Lokant (15 page)

‘She has had much on
her mind of late,’ Tren replied. Glancing about the office, he saw
several examples of the artistic light-globes that Eva used in her
own house. How like her, he thought; if she admired a company’s
product she would simply buy the company.

‘I have the regular
reports,’ the clerk offered. ‘Perhaps you can deliver them
directly, Mr Warvel?’

‘Ah - no. I have some
other business to perform for her ladyship before I am permitted to
return to Glour City.’

The man nodded briskly.
‘Please convey our continued regards. Her recent investment has
allowed us to expand the business considerably. Please also inform
her that the new style of globe she suggested has proved very
popular. She’ll be pleased to know it.’

The clerk’s attitude
was beginning to prove too oily for Tren’s tastes, but he stood his
ground. ‘I will ensure that she knows. She particularly asked me to
check on the progress of her share transfer. I believe Geslin was
the name?’

The clerk donned a
gleaming pair of spectacles and rustled papers for a few minutes.
At length he looked up with a triumphant exclamation.

‘Here it is. Geslin,
35th house Ruarch Street? Yes. Those shares were transferred
successfully. We are delighted to have her ladyship’s friends among
our shareholders.’

Tren sighed inwardly,
suffering some conflicted feelings. Part of him felt that it ought
to have been his responsibility to care for the Geslins; he was
practically a member of the family after all, and if he hadn’t been
able to save Ed, at least he could make up for it by taking over
where he had left off.

But he knew that
attitude was essentially selfish. Eva had found a simple and direct
way of providing for them in the long-term, and she’d done it
without mentioning a word to anyone. She had also found a way to
protect Mrs Geslin’s pride. It was a deeply decent thing to do and
also a sensitive one, and he felt a brief pang in reflecting on
it.

‘Thank you,’ he said to
the clerk and rose to leave.

‘Ah - a moment, Mr
Warvel. It occurs to me that her ladyship might enjoy a sample of
our newest product. Would you care to see it?’

‘I - yes, all right,
but I have a great deal more to do this morning.’ Tren affected the
harried and self-important air of a middle-rank official with
surprising ease.

‘Of course, of course,’
the clerk replied. Moving with bustling speed, he unlocked a
cabinet that stood behind his desk and took out a light globe. It
was larger than any Tren had seen before, as large as the
chandelier that graced Eva’s drawing-room. It was encased in a
gracefully wrought silver cage; Tren could see at a glance that the
globe would throw light onto nearby surfaces in the pattern
enforced by the metal.

‘Remarkable,’ he said
honestly.

‘That’s not all, sir!
When activated, this globe will change the colour of the light with
every rotation.’

Tren blinked. ‘Truly?
May I try?’

‘Please!’ The clerk
placed the globe gently on the desk. Tren summoned his sorcery and
activated it; the ball rose gently into the air and began to slowly
rotate, emitting a soft white light. After about a minute, the
light changed to blue.

Tren had seen coloured
globes before, but the colours were either embedded into the glass
and therefore fixed, or they had to be changed manually by the
sorcerer. A colour-changing globe was perfectly possible, as long
as a sorcerer was prepared to stand by it and alter the hue of
light every few minutes. This globe operated autonomously.

‘How does it work? An
embedded enchantment of some kind?’ Tren made the suggestion
knowing it didn’t make sense. Embedding enchantments was, again,
the province of the sorcerer; Lawch & Son couldn’t advertise
the properties of the product unless those properties were bound to
the globe in some way.

‘It’s more a matter of
science. We had an inventor come in from Ullarn - mighty difficult
fellow and the consultancy fees were enormous, but he did a
marvellous job, so I’m told. You couldn’t ask me to say more than
that. I’m an administrative man, not a scientist.’

‘Of course,’ murmured
Tren. ‘Fascinating. Has Lady Glostrum seen this yet?’

‘Not to my knowledge.
Do you think her ladyship would enjoy a sample? It’s her money as
made it possible, after all.’

‘Oh, certainly. Do send
one right away. A wedding gift, perhaps.’ He paused. ‘If you could
note that you sent it on my recommendation, I’d be grateful.’

The clerk winked,
entirely understanding the apparent attempts of a middle-grade
lackey to get ahead. ‘I’ll do that, sir.’

Tren left the factory
feeling thoughtful. He was surprised to hear of the involvement of
an Ullarn inventor. It was not common to hear of the Darklands
engineers hiring themselves out that way. He had no doubt that the
consultancy fees were, indeed, enormous.

What puzzled him most
was the mechanics of it. A new type of glass? How could that
possibly work? The colour change reminded him of the way the light
changed in the Lower Realm as the moons turned. Instinctively he
would have said that this new technology owed something to the
world of Ayrien, as he supposed he must now call it. But if there
was a link, the probable nature of it escaped him entirely.

He dismissed the
problem. He couldn’t get side-tracked by new technologies, however
interesting they might be; he had a more pressing task.

He was planning to
journey south of Westrarc, close to the Ullarn border in fact. When
he had travelled that way with Eva some weeks before, they had
stepped through a rogue gate into the Lowers - a curious type of
gate that remained stable unless it was deliberately closed. Even
then, the gate would reopen itself in the same place sometime
later.

He had a theory that
the gate was not a rogue at all, but placed there and maintained by
the sorcerer Griel. He hoped to find it still in place when he
arrived, and if it was... going through it would return him to the
same vicinity he’d visited with Eva.

In that area had been
the tall and highly peculiar tower in which they had found Andraly
Winnier’s memoirs. They had lost the book, so instead he would go
back to the book’s source and try his luck there.

And if it got him out
of Glour City before Eva wed herself irrevocably to a man she
didn’t love, all the better.

They had not been long
in the air when a wave of excitement swamped Llandry’s senses,
emanating from Pensould. It was never easy to keep pace with a
draykon so much bigger than she was, but by beating her sail-like
wings at an unsustainable pace she was able to draw level with him.
Glancing down, she saw nothing to explain his enthusiasm.

Pensould? What is
it?

He banked abruptly and
circled around, gradually descending towards the ground.

Another draykon
grave,
he replied.
Open your mind, Minchu. You will feel
it.

Open her mind? As
instructions went, this was vague to say the least. Llandry wasted
a few seconds feeling irritable, but with an inward sigh she put
that aside.

She knew how the
draykon bone felt. She had sensed it before, but then she had been
in human form and on the ground. She had felt it pulse through the
earth beneath her feet. Could she feel it from the air?

She cleared her mind
with a deep breath and tentatively began to search. She promptly
lost her concentration on her flight and descended with unseemly
haste towards the ground. A flash of panic froze her body and she
failed to right herself. The ground rushed towards her face...

With a grunt of
irritation, Pensould darted beneath her and she landed on him
instead. They both hit the ground with a sharp impact and she felt
a stab of pain from him.

Sorry, sorry.

Pensould’s voice in her
mind was gruff with exasperation.
You must stop trying to fly
like a human. These things? These?
He righted himself, flapping
his wings ostentatiously.
They are not arms! You fly as though
you are trying to grab the air and pull yourself forward. You must
let the currents do the work for you.

Um, right.
Sorry.
She stretched out her crumpled legs, mortified. Really,
she made a liability of herself. Pensould would do better to leave
her behind.

Now, Minchu. I love
you still.
Pensould nudged her with his nose, sending her a
wave of affection that made her instantly feel better.

Until she remembered
Sigwide.
Oh no, Sig!

Pensould’s nostrils
twitched.
If you will insist on bringing tiny
passengers...

Frantic, she cast out
with her summoner senses, looking for the imprint Sigwide’s
presence made on the world. She knew it better than she knew her
own, but she couldn’t sense him.

Sigwide!
She
roared the name with the full power of her will. To her surprise
and alarm, the cry was amplified beyond all reason. She knew the
limits of her own, untrained summoner abilities; she should not be
able to reach so far, to quest so powerfully for her orting’s
presence. The depths of her own power frightened her.

A thin, answering cry
came from somewhere above. She launched herself into the air,
hurling herself in the direction of that call. She discovered
Sigwide at last, sitting in the branches of one of the tall,
red-leaved trees in this part of Iskyr. He was clinging desperately
to the branch as it swayed in the wind, his short grey fur standing
on end. His desperation was palpable as she neared him; he screamed
again, and to her shock she understood him.

Help.

The word formed clearly
in her mind, though she recognised it as an interpretation of his
actual utterance. She read his speech in the same way that she
understood Pensould when he spoke to her without words.

Help!

Tentatively, she sent a
thought back to him.
Coming!

Carefully, she
descended until she hovered near Sigwide’s branch. Reaching out
with one alarmingly large leg, she delicately closed her claws
around Sigwide and snatched him up. The orting screamed with fear
and relief as he was borne back to the ground. She released him and
immediately transformed back into her human shape so she could pick
him up. He nuzzled her face, calming rapidly in her arms.

Siggy?

It was harder to do it
outside of her draykon shape. She knew that from Pensould, though
it was growing easier the more she practiced. Nonetheless, she
caught Sigwide’s brief reply.

Food?

She laughed. ‘You
foolish creature,’ she muttered aloud.
Try not to fall off
again, Siggy.

Yes. No. Food?

If we are finished,
perhaps we can proceed?

She was learning that
Pensould could be a grouch.

Nearly,
she
returned.
I don’t understand, Pensould. How am I hearing
Sigwide?

She felt his surprise.
You could not before?

No, though I began to
feel his emotions more clearly when I carried one of your bones.
And now, when I am draykon-shaped.

Pensould sniffed
disapprovingly at the mention of his bones.
The connection ought
to be obvious.

Oh.
She thought
furiously.
Draykon bone amplifies human magic, doesn’t it?
That’s why people were so interested in it. I was a better summoner
than I’ve ever been when I wore a piece.

Human magic? There
is no such thing.
He was arrogantly condescending.
It is
draykon magic, pure and simple. As far as I can tell, what you
grant the odd name of “summoning” is merely a diluted, weak form of
draykon empathetics.

Llandry blinked.
We’ve been working draykon magic?

It can barely be graced
with that name in its current form, but yes. I sense nothing about
it that is not perfectly compatible with what we are doing.

But we’re human.

Are you? You yourself
are only a small bit human. You are mostly draykon. Does it not
follow that others are mostly human, with a small bit draykon?

You’re saying that
humans and draykons can breed?
Her mind reeled at the thought
that somewhere back in time, many generations ago, the draykon and
human species had somehow, in some way, been combined, and the
draykon traits had bred true ever since.

I cannot say that I
have ever tried,
he returned.
When I was last awake, humans
were magicless creatures and we never thought it worthwhile to try
to look like one. But I have an idea.
His mood flashed from
pompously didactic to mischievous.
We will both take our human
shapes, and then we will mate. If we succeed in producing young,
then we will consider the theory confirmed.

Llandry’s face
instantly heated, and she buried it in Sigwide’s fur.
Um,
perhaps another time. Didn’t you say something about a draykon
grave?

Ah! Yes. Come.
He soared overhead and she rushed to metamorphose. Sigwide was
restored to his early travelling position and she felt him grip
with his claws.

Good,
she told
him.

Food?
He
replied.

She began to think that
improved communication with her trouble-seeking orting might have
its downsides.

Pensould at last found
his draykon grave, but it was not the triumph that she expected. As
he circled to the ground ahead of her, she followed with particular
care, determined not to repeat her earlier disgrace. But she almost
fell out of the air again when she felt his mood change in an
instant from excitement to white-hot rage.

What is this
drekric?