Karl Schroeder - Ashes of Candesce - Book Five of Virga

Now that he knew where to look in his own mind, he remembered it--not all, but enough. Sita had forgotten him; but in the months after their marrage had dissolved, he'd still held out hope that they might have a second chance. They could, after all, start over from scratch as long as she didn't de-list him from her social reality.

But then, during the gentle winter of the year, something had started killing nags.

Revelation had always been a beautiful planet, and most of its beauty was real. The virtual overlays that accented it (like the cascades of pixie dust the fairies threw off) were subtle and added to the wonder of the natural world. Anyone who spent too long in a purely virtual world would get kicked out by the nags; keeping people anchored in reality was, after all, their function.

"When the rumors about the nags started," he told Leal, "I was too sunk in my own misery to pay much attention. At first I didn't notice when the scry's overlays on my senses began to become more detailed, more interlinked into these strange and gorgeous, purely virtual realms. I guess I was sufficiently unhappy--and sufficiently stubborn not to take a cure for my misery--that I remained immune to this kind of a ... siren call ... of a nag-free, virtual paradise that had started to creep over Revelation."

As he'd sat here on the hull of the Judgment , Keir had found himself thinking about one memory in particular--a memory that he couldn't believe he'd lost during these past months. It was of his last glimpse of Sita.

"I remember her," he said softly, "standing on marble steps that led up to a golden, glowing archway. A dozen of my other friends were there, too. It's like a dream, but I know it really happened: some of them walked without hesitation up and into the light and it ... swallowed them. Sita glanced around once, and there was recognition in her eyes. And then she, too, mounted the steps and consigned her mind to an online reality that would never again let her free."

In the real world, Sita's body and its double had fallen silent. That day they had left Atavus to join a vast throng of Revelation's population that was congregating at the edge of the seashore. Like ants, they were building a vast arcology--a hive--for the entity that had traded them its illusions for reality.

"A week after that, I sold my house to the tulips and I left Revelation for good." He had joined the Renaissance.

"Leal, I was one of the founders of the Brink expedition. But ... something happened. Sometime in the past two years, I was neotenized. That's not all bad; my body began to change, shedding its old cells and structures, replacing it all with new, strong tissue. But my brain began to lose the pathways it had built for decades. It began to rewire itself, and when that happens it's not just memory that you lose. Most of your personality goes as well.

"Whether I did this to myself or ... someone forced it on me, I don't know--"

"Forced it on you?" She looked horrified. "Who would do such a thing?"

He shrugged. "It's less than murder, but just as effective. And I would never have known, had I not come here to Virga. The process seems to have stopped, probably because of--" He nodded at distant Candesce.

She followed his gaze to the sun of suns. "Do you have any idea who it was? Someone at the Renaissance?"

"It could have been me." He slapped the cold hull. "I know I never got over what happened to Sita--but I'd also sworn never to do something like it to myself. And I remember resisting the feeling ... of things slipping away."

"Keir," Leal said soberly, "why did you come to Virga? You had a chance to go back after you rescued us--"

"No, I had to get out!" Even as he said this he realized how intense that need for escape had been; yet now, he had no idea what had caused it. Unless-- "If I didn't do this to myself ... if someone else did it to me and I knew, knew it was happening ... that would explain..."

Something welled up in him then, and to his astonishment Keir found he was crying. Part of him stood outside himself, watching in wonder, and his tears flicked away in the winds of Virga, and Leal wrapped him in her arms and murmured in his ear.

Eventually he stopped, but they stayed together, washed in the breeze and unspeaking.

Then the hatch flew open and Venera Fanning's head popped out. "There you are. Grab your things, I'm sending you back to Rush with the others."

Venera gave no sign of noticing that Leal and Keir were holding one another. Instead, she vigorously yanked at the tab on a signal flare, and when it lit, began waving it in broad strokes. She left a long spiral trail of smoke on the air.

Keir and Leal disengaged themselves. "Where are you going, Venera?" asked Leal.

"The city-state of Fracas," she announced with an air of satisfaction. "Currently something of a thorn in our side, no? And I'd like to know why." Keir had seen the red dots Venera had started adding to her chart of nations; and since their meeting with Princess Thavia, he'd certainly noticed how many cities and countries had begun turning the Judgment away. "If Sacrus and its outside allies are mustering their own alliance, we need to know the details. That could take a very long time if we were to rely on diplomacy and reportage. What we need is a way to make a very quick head count." She grinned rakishly, every inch the pirate queen in her leather trousers and flapping shirt, sizzling flare in one hand as the other clutched a guide rope hanging off the Judgment 's nose.

Keir laughed in surprise. His melancholy mood was evaporating in the face of the sheer strangeness that was Venera Fanning.

The flare died and Venera let it go. "It's funny--I've come full circle," she mused. "Fracas is right next to where Spyre used to be. The city's always sheltered under Spyre's battlements. It's under no one's jurisdiction. It would be the perfect base for people who claim no country of their own, don't you think? I've no doubt that if the hostages are still in Virga, this is where they're being kept.

"Ah!" she added brightly. "There they are."

A glitter of ship lights had appeared in the depths beyond the way station. There must be four or five vessels there--all quite large by Leal's reckoning.

Venera made to reenter the yacht, but looked back to say, "I'm leaving in a half-hour, so you'd best be gone by then."

"And a fond good-bye to you, too," Leal said after she vanished. She and Keir climbed over to the hatch. "Well, as usual, Venera seems to have a plan," she said as he opened it. "But what about you, Keir? --Now that you know ... something ... of yourself? What are you going to do?"

He took one more look at Candesce, half-wrapped now in veils of cloud. "My memory's a puzzle," he said. "But I think enough of the pieces remain ... and one thing I do remember is that I'm good at puzzles.

"I'm going to put this one together."

15

"THIS ONE'S NOTon the list."

Jacoby Sarto frowned like a thunderhead at the dockmaster. The open-ended, cylindrical docking structure of the town of Fracas was crowded with ships, a jumble of national flags and royal seals. They'd all landed as scheduled over the past days, disgorging one or two key persons who would look around in apprehension or disdain, then take to the stairs that led down to the city--and never return.

The yacht that was settling onto the decking now was different from the others. It was a kind of assassin's dagger, long, sharp, and bristling with prickles for any unwary hand that tried to grasp it. Closer up, the thorns became fins, some adorned with jet engines. Jacoby's military experience told him that the yacht's cockpit was at its center of gravity, and those engines would let the craft spin around itself, for what Jacoby assumed was uncanny--and clearly military--maneuverability.