A few hours later, Aysun was close to despair. His device was malfunctioning; it had to be. According to the display, Llandry was moving far faster than they were. No matter how quickly he forced his company to move, she continued to draw further away. He knew she could fly fast with her Glinnish wings - she and her mother had often outpaced him on the ground, even when Llandry was a child - but even so, it shouldn't be possible for her to put so much distance between them at such a rate.
A halt was called some hours after they had encountered the snakes. Eyas at last declared it safe to rest, but while the others slept Aysun worked on his location device. He worked relentlessly, ignoring his tiredness, searching for the fault in the machinery that was causing the problems with the display.
But all his efforts only made it worse, for after an hour's work something remarkably strange happened. The point of light that represented Llandry's position abruptly reversed its direction and began to head back towards Aysun's group. He calculated that her position must be more than fifty miles ahead of them, but she closed that distance with impossible speed. Over the space of a mere few minutes, her path traced an arc around them, passing a few miles to the northeast. Then that taunting dot of light veered away once more.
Aysun was an engineer, hailing from the realm of Irbel where talent with machinery was common and highly valued. He was a skilled practitioner of the mechanical arts himself, and had long worked with the outpost of Irbellian engineers based in Glinnery. He was aware of several projects developing vehicles that would move faster than nivven-drawn carriages, but he had never heard of anything that would allow the kind of speed his display was showing. It was unimaginable.
It must be broken, but he could find no fault and as such there was nothing to repair.
Without the reliable help of his locator, how could he ever expect to find Llandry in this fluid place, where nothing stayed the same and no landmark could be relied upon? Despairing, Aysun tossed the device into his pack and turned his back on his companions. He wanted to sleep, but he couldn't; not while Llandry was lost somewhere in the Uppers. He was one of the foremost engineers of Irbel: he had to find the solution.
'Who would you recommend as your successor?'
Guardian Islvy Troste regarded Eva with some sadness as she posed the question. Eva's eleven years as High Summoner had just come to an end; Islvy had been at the head of Glour's government for seven of those years, and the two women had often worked together. They had never been close friends, but they had been able to rely on each other.
'Roys Alin,' Eva replied. She hadn't had to think hard for an answer to that question. Roys was no aristocrat, and that must speak against her when it came to government appointments. But she was a summoner whose natural strength almost equalled Eva's own, and had long been Eva's second in command. She was a rational, dedicated woman; she would do well in the role of chief of the realm's summoner practitioners.
The Guardian nodded. 'That's as I expected. I agree with you entirely, and I'll make sure there are no objections from the rest of the Council. Would you prefer to postpone your departure, or is your resignation effective immediately?'
'Immediate,' Eva replied without hesitation. It cost her something to say it, but she ensured that no trace of doubt appeared in her manner. 'There is much to be done regarding the draykon problem, and I have already lost a great deal of time.'
The Guardian frowned slightly. 'That issue has already been passed to the university. Some of their finest scholars are at work on it. Not that I doubt your ability to contribute to the research, but is it indeed so vital that you participate immediately? I don't wish to lose our best High Summoner in a generation unnecessarily.'
Eva permitted herself a small smile. 'They are at work, yes, but you must admit that many of them barely believe me. They think that I spoke of some other large, winged species, perhaps, or that some variety of shock damaged my ability to clearly interpret the events happening around me. I have even heard it said that I was under the influence of some one or other of the hallucinogenic substances that can be harvested in the Lowers. I was, after all, in the company of a youth of twenty-five and everyone knows that all young people are fond of recreational drugs. Few are giving the matter any real attention.'
Islvy smiled rather grimly. 'Is that so? Then they will be addressed on the matter.'
Eva shook her head. 'They cannot be forced to take me seriously, not without any real evidence other than my testimony, and Mr. Warvel's. Even if they could, there is only so far I can help them by describing what I saw. My eyewitness experience is of paramount importance in understanding recent events. At present there are only two of us who can claim that experience.'
'Mr. Warvel has been excused from his duties as Angstrun's aide, I understand?'
'Yes, he is currently working full time on research. It is my intent to join him at once. I do not believe this spell of quiet will last indefinitely; we will see something of these draykons before long, and it would be well to understand the possible consequences of that.'
Eva didn't add her private fears. Llandry's fate had been remarkable, but was it safe to assume that it was isolated only to her? Could there be others across the Seven who might likewise possess the latent potential to metamorphose? If so, it could be extremely important to identify them before they transformed for the first time. And Eva feared that those transformations may be triggered by proximity to a fellow draykon, as Llandry's appeared to have been. She needed to answer these questions, fast, before Llandry found her way home.
'Very well,' sighed the Guardian. 'You are already a Fellow of the university, yes?'
'I am. I have never before exploited the privileges of that post, but I will now.'
Islvy nodded. 'I sincerely regret your departure, but I wish you success with your new endeavours.'
Eva rose, recognising that as a dismissal. 'Thank you, Guardian Troste.'
The Guardian dropped her formality for a moment, and smiled with real warmth. 'Take care, Eva.'
Eva smiled back. 'And you, Islvy.'
Eva left the Guardian's office with a heavy heart. No matter the strength of her motives, it was hard to relinquish a role she had occupied for so long, and which had been the centre of her life for more than a decade. It would be strange to be excluded from the processes of government in the future, no longer summoned to meetings, her contributions and advice no longer sought. But she was beginning a new phase of her life, and the questions at hand were more than enough to excite and inspire her.
And Tren would be waiting for her at home. He had arrived early in the morning, as usual, and when she had left the house he was already deep into his study of Winnier's memoirs. Thinking of this, she quickened her pace.
She arrived home to find an empty box in the hallway of her house. The box was of the sort her tailor, Baynson, packed garments in when they were to be sent to the gentry. Strewn around it were wisps of scented paper.
Eva gave her coat to a servant, then followed the trail of discarded packaging into the study. Tren sat at her desk with several books and notebooks open around him. He was wearing at least three shirts, and several more were being used to pad the spines of the books he was studying.
'That's not what I had in mind when I ordered Baynson's finest,' she observed.
Tren looked up with a grin. 'No? Then what did you have in mind? You owed me two shirts as I recall, but no less than twelve came out of the box.'
'I was just making sure.'
'Making sure of what? Are you planning to ruin several more of my personal garments?'
Eva grinned. 'It does seem to happen when I'm around.' Tren had ripped up one of his own shirts to bind a hand wound for her, when they had been en route through Orstwych some weeks ago. Later, another shirt had been irrevocably damaged when they both took an unplanned dip in ice-cold salt water. She had promised to replace them, and so she had. She'd even provided an upgrade to the quality. A considerable one.
'This silk is remarkably comfortable to wear, though a little thin,' Tren continued. 'Maybe that's what you had in mind: layers.'
The multiple shirts he wore were in clashing colours. He had a dark red shirt over a leaf-green one, over a beautiful purple colour. Eva chuckled.
'Baynson would have heart failure if he saw you like that. By the way, there are cushions for the books' spines.'
'I know, but if I am to enjoy the luxury of pure silk shirts, why should I deny it to the books? Lulled into a sense of pampered security, they will give up their secrets the more easily.'
'Ah. And how is that working out?'
'Quite well. For example.' Tren leaned forward in his chair and leafed through the book that rested before him. Eva recognised the aged, dark leather of Andraly Winnier's book. 'We - or at least, I - assumed that this book, looking as it does rather terrifically ancient, is the work of a long-dead author. However, there are some entries describing recent events in the Lowers and - this is the good part - they're obviously written in the same handwriting as the oldest entries.' He paged carefully through the book, demonstrating his point, and Eva leaned over the desk to see. She had to agree: the newer script was written in different ink, but the letters were formed in the same manner.
'You're certain the events described are recent? Maybe this isn't the first time that the Lowers have suffered this kind of disruption.'
'Interesting that you asked that. I am certain that these entries are very recent, yes, but there are earlier entries describing the same kinds of things. And these recent chapters refer to that. Here: The re-emergence of the draykon race has upset the balance of Ayrien, causing serious upheaval of a type previously observed and recorded during the Eterna Conflict.' "Ayrien" seems to refer to the Lowers, but I've yet to find any more references to an Eterna Conflict.'
'Ayrien,' Eva repeated. 'I've never heard that term before, have you?'
'Nope. I'm going back to the City Library tomorrow to look for them both. That's not all, though. Look at this.' Tren turned to approximately the middle of the large tome, revealing the roughly-torn stubs of several missing pages. 'There are a few more torn out throughout the book. No indication as to what they discussed.'
'I wonder if Griel removed them,' Eva mused. 'Though I can't imagine why he might have. It's a pity we didn't get longer to explore the tower; maybe we could have found the missing pages.'
'And who knows what else,' Tren agreed. 'What's making me very curious, though, is the identity of the author. Who is Andraly Winnier? This person appears to have been writing for an impossibly long time.'
'That's not confirmed,' Eva replied. 'Handwriting can be imitated.'
'True. But why bother?'
Eva shrugged. 'If it's conceivably possible, then it should be considered and investigated.'
Tren grinned up at her. 'You're a curious mixture. In some respects you're a complete rebel, and in others you're a surprisingly conservative woman. Even, dare I say, pedantic.'
'But imagine how dull life would be if everyone was completely predictable. Please, Tren, for the sake of my sanity, take off the extra shirts.'
Tren laughed. 'That's really bothering you, is it?'
'Yes. It's hurting my eyes. I can't consent to stand anywhere near you while you're like that.'
'That is a grave threat,' Tren replied seriously. He disappeared for a moment under a succession of silk shirts as several clashing colours came off. Eva collected the discarded shirts and folded them up, arranging them into perfectly colour-coordinated pairs. At length Tren was down to only one shirt, a perfectly inoffensive blue one.
'Thank you,' she said. 'Now you may proceed.'
'That's everything I had to report.' Tren pulled in his chair and focused on the book again. 'I'll let you know if I find anything else interesting.'
'I'll send Beane in with some refreshment,' she offered.
He shook his head without looking up. 'Thanks, but I don't want to risk getting the books dirty.'
'Very well; then I shall call you for lunch.'
She wanted him to look up and smile again, but he kept his eyes fixed on his book. 'Thank you.'
She nodded, though he didn't see the gesture, and departed.