Beyond the Wall of Time (40 page)

Noetos snatched up his sword and turned on the man. “You are not the appropriate person to speak of love and sacrifice,” he
said in a cold voice. “My reckoning with you is merely delayed, not denied. By Alkuon, if you say another word, I will cut
out your tongue.”

Astonishingly, the Undying Man merely nodded, then took a step back, conceding the point.

“Why should I try to drive you out when you are imprisoned?” Lenares said to the monster. “If we do nothing, you are trapped
in Cylene’s body until you give up and go away, your connection with the void unsevered.”

“Why?” cried Keppia. “Because she suffers!” And the mouth opened wide, impossibly wide, and Cylene’s voice came out: “Please!
Please! Help me!” and tailed off into a scream.

“Impressive,” Lenares said, and turned her back on her sister and her suffering.

*   *   *

Duon turned his head from one scene to the other, knowing that the cusp of their adventure had come. Knowing also that he
had nothing to contribute, would be nothing more than a witness. He had hoped that his involvement in the events that would
change the world in one way or another would prove to be a chance at redemption, a chance to put right his failure in the
Valley of the Damned; but he was once again irrelevant. The knowledge left him both bitter and relieved.

Lenares continued to walk away from her sister, abandoning any attempt to rescue her. The reason for this was impossible for
Duon to discern. Had she called Keppia’s bluff? Unlikely in the extreme: Lenares was not such a sophisticated person. She
could not tell lies even by omission. She used her gift as a hammer to bludgeon sophistication into truth and falsehood. More
likely, given her detachment from normal human emotion, was the simple explanation that she’d decided to abandon her sister.
After all, she’d shown little love for her real family when she encountered them in Sayonae. Why should she show compassion
to the one who was favoured by her parents?

No, she’s more complex than you think
, said Arathé in his mind.
She has a plan, I’m sure of it.

I hope you are right. I can’t abide the idea of that girl locked away in her body forever.

Cylene continued to shout and scream, the voice alternating between the warnings and gloatings of the god and the girl’s agonised
pleas. The shocked crowd began to follow Lenares along the road, out of the village, away from the unbearable sounds.

This feels dreadful
, Duon said to Arathé.
Walking away from someone’s suffering. There must be something we can do!

As they reached the open road, a space suddenly cleared around Noetos and the Bhrudwan lord. Further words had clearly been
exchanged, a conversation Duon had not overheard but could guess at. “You heard my explanation. I would have prevented any
further unnecessary suffering had I not been drawn away from Andratan to a meeting with the Most High.”

Noetos leaned forward, the courtesy and restraint in his words not matched by the strain on his face. At least the man had
sheathed his sword.

“What,” he asked, “could have been more important than, as you rightly say, the unnecessary suffering of an innocent girl?”

“Innocent? I doubt that. But even given her so-called innocence, am I to take it you are objectively arguing that the alleviation
of your daughter’s suffering—remember, her suffering was not going to end in death, because of my intercession—was more important
than hearing what a god had to say?”

“Yes, of course,” Noetos said, and turned in surprise when he realised his words had been echoed by another voice. That of
Stella, the Falthan queen.

“The fact she’s your daughter has nothing to do with it?”

“It has everything to do with it, you fool,” Noetos said, courtesy and restraint cast aside. “Had it been someone else’s daughter,
I would not have known of it. Given that I know what happened to Arathé, I am led to wonder how many other faithful sons and
daughters of Bhrudwo have suffered similarly.”

“He doesn’t understand your question,” Stella said, as the crowd continued to walk along the road out of Mensaya. “To the
Lord of Bhrudwo, good government is the cold-hearted weighing of numbers. This action will save a hundred souls, while that
action will save two hundred. Therefore the second action is favoured over the first, irrespective of how repugnant that action
might be. If imprisoning and repeatedly draining young girls achieves an incrementally positive outcome for his empire, he
will do it.”

“Yes,” the Undying Man said fiercely, almost proudly. “See how well my queen understands me?”

“Do not call me that,” Stella grated.

“My apologies. But Stella is right. Actions that for you, with your limited knowledge, would be immoral are for me not only
moral but necessary. Do you not see it? For you to lay waste to a town would be a crime. But if I see that such an action
would prevent civil war and ultimately save thousands of lives, would it not be immoral to refrain from destroying the town?”

“Now we are at the heart,” Stella said. Noetos looked on, his bemusement at this hijacking of his question plain to see. “You
employ spies and researchers to gather information and statisticians to analyse it all. You then apply the solution that brings
the least pain to your people. Yet you continue to be ignorant of what you are really doing.”

“And what is that?”

“First, you have no proof that your solutions are the most appropriate, only the word of your statisticians. Unless you are
somehow able to fold back time and try multiple resolutions to your empire’s problems, you cannot prove that your actions
are, in fact, in the best interests of your subjects.”

“You discount my two thousand years’ worth of experience.”

“I do not. I just do not believe it is infallible. Second, your statisticians calculate a less-than-complete set of outcomes.
While a particular action may conclude with fewer lives lost, the fear and hatred spread thereby adds to everyone’s burden.
Millions of lives are subtly altered for the worse.”

“Ah, yes, Stella, I have considered that. Show me but one way of measuring such harm and I will factor it into my calculations.”

“Fool! Empiricism is not a sufficiently flexible philosophy to assess such things! Third, you increase the blot on your own
soul with every action. You make yourself more susceptible to the most outrageous cruelty. And fourth, you load intolerable
burdens on those without your scope of vision and experience. What of your statisticians? How do they deal with the fact that
their calculations condemn innocent people to death? Do they enjoy long working lives, or do they beg to be retired after
only a few years of service? How many of them commit suicide, I wonder?

“And what of those chosen to live? I remember you putting a village to the sword in an attempt to cow me. Did your calculations
consider the damage that did to your soul—or to mine? You may be able to live with the guilt, but I still wake imagining myself
smothered in bloodied silks, having been forced to watch the impalement of men, the rape of women and the dismemberment of
children for no more useful purpose than to make me your tool. Such an action has led inevitably to this moment, the moment
where I reject you. Do you understand, Kannwar? Those people died in vain! Had they lived, I might well now be your willing
queen! As it is, Kannwar, I wish to have nothing more to do with you. You have miscalculated. I care nothing for your fate.”

She stood for a moment, breathing heavily, then strode swiftly down the road, her smirking guardsman at her heel.

“Are you answered?” the Bhrudwan lord asked Noetos.

“Yes,” said the fisherman. “But I judge the answer insufficient.”

Arathé cried out then, her voice inarticulate in its desperation, and even Duon had trouble deciphering the spear of fear
and panic that pierced his mind. She knew her father, and knew what he was going to do.

Out came the man’s sword, drawn as swiftly as thought, and the first cut flashed at the Undying Man’s throat before anyone
had a chance to act. Kannwar jerked his head back and the tip of the sword nicked his larynx. Within moments the blood of
an immortal began to trickle from the wound.

Another man came and stood beside Noetos. Cyclamere the Padouki, a mysterious ally of the fisherman’s through some prior relationship
Duon had not quite understood, drew his own sword and began to strike against the seemingly defenceless man.

Who proved not to be defenceless at all. He drew no famous weapon, nor did he create some counterattack from the air or another
of the elemental forces of the world. He took a blow to the arm and another to the shoulder, both cutting him to the bone,
before two men stepped forward to defend him.

Bregor the Hegeoman, the man Kannwar had but recently struck down and healed in a time that no longer existed save in the
memory. And Torve the Omeran, although Duon could think of no reason why he would defend a tyrant so similar to the Emperor
of Elamaq.

In the distance Stella turned to watch, a look of despair on her face. She had lied. She cared.

Bregor faced Noetos with nothing more than a walking stick, while Torve had not even that: barefoot and unarmed—and unmanned—he
took a strange stance in front of Cyclamere, forcing Kannwar backwards.

“Why do you oppose me?” Noetos asked Bregor. “You know my cause is just. Or has he bought you? Are you still in Neherian employ?”

“He could have let me die, but he didn’t,” Bregor said, his face white with fear. “Noetos, do not strike at this man. Any
blow you land could end up killing yourself. You saw what happened to me.”

“I saw,” Noetos said as he drew his sword back for a powerful blow. “Yet his tyranny must be answered. I am sure I will fail,
but my actions may inspire others to try. One day he will fall.”

His blow fell, and Bregor barely managed to divert its power away from his own arms. His stick splintered, and the end was
sheared off and fell some distance away.

Torve exploded in a flurry of movement, not fast exactly, but fluid, as though dancing between Cyclamere’s strokes. He rained
blows at the swordmaster from every direction. Cyclamere withdrew a pace, baffled and more than a little bruised.

“Was this part of your calculations?” Noetos called out to Kannwar.

“Not at all,” the immortal replied.

“Order them to move aside then. I do not want innocent blood shed.”

“I follow no one’s orders,” Torve said. Was that anger shading his voice? Duon had never heard it before, had not believed
it possible of an Omeran. “This man healed me. He saved my life. I do not love him, nor do I agree with him, but how can I
do less for him in turn?”

“This is perfectly ridiculous,” said Noetos, frustration spilling over into his voice. “You are being defended, coward, by
people who are behaving morally and yet making exactly the opposite calculation that you would make in their place. They do
not consider the thousands of lives forever safe from your possible future depredations should you be slain here today. Instead,
they think only of their debt to you. Do your statisticians have a column for loyalty, coward? Or if they do, does it record
only how such loyalty can be exploited?”

“He can order me to move until he runs out of breath, Noetos,” Bregor said. “I will defend him in this. But there must come
an accounting even for the Lord of Bhrudwo. Moral men and women must be given access to the calculations of his statisticians.
Others must weigh the morality of his actions. You, Noetos, are not one of them. Step aside, lay down your weapon, see this
adventure through to its conclusion and then observe Bhrudwans put this empire to rights. At the end we may still have an
immortal lord, or we may not.”

This brave but foolish speech was barely out of Bregor’s mouth before the Lord of Bhrudwo drew himself up. “You mortals think
you can decide my future and the future of this land? I have suffered far more grievous challenges than yours and withstood
them all! Where were you when the sorcerers of the Had Hills banded together in a thousand-strong cabal against me? I did
not see you lining the parapets of newly built Andratan to help me throw back the grease-smeared hordes from Kanabar, who
had laid the whole of the Malayu Basin to waste. Were you one of those who stood with me when I faced down the Most High himself
in golden Dona Mihst? I have restrained myself amongst you short-lived maggots, but now the carcass upon which you feed bestirs
himself. I am not dead. I have suffered you until now at the behest of the Most High. But no longer.”

The Lord of Bhrudwo strode forward, his hands thrusting aside Bregor and Torve as though they were mere leaves, and began
to swell. Larger and larger he grew, until he stood ten paces tall.

“Larger target to hit,” Noetos commented to Cyclamere, and hefted his sword.

Lenares never wondered where she found the courage. In fact, she did not consider her motivation for what she did “courage”
at all. If pressed, she would perhaps have admitted to annoyance, even anger, but not bravery.

Foolish, wasted words. These men wanted to strike at each other and in so doing ease their pain. All the words did was to
make it easier for them to strike.

Seeing this, she ceased her conversation with Mahudia and stepped forward, faster than light, and in an eye-blink stood between
them.

So this is magic.

Yes, girl
, said her true mother.
But because it is magic, it comes at a price; a price which falls to me to pay. Please use it sparingly.

Squeals, exclamations of shock, fear and wonder on their faces. Lenares tried to keep herself from enjoying the reactions
of her friends. To them it would have seemed she simply materialised among the combatants.

“Put your swords down,” she said, “and listen to me.”

“Not until I’ve dealt with the Undying Man,” Noetos said.

Lenares raised her gaze to rest on the bear-man. “Look at you, stupid man, choosing hate over love. Which is the better answer
to the death and destruction of your family: to kill everyone around you, or to help someone you love regain life?”