The Snow Queen (14 page)

“The right
people listen.” Fate’s voice reached him from behind. “Didn’t I tell you they
would?”

The Queen’s
gaze followed as he glanced back. “Well, mask maker. How is your work
proceeding? Have you begun the Summer Queen’s mask yet?”

“Your Majesty.”
Fate bowed her head solemnly. “My work has been going better than usual, thanks
to
Sparks
. But
it isn’t time yet for the Summer Queen.” She smiled. “Winter still reigns. Take
care of my musician. I’m going to miss him.”

“The best
care imaginable,” the Queen said softly.

Sparks
moved to the stoop, picked up his
flute and slipped it into the pouch at his belt. Then, impulsively, he took
Fate’s hands in his own, leaned across the trays to kiss her cheek. “I’ll come
and see you.”

“I know you
will.” She nodded. “Now, don’t keep your future waiting.”

He stood
up, turned back toward the Queen, blinking as reality and illusion blurred his
vision. Her attendants closed around him like the petals of an alien flower,
and she took him away.

“I’m going
to ask him for a ride. I can’t wait here any longer. Too much time has passed
already.” Moon stood at the window of her grandmother’s cottage, looking out
through the rippled glass toward town. Her mother sat at the heavy wooden table
where her grandmother was cleaning fish; Moon kept her back to them, ashamed at
needing that crutch to support her resolution. “That trader won’t be back again
for months. Think of how long it’s been since
Sparks
sent for me.” And she had been too
late, by a month, coming home; the trader who had brought her the message had
already gone on his way again. Her hands whitened on the wooden window ledge,
among the shells she and
Sparks
had gathered on the beach together when they were children. There would not be
another ship coming to these remote islands from Carbuncle for too long; the
closest place where she could hope to find one was at
Shotover
Bay
,
on the edge of Winter, and that was too long a journey by sea for her to make
alone.

But in the
fields above the village now a stranger worked to repair a ship that flew, like
the ship she had seen in one of her trances; not a Winter, but an actual off
worlder the first one who had ever set foot on Neith, a man with skin the color
of brass and strange, hooded eyes. His flying ship had made a forced landing,
she had watched it come out of the sky while she stood among the villagers’
eager questions this morning. She had been relieved and a little proud to tell
them from her own knowledge what the thing was, and that it was nothing to be afraid
of.

And the off
worlder had looked relieved, too, that the villagers had known enough about
technology not to panic. Listening to him speak, Moon had realized that he was
just as uneasy about his presence among them as they were. They had all gone
away at his brusque urging, leaving him to work in peace, hoping that if they
ignored him he would disappear again.

And she had
to act now, before he did disappear. He must be on his way to Carbuncle; all
the off worlders were from there. If he would only take her, too ...

“But Moon,
you’re a sibyl now,” her mother said.

Angry with
half-guilt, she turned back to them. “I won’t be abandoning my duty! Sibyls are
needed everywhere.”

“Not in
Carbuncle.” Her mother’s voice strained. “It’s not your faith I’m questioning,
Moon, it’s your safety. You’re the Sea’s daughter now. I know I can’t forbid
you to lead your own life. But they don’t want sibyls in Carbuncle. If they
learned what you were—”

“I know.”
She bit her lip, remembering Danaquil Lu. “I know that. I’ll keep my trefoil
hidden while I’m there.” She picked it up on its chain, cupping it in her
hands. “Just until I find him.”

“It’s wrong
for him to ask you to go.” Her mother stood up, walking restlessly around the
table. “He must know that he’s putting you in danger. He wouldn’t ask that if
he was thinking of you. Wait for him to come to you, wait for him to grow up
and stop thinking only of himself.”

Moon shook
her head. “Mother, it’s
Sparks
we’re talking about! He wouldn’t say that he can’t come home unless he’s in
trouble. He wouldn’t ask me to come unless he needs me.”
And I’ve already betrayed him once
. She looked out the window
again. “I know him.” She picked up a shell.
I
love him.

Her mother
came to stand beside her; she sensed the hesitation that kept even her own
mother a little apart from her now, when they stood together. “Yes, you do.”
Her mother glanced back at Gran, who still sat at the table with concentration
fixed on her scaling. “You know him better than I do. You know him better than
I know you.” Her mother touched her shoulder, turned her until they faced each
other; she saw a brief instant of awe and sorrow in her mother’s gaze. “My
daughter is a sibyl. Child of my heart and body, sometimes I feel as though I
don’t really know you at all.”

“Mama—”
Moon bent her head, pressed her cheek against her mother’s callused hand.
“Don’t say that.”

Her mother
smiled, as though an unspoken question had been answered.

Moon
straightened again, took her mother’s hand carefully and lowered it in her own.
“I know I’ve only just come home. And I wanted so much to have this time with
you.” Her hands squeezed tight; she looked down. “But at least I have to talk
to the off worlder

“I know.”
Her mother nodded, still smiling. She picked up the slicker that lay at the
foot of Moon’s cot and handed it to her. “At least I know the Lady goes with
you now, even if I can’t.”

Moon pulled
the slicker on over her head and went out of the house. She followed the stony
track to the terraced village fields, half running with the fear that she would
see the off worlder ship rise into the drizzling gray sky before she reached
it. And as she climbed the parapet onto the terrace where the flying ship sat,
a high whine filled the sodden air around her, the unearthly sound of a power unit
engaging.

“Wait!” She
began to run, seeing the handful of curious children who lurked at the field’s
perimeter point at her and wave, thinking she waved at them. But the man in the
flying ship stuck his head out the door opening to look at her, too, and the
whining died.

He stepped
out of the craft and straightened up. He wore the clothing of an islander, but
it was made from a material she had never seen before. She slowed as she
realized that he was not about to leave without her. He put his hands on his
hips, glaring down at her as she approached; she saw suddenly how very tall he
was, that she barely reached his shoulder. “All right, what’s the crisis,
missy?”

She
stopped, reduced by the tone of his voice to another childish nuisance in a
mucky field on a rocky, godforsaken island. “I—I thought you were taking off.”

“I will be,
just as soon as I get my tools aboard. Why do you ask?”

“That
soon.” Moon looked down at her slicker, tightening her resolution. If it had to
be now, it had to be. “I’d like to ask you a favor before you go.”

He wasn’t
looking at her; he slid a compartment shut beneath the window curve at the
craft’s front and rapped on it with a hand. “If you want an explanation about how
the magic ship flies, I’m afraid I just haven’t got the time. I’m late for an
appointment.”

“I know how
they fly, my cousin told me.” Her own irritation chewed the words. “I just want
you to take me to Carbuncle.”

He did look
up this time, in mild astonishment. She forced the smile that said she had
every right to ask. Several responses almost got past his lips, before he
stooped to pick up his tool kit. “Sorry. I’m not going to Carbuncle.”

“But—” She
took a step, putting herself between him and the door opening as he started
toward it. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going
to
Shotover
Bay
, if it’s any business of yours. Now
if you’ll just—”

“That’s all
right. That’s fine, in fact. Will you take me there instead?”

He pushed
back his black, reed-straight hair, leaving a muddy track through it; he was
beardless, but a black mustache draped his downturned mouth. “Just why in the
names of a thousand gods should I do that?”

“Well ...”
She almost frowned at his lack of generosity. “I’d be glad to do anything you
ask, to repay you.” She hesitated, as his expression changed for the worse. “I
... guess I’ve made a mistake, haven’t I?”

He laughed
unexpectedly. “That’s all right, missy.” He thrust the tool kit past her into
the space behind the seats. “But you shouldn’t be so ready to run off with the
first stranger you see. You might just wind up in a worse situation than the
one you think you’re in.”

“Oh—” Moon
felt her cheeks burning in the cold air. She put a hand up, covering her face.
“Oh, no, that’s not what I meant! Here in the islands, when someone wants to go
somewhere, and you’re going, you just—take them ...” Her voice disappeared.
“I’m sorry.” She started away, stumbling over a rut, suddenly feeling like
precisely the foolish child she had seen in his eyes.

“Well, wait
a minute.” The sand of annoyance was still in his voice, but its sting wasn’t
as sharp. “Why do you want to go there?”

She turned
back again, trying to remember the trefoil hidden beneath her slicker, and that
she had a right to a sibyl’s dignity. “I want to find a ship at
Shotover
Bay
to take me to Carbuncle. It’s very
important to me.”

“It must
be, to make a Summer willing to get into a flying machine with an oflvvorlder.”

Moon’s
mouth tightened. “Just because we don’t use off world technology, that doesn’t
mean we turn pale at the sight of it.”

He laughed
again, appreciatively, as though he enjoyed being paid in kind. “All right,
then. If all you want is a ride, missy, you’ve got it.”

“Moon.” She
put out her hand. “Moon Dawntreader Summer.”

“Ngenet ran
Abase Miroe.” He took her hand and shook it, not clasping wrists as she was
used to; said, as an afterthought, “Last name first. Climb aboard and strap
in.”

She climbed
in resolutely on the far side, looking no further than the present moment, and fumbled
with the safety harness. The interior of this craft was different from the one
she had seen in her trance; she thought that it looked simpler. She held tight
to the straps, and its false familiarity. Ngenet ran Ahase Miroe got in behind
the controls and sealed the doors; the whine began to build in the space around
them, muted this time, no louder than the rush of blood in her ears.

There was
no sensation of movement when they lifted from the field, but as she saw Neith
and her village fall away below she felt a sourceless wrench of pain, as though
something inside her had been pulled apart. She pressed her hands against her
chest, feeling the trefoil safely beneath her clothes, and sang a silent
prayer.

The
hovercraft banked sharply, heading out over the open sea.

Jerusha
PalaThion stared out at the endless mirroring blue seeded with green island
hummocks. She pictured it flowing past beneath the patrol craft like waters
under the earth, pictured herself caught in an endless loop of time, freed from
the suffocating futility of her duty .... She blinked her eyes back into focus,
glanced over at Gundhalinu where he sat reading behind the autopilot-locked
controls. “How much longer till we get to
Shotover
Bay
,
BZ?”

He glanced
up, down at the chronometer on the panel. “Still a couple of hours, Inspector.”

She sighed,
and shifted her feet again.

“You sure
you don’t want to read one of my books, Inspector?” He held up one of the
battered Old Empire fantasies that he spent half his off-duty time wallowing
in. It was in Tiamatan; she read the title: Tales of the Future Past.

“No thanks.
Being bored is more interesting.” She flicked an iesta pod discreetly into the
waste container. “How can an honest technocrat like you stand to read that
crap, BZ? I’m surprised it doesn’t cause brain damage.”

He looked
indignant. “These are based on solid archaeological data and analysis of sibyl
Transfers. They’re—” he grinned, the vacant bliss crept back into his eyes—”the
next best thing to being there.”

“Carbuncle’s
the next best thing to being there; and if that’s any sample, good riddance to
the good old days.”

He made a
disgusted noise. “That’s exactly what I’m trying to get away from when I read.
The real Carbuncle was—”

“Whatever
it was, was probably just as bad. And furthermore, nobody gave a good goddamn
about changing things then, any more than they do now.” She settled back in her
seat, frowning out at the blue water. “Sometimes I feel like a bottle thrown
into the sea, carried endlessly on the tide, never reaching a shore. The
message I carry, the meaning that I try to give my own life, is never realized
. because no one is ever interested.”