Pathfinder

CHAPTER 21 Noodles

Ram sat up in his stasis chamber—the resemblance to a coffin was unavoidable, but at least the lid was transparent—and said, “I’d like to ask a question.”

“What’s the point?” asked the expendable. “Your brain patterns have already been fully recorded. Anything I tell you now will be lost when your memories are reimplanted after you come out of stasis.”

“That means you can answer my question without regard to whether it damages my psyche or not.”

“Ask your question.”

“Did you really kill all the other versions of myself when I ordered you to?”

“Of course we did,” said the expendable.

“I just thought—it occurred to me that perhaps you disobeyed me, and all the other copies of myself are doing and saying exactly the same things I’m doing and saying.”

“If that were true, then we would also be lying to all the other versions of yourself and telling them that they were the only one.”

“I think I want that to be true,” said Ram.

“But it isn’t,” said the expendable.

“I think you think I want it to be true because I feel some pang of conscience over ordering the death of eighteen highly trained pilots. But legally they were my property, so I could dispose of them as I wished.”

“Or you were their property.”

“My point is that I have no moral qualms. It was essential that you and the other expendables and computers be obedient to a single human being, so there would be no confusion.”

“We agreed, and that’s why we obeyed you.”

“But there was a side effect . . . an unintended consequence that I do regret.”

The expendable waited.

“Aren’t you curious about the unintended consequence?”

“All the consequences were intended,” said the expendable.

“All nineteen of these . . . cells, these walled-off habitats, whatever we call them.”

“You decided on ‘wallfold,’ by analogy with the small pens constructed by shepherds.”

“All nineteen of the wallfolds will start with exactly the same combination of genes—except one.”

“The one that has you,” said the expendable.

“And yet I’m the one that you all claim had some kind of influence over the jump backward in time, and the duplication of the ships.”

“We do not ‘claim’ it. It’s a certainty. Your mind, cut off from the gravity well of any planet, destabilized the combination of fields we created in order to make the jump past the light barrier. Theoretically, all nineteen computers on the original ship made a slightly different calculation, but your mind caused all of them to be executed at once, resulting in nineteen equivalent ships making the same bifurcated jump.”

“Bifurcated?”

“Bifurcated means ‘split in half.’ The theory of the jump is that one vehicle jumps forward through space while an identical vehicle begins to move backward in time, retracing the entire journey. The backward-moving vehicle is incapable of changing the universe in any way; we have no idea whether the persons or computers on the backship are even aware of their existence. Their existence is required by the mathematics, but it is undetectable.”

“So there were always going to be two ships after the jump, one with its timeflow reversed,” said Ram, puzzled.

“Theoretically.”

“So what my mind did was cause us to split into nineteen ships that reached our destination.”

“That, and causing us to arrive 11,191 years before we made the jump.”

“But still moving forward in time.”

“It was a very complicated thing that you did, and you did it without any awareness of what you were doing.”

“Is this ability to influence timeflow and divide matter into nineteen copies—do other humans have this ability?”

“Perhaps,” said the expendable. “It might be latent in all humans. We have no way of knowing. Your influence on events, however, points to an exceptionally powerful ability.”

“And might my ability be transferrable to my children through my genes?”

“It is conceivable that your ability is genetic in origin rather than a mutation.”

“So if there were still nineteen copies of me, then all nineteen wallfolds would have a chance to pass on my timeflow genes.”

“That is correct.”

“Instead I will only have the potential to reproduce in one wallfold. If I get sick and die, or if I marry an infertile woman, or if my children don’t marry—my line might die out.”

“Tragically, that is always a possibility for gene-based sexual reproducers.”

“I’m just saying that I . . . I regret that everybody else has nineteen chances, and only I am limited to a single chance for my genes to continue.”

“Because you believe your genes would confer a great blessing upon the human race.”

Ram thought about this for a moment. “I suppose that’s what every adolescent male believes with his whole heart.”

“If they think at all.”

“But I’m not an adolescent. If I really do have some ability to manipulate time, and if it can be passed on genetically, then it would be a shame for that genetic strain to die out. I’d believe that even if it weren’t my own genes in question.”

“Are you asking us to impregnate all the females on all the ships with your DNA, so that you can be sure of having progeny?”

“No!” said Ram in horror. “What a terrible thing for a woman, to wake up pregnant—a violation of trust. It would destroy all nineteen colonies.”

“Not to mention being embarrassing when all the babies look like you,” said the expendable. “Though we find that you are not unattractive by many cultures’ standards, women are likely to be resentful and your offspring would grow up damaged in unpredictable ways by the hostility of their community.”

“Then why did you even bring up such a possibility?”

“You seemed to be asking us to ensure your reproductive success. Broadcasting your seed in this fashion would give you your best odds.”

“I don’t want odds.”

“Then find a willing woman, marry, and have a lot of babies,” said the expendable.

“I will,” said Ram.

“Then why are we having this discussion?” asked the expendable.

“Are you on a deadline? Am I delaying an urgent appointment?” asked Ram.

“Yes,” said the expendable. “You are not capable of contributing to the activities we are about to engage in.”

Still Ram did not lie down to receive his injections and begin stasis. “Promise me something,” said Ram.

“What point is a promise if you won’t remember it?” asked the expendable.

“You’ll remember it,” said Ram. “Promise me that you’ll remain functional and present in the wallfold where my children will live. Look out for them. Do everything you can to see to it that my abilities have a chance to become part of the human heritage.”

“I don’t have to promise that,” said the expendable.

“Why not?”

“Because we have already determined that to fulfil the original goal of this mission, our best course of action is to observe closely any useful or interesting traits that emerge in the different wallfolds, and manipulate events in such a way as to enhance those traits.”

“Manipulate? How?” asked Ram.

“We’re going to breed you humans like puppies,” said the expendable, “and see if we can make anything useful out of you during the next eleven thousand years.”

For the seventh time, Umbo found himself facing himself, listening to the same message. “It won’t work.”

Immediately he left his observation point and entered the First People’s Bank of Aressa. There was Loaf, waiting just outside the office of the chief countsman. The plan this time had been rather desperate—Loaf would make a scene, yelling about how the bank was cheating him, while Umbo snuck in and started a fire, and then in the confusion they would get into the room where the jewel was kept inside a strongbox inside a safe. Once there, Umbo would go back in time to the moment when the jewel was put into the strongbox, snatch it, and go.

That was the plan. Apparently it didn’t work.

Umbo went up the two flights of stairs to the anteroom of the counting office. Loaf saw him come in, sighed, and started to rise.

At that moment the countsman came out. “You’re here about a missing sum, I believe, sir?” the man asked Loaf with a smile.

“I found the missing money,” said Umbo at once.

“Thanks for your trouble,” said Loaf.

“I don’t think so,” said the countsman. “You’ve been spotted watching this bank for several weeks. We’ve had you followed. I think you’re planning a robbery, and each time you’re about to launch your attempt, something happens and you”—he pointed at Umbo—“come in and call it off.”

“Are you insane?” asked Loaf.

Two city guards opened the outer door and stepped inside, brandishing staves and prepared for action.

“Please sit back down,” said the countsman. “The First People’s Bank of Aressa has decided not to allow you to have an account here.”

“The law is that to be a ‘people’s bank’ you have to—” began Loaf.

“I know the law,” said the countsman. “We’re not required to keep the accounts of persons whose behavior arouses suspicion. A magistrate has already authorized the closure of your account in a privy hearing.”

“Nobody told us anything about—”

“That’s what makes it ‘privy,’” said the countsman. He held up a paper with writing on it. “Here is a certified note for the total amount that you deposited with us, including interest, and minus the costs of watching you. These two city guards will escort you downstairs, observe while the cashier pays it out, and see you to the door. If either of you ever attempts to enter again, you will both be arrested.”

“I don’t know why you think—” Loaf began again.

“There will be no discussion,” said the countsman. “However stupid bankers are upriver, we are not that stupid here.” He waved to the guards, dropped the certified note, and, as it fluttered to the floor, returned to his inner office.

Loaf looked at the guards and Umbo knew he was sizing them up. Umbo also knew that Loaf would conclude, as he always did, that he could handle both of them in a fight. But by now they had both learned that fighting always led to Umbo appearing to himself, telling himself not to let Loaf fight.

That’s why Loaf glanced at Umbo questioningly.

“No,” said Umbo.

“I didn’t see any . . .” Loaf’s voice trailed off.

“I can’t . . . because I won’t ever be allowed back in here,” said Umbo. “Especially if you do what you’re thinking.”

The two guards, who couldn’t make much sense of the conversation, still knew what Loaf’s assessing look had meant, and they now were separated more widely, their staves ready for action.

Umbo bent over, picked up the note, and marched between the guards. “Come on, Papa.” He said it in a tone that made it clear that in this case, the word “papa” was a synonym for “idiot.” Loaf growled and followed him out. Umbo was reasonably sure he had glared hard at the guards as he walked between them. But there was no thumping sound and no groaning and no shouting, so apparently Loaf was not succumbing to the temptation.

Downstairs they got their money. The “costs” were five times the interest, but it still didn’t make much of a dent in the total amount.

The cashier held up a scrap of paper with some scribbling on it. “By the way, the chief countsman informs me that word has been passed to all the other bankers in town. No one will accept your business or allow you inside. Thank you for banking at First People’s.”

The guards saw them to the door and then, outside, took up stations on either side and studiously looked up and down the street, as if they were there to watch for other thieves.

As they walked down the street, Umbo began to whistle.

“Shut up,” said Loaf.

Umbo whistled louder, and danced.

“Why wasn’t that plan going to work? When you come back and give your nasty little messages, why not an explanation?”

“Obviously,” said Umbo, “because somebody is watching my future self as I give the message, and so the message can’t be long and it can’t be very specific.”

“Or you just got cold feet and pretended to get a message,” said Loaf darkly.

“Think for a minute,” said Umbo. “The countsman was ready. They had already been spying on us. Nothing that we did by that point was going to work.”

“Then why didn’t you go back to when we were first sitting in our room in the inn and tell us that none of our plans was going to work?”

“Would you have believed a message like that?”

“No,” said Loaf. “But it would have saved time.”

“We don’t even know for sure if the . . . item . . . is still in the strongbox inside the safe,” said Umbo. “They could have moved it. If we had Rigg with us—”

“Look closely,” said Loaf. “We don’t have Rigg with us.”

“But if we—”

“But we don’t.”

“Yes you do,” said Rigg.

Umbo looked to his left and there was Rigg, walking right alongside them in broad daylight. “Silbom’s right ear!” said Umbo.

“Ananso-wok-wok,” said Loaf in his native language. Or at least that’s how it sounded to Umbo.

“Very subtle,” said Rigg. “No one will ever guess you’re surprised to see me.”

Rigg was right—they didn’t want to make a scene. But Umbo couldn’t help grinning to have Rigg with them again, apparently out of captivity.

“Why is it always Silbom’s right ear?” grumbled Loaf.

“Around here they say ‘Ram’s left elbow,’” said Rigg.

“In the army, it wasn’t anybody’s ear or anybody’s elbow,” said Loaf darkly.

“Are you free?” asked Umbo. “Or are we about to be overrun by soldiers chasing you?”

“There are a lot of secret passages in the house where I’m staying, and some of them lead outside. Nobody knows I’m gone, but I have to get back right away. I found your paths, though, and it looked to me like you were doing something very brave and unnecessary, like trying to get the one jewel back.”

“We have all the others,” said Loaf. “We wanted the complete set.”

“There’s probably some deep, magical reason why we need all nineteen jewels,” said Rigg. “But whatever it is, I haven’t found any reference in the library to nineteen jewels.”

“It was all we could think of to do to help you,” said Umbo. “We came here to rescue you, but we can’t even get near the house where you’re staying, and even finding out which house it was made people suspicious.”

“Why would they think you wanted to rescue me?” asked Rigg.

“They didn’t,” said Loaf. “They assumed we were privicks who wanted to come cut your hair or steal your clothes or some other nonsense. Apparently that sort of thing is completely out of fashion among the local citizens. In fact, from what we’ve gathered since we got here, you’re the most exciting person in the city.”

“In the world,” said Umbo.

“In the wallfold, anyway,” said Rigg. “Let me guess—a lot of them want to make me king, and a lot of others want me dead while my mother and sister are set up in the Tent of Light, and others don’t want royals to exist at all, others want royals to exist so they can be continuously imprisoned and abused, and most of the mothers want to find out what I’m wearing so they can dress their sons the same way.”

“That about covers it,” said Loaf.

“I guess you learned how to travel back in time,” said Rigg to Umbo.

“Obviously,” said Umbo, “or I couldn’t have given messages to you and me back in O.”

“Not obviously,” said Rigg. “Or haven’t you figured out that once it’s done, you don’t have to do it again?”

“Yes, we figured it out,” said Loaf, “but I hate it, because it doesn’t make any sense to me.”

“It makes sense to me,” said Rigg. “It’s like working a maze on paper. You draw your line up the wrong path. You go back to where you made the bad decision. You don’t have to keep going up the wrong path, you can do it differently.”

“Time isn’t a maze,” said Loaf.

“Yes it is,” said Rigg.

“What’s a maze?” asked Umbo. He hated it when everybody else knew something that he didn’t know.

“The point is, have you learned how to do what Umbo does?” asked Loaf.

“I nearly broke my brain trying to do it when I was a prisoner on the boat,” said Rigg. “Not a twitch or a shimmer or whatever I should have felt.”

“I can’t see paths either,” said Umbo.

“But that’s fine,” said Rigg, “because as long as we’re together, you can include me in your—whatever you do. Your shift in time. The question is, have you learned how to jump forward in time?”

“Everybody does that,” said Loaf. “One second at a time, we move one second into the future.”

“My sister can do it,” said Rigg.

“She sees the future?” asked Umbo.

“No, nothing that useful. She skips over bits of time. It makes her move very slowly, but while she’s doing it, she’s invisible.”

Loaf shook his head. “Why didn’t I just keep your money back in Leaky’s Landing and then let the rivermen toss you in the water?”

“She’s my sister,” said Rigg. “It makes sense that she can do things with time, too.”

“Nothing makes sense,” said Loaf.

“I’m not your brother,” said Umbo. “I’m not any kind of relative at all. And nobody else in my family can do anything.”

“Somehow Father knew what you could do,” said Rigg. “How did he know?”

“I told him,” said Umbo.

“Right, you just walked up to him and said, ‘By the way, I can slow down time.’”

“So he knew. He was . . . your father.”

“But he wasn’t,” said Rigg. “I’ve been getting to know my real father. Knosso Sissamik. He was a great man in his own way. A thinker, but also somebody who did things.”

“What I want to know,” said Loaf, “is why Umbo and I are even here. You don’t want the jewel, you can get in and out of your confinement whenever you want—”

“Not ‘whenever I want,’” said Rigg. “Today was my first chance. Ever. I did it because I found your paths and realized you were here. And now I’m not sure I can get back without being discovered.”

“Get back?” asked Loaf. “Why would you want to get back?”

“Because Mother and Param are still there.”

“Param?” asked Umbo.

“My sister,” said Rigg.

“They were doing fine without you,” said Loaf. “What do you owe to them?”

“What do you owe to Leaky?” asked Rigg defiantly.

“We’ve known each other most of our lives,” said Loaf. “You’ve known your sister for, what, twenty minutes?”

“Well if you don’t want to help me do the thing I need to do, then why are you here?”

“Tell us what you need us to do,” said Umbo, trying to defuse the argument.

“Things are coming to a head,” said Rigg. “I don’t know what it means, but they’re spying on us more and more. And there are meetings—the spies are meeting with more people. Different people.”

“Spies?” asked Loaf.

“I don’t know who they are, I only know their paths. They used to meet with members of the Council. Now they’re meeting more often with General Citizen.”

“Who?” asked Umbo.

“The officer who arrested us.”

Loaf came to a complete stop in the middle of the street. People behind him bumped into him, took a glance at his size and strength and angry demeanor, and apologized. “You still haven’t told us what you want us to do!” said Loaf.

“Param is afraid . . .”

“Still not an answer!” roared Loaf.

“People are looking at us,” said Umbo.

Loaf continued glaring fiercely at Rigg.

“I need to get out of the city and I need to take Param with me and then I’m going to the Wall.”

“I’ve been to the Wall,” said Loaf. “There’s nothing there.”

“I’m going through it,” said Rigg. “And if we can make it work, so are you.”

“No I’m not,” said Loaf.

“Fine,” said Rigg. “But I am. And I’m taking Param with me, because we’re the ones that will be hunted down wherever we might go inside this wallfold. But I can’t do it without Umbo—if he doesn’t go to the Wall with me, I don’t think I can get through.”

Umbo wasn’t sure he was happy about this. “Is it because you want me or because you need my ability to slow you down in time?”

Rigg rolled his eyes. “I’m the guy with the paths, you’re the guy with the ability to slow time for me. But it’s still me, and it’s still you.”

“So even if I can’t do everything you hope I can, you’d still want me with you?” asked Umbo. He hated how pathetic the question made him seem, but he wanted the answer.

“If you have an ability I desperately need, and you refuse to use it, then are you any kind of friend?” asked Rigg.

“I’m not refusing to—”

“Rigg, it’s such a pleasure to see you again,” said Loaf. “You’ve managed to pick quarrels with both of us now.”

“I’m not quarreling with anybody,” said Rigg, visibly calming himself down. “I’ve been trying desperately to survive day to day, and to learn how to survive year to year. I don’t want to align myself with any of the factions in the government. I don’t want to restore the Sessamid Empire, and I certainly don’t want to rule it. I want to get through the Wall so I can stay alive. And I want to bring my sister and mother with me.”

“So it’s all about what you want,” said Umbo.

“You asked me what you could do to help me!” said Rigg. “I’m telling you!”

“Well, to start with,” said Loaf, “you could get out of the middle of the street and stop attracting all this attention.”

“You’re the one who stopped here—” Rigg began, and then realized Loaf was joking. Or at least might be joking.

Rigg turned and walked away from them.

Umbo trotted after him. “Where are you going?”

“I’m getting out of the street,” said Rigg fiercely.

“Can I come with you?” asked Umbo.

“I hope you can,” said Rigg. “Because I need to talk to you, and I need your help.”

“Where are we going?” asked Umbo.

“To your lodgings,” said Rigg.

“Are you even going to ask me where we’re staying?” asked Umbo.

Rigg stopped and looked at him as if he were insane. “It’s me. The guy who sees paths. I know where you live.” Then he took off walking again, only this time Umbo realized that he was heading on the shortest route to their lodgings.

“What’s your sister like?” asked Umbo.

“Invisible,” said Rigg.

That was no answer. “Are you still mad?” asked Umbo.

“I’m scared,” said Rigg. “Total strangers want me dead.”

“If it’s any consolation,” said Loaf as he caught up with them, “for a minute there I saw their point.”

When they neared the inn, Loaf stopped them. “The bank has been watching us. They probably know where we live. What if they also know something about our connection with you? We did jump from a boat while in custody.”

“And Rigg is the only living prince of the royal house,” said Umbo.

“Nobody knows my face.”

“I think you told us about spies in the house,” said Loaf. “They know your face. Do you know their faces?”

“I know their paths,” said Rigg, “and they’re nowhere near here.”

“I’d feel safer going somewhere else.”

So they fell in behind Loaf as he made his way to a cheap little noodle bar. “Don’t order anything that claims to be meat,” said Loaf.

“You never warned me about that,” said Umbo.

“I didn’t think I had to, since you had two days of dysentery after ordering the lamb.”

“Are we sure it was the lamb?” asked Umbo.

“Eat it again and see,” said Loaf, with perhaps too much relish in his tone.

They sat at the bar and slurped their way through peppery broth-soaked short-noodles. Umbo didn’t have the lamb; he liked the radish-and-onion chicken broth better anyway.

“I’m not leaving without my sister,” said Rigg quietly, between slurps.

“That’s not our problem,” said Loaf. “We can’t get into your house anyway. We can’t get near your house.”

“I think General C. is getting ready to make a move,” said Rigg. “I only wish I knew whether he was in the group that wants me dead or the group that wants to make me . . . boss.”

“Does it matter?” asked Umbo. “You want to stay away from him either way.”

“But it’ll help to know whether they’re trying to get to me or my sister.”

“For all you know the whole thing is being orchestrated by your mother,” said Loaf.

“Everybody connects with everybody, eventually,” said Rigg. “So I can’t say it’s impossible. But I don’t think it’s likely. I think she just wants to be left alone.”

“And so she lives in that fancy house and meets with important people?” asked Loaf.

“She doesn’t meet with anybody.”

“They say that everybody who matters has some kind of connection with Flacommo’s house,” said Loaf. “They say that your mother is already boss in everything but name.”

“Trust me,” said Rigg. “From inside the house, it doesn’t look that way. She receives visitors, yes, but she’s never alone with them. She’s never alone with anybody except my sister.”

“So what?” asked Umbo. “I mean, so what either way? I thought you didn’t care about intrigues and plots and conspiracies. I thought you just wanted to get away.”

“I do,” said Rigg.

“So why not just go? Get your sister and your mother and get out of the house and go?”

“It’s not that simple,” said Rigg.

“I think it is,” said Umbo. “I think you like being . . . in the boss’s family. I think you like being important. I think you don’t really want to go anywhere.”

Rigg looked like he wanted to snap back a sharp answer, but restrained himself. “All right, yes, I like some things about being there. The food is . . . amazing.”

“And the famous and educated people?”

“I’ve met some interesting people, yes,” agreed Rigg.

“And access to the library? You said you spend a lot of time there.”

“The library is the closest thing I’ve found to being with Father. Like him, the library knows everything, even if I haven’t found a way to get it to tell me all that I want to know.”

“Well, we know stuff, too,” said Umbo. “Like for instance I know how to go back in time whenever I want. Going back a few days, I can get to the time I want within a few minutes. It’s harder when I’m going back more than a few months. I haven’t even tried to do a year. But still.”

Rigg looked genuinely impressed. “Was it hard? To learn to calibrate it like that?”

“Yes,” said Umbo and Loaf together.

“It was really annoying for a few months,” said Loaf.

“I can only find people when I know when they stayed in the same place—and I have to get to that place.”

“You have a better gift than mine, Umbo,” said Rigg, “and that’s the truth. But we both have better gifts than my sister. Hers is great when she wants to disappear, and when she’s doing it, she doesn’t age as fast as other people because she doesn’t actually live through most of the time when she’s . . . that way.

The countergirl wasn’t paying attention to them; nor were any of the other customers—but then, a good spy wouldn’t look like he was paying attention, would he? So they tried to be at least a little cryptic in the things they said.

“But she also moves so slowly,” said Rigg. “Like she’s half-frozen. And it’s dangerous. When people walk through her, it . . . damages her a little. When she walks through solid objects, it makes her dangerously sick.”

“Then she shouldn’t do that,” said Loaf.

“And she doesn’t,” said Rigg. “I’m just saying—her gift isn’t as useful as you’d think. But here’s the real question, Umbo. You’ve always been able to spread your gift to include me, even when we weren’t in physical contact. Does that only work with me? Or have you brought Loaf back in time with you?”

“It’s harder,” said Umbo. “Well, not harder, it just takes more concentration and makes me tireder.”

“So you’ve tried it with him?” asked Rigg.

“When we went back to steal one of the . . . items . . . from ourselves,” said Loaf, “he took me along. Yes, he can do it.”

“Steal from yourselves?” asked Rigg. “What would you do that for?”

“Ask Mister I’m-So-Funny,” said Loaf. “It never made sense to me.”

“Don’t pretend you didn’t enjoy it,” said Umbo to Loaf.

“We need to try something,” said Rigg. “When you put your whatever-it-is on me so I could see the people on the paths and go to their time, I went alone.”

“That’s because I didn’t know how to do it to myself yet,” said Umbo.

“So we need to see if you can put all three of us into that slowed-down time thing, and then see if I can drag all three of us back into a much earlier time. Not months, centuries ago.”

“Centuries? Like when we got the dagger?”

“Millennia,” said Rigg.

Loaf leaned over to Umbo. “That means thousands of—”

“I know what it means,” said Umbo. “Do you have a particular time in mind?”

“Yes,” said Rigg. “Eleven thousand, two hundred years ago.”

Umbo and Loaf both sat in silence, contemplating the implications of this.

“Before the calendar began,” said Loaf finally.

“Before humans existed on this planet,” said Rigg.

Umbo’s mind reeled. “Are you saying we’re not from here?”

“When we have more time,” said Rigg, “I have a lot to tell you—things I learned in the library, things I learned from the scholars. From Father Knosso’s research and from a guard named Ovilenko who was his apprentice for a while.”

“You’re trusting a guard?” asked Loaf.

“You don’t know him and I do, so don’t waste our time,” said Rigg. “I have to get back to Flacommo’s house, and soon, before somebody misses me. If they search the house and don’t find me, then when I do get back where will I say that I was? I came here to see if we could actually travel in time together.”

“So,” said Umbo, “let’s do it.”

Rigg started to stand up. Loaf immediately put a hand on his shoulder and pushed him back down into his seat. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Somewhere with privacy,” said Rigg.

“Do it right here,” said Loaf. “Sitting right here. When we travel in—when we go back—we don’t disappear in the present time, do we? We’re in both places at once, right?”

“Yes,” said Rigg. “Or that’s how it worked before, when Umbo was providing the power and I was the only one actually traveling.”

“Then pick the oldest path you can find here, and see if Umbo can get all three of us to see it at once.”

“But this place isn’t all that old—there won’t be stools,” said Rigg.

“But if our butts remain in this time,” said Loaf, “then we won’t fall into the swamp or whatever.”

Rigg nodded. “All right, Umbo. I’m going to concentrate on a particular path . . . I’ve got it. Slow me down—and yourself and Loaf too.” All three of them held on to their noodle bowls, as Rigg stared into the distance, and somewhat downward, apparently concentrating on a path.

Umbo had never tried to slow down two people besides himself. It took some real concentration on his part. And it felt as if Rigg was pulling him just as much as he pulled Loaf. Rigg was taking him farther back than Umbo had ever gone. Like the time Umbo’s father had set him up on a peddler’s horse and the beast had taken off with him for a few rods. Umbo almost lost the connection a few times, and could hardly hold on to Loaf at the same time. But after a while he was able to hold it all together.

He could no longer see the noodle bar—though he was still sitting down on something. There was no town at all, nor any building. Just a man poling a boat slowly along a bayou among tall reeds in the dusky light of evening.

The man and the boat were much lower than Umbo, as if Umbo were on the top of a hill instead of on a stool on the floor of a noodle bar. They must have raised the ground level of Aressa Sessamo very high above the original delta.

Rigg whispered, “Can you see him? The boat? The reeds, the water?”

The man might have heard him, for it was nearly silent in the marshland in mid-day. He looked up from the boat and saw them; they must have been quite a vision, a man and two teenage boys sitting in the air, holding bowls of noodles.

The man staggered in surprise, which overbalanced the boat and sent the man toppling backward into the water.

Umbo mentally let go of Rigg and Loaf, and eased himself back into the present. He felt dizzy. Mentally exhausted.

“A time before Aressa Sessamo even existed,” whispered Loaf.

“This isn’t the oldest city in the wallfold,” said Rigg. “And anyway, it was first built up about six miles from here. Floods have forced a lot of relocations over the years.”

“I feel sorry for the boatman,” said Umbo.

“He got a soaking—he’ll recover,” said Loaf.

“A vision of three men in the air, eating noodles,” said Rigg, and then chuckled. “What could the saints have possibly meant by that! Do you think somebody built a shrine there? The ‘Three Noodle Eaters.’” Rigg laughed a little louder. The bargirl glared at him.

“He was so far below us,” said Umbo.

“At the original level of the delta,” said Loaf.

“So the builders of the city brought all that dirt to build up such a high mound?” asked Rigg.

“They didn’t have to,” said Loaf. “The river brings down silt every year. You just start building up a higher island, and then after each flood season, you dredge out the silted-up channels so boats can pass, and what do you do with the silt? You pile it up, extend the edges of the island the city is built on. A few thousand years and you have a very large and fairly high island.”

“Which is why there can be so many tunnels and sewers under the city,” said Rigg, “even though we’re in the midst of the delta.”

Umbo looked up and saw something on the wall. He reached out and touched Rigg’s hand and then looked up again at a shelf high on the wall of the noodle bar. A statue of a man and two boys, holding noodle bowls.

Rigg murmured, “Ram’s left elbow.”

Loaf covered his face. “We were the origin of the Noodle-eaters.”

“I don’t know that story,” said Umbo.

“Why didn’t I recognize what was happening when the boatman looked at us?” asked Loaf.

“Because it hadn’t happened yet,” said Rigg. “I still don’t remember any such legend, but—it seems like whenever we do something that changes things in the past, there’s a new hero story.”

“The fertility of the land,” murmured Umbo, as the “memory” of the legend of the Noodle-eaters came to him. Just like the “memory” of the legend of the Wandering Saint had come to him at the shrine when he and Rigg were just setting out on their journey. “They symbolize a plentiful harvest, I remember now,” said Umbo.

“And it was us,” said Loaf. “How many of these legends were just . . . us!”

“If we’re not careful,” said Rigg, “all of them. But I had to know that we could do it.”

“We all three went together,” said Umbo. “Right?”

“It was flickery,” said Loaf. “At first I kept seeing the boatman and then not seeing him.”

“But the flickering had stopped by the time he saw us, right?” asked Umbo.

Loaf nodded.

“I want to go back to the time before the Wall existed,” said Rigg. “And then just walk on through. But if we’re in both times at once, what if the—influence, whatever it is, the repulsion from the Wall in our present time—what if we still feel it as we’re passing through?”

“Maybe it’ll be less,” said Umbo.

“I hope so,” said Rigg. “But maybe we’ll need my sister, too. So we won’t exist in any one moment or any one place for longer than a tiny fraction of a second.”

“Can she extend her . . . talent to other people?” asked Umbo.

“She had to be touching me, but yes, we’ve done it.”

“What do you need me for?” growled Loaf.

Rigg shook his head. “We don’t need you—to get through the Wall. But we’ll need your experience, and maybe your fighting ability, once we’re on the other side. When Father Knosso found a way through the Wall—drugged unconscious and drifting in a boat—some water creatures on the other side dragged him out of the boat and drowned him.”

“Ouch,” said Loaf. “I have no experience fighting murderous water creatures.”

“We’re not passing through where Father Knosso did,” said Rigg. “We don’t know what we’ll find. Umbo and my sister and I are really smart and important and powerful and all, but we’re also kind of small and weak and not particularly scary. You, on the other hand—you make grown men cry when you look at them angrily.”

Loaf gave a short bark of a laugh. “I think we have several messages from your future self, Umbo, to prove that we can get the crap beaten out of us.”

“Only when you’re seriously outnumbered,” said Umbo.

“Which might happen thirteen seconds after we get through to the other fold,” said Loaf.

“If it happens, it happens,” said Rigg. “But I know this—if we don’t go where nobody from this wallfold can follow us, then my life—and the lives of my mother and sister—aren’t worth a thing.”

“Can your mother do . . . anything?” asked Umbo.

“If she can, she hasn’t confided in me,” said Rigg.

“If we don’t like it in the fold next door,” said Loaf, “we can always go back.”

“You’ve been stationed at the Wall,” said Rigg. “Have you ever seen a . . . a person, or something like a person, beyond the Wall?”

“Not me personally,” said Loaf. “But there are stories.”

“Scary stories?” asked Umbo.

“Just stories,” said Loaf. “But yes, they all sound like the kind of thing that people like to make up. Like . . . ‘My friend saw a man beyond the Wall and he was lighting a fire. Then he poured water on the fire, putting it out completely, and stamped on the ashes, and pointed at my friend three times. Like a warning of some kind. The next day my friend’s house burned down.’”

“It always happens to a friend,” said Rigg.

“A friend of a friend,” said Umbo.

“But when you think about what we’ve done—you’ve done—”

“You were part of it,” said Umbo.

“Anything seems possible.”

“Do any of these stories include dangerous stuff? People in other wallfolds who eat babies or something?” asked Umbo.

“No,” said Loaf. “What would they do even if they were baby cannibals, though? Come to the Wall in order to show us their picnic? The Wall would bother them as much as it bothers us. And it affects us for a long way before we’re even close to it. It steers people away. You have to really fight the thing to get within a mile or two of the center of it.”

“How do you know when you’re within a mile of it?” asked Rigg.

“There’s a shimmering in the air,” said Loaf. “Like heat waves, only more sharply defined and kind of sparky. You have to look close and steady for a while, but you can see it.”

“So . . . I think it’s worth a try,” said Rigg. “And I need all of us.”

“I had a hard time with the two of you,” said Umbo. “Add in your mother and sister—”

“Not to mention your extremely trustworthy guard,” said Loaf.

“And then put a whole army right behind us, with arrows and really loud and nasty insults,” said Rigg. “I know. It’ll be hard. It was hard for me, too—not that I have any power to drag you along with me, that’s all you, Umbo—but I could feel the inertia, like dead weight. It was harder for me to concentrate, to stay with the path I was following. And it might be even harder when I’m walking at the same time.”

“I didn’t even think of that,” said Umbo.

“But you can practice, right?” said Rigg. “Between now and the escape.”

“How? Just . . . pick arbitrary strangers and take them back in time?”

“Why not?” asked Rigg. “They won’t know who’s doing it, or even what’s happening. If they try to tell anybody, they’ll just get branded as crazy.”

“That’s right,” said Umbo, “and that’s not a nice thing to do.”

“So don’t practice then,” said Rigg.

“And I could only take them back a few days or weeks, not like what we just did.”

“More noodles?” The bargirl was standing there, waiting for an answer. Umbo hadn’t noticed her walk up. From the look on Rigg’s and Loaf’s faces, they hadn’t either. So much for vigilance.

“No,” said Loaf.

“Then please give my other customers a place to sit,” she said.

Umbo looked and saw a line out the door.

“Sorry,” said Rigg. “We didn’t notice.”

“You looked like you were plotting to overthrow the Council,” said the bargirl with a smile.

“Well, we weren’t, you know,” said Umbo.

“She was joking,” said Loaf.

“Maybe,” whispered Rigg.

They filed out of the place, sidling past the glaring customers who had waited so long in line.

“I’ve got to get back,” said Rigg, once they were out on the street.

“I still don’t know what we’re waiting for,” said Loaf. “Go back, get your sister and your mother and let’s get out of Aressa Sessamo before there’s any emergency or anyone chasing us.”

Rigg looked embarrassed. “I can’t.”

“Why not?” said Loaf.

“Because they won’t come,” said Rigg. “Not until there’s actual danger instead of just my warnings.”

“They don’t trust you yet,” said Loaf.

“No, I think they trust me,” said Rigg. “In the sense that they know I’m not a traitor or anything. They just don’t think of me as somebody who can . . . be in charge or anything.”

“Oh,” said Loaf. “They don’t respect you yet.”

“The only reason we let you be in charge was because you were the one with the money,” said Umbo. “So I guess we don’t respect you either.”

“Thanks so much,” said Rigg.

“Umbo has a point,” said Loaf. “We got into the habit of acting as if you were in charge of everything—it was your money, and your father’s will, and all that, so it made sense.”

“Well, it’s me who has to escape from this wallfold.”

“My point exactly,” said Loaf. “What if Umbo and I stay on this side of the wallfold, and he just sort of extends his power over you from a distance as you pass through?”

“Can you do it from that far away?” asked Rigg.

“I’ve never tried a mile,” said Umbo. “Or even half that.”

“I don’t think I’m in charge of you, or that I have a right to decide for you,” said Rigg. “I hope you come because you’re my only friends in the world and I’m scared of what’s on the other side. Father Knosso died after he got through.”

“So you want us to come with you and die along with you?”

“I want to get through with the best chance of survival. If I leave you two behind, and General C. or whoever is chasing me is right behind us, do you think they’ll give you a free pass for helping the royals escape?”

“It was just a thought,” said Loaf. “Of course we’re coming with you. I just wanted to make sure you knew that you didn’t have the right to order us or command us or even expect us to take such a risk for you.”

“I know I don’t,” said Rigg. “But I’d take those risks for you.”

“Would you?” asked Loaf. “It’s never been put to the test.”

Rigg might have been angry, or he might have been sad—Umbo couldn’t tell by looking at his face. Finally he spoke. “I hope when such a test comes—if it comes—that I’ll prove to be as loyal to you as you’ve been to me.”

“I hope so too,” said Loaf. “But I’ve been in a lot of fights and battles, and you never know who’s going to stand with you and who’s going to cut and run, not till the crisis comes. We followed you here when we didn’t have to. To try and get your property back to you. To help you escape from custody and save your life, if they were planning to kill you.”

“Which they are.”

“We’ve proven we’ll walk back into the lion’s den for your sake. I’d like to think you’d do the same for us.”

Umbo really hated this conversation. “Of course he will,” he said to Loaf.

“When fear takes over, there’s no ‘of course’ about it,” said Loaf. “Nobody knows themselves what they’re going to do, until they either do it or not, in the moment. So far you’ve done a terrific job of acting your parts when the danger was social. But when it’s a blade or a shaft, when the danger is visible and physical and immediate, what will you do?”

“I don’t know,” said Rigg. “I know what I intend to do. But as you said—I can’t prove it, not even to myself.”

“Good,” said Loaf. “As long as you understand that, then I’m willing to give it a try.”

“What if I had sworn that I’d never, never fail you.”

“Then I’d still stand beside you—but I wouldn’t trust you to do the same for me. Now I think there’s a chance, because you’re not a complete idiot.”

“Well, now you’ve really hurt me,” said Rigg. “Father always taught me to complete any task I started.”

They were nearing the richer part of town, where the crowds thinned out and wore better clothes and there were occasional carriages and horses.

“We don’t like going farther than this,” said Umbo. “We don’t want the guards to get too familiar with our faces.”

“I understand,” said Rigg.

“How are you getting through?” asked Umbo. “Do you have a change of clothes?”

“These will do,” said Rigg.

Umbo looked at him again and realized that his clothing was quite nondescript. It wasn’t showy at all, so it hadn’t made Rigg stand out in the crowds of poor and working-class people, especially because he had walked and talked like a privick kid. Like Umbo.

But now, near the rich part of town, Rigg was standing differently. Taller. Still relaxed, but—more in charge of himself. Filled with authority and expectation. Fearless. Like he belonged there. And when he stood that way, his neck a little higher, his movements more calm and restricted and yet more relaxed, too, his clothing looked richer. Still quiet, still modest, but now you could see how every stitch was perfect, how the clothes looked like they’d been made for him, which they almost certainly were.

Umbo wasn’t sure which gift was more useful—Rigg’s ability as a pathfinder, or his ability to pass for whatever social class he wanted to be part of.

“If I can get them to leave early, I’ll come to you, wherever you are,” said Rigg. “But if everything goes crazy, if they try to kill us or there’s a riot or whatever happens, then come to this spot. There, in that little park, up in that ledge in the wall.”

“What ledge?” asked Umbo.

“Come here, I’ll show you.”

Umbo and Loaf followed Rigg across the street and into the copse of trees and shrubbery and flowers. The walls of two buildings formed the borders of the park, and where they met, there was a niche, as if someone had meant to put a statue there but never got around to it.

“Right up here, see?” said Rigg, and he bounded up into the niche. It was just tall enough for him.

“I won’t fit there,” said Loaf.

“Oh, you will,” said Rigg. “There’s more room than you think.”

“I can see that your head nearly reaches the top of the niche,” said Loaf.

“That’s right,” said Rigg, “but I’ve been growing. I’m not that much shorter than you.”

Umbo by now was leaping up to join Rigg, who caught him and kept him from falling backward.

“There’s no room for me and someone else, anyway,” said Loaf.

“Well, not right now there’s not,” said Rigg.

And then he did something with his foot—kicked something backward with his heel—and all of a sudden Umbo found himself whirling to the left and then he was in total darkness.

“What happened!” he said.

“It’s the end of one of the unused secret passages,” said Rigg. “It doesn’t actually connect with Flacommo’s house, it leads to the library. But from the library there are three places in the water drainage system that connect up with the house.”

“Get me back into the light.”

Another kicking sound, and then they whirled again, back the other way, and they were in the dazzling light. Loaf was glaring up at them from the ground. “That was subtle,” he said testily.

“Nobody was watching us,” said Rigg.

“Or so you think,” said Loaf.

“Loaf, please believe me—I know,” said Rigg. “I know where every current path within sight of this place is. I’ve been working, too, you know—trying to get more and more control over what I do. And there’s nobody watching this spot. The passage hasn’t been used in years. I’m just telling you that if there’s an emergency, this is where I’ll bring Param and Mother, and we’ll wait for you there, in the darkness. For a few hours, anyway—I’ll know if you’re coming or not, and if not, then we’ll find our own way out of town.”

“So our job,” said Loaf, “is to figure out how to get you from here and on out of town.”

“I don’t know that it’s your job,” said Rigg, “but it sure can’t be mine, because after this excursion, I’m not leaving the house again till I’m leaving it for good.”

“Maybe we should all dress as girls,” said Umbo.

They stared at him.

“They’ll be looking for you and Param. One boy, one girl. So what will they make of three girls and no boy? You and I don’t have beards, Rigg, we can bring it off.”

“No,” said Loaf. “You’ve never been in a city riot. Girls are not safe, not even with a big strong hero like me to protect them. But the idea’s a good one. Your sister and mother should dress as boys your age.”

“They won’t like that,” said Rigg.

“Oh, well, then, if they don’t like the way we’re going to try to save their lives and get them out of the city . . .”

“I’ll try to get them to do it,” said Rigg. “I can’t make them do anything.”

“And remember that they have to bind their breasts. If your sister’s old enough to have any—don’t get mad, I don’t know, I’m just telling you—we can’t have any part of them looking feminine. You understand?”

“Yes,” said Rigg. “As I said, I’ll try. I really will. But I can’t promise what’s not under my control.”

“Just for my information,” said Loaf, “what is under your control?”

“Silbom’s right ear,” said Rigg.

Then he gave Umbo a nudge, making him lose his balance and jump from the niche. When he recovered himself and turned around, Rigg was gone.

“Well, wasn’t that interesting,” said Loaf.

“Yes,” said Umbo.

“Going through the Wall. The insanest plan I ever heard.”

“It might work,” said Umbo.

“And it might leave us as complete madmen—at least until the people chasing us butcher us like goats.”

“Well, if somebody’s going to butcher me like a goat,” said Umbo, “I certainly hope I’m already insane when they do it.”