Page 98 of The Book that Broke the World

“Livira?” Evar looked around him and came to her, arms reaching.

Livira wrapped her own arms around the canith, surprised once more by the size of him, the sheer physicality after being so long beyond touch, the smell of him, an animal scent, distinct, strong even, but provoking an undercurrent of excitement as she breathed him in. She buried her face in the hollow just beneath his sternum, her cheek subject to the innumerable soft prickles of the short fur there.

They stood in the embrace, neither of them willing to break the silence with questions or words of any sort, lest doing so might somehow invite a wider world and its problems into their moment.

At last, Evar shifted his hands until they were under her arms. She stood still, not knowing what to expect. When, without apparent effort, he lifted her until their faces were level and the best part of a yard lay beneath her dangling toes.

“I missed you.”

“I missed you too.” She had, if “ached for” was the same as “missed.”

“Let’s not lose each other again.”

“No.” Livira shook her head. If she had been in charge of the distance between them, she would have closed it immediately and repeated their first kiss.

Evar brought her to him, and pressed his face into her neck, nuzzling, a deep sound in his throat that sounded as if it came from a beast far larger than him, a northern bear perhaps, or a mountain ox. His mane engulfed her and with it that scent of his which filled her lungs with trembling desire.

“Where are we?” Evar lowered her to her feet, and she found her legs less willing to hold her up than they had been just a short while before.

“A place... I made.” Livira wasn’t sure how to say it. “A pause between the world’s breathing. Time won’t notice we’re gone, but I don’t know how long I can keep us here.”

Evar sighed. “Yute brought the killers to my home.”

“He didn’t know. It’s Oanold that deserves the blame.” Livira hesitated, unsure. It was Oanold who deserved the blame, but surely all those others, the soldiers who had followed his order, deserved the blame too. Perhaps there hadn’t been any order and the mere sight of canith without weapons had been enough to spur them into slaughter. It went deeper. The soldiers were just people. People given leeway, grievance, and a sharp edge to rebalance the scales. The canith were hardly saints. Every one of those trapped then killed in the chamber were descendants of the warrior and the priest who had come to Livira’s settlement and watered the Dust with the blood of simple farmers. The same warrior and priest who had scaled Crath’s walls and set the city on fire. “There’s a lot of blame,” she concluded, unhappy at the defeat in her voice. If she could hate one group or the other, she would at least take some comfort in the purity of that conviction. As it was, she feared that, if she allowed it, the world might one day bring her insights that would undermine her hate even for Algar or Oanold; she might come to understand them as products of weakness and circumstance rather than demons spat from a dark hell with motivations that were simple evil and nothing else. Livira shivered. For a moment it even seemed that Jaspeth might be right—too much information could drown you; the world was simpler in black and white, more easily enjoyed, less fraught with guilt.

Evar studied her silence. “Yute brought them. That’s all Clovis will have heard.” He looked sad. “Whatever happens, I am on your side, Livira. I won’t arrive too late again.”

“Whatever happens.” Livira felt scared. She wasn’t given to fear, though she had been so full of it when Oanold had her that she thought it might stop her heart. This fear was a different kind. A dread. The conviction that nothing would be right no matter how hard they might wish it. “Whatever happens, we’ll face it together.”

“Together.” Evar bent towards her, and the kiss came, sweeter and deeper than before, and closer to their final one.

The wait for the world to tell you that you’re special can be a long and lonely one. Better to get off your arse and let it know that you are.

Blowing Your Own Horn: Lesson 1: Pucker Up, by Miles Smoly

CHAPTER 43

Evar

Evar walked out of the Mechanism, blinking against the library’s light. He had seen the door as a bright rectangle in the void. Distant at first but closer with each step. Until the moment he escaped, a large part of him didn’t believe that, even with Livira’s help, the thing would let him go. And yet, stepping out had been as easy as stepping in. On the threshold, a strange anger suffused him, as if he had wanted the Mechanism to acknowledge its debt to him, as if he had wanted it to remember him as special, not simply another visitor to be taken in and set free like any other.

The scene that met his return blew those thoughts away like dust before a storm. Strangers, screaming, struggling, harsh shouts. The newcomers seemed all to be soldiers—just like those in the vision that Jaspeth had shown them—only leaner and dirtier. Scores of soldiers were wrestling Yute’s people into submission, binding their hands with cords, rope, or even strips of cloth. Those resisting were being clubbed or punched. Evar spotted Arpix’s long, skinny form sprawled on the ground, unmoving, a bloody wound on his forehead, hands tied behind his back.

Soldiers stood to either side of the Mechanism’s door, waiting to seize everyone as they emerged. It seemed that the last in had been the first out. He was the first canith to return.

Perhaps Oanold’s army had grown complacent as they overwhelmed unprepared civilians, some of them children or elderly. Maybe the appearance of a canith stunned them for a heartbeat. Or perhaps humans were just that slow. But even taken by surprise, Evar managed to strike the nearest soldier with a flat palm to the chest, hard enough to lift him from his feet. At the same time Evar pulled the man’s sword from his scabbard with his other hand.

Evar spun, tumbling another soldier and driving his stolen blade to the depth of its hilt through the chest of the man who had taken hold of Livira. He would have done more. A lot more. But someone among his many opponents threw a grenade. The explosion was by far the loudest thing Evar had ever heard and smoke swept in behind the shock wave, so fast that it swallowed all and any carnage.

For several dazed moments Evar staggered about, arms out in front of him, hunting Livira. He was sure he was calling her name, but no sound reached his ears. Instead, they were filled with a great, pulsing silence that sang a single high note.

His confusion cleared long before the smoke did but, lacking sight or hearing, his mind had little to work with. Time and again he collided with bodies that came out of the surrounding cloud. He dealt with them more gently now, not knowing friend from foe, seeking Livira.

Another concussion hammered through the smoke, further away this time. He turned towards it and found his arms full of Livira. She recognised him and clung tight. Evar held her with one arm, rotating slowly to ward off any danger that might come out of the thinning smog.

“What in the hells?” Clovis emerged from the Mechanism, Kerrol at her shoulder.

Immediately Clovis went to one knee beside the soldier Evar had killed. In her right hand the white sword pointed towards potential attackers while with her left she rolled the man from his front to his back. A snarl twisted her face, exposing every tooth she owned.

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