‘Where should I land?’ asked Ariadne.
‘Forgive me, but I don’t want a fuss. Matters will be hard enough to explain. My family own a summer retreat upstream. There’s a dock, and the house is above there, facing north,’ said Elenya.
‘No,’ said Va. ‘Not any more.’
‘How do you know? You never went there.’
‘I had it destroyed. There was a detachment of Caliphate cavalry billeted there. During the night my army surrounded the place and burned them, and their horses, alive. You’re right. I never went there. But I ordered the action and welcomed the report. To this day I don’t know if you had any servants there, or what happened to them.’ He wiped his face with his hand. ‘I was protecting my left flank.’
Elenya watched as Ariadne sought out any sign of the wooden dock or the comfortable dacha. There was a path from the river that led to a clearing. Nothing more.
‘I’ve always tried to make you understand what it was like, what I actually did to break the Caliphate’s siege. We took the barges they left and sent them downstream, laden with rock oil and wood. People burned themselves to death guiding the fires to the heart of the fleet, because it was the only way we could guarantee success. They gave up their lives gladly, sometimes singing as they went.’
Benzamir slipped from the pilot’s chair and stood beside the monk. ‘Don’t do this.’
‘They died because I asked them to.’
‘Perhaps they died because they thought the cause was right?’
‘The cause wasn’t right. The Caliphate wasn’t the enemy. I was. Because I wanted her, I gave them war.’
‘Whose cause is ever right? My motives for coming here weren’t pure. If I hadn’t accepted the decision of my people, I would have been on Persephone Shipsister. I’d have ended up justifying the murder of your brothers for a pile of metal books.’
Va was close to vomiting. His skin was translucent, dripping sweat onto the deck.
‘One decision separated me from them. Everything that followed afterwards was because I chose to stay with my people, even though I thought it was the wrong thing to do.’
‘The voices,’ said Va. ‘They curse me.’
Benzamir spun up a map of the Inner Ocean. ‘Alessandra? Tell him. Tell him about Misr.’
She looked confused for a moment, and looked at the map. ‘You saved us,’ she said in sudden recognition. ‘You did, didn’t you? The Caliphate’s navy was strangling Misr’s trade, always threatening a landing. The Kenyans had turned us into an armed camp. Then it suddenly stopped. You broke the Caliphate’s back right here at Novy Rostov, and they lost their stomach for fighting.’
‘You don’t understand,’ started Va, but Alessandra gasped.
‘Five years later the Caliphate wasn’t in any position to stop you from following Solomon Akisi wherever you wanted. It’s almost as if’ – and she put her hand to her mouth – ‘you knew.’
Va doubled over, spewing out everything he had. Benzamir took an instinctive step back. Va retched again, almost kneeling in his own filth.
Elenya watched, her face void of expression.
‘I am no prophet. I didn’t know. Believe me, I didn’t.’ Va’s voice was hoarse, rasping.
‘Neither did I know that your mission and mine would coincide so completely when I submitted to the Council’s authority. We make decisions based on imperfect knowledge and uncontrollable passions. We have to live with the consequences.’
‘I killed them all.’ Alessandra tried to give Va water, but he held her wrist. ‘Every man and woman and child. I’ve tried living with it for six years. I thought bringing the books back would give me some comfort. I bargained with the dead. I thought we had a pact.’
Benzamir wrestled Alessandra from Va’s grip, and she backed away, cradling her hand across her body and flexing her fingers.
‘It’s not forgiveness you want, it’s redemption. It’s within your reach.’
‘Then why do I feel so utterly wretched?’ Va howled.
‘Because you don’t understand what it is you’ve saved the world from. You saw their buildings and their weapons. You caught the blunt edge of their plan that left your brothers dead and you chasing across the face of the planet. I had to look straight into their corrupt and diseased heart. You should be happy, Brother Va. You should have peace.’
‘I feel no peace.’
‘Then,’ said Benzamir, ‘the enormity of what you have done escapes you. I can only thank you, and wish you well.’
Shiny, scuttling crabs started to clean the floor.
‘How can I believe the things you say?’
‘He doesn’t lie,’ said Elenya. ‘He’s been honest with everyone he’s met. Listen, Va. All those people who died because you loved me, the thing you hate the most about yourself, has been taken and changed and turned into something different. Alessandra and Benzamir are right: if you hadn’t beaten the Caliphate here, you’d never have got the books back. Va, look at me.’
He did so, eventually, reluctantly, sick still on his chin, on the hem of his robe.
‘It wasn’t for nothing. It wasn’t for me. It wasn’t a mistake. It had to happen. I don’t pretend to understand how any of this can begin to make sense. But it makes more sense than twenty thousand peasants and soldiers going to their grave over a woman.’ She smiled at the irony. ‘Even if that woman was me.’
Benzamir guided Va back a step to let the crabs do their work.
Elenya continued: ‘No one’s trying to say their deaths are now justified. Somehow, they’ve . . .’ She gave up, shrugged and sighed.
Va nodded miserably, and Benzamir asked Ariadne to land.
‘Where, Benzamir?’
‘Close to the city. There’s a blizzard blowing, it’s dark, and if we’re quick, we won’t be seen.’
Ariadne settled through the layers of low-lying cloud. The display showed a blinding swirl of snowflakes superimposed on the radar-mapped landscape.
‘I’ll go now.’ Elenya held up her hands. ‘I don’t want any of you to come with me. Promise me you’ll stay here, in this room.’ She glared at each of them in turn, waiting for them to acquiesce.
‘Good luck, Princess,’ said Alessandra. ‘I hope you . . . I don’t know – have a long and happy life? Is that too much to ask for?’
‘I don’t know. Any sort of life will be welcome.’
Benzamir raised his hand. ‘Princess Elenya,’ he said, and there was a catch in his throat.
‘Tell me again,’ she said.
‘All will be well.’
There was silence, punctuated only by Ariadne telling them they had landed.
‘Va? Have you nothing to say to me?’
‘God go with you, wherever you are. And I’m sorry.’
The corner of her mouth twitched in the memory of a smile. ‘I release you, Brother Va Angemaite. I won’t chase after you again.’
She strode from the flight deck, her machine-fabricated boots clicking on the floor. The door shushed and cut off the noise completely.
‘I’ve opened the cargo bay doors,’ said Ariadne. The display twisted: Elenya was standing at the doors, eyes half closed against the snow flying at her face. Then she jumped to the ground, and with her ankles swallowed by drifting snow, she ploughed towards the gates of Novy Rostov.
Benzamir realized he’d been holding his breath. He puffed, and patted Va on the back. The monk didn’t move. He seemed frozen in place.
They watched as the figure on the screen broke into a run, uphill, until she was dwarfed by the city’s wall.
‘It’s time to go, Ariadne. We’re almost done.’
CHAPTER 45
THERE WAS A smear of light left on the eastern horizon as Benzamir carried two more books outside and set them on the growing pile. Two light-bees buzzed behind him.
‘Thank you,’ said Va. He counted them up, like he’d done every time, then squared off the books to be neat.