The Evolutionary Void (83 page)

The open bridge over Grove Canal was so smooth that it verged on
slippery, and that was with the rugged soles of her boots. She vaguely recalled
it had a rope rail and wooden slats pinned on back in Edeard’s time. But she
edged across it without falling into the water below. Then she was in Eyrie.
The tall towers did have a distant kinship with human Gothic design, though no
one on Earth had ever built anything quite so crooked as these. She walked
though the broad thoroughfares between them, tipping her head back to try to
glimpse the spires that formed a crown around each apex. The angle was all
wrong, but she wasn’t going to climb up one to gain a view from the platform at
the top, not today.

It was late morning by the time she arrived at the Lady’s church.
“Cathedral” would be more accurate
, she thought. The large
central dome with its crystal summit radiated three long wings outward, each
with five levels of balconies held apart by slim fluted pillars.

The doors had gone, as had all the pews. Justine walked in, feeling more
nervous than she usually did when she scouted the famous buildings. Sunlight
shone down vertically through the huge transparent center of the dome, creating
a bright haze over the silver-white floor. Several default genistars gave her a
curious look before shuffling away down one of the broad side cloisters where
they were nesting. There were no sculpted genistars left, of course. Creating
ge-chimps or maybe ge-hounds was another possible occupation for her, though
the high probability that she’d mess up the sculpting made her squeamish. Even
Master Akeem at the height of his ability had a regular quota of failures.

She thought she could see something moving on the other side of the
bright shaft of light filling the center of the church. Farsight and retinal
zoom functions found nothing, but she was uncertain. Something about the church
was unnerving her, like a deep harmonic that she couldn’t quite hear.

Stupid. Come on, girl. Pull yourself together
.

She marched straight through the intense splash of light. The giant white
marble statue of the Lady had survived, standing alone where the altar once had
rested. One of the cloisters opened up behind it, and again she thought there was
some movement in the shadows. Goose bumps were rising along her arms. She moved
forward, more cautiously this time. Her third hand pulled gingerly at the
secure flap on top of her holster. Just in case …

She moved into the relative gloom of the cloister, allowing her retinas
to adjust. Farsight showed her there was nothing but empty air. Then her father
stepped out from behind a pillar twenty meters away.

Justine let out a small sob of relief and took one step forward before
freezing. A big alien had emerged beside him.

“Dad?”

“Hello, darling. Glad you made it here. Not that I was getting worried,
but …”

He smiled his half smile, the one that was so familiar and welcome that
she just wanted to rush over and hug him. However—“Is that an Anomine?”

“Yep. Meet Tyzak. He’s slowly showing an interest in our story.”

The Anomine twittered away in its high-pitched voice.

“He says he’s pleased to see you,” Gore translated.

Justine sighed. “And here I was just starting to think everything was
making sense.”

“Trust me. You’re doing fine. That was a good landing, by the way. Nicely
judged.”

“What’s happening, Dad? Why am I here?”

“You’re my link into the Void. And that makes you critical. People are on
their way.”

“The Pilgrimage fleet?”

“Yeah; they made it past the warrior Raiel. But there’s someone else,
too. That’s important, Justine. They should arrive before the fleet. They may
even be in the Void already.”

“Okay,” she said uncertainly. “Who?”

“The other Dreamers.”

“You’re kidding?” That made little sense. “Really?”

“Yeah. An old contact told me they got ahead or at least made it to the
boundary. I don’t know anything more. But if they made it through, they’ll head
for Makkathran.”

“Why, though? Why them?”

“Because they’re what I need in place along with you.”

“All right, Dad, I’ll watch for them.”

“Thank you.”

“Have you got any idea of time scale?”

“Not really. I’m sorry, darling; you’ll just have to sit it out.”

“Do I need to get anything ready?”

“No. Just survive, however long it takes.”

“I was thinking I might try and communicate with the city mind. Drill
down into the deep tunnels or something,” she said with a hopeful tone.

“No point.”

“Can’t you tell me anything?”

“I will, I promise. But I’m contending with a small local problem that
might become unpleasantly physical if I show my hand too soon. And I should
warn you that Ilanthe is with the Pilgrimage fleet.”

“Ha! That bitch. I’ll sort her out if she tries anything with me.”

Gore’s golden features reflected anxiety. “No, you won’t, darling. She’s
not what she used to be. She’s taken on a different aspect which might be
trouble, a lot of trouble. Even the Silfen are worried about her and what she’s
doing.”

“Oh. Okay.” Justine didn’t like the sound of that at all. It took a great
deal for Gore to show caution.

“I love you, darling.”

“Dad. Be careful, please.”

“My middle name.”

“I thought that was ‘Bulldozer.’”

“I hyphenate a lot these days. Sign of the times.” He raised his arm and
gradually turned translucent. After a while he was gone altogether, and Tyzak with
him.

Justine stared at the space where they’d been, then shook her head as if
coming out of a trance. “Oh, crap.” She tried to press down on the sensation of
anxiety without any real success. But at least he’d given her a clear
objective.
Stay alive
. “Nice to know,” she muttered.
Not understanding came hard to Justine; it showed an alarming lack of control,
and that just didn’t sit right at all.

Justine turned and walked back out into the cavernous central section of
the church. If she was going to be staying in Makkathran for any serious length
of time, there were practical aspects she’d have to work out, not to mention
contingencies should the
Silverbird
’s systems
eventually fail. Food was the primary long-term requirement. She was sure there
had been some sheep and goats roaming around on the Iguru, and seven days ago
she’d actually glimpsed what looked like chickens on Low Moat. There must be
seeds she could cultivate, too. The Grand Families all had kitchen gardens in
their mansions; the plants must have survived in some form. And fishing … She
grinned. Fishing would be easy with a third hand.

It wouldn’t be easy, but she could survive. After all, the city must have
been in a similar unkempt state when Rah and the Lady arrived. Justine smiled
up at the Lady’s face high above her. “And look what you did with the place,”
she told the statue. The Lady gazed down with her unchanging somber expression.
Justine’s smile began to fade. There was something about those features now
that she could study them closely—after all, Edeard hadn’t been a particularly
regular visitor to the church. She had to dig deep amid memories she hadn’t
realized her body had retained, but there were connections sparking away in her
subconscious. “No,” she whispered in shock. This Lady as captured by the
sculptor was a lot older than the time Justine had met her, and she’d had very
different hair back then, not to mention figure. “Oh, no.” Justine’s eyes began
to water as the sheer emotional power of recognition engulfed her. “It is, isn’t
it?” Her shoulders started to shake, and she giggled. “It is you. Holy crap,
it’s really you!” Giggles gave way to hysterical laughter; she actually had to
hug her belly it hurt so much. She couldn’t stop.
This
was the Lady, venerated and worshipped by two separate civilizations. The
epitome of dignity and grace. “YES!” she yelled out, and punched the air. Then
the joyful laughter made her double up again. She waved her hands helplessly,
trying to wipe the tears away.

Well, what do you know, the universe has a sense of
irony, after all
.

T
HE THIN SLEET OF BLUE SPARKS
cascading through
hyperspace’s pseudofabric faded away as power was withdrawn from the ultradrive
engines of the
Lady’s Light
, and the ship dropped
back into spacetime. Blackness pressed in against the vast transparent wall at
the front of the observation deck. Radiation from the glowing loop of
interstellar detritus behind them struck the ordinary force field that was
protecting them from the hostility of the Gulf, creating a disagreeable claret
glow around the edges of the transparency. Araminta put on a pair of sunglasses
and stared through the polarized lenses at the greater darkness four
light-years ahead.

Ethan stood beside her, immaculate in his Cleric robes, leaking awe and
expectation into the gaiafield. Taranse, Darraklan, and Rincenso waited loyally
behind their Dreamer, also subdued at the sight of the barrier they had doubted
they would ever witness for themselves.

“We’re here,” Araminta told the Skylord. “Ask the Heart to reach for us,
please.”

It responded with a pulse of nearly human happiness.

Exoimage displays showed her the starship’s hysradar return. The Void
boundary was rippling, distending upward at hyperluminal speed. Reaching for
the Pilgrimage fleet. For her. Its summit opened.

A soft gale of nebula light swept over the twelve Pilgrimage ships.

Hysradar detected another ship emerging from stealth mode, tiny beside
the waiting Goliaths but with an impenetrable force field.

“I wondered where you were,” Araminta said.

“You knew,” Ilanthe replied equitably.

Ethan’s delight chilled rapidly at the reminder of the cost of his
victory. “What now?” he asked.

“We go in,” Araminta told him. “Together. Correct?”

“Correct,” Ilanthe said.

“Taranse,” Araminta said. “Take us through.”

He gave a dreamy nod. The
Lady’s Light
accelerated forward, with the other ships matching its course.

“My Lord,” Ethan’s mind cried, his thoughts amplified by the three
confluence nests on board, then reinforced by those on the remainder of the
fleet. “Please take us to the solid world which used to be inhabited by those
of our species.”

Shit!
Araminta shot him a furious glare. He
returned a satisfied sneer. “Did you overlook that part of the request,
Dreamer?” he asked mockingly.

Araminta watched the tortured red glare fade from the edge of the
transparency as the glow of the nebulae strengthened. Somewhere behind them,
the boundary was closing again. For the first time in days the infestation of
nausea and confusion from living at two speeds abated. Her thoughts cleared.

“And your uniqueness would appear to be at an end,” Ethan continued.
Araminta’s farsight showed her his thoughts, the malice that festered there,
naked to taste as he slowly realized the abilities of the Void and recalled the
techniques Edeard had applied. Farsight also showed her what he was hiding
within the copious folds of his robe.

“True,” she said. “But that leaves us leading the real life of the Void.”

Ethan reached for the old-fashioned pistol he’d concealed. Araminta’s
third hand picked him up and threw him across the observation chamber. He
screamed as much from shock as from fright as he flew through the air, a cry
that was cut off as he thudded face-first into the bulkhead. He crashed
awkwardly to the floor, whimpering in pain from the broken bones. Blood was
dripping from his mouth and nose.

“When Rah and the Lady came to Makkathran, they had only politics and
brute force to enforce their rule,” Araminta said lightly as she walked toward
Ethan, who was trying to scramble away. “How fitting that such gifts are also
what we will be starting out with.”

Ethan went for a heartsqueeze. Araminta warded it off easily. She held
out a hand, palm upward, raising it. Ethan was abruptly tugged off the floor. A
finger beckoned. He was drawn toward her.

“You were right,” she said to Aaron. “I did need to practice. He’s a
sneaky little shit.”

Taranse, Darraklan, and Rincenso were very still, all of them hurrying to
establish their own mental shields lest the Dreamer should read their thoughts.

“You don’t believe,” Ethan hissed through bloody lips. “You never did.”

“But you believe in me, don’t you?” she urged huskily, recalling Tathal’s
dreadful compulsive domination during the Twenty-sixth dream, applying the
ability against the squirming mind before her. “It was me who brought you to
the barrier. Me who called to the Skylord. Me who is bringing you to Querencia.
Isn’t that so?”

“Yes,” Ethan gurgled.

“And you are grateful for such an act of selfless generosity, are you
not?”

“Yes.”

“How could you do anything but love the person who made it possible to
finally live the dream?”

“I couldn’t.”

“Do you love me, Ethan? Do you trust me?”

“Yes. Oh, yes.”

“Thank you, Ethan, from the bottom of my heart.” She lowered him
carefully to the decking and smiled gently at her aghast audience. “The
ex-Conservator seems to have tripped in all the excitement. Please take him to
the sick bay.”

Taranse nodded nervously and knelt down to help Ethan. With Darraklan’s
assistance, they managed to pull him up between them.

Because she could show no weakness, Araminta watched them with a passive
smile. Over in the
Mellanie’s Redemption
,
Araminta-two was puking his guts up at the atrocity he’d just committed.

“Dreamer, look,” Rincenso said in wonder. He was pointing at the front of
the observation deck. On the other side of the transparent bulkhead, a flock of
Skylords were approaching the pilgrimage fleet. For all she feared and resented
the creatures, they looked glorious as they swam out of the sparse starscape.

As soon as the boundary closed behind them, Ilanthe ordered
the ship
to open its cargo bay doors. She could sense the
abilities intrinsic to the Void’s fabric pervade the inversion core. What the
animal humans of Querencia crudely described as farsight allowed her mind to
examine the fabric directly, plotting the effect her own thoughts had on it,
the alterations and reactions they propagated. The symbiosis was fascinating;
already she’d learned more than she had from a century of remote analysis of
Inigo’s stupid dreams. The Void’s quantum architecture was completely different
from the universe outside. But it was tragically flawed, requiring extrinsic
energy to sustain itself even in its base state. When the functions enfolded
within its extraordinary intricate quantum fields were activated, the power
levels they consumed were far greater than she’d expected.

“The doomsayers were right,” she told Neskia. “The pilgrimage animals
would have wiped out the galaxy with their reset demands.”

“Will you prevent that?” Neskia asked.

Ilanthe regarded the concern swirling within her otherwise faithful
operative’s mind with detached interest. Even a Higher as progressive and
complex as Neskia was betrayed by residual animal emotion. “My success will
render the question irrelevant.”

Ilanthe observed the flock of Skylords closing in. With their opalescent
vacuum wings extended wide, the mountain-size creatures were expanding quickly
across the thin scattering of stars as they accelerated toward the fleet. The
lambent twisted strands of the nebulae were distorted through the weird lensing
effect of the wings, causing them to flicker and shift like celestial flames.
Ilanthe examined the true functionality of the wings, how they rooted down into
the Void fabric, manipulating localized gravity and temporal flow. A process of
propulsion so much more sophisticated than the crude “telekinetic” ability of
manipulating mass location. Less energy-demanding, too, she noted approvingly.

When her thoughts tried to replicate the same interaction with the Void
fabric, there was some aspect missing. Instead she simply wished herself
elevating out into space, employing some of the technique Edeard’s descendant
had employed in the Last Dream. The inversion core immediately flew clear of
the ship
. The method worked, which was gratifying, but it
lacked the elegance and capability of the Skylords.

Ilanthe felt the perception of the Skylords concentrate on the inversion
core, seeking understanding of what she was. Her thoughts established a perfect
shield around the shell of the inversion core, blocking their probes.

“Greetings,” she told the closest Skylord neutrally, and began to
accelerate toward it. Her own perception ability listened to Araminta and
several others from the Pilgrimage fleet frantically warning the Skylords to be
careful, claiming she was dangerous. Their responses were interesting,
revealing their complete lack of rational intellect. They almost evaded the
topic; certainly, they didn’t seem to comprehend the meaning behind the
concepts. It wasn’t part of their world; therefore, their mental vocabulary
didn’t accommodate it. Either they were artificial constructs designated by the
nucleus with the specific task of gathering up mature minds, or they had once
been fully sentient spaceborne entities who had de-evolved throughout the
countless millennia since their imprisonment. With nothing new to experience
inside the Void, no challenges to struggle with, their minds had atrophied down
to instinct-based responses.

“I am fulfilled,” Ilanthe told the Skylord as she approached it. “Please
take me to the Heart.”

“I do not know if you are fulfilled,” the Skylord responded. “You are
closed to me. Open yourself.”

The tentative wisps of the colorful vacuum wings flowed around the
inversion core as it glided in toward the Skylord’s glimmering crystalline
body. Ilanthe could perceive the texture of its oddly distorted geometry, a
kind of honeycomb of ordinary matter and something similar to an exotic force;
the two were in constant flux, which bestowed that distinctive surface
instability. The composition was intriguing. But despite its subtle complexity,
the thoughts that animated it lacked potency. Her own determination, amplified
by the neural pathways available within the inversion core, was a lot stronger.
“I would be grateful if you would open yourself to me,” she told it.

“I withhold nothing.”

“Oh, but you do.” And she reached for the Skylord, inserting her
hardened, purposeful thoughts amid its clean and simple routines. Lovingly
entwining them. Taking hold.

“What are you doing?” the Skylord asked.

She suppressed the rising incomprehension, stilling its deep instincts to
facilitate applications that would take it far from this place.

“Your intrusion is preventing me from functioning. Parts of me are
failing. Withdraw yourself.”

“I am helping you to become so much more. Together we are synergistic,”
she promised. “I will guide you to the pinnacle of fulfillment.” Then the feast
began.

“I am ending,” the Skylord declared.

“Stop!” Araminta cried. “You’re killing it.”

“Have you learned nothing about the Void?” Ilanthe retorted.

Dark specters began to slither through the cheerful sparkles of the
Skylord’s vacuum wings, proliferating and expanding. The tenuous cloud of
molecules that formed the physical aspect of the wings burst apart, dark frosty
motes dissipating through space like a black snowstorm. Now the dark flames
were shivering across the intricate optical quivering of the Skylord’s surface,
biting inward.

Everything it was poured across the gap to the inversion core, an
extirpation that allowed the abilities and knowledge of its kind to flow into
Ilanthe.

At that point she almost regretted no longer having a human face. How she
would be smiling now. Engorged and enriched by the Skylord’s essence, her
mastery of this strange continuum was rising toward absolute. Function
manipulation began to integrate with her personality at an instinctive level.
She heard the call of the nebulae, the transdimensional sink points of
rationality twisting out through the Void’s quantum fields, keening for
intelligence with the promise of escalation to something greater, as yet
unglimpsed. They must lead to the paramount consciousness, she knew. The Heart
itself. From that nucleus everything could be controlled.

Local space was awash with despair and revulsion at the Skylord’s demise.
“You will thank me soon enough,” she informed the insignificant human minds.
One was different from the rest. A small part of her acknowledged the Dreamer
Araminta, whose thoughts stretched away somehow, a method that didn’t utilize
the Void fabric. It wasn’t relevant.

Once more Ilanthe’s thoughts flowed into the pattern to manipulate the
Void’s temporal and gravatonic functions, this time correctly. A wide area
around the inversion core began to sparkle as the surrounding dust was caught
up in the effect, drifting into chiaroscuro spirals. Ilanthe accelerated hard,
simultaneously negating the temporal flow around the inversion core’s shell.
The Pilgrimage fleet dwindled away to nothing in seconds as it achieved point
nine lightspeed. Far ahead, the siren melody from the nebula that Querencia
humans had named Odin’s Sea grew perceptibly stronger.