…the feedback built and built until the air itself clanged like metal…
…she began to SHAPE…
…digging deep within herself…
…laying hold on the power offered her…
…crafting out of memory and instinct…
…out of the people's belief…
…she SHAPED the THREE and sent THEM dancing over the crowd…
…made them sing with the voice of the throng…
…made them strut and posture and gather to themselves every eye, every heart, every fragment of brain…
…the priests in the Bubble left their places and streamed down the ramps at the two sides of the Stage, melding with the crowd, chanting and rapt, their eyes fixed on the THREE…
…the Palaka Dancers lifted their arms and danced round and round where they were, moaning and turned so deeply inward, they were beyond noticing anything around them…
…the Longhorners blew in a trance, seeing nothing but the THREE, hearing nothing but the groan and thrum of their pipes…
…the Na-priests were on their knees, sobbing, their arms stretched toward the THREE…
Shadith looked over her shoulder, caught Rohant's eye, jerked her head at the front of the Bubble.
Still singing, almost blind with the effort, her voice picked up and transmitted to the speakers by the lug-ikes clipped between her breasts, she got to her feet and began moving step by slow step toward the ramp at the right curving down from the Bubble Stage to the crater floor…
Behind her Rohant launched Sassa into the air, then reached for the Gospah's neck, caressed his carotids until the man was out cold. He laid him on the bench and stepped down. Moving as quickly as he could-the air felt thick as chilled honey and his head was throbbing, his eyes tearing so badly he could barely see-Rohant crossed the few steps to Miowee's side; he tore away the paper chains and swept her up and• around so she could cling to his back, then he caught hold of Kaya's hand and led her after Shadith…
The cats writhing about him, Kikun danced his shimmer-dance, putting aside the stamps and turns beaten into him by the priests. Shiver and shimmer he moved slowly after Shadith and Rohant, holding the feed steady, maintaining the flow from the pilgrim trance into Shadith so she could keep that trance going, keep the illusion there to pin the eyes of everyone and let them walk away…
Using the hallucinated THREE to open a way for them… Nikamo-Oskinin twenty stories tall, bending to sweepher illusory, fingers through the pilgrims… Shadith struggled across the floor of the crater… exhausted, running on the dregs of her strength, emptying herself to keep the trance in place, the IMAGES whole and present… she won one meter, two, three, ten, twenty… the Firedeath at her back… pulling endurance out of a consuming terror, she drove herself on and on… playing the kitskew till her fingers bled… singing the same song over and over…
WATCHER 13
1
Ginbiryol Seyirshi watched the Invocation begin, then switched his attention to the prisoners. All that chanting and hopping around, it was boring, the kind of thing one might expect from that woman the girl was going to meet, that xenoethnologist, boring, boring, boring. Most of it he would have to throw out, maybe keep a little for the color-and of course one could always sweeten the scenes by mixing in the pulsing terror from the girl. Ahhh, she was afraid, ah yesss, she was sick with horror. He touched the test-sensors on the pathecorder and smiled as he felt a lump of horror/terror/fury grow inside him; he savored the sour flavor of her nausea. Yes. Fire and death. Ahhh, that would be splendid. Firedeath. He ran his tongue over his lips, tasting the burning in anticipation, smelling the meat…
2
The second day started out more interesting and improved as it progressed, especially after the girl began singing. He listened to that soaring voice, contemplated the shining youth of the singer, so sweeet, so tennnderand on the verge of ceasing to exist. Exquisite pathos. He could see his clients weeping at the sadness of her fate, reveling in every nuance of her pain. They were a sentimental lot. Which was just as well-if they were not they would not pay his prices.
In the early afternoon when the resonance was born between the singer and the pilgrims and began to build and build, he was elated; the charge coming through the EYEs was so strong it was close to blowing the circuits of the pathecorder. His connoisseurs of emotion would be ecstatic.
When he saw the giant Holos form, he laughed aloud and murmured encouragement, tender nothings, loving nonsense. "So good, so good, a phenomenal finale, blessed be the Lady for sending you to me…"
3
A moment later he was scowling as Shadith began slogging slowly and painfully down the ramp, then across the crater floor, forcing her way through the pilgrims, heading for the broken section of the crater wall where the Road came in, the Cicipi Gate. Kikun, Rohant, and his beasts were following her. "That, that…" He looked around as if the answer to handling her was pinned on the wall somewhere. He was alone, Ajeri was in the gym, and Puk was still tucked away in the tranx web. He rubbed his hands together, glared up at the Pet whose chatter was beginning to irritate him. He didn't need them. He knew the kephalos better than anyone, it just took time…
Stroking his thumbnail over his chin and down along his throat, he contemplated Cell 1. She was halfway across the crater already, the others plowing along behind her, the Holos of the local demigods dancing a stately pavane-above them, the pilgrims swaying and ululating, lost in a trance so deep they were blind to everything but the towering images moving over their heads. He examined the readouts and frowned. What was pouring off the locals was beginning to move beyond the capacity of the pathecorder circuits, even of the kephalos itself. Triggered, he thought, by the Three, especially the girl and that odd little lizardman. Despite the strain of his instruments, it was good. It was very good. Better than anything he'd expected to capture. Fascinating, the synergy developed by those Three.
He unfolded Cell 2, the one assigned to Rohant, emptied it out and sent the POV dancing from EYE to EYE, the scene careening here and there, front and back, side to side, as he tried to decide what to do; he did not want to break the trance and lose the dancing demigods, they were going to make this Edition the best he had ever created… still, he did not need much more of that Shadowplay, that giant ghostdance. Yes, he thought, yes. More pathos. Let her allt-most reach the Gate, then drag her back. Yes.
"Ajeri tiszteh, come to the Bridge immediately. I need you."
4
Ajeri Kilavez strode to her chair, a vortex of nervous energy in precarious control. Once she was settled, she glanced at Cell 1 and her mouth tightened until her lips disappeared. She swung to face Ginbiryol. "Well?"
"Let them get to the Gate, then pull them back. From what I have seen, all you will have to do is disrupt that trance."
"That's all?" Her voice dripped sarcasm.
He ignored that, though he added it to the balance against retaining her once this project was completed. "You will find it easy enough, simply disrupt what comes from those speakers. It is her singing that controls the effect she is producing."