Alchymist

No wonder he'd never been able to discover how the world worked. Two-thirds of his globe was based on charts that could have been made up, and he couldn't see how to remedy that. No, there was one possibility, though it would put him in such deep debt that he might never escape it. But then, if the globe worked, it offered another way out of here.

'What progress do you have to report?' Gyrull asked Ryll a few days later.

'The work goes slowly,' he replied. 'A flisnadr is much more difficult to pattern than our torgnadrs, and we only made a handful of them in years of labour. The human slaves we use in the patterners are not strong enough – they keep dying, ruining all our work. And also,' Ryll looked around, in case they were being overheard by other lyrinx, 'I'm unhappy about.., the morality of it.' He used the word uncomfortably, as if, applied to the enemy, it was a new concept for him.

'You surprise me,' Gyrull said ambiguously. 'I begin to wonder if you've also been corrupted by association with the human, Tiaan.'

'She made me realise that humankind are not so different. And then, what you discovered in the Great Seep…'

'It's always on my mind.' She scratched a scaly armpit. 'The war will be over within a year. We must prepare for the peace now, though -'

'Not all of us want to change,' he said perceptively. 'We've had too much of it, and it's uncomfortable. The way we are is a refuge. Take that away, what do we have left? And yet…'

'Go on,' she said.

'It's not enough to be the greatest and most successful martial species of all, for in our hearts our people know that they're destroying a great and glorious culture, and replacing it with a desert. We know because we've lost our own civilisation, and the best among us lament it. Our ordinary folk just have a feeling that their victories are hollow, their very lives and purposes meaningless. For thousands of years they've been warriors but, once the victory comes, we won't need warriors any more. What will they do then? They don't know anything else. They don't want anything else.

'So now,' he went on, 'some of us are asking what this war was for. It is no longer mere survival – it's now existence.'

'Indeed, though that's a debate for another time. Let's talk about your patterning. I've the impression that you're thinking along new lines.'

'It was Liett's idea,' he said over-generously. 'To link a dozen patterners, each with its human inside. Each contributing, in its own way, to the flisnadr we're trying to create.'

'I don't see how it can work,' said Gyrull.

Pink speckles flushed his chest and throat, as if he took her words as a criticism, but he quickly skin-changed to the brilliant blue of resolution. 'We also have doubts, but first let me tell you about the advantages. If Liett's idea works it will give us a stronger and more robust flisnadr. A weak human must result in a feeble device, if she survives at all, and many don't. This way, we need not pattern any human to their limit, which gives us a better chance of success.'

Gyrull was pleased by the idea, and the forceful way he presented it, though she foresaw difficulties with his plan. 'How can the individual patterners be linked, and how are the different efforts coordinated? It's never been done before.'

'In the past year,' said Ryll, 'we've done many things that had never been done before. I – I have an idea,' he said, now hesitantly. 'I'm not sure you're going to like it.'

Allow me to decide that for myself!' she said peremptorily.

Again the blue of resolution and she smiled to see it. Ryll was developing well.

'Do you recall the behaviour of Tiaan's amplimet in Snizort, just before the end?' said Ryll. 'It appeared to be communicating, via threads of force, with the node.'

'I do. Continue!'

'I thought we might… I don't know…'

'Use the amplimet, and perhaps Tiaan too, to link the patterners together?'

'Yes' he said quietly. 'It's against our creed, but…'

'We've used her and her crystal before. It was not an unqualified success.'

'The torgnadrs we made by patterning Tiaan never reached their potential,' Ryll agreed. 'What happened to them?'

'One failed in Snizort and had to be destroyed. The other burned in the fires.' Gyrull rubbed her chin. 'I think I know what the problem was, and how to solve it, but Tiaan is far away. Do you propose to make a foray after her?'

'Not if there's any other way,' he said. 'And there may be. Remember how she came to Snizort, even though crippled, to find the tetrarch? Tiaan's weakness is excessive compassion; she cares about people even when they don't reciprocate. She even felt for me, an alien and her enemy. If we were to make it known that the tetrarch was here, I believe she'd find a way to come after him.'

'She might,' mused Gyrull, 'if she gets the opportunity, but we can't rely on it. And this amplimet is a perilous device we may not be able to control it. We must have an alternative plan.' She strode up and down, her armour flashing in waves of colour – mauves to reds to purples – as she thought. 'We might link the patterners another way. The tetrarch's geomantic globe offers certain possibilities. It might, if carefully formed, and used at a certain place within Alcifer, be made to serve.'

'How so?' said Ryll curiously.

'Alcifer's original purpose was never fulfilled. The city sleeps, but it is still powerful.' 'I don't understand.'

'How could you – you don't know the place. Leave it to me. I've been spying on the tetrarch. He's begun to rebuild his geo-mantic globe and already realises it has a number of flaws.' How do you know?'

'I studied it carefully in Snizort, and I've been feeding him information since then, to make him aware of errors in it. He will come to me for assistance – he has no other option. Were I to provide him with certain knowledge, and he to mould the globe according to it, if taken to a particular place in Alcifer it might just be what you need.'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' said Ryll.

'No matter – I was just thinking aloud. We'll go over it later. In the meantime, I'll assist you in the design of the new patterners, so they can be linked. Once that's done you must begin patterning the flisnadr, but don't take it beyond the juvenile stage. Leave it in stasis until the geomantic globe is ready. I'll spread a rumour in Lauralin that the tetrarch has fled to Alcifer. If Tiaan does come, we'll be waiting for her. If she doesn't, I'll send a force to snatch her from the Aachim. Between her amplimet and Gilhaelith's globe, we'll create a perfect flisnadr And then let the humans beware!' she concluded fiercely.

I – I would like to put one condition,' he said, diffident at first but finishing forcefully.

Gyrull looked taken aback, but replied, 'One who would lead must learn how to be strong. What is your condition?'

'I would have Tiaan treated with due respect, and given her freedom afterwards.'

She inclined her head, watching him with her penetrating eyes. 'I applaud your nobility of spirit, though to be freed by us will rouse suspicion in the eyes of her own people. And what of Gilhaelith? Do you feel compassion for him too?'

'He's a danger to the whole world; said Ryll.

'Yes, he's a brilliant, blind fool. He cannot see what others will do with his work, if it succeeds. It would give them power undreamed of, power that, if misused, could sterilise Santhenar for all forms of life. We must prevent that, or turn it to our own purposes. So, Ryll, what are we going to do about Gilhaelith?'

'Once we've no further use for him, he can go to the slaughtering pens.'

Forty-one

Irisis was sitting by herself, slicing onions as she watched the sun go down from the mouth of the cave they'd been living in for well over a month. The ragged slot was etched into a pebblestone cliff on the seaward edge of a barren island in the Sea of Thurkad, half a league off the coast of Lauralin. It was the safest refuge Muss had been able to find – hidden from all but a direct pass by Ghorr's remaining air-floaters, which was unlikely here; and, being surrounded by water, it was even less likely to be visited by the enemy. It was, however, exposed to the chilly south-westerlies, which intensified every day as the season turned. Winter was still months off, but every morning it felt a little closer.