Читать книгу Banner of Souls - Liz Williams - Страница 17

CHAPTER 4

NIGHTSHADE

She was apart from the Animus now; he remained in her chamber, chained to the bed by Isti. Yskatarina was painfully aware of the lack of him by her side and she frowned as she walked across the bitter hall of Tower Cold, to where her aunt awaited the boat sent by the Matriarchs of Memnos.

Stepping into the elevator, she watched the hall grow small beneath her as she ascended. A hundred stories, two hundred, three . . . Then the hall was invisible except as a tiny dark square, and Yskatarina rose out into the darkness above Nightshade. The Sunken World lay before her. She could see the frozen peaks and summits, the craters and gouges made by meteor strikes. At the farthest point, between the Horns of Tyr, was the sun: a little, blazing star. Above, to the north, Dis hung in the heavens, and then there was nothing but the great gulf, only debris and dust until the beginning of the outer systems, light-years distant. Only the boats went farther, filled with the canopics dispatched by the mourn-women and the Steersmen Skull-Faces—bodies embalmed in ultrasleep, gliding through the Eldritch Realm for whatever systems lay beyond the abyss.

Yskatarina closed her eyes to the dark, thought of the Animus’s sharp touch, and was glad when the elevator slid to a silent halt at the top of the tower.

The Elder Elaki’s chamber was round, with windows like portholes. Here, when she was not in the laboratory or the haunt-tech chambers, Yskatarina’s aunt sat out her days, her unhuman eyes fixed on things that no one else could see. She said nothing when Yskatarina entered, only flicked a hand at a kneeling-chair. The great eyes, owl-yellow, veined with broken blood vessels, blinked with an almost audible snap.

“Has the ship that is to take me to Mars arrived?” Yskatarina said. Near-worship flooded through her at Elaki’s proximity. She bowed her head before she knew it, then thought of Elaki’s overheard threat and grew cold.

“Not long. It approaches down the Chain.” The Elder Elaki gestured toward a window and Yskatarina could, indeed, see a star coming, rattling fast into the silvery shadow of the Nightshade maw of the Chain. “As you know, you have a task to perform very soon.” Elaki frowned. “You appear discontented. Why?”

But Yskatarina loved her aunt beyond love, and so, bitterly, said nothing.

“Your Animus will accompany you. I have impressed upon you the importance of this task, Yskatarina.”

Here it comes, Yskatarina thought.

“And if you should fail, I will have to take him away from you.” Elaki spoke with a twist of the mouth.

Yskatarina looked up at her numbly. Love for the Animus poured through her, and love for Elaki also. She felt torn in two.

“I will not fail, Aunt.” Her voice sounded as though it came from the bottom of a well.

“Then the Animus will stay with you, of course.”

“I am grateful,” Yskatarina managed to say.

“Yskatarina? Are you all right?” Elaki asked impatiently.

Yskatarina managed to mutter, “When will I be leaving?”

“As soon as I see fit. And now, there are things I have to tell you.”

Yskatarina’s gaze once more traveled to that traveling star, brighter now, blazing like a captured sun as it was whisked along through the maw of the Chain. A few moments later, the blaze sharpened, then faded. The boat sent by the Memnos Matriarchs was docking.

Yskatarina knelt before her aunt, head still forcibly bowed, awaiting her orders.