Mass stream disruption in the Saturn corridor. Streamship Bubble Bobble buying mass stream queue positions.
Lightmill in Martian orbit unavailable.
Requesting Poincaré invariant surface access for Saturn kilocklick beam.
Buying derivatives on future access rights to Saturn kiloklick beam.
I hold my breath. That’s the great thing about the zoku: their jewels force them to follow the zoku volition. I watch with satisfaction as the Highway-zoku routes the Bob Howard to a slower beam. It does not buy me much – perhaps an extra week – but that is just enough for me to get to Saturn right behind the Rainbow Table Zoku ship. Hopefully that won’t be enough time for the Great Game to break Mieli completely.
And of course, I now also have enough entanglement to trade for the tools I need for the Iapetos job.
Smiling to myself, I step back into the Wardrobe’s main vir.
It is snowing in the bookshop. Large white flakes drift down from the shadows in the ceiling. The bookshelves look like snow-covered trees, and the café table has been replaced by a tall lamppost, with a cast-iron gas lantern on top that casts yellow, fluttering light. My breath steams. It is cold. Matjek is nowhere to be seen.
Somewhere, far away, there is the sound of tiny bells. A set of small footprints leads into the shadows between the shelves. There is a discarded candy wrapper on the ground, silver and purple against the snow. Turkish Delight.
‘Matjek!’ I shout, in a snow-muffled voice. There is no reply. How the hell did he do this to the vir?
I stick my hands into my armpits for warmth and fumble at my Founder code to repair the damage done by the future god-emperor of the Solar System.
A snowball hits me in the back of the head.
I blink at the stinging wetness that slides down my neck. Matjek laughs somewhere in the darkness. I’m still rubbing my head when the qupt comes. It’s Isidore.
Jean! You can’t believe what I found! I struggle to receive an exomemory fragment, flashes of flying in the Martian sky, a bright star between a man’s fingers. It’s not just Earth, it’s the Spike, and the Collapse, you have to see this—
The detective’s voice is lost in a flood of images. Phobos falling from the sky. A pillar of light in the horizon. An earthquake, the whole planet ringing like a bell, the Oubliette losing its balance.
And then, silence.
2
MIELI AND THE MOUNTAIN
You have come to the mountain to find the witch.
The steep slopes and the white, bowl-shaped peak are shrouded in lacelike clouds. The mountain stands alone, perfect within itself, not caring for the narrow human path that zigzags up before you, like a stitch in a wound.
You think back at the journey, at the choices. Beads on a string, jewels in a necklace, one after another.
You adjust your katana and start climbing. The wind brings a whiff of smoke. Somewhere, behind you, a white pillar rises to the sky.
Your village is still burning.
The gaki attack when you make it up to the mountain’s shoulder ridge in the early evening.
You are above the clouds now, and the last rays of the sun turn the cloudtops into a mixture of blue and pink. A chilly wind comes down the white slope of the mountain, bringing tiny snowflakes. The breath of Yuki-Onna, the white witch. She knows you are coming.
There are pits in the mountainside above. The gaki emerge from them slowly, like pale tongues from dark mouths.
They are emaciated, withered creatures, except for their swollen bellies, filled with dark blood. They sniff the air, and come down the mountain path, hesitantly at first, then in a loping run.
Your katana comes out of its scabbard of its own volition, a sliver of bright silver.
The first gaki hisses and swings a scythelike arm at you. Its smell makes you gag: excrement, wet earth and decay. Your katana draws a lightning arc in the air. Ash-coloured liquid spurts out from the stump of the gaki’s outstretched paw. It backs off, clacking its teeth together angrily, yellow eyes burning.
Then you see two of its comrades going up the slope to the right. They scamper back down towards your flank.
There is an outcropping not that far below, with a large standing boulder that would protect your back. But getting there requires risking the steep, snowy slope.
A gaki makes the decision for you. It hurls itself straight at you, looking to impale itself on your blade. You dance lightly to one side, slice at its legs; it rolls down the slope, and you follow it, making crazy leaps as rocks rattle and roll beneath your feet, praying that your ankle won’t catch and twist.
You nearly fall close to the bottom, but catch yourself in a half-roll, come back up, and turn around, breathing hard. Your back is now protected, but a half-circle of gaki is coming at you, clawing and hissing and clacking and spitting. You wait. The wind picks up. It feels like a good place to die. Your only regret is that the Yuki-Onna will escape your vengeance and keep your lover’s soul. You grip the katana lightly, like a calligrapher’s brush, and prepare to write a haiku of death.
A feathered arrow sprouts from the neck of the gaki in the middle. More come arcing down at the others, in rapid succession. You advance with rapid, shuffling steps, and strike left and right. A gaki head rolls down the mountainside.
Then another ronin appears behind the gaki. He – or she, judging by her light frame – wields a naginata and wears an usagi mask, the cross-marked white face of a demon rabbit. She spins her weapon in an arc and clears a space around her, then lunges forward to pierce a gaki’s chest. She stops to look at you. Her eyes flash behind the mask.
The battle goes quickly after that. You coordinate your movements, swift sword and reaching naginata. It feels like you were back in the dojo, and even on the uneven ground of the mountain, difficult strokes become easy, and the gaki fall before you like wheat. Soon they flee, leaving dismembered bodies behind. The rocks are slick with their gore.
Afterwards, you are the first to bow.
‘Honoured ronin,’ you say. ‘You have saved my life.’
She bows back and removes her mask. Her face is dark-skinned, and her long jet-black hair is tangled with sweat.
‘The honour is mine,’ she says, with a soft voice that is like the whisper of silk wiping blood off a blade. ‘Without you, I would have fallen prey to the gaki myself.’
You bow again.
‘What is it that you seek, usagi-sama?’
‘The witch Yuki-Onna, who has done me a wrong,’ she says.
The wind picks up.
‘An ill-spoken name. I seek her also,’ you answer.
‘Shall we join in a common purpose, to seek our vengeance together?’
You hesitate.
‘My path is my own,’ you say. ‘And so are the dangers of the mountain.’
‘I understand. But we have both travelled far. Let us guard each other’s sleep tonight, and then go our separate ways.’
You nod. You return to the path together and continue the climb, with the usagi-ronin leading the way. You try to ignore a whispering voice in your head, a voice that tastes like fire and sulphur, of a bite of metal against your cheek.
Mieli, you fool, it says. Mieli, wake up.
You make camp in a cluster of pitiful, low pine trees. For a long time, you sit quietly and eat your meagre fare of rice cakes.
‘Would you honour me by allowing me to accept the first watch?’ the usagi-ronin says, after you have finished eating.