Mountain of Black Glass (72 page)

“All of the First People went to Grandfather Mantis to complain, saying that it was unfair for old Lizard to keep a lovely young woman like Beetle hidden away so that none of their sons could marry her and her beauty was not shared. Grandfather Mantis sent them away, saying he must consider what they said.

“That night, Mantis had a dream. He dreamed that Lizard had taken the moon down into his hole in the earth as well, and that without it in the night sky, the First People were lost and terrified. When he awakened, he decided that he could not allow Lizard to hide his daughter away.

“Mantis sent for Long-Nosed Mouse, who was a beautiful fellow, and told him what had happened. ‘It is for you to find the place she is hidden,' Grandfather Mantis said. Long-Nosed Mouse was one of the best of all the First People at finding things, so he agreed, and went in search of Lizard's daughter.

“When at last Long-Nosed Mouse came near the hole in the earth, Beetle saw him. In her excitement, she could not help herself. She called out, ‘Look, look, a man is coming!' Her father heard this cry, and when Long-Nosed Mouse entered into the earth, Lizard fell upon him in the dark and killed him.

“ ‘Who shall tell a father what he may and may not do?' said Lizard. He was so proud and happy he did a dance. Beetle wept.

“When Mantis heard what had happened he was sad and afraid. The kinsmen of Long-Nose Mouse heard also, and one by one they went down into Lizard's hole to avenge their brother, but Lizard lay hidden until each one was lost in the dark tunnels, then fell upon him and killed him. Soon all of the men of the long-nosed mice had been slain. Their wives and children set up a great cry of mourning so loud that it pained Grandfather Mantis, so loud that he could not sleep for three days.

“When at last he fell asleep, he had another dream, and when he awakened from it he called all his people together. ‘In my dream I have seen Lizard killing the long-nosed mice, and that is something that cannot be. In my dream I have spoken to myself, and I have thought much, and I find that it is the Striped Mouse who must now go and save the young woman, Beetle.'

“Striped Mouse was young, quiet, and clever, and he knew that the dreams of Mantis could not be ignored. ‘I will go,' he said and set out. But when he came to the place where Lizard lived, and where so many had fallen before him, Striped Mouse thought, ‘Why should I go down that hole into the dark, when I know Lizard is waiting? I will dig a hole of my own.' And so he did, scratching his way into the earth, for the Striped Mouse is a good digger, until he came at last into the tunnel where Lizard lay in wait. But because he had been quiet and clever, Striped Mouse had dug his own hole in behind the place where Lizard was, and so he was able to fall upon Lizard from behind. Long they fought, until Striped Mouse at last began to win out.

“Lizard shouted in fear and unhappiness, ‘Why do you kill me? Why do you raise your hand against me?'

“ ‘I am, by myself, killing to save friends,' cried Striped Mouse, and with that Lizard fell dead before him. Striped Mouse found Beetle, and although she was frightened he led her forth out of the hole and into the light. As he did that, a wonderful thing happened, for all the long-nosed mice who had fallen came back to life, crying ‘I am here!' Each stepped out into the sunlight behind Striped Mouse and Beetle, each one carrying a fly-whisk, which he lifted over his head like a flag. Striped Mouse was very proud as he walked beside Beetle, and happiness was great inside both of them, because he already felt himself to be the husband of the young woman, and she felt herself to be his utterly.

“When they reached Mantis, he got up and followed them. As they came to the village where the long-nosed mice had lived, waving their fly-whisks, the grass of the plain began to wave, too. All the wives and children of the long-nosed mice came rushing out, making glad cries to see that their men were alive again, and Grandfather Mantis watched with amazement and joy, not a little surprised by how well he had dreamed.”

Oddly enough, Renie did feel more relaxed as !Xabbu finished his story, but she could not entirely free herself of nagging worries. “It was a lovely story,” she told him, “but I'd still like to try to think of some other way to search for Martine.”

Even after all this time, it was still a little hard to read the baboon expressions, but he seemed to be smiling. “But that is what my story is about, Renie. Some tasks can only be done by one person—by the right person. I feel that I am that person. And sometimes, as the story also tells, we must all trust in the dream that is dreaming us.”

There was nothing to argue with—no crevice into which she could get the fingernails of logic—and exhaustion was weighing heavily on her. Renie yawned, tried to speak, but yawned again.

“We'll talk about it when you wake up . . . when you wake
me
up for my turn at sentry,” she said, starting to stumble over her words.

“You sleep now,” he said. “Look—the others are sleeping already.”

She did not bother to look. She could hear the steady rasp of Florimel's breath a meter away, and the longer she listened, the more it seemed to pull her down, down, down.

 

“He's
what
?” She shook off the lethargy of waking, her heart suddenly tight as knotted wire in her chest. “The bastard! He told me we would talk about it some more!”

“He waited until dark, but he was determined, Renie.” Florimel had been the final sentry, and thus the only one to see !Xabbu leave. He had never wakened Renie. “You could not have stopped him—you could only have made it more difficult.”

Renie was furious, but she knew that Florimel was right. “I'm just . . . what if we lose him, too? We're falling apart, fragmenting . . .”

Florimel took her arm in a tight grip. Afternoon light was leaking in through the drapes: it was easy to see the other woman's face, hard to ignore her anger. “The others are waking up. They do not need to hear such things from you of all people.”

“But you know I'm right.” Renie shook her head. This was the problem with holding so tightly onto control as everything pulled harder and harder against it—when things began to slip, the temptation simply to give up was very strong. “Quan Li and William and Martine already gone, not to mention Orlando and Fredericks—and now !Xabbu. What's the point? Is it going to come down to you and me arguing about which cliff we should jump off?”

Florimel's laugh was sudden and unexpected. “It would probably be a long argument, Renie. I'm sure I would be a much better judge of cliffs.”

It took a moment for Renie to realize Florimel had made a joke—the German woman was turning into a regular comedienne. Renie felt a bleak amusement of her own. Perhaps as the group shrank, everyone would begin to take on new roles. What would be next, T4b as the group's diplomat? Emily as the sergeant-at-arms? “I don't think I'll have the energy to argue, Florimel,” Renie said at last, and did her best to smile. “Tell you what—I promise I'll let you pick the cliff.”

“Bravely spoken, soldier.” Florimel smiled back and patted her on the shoulder. Her clumsiness with the friendly gesture made Renie suddenly like her more than she ever had before.

“Right,” she said. “So we wait. Jesus Mercy, I hate waiting! But if we can't do anything about !Xabbu, we can at least plan what we want to do when we hear from him, I suppose.”

“Why are we here?” Emily said groggily from the bench, where she had pillowed herself in what seemed a fairly uncomfortable way on T4b. “I don't want to be here anymore.”

“Of course you don't.” Renie sighed. “But the rest of us are having such a lovely time, we thought we'd stay.”

 

Renie's improved spirits did not last long. Although they used the time waiting for !Xabbu's return to scavenge a few weapons—splintered table legs and heavy curtain rods for clubs and spears, even a ceremonial sword found hanging neglected in an alcove in one of the lower halls—there was only so much planning and preparation they could do. As evening passed into night, and night itself stretched on and on with no sign of the man in the baboon sim, the tightness in Renie's chest became overwhelming.

“I told you we shouldn't have let him go by himself!”

Florimel shook her head. “He has many towers to investigate. And even if something happens to him—and of course we all pray it does not—that would not make his plan wrong. The rest of us cannot go where he can go, wearing that body.”

Renie knew it was true, but that did nothing to alleviate the helplessness, the terrible, despairing pressure building inside her. “So what do we do? Just sit here until doomsday, knowing that monster probably has both of them now?”

Factum Quintus looked up. “Unlike your monkey friend, we do not need darkness to search,” he said. “In fact, we will do better in daytime, since we will be able to see which hallways are full of undisturbed dust—I have noticed a few such in our exploration this evening.”

“So if !Xabbu isn't back by dawn,” Renie said, “we can start looking.” It was amazing how much relief came from the simple notion of
doing something.

“Then let us all try to get some more sleep now,” Florimel said. “We have been working hard since your friend left us and we are still tired. We do not know what a search will lead us to.”

“Talkin' smart,” T4b agreed. “Like wearing a car, this armor.”

“So take it off,” Renie growled.

“You crash for total?” T4b said, shocked. “Like, fly around dangling my
churro
?”

Emily giggled. Renie waved her hand in disgust and went back to sharpening the end of her curtain rod on the exposed stone wall.

Night crept on, but no one could sleep. !Xabbu did not return. At last, everyone had run out of things to do, and sat, wrapped in silent thoughts and worries. Outside, the moon passed slowly over the Spire Forest, as though trying not to prick itself on the thorny towers.

 

“C
ODE Delphi.
Start here.

“Something strange and frightening has happened. Even now I find it difficult to speak, but I doubt I have much time so I must use this chance.

“The monster who had impersonated Quan Li, the thing that calls itself ‘Dread,' has been working me hard, exploring the nature of the access device. Some of his questions are so strange and unexpected that I am certain now he is consulting outside sources as well—not surprising since, unlike us, he can leave the network and then return to his stolen sim whenever he pleases. But there has been an edge to his explorations as well. I think it likely that he is using the outside knowledge in large part to test
me
—to make sure I am giving him legitimate data. Fortunately, although I lied about how we came to the House, I have been honest in all my other discussions of the access device. He is too frighteningly clever for me to risk trying to trick him, and I do not fool myself he will keep me alive an instant longer than suits him.

“But no, this is not what I wished to record. In my upset state, I have gone about these thoughts wrong-way 'round, since Dread is not the subject. When I awakened a little while ago from a short, exhausted sleep, he had disappeared again, perhaps to confer with his other sources, and I was alone. Or so I thought.

“As I went through my groggy ritual, checking more in reflex than in hope to see if I was still securely tied to the fixture above my head and that the thing itself was still firmly attached to the wall, I only slowly became aware that something in my prison room was different. It did not remain a mystery for long, though. There were now two corpses leaning against the wall, sharing my captivity.

“My heart sank, and I found myself praying that the new body was only another sim, and not one of my own companions who had been captured or even killed trying to find me. But as I concentrated, I discovered something very, very strange. The first corpse was still the familiar virtual cadaver of the young woman Dread had killed. The second body, though, seemed to be her twin. Everything about this second unmoving form mirrored the first—shape, dimension, position. Somehow, Dread had murdered a victim just like the other, then propped her up in identical pose while I was sleeping. But how? And why?

“Then the second corpse began to speak.

“I screamed. I should be used to the madness of this network by now, but even though I knew the first body was virtual, it was still a corpse to me, and the second was just as cold, just as still. Until it began to talk. And the voice—it might once have belonged to the original Puppet, the sad, dead young woman of the Upper Pantry Clerks, but it was being used now by someone unused to speech, a sound midway between an automated reader and a stroke victim. I cannot reproduce it. I will not try, for even to think about it makes me queasy.

“ ‘Help . . . is . . . needed,'
the corpse said.
‘Flowpatch. Reroute. Help.'

“If I made a sound in response, it must have been a moan. I was shocked, caught completely by surprise.

“It said again,
‘Help is needed,'
with exactly the same intonation.
‘Unexpected feedback. Danger of subroutine overwhelming central directive.'
It paused as a shiver or something similar passed through it. The plump arms moved in random ways, and one of the hands thumped against the twin corpse beside it.
‘Help is needed.'

“ ‘Who . . . who are you?' I managed to ask. ‘What kind of help do you need?'

“The head rotated toward me, as though it had not known where I was until I spoke.
‘Speech is secondary functionality. Subroutines are confused. Nemesis Two needs clarification, or reroute of . . .'
It then spewed out a string of numbers and designations that must have been programming code, but they were mixed up with other lumps of barely comprehensible noise that didn't sound like any gear-scripts I have ever encountered.
‘Nemesis One has been made nonfunctional by operating system problem,'
it said slowly.
‘No contact, X abort threshold X cycles. Nemesis Three still operant, but has closed on the greater anomaly, no contact, X abort threshold X cycles. For White Ocean read Sea of Silver Light. Strong pull. Nemesis Three operant, but must be considered nonfunctional.'
Despite the strange, mechanical voice, there was something in its words that suggested a kind of devastation, like the deceptively ordinary speech of someone who has survived a terrible disaster.
‘Nemesis Two caught in expanding subroutine loop. Cannot prosecute X Paul Jonas X search. Help is needed.'