Текст книги "Incarceron"

Автор книги: Kathryn Fisher

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12

The decay was gradual and we were slow to recognize it. Then, one day, I had been talking with the Prison, and as I left the room I heard it laugh. A low, mocking chuckle. The sound turned me cold. I stood in the corridor and the thought came to me of an ancient image I had once seen in a fragmented manuscript, of the enormous mouth of Hell devouring sinners. It was then I knew we had created a demon that would destroy us.

-Lord Calliston's Diary

The sound of the unlocking was painful, as if the Prison sighed. As if this was a door that had not been opened for centuries. But no alarms howled. Perhaps Incarceron knew no door could lead them out.

Gildas stepped back at Finn's warning; chunks of debris and a red rain of rust clattered.

The door shuddered inward, and stuck.

For a moment they waited, because the narrow slit was dark and a cool, oddly sweetsmelling air moved beyond. Then Finn kicked the rubble aside and put his shoulder to the door. He heaved, and rammed it until it stuck again. But now there was room to squeeze through.

Gildas nudged him. "Take a look. Be careful."

Finn glanced back at Keiro, sitting slumped and weary. He drew his sword and slipped sideways through the gap.

It was colder. His breath frosted. The ground was uneven, and ran downhill. As he took a few steps a strange tinny litter rustled around his ankles; putting a hand down, he felt drifts of crisp stuff, cold and wet, sharp against his fingertips. As his eyes grew used to the deeper gloom, he thought he was standing in a sloping hall of columns; tall black pillars rose to a tangle overhead. Groping to the nearest one, he felt it over with his hands, puzzled. It was icy cold and hard, but not smooth. A mass of fissures and cracks seamed it, knots and swelling growths, and branches of intricate mesh.

"Finn?"

Gildas was a shadow at the door.

"Wait." Finn listened. The breeze moved in the tangle, making a faint silvery tinkle that seemed to stretch for miles. After a moment he said, "There's no one here. Come through."

A few rustles and stirrings. Then Gildas said, "Bring the Key, Keiro. We need to shut this."

"If we do, can we get back?" Keiro sounded worn.

"What's to get back for? Give me a hand." As soon as the dog-slave had slipped through, Finn and the old man shoved and forced the tiny door back into its frame. It clicked quietly shut.

A rustle. A scrape of sound. Light, steadying, in a lantern.

"Someone might see it," Keiro snapped.

But Finn said, "I told you. We're alone."

As Gildas held the lantern high, they looked around at the ominous enclosing pillars.

Finally Keiro said, "What are they?"

Behind him, the dog-creature crouched down. Finn glanced at it, and knew it was looking at him.

"Metal trees." The light caught the Sapient's plaited beard, the gleam of satisfaction in his eye. "A forest where the species are iron, and steel, and copper, where the leaves are thin as foil, where fruits grow gold and silver." He turned. "There are stories, from the old times, of such places. Apples of gold guarded by monsters. It seems they're true."

The air was cold and still. It held an alien sense of distance. It was Keiro who asked the question Finn didn't dare to.

"Are we Outside?"

Gildas snorted. "Do you think it's that easy? Now sit before you fall." He glanced at Finn.

'I'll deal with his wounds. This is as good a place as any to wait for Lightson. We can rest.

Even eat."

But Finn turned and faced Keiro. He felt cold and sick, but he spoke the words stubbornly.

"Before we go any further I want to know what Jormanric meant. About the Maestra's death."

There was a second of silence. In the ghostly light Keiro gave

Finn one exasperated glare and crumpled wearily in the rustling leaves, pushing back his hair with blood-streaked hands. "For God's sake, Finn, do you really think I know? You saw him. He was finished. He would have said anything! It was just lies. Forget it."

Finn looked down at him. For a second he wanted to insist, ask again, to silence the nagging fear inside him, but Gildas eased him aside. "Make yourself useful. Find something to eat.

While the Sapient poured water, Finn tipped out a few packages of dried meat and fruit from his pack and another lantern, which he lit from the first. Then he trampled down the icy metal leaves into a clotted mass, spread some blankets on them, and sat. In the shadowed forest beyond the pool of light, small rustles and scrapings disturbed him; he tried to ignore them. Keiro swore viciously as Gildas cleaned his cuts, stripped his jacket and shirt, and rubbed chewed-up herbs of a disgusting pungency onto the wound across his chest.

In the shadows the dog-slave crouched, barely visible. Finn took one of the food packets, opened it, and held some out.

"Take it," he whispered.

A rag-bound hand, crusted with sores, snatched it from him. While the creature ate he watched, remembering the voice that had answered him, a low, urgent voice. Now he whispered, "Who are you?"

"Is that thing still here?" Sore and irritable, Keiro pulled his jacket back on and laced it, scowling at the slashes and tears. Finn shrugged.

"We dump it." Keiro sat, wolfed down the meat, and looked around for more. "It's poxed."

"You owe that thing your life," Gildas remarked.

Hot, Keiro glared up. "I don't think so! I had Jormanric where I wanted him." His eyes turned to the creature; then they widened in sudden fury and he leaped up, strode to where it crouched, and snatched away something dark. "This is mine!"

It was his bag. A green tunic and a jeweled dagger spilled out. "Stinking thief." Keiro aimed a kick at the creature; it jerked away. Then, to their astonishment, it said in a girl's voice, "You should be grateful to me for bringing it."

Gildas turned on his heel and stared at the shadow of rags. Then he stabbed a bony finger at it. "Show yourself," he said.

The ragged hood was pushed back, the wrapped paws unwound bandages and gray strips of binding. Slowly, out of the crippled huddle a small figure emerged, crouched up on its knees, a dark cropped head of dirty hair, a narrow face with watchful, suspicious eyes. She was layered with clothes strapped and tied to make humps and bulges; as she tugged the clotted wrappings from her hands, Finn stepped back in disgust at the open sores, the running ulcers. Until Gildas snorted. "Fake."

He strode forward. "No wonder you didn't want me near you."

In the dimness of the metal forest the dog-slave had become a small thin girl, the sores clever messes of color. She stood upright slowly, as if she had almost forgotten how. Then she stretched and groaned. The ends of the chain around her neck clattered and swung.

Keiro laughed harshly. "Well, well. Jormanric was slyer than I thought."

"He didn't know." The girl looked at him boldly. "None of them knew. When they caught me

I was with a group—one old woman died that night. I stole these rags from her body and made the sores out of rust, rubbed muck all over myself, hacked off my hair. I knew I had to be clever, very clever, to stay alive."

She looked scared, and defiant. It was hard to tell her age; the brutal haircut made her seem like a scrawny child, but Finn guessed she was not so much younger than himself.

He said, "It didn't turn out to be such a good idea."

She shrugged. "I didn't know I'd end up as his slave."

"And tasting his food?"

She laughed then, a bitter amusement. "He ate well. It kept me alive."

Finn glanced at Keiro. His oathbrother watched the girl, then turned away and curled up in the blankets. "We dump her in the morning."

"It's not up to you." Her voice was quiet but firm. "I'm the servant of the Starseer now."

Keiro rolled and stared. Finn said, "Me?"

"You brought me out of that place. No one else would have done that. Leave me, and I'll follow you. Like a dog ." She stepped forward, "I want to

Escape. I want to find the Outside, if there is one. And they said in the slavehall that you see the stars in your dreams, that Sapphique talks to you. That the Prison will show you the way out because you're its son."

He stared at her in dismay. Gildas shook his head. He looked at Finn and Finn looked back.

"Up to you," the old man muttered.

He had no idea what to do, so he cleared his throat and said to the girl, "What's your name?" "Attia."

"Well, look, Attia. I don't want a servant. But ... you can come with us."

"She has no food. That means we have to feed her," Keiro said.

"Neither do you." Finn nudged the pack of clothes. "Or me, now."

"Then she shares your catch, brother. Not mine."

Gildas leaned back against one of the metal trees. "Sleep," he said. "We'll discuss it when the lights come on. But someone has to keep watch, so first it can be you, girl."

She nodded, and as Finn curled up uneasily in the blankets, he saw her slip into the shadows and vanish.

Keiro yawned like a cat. "She'll probably slit our throats," he muttered.

CLAUDIA SAID, "I said good night, Alys," and watched in her dressing table mirror as her nurse fussed over silk garments strewn on the floor.

"Look at this, Claudia, it's ruined with mud ..."

"Put it through the washing machine. I know you've got one somewhere."

Alys gave her a glare. They both knew the endless archaic scrubbing and beating and starching of clothes was so wearing that the staff had secretly abandoned Protocol long ago. It was probably the same even at Court, Claudia thought.

As soon as the door was closed she jumped up and went over and locked it, turning the wrought-iron key and clicking on all the secrecy systems. Then she leaned her back against it and considered.

Jared had not been at supper. That didn't mean anything; he would have wanted to keep up the pretense, and he hated the Ear's stupidity. For a moment she wondered if he really had been ill in the maze, and whether she should call him, but he had warned her to keep the minicom for emergencies, especially with the Warden in the house.

She tied the belt of her dressing gown and jumped on the bed, reaching up to grope in the canopy of the four-poster.

Not there.

The house was quiet now. Caspar had talked and drunk his way through supper; fourteen courses of fish and finches, capons and swan, eels and sweetmeats. He had talked loudly and peevishly about tournaments, his new horse, a castle he was having built on the coast, the sums he had lost at gambling. His new passion seemed to be boar-hunting, or at least staying well back while his servants trussed a wounded boar for him to kill. He had described his spear, the kills he had made, the tusked heads that adorned the corridors of the Court.

And all the time he had drunk and refilled and his voice had grown more and more hectoring and slurred.

She had listened with a fixed smile and had teased him with odd, barbed questions that he had barely understood. And all the time her father had sat opposite and toyed with the stem of his wineglass, turning it on the white cloth between his thin fingers, looking at her.

Now, as she jumped down and went over to the dressing table, searching through all the drawers, she remembered that cool look, how it appraised her sitting there, beside the fool she would have to marry.

It wasn't in any of the drawers.

Suddenly chilled, she went to the window and unlatched it, letting the casement swing open, curling herself up in a miserable huddle on the cushions of the window seat. If he loved her, how could he do this to her? Couldn't he see the misery it would be?

The summer evening was warm and smelled sweetly of stocks and honeysuckle and the hedge of musk-roses that curved around the moat. From far over the fields the bell of Hornsely church softly tolled twelve chimes. She watched as a moth fluttered in and swooped recklessly around the flame of the candles; its shadow briefly huge on the ceiling.

Had there been a new edge in his smile? Had that stupid blurted question about her mother sharpened the danger?

Her mother had died. That's what Alys had said, but Alys hadn't been working here then, nor had any of the servants except Medlicote, her father's secretary, a man she rarely spoke to. But maybe she should. Because that question had gone in like a knife, through the Warden's studied armor of grave smiles and cold Period decorum. She had stabbed him and he had felt it.

She smiled, her face hot.

It had never happened before.

Could there be something strange about her mother's death? Illness was rife, but for the rich, illegal drugs could be found. Medicines too modern for this Era. Her father was strict, but surely if he had loved his wife he would have done anything, however illegal, to save her. Could he have sacrificed his wife just because of Protocol? Or was it worse than that?

The moth scuttered on the ceiling. Leaning forward, she looked out of the window at the sky.

The summer stars were bright. They lit the roofs and gables of the manor house with a faint, ghostly glimmer, an owl-light, reflecting the black and silver ripples of the moat.

Her father was implicated in Giles's death. Could he have killed before?

A touch on her cheek made her jump. The moth wings brushed her, whispered, "In the window seat" and were gone, fluttering out toward the faint light in Jared's tower.

Claudia grinned.

She pushed herself up, groped under the cushions, and touched the cold edge of crystal.

Carefully, she pulled it out.

The Key took the light of the stars and held it. It seemed to shine with a faint luminescence, and the eagle within it held a sliver of light in its beak.

Jared must have brought it here while everyone was at supper.

She took the precaution of blowing the candles out and closing the window. Tugging the heavy quilt from her bed, she wrapped herself in it and propped the Key on her knees.

Then she touched it, rubbed it, breathed on it.

"Speak to me," she said.

FINN WAS so cold he barely had the energy even to shiver.

The metal forest was utterly black; the lantern threw only a tiny pool of light, on Keiro's sprawled hand, on the huddle that was Gildas. The girl was a shadow under a tree; she made no sound and he wondered if she was even asleep.

He reached out cautiously for Keiro's pack. He would pull one of his oathbrother's fancy jackets over his own. Two, maybe, and if they split Keiro could put up with it.

Tugging the pack over, he put his hand in, and touched the Key.

It was warm.

He lifted it out, very gently, and let his fingers close over it, so that the heat it was generating comforted his cramped fingers. Quietly it said, "Speak to me."

Wide-eyed, Finn glanced at the others.

No one moved.

Carefully, his leather belt creaking in the stillness, he stood up and turned. He managed three steps before the rustling crunch of the metal leaves made Keiro mutter and turn over.

Behind the tree, Finn froze.

He brought the Key up to his ear. It was silent. He touched it, all over, shook it. Then he whispered to it, "Sapphique. Lord Sapphique. Is that you?"

CLAUDIA GASPED.

The answer had come so clearly. She looked wildly around for anything to record this on, saw nothing and cursed. Then she said, "No! No. My name's Claudia. Who are you?"

"Quiet! They'll wake up."

"Who will?"

There was a pause. Then he said, "My friends." He sounded breathless, oddly terrified.

"Who are you?" she said. "Where are you? Are you a Prisoner? Are you in Incarceron?"

HE JERKED his head back and stared at the Key in disbelief.

There was a small blue light in the heart of it; he bent closer so that it lit his skin. "Of course I am. Do you mean ... Are you ... Outside?"

There was silence. It lasted so long he thought the link had been broken; he said hurriedly, "Did you hear me?" and at the same time the girl said, "Are you still there?" in awkward collision.

Then she said, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be speaking to you. Jared warned me about this."

"Jared?"

"My tutor."

He shook his head, and his breath frosted the crystal.

"But look," she said, "it's too late now and I can't believe a few words can damage a centuries-old experiment, do you?"

He had no idea what she was talking about. "You are Outside, aren't you? Outside exists?

The stars are there, aren't they?"

He was terrified she wouldn't answer, but after a moment she said, "Yes. I'm looking at them."

He breathed out in amazement; the crystal furred instantly with frost.

"You didn't tell me your name," she said.

"Finn. Just Finn."

Silence. A self-conscious stillness, the Key clumsy in his hands. There was so much he wanted to ask, to know, that he didn't know where to begin. And then she said, "How are you speaking to me, Finn? Is it a crystal key, with the hologram of an eagle inside?"

He swallowed. "Yes. A key."

A rustle, behind him. He looked around the tree, saw Gildas snore and grunt.

"Then we each have a replica of the same device." She sounded quick, thoughtful, as if she was used to solving problems, working out solutions; a clear voice that made him remember suddenly, with the tiniest spark of pain, candles. The seven candles on the cake.

At that moment, with their usual abruptness, the lights of Incarceron came on.

He gasped, saw that he was standing in a landscape of copper and gilt and tawny redness. The forest stretched for miles, sloping down, far down into a wide, undulating landscape. He stared at it in astonishment.

"What was that? What happened? Finn?"

"The lights went on. I ... I'm in a new place, a different Wing. A metal forest."

She said oddly, "I envy you. It must be fascinating."

"Finn?" Gildas was on his feet, looking around. For a moment Finn wanted to call him over, and then caution set in. This was his secret. He needed to keep it.

"I have to go," he said hurriedly. "1'll try and speak to you again ... now we know... that is, if you want to. But you have to," he added urgently. "You have to help me."

The girl's answer surprised him. "How can I help you? What can be wrong in a perfect world?"

Finn's hand tightened as the blue light faded. Desperately he whispered, "Please. You have to help me Escape."

13

Walls have ears.

Doors have eyes.

Trees have voices.

Beasts tell lies.

Beware the rain.

Beware the snow.

Beware the man

You think you know.

-Songs of Sapphique

Finn's voice. As she pulled on the gauntlet and flexed the foil, his voice whispered again inside her mask.

You have to help me Escape...

"En garde, please, Claudia." The swordmaster was a small gray man who sweated profusely. His sword crossed hers; he gave signals with the tiny precise movements of a skilled fencer. Automatically she responded, practicing lunges, parries—sixte, septime, octave—as she had done since she was six.

There had been something familiar about the boy's voice. Inside the warm darkness of the mask she bit her lip, attacked, took quarte, riposted, hitting the maestro's padded jacket with a satisfying thud.

The accent, the slightly slow vowels. It was how they spoke at Court.

"Feint of straight thrust, disengage, please."

She obeyed, hot now, the glove already softened with sweat, the foil whipping, the small clicks of the familiar exercise comforting, the control of the sword forcing her mind to speed.

You have to help me Escape.

Fear. Fear in the whispering, of being overheard, of saying what he said. And the word

Escape like a holy thing, forbidden, full of awe.

"Quarte counter quarte, please, Claudia. And keep your hand high."

She took the parries absently, the blades of the foils sliding past her body. Behind the maestro Lord Evian came out of the main door into the courtyard and stood on the steps, taking snuff. He watched her, elegantly poised.

Claudia frowned.

She had so much to think about. The fencing lesson was her own escape. In the house it was chaos; her clothes being packed, the last measurements for the wedding dress, the books she refused to leave behind, the pets she insisted came with her. And now this.

One thing—Jared would have to carry the Key. It wouldn't be safe in her baggage.

They were fighting now. She let all thoughts go, concentrated on the hits, the clicked parries, the bending of the foil as she hit once, again, again.

Until finally he stepped back. "Very good, my lady. Your point control remains excellent."

Slowly she took off her mask and shook his hand. Close up, he looked older, and a little sad.

"I'll be sorry to lose such a pupil."

Her hand clenched on his. "Lose?"

He stepped back. "I... it seems... after your wedding ..."

Claudia restrained her anger. She released his hand and drew herself up. "After my marriage I will still require your services. Please disregard anything my father has said about this. You will travel with us to the Court."

He smiled, and bowed. His doubt showed; as she turned away and took the cup of water from Alys, she felt the heat of humiliation scorch her face.

They were trying to isolate her. She had expected this; Jared had warned her of it. At

Queen Sia's court they wanted her alone with no one to trust, no one to plot with. But she was having none of that.

Lord Evian had waddled over. "Quite wonderful, my dear." His small eyes enjoyed her figure in the fencing breeches.

"Don't patronize me," she snapped, "waving Alys away, she took the cup and jug and stalked to a bench that stood at the edge of the green lawn. After a moment Evian came after her. She turned on him. "I need to talk to you."

"The house overlooks us," he said quietly. "Anyone can see."

"Then wave your handkerchief and laugh. Or whatever it is spies do."

His fingers closed the snuffbox. "You are angry, Lady Claudia. But not, I think, with me."

That was true. But still she glared at him. "What do you want from me?"

He smiled serenely at the ducks on the lake, the small black moorhens in the rushes. "As yet, nothing. Obviously we will make no move until after the wedding. But then, we will need your help. The Queen must be dealt with first—she is the most dangerous. And then, when you are safely Queen, your husband will meet with some accident..."

She drank the cold water. Upside-down in the cup she saw Jared's tower reflected, the blue sky behind it, the tiny windows in perfect Protocol.

"How do I know this isn't a trap?"

He smiled. "Does the Queen doubt you? She has no reason.

Claudia shrugged. She only met the Queen at festivals. The first rime had been at her betrothal, and that had been years ago. She remembered a slim blond woman in a white dress, sitting on a throne that had seemed to have hundreds of steps up to it, and she had had to climb every one, concentrating, carrying the basket of flowers that was almost as big as she had been.

The Queen's hands, the nails a glossy red.

The cool palm on her forehead.

The words. "How charming, Warden. How sweet."

"You could be recording this," she said. "You could be testing me ... my loyalty."

Evian sighed, a tiny sound. "I assure you ..."

"Assure all you like, it could be true." She dumped the cup and picked up the towel Alys had left, wiping her face with its softness. Then she turned. "What do you know about

Giles's death?"

It startled him. His pale eyes widened slightly. But he was practiced at deception; he answered without giving anything away. "Prince Giles? He fell from his horse."

"Was it an accident? Or was he murdered?"

If he was recording this, she knew she was finished now.

His stubby fingers folded together. "Really, my dear ..."

"Tell me. I need to know. Of all people it concerns me most. Giles was ... we were betrothed. I liked him."

"Yes." Evian looked at her shrewdly. "I see." He seemed uncertain, then, as if he'd made up his mind, he said, "There was something strange about the death."

"I knew it! I told Jared—"

"The Sapient knows about this?" He looked up in alarm. "About me?"

"I would trust Jared with my life."

"Those are the most dangerous people." Evian turned, watching the house. One of the ducks meandered toward him; he gave a flurried wave and it padded away, quacking.

"We never know where the listeners are," he said quietly, staring after it. "That is what the

Havaarna have done to us, Claudia. They have riddled us with fear."

For a moment he seemed almost shaken; then he brushed an invisible crease from his silk suit and said in his changed voice, "Prince Giles rode out that morning without any of his usual attendants. It was a fine spring morning; he was well, in good health, a laughing boy of fifteen years. Two hours later a messenger thundered in on a horse white with sweat; he leaped from it and raced into the hall of the Court, ran up the steps, and threw himself at the Queens feet. I was there, Claudia. I saw her face when they told her of the accident. She is a pale woman, as they all are, but then she was white. If it was an act, it was expert. They brought the boy back on a hastily made bier of boughs, their coats laid over his face. Grown men were weeping."

Impatient, Claudia said, "Go on."

"They laid him in state. Wearing a great gold robe and a tunic of white silk embroidered with the crowned eagle. Thousands filed past him. Women sobbed. Children brought flowers. How beautiful he was, they said. How young."

He watched the house.

"But there was something odd. A man. His name was Bartlett. A man who had looked after the boy from his earliest years. He was old now, retired and feeble. They allowed him in to see the body late one afternoon, when the people had left. They brought him through the pillars and shadows of the Chamber of State and he climbed the steps with difficulty and looked down at Giles.

They thought he would weep and wail and howl with grief. They thought he would tear his clothes with agony. But he didn't."

Evian looked up and she saw his small eyes were shrewd. "He laughed, Claudia. The old man laughed."

AFTER TWO hours walking through the metallic forest the snow began.

Stumbling over a root of copper and out of a daydream, Finn realized it had been falling for some time; it was already coating the leaf-litter with a fine frost. He looked back, his breath smoking.

Gildas was a little way behind, talking to the girl. But where was Keiro?

Finn turned quickly. All morning he had been unable to stop thinking of that voice, the voice from Outside, where the stars were. Claudia. How had she been able to speak to him? He felt the cold lump of the Key inside his shirt; its awkwardness comforted him.

"Where's Keiro?" he said.

Gildas stopped. He planted his staff in the ground and leaned on it. "Scouting ahead.

Didn't you hear him tell you?" Suddenly he strode forward and looked hard at Finn, the blue eyes clear as crystal in his small lined face. "Are you well? Is this a vision coming on you, Finn?"

Tm fine. Sorry to disappoint you." Sickened by the eagerness in the Sapient's voice Finn looked at the girl. "We need to get that chain off you."

She had wrapped it around her like a necklace to stop it swinging. He could see the raw skin under the collar where she had padded it with cloth. She said quietly, "I can manage.

But where are we?"

Turning, he stared over the miles of forest. A wind was rising, the metallic leaves meshing and rustling. Far below, the wood was lost under snow clouds, and high above the roof of the Prison was a distant oppression, its lights misted and faint.

"Sapphique came this way." Gildas sounded tense with excitement. "In this forest he defeated his first doubts, the dark despairs that told him there was no way on. Here he began the climb out."

"But the way leads down," Attia said quietly.

Finn looked at her. Beneath the dirt and hacked hair her face was lit with a strange joy.

"Have you been here before?" he asked.

"No. I was from a small Civicry group back there. We never left the Wing. This is so ... wonderful."

The word made him think of the Maestra, and the chill of guilt struck through him, but

Gildas pushed past and strode on. "It may appear to lead downhill, but if the theory that

Incarceron is underground is true, we must climb eventually. Perhaps beyond the wood."

Appalled, Finn gazed at the forested leagues. How could Incarceron be so vast? He had never imagined it would be like this. Then the girl said, "Is that smoke?"

They followed her pointing finger. Far oft, in the distant mists, a thin column rose and dissipated. It looked like the smoke from a fire, he thought.

"Finn! Give me a hand!"

They turned. Keiro was dragging something out from the thickets of copper and steel; as they ran over to him Finn saw that it was a small sheep, one of its legs crudely repaired, the circuits exposed.

"You re still thieves then," Gildas said acidly.

"You know the rule of the Comitatus." Keiro sounded cheerful. "Everything belongs to the

Prison, and the Prison is our Enemy."

He had already cut its throat. Now he looked around. "We can butcher it here. Well, she can. She may as well make herself useful."

None of them moved. Gildas said, "It was stupid. We have no idea of what inmates are here. Or of their strength."

"We have to eat!" Keiro was angry now, his face darkening. He threw the sheep down.

"But if you don't want it, fine!"

There was an awkward silence. Then Attia said simply, "Finn?"

He realized she would do it if he asked her to. He didn't want to have that power. But

Keiro was glowering, so he said, "All right. I'll help you."

Side by side, they knelt and cut the sheep up. She borrowed Gildas's knife and worked efficiently; he realized she had done it often before, and when he was clumsy, she pushed him aside and dissected the raw flesh. They took only a little; they had no way of carrying more or any tinder to cook it on as yet. Only half the beast was organic; the rest was a patchwork of metal, ingeniously put together. Gildas raked over the remains with his stick.

"The Prison breeds its beasts less well these days."

He sounded grave. Keiro said, "What do you mean, old man:

"What I say. I can remember when the creatures were all flesh. Then circuits began to appear, tiny things, threaded instead of vein, of cartilage. The Sapienti have always studied and dissected any tissue we could find. At one time I offered rewards for carcasses brought to me, though the Prison was usually too quick."