Tutor was sent for. He dried her face and sat unmoving until she stopped crying. ‘Patterning had the same effect on me.’
She raised her head. ‘They patterned you?’
He smiled. ‘They tried everyone, back in the early days when they were learning. They thought torgnadrs were going to win the war in a few weeks, by draining the nodes each time clankers went into battle. They probably would have won, had they been able to pattern enough of them. Fortunately for us, nearly all failed. The lyrinx got no torgnadr out of me, but I cried for a fortnight. I can still remember how it felt.’
‘When was that, Tutor?’ The title still felt wrong. She did not like using it.
‘A long time ago. Five or six years? You lose track of time down here.’
She felt closer to him. Tutor was a nondescript fellow, neither tall nor short, handsome nor ugly. He was thin, but every human here was. And pale; few of the prisoners ever saw the sun. His dark eyes were kindly, his brow lined. His hand was callused – evidently they worked him hard and not only as a teacher.
‘This torgnadr of mine, if they succeed with it, will cause the deaths of thousands. Are all these people in the patterners –?’
‘No, Tiaan. I told you, torgnadrs are hard to make. The others are just patterning weak devices like limnadrs and phynadrs, and most of those fail too.’
‘What are they?’
‘Limnadrs are spying devices. They can sense moving clankers, though not well, since the design was changed last year. Phynadrs draw small amounts of power from the field, for one purpose or another. They’re a bit like clanker controllers. I think they got a limnadr out of patterning me. Because of my gift for languages, you see – useful for spying.’
‘Yes. Do you mind if I call you Merryl? Tutor seems like a slave name.’
‘Of course not.’ Before he could say any more, Merryl was called away.
He came back several times, when she was overcome by melancholy. They did not talk much but she drew comfort from his presence. The other humans felt alien but he never did.
Tiaan wondered, as she often did, what they were doing with Gilhaelith. He had been kind to her in his own strange way, but in the end, like everyone else, he had made his choice. No doubt he was looking after himself, though she could not see how he could get the amplimet.
Old Hyull now inspected the torgnadr after every patterning session. After the fifth such visit he gave the faintest of toothy smiles as he hefted the bucket, peering through the glass from below.
Ryll spoke to him. Old Hyull shook his head violently. Ryll cast a glance at Tiaan. Old Hyull put down the bucket, rasping a series of orders in which all Tiaan could make out was her name and, once, torgnadr. Old Hyull went out with the torgnadr.
‘Is it fixed?’ Tiaan whispered to Ryll.
‘No,’ he replied, after looking over his shoulder. ‘And Old Hyull can’t understand why not. But it’s better than it was – it will do.’
She wondered what she was responsible for. ‘Aren’t you going to take me out of the patterner? My skin feels all lumpy and hot.’
‘There isn’t time. We must pattern another torgnadr from the beginning and hope we can complete it.’
‘No,’ she whispered. ‘I can’t take any more, Ryll.’
‘You must.’ He did not meet her eyes.
The patterning began, exactly as before except that the sessions were much longer. Perhaps it was easier the second time. But if that was so, why did the enemy have so few torgnadrs? Maybe the second time was fatal.
The growing torgnadr was a blob the size of a large melon when the cavern shook, as if something had thumped into the ground overhead. Ryll set down the bucket. His eyes were huge. Threads of red and black inched their way up his arms. The sight made her afraid.
‘What is it, Ryll?’ she whispered.
‘The battle for Snizort has begun and we are not ready.’ Ryll closed his eyes. ‘I can see Snizort burning. Fire!’ he gasped, looking around like a desperate animal.
‘Ryll?’ Too late. He was gone.
Tiaan felt an urge to scream. If Snizort was on fire, all she could do was await her death with whatever dignity she could muster. She took deep breaths, which was no help at all. She hoped it would be quick.
Some minutes later, Ryll returned, his skin now showing camouflage colours. He approached, head hanging. ‘I’m sorry, Tiaan. I am proven to be a rank coward. Fire is my greatest terror.’
She said nothing. The patterning resumed, but some minutes later the room shook again. Old Hyull bounded through the door and dragged Ryll out, flashing distress markings. Down the row of patterners, someone screamed, but thankfully no one else took it up. The women chattered among themselves in their own language, ignoring Tiaan as usual.
More lyrinx ran in, gathering inside the door and skin-speaking furiously. It looked like a general panic. There were two more thumps. The lyrinx disappeared again.
She was glad when Merryl came up the row a few minutes later.
‘What’s the matter?’ she yelled. ‘Are we being attacked?’
‘Yes, but we’re not in danger yet.’
‘Then why the panic?’
‘The old torgnadr has finally failed and yours is not proving as effective against the enemy as they had hoped.’
She was pleased to hear it. ‘You mean at draining the node?’
‘Yes, and channelling power to their great project.’
‘How do you know?’
‘One picks things up. But –’
He looked around to see if anyone was watching. No one was, though Tiaan was uncomfortably aware of the growing torgnadr beside her, so similar to their spying devices.
‘What are they going to do?’
‘Their great project is not yet complete, and that they are determined to do. The defenders will fight to make time for it, to the last drop of their purple blood. The battle is going to be vicious.’
‘Our people are already dying,’ said Tiaan. ‘And these torgnadrs will destroy many more. My torgnadrs. I’m sick of being used, Merryl.’
‘There’s nothing you could have done.’
‘If I ever get the chance,’ she vowed, ‘I’ll smash the amplimet to pieces. I would destroy every node on Santhenar if it would only stop this endless war. I mean it, Merryl.’ As she spoke, the amplimet flared, then faded, and the skin-creeping feeling reappeared.
‘I know you do, but there are no simple answers.’
‘I don’t care.’ If the field was gone, both clankers and torgnadrs would be useless, and no one would want to use her either. She just wanted to be ordinary; anonymous.
Ryll came hurtling through the door. ‘Begone, Tutor!’
The patterning continued, now with breaks of just hours in between. Her skin chafed constantly, she could not sleep and Tiaan was struck by an old fear that she’d not thought about in her weeks here – what the amplimet was up to. That sudden surge, and the earlier pulsing, suggested that it was watching her. It might not let her destroy it.
‘There’s not time!’ Ryll said to Liett several days later. ‘We can’t fail now. Not so close.’ He looked desperate.
The shocks became more frequent. They had been going on for three days, judging by her sleeps. The lyrinx panic grew. Ryll forced the patterning so hard and fast that Tiaan began to have a hallucination. For a few seconds the stone walls thinned to transparency and she saw lyrinx and humans struggling in a long black tunnel. Gilhaelith was among them.
Her viewpoint drifted outside her body. She could see right through the patterner, and her own flesh, to her bones. A hot yellow glow throbbed in the middle, where her back had been broken.
After another hallucination, Ryll realised that she could be driven no further that day. The torgnadr almost filled the bucket, but was still immature. He ended the session but left Tiaan in the patterner. She had been inside for more than a day now.