Sea of Silver Light

The miniature infant opened its eyes, startling her back to the present.

"Too late. . . ." it said, the voice airy with distance. "Too late . . . the children are dying . . . the old children and the new children. . . ."

Renie found herself growing angry, although she was a little distracted to realize that her baby was male. "What do you mean, 'too late?' That's a lot of shit, after everything we've been through." She looked to the Stone Girl. "Don't I get to ask it a question?"

Her companion was watching the baby's eyes, which filled the lids like pearls, without irises or pupils. The Stone Girl seemed frightened about something and did not answer, so Renie turned back to the strange fruit,

"Look, I think I know what you are, and I think I may even understand a little of what is going on." Renie was not sure if she was addressing the homunculus, the tree, the air. It's like talking to God, she decided. Although this one goes out of its way to communicate. Sort of. "Just tell me what you want from us. Are we supposed to find you? Was that what the black mountain was all about?"

Tiny limbs twitched slowly. "Wanted . . . the children . . . safe. . . ." It flailed again, as though drowning in a deep, unfriendly dream. "The new children . . . nowhere to be. . . . Now the cold. . . ."

"What about the children? Why don't you just let them go?"

"Hurts. Going to fall. Then warm . . . for a little while. . . ." Terrifyingly, the small perfect mouth opened wide and a rhythmic, wheezing hiss filled the air. Renie could not tell if it was laughter or gasping misery; either way, it was a horrible sound.

"Just tell us what you want! Why did you take the children—my brother Stephen, all the others? How can we get them back?"

The noise had ended. The tiny arms moved more slowly. The homunculus was becoming loose and flabby, collapsing in on itself in dreadful, high-speed putrefaction.

". . . Set free. . . ." The voice was a whisper that barely reached her ears. ". . . Set . . . free. . . ."

"God damn you!" Renie shouted. "Come back and talk to me!" But whatever had spoken was silent. Renie tried to remember the song that had summoned it, but the words were a jumble in her head, adding chaos to the rising anger. It was like dealing with Stephen at his most truculent—the child that simply would not obey, who almost dared you to use force. She gave up on the unfamiliar verse and began hoarsely to sing the words she did know, determined to drag the thing back from wherever it was hiding, force it to deal with her.

"Rock-a-bye, baby,

in the treetop,"

The fruit in her hands liquified and ran between her fingers. With a grunt of disgust, Renie threw it down and wiped her hands in the dirt, singing all the while.

"When the wind blows,

the cradle will rock.

When the bough breaks,

the cradle will fall,

And down will come baby,

cradle and all."

"Do you hear me?" she snarled. "Cradle and all, damn it!"

For a long moment there was only silence. Then a whisper, thin as a death-sigh, rose all around her.

"Why . . . hurting? . . . Called you . . . but now . . . too late. . . ."

"Called. . . ? You bastard, you didn't call anyone—you stole my brother!" Anger was bubbling out of her now, confined for too long in too tight a space. "Where is he? God damn you, you tell me where Stephen Sulaweyo is or I'll come find you and take you apart piece by piece. . . !" There was no reply. Furious, she opened her mouth to begin the verse again, to drag the thing back by its metaphorical ear, but was stopped by a sudden convulsive shudder up and down the tree's smooth black trunk—a peristaltic spasm that made the branches whip and snap overhead, knocking leaves and twigs from the other trees even as the black roots stirred the lake to froth.

Then, with the sudde

The Stone Girl turned to Renie, eyes wide, mouth a dark gape.

"You . . . you killed it," she said. "You killed the Witching Tree!"

CHAPTER 19

The Bravest: Man in the World

NETFEED/NEWS: ANVAC Arrests Own Customer for Noncomptiance

(visual: defendant Vildbjerg's house, Odense, Denmark)

VO: Danish music producer Nalli Vildbjerg was briefly jailed and is being sued by the security corporation ANVAC for violating his contract—failing to notify them of a crime that occurred on the premises they protect.

VILDBJERG: "These people are mad! I had a party, and someone took a coat that didn't belong to them—by accident, I'm certain. These ANVAC madmen saw it on the surveillance, and not only had this person arrested—a guest of mine!—but now they're prosecuting me, too!"

(visual: anonymated attorney from ANVAC's international legal firm, Thurn, Taxis, and Posthorn)

ATTORNEY: "When you sign one of our contracts, it says very clearly on page one hundred and seventeen that all crimes that occur onsite must be immediately and accurately reported to the company. Mr. Vildbjerg does not have the right to ignore crime—to appoint himself judge and jury in a matter of Danish and UN law."

I'll just remember Orlando, Sam told herself for perhaps the twentieth time in the past few hours. Then I can keep going. She might be stumbling with fatigue and miserable with worry, missing her parents and her home so badly she wanted to scream, but that was nothing compared to what Orlando had shouldered every single day.

But it killed him, she could not help remembering. So what good did it do him being brave, so brave. . . ?

"I think it is time for another rest," !Xabbu said. "We have been walking a long time now."

"And nothing is different," she said bitterly. "Is it just going to be like this forever? It could, couldn't it? Huh? Just go on forever, I mean. It's not a real place."

"I suppose." !Xabbu dropped easily into a crouch, showing no effects from the all-day march that had Sam's legs trembling with fatigue. "But it doesn't seem . . . what is the word? Likely. Logical."

"Logical." She sniffed. "That sounds like Renie."

"It does sound like her," said !Xabbu. "I miss her—always thinking, wondering, trying to make sense of every detail." He looked up at a movement nearby, something cresting the low riverside hill they had just descended. It was Jongleur, trudging after them with that grim tenacity that Sam found almost admirable. His body might be relatively young and healthy, that of a fit middle-aged man, but it was clear Jongleur himself had no recent practice in moving such a body for very long and was feeling the endless walk even more than she was.

"I still hate him," Sam said quietly. "I utterly do. But it's hard to, you know, keep it up when you see someone all the time, isn't it?"

!Xabbu did not answer. He and the older man were no longer naked since the Bushman had woven them both a sort of kilt from the long river grasses during their rest stops, and Sam had to admit it made her a little more comfortable. She thought of herself as modern and un-shockable, but it was strange enough having !Xabbu naked all the time, and herself nearly so; to have to confront the raw physical reality of Felix Jongleur for days on end had made her feel like she couldn't quite get clean.