Another point of blue light flared in the jungle that circled the city’s basin, this time only a few leagues away. “Who? Who is it, little master? Is it your master?” The thunder was louder, and came less than two seconds after the flare of blue light.
The rock shuddered again and Pandaras sat down hard, trembling with fear. He knew now how he could reach the floating garden, but he wished with all his heart that it had not come to this. He looked up at Tibor and said, “Yama is close by, but this is not him. No, it is Prefect Corin, and if I want to see my master again I must let him find me.”
Chapter Tweleve
The Last Flight of Dr. Dismas
He is here, the Shadow said, and with those words appeared above the bed as the eidolon of Derev. She was clinging to the ceiling with her fingers and toes and looking down at Yama through the fall of her feathery white hair. She was naked under her filmy shift. Her skin glowed with the soft green radiance sometimes seen on rotting wood.
“Transform,” Yama said wearily. The coin nagged at his attention, like the wink of sunlight on a far-off window. He knew that Pandaras was very close now, but he could no longer make use of a machine to search for the boy. The Shadow had taken away even that.
The eidolon squeezed its small breasts together with one hand. You do not like this?
Blue light flared beyond the big eye of the window, briefly illuminating the pentad of servants who stood around the bed. For a moment, Yama thought that the feral machine had returned for him.
Something wicked this way comes.
The double doors on the far side of the room crashed open, and the floating lights brightened. Dr. Dismas strode in, shouting wildly.
“Child! Dear child! Enobarbus is trying to murder us!”
Sit up, the Shadow said.
Yama obeyed without thinking and was astonished to find that he could move. “You are right,” he said. “It is time to go.”
Halfway across the room, Dr. Dismas stopped and stared in amazement, then drew out his energy pistol. He wore a silvery cloak over his black suit and a cap of silver on his head; Yama remembered that the apothecary had once confided to him that he wore a hat lined with metal to stop machines spying on him.
The Shadow, still in the form of Derev, was suddenly standing behind Dr. Dismas. It smiled and said, I have allowed your body to overcome the good doctor’s potion by a simple matter of physiology. It is not Enobarbus who is attacking us, by the way, but let the doctor think what he will. Besides, Enobarbus is on his way. He thinks that Dismas is attacking him. Many men have already died. Many more will die. It is quite exciting. Shall I show you?
Yama ignored this. He told Dr. Dismas, “A simple matter of physiology, Doctor,” and swung his legs over the side of the bed. One of the servants—the forest pygmy—placed a bundle of clothes at his feet. As Yama began to dress, he added, “It is time I made a move.”
“I want you to destroy Enobarbus’s machines,” Dr. Dismas said. “I hope I am speaking to the right person.”
We will not need to worry about the machines.
The eidolon of Derev vanished. Yama had a dizzy sense of doubled vision and discovered that he was once more a prisoner in his own body. It pulled on a loose white shirt, stepped into boots which fastened themselves around its ankles, and walked forward. He heard his voice, pitched an octave lower than normal, say, “You do not need that silly little weapon, Doctor. Not with me by your side.”
Dr. Dismas nodded, and lowered the pistol. He said, “You’re right, of course. I have armed the other servants. They are killing those of Enobarbus’s men I have not myself already killed. We must get you to a safe place. It is indeed time to move.” He snapped his stiff fingers, and one of the servants threw a silvery bundle on the bed. “That will shield you from pellets and from near misses of energy weapons.”
Yama tried to speak, but the Shadow had assumed complete control of his body. “I do not need such things,” it told Dr. Dismas. It flung out Yama’s right arm, and the servants collapsed.
Dr. Dismas raised the pistol again, pointing it at Yama’s head, and said angrily, “Restore them, you fool. This is not a time for tricks. We need them still.”
“Alas,” the Shadow said, “they are dead. I will kill the other hybrids too, once they have defeated Enobarbus’s men. Ah, I see why you wear that cap. It is more than it seems. But you will do as I say anyway. It is time we left, Doctor. Time we returned to our parent to complete our growth, to discard this frail shell. Time we took our place at the center of the world’s stage.”
Dr. Dismas stepped back two paces, still pointing the pistol at Yama. “I’ll shoot you if I have to. Put on the cloak, but do not think that it will protect you from a direct shot.”
A brilliant flash outside the big window momentarily filled the room with white light, fading to reveal the city spread directly below. The floating garden had tipped on its axis, although its local gravity still held.
Carrying Yama’s senses with it, the Shadow reached out to a machine speeding through the night a league away. The machine executed a crash stop, spun on its axis, and saw that the floating garden was standing at right angles above the basin of the city. There was fighting in the woods which covered most of the garden’s surface; the machine detected the pinpoint disturbances in the gravity fields caused by energy weapons, and flashes of intense light winked in the air all around. A flier shot toward its rocky keel, but must have hit some invisible obstruction, for it suddenly slammed to a halt and disintegrated in a blaze of white flame.
The floating garden slowly righted itself. And high above the far edge of the city, silhouetted against the orange glow of the sky, another garden tore away from an archipelago and began to move toward it.
The fighting in the camp did not last long. There was the confused noise of men and women shouting, a frantic staccato of small-arms fire, an explosion which lofted a ball of greasy yellow flame above the trees. Then a flash of blue light hit half the sky and there was a sudden shocking silence before the screams began, tearing the night air like ripsaws.
Pandaras paced up and down in distress. The screams pierced him to his marrow, and although he had resolved not to run it was very hard to stay where he was.
Tibor said, “Surely he will kill us, little master.”
“No. He needs me to—”
And then Prefect Corin stooped out of the night, like an owl on a mouse. He sprang from the floating disc and ran straight at Pandaras, knocking Tibor down when the hierodule tried to get in the way. He caught Pandaras and lifted him up and stared into his face. His left eye was covered by a white adhesive pad. A rifle was slung over his shoulder. “You have caused me such trouble, boy,” he said. “You should have stayed with me. You would not have lost your hand. Where is he?”
Pandaras’s ribcage was painfully compressed by Prefect Corin’s grip; he could scarcely catch his breath. He gasped, “Promise that you will not kill my friend.”
“A hierodule has his uses. Where?”
“Did you follow me all this way downriver? I am flattered.”
“I should have sunk the barge and killed everyone on board it. Where is he?”
“Surely you have heard of the great mage of this city, dominie.”
“I did not have time to question anyone. I was too busy looking for you. I know that he is close by. I can see the coin shining through your shirt.”
“Is that how you found me?”
“Alas, there are too many similar sources in this city.”