Rift in the Sky (29 page)

“Where—Never mind, I've locked your
coordinates
.” He was distracted; she could hear it in his voice. “Turn off the 'scanner and stay where you are. I'm almost there.”

He was?

The device's clear dome covered its array of tiny glowing parts. Staring at it did nothing to ease her disquiet.

“Almost here?” she echoed. “Why?”

“Turn off the 'scanner. Bowman out.”

Aryl did as he demanded; the lights faded, the device lifeless in her hand. She tucked it away carefully. Some Om'ray could
taste
change about to happen. She could. And did. A thoroughly unreliable sense, giving little more than a vague sense of
dread.
But she paid attention to any warning in the canopy. And here.

Enris chuckled. “I thought we'd get to laze about till supper at least. Who'd have guessed . . .” His smile faded as he looked at her. He sat up. “What's wrong?”

The
taste
of change.

“Marcus hasn't left the valley since the last snow. He lets the others come to him. Why would he be flying about? Why this way?” Her hair strained against its net. “He must be leaving Cersi.” Aryl drew her knees to her chest and hugged them. “I thought he'd warn us first.” Had she offended him? Missed some vital Human courtesy? Made him sick with the turrif after all?

Or had she misunderstood their friendship all along? There was hurt in the thought. That didn't make it wrong.

“You're the one who says look before you take hold,” Enris soothed, one hand shading his eyes. “Marcus wouldn't go without telling us. And when he does leave, he'll be back soon. He wants to see our beautiful Sweetpie.”

“Will he be back?” Aryl countered. “What do we know of his kind, beyond the few here?”

They were few, she thought, because their technology did so much for them. Site One, the Lake of Fire, held only the three of its Triad. Site Two, the mountain near Grona, had Henshaw's Triad and the flitterlike being who'd helped Marcus rescue the exiles. Marcus, with a vague wave toward the sunset, referred to Site Three as
inactive
and explained they used it now for
re-supply
. Six lived there, two
comtechs,
the pair of archivists sent to help him pack, and the non-Humans who comprised the rest of Marcus' new Triad. She hadn't paid attention to his babble of incomprehensible—and unpronounceable—names, but she had to the numbers. The camp at Sona was called Site Four, implying no others. Four sites and fourteen Strangers were, in Haxel's dour estimation, four and fourteen too many.

From what else Marcus had said, and not said, there were far more involved in his work. They lived on other worlds. Gave orders by comlink. Traveled between in ways he'd never quite explained. Which had been fine, Aryl thought in frustration, until now.

“He told us he answers to others. Coming back might not be his decision to make.” She dropped her head to her knees. What if she hadn't called Marcus? What if they'd 'ported home, only to find him gone from the world?

Enris traced the back of her hand with a sandy finger. “Don't underestimate our resourceful Human,” he said gently. “Even if you're right—and I'm not saying you are—he talks to his family from here, doesn't he? So he can talk to us from there.”

She raised her head to glare at him. “Where, Enris? Where is ‘there'? We don't know the full shape of this world, let alone his!”

What's wrong?
Naryn had stopped pacing. Too far away to hear, not far enough to escape carelessly spilled emotion.

Nothing.
Aryl tightened her shields.
We'll be leaving soon.

Her Chosen freed his feet and brushed them off, shedding sand like snow. “I should have known.” He pulled on a still-damp boot with a grimace. “A peaceful Cersi isn't enough for my wild little Yena.” Utterly sincere, if not for the
teasing
beneath the words. “But I've the answer. Om'ray-sized fiches. We've no lack of cliffs to jump from.”

Cheering her up, was he?

She should be happy. The future she wanted for her people was here, now. That could be the change she
tasted.
Not a warning, a promise. Aryl managed a smile. “You hate cliffs.”

“I wasn't volunteering to try the things,” with an exaggerated shudder. “I'll leave that to those with less sense.”

“Meaning me.”

He laughed. “Hoyon comes to mind. Might inspire him to 'port.”

“And you call me bloodthirsty?”

His grin, the
relief
beneath it—they only added to the guilt she was careful to keep to herself. How could she care so much for a not-Om'ray? She'd known Marcus would leave. If not today, then one day. One day, he'd leave forever.

Wasn't that for the best?

Of course it would be, Aryl told herself sadly.

For everyone else.

“There he is.”

The sun sat over Grona. Naryn and Enris shaded their eyes, gazing where Aryl pointed. She was sure the glint in the sky could be nothing else. Nothing living moved that fast, or in a straight line against the wind.

Fast? Aryl frowned as it approached. Too fast. The glint became a machine that plunged at them like a rock falling. She and the others flinched as the aircar came uncomfortably close overhead before it dropped to rest, throwing a stinging cloud of white almost at their feet.

The opaque roof lifted before the sand settled again. Marcus popped up like an Oud from a tunnel. “Let's go!” he shouted at them, beckoning with both arms. “Hurry!”

Fear of the Tikitik?

Naryn scowled but followed Aryl and Enris. Her displeasure aroused Anaj, silent for some time.
Naryn? What's happening?
A pause as they climbed into the aircar, then:
ANSWER ME!

The Old Adept, Aryl winced, had very little patience and a very loud mindvoice.

“We're flying home,” Naryn said aloud, her face like ash. Aryl took her arm, poured
strength
through that link. Her friend gave her a determined smile. “Hopefully a quick trip,” she added fervently.

It will be,
Aryl sent, smiling at Marcus. “Thank—”

He didn't smile back. “Hurry,” he insisted, moving out of the way to allow them to climb in.

Funny voice for a Tikitik.
But after the observation, Anaj's presence faded behind her shields.

This aircar had two seats, facing front, with padded benches along each side. No packs or crates cluttered the floor, Aryl noticed with relief as she took one of the forward seats. She'd been wrong. The Human wasn't dressed for a journey either. He wore his favorite pretend-Om'ray clothes: pants, shirt, and boots of the right shape and color, if wrong fabric and fasteners. The boots were covered in dried mud and had left tracks and clumps everywhere. The shirt was stained with sweat. “Sit, sit,” he urged, throwing himself into the seat beside Aryl's and stabbing the control buttons.

Naryn and Enris hadn't reached their seats before the roof closed and Aryl felt the machine lift.

Her relief evaporated. In haste. And alone? Something was wrong.

“Any reason for the rush?” Enris asked, a little too casually.

“Busy day.” A little too glib. “Always busy days. Are you comfortable? Aryl? Naryn?” In that distracted tone. “Enris?”

Not “What are you doing on the other side of the world?” or “Why didn't you 'port home?” Reasonable questions. Important ones.

Leave this to me,
Aryl sent. “We're fine, Marcus. We were visiting—” he wouldn't like this, she knew, but continued, “—the Tikitik.”

But instead of the wild-eyed flinch she'd expected, the Human merely nodded. “
Scanned lifeforms.
Many Tikitik, many other
organisms
. Busy place,
saltmarsh
.”

He didn't know about Tikitna, she realized with surprise. Perhaps living buildings couldn't be detected by machines designed to search for ruins of metal and stone.

Right now, he wouldn't care. She didn't have to sense the Human's emotions to read the tremble of his hands on the controls or the sheen on his forehead. His green-brown eyes flicked constantly between two small screens.

Trouble.

The day had been going so well.

The aircar leveled. Marcus sat back with what was more shudder than sigh. Aryl put her hand on his arm, careful to keep her shields tight to avoid any painful contact with his mind. “What's wrong?”

His eyes lifted to hers, brimming with worry. “Take you home,” he said faintly.

She tightened her fingers to get his attention, not to hurt. “What is it?”

“Might be nothing.” He collected himself with a visible effort, managed a wan smile. “
Autosurveillance
didn't resume this morning. Not what I did. I only set for last 'night.” A slide of his eyes behind her. “Only for that one time.”

She didn't need to ask why. Enris and his dam. She'd been right to suspect something going on with the two of them. It didn't help her know what troubled him now. Aryl nodded encouragement, hoping the Human would begin to make sense. “Go on.”

“Should have been fixed with
nextroutinesweep
. Back up at dawn. All working. But not on. Not right. Not normal. Nothing—” Now the words came too fast, but she didn't try to slow him. “Dawn comes, all systems go dead. No com. No security field. No autodefense. No one comes to see why.
Securityprotocol.
Someone should have come.”

Too much sense. She might not understand the machines, but any Yena knew what it meant to post scouts, then have them fail to report. “So you're doing it. Going to them—to the other sites.” Her heart started to pound. Why him? Why alone? “Couldn't the others do that?”

He shook his head vigorously. “Need them to stay and secure the artifacts. I'm First. My responsibility, everyone on Cersi. My fault.”

“No,” Enris objected. “I asked you to turn off your vids.”

“My decision,” Marcus said simply. In that moment, Om'ray or not, he was the elder. He shrugged, that gesture they had in common. “Should have been no problem. Should have come back on.”

She'd never seen the Human quietly desperate, not even when the Oud were burying them. “This isn't about machines being broken.”

Marcus covered her hand with his, stared down as if fascinated by the contrast between her tanned, scarred skin and his, white and smooth. “Aryl reading my mind?” he asked with an odd smile.

“You know I—”

“I know.” Softly. The smile disappeared, replaced by something grim. His thumb rubbed hers, then he looked up. “You're right. Not about machines. About danger. Here. Because of our work.”

Tension.
She tried not to show her own. “What do you mean?”

“The search for the Hoveny—important. But many Triads search, on many other worlds. Most look for years and nothing worthwhile. Our families forget us. Those who sent us here, they send supplies and wait for reports. Forget us.” A hand pressed to his chest with the word. “Security checks, back at First. Offworld protocols. Good enough, understand? No risk, no one cares, forgotten. Unless we find something. Or think we have. Once find confirmed, every protection sent.” That desperate edge to his voice. “Reports secret. Go only to the office of the First. No one else should know.”

“Why?” Aryl narrowed her eyes. “Who shouldn't know?”

“Those who take what isn't theirs.”

Why had she thought his vast Trade Pact would be safe from greed and thieves? Maybe, she realized, because the alternative was terrifying. “You think that's what's happened.” She licked dry lips. “That someone's come to Cersi, to take from you.”

“I could be wrong.” Marcus lifted his hand from hers; guessing he worried about the contact, she released his arm. “No
leak
in history of First—no secret exposed. None they admit,” this heavily, as if he, too, had suddenly found an alternative difficult to bear. “If happened, maybe my fault, too. I delayed reports, kept some information out—” a faint blush on his cheeks. “I could have drawn attention. Wrong attention.”

What does this mean for us?
Naryn sent.

She was right to ask. “You said ‘danger.' What kind of danger? What would they do?” Whoever “they” were.

Marcus consulted his screens—not, Aryl judged, because they told him what to say. Finally, he gave her that uncertain sideways glance. “The bad kind. I flew over Site One on the way here. The tower is damaged. I thought—hoped that explained the com silence. A broken machine, not—not—Then you called. Coms work, Aryl. No one's using them. No one.”