Tim Lebbon - Echo city

He opened the nozzle and they drank the water down.

"Making friends?" Nadielle asked. She'd appeared silently behind him, and something about her had changed. The watering had calmed him a little, giving him time to think, and he'd hoped that the Baker would be more composed when he next saw her. Her work was in progress, after all. And being home must surely make her feel safe.

But when he turned to Nadielle, he was shocked. It was as if days, not mere moments, had passed since he'd seen her last; she looked older, more tired, and her skin had taken on a pale gray hue he had never noticed before. Her eyes flittered left and right. She had always been strong, superior in her position of greater knowledge-though he wasn't sure whether he'd placed her on a pedestal or if she'd climbed there herself-but now she looked like a lost soul.

"Nadielle…"

"It's all too much," she said. "Gorham, I can't do it on my own. Some of it, but not all. I need your help." She frowned and started talking almost to herself again. "There's so much to do. We'll need the seed, and then the ingredients, the formulae, and then…" She paused and glanced up at Gorham.

Did she really forgot I'm here? he thought. Or did she forget where she is?

"I'm here to help you, Nadielle. What do you need? I've watered the vats, and I'll do whatever else you want. They'll come back with Rufus soon, and-"

"Too late to wait for that," she said. She looked around at her vats, her chamber, her sharp creations. "Come with me."

He followed her to her rooms, closing the door behind him, and she went straight to her table. Books and papers were strewn across its surface, and at the mess's center lay one of the big books she'd brought in from that deeper room. Torn paper bookmarks protruded from it, and he caught sight of a smear of words and numbers where it lay open. It looked as if someone had passed their hand across wet ink, smudging the information across both pages.

"I can't do both," she said. "I can't fight the Vex and plan how to use Rufus, look at him, find out about him. It's too much for one person. My mother, perhaps… her mother… but not me, Gorham. I don't have it in me. Not with this happening. Not with the Vex."

"So what do you need from me?" he asked, sitting down across the table from her.

"Your seed," Nadielle said.

Gorham caught his breath. Her eyes glittered in her pale face. He smelled those vats, saw the strange surface sucking water down, heard and felt the gentle impacts against their sides as he climbed the ladder. And he knew what she wanted to do.

"How can another me help us?"

"It can't. But another me can."

"I don't understand," he said, but in truth he did. He simply did not want to acknowledge what she was thinking.

"I need to go back down now," she said. "I'm the Baker, and I might be able to slow it. There are ways and means." She waved generally toward the vat hall. "And maybe I can even reason with it." She ran her hand across the books again. "But I also need to be here, and to take advantage of the time I make by slowing the Vex to think of Rufus, and how we might escape."

He nodded slowly, her intentions dawning. I've already lost one woman I love, he thought, but the selfishness of that hit him hard, and he felt himself blush.

Nadielle must have thought the flush was because of something else.

"It'll be okay," she said, smiling wanly. "I've done it before. Don't you remember?"

He did remember. Before there had been passion and lust, heavy breathing from both of them, a need and a desire, and her stroking of his cock had been a preamble, a tender massage ensuring his hardness before she rode him or he rode her, and sometimes she'd kept going because she could feel how primed he was, how ready and desperate for the release.

This time it was joyless and harsh. Nadielle did not smile but worked at him hard and fast, keen not to waste any time. In her other hand she held the glass beaker, ready to catch his seed. He closed his eyes and tried to remember more-loving times, but he could not. It was so impersonal and cold that he did not even want to make a noise when he came, and he found it easy to spend himself with little more than a sigh.

She smiled at him when it was over-a sad smile that said so much-but they were both way beyond platitudes. She stood and went for the door, and Gorham stumbled behind her, buttoning his trousers.

"Gorham," she said, standing with her back to the door, "you can't watch me doing this."

"But I'm helping you." He looked at the beaker, clasped in both of her hands as if to keep it warm.

"You are," she agreed. "But no Baker has ever revealed her own special secrets. I'll not be the first." She opened the door, whispered something that sounded more like a hiss, and several bladed shadows manifested behind her.

"Please don't try to follow me," she said. "I'll tell you when it's done." And she closed the door on his bafflement and hurt.

He wandered the room for a while, looking at her papers and books and making sense of none of it. He sat on her bed. And when he heard a long, strident hiss-a vat being initiated, he guessed, or something more arcane that he could never even guess at-he lay back down and closed his eyes.

This time sleep would not come, so he lived his nightmares awake.

They help him. Give him water-sweet, pure, fresher than any he has ever tasted-but not too much. Fruit he cannot identify. A thick, rich vegetable soup that tastes of the ground and all the wonders within. He's settled on a gently swinging hammock strung between two tall, lush trees that are taller than any he's seen before, their tops scratching the sky and almost gathering clouds. The hammock is woven from soft rope. It's gentle on his sunburned skin. He's naked, and the woman who found him has tended his burns with a gentle, sour-smelling ointment that moisturizes his skin and eases the pain. There are blisters, and his skin is shedding from his shoulders and back, but he can feel his body fixing itself. All around him the rich green grass is crisscrossed with shale paths, and low buildings hug the landscape in the shadows of tall trees.

A group of children are playing away from the trees, throwing a ball to one another in a large marked pitch. Sometimes they shout and cheer as one of them scores, other times they argue good-naturedly, and he has spent some time trying to work out the rules of their game. The fact that he is no nearer to understanding than he was when he started watching does not upset him. This is a new place, a different place, and he's glad.

Some of the children glance at him now and then, and as the sun dips toward the valley's ridgeline, a few come to look. They stare for a while-long-haired and brown-skinned and glowing with health, their eyes filled with wonder and innocence. He sees intelligence in their expressions and the evidence of hard work on their hands. Perhaps soon they will let him play with them.

The woman comes and helps him from the hammock, wrapping him in a blanket and guiding him toward one of the buildings. He becomes aware of many other people watching him, observing with a frank curiosity that does not make him uncomfortable.

They don't know where I'm from, he thinks. I showed her the desert and she was shocked. They must think nothing can live out there. Perhaps they think they're all there is.

The building is like others he has seen in the settlement, made from baked mud bricks, strong and dependable. The windows are glazed with extravagant colored glass, the doors hung with strange sigils, and inside there are several rooms, all leading out from the central area. Here there is a roaring fire, and several people are seated on intricately carved wooden chairs. There's a peace about them, a calmness that puts him at ease.