The Red Queen (39 page)

‘What of Miryum?’ Dragon asked suddenly ‘Will we look for her while we are waiting for the others to wake? It may be that she is in Midland, too.’

I glanced into her searching blue eyes and saw that, weary or not, she was very alert. This reminded me that she was a queen who would someday rule an entire land, if she survived my quest. And clearly, she was no longer a child.

‘She is here,’ I said. ‘I asked about her when I went to look at the others. The androne guided me to where she is, in a cryopod on one of the lowest levels of Midland among many others sealed in ice. It was absolutely freezing, which was why I mentioned needing warmer clothes. I was too cold to stay long enough to find her.’

‘You can ask God for warm clothing,’ Dragon said eagerly. ‘But why are they under ice?’

‘Because they have plague seeds in them and God can’t fix them because it needs information from govamen to do it and it can’t reach out to govamen of course.’

Dragon’s eyes widened. ‘I thought you said Miryum had taint sickness.’

‘That was what I thought because of what Straaka’s spirit told me about her journey. But let’s have a look at these bundles and see what God has sent us,’ I said. I thought to distract her, but Dragon asked how Miryum had got plague seeds in her, so I repeated what God had said about the Endrax virus.

‘But if all of the Beforetimers who had it died, how could she have caught it?’

‘Apparently it is a sickness that can be carried harmlessly in beasts, and only becomes dangerous when it gets to a human. God said Miryum had bite marks when she was found by the androne.’

‘Poor Miryum,’ Dragon said. Then her face changed. ‘But you said she knows something that you need for your quest. And if you wake her . . .’

‘God says she would not be immediately contagious. But before she can wake and answer any question rationally, I will need to bring her out of her nightmare, and that means entering her sleeping mind and becoming part of her imagined world.’

‘As you did when I was in a coma,’ Dragon said, almost shyly.

I nodded. ‘What I am hoping to do is to bring her out of her delusion and warn her about what has been happening,
before
I take her from the cryopod. It may be that she knows what she has to tell me and can do so without being wakened. Atthis may have used her deepsleep to send me a message before she died. In that case, Miryum can pass on the message and then remain in the cryopod and we can send Dell a message with Ahmedri to seek out the information that is needed to heal her. God said it exists but it cannot get to it because it cannot reach out to one of the govamen’s terminals. Of course I will also ask her about Straaka’s bones.’

‘What if Miryum must come with us to do something? Won’t she make us sick?’

‘Yes, but in that case you and the others would have to keep your distance . . . until . . .’ I stopped but Dragon nodded soberly.

‘Until she dies,’ Dragon said quietly. ‘But will God let her wake if it thinks of her as a Speci?’

‘I think it will because, although the section Miryum is lying in is restricted, Hannah had left some sort of code with God that would let me go there. So she must have foreseen that Miryum would be there and that I would need to reach her.’

‘She might have foreseen that you are to go into her mind,’ Dragon said. But before I could respond her face brightened. ‘But wait, the overguardian of the Earthtemple told Ahmedri you were to wake Miryum!’

‘He did say that, I had forgotten,’ I said, relieved.

Dragon’s smile faded. ‘If she wakes, she will die from the sickness she has.’ Her blue eyes met mine. ‘I think that would be better than to lie sleeping in ice, maybe forever. I would not want that. Better to have a clean death in the sunlight.’

I thought bleakly of Domick’s horrific death from Beforetime plague and wondered how clean that death would truly be, if Miryum chose it. But I did not burden Dragon with the memory. ‘Where there is life there is hope,’ I said firmly. ‘But it will be Miryum’s decision for I am sure God will agree to return her to sleep in a cryopod.’

Dragon nodded, but I had the feeling she had not really taken in my words. Seeing her stifle a yawn, I bade her go back to bed. This time, instead of arguing, she yawned again widely and acquiesced.

I took out some clothes I could wear and carried them to my sleeping chamber, hung the towel to dry and put them on, then searched all of the shelves and cupboards, once I figured out how they opened, but they were empty. This must not have been the chamber Hannah or Kelver Rhonin had occupied. When we were all awake, I would search all of the other chambers in the residence. I stopped, startled, catching a glimpse of myself in a mirror fixed to the wall. I looked pale and weary, and I realised that, despite sleeping soundly, I
was
weary. I decided to take my own advice and lay down fully clothed, save for my new boots which I had not bothered to put on. I drew the covers over me, turning on my belly and pushing my arms under the pillow, laying my head on it, thinking it was very difficult to know how to divide day from night without the moon and the sun.

‘Time we were back in the sunlight,’ I thought drowsily, and fell asleep imagining the feel of it on my face.

As if my thought had been a wish, and the wish had been answered, I woke to sunlight. And to the sound of voices –
men’s voices.

My head felt thick and my mouth was dry as I sat up and looked around. Sunlight was coming through high windows, which I had not even noticed before. It was day, except that day was impossible in this place. But we had asked God for sunlight and it had said something about restoring a cycle of day and night. I had forgotten, but it seemed God had done what was required, given that it was impossible for it to be a true day.

I drank, splashed cold water onto my face to wake my wits and hurried barefoot along the hall, tying my hair in a hasty knot to keep it from my eyes.

Entering the large chamber, I found not only Tash and Dragon, but Ana, Swallow and Dameon! The latter turned, smiling, having sensed my entrance as he always did, though the others were still talking earnestly about something to do with supplies. Behind them the enormous dark squares of glass had become windows through which sunlight flooded from a blue summer sky, lighting not only the room and my companions seated at a table, which had somehow grown in length, but the city itself.

Tash looked from Dameon to me, obviously feeling Dameon’s response to my entrance, and Dragon leapt to her feet with a cry of ‘Elspeth!’ and ran to hug me. I smiled at her, noting that she was wearing the same lightweight black trews and soft white shirt as I wore – the only garments God had sent, along with identical warm overshirts and jackets – the only difference being the sizes.

‘I gather I have slept awhile?’ I said.

‘Ages,’ she said. ‘I wanted to wake you when Ana and the others came, but she would not let us. She said your . . . your healing powers drained you and that we should always let you wake naturally.’

‘The sunlight . . .’ I murmured. ‘But of course it is not real.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘God made it happen and it doesn’t feel real, truly, but it is lovely just the same. It is a pretend day, like the walls. But you notice how the pictures and patterns on the walls have gone? They don’t show when there is sunlight, God said.’

‘God said,’ Ana repeated, shaking her head. ‘How queer to think of the Speci, all but worshipping a computermachine. Dragon told us everything that happened after we were taken. You were lucky to have worked it all out before the Speci got you.’

‘It was Tash who saved us,’ I said, smiling at the abashed girl.

Ana suddenly grinned at me. ‘You know I dreamed of you when I was asleep. You were running and one of the andrones was running with you, and a whole host of cats and dogs and goats as well.’

I laughed and looked from her to Dameon and Swallow, who had stood up as well. I embraced them and then bade everyone sit again, and drew up a seat of my own. There were platters of food laid out, all of which smelled delicious, and for a moment sitting in the sunlight with my friends, watching Tash fill a plate for me, I was content. Then I said, ‘I am so glad to see you all here, though I expected to be summoned to come and fetch you myself.’

‘God asked us,’ Dragon said. ‘It knew you were asleep, though I don’t know how, and it asked us to wake you and ask if Unit B could bring your technicians up, now that they had woken. I said it should bring them up at once.’

‘It was incredible to wake in that strange dark place, and to hear a voice say you were here waiting for us,’ Swallow said. ‘Then the Tumen – the androne – came and brought us here.’

‘Eat,’ Ana commanded me. ‘You have too little flesh.’

I laughed at her familiar bluntness, saying, ‘You sound like Katlyn.’ But I did as she bade me, relishing the tastiness of the fare.

‘Dragon told us about Miryum,’ Swallow said. ‘That is a sad tale.’

‘It is less sad than if she had taint sickness,’ Ana told him tartly. ‘I am sure Dell will be able to get Ines to communicate with a govamen terminal and find out what God needs. Or maybe Ines has the knowledge God needs. And if not Ines, then Garth can have the teknoguilders find a govamen computermachine and get what is needed from it.’

I stared at her for a moment, realising how much I loved her steadfast courage and determination. For these things alone she would have been a worthy companion on my quest, and it was strange to think how I had wondered at her inclusion, when I had come to the valley of the Skylake to find her and Swallow and some of the beasts awaiting me.

‘I dreamed of the Norselanders,’ Dameon murmured, and all of us looked at him. ‘I dreamed they have found a way to wake the computermachine under Ariel’s residence in Norseland. Perhaps it is a govamen computermachine.’

‘I dreamed something of that, too,’ I said. ‘If it was a govamen computermachine and they can get it to work, it might be possible to have it commune with the computermachine in Northport and make it reach out to God, so that it can heal Miryum.’

‘Unless she is to come with us,’ Swallow said.

I sighed. ‘Let us not think about all of this yet. First we have to find her. In fact, I mean to do that as soon as I have finished eating.’

‘We will come, too,’ Ana said. ‘I want to get out there and have a look around.’

‘Me too!’ Dragon beamed at her.

‘We need to sort out supplies . . .’ I began, but Dragon waved away my words.

‘We have God working on it, and in a bit, Unit B will come and bring some of us to the storage level. It went away just now because God said it needed something doing to it. Something about its memory being full and needing to be unloaded or something. The other androne – Unit A – has been sent out to look for Ahmedri and the others.’

‘Hard to believe two machine men built the whole of Habitat,’ Dameon murmured.

‘I think Hannah’s request to build it was refused a couple of times because there were only two, and it was such a huge undertaking,’ I said, remembering some of the things God had told me. ‘It only agreed because she found a space that had already been prepared for something else, where it could be established.’

‘I wonder what Habitat was supposed to be for,’ Dameon murmured at the same moment as Ana spoke, saying the andrones would have had many powerful machines and devices to help them. She was swift as ever to grasp and make use of knowledge.

‘And they had God,’ Tash said, then flushed when everyone looked at her.

The others laughed and clapped her on the back, but Dameon looked at me gravely, no doubt sensing my unspoken anxieties about the girl.

‘I have been thinking,’ Swallow said. ‘If the androne sent out by God does bring the others back, the horses are not going to want to come down here, even if it is possible, as God says. I think I ought to go up and see about setting up camp on the surface, just outside the wall of Habitat. Best would be somewhere close to one of these entrances to Midland that Dragon says God mentioned.’

‘What about the
rhenlings
?’ Ana asked. ‘Obviously that was what was flocking on Habitat, killing people. I know they will only come in the darkest hours, but it is getting close to darkmoon and if they dwell nearby, maybe they will make forays after the sun sets and before the moon rises.’

‘What I wonder is how the others have survived out there,’ Swallow said.

I forbore to say that perhaps not all of them had survived. Rheagor had said some of my companions would die, but Dragon went on earnestly, ‘Gavyn would look after them.’

‘
If
they were all together,’ Ana murmured.

‘We will know soon enough,’ Swallow said. ‘Anyway, what do you think about setting up a camp in the sun? We can always come down here at darkmoon and even sleep here at night, but at some point we are going to have to get our supplies out of Midland and so I was thinking we might as well amass them on the surface. God said it would be possible if you want it.’

‘You asked God?’

Swallow nodded. ‘It said User Seeker and her technicians can leave when User Seeker wishes.’

I nodded and decided this was not the moment to find out if God would allow us to change Tash’s status so that she could leave with us. I was always trying to solve everything in advance, but sometimes, things worked themselves out. Yet at the same time, I was worried that Tash had not been one of those chosen by Atthis to accompany me. What if her presence changed things? The outcome of my quest was not set, after all. Atthis had once told me it was only one of a number of possibilities. Failure was another. Dell and Ana had foreseen that other darker future and so had Maryon and I at different times. Unfortunately there was no futureteller to ask, and in any case they would be unlikely to deliver a clear answer. On the other hand, this train of thought reminded me that Atthis had said nothing of Miryum, so she must not be supposed to accompany us, which meant I would not be responsible for her death.

Cheered by this realisation, I ate, letting the others’ talk flow over me for a moment. My thoughts drifted to Astyanax and I wondered if the young Agyllian male had managed to encompass all of the oldOnes. Then I wondered again about Straaka’s spirit and why it had not been with Miryum’s body when I had entered her dream. It seemed possible the link between their spirits had failed or faded, or that he had found some way to break it, yet I doubted he would sever the link while Miryum lay trapped in frozen sleep, even had he discovered the means to do so. The other possibility was that he had risen to seek out the wisdom of the trapped spirits of the oldOnes, and if that was so, he might return with news for me, too.

‘God said nothing to us until Dragon introduced us,’ Dameon said, and I looked up to see a faint wry smile on his lips as if he felt my inattention. I was glad to see that he had not let the loss of Balboa devastate him.

‘It was most unnerving to be helped to my feet by a machine,’ he continued, ‘but then Swallow woke and it was better. Of course we were terribly apprehensive about how much time had passed since we had been taken captive by the Committee and put into cryopods, and worried because you and Dragon were not with us. The last thing either of us remembered was that the Speci thought you had corrupted us and were intent on capturing you. But then Ana woke and she said the giant metal man perfectly fitted the description Dragon had given of the silver-clad man who had captured us. That made it one of the Tumen, and if it was a Tumen, we could ask it questions, just as you had done. It told us a good deal on the way to bringing us to you.’

‘I near fainted when I came out to find Dameon and the others here,’ Dragon broke in, then gave Dameon a shamefaced look, apologising for interrupting his tale.

He reached out unerringly to stroke her hair, saying, ‘Dragon introduced us to this place and to God, and as you can imagine I was astonished to hear Ines speak! Of course, in the Beforetime there were many computermachines that had Ines in them and God is an altered Ines in any case. Nevertheless, it was very disconcerting. Ana has asked most of the questions. She has a knack for it,’ he added.

His words reminded me of how Garth had been convinced that Ana possessed machine empathy. Certainly she had always seemed as fascinated with the Beforetime as any in Garth’s guild. If it were true, it might explain why Atthis had chosen her to accompany me. I had supposed her purpose had been chiefly to lure her brother to us, that he might bring us Dragon, but she had proven her worth again and again since then.

‘I was in the middle of questioning it when the sun came up,’ Ana said, taking up the tale when Dameon fell silent. ‘Or maybe I should say it came
on
, since it is a Beforetime device of some kind that produces the semblance of daylight, and also of dusk and dawn and all the other parts of day and night.’

Dameon said, ‘I could not see the sun but I felt the response of the others. Then God explained about the false weather it can make while Tash prepared a meal, then we bathed again and got into our new clothes.’

‘Dameon knew how the bathing chamber devices worked because he said they have a lot of the same things at Oldhaven,’ Dragon told me earnestly.

‘God could have told us how to use them if Dameon had not known,’ Ana said, her eyes shining with enthusiasm. ‘With computermachines, you only need to find out how to ask for what you want, and if the computermachine knows, it will tell you.’

‘
If
its program permits it to respond,’ Swallow muttered, sounding less enchanted.

‘
And
if you think to ask it,’ Dameon added. ‘Imagine all that time when we were in Habitat and we might have spoken to God, only none of us thought to try it. Until Elspeth did.’

That made me think of the other androne and wonder how it was faring in its search. I asked, ‘God, where is the androne I asked you to send out with a message for my technicians? Has there been any response?’

‘Unit A travelled directly to Subio, traversed and circled it as instructed, broadcasting your recorded message, User Seeker. There was no response. It is now travelling to Westside.’

I sighed. ‘If only we could see what it sees.’

‘I can stream a visual from Unit A,’ God said.

‘You mean we can see what it sees?’ Ana asked eagerly. ‘How? Where?’