Ashes of Candesce: Book Five of Virga

3

"I KNOW IT doesn't look like much right now," Maerta was telling Leal Maspeth, "but in a day or two it'll be able to fly."

Keir hung back, in the shadows, watching the grown-ups inspect the new flying machine. This one was different from his ornithopter--naturally, since the Edisonians evolved each object from scratch.

"What are the air bags for?" Maspeth asked. With her were Minister Loll, Piero Harper, and several other "airmen."

Maerta frowned. "I don't know. --We often don't know the inner workings of the devices the Edisonians make. You could ask one of them, but they might not know, either; since they merely evolve the designs, they don't need to comprehend them."

"Lift," said Keir without thinking. They both turned to look for him, and he reluctantly stepped out of the shadows.

"The bags will probably hold hydrogen," he said, "which is lighter than air. So they'll carry you up, at least until you reach the freefall zone."

"Keir knows something about flying machines," said Maerta with no trace of irony or malice. "He has one of his own." And she nodded to where his ornithopter sat preening its metal feathers in a distant corner of the courtyard.

"Oh, do you fly?" asked Harper. Keir regretted having spoken, and shuffled his feet.

"Not yet," he said curtly.

"You're wise to start slow." Harper grinned. "Flying under gravity's no mean feat. We learned that the hard way."

Keir's scry was telling him to disengage from this conversation. That was probably Maerta's fault; she didn't want him to socialize with the strangers, even though he'd saved their lives and they were clearly grateful. Keir knew his own scry was registering his anger to her and the other Renaissance people nearby, but he kept his face composed as he bowed to the Virgans. "Yes ... if you'll excuse me?" He walked away.

"We'll be able to ferry the rest of our men up from the surface in these?" said Leal Maspeth behind him--but she was watching him go. He could see that through his dragonflies.

He wondered what his scry would tell hers if she had it; it was frustrating that she had none. Scry was useful, because it made explicit the implicit. It interpreted your unconscious thoughts and motives, and communicated those to the scry of the people around you. This took the guesswork out of social relations; or at any rate, Keir's tutors said that was its original function. Like anything else that actually survived in the real world, it had evolved.

Scry was said to predate Artificial Nature. If that were the case, then the original scry technology had been thought up and designed, maybe even by human minds. Some idealist, perhaps, had believed that human society would function more efficiently if people's unconscious minds coordinated their efforts.

Feeling isolated and lonely, he went to his ornithopter and knelt next to it. "How are you?" he asked it.

"Ready," it said. Keir sighed in annoyance and stood up again.

"Ahem." He looked around to find the Virgan government minister, Eustace Loll, standing a polite distance away. Maerta's bots had fixed his broken leg, and he'd seemed pathetically grateful, as if he hadn't expected such a basic courtesy from his hosts.

Of all the Virgans, only Loll seemed to sense the scry around him. He couldn't actually see the emoticons and assessment tags that hovered virtually around everybody and everything here--but he somehow acted like he could. Maerta and the others had warmed up to him very quickly, yet Keir's scry told him that Maspeth didn't trust him.

Maspeth, however, wasn't anywhere to be seen. None of the Virgans were in the courtyard anymore, except for Loll.

He bowed. "Keir Chen, may I talk to you for a minute?"

"Certainly, Minister. I'm done here anyway." Keir didn't know what a "minister" was, but the title came attached to Loll, so he used it.

Loll appeared to like being addressed this way. He peered up at the black sky above the courtyard, then smiled and shook his head. "I confess, I find it strange that your people claim not to understand the very flying machine they're building for us."

Keir shrugged. "Nobody understands machines. We just use 'em. And if we're not careful, we get used by 'em."

Loll's laugh was rich and comradely. He reached out to pat the ornithopter's wing. "So who uses who, in this particular relationship?"

"Oh, it's not very bright and it doesn't think for itself," he said.

"Yet it does what you tell it to?"

Keir nodded. "You can command it, yes. Or use the hand controls, but I still haven't got the hang of it."

Loll mused, rubbing his large chin. "Yet, I should think I'd feel guilty, ordering such a creature around. It may only be a beast of burden, but ... perhaps I can sympathize with it on that level."

"How are you a beast of burden, Minister?" he asked after a conspicuous and awkward silence.

"Oh! Well, I've had to carry heavy loads before. Mostly policy, you know." Loll shrugged. "And responsibility. I don't know how it is in your world, Keir Chen, but in mine we have to take individual responsibility for the welfare of people we may never meet. That's what I've done all my life. It's a calling, really. I help care for people who may not have the resources or information to make certain kinds of decisions for themselves. That's what we call 'government.' I gather you don't have that here."

"Government? No. Responsibility? Sure."

"Ah, then maybe you'll understand my ... distress ... at the current situation."

"Your being stranded here? I guess you've got people waiting for you back home," he said, a little enviously. "A family?"

Loll shook his head. "A city--actually, a whole country whose fate may rest on my ability to reach them in time with a warning."

"Is that why you were out here?"

Loll looked uncomfortable. "Yes, though--it pains me to say this--we've been told not to talk about the details to any outsiders. By that creature Professor Maspeth calls the 'emissary.'"

"The morphont?" Keir's scry was trying to read Loll by the man's stance, blood perfusion, eye movements, and so on. It wasn't having any success--no extra emoticons were floating around Loll that weren't already obvious from the tone of his voice and expression. Either he had fabulous self-control, or he was telling the truth. "It looked like a servant," said Keir. "When I saw it on the mountainside, it was just helping you stay on your feet."

"It wouldn't show its other side to you, naturally." Loll looked grieved. "It's a creature we know very little about. You've seen that little rider it has perched on Maspeth's shoulder? It's impossible to talk to her without it listening. Impossible for her to say what she really means without it hearing, as well. It's using her as its mouthpiece and it wants to get that mouthpiece into Virga to deliver an ultimatum to my people." He glanced around. "We can only tell you this now because, for the moment, it's elsewhere."

Keir hid his surprise and sudden curiosity behind a noncommittal "Hmm.

"It's a morphont, though," he added, "so it could hide any sort of mind in its bodies. You can't judge them by how they look, so I guess I can't tell you what to expect, either. If you're asking us to help you in any way regarding it, I'm not sure what we can do."

Loll gestured impatiently at the half-grown aircraft. "You have power! It seems to me that the people of this world can do anything you want." He rubbed his forehead. "Sorry. It's just the strain of this march we've been forced to undertake. --Make no mistake, we all want to get home, and as quickly as possible. We don't even mind the emissary delivering its message. But our people need to be warned in advance. They need to be prepared. And all this time, as we've walked and walked in its company, it seemed impossible that we could send anyone on ahead. Until now."

Keir glanced at a scry summary. "The airship will be ready in a couple of days--"

"And when it is, it'll carry all of us," insisted Loll. "All of us--including the, the morphont. We need someone to go ahead of it."

Keir finally realized what the man was asking. "You want to take my ornithopter!"

Loll looked chagrined. "If there were any way to return it ... And maybe there will be. We have many friends and allies in Abyss--in my nation. If you could see it in your heart to lend it to us--this is our chance to break away from the emissary's watchful eye..."

First Maerta impounded it, and now this outsider wanted to borrow it! And Keir himself was never going to get to use the thing. "No, you can't," he said quickly--and a little loudly. "I made it, I should get to use it!"

"I understand," said Loll in a soothing tone. "But ... will they let you?"

What had he heard? Maerta must have told others about Keir's plans to leave. Suddenly she didn't seem so wise, or nearly as caring as she pretended. Keir pictured her laughing with her friends while she told them about Keir's folly.

He decided. "I get to use it first. But once I'm done, I can send it back here. It's smart enough to find its way."

The Virgan minister nodded. "And where are you going with it, if I may ask?"

Keir shrugged. "It's a ... private matter. But I do intend to start as soon as I can." He thought about the timetable for completing the new airship, and suddenly realized what he was agreeing to. "Maybe even tonight..."

Loll nodded.

Suddenly not at all sure about this, Keir stepped away, looking around at who might be in earshot or scry distance. "You know," he mumbled, "once I go, the others will, um, kick up something of a fuss. About my being gone. It's important that you stay out of their way and say nothing. I can't guarantee that they won't catch and confiscate the 'thopter when it returns, so you'll have to set a watch for it and be ready to jump in the moment it lands."

"I understand," said Loll. "It's the best we can do under the circumstances. Thank you very much for indulging me in this, Keir Chen. If there were any way we could pay you back..."

He shook his head. "Just keep this secret."

Loll laughed. "Since you've told me nothing about your destination, that should be easy."

After the Virgan walked away Keir stood for a long time staring at the ornithopter. It seemed uncomfortable under his gaze, finally shuffling around to face the other way as it stretched out its wings and landing gear. Keir barely noticed.

He was thinking about the black air beyond the city, and about what it would really mean to launch himself into it. It should have helped that he knew now of two destinations up there: the exit to the arena, at the far end of Aethyr, and, much closer by, the corresponding door to Virga. Before he'd known about that second door, the arena had been his only hope. Now he could picture himself flying to Virga instead, and yet, from what Loll had said, that door was guarded, too. When he landed there, they would ask where he came from. They would investigate, and probably send him back here.

He clenched his fists and glared at the pavement. "But you're getting shorter," he whispered.

The ornithopter angled its sensors as though pondering how to reply, and Keir turned and began walking away--only realizing, midstep, that he was doing it because of subtle hints from his scry.

No--not his scry. One of Maerta's annoying overrides had just kicked in, shoving his own emoticons and hints into the background, making him think he should head to his room.

Why would they want him there? He raised his hands and his dragonflies fountained up and away in every direction. And now he saw it--

--Human figures running up to Leal Maspeth and her people; lumbering mechs shouldering their way out of stone niches where they'd slept ever since the Renaissance arrived here; Maerta herself, pacing down the stairs along with her double, both equally grim-faced.

The usual scry map of Complication Hall and its environs had been edited down to a small set of corridors and rooms--the kids' spaces. A cold prickling feeling washed over Keir as he realized that Gallard had called everyone together and he was using scry to herd them somewhere safe--somewhere high up.

The searchlight of Maerta's attention landed on Keir for an instant, and he gulped and started walking again. He couldn't defy her, or any of the adults. He was going to his room. That didn't mean he couldn't find out what was going on, though.

On the way to the stairs he passed one of the blocky Edisonians. The kids learned early how to make queries to these devices--to ask for things. Along with your earliest lessons in dealing with an Edisonian, the Renaissance grown-ups taught you ancient stories about mythical beings who could grant wishes. Beware what you asked for, these stories cautioned. If your request was not worded exactly right, calamity might emerge from triumph. In one such story, King Midas wished that everything he touched turn to gold, and so his food, his dog, and finally his own wife and children all became statues and sculptures.

On more than one occasion, Keir had asked an Edisonian to extend the communications range of his dragonflies, but Maerta or Gallard or someone had anticipated this, and the Edisonians invariably replied that it was forbidden.

Keir had lately discovered that he had a bit of a talent for thinking around such problems. Actually, it was kind of a big talent for asking the right question. Everybody in the Renaissance had it to one degree or another, but for Keir it seemed to come easily. So, a few weeks ago he'd done something most of his people wouldn't think to do: he'd designed a solution to the range problem.

"Form a chain," he told his dragonflies as he took the steps two at a time. "One end by me, the other end by ... by Maerta."

The dragonflies formed a whirling cloud, which suddenly unreeled in the direction the grown-ups had gone.

Now he issued a second command he'd designed. "Lip-read," he told the lead dragonfly just before it disappeared through a distant archway. Then he had to turn his attention back to his main body, because as he went up one flight of stairs, Maerta and Leal Maspeth were going down another. The confusion of directions caused him to nearly fall flat on his face when he reached the top of his own flight.

He rubbed his shin; but the pain didn't dampen his enjoyment of the moment. He'd never really had cause to use the signal-chain idea before, but it worked perfectly. It was amazing the things you could do if you chose not to use the Edisonians to solve all your problems.

Maerta and Leal Maspeth were talking, and Keir's dragonflies relayed their words back along the chain, along with full visuals.

"--showed up about ten minutes ago," said Maerta.

Maspeth was shaking her head, twisting her hands together as she half-ran down the steps. "But how did he survive? I saw him get washed away by, by a thousand tons of ice!"

"That body probably didn't survive," said Maerta. They burst into one of the chambers just below Complication Hall. This place was normally dark, being just beyond the last storage rooms the Renaissance used. Keir had only ever seen it through the night vision of his dragonflies, which was probably just as well: the place was one of the city's follies, a chamber whose walls and ceiling looked like they were in the process of toppling in on you. Its menacing stone stalactites and leaning walls were lit bright as day by hovering light globes.

The globes, and the smoldering, lightly vibrating mechs, and a few of the older members of the Renaissance, formed a half-circle around a single figure who stood in the center of the room.

Keir didn't know this lean, bald man's face, but he guessed that he'd seen his silhouette before, in the mouth of the tunnel under Brink. He'd reached out one hand and asked them to let him in, and Piero Harper had shot him, driving him into the teeth of the avalanche. Now, once again, he had one hand out in an appeal.

"Leal." A smile of pure joy lit up his face as he saw her. He took a step forward, and one of the mechs moved to block him. The smile faltered.

Maspeth had stopped at the room's entrance, seemingly unsure of what to pay attention to--the looming catastrophe of the ceiling, the hulking metal warriors on either side of her, or the man standing alone on the flat stone floor. Her right hand had gone up to her throat, and she steadied herself momentarily against the doorjamb. Then her expression hardened, and with no more hesitation, she stepped into the room.

"Why have you come here?" she snapped.

The man bowed, a sad half-smile on his face. "Leal, it's me, John."

"John Tarvey drowned. I saw it happen."

He nodded. "And, if this were Virga, that would have been the end of it. Surely the emissary explained it to you?"

The doll riding on Maspeth's shoulder must have said something, because she tilted her head toward it and there was a pause; but Keir's dragonflies couldn't read its lips, because it had none. He was sitting on his bed by now and smacked the mattress in frustration.

"Your enemies, yes, yes," she said to it. "I still don't understand." To Tarvey she said, "They raised you from the dead, or so you say. But this one says no." She curled one hand up to touch the junk-doll's tiny shoulder.

John Tarvey scowled at the little morphont. "It should know better than anybody how expendable bodies are! It wears them like gloves, you've seen that. Leal, I don't understand you. I might almost say you were being, well, hypocritical." He wouldn't meet her eye as he said this. "You keep that thing as your companion knowing full well that it's not what it looks like, that it has no body of its own. It doesn't bother you when it loses one, like it did in the river or in the landslides. It just builds another one or consolidates itself into what's left. But when I do it, you treat me like a monster."

Maspeth shook her head in confusion. "It was meant to be what it is! You weren't. Maybe the emissary's people can come back from the dead because they don't really die to begin with. But people die. You died! I saw you die."

"I didn't die, I became post-physical." He shook his head angrily. "Look, the only reason the people of Virga die is because we don't have allies to rebuild our bodies. I didn't know that before, none of us did. It was dumb luck that I drowned in an area where post-physical scouts were working. They revived me and made me an offer." His half-smile was back.

Maspeth looked very pale and small now, standing half in shadow by the door as though ready to bolt up the stairs at any moment. "What offer is that?"

Tarvey held out his hand. "The same one I'm making to you now. The offer of immortality."

Maspeth shook her head rapidly and sat down on the bottom step. "What does he mean?" She stared up at Maerta, who had stood with her arms crossed through the whole exchange. "Are you like him?"

"No," said Maerta. "We're not." She put herself in between Maspeth and the shade of John Tarvey. "I think you should leave now. She's not ready for your offer. None of them are."

"That's not for you to say, is it?" He walked up to her, looking her up and down. "What exactly are you, anyway? Why are you here, hiding in the darkness next to Virga's wall? Such an odd place to live. I'm sure my friends can tell me what you are; I'll know soon enough. What I wonder, though, is whether you've told her." He nodded at Maspeth.

--Who stood up and stepped past Maerta to glare into his face. "You are not who you say you are; that's all I need to know. Now leave!" She pointed to the black archway opposite the stairs.

He slouched for a moment, his mouth a moue of disagreement; then he turned on one heel and strode away. "The offer stands," he tossed back. "For all your people." He disappeared through the archway.

Maspeth put her face in her hands for a moment, and Maerta stepped forward, maybe to console her--but Maspeth looked up quickly at her, and Keir could see she was furious.

"Explain this!" she bellowed. Keir's lip-reading software rendered the words in as flat a tone as it had everything else so far; he dearly wished he'd heard her own voice at that moment. Clearly, her tone was electric; even the mechs shifted in some analogue of unease.

Then the doll on her shoulder said something. It spoke at length, while she held her head tilted to listen. Finally she shook her head and stalked to the stairs.

Keir called his dragonflies back, and images and words from the confrontation whirled through his head as he let himself fall back on the bed. He understood it on one level: certainly the virtuals could bring someone back from the dead, it probably happened all the time in areas where they held full sway. It was just that ... why was Leal Maspeth so upset by it? And why the strange dynamic between her and Tarvey--why this "offer" that Tarvey talked about?

Something was going on there, some adult political game he couldn't fathom. Yet he felt he should be able to understand it.

He thought furiously for a while, and then startled himself with a new idea. Maspeth and her people came from a place where transformations and extensions and metamorphoses just didn't happen. In Virga, people were born people and kept their one body all their lives. If part of it broke, like Eustace Loll's leg, that was it--it was broken. Nobody had second bodies or morphont extensions like his dragonflies. So, for Maspeth, a resurrected John Tarvey must have seemed impossible, even an abomination.

He barked a laugh at the ceiling. Yes, that was it ... or part of it. The apparent urgency of Tarvey's "offer" was still a mystery, but ...

Keir flipped over and raised his head to glare at the silent door. He'd never given much thought to what it was actually like in Virga. The important thing about the place was the technological bubble that sheltered it from Artificial Nature; beyond that, he'd just thought of it as a realm of boring backwardness, where primitive humans scrabbled for survival in a state of ignorance and helplessness. Yet, if Virga was also a place where transformations and metamorphoses were impossible ...

He sat up, examining his hands--hands that were smaller, weaker, and smoother than they should be.

Eustace Loll had asked Keir where he would go, if he left Brink. At the time, he'd had no idea; he just needed to get away. Now, though, the answer was obvious.

Somehow, he needed to convince Leal Maspeth that, when she returned to Virga, she must take him with her.