World's End

Page 129

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165

JOAN D. VINGE

The sudden question almost throws me into Transfer.

My mind stumbles and pulls itself together desperately. Stop! Stop! "Yes! . . . What?" I find myself staring up into

Goldbeard's mottled face. "What do you want?" I glare at him, because his expression fills me with cold fear. I

remember that he heard me tell Song I wasn't a sibyl. But 1 am a sibyl. . . . Slipping, slipping.

Concentrate! Stop. I

take deep breaths, mumbling an adhani; knowing that it's futile, but somehow succeeding anyway.

"I want what belongs to me--"

For a moment my floundering brain thinks he means the watch.

"--the solii."

I blink. "The . . . Song gave you your reward." I try to push past him, but he grabs my arm.

"A lousy diamond. Where's the solii?"

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I have to stop and remember. And then I tell him.

His jaw drops in moronic disbelief, snaps shut again with fury. "I'll spill your guts and find it, pilgrim--" He shakes me. "Only ..." He lets me go abruptly. "She says not to touch you. She says you belong to the Lake now."

He stares at me, as if he is seeing the sweat-streaked designs on my face for the first time.

I nod, eager to make him believe it.

"You hear the Lake talk?" he asks. "You see the future and the past?"

"Does . . . does she?"

"Sure." He nods, and I feel a giddy wash of relief. I was right. The ghosts, the buildings, are not hallucinations

. . . they're something else. . . . One less symptom, one more clue. "Do you see them?" I ask.

He laughs, and spits. "Nah. She's the sibyl, the one got power over the Lake. It has her, and it leaves us alone."