There were only eight of the avengers left. Urza had destroyed two of those with dazzling streaks of raw power from his jeweled eyes. No one learned faster than Urza. He never tired nor depleted his resources. So long as there was substance beneath his feet or stars in the sky overhead, Urza the Artificer could work his uniquely potent magic.
Then, suddenly, his strikes became indecisive.
A turtle scuttled forward unchallenged and knocked Urza backward; the first time Xantcha had ever seen him touched in battle. He destroyed it with a glut of flame, but not before the other turtles pelted him with bursts of darkness.
After that Xantcha expected Urza to make short work of the enemy. Instead he became vaporous, a man of light and shadow. A turtle paw passed directly through him. Xantcha thought it was another of Urza's tactical surprises, until she watched his counter-strike pass through the turtle.
Xantcha had imagined the end many times, but she never
thought the end would come from turtles on an ice-bound world.
Her armor would protect her ... probably. Her club would almost certainly have no effect on avengers meant to destroy Urza the Artificer, but Xantcha would sooner face her personal end right here, right now, than risk capture and return to Phyrexia, or-even worse-eternity on this icebound world. She leapt onto the back of the nearest turtle and took aim at the forward gap in its carapace.
The turtle proved quite agile, bucking like an unbroken horse in its efforts to throw Xantcha off. She held on until two of the other avengers began targeting her instead of Urza. The armor held, barely. Xantcha felt the heat of dark magic, front and back, and the crack of her ribs as they began to break, one by one, under the hammer-and-anvil pressure.
The last thing Xantcha saw was Urza, brighter than the sun....
Not a bad sight to carry into the darkness.
CHAPTER 13
Summer had come to the Ohran ridge some two months after Ratepe arrived. Grass in every shade of green rippled in the wind beneath a blue crystal sky. Xantcha's sphere rose easily, caught a westward breeze, and began the journey to Efuan Pincar.
"Do you think this is going to work?" Ratepe asked when the cottage had disappeared into the folded foothills.
She didn't answer. Ratepe gave her a sulky look, which she also ignored. Still sulking, he began rearranging their traveling gear. Xantcha's head brushed the inner curve. Ratepe, who was a head-plus taller, was at a much greater disadvantage. With a dramatic show of determination, he shoved the largest, heaviest box behind them and upholstered it with food sacks. Although his efforts made the sphere easier to maneuver, if he didn't settle down Xantcha thought she might finish the journey alone.
"I don't think I've ever had cushions up here before," she said, trying to be pleasant, hoping pleasantry would be enough to calm her companion.
"I do what I can," he replied, still sulking.
Ratepe had a flair for solving problems, which didn't seem to depend on the images he gleaned from Urza's Weakstone eye.
Even Urza had noticed it and made a point of discussing things with him that he'd never have mentioned to her. Xantcha told herself this was exactly what she'd wanted-an Urza who paid attention to the world around him. Of course, Urza thought he was talking to his long-dead brother, and Ratepe, though he played his part well, wanted more than conversation.
These days, Ratepe's mind swam in the memories of a man who'd been Urza's peer in artifice. He'd absorbed all the theories of artifact creation, but as clever as he was with sacks and boxes, he was awkward at the worktable. Perhaps if he'd been willing to start with simple things ... but if Ratepe had had the temperament for easy beginnings, the Weakstone probably would have ignored him, as it had always ignored Xantcha.
He'd tried pure magic where Xantcha had been certain he would succeed. Urza always said that magic was rooted in the land. Ratepe's devotion to Efuan Pincar was the touchstone of his life, and magic often came both late and sudden into a mortal's life, but it wouldn't enter Ratepe's, no matter how earnestly he invited it. The lowest blow, however, had come after he'd badgered Urza into concocting another cyst.
Ratepe had gulped the lump without a heartbeat's hesitation and writhed in agony for two days before he let Urza dissolve it. One artifact poisoning wasn't enough. He'd tried twice more, until Urza-who knew somewhere in the fathomless depths of his being that Ratepe was an ordinary young man and not his brother-refused to brew up another one.
"I don't mind doing the heavy work," Xantcha said. The sphere was moving nicely on its own. She laid her hand on his arm. "I like the company ... the friendship."
Ratepe was more than a friend, though both of them were careful not to put the difference into words. The cottage had only two rooms. Her room had only one bed. The difference had come suddenly. One moment they were each alone, ignoring another rainy night. The next, they were on the bed, sitting near each other, then touching. For warmth, he'd said, and Xantcha had agreed, as if curiosity had never gotten her into trouble before. As if she hadn't known the difference between curiosity and need and been coldly willing to take advantage of it.
It had been awkward at first. Xantcha was, as she'd warned, a Phyrexian newt, a vat-grown creature whose purpose had never been to love another or beget children. But Ratepe was nothing if not persistent in the face of challenge, and the problems, though inconvenient, had been surmounted without artifice or magic. He was satisfied. Xantcha was surprised-astonished beyond all the words in all the languages she knew-to discover that being in love had nothing to do with being born.
Ratepe laced his fingers through hers. "I could do more. You never made good on your threat to make me cook my own food."
"There's only one hearth. I haven't had time to make another."
"That's what I mean." Ratepe tightened his hand. "You do everything. Urza doesn't notice, but I do. You're the one who makes the decisions."
Xantcha laughed. "You don't know Urza very well."
"I wouldn't know him at all if you hadn't decided to bring me here. I wake up in the morning, and for a few moments I think I'm back in Efuan Pincar with my family and that it's all been a dream. I think about telling my little brother, then I look over at you-"
She made an unnecessary adjustment to the sphere's drift, an excuse to reclaim her hand. "Urza's coming back to life, letting go of his obsessions. That's your doing."
Ratepe sighed. "I hadn't noticed."
Ratepe, like Mishra, had a tendency to sulk. Xantcha had reread The Antiquity Wars looking for ways to buoy his spirits. She'd even asked Urza what could put an end to Ratepe-or Mishra's- black, self-defeating moods. Silence, Urza had replied, had always been the best tactic when his
brother sulked. Mishra couldn't bear to be ignored. Be patient, out wait him and his quicksilver temper would find another target.
Xantcha had learned endurance without mastering patience. "For the first time in two and a half centuries, Urza's worktable isn't covered with mountains. He's making artifacts again." Xantcha thumped the box behind her. "New artifacts, not the same gnats. He pays attention when you talk to him. Why do you think we're going up to Efuan Pincar?"
"To appease me? To keep me in my place?"
Xantcha's temper rose. "Don't be ridiculous."
"No? I've done what you wanted. He calls me Mishra and I answer. I listen to the Weakstone and remember things I never lived, that no one should have lived. When you or he says that I'm so much like Mishra ... by Avohir's book, I want to go outside and smash my skull with a rock. It's no compliment to be compared with a cold-blooded murderer, and that's what they both are, Xantcha. That's what they always were. They care more about things than people. But I don't do it, because all I've got to replace everything I've lost is you. You asked me to be Mishra, so I am. All I've asked of Urza is that he care enough to send a few of his precious artifacts for Efuan Pincar."