Pathspace: The Space of Paths (55 page)

Kareef's face spoke plainly of his doubt of
this. “Millions? How would one feed a million people in a small
place?”

“
You are forgetting the
conveyances of the Ancients, their cars and trucks. Every day the
equivalent of many caravans would come into a city such as new
York. Their trucks and trains brought food, clothing, all the
necessities of life, grown and manufactured elsewhere. Cities
breathed them in as your body breathes in the air.”

“
But that's all gone
now.”

“
Yes. Now they are much as
we are, with much smaller cities and more farmers than
city-dwellers.”

“
Still, said Kareef,
unwilling to conceded the point, “they have more mines.”

“
Why does that bother you?
The Emirates have survived quite well without a lot of metal. Our
winters are milder, so we don't need coal, either. The land gives
us what we need.”

“
But what if we needed
more weapons? The northerners are not the only people we might
still have to fight.”

Nizar was silent for a moment.
“Unfortunately, you are right,” he said. “The news from the West is
not good. The Lone Star Empire is apparently preparing for another
period of expansion.”

“
Why?”

Probably because much of the Honcho's Empire
is desert. Without the irrigation systems of the Ancients, most of
West Texas has reverted to dry sand again. Which means they have
two options, go North or East. The country of Rado to their north
has resisted their invasion attempts in the past. They might decide
to try conquering to the East this time.”

“
Which puts us squarely in
their path. But don't you see? That means we
do
need more weapons, top fight them
off.”

“
Swords do not prevail
against arrows,” the
Mullah
reminded him. “And there are reports that the
Texans have uncovered a cache of ancient weapons, things like
cannons on carts that can travel swiftly to battles. Against those,
our finest horsemen and archers would be useless.”

“
I had not heard this,”
said Kareef.

“
It is not common
knowledge,” said Nizar. “And according to our
operatives...”

“
Our spies, you
mean.”

“
All right. According to
our spies, the only reason he hasn't used his armored vehicles
against us is he doesn't have the fuel for them. But the Honcho is
resourceful. He may find a way to recreate the fuel he
needs.”

“
Then we should seek
alliances with his enemies.”

“
Now, finally, we reach my
destination,” the
Mullah
said. “It is time to talk about your own
Hajj
, your own
Quest..”

Xander
:
Afterthoughts and
Consequences

“
Success is not final, failure is not
fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts.”

–
Winston Churchill

He watched the workmen
with little comment as they went about their tasks, readying dorm
rooms and classrooms for his school. An observer might have noticed
nothing in his expression. But his thoughts were
elsewhere.

“
Why so somber, wizard?”

He turned as Aria stepped
out of the stairwell. “I would have thought you'd be happy,” she
said. “Finally starting your school...and at the expense of my
gardens.”

“
We've talked about this. You weren't
using the floors below yours anyway.”

Her chin jutted. “Well, I
could have, if you hadn't gotten them first. We can always use more
garden space. Unless you plan to take your students off to distant
fields in the Summer, to teach them about herbs.”

“
I'm sure our students will appreciate
your gardens, eventually,” he said. “But to have students, one must
have a school.” He glanced sideways at her. “But what do you care?
Aren't you going to be spending half of each year in
Texas?”

Aria's lips compressed,
and he saw he had touched upon a sensitive area. “Having second
thoughts?”

“
No,” she said. “I'm way past second
thoughts about the engagement. I'm more on fourth and fifth
thoughts now.”

“
Like what? Anything you want to talk
about?”

She watched a carpenter
putting up a bookshelf before answering. “I feel like I've saved
Rado by betraying it. How can I marry the ruler of Texas when I'm
supposed to take over for my mother here?”

“
It will be complicated,” he
agreed.

“
And that's just the start. What about
the children? If we have a son, his people will want to raise it as
the Runt, the next Texan heir. But what about Rado? Are we giving
everything away to the Empire just to avoid war?”

“
I'm sure you will figure out what to
do,” he said.

“
Are you even listening? These are not
simple problems. Now that I think about it, I don't see how I can
be the next Governor and at the same time be Jeffrey's
Honchessa.”

“
If that's how you feel, then cancel
the engagement.”

She scowled. “You know I
can't do that. Jeffrey's better than his father, but he won't last
long as Honcho if he comes back with nothing to show for the
invasion.”

“
I was wondering about that,” said
Xander. “Why aren't you going back to Dallas with him?”

“
I can't. Not until I know this new
alliance will hold. If there's a coup and he's replaced I could end
up being just a hostage. I can't do that to Mother.”

“
No. So how long are you going to make
him wait?”

She sighed. “I don't know.
Have you heard anything from Lester?”

“
Not since he left for Inverness. He
must have reached his home town by now. I only hope he can find
some potential students on his way back.”

She changed the subject.
“Why are you holding your hands in your pockets like that? Are you
cold?”

“
No. I noticed that every time I wave
my hand some worker stops what he's doing and asks what I need. But
what I need is what they're already doing.”

She exhaled. “Well, when
you do have students, I hope you keep them down here and away from
my greenhouses. It took us a long time to get them set
up.”

He smiled. “Look on the
bright side. Someday you won't have to hunt me down when your
glow-tubes need refreshing. If everything works out, you've have a
whole school full of troubleshooters on the floors below
you.”

Aria tossed her head.
“Just make sure they stay away until I need them,” she grumbled,
and turned to leave.

After she was gone he pulled his hands out of his pockets
and gazed at the blisters again. There was no longer any doubt
about it. He'd tuned those everflames way too high when he tossed a
handful into one of the Honcho's tanks. In a hurry, and thinking
only of doing the most damage in the confined space of the tank's
interior, he had pushed the weaving of
tonespace
around the handful of coins to the
limit.

That hastiness had helped
win the day. It had also earned him some second-degree burns.
Radiation burns.

He thrust the hands back into his pockets.
For all my
skills,
he
thought,
I
still cannot do anything about healing.

He had read that one of the Gifts of the aliens had been
something called a
tissue regenerator.
Like the other Gifts, it had caused upheaval and
the collapse of competing human technologies. Antiseptics,
antibiotics, and while sections of the health-care industry had
been destroyed by it. Unfortunately, it used a property of space he
was not familiar with.

From the swizzle he had grown up with on the commune in
Wyoming he had learned
pathspace
. The family's everflame had helped prepare him to
learn the weaving of
tonespace
. And artifacts the General's men had located for
him had helped the wizard learn how to handle
spinspace
.

But the fabled tissue
regenerator used still another component of space, one he had never
learned. Too bad he had never found one.

Carolyn:
Curiouser and Curiouser

“
We cannot all succeed when half of us
are held back.”

–
Malala Yousafzai

She waited until her
father came in from the smithy and sat down to dinner before she
spoke. “What was Lester here for? What did he want”

Jonathan reached for the
salt. “Never you mind. You should be worrying more about what
Burton wants.”

She poured water into his
glass and hers, then sat down. “Dad, I've already told you I don't
want to marry Burton Tolbert. Why was Lester here? Does he need
something for the Inn?”

“
Just some pipe. That's all. Pass the
potatoes.”

Why would Gerrold need pipe?
“Is the inn doing that well, then, that
Gerrold can afford pipe? I know it's not cheap.”

“
It's none of our business,” he said,
mashing a potato and spooning his soup over it. “Besides, unless
I'm wrong he'll be heading back up to Denver soon. If I were you
I'd be forgetting about him.”

He's hiding something,
she decided. “What makes you so sure about
that? Inverness is his home as much as it is ours. Why wouldn't he
stay...especially with the holidays coming up?”

“
It looks to me,” her father said,
“that Lester's found himself a government job up in Denver. He's
got things to do up at the capital, I think.”

“
What makes you think
that?”

“
The gray cloak he's wearing. Seen one
before, just like it. Fellow named...what was his name? Anyway, the
last man I saw wearing something like that worked for the
Governor.”

She absorbed that in wonder.
Lester, working for the Governor?
Maybe stranger
things had happened. Still there was something her father was not
telling her, she was sure of it. “Are you finished for the day, or
do you need me to work the bellows after dinner?”

“
No more work tonight,” he said. “You
can get back to your sewing.”

“
Actually,” she said, as if it had
just occurred to her,” If you don't need me I think I'll head over
to the inn and see if Mary needs any spices. “

He said nothing to this.
What was there to be said? She was a grown woman, not a toddler to
be kept in.

“
Don't forget your coat,” he said
finally.

There was definitely
something on his mind. She had never seen him this quiet at dinner.
Well, maybe for a while after her mother passed away. But not since
then. Jonathan was always full of news and gossip. It wasn't like
him to be so silent. Almost morose.

Nathan:
Strange Things

העיניים שלך יראו דברים מוזרים

“your eyes will see
strange things” –
Proverbs
23:33

It took him a minute or so to notice
that the coach had stopped. Frowning, he looked up from the book he
was reading. “Why are we stopping?”

His father leaned forward and shouted
a question up to the driver.

“
Bit of a fight ahead on
the road, sir. No idea what about.”

His father sighed and shared a look
with his wife.

“
You know you don't have
to, Isaac,” she said.

But he was already unbuttoning his
coat. As always, he had his white robe on underneath, with its gold
Star if David on the breast with the number '36'. Quickly, his
fingers drew the hood out and over his head. “If a task presents
itself, then I must step up, nu?” And just like that, he yanked
open the door of the coach.

Winter air blasted into the interior,
blowing the pages of Nathan's book. “What is is Father doesn't have
to do?” he said, laying the book down for a minute.

His mother didn't answer. Nathan
frowned. Without planning it, he found himself wrenching the door
open again.

Again the icy wind invaded the
coach.

“
Nathan! Don't go
far!”

He didn't. He stepped out
and stood by the coach, watching as his father strode forward into
a crowd of people who parted before him like the Red Sea did for
Moses. He heard a word whispered:
Tzaddik.

The people fell silent, so Isaac
addressed them. “What is the problem here, citizens?”