The Temporal Void

  All that Edeard had put behind him in favour of sunny days lounging on the sands drinking cool wine; and equally hot nights making love to Kristabel. Then the day came when the staff and ge-monkeys packed the huge pile of bags and crates, and they began the carriage journey home. He fell silent as they trundled along the broad coastal road, contemplating what news he would be accosted with as soon as they reached the city once again.

  ‘You’ll still have me,’ Kristabel said adamantly.

  Edeard broke out of his revere. ‘Huh?’

  ‘You haven’t spoken a word for the last two miles. Was it that horrible a time?’

  ‘No! That’s the problem, I wish it could have gone on and on. There’s a big part of me that doesn’t want to go back.’

  ‘Me too,’ she attempted a smile, but her usual contentment was missing. ‘I don’t think I’m pregnant yet.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘They say vinak juice lingers in the blood for a while after you stop taking it. Another month would see it gone, and us successful.’

  He put his arm around her. ‘I promise to redouble my efforts when we get home.’ He stopped abruptly, then smiled. ‘Home.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said with equal glee. ‘The two of us together.’

  ‘Alone, apart from your family and two hundred servants. But what the Honious, we’ll try to make the best of it.’

  Her third hand pinched him hard. ‘You feel so guilty about that, don’t you?’

  ‘Not guilty . . . just unaccustomed to it.’ He remembered what Kanseen had said on the balcony of Bea’s Bottle. ‘I’m sure I’ll get used to it eventually; it can’t be that difficult.’

  ‘You know, if Finitan had lost I really would have followed you to a village on the edge of the wilds.’

  He kissed her. ‘And Mirnatha would have become Mistress of Haxpen.’

  ‘Oh Lady,’ Kristabel’s hand flew to her mouth. ‘I never thought of that. Off to the wilds by yourself you go then.’

  They clasped each other tighter.

  ‘I wanted to be pregnant,’ she said. ‘It would be so nice for Kanseen’s boy to have a playmate. Our children would grow up together.’

  ‘Kanseen still has another month and a half to go. And you will be pregnant many times. Our children will play with those of the Sampalok Master’s family.’

  She nodded, allowing him to convince her. ‘What will happen with the bandits and the provinces?’

  He sighed. ‘I don’t know. We still don’t know where they get their weapons from. That’s the true cause of all this strife.’

  ‘Finitan’s going to ask you to go out there, isn’t he?’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘You must go if it’s the right thing.’

  ‘I don’t want to leave you.’

  ‘I know. But, Edeard, don’t you want our children to live in a safe world?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘So really there’s no choice to be made, is there?’

  Edeard said nothing. She was right of course, which made arguing futile. Given the path he’d chosen for himself, some events were inevitable.

  At least nothing about the city had changed when they got back. The carriage and horses were led away to the Culverit stables in Tycho, and they took the family gondola back to the ziggurat mansion. Julan and Mirnatha were waiting for them on the mooring platform, both equally excited.

  ‘I missed you so,’ Mirnatha squealed, hugging her sister.

  ‘And I you,’ Kristabel promised.

  ‘What was it like?’

  Edeard and Kristabel managed to avoid looking at each other. ‘A nice restful holiday,’ Kristabel explained to her little sister.

  ‘Really? I always get fearfully bored after just one day at the lodge. What did you do all that time?’ She gave Edeard a wide-eyed look of innocent interest. It didn’t fool him for a second.

  Julan cleared his throat. ‘Shall we go and inspect the tenth floor now.’

  The staff and ge-monkeys had been extremely busy since the wedding. Kristabel’s agonized rearrangement of the family had been implemented, with everyone shifting apartments and floors. In the end, fourteen sets of relatives had moved out. More than originally intended, but there were a lot of new marriages planned amid the relatives occupying the fifth and seventh floors, which would create another accommodation shortage over the next couple of years. Some of the third-floor families decided not to wait. Julan had offered to build them new manor houses on lands the Culverits owned beyond the Iguru.

  In all honesty, Edeard didn’t see a lot of change to the furniture and fittings on the tenth floor. The big lounges and reception rooms were the same as before with all the family’s artwork and antiques in the same positions they’d occupied for centuries. He and Kristabel would take over the Master’s suite from Julan, which had been decluttered – he made no comment on the standard Makkathran bed and bathing pool, they could be reshaped easily enough. His few possessions from the maisonette were standing forlornly in one of the empty studies. When he looked at the small pile of boxes in comparison to everything the Culverits had accumulated over two millennia he began to feel intimidated by the family again.

  ‘You’ll soon make it your own,’ Julan said comfortingly as he caught sight of Edeard’s expression.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I got Uncle Dagnal’s old chambers,’ Mirnatha said joyfully. ‘And Daddy said I could have new furniture and curtains and everything.’

  ‘Within reason,’ Julan said hurriedly.

  ‘Come and show us then,’ Kristabel said, holding out a hand.

  Edeard followed the sisters out of the Master’s suite, taking one last look at the main octagonal bedroom with its huge circular bed. The room was bare apart from a fluffy brown carpet, some plain wardrobes and chests; the dressing room next door contained all of Kristabel’s clothes. He couldn’t help but compare its simplicity to the way Kristabel had decorated her bachelorette room just down the hall.

  Perhaps she’ll allow me some say in how we make our bedroom look. I could offer to craft her a shower, and a proper toilet, make the light white. The idea of spending the next two hundred years sleeping in anything as fluffy as she’d created before was unnerving.

  They spent the afternoon with the tenth floor’s housekeeper discussing further changes. Several Master carpenters were summoned to prepare drawings of the furniture Kristabel wanted to commission. Edeard was relieved when she toned down the drapes and fittings for their bedroom, and finally found the courage to volunteer his own alterations. The craftsmen tried not to be too obvious listening when he explained how the shower could go anywhere, and be any size. In fact, altering the whole layout of the tenth floor would be a simple matter for him if she was just prepared to wait while the walls adjusted themselves. Kristabel sent everyone away when he started explaining that.

  ‘I’d never thought of altering things on that scale,’ she admitted. ‘Nothing ever changes in Makkathran.’

  ‘It can now.’ He looked round the big lounge they were in. ‘In fact, how about some more windows in this place? Let some light in?’

  ‘What about the main stairs?’ she asked excitedly. ‘Can you change them? The ones in Kanseen’s new mansion are actually usable.’

  ‘I thought you’d never ask.’

  Julan and Mirnatha were noticeably absent from supper on the tenth-floor hortus that evening, making a big show of saying how much they wanted to eat with the ninth-floor families.

  ‘It’ll never last,’ Kristabel said as they sipped some sparkling white wine under a big white gauze awning. Long candles had been lit among the pots of orchids and troughs full of huge evening glories. With the orange lights of the city starting to twinkle amid the twilight and lengthening shadows, Edeard couldn’t imagine a more romantic setting. Neither, it seemed, could a lot of Makkathran’s citizens; they both had to cast a seclusion haze to ward off curious farsights.

  ‘But we can make the most of it for a cou
ple more days,’ he said. It was almost a plea.

  ‘You have to go back to Jeavons station tomorrow. You’re its captain, after all. And Finitan will want to talk to you, and Macsen is going to have a dozen problems.’

  ‘I know. They’ve been very polite not calling us today.’

  ‘I did longtalk Kanseen earlier. She says the mansion’s almost complete, as far as she can tell. She wants you to confirm it’s finished growing so she can start ordering fittings and fabrics for it.’

  ‘Okay,’ he said reluctantly. ‘I’ll check tomorrow.’

  Her hand came down on top of his. ‘We still have tonight.’

  ‘And every night.’

  ‘You know what I mean. Tomorrow our new lives really begin.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘But that’s hours yet.’

  When Edeard walked into the Jeavons station first thing the next morning, he found Dinlay had coped admirably during his absence. He was almost peeved at that, but you couldn’t argue with paperwork, and Dinlay had been quite meticulous about recording everything. Glancing at the new charts hanging up in his office, Edeard saw that patrols had gone out on time, duty rosters were made up, monies allocated and spent, timetables established. Arrests had been made, but these days the constables tended to issue cautions to any miscreants they found. It was often enough. Only the most committed recidivists were hauled up in front of the judges now. Probationer training was also going well. Even Marcol was expected to pass his exams in time for graduation next month.

  ‘Though it’s touch and go,’ Dinlay admitted. ‘There’s a sweep if you want to put some money down.’

  ‘I don’t think that would be proper,’ Edeard said. It wasn’t quite the comment he expected from Dinlay. But he couldn’t find fault in any other way. ‘So what else has been happening?’

  ‘It’s been quiet actually. In the city at least. We’re still getting refugees arriving, which is causing a lot of talk about how the remaining empty buildings are being taken up. People were expecting their children to move into the available places.’

  ‘Do we know how much spare housing there is? I mean, is this going to be a problem?’

  ‘I expect the Guild of Clerks knows the true numbers.’

  ‘I’m sure they do, they seem to know everything else.’

  ‘And anyway, it’s Finitan’s problem, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. You’re right.’ Edeard sat behind the desk he’d inherited from Ronark. Like the office, it was dark and functional. To be honest, a little bit drab and depressing for his taste. He looked round at the high, slightly curved walls with their small oval windows. No wonder it was so gloomy, the city fabric was a grungy brown with strange vertical vermilion streaks, as if someone had spilt colouring dye down them a long time ago.

  Dinlay left to lead a squad on patrol. Edeard began reviewing the station logs. It was no good, the office just kept distracting him. He reached down to the city’s thoughts, and made some suggestions for modification. Expanding the windows, changing the wall colours to a pleasant pale sky-blue, adapting the lighting rosettes to shine white. Much the same as he’d done to the tenth floor of the Culverit mansion this morning. Here the changes would be finished within a week, back home it would take longer. Kristabel was still toying with the idea of changing the entire layout.

  Even after he’d kicked off the office changes, the logs didn’t interest him. He let his farsight reach out to the Orchard Palace.

  ‘I wondered how long it would take you,’ Finitan said.

  The oval sanctum hadn’t changed. Edeard had expected Finitan to stamp his mark immediately, but the week after the election Finitan had remarked that he had more important things to worry about than the furniture. So the huge desk was still there in the middle, its dark veneer glossed to a mirror shine. The high velvet-padded chair behind it was Owain’s relic, to. But Edeard did recognize the silver cups that the ge-chimps poured his tea into. And Owain hadn’t used genistars in here.

  Finitan had brought the genistar egg cradle from his office in the Blue Tower. But it sat on his desk empty.

  Topar took a seat next to Edeard, refusing a cup of tea.

  ‘Well,’ Finitan started. ‘We managed to survive an entire twenty days without you.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Edeard said.

  ‘The city isn’t really a problem any more. People seem to have accepted my term without too much resistance.’

  ‘They certainly have. Kristabel is complaining about how long the furniture she commissioned will take to build. The craftsmen are run off their feet right now. It’s the same all across Makkathran. People are spending their money again. They have confidence in you, sir.’

  ‘My apologies to your wife.’ Finitan put his cup down, and gave Edeard an uncomfortable stare. ‘Unfortunately, the city’s current bout of good fortune isn’t being repeated beyond the Iguru Plain.’

  Edeard gave a short nod. ‘I know.’

  Topar cast out a strong seclusion haze. ‘I’ve been sending scouts out into the provinces,’ he said. ‘Good men: ex-constables, sheriffs, even a few reserve officers from the militia. People who know how to look after themselves, people I can rely on.’

  ‘We wanted to build up a picture of these damn raids,’ Finitan said. ‘See if there was a pattern behind them, a purpose.’

  ‘That’s where it gets strange,’ Topar said. ‘If they’re trying to soften us up for an invasion, they’re going about it in a very odd way. There have been no bandit raids at all in the Rulan province since midsummer; in fact, the west seems clear of all disturbances. They’ve moved steadily east through the three largest mountain ranges, causing a lot of damage, and setting light to a wildfire of fear and rumour. In fact, that’s our worse enemy right now. Any dispute that results in violence is attributed to bandit raids, from landowners fighting with poachers to a tavern brawl, so bad is their reputation. It’s hard to determine what’s real and what isn’t. The provincial governors aren’t reliable at the best of times, now any trifling squabble is seen as an excuse to petition Makkathran for militia support.’

  ‘It doesn’t help that Owain sent the regiments out so willingly before,’ Topar said. ‘Expectations of support were set too high.’

  ‘He’s left you a real mess,’ Edeard said.

  ‘Yes. That’s politics, and to be expected. But we took a very good look at the information we can confirm. It’s a worrying result.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘Basically, we’ve established there are six main packs of bandits,’ Topar said. ‘Two are heading along the Ulfsen Mountains. One is using the Komansa range for cover. Two started out in the Gorgian Mountains, though one of those is now heading north east along the Yorarns. And the last is plaguing the Sastairs all the way down to the southern coastal provinces.’

  Edeard closed his eyes, trying to picture what he’d just been told on a map of the known lands. ‘They’re stretched quite thin, then.’

  ‘I prefer the term “widespread”,’ Topar said. ‘We’re a basically peaceful society, and their physical impact is minimal given the size of the areas concerned, but the disturbance and worry they cause is near universal.’

  ‘So what are they doing?’

  ‘One last thing.’ Finitan pulled a piece of paper across the desk, and started to read. ‘In Plax province there were raids on Payerne, Orastrul, Oki, Bihac, and Tikrit. All villages or small towns. The manor houses and their lands at Stonyford, Turndich, Uxmal, Saltmarch, Klongsop, Ettrick, and Castlebay have also suffered extensive damage during the last two months.’ He gave Edeard an expectant look. ‘Anything ring a bell?’

  ‘I’ve heard of the Uxmal manor, the Culverits own it. I think it’s a big parkland holding, they raise sheep there.’ He had a nasty feeling one of the families from the third floor had gone there to make their new home.

  ‘Indeed. Every one of those estates belongs to an ally of mine,’ Finitan said. ‘Allies and supporters also have considerable a
ssets in or around the targeted villages.’

  Edeard felt cold. ‘How could bandits know that?’

  ‘Somebody told them,’ Topar said. ‘Someone who has conducted a comprehensive search through the official Treasury registry.’

  ‘It took us a while to work it out,’ Finitan said. ‘Everyone I met at a party or dinner was complaining about their losses. I heard nothing else. I thought the invasion had already begun until I realized my allies were being singled out.’

  ‘Lady!’

  ‘Which brings us back to the question of who are they and what are they doing?’

  ‘They must have collaborators in the city,’ a shocked Edeard said.

  ‘At the very least,’ Topar said. He exchanged a worried glance with Finitan. ‘There’s also the question of the guns. If there isn’t another city equal to us . . .’

  ‘No,’ Edeard said. ‘The Weapons Guild . . .’ They had the longbarrel pistols all this time. But whoever supplied the bandits with repeat-fire guns killed Ashwell.

  ‘Too early to make that accusation,’ Topar said abruptly. ‘And we have no proof whatsoever.’

  ‘This is why we asked you in,’ Finitan said. ‘I know a lot of your power comes from whatever relationship you have with the city itself, but you still have the strongest psychic ability I have ever known.’

  ‘A week ago a report came in of a raid on Northford,’ Topar said. ‘That’s a village in the Donsori Mountains, Edeard, just four days ride from Makkathran for the Lady’s sake. Rapid-fire guns were used. We know that for a fact. One of the Ulfsen mountain groups must have pushed eastwards in the last month.’

  ‘If we can capture one of them alive,’ Finitan said, ‘We might just be able to find out what exactly is going on, who those collaborators are.’

  ‘I’m going to take a small group of the best people I know and trust,’ Topar said. ‘We’ll have ge-eagles and ge-wolves, and the best pistols available. Even so, I could do with some help.’

  ‘Oh Lady,’ Edeard put his cold tea cup back on the desk. ‘When do we leave?’