Part 16 (1/2)

'Do you know where Tannahill is, then?'

'No,' Ede said. 'Once I knew, but I have forgotten.'

'I am sorry.'

'But I know of other peoples who may know of Tannahill.'

'These peoples are human, then?'

'Mostly most of them still are.'

'And these human beings ... live where?'

'At the centre of the Vild. Where the stars are wildest, on other Earths that I once made.'

'Do you know the fixed-points of these stars?'

'I know them.'

'Will you tell me where these stars are?'

'Only if you promise to take me with you.'

'In the hold of my s.h.i.+p? As ... cargo in a lights.h.i.+p?'

'No, as a pa.s.senger. As a fellow seeker of the ineffable flame. And of other things.'

Danlo rubbed his head and sighed. 'All right if you would like, you may share the pit of my s.h.i.+p.'

'And you must promise one other thing,' Ede said. He was smiling now, and it seemed that he was reading the emotions from Danlo's face.

'What ... is that?'

'You must promise that if we find Tannahill, you will help me recover my body.'

'That... will be hard to do.'

'Hard to promise or a hard promise to fulfil?'

'Both.'

'I'm only asking you to help me is that so wrong?'

Danlo rubbed his aching head, remembering. 'The dead ... are so very dead when they die. It is shaida for the dead to live again.'

'But I am not dead at all,' Ede said. His eyes twinkled, and the hologram manifesting his shape flared as brightly as a flame globe. 'I am as alive as you are almost.'

'Even if you do not reveal the fixed-points of the stars that I seek, I might find them anyway,' Danlo said.

'Possibly.'

'I may find Tannahill without you, but you will never leave this lost Earth without me.''It would seem that you hold the superior negotiating position,' Ede said.

'Yes.'

Ede's eyes were now as hard to look at as black holes, and they seemed to drink in the light falling off Danlo's face. Ede said, 'But I would think that you don't like to negotiate.'

Merchants, Danlo thought, haggled over the price of a Fravas.h.i.+ carpet; wormrunners argued with wh.o.r.es over the cost of sharing their tattooed bodies for a night. 'Truly, I hate negotiating,' he said.

'Then help me. Please, Pilot.'

For a long time Danlo stared at Ede's face burning in its computer-generated colours, and he lost himself in Ede's sad gaze. There came a moment when Danlo's face was burning, too, his forehead and his eyes and the blood rus.h.i.+ng beneath his skin. And then another moment, fearful and strange, when all the world was nothing but fire and pain and a wild white light s.h.i.+mmering through the cold s.p.a.ce between them and all around. 'If you would like,' Danlo finally said. 'If I can ... I will help you.'

'Thank you.'

'And now,' Danlo said, looking about the floor of the temple cluttered with all the cybernetica and other things, 'I must find a place to sleep.'

'Of course you must.'

'You ... never sleep?'

'I am as you see,' Ede said. 'Always. I will never say the word that will take me down.'

'Even for a night?'

'Even for a moment. Even for a millionth of a moment.'

Danlo smiled at Ede and yawned. He said, 'Then I must say goodnight now and find another room where I can lay out my furs.'

'Of course.'

'It would be hard for me to sleep ... with you watching me all night.'

'And in the morning?'

'In the morning I will explore the rest of the temple. I have always wanted to see the chambers where the Architects are vastened.'

'And then?'

'And then we will return to my s.h.i.+p. To the Vild. To ... the stars.'

So saying, Danlo bowed politely. It amused him to watch as the little hologram of Nikolos Daru Ede with his emaciated body and huge bony head returned his bow with an otherworldly grace, as only an imago floating in the air might accomplish.

'Goodnight, then,' Danlo said.

'Goodnight, Pilot. Sleep deeply and well.'