Sea of Silver Light

She had lied to the security people, of course, if only by omission. And in a way she had lied to Mr. Ramsey—not by anything she had told him, but by doing it in a written message, knowing he could not respond, that she would not have to defend herself. And just as she had feared, his replies had come hastening back, a chorus of protesting voices that she could not bear to access.

It was time to go. She would sleep in her rental car for a few hours in the out-of-the-way spot she had found deep in the bayou, then when her alarm woke her at midnight, she would make her way in through the swamp in the raft she had bought, try to land somewhere in the park that covered one edge of the artificial island. It seemed unlikely there would be no guards, but there would certainly be fewer of them out on the edges of the impenetrable swamp, wouldn't there?

It wasn't much of a plan, she knew, but it was the best she'd been able to come up with.

The pad would stay hidden in the room, of course; with two weeks' stay already paid for, it would likely go u

She knew she should make a last circuit of the room, but the thought of Catur Ramsey would not leave her so easily. She flipped open the pad and looked at his last three messages, all of them blinking, tagged "urgent," practically screaming for attention. She knew that it would only make her feel worse to access them, that all his arguments would make good sense but would change nothing. She was terrible at arguing—Aleksandr had teased her with it, made her agree to ridiculous things, then laughed and refused to take advantage. "You are like water, Olga," he would say. "Always, you give way."

But what if there was something else Ramsey wanted to tell her? What if he needed some other kind of permission from her to sell the house? What if the people who had taken Misha had forgotten the veterinarian's name and couldn't get him his medicine?

She knew she was stalling, fearful of the journey in front of her, but now the worry wouldn't go away. Had that been the meaning of the dream, of dear Aleksandr so fretful outside the door, wanting to leave but unable to go?

She made a last circuit of the room, then picked up the pad. She had decided to leave it in the closet, down at the bottom under the extra blankets. There would be no one in the room, so no reason to put in fresh blankets; the motel's underpaid cleaning crew would be unlikely to go searching for extra work.

Olga slid the pad into the back of the closet, then went to the desk and wrote a note on the quaint, old-fashioned note paper—the one thing about the place that had separated it from the dozen or so others in which she had stayed during this trip. Under the "Bayou Suites" heading, she wrote, "I will be hack for this pad. If it must be taken out of the room, please leave it in the motel office, or contact C. Ramsey, atty.," then added his address and signed her name.

She was all the way back to the closet when the thought of little Misha jumped up at her again. What if something had happened? If he did not get his medicine, he would start having those terrible seizures again. She had told them over and over, his new owners, but who knew how much attention people might be paying?

Poor little thing! I gave him away to strangers. Left him behind.

Her eyes swelling with tears again, Olga swore quietly to herself, then sat down on the bed with the pad across her lap and began opening messages.

CHAPTER 18

Making a Witch

NETFEED/NEWS: Mystery Still Surrounds General's Death

(visual: Yacoubian meeting President Anford)

VO: The death of Brigadier General Daniel Yacoubian in a Virginia hotel suite has spawned a surprisingly virulent set of rumors, strangest of which is an assertion by one of the general's bodyguards, Edward Pilger, that he believes Yacoubian was involved in some kind of coup against the American government. Journalist Ekaterina Slocomb, who produced a short documentary on the general for Beltway, an upmarket tabnode, finds that idea hard to swallow.

(visual: Ekaterina Slocomb in studio)

SLOCOMB: "It just doesn't make sense. Yacoubian was friends with a lot of powerful people. Why would he or any of them want to overthrow a government that they already more or less own? Yacoubian was not an ideologue—if anything, he was a kind of ultimate pragmatist. . . ."

One of these days, Renie thought, something that happens to me in this network is going to make sense. But not yet, obviously. A little creature made of mud who called herself the Stone Girl was stumping along determinedly beside her, on either side of the dark, empty street the giant shoes that housed the local inhabitants were shut up tight against the night and its dangers, and this entire world had grown out of silvery nothing right in front of Renie's eyes.

"I still don't understand why you're coming with me," she told the child. "Aren't you supposed to stay at home? You're already in trouble for my sake."

The Stone Girl's face was as shadowy as the street. "Because . . . because . . . I don't know. Because things are going wrong and no one will listen to me. The stepmother never listens." She wiped defiantly at the dark spots of her eyes, and Renie couldn't help wondering how a child made of earth and rock could cry. "The Ending is getting closer, and the Witching Tree isn't there anymore."

"Hang on. I thought you said that's where we were going—to this Witching Tree."

"We are. We just have to find out where it is now."

Renie chewed this over as they made their way out through the outskirts of the shoe-village. It was touching and disconcerting, both. The girl's willingness to push against the normal order of her life made Renie think of Brother Factum Quintus back in the House world—it was hard to imagine someone programming such flexible individuality into any mere simulacrum, but over and over she had seen the evidence. There was something different about this newest simulation, though—something more than the fact it seemed to have been created by the Other itself. A ragged bit of memory was still tickling her, and had been ever since she had first seen the shoe where the Stone Girl and her motley assortment of siblings lived, but it remained out of reach.

So what do I know? That this place is made up from some kind of nursery rhyme—or from lots of them, more likely. I never heard of any Stone Girl in the "Old Lady and the Shoe" rhyme. Martine said she taught the Other a song—that "angel" thing it was singing when we first saw it on the mountaintop. Maybe she taught it some stories, too.

But that still did not scratch the itch at the back of her memory.

They had reached the edge of the dark settlement. There was no moon, only a sort of dully glowing latency to the sky that left it just a shade more purple than black and gave faint shape to the shadowy world. Renie could barely make out the small person walking right next to her. She had just begun to wander what would happen if she lost her little guide when a glowing apparition stepped out in front of them, billowing and moaning.

Frightened, Renie grabbed for the Stone Girl, but her companion shook off her hand. "It's just Weeweekee," she said.

"Stop!" The thing lifted its hand. A glowing ball hung just above it, a flame with no source. "Who goes there?"

"It's me, the Stone Girl."