She had completed the spell.
Â
Twist the aether just so, avoid aspectation by generating a Thamassian Fog first, pass it through the somatic barrier at the proper pulse rate…
Â
All parts were difficult, but the particularly difficult part had been projecting the wavelength of spiritbonded memory so that it persisted in the speci-- in thesubject, without damaging it. Kannadi’s learning process ended with the injections she intended, but it had started with bludgeons. There were many accidents. A jackal had exploded. Luckily there was never a shortage of monsters in need of culling, and practice quickly made perfect.
Â
The next task had been to apply Oil and/or Sands of Time to the given subject. Happily, the usual forging process seemed to be unnecessary for a living body. Unhappily, the body didn’t enjoy staying alive thereafter. The spell allowed for greater aetheric convection so the Allagan materials would work, but there were unexpected problems of reliability.
Â
The sea-scorpion had petrified, for instance. She still wasn’t sure why. The yeti had accelerated its age so fast it crumbled to dust. The kraken had melted into a foam of what turned out to be eggs, which were summarily killed with fire. The giant cactuar had shrunk to a week-old cutting and started following her around. Kannadi had named it Saguaro in a moment of levity.
Â
Saguaro bounced idly from leg to leg as voices carried on far above.
Â
“It seems your spell is sound, at least,†came the older woman’s voice.
Â
“Hardly, Grandmother,†the younger woman’s voice said. They both spoke softly. The physicians had been dismissed, and the door was shut and solid, but sound traveled.
Â
Kannadi was alone with her grandmother. She suspected the tiny cactuar wouldn’t spread rumors of what transpired.
Â
“Cactuars of that size take a very long time to grow,†said Kannadi, “and Gerolt’s memorybond only records the time of his masterworks’ completion. He hasn’t been a useless lush for that long.â€
Â
Saguaro bumped Kannadi’s shin for attention. She kicked and sent it cartwheeling into the curtain of the elaborate breakfast cart. Its needles, though short, were still enough to snag it on the fabric and stick it upside down. It wiggled, gently clattering hidden silverware.
Â
“The time subtracted and the time between his peak and the present simply don’t equate,†Kannadi said. “There must be something else at play.â€
Â
Her grandmother hadn’t yet touched the breakfast laid on the, yes, silver platter across her lap. She had hotel-quality room service in what several trusted and therefore well-paid doctors tried to prevent becoming her deathbed. It was so very like her.
Â
“But it works,†Karen Albedo said. Her face was drawn and gaunt, but at least it wasn’t ashen anymore. To switch one horror for another, her expression radiated hope. Hope in the unproven. It was so very unlike her.
Â
“It doesn’t work as intended,†Kannadi said.
Â
Karen gripped her lap tray for emphasis. “You can reduce the age of a living creature, Kanna dear. Have you the slightest idea--â€
Â
“--How much people would pay, even for a chance? This is Ul’dah, Grandmother. If Lolorito--â€
Â
Karen spat at the name, missing her breakfast.
Â
“If Lolorito,†Kannadi continued, “or any of the rest heard, do you really think they would pay for perhaps one chance in ten of being reduced to something asvulnerable as an infant?â€
Â
Karen at last took up a bread roll. “They can afford bodyguards,†she said. “So can I. Even at cribside.â€
Â
“You aren’t thinking straight.â€
Â
“Of course I’m not. I’m confined, lest exertion finish what the heart attack started.†Karen tore into her roll. The rest of her breakfast was inoffensive grain and water, not an onze of the sausage she ordered, and Kannadi could tell it offended her.
Â
“Then think legally, Grandmother. What real estate rights does an infant have? What wealth is allowed of a minor? The law would no longer recognize you, presuming first of all that my spell even works so well as to leave you alive!â€
Â
“Try it and see,†Karen said casually between bites.
Â
“I’m not about to turn you into a pile of dust or wet matter, Grandmother.â€
Â
“I’m both at this very moment. All of us are. What have I to lose?â€
Â
“Your life!†Kannadi punched the mattress two-fisted and leaned hard. Annoyance successfully dammed the tears. Not anger, that was important. It was definitely annoyance at how lightly her grandmother seemed to be taking the likely prospect of suicide.
Â
Karen stared at her, gray eyes to gray eyes. Carefully and without a fuss, Karen tucked her pinky fingers under her tray and lifted it off her lap. The water in the glass at one end wobbled.
Â
“Kannadi,†she said, “I will lose it anyway.â€
Â
The tray hit the serving cart at speed with a satisfying crash and clatter that disentangled the cactuar.
Â
A nurse instantly threw open the thick oaken door, but Karen’s hand was already raised.
Â
“Muscle spasm,†she said. “My fault entirely. Take all of it away, please.â€
Â
The nurse was Nadra, one of Kannadi’s cousins, younger than her. Nadra had initially served her brother Rasim the doctor as a pair of functional legs, but she had made herself a fixture of the whole Phrontistery. Even if her idea of responsibility made her a busybody.
Â
“I’ll get your waitstaff, Gramma,†Nadra mumbled, grateful that she hadn’t propped a cup against the door this time. It would’ve been too incriminating.
Â
“You will take it yourself,†Karen said.
Â
And she did, because one didn’t argue with a glare like that. Kannadi watched Nadra work in silence until she wheeled the serving cart away and gently shut the door. Saguaro peeked from under the bed, where it -- he? -- had scuttled.
Â
“I doubt if she heard much,†Kannadi said.
Â
“Lock and ward it, Kanna dear.â€
Â
Kannadi complied even though Karen spared her a glare. Warding a door against sound was a time-consuming process that she had skipped before. Now it provided time to think, but Kannadi didn’t use it. What was there to think about? Killing her? It was out of the question.
Â
Kannadi always loved her mother Avani’s abundance of support, of course, always enjoyed having it, wouldn’t say anything negative against it. Karen, though, her father’s mother, always came off to Kannadi as... more compelling. If Avani was a mountain, Karen was a glacier. More mobile, to the perceptive. Moving with more foresight, more irresistible shaping strength. More hazardous to navigate. More dangerous. And yet equally on Kannadi’s side.
Â
Her mother was her strength to weather the ills of the world, but her grandmother was her strength to weather them, actively, to scour and erode and make disappear.
Â
Kannadi was a reserved child. Avani was a reserved adult. But Karen had taught Kannadi that holding back built pressure, built power. So she held many things back to power the turbines in her head.
Â
Kannadi was patient. Avani was patient. But Karen taught Kannadi that patience could grind peaks into prairie. So she ground away at mysteries until the vague future day when all horizons were clear.
Â
Kannadi hated surprises. She was alone on that. But Karen taught her that nothing surprised someone who was sufficiently prepared. So she prepared herself for everything she could.
Â
Except her grandmother’s mortality...
Â
Kannadi finished the ward after ten minutes. She knocked twice on the sturdy wood, to a resounding silence.
Â
“What is there that you have yet to try?†Karen asked.
Â
“The same process on hundreds more creatures,†Kannadi said, turning from the door. “I need more specimens, more practice.â€
Â
“I will wait no longer. I have no time.â€
Â
“I need more,†Kannadi repeated. “The ones your age or older, with a larger ‘time buffer’ as it were, are highly uncooperative. I have to beat them into submission, to near-death, before I can even get close enough.â€
Â
“You can get close enough to me.†Karen beckoned. “Come, at least demonstrate how you would do it. Pretend I’m a monster.â€
Â
Kannadi successfully kept her face straight and stepped forward. She extended her right arm, holding out an invisible staff.
Â
“First I project a simulation of the memory-bond from Gerolt’s masterworks into you.â€
Â
“Very well.â€
Â
“But to make it perceptible to the Allagan substances at all, the spell weakens the somatic barrier -- what is to your aether as skin is to your body.â€
Â
“And this means what?â€
Â
Kannadi lowered her imaginary staff. “It means that ambient aether can cross into your body easier than usual, which… muddles things.â€
Â
“And it doesn’t work on dead bodies?â€
Â
“I can attest with certainty that it does not.â€
Â
“I see. The next step?â€
Â
Kannadi rubbed her fingers as if dusting sugar. “Then I, well, sprinkle the stuff on you. It doesn’t require forceful persuasion as it does with objects. I think it may be due to vital aether galvanizing the differential convection of--â€
Â
“--And this is done after the projection?†Karen cut her off, lest she recite a dissertation.
Â
“Yes.â€
Â
“Why?â€
Â
Kannadi blinked. Her lips parted. Surely not...
Â
“Well,†she said after a moment, “for practicality. If I dosed the specimen before it was subdued, the Oil or Sands of Time would have rubbed off or fallen away in the regrettably assured battle.â€
Â
“Assured?â€
Â
“Monsters, particularly older ones, are quite averse to small creatures throwing things at them.â€
Â
“I guarantee I will not be averse to your process.â€
Â
“The order of application oughtn’t matter,†Kannadi began, but her grandmother smelled uncertainty as a shark smells blood.
Â
“Oughtn’t it? Who are you to tell ancient Allagan science how it ought to behave?â€
Â
“Fine, but I haven’t--â€
Â
“--Haven’t experimented enough, yes? Then think. Wouldn’t this Timestuff have a more stable reaction to your spell if the subject were willingly exposed to it first?â€
Â
Kannadi almost rolled her eyes. “This is science, Grandmother. What does will have to do with it?â€
Â
“Will is everything, Kanna dear,†said Karen in a professorial tone. “Will is the capacity for freedom. Will is the border of life. Will is the very soul. And didn’t you tell me that aether could reflect aspects of the soul?â€
Â
Kannadi hadn’t said that exactly, but she knew a good point when she heard one. Karen pressed her advantage.
Â
“And I guarantee you again, my soul will be in total focus. No ambience will trouble your spell, with me allowing you in.â€
Â
Kannadi, mentally stumbling, secured her footing on fact. “But there is no proof that aether can carry the shape of will!â€
Â
Karen moved under her sheets. “That is only because your device doesn’t tell you which bit is which. Did you bring any of the Timestuff with you?â€
Â
“A flask of the Oil, yes, but Grandmother you really should--â€
Â
“--I should do what I will to do.†Karen stood out of bed, dressed in a nightgown. “And I will have you work your spell on me, here and now.â€
Â
Kannadi looked up, unmoved, which was difficult. Her grandmother loomed no less ominous for the demure frills and lace of her gown. Kannadi still managed a stolid huff.
Â
“You can’t force me to possibly kill you, your pride won’t let you reduce yourself to blackmail, I don’t even have my staff right now, and what if it does work? Do you expect me to reduce your age at regular intervals?â€
Â
“I wouldn’t impose so much on your kindness, Kanna dear.â€
Â
“Yes you would, Grandmother, and you’re already imposing a great deal. So please don’t lie to me.â€
Â
Karen stared at her a moment, then smiled.
Â
“You’re so close. So very close to confirmation. So close to a truth never seen, never touched.†She spread her arms before her granddaughter. “A specimen stands before you, and you will never find another more willing. Its body isn’t much longer for the world. It is a perfect opportunity. How inefficient it would be to waste it.â€
Â
Kannadi hesitated. Her grandmother knew everyone’s resonance frequency, and the words rang in Kannadi like a Sil’dihn temple bell, muting her internal protests.
Â
Inefficient. Yes, it would be, wouldn’t it. Spending resources was one thing. Wasting them was quite another. And wasting an opportunity to learn an unknown scientific truth? That was the closest thing to a sin the nonreligious Kannadi had.
Â
All right, so she hadn’t accounted for either willingness or order of operations before. She could try.
Â
And then what? She asked herself.
Â
What indeed? Kannadi hated mysteries, hated riddles. She felt that they mocked her for not knowing the answer.
Â
So know the answer, dimwit! Cast the spell! Learn, and be enlightened!
Â
Yes... she would try, and with a clench of her brain she banished all thought of getting it wrong.
Â
But even so, if anyone knew, there would be questions. Demands. Incarceration. Disappearance. And not just about the spell.
Â
“Grandmother,†she said, “I was witnessed with you in a locked room which I then warded against sound. If eighty-seven-year-old Karen Albedo disappears, by either my success or my failure, there will be inquiries.â€
Â
Kannadi knew how to ring her grandmother too. “Inquiries†implied questions asked by paid-off authority in locked rooms, truth arrived at by tunnels and shade and sharp things. The old woman had made several, in her heyday. She had even been inquired after. It wasn’t a thing to inflict on a family member whom you liked.
Â
Karen reluctantly returned to her bed, failing to conceal the tremble in her knees.
Â
“Right as always, dear,†she said. “I will endeavor to be somewhere less conspicuous for you to cast your spell. Will that do?â€
Â
“It should,†said Kannadi.
Â
“Then open the door and send for Rasim. And your father. I know better than you how to convince him of anything.â€
Â
“That’s easy,†Kannadi said, “just tell him it’s rare.â€
Â
“That may be nine-tenths of it, but he needs to hear it from me.â€
Â
“Should I tell Nadra to come as well?â€
Â
“No, the girl can’t keep her mouth shut.†Which was true. To tell Nadra would be to tell her sisters, and to tell them would be to tell the newspapers.
Â
“What is your plan, exactly?†Kannadi asked.
Â
“To wait here until you do as I command. I will not repeat myself.â€
Â
It was a statement of fact. They knew each other well. Kannadi knew her grandmother would in fact repeat if asked, but Karen knew she wouldn’t. It would be inefficient.
Â
Twist the aether just so, avoid aspectation by generating a Thamassian Fog first, pass it through the somatic barrier at the proper pulse rate…
Â
All parts were difficult, but the particularly difficult part had been projecting the wavelength of spiritbonded memory so that it persisted in the speci-- in thesubject, without damaging it. Kannadi’s learning process ended with the injections she intended, but it had started with bludgeons. There were many accidents. A jackal had exploded. Luckily there was never a shortage of monsters in need of culling, and practice quickly made perfect.
Â
The next task had been to apply Oil and/or Sands of Time to the given subject. Happily, the usual forging process seemed to be unnecessary for a living body. Unhappily, the body didn’t enjoy staying alive thereafter. The spell allowed for greater aetheric convection so the Allagan materials would work, but there were unexpected problems of reliability.
Â
The sea-scorpion had petrified, for instance. She still wasn’t sure why. The yeti had accelerated its age so fast it crumbled to dust. The kraken had melted into a foam of what turned out to be eggs, which were summarily killed with fire. The giant cactuar had shrunk to a week-old cutting and started following her around. Kannadi had named it Saguaro in a moment of levity.
Â
Saguaro bounced idly from leg to leg as voices carried on far above.
Â
“It seems your spell is sound, at least,†came the older woman’s voice.
Â
“Hardly, Grandmother,†the younger woman’s voice said. They both spoke softly. The physicians had been dismissed, and the door was shut and solid, but sound traveled.
Â
Kannadi was alone with her grandmother. She suspected the tiny cactuar wouldn’t spread rumors of what transpired.
Â
“Cactuars of that size take a very long time to grow,†said Kannadi, “and Gerolt’s memorybond only records the time of his masterworks’ completion. He hasn’t been a useless lush for that long.â€
Â
Saguaro bumped Kannadi’s shin for attention. She kicked and sent it cartwheeling into the curtain of the elaborate breakfast cart. Its needles, though short, were still enough to snag it on the fabric and stick it upside down. It wiggled, gently clattering hidden silverware.
Â
“The time subtracted and the time between his peak and the present simply don’t equate,†Kannadi said. “There must be something else at play.â€
Â
Her grandmother hadn’t yet touched the breakfast laid on the, yes, silver platter across her lap. She had hotel-quality room service in what several trusted and therefore well-paid doctors tried to prevent becoming her deathbed. It was so very like her.
Â
“But it works,†Karen Albedo said. Her face was drawn and gaunt, but at least it wasn’t ashen anymore. To switch one horror for another, her expression radiated hope. Hope in the unproven. It was so very unlike her.
Â
“It doesn’t work as intended,†Kannadi said.
Â
Karen gripped her lap tray for emphasis. “You can reduce the age of a living creature, Kanna dear. Have you the slightest idea--â€
Â
“--How much people would pay, even for a chance? This is Ul’dah, Grandmother. If Lolorito--â€
Â
Karen spat at the name, missing her breakfast.
Â
“If Lolorito,†Kannadi continued, “or any of the rest heard, do you really think they would pay for perhaps one chance in ten of being reduced to something asvulnerable as an infant?â€
Â
Karen at last took up a bread roll. “They can afford bodyguards,†she said. “So can I. Even at cribside.â€
Â
“You aren’t thinking straight.â€
Â
“Of course I’m not. I’m confined, lest exertion finish what the heart attack started.†Karen tore into her roll. The rest of her breakfast was inoffensive grain and water, not an onze of the sausage she ordered, and Kannadi could tell it offended her.
Â
“Then think legally, Grandmother. What real estate rights does an infant have? What wealth is allowed of a minor? The law would no longer recognize you, presuming first of all that my spell even works so well as to leave you alive!â€
Â
“Try it and see,†Karen said casually between bites.
Â
“I’m not about to turn you into a pile of dust or wet matter, Grandmother.â€
Â
“I’m both at this very moment. All of us are. What have I to lose?â€
Â
“Your life!†Kannadi punched the mattress two-fisted and leaned hard. Annoyance successfully dammed the tears. Not anger, that was important. It was definitely annoyance at how lightly her grandmother seemed to be taking the likely prospect of suicide.
Â
Karen stared at her, gray eyes to gray eyes. Carefully and without a fuss, Karen tucked her pinky fingers under her tray and lifted it off her lap. The water in the glass at one end wobbled.
Â
“Kannadi,†she said, “I will lose it anyway.â€
Â
The tray hit the serving cart at speed with a satisfying crash and clatter that disentangled the cactuar.
Â
A nurse instantly threw open the thick oaken door, but Karen’s hand was already raised.
Â
“Muscle spasm,†she said. “My fault entirely. Take all of it away, please.â€
Â
The nurse was Nadra, one of Kannadi’s cousins, younger than her. Nadra had initially served her brother Rasim the doctor as a pair of functional legs, but she had made herself a fixture of the whole Phrontistery. Even if her idea of responsibility made her a busybody.
Â
“I’ll get your waitstaff, Gramma,†Nadra mumbled, grateful that she hadn’t propped a cup against the door this time. It would’ve been too incriminating.
Â
“You will take it yourself,†Karen said.
Â
And she did, because one didn’t argue with a glare like that. Kannadi watched Nadra work in silence until she wheeled the serving cart away and gently shut the door. Saguaro peeked from under the bed, where it -- he? -- had scuttled.
Â
“I doubt if she heard much,†Kannadi said.
Â
“Lock and ward it, Kanna dear.â€
Â
Kannadi complied even though Karen spared her a glare. Warding a door against sound was a time-consuming process that she had skipped before. Now it provided time to think, but Kannadi didn’t use it. What was there to think about? Killing her? It was out of the question.
Â
Kannadi always loved her mother Avani’s abundance of support, of course, always enjoyed having it, wouldn’t say anything negative against it. Karen, though, her father’s mother, always came off to Kannadi as... more compelling. If Avani was a mountain, Karen was a glacier. More mobile, to the perceptive. Moving with more foresight, more irresistible shaping strength. More hazardous to navigate. More dangerous. And yet equally on Kannadi’s side.
Â
Her mother was her strength to weather the ills of the world, but her grandmother was her strength to weather them, actively, to scour and erode and make disappear.
Â
Kannadi was a reserved child. Avani was a reserved adult. But Karen had taught Kannadi that holding back built pressure, built power. So she held many things back to power the turbines in her head.
Â
Kannadi was patient. Avani was patient. But Karen taught Kannadi that patience could grind peaks into prairie. So she ground away at mysteries until the vague future day when all horizons were clear.
Â
Kannadi hated surprises. She was alone on that. But Karen taught her that nothing surprised someone who was sufficiently prepared. So she prepared herself for everything she could.
Â
Except her grandmother’s mortality...
Â
Kannadi finished the ward after ten minutes. She knocked twice on the sturdy wood, to a resounding silence.
Â
“What is there that you have yet to try?†Karen asked.
Â
“The same process on hundreds more creatures,†Kannadi said, turning from the door. “I need more specimens, more practice.â€
Â
“I will wait no longer. I have no time.â€
Â
“I need more,†Kannadi repeated. “The ones your age or older, with a larger ‘time buffer’ as it were, are highly uncooperative. I have to beat them into submission, to near-death, before I can even get close enough.â€
Â
“You can get close enough to me.†Karen beckoned. “Come, at least demonstrate how you would do it. Pretend I’m a monster.â€
Â
Kannadi successfully kept her face straight and stepped forward. She extended her right arm, holding out an invisible staff.
Â
“First I project a simulation of the memory-bond from Gerolt’s masterworks into you.â€
Â
“Very well.â€
Â
“But to make it perceptible to the Allagan substances at all, the spell weakens the somatic barrier -- what is to your aether as skin is to your body.â€
Â
“And this means what?â€
Â
Kannadi lowered her imaginary staff. “It means that ambient aether can cross into your body easier than usual, which… muddles things.â€
Â
“And it doesn’t work on dead bodies?â€
Â
“I can attest with certainty that it does not.â€
Â
“I see. The next step?â€
Â
Kannadi rubbed her fingers as if dusting sugar. “Then I, well, sprinkle the stuff on you. It doesn’t require forceful persuasion as it does with objects. I think it may be due to vital aether galvanizing the differential convection of--â€
Â
“--And this is done after the projection?†Karen cut her off, lest she recite a dissertation.
Â
“Yes.â€
Â
“Why?â€
Â
Kannadi blinked. Her lips parted. Surely not...
Â
“Well,†she said after a moment, “for practicality. If I dosed the specimen before it was subdued, the Oil or Sands of Time would have rubbed off or fallen away in the regrettably assured battle.â€
Â
“Assured?â€
Â
“Monsters, particularly older ones, are quite averse to small creatures throwing things at them.â€
Â
“I guarantee I will not be averse to your process.â€
Â
“The order of application oughtn’t matter,†Kannadi began, but her grandmother smelled uncertainty as a shark smells blood.
Â
“Oughtn’t it? Who are you to tell ancient Allagan science how it ought to behave?â€
Â
“Fine, but I haven’t--â€
Â
“--Haven’t experimented enough, yes? Then think. Wouldn’t this Timestuff have a more stable reaction to your spell if the subject were willingly exposed to it first?â€
Â
Kannadi almost rolled her eyes. “This is science, Grandmother. What does will have to do with it?â€
Â
“Will is everything, Kanna dear,†said Karen in a professorial tone. “Will is the capacity for freedom. Will is the border of life. Will is the very soul. And didn’t you tell me that aether could reflect aspects of the soul?â€
Â
Kannadi hadn’t said that exactly, but she knew a good point when she heard one. Karen pressed her advantage.
Â
“And I guarantee you again, my soul will be in total focus. No ambience will trouble your spell, with me allowing you in.â€
Â
Kannadi, mentally stumbling, secured her footing on fact. “But there is no proof that aether can carry the shape of will!â€
Â
Karen moved under her sheets. “That is only because your device doesn’t tell you which bit is which. Did you bring any of the Timestuff with you?â€
Â
“A flask of the Oil, yes, but Grandmother you really should--â€
Â
“--I should do what I will to do.†Karen stood out of bed, dressed in a nightgown. “And I will have you work your spell on me, here and now.â€
Â
Kannadi looked up, unmoved, which was difficult. Her grandmother loomed no less ominous for the demure frills and lace of her gown. Kannadi still managed a stolid huff.
Â
“You can’t force me to possibly kill you, your pride won’t let you reduce yourself to blackmail, I don’t even have my staff right now, and what if it does work? Do you expect me to reduce your age at regular intervals?â€
Â
“I wouldn’t impose so much on your kindness, Kanna dear.â€
Â
“Yes you would, Grandmother, and you’re already imposing a great deal. So please don’t lie to me.â€
Â
Karen stared at her a moment, then smiled.
Â
“You’re so close. So very close to confirmation. So close to a truth never seen, never touched.†She spread her arms before her granddaughter. “A specimen stands before you, and you will never find another more willing. Its body isn’t much longer for the world. It is a perfect opportunity. How inefficient it would be to waste it.â€
Â
Kannadi hesitated. Her grandmother knew everyone’s resonance frequency, and the words rang in Kannadi like a Sil’dihn temple bell, muting her internal protests.
Â
Inefficient. Yes, it would be, wouldn’t it. Spending resources was one thing. Wasting them was quite another. And wasting an opportunity to learn an unknown scientific truth? That was the closest thing to a sin the nonreligious Kannadi had.
Â
All right, so she hadn’t accounted for either willingness or order of operations before. She could try.
Â
And then what? She asked herself.
Â
What indeed? Kannadi hated mysteries, hated riddles. She felt that they mocked her for not knowing the answer.
Â
So know the answer, dimwit! Cast the spell! Learn, and be enlightened!
Â
Yes... she would try, and with a clench of her brain she banished all thought of getting it wrong.
Â
But even so, if anyone knew, there would be questions. Demands. Incarceration. Disappearance. And not just about the spell.
Â
“Grandmother,†she said, “I was witnessed with you in a locked room which I then warded against sound. If eighty-seven-year-old Karen Albedo disappears, by either my success or my failure, there will be inquiries.â€
Â
Kannadi knew how to ring her grandmother too. “Inquiries†implied questions asked by paid-off authority in locked rooms, truth arrived at by tunnels and shade and sharp things. The old woman had made several, in her heyday. She had even been inquired after. It wasn’t a thing to inflict on a family member whom you liked.
Â
Karen reluctantly returned to her bed, failing to conceal the tremble in her knees.
Â
“Right as always, dear,†she said. “I will endeavor to be somewhere less conspicuous for you to cast your spell. Will that do?â€
Â
“It should,†said Kannadi.
Â
“Then open the door and send for Rasim. And your father. I know better than you how to convince him of anything.â€
Â
“That’s easy,†Kannadi said, “just tell him it’s rare.â€
Â
“That may be nine-tenths of it, but he needs to hear it from me.â€
Â
“Should I tell Nadra to come as well?â€
Â
“No, the girl can’t keep her mouth shut.†Which was true. To tell Nadra would be to tell her sisters, and to tell them would be to tell the newspapers.
Â
“What is your plan, exactly?†Kannadi asked.
Â
“To wait here until you do as I command. I will not repeat myself.â€
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It was a statement of fact. They knew each other well. Kannadi knew her grandmother would in fact repeat if asked, but Karen knew she wouldn’t. It would be inefficient.
"You know, I was God once."
"Yes, I saw. You were doing well until everyone died."