Orlind (47 page)

Galywis’s story
also explained why the Lokant language was so similar to her own.
The languages of the Seven must have evolved from the Lokants’ own
tongue. Some of those languages had developed along similar lines;
others varied a lot more.

But what of these
amaskan energies? What did it mean to say that Galywis had “bound”
part of his Library to their Cluster, via this strange force? And
how did any of this explain why Krays was so urgently interested in
Orlind?

‘
Another question, Galywis,’ she began.

‘
Full
of questions, you,’ he grouched. ‘I’m getting tired.’

‘
Sorry. Just a couple more.’

He sighed.
‘Fine.’

‘
What
did you mean when you called your Library the centre?’

‘
It
was the
first.
All the rest came later. Lesser ones. After
all,’ he said, beaming, ‘you can’t have all those Librarians just
wandering off, can you? Building Libraries anywhere you please and
doing who-knows-what. We needed a centre. Keep them all in
line.’

Eva knew from
long experience that people resented anything that “kept them in
line” - and coveted that power for themselves. She was going to ask
for an elaboration, but Galywis waved a hand.

‘
I
know, I know. You want more. All the Libraries were connected to
the old girl, right? No way out of
that.
’

‘
Unless you destroyed the old girl,’ Tren said.
‘Right?’

‘
Or
controlled it!’ added Eva. ‘Mastery of this Library must’ve meant
mastery over them all.’

‘
That
was me,’ Galywis confided, smiling. ‘I was the Master.’

‘
I’m
sure you were marvellous at it,’ Eva smiled.

‘
Marvellous,’ he sighed with infinite satisfaction.
‘Yes.’

‘
So
did Krays and Limbane want to destroy the Library or rule it?’ she
mused, thinking out loud.

‘
Either way, I wonder how it ended up like
this,
’ Tren
said, gesturing at the glass walls of the temporary
greenhouse.

Galywis’s face
darkened. ‘If they were going to have a
war
over it they
should’ve kept it among themselves!’ he bellowed in a sudden rage.
‘No use dragging the whole world into it!’

Llandry, silent
up until now, let out a sudden gasp. ‘I think I know,’ she said.
‘It was the draykoni, wasn’t it? They got pulled in on one side or
the other, and... well, when they were attacking Waeverleyne they
started manipulating the... the amasku? Trying to use Glinnery
itself
to destroy us. What if there were numerous drayks on
both sides, all doing the same thing? Imagine the
chaos
!’

‘
Such
a mess,’ Galywis agreed. ‘I did what I could to hold onto my
Library but it was me against a war. How much could I
do?’

Eva shivered,
picturing that conflict. It wasn’t hard to imagine that Orlind had
been a larger, populous realm at one time, housing the emerging
human and draykoni races together, until the Lokant civil war had
spilled over. How little now remained! A tiny island and a
crippled, diminished Master Library...

‘
Galywis,’ she said suddenly. ‘Do you think the old girl could
ever be restored?’

‘
Nope,’ he said with finality. ‘Too far gone. Amasku’s out of
control, can’t be fixed now.’

‘
Are
you sure?’

He eyed her.
‘Why? You planning to try?’

‘
I
think that Krays Maeval is planning to try. That’s why he wants
those energy collectors; the plan is to drain out most of the
violently unstable amasku until it’s back to manageable levels.
Then he’d need access to draykon talents to bring it under his
control, to get into the Library and wrest it back into shape.
Supposing that can even be done. But he’s tried allying himself
with drayks before and it seems it didn’t work out well. How much
better if he can do it himself?’

‘
But
why wouldn’t he just build another drayk-style race?’ Ori
asked.

Galywis gave a
shout of laughter. ‘
Just
build another one! Can’t be done,
young man. That was the greatest undertaking of our history, and we
needed the Library and the binding to make it work. Besides, Maeval
could never have done it. Hasn’t got the wit.’ He
sniffed.

‘
Okay,’ Ori said, ‘so he has to work with what’s already here.
I wonder whether the goal is to take back that mastery over all the
Lokant Libraries, or whether it’s about regaining Orlind so he can
attempt another project like the draykoni?’

‘
Probably the former,’ Eva guessed. ‘He built
hundreds
of constructs, many of them war machines of one sort or another. He
didn’t build them for the Waeverleyne war - he started building
much earlier than that. Why would he need them? Because he was
planning a war against the rest of his kind.’

‘
Maeval’s ambitious,’ sneered Galywis. ‘He tried several times
to take mastery from me.’

That didn’t
surprise Eva at all. ‘And Erritas?’

‘
Him
too.’

That surprised
her, just a little. But not much.

‘
I
wonder what Limbane’s up to,’ she mused. ‘I’d wager that he knows
Krays is making a bid for Orlind, but perhaps he doesn’t know how.
Does he mean to stop him, I wonder, or to let him do the hard work
then wrest the mastery from him afterwards?’

‘
The
latter sounds very Limbane,’ Tren ventured.

‘
Doesn’t it though. That explains the trick with the book in
his reading room. He probably fed him something that will “help”
Krays, and therefore Limbane too, by extension.’

Tren sneered. ‘I
think Galywis is right; building purely biological creatures is not
Krays’s strong point. All his constructs are at least partly
mechanical. The best he’s managed is to build
some
bio
features in.’

‘
And
who knows who he’s got helping him?’ Eva added.

‘
I
foresee a problem,’ Pensould said. ‘I cannot see how it is to be
possible to “drain away” the amasku. My understanding of machinery
is minimal, so supposing we accept that it can be done... where is
it to go?’

Five people
stared at him in incomprehension.

‘
It
certainly cannot be destroyed,’ he continued. ‘I do not personally
imagine it can be contained either. So it must be redirected. Where
to?’

‘
Somewhere else within our Cluster,’ Eva realised with a
sinking feeling. ‘The return of the draykoni caused some similar
chaos, am I right?’

‘
The
effect is similar,’ Pensould agreed, ‘though in this place it is
much exaggerated. That is why there are no beasts here. They cannot
bear it; it drives them mad. They have all long since fled or
died.’

Eva shivered. ‘So
if this corrupted amasku were to spread into the rest of our
Cluster?’

‘
The
impact would be severe,’ Pensould said.

‘
Why
hasn’t it already, though?’ Tren asked. ‘Orlind’s still connected
to the other six realms, even if there’s a sea in the
way.

Llandry spoke up.
‘We didn’t start to feel those effects until we were almost at the
island. It’s centred around this area and here it stays. Perhaps it
doesn’t “spread”, precisely, on its own.’

Eva looked at
Galywis.

He grinned.
‘Clever, clever Maeval, to build such clever machines! Sadly for
him, he is not the first. Shame...’ He began whistling a simple
tune, keeping time with his feet.

‘
You’ve got devices around the island,’ Eva guessed. ‘Buried I
suppose, so they aren’t affected by the Changes. They direct the
amasku around in circles?’

‘
Mmhm,’ Galywis nodded.

‘
Is
that why you’re still here?’

‘
Somebody’s got to keep an eye on the old girl.’

Eva gazed at his
lined face sadly. How many centuries had he been here, tucked
inside the Library’s stuttering time-altering field, guarding “the
old girl” and what was left of Orlind?

‘
Right,’ she said crisply, ejecting these thoughts. ‘We
probably haven’t much time before Krays is ready to make his
attempt. There must be a way for us to stop all this.’

Tren nodded his
head at Llandry, Pensould and Ori. ‘Drayk powers seem central to
all of this. Luckily we have a few with us.’

Eva nodded. ‘And
you and I aren’t helpless either. If we keep together, we can all
work on the amasku. If we’re lucky, he won’t expect any such
interference. They’ve all gone to great lengths to keep Orlind a
secret.’

She would have
said more, but a shudder ran through the Library, almost knocking
her off her feet. Llan, Pense and Ori all cried out as if in
pain.

‘
Too
late,’ said Pensould through gritted teeth. ‘It’s
starting.’

Chapter Thirty One

Ever since
Llandry had arrived in Orlind, the thrumming energies of the place
had kept a perpetual buzzing sense of explosive energy running
through her. It was not unlike the heightened alertness and
heart-pounding dread she suffered in one of her fits of anxiety;
her body was unable to cope with the interference and it did not
react well. Throughout Eva’s conversation with Galywis, she had
been obliged to keep part of her mind on the struggle to stay calm
and in control of her breathing and her trembling limbs.

Then a jolt had
shot through the floor, a powerful burst of energy that sent her
rocking back on her feet, almost tumbling to the ground. Her heart
had jumped in tandem and now pounded harder than ever. She couldn’t
breathe and was rapidly growing dizzy.

Pensould’s hands
steadied her as she swayed. He whispered a few words of comfort,
which helped, although she could sense that neither he nor Ori were
in any better state. Tren and Eva’s confidence in them was
gratifying but also alarming. How could they prevail in any
confrontation when the very measures Krays took to subdue Orlind
had such a powerfully negative impact on the three of them as
well?

But they would
have to manage, for she doubted not that Krays’s arrival was the
reason for the additional disturbance. A second jolt shook the
building again, harder this time, and she had to cling to Pensould
to remain upright.

For some minutes
a palpable sense of panic reigned in the corrupted Library. They
weren’t ready, weren’t prepared; they’d only just arrived at some
degree of understanding about Krays’s motives and had only the
vaguest idea how to combat his methods. Further, the extent of the
possible consequences appalled and frightened her.

She looked across
to where Eva was helping a recumbent Tren to his feet. ‘Eva, do you
have a plan?’

‘
Stick
together, for a start,’ she said, looking around for Ori. ‘Galywis,
if you can keep him from finding your energy devices that would be
a big help.’

Galywis had
hitherto been more frightened than any of them as his beloved “old
girl” shook around him, but at Eva’s words he snapped back to
alertness. ‘I’ll do that!’ he cried as the greenhouse dissolved.
The Library rushed through three Changes in as many seconds,
flashing from a laboratory to a reading room to a kitchen back to a
greenhouse with disorienting speed. By the time the Library settled
again, Galywis had disappeared.

‘
Time
for an experiment,’ Eva said, lunging across the shivering floor to
grab Llandry’s hand. ‘If contact with draykon bone is enough to
amplify my draykon side, I should get the same effect if I keep in
contact with one of you.’ Llandry blinked as a statue of Eva
appeared a few feet away, made from solid gold and wearing an
ironic expression. ‘Theory confirmed,’ Eva said, and the statue
went away again.

‘
I
want one of those in our house,’ Tren told her.

‘
If
you’re good for the next hour or so. Llan, please keep with Tren.
Ori too. Make sure he can reach one of you at all times. Pensould,
you’re with me if you have no objection.’

Llandry didn’t
like being separated from Pensould, but Eva’s strategy was sound.
Pensould was the strongest and could support Eva alone; Tren would
do better with both Llandry and Ori to help him.

‘
We’d
better get out of this building,’ Ori said, eyeing the increasingly
unstable floor with misgiving.

‘
Seconded,’ Eva said. ‘Run!’

They hastened for
the greenhouse’s misted glass walls, and as they approached no less
than three doors blossomed in the transparent surface.

‘
That’s a waste,’ Eva said curtly as they passed through.
‘Pense, please keep in contact with the others in that draykon
fashion you have. We’ll need to coordinate better.’

Outside, a
clinging fog had descended from the cloud bank overhead, obscuring
the island. ‘Clear it or no?’ Tren asked.

There was a
difficult question. If they left it alone, they couldn’t see what
was happening and therefore they couldn’t stop it. But if they did
remove the fog, they would betray their presence to Krays and the
advantage of surprise would be lost.