Friends and Enemies (Gwen Farris Book 5) (26 page)

Then he spoke, his voice a bit clipped, and
totally
foreign. She couldn't even tell what he said, it being in a different language than any she knew.

Europan, to be exact.

In this world that was actually a time shifted form of Mongolian, since Attila and his family had been good with magic as it turned out, and taken over almost all of Europe and had held onto it for a long time. The fingerprint of that was left on the culture even to that day. They
loved
horses for instance. Not just for food, either. They used the things occasionally in the Western Kingdom, but almost everyone had one here. It was like Americans and their cars nearly.

Her mouth moved, and words came out, if a bit hesitantly. She had
no
clue what she was telling the man, since it was Katherine doing the talking, not her. After a bit her pillow was fluffed for her, the man being very professional and not copping a feel while he did it, and her wrists were checked for chaffing. There was some, from her pulling on the things earlier, which was noted on a clipboard at the foot of her bed.

She hadn't seen the thing at all, since it was hidden away under the left hand side of the bed frame as it was. It lent to the hospital like feeling of the whole thing. Those kinds of places never let you see your chart, if they could help it. Probably because they wrote down mean things about people in code on them. If you were around too long you learned what the different letters meant, and then you could get all crappy about it.

Then they spoke for a while longer, the man finally waving affably enough, and taking his leave. He probably had other patients to get to.

As soon as he was gone, she spoke, using English. It was a relief to hear it.

"So, how did we end up here? I take it we're in Europa somewhere?"

'Indeed. You see, I'd failed in my plan to gather my freedom, and the riches needed for a good life, so I had to move to another one. Thankfully you'd started your project. You being able to rift gave me a bargaining chip. Not that I needed it, to be honest. Not in the end. It took great work to make contact with the right people however. Especially with that Westmorland witch watching me like a hawk the whole time. Do you know that Bethany was just playing with me? That night, in the hotel? As soon as I put you away for the night, the witch started to scold me.
Me
! As if she hadn't been coming onto me the whole trip. The tease.'

Gwen made a considering face. That sounded a lot more promising than whatever sexual position might have been in the offing. A lot better to her. Maybe she and Beth were still friends even.

'It was humiliating, and she'd done it on purpose. So I ran out, and evaded her long enough to make my way to the docks. I may have loathed all the running you did back then, but it paid off, didn't it? She never got close to catching me. From there I used some of your funds, and booked passage on the first ship I could find that would get me out of the kingdom. It was a tramp freighter, but the Captain let me bribe him for passage. I had to service him and the First Mate for a month as well, which was humiliating, but finally we set into Britia. The Europan islands? After that I was able to make contact with the government, and set up a bargain.'

Gwen processed the story, running over it several times in her head. Finally, she just had to
ask
, since there wasn't enough to go on otherwise.

"Wait, how long have I been out of it? Over a month, unless you're lying, but..."

'Ah, yes. It's a bit longer than that, Miss Farris. You see, the Europans were most interested in learning how to rift, and while I can't do it myself, I was able to show them how to get it done. The training used is the important portion of it, and since I know how to use Doctor Debussey's magically aided mesmerism, I dare say their new program for it here is much more efficient than the one in the Western Kingdom. We didn't have to torture people at all, for instance.'

Gwen's first impulse was to sit there sputtering the word what, over and over again. Then screaming came to mind, as a proper response to the whole thing.

Instead she managed to lie there calmly, and nod a bit.

"Okay. I suppose I can see that. So you sold rifting to them, and probably how to do that sort of mesmerism enhanced by operant conditioning, for... All t
his
, and the use of a bedpan on demand?" She glanced around the room, and then down at the chains.

'Yes. It rather seems so. As you might surmise, that was not the original bargain I made. I worked with them for years, setting the whole thing up. Two and a half, and when they had it all, every bit they could get from me, they tucked me in here, instead of rewarding me as they claimed they would. Other than the chains, they haven't mistreated me, but it isn't the life I envisioned at all. So, here we are. It's been three years for you, and for me as well. I know you might be a
little
upset with me. It seemed to be working for most of it though. I swear.'

It was time for some name calling.

 Three years. Her entire life in this new world would be gone then, if that was the case. It could be a trick though. It didn't feel like she'd been out of it for any real length of time, for instance. Long enough that she needed to brush her teeth, but no more than that.

If it
wasn't
a lie, or a joke, then everything was probably gone already. Chris would have moved on, and married, or at least given up on seeing her again. On the good side they'd never been all that close, so it probably wouldn't rip
his
poor world apart, thank goodness. The Vernors would have given her up for dead, or at least assumed, rightly as it turned out, that Katherine had taken over and run off.

Beth and the others, they'd...

Gwen didn't know that one. They would probably go on, after a bit.

Sighing, she shook her head, and noticed that it didn't move right. She definitely had a boy cut now.

'They did that as soon as I got here. It's easier for them to manage, they said. This is some kind of sanatorium. A place for the insane? A rather nicer one than what we'd have gotten back home. Anyway, that's the story, up to now. I was hoping, if you wouldn't mind, do you think you could help us escape? I don't know where to go, but staying here for the rest of my life isn't a grand option.'

Rattling the chains, which glowed at the cuffs with strange green sigils, she understood what her part in it would be then. The null radiatives would stop most people from using their skills, after all. In fact, they might even stop her. Bethany had mentioned to her once that
she
could use her telepathy, even with them on, since the Westmorland training was simply that powerful.

That was how she'd learned to do a few things, too. Her flying and energy blasts were out, for the moment, but she could probably teletransport, having gotten that skill under torture.

The trick there was actually different than that though. She had to think for a bit, before speaking.

"Why?"

'Sorry? Why what, dear?'

"Why should you go free? I don't love losing everything, and you kind of stole everything from me, twice now, but I guess I can see where you were coming from there. That
doesn't
give you an excuse to sell out your entire
land
. What kind of monster does that? Do you even realize what you did?"

'Certainly I do. I lived it. I made a mess of things, and ended up here!'
The haughty and entitled tones were back, which made it a bit easier to deal with.

"Not that, though you did fuck up pretty royally. No, I mean the part where you endangered the entire
world
. If one side has super weapons, they might or might not use them. You didn't just double the danger of that by letting two groups have them, you made it
much
more likely that they would, trying to keep the others from doing it first. Worse if that happens, the other side will have to strike back instantly, in order to make sure they aren't destroyed out of hand. Fuck."

She just looked up at the cool white ceiling for a while, and then shuddered. That was what she was going for, but it turned into shaking and didn't stop.

'I... Know that. Now. I didn't see that I had a choice, and I was offered a lot for my information and aid. Then they betrayed me. I could see it coming, a bit, but it was too late by then. Now we either escape, or die here. I guess the choice will have to be yours. I can't make you use your magic.'

No, all she could do was leave her there, in control of the body, as she peed into a bed pan on command every few hours. Gwen didn't say anything for a long time, just going along with the program, but all the people did was check on her, every hour or so. When that happened, they'd talk, or not, and make sure she was cleaned up occasionally. Every other day. They even had a female nurse for that part. Sponge baths, but at least she wasn't left reeking in her own filth.

That was it though. No television, or even a foreign language Telesar in the room. After four days she felt herself slowly losing it, the sensory deprivation of the white space getting to her. When she was just about to lose it, Katherine spoke to her again.

'Four months, Miss Farris. I can't take this any longer, and can't kill myself. You're the only hope I have left. Our only hope.'

"Great, I'm Obi Wan now. Fuck it. Fine, I'll try to get us out of here, but after that... I'm going home." She didn't really know where that was now however, did she?

The Vernors?

They probably couldn't help her, and if Kat took over again, she was stuck. It would have to be something else.

'I understand. I'll do what you want. I promise. This was never about you. I never hated you. Nor did I blame you for what you did. I tried to, to make killing you all right, but it never worked. You were always the better woman, Gwen Farris.'

Just not good enough to hold on to her new life. Gwen felt that keenly now, and kind of wanted it back. Here she was though, chained to a bed, hand and foot. The thick links were warm against her skin, the ugly green glow never wavering in the slightest.

"We move at dark then."

She didn't share more, and really didn't have to. Katherine might have been a ditz, once upon a time, but the last few years had taught her a lot it seemed. One of those things was not running her mouth when there was no need for it.

When the time came, after a mind numbing day of waiting, she tried to teletransport as hard as she could. It didn't work. It wasn't that nothing at all happened, but as she tried to leave, pushing as much magic into it as possible, her wrists and ankles didn't go with her. Given everything that meant she was left in place. Tied to the bed, rather than free.

It had nearly worked though, Gwen could feel it, so she kept trying, until hours later, exhausted, she had to give up.

Inside her mind, Kat cried. It was pitiful.

'Nothing? Nothing?'
She just kept saying it over and again. Because that was going to help them do better in the end, Gwen didn't doubt. Constant whining about failure was a great way to improve. Everyone knew that.

Gwen murmured softly, trying not to call a nurse or orderly in by making too much noise.

"Not that way. Don't give up
yet
. We just need to change tactics. Do they ever take the chains off? Or roll you over so you don't get bed sores? If we can get free of these things for a bit, that could help."

The answer was yes, but a
lot
of drugs were used then, which would keep them in place. More than what they were on already. Since they didn't give her shots very often, the daily doses probably came in either the food or water. Whatever they gave her was strong enough that her arms and legs didn't actually ache all that much, which they should have, after months of not being used.

Gwen tried to think through the whole thing then, and finally made a face, realizing what the answer was.

If the null radiatives were being a problem, stopping the magical instructions from working like they were, by wiping them out when they were made each time, then she'd need to rewrite the instructions that caused that to happen. That was all. That she didn't know how to make that kind of thing happen was a problem, but it wasn't like she didn't have time to teach herself.

Rather than explain the new idea, she started right into work. The first thing to do, naturally, would be understanding the field on the metal. There were sigils there, but she was nearly certain that had to do with the kind of old fashioned magic that the things were made with. Similar ones were used in the Western Kingdom.

Sumerian, she thought. Nearly meaningless to her, and what little she did know was all from her own world. She'd built a web-site once for a man that was a historian. It was a far cry from learning how the things worked.

Each one of the letters had a slightly different feeling to them, when she focused on them intently enough. Making up the spell, which at the end of the pattern grabbed any incoming magic, and washed it clean of ideas. The spell itself had to live, as it were, underneath that.

It would have been impossible for her to overwrite them, using brute force, since they used a kind of magical aikido, twisting any other instructions away just at the right time to make them ineffective.

The trick then, would be to break the instructions there, along the line that set the pattern, just enough to allow her to get away. Kind of like programming a computer, she
hoped
.

If she had to write a new program, she'd be screwed, lacking the proper coding skills, but if she could get
into
the code, it wouldn't be that hard to mess things up enough for the program to not work anymore. A monkey could pound on a keyboard until the thing just didn't work anymore, adding no more than random junk.

She didn't know how you impressed an idea into metal though. Not really. She'd been planning on lessons, just before she'd left and then... Yeah. Things were fucked up now.