Angel Isle (37 page)

“Right. Made of the wrong stuff somehow. Didn’t get it about different universes, different dimensions, all that. Trial and error. Blasted myself clean out of the tunnel a couple of times. Must’ve been mad to try it.”

He laughed, shaking his head at his own folly.

“Did it in the end,” he went on. “Made a sort of pocket in the barrier. Put a lining into it—wove it out of same stuff barrier was made of, way I do with a net. Made it small, easier to move around once I was through. Came out egg-shaped, like Benayu’s. Seemed to be the only way. Don’t know why.”

“Nor do I, really,” said Benayu. “But it’s in Fodaro’s equations, so I knew it had to be like that.”

“Right. Had to leave something behind to come back to—know about that too?”

“Jex had told Maja there had to be something,” said Saranja.

“Worked it out for myself. Made a couple of little dollies, put one in my egg, sent other off to the oyster-beds. All ready now. Lot of weird creatures had shown up other side of the barrier while I was at it. Knew something was up, I reckoned. Got inquisitive.”

“They were feeding on the energy seeping through the touching point from what you were doing,”
said Jex.

“Right again. Wish I’d had you there to tell me what’s what. Saved a lot of trouble. Anyway, took over one of these creatures, way Maja did with Sponge here. Great lump of a thing. Lots of eyes.”

“A fufu. More intelligent than it appears.”

“Take your word for it. Got it to pick the egg up and ferry me around. Used the ring to work back through time, find out where it came from, first place. Tricky work, different rope from the one I knew.”

“There are two dimensions of time there, which have to fit with the other five dimensions, which are also different.”

“No idea about that. Still, found where the ring was made—when in time, where on the rope. Must’ve been blind luck, but I thought that meant I’d got it all sorted. Bad mistake. Nothing special about the place I could see, but the whatchamacallit, fufu, didn’t want to go near it.”

“You had reached a dimensional node, a point at which the seven dimensions lock themselves together to hold the structure of the universe firm. Considerable secondary forces are generated, which could have been used in the construction of the ring. Proximity to such points arouses sensations of extreme anxiety in the creatures of my universe.”

“Second mistake. Tried putting it to sleep. Shouldn’t’ve been a problem, but soon as I got one lot of eyes shut another lot opened.”

“That is how a fufu sleeps. Serially.”

“Know next time. Didn’t have anything to spare to hold the creature hanging around when it was crazy to be off. Had to let it go.

“Problem was, couldn’t have the ring unmake itself there—place it was made, time it was made. Do that, there’d be no ring, so no Tilja story. You wouldn’t be here. Had to set it up there to destroy itself—only place I could have done that—then forward into the future, beyond the time when I came in, time now. Leave it there, all set to send me back to time now, and then unmake itself when I give the word. Pick up another creature, give the word, out through the touching point into my own world, before anything happened.”

“Let me understand you. The ring cannot be destroyed in your universe, because it was made from outside the time of your universe. So you were planning to use it to travel to some time in the future of both universes…”

“Didn’t get it they were that different.”

“Yes, very different. And then you were going to arrange for the ring to destroy itself at the dimensional node where it was made in that universe, but not to do so until you had used it to return to the time you had come from in both universes, which you assumed would remain identical with each other, and escaped into your own universe?”

“That’s about it.”

“It is just as well you failed. The convulsion at a dimensional node would have caused a major change in the structure of that universe, with unpredictable results in other universes, including at the least a major irruption of demons into this one.”

“Bad as that?”

“Yes.”

“Doesn’t bear thinking about.”

They sat in silence and thought about it. To Maja the dismaying thing wasn’t the chance-averted disaster—that seemed so remote as to be unimaginable—but that the Ropemaker, who she had been vaguely assuming knew almost everything and could do almost anything, could have come so close to such a blunder. Even going backward and forward in time hadn’t warned him.

“Wonder I’m scared of the thing?” said the Ropemaker. “Too dangerous to have around. Got to get rid of it. Beyond me. No time, anyway. Think you could do it with these equations of yours, Benayu?”

Benayu shook his head.

“We’ve done the first part of what we came to do,” he said. “Now I’m going to destroy the Watchers and then I’m going back to shepherding. I’ll show you how Fodaro’s equations work, if that’d help.”

“And you’ve got to get Maja and Ribek back to the Valley,” said Saranja. “She can’t do it the way we came. It’d kill her.”

The Ropemaker stared at Maja, his face unreadable.

“Not enough time,” he muttered, as if he too had been in the same state as she was, just a tired old man.

Yes,
thought Maja.
I’m very close to the edge.
She could sense the coming fall, her almost weightless body floating down into darkness.
Won’t be long now. No time.

“Well, you’re going to have to make time,” snapped Saranja. “You can use that ring of yours, can’t you? Look, Ribek. You can take Rocky. He’ll be quicker than Levanter. I’ll leave the wings on him. It’ll only take…”

She didn’t finish the sentence. She knew too. Not enough time.

“Ribek,” Maja whispered. He looked enquiringly down at her. “He’s got time to tell us how the story ended. How did he get himself stuck?”

The Ropemaker’s whole mood changed when Ribek passed the message on. He laughed.

“Time for that,” he said. “First bit was the tricky bit, setting the ring up to unmake itself. Managed it in the end. Rest should have been easy. Relaxed a bit, maybe. Bad mistake. Came forward, reached time now, where I came in. Uh-uh, there I was, coming in again, going back again, setting the ring up to unmake itself. Then forward, time now, and same again. Still got ring, no memory of where I’d just been. Went forward again. And again. And again…

“Didn’t know it was happening. All fresh every time. Then somebody spoke my name. Farmyard long way off, horse, roc feathers, hair from my head. Forgot about it next time round. Same stupid business, over and over and over.

“Happened again. Still long way off. Mountain pasture, sheep, same hair, roc feathers. Big convulsion close by me, connected with other place. Couldn’t make it out.”

“My selves in both universes were adversely affected by the magical overload emanating from the utterance of your name.”

“Uh-huh. Remembered first time for a moment, then forgot ’em both starting next time round, remembered ’em halfway through. Got an idea what was up. Forgot and remembered that too.

“Happened again. Had to be a while later because it was someplace else again. Hilltop above the sea. Big magic, dragons, burning city, flying battle-wagons, monster storm, convulsion close by, same rum connection. Jex here, of course. Roc feathers, hair—got it this time. The Valley. Urlasdaughters and Ortahlsons, coming to look for me…

“Then the same stupid cycle again, remembering and forgetting. Tried to think about it in the remembering bits, pick up where I’d left off, get through to you somehow. Frustrating, forgetting and forgetting. Just one glimpse, once. Doorway, kid standing far side, watching me—you, Maja?”

“Yes, but there was a Watcher there on the hillside, looking for you. I shouted at him to stop him seeing the doorway.”

“Felt that. Got us both clear somehow. Didn’t want to risk it again. Big help, all the same. Remembered longer each time round. Same again when you found my dolly at the oyster-beds, again when Saranja called my name from inside the egg. Still that last little bit of forgetting each time I started again. Still couldn’t break right out, not till Maja barked my name right there, close outside my egg. That did it.

“Story over. Stop now, Maja?”

“Thank you,” she whispered.

Satisfied, she closed her eyes and felt herself floating away, down and away. She was dreaming, strange, shadowy moments: a kiss beside the millrace; a wedding feast, herself at the heart of it; a caress on her naked flesh in the warm dark, with the race roaring beneath the window; the stir of a child inside her own ghostly body; two children fishing on a green bank, their reflections steady in the stillness of the millpool; a shaft of sunlight slanting through gloom, a slowly turning millwheel clear in its brightness, the shapes of a man and a half-grown lad dark against it as they watched the steady trickle of flour down the chute. Hauntings from the promised life she would never now be given. Vaguely through this she was aware of her exhausted body being laid gently on the turf, of hearing the murmur of voices, receding, almost gone…

CHAPTER
20

C
hange. What…? Her hands…a flow of warmth…feeling…other hands gripping them, the warmth pouring through, into her arms, spreading through her body…

Then sleep.

Then a voice, known but strange…

“Maja. You can wake up now. Wake up. You’re going to be all right.”

She opened her eyes, clenched them shut against the midday glare, and forced them open. Ribek was kneeling over her, a dark silhouette, features almost invisible. But…

She snatched her hands free and pushed herself violently up, almost clashing heads with him.

“You couldn’t’ve done that a couple of hours back,” he said.

His voice had a strange, effortful wheeze in it. She stared.

Stared at an old man, stoop-shouldered, rheumy-eyed; with a bald, mottled scalp fringed with wispy, silvery hair; smiling lips thin and purple, with a dribble of spittle at one corner; wrinkled cheeks sunken above toothless jaws. She flung out an arm to support him as he sank onto the turf beside her, laid her head on his shoulder and wept for both lost lives. He caressed her shoulder with a trembling hand.

“It’s all right,” he said. “I’ve just lent…”

“I don’t want it!” she said furiously. “You didn’t ask me! I’m going to give it right back!”

“Done that already,” said a voice above them—the Ropemaker. “Other universe, weren’t shielded, were you? Couldn’t be. Time different there, remember? Out of balance with our time. Years leaking away. Still doing it, even back here, on Angel Isle. Ribek lent you his years, just to hold you, while Benayu sorted it out with his equations. Then he took them back and lent them to me.”

“No!”

She shot to her feet. So far she’d had eyes only for Ribek, but now she saw that the others were standing close in front of them, watching and waiting. She swung to the Ropemaker. He’d changed too—changed back to the age he’d been when she’d first seen him.

“Give it back if you say so,” he said gently. “Tell you first?”

“Oh…All right.”

“Kept saying, not enough time, remember?”

“I thought you meant time till whatever was going to happen next.”

“That too. But talking about myself, mostly. Time’s almost up. Back there trapped in my egg, wasn’t any time going by. Same time over and over. Each time I went round, back to the same age I’d been last time. Didn’t get any older. Back here—you’ve seen Zara—that’s how old I am.”

“But you don’t look…”

“Angel Isle. Betwixt and between. Wouldn’t last even here. Feel the pull of it already. Couple of days, at most. Still got to disempower the Watchers, right? Think Zara could take that on, the way she is now? Me, like this—need Benayu’s help, as it is.”

“But…but…Why Ribek?”

“Because,” said Ribek, and started to struggle to his feet. Saranja moved to help him.

“I’ll do it,” said Maja furiously.

Oh, he weighed so much less than he should have!

He turned to face her and took her hands.

“Listen, my dear,” he said. “Back there, in Benayu’s egg, it was the other way round. You wanted to go and follow the magical trail to the Ropemaker, unshielded from its power, because it couldn’t be done any other way. I said no—I care deeply about you, and I knew what it would do to you. I was right. You said you had to do it. You were the only one who could. It was why you were there. And if you didn’t, the Watchers would find us and that would be even worse for you, as well as for the rest of us. All that was true, but I still didn’t want you to go. I simply had to accept it.

“And it’s true now, only the other way round, except for one thing. It won’t be as bad for you as it was for me. I knew that you might find him but we might still lose you—that very nearly happened. Now if we fail, that will still be unspeakable for all of us. But if we succeed, he will repay his loan, and I’ll have lost nothing, so nor will you. Please will you accept this? I did.”

By the time he’d finished he was wheezing for breath between every few words. Maja couldn’t speak. Weeping again, she nodded and helped him ease himself back onto the turf.

“Thank you,” said Saranja. Being her, she would have offered to lend the necessary years instead of him, of course. There must have been some reason why not. Something magical, probably. And being her, she wouldn’t have said.

Maja settled again beside Ribek, put her arm round him and curled herself up next to him with her other hand on his thigh. He laid his own hand on it and squeezed it gently.
Good practice for later,
she thought,
when he really is old.
She knew she was cheating as she cuddled against him. He cared deeply about her—he’d said so—but not in the same way she cared about him. He was an old man, needing human comfort, closeness, love, and was letting her fulfill that need, as well as her own.

She glanced across at the others to see if they’d noticed, but they seemed to be taking it for granted that that was how she felt about Ribek. Benayu and the Ropemaker were talking together, low-voiced. Benayu was trying to explain something about Fodaro’s equations—for what was going to happen next, probably. Jex was on a boulder beside them. Every now and then both human voices would stop, and Maja could hear, faintly, his granite murmur inside her head. Saranja was listening.

Now they moved apart. The Ropemaker raised his hands, touched the ring on his left forefinger and spoke quietly. The pale, cloaked figure of a woman carrying a narrow-necked urn in the crook of her arm appeared in front of the encircling rocks. Even in the full light of that stormy morning she seemed to glimmer as if lit by a full moon under starry skies. She stood the urn on a flat boulder beside her and turned. It was Zara, Zara in the form she had assumed on the hill above Larg when she and Benayu between them had bound the demon Azarod into the rock. But she too had changed. Now she looked wraithlike, almost transparent, though the urn she had carried seemed solid and heavy enough.

The Ropemaker took both her hands in his and kissed her on the cheek. She greeted the others and joined the discussion.

Maja was distracted by Ribek, who had fallen asleep almost instantly, the way old people do. He was mumbling something uninterpretable. Maja wished she could have got into his dream, the way she’d been able to do in the egg. Not in this universe, even on Angel Isle. Probably just as well. There was a movement on the rock behind her. She glanced round and saw Jex. No, Jex was still where he’d been, with Benayu and the others, and this one had purple blotches.

“Hello,” she whispered. “You must be one of Jex’s friends.”

“Greetings, Maja. We are here to help you destroy the Watchers before they themselves destroy both your universe and ours.”

We…? Yes, there was another one, a little further along. And another and another. All round the arena they were flickering into existence. Scores of them now. Hundreds. Crouching there, waiting.

Waiting for what? For the Watchers to arrive. Whatever powers they poured out against the Ropemaker, the massed Jexes would simply absorb and channel away, while he, thus shielded, destroyed them. And she and Ribek and Saranja, Benayu and the Ropemaker, were waiting for them too, not running away any more, not hiding any more, but waiting to destroy them, here, on Angel Isle. Soon.

Saranja’s voice broke through.

“Wait! Something’s happening to Striclan….”

She pulled Zald out from under her blouse.

“I told him how to call for help,” she said. “He wouldn’t do that, unless…I could take Rocky. Do you need me here?”

“Know where he is?” said the Ropemaker.

“Zald will find him.”

“Let’s have a look….”

He craned over Zald.

“Hm. Fair distance. Demon stuff. You’d better deal with it. Nothing much you can do here. Going to have to hurry. Can’t come myself. Lot of stuff to get ready here. Tell you what. No, keep it out. Hold it steady. Right.”

Maja saw him draw the black box he’d been playing with earlier from under his robe, open the lid and hold the box cupped in his right hand. He laid the forefinger of his other hand on one of the stones in Zald and curled the middle finger of his right hand over to touch whatever was inside the box. It was only for a moment, and then he closed the box, put it away and laughed.

“Even that simple, still makes me sweat a bit,” he said.

“What did you do?” said Saranja.

“Held time still where your fellow is till you show up. Get there, touch the stone, whisper my name, start time again.”

“Shall I bring him back here?”

Maja didn’t hear his answer, because Ribek had muttered a grunt of discomfort in his sleep and shifted his position as if to ease an aching hip. By the time she’d worked the bedrolls round him to cushion him as much as possible, and adjusted herself to the new position, Saranja was mounted and ready to leave. She was making no attempt to hide her eagerness and excitement, and Rocky seemed to share her mood. In the strange light of Angel Isle horse and rider glowed like a cloud at sunset.

She gave the reins a shake. Rocky settled back onto his hindquarters, spread his wings ready for the first driving downbeat, sprang into the air, and they were away, dwindling fast beneath the stormy sky.

“Amusing collection of stuff, Zald,” said the Ropemaker casually, as if this were any ordinary day and there was time for chat. “Tricky locks. Take a bit of thinking about to get at the amber.”

“Do you know what it’s for?” said Benayu. “Someone told us it’s for summoning some kind of major power.”

“Not to say know. Have a guess. Amber’s from the north, right? Cold there. Ice and snow all year. Would’ve saved me a deal of trouble, Maja’s time.”

“Oh yes, of course. That’s what…You don’t think we could’ve used it now?”

“Too much to handle, everything else going on. All set then?”

“I still need the staff. Shall we do that now?”

“See how it goes,” said the Ropemaker.

He turned to face Benayu, who nodded to show he was ready. They crouched side on to Maja and facing each other, and placed their right hands together, palm to palm, close above the turf, then moved them steadily back and forth as if they were rolling a cylindrical object between the two palms. A swirl of light, bright in the cloud-gloom, appeared above the two hands. The Ropemaker grasped it with his left hand and fed it in between their palms, apparently twisting it between his thumb and the side of his forefinger like a housewife feeding wool onto the spindle of her spinning.

At the same time Benayu was doing something very similar from below, close against the turf, seeming to draw his material directly out of Angel Isle itself. Shielded though she was, Maja felt the steadily growing pulse of powerful magic—two separate magics, utterly different from each other yet steadily weaving themselves together, like two different tunes being played at the same time and somehow weaving themselves together into a single piece of music.

Slowly the four hands rose upward, and now Maja could see the second swirl, not of light as she knew it, but of something else that Benayu was feeding into the process in the same manner, non-light, light from another universe, drawn somehow through the sealed touching point below them and into this one.

It continued to stream upward as the hands rose further, difficult to see, never what or where it had seemed to be only a moment before. But through its vagueness she thought she could sometimes discern some kind of central shaft, extending and extending from the steadily rising hands down to the ground.

When the two magicians were standing erect with their hands level with Benayu’s shoulder, the two swirls, light from above and non-light from below, dwindled and vanished in between the moving palms, allowing Maja to see the staff they had created between them. She recognized the pearly, half-luminous glimmer of the substance it was made of, grayer than gray, the light of two utterly incompatible universes so entangled together as to compose a single solid object—an egg, a staff—that could survive in either set of dimensions.

Benayu and the Ropemaker were fully upright and the staff rose vertically from the turf between them, but its vertical was visibly not the same as theirs. It obeyed some other set of physical laws.

Benayu grasped the top of the staff with his right hand. The Ropemaker clasped it in both of his and Benayu laid his left hand over them. They closed their eyes and stood for a while, Benayu pale with concentration, the Ropemaker’s restless energies stilled to a single focus. Then they let go, leaving the staff erect. It struck Maja that the turf of Angel Isle was far too thin to hold it steady. It must penetrate well into the underlying rock.

“Should do,” said the Ropemaker. “Couldn’t have managed it on my own.”

“Nor me,” said Benayu. “And anyway, it was Fodaro, really. And Jex, of course.”

“Right. All set, then? Ready, Maja? No telling how this’ll turn out. Surprise ’em a bit, maybe, but they’ll have stuff to spring on us too. Better have the horses over with you. Sponge too.”

Maja started to scramble to her feet, but as if led by invisible grooms Levanter and Pogo came ambling over and lined themselves up beside Ribek. Sponge trotted across and settled at her feet. Disturbed by the sudden bustle Ribek grunted, opened his eyes and peered blearily at the scene in front of him. It seemed to take him a moment or two to remember where he was.