The Wizard from Earth (39 page)

Matt replied, “She was taken to have a private audience with the Emperor.”

“A private audience, you say?”

Archimedes watched Valarion's face and said flatly, “Something is going on, isn't it?”

Valarion raised an eyebrow and smiled.  “What do you mean?”

“You spoke just now in the same tone of voice you used when you made excuses as to why you were late with your homework.”

“I don't have time for your tiresome mental torments,” Valarion replied, his forehead twitching.  “I must look into this matter of the Emperor.”  And with that, he abruptly departed. 

“He never wants anything to do with me,” Archimedes said.  “Yet now he's approached me twice in one night.  Matt?”

At the moment, Matt was barely listening.  His mind was aswirl with the realization that his 'brother' had come to Ne'arth a century earlier, had joined the mentors in a war that had all but destroyed civilization on this world, and had seemingly vanished without trace. 

“Why didn't he try to contact me?” Matt asked subvocally.  “Why didn't he leave a message?”

“It is possible that he died before being able to do so,” Ivan said.

Matt stared at the patch of blue on the painting.  It wasn't much to go on, given that it was turning his life upside down – again.

“Matt?  Return from the clouds, Matt.”

Matt blinked.  “Archimedes.  When were these paintings made?”

“They were installed a year ago, by the Sisters of Wisdom.  Part of an effort to stem a revival of mentorism that occurred due to the appearance of that comet.”

“Mentorism?  Comet?”

But Archimedes had turned away.  He was watching Valarion, who was standing by an entry, conferring with a contingent of palace guard.  Valarion was listening raptly, his expression deathly serious.  He nodded to the guards and several dispersed.  He took the spear of one of those who remained and headed over to the orchestra with long, quick strides.

“I sense the closing of a net,” Archimedes said, watching.  “Perhaps we should be off while we can.”

“Carrot's not back,” Matt said.

“Follow me, Matt.  In haste.”

While he tagged after Archimedes, Matt watched Valarion, who was speaking to the conductor.  The music instantly halted.  Motioning the conductor aside, Valarion took the platform and pounded the spear. 

"ATTENTION!  ATTENTION ALL OF YOU!" 

The hubbub of conversation ceased and heads turned.

"BY ORDER OF THE PALACE GUARD, NO ONE IS TO LEAVE THE PREMISES!  I REPEAT, NO ONE IS TO LEAVE THE PREMISES UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.  YOU WILL COMPLY WITH THE INSTRUCTIONS OF THE GUARD!"

"What is the meaning of this?" someone demanded.  Conversation resumed, whispered and more frantic than before.  Valarion banged the spear again. 

"THERE WILL BE QUIET!  NO ONE IS TO MOVE ABOUT.  YOU WILL COMPLY WITH THE INSTRUCTIONS OF THE GUARD!"

Men in polished armor, bearing spears and swords and wearing purple plumes spread from the entries and lined the perimeter of the hall.  Matt realized that he was trapped.  Archimedes meanwhile, headed toward a fresco on the far wall.

“TEACHER!”

Valarion had singled out Archimedes.  Archimedes halted and faced him.  Valarion walked toward Archimedes, the crowd meekly parting. 

When he was within speaking distance, Valarion loomed over Archimedes and said in a stage whisper, “There has been a serious incident.  I'm afraid you must be detained with the rest of us until matters are resolved.”

Archimedes surveyed the onlookers and nodded slowly. 

“Well acted,” he replied.  “You've finally gone and killed him, haven't you?”

Valarion's eyes and mouth went wide.  “Teacher, what are you saying?  How do you know of the Emperor's death?”

At the words, the crowd gasped.  Valarion quickly admonished,  “No one is to repeat that!”

And that, of course, caused the noise level within the great hall to escalate to a roar of shouts.

A contingent of purple-plumed soldiers converged on Valarion, Archimedes, and Matt.  Archimedes stepped back and held out his staff.  He oriented it vertically.  He pressed a stud on the side.  He stamped the base of the staff on the floor.

The base emitted a blinding flash. 

Smoke engulfed Archimedes and Matt.  In his temporary blindness, Matt felt a tug on his sleeve, so insistent that he nearly staggered.  He followed Archimedes to the fresco they'd been heading toward before.  Choking, Matt saw dimly through the smoke as Archimedes pushed in the eye of an anthropomorphic sun.  There was a click, and a panel of the fresco swung inward, revealing a dark passage.  They entered.  Another click, and the panel sealed them in from the hall.  Matt breathed clear air again.     

Light from the hall filtered through patches of stained glass that from the other side Matt had taken to be merely ornamental.  The illumination was faint, but enough to recognize the outlines of flowing hair and elongated beard in front of him.

"This passage leads to the sewers," Archimedes said.  He jangled a key ring.  "We'll must head to the house and warn the servants without delay."

"What about Carrot?" Matt asked.

Pounding erupted on the other side of the panel.

“Matt, by now the barracks have been alerted and a thousand guards will be swarming the grounds.  I'm afraid Carrot is on her own for now."

The panel boomed and shuddered and splintered.  Archimedes fumbled with the keyring, inserted a key into a lock on a barred door, opened the door and stepped through.

“Matt!  Come!”

“Go without me.”

“You don't even know – “

Another boom, and the panel cracked in two.  The soldiers on the other side threw away the table they had used as battering ram and streamed in.  Matt heard the door behind him clang shut.  Then his arms were grabbed and thrust behind his back.  A soldier placed the blade of a short sword to Matt's throat.

“Don't try anything!” the soldier said.

To the outside world, Matt made sure not to seem that he was trying anything.  But to Ivan, he subvocaled, “Start warming up hypermode.”

"Hypermode is at standby now," Ivan said.

"That quick?"

"I sensed a life-threatening situation and commenced hypermode initiation three minutes ago."

“Ivan, I love you!”

Matt was dragged blinking into the light of the great hall.  The center of the room had been cleared, the civilians having been herded to the walls by the soldiers.  Valarion, amid a coterie of guardsmen, stormed toward Matt.  He was not smiling.

Matt asked subvocally,  "How many soldiers between us and the deck?"

Ivan replied,  "Thirty-four."

"Not good, but let's do this.  Go to hypermode!"

"You there!" Valarion shouted at Matt.  "Where . . . is . . . Archiiiii . . . mmmmmeeeeee . . . . "

The general's voice dropped from tenor to baritone to a lethargic drone.  The lights flickered and dimmed and then brightened as Ivan compensated for subjective changes in frequency and photon flux.  Matt felt almost weightless, but at the same time the air seemed to thicken into a gaseous syrup.

Everyone was moving in slow motion.  Valarion was barely inching. 

In the upper right corner of Matt's field of vision, the number '3.0' appeared, then a subjective second later ticked to 2.9.  Then 2.8 –

Matt twisted, but his captors held firm.  Matt stamped on a foot.  The owner's face rippled with pain and his throat rattled a moan.  Matt shook loose.

Matt felt the pressure of the blade on his throat begin to intensify.  The soldier holding it had seen Matt's sudden movement and was reacting with lightning instinct.

Matt pitched himself backward from the blade, toppling onto the soldier who still held him by the arm.  He broke free and rolled and stood straight.  A ring of soldiers slothfully closed.  A sword crept toward his chest.  Matt sidestepped and sprinted toward the deck.

"Matt, be careful!  You'll tear a ligament!  You'll break a bone!"

Matt was in too much of a frenzy even to tell Ivan to shut up.  The hypermode timer was down to 1.5, half exhausted already and he hadn't even started his bolt for freedom.  

"Matt, object at six o'clock!"

A crossbow arrow streaked toward his neck.  It seemed to be moving only a few kilometers an hour, but Matt knew that hypermode wouldn't spare his body from kinetic damage in real time.  He dodged.  The arrow flew past.

Timer:  1.1 . . . 1.0 . . . .

Matt glanced behind.  More arrows!  Hop right – hop left – duck! 

A shadow fell across his face.  A snarling giant of a guard had intercepted his path and was slashing with a broadsword.  Matt scrambled and the blade gouged into the floor. 

Matt saw an opening between guards, and through it the deck.  He leaped through the gap and then made another leap that cleared the rail.  He tumbled onto the lawn, sprang and ducked through an orchard and around a hedge.

Then the world shuddered.  His vision flickered with a blinding flash as Ivan adjusted for the re-transition to normal time-sense.  Voices that had been a dull roar resumed being cries and yells.  Matt gulped air and felt his heart pound explosively.  He tried to move his legs and found them leaden. 

"Hypermode reserves are exhausted," Ivan said needlessly. 

So tired
, Matt thought.  "Yeah."

"Matt, Hermanrise has occurred."

"Yes!  Get me out of here without running into soldiers!”

“Follow the path to your right, then – “

Matt lost track of how many directions Ivan gave him, but without fail he managed to avoid the guards rushing seemingly on the other side of every hedge and bush.  Within minutes, he had taken refuge in a narrow crevice between buildings.  Hiding behind a bush, Matt watched the infrared signatures of the guards sparkle like fireflies beneath the moonlight as they ran among the plantings.  The sparks were concentrating toward a central building.

“I think that's where she is,” Matt said.

“That is where signal triangulation has located her.”

“That too.”  Matt had forgotten about the partition. 

"Do you wish me to plot the most evasive path through the guards?"

"I might have a better idea.”  Matt caught his breath.  “Dig up your photos of the plans for the palace.  Archimedes built this place, and I have a hunch that the secret passage back there wasn't his only easter egg!"

41.

Before Carrot even realized what was happening, a dozen soldier-guards streamed inside the Emperor's bedroom, swords and crossbows drawn.  On the tips of the crossbow arrows aimed at her abdomen, a moist substance glistened.  An imperial guard major entered and made a show of glancing over the bed scene while listening to the servant who had brought Carrot to the room.

"They had been alone for about half an hour when I asked Mayil to offer them fresh drinks," the servant said, indicating the woman who had dropped the tray.  "Shortly after, I heard Mayil scream and I summoned the guard."

"I see evidence of a struggle," the major said, nodding to a pillow by the Emperor's head.  The pillow looked like an ordinary pillow. 

Carrot glared at the servant.  "He's lying!  I had barely entered the room when she screamed.  I found him that way!" 

As she raised her arm to gesture, the circle of arrows raised and closed.  She saw the steady glares and slowly lowered her arm 

The major addressed the servant,  “We will need your deposition.”

Carrot was thinking of deposing a few words of her own, but just then she smelled Matt.

“Carrot, this is Matt,” his voice said, seemingly at her side.  “I'm in the room with you.  I can't see you, but I can hear if you cough.  If you can hear me, please cough.”

Carrot coughed.  She scanned the room.  The guards stared back stonily.  The major continued ignoring her.  The servants kneaded their fingers.  Matt was nowhere to be seen.  However, when she twisted her head slightly, she was able to localize his scent.  It was coming from the wall opposite the door – which made no sense, as Carrot had not seen him enter and surely the guards would have stopped him if he had.  She wondered, 
Does Ivan confer the power of invisibility?

Then she noticed that the curtain covering the opposite wall was rustling.  How odd that a curtain should cover a windowless interior wall . . . .

“All right,” Matt said.  “Carrot, in order for me to hear you speak, you'll have to grant me permission.  I want you to speak softly, so that no one else can hear.  Speak these words:  '
I grant Matt permission to hear me speak.'
”

In barely a whisper, she said,  “I grant Matt permission to hear me speak.”

“Okay, I heard that, good.”

“Matt!” Carrot continued to speak in the same sub-whisper.  “You put a radio in me, didn't you?”

“Good, you learned what a radio is, so I won't have to explain.  All right, we need to get you out of here.  You're being framed for a political assassination.  So am I and so is Archimedes.”

“Where is Archimedes?”

“He's safe.  Look – “

“You put a radio in me!  That's called 'bugging!'  You bugged me without my permission!”

“Carrot, please.  We'll talk about that later.  We have to get you out of here.”

Carrot shook her head, forgetting that Matt had said that he couldn't see her.  “I'm going to stay here and clear my name.  Matt, the Emperor was dead before I came in!”

“Yes, Ivan's micro-laser measured his corpse temperature.  He's been dead since before we arrived at the palace.  But that doesn't change anything.  You're going to be falsely accused of killing him.  That's what this was all about.  Look, I've had time to think about this and this is what I figure.  The dogs barked at you to show everyone that you were a so-called 'witch.'  Then Valarion lets you into the palace anyway so that you could be brought here.  It's all been a set-up, to get you in this room with the Emperor's dead body so you could be accused of killing him.  I wouldn't be surprised if Hadron didn't even know you were coming to the party.”

“Then who freed Geth and the others?”

“Valarion, probably.”

“Valarion wouldn't free Britanian slaves.”

“Carrot, we don't have time for a discussion!”

“I'm not leaving.  I'm going to clear my name as a Britanian or they'll take retribution against all of Britan!”

Matt paused.  “Look, you're not going to have a chance to clear your name.  Valarion is behind this whole thing because he needed Hadron out of the way in order to become Emperor.  As for you, you're what they call a 'patsy.'  He wanted you in this room to have you accused of the murder of the Emperor, and he knew you wouldn't come to the party unless you had a strong sense of personal obligation to thank the Emperor.  That's why he got your friends freed.  It wasn't a favor, it was a ruse.”

“A ruse.”

“Yes, a trick, a ploy – “

“I know what a ruse is.  But Matt, they can't charge me with killing the Emperor! They have no evidence!  They – “

She noticed the major was staring hard. 

“Can I help you?” she asked aloud.

“I'll say it again,” the major replied, holding out his hand.  “Where is your daisy brooch?”

“My what?”

“Witnesses say that you were wearing at the party a jeweled brooch in the form of a daisy.  Where is it?”

“What dai – oh, I know what you mean.  I left that at home.”  Her eyebrows knitted.  “How would you know what witnesses at the party would say?  You've not been out of the room, and no one has come in.” 
As far as you know
, Carrot thought.

For a moment, the major seemed at a loss.  Then he turned to the bed, and his eyebrows elevated in mock surprise.  “Ah, here it is!”

He reached beneath the bed sheets – from a place where he could not have seen it – and pulled out a brooch identical to the one she had been gifted with by the 'Emperor.'  The major turned it end over end, then seemed to 'accidentally' press a tiny stud.  The brooch flipped open, and a white powder spilled out.

“Poison!” he declared.  The servants gasped while the major made a show of examining the 'evidence.' He glared sternly at Carrot.  “And how do you explain the presence of this?”

“You took it out of your pocket just now and put it under the sheets and pretended to have found it there,” she replied.

“I think her actions in this tragedy are clear,” the major announced to the room, holding up the brooch.  “She attempted to surreptitiously poison the Emperor, but he caught her in the act.  There was a struggle, and so she killed him by suffocation.”

The soldiers watched mutely, but the servant girl put her hands to her mouth and squealed theatrically.  Carrot suppressed an impulse to punch her out.  She looked across the room at the accusing eyes and arrow heads.  Then she looked at the brooch.  It was an exact duplicate of the one she had been given at the house, save that first one doubtless didn't have a secret compartment that she might have opened on the way by accident and come prematurely to suspect the . . . ruse.

“Matt,” Carrot said.  “You are right.  But how do we get out of here?” 

With a glance she surveyed the six bowmen.  They were a little fatter than the legion regulars she'd fought in Britan, but their eyes had a glint of greater intelligence, and that meant greater skill.  Moreover, there were another half-dozen guards with short swords.  Three guards she might have been able to handle in close quarters combat, but a dozen?   

Matt better have a good plan
, she thought.

"There's a secret passage,” he said.  “I'm going to create a distraction, then come to you.  Then you follow me.”

“That's it?”

Matt didn't answer.  She then saw that, on the far wall, above the heads of the soldiers, a wick snuffer pole was bobbing as it moved from wall lamp to wall lamp, dousing the flames as it went.  At first the major was too busy conferring with his subordinates to notice.  But when only three lamps remained – one on each wall – he looked up and scowled.  His gaze went immediately to the snuffer pole.

“Who's doing that?” he demanded.  “Who's there!”

The pole doused the lamp on the far wall.  Then it descended out of sight.  The major shifted his head back and forth, and then the pole rose again on the wall to Carrot's right.  That lamp was doused, and only the lamp on the opposite wall remained.

“Clear away!” the major shouted, making a parting motion with his arms.

The men parted, revealing Matt stooped against the wall and still holding the pole.

“Get him!”

The soldiers drew their swords.  Matt threw the snuffer pole.  It described a perfect arc and struck the one still-illuminated lamp with cybernetic precision.  The room was plunged into darkness.

The major roared and men shouted and swords clanged as in the confusion and darkness they fought one another.  Carrot felt a hand grasp her ankle, tugging her downward.  She crouched, with her cat's eyes discerning Matt's silhouette on all fours against the sliver of light pouring from the outside hall.

Matt crawled through the crowd.  Carrot scrambled after.  She felt the wall curtain brush by.  She sensed Matt standing and she stood also.  She was led in darkness down a ramp, and a panel clicked and they emerged into a well-lit room.

"A kitchen!" she said.  "How did we get into a kitchen?"

“The Emperor's secret midnight snack tunnel.  He had Archimedes build it for him.” 

The kitchen was much larger than the one in the house of Archimedes, with rows of gleaming utensils and towering pantry shelves and an icebox big enough to walk inside. 
Mola would faint
, Carrot thought.  But there was no time to gawk.  Matt had let go of Carrot's hand and was motioning for her to follow as he checked the next room, where a table for two had been set.  Carrot saw the roses in the vases and the graphically explicit paintings on the walls and suspected this had been where the Emperor had his romantically intimate meals with special 'guests.' 
All so cozy
, she thought.  But the man was dead now and there was no point in reproving.

They proceeded to the hall, and with the entire building suffused with the scent of the imperial guard, she did not realize that a squad of guardsmen were near until they rushed the corner.

They raised their swords, yelled and charged.  Matt and Carrot retreated to the dining room.  As the guards burst past the threshold, Carrot grabbed the table and hurled it.  She caught two but the rest streamed in.  She grabbed a chair and fended off the blades while snapping a guard's wrist bone and expropriating his sword.  Throwing away the chair, she kicked off her high heels and ripped a new hem for her dress, one that went above the knee and gave her freedom of movement.  She brandished her blade and growled.   

Clang-clang-clang!
  The soldiers pressed in, and Carrot retreated to a corner.  They were four against one and their skill was better than she'd ever faced in the forests of Britan.  Again and again she barely dodged their blades and points.  She eyed Matt standing free to one side and called, “Help me!”

“I don't know how to sword fight!” he shouted.

Clang-clang!

“Just make a show of it and draw a couple off.  I can't fight them all at once!”

Matt took the sword from a soldier she had knocked unconscious with the table.  He sidestepped warily at the fringe of the battle between Carrot and the four guards.  Then a blade nicked her dress and in reaction he yelled and stabbed his point into the fray.  His thrust was too short to cause damage, but two guards turned and gave attention to him. 

She quickly saw that Matt was right, he didn't know the first thing about fighting with a sword.  Soon he was being pushed to another corner, blades coming within centimeters of his throat as the chair he used as shield was hacked to kindling. 

But now she was down to two opponents – and two was a number she could handle.  Gritting her teeth and bracing her feet against the wall, Carrot slammed her sword against an incoming blade. 
CLANG!
  The impact stunned the guard, who fell and lost his grip.  Carrot whirled to the other and slashed.  His body armor took only a scrape, but the fury of the attack had put him off balance.  Carrot sprang off the wall, launching herself across the meters of separation.  She knocked him over and punched him unconscious and whirled to face Matt's assailants.  One of them charged and she had him disarmed in three swift strokes, and stunned and reeling in one more.

The sole remaining guard stared at the scene, then at her.  She snarled.  He bolted.

Matt had fallen and lost his sword in the melee.  He accepted her hand and she pulled him standing.  He looked at the littering of incapacitated guards sprawled across the carpet and said, “Wow.”

She realized her hair was disheveled and she was perspiring.  She heard herself snorting and took a deep, calming breath.  Then she met his eyes. 

“I look like a ragged beast, don't I?”

“You look like a gorgeous ragged beast.”  He cast a side glance and twisted his head, listening to his inner voice as his finger traced above a screen she could not seen.  “Ivan has mapped a clear route from here to the east wall of the palace.  Let's get outside before Herman sets.”

A twist and a turn and they clattered down steps into clear night air.  The garden's knee-high dainty lanterns barely illuminated the path over the light provided by the blazing stars and brilliant moon.  Carrot let Matt guide.  "This way!"  Then,  "This way!"  She saw and smelled no guards, a positive sign that their pursuers were being efficiently evaded.