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Part 10 (Conclusion)
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
1
They spent four weeks at Hexiya's apartment.
The first night, they treated each other's injuries.
'This is the third time we've had to play the part of surgeons,' said Kaledria as she sat upon the side of the bath and Hexiya sewed up her side. There was dark amusement in her voice. 'May it be the last.'
When it was done, they bathed and washed each other. Then they went to bed and slept the sleep of utter exhaustion - deep and long.
The next day they covered the window that Kaledria had broken when she had recovered her sword and other weapons. When that was done, and the rain and wind had been shut out, the place seemed to become, once again, their sanctuary - sheltering, protective and a haven away from the world. Within the comfortable rooms they were able to ease away the pain they had endured. Once more they could enjoy the love that they shared.
For much of the day they sat together on the sofa under a blanket and listened to the patter of rain on the roof and against the windows.
2
Further days passed.
They rested and ate and slept. Sometimes they lay down upon a rug by the fire, their naked bodies warmed by the dancing flames. They took long baths together. Later they stayed long in bed, making love and sleeping and making love again - very gently at first, to protect their hurts, then with increasing passion.
At length they went out to buy food and firewood, but retreated quickly back to safety and rest.
They cooked exquisite meals. Sometimes they did so together. On other occasions they tried to surprise and delight each other with their creations.
They read old manuscripts from Hexiya's shelves - histories, ancient poetry and epic stories. They discussed them afterwards.
Sometimes Hexiya brought out her flute and played for a while - compositions that unfolded in slow beauty, like the opening petals of a flower growing upon a landscape of ice - complex melodies she fashioned herself. One night she spent some time writing a piece inspired by Kaledria's swordplay. She played it to her the next morning.
They began to exercise together. Avoiding anything strenuous, they concentrated on stretching and relaxation techniques. Kaledria showed Hexiya a few of the forms she knew. Hexiya smiled ruefully at that fact that Kaledria was so much stronger than her.
'How is that?' she asked once. 'I am smaller than you but have a pretty sturdy build. You have beautiful muscles but they are not exaggerated. Yet you have enormous strength compared to me. More than even the strongest men.'
'My physical ability is like your psychic ability,' replied Kaledria. 'It is exceptional.'
'Your body is incredible,' said Hexiya with a grin.
Kaledria looked her up and down. 'I like your body more,' she said, a twinkle in her eyes.
As more time passed, Hexiya began to explore the range and forms of her psychic talents. She was very tentative and careful at first but quickly became more confident.
She practised reading the minds of people passing on the street below - hearing and feeling their thoughts and emotions.
She found that she could project her consciousness outwards from her body - and, as a disembodied viewpoint, soar upwards and outwards over the city and the desert beyond it.
She discovered that, to an extent - and at the cost of great effort - she could help wounds to heal.
She found that she could control the minds of weaker-willed people. But the skill was abhorrent to her and she did not use it except to test its reality.
She exercised her ability to fire psychic bolts that could burn into an opponent's mind - projecting them at a blank wall in order to learn her strengths and limitations.
She found that she could create and wield bright lights around her. This illumination she could use to spectacular effect - flashes, pulses, rainbows, showers, balls and explosions of radiance. Unless she willed otherwise, the luminescence was always mauve or a shade of amethyst - a beautiful contrast, Kaledria had told her, with her green eyes. Other hues, however, were easy to summon.
She practised moving physical objects. This was very difficult for her. With extreme effort she could raise an object as heavy as herself from the ground by a few inches, but only for a few seconds. Levitating was no easier. Objects up to the size of a small book she could lift and move through the air at speed - but it was taxing. When she asked Kaledria to throw things at her, she was able to deflect lighter objects but not anything that weighed more than a few pounds.
She found that she could move almost entirely silently and could dampen the noise of anything she did.
She discovered that she could cloak herself such that light bent around her. Though this did not quite render her invisible, it did reduce her to a shimmering shape that would be hard for anyone to fix their gaze upon.
But the skill that made her wonder more than anything was her ability to see the flows of mental and life energies in people and animals and plants; and even in the planet itself. For hours each day she would simply stand at one of the windows of her apartment and stare out - seeing the people and the world with a form of vision that was so enhanced that she felt as if she was being bathed by the deepest and mystical secrets of the world.
3
More time passed. For much of it they were quiet together. Silently, they would bask in the profound, warming glow of each other's proximity. They were truly happy in their togetherness.
Each day they would enhance their love with the bliss of each other's body and passion. With gentle or fierce caresses they would give each other the most exquisite pleasures.
One evening, as they sat together by the fire, Kaledria said: 'You are the wielder of energies, and I am the warrior. Could we fit each other any better?'
Hexiya looked deep into her eyes. 'I never hoped to have so much,' she said. 'Most of all, you.'
Gradually during this wonderful time of rest, their full strength returned to them.
4
Late one night, as they sat cross-legged before the fire and felt its heat upon their skin, they turned to each other. Each knew what the other was thinking.
'It is time for us to go,' Kaledria said. 'We have a long journey to make. Hopefully a pleasant one.' She smiled.
Hexiya regarded her for a long moment, in silence. She felt a flicker of excitement rush through her, mixed with a touch of trepidation. Then she said: 'To go to the places of my dreams?'
'They are our destinations.'
'You'll have to show me how to make such a journey.'
Kaledria's blue gaze stared into the flames of the fire. 'When I came here,' she said, 'to Varanta . . . When I found you in the graveyard, and slew those who wanted to use you . . . I just stepped through a wall.' She smiled a smile that was an echo of wonders seen. 'All the stars and galaxies that you know of - the thousand billion stars of this galaxy and the thousand billion galaxies beyond - and all the vast tracts of space, reaching out to infinity . . . This is what you call the universe. But it is not everything. In fact it is only one of innumerable such places. It is a single bubble of stars and space, floating in a titanic ocean that contains an infinite number of other such bubbles.'
'You came from a different bubble?' asked Hexiya.
'Yes. One adjacent to this. One easy to cross to.' She shrugged. 'But now we have to go further away. Away across the whirlpools of the extra-planar ocean. We will have to navigate our way among trillions of existences.'
'Romgallak,' said Hexiya. 'When I asked him if he could help me, he replied that it would take him more than a year to get here. Is that where we will go? To join him?'
'We will go to a place where the Qallish sometimes gather,' said Kaledria. 'It is possible that Romgallak will be there. But I don't know.' She turned her lovely head to her, and her hair was like a waterfall of shimmering darkness falling about her. She said: 'Paint a picture. I'll describe the scene. It will be of a distant place: a place on a world in a remote existence. Your picture will help us to make the great leap across the immensities between here and there.'
5
The next day, Hexiya commenced work. The painting was to be large, covering an entire wall of her studio. As she sketched in the background and outlined some of the detail, she wondered if this would be her last work in this place, and if she would ever return here.
Within two days she began to suspect that the picture would be a masterpiece - a wonderful evocation of a strange and alien landscape. In its centre was an emerald jungle. To the left was a range of dormant volcanoes. To the right, beaches of pink and gold sand bordered a light blue sea. Above, five orange suns burned in a clear violet sky.
Kaledria spent much time with her, describing what she must paint.
It took them a week to complete the work. Though Hexiya might have painted it much more quickly, they lingered over details in order to get them just right.
When it was done, they stood together and studied it. Hexiya saw great pleasure in Kaledria's face - admiration, wonder, contentment, even awe.
'It's amazing,' breathed the dark-haired woman. 'So real.' Then she turned to the smaller blonde. 'Let's prepare and pack for a very long journey,' she said. 'We could leave tomorrow.'
Hexiya glanced at their picture again. 'I'd like that,' she murmured.
They spent the rest of the day getting ready.
They made a trip to the local bazaar to buy provisions - a good supply of dried and preserved foods. They also purchased a number of other things they thought they might need.
By the end of the day they were prepared for a long trip away from civilisation.
Hexiya had had some trouble deciding what few personal belongings she wished to take. At length she had settled upon her writings and her musical compositions, and nothing else at all.
That night they retired early and made joyous love. Their desire seemed heightened by their awareness that this would probably be the last night they would ever spend in this place - Hexiya's home, the sanctuary where they had come together in the most profound way.
Afterwards they lay in each other's arms, each of them marvelling at the tenderness, warmth and love that wrapped around their hearts. And then they slept deeply and long, together in each other's embrace.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
1
They arose at mid-morning. After a late breakfast, they dressed in their travelling gear. Kaledria donned her weapons. Lastly they shrugged into their backpacks. The heaviest items they carried were some full waterskins - Kaledria had been worried that they might go a long time without finding a source of drinking water.
As they went through to the studio, Hexiya felt a thrill of nervousness rush through her. Over the past day or two she had felt both anxious and hopeful as she had looked forward to their journey. Now that the moment to depart had come she felt intensely alive - alert, excited, frightened, and very aware of her own mortality.
Standing in front of the painting, they regarded each other for a moment.
'I hope I can remember how to do this,' said Kaledria with a wry smile. Then she took Hexiya's hand.
Together, they turned to the picture, stepped forwards and walked straight through it.
2
There was a moment of fearful disorientation. Hexiya felt as if she was being pulled in all directions at once. Though her eyes were open, she could see nothing at all. Impenetrable blackness surrounded her like a blanket. Her only point of reference was the tight grip with which Kaledria held her hand.
Suddenly she felt utterly weightless, as if she was drifting upon a balmy sea. The darkness gave way to an all-pervading glow of deep red light.
She looked at Kaledria. Her hair, red-black in the eerie radiance, was drifting about her head. Her eyes were impossibly deep pools of light.
Then she looked outwards. What she saw took her breath away.
Beneath her was a vast sphere with a transparent silver-blue surface. Within it she could make out titanic strings and clusters of galaxies - countless trillions of them. Their glittering, rainbow-hued luminescence captivated her. Never had she dreamed that she might see such celestial magnificence - stars innumerable.
Then she realised that somewhere within that immensity was the world she had come from - a world orbiting three suns which drifted among countless others in just one of the boundless galaxies.
Vertigo seized her, combining with the awe she felt. It was hard for her to grasp the enormity of what she was looking at - what she had thought of as the entire universe.
Then, as she watched, it began to recede from her and Kaledria - or else they receded from it. More and more rapidly it diminished, until it was just a small, silver-blue bubble in an ocean of muted red light.
But it was not the only one. All around were vast hordes of such bubbles. They were countless as stars.
Hexiya knew that she was gazing across infinity. Wonder and amazement filled her - a feeling akin to worship.
Then Kaledria squeezed her hand. Looking across at her, she saw that she was smiling a wide smile of delight and exultation.
She spoke, and when she did so her voice sounded strangely muffled. 'How is it that we can breathe?' she asked, though her mind was barely on the question.
'We are surrounded by a small pocket of air,' said Kaledria. 'I did not forget that part.'
They were accelerating now, rushing outwards through great drifts of bubble-universes that loomed, flashed by, became tiny with distance, then vanished into the glittering radiance behind them.
And then, of a sudden, Hexiya and Kaledria surged right out of the streaming spheres and into a great void. As the silvered orbs receded into a glimmering diffuseness behind them, it could be seen that they were clustered in a gigantic storm-like formation - a deep-centred whirlpool with streamers reaching out from its flanks.
Looking out across the void, Hexiya saw that there were many other such enormous groups of bubble-universes. Though no two were the same, most were shaped like towering tornadoes with great, twisted arms emerging from their sides.
As she watched, these titanic masses slowly passed by, far away.
3
Many hours passed. Eventually their headlong flight slowed, and they dropped towards one of the great tornadoes. Soon they plunged into one its arms. Many-coloured silvered spheres rushed by them. The closer ones came so near that Hexiya could make out the immensities within them. Some contained galaxies, more numerous than grains of sand on a beach. Others contained stranger things - coiling alien energies whose magnitudes she could not grasp; darknesses or flaring brilliances; geometrical structures and crystalline formations of astonishing complexity; and bizarre places that she could not fix her eyes upon, as if they contained too many dimensions for her to perceive or grasp.
Soon they had penetrated deep into the tornado. When Kaledria pointed ahead of them, Hexiya saw that they were dropping towards a single bubble-universe. It swelled before them until it loomed like an edifice, blocking out half of existence. Within it she could see strings of galaxies glittering against velvet darkness.
They dropped through its surface.
The galaxies rushed past - though they did not have quite the same shape as those that had swarmed in the skies above Hexiya's homeworld. Of generally spiral form, they had a slightly geometrical look to them - great forces seemed to have warped them with a curious regularity. Most were a fierce, deep green colour, as if all the stars within them emitted the same spectrum of light. A smaller number were muted orange or deep red.
Billions of such galaxies flooded by - seething strings and clusters of them, describing crystalline patterns across infinite space. Great swathes of emerald luminescence shone against the blackness. Hexiya could only wonder at the endlessness of it all, and marvel at the thought of how many worlds there might be here to explore.
Then, gradually, she and Kaledria began to slow down. Before long they fell towards a galaxy of a rare, deep orange hue. They penetrated its edges and watched the outermost stars stream by. Then they plunged through great gas-clouds that were lit from within by the fires of stellar formation.
At length they dropped towards a single, complex system. Here, five great, orange suns orbited each other in a stately dance. About them, near and far, the points of fifty or more planets waltzed their way around the stellar fires.
They hurtled towards one of the worlds. It swelled from a point to a disc, and then to a globe. Hexiya saw that it was dominated by tracts of deep orange and dark green land. Small blue seas glittered here and their. Most of it looked like an arid place.
Just as they neared the atmosphere, disorientation and darkness confused Hexiya's perceptions.
4
After a long moment, her weightlessness was replaced by sudden mass. Heat and light washed over her.
She lost her balance and fell to solid ground. Kaledria, next to her, somehow stayed on her feet.
They were in the centre of a clearing on a hillside. Emerald jungle grew all around them. The trees were strange and alien. In one direction loomed a number of rugged orange mountains - dormant volcanoes. In the opposite direction, much closer, was a clear blue sea bordered by beaches of pink and gold sand.
Above, strewn like a necklace across a mauve sky, wheeled the five orange suns.
The whole scene was just as Hexiya had painted - as directed by Kaledria.
'I feel . . . heavy,' said she said as she climbed to her feet.
'This is a higher-gravity planet. Are you uncomfortable?'
'No. I'll get used to it.'
They gazed about them for a while. They felt the heat of the suns upon their skin. They breathed the strange scents that filled the air. They listened to the unfamiliar noises of the unknown birds and animals that populated the jungle.
'Let's get down to the nearest beach,' said Kaledria. 'We'll camp there for the night.'
'How many times have you been here before?' asked Hexiya.
'Just once, as far as I remember.'
5
They made their way down through the trees. Before long the heat and humidity forced them to stop to take off their outer clothes. Hexiya's pack became an unpleasant weight upon her back. A sheen of sweat glistened on her skin.
And yet she felt amazement and took great pleasure in what she was seeing. She reflected that most of her life she had felt as if she had been waiting - though she had not known what she was waiting for. Now that time was over. Now she was with Kaledria and they had a journey to undertake. It was purpose enough for her.
The thought made her realise how much she loved the woman that walked just in front of her. She watched her for a while as she found the easiest route through the clinging, thorn-covered trees - the way she moved, she shape of her, the dark fall of her hair, and the way in which she was so focused upon her environment that she seemed to be a perfect part of it, utterly in tune with its nature.
Just the thought of how very lonely and desolate her life would be without her was a poignant awareness in Hexiya's chest. But being with her, in this alien place, was wondrous.
They reached the beach as the last two suns were brushing the horizon and throwing streams of copper fire across the waves of the sea. They did not pitch the lightweight tent they had brought, but opened their sleeping bags on the sand. Then they built a small fire, bringing sticks from the edge of the jungle at the back of the beach. They did not light it yet. Though the night would probably be warm, they thought they might like the comfort of its radiance.
They had a light meal of food from their packs, and drank water from a nearby stream. Kaledria found a kind of fruit hanging in bunches from the branches of huge, grey-barked trees that grew on a small spur a hundred yards from where they had set camp. They tried them and found them surprisingly good.
Afterwards they watched the last glow of day fading from the western sky - darkest oranges and golds and a touch of deep blue from the sea. Now that the heat of the day was gone, the warmth was very pleasant.
Hexiya stood and went to the water's edge, and listened to the gentle lapping of the waves. She closed her eyes and reached out with her mind, wondering what kind of life the water harboured. She wanted to know if there were any dangerous species - any predators that might be harmful.
She felt the presence of a myriad fish of strange and unfamiliar form. In the distance she sensed a small group of larger marine animals. Projecting her consciousness closer to them, she entered their minds and was able to look out through their eyes. In this way she could see them quite clearly. The largest was more than two hundred feet long. They had fur and long necks and wedge-shaped heads. They were also quite intelligent and spoke to one another in a strange language. Eaters of deep-sea plants, they were quite harmless. Now, after the diving and playing of the day, they moved ponderously and waited for sleep to come to them.
A thousand other species Hexiya sensed as well. None seemed immediately dangerous.
Satisfied, she shrugged out of her clothes. Kaledria, joining her, did the same.
They waded, then swam out into the warm water. Then, buoyed up by its saltiness, they drifted and floated. For a while they lay upon their backs and stared up into the immensity of the sky.
Stars filled the vault, more close-packed than above the world Hexiya knew. They glimmered and glittered in streams and clouds and drifts. Most were orange or dark red. A few rare ones were a deep, fierce green.
Held up by the water, she felt quite weightless. Everything was silent but for the gentle lap of wavelets against her. Looking straight up, she could not see the sea or the land except as darknesses at the edges of her vision. But above her blazed this magnificent vault of radiance. Staring across the lightyears of a new universe, she felt humbled and inspired.
At length they returned to shore. They rinsed the salt water from them in the fresh water of the stream. The night air was still warm and soon they were dry.
They lit the fire they had built and settled down upon their sleeping bags - they had laid them down beside each other. For a while they stared into the flames, holding each other. Then, before the flickering light, they lay down together. Kaledria lay upon her back while Hexiya lay on her side against her, her head upon her upper chest, her arm about her waist, Kaledria's arms wrapped about her. When sleep came, it was deep and peaceful.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
1
As the sky lightened to a cloud-streaked maroon splendour behind the volcanoes that rose against the eastern sky, Kaledria came awake. Dreams had stalked her later in the night, becoming intense and frightening. Now she rose to consciousness with a gasp. She was damp with sweat.
A chill, nameless fear surged through her. She sat up abruptly. Clutching her hands in front of her, she began to rock back and forth.
Hexiya sleepily reached up from beside her. 'Are you all right?' she asked, alarm in her voice as she too say up.
Kaledria tried to reply. 'I don't . . .' But her throat was constricted, her voice hoarse. She shook her head once, trying to clear the disorientation and confusion that were taking over her thoughts. A trembling began to course uncontrollably along her limbs. A sense of anguish and dread stirred deep within her. Tears flowed from her eyes and down her cheeks.
In the depths of her mind, she felt something moving - a leviathan awakening that was about to engulf her entire being.
2
Hexiya crouched in front of Kaledria. Anxiety filled her as she regarded her shivering form and the fear that was in her face.
'Kaledria? What should I do?' she asked. But there was no reply.
Kaledria put her face in her hands. All Hexiya could do was put her arms around her and hold her tight. And gradually her love became calmer, the trembling lessening, the tears slowing.
And then, in a surprising moment, Kaledria came suddenly back to herself, looking up into Hexiya's face, her eyes clear and focused. It was as if she had surfaced from too long beneath water and was flooded with relief. For a while she did not say anything. A long, slow sigh escaped her. Her breathing deepened and slowed and she relaxed more completely into Hexiya's arms.
Hexiya cradled her head and ran her fingers through her hair. 'My love,' she said; and spoke softly to her, trying to give her what comfort she might.
After a long while, Kaledria sat straight and regarded her, looking deep into her eyes. In the diffuse orange and violet light of dawn, her pupils were enormous pools surrounded by shimmering blue. 'My memories,' she murmured. 'They've returned to me.'
'All that you lost?'
She looked away and seemed to look inwards. 'I think so. The bad as well as the good. And there was a lot of bad.' When she turned to Hexiya again there was awe in her gaze. 'More than a hundred years of memories. So many of them traumatic.' She shook her head. 'I've seen so many deaths. So much pain. And what I've felt myself -' But she fell silent, clearly not wishing to say more, at least for the moment.
For a time they sat together as Kaledria seemed to consider all that had returned to her. When she spoke again her eyes were accepting. 'I've seen wonders too,' she said. 'Magnificent things most people would not believe. The most astonishing beauty.'
She stood and walked away along the beach a little way, barefoot in the coral sand. Then she stared out across the calm indigo sea.
Hexiya stayed where she was, sitting quietly and still. Perhaps, she thought, Kaledria would need some space and some time alone to embrace her past more fully.
But soon she returned and sat down cross-legged upon her sleeping bag. 'Only one thing confuses me,' she said. 'My loss of memory. I'm not sure how it happened.' Her shoulders rose and fell a fraction, a slight shrug. 'Perhaps it was not a bad thing. I could have come to you as someone with more than a century of life and experience. Perhaps I would have seemed alien to you. Perhaps that is why I forgot my past, keeping only the memories of my childhood and a few key experiences of my adult life. Perhaps I wanted to be more as you remembered me than as I had become.' She smiled uncertainly. 'I had some presentiment of the love that we would share. I wanted it to be unbreakable. But the gulf of age between us would probably not have weakened our desire for each other.'
'You think it is possible you made yourself forget? Even with my wielding abilities and mind-skills I am not sure I could do so.'
Kaledria looked down. 'If I did make myself forget, it was an unconscious thing.' Uncertainty, perhaps even fear touched her visage then. She brushed a stray lock of hair from her face and pressed her fingers to her forehead. 'No,' she said. And when she spoke again, it was with more certainty: 'No. I do not think that was why I lost my memories. I think I am still forgetting something after all. Something that I should be terrified of. I can feel it like a shadow or an echo in the deepest part of me. The thing that made me forget. But I cannot recall what it was.' She paused for a while, and she rested her hands upon the sand and stared at the ground, at nothing. At length she said: 'Several years ago something happened to me. An encounter with an enemy whose name I never learned. I was changed by the experience. After it I felt this darkness within me. The sense that something had been done to me but I did not know what it was. Now that I think upon it, it feels like it might have triggered my loss of memory, though I could not say how or why.'
'You never had any clue as to what was done to you?' asked Hexiya.
'Only a feeling,' said Kaledria, 'though a strong one. A sense of onrushing desolation. A sense that something terrible was going to happen, not only to me but to many people. And the near certainty that my mind had been tampered with. I asked Mavaea for help. She has some extraordinary skills, and put me in a deep trance, and tried to trigger some recollection of what had been done to my mind. It did not work.'
'Mavaea,' breathed Hexiya. She recalled the dreams she had had of her - an old woman with wrinkled skin and sunken eyes. She had never been able to understand the words she spoke.
'You'll meet her soon, I hope,' said Kaledria. She shrugged again. 'It makes little sense to me that any of it caused a loss of memory when I came for you, but I am sure there is a reason, perhaps one that may threaten us. The return of the rest of my memories tells me that there are many more enemies than Rammon and that we will have no choice but to face them.'
Kaledria looked at Hexiya again and suddenly, unexpectedly smiled, shapely lips around white teeth. It was like the sun coming out. 'But for now we are together, and whole, and I remember most of what I am.'
Hexiya said, after a time: 'How old are you, exactly?' She found that she was not fearful of the answer, not even if Kaledria was far older than the century that she had suggested. Looking at her, she felt the radiance of love and warmth that radiated from her. There was nothing, she realised, that might weaken the bond between them.
'A hundred and thirty-nine of your years. Every one of them as full and as intense as might be imagined.'
'But I don't understand. We were children together. How could you be that old?'
'In some of the places I lived, time flowed faster. In a few, somewhat slower. But overall, while we were apart . . . I lived for more than a hundred years, while you lived less than thirty.'
Hexiya felt a strange tension at the thought that she knew so little about this woman she had come to love so much.
But, seeing this, Kaledria took her in her arms and kissed her upon her lips. Her skin was warm and soft. Her scent, familiar and wondrous, was a soothing balm, and she smiled again her beautiful smile.
In that smile Hexiya saw the girl she had once known: a girl full of life and energy, irrepressible, given to an elemental wildness that mixed strangely with her times of contemplation and seriousness.
She smiled back. 'What were you?' she asked.
After a moment Kaledria stood, energised of a sudden, and walked in a circle, naked and magnificent in the early morning light - a dark-haired beauty, perfectly sensuous, lithe-limbed, muscles sliding beneath skin touched with bronze. She seemed almost weightless. Raising her arms above her head, she stood on her toes, stretching, then walked another circle. She looked happy. Powerful currents of energy seemed to be surging within her after her recapturing of herself.
'I was many things,' she said. 'An explorer of wild primaeval continents. A mariner across great oceans. A warrior at a school of honourable masters. A mistress of combat with my own students. A reclusive ascetic, living in a wonderful forest. A captain of a trading ship, in honour of Avassia. And a queen of a great country. All these things and more.
'And I was one of the Qallish. A hunter of our ancient enemies. Hunted by them in turn. Immune to ageing and most disease. With the potential to be immortal.'
She stood still of a sudden and looked down at Hexiya, suddenly grave. 'Just like you,' she said.
Hexiya regarded her. Her mind span. There were so many questions she wanted to ask. But Kaledria said, almost apologetically: 'Let us have breakfast. We will talk after we have eaten. I still feel a need to order my thoughts.'
3
They went to the stream that emerged from the jungle just to the north, refilled two of their waterskins, drank their fill, and splashed cool water over themselves.
After bathing they walked to the nearby spur that jutted into the sea. Clambering up over rocky ground, they reached the spiky, grey-barked trees that grew there. Once they had gathered some of the large, globular green fruit that depended from the outer branches, they went back to their camp.
Though the day was young, the heat of the rising orange suns was already fierce. As such they decided to move to the shade at the jungle's edge, at the top of the beach.
Settling down, they ate the fruit with some biscuits and cheese. Kaledria stared out across the turquoise sea as she ate. She seemed far away. But when she had finished she sat back and her blue gaze met Hexiya's green.
'You saw Rammon when you were a child,' she said. 'On the day your father died, standing outside his workshop. But you never found out what he was doing there.'
Hexiya felt her heart beat suddenly hard in her chest. 'I asked him. He did not answer.'
Kaledria grimaced. 'He was there because he wanted to kill your father. Not the man you thought of as your father, but your real father.'
Hexiya stared at her. Her mind span. Kaledria's words had shaken her to the very core of her being. 'Who was my real father?' she asked after a shocked moment. Her voice came out as a mere whisper.
'Romgallak,' Kaledria said, just as quietly.
At this, Hexiya felt as if the world had suddenly fallen away from beneath her. 'How is that possible?' she breathed. For a moment she did not quite believe what Kaledria had said. And then she felt the unarguable truth of the matter. She had always known she was different to others. Then she had found out that she was Qallish. How else but through one or both parents? 'Who was my mother?' she asked - and was terrified of the answer.
'Your mother was Havena.'
This, at least, was a relief. 'And the man I thought was my father?' She remembered his kindness and gentleness. She remembered his face.
'An ordinary man,' replied Kaledria. 'A good man. He thought you were his daughter. He loved you.'
Hexiya absorbed this. 'Havena never told me about Romgallak,' she said.
Kaledria's look was regretful. 'She never remembered. Romgallak never allowed her to recall him except when he was with her. She only saw him three times.'
'When?'
'At your conception. At your birth. And just before the death of the man you thought of as your father.'
Hexiya gazed out over the pink and gold sand of the beach, seeing nothing. Though she was suddenly finding it hard to speak, she said: 'Why did my . . . supposed father . . . have to die such a death? Why did my mother have to be confined in a madhouse?'
Kaledria reached out and gently ran her fingers through Hexiya's shortish blonde hair, then dropped her hand to her shoulder. She sighed. 'It was the first touch of the influence of the stone man.'
'Then what happened? What did Havena actually do?'
'She went to her husband's workshop. She hallucinated. She thought there was something inside him. She thought she could set him free if she could remove it.' Kaledria looked saddened. 'I'm sorry, Hexiya. She really did kill him. She was utterly insane during that time and later remembered nothing. But in no way was it her fault,' she said, and there was a fierce conviction in her voice. 'You remember all the things that happened in Kohidra when we were children? The things that were caused by the stone man and the radiations of the place he came from? The demise of the man you thought of as your father was the first.'
'Then why was Rammon present at his death?'
'Rammon was chasing Romgallak, who had just visited Havena - the final time, to tell her about you in a way she would remember in her heart - but not consciously. Rammon journeyed to Kohidra to face him - to slay him. But he was too late. Romgallak was gone before he got there. I would guess that Rammon then followed your mother for a while, wondering if Romgallak might make contact with her again. And so he was watching her when she slew her husband.'
After a while she continued: 'In fact it was unfortunate that Rammon missed Romgallak. He would have been no match for Romgallak if it had come to a duel. In later years, Rammon terrorised a number of worlds and the Qallish were never able to get close enough to him to slay him. I do not need to remind you of what he did to Varanta and what he did to you and me. A shame then, that he failed to come face to face with Romgallak all those years ago.'
Hexiya sat quietly, thinking. 'I cannot imagine Havena being unfaithful,' she said at length. 'Even with . . .'
At this, a slight smile touched Kaledria's mouth. 'Not unfaithful,' she said. 'Understanding of necessity. He merely told her what you would be. He explained that without her you would never exist. And believe me, when Romgallak - who looks and acts like a god among men - explains why something must be, that is more than enough reason for most people.'
'Romgallak . . .' Hexiya wondered about him. 'Why the subterfuge?' she asked.
'He wanted to keep you away from him,' said Kaledria. 'He wanted to keep you safe. The best way to do that was to allow neither you nor your mother any conscious knowledge or memory of what he was - and what you were - except when he was actually present. And it worked. It did keep you safe. Had Rammon known what you were, he would have slain you as a child. Too many children of the Qallish have been killed by such as him. So now the Qallish do everything they can to hide their offspring - by having them raised on remote worlds in ignorance of their nature.'
'Like Borudin,' said Hexiya, recalling the urchin of her dreams. 'He did not know what he was either.'
'Like Borudin,' echoed Kaledria. 'And like me. But all of us, eventually, find out what we are. And when we do, we seek out the rest of our kind.'
4
Though they could have continued their journey whenever they wanted, they decided to remain where they were for a few days. It was a pleasant place. While Hexiya had much to come to terms with, Kaledria was anxious to share some of her newly-recovered memories with her.
On their second night by the sea, they lit a small fire and cooked some fish that they had caught.
'Tell me more about the Qallish,' said Hexiya after they had eaten.
'There is much to say,' said Kaledria. She seemed to gather her thoughts, then continued: 'Rammon's race think that we are their absolute opposites - the cosmic antithesis of what they are. They know that they have been at war with us since long before the eras from which the oldest existent records have survived. Some of them have even theorised that we have been fighting against each other for all eternity. They believe that our two sides are a kind of balancing mechanism in the universe.
'In part, that may be true. But it is not the whole story. Though Rammon's kind and the Qallish are like elemental forces that inevitably conflict with each other, they are not equal. There is also the very real possibility that one or the other will eventually be destroyed. What kind of a balance will there be then?
'What Rammon's kind do not realise is that they are not the only ones the Qallish go up against. Rather, they are only one of many enemies, and less significant than some.'
Kaledria had been staring into the fire. Now she looked into Hexiya's eyes. Her gaze reflected the light of the flames. 'For hundreds of millennia,' she said, 'the Qallish have been drawn into successive and sometimes simultaneous conflicts. We do not know why. Some of our clerics and philosophers suspect that we are the weapons of gods. Whether or not that is true, we have fought battles - both literally and metaphorically - without end.'
She sighed. 'That is why you and I opposed the stone man when we were children. We were born to oppose such destructive aspects of existence. And no doubt, in the future, we will oppose such forces again.'
'Do any of the Qallish refuse?' asked Hexiya.
'Some do. They feel that the struggle, the contention, the conflict is not theirs. Or, if they are old and have fought hard, they retreat to the wild and remote places of the multiverse, feeling that their work is done.' She smiled a slight smile. 'We are always free to choose,' she said. 'And there is no dishonour in following one's heart, whether into the great striving or away from it. But most of us find that, faced with the choices we are given, we usually choose to stand against those we are confronted with. Not because we are slaves or pawns, but because it is our desire to do so.'
'You have experienced more than a century of it,' murmured Hexiya.
Kaledria's eyes flashed with light. 'A century of astonishing intensity,' she said. 'Traumatic and painful. But with so much beauty as well.'
They were silent for a while. Hexiya tended the fire. Then, sitting back, she said: 'How many Qallish are there? Do you know?'
'It is impossible to give an exact answer,' replied Kaledria. 'Some of us, after all, can travel through time. But certainly our number is small. Very small indeed, in the context of the infinite and eternal multiverse. There are rarely more than a few hundred Qallish alive at any given moment. And yet, we are not without some significant influence upon the histories and futures of many thousands of worlds.'
'How can that be?' asked Hexiya. 'How can such a tiny group be so powerful?'
'It is partly because of the time-span over which we have influence. A single, seemingly insignificant act may have huge consequences given the passage of enough years. Some of the Qallish have the ability to perceive the consequences of their actions across thousands of millennia. These, the most gifted of us, peer into the infinite possibilities of the future. They understand what deeds are necessary to bring the most favourable futures into existence. And they try to make them real.'
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
1
Two days later they decided to leave the sea and the beach and the world with its five orange suns.
'It will be slower now,' said Kaledria as they set off into the jungle, up the steep slope towards the clearing they had first materialised in. 'We do not have an artifice like your painting to guide us across such a vast distance. Instead we will have to make shorter jumps between the spheres - the bubble-universes, as we called them. Moreover, it will not always be possible to leave every world from the place where we arrive upon it. Sometimes we will have to travel for a while, to a another location - a gateway - from which we can depart.'
Hexiya, following her through the trees, wondered at what strange and exotic worlds she might see. Excitement, anticipation and a touch of fear made her feel very alive.
Early in the afternoon they reached the clearing. Gratefully, they set down their packs and drank a little water.
'We'll make the leap shortly,' said Kaledria. 'As we do so, I'll show you how to navigate between spheres and worlds.'
'Is it difficult?'
'For some of the Qallish it is very difficult indeed. For most of the people we knew in Kohidra and Varanta, it would be all but impossible. But for you, I suspect it will be easy. Once I give you the secret, you will simply know how to do it.'
As it happened, so she did.
2
Months passed. Each few days they would leap between the spheres of existence and arrive on a world within another bubble-universe.
They camped upon a snow-field on a plateau while storms surged down upon them from an encircling range of black mountains. Above them a small, dim, solitary mauve sun wheeled slowly across a dark green sky among stars that were visible even at midday.
They stayed on a coral atoll, and hunted and foraged in its woods and fished in its lagoons, under a red vault crossed by a necklace of six moons, rainbow-coloured.
They walked across a desert of black sand and jagged rocks under a fierce blue sun. Stalked by ferocious leonine beasts, they feared for their lives but evaded them at the last.
They came to a world that had no land but a warm ocean that was hundreds of miles deep; and climbing onto an island of drifting seaweed, they slept under a yellow sky.
They trekked across a desolate plain of fused, uneven glass that was crossed by coloured bands - brown, dark green and dark red. A cold wind whistled about them. The rings of the planet upon which they walked turned slowly above them in the ochre sky.
On and on they went, from sphere to sphere, stopping at a single world in each.
And then, at last, they came to a world that was different to any they had been to before, because there were people there.
3
Hexiya felt the familiar moment of disorientation. Then she found herself standing upon a sward of rich grass that was a deep, dusty red colour. Above was a deep indigo sky, with two suns close to their zenith - one a dim mauve giant, the other a bright green dwarf. Star-matter streamed between them in an incandescent arc.
'We are there,' said Kaledria. There was great pleasure in her voice.
Great trees with smooth green bark grew to their left. Their curving boughs were heavy with paddle-like mauve leaves and bulbous, pale green fruit. Away to the right was a river that sparkled with sapphire light. A simple rope-and-wood bridge led across it.
On the far bank rose a small city. Intricate marble structures were fashioned around one another in wondrous forms - columns and domes and spires rising from many levels, with rounded, filigreed walls, gardens upon roofs, trees growing from courtyards, and climbing plants covered with rainbow-coloured blooms growing everywhere.
'Our destination,' said Kaledria. 'One of the homes of the Qallish.' And she took Hexiya's hand and walked forward, to cross the bridge and enter the city through a delicate arch.
Someone was standing there, seemingly waiting for them, to greet them. For a moment the figure - a woman - was just a silhouette in the shadows. Then she stepped out into the sunlight.
Her hair was blood-red on one side and jet-black on the other. Her eyes were large, amber pools. She was wearing a loose white robe, belted at the waist. As they neared her she smiled a smile of warm welcome.
'Obenaia!' breathed Hexiya.
The three of them ran to each other and embraced.
After a while Obenaia stood back. 'You are probably weary after your journey,' she said.
Kaledria nodded. 'It will be good to rest. We'll go to my rooms and settle in, then come down and talk with you. We have much to discuss.'
Obenaia regarded Hexiya then. 'There are some that would like to meet you,' she said.
'Is Romgallak here?'
She shook her head. 'But you will meet him soon enough. I imagine that he is as eager to meet his daughter as she is to meet him.'
Together they walked through the archway and into the city of the Qallish.
The End
I hope you enjoyed this story. If you have a moment, I would much like to hear from you.
Peace and happiness :-)
Icebard
Email: noumenal_rabbit@hotmail.com
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