Dark Heart Part 32

CHAPTER 14.

THE DAUGHTER'S NUMBER A TUG ON HER MIND jerked Lenares awake.

She liked to wake to one thing at a time, but even before she opened her eyes she was a.s.sailed from every direction by sensations and their a.s.sociated numbers.

Another tug.

The sound of waves cras.h.i.+ng. A cold splash.

The heat and ache of pain; the numbness of what she feared might be a serious injury.

Cool wind brus.h.i.+ng her face, pulling at her hair, making a hollow booming sound behind her.

An insistent tug.

The arcing cry of a seagull.

The sun beating down on her eyelids, the sting of salt in the corners of her eyes.

The tug, tug of the mathematical line she had secured to the hole in the world. One of the holes. The one exploited by the Daughter.

She opened her eyes.

She lay on rocks below a seaside cliff, but not the same rocks as yesterday. There had been no cave in the cliffs yesterday. She shuddered. The sight of any hole, any void, set her on edge.

Tug. Tug, tug.

She had been s.h.i.+fted since she fell. Perhaps she did it herself. Yes, that was it: an explanation for the abrasions on her body, on her hands and knees, that hadn't been there yesterday.

The annoying tugging hadn't been there either.

Something was broken in her chest. Lenares was a little hazy about anatomy, but it wasn't her heart or lungs; it felt more like the dull ache she imagined would be a.s.sociated with a broken bone. One of her ribs perhaps. It hurt to breathe, but the pain wasn't unbearable.

Tug.

Stop tugging me!

She had bled on the rocks yesterday, but these rocks were clean. The tide was almost in, her numbers told her, but she was safe from the waves, though the spray spattered her with stinging drops of salty water.

One of her knees hurt, the left one. She had to sit up to see it; her leg hung down from the rocks and her foot actually trailed in the water. She hissed at the pain in her chest as she moved.

Tug.

Snarling, Lenares s.n.a.t.c.hed at the link between herself and the hole, the one she had spun with her experimental numbers. The link seemed to have no solid anchor in the hole-apart from her unproven notion that the far end was held by Mahudia. Her dead Mahudia.

The link shook, then oscillated like the wave she could make in a skipping rope if the other girls let her play. The wave reached the far end.

Ah, so you are awake, little one.

'I'm not speaking to you.'

Oh yes, you are. See? You've always had trouble with numbers, little Lenares. Particularly zero. You say something isn't, when clearly it is.

'That sounds like a lie. I don't lie.'

No? So when you said you weren't speaking to me, what did you mean?

The Daughter was right. 'I will find out how you were able to trick me, and change my thinking. I'm not perfect.'

There are more important things to consider, little one. There is a nexus coming, and you need to be there. Are you ready to travel?

'I'm not doing anything you tell me to.'

Really? Breathe, Lenares.

For an instant she considered holding her breath, but that would just be childish. 'I'm not breathing because you told me to,' she argued. 'You could say "live" to me and the only way I could disobey you would be to die. But that doesn't make you my lord.'

Your problem, Lenares, is that you don't truly understand numbers.

There are things you don't understand either, Daughter, Lenares thought; but, unlike the unwise G.o.d, she did not speak her thoughts aloud.

One of the things Lenares felt certain the Daughter didn't understand was that Lenares had tied a numerical link to the hole the Daughter used. Had the G.o.d known, she would surely have taken steps to undo it. The link allowed Lenares to sense with much more clarity not only the Daughter's numbers, but also her emotions and thoughts.

But the Daughter was right: Lenares didn't fully understand the numbers she had used. She had puzzled over the mathematical concept of 'nothing' for a long time, even before she had become aware of the hole. Perhaps-she couldn't remember, but it seemed likely-her thinking about how to express 'nothing' had led her to the discovery of the hole. Holes. She still wasn't certain how many.

The cosmographers had a strong tradition of recording and debating concepts, and Lenares had spent many happy days in the vaults reading complex theorems. But none of them did more than touch on the notion of 'nothing' as a mathematical concept.

Then one day she had come across the notes of the madman Qarismi of Kutrubul, a small town in the Biyyamid, a fertile area well to the south of Talamaq. He was famous for getting himself arrested every market day for his outrageous and blasphemous statements. Latterly, though, the Emperor had encouraged him, employing a note-taker to record his ramblings. These notes had recently been deposited in the cosmographers' library, and no one else had seen them. Lenares was certain of that: cosmographers were taught to respect doc.u.ments, but these were covered with some sort of jam. Mahudia would have lamented the state of the notes, but Lenares hadn't cared.

The madman had obviously appended new material to his lectures. 'How many sons do I have?' the crazy Qarismi asked himself in frenzied jottings in the margins of a discussion about root vegetables. 'None. My heart is a void, I have no sons. What number is the number of my sons? How can the number of my sons be a number when it is nothing?' The last line had been crossed out, but Lenares could still read it: 'How can nothing be something? Is "none" a quant.i.ty of something?'

Lenares had read on, fascinated. 'Let x be the number of brothers I have, and y be the number of sisters. Let x = y. The mathematical difference between x and y is a number, but it is nothing. How can it be a number and a nothing? It must be a number-called 0. Zero after Ahmal's naming. So, x y = 0. But what does that mean? Zero is here defined as brothers minus sisters. But what does that mean?'

The marginal notes continued on the next page. 'Zero is defined by its context. Consider my debts: I and the moneylender Aleb know well it is possible for me to have less than no money. I buy a pastina, I have no money left. I buy another pastina, I owe Aleb. So zero is a placeholder: between the state of owning and owing, reality and its negation.'

These strange words had come back to Lenares' mind as she considered the hole in the world. She had tied her strange numbers to...to what? Not to nothing. To a mathematical concept that was defined by being between something? Yes. The hole was in the wall of the world, the material worldwall that separated time and s.p.a.ce from the realm of the G.o.ds. So the hole was defined by the wall, in the same way that having no money was defined by being neither the state of owning nor owing. That was what she had instinctively worked out when she had a.s.signed her own numbers to the hole. She had defined the hole by its context. Now she could track any contact the Daughter might make with the world. It would tug at her.

As it did now.

But she was no nearer knowing whether she had imagined Mahudia's hand taking her numbers and tying them to the hole. Patience. Understanding would come.

'No, I don't truly understand what it is like not to exist,' she said. 'You would have to be a G.o.d to understand that.' She smiled, not a nice smile. 'What's it like, Daughter? Is it a wonderful thing, not existing?'

I don't understand you. Of course I exist. The Daughter's voice sounded vexed.

'Then why all this effort to return to the world?'

To help you, fool. Not that you're proving worthy of it. Get up, girl; there is someone approaching. I have worked hard to bring him here. He, also, is necessary.

'Poor cold Daughter, wrecking the world in an attempt to get back what you left behind. How much more will you destroy before you admit defeat?'

Silence, little one. Or I will dispose of you and find someone more suited.

'You can't kill me,' Lenares said. Time to test another of her theories. 'You don't have the strength. Especially not since you've just spent most of it on the wave that smashed the tea house, and the remainder helping me to this place.'

Not all of my strength is spent, said the Daughter, her voice roughening. I still have enough to crush you like a bug.

'And do you want to attract your brother's attention in your weakened state?'

The big gamble, but her numbers led her to suspect it. There was a simple pattern in the interval between major attacks through the hole(s) in the world that implied a recovery period. Finite strength.

Not much of a risk, the voice hissed. Since he helped me with the wave.

Oh. Get up, get up, Lenares told herself. I miscalculated.

She grasped the rocks with abraded hands and heaved herself upwards, hissing as her chest tightened painfully. Hurry, she told herself, something is coming.

And something came from out of the sun, a dazzling blaze of light, so bright Lenares had to s.h.i.+eld her eyes. When next she looked there were three suns, one on each side of the main sun.

'Pretty,' she said, as she scrambled across the rocks and towards the cave. 'But an illusion.'

I've made the air colder so I can manifest myself, said the Daughter. Then: Where are you going? Don't go in the cave, Lenares. Please.

Lenares blinked: her eyes were still dazed by the glare of the sun. The cave mouth was disturbingly circular and, as she focused, she could see nothing within. But it is open to the sun: light should be illuminating the rear of the cave.

Not a cave, then.

She found herself between G.o.ds.

A cold mist emerged from the cave, the barest emanation, but flowing against the onsh.o.r.e breeze. It flailed in the air, writhed, then began to shape itself into a hand. Cruelly sharp talons raked the air above Lenares, searching.

He has awoken, the Daughter said. You must flee.

'I'm already fleeing you!' Lenares yelled. The talons might be made of mist, but she had no doubt they could hurt her.

Flee. I will keep him at bay.

'Why should I care? He's no worse than you.'

You are wrong, Lenares; of all the things you have ever claimed, that is the most wrong. The Son must never be let loose in the world. He will lay waste to it.

A hand of s.h.i.+mmering rainbow light came from out of the sea, a sun-shaped amalgam of sparkle on the waves and reflection from the clouds. It was the most beautiful, fragile thing Lenares had ever seen, and she said so, even as she scrambled for her life.

It is all I can do, the Daughter admitted, in my weakened state. Manipulate sunlight and cloud crystals through temperature. Behold the battle of the exhausted G.o.ds, fought with weapons without substance. A bitter laugh rippled across the sh.o.r.e.

The two hands came together, the grey hand of the Son and the s.h.i.+mmering rainbow-hued hand of the Daughter. Clashed, drew apart, and clashed again, looking for a grip. Lenares reached the sand and began to run in earnest. Her rib flamed in agony, but she forced herself to ignore it.

Out of my way, sister, rumbled a voice so deep it shook the earth. Small rocks were shaken loose from the cliff above and clattered down onto the beach. Lenares had to wait until they stopped falling.

She is mine. I found her, I raised her. Find yourself another tool.

I don't want her. I need no tool. I simply want to deprive you of her.

The fingers locked together with a ghostly sound. Ethereal digits squirmed above the rocks as the two G.o.ds traded spiteful insults.

She's mine.

I should have killed you before our ascension.

Then you would not have been chosen, you fool.

It would have been worth it. This whole effort to become corporeal again is so I can get my hands around your throat. I want to feel your arteries pumping in vain against my fingers.

So you've said, many times. I still don't believe you. I loved you once, brother, and I know you loved me.

Stop lying. There is no moral high ground to be claimed between you and me. The girl believes you are no better than I am. She is right.

The beach was nearly at an end. Ahead lay a small promontory. If she could just get around the point, she might be able to scale the cliff, or find shelter somewhere. To avoid their gaze long enough to devise some strategy. Eventually to find the others.

To find Torve.

She turned to see the two giant hands wrestling on the beach, scoring deep marks on the sand, knocking rocks from the cliff-face, occasionally splas.h.i.+ng in the surf. The Son appeared to be getting the better of his sister. His hand was larger, his talons longer, while hers struggled under his, pale knuckles sc.r.a.ping on the rocks. The rainbow colours had dimmed.

Just then the sun went behind a cloud.

The Daughter's hand disappeared and the Son roared in triumph. Lenares leapt forward onto the rocks of the headland, spurred on by the bellows behind her, bellows drawing nearer to the accompaniment of cras.h.i.+ng and thumping, as though the G.o.d dragged the cave along with him.

She did not want to get caught up in that grey hand.

She had underestimated them both. Her numbers were correct, but only in a relative sense. All her calculations of the strength of the G.o.ds had to be increased by some constant below which they did not fall. It made sense: they had to have some baseline strength or they would not survive beyond the walls of the world. The strength might come from beyond the world, in which case it could not be enumerated.

Could that be a way to defeat them? Cause them to draw more and more of their strength until they no longer had enough to sustain themselves?

A thought for another day.

Could a misty hand cast a shadow? Something loomed over her. She kept her head down, she did not want to look; her fear was finally getting the better of her, it was harder and harder to take steps forward; so cruel, she had almost escaped...

'Ahoy, the sh.o.r.e!' a cheery voice cried. It came from somewhere to her right, out to sea.

Above her a deep growl shook the headland, and the shadow vanished.

'Hoy!' There was a man in a boat, and he was waving to her with a small, pale hand. A human, welcoming hand. 'Can you tell me how far it is to Foulwater Mouth? Oh my, I'm lost, oh yes indeed.'

The man brought his boat to sh.o.r.e on the next beach. Lenares helped him to drag it the last few yards, though the effort bit into her chest.