Ventus Part 10

He shook his head and sat up a little straighter. Must be the wine, he thought hopefully. With an effort, he returned his attention to the banquet.

Linden and Sheia still ate stone-faced, though their wives seemed animated enough. At the head table, Yuri seemed most relaxed, his slack-jawed pale face s.h.i.+ning in the gas light. But, Jordan noticed, his hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat, and it wasn't hot in here. Of course, Yuri was right next to the fire.

In more ways than one, Jordan thought, and smiled. "You wouldn't wish to have the troubles of the highborn," Jordan's father had told him more than once. Just now he agreed.

Jordan leaned back and closed his eyes.

His ruined hand brushed aside twigs, revealing a forest path. With a sigh he stepped down to it. For a moment he swayed, and put one hand out to steady himself against a tree. Then he sat down.

Armiger looked up at the sky. Night was coming. He had been walking for two days now without pause; night merely slowed him down. At first it had been mechanical, aimless activity. Gradually as he walked, though, the bright air and thrum of life all around him awakened something in him--a kind of recognition, an identification with the things that grew and struggled all around. If he squinted at the sky, his healing eyes could perceive the faint threads of the Diadem swans wavering in their high seats. The Winds still did not know he was here. But while the sight of them filled him with a deep pang of loss--for they were his own kind, if distantly related--it was the buzzing insects and the gaudy flowers that he drew strength from. The swans, like his greater Self, were inaccessible.

As he walked, Armiger for the first time contemplated what it meant to be mortal.

Now as he paused on this tenuous path, he forced himself to take stock of his body. Hitherto the body had been just a vessel, rugged but ultimately disposable. Today as he walked he had begun to come to grips with the idea that this was his only body now--that his resources were finite and concentrated in this ruined husk.

His wounds were healing. If he tried he could articulate words with his split tongue, and his fingers could grip again. The terrible wound in his chest had closed, and great sloughs of skin had fallen away to reveal flesh new and pink. As he walked he had stuffed leaves into his mouth to make up the ma.s.s he'd lost, dimly aware as he did so that the human biology of his body protested. He overrode it to command digestion and a.s.similation. After all he was not human; he was Armiger, agent of a G.o.d.

Or he had been. What he examined now in the failing daylight was a badly wounded man, dehydrated and staggering on blistered feet. In his experience in the field, he had seen men like this weeping as they collapsed by the side of his marching columns. They tended not to rise again.

When he closed his eyes and listened to this human body, Armiger knew why. Yesterday as he walked he had wondered how the small lives around him experienced existence, unaware that he need only pay attention to his own body to know.

As long as he thought of himself as Armiger the demiG.o.d, this body's problems seemed trivial, as he had treated those dying men's tears as trivial. After all, they were so stupidly unaware of themselves as parts of the systems of army, ecology and planetary action which Armiger felt in his deepest being. What was a body, or even a mind? Get rid of it, there were more, the important thing was the system. Armiger had been the systems' awareness; they had been it also, but never knew.

While he had his tie to the omniscient power that had created him, Armiger had rarely used the brain of this human body he was in, except when he needed to understand the irrational actions of his soldiers. This body thought, and felt, like any human, but he didn't need to use that mind, for he had access to the far greater mind of his master, whose own thoughts could themselves be conscious ent.i.ties.

Previously Armiger had existed as G.o.d and mind, with the body merely a tool. Now he was only mind and body. He ran his hands over this body, finding the strains and infections. He stank, he realized. The human instincts he had ignored so long quailed at the damage, the humiliation of his state. For the first time, Armiger opened himself to those instincts.

This was what his men had felt, fighting and dying. This was the essential experience of the deer and foxes he had sighted as he walked: pain and loneliness.

Armiger no longer had the G.o.d to center him, make him complete. Humans and the animals of this world had existed without such a G.o.d. How? Who are you? he asked his human side.

In wonder, Armiger realized he had sunk to his knees, was clutching himself, and crying in wrenching gusts. And now he knew the feeling of the human misery he had heard so much on this world.

"Calandria!" Jordan clutched at her shoulder.

"Shh!" She put a hand on his lips angrily.

He started to protest--he needed help, the visions were back--then noticed the silence.

Jordan turned his head. A few people were staring at him. The rest had their eyes on the head table, and only one voice in the whole hall was speaking. It was Yuri, who had risen and now stood with his arms crossed, staring at nothing while he spoke. Jordan had not heard him speak before; his voice was a high tenor, very mannered and hard to hear, even in this attentive silence.

"...Are aware of the Iapysian tragedy. The Boros clan has an obligation, as n.o.bility in that state, to not stand aside and allow it to continue. We also have an obligation, as n.o.bility in other states, to avoid any action that might seem to be foreign interference. That is the reason I have not acted before now. It is the reason you were called here. All three nations know the Boros' are meeting, and that we are meeting at our ancestral home because it is our home, and for no other political reason.

"Now, there are many stories circulating about the nature of the catastrophe in Iapysia. It is popularly held to be a punishment by the Winds, who are popularly held to have installed Queen Galas to begin with. Firstly, though, she was the legal heir, so she would have inherited without their help. And second, she has been committing all manner of atrocities in the name of 'reform', many of which have struck at the very heart of our social order."

Brendan Sheia glared at Yuri. "Is reform a bad word around here?" he boomed.

Yuri held up a hand, c.o.c.king his head, and said, "Not at all. But we have to face the prospect of a nation ruled only by the rabble, in the form of the Iapysian parliament. Regardless of Queen Galas' crimes, no right-minded man or woman would want to see the state headless. We would all have to deal with the consequences and, I believe, the Winds would not look favorably upon Iapysia. And we, the Boros, are part of Iapysia."

Calandria put her hand on Jordan's sleeve. "Are you all right?" she asked in a whisper.

He wanted to tell her about the visions--but that would end the evening for sure. It wasn't that Jordan was enjoying this a.s.sembly, but it was a very big thing to be here at all. He wanted to stay until the end.

He shook his head. "I'm fine." But he was beginning to sweat.

Yuri continued: "The Queen earned the wrath of the parliament, and much of the n.o.bility, by creating a number of `experimental villages' in which the laws of the land were replaced by mock laws of her own devising. In one such, every citizen was ent.i.tled to both a husband and a wife--male and female." Yuri nodded sagely at the shocked expressions of his audience. "In another she repealed law entirely, replacing it with cra.s.s public opinion. And in yet another, she inverted all the laws of the land, so that no one was punishable for any act--instead of being punished for acting unjustly, people were rewarded for acting justly. In short, she flung a challenge into the face of decency in all its forms. All in the name of some nebulous `reform'." Yuri looked down his nose at Brendan Sheia. "We are all ashamed of the actions of this Queen, and no amount of condemnation would be sufficient.

"But she is Queen, and if she is to be dealt with, it should be by the land owners, not the rabble. So, my dear family, we find ourselves on the horns of a dilemma, for the army raised and ruled by parliament is winning the war against the Queen."

Who cared? He had to get out of here. Jordan made to stand, only to feel Axel's hand clamp onto his shoulder, forcing him down again. He turned to snap at the man, but a wave of dizziness overcame him.

Strange, how rea.s.suring tears were. They were right for this body, a healing action. Armiger had never known that about tears before, had always taken them to be some reflex reaction of his men to pain. But they freed up sorrow, and this body of his, now his only one, thanked him for allowing them.

Now he stood, wiped his eyes, and gazed up and down the path. What else did this body need? It seemed he should take it into account now that his greater Self was gone. He required proper food, yes, and shelter, warmth and rest. Rest...

He had not known that his body was so weary. All the energy he had poured into it over the past day had poured right out again as he walked. He was healing despite his great expenditure of energy, not because of it. If he wasn't careful, the body would give out again, this time permanently. He would have to find another, or exist only as the ghostly net of threads that had first come to this world. While he could survive that way, Armiger feared the loss of his human body--it was his anchor. Without it he would drift into the madness of his own sense of loss.

His body wanted the comfort of its own kind to heal it. He would see where this path led to.

Axel took his hand off Jordan's shoulder. The kid had settled down. He now appeared to be concentrating on Yuri's speech. Good; couldn't have him running off to the latrine right now. Yuri was obviously about to announce which s.h.i.+p he was backing, the parliament or the Queen. It would not do to be conspicuous right now.

Jordan couldn't move. His perceptions seemed doubled: he knew he was sitting at the table in the banquet hall, even felt Axel take his hand from his shoulder. But at the same time, he was far away, watching through another set of eyes. His other hand brushed leaves aside; he stumbled, and Jordan tried to put his right hand out to steady himself. It worked!--he grabbed a branch. But then the hand let go again, before he willed it. No, he was not controlling this body, only reacting in synchrony with it.

"So it is with reluctance and in full awareness that this decision will please no one, that I have to tell you the official position of the house of Boros." Yuri frowned around at the a.s.sembled family members. "In the interest of eventually returning a true monarchy to Iapysia, we must support parliament at this time."

The path wound down a hillside, and there on a shoulder of the hill, under tall trees, sat a cabin. Extensive gardens were carved out of the brambles at the bottom of the hill, where a small stream wound through this wooded ravine.

Armiger paused, breath heaving. He felt conflicting impulses--to avoid this place, since he was not strong and his body might not survive a hostile encounter--or to seek help for it now. He was desperately ill, tired and wounded.

He stood s.h.i.+fting from foot to foot, aware of jabs of pain every time he moved. Where else could he go? Would he walk to the edge of the world? Or until the Winds found him and wrapped him in their own unwanted embrace? That prospect was daunting.

A gasp from behind him caught Armiger by surprise, and he tried to turn, only to lose his footing. With a raw shout he tumbled down the slope, quite helpless. At the bottom he lay wondering at his weakness. Never, even in the tomb, had he felt this way. His energies were failing from the effort it took to restore his body to life. Coughing, he blinked at the pale leaves high above.

"G.o.ddess!" The voice was a woman's. "Are you all right?"

A shadow bent over him. He heard another intake of breath. "G.o.ddess, you are not!"

Armiger tried to lift his hand. "Please," he croaked. "Help me." His black fingers closed in fine hair.

"No!" Jordan was barely aware that his plate was skittering across the table, and off to shatter on the floor. He had fallen forward, fighting to hold back Armiger's distant body. "Run! Get away from him!"

No one was paying any attention to him. Brendan Sheia was on his feet, shaking his finger at Yuri. "This is a calumny!" he shouted. "We all know the real reason you're supporting parliament, father. It's to cut me out of my birthright!"

A gasp went around the room. Then everyone was shouting at once.

No one could hear Jordan--not those in the banquet hall, transfixed as they were by the drama unfolding here, nor the distant woman, too close to Armiger. Jordan felt her hands on him--or were they Calandria's?

A torrent of outraged voices enveloped him--"Your anger does you no credit, Brendan!" "Quiet, Linden, you traitor." Chairs toppled; ladies scurried for cover as the two Boros heirs confronted one another below the head table.

None of this mattered to Jordan. He tried with all his will to take control of Armiger's body, but it was futile. That hand in her hair... He dimly knew that Axel had him in an armlock and together with Calandria, was marching him from the banquet hall.

He fought the wrong bodies, and even as they resisted, in that distant place the one who should resist, should flee, did not. Instead, her gentle arms gathered him up.

8.

Calandria poured some wine and handed Jordan the cup. He accepted it gratefully, and hunched further under the blanket next to the fire Axel had lit in the fireplace. Axel now paced angrily at the doorway to their tower room. He had barred the door. Several times people had knocked, but he'd shouted that things were under control, Jordan was fine.

It seemed he'd disgraced them at the banquet. Jordan could still taste vomit faintly; he gulped at the wine to mask it. His hands shook, and he stared at them dumbly.

"What's wrong with him?" Axel demanded.

"He seems to be becoming more attuned to the implant. He was only able to receive when he was asleep before. Jordan, can you hear me?"

He drew himself closer to the fire. Reluctantly, he said, "Yeah."

Her fingers alighted on his shoulder. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah." He drained the wine, facing into the fire.

"This is too much for him," Axel said. "We should stop."

"We don't know where he is yet!" she retorted. "The avatar is a threat until we find him and neutralize him. You know how the G.o.ds are. We have no way of knowing whether 3340 hid a resurrection seed in Armiger. If it did, and the seed sprouts... then, everything we've done is threatened."

"There are other ways to find him."

"No!" They both turned their heads. Jordan glared at them. At that moment the two of them reminded him of his parents, ineffectually mouthing words instead of acting. "We have to do something now! He's hurting people."

Calandria came to sit next to him. "What do you mean?"

"We have to find out where he is right now," Jordan insisted. "You promised you would take the visions away when I'd told you where Armiger is. Well, let's do it. I thought after the manse that things would get easier, since you said you knew what was happening and I thought you could do something about it. But you didn't expect what happened tonight, and it's getting worse!" He hunkered himself down, trying to pin her with the reproach of his gaze.

Calandria and Axel exchanged looks. Axel shrugged, appearing almost amused. "There are three of us in on this venture now, Cal. He's got a point."

"Where's the wisdom you were going to trade me for telling you where Armiger is?" Jordan pointed out. "I haven't got anything out of this. You kidnapped me, and put visions in my head till I'm almost crazy!" He was mildly astonished at his own outburst. Of course, he'd had a few cups of wine tonight, but really enough was enough. An echo of the force that had driven him into the night after Emmy drove him to speak now.

"You seem like the Winds sometimes," he said, "but you haven't done anything for me. You said you would."

Calandria stood. "I'm sorry," she said. "I promise to make it up to you. And I realize I made a mistake in bringing you to the banquet. I didn't think you would find it so stressful."

"Wait a second," said Axel. "So he was under extreme stress tonight. And started having visions. Is stress the trigger?"

She nodded, and sighed. "Sorry, Axel. I wasn't sure of it before, so I didn't mention it. But the banquet proves it. There's a correlation between stress and his receptivity."

"Maybe if he can control his stress reactions, he can control the visions," said Axel. Jordan looked up again at this.

Calandria looked pained. "Yes, but we don't want to eliminate them entirely. On the other hand, he won't be able to learn to control himself fast enough to prevent us learning what we need to know."

"We can at least teach him how to avoid the sort of thing that just happened." Axel nodded, his arms crossed and his eyes on Jordan. "Teach him some of your tricks. Relaxation games. Mind control. We owe him that much, and you'd said we'd pay him in wisdom. So let's start paying."

Calandria looked from Axel to Jordan, and nodded wearily. "All right." She sat down again. "Jordan, we will start your education right now, if you want."

"Yes!" He turned to face her. Finally.

"This will take time, and a lot of practise. It might not even work for the first while, but with practise you'll start to get it. Okay? Good. The first thing you must learn is that you cannot do anything if you cannot control your own mind--your emotions and your reactions. So, that is the first thing you will learn. Beginning with how to relax."

Jordan forgot the heat at his back and the wine in his cup, and listened.

Two anxious days pa.s.sed. Armiger wasn't moving, so Jordan had nothing new to report to Calandria. He knew she was frustrated by the delay; they went over his previous visions time and again, but he could provide nothing new for her. He often saw her meditating with her eyes closed, and often after these sessions she had new questions for him about the landscapes he had glimpsed: "was there a tall rounded hill in the distance? Did the forest extend in three tongues near the horizon?" He had no answers.

On the third day, on one of his infrequent breaks, Jordan went to the roof to stretch. The Boros estate sprawled out below. People went to and fro about duties that were all familiar to him. He could tell what was happening by watching the servants, though the purposes of the Boros' themselves were impossible to read.

Though politics as such was beyond him, Jordan could read the story of the Boros family home from its very stones--could tell what was added when, and in what style. If you went by the boasts of the visiting family members, the clan had always been prominent. But this tower was ancient, and the manor house new, and in between were traces of buildings and walls in styles from various periods. Jordan could imagine each in turn, and he saw large gaps between the apparent razing of one set of buildings and the growth of the manor. If this were the Boros' ancestral home, it had lain unoccupied for up to a century at a time.

This exercise was a good way to take his mind off things. And, he had to admit, he was starting to relax despite himself. Over the past days he had constantly practiced the skills Calandria May had taught him. He'd never known he should breathe from the belly, not the chest--or that his body carried tension in tight muscles even when his mind was relaxed. He scanned his body every minute or two, and every time he did, he found some part of it had tightened up, usually his shoulders. He would concentrate for a second, relax them, and go back to what he was doing. The feeling of being pursued that had plagued him was receding.

Best of all, the visitations by Armiger were no longer arbitrary and uncontrollable. He still dreamed about the demiG.o.d, but in daylight he could tell when a vision fit was creeping up on him. Using the relaxation exercises Calandria had taught him, he could usually stop it dead. Calandria encouraged him to think of the visions as a talent he could master, and not as some alien intrusion.

He knew this worked to her ends, but was prepared to go along because, at last, her ends paralleled his own. He was able to think about the visions with some objectivity, and report what he saw and heard in detail to her.

Most importantly, what he saw and heard had changed. Armiger lay in bed in a cabin somewhere to the south. He was being nursed by a solitary woman, a widow who lived alone in the woods. In his convalescence Armiger seemed like an ordinary man. His terrible wounds were healing, and the small s.n.a.t.c.hes of dialogue between him and his benefactor that Jordan caught were mundane, awkward, almost shy. Armiger had not eaten her, nor did he order her about. He accepted her help, and thanked her graciously for it. His voice was no longer a choked rasp, but a mellow tenor.

Jordan didn't doubt Armiger's capacity for evil. He was not human. But what Jordan saw was no longer nightmarish, and that, too, was a relief.

"Hey, there you are!" Axel Chan's head poked up from the open trapdoor of the tower's roof. He emerged, dusted himself off, and came to join Jordan at the battlement. "What are you doing up here? The gardens are fine today. Soaking up the sun?"

Jordan nodded. "I like it up here. I can see all the buildings." Gardens didn't interest him; they were the provenance of gardeners, not stoneworkers like him.

He hesitated, then asked something that had been on his mind. "We're not staying here, are we?"

"We'll be leaving as soon as we have a fix on Armiger." Axel leaned out carefully, and spat. "Hm. Twenty meters down." He looked slyly at Jordan. "You wouldn't be hiding from Calandria up here, would you?"

"No." It was the truth, though Jordan did know what Axel meant. "She works me pretty hard." If she had her way, Jordan would spent sixteen hours a day on his exercises.

Axel shrugged. "She's trying to pack as much information into you as she can in a short time."

"But she won't answer all my questions."

"Really? Like what?"