Роберт Асприн - Forever After

Gar said nothing as they rode from Caltus. He knew well the route they would take and imagined the journey would only suffer because of his companion. From Caltus they would head north until they reached the Failles of Dunn. From there the trek would take them west by northwest, up to the rim country where they would cross the Wastes of Rahoban. On the other side of that lay the mountains and, in a deep mountain valley, the village of Gelfait.

Gar’s single misgiving about his mission — aside from Spido — concerned Gelfait itself. The village, as nearly as could be determined by legend, had no anchor in time. It appeared outside any discernible cycle, and no dne could remember having seen it in the last century. Even he had never been there and while he did not doubt its existence in the past, he wondered if it would again manifest itself.

His fear that it would not had been born out of his success at obtaining Anachron in the first place. On his original quest, on a night in the middle of the wastes, a howling storm had arisen around him. Dust and the dry bones of the meager plants living on the arid plateau swirled about him. The red dust became a bloody cyclone shot through with lightning black and gold. Pressure built, surrounding him, while debris tugged at his clothing and grit choked him.

Suddenly, in confirmation of the storm’s unnatural origins, argent and ivory men clad in ancient armor stepped through the seething stormwall and confronted him. Their leader, the legendary Belamon, who had sought to bring the amulet Anachron to the Failles of Dunn to end the threat of a proto-Kalaranian despot, challenged Gar. The Gelfaiti warrior had sensed in him a desire for Anachron and took him to be an agent of evil meant to stop them. Though Gar tried to explain the situation, Belamon refused to believe they had been lost in their travels for tens of centuries, and decided only combat could resolve the conflict between them.

The threat of a smile tugged at Gar’s lips as he remembered that battle. In the midst of the howling storm, a silvery giant in a place out of time battled an assassin willfully divorced from his own past. Blows struck by Belamon that night had the force sufficient to split mountains and recourse rivers, yet Gar had proved a most elusive target. Conversely Belamon withstood the Rabid Lemur Punch, the Lethal Orchid Caress and even the Hammerstrike with Wedge and Awl. Gar remained awed by the stamina and skill the Gelfaiti displayed, and the Gelfaiti company repeatedly cried out in admiration of how Car handled their Champion.

Finally, simultaneously, the two men called “Hold!” Belamon dropped to one knee and held his spear like a staff to support himself. ‘Though your story of time passing speaks of deception to me, the heart you display in battle could harbor no deceit. To you I yield.“

Gar, his chest heaving with exertion and his heart racing with exhilaration, shook his head. “Nay, it is I who must yield to you. In you I have confirmation of what I have known: the nobility and martial skills we possess today are but degraded forms of what you know. You are my superior, and to you I yield.”

A great cry rose up from the Gelfaiti horde and Gar saw Belamon was smiling. “You have bested me, Gar Quithnick, for it is told that Anachron cannot be taken by force, but must be given freely. Upon the death of the Bearer, it will return to the one who gave it, or from whom it was taken. By passing it among us, we have guaranteed we would not lose it, yet we have failed to deliver it in time. To you, we entrust Anachron, and pray you will remember us with the honor you have shown us here. Our mission is done, so now we shall return home.”

Gar accepted Anachron from Belamon, then watched as the horde moved back off to the west. As they faded from sight, so did the storm die. He wondered if Gelfait would have faded for all time with them or if, as Rango suggested, bringing Anachron again to its home would summon the village from whatever limbo claimed it. Only finding the city, which was said to appear at dawn and disappear with the sun — prompting some to consider it a solar illusion — would allow him to complete his mission.

If the presence of Anachron did not bring the village back, he reasoned, he had two choices open to him. One was to wait in the mountains against a time when it would appear. While his self-imposed exile would doubtlessly please many in the court at Caltus — and spare many a revenge-minded farmer from death — it would deprive him of access to ancient tomes of lore and similar records of the time of the Gelfaitis and even before.,

It would also forever remove him from Domino Blaid. Were his mission a failure, he considered returning to Caltus. He knew he would do so under the blind of seeking new orders. That he would bring Anachron with him presented him no worry because having one of the artifacts back in the capital certainly would be no problem.

Even with that rationale, he knew if he went back he would be going to see Domino. As he thought of her, a pang of regret tightened his chest. He marveled at the sensation because it was so alien to his emotionless upbringing within the shenkai at Armbruss. There Udan Kann had taught him and the other hingu-kun all the myriad ways to inflict death, and praised those who were able to do so without squeamishness or emotion.

A harsh rolling burp from Spido brought Gar out of his brooding. The sorcellet smiled sheepishly and pounded his chest with a fist. “Sorry. Sweet pickles do that to me.”

Gar shrugged. “Burping is hardly a crime, Spido.” The assassin gave him half a smile. “But impersonating a hingu-kun is.”

All color drained from Spido’s face. “I’m not impersonating anyone.”

“True, for no one could recognize in you a student of hingu .” Gar reined his horse in closer to Spido. “Why did you lie about being at Armbruss?”

“I didn’t. I was there.” Spido brought his head up and thrust his chin out. “I was there, really.”

Gar slowly shook his head. “Spido, at Armbruss they train children, children that have no families. You have admitted to having a mother and uncle in a mountain village. Clearly you are deceiving me, or trying to.”

“No, yes, wait.” He held both of his hands up to forestall a blow, but raised them so slowly that even a broken-spined hingu-dan could have killed him with a casual effort. “I infiltrated Armbruss four years ago. I had to. It was my destiny, you see.”

Gar frowned. “So you entered Armbruss as an adult? What did you learn there, Spido?”

The aide swallowed hard. “Well, my first year was a lot of sweeping up, see. And putting wax on things and taking it off again. But I did right good, and they let me move on. And in my second year I did lots better at learning.”

“Excellent, then our meals on the journey shall be acceptable.” The assassin watched his aide closely. “And in your third year? Did you learn anything of hingu ?”

Spido nodded proudly. “I learned a strike.”

“Show me.”

Spido clapped his hands.

“Again.”

The urgency in Gar’s voice made Spido clap faster. “My master, he said I had the speed necessary to get flies and mosquitoes and such. He was proud of me.”

“A keen observer, your shanshao .”

“He was that, sir. He was Nindal Gor. Did you know him?”

“I did.” Gar nodded carefully. “At Bardu I shattered his fifth, seventeenth and twenty-first vertebrae, then broke his legs and punctured his lungs. Then, of course, I killed him.”

Spido’s eyes bugged out farther than if he’d tasted of Lotus Tincture number five. “You did that to him?”

“Only because he was a friend.” Gar looked away. “Growing up he said he hoped he would die of a cerebral hemorrhage while entertaining amorous triplets. I thought he would appreciate the irony.”