Abasio had no better luck elsewhere. At night, with the gaslights lit and crowds milling about, the District sometimes felt exciting, but now the shops were faded and tawdry, the area reeking of smoke. As a last resort, Abasio stopped at a smuggler’s shop for a bottle of good stuff, paying the extortionate price without complaint as he dropped the bottle into the capacious pocket of his baggy trousers. From there he dodged swiftly and watchfully through the warehouse district to the South Bridge. Though this was neutral territory, one never knew when some kid might try to make a reputation. At the far end of the bridge was a Patrol Post where Abasio sometimes picked up information. This morning he slouched his way into the commander’s office, grinning amiably and making clinking noises with a coin against the bottle in his pocket.
“Whatso, Basio?” said the lieutenant, wondering thirstily what might come of the visit.
“Not much.” Abasio smiled, putting his elbow on the lieutenant’s desk and letting one hand languidly support his chin. “Whatso with you?”
The lieutenant shrugged. “Truck came in from Hanurg this mornin’. Loaded with honey-beer.”
Basio shrugged. He had drunk the beverage mentioned and found it merely average, though. TeClar and CummyNup sloshed it down by the gallon when they could get it.
The officer furrowed his brow in thought. He wouldn’t get whatever Abasio had in his pocket unless he came up with something. “Whistler’s down from the hills. His people came up with this new drug. He calls it Starlight. Dreamy stuff, he says. It’s a sex thing.”
Basio pulled out his pocket notebook and ostentatiously made a note. He’d bought drugs from Whistler before. Sex stuff was always in demand.
“He’ll be sellin’ the stuff in the market pretty soon.”
Abasio made another note, smiling noncommittally.
The lieutenant slogged on. “When the patrol come in this mornin’, they said there was a refugee reported out in the farmlands.”
Bells clanged in Abasio’s head, like a tocsin ardently rung. “What sort of a refugee?”
“Just a refugee. Prob’ly from an ark-type village. They said a female. Looked to be young, dark-haired.”
Abasio went cold, then hot. He had no reason to think the refugee was anyone who would interest him. It could be an aged Ingenue or a well-preserved Wicked Stepmother whose stepchildren had grown up and gone. He told himself this, knowing it wasn’t true. The refugee was from the archetypal village he’d recently visited and could be only one person. He knew it as simply and absolutely as he knew his own name. The girl was Orphan, his Orphan (for so he had labeled her), out wandering around by herself.
Still, he couldn’t go all that way on mere intuition. “Who saw the refugee?” he asked from a dry mouth. “Who told the patrol?”
“Hunters. They was out there above the. Wise Rocks tryin’ to get a few deer or wild goats for that roast-kitchen near the arena—Hub’s Kitchen, you know—and they saw this refugee down below makin’ for Long Plain.”
Abasio kept his face expressionless. The Purples had gone into the archetypal village from the north, where the road was. The girl must have come out from the south, over the gap in the hills, the way the old man and the donkey had gone, the way Abasio himself had used to go to spy on the village. Why? Why that break-back trail? What trouble was she in?
He reminded himself, with some effort, that he was supposed to be looking for amusements for the Young Chief. He would no more bring such a girl to the city to amuse the. Young Chief than he would attempt insurrection among the Purples!
His attempt at being dutiful did no good. He had to go see. He presented the bottle with an expansive gesture.
“Little present,” he muttered. “If you’ll let me borrow a horse and wander out there to take a look.”
The officer, with a gap-toothed grin, waved at the paddock visible through the window where half a dozen horses lazed under the shade of a large tree, tails flicking. He had no objection at all. A man who brought such acceptable gifts could borrow a horse anytime he had a mind to.
Abasio rode with a natural grace, though he’d done it seldom since coming to the city. Gangers preferred their smoke-wagons, nongangers rode bicycles or walked. Edgers, so it was said, had clean vehicles that ran on electricity. Only farmers and patrolmen used horses, and those in the paddock were an unexciting lot, uniformly lazy, underexercised, and fat.
Why then, this thrill of anticipation that went through him as he went into the tack room for a saddle, a canteen, and blankets? Why this feeling of energy and liveliness as he mounted? He sat stiffly for a moment, waiting for the feeling to abate or clarify itself. It didn’t happen. Instead, there was a sort of clenching in the pit of his stomach, a feeling of alertness to his skin. Was it the girl? Was it something else? He had a sudden recollection of his dream about himself and someone else on Big Blue, walking off into the darkness.
The officer, holding the open bottle by the neck, was watching Abasio curiously from inside the door. Abasio waved one hand, trying not to let his confusion show.
“Ride careful,” called the patrol officer.
“Ayeh,” he called over his shoulder. The horse was already moving off in the right direction, as though it knew where he wanted to go.
• • •
Morning beneath the Dome. Standing immobile, Qualary held the book. The Witch leaned upon the railing, watching the walkers depart.
“Mine,” the Witch muttered, turning her head slightly. The mask glittered in the motion, almost as though it smiled.
Qualary did not move. It was unwise to hear the Witch when she spoke, as now, privately to herself. It would be only a few moments longer. The last of the serpent lines was leaking away.
Almost the last. Caught by an unusual sound, Qualary risked a glance from the corner of her eye. One of the creatures had fallen over. It was making crawling motions, arrhythmically thwacking itself against the marble floor.
The Witch muttered an obscenity under her breath, whipping her robes around her as she descended in the chair to the console, where her fingers flew across the buttons Qualary knew what she was doing: summoning certain of her creatures by number, particular ones she had taught to obey her. In the marketplace, in the community tavern, Qualary had heard Mitty’s men say that the creatures should be on a regular maintenance schedule, that they would begin malfunctioning otherwise. Was this what they meant? Was the thing broken? If so, it seemed determined to break the rest of the world as well. Already it had shattered great chunks out of the floor and fractured one of the pillars. The balcony trembled with the creature’s flailing, and Qualary reached out a hand to steady herself. Luckily, the Witch was concentrated on the event below and did not see the movement.
Half a dozen beetle-blacks came silently from the shadows to carry the crippled one away. It went on mindlessly thrusting with arms and legs. Qualary had never seen a broken walker before. From the way the Witch was half crouched over the console railing, like a vulture about to drop, neither had she.
“Malfunction,” muttered the voice from behind the mask “Was it?”
Qualary didn’t reply. The question hadn’t been directed at her.
“Or was it sabotage?” the voice hissed, then paused, as though awaiting an answer.
“Berkli, perhaps?” the voice asked. “Or perhaps Gaddi House?”
Qualary gave no evidence of having heard. In her mind she quoted one of her rhymes for trying times: “ ‘When you’re bitten by a louse, blame the bites on Gaddi House.’ ” Everything was the fault of Gaddi House, to hear Ellel tell it.
“Ellel?” called a voice from below.
Qualary knew the voice well. The Ander.
“May I come up?”
The Witch did not reply, but one arm beckoned. Fashimir Ander came whirling up the spiral trackway, his gown fluttering, his sleeves like kites. Qualary took no notice of him, nor he of her.
“I saw one of the walkers being carried out,” he cried, his flu
telike voice giving the words a tremolo of concern.
“Malfunction,” said the mask.
“Ah. Well, I suppose one has to expect some of that,” he said dismissively. “Is there anything interesting on the console?”
Even from where she stood, Qualary could hear the careless complacency of Ander’s voice, see the irritated quiver of the Witch’s shoulder. They would be amazed to know she had heard them, seen them, knew what they felt. So far as Ander and Ellel were concerned, servants were deaf and blind and mute.
The Witch did not answer her visitor. She merely stood aside from the console, letting Ander approach it, which he did diffidently, with a sycophant’s shuffle.
“Some of the population figures look odd,” he said after a few moments’ perusal. “I don’t remember their being this low before. Berkli was here a few days ago. He should have seen it.”
“Was he?” The Witch turned from the railing and peered through her eyeholes at her follower.
“Here, you see,” Ander chirruped. “Population is down in segment AN 856, and has been for weeks.”
“Where is segment AN 856?”
The words were hollow, distant. Qualary had only recently realized what the Witch sounded like: She sounded like her own creatures. Like the walkers. She moved like them. Even her masked face copied their inhuman quality.
“Let me find it for you,” said Ander, manipulating the console, which honked at him several times before displaying the desired information. “It’s a piece of manland, farmland mostly, though it includes a couple of cities and Edges. Well, you don’t need to worry about that, Ellel. The Edges keep their population stable, but in the cities, every time they have a little gang war or a flare-up of plague, the population goes down. Afterward, the birthrate soars, and the population rises again.”
He cast a sidewise glance at his colleague, and received no encouragement, so went back to fiddling with the console, bringing some display onto the screen. From where Qualary was, it looked to be a star chart, little lights all clumped together in one area.
“What’s this?” Ander asked curiously. “You’ve got many of your walkers gathering in one place?”
The Witch laughed.
Qualary bit her cheeks, tasting blood. To those who knew the Witch best, that laugh carried terrible associations.
“I think we’ve found the Gaddir child,” she said.
“You’re joking?” Ander was incredulous.
The Witch laughed again. “Berkli jokes; I don’t. I remember what my father told me years ago to expect from Berkli, from you all. Expect nonsense from Gaddi House, he said Expect machines from the Mittys; aesthetics from the Anders; balks from the Berklis.”
Silently, Qualary completed the list, well-known among the servant class: “And tyranny from the Ellels.”
“Why are you here?” the Witch asked.
“You asked me to meet you,” Ander reminded her. “You wanted to see the shuttle this morning?”
“Ah.” A long silence. “I want to check what we’ve been told, yes. There’s always the possibility we’ve been lied to.”
Ander sighed, one of his much-put-upon sighs. “I don’t know why you think Berkli or Mitty would lie about the shuttle. They don’t care about it enough to lie about it.”
“I will see what has been accomplished.”
He frowned at her obdurate tone, but he got into his chair in response to an imperious gesture, swirling down the track and clearing the way for her to follow him.
Only when the two had gone off down the long corridor leading toward the silo did Qualary ease her rigid muscles, relaxing them slowly. Sometimes by the end of the morning’s ceremony they had grown so stiff and unyielding, she thought her bones would snap when they let go. She took a deep breath, let it out, moved her head, her arms. If she hurried, she could have the Witch’s apartments cleaned before the Witch got back from looking at the shuttle.
Ellel and Ander made slow progress down the long corridor between Dome and silo. The distance was not great, but there were a multitude of niches and closets and storage rooms for Ellel to examine as they went by. Then came a door giving onto the raised side aisles above the noisy, bustling Domer shops where tools and equipment were manufactured for trade with those beyond the wall; then a tortuous ramp that led them a considerable distance underground; and finally the huge double doors with their multiple locks, which gave upon echoing space where curving walls forced their eyes toward the cylindrical structure before them and thence upward.
Ander shut his eyes as he always did when he came to the silo. Though he was looking up, not down, the perspective made him feel vertiginous. Everything dwindled away to an infinite distance: the circular wall, the vast cylindrical construction held in its protective arc, the zigzagging ladders that went up to the limits of vision. He could never convince himself he was not falling.
High above, in the gloom, the lights that sparkled like stars could have been an infinite distance below. Voices echoed from aloft; tools whined like trapped insects.
“They’re working,” said Ellel.
“What did you think they’d be doing?” asked Ander in the slightly sardonic tone he sometimes, though rarely, dared use with her. “Having a nap? Shall we go up and ask the workmen if Berkli is sabotaging the ship? Or maybe make a tour of inspection? In that case, do tell me what to look for!” He knew she would not. She didn’t intend to display her knowledge, at least not yet. Ander knew of it only by inference. But then, Anders were notoriously good at inference.
She did not dignify his sarcasm with an answer but merely strode to a nearby control panel and keyed a summons. After what seemed a very long time, a mechanism high on the side of the ship began to hum shrilly as it moved downward, finally stopping against the floor with a metallic cry of protest. A stocky man with a much-lined face emerged, pausing to remove his protective helmet before approaching them.
He bowed. “Madam Founder. Sir.” He knew them well enough, but Domers never remembered anyone’s name who wasn’t a family member, so he introduced himself. “Dever, project engineer in charge.”
The Witch’s question was flat, unemphatic: “How near is the shuttle to completion?”
He took off his helmet and rubbed his forehead thoughtfully. “We’ve made excellent progress recently, mostly because we’ve had everything on hand we’ve needed. Search and salvage teams have been scavenging materials and fuel for a long time, but you know that. It was members of your Families who sent them out in the first place.”
“We do know that,” said Ander, with a sidelong glance at his companion.
“It’s taken a long time,” said Ellel. The words were an indictment.
The engineer stared from face to face, a little fearfully, wondering what had sparked this inquiry. “I know it’s been frustrating,” he commented, assuming what they did not say. “Finding the materials was the big problem. Sometimes a team couldn’t find what it expected to; sometimes teams didn’t come back. More than once we had to pay ransom to the Tribes to get our people back, and them empty-handed.” He sighed and rubbed the sides of his face where the protective helmet had made reddened welts. “Most of the delays were early in the project, however. We have everything we need now. Except the guidance system, of course, but you know about that.”
“How long?” breathed the implacable voice from behind the mask.
Dever shrugged. “Since we’re doing everything for the first time, it’s been hard to judge the time any specific job will take Barring any unforeseen difficulties, however, I’d say a few more days for the shuttle itself.”
“Which is exactly what we’ve heard before from Berkli,” remarked Ander, jittering uncomfortably from foot to foot. “Do we need to know anything else?”
“One more thing.” The woman turned back toward the engineer. “Dever, what’s the status of the space station?”
The engineer was momentarily confused “Status?”
The robed woman merely w
aited.
What did the woman want? “No one’s looked at it. I mean, we can’t get there, can we? Not until this shuttle is finished.” He rubbed at the furrows between his eyes. “When I came on the project, I was told there’d been a complete computer review before the project even started Of the moon bases too.”
Ander made a finicky gesture. “We’ve seen the records, Ellel. Our grandfathers used the orbital telescope to look at everything visible, and they got the station and settlement computers back on line as well. Everything up there is just as it was left when men departed for the stars.”
The engineer nodded assent, wondering why the hell they were asking these questions now. A little late, wasn’t it? He was given no answers. Without farewell, the woman turned and left, Ander tottering after her, miming exhaustion. Heaving a deep, relieved breath, Dever put on his helmet and went up to the shuttle tip once more. Around him, surfaces gleamed with polish and paint, each component individually made and finished. The control section was complete. He ran his fingers along the enclosed bunks for the flight crew, the doors of the toilets and the galley. Behind them was what had been cargo space on the plans, now divided into personnel cubicles, each with its own bunk and storage space And behind that, the moon lander folded neatly into its own compartment—a salvage crew had found that in a museum, so they hadn’t had to build one, though getting it to the Place of Power had been a three-year nightmare. Behind the lander were the engines. They’d had to build a plant just to create the fuel they needed. Twenty-some-odd years of his life.