Elizabeth Hand - Æstival Tide

“Because of the Architects,” Nasrani was saying. Hobi started. He hadn’t been listening; a soft labored sound, like something breathing, had diverted his attention to a heap of rags near the gravator entrance.

“…back then they were training me to be the next Architect Imperator—”

Hobi looked up in surprise as Nasrani continued, “Before you were born. I had the finest tutors. The Kray Nine Thousand and Natambu Bellairs. I’m the oldest in the family, you know. Âziz comes next, but she’s three years younger and…”

Hobi nodded, fidgeting. Far above the gravator could barely be discerned, a square of violet light floating down, cables wrapping it like black velvet ropes.

Nasrani continued, “…and really she’s the least intelligent of all of us. That’s why she relies so utterly on the Architects; why for generations they have all enslaved themselves to the Architects. Because they were stupid; because no one had the education or temperament to question the machines.”

“But you did.” Hobi nodded. It seemed the right thing to say.

“That’s right. I did. I was researching the western storm system, what the moujiks call Ucalegon. Did you know there was another city here once, before Araboth?”

Hobi shook his head.

“There was. It was called Indianola.”

With a grating noise the gravator finally stopped in front of them. They stepped inside and sat down. Hobi practically groaned with relief as the doors closed and the machine began to rise once more, but Nasrani went on as though nothing had changed.

“We’ve found evidence that this site was settled nearly a thousand years ago. It was a port then, feeding into the Gulf—”

“The Gulf?”

“Yes, the Gulf! All that water out there? The sea? ” Nasrani glared at him. “You’ve been out at Æstival Tide?”

Hobi looked offended. “I just never heard anyone call it that.”

Nasrani raised his eyebrows triumphantly. “My point exactly. That’s because nobody knows anymore. The Architects clean their files periodically and purge them of old data, and then no one remembers the original names of things. But there was a city here, quite a large one. Indianola. The Gateway to Texas, they called it. It was a trade center for petroleum and metals and other things. Cattle, in the very beginning when there were farmlands here. A pleasure city for a while. Then a port again, for trade with HORUS and the Commonwealth, before the Long Night destroyed most of the cities and there was no one left to trade with: Then when things were restored somewhat after the Third Ascension, it became a port for the slave trade.”

Hobi tilted his head. “So was this city destroyed by the Commonwealth or the Emirate?”

“It was destroyed by a storm. By several storms. Hurricanes, tidal waves, typhoons. The first time—the first time we have records—was in the nineteenth century. Then again in the twentieth, and again in the twenty-first. Each time they rebuilt the city, and each time it was wiped away as though it had never existed. The last time was the worst—by then the storm systems had grown terrifically—the weather had mutated like everything else. Afterward the Long Night came before they had a chance to rebuild it. When the Prophets of the Two Faiths finally joined forces a hundred years later, they raised the Quincunx Domes atop the ruins of those earlier cities, and named the new city Araboth. Seventh Heaven.”

Hobi glanced out the window. Outside the glow of the refineries faded as they rose another level. “Is it a secret, then? That this was Indianola once?”

Nasrani took a snuffbox from his greatcoat and did a pinch, sneezed, then tucked his long legs under him. “No. No secret; just forgotten history.

“I learned other things, too. Especially later, when I started to try and find out about the nemosynes. I told you that the weather has been changing outside—the Shinings did that, and then some of the HORUS projects had an unanticipated effect. In the last few years it’s gotten worse—the Aviators bring back reports of storms in the Archipelago that wipe out entire islands in a single night. I myself have seen images from the HORUS satellites that show that the very shape of some of the continents has changed. There is a new storm system that builds in the seas to the east of Araboth. Every year for the last six or seven years at least one of these storms has come near enough to alter the topography of the coast a hundred miles south of here.”

Hobi stared openmouthed, but before he could say anything the exile cut him off.

“But did the Architects see this? They did not! Storms like these—if one of them were to strike here it could destroy us—”

Hobi protested, “But it would never break through. The domes…”

“The domes are hundreds of years old! And the Architects are even older. I believe they are starting to fail us—they are not as reliable as they once were. In the last year they have been giving the wrong data. Nothing anyone would notice during routine use; but as I told you, I was trained to be the Architect Imperator, so I noticed. Little things, like that hole we saw in the Undercity….”

Hobi cried, “But—but what does it mean?”

Nasrani took a deep breath. “It means, either the Architects are malfunctioning or—or they’re malfunctioning, that’s all.”

Suddenly he looked tired, not the margravin in exile but a haggard man no longer young. He looked at Hobi almost desperately. “That is why I’m trying to wake the nemosyne, to see if she can access others Outside. Perhaps there is a master diagnostic that could repair the Architects. Or one of the meteorological nemosynes that could track the storm systems accurately. Because otherwise…”

He spread his hands, shrugging, and said nothing more.

Hobi looked away, brushing his long hair from his face. Periwinkle light filled the gravator, and the smell of lemons. They were approaching Cherubim. He thought of his father sitting up all night, talking to the Architects. He thought of all those other nights since his mother had been murdered, his sleepless father bleary-eyed and grim in his study. He thought of the fissure in the Undercity, and of a clear voice intoning The rift at Pier Forty-three is spreading.

“How do you know all this?” he asked at last, his voice cracking. “Why haven’t the Architects said anything? Why doesn’t my father know?”

Nasrani threw up his hands, falling against the wall as the gravator lurched to a stop. “Because the Architects are wrong, that’s why! They’ve been relying on old data, the lines from HORUS have been skewed, I don’t know! But they’re wrong, there is a new storm system. And I know, because I’ve seen it.”

Hobi swallowed. He remembered what the exile had said earlier, about the tunnel that had led him to the replicants. “You’ve been Outside?”

Nasrani nodded. Without looking at the boy he stood and started for the door. Hobi followed, shaking his head.

“But you’re alive. They say you can’t go Outside, except at Æstival Tide. They say you’ll go mad. They say you’ll die.”

With a grinding clang the doors slid open. “Well,” said Nasrani as he looked down at Hobi with his clear pale eyes. “It’s like I told you:

“ They’re wrong. ”

IT HAD BEEN SOME time since Ceryl had been to her chambers on Thrones. When she opened the door a musky smell greeted them, amber essence and patchouli, but everything was neat and considerably more luxurious than what Reive was accustomed to.

“You can sleep here.” Ceryl pointed to a long divan plumped with yellow velvet pillows. “I’ll be in the next room if you need me—help yourself to anything you can find.” She was exhausted. Not even the threat of more nightmares could keep her from sleeping. She drew a bolt on the door, then retired to the bedroom.