Pain Stones (Coalescence Book 2) Read online

  “That’s as good of a test as any I’ve ever heard of, for a fighting force. Tell them that if they do it, they can get great powers, but it might leave them crippled or dead. What are the odds on that? For real, I mean?”

  Thinking about that, he tilted his head. They were going to have Timon and Taman there, as far as he knew, so the actual danger would be fairly small. If it started to go wrong, then one of them would simply step in and either stop, or help fix things.

  “Better than ninety-five percent chance of success. Even if the first efforts fail, it will probably be repaired before the end of the day. We’ll need to check each of the people coming into the program, and they won’t be made immortal or anything, unless you specifically want to reward someone.” It wouldn’t make sense to make everyone into a person that would have to be dealt with in a thousand years or more. Not for him, anyway.

  The Ancient, her blue eyes twinkling a bit, leaned toward her own hand.

  “Excellent, Baker. I’ll have people in position there then. How many?”

  He didn't really know, so made up a number on the spot.

  “Fifteen. They might not all have the work done the first day, so be ready for us to keep them for a bit. I don’t have any other training worked out for them, so some kind of program would be a good idea. I’ll leave that to you? I can help, a bit, if you need me to, but really, I have some things to keep up on, if I can.” He didn't want to be rude, but the truth was that there was a war he needed to be seeing to.

  At least as far as collecting information went.

  So far that had been due to happenstance when it actually happened. In a few cases messages had come in that had taken him to locations where the bad guys were clearly working from, for instance. That they didn't realize they should try to kill him each time left him feeling slightly amazed. Really, that seemed to be down to the simple fact that he’d never directly betrayed them, he thought.

  Yes, a few of the packages were examined, or the letters read, but they got where they were supposed to be going in a timely fashion and so far there had been no negative repercussions from it. Mainly thanks to the fact that no one sending in official data had trusted him with anything that was all that important. What they’d mainly gotten was…

  Well, a lot of raw data on worlds that were more or less aligned with them. The good people that didn’t want everything destroyed. The others were handling that part. His task was just in getting the messages around. It worked, but for some reason he’d figured that being the cross world spy would have been more glamourous, somehow. At least that it would involve more sneaking and disguises. So far he’d just walked up to people and handed them things. Knocking on their doors, and on occasion, accepting payments.

  Even those were mainly taken in by other people. May and Jill, in Zack the Human Line Walker’s world. Some others as well, however. Demon Zack had some people doing things that had been filtered through him, for instance. A lot of those were actual work. Most of what he did really was, day to day. Real packages that people wanted carried around, from one reality to another.

  Blinking, he realized that the person in his hand was speaking. It was rude to go off in his own thoughts like that. Easier to do now though, than it had been before. Mainly thanks to the fact that when he focused on anything, it tended to consume him.

  All the time in the void had assured that.

  “Understood, Baker. I can handle that portion of things. Good work, setting this up. Tim Baker called me about the basic idea a few weeks ago, but…” She sighed then and shook her head, looking rueful about the whole thing. “I have programming that makes it too hard for me to work with men that are attractive. It was a stupid thing to put in, but the people that did the design work on me weren’t thinking about my comfort when they did it. I was a test model. Thankfully one that didn’t work out. I mean, the original goal was to make ten thousand of me, for sale. To fight in wars. I can’t imagine that would have allowed the world to survive.” She shook her head a bit, then went on, seeming happier. It was a sudden and probably fake, shift. “Still, people are starting to catch on, lately. You and that Canton kid are making things work pretty well. Even knowing that you’re both incredible looking under the masks you put on, I can get around the old Rhetistics. As long as you both keep that up…”

  He nodded. Not that he understood what a Rhetistic was. The point being made was clear. He needed to keep up his act with the Ancient, when in her presence. At least if she were going to work with him efficiently.

  “Not a problem. The new river is going up here at noon, our time? You should get people in to see that. It will be much like the old river, but you know, if we don’t celebrate things, then life gets stale and boring.”

  There was as soft snort from the lady, who was a bit golden in color, he noticed. Like his friend Scott was, instead of just being a tan color. It was less obvious with Alice, however.

  “Half of me wants to put the whole Fleet on lockdown and to torture them all until they tell me who the other traitors are. You’re recommending I give them extra treats and goodies? Well…” She nodded. “Right. We can do that as well. It might make a few people think twice about attempting to kill my officers, if nothing else. Not that we didn’t get a good start on that already. Nice work there, by the way.”

  She meant the killing portion of things. There was no need to talk about it out loud, thankfully. He didn’t feel bad enough about it to come off as being sane if they did. What he had been feeling, even the depression over it, was mainly gone already.

  On the good side he didn’t have to walk around as if he had a cloud over his head for the next year or longer.

  “I’ll see you, or whoever you send, tomorrow, then. Let me… I’ll see if I can get a transport hut set up out here? Um… If I can, it will be under the location name… Black Tower. I don’t want my name on things like that, if I can help it.”

  That was because it seemed pretentious, not anything else. The woman nodded, as if she actually got his reasoning.

  “Noted. See you then.” The line went black, which meant a small pause of about a second before the blue glowing sigils came back into being.

  Then he triggered the device again, as fast as his fingers would make it work. There were more people to be in touch with, after all.

  The first was Dareg Canton. They didn’t really know each other well, but they had a few things in common. For instance, neither of them needed to sleep. That meant the man would be awake, if he were in range at all. He was another line walker, so could be off in other worlds. The thing there was that Willum was the one who did most of the work that way, so far. Dareg tended to spend most of his time at school, of late. That was in Printer, on the eastern coast. Which, given it was only about one-thirty in the morning, meant he probably wasn’t in classes there. It was hours ahead of Capital time, but still the middle of the night.

  The voice that came was hushed.

  “Dare here.” The face was good looking of course, having a smoothness that real people generally didn’t. The eyes were a little less dramatic than what Willum had going on, not being outlined in black constantly. Then, he still had his disguise on, which got him to grin.

  He whispered as well. After all, there was a reason that Dareg had done that. Probably, given the plain wood and focus stone backdrop behind him, and the time space, due to the fact that whoever he was sharing his living space with was sleeping.

  “It’s Will Baker. I need a transport hut for my new place, if that’s possible? Probably some kind of craft as well… I don’t know how to get one of those yet. Um… Count Thomson offered to teach me how to drive or fly one though, if you have any ideas?”

  There was a pause. It wasn’t a long thing, but several different ideas were clearly being processed as he waited. A few seconds later the man grinned.

  “Got it. I can have something there for you in… Call it six hours? I think that Eva has a copy of everything you need and is clo
se enough to get there. It may not take that long, depending where you are?”

  That got him to describe the tower, which had Dareg Canton nodding.

  “I see. Let’s call that… Two hours then? You might want to go and wait for her out front. Um… She… You’ve met Eve, so you’ll recognize her. This is Eva. Um… One of my daughters.” There was no particular weight on the words, but even Will had heard that story.

  How the mighty, and possibly insane, Wizard Dare had built two girls out of magic. Each of them had a hundred or more bodies, and were lovely to behold. They were also the main military force of Mars, and the few people that had spoken about it to him had figured that place to be one of the hardest to take in known space, thanks to that. The girls were basically shields, couldn’t be destroyed functionally speaking and were both stronger and faster than all but the most altered of human beings.

  “I look forward to meeting her. Please tell her that I’ll be out front and that she can get in touch with me directly, if she needs to? Not that it will be hard to find me. There’s only the one seventy-plus foot tall tower out here, after all.”

  That got a nod. Then a bit more whispering.

  “We should talk more, soon? I’d do more now, but fear that I’ll wake poor Charles. My roommate. Let me see about setting this all up for you… I have some time off in… Two days? We should meet up then.”

  Willum smiled. Not because they were so close that making plans made sense, but that his cousin was actually trying to be… well, family. It was a thing that he hadn’t really seen from the others so far. Part of that was due to him being away so often, of course.

  “That sounds wonderful. Please give my regards to Charles, when he wakes. Will he be coming as well? I actually have room for people here now.”

  They decided to ask the boy if he wanted to attend, since hanging out with Dare’s strange relatives might not exactly thrill the boy. At least that was how Willum was taking what was said. It was done a lot more politely than that, of course. Very properly, in fact.

  He realized that when he went to the front stoop, outside, and then caused a light to shine from the tower behind him. It was like daylight. That was, in part, to make him easy to see, when the delivery came.

  It was about ten in the morning, up on Harmony, which he knew thanks to a special sigil on his handheld. It let him see the time almost everywhere. It took him a minute to find the right sigil, but he called up his Aunt Tiera first. After all, she was the Queen of that place, so not inviting her was probably a poor choice.

  “Go.” She sounded annoyed and more than a little bit like she wanted to hit someone.

  Other than that, she looked fine. About eighteen or so, but so lovely that part of him wanted to throw away incest taboos and have sex with her anyway. Which was gross of him, but honestly there, deep inside. He buried that before speaking. After all, no one wanted to be the gross relative.

  “Aunt Tiera! I made a new river for the Capital here, as you assigned me to do. It’s going up at noon our time here. I also have a home here now, outside the city. I should be in the transport system under Black Tower, before then. If you could get here for that at about nine-thirty or so? I have to show up early, and give a speech. On… I also need a musician. Any recommendations?”

  The woman actually lit up then.

  “Marco Sorvee? He and his band are all the rage up here right now. A relative of ours, if a distant one. Your second cousin, I think? I’d love to come, especially if I can have point to point transportation like that. Make it too easy and I’ll take your place there over as my vacation home.”

  Willum just nodded at the idea.

  “If you like it, then you’re welcome to do that. Actually, given my schedule that’s probably… A very good idea. Yes. That will give me an excuse to put in a wall and maybe a pond or two. Now, Marco Sorvee? I’ve heard the name. I don’t suppose you could call in a recommendation for me?”

  That got a raspberry blown his way from the otherwise dignified seeming woman.

  “Nope? Believe it or not, I don’t generally chat with… Really, anyone that would be fun. As it stands right now, I need to… Go and talk about sewage treatment. With my father. Oh, is he invited as well? I don’t know if…” She seemed embarrassed suddenly. As if Will didn’t know Douglas Baker.

  The man had actually come to the last IPB camp out himself, and had even learned some English, so that he could communicate with everyone.

  “I’ll call him up next. Grandmother Baker as well.”

  “Good. We’d never hear the end of it if you didn’t at least get in touch with them. There are some others…”

  He nodded.

  “Up to… Call it ten people? We’re having some folks in from the IPB, other worlds as well. Avery Rome is coming with some friends from her place.”

  “Oh? That’s exciting then! I’ll set things up here.”

  The line broke then, since that was how the rude people in space did things. Just getting off the line, as if it didn’t matter how people felt about you when you left them.

  The next several calls went well enough, since everyone he needed was awake at the moment. That was due to them being on the Moon, or Mars, mainly. He needed to at least take a shot of getting Marco Sorvee in as well, if he could. The issue there was that he’d never met the man at all.

  Really, other than in passing, he’d never even heard of him at all. The man was clearly famous, but before leaving Pine Creek, Willum hadn’t heard a lot of music that wasn’t being played by someone he’d known all his life.

  So, as a familiar girl walked up, jogging a bit, dressed in black trousers and a matching tunic, her black hair hitting around her collar, the musician in his hand showed up. The fellow blinked at him, but then nodded and smiled.

  “Hello? This is Marco.” He sounded pleasant enough.

  Willum still had his disguise on, but was dealing with a man who lived in Austra. His matching hair and eyes probably seemed normal, given that.

  “Hello! I’m Willum Baker. We’re hanging the new river here in the Noram Capital at noon today, and I need someone to play some music, to show how the new system works? It will put the music out from the water itself, all the way around the city. You were recommended to me for it?”

  The man smiled, then looked off to the side. It was kind of clear that he was having to fight an eye roll.

  “Oh? By whom? If it’s all right to ask, I mean?”

  “Queen Tiera? Of Harmony. It’s horribly short notice, but I’ll pay you… You take gold, don’t you?” He could get some of that. Even if it meant going to another world for the coin. The thing there was that he didn’t think they used it in Austra. They had a different currency there. He hadn’t been there a lot, so it was hard to know for certain.

  “Certainly. We… Well, it is very short notice. Call it a hundred gold?” The tone spoke of haggling and starting high.

  The thing there was that it really was short notice. That was more coin than five good farms would make in a year though. Part of Willum wanted to blanch at the idea.

  “Fifty gold, but I’ll get you here in time for it? It really is a tight time frame. We should have a transport hut up though, if you have access to one there?” He glanced up at the attractive lady standing in front of him. She really did look like Eve Benson. Like Tiera as well, since they were the same people, if from different realities.

  She nodded though, holding up a small tile.

  “I can put this up now. Just here, to the side of the door? Or away a bit, so that people you don’t know will have to walk further to get inside?”

  He shook his head then, but smiled.

  “Here works for me, actually. Everyone coming in will be a friend, I think. They might not know that yet, but they will… Oh, yes… They will…” He narrowed his eyes, making himself seem insane for a moment. The man in his hand laughed.

  It sounded actually happy.

  “A Baker relation with a sense of hu
mor? That’s new then! Nice people, but they tend to be a bit… Serious, really. Almost all the time. I suppose that means you aren’t related to them?”

  He got what that meant and even why the man would be asking. Willum was offering gold, which meant he was wealthy enough to at least pretend to that kind of thing. The Baker family was powerful, being incredibly wealthy and all that. Half of the world, including Austra, was secretly led by them.

  The thing there was that they all had a certain high level of good looks. Even those that hadn’t had any magical work done on them tended toward that. Countess Thomson was a good example there. She was fine, but had been born that way. Delicate and lovely on a level that few would be able to match. Tiera could and Eva, but short of magic or a lot of makeup being used it was a rare enough thing.

  “Ah.” Willum reached up and tapped near his throat. The disguise amulet was inside of his velvet shirt, but it was the intent that was needed. He didn’t really have to move at all to make it happen even. That was just so the other man would understand what was going on.

  “I was just on with Alice Orange of Space Fleet. She doesn’t like attractive men. So if you ever deal with her, make sure you disguise that in yourself.”

  The other man wasn’t that good looking, but he was better than average by enough that it might just make a difference to the lady in question. There was a smile then and a nod.

  “So, eighty gold and transportation there? I do have a hut here. It’s not listed, but connects to the main hub. Dareg Canton gave it to me. Have you met him?”

  “I have. He won’t be attending, since he has school in the morning. He should be by here in two days, if you want to visit? You and your band? There was mention of that. I don’t know if you want to bring them in for this or not. They’re all welcome to stay with me, of course.”

  The man went a bit wide eyed then.

  “Really? We can all come this time? Hmm… I don’t suppose we could bring in my bass player’s younger sister as well? Otherwise I’ll have her sulking at me for the next two months about how we never take her anyplace. Why she hangs around here at all… Well, I honestly don’t know.”