‘We’re quite a pair of relics, you and I,’ Remontoire said. He stood up, stretching his limbs, turning them this way and that as if ascertaining that none of them had become dislocated.
‘I’m afraid I have some bad news,’ Scorpio said.
‘Clavain?’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I guessed, of course. The moment I saw you, I knew he must be dead. When did it happen?’
‘A couple of days ago.’
‘And how did he die?’
‘Very badly. But he died for Ararat. He was a hero to the end, Rem.’
For a moment Remontoire was somewhere else, wandering through a landscape of mental reflection accessible only to Conjoiners. He closed his eyes, remained that way for perhaps ten seconds and then opened them again. They were now gleaming with bright alertness, no trace of sorrow visible.
‘Well, I’ve grieved,’ he said.
Scorpio knew better than to doubt Remontoire’s word; that was just how Conjoiners did things. It was a measure of Remontoire’s respect for his old friend and ally that he had even deemed a period of grieving necessary in the first place. It would have been trivial for him to edit his own mind into a state of serene acceptance. By going through the motions of grief he had paid a great, humbling tribute to Clavain. Even if it had only taken ten or twelve seconds.
‘Are we safe?’ Scorpio asked.
‘For now. We planned your escape carefully, creating a major diversion using the remaining assets. We knew the wolves would be able to reallocate some of their resources to bring you down, but our forecasts showed that we could handle them, provided you left exactly on schedule.’
‘You can beat the wolves?’
‘No, not beat them, Scorpio.’ Remontoire’s tone was school-masterly, gently reproachful. ‘We can overwhelm a small number of wolf machines in a specific location by using a deliberate concentration of power. We can inflict some damage, push them back, force them to regroup. But really, it’s like throwing pebbles at pack dogs. Against a large grouping, there is still little we can do. And in the longer term — so our forecasts tell us — we will lose.’
‘But you’ve survived until now.’
‘With the weapons and techniques Aura gave us, yes. But that well is nearly dry now. And the wolves have shown a remarkable propensity for matching us.’ Remontoire’s eyes sparkled with admiration. ‘They are very efficient, these machines.’
Scorpio laughed. After everything that he had been through, this was the outcome Remontoire was spelling out? ‘Then we’re screwed, right?’
‘In the long run, at least according to the current forecasts, the prognosis is not good.’
Behind Remontoire, the black ship sealed itself, becoming once again a sharp-edged chunk of shadow.
‘Then why don’t we just give up now?’
‘Because there is a chance — albeit a small one — that the forecasts may be badly wrong.’
‘I think we need to talk,’ Scorpio said.
‘And I know just the place,’ said Antoinette Bax, stepping into the bay. She inclined her head towards Remontoire, as if they had seen each other only minutes earlier. ‘Follow me, you two. I think you’re going to love this.’
Rashmika saw the cathedrals.
It was not how she had imagined it, when she had rehearsed in her head her arrival at the Way. In her mind’s eye she was always simply there, with no approach, no opportunity to see the cathedrals small and neat in the distance, perched like ornaments on the horizon. But here they were, still a dozen or more kilometres away, yet clearly visible. It was like looking at the sailing ships of olden days, the way their topgallants came over the horizon long before their hulls. She could reach out her hand, open her fist and trap any one of those cathedrals in the curve between finger and thumb. She could close one eye so that the lack of perspective made the cathedral appear like a small and lovely toy, a thing of magical jewelled delicacy.
And she could just as easily imagine closing her fist on it.
There were too many of them to count. Thirty, forty, easily. Some were bunched up into tight clusters, like galleons exchanging close-quarters cannon fire. When they were so close, it was not easy to separate the resulting confusion of towers and spires into individual structures. Some cathedrals were single-spired or single-towered; others resembled whole city parishes joined together and set adrift. There were elbowed towers and lavish minarets. There were spires — barbed, flanged and buttressed. There were stained-glass windows hundreds of metres tall. There were rose windows wide enough to fly a ship through. There were glints of rare metals, acres of fabulous alloys. There were things like barnacles climbing halfway up the skins of some of the cathedrals, things whose scale she completely misjudged until she was close enough to realise that they were actually buildings in their own right, piled higgledy-piggledy atop one another.
Again, she thought of Brueghel.
As the caravan continued its approach to the Way, a greater proportion of each cathedral gradually became visible. Yet more sailed over the horizon, far to their rear, but this was the main group, Rashmika knew: the vanguard of the procession.
Above, Haldora sat perfectly at the zenith, at the apex of the celestial dome.
She had nearly arrived.
Scorpio sat on the wooden table in the glade. He looked around, anxious to absorb every detail, but at the same time hoping not to appear too overwhelmed. It was really like no place he had ever been. The sky was a pure corneal blue, richer and deeper than anything he recalled from Ararat. The trees were amazingly intricate, shimmering with detail. They breathed. He had only ever seen pictures of trees, but the pictures had failed utterly to convey the enormous dizzying complexity of the things. It was like the first time he had seen the ocean: the gulf between expectation and reality was vast and nauseating. It wasn’t simply a question of scaling up some local, familiar thing, like a cup of water. There was a whole essence of seaness that he could never have predicted.
Frankly, the trees alarmed him. They were so huge, so alive. What if they decided they didn’t like him?
‘Scorp,’ Antoinette said. ‘Put these on, will you?’
He took the goggles, frowning at them. ‘Any particular reason why?’
‘So you can talk to John. Those of us without machines in our heads can’t see him most of the time. Don’t worry, you won’t be the only one looking silly.’
He fixed the goggles in place. They were designed for people, not pigs, but they were not too uncomfortable when he adjusted them for the shape of his face. Nothing happened when he looked through them.
‘John’ll be here in a moment,’ Antoinette reassured him.
This meeting had been convened very quickly. Around the table, in addition to Antoinette and himself, sat Vasko Malinin, Ana Khouri and her daughter — still inside a portable incubator, which Khouri rested on her lap — Dr Valensin and three low-ranking colony representatives. The three representatives were simply the most senior of the fourteen thousand or so citizens who were already aboard the Nostalgia for Infinity. The usual senior members — Orca Cruz, Blood, Xavier Liu, amongst others — were still on Ararat. Remontoire took the place opposite Scorpio, leaving only one vacant position.
‘This will have to be brief,’ Remontoire said. ‘In less than an hour I must be on my way.’
‘You won’t be staying for lunch?’ Scorpio asked, remembering belatedly that Remontoire had no sense of humour.