JULIEN

II

Chapter 68

Smash and grab

The configuration supplied by their host sent Yülien and Ambar directly back to the Outside of their own universe, which was a situation that Yülien would normally have been able to cope with fairly easily. But this time something was different: either because of his stay with the communication unit, or because of the brief contact with the horrible 'guardians' – or even perhaps because of something the 'non-dual auto-conscious being' had done to him – he found that this time around Ambar was able to share completely in his perception of the surrounding chaos. And the result was devastating.

The first time Julien had been exposed to this sort of attack on every one of his senses by an environment which was not meant to be accessed by human consciousness he had been protected by Xarax, who had instantly jumped in to close off all his senses of perception. But Yülien was not Xarax and he couldn't access the subtle mechanisms of his friend's mind – and even if he had been able to do that he would have had no way to change anything.

The panic that overwhelmed Ambar was both immediate and complete and, fused as they were, it also engulfed the unfortunate Yülien, preventing him from being able to access the Orientation Table and leaving only one thought intact in his brutalised mind: get out of the Outside!

Although Yülien was starting to feel fairly at ease within the network of the klirks he had had no training in the more subtle Art of klirk-free navigation, and so also no ability to master it. So it is remarkable that he and his terrified companion didn't simply emerge into empty space, which after all accounts for the vast majority of most universes. Alternatively – a little less likely but still a reasonable possibility – he could have jumped into the heart of a star, because that sort of object exerts, for a careless Guide, the same sort of pull as a magnet has for an iron filing.

Both catastrophes were avoided thanks to a reflex action pitilessly implanted in him by Wenn Hyaï, who had utterly ignored the heartbreaking laments of a student who had accused him of mental cruelty, or even of indulging in the perverted practice of inflicting pain for his own amusement.

It is true that this training would normally have only been inflicted on Guides who were suitable for klirk-free travel several years further into their instruction. But Master Wenn Hyaï had in his wisdom decided that the precocity of Julien's Tsenn kenn left them no option: he had to quash any thought of compassion and inflict the training regardless, because any other course of action would have been not only wrong but also potentially dangerous.

So Yülien had had to repeat ad nauseam the exercise of jumping without thinking, without even having to visualise anything, to a point as close as possible to the First Klirk of Hyaï Ho, the Guides' world of origin.

He was still a long way short of mastering that essential safety technique, but it did at least spare them from an instant and ignominious death. Instead they jumped safe and sound to Hyaï Ho. Some ten thousand metres above the surface, admittedly, but exactly above the granite monolith on which was sealed the most famous klirk in the Known Universe.

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Xarax came crashing down onto Julien's shoulders, making him drop the precious Garwang porcelain bowl he was lifting to his lips. The bowl shattered on the floor.

They're here! cried Xarax in Julien's head. I can sense them! They're back!

There was no need to ask who the haptir was referring to, especially since at that moment Julien was in the process of giving the Katak clan – whose precious heirloom the Garwang bowl had been – the terrible news about the disappearance of their most promising offspring since Aïn himself.

Sometimes an excess of courtesy or a too careful following of diplomatic procedure can impair efficiency. It took Julien less than three seconds to recognise that this was one of those times, after which he jumped into the Outside, instantly located the target-klirk which was still solidly attached to Ambar's neck, and emerged again as close as he thought was safe.

They were still about three thousand metres above the ground, but the two entwined partners had already reached their terminal velocity and were going away from them, even though Julien had quickly adjusted to the circumstances and had begin to accelerate downwards himself. He didn't need to be within arm's length to take them with him, but if the distance between them was too great the procedure could become extremely hazardous.

Arriving from the Outside into mid-air had caused him some initial confusion, but he quickly realised what needed to be done. And Xarax, who had recovered faster, was already rocketing towards the ground in attack configuration, flying as fast as he was able. Within seconds he had caught up with the unfortunate couple and was able to dig his claws firmly into Ambar's gluteus maximus, which had been left conveniently exposed by the flapping of his laï. Then, spreading his large wings progressively wider, he began to slow their descent just enough for Julien to reach a distance which he had to consider reasonable if he wanted to transport anything other than mangled corpses.

In fact the distance was still anything but 'reasonable', but he still managed to pick the three of them up and deposit them some four hundred metres away. The only problem was that he was so desperate to make sure he didn't fail to catch his two protegés that he spread his catchment area too widely and also picked up a few tons of green grantite that had previously formed part of the monolith. He felt sure that the Major Circle wouldn't be happy with this desecration of their monument, and he also suspected that Wenn Hyaï would disapprove of the way he had rushed in instead of using the combat stasis that would have allowed him to slow down his perceptions and so avoid botching the job, but at that moment he couldn't have cared less: despite Ambar's howls of complaint about the wounds to his tender flesh, mixed with the residue of his shock and terror from the Outside, Julien was positively revelling in unalloyed happiness.

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Actually nobody offered him the least reproach, and in fact a little later the Major Circle of Master Guides decided unanimously to leave the Monument of the First Klirk in its present truncated state as proof of the dedication of the Protector of the Nine Worlds to the safeguarding of the Noble Species of Guides.

The Katak Clan in particular celebrated a rescue that some of them called 'miraculous' and, as proof of their gratitude, they offered honorary membership of the Clan to Xarax - not a Guide and not even a human, but a haptir of Kretzlal!

Xarax, following advice given discreetly by Wenn Hyaï, showed a sense of diplomacy uncommon in his species by offering his newly-adopted Clan a very rare Garwang bowl of the High Period, thus fortuitously replacing the one which had slipped from the hands of the Protector himself.

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For the next several weeks the two heroes of the first exploration – albeit involuntary – of what seemed to be another universe were submitted during their mid-morning break to the questions of a few visitors who were greedy for information. The visitors were carefully selected and had to be content with quite preposterously short interviews, with those who tried to prolong the discussion running the risk of being courteously but firmly removed from the premises by a couple of gigantic Palace Guards. But these interviews didn't start until after a few days' recuperation, during which period nobody from outside Julien's circle of friends was allowed near them.

Ambar spent a few days lying on his stomach, and it was purely due to his sunny nature that he didn't once suggest to Xarax that he could have slowed their descent equally effectively by grabbing his laï instead. Although it probably helped that there was a need for a soothing balm to be applied regularly to his injuries, and that Julien was more than happy to carry out that unrewarding task himself...

But although every step was taken to ensure that Ambar's buttocks would remain free of any lasting scar, it did seem possible that he might not easily be able to forget every unpleasant moment of their odyssey. The same was true of Yülien, who had not emerged unscathed from his encounter with the loathsome guardians of the now-famous 'non-dual auto-conscious being'.

However, to Julien's surprise, Wenn Hyaï did not support his suggestion that his Tsenn kenn should be temporarily forbidden from any further practice of an Art which had so nearly proved fatal. The Master Guide instead recommended leaving the two friends together and added that Julien should consider performing as soon as possible the purely formal part of the rite which would make them an officially-recognised Nyingtchik, because in every other way the union was already a fait-accompli. Whether the joining had been a wilful act on the part of the entity they had encountered or the result of the trauma they had been through together was unimportant.

Once the brief ceremony had been performed and the resulting celebratory feast duly shared, Master Wenn Hyaï planned some joint training for them which, even though they might not enjoy it much while it was happening, was designed to give them a far better chance of meeting future hazards caused by unplanned journeys successfully.

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Chapter 69

...they just fade away.

Ex-Senior Conqueror Hoctimer had never for one moment considered surrendering to the authorities of the Empire. As resident in charge of the bridgehead that had been intended to subvert the government of the Nine Worlds he was certain he could not expect any leniency, and if he did make the mistake of turning himself in and then let slip any of the darker things he had done when he was probed, as he was sure to be, he was certain that any leaning towards leniency would be replaced by a lust for revenge.

It was true that the brat currently wearing the title of Protector of the R'hinz seemed to be pathetically weak: unlike a worthy leader of men, he seemed reluctant to order the kind of painful and exemplary executions that the situation demanded. But it was also clear that some of the members of his entourage were far more willing to do what needed to be done, and he was sure that at least one of them would be more than ready to make the leader of their enemies pay dearly for the attempted conquest of their realm.

And even if he was stupid enough to surrender and managed not to die during the subsequent torture and probing, the best sentence he could hope for would be to be returned to Dalann, where he would undoubtedly have to pay the price of his failure. The best that could be said for the other alternative, exile on Tandil, was that at least it promised a relatively quick death following a certain amount of pain from the claws of a tak or the venom of one of the other assorted nasties that seemed to thrive on that hellhole of a planet. And that would almost certainly be better than what would follow a return to Dalann.

Of course it was just about possible to imagine a better outcome: if he were to surrender to the other kid, 'Lord' Niil of the Ksantiris, it could give him an opportunity to plead his case in front of his buddy the Emperor, and that might just give him a chance of avoiding the revenge of the Emperor's councillors, who would be sure to do him in if they could manage it without the so-called Lord of the Nine Worlds finding out about it. And the kid might just be soft enough to let him live without sending him back to Dalann. But he would have to be insane to gamble what was left of his life on that sort of vain hope.

Right now it seemed unlikely that he would be caught. He'd personally ensured that the few trusted men who knew who he was would never be able to reveal anything during a probing, because as far as he knew nobody had ever yet found a way to make a dead man talk. And although they were certainly looking for him on Dvârinn and probably also on Nüngen, he thought it unlikely that they would go looking for him among the volcanoes of Zenn R'aal. He still congratulated himself every day for the foresight that had impelled him to go into hiding before things turned really nasty.

He had a communicator that enabled him to receive reports from three agents who were still active – of course they had no idea of where, or even who, he was. He was free to move about under the cover of a merchant travelling on business, although he was reluctant to use Guides. The Guides were not supposed to probe their clients, but he felt it would be stupid to take the chance.

He also had another communicator which allowed him – theoretically – to remain in contact with Dalann, but by now he had stopped responding to calls from the High Command. It was unlikely that a spy from the Nine Worlds could have infiltrated his headquarters on Dalann, but you can never be too careful, and in any case there was nothing his planet of origin could do to help him now.

It was galling: he'd worked so hard to get where he was! A series of 'untimely deaths' had thinned out his competitors, but he had still had to wait for the failure of the last attempt of his predecessor, Conqueror Enndigar, some eighteen cycles previously, before being awarded the prestigious task of bringing their project of conquest to fruition. And now his failure was complete and he could rely on nobody to keep him out of trouble except himself. Fortunately he had access to considerable wealth, and his cover as a prosperous merchant was solid enough to give him time to decide what to do next. He'd have been a lot happier if that fanatical moron Krentir hadn't made life harder for him by blowing himself to atoms on that deserted island in order to activate the marker beacon. A nuclear explosion was absolutely guaranteed to get the Emperor's bloodhounds straining at the leash. It was a good thing the stupid bastard hadn't decided to do it in Ksantir harbour!

He made his decision. He'd wait another two weeks and then leave this rented chalet with its spectacular views of the eruption of Djowo Metchen and go to Tang Loung, where he would be able to retrieve the considerable sums he had carefully siphoned off from his official funds just in case things went wrong, and then he would be able to organise himself a happy retirement.

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