The Star Whorl (The Totality Cycles Book 1) (17 page)

     “Oh ha,” Ro-Becilo’Ran
breathed, sitting back. “I didn’t really think you could do it! Well, if you
can apply Nil’Gu’vua to it...!”

     Trying not to breath
heavily, Kreceno’Tiv closed his eyes and engaged his vuu’erio to his tertiary
retinas, seeing Nil’Gu’vua with his fully compound eyes, even through the lids.
He pulled gently at the stuff of Nil’Gu’vua, formless potential, and wrapped it
around his travel glyph, coaxing it to flow along the lines and whorls of it to
give it potency. It iridesced, but nothing happened, and he tiredly realized
that he had to add part of his own personal glyph to it. Opening his eyes, he
saw the glowing glyph hovering before him, and Ro-Becilo’Ran’s incredulous face
beyond it.

     “Did you add me?” his friend
asked, just before he fully activated it. Gesturing annoyance, he added parts
of Ro-Becilo’Ran’s glyph, also, and something told him to make sure that his
and his friend’s glyphs remain separate and distinct. Then he realized that he
needed the return glyph, or they would have to wrestle their way through the
crowds again.

     He put the glyph in
abeyance. Then he made another duplicate of the travel glyph, and made
modifications for it to return here to his suite. It was easier, the second
time, but he still felt as if he had run all the way to Secondus and back when he
finished.

     “Here,” Ro-Becilo’Ran said,
sliding a new platter to him. “You look like something dead, only half-Nil-ized.
Eat.”

     He ate, then flopped back,
lying on his floor as he waited for the calories to hit his blood. He wanted to
hurry, before whatever it was went away, or someone else found it, but he could
not make his body digest any faster, and had to wait until he felt strong
enough to move. When he finally did, more than half a time-mark had passed, and
his friend was patiently waiting for him to recover.

     He thought about the glyphs
as he sat up, and made two minor modifications. Then he mustered his Nil’Gu’ua,
and began applying Nil’Gu’vua to them. The stuff of Nil’Gu’vua resisted at
first, this time, something that had never happened to him before. Puzzled,
fatigued, he tried again and again, and the glyph brightened, but did not
become active.

    
What goes?
he thought
testily, feeling slightly foolish, and not quite able to think straight.
Ro-Becilo’Ran wisely said nothing, just sat watching. Pa-Kreceno’Tiv engaged
his secondary retinas to his vuu’erio tennae, and studied the glyph more
closely, letting it decompose to its constituent parts in his semi-compound
vision. It seemed to have all the elements needed – the short-time fixing
matrix, the activator sub-glyph, the subjective and objective sub-glyphs – he
just could not see why applying Nil’Gu’vua to it did not work. So he engaged
his vuu’erio tennae to his tertiary retinas, letting his eyes go fully compound
– and the answer jumped out at him. It was a
travel
glyph, meaning it
affected the stuff of Nil’Gu’vua directly, changing its very nature to bring
two points that were distant from each other to within close proximity and span
the new, smaller separation between them – and to do so, Nil’Gu’vua was not
applied to the glyph, the glyph was applied to Nil’Gu’vua.

    
And how do I do that?
he
brooded, staring at his ineffectual creation. This had not been covered in his
Long-Travel lecture, nor had he read about it in the text. They had no intention
of teaching it, it was obvious – so he would have to figure it out, himself.

    
Apply the glyph – how?
There was a way, Vespa Ytoni’Dal had figured it out. And it had to be in such a
way that no one else could perceive it – so it needed to be veiled. He took a
deep breath and modified the glyph one more time, adding the illicit aspect of
veiling, then moved it while just barely touching Nil’Gu’vua. He could see that
it was affecting the stuff of Nil’Gu’vua a little, or rather, in a very small,
localized region.

    
It is basically a
probability wave function of an event,
he mused, trying to think through
the fog building in his brain.
The more region it encompasses, the greater
the probability of the event coming to pass. So – inflate it to encompass as
big a region as I can manage? Of course! It, in effect, has to encompass the
two regions that have to be brought together! But – if that is the truth of it,
how did they span the distance between Star Whorls?

     That was too much to think
about. He took the glyph and made it bigger, then bigger, pushing it outward for
as far as he could sense. His awareness seemed strangely tied to it, so that he
could feel when the second region, the abandoned building, was within its
effective radius. His suite blurred around them, then was gone in a flash.

Whorl Fifty Two

     They ended up, not at the
lower level they had seen, but in one of the upper levels, in a dark, dusty
chamber.

     “Oh ha,” Ro-Becilo’Ran
breathed, rocking on his feet. “By the Ancient Hives above. You did it! I
didn’t think you could really do it! But you did!”

     Shaking his head to fight
off an almost overwhelming wave of dizziness, he looked around for the hard
wish to be concealed, and saw a – void area off to his right. Head throbbing, he
moved toward it carefully, trying to project friendliness, calm, and a feeling
of safety.

     “Come out, I won’t hurt
you,” he said, stopping on the edge of the area.

     “Oh ha!” Ro-Becilo’Ran
exclaimed, finally seeing the glyph-shaded area. “And you sensed this from the
transport?!”

     “Come out,” Pa-Kreceno’Tiv
coaxed, crouching by the area, ignoring the question. “I can sense you, so come
out and let me help you.”

     “Why would anyone wish to
hide up here?” his friend said, projecting confusion.

     Wanting to gesture
exasperation, he looked back over his shoulder. “Becil, why don’t you go and
make sure no one can hear or sense us? Carefully!” He turned back to the hidden
person, who had not moved or banished the concealment glyph-construct. When the
other did nothing for a couple of deci-marks, he reached out to the glyph
itself and gently manipulated it, so that he could see through it without
destroying it altogether.

     A soft cry and the wavering
of the void area told of his success. A form came into focus, and he reared
back in surprise.

     It was an other-worlder, a
foreign sentient from one of the other worlds of the Star Whorl. She was small,
though whether that was because she was young or merely of a tiny race, he was
not sure. Was she one of the supposed sentients-on-display in the
Bustani
,
somehow escaped or lost? She stared up at him with huge eyes, fear radiating
from her in palpable waves. She had a high level of Nil’Gu’ua, he could tell,
for the wave-glyph of repelling desire from her almost physically pushed him
back.

    
If she is from one of the
other worlds, she may not understand our speech.
He thought of trying to
formulate a glyph of comprehension and project it at her, so that they could
communicate verbally, but his mind was too tired. Instead, he projected a
simple interrogative at her.
Who are you? Why are you here?

     She just stared at him, and
a tear gathered in one of her eyes and fell.

     “Becil,” he called softly,
and was rewarded with his friend’s footsteps coming and he crouched at Pa-Kreceno’Tiv’s
left.

     “What is it?” Ro-Becilo’Ran
whispered, still unable to see her. Pa-Kreceno’Tiv modified the concealment
glyph a little more, and Ro-Becilo’Ran actually fell back and scooted away a
bit.

     “What in the name of the
Ancient Hives?!” he exclaimed.

     “It’s all right, it’s just a
little girl from one of the other sentient races,” he said. “I need you to
enclose her in a glyph of comprehension so we can talk to her. Will you do
that?”

     “Y-yes,” his friend said,
and he could practically feel him fumbling around to form a language
comprehension glyph. Finally it engaged the girl.

     “Who are you?” he asked, and
her head snapped to him. Her eyes widened, and she blinked at him. “Why are you
here? How did you get here? What can we do to help you?”

     “You – do not just ogle,”
she whispered. “You offer help?”

     “Yes, of course,” Pa-Kreceno’Tiv
said, gesturing confusion. He was having a little trouble thinking straight.
“Why would I not?”

     “All the other Gods of Traveling
just wanted to stare and pull at me and – and...” she began to cry, covering
her face.

     Pa-Kreceno’Tiv felt a hard
chill. “Did – did someone violate you?” he asked, and he did not recognize his
own voice.
Gods of Traveling?
a distant corner of his mind thought,
disturbed.

     She looked up at him, and
laughed an angry laugh through her tears. “No, Traveling God, all of your
fellow Gods just – turned me around and around, as if they had never seen
anything like me and wanted to see every part of me. As if I were an insect to
be studied!”

     That, he could understand
happening. She was unusual-looking, mammalian without the chitinous extrusions
such as elytra-pace or the head-plate that held the vuu’erio tennae. Her eyes
were a dark brown, a shade unknown to the people of Gu’Anin. And she had no
chitinous parts to her anatomy, no external structures specifically for sensing
glyphs.

     “What world are you from?” Ro-Becilo’Ran
cut in, leaning as close as her repelling glyph would allow. “Are you a child?
How did you get here...?”

     “Ro-Becilo’Ran,” he said,
repressively, projecting disapproval. His friend was acting in just the manner
that she had described, his curiosity and fascination with something new and
different fighting with and getting the better of his judgement.

     “I promise, I hear voices up
here,” a distant voice said.

    
Hives, we’ve lost our
time,
he thought. “Listen, little friend, others are coming. Will you come
with us? We won’t hurt you, or study you like an insect, I promise. Or we can
leave you alone, here, if you wish. What do you want?”

     She blinked at him, obvious
indecision warring with fear on her face. Then she moved, lunging at him, and
he fell back. But she had only wrapped her arms around him, and huddled to him,
shivering.

     “Come, Becil, it’s time to
go,” he said, holding her close and struggling to stand. He began working to
add her glyph, what he could sense of it, to the veiled return-glyph, just as
many treading feet could be heard coming toward them. He managed to do it, just
as a group came into the room, and he applied it to Nil’Gu’vua so that they flashed
to his suite.

     As the room snapped around
them, Pa-Kreceno’Tiv felt as if he had hit a wall of cold darkness, that fell
and crushed the breath out of him.

Whorl Fifty Three

     Pa-Kreceno’Tiv moaned as he
struggled to open his eyes. His head was one mass of pain, and his stomach felt
as if it were empty and dusty. He felt weak, worn, completely without vitality.

     “I think he’s waking. You
are fortunate, son, that you do not have to go to Secondus this turn,” he heard
his mother’s voice say sternly, and he knew immediately that he was in trouble.
“You are extremely fortunate, extremely skilled, and extremely foolhardy. What
you did...” Her projected glyph said it all, that, in short, he could have
killed himself and his friend.

     He opened his aching eyes,
felt a warm bundle at his side. The girl was huddled beside him on the floor,
hanging on to his deshik. His mother was kneeling on the other side of him,
looking down at him with disapproval mixed strangely with concern. His father
was standing a little ways away. Ro-Becilo’Ran was beside Vespar-Drelano’Sev’Tiv,
looking chastened.

     “Where did you find that
Heretian child?” Vespa Kareni’Tiv asked, touching his forehead above his
vuu’erio tennae.

     Pa-Kreceno’Tiv tried to
speak, but just looking around had finished off what little strength he had. He
let his head drop back, closed his eyes, and the hard wall of enervation almost
toppled on him again, but he fought to hold on to consciousness.

     “My dear, let me move him to
the resting pad,” his father said.

     “Wait. The child is
frightened, and she obviously wants to stay by him. Please pass me a cushion
and a coverlet,” his mother instructed.

     Something soft was placed
beneath his head, and then another soft thing covered him. A hard something
nudged his mouth, and he opened it, sucked on the spout that was placed there.
Life and energy seemed to flow into him as he drank the too-sweet liquid.

     “Child, what is your name?”
he heard his mother ask kindly. The girl’s clutch on him tightened, and she
made a frightened sound.

     Groaning softly, he tried to
project the idea that these were his parents.

     “Travel Gods have mothers?”
he heard the girl ask, incredulous.

     “Of course we do, dear,” his
mother assured her. “Now, what is your name, and how did you get all the way
here from Hereta?”

     He felt the girl press close
to his side, and he tiredly projected reassurance, and the feeling that his
parents could help her.

     “My name is Okon,” the girl
said reluctantly. “I – I came to find a spell to free my people.”

    
Free her people? From
what?
he wondered, but did not project.

     “Continue,” Vespa Kareni’Tiv
said, and Pa-Kreceno’Tiv recognized the meditative tone.

     “You have been our rulers
long enough!” Okon burst out, ire and determination radiating from her. “You
may think yourselves benevolent, but you still dictate what we do, how we may
perform our own magic! I would rid our world of you! I found one of your Travel
Temples, and I – I used it, to come here, to the place of the Travel Gods, to
find a way to vanquish you from Hereta!”