Alchymist (80 page)

'Unless,'
said Bilfis, 'it's replenished from outside, from other nodes.'

'But
that's good, isn't it?' Tiaan searched their faces.

'We
thought so, until we heard about the death of the Snizort node' said Bilfis.
'That's bothered me ever since I heard the news. I'm afraid . . .' He looked to
Malien. She nodded.

'Yes?'
said Tiaan.

'If
the nodes are linked, it could be a problem.'

'What
do you mean?'

'Every
month humanity adds more clankers to the thousands they're already using, along
with a myriad of other devices that draw power from the field. The lyrinx do
the same, as does Vithis with his thousands of constructs. Now Stassor has
embarked on this city-sized shield and just to build it will take much from the
node. Maintaining it day after day, year after year, will require far more. It
adds up to too much power, taken too quickly, and there's got to be a
consequence. It may drain the node dry and, if the nodes are linked, the ones
surrounding it as well. Perhaps even the ones surrounding them. You see the
danger?'

'I
think so . . .' said Tiaan.

'If
many nodes fail at once, the great forces that create them will ultimately have
to readjust. What's that going to do to the puny creatures clinging to
Santhenar's fragile shell?'

'Are
you saying that some of the nodes might explode, as at Snizort?' asked Tiaan.

'That's
one possibility, and the explosive force could spread to the nodes surrounding
them,' said Malien. 'Or the driving forces themselves could become unbalanced,
tearing the crust of the world apart. No one knows enough geomancy to tell.'

'Is
there any way to find out.’

'That's
what we've been talking about.'

'Bilfis
and I have put our concerns to the Aachim Syndic,' said Malien the following
morning. 'That last earth trembler alarmed them, so we turned the screws. My
people aren't happy, but they've agreed to give us what we want, in return for
the secret of flight. They want to build their own thapters.'

'Is
that wise?' said Tiaan, but regretted it as soon as she'd spoken. She had no
right to question Malien.

'I
had nothing else to bargain with.'

'What
are they giving in return?'

'Everything
they know about nodes.'

'You
might have demanded that by right,' said Bilfis.

'And
they might have stalled me for months,' said Malien. This way we can begin in a
week.'

'To
do what?' said Tiaan.

'To
map the nodes near Stassor, so we can see how they're being affected.'

'Can
I come too?' Tiaan was used to being busy but there would be nothing for her to
do here. 'I'll do anything that needs doing.'

'I
want you to come,' said Malien. 'Indeed, I can't do it without you.'

By
the time the Aachim had released the thapter and made a start on building their
own, weeks later, Tiaan, Malien and a mapmaker had gone through the archives
and produced a series of charts of the mountains surrounding Stassor. These
showed all nodes the Aachim knew about.

There
were many kinds: weak nodes and strong, steady ones and those whose fields
fluctuated wildly or unpre-dictably, or flared up only to die away to nothing.
There were occasional double nodes and one triple — which Malien was too
perilous to approach — as well as two anti-nodes which were even more
dangerous. The anti-nodes may have grown by cannibalising the fields of others,
but no one had ever dared approach close enough to find out.

Only
then did Tiaan and Malien sit down, with a small glass of the Aachim liquor called
syspial in hand, and consider their work. The nodes were not evenly distributed
but fell into patterns, groups and aggregations, which in turn were organised
into provinces. These often corresponded to geographic features like mountain
chains, volcanoes, cliffs or ridges. Not always, though — some nodes were not
related to anything on the surface of the earth.

Tiaan
took a sip of her drink, which was the colour and flavour of sweet blackberry
liqueur, but stingingly spicy-hot. 'Where do nodes come from, anyway?'

'No
one has any idea,' said Malien, 'except, possibly, your friend Gilhaelith. He
knows more about the natural philosophy of the world than anyone.'

'It's
been his life's work.' She wondered if Gilhaelith was still alive; and if so,
what he was up to.

The
next step was to go out at night in the thapter, mapping the fields of the
nodes while Malien flew a course by the moon or the stars, and Bilfis plotted
the fields on the chart. Tiaan was forced to use the amplimet, which was always
risky now. Once or twice she flew the thapter, and had to use the crystal for
that as well. She did not have the talent to fly the thapter the way Malien
did.

They
spent a tedious month on this work, by which time they had created a map of the
area within forty leagues of Stassor. It was very rough, but to refine it would
have taken months more, for they learned something new every day: new fields
and new nodes, even new kinds of nodes. Tiaan wished she understood them.

By
that time, two teams, each one comprising hundreds of Aachim, working day and
night, had built a pair of thapters, though only the second of them remained at
Stassor: the other machine had flown west a fortnight ago. Tiaan suspected it had
been sent on an embassy to Vithis, and she was not looking forward to its
return.

The
following morning she was in the front meeting room when there was a screeching
whine outside and the missing thapter shot past a transparent section of wall,
heading for the compressed-ice platform.

'Who's
that?' Malien said sharply.

'Tormil,'
said Harjax. 'I sent him to make contact with Vithis, and from his haste I'd
say he has.' He bent his head to his papers.

Malien's
left hand gripped Tiaan's knee under the table and squeezed hard — a warning.
She wrote a note on a scrap of paper and passed it to Tiaan. 'Would you take
this to Bilfis, please? He's in his room.'

'Of
course,' said Tiaan. She rose, bowing to the Aachim, who ignored her as usual,
and hurried out.

The
operator was in such haste that he had flown his thapter right up to the
cubular doors, which were spreading apart as Tiaan went by. He threw himself
over the side, almost falling in his haste.

Tiaan
made her way to Bilfis's room, and found him sitting at the table, poring over
his field maps.

'Malien
asked me to give you this.' She passed him the paper.

He
scanned it, thrust it into his pocket, rolled the maps and sprang up. 'Take
these to Malien's thapter. Act normally. Have you your amplimet?'

'Always.'

Scooping
gear from the table, he thrust it into a small pack. A pile on the bed followed
it and he tossed the pack over his shoulder.

'What's
the matter?' said Tiaan.

'Don't
ask stupid questions, just go!'

That
alarmed her, for the Aachim of Stassor might be remote, condescending or aloof,
but they were invariably polite.

'Walk
calmly,' he went on. 'Don't attract attention.'

Easy
to say, but she didn't know if he was helping or kidnapping her. Trust Malien,
she told herself. Tiaan did her best to act normally, though it must have been
obvious, had the passing Aachim glanced at her, that she was under a strain.
Fortunately they took no more notice of her than at any other time.

They'd
trudged the corridors and were halfway across the ice pavement outside when
someone called out, 'Bilfis, can you spare me a moment?'

'Keep
going, Tiaan,' Bilfis said softly. 'Get into the thapter and make it ready for
flight. Don't get out no matter what happens, or what I say.' He turned.
'Harjax? I'm just checking some of the maps I left in the thapter.'

'Would
you bring the old human back for interrogation, please?'

'Certainly.
Tiaan,' he called, 'fetch the maps from the thapter, if you would.'

Tiaan
risked a glance over her shoulder as she climbed the side. Harjax stood
uncertainly outside the cubular doors, a victim of indecision and Aachim
politeness. Tiaan slipped in, put the maps into their racks, carefully inserted
the amplimet and made all ready. She felt ill. She'd only flown this thapter a
couple of times, and then briefly. Its controls, different from those of her
original thapter, could be temperamental. She prayed for a steady hand and a
strong stomach.

'Would
you fetch her please, Bilfis,' called Harjax, trying to be commanding without
alerting his quarry. 'It's rather important.'

'Of
course,' said Bilfis, 'if it's so urgent.' He strolled towards the thapter, a
picture of unconcern. As he climbed the side he said quietly to Tiaan, 'Ready?'

'Yes.'

'Go,
as fast as you possibly can. Fly around the side, then back to the east-facing
door. Malien will be waiting there.' He jumped in.

The
thapter sprang to life. Tiaan mentally worked the controls, praying she had
them right.

Harjax,
belatedly realising that something was wrong, began to run across the paving.

'Come
on!' Bilfis snapped.

She
jerked and twisted the yoke at the same time. The thapter lifted sharply,
spinning on its axis, front down, so quickly that she couldn't see where she
was going. Harjax sprang out of the way, shouted to the guards outside the
doors but again hesitated, unwilling to fire on his own.

Tiaan
turned the yoke back, a fraction too far, for the thapter now tumbled end for
end while it was still spinning. At least it was slowly gaining height, though
it was heading straight for the cubular doors.

'Do
something!' Bilfis shouted.

She
jerked the yoke, intuition guiding her hand, the machine straightened out and
Tiaan took it up vertically. Harjax roared orders to fire but Tiaan
sideslipped, hurtled towards the high north-western corner of Stassor, skimmed
the flank of its peak and shot over the top, out of sight.

'Down,
low to the roof!' hissed Bilfis. 'Weave about, just in case. They've weapons
here that could shatter this machine like ice on an anvil, once they find the
resolve to use them.'

Tiaan
raced across the roof, dropped so sharply on the other side that Bilfis's feet
lifted off the floor, corkscrewed around the north-eastern peak out of sight,
then zipped back towards the eastern door. There was no one outside.

A
shrill piping sounded within, a call to arms, and she saw a squad of soldiers
racing down the hall. 'What do we do, Bilfis?'

Just
as Tiaan was thinking that Malien wasn't coming, three people threw themselves
through the doors. Tiaan slammed into a pancaking hover just to the right of
the doors, so the guards could not shoot from inside the hall. The three Aachim
flung themselves in and she shot up, piling them all onto the floor.

'Get
over that far mountain, quick!' cried Malien, pointing to a range to their
east. 'Fly like you've never flown before, or they'll melt us down to tallow.'

Crossbow
bolts slammed into the sides. Tiaan spun down the ridge, across the
glacier-filled valley and up the other side towards a saddle between two rocky
horns. As they were halfway up she felt the field draw down so hard that the
thapter missed a beat. The patterns on the glass went wild and she could feel
the amplimet flaring in sympathy.

'Over
the saddle!' roared Malien. 'Get down into shelter, before it's too late.'

It
was still a long way ahead, up a precipitous slope. Tiaan looked back. A tower
at the top of the building had developed glowing crimson rings. The whole of
the glassy cube of Stassor had gone black. A chill went up her spine. She
hurled the thapter hard left, left again, right, up, then down and to the left
once more.

The
saddle approached, as sharp as a blade. She made for the middle of it, the
lowest point. The rings were whirling up and down the tower, faster and faster.
She could see them reflected on the glass of the binnacle.

 Tiaan
was almost to the saddle before she realised that it made the perfectly framed
shot the Aachim were waiting for.

'Go
left!' Malien's voice was a choked scream.

Tiaan
was about to but, as her hand moved the yoke, an urgent sense of wrongness told
her that the Aachim were expecting that. She flung the yoke hard the other way,
veering right and shaving ice off the rising ridge crest with the base of the
thapter.

The
low point, as well as the left-hand side of the saddle, exploded in a spray of
steam and molten rock, then they were over and hurtling down the sharp decline
with an avalanche on their heels.

'Pull
up,' said Malien, 'but keep well below the saddle. They might reflect the beam
off the ice, even if they can't see us.'

Tiaan
was already doing so. The Aachim picked themselves up from the floor, looking
at each other. They were unharmed, apart from Bilfis, who had a fleck of blood
on the back of his robes, below the right shoulder blade.