“That’s an argument we can settle, right now,” he said. He danced in, rattling blows off my guard. He moved in, and I saw it coming.
“Niall!” screamed Blackbird.
He whirled in front of me and I did the only thing I could think of. I did exactly the same. I spun on the spot, twisting my sword in an elaborate spiral, just as he’d demonstrated for me. I heard a tang, as his blade rang off mine, and then felt a thump which travelled down the blade.
I opened my eyes. I wasn’t even aware I’d closed them. In front of me was Raffmir, close enough for a kiss. He looked down at my hands wrapped around the hilt, the blade of my sword piercing his chest. The blade fell from his hand and clattered on the floor.
“No,” he coughed. “That’s too rare, too special.”
I jerked the blade in and up. He spasmed.
“You’re enjoying this,” he gasped. “We’re alike, you and I.”
“No we’re not.” I told him. “I’m not dying.”
“Here,” he said, lifting his hand. “If I must go…” he laughed a hollow laugh. “A parting gift. Something for… old… times.” He opened his hand and there was a tiny light there, like a minute star.
I pulled the blade. It slid with a sucking sound from his chest, and in a move which would make Garvin proud I arced the blade around and struck his head clean from his body. It sailed into the corner of the room where it bounced once and rolled into the corner. His body folded in on itself and crumpled to the floor.
“It’s done,” I said, stepping back, the smoke coiling about me.
“Niall?” said Blackbird. “What’s that?” Above Raffmir’s remains, the tiny star floated in the air. Now I looked more closely it seemed to be shimmering.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Raffmir made it.”
“It’s still there,” she pointed out.
“I can see that’” I said.
“It should have disappeared when he died,” she said. “You’re sure he’s dead?”
“His head’s over there,” I pointed out.
I put my hand out and the star floated gently over to it, hovering over my palm. It was bright white, like an intense spark, but persistent. I passed my hand around it. It followed my hands, almost as if it liked me.
“It’s strange,” I said. “Almost as if it has a life of its own.”
“We have to get out,” said Blackbird. “The house is going to go.” I could hear bangs and cracks as ancient beams warped in the heat, and the crash and whoosh as a ceiling came down or a wall gave way.
“It’s growing,” I said.
“What do you mean?” she asked me.
“It’s getting bigger. It was tiny at first, but now it has a distinct size.”
“Well make it stop,” she said. “In fact, make it disappear altogether.”
“I don’t even know what it is,” I said, coughing at the encroaching swirls of smoke. I extended my senses, looking into the light. It had an intensity that belied its size. “I’m going to try and extinguish it,” I said.
I extended my hand and the star hovered over my palm. As a creature of the void I had a sense of the space between things. If I could collapse it, then it should vanish. I subtracted the space from it, expecting it to wink out of existence. Instead it grew brighter. I tried again, and once more it grew brighter. You could see the whirls and eddies of smoke by the light it shed.
“It’s getting stronger,” said Blackbird.
I let my senses extend and gathered power from the surroundings. The room cooled and warm air rushed to take its place. I could hear the flames roar nearby as the breeze I was creating fuelled it. “Niall! What are you trying to do, fry us all?”
“I have to see it,” I explained. “It’s operating in a space of its own. I need to be able to sense the void to see what it’s made of.” I continued to draw power until everything began to fade around me. Strangely the star did not fade. In comparison to everything else it grew brighter, more dominant.
With my senses extending into the void I began to see it more clearly. Whereas it looked like a point, in the shadow world between things it was a twisted knot. It writhed and turned in on itself, turning inside out and then twisting to invert again.
“Niall! We have to get out.”
I reached into the knot with my sense of the void, pulling at one of the threads that made it. It wriggled under my gaze and inverted, gaining size and strength.
“Niall!”
“What? Give me a minute. I have to try and work this out.”
“Niall, look at your face. Look!”
I retreated from the void and found myself looking at a twisting ball of light. In the radiance it shed, I could see my hands. They were red and starting to blister. I felt my face — it stung just to touch the skin.
“It’s not hot,” I said. “It isn’t heat that’s driving it.”
“No,” said Blackbird, stepping aside from the doorway. “It’s radiation.”
“What?”
“Whatever that thing is,” she said. “It’s like you have sudden sunburn. You’re being exposed to some kind of radiation — maybe light, maybe more than that.”
“It’s a twist of space,” I said. “I keep trying to untangle it, but it reforms itself.”
“What did he say?” she asked.
“Raffmir? He said it was a parting gift, something for old times.”
“Is that a clue?”
“I have no idea,” I said. “What do I do with it? It’s getting bigger.”
“Bury it,” said Blackbird.
“Where?” I asked.
“It doesn’t matter — in the wall, under the floor. Get rid of it.”
I guided it over to the fireplace where there was a solid surface, and then coaxed it down to floor level and positioned it. I found I could both pull and push it, and that it could be guided. Using my hand I pushed it downwards into the hearthstone. It flared angrily, pulsing out white flashes of light. Each time, my sight was blurred from the intensity.
“Stop! It’s not helping,” called Blackbird.
“There’s a hole in the stone,” I called to her. “I think it’s eaten into it.” It was also noticeably larger.
“Anything that can be made with magic, can be undone with magic,” said Blackbird.
“If it were made of magic,” I said, “wouldn’t it have died with Raffmir?”
Now it was pulsing, absorbing energy from the house, the fire — I just didn’t know. I could feel the skin on my hands burning in the scintillating light. With my void-sight I could see that the tangle had accelerated; it was twisting, turning, inverting and re-ravelling faster now.
“I have to get it away,” I said.
“Where to?” said Blackbird. “If it eats through anything it’s in contact with, what will you put it in? Where will you take it?”
“Is there some sort of nuclear shelter? Maybe glass will hold it?”
“It needs to be somewhere away from anything else.” I could hear the panic in her voice. “Niall, the walls are smoking, and it’s not the fire.”
I already knew. My sight was failing me. I could no longer see with my eyes. They had been burned away with the intensity of the light. Only with the void-sight could I sense the malignant tangle. Whatever Raffmir had done, it was his way of denying us the future we had fought for. My mind raced, trying to think of somewhere it could go, something that would contain it. Soon the house would collapse and bury it, which would only make it bigger and harder to contain. Even if I managed to get it out of the house, it would continue to grow unless I could find some way of undoing it. But then, if I released it, where would all the energy it contained go?
Then I knew what had to be done. I knew of one place where it could go where the harm it could create would be limited. I understood at last what Kareesh and Angela had meant. Finally, it all made sense.
“Blackbird?”
“Yes, Niall?”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“About what? What are you sorry about?”
“Look after the children. I love you.”
“What? What are you doing?”
I embraced the tangle. There was a white flash greater than anything I’ve ever seen. It filled me with a burning intensity that surpassed anything I’d ever know.