“I’ve seen it before.” I stare at the pyramid, reluctantly examining the memory. Increasingly certain.
“I doubt it.”
“No. I’m sure.” Those surreal moments at the naumachia are engraved on my mind. Stylus to Estevan’s throat. “Not this exactly. But there was a pyramid just like that one. A bridge across the entire harbour with statues along it. And the waves were enormous. Like they were at Solivagus.” The last realisation only comes to me as I say it.
A surprised silence. “There is another city where Caten would be. Similar to Duat. I’ve never been there, but I’ve heard it described.” He casts an uncertain glance at the pyramid in the distance, then back at me. “Where did you see this?”
“It was just a glimpse. I was caught in an attack by the Anguis, last year. They had some strange weapon, and the air started to vibrate and I … I saw it.” I keep the details vague. Now the connection’s been made, I don’t want to think about it any further.
Caeror studies me. Wanting to know more, I suspect, but he can see my reluctance. “I’d like to hear the details later, if you’re willing,” he says gently. “For now, though, I’m guessing you have a few more questions of your own?”
“Just a few,” I agree wryly, grateful for the chance to move on. My gaze switches to Djedef as we start along the sand, Caeror guiding him once more. “You said you imbued him, to bring him back.”
“That’s right.”
“But … gods. What happens if you lose sight of him?” Keeping an object imbued means maintaining an accurate mental image of its form: slight deviations can be accounted for, but larger changes need to be observed to keep theimbuing. The constantly shifting profile of a human body would surely fall into the latter category.
“Nothing. The iunctus’s mind takes over much of the cognition load. They maintain it internally.”
I wipe a bead of sweat away, already flagging beneath the unrelenting roasting of the day. Sand cascades in small white waves from our footsteps as we crest a dune and start picking our way down the other side, hiding the valley and black pyramid behind us. “But … it’syour Will,” I say eventually, making my confusion plain. That’s one of the cornerstones of imbuing: only the imbuer can control it.
“And it stays that way—you can always take it back through physical contact, and if you die, it dies with you—in those respects, it’s just like back home. But here, once Will is imbued outside your own body, it can be … meshed, I suppose, with someone else’s. Like adding it to a common pool. ‘Adoption,’ my mentor used to call it.” He sees my disbelieving expression. “I know, but remember what I told you about the Rending? You have to understand that things arefundamentally differenthere. Take that Vitaerium on your arm as an example. If you were in the Academy, then you must have studied them. You’d know that nobody has any real idea how they work. And why is that?”
I chew my lip. “Because Will shouldn’t be able to directly affect a living person.” I say it slowly. A reluctant concession. “Their body’s already controlled by their own Will, so it should be impossible to imbue them … you’re saying that Vitaeria come from this world? That we’re beingimbuedright now?”
“All Vitaeria were created by someone using Obiteum’s form of Will, at least. And yes. We’re being imbued. It’s how our lungs are being preserved against the air out here.”
I feel sick. Resist the urge to pull the gods-damned scarab off my suddenly itching skin. “Where’s the Will coming from?”
Caeror grunts. “Thatis a good question. If you ever find out, let me know.” He twists to look back at me, nodding apologetically to my uncomfortable expression. “I don’t like it much either, Vis, but the people out here know almost nothing about all this. These amulets let them survive, but they believe it’s the favour of the gods. They don’t like being told otherwise, either. Trust me.” He turns back, steadying Djedef again as we start another plodding descent. “The good news is that these Vitaeria we’re wearing are stronger than the ones back home—and thanks to Adoption, the excess doesn’t have to go to waste. Theymake us somewhere between a Septimus and Sextus, from what I’ve been able to tell. You could self-imbue right now, if you’re getting tired.”
He means it as a comfort. I’m glad he can’t see my face. “I haven’t even been through the Aurora Columnae.” A protest, albeit a weak one.
“Actually, you have, now—the Gate on Solivagus is a kind of extension of them. That’s why it won’t work on anyone who’s already been through the ceremony.”
Only the slow crunching of our laboured footsteps and the chasing swish of my erasing them. Fine white sand flows over my exposed toes as I trudge, too hot where it touches. Barely noticeable next to the sick, slinking feeling as I again resist the urge to rip off the amulet on my arm. I’ve worked all my life to avoid Will. I’m not ceding, not part of one of the Hierarchy’s pyramids. But it doesn’t feel right, either.
Vek.
I walk in silence for a while, Caeror letting me digest the information as he murmurs the occasional reassurance to Djedef. Eventually, though, we reach the bottom of yet another dune and he slows. Looks around and then stops, bringing Djedef to a halt as well. “This is far enough.”
“For what?” I frown around. Bleached waves tower in each direction, concealing everything of note from view. We’ve barely walked fifteen minutes from the cave. “Why do we need to be out here?” A concern that’s been a distant second next to rearranging my understanding of how the world works, but still.
“Ka—the Concurrence—has a way of controlling the minds of iunctii. He leaves slivers of Will in their bodies, and a command to do something if we bring them back. Sometimes escape, report back our location. Sometimes murder everyone in their sleep. No way of knowing.” His voice is filled with distaste as he checks the bindings on Djedef’s hands. “You already had a small taste of it at the Labyrinth, I assume. If Djedef isn’t infected, he can be useful to us. To everyone’s survival. But we have to check.”
“Out here?”
“Yes. Only one way to know for sure, but it’s too dangerous to do it in Qabr.” Caeror, to my increasing dismay, draws the obsidian blade from his belt. Shows it to me. “You said you’d been to the ruins near the Academy. You know how the Instruction Blades work?”
“How they work?” I frown at the sword, not understanding.
Then, with gradual unease, worried I do.
“There are more pleasant things,” he agrees, seeing my troubled recognition and nodding regretfully. “I wish there was time to explain all of this more thoroughly, but just being out here like this is a risk. Stand back, and don’t say anything until I’m done.”
Then he steadies Djedef, and plunges the blade through his back.
VI
