All The Turns of Light (13 page)

“Well,” Mug demanded. “Is it the real Horn or isn’t it?”

“It appears to be,” Meralda said. “Even though it can’t be.”

She took in another deep breath and focused her Sight anew, willing her perception to go deeper.

For one moment, the Horn’s workings lay in her hands, moving and turning, as they had for centuries.

The next, Meralda saw the cold traceries of even subtler influences, which lay behind and beneath and beside the attachments laid down by Amorp.

She blinked, and her Sight was suddenly awash with perceptions of primal forces underlying even the first layer of new ones she saw just an instant ago.

None of it made any sense. “This isn’t working,” she said aloud, but as she decided to put the Horn down the patterns in her Sight coalesced, changing from a confusing jumble of disjointed images into a simple, elegant shape that both explained and contained the essence of Amorp’s Strident Horn.

“Now I see you!” Meralda felt herself smile. So simple, she thought. As marvelous as the construction was, it could be improved—she couldn’t resist tweaking it now that she understood it. A straightening there, the addition of a linkage there, the removal of this bit
here
...

For the briefest of instants, Meralda looked upon the improved spellwork with a mixture of pleasure and pride. Then a memory came rushing back, from her first time using Sight under the gruff but watchful guidance of Mage Fromarch.

“
Not bad for a first time,” the greying wizard had muttered. “But there’s one thing you’ve got to remember about Sight, apprentice Ovis. You can see things most people cannot. You can observe the hidden, the magical, and the mysterious. But observe only. Never try to change what you see with an act of will.”

“
Why not?” Meralda recalled asking. “Wouldn’t that save you time and effort?”

“
Sight reveals,” replied Fromarch. “It is the nature of creation that you may observe a thing, or you may change it, but you may not use Sight to do both at once. Which is why we attach spellworks to things, rather than trying to change the fundamental nature of the objects themselves.”

“
And if I try?” Meralda had asked.

Fromarch had shrugged. “Then I’ll be training another apprentice,” he said. “And the Palace cleaning staff will probably never get the stains off the floor.”

I’ve done what Fromarch said was impossible, she realized.

I remade the Horn from an act of mere will. No latching of spells, no holdstones, no charged wands, not a single scrap of wire. Yet the Horn is made anew, by no more than a whim, which is directly contrary to the laws of creation.

The new world Meralda perceived burst into blinding sheets of pure white fire. The deck of the
Intrepid
seemed to drop away, leaving her blind and falling, falling, down through a rushing void.

“Mistress!” shouted Mug, his flying coils buzzing. Meralda’s Sight fell away, and with it the lovely pattern of Amorp’s careful magic.

Meralda found herself on her knees, the wonder she’d felt replaced with a searing, piercing pain that began between her eyes and stretched through her skull and all the way down to the base of her spine.

Mug’s eyes swam into her view, all of them straining to reach through the bars of his cage.

“Bellringers!” he shouted. “Guards! Anybody! Get up, Mistress! Get up!”

Mug’s cries thundered in her ears, driving spikes of agony through flesh and bone alike.

Meralda covered her ears with her fists and squeezed her eyes tightly shut, barely able to feel the deck beneath her knees, her only real sensations those of pain.

She barely heard the Bellringers come charging in. She barely felt them pick her gently up and lay her carefully down on her berth. The least touch of light was like being burned with embers. She moaned in relief when they covered the portholes with blankets, and extinguished every lamp.

The cool damp cloth across her forehead did little to soothe the pain, but at least it was not more agony.

It wasn’t until the ship’s physician gave her an infusion of mertle-bay tea that she was relaxed enough to close her eyes and sink into slumber.

* * *

By the time she awoke, the sun was nearly set. The blanket-covered portholes only let in a gentle ruddy glow, much fainter than the light of a single candle. She could hear the soft breathing of the Bellringers, who were seated near, and could make out the ghostly glow of Mug’s many eyes, all of which were trained upon her.

“She’s awake,” whispered Mug.

One of the Bellringers stood.

“I feel simply awful,” Meralda said. Her voice was more croak than speech.

A cold glass was thrust into her hand.

“It’s water,” said Kervis in a whisper. “The doctor said you’d need it when you woke.”

Meralda drank, not realizing how parched she was until she’d emptied the glass.

“How long was I asleep?” she asked.

“A few hours,” Mug said. “How many eyes do I have?”

“Twenty-nine, of course,” replied Meralda. She managed to sit up, and though the cabin did wobble and swim for a moment she remained upright. “Why would you ask such a thing?”

“No reason,” Mug said, quickly. “More water?”

“In a moment,” Meralda said. She swung her feet over the edge of the bed, waited a moment, then stood.

The Bellringers rushed to her side.

Meralda managed a smile.

“You need not accompany me to my next destination,” she said, glancing toward her water closet. “I assure you both I am quite capable.”

She couldn’t see it happen, but she knew both of the guards blushed furiously.

“We’ll be just outside,” said Kervis.

“Glad you’re better,” added Tervis.

Meralda fought back a brief wave of renewed nausea and nodded. “Thank you.”

Mug hovered near the closed door, but she ignored his nonstop stream of questions. She found the switch on the side of the water closet’s single electric lamp, squeezed her eyes shut, and twisted the lamp on.

Even with her eyes shut, the force of the light struck her like a blow.

Slowly, very slowly, she opened her eyes, squinting. At first, she was able to make out nothing but a white glare that enveloped her. Eventually, the mirror and the bright copper fixtures became visible, if not yet perfectly clear.

Relieved, she turned the faucet and splashed water in her face. The icy-cold water felt wonderful. Some of the pain went away. But Meralda couldn’t forget the sight of the Horn’s magical composition changing to her whim, and she couldn’t ignore the single obvious conclusion drawn from her experience.

She pulled back her wet hair and looked into the mirror.

It isn’t Amorp’s Strident Horn behaving in new ways.

It’s me.

She plunged her face into the water again, letting the chill of it numb the pain until her breath ran out.

Her mind raced. Could this be some sort of magical assault?

“No,” she muttered aloud. That makes no sense. If the Vonats could alter reality, we’d all be inmates in their work camps by now.

Hallucination?

No, because Mug and the Bellringers and Tower also saw the Horn move from place to place.

What, then? What?

Meralda groped for a fresh towel, dried her face, and wrapped the towel around her wet hair. Then she leaned on the sink with both hands and glared at her bedraggled reflection and tried to make sense of it all.

Mug shouted through her door. “Sorry to interrupt, Mistress, but the bridge is asking for you. Problem with a desalinizer. Shall I tell them to go pound sand?”

“No,” Meralda said. She splashed more water on her face. “Tell them I’ll be in the maintenance bay shortly. Ask them to remove the covers before I arrive.”

Mug shouted agreement.

“You still have a job to do,” Meralda said to her reflection. “We can try and make sense of this later.”

She used the toilet and drew a hasty bath. “The laws of the universe don’t change merely because one boards an airship and leaves home,” she muttered as she slipped into her tub.

She remembered smelling the Laboratory earlier, when she spoke the Word of Warding. “There is an explanation. There must be.”

The water was warm. Meralda lay back, covered in soap bubbles and feeling the aches fade away.

I wonder...

She raised her Sight, just the tiniest glimpse of it. Then she lifted her hand, and regarded the bubbles she held in her palm.

They sparkled. Meralda blew on them, and they floated through the air, shining like jewels.

Jewels which quickly formed themselves into a perfect spiral reaching all the way to the ceiling.

More bubbles joined the spiral.

“Make a circle,” Meralda said. The bubbles obeyed, forming a perfect ring above the tub.

Her headache came sneaking back, but she ignored it. If I can do this, she wondered, what else can I do?

Could I make myself taller?

The soles of her feet suddenly pressed hard against the end of the tub.

“No, it can’t be,” she said, and suddenly she was no longer crowded in the tub.

I’ve never been very busty, she thought, and she shrieked as she felt her body change.

“Mistress?” shouted Mug.

“Nothing, stubbed my toe, go away,” shouted Meralda.

“Oh, the bridge was on the tube just now,” reported Mug. “Said they made a mistake, the desalinizer wasn’t broken after all. Unless you fixed it from the tub, ha ha.”

Meralda willed her body back to normal. A pang of loneliness shot through her. If anyone could offer insight, she knew, it would be Donchen.

He wouldn’t have the answers either, she realized. But he’d listen, watching her with those soft grey eyes. He’d hold her close while she spoke and when she was done, he’d tell her everything would be all right. Best of all, thought Meralda, just for a moment I’d believe him. Everything would be all right.

“Donchen,” she said miserably, to her empty bathroom. “I do so wish you were here.”

* * *

The crashing and screaming from inside Meralda’s water closet was loud enough for the Bellringers to hear from the passageway. They burst inside Meralda’s cabin, short-swords drawn. Mug, who was engaged in a futile effort to break down the door himself by ramming it with his birdcage, shouted for them to smash down the water closet door.

Before they could reach it, the door burst open and a panicked man dashed out. Meralda followed, wrapped in a towel and close on his heels. When the man hesitated at sight of the Bellringers, Meralda caught him around his waist and knocked him to the deck.

Mug shouted and flew. The Bellringers fell on top of the struggling man, who curled into a ball and wrapped his arms over his face against their blows.

“We’ve got swords on you,” shouted Kervis, who put the tip of his short bright weapon at the base of the man’s neck. “You so much as blink and we’ll stick you to the deck, right here, right now.”

Meralda rolled off the man, blinking and frowning. “Wait,” she said. “Wait.”

“Tervis, fetch the Watch officer,” said Kervis. “We’ve got a spy by the neck, and no mistake.”

“Indeed there is a mistake,” said the man. Meralda’s frown deepened at the sound of his voice. “I am no spy. I meant the Mage no harm.”

“Quiet, you,” said Kervis. “Lurking in a lady’s water closet. I’ve half a mind to toss you into the Sea myself. Tervis. Go.”

“Wait,” Meralda said. She squinted, staring at the man. “Tervis. Stay. Kervis. Let me see him.”

“Mage—”

“That’s an order,” Meralda said. “Please,” she added.

Kervis glared at the supine figure but stepped sideways, allowing Meralda to see the man’s face. “Show yourself,” said Kervis. “But don’t even think about getting up.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it, guardsman,” said the man. He moved his hands slowly away from his face. “A word of explanation is clearly in order,” he began. “Does anyone happen to have one?”

“I know you,” Meralda said. The pain was returning, washing over her in waves. Her cabin door stood open. The light spilling in from the corridor nearly blinded her, but she shielded her eyes with her right hand and kept speaking. “Fifty-two. You were in the Grand Salon, counting chairs.”

“Line Cook Jeffrey Sink,” said the man, smiling. “At your service.”

Meralda gasped. Her cabin spun, and she nearly fell. The man tried to reach for her, only to be stopped by Kervis’s blade.

“I said don’t move.”

The man batted the sword away easily. “She’s injured,” he said, and before either Bellringer could react, he had Meralda in his arms.

“I said I know you,” Meralda said, her voice slurred, her eyes shut. “Donchen.”

The man ignored the swords at his face. “Meralda, stay awake,” he said. “Don’t sleep. Stay with me.”