Authors: Jane Lindskold
She mused aloud as she returned to her preparations for dinner. After confirming that the men were still busy over their paperwork, Adara took the buck to where she could butcher it without getting in Jean’s way. She had no particular desire to return to the stuffy room, even if the view from the window was like watching a painting come to life. She had another reason for staying near. She wanted the cook and her husband to get used to seeing her around, even to forgetting she was there. It was amazing what people who were used to being alone together talked about when they forgot there was a listener.
Adara hadn’t forgotten that odd comment that Jean had made about not having anything to hide. Something in Jean’s inflection had implied that there were those who did. If the Old One had secrets, it was likely these trusted servants knew some of them, though they might not be aware of how they fit into the larger picture. Adara knew she might be being naive, but she couldn’t imagine that the cook—even now humming away to herself as she washed spring greens for a salad—would accept the sort of slavery Lynn had described.
If Jean did, then the Old One’s influence was so powerful that Adara’s hopes were doomed from the start.
Interlude:
Sowing spores.
Sewing spores.
Ganglion, neurons, axons.
“Interlocking mosaics of mycelium infuse habitats with information-sharing membranes.”
Aware, reactive.
Reactive, reacting.
Reacting, acting, linking.
Axons, neurons, sporophores, semaphores.
Signaling,
Wriggling,
Slowly, tentatively,
interlacing mosaics
becoming,
coming,
bursting forth into a burgeoning
One.
14
The Hidden Door
From the moment the Old One ushered them into the visitor’s center, Griffin felt as if the world had righted itself under his feet. Here at last were things he had grown up taking for granted: large windows, flat floors, high ceilings. The lack of power didn’t unsettle his sense of rightness. Even on Sierra, power outages happened. They were uncommon and backups came on nearly instantly, but he was familiar with how a building felt when the power was off.
So his brain had a comfortable category into which to place the experience, leaving Griffin free to glory in the unfamiliar familiar. There had been a jolt when the Old One pulled out primitive oil lanterns to illuminate their venture below the ground floor, but Griffin’s sense of exploration fired up. He was one with all the archeologists who had ever entered a ruin with a torch held high.
After all, it wasn’t as if he was back on Sierra. This was Artemis. The technology lying dormant around him was not that of Griffin’s own culture, but that of a foundation culture so vanished into the past as to have become—even with all the tidbits saved in modern information storage—gloriously mythical. Griffin always found amazing how much of what a culture wrote about itself assumed that the reader
was
of itself. As time passed and words fell out of use, even material written in a known language became cryptic.
Griffin’s excitement grew as the Old One showed off the facility. As part of his quest to find Artemis, Griffin had immersed himself in relics of the Imperial past. Now he was seeing those items firsthand, in nearly pristine condition, rather than as holograms or as time-ravaged relics. Artemis had never been bombed or otherwise suffered the damaging aspects of war. There had been one raid. The targets for that raid had been very specific: not the technology, but rather the people who knew how to use that technology.
For the first time since he had met her, Griffin found himself unaware of Adara’s presence—or of her absence. He was back, back to himself, back to where he belonged. Had he ever loved that wild woman? Had his feelings been the weak fantasies of a man disconnected from all he knew?
Even when the comm units refused to activate, Griffin couldn’t let go of the dream that any time now he would regain contact with his orbiting ship, that he would have the means to return to Sierra, there to flaunt his discovery before an awed universe. Such fantasies sustained him as he pored over maps and charts with the Old One and Terrell.
When the servant had shown Griffin and Terrell to their suite, the sight of Griffin’s now-familiar travel bag had come as something of a shock. On some level, Griffin had expected his “real” luggage, holding the clothing and toiletries now isolated from him by the unreachable void of the planet’s atmosphere. After washing, Griffin almost put on his coverall, just to maintain the feeling he was “back.” He resisted the impulse at the last minute as foolish—or worse, as an attempt to show off.
Instead Griffin donned clean woolen trousers, a loose shirt with buttons carved from bone, then slid his feet into soft moccasins. He peed in a toilet that was little more than a hole flushed with water (doubtless from a holding tank somewhere on the roof), then tried not to slouch or mope as Terrell led the way to the dining room.
Adara was waiting for them. She’d been out most of the day but, at some point, she must have cleaned up, for she no longer wore her hunting leathers. Instead, she had changed into one of the several long dresses Bruin had insisted she pack for just such an occasion. This one was a deep shade of honey gold that echoed the color of her amber eyes. It laced close at the bodice, showing off her figure quite differently than did her ordinary clothing.
Griffin hardly noticed the change. Instead he found himself entranced by the flat panels of the defunct lighting system, imagining how they once would have provided an illumination neither too glaring nor too soft—and certainly not as diffuse as the elegant wax candles that were liberally set around the room in an effort to compensate for the failing daylight.
On some level Griffin knew that dinner was excellent—the fried fish not the least greasy, the bread of high quality, the salad an elegant assortment of greens that complemented each other to perfection—but he found himself eating without interest. Indeed, the only person possibly less attentive to the meal than himself was the Old One. He ate hardly anything and refused a helping of the strawberry tart Joffrey brought in for dessert.
Almost before it was polite, certainly before either Terrell or Adara had eaten their fill of the pastry, the Old One asked Griffin if he would care to return to the lower levels.
“I realize you have already had a long day…”
Griffin shook his head. “Compared with our days of travel, this one was easy. I’d like to see what I can make of the various symbols you have found. Please remember, though, the language of the Empire is not the language of my time.”
“I understand completely.” The Old One glanced at Terrell and Adara. “Are you coming with us?”
Adara looked bored and sulky, Terrell torn.
“Perhaps I can join you later,” the factotum said. “I want to walk over to the Trainers and make sure Sam is letting someone other than me groom him.”
The Old One nodded graciously. “Of course, Terrell. We would be happy to have your insights.”
Griffin turned to make sure Adara knew she also was welcome, but as silently as might her puma, the huntress had vanished.
* * *
“So … Interesting developments,” Terrell said when he joined Adara and they were clear of the Sanctum. Sand Shadow remained behind, promising to alert them if either Griffin or the Old One departed.
“Indeed,” Adara agreed. “What next?”
“Did you sense anything in the lower part of the facility?”
“Nothing in the Sanctum itself,” Adara said, “nor did Sand Shadow but, when we went hunting…”
Quickly, she sketched what they had found.
“So they’ve relocated.”
“As we expected,” Adara countered. “I never disbelieved Lynn, but I am pleased to have confirmation of her tale nonetheless.”
“The huntress does not feel the hunt is ended then?”
Adara snorted. “Hardly. As I see it, the Old One would have been torn between two equally strong conflicts. He would not wish to have his breeding facility discovered. However, he would not want it out of his reach.”
“He is a controller, that one,” Terrell agreed. “Have you seen how he looks at Griffin?”
“Like he is deciding whether to pluck the bird or swallow it feathers and all.” Adara shook her head. “Do you think Griffin has noticed?”
Terrell was silent for four or five long strides. “No. I don’t think he has. He is too overwhelmed by having his hopes and dreams so close and so far…”
“That one!” Adara tried to sound amused but suspected she only sounded annoyed. “Griffin changes dreams far too easily. First his dream was to find Artemis. Now his dream is to leave her as quickly as possible.”
Terrell chuckled. “He would not see it that way. He never cared for Artemis for herself, only as a prize to flaunt. What good is the prize if no one knows he has found it?”
“Still, what’s the hurry? He certainly did not intend to arrive here and turn around immediately. He has been here how long? A month?”
Again, Terrell’s voice held laughter. “From what I gather, Griffin’s people view time differently than we do. For all they have the means of faster travel, faster communication, faster just about everything, they seem to have less time.”
At the Trainers, Elaine and Cedric came out while Terrell spoke sternly to Sam about the need to permit someone else to care for him and give him exercise. Although pressed to do so, they did not stay to a late meal. Leaving Griffin alone with the Old One for too long did not seem wise. However, both promised they would be back on a regular basis.
As they walked back to the Sanctum, Terrell asked, “Your plans, Huntress?”
“I think the Old One will not miss me if I stay away. Let him think me wild and without a thought in my head. That will free me and Sand Shadow to scout the area.”
“You think the new facility will not be too far?”
“Not if the Old One is to easily visit. Although Sand Shadow is a sight hunter, her sense of smell is still far better than that of a human. Between us, we may discover something.”
“While I keep an eye on Griffin,” Terrell agreed, “and on the Old One. If he leaves to deal with ‘business,’ I can try to discover where he goes. If he is absent for a long time, that too, may tell us something.”
“Something else I meant to tell you,” Adara said. “Jean Cook thinks someone has secrets. Who if not the Old One?”
“Did she say so?”
“Not so much, but her manner was very odd…” Adara related her exchange with the cook.
“Not much,” Terrell said thoughtfully, “but not so little that we should ignore it.”
“You are a personable man,” Adara said, “skilled in social graces. She may confide in you…”
“Do you really think that?” Terrell had stopped in midstride. They were on a quiet stretch where the road wended down toward the Sanctum. “About me being personable?”
Adara must also stop or be impolite, so she did, although she wanted nothing more than to race ahead. For a moment, she’d actually forgotten that Terrell had feelings for her—or thought he did.
“Would I have said it if I didn’t?” she countered.
“Adara…”
She made a swift cutting-off gesture and started walking again. “You are not being personable now. I don’t want to be pressed about such things. We have a seegnur to deal with, the Old One’s treachery to unravel. This is not the time to think of partnering or bedding or such…”
Terrell sighed and caught up to her. “I could wish you were wolf-kind, not cat-kind … A wolf might understand why such a time is precisely when you need a partner most.”
Adara shrugged. “I am what I am. In any case, the idea does not hold. In a wolf pack, only a few mate. The rest do not, in season or not. They know that withholding their urges will best serve the pack.”
Terrell laughed and there was real humor in it. “I’m an idiot to try and convince you using an example from where you are an expert. Tell me this much, Adara. Do you turn away from me because you are turning toward Griffin?”
“Would that matter?”
“It might … I like Griffin. There is something … I…” Terrell sounded genuinely confused. “I do not know if I could cross his interests. I might even wish you both happy.”
“Then I am sorry that I cannot make matters so easy for you. I feel responsible toward Griffin. I will not deny that I find him attractive … Beyond that, I don’t know. Now, peace. I want to check with Sand Shadow.”
The lights of the Sanctum glowed below. Adara reached for Sand Shadow, confirming that neither Griffin nor the Old One had left. No one had left the building, except for Joffrey coming to clean the outdoor kitchen and feed wood into the ovens where bread was baking.
No visitors?
The image contained several small animals of the sort that prowled after dark, including a fox—untempting to even a starving puma and certainly not to a well-fed one. No humans.
Adara asked if Sand Shadow preferred to remain out or sleep inside. The returning image was so graphically sexual—involving Adara coupling with both Terrell and Griffin—that Adara was glad Terrell did not have the gift for seeing in the dark, since he could not have missed her blush.
Cats!
After Adara assured the puma that she intended doing no such thing, the great cat lazily agreed that she would prefer to sleep out of the damp. She leapt down from the rock that had been her watch stand and came to join the two humans.
“Coming to see what Griffin and the Old One are about?” Terrell asked as they went inside.
“Not where it’s obvious,” Adara said. “I’ll trail after and listen. I’ll make sure I’m out of sight. Best I be thought completely bored by the search.”
Terrell nodded. “Right. And, as for that other thing … Thanks for not getting too, well … Anyhow, thanks.”
Adara, Sand Shadow’s pornographic images still vivid in her mind, did not trust her voice, but she managed a smile and nod.