“It has changed, Aurian. Nexis has altered beyond any accounting for the one year of our absence.”
The Mage frowned, trying to put her thoughts in order, despite the throbbing in her head. “So we traveled ... Clearly, we moved between places—but have we also moved between times!”
D’arvan nodded. “It’s a difficult notion to accept—but what else could explain such a difference in the city?”
A coldness settled in the pit of Aurian’s stomach. “Show me,” she demanded.
“Indeed, Mage. Look upon your city. See that the Phaerie have not been idle in your absence.” Hellorin smiled bleakly and drew back from his Window of Seeing. Though his face remained impassive, as befitted the Lord of the Phaerie, he could scarcely contain his excitement. Oh, he had waited long for this day! He had always known that his son would return one day—and as a bonus, D’arvan had brought the missing Xandim horses with him.
From his high tower in the delicately constructed palace, Hellorin sent out a mental summons that reverberated to the furthest reaches of his new city. This time, there was no need to wait for moonlight. The Phaerie hunt must ride at once. Not a moment must be lost, lest the Forest Lord’s quarry should escape him once again.
As the cats, the Mages, and Maya stole through the woodland, moving with as little noise as possible over the soft blanket of living moss, Aurian could feel the dew of dawn striking right through her cloak and the Xandim leather tunic and breeches that she still wore. She felt lost and anchorless, lightheaded and drifting. This change in time and place had happened far too fast. For the Mage, it was as though the dreadful battle in the Vale and her disastrous confrontation with the Sword of Flame had taken place but an hour ago. She could still smell the smoke on her hair from Eliseth’s burning of the wildwood, and the leather of her garments was stained and stiffened in places with Cygnus’s blood. When she reached the edge of the forest and looked out between the last trees, Aurian felt her stomach lurch. Nexis it was—so much was still familiar—but so much of the city had changed!
The companions had come out of the woods above a steep fall of land where an earthslide had stripped the slope of its trees as far as the river. Below the eminence where Aurian stood, the verdant forest ended abruptly and below it lay a wilderness of boulders, mud and naked earth, strewn with the snapped and splintered trunks of trees. The river, dammed by the rubble that had swept down the hillside, had swollen above the obstruction to fill the upper valley with a long, narrow lake. Below the choking mass of earth and trees, the river had dwindled to little more than a stagnant thread that trickled haphazardly through the bottom of the muddy trench that had once been the riverbed.—Now that the river, the lifeblood of the city, had vanished, Nexis had begun to die. The wharves on the northern bank rose high and dry on stilt-legged pilings above the abandoned watercourse. It looked as though many of the warehouses had been destroyed by fire. Miathan’s great new walls, which had been described to the Mage by Zanna during her brief stay in the Nightrunner stronghold, were cracked throughout their length and in places had collapsed completely. The Academy, however, still stood high on its promontory in the loop of the dried-up riverbed. As far as Aurian could see at this distance, the library and the Mages’ Tower were still intact, though the weather-dome had been broken open like the shell of a shattered egg. Was Anvar somewhere down there, as she had dreamed? Aurian could scarcely bear to think of it.—The Mage wrenched her attention from the Academy and forced herself to examine the remainder of Nexis. What had happened to the houses on the northern slopes of the valley? The outlines of the streets, once so neat and regular, seemed to have altered and lost their definition, and as far as Aurian could tell, many of those homes had been destroyed. Lower down there was similar ruin.—Though the great domed edifice of the circular Guildhall seemed unscathed, part of the roof of the grand Arcade had fallen in, exposing the labyrinth of stalls, aisles, and walkways to the elements. A broad fissure ran right across the Garrison parade ground, making Aurian wonder uneasily if the edge or the plateau would eventually break away and crash down in ruin on the lower part of the city.
As the light continued to grow, the Mage lifted her eyes to what had once been a deep, wide river, and looked upon the ravaged landscape and altered city.—She shook her head in dismay. “What in the name of the Gods can have happened here?” Taken with the landslip that had dammed the river, the destruction seemed to point to some kind of earth tremor. But why? The land around Nexis had always been stable before. She remembered—how could she forget?—that Eliseth had possessed the Grail of Rebirth when she had attacked in the Vale.—That implied that she had found some way of defeating Miathan. Had the two Mages fought? Was that the cause of this extensive damage to the city? Yet if the Arch-mage had been killed, surely she and Anvar would have felt his death.—So where was Miathan now? Aurian shuddered, remembering her nightmare.
“How much time do you think we’ve missed?” Maya asked softly.
Aurian shrugged. “Who knows? That kind of destruction could have taken place over years—or in a single day.”
“I don’t think so,” D’arvan demurred. “Not in one day—at least, it’s more than a day since the earthslip happened. Look there.” The Earth-Mage gestured at the sprawling hillock of earth that dammed the river. “It’s hard to tell for sure, but there’s at least one year’s growth on that exposed soil—probably more, I should say.”
“You could be right.” Aurian squinted across the intervening distance, wishing that the light were better—and wishing still more for Chiamh, with his cheerful good humor and his ability to take her riding the winds so that she could look more closely at the ruined city.
“Of course I’m right,” D’arvan replied firmly. “Your mother was a good teacher.”
Maya was looking troubled. “But if you’re right, love—and I’m not saying that you aren’t—then why in the name of all creation haven’t they done something about it? If the folk in the city had organized themselves properly, it would have taken far less than a year to shift that mudslide and let the river flow again.” She frowned. “Which begs the question . ..”
“Who is leading the Nexians now?” Aurian finished for her, “Who could possibly benefit from leaving the city in this ruinous condition?” She swung around to face her companions, her face drawn in lines of bitterness. “We may have no notion of what’s going on down there, but we do know that neither Vannor, nor Parric, nor any of our other friends are in charge. None of them would ever abandon the city to such desolation. And if our friends don’t rule Nexis ...”
“We must assume that the city is in the hands of our enemies,” Maya finished grimly.
When the Mage and her companions returned to the horses they discovered that Khanu and Shia had been hunting, and had saved two fat rabbits for their human friends. The companions decided to rest and eat before going down into Nexis to search the Academy for clues to the whereabouts of Miathan and Eliseth.—Even the Mage, who was consumed with impatience, had sense enough to realize that it would be plain stupidity to face unknown danger with her strength and judgment impaired by hunger and fatigue. Besides, nightfall would be a safer time to slip unseen into the city. As soon as Maya and D’arvan were busy preparing the rabbits, Aurian slipped away by herself among the trees. She was sure that, after their long separation, her companions would appreciate a little time together—and as for herself, she wanted to be alone to think.—As the sharp odor of scorching flesh stung her nostrils, Maya extricated herself reluctantly from D’arvan’s embrace. With a curse she fumbled for the rabbits that had been spitted over the fire, and turned the sizzling carcasses, moving them a little farther from the flame.