Rob Scott - Lessek_s Key

Nothing immediately sprang to mind so he decided to root around until he found some dates: franked letters, maybe, or old utility bills. Using those as a guide, he could chart a rudimentary map through the mountains based on the passage of time. If he ignored areas where the rubbish came from before October 15, or after the previous week, he hoped to zero in on the final resting place of his and Mark’s charred possessions.

‘Let’s get going!’ Steven said briskly. He took a few steps towards the hill on his left when his toe caught on something solid beneath the snow and he cursed and flailed his arms in a desperate effort to regain his balance. ‘Speed bumps?’ he yelled, ‘Why the hell do we need speed bumps at the damned-’ As his foot landed he felt a shock of pain fire through his leg and he tumbled to the ground. Ah, shit, my knee,’ he groaned, and rolled onto his back, clutching it with both hands.

Anticipating the dull throb of soft tissue damage, he sat up and gingerly straightened his right leg, the one that had nearly been bitten off by the injured grettan in the Blackstone Mountains south of Meyers’ Vale. But though he expected another blast of pain, Steven found to his surprise that he was able to flex and extend his leg with no problem.

‘Huh,’ he said, his voice bright with relief, ‘I must have come down on it crooked or something.’ He stood up carefully, putting a little weight through the leg until he was certain there were no injuries. ‘Thank God! I’d be flat-out screwed, trapped here with a blown knee.’

Below, the siren’s cry came again, and as Steven stepped over the disfigured snow angel he had made another explosion lanced through his leg, spilling him to the ground once more. ‘What the hell is this?’ he shouted up towards Alps Mountain. ‘What’s wrong with me?’ He clutched at his knee with one hand and rolled into a sitting position. Grimacing, he started to straighten the leg – and once again, it was as if nothing had happened. Swearing, he took off his gloves and stuffed them in a pocket, then carefully rolled his trouser leg above the knee so he could see if it had swelled up – maybe he had torn a ligament or something and the cold was numbing it.

‘I’ll bet it was coming over that rutting fence,’ he said, not noticing the Eldarni profanity. ‘Just my bloody luck.’ But the leg looked perfectly healthy. Steven, at a loss, put his clothes to rights and heaved himself back on his feet. He tested the leg again, gingerly at first, then stamping both feet hard, but it felt fine.

Still swearing under his breath, Steven turned back towards the hills of rubbish. This time he stopped dead, his foot in mid-air: when he looked down, he saw he was about to put his boot on exactly the spot where his knee had twice buckled beneath him.

Standing upright, one foot suspended several inches above the ground, he waited until he felt it: a muted sensation, like the soft rubbing of fingertips against an unfinished pine tabletop or the coarse skin of a callused palm. ‘Gilmour?’ Steven whispered, then stepped back, planting his foot away from the impacted snow where he had fallen. It was an urge now, like something – someone – was guiding him; he reached out, palms forward, as if to feel the air before him. He tried to recall how he’d felt all those months ago, when he was so determined to break into the bank safe and see what William Higgins had deposited there a century and a half earlier – he remembered feeling driven as he hurried home to see what was so important it had merited an eternity in a safe-deposit box.

He recognised that feeling; it was back: Lessek’s key and the Larion far portal were here, close by. He was not too late; not yet.

Steven covered his eyes: they were deceiving him, telling him there were acres of garbage to consider. There were not. Now, when he removed his hand, the landfill was gone, blurred into a waxy backdrop of beige, green and white. In its place were three tears, like irregular gashes on an oil canvas. The rips separated the landscape, pulling and tugging at the wash of colour that had been the valley below.

Steven’s breathing slowed as he understood what he was seeing; he had experienced something like this before, when he had touched the leather binding of Lessek’s spell book that night on the Prince Marek. He was overwhelmed with a monumental sense of power, as vast as the Midwest he had crossed just days before. Closing his eyes again, he reached into the air; it was tangible, malleable. When you are running, run, Steven. The way to win the battle was not to battle. The way to win the battle was to create. Ideas and algorithms swirled around him, and for a moment everything that ever was or would be was spread before him: opportunities won and lost, all was clear. It was maths. Maths could do anything, even the Fold could…

When Steven broke free from the magic, he found himself struggling to breathe, as if unseen arms encircled his chest. He cursed the altitude, rubbed his eyes and zipped his jacket up under his chin. It had grown colder; around him, the valley seemed darker.

Delicately, carefully, Steven edged the toe of his boot forward until it reached the point where he had fallen twice that morning. Nothing. No shock of Larion magic this time. He cautiously inched forward; now he knew what he was looking for. ‘A speed bump,’ he said, ‘a speed bump in a city dump. Who would have thought-?’

He walked to the snow bank towering above the road and began kicking at the base of the five-month accumulation of ploughed snow and ice. It was there; he was certain – just a foot or so away from where his legs had given way: a small granite stone, irregular and nondescript. Lessek’s key.

‘A speed bump.’ He shook his head and laughed out loud. ‘It bounced off the truck when it hit the speed bump.’ Steven turned the stone over in his hands, then slipped it into the pocket of his stolen jacket. The distant scream of sirens carried up the valley from Clear Creek Canyon.

He slipped several times on his way up the north face and some twelve feet down the other side of the middle mound of garbage, making him bitterly regret his lack of clean clothing. Wiping off a lump of what he was hoped was only rancid beef, he began digging through the layers of snow, frozen mud and damp rubbish. Three feet of mouldy food, rotten newspapers and dirty diapers later, his torn gloves came away thick with black, smoky mud. Paydirt: the remains of 147 Tenth Street.

Ten minutes later found Steven pulling out a wrinkled, sodden, almost unrecognisable Larion far portal. Though it looked – and felt – disgusting, as he tossed it over his shoulder, he noticed its fragrance, a hint of lilac, Hannah’s perfume. Its energy, the force that had driven him to rob his own bank, hadn’t waned. He could feel it pulsing through the muscles of his shoulder like a second cousin to the hickory staff. He glanced at the stolen watch, 10.54 a.m., six hours until he could get it back again. He hadn’t expected to miss it so much.

As he came down from the trash mountain, Steven wore a look of grim confidence. Lessek’s Larion portal was his; this time all the trepidation and terror he had experienced the night he followed Mark to Estrad were gone. In six hours he would step back into Eldarn, this time without fear, but he would carry with him sadness for Versen’s loss, loneliness without Hannah, and slow-boiling hatred for Nerak.

From the trees to the north came yet another wailing siren. As if he had suddenly heard it for the first time, Steven snapped his attention towards the sound. He swore, and began sprinting towards Howard’s car. Nerak was in Idaho Springs.

On the north bank of the Medera River, where it spilled out into Orindale Harbour, there was an alehouse, bigger than most along the waterfront, catering to a mixed clientele of sailors, stevedores and merchants, and even a few Malakasian soldiers. It was a positive hive of revelry, from early morning until late each night, with fights tending to be little more than angry shoving matches as no one wanted to bring the full scrutiny of the local occupation force onto the establishment. Going too far would raise concern among the officers, and risk them closing the tavern, or, worse, having it burned to the ground.