Текст книги "The First Stone"

Автор книги: Mark Anthony

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Текущая страница: 37 (всего у книги 38 страниц)

48.

Travis was cold. So terribly cold.

He was a planet, spinning alone out in space. The sun he had been bound to had vanished. Its light and life-giving warmth were gone, and there was nothing to hold him down, nothing to keep him from spinning off into the dark, endless Void alone. . . .

“Travis?” a voice murmured. “Travis, can you hear me?”

The voice was warm and familiar, like the memory of the sun. In the darkness, two lights appeared. They were stars, each as green as a summer forest. He let the stars pull him in with their gravity.

“Please, Travis. I know you’re still in there. Talk to me.”

The stars grew brighter, closer. Only they weren’t stars, he realized. They were eyes.

Grace Beckett’s eyes.

A shuddering breath rushed into him, and Travis sat up.

“Grace?”

She was kneeling beside him, along with Beltan. Vani, Nim, Larad, and Hadrian Farr stood close by. Beyond them, the dim air flickered, as if lit by a lamp swinging on a chain.

Grace smiled, a look of relief on her face. “There you are, my friend.”

Beltan gripped his hand. “You scared me. I thought after all this that . . . I thought you weren’t going to . . .” The blond man pressed his lips together and shook his head.

Sorrow pierced Travis’s heart. Why was Beltan so sad? Travis tried to think back, to remember what had happened. It was hard. He felt thin and hollow, like a candy wrapper with nothing good left inside. Only that wasn’t completely true. He still felt good when he looked at Beltan, and Grace, and Nim. They all looked well and whole, though Grace did have a small cut on her arm.

“What happened?” he said. For some reason, he couldn’t stop shivering.

“There’s no magic,” Farr said. His face was haggard, haunted, but there was a note of wonder in his voice. “It’s gone. The Imsari and the morndariwere what brought it into being in the first place. When the Stones and the Seven came in contact, when they eliminated one another, magic ceased to be. We feared you would share their fate.”

Travis frowned at him. “Share whose fate?”

Farr stepped aside and gestured to something on the floor. It was a heap of black cloth—a robe. Shriveled hands jutted from the sleeves of the robe, skeletal fingers curving like claws. A black veil half concealed a skull stretched with withered skin.

It was Phoebe.

Travis started to stand. He was still shaking, and would have fallen, but Grace and Beltan helped him. Beyond Phoebe, he saw the other five on the floor. All of them were dried mummies.

“The Philosophers,” Travis said, the words a croak.

Farr stood above the mummy that had been Phoebe. “It was magic that sustained their lives all these centuries. Drinking the blood of the Seven gave them the gift of immortality. Once the Seven were no more, that gift was taken away.”

Travis swallowed hard. “And you thought . . . you thought the same had happened to me.”

“We didn’t know,” Grace said. “Orú’s blood hadn’t extended your life, at least not yet, but it hadchanged you. You collapsed at the same moment the Philosophers did, and we feared the worst.”

Beltan touched his cheek. “Only you’re all right, aren’t you?”

Again, Travis shivered. It felt as if there was a hole in him where something had been excised, something rich and warm and golden. And something else was missing as well—a familiar presence.

Jack?he spoke in his mind. Jack are you there?

There was no answer. And there never would be again. Travis touched his right hand, but for the first time in five years he didn’t feel the familiar itch beneath the skin of his palm, the faint tingle of the hidden rune.

“Travis?” Beltan’s green eyes were worried.

Travis breathed. “Yes. I’m fine.” He smiled, laying his hand over Beltan’s, pressing it against his cheek. “I’m more than fine.”

Already a new warmth was filling the hole inside Travis. And while it was not so golden and fiery as Orú’s blood, or as shimmering as rune magic, it was every bit as powerful in its own way. And as long as Beltan was at his side, it would never fade.

“Now that he is awake, we must make our decisions,” Vani said, hands on her hips. “Time grows short.”

Travis shook his head. What was she talking about? A note of alarm cut through his confusion.

“Where’s Deirdre?”

“She’s gone,” Farr said simply.

Travis staggered, leaning against Beltan. For a moment he felt disbelief. Then memory returned. Phoebe had chilled him with a glance, as well as Beltan. Travis had watched, unable to move, as the circle of the Seven closed in around Nim and the Imsari.

And Deirdre.

The last thing he remembered was an orb of brilliant silver-gold light encapsulating both Nim and Deirdre. The final image he could recall was of the light beginning to dim, and of a single, tiny figure standing in its midst, like a chick inside an egg lit from behind. There had been no taller figure standing beside the little one.

“Gone,” Travis repeated the word, as if it was unfamiliar to him.

Grace gripped his hand. “She was happy, Travis.” A tear slid down her cheek. “I felt her, right before . . . right before she was gone. She was so happy. She understood everything. She knew that—”

“Forgive me, Your Majesty,” Larad said with an uncomfortable look. “But I don’t think we have time for that now.” He gestured behind them.

Travis turned around, and he tried to understand what he was seeing. “Where are we? On Earth or Eldh?

“Both, for the moment,” Farr said. “But perihelion is drawing to a close. The worlds are beginning to drift apart.”

Travis understood. It had seemed the shadows in the room were shifting. But that wasn’t it at all. It was the room itself that was shifting. The chamber in London and the throne room on Eldh were no longer blurred as one. Instead they were discrete, separate. First one flickered into view, then the other.

However, even as Travis watched, the area affected in this way shrank inward. It was limited to the center of the chamber, to the area around the dais. The rest of the chamber was solidly, unwaveringly the room in London. Again the air flickered, and the area around the dais became part of the throne room in Morindu. Orú’s mummy still sat shackled to his throne. A few moments later the air seemed to wrinkle, and the throne was gone, replaced by the jumbled heap of stones that had been the gate.

Farr took a step toward the dais, his black serafiswishing. “I don’t think we have much longer. We have to decide which side to remain on before perihelion ends.”

His words stunned Travis. Decide? How could he possibly decide between two worlds? Before, when he had returned to Earth, there had always been the possibility that he would return to Eldh. Only this time there would be no chance of that.

“Perihelion won’t come again, will it?”

Farr shook his head. “It was the pull of the Imsari and the Seven that brought the worlds close together. They will never draw near again. And nor will gates function, now that magic is no more.”

“I suppose these aren’t worth anything anymore,” Travis said, pulling the silver coin from his serafi.

Grace smiled. “It’s still worth something, Travis.”

True. But it couldn’t take them between worlds, could it? Travis’s heart ached. He didn’t want to say good-bye. Not so suddenly. Not forever.

The air in the center of the room rippled. The nexus between the two worlds shuddered, then shrank until it was no larger than the dais. One moment it was Morindu, the next London.

“I’ve made my choice,” Farr said, moving onto the dais. “I intend to stay in Morindu.”

“But sorcery doesn’t work anymore,” Travis said.

A smile flickered across Farr’s handsome face. “It was never about magic, Travis Wilder. That’s not why I searched for other worlds. It was for knowledge. For wonder. All of Morindu the Dark remains to be explored. Who knows what secrets remain to be discovered? I cannot throw away the chance to learn things no other living person knows. Deirdre would have understood.”

Travis sighed. Yes, she would have. But Deirdre knew more than any of them now.

Master Larad moved to the dais, standing next to Farr. “As interested as I am in learning about another world—this Earth on which you spent so much of your life, Your Majesty—Eldh is my home, and I cannot imagine not spending the rest of my years there.” He gave a sardonic smile. “Though the problem of getting out of the desert and returning to Malachor may require all of those years to solve.”

Farr grinned. “I imagine we’ll be able to solve that one, Master Larad. Camels aren’t the only way through the desert.”

Like the iris of an eye contracting, the circle above the dais shrank inward another fraction. The nexus was already not much larger than a door. They were almost out of time.

“What do you think, Beltan?” Travis said. “Which world do you want to be on?” Travis tried to sound noncommittal, even though he knew, without doubt, that he wanted to stay on Earth. Eldh was a world of beauty and wonder. But it wasn’t his home. It never had been.

“I want to be on planet Travis,” Beltan said solemnly. “My world is wherever you are.”

“Are you sure?” Travis said, wanting to laugh and cry at the same time. Could he really expect Beltan to spend the rest of his life on another world?

“I’m sure,” Beltan said, taking Travis’s hand.

Doubt vanished, and Travis grinned. “I guess we’ve done pretty well here on Earth. I think we’ll stay, if that’s all right.”

Beltan kissed him. It was.

Reluctantly, Travis pulled away. Now came two farewells he didn’t think he could bear. Only, somehow, he had to. He knelt before Nim. The girl had not said anything since he had awakened. Did she understand what was happening?

She did.

“I want to stay with you, Father!” she said, throwing her small arms around Travis’s neck. “And with Father!”

Travis hugged her tight. “I know, sweetheart. I wish you could stay with us, too. But your place is with your mother.”

“I do not believe that is so.”

Travis looked up, too stunned to speak. Nim turned around, tears staining her cheeks, her eyes wide.

“Mother?”

Vani knelt before her. “My brave daughter.” She brushed a dark curl from Nim’s face. “I love you. You must never forget that.”

“I won’t,” Nim said.

Vani bent, kissed Nim’s brow, and stood.

“I took her from you once,” she said, gazing at Travis, then at Beltan. “I cannot do so a second time.”

“You’re serious,” Travis said, finally managing to speak.

Vani nodded. “ T’goldo not customarily have children. So in Nim, I have known a joy I never believed I would know in my life. Nothing will ever change that. However, I belong in Morindu. It is my heritage, and my fate. I would . . . I would go with Hadrian Farr.”

She gave the former Seeker a glance that was suddenly tentative, almost shy. Farr gave her an astonished look in return. Then the hint of a smile touched his lips.

Beltan stepped forward. “Vani, you’ll never see Nim again.”

“I know.” The T’golmoved to the dais, standing next to Farr and Larad. “But it must be so. Perhaps someday Morindu will be a living city again, but that day is long off. Right now it is still dead. And a dead city, however full of wonders, is no place for a living child.” A tear slid down her cheek. “Love her, Beltan. Give her every joy you possibly can.”

Beltan nodded, laying his big hands on Nim’s small shoulders. She turned and buried her small face against his legs.

Bittersweet joy filled Travis. He would not have to say good-bye to Nim. Only there was another farewell he dreaded, and there was no putting it off.

“Your Majesty,” Larad called out. “You must hurry.”

Travis moved to Grace. He opened his mouth, but how could he put into words what he was feeling? Beltan was his partner, his soul mate, but Grace was his best friend. More than that. She was part of him.

“I’m going to . . . I’m going to miss your voice,” he said, and didn’t even try not to weep.

Grace brushed a tear from his cheek. “Don’t be silly,” she said. “That’s what telephones are for.”

He could only stare at her.

“I’m staying on Earth,” she said.

Beltan let out a great laugh. Even Nim turned around and clapped her hands together.

“But what about . . . ?” He glanced at Hadrian Farr.

“I’m not his case subject to watch anymore. And I think Fate has something else in mind for him. For both of us.” She glanced at Vani, then she looked at Travis again and smiled. “By the way, you still haven’t said if it’s okay if I stay here.”

It was too much. Joy and sorrow and love all melded into a single, shining emotion inside Travis, igniting like a new sun.

“Yeah,” he said gruffly. “It’s okay.”

Grace turned and waved at the figures on the dais. “Give my love to Melia and Falken and everyone. And remember what I said about holding an election, Master Larad. Tell them it was my last order. And tell them I cast my vote for you!”

Larad held up his hand in a gesture of farewell. Vani’s gaze was locked on Nim. Farr opened his mouth to say something.

There was one final flicker, and the three of them disappeared. As if a door had been shut, the image of the throne room in Morindu vanished. The nexus was gone.

“Good-bye,” Travis whispered.

He felt Grace’s hand slip inside his. He gripped it tight.

Beltan picked Nim up, holding her in his arms. “Are you going to be all right?” he said, his expression solemn.

The girl seemed to think about it, then nodded. “I’ll be sad some. A lot at first. But that’s okay, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” he said, holding her tight. “It is.”

She rested her head on his shoulder.

Travis took a step forward, toward the place where Deirdre had vanished. He would never look into her smoky jade eyes again, would never hear the soft tones of her mandolin.

“I wish I’d gotten to say good-bye to her,” he said. “I wish I could have told her how much I cared about her.”

“She knew,” Grace said behind him. “I was with her, in that final moment. She knew everything, Travis. She sent it to me over the last strands of the Weirding. I wish . . . I wish I could describe what it was she saw.”

Travis turned around. “Try.”

He could see Grace struggle for words. “She sensed . . . Deirdre sensed how happy they were—the Sleeping Ones and the Imsari. They wantedto come together. They wanted to balance one another out. It was their whole purpose. But the Seven had known they needed the right catalyst for the union to work. The Imsari and the morndarihad both been changed by their history on Eldh. Alcendifar the dwarf changed the Great Stones with his craft, and the thirteen morndariwere changed by their union with Orú. Those imperfections would have kept their union from being complete without a catalyst.”

Travis looked back at Beltan and Nim. “Why Nim? Why was she the catalyst?”

“Vani was descended from Orú,” Grace said. “And there was fairy blood in Beltan. Northern and southern magic were melded together in Nim. I think it was that blending that helped the Seven and the Imsari to come in contact, to unite despite the way they’d been changed.”

“What about Travis then?” Beltan said. “Couldn’t he have been a catalyst?”

Grace rubbed her chin. “Both rune magic and sorcery are in him– werein him. But he wasn’t born with them inside him. Nim was. I think that made her a more perfect catalyst.”

Beltan tossed Nim into the air. She let out a shriek of laughter, and he caught her. “She’s perfect, all right.”

“The Little People must have known,” Travis said, looking at Beltan and Nim.

The sound of distant sirens drifted through the door. The earthquakes brought on by perihelion would have caused some damage. Travis hoped it hadn’t been severe.

Grace touched his arm. “Are you all right?”

He looked down at his hands. Again he felt the hole inside him. But it was all right. He had spent most of his life not being magic. He didn’t think it would be too hard to get used to being normal again. Who knew? He might actually kind of like it.

“Nim really was the Last Rune,” he said. “There are no more runes. Magic’s gone.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Grace said. “Only . . .” She cocked her head, as if listening to a distant sound.

“What is it?” Beltan said, giving her a sharp look. “Do you feel something?”

Grace smiled and shook her head.

“Just hope,” she said.

49.

On another world, in a castle with seven towers, Aryn rested a hand on her full stomach and felt a strong kick deep within.

Teravian turned away from the window of their bedchamber, wonder on his face. “I can see stars, Aryn. All the stars.”

She tried to reach out with the Touch, to sense the small life inside her, but there was nothing to grasp, no trace of the Weirding. It was gone. Completely gone. But it didn’t matter. Aryn didn’t need magic to know the baby was whole and healthy; she knew it with her heart.

“Do you want to feel your daughter kick?” she asked.

Teravian grinned. “You mean my son.”

And the young king knelt before his queen, laying his hands atop hers as new life stirred beneath.

EPILOGUE

CASTLE CITY

The shiny green pickup truck blew into town with the first evening gale of October.

It pulled off the highway on a bare patch of gravel, not far from a peeling billboard, just down the road from the burnt ruin of a clapboard building. Doors opened, and four people got out. There was a man with red-brown hair, and another man, tall and rangy, who walked with a lanky stride. After them came a woman who was beautiful and regal, even dressed in jeans and a baggy sweater. With her came a girl who looked to be five or six, with hair as dark as shadows dancing on the wind.

The four joined hands, and together they walked toward a flat patch of ground where, once upon a time, a parti-colored circus tent had stood. It had taken them longer than they had expected to come to this place. But then, at first, they hadn’t even known this was where they were going.

London—and much of the world—had been in something of a state of chaos for a few weeks as damage from the earthquakes, hurricanes, and typhoons was repaired. However, none of the disasters had been as bad as they might have been, as bad as some experts had feared they were going to get; the tremors in London had been localized to the area in and around Brixton. And, as suddenly as they had begun, the storms and eruptions ceased. People had been so relieved that they hadn’t even noticed at first that something else had gone as well: the rifts in the sky.

Astronomers and physicists were still speculating about what the rifts were. No doubt studying the data various telescopes had collected would keep the scientists occupied for years to come. However, most people forgot about the rifts soon enough, as people tended to do when something strange departed and the normalcy of everyday life resumed. The Mouthers took off their white sheets and put down their signs. People were ready to go on with their lives. They were ready to hope again.

True, there was the occasional story of someone who had claimed to have seen green forests in the desert and mountains in the middle of the ocean just before the rifts vanished, but those stories were relegated to the tabloids, and were soon replaced by the usual celebrity scandals and UFO sightings.

Once London was back to normal, and a decision to go west was reached—or rather, maybe, a call was heard—there were still arrangements to be made. The flat in Mayfair was sold. Calls were made across the sea, and new accommodations procured with the help of old friends Mitchell and Davis Burke-Favor. Then the day arrived. They flew toward the sunset, then picked up the new truck they had bought (for some reason, it had to be green) and let the mountains call them upward.

Now the wind swirled, kicking up a dust devil right where the main pole of the big top would have stood.

“What do you think happened to them?” Grace said, glad for her thick sweater. Clouds scudded past the tops of the mountains. “To Cy and Mirrim and Samanda, I mean?”

“I think they went back to Eldh when the rune of sky was broken,” Travis said, his breath ghosting on the air. “I think they returned to the Twilight Realm with the other Old Gods.”

Grace nodded. She believed the same. “I’m glad we stopped here. I just wanted to say thanks to Cy, and to the others. We never would have gone to Eldh without them.”

Travis glanced at Beltan. “A lot of things wouldn’t have happened without them.”

Beltan gave him a solemn look. Then, suddenly, the blond man grinned.

“Can we head into Castle City now? I want to see the new house. And I’m getting hungry.” He picked up the girl. “How about you, Nim? Are you hungry?”

“Yes!” she said, clapping her hands.

“That’s my daughter. Get in the truck, then.”

Beltan urged her on with a gentle push. She ran toward the pickup. Beltan gave Travis a quick kiss, then hurried after the girl. Grace sighed, watching the two run, the girl taking three strides for every one of the blond man’s.

“He’s a wonderful father,” she said. “Nim is lucky.”

“So am I,” Travis said. “I love him so much sometimes I almost can’t believe it’s possible.”

She smiled at him. “But it is.”

His gray eyes were thoughtful. “What about you, Grace? Will you ever find someone to love?”

Grace breathed in the cold air. On the journey through the desert, she had discovered she didn’t love Hadrian Farr. But in learning that, she had learned she couldlove. And she did. She looked at Travis, then let her gaze follow Beltan and Nim. Despite the chill, a warmth filled her.

“I already have found someone,” she murmured. “Some-ones.”

Travis watched her a moment, then he nodded. “So you have,” he said. “So you have.”

They walked back to the pickup, following Beltan and Nim. It was only after a moment that Grace realized Travis was singing in a low voice.

“We live our lives a circle,

And wander where we can.

Then after fire and wonder

We end where we began. . . .”

A chill gust caught the words, carrying them away. The four of them reached the truck. Grace climbed in and Nim scrambled onto her lap. Beltan slid behind the wheel, and Travis closed the passenger door. In the valley below, a collection of lights twinkled in the deepening dusk.

“All right, Beltan,” Travis said. “Take us home.”

The pickup pulled onto the highway, and the wind rattled through the witchgrass, blowing away across the mountains to places unknown.