Sea of Silver Light

  "A minaret, yes," said Florimel.

  "Maybe this is the Mars I visited before," Paul said excitedly. "That strange sort of late-Victorian adventure world. It had a lot of Moorish-looking architecture." His gaze slipped to the countless miles of deadening white spread over both sides of the river. "But what happened?"

  "Dread," said Martine quietly. "The man called Dread has happened to this place, I would bet."

  They were all straining to see something now, all except for Martine who had let her trembling chin sink to her chest. As they drew closer to the great mound of snow and its single protruding spire, Paul saw something on the bank beside them, a much smaller shape half-covered by white drifts. "What the hell is that?"

  T4b, who was leaning so far out of the boat the little craft was tipping to one side, said, "It's one of those Tut-Tut and the Sphinx things, like—you know, that netshow for micros? That animal they ride with bumps?"

  Paul, whose grasp of popular culture had been diminishing rapidly since he left boarding school, could only shake his head. "It's a sphinx?"

  "He means a camel," Florimel said. If she had not been pressing her teeth together to keep them from chattering, she might have laughed. "It is a frozen camel. Did they have camels on your Mars?"

  "No." Now that they were closer, he saw the boy was right again. The dead camel was on its knees at the river's edge, teeth exposed in a hideous grin, the skin stretched so tight on its neck and head that it seemed mummified, but it was definitely a camel. "We must be in Orlando's Egypt. Or something like it,"

  Martine stirred. "That man c–called Nandi. If we are in Egypt, p–p–perhaps we could find him. Orlando and Fredericks said he was the Circle's special expert on the gateways. He might be able to help us reach Renie and the others."

  "If he's here, gotta be a popsicle," T4b suggested.

  "Ancient Egypt with minarets?" asked Florimel sourly. "In any case, I have changed my mind about trying to outlast this cold. So let us head toward that tower or none of this speculation will matter, because we, too, will be . . . popsicles."

  "We'll have to paddle with our hands," Paul said. "We'll have to get there fast or we'll all get frostbite."

  "We will take our hands out in turn to warm up," Martine said. "Two paddling, two warming. Now."

  For a moment, as he plunged his fingers into the dark river, Paul felt nothing but clean chill, like an alcohol-swabbing before an injection. Then his skin began to burn like fire.

  It was only snow and not ice they had to kick through to reach the open arched door of the building beneath the looming, white-shrouded tower, a piece of luck for which Paul was terribly grateful. Within a few moments they were standing in a decorated antechamber, painted head to ceiling in a beautiful, elaborate scarlet, black, and gold fretwork of repeating shapes. They did not stop to look, but continued forward, bending over the freezing hands they all held pressed against their bellies.

  Three more doors and three more decorated chambers led them to a smaller room whose walls were lined with shelves full of leather-bound books, and the glorious discovery of a tiled fire pit and a stack of wood.

  "It's damp," Paul said as he stacked logs in the fireplace with clumsy, stinging fingers. "We need something to use as kindling. Not to mention a match."

  "Kindling?" Florimel pulled a book down from the shelf and began tearing out pages. It seemed somehow sacrilegious to Paul, but after a moment's consideration he decided he could live with the feeling. He looked at a page and saw that it was in English, but English rendered in a spidery print that had the feeling of Arabic script. As he crumpled pages and arranged them around the wood, he saw a pretty lacquer box tucked into an alcove in the tile on the outside of the fireplace. He opened it, then held it up. "It's flint and steel, I think, and thank God for that. I wish !Xabbu were here. Anyone else know how to use this?"

  "We did not even have electricity at Harmony Camp until I was ten years old," said Florimel. "Give it to me."

  Perhaps a quarter of an hour passed, the sound of clicking teeth gradually subsiding, before Paul was willing to take his hands away from the wonderful heat of the fire. After a bit of exploration he turned up a storeroom full of soft rugs which he and the others wrapped around themselves like cloaks. Warmer now and feeling almost human, he picked up one of the discarded books and opened it.

  "It's definitely supposed to be Arabic—this book is dedicated to His Majesty the Caliph, Haroun al-Rashid. Hmmm. It seems to be a story about Sinbad the Sailor." Paul looked up at the shelves. "I think this is a library of the Thousand and One Arabian Nights."

  "Ain't spending no thousand nights here in this popsicle pit," T4b said. "Lock that. Lock that tight."

  "That's just the name of a book," Paul told him. "A famous old collection of stories." He turned to Florimel and Martine. "Which reminds me. . . ."

  "I said I could not remember the story," Martine began.

  "But I said I could." Florimel pushed herself back a little way from the fire. Bundled in the stiff carpet, and with the makeshift bandage covering her eye and a large portion of the side of her head, she looked more than ever like some medieval hedge-witch.

  Which is funny, Paul thought, since the witch of the group is Martine. It was an odd realization, but no less true for being odd.

  "I will tell it as I remember it." The German woman scowled, exaggerating her already daunting appearance. "It is only memorized because my daughter asked to hear it—and several of that Gurnemanz collection's other stories—many, many times, so don't interrupt me or I will lose the rhythm and forget parts of it. Martine, I am sure it will be different than the version you knew, but tell me about it afterward, will you?"

  Paul saw the ghost of a smile flicker on the blind woman's face. "That is fair, Florimel,"

  "Good." She arranged her damp but drying robes beneath her, opened her mouth, then shut it again and glared at T4b. "And I will explain the parts you don't understand after I'm done. Do you hear me, Javier? Don't interrupt or I will throw you out into the snow."

  Paul expected anger, or at least teenage indignation, but the boy seemed amused. "Chizz. Bang those squeezers. Listening, me."

  "Right. Very well then, here it is as I remember it."

  "Once upon a time there was a boy who was the apple of his parents' eye. They loved him so fiercely that they were frightened something would happen to him, so they got him a dog to be his companion. The dog was named Sleeps-Not, and was fierce and loyal.

  "Even with the love of two parents and the mercy of God, not all accidents can be avoided. One day, while his father was out working in the fields and his mother was busy preparing the afternoon meal, the boy wandered far from the house. Sleeps-Not tried to stop him, but the boy cuffed the dog and sent him away. The dog ran back to summon the boy's mother, but before she could reach him, the boy fell down into an abandoned well.

  "The boy fell and rolled and tumbled a long, long time, and when he finally struck the bottom of the well he was in a cavern very deep in the earth, by the side of an underground stream. When his mother discovered what had happened she ran to get her husband, but no rope they had in the house would reach down to the bottom. They brought all the other villagers as well, but even with their ropes all tied together they could not reach the bottom where the boy was trapped.

  "The boy's parents called to him that he must be brave, that somehow they would find a way to get him out of the deep, deep hole. He heard them and was a little heartened, and when they had dropped some food down wrapped in leaves to cushion the fall, he decided to make the best of it.

  "Late at night, when his parents and the other villagers had finally gone in to sleep and the boy thought he was alone again at the bottom of the well, he began to weep and to pray to God.

  "No one heard him but Sleeps-Not, and when that loyal dog heard his little master crying, he rushed off to roam the wide world in search of someone who could help the boy in the well.

  "The boy's parents
dropped food to him every day, and he had water to drink from the underground stream, but he was still sad and lonely, and every night, when he thought that no one was listening, he wept. With his dog Sleeps-Not out searching for help, there was no one to hear him at first, except the Devil, who after all lives deep in the ground. The Devil cannot cross rushing water, so he could not reach the little boy and take him down to Hell, but he stood in the darkness on the far side of the river and tormented the boy with lies, telling him that his parents had forgotten him, that everyone above the ground had given up hope of getting him out long ago. The boy's weeping became greater and greater until an angel heard him and appeared to him in the darkness in the form of a pale and fair woman.

  " 'God will protect you,' the angel told the boy, and kissed him on the cheek. 'Put yourself into the river and all will be well.'

  "The boy did as he was told, and then climbed out again wet and shivering, and sang this song: 'An angel touched me, an angel touched me, the river washed me and now I am clean.'

  "The second night the Devil sent a serpent up from the dark depths to attack the boy, but Sleeps-Not had found a hunter, a brave man with a gun, and brought him to the top of the well. Although the hunter could not bring the boy up from the hole, with his keen eyes he saw the serpent coming and killed it with a shot from his gun, and the boy was safe. Again the boy said his prayers and stepped into the river, and again stepped out again, singing: 'An angel touched me, an angel touched me, the river washed me and now I am clean.'

  "The next night the Devil sent a ghost to attack the boy, but Sleeps-Not had brought a priest to the top of the well, and although he could not bring the boy up from his hole, the priest saw the ghost coming and threw down his rosary, dispatching the spirit back to hell. The boy said prayers of thanks and stepped into the river, then came out singing: 'An angel touched me, an angel touched me, the river washed me and now I am clean.'

  "The next night the Devil sent all the hosts of hell after the boy, but Sleeps-Not had brought a peasant girl to the top of the well. It seemed there was little she could do to save the boy from all the hosts of hell, but in truth she was not a peasant girl but the angel who had first helped him, and she flew down into the well holding a fiery sword and the hosts of hell drew back, afraid.

  " 'God will protect you,' the angel told the boy, and kissed him on the cheek. 'Put yourself into the river and all will be well.'

  "The boy stepped into the water, but when he would have come out again, the angel raised her hand and shook her head. 'God will protect you,' she said. 'All will be well.'

  "At this the boy realized what he was expected to do, and instead of stepping out of the water he let go and allowed the river to carry him. It took him a long way through darkness, but always he could feel the angel's kiss on him, keeping him warm and safe, and when at last he came out into the light again, it was no less a light than that of Paradise itself, which shines from God's face. And soon enough his dog Sleeps-Not and his two loving parents joined him in that place, and unless I am wrong, they are all there still."

  "I am certain I got some details wrong," Florimel said after they had all spent a few silent moments listening to the pop and hiss of the fire. "But that is close to what I read so many times to . . . to my Eirene." She scowled and rubbed at the corner of her good eye. Caught between sympathy and courtesy, Paul looked away.

  "Know how you said you'd explain parts that didn't make sense?" T4b asked.

  "Which parts didn't you understand?"

  "Total."

  Florimel grunted a laugh. "I think you are saying that to be funny. You are not foolish, Javier, and that is a story meant for children."

  He shrugged, but didn't take offense. Paul could not help wondering if the sullen teenager might be slowly turning human. Perhaps the simple fact of being out of armor was having an effect.

  "Is it as you remember it, Martine?" Florimel asked. "The same story? Martine?"

  The blind woman shook her head as though awakening from a daydream. "Oh. Sorry, yes, it is much the same, I think—it has been a long time. Perhaps a few differences. The dog in my childhood version was named 'Never-Sleeps,' and I think the hunter was a knight. . . ." She trailed off, still absorbed in some inner conversation. "I am sorry," she said after a moment, "but . . . but as I hear it now, hear the song and the story that go with it, I am reminded of what was for me a very bad time." She waved her hands, forestalling sympathy. "No, but that is not all. Also it has made me think."

  "About the song?" Paul asked.

  "About everything. About what Kunohara said—that the reason for the operating . . . for the Other's strange patterns might be that I taught it a story. But I think that is too simple. I think that many of the children at the institute must have told it stories—I am fairly certain I told it other fairy tales myself. Telling stories was one of the things the doctors often asked us to do, perhaps as a measure of our memory and general mental health. If the operating system and its growing intelligence has been corrupted by this one particular folktale, I do not think it is because it was the only tale, the only song, that it ever heard."

  Paul blinked. A great wave of weariness was rolling over him. After the perils of Kunohara's bugworld and their escape along the river, he was only now feeling how exhausted he truly was. "I'm sorry. I don't understand."

  "I think it has taken this story to heart, if you will excuse an inappropriate metaphor, because more than any other, this story had resonance." Martine looked weary, too. "For the Other, this was the one that spoke most clearly of its own situation."

  "Are you saying it thinks it's a little boy?" Florimel said, an edge of angry amusement in her voice. "A little boy with a dog? In a hole?"

  "Perhaps, but that is rather simplifying it." Martine bowed her head for a moment. "Please, give me the chance to think out loud, Florimel. I do not have the strength to take much argument."

  The other woman flushed a little, but nodded her head. "Go on."

  "It may not think it is a boy, a human child, but if this truly is an artificial intelligence, something that has become almost human, imagine how it does feel. What did Dread say, in that moment on the mountain when he appeared like a giant? 'Your system is still fighting me, but I have learned how to hurt it.' A metaphor . . . or not? Perhaps when the system, with its growing individuality, did things the Brotherhood did not want it to do, they had to check its efforts with something it perceived as pain."

  Paul had a sudden, nightmarish memory of the Other straining against its bonds, an agonized, Promethean figure. "It thinks of itself as a prisoner."

  "A prisoner in the dark. Yes, perhaps." Martine took a breath. "A thing being punished for no reason—tormented as the Devil torments people, for the pure enjoyment of another's suffering. And so it has sat in its darkness for years—at least three decades, maybe more—hoping that one day it would be saved from its pain and set free, and singing a song that a little boy sang at the bottom of a deep, black well." Her face suddenly contorted in anger and unhappiness. "It is terrible to think about, no?"

  "You think it has done these things . . . against its will?" Florimel asked. "That what it did to my Eirene and the other children, to your friend Singh—all these things it was forced to do, like a slave? Like a conscripted soldier?" She looked shocked. "It is hard to think that way."

  "Oh, Jesus, the angel." Paul could hardly breathe. "In the story. Is that why . . . why Ava appears the way she does? Because the Other thinks she's an angel?"

  "Perhaps." Martine shrugged. "Or because that is the only way it can imagine a human female who is not part of the legions of pain-bringers. And there is the image of the river as well—certainly we must all find that familiar by now."

  "But even if you are right, what good does this do us?" Florimel said, breaking a long moment's silence. "The Other is defeated, at least the part of it that thinks. Dread has taken over the system. Look at this place—the Baghdad of Haroun al-Rashid, all vanished und
er a glacier. Dread is not an unwilling monster. He has turned this whole imaginary universe upside down just to amuse himself."

  "Yes, and with the Brotherhood dead or dispersed, he is our true enemy." Martine leaned back against the wall. "I'm afraid you are right, Florimel—my idea means little. If nothing we did before could affect the Other, I cannot imagine how we can do anything to discomfort Dread."

  Paul sat up. "Aren't you forgetting something? Like the fact that we have friends who are still out there? Maybe we can't do anything to bring down the system, maybe we can't touch this murderer-turned-virtual-god I've heard so much about, but we can bloody well try to find Renie and the others."

  For a moment it looked like Martine would lose her temper—Paul saw color bloom on the cheeks of her sim-face. "I have not forgotten, Paul," she said stiffly. "It is my curse that I forget almost nothing."

  "I didn't mean it that way. But if we can't do anything to stop Dread, we can at least try to get out of this network. The Grail Brotherhood is dead as a doornail, so what are we fighting against anyway? You lot may have volunteered, sort of, but I sure as Christ didn't." Paul felt his anger swirling uselessly and tried to calm himself. "Right, then. So what's our next step? If the Troy simulation is offline, how can we get to Renie and the others?"

  "We do not know that same trick would work twice anyway," Florimel pointed out. "It was my impression that the Other somehow wanted us to come to it—that it made some kind of special gateway for us. If the artificial intelligence is enslaved now, or at least defeated, then I doubt. . . ."

  She paused because Martine had held up her hand, fingers spread, like a sentinel who hears a stealthy footstep outside the camp.

  "I think you are right," Martine said slowly. "I think, along with Paul's angel, the Other tried to bring us to itself, somehow. It wanted something from us."

  "But we have no idea what that might be," said Paul.

  "Just wait for a moment!" The blind woman's angry flush returned. "My God, let a person think. It . . . the Other . . . wanted us for some reason. To help it free itself? As in the story?"