Alastair Reynolds - Poseidon's Wake

‘It has to be said that Sunday’s position was exceptional,’ Nissa put in. ‘It was her choice to leave the family business, but that money was always there if she chose to return.’ She glanced at Kanu, as if seeking his approval.

Kanu nodded. ‘Yes. She was a struggling artist, but she always had that safety net. And when the time came, she felt she had no choice but to take on her share of the family responsibility. But it was not a surrender. From what I understand — and Nissa is the historian here, not me — Sunday could have carried on creating art indefinitely.’

‘She was prolific enough as it was,’ said Mrs Karimah Al Asnam. ‘Imagine how hard it would be to get to grips with her work if she’d continued for another century!’

‘Picasso produced around fifty-two thousand works of art,’ Nissa said, ‘and Vermeer fewer than fifty, yet they are of equal interest to us. It’s true, though: Sunday’s legacy is already more than enough for most of us. And that’s before we start worrying about all the lost pieces, scattered around Earth and the solar system.’

‘I am just sorry she could not share in this,’ said Mr Al Asnam. ‘It would have been a blessing on her life. What is the point of having all this fame and prestige if you are not alive to share it?’

‘You think about death too much,’ chided Mrs Al Asnam, placing a hand on her husband’s wrist. ‘It’s not a healthy preoccupation.’

‘I think about death to stare it in the eye,’ Mr Al Asnam replied, with a sudden fierce enthusiasm.

There was a formulaic quality to this exchange which led Kanu to suspect it had been aired before, perhaps many times. The Al Asnams appeared cosily settled in their routines, as comfortable with each other as a pair of gloves.

‘You must tell us again how you came to meet,’ said Mrs Al Asnam. ‘Nissa explained quickly, but I do not think I quite understood. You were married once, and now you have met again because of your mutual interest in Sunday?’

‘We met in Lisbon,’ Nissa said. ‘Accidentally. But had it not been for Sunday’s work, it wouldn’t have happened.’

‘And you were aware of Mrs Mbaye’s scholarship beforehand?’ Mr Al Asnam asked.

‘How could he not have been?’ asked Mrs Al Asnam, as if this was the silliest thing he had ever said.

‘Actually, I wasn’t,’ Kanu said, smiling. ‘It’s a terrible confession, I know, but I’ve really only developed an interest in Sunday since I got home. And it was a coincidence, our meeting again.’

‘The world still has the capacity to surprise us,’ said Mr Al Asnam, visibly pleased with himself at the expression of this sentiment. ‘This gives me hope.’

‘Sooner or later,’ Nissa said, ‘our paths would have crossed. In some ways, perhaps it’s not such a coincidence. I developed an interest in Sunday’s work because of our marriage, and it must always have been at the back of Kanu’s mind, something he meant to look into.’

‘I’m glad it happened, though,’ Kanu said. ‘I didn’t realise how much I’d missed a friend until I was back on Earth.’

With a certain inevitability they had become lovers again a week after their reunion in Lisbon. It was tentative at first, both of them recognising that their new-found friendship could just as easily be broken as reinforced. Equally, neither had much to lose. If they became lovers and then decided it was not working, no great hurt would have been done to either party. They could still part on good terms, better for the experience. In the meantime, as in all things, Kanu opted to trust the compass of his instincts and hope for the best.

Both had changed in the century since their marriage ended. Kanu was much older than Nissa — very old indeed even by the modern measure. He had benefited from his merfolk genetic transformation, which protected him against the worse effects of the Mechanism’s fall. Nissa was less advantaged, but as she approached the turn of her third century, it was clear she had made the wisest use of her wealth and contacts, seeking out the best prolongation therapies available in this harsher, simpler world. They both carried their allotment of scars, inside and out.

‘I have work to do,’ she said as they were lying next to each other in one of the guest bedrooms. ‘Too much work and not enough time. I’m not ready to give in just yet.’

‘I was thinking back to what Mr Al Asnam said. He had a point, didn’t he? What’s the sense in all this glory if Sunday’s not around to be a part of it?’ Kanu kept his voice low, not wanting to disturb the other sleepers in the household. It was late and the night silent. He felt himself at the epicentre of an almost perfect stillness, as if Tangiers was the unmoving pivot around which the rest of the universe revolved.

Perhaps it was the wine.

‘Half of all the great art and literature in existence went unrecognised during the lifetimes of its creators,’ Nissa answered in the same low murmur. ‘I know, it’s a terribly unfair state of affairs, but that’s just life. At least your grandmother wasn’t unhappy, or starving, or persecuted. That’s more than some of them managed.’

‘I’m not ungrateful. We’d both be poorer without her work.’

Nissa rolled over into his belly, straddling him. She began to draw lazy spiralling designs on his chest, circles within circles, wheels within wheels. ‘Reputation’s everything to you Akinyas, isn’t it? You’ve always got to push at the boundaries, looking to the horizon.’

‘Not all of us.’

She stroked his neck. ‘What happened to the gills?’

‘I didn’t need them on Mars and they’re a bother in a spacesuit.’ Kanu began to stroke the side of her face, testing the line of her jaw against his memory. ‘Perhaps I should grow them back. I think my space-travelling days are over.’

‘That’s a shame. I thought you might like to see my ship.’

‘You really have a ship?’

‘A terrible waste of money, most of the time — just sits up in orbit, depreciating.’

‘Then sell it.’

‘I would, except it’s not exactly a seller’s market right now. Hello, would you like to buy a spaceship? Nearly new, one careful owner? The only drawback is you’ll need to spend a month filing flight applications even if you only want to go to Venus and back. Oh, and there are huge alien things floating out there which might be about to kill us. Most people can’t be bothered.’ She was working her way down his abdomen, slowly and with care, as if mapping an alien territory. ‘Besides, I’m going to need it again. All I’m waiting on is the permission.’

She had been vague about her plans for the future. Kanu began to understand why.

‘You mean to go somewhere?’

‘Not far — just an exploratory expedition, following up a line of enquiry.’

‘To do with Sunday?’

‘From the right angle, everything is to do with Sunday. I’m serious, though — I thought you might like to see the ship.’

‘I’ll think about it.’

‘Well, don’t overdo the enthusiasm.’

‘No, really — it would be nice. Where exactly are you going, anyway?’

‘You don’t get to learn all my secrets at once, Kanu Akinya.’

He smiled at her coyness. ‘Nor would I wish to.’

They fell into wordless, near-silent lovemaking, after which they lay back in their bed and tried to sleep.

But Kanu found it impossible. After a few restless hours he rose, dressed, left the room as quietly as possible and began to stroll the moonlit corridors, stairs and courtyard of the house. When the shutters were thrown wide, the windows turned out to be wooden carvings cut with tremendous skill into mesmerising Islamic patterns. By day, they cast interlocking designs across the courtyard’s tiles, developing across the hours like a slowly revealing mathematical argument. At night the same theorem repeated itself in the paler hues of moonlight.