A World Too Near (46 page)

“You chose against me,” Yulin murmured.

“Yes, this one time.”

He sighed. The sky held a glow of silver that presaged Early Day. The days would come and go, astonishing in their normalcy, but Suzong would not be at his side.

“How will you die?” he asked finally.

“Poison. Before Hu Zha denounces me to the strutting queen.”

Yulin would never let her die like her mother had died. If she wished poison, so be it.

The day had begun so ordinary, and then Titus Quinn was among them, and the news that the world would not last, and lastly, most terribly, that his wife must die.

Yulin felt strangely empty. All his schemes and fears had wound down to this simple moment, sitting on the hard ground, looking into his wife’s face.

“We had a glorious run,” he said.

She clapped. “The saying for my grave flag. May I?”

Yulin nodded. “And I shall have the same.”

“No, husband—”

He put up his hand. “I will decide, wife, whether to go on without you. Keep silent on that, but allow me your last minutes free of disorder.”

Suzong put her hands on her bony knees, and looked around in satisfaction. “Remember the day we met? The day I arrived and I was twenty thousand days older than you’d been told?”

He felt a half smile slide into his cheek. “You wore a red gown. It swept the tally of days from your face. And then you spoke, and I came under your spell. After you, I could never stand my young wives.”

“Nice girls. You should have given them babies.”

“I did.”

“But babies you could have cared for.”

He looked into her face, familiar and dear. “I cared for you.”

“Yes, my love, you did. To my everlasting delight.” She slid down to her knees in front of him, holding out her hands.

He took them.

A messenger appeared in the gully, stopping respectfully, seeing the master and his lady sitting on the dirt. Noting him, Yulin beckoned.

Approaching, the messenger blurted, “Master, the cook Hu Zha is dead.”

Startled, Yulin stared at him. “Dead?”

“Yes, master. We found him in his tent.”

Yulin swung his glance over to Suzong. She had closed her eyes as though she would collapse.

“How killed and by whom?”

“We do not yet know, Master.”

Yulin dismissed him. If Hu Zha was dead, then Chiron would not descend, not immediately. And Chiron would not know of Suzong’s betrayal. There was time to escape, once again.

A surge of energy propelled Yulin to his feet. He looked down sternly at Suzong. “An apology, wife.”

“I humbly beg your pardon, a thousand times. But you must admit that Titus Quinn is still our best chance—”

He held up his hand. “Just the apology.”

She made obeisance on the ground, head on the dirt.

He took in a great breath of Twilight Ebb air and then reached down to take her elbow and help her stand. “Now, instead of poison . . . a glass of wine?”

“So early . . . ,” Suzong tittered. “But perhaps a small glass.”

They hobbled up the gully together, dazed and renewed. They would be on the run once more. But first, they would have wine.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

To achieve my blessing, do not deprive me of a glorious death.

—Hoptat, seer of the Miserable God

Q
UINN AND ANZI SET A BRUTAL PACE, knowing that Yulin’s guards couldn’t be far behind them. Included in this pack was the man whom Sydney had sent to kill him. Sent to kill him. And he knew why: because Helice had found his daughter and told her about the weapon. Helice had gone to the Inyx military camp and then to their sway. That she was poisoning Sydney against him, he had no doubt. He’d give a lot to know what her larger plans were. Being Helice, she would have large plans.

Anzi crested a hill, swiftly taking her bearings. She knew this particular area only from reports of Yulin’s scouts. She hoped to follow a minor canyon down primacy, but so far the canyon was hidden by the endless pattern of basin and ridge, basin and ridge.

The Repel was still a full day away, as Yulin had estimated, back when the man had found it convenient to help Quinn. Just an hour ago, but all had changed now. They crested a saddle and slid recklessly down the other side, with Quinn keeping the pack, and the Going Over blade in its sheath at his waist. Anzi, too, was armed, since Suzong had urged her own knife on her niece as a parting gift. Their only advantage would be to meet Yulin’s men at the top of a ridge, keeping their attackers below them.

The cirque chafed on Quinn’s ankle with each step. He resisted the urge to bend down and touch it, to see if, as it seemed, the metal sleeve was losing its frigid coldness. Two days of stability remained in the thing, three at the outside. Quinn tried not to think how the first leaks would feel. With any luck, by then he’d be at the foot of the great engine. Then let all hell break loose. It was what he had come for. It was what the Rose counted on, what Caitlin Quinn counted on—if she could have known his task—and what Emily and Mateo must have to live their lives in peace. To live their lives at all. By God, Yulin’s soldiers weren’t going to stop him now.

Anzi pointed down a ravine. “This way.”

His instinct was to head straight to Ahnenhoon, a direction he thought he might gauge by the storm wall in the distance, but Anzi seemed certain of herself. He began to wonder if they should stand and fight. If he could get the giant near the edge of the canyon that Anzi had described, he might have a chance to maneuver him over the edge. Quinn was still weak from the poisoning. He needed an advantage.

“How far is the canyon, Anzi?”

“Not far.” But he saw her lips moving in what he took for a prayer.

Mo Ti looked down in disgust as another of Yulin’s servants pulled off a boot and dumped out a rock.

“Soft,” Mo Ti muttered.

“You try running up hillsides in such shoes as this,” the youngster snarled.

Out of shape, clumsy in his gait, and already hungry, the fellow wasn’t much worse than the fourteen others Yulin had sent as a fighting force. They weren’t soldiers, but courtiers, more accustomed to long parties than long treks. And this trek had just
begun. Mo Ti knew this terrain around Ahnenhoon: gullies giving way to canyons gouged from the plains by the quaking storm walls. He feared that if he got much ahead of these idlers, they would never press on. On the other hand, despite his groin injury, Mo Ti had the stamina to double his pace.

He summoned the most able-bodied man and pinned him with his best glare. “Mo Ti will go ahead. See that you bring these men along in good order and without slacking. If not, our prey will report your camp and your master. You know the penalty for treason?”

The man did. He kicked the seated youth, and soon the group was slogging up and down the hillocks in better order.

Mo Ti swiftly left them behind. The bright waxed into Prime of Day, a dazzling blanket across the vault of the sky, like the plowed ground of heaven. By its harsh light, Mo Ti saw that the tracks of his quarry pointed directly to Ahnenhoon. He trod in their groove. By Heart of Day, however, he knew that Yulin’s men, if they caught up at all, would never arrive in time for the coming confrontation. He would have to kill Titus Quinn without assistance. His wound still bled, though cinched close with a band of cloth. Even so, Mo Ti could overcome the two he pursued. They hadn’t slept for days, whereas he had caught fistfuls of sleep riding Distanir on their way into Yulin’s camp.

Distanir. The loss seared him. But it didn’t slow his steps.

Quinn squinted into the distance, seeing a man the size of a bear lumber over a ridge. Their perch afforded them a wider view than before, one that showed them the giant was still hunting them. Although the big man was alone and limping badly, he was close: six hillocks away, and giving no signs of needing rest.

From your own daughter
, Suzong had said.
Sent to kill you.
Over the last few days he had allowed himself to think that Sydney would soften toward him after his messages. But instead, she now thought of her father as someone who would commit genocide.

Leaving these thoughts to smolder, he concentrated on their predicament. The Inyx mount wasn’t with Sydney’s assassin; perhaps the mount’s wound prevented him from undertaking the chase. However, even without the mount, and despite his wound, the man lumbered relentlessly after them.

At Quinn’s side, Anzi said, “If he comes, leave me behind. He’s wounded. I can delay him. Let me do this, Titus.”

He looked at her, tracing her features, seeing her anew. Could he let her? What was one person’s life worth now? But
this
person’s life . . .
No, don’t ask
me, Miserable God.
He didn’t answer her, and Anzi let it lie for now.

They crept back into the next gully and rushed on.

Anzi had been looking for landmarks, and now she found one. “This way,” she said, pointing upslope. They clambered to a saddle of rock between two outcroppings.

“There. The fissures begin.” Below them, a broad valley extended, cleft by a dark line. “We should go around, or we’ll be trapped against the canyon edge.”

She led the way. But by now they were both stumbling, and gave up the effort to move quietly.

Quinn wasn’t thinking clearly. He should turn and wait for the assassin. Fight him now, before he grew weaker.

“Anzi,” he said. “The sequence on the chain. You should know it. How to take it off me. How to activate it.”

“Yes, teach me.”

He did, as they loped along. They were talking about dying.

Nearby the fissure came into view. Beginning as a narrow crack, it widened to their right into the canyon proper. Seven or eight hundred feet to the bottom, Quinn guessed. A rock bridge crossed it. They could cross and defend the bridge easily against all comers. He pointed to it, but Anzi shook her head.

“Too fragile. No, we must go the long way.” She pulled him onward.

He drilled her on the sequence of four, five, one to remove the chain and one, five, four to activate, but it was useless. She would never get into Ahnenhoon without him.

Anzi stumbled, going down to her knees. She clutched her ankle.

He knelt beside her, but she pushed him furiously away.

“Let me look at it,” he said.

She shook her head, wincing.

“How bad is it?”

She groaned. “Bad enough. It’ll slow me down.” She looked back in the direction of their pursuer. “Go, get out of here, Titus.” Seeing his expression, she said, “I’ll get back to Suzong. She’ll help me. Just go.”

He couldn’t carry her. Ahnenhoon waited. The giant pursued.

Still, he lifted her up and carried her a few steps to a place behind a cloven boulder the size of a beku. “Anzi . . . ,” he said.

She shook her head. “Go. Don’t say anything. Don’t say farewell. For luck.” She smiled and pushed him away.

He backed up. “My heart is broken,” he said.

“It always was.” She made pushing gestures and finally drove him into a desperate run. He ran along the canyon edge, keeping to the most open area, hoping to draw attention. He told himself that Anzi would make it back to camp. He took comfort in the thought even while knowing it was wildly improbable.

Mo Ti heard voices. He stopped to listen. Ahead of him, a woman’s voice, proof that he had at last caught up to his quarry. They were nearby, but where? Closing his eyes, he turned slowly, listening. There.

He hurried down the cleft between the ridges and came out on a flattened shelf of land that abutted the storm canyon. There, on the rock arch spanning the end of the great fissure, he spied them trying to cross. He loped forward. No, it was the woman, alone. He drew his knife, watching for Quinn.

Anzi stood in the center of the rock arch, waiting. Every thought left her like a flock of startled birds. There was nothing but fright, sickening fright, of the drop beneath her feet. Her ankle didn’t hurt a bit. Even if she had broken it instead of pretending an injury, she would have felt nothing but terror.

The giant strode onto the slab, walking toward her, sheathing his knife. He would just push her.

The arch was cracked in the middle. She stood on the crack.

The moment the giant left the buttressed sides of the rock bridge and entered the middle, the bridge gave way. It collapsed a section at a time, beginning under the man’s huge weight, and falling toward Anzi, who just had time to scramble to a portion that held to the far side of the crevasse.

Anzi stood on solid ground, watching as he crashed onto a slope below, bringing down a cascade of rubble in a cloud of dust. The man lay dead, a boulder among the stones. She slumped to the ground, kneeling. When she finally looked up, Titus was standing on the other side of the crevasse. She was glad she couldn’t read his expression.

She motioned that he should follow his side of the canyon and meet her at its head. She thought she could make it that far. But all the strength was seeping out of her body. She walked for only a few increments when she went to her knees in exhaustion. Not another step. Head on knees, she kept seeing the rock bridge sink and fall.

After an indeterminate amount of time, she saw Titus approach.

He dropped the pack at her feet. Crouching beside her, he offered her the flask of water, and she drank.

“I suppose I can’t trust you anymore.”

“No. It would be foolish.”

“You planned this from the moment we left Yulin.”

“For the Rose.”

He sat down next to her and put his arm around her. “We’ll sleep for an hour.”

“
You
sleep,” she said.

He pulled her head onto his shoulder, and against her will, Anzi lost
consciousness.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

The knowledge of Heaven is obtained by offerings to the Miserable
God; the laws of the universe can be verified by mathematical
calculation; but the dispositions of the enemy are ascertainable
through spies, and spies alone.

—from Tun Mu’s
Annals of War

T
HE SUN ROSE ON SCHEDULE, piercing the deeps of Johanna’s forest with excellent lateral light shafts. It was all lovely, convincing, and false. She rose from her pallet, knowing that Early Day had come to the Entire and she could be properly abroad, appearing to engage in the petty concerns of her life, such as painting on canvases, maintaining the forest illusion, and tending to silk spiders. In reality, though she hadn’t slept, she was renewed. The new lord had come to her side last night whispering in her ear, breathing life into her again. Breathing life into the Earth. The secret of access to the engine was now revealed. It could be brought down. Soon this forest, poor copy of Earth that it was, would buckle and fold. Let it all buckle and fold, she told herself.