Recoiling, grunting from the force of the strike, he glared at me and then moved to parry my next attack.
“You waste your time,” he growled. “Accept defeat. I have but two more of the artifacts to locate and collect and my task will be complete.”
“You have claimed to wish to revive Baranak,” I all-but-shouted at him. “I have come to doubt this is true, but if it is, know that I will do everything in my power to prevent you from disturbing the golden god’s rest.” Even as I spoke those words, I continued to tell myself that they were true—that I did not wish to see Baranak reincarnated. I wondered if and when I might start to believe it.
“Baranak? No, you are right to have doubted my word on that account,” Cevelar replied, deflecting another blow with the Shield that was strapped now to his left arm. “I must admit I lied about it, in order to make my initial offer to you more enticing.”
“Speak the truth now, Cevelar,” I demanded as I pressed my attack. “Be honest, for once. Admit your monstrous scheme!”
“You know the truth,” he said, grinning. “You know that I will be successful in my task. Great Vorthan will soon stride across the realms of gods and men once more!”
My allies and I had been right about his plan, but hearing it spoken aloud truly horrified me. “Never!” I cried, and I raised my sword, moving to the attack.
“Oh yes,” he said, even as he retreated a few steps back from me, momentarily opening a short safe distance between us. He reached into a satchel he wore slung over his shoulder, drew forth a small black sack, and held it up, grinning. “I have reacquired the gemstones that great Vorthan utilized to preserve bits of his Aspect, his persona. He placed them into my care before his final showdown with the dark god and the golden god. For so very long they languished with me in stasis.” He laughed, and red light flared from inside the bag, powerful enough to light it up like a lantern. “But now both I and they are freed. Combined with the raw energy of the Cosmic Weapons… Well, you can understand my optimism. Soon we shall return the deathgod to his rightful glory!”
“Never!” I shouted again, before lunging at him with my blade.
We clashed again. This time, as he deflected my attack with the Shield on his left arm, he switched the bag of gems for the Knife of Alaria and brought it up with his right hand. He feinted towards me with it, then spun about and sliced down hard, through thin air.
Sparks and burning plasma flew out from the space where he’d struck. A shimmering gash opened in midair, widening as he dragged the blade down.
He was cutting a hole in reality. Creating an escape route.
I lunged for him, my sword swinging wide.
Just in the nick of time he managed to block it with the Shield. Then he spun about and leapt through the gash in reality.
I momentarily considered attempting to follow him through, but a second later was glad I had not. The opening snapped closed behind him, narrowly missing his foot. It would have chopped me in half, with part of me here and the rest some unknowable distance across realities.
I turned around and saw that my companions had made remarkably short work of their opponents. This gladdened me, though I was sick to my stomach that Cevelar had again escaped, and with another of the cosmic weapons.
Four Legion III soldiers were still on their feet and, as I turned to face them, they all dropped their weapons and raised their hands.
I ignored them. It wasn’t like I could take them prisoner, and I wasn’t about to simply kill them. They were surely following Vostok’s orders, with no knowledge of what they were actually about. I didn’t blame them. How they planned to get back home, though, now that their leader had deserted them, I had no idea, and didn’t much care.
Then I saw Solonis, standing at the rear as usual, behind a large piece of furniture or machinery, keeping safely out of the fray. I met his eyes and pointed back the way we had entered. “Come on,” I told him. “You and I have to talk.”
* * *
“You can carry us through time,” Binari called out to Solonis as I was about to suggest the same thing. “Simply take us back to before Cevelar acquired the weapons, and we will take them first.”
The brown-robed god shook his head slowly as he looked back at us, frowning deeply. “If you believe it is that simple, you haven’t been paying proper attention,” he said.
Binari squared off against him, and consequently I stood to one side, deferring to the little Rao’s anger as well as waiting to hear Solonis’ explanation.
“What do you mean?” the Technologist pressed. “You’ve carried us forwards and backwards multiple times now.”
“I cannot control when or where the Time Tomb goes,” Solonis said, spreading his hands wide.
The rest of us simply stared back at him. I suppose we had never taken him seriously before when he had said things to that effect.
“Then...then how do you direct the vessel to the proper points in time?” Mirana asked, her voice filled with skepticism.
Solonis turned to her, but appeared to be at a loss for words. His mouth opened and closed several times but nothing came out.
“The Fates decide,” Davos rumbled from where he was leaning against the wall nearby. “Did you hear him before? He said he’s just a passenger and his box carries him where and when it will.” His tone was such that it was impossible to determine if he was being serious or facetious.
“That is correct,” Solonis agreed quickly. “Just so. It comes to me in time of need—or else I construct it, when it becomes necessary—and then it takes me to where and when I am to go. And then it leaves me.”
We all stared back at him, none of us sure what to think. The seconds ticked by.
“Then what do you suggest we do?” Binari asked, frustrated. Looking on, I appreciated his growing assertiveness. It seemed to me he had grown quite a bit in his brief time among us.
“I—I don’t know,” Solonis replied, scowling.
“Why not?” Mirana asked, angry.
He looked away for a long moment, then turned to face her. “I don’t know that either,” he repeated. “I simply know we won’t be allowed to do what Binari suggested. I can feel it.”
Again we all stared at one another in silence.
“Perhaps you are mistaken,” Davos suggested. “Perhaps if we go and get inside it, the situation will change. Perhaps you will have some revelation.”
“No, no,” Solonis mumbled. “I would sense it if we were able to do what you wish. I would know it, if that was our correct path…” His voice trailed off and he stared away into space.
Davos lay a big gray hand on his skinny shoulder. “Humor me,” he said. “Why not try it and see? You don’t seem to have a better plan at the moment.”
Reluctantly Solonis allowed the big gray alien to lead him over to the crystal box. The door stood open. Solonis looked at it, then back at us. He shrugged. “Very well,” he said. “We can try it, I suppose.”
“Good,” Mirana said. “Sensible.” She gestured for me to enter ahead of her.
I wasn’t entirely sure about this. The others didn’t understand that we gods are not always able to explain the complexities of our powers and Aspects to mere mortals. What Solonis had been saying was as frustrating to me as it was to the others. They, though, seemed to believe he was simply lying. I knew that he could be telling us the complete truth, just not in a way that anyone who wasn’t a god would understand.
Even so, he was willing to try—to try denying the very Fates themselves—and as dangerous as I knew that could be, I could scarcely do less. So I boarded his crystal box and the others followed me inside.
Solonis entered last. He clearly was not happy. He reached out, grasped the sliding door, and pulled it closed. Then he turned to face us. Seconds ticked by, moving at their normal rate and in their normal direction. He continued to stand there, glaring at us.
“Will you not proceed?” Binari asked.
I suppressed a laugh. A Techn
ologist, a Rao, with the great affinity their kind shared for advanced technology, could not conceive of a machine with no controls; a machine that performed its functions only when it chose to do so. When the Fates allowed it to do so.
“Proceed with what?” Solonis asked.
“With—with—sending us back in time,” Binari sputtered, exasperated. He took a quick look around the interior of the crystal box we occupied, then up at the god.
Solonis crossed his arms and continued to stare back at the Rao.
With a wordless exclamation of indignation, Binari returned his attention to the transparent walls that surrounded us. Mirana did so as well. Watching them, Davos chuckled and offered me a look of amusement, which I returned, despite my own growing sense of failure.
“Where are the controls?” Binari asked, puzzled.
“Controls?” Solonis said by way of reply.
“There are no controls,” Davos told him. “Surely you noticed that before.” He chuckled again. “I’ve seen how you’ve been studying this thing, every time we’ve been aboard.”
“There is nothing to study,” Binari whined. “It might as well work by magic.” He spoke that last word as if it were profanity.
“Close enough to true,” Solonis said with a half-shrug.
I grew tired of their antics. “We are wasting time,” I said. “Let us determine what options are available to us now.”
Davos shook his head. “Few options come to mind,” he said. “I am not even certain we can escape the Spire now.”
I looked at him. “What do you mean?”
“This place has as much a reputation for being a prison as a fortress for the powerful. And while we may have temporarily defeated Garvael, there may be other sorcerers in other parts of the tower. If so, they may now be aware of our presence.”
“You didn’t have a plan for getting us out, when you brought us here?” Binari grumbled, seemingly happy to have someone else at whom to direct his ire.
“How you escaped this place was never my concern,” Davos countered. “Nor, for that matter, how you got in. If you will recall, my job was to see you safely to the Spire.” He shrugged. “In truth, I never imagined you would get this far. So I never bothered to look into ways of getting back out.”
“This is all astonishing to me,” Binary sniped in his high voice. He was growing more agitated by the moment. “The two people with the knowledge and ability to get us out of here are suddenly informing us that they have no way to do so, and in fact have given it no thought at all.”
This must have truly rubbed Davos the wrong way. He glared down at the Rao and snapped, “Idiot Builder. You chose to come here, as did we all. You now share in our fate.”
“Impudent Hand!” Binari snapped back at him.
“I am no Hand,” the giant growled. “Least of all yours, Builder.”
Binari raised his arms and electricity flowed over them—coming, I assumed, from the network of circuitry imprinted into his clothing. Davos in turn squared off against him, massive fists bunched together as if he were prepared to smash Binari down into the floor.
I moved between them, hands raised to hold them both back. Honestly, I had no idea which of them would prevail in a fight—Binari with his many advanced and hidden weapons, or Davos with his raw might—and I did not wish to find out, and certainly not at that moment, when we needed above all else unity in the face of so much adversity.
They both blustered a moment longer before backing down just enough for me to lower my hands, but still I watched them both, to be sure the crisis moment had passed.
Mirana leaned in then, angry. “What is this ‘Builder’ foolishness?” she demanded of Davos. “You’ve called him that before. What does it mean?”
“The Builder knows,” Davos muttered, still eyeing Binari.
“I am no Builder,” Binari repeated slowly, angrily. “That was well before my time. Ages before.”
“It is all your kind,” Davos said, jabbing a big blunt gray finger out for emphasis.
“Tell us all now,” Mirana demanded, furious. I had never seen her so agitated.
Davos shrugged. “If he will not speak of it, I will.” He stepped back, away from Binari, and spread his hands. “Eons ago, my kind were simple farmer folk on an agricultural world. Conditions were hard there, and we had evolved our size and strength to overcome those challenges. As such, strong and durable, we were attractive as foot soldiers for the armies of more advanced beings.”
“You were servants of the Rao?” Mirana asked, wide-eyed.
“No,” Davos said. “Not the Rao. We were servants of a creation of the Rao.”
Now I too was puzzled. “The Rao created something that in turn pulled your people into its service?” I shook my head. “I do not—” And then it came to me, and I understood it all. My mouth opened and I looked in amazement at Binari. “No,” I said. “No. It couldn’t have been the Rao. They haven’t been extant as an advanced race long enough to have created that.”
Binari looked at me now with a twinkle in his eye and he actually half-smiled. “Many believe they know more about the Rao than they actually do,” he said. “We are a far more ancient people than we are given credit for.” He nodded toward Mirana. “Most naturally assume the Dyonari are the eldest of races in this portion of the galaxy, and when they see my kind, they conclude we are a younger race, newly arrived on the interstellar scene.” He snorted. “But they are wrong.”
“You’re saying the Rao were a starfaring race before even the Dyonari?” Mirana asked, incredulous.
“Indeed we were. For how much longer, I cannot say. But my people were abroad in the galaxy when the Dyonari star-cities first took flight.”
I was astonished at this. “But then, how—”
“We fell,” he answered quickly. “We reached too far and too fast and our technological prowess eventually betrayed us and we fell.” He shook his head at the mere thought. “Undone by our own works. Cast down by our automatons. Overthrown and hurled back into barbarism for millennia, before we inevitably rose again.” He exhaled slowly, tiredly, then breathed in. “This time, though, my people were cautious. They strictly outlawed all forms of advanced artificial intelligence; indeed, most forms of technology in general.”
“Yet you carry a number of devices,” Mirana pointed out. “Your drone. Your clothing itself.”
“I am a member of the Technologists, as I trust you all are aware. We are a minority faction, largely shunned by our own government and society. We seek to preserve as much technology as possible, though generally we are only permitted by our leaders to put it toward military purposes, in their constant wars of expansion.” He shrugged. “I sometimes have been known to push the boundaries of what is allowed, right up to the edge.” He pursed his lips and gazed downward. “Perhaps beyond.”
“That is how you came to be involved with the Templars,” I guessed.
“Yes. I was recruited while abroad on another somewhat illegal mission.” He grinned sheepishly. “I seem to make a habit of getting involved in such affairs.”
“Before your old civilization fell and you banned technology, though,” Davos said, his tone icy as he drove a rhetorical dagger through the lighter turn Binari had been trying to take the conversation, “you created the single most insidious, autocratic artificial entity ever devised. One that continues to bedevil the galaxy to this day.”
A dawning of understanding came across Mirana’s face now, too. “No,” she said, turning to Binari. “No—it simply isn’t possible. The Rao?”
“It most assuredly is possible,” Davos grumbled. “It happened. And my people paid the price for it, more than anyone else.”
“The Machine,” Mirana gasped. “The great interstellar artificial intelligence that currently oversees the safety and security of the galaxy.” She leaned in, her eyes boring into Binari’s. “You’re saying the Rao built the Machine.”
“Many ages ago,” Binari said, nodding, “yes.�
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“And it in turn enslaved my people,” Davos noted, “inducting us into service as Hands of the Machine, drafting us into vast spacefaring armies, all obeying the every utterance of the Machine.”
“And over time being worn down, killed, exterminated as a race,” I observed. “You were made into an army, and eventually nearly all of the soldiers in that army were killed.”
“Yes, precisely,” Davos said. “And so now, with the Machine awake again for the first time in millennia, and completely outside of our control, it has begun to build a new army for itself—and this time it is using humans as its raw material, its Hands.”
I thought of all those brightly-clad Hands—Hawks and Falcons and Ravens and all the others—zipping around the galaxy in their multitude of super-advanced spacecraft over the last few years, ever since the end of the Nightfall War. I realized then that all of them had indeed appeared human; not a one of them I’d seen had been the gray giants of Davos’ species.
“And so my people have carried the greatest animosity toward the Rao for millennia,” Davos stated. “We simply have never had the numbers remaining to us to do anything about it.” He glared down at Binari. “I have been exceptionally patient with you from the time you and the others first came to my house to ask favors of me, Builder,” he said, “but my patience grows thin.”
“Alright,” I said, understanding most of the situation at last. “Neither of you is personally responsible for the current situation—or the old one, for that matter—and therefore we are all going to apologize for insulting each other and we are all going to accept those apologies in the spirit of teamwork and camaraderie.” I hefted my sword between them. “Because I aim to go home soon, Cevelar’s head on a pike accompanying me. And I believe the only way that is going to happen is if we all cooperate.”
This had something of the effect I desired; the broiling hostility between Davos and Binari once again dialed down to a low simmer. That being the case, I returned my attention to the immediate problem at hand. More specifically, I rounded on Solonis and, when I spoke, my tone left no room for misinterpretation.
Karilyne- Heart Cold as Ice Page 17