Vergence (31 page)

The cheg wheeled with unexpected agility, and set off along the walkway. Ben-gan fell in behind them, and together they trailed after their gigantic escort.

“Many of the H'nChae cheg tribes were amongst the first to ally with Volane at the founding of the Volanian Imperium. They provided elite soldiers for the household guard of the ruler for a hundred generations, and to be accepted into the Volanian guard is an honour for the cheg. There were no warriors more powerful—”

“More powerful than a summoned ephemeral?” Ebryn asked.

“True,” Ben-gan said. “I think many ephemeral have greater power. But a summoner who has no dominating affinity would be in terrible peril, attempting to control a being powerful enough to defeat a cheg. The higher ephemeral are capricious.”

The cheg turned left and climbed a set of broad shallow stairs. At the top they stepped out into a wide circular area with a vaulted roof, supported by tall round pillars, evenly spaced around the entire circumference.

Flush with the pillars, a small lip, barely a hand's breadth high, marked the boundary of the circle. The floor was decorated with elaborate mosaic and in the centre sat an object which looked something like a claw-footed silver pedestal. Ebryn estimated the space must be easily four score yards across, and he realised they must have ascended to the crown of the hill. Unlike Fyrenar, where ascending a hill guaranteed a brisk breeze, the air here was still and somehow fresher than in the surrounding city.

Visible past the pillars were the rooftops of the three levels of library, and beyond those, the surrounding strip of parkland, and then a great tumbling sprawl of buildings as far as he could see. Ebryn couldn't imagine the number of people who must live in a city so vast. He scanned the distant buildings, looking for landmarks, places he recognised, but found he couldn't pick out individual features.

“It's huge,” he said. “How many—”

He turned to the others but found they had moved away. Ben-gan stood near the centre of the circle with the cheg. Sash and Addae were a dozen yards away examining the pattern on the floor.

Ebryn stepped down over the lip, feeling a peculiar resistance as he walked across to Sash and Addae. He imagined he could hear an indistinct sound, like somebody just out of sight whispering to him.

Sash looked up he approached. “Can you feel that?”

“Yes,” Ebryn said, “and there's a sound. Can you hear it — like hissing, or whispering?”

Sash tilted her head on one side. “Not so much, it's more like falling sand.”

“The sound I hear is the sound of flowing water,” Addae said.

Sash stepped closer to where Ebryn stood. “It's different, depending on where you're standing.”

They moved towards Ben-gan, and Ebryn was surprised to see one of the cheg removing his sevyric bracelets.

“I have a task to perform,” Ben-gan said, following his gaze. “With these on, I cannot do the work needed, and so I am granted a temporary reprieve.”

As they approached Ben-gan, one of the cheg held out an arm as thick as a tree trunk to block their path.

Ben-gan flexed his wrists and rubbed his forearms where the bands had been. “They won't allow you close to me while I am free of the restraints. I would ask you to stay back and not move across the Arrayal — the pattern — while I work the weatherstone.”

“Is it dangerous?” Sash asked, leaning forward to see past the cheg's arm.

“Not dangerous to you,” Ben-gan said. “Although if done poorly, we may all be enjoying Haeldran weather instead of what Guele has to offer.”

The top of the pedestal looked like some kind of half open long-petalled metal flower, and it was around this Ben-gan placed his hands as the cheg guards herded them back a dozen paces.

For a long moment nothing happened, and Ebryn had just started wondering if there would be any kind of sign heralding the change, when the ground started to vibrate. It seemed to seethe, before settling into a sliding sensation, as if the entire structure around them had broken free and started slipping down the side of the hill.

“Look at that,” Sash said.

The floor felt as if it heaved under their feet, the pattern visibly twisting and writhing. Ebryn felt as if he was falling and reached out instinctively for support, but even as he felt everything moving, part of him knew he was still standing on firm ground.

The sky above Vergence darkened, and a sudden cooling breeze of crisp air blew between the pillars. Ebryn shook his head to clear his senses.

Ben-gan rejoined them, holding out his arms to accept the armbands from one of the cheg. “Good, I think that went well. Clear weather for the festival, with a little rain afterwards to clean up, and dampen down the festive spirits.”

“How does is work?” Sash asked.

“The weatherstone? I think it is too difficult to explain,” Ben-gan said, running his hand over his beard. “Simply stated, we borrow our weather, our air, our sunlight from the worlds nearest us.”

“And our water?” Ebryn asked, thinking of Elouphe.

“Yes, also our water.”

Looking at Ben-gan, Ebryn suddenly recalled where he'd encountered the name before. “Is Ben-gan a family name?”

“No, it's my given name.”

“Your name is in my book by Ullvenard.”

“Ah, Ullvenard,” Ben-gan said. “I remember him. He wrote a number of colourful screeds about his travels. Yes, I am the Ben-gan he writes about. Like the Senesellans, my people can be long-lived.”

Ebryn stared at him. “But that means, in Fyrenar years, you must be over a hundred years old. He said you were one of the architects of Vergence, and the Elect — the greatest living caster.”

Ben-gan chuckled. “I think Ullvenard was a fine man, but a bit given to embellishing facts to make them more interesting.”

That evening Ebryn described his visit to the library and meeting with Ben-gan to a silent room. Aara and Alvin focused on their food, apparently not listening. Plyntoure sat with his ears folded back, his eyes moving back and forth between Ebryn and Tenlier. Even Kleple said nothing.

Ebryn finished his account, and looked around the table. With the Tranquillity drawing to a close, Tenlier would be leaving the following morning, taking Kleple and Alvin with him.

Kleple had spent much of the previous week grumbling about going, but even allowing for that, he thought they all looked subdued. Perhaps they were upset at leaving behind friends or family, Ebryn thought.

At the end of the meal, Tenlier motioned Ebryn to one side. “There are a few things we need to discuss before I leave.”

Tenlier led him through a small door, tucked away to one side of the main staircase. It opened into a well furnished room, with floor to ceiling bookshelves along all the walls.

A bewildering assortment of cabinets, desks and tables occupied most of the space. Hundreds of interesting looking objects cluttered every available surface. Brightly coloured globules drifted through oily fluid inside crystal clear closed vase-like cylinders. Small objects of bunched silvery wires crouched on top of wooden shelves, like strange frozen insects, alongside dozens of metallic fronds. Everywhere there were strange crystals, and small glassy spheres.

The room felt alive, with dozens of sources of power tickling at the edge of his awareness, and Ebryn would have liked nothing better than half a day free to explore.

Tenlier shut the door and ushered him towards a set of comfortable looking chairs in the far corner. “Please have a seat.”

They sat at an angle to each other, facing towards an empty hearth. It looked so clean Ebryn wondered what kind of fire they used in it.

“It's not used much,” Tenlier said. “We're seldom cold enough to make it worthwhile.”

“Because of the weatherstone?”

“Yes, the weatherstone.”

The odd collection of objects on the low circular table between them drew Ebryn's eye. He could feel power emanating from some of the items — a metal box, small white candelabra, something that looked like a nut cracker, and an irregularly shaped upside-down crystal bowl.

The bowl glowed with a dim inner light, looking so fragile it almost seemed to be only half there. As he moved his head, the light reflecting from its depths shifted from blue to mauve, to dark orange.

“Interesting, isn't it,” Tenlier said.

“What is it?”

“It goes over your head, like a helmet. Try it on if you wish. It's safe as long as you're sitting down.”

Ebryn picked it up, and slipped it over his head. Aside from a prickling sensation around his temple nothing happened.

“What's it supposed to do?”

Tenlier motioned with the fingers of one hand, and it slipped round until it covered Ebryn's eyes. All at once his view of the room vanished, replaced by a web of countless fine coloured threads, like illuminated lines forming vastly complex patterns, and stretching out as far as he could see.

He gripped at the arms of the chair, feeling as if he'd tipped forward into a void.

“Interesting, eh?” Tenlier said.

“What am I seeing?”

“The helmet hides the surface veneer of the world. It's allowing you to see the skeins of power which bind together to form the essential nature of everything that exists. We use it when we're trying to investigate the nature of a thing without the distraction of relying on a sense casting.”

“Is this what you wanted to show me?” Ebryn asked, taking the helmet off, and turning it in his hands.

“No … you seemed curious, a healthy quality in our order. Unfortunately, there are a couple of other things we need to discuss. About you,” Tenlier said. “Plyntoure asked my advice in seeking out your parents.”

Ebryn flushed. “I didn't mean him to go to that much trouble. I thought he might know, or know how to find out where my name came from. One of the men before the test — one of the recorders — told me Alire is a Volanian name.”

“Now, now, no need to explain. I have no doubt, were I in your position, I'd have asked too. It's only natural after all. I suggested a few avenues of enquiry to Plyntoure, but unfortunately he's not managed to turn up anything more about your history than we knew already, which isn't much at all, I'm afraid to say.”

“So do you think Alire isn't a Volanian name?”

“Oh, no, that's not what I mean at all,” Tenlier said, giving Ebryn a kindly smile. “It most probably is. But you must understand, many Volanians lived in other places before the fall, and many more fled during the war. Few records survive, so I sorry to say, however diligent Plyntoure is, it's unlikely he'll find anything to help.”

“It was good of him to try,” Ebryn said, trying to hide his disappointment.

“Yes, he's a fine fellow. I'm confident I'll be leaving you in good hands, but before we go I also need to talk about a more delicate matter — my fellow casters in the library.

“This isn't something I'd have to bring up with most apprentices, you understand. However, with your unusual talents I feel I ought to warn you. It will not have escaped some of those who are wearing the sevyric restraints in the library that you have the the ability to free them.”

Ebryn nodded. “Ben-gan has already told me I'd be in trouble if I do.”

“Hmm … it's not so much the authorities I'll be concerned about if you removed their shackles. Some of them are extremely powerful, and could turn out to be very dangerous if they escape.”

“Ben-gan told us they'd been working with ephemerals, to find cures for ailments.”

“Perhaps that's true,” Tenlier said, “but we can't be sure, so I want your word you won't free any of them under any circumstances. Whatever they tell you, or promise, even if they try to find a way to coerce you. This is vitally important.”

First Lessons

A
SLOW-MOVING TIDE
of students filed down the passage leading to the arena.

“Sorry, slipped,” Elouphe said for the fifth time, as his feet lost purchase on the smooth stone floor, and he skidded into one of his neighbours.

Ebryn put out a hand to help Elouphe as he struggled to regain his balance. He couldn’t help feeling some sense of affinity for the water dweller. Like Elouphe he found himself surrounded by the unfamiliar.