An obvious trap, yet Meric was tempted. Even Trajan’s tricks could go awry. His arrogance could prove his undoing. Meric might dodge the old man’s magic, might prove faster and craftier than expected.
“What’s the matter? Need a weapon for the Wildlands?”
A sword materialized and dropped into the dust. Meric gaped at it.
“Not enough?”
Bladed weapons clattered around him. Meric backed away, thoughts thick with terror. Those blades were forming from the Fog…
He bolted.
The air thickened, became gray water. He pushed through it. It thickened further. He was running through goo, through wet cement. His muscles strained. His legs slowed. Concrete encased him from the neck down.
Trajan circled to Meric’s front. Ten steps away, he raised a knife in one hand, took aim, and threw. The blade spun toward Meric’s face … and broke into a million pieces, a mass of gray grit that pelted him like warm sand.
“Seen that trick? Gallatius was overly fond of it,” Trajan said. “Sadly, it was by far his kindest joke. If you’d heard the tales I’ve heard, you’d shudder at the name. For a time it was rumored he hadn’t used Fog to color the floors of his palace. It was said he’d mixed red paint with Plebian blood. I’m inclined to tell you there are no demons, but when it comes to Gallatius, I may revise my opinion.”
Meric’s expression was unfathomable. He looked down at the gray mass encasing his body. Not black magic. Fog. Was there any difference? Yes. Because magic was a dark mystery, but Fog was God’s gift to man. His Divine Instrument. The embodiment of His Will. And only a Plutarch could Speak to it.
Meric’s eyes glazed over. Though the concrete cracked and sloughed away, he labored for breath. He couldn’t draw enough. Some part of him was suffocating. He’d lost all avenues to denial.
Trajan is a Plutarch. A real Plutarch.
He vomited. He wanted to keep vomiting. He wanted to vomit out his feelings and thoughts and expectations, his past and his future. When he could speak again, with a trembling voice, he said:
“I thought you were a demon once, but you’re worse. You were one of God’s Chosen. Yet you turned against your own kind. You’re here, with the savages, in this godless place. You’re the fallow land where the holy seed would not take. You are fallen.”
Trajan considered him before speaking.
“Truth has begun its surgery. It has taken a scalpel to your mind, but you’re like an animal that rips out its stitches. You fight that which would heal you. Be brave enough to face this, Meric. Your roots were sunk in salted soil, your first steps taken on unclean ground. Your parents were lied to, and their parents were lied to, and the people who look down on you from the heights, the ones who watch over you from the pinnacle of your culture–they wove a web of lies to ensnare you from birth. They tell you their word is truth, that it’s holy, that the life they’ve structured is the best and only option–but it’s all designed for one thing and one thing only: to keep them in control.”
“Monstrous. You’re monstrous,” Meric breathed, signing himself.
“I can’t blame you for thinking so. The Plutarchs’ lies are sprinkled with truths. They twist the two around each other until you can’t tell one from another. And now you are loathe to part with either, because you took good feelings and noble intentions, and you wrapped them around those lies without knowing it. The programming that imprisons you is integrated into the depths of your mind.
“I used to be a Plutarch, yes. I liked what I was. I played the game. I took part in ceremonies. I uttered the platitudes spoken by my kind–the sayings that took away our doubts, that made us believe we’d earned what was given to us, that you deserved to toil for our benefit. I didn’t personally take advantage of any Plebians. Few of us did. We were just part of the system. But I got older–much older than I look–and I began to dislike the niches carved out for us. I saw that our goals were structured not to progress–but to suppress. Not to change but to preserve. In trying to survive, we had stagnated as a species, and we were doing everything possible to keep it that way.”
Trajan paced, looking into the Fog. Meric watched, wiping his mouth with the back of a shaking hand.
“It wasn’t always this way. The Fog began with a dream. A promise for all mankind. The power to create anything, anywhere, anytime–think of it! We could have been to the stars by now, Meric. We could be living in a utopia. Instead, we’re here, and most of the world is dead. Why? Because the Fog is only a tool, and it was used by corrupt men for corrupt purposes. They gripped it like children with a new toy, and then they did what all children do–they made sure no one could take it from them. To prevent war, they went to war. To prevent death, they killed. The Fog became a terrible weapon, even against those it was meant to serve. Machines don’t care where their programs come from. It’s the same to them whether they make a teddy bear or a hatchet, whether they cut stone or flesh. And here is the end result of all that scheming…”
Trajan raised his arms to the Fog.
“Ozymand?” Meric asked.
“A dead city in a dead world. Patches of Fog like this are few and far between. Accidental survivors. The Fog was a powerful tool, but it was not the last of our ancestors’ creations. Just as the sword inspired the shield, the Fog inspired RFI. Residual Field Interference. Satellites were launched–machines which circled the Earth, watching, waiting, hidden in the blackness. A preventative threat, a check on the Fog’s power, but one that was never meant to be used. When the fear was great enough, when their masters were desperate enough, someone turned a key, someone pushed a button. ‘Divine rays’ bathed the planet. The bedrock of the Earth itself was altered. Static fields arose–spaces in which no electronic components could operate. RFI. A deathblow for the Fog. You know that event by a different name: the Smiting.
“The old world died that day. Malicious programs had already spread through the Fog, killing untold millions–millions, Meric. Imagine our paltry thousands compared to that. When the satellites were triggered, Fog-cities died all over the world. The offending programs died with them, but the end result was even worse. The effects of the RFI lingered. They did not fade as expected. Men were robbed of the power behind all their most advanced technologies, their transportation, their means of acquiring food, their whole way of life. Mass starvation followed. Rioting, chaos, a descent into barbarism. Civilization faltered. Except in those rare patches of land which escaped the deluge. Places like Panchaea.”
Meric began to walk away. He could no longer bear the words. No barrier formed to stop him, though Trajan followed on the edge of sight. Doubts overwhelmed him. It couldn’t be true. Panchaea was not a lucky survivor. It was the Holy City. The Plutarchs were not out for their own good…
Why wouldn’t they be? a voice whispered.
“They’re God’s Chosen,” he mumbled.
How do you know?
“It’s all a test. The Wildlands test the faithful.”
It became his mantra.
In that first instant of discovery, Ozymand had been something of a comfort. The Fog had brought familiar sensations, associations with home, friends, family. Now it only obscured his vision. Was there no end to it? Where was the corridor? Everything was gray. He was lost in the haze. Trajan stared at him.
“Just go away,” Meric pleaded.
“So we say to change when it knocks on our door. But I did not make this journey just for you. Come.”
Trajan led him back toward the entrance-corridor. The fluorescent lights reappeared, the silhouettes of Azog and Nog. Trajan halted. His brow came down in concentration. A slim gray line the length of Meric’s arm coalesced a meter from his face. Slowly, the line became an atomblade. The atomblade floated to the edge of the corridor and dropped onto a wheeled platform. The platform too had formed from the Fog. When Meric looked back at Trajan, another atomblade was already taking shape.
“Knives are easy to make, but an atomblade requires prec
ision on a microscopic level. They take longer to perfect. Anything less can’t pierce fogplate. Thanks to Ozymand, my people are on a more even footing with those poor fools they send against us. With the pawns of the Plutarchs.”
He gave Meric a meaningful look.
Meric was numb. He had to escape–not the physical escape he’d considered earlier. A more complete escape, from existence itself. He stumbled toward the corridor.
“Take him to the surface,” Trajan called after him.
At the lift, he fumbled with the yellow box. Nog took it from him and pressed a button.
In the sunlight outside the hollow hill, Meric fell to his knees. Savages watched him. Meliai chewed her lip, an oddly feminine touch on a creature so wild. Wordlessly, Meric sat in the grass and covered his face with his hands. He’d never felt more alone.
*
Trajan spent a day forming goods from the Fog. Select savages unloaded them from the lift; Hestia and others refused to enter the hollow hill at all. The steamcar was loaded to capacity, leaving only a narrow center isle between stacked crates of supplies.
Still, Trajan was back in Ozymand the next morning. If the steamcar was packed, what was he doing? Meric stared at the door in the hill with a mixture of repugnance and fascination. No one stopped him when he walked toward it. Meliai put a hand on his arm, alarm in her eyes, but she let go. Azog joined him on the lift, uneasy again as they descended toward the Fog. The muscled savage had shown no trace of the terrifying fury displayed at Jarl’s Ravine. Meric wanted to hate him for killing Horus, but he couldn’t always find the anger.
War takes what it will.
Trajan’s silhouette was visible a short distance into the Fog. The Plutarch was sitting ten meters off the ground, legs folded, a dense haze supporting him. Something was whirling, circling, dancing all around him. Spade-shaped blades. Dozens of them, possibly hundreds, moving too fast to count. The blades swirled in mesmerizing patterns, circles within circles, spirals, ellipses, figure-eights. They merged into groups, flew together and scattered just as quickly, a storm with Trajan at their center. Meric stood transfixed.
The blades began to synchronize. It became less a storm and more a symphony. A tight circle of knives revolved around Trajan. Others joined in, forming larger and smaller circles. Some revolved one way, some the other. The Plutarch was encased in a spinning sphere of blades. Then the sphere itself rotated around another axis. The blades changed color, morphing through bright hues, through green and blue and red and gold.
At last, the savage-king threw his arms wide. The knives flew outward in every direction, exploding in a shower of glittering golden shards. The shards fell, dissipating into gray mist, until there was only the Fog.
Trajan descended.
Meric was speechless. No wonder the savages thought the man a sorcerer. Yet Trajan’s eyes were sad. He walked past Meric, leading him out of the Fog.
“The Dance of a Thousand Knives,” Trajan said, walking down the corridor.
“I’ve never seen such a thing,” Meric said.
“Of course not. The Dance is an annual performance and competition among the Plutarchs. Each competitor develops their own unique piece, and they’re never repeated. It’s difficult to control so much of the Fog at once. The more you take on, the riskier it gets. You can easily make a mistake and run yourself through. It’s happened before, believe me. Many years ago, there was a skilled Plutarch by the name of Oryn. His concentration was astonishing. His Dance was done with double-sided axes. Yet one day he conjured a few too many. He made one slip–and lopped off his own head. Gallatius, the bastard, formed a headless silver statue in front of his palace–‘in tribute,’ he claimed. It was there a few days before Abraxas was finally moved to cast it down.”
Meric walked in a daze. It was difficult to fathom that he was walking with a Plutarch. He couldn’t accept all of Trajan’s wild claims, but that much he couldn’t deny. No one but a Plutarch could speak to the Fog. To hear of life in the clouds in such a casual way…
Aboveground, the savages were preparing to depart. Trajan rode in the steamcar. Meric was allowed to walk with the others. His wrists and feet were bound once more, though with enough slack to take a step. The exercise was a welcome distraction. He liked walking next to Meliai as well, despite her obvious savagery.
At noon, they stopped for a meal. Meliai went into the forest and came back bearing fruit. When he saw what she offered in her purple-stained hand, Meric laughed.
“Blackberries!” he said, almost hysterical.
“You do not like?” Meliai asked, eyes flashing.
“Oh, I like very much. It’s just … I used to grow these.”
“Fruit is born in the womb of the Goddess. It is filled with gaija.”
“Uh, yes. Thank you.”
For the first time since he’d known her, Meliai flashed a smile. Meric closed his eyes and relished the berries. How had he ever grown tired of them? They tasted like home.
“Delicious,” he mumbled.
“Bah, you should try my blackberry tart,” Nog said. “The Goddess gives us the basic ingredients. It’s up to us to combine them into the proper flavor.”
“The food of the Goddess is beyond improvement,” Meliai snapped.
“I know your views, little honeycomb. Go feast on your roots and berries. I’ll save my nosh for more refined palettes.”
Meliai’s nostrils flared.
“Your squirrel has more sense than you,” she said, giving a disdainful twist and stalking away.
Meric didn’t see her again for several hours. As they walked, she sidled up to him silently, carrying a small mound of blackberries wrapped in thick green leaves. Her arm brushed against him, and his heart quickened.
“The Goddess blesses us,” she said, plucking a berry from the pile, holding the leafy bowl out for Meric. He took some with a sad smile. He’d been thinking about Reed, who idolized him despite their differences. Reed probably thought he was dead. His mother too, and Dominus … and Swan. He felt suddenly very far from everyone he’d ever known.
“What is it like in the Fog?” Meliai asked.
Meric opened his mouth to answer … and couldn’t. The question was too big.
“Gray,” he said, frowning. He’d spent his whole life in Panchaea. Couldn’t he come up with something better than ‘gray?’ Sure, it wasn’t nearly as colorful as the wider world, and the air was harder to breathe, and the sun wasn’t as bright but…
But what? It was safe? It was home? He tried to think of something else, something great about Panchaea. Instead, he remembered the excitement and fear which had filled him in his first days outside. The way the sun lit up the grass, the greenery stretching further than he’d ever seen. That feeling of first entering the forest. Meliai’s green eyes hidden in the trees. Simple things, but things which had amazed him.
He looked at Meliai. He couldn’t imagine her in Panchaea.
“You wouldn’t like it,” he told her.
“Do you like it?” she asked.
“Of course. I serve the Plutarchs.”
Her eyebrows went up. Meric was unsatisfied by his own answer. He grew angry. He thought of asking Meliai if she liked living in the Wildlands, but the answer was obvious. She was as much a part of the forest as the animals in the trees. As much a part of it as the…
Whitecrowns.
The white-capped mushrooms poked out of the grass beneath his boots. Droves of them. Which meant the Great River was only a few kilometers ahead…
The plan came fully formed, as if he’d thought of it long ago and only just remembered. He let it sit quietly in his thoughts, afraid to frighten it off. Could it work? There was a chance. He had to risk it.
Meric tripped over his bootlaces and fell headlong into a patch of mushrooms. Some of the savages laughed. Meliai helped him up. As they moved on, she talked about the Goddess and the Priestess Ishka, and how Ishka had told her a great secret in the wake of her mother’s death, but
Meric was tense and distracted.
Near dinnertime, they reached the river. The black mammoth, which had grown grumpy and reluctant in the last hour, lowered its massive trunk and drank its fill. Trajan emerged from the steamcar, gazing up and down the riverbank. He consulted the tribesmen. Meric drifted closer to listen.
“Those boulders look familiar,” Hestia said.
“I thought so. That was the bend we noted, wasn’t it? We’re only a kilometer or two north then,” Trajan said.
Inwardly, Meric was bursting. He would’ve risked a swim, but the pontoon was even better. Nog was building the bones of a fire. Three savages were moving toward the river with nets and skinnyguns. Meric had figured they would sup somewhere near the river, but to do so on the very bank was more than he’d hoped for. He couldn’t have asked for a clearer sign.
“Need a hand?” Meric asked.
Nog paused, straightening over the logs he’d been arranging. The cook was among the more amicable savages, but Meric had never offered to help before. Hestia laughed in passing.
“He’s fogged. Thinks he’s one of us now,” she said, continuing toward the river.
“Bah. Will be soon enough, most like. Seen it with the others. Something about this trip always gets to ‘em,” Nog said.
Meric shrugged.
“Better than standing around. A man should contribute to his dinner. But if you don’t want help…” Meric trailed off, turning away.
“Hell, I suppose it may save some time. Pick up those logs. Do you even know how to build a fire?” Nog asked.
Meric nodded.
Nog looked doubtful, but he retrieved the cauldron from the steamcar and gathered herbs as Meric arranged the logs. Mobius perched on the edge of a supply crate, gnawing on a pecan. All legionnaires were trained in outdoor survival. Meric had practiced setting fires on the march north. He couldn’t do it nearly as well as the savages, but he managed to get the kindling smoldering. The cook broke into a smile.
“Soon enough you’ll be marrying into the tribe, just like that old bastard,” Nog said, pointing in Trajan’s direction.
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