‘No excuses: we keep trying.’ Caliper lurched to his feet and brushed his fingers over stacked trays of brooches and necklaces, and onto a sickly white mask shaped for people his size.
Terelian gasped, and Caliper’s vision blurred as distances swelled around him. He looked up, and Christina’s image glided through a stack of crates. Her satin robe drifted around her as the mounds of exhibits seemed to shift further away. Terelian’s fretted prayers sounded as if they’d travelled a hundred yards, and Caliper heard a distant twittering.
Christina gazed at him. ‘We must hurry.’
‘We never have time together, but I know you’re close. Have you seen Phos, the girl who came with us?’
‘You must travel below to reach me. There is….’ Her image and voice both faded for three heartbeats before returning. ‘…white mask renders the newer walls transparent. Time has blocked many paths, but breach the barriers, and you’ll find me.’
‘What’s she saying?’ Mitch’s voice had become a high-pitched, metallic rasp.
‘I wear the mask?’
Christina drew closer and crouched before lifting her hand to hover one inch from his cheek. ‘The mask will help you find my physical form. We’ll be together, and….’
He’d expected her sudden vanishing, but air still hissed through his teeth as his world repainted itself in brown and grey.
Mitch stepped where Christina’s image had stood. ‘What happened? Was she talking?’
Caliper nodded and touched the mask. Was it wax? Turning it over showed space for eyes and nose. He pressed the mask onto his face, and it writhed to clamp onto his head. Chilled iron gnawed his skin as its eyes lined up with his.
White fog everywhere. The mask hummed, and he staggered as pain lanced through his skull and his sight faded to black.
‘Not helping,’ Caliper said.
‘No one tells me anything either,’ Mitch said.
Silver lines stroked the darkness as a dew-spangled web reached across his vision, and Caliper steadied himself. More lines appeared to suggest walls and ceilings, and turning showed corners capped by curves, the arches of another alcove. The mask saw through the carousel’s clutter. As Caliper stepped forward, the lines dragged through space as if he wandered through a model, and the display picked out a chamber lurking behind the wall. A sealed room wasn’t a way forward, but these alcoves had been doorways.
Shouts and clattering footsteps pealed out from around the carousel’s curve. The mannequins had drawn near, but now elders hauling tarpaulins raced up behind them. Orders barked out, and the elders threw the canvas over the wooden mannequins before tugging the fabric back. The wooden bodies skittled to the ground, and an ashen-faced Frinelia stumbled towards him.
‘We saw the eidolon,’ Frinelia said. ‘She didn’t speak, but she wafted through the arena wall. Did you see her?’
‘We spoke,’ Caliper said.
‘Why did I leave you, and what did she say?’
‘Just a few words. She didn’t mention Phos, but I have to travel below.’
‘Did she give directions?’
Caliper explained; his mask’s slow pace meant he’d never explore everywhere, and not before Rastersen broke inside.
Frinelia clasped her hands before her. ‘How can I help?’
‘You’ll know Morzenthal’s books, so is there some class of map for the carousel?’
‘The carousel changes, and new walls appear, so any map will be dated, but let me search.’
The mannequins rattled and twitched under the canvas, but Caliper strode to the next alcove and slipped the mask over his face. Another dead end. Mitch shepherded him to the alcove beyond, but again only a sealed chamber sat behind, and the silver lines took longer to refresh. One alcove showed a nest of tiny passages he’d not fit his arm into, and Caliper’s shin barked on an iron trolley; tears smeared behind his mask. Terelian followed.
Another alcove. Caliper gasped: the silver lines hinted at a sloping passageway. He ripped his mask away and slapped his palm over the stones.
‘Can this wall move?’
Terelian shrugged. ‘Yesterday I’d have said not, but now….’
‘Do you have hammers or pickaxes?’
‘I’ve seen gardening tools, rakes and trowels, but anything heavier needs grubbing out.’
‘Get grubbing out.’
Dusk pooled around the clutter as the patches above darkened, and a crate beside him rattled. Mitch scraped one of his lock picks against a join, and Caliper ran his hands over the stones, smoother than any work he’d touched before.
Minutes passed as light faded into a stagnant twilight, but three elders returned carrying tools, and Caliper chose a two-handed hammer. One blow smacked a fist-sized dent into the stone, and another deepened the hole and splintered out chunks of rock.
‘Watch the wall,’ Mitch said.
Caliper paused as sweat trickled over his face. His jagged rent softened and shallowed as the stone healed, and his hammer slipped to the floor.
Mitch coughed. ‘This wall is original Morzenthal, so it heals.’
Drum sounds boomed through the air, and dust sprinkled from the ceiling as Caliper turned to Terelian.
‘I’ll investigate.’ Terelian hurried off.
‘That’s your friend Rastersen.’ Mitch squatted on a wicker stool. ‘He wants to meet Phos. Most likely he’s not so fond of you, but he still wants to meet.’
Caliper craved the peace that came when thinking wasn’t needed, but outside, fearful puppets with broken strings listened to men with easy answers, and Rastersen would terrify men before offering them a crumb of safety. Caliper picked up his hammer.
‘There’s other alcoves, and one with worn stones,’ Mitch said. ‘Maybe the healing’s broken there.’
Caliper followed Mitch.
‘Look, these stones aren’t level.’
Caliper squinted in the gloom. Workers had hoisted each block into this wall; some foreman had demanded this wall blend with the carousel, but the difference showed. Morzenthal’s stones looked perfect, but this forgery showed overlaps and gentle twists in the joints; men had sanded one stone back, and a crack had split another. Good work, but it jarred against Morzenthal’s clean lines, and imperfections meant humans.
The distant booms quickened into a mechanical heartbeat. Caliper winced as he slid his mask on, and the silver threads reappeared to reveal another inclined hallway Christina’s size.
Footsteps behind, and Terelian’s voice glided into his ears. ‘You’ve twenty guards and priests milling outside like worker ants, and they’ve rigged up a battering ram to break the front door while others hunt for entrances.’
‘Can they get inside?’
The drumming paused before returning, louder now.
‘The other entrances are hard to detect, but they exist, and many in the council call for unlocking.’
Caliper frowned. ‘Can you find me lanterns and rope?’
‘What if Rastersen breaks in?’
Caliper said nothing and swung his hammer.
Chapter 18: shadow of the future
Frost numbed her fingers, and she couldn’t stop shivering. The time-scoured plaster walls and posters spun around her. Phos stumbled into a bookshelf, and splinters jabbed her palm as books tumbled onto the floor.
Cracks ran through the shelf. Without thinking, her thumb slunk into a gap, and a four-foot spar split away to clatter at her feet. She picked up the ancient wood. The rod had the age-baked hardness of rock.
Teachers always sent her away before they used levers, but she’d played enough to learn, and she jammed the spar into the gap between the doors. Phos thrust sideways, and the doors squealed. She strained, and the left-hand side sprang open to flood brackish air over her as Phos hitched her tunic back into place and stepped through.
The doors led into a vast curving corridor, a mirror of Morzenthal’s passages. Sculptors had moulded the wall’s plaster into a forest of trunks, and their
crinkled bark rose into veined carvings of curling leaves stretching onto the arched ceiling ten yards above. Light filtered through the leaves and reminded her of daylight trickling through the wood where she’d played, but wasn’t the ceiling stone? An illusion, a memory of walking outside; glowing greens and golds bathed the air as her boots tapped over the stone tiles.
Clumps of dust daubed the floor, and a stagnant-pond stench filled the air. Her breathing sped up, and she leaned against a wall as sweat poured over her face. Thousands of tons of earth piled above her, and half-broken machines were probably tinkering with her body, but didn’t learning always travel with danger?
Another sip of water eased her throat, and ahead a door had toppled onto the floor. Phos paused before looking through the doorway. Scraps of light sneaked from the corridor but showed nothing. She sensed a vast cavern ahead, but darkness swallowed her torch beam, and the space ate her shouts.
Back outside, and Phos sidled past dingy green streaks that had dribbled over the outer wall, and an insect crawled into a crack beside a carved tree. Another doorway loomed on her right, and she stepped inside and into a short passage.
Yellow light burst from a high ceiling, and Phos stepped back. Below, three or four hundred red fabric seats formed rings around a distant circular stage. Stuffing spilled from several chairs, and ceiling tiles had fallen, but even with the decay, this theatre would welcome questions; the circling seats meant you’d see other students learning.
She returned to the curving hallway. The dust grew into small dunes stamped with footprints. Had she completed a circle? No. These were builder prints – twice her size and still sharp. The trail started inside a drift, as if someone had jumped into the dust. Phos tried leaping over the drift, but even her gangling legs were too short, and she’d never avoid leaving prints.
Another room appeared on her right, its double doors gaped open, and she entered. Three heartbeats passed before white light slammed out an eye-gouging blaze, far brighter than the sun’s arch. Phos winced, but the glare faded. She’d wandered into a vast wedge-shaped room with beige walls and a high ceiling. Shelves ran along the sides, and each held arrays of identical boxes brimming with folded white cloth. Headless wooden bodies stood motionless on her right. In front hunched three black metal machines looking like insects slobbering over food. Wrinkled crimson sheets hung over chairs, and drawers dotted a cabinet beside her. The ceiling crackled as beige flakes drifted down.
Phos wandered forward. She might be wrong – her old learning might fool her here – but wasn’t this a tailor’s room? Doorless wardrobes crammed with white jackets stretched into the distance. She stood on tiptoes to unhook a jacket, and dust showered away as soon as her fingers touched the satiny fabric. She stroked an arm, and the tunic quivered. Other cabinets held trousers and boots. Her current clothes scratched, and how often had she hitched up her trousers? She paused. Had she heard rustling?
Phos undid her belt, and her old trousers slipped to her ankles. She shrugged on a clinging one-piece that had to be underwear, and pulled on new trousers. The waist gripped her, and the legs ballooned before shrinking to coat her legs with a pearly fabric. The new jacket hugged her body before fastening itself with a faint sigh, and an instant of pressure at her waist gave way to a solid hug as the jacket and trousers fused.
Smaller cubbyholes sat inside the cabinets, stuffed with what looked like hands without bodies. No, not hands, rigid gloves with metal rims circling the wrist. She snatched one and fitted her hand inside, and the gleaming white gauntlet shrank. Part of her wanted to tug it off, but she waited. The glove knew when to stop, and her hand felt as if she’d dunked it in paint as she flexed her fingers under the glossy fabric. The metal rim snuggled her wrist as if forged by a master silversmith. She picked at the metal, and it resisted for a heartbeat before peeling away. Boots behaved the same way, and she stowed her old ones in the cabinet.
An outfit whiter than any carpet of lilies; Phos’s fingers stroked the seams and ran two fingers along the metal collar ringing her neck. Back home a tailor would labour for weeks on this suit, and no suit-maker had ever touched this gleaming fabric, so Morzenthal meant she should learn like a child, learn by prodding and poking anything in reach. Dad wasn’t here to guide her from danger, so she had to take care.
These rooms hung off the ring corridor like beads on a bracelet, and each one might house a trade. She imagined indoor fields bustling with machine servants, and breweries wafting yeast and barley through the air. Villagers might work without sweat and curses; there’d be time to read and sing and act, so why had people left?
The next shelves held upside-down fish bowls that threw back curved reflections of Phos’s face, and they’d fit over her head while the metal rims they sat on would link to her collar. She snatched one up – far lighter than she’d expected. Light flickered, and a shower of white flakes fluttered past; a bowl might protect her head, but she needed to listen.
A grinding, growling roar bled in from the corridor, and Phos glanced ahead; cabinets stretched to the far walls, but she saw no exits. Had she woken those wooden dummies? No. This rumbling came from the entrance.
Phos squatted behind a cabinet and focused on breathing through her nose, but chiming noises bustled through the doorway with their own rhythm, like a heartbeat of tiny bells. She poked her head out as a squall of glistening dust specks shimmied at the doorway and billowed forward. Metallic specks tumbled in squirming patterns she’d never follow, but after a few heartbeats, the swarm tamed itself, and the dust circled a blurred central point. Dim shapes congealed inside the storm to form spinning bars, spiralling wires and a curving net, a mad dance where everything pivoted around everything else. Shapes collided and merged; each collision pealed out a soft clang.
Hints of something solid emerged inside the cloud. A pair of rigid columns sprouted from the ground. Above, a growing frame of curved rods appeared, a skeleton’s ribcage hanging in air. Twice her size, the right size for this room, these swirling motes might rip through her body, but she stood up; Grump’s cane and Rastersen’s clammy palms could stay in the past.
The cloud rippled like a swarm of bees chasing a fresh target, and dust rushed into the ribcage. Its ribs grew into a solid chest like she’d seen on statues, and arms sprouted from the sides as the blocky outline of a head appeared. This was a blurry sculpture, like a rough carving of a giant human. The leaden surface crawled as more dust smacked into the figure.
Phos inched forward and raised her arm, but the statue’s limbs stayed still, an empty house waiting for life. Features coloured the head; closed eyes and mouth brought a quiet imitation of personality. Hands too, blocky models of wrists and fingers. Back home, delivering a statue took three men with a cart and exciting swear words, but here they delivered themselves, which was impressive even if she couldn’t tell the gender. No clothes and nothing to hide, though a thin mist still rolled around the limbs as metallic specks stung Phos’s cheek.
The statue stayed static, and Phos stepped forward. Three ceiling lights died, and shadows reared around her. She flinched as an intense hissing filled the room.
The body softened and swelled as a long robe condensed across the metal, belted at the waist and tight enough to show breasts swelling into place. Dust danced over the eyes and cheeks as the mouth widened and the lips filled, and shoulder-length hair framed the face as if life waited for a signal. Flesh-coloured patches burst from below to sweep over the grey surface, a flawless peach no paint could match, and dark blue ink flowed over the robe and hair.
Phos didn’t know the word, but humans showed a quality; they shared it with dogs and cats but not with spiders or fish. Humans knew if actions helped or hindered, and humans crafted their own future. The quality lived here; she wasn’t alone.
The twisting head made her gasp with its perfect mimicking of human muscles, and the figure’s robe flowed as the arms rose. Eyes opened, and a half smile flickered as its hand swept to its face, and t
he statue blew over its fingers. The arms glided like a dancer’s, though they were thicker than Caliper’s thighs.
The figure gazed at Phos, and its head tilted a fraction.
‘I’ve done this a dozen times, and I’m still surprised when it works.’ A lilting voice where calm tones dripped with precision. ‘I trust I didn’t startle you, Phos. Materialising before people seems rude, but I didn’t know your exact location.’
Phos’s mouth hung open. Now even her own name sounded strange.
‘You’re the first here for centuries,’ said the figure. ‘I hope you’re managing.’
‘It’s fine. I found water.’
‘Water, yes, good. My name is Christina – you’ve met my friend.’
‘Caliper mentioned you.’
‘I asked him to come, but projecting outside is difficult: so much has broken.’
‘How do you know my name, and Caliper’s name, and who are you?’
‘Caliper understood a slice of your world’s workings, and you’ve seen his exploits.’
‘You’ve watched us?’
‘He learned a few secrets from me, but I couldn’t say much: even he has limits.’ Christina held out her arms in welcome, and her sleeves flowed to follow the motion, an almost perfect illusion, though her lips never quite matched her words. ‘My room awaits, so will you join me?’
‘Is it rude to ask what you’re made of?’
‘I’ll explain later, but my room may offer more comfort.’
Outside, and the corridor blazed gold and green like a forest’s sunny day, and Christina strode forward before checking herself and walking at Phos’s pace. They walked for minutes past several blocked doorways.
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