Infinite (8 page)

It was wide enough for two vehicles to drive side by side. That hadn’t seemed so wide when we’d been walking on it yesterday, but now that we had to cross in full view of a herd of centaurs, we might as well have been crossing the Range caldera.

Sam tested the wind. It still carried the centaurs’ stink and fractured voices. I couldn’t make out their words, but it seemed unlikely they’d speak our language, anyway.

“We should crawl,” I whispered. “So they don’t see two tall creatures go walking by.”

“One tall and one unusually short.” He said it with a smile, but his humor was strained. “You’re right. We’ll crawl.” He sighed and flexed his injured hand.

We adjusted our belongings and lowered ourselves to the ground. Frosty grass reached up to my elbows, blocking too much of my view—and not blocking enough. Though we were far back on the trail, around a bend to keep out of view, by the time we reached the center of the path, I could see the centaurs’ fires and their silhouettes as they moved about the field. There were so many. They wouldn’t have to worry about rocs swooping down on them.

The ground trembled under my palms, vibrations from all the movement to the east. Faintly, I saw startlingly graceful movements as a group of centaurs chased one another. They called out and laughed, their hooves beating the ground in rhythm.

They’d seemed awkward at first, so forward-heavy with their human halves in the front, but firelight glistened off muscular horse halves and sturdy legs. A pair of centaurs embraced. One reared up and spread his arms to the stars and moon and sky.

None of them
looked
like they were wearing human skin as clothing.

We’d been wrong about the sylph. Sort of. They
had
attacked people for thousands of years. They’d attacked me on my birthday last year, too. But there was something about them. They loved music. And now Cris was one.

What if we’d been wrong about centaurs?

Hoofbeats pounded on the ground, coming closer. Sam twisted to look back at me, and in the darkness, his eyes were wide. “Go,” he mouthed. “Fast.”

I scrambled across the path as quickly as I could, aching to get up and use my legs. But if they were coming our way, I didn’t want to be seen.

The hoofbeats thumped and a high, thin voice shrieked.

I jerked my face up to find a young centaur staring down at me, wearing a shocked expression. Another stopped next to the first. They both screamed.

I screamed.

Sam reached back and grabbed my wrist, and together we lurched for the other side of the path, but the centaurs were following—

And then the ground shuddered. Not from the herd. No, this was from the opposite direction. One solid thud followed by another.

The young centaurs stared past Sam and me, and the herd went quiet.

A hush fell over the entire area as the thuds came louder, faster. Then Sam climbed all the way to his feet—making the young centaurs jump back—and dragged me into the woods.

“Troll!”

At once, the area turned loud with centaurs shouting and metal clashing. And when I glanced over my shoulder, the young centaurs were just standing in the middle of the path, staring up with their mouths wide open as a human-shaped beast three times my size came roaring toward the field. Ice and branches flew away from the troll’s destructive passage.

“Wait!” I shook myself away from Sam and darted back to the path. The young centaurs—colts? children?—both snapped their attention to me. “Come on!” I had no idea if they understood me, but when I reached for them, one of the boys clasped his hand around my damp mitten, and we raced into the woods just as the troll thundered into the place where they’d been standing.

Sam opened his mouth, but shook his head and began running through the forest as cacophony erupted by the pond. Screams and roars spurred us through the woods. The children surged ahead, shoving branches and bushes out of the way. Sam and I hurried to keep up, but the dark forest was only brokenly lit with torches on the battlefield.

My SED buzzed in my pocket, but I couldn’t answer it. I focused on jumping over the tangle of roots the centaurs jumped over. On ducking ice-white limbs. On putting one leg in front of the other.

Shouts filled the area. Then a thundering growl. And the world thudded hard as something dropped. I stumbled, but one of the centaur children reached back and took my arm until I was balanced and running on my own again.

“Ana! Sam!” Stef’s voice came from just ahead. “There you are! I—”

Blue lights flared, targeting the young centaurs as we broke out into the open. The rest of the herd was far to our right, gathered around the fallen troll, so now it was just four humans and two scared centaur kids.

One of the boys screamed. The herd’s attention shifted.

“No, don’t!” I moved in front of the boys and held out my hands. They tried, unsuccessfully, to hide behind me. They were both much bigger than I was. “Don’t shoot. They’re just kids.”

“They’re
centaurs
.” Whit kept his weapon up. No one else moved, either.

Sam stayed off to the side, looking between us. “Don’t shoot Ana.”

“They’re just kids,” I said again.

The herd of centaurs rumbled closer, swords and spears lifted and glinting with blood in torchlight. Suddenly, we were surrounded. All of us humans. The young centaurs.

Stef swung her laser pistol toward the approaching army, but there was no way she’d overcome a thousand centaurs.

One targeting light still aimed at the young centaurs. I didn’t move from my position guarding them. And the other centaurs were deadly quiet as they appraised the situation.

No one moved. I could hardly breathe.

And then shadows appeared in the forest, falling toward the torchlight as they abandoned natural shadows. These were tall and thin, not attached to anything. They hmmed quietly, singing among themselves.

Gradually, the centaurs’ attention shifted from us to the shadows approaching from the other side. Heat billowed across the cool space as one shadow pushed forward, ahead of the others. It paused near me, a slender black rose blossoming inside one of its tendrils before it shivered apart.

The sylph had come.

HOPE KINDLED INSIDE me, then was smothered when, as one, the herd of centaurs lifted their weapons and screamed their rage to the sky. Ground shook under their pounding hooves as they ran to meet the sylph.

The sylph keened: awful, dissonant wailing. Shadows surged forth, sending waves of heat throughout the gathered humans and centaurs. What had been a midwinter night now became like summer as the sylph songs morphed into terrible cacophony.

The two young centaurs sobbed and dropped to the ground, clutching each other, clutching my legs. I tumbled down with them.

Sam and my friends cried out, but an insubstantial wall of shadows forced itself between us, carefully not burning delicate human flesh. But they were going straight for the centaurs, who just wanted their children back.

“Stop!” I pulled myself up from the tangle of limbs.

When I tried to throw myself into the mass of shadows, one of the centaur boys grabbed my wrist and shook his head, a panicked look on his face.

I used my free hand to cover his knobby knuckles, sharp with the strength of his grip, and smiled a little. “It’s okay.” No idea if he understood, but when he released me, I turned and shouted, “Stop!” again.

The sylph and centaurs kept moving toward one another, and the centaurs were about to be boiled alive—

I sang one long, sustained note. The pitch fell, and my voice cracked with winter and nerves. Though Sam had given me a few tips on how to best project my voice, we’d never arranged real lessons. There’d never been time.

But the sylph nearest me shifted and turned at the sound of my voice, peeling itself from the mass of shadows. It hovered around me, waiting, matching my note.

If music were water, this would have been a ripple. The angry keening dropped, and the sylph all seemed to gasp and face me. They watched me, though they had no eyes, no faces. They were but tall shadows, with tendrils that flickered toward the sky as I fumbled to free my hands of mittens, then found my SED and searched through the music function.

I chose Phoenix Symphony. Some of the sylph already knew it, and it was one of my favorites.

The first chords rushed from the speakers like a waterfall, and I let my voice fade beneath the powerful sounds of the piano, violins, and thunderous bass.

I pushed the volume as high as it would go, so that every sylph heard. They halted just before they reached the line of centaurs, and the incredible heat faded to something more bearable.

Behind me, the centaur boys scrambled to their feet. One touched my shoulder, and his gaze fell on the SED clutched in my hands. The light from the screen illuminated his face, scratched from our run and his fall to the ground. But he smiled when his hand passed through the SED glow, and he said something I could neither hear clearly over the music, nor understand.

My SED screen flashed; on the other side of the sylph swarm, Sam had synced his SED with mine. Phoenix Symphony played all around.

The boys needed to return to their people. The centaurs just wanted them back. That was why they were here. And surely the sylph wouldn’t let the centaurs hurt me, if they tried.

I put my SED in my pocket, speaker facing up so the music remained loud and clear, then reached up to take each centaur boy’s hand. Together, we walked around the sylph, which sang and danced along with the music, though still watchful, as though waiting for the centaurs to attack again.

We broke through the line of shadows and found the centaur herd almost motionless. Their eyes narrowed, but that was all.

One of the centaur women crashed through the herd, her arms wide. The boys leapt out into the thin strip of land between us and bounded to her, and sylph fanned around me, including me in their line as they sang melodies and countermelodies of the first movement of Phoenix Symphony.

The boys hugged the woman—their mother?—and the lead warriors of the herd seemed to look over my group. Four humans armed with only lasers and music, and dozens of sylph.

The shadows coiling around me must have been the deciding factor. One of the leaders turned and shouted some kind of order, and the herd began moving away, their hooves like thunder in the ground.

One of the centaur boys ran back, though. He stopped midway between our groups and called out something as he pointed southeast. Showing me where they were going. Then, in a high and eerily beautiful voice, he sang along with a measure of melody as it flowed from the SED, and from the sylph.

Only a moment later, he was gone, lost among the other centaurs.

The music swelled, and I turned back to Sam and the others. Sylph parted, forming a clear path.

As I headed for Sam at the other end of the dark tunnel, tendrils of shadow snaked out and wrapped around my wrist or touched my hair. But the tendrils were incorporeal. I felt nothing but warmth where they touched me.

Sylph song surrounded me, layers of harmony in otherworldly wailing and whispering. A few sylph swayed, as though lost in music.

“Are you okay?” Sam reached for me, and our SEDs were muffled as we hugged.

“I’m fine.” I pulled back, relieved to be reunited with my friends. “They were just scared children. They were new. Like me.” My smile felt forced as I gazed from Stef to Whit. These were my friends. They’d agreed to come on this incredible and possibly futile journey with me. But they were oldsouls. They’d never truly understand the connection I felt with other newsouls, even if the newsouls were centaurs.

“We’re just glad you’re safe.” Whit gazed beyond me at the sea of sylph still fluttering with the music, singing along with the parts they knew. “And I see you found the sylph.” His voice was raspy, wary.

I shook my head and lowered the volume of my SED, but didn’t turn off the music as the second movement began to play. “They found us.”

“They seem to really like you.” He frowned, and I tried to imagine how strange the whole situation must appear. Centaurs retreating in the background. Sylph curling up around me like shadowy cloaks. “Which one is”—he seemed to struggle with the memory and knowledge—“Cris?”

I glanced over my shoulder, but I couldn’t tell the sylph apart. They were all just pillars of darkness.

One sylph moved forward to stand beside me.

“Cris.”

He twitched a little, almost like a nod, and a black rose bloomed around him.

“Oh, Cris.” Stef reached out, and her voice broke.

I bit my lip. “That movement earlier. It was a nod?”

He did the same thing.

“And what means no?”

The shadow twisted, just the upper half. Like a head shake, only the smoke resettled and he hadn’t twisted back. Unnerving.

“Okay.” I didn’t know what else to say. Great, we could ask yes and no questions, but I didn’t want to ask if he was miserable like this, if he hurt, or if he blamed me. I didn’t want to know the answers in case they were yes.

“These other sylph won’t harm us?” Whit asked.

Cris shook his head, even as the rest of the swarm circled us, radiating heat to ward off the cold night. They’d stopped singing.

“Now that we’ve joined with the sylph,” Whit said, gazing around at the ring of darkness, “what do we do?”

I wasn’t sure. I’d wanted to find them, be able to ask questions. And now I could. But I hadn’t thought about much beyond that. I had goals, but no idea how to complete them. “First thing,” I said, turning to Cris. “We need somewhere safe to hide. Most of the Council has been killed. Deborl is in control of the city. He’s searching for us. Sarit and Armande stayed behind to keep us informed.” My heart ached at the thought of Sarit, but I’d call her later. She’d never believe it when I told her about tonight.

Cris nodded.

“Second thing.” I glanced southeast. “We sent a group of about forty people that way, to get them away from Deborl and an eruption. That way they have a chance.”

Cris nodded again, and the other sylph all leaned in, listening.

“Can a few of you catch up with them and protect them? We’ll call and make sure they know you’re coming, so they won’t try to trap you. But they don’t have much in the way of protection. A few sylph would help a lot.”

The sylph hummed and sang among themselves for a minute, and then four broke away and darted southeast. They were frighteningly quick, almost like real shadows when someone turned on a light.

“Thank you,” I whispered as the sylph closed the circle in tighter, and my friends pressed closer together. “The third thing is this: I need to learn, and I was hoping you would be able to help. We have only a short time, so the sooner I figure out how to read these books and understand what happened five thousand years ago, the sooner I can get started on my plan.”

The sylph waited, undulating darkly under the moonlight.

I made my voice strong. “I want to stop Janan from ascending.”

Night shattered as every sylph cried out in triumph.

The sylph led us to a cave at the base of a mountain, with a stream running through its center. Wind blew in, and the stone was cold and hard, but when sylph lined up around the perimeter, warmth radiated through the walls and ground.

With lamps brightening the gloom and our sleeping bags folded up to sit on, the cave wasn’t so bad.

“I bet the stream floods in the spring,” Stef said, looking up from her SED. “Not that we’ll be here that long. I have an update from Armande, by the way.”

We all leaned in, and one of the sylph broke away from the others.

“Cris.” I scooted closer to Sam to make room between Whit and me, and though Whit’s smile was more strained than welcoming, he edged toward Stef and patted the place beside him. “Sit with us,” I said.

Cris hesitated, seeming to look between the other sylph and us, all gathered around a bright lamp and things we’d brought from Heart. He wasn’t sure what to do. Sit with people who’d hated sylph for five thousand years, or stay with his new people. Suddenly, I felt rotten for asking him to choose.

The others were all waiting, too, watching Cris to see what he’d do.

“Why don’t you all come closer?”

Stef and Whit cringed, even as they nodded, and Sam went pale. It was hard to accept that while sylph were frightening, they wouldn’t hurt us.

But what about the sylph that had chased me on my birthday last year? Or burned my hands?

I’d have to ask Cris later.

None of the sylph moved to accept my invitation. “Come on,” I said. “We’re allies. We have friends in common. We have goals in common.” At least, it seemed like the sylph wanted me to stop Janan, if their singing earlier was any indication.

Gradually, the sylph eased toward us, keeping their heat low and their songs quiet. They left a good distance between us, but this was an improvement. I tried to smile at them.

Stef cleared her throat, and everyone’s attention shifted back to her. “Armande reports the curfew is tighter than ever. Several people have been imprisoned for disobeying. Even more have been imprisoned for skipping morning gatherings around the temple. Deborl insists they make amends for centuries of ignoring Janan. They’ve started building something inside the city, as well, but no one is sure what it is, just that they’re all to contribute. Some people have been sent to mine or refine more materials.”

“So even regular jobs are suspended?” Whit asked. “For whatever it is they’re building?”

Stef nodded. “It’s in the industrial quarter. It looks like they’re using the geothermal energy lines for something. And many of the warehouses have been destroyed. There’s a picture.” She turned the SED to share it with the rest of us.

As she’d said, a large section of the industrial quarter had been seized and razed. Where there had once been warehouses, now only a few odd buildings and skeletal tubes remained. Some of those were water lines or sewer lines, while others were for power generation. Along the far edge of the quarter, the textile mill, pottery workshop, and forgers were still standing. For now.

Whatever they were building, it wasn’t far along enough for us to guess its purpose. Something wide and flat, though that could simply be the foundation for something bigger, especially if they were gathering more materials.

“Just because we don’t know what it is,” Sam said, “doesn’t mean we don’t know what it’s for in the end.”

“Janan.” Stef nodded. “No doubt it’s to benefit him.”

“There’s so much we still need to know,” Whit said. “Which means we need to get back to those books. Ana?”

“I’m ready.” I glanced at Cris—or the sylph I thought was Cris. “Did you happen to learn how to read these books when you became a sylph?”

Cris hummed and trilled, almost like a chuckle as he shook his head. But before I could be disappointed, he twitched, and another sylph came forward.

I struggled for a pronoun. I’d always thought of sylph as genderless
its
, but it seemed rude to say that to . . . not their faces, since they didn’t have faces, but . . . Ugh. I addressed the new sylph. “You can help me translate the symbols from the books?”

The sylph nodded, mostly a vertical rolling of smoke.

“Great.” It would be a long night if we had to ask yes and no questions about the meanings of words, though. Still, we could start with confirming the words we already had. “Whit?”

He stood and headed for my bag, where I kept the temple books. “The sooner we get this done, the sooner we’re not living in a cave.”

Sam leaned toward me—and the sylph. “He misses the library.”

I sighed. “I do, too. All the books. The well-lit reading areas.”

“The chairs.” Stef swooned dramatically. “I miss chairs. My legs are tired after all this walking.”

Cris whistled, like bragging he didn’t have sore legs.

“Ready?” Whit handed everyone books and notebooks, and we all got to work. Sylph floated around as we went through pages, confirming or attempting to correct our translations. It was difficult, trying to understand the sylph, but as the night deepened, I began catching on to their movements more quickly, and their trills and hmms, the moods conveyed by their pitch and the notes they sang.

When I glanced at Sam to see if he’d begun understanding the sylph, he smiled.