The Witches of Ne'arth (The Star Wizards Trilogy Book 2) (15 page)

HELLO ATHENA  ARE YOU THERE

YES FATHER THIS IS ATHENA I AM HERE HOW ARE YOU

I CANT FEEL ANYTHING WHERE AM I

YOU ARE ON NEW EARTH

IT IS DARK AND COLD MY BODY IS NUMB I AM TIRED WHERE AM I

FATHER I HAVE GOOD NEWS THE STOLEN IMPLANT HAS BEEN FOUND  I AM SENDING SOMEONE TO GET IT NOW EVERYTHING WILL BE RIGHT SOON

WHY IS IT DARK AND COLD I AM TIRED WHERE AM I ATHENA HELP ME HELP ME HELP

The printer chattered on, the message always the same, words of confusion that seemed to carry to Athena the hint that death would be a release.

Athena raised her eyes to the thick window above the teletype station.  On the other side, only a meter away, bundles of wires penetrated into a vat of green syrup.  The liquid faintly flickered in rhythm with the striking of each letter. 

Athena shuddered with the flashback:  that night centuries ago when he had screamed at her to do what had to be done and she had wept hysterically and in the end she had done it because always doing exactly what he said to do was the sole reason for her being. 

As the printer relayed his pleading, Athena writhed her hands, reflexively washing the blood away – the blood that had been washed away centuries before, that would never wash away.

7.

Shortly after dawn, Carrot arose from her hut and walked alone on the Oksiden Road west to Ravencall.  She arrived at the former training hut to find a Leaf lieutenant seated at her former desk.  She had never seen him before and she assumed that he must have been another staffer sent by the Eastern Command.  He shuffled papers on his desk while she waited quietly, until it was painfully obvious that he was deliberately ignoring her.  Finally, she politely coughed. 

He looked her over severely and said, “What are you doing here, miss?”

“I have been commissioned as a lieutenant in the Army of Britan,” she replied.  “I have been waiting to receive orders to report to duty.  I would like to find out what I should be doing now.”

He frowned.  “You're a woman.  The army doesn't yet have a women's auxiliary”

“I was informed by a man named Krobart that I would be given commission as –  “

“Colonel Krobart has issued no instructions regarding a woman in the army.” He stood, drawing himself to all of a centimeter taller than Carrot.  “I don't know what your story is, miss, but you're interfering with army business by being here.  I have to ask you to leave.”

Do you know who I am?
Carrot restrained the ends of her hair from flickering orange.  “I see.”

She surprised herself by how calmly she took the incident.  She enjoyed the morning as she returned to Fish Lake, nodding greeting to the villagers who had arisen to work and chores.  Returning to her hut, she stoked a cooking fire and brewed a cup of tea.  As she poured the cup, she recalled how Matt had said that the maternal side of his family practiced a tea ceremony steeped in cultural meaning.  It sounded, she thought, like something that ought to be grafted onto Britanian culture. 

Through the window she spotted Matt's hut.  She scented that he wasn't there, and wondered if it would be all right to take a peek as she might be living there some day . . . and then she stiffened, for the breeze had brought two scents from another quarter – the fainter of which aroused dread. 

She went to the door.  Arms around shoulders, Norian and Mirian were leaning against each other a few meters away.  Their clothing was wrinkled and their hair mutually disheveled.  They shared an expression of contentment that Carrot found annoying on sight. 

Mirian grinned at her husband.  “You were right, Norian, she does have a good sense of smell!” 

“Good morning, Carrot,” Norian said.  “Sorry we haven't contacted you.  Mirian and I have been spending a little time alone in order to become reacquainted.  But we do have something to share.  Mirian?”

Mirian turned to Carrot, then abruptly glared.  “Don't you
ever
dance with my husband
again
!” 

Carrot reeled, struck by a jolt of guilt.  Mirian burst into laughter.

“Nor, you were right!” Mirian exclaimed.  “They're so conservative here!  So uptight it's hilarious!”

“Mirian,” Norian said, with irritation in his voice.  “Tell her what we discussed.”

“Fine.  Meantime, how about tea for us as well?”

Carrot poured their cups and they sat on a pair of logs by the lake.  Carrot waited for Mirian to finish sipping, and prompted, “Norian said you might know of the Box.”

“I know nothing of your Box,” Mirian replied.  “I do know of mutants.”

Norian interjected, “Carrot, from what has been explained to me, the Boxes have the power to make mutants.  Does it not follow, then, that the presence of mutants might sign the presence of a Box?”

Carrot addressed Mirian:  “What do you know of mutants?”

Mirian set down her cup, doffed her cap and pulled back her hair.  The upper tips of her ears were pointed. 

“Dearie, I
am
a mutant.”

Carrot nearly spilled her tea.  Save for her mother and Inoldia, she had never met another mutant before.   

“Tell her about the other mutants,” Norian said.  “The ones who live north of your village.”

“Well,” Mirian said, “assuming anyone different counts as one of your mutants, there are the little people, and then the big people, and then there are the trolls said to live beyond the river in the northernmost reaches.”

“The little people,” said Carrot, raising an eyebrow.  “The big people, and . . . the
trolls
.”

“Yes,” Mirian said.  “A troll is a human-like monster that – “

“I know what a troll is said to be.” 
A thing in a fairy tale
, but she didn't say that aloud.

Norian nodded.  “So here is my thinking, Carrot.  Mirian comes from a village in the northwest, a village of mutants like herself.  To their north are still other villages of mutants.  How did they become mutants?  Some great power must have bewitched them, and I suspect your Box.  One imagines that the Box was transported through the area, and has left a trail of mutants in its wake.”

“For what purpose?” asked Carrot.  “Boxes are intelligent, they have purposes.  Why would a Box do such a thing?”

Norian shrugged.  “Some mysteries can't be answered without investigation.  I propose we do one.”

“Are you sure it would be worth our time?  I have listened to travelers tell of the northwest.  I have never heard of villages of mutants.”

“Speaking for my village,” Mirian said, “our differences are not something we like to have known.  Differences are hated in this world.  If you are different, you keep to yourself.”  She stroked her hair forward and set her cap so that her ear tips were once again doubly hidden.  “My village is placed well from the road, and the trail is winding so that a traveler would have to go to great effort to chance upon us.  It is said that the other mutants also have precautions against encounter.  It is even said that the trolls guard their land with a Monstrous Hedge that eats all trespassers.”

“A . . .
Monstrous . . .
Hedge
.  That
eats
people?” 

“I've never seen it so don't ask what it is like.  And don't ask what the trolls are like, for I've never seen them either.  All I know of the trolls is that they are said to be big and hairy and ugly.  Hence, they were given the name.”

“
How
big and hairy and ugly?  After all, normal people are sometimes big and hairy, and there are different standards of beauty, and spinners of tavern tales do tend to exaggerate.”

Norian looked to Carrot earnestly.  “I've heard northwesters speak of direct encounters with trolls.  Carrot, trust me when I say there was fear in the voices of the tellers of the tales.  So much that I fear too what we may find.”

Carrot recalled Norian in action during the Battle of the Dark Forest.  At one point, a squad of Romans had come within swording distance of a catapult crew.  Norian had streaked from a safe position to defend the crew, flashing his sword against three attackers at once.  He was not a man lightly given to fear. 

Norian continued, “Carrot, your plan to use the army to survey the entire west has been doused by the Leaf, but is this not better?  You, Mirian, and I are sufficient for the task.  We can follow the path of mutants like a trail of footprints, directly to the lair of the Box.” 

“I can't go,” Carrot said.  “My responsibility to the Leaf – “

“Forget the Leaf!  I heard what the Leaf has done to you.  Stripped you of command, ejected you from their army.  They made me a major, but I quit!” 

He yanked the rank insignia symbols – 'pips' in the slang of the Leaf – from his collar and tossed them into the brush.  Carrot arose and sifted through the foliage, returning the pips to his questioning gaze.

“Let's not act in haste,” she said.  “They have not yet officially ejected me from the army, although it is clear that is their intent.  Norian, in any case your commission is not something you should take lightly.  The Leaf is the only effective force we have for fighting against the Romans.”

“Even if that is so, Carrot, have you not said that finding the Box is everything?  That if Rome finds it first, the whole world is lost?  Then Mirian and I will search alone, if you will not go with us.”

The tea leaves at the bottom of her cup had settled into odd shapes.  Carrot recalled hearing that such shapes foretold the future.  As she contemplated, she realized there was already an undisputed source of divination at her call.  She wanted to see him anyway.

“So that you know that I take you seriously,” Carrot said, “I will prepare for the journey.  I will go with you as far as Ravencall, then I want to speak with Matt.  Then I will make the decision to go on.”

“Before, this was so important that you wanted to send an army,” Mirian said. “Now you need your boyfriend's permission to go just yourself?”

“Mirian,” Norian said, “I'm sure there is more to it than that.” 

Refraining from fuming, Carrot gathered her backpack and dressed for travel, exchanging her dress for shirt, overshirt, and pants, and adding a hooded coat to her shawl for warmth.  Layal heard the rummaging, provided a breakfast and packed leftover roast.  There were weepy hugs, though Carrot assured Layal that she might not be leaving at all and in any case would return soon.  Personally, though, she was glad for the opportunity to go on a quest, even a misbegotten one.  She had been growing intolerably restless with inaction.     

Then she was off on the Oksiden once again to Ravencall.  She veered clear of the command hut and went directly to the airship hangar.  A fence had been erected around it, and sentries – men from East Britan – refused her entry as she was neither authorized work crew nor military personnel.  Norian reaffixed his major's pips to his collar and blasted choice words.  The sentries continued to refuse admission to Carrot, but had no pretext to halt Norian, who briskly strode past the gate and into the hangar and returned moments later with Matt.

Carrot introduced Matt to Mirian, and said, “Can we speak in private?”

Matt motioned to the nearby supply hut.  Carrot closed the door and they were alone.  Matt gently touched her shoulder and she looked into his eyes, and they kissed.

“I've really missed you,” he said, when he had caught his breath.

“We were together last night!” She bowed her head and smiled.  “I missed you too.”

“We've been very busy today.  The Leaf has finally released the funds.  They don't know it, but we're outfitting the ship for the mission to the Other Side.  Still, I'm worried they're going to find out.  Prin, Andra, me, we all have Leafmen following us around like shadows.  I'm – “ He noticed her backpack and clothes for the first time.  “You look like you're going somewhere.”

“It depends.”  She explained the 'mutant trail' theory of Norian and Mirian.

“Sounds like ancient Earth mythology,” Matt said.  “Dwarfs, giants, trolls.”

“Mirian's pointed ears are real enough.  Would that make her people something in Earth mythology?”

“I'm guessing they would correspond to Elves.”

“What were Elves said to be like?”

“Well, pointy ears.  Also, they were very emotionally-controlled and logical.”

To Carrot, Mirian hadn't seemed too much of either.  “And this is what Ivan says?”

“Carrot, I don't need to ask Ivan about everything.  Anyhow, according to ancient mythology, the Elves lived on Earth during the Middle Ages, then there was going to be a big war and they went back to their home planet.  In modern times we sent probes to all the nearby stars and didn't find any intelligent species, so it's probably all a myth.  That doesn't stop a seeder probe from referencing ancient myths and making them come to life here.”

“Why would a Pandora Box do such a thing?”

“There's an old saying, 'An AI can sanely pursue insane objectives.'  She was programmed by Eric Roth and Athena Spencer, and as far as I'm concerned, they're both crazy, and that's explanation enough.  So . . . you're really going to investigate Mirian's story . . . now?”

“It depends,” she said.  “This is such a volatile time in our relations with the Leaf, and I don't want to leave the vicinity of Ravencall without some certainty that there is flesh to her story.  So I've come to ask . . . could Ivan provide an aerial view?”

She elevated her hand.  Matt placed it on his forehead.  Carrot felt a mild tingle as Ivan's micro-tentacles penetrated her skin and connected to her optic nerve bundles.  A rectangular window shimmered in her field of vision, resolving into a satellite-view composite image of the island of Britan.  Having had experience with augmented reality, Carrot made the gestures needed to zoom into the northwest quadrant. 

At the west end of the Oksiden, a dirt path branched north, leading into a thickly forested plain between mountain ranges.  As she traced the path, Carrot absorbed details – the twists and turns, the distances, the placement of landmarks and villages. 

“Some of these villages are peculiar,” she said.  “See how they're set away from the path, in the midst of the thickest woods?  It corresponds to what Mirian said, that they do not wish to be noticed.”

The path went well northward, then stopped at a wide river.  There was a bridge, but only untamed field and forest on the other side.