Grelier surveyed the congregation. Apart from a skeleton staff taking care of essential duties, the entire population of the cathedral must now be present. He knew many of the five thousand people here by name — more than many of them would ever have suspected. Of the others, there were only a few hundred faces that he was not passingly familiar with. It thrilled him to see so many in attendance, especially when he thought of the threads of blood that bound them all. He could almost see it: a rich, red tapestry of connections hanging above the congregation, drapes and banners of scarlet and maroon, simultaneously complex and wondrous.
The thought of blood reminded him of Harbin Els. The young man, as Grelier had told Quaiche, was dead, killed in clearance duties. Their paths had never crossed again after that initial interview on the caravan, even though Grelier had been awake during part of Harbin’s period of work in the Lady Morwenna. The Bloodwork processing that Harbin had indeed gone through had been handled by Grelier’s assistants rather than the surgeon-general himself. But like all the blood that was collected by the cathedral, his sample had been catalogued and stored in the Lady Morwenna’s blood vaults. Now that the girl had re-entered his life, Grelier had taken the expedient step of recalling Harbin’s sample from the library and running a detailed assay on it.
It was a long shot, but worth his trouble. A question had occurred to Grelier: was the girl’s gift a learned thing, or innate? And if it was innate, was there something in her DNA that had activated it? He knew that only one in a thousand people had the gift for recognising and interpreting microexpressions; that fewer still had it to the same degree as Rashmika Els. It could be learned, certainly, but people like
Rashmika didn’t need any training: they just knew the rules, with absolute conviction. They had the observational equivalent of perfect pitch. To them, the strange thing was that everyone else failed to pick up on the same signs. But that didn’t mean the gift was some mysterious superhuman endowment. The gift was socially debilitating. The afflicted could never be told a consoling lie. If they were ugly and someone told them they were beautiful, the gap between intention and effect was all the more hurtful because it was so obvious, so stingingly sarcastic.
He had searched the cathedral’s records, scanning centuries-old medical literature for anything on genetic predisposition to the girl’s condition. But the records were frustratingly incomplete. There was much on cloning and life-extension, but very little on the genetic markers for hypersensitivity to facial microexpression.
Nonetheless, he had still gone to the trouble of analysing Harbin’s blood sample, looking for anything unusual or anomalous, preferably in the genes that were associated with the brain’s perceptual centres. Harbin could not have had the gift to anything like the same degree as his sister, but that in itself would be interesting. If there were no significant differences in their genes beyond the normal variations seen between non-identical siblings, then Rashmika’s gift would begin to look like something acquired rather than inherited. A fluke of development, perhaps, something in her early environment that nurtured the gift. If something did show up, on the other hand, then he might be able to map the mismatched genes to specific areas of brain function. The literature suggested that people with brain damage could acquire the skill as a compensatory mechanism when they lost the ability to process speech. If that was the case, and if the important brain regions could be identified, then it might even be possible to introduce the condition by surgical intervention. Grelier’s imagination was freewheeling: he was thinking of installing neural blockades in Quaiche’s skull, little valves and dams that could be opened and closed remotely. Isolate the right brain regions — make them light up or dim, depending on function — and it might even be possible to turn the skill on and off. The thought thrilled him. What a gift for a negotiator, to be able to choose when you wished to see through the lies of those around you.
But for now he only had a sample from the brother. The tests had revealed no striking anomalies, nothing that would have made the sample stand out had he not already had a prior interest in the family. Perhaps that supported the hypothesis that the skill was acquired. He would not know for certain until he had some blood from Rashmika Els.
The quaestor had been useful, of course. With the right persuasion, it wouldn’t have been difficult to find a way to get a sample from Rashmika. But why risk derailing a process that was already rolling smoothly towards its conclusion? The letter had already had precisely the desired effect. She had interpreted it as a forgery, designed to warn her off the trail. She had seen through the quaestor’s fumbling explanation for the letter’s existence. It had only strengthened her resolve.
Grelier smiled to himself. No; he could wait. She would be here very shortly, and then he would have his blood.
As much of it as he needed.
At that moment a hush fell on proceedings. He looked around, watching Quaiche slide down the aisle in his moving pulpit. The upright black structure made a faint trundling sound as it approached. Quaiche remained in his life-support couch, tilted nearly to vertical and carried atop the pulpit. Even as he moved down the aisle, the light from Haldora was still reaching his eyes. An elaborate system of jointed tubes and mirrors conveyed it all the way down from the Clocktower. Robed technicians followed behind the pulpit, adjusting the tubes with long clawed poles. In the dim light, Quaiche’s sunglasses were gone, revealing the painful framework of the eye-opener.
For many of those present — certainly those who had arrived in the Lady Morwenna in the last two or three years — this might well be the first time they had ever seen Quaiche in person. It was very rare for him to descend from the Clocktower these days. Rumours of his death had been circulating for decades, barely checked by each increasingly infrequent appearance.
The pulpit swung around and moved along the front of the congregation before coming to a halt immediately below the black window. Quaiche had his back to it, facing the audience. In the candlelight he appeared to be a chiselled outgrowth of the pulpit itself. In bas-relief, vacuum-suited saints supported him from below.
‘My people,’ he said, ‘let us rejoice. This is a day of wonders, of opportunity in adversity.’ His voice was the usual smoky croak, but amplified and enhanced by hidden microphones. From high above, the organ provided a rumbling, almost subsonic counterpoint to Quaiche’s oration.
‘For twenty-two days we have been approaching the impasse in the Gullveig canyon, slowing our speed, allowing Haldora to slip ahead of us, but never actually stopping. We had hoped that the blockage would be cleared twelve or thirteen days ago. If it had, we would have lost no ground. But the obstruction proved more challenging than we had feared. Conventional clearance measures proved ineffective. Good men died surveying the problem, and yet more lives were lost in planting the demolition charges. I need hardly remind anyone present that this is a delicate business: the Way itself must remain substantially undamaged once the main obstruction is cleared.’ He paused, the circular frames around his eyes catching the candlelight and flaring the colour of brass. ‘But now the dangerous work is done. The charges are in place.’