The Snow Queen

11

“You travel awfully light. You sure you’re going to get all the way to Carbuncle from here, with nothing but the clothes on your back?” Ngenet pressed a long finger into the lock on the hovercraft’s door while Moon stood looking out over the harbor. They had covered the distance from Neith in hours instead of days. Her knees were weak with the unbelievable fact of her presence in this distant place.

“What?… Oh, I’ll be all right. I’ll crew with some trader from here — there must be a hundred ships in this bay!” Shotover Bay would have swallowed the harbor at Neith, and the village, and half of the island, with no trouble. The setting suns broke through clouds, scattered chips of ruby across the water surface; ships of all sizes rode high on the tide’s flow. Some had an alien ness of form that she couldn’t put a name to. Some were mast less she wondered whether they had been caught in a storm.

“A lot of Winter ships use engines, you know. A lot of them don’t even use sail at all. Will they take you on?” Ngenet’s brusque questioning tapped her on the shoulder again, as she suddenly understood why there were no masts. During their arrow’s flight across the sea she had not learned much about him except that he didn’t like to talk about himself; but his curt inquiries about her journey told her more than he knew.

“I’m not afraid of engines. And the work will be the same; there’s only so much you can do on a ship.” She smiled, hoping it was true. She ran her hand along the hovercraft’s chill metal skin, struggling against the fresh awareness that it could have taken her to Sparks in less than a day… Her smile faded.

“Well, you just make sure you find yourself a ship run by females. Some of the Winter men have picked up bad habits from the star port scum.”

“I don’t — Oh.” She nodded, remembering why her grandmother had told her to stay off the traders’ ships. “I’ll do that.” Even though she was certain that Ngenet was an off worlder he spoke as if his people meant no more to him than Summers or Winters seemed to. She hadn’t asked him why; she was no longer afraid of his surliness, but she wasn’t ready to impose on it. “And I want to thank—”

He frowned across the harbor at the sunset. “No time for that. I’m half a day late for this meeting as it is. So you just—”

“Hey, honey cake ditch that old man an’ let us show you a good time!” One of the two Winter males who had been weaving toward them along the quay angled closer, grinning appreciatively, arms out. But as she reached for a biting reply Moon saw his expression change. He pulled his companion into a precarious veer away, muttered something close to the other’s ear. They hurried on, looking back.

“H-how did they know?” Moon’s hands pressed against her slicker front.

“Know what?” The frown was still on Ngenet’s face, etching deeper, as he watched them go.

“That I’m a sibyl.” She reached down inside and brought the trefoil out on its chain.

“You’re a what?” He turned back to her, actually took the trefoil into his hands as if he had to prove its reality. He dropped it again, hastily. “Why didn’t you tell me that?”

“Well, I didn’t… I mean, I—”

“That settles it.” He wasn’t listening. “You’re not staying here alone overnight. You can come with me; Elsie’ll understand.” His hand closed around her upper arm; he pulled her after him across the expanse of paving toward the quay’s town side

“Where are we going? Wait!” Moon stumbled after him with impotent anger as he strode toward the nearest street entrance. She saw light blossom at the top of a slender pole, and then another and another ahead of them, immense flame less candles. “I don’t understand.” She dropped her voice, “Do you believe in the Lady?”

“No, but I believe in you.” He guided them onto a sidewalk.

“You’re an off worlder

“That’s right, I am.”

“But, I thought—”

“Don’t ask, just walk. There’s nothing strange about it.” He let go of her arm; she kept up with him.

“Aren’t you afraid of me, then?”

He shook his head. “Just don’t fall down and skin your knee, or I might worry some.” She looked at him blankly.

Behind them another hovercraft, with the markings of the Hegemonic Police, drifted down toward a landing on the quay. But he did not look back, and so he did not see it settle beside his own.

“Where are we going?” Moon maneuvered around a cluster of laughing sailors.

“To meet a friend.”

“A woman friend? Won’t she mind—”

“It’s business, not pleasure. Just mind your own when we get there.”

Moon shrugged, and pushed her numbing hands into the pockets of her pants. She could see their breath now, as the temperature followed the sun down. She peered curiously into the assortment of one — and two-story building fronts, more buildings than she had ever seen in one place, but stolidly familiar in form. Mortared stone and wood planking leaned on each other for support, and among them she saw an occasional wall made of something that was not really dried mud. Multiple layers of exotic noise reached out to catch at her ears as they passed by one tavern after another. “How did they know what I was, if you didn’t, Ngenet?”

“Call me Miroe. I don’t think they did. I think they probably just noticed that I was a lot bigger and a hell of a lot more sober than either one of them.”

“Hm.” Moon fingered the scaling knife at her belt thoughtfully; she felt the knots go out of her back muscles as she realized that the eyes of everyone passing were not staying on her too often and too long.

Ngenet turned down a narrow side street; they stopped at last before a small, isolated tavern. Light rainbowed out onto the cobbles through colored glass; the peeling painted sign above the door read The Black Deeds Inn. He grunted. “Elsie always did have a peculiar sense of humor.” Moon noticed a second sign that read Closed, but Ngenet pulled on the latch; the door opened, and they went inside.

“Hey, we’re closed!” An immense balloon of woman pouring beer into a mug for no one glowered at them from the bar.

“I’m looking for Elsevier.” Ngenet moved into the light.

“Oh, yeah?” The woman put the mug down and squinted at him. “I guess you are at that. What took you so long?”

“Engine trouble. Did she wait?”

“She’s still in town, if that’s what you mean. But she’s out looking into — other arrangements, in case you decided not to show.” The woman’s buried eyes found Moon; she frowned.

Ngenet swore. “Damn her, she knows I’m dependable!”

“But she didn’t know if maybe you’d been permanently delayed, if you take my meaning. Who’s that?”

“A hitchhiker.” Moon felt Ngenet’s hand on her arm again, moved forward at his urging, reluctantly. “She won’t make any trouble,” cutting off the woman’s indignation. “Will you?”

Moon looked up into his expression. “Me?” She shook her head, caught a whisper of a smile.

“I’m going out again to look for my friend. You can wait here until I get back.” He pointed with his chin toward the room full of tables. “Then maybe we’ll talk about Carbuncle.”

“All right.” She chose a table near the fireplace, went to it and sat down. Ngenet turned back toward the door.

“You know where to look?” the fat woman called. “Ask around the Club.”

“I’ll do that.” He went out.

Moon sat in uncomfortable silence under the innkeeper’s dour gaze, running her fingers along the scars in the wooden tabletop. But at last the woman shrugged, wiping her own hands on her apron, picked up the glass of beer and brought it to the table. Moon flinched slightly as it came down in front of her, froth spilling out onto the ring-marked wood. The woman billowed away again without speaking, did something to a featureless black box behind the bar. Someone began to sing abruptly, in the middle of a song, the middle of a word, with pieces of the same rhythmic stridency Moon had heard in the streets as accompaniment.

Moon started, glanced back over her shoulder to find the room as empty as before. Emptier — she watched the innkeeper disappear up the stairs, taking another mug of beer with her. Moon’s eyes came back to the black box. She had a sudden smiling image of it stuffed full of sound, like a keg or a sack of meal. She took a swallow of her beer, grimaced: kelp beer, sour and badly brewed. Setting down the mug, she pulled off her slicker. In the fireplace a solitary chunk of metal glowed red hot like a bar of iron in a smithy’s forge. She twisted in her seat, her fingers exploring the animal faces capping the chair back while she absorbed the heat and the music. Her foot began to tap time as a kind of pleasant compulsion moved her body. The harmonies were complicated, the sound was loud and throbbing, the voice trilled meaningless noise. The effect was nothing like the music that Sparks made with his flute… but something in it was compelling, distantly akin to the secret song of the choosing place.

Moon closed her eyes, sipping beer; let her mind separate out the memory of all that had gone wrong from all that was right between herself and Sparks , as she listened to the music that he had always heard with a different ear. They would talk about Carbuncle, Ngenet had said. Would he take her there, then? Or would he only try to change her mind? No one would change her mind… but she thought she could change his. She could use his concern about her to make him take her there, she was sure of it. She could be there tomorrow… She began to smile.

But was it right? Some part of her mind stirred uneasily. How was it wrong? Ngenet wanted to help her; she knew he did. And she didn’t even know why Sparks needed her: She imagined him sick or hungry, moneyless, friendless, starving. A day, an hour, could make a difference… Lady, every minute that she could spare him any sorrow or pain was important, more important than anything else.

A noise at the back of the room made her open her eyes. She looked toward the doorway at the rear of the room, felt her eyes widen, and widen again, as her mind refused to accept the information they took in. It was alive, and moving. It stood on two legs like a human being, but it’s feet were broad and webbed, its motion was the fluid shifting of sea grass in the underwater swell. The gray green, sexless body, glistening with an oily film, was naked except for a woven belt hung with unidentifiable shapes; the thing’s arms split into half a dozen whiplike tendrils. Nacreous, pupil less eyes fixed on her like the eyes of a sea spirit.

Moon stood up, her mouth too dry for the sounds she was trying to make; she put the chair between herself and the nightmare thing as she reached for her knife. But at her motion the creature gave a guttural cough and darted back through the doorway, disappearing from her sight before she could really believe that it had ever been there.

Standing in its place was a man she had never seen before, half again her own age, with a stiff crest of blond hair falling over one eye. He was wearing a fisherman’s parka, but his pants were a lurid green in the flame less brightness of the room. “Don’t go for it, young mistress, I’ve got you marked.” He stretched out his arm, she saw something unidentifiable in his hand. “Toss it out onto the floor, now, gently does it.”

She finished drawing her knife, uncertain about the threat. He moved his hand impatiently, and she tossed the curved blade out. He came forward far enough to pick it up.

“What do you want?” The shrillness of it told her just how afraid she really was.

“Come on out, Silky.” The man glanced toward the doorway, in stead. Unintelligible hissing sounds were the response; the man smiled humorlessly. “Yes, precisely as delighted to meet you as you were to find her here. Come out and give her a better look.”

The creature came cautiously through into the room again; Moon’s hands tightened over the animal heads on the chair back. The thing made her think suddenly of a family crest come to life. “I — I don’t have any money.”

The man looked at her blankly, laughed. “Oh, I see. Then we’re all in the same boat, at the moment. But not for the same reason. So just stay calm, and you won’t get hurt.”

“Cress! What in the world is going on here?” A third stranger entered the room behind him, human again, but just as unexpected. Moon saw the small plump woman with blue-black skin and silvery hair stop, hands clasping in surprise. “My dear, you’ll never get a date by holding the girl at gunpoint,” not quite smiling as she studied Moon back.

The blond man didn’t laugh this time. “I don’t know what she knows, but she shouldn’t be here, Elsie.”

“Obviously. Who are you, girl? What are you doing here?” The words asked her to answer as a simple courtesy, but the voice was steel.

“Friend — I’m a friend of Ngenet Miroe. Are you Elsevier, are you the one he came to see?” Moon took the initiative as she saw the answers start to register. “He went to look for you. I can go find him-” She glanced toward the door.

“That won’t be necessary.” The woman waved her hand; the man lowered his weapon, pushed it into the pocket where her knife had gone. Both their faces eased a little. “We’ll wait with you.” The spirit-thing hissed an almost human-sounding question. “Silky would like to know what kept him.”

“Engine trouble,” Moon repeated mechanically, shifted her weight, still keeping the chair between them.

“Ah. That explains it.” But she thought something in the old woman’s voice was still not entirely satisfied. “Well, no need for us to stand up while we wait, is there? My old bones creak at the thought. Sit down, dear, we’ll all just sit by the fire and get acquainted until he comes back. Cress, bring us some beers too, won’t you?”

Moon watched in dismay as the woman and the nightmare came toward the table. But the creature crouched on the hearth just out of kicking range, looking down, its body glistening in the heater’s radiance. Its flat tentacles traced the patterns of the hearthstones with rhythmic, hypnotic motions; some of the tentacles were maimed, distorted by old scars. The woman pulled out a chair and sat down beside her with a smile of seeming encouragement. She unfastened a slicker several sizes too large, revealing a plain one-piece garment, its orange color as vivid as the green of the man’s pants. “You’ll have to excuse Silky if he doesn’t join us at the table; he’s not very fond of strangers, I’m afraid.”

Moon moved slowly around her own chair and sat down. The man came back with three mugs of beer and set one down on the hearth. Moon watched the tracing tentacles of the sea-demon caress the mug, wrap it, and lift it to drink. She picked up her own mug and drank, in long gulps. The man sat down on the other side of her, grinned. “You sure put away the brew, young mistress.”

The old woman clucked disapprovingly, sipping at her own mug. “Never mind. Tell us about yourself, dear. I don’t think you’ve told us your name. I am Elsevier, of course, and this is Cress. And that is Silky, my late husband’s — business partner. Silky is not his real name, obviously. We simply can’t say his real name. He is a dillyp, from Tsieh-pun; from another world, as we are,” with quiet reassurance. “Are you one of Miroe’s — colleagues?”

“I’m Moon. I…” She hesitated, aware of their hesitations; still not sure of them, not sure whether a lie or the truth would be a worse choice. “I just met him. He gave me a ride.”

“And then he brought you here?” Cress leaned forward, frowning. “Just like that. What did he tell you?”

“Nothing.” Moon drew away from him, toward the old woman. “And I don’t care, really. I’m just going to Carbuncle. He — said that you’d understand.” She turned to Elsevier, met the astringent indigo eyes set in a web of age lines.

“Understand what?”

Moon took a deep breath, pulled the sibyl sign out of her sweater. “This.”

Elsevier started visibly; Cress sat back in his chair. The thing on the hearth hissed a question, and Cress said, “She’s a sibyl!”

“Well… I” Almost a sigh. “We are honored.” Elsevier glanced at the others, Cress nodded. “I understand that this half of Tiamat is not the best place for a sibyl. That would be like Miroe, to go getting involved.” She smiled suddenly, deeply, but with great weariness. “No, it’s nothing — simply that seeing you who are so young and so wise makes me feel old and foolish.”

Moon looked down at her fingers twisting on the wood. “I am only a vessel for the Lady’s wisdom.” She repeated the traditional words self-consciously. These were off worlders and yet their reaction, like Miroe’s, was the respect-that-was-almost-awe a Summer would feel. “I — thought that no off worlder believed in the Lady’s power. Everyone says you make the Winters hate sibyls. Why don’t you hate me?”

“You don’t know?” Cress said, incredulous. He looked at El sevier, around at the alien on the hearth. “She doesn’t know what she is.”

“Of course she doesn’t, Cress. The Hedge wants this world kept in the technological dark, and sibyls are beacons of knowledge. But only if someone knows how to use their light.” Elsevier sipped her beer thoughtfully. “We could bring our own little Millennium, our own golden age, to this world. You know, Cress, we may just be the most dangerous people ever to visit this planet…”

Moon half frowned. “What do you mean, I don’t know what I am? I’m a sibyl. I answer questions.”

Elsevier nodded. “But not the right ones. Why are you going to Carbuncle, Moon, if you only expect to be met by hatred there?”

“I — have to find my cousin.”

“That’s the only reason?”

“It’s the only thing that matters.” He belongs with me. She looked down at the trefoil.

“Then it’s not just a kinsman you’re looking for, is it?”

“No.”

“A lover?” very gently.

She nodded, swallowing to ease the sudden cramp in her throat. “The only one I’ll ever love. Even if I never find him…”

Elsevier put out an age-stiffened hand, patted her own. “Yes, dear, I know. Sometimes you find one that you’d walk barefoot through the fires of hell for. What makes that one so different from all the rest, I wonder… ?”

Moon shook her head. And what made him different from me?

“Are you from Carbuncle?” She looked up. “Maybe you’ve seen him there. He has red hair…”

Elsevier shook her head. “No, alas. We’re not from the city. We’re just — visiting, temporarily.” She glanced toward the door, as if she suddenly remembered why they were waiting.

“Oh… What did you mean, about not asking the right ques—”

The door of the inn burst open with enough force to slam it back against the wall. Moon looked up with the others, her question left hanging in the air.

Two figures came in out of the darkness: a slender man of medium height, and a tall sturdy woman, both off worlders heavily dressed in matched clothing, wearing helmets. Holding weapons.

“Blues!” Cress muttered, his mouth barely moving. Elsevier’s hand rose to her throat, drawing the slicker together over the orange beneath it. She looked down at the darkness of her skin, let the hand drop.

“What is it?” Moon controlled a desire to leap up as Silky took refuge beside her. “Who are they?”

“No one you should know any better,” Elsevier said mildly. She picked up her mug before she looked back at the intruders. “Well, Inspector. This is unexpected. You’re a long way from home tonight.”

“Not half as far from home as you are, I expect.” The woman moved forward, searching them with her eyes, the weapon still showing in her fist.

“I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean.” Elsevier glittered with controlled indignation. “This is a private party of responsible Hegemony citizens, and I consider your bursting in like this highly—”

“Spare me, tech runner The woman gestured with her gun, her mouth set. “Your ship was spotted coming in, you’re on this planet illegally. I charge you further with suspicion of smuggling contraband items. Stand up, all of you, and put your hands on top of your heads.”

Moon sat frozen, looking from Elsevier to Cress and back; but their eyes were only for the strangers. The trefoil cut into her tightening hand; understanding just enough to be afraid, she stuffed it into her sweater.

But the uniformed woman spotted the motion and came forward; as she came Moon saw the frown on her face change into the same incredulity that had shown on the faces of the two Winters on the quay. The man behind her began to move watchfully to the side, as Elsevier and Cress got to their feet together. Moon felt Elsevier nudge her elbow and rose awkwardly, her chair grating on the floor.

“Now, Silky!” Elsevier murmured, jerking Moon back as the alien bolted away from the table, scrambled toward the doorway they had all come through. Moon came up against the chimney wall as the two officers wavered between targets, as Cress swept a mug from the table and hurled it, as the mug struck the light fixture suspended from the rafters and smashed it. A shower of electric sparks and foam rained down in the sudden darkness.

“Run for it!”

“BZ! Nail him!”

“Moon, stay out of this!” Moon felt Elsevier shove her ungently away, stumbled blindly over her own chair and fell against the table. There was noise and a cry behind her; dimly she saw the woman officer leap to catch Elsevier by the slicker. Moon’s hand closed over another mug on the tabletop; she brought it around and down with all her strength on the woman officer’s arm and heard a gasp of pain. Elsevier broke free, herded her ahead toward the way out. “Never, never hit a Blue, my dear—” breathlessly, next to her ear. “But thank you. Now run!”

Moon bolted through the doorway, her mind a white blur like the brightly lit room beyond, then through another door into a dark alley.

“This way!” Cress materialized beside her, pointing left. “That’s a dead end. Elsie?”

“Here.” The door banged behind them. “Don’t talk about it, get to the LBf”

They ran; Moon caught the old woman’s hand, lending her strength and speed. Up ahead she saw the alien in a band of reddish gold starlight, disappearing into a bolt-hole of shadow; behind them she heard the door fly open and a shout of discovery. Her free hand went dead suddenly up to the wrist; panic gave her wings.

Cress slid to a halt where she had seen the alien disappear. She saw a night-gilded board fence, saw him duck through the space between two rotten planks. She followed him through, pulling Elsevier with her, and almost fell over a peninsula of piled driftwood on the other side. “Get to the LBf” Cress waved them on frantically. “I’ll plug the gap.”

“This way.” Elsevier pulled at her arm, started away through the stacks and mounds of salvage and flotsam. Moon went with her, looking back as Cress dragged the spiny-armed corpse of a tree shrub up against the gap. A limb caught in his parka as he turned away and jerked him back; she saw him struggle free before a pile of moldy sails cut off her view. Elsevier stumbled over some obstacle in the shadows beside her, and she put out a steadying arm. Before them now across the shadow and gold of the star-washed yard she saw a lens of battered metal lying in the midden. A hatch stood open in its side, and a ramp extended to the ground. “What is it?”

“Sanctuary,” Elsevier gasped. They reached the ramp and went up it together to find Silky waiting at the top. “Switched on?”

The alien grunted affirmation, gestured with a tentacle.

“Then strap in, we’re getting out of here.” Elsevier leaned against a bulkhead, a hand pressed against her heart. “Cress?” She looked toward the hatchway, but it showed them only junk and smoldering sky.

Moon turned back, leaned out to look down the ramp. Cress came running; but as she watched he tripped and fell, lay stunned on the ground for a space of heartbeats. When he pushed himself up at last and came on, she thought of a man running underwater, with every motion resisted. “Here he comes!”

He reached the foot of the ramp, stopped, and looked up it for a long moment with his arms wrapped across his stomach before he began to climb. Behind him she saw one of their pursuers round the heap of sails. “Cress, hurry!”

But even as she called to him he slowed, midway up the ramp, his eyes glazing with despair.

“Come on!”

He shook his head, swaying where he stood.

Across the lot she saw both police officers now, saw one of them taking aim at him, heard a voice shout “Hold it!”

Moon pushed out and down the ramp, grabbed the flapping sleeve of his parka and dragged him forward through the hatch. The ramp telescoped upward behind them, and the door hissed shut, hurting her ears with pressure-change. Cress clutched at the frame of the inner doorway as Moon found her balance, letting him go. Her hand was still crippled with a strange paralysis; she looked down at it and gave a small, disbelieving cry as she saw it smeared with blood.

“Cress, get up front and—” Elsevier stopped as Cress crumpled to the floor. Moon saw the vivid stain on his jacket and knew that the blood was not her own.

“Oh, my gods, Cress!”

“What happened?” Moon dropped to her knees beside him, reaching out.

He struck her reddened hand aside. “No!” She saw the hilt of her own scaling knife protruding from the pouch pocket at the center of the jacket’s spreading stain. “Don’t touch it… I’ll gush.” Moon pulled back, folded her hands against her sides. “Elsevier?” He looked past her.

“Cress, how did it happen?” Elsevier let herself down stiffly on his other side, laying her hand against his cheek. Silky appeared in the doorway behind her.

Cress laughed through white lips. “Should’ve let the young mistress keep her dagger… fell on the goddamn thing, running. Put me in the freezer, Elsie, I’m h-hurting…” He struggled to push himself up, groaned through clenched teeth as they hauled him to his feet.

“Silky, get to the controls.”

Silky moved ahead of them as they guided Cress through into the next chamber and let him down onto a level couch in the cramped space.

“Putting her knife in your pocket! Dear boy, that was incredibly stupid, you know.” Elsevier kissed her fingers and laid them lightly above his eyes.

“I’m an astrogator, not… not a hired killer. What do I… know about it?” He coughed; a trickle of blood appeared at the corner of his mouth, ran down his cheek toward his ear.

Elsevier stepped back as a smoke-colored translucent cone lowered over the couch, shutting him away from their view. “Sleep well.” It had the sound of a benediction; but she shook her head, looking up into Moon’s unspoken question. “No. This will keep him alive until we can get him to help.” Her face changed. “If we can even get out of the atmosphere before those Blues call down heaven’s wrath. Strap in, dear, the acceleration may be unpleasant your first time.” She pushed past, settled into a padded, upright seat before a panel of controls. The alien was settled in a second seat, tentacles suspended above a board of lights. In front of them a wide, thickly glassed port showed her another view of the junkyard. Moon took the third upright couch and fastened the straps uncertainly. The alien made a guttural query.

“Well, what else am I going to do?” Elsevier said sharply. “We can’t leave her to the police; not a sibyl. Not after she fought to save me — you know what they’d do… Lift!”

Moon leaned forward, listening, was driven back into the seat by the crest of an unseen wave. She gasped in surprise, gasped again as the pressure went on increasing, squeezing the air out of her lungs. She fought against it like a dr owner with no more success; collapsed into the cushioning curves with a whimper of disbelief. Between the forward seats she could no longer see the junkyard or any ground at all, but only stars. As she watched, the moon fell like a stone past the window and disappeared. She shut her eyes, felt herself being sucked down into a whirlpool of nightmare, bottomless and black.

But among the tumbled waters of dark panic she found the memory of another blackness, more utter, more absolute than any she would ever know — the black heart of the Transfer. The Transfer . this was like the Transfer. She clung to that anchor, felt the solid weight of familiarity slow the spiraling of her fear. She centered her concentration on the disciplined rhythms of mind and body that kept the narrow thread of her awareness tied to reality . slowly she settled into enduring.

She opened her eyes again, saw that the stars were still outside; rolled her head to look over at the wall of blinking lights and dials beside her own seat. She did not try to touch them. She became aware of Elsevier’s voice, strained, almost inaudible, and the alien’s responses; one was as unintelligible to her as the other.

“…Checking. No tracking alerts going out yet. Hope that they hadn’t re layers… by the time they call it in we may clear… Are the shields green?”

Silky responded, in unintelligible alien speech.

“I hope it too… but stay ready to shift power.”

(Response.)

“Affirmative, we’re damped. They look for inbound runners, anyway . they don’t look behind them enough… I pray they don’t.”

(Response.)

A weak chuckle. “Of course… Time elapsed?”

Moon closed her eyes again, comforted, letting the words go on by. They were flying, somehow, in this metal-bound cabin; but it was nothing like her flight with Ngenet. She wondered why, and how, wondered dimly whether this was anything like being on an off worlder starship… Her eyes came open suddenly. “Elsevier!”

“Yes… Are you all right, Moon?”

“What are we doing?… Where are we going?” She gasped for air.

“We’re leaving… Time elapsed?”

(Response.)

“Out of the well!” A squeezed laugh of triumph. “Cutting energy . we’d better save what we’ve got left for rendezvous.”

The pressure vise dissipated around her, as abruptly as it had come. Moon stretched her arms in release. With the crushing weight gone from her body, she felt as though she had no substance at all, rising like a bubble through the waters of the sea… rising from the padded couch against the restraining straps. She looked down at herself wildly, clutched the straps with her hands.

“Ohh, Silky. I’m getting too old for this. This is no way for a civilized person to make a living.”

(Response.)

“Of course it’s been the principle of the thing! You don’t think I would have carried on TJ’s work just for money? And certainly not for the thrill of it.” She tsked. “But there won’t be any more trips, anyway. We won’t make a brass cawie from this one, we’ve still got all the goods on board… Ah, poor Miroe! The gods know what’s become of him.” There was the sound of a catch releasing; Moon saw Elsevier’s silvery head begin to rise up past the seat back. “But we never shall, now.” Elsevier turned to look back at her. “Moon, are you—”

“Don’t be afraid!” Moon raised wondering eyes. “It’s the Lady’s presence. The room is full of the Sea, that’s why we’re floating… It’s a miracle.”

Elsevier smiled at her, a little sadly. “No, my dear — only the absence of one. We’re beyond the reach of your goddess, beyond the grasp of your world. There’s simply no gravity this far out to hold you down. Come forward and see what I mean.”

Moon unstrapped uncertainly, and pushed herself up. Elsevier lunged and caught her by the leg before she crashed into the cone that hung, like the one that protected Cress, above her own couch. “Gently!” Elsevier drew her forward to the window and pointed down. Below them lay the curve of Tiamat’s sphere, a foam-flecked swell of translucent blue breaking against the wall of stars.

In her heart she had known what she would find; but as she drifted to the window, the vision surpassed anything she had imagined, and she could only breathe, “Beautiful… beautiful…” She pressed her hands against the cold transparency.

“Wait until you pass through the Black Gate, and see what lies on the other side.”

“Oh, yes…” A dark seed of doubt sprouted in her mind. She pulled her eyes away, turning her head. “The Black Gate? But that’s how the off worlders go to other worlds…” She looked back and out, at her entire world that had seemed so immense and so varied lying below her feet like a blue glass fishing float. “No… no, I can’t go through the Gate with you. I have to go to Carbuncle. I have to find Sparks .” She pushed firmly away from the window, caught herself on the back of Silky’s seat. “Will you take me back down, now? Can you, would you put me — ashore at the star port

“Take you back down?” A frown creased the space between Elsevier’s blue-violet eyes; she pressed her hands against her lips. “Oh, Moon, my dear… I was afraid that you hadn’t understood. You see, we can’t take you back down. They’ll track us, and we’re low on charge besides — there’s no way we can go back now. I’m afraid that when I told you about the Gate I wasn’t offering you a choice.”