Scaf made a tiny shrugging motion, then looked away. "You want to know what's happening—is that it?" He glanced at Ben then nodded.
"I understand. Today . . . well, if I'd prepared you for what was going to happen, you wouldn't have gone through with it. Now that it's happened, you'll be better prepared next time. Maybe you'll even enjoy it."
There was a disgruntled murmur from the others. Ben took a long breath, momentarily irritated by them—by their stubbornness, their intractability. It was as if they didn't want to be better than they were: as if all they really wanted was to wallow in the filth and darkness from whence they'd come.
"This is it," he said, keeping his voice free of any trace of irritability. "Don't you understand that yet? This is what we've been working toward all these years." He held up the printouts he had brought from his study and waved them at the daymen. "Look, I've made lists for each of you of what needs to be done." He began to hand them out. "You'll see here just what needs to be prepared, what packed."
There was general consternation as they studied their lists. Kygek, in his usual fashion, scratched his head. But it was Scaf, as ever, who spoke for them, his long face furrowed deeply.
"But this . . . this is for a journey, Master." He looked up and met Ben's eyes. "Where exactly are we going?"
"Inside," Ben answered, smiling back at him. "Into the Clay."
NEVILLE TURNED FROM the window, looking across as Meg came back into the room carrying a loaded tray. As she set it down, he went across to her, watching as she laid out the cups and then poured the ch'a.
Tea, he reminded himself. Here they call it tea.
Setting the teapot down, she lifted the brimming cup and offered it to him, her dark eyes meeting his for the first time since she'd left the room. Again he felt his stomach clench, his heart begin to hammer. Whatever he'd expected to find out here in the Domain, it wasn't her. He had thought her a fiction—something conjured from Ben's mind, like all the rest of it, but she was real. Real, and quite beautiful.
More beautiful even than the day.
He watched her draw her long dark hair back from her face, then lift her own cup; felt his breath catch as she smiled and sipped.
So simple a thing to do, and yet she transformed it utterly.
"So, Mister Neville?" she said, the unusualness of that word Mister, the strangeness of her accent—so pure and clipped—making him feel, once again, that he had strayed into a dream. "Do you like our little valley?"
Like it? He laughed gently and made a vague gesture with his head. How could one not like it? Why, he had fallen in love with it the moment he had stepped from the cruiser. With it and with her.
He looked about him at the room, at the carved wooden panels of the walls, the dark oak beams, the low ceiling, and the soft furnishings of the chairs, and sighed.
"It's like a dream," he said. "If only the whole world were like this."
"It was once," she said. "Or parts of it."
He stared at her, drawn into her eyes a moment, unable to look away, then broke his gaze, embarrassed, unused to such directness.
She was like her brother in that. Neither of them had learned any of those games one took for granted in the Above: games of face and status. One did not have to look for the motive behind their words, nor for some barbed insult.
"Those men," he said, turning to indicate the window. "Who are they? I thought you were alone here."
"The daymen.7" She moved past him, the scent of apple wafting to him from her hair, so fresh and natural. "They came here nine years ago when the valley was invaded. Ben captured them, civilized them."
"I didn't know," he said, moving up beside her to stare out down the garden toward the bay. "Was it frightening?"
"Yes." She turned her face to him and smiled. A smile full of sunlight and roses. "I left, after that. I stayed away from here almost two years, but I had to come back. Ben needed me."
He frowned, not quite understanding what she meant, but sensing the strength of feeling behind her words.
"Your brother is a remarkable man, Nu shi Shepherd. No one knows the inner workings of a man better than he. His self-knowledge is quite astonishing."
His comments brought a strange smile to her features. "Forgive me, Mister Neville, but you're wrong. Ben but guesses at his nature. If he knew, there would be no art, no ... creativity in him. It's that darkness within him he pursues. Those things unknown."
She stopped, turning suddenly. Ben had stolen silently into the room. He stood beside the door, like a piece of the darkness itself, his dark eyes watching them intently.
"I learnt his road and, ere they were sure I was I, left the dark wood behind, kestrel and woodpecker, the inn in the sun, the happy mood when first I tasted sunlight there. I traveled fast, in hopes I should outrun that other. What to do when caught, I planned not. I pursued to prove the likeness, and, if true, to watch until myself I knew."
Neville felt a shiver ripple up his back. The hairs on the back of his neck were standing on end.
"Is that something you made up?"
Ben stepped into the light. "Good God, no. That's Edward Thomas. The Other.' He understood, you see. It's like Meg says. It's the pursuit that matters. The ceaseless search for self."
Neville bowed his head in a gesture of respect, but Ben seemed merely amused.
"You want to know what I've decided, yes?"
"I . . ." Neville hesitated, then smiled, deciding that such directness should be answered in kind. "Yes."
"Then you can tell your Masters that they have a deal."
"I see." Neville nodded, but his surprise was close to shock. What, no haggling? No endless questioning of contractual clauses? Just a straight yes? It was unheard of! "You're sure?"
Ben laughed. "Don't think me naive, Mister Neville. Or may I call you jack? I've studied the contract at length and I know what I've signed." He took the papers from his pocket and handed them to Neville. "If SimFic want something more complex than my signature, I'll provide whatever they want. There's only one condition."
Ah . . . Neville smiled tightly. Here it was.
"I do no publicity."
Neville laughed. "But—"
"My work speaks for itself, or it doesn't speak at all."
Neville hesitated, then bowed his head. "Well, it's strange. The media—"
"Can take it or leave it."
"I see,"
"Make sure you do." Ben lifted the teapot and poured himself a cup, then came across to where Neville and his sister stood. "And make sure your Masters understand as well. What they do with the work is their concern. Mine is to create."
Neville licked his lips, his mouth suddenly dry. It was as he'd been warned. Ben was one of a kind. Every other artist he'd ever met had been neurotically concerned with every last tiny detail of the promotional strategy, but Ben genuinely seemed not to care.
"Doesn't it worry you?"
"Worry me? Why should it? The sum you've paid me, I'm sure you'll do your best to recoup your investment. And even if you don't, how does that affect me? Will it change what I do next? No. Will it change the work I've already created? No. So why should I be worried?"
"Put that way, I guess—"
Ben reached out, pressing the fingers of his left hand to Neville's chest, the touch firm yet unthreatening.
"Did you like the work?"
Caught in the intensity of that stare, Neville felt transfixed. To answer no seemed impossible, and yet he felt compelled to give more than the stock, expected answer.
"It frightened me," he said. "It was so real."