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.
CHAPTER 5
EARTH
For once, it was hard to track the kappa down. Usually the nursemaid hovered protectively near her charge, but now, perhaps not wanting to distract Dreams-of-War, the kappa seemed to be keeping out of sight. Lunae trudged through the house, eventually locating the kappa in the long chamber at the heart of the house, attending to the growing-skins.
Steam rose from the vents in the walls, each configured in the form of a gargoyle’s head. Cross-eyed faces opened mouths to emit plumes of mist; Lunae took care not to go too close. Along the metal-ridged floor, the racks of feeder orchids turned their faces toward the moisture, their petals swelling with water. Bronze walls dripped and ran with a rainy haze. The air smelled damp and hot, rich with loam and a meaty undernote of stagnation that only served to enhance the perfume of the orchids. Lunae always felt safe here, though she did not like to look at the skins, which occasionally bulged and writhed as if the contents sought escape. Lunae knew, however, that she herself had come from one of those fleshy bags, and perhaps this was why she felt so secure in this room.
She watched as the kappa wafted the mist over each skin. In the heat of the chamber, the mist swiftly accumulated into droplets, which ran down the outside of the skins before bouncing into the trays beneath, in an atonal accompaniment to the kappa’s movements. Lunae gave a delicate cough, remembering Dreams-of-War’s countless instructions not to interrupt people when they were busy.
The kappa’s head moved ponderously around, swiveling on the twisted neck. The toes of her wrinkled feet gripped the floor; the kappa found it hard to keep her balance on the lacquered boards of the mansion and the metal floor of the hatching room alike. Lunae could not help feeling a twinge of pity, which rang as plangently as a waterdrop inside her mind.
“We are above such emotions,” Dreams-of-War had told her in her first weeks out of the hatchery. “You are a made-being, even if your ancestors practiced bloodbirth, just as the lowest orders do. You are therefore superior, as I am.”
“Are you a made-thing, too?” Lunae said.
“I?” Dreams-of-War replied, with a disdainful tilt of her head. “Of course. And so is your nurse, when it comes to that. But the kappa is a slave and to be treated as such. Do not waste emotion upon it.”
“I see,” Lunae had said, but though she was then nothing more than a weeks-old child, there seemed something wrong with this picture. It seemed hard on the kappa who was her nursemaid, who walked as if her feet hurt her, and who seemed so encumbered by her heavy shell-like skin. And if the kappa were supposed to serve, then why did so many other folk seem bound to the factories and wage-shops of the city? Perhaps it was different elsewhere. Yet Fragrant Harbor was rumored to be a good place. It did not seem good to Lunae.
Now the kappa said mildly, “You are in disgrace.”
“I know. Dreams-of-War has had much to say on the subject.” Lunae looked down at her hand, at a row of bloody dots that were the legacy of her encounter. “She sent me to find you, to bind this up.”
The kappa looked at Lunae’s hand and made a small scratchy sound of disapproval. “You should never have gone out of the house.”
“I know.”
“The Grandmothers want to see you. They are not pleased, Lunae.”
“I know.” It was beginning to sound like a mantra. “I’m sorry, kappa.”
The kappa reached out and gently touched Lunae’s hair. “I was very worried, Lunae. We all were. Terrible things could have happened to you.”
Lunae gave an unhappy grimace. “Perhaps terrible things did.”
“That remains to be seen. Now, give me your hand.” The kappa rinsed her fingers beneath a nearby tap, then took Lunae’s hand and began to swab at the bloodied holes with a leaf torn from one of the plants.
“Does this hurt?”
“Not very much. Kappa, I don’t understand why that woman—that Kami—even noticed me. Is it because of this—thing I am supposed to be? A hito-bashira?” Her hand was growing cold.
“Perhaps.”
“What is a hito-bashira? I have been told so often
