City At The End Of Time (60 page)

Tiadba rolled on her back, still expecting to die—or worse. All her marcher training and instincts seemed unreliable, blacked out by fear that reached deep into the old matter that made her. What had they gotten themselves into? How many more terrors would they face, much worse than this?

Were they even safe here, with cover and apparent protection, the Chaos held back, frustrated?

Macht wept for Perf. “He went just like the Tall One. Just sparked away.”

“He was slow,” Denbord said.

Macht took offense and moved on him with fists clenched, but Herza and Frinna held him back, and together they all collapsed to the ground once more, coughing out little howls of misery. Tiadba sat apart, too exhausted to join in. Nico recovered first and looked around through his faceplate, unable to believe they weren’t still being followed.

“What is this place?” Tiadba asked the armor. No answer.

“The armor doesn’t want to help us,” Macht said. “It’s useless.”

“Maybe it can’t talk about what it doesn’t know,” Shewel said.

“The armor didn’t save Perf—it didn’t tell him what to do!”

“Everything out here changes,” Nico said. “The trainer said—”

“Then why let it speak at all?” Macht shouted. “What use is it to
any
of us?” He kicked and thumped his arms and hands on the gray ground, a crèche-born gesture of anger and irritation that they understood too well.

Denbord crawled over and flopped down beside Tiadba. “I don’t know whether we’re safe or just in the belly of something different.”

Tiadba felt the gray surface and noticed that her armored fingers did not produce the faint glow of adjustment they had observed in the Chaos. “The suits aren’t working very hard,” she said. “Maybe there’s a generator nearby.”

“I don’t see anything,” Nico said. “Just the purple, and those branches. I don’t like the way they glow.”

Shewel joined them and lay on his back. They all seemed to want to stay low and not touch the branches, growing ever thicker.

One positive: they could no longer see the burning crescent.

“Nobody said this would be easy,” Denbord offered, his voice quavering, not at all convinced a show of bravery was appropriate—certainly not false bravery. Macht stared at them all with large, round eyes. Herza and Frinna sat beside each other, clutching hands.

They all sucked in their breaths.

Silence—no more words—seemed best. Tiadba examined her gloved fingers, felt the suit drying and soothing her twitching, itching skin, the most comfortable clothing she had ever worn. The armor was still working, then.

Slowly she let her fear burn itself out, leaving only a hollow grief and, like Macht, disappointment. If the others looked up to her as some sort of example, a leader…

After a while the branches stopped growing and everything became still.

“If we’re in a belly, there’s nothing we can do about it,” Tiadba said. “Better here than out there.”

“We can’t stay here forever,” Denbord said.

“We know that,” Macht said. “Just shut up and let us be sad.”

“Maybe this is a mourning place,” Nico said, ever the philosophical one. Tiadba looked left, to the edge of the clearing, just a few yards away, between the smooth brown trunks that had so quickly branched out. The glowing tips gave off a dim yellow light. She wasn’t sure they would be able to escape through that thicket.

No shadows, no motion, no threat—and no promise.

Then she thought she must be dreaming. The branches parted, the glowing tips formed an arch—and through them stepped a Tall One, wearing nothing but a kind of curtus—smudged, torn, mended with what might have been lengths of twig.

The Tall One approached close enough in the dim light that they could see him clearly. All of them stared in astonishment.

“What is this?” Tiadba whispered, but again the suit had no answer. He looked a great deal like their trainer, Pahtun, but then, to breeds, Tall Ones tended to resemble one another. He approached and knelt, his dirty face impassive, eyes examining but incurious, as if he was not surprised to find them in this place but felt no immediate concern over their intentions.

“What is this?” Tiadba asked, louder. “Where are we?”

The Tall One shook his head. Then he spoke.

Their helmets suddenly split and fell around their shoulders, making Denbord cry out and cover his eyes and mouth, until he realized he was not dying.

The breeds gasped—the air was thin but sweet enough.

The Tall One said, “They recognize me and they follow my orders. Poor things.” He stroked Tiadba’s shoulder—not her, but the armor she wore. “Out of date. Obsolete, actually. Breaking down under the stress.”

Khren said, “One of us has already died.”

They stood and their heads were of a height with the Tall One’s shoulders.

“I am Pahtun,” he said.

“Pahtun is dead,” Macht said.

“There will always be Pahtuns,” the Tall One said. “Where did he die?”

“In the zone of lies,” Nico said. They all nodded agreement.

The Tall One nodded. “A grand object lesson—don’t you think? I made many copies and broke many rules to help the marchers. If breeds reach my cache, they deserve rest, instruction, better forecasts of Chaos weather…knowledge not available in the Kalpa. And we should refresh and upgrade your armor, don’t you think?”

“That would be good,” Macht said. “But I don’t believe you—not one bit. Pahtun told us not to trust things like you.” He spoke reasonably, without anger, but his face was tense. The Tall One reached up, touched his own nose, and made the sound Pahtun had made when amused—a rumbling, crackling exhalation, somewhat upsetting to a breed. “Good instincts,” he said.

“But if I were a monster, even your poor old damaged armor would have warned you. How are things back in the city? We can’t see it from here, of course.”

“Bad,” Tiadba said. “Very bad.”

“Well, it had to be. The Typhon grows restless, ever stronger, and wants to have done with us. Any more breeds coming after you?”

“We don’t know,” she said. “Maybe not.”

“Then all the more reason to get this thing done,” Pahtun said. “These shrubs will only last a short while. I trained them myself—grew them from old ground. They’re primordial matter, just like you—and me. Good thing you broke through…if you had gone around, you would have crossed a trod, and the Silent Ones have been busy of late. Follow me.”

He got to his feet, towering over them, and held out his arms. “Congratulations, one and all! You’ve made it this far.”

CHAPTER 75

The Green Warehouse

Throughout the warehouse the book group women were arranging their own cots in preparation for the night that was not even remotely a night. For though dark had fallen, and Ginny could see two stars gleaming through the skylight,
they were the same two stars
. The Earth was not moving. Sun and moon had not changed their positions in the sky.

Ginny reluctantly arranged the blankets on her cot and sat, surrounded by her pitiful cubicle of stacked boxes, exhausted, ready for sleep—but she knew what would happen if she laid down and closed her eyes. She dreaded this part of the dream: the separation (though Jack was asleep just a few yards away—she could hear him faintly snoring); the journey through the…she couldn’t remember what it was. Great gray walls and dusty floors.

If only I could put it all in sequence!

Minimus crept through a crack between the boxes and leaped onto the cot. Ginny let the cat lie across her lap, purring contentment and watching her with the royal concern only a cat can show—aloof, alert, curious only out of politeness.

With Minimus she felt safer, but the cat could not go with her into the dark behind her eyelids—the unwanted world that opened just a crack and rustle beyond.

Finally, she could stay awake no longer. She heard the cat jump down but did not care. She was so tired of trying to understand and take control of her life.

And so, for a few unclocked moments—a brief interlude in a slice of world bereft of real time—she gave up, gave in. She let the out-of-sequence existence she so dreaded wash over her, fill her up. Every time she closed her eyes—anytime she had to rest, to sleep—until her two lives were combined and
reconciled
—this would be her sacrifice, her misery.

Yes, yes—I’ve dreamed those things before. Move on!

Take me out into the Chaos—send me to the False City—abandon me—get it over with!

The women gathered around the stove. None could sleep. “How long do we have?” Agazutta asked Bidewell. She had recovered her dignity, but there were dark circles under her eyes, and her red hair was in complete disarray.

Bidewell handed them all cups of chamomile tea.

Miriam came last into the darkened, stove-lit room, having checked on Jack and Ginny, and—she murmured to Ellen—having made sure that Daniel and Glaucous were in their closet. Bidewell held his answer until all the women had gathered. Most sat on the old wooden chairs—Agazutta remained standing. Farrah lay back on the overstuffed chair, languid as always, but her eyes flicked at every noise, and her hands clutched the padded chair arms.

“Not long,” Bidewell said. “I haven’t told the children. From this point, things will decay rapidly. I have deeply valued your company.”

“But not our judgment,” Farrah said with a sniff. “Letting those bastards in. Why?”

Bidewell stared up at the high rafters and shook his head. “The stones choose.”

“How do you know Glaucous?” Agazutta asked.

Bidewell made a disgusted grimace. “Him I could have predicted.”

“If he’s a hunter, why let him in?”

“No answer I give will ever suffice…but the sum-runners pick their companions.”

“More like
create
them, right?” Ellen asked, her hands making small lost movements to her cheek, her chin. They all jumped at another sharp crack and grind from outside the walls.

“Not to be known,” Agazutta said wearily.

Bidewell looked down and there were tears on his cracked, rugged cheeks, which shocked them all. “I know this much. The shepherds as confirmed by Mnemosyne are by text, out of text—text is central. The sum-runners have mazed their courses throughout all the world-lines, traveling all possible avenues, even the most unlikely, and now they have arrived, summed—come to our attention…and out of themselves, vaster than anything we can imagine, they have made guardians. Even Daniel, though that is not certain.”

“A false one, perhaps,” Miriam said.

“We do not know that,” Bidewell said. “Though his proximity to Glaucous—worrying, certainly. For centuries, there have been rumors of a bad shepherd…But I have never met him, or her.”

“What’s a bad shepherd?” Agazutta asked, combing her fingers through her hair.

“A traveler working his way forward, through other shepherds. Using them. Bringing more than just a stone—bringing something else, for his own motives.”

“Sounds charming,” Farrah said.

Bidewell held his hands over the iron stove, then examined his fingers. “As always, I apologize for my ignorance, ladies,” he murmured. “But as you say, our time is limited. I sense restlessness. I can assure you the opportunities outside are very limited.”

“They’ve made up their minds,” Ellen said.

“Who is going?”

Agazutta raised her hand. “Children, grown and moved out—France, Japan, far away, but maybe they’ve left messages for me at home. Maybe there’s still a way to speak to them. I have to try.”

Miriam raised hers. “I need to get back to the clinic—if it’s still there. My patients must be scared out of their wits. My staff…They’ve been with me for years.”

Farrah stood and stretched. “I’m alone,” she said. “But I’ll go with Agazutta and Miriam, just to watch out for them.”

“I’ll stay,” Ellen said. “Whether I’m needed here or not—no one out there needs me.”

“Not even us?” Agazutta said. “Is this the end of the Witches of Eastlake?”

“It’s been good,” Ellen said. “You are all the best friends, the finest adventurers one could hope for.”

“Well, it ain’t over…”

“Until I sing,” Farrah said.

The women exchanged hugs. More tears were shed. Then they took up their bags and purses, and Bidewell escorted them to the northern door.

“You have your books?” he asked. “Do not lose them. Keep them close at all times.”

They gave him wry looks. “Slender tomes,” Agazutta said.

“What does 1298 mean?” Farrah asked.

“They are your stories, dear ladies,” Bidewell said, “penned long ago in Latin, by your obedient servant, copying from even older texts—scrolls that were burned at Herculaneum. So long as you keep your stories near, you will be afforded some protection. I do not suggest reading ahead or skipping to the end—not yet.”

“Will we get out of this alive?” Farrah asked.

Bidewell lightly snorted, but gave no answer.

Miriam opened the door to the outside. The air over the city had cleared a little. “Oh, look,” she said with a sigh. “It isn’t raining.”

“What will happen to the rest of you?” Agazutta asked, taking Bidewell by the elbow as they walked down the ramp side by side.