"I need to find Maggie and Parker," Gretchen called after her. But they're not going to know about these tunnels, which means if they've not been captured, they will head to the train station and then south to Parus. If they heard my voice – I think they did, but how much of what happened in the vault was real?
Malakar reappeared and pressed a bun straight from the oven into her hand.
"Ow! These are hot!" Anderssen tossed the crusted pastry from hand to hand.
The Jehanan chewed vigorously, having swallowed the bun whole, and nodded her head.
"Ah…very tasty. These are stuffed with pang nuts and melle. Very sweet. They will drive your hunger away. What were you saying?"
Gretchen pointed with her chin at the ceiling. "Does this passage lead to the khus?"
"There is a ramp quite near your building." Malakar allowed, eyeing the uneaten bun in the human's hands. "But if the prince's soldiers are in the streets, will your friends wait? I cannot imagine any creature with an ear and an eye could miss the sound of that machine in movement."
"You could be right," Anderssen nodded, nibbling at the edge of the still-hot pastry. "They'll try to reach the train station and get south to Parus if they don't find me there."
"Hooooo…" Malakar tapped Gretchen's chest thoughtfully, one claw brushing against the dead comp. "Will the Magdalena and the Parker have another device like this? One which works?"
Gretchen frowned up at the Jehanan. "If they were under cover of some kind when the EMP wave hit the city, yes. Maggie has four or five comps with her – she collects them like Parker collects…well, Parker doesn't really collect anything but tabac tar…"
The gardener pointed down one of the passages. "The iron road can be reached by following certain ways beneath the city – but if the kujen is hunting for asuchau I fear his servants will throng the station like yi upon the corpses of fallen heroes. If your friends flee that way, they will be taken." Malakar's nostrils crinkled up. "If memory serves, there is only one train to Parus each day and that one not for many hours yet."
"Is there another way south?" Anderssen wracked her memory, trying to remember if there had been other options for local transport. I shouldn't have just accepted Petrel's arrangements – we should have gotten an aerocar somehow, or a truck at least…
"There is." The old Jehanan indicated a different passage. "Beyond the edge of the city is a tikikit station. We could be in Parus by morning if our legs are long enough. The tikikit do not care if Jehanan and asuchau are fighting!" She clicked her claws together in amusement. "They have seen such things many, many times and are no longer impressed."
Gretchen licked her lips, feeling worry surge in her breast. What if Maggie and Parker are still waiting for me at the apartment? But the brief perception of them on a rooftop implied they were already on the run, and somehow she thought they had heard her cry out of the green void. The kalpataru was connected to every other communications device and comp on the planet in that one instant, I know it was. Mother Mary, please keep them safe. And me too. Keep me safe until we're all together again.
"All right," Anderssen said, trying not to chew her lip. "Will you take me to this place? Are you sure we can get to Parus by morning?"
Several hours later, Gretchen and Malakar emerged from a tunnel on the eastern side of the city, following a footpath between disintegrating rows of concrete pilings. The sun was setting, the eastern sky growing dark, though the fields of grain on either side of the old subway line were gilded pink and bronze. Anderssen glanced up automatically and was disturbed to see the sky to the west bruised with odd, harsh colors. Auroralike patterns of filmy lights were strewn across the twilit sky.
Long trails of smoke rising over the city glowed in the failing light. High up, what looked like contrails criss-crossed the sky, though she didn't think any aircraft could have survived the electromagnetic shock wave from the explosions in orbit.
"How far is this station?" Anderssen wondered aloud, seeing the orchards on the far side of the grain fields were dusky with oncoming night. She automatically checked to make sure she still had her flashlight, and was relieved to feel cold metal under her fingers. "Have you taken this path before?"
"Not so long ago," Malakar answered, her stride quickening. The Jehanan's snout was raised, tasting the evening and the hum and chirp of insects rose and fell as they walked. There was a moist, humid feeling to the air and Gretchen was reminded of the lowland farm country around New Canarvon back home. "There is a wood-lot and then a village. The station is beyond, on the old road – but it is not far, not far at all."
They walked in silence for a time, passing out of the fields and onto a larger path – not quite a road, but close – which ran through rows of planted trees. Long straight trunks rose up over their heads, merging into a spreading roof of branches lined with heavy leaves. Anderssen's eye was drawn to the signs of pruning and trimming and guessed the section of woodland was a farm growing lumber for the city markets. Some of the newer prunings revealed a hexagonal pattern in the underlying wood.
"These are lohaja?" She gestured at the rows of trees. "This is a plantation?"
The old Jehanan grunted, twitching her nostrils. "Not every soil is suitable for the better woods – but these hills around Takshila are famous for their abundant crops and strong-growing trees. Even the Nem flourish here, though you cannot claim their taste is sweet."
Then the creature sighed, grief settling over her and she fell silent.
"I'm sorry," Gretchen said, feeling guilty at having raised the question. "I've been lucky to do so much of what I wanted. My family sacrificed a great deal to see me on this long road – they still do, with my mother taking care of my children – and the pitiful wage the Company pays is not enough, not really, to make up the difference."
A low humming sound rose from the back of the Jehanan's throat. She fixed Anderssen with one dark eye. "And you say you've not found the right path to yigal? Do you bite your own tail in spite? Do you have two mouths to argue with yourself?"
"Ha! I suppose." Gretchen smiled. "I know how it feels to be denied, ridiculed, opposed at every turn. My clan is poorly favored in the Empire. We have no powerful friends. There are no tenured positions for me, no research grants or stipends. Most of my fellows from graduate school have actual posts at actual universities – or they oversee important sites – and me? I grub in the refuse on the edge of human space for a scattering of quills a day, looking for sites of interest to others. Then they do the real work, and I'm on to another world, bag in hand, exhausted, my boots needing repair…"
Malakar trilled, her mood entirely restored. "A perfect path for your tiny feet to walk! Do you truly enjoy the dull work of counting and measuring and making reports which must come after all this poking and prodding and prying into dusty, hidden places?"
"Yes, I do." Anderssen's professional sensibilities were outraged at such a suggestion, though at the same time a little voice was saying Oh god, no! "Survey is only the first step in a long process – the real work is in the analysis and conclusions at the end. I mean, how else will I get a position somewhere without publications? Without discrete evidence of my work?"
"Hur-hur-hur!" The gardener hid her snout behind both claws. "This old walnut thinks your path does not lead to the stuffy chambers of a Master, with acolytes fawning and snuffling at your feet. Your path lies at the edge of furrowed soil, it does, where there are strange shadows and queer lights among the trees, where every step is into the unknown. What wonders might you see, with undimmed eyes?