He walked through, staring at the two women a moment, seeing the fear in their eyes. For a moment he thought of finishing them, but he was beyond such pettiness right now. Turning from them, he pressed his hand against the pad on the hull and the hatch hissed open.
It was evening now and the sun was slowly setting. He stepped out, looking about him briefly at the bleak cityscape, then stepped down onto the roof.With any luck they’d kill his twin. Deal with him for him. And maybe that would satisfy them. Whatever, it would be good for him. Because he didn’t like competition. Not even from himself.
He turned, taking one last look at the world, glowering at the sun, then walked across and pulled open the door, going down into the building.
The two craft fell silently from the upper air, slowing as the great cityscape unfolded before them. Tientsin was directly beneath them now, the sea to their right Ahead, beyond the city, the mountains lifted into the blue. As they levelled out at ten thousand feet, Joseph gestured to Karr in the other craft.
“Gregor ... you go after the shuttle. We’ll wait at the Temple.” Karr gave a wave of acknowledgement as his craft peeled away, like a great chair gliding on the air.
Joseph turned to look at Jelka, smiling awkwardly at her. He was still not used
to the way she looked at him, nor was he sure that he could even imagine what
she was thinking, let alone feeling, only that he reminded her of what she had
lost
“Why the Temple?” she asked.
“Because it is the centre of all things.”
“And you think DeVore will go there?”
“He will be drawn to it, if only because we are there.”
She narrowed her eyes, then looked away.
“Jelka?”
She looked back. “Yes?”
“I wish Td known them.”
“Yes ...” She paused, a small motion in her face showing how she fought briefly to control what she felt, then she smiled. “If we come through, I’ll tell you of them. Or what I know, anyway. I didn’t know K. long.” He nodded, then looked back at the landscape below them. The Temple of Heaven was not far now. If one looked hard one could see it, just there beyond the southern city, in the great open space between the southern sprawl and the towers of the financial district. The centre. Where it all began, if Master Tuan is right. And where it now must end.
“Dcuro?”
“Yes, Joseph?”
“Are you ready?”
Dcuro laughed. “Let him show me the whites of his eyes and I’ll drill two holes in them!”
Wisps of black smoke, drifting out of nowhere, gusted in a wind that never ceased, blowing from the dark heart of nothingness. The great spider crouched on the mound, overlooking the ancient Temple, gnawing at the bones of its latest victim as it waited. The darkness between the stars called to it, making it ache to leap high, away from the pull of this tiny rock, away from the irritating heat of this paltry, insignificant star, out until it could drift, free of all forces, in the silent coldness where it had first begun.
Yet something kept it here. Some dark residual thing.
It looked up, frowning, its huge eyes focusing, and then it remembered.
The game. I have not finished the game.
They were standing between the pillars of the temple. Three of them. Jelka, the one who called himself Joseph, and one other, a Han by the look of him. He laughed, the noise issuing from his huge, beaked mouth like the raucous cry of a crow. Yet his voice, when it came, was still DeVore’s voice. “The last stone,” it said, casting the bones aside then stretching on its legs, so that it towered above both them and the Temple itself. “I have come to place the last stone on the board.”
The Joseph one nodded, then stepped forward. He held something in his palm.
Something small and round and white.
A stone ...
“How quaint,” it said, smiling ferociously.
It took a step towards them, then stopped, seeing the man’s arm go back, to heft the stone into the air.
The explosion took off two of its legs. It staggered, keeping itself upright, then, furious, twisted its abdomen round to face them, ready to pierce the barrier and release the darkness that would annihilate them. Yet, even as it turned, it froze, as the air surrounding it shimmered and went solid. Jelka looked to Joseph, but he was staring, as if he did not understand what had happened. And then the air before them parted.
Jelka cried out; a sound both of pain and happiness.
“Kim!”
Joseph felt a ripple of pure fear run through him. It was Kim, and K. too, just behind him. But they were dead. He could see from the paleness of their skin, from the marks upon their flesh, that they were dead. “What have you done?” he asked.
The voice that answered him was an echo that sounded from their empty mouths as if they spoke with a single voice.
“Master Tuan has given us this hour, to set things right and unify the universes.”
Jelka took a step towards them, but Joseph reached out and held her arm.
“No,” he said quietly.
And now she too saw the small red mark upon Kim’s forehead, and groaned. And Joseph felt the sorrow that lay behind that noise, as much as if he himself had uttered it, and finally understood what she had lost “What has happened to it?” he asked, pointing to the frozen creature. Kim and K. turned as one, their eyes impassive, then looked back at Joseph. “I have placed it in a temporary space.”
“Will it be destroyed?”
But Kim, if he heard the question, did not answer it directly. “The snake,” he said, even as his form shimmered and disappeared from sight, “the snake must swallow its tail.”
THE MARRIAGE OF THE LIVING DARK
“Li Yuan?”
Li Yuan stared back at Karr, fear in his eyes, and began to back away.
“No, wait! I won’t harm you. I’m on your side!”
“You know me?”
“In another universe, yes.”
Li Yuan turned, looking back over his shoulder at the building, as if expecting something horrible to emerge from it at any moment Noting that look, Karr frowned.
“What is it?”
Li Yuan looked back at him, then shook his head. “You wouldn’t believe me.”
“Did he change?”
“Change?”
The look of startlement told Karr that he was right DeVore must have changed into his original form.
“Were they both here?”
Li Yuan hesitated, then nodded.
“So where’s the other one?”
“He left, to go and do something. Thaf s when I went inside, after his twin. But he must have come back. When I came out here again it was gone.” “Your craft?”
“Yes.” Li Yuan shook his head, distraught “He’s got her.”
“Her?”
“Fei Yen and her mother.”
Karr looked to Chen, exchanging a look. “You’re married to Fei Yen?”
Li Yuan shook his head. “No, no, I...”
“Look,” Chen said, interrupting, “can we trace your craft somehow?”
“Yes. There’s a trace-code. In case it gets stolen. I have it here.” He searched a moment, then took a small card from his pocket and handed it to Karr. Karr studied it a moment, then asked. “How do we get this to work?” “If 11 work in the computer of any glide.”
“Glide?””The hover cars. That’s what they’re called.” “Ah ...” Karr looked about him, then, spotting one nearby, went over to it. He stared at it a moment, then took out his gun and shot the lock open. Turning back to Li Yuan, he grinned. “Okay. You come with me, Yuan. Chen, you and Hans follow on in the ship. We may need it if things get too hot.” Li Yuan, however, still seemed reluctant to go with him.