Fleeing Peace

by Sherwood Smith

  CJ closed her eyes. “Okay. And the big rift is real long, like a tear in the world, Clair said. See, she was there a while back, when they closed one by the city of Bereth Ferian.”

  “You can’t make a big one without having at least two small ones to join. And a really big one will join a line of them, close together as they can get ‘em, kind of like stringing beads. That’s why in the past, when there were big rifts, they could move numbers back and forth just like marching from here to that hill over yonder.”

  “So where do the off-worlders come in?” CJ asked.

  “You know that lighters can destroy a huge spell by ending their own lives, but it only works for certain people.”

  “Yes.”

  “Dark magic can force anyone into that position. They are killed, the magic is on them, they get stashed in Norsunder, and if the lighters can’t get to them, then they can’t break the magic. Mirror image.”

  CJ looked sick. “Siamis wants to do that to the off-worlders?”

  Senrid nodded. “They are young. No threat. The drawback is that if they aren’t strong enough to hold the magic, they die, and end up in Norsunder, where they will never gain enough power to come back and make trouble.”

  “Ohhhh, yes,” CJ said, her eyes distant. “Now I see it. Groanboils! That really stinks!”

  Senrid smiled sourly. “Right. Normally death takes you beyond the temporal realm. In Norsunder, you stay, not in it, or quite outside, but alongside. Whether you want to or not.”

  CJ shuddered.

  “That’s why they don’t often do that kind of magic, using a life. The strong victims tend to come back and make trouble.”

  CJ narrowed her eyes. “So why hasn’t he used them if he’s going to?”

  “Because of the drawbacks, is my guess,” Senrid said. “The rift enchantments just aren’t going to be good sized with them. Even using all four. They won’t be able to hold the amount of power he’s going to want. Now, if he had someone who knows dark magic, who can control a lot of power, but who is under his control . . .”

  CJ’s gaze was now uncomfortably direct. “Someone like you.”

  “If he can catch me.” Senrid curled his lip. “Anyway, the question we have to answer is, where is the real rift going to be? So here’s the coast, along which we’ve got Hier Alverian, and so on, down to Chor, and the big bay. West of this land, down toward the Venn, was a huge rift millennia ago. Mages are all busy there, trying to negate attempts to reopen that old rift.”

  CJ shrugged. “That’s not news.”

  “I haven’t finished. I don’t think he’s going there—too many mages expect it. I think he’s making a new one, but where? He’s not going to make a rift that will put his emerging troops in front of a huge body of water and no way to cross it quickly. Or in front of a big mountain range, or anything else that’ll slow ‘em up right at the start. That’s where those mages are starting out wrong. They know nothing about military thinking, and they won’t listen to Winn, who does.”

  “And Clair doesn’t know anything about war junk,” CJ said, “so she won’t be able to tell them.”

  “That’s my part,” Senrid said, with his old grin that showed too many teeth. “We all have our own special knowledge. Clair did her part with the slates. This way we keep track of everyone.”

  CJ nodded.

  Senrid looked down, his gaze distant. “Has to be this coast, here, in the north. He won’t make it too far south, because then he’d have the Venn to face before long. If Liere’s made it over to the Venn side of this region, they’re going to be worse than an angry wasp nest, and even Norsunder respects the Venn in the field.”

  “Even the Marlovens respect the Venn?” CJ asked, digging a little.

  He looked up fast—and saw the tease in her face.

  “Even the Marlovens respect the Venn,” he said. “We tangled with ‘em all up and down the coast of both continents, back in the bad old empire days. Where d’you think we come from? Marlo-ven, Marolo-Venn, Outcasts of the Venn. Anyhow. Gotta be this coast. . . . no big river, but a good port for putting in warships. Big enough . . . Hier Alverian has plenty of good spots. But which?”

  “Don’t ask me,” CJ said. “My way of catching elevens is to sniff the air and see which way it stinks. That is, if I’d ever want to catch any, which I haven’t. So far my preference has been to run soon’s I see ‘em!”

  “I need a good map.” Senrid straightened up. “Back to harassing Winn for his.”

  “I’ll go with you. I hate sitting around waiting for a giant boot to squash us.” CJ snagged her plate, to be dumped in the barrel outside the cook tent. “I want to be doing something.”

  The afternoon shadows were at their longest slant. Soon they’d blur together into the long northern twilight. Another day gone, Senrid thought.

  CJ said, “What I want to know is, why do you want to get the off-worlders back? Besides foiling his plan, and rescuing them, I mean.”

  “Because they could also break the rift. I think.”

  “Ugh!”

  “Oh, not that way. See, they weren’t born here, so they exist outside of magics that ward natives. So they could do the spells and bind a powerful white object, which would get destroyed. But isn’t that a good cause?”

  “Sure,” CJ said. “And if it doesn’t work, no one gets hurt, right?”

  “Except,” Senrid said, “then we are still stuck with a functioning rift. And he might be making it right now.”

  CJ sighed.

  In the west, the sun rimmed the distant mountains.

  Chapter Forty-five

  “I like this country,” Devon said, looking around the capital city of Silver Wood, as she and Liere walked away from the city center. “I sure like it better than that huge, scary place this morning!”

  “Land of the Venn,” Liere said.

  This city was full of flowers, in gardens, along the streets, in window boxes, even visible along balconies and roof terraces. Devon sniffed the balmy air. “Roses!” She loved the glowglobes set on metal poles with brass leaves twining all round them. In their light, though, Liere looked tired.

  “It was kind of strange, wasn’t it?” Liere said. “Strange, but not at all ugly. Who would have thought they would have a city above the ground and another underground, like morvende? But completely unlike.”

  “I thought they were scary.”

  “Scary? Their city is very old. I want to learn about their history.”

  Ugh, Devon thought. But she didn’t say it. Her knees ached and her neck felt like someone had put an invisible iron band round it, and when she looked up at the glowglobes, they had rings around them.

  The streets were full of people laughing, talking, some angry, all busy with one another. The girls had left so quickly that no one knew who they were. Liere had gotten very good at that.

  Devon sighed as she tried to see past all those adults. “Where is Hreealdar? I’m so, so, tired.”

  Liere took Devon’s hand. “I’m sorry, Devon. But we’re done now. This is the end, for we dare not go to the east coast. Siamis and his elevens are there.”

  Devon didn’t ask how she knew. It was enough that she did, that the job was finished.

  Liere knew better than to tell Devon that she felt Siamis’s presence in her dreams, as if he wanted her to know where he was.

  Each day of the past couple of weeks seemed to have gotten longer, and all the places they had visited blurred together in her memory. Where was it the people all had rainbow coloring? What was that place where the queen had fixed them a meal with her own hands, in the hollowed-out goldenwood tree she said reached a thousand years of age before it died in a lightning blast? Devon couldn’t remember any more.

  They reached a bridge. Liere leaned against the rail and looked back at the people in the square, their faces reflected in the light of glowglobes, and of windows in cozy-looking houses with arched, diamond-paned windows.

  Liere made the sign, w
hich was followed by the familiar flash.

  Devon forced her tired body up onto Hreealdar.

  “Last time,” Liere breathed.

  And they transferred to Bereth Ferian.

  The minds around her were bright, clear, a jewelbox of emotion-colors, instead of the muted-gray sameness of those under the enchantment.

  They slid off Hreealdar. Liere leaned against the horse that wasn’t a horse. She closed her eyes. Thank you, she thought. Thank you.

  And from Hreealdar came an outflowing of benediction.

  Then the creature vanished.

  The girls looked up at the night-lit palace, the windows like golden lacework through the leafing birches. From somewhere came the bracing scents of an herb garden.

  They walked inside. A woman in blue and white met them.

  “Is Evend here?” Liere asked. Her voice was going hoarse.

  “She is Sartora,” Devon added, and Liere hid the sharp jab of irritation at the pride in her voice.

  The woman gave them a slight smile. Devon thought of her mother, though this lady looked only a little like her mother—gray eyes and thin. But this lady’s smile was a real smile, not painted, and she looked right at you, and not at your clothes and then away to find her own reflection. “You are most welcome,” the lady said, and the memory disappeared. “Come.”

  The girls followed her swaying robes down a long hall to a room with windows on all sides, and double door. They were open.

  “Here he is,” she said, and she walked away.

  Devon watched her go. That slim back, the gold-glinting hair, again reminded her of her mother—one of the times her hair had been that color.

  Does she miss me at all?

  Probably not. Do I miss her? I don’t know. I hope she’s nicer to my baby brother. But even as she thought it Devon knew that would last exactly as long as her mother had an interest in the baby’s father. Then she’d ignore him just as she had her, while she shopped for a new husband.

  Liere had gone inside. Devon followed down a hall lit by tiny glowglobes to a room with lamplight spilling out. A tall, stooped old man sat in a carved chair, reading

  “Welcome, children,” he said. “I am Evend.”

  “Isn’t it dangerous for you to be here?” Devon burst out.

  “I await Siamis.” Evend spoke the words with calm conviction.

  Devon hunched up.

  Liere said, “There has to be another way. Can’t you use this thing? I’m done now, or nearly.” She pulled the dyr bag from her tunic. “It’s a dyr.”

  “I know what a dyr is. At least, I know as much as anyone knows these days. It was I who trained Erai-Yanya in its protection.”

  “Take it, then. Use it, please. I’m done.” Liere held it out.

  He shook his head. “It is not going to help. Its purpose seems to be restricted to distorting, or augmenting, or manipulating interactions between people, as far as we can discover. It’s useless for anything else.”

  “How about The Guardian’s hatpin?” She unpinned it from the hem of the dyr bag.

  “That is even more useless, I am afraid.”

  Liere felt sick inside. She had been so certain that she had the solution. She remembered, with almost overwhelming shame, sending a little cat on a long perilous journey. How many beings, human, animal, and non-human, waited confidently for Sartora to rescue them yet again? Yet here she stood, ignorant about magic—ignorant about everything, even where she’d been. She was done breaking the enchantment, but there was no feeling of triumph, or even the power she’d feared. How very arrogant that seemed now! She had never felt more stupid in her life.

  “Is Rina all right?” she managed, fighting the sting of tears.

  Evend smiled. “Rina is fine. She stayed a long time with her cousins in Helandrias, and the Lake beings sent her home to Geranda.”

  Liere’s eyes burned as she struggled against the stupid, useless feelings. Weakness! How could one kill them forever, and be free to exist in a mental realm of calm rationality?

  Think!

  She lifted her hand. “Senrid Montredaun-An was sure there was another way.”

  Evend said, “He knows little about our forms of magic. In the meantime, there is danger. You cannot remain here.”

  Liere stared back at him, blinking hard. All this time, all this way—and nothing had happened the way she’d planned. Evend was kind, and good, but he wouldn’t listen to her. She was just an ignorant little girl in his eyes, and the adults would go right on doing what they wanted.

  “You must leave,” Evend said again.

  “Where would I go?” Liere asked, whispering.

  Evend leaned forward, compassion and regret clear in his old face. “Surely you, of all people, would find a welcome anywhere you chose.”

  Liere drew in a shuddering breath. “No. Sartora would. Not me. Nobody wants stupid Liere Fer Eider.” Not even my family. She didn’t say it; she knew it wasn’t true. The truth was she no longer wanted them, or rather, she no longer could bear being shoved into the back of a shop to count yarns, and beat dust out of rugs, and sweep floors after her brothers ran in and out on deliveries; she could no longer bear her father scorning her for inappropriate curiosity about the world outside South End, could no longer bear her mother’s hurt silences when Father’s temper smashed the family harmony she longed for, could no longer bear Marga’s unquestioning happiness—or Brother Elesier’s silent unhappiness at being kept away from the kitchens.

  Was there no one, besides little Devon here, who wanted the company of Liere Fer Eider?

  Senrid. She could see his face, so vividly—his near sacrifice.

  She looked up. “Is Senrid is here?”

  “Near enough.” Evend said kindly, “He is with my heir, helping with the efforts to deflect the Norsundrians. My allies will transport you in a wagon. It will take all night. “ His old eyes took in Devon’s drooping form. “You can rest during the journey.”

  Devon’s pleading gaze decided Liere. “Thank you,” she said.

  And very soon they lay on quilts under more quilts, with empty baskets piled on top to hide them.

  Devon dropped promptly into slumber.

  Liere lay awake, her body exhausted, her mind reeling. Someday she would be able to remember the places she’d been, the people she’d encountered so briefly. But what to do about Evend? Don’t think about the rift . . . don’t feel. There has to be a solution.

  She’d find Senrid, and ask him.

  Senrid.

  Liere thought of Kerendal, Prince of the Venn, a boy not much older than she. He’d had Senrid’s coloring, only more intense: golden hair instead of blond, and eyes so dark a blue they seemed violet. But there the resemblance ended, for Kerendal, though young, was already tall, and strong from whatever training had fashioned Rel to move the way he did. The physical resemblance ended there, but not the intensity of personality.

  Show me on the map where you’ve been, Kerendal had asked, there in the awe-inspiring halls of his ancestors, gazing at her with the kind of hungry focus Liere knew from her own days of mental starvation. And when she had to confess she could not name the kingdoms she’d been in and out of so swiftly, he’d nodded, in sympathy, not scorn, and said, Show me the magic object? We are forbidden magic here, because my forefathers always used it to make war.

  Amid images of the wind-battered ancient city of Twelve Towers, she slid into sleep.

  o0o

  That same morning, not far distant, a figure emerged from the ocean onto a beach, having spotted kids her own age.

  The four kids she’d seen from the water stared in somewhat muddled bemusement to see a girl more or less their own age swim to the shore and step up carefully, as if she found walking difficult, her dress soggy with brine. Nobody had seen her go into the water.

  One of the four disappeared up the beach; by the time the girl had paused to wring out her hair and skirts as best she could, the kid was back, having been joined by a
man.

  Kyale Marlonen was relieved that the grownup didn’t look like any eleven or Marloven or other such creep.

  The man walked down the shore to join her. “Had a long swim?” he asked.

  He seemed friendly enough. In the background, the kids all smiled.

  Kyale said, “I have. A month! At least. Maybe longer! It’s hard to count days when you’re in the ocean bottom. The seafolk don’t really talk, except if you go up for air.”

  “Why would so young a girl undertake so long a journey?”

  “I’m a princess,” Kitty replied, chin elevated. “It’s my duty to see to the safety of my brother. Who’s a king! No one else will. Not that they even know what a princess is down there, but they did know where Bereth Ferian is, and pointed me in the right direction, and the last time, said this beach was the best place for me to come up to land.”

  “I see.” He smiled. “Well done, your highness.”

  She grinned, pleased at last to be properly addressed by someone with a notion of proper protocol!

  “So when I was swimming in, I saw those kids. I figure, I’m safe where there are kids. And all the rest of the coastline is all rocky and full of weeds and things.”

  “It is,” the man agreed. “That’s why we are here.”

  “As for which princess I am,” she went on importantly, though the man had not asked, “I am Her Royal Highness Princess Kyale Marlonen of Vasande Leror, and I’m looking for my brother, His Majesty King Leander Tlennen-Hess of Vasande Leror.”

  “I regret to inform you he is not here, your royal highness,” the man said.

  Kyale loved it when people were impressed—if they really were impressed. Was he laughing at her? He was definitely smiling, and so were all those kids.

  She wondered if she might have sounded maybe a little pompous. She had an uneasy feeling that the Mearsiean girls would have thought so, and she admired them. But a person had a right to be proud of her birth! Even if her mother had turned out to be a rotter.

  “Well,” she said, “you can call me Princess Kitty if you don’t like long titles, and some of my royal friends don’t. Anyway, can you direct me to where Evend and all the others are? I’ve got to keep an eye on my brother to make sure he doesn’t get cabbaged by that picayune pickle-face Siamis and his nasty bunch of bunions.”