by Liz Williams
Rubirosa and I watched our own swift demise in the reflective window of the viewport as the array hurled us into haunt-space. Since neither of us were trained pilots in this particular realm, all we could do was remain in our chairs, paralysed, dead, as the aftergone of the Eldritch Realm swirled around us. We shot through entire histories: mutant faces from the Memnos Matriarchy and the Age of Children, hands clawing at the sides of our craft as we passed by, beings striding beyond the perimeters of vision, unguessable, unknown. Sometimes, I knew, they became weary of the constant transgression and seized a ship: there were a lot of lost vessels in haunt-space. But we were not one of them. With a shudder and a gasp and a cry we hurtled out of the other end of the Chain. Rubirosa and I were reanimated under Earth’s moon and Earth lay below.
As we reappeared, so did the representation of the array. She emerged with a shriek, spinning wildly. Her limbs were contorted and blood arced out into the air, to spatter through me. I didn’t need her presence to tell me that the ship was in trouble. Earth swung up below, a wheeling azure ball. A scatter of lights skeined down darkside. Rubirosa swore.
‘Moonstation requesting add-on destination codes!’ the array shrieked, and tore her hair.
At this rate,’ Rubirosa unnecessarily informed me, ‘we might as well give them all of them. Since we’ll be coming down in bits.’
‘We need to head for Ropa. My mother should have sent the coordinates through.’
I was still trying to process everything that Sulie had said to me and it didn’t make easy processing. Go to Earth, to Ropa. There are people there, servants of the Centipede Queen. Tell them she's missing, if they don’t already know. And when I’d asked – Who are these people? What are they doing there? – because I’d known that the Queen had come from Malay, on the other side of the planet from drowned Ropa – she’d told me that they were a research team.
And they’d been hired to look for demotheas. Matters were beginning to knit together, into a pattern that I did not like the look of.
I didn’t have time to think about this now. The ship was starting to shake, a deep through-the-bone shuddering that I’d felt once before, on a flyer stricken above the mountains just outside Winterstrike. We’d crashed then, but we’d been flying low and over trees. This time, after all, I’d only just been reanimated, on our re-entry from haunt-space. I didn’t fancy going back into the aftergone quite so soon.
The array was still screaming. I slammed a hand down onto the console and shut her off, taking the ship back onto manual. It was no comfort to know that I’d only ever done this before on simulators from this altitude. I hauled the ship around out of the path of a satellite station, looming up in front, keyed in a hopeful-but-optimistic re-entry angle and took the ship down. There was a ripping sound from behind me, and a moment later I saw a fragment of nacelle fall away and spin planetwards.
Someone said, ‘Best let me do it.’
Rubirosa said, ‘Who the fuck are you?’
I turned, to find myself staring into the flayed face of the Library.
‘You’re back!’ – to the Library. And to Rubirosa, And you can see her!’
‘Haunt-space,’ the Library said modestly, ‘seems to agree with me. You can see me because this is a haunt-vessel. I’m linked into its array. What’s left of it.’ She passed a sinewed hand over the console and the manual array flickered in its wake. Rubirosa was still gaping.
‘But my armour—’ she began.
‘I reasoned with it,’ the Library said.
I said, ‘This is the Library of Caud.’
‘What, all of it?’
‘No,’ the Library said, modestly. ‘Just an archive.’
‘Some archive,’ Rubirosa said, impressed.
Earth was a lot closer now. We were flying in over darkside and the ship was still screaming and shaking, but at least it was remaining intact. The Library’s hands were a blur: representation only. Her essence was inside the array; I could see the codes whipping through her half-solid flesh, like the wounds displayed by an excissiere.
I was familiar with Earth from viewcasts, of course, but it was the old atlas at Calmaretto that came most readily to mind, the skeins and patterns of islands, the fractured lands between. There, a patch of white that had to be the Thibetan island shamandoms, running all the way up through the Siberian Sea. Here, the ridges of the Americas, barriering the Atlan Ocean.
I turned to the Library. ‘Where are we due to land?’ Might as well be optimistic.
There,’ the Library said, and pointed to a shimmer of white peaks.
‘Isn’t that Ropa, there?’ Rubirosa asked. ‘The whole continent’s nothing but a swamp.’
‘Fine with me,’ I said. Swamps sounded soft. We were out of darkside now and flying lower, curving around the world. The ochre splash of the Dahomey lands was beneath us, the mountain cones rising out of shallow seas, scattered with the white spires of the great cities of Afrique. Possibly just as well that the Library didn’t plan to land us there; I wasn’t sure where the Afriquenne Matriarchies stood with Mars.
But politics weren’t my main preoccupation right now. Earth was coming up fast. The Library said, ‘Excuse me,’ and vanished in a rush of data into the array. We shot over sandbanks and long, snaking rivers, over deserted shorelines and low ranges of hilly islands that looked as if another tide would submerge them completely. The viewport was partly obscured by smoke and I realized this was coming from us.
The Library reappeared, no more than a shadow.
‘Controls!’ she ordered. ‘Go to manual!’ and I grabbed the flight control and tried to glide. This was not completely unsuccessful. We spun, once, causing curses from Rubirosa and a stream of instructions from the Library that, unfortunately, I failed to understand. We flipped again, hung briefly over the uprushing world and then crashlanded, right side up, in a morass of reed and water and peat.
The silence was deafening and brief. A moment later, the haunt-array kicked back in with a shriek. The Library strolled over to her, walking easily on the tilted floor, and took the spirit by the arms. Then she folded her neatly down into a little smoking pill and swallowed her whole. I think this unnerved me more than the crash.
That’s better,’ the Library said. ‘They don’t like releasing information, sometimes. Had a hard job getting it out of her on the way in.’
‘Where are we?’ Rubirosa asked. The viewport was too mired in black spatters of peat for me to be able to see out, so I disentangled myself from my seat and lurched down to the hatch, holding on to the console as I did so and discovering several new areas of injury: bruised ribs, a banged shin and several cuts where my knuckles had met the surface of the array. I could not have cared less; I felt lucky to be alive.
The hatch was stuck. I kicked it, and nearly fell into the marsh.
‘How safe is this thing?’ I shouted to the Library. From the pungent scent of burning, not very. Rubirosa joined me at the hatch and together we helped one another down onto a reed bed. The ship shuddered: it was starting to sink. A thick column of black smoke was rising from its side and spiralling up into a pale grey sky. Rubirosa and I hobbled along the reed bed as fast as we could. My concern now was not just that the ship might blow, but also the kind of attention we’d attracted on the way down: I didn’t have a clear idea of Earth’s regulations but unauthorized ship, lack of proper permits, forced re-entry, crashlanding did not inspire me with confidence. It didn’t bode well for the ultimate success of our hastily planned mission, either.
‘Bit bleak,’ said Rubirosa, leaping nimbly across to a causeway. She was right. The saltmarsh extended as far as the horizon: a labyrinth of reed beds and causeways, which might or might not have been human-made. As far as the eye could see lay a wilderness of silver-grey water, the reeds bleached fawn, with frothy plumes like smoke, and the black crumbling earth rising low out of the water. The air smelled of salt and wet and rot. There was no sign of any habitation.
‘How lon
g does this go on for?’ Rubirosa asked the Library, clearly underwhelmed.
A thousand miles, maybe? Perhaps more. This has changed a little since I last took data in.’
‘This is the north of the northern hemisphere, yes?’
‘Yes. A great centre of civilization, once. Cities and spaceports and all.’
I balanced on a narrow strip of earth and looked down into the swirling water. Not far away, a startled flock of birds flew up from the reeds, black against the pale sky. From the position of the sun, which was low, this felt like mid- to late afternoon, but I could not be sure. And of those cities, now?’
‘They say their bells toll under the waves,’ the Library said. ‘That if you look down at low tide, you can see roads and towers. There’s the ruin of a great city a little further to the north. But the tides took almost everything, over centuries. Folk moved east to the more developed lands. Here, they were too proud, so it’s said, to take action. In the east, people were more accustomed to disaster.’
I stared into the water and thought of cities. ‘Is anyone likely to come after us?’ I asked. Apart from Gennera, that is. ‘We must have violated any number of laws.’
‘I’m not aware of any broadcasts,’ the Library said. ‘But whoever was after you is unlikely to give up.’
‘We’ll have been pretty visible,’ Rubirosa agreed. She looked back to where the roof of the ship was still visible, but only barely. The smoke was finally dissipating, smearing the air.
‘Better keep walking,’ I told her.
By early evening neither the ship nor the smoke from the crash was visible. I was growing very tired of saltmarsh. But the sky had stayed empty: only a very faint contrail, far above, as some vessel sought orbit. No one had come looking, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. I hoped they’d assume we’d died, but if I’d been in their position, I wouldn’t have assumed a thing.
I was also growing more and more certain that the causeways had been made by sentient beings. They seemed too regular, too straight. The Library, when consulted, confessed that she did not know. I pointed out the interwoven mesh of reeds, so tightly and carefully twined together that it made a strong floating base for the causeway. ‘That isn’t natural,’ I said.
‘Doesn’t mean a human made it,’ Rubirosa pointed out.
‘What else?’
‘Earth is full of the Changed.’ The marauder spoke with an authority that irritated me. ‘Many water people – the kappa, the deinah, the phine. A big thing in engineering, once – they wanted to make sure people would cope with the water levels.’
I thought back to my own dry Mars and shuddered. There, the Small Sea was the largest sea and all this water made me feel weak at the bone. I said as much. And I couldn’t help thinking about demotheas, too.
‘Do any of these amphibious folk live here?’
‘I don’t know,’ Rubirosa said, uneasy. ‘But this has to lead somewhere.’
And indeed, it did.
TWENTY-THREE
Hestia — Earth
It was as though the village manifested out of thin air: one moment the saltmarsh was empty apart from the desolate call of birds and the slight slosh of water, the next, we were on the edge of a settlement of round huts. I pulled Rubirosa behind a wall, which seconds before had resembled a bank of reeds. The Library walked on, fading as she did so. I could smell smoke over the salt-and-bullrush odour of the marsh.
‘Where’s she gone?’ Rubirosa murmured. Her hand showed the tips of weapons.
‘I don’t know—’ but a minute later, the Library was back, striding stiffly out of the air.
‘There,’ I said.
‘Where?’
‘I’ll speak to your armour,’ the Library said, with what might have been a sigh. A moment later, Rubirosa took a step back and said, ‘All right, I can see you now. What have you found?’
‘No one’s home.’
‘What? Nobody?’
The Library shook her grim head. ‘It’s deserted. Can’t have been that long ago, though.’
There’s smoke,’ I said.
‘More than that,’ said the Library. ‘There’s food on tables.’
Cautiously, we followed her into the settlement’s one and only street: a narrow lane between the huts, ending in a perimeter wall that, curiously, ran along only one side.
‘Maybe they’re all out hunting,’ Rubirosa said, doubtful.
‘Maybe they’re hiding,’ I said aloud, and wished I hadn’t. Whoever had built the settlement had done so with some degree of expertise: the walls of the huts were tightly woven from reed and the roof beams, which were a mixture of wood and metal, fitted snugly. But they were still primitive in design. A central hole lay above a firepit in each hut and the furniture was basic, consisting mainly of low tables, also woven, baskets, and blankets that seemed mainly to consist of reed pith and feathers.
‘Know anything about the people here?’ Rubirosa asked the Library.
‘Nothing at all. They lived like this on Earth, in the ages before the ages. Before the Flood. Or so it’s told.’ Which meant ‘no’ too, when all was said and done. I glanced out of the doorway behind us.
‘I don’t think we should stay here. It’s not far from dark.’ Already the sun was a low yellow smear over the marshes and the air was humming with insects. I slapped a biting fly away from my face and more took its place. If we did find somewhere else to camp, I thought, we’d have to light a fire or be eaten alive.
‘I agree,’ Rubirosa said. ‘It’s all very well for you.’ She nodded in the direction of the Library. ‘You’re not real.’
The Library’s face might almost have betrayed hurt. ‘I am as real as you!’
‘I just heard something,’ I said. Rubirosa and the Library fell silent. A thin, distant scratching came from beyond the hut.
‘Beetles?’ Rubirosa said.
‘Go. Now!’ But we were too late. As I stepped through the doorway of the hut, shapes were rising out of the ground in the twilight, short squat forms which did not move like humans, or smell like them.
‘Kappa,’ the Library said. Damp webbed hands caught me by the wrists and twisted back my arms with surprising strength. Rubirosa’s armour flared and, hissing, extinguished itself. The kappa were all around, murmuring in soft, angry voices. Someone struck me in the face with what felt like a handful of wet moss, a pungent, astringent odour. My knees buckled then, and I went down.
When I came round again, it was completely dark and my wrists and ankles were shackled. After a moment, my eyes adjusted, but all I could see was earth, a low peat ceiling. I could hear the kappa not far away, talking among themselves: the Library might have been able to understand them, but I could not. At that thought, the Library was at my side.
‘Sorry,’ the warrior said. ‘Can’t do much with low tech.’
‘I don’t expect you to,’ I whispered in reply. ‘Where’s Rubirosa?’
‘In another room. We’re underground, in case you hadn’t worked that out. Of course, the kappa live primarily in burrows. I should have remembered.’
‘It would have been helpful,’ I said, but I found it difficult to blame her.
‘There’s not a lot I can do,’ the Library repeated. ‘They’re scavengers, as far as I can see. Bits of passing ships seem to be incorporated into the architecture.’
‘Bits of wrecked ships, you mean.’
There’s an old antiscribe,’ the warrior went on, as though I had not spoken, ‘and a couple of devices I’m not familiar with. Might be weapons. Might be food-mixers. I can’t activate either of them, in any case.’
I sighed, nodding in the direction of my bound limbs to indicate that I’d make a start in trying to free myself. The Library melted away. I tugged and twisted and achieved nothing. One of the kappa came to stand over me. There was no expression of triumph over an enemy in its large, liquid eyes: only a melting sadness.
‘What’s your name?’ I asked. ‘Can you free me? I am
a friend of the Queen.’ Not strictly true, but worth a try. I’d made a stab at the patois tongue of Earth, but the kappa just continued to stare at me, uncomprehending. Then there was a sudden sound from outside the chamber, a kind of rippling wail. The kappa stumped off, leaving me alone in the dim room.
I started working at the bonds again. Squinting down, I thought they were reed pith, a stretchy, tough substance. Angling myself up against the wall, I pulled my bound feet through my arms, so that I could get at my wrists with my teeth. Several minutes of determined chewing ensued. The pith tasted disgusting, like rotting weed. After a while, a bitterness seeped out over my tongue and my mouth became numb, which was a mercy because it meant that I could no longer taste anything properly. I kept listening as best I could. There were faint sounds from beyond the chamber, rustling, and voices.
Finally, with a tug, the bonds separated and my wrists were free. I set to work on the shackles around my ankles, tearing at the pith with what was left of my nails. At last this, too, came free and I got off the bed and stood up. There was nothing in the room that would serve as a weapon, but there were two blankets. A hasty arrangement gave one of them the vague impression of a huddled figure, not that I thought this would fool the kappa. The Changed on both worlds were different, not stupid, no matter what many folk believed.
Cautiously, I peered around the door. The chamber led into a rough earth corridor, with white roots snaking through the ceiling. Primitive, but it was dry and did not smell unpleasant. I suppose there were worse boltholes. I slipped down to the next doorway and found Rubirosa stripped of her armour and pinned to a bench, rather as I had been, with bonds of plant material. The door was open. I went in and freed her hands.
‘They’ve taken the armour,’ Rubirosa hissed, once she’d got rid of the gag that blocked her mouth. She sat up, dressed in a thermal tunic and leggings, also dark red. ‘Bloody stupid. They can’t know what to do with it. They can’t know what it is.’
