Abasio’s hand covered her mouth. He bent close to her ear. “Shhh. Don’t say anything. Nobody is supposed to say anything.”
The thing sat quietly, watching its own hand. It was trembling. “Maintenance,” it said. “Loop. Can’t get out of loop.”
“Doctor Hammond knows. Doctor Hammond will get you out of the loop.”
The creature closed its eyes. Justinian sat quietly. The thing did not seem to breathe. Perhaps it had never breathed. After a very long time it said, “Good. Out of loop. Good. Thank you, Doctor Hammond. Soon will go kill now . . .”
Justinian got up and . . . walked . . . away . . . down the road . . . in the silence.
The fire burned. The wolves watched. The archers stood, arrows nocked. After a while, a rather long while, the creature slumped and fell from the bench. It lay still in the road. Precious Wind and the wolves came closer; the wolves spread, watching. Behind them the archers moved forward, arrows ready.
Xulai whispered, “What was in the tube?”
“Something that stopped the hunger. Narcotic, I think. Something that went to the flesh parts of the brain and put it to sleep. If we’re right, it won’t be able to move for a while.”
Men emerged from the shadows down the road carrying one of the heavy nets. The creature was wrapped in the net. It struggled feebly. The wolves darted forward. Precious Wind recalled them. Another net came, equally heavy. Twelve, eighteen, twenty-four men fastened loops through the net, picked it up, and ran toward the north, a dozen to each side, the way they had come, a practiced lope that did not hesitate or stumble.
Xulai leaned out the window. The moon had risen; there were other men waiting to help anyone who faltered; torchbearers ran alongside. In the moonlight, she could see the bearers running, onto the way-halt, then downhill, toward the switchback below, where she had seen the footpath. Torch flame burned red against the dark, descending on the path, hidden at last by the slope. She watched until the men returned without the net, still running. She could hear their panting. Someone came into the room and closed the shutters over the window. Precious Wind.
“Come,” she said. “We need a barrier between us and the explosion. The pit is around the hill, down a bit. They’re about to blow it up, the way we did all the others.”
“Wasn’t he dead?” asked Xulai.
“All the flesh that was in him is dead. The only way we know of to kill the rest of it is to blow it up and collect the pieces and pour them into a concrete lump and sink it in the deepest part of the sea. It seems to work. None of the ones we fixed that way have ever come back.”
She led them into the village, into some lower floor at the very back of the village where there were no windows, no doors, and where every villager was taking refuge. Justinian was among them. Xulai ran to him. “Why did you do that?” she cried. “I thought it would kill you!”
“Not if we had learned the right words,” he said in a rather feeble voice with an even feebler chuckle. “The emissary told us he took books from that place, remember. Before they blew it up. The books were very, very old. Their pages were enclosed in stuff they used to preserve paper, stuff like glass, page by page. It was a record of what they’d done. The books had pictures and names in them. The names of the people, the real people they made into monsters. Volunteers! The names of the real monsters, the ones who created the slaughterers. Proud scientists, the ones who set out to make the world pure. Jacob was the last monster, the new, improved monster. Doctor Hammond was the real monster who made him . . .”
The building shook. Dust fell from the ceiling. A few children cried, a few others cheered.
“That was the bomb,” said Precious Wind. “Only a little one. Not lastingly deadly, like the one at the Old Dark House. When everything cools down, we’ll pick up any scraps that may be left. We dropped the creature in a pit and put a heavy cover on it before we set the bomb off. Chances are, not much will be left to find.”
The door opened. People began to leave.
Justinian said, “The emissary told me they found Doctor Hammond in the Old Dark House too. He was very well hidden in a subcellar, in a kind of coffin attached to a maintenance gadget. He had planned to wake up in a purified world, but he was very, very dead. There were pictures of him. He looked a little bit like me.”
“And that’s why you did it? Because he looked like you?”
“No,” he said. “Maybe a little. It increased our chances of success. I really did it because of your mother. I was quite willing to . . . take the risk so long as I put an end to her killer. Alicia was only a creation of the Old Dark Man, and even the Old Dark Man wasn’t as guilty as Doctor Hammond and his friends. They were the real ones.”
He had, at one point during the planning, actually wanted to die during the event, but he didn’t mention that. That was before he knew Xulai was expecting a child.
Xulai turned pale and gulped. Abasio helped her sit down.
She said, “I was getting very angry at you. No one told me anything. I really thought you might die. If you did, I would have . . .”
Precious Wind murmured, “It could smell fear. We needed you to be afraid. I’m sorry, but we needed you to be afraid . . .”
Abasio turned her and let her lie back against him, thanking every beneficent entity that it was over. “I didn’t know that little bit of information, Precious Wind. I thought it was just that everyone thought Xulai had quite enough to deal with, and we had to do a great deal of last-minute scurrying.”
Precious Wind nodded. “That, too. The creature was behaving just as the people in Tingawa had guessed it would. They said if it was deprived of its maintenance, it would have to fall into a pattern. Killing preceded maintenance. So it would kill, then try to find its maintenance location, then try to find the coffin thing, then put flesh directly into the tube portal, maybe even try to eat, then it would revert to killing again. It would gradually be weakening. We were all but positive it would work, Xulai. And it did.”
“It’s all just . . . it’s been . . . and now I feel very strange.” She relaxed against him, breathing deeply, her hands pressed firmly on her belly. “My stomach is acting very . . . strange!”
Justinian laid his hand on her belly, felt the kick. “Very strange,” he agreed, smiling, deciding he was glad he hadn’t had to die after all.
Chapter 11
The Sea Child
Immediately upon the destruction of the Old Dark Man, the cliff-side villagers had stopped wearing strange garments, acting in strange manners, and advocating strange ways of becoming beloved by the king. They no longer seemed to care particularly whether the king loved them or not. Xulai, Abasio, and Precious Wind spent some time among the little towns, distributing sea eggs, and Xulai had a lengthy conversation with the woman who had given Xulai the cake on her first journey up the cliff.
“We knew the duchess was dangerous,” the woman said. “We knew there was a monster; some of us talked to old people who had seen it when they were youngsters. The duchess claimed to represent the king, she claimed to express his wishes; she amused herself trying to find out how far we could be pushed. We had already decided to go as far as she wished. We kept her amused, though it was wearisome. We never knew when she might show up, so we had to play the part all the time even though she had shorter ways to go and come from the court. There are shaft entries up and down the slope at the north end of the road as well as at the top, in the Eastern Valley, so she didn’t come up the cliff road often.”
After the eggs were distributed, with many of the same delays and questions that had kept them for some time in Wellsport—though without the obligatory sea change—they returned to Woldsgard. There news had come, via travelers to and from Ghastain and Kamfels, that both Hulix and Rancitor were dead.
“We’ll never really know what killed them,” Xulai complained.
“I’d just as soon not know,” Abasio replied. “Everything tied together, we’re sure of that. Genetic patterns and mi
rrors and sending killing clouds, it all tied together. There may have been a device in the Old Dark House, perhaps in his cocoon, that maintained the pattern of the Old Dark Man and every creature that shared his pattern. When the Old Dark House was destroyed, the patterns simply fell apart, not all at once, but inexorably. I don’t need to know how. I’m just very glad they did.”
“Did you get the helmet back from Precious Wind?”
“Yes. I promised her I’d let the people in Tingawa look at it.”
“That’s good. They can probably learn a lot.”
Justinian was resuming his life in Wold. Most of Prince Orez’s men had returned to their homes in Etershore or among the fiefdoms, though the prince lingered, enjoying a friendship that had too long been scarred by tragedy and separation. The prince had decided that before leaving Woldsgard he and Justinian should make a trip to Ghastain. It had been years since either of them had talked with the king.
It might as well have been a lifetime, they confessed when they returned to Woldsgard. King Gahls simply wasn’t interested in hearing about the waters rising. He told Hallad and Justinian he didn’t believe it. It was all chatter. Mirami had told him it was all chatter. The only problems that bothered the king were that the tailor simply couldn’t get his costume for the parade to fit right, and oh, incidentally, Rancitor had died, leaving him without an heir.
“I had thought of suggesting a new wife,” said Hallad to those gathered at the supper table. “But I could not think of a woman sufficiently unworthy. Then Justinian told me about the emperor in Tingawa.”
“The hereditary personage? The one who did as little as possible?” asked Xulai.
“Exactly. We decided King Gahls should be far too important to be bothered with trivialities like survival. So, first we told him about Ghastain adopting Huold, then we suggested he follow Ghastain’s example and adopt an heir. We said he should find a bright young man among his subjects, one who spoke several languages, one who could deal with foreign dignitaries, one who could take care of all the dull business of the kingdom while the king himself saw to the important things, like parades and balls.”
“Wasn’t he offended?” asked Xulai wonderingly from the couch where she had lain in marvelous idleness all morning among a purring clowder of cats, Bother and Vex among them.
“Not at all. He thought it was a splendid idea. We offered to help find someone for the job, and he agreed to let us do it. If you and Abasio weren’t so involved with the whole sea-egg project, I’d have suggested you.”
“Someone will have to supervise Ghastain at some point,” said Abasio. “There’s a large population there, and not all of them are going to reject survival. We’d rather thought that someone from the cliff villages would take over the sea-egg distribution on the King’s Highland.”
“However,” said Xulai to the prince, very firmly, “I don’t think either of us is interested in running Ghastain. I’ll bet you have someone at Etershore who would be perfect for the job.”
“He does,” said Justinian with a sigh. “And now that the monster is dead and sea travel will be allowed again, that person will have something to do. Ghastain will have more trade than heretofore. For one or two lifetimes, at least.”
“Perhaps a bit longer,” said the prince. “Ghastain may become a port city. They’re a long way up there.”
“Meantime,” offered Precious Wind, “we have to schedule a trip back to Tingawa. We have to take sea eggs from Wellsport across the sea and return with Tingawan ones to take inland. Transport of eggs between populations is a necessary part of the plan.”
“Artemisia,” said Abasio. “I want to be sure the Artemisians are included.”
“But first,” repeated Precious Wind, “we need to return to Tingawa.”
“She means before the baby comes,” said Xulai in a slightly annoyed voice. “They want me there when it happens. Since it’s the first one, you know.”
“ ‘They’?” asked Abasio. “What ‘they’?”
Xulai stood, cats spilling on either side; threw her arms wide in a fine dramatic gesture; and trumpeted: “They, the head of Clan Do-Lok. They, the council of elders of all the clans. They, the Sea King. They, the people who have been working for a hundred years to make our survival possible!” She sat back down. “That’s how Precious Wind says it.”
Precious Wind flushed. “I never shouted.”
“You most certainly did. You know, Precious Wind, I really thought when we’d done all the stuff we were supposed to do, people would stop herding us around like goats and yelling at us.” She turned to Abasio, giving him a wink that only he could see. She sighed dramatically and whined in a pitiful voice, “Abasio.”
“Poor thing,” he said. “She’s tired. We’ll let you all get on with your councils of state.”
They left, she leaning heavily on his arm.
“What was all that?” asked Prince Hallad.
Precious Wind said, “That was Xulai having a temperament. She’s enjoying it. We have led her quite a dance. She hasn’t forgiven me for allowing her to be so frightened during our confrontation with the monster. Abasio hasn’t either. I don’t grudge her getting a little of her own back, but we really do have to get back to Tingawa. It’s the only place I know of that has the equipment and the trained people to handle any kind of medical emergency that may arise. No, no, Justinian, don’t get in an uproar. We’re not expecting an emergency. But she was right, it’s the first time. We really don’t know what to expect. Right now I wish we had some of the devices they had in the Before Time. X-ray machines, for instance.”
“Those machines only showed bones,” said Justinian with some distaste. “Her baby may not have bones.”
“What do you mean?” asked the prince.
Precious Wind explained to him about changing, that both Xulai and Abasio could change. “I can’t believe no one has talked with you about this.”
“We’ve had very little time to discuss anything,” Hallad, Prince Orez, said stiffly. “I was under the impression that our great great-great-grandchildren might be born with gills. I was not told they might be born without bones.”
Justinian said plaintively, “If Xulai is going to Tingawa, I’d like to go with her. Can you recommend someone to stay here and keep Wold running for me?”
“You have good people of your own. Crampocket is a good steward, but he’s not good with people, so you need someone else between him and the world. If I were doing it, I’d put Horsemaster in charge. He’s strong enough to keep Crampocket from overdoing his economies, he knows everyone, he knows how things are done, and he’s respected.”
“You’re right,” said Justinian, amazed. At one time, he would have suggested this himself. How long had he been elsewhere? All the while the princess was ill, he had been elsewhere. Perhaps it was time to come back from elsewhere. He was to have posterity, after all, at least a few generations of it. “Will Xulai consent to inherit Woldsgard? Will she want it?” he wondered.
“It’s her home and she obviously loves Woldsgard,” said the prince. “But with the future of the human race hanging in the balance, she and Abasio are going to be traveling a great deal. While they’re gone, Horsemaster is still a good choice. He has a son who will be a good choice in his turn. The thing you don’t have is an alert and well-trained garrison. Though the need may not be great from now on, I’ll leave you a good man to whip them into shape.”
The return to the Falsa-xin, still anchored in Wellsport, was far easier than their previous route through Merhaven. Blue would go. The wolves would stay and Precious Wind would stay with them. Two of the younger ones could speak a few words. She had changed them, trained them, would have let them risk or lose their lives to save Xulai. Having used them so, she would not leave them now. It would have felt dishonorable.
Justinian would go, of course. He would return after his grandchild was born. He wanted to make sure that someone approached Genieve with the offer of sea eggs for her ch
ild or children or grandchildren. Precious Wind said she would see to it. Meantime, sea eggs from Wellsport would go with the Falsa-xin to Tingawa. Sea eggs would go from the cliff villages to Wellsport. Sea eggs would go from both Wellsport and the cliff villages to “Ghastain,” as the king still called it. “Up there,” said Hallad. Precious Wind and the wolves would see to it. She still had the ul xaolat. Lok-i-xan had sent word that she should keep it; a reward for her service, her honor, her faithfulness. If she was to be chief distributor, it would be of great assistance to her. When Xulai and Abasio returned to Woldsgard, they would join her in making a long trip to the east, to Artemisia. In the meantime, Precious Wind would recruit travelers, guards, scouts, to make that trip easier. No, she had said heatedly to Abasio and Xulai, under no circumstances would they be allowed to go alone!
“I have never felt so well planned for,” grouched Abasio.
“Now you know how I’ve felt my entire life,” said Xulai. “Except I never before felt hungry all the time, the way I do now.”
“You are burgeoning,” said Abasio. “Very properly. It is my understanding that women in your condition crave exotic foods. What may I bring you?”
“Two scrambled eggs and one of Horsemaster’s horse biscuits,” she said thoughtfully.
“You crave horse biscuits?”
“I always did. I’ve eaten them since I was little,” she said in surprise. “I used to lie up in the haymow in the stable with the cats, eating horse biscuits. I didn’t know how to make them then, as I do now, but how would I know they were any good if I didn’t eat them myself?”
There were no sad farewells. When they left, Precious Wind was already on her way to the cliff villages and Oldwife Gancer had patiently been talked out of going along to take care of the baby. Both Abasio and Xulai were worried that she could not deal with the situation. She might be too surprised. Shocked? Who knew? No, she could see to the baby when they returned to Woldsgard, “Unless the baby needs to stay in the sea,” said Abasio.