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most of
their comgeutors. It isn't until the rotting log's nearly finished that they revert to doing things the way most other flies do, pupating by the thousand and lying dormant for a while, until they produce a whole flock of adults which promptly mate like crazy and then fly off in every direction, in search of juicy trees hovering on the very edge of terminal decay. Paedogenesis means breeding young, or words to that effect. That's what the maggots do, you see, just so long as everything is going well and the good things of maggoty life are in abundant supply. "
"Very clever," Checuti said.
"So what?"
"Mossassor reckons that the forefathers made some creatures with a similar lifesryle, only much more so. Don't ask me how, but even Ssifuss agrees that designing and making living things is what the legendary Genesys business was all about. The people of the ship were our ancestors, but they didn't just give birth to us the way we give birth to our children. They designed us, and they designed and made a million other things as well. Every species, in fact, that we call " earthly" - or their ancestors, at least. Pigs, horses, dredgers, gnarly trees . . . and countless tinier things. Including things that live on us and things that live in us."
"Why would they do that?" ' "Because it was the only way, apparently, that we could live in the world at all. According to ^lossassor and the lore, according to Fraxinus's reading of it they couldn't have done it without borrowing some stuff from Serpents and Salamanders. Don't ask me what they borrowed, or why they had to, or- what they did with it, but let's accept for the sake of argument that they did. Well, some of the things they made some of the most important things they made were paedogenetic. Not flies and maggots, you understand much smaller and subtler things than that.
"For generation after generation, these things breed while remaining immature in some crucial sense . . . but from time to time, they respond to some kind of environmental signal and they go into a wholly different reproductive mode. All of a sudden, after hundreds of generations maybe thousands they start. . . well, whatever their equivalent of pupating is. They start producing something new, something different. And because they're inside us inside some of us, at least they start affecting us differently. They start fouling up the way we normally behave.
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"That's what Mossassor says, anyway. That's what it thinks we mean when we say someone has Serpent blood. It thinks they have something inside of them which can suddenly flip into a whole new way of being . .. and flip them, too. It's not just people who have Serpent's blood, though . . .
potentially, at least, it's all of us ... one way or another. Them too Serpents, I mean. And drago mites And Salamanders. And . . . well, everything. The whole damn world. For hundreds of generations . . .
thousands of years . . . it's all maggots. Then, all of a sudden, it's pupa time . . . and after that, fly time. Not literally, but something like that.
"In short, something very, very weird is happening ... in our blood, in our heads, and most of all in the Pool of Life at the Navel of the World: in Chimera's Cradle."
Checuti studied her face carefully.
"You believe all that, don't you?" he said.
"Even though this Ssifuss doesn't, you do."
"Every rotting word," she agreed.
"I can barely grasp the elements of it, and I certainly don't know what it implies for the world or for me, but I believe it. Mossassor believes it, and Fraxinus is more than halfway to believing it. Ssifuss doesn't want to believe it... but it's here, isn't it? We're all here."
"You're saying that something inside of us some living thing squirming in our guts like that worm Ereleth fed me brought us here without our even knowing it?"
"In a manner of speaking," she agreed.
"But then again, it certainly didn't force us. That's not the way it works.
We make our own decisions. Maybe there are things in our flesh which aren't, strictly speaking, us and maybe there are ideas in our mind which aren't entirely our own but we're still free. In some essential respect, we're still free. Every time we go to sleep, we become someone else .
. but when we wake up again, we're still us. Something like that, anyhow. "
"And all this is supposed to make sense, is it?" Checuti said.
"Or are you telling me in the hope that I'll tell you that it doesn't make sense, so that you can forget it?"
"I'm telling you," she informed him frostily, 'because I thought you'd like to know. I thought you were entitled to know, even though you're just a lousy thief who can't be trusted any further than I could throw a feather into a headwind, and who'd probably be doing us all a big favour if you decided to desert, disappear or 475
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die. Assuming that Mossassor comes out
of that mound, you see, we're all going on together: south, to the marshes and Salamander's Fire and the Silver Thorns, all the way to the Navel of the World. I just thought you'd like to know why, or as much of the why as anyone else knows. " : " I see," Checuti said.
"Thanks."
She stared into his eyes, as if she were trying to judge whether he believed her, and whether he cared. He wished that he had an honest answer to show her, but he didn't. The only thing he was sure of was that she meant every word of it.
To stave off the force of that assertive gaze he said: "It's true that Serpents can control drago mites then. The dark landers were right about that, too."
"The Serpents can't exactly control the drago mites Keshvara told him evenly.
"They didn't lead that army here, no matter what it might have looked like.
It's just that they can talk to the drago mites in their own language of odours and vibrations. The drago mites tolerate them to the extent that if only Mossassor can reach the people trapped in the Corridors of Power it'll be able to protect them from the invaders."
Checuti considered the implications of the word tolerate, on the assumption that it must have been carefully chosen.
"If your Serpent friends can't actually control drago mites he said slowly,
'that means they aren't actually controlling the situation as a whole, doesn't it?"
"I'm afraid so," Keshvara replied.
"But we're not in mortal danger.
Mossassor was very certain of that. " ' Speak for yourself, Checuti thought.
I've got a worm in my guts which needs Ereleth's tender care to ensure it stays lonely.
"Not that any of us is actually in control," he observed aloud.
"Fraxinus and Ereleth both think they're in command of the expedition and they hate one another's guts. Myrasol and I hate Ereleth too, but we have to follow her orders regardless. As for the princess, and that gloomy young captain ... do you really think we'll meekly follow a Serpent whose own kind think it's probably crazy, when we can't even organise ourselves?"
"We all want the same thing," Keshvara said.
"Life, preferably long and preferably interesting. It doesn't matter who's in control, as long as we're all headed in the same direction."
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"Not to you, maybe," he said, choosing to voice the thought this time.
"But Ereleth is in control of me, and I don't like it. The thing that's living inside me certainly isn't leaving me much freedom of choice."
"No," she said.
"I guess it isn't. Still now you know as much as I do. That's something, isn't it?"
She was right, and he couldn't deny it. Even if it turned out to be nonsense, it
was the nonsense which was driving their rescuers the nonsense that had saved their lives, at least for a day or two. He had to know things like that, if he were to bring all his cleverness to bear on his present predicament.
"After all," she continued, 'we wouldn't want things to be too simple and straightforward, would we? That'd take all the savour out of life, wouldn't it? "
He recognised the quotation, and condescended to smile wryly. "Thanks for bringing me up to date," he said. He added: "I appreciate it,"
just to make sure that she understood he wasn't being sarcastic, and then stretched out his right hand.
She took it.
"Funny old world, isn't it?" she remarked, evidently unable to resist the temptation.
"But then, you like it that way, don't you?"
As they sealed their uneasy friendship, Checuti saw Ereleth step out of the mouth of a tunnel on the slope high above them, hiding her eyes from the sudden sunlight. She was flanked by half a dozen mound-women. They all looked down at the waiting horses and wagons.
Ereleth was dirty and dishevelled but somehow perhaps it was the vivid brightness of the sunlight in which she bathed, and the way she welcomed its dry heat as though it were hers to demand and command there was no mistaking the fact that she was a queen, of sorts.
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A. "
20 the open air had never felt so good to breathe, and the sight of the sun although the afternoon was bruisingly bright had never been so welcome to Andris's eyes. He felt that he had descended into a kind of hell and had emerged again, triumphant simply by virtue of having survived. He felt that he was stronger now than he had ever been, tempered by adversity and by horror.
No one rushed to greet him or to enthuse over his salvation. The only one of their party who received any kind of welcome was the princess; she and the Serpent named Mossassor were the centre of attention.
Andris might have commanded more attention by displaying the head of the human drone like some gruesome trophy, but he had taken care to secrete that within his shirt remaining sensible, of course, of the warning he had been given about wrapping it too tightly, i He returned as quickly as he could to the small wagon, where his personal possessions were stored. Merel and Jacom Cerri went with him. There was no water for bathing but they cleaned themselves as best they could with damp rags and put on clean clothes. Then they found a sealed jar full of biscuits and another of spiced and salted meat, and fed themselves. Then Andris dissolved some sugar in a little fresh water, and dripped it on to the tongue of the disembodied head.
Afterwards, Andris placed the head in a dark corner, where it would be unobtrusive. Merel constantly darted glances at it, as if expecting its eyes to open.
"Can it really survive like that?" she asked.
"It has no lungs to enliven its blood, and no heart to pump the blood through its brain.
Surely it requires more than sugared water to sustain itself. "
"It seemed to think that it could live long enough to be united with a new body, if only I could find out how to do it," Andris said.
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"I suppose it has provision of some kind for the enlivening of its blood and the adequate supply of its sleeping brain. It isn't truly human or, at any rate, not merely human. It's a chimera: a fusion of earthly and unearthly flesh. I suspect Dhalla may be a chimera too and possibly the princess, though she doesn't show it."
"Perhaps we all are," Merel suggested, not meaning it.
"Perhaps we are," Andris said thoughtfully.
"I don't believe that," Cerri said.
"There was too much nonsense being talked around here even before that damned Serpent added his contribution. We'd be far better off without any of it."
"We don't have that option, Jacom," Andris said quietly. He used the captain's given name deliberately, to emphasise the fact that they had made their peace, and could disagree without injuring their new-found and still-awkward amity. The captain contrived a slight smile in recognition of his courtesy. Cerri seemed happier now as a man who had been through what he had been through had every right to be.
"Did it really call you brother, and ask you to find it a new body?"
Merel asked.
"It did," Andris assured her.
"And I accepted the duty. It seemed important not just to the drone but in some more general sense. All that my actual brothers ever wanted was either to recruit me to their schemes or to stab me in the back. I've no real reason to think that this desperate pretended brother has any nobler intentions, but. . .
you've taught me a lesson in kinship, cousin, and I must put it to the test.
I don't know how to do what it- what he asked me to do, but I'll surely try.
Fraxinus and Phar might be able to advise me and they'll certainly be interested. "
"The princess was interested," Merel observed.
"I could see that plainly enough. Perhaps witches have their uses for severed heads, just as they have their uses for broken-legged bodies. I think the Serpent was interested too, although it's hard to tell when a face shows as little expression as that. He's trying very hard to be friends, isn't he? All on ssame sside, yessf Merel glanced at Jacom as she said this dutifully pretending, for Andris's sake, that she intended no insult to him.
Andris was glad when Cerri smiled again.
"I'm not complaining," Andris said.
"He actually, I think the Serpent really is an it saved our lives down there."
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"We might not have needed saving," Merel pointed out grimly, 'if that giant hadn't hit me. I'd vow to get even if she wasn't three times my size and five times as nasty. "
"We've got grudges enough to bear," Andris told her tiredly.
"She didn't mean to hurt you, and she came to take her stand with us when she could have slipped away. Let's just be thankful that Ereleth got out safely she still holds the key to my continued survival.
Finished? "
Merel and Cerri nodded, and Andris gathered up the remains of their meal. He moved to the rear of the wagon to stow the debris in an orderly fashion.
Checuti was just about to climb in, and Andris extended a helping hand to him. The thief-master pointed at the slope from which Andris and his companions had earlier descended.
"It's all over," he said.
"We're on our way."
Andris followed the direction of the pointing finger, and then looked the other way. Cerri moved to join them and they all looked out, shading their eyes against the sun.
To the right and left of the wagons and the donkey-train, less than fifty mets distant on either flank, two columns of drago mites and mound-women had formed, each with a single warrior in the van. The drago mite workers had'
clusters of eggs cemented to their backs, encased in translucent masses of hardened slime. From the ridges above, other warriors locked on. To Andris they seemed identical to those whose departure they were supervising, but he knew that they were enemies and conquerors, made gracious in victory only by the diplomatic intervention of the Serpents.
Two dark landers had already taken their stations at the front of the wagon, and they were urging the waiting horses to action.
"Passengers only on this wagon," Checuti observed drily.
"All the important people are up ahead, planning the future of the world.
Fraxinus and Phar, the three Serpents, Ereleth. . . can you imagine how painful it is for one of my abilities to feel excluded? "
"It's not going to be easy to feel included," Cerri commented. "The order of things has been turned upside-down. Dragomite
s march alongside men, Serpents enter into earnest discussion with men as to the meaning of a word I never heard before, and the true significance of Serpent's blood and Salamander's fire. It's difficult to feel that we're really part of something like this."
"We could be part of it," Checuti said, 'if only we were invited.
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You ought to regret it as much as I do, captain. Your future lies with us, now that your guardsmen have ridden off and will probably never be seen again taking that boy you befriended with them. You might not like the idea of allying yourself with Serpents and drago mites not to mention we three diehard rogues but you have precious few alternatives. Given that you're included, whether you like it or not, wouldn't you rather be fully included?
"
Cerri shrugged, with only a slight hint of resentment in his pale eyes.
"I've had enough of quarrelling," Andris said.
"I'm too tired for this kind of sniping and so is Jacom." Again he used the given name deliberately, for Checuti's information.
The thief-master evidently took the inference.
"A thousand pardons!"
he said.
"You're brothers in blood, now, are you not? You descended into the underworld as enemies, shared many adventures, and came back fast friends."
"Yes we did," Andris agreed flatly.
"Shall I tell you what happened down there? Shall I tell you what you missed because Jacom took your place?"
Checuti held up a placatory hand.
"I'm sorry," he said, this time sounding as if he meant it.
"Yes, you must tell me what happened, when you have the time and the patience. I had already offered Captain Cerri a truce, if you recall, and I'm more than willing to offer him my hand now. When the order of things turns upside- down, we must be prepared to commit ourselves to strange alliances. I know that."
"You cannot know how strange," the captain muttered, as he reached out to touch the thief-master's fingers in belated acknowledgement of their truce.
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