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CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Aleasha pushed aside the plate which had held her now vanished breakfast and demanded, “What do you think this priestess is doing, Druadaen?”

“Yes,” Ancrushav added, making sure his own plate did not come to rest on the map of portals—or worlds—spread out on the table, “and let us assume she knows everything that we know.”

Druadaen surprised them by calmly, unhurriedly finishing his citrus-infused water. “I thought you might ask that,” he said with a smile.

It had hardly required great leaps of foresight. While the road ahead was strewn with unknowns, the greatest danger at the end of it—the priestess—was from his world. Her people had fought against his, and her mancery was related to the kinds he had witnessed. So it was natural for them to presume him to be the authority on her intents and powers. Which would be comical, if we weren’t contemplating a course of action that seems sure to get us killed.

But at least he was well prepared. “Once the priestess realized that she could not return through the Fickle Haze, she likely resolved to find some portal that could take her back to where she started: the Nidus.”

“That’s the island with many gates,” Aleasha said with a nod, “and near her homeland.”

“Correct. So she decided to find the best collection of either present or historical accounts that might point to another active portal on this world. And whoever might know even more about them.”

Ancrushav nodded. “So she broke into the Principiate Repository.”

Druadaen nodded. “Yes, but while she was there, I suspect she saw something which has been missed by centuries of Sarmese researchers. But she would notice immediately.”

“You mean something other than the Prow and the Maelstrom being the Annihilation Gate?”

“Yes, although it’s related. Now, this is conjecture, because there’s no way to be certain without reading all the books she did. But as you pointed out yesterday, Ancrushav, she is practicing an intact and complete art, whereas even the most accomplished sorcerers of Pagudon know but a smattering of fragments from it.”

Ancrushav set his immense fists upon the table. “And would that have determined the actions she has taken since coming through what you call the Shimmer?”

Druadaen shrugged. “Well, if she has any familiarity with the discipline called cosmancery, she will almost surely have much greater knowledge of portals than anyone on this world. That might not only include having cognates to control and change them, but greater knowledge of the Vortex of Worlds.” He leaned forward, pointed to the map. “We’re not even sure what all the symbols on this diagram mean. But what if she did? Or just knew half of them?

“At the very least, she’d know that this was a world with other portals which might ultimately lead to a way home. At the best, she might take one look at this and know exactly where she has to go to return to the Nidus.”

“Or, failing that, just head here.” Aleasha’s finger rested on the symbol that sent out so many crisscrossing connecting lines that it resembled a spider web.

Which stopped Druadaen for a moment: A spider web? Or maybe a spider nest: which is to say, a nidus. Possibly the Nidus? Is that a connection or a coincidence? Not enough information, and not enough time, to consider that now.

“She might do that,” Druadaen agreed, pointing at the same jumbled intersection of lines. “In fact, even if all she knows is that such a multiple crossroads exists, she would be likely to make it her next destination. And from the moment she left Sarmasid, she was heading as directly and quickly as she could to the Maelstrom. So yes, she almost certainly knows it is the Annihilation Gate and the references to it may have made her confident that it is the kind of osmotium with which she is familiar: that of the Old Art. In which she is a master.”

Aleasha was staring at the diagram in something like dread. “So, if she is a… a cosmancer, is it possible that she’s heard of Hystzos before? That she might have been here? Or, by other means, might know who and what the Annihilators were?”

The profundity of her simple, clear-sighted question struck Druadaen dumb. Because if any of those freewheeling possibilities touched on the truth, it had immense ramifications for Arrdanc as well as Hystzos. “There is no way to know that. I do not know much about my world’s cosmancers. They are figures as little spoken about as were portals during your world’s epoch of Great Hystzos; they are known to exist but little more. However, perhaps something she read about the Annihilation Gate suggested a parallel or shared property with the Nidus.”

“Such as their ability to withstand attempts to destroy them?” Ancrushav offered.

Druadaen nodded. “I hadn’t thought of that, but yes, that might certainly fix her attention upon the Maelstrom: a portal that is likely to still exist and is known to work in both directions. Which means it is either located on, or at least one step closer to, this”—Druadaen gestured toward the diagram on the table—“the Vortex of Worlds.”

“Where she can try to find her way to the big crossroads,” Aleasha added, pointing to the spiderweb.

“Or find lore which would reveal a portal that has, at some point, been connected to the Nidus,” Ancrushav amended. He leaned back. “Very well. There seems no other logical course of action for her if she means to return to your world as swiftly as possible.” He squinted at the map. “And you feel sure she presumes that people from your world are trying to catch her?”

“I wouldn’t say that, but she can hardly assume they won’t. So, to the extent she fears pursuit, she will be in a hurry to get out of this world. And perhaps the next as well.”

“And where would such flight end?”

Druadaen shook his head. “That is an excellent and troubling question. Logically, every world she enters is one more to which, and through which, pursuers must track her. But logically speed cannot be her only concern. Everywhere she travels, she must stop and converse long enough to learn about any gates there, always mindful of any hints which suggest that one of them is, or could be, connected to the Nidus. So she will have to strike a balance between fleeing swiftly, yet conducting that research as quietly as she may.”

“She did a poor job of that here,” Aleasha snorted.

Druadaen shrugged. “In some ways, but she managed to gather what she needed before disappearing into a remote area beyond the reach of any nation and from which rumors, let alone news, rarely come. And I suspect she has learned many lessons here which will prove very valuable in every new world she might enter.”

Aleasha crossed her arms. “Well, I am resolved to pursue her. And to stop her, even if the odds seem impossible. Which they do, insofar as none of us have powerful allies that we might ask to join us in such a quest. But still, to plan in ignorance of your enemy is to ensure that they will defeat you. So Druadaen, tell us: what powers might this cosmancer bring to bear against us?”

Druadaen frowned, rubbed his chin. “Firstly, I doubt she is a cosmancer, at least not primarily. But that question is far faster in the asking than the answering, and we can discuss it just as well once we are underway.”

Ancrushav nodded. “Which should be no later than tomorrow.”

“Really?” Aleasha’s voice was playfully facetious. “Why not today?”

Ancrushav’s tone and face remained akin to granite. “If I thought we could, I would press for that. But it will take that long for us to prepare. I am told that the supragants which bore you here have not left. Will they bear us to the Prow?”

Aleasha nodded slowly. “I believe that is why they have stayed. They sense we share mortal enemies.”

“Excellent. You shall equip yourselves as you wish.”

“Equip ourselves?” Druadaen echoed. Since arriving, he’d seen very little that would answer to such a description, despite the place being named the Armory.

Ancrushav waved an unconcerned hand. “I have much equipment from caravans that did not successfully cross the Godbarrows. Most of it does not fit any of the Changelings, so you may take whatever you find in the storerooms.”

Aleasha looked up from under beetled brows. “Speaking of Changelings; do you mean to take any of them with us?”

“It would not be right. It would also be unwise. Should we fail and they be captured, what resides in their mind may ultimately come to be in our adversary’s mind. And that could be the end of all we hope to achieve. I cannot risk that.”

Her gaze was curious, not accusatory. “But we, too, have seen much.”

“Yes, but as yet, understand little. And you have not seen what the priestess would most want to.”

She gestured at the shelves surrounding them. “Certain of these books, I imagine?”

“Yes, but more importantly, any hint of my discoveries concerning the animalcules of Change. My old Pagudon masters congratulated themselves on having the greatest knowledge of the compounds which effect it, but they were merely following recipes. They had no real insight into the ingredients.”

“And you do?”

“I believe I might. If so, much of what I have discovered must never come to light. It would enable the unscrupulous to propagate even greater and more dangerous Changes.”

Druadaen frowned. “Why not destroy the knowledge, then?”

“Because the same knowledge holds the key to preventing Changes. Now, we are agreed that there is much to do before we may depart. And while haste is a friend to no plan, time is against us.”

“So, we should make haste slowly,” Druadaen offered with a grin.

Ancrushav stopped, stared. “That could be an aphorism.”

Aleasha scowled. “That contradictory bit of nonsense? Never. Let’s be about our tasks. Tomorrow will be here sooner than we wish.”

“And our journey harder than we’d like,” Ancrushav added.

Nodding, Druadaen kept his final caveat silent: And peril our only certain companion.


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