Tonespace: The Space of Energy (The Metaspace Chronicles Book 3) Read online

  “This squabbling must end, gentlemen,” said Vaca. “There are plans and preparations to be made.”

  “But Jeffrey is still at large,” objected Torrez. “Until he is found, how can we plan anything? The troops could always...”

  “He is finished as a ruler,” said Vaca. “If the rank and file of the military do not know that yet, they soon will. How can anybody believe that he still holds Texas, when he couldn't even hold his own headquarters?”

  “There is that,” Jimenez conceded. “But also this: how can they believe us capable of ruling in his stead when we cannot even find and capture one man? It may seem like a little thing, but if we cannot do the little things, who will follow us to do the great things?”

  “He'll be rounded up in due course,” Anderson said. “In the meantime, we have a decision to make. The people need to see a Honcho in control, or there will be trouble.”

  “How do you figure that?” Karlota said. “When the word gets out, they'll know he's out and we're in charge.”

  “No,” said Anderson. “Don't you see? Texas is ruled by a Honcho. An Empire must have its emperor. If they see a group in charge, then what is to prevent the people from thinking that some other group could take charge? We cannot allow such thinking to infect the commoners. The Empire is not a democracy.”

  “And how do we select the new ruler?” Torrez wanted to know. “I get the feeling that every one of you has already selected himself. Do we fight it out among ourselves, with our armies? Madness. Disunity will only encourage other countries to come chewing on our borders.”

  “What about Excalibur?”

  Puzzled faces turned toward Jimenez. “The legend says that long ago, in England, there was no king.” he said. “To end the infighting among the nobles, they agreed that whoever pulled the sword from the stone would be King. That's how Arthur became their leader – he was the only one who could do it.”

  “Are you suggesting we determine this with a feat of strength?” Vaca sneered.

  “No,” he said. “Of effectiveness. We could agree that whoever brings us the head of Jeffrey will be our Honcho.” He looked from face to face at the table. “We all agree he can't be allowed to survive and come back to make trouble. If he does, there will always be people that follow him, perhaps enough to make for civil war. Someone has to stop him. I suggest that whoever manages that will have shown that he can do the things that need to be done.”

  Chapter 4

  Lester: The Worst Demons Are Inside

  “I want to know God's thoughts. The rest are details.”

  – Albert Einstein

  It seemed as if he had been walking forever. Where was this place? The terrain was unfamiliar. Instead of the flat plains and rocky mountains of his native Rado, the land rolled with hills to the horizon, and thick grass carpeted those hills.

  A grinding metal growl assaulted his ears are the first of the tanks powered over the top of a hill near him. That's one of the Honcho's tanks. How did he get it out of Denver, and what is it doing here?

  He might never learn the answer to the first question, because the answer to the second was obvious: it was coming for him. Two more appeared on its left and right flanks as the metal monster bore down on him.

  He had to move! But his feet seemed glued to the ground. What was wrong with him? Lester gritted his teeth and forced his feet to move but he seemed to be moving in slow motion. One foot slowly lifted and set down. Agonizing. Way too slow. He'd never escape at this rate.

  The lead tank halted. It was so close now he was staring right into the bore of its main gun. Even though he knew it was only 120mm, less than five inches across, the dark hole of the bore seemed enormous: a bottomless pit that swallowed his gaze as he stared into oblivion.

  The hatch on top of the turret popped open and a head full of red-haired malevolence grinned at him with cold fury.

  “Boy, you're in a heap of trouble,” said Brutus Glock. He waved good bye, then turned to bark down into the interior. “Blow this bastard to hell!'

  BOOM.

  Lester jerked and his eyes snapped open in the darkness of his room. Only another bad dream. Why won't you stay dead, Brutus?

  He sat up, swung his legs off the edge of the bed and put his face in his hands. You're dead, damn you! It's not real. Exhaling slowly, he reminded himself that Glock was history, that he himself had killed the Texan. But the dream had seemed so real.

  He shook his head. No way he was going to go back to sleep now. He pushed off the bed and padded out of his bedroom into the living room he shared with Xander. No stars were visible through the window but it was as black as his mood outside; it must be the middle of the night. Xander's oil clock in the corner had filled the bottom up to the middle of the yellow band, which meant it must be about 3:30 AM, assuming the wizard had flipped it on time at midnight.

  He stalked over to the coldbox, pulled its door open and groped inside for a bottle of cider. He wanted to drain it in one long pull, but forced himself to sit at the table and sip it while he tried to forget the dream.

  I'm not sorry I killed him. I'm not! The bastard deserved to die. He would have done the same to me. Well, not the same, but something as lethal and probably more painful. Falling from that height killed him in a fraction of a second. Not that bad a way to go...even if he had a few seconds of falling first.

  Xander would have handled it differently, though. Or would he? He'd killed the Honcho and his tank crew handily enough. But that was different, wasn't it? When you're playing chicken with a tank it's hard to be gentle...

  He supposed he could have found a way to spare Brutus. Especially with Xander's help. He could have just tied the man up in pathspace flows and let the Governor's men take him captive for a trial.

  But would there have been a trial? The only witnesses to Brutus's war crimes that he knew about were himself and Jeffrey. He wasn't sure Kristana had the right to compel a foreign head of state to testify against one of his own officers. And even if Jeffrey was willing to let one of his first acts as the new Honcho be helping to convict and execute one of his late father's officers, it would have complicated the treaty process that everyone needed to defuse the situation. Some of those remaining tank crews might have objected to an instant trial of their commander.

  No, keeping Brutus alive for a trial would have stirred up too many bad feelings. Wouldn't have been a good mood for negotiations. Lester had probably done them all a favor.

  He did not feel any guilt for killing Glock. So why was he still having nightmares? What was his mind trying to tell him?

  Chapter 5

  Kareef: Increasing in Knowledge

  “O Lord! Increase me in knowledge.”

  – Quran 20:114

  As he waited for Qusay to open the door, Kareef thought about how much his life had changed in the last few weeks. When Nizar had told him he was to go to Denver and apply to Xander's school, he had thought it a gross injustice: to be cast out of the madrassah without graduating, to become a dropout and a wanderer, with no trade or prospects, a member of a secret order whose secrets he was not to learn, or at least not until he had learned what the wizards of Rado could teach him..

  How natural, and yet how petty those thoughts seemed now. Ironically, although he still knew next to nothing about the Sihr, he now knew things they didn't, things he would never have learned back on his father's farms if he hadn't been chosen for this mission.

  The door opened. “Come in, Kareef. We need to talk.”

  He stepped inside and the door swung closed behind him. What might have been a mystery a short time ago he could now recognize as a simple application of spinspace – what the Ambassador called the magic of turning. All of the members of the Sihr knew it.

  How many of the miller's water wheels back home in the Emirates were actually everwheels, needing no water to push them? He had no idea how many of the Sihr were among his people, but he suspected there were more than any of the mundanes knew, for
although they wore their black robes sometimes, in public, as a warning and a deterrent to any who might seek the lives of the Emirs, there was no telling how many walked among the people in more ordinary attire when they had no wish to be recognized.

  Qusay was standing by the room's window, gazing out at the half-ruined splendor that was Denver. He turned and met Kareef's eyes and gestured to the little table. They seated themselves, and he poured them both a glass of cider from the pitcher. “I shall be returning to the Emirates soon,” he said.

  Oh? “When do we leave?”

  Qusay sipped his cider and regarded him. “That is what we need to talk about. I have to go, to take them the trade agreement we have negotiated with Rado and New Israel. But you don't have to. What do you want to do?”

  Now there was a first: someone asking him what he wanted, instead of deciding his life for him. Kareef wondered how he felt about it. “Well...if I return now I can pass on what I have learned. But if I stay longer, I will have even more to give them. It is not an easy decision.”

  Qusay leaned back in his chair. “I can make it easier for you,” he said.

  “How?”

  “It doesn't have to be an either/or situation. You can show me what you've learned, and that way we can pass it on to the Order while you remain here, learning even more.”

  Kareef frowned at that, though he knew it was a good idea. After what he had been through, he would prefer to present his report personally, instead of letting the ambassador be the one to impress the Sihr with gifts of new knowledge.

  Qusay smiled at his expression. “You'd rather be the one to impress them with your hard-earned wisdom, wouldn't you? But I assure you, they will be impressed with you no matter who delivers the information.”

  “Will they?” He wondered. They'd never even met him – just delivered his orders through Nizar and sent him on his way. Nizar was a Mullah, with a position of respect. Qusay was their ambassador, and a known and respected colleague, whereas he, Kareef, was merely a gatherer of secrets, like a farmer of the mind, who collected useful information for them as a farmer collected the fruits of the harvest for his landlord.

  “Of course they will. Men of knowledge respect knowledge, and those who seek it. You will be an important member of the Sihr, Kareef. But even more so if you remain here and learn more than you already have.”

  So that was it, then. He was to be left behind to continue his studies, while Qusay presented his findings. Yet he did not burn with resentment at this, which surprised him. Part of him was in no hurry to make another long journey.

  He sighed. “Very well. Where do you want me to start?”

  “Why don't you start with explaining how Xander thinks he does what he does?”

  “All right. It's nothing like the old stories of sorcerers and witches. What we do – what the Tourists did – has nothing to do with angels or demons or Djinn. But you know that already, don't you?”

  “Of course. There have always been some among us who could do unusual things, without, unfortunately, clear knowledge of how they could do them.”

  “Xander believes it all has to do with unsuspected interactions between our minds and properties of space.”

  Qusay lifted his eyebrows. “Empty space has properties?”

  “Yes. And those properties of space affect all matter which lives in space. For example, gravity is an aspect of what the ancients called the space curvature.”

  “What? How can emptiness be curved?”

  “I know, it sounds like nonsense. Xander doesn't like to call it curvature. He calls it pathspace, and says it is the aspect of space which tells matter passing through it what path it should take. The Earth orbits the Sun because the Sun's pathspace tells the Earth to curve toward it, so we never fly away.”

  “And how does he use this idea to make things happen?”

  “Some people can affect pathspace with their minds. They don't have to be as big as the Earth or the Sun to affect the space nearby. By imagining a different configuration of pathspace, they can persuade space to act differently, and thus, to make the matter in it move differently.”

  Here Qusay frowned. “The laws of motion of the Ancient named Newton contradict that. It takes force to change an object's state of motion, not imagination.”

  Kareef shrugged. “That's how they used to think of gravity, also – as a force. But it's not, really.” He pointed at the pitcher. “In the old way of thinking, the only way to make that move is to push on it or pull on it – to exert a force.”

  He reached out with his mind and reshaped the pathspace near the pitcher, making it slide across the table to to his hand. “But using pathspace is easier. I don't even have to touch it.”

  Qusay was eyeing the pitcher. “How do you do that?”

  “It's hard to do, at first,” he admitted. “You imagine the path you want it to take, and your mind alters the pathspace to conform to your image. At first it seems impossible, but the mind gets stronger with practice, like a muscle.”

  Qusay gestured at the pitcher, and it slid over into his hand. But Kareef noticed a difference. When he did it, the pitcher moved in a straight line. When Qusay moved it, however, the pitcher slid in an arc, as if attached to the rim of an invisible wheel.

  “...or you could do it your own way, by using what Xander calls spinspace. That's what you did with the stuck wagon wheel, isn't it? You just let them think it was because you helped push.”

  “Yes.” Qusay grimaced. “I can see it'll take some practice to do things with pathspace instead of the way I'm used to.”

  “Why bother, if you already have a way that works?”

  “Listen to me, Kareef. I know something that Xander might not know yet. When you learn how to control spinspace, it's not just to do neat tricks. There's another benefit. Do you know why members of Sihr can trust each other?”

  The change of topic caught him by surprise. “What? No, why?”

  “Because they can't do anything to me, nor I to them. When you attain mastery of what you call spinspace, the turning magic, you also get immunity to it. I control the spinspace near my body, so no other wizard can hurt me with it. Understand?”

  “Okay, but what does that have to with pathspace?”

  “Think about it. The more flavors of this magic you learn, the fewer can be used against you.”

  Kareef shook his head. “There are still plenty of ordinary ways to hurt a person. Anyone could just shoot me with a crossbow. Or use pathspace to throw a rock at me.”

  “True,” the ambassador agreed. “But unless they're standing right next to you, you could use either spinspace or pathspace to bend its path around you and make a projectile miss.” He rubbed the side of his nose. “The difference is, a man with a shield can survive a sword thrust or arrow shot, but he's helpless against spinspace and pathspace because they're invisible. A wizard, on the other hand, can deflect ordinary weapons if he's careful, and he is immune to magical attacks.”

  “As long as he's mastered the right kinds of magic.”

  “Exactly. And since wizards can sense each other, once you step onto this path there's no going back. We can't sense specific abilities, so if you run into a stranger who's a wizard and things turn ugly, better hope you know more magic than he does.”

  So that was what this was about. Is Qusay aiming for more more power back home? Thanks to my helping him learn what they don't know?

  “Now that you've begun to master spinspace,” the ambassador continued, “I'm allowed to supplement what you've already been shown. The order didn't want me to interfere with your learning, in case Xander knew something about spinspace that we didn't. But from what you've told me, he doesn't. He knows it, but mainly uses pathspace and tonespace when he needs to get things done.”

  Kareef had to disagree. “Well, yes and no. The Order might be ahead of him on spinspace in some ways, but he'll catch up. I don't know how the Order does its training, but I think Xander has one advantage, and that's
the fact that he approaches magic like an engineer. He doesn't even like the word wizard. He wishes people would call him a psionic engineer instead.”

  The ambassador made a gesture with one hand as if waving a fly away. “What we call it is not that important as long as we get results. Since you're soon going to be helping him teach spinspace to the next class of students, I'm sure he won't mind me helping you with it. Call it an unofficial trade, if you like. Your knowledge for mine. It's the best trade possible, because we both learn something new without losing what we already have.”

  “You said you have to leave soon. How soon?”

  Qusay shrugged. “If I was in a hurry I could leave today. But no one will be surprised if it takes me, say, a week to actually be on my way. Can you come down after dinners to work with me, like you did tonight?”

  I can't believe he actually asked instead of ordering me. “Of course. What would you like to learn first?”

  Qusay considered. “How do you make a swizzle?”

  “It's just a pattern in pathspace that's anchored to a pipe. Metals seems to hold the pattern the longest. You can make the same pattern in empty space, but it eventually fades.”

  “What kind of pattern?”

  “Like a smoke ring or a doughnut, but stretched, so that the piece of pipe is embedded inside the flow lines.”

  Qusay produced a sheet of paper and a wax crayon. “Can you draw it for me?”

  “I'll try.” Kareef said. He sketched a short pipe. Then he swept the tip of the crayon through the pipe, out one end, around in an arc and back into the opposite end. He repeated this on the other side so it looked as if the pipe had grown butterfly wings. “This is a cross section, of course. But you get the idea. In this pattern, this configuration of pathspace, this weave, the paths kind of orbit the pipe.” He looked down at the sketch and shook his head. “But it doesn't tell the whole story. While the lines show the paths, they can't show the speed along those paths, or the acceleration, which is the important part.”