Space Magic (29 page)

Not waiting for a response, Theo strode from the library and descended the brass-railed oak spiral stair to his quarters. There he shrugged on his black wool overcoat, with the high, stiff collar and gold-braided epaulets of a Commander of the Musings. He descended two more flights, then took a long corridor—his thudding boots raising dust from the worn carpet below portraits of long-dead zeppelin captains—to the reception bay, where the house slaves had already opened the doors and extended the boarding ramp to meet the descending
Edison
. A cold, damp breeze blew in from the endless night. Theo fastened his top coat button.

Theo stood silent, marinating in memory and regret, as shouting slaves tossed lines to the
Edison
and made her fast. Then her hatch opened, the boarding stair unrolling itself like a great slatted tongue, and Kyrie Strommond descended to the ramp, majestic in the green uniform of a Commander of the Revenants.

Though the threads of gray in her hair now outnumbered the black, Kyrie was still a handsome woman, with keen, intelligent green eyes and clear, pale skin. But the mouth tightened in a hard line as she saw who had come to meet her. “Honor to you, Theophile,” she said, “and honor to your House.”

“Honor to you, Kyrie,” he replied, “and honor to your airship.”

It was a calculated insult, barely within the bounds of protocol, but his only reward was a single blink. Despite himself, Theo had to admire her steel. It was a shame they could never be friends.

“I require quarters for my troops,” she said, “as stipulated by the Compact.”

“That may be... difficult. At this time of year. How many?”

“Three hundred.” At that, Theo blinked. So large a contingent had not been seen in centuries. What could the Revenants be planning? “But they require no food or water, and only the minimum of space.”

“Of course.” He escorted her to an alcove in the wall, where a wooden model of the House of the Guided Musings floated in the air. He touched one of the brass knobs that studded its surface, and the model obediently split open, revealing the warren of rooms and corridors within. Thousands of tiny wooden pegs populated the spaces—mahogany for men, maple for women, fir for slaves—their fitful motion reminding Theo of a disturbed anthill. “As you see,” he said, “the Reunion Day crowds have already arrived.”

Naturally, since this model was in a public space, much of the information was lies. But Theo’s lip quirked in amusement at the two pegs, maple and mahogany, that stood by the alcove in the model’s reception bay.

Theo turned the model this way and that, opening and closing its various sections. “Ah, I believe the children’s squander-ball games can be moved from the lesser gymnasium. Would that do?”

Kyrie pondered the model gymnasium, as though trying to discern its size. The model did not show the steel doors and mantraps that surrounded it, of course, but Kyrie would be looking for tell-tale voids and discontinuities. Theo sweated under his heavy coat. He had supervised the reconstruction of the Red Diamond section himself, and the model’s complex of feints and deceptions was superb, but Kyrie was a formidable strategist.

“Yes,” she said at last, “that will suffice.”

Theo pointed out the route from the reception bay to the gymnasium. “Your troops will be escorted, to prevent them losing their way.”

“Thank you.” She gave a smile that appeared nearly genuine.

As Kyrie returned to the
Edison
, Theo climbed an aluminum ladder to the glass-enclosed mezzanine. There he stepped to a brass trumpet set in the wall and pulled the chain for privacy. Immediately the reception bay’s clatter and banging were stifled to a dull mutter, accompanied by a feeling of pressure in Theo’s ears.

The grating voices of the House Fathers emerged from the trumpet. “What does Kyrie plan?” they demanded without preamble.

“There can be little doubt she will attempt to take the House, most likely tonight,” he replied. “I have quartered her troops in the lesser gymnasium.”

“Excellent. We will transfer Cherub and Centaur divisions to that section immediately.”

“You must also prepare to cut the section loose, if necessary. Even with all our preparations, three hundred zombies are a formidable force.”

The Fathers muttered in consternation, but finally replied, “We will begin the calculations. We hope it will not come to that.”

“As do I.” Theo hesitated. The final element of his defense plan would be highly controversial, and he considered keeping it to himself until the thing was done. But the long habit of duty compelled him to speak. “There is one other thing.”

“What?”

“Kyrie’s airship. The
Grand Edison
.”

“What about it?”

Theo swallowed. “I intend to kill her.”

At that the Fathers’ chorus fragmented into a confused babble. “...impossible... unprecedented... against the Compact...”

“Hear me out!” Theo shouted into the trumpet, his throat tight with rage and anguish. “Even if we prevail in this battle, the Revenants have made it clear that they will not hesitate to summon the zombies again and again until they achieve complete domination. They have bent the Compact nearly to the breaking point already. Killing the
Edison
will only complete a process that the Revenants began. And without her, their strength will be reduced to the point that the other Houses can once again balance them. We can restore the spirit of the Compact only by breaking its letter.”

Theo’s outburst silenced the Fathers for a long moment. “We cannot officially sanction such an action,” they replied at last.

“I understand.” The privacy field pressed in on Theo’s head like a vise. “Any action I take will be my responsibility alone.”

Theo took a moment to compose himself before returning to the floor of the bay, where the zombies were already lining up. The smallest of them was over six feet tall and heavily muscled, and their dead gray skin and lifeless eyes hinted at their incapacity for pain and fatigue while belying the speed of which they were capable. Each wore a poison-green uniform, with Kyrie’s Capricorn sigil at the shoulder, and carried a heavy spider-rifle. Theo noted that the rifles’ bores and magazines were exactly at the limit prescribed by the Compact.

A company of Musings troops, uniformed in black with Theo’s own trident-and-anvil on their shoulders, confronted the zombies with razor-whips at the ready. Theo nodded in approval; standard-issue confusers would be of no use whatsoever against zombies.

The last zombie marched off of the
Edison
and lined up with its fellows. “This is Sergeant Shrive,” Theo said to Kyrie. “He and his men will conduct your troops to the gymnasium. Once they are settled, would you do me the honor of joining me for dinner?”

“The honor would be mine,” she replied.

“It will be a formal occasion, of course.”

They leveled stares at each other like lances at a joust. Under the Compact, a formal dinner was a web of obligations and prescribed courtesies, offering many opportunities for insult. The Revenants’ last three battles had all begun over protocol violations at formal dinners—one of them might even have been justified.

As the invited party, Kyrie had the choice of wine. “I have an Upwelling Iris ’623 in my cellars. Would that be appropriate?”

“Delightful,” Theo replied. The Revenants always used poisons from the cadenine family with that vintage; he made a mental note to issue the appropriate antidote to his steward. “One of my men will bring you to my quarters at seven bells.”

They bowed stiffly to each other, sealing the invitation. But with the formalities concluded, Theo had one more request. “As you may know, I once served aboard the
Edison
. While you are seeing to your troops’ comfort, may I come aboard for a visit? An
informal
visit.”

Kyrie hesitated. Theo knew she was torn between denying him the intelligence he would gain and granting him the pain and distraction the visit would cause. “Certainly,” she said at last. “My captain will escort you.”

Theo smiled a grim little smile. As he had expected, Kyrie’s sadism had won out over her strategic judgment. His stratagem had succeeded, but now he would have to live with the consequences.

The captain was a lean, cadaverous man who seemed half zombie himself. He conducted Theo across the creaking boarding ramp, stretched across infinite blackness from the House of the Guided Musings, and up the
Edison
’s warm and faintly pulsing steps. Once inside, Theo was assaulted by an appalled nostalgia—his old lover’s familiar halls, railings, and wainscotings were now covered with a gray coat of fireproof military paint, and oak sideboards had been replaced by racks of laser-guided scramblers.

Theo was led on a circuitous route to the airship’s audience chamber. The route itself told him much—clearly something major had been installed on deck three between the fore and mizzen engines, and the captain didn’t want him to see it. He thought it might be a bay for boarding-craft, but then the scent of hydrazine in section twenty-five told him it was even worse: guided missiles. Inwardly he trembled, even as he continued counting men at duty stations and analyzing the upgraded fire-fighting systems.

“This is the audience chamber,” the captain said unnecessarily. “You may have ten minutes.”

“Thank you,” Theo said, and slipped down through the opened hatch.

Unlike the rest of the ship, here nothing had changed. It was still close and moist and warm, echoing with the thrum and gurgle of the great zeppelin’s life fluids.

“Hello, Theo.” The airship’s voice was warm and maternal, but still gave Theo an erotic tingle.

“Hello, Edie.”

“I’m surprised you came. I thought you wouldn’t want to see me.”

Tears pinched at the back of Theo’s throat, but he refused them. “I... It was a hard choice, Edie. But, the way things have been going lately, I thought it might be my last chance for a while.” Maybe forever, he thought.

“I’m sorry, Theo.” Warm pseudopods extended from the wall and rubbed his shoulders, and Theo relaxed for a moment into the familiar touch. “Kyrie is keeping me so busy these days.”

Theo sat up and brushed the pseudopods away. “Yes, I know. That’s what I’m here to talk with you about.”

The seat of Theo’s chair stiffened and grew cool. “The answer is still no.”

“Damn it, Edie!” Now the tears did come, though he sniffed them back. “How could you abandon the Musings—how could you abandon
me?
I loved you!”

“And I loved you too. But the Revenants are the future, Theo. Why can’t you see that? The Musings, the Regalia, the Apocrypha... They’re trying to hold on to the sky by their fingernails. How many Houses have gone down in the past year?”

“Eight,” he replied automatically.

“Eight,” she repeated, “and madly flapping the Compact isn’t going to keep the rest in the air forever. As long as each House holds its thaumaturgies and technologies close to its vest, each will float or fall on its own... and each one that falls takes all its secrets with it. Only by pooling our best ideas do we have a chance to keep what remains of humanity aloft.”

“The Compact has provisions for information sharing.”

“The system isn’t working, Theo. The lesser Houses—the ones that float lowest and are closest to losing buoyancy—are naturally the most driven to create new techniques. But because of their reduced status, none will trade with them, and so they fail, and so their learnings are lost to us.”

“And the Revenants’ forced labor and torture are better?”

“We’ve already learned so much, by combining the work of the Whistlers and the Philosophers and the Radiant Ones. Once all the Houses are united under Revenant guidance, we will surely find the final solution. And then these unfortunate practices can be brought to an end.”

“‘Unfortunate practices’? ‘Final solution’? Edie, what’s become of you?”

“Nothing’s changed, Theo. I’m still trying to do what I was built to do—keep you all alive, in the best way I know how.” The sounds behind the walls changed, as though the great airship’s heart were beating more slowly. “Whether you understand it or not.”

The hatch opened, sending the harsh military light of the cabin above into Theo’s stinging eyes. “Time’s up,” said the captain, and without a word Theo climbed out of the audience chamber.

He thought he heard “I love you, Theo,” as the hatch closed. Perhaps it was only his imagination. But as the captain walked him back to the boarding ramp, he pushed the question out of his mind and focused on the enemy airship’s defenses.

Seven bells. Theo paced his dining room, sweating in his dress uniform. Five battalions of the Musings’ best troops were hidden in the walls around the lesser gymnasium. Tanks of acid were pressurized and ready to spew, frenzied eagle-cats snarled and battered great wings against the walls of their cages, and trans-dimensional fields strained the vertices of their dark crystals. All was in readiness, but the forms of the Compact must be observed.

As the sound of the seventh bell echoed away down the oak-walled corridor, the door opened and two men in radiation armor escorted Kyrie in. A tiny constellation of five pea-sized diamonds orbited above each of the epaulets of her dress uniform.

“So pleased you could join me, Kyrie.” He proffered his arm. “May I show you to your seat?”

“Why, thank you.” Her uniform sleeve was lined with ceramic plates, which struck rigidly against the defensive field grid sewn into his own.

He pulled out her chair—the one facing the door, as required—and brushed off the seat with his handkerchief. She sat, and he helped her to push in her chair.

Kyrie peered at the table. All the cutlery was in the proper positions. The napkins were folded appropriately for the time of day and the season. The number and size of servants were within prescribed limits. Theo was certain there was nothing Kyrie could use to provoke an incident. “What a charming table.”

Theo bowed, and called for the first course. A serving cart rolled out on silent rubber wheels, parked obediently by the table, and raised its silver dome, revealing fairy shrimp steaming in a glistening brown sauce. The steward carefully ladled out a precise portion on each plate.