The Ghost Sister

by Liz Williams

  “I'm fine,” Bel protested. “Just a bit stiff, that's all, and it'll soon wear off.”

  “I don't know,” Dia said doubtfully. “That was a nasty injury. And we don't know what it was that attacked you; there could be more of them.”

  Shu took a deep, careful breath, and asked the question that had been preoccupying her ever since they'd landed. “Might I suggest,” she said “that in that case, we try to rig up some sort of defense?”

  As she had expected, her words fell into a chilly silence. Dia said, “Are you suggesting we take up arms?”

  “No, certainly not, but it would be simple enough to attach a modified biotics spray to one of the bolt projectile devices. They use something similar on Narrandera. They're called stun guns, but that's just a name.You wouldn't actually hurt whatever you shot, just put it out of action for a while.” She took care to sound reasonable, but she was not really anticipating anything other than disagreement. However, Shu told herself, she owed it to reason to try, and this was the first time she had tested whatever waters might lie between herself and Dia. Dia's pale eyes blinked once like an owl, as if in incomprehension. “Narrandera,” the Guardian said icily “is a world of heretics. I do not expect a member of this mission to invoke such action.”

  “Maybe I should remind you that I'm not really a member of the mission. I'm just along to do some research. But I don't want to argue with you, Dia, and I recognize that you are Ship's Guardian. If you forbid weapons of any description, I'll go along with that.”

  “Then I thank you for your conciliation,” Dia said, and smiled to show that Shu was forgiven. Shu inclined her head, making private plans to sneak away one of the bolt projectile devices as soon as she could manage it. As the most elderly member of the party, she thought, she had some right to feel insecure.

  “Look,” Bel said hastily. “Now that we know there's something there, we'll just have to be more careful. We've got the life scanners, after all—they're able to show us if there's anything within a fairly wide radius. We'll just have to avoid it if there is.”

  Dia frowned. “And why didn't the scanner work last time?”

  “Because whatever it was that attacked me came in so fast,” Bel said defensively. “The scanner did pick it up, but I wasn't quick enough.”

  Dia sighed and said, “Bel, this isn't Irie St Syre, where nothing will harm you. We don't know what might be out there. Your basic training should have made you aware of that before we ever set foot on the ship.”

  “It did. I made a mistake; I'm sorry.”

  “I'm as much to blame as Bel,” Shu said quickly, but Dia interrupted.

  “Bel has to learn to take responsibility for her own actions, Shu Gho.” Dia sat up straighter and her expression became even more austere. “All our lives depend on one another, now.”

  “Guardian, I'm sorry,” Bel said, again. “But you know we've no choice but to go back to the ruins, whatever's in there.”

  Dia looked at her acolyte, at Bel's wide, eager eyes, and Shu saw her face soften. She said, more gently, “I know. I'm simply telling you to be careful.”

  This time, the journey into the caldera was not quite so alarming, and Shu managed to keep her eyes open most of the way. After some argument, the biologist, Sylvian, had remained at camp with Dia; she had put up a good case for coming along, Shu thought, but Dia had insisted. Shu wondered, somewhat cynically, if the reason might simply be that Dia regarded Shu herself as rather more expendable, but if that was the reasoning, then she could hardly blame the Guardian. Even in a culture where art was so highly valued, when it came to the crunch, biologists were more useful than writers.

  The aircar glided into the caldera itself, and Shu could see the patch of dust disturbed by their previous landing. Bel took them down and, once outside, they walked cautiously back toward the ruins. This time, both wrist scanners were on full wide-radius audio alert, but Shu was taking no chances. The bolt projectile device, retrieved from the air-car's resource pack while Bel was concentrating on the coordinates, rested comfortingly in the folds of Shu's jacket. But the only signs of recent life were their own footprints patterning through the dust.

  They moved deeper into the settlement, following the sound. The humming note seemed louder here, perhaps amplified by the cliff walls. Soon, they found themselves in an unfamiliar set of rooms: a sequence of chambered halls with a colonnaded view out across the caldera. If the tall, arched windows had ever contained flexglass however, it was long gone. Granules of red dust skittered across the floor, and something about the movement did not seem natural. After a puzzled moment, Shu realized that the wind had dropped. A regular flutter of interference passed across the curved surface of Bel's scanner, as if mimicking the passage of the dust, and the girl stared at it, evidently bewildered.

  “Is that the field signature we picked up yesterday?” Shu asked.

  “I don't know,” Bel murmured, frowning. “I think it might be the same, but it seems to be fluctuating. When we got back yesterday, I patched through the field signature to the ship after Sylvian had fixed up my leg.” She paused, gazing out at the shafts of sunlight illuminating the walls of the caldera.

  “And?” Shu prompted gently.

  “It hasn't come back with anything yet. I gave it instructions to relay any results to the aircar console.”

  “There's no sign of anything in here. Maybe we should see what's through those doors at the end of the chamber.”

  In silence, they walked the length of the room to the tall doors. The catches had rusted together, but after a moment, Bel managed to wrench them open. A further long passage lay beyond, lined on one side by panels of lacy metal. Dispersed by the frets, the afternoon light was scattered across the floor like grain.

  Shu paused. “Bel? Look at this.” Some of the panels were less intricately carved than the rest, with only a few openings to let the light through. But that light fell in familiar patterns upon the opposite wall.

  “Stars,” Bel murmured, following Shu's pointing hand. “They're the stars of Irie. Look, you can see the Maiden … and the Cat.”

  “Maybe they wanted reminders of home,” Shu whispered. “Come on. Let's see what's at the end of the corridor.”

  At the end of the passage a final door led down onto a spiral staircase, which made its way down into the earth like a screw.

  “Scanner picking up anything?” Shu asked.

  Bel shook her head. “Nothing's showing.”

  They listened for a moment, but the only sound was, as ever, that faint, disquieting hum which echoed up through the well of the stair. The light of the flashlight showed nothing but more steps, seeming to lead into infinity. Bel went first, moving cautiously. To Shu, it felt as though they descended for hours, but at last they came out onto a narrow platform. The humming was louder here, reverberating all around them as though they stood in a cave of the sea.

  “Whatever's making that field of yours,” Shu said, raising her voice above the great singing, “I think we've found it.”

  At the far end of the platform lay yet another door, but this one was different. Instead of the etched metal, it was a single slab of some glossy, pale substance which, because it was so familiar, Shu initially failed to recognize. The door was made from grown-bone, like many of the early structures on Irie before all genetically engineered and vat-grown substances were restricted. Stepping up to it, she put her hand to its smooth surface. It felt cool and hard, almost brittle, but she knew that it was impervious to almost anything except a direct explosive blast. Whatever lay behind this door was intended to be protected. Bel peered at the red palm print beside the door: a deliberately archaic symbol of an advanced technology.

  “Gene-reading?”

  “Yes, but I doubt whether it's still active after all this time. We can probably force it.”

  She held up the scanner, and Shu watched as the patterns of light flickered across the surface of the palm print, scanning for DNA traces and reflecting th
em back in mimicry of whoever had last used the mechanism. The bone door glided open with barely a sound. Bel and Shu found themselves gazing into a chamber.

  This place was a world away from the style of the rooms above, the delicate, curling carvings and etched metal. This room was of Irie St Syre, using forms that had remained unchanged for thousands of years. It was molded, organic, a flowing sequence of curves which made it difficult to see where the walls ended and the floor began. Everything was a familiar dark, mottled green, like water in a deep pool, and at the far end of the room a long console was set into the wall. Its surfaces were a glistening green-black, and slick as oil beneath nanomolecular filters. It flowed outward like a wave, and light flickered across its surface as though under water. It was humming. As Shu watched, it seemed to shift and change, reconfiguring itself beneath her gaze as though she were making it uncomfortable. The air smelled of something familiar, which Shu was nonetheless initially unable to place. Then she recognized it: it was the smell of technology, of order. Irie St Syre had smelled like this, balanced and harmonious and controlled, with nothing to revolt the senses. Wholly artificial.

  Used by now to fresher, wilder air, Shu wrinkled her nose. She turned to find that Bel was standing in front of a second row of equipment: more ancient, organic technology with that strange smell of grass and home. This too did not look like a machine. It looked like many things, and it changed as Shu watched. The only constant element was a flowscreen set into the wall. Data marched in spiky green symbols across the flowscreen, like a flight of dragonflies.

  “What is it?” Shu mouthed.

  “I think it's generating some kind of biomagnetic field,” Bel shouted back.

  “Is it dangerous?”

  “I don't know.” Bel glanced uncertainly toward the console. Shu peered over her shoulder, trying with limited technical knowledge to make sense of the spiky patterns that strode across the little screen, thus she was unprepared for the hand that snaked out and grasped her by the wrist. She was so startled that she stumbled against Bel, only to find that the girl had become rigid and that it was Bel's own hand that was holding her.

  “Look!”

  Someone was coming out of the shadows. It was much taller than a human being. It had a long, pointed jaw, open to display sharp teeth. A dark mane concealed its shoulders, and the hands which it held out before it were tipped with talons. It was entirely transparent, and in the lightning glimpse that Shu had of it before she hauled Bel backward and slammed the bone door shut, she saw that its great, star-filled eyes were intelligent and aware.

  8. Eleres

  It was an uncertain day; one of those times at the very end of spring when colder weather suddenly makes a last-minute return before the brief summer sets in. There was a cool wind from the river, stirring the trees in the orchard, and clouds were hanging heavy over the distant hills. I hadn't seen Morrac for a while—as was characteristic of our relationship, once the first flurry of passion was over. He'd gone up along the estuary, murmuring something about “coming back in a bit.” He had now been gone for over two days. He was like that, blowing hot and cold, judging my mood in order to keep out of my way when he estimated I was at my most desperate. The tower, which we'd spent the last few days cleaning up, was quiet when I entered, but as I walked along the hall, I could hear voices, and one of them belonged to Sereth. The other was Morrac's.

  “…just think that you ought not to get so involved with it. It's as though you seek it out. This is the third time in as many weeks. And Eiru told me you were off with the ai Zherren last month, in one of their raids. You're not going to tell me that was any business of yours.”

  “I was visiting the house. I got caught up in it.” Morrac sounded both defensive and sullen. I pictured him in my mind's eye: looking away from his twin as he had so often avoided my own accusing eyes.

  “Well, maybe you should have tried not to 'get caught up in it,' “ Sereth snapped.

  “I did try,” he protested.

  “Not hard enough, obviously. And I know very well— and this is what really annoys me, Morrac—that the ai Zherren don't always go off on the hunt only when it's strictly necessary.”

  “A lot of people don't. What difference does it make?”

  “It makes a difference,” she said, after a moment.

  I found my footsteps slowing as I eavesdropped. I heard him say, “And what about you? We're the same, Sereth. I know you. The world at your heels and blood in your mouth. That's what you want, isn't it?” and his voice was silken, intimate, the same voice I heard when he was holding me down in the casual domination of sex.

  “Morrac, be quiet.”

  “Why? Don't you want to face the truth, about yourself, about the bloodmind? I know you; I understand. And you know how it's always with us, a part of us. Why fight it, Sereth? Why deny it? You're like Eleres, trying to pretend all the time that he's something other than what he is— than what we all are, except the sick and the weak, like Mevennen.”

  “No,” she whispered, so low that it might only have been a shiver in the air.

  “Stop lying to yourself,” her brother said, and he sounded disgusted. I wondered whether it was with his sister, or with himself. Suddenly, I could not bear to listen any longer. I stepped quickly and quietly into an adjoining chamber. Crossing to the window, I opened it and leaned out to catch the wind. Beyond the river the distant hills still looked winter bare: ocher, mauve, bone pale beneath the wind-driven sky, and I shivered at the touch of the cold air through my summer shirt.

  Clouds massed at the edge of the Attraith. Sereth's footsteps vanished down the hall; she was running. I took a deep breath of air that promised rain, and went in search of Morrac.

  He was lying back on the ancient couch with a book across his knees. He opened one eye as I came through the door; it held a sensual, speculative look. Arguments aroused him; it didn't matter who it was with.

  “How's your sister?” he asked me, amicably enough. I leaned over and raised the book: it was some inconsequential drama. How appropriate, I thought. It seemed to sum up our relationship admirably.

  “She's not too bad,” I said. “She says she hasn't had any more fits, anyway, which is a relief.”

  “Surely you don't think she's cured?”

  “Well, no, but at least she's not having those seizures.”

  “You should have left her at Aidi Mordha, Eleres.”

  “Morrac, why is Mevennen having fits not better than Mevennen having no fits?”

  He shrugged. “I'd have thought that was obvious.”

  “Not to me,” I said coldly.

  Slowly, Morrac said, “Eleres, I know how you feel about Mevennen. I know you're very fond of her, but—”

  “Fond of her? I love her; she's my sister. You make it sound as though she were some kind of pet!”

  “I know how much you love her, then. But you know very well your family should have done something about Mevennen when she first came home,” he said patiently, as if reasoning with an idiot. “And if she's started having seizures, then it might be a sign that she's dying at last and you'll be well rid of her.”

  I stared at him, trying to swallow my fury. “You've never liked her,” I said.

  “No, I never have, and there's a very good reason for that.

  She's ill. It isn't her fault, but it really would have been kinder to have put an end to her long ago.”

  “Morrac—”

  “We are a certain type of creature, Eleres. We can't afford to tolerate weakness; this world is too harsh and hard for that. That's why the world gave us the bloodmind, after all; made us into predators. Do you like to see your sister as she is?”

  “Of course not. But we're not animals, Morrac. Not all the time. Other people might turn on their own but I won't. I think we have to try to be more than we are—more than our natures dictate.”

  “Why should we?” He did not like what I was saying; I could see it in his face. “I know you've thought
about killing her. You have, haven't you?”

  “Just because I feel something, however strongly, doesn't necessarily mean I have to act on it.”

  “Oh, stop pretending to be something you're not, Eleres. You're afraid of yourself, that's your problem.” But as he reached out for the nearby water jug, I could see that his hand was shaking, and I remembered the conversation that I had overheard.

  “Who's afraid now?” I asked him. Our eyes met, and his gaze was the first to fall away.

  9. The mission

  “It was some kind of image, of course,” Bel said, absently rubbing the fading scar along her calf. “A hologram, perhaps.”

  “At the time I could have sworn it was a damn demon,” Shu said, with feeling. They were sitting on the steps of the aircar, in illusory safety, with the vista of the caldera spread before them.

  “Maybe it's some sort of defense mechanism,” Bel said.

  “I think you may be right. One look at that and you wouldn't stick around, would you? But what was it supposed to be? I'm familiar with a whole range of cultural images from my folklore research and I've never seen anything like that before.”

  “It looked like some kind of demon. Like you said.” Bel shivered.

  “Perhaps that's what it was. Something from someone's imagination.” Shu paused, gazing out across the ruins and their secrets, then turned to Bel. The girl's amber braids and gilded skin were now a uniform beige beneath a coat of dust, and her dark eyes were swollen and rimmed with red. Despite the chill, there were damp patches spreading beneath the armpits of her jacket. Doubtless, Shu thought with sympathy, she probably looked a whole lot worse herself. “How's your leg?”

  “All right. I strained it, running. Look, Shu, I suppose we should go back in there but to be quite honest, I'd rather wait a bit.”