"Can I do something for you?" she asked.
"I wondered if you wanted a guide to the city." It sounded unconvincing, but it was the best introduction he could think of.
"Thank you," she said. "But I’m fine." The conversation screeched to a halt.
He tried again. "I don’t often get a chance to talk to anyone from offplanet."
Her posture eased. "I noticed my ship was the only one in port."
"Did you come to trade for a Dream?"
"No. Just some minor repairs. I’ll be leaving as soon they’re done."
Behind her, Jato caught sight of a globe sparkling with lights in a fractal pattern. As it floated forward, it resolved into a robot drone over a meter in diameter, its surface patterned by delicate curls of the Mandelbrot set, swirls fringed by swirls fringed by swirls in an unending pattern of ever more minute lace.
Following his gaze, the woman glanced back. "What is that?"
"A robot. It watches this staircase."
She turned back to him. "Why does that make you angry?"
"Angry?" How had she known? "I’m not angry."
"What does it do?" she asked.
"I’ll show you." Jato strode forward and hauled his bulk onto the tenth step. Although he towered over the spacer, she seemed unperturbed, simply scooting over to let him pass. That self-confidence impressed him as much as her beauty.
As he approached the eleventh step, the globe whirred into his face. When he tried to push it away, it rammed his shoulder so hard he fell to one knee.
"Hey!" The woman jumped up and grabbed for him, as if she actually thought she could stop someone his size from falling over the edge. "Why did it do that?"
He stood up, brushing rock dust off his trousers. "As a warning."
That’s when she did it. She smiled. "Whatever for?"
Jato hardly heard her. All he saw was her smile. It dazzled.
But after a moment, her smile faded. "Are you all right?" she asked.
He refocused his thoughts. "What?"
"You’re just staring at me."
"Sorry." He motioned at the globe. "It was warning me not to go past the city border, which crosses the cliff here." Having the drones watch him up here was almost funny. As if he could actually escape Nightingale by climbing a staircase that grew geometrically.
"Why can’t you leave the city?" she asked.
He discovered he couldn’t make himself tell her, at least not yet. Why should she believe his story? Eight years ago, the Dreamers had showed up at his room in the Whisper Inn and locked his wrists behind his back with cuffs made from sterling silver Mobius strips. He had no idea what was happening until he found himself on trial. They convicted him of a murder that never happened and sentenced him to life in prison.
Supposedly, years of treatment had "cured" him, and he no longer posed a danger to society. So the Dreamers let him out of his cell, which had never been a cell anyway, but an apartment under the city. For a giddy span of hours he had thought they meant to send him home; if he was no longer dangerous, after all, why keep him under sentence?
He soon found out otherwise.
For the Dreamers who believed in his guilt, which was most of them, it would take a lifetime for him to atone. One of their most renowned artists, Crankenshaft Granite, had argued-with truth-that to Jato it would be almost as much a punishment to spend his life confined to Nightingale as to his apartment. But by making the city his jail, they showed their compassion for a criminal who had turned away from his violent nature. Jato saw why that logic appealed to the Dreamers, who for some reason had a driving need to see themselves as kind, yet who in truth considered all sun-dwellers flawed, deserving neither freedom nor friendship.
But he knew the truth. Crankenshaft’s motives had nothing to do with compassion. The only reason Jato had a modicum more freedom now was because it made Crankenshaft’s life easier.
Jato didn’t want to see that wary look appear on this woman’s face, the one spacers always wore when they learned his story. Not yet. He wanted to have these few minutes without the weight of his conviction pressing on them.
So instead of telling her, he pointed at his feet and made a joke. "This is where I live. These are my coordinates."
"Your what?"
So much for scintillating wit, he thought. "Coordinates. This staircase is the plot of a non-linear step function."
She laughed, like the sweet ringing of a bell. "Why would anyone go to all this work just to make a big plot?"
"It’s art." He wished she would laugh again. It was a glorious sound.
"This is some art," she said. "But you haven’t told me why your people won’t let you leave."
His people? She thought he was a Dreamer? It wasn’t only that he bore no resemblance to them. Dreamers were gifted at both art and mathematics, neither of which he had talent for. Yet this beautiful woman thought he was both. He grinned. "They like me. They don’t want me to go."
She stared at him, her mouth opening.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
She closed her mouth. "What?"
"You’re just staring at me."
"I-your smile-" She flushed. "My apologies. I’m afraid I’m rather tired." She gave him a formal nod. "My pleasure at your company." Then she turned and headed down the stairs.
He almost went after her, stunned by her abrupt leave-taking. But he managed to keep from making a fool of himself. Instead, he stood in the shadows and watched her descend the SquareCase.
When Jato turned into the underground corridor that dead-ended at his apartment, he saw a Mandelbrot globe waiting at the door. Given that he lived nowhere near Nightingale’s perimeter, only one reason existed for its presence. Crankenshaft had sent it. With Jato no longer confined to his apartment, Crankenshaft could have him brought wherever he wanted instead of the Dreamer having to come down here.
Jato spun around and ran, his boots clanging on the metal floor. If he could find a side passage too narrow for the globe to follow, he might evade capture. It was a stupid game Crankenshaft played; if Jato escaped the drones, Crankenshaft let him have the day off.
A whirring sound came from behind him. The drone hit his side and he stumbled into the wall, bringing up his arms to protect his face. An aperture opened on the robot and an air syringe slid out, accompanied by the hiss of its firing.
His view of the hall wavered, darkened, faded…
Jato opened his eyes. A face floated above him, an aged Dreamer with eyes like ice. Gusts of wind fluttered her silver hair around her cheeks. He knew that gaunt face. It belonged to Silicate Glacier. Crankenshaft’s wife.
Crankenshaft was standing behind her. Tall for a Dreamer, he had a well-kept physique that belied his one-hundred and six years of age. Black hair covered his head in bristles. He had two-tone eyes, grey bordered by red, like old ice in ruby rings.
Jato spoke in a hoarse voice. "How long?"
"You have slept several hours," Crankenshaft said.
"I meant, how long do you need me for?"
"I don’t know. We will see."
As Jato pulled himself into a sitting position, Silicate stepped back, avoiding contact with him. He swung his legs over the stone ledge where he had been lying and looked around. Crankenshaft had chosen the big studio. The ledge jutted out of the west wall, an otherwise blank plane of grey stone. On the left, the south wall was a window looking over Nightingale, which lay far below. The east and north "walls" were holoscreens, sheets of thermoplastic that hung from the ceiling. Holos rippled in front of them, swaths of color that trembled as breezes shook the screens.