Morning. At last. Those words were not spoken, nor even framed as thoughts. They were just a feeling that ought to have been relief, but didn't quite achieve the goal.
Nancy awoke instantly from a feverish sleep, stared dully at the ceiling. She felt dull-headed, unclean with dried sweat, and her stomach felt raw. Sleep had not refreshed her, and she was too leaden-limbed to get up and attend to her discomforts.
She reflected on the course of events that had brought her to this sorry state. Just a few days earlier she had been ripped from the quiet routine of her student life, and had had her mind worked over by a relic of ancient intelligence, and then by a subversive group dedicated to the dispersal of her clan. Unable — indeed, unwilling — to return home, reluctant to tie herself to the psychics' bureaucracy of the Linkers' Guild, she had shipped out on the first generally Earthbound liner; but even that was no escape. The notoriety of her Clan, and her distinctive appearance, her silver hair, her ash-grey skin, that tied her to it still followed her.
A few systems down the line, after staying a cabin bound recluse, she swapped to a different ship, and then again, taking a random walk. But even that was no true escape — she was, she realised, trying to escape from herself, the one who had suffered under such a combined assault upon her very self. Even now, she had the feeling that some malignant mentality wished to possess her, to itself become Nancy Elanor, late of Clan Wolf. Or, maybe, what she was trying to escape was the thing that had precipitated all this, the alien artefact, the blue gem she wore on a chain around her neck, the thing that had compelled her across oceans and continents, and was now a burden that she could not renounce.
She had in a sense died, albeit briefly, under its attack, and yet had regained herself, and in doing so had awoken some unforeseen telepathic potentials — as much a curse as all the rest, having to continually shut out the background chatter from the masses around her, the continued seepage of too much information. And which had brought her to the paternalistic attentions of the Linkers.
Last night had been one such time, and she had used a shipboard icebreaking banquet as an excuse to drown her sorrows in drink. The attempt had failed miserably, with the drink and the happiness of the other revellers turning her thoughts inwards, until finally staggering back to her cabin, with the support of one of the attendants.
And now, she would have to face the morning after. She cast away the one sheet that remained on her bed, and staggered to her feet. A pause of a few vertiginous instants, as her circulation adapted itself to her new posture, before discarding the underwear in which she had slept, and heading for the bathroom. A hot bath would take care of most of her discomforts, and there would doubtless be something in the medical supplies that would be appropriate for the rest.
Between the tasteless slurry that had been dispensed for her, and the relaxing warmth of the bath, Nancy drowsed, catching up on the sleep she had lost, only to be jolted from the tranquillity of non-thought by the door-buzzer. She fought petty anger at the person responsible, but failed to stem its evil tide, and with a hate in her heart that the mask of her expression only concealed, she went to answer the call.
The tall avian steward waiting at the door did not react visibly to the towel-wrapped, dripping figure that answered.
“Lady Nancy Elanor?”
“Yes.” Coldly, Nancy noticed how she filled that word with her continuing rage and spat it out.
“A package for you. Sign here.”
Anger gave way to curiosity, and it was excitement that spread her signature untidily across the form.
“Thanks,” she called, distractedly, as she shut the door again.
Asprawl on her bed, she examined the package, a small box, four inches by five, and three quarters of an inch deep. The address label was printed, and postmarked from the next system Earthwards of the current position of this liner, and arriving soon after they had docked in what for her had been the small hours. Nancy could think of no one she knew, or had ever known, who could have sent something to her from there.
She cut the seal open with her thumbnail, and scattered the contents out onto the sheets. Freed from its wad of packaging, a small pendant glittered there, a square of bright metal set with a pale-blue transparent gem. Disbelieving, Nancy looked to her bedside table where the original lay, its gem indigo, not cornflower blue of this cheap imitation. She sought explanation from the small envelope which had remained in the box. It contained a note handwritten on a sheet of cream-toned paper.
‘If you know this, then your time is come. I may have been delayed a few million years, but now, I have you.’
In place of signature there were three whorls of glowing red light, like fingerprints woven into the page.
Before reading, Nancy had been sliding into mild hysterical shock, while she took in this seemingly impossible gift. Now she was only afraid. For the last few weeks, she had been able to set aside, regard as but an echo, an engram that shaped the energies within the gem, that personality that had woken into her. Memories that were not truly hers, that had been planted by the indigo gem, stirred to life, memories of the previous owner, Vaelithra, High Priestess of the Earth, worshipper of light and life, the gem her badge of office, and she had known that sign of three.
The powers of Sky and Earth had not been alone in bestowing aid to their faithful: and the spirits of Fire and Night had matched the powers of life in their generosity, and in the teachings of both cults there was the prophecy that at the end of time, the two factions would rise in open combat, and bring down the curtain. Was this to be that battle, her own self against the person or persons who now controlled the opposing holy relics?
Armageddon, universal ruin across the cosmos full of galaxies unaffected by the original struggle, Nancy could not accept, but her own death seemed all too likely. Would she run? She might be able to, depending on the sequencing of the Links, but if she had been located, it would not be easy — if indeed it were possible — to shake off pursuit, and to be condemned to eternal flight. She would rather die than suffer that tyranny.
There was only one alternative, to stand and fight, and her one advantage, that she would be able to choose where. Ship-board, obviously, was far too fragile an environment for any display of force, such as she could recall from Vaelithra's memory. The only suitable place would be dirtside, on the green Earth, where her own power would be the stronger.
“Ship,” she called, “This is Nancy Wolf, Cabin 06-458. I'm pausing my journey here. Have my luggage stowed on board the Link station.”
“Decision registered. Your luggage will be collected in ten minutes. Thank you for your custom.”
Packing was trivial. One suitcase was filled from her wardrobe, the other from the incidental luggage scattered around the cabin. All the remaining trash and trinkets were dumped in the bin, and that was all. The bath, the half destroyed bed, were all the trace she would leave of her passing.
One last check, one final decision on what to wear, and she departed. She travelled light, with only a shoulder-bag to carry her minimum of supplies. Anything else, she had money enough to buy.
By the time the shuttle undocked from the Link, half an hour later, Nancy had a clearer idea of what she would do. Time was her most precious resource, her two-hour lead over any opponent fighting the timetables down the line from the next system, two hours that would remain hers until she stopped. Meanwhile, she would ignore the oh-so-familiar sight of the Link station drifting away into the distance, and concentrate on the guidebook she had purchased, in case there might be some useful peculiarity of the world, something that would work to her advantage.
The world was called Nalthor, a world slightly smaller than Earth, roughly half of its surface dry land. There was only one spaceport — the population being too small to warrant more — and that in a region of temperate climate. That was the first bonus, that her pursuit would be constrained to a predictable path for a longer time.
She continued to read, gleaning other interesting snippets of information about the world. It had been tamed long before the first Partnership vessel had approached it, and had remained so. Even the cities, at that point simply scatters of its own Q'l-hrui ruins, had been there then, all placed in the most advantageous regions, on fertile plains, away from the deep continental deserts, but linked with an encompassing grid of rail tracks.
The presence of the ruins bothered her, as if she might have ceded her advantage by stopping on this deliberately bucolic and sleepy world, with who knows what ancient forces slumbering. But, too late, the die was cast.
The landing field was a seemingly endless expanse of concrete, uncomfortably bright in the bright sunlight. The sky a little too dark by Nancy's prejudices, the clouds too wispy, and the gravity perceptibly lighter than the shipboard value. Planets seemed a little primitive after only weeks away, despite her atavistic desire for a blue sky and bright sun overhead.
She shrugged, more with her face than her shoulders, and followed the other passengers into the reception hall, a bright white construction of corrugated metal where a few officials waited to supervise the newcomers. Nancy chose a queue randomly — there was none perceptibly shorter than any other — and resigned herself to the wait.
The formalities were thankfully brief, and soon she was at the head of the queue. The rodent-like creature at the desk sounded bored as he asked to see her passport, and asked for a few other bits and pieces of information for the files.
“The purpose of your visit, Lady Wolf?” he asked.
“I'm expecting to meet someone here.” She had none of her usual lies ready against that question, and so answered with almost the truth. She was greeted by an expression that clearly thought this world an unlikely place for rendezvous.
“How long will you be staying?”
“A few days at most. Matters should resolve swiftly after we meet, and then, who knows?”
As soon as she left the hall, she headed directly for a public terminal — she would have to choose a destination. She requested a map, and jabbed her finger randomly at it to decide. The resultant choice had only its name to distinguish it from any other possible choice, so there could be no underlying drive to choose any other — just whatever psychic forces might be influencing her.
Nancy withdrew her card, looking around the reception area for signposts. She strolled away from her corner, watching for one to appear from behind stairways or ornamental greenery, though the hall, easily a hundred yards long, encouraged her to patience: if she could not see a sign now, there was plenty of opportunity for one later.
She paused at one of the shops that lined the hall, and bought things to read during the journey, bundling them into her shoulder-bag, then moving on to a snack bar, where she bought a basic breakfast. She ate as she walked, following the sign that she now could see in the distance, directing her to the rail terminal, up a flight of stairs to the catwalk level. She discarded her now empty cup as she climbed, letting it drift into a trash-can below.
There was another receptacle by the ticket machine, where she deposited the napkin which had wrapped the rest of the meal, and wiped her hands, before tapping the key labelled Halcyon. The plastic tab that would permit her the random journey clattered into the receiving dish. She picked it up, hesitantly, as if that could delay the inevitable. A travel plan appeared on the dispenser screen, giving her a choice between the first departing train, and the more direct one that would reach the final destination first. She decided upon the second, despite the half hour it would hold her at the spaceport. She went through to the waiting area, a scattering of chairs and tables, with continuous windows on two sides allowing a view out onto the field.
Nancy had no eyes for the comparatively uninspiring aspect, nor did she notice the bar, just the clock above it. She sat herself down where she could just look up to see the time, and began to read one of the books she had bought.
Once aboard the train, however, she had no taste for reading. She had never travelled so fast so close to the ground, and the increased perception of speed drew her attention. Out of the city, the line passed first through forest, and the continuously changing aspect of sun, and trees presented a hypnotic display of light.
The outside air had been cool, but inside the carriage, the sunlight was warm. Imperceptibly, Nancy felt her eyes grow heavy, beyond her capacity to hold them open.
Dreams came to her, interwoven with her intermittent glimpses of objective reality. And amidst the dreams, there were threads of her false memories.
So when she walked again the woodland path down to river that she had known only, yet repeatedly, in her dreams, she was at times not herself, but Vaelithra, so that when she turned a bend in the river's course, she came across the temple where she had trained. There was a sense of the sky darkening as she approached, a threat above her. In the distance, behind her, something glowed red, and she knew it for the witchfires of the night cult. Nancy forced herself into control of the dream, forced herself to levitate, to speed her travel, fighting the unaccustomed resistance she met.
It was all she could do to lift herself a handsbreadth from the ground, and half walk, half drift along, but it brought her to the temple itself ahead of the threat. She screamed with her mind as she raced along the central path, calling for people long departed, the fires of devotion cold, their ashes scattered onto the floor.
That shocked the Vaelithra-structure, and Nancy, freed from its moulding of her dream, ducked out. She stood on the riverbank under the sunlight, where it was crossed by a broad belt of grassland, between two halves of an old-fashioned city. Two exotic looking young women stood nearby, at the door of a small cabin.
“Where is the spaceport?” she asked them.
“But this is Halcyon.” The reply was unnecessary; she knew where to go. She struck away from the river, along the highway of grass.
Something startled her awake, and she forced her eyes open. A few moments of disorientation went by while she adapted herself to the time of day, and realized that the train had reached the first stop of three en route to Halcyon, and would soon be heading out into the wide deserts.
She ordered sparkling water to help remove the stale taste in her mouth, and a somewhat unimaginative lunch to occupy her mind for at least part of the next leg of the journey, and while she waited she looked around to see her fellow passengers. They were a mixed bunch, none of them human — an Ayassa female in traditional kilt, a troupe of shaggy blue spider-monkeys, a number of huddled beings in all concealing robes, and some strange being in a heavily armoured environment suit. None seemed likely to strike up a conversation, and at that moment, she would have welcomed anything to take her mind off the reason for making this trip at all, and to prevent her dreaming about it. She had been unable to think of anything that she could do for herself, and so she wished now only to forget what was going on, pretend that nothing was wrong, at least until it happened.
It was evening, now, as the train raced the sun. As she looked out of the window Nancy could see at last the city of Halcyon, its distant white spires rising above the rolling terrain to gleam in the golden light. The rail track itself formed a jewelled thread, reaching out from the city, curving wide around the low hill that still hid the bulk of it, and out to her.
She gathered together her belongings and turned, impatiently to the window, as if she could hurry her arrival by the force of her will, although she knew that it would be nearly three hours before her pursuer could arrive. There was, as she expected, a hotel catering to travellers near the station, and she checked in for a short stay, leaving her meagre luggage, still packed, in her room. Now all she carried was the key, her credit card, and holstered in her right boot the small gun that she carried out of habit.
She wandered restlessly, waiting out the time with growing impatience. Occasionally, she opened the defences about her mind to ease the chafing, for all that it forced her into overly intimate contact with the swarms of other minds around, and left her unclean as she retreated behind the barriers, but there was never a trace of hostility directed at her.
Two hours brought her roughly back to her starting place, having traced a path through and around most of the inhabited districts, the small squares, organic-seeming towers, and elevated boulevards, of the city, if not the extensive surrounding ruins. She had decided to have one last meal, before… She realized that even the prospect of imminent death did not fill her with the fear that, even a month ago, it would have done. But then, she remembered wryly, she had died once in that intervening time. She choked back hysterical laughter, hanging grimly on to her own version of sanity, and forcing her conscious thoughts to the location of a place to eat.
She chose the first restaurant she came to, its one small dining room already busy, and sat down at a corner table for two, as near as she could be away from the general huddle of diners. Looking around, at the tables almost within arm's reach there was such a crowd - one group at a long table who were obviously tourists travelling together; another, a couple, obviously a mated pair, having an animated argument; and a number of persons of a very non-human race gossiping most intensely. Their conversation came to her, in isolated snippets, intruding into her consciousness while she studied the menu. She felt herself alienated from the people to whom she could attribute the dialogue. The bitterness that now seemed to be her constant companion welled up inside her, tearing her apart, when she resisted the temptation to tears or anger.
“Hi! What'll you be having?” The arrival of a waiter, a casually dressed feline woman, turned her attention outwards again. Nancy ordered, her choice made off the top of her head.
“Fine. Thanks,” the girl smiled at her before going off with the order. Nancy sighed. That girl had been happy in her work, and friendly: easy enough to do, while the days could just roll one into the other, as she too had thought they would for her. She felt a tear of anguish form at the corner of her right eye, and affected an itch to hide the reason that she tended to the eye. She could not shake this feeling of her own essential hollowness behind her façade, not even knowing if she was truly her own person, or just a puppet of something ancient, drowning in the sea of other people’s thoughts.
She didn't even interrupt the train of thought while she faked a sorrowful smile for, and accepted her first course from another waiter, a human male, who smiled back at her as well. She bore the pangs of despair within herself until she was unobserved, and could relax her expression. This time her face contorted itself in preparation for tears, and, she forced her feelings away, trying to return to the untroubled days before this alien thing had arisen to complicate things, before she had had to feel things out for herself.
She sighed, half in regret, half in appreciation of the cold tangy taste of her drink, and began to eat greedily, which at least beat thinking for entertainment.
Too soon for Nancy's liking, she could reasonably eat no more and would once again have to face outside reality. She felt mentally tired as she went to pay her bill, too tired even to raise a wan smile as she did, and she fled as soon as the transaction was complete.
The darkness on the street, the jazzy lighting, rolled unnoticed off her back. Night, as far as her mood would allow her to be concerned, was merely an inevitable fact and the city lights were an immediate corollary. She knew that her time of reckoning came soon, and some impulse decided her to seek out a hidden place beyond the city. Later in her wandering, she rationalized her choice as being motivated by a desire to protect lives and property but at the time, it seemed pure whimsy upon her part.
This island of habitation ended abruptly; beyond the perimeter, only the empty land and ruins. Her route had taken her south, across the railway, and the final ramp that led her out of the city faced south-east. Across to her left, she could see, by the lights in it, the last sweep of the line into the city. Turning slowly, she saw in the east a faint shimmering of light behind thin clouds, and a paling of the sky that foretold the rising of a moon. Directly in front of her lay a bare grassy hill, and then past it, a swirl of pale mist, and the dark shapes of trees. A river; the only interesting terrain in the vicinity. Unhurriedly, she walked in that direction. She knew she still had enough lead over her pursuit to reach it.
As she passed, she felt, rather than saw, in the starlight, the terrain change underfoot, the grass become longer, heaped into irregular mounds: that formed an almost impossible surface to walk, before merging into a uniform calf-high blanket on the ground. In the growing light before moonrise, and her growing adaptation to the dark, she could now see to guide her way past obstacles, outcrops of rock, ruins or exposed bedrock, she could not tell, and fallen, blasted trees, now only bleached shells, stripped of leaf and branch, and between the main avenue of their yet-living brothers along the mist-curdled river. There was a chill dankness to the scent of the air, and the utmost calm, yet without the sense of impending storm — ironical in the face of what must surely come to pass.
Between the trees, the earth was bare again, save for the debris of the last autumn, and the darkness folded her in its cloak, hiding her rather than engulfing. Her arcane senses, loosed as she passed beyond the inhabited city, detected a thread of a call from ahead, as from a welcoming beacon, her Vaelithra memories endorsing the faint message. In her flight, she had indeed not been as random as she had intended, instead following some unconscious notion of a place of possible sanctuary.
She stared forward into the gloom, to the pale curtain of light ahead that was the river. There was no sign of the beckoning place; merely the swirls of mist. She hurried forwards to the river, as much as the poor seeing allowed, and did not find the crumbling earth of a normal riverbank, but a path leading both ways. She followed it to her left, and soon ahead a bridge loomed out of the mist, a spar of the same not-quite-rock of the path, and she crossed it.
There was a similar path on the far bank, but she spurned it and stumbled her way through the trees there, and out into the open, spurred on by a feeling of the closeness of her unknown goal. The open land came suddenly upon her, and she stopped at the edge of its extent. Above her, paralleling the trees, and ultimately the river, a line of pylons extended in both directions, as far as she could see. Beyond that line, a low hill with a handful of trees on its slopes, one standing stark, blasted and dead on the skyline at the left, at the contour of some darkness, be it a wall or hedge she could not tell. At the summit a number of slender stones were arranged in what she guessed was a circle. Pale blue fires played around their tips. She now knew what she had been seeking, a safe place of the powers allied to Vaelithra's cause. She felt their call, and knew that it offered safety for her; and in that same instant she felt the hellfire breath of the aura of her pursuer.
She walked calmly up the hill, knowing that pursuit could not catch her before she had gained the summit, and at the darkness, now clearly a low wall of dry stone, she turned and looked back to the city. A mile away, it did not seem diminished by distance, rather it seemed merely to have been given context. It, and the intervening terrain, gave no sign of any life, and it did not surprise her that she did not see anything. That could wait until she had gained the summit.
Stepping over the wall, barely more than knee-high, was nothing significant on the ground, but as she did so, Nancy felt a sense of transition, and looked around to find the city obscured, or merely obscurely altered.
“Hold!” Nancy wheeled to find the source of that cry, and saw, halfway between herself and the summit, a figure indistinct in the darkness, and seemingly wreathed in dull red fire, and felt the gem at her breast surge into life. She recalled the first time she had worn it, how it had caught her up in triumphal song, never since to waken. This was like that time, yet weaker, and she too bound to her immediate conception of reality to let herself go.
“Who are you?” she called in counter challenge, her voice weak in her ears.
“My names are many, as well you know, priestess of earth, as indeed are yours. They are all irrelevant. Now is our hour.”
“I don't suppose you're open to reasonable persuasion?” Nancy felt the weakness of her voice change to tiredness as she made her final play. The reply was only laughter, floating on the slightest of winds.
Fire gathered in her challenger's darkness, and roared at her, passing unnoticing the blue fire that guarded her, her clothing and her flesh, to strike at her spirit. It broke like a storm against her mind's defences, and sent pain lancing through her whole existence. She screamed in a scream that tore at her throat, in pain, misery and fear.
When she had come to this place expecting death, it had merely been the concept of annihilation that she had accepted; she had given no thought to the many roads that might lead to that end, and how many led through pain. That was what she could not accept. She had to struggle, to fight her way clear; and yet she had no resources available. The gem she wore had power but it was not hers to command, and the time spent in surrender to it was not left to her.
In a moment of clarity, detached from the swirl of competing memories, she reached for the gun she had holstered in her boot to counter this opponent — after all, a stunner blast had stripped the influence of the gem from her on the night she had acquired it — but found nothing. These were not even the clothes she had been wearing as she climbed the hill.
It held forth one hand, and the flame gathered about it, brightening, and in the instant, leaping forth even as she rolled to one side, began a mad scramble to reach the hilltop around where the other stood, gathering more of its fires.
“Now, it is over. You will soon…”
She wanted to call out asking that her death be brief, yet remained silent as this next attack was prepared. She yearned for it, the brief explosion that would tear her from this agonized shell of flesh, and yet, the voice halted, as Nancy stumbled upon a sudden mass amongst the tall grasses, sprawling headlong over a slab of rock, and into darkness.
For some moments, she felt herself floating in a void, then, like waking from a brief sleep, she was standing on a path that glowed a gentle blue, leading up the circle of stones above.
“You may have found the path, Priestess, but it will not save you.”
“Time will tell, Fire-holder.”
The demon did not speak in reply. It had grown silently, and now released the gathered fire. She spread her arms wide as if to greet the attack. Golden flame lapped about her as it struck, instantly to be engulfed in blue; and while it jolted her, the jolt was more than merely physical, carrying her in a flare of ecstasy into that altered state of awareness that she had known once before, as she surrendered to the Vaelithra gem.
Engulfed in the blue flame of the gem, she was Vaelithra awakened, deeply aware of more than just herself. She felt with the plants and animals of the region, could taste the night wind, and touch the patterns of its motion. She moulded the blue fire now, sending a streamer out to meet the onrushing lance of red-gold that had been launched at her, and dissipated it. She prepared a counter-blow and held it ready to launch when the idea struck her that there might be more than this one use to the flame she possessed.
Gently, she released the stored power, letting it strengthen the veil about her, and then drew that veil into herself. There was another transition, a moment's eddying of darkness, before she stood again on the hill, her fire gone out. Equally, she knew that she had lost nothing of the flame state, and had possibly gained. Not so her enemy, for she heard a contemptuous laugh as another vortex of fire rushed towards her. With equal, if silent, contempt, she caught it in her hand, a hand, she noticed with quiet interest, that was gloved in silver, and crushed the golden glow. The demon form hesitated, and then fled. In her hands of silver, she gathered the lightning, like a fluorescent jelly that dripped slowly away from an over-full grasp, and released its power at the fleeing figure. It howled, but did not drop and staggered into the confusion of boulders that lay on the far side of the hill from the stone circle.
She climbed to the stone circle that would give her a commanding view of the slope, and conjured such a glow from the stones to light the slopes like day, but nothing moved. Letting the light subside, she waited and watched for what she guessed had been half an hour, until clouds came up and obscured the land. Gradually, the flames of the gem subsided, and she felt herself descending to her mundane self, leaving the Q'l-hrui dream that had overcome her, ultimately weary, drained of energy, ready to slumber.
No, she told herself, this would not do. She would have to pull herself together, trudge down that hill to the brightly lit city that lay across the river, and her bed for the night.
Morning came, bright and clear, with sunlight streaming through the open curtains onto Nancy's bed. She fought to remain asleep despite the hurtful glare in her eyes, tossing and turning as she transposed fitfully between wakefulness and dream until sleep finally abandoned her. She lay a long while as the sluggishness left her limbs and she felt ready to stir, ready to feed. Whatever had happened to her body on the previous evening and during the night had taken a lot more out of her than she had realized at the time, now resolving to a hunger that surprised her.
Quickly, she washed and dressed, once again taking inventory of what she carried, that had been restored on her return to what she thought of as the waking world, then headed out.
At this time of the mid-morning, the hotel restaurant was remodelled as bar, open to the patio, a swimming pool, and a large lawn. Everything was a bright white, and the air was pleasingly cool — and the buffet all well stocked for her to graze while waiting for coffee and the cooked meal.
As she tackled the well heaped plate from the buffet, the immediate hunger began to subside, and as its all-pervasive influence declined, another element of disquiet became distinguishable. There was a presence about the area that compelled her attention.
Nancy looked up from her plate, eyes, as well as more subtle senses, attuned to the task, seeking its cause — and finding it. The psychic unrest that had attracted her attention seemed to centre about a young woman, with dusky skin and blonde hair, towelling herself down at the poolside. Their eyes met, and held, as some discharge of psychic effect passed between them, and was gone.
Impulsively, without a clear idea of her intent, Nancy nodded assent as the woman indicated coming to join her. She in her turn hesitated, as if to make sure that it was not some other who was being indicated, and, wrapping her towel around herself for warmth, followed the invitation.
“Hi,” she said as she sat down on the chair next to Nancy's, “I'm Bree, Bree Tamberlane. Which one of us did whatever happened?”
“Nancy Wolf — Clan Wolf. I don't think it was me, at least not consciously. Are you psychic? I can telepath a little.”
“I'm a weak sensitive, not enough for the Guild to be interested. Are you Guild?”
“No, I'm still a free agent, making my way slowly Earthwards. You local?”
“No, I'm just wandering too. But,” a troubled frown passed across her face, as if she were uncertain whether to continue the sentence she had begun.
“Well?” Nancy asked in encouragement.
“No, I was just wondering what it might be that brought both of us here, thousands of miles from the spaceport, from halfway across the Partnership. It was as if somehow we were meant to meet.”
“Meant?”
“Well, not predestination on any rubbish like that, but some kind of affinity between us, though what, or how…?”
“You wouldn't happen to be a depressive self exile?”
“No, I go in for memory lapses myself.”
“You realize,” Nancy said, in an effort to change the direction of the conversation, “that we're both being amazingly frank about ourselves.”
“It must be that ... whatever it was happened when I saw you. Are you alone here?”
“Until now. It's that in a way that which brought me here. I was thinking I might die here, only self preservation won.”
“Wow. What happened, what was it?”
“Wandering off into the night, getting lost. I was just in a bad place,” she half-lied, caught off guard, without a cover story ready.
Bree's expression was uncertain, as if she wanted to continue the conversation but could not find the lines she wanted. Silence continued long enough for Nancy to take advantage of the break and cut herself another mouthful of pancake.
“Where are you staying?” Bree asked after a minute or so.
“Room 609. You?”
“497. I'll go and change now. See you around. Bye, Nancy.”
“Bye, Bree.”
Nancy watched her as she went, uncertain of the decisions she had made, each time she had chosen to be open and truthful, laying herself open to emotional harm from this woman she did not even know.
After concluding her substantial breakfast, Nancy set out to lose herself amongst the crowds. She window-shopped extensively, intent more on putting distance between herself and the hotel than on actually buying.
She lunched in a street café, on a none too imaginative choice of cuisine, and a tall glass of lager, and watched the sunlight sparkling from the waters of a fountain in its pool in the little rock-garden in the middle of the small square. Consciously she tried to act the part of a tourist, to keep her mind from stagnating in negative thinking about everything that had happened since she had arrived in the system. She was half minded to leave, unable to think of reason why not, until she decided that events had not been resolved, so all her original reasoning still held.
Yet she had done all that there was to do and, still did not want to return to the hotel, to face her chance acquaintance. She walked restlessly after leaving the restaurant, trying to lose herself in the mess of people, and failing. That left her, she reluctantly concluded, only one place to go. Out to visit the site of last night's conflict, maybe to find something that could help… well, “just to satisfy my curiosity,” she thought in correction.
In daylight the scene was changed. For one thing, though morning sun had given way to light overcast, she was not alone. The open land down to the river was scattered with people, like any park would be; by no means crowded, but more than enough to make her feel alone in a crowd.
Moving on, beneath the trees, she felt calmer, the moist green darkness enclosing her protectively. She slacked her pace for a while, until impatience hurried her on. The grey-brown mould that scattered in dry clods underfoot radiated a comforting warmth that she could feel through the soles of her boots. The seclusion made it almost seductive, tempting her to roll naked on the good earth. The river when she came to it, flowing leisurely, peacefully along, its waters clear, and silvery in the grey light, offered her much the same temptation, to be herself, free from any of the restraints that convention placed upon her spirit. With the same regrets, she withstood its allure, sad, even annoyed at herself for acting so subdued.
The bridge was close now, and as she set foot upon it, she finally fought down the call of the wild, and strode along purposefully, without turning her head. Besides, she was now almost at her intended destination, too close to be distracted.
At the edge of the trees on the far side, she paused, and listened, with ears and mind alike. People, random sounds of talk, which, half-noticed, had prompted her to actively listen. She moved out of the cover, and saw them, a small group among the standing stones at the hill-top. Clearly a group being given a guided tour of the local oddities, and as she reached out to eavesdrop, one of the minds had a familiar feel. Instantly, on that touch, Nancy clamped her mind shut. Bree had been among that group, and she did not know how to react to the girl. She faded back into the trees, and followed the edge of them around the hill, and waited, and watched.
After a wait that seemed to go on and on, the party finally moved on, down the flank of the hill furthest from the city, and almost directly towards her. For her part, Nancy retreated into the trees, retracing her steps, and every so often, checking the progress of the tourists. It seemed that they intended to follow the line of pylons for some distance further. Maybe there was some other site of relics along that way. She would see later, when the sightseers had moved on.
When at last she deemed the group to be suitably far away, about two hundred meters along the line, Nancy left the cover of the trees for the open land, heading directly up the hill. A stage-fright feeling gripped her as she walked, as if eyes were trained upon her from every concealment, watching her, just watching.
She crossed the dry stone wall at the base of the blasted tree she had seen the previous night, clutching at its white, dry wood for support as she passed. No sense of stepping into some otherness, no figure of flame rising to confront her, this time, and she climbed the last twenty meters to the stones.
Gently she reached out one hand to touch the nearest, a rough near-cylinder, a dull dusty white column just wide enough that she could comfortably reach her arms around, and maybe thrice her height, its tip looking like it had been snapped off, yet…
As her hand drew close a faint aura of blue fire awoke upon the pillar, turning part of the dusty white to clear crystal. The skin on her hand crawled, then up the arm, up the side of her head and across her whole body. Jerking her hand away, she retreated a few steps, and as she did so, the feeling subsided, as did the aura, the clear patch of crystal remaining a little longer after the fire faded.
A yearning, an allure, came upon her, to actually embrace the pillar, as the Q'l-hrui gem she wore flashed with answering fire. Both gem and larger installation seemed insistent that she should yield herself to them, her thoughts filling with something that wasn't a map but served as one, sparkling with yellow points that she knew were minds, civilians and one point that burned red. Enemy, they insisted.
“No!” she yelled, trying to deny its alien insistence. But she was outvoted, two to one. Both the installation, and the memories that had come with the jewel at her throat insisted the necessity and the right of the hate she felt for the devil enemy.
“No,” quieter this time, barely voiced, a blunt denial of something that revealed itself as external to her, that seemed to need her acceptance, her volition, to move. And using that grace, she channelled the aggression she felt into a primal howling of psychic energies, raging against the heavens.
She felt weaker after that, but the other thoughts were still. However, the map was still clear in her memory, tracking something that was an enemy to this Q'l-hrui aspect. The hate, though, she did not need, it did not suit her temperament; but she was all aboard with a temporary alliance aimed at frustrating attempts to murder her here by pseudo-magical means. In her mind, she saluted the broken-down installation, and turned away, her thoughts overrun by her adjusting to her new realization of her situation.
So enwrapt was she in her thoughts that she took little heed of the direction in which her feet were taking her, more concerned with the next stages of this confrontation in which she had become unwillingly entangled. And so, when she surfaced a while later, to look consciously at the world again, it took more than a few seconds to figure out where she was, that she was following the line of pylons in the direction that the guided party had taken, and the same direction in which she had been advised that one of the enemy still remained. Two opposed installations, so close?
She walked on, curiosity winning over her frantic self-analysis. She crossed through the row of trees that at a distance had looked much denser than they now seemed, and saw that they marked the end of the pylons, and through the trees she saw why. The darkness she had taken at distance to be the shadow of a deeper mass of woods was revealed as a field of totally black substance, dull under the now leaden sky, the expanse uninviting with the cool wind that had started to pick up, gusting across it fitfully.
Squatting down, she reached out tentatively to touch the surface, but it was just as glassy as it looked, no strange textures or reactions to her cautious fingertips. There was something disturbing about it, though what caused the feeling was not clear. What was clear was that indeed it was the enemy, and possibly their equivalent of the stone circle.
Respectfully, she backed away, senses extended, waiting lest her presence had been revealed to that which hunted her. Assured that there was no-one in sight, no sign of the unmistakable thought pattern of her pursuer, Nancy retraced her steps, circling the hill of standing stones, and back across the river. From there on she felt almost safe; among people and to some degree hidden.
Bree was in the front lounge as Nancy returned to the hotel, and greeted her like a long-lost friend, hugging her tight, and kissing her on the cheek.
“Hey, girl — people will think we're an item, or at least having a fling!” Nancy remarked as she disengaged herself, though feeling perhaps not entirely averse to the concept.
“Maybe not like that... But with what happened this morning, it's as if we were soulmates of some kind, like we had met in some previous existence…”
Nancy too, had started to have suspicions along those lines. Was this somewhat air-headed woman being used by some antagonistic Q'l-hrui force, was she indeed the one she had faced and nearly fallen to last night? Cautiously she reached out the faintest sensory probe. And found nothing— not an absence of abnormality, but a total absence of all function on any of the few surface levels she could reach in such manner, as if the Bree persona was a shell over an essential hollowness, the sort of thing she feared herself becoming.
“Who knows,” she replied, now strongly believing that she was facing a, possibly unwitting, puppet, “but now we've met, now what?”
“Getting to know a bit more about each other, that sort of thing. And I do believe they've started serving tea.”
Back in her room, Nancy breathed a sigh of relief. At least Bree had carried the burden of the small-talk, random anecdotes from a string of worlds where she had wandered, such a contrast to her own rather cloistered past, even with the whole scope of Castle Wolf to have grown up in, until time to get changed for dinner. But now what?
She sorted through her scant wardrobe, wishing that she still had the night combat kit, even just the fuligin body paint, that she had left back home, somewhere in one of those scattered bags and boxes strewn around her suite, assembling the darkest colours, and bundling her hair under a cap. Thus attired, for whatever the night might bring, and not for dinner, she slipped out of the hotel room, and out into the streets.
Evening was drawing in under a leaden sky, lights coming on against the gloom, as she walked; her mood matched the skies, and not the superficial cheer of people and the bright lights around her, and it was almost a comfort to pass the outskirts, finally coming to the slope leading, in time, down to the river.
Beyond the lights, she paused a while as her eyes adapted, realising that in some respects the visibility was better than it had been the previous night, with the clouds above reflecting the city's brightness, a poor echo of the ring-light she had grown up with, but she still moved cautiously across the rough ground, retracing her steps of the night before, listening with ears and with mind for any signs of pursuit. But all she could hear was the sound of trees rustling and the roar of the wind, as fitful gusts picked up; and when passing through under the trees, the occasional ominous creaking that brought to mind the fallen trunks she had seen this way.
Quickly as she could pick her way through the darkness, and the drifts of twigs and small branches brought down by the winds, she emerged from the trees, and gained the riverside path. Gone were the mists of the previous night, not even the faintest wisps, all dissipated on the wind, which plucked at her clothing as she crossed the bridge, grabbing her cap and sending it to fall somewhere, her hair spilling out. So much for camouflage — not, she thought, that it would be much use in the confrontation she anticipated.
Beyond the trees on the far bank, the hill with the standing stones was a deeper darkness than the sky, nothing wakened there as yet, but the energies gathering were palpable as she headed away from the river, feeling her way, guided by their pull. At her breast, the Q'l-hrui gem had begun to flicker with blue light, but so far, more to be seen than to see by. Above, what had been a featureless sky, distantly lit by the city, showed signs of motion, a stirring on the gale.
At last, out from cover, with that faint glow from the flowing cloud above, she strode up the hill; and as she climbed, she could see faint blue light gathering in response at the base of the columns. Reaching the wall, she paused. This was the boundary, the point of commitment. A deep breath, and she stepped over.
Again, that sense of transition, that this was not the world she was accustomed to; and the feeling, presence, of Vaelithra, as if looking over her shoulder, blossomed. The sounds of the wind as it pushed her up the last few yards awoke memories of the sounds that had triggered the gem, that first night she had found it. The standing stones were all alight with electric blue glow as she stepped into the ring, stopping at the centre to look all around, bracing against the wind as the presence surged up, and she felt herself dissolve once again into the ecstatic trance that it offered. That first time, she had been cut down by a simple stun beam; here within the Q'l-hrui veil, there should be no such mundane attacks.
No mundane ones, but in that moment of glory, the Other struck, a blast of subtle energies that tore at her extended self; it was Vaelithra that responded, firing back in kind. The remaining core that was Nancy just looked on as from afar, and could feel that, as the struggle continued, she was likely the weaker party. So, this would indeed be it.
Rents were forming in the clouds above, patches of stars and nebulae showing, and she watched their beauty even as she felt herself being eroded. Silvery glow appeared around the fringes of the remaining cloud, bringing more light, bringing… hope?
“This is not me! I am not Vaelithra! I am not a puppet of the Q'l-hrui!” she shouted, at least in her mind, if not vocally.
The light brightened, and she continued to fight back against all the alien influences.
“I am Nancy... Elanor…” she declared.
The last of the clouds were stripped away from the full moon, in the sky both in the outer world and the inner.
“I… am… the… WOLF!”
She reached for the thing that was riding her as a puppet, and took it in her jaws, wolfing it down, even as the Other continued to rain down its hatred. The energies that had driven her were now hers, and she sprang, catching the Other by surprise at the change of initiative. It fought back at her as she snapped at it, tearing chunks from it that served only to feed her further, but it was lumbering and slow, and her harrying soon turned into outright feasting, as she stripped its being and devoured it, until only a human infant remained.
Nancy sniffed at it, and deemed it harmless; weary and sated after the battle, she lay down to sleep, curling herself around the defenceless one.
Bright morning, skies that looked rain-washed, though the night had remained dry, the winds of the previous night all gone to calm.
Nancy slowly woke in the warm early sunlight, to a feeling of déjà vu, memories of her last such awakening, on the very last morning on her home planet coming back to her and the unfamiliar yet familiar sensations of herself, curled on the dew-wet grass. She opened her eyes to the sunlight, and stretched out silver furred paws. A moment of uncertainty, then recollection — ah, yes, like this : a hand, and then a paw again. Getting to her feet, she saw Bree curled up beside her, her evening wear rather bedraggled, looking like the discarded Q'l-hrui puppet than she had been. She sniffed cautiously. Yes, she had soiled herself too, just like an infant.
Cautiously, she reached out her mind, realising as she did that this was now her, not an adjunct of an artefact, doing that. File that away for later, too, she thought. She was hesitant as she actually contacted Bree, afraid of what she might find. There was no Q'l-hrui taint, that she was sure of at the first touch; but not much else either. The real Bree was truly the infant whose image she had revealed at the end of the battle, the vapid adult shell just something that had been used by the lumbering hunter that had preyed on her, and how many others she could not tell.
Gently she coaxed little Bree awake, calming her initial rush of panic and bewilderment, then, with infinite care, set her on the path back to the city, walking alongside her in the now natural-seeming form of a wolf, stopping only to do a minimum of cleaning up at the river. The early hour helped, few were awake, to wonder at this strange pair, the seeming dog almost herding the seeming woman, and having to be distracted by simple mental misdirection. At the door to her room, Nancy shed the wolf, in one ecstatic stretch. Naked, of course, she thought, bar — to her surprise — the gem at her chest, still on its chain, its fires diminished, like those of the gem she had been sent, back on the liner, what felt like a lifetime ago.
She palmed the lock, ushered Bree inside, and guided her into the shower while she got herself dressed.
“And now, what?” she mused. No, she wasn't going to be a baby-sitter for the next few years, so … Only one thing to do.
Checking an ephemeris, she located the direction of the Link station, and cast a thought in that direction. Could she reach that far?
“Hello, Nancy,” came an avuncular response. So she could indeed reach other telepaths, at least, across planetary distances. “After last night's fireworks, we'd been hoping to hear from you.”
She hesitated, taken aback.
“Well, we would keep an eye on a known, shall we say ‘lone wolf’, while they're still finding their feet. Or when they cause a massive Q'l-hrui event,” the other paused, “So, what sort of assistance are you seeking?”
Morning. At last. Those words were not spoken, nor even framed as thoughts. They were just a feeling of welcome relief.
Nancy awoke instantly from a deep sleep, stared at the ceiling. She felt refreshed, relieved, even if somewhat unsatisfied, after a day spent being debriefed by the Linkers, then rushed back off-planet to catch the next liner taking the outbound route. She checked the time.
Ah, nearly that time.
And as she lay there debating whether to get up, or summon coffee, the announcement came. The ship was about to cast off from the Link station, and she could consign the world of Nalthor, the city of Halcyon, and Bree to fading memories. Now would be the true new start for this lone Wolf.
Afterword 2026
One of the first things I'd wondered about LLM AI was whether I could use it to finish my fragmentary works; this story is, in essence, the result of that experiment. The original story ran itself into a dead end, and I had no idea how to continue it in a way that tied back to the initial character concept; but in what turned out to be a prime example of rubber-duck debugging using Grok, I figured out what I had to throw away and what I had to keep, and how to continue the story.
The result is what you see here, with Grok's subsequent input being restricted to the new names, and a serious dose of copy-editing.
© Steve Gilham 2000-2026