Keeping to well-used paths, he travelled through a few worlds then began to gather information. Whenever he arrived in a city, he skimmed to somewhere quiet so he could read the minds of the locals. Much discussion was occurring between regional leaders over tackling the conflict in Thot, which had once been a world of sophisticated, peaceful societies. Tyen was dismayed to learn that one had recently gained the upper hand through the use of mechanical magic weaponry. Nobody knew exactly what form the insectoids took, but something new and devastating about them had tipped the conflict in their favour. Tyen’s first thought was to avoid that place, but it did present the opportunity to seize one of these new insectoids for Zeke to investigate.
Straightening his shoulders and bracing himself for sights he may wish he’d never seen, he travelled to Thot. A well-used path took him to a city of broken walls and scorched roof beams curving up like blackened ribs. A search for minds told him that only scavengers remained. The battle that had destroyed this place was long past, and the wounded had either recovered or died long ago. Disease had run its course. Most fields and wells had been poisoned by war machines, so the few survivors were perishing from starvation. He could wait until one died, then restore their body, but it was harder to heal someone whose body was emaciated than a person who had died of their wounds. Sickened, he moved on.
He skimmed across the world. Plumes of smoke rising above the horizon led him to the next city. The battle that had reduced this one to ruin was some days in the past. He found a makeshift hospital full of promising vessels, but could not bring himself to appear in the middle of the wounded to take away one of the newly dead, especially after he saw insectoids enlarged by terror in their memories.
It would be easier to snatch a fresh corpse unnoticed in a battlefield. Continuing on, he eventually reached a sprawling temple city still burning from an attack that morning. He stopped in the farmland outside to scan for minds. The realisation that some priests were likely to be people who had no family sent a flash of excitement through him, followed by a shudder of horror at himself for feeling any kind of enthusiasm under the circumstances.
I have to take someone, he told himself. If they’re already dead and nobody cares what happens to the body that’s better, right? Though am I denying them the rituals of their people? Perhaps I could find out what those are and ensure that, if I fail, I take them back here for the priests to deal with their body as they’d wished.
But what if he succeeded?
Before he could begin to consider the implications, a noise several hundred paces to the right drew his attention. A great dome began to rise from behind a nearby hill. A familiar sound drifted to him, more of a hum than a noise.
The dome grew larger and became a great ball the size of a house, lifted by hinged stilts.
No. Not stilts. Legs. Eight enormous legs.
Tyen gaped at the giant contraption. It was an overgrown insectoid. A smaller sphere, ringed with tiny windows, was attached to the main ball. The silhouette of a driver could be seen within.
The creature lurched forward. Tyen looked towards its destination and, as it altered course, realised it was chasing people. They ran with the speed of terror, but they had no hope of outpacing it. From some kind of protrusion, a liquid sprayed out, sweeping back and forth, and the people fell. Tyen sought the driver’s mind … and nausea twisted his stomach. The sorcerer inside crowed with victory as he doused his quarry with the poison, achieving two aims with one spray: kill the locals and poison the fields so that the enemy would never challenge his people’s right to rule again.
Tyen recoiled. He was breathing in short, shuddering breaths, holding back the need to retch. Before he could recover, the machine began to fade, and in a few heartbeats had disappeared.
He stared at the place it had been, wishing that he had imagined it. The ground still steamed. Minds maddened with agony whispered at the edge of his senses. I thought my own people were despicable for creating war aircarts and spear and arrow throwers in order to conquer and subdue the colonies, but this is so much more ruthless. This never occurred to the worst of the sorcerers of my world. Something tightened within him. I can’t be held completely responsible for this. It has as much to do with my insectoids as a kettle has to do with railsledges! This is a product of the worlds. Not my world. Not me.
And yet they blamed him.
Anger boiled up inside him, leaving him shaking. He wanted to chase after the machine and its driver and destroy both.
No. Not the driver. The machine, yes. Destroying it may be one small, futile act, but if it prevents a few deaths or gives potential victims time to flee or hide, then it is worth doing.
Pushing a little way out of the world, he skimmed to the place the machine had stood when it disappeared. His stomach turned as he saw the bodies of the sorcerer’s victims curled up on the ground, their tongues protruding, eyes staring and bloodshot. Whatever poison the man had used, the death was not pleasant.
A path led away, and he followed it. The sorcerer had skimmed across the world, taking his monstrous weapon away from the temple, past cities and over rivers and mountains. He was not ageless, Tyen guessed, noting that the man had stopped several times for no obvious reason except perhaps to breathe.
The path descended into a valley, the bottom of which was darkened by the shapes of men, all the usual features of an organised, army encampment, and several machines. Tyen counted forty-one of the monsters. Do I destroy one, or all of them?
Stupid question really.
He let the poisoner’s trail take him down into the midst of the encampment, to where the man was climbing down a slim ladder from a hatch in his machine’s belly. As Tyen arrived, he stilled air around himself to form a shield. The man stepped off the ladder, looked around and saw him. Tyen met his surprised gaze.
The sorcerer took a step backwards, his eyes moving up and down as he registered that this stranger with a silent mind wore no familiar uniform, nor looked like any race of his world. This stranger with murder in his eyes. He pushed out of the world and fled.
Tyen resisted the temptation to follow. He drew magic from the valley, leaving it darkened to all sorcerous senses, then stilled the air either side of the machine above him and drove it inwards.
The double spheres of the hull crumpled with a satisfying, deafening crunch. Tyen stepped back out of the way as the machine crashed to the ground.
Silence followed.
He looked around, ignoring the many eyes and minds that were fixing on him, and chose another machine to crush. The driver dove out of the belly just in time as it collapsed.
A new noise replaced the silence. The noise of many voices shouting in anger and warning. Tyen moved to the next machine, then the next, and added the sound of metal tearing and crumpling and glass shattering to the protests.
More than a quarter of the monstrosities lay squashed and useless when Tyen heard a new kind of shout. This one was an order. He smiled as the attack came. It was stronger than he’d expected. The attackers had arranged themselves into a small arc to one side of him. They must have used the little power they had left to skim out of the valley in order to collect magic. Either that or they’d held plenty of magic in reserve. He resisted the temptation to rid the world of them, walking away in order to get closer to more machines.
Crushing them was exhilarating. His determination to never kill so often restricted what justice he could seek. Having something non-human to strike against was immensely satisfying. The fact that he was also punishing people who had corrupted mechanical magic made vengeance extra sweet.
Walking between the lines of machines, he rejoiced as each crumpled, and cheered silently as the sorcerers shifted their defence to protecting the machines and failed. He laughed softly as, after the last of them crashed to the ground, another materialised. He let the driver leap clear before he destroyed the giant insectoid.
No more appeared. He turned to look back at the defenders. They stagger
ed backwards, breaking formation as they realised that together they were one easy target. He took a step towards them, and they disappeared as they fled into the place between worlds.
Silence remained. He looked around at the mounds of broken metal. Smaller objects lay between the machines. Looking closer, his mouth went dry as he realised they were bodies.
But I … His feet took him towards one. The man’s face was contorted in the same way the poison victims’ had been. The stink of the liquid filled Tyen’s nostrils. Did some of the poison spray out when I crushed a machine?
The jubilation and anger in him died. He looked around, noting three other corpses nearby. How did I not notice? The unwelcome answer came. He’d been too focused on what towered above him to see the few people who hadn’t had the time to run clear of the spray.
I tried not to kill anyone, he reminded himself. That’s better than they deserve. Yet he felt no better as he pushed out of the world.
As he returned to the temple he forced himself to see the destruction around it, and remember who was to blame. He searched the minds around him, seeing their recollection of the monstrous machines and their poison. They did far worse than I, he told himself, but he felt no easing of his conscience.
Several priests huddled in a secret room below ground, the entrance blocked. Their minds were full of concern for the priests who hadn’t made it back in time to join them. He found one of the latecomers sprawled in the middle of a street, half crushed by a fallen wall, mind blank but body still warm. Moving away the rubble, Tyen lifted the bloodied corpse and pushed out of the world.
He couldn’t retrace his steps exactly. If he took a corpse along well-travelled paths it would attract notice. Someone might see the body and, having heard that the Spy was trying to resurrect the Raen, wonder if this was the traitor. So Tyen forged new paths and then hid them. It was slower, but he did not want to attract any more attention than he must.
He was a few worlds from his new home when he sensed another shadow in the place between. It was behind him, and when he changed direction it followed. Stopping, he turned back to scan the whiteness. A figure emerged, and recognition came even before the man’s features were fully visible.
Baluka.
His friend’s eyes full of accusation and challenge. Several shadows appeared, joining the Restorers’ leader. Though Baluka’s mouth did not move, his voice sounded clear in Tyen’s mind.
“So. Tyen. Is that to be Valhan’s new body, or Vella’s?”
CHAPTER 17
Tyen paused. He knew he ought to flee, but something made him hesitate. Am I foolish enough to think I can explain myself to him? he wondered. Then a sense of something approaching drew his attention back in the direction he had been travelling. Several more shadows crowded the place between, blocking his path. How many sorcerers surrounded him was hard to tell. More importantly, he had no clue as to their strength while he was in the place between. No doubt Baluka hoped or believed they were strong enough to win if Tyen chose to attack or tried to escape.
Tyen made himself meet and hold Baluka’s gaze.
“Neither,” he replied. “Which way, then? The last or next world?”
“Next.”
Tyen turned to the sorcerers behind him. They retreated, watching him warily. He followed them to a rocky landscape of interlocking columns as big as mountains. The arrival place was on the flat top of one of these. As Tyen glanced down to make sure the ground was clear of obstacles, he noticed a crystalline lacework of cracks in the surface.
Air surrounded him, and the whine of a restless wind. He stilled it in a protective shield around himself. The sorcerers behind Baluka moved forward to flank their leader as he arrived. They did not suck in a deep breath as they reached the world. Only Baluka began breathing deeply. Only Baluka was not ageless.
Looking around, Tyen counted fifty sorcerers and gauged their strength by what he could read from their minds. They were the strongest of the Restorers, and all had gathered magic in anticipation of a fight.
Destroying the machines had depleted Tyen’s store of magic. He had more than enough to leave this world. Enough to put up a good fight too. Whether he had enough for both was doubtful. If he left now, and the next world turned out to have been stripped of magic, he’d be defenceless and trapped.
He reached out to the magic of this world and was not surprised to find that it was patchy and thin. The unevenness hinted at a deliberate draining, as if many sorcerers had travelled around the world taking as much magic as they could. That they hadn’t stripped the world completely hinted it was done in a hurry.
A hastily made trap, he concluded. What if I had tried to retreat to the last world? He might have forced his way through, and escaped. He might have found the previous world as depleted. There was no point wondering. He was here.
The only chance I have is to talk my way out of this.
Fortunately Baluka wanted to question Tyen. The Restorers would not strike until he ordered it. They were eagerly awaiting that moment, when they could finally deal with the Spy permanently.
Who spotted me travelling between worlds? Tyen wondered. He let out a huff as he read the answer from Baluka’s mind: news of Tyen’s attack on the machines had spread quickly and the Restorers had been prepared to respond quickly. Tyen might have returned to the workroom safely if he hadn’t taken the corpse from the temple. By stopping, he’d given the messenger time to reach Baluka and for the Restorers to catch up with him.
The corpse was a heavy weight in his arms now that he was in a world. He gently set it down on the ground.
“So,” Baluka said as he caught his breath. “Why are you carrying a body?”
Tyen glanced around at the sorcerers again. “Can we have a little privacy?”
“You expect me to talk to you alone?”
“If you want answers, you will. I’d do it myself, except I doubt your friends will react well if I create a noise shield around you.” Though it would be pointless if anyone could read lips. He did a quick scan, and was relieved to find none had that skill.
Baluka frowned, then took a step forward. One of his companions made a low noise, but he silenced the man with a raised hand. After another step, Baluka stopped. The sound of wind ceased.
“Speak,” the man ordered.
Tyen turned his palms upwards. “What would you like to know?”
Baluka looked down at the corpse. “If this is not for Valhan or Vella, what is it for?”
“A rich merchant with a terminal disease,” Tyen told him truthfully. He was not yet sure how much Baluka knew, so it was safer to tell the truth. If he was caught lying, it would make the man distrust everything he said. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t avoid telling some truths.
The rebel’s eyebrows rose. “So you are not, as Rielle claims, attempting to resurrect Valhan?”
Tyen lifted his shoulders. “I am.”
Baluka’s mouth opened, then closed again. “You admit that?”
“I won’t say I never lie, but I avoid it unless doing so will protect others from harm.”
“You could justify a great deal, saying that.” Baluka crossed his arms. “Like spying on the rebels you claimed to be supporting—and then leading.”
Tyen spread his hands. “I am sorry, Baluka. Sorry that I deceived you. But I am not sorry that I tried to keep the rebels from attacking the Raen, or that I minimised the damage when they did. My intention was to save lives—and yes, that included my own. If the Raen hadn’t intended to die, the rebels would all have been slaughtered before I became leader.”
“Or we may have survived and won,” Baluka pointed out.
Tyen nodded. “I actually thought you would, at the end. I wanted you to, even as I hoped the only person who could help Vella wasn’t about to perish.”
Baluka said nothing as he considered Tyen’s words. Watching the man’s thoughts, Tyen saw that Baluka was disturbed to find Tyen was neither pretending to be the same man he’d
thought he’d known, nor had he transformed into a different person once confronted with the truth. He was seeing the man he had glimpsed the one time Tyen had laid bare his mind.
But Baluka’s anger was deep, and he wasn’t ready to forgive Tyen yet.
“Is that why you’re trying to resurrect him?” Baluka asked. “To give Vella a body?”
“No. If I can resurrect him, I can resurrect Vella.”
“Then why do you want to bring him back?”
How much can I risk telling him? Tyen wondered. As much as I have to, to safe my life.
“I don’t. Dahli does. He believes the Raen is the only one who can end the chaos and wars in the worlds—”
“Chaos? Wars?” Baluka let out a disbelieving huff. “Do you mean the chaos and wars in which your invention wreaks the worst damage?”
“I’m working on a solution, Baluka. We’ve made excellent progress.” Here, Tyen hoped, was a reason for Baluka to let him live. “If I can’t get rid of them, Baluka, who can?”
“Valhan is not the solution to everything!” Baluka exclaimed. He drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. “There are countless people in the worlds. Given the freedom to learn and teach and move about, the chances are that solutions will be found for many—if not all—of the worlds’ problems. Besides, there are more worlds at peace than at war now—and more joining them every cycle. Chaos was inevitable after the Raen died, but it will not last. There will always be wars somewhere, but only local conflicts, more easily resolved with the help of the Restorers.”
He believed it, Tyen saw. While Tyen could dismiss Baluka’s optimism, he could not overlook the man’s knowledge of the state of the worlds. It wasn’t entirely based on the information given by the men and women who reported to him. Baluka regularly ventured out to gauge the state of the worlds for himself, at no small risk to himself.