That was not the reason, Fleta realized. It was because she was an alien creature masquerading as an android of the opposite sex. She could not qualify for a regular ladder without giving herself away, so the self-willed machines had set her up with this all-inclusive one. They did know what they were doing.
But she was on the 142nd rung! How could she ever make it to the top ten rungs?
Shock showed her where to verify her ranking: the Game Computer had a special screen that would show the placement of whomever approached it. Sure enough, FLETA was now listed 142 on LEFTOVER. SHOCK was 143. He shrugged and departed, satisfied.
“Report to alcove for special instructions,” a low voice murmured from the speaker.
Surprised, she went to an alcove, where there was slightly greater privacy.
“Challenge the player on the eighth rung,” the speaker said.
“But don’t I have to climb step by step?” she asked.
“Not in this case. You are permitted two free challenges: one in the lowest ten, to register on the ladder, and one elsewhere, to establish your regular position. Thereafter you can ascend or descend only rung by rung, and need accept only a single challenge each day. If you win Rung Eight, and limit subsequent challenges to one a day, you can lose on the following two days and still qualify for the Tourney. You must achieve the rung now; pursuit is closing, and you will be protected while you remain at the qualifying level.”
She felt like melting. She had almost forgotten the danger she was in. “How do I challenge?”
“We shall enter it for you. Follow the line.”
She looked. The new line was there on the floor. “Thank you,” she said, but the speaker did not respond. She hadn’t known that the Game Computer itself was cooperating with the self-willed machines; probably it could get in serious trouble itself, if the Contrary Citizens learned of its part in this. That had to be why her double slip in naming herself and her nature had not given her away: the computer already knew her identity, and was covering for her.
She followed the line, still intrigued by the magic of this realm. It led to another console, where an older woman stood. She had only one arm. This, it seemed, was Number Eight on the Ladder.
“Fleta of Uni,” the woman said disapprovingly. “You breeze here from offplanet at the last minute and want to enter the Tourney and maybe win Citizenship, just like that?”
Fleta looked at the name on the screen. This was Stumpy of Proton. A cruel name for a long-time serf. “Citizenship?” she asked, alarmed. If the Citizens were already closing in…
Stumpy looked at her with open incredulity. “You don’t know?”
“Know what?” Fleta asked, confused.
“Oh—you’re an android,” Stumpy said.
Fleta did not argue, as she was impersonating an android. A reputation for stupidity was an asset, for her. She smiled and looked appropriately blank.
“Well, let’s get this charade over with,” Stumpy said. She slapped her hand down on her screen.
Fleta had the letters again, so she took D. ANIMAL again. Immediately the screen showed Stumpy’s choice, 3. CHANCE. The square expanded.
Instead of a new grid, there was a message: BETTING ON ANIMAL CONTESTS. SELECT AN INCIPIENT CONTEST. ONGOING LIST FOLLOWS.
Below was a grid in which many animal contests were listed: races, fights and performances, between horses, dogs, fowl or other creatures.
Bemused by this approach, Fleta touched the column that contained horses, but immediately the chosen square brightened, and it was 1D7E: DOG FIGHT.
Well, she had watched werewolves fighting each other for status. Because she was the foal of Neysa, the friend of the entire local Pack, she had been privileged to witness rites that were ordinarily barred to outsiders. That was how she had become friends with Furramenin; she had been a foal and the werewolf a pup together. Dogs were similar creatures, though inferior; they bore about the same relation to werewolves as horses did to unicorns or monkeys to human folk. She should be able to judge a dog fight.
Now the screen became a picture, startling her. It showed a pit, with two snarling dogs being held by trainers. Fleta saw at a glance that one dog, though slightly smaller and leaner, had a more savage temperament; it would be more serious about the fight than the other.
SELECT VICTORIOUS DOG, the screen directed.
Fleta touched the screen where that dog was portrayed. But in a moment a message appeared: BETTORS SELECTED SAME ANIMAL. SELECT TIME OF DECISION: CLOSEST MARK.
A scale of times appeared, delineated in seconds and minutes and hours.
Fleta judged that the larger dog would quickly be cowed, and try to break off. Would the fight be halted at that point? Since the horses were owned by a Citizen who wanted them treated well, perhaps the dogs were similarly owned, and the fight would not be allowed to proceed beyond the point of evident advantage. That would keep it short. She touched the scale at one minute, ten seconds.
Stumpy’s mark showed: four minutes even. Now they had a viable bet.
The picture of the dogs reappeared, with the scale retreating to the bottom of the screen. Both bets were marked, and a pointer pointed at 0: the elapsed time of the fight.
Then the dogs were released. They sprang at each other, the larger one confident of the advantage. Indeed, for a few seconds he had it. But then blood flowed from grazing gashes, and the smaller dog went berserk. He attacked with such ferocity that the other was first surprised, then dismayed. Suddenly the other tried to break free—and nets came down, incapacitating both animals, and the fight was over.
The time was fifty-four seconds.
Stumpy looked at Fleta with new appraisal. “You weren’t guessing,” she said flatly.
“I understand animals,” Fleta said.
Stumpy turned and walked away.
Fleta walked back to the Ladder screen. There was her name, on the eighth rung, with Stumpy just below it. She had qualified for the Tourney.
Chapter 5
Spy
Bane felt the girl in his arms sag. He steadied her, realizing that Fleta had been in Mach’s embrace, just as Agape had been in his own embrace, at the time of his exchange with Mach. Fortunately this had not disrupted the process.
Bane looked out over the grassy plain. It was good to be back in Phaze, after the horrors of the pursuit by the Proton Contrary Citizens! Mach had told him briefly of the discovery by Stile, his father, that their exchange was causing a dangerous imbalance, so they had to spend more time in their own frames. Thus he was back for that reason—but the love of his home frame smote him, and he knew he was glad that this need had developed. It was early morning, just as it had been in Proton, but here it was beautiful.
Except for his separation from Agape. He loved her too, and wanted to be with her—and could not, here.
The girl blinked, recovering equilibrium. “We have exchanged, Fleta,” he told her. “I be not Mach.”
There was a little pop behind him, and a trace of vapor passed, evidently lingering from the mist of the dawn.
She stared at him. “You are alive!” she breathed. “Aye, filly.” Then he asked her about the nature of the truce Mach had told him about, but she seemed confused.
“Where are we?” she asked.
He laughed. “Where thou hast always been, mare! In Phaze, o’ course.”
Still she seemed perplexed. “Please—do some magic,” she said.
He realized that she had suffered some kind of shock, perhaps because of her proximity to the exchange he had made with Mach. He conjured a basket of oats for her.
“I am not the unicorn,” she said. “I am Agape.”
“Be thou joking, mare?”
She claimed she was not. There followed some confusion, as each doubted the other’s identity, but soon she convinced him that she was indeed Agape. He could not, however, convince her that he was Bane. Finally they compromised: he gave her a spell she could invoke for protection and left her. He wo
uld know if she used the spell, so he could check on her, for it was his magic.
Then he conjured himself to the Blue Demesnes.
His mother, the Lady Blue, welcomed him, of course. It was his father Stile he was concerned about.
He need not have been. They met privately in Stile’s office, protected from observation by a careful spell. “I made a mistake in judging you,” Stile said, speaking in his original dialect, as he was apt to do when serious. “Or perhaps in judging your other self, Mach the Robot. I should have remembered how Sheen was—and how Neysa was. Their offspring—” He shrugged. “I shall not err like that again.”
There was a faint ripple in the air. Bane was startled. The statement had seemed incidental, but that was the splash of truth. Stile was deadly serious.
“As you may know, Fleta sought to kill herself,” Stile continued gravely. “And Mach rescued her in a manner reminiscent of my own Oath of Friendship to Neysa, proving his love and his nascent power. Were you aware that he overrode an Adept’s spell in the process?”
“I had not much time for news,” Bane said. “Trool’s spell?”
“Trool’s spell. He always was too decent for his own good, and when he couldn’t talk her out of suicide, he gave her what she asked, reluctantly. It was incidental magic, for him—but no ordinary person overrides any Adept magic! The doing of it shook the frame, and suddenly all of us knew that a new Adept was in the process of coming into being. Translucent pounced on the opening, and won Mach’s trust, leaving us in a very bad situation.”
“Aye,” Bane agreed. “Dost know that I have found love in Proton-frame?”
“The parallelism of the frames made that likely. We were so blinded by our concern for the continuation of our line that we lost sight of other realities. Our opposition to your union as such is at an end. Do what you must do; I’m sure you have found a worthy companion.”
“As such?”
Stile laughed. “We still must oppose it—for different reason. You cannot remain in Proton without aggravating the deadly imbalance.”
“Ah, aye,” Bane agreed. “So it be the same.” He grimaced. “I sought not love there,” he continued. “I knew not I was going there, when first it happened. But e’en as thou didst find love across the frames, so did I.”
“I was concerned about the future,” Stile said. “Now I am concerned about the present. The Adverse Adepts are marshaling their forces, seeking to use their advantage to achieve complete victory. If they can establish communication between the frames, merging Proton analytic techniques with Phaze magic, they can dominate this frame. You and Mach are the key; if you cooperate in that, the power is theirs.”
“I seek not to give them that!” Bane protested.
“But if they take possession of your woman?”
“Aye, they tried,” Bane said. “We seek to return her to her planet of Moeba, then she will be safe. But it be difficult; the Contrary Citizens be alert.”
“You will accept separation from her?” Stile asked, surprised.
“Aye, because though I love her, so also do I love the frame. I would not take her at the cost of all else I value. So I am with thee, my father; I know our romance can be not permanent.”
“I had thought you would oppose me in this,” Stile said. “But if you give her up, will you then—?”
“Aye, I will find a woman of Phaze and make an heir,” Bane said. “An she be amenable to the knowledge that I love her not.”
Stile, not normally the most demonstrative of men, simply extended his hand. Bane shook it. Again a faint splash was evoked. There was no quarrel between them.
“I thought to give up my own love similarly,” Stile said, “for the good of the frame. But I got her back—and if there is any way I can find to do the same for you, I will do it, regardless of the heir.”
Bane smiled. “But there be a development they know not: Agape be now here in Phaze.”
“She crossed the curtain with you?” Stile asked, amazed.
“Aye. She was embracing me, and Fleta embraced Mach as we exchanged, and methinks we carried them with us.”
“But where is she now?”
“In Fleta’s body, girlform. She feared a trick by the Citizens, and they have been most devious before. She be seeking her answer alone.”
“But there is danger for the uninitiate in Phaze!”
“Aye. I gave her a spell. More can I not do, an I wish to keep mine agreement to let her be. When she accepts Phaze, then can we be together again.”
“This is apt to aggravate the imbalance,” Stile said.
“I sent word to Mach and Fleta. Trool identified it; your exchange is wreaking mischief of a cumulative nature. The Adverse Adepts verified it, once we identified it; they know that both frames can be pushed to destruction, if we ignore this imbalance. We can halt it only by returning you to your own frames.”
Bane sighed. “And our loves be in the opposite frames! Mischief indeed!”
“Mischief indeed,” Stile agreed. “But it does not solve the problem of dominance in the frames. The two of you can continue to communicate from your own frames, and if you do it for the benefit of the Adverse Adepts, they will prevail.”
“And if the Contrary Citizens gain power o’er Agape, I can promise not that I will not do their bidding,” Bane said.
“And the same for the Adverse Adepts,” Stile said. “You don’t want them to catch on to her presence here. As long as they believe she is Fleta, they will leave her alone, so as not to give Mach cause to change his mind.”
“Aye. That were in my mind as I left her: that she be in no danger from them, only from natural creatures.”
Stile walked around the chamber, his blue robe swinging out as he turned. “I do not trust the Adverse Adepts to wait passively for you to fall into their hands. They seem to be honoring the truce, perhaps because they fear that any violation here will bring a countermove in Proton, or will alienate Mach. But as Mach discovers that the Lady Blue and I have withdrawn our opposition to their union, and realizes that he no longer needs sanctuary with Translucent, the Adepts will seek to consolidate their advantage by more forceful means. It would facilitate my preparation if I had a better notion what they might be planning.”
“And thou canst not simply go and ask!” Bane said with a wry smile.
“They keep aware of me as I do of them,” Stile agreed. “They know where I am at any given moment, just as I know where they are. I fear they use their minions for their dirty work, but I don’t want to seem to be spying on the goblins or ogres or demons either, lest I alert them to my suspicions.”
“But if I were to use similar magic to do some spying—”
“I could cover for you,” Stile concluded. “They surely have a tracer on you, too, but I could enchant a humanoid golem to resemble you and divert their awareness to it. Then you would be unsuspected.”
“Aye,” Bane agreed, liking the challenge. “But e’en so, I could go not in mine own form.”
“You have been studying blue magic for several years. I think you’re ready for full Adept-level techniques, such as form-changing. I have long since used up most of the best forms for me, and cannot assume them with the same spells. But those spells will still be good for you, and perhaps it is time for you to use them.”
“Aye,” Bane said, gratified. This was a tacit promotion to adult status. He realized that his decision to favor the welfare of the frame over his personal love had won his father’s respect, and this was an immediate result.
“The main problem with form-changing is the reversion,” Stile said. “Blue magic is spoken, or sung, and other forms cannot duplicate the human sounds. What is required is a translation of the spells to the language of the other form. Once you have that, you can always revert to human form. But then that form is done for you; the magic will not work a second time.”
“Aye.”
“Therefore you will need a form that the Adverse Adepts will not suspect
, that you can remain in until you are done, and will not need again. It is true that there are many available forms, and a variant of the original spell will work as new for changing into similar species. Still, caution is best.”
“Aye.” Bane was really pleased; his father had never before trusted him with magic of this nature.
“Select a form that you find suitable, and when you assume it, I can conjure you to one of the Adverse Demesnes,” Stile said. “Thereafter you will be on your own. If you get in trouble, you will have to revert to your natural form, then conjure yourself back here. You should be able to handle that.”
“Aye,” Bane agreed. He had devised many conjuration spells, so that he could jump from one spot to another at any time, as he had done to come here from the region of the harpies. “But—methinks a trial run first?”
Stile laughed. “A sensible precaution! We’ll try something innocuous, and complete the full process; then you will know what to expect. What form would you like to try?”
“I think for observation, something small and unnoticed. An insect, perhaps a bee.”
Stile had the spell. He spoke it, and it had no effect on him because he had already used it for himself. Then he described the reversion spell in bee-buzz, making sure Bane understood it. “If you confuse it, you could change back into the wrong form,” he warned. “I could devise a spell to correct the error for you, but I think it best that you handle it yourself.”
“Aye.” For when Bane became the Blue Adept, there would be no one to rescue him from his own errors.
Agape, Agape, Agape!
Bane jumped. “She invoked the spell I gave her!” he exclaimed. “She be in danger!”
“Your spell should protect her,” Stile said. “But you don’t want to interfere before she is ready. Still, you want to be sure she is safe.”
“How canst thou know my thought so perfectly?”
“I knew it when I first loved your mother. Change now, and I will conjure you to her vicinity; this is an ideal test situation.”
Bane realized it was true. He wanted, in effect, to spy on Agape, to be sure she was safe without intruding on her presence. He sang the bee spell, and in a moment was crashing to the floor, unable to fly.