Glimmer in the Maelstrom: Shadow Through Time 3 (27 page)

‘I
feel awkward,’ Khatrene said. ‘I know I’m not really your mother. It was Sarah who raised you.’ Was she hoping Glimmer would make some extravagant avowal of love and gratitude? Khatrene knew it was hopeless. The girl didn’t care about anyone except Kert. And why Kert?

Why not her mother?

Where love and anticipation had once lived as a warm glow inside Khatrene’s heart, there was now only hollow disappointment and the terrible premonition that Glimmer had never been hers. The Catalyst belonged to fate.

Glimmer simply continued staring into the nondescript mists that surrounded them. They’d arrived on the Airworld minutes earlier, accompanied by a beam of light so dazzling that even through closed eyelids it had hurt Khatrene’s eyes. In the transition Glimmer had changed from the gown she had been wearing into jeans and a T-shirt. She had multicoloured nail polish on. And the sulks.

Khatrene didn’t know what to do. For all of Glimmer’s life she’d looked forward to this day, preparing herself to deal with the extraordinary — The Catalyst. But apart from magical powers, what confronted her now was a typical teenager. After the reception they’d just had, Khatrene doubted that her daughter would ever acknowledge their relationship, and painful though that may be, it mustn’t stop her helping Glimmer fulfil her destiny.

‘Shouldn’t you be on Ennae?’ she asked.

Glimmer turned and looked at her, a cool assessing stare that unnerved Khatrene. Maybe she shouldn’t be telling The Catalyst what to do. She tried again, ‘The last time I held you, you were a baby, but while you were growing up I kept an eye on you from here.’ She waved a hand at the nondescript clouds around them. Atheyre was monotonous, and being on it had been like living inside a bag of giant cotton wool balls. The only thing that had kept Khatrene sane, apart from Talis, was her daily dose of Glimmer’s life viewed through the seeing-storm. ‘I kept wishing … I could be with you.’

Glimmer remained silent, and Khatrene supposed there was nothing she could say. It hadn’t been her decision to go into exile with Pagan. But Sarah had been a good mother to her. Glimmer had been loved and well cared for. It could have been a lot worse — in fact, would have been a lot worse if her father had got his hands on her.

‘I realise you don’t know me very well,’ Khatrene said, awkwardly trying to bridge the gap between them. ‘But I still think of you as my daughter and —’

‘This is not helping me attain my objective,’ Glimmer interrupted. ‘I care nothing for you, except that you help me win Kert’s love.’

‘Oh, okay.’ Nothing like having it spelt out for you. Khatrene took a deep breath and blinked a couple of times to hold back tears. The hollow place in her chest felt squeezed tight, as though her heart was contracting. ‘Well, I
can
help you,’ she replied, and was surprised at how calm she sounded. ‘Tell me how you came to love Kert and what has happened between you so far’

‘Very well.’ Glimmer wasted no time in laying out the whole sorry situation in bald detail. She hid no detail from Khatrene, divulging far more than any mother would want to hear. When at last it was over, Glimmer said, ‘A new threat hastens the Maelstrom and little time remains in which to secure Kert’s everlasting love. You must tell me how it can be won.’

Threat?
‘What new threat?’

Glimmer merely looked at her mother, then said, ‘Your advice?’

But Khatrene wasn’t about to be distracted. ‘Are you ignoring the Maelstrom to be with Kert?’

‘If you do not provide the information I require,’ Glimmer countered evenly, ‘I will return you and your Champion to the Volcastle.’

‘I don’t want that,’ Khatrene said and held up both hands in surrender. ‘Let me think for a minute. How long do we have?’ Perhaps that would give her a clue to this ‘new threat’.

‘On Haddash …’ Glimmer’s eyes narrowed and Khatrene had a sudden insight into her problem with Kert. She was physically beautiful, but that beauty was marred by the calculating expression on her face. No wonder he had been unable to fall in love with her. ‘… there may be ten or twelve weeks.’

‘Weeks?’ Khatrene’s train of thought derailed. ‘Ten weeks until you have to join the Four Worlds?’ Was that all? Khatrene thought of Talis then, and of his child growing within her. It would be born after the Four Worlds were joined. If she survived.

‘Birth of the Serpent God’s child has changed the course of events,’ Glimmer said. ‘The anchoring will cease to be effective much sooner than I had anticipated. I must either join the Four Worlds then, or … not.’

Serpent God’s
child?
Khatrene was desperate for information about this new danger, but pressing her daughter for answers would only get her sent back to the Volcastle. Better to pretend disinterest and see whether Glimmer made further disclosures on her own. ‘If you don’t join the Four Worlds everyone will die,’ she pointed out. ‘Including Kert.’

‘My obsession with Kert is illogical,’ Glimmer admitted. ‘But it overshadows everything else, even my destiny’

Khatrene shook her head. ‘Fight it.’

‘Why should I?’ Glimmer asked. ‘If Kert will not love me, why should I care for the fate of others?’

‘You don’t care about them now.’ Glimmer’s capacity for love was so narrow it frightened Khatrene. Only Kert. How could she help her daughter widen that field and include others? Should she even try? The last thing she wanted was to distract Glimmer from her destiny. But wasn’t she hopelessly distracted already? ‘And you should care,’ she said helplessly. ‘You’re The Catalyst.’

‘Do you have any instruction on how to make Kert love me?’ Glimmer asked.

There was so much more Khatrene needed to know, but her daughter’s irritation was evident. She dragged her mind back to the task at hand. ‘You don’t
make
someone love you,’ she said, wondering how far she could coax Glimmer. ‘That implies changing them. Unless you want to use your magic, you can only change yourself. And the way you behave.’

‘I won’t use my powers on Kert,’ Glimmer said, unable to meet her mother’s eyes. ‘Tell me how to begin. What behaviour must I change?’

‘Well …’ Where to start? ‘When you love someone you want them to be happy. You want them to —’

‘You said I must change my behaviour,’ Glimmer interrupted, her irritation growing. ‘You are generalising. Speak in specifics. Must I change my conversation, my manners?’

‘No. Not that.’ Khatrene looked around, then lowered herself onto the spongy cloud surface she’d grown so used to during her exile in Atheyre. ‘You need to change the way you act towards Kert,’ she said, and patted the soft surface beside her.

‘I wish to stand,’ Glimmer said.

‘And I want you to sit,’ Khatrene replied. ‘Do you see how you are being selfish by not considering my needs?’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘If I were Kert, I’d be thinking you didn’t love me if you couldn’t even sit down when I asked you to.’

Glimmer’s lips pressed tightly together for a moment, then she sat at Khatrene’s side. ‘You wish me to pretend that you are Kert?’

‘For the purposes of instruction,’ Khatrene replied, ‘that’s a good idea.’

‘You are ill equipped to impersonate a man in any physical interaction.’

‘God no!’ Khatrene suppressed a shudder. ‘We’re just going to be talking. Not touching,’ she said. ‘It’s not … that sort of instruction.’

‘Theory then, not practice.’

‘Exactly.’ Khatrene tried to relax but Glimmer took everything so literally. ‘Let’s talk about needs. Kert’s needs.’

‘His physical needs are adequately met,’ Glimmer interrupted. ‘I see no purpose —’

‘I’ve no doubt you’re having lots of sex,’ Khatrene said. ‘But what about his emotional needs?’

‘If he needs someone to love, why does he not love me?’ Glimmer shot back.

‘Because you’re not
lovable
,’ Khatrene replied. ‘You’re … greedy.’

Glimmer merely observed her mother and Khatrene had no idea what was going through her mind.

‘You want his love, but you’re not willing to give him anything he wants in return.’

‘I would give him my love. I already have.’

‘He doesn’t want that.’ Khatrene wasn’t sure if she was going too far, but subtlety didn’t appear to be something Glimmer recognised.

‘And you know him well enough to know what he does want?’

‘That’s why I’m here,’ Khatrene replied confidently.

‘Then tell me,’ Glimmer demanded.

‘What he wants is his freedom,’ Khatrene said. ‘And you don’t
use
it to buy his love. You give it to him freely
because
you love him.’

Glimmer’s eyes narrowed. ‘He will go straight to Mihale. How can this help me?’

‘You lied to me,’ Khatrene said provocatively, hoping to break Glimmer away from her inexorable logic. ‘You don’t love him at all.’

Glimmer shook her head, her long blonde hair, straighter than Khatrene’s, sliding over her stiff shoulders. ‘You cannot know what is in my heart.’

‘I can see how you behave —’

‘My behaviour is not —’

‘Your behaviour has been
appalling.
’ Khatrene leant close to her daughter so she could stare her down. ‘And that is all he sees. He doesn’t see into your heart. He only sees what you do. And what have you done?’

Glimmer’s gaze wavered and then broke away from her mother’s. ‘I have imprisoned him.’

‘And?’

‘And …’ Glimmer looked back at Khatrene and her expression softened, her lip actually trembling. ‘What else have I done?’

‘You forced him to pretend to love you, just so you wouldn’t punish him.’

Glimmer shook her head again. ‘I would never hurt him.’

‘Not Kert. But you told me you threatened the woman who stumbled into the cave. Darten? You must have known that would upset him.’ Khatrene tried to soften her verbal assault by resting her hand over Glimmer’s. Surprisingly, she didn’t pull away. ‘And where is Darten now?’

Glimmer looked down at her lap. ‘Drowned. All of the Domedwellers are dead. Just as the Cliffdwellers are.’

Khatrene frowned, distracted. ‘I saw the Cliffdwellers appear while I was here with Mihale and Talis. It looked like their whole race. Did they die in some tragedy?’

‘No, they were simply ready to ascend. They voluntarily relinquished their lives. They and the cetaceans of Magoria.’

‘Whales?’ Khatrene was lost. ‘Here?’

Glimmer sighed extravagantly, as only teenagers can. ‘Normally, those who die before the end of time are caught up in the cycle of rebirth that characterises the three lower worlds, Haddash, Magoria and Ennae.’ She had slipped into a lecturing tone but Khatrene was too busy following the conversation to care. ‘Eventually, beings reach the end of that cycle.’

‘But Cliffdwellers and
whales
?’

Glimmer look at her as though the facts were self-evident. ‘Those whose cycles have ended leave the lower worlds and ascend to Atheyre where they wait for the creation of the One World.’

‘So what happens to them if you don’t do your job? Are their souls lost forever?’

Glimmer stared into her mother’s eyes and was a full minute composing her reply. ‘I will “do my job”,’ she said. ‘The One World is a reality.’

‘But,’ Khatrene frowned, ‘you haven’t created it yet.’

‘In your linear time I haven’t. In nonlinear time it has always
been.
I came from there.’

Khatrene tried to get her head around that. ‘You came back in time from the One World to set up its creation?’

Glimmer frowned. ‘If that framework helps you to understand, then yes. I did.’

‘But, that means … you must succeed. You must be going to join the Four Worlds or you wouldn’t be here now.’

‘I will eventually.’

‘Eventually? What does that mean?’

‘This isn’t the first time I’ve tried.’

Even in the buffered quiet of Atheyre, the silence that followed Glimmer’s statement was deafening.

‘You’ve … tried before. You mean you’ve been here before? In my past.’

Glimmer shook her head. ‘I have lived this life, in this time, over and over. I am the shadow through time,’ she reminded her mother.

‘I knew that,’ Khatrene said but her head was spinning. She held up a hand when Glimmer would have gone on, to give herself time to catch up. ‘You’re talking about time repeating itself?’ she said at last. ‘Not reincarnation in linear time. You mean time replaying itself so you can get this right?’

Glimmer nodded and Khatrene felt hollow, as though the bottom had just fallen out of her stomach and dropped down through the spongy cloud surface of Atheyre into infinity. Her daughter was so alien that the link of flesh between them felt inconsequential.

‘At each failure I have gone back to the point where it could be remedied,’ Glimmer explained.

Khatrene shook her head, struggling to take that in. ‘Have we all been reliving our lives over and over again so you could get this right?’

‘Parts of your lives. I have not always gone back to my birth —’

‘Well that explains deja vu.’

‘— but on each occasion when I reached the critical moment, the talisman either crippled me, or simply would not function in my hands.’

Khatrene blinked, stunned this time. ‘You can’t use the talisman?’

Glimmer shook her head and Khatrene felt the whole sorry mess expand inside her mind, as if her skull wasn’t large enough to hold it.

‘Then how the hell are you going to join the Four Worlds?’ She stared at her daughter. ‘Isn’t their some ancient lore? An instruction manual?’

Glimmer let that fly over her head. ‘In this life I saved Kert and took him to Haddash,’ she explained. ‘Perhaps only to change the circumstances. I don’t know.’

‘You don’t know?’ Khatrene echoed, growing more incredulous by the minute.

‘I am the memory of all things that abide in the minds of man,’ Glimmer said, ‘but man does not know everything.’

‘The Great Guardian knows everything,’ Khatrene countered, wondering why her daughter’s admission that she wasn’t all-powerful was a relief. Had it narrowed the evolutionary gap between them?

Glimmer smiled. A Mona Lisa smile. ‘Ah, the Great Guardian.’

Khatrene’s eyes narrowed. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’