The apartment they had given him was near the roof level of one of Aquime City’s central galleries. One set of rooms looked out across the city to the inland sea. The other side of the suite, like this glazed lobby outside, looked down into the gallery itself.
Aquime’s altitude and consequently cold winters meant that a lot of the life of the city took place indoors rather than out, and as a result what would have been ordinary streets in a more temperate city, open to the sky, here were galleries, roofed-over streets vaulted with anything from antique glass to force fields. It was possible to walk from one end of the city to the other under cover and wearing summer clothes, even when, as now, there was a blizzard blowing.
Free of the driving snow that was bringing visibility down to a few metres, the view from the apartment’s exterior was delicately impressive. The city had been built in a deliberately archaic style, mostly from stone. The buildings were red and blonde and grey and pink, and the slates covering the steeply pitched roofs were various shades of green and blue. Long tapering fingers of forest penetrated the city almost to its heart, bringing further greens and blues into play and—with the galleries—dicing the city into irregular blocks and shapes.
A few kilometres in the distance, the docks and canals would glitter under a morning sun. Spinward of those, on a gentle slope of ridge rising to the outskirts of the city, Quilan could, when it was clear, see the tall buttresses and towers of the ornately decorated apartment building which contained the home of Mahrai Ziller.
~ So could we just go and walk into his apartment?
~ No. He got somebody to make him locks when he heard I was coming. Apparently this was mildly scandalous.
~ Well, we could have locks, too.
~ I think it better not to.
~ Thought you might.
~ We wouldn’t want it to look like I have something to hide.
~ That would never do.
Quilan swung open a window, letting the sounds of the gallery into the apartment. He heard tinkling water, people talking and laughing, birdsong and music.
He watched drones and people in float harnesses waft by beneath him but above the other humans, saw people in an apartment on the other side of the gallery wave—he waved back almost without thinking—and smelled perfumes and the scent of cooking.
He looked up at the roof, which was not glass but some other more perfectly transparent material—he supposed he could have asked his little pen-terminal to find out exactly what it was, but he had not bothered—and he listened in vain for any sound of the storm swirling and blowing outside.
~ They do love their little insulated existence, don’t they?
~ Yes, they do.
He remembered a gallery not so dissimilar to this, in Shaunesta, on Chel. It was before they had married, about a year after they had met. They had been walking hand-in-hand, and had stopped to look in a jeweller’s window. He had gazed in casually enough at all the finery, and wondered if he might buy something for her. Then he’d heard her making this little noise, a sort of appreciative but barely audible, “Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm.”
At first he’d assumed she was making the noise for his amusement. It had taken him a few moments to realise that not only was she not doing that, but she was not aware that she was making the noise at all.
He realised this and suddenly felt as though his heart would burst with joy and love; he turned, swept her into his arms and hugged her, laughing at the surprised, confused, blinkingly happy look on her face.
~ Quil?
~ Sorry. Yes.
Somebody laughed on the gallery floor below; a high, throaty, female laugh, unrestrained and pure. He heard it echo round the hard surfaces of the closed-in street, remembering a place where there were no echoes at all.
They’d got drunk the night before they left; Estodien Visquile with his extended entourage including the bulky, white-furred Eweirl, and he. He had to be helped from his bed the next morning by a laughing Eweirl. A drenching under a cold shower just about brought him round, then he was taken straight to the VTOL, then to the field with the sub-orbital, then to Equator Launch City, where a commercial flight hoisted them to a small Orbiter. A demilled ex-Navy privateer was waiting. They’d left the system headed for deep space before his hangover started to abate, and he realised that he had been selected as the one to do whatever it was he had to do, and remembered what had happened the night before.
They were in an old mess hall, decorated in an antique style with the heads of various prey animals adorning three of the walls; the fourth wall of glass doors opened onto a narrow terrace which looked out to sea. There was a warm wind blowing and the doors were all opened, bringing the smell of the ocean into the bar. Two Blinded Invisible servants dressed in white trousers and jackets attended them, bringing the various strengths of fermented and distilled liquors a traditional drinking binge required.
The food was sparse and salty, again as dictated by tradition. Toasts were proposed, drinking games indulged in, and Eweirl and another of the party, who seemed nearly as well built as the white-furred male, balanced their way along the wall of the terrace from one end to the other, with the two-hundred-metre drop to one side. The other male went first; Eweirl went one better by stopping halfway along and downing a cup of spirit.
Quilan drank the minimum required, wondering quite what it was all in aid of and suspecting that even this apparent celebration was part of a test. He tried not to be too much of a wet blanket, and joined in several of the drinking games with a forced heartiness he thought must easily be seen through.
The night wore on. Gradually people went off to their curl-pads. After a while, only Visquile, Eweirl and he were left, served by the larger of the two Invisibles, a male even bulkier than Eweirl who manoeuvred his way amongst the tables with surprising adroitness, his green-banded head swinging this way and that and his white clothes making him look like a ghost in the dim light.
Eweirl tripped him up a couple of times, on the second occasion causing him to drop a tray of glasses. When this happened Eweirl put his head back and laughed loudly. Visquile looked on like the indulgent parent of a spoiled child. The big servant apologised and felt his way to the bar to bring back a dustpan and broom.
Eweirl sank another cup of spirit and watched the servant lift a table out of the way one-handed. He challenged him to an arm-wrestling contest. The Invisible declined, so Eweirl ordered him to take part, which eventually he did, and won.
Eweirl was left panting with exertion; the big Invisible put his jacket back on, inclined his green-banded head, and resumed his duties.
Quilan was slumped in his curl-seat watching events with one eye closed. Eweirl did not look happy that the servant had won the contest. He drank some more. Estodien Visquile, who did not seem very drunk at all, asked Quilan some questions about his wife, his military career, his family and his beliefs. Quilan remembered trying not to appear evasive. Eweirl watched the big Invisible go about his duties, his white-furred body looking tensed and coiled.
“They might find the ship yet, Quil,” the Estodien told him. “There may still be wreckage. The Culture; their consciences. Helping us look for the lost ships. It might turn up yet. Not her, of course. She is quite lost. The gone-before say there is no sign, no hint of her Soulkeeper having worked. But we might yet find the ship, and know more of what happened.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “She is dead. That’s all that matters. Nothing else. I don’t care about anything else.”
“Not even your own survival after death, Quilan?” the Estodien asked.
“That least of all. I don’t want to survive. I want to die. I want to be as she is. No more. Nothing more. Ever again.”
The Estodien nodded silently, his eyelids drooping, a small smile playing across his face. He glanced at Eweirl. Quilan looked too.
The white-furred male had quietly changed seats. He waited until the big Invisible was approaching, then stood up suddenly in his path
. The servant collided with him, spilling three cups of spirit over Eweirl’s waistcoat.
“You clumsy fuck! Can’t you see where you’re going?”
“I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t know you’d moved.” The servant offered Eweirl a cloth from his waistband.
Eweirl knocked it away. “I don’t want your rag!” he screamed. “I said, can’t you see where you’re going?” He picked at the lower edge of the green band covering the other male’s eyes. The big Invisible flinched instinctively, pulling back. Eweirl had hooked a leg behind him; he stumbled and fell and Eweirl went down with him in a flurry of crashing glasses and tumbling chairs.
Eweirl staggered to his feet and jerked the big male after him. “Attack me, would you? Attack me, would you?” he yelled. He had pulled the servant’s jacket down across his shoulders and over his arms so that he was half helpless, though the servant anyway did not seem to be putting up any fight. He stood impassively as Eweirl screamed at him.
Quilan didn’t like this. He looked at Visquile, but the Estodien was looking on tolerantly. Quilan pushed himself up from the table they were curled at. The Estodien put a hand on his arm, but he pulled it away.
“Traitor!” Eweirl bellowed at the Invisible. “Spy!” He pulled the servant round and pushed him this way and that; the big male crashed into tables and chairs, staggering and nearly falling, unable to save himself with his trapped arms, each time using what leverage he had from his midlimb to fend off the unseen obstacles.
Quilan started to make his way round the table. He tripped over a chair and had to fall across the table to avoid hitting the floor. Eweirl was spinning and pushing the Invisible, trying to disorient him or make him dizzy as well as get him to fall over. “Right!” he shouted in the servant’s ear. “I’m taking you to the cells!” Quilan pushed himself away from the table.
Eweirl held the servant before him and started marching not to the double doors which led from the bar but towards the terrace doors. The servant went uncomplainingly at first, then must have regained his sense of direction or maybe just smelled or heard the sea and felt the open air on his fur, because he pushed back and started to say something in protest.
Quilan was trying to get in front of Eweirl and the Invisible, to intercept them. He was a few metres to the side now, feeling his way round the tables and chairs.
Eweirl reached up with one hand, pulled the green eye-band down—so that for an instant Quilan could see the Invisible’s two empty sockets—and forced it over the servant’s mouth. Then he whipped the other male’s legs from under him and while he was still trying to stagger back to his feet ran him out across the terrace to the wall and up-ended the Invisible over the top and into the night.
He stood there, breathing heavily, as Quilan came stumbling up to his side. They both looked over. There was a dim white ruff of surf round the base of the seastack. After a moment Quilan could see the pale shape of the tiny falling figure, outlined against the dark sea. After a moment more, the faint sound of a scream floated up to them. The white figure joined the surf with no visible splash and the scream stopped a few moments later.
“Clumsy,” Eweirl said. He wiped some spittle from around his mouth. He smiled at Quilan, then looked troubled and shook his head. “Tragic,” he said. “High spirits.” He put one hand on Quilan’s shoulder. “High jinks, eh?” He reached out and brought Quilan into a hug, pressing him hard into his chest. Quilan tried to push away, but the other male was too strong. They swayed, close to the wall and the drop. The other male’s lips were at his ear. “Do you think he wanted to die, Quil? Hmm, Quilan? Hmm? Do you think he wanted to die? Do you?”
“I don’t know,” Quilan mumbled, finally being allowed to use his midlimb to push himself away. He stood looking up at the white-furred male. He felt more sober now. He was half terrified, half careless. “I know you killed him,” he said, and immediately thought that he might die too, now. He thought about taking up the classical defensive position, but didn’t.
Eweirl smiled and looked back at Visquile, who still sat where he had been throughout. “Tragic accident,” Eweirl said. The Estodien spread his hands. Eweirl held onto the wall to stop himself swaying, and waved at Quilan. “Tragic accident.”
Quilan felt suddenly dizzy, and sat down. The view started to disappear at the edges. “Leaving us too?” he heard Eweirl inquire. Then nothing till the morning.
“You chose me, then?”
“You chose yourself, Major.”
He and Visquile sat in the privateer’s lounge area. Along with Eweirl, they were the only people aboard. The ship had its own AI, albeit an uncommunicative one. Visquile claimed not to know the craft’s orders, or its destination.
Quilan drank slowly; a restorative laced with anti-hangover chemicals. It was working, though it might have worked more quickly.
“And what Eweirl did to the Blinded Invisible?”
Visquile shrugged. “What happened was unfortunate. These accidents happen when people drink freely.”
“It was murder, Estodien.”
“That would be impossible to prove, Major. Personally I was, like the unfortunate concerned, unsighted at the time.” He smiled. Then the smile faded. “Besides, Major, I think you’ll find Called-To-Arms Eweirl has a certain latitude in such matters.” He reached out and patted Quilan’s hand. “You must not concern yourself with the unhappy incident any further.”
Quilan spent a lot of time in the ship’s gym. Eweirl did, too, though they exchanged few words. Quilan had little he wanted to say to the other male, and Eweirl didn’t seem to care. They worked and hauled and pulled and ran and sweated and panted and dust-bathed and showered alongside each other, but barely acknowledged the other’s presence. Eweirl wore earplugs and a visor, and sometimes laughed as he exercised, or made growling, appreciative noises.
Quilan ignored him.
He was brushing the dust-bath off one day when a bead of sweat dropped from his face and spotted in the dust like a globule of dirty mercury, rolling into the hollow by his feet. They had mated once in a dust-bath, on their honeymoon. A droplet of her sweet sweat had fallen into the grey fines just so, rolling with a fluid silky grace down the soft indentation they had created.
He was suddenly aware he had made a keening, moaning noise. He looked out at Eweirl in the main body of the gym, hoping he would not have heard, but the white-furred male had taken his plugs and visor off, and was looking at him, grinning.
The privateer rendezvoused with something after five days’ travel. The ship went very quiet and moved oddly, as though it was on solid ground but being slid around from side to side. There were thudding noises, then hisses, then most of the remaining noise of the craft died. Quilan sat in his little cabin and tried accessing the exterior views on his screens; nothing. He tried the navigation information, but that had been closed off too. He had never before lamented the fact that ships had no windows or portholes.
He found Visquile on the ship’s small and elegantly spare bridge, taking a data clip from the craft’s manual controls and slipping it into his robes. The few data screens still live on the bridge winked out.
“Estodien?” Quilan asked.
“Major,” Visquile said. He patted Quilan on the elbow. “We’re hitching a ride.” He held up a hand as Quilan opened his mouth to ask where to. “It’s best if you don’t ask with whom or to where, Major, because I’m not able to tell you.” He smiled. “Just pretend we’re still under way using our own power. That’s easiest. You needn’t worry; we’re very secure in here. Very secure indeed.” He touched midlimb to midlimb. “See you at dinner.”
Another twenty days passed. He became even fitter. He studied ancient histories of the Involveds. Then one day he woke and the ship was suddenly loud about him. He turned on the cabin screen and saw space ahead. The navigation screens were still unavailable, but he looked all about the ship’s exterior views through the different sensors and viewing angles and didn’t recognise anything until he saw
a fuzzy Y shape and knew they were somewhere on the outskirts of the galaxy, near the Clouds.
Whatever had brought them here in only twenty days must be much faster than their own ships. He wondered about that.
The privateer craft was held in a bubble of vacuum within a vast blue-green space. A wobbling limb of atmosphere three metres in diameter flowed slowly out to meet with their outer airlock. On the far side of the tube floated something like a small airship.
The air was briefly cold as they walked through, turning gradually warmer as they approached the airship. The atmosphere felt thick. Underneath their feet, the tunnel of air seemed as pliantly firm as wood. He carried his own modest luggage; Eweirl toted two immense kit bags as though they were purses, and Visquile was followed by a civilian drone carrying his bags.
The airship was about forty metres long; a single giant ellipsoid in dark purple, its smooth-looking envelope of skin lined with long yellow strakes of frill which rippled slowly in the warm air like the mantle of a fish. The tube led the three Chelgrians to a small gondola slung underneath the vessel.
The gondola looked like something grown rather than constructed, like the hollowed-out husk of an immense fruit; it appeared to have no windows until they climbed aboard, making the ship tip gently, but gauzy panels let in light and made the smooth interior glow with a pastel-green light. It held them comfortably. The tube of air dissipated behind them as the gondola’s door irised shut.
Eweirl popped his earplugs in and put on his visor, sitting back, seemingly oblivious. Visquile sat with his silvery stave planted between his feet, the round top under his chin, gazing ahead through one of the gauzy windows.
Quilan had only the vaguest idea where he was. He had seen the gigantic, slowly revolving elongated 8-shaped object ahead of them for several hours before they’d rendezvoused. The privateer ship had closed very slowly, seemingly on emergency thrust alone, and the thing—the world, as he was now starting to think of it, having come to a rough estimate of its size—had just kept getting bigger and bigger and rilling more and more of the view ahead, yet without betraying any detail.
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