Mathew Stover - Test of Metal

His head came up warily. Frowning, he began slowly to back away.

“I don’t want to kill you, Jace. You’re too useful; I may need your talents someday. On the other hand, I don’t see any reason I should let a vicious little gutter monkey like you walk off without a scratch.”

“What are you going to do?” Jace was slowly lowering himself toward a crouch. To Bolas, he looked like a herd animal trying to be inconspicuous to a predator.

“Right now? I’m going to let you go.”

“That’s it?”

“For now. Your gift,” Tezzeret said, “is fear.”

He stopped. “I don’t get it.”

“You will. You never were a brave man. I have decided to remove from you the burden of courage. Take Baltrice, for example. Once she tries on that necklace, I would not want to be you. Not to grind too fine an edge on it, I would rather not be on the same plane as you. Because I would not be at all surprised to learn that Baltrice had incinerated an entire planet just because you were on it.”

“Yeah, okay, whatever. I can handle Baltrice. She’s a better person than you think.”

“She was. Circumstances may change. And you have others to fear-me, for instance. Should I ever look in on you and decide you are insufficiently frightened, I will hurt you. I will hurt your family, if you have such. I will hurt your friends. Every person you have ever met will die screaming curses upon your name.”

Beleren’s jaw clenched. “Then maybe I should take you out right now.”

“Too late,” Tezzeret said. “You also have a little bit of a Nicol Bolas problem.”

The mentalist went still.

“Do you remember that device in your brain? I should hardly think you’ve forgotten already. Would you be interested in what happened to that device?”

Beleren’s only reply was a guarded stare.

“You gave it to Nicol Bolas. Against his will.”

Jace went pale. “You-you couldn’t have! It’s not possible!”

“That’s exactly what Bolas said. Another thing you two have in common.”

“But-but I didn’t have anything to do with it!” Beleren said, going even whiter. “You did it to me-and you did it to him-”

“And you helped.”

“But I didn’t!” he whined. “There was nothing I could have done about it!”

“Tragic, isn’t it?” He sighed. “I suspect Bolas is not interested in subtle distinctions.”

“But-what about you? You’re the one who actually did it!”

“I’m touched by your concern,” Tezzeret said. “You’ll be comforted to learn that Nicol Bolas and I have reached an understanding. A truce. You might even call it a partnership.”

“That’s-that’s not-I mean, you and Bolas? You’re just making that up!”

“You think so?” Tezzeret said, opening his hand in a gesture of invitation. “You can ask him.”

From the goggle-eyed whiter-than-foam countenance Jace Beleren turned up in his direction, Nicol Bolas assumed he was now visible. And since there was nothing, at the moment, he could do to harm either one of them, he settled for a fang-filled grin.

“Jace. Lovely to see you again. Lovely to…” He sniffed the air, broadened his grin, and sniffed again. “Is that fear? Delicious. If I were to, say, lunge at you suddenly, do you think you might wet your pants?”

Why not? It was funny. To Bolas, anyway. Beleren didn’t seem amused, but there was no way to know for sure, as the mentalist’s response was a gurgle like a dragon choking on a griffin bone, followed hard upon by a magically enhanced sprint for the tree line.

Bolas watched him go, and then he sighed. Diverting as this tiny episode had been, nothing had changed in his intolerable situation. He sighed again and looked down upon his tormentor. He said, “Partnership?”

Tezzeret said, “Yes.”

“Are you insane?”

“It’s possible,” the artificer allowed. “A wasted question.”

“Then a pertinent one. Why would I make a deal with you, much less keep it?”

“Because you need me.”

“Do I?”

“No more games, Bolas. That’s over for us. I know you’re failing. Your faculties are degrading. You’ve aged more in the last ten years than in the last ten thousand. That’s the only reason I was able to do what I’ve done to you.”

The dragon frowned down at the artificer. He had to admit the scrawny little scut worm had a point.

“Listen to me: I don’t know what you’ve planned, but I know it’s big, and I suspect it is intended to repair your mind and rebuild your power. I also believe that your plan is going to involve a great deal of destruction, not to mention the deaths of many planeswalkers, including myself. This is where you and I have a problem. I’m not certain that you even know how destructive whatever you’re doing will be. As far as I can see, you might have passed your mental tipping point, and millions or billions may die for nothing at all. So I’m going to help you.”

Bolas stared. “You may need to say that again.”

“Think about what you’ve seen here, since you came. Think about what happened on the beach, and what you took from my mind. Bolas, I know it’s hard. Especially now. But think. What do you know?”

The dragon lowered his head. “I know that you beat me.”

“Yes.”

“You could have killed me at any time since I arrived here. I have been completely at your mercy the entire time.”

“Mercy,” he said, “is the greatest virtue.”

“But you haven’t killed me. You expect to get some use out of me.”

“Expect is too strong a word. But I am allowing for the possibility.”

“Because… there is no such thing as trash-only materials you haven’t yet found a use for. Including me.”

“Yes.”

“This whole thing hasn’t been about you at all. It’s-you did all this-everything you have shown me, everything you have done to me, and everything you haven’t done to me… you…”

Bolas felt the dawn of a sensation he could not identify. He wondered if it might be awe. “It was about me all along…”

“Yes,” Tezzeret said. “Also all about me. At the same time. Curious, isn’t it?”

“To prove that I can trust you… and find out if you can trust me…”

Tezzeret shrugged. “Trust is too much to hope for between beings like us, Bolas. But you can believe I will not harm you unless you leave me no other choice. You can believe that I do not want you to kill billions, for good reason or otherwise, and I certainly don’t want you to kill me. I believe that you want so badly to be restored to your former glory that you will accept help. Even from me.”

“So this…” Bolas began to understand the feeling of the metal whirl that had plagued Tezzeret in the Riddle Gate. “So this is about the fourth line.”

“The last riddle,” Tezzeret said seriously. “The most important one; the one that requires the fourth trait of greatness in an artificer.”

Bolas looked at him in silent query.

“Insight,” Tezzeret said.

“Whom do you rescue by slaying…”

“Exactly. Whom do I rescue by slaying.” The artificer offered his hand. “I don’t want the answer to be you.”

Bolas stared.

He had never, in all his vast life, felt so wholly at a loss.

“I suppose…” Bolas murmured. “I suppose… I don’t, either.” And to his own astonishment, he lowered one great talon and shook Tezzeret’s hand. “Though I’ll probably kill you anyway.”

“But not today.”

“Yes,” Bolas said. “Not today.”

A moment later, he discovered something still troubled him. “But Crucius,” he said, waving a talon up at the Metal Sphinx. “That’s really him? The Mad Sphinx?”

“Not really.”