Deception Well (The Nanotech Succession Book 2) (8 page)

Lot felt as if his breath had been pulled from his lungs by a sudden change of pressure. Cold storage was in the city’s industrial core, and access was strictly controlled. “Into the tunnels?” The proposition pleased and horrified him at once. To return to the industrial corridors. . . . His nostrils flared, haunted by a ghost aura of death. He didn’t ever want to go back there. But to prove that city authority had lied, that Jupiter was not there with the dead. . . .

“Yeah,” Urban said. “Maybe if we find your old man’s body, you can stop waiting for him. Maybe you can start living your own life.”

Lot did not understand this animosity. “He
is
my life.” Jupiter blazed in his memory like a sun holding his spirit in close orbit. In Urban’s mind that made him a slave. But was it any better to be like Urban . . . and believe in nothing at all? Could a man’s soul be as empty as the void and still be the soul of a man? But, Lot realized, the void wasn’t empty. It was prowled by the war weapons of the Chenzeme.

His gaze rose, to the brilliant white column towering above the peak of the city, the great wall of the elevator cable hard and bright in the full light of Kheth. “We won’t find Jupiter in cold storage.” He stood up, defiance coursing through him. “You don’t believe that now. But you’ll come to believe it.”

Urban laughed. His eyes were unfocused, dark windows where vague shapes moved, shadowy dreams of power. “Either way, I want you to come to the rally tonight. You’ll do that for me if I take you into cold storage. You’ll do it for Gent.”

Lot felt his enthusiasm descend to a cooler plane. “You mean if we aren’t arrested for trespassing.”

“That won’t happen.” He glanced over his shoulder, winking at a faint sheen high up on the green wall of the surrounding hedge—a slick, round reflection, no bigger than the cross section of a girl’s arm—all that was visible of a security camera mounted there. “We’re not alone, you know. Clemantine’s off-duty now. This shift is on our side.”

“You’ve got security behind you?”

“I’m not going to answer that, fury. Not until you’re sure you really want to know.”

CHAPTER

6

T
HEY WAITED UNTIL THE STREET BELOW WAS EMPTY
. Then they dropped over the railing and trotted east. Here, town houses clustered against each other under veils of climbing ivy, clematis, and thick-trunked wisteria. The vegetation split the morning sun’s horizontal rays into sprays of gold that glinted against address plaques and puddled water, so that a hundred times Lot thought he saw Ord returning.

But each time he was mistaken, and they were still alone when they reached the first of the narrow green bridges that arched across Vibrant Harmony as the stream boiled down the stepped slope of the eastern city. Urban raced over the narrow span. Lot followed silently, a step behind. From there they bounded down the winding path that paralleled the stream, skirting the patios of opulent homes squeezed close upon the water.

Lot’s knees ached and his lungs were burning by the time they reached the broad pond at the bottom of the city’s long slope. He pulled up, to stand with his hands on his hips, head thrown back, drinking in lungfuls of sweetly humid air. In the pond, orange and white koi saw him and swam over, their heavy tails splashing loudly as they harassed each other, seeking the best begging position. Here, the stream path joined a white-paved street that ran beneath the arched entrance of the walled refugee quarter.

“Come on, fury,” Urban urged, his breathing already beginning to slow. “We have to meet Gent.”

Lot gazed anxiously into the quarter.

Jupiter’s people had settled here, moving into a cluster of ornate pyramids separated by lines of street trees. The pyramids loomed over the neighborhood’s enclosing wall. They were fifteen stories high, with balconies around each floor, and progressively fewer apartments on the higher levels. They’d been unpopular with the Silkens because they were at the base of the city, across from Splendid Peace Park, and the view wasn’t so good.

Lot had never tried to enter the refugee quarter before.

Such a good boy.

He grimaced. Ado defiance began to work at him, and finally, he trotted after Urban.

I
T STARTED WHEN THEY WERE ONLY A FEW STEPS
into the quarter. Some kids kicking a ball through the white street stopped their game abruptly when they saw him. The ball bounced away into a bed of ferns while the kids huddled together, their whispered debate easily audible: “
It’s him
.
It’s him
.”

“Jupiter?”

“No, stupid, that’s Lot.”

“Shut up, you dumb ados! Remember what Gent said?”

Farther down the street, two women stood chatting beside a doorway. Recognition sparked in their eyes. “It’s him.” One stepped forward, but the other laid a gentle hand on her arm as if to hold her back. They exchanged a quick look.

Lot felt his pulse rise. His sensory tears tingled subtly, and suddenly he felt
linked
to these women, bound to them by a tenuous connection that glinted faintly silver in his awareness. His will flowed outward upon molecular links. Their will flowed back to him.

His pace slowed. A few dozen steps away, an open-air restaurant filled the alley between the broad bases of two pyramids. It was packed, and many of the patrons had already noticed him. They stood at their seats, jabbering excitedly. His name leaped out from all the meaningless noise,
Lot, Lot, Lot
. . . the same way Jupiter’s name had threaded the chaos of panicked human screams down in the tunnels.

Lot felt his perceptions begin to slip. Over a period of seconds the light around him brightened, blurring the structures and vegetation into an increscent silver glow while the people themselves became fluid, melting into humanistic icons, their individuality seeping swiftly away. He stopped in the middle of the street, blinking hard.
What was he seeing?
His natural vision ran from the visual down through the infrared range. He could see heat as well as light. But this vision did not fit anywhere in the electromagnetic spectrum.

A different interpretation, then?

Chemical sight
. He was seeing faith . . . like a silver wash spilled on the world, dissolving it, homogenizing it, melding it into a skin that enwrapped him, an invulnerable silver armor. He owned these people. He could command them; he could wear their will like a flawless silver hide. . . .

The tide shifted. Against his throat he felt the cold press of a hand. His own hand shot up, to close hard around a wrist.

“Look at me, Lot.” The voice fell like a shadow across the silver glow. “Listen to your heart. It’s flowing like a river. Try to slow it down. Slow it down.”

He could hear his heart. It rumbled like the rake of air across a ship’s skin as it dipped into atmosphere, dumping velocity. Fear darkened his vision, and his grip tightened on the wrist. “That’s right, Lot. Listen to me. Try to see me.”

“Gent?” His voice was an ugly croak in the fading light.

“Sooth. It’s me. You’re okay now, aren’t you? Sure.”

Lot’s hand ached. He looked down, to find himself still clasping Gent’s wrist in a grip so tight the veins stood out, red on white against his knuckles. He let go and Gent quickly lowered his arm, to rub at a band of four parallel purple bruises.

Lot felt drained. He glanced around: at the street, at the pyramidal buildings rising past the trees, at the breakfast crowd in the restaurant, now returned to their seats though Lot could feel them still, vibrating just beneath his vision. His gaze shifted again. Urban stood behind Gent, his arms crossed belligerently over his chest while tangled skeins of jealousy and anger ran off him. Finally, he looked at Gent.

In Lot’s personal mythology, Gent didn’t stand out as a big man—an impression derived, perhaps, from the quiet way he’d always moved on the periphery of Lot’s life. So it surprised him that he had to look up to meet Gent’s gaze. When Gent reached out to squeeze his arm, Lot felt the strength in his hand, and knew that Gent could have broken the grip Lot had held on his wrist, if he’d chosen to. “You shouldn’t have stayed away,” Gent said, his voice softly chiding. “We’ve tried to respect your wishes on it, but it hasn’t been good for you.”

Lot felt a bit of color return to his cheeks. “It wasn’t my choice.”

Gent’s face was all sharp angles and narrow planes, as if some slow inner heat had melted all the softness out of him. His hair was a mix of blond and black threads woven into eight braids that were waxed and formed into perfect rings pinned just beneath his ears. Lot touched his shoulder. He wore a thin gray shirt, and through it Lot could feel the warmth of his skin, and the rough vibration of blood stumbling through the capillaries. He could wear Gent if he wanted to. He knew it. He drew in a sharp, startled breath and turned half away, shaking with the temptation.

Was this how Jupiter had felt?

He closed his eyes, forced himself to breathe long and slow, calming himself, the way the monkey-house docs had taught him . . . trying not to hear the distant chorus of screams reverberating through the darkened corridors. The taste of bile was suddenly in his mouth. “
Why are we here?
” he croaked. He turned around, his gaze seeking Urban. “Why did you bring me here?”

Urban’s face was stony, his resentment a foul simmer in the air. “Everybody wants something.” He jerked his chin at Gent. “He wants you. He brought you here, fury. Not me. That was his price. Best if you know that.”

Cautiously, Lot raised his gaze, to look into Gent’s eyes again. Steady eyes, that looked back at him with quiet affection. Lot could feel the subtle field of his faith. “You’re not like the Silkens.”

“Let’s go inside,” Gent said. “We only have a little time.”

What am I doing here?
Kheth’s rays fell hot against his face. The air was very still. He could feel himself at a threshold. A soft voice whispered that it wasn’t too late. He could turn around. He could walk out of the refugee quarter, take the transit to Skyline, where he worked every morning tending estate gardens that belonged to families of the very real. As easily as that he could be back inside the boundaries of his routine, and city authority would show its approval by leaving him alone, leaving him the hell alone.

Maybe he’d been alone too long. Good monkey.

Ado defiance nibbled at him. Gent had been part of his family once. Together they were the last surviving members of Jupiter’s household. Maybe Lot wanted some of that relationship back.

“Okay,” he said, trying not to see Gent’s faint silver aura. “It’s good.”

“It will be,” Gent said. He held his arm out, inviting Lot to accompany him.

T
HEY CROSSED THE STREET, THEN WENT THROUGH
heavy plastic doors cast in a stylized solar design. Urban caught his eye. “You okay, fury?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

Urban looked doubtful. “You looked . . . half-gone. Vacant. I’ve never seen that before.”

Lot didn’t know how to answer him. He looked to Gent. “Did you know it would be like that?”

“There was a chance.”

“So what was it? What happened out there?”

Gent gave him an odd look. “You know.”

“I don’t.”

For just a moment Gent looked impatient. “You’re the gate to the Communion, Lot. The focusing lens through which we’ll all pass. You gather the essence of your people. Through you, they become one.”

Lot shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

Urban said, “That’s because it’s shit.”

Gent glanced at him, and shrugged—a gesture that chilled Lot. If doubts translated to defensiveness, then Gent had no doubts at all. Lot rubbed nervously at his sensory tears. “I never felt this way with Silkens.”

“That’ll come,” Gent assured him. “Given time, you can touch anyone. The difference is, we’re ready to give ourselves to you, while the Silkens, I think, still resist.” He looked to Urban, and gave him a broad wink.

“
Shit
.”

Lot gave it up for the moment, and looked around. They’d come into a small lobby. The carpets and walls were a wash of light yellow, a bright contrast to his own disquiet. An elevator opened on one side. Beside it, a wide sweep of stairs went
down
. Lot looked at the stairs in surprise. He’d never seen a building with access below ground. Silk was a surface city, and only utility engineers were permitted in the inner levels. Urban’s mood shifted as he took some pleasure from Lot’s surprise. “You’ll like this,” he said. “It’s cute.”

They trotted down the stairs, the impact of their footfalls absorbed by the carpet. The stair bent back on itself and descended another flight. Lot caught her presence while he was still on the landing. “Alta!”

He bounded after her trace. At the bottom of the stairs stood a second set of double doors cast in the sun symbol they’d seen above. Her presence teased him. “Alta?”

One of the doors swung open. Alta looked out past it, seeming a little surprised to see him. “Lot. Hello. I didn’t think you’d come.”

She’d had ten years to finish growing. Lot had watched her at the task, following her at a distance whenever he chanced to see her about in the city. She’d become an ado girl of extremes: black hair, black eyes, pale skin. No shading and no bright colors to distract from her elemental nature.

Lot had missed her sorely and he had always imagined she felt the same way, so he’d been ready to grab her, hug her, maybe hold her hands and dance—but those intentions evaporated as he ran up against the slick surface of her aura.

I didn’t think you’d come.

With painful abruptness—like running into a wall—he understood that Alta had not been missing him, though she smiled at him now in a friendly way. “You look like Jupiter. Almost exactly like him.”

“Sooth. It gives the monkey house fits.” That earned him a short laugh. But he couldn’t enjoy it. He was remembering how he’d abandoned her when panic had ignited in the tunnels. “I looked for you that day.”