Requiem (31 page)

She’d not waited for him to return when he had turned back, and his shouts for her to wait had gone unanswered. All he heard was the muffled sound of occasional footfalls someplace above him as she, too, climbed the stairs.

If she intended to leave me behind, why did she wait for me to awaken?
Why not just abandon him where he slept? It made little sense, but so far the girl was a contradiction he could not comprehend. One minute innocent, another alluring, and the next enraged.

He didn’t know the nature of her illness, but Aver-Tal-Ka was right in his assessment: Amylé D’Anjite was not well.

Neb paused, thinking perhaps he’d heard something. Somewhere above, a new sound tickled at his ears. Metal groaning and creaking. And then the slightest drop in temperature, the faintest scent of something old and dusty, closed off, on the downward-drifting breeze.

He felt the emotions first.
Terror. Panic.
Then he heard the gasp of surprise above him, and it started him climbing again, moving faster through the dark with one hand trailing against the smooth, warm metallic wall. “Amylé?”

He heard fear in the girl’s voice, too, but it was nothing compared to the waves of emotion she pulsated with. “Who is it?”

“Nebios,” he said. “Nebios Whym.”

“Did my father send—?” A sob swallowed the rest of her words and became a snuffled gasp. “You’re the boy from the garden at the top of the temple.”

“Yes,” he said. “Wait for me. I’m coming to you.”

Neb increased his pace, aware now that not only had the air changed, but the light—or lack thereof—had changed as well. It wasn’t by much, but enough to raise his feet’s confidence on the stairs he climbed. And as he drew closer, he saw the source of the light. At the top of the stairs a large, round metal door stood open a crack, and the dimmest light leaked in from it. More than that, the faintest sound of music also leaked into the dark and deep stairwell. Amylé sat in that gray pool of illumination, the white oval of her face turned toward Neb as he approached.

She scrambled back from him, her eyes widening. The questions spilled out of her in a mad rush. “Where are our clothes? Where have you brought me? How did you wake me?”

Neb stopped and dropped to a crouch, holding up his hands. He closed his eyes and tried to push his own emotions toward her.
Peace. Calm.
“Don’t be afraid.”

But his own fear was too present in the moment. The bitter, angry woman who’d brought him here and had assured him that she’d already stopped him from unsealing the temple now didn’t know where she was or how she had come to be there. He couldn’t trust her. And he was still coming to grips with just how badly things had gone. Isaak destroyed. Stranded on the moon—in the very tower he was sent to unseal—with no sense of how to do what needed doing.

Her back was to the wall now, beside the door she’d opened. They were on a landing, and he picked out a section of wall as far from her as he could get without staying on the stairs. He moved to it slowly and sat down, feeling the warmth of the metal against his back.

She sobbed again, and now her voice rose. “Tell me where you’ve brought me. Does my father know?”

Neb swallowed. “I think we’re in the Firsthome Temple. And your father…” No, he couldn’t tell her now that he suspected that the man had been dead for two millennia. He found the closest compromise he could with truth. “I don’t think he sent me,” he said, “but I think maybe
my
father did.” He waited for the words to set in and caught the faint trace of music on the air. Its notes were constant companions to him now. “Do you hear the song?”

Her nod was the faintest outline in the gloom. “I do. It’s the Homeseeker’s Song.”

The Homeseeker’s Song.
He knew it as the Canticle for the Fallen Moon—a song attributed to the Last Weeping Czar Frederico, though Neb now suspected it originated somewhere above them. A song heard in the Wastes by metal ears, from a crescent buried deep beneath the ruins of the Old World. “Yes. It brought me here to unseal the tower.” He paused again. “There is a dream coded into it.”

“And it brought you to me as well?”

Neb hesitated. “I think so. I met you in my dreams right after arriving.” He paused. “And you said our fathers knew each other.”

“Yes,” she said. “I remember. You were in the garden at the top of the temple. We watched home-rise together, and I flew away when you woke the hounds.”

“Yes.”

“You had more hair then.” Her voice was matter-of-fact.

Neb blushed, his hand absently moving to his head. The hair was already losing its bristle and softening—growing back after it had burned away far faster than normal. “Yes,” he said.

“And after the dream you found me and brought me here?”

Neb shook his head. “I did find you and wake you. But…” He wasn’t sure he should say more. She was already precariously poised on the brink of something he couldn’t comprehend. Finally, he chose his path. “But I didn’t bring you here.”

“Then who brought us?”

Neb opened his mouth and closed it.
You did.
But he couldn’t say it. “I don’t know.”

She looked around. “And you say it’s the Firsthome Temple?”

“I think so.” His eyes were adjusting even more now to the dark. “Or maybe we’re beneath it. Maybe it’s beyond that door.”

She was calming down now. He could feel the panic moving into a quieter fear. Amylé looked up at him, and their eyes met. “I don’t see how it’s possible. I’ve been to the temple hundreds of times. This place is dark and desolate. The temple is full of life.”

Neb shrugged, and her eyes narrowed.

“So why are we here, Nebios?”

“I don’t know exactly,” he said. It wasn’t a lie, though it wasn’t the complete truth, either. He nodded to the door. “But I think we should go in.”

Neb stood slowly, his eyes on the girl. Everything about her was different now, even her posture. It was hard to believe this was the same woman he had awakened with earlier. He took a step toward her and held out his hand.

She hesitated before taking it and letting him help her to her feet. When their skin touched, Neb felt it like heat moving through his body, and he flushed. Once she was steady, he released her hand quickly and reached forward to push the large metal door open wider. Then, they stepped through together.

The smell of something old and musty mingled with the faintest aroma of spices and ozone. The scents were subtle, but the odd assortment made them somehow overpowering, and he coughed against it. He felt a hand slipping into his own, and that heat stirred again, threatening his balance with an intoxication he did not comprehend.

Her scent is here, too.
Neb swallowed and willed his hand to release hers again. But this time, it would not obey him and he closed his eyes against the vertigo of her touch.

It is a mirage,
he realized. Because whatever he saw now, there was more to Amylé D’Anjite than the frightened woman he stood with. Neb tried to see the enraged, bitter woman who had lured him here intending to stop him from unsealing the tower, but she seemed gone now. Everything about Amylé was different—her posture, the tone of her voice, the way she looked at him.

Desire. Hope.
He felt the emotions rising off of her, and when he met her eyes, she looked away.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve … I’ve been asleep for a long time. You’re the first person I’ve seen in…” The words trailed off into silence. “Well, I don’t know how long,” she finally said. “Surely you feel it, too?”

“Feel what?”

“The call,” she said.

Neb blushed. He didn’t have to ask what she meant. The more her anxiety settled, and the more time they spent near each other, the stronger it became. He felt it from her in waves, and he knew she must feel it too. And beyond that, if it went on much longer, he’d not be able to hide the evidence of its physical effect on him. “We should walk while we talk.”

She nodded, and they set out hand in hand, naked and unashamed though the idea of it baffled Neb. They moved out into an open space, and the farther they walked, the more Neb’s eyes adjusted to the gloom. The floor beneath their feet was soft and pliable, the light emanating from scattered patches of lichen and fungi that glowed faintly around them. Whatever walls or ceiling this large room had were beyond the little light they saw by.

“I don’t understand what’s happened to the temple,” Amylé said in a quiet voice. “Why was it sealed? How long ago?”

Neb shrugged. “I don’t know for certain. But I think the Moon Wizard did it before he fell.”

Confusion.
He sensed it even as he changed direction with his words. “Y’Zir, I mean.”

She stopped walking, and he felt the fear returning. “Then he won.”

Neb stopped, too, and took a deep breath. “I think he did. But I think maybe I’m here to undo that.”

He started to walk, but her grip on his hand tightened and held him back. Her face was sober, and the fear had all but swallowed the desire that had been radiating from her moments before. “How long have I been asleep, Nebios Whym? Where are our fathers? What has become of the People?”

Her voice rose with her panic, and the terror chilled him and forced his eyes away from her.

Tell me.
He felt the strength of her words as they struck his mind and he released his held breath.

“I think Y’Zir won a long time ago,” he said. “My father was a ghost in a cave deep underground when I met him.” He didn’t know how to tell her that he’d not even known he was of her kind until recently. And the knowledge still terrified him. So instead, he fell back to a comfortable answer. “And I don’t know what became of the People.” He paused and felt his own fear rising again. “All I know is to follow the song.”

She squeezed his hand. “Okay.”

And as they set out across the room, Neb wondered exactly what he would do when he did find the source of the song. And more importantly, he wondered what Amylé D’Anjite would do.

He knew better than to believe that the bitter woman who brought him here was gone. But she was gone for now, and the woman who replaced her left him with a feeling he had never felt before.

It feels,
Nebios Whym realized,
like home.

Winters

Winters paused, her pencil poised above the empty page, and closed her eyes against the noise of the camp beyond her tent.

The taste of sleep still filled her mouth, and the faint scent of boiling chai pulled at her, tempting her away from her morning’s work.

I need to remember.
Putting down the pencil, she rubbed her eyes. She was dreaming again, but laying hold of the words and images was like swimming in mud. She knew they were there, just beyond the reach of her memory. She felt the presence of the night’s dreams in her sweat-damp hair and her sore muscles.

She wasn’t exactly sure how long she’d been underground at this point. They’d traveled the Beneath Places on a seemingly endless route of twists and turns and unexpected descents before arriving at the small camp they now occupied. And somewhere along the way, her dreams had returned. Only muted now, veiled and far away and impossible to remember. But they’d become more and more regular the farther down they went.

Winters heard a stirring behind her and looked over her shoulder. Marta sat up in her cot, the blankets pooling around her. “Good morning,” the girl said, her voice muffled by sleep.

“Good morning,” Winters replied. “How are you feeling?”

The girl’s injuries had been relatively minor, though her black eyes made it appear much worse. “I’m fine. Can I see the Watcher now?”

When they’d arrived the day before, the mechoservitor had been hurried off with Hebda, Charles, and the others. Marta had been left in Winters’s care, and despite the wonders of an Androfrancine camp buried deep beneath the surface, all the girl could think about—or ask about—had been her metal companion.

Winters scowled. “I don’t think that’s really his name.” But she didn’t elaborate; she wasn’t sure it was her place.

Marta shrugged. “I don’t care what his name is. I just want to see him.”

She looked back to the page. All she had were vague recollections of emotions and images lost in shadow. Winters turned her chair so that she faced the girl. “I think that can be arranged,” she said. “Did you sleep well?”

The girl shrugged, then yawned. “I think I had bad dreams.”

Me too.
Winters stood and went to her pack. “What kind of dreams?”

The girl shrugged again. “I can’t remember.”

Winters dug through her pack, pulling out clean trousers and a shirt. She passed them to the girl. “These will be too big,” she said. “But they’ll serve better than anything else around here until we can find better.”

They both dressed quickly, their backs to one another, and slipped out into a large chamber lined with bedrolls and broken into campsites by company. Winters led them away from their own campsite among the other senior officers, marking its place, and followed a metal pipe suspended above them until they reached the cistern it poured into. There, she dipped them a bucket to wash from, and with faces wet from ice-cold water, they followed the smells of frying bacon and chai to the mess tables.

Charles was already there, sitting alone at a table with a bowl of oats. Winters led Marta through the line, watching the girl stack her tin plate with bacon and a sweetened bread made with corn. Winters took a slice of bacon and an apple, focusing on the chai and ignoring the eyes that took in the latticework of scars that covered her face and arms.

The old arch-engineer looked up as they approached. When she met his eyes, she saw the circles under them and knew he hadn’t slept well. Still, he smiled. “How are you feeling?”

Marta touched the stitched gash on her scalp as she set her plate down. “My head hurts.”

Winters gingerly moved her shoulder, feeling the bite of her own cut. “I’m okay,” she said. Then, she furrowed her brows. “Did you get any sleep?”

Charles shook his head. “I don’t know how you ever slept with the dreams going on all night.”