeter of the stasis field, at each corner, Paul had placed a single candle and a small portion of incense in a censer. A snap of his fingers had been enough to ignite both. Since he had far more incense than needed for this ceremony, he took a moment to stuff some in his wallet. He never knew when he might need some in a tight spot. Right.
Daneel’s quantum computer was not present. Paul felt it unwise to let Capie see it until she at least had a little time to deal with the reality of his death. So he had stored the hardware, Daneel’s ‘physical body,’ at the Staging Area instead.
The yokai mirror was also not present but was instead in their York Hotel room. Paul did not want the mirror to be a distraction during the procedure, lest it interfere, or worse, succeed in confusing or upsetting Capie in some fashion. However, Merlin was standing by, on the opposite side of the field, observing the situation intently.
With a wave of his hand, Paul lowered the lighting level in the building.
The warehouse was taking on a very pleasant odor from the burning of the incense, almost hypnotic in its effects. Together with the low light, the room was nearly mystical. With a wave of his hand, all of the censers, candles and the stasis field rose gracefully into the air, upward until they hovered four feet above the concrete floor.
“It is time,” Paul firmly stated. Yes, he wanted his wife out of the field. Now. But he was concerned about the emotional impact that she was going to be put through.
Paul laid Hamadi’s talisman on the stasis field, almost directly over the center of Capie’s heart.
He glanced over at Merlin. “Are you ready?”
“Yes, of course. Please proceed, Paul. It’s time to get her out of there,” Merlin responded.
Paul tried to clear the sudden lump in his throat. “In the names of Roger Zelazny, J.K. Rowling and J.R.R. Tolkien, may the spell that cast this stasis field be gently and slowly removed, that the person enclosed within resume her life as normally as when the spell was first cast, with health in the marrow of her bones, strength in her muscles and in her sinews, her intellect restored and her memories fully intact.”
For several moments, nothing seemed to be happening, but then Paul noticed that the sheen of the stasis field was slowly diminishing, becoming a tiny bit dimmer with each passing moment.
“It’s working, Paul,” whispered Merlin with a cautious grin.
Paul merely nodded in agreement, his breath caught in his throat.
The process in removing the spell appeared to be exactly backwards to creating a stasis field. Paul noted it was just like what had happened to H
amadi and his Oni when he had emplaced them in stasis fields, only now the process was occurring in reverse.
It took a full two minutes until the field fully disappeared. The censers and candles floated free, gradually lowering themselves to the floor. Now only Capie floated in midair, the talisman lying on her chest.
Her breath caught and suddenly she was gasping for air. Paul physically pulled the talisman from her, letting it fall slowly to the floor. Stretching forth his hand and putting it between her shoulder blades, he rotated her to a vertical position, setting her down gently on her feet. Then, stepping up close to her, Paul took both of her hands in his own, squeezing them tightly.
Her eyelids fluttered and opened, snapping up to look at him in shock and stunned surprise.
“Welcome back to the land of the living, Sleeping Beauty,” Paul whispered, leaning over to kiss her gently on the lips. “Welcome home.”
At first, Paul saw no recognition in her eyes. Her expression looked haunted, confused, and empty, all rolled into one. And then, as if all her memories had come flooding back to her in one fell swoop, Capie’s expressed transformed itself into one of horror and shock.
“Oh, Paul! Paul!” she moaned in an almost inaudible voice.
And she leapt into his arms, sobbing fiercely and hanging on to him like a drowning victim.
“Oh, Paul!” she whispered again, this time in his ear.
He hugged her tightly in return and for a minute, neither one of them spoke.
“Oh, Paul!” she cried through her tears. “Thank God, it’s you! Oh, Paul! Thank God!”
“How are you doing?” he anxiously asked her, his stomach churning. “Anything broken? Are you in pain anywhere?”
“Only my soul!” she exclaimed as she pulled back gently, rubbing her eyes with the back of one hand. “It’s like a very heavy weight has been set directly on my heart. Even breathing is hard work. Oh, God, Paul! They were waiting for me! They staged the kidnapping of those innocent children, to set a trap for me! And that monster killed two children right in front of me! God, that evil fiend! That—that…”
Paul held her close and gently stroked her hair. “You’re safe now. And he’s been taken care of. You’re safe, my dear.”
Capie looked down, more tears streaming from her eyes. “Oh, Paul! Thank you for being here and for saving me! I don’t know how you did it…” And then she looked around the room, her eyes reflecting her growling puzzlement.
“Paul? Daneel? Is he back at the hotel room?” She looked at Paul, then rubbed her arms anxiously. “Where is Daneel?”
Paul glanced away, shuffling his weight from foot to foot. “Capie? I don’t know how to tell you this, but Daneel didn’t make it.”
“Oh, God, no!” she whispered, her eyes opened wide in horror and shock again. “No, no, NO! Don’t tell me… Daneel is DEAD?!”
Paul gulped and made himself look at her, his voice quavering. “You’d have been proud of him, dear. He died saving both of our lives.”
“No, no, it can’t be true!” she wailed. “No, God, no! No, God, NO!” And at that point, she lost her voice, falling into his arms and bursting into rivers of bitter tears.
• • • •
She cried most of the afternoon.
Paul took her to the Fitzgerald River Park, west of Esperance, Australia, to a high cliff above the sea. There they could see the rugged Australian coast line and the endless ocean waves beating against the foot of the sheer rugged cliff walls.
As they vacantly stared at the bleak but beautiful landscape, Capie was able to choke out her story in small segments. She confessed how, on a previous trip to the Middle East, she had been confronted by Oni (which explained to Paul how they had known enough to set a trap for her). On her arrival in Syria at the school house where the Israeli children hostages were, she had snuck past the Syrian soldiers into the room where the hostages were being held. One of the children had turned toward her and held out an odd-looking golden oval medallion, embossed with intricate symbols, lines and scrolls. As soon as Capie had touched it, she had been instantly paralyzed and unable to move. She had fought hard against the spell, but had not been able to break its grip.
That was when Hamadi had shown up, laughing at her, slapping her hard in the face. Much worse, he had proceeded to torture and murder two of the children in front of her, to prove how little Normies meant to him and to punish Capie for interfering in his plans.
Then she had been whisked to some castle somewhere in Europe, she had been told, and tortured and questioned in multiple sessions. Some sort of odd looking small mirror had been used during the interrogations. And, much to her shame, she had told the evil wizard everything that he had wanted to know.
When she had finished, a sorrowful Paul had shared his part of the story with her, including how Daneel had saved both of them and paid the ultimate price for having done so.
At nightfall, they watched a reddened sun sink slowly behind an inky tempestuous sea. By mutual agreement, they portaled to the Four Seasons Resort at Bali Jimbaran Bay, in Indonesia, an international five-star hotel with spectacular vistas of Jimbaran Bay and Mount Agung. After dining at the exquisite Oceanside restaurant, they retired for the night to an elegant and charming villa. Despite the superlative accommodations, neither one of them slept at all well that night.
• • • •
“Thank you, Dom,” Capie sincerely told her husband two days later.
Fresh from their return from Indonesia and parts of Western Australia, the two of them were standing in the Staging Area, not doing much of anything at the moment. Just standing there, in the late afternoon sun, looking at the Sirius Effort and all the hardware and supplies just lying around.
Paul cocked his head to one side, puzzled. “For what, CB?”
“For not saying ‘I told you so,’” Capie said, with a heavy sigh.
“You did what you felt to be right,” Paul said, folding his arms and giving her a shrug of his shoulders. “What you felt to be necessary.”
She sighed, looking down at the ground. “So, what do we do now?” she plaintively asked. “All this effort. All of this cost. All of the time spent. Was it all for nothing?” Capie strolled over to the ship, reaching out to lightly touch one of the engine nozzles.
Paul shrugged listlessly before replying. “Daneel’s hardware is still intact. I can resurrect his files from storage, use the California supercomputers to rebuild him.”
“But why?” Capie challenged him, but in a deadpan voice, lacking any real emotional tones. “If he can’t handle magical powers, what’s the point? What’s the point of all of this?” She nodded at the ship. “Or the trip to Mars. If there are no Scotties, if there can never be any Scotties, then why bother. Face it, Paul. You need to re-evaluate your plan. We might possibly need a totally new one.”
Paul grimaced but said nothing.
Capie turned from the ship and sighed. Obviously, her husband needed time to reach the same conclusion that she had.
“Let’s stay in Hotel York tonight,” she suggested with a small smile. “In the morning, when you are ready, we need to talk, make some decisions.”
Paul again failed to say anything, simply nodding.
Capie formed the portal back to Kalgoorlie, taking Paul by the hand, and with another understanding smile, led him through.
• • • •
The next morning, as Paul ducked into the bathroom for his morning shower, Capie rolled gently out of bed and walked over to the room’s single window.
Pulling open the heavy curtains, she noted with surprise a large picture frame sitting on the window ledge, the back of the frame in her direction.
“What’s this?” she asked, touching her throat in surprise. “Did Paul do this? I wonder.”
And she reached out, grasping the frame and turning it around. It was actually quite heavy and bulky but she managed to spin it around without the use of a magical spell.
“It’s a mirror! Oh
, a perfectly lovely mirror too! I wonder if Paul was planning to give it to me as a gift and he forgot, during everything that has happened. Such a nice frame too!”
She gripped the mirror, lugging it from the window sill over to the room’s small desk, parking it there so that it leaned against the wall but now facing the room.
“There!” she declared with a cocky smile, stepping back farther away from the desk to admire her handiwork. “Much better than the bathroom mirror. I can do my hair and makeup in here.”
Seeing the mirror reminded her of the small Truth Mirror that had been used to interrogate her and her smile faded away, her lips curling, her eyes cold and hard.
“Hamadi! That venomed beetle-headed varlet! That churlish lily-livered toad! That villainous misbegotten scullion!”
“Me lady, whoa! That last one, never have I heard before! Inventive! Appropriate too!” exclaimed Ariel-Leira as she materialized in the center of the mirror. This time, she was wearing a long flowing white dress, with lots of lace and loose folds. Combined with her jet black hair and eyelashes, the effect was quite stunning.
Capie froze stock still in total surprise, her mouth dropping slowly open, her eyes as large and as round as DVDs.
For several seconds, she was unable to say a word.
“Your tongue, cat got?” Ariel-Leira asked with a knowing smirk.
“Who the heck are you?” Capie was finally able to whisper.
“Me, little ole?” the mirror woman asked in feigned innocence, and an arrogant chuckle. “Mirror folk, never met before? Shame it is. Loss is yours.”
Paul picked that moment to pop open the bathroom door and walk into the room, sans clothing or even a bath towel.
“Honey, have you seen my razor? I could have sworn—”
“Whooot whooo!”
The wolf whistle, not from Capie to his left, instead came from his right, from the desk. Belatedly, he realized that the mirror woman was there, with her eyebrows raised and displaying a wide wicked grin.
“Oh, my…!” Paul blurted out, his face turning red as he spun and dashed back through the open bathroom doorway.
Orders of Magnitude (The Genie and the Engineer Series Book 2) Page 30