Summoning Light (4 page)

"Got it."

Tilar snorted. "He couldn't keep his secrets better than anyone else."

Bunny tossed her head. "You could give me some credit."

Anna considered the possibility that Bunny might be at fault for Kell's death, but her passengers seemed satisfied with the telepath's actions.

Tilar's foot nudged again at Kell. "The leader of the Circle. He wasn't so great. He was easy enough to kill."

Elizar looked to Tilar. "He killed himself."

"Now we can send the message the Shadows directed," Tilar said. "Right, Elizar?"

"Straighten his limbs," Elizar said, "and I will begin."

Anna had little interest in the technical work that followed. Kell's skin was sliced open; blood flowed out over her. It was time for her systems check, and she was simply glad that she had completed her unfamiliar duties successfully. She had obeyed both the Eye and Elizar, and she had delivered the required torturings without killing. She had furthered their path to victory. The greatest joy was the ecstasy of victory.

Soon she would return these passengers to the planet below. She would be glad to have them gone from her body. The Eye had told her she would have to stay nearby and carry them again when there was need; they were critical to victory. Anna hoped the need never again arose. She would prefer to go on to other duties, to use the machine as it was meant to be used.

The machine was so beautiful, so elegant. Perfect grace, perfect control, form and function integrated into the circuitry of the unbroken loop, the closed universe. All systems of the machine passed through her. She was its heart; she was its brain; she was the machine. She kept the neurons firing in harmony. She synchronized the cleansing and circulation in sublime synergy. She beat out a flawless march with the complex, multileveled systems. The skin of the machine was her skin; its bones and blood, her bones and blood. She and the machine were one: a great engine of chaos and destruction.

C
HAPTER 2

Galen had unpacked only a few weeks ago. Now he was packing again, this time for good. He and Elric would leave Soom. They would flee with the mages.

Packing was a strange thing. It involved imagining oneself in a different place, doing different things, projecting which items might be necessary or useful under those circumstances. But Galen couldn't imagine himself anywhere, doing anything. His mind could not form the picture.

He remembered the last time he'd packed, for the trip to Zafran 8, weighing the value of each item against the space it would take. Yet now, it was impossible to distinguish one item from another. Nothing seemed necessary, nothing potentially useful. He could leave it all behind, or he could bring it all with him. It made no difference.

He stood at the side of his bed, which was covered with boxes of various sizes, filled to various levels. He did not know how long he had been standing there. He decided it did not matter.

Elric had gone to town to say good-bye. He had asked Galen to go with him, but Galen had wanted to stay behind. Stay behind and pack. They would leave before dark. And so here he stood.

The four rough wooden shelves above his worktable were half-empty, items taken or left behind at random, the remaining items disorganized. The disarray would normally have bothered him, yet now it did not. His thoughts simply drifted away.

A cool breeze blew in through the window, and Galen shivered. He was always cold now. Outside, the mak, the plain of moss-covered rock on which he lived, was shrouded in thick mist. It was as if he lived within a formless limbo where neither light nor darkness could find definition. They could only mix in shades of grey.

On the floor below the window he saw a square shape. He went to it. He bent, picked it up. He opened the cover, flipped through the pages, the recognition delayed a few seconds. Mirm, the Extremely Mottled Swug. It was Fa's book. She had not come to his house in a long time. He had frightened her away. The book must have lain there since before.

If he had found it earlier, he could have given it to Elric to return. Now. Here it was. He squeezed it tightly, forcing the memories to remain within. It was her favorite book. If he left it behind, it would be destroyed with the house. He must return it.

He had not treated her well. He had never treated her well. She had given him friendship and kindness. He had given her arrogance and impatience. And lately, not even that. He owed her something. He owed her, at least, a good- bye. The picture formed in his head: a smiling, black-robed figure wrapping Fa in a warm embrace, speaking words of love and reassurance, exchanging sleights of hand one more time.

But the figure in the black robe was not he. What he owed her he could not give. He could not find the words, could not perform the actions. He looked down at the book clenched in his hands. He would return it to her through a messenger.

He left his home of stacked stones behind and passed into the mist. He felt like a ghost, lacking in substance or reality. The wind drove him along.

He knew Fa's house, though as he approached the back of it, he realized he had never been inside. She had always come to him; he had never gone to her. He was still a stranger in this place, among these people, after eleven years of living here. He had never opened himself to them, or to Fa, and now there was nothing of him left to open. He was transparent, empty.

He heard her voice coming from one of the windows. He imagined his mind as a blank screen, carefully visualized an equation written upon it. The spell gave him access to the probe in the ring he'd given her, his father's ring. The image appeared in his mind's eye.

She was staring right at him, right at the stone in the ring. Below the curly white wisps of hair that covered her face, her skin was the deep pink it became when she was excited. Her eyes were wide, bright, engaged in play. Her head turned back and forth as she studied the ring.

Seeing her in his mind's eye was like peering through a telescope at some impossibly distant past. It was a past to which he could not return.

"Make me great flowers of light in the sky," she said in the language of the Soom. The probe's image turned away from her, swooping over the stone walls of her room in dizzying circles as she waved her arms and twirled, imagining the flowers falling around her. Of course the ring would do no magic for her.

"Pretty, pretty flowers." She again held the ring up to her face. "Blow all the flowers to Gale. Tell him not to be sad anymore. Tell him to be happy. Tell him not to go away."

Galen turned, nearly starting for home. He did not want to think. He did not want to feel. Yet he had taken the easy path and ignored her for too long. He must say good-bye.

"Turn me into a great lady carried in a chair," Fa said.

He needed a messenger. He had once, for practice, created an illusion of Mirm, trying to combine the feel of the book's hand-tinted engravings with realistic swuglike movements. He had never been happy with the illusion, but it would have to do.

On the screen in his mind's eye, he visualized a second equation, one to create the image of Mirm. His tech eagerly echoed the spell, and the massive swug stood before him, chest high, skin brightly mottled with shades of pink, purple, and blue, a friendly tilt to his head, just as in the book. Galen added another equation, creating a small flying platform on top of Mirm's snout. He laid the book upon it, so it appeared as if Mirm carried the book balanced there. Galen conjured an equation of motion, and Mirm approached Fa's window. The swug's ample fatty deposits jiggled as he trotted on thin legs.

Holding the spells in his mind, Galen withdrew behind a short wall of stacked stones that marked the boundary of the property. He created a new equation of motion, sending Mirm scrabbling up through Fa's window, then knelt among the grasses, out of sight. He closed his eyes, focusing on the image from the probe.

The image had been waving all over the room as Fa played. Suddenly it froze in place. "Mirm! Is it really you?"

Galen had created a voice for Mirm, which quavered like the deep bleats that swugs usually made. He conjured the voice, composed the words Mirm would say as if he were writing a message. The illusion spoke. "Hello, Fa," Mirm said. "I brought your book." With a flick of his nose Mirm flipped the book toward Fa. She caught it.

"I left it at Gale's house," she said, running her hands over the book, amazed. "I didn't think I should go there." She looked up eagerly. "Is he with you?" She ran to the window, looked out.

Galen bent forward, bracing his hands against the cold ground.

"Gale isn't here," Mirm said. "He sent me. To say good-bye."

"Honored El said that they must leave." She turned back to Mirm. "Can't Gale stay?"

"No," Mirm said. "He must go with all the others like him."

Fa crouched beside the window, her head bent. "He's my best friend."

"He asked me to tell you he is sorry he has not been more friendly."

"He is sad. I understand. I wish he wasn't so sad, though."

Galen's fingers tightened, digging into the dirt. "He worries that you will be sad," Mirm said.

"I wish we could be sad together."

Galen needed to end this. "Gale said that wherever he is, he will look up at the stars in the sky and think of you."

"I want to create lights in the sky, just like him. If I do, can I go where he goes?"

"You cannot create lights. Not from the ring. You can use it only to call Gale by saying his name three times. But you must not call him unless you are in dire need. The ring will watch over you. He will watch over you."

She stared at the ring – at him – and began to cry. He was a coward.

"But I don't want the ring," she said. "I want Gale. I don't want him to leave."

This was only making her more upset. As usual, he had no skills for dealing with others. Galen moved Mirm toward the window.

Fa lunged at the swug, extending her arms to embrace him. They passed through the illusion, and she fell to the floor. She lay there sobbing, her skin a bright pink, the hair below her eyes matted with tears. "Mirm!"

Mirm hesitated at the window.

Fa pushed herself up on her hands. "Tell Gale I love him."

Galen's heart pounded. "Good-bye," Mirm said.

He conjured equation of motion. Mirm scrambled out the window, ran away between the stone houses into the mist.

Fa stared into the ring. "Gale," she whispered. "Gale." She stopped herself before saying his name a third time. She would not abuse the gift he had given her. "Don't be sad anymore. Do you remember our picnic with Is? Remember how she laughed? She would want you to be happy."

She rubbed a finger over the ring. "I will look up at the stars and think of you. I will hope that, wherever you are, you are laughing."

Galen broke the connection with the probe, dissolved the illusion.

He willed his heart to slow, his mind to go blank. He would not think. He would not feel. He would regain the transparency of a ghost.

He had done what he needed to do; he had said good-bye to the past. Now he could fade away.

He pushed himself to his feet and walked stiffly back toward home.

In his place of power, Elric sat in darkness. He dreaded what he had to do. He had given himself to Soom, sunk his bones deep into this planet. He was a part of it, and it was a part of him. He could not imagine splitting them asunder.

Soom lived and breathed. The planet's core generated the heat that gave it life. Driven by this heart, magma pumped to the surface, carrying the energy that moved continents, raised mountains, and built volcanoes. From the volcanoes magma and steam escaped, enriching the atmosphere and driving rains that spread precious water upon the surface. Sustained by this living planet, life flourished in many forms.

On the far side of Soom, the coarse-haired wild tak stood on a rocky mountainside, sleeping in the predawn darkness. The tiny krit, eyes closed, clung to thick stalks of grass as they blew in the breeze. Across the continent, shadows in the desert city of Drel shortened as the sun climbed toward its zenith. Sand blew across the vast open plain.

Closer to home, the sea shril began their migration south with the warm currents. Above the waterline, the coastal city of Tain was busy with traders leaving the marketplace and heading for their evening meal. The Rook of Tain, corrupt leader of that city, stared once again into the great chest of gems that had arrived a few weeks ago from his new friends on the rim.

In the town of Lok, a few discussed Elric's departure with regret, though for most, the event was only a curiosity, nothing more. Farmer Jae and Farmer Nee shared their afternoon drink, as had become their custom. After their last fight, Elric had directed them to have three mugs of brew together each day for three days. The punishment had been more successful than he had ever hoped. Drinking together each day had broken down the barriers between them, and they had found in each other, if not a kindred spirit, at least someone to listen. Though they still often quarreled, they had become friends, of a sort.

Unnoticed, Farmer Nee's Jab marched into Farmer Jae's barn, where the prizewinning swug, Des, lay. Elric's probe, stuck between Jab's eyes, shifted back and forth as her low body drove forward with powerful legs. Des raised his head at Jab's approach, but did not rouse his vast bulk. He returned his attention to something else, to a chunk of brownish food that had fallen into the grasses of his bed. Jab approached the chunk of food. Tiny wormlike creatures struggled over the damp surface. They were perhaps one-quarter inch long, with barely visible arms and legs. Jab sniffed at her offspring. Des watched them with great interest and, if Elric was not mistaken, some pride. After all, they had incubated beneath his skin.

Out on the mak, the brilliant lime-green moss thrived, covering the rocky plain like a carpet. Within the mist stood Elric's circle of seven great moss-covered standing stones, and below it, a chamber carved out of rock, his place of power.

He lingered there, caught between necessity and dread. He had to act. Yet the planet and its inhabitants needed him. He did not want to desert them. And as much as they needed him, he needed them. They endowed his life and his conjuries with meaning and direction. They gave him a center, a place that nourished his spirit and called him to a purpose greater than his own interests. They enriched him.