Now, the sights and smells made her wish she had not been so noble, or that someone had argued against this. Every corpse told a story to her soul: This was someone’s son. This man had hopes and dreams. Even if his only joy was to drink and carouse, those days are over.
“I can see that the smell bothers you,” said Loaf quietly. “But I assure you, today the bodies are still fresh and the rot has not set in. Tomorrow I would urge you strongly not to come. You would vomit, and that is not something your people need to see.”
Param had been trying not to think of vomit, since, as with yawning, the very thought made it more likely she would do it. But she understood his point, and stopped allowing herself to imagine these as living men. She cast her eyes toward them, but did not allow the sights to register. She was not here to learn about all the positions a broken body can collapse into when death comes by sudden violence. She was here to be seen caring about the fallen. So she fixed the proper expression of sympathy and barely-contained grief on her face, and allowed herself to be led where there were the most spectators to see how the Queen-in-the-Tent loved her soldiers.
And when a particularly pungent spot made her gorge rise, she allowed herself to burst into tears so she could be led away from the malodorous spot. Thus she prevented herself from throwing up and disgracing herself. Vomiting was not sympathy. Nausea and nobility were not compatible. But weeping went well with both sympathy and nobility, especially because she was a woman. She noticed that Umbo matched her step for step, but did not weep. She didn’t know if this was because he had seen worse, or smelled worse, or cared less, or was simply stronger than she was. Probably all of those were true.
This is why she was on the battlefield when the emissary arrived from Mother’s army. Param did not recognize the man, but that did not surprise her. In Flacommo’s house she had seen only sycophants, and mostly those who were in favor with the People’s Revolutionary Council. None of those would be in General Haddamander’s army.
“Hagia Sessaminiak sees no reason for this war to continue,” said the emissary. “She is ready to recognize her daughter, Param Sessamin, as Queen-in-the-Tent-of-Light, and her husband as Umbo Sissamik.”
The names were right: “Sissamik” as the male consort of a reigning queen; “Sessaminiak” as a former queen, now rightfully deposed. Deposed, not abdicating voluntarily; that would have been Sessaminissa, and it was a decision that could be rescinded. Mother was saying that she was prepared to recognize that she had been thrown down, and could not rise again.
“I am sure that Mother has terms and conditions to propose,” said Param to the emissary.
She noticed that none of her own people showed the slightest sign that they were worried she would say the wrong thing or agree to too many concessions—or, even worse, needlessly prolong the war out of some point of pride.
“Hagia Sessaminiak wishes to meet with her daughter and her son face to face to make the formal surrender,” she said. “Whether her consort, Haddamander Citizen, should be with her is a point on which she will gladly bend to your will.”
“Such a meeting will not be pleasant for anyone, but it is wise for there to be a public ritual of surrender, and for Mother to do it personally,” said Param. “I commend her courage and generosity to our people. Let the time and place be worked out with General Olivenko or someone he designates. I will attend, as will my brother. Now you must excuse me. I am visiting wounded soldiers, and must not be delayed any further.”
With that, Param swept away, leaving Olivenko to deal with the logistics of the meeting.
That evening, in the meeting of the council of war, it was Param who broached the obvious problem. “Of course it’s a trap,” she said. “I’m assuming it’s an assassination attempt, though they must know it’s impossible to kill us.”
“It is far from impossible,” said Olivenko, “and you can be sure they’ve been wracking their brains for a long time, devising a foolproof plan.”
“And they are not fools,” said Param, “so it may work. Therefore, before Rigg and I go, we will publicly invest Umbo as Sissaminkesh, heir to the Tent of Light if both Rigg and I die.”
Umbo gave a bark of laughter. “If you die,” he said, “I might as well call myself Ring-in-the-Sky for all the attention anyone will pay to me as king.”
“They aren’t going to die,” said Square. “My Masks and I will never allow it.”
“You and the Masks will not be there,” said Param. “It will be only Rigg and myself, along with a few witnesses. There will be no fighting.”
“But if it’s an assassination attempt!” Square cried.
“It is an assassination attempt,” said Param.
“Or a kidnapping,” said Rigg.
“But between us, Rigg and I can get ourselves out of anything. All that anyone else would be is a distraction, someone for them to hold hostage in order to get us not to resist them.”
“No one can stand against facemask soldiers,” said Square.
“So far, you’re right,” said Loaf. “But imagine that you fought, and were victorious. Then everyone would say it was Captain Toad and his Masks who broke the truce and slaughtered Hagia’s men.”
“There will be witnesses!”
“Their witnesses will say whatever they’ve been told to say,” said Loaf. “And their supporters will believe any lie.”
“There has been enough killing,” said Param. “They will try to kill us, and they will fail.”
“Or they’ll succeed,” said Rigg. “Either way, they’ll be the ones who betray their word, not us.”
“You speak blithely of dying,” said Loaf, “because you’ve never done it.”
“Neither have you,” said Rigg.
“But I’ve seen it more often,” said Loaf, “and I’ve never seen any of my friends who was happy to do it. Or any of my enemies, for that matter—they seemed to be quite reluctant to begin, and it took a good deal of exertion to get them to change their minds.”
“We won’t die,” said Param.
“Everyone dies,” said Loaf. “But it’s also true that there’s no escort we could give you that would improve your chances. What we will do is station Umbo in a location that you know about, but they do not—right, Umbo? You’ll go there in the past and then jump forward?”
“Will I be able to see what happens?” asked Umbo.
“If you’re close enough to see,” said Loaf, “I imagine you’ll be close enough to be seen. What matters is that they’ll know where you are. So if things go badly wrong, but one of them survives, they can go to where you are and put a message into your hands, warning you to warn them about the danger. Then either they don’t go after all, or they go in prepared.”
“Good plan,” said Umbo. “But I also want to be able to see.”
“We’ll look for a hiding place that can do that,” said Rigg. “Once we have some idea of where it will be.”
It turned out to be a place that was far from any of Haddamander’s army camps, far from any major cities. As they approached along a road in deep woods, Rigg looked at the tangle of paths up ahead. “I think they’ve prepared this place especially for us, to block our escape.”
Param was not surprised. “How can they block an escape into the past?” she asked.
“They dug a deep, wide pit,” said Rigg. “I can see the paths of the men who dug it out. If I jump us back into the past, it’ll either be underground, killing us instantly, or it’ll be in the midst of the men digging—who were warned, I’m sure, to watch for us to appear suddenly among them.”
“Interesting,” said Param. “And we can be sure they’ll have barriers made of stone or metal to keep me contained.”
“They promised,” said Olivenko, “to have no one carrying any kind of metal or stone larger than a single coin within a walk from the place.”
?
??It’ll be interesting to see what they’ve devised,” said Param. “They made their plans based on what they knew of our abilities. But those have changed. Noxon and I worked on my slicing. I can go backward, for one thing. And I can slice forward at such a pace that they could pass iron bars through me for hours without my heating up more than a degree or two.”
“And if they find some way to defeat that,” said Rigg, “remember that I have a facemask and I’m trained as a fighter now. Not just the boy they knew in Aressa Sessamo.”
“Armed only with a knife,” said Loaf.
“A knife in the hands of a masker is like a hundred arrows,” said Rigg.
“Is that a quotation from something?” asked Olivenko.
“From me,” said Rigg. “It’s a thing I said while approaching the trap laid by my mother and General Citizen.”
“I’ll write it down,” said Olivenko, “so other people can say it again, quoting you.”
“That’s assuming anybody ever reads anything you write,” said Param. “I’m sorry, Olivenko, but scholars are rarely read by anyone but other scholars.”
“But I’m a victorious general,” said Olivenko. “And Rigg is a great timeshaper. Even if they don’t read my works, they’ll want to remember him and his.”
“Enough,” said Loaf. “I think when we crest this rise, they’ll be visible to us and us to them.”
“Time for you to all drop back into the past,” said Param.
“Not yet,” said Loaf. “Not until we’ve seen the place. So Umbo can come back and hide and watch.”
They reached the crest and looked down into a narrow valley, with a deep pit in the middle. The pit was nearly filled by a large one-story house with a sturdy-looking roof.
“First time it rains,” said Rigg, “that pit’s going to fill with water.”
“Maybe they’re hoping it’ll do that, and we’ll drown while slicing,” said Param.
“Don’t point, Umbo. Just tell them where you’ll be.”
“The trees on the north end of the pit,” said Umbo. “I’ll pop in there just about two minutes from now.”
“We’ll notice the spot as we go down to the house,” said Param. “Thank you, Umbo. Thanks to all of you. Either we’ll come out of this with a treaty of surrender—their surrender—or we’ll have Umbo popping up in front of us to tell us not to do this.”
But Umbo was already gone. As were the others. Param and Rigg walked down the hill without anyone close at hand. A few witnesses had been sent ahead and were seated with a few unarmed men from Haddamander’s army on a platform overlooking the pit.
“There’s no one at all inside the house,” said Rigg. “No one in hiding places, not even in the roof.”
“I’d say Mother and Haddamander missed some opportunities there.”
“Or they’ve had good reports on Captain Toad’s ability to see where everyone is hiding.”
“You’ve never been Captain Toad, as far as they know,” said Param. “Square did the job, the only time they remember.”
“Ah, but he has a facemask, and nobody can hide from a facemask. Not if they’re breathing or their heart is beating.”
A voice came from the platform of observers. “Hagia Sessaminiak is approaching from the other side! Please wait to enter the house until she is there!”
Param and Rigg waited outside the open door. They could see right through the large room to the door on the other side as it opened and light streamed in. There stood Mother, looking as she always had, and a step or two behind her, General Haddamander Citizen, a bit more posh than in his old People’s Army uniform.
Mother and Haddamander stepped into the room. “Please come in,” Mother said.
Param stepped forward, holding tightly to Rigg’s hand. If she had to slice time, she didn’t want to have to search for his hand before disappearing.
Mother and Haddamander walked to the center of the room. Mother held up a paper. “Here is our instrument of surrender. For all of us to sign.”
“Perhaps if we had a table, Mother,” said Param.
Haddamander turned and shouted toward the other door. “Bring in the table!”
“We wanted the room empty when you arrived,” said Mother. “So you’d see there was no trap.”
“Which means,” murmured Param, “that there’s a trap.” She spoke so softly that she couldn’t hear her own voice—but she knew that Rigg’s facemask would let him hear.
He squeezed her hand in reply.
A servant came into the room, carrying a very small table with only a single leg. He fitted it into a prepared notch in the floor.
Param wasn’t a genius of mechanical reasoning, but even she could see that the table would easily serve as a lever now, if there was some sort of control embedded in the floor. But could they really expect she and Rigg would fall for such an obvious device?
Well, yes, they could, because they were falling for it, not in ignorance, but with eyes wide open.
“What a clever little table,” said Param. “Mother, you planned for everything.”
“Come and sign, my dears. When the war is over, I hope we can sit and have a wonderful conversation.”
“That would be very nice, Mother,” said Rigg.
Param and Rigg now stood right up against the table.
Haddamander, reached across the small table, gripped the side nearest Rigg and Param, and pulled the whole thing toward himself.
There were sounds of shifting metal from the walls, the ceiling, the floor.
“Good-bye, Mother,” said Rigg.
Param took that as her cue, and began slicing time, not the way she used to, but so deeply that Mother and Haddamander were barely a blur as they threaded their way out of the room.
No one else came in. No one had to.
For the shifting metal had been a series of counterweights and controls. Thick slabs of metal rose up out of the floor and down from the ceilings. None were right where the table was—nothing would have struck their bodies immediately. But if Param were still slicing time the way she used to, she would have recoiled from this metal, because the pain of trying to pass through it would have been excruciating.
It was possible to thread their way out the way Mother and Haddamander had gone, but Param was quite sure there were archers ready to shoot them if they appeared through that door.
To go through any other door, however, would have forced them to pass through metal.
Even at this level of slicing, there was some heat from passing through the metal bars. But it was trivial—rather as passing through plaster walls had been, back in Flacommo’s house.
The only problem with slicing time at this pace was that their movement across the floor was maddeningly slow. Especially considering that only moments after Mother and Haddamander had left, the house caught fire.
The wood of the house must have been soaked in something highly inflammable. The fire seemed to start everywhere at once.
Param sliced time even more sharply.
The fire was out in only a few moments, though they felt the searing heat of it, like one blast of hot air from standing too close to a furnace.
The ceiling collapsed onto them—with all its metal bars and the heavy framework holding it together from the top. But slicing time this drastically, even the frame caused them little pain.
Days and nights passed by in flashes of light and dark. It rained and then stopped raining, but only a little water got to them. It occurred to Param that she ought to be thirsty. But no. She had only been slicing time for a few minutes. The world around her might have gone through half a year by now, but . . .
Snow fell around them and lingered for a few minutes. Then again, deeper, and staying longer. When winter ended, they were only halfway through the forest of metal bars and burnt wood.
How had this looked to Umbo? They went into the house. A few moments later, it burst into flame . . . and they never came out. Umbo would know, of course, what they were capable of doing, and that her time-slicing could easily take all this in stride. Still, there was a limit to how long he would wait.
Had he gone back to join the others and decide what to do? Or had he already decided to warn them not to go in? Fire and an elaborate metal framework—not worth the effort? Perhaps Param and Rigg had already been warned, had not come into the house this time through. But this iteration of Param and Rigg had not been warned, and so they would continue in this futile evasion of a danger that their alternate selves would never face.
I was once murdered in the Odinfolders’ library, by the mice, Param remembered. She remembered it as information she had been told, for Rigg had shown up to rescue her before the mice could bring in the metal bar to kill her. But there had been a version of her that died. Rigg had seen the body. Her corpse. Nobody in this timestream had ever had to deal with burying that body, because this was the timestream in which she did not die in the library. Instead, this was the timestream in which she would die here in this burnt-out, metal-lined pit. For there were archers stationed around the edges of the pit, and torches burned every night to make sure they did not escape under cover of darkness. Mother was not giving up. She and Haddamander had learned their lesson back at the Wall, when they had waited for days and yet Param and Umbo had never come to the ground where they jumped from the rock. Mother was going to have her assassins wait till the end of the world, if that’s what it took.
The end of the world.
Winter again, as they reached the edge of the burnt-out building and passed beyond the metal frame.
And still the archers waited, watching. Still there were men with heavy metal swords waiting just beyond them.
They were into their third summer of slicetime as they faced the spot where once a wooden stairway had carried them down into the pit. The stairway was gone, taken away as the observation platform had been. The walls of the pit were cut sheer, unclimbable—especially unclimbable as they were, clasping hands. If they let go of each other to climb, they would become visible to the archers. If Rigg jumped them back in time, they’d either be buried over their heads in undisturbed earth, or surrounded by the workmen digging the pit or building the house.