WebMage (23 page)

"I'm afraid you're right," said the troll. "Just let me change, and we can get started on Melchior." She reached for the switches on her neck and began the transformation from troll to mainframe.

"Thank you." I turned then and knelt in front of Cerice. Taking her right hand in mine, I pressed a kiss to her palm.

"And here we are again," I said, and laughed a bitter laugh. "I am unused to being at a loss for words, and yet with you I find that is too often my situation. Perhaps that's because what I say to you really matters." Or perhaps it was the fact that what I wanted to say and what I felt I could say were not one and the same. "Whatever the reason, it doesn't appear that I'm going to get the chance to find a cure for my silence. Nor give you the courting I once promised. Instead, the best I can do is to take what is increasingly looking like it's going to be a really messy death far enough away to prevent you from getting caught in the splash zone."

She brought her free hand up and ran it through my hair. An odd smile quirked her lips. "How very typically Ravirn," she said. "Impulsive, romantic, and utterly impractical."

"W-what?" I stammered.

"I take it the plan is to run for the hills, leading the hunt far away before you're caught, then dying in a dramatic last stand, after which they'll run the end credits." She rolled her eyes.

I couldn't help it. I laughed. "That's not exactly how I'd envisioned it," I replied. I put my hands in the air between us, shaping a movie screen, and looked through it at Cerice. "I was actually picturing cleverly eluding my pursuers at the last possible moment and escaping into the night to live the life of a wild-eyed fugitive. You know, dressed only in poorly cured hides and eating rats in some remote mountain hideaway. I must admit the dramatic last stand was running a close second, since I've never developed a taste for rat. But, if you've a better idea, I'd be willing to give it a listen." I waggled my pointed ears at her.

"How about winning instead?" she asked, her voice earnest.

"Well, that's always a possibility, I suppose. It doesn't have that true Greek Tragedy grandeur to it, but maybe we could shoot for a farce instead. How were you thinking of pulling this miraculous victory off?"

"I hadn't really gotten as far along as the end credits yet," said Cerice. "Atropos and Puppeteer are proving a most intractable pair. But I do have an idea for prying two Fates and three Furies loose from your back." She grinned. "It might even loosen Atropos's grip a bit."

"What is it?"

"Well, assuming you aren't really guilty of that mess in the Core, you might try finding proof that Eris is."

"And how would I do that? Break into Castle Discord?" I'd meant it as a joke, but I could see by her expression that was exactly what she'd been thinking.

"Exactly," she said. "If Eris is responsible, the only place you're going to find proof is in her files."

"That's insane. It's suicide."

"Oh come on. What's the worst that can happen?"

"She'll kill me. That's what could… All right. Good point. My life expectancy isn't looking so hot in any case." Another thought occurred to me. "And there's a bonus. It's probably one of the only places in existence where the power of the Fates doesn't count for much. Even the Furies might be slow to violate its environs." I smiled. "You know, I'm starting to like this idea."

So, if I was really that enthusiastic, why did I sound like I did when I said something affected by the Cassandra curse? Not that it mattered. I was going to die soon anyway. I couldn't see any way around it. At least this would let me go down trying to accomplish something.

"Let's get Melchior fixed," said Cerice. "And speed you on your way. 'If it were done… then 'twere well it were done quickly.'"

"Ah,
MacBeth
," I said. "Do you think my chances so slim, Cerice?" The look in her eyes was all the answer I needed. She was already mourning me. "I'm sorry it's come to this. You
will
try to do something about Puppeteer if I die without fixing the problem, won't you?"

"If this tangle of Atropos's kills you, Ravirn, I'll see she regrets it as she's never regretted anything before." She grinned. "If anyone's going to kill you, it's going to be me for all the misery you've put me through in these last few months."

"Well then," I said. "I'd better live through the next couple of days." I bowed deeply. "If it is my lady's will to put an end to me personally, it would be most churlish of me to deny her the honor. Shall we begin the funeral arrangements?" I put her hand on my arm and stepped to the place where Ahllan waited.

"Why not?" she asked. "Shara, would you do answering-machine duty? We don't know when Kalkin will call, and he may not have much time to talk."

"Of course," she replied, with a sigh. "Nothing makes a girl happier than waiting by the phone."

It didn't take much over an hour to whip up a really potent insecticide and pump it into Melchior's system. Once Mel was fully disconnected from Ahllan, I laid him carefully on my lap and hit his programmer's switch.

There was a gentle chime, followed by the sound of his processor cycling. If everything went right, he'd be online in a matter of minutes. Time seemed to distend, stretching grotesquely like the belly of snake after a big meal. I found myself holding my breath. Finally, there was a gentle stirring in my lap.

"Hi, Boss. How long was I out? What'd I miss? Have you managed to destroy the world without me?" His voice was scratchy and sarcastic, just this side of being offensive. In a word, normal. I crushed him to my chest.

"I've missed you," I said, and realized I was crying.

"I wish I could say the same," he growled, "but I've just come back from a place where there's no time in which to miss anyone. No time at all, in fact." His tone was bantering, but there was an underlying tension, and his little arms stole around ray neck in a quick hug. "Thanks for bringing me home."

"I owe you my life, Mel. Several times over. It's the very least I could do."

I held him for a few more seconds before letting him go. Once he was loose, he slid to the floor and looked around.

"Welcome back," said Cerice.

"Yes," agreed Ahllan.

Shara walked over and planted a very firm kiss on Mel's lips, and said, "Nice to see you up again, stud."

"Looks like the gang's all here," he said, sounding distracted.

It was kind of fun to watch him looking from Ahllan to Shara and back, fishing for clues while trying to look nonchalant.

"It's OK," I said. "I know the whole story."

"That's a relief," he replied, but his body stayed tight and coiled until Ahllan nodded. Then he relaxed visibly, sliding down to sit cross-legged on the floor.

"I wasn't sure sending you here was a good idea," he continued. "Especially not after the way Ahllan acted when Shara let Cerice in on the deal. But it was the only thing I could think of to get us out from under the Furies. Speaking of which, I don't suppose you solved all of our problems while I was out, did you?"

"Afraid not, little buddy, though Cerice
has
helped me come up with a really spectacular way of committing suicide."

"Fantastic." He turned to Cerice and shook his head. "That is
not
the kind of help he needs. If there were an Olympic event for getting into hot water, he'd be awarded all three medals by acclamation." The webgoblin sighed. "What is it this time? Blindfolded motorcycle racing?"

"Even better," I said. "What's the perfect follow-up to hacking the Fate Core?"

"I can't even begin to imagine," said Melchior, sounding resigned.

"If you think of the Fate Core as one inviolable pole of the battle between chaos and order, what's the other one?"

He put his head in his hands and whispered between the fingers. "Cerice, please tell me he doesn't mean Castle Discord."

"I'm afraid he does."

"Oh my," said the webgoblin, taking a deep breath. "And this was your idea?"

"Guilty," said Cerice.

"I should have stayed crashed." Melchior started pacing. "It would have saved some steps. I don't suppose there's any way I could talk you out of this."

"No," I replied. "At this point, I think it's the only way to move forward. If there's a chance of clearing my name, it rests in Castle Discord." I quickly brought him up to date.

"I guess you're right," he said when I finished. "But I'd been kind of looking forward to a bit of quiet time when we got here. Preferably with lots of Ahllan's wonderful baking involved." Then he straightened up and squared his shoulders. "When do we leave?"

"
I
leave as soon as we can crack a channel open," I answered. "But this is a volunteers-only mission. If you'd rather stay here, I'll understand. In fact, I'd applaud the decision. That way when I do get myself killed, I'll take one fewer friend with me."

"Hey!" said Melchior. "That's not how it works. I'm your familiar. Where you go, I go."

"Not anymore. We both know that you're more than an extension of my will. If you want to come with me, I won't turn you down. Necessity knows I could use the help. But if you do come, you do it as a friend, not a servant. It has to be your free choice."

The look on his face was agonized. "Damn, but I didn't know self-determination could hurt so much," he said. "You're going to die. You know that, right?"

"Probably."

"There's no doubt about it, not if you go alone. And then you'll break her heart." He jerked a thumb in Cerice's direction. "I am not going to be held responsible for that. So, I guess I'll just have to come along and save your sorry ass one more time."

"Are you sure?" I asked. "If you do this, it has to be for you, not for anybody else."

"You're not going to let me fob off the responsibility for this, are you?" he asked. I shook my head. He sagged, then lifted his chin decisively. "I'm still in. Life with you is always interesting. I don't know what I'd do for entertainment without the chaos that follows in your wake." His mouth quirked upward at one corner. "Besides, 'I've grown accustomed to your face.'" He stuck a tiny hand out. "Partners?"

"Partners it is," I replied, taking it. I suddenly found myself grinning like a maniac. Maybe we could pull this thing off after all. "Hey, Cerice, when you came up with this crazy idea, did you have any thoughts for how to start? Castle Discord isn't exactly on the mweb."

"Actually, yes. I figured we could try a variation of the technique I used to get to your DecLocus back when you crashed the mweb. A single-use gate."

"I thought that required being at one of the Fate Servers."

"It does," she replied.

"You know I don't dare go anywhere near any of the three."

"Well then, aren't you lucky we have a Fate Server right here?" Ahllan stepped forward and bowed.

"Oh," I said. "Right. I keep forgetting. But don't you think Castle Discord will be warded against this sort of thing? It's not like the Fates are Eris's favorite people."

"Probably," said Cerice, "but it's the only suggestion I've got."

"And it's one more than I've come up with, so I guess we'll have to go with it. Do you want to start the arrangements now, or should we wait until we hear from Kalkin? I'm still on evil-genius watch, am I not?"

"Why don't we get started," she replied. "Kalkin has already taken longer to get back to us then he should have."

"I'm ready when you are," I said.

"Let's begin then," she said. "Ahllan?"

"Of course," replied the webtroll. "We'll need a flat wall. Come on."

Milan led a small parade to the back of the house-under-hill. Just past the bathroom, the passage ended in a heavy steel door marked USS ARIZONA. Ahllan undogged the hatch. Beyond, a series of shallow stairs led downward.

They ended in big room with worktables on two walls. The one on the left was covered with clamps and soldering irons, oscilloscopes and wires, cables and computer enclosures. In short, a fully stocked lab for the repair and assembly of computer hardware. The one on the right held chalk and string, alembics and beakers, and countless jars of herbs and multicolored fluids. It had all the makings of a classical wizard's workshop.

"Wow," I said. "I want one."

Cerice nodded. "It's a really nice setup. There's even a clean room through a door under the stairs."

Ahllan grabbed a box of chalk and a tape measure before heading for the wall at the end of the room.

"How does this work?" I asked, as she began inscribing a large hexagram.

"It's a bit like an ltp link," said Cerice.

"Why is it vertical?"

"It's going to create a tunnel of probability," said Ahllan. "One end's anchored here, the other in the target DecLocus. If it were on the floor, that distance would be vertical, and you'd have to drop something like fifty feet."

She finished the basic geometric structure and started putting equations in the interstices with blanks instead of numbers. I asked her about that.

"In an ltp link, the magical resource locators are just placeholders," said Ahllan. "The worlds are constantly shifting in their relation to each other as new DecLoci are created and old ones fade away. You send a request to the server to open a gate between two mrls. Then the server calculates relative positions and opens the way."

"Uh-huh," I said. "I get that." It was all stuff I'd learned long ago. "But what's with the blank spots?"

"Castle Discord is off the mweb, so the calculations have to be done on the fly and constantly updated. Every time I refigure, the numbers will automatically show up in the boxes." She filled in another symbol. "There, that's it. We can start whenever you're ready."

I turned to Cerice. Opened my mouth. Closed it again. There were so many hard truths and half-truths between us, so much deception and delusion. And now, one more goodbye. Cerice smiled sadly and shook her head.

"I know," she said. "I know. It'll have to wait." She stroked my cheek. "After this is over we'll talk."

I caught her hand and held it against my face. "What if there is no after? This isn't a faerie tale."