“It’s not broken,” said Vadesh. “I don’t damage human beings. I don’t kill them. We expendables can’t kill people. Why do you think I only burned the grass between the armies?”
“But people died,” said Olivenko.
“People killed each other,” said Vadesh. “But I never did.”
“Just the way you didn’t damage me,” said Loaf savagely. “You were just telling me to shut up, is that it?”
“And yet you still didn’t get the message,” said Vadesh with a smile. “Why did the smart ones bother to bring you along?”
Loaf became even more furious, but he had felt the power of Vadesh’s blow—Param watched him restrain himself.
“Very good,” said Vadesh. “Slow, but he does learn.”
“You’ve made your point,” said Rigg. “You’re stronger than we are. You can knock us around. But we can get away from you whenever we want. So I suggest that you never hit any of us again, or we’re gone.”
Vadesh looked genuinely stricken—but what did any of his humanlike expressions mean? He was as false as Mother; yet, just as with Mother, Param couldn’t keep herself from responding to him as if he were a real person, with real feelings. When he looked so hurt at Rigg’s words, Param found herself wanting to reassure him.
“Just tell us what you want from us,” said Param. “Then we’ll decide if we want to give it to you.”
“And I’ll decide if I want to give you more water,” said Vadesh.
“And we’ll decide if we want to go back to a time before you and your kind ever got to this world, cross back through the Wall, and never let you anywhere near us again,” said Rigg.
Vadesh’s smile never wavered. “Stalemate,” he said. “Come back into the city and you can have all the safe water you want. Then I’ll tell you what I need from you, and you can decide what you want to do about it. What could be more fair than that?”
“Coming from a genocidal traitor,” said Param, “I think that’s a generous offer.”
She half expected him to give her the same little flick of violence that Loaf had been subjected to. But he only winked at her. “You can’t hurt my feelings,” he said. “I don’t have any.”
But to Param it seemed that his violence against Loaf could only be explained by hurt feelings. Vadesh lashed out when Loaf taunted him for getting all the humans in his wallfold killed. Whatever Vadesh might be, he didn’t like being accused of . . . genocide? Or failure? Whatever it was that provoked him, it was clear that he could be provoked, and by words alone. He was dangerous, and they all knew it now.
We fear him. Maybe that’s the new tool he created to manipulate us, when we could no longer be deceived. So maybe he wasn’t provoked after all. Maybe he merely switched from spoon to fork, whatever utensil was appropriate for the dish he’d been served.
Just like Mother, just like most of the powerful people she had known all her life. And if there was one thing Param had learned, it was this: She couldn’t win a game against an opponent who could change the rules whenever things didn’t go his way. All Param had ever been able to do was stop playing.
So she disappeared.
CHAPTER 5
Decisions
To Rigg, Param was not invisible—he still knew exactly where she was, because her path was new and clear. That was how he had first discovered her, back in the house where their mother lived as a royal captive. Now, though, he made a point of not looking at her path, at the place where he knew she was, because he didn’t want Vadesh to have the option of moving his metal-threaded body into the same space she was flashing in and out of. Rigg wasn’t sure how much metal the body of an expendable contained, but it didn’t take much to do serious harm to Param.
“I know where she is,” said Vadesh to Rigg. “I have a perfect sense of time, and I know exactly how far she could have gone by now, even running.”
Rigg looked at Loaf, Olivenko, and Umbo. “Param made her own decision, it seems.”
“She’s going to get thirsty,” said Umbo.
“I don’t like splitting up,” said Loaf. “We can’t help each other then.”
“One thing is certain,” said Rigg. “We need to organize ourselves differently.”
He sensed Umbo growing stiff, resistant. Resentful.
“I agree with you completely, Umbo,” said Rigg.
“I didn’t say anything!” Umbo protested.
“When we started out, I was the one with the money. The jewels.”
“Still got ’em,” said Loaf.
“Do you want them?” asked Rigg. “You’ve had them before. I’ll give them back to you.”
“No!” said Vadesh sharply, before Loaf could answer.
“You’re not in this discussion,” said Rigg. “We can’t make you go away, and we couldn’t stop you from listening even if you left, but we’re not interested in your viewpoint, because as far as we can tell, you’re the enemy.”
“Those wild facemasks are the enemy,” said Vadesh.
“You’re their ally,” said Loaf.
“Please, let’s none of us respond to him, including me,” said Rigg. “I was making a point.”
“Wouldn’t want to interrupt your point-making,” said Umbo.
Rigg ignored Umbo’s dig, for now. “It made sense for me to pretend to be in charge at first because of the subterfuge we were using,” said Rigg. “Pretending I was a rich young heir and you were my attendants.”
“Oh, we were pretending,” murmured Umbo.
“Then I was captured, and Umbo and Loaf—you were on your own and you came to Aressa Sessamo to help me, and I’m grateful. I met Olivenko and brought him into our strange set of problems, and Param is my sister and she was in as much danger as I was. But at the end of it all, what I can’t figure out is why I should be in charge.”
“You’re not,” said Umbo defiantly.
“I’m relieved,” said Rigg. “The trouble is that Loaf and Olivenko defer to me whenever there’s a decision to be made. Which makes sense, because even though they’re the oldest and one of them should definitely be in charge, they don’t have any power over time, and they spend most of their energy sniping at each other anyway.”
“He does,” said Olivenko.
“You think you’re so smart,” said Loaf.
“Thank you for demonstrating my point,” said Rigg. “It’s asinine for the two of you to keep this stupid rivalry alive. Regular army against city guard—who cares? Loaf retired years ago and began two new careers—innkeeper and Leaky’s husband. Olivenko only joined the guard because his career as a scholar was wrecked when my father—my real father—died. An innkeeper and a scholar—but both of you large and strong and well-enough-trained to make anyone think twice about fighting you unless they seriously outnumber you.”
Loaf said, “He wouldn’t scare a—”
“Yes he would,” said Rigg. “Can’t you hear what I’m saying? Grow up, both of you, act like adults, and take charge of this expedition.”
“We can’t,” said Olivenko. “Not him or me.”
“Can so,” said Loaf. “Just don’t want to.”
Rigg glared at Loaf, who rolled his eyes like a teenage boy and looked away.
“It’s actually possible for each of you to allow the other to speak without contradicting him,” said Rigg. “The fact that you don’t seem to know this is why I’ve had to stay in charge, despite Umbo’s resentment.”
“I don’t resent—” began Umbo.
“‘I wouldn’t want to interrupt your point-making,’” Rigg quoted him. “‘Oh, we were pretending.’ I agree with you, Umbo. I have no right to lead, and I’m tired of it anyway.”
“Your father trained you to,” said Umbo grudgingly.
“Everything he trained me for has already happened,” said Rigg. “I got to Aressa Sessamo, I got my sister out of the house, and then with your help she and I got out of the wallfold before General Citizen and our loving mother could kill us. Beyond that, I
don’t know what the expendable called Ram had in mind and I don’t care, because what matters now is what we have in mind. Only I don’t have anything in mind. The past few weeks have been all about survival and nothing else.”
“I thought you wanted to find out what happened to Knosso Sissamik,” said Olivenko.
“I do,” said Rigg, “but not so much that I think it’s worth dying for. I want to get out of this wallfold, that’s for certain, because I don’t trust Vadesh here any farther than I can piss, and even on a windless day that’s not far.”
“Where, then?” asked Olivenko. “Back to Ramfold?”
“No,” said Rigg. “I mean, you’re welcome to, but Param and I can’t.”
“I can’t go anywhere,” said Olivenko. “Unless one of you time changers takes me.”
“Maybe Umbo will take you,” said Rigg. “He proved a long time ago that he doesn’t need me to time travel.”
“And you just can’t get over it, can you?” said Umbo.
Rigg heard him and despaired. “Your ability saved my life. Saved my sister’s life. Saved all of us. I admit I felt weak and foolish when you could do it without me, and I couldn’t do it without you. But now we’re even.”
“Oh, definitely,” said Umbo. “You can go back eleven thousand years, and I can barely manage six months, which doesn’t get me through the Wall.”
“And you can stay rooted in the present and always come right back to the time you left,” said Rigg. “We’re different, and we’re both amazing. Now I’m telling you I don’t want to be anybody’s boss, all right? You be boss now. It’s your party.”
“Not me,” said Umbo. “I don’t want to be in charge of anything.”
“I know the feeling,” said Rigg.
“It seems to me you need impartial leadership,” said Vadesh.
Rigg didn’t even glance in his direction. “Loaf?”
“I admit I want to go home.”
“Then go. Please,” said Rigg. “You’ve already done far more than I ever hoped for. Leaky needs you.”
“If I don’t bring the two of you back to Leaky so I can prove you’re all right, my life won’t be worth a piece of bread surrounded by crows.”
“Why do we need anyone in charge?” asked Umbo. “Why can’t we just stay together as long as we feel like it, and split up when we feel like it?”
“Fine with me,” said Olivenko.
“Because you’re a scholar,” said Loaf. “I’m not picking a fight here, I’m just saying that one thing I learned in the army, either we’re together or we’re not. We need to know we can count on everybody who’s with us, or go it alone.”
Rigg buried his face in his hands. “You’re probably right but I’m just so tired of feeling responsible for everybody.”
“You’ve never been responsible for me!” Umbo said, leaping to his feet.
“Yes I have!” Rigg shouted back at him. “It’s my fault you had to run away from home. My fault you had to go to Aressa Sessamo, my fault you had to flee the wallfold, my fault you’re thirsty and under the power of this talking machine.”
“I made my own choices,” said Umbo stubbornly.
“It’s still my responsibility to make things right,” said Rigg, “but I’m not up to it, I can’t do it, I don’t even know what ‘right’ is anymore.”
“I know,” said Vadesh. “I tried to tell my people but they wouldn’t listen. I did what I had to do.”
“Param made a choice, all on her own,” said Rigg. “Without asking me. Which means she really isn’t my responsibility now.”
“She’s your sister,” said Loaf.
“She’s Knosso’s daughter,” said Olivenko.
“But not my responsibility,” said Rigg.
“I’m beginning to get the idea you don’t want to be in charge anymore,” said Loaf.
Rigg nodded wearily. “Communication is finally being achieved.”
“All right,” said Loaf. “Then I’ll be in charge. I say we follow this self-powered puppet to the water and drink up while we hear what he has to say. Everybody agree with that?”
“Yes,” said Olivenko. He shot a look at Rigg, as if to say, See? I can agree with Loaf.
“Fine,” said Umbo. “I’m thirsty.”
“No,” said Rigg.
They all looked at him in consternation.
“Oh, it’s the right plan,” said Rigg, “and Loaf’s in charge. It just felt good to be wrong and have it not matter. Param can follow or not, as she chooses.”
Vadesh, who was still standing close by, seemed a little perplexed. “So you’re going to do what I asked?”
“Yes,” said Loaf.
“Then what was all the discussion about?”
Loaf just shook his head. “It’s a human thing.”
“You’re not really very smart,” said Umbo to Vadesh.
“He’s just pretending not to understand us,” said Rigg.
“I think he never understood humans at all,” said Olivenko.
“Oh, you’re right about that,” said Vadesh. “But I know that if you don’t get water you’ll die, and I have water for you, as much as you want, so let’s go.”
He sounded so cheerful. He sounded just like Father. I cannot let myself trust him, Rigg reminded himself. He isn’t Father. Father wasn’t even Father. They’re all liars.
But following this face, this man, answering his questions, doing what he said—that was how Rigg had spent his entire childhood, his whole life until a year ago. To follow him again felt right; it was the feeling Rigg imagined other people referred to when they spoke of “coming home.”
Back in the same room in the factory, they drank their fill, recharged their canteens and water bags, said little as Vadesh said much. He talked about the days when the city had been productive.
“We kept the technology of the starships, as best we could. Not that we flew anywhere—air travel was too dangerous, what with the Wall. You couldn’t see it, so if a pilot strayed too near, he could go mad and crash the plane.”
Rigg tried to make sense of humans flying and decided that “plane” was a sort of flying carriage. Or boat, since it had a pilot. A flying boat. Would it have to fight the winds the way boats had to struggle upstream on a great river?
But he said nothing, for his project at the moment was trying to learn the way Vadesh thought, since it might help them get out of Vadeshfold safely. And it wasn’t just Vadesh. He was only the second expendable that Rigg had known, and there were things Rigg needed to learn about them. Every wallfold had an expendable, so he would be facing the equivalent of Vadesh or Ram in every one.
The expendables can make us rely on them, need them, love them, thought Rigg. Yet they can also lead us to our own destruction, as Vadesh did with the uninfected humans of the city. Had Father been manipulating humans the same ruthless way? Am I his son, or merely a particularly talented human with royal blood who could be manipulated to cause destruction? Maybe Ram was as careless with human life in his wallfold as Vadesh was in this one. In which case perhaps I should untrain myself, and refuse to see the world as Father trained me to see it.
Or perhaps Father, knowing I would face someone—something—like Vadesh, trained me precisely to be able to learn from and overcome a monster like this.
If only Vadesh didn’t look exactly like Father.
“But Rigg is too important to listen,” said Vadesh.
“I’m listening,” said Rigg.
Vadesh said nothing.
Rigg repeated back to him what he had just said. “This city was designed by human engineers. All these achievements were human.”
“You did not seem to pay attention,” said Vadesh.
“I was thinking that it seems very important to you that we understand that everything here was done by humans. At first I thought you meant ‘human as opposed to you.’ But now I see that by ‘humans’ you meant ‘humans possessed by facemasks.’”
“Not possessed!” cried Va
desh. “Augmented! It was what we hoped for at the beginning, what the great Ram Odin told us our work should be—to combine the life of this world with the life that humans brought with them.”
“So this is really the great city of the facemasks,” said Olivenko.
“Of humans whose senses were sharpened and intensified by facemasks,” insisted Vadesh.
“I thought you said that facemasks returned humans to a primitive state, all war and reproduction,” said Olivenko.
“At first. And in the weaker humans, yes, that was a permanent condition. But some humans were strong enough to overmaster the facemasks. And some facemasks were able to learn the civilized virtues. Self-restraint. Discipline. Forethought. Guilt.”
“Guilt!” said Loaf. “What were they guilty of? They were owned by animals. Ridden by them.”
“Guilt is a civilizing virtue,” said Vadesh patiently.
Father had taught Rigg the same thing. “Guilt is how a person punishes himself in advance,” said Rigg. “Before he commits the act, and afterward, even though no one else detected his crime.”
“It makes people self-policing,” said Vadesh. “The more people feel guilt, the more easily they live together in large numbers.”
“So the facemasks learned guilt,” said Loaf. “They still killed all the uninfected humans.”
“They didn’t!” said Vadesh. “Why do you think they did? They defended themselves.”
“Until the last normal human was dead,” said Loaf.
“No and no and no,” said Vadesh. “It was the uninfected, as you call them—I think of them as invaders from Earth—”
“Like you?” suggested Umbo.
“Invaders from Earth,” repeated Vadesh, “who returned to the city again and again until they murdered every man, woman, and child of the native people.”
“They were not native,” said Umbo. “They were captives.”
“They were a new native life form, half human, half facemask,” said Vadesh. “It was a beautiful blending—painful and frightening at first, for both, but then a fruition of both. As if they were trees that could not bear until they pollinated each other.”
“You’re a poet of parasitism,” said Rigg. “Are these the stories you told the possessed people, to convince them they were even better than humans or facemasks alone?”
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