Orcs:Bad blood

8

A rough diamond lying among a fall of hailstones. A beetle moving unhurriedly across a table strewn with grapes. A wind-tossed lily petal caught up in a distant flock of doves. None are less real for being hard to see.

So it was in the limitless ocean of existence, where parallel worlds teemed in numbers beyond reckoning. There were anomalies, constructs that differed from the norm though superficially identical. They were rare to the point of improbability, but genuine enough.

One singularity of this kind was a radiant sphere created and maintained by the vigour of unimaginably potent magic. Within was a world whose entire resources and population were devoted to a single cause. This enterprise was carried out in secrecy, and its heart lay in their only city.

The city was as remarkable as the curious world fashioned to house it. Had an outsider been permitted to see it, not that any ever were, they would have been awed by its startling diversity. It embraced myriad architectural styles. Crystal spires and squat enclosures, soaring arches and faceless blocks. Grand amphitheatres standing adjacent to lofty tree houses; groups of round huts overshadowed by multi-turreted citadels. The city was made of stone, glass, timber, quartz, seashells, congealed mud, iron, brick, marble, ebony, canvas, steel and materials that resisted identification.

Many structures appeared incomprehensible, with no obvious practical or aesthetic function. Some melted into one another as though they had grown rather than been erected. A few appeared to disobey gravity, or continuously shifted, flowing into different shapes as they subtly remade themselves.

Highways and watercourses riddled the conglomeration. The twisting roads, elevated at some points, or burrowing into subterranean labyrinths, defied logic, and only a percentage of the canals and conduits contained water. What ran in others was viscous and of varying colours, and in certain stretches could be taken for quicksilver.

The whole bewildering muddle seemed hardly to qualify as a metropolis at all, yet it had an eccentric kind of organic coherence. Given enough time, a visitor, of which there were none, would realise that the city was best understood as the coming together of numerous cultures. A glimpse of its inhabitants would confirm it.

At the centre of the city there was a particularly imposing cluster of buildings. They were topped by a tower made of something that looked like polished ebony. It had no windows, or need of them; those inside saw infinitely more than mere glass could show.

The hub of the tower was a large chamber near its apex. Had a stranger entered they would have seen that the walls seemed to be covered in hundreds of framed works of art, all of the same size and uniformly rectangular. Closer inspection would reveal that they weren't paintings or sketches, and far from still life. They moved.

The frames were like apertures, through which a perplexing variety of constantly changing landscapes could be glimpsed: deserts, forests, oceans, cities, villages, rivers, fields, hamlets, cliff faces, towns, marshes, jungles, lakes and other, unrecognisable terrains, bizarre and alien.

One wall consisted of a single enormous aperture, its surface faintly rippling as though covered by an oily, transparent film. The scene it displayed was less easy to grasp than the others. It was entirely black, except for five pinpoints of golden light, clustered together and glowing like hot embers.

There were beings of many races present, and they were engrossed by it.

The highest ranking was human. Entering late maturity, Karrell Revers had silvering, close-cropped hair and beard, though he remained vigorous and straight-backed. Astuteness glinted in his jade eyes.

"That's it," he declared, pointing at the image. "We've found them."

"You're sure?" Pelli Madayar asked. She was a young female of the elf folk, dainty of form and with features so delicate she looked almost fragile. An appearance that belied both her stamina and the force of her will.

"You've not seen instrumentalities via the tracker before, Pelli," Revers replied. "Over the years, I have, though seldom. Believe me, we've found them."

"And they've been activated."

He nodded at the screen. "As you can see."

"Do we know who by?"

"Given where the artefacts are located, we can make an educated guess. I think they're with the one race not represented in the Gateway Corps."

"Orcs?"

"I'd bet on it."

"So you take this to be the set created by the sorcerer Arngrim."

"Almost certainly. We're sure they were fashioned there," he indicated the screen again, "in the region known locally as Maras-Dantia, and that they passed through many hands before being seized by a band of renegade orcs."

"And then they disappeared."

"Several years ago, after we picked up their last flaring. Which indicated, of course, that they must have transported whoever possessed them to another habitation. Where that may have been, we have no idea. Tracking is an imprecise art, relying more than a little on luck. Wherever they were, the instrumentalities have lain dormant until now."

"So we don't know it's the set Arngrim made."

"Their provenance can be established. As you're aware, every assemblage of instrumentalities has a signature. Its own song. We can verify their origin once we've recovered them. That's not important. What is important is that a set has been activated, and the possible consequences of that are dire at the best of times. But to think they could be in the keeping of a race like the orcs — "

"We don't know that either. Perhaps they've passed to someone else."

"Someone capable of taking them from orcs? Unlikely. And I can't see the orcs trading them once they realised what they were capable of."

"Could they? See their potential, I mean. They don't have a reputation for being the brightest of races."

"But we can credit them with a certain base cunning. Which seems to have served them well enough to employ the instrumentalities. Though to fully direct the artefacts requires magical ability, and we should be grateful that's something orcs don't have."

"As do few of your race, Commander," she gently reminded him.

"You're not suggesting they're capable of mastering sorcery?"

"Who's to say what rogue intellect nature might have thrown up? Or perhaps they have help from someone who already has the necessary skills."

"So we have two alarming prospects. Instrumentalities in the hands of an ignorant race wedded to bloodletting, or somebody directing the orcs for purposes of their own. The ramifications of either are incalculable."

"What do we do?"

"We fulfil the remit the Corps was established for; the duty our forebears have carried out over the centuries. We do what we were all born to, Pelli. Whatever it takes."

"I understand."

"This needs dealing with at the highest level. As my second-in-command, I'm entrusting you personally with the task of recovering the artefacts."

She nodded.

Revers turned to face the rest of his team. Dwarfs, gnomes, brownies, centaurs, elves and representatives of half a dozen other races stared back at him. All were dressed in variants of the black garb he and Madayar wore, with a stylised field of stars motif on their chests.

"We have a crisis brewing," Revers told them. "Instrumentalities falling into unauthorised hands is such an uncommon event that, for some of you, this is the first time you would have experienced it. But you've been trained for such an eventuality, and I expect you to act in accordance with the highest standards of the Gateway Corps." He looked to the screen and its five luminous points of light. Everyone followed his gaze. "We take for granted the multiplicity of worlds. We don't know who first discovered their existence or the means to move between them. Some conjecture that it was an ancient, long-extinct race. Others among you credit your gods. We can speculate on that endlessly and never find an answer; any more than we will ever know the true origins of magic. But that doesn't matter. Our purpose is not to plumb the mystery but to bar irresponsible access to the portals." He scanned their faces and saw resolve there. "The Corps has never failed to recover known instrumentalities, or to punish those responsible for their misuse. This will be no exception. You all have your duties. Attend to them."

The crowd dispersed.

He returned his attention to Madayar. "We have to move quickly, before the artefacts are used again and we lose sight of them. Pick whoever you want for your squad and take any provisions you need."

"Do I have discretion in how I deal with this?"

"Act in any way you see fit. And I know it's asking a lot of you, Pelli, but bear in mind it's vital that the existence of the Corps remains secret."

"That won't be easy, particularly if we have to use force."

"Try persuasion if you can. Though I've little faith in that approach working with orcs. They're beyond the pale. Remember, you serve a higher moral purpose. If it's necessary to exterminate any who stand in your way, so be it. You'll have weaponry superior to anything you're likely to run into in Maras-Dantia."

"I hope it doesn't come to that. We elves like to think that few beings are beyond salvation. Surely even orcs are susceptible to reason?"