The Red Queen (45 page)

Ana was giving me a hard look now, her eyes daring me to find another excuse. ‘Look,’ I said, struggling to speak in a reasonable voice, ‘even if I relished the thought of trusting ourselves to a Beforetime flying machine, if we find one and it is of a size that could carry us all, surely it will be incapable of flight after all these aeons sitting on the ground. Or, maybe it will carry us up into the air and then fall out of the sky. Even if I cared nothing for our safety, I cannot put my quest at such risk.’

Ana’s exasperation faded, but God said, ‘The androne can be fitted with a program to assess any glide for flight fitness, and I can activate the glide’s self-maintenance and repair program. In addition, hangar nanobots will have been performing constant routine maintenance, unless the program was disabled, and they can be programmed to perform more complex operations.’

I hardly heard its words. I was too aware that the others were looking at me with varying degrees of delight and dismay. Even Tash was staring at me expectantly.

‘I will think on it,’ I said tightly. ‘But, God, I do want you to fix one of the andrones so that it can operate independently of you and lead us to Northport. It will be able to lead us to the grave of Jacob Obernewtyn.’

‘It can carry things for us, too!’ Ana said eagerly. ‘And there is a wheeled platform we can use if he is to go with us. We could pile a lot of supplies on it and Unit B can draw it along.’

I bit back the urge to snarl at her and said she had better get the androne to carry all of the supplies she had amassed to the surface before God started meddling with it.

‘How long will it take to change Unit B so he can do all the things you said, God?’ Ana asked.

‘It will be necessary to culture and develop organics capable of accepting the installation of additional memory and advanced reasoning capacities. This can be done within twelve hours. Then they will need to be installed and linked to the androne’s current organics. This will take fifty hours. Once it is done, I will install a map of Northport with specific instructions for the activation of the main terminal link, which will connect the Pellmar Quadrants.’

‘If it is so easy, why didn’t Kelver Rhonin do it like that?’ Swallow muttered.

‘Kelver Rhonin believed strongly that there would be a connection between Northport and govamen, Technician Swallow,’ God said. ‘The plan to use a glide was a secondary option that he formulated just before his departure. User Seeker, I will upload a guidance system for the location of key glide hangars as well as reverting it to its default programming for autonomy. This will require three hours.’

‘Let us plan to leave here in three days, then,’ I said. ‘Time enough for Ahmedri to get here.’

Time to find Miryum, I thought decisively.

Ana and Dragon went to get some supplies, and Swallow avoided her glare as he announced that he would go up to the surface and prepare a camp so that the horses, assuming they were with Ahmedri, would have some shelter, and so that we could begin amassing supplies for the journey to Northport. God suggested Unit B lead him to the surface and return to collect whatever Ana and Dragon had found. I agreed; I did not want to go searching for Miryum until I knew what was happening with Ahmedri. Before departing, Swallow reminded us to keep an eye on the other androne so we would know when it moved again, and then, impulsively, he asked if I was sure I did not want to come up with him and breathe some true air.

I was tempted, for in truth I felt half suffocated by the conversation about glides and flying. But I did not want to hear Swallow rant about Ana’s wild notions, so I went to wash the dishes. After a little, Tash came to dry them. She was peaceful company, saying little, but this only deepened my guilt at not knowing what we could do about her. At the least, I now knew that Ahmedri lived, and though she did not know him, he would be able to take her with him to the Land. But it would be a hard journey ahead of them. There was also the possibility that she would be unable to leave Midland, and maybe God would insist she be put into a cryopod, yet she had not so far done anything to prove herself a special anomaly. What if God decided she was not any sort of anomaly and wanted to put her back into Habitat, nullified. It would be a poor reward, given that she had saved our lives.

How much did she really understand of my quest, I wondered. We had spoken freely in front of her, but she seldom asked questions, though maybe she did ask them of Dragon.

The dishes done, I returned to the table, leaving the Speci girl to dry the last of them. Dameon was still sitting quietly, hands loosely cupped about his empty mug, his expression thoughtful. ‘Do you think the beasts sent to Eden will still be sleeping in cryopods?’ he asked.

Oddly I had not thought about this, despite knowing that two of the cryopods had contained flame birds. ‘It depends upon whether it was a target during the Great White. Even if it was, as long as the actual building the cryopods were in was not hit, the beasts in them would be safe from any poisons in the air or earth. It seems unlikely for it to have been a target, given that it was remote and no more than a storage place for beasts in an age when beasts were thought of as heads of corn to be harvested and consumed. But for that reason it might also be a ruin, given that aeons have passed between when the beasts were brought there and now.’

‘Yet this place is intact, so why not Eden?’

‘I
hope
it is intact,’ I said. ‘For perhaps if we come there, we will find the place where Elke Erlinder dwelt, and given that his sister worked at the Sentinel complex, he might have scribed something that will help us find it. Kelver Rhonin thought he knew, according to God.’

‘Given how little regard the Beforetimers had for beasts it is a wonder they bothered to put any in cryopods, let alone building Eden and sending them there,’ Dameon said.

‘From what Garth and the teknoguilders said, there were many Beforetimers who cared profoundly about beasts. I think it was partly to impress them that the govamen saved species that were dying out by putting pairs into cryopods. But that was a magi lay – I think the main reason they were saved was because the teknoguilders wanted to find out if the cryopods worked; if they would sustain life and wit over very long periods. I don’t know, though, if that was the sole purpose of Eden for there are so many human-sized cryopods that we have to assume the tests had proven out.’

‘Unless that was what this storage was all about,’ Dameon said slowly. ‘But as to Eden, given what the androne said, it might have been a twin to the God project Kelver Rhonin was involved in, with beasts being rescued instead of humans. After all, it sounds as if the plan was for beasts rescued here to be sent there, until God realised no one from Eden was coming.’

‘That seems to suggest Eden might be closer than we think,’ I said.

‘Not necessarily,’ Dameon said. ‘Remember the Beforetimers thought very differently about distance. What was near to them may be far for us.’

I was relieved he had not mentioned the possibility of using a Beforetimers’ glide, for no matter what had been said, it seemed madness to me. In truth, I hoped the subject would not be raised again.

‘You said that God told you Eden is in Gadfian territory?’ Dameon said.

I nodded. ‘I wonder if it could be the land from whence the slavemaster hordes came to overrun the Red Land, for that was Gadfian territory in the Beforetime as well.’

‘So you do not think Sentinel is in the Red Land, despite what Ana was told about the Andol Sea?’ Dameon asked. ‘What of the sign left for you by Cassandra, which refers to the Red Land?’

‘I have been thinking for some time that whatever I am to find is not in the Red Land but in Dragon’s memory of the Red Land, and maybe it has to do with the slavemasters’ land. The clue could be interpreted in that way.’

Sooner rather than later, I would have to delve into her memory, I knew, but as ever, I found it hard to think of entering the memories of another person, particularly someone I knew and cared about. And it would be complicated because Dragon’s mind had barriers that she could not control. I would have to try to do it from the dreamtrails, and maybe even then her mind would refuse me entry. And what if the only way in was to batter down those barriers? I thrust the thought from me with real revulsion.

‘We are to sail into the arms of the slavemasters then,’ Dameon said without fear or bitterness.

‘I do not know, but wherever Sentinel is, I must go there.’ I put a slight emphasis on
I
, to make it clear that it was a matter of choice for him and the others; I did not take it for granted that they would go on with me, even though they had committed themselves to my quest. Dameon said only that it would be an irony if that warlike people had the most terrible weapon of all in their midst, with no idea of what it was, for if they
had
known, they would surely have made use of it.

‘Sentinel has the means to defend itself,’ I said quietly. ‘Much that my guides have left me concerns the thwarting of its formidable protections. They, at least, will not be sleeping. But it has always been said that Sentinel is somewhere remote, and so perhaps it is far from whatever cities and settlements are in that land.’

‘We will know better, maybe, once God produces her maps,’ Dameon murmured.

I was wondering what form the maps would take, and whether someone would have to make a copy from a screen picture, when Tash came over somewhat hesitantly to say she had finished. I bade her sit with us but she said that she had better go and bathe. There was something so humble and accepting in her that, watching her go, I felt a sudden fury at the fates that had caught her in this sticky web. Feeling my anger and divining its cause, Dameon observed that she had been very downcast since leaving Habitat. I told him I thought she was grieving that the Committee had given her the red token, knowing it would result in her being killed or having her mind wiped. It turned out Dameon had not heard this part of our tale, so I told him all that had happened in the cacti grove and in the Hub.

‘She thought God had given this red device to her as a test?’ he said, looking appalled.

‘She did, and though she knew it might mean she would probably die horribly, she accepted it as God’s will. It was honest and pure faith as much as courage that allowed her to accept what was to come. Discovering the Committee controlled the red token, and that Feyat had dealt it to her simply because she had got wind of a dalliance the woman had been conducting, shattered her. The worst of it is that Tash knew only incidentally because she is an empath. She must have given herself away by some glance or inadvertent word and Feyat wanted to silence her. I think the sheer vicious pettiness of it was what sickened and anguished the girl most. She had revered the Committee folk, you see.’

‘Poor child. It is hard to see someone you have put on a pedestal fall from it. I will speak to her later,’ Dameon said.

‘You are still the Guildmaster of the Empaths,’ I said, loving his kindness.

He smiled. ‘I am afraid it grows on one and in one, that authority.’

‘Do you wish you were back at Obernewtyn?’ I asked, and then wished I had not, for I did not want to evoke nostalgia in him.

‘No,’ he said, with gentle finality.

I heard the sound of a door opening and there was a burst of laughter as Ana and Dragon entered, struggling under many devices and parcels and boxes. Behind them stood the androne all but obscured by a great mound of boxes and packages.

‘Ye gods, what is all this?’ I muttered.

‘Ouf! This is the least of it,’ Ana said, spilling the things she had been carrying onto the table then turning to unburden Dragon. ‘I had chosen a lot of it already and when Hendon came it seemed a good idea to have him bring up as much of it as he could. God sent him to help us because he does not need to do anything to him yet. I am going to sort out a pile for him to take to the surface.’

‘Hendon?’

‘It was too confusing to keep calling him androne and Unit B,’ Ana said. ‘It was like calling a dog Dog or us Human One and Human Two. So when we went out this morning, I asked if I could give him a name and he said I might.’

‘Why Hendon?’ And why
he
, I wondered, though I had noticed Dameon had begun to call God
she
from time to time.

Ana shrugged. ‘It was the name of my mother’s brother. He loved her well and she would tell me and Bergold about the adventures they had together, how he always protected her.’ There was pain in her eyes, and I regretted questioning her.

‘Hendon is a good name,’ I said, though in truth it seemed idiotic to me to name a machine. But had not Dell done the same thing? ‘What of the other androne?’ I asked, half facetiously.

She gave me a wry smile. ‘I have not met him so he will remain Unit A.’ Then she grew serious and eager. ‘But Elspeth, listen, I was asking Hendon questions and one of them was how Kelver Rhonin had got from here to Northport. He remembers everything that was said to him or near him . . .’ My heart sank at the thought that she was about to renew her talk of glides, but instead she turned to the androne. ‘Hendon, tell Elspeth what you told me.’

‘I accompanied Prime Operator Kelver Rhonin when he set off on foot from Midland to Northport,’ the androne said in its rather monotonous masculine voice.

‘But wait,’ I said. ‘God told me it could not go that far.’

‘God limited the andrones’ range after that, but listen, I am trying to tell you that Hendon knows the way to Northport,’ Ana said impatiently. ‘I have been asking him about it and it sounds very bleak terrain, but there are only tainted patches, not great poisonous swathes of land.’

‘That is good to hear,’ I said, for that had been troubling me. ‘Did you get a sense of how far it is?’

‘Hendon says it took three days for Kelver Rhonin to get there but I don’t know how fast they went.’

‘Did it speak of
rhenlings
?’

She nodded, her expression darkening. ‘They swarm over the whole territory, but only when it is dark. The moon is thin now, but it is not yet darkmoon. If we leave in three days as you planned, it would still just be visible. If we left in a twoday, I think we could make it to Northport before darkmoon, but if we leave later and fall short, we will be out in the open.’

‘That might not matter as long as we stayed quiet and showed no light in the dark hours,’ I said pensively. I knew we could wait but I did not want to delay any more than we absolutely must.

‘There is also the weather to consider,’ Ana said. ‘If it clouds over, the
rhenlings
will swarm, too.’

‘If only it is Gavyn with Ahmedri!’ Dragon said.

I was not sure the strange boy could be brought to use his shielding ability to order, but there was no point in saying so when we had no idea who was with Ahmedri. But that gave me another idea. ‘It may be that Ahmedri himself will have something to say, for it seems to me he must have encountered them more than once in all the time we slept.’

‘That is true,’ Ana said.

A thought struck me. ‘The androne must know what happened to Kelver Rhonin once he reached Northport, if he led him there!’

Ana looked crestfallen. ‘I thought of that and I asked, but Hendon said he had no memory of what had happened after they entered Northport. His memory was damaged during one of his journeys to find survivors. That was why God decided to limit their range. So much knowledge was lost in that one mischance.’

‘A pity,’ I said, wondering if it really was a pity, or convenient. Maybe Kelver Rhonin had done something to prevent the androne remembering what he did, and yet why would he be so sly and secretive when for all he knew he might be alone in the world? Then I realised that even if that had been true, he would not at that moment have had any way to know it.

Dragon, who had gone off to check on the little screen, came rushing in then, and said we had better come because the androne was moving. We went in haste to the small chamber with its little computer screen. The sun had risen higher now, and the desert rocked, seen through the eyes of the moving machine man, but there was no sign of Ahmedri, which explained why God had not summoned me.