Glen Cook - Ceremony

She knew very little about what had happened since her departure. But for the regular visit of High Night Rider, and the occasional appearance of a Mistress of the Ship with an adventurous spirit, a desire to visit the strange worlds Marika had reported, and a knack for assembling bath of like temperament, she had no ties with home.

Grauel and Barlog had recognized the process at work and had ceased their importunities for abandoning the quest, fearing their petitions would harden her resolve.

She was finding it increasingly difficult to convince herself that the hunt was worthwhile. There was no end to the universe, even within the dust cloud. There was always another star. And, inevitably, always another disappointment.

It was time for High Night Rider to come again. She felt she had reached a time of decision. If the news from home were bad, she would return.

The mirrors, insofar as she knew, were coming along well. A brief note half a year earlier, written by Bagnel, had told her the mirror in the leading trojan was well ahead of schedule. So much for his doubts about his management skills.

But he had mentioned trouble down on the homeworld's surface. The old rogue male trouble had begun to reassert itself. The Communities seemed unable to stem it. This time the outlaws seemed to be working independent of the brethren, under the dominance of their wehrlen, but there were those, according to Bagnel, who did not believe the warlock was the true source of their witchcraft. Silth did not want to believe a male could be so strong, so felt the rogues had to be getting aid and encouragement from silth smuggled in by the Serke.

On its last visit High Night Rider had brought word that the rogues were sabotaging the brethren as well as silth, that assassination had become their primary weapon. They were using their talent-suppressing device again, and the sisterhoods could not cope.

Marika suspected they could not cope because they did not feel motivated enough. Even now, after all the disaster they had wrought, it was difficult to get silth to take males seriously as a threat.

Marika did not want to take up that task again, but it seemed she might have to, if the vague reports she received indicated the way things were actually moving. If the Communities themselves would not spend the effort and energy to defend themselves adequately.

A wave of undirected touch passed over her. She looked at the sky as one of her bath called out, "Mistress, High Night Rider has come."

A blob of light moved across the sky, visible even in daylight. It slowed, maneuvered, fell into orbit. Marika rose and stalked through the camp, which today housed nearly a score of meth. Two other darkships were operating from her base, not participating in the hunt, but examining more closely the most interesting of the worlds that Marika had discovered. Their Mistresses were young ones, filled with a desire to expand the frontiers, and they had found themselves teams of bath willing to join their ventures.

Marika's reports home had had one effect: They had somewhat revivified the old spirit of exploration. Once she had blazed a trail others were eager to devote closer attention to what she had found.

She suspected Bagnel was irked. That meant darkships scattered about the void contributing nothing to the mirror project. She suspected the tedium of construction work was what had encouraged these younger Mistresses and bath to come out to the edge of beyond.

The explorers could do little to truly expand meth knowledge. There were more curiosities among the starworlds than could have been cataloged by ten thousand darkship crews in ten thousand lifetimes.

Of late even Marika had been spending more time looking at those curiosities than she had been being driven by her need to overhaul the Serke.

"Darkships coming down, mistress," someone called. "At least three of them. Maybe four."

That was to be expected. There were supplies to be delivered, and always there was another group of explorers who had saved themselves effort by scavenging a ride aboard the giant voidship.

Though the darkships would not ground for a long time yet, Marika went to the landing area with the others. They all stood around waiting, joining in speculation about what news would come from home.

The first darkship down carried a passenger.

"By the All! Bagnel!" Marika swore as the tradermale stepped down. He was shaking, numb with awe. "What are you doing here?" He did not hear her. Whether he was amazed to have arrived healthy, or overawed by having traveled so far, he was completely turned inside himself. She rushed over and repeated her question as meth yelled about clearing the area so the next darkship could ground.

Silth stared. A male! Out here!

Bagnel shuddered as though shaking water off, and said, "Marika." He looked her over. "You have changed."

"So have you. Is that gray I see there? Time gnaws, does it not? It must be fate. I was just thinking about you-and here you are. What are you doing here? Come with me. Before that Mistress gets impatient and plops down on our heads."

"Are you all right? You look tired."

"I am tired, Bagnel. I have looked at more stars than you can imagine even exist. Though you must have seen how many there are when you spanned the reach outside the cloud. Come. Let's get something to eat. You must be starved."

"My stomach is too unsettled. That passage ... It was too much for me, I fear. The Up-and-Over ... I find myself dreading the return trip already."

"You still haven't told me what you're doing here. Has something happened?"

"No. Except that I have been stripped of my job and prerogatives. Whoa! It's only temporary. A cabal of senior factors and high silth ganged up on me and ordered me to take a vacation. They said I was pushing myself too hard, that I was on the edge of a breakdown because I was trying too hard to keep the project ahead of schedule. They stripped me of my powers so I would have no choice. Since they wouldn't let me do anything at all, and the Redoriad were willing when I approached them, I decided to come walk the stars while I had a chance. You invited me, you'll recall. I think I am sorry I did it."

"I recall. I believe I invited you to come after I caught the Serke."

"But you haven't. You've been out here forever. It begins to seem unlikely, doesn't it?"

"I am narrowing it down, Bagnel. Narrowing it down. I have a very good idea where they're not."

"You are still able to be amused at yourself."

"Not often. But I don't think it will be too much longer."

"You sound like you're trying to convince yourself."

Marika noted Grauel and Barlog hovering. They were polite enough to remain out of earshot, but they were there, eager to discover the meaning of Bagnel's appearance. Marika asked, "You're sure this isn't business? That someone didn't send you out to get me to come home?"

He looked surprised. "No. Why do you ask that?"

"We get very little reliable news out here. What we have gotten are rumors about increasingly bad rogue trouble. Trouble nobody seems able-or maybe just willing-to solve. I thought maybe someone sent you to get me to come back and deal with it."

"Marika ... I might as well put it bluntly. The vast majority of silth are very happy that you are out here instead of at home. That's why you get the support you do. The farther away you are, the happier they are."

"Oh."

"The rogues have become a problem again, though, that's for sure. They're much better organized this time. They learned a lot."

"I believe I predicted that. I believe no one would listen to me."

"Right. It's no longer possible to use the tactics you developed. One cannot be taken and forced to betray scores more by subjecting him to a truthsaying. They have structured their organization so that few members know any of the others. And they are careful to keep the risks low whenever they choose to strike."