Shadow Over Avalon (20 page)

“Drop your weapons belt, hellcat,” Lief pleasantly invited.

The tip of Thor’s sword touched between her shoulder blades.

“You are tracking someone, aren’t you? I give my word your quarry didn’t come to Grimes,” Thor said. “I guess you brought Erwin in just to scout.”

Lief took her weapons belt, while other soldiers flanked him, on guard. One of the soldiers stepped toward her with a chain and a pair of leg-irons swinging from his hand. “Give your Brethren oath to serve as agreed.”

“My oath is given.” Shadow seethed.

“See you keep it, or I will have those fetters attached, and I think I might just lose the key,” Lief warned.

Shadow marched back into camp under escort to the women’s wagon. Her blanket lay there, along with two other bedrolls. She did not bother to ask whose. The half-brothers looked too smug for it to be any but theirs. They ignored her now that they had won, settling to talk to each other about High Fort, and who would be there.

Shadow took her chance to reach Ector. Not what she had wanted to do in a camp full of people already on the alert for strangeness.

The touch of his mind tasted as fresh and welcome as a summer shower after drought. Shadow gave and took. This mission aborted, they agreed the Submariners must pull out. Ector reckoned about five days for her to travel to High Fort, two to the coast and another five for the unexpected. He intended to cruise along the shoreline from the twelfth day until the twentieth. They both decided Shadow should remain with the Terrans rather than risk her safety trying to escape again.

“Hey you. I asked a question,” Lief said, red-faced at being ignored.

“Thinking,” Shadow said.

“Don’t try going back to single word replies when we’ve both heard you do better,” Thor said.

“Forts are bad places for us. Talk better outside.” Shadow hoped to smooth over her mental absence.

“I said how did you lose your mount?” Lief repeated.

“Saurian attack.” Shadow rolled up the sleeve covering her real arm. Scars she did not remember getting had settled to a raw pink.

Lief looked at the limb. “Those are months old.”

Shadow shrugged, not caring what he thought.

A call from within the wagon sent Lief running to the entrance. He returned, grinning.

“The ladies want escort to the ‘necessary’ enclosure. I think they spent all day drinking to keep cool from the fuss they’re making now. They demand the dark one goes in with them.”

“Escort duty at High Fort . . . I accept.” Shadow went to collect the women, ignoring the brothers’ amazement at her about-face.

Arthur roused from a dream where he had inhabited a young boy’s body and an older man taught him to ride. He recalled every sensation, different from his shared experiences with Shadow. His teacher’s face and the location looked familiar, but Shadow had never entered a strange stone building above ground. The Terran forts she visited appeared encased in natural landscape. This structure was how he imagined ancient buildings on the surface might have looked before they fell into decay. It was not her life meshing him into an endless dream. Something else infiltrated his mind.

Seers pressed him to take his final vows for the deep training, interrupting his studies into metallurgy and geology – so necessary for one hoping to go on a surface mission. His access to the Archive suddenly became restricted by repeated surprise initiate visits to all its outlets, and Circe had taken Evegena’s side, urging him to go for initiation. As they argued every time they met, Arthur now avoided her.

He was being herded into a net he didn’t want to enter, not without knowing the true cost. There was one who would tell him the truth: Ector, the seer who got away from their clutches, was the best source of advice. A rapid check on his console confirmed Ector in residence and off duty.

Arthur couldn’t walk out of Sanctuary without permission any longer, and so he selected a new escape route, going down to the lowest level of Sanctuary to the unbolted cover of an airshaft sat in the wall. As he struggled to wedge it shut behind him, he ran over the schematics of the system, satisfied he had memorized each junction. He emerged an hour later in the lowest level of the Elite barracks. Lit by a dim glow globe, open bins lined an outer wall, a collection area for street trash. Arthur held his breath while climbing a garbage disposal chute opening to the street. He gagged when one unpleasant mess hit him full in the face on his way up, almost losing his foothold on a join in the pipe. Odorless air from the street brought a welcome relief, if slightly tainted by the refuse.

His credits bought him a railpod ride to the western sector, landing him two blocks from Ector’s unit, near enough to walk the rest.

He looked for a white, two-tiered structure linked to its neighbors bearing three blue bars above the door. Arthur pressed his palm to the entry lock. The device denied access, expressing its regrets for the owner’s absence. He wanted to scream in frustration. Ector wouldn’t stay out late, not with Morgan in tow, for he always spent his free time with his small daughter. Arthur sat down by the door to wait.

“Arthur?” A hand on his shoulder shook him awake much later. “What are you doing out of Sanctuary, lad?” Ector asked.

“Waiting . . .” Arthur yawned. “For you.”

Ector stood over him, a sleeping child cradled against his chest. “Get inside. We’ll discuss this after Morgan is in bed.”

Arthur stumbled in after Ector. He slumped into an easy chair near a container-grown date palm in the central atrium while Ector tended to his tiny daughter. As he looked up through a skylight to the blue glow above, Arthur realized he couldn’t return to Sanctuary undetected, not at the fifth sleeping hour when service crews started duty.

The walls decorated with colored sands gave a look of motion. He wanted to dive into the movement and emerge as a warrior on the surface world.

“Well, lad?” Ector had brought a bottle and two glasses back. He poured a full measure in each. “If you’re man enough to sneak out of Sanctuary, you’re man enough to take your liquor.”

Arthur took the beverage prohibited to acolytes. He gulped at his drink, choking as the burning fluid stung his throat.

“Your dam had the same problem with liquor at your age.”

“Who?” Arthur’s heart pounded.

“Find out for yourself. I’m only guessing.”

“Why hide it?” He breathed out forever, hardly able to take this in. “You named me man enough to drink, so why aren’t I man enough to know my origins?”

“Arthur, if I knew for sure, I’d tell you and sink the consequences. Talking of consequences, Sanctuary doesn’t permit acolytes to visit the city without an escort. I presume you didn’t follow my bad example of knotted bed sheets when you sneaked out?”

“No, the air vents on the lower level.” Arthur placed his glass back on Ector’s polished coral table. It took him a few moments to isolate and eliminate the effects of the intoxicant. He had to stay sober, or he might start raiding for information and lose a friend.

“Much more discreet. It may be days before anyone notices you’re missing.”

“Ector, I’m not sure I’m staying out. That’s why I needed to see you. Am I making a mistake if I take the vows?”

“Each individual makes a unique selection of ideas fit a certain action for his or her own reasons. I can listen, suggest, offer alternatives, but the final choice must be yours alone.”

“The Archive places exactly the same stress on the word ‘individual’,” Arthur said.

“With good reason. Most people live their lives how custom or society expects. Free thought isn’t following the shoal instinct. An intelligence of the Archive’s magnitude can predict each action of such people. Individuals, those of us who create different paths in opposition to the norm, are wild cards in the pack. Play a joker and the very nature of the game becomes unpredictable. That’s much more interesting to the Archive.” Ector refreshed his glass, holding it up to the light before he took a sip.

Arthur tried to think of a way to explain his actions without having to confess his crime.

“The Archive finds you interesting,” Ector said. “It wouldn’t unless you’d stepped away from shoal behavior, and don’t bother to deny you’ve been in contact. Exactly which rules have you broken, Arthur?”

“Full sensory playback—so what?” Arthur challenged, hoping Ector would let it go at that.

“Very dangerous unless you had the Archive’s full attention. It wouldn’t concern itself with a general search. You reviewed a particular subject?”

“Shadow.” Arthur tried to stop heat rising to his cheeks, aware it made him look like a child caught out.

“And you came to me? How long since you last accessed?”

“Six days. The Archive calls when it’s safe.” Was Ector going to turn him over to Sanctuary? Logic and the law said he must, or become an accomplice after the fact.

“Seers watch access points in Sanctuary waiting for you to get careless. I can tell you the choices right now: either give up on the Archive, or renege from Sanctuary.”

“If I renege?”

“Only one choice really—mine,” Ector said. “You could enroll in Healer Faculty, or join the regular military, but they’d never let you rise to any interesting position with that blot on your record. I chose the Elite because I wanted control of my life and I’ve been lucky to survive as long as I have. It’s not an easy choice. There are sacrifices.”

“How long do I have to decide?”

Ector looked up over the rim of his glass. “Picking on Shadow as a subject is bound to panic Sanctuary when they find out. They will, if they haven’t already, and they have reason to be sensitive over acolytes reviewing her. I’d guess they’re making regular head counts now, since they know someone’s misbehaving. You’ll be missed at first waking hour.” He paused. “Why her?”

“I wanted to see how she survived on the surface world, as that is where I wanted to go. I want to fight the Nestines, Ector.” He looked up. “Are you going to report me?”

Ector took another sip of his drink. “Individuals sometimes make decisions for the benefit of all. I think our society needs ‘individuals’ desperately. Unlike you, I am well beyond any seer punishment as a member of the Elite. I can’t protect you without a definite commitment, but if you join us in the surface war, there is no way for anyone to reverse your decision.”

“What made you quit?” Arthur asked. Every nerve tingled when Ector leaned back, lost in thought.

“My reasons don’t compare with yours. I’d had a taste of normal life, and I didn’t like Sanctuary restrictions by comparison. At age fifteen, thrust into that environment, I found their eugenics program repulsive. Maybe, if I’d been raised from birth to accept their way as norm, or the first brood mother had been younger . . . you see, we differ. You’ve already provided the necessary genetic material.”

“Not exactly.” Arthur grinned, enjoying the upper hand for once. “Sanctuary is losing patience with my limited cooperation. They haven’t found the right lever to force viability.”

“You young shark! I’m tempted to rate your psi-level right now, but I think I’d need help. Over fifteen?”

“Twenty on a good day. Ector, I can’t be a stud for them—I’m really not sure I should father children.” Arthur forced down the burning liquor like a glass of water. The heat of its passage dulled the pain deep inside. “I’ve always had vivid dreams, and they have now become very real, like full sensory feedback from the Archive, but more so. It’s like I’m different person, not just seeing through another set of eyes. At the start I refused my part in the eugenics program just because I could, but I can’t keep stalling, and I can’t pass insanity on to an innocent child. I studied Shadow because of her psi-level as well as her skills. I wanted to know if she had my problems. I need to find out if she is really sane.”

Ector refilled both their glasses. His eyes held shades of concern. “Cyborgs tend to develop different inner balances. I have, and Shadow is less human than I am. We live on a fine edge. I’m warning you against applying ordinary standards to us.” Ector looked at Arthur. “These dreams of yours, are they sleeping or waking?”

“Sleeping.”

“Only the sane question themselves. Don’t worry unless you start getting waking episodes, and Arthur, Sanctuary is dangerous for you. If they find out, they’ll declare you incompetent.”

A cold wave ran down Arthur’s spine. He guessed how Sanctuary would deal with a problem like him. Keep living the parts they needed and neutralize the rest. The game he had been playing with them suddenly took on deadly overtones.

“I’ve an implant.” He brushed aside hair from the interface. “Would it cause the dreams?”

“All acolytes have those. It doesn’t make you a full cyborg. My advice is to join the Elite and keep studying Shadow if it helps. I’d like to have you two working together once you’re fit for surface assignment.”

Surface missions without having the restrictions of Sanctuary imposed on him? A chance to see the enslaved Terrans at close quarters,
and
he’d have a shot at killing Nestines? All this and a legitimate escape from Sanctuary was a dream come true.

“Thanks, Ector. I suppose I’d better head over to barracks. Will they let me in this late?”