She felt sorry for Harbin. But not as sorry as she felt for Rashmika Els.
What did it mean? The shadows had spoken of machines in her head; Grelier thought it unlikely that she had even been born on Hela. But her memories said she had been born to a family in the Vigrid badlands, that she was the sister of someone named Harbin. She looked back over her past, examining it with the raptorial eye of someone inspecting a suspected forgery, attentive to every detail. She expected a flaw, a faint disjunction where something had been pasted over something else. But her recent memories flowed seamlessly into the past. Everything that she recalled had the unmistakable grain of lived experience. She didn’t just see her past in her mind’s eye: she heard it, smelt it, felt it, with the bruising, tactile immediacy of reality.
Until she looked back far enough. Nine years, the shadows had said. And then things became less certain. She had memories of her first eight years on Hela, but they felt detached: a sequence of anonymous snapshots. They could have been her memories; they could equally well have belonged to someone else.
But perhaps, Rashmika thought, that was what childhood always felt like from the perspective of adulthood: a handful of time-faded moments, as thin and translucent as stained glass.
Rashmika Els. It might not even have been her real name.
THE DEAN WAITED in his garret with the next Ultra delegation, sunglasses covering the eye-opener. When Rashmika arrived the air had a peculiar stillness, as if no one there had spoken for several minutes. She watched the shattered components of herself prowl through the confusion of mirrors, trying to reassemble the expression on her own face, anxious that there should be no indication of the upsetting conversation she had just had with the surgeon-general.
“You’re late, Miss Els,” the dean observed.
“I was detained,” she told him, hearing the tremble in her voice. Grelier had made it clear she was to make no mention of her visit to Bloodwork, but some excuse seemed necessary.
“Have a seat, drink some tea. I was just having a chat with Mr. Malinin and Miss Khouri.”
The names, inexplicably, meant something to her. She looked at the two visitors and felt another tingle of recognition. Neither of them looked much like Ultras. They were too normal; there was nothing obviously artificial about either of them, no missing or augmented bits, no suggestion of genetic reshaping or chimeric fusion. He was a tall, slim, dark-haired man, about ten years older than her. Handsome, even, in a slightly self-regarding way. He wore a stiff red uniform and stood with his hands behind his back, as if at attention. He watched her as she sat down and poured herself some tea, taking more interest in her than any of the other Ultras had done. To them she had only ever been part of the scenery, but from Malinin she sensed curiosity. The other one—the woman called Khouri—looked at her with something of the same in-quisitiveness. Khouri was a small-framed older woman, sad eyes dominating a sad face, as if too much had been taken from her and not enough given back.
Rashmika thought she had seen both of them before. The woman, in particular.
“We haven’t been introduced,” the man said, nodding towards Rashmika.
“This is Rashmika Els, my advisor,” the dean said, the tone of his voice indicating that this was all he was prepared to say on the matter. “Now, Mr. Malinin…”
“You still haven’t properly introduced us,” he said.
The dean reached out to adjust one of his mirrors. “This is Vasko Malinin, and this is Ana Khouri,” he said, gesturing to each of them in turn, “the human representatives of the Nostalgia for Infinity, an Ultra vessel recently arrived in our system.”
The man looked at her again. “No one mentioned anything about advisors sitting in on negotiations.”
“You have a particular problem with that, Mr. Malinin? If you do, I can ask her to leave.”
“No,” the Ultra said, after a moment’s consideration. “It doesn’t matter.”
The dean invited the two visitors to sit down. They took their seats opposite Rashmika, on the other side of the little table where she poured tea.
“What brought you to our system?” the dean asked, directing his question to the male Ultra.
“The usual. We have a belly full of evacuees from the inner systems. Many of them specifically wanted to be brought here, before the vanishings reach culmination. We don’t question their motives, so long as they pay. The others want to be taken further out, as far away from the wolves as possible. We, of course, have our own technical needs. But we don’t plan on staying very long.”
“Interested in scuttler relics?”
“We have a different incentive,” the man said, pressing a crease from his suit. “We’re interested in Haldora, as it happens.”
Quaiche reached up and undipped his sunglasses. “Aren’t we all?”
“Not in the religious sense,” the Ultra replied, apparently unfazed by Quaiche lying there with his splayed-open eyelids. “But it’s not our intention to undermine anyone’s belief system. However, since this system was discovered, there’s been almost no scientific investigation into the Haldora phenomenon. Not because no one has wanted to examine it, but because the authorities here—including the Adventist church—have never permitted close-up examinations.”
“The ships in the parking swarm are free to use their sensors to study the vanishings,” Quaiche said. “Many have done so, and have circulated their findings to the wider community.”
“True,” the Ultra said, “but those long-distance observations haven’t been taken very seriously beyond this system. What’s really needed is a detailed study, using physical probes—instrument packages fired into the face of the planet, that kind of thing.”
“You might as well spit in the face of God.”
“Why? If this is a genuine miracle, it should withstand investigation. What do you have to fear?”
“God’s ire, that’s what.”
The Ultra examined his fingers. Rashmika read his tension like a book. He had lied once, when he told the dean about the ship being full of evacuees who wanted to witness the vanishings. There might be a host of mundane reasons for that. Beyond that he had told the truth, so far as she was able to judge. Rashmika glanced at the woman, who had said nothing yet, and felt another electric shock of recognition. For a moment their eyes met, and the woman held the gaze for a second longer than Rashmika found comfortable. It was Rashmika who looked away, feeling the blood rush to her cheeks.
‘The vanishings are reaching culmination,“ the Ultra said. ”No one disputes this. But it also means that we do not have much time to study Haldora as it is now.“
“I can’t allow it.”
“It has happened once before, hasn’t it?”
The light caught the frame of his eye-opener as he turned towards the man. “What has?”
“The direct probing of Haldora,” the Ultra said. “On Hela, so far as we can gather, there are rumours of an unrecorded vanishing, one that happened about twenty years ago. A vanishing that lasted longer than the others, but which has now been stricken from the public record.”
“There are rumours about everything,” Quaiche said, sounding peevish.
“It’s said that the prolonged event was the result of an instrument package being sent into the face of Haldora at the moment of an ordinary vanishing. Somehow it delayed the return of the normal three-dimensional image of the planet. Stressed the system, perhaps. Overloaded it.”
“The system?”
“The mechanism,” the Ultra said. “Whatever it is that projects an image of the gas giant.”
“The mechanism, my friend, is God.”
“That’s one interpretation.” The Ultra sighed. “Look, I didn’t come here to irritate you, only to state our position honestly. We believe that an instrument package has already been sent into the face of Haldora, and that it was probably done with Adventist blessing.” Rashmika thought again about the scratchy markings Pietr had shown her, and what she had been told b
y the shadows. It was true, then: there really had been a missing vanishing, and it was in that moment that the shadows had sent their bodiless envoy—their agent of negotiation—into the scrimshaw suit. The same suit they wanted her to remove from the cathedral, before it was dashed to pieces on the floor of Ginnungagap Rift.
She forced her attention back to the Ultra, for fear of missing something crucial. “We also believe that no harm can come from a second attempt,” he said. “That’s all we want: permission to repeat the experiment.”
“The experiment that never happened,” Quaiche said.
“If so, we’ll just have to be the first.” The Ultra leaned forwards in his seat. “We’ll give you the protection you require for” free. No need to offer us trade incentives. You can continue to deal with other Ultra parties as you have always done. In return, all we ask for is the permission to make a small study of Haldora.“
The Ultra leant back. He glanced at Rashmika and then looked out of one of the windows. From the garret, the line of the Way was clearly visible, stretching twenty kilometres into the distance. Very soon they would see the geological transitions that marked the approach of the Rift. The bridge could not be far below the horizon.
Fewer than three days, she thought. Then they’d be on it. But it wouldn’t be over quickly, even then. At the cathedral’s usual crawl it would take a day and a half to make the crossing.
“I do need protection,” Quaiche said, after a great silence. “And I suppose I am prepared to be flexible. You have a good ship, it seems. Heavily armed, and with a sound propulsion system. You’d be surprised how difficult it has been to find a ship that can meet my requirements. By the time they get here, most ships are on their last legs. They’re in no fit state to act as a bodyguard.”
“Our ship has some idiosyncrasies,” the Ultra said, “but yes, it is sound. I doubt that there’s a better-armed ship in the parking swarm.”
“The experiment,” Quaiche said. “It wouldn’t be anything more than the dropping of an instrument package?”
“One or two. Nothing fancy.”
“Sequenced with a vanishing?”
“Not necessarily. We can learn a great deal at any time. Of course, if a vanishing chooses to happen… we’ll be sure to have an automated drone stationed within response distance.”
“I don’t like the sound of any of this,” Quaiche said. “But I do like the sound of protection. I take it you have studied the rest of my terms?”
“They seem reasonable enough.”
“You agree to the presence of a small Adventist delegation on your ship?”
“We don’t really see why it’s necessary.”
“Well, it is. You don’t understand the politics of this system. It’s no criticism: after only a few weeks here, I wouldn’t expect you to. But how are you going to know the difference between a genuine threat and an innocent transgression? I can’t have you shooting at everything that comes within range of Hela. That wouldn’t do at all.”
“Your delegates would take those decisions?”
“They’d be there in an advisory capacity,” Quaiche said, “nothing more. You won’t have to worry about every ship that comes near Hela, and I won’t have to worry about your weapons being ready when I need them.”
“How many delegates?”
“Thirty,” Quaiche said.
“Too many. We’ll consider ten, maybe twelve.”
“Make it twenty, and we’ll say no more on the matter.”
The Ultra looked at Rashmika again, as if it was her advice that he sought. “I’ll have to discuss this with my crew,” he said.
“But in principle, you don’t have any strong objections?”
“We don’t like it,” Malinin said. He stood up, straightened his uniform. “But if that’s what it takes to get your permission, we may have no choice but to accept it.”
Quaiche bobbed his head emphatically, sending a sympathetic ripple through his attendant mirrors. “I’m so pleased,” he said. “The moment you came through that door, Mr. Malinin, I knew you were someone I could do business with.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Hela Surface, 2727
WHEN THE ULTRAS’ shuttle had departed, Quaiche turned to her and said, “Well? Are they the ones?”
“I think they are,” she said.
“The ship looks very suitable from a technical standpoint, and they certainly want the position very badly. The woman didn’t give us much to go on. What about the man: did you sense that Malinin was hiding anything?”
This was it, she thought: the crux moment. She had known that Vasko Malinin meant something important as soon as she heard his name: it had felt like the right key slipping into a lock after so many wrong ones, like the sequenced falling of well-oiled tumblers.
She had felt the same thing when she had heard the woman’s name.
I know these people, she thought. They were older than she remembered them, but their faces and mannerisms were as familiar to her as her own flesh and blood.
There had been something in Malinin’s manner, too: he knew her, just as she knew him. The recognition went both ways. And she had sensed, too, that he was hiding something. He had lied blatantly about his motive for coming to Hela, but there had been more to it than that. He wanted more than just the chance to make an innocent study of Haldora.
This was it: the crux moment.
“He seemed honest enough,” Rashmika said.
“He did?” the dean asked.
“He was nervous,” she replied, “and he was hoping you wouldn’t ask too many questions, but only because he wants his ship to get the position.”
“It’s odd that they should show such an interest in Haldora. Most Ultras are only interested in trade advantages.”
“You heard what he said: the market’s crashed.”
“Still doesn’t explain his interest in Haldora, though.”
Rashmika sipped at her tea, hoping to hide her own expression. She was nowhere near as successful at lying as she was adept at its detection.
“Doesn’t really matter, does it? You’ll have your representatives aboard their ship. They won’t be able to get up to anything fishy with a bunch of Adventists breathing down their necks.”
“There’s still something,” Quaiche said. With no visitors to intimidate he had replaced his sunglasses, clipping them into place over the eye-opener. “Something I just can’t put my finger… I know, did you see the way he kept looking at you? And the woman, too? Odd, that. The others have barely looked at you.”
“I didn’t notice,” she said.
Hela Orbit, 2727
VASKO FELT HIS weight increase as the shuttle pushed them back towards orbit. As the vessel altered its course, he saw the Lady Morwenna again, looking tiny and toy like compared to when they had first approached it. The great cathedral sat alone on its own diverging track of the Permanent Way, so far from the others that it appeared to have been cast into the icy wilderness for some unspeakable heresy, excommunicated from the main family of cathedrals. He knew it was moving, but at this distance the cathedral might as well have been fixed to the landscape, turning with Hela. It took ten minutes to travel its own length, after all.
He looked at Khouri, sitting next to him. She had said nothing since they left the cathedral.
An odd thought occurred to him, popping into his mind from nowhere. All this trouble that the cathedrals went to—the great circumnavigation of Hela’s equator—was undertaken to ensure that Haldora was always overhead, so that it could be observed without interruption. And that was because Hela had not quite settled into synchronous rotation around the larger planet. How much simpler it would have been had Hela reached that state, so that it always kept the same face turned towards Haldora. Then all the cathedrals could have gathered at the same spot and set down roots. There would have been no need for them to move, no need for the Permanent Way, no need for the unwieldy culture of support communities that the cathedrals both
depended upon and nurtured. And all it would have taken was a tiny adjustment in Hela’s rotation. The planet was like a clock that almost kept time. It only needed a tiny nudge to fall into absolute, ticking synchrony. How much? Vasko ran the numbers in his head, not quite believing what they told him. The length of Hela’s day would only have to be changed by one part in two hundred. Just twelve minutes out of the forty hours.
He wondered how any of them could keep their faith knowing that. For if there was anything miraculous about Haldora, why would the Creator have slipped up over a matter of twelve minutes in forty hours when arranging Hela’s diurnal rotation? It was a glaring omission, a sign of cosmic sloppiness. Not even that, Vasko corrected himself. It was a sign of cosmic obliviousness. The universe didn’t know what was happening here. It didn’t know and it didn’t care. It didn’t even know that it didn’t know.
If there was a God, he thought, then there wouldn’t be wolves. They weren’t part of anyone’s idea of heaven and hell.
The shuttle banked away from the cathedral. He could see the rough, ungraded surface of the Permanent Way stretching ahead of the Lady Morwenna. But it did not stretch very far before meeting the dark, shadowed absence of Ginnungagap Rift. Vasko knew exactly what the locals called it.
The Way appeared to end at the edge of Absolution Gap. On the far side of the Rift, forty kilometres from the near side, the road continued. There appeared to be nothing in between but forty kilometres of empty space. It was only when the shuttle had climbed a little higher that a particular angle of the light picked out the absurdly delicate filigree of the bridge, as if it had been breathed into being just at that moment.
Vasko looked at the bridge, then back to the cathedral. It still appeared to be stationary, but he could see that the landmarks that had been next to it a few minutes earlier were now just behind it. The crawl was slug-slow, but there was also an inevitability about it.
Absolution Gap Page 72