Beyond the Wall of Time (34 page)

He joined the scholar in picking through the wreckage, searching for Noetos’s pack and their other possessions. Noetos had
reduced the vessel to pieces the size of his forearm or smaller, the result of a detonation of magic so strong it had knocked
Anomer to the ground where he stood at the far end of the beach. A few larger beams lay together further up the beach, towards
the forest, and the two searchers focused their efforts there.

There were a few heartening finds. Anomer’s own sword and some of his clothes lay under a pile of decking, along with a couple
of Mustar’s shirts. As the searchers sifted through the wreckage a raft made of clothes and sailcloth floated in on the waves.
And Morayle let out a whoop, holding up the Sword of Roudhos. After that, their returns diminished.

As the sun touched the treetops, Arathé hailed his mind.

Brother, it strikes me there’s a better way of searching
, she said.
The huanu stone is anti-magical, right? And we were taught in Andratan that everything has its own magical quotient, its essenza.
He nodded mentally to her.
So if you search using magic, you should be able to sense the absence of magic in a specific place.

Like using torchlight to find something lost in the dark?
He imagined having a magical sense that could sweep over the beach, and instantly found he could see magic.

It was breathtaking.

The nearest he could come to describing what he could see was a lattice of thin golden threads matting the landscape, connecting
everything with everything. No, not everything: the threads were thickest between the individual pieces of the shipwreck;
because, Anomer supposed, they had until recently been parts of one thing. Threads ran through the air, though there were
not nearly so many and they appeared much thinner. Something about the thickness was important, though he had no idea what.
He doubted it mattered to the task at hand. Larger objects, those composed of many things, were lumps of magical gold, node-like
junctions of thousands of threaded pathways.

Beside him, Moralye stooped, lifted and peered, oblivious to his amazement.

This may be what Lenares sees
, Arathé remarked, her strength trickling in union with his.
If so, I can understand why she is so different from the rest of us.

I don’t see any obvious gap
, Anomer said, trying to focus on the mundanity of their search.
The threads seem to be evenly spread across the beach.

Have you looked in the water?

No; I never thought it might have been thrown into the sea.

He turned to gaze out on the placid bay, and immediately saw what he was looking for: an absence, a place where the threads
melted into nothingness.

“Are there toothwhales?” Moralye’s voice intruded upon his inward vision of splendour.

“Toothwhales? I’ve not heard of such things. What are they?”

“Good.” She nodded in obvious relief and waded in the direction he pointed.

She worked through a tightly packed zone of debris, taking a wide berth around a knot of bobbing bodies. Anomer wondered if
they were from the
Conch
, if they had made it through the storm only to die as the ship cast itself onto the beach. Would he recognise them if he
looked closely at their cold faces? This led to thoughts of Cylene and he tried to think of something else.

“Keep going forward,” he called to her as the water reached her waist. “Forward; about ten paces more. Left a little, to your
left. About there.”

She seemed to stand still for some time, the waves surging around her chest. Anomer guessed she was feeling the sandy floor
with her feet.

“I have something!” she cried.

“Did you mean sharks?” he asked her.

“What?”

“Sharks. Big fish with very sharp teeth. Is that what you meant by toothwhales?”

Moralye froze in the act of reaching down into the water. “Yes,” she said. “Do you have any of those?”

“Not around here,” he said, hoping he sounded convincing. “We see them out beyond The Rhoos sometimes, shadowing the Neherian
fleet, but they don’t often come inshore. Water’s not deep enough for them.”

She clearly didn’t find this at all comforting. “They are so large that this depth of water cannot sustain them?”

Anomer noted the quaver in her voice. He didn’t answer her.

You are such a stupid brother
, Arathé said to him. He shot back a mental agreement.

“See if you can pick up the pack,” he called to Moralye.

She grimaced at him, then leaned over until her head practically touched the water. Clearly, she still could not reach the
pack.

The next wave approached her.

“Moralye, watch out,” he called.

She jerked up straight, eyes wide, her head turning left and right.

“Just a wave,” Anomer said. “Look, I’m coming out to help you.”

Such a clever boy
, Arathé said.
Frighten her when she’s feeling vulnerable, then emphasise her weakness by offering to help. Such wonderfully sensitive creatures,
males.

Aye, and females show such good sense by distracting people from the task at hand.
He started into the surf, which was surprisingly warm.

Moralye bent over again, resignation on her face, and was struck by the next wave. With a squeal she disappeared.

“Damn,” Anomer breathed, and began to run towards her.

A moment later she emerged, one arm held high. “I have it!” she called, then coughed and spat seawater from her mouth.

He joined her in the surf and together they stared at the green-stone carving of his sister. Arathé looked too, using his
eyes.
It must have burst free of Father’s pack
, he said to her.

Not very prepossessing, is it
, she said.
Not for something that has caused so much trouble.

Something rippled across the magical lattice.

Things don’t have to be prepossessing to cause trouble
, he answered her grimly.

Did you see that?
she sent, interrupting him.

What?
he replied, just as a larger ripple sped across their golden vision.

That. What is it?

He stared in the direction from which the ripples had come. There, in the sky, far out to sea, was another absence of magic:
a vast circular maw where threads ended as though severed by knives. Faint stars were visible within the hole in the sky,
a window to another place.

Moralye tugged his arm. “Are we going to go back to shore, or shall we wait for the toothwhales?”

“We’re going back,” Anomer said hastily. “We need to hurry.”

Another ripple began to form below the hole in the sky. Anomer knew they were in danger, but the sheer size of it kept his
eyes fixed to the spot. Arathé shrieked a warning.

“I see it, sister,” he said aloud. “Come on,” he added, turning to Moralye. “Run!”

The huge ripple struck just as they were leaving the water. The magical lattice billowed up into a mountain, then surged over
them. A moment later the earth shook, knocking them both to the ground. Beside him Moralye screamed. Somewhere nearby his
sister emitted a high-pitched whine. He himself bellowed in fear. The shaking intensified, pulling him left and right, throwing
him into the air and dashing his head into the surprisingly hard sand, once, twice and again.

He tried to stand, but the earth kept throwing him back down. He caught a glimpse of Moralye kneeling in the shallow water
some distance away, though she had been beside him a moment ago.

The sand collapsed beneath him.

For a moment he visualised himself falling into a bottomless pit, but he found himself in a hole a foot deep, the sand below
him hot to the touch. He scrambled out of the depression and clung to the ground as the tremor continued.

Another ripple surged past.

The ground heaved. Sand billowed into the air. Anomer found himself lifted off the ground as though bucked from a horse. His
landing knocked the wind from his chest.

The earth groaned like a wounded animal: the sound was deafening. A deep grinding noise came from somewhere beneath him and
he levered himself to his feet in fear. Then his eye caught something that disoriented him further. The trees in the coastal
forest were moving southwards relative to the beach.

With a violent jerk the further part of the forest relocated itself a dozen paces to his right and some indeterminate distance
further away. The motion was accompanied by a noise that seemed to exploit every pitch his ears were capable of hearing, from
a deep growl to a shrill scream.

Booms, rattles, crashes and bangs surrounded him.

Beside him the sand began to move. He rolled away in a panic, then stood to see the sand fountaining up as though it was water
forced through a pipe. All over the beach the same thing was happening. The booming and banging continued; the remaining upright
trees began to crash to the ground. Another shake knocked the legs out from under him.

Above the beach, the hole in the world stared down at him like a giant dark eye.

The shaking began to slacken.

Arathé? Sister?

Here, Anomer
, she said, and stood up from the place in the forest where she’d been thrown.

Are you hurt?

Bruised
, she said.
Duon is awake.

I’m not surprised.

Another tremor rippled across the beach and he fell to his hands and knees.

A moment later Moralye had an arm around him. “Anomer, are you all right?” she asked.

He nodded, and the two of them struggled across the sand towards his sister, who had Duon in tow.

The four of them clung to each other.

“When will this end?” Moralye whimpered.

“When we end it,” Anomer said.

Duon probed a bloody scrape on his cheek. “The gods are too powerfu1.”

“Not powerful enough to have killed us yet,” Arathé signalled.

“No, but powerful enough that in time they will break the world,” Moralye said.

Anomer looked at their crazed surroundings: fountains still heaving sand into the air, the coastal forest flattened, the bay
choppy with waves heading in every direction.

“Where is Cylene’s body?” he asked.

Noetos had no memory of anything since he’d laid Cylene on the beach. He supposed he’d been walking about the forest. Nothing
else would explain the scratches and bruises on his arms and legs, no doubt from repeated encounters with fallen trees. He’d
lain face down on the pine needles for some time after the last fall, heedless of anything around him, which was where the
corpse of Dryman found him.

Thick fingers curled around his shoulder and jerked him to his feet. At any other time, shock would have claimed him at a
confrontation with a dead man; however, the fisherman was so drained he could stare into Dryman’s face with equanimity.

Dryman’s face, yes, but it was not Dryman who stared out of those dark eyes. The eyes crinkled a little and the head tilted
to one side, as though the body’s occupant was somewhat puzzled by what he saw.

“You are the fisherman?” asked the mouth in a well-modulated voice. Dryman’s voice, but not his inflections. Someone else
used the mercenary’s apparatus.

“You’ve done the voice well,” Noetos replied. His heart burned with an icy fire; all he wanted to do was to goad the god standing
before him. He cared nothing for the consequences. “I’m not so convinced by the way you wear the body.” He screwed his face
up theatrically. “It looks a little…
large
for you.”

At these words, the tiny muscles normally continually mobile in a face froze for a moment. “Answer my question,” the thing
said, in a voice designed to command.

It moved Noetos not an inch. “You’ll need to work on your presence,” he said, and sneered at the god-monster. “What is it
like to spend eternity on the far side of the Wall of Time? Plenty of things to do there? Interesting people to talk to?”

At this moment he did not fear any outcome. Finally, a game he could not possibly lose.

“I will not ask again,” the voice said.

“That is fortunate, for I am already bored with you. Go about your business.”

The thing’s mouth twisted cruelly. “Did you enjoy watching the hire-girl’s death, fisherman? Did you take as much pleasure
from it as I did in killing her? Oh, it was so touching, seeing you and her reunited; what else could I do but await my chance
to slay her the moment you let her out of your sight?” The blue lips barked a laugh.

No conscious thought. Duon’s sword was out of its scabbard and in his hand, the first cut underway, even before Noetos realised
he was angry. He took the corpse’s left arm off at the shoulder, surprised to meet no resistance, but did not stop his attack.

“Pain anchors me to this world,” the thing said, as clotting blood dribbled from the wound. “Kill this body and you may well—”

Noetos had no will to listen. Everything was bent on chopping the unnatural life out of the thing that had killed his Cylene.
His third cut took the corpse in the mouth, effectively silencing it.

The body took some time to die.

Noetos stood over it, breathing heavily, and watched the life ebb from its eyes.

“I am enjoying this,” he whispered to it.

The body settled on the ground with a sigh like escaping marsh gas. Just after the moment of death, the few birds in the forest
rose up from their perches and flew off in a flurry of wings.

A moment later the ground heaved.

The sand had ceased its strange fountaining, leaving miniature volcanos dotted across the beach, each one collapsing a little
more with every aftershock. The forest around them was silent save for the rustle of leaves whenever the earth shook.

Could you have used magic to protect us from the quake?
Duon asked her.

Those were the words his question translated to, but within the question was laced a genuine interest, not a fearful demand
that she protect him. She could see it was neither thoughtless nor malicious.