World's End

Page 175

He had proved his right to be obeyed, in the name of

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218

WORLD S END

Hegemonic security. He had watched through a fog of pain and drugs as the staff obeyed, deferred, acted on his orders, all the while stealing glances at the readouts above his head. Their expressions told him they didn't know how he was even able to function.

He functioned because he had no choice, enduring drugs and pain as he had learned to endure the Lake.

And slowly he came to realize that they obeyed him not out of loyalty to the Hegemony, but because of the trefoil they had found around his neck. Knowledge was the one true and lasting power. . . .

Gundhalinu felt for the trefoil resting against the smooth fabric of his uniform. Knowledge. He knew now, really knew, what it meant to be a sibyl. Not a saint, not a god . . . only a vessel. Only human. He clutched the pendant in his fist, remembering the moment when he had first put it on; his hand tightened, until he felt the

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barbs wound his palm again. Droplets of blood crept down his wrist into his sleeve. It was nothing like what he had imagined. . . .

A light blinked on his terminal, and he touched the board. The door to his office opened.

Ossidge led the two prisoners into the room. Their faces were still obscured by security bubbles; they had been held incommunicado for nearly four weeks. They had been cut off competely from contact with the outside world from the moment of their arrest, on his orders. He had called it a matter of high Hegemonic security, blocking all their civil rights.

He had been justified.

Ossidge stood waiting.

"You can remove their restraints, Ossidge. I'm going to interrogate them off the record."

"That's not regulation, Inspector." Ossidge stood like a lump of granite.

"This is an extremely . . . sensitive matter, Ossidge."

The inspector who once would not have tolerated the

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