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___Portunista stepped into a scene from the fabric of dreams.
___Here was the laboratory, with tables and books and shelves and equipment, testament to the will and the labor of Man. Here there was light, bound by artifice magical and mundane.
___There, within one arcing span of wall, was life abundant, the verdant trees and the flowering fruits of a tropical forest half a world away—a forest she recognized. Its light shone living and beautiful: starry gleaming and crimson-violet clouds.
___The laboratory hummed of the settled and antiseptic. Through the breach came all the noise of a living world, poised on the edge between sleeping and waking.
___Jian stood, bridging the gap, feeding a meat to the bird.
___The fair man turned his head to them, and put his finger to his lips.
___“She’s a little skitterish,” Jian explained, softly with an even tone. “But don’t be whispering, either; it sounds like hissing to her.” Even the sibilants in that sentence were making the avian edgy. Jian turned back to the animal, twice his size though still quite young, trilling lowly to her. A stack of meat was lying at his feet.
___“Where…how…?” Portunista had too many questions.
___“The meat was in a supply room. I’ll show you in a minute.”
___One snip…A corner of Portunista’s mind kept on replaying this creature’s blindingly quick attacks, while her feet were taking her slowly into the room at an angle. The thing would only need one snip. Those haunches couldn’t possibly be as fresh as Jian himself…
___“With your permission, Midama, I think I’ll stay right here.” Gaekwar took a position near the gap; he would help keep anyone else from disrupting the hazardous balance that Jian had somehow attained.
___The aasvogel could easily dart into the laboratory at any moment—and Portunista couldn’t possibly make it to the outer landing, if the avian now attacked. Nor was there anywhere for her to feasibly hide in the room.
___She might be able to kill it—but not soon enough to save Jian, if it chose him as its first target. The blind-minded man was standing right next to the thing…!
___“Jian,” she carefully said—and the avian’s black inhuman eyes locked onto her instantly, instinctively gauging vectors… “Jian, you must step away from the bird. That animal isn’t a pet.”
___Jian clucked softly, drawing the creature’s attention back to himself. “Of course she isn’t a pet,” he murmured. “I would be insulting her, to treat her like that! She is more like…a lover, I think. I am learning from her; she is learning from me; and so we are communicating.” He was silent a moment. “I want the love we share to grow.”
___“Jian!” Portunista grated. “She…IT…is a killer…bird! It doesn’t love anyone!”
___The impossible man looked back at her a moment, with that quiet smile. “Surely you aren’t jealous of a killer bird, milady.”
___Portunista briefly considered blowing the innards out of the animal, or screeching some denial that would probably make it react into spearing her “husband” like a quail on a stick!—but, either of those responses might be interpreted as her being jealous of a killer bird.
___So, she forced herself to calm.
___“No,” she replied, reasonably and calmly. “I am not jealous of the bird.”
___“That’s because, unlike the bird, Portunista doesn’t give a hoot!” The maga whipped her head around to impale the ‘cowherd’ with a glare; but the lanky man continued to grin, as he lazily leaned against the edge of the wall-gap—carefully aiming his disker at the aasvogel.
___“Good,” said Jian. “Because, to be honest, I think she may be jealous of you.” He softly laughed. The avian shifted on its branch, edging closer to Jian; but its eyes were locked back onto Portunista.
___The maga decided this conversation was only allowing the men to enjoy the situation at her expense. If the fool insisted on putting himself into this position, then he deserved to die. She would just have to…
___…trust him.
___Years later, contemplating her thoughts of that night, she would write:
___“Behind me lay a path, which I could follow with my mind, clearly enough; but it led beneath me up to a veil. Did it stop behind the veil? Or did it continue on?
___“It had continued on before. But, did that guarantee that it still would continue?
___“Perhaps Jian was insane. Perhaps he was making a sentimental mistake. The path behind me told me that neither of these was likely true; but, there were many parts of that path I still didn’t understand.
___“Yet Jian wasn’t merely a thing to be analyzed. Jian was a person. Perhaps he could see beyond the veil, and wasn’t merely imagining that he saw.
___“Trusting what I could see was very important; and one of the things I could see, was that he usually knew what he was doing. But…
___“Trusting my analysis, could carry me to the veil, and it could give me some idea of what should lie beyond it.
___“But trusting Jian, personally…did I dare do that?
___“I wish I could say I chose to step through the veil.
___“I decided instead, that I was too tired to care.
___“I told myself I didn’t care, and wouldn’t care if he died.
___“I lied to myself—to avoid the risk of a personal trust.”
___“Fine, Jian, whatever,” Portunista sighed. “She can be as jealous of me as she wants, so long as she stays over there.”
___And so she turned away from Jian.
___It didn’t help her to feel any better. Instead of exhausting herself with worry…she only felt exhausted.
___She began to examine the room more directly—how had Jian done this at all?
___The tablemap quickly caught her attention.
___“Jian,” she asked, “why is that little ball on the table?”
___“It activates the tesser-generator built into this wall,” he answered. “I thought it was meant to move the map around, by rolling the ball in its niche. Except, of course, there were other sigils for doing that. Then, after you left, I noticed the niche was beveled down to halfway below the middle of the ball. There didn’t seem to be any point to that, except to allow some fingers room for taking out the ball. So, I took it out.”
___Portunista couldn’t resist looking up, to see how things were going over at the portal. Jian was holding out an especially heavy haunch; the avian nicked its flesh and bone—the length of a forearm or so from Jian’s own flesh.
___The maga’s stomach clenched; she looked away.
___“So, when you removed the ball…” she prompted.
___“The sound of the table changed. You probably noticed already.” Actually, she hadn’t, but neither could she remember what kind of semi-audible hum it had made before. “That hinted that maybe the ball would be useful somewhere else than in its niche. There weren’t any other obvious holes; so I touched it to the map. Poom,” he softly exclaimed. “The wall disappeared, and rain began to blow in the room—from a shower out at sea. You saw the water on the floor, right?”
___“The giant killer bird eating out of your hand had first attention, I’m afraid.”
___“Awwwww,” Gaekwar drawled. “She does give a hoot…”
___Portunista pointed this time, along with her glare. Her subcommander didn’t stop grinning, but at least he did stop talking.
___“The map immediately scrolled to put the ball at the center. Using the arrows, not the brackets, moves the portal laterally; the ball stays in the center. Pick up the ball to close the portal. Nice design.”
___Portunista wondered whether closing the portal right that moment would slice the bird in half. But, then it would also slice him…
___“Jian,” she tried to achieve a tone of pleasant casualness, “step into the room for a moment, hm?”
___And she flashed what she hoped was an innocent smile.
___Jian looked only suspicious and amused.
___Then he bent for the largest remaining ham. “Here, Milady,” he murmured to the animal. “Watch the ham…watch it…” He waved it back and forth between them; the aasvogel tracked the meat, tensing itself to strike. Portunista felt her nose twist with a burst of…jealousy?! Was she jealous of the bird? So what if Jian was calling it by her name…?—her name?! She didn’t want that name from him! Blast its eyes, the bird was a something, not a someone anyway!
___Jian threw the ham far into the trees; the adolescent aasvogel leapt in chase, twisting through the branches, nabbing it before the haunch had bounced three times. “Well done, Milady!” Jian called out. The avian scree’ed in their direction twice, shortly. At being complimented? In farewell?
___Probably telling its siblings and cousins about free food nearby, thought Portunista sourly…
___Jian had already stepped back over the threshold, so she plucked the ball off the map. The portal snapped from existence, leaving the curved stone wall.
___Jian sighed and nodded, toward the vanished portal. Then he walked to the map.
___“I don’t suppose that anyone has a towel, or something?” he asked, keeping his hands away from anything. “I’d rather not have my new green shirt to be smelling like ‘dead pig’. Just in case I see Milady again.” He winked at Gaekwar; the lanky subcommander shook his head, and chuckled.
___“No, I do not have a towel,” said Portunista.
___“Not a problem,” he shrugged. “I think I saw some goods like that, in Qarfax’s storeroom.”
___“Which would be, where…?”
___“See the short blue spike on the map?” Despite her temper, Portunista found herself looking for it with a rising sense of discovery. There it was, dead center; the colored spike had risen up from the table after she’d lifted the ball away. “Now, that spike represents a location Qarfax taught this table to learn—specifically, the aasvogel nesting grounds. Now try pulling out the map-table’s focus.” He waited patiently, prudently keeping his hands away from anything.
___With another sigh, though partly from her growing pleasure at finding out something useful and important, she set the sigilball in its niche—the hum did shift, just as Jian had said—and did as he had suggested.
___Hours ago, not long after noon, she had discovered most of the map controls; the excitement she had felt at that time was now returning, increased with the expectation of accomplishment.
___When she had pulled the focus out, farther than she had tested before, a second blue spike appeared, amidst a mountain range, hundreds of kilopaces north and west of the Tower. She easily focused the map on that.
___Restraining, with some difficulty, a shiver and a smile, Portunista carefully pulled the sigilball from its resting niche. With only a look at Jian to reassure herself that she was doing correctly—a look she found she barely resented right that moment—she touched the spike with the ball.
___It sank beneath the ball; she felt but didn’t hear it finely grinding. As the ball touched down upon the nominal surface of the map, it twisted and jolted within her fingers—she yanked her hand away with a curse, although she wasn’t hurt.
___“Oh, sorry. I think it only does that with the blue spikes.”
___She started to shoot an indignant glare at Jian…but the scene behind him caught her attention.
___Where the wall of stone had arced, now gaped a shallow cave.
___Ignoring her irritation in the glow of her amazement, Portunista stepped around the table’s edge, toward the cave.
___The lights of the laboratory illumined stacks of crates and barrels. Who knew what Qarfax had buried beneath this mountain?!
___One object stood especially out in the careful piles.
___A mirror, tall and wide, framed in gilded leaf.
___“I’ve poked around a little in there already,” Jian was saying behind her. “Mostly I only found some normal tower storeroom things. Although,” he added, “my search was not very thorough. I lugged a stack of salted haunches back into the lab, for us to roast. Then I tried the other blue spike—and who did I find, but my flying partner, moping around alone! The other aasvogels must be shunning her right now, after she accidentally started that birdfight.”
___Portunista didn’t give a single burning feather for the bird, or its troubles…She stopped her approach with a jerk—she was standing so close to the portal, she could see a faint transparent film in front of her eyes. Her nose was almost brushing it.
___“Even though I searched around,” continued Jian, “I didn’t touch the mirror. I figured you would want to be the first of us to look it over. And after all, you are the maga.” Silence for some moments; then, “Well? What do you think?”
___But she couldn’t bring herself to cross the threshold.
___“Where…” She swallowed and started again. “Where does the cavern lead?”
___“Nowhere,” came the answer from behind. “As far as I can tell, it’s simply a natural fissure deep in the heart of a mountain. It isn’t large at all.” He paused again. “I didn’t see anything in there—dangerous I mean.” Another pause; she didn’t move. “Portunista?” Now he sounded worried. “Is something wrong? Are you seeing something?”
___“No,” she answered, faintly.
___She was lying.
___What she saw, in her mind, was an image from the night before.
___She saw herself, stepping through a portal much like this one.
___And she saw that other portal, closing behind her, trapping her on the other side.
___And she imagined Jian: lifting the ball from the table, after she entered this portal—
___—she would die, smothering, long before she could possibly melt through klips of stone.
___Or, perhaps he would lift the ball as she stepped across the portal’s membrane—bloodily bisecting her.
___how would that feel? how long would she live? would she go mad before she died?
___Burning hot into her mind, the memory came, of what she had wanted to do, to the aasvogel…
___She laughed, once, a chuff of air. They’d probably think she was jotting.
___Didn’t she trust Jian?
___If she wanted that mirror, she would have to personally trust him—as a person himself—not to kill her in her vulnerability.
___The possibility also remained: that Jian would abuse her trust.
___True, she knew of several facts that gave her grounds for believing she could trust him with her life. Including a promised commitment to her, that she didn’t want to accept.
___Yet without an active personal trust, given freely by her choice, the facts were merely facts, shedding their light but only as far as she could understand them—or as far as she chose to see them.
___And the facts might as well be dead. They couldn’t make the decision for her.
___Would you even want them to? asked a quieter voice within. Is that the sort of person you are, to let your decisions be made by something other than you yourself?
___No.
___Then choose. Will you, you yourself, trust Jian, he himself? Or not?
___And then another voice, a spiteful ironic voice, asked:
___Won’t you put your faith in Jian?
___She could feel her brain constricting, her teeth baring…
___“Jian,” she said. “Would you step away from the table, please?”
___A moment passed. Then two. “The table?” He sounded truly perplexed. Of course he does, one of those voices told her, a voice she didn’t want to hear—after all, he trusted you to not be hurting him…
___Well, he didn’t trust me not to hurt that bird! she retorted.
___The voices were silent. The quieter voice had no need to speak, when it could flash up the memory of her feelings and thoughts when she had asked Jian to step back into the room, away from the aasvogel. The other voice kept silent, betting that this would make no difference.
___That’s right! she said to the quieter voice. You see? I couldn’t be trusted!
___The voice replied no further.
___She told herself this was a victory.
___“Jian,” she said; a feeling like grime was washing down her hair, down her skin…but she wouldn’t stop… “Step away from the table now.” She made it an order, not a request.
___What would she say, if he asked her why? So I can be sure you won’t kill me, Jian? Because after all I’ve seen, and all you’ve done, I still don’t want to trust you, Jian? Just shut up and do what I tell you, Jian?
___“Oh.”
___And that was all he said. But it was enough. She knew that he knew what she meant.
___Once, long ago, in an idle moment during her apprenticeship, she had wondered how it would feel to be turned into stone.
___Her heart was doing that now.
_________the most horrible thing she had felt in her life
___She opened her mouth to tell him to never mind…
___…she shut it again. It was too late. It was already done. She would only look a fool.
___She listened to him walk, slowly, across the floor. “Okay,” he said; but there was no cheer, no joy in his voice. “I’m over here near Gaekwar, Commander.” Not Portunista…not ‘ista…not even milady…
___She stepped through the portal.
___She stood in the heart of a mountain; a heart where no light had shown for ages of ages—aside from one occasional light provided by someone from far beyond.
___She looked up, around. The cavern did not continue very far behind the portal—a fissure less than a third the size of the laboratory.
___One constricted hole of a heart within a mountain of stone…
___“So, where is the wall?” Gaekwar was asking Jian—but his jocular drawl sounded strained.
___“What…? Oh…it’s still there, I think, behind the portal. The tesser is terribly thin, you know. It’s being generated by a slight extension running around the wall, lined with sigils even smaller and more complex than the ones on the door—maybe Qarfax scribed them after further refining his skill. The ridge is pretty hard to spot, unless you suspect already that something is there.” Jian seemed to be making apology. For what? thought Portunista bitterly. He had found the thing…!
___Not her. After being in the room for hours.
___She, the maga, had missed it completely.
___Jian was tacitly covering for her failure, so she wouldn’t look incompetent. He even sounded happy again; perhaps because he was able to help someone.
___Because he was helping her.
___Don’t you understand I can’t be trusted?!! she screamed in her mind.
___Why not choose to live up to his expectations instead? asked the quieter voice. You do have the choice…
___If he cannot trust you with his heart, then why should you trust him with yours? asked the other voice.
___She thrust both questions away, and walked back into the laboratory, taking the mirror with her—it wasn’t heavy, as if its only weight was in its golden filigree. Certainly magical, then; but she would have to study it later. There were other things worth doing now, with this portal—things that could possibly help them to survive.
___She found a place to lay the mirror down, near her books and scrolls; and turning back, to close the tesser…
___Jian was in the cavern.
___Puttering round, in one of the casks; and as she watched, he pulled out…
___…a towel.
___He walked back into the laboratory, wiping his hands.
___“I’m glad I saw those in there earlier! In fact,” he grinned, “I think I’ll get some water from the well downstairs, to clean myself up better.” And nodding briskly, he left the room.
___A towel.
___She wouldn’t trust him with her life, to get a thing she only suspected the worth of, and didn’t even remotely know how to use.
___He was willing to trust her with his life—simply to get a towel to clean his hands, so that he wouldn’t annoy any others—no, so she would not be annoyed—with a stink.
___She refused to watch him leave.
___Instead she stood, watching the portal, for half a minute.
___The half became one.
___Then Gaekwar spoke.
___“Y’know,” he drawled. “I’ve been thinking about that bird of his. The one he wouldn’t dream of treating like a pet. The one he wouldn’t be enemies with, even if he had to fight her; the one he’s willing to love, ‘cause she and he both share a love for something. The one he’s willing to risk his own life for. And I think I’ve figured out what they both love.
___“He and she, both love her.”
___His drawl had disappeared, replaced by diamond-cutting hardness. “Excuse me,” he said, uncoiling from his lounge against the wall. “I’m gonna go downstairs and get some hot spiced mead. Got a bad taste in my mouth.”
___He left, without looking back.
