Tammis looked away, shrugged. “I don’t know… . Merovy said he’d cut off his own ear to hurt somebody else.”
“Yes,” Moon murmured. “I think he would. He did it to hurt you, Tammis, and to hurt us all. I can’t tell you why, exactly …” although something in her voice told him that she could have. “But I can tell you, keep away from people like that It doesn’t matter why they do what they do; it only matters that you know they will.”
She took her hand away from his; looked down at both her hands together on the tabletop. Her one hand touched the other, almost questioningly. “I am Arienrhod’s clone, Tammis. But I’m not Arienrhod… . The woman who gave birth to me was Lelark Dawntreader Summer. Sparks—your father—” she said insistently, “and I grew up together on Neith, in the Windward Islands. Gran and my mother were our family. Maybe I was Arienrhod’s clone … but Arienrhod didn’t raise me or feed me or sew my clothes or teach me right from wrong. Arienrhod didn’t love me… . That’s what makes someone your mother, or your father. That’s what family is.” She looked up at him, blinking too much. “And as for the rest of it … the Change took care of that, at the last Festival. We all cast our sins into the sea, and the sea washed them away. That’s what forgiveness is.”
He nodded, glancing down.
“Do you think you can forgive me?” she asked softly. “And your father?”
He lifted his head, blinking hard himself; but he did not answer. He hugged her, feeling safe and certain for the brief moment that she held him, before he said, “Good night” again, and meant it this time.
ONDINEE: Tuo Ne’el
“Boss, I think we’ve got trouble.” Kedalion Niburu called the words over his shoulder without looking back, not able to take his eyes off the screen in front of him. It showed him the unmistakable expanding diamond of a pursuit pattern forming in their wake—at least half a dozen craft, still beyond sight but closing rapidly with their own.
“Who is it?” Reede dropped into the seat next to him, peering out with bloodshot eyes across the living-death landscape. Tuo Ne’el had been sliding past below them for several hours now; gradually lightening into the visible as they caught up second by second with the day. Kedalion had never thought he would be glad to see that view again; but, until he had done this last scan, it had almost seemed like he was coming home. They had been in flight for nearly twelve hours straight, coming directly off their landing at an obscure shipping field halfway around the planet, flightlagged and exhausted to begin with. But Reede had ordered it, Reede had not explained why, Reede had simply wanted it done, that way, in secrecy with faked codes and no rest at all… .
And Reede was swearing now, as Kedalion pointed at the displays, letting him see trouble for himself. “Whose are they?” His own hand moved over the control boards, querying, reconfirming, as if he thought he could somehow find a better answer
But it was an impossible question. “I don’t know,” Kedalion said, “except they’re not Humbaba’s welcoming committee. They don’t respond to any of the codes, and they aren’t talking. I’ve tried all the usual frequencies.”
“Shit. Shit!” Reede hit the panel with his fist, making some system bleat in protest “We covered our tracks coming in. How could the Blues have figured it—?” He shook his head. “It can’t be the Blues. They’d just nail us from upstairs.” He frowned, rubbing his face. “How far are we from Humbaba’s?”
“About ten minutes.”
“Can we get there first?”
“Don’t think so.”
“Are we transmitting a distress code?”
Kedalion looked up again, facing Reede’s expression with an effort of will. His own face felt paralyzed. “No one’s answering it, boss,” he said. “Seems like nobody’s home.”
“That’s insane,” Reede snapped, reaching for the comm. He stuffed a remote into his ear, sent out the same call, without even looking down. He got the same results: No answer. Nothing at all. Dead silence. His hand fisted on the panel, Kedalion felt his own hands beginning to sweat.
“You think they’re jamming us?” Reede touched the images on the screen.
“No. We’d get a reading off their beam.”
“By the Render—” Reede tugged at his ear, his eyes searching the featureless horizon for a sign of their pursuit, a sign of salvation. “Get me remote visual on the citadel, as soon as you can.”
“Boss …” Kedalion hesitated, remembering the mysterious meeting he had stumbled on before their departure for Number Four; remembering that Reede had told him to forget it. “Is there anybody else who can help us?”
Reede looked sharply at him; but then he sat back in his seat, actually seeming to consider the question. “Not close enough. Not that I trust. Not with what we’re carrying. Try the citadel again.”
Kedalion tried it. No results.
“Try our tail again.”
He ran a call all up and down the open frequencies. No answer. “You think they want our cargo?” He glanced into the rear of the hovercraft, where Ananke lay slumped across a seat in blissful ignorance, sound asleep. Concealed beneath the seat there was a heavy, unlabeled container—with the key to the universe locked inside it.
“That’s my bet.” Reede nodded. “But why—? The only ones who could possibly know I’m here and what we’ve got know I’m bringing it home for them.” He shook his hair back from his eyes; a muscle in his cheek was twitching.
“I thought Humbaba sent us—”
“No.” Reede looked at him suddenly, with cold disgust. “Humbaba did not send us. Humbaba doesn’t know shit. … I don’t like this, gods, I don’t… . Get the citadel on visual.” He pointed straight ahead.
Kedalion could see nothing. Wondering whether Reede actually could, he upped the resolution factor on the forward visual. A segment of their view appeared in abrupt magnification, showing him the distant spire of Humbaba’s fortress, rising like a beacon from the gray sea of impenetrable scrub. He heard Reede suck in a long harsh breath of relief, let it out again as he saw the citadel still intact. “Why don’t the) answer?” he murmured. “Unless someone’scut their entire power system … and that means no protection.” His knuckles showed white on the panel. “Try them again!” he said. Kedalion repeated the callcode automatically.
As he input the final digit a gout of flame rose from the image on the screen. ^ ball of white light expanded outward, filling the magnification segment, spilling over into their realtime view, blinding them even through the protected shield of the dome
Kedalion swore, shutting his eyes. Reede cried out, a sound that was more like despair than pain, as his hands flew up to his face.
An explosion. As his own vision cleared, it let him see that the white light & fading … let him see what it had done. Where there had been an impregnable, shining tower on the sullen plain, there was now twisted wreckage, a splinter of rum glowing cherry-red, flickering with the starpoint flares of secondary explosions.
“What … what … ?” Ananke groaned, stumbling forward from the back seat. “What happened— Hallowed Calavre!” He stopped, clinging to the seatbacks, gaping in disbelief at what showed ahead. A black shroud of smoke had begun to conceal the ruin, as the thorn forest ignited like a funeral pyre. Kedalion could see the forest blazing up now in explosions of its own as petrochemicals caught fire in bark and leaves, setting off a holocaust that would torch the plain for thousands of hectares in all directions. Beside him Reede stared, motionless, his face devoid of any expression, as if his mind had gone completely somewhere else. He twisted the ring he wore on his thumb. Kedalion looked away from the emptiness of his eyes.