Geis stared at her, appalled.
“And I was supposed to feel so fucking grateful, wasn’t I, Geis?-” she said, shaking her head. “I was meant to fall into your arms. Or am I flattering myself?” She looked puzzled. “Was that part of the deal or not?”
“I loved you, Sharrow,” Geis said, sounding more sad than anything else. “I still love you. Just let me out of this and I’ll prove it all. I do love you, and I do love this family and our race-Oh, smile your cynical smile if you want, Sharrow, but I mean it. Everything I’ve had to do has been done for love.”
Feril turned to her then and said, “I think somebody is coming.” It nodded at the low door set underneath the two giant diamond leaf ikons.
Sharrow turned to face the door and pointed the gun at it. She heard the chink-chink noise of a chain and guessed who it might be.
The door opened and Breyguhn entered. She was dressed as Sharrow remembered, in a plain, grey shift, though the gown was dirtier than it had been. Her eyes looked wild; when she gazed at Sharrow, then at the android, then at Ceis, it was with a strange blankness. She carried a pile of books awkwardly in her arms. Her right hand was still joined to the track in the wall via a manacle and chain, but it was steel now rather than iron.
Sharrow let her gun down. “Hello again,” she said. “Feril; this is my half-sister, Breyguhn.”
Feril turned and bowed slightly.
Breyguhn dropped the books at the same moment, revealing a pistol. She fired it at Sharrow’s head as Geis half-stood and whirled round, whacking the back legs of the chair he was tied to into the legs of the android.
Sharrow felt something smack into the side of her head and spin her round. She slumped against the table, trying to bring the laser up to bear on Breyguhn, then fell to the flagstones, the gun bouncing out of her limp fingers.
She lay there. Her head was sore. As though through a fine mist she saw Feril staggering from the blow Geis had dealt it with the chair. Breyguhn fired at the android; Feril’s right leg blew off at the thigh. The android hopped round on one leg, trying to stay upright. Another shot cracked across its chest, raising sparks. It kept on hopping. It still held the laser rifle but it didn’t seem to want to use it. She tried to shout at it to shoot all the dirty bastards, but her mouth wouldn’t move. Feril kept on hopping and hopping, banging into the stone table and stumbling, the rifle still clutched in its hand.
Then Geis shouted something, and fell over on the floor still tied to the chair. Breyguhn came over and kept the gun on the hopping android while she pulled at the strips of shirt restraining Geis.
As soon as he was released Geis stood up, pulled the bluntbladed sword from its scabbard on the table, flicked one of its jewels so that its blade edges flickered with pink fire, and swung it at the hopping android.
It wasn’t a powerful stroke, but it separated Feril’s head from its trunk as though its neck had been made of paper. Feril had raised one arm over its head while trying to balance, and that was sliced off in the same blow. The head fell to the floor and rolled under the table; the arm fell onto it. The android’s headless body tottered on its single leg for a second. Geis raised the sword over his head and brought it scything down. Feril’s body parted down the middle and fell apart in halves, like something from a cartoon.
Sharrow made a last attempt to raise her hand, then gave up. She closed her eyes.
Are you all right?… Hello? I said, Are you all right?
… You… You again… Now what?
This isn’t really going as we hoped, is it?
…No.
Well?
Fate… Who cares?
Nobody, if you don’t. It’s your life.
… Exactly. Oh, I’m tired. Fuck it, just let me die.
No, I don’t really feel we’ve destroyed enough yet. One of us has to. We are each other, after all. We are the last of the eight.
Oh, fuck, yes, sure… We’ll see what we can do…
That’s right. Now wake up.
I don’t want to wake up.
I said, Wake up.
No, won’t.
Wake up!
No, wo-
Now!
No.
N
People were arguing. Her head hurt and people were arguing. She hated it when people argued. She screamed at them, told them to shut up; it was bad enough the Gun wouldn’t give her any peace. Screaming just made her head hurt worse. They didn’t seem to hear, anyway.
“You have to kill her.”
“No! There’s no need; I almost had her convinced before you came in.”
“Oh, it’s my fault now, is it? I save your skin and-”
“I didn’t say that! That’s not what I meant.”
“Kill her. Kill her now. If you can’t, I will.”
“How can you say that! You’re her sister!”
Half-sister, Sharrow thought.
“Because I know what she’s like, that’s why!”
Shut up, shut up! she screamed at them.
“She’s coming round. I heard her say something.”
“No she isn’t. Look at her; lucky you didn’t blow her brains out.”
“I was trying to.”
“Well, I’m not going to let you.”
She was tied. Tied sitting to a seat, much like Geis had been. Hands and feet tied; no, taped. Tape over mouth, too. Head hanging forward. Sore. She wanted to tell them to shut up again, but didn’t. She raised her head and looked at them.
They stood in front of the table, arguing. Breyguhn was still joined by her chain to the wall. Sharrow didn’t understand the chain; Brey must have some sort of special place she could change over from the main system to some private line. At least they had given her a chain of steel rather than iron. Probably a really generous concession for the Sea House…
She had to let her head drop again. They didn’t seem to have noticed, anyway. Everything went grey again. Still had sound, though.
“Kill her, Geis. Please keep your personal feelings out of this; this is for-”
“Keep my personal feelings out of it? Well, that’s rich, coming from you!”
“I stayed here for you! My Fate; I came in here for you! Who was it found you this place? And I could have left; but I stayed for you, for you and the family. I won’t let her ruin everything. You know she will, Geis; you know what she’s like. She won’t forgive; she can’t forgive! Geis, please, kill her. For me. Please. Please…”
“I didn’t ask you to stay; you wanted to.”
“I know, but please, for me… Oh, Geis…”
“Get off me! You stayed because you wanted to, not because of me or the family. You’re more attached to that chain than me!”
She thought she heard a sharp intake of breath. She wanted to laugh but she couldn’t put her head back. Oh Geis, she thought, you were always too literal.
“How dare you! You’re frightened! All right, I’ll show you how it’s done!”
“Brey! No! Put that-!”
The sounds of a struggle. A shot was fired; she heard a ricochet nearby. The crack of a slap. Silence, then a cry, then lots of weeping, and some sobbed words she couldn’t make out.
“Brey…I-”
“Have her, then!” Breyguhn cried. “It was always her you wanted, anyway. Well, do what you want!”
Then the sound of her chain rattling, followed by a door slamming. A door in the place where there were not supposed to be any. But she had seen lots of doors here today. Lots and lots of doors… It all drifted away from her again.
Suddenly there was something under her nose and she was sniffing a sharp, noxious vapour and her head seemed to clear and there was an odd ringing noise somewhere.