The Nemesis Blade (78 page)

Eventually
everyone was up.

Apprehension
possessed tangible presence. They had wasted the suddenly precious
commodity that was time.

The cleft was
a narrow aperture in the fold of the mountain, the entrance uneven,
but smoothed over by ages of water passing over it.

“Window?”
Elianas asked of Torrullin.

“Only barely,”
he said for Elianas’ ears alone.

They entered
and it was dark. Torrullin passed a globe to Sabian and then stood
listening in the flickering light. The mountain rumbled and groaned
like a sleeping giant.

“Elianas?”
Torrullin held his hand out. Elianas took it, their fingers
entwining. “We are beyond choices now.”

To the others
it seemed the two men were frozen, doing nothing, but they were
hard at work communicating with the void, asking it to summon them
to the edge, to make up the time they needed.

At first there
were the sounds of the mountain, a groan that was eerie, and then
there was a great emptiness, the position of the void. It had
heard. Would it now acquiesce to a demand?

Thereafter
there was hissing only the two men heard, causing them to glance at
each other with eyes wider than usual, and then a low moan that
sounded almost human, and was heard by all.

Skin shivered
and erupted in bumps of unease.

Quilla
whispered, “I suggest we hold onto each other.” He hooked himself
in to Torrullin.

Just in time,
for in the next moment movement was a blur of strata as the void
pulled them closer in the most direct route. The sounds of fear and
astonishment fell into the deeper silence of manipulation. They
were pulled through rock, water and then more rock, to be released
on the ledge where they first crossed.

All were wet
and cold. Shuddering. Silent.

Nothing had
ever hurt so much.

“Fuck me,”
Teighlar muttered. “I do not want to do that again. I feel the need
to check my pulse.”

Rose drew
great breaths.

“Sabian, check
if the Dragon symbol is there,” Torrullin commanded. Sabian bobbed
away with the light. “Lowen, have you seen anything of this
moment?”

“I think even
seers are blinded by a void.”

“Agreed,”
Caballa said.

Sabian
returned. “The symbol is there, but something has been at it with a
chisel. It has been defaced.”

“As long as it
is there,” Torrullin said. “Realm and reality are still connected,
but we have not much time.”

“Why this
window?” Teroux asked. “You’re saying time is somehow
sentient.”

“I believe it
is the last remaining time from crossing ages. The final
connection, as Torrullin says,” Quilla murmured. “And Time is
ruler; of course it is sentient.”

“It does not
matter now.” Torrullin frowned. “After we go down, stay another
hour. Despite what Lowen said about getting out, I believe it safer
to remain, and the delay should allow sufficient time to oust the
current situation.”

“You’re not
sure?” Rose blurted.

“Nothing is
certain,” and he suddenly grinned. Exactly the way he liked it.

Elianas gave a
laugh, understanding that.

Then Torrullin
was serious. “The journey was a mighty risk, and this is the last
instalment. Now is the time to trust, however.” Most nodded and he
reached out and gripped Teighlar in an embrace. “See you soon, my
friend.”

“Count on it,”
Teighlar said. “I will not be full of shit after, promise.”

Torrullin
grinned, knowing that was a mistruth, and took Teroux to him,
saying, “Rose will be good for you. Keep your eyes open wide,
okay?”

Numb, Teroux
nodded.

Tianoman was
next. “You will be a great Vallorin, Tianoman,” Torrullin whispered
in his ear and let go.

“Really?”
Tianoman’s eyes were big.

“Really.” A
smile and then he moved to Maple. “Digilan has released you. Go
make your peace with Tymall, then go home, my friend. Lily will
know you.”

Maple
swallowed. “Thank you, my Lord.”

Elianas and
Lowen were speaking farewells also, as were Tristan, Caballa and
Quilla, and Torrullin stood before Declan. “Hold the fort and light
a candle in the window.”

Declan, Siric,
bowed and flared his wings out in homage. “Safe journey.”

Torrullin
nodded, clasped Rose’s face and then said to Teighlar, “When you
are free, go to Saska. Talk to her, please, and make her
understand.”

“I shall. Go
in friendship and love.”

Then it was
time.

“How?” Quilla
whispered.

“Jump,”
Torrullin laughed, and jumped.

Chapter 58

Thought is
matter. A void, therefore, cannot ever be empty.

~ Book of
Sages

The Void

T
wenty-six years ago Torrullin and
Lowen stood at the lip of an abyss and entered to find below the
Syllvan, Gatekeepers of Reaume.

Questions and
answers there opened new paths.

This void was
different.

A longer time
ago Torrullin and Elianas speculated that to enter was never to
leave. It was akin to being eternally lost, and free.

It was not
like that.

They fell
through Eternity, and at first it was dark.

Then there was
colour.

Parallel rings
of an artist’s palette flashed and dimmed as accompaniment where
they hurtled through. They went too fast to hold onto specifics,
yet enough burned into retinas to prove those rings were snatches
of parallel dimensions, alternate worlds, times and universes … and
realms. There was life, marvellous and terrible life, to each.

In the depths
of the corridor worlds floated, worlds swallowed or failed or
forgotten, worlds yet to be born. Bright stars curved in patterns
with red giants and blue dwarfs. The fabric of cosmic mastery. So
much, and yet in the vastness it was empty.

In such
immensity they were minute, a skip in memory, and memory would not
light an atom in this eternity. All that they were and would be was
stripped from them until only pure soul remained. All that was
physical was immaterial and although they made contact in the
flashing dark, they felt nothing of each other … and felt
everything.

They passed
through the anti-matter pull of black holes, were tossed beyond the
reaches of imploding stars and swirled in vacuum, crushed in
gravity, and felt nothing. A wormhole flicked an errant tail,
asteroids and comets played to silent music and heat blasted while
cold froze.

Then, for a
moment, but a moment, all slowed … and ceased. A crossroad in
eternity. They were blind and at the mercy of something boundless;
no understanding would ever be.

In the next
micron of time and nothingness, they were forcibly pushed,
breath-sucking death, into white light.

All
consciousness fled, and sentience became another’s memory.

Blackness

Cold.

Sensation

Sound …
sound
.

“Tristan?”

Fingers
searched, found, held.

“I am here,
Caballa.”

A cough, a
splutter.

“Quilla?”

“Still alive,
yes.”

A moan. “Where
are we?” Lowen’s voice, scratchy, barely there.

“No idea,”
Tristan whispered.

“Torrullin?”
Lowen called, but there was no answer. “Elianas?” He was silent
also.

Time stood
still and they forgot they had awakened.

Light.

Heat.

Sensation.

Music …
music
.

Torrullin
opened his eyes. Flutes and blue stars, pink sky.

He was on his
back, staring up.

A sigh near
him and he turned his head.

Elianas’ eyes
flickered wide.

“Elianas.”

Dark eyes
found him. A great, shuddering sigh.

Time locked
them away, and they forgot they had awakened.

Chapter 59

Events make up
a life. Events, therefore, mark time.

Awl

Grinwallin

T
eighlar stared up at Grinwallin’s
mountain from the plateau.

That was his
mountain.

He lowered his
gaze to bright pennants and winging birds.

And there was
his city.

Thank all the
gods of the universe, he was home. A smile broke out upon his face.
Yes, now it was true home.

“My Lord
Emperor!”

His smile
widened, seeing Dechend on the mighty stairway. Dancing a little,
he met his Elder halfway and they clasped arms as friends do,
rather than ruler and subject.

Then,
embarrassed, Dechend withdrew his arm and murmured, “Welcome
back.”

“Glad I am to
be back.”

“Where are the
others?”

Teighlar
glanced over his shoulder. “We decided to scatter to see if all is
well in our various places of the heart. Everyone is fine, have no
fear.” He frowned. “How long were we away?”

Dechend gave a
sigh. “Time is very strange, my lord. I was gone from Grinwallin
four months, and it has been a further eight for you. I guess it
feels more like days.”

“We were away
almost a year? Yes, how strange that days can be measured … never
mind.” Teighlar gripped Dechend’s shoulder. “I am in need of a
proper bath, a shave and the best red we can find!”

Grinning
together, they happily went up the stairs and into Grinwallin
proper.

Minea

Maple trudged
up the path to the cave where Lily, the Lady of Life, had made her
home.

Torrullin said
he would find welcome here, but would he? Maple’s heart beat an
unnatural rhythm, and yet he would not now back away.

He saw a young
woman bent over a cauldron, stirring slowly with a worn wooden
pole. He smiled inwardly. Many would call the image presented as
witchery.

She looked up
and squinted. “Is that you, Maple?”

Clearing his
throat, he managed to say yes.

Lily smiled,
her whiteless eyes exactly like his. “You have been redeemed. How
wonderful.”

Maple’s knees
thudded into the dust and he lifted his arms to the heavens.
Hallelujah. He had been redeemed indeed.

Valaris

Sabian drew
deep of Galilan’s cosmopolitan city air.

The choice was
his. He had sole control over what form his future would now
assume. As a darkling once, never had the thought of choice entered
his subconscious. As Agnimus, draithen, a creature of body and
melded soul, the agony of his past had forced him into less than
savoury decisions.

Sabian the
soul had emerged victorious from all that, and Torrullin Valla
gifted him true freedom.

Finally choice
was his alone.

He wandered
amid bright stalls and bought a meat pastry. Eating, he meandered
onward. He had heard tell on Linmoor’s great market. It might be
nice to pay it a visit. Then again, the new Maze in the Vall
Peninsula was worth a stopover also. Maybe Menllik’s theatres …

Smiling,
Sabian licked his fingers.

To everyone he
appeared human, a Valarian. If he visited Xen III, folk there would
think him Xenian. He was, point of fact, anonymous. He could go
anywhere and no one would stop him.

He halted to
purchase a cold ale, slugging the brew back with gusto.

There was no
rush to choose one place.

Sightseeing
was his new motto.

The Dome

Declan
paced.

A year had
elapsed upon a finger click, damn it, when they were in the realm
of time. Another year had now gone by and still there was no sign
or word of the six in the Void.

Swinging to
the Kaval in the Dome, the Siric muttered, “Any disturbances?”

Chaim rose
from a seat at the slab. “Siric, calm yourself. All is well. Elixir
will return soon enough.”

Declan
frowned, swinging away again to pace along the ogives. All was
well, yes. The Lax situation had been satisfactorily diffused,
Excelsior had been rapped soundly upon the knuckles, and everywhere
there was peace. Folk murmured about a peace akin to the two
millennia of equanimity all now spoke of in hushed and reverent
tones.

It was too
quiet for his liking.

Another year
passed.

Frustration
bit at the Siric, but he kept the proverbial lamps burning.

There was
something amiss with this ‘peace’, in his opinion, but only
Torrullin would hark to his suspicions.

When would the
bloody man reappear?

Valaris

Tianoman
grinned from the dais as sound erupted around him, threatening to
lift the heavens under which they all celebrated.

Behind him,
the golden Valleur Throne had made it known without doubt who it
now regarded as Vallorin. It had glowed, and then a pair of eagles
flitted overhead.

The Valleur
were ecstatic and made certain everyone heard them.

Yiddin and
Vanar thumped the dais in rapturous accompaniment, tears flowing
freely over their faces. The Valleur future had been secured
without question in these last few minutes.

“Hail Tianoman
Valla!” Yiddin roared, and punched the air in bliss.

They roared
with him.

Tianoman,
giddy with happiness, noticed a familiar face in the crowd.
Aislinn? Aislinn! He winked at her.

To his
delight, she winked back.

Xen III

Rose took
Teroux on a tour of the Farspeaker enclave.

In the dimmed
spaces they discovered each other, speaking from their hearts about
the traumas of their youth.