“Someone’s in the arrival place,” Qall said. “Dahli.” He paused. “Kettin is on her way.”
The three of them stood and turned to the cave entrance. Footsteps echoed in the passage beyond, then a woman stepped into view. Rielle stared at the newcomer. It was like looking at a three-dimensional, moving reflection – but not for long. The face, so personal and familiar, began to distort. Soon Dahli’s features were recognisable, his body matching his voice as he spoke to Rielle.
“Your turn.”
She snapped out of her fascinated trance and turned her attention to her body. All but her mind was held in a copy of Dahli’s pattern. As she relaxed that hold, her mind automatically changed her pattern back to her own, bringing a brief sensation that was not exactly pain, but was as intense.
“Then this is goodbye,” Qall said, standing. “Thank you, Dahli. We owe you more than we can repay.”
Dahli shrugged. “Not if you get this right. So… get this right.” He looked at Rielle. “We don’t have much time. She is quite determined to catch you. It took all the tricks I know to keep ahead of her. Be wary.”
“I will,” Rielle replied. “Look after Zeke.”
He smiled. “Always.”
“I promise I will do everything I can to work out how to re-link the worlds.”
“I know you will.” He looked at Tyen. “Look after her.”
Tyen could not help smiling. “She can look after herself. But if she needs help, I’ll be there. As I’m sure she will be for me.”
Dahli turned to Qall, nodded, then turned on his heel and hurried away, his footsteps breaking into a rapid beat as he sprinted back to the arrival place. Rielle’s stomach sank as she realised what that meant. He fears she is close enough that she might catch up before he can travel on to the fake base. I hope he has time to warn the volunteers. Following him by his mind, she breathed a sigh of relief when he reached the cave and his mind disappeared from her senses.
A long, tense stretch of time followed, then Qall drew in a quick breath. His eyes were focused elsewhere.
“She’s here. Or rather, the leading edge of her army.”
Stretching out her senses again, Rielle found the mind of one of Kettin’s followers. He was holding a sphere of machines, not yet activated, within the confines of the enormous cave. Some of it had fused with the wall. He was admiring the Restorers for this good initial defensive strategy, but now that he knew the arrival place was in a cave he could go back and warn Kettin to skim up to the world’s surface. His mind faded away.
Then several minds appeared: the Restorer volunteers, who’d had to skim out of the way of the giant machine sphere stuck in the sinkhole. Hundreds appeared in the space, then retreated to the edges to allow room for others to arrive. They deliberated briefly whether to continue on or hide here, but the thought of encountering Kettin and her followers sent them scurrying towards a tunnel entrance. One looked up, then stopped and gasped. Through his eyes Rielle saw several circular shadows against a chink of the sky, some close and large and others small and distant.
“So many,” she whispered.
Qall laughed sourly. “Overkill for one world. I guess we needn’t worry whether she’s taken the bait.”
The spheres were breaking apart and expanding as they arrived, their lattice pattern matching and overlapping. Soon the sky had been blotted out, and a darkness deeper than night had the Restorers wondering if they could risk creating a light.
Then the sky flashed bright white, and as the volunteers’ eyesight recovered they saw only sky above them again.
“Gone,” Tyen muttered. “To the next world.”
Imagining how the solid black sphere of machines would look as it arrived in the trap world sent a shiver down Rielle’s spine. Be careful, Dahli. There are a LOT of machines coming your way.
“Now we go after her,” Qall said as he got to his feet.
Rielle dragged her attention back to her surrounds. Qall and Tyen had linked hands and were extending their free ones towards her. She pushed a rising foreboding aside and took them. The room faded.
As Qall sent them into the place between worlds, Rielle stretched her senses out, searching for other presences. Kettin would most likely hang back to watch the effect her blanket of war machines had on her enemy’s world. She’d be looking for Rielle, too. Dahli’s words echoed in her memory. “She is quite determined to catch you.”
All she found were the many presences of the woman’s followers, hovering behind the interlocking spheres of machines. Which was like coming upon an enormous black wall within thick fog. It loomed before them, effectively blocking access to the entire world. She looked closer, using her newer senses, and detected the vibration of their pattern. Could she change the machines while between worlds? Perhaps render them useless?
She dared not try. Not only was there a risk the sorcerer controlling them would detect it, but it had been her previous attempt to move someone in the place between that had triggered the separation of worlds.
The great looming mass of machines faded from her new senses, though it was still visible. It had arrived in the trap world. The presences of the sorcerers had vanished too.
All but one. As Rielle focused on it, she recognised it, and knew that it had detected her, Tyen and Qall.
Kettin.
The woman headed towards them. Qall started to retreat, then stopped. Looking at him, Rielle read that he did not want to draw Kettin away from the trap world.
The woman halted a distance away.
“Rielle Lazuli!” she said, removing her mask. Her gaze shifted to Tyen and Qall. “And my other two favourite magic users: Qall, Leader of Restorers, and Tyen, Inventor of Machines.”
I could unlink the world now, Rielle thought. But Kettin will die. And I don’t know what will happen to Tyen and Qall. They were supposed to retreat to the previous world once they confirmed that Kettin was in the trap world, so there was no chance they’d be harmed. But they made no move to leave.
“Kettin,” Qall replied. “What are you calling yourself now? Destroyer of Worlds?”
The woman shook her head. “No, I think we ought to put that one in reserve for Rielle here.” Though she smiled, her eyes were hard. “You haven’t yet torn the worlds apart, have you? Why not?”
“Perhaps because, unlike you, I don’t want to,” Rielle replied. She looked at Qall and Tyen, but their attention was fixed on Kettin. I can’t tell them to go or Kettin will wonder why. They might be thrown out of the place between worlds, as she had been last time, if they were behind her when she made the tear. But she couldn’t be sure, and didn’t want to take the risk.
“I don’t want to destroy the worlds!” Kettin rolled her eyes. “I want to free them from the evils of magic. I see my conversation with Rielle did nothing to convince you of the need. But I didn’t expect it to. You have so much to lose. So I have a new proposal for Rielle.”
Blunt words came to Rielle’s mind, but she held them back. “What is it this time?”
“It is only for you,” Kettin added, giving Qall and Tyen a haughty look. “Your friends will have to leave.”
Hope sparked in Rielle’s mind. She turned to them. “Go back.”
“No,” Qall said.
Tyen let go of Rielle’s hand and took Qall’s forearm.
“Rielle is stronger,” Tyen reminded him.
“She is,” Kettin acknowledged. “The risk is all mine.”
Rielle turned to face Qall. “I have to hear what she has to say,” she told him. Then, making sure her back was to Kettin, she winked.
Qall’s eyes narrowed a fraction. Reluctantly, he let go of her hand. “Don’t take too long,” he warned as Tyen drew him away.
Rielle did not reply. As Qall and Tyen passed the midpoint between worlds, she turned to Kettin.
“Well?”
The woman looked past Rielle. “A bit longer. I want to make sure they can’t hear us.”
“Are you trying
to suffocate me?” Rielle asked.
Kettin blinked. “No. I am serious. I will be quick.” Her expression became earnest. “I have to admit, I don’t know that much about Maker’s Curse, and what I do know could be wrong. And I realise that you’d hardly agree to an alliance, for ideological reasons. So, I’m proposing a truce of sorts. I will conquer no more worlds if you agree to restore those I select.”
“How do I know if you will hold to such a deal?”
Kettin nodded. “Well, if you come with me to the next world, you could read my mind and know I don’t intend to go back on my word.”
“To a world full of your machines and followers? Alone?”
“If we go to the previous world, how can I be sure your friends won’t kill me?”
“Because, unlike you, they are not murderers,” Rielle replied.
A look of confusion and disbelief crossed Kettin’s face. It was such an odd response, Rielle began to focus on the woman’s pattern.
Thoughts emerged. Cold, calculating thoughts. Kettin did, indeed, plan to set all her forces – machine and sorcerer – on Rielle as soon as they arrived, whether it be in either world. Then she would hunt down Qall and Tyen. Then continue her domination of the worlds. She felt no remorse or shame. Only a belief that if she could do something, she should. The fact that she had got away with so much already was a source of great satisfaction. She could do anything she wanted – or would be able to once the only sorcerers more powerful than her were gone – and intended to.
Rielle had never encountered a mind like it. But it was not entirely unique. She had encountered people with no conscience before, though most were neither as clever nor as powerful as Kettin. She shook her head slowly. “Go back to your machines and followers and find what satisfaction you can in them, Kettin.”
Kettin’s eyebrows rose and her mouth twisted. “That’s disappointing. Though no great loss, really. You would have been a useful ally, but I don’t need you, Rielle Lazuli, and you have terrible taste in friends.”
The woman did not move. Rielle waited. After a long pause, Kettin smiled. “Oh, I’m not going to leave until you have.”
Well, I can wait as long as she does, Rielle thought. But then she would reveal that she had become ageless again, and Kettin would suspect Rielle had more dangerous abilities. If I retreat, will she follow? Pushing back towards the sinkhole world, Rielle silently cursed as Kettin began to follow. They passed the halfway point. Details of the sinkhole world began to emerge. Flashes and movement surrounded them, and Rielle made out the cause she saw that the sphere of machines in the sinkhole was gone and a battle had taken its place. Tyen, Qall and the Restorers crowded together in the arrival place, taking advantage of the constricted space to lessen the number of machines that could attack at any time.
“Did you really think I wouldn’t guess you had an escape plan?” Kettin asked. “Or that I’d let your friends go? I have more walls of machines preventing them from reaching the worlds beyond. And more waiting beyond that. My followers will keep transporting machines in until the Restorers run out of magic. And you won’t be able to create it fast enough to help them. You’re trapped.”
Rielle stopped and turned back to face Kettin. The woman’s smile was feral, eyes bright with anticipation. Rielle was glad of the detachment between worlds, as she saw which of two terrible choices she must make.
“You’d better hurry and join them, or they won’t last very long at all,” Kettin added.
“They’ll last long enough,” Rielle told her.
Focusing on the substance of the place between worlds, she willed part of it to come towards her. This time she pulled carefully, increasing the strength of it until she felt the substance tear.
As before, the impression of the split only lasted a moment, before blackness gaped wide. The substance of the place between worlds rippled and bucked. She thought she saw eddies of it pouring into the darkness. She lost all sense of Kettin’s presence, and she could not tell if the woman had slipped into the hole or fled.
Then, once again, a force knocked her backwards. As she careened towards the sinkhole world, half-dazed by the force she’d unleashed, she thought of Dahli and Zeke, and the sacrifice they’d made. Be safe, she thought at them. I will find a way to retrieve you.
And then she was kneeling on the ground, feeling her strength returning as her body healed. Qall and Tyen hovered close, anxious and protective, their questions tangling together. The battle still raged overhead.
She got to her feet. Dusted herself off. And nodded.
“It’s done. The world is isolated.”
“Kettin?” Qall asked.
“I couldn’t tell if she survived.
“So she is either dead or isolated,” Tyen concluded.
Qall nodded and let out a relieved sigh. “The worlds no longer need to fear her.”
Rielle looked up. “Just her machines.”
Tyen and Qall exchanged a grim but satisfied look.
“Let’s get out of here,” Qall said, holding out his hands to them.
“Kettin has more of those walls of machines blocking your exit,” Rielle warned as she took one of them.
He nodded. “And we three are strong enough to move them. I’ve had stores of Tyen’s beetles placed in all the local worlds, ready to deal with any further attacks.”
Tyen looked at Qall in surprise. “You have been busy.”
“Not as busy as their makers.”
Tyen took Qall’s other hand. “But they’re not really my machines. I had little to do with their design.”
Qall smiled. “But without you they’d have never been created. The worlds need to know who saved them, Tyen.”
Tyen looked at Rielle. “Then they should know it was Rielle.”
Qall looked at her and nodded. “She did, indeed.”
Rielle grimaced. “Well, in return I have one request.”
Qall’s eyebrows rose. “Yes?”
“Never, ever, ask me to do something like that again.”
“Of course not,” Tyen replied.
“I won’t,” Qall promised. Then one of his eyebrows quirked upwards. “Not if the worlds face a danger equally as terrible?”
She frowned. “It would have to be at least as bad.”
“You’re not now opposed to re-linking worlds, are you?”
She thought of Dahli and Zeke, starting a new life in what was probably now a magically dead, machine-filled empty world. Though if Kettin’s followers had survived, they wouldn’t be completely alone. And if Kettin had… She smiled grimly. Dahli could take care of himself. And Zeke.
Rielle shook her head. “No,” she answered. “I made a promise to Dahli to free him and Zeke, and I intend to keep it.”
Qall nodded, then raised his head. “Link!”
The Restorers immediately took hold of each other.
“Anyone not ready?”
No reply came.
The sinkhole and the milling machines within it faded a little, then faded to white.
EPILOGUE
TYEN
Despite knowing she could levitate and hold objects in the air, Rielle had never been completely at ease in an aircart. Tyen, however, was like an excited boy when he was in a flying contraption, whether one of the Academy’s small aircarts or one of Mig’s gliding vehicles. The aircart they were in now was nothing like either of those agile, sleek contraptions. It was a big-bellied thing with generous glass windows affording a view of the city below. Within, it was wide enough to fit a set of chairs and tables on either side of an aisle, and long enough for twenty tables in total, and a tiny kitchen at the far end.
Only their table was occupied today, so no hum of conversation covered the sound of the propellers.
“A restaurant aircart,” Tyen said yet again. “Genius idea.”
“Yes,” Rielle agreed, her tone betraying her doubt.
The light in his eyes dimmed a little. “You’re not enjoying this.”
&nb
sp; She waved a hand. “I’m not hating it either. It’s just not the thrill to me that it is to you.”
“I’m sorry. If it bothers you, don’t look down,” he advised.
She glanced at the oval of glass next to their chairs. A section of Beltonia was captured within the frame. An impressive amount of rebuilding had been done in the last quarter-cycle, some of it taking advantage of the damage from the invasion to simplify the maze of streets.
“It’s not that,” she said. “I’d have no trouble levitating this high. It’s more the idea of being stuck in the middle of so much wood and glass and fabric if this thing fell that bothers me.”
Her stomach swooped as the aircart was buffeted by wind.
“And there’s that, too,” she added.
“Yes,” he agreed ruefully. “It does take a strong stomach to eat on an aircart in windy weather.”
Looking over his shoulder, she saw a waiter heading their way, slim glasses balanced on a tray. The man paused and rode out another disturbance with practised ease. When the floor was relatively still again, he continued to their table, set down the three glasses and filled them without spilling a drop.
“That was well done,” Tyen told him.
“I spent many years serving on the royal ship, Director,” the man replied.
As the waiter walked away, Tyen checked his clock pendant and frowned, for the fifth time since they’d arrived.
Rielle smiled sympathetically. “Don’t get your hopes too high, Tyen. Aside from the difficulties in calculating time difference between worlds, Qall has a lot of work to do now the war is over.”
“Over?” a familiar voice said. “Who said it was over?”
They turned to see Qall standing in the aisle. He grinned and nodded to a man standing beside him.
“Baluka!” Rielle rose to her feet. Qall had sent several messages to arrange a meeting since their confrontation with Kettin, but hadn’t managed to attend any. Now not only had he finally made it to one, but he had brought Baluka as well. She kissed them both on the cheek.
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