Paolo Bacigalupi - The Alchemist

I took the bread and cut a slice on a work table. Cut one for him as well. The scent of honey and rosemary, along with the reek of neem and mint and the burn of coals from my glass fire.

“It’s a strange world we live in,” I said, waving at my worktable. “All that time spent trying to find magic, and now, suddenly Scacz asks for balanthasts to kill bramble again. Maybe he’ll finally decide to cut away the bramble wall.”

Jaiska snorted. “Well. In a way.” He took another bite of bread and spoke around the mouthful. “He cuts new lands into the bramble for his and the Mayor’s friends. The people who inform for them. Their favored guards.”

“Are you going to get new lands?”

Jaiska shrugged. “I’m just a sword. Keep my head down. Don’t work magic when the hunters are out. Hope my sons all learn their sword swinging right. Don’t need lands. Don’t need honors. Don’t do traffic with the Mayor.”

I grimaced. “That’s wisdom, there. I, on the other hand, thought I’d be a savior of our land.”

“Bramble’s mostly stopped.” Jaiska said. “Hardly anyone except Scacz uses magic anymore. Not in any real way. Can’t remember the last time I saw bramble sprouting in the city. We’re saved. In a way.”

“It isn’t the way I hoped.”

Jaiska laughed at that. “For being so clever with the devices, you’re a damn silly-headed bastard.”

“Pila said something similar to me, once.”

“Because it’s true, alchemist.”

At the new voice, Jaiska leaped to his feet. “No offense, sir.”

Scacz swept into view. “Go find something to do, guardsman.”

“Grace.” Jaiska touched his brow and fled.

Scacz sat down on the stool that Jaiska had vacated. His gaze came to rest on Pila’s gift. “I’d ask you for some of that lovely bread, but I’m afraid you’d put bramble threads in it.”

I shook my head. “Bramble threads would be too good for a creature like you.”

“Ah. Yes. A creature. Indeed.” He smiled. “A powerful creature, actually. Thanks to you. The most powerful majister in the land, now. The Majisters of Alacan all have their heads fitted to spikes.” He sighed. “It really is an addiction. The feel of power flowing through… no one understands that. Siren song for those of us who have the knack. But then, you already knew that.”

“I don’t miss it,” I said.

Scacz snorted. “Maybe. But the lure is certainly there. For many. For most. We could never allow the people to believe that your balanthast was actually a solution. False comfort there. As soon as they sipped a little magic from the pool, they would have demanded to drink deep. And then,” he made a motion with his hands, “willy-nilly everyone would have been spelling here and there, charming and spelling and making flying carpets, and we’d all have a lovely time. Until the bramble overwhelmed us.”

“It wouldn’t have,” I said. “We’re not stupid.”

Scacz laughed. “It’s not as if the people of Jhandpara-of all the old empire-were unaware of magic’s unfortunate effects. From the historical manuscripts, they tried mightily to hold back their base urges. But still they thirsted for magic. For the power, some. For the thrill. For the convenience. For the salvation. For the wonderful luxury.”

He made a motion, and a castle appeared above his hand, glowing. It floated in clouds, with dragons of every color circling it.

“How could anyone give this up?” he asked. “The people of Jhandpara had no discipline. Even the ones who wished to control themselves lacked the necessary will. And so our Empire fell.”

In Scacz’s hand, the castle tumbled from its clouds, crashing into deep bramble forests below. Bramble spread over arched palaces, over coliseums, over temples to the Three Faces of Mara, growing tall and terrible. Dust and rubble clouds obscured the scene as more cloud castles fell.

Scacz brushed his hands together, obliterating the scene and knocking off a rain of dust that landed on his robes.

“Magic brings bramble,” he said. “And even you, alchemist, hungered to use it.”

“Only a little. To save my daughter.”

“Every spell maker has a reasonable excuse. If we grant individual mercies, we commit collective suicide. A pretty puzzle for an ethical man like you.”

“You think we’re the same, then?”

“Magic is magic. Bramble is bramble. I couldn’t care less what hairs a philosopher splits. Now, every night, I sleep knowing that bramble will no longer encroach. So I sleep very well indeed.” He stood. Nodded at my new balanthast. “Hurry with your new device, alchemist. As always, your daughter’s well-being depends upon it.”

“Why not let me go?”

“Why would I do such a thing? Then you might go and carry this knowledge of balanthasts to some other city. Perhaps give others the illusion that discipline is no longer needed.” He shook his head. “No. That would not do at all.”

“Khaim is my home,” I said. “I have no wish to leave. I could construct balanthasts. You say you want to cut back the bramble now. At last, our goals align.”

“Our goals already align, alchemist.” Scacz turned away. “Hurry with your tools. I have fiefs I wish to disburse.”

“And if I refuse?”

Scacz turned back. “Then I simply will stop caring whether your daughter coughs up that river of blood of hers. The choice is yours. It always has been.”

“You’ll never let me go.”

Scacz laughed. “I can’t think why I would. You’re far too useful.”

That night I lay in my bed, surrounded by the weirdly comfortable smells and drips of my prison workshop, turning the problem of the Majister over in my head. I could not bargain with the dragon mind of Scacz. And despite his words, I suspected my time was running out.

Building balanthasts to create bramble fiefdoms was not the green grass of a new beginning, but the signal smoke of a bitter end. Once a brigade of balanthasts was prepared, there would be no more need of me.

I lay listening to the night guard’s snores, and began to plan. Assembling pieces and components into a larger whole. Not a plan fully realized, but still… an intrigue. A tangle of misdirection, and at the end of its winding way, a path, perhaps, out of my Halizakian box. I considered the alleys and angles, testing chinks in the armor of my logic.

If I was honest, there were many.

But Pima, Jiala and I had already lived too long in the center of Khaim’s bloody vortex. The storm would eventually tear us to pieces as well. Scacz might be a man of his word, but he was not a man of charity. The Mayor and Scacz thought in terms of trade, and when I had nothing left to offer, they would do away with me.

In the morning, I was up and constructing.

“Jaiska,” I said. “Go find Scacz. Tell him I’ve had an inspiration.”

When Scacz appeared, I made my proposal. “If you let me walk outside occasionally, I will make your detectors more powerful. I can extend their reach considerably, I think. And build them so that a man need not even handle them. They could run continuously, in market squares, all along the thoroughfares, at city gates.”

Scacz looked at me suspiciously. “Why so amenable all of a sudden?”

“I want to live well. I want to see the sun and the sky, and I’m willing to bargain.”

“You think to escape.”

“From a great majister like you?” I shook my head. “I have no illusions. But I cannot live forever without fresh air.” I held up an arm. “Look at me. I’m wasting away. Look how pale I become. Shackle me how you like, but I would breathe fresh air.”

“How will you improve your design?”

“Here.” I rolled out parchment and dipped my quill. Scratched out the bones of a design. “It would be a bit like a torch, standing. A sentry. It would issue a slow smoke from its boiler. Anyone who walked near would be caught.” I pushed the rough sketch through the bars.