Heart Fortune (Celta) (37 page)

Zem’s claws pricked Jace’s shoulders as he dug into the leather tunic, the familiar weight pleasing Jace. He felt the brush of Lepid’s body as the fox danced around them.

We are out, Out, OUT!
the Fam crooned.

“Yes, out of the chamber.”

Glyssa looked up at him with a strained expression. “But not out of the ship. We are all still trapped down here.” She shivered and Jace rubbed up and down her back.

“We’ll work on that,” he said.

A few minutes later he stepped over to the door of the quarters where he and Lepid had spent long septhours and studied the mechanism to the side of the door. When he put his hand in the cavity and touched the lever to open the door, he felt the taint of Trago’s Flair. He turned the crank, grunted when it stopped and applied pressure. The metal broke off in his hands. Jace shook his head. “No way we could have gotten out by ourselves, or by this method.”

“No,” Glyssa said. “And I’m not sure we can get out of the ship by ourselves.” She hesitated and said in an even smaller voice, “I don’t even know if we can survive until someone comes and gets us.” She blinked rapidly, stiffened her spine and when she spoke again, her voice was coolly logical. “There were farms, a conservatory—something like the Great Greensward on
Nuada’s Sword
—here, wasn’t there?” Glyssa asked.

“I paid attention to the blueprints,” Jace teased gently. “Yes, about a quarter of the ship was given over to agriculture and growing.” He hesitated. “It failed in some way, or wasn’t enough to sustain the long voyage the way the colonists had imagined. The
Lugh’s Spear
people needed help.”

Glyssa nodded. “I remember that from the play,
Heart and Sword
. But maybe since then . . .”

“Four hundred years of darkness, of being underground, it couldn’t have survived. Whatever food we find might have lost all nutritional value like the subsistence bars. I’m not sure whether we can reach other levels. We are on the sixteenth level now and the green ag area was one whole side of the third level.”

“But those walls held during the landing, didn’t they?” she asked, trying to remember without resorting to the recordsphere in her pocket. That knowledge hadn’t been a priority of hers.

Lepid barked once.
I have been down one level.

“Really?” Glyssa and Jace asked together.

Yes, there is a stairway. And down there I found an opening, a tube that smelled of once-growing things.
His nose wrinkled and he sneezed.
Very, very bad smells.

Jace’s lips twisted. “Who knows, something
might
have mutated.”

Images from horror vizes flickered through Glyssa’s mind. She shivered. “Maybe we shouldn’t find out.”

Not by ourselves,
Zem said. He shifted from foot to foot on Jace’s shoulder.
I do not like being here.

“It doesn’t look good,” Jace said.

I am cold,
Zem said.

There is a big bag of clothing not too far down the hallway!
Lepid said, sounding chipper now that she was here and they were all together. He trotted down the hall, into the darkness beyond Glyssa’s spellglobe.

She followed slowly with Jace. “We are trapped.”

“Sounds like.”

“You didn’t bring any food or water?” she asked.

“No.”

Her smile trembled. “I didn’t, either. No one told me I should and I didn’t consider it.”

“Without Trago’s actions, we would have been fine.” Jace’s tone was casual.

“Did you try the water in the ship?” she asked.

“No, but maybe we should.” Jace walked over to the nearest open door, checked the doorway, opened the panel for manual operation of the door, and touched the controls. No feel of any Flair.

A scraping sounded behind him, and he saw Glyssa moving a large box into the doorway.

“It’s not heavy, but it’s metal and constructed well,” she said and frowned down on it. “I think it held subsistence bars.”

Jace nodded and climbed over the box and into the room. Summoning a dim spell light, he went straight to the cleansing cubicle where a small sink was attached to the wall, and stared at the lever next to the spout.

That does not look like what is in the shower tent,
Zem said.

“It doesn’t work with Flair. Nothing in this ship works with Flair,” Jace said.

Flair makes the world go around,
Zem said.

Jace wasn’t going to argue or lecture. Using muscle and a steady pressure, he pushed the lever all the way down. Nothing happened, not a creak, not a gurgle.

Glyssa joined him and they both stared at the tiny basin. “No water,” she said.

“No,” he said and waved for her to leave the room.

She did and he went back into the hallway, moved the box close to its original position.

“We probably wouldn’t want to drink water that sat stagnant in pipes for four centuries anyway,” she said.

“Not me,” he said.

She shivered. “The ship is always this cold?”

“As far as I know. I’d like to see the entryway,” Jace said.

Glyssa nodded and they turned back.

He reached out and took her hand, swung their arms, which had her smiling.

“Thank you for coming to save me.”

“I couldn’t do anything else.”

His chest tightened. “Thank you,” he said again, unable to find more words.

They reached the place where the ship had broken, and stood staring at the pile of rock and dirt. “Doesn’t look like anything we can handle ourselves,” Jace said.

Thirty-nine

R
az contacted them again
.
We only have two Flaired earth-moving machines, the best on the market, but they can’t tunnel so deep in
time
.

Before they died of thirst. Two to four days, max. “Figured that,” Jace muttered. He held Zem and stroked the bird.

Another mind stream from Raz,
The greatest building machines are stored on
Nuada’s Sword
, the starship in Druida City. I don’t know if they are in working order or available. However, the people who could run those machines are Captain Ruis Elder and Dani Eve Elder.

“Nulls,” Glyssa said flatly. “They can’t get here on an airship, they would interfere with the Flaired flying spells.”

“Figured that, too,” Jace said.

Raz said delicately,
I am sure you understand the problems in asking for help from Captain Elder and his daughter.

“Not to mention the Elecampanes still want to keep this project under their control,” Jace said, with no bitterness.

Glyssa lifted her brows.

“What? Not the Elecampanes’ fault that we got trapped in here,” Jace said.

“I think if we perish they will have significant problems,” Glyssa said. “People will blame them.” Glyssa shrugged. “Too late now.”

Jace’s grin was swift. “Let’s hope not.”

Not looking good,
Zem grumbled.

Raz’s telepathic voice interrupted them.
We will return to the camp. I am only a few septhours away with the airship. Del is . . . she’ll be back in a day. We can send images to you, Glyssa, pull you out, then you can help with Jace and the others.

Jace’s face set into impassivity. He said nothing, but his shuttered gaze met hers.

Perhaps that would work, but Glyssa doubted it. If it had been only her, she’d have risked it.

No, Raz
, she sent firmly.
You have a load of passengers there at the Deep Blue Sea, don’t tell me they all stayed in camp. Didn’t the cross-folk head off overland to somewhere else?
From his lack of reply, she was right.
You must stay for them. I am not sure how long we could survive down here. We have no water. We are reluctant to explore the ship and waste our energy.
She took a breath and continued.
You and I are not that close that I would trust our link. Not even if it were Laev and you. I’m sure there is only limited Flair available to you, I will not be the first one out and leave my loved ones.

She moved close to Jace, hugged him, looked down at Lepid, whose ears had quivered with fear. “We stay together.”

I WILL find a way to rescue you, though it beggars me!
Laev T’Hawthorn shouted.

Lepid and Zem gasped, obviously hearing the GreatLord. Jace grimaced.

Glyssa bit her lips. How dire their situation was began sinking in. Her joy at finding Jace and Lepid completely gone. She swallowed and met Jace’s eyes. Shaking her head, she whispered, “All the greatest Flaired mages in Celta can’t save us.”

And she was surprised by a tender look and carefree smile.
There is freedom in hopelessness,
his thought that she believed she wasn’t supposed to catch.

“I know,” Jace said.

The last-ditch idea that had been cycling in the back of her mind jumped forward and off her tongue. “I think we should try to teleport home.”

Jace frowned. “Home?”

She sucked in a desperate breath. “Home. To Druida.”

His mouth actually dropped open. “What! Thousands of kilometers!”

Lifting her chin, she said, “I can teleport to Verde Valley from my home in Druida City. That’s—” She couldn’t recall the exact distance, hundreds of kilometers, though. “That’s not close.”

He appeared stunned.

Yes!
Lepid wagged his tail.
Let’s do that!

“Thousands. Of. Kilometers,” Jace said, shuddering. He dropped her hands.

She rubbed her arms. “What are our other options? Scavenging through the ship, hoping to find food and water. We’d just end up waiting on others, depending on others.”

His gray eyes deepened and his mouth turned down. “There is that.” But he turned and paced—not going far, not beyond her spell light. He glanced in the open doors.

I do not like it here,
Zem said.
It is too cold all the time. There is no sunlight. There is no wind. There are no trees.

Lepid took up the negative litany.
There is no food. Not one little mousie or insect. There is no brook to lap at with fresh water.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jace said. His hands were clasped behind his back, his head down as he paced.

He looked fine, but fear crept along each nerve in Glyssa’s body, screaming for her to
do something
. She could be patient. She could wait. Truly. If she knew for certain she’d be saved,
they’d
be saved. But she didn’t. She only saw slow and painful death or a terrible risk.

Jace turned back, chin lowered. When he raised his head his face was grim and he flipped a gesture at the hallway with lost and forgotten items around them. “We could scavenge here, for sure, but might not find anything useful.”

“That’s right,” she said.

“And we all could last, what, maybe a full eightday?”

Instinctively at the thought of no water, she wet her lips. “Maybe. Maybe longer if we went into Flaired trances.” She didn’t think Lepid was able to hold a Flaired trance, too young and nervy.

“You really don’t believe any mages GreatLord Laev T’Hawthorn recruits to save us any way they could would have a chance?” Jace asked.

“No.”

“And we’ll get weaker and weaker.” He lifted his hand to stroke Zem. “We’re about as strong as we’ll ever be, right now.”

“Yes.” Her pulse rushed in her ears, accepting their death. Not only hers, but Jace’s and their wonderful animal companions. She might have sacrificed herself for them if it would do any good, but it wouldn’t. She wanted to live, her HeartMate to live, her Fam and Jace’s Fam to live.

Jace grimaced. “With all the options for teleporting to somewhere in camp gone, we don’t have any choice but to risk the long chance.”

She nodded. “I agree.” She paused for a breath, then said, “I think it would be best if we trie—if we teleported to my bedroom. I know that room very well, was in it every day for many years. The rest of you have been there, too, so you can add your individual images and knowledge of it. That will be a benefit for all of us.” She smiled at Zem. “It will include your perch, which you know the best.” She actually sounded confident. “I know the light, and all the furnishings. No one should be there. My Family will be at work in the library.”

We can do it!
Lepid gamboled around the hallway. Glyssa’s gaze met Jace’s uncommonly serious one. He thought they’d die, too. He glanced up and down the hallway. “Better than staying here, fading away.”

“Yes.”

“Then let’s do it now.” Frowning, Jace lifted Zem from his shoulder. “I think Zem should be held closer.”

And me, too!
Lepid said.

“What about slings?” Glyssa asked.

“Those would work,” Jace said.

They rooted around in a couple of bags of the colonists’ pitiful belongings before they found some material and fashioned slings that hung against their chests for both Fams. Jace placed Zem carefully in his, tightened it.

Zem asked,
What happens if we don’t make it?

“Another unknown,” Glyssa said. She kept her tone light. “We might disintegrate. Throwing all our effort into this, everything we each have, holding nothing back, we’ll probably go unconscious. So, ah”—she cleared her throat—“if we, uh, materialize in, say, a mountain in one of the ranges between here or there, we will probably never know. I’m sure it’s quick!”

Flying into a mountain often is,
Zem said.

Actually, Camellia, who’d been in the next room from a man who’d died teleporting, had told Glyssa his scream had lasted long, agonizing seconds. But he’d been conscious at the time. She didn’t think they would be.

“I’m sure it’s quick,” she repeated.

A couple of minutes later their preparations were done. Glyssa leaned back to stare into Jace’s beautiful misty gray eyes. “You never said what your primary Flair is.”

His mouth twisted. “I did tell you that I’m not strong enough in psi power to manifest a primary Flair.”

“I disagree. You had defined Passages. You made a HeartGift.” She gestured to the bespelled envelope. “Your secondary Flair, leather working, is intricate and gorgeous. That indicates a powerful primary Flair.”

He scoffed a sound of disagreement.

She tightened her arms around him. “I think I know what your Flair is. It’s extremely subtle, but I’ve deduced it.”

“Deduced it, eh?” He smiled.

“Yes.” She framed his face with her hands, made sure his entire focus was on her. “It’s luck.”

“What!”

“You’re luckier than a man should be, especially with regard to dangerous, perhaps potentially fatal events.”

He blinked in astonishment. “You must be joking.”

“No. I’m not. Think of all the hazardous ventures you’ve been in, all the chances you’ve taken, and you’re still whole and sane, haven’t had any major Healings. You’ve been able to do pretty much as you please all of your life and recently you came into a small inheritance. You’re phenomenally lucky, Jace.”

“You really believe this.”

“I do. And you need to, also. That’s what I’m counting on to get us home.” She glanced at Lepid. “When we teleport, you must use
all
your Flair, saving nothing. You must believe that Jace’s luck will see us through.”

I do. I DO!
Lepid looked at Jace with liquid eyes.
I KNOW FamMan is lucky. We will be ALL RIGHT!

Zem said,
He is lucky, and we who associate with him are lucky, too.
He hesitated, then added.
I will use all of my Flair in this teleportation. I will hold nothing back, though it kills me.

“Right,” Glyssa said with only a small wince. He didn’t have to have said that last bit. She met the hawkcel’s eyes and nodded, then looked back at Jace,
willing
him to accept this theory. It was a good theory. Perhaps even true. She refused to doubt.

“And you must not doubt, either, Jace. Lover. HeartMate. We need your total belief.”

His eyes went distant, as if he considered his life. “Maybe you’re right.”

“I
am
right. You are phenomenally lucky.”

“Phenomenally lucky.”

“‘Say it three and it will be,’” she said an old children’s charm. Anything that would help. “Phenomenally lucky.”

“Phenomenally lucky, phenomenally lucky,” Jace said, his lips curving in a smile. “I’m phenomenally lucky to have you and Zem and Lepid.”

Phenomenally lucky, phenomenally lucky, phenomenally lucky,
chanted the Fams.

He picked up the envelope that held his HeartGift and grimaced. “I’ll need to remove the spellshield, and when I do—”

“We’ll be swamped with sexual energy.” A notion wisped through Glyssa’s mind. “Wait, wait!”

He tilted his head. “Yeah?”

“Count down before you release the spell.” She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to recall a spell she and her friends had practiced in their teenaged years, transmuting energy from emotional turmoil to physical energy. They hadn’t done it very often, because it had left them jittery. Still, she and Jace and the Fams would need every iota of energy they could scrape up. She wet her lips, saw Jace focus on her mouth, then meet her eyes with a smile. “I think . . . I think I might be able to snatch that sexual energy and transform it to, um, regular physical and Flair energy, store it in our bodies. There will be, um, increased arousal, but I don’t want to waste any of our time or strength on sex.”

Jace laughed. “Having sex is not a waste of anything.”

Embarrassment painted hot spots on her cheeks. “Maybe not, but our energy would be better spent making sure we can teleport out of here.”

He nodded. “All right. One, HeartGift mine; two, Glyssa mine; three, Flair is
ours!
” He dropped the shield. A teenage boy’s lust, her HeartMate’s young sexuality hit her with intimate need. Her body clenched. Opening her eyes wide she saw the red orange energy, yanked at it, flipped it, recited the four rhyming couplets.

The intense yearning changed shape into bright blue energy, radiating Flair. An unexpected source of power. Inhaling, she halved it, took some into her body, feeling the lightning jolt, blew the rest to Jace and saw it hit him, sink into him, arc his body.

For a couple of minutes they trembled with the aftermath. Her finger shaking, she pointed at the envelope he’d dropped. Zem hopped over and snipped the soft string tie with his beak, pushed the top up and open.

Glyssa gasped at the beauty of the small rounded rectangular pursenal. Deep wine red, the darker color she preferred to licorice red, the gold of simple and elegant curlicues gleamed in a pattern that settled into her as much as the Flair coating it had. The most innately pleasing design to her.

“
Your
pattern, no one else’s,” Jace said. Stiffly he leaned down and plucked it from the envelope, offered it to her. A gold filigree clasp showed on the front. “My HeartGift for you, to you.”