The Bloodline Feud (Merchant Princes Omnibus 1) by Stross Charles

Author:Stross, Charles [Stross, Charles]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780230771734
Publisher: Tor
Published: 2013-04-10T20:00:00+00:00

PAWNBROKER

‘It’s no good,’ said Miriam, rubbing her forehead. ‘All I get is crossed eyes, blurred vision, and a headache. It doesn’t work.’ She snapped the assassin’s locket closed in frustration.

‘Maybe it doesn’t work here,’ Brill suggested. ‘If it’s a different design?’

‘Maybe. Or then again, it’s a different design and it came through on the other side. How do I know where I’d end up if I did get it to work here?’ She paused, then looked at the locket. ‘Maybe it wasn’t real clever of me to try that here,’ she said slowly. ‘I really ought to cross over before I try it again. If there’s really a third world out there, how do we know there isn’t a fourth? Or more? How do we know that using it twice in succession brings you back to the place you departed from – that travel using it is commutative? It raises more questions than it answers, doesn’t it?’

‘Yes – ’ Brill fell silent.

‘Do you know anything about this?’ Miriam asked.

‘No.’ She shook her head slowly. ‘I don’t – they never spoke about the possibility. Why should they? It was as much as anyone could do to travel between this world and the other, without invoking phantoms. Would testing a new sigil not be dangerous? If it by some chance carried you to another world where wild animals or storms waited . . .’

‘Someone must have tried it, mustn’t they?’

‘You would have to ask the elders. All I can tell is what I was told.’

‘Well, anyway,’ Miriam rubbed her forehead again, ‘if it works, it’ll be one hell of a lever to use with Angbard. I’ll just have to take this one and cross over to the other side before I try to go wherever its original owner came from. Then try from there.’

‘Can you do that?’ Brill asked.

‘Yes. But just one crossing gives me a cracking headache if I don’t take my pills. I figure I can make two an hour apart. But if I run into something nasty on the far side – wherever this one takes me – I’ll be in deep trouble if I need to get away from it in a hurry.’

Malignant hypertension wasn’t a term she could use with Brill, but she’d seen what it could do to people. In particular she’d seen a middle-aged man who’d not bothered to take his antihypertensives. She’d been in the emergency room when the ambulance brought him in, eyes open and nobody home after the massive stroke. She’d been there when they turned the ventilator off and filled out the death certificate. She shook her head. ‘It’ll take careful planning.’

Miriam glanced at the window. Snow drifted down from a sky the color of shattered dreams. It was bitterly cold outside. ‘What I should do is go across, hole up somewhere and catch some sleep, then try to cross over the next day so I can run away if anything goes wrong. Trouble is, it’s going to be just as cold on the other side as it is here.

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