Tim Lebbon - Echo city

Nophel looked through the wide doorway at the amazing room beyond. Peer hugged a man, Alexia stood inside the doorway looking around in amazement, shadows shifted, air moved, and scenes of destruction were countered by the presence of the single huge vat that still appeared whole.

These were the Baker's laboratories, and it was nothing like coming home.

He took a step forward and groaned. His vision blurred, and he tried to shout at the unfairness of things. All this way, I only need to set eyes on her before…

Nophel's world upended, and soft hands eased him to the ground.

Gorham wanted to talk with Peer, discover what she had been through, connect with her again after being apart for so long. He had never believed that connection would be possible again, not after what he had done to her. But something had changed. And he was not foolish enough to believe that the change was only in her.

She told him about Malia. He told her about Nadielle and Rose. Alexia was introduced, Rose came and took the water canteen containing Rufus's blood, and the Pserans carried Nophel into the vat chamber.

"The Baker's blood son," Peer said. Rose paused for the briefest moment to stare at him, then walked away from them all. Peer stared after her, eyes growing wide as Gorham explained more.

"So she's your daughter?"

"I…" Gorham could not say, because he had not yet come to terms with the reality of that himself.

Rose had climbed the ladder beside the vat, and she sat there with her potions and mixes, carefully extracting blood from the canteen and doing something with it that none of them could see.

"I so need to rest," Peer said. "To wash, and eat, and sleep for a day. But it feels as if it's only just begun."

"The whole city's moving south," Alexia said. She looked tired and drawn, and already she was reminding Gorham very much of Malia. There was an inner strength to her that could never be touched by physical tiredness, and she looked like someone who would get what she wanted. Unlike Malia, her eyes held a restrained humor. He liked that. In the face of all that was happening, it made her seem so human.

"We're in Rose's hands now," Gorham said. "Every chance feels small, but without her there's no chance at all."

Nophel mumbled, still unconscious. The Pserans had quickly melted away after bringing him in, and Alexia crouched by his side, carefully examining his wound.

"It needs cleaning," she said. "And he needs medicine."

The new Baker returned to them, her girl's body and face already appearing older than any of theirs. She's fading even more, Gorham thought, and he only hoped she lasted long enough.

"Do you have medicine?" Alexia asked her.

The girl stared at the prone man, and there was something in her that Gorham had not seen before. Since her birthing she had been busy-either working at the vat, or thinking about what to do next, reading the Baker's books and charts, and making esoteric notes in a thick pad. Now, for the first time, she was still and contemplative.

"Carry him through to my rooms," she said.

"Seeing you is what's kept him alive," Peer said.

Rose looked at her, then turned and walked away without replying.

Peer took a step forward, but Gorham caught her arm.

"And you thought Nadielle was cold?" he said. She smiled at him, and that warm flush he'd felt upon seeing her enter the laboratory returned. They both had so much to say, with so little time.

"I'll tell you when I'm ready," Rose said from where she'd climbed back up to the vat's lip. "You should all rest. When the time comes, we'll have to go south, to Skulk."

"And then?" Peer asked.

The girl looked at her curiously, as if considering a specimen of something she had never seen before. "I remember so much about you," she said.

Gorham felt Peer shiver against his side.

"What will happen?" Gorham asked.

"Then we see whether any of this will work." Rose turned back to the vat.

"Come on," he said. "There's some food left. And wine. We'll drink to success." He helped Alexia carry the unconscious man through the vat chamber and into the rooms beyond, and the air buzzed with unspoken news.

Peer seemed changed. She held her injured hip, but there was a strength to her that had not been there when she'd offer him a dismissive wave goodbye. Her eyes were haunted, but she had a smile for him. He hoped that was a good enough start.

They placed Nophel on the Baker's bed, then sat at a table and passed around a bottle of wine. Before long, Alexia leaned back in her chair and slept, and Peer had to settle Gorham when the Unseen woman began to flicker from view.

Gorham and Peer lay together on the other side of the bed. He watched her close her eyes and sleep, but he refused to do so. This might be the end, and he wanted to spend every moment he had left looking at the woman he had wronged. But as her breathing deepened, he, too, closed his eyes, and he rested his hand on hers as dreams carried him away. Come with me, the voice said. Please, come with me. It was a child's voice, yet it carried the weight of ages. Nophel saw the words in his father's mouth, yet his lips spelled something different, because he had gone against the Dragarians to save his son, not to doom him. There was a pain in his chest and his father frowned, but Dane could do nothing, because he was already dead. For an instant briefer than a blink, Nophel saw the fat Marcellan as he was now-taken apart in the darkness beneath the city.

His eyes snapped open, and his mother was looking down at him.

"Please, come with me." She was whispering. She looked in Nophel's one good eye, but her hands were elsewhere, sprinkling something warm and dry across his bared chest.

Nophel raised his head and looked down at the wound. The bolt had somehow been removed without him waking, and now the girl-the new Baker, two steps from his mother and yet still very much her-was tending the ragged hole left behind. It was red and inflamed, and the dust she dropped hissed slightly as it touched his skin.

"It smells," he whispered, voice harsh and dry.

"It will stop the pain." She averted her eyes.

"I'm dying." There was a weight in his chest, as if his heart had been replaced with a lump of rock.

"The bolt split a main vein. You've been bleeding into your chest cavity. I've seared the split, but it will reopen." The girl looked at him again, and there was something about her eyes that took his breath away. One of them could be mine, he thought. "Please, come with me," she repeated.

"Why?"

"Because you came down here for a reason."

Something thudded through the room, and a swath of spiderwebs hanging from the ceiling swayed. Scurrying shadows hurried across them, looking for prey that had not landed. The bed shifted, and by his side Nophel saw Peer and the man, both asleep. She looked exhausted and at peace. He only looked sad.

When Nophel held out one hand, the Baker took it and helped him up.

"Where are we going?" he asked.

"I think I have something to show you." She led him across the room, which was redolent with signs of the mother he had never known. The girl paused when he stopped, letting him lean against her as a faint passed through him. He bit his lip, and she pressed a small flattened nut into his hand.

"Sniff."

He sniffed, and the sharp scent brought his senses back.

In the corner of the room she opened a door, and they entered a much smaller room with a table, scattered charts, and a broken book on the floor. He leaned on the table as she opened another, lower door, and when she started to go down a small set of steps, he did not move.

"You abandoned me," he said, and though it was strange talking like this to a little girl, he could see that she understood every word. "I came here to… kill you."