The Red Queen (79 page)

It made no response.

‘It cannot answer because it has no true will of its own,’ I said.

Ana glared at me but asked the androne. ‘Hendon, what will you do if we leave you here?’

‘If commanded to follow by User Seeker, I will do so when my cells regenerate, Technician Ana. If not, I will return to God, collecting information as I travel.’

‘But how can you possibly return to Pellmar without a glide?’ Ana asked.

‘I will seek alternative means,’ the androne answered calmly.

‘Ana, Hendon is a machine with a task to do. I don’t know how it can get over the sea and across the Desolation, but we have already seen it do things that no human could do. Hendon is resourceful and almost certainly has abilities we do not even know about. If anyone can get back to Pellmar, it can.’

Ana looked at the androne. ‘Do you want to leave us and go back to God, Hendon?’

I willed the androne to answer yes, not because I did not value it, but because I disliked Ana’s attachment to it, which had caused her to risk her life. But the androne merely stood silent and unmoving. Its blue eyes glimmered, and though they were the most human part of its form, the absence of any recognisable emotion rendered them all the more inhuman. I reached out to put my hand on Ana’s arm and said gently but firmly, ‘Again you are asking for something it can’t give you. A machine cannot want. That is a human emotion. You can’t feel human emotions such as desire, can you, Hendon?’

‘I am programmed to offer a vocal facsimile of positive, receptive emotions that will enable human users to feel comfortable and uninhibited in any interaction with me, that I might better perform my program, User Seeker.’

Tears welled and spilled down Ana’s cheeks. I stifled a feeling of impatience, knowing that part of her sorrow probably arose from her machine empathy. That Garth had been right about her possession of the Talent was no longer in any doubt, and I thought it was probably very strong, for I had never seen any teknoguilder risk their life for a machine, or weep over leaving it.

But she was not alone in regretting what must happen, for I noticed Dragon brushing away tears and even Swallow’s mouth was twisted with grim regret. Dameon looked sad too, but his was the only sorrow that made any sense. He had no choice but to endure everyone else’s emotions.

‘Someone is coming,’ Dameon said suddenly. ‘Listen.’

It was some moments before Swallow’s light beam caught Gavyn’s pale form running fleetly towards us beside the rift. Barefoot as ever, he was seemingly as untroubled by the heat as the horses, though Rasial’s tongue hung redly out as she bounded along at the lad’s heels. Ana gave the boy a bowl of food we had saved and he immediately squatted down and began to scoop it uninhibitedly into his mouth.

I questioned Rasial, as Ana set down a bowl and poured the little reserve of water from the watermaking device into it.

‘We went into this rift/crack, scenting water deepdeep down. We drank then followed the wolfscent deeper down. Here there is a great tunnel underearth, greater than the
graag
but broken and so long its end was beyond scenting. The wolfscent went into it but we did not follow. We went back up and licked water and slept in the cool. While we slept, the sun fell and then we flew in our dreams with the owl, fast/high. We/she lookedfar. We saw what she saw,’ Rasial sent and then she showed me what their spirit-bond with the little owl had allowed her and the boy to see: the coast and a city sprawled about a bay within two high narrow stone peninsulas that curved sharply towards one another.

‘That is Redport,’ Dragon said triumphantly, when I described it to the others.

Having accepted Redport as our immediate destination, I now felt sure that the final clue left for me by Cassy must be there. But even more than my apprehension that I would compromise my quest by becoming entangled in events in Redport, I feared falling into Ariel’s hands, and I prayed he was far away. Yet I dared not assume it. Nor could I risk farseeking him to learn his whereabouts if he was in Redport, lest it alert him to
my
presence.

As we packed up our makeshift campsite, I resolved to enter and explore the city alone to begin with. One stranger would be less noticeable than a number of strangers and I was the obvious choice since I could use coercion to defend and to conceal myself, as well as to gain information. I would also be able to make use of the knowledge and aid of any beast I encountered, unlike the others, who would only be able to communicate with beasts who could understand signal speech, and how should any beast in Redport have learned that?

Of course I would have trouble with the others when I suggested it.

Dragon would not want to delay her entry, but she would have to admit that her appearance would cause a sensation the moment anyone beheld her, and what if the beholders were Gadfians rather than her own people? Until we knew how things stood in Redport, the last thing any of us wanted or needed was a fuss. In truth it would be hard to imagine a situation with more potential for turmoil than the return of a long-lost queen. She must be brought in secret to her supporters, so that they could decide together the best way for Dragon to reveal herself to her people. And even if the four ships had somehow enabled the Redlanders to throw off the slavers, and Dragon’s people were simply waiting to welcome her, it would do no harm to be cautious.

Yet I felt certain the slavemasters
were
still in control of the Red Land, for the Redlanders had utterly refused to rise until their queen returned. And little as I liked to imagine it, it was very possible that Ariel
knew
Dragon was the Red Queen and even that she was coming to Redport. If that was so, would he not have consolidated his relationship with the slavemasters by warning them? According to Dragon, he had only seen her in her dragon-shaped spirit-form, but that had been an encounter in
her
dream. He might easily have seen her in
his
dreams in her true form, and further, his futuretellings might have shown him her fellow travellers. That meant the Destroyer would know the Seeker was near and it would make entering Redport as dangerous for Dragon as for me.

Swallow would not want me to go in without him because his futuredream had shown us standing together in the place where the ancient promises of his people had first been made, and he was determined to fulfil that vision. Given that Cassy and Hannah had dwelt in Redport for ten years, it was very likely that the ancient promises that had guided the Twentyfamilies for years
had
been made here for the first time, and it was even possible that Swallow would have some part to play in my finding whatever had been left for me here. With this in mind, I was determined to question him to find out what he knew from his dreams and from stories told by his ancestors about the place in which the ancient promises had been made.

I resolved to explain to my companions very clearly that my initial entrance to Redport would be nothing more than a scouting trip. Once I had some idea of what we were getting ourselves into, I would return to the others and then we could decide together how best to proceed. Of course no scouting would be necessary if I could farseek Matthew. That would be the first thing I attempted to do, but try as I had, after Rasial’s news, I had been unable to find the city, though there was an area of interference that seemed thicker than the rest. Redport might very well be tainted, despite Hendon’s assurance, which after all could only be based on what God had told him and what his internal devices told him of his surroundings. But it was also possible that Ariel, knowing I was coming, had convinced the Gadfians to distribute tainted matter to block my Talents. Certainly he had done exactly this when he had been aligned with the Herder Faction.

I longed to try to make contact with Matthew, for that might enable me to focus a farseeking probe that would be specific enough to defeat the interference cloaking Redport. But I was also afraid that Ariel might have him. The farseeker had long loathed the enthraller for the deaths of Selmar and poor little Cameo, swearing vengeance on their behalf. And although my dreams had never suggested they had come face to face in Redport, we had slept for a long time in Midland. Anything might have happened in that time.

Even if Matthew had set aside his hunger for revenge in order to concentrate on preparing the way for Dragon, Ariel loathed anyone who had been at Obernewtyn to witness his ignominious defeat, and he knew Matthew. At least they had known one another as boys. If Ariel realised who Matthew was, I had no doubt that he would have made it his business to harm the farseeker, and all the more if he was aware of my love for him. Hadn’t that been why he had so ruthlessly and cruelly used Domick and Rushton, to cause me anguish?

That roused a deeper fear I hardly dared consider: that
Rushton
had got to Redport and had fallen into Ariel’s clutches. It was no comfort that all of these confrontations might have happened long ago. No comfort, either, that no matter what I found in Redport, I could not risk being killed or delivered into Ariel’s hands. My quest was my priority and I had to remember that. No individual’s life mattered more, not even the lives of all the enslaved Redlanders.

It came to me as a revelation then, that when I left Redport after retrieving whatever Cassy had left for me there, I would do so without the others, that their time with me was coming to an end. Dragon would remain in Redport, of course. Swallow would have fulfilled his vow so he and Ana could stay on and make a home there. Darga would stay with Ana, I was sure, for he was as devoted to her as ever he had been to Jik.

I thought of Dameon then, and wondered if, given the choice, he would choose to erase the memory of his feelings for me. I thought he would make his way back to the Land with Rushton after all was done, if Rushton lived. What a heroes welcome the two of them would return to after all this time, and Rushton would resume his place as Chieftain of Obernewtyn, while Dameon would again take his place as the revered Guildmaster of the Empaths.

I had to accept that I might come to Redport and go from it without ever laying eyes on any of my friends, without ever knowing what had happened to them, and even, without knowing if Dragon had been able to claim her place as queen. I
would
go, I told myself, no matter what I knew or did not know. I had a quest I had sworn to fulfil, and had I not long known that I would have to leave those I loved ere the end of my quest?

‘Not Marumanyelloweyes or the Moonwatcher,’ Gahltha sent sternly, and Maruman sank his claws into my shoulder as if to underline the horse’s thought.

I winced but was much comforted by their fierce loyalty. And truly, as long as they walked with me I would never be alone. With that thought as a talisman, I turned my mind from mawkish sentiment back to practicalities.

The plan I had outlined to the others was simple. We would travel to Redport and I would try to farseek Matthew or one of those who had travelled aboard the four ships. If I failed, I would enter the city and coerce the information we needed out of the first inhabitant I encountered. Or the next, depending on what they could tell me. Then I would return to my friends.

Beyond that I could make no firm plan, save that we would try to bring Dragon to those who would protect her and help her to claim her place as queen. Bringing her to Matthew would be bound to have its own complications, but I knew and trusted him. If he was not available, then we must find the leaders among the Redlanders into whose hands we could deliver Dragon. If the slavemasters were still in control, finding Redland rebels might not be so easy, but with a little coercion I was confident that I would be able to do so. But I would not give Dragon to them until I was sure she would be safe in their hands. They must be ready to protect her and serve her as subjects, rather than merely seeing her as a symbol.

The horses would not be able to enter Redport, because the research of the farseeker Wila and her team had revealed that there were no horses in the Red Land, only some sort of small furry horselike creatures. Hopefully the horses would find enough fodder to graze on in the terrain about the city, otherwise Swallow and I would need to find food and bring it out for them. I had no idea where the Redlanders got fodder for their beasts. I had not seen any crops in the vision Rasial had shared from Fey, but perhaps the little owl had not troubled to note them, or maybe they lay some distance from the city.

Food could wait, but I would need to take water with me when I made my initial foray, for by the time we reached Redport we would be parched, unless we found some source of water on the way. I would have to remove any Beforetime clothing I was wearing before entering Redport, too, and with this in mind, I enlisted Ana’s help to put together a set of clothes that resembled the scanty attire I had seen worn by people in Redport in my dreams. Once I was in the city, I would make it my business to acquire local clothing for the others. I would need to be careful of what I chose, though, for as in the Land in the old days, or with gypsy attire, what you wore told a story about who and what you were for anyone to read, and I had little knowledge of the customs of Redport to guide me.

Planning calmed me as it had always done, and it struck me that the expedition to Redport had turned me back into the Guildmistress of the Farseekers, planning the rescue of a Misfit. The thought made me smile, but it was also a reminder that no matter how it felt, I was no longer a rescuer or part of Obernewtyn. I had cast off that role and now I was wholly and openly the Seeker.

That strengthened my resolve to keep my quest at the front of my mind, and if what I learned or acquired in the city did not include directions to Sentinel, I would gather supplies and return to the crevasse and acquire the large golator that would tell me when I was near Kelver Rhonin’s golator. It would not lead me to Sentinel, but it might bring me to Eden, in the absence of any other guidance. With this in mind, I rose, intending to speak to the androne, only to find Swallow approaching me purposefully.