on both sides of her. They faced forward without a tremor in their rigid concentration on the rite. Abruptly she rebelled. She cautiously stepped back, slipping behind the guards to the edge of the cliff where the air felt somehow a little cleaner. Standing on the edge with her back turned to the interminable ceremony she looked out over the dreaming innocent land.
It spread out in muted patchwork interrupted by scattered towers of rock that were other buttes rising in rugged grandeur above the fields. Beside these buttes were dark blotches where houses clustered in walled cities clinging to the base of the precipitous rock. Here and there, on pale straight lines, vehicles like small black bugs scooted in nervous spasms belching behind them clouds of steam. The river came looping out of the blue in the east in long lazy bends, glinting gently in the light from the setting sun. That way, she thought, down the river in that blue mist where that sick blue sky comes down, thereâs the star city. Thatâs where I have to go.
The river came to them and split in half, one side hugging the base of the butte, the other swinging out in a wide lazy crescent that circled the city and separated it from the farm lands. But I have it backwards, she thought. Funny. The current runs the other way, from me to the east. Whyâd I think of it coming to me?
A hundred meters below she could see the small green patch of her garden sealed within the massive gray bulk of the mahazh and its outbuildings, a walled fortress inside the walled city, smooth and sterile except for that green nodule like a cysted tumor. She studied the city outside the walls of her prison. On the western side there was more greenâscattered trees and shrubs around walled houses like gray beehives, the streets between quiet and empty.
So seductive was the peace and serenity below she could almost hear the cicadaâs drowsy hum and feel the warm sweet breeze ruffling her hair.
On the eastern side the beehive houses crowded in a kind of cheerful elbow-in-the-ribs confusion along twisting streets whose narrow strips of paving almost disappeared beneath awnings striped in brilliant clashing stained-glass colors. These streets were crowded and busy, though she caught only glimpses of tiny nayid figures bustling from shop to shop. Where the city met the river the walls widened into low blocky warehouses with piers stretching a short way into the river. Three ships were tied there, their lengths parallel to the bank, most of their cranes idle, one or two desultorily unloading bales which a few hand-truck pushers were wheeling into the warehouses.
Behind Aleytys the chant broke off momentarily and a single massive basso began intoning a long invocation which she resolutely ignored, running her eyes back along the river until she was staring intently at the eastern horizon.
The invocation finished. A sudden crackling sound closed her hands into white-knuckled fists. She swallowed and swallowed and still the sour taste came back. A chorus of screams from the hiiri trembled through her body. She felt the heat of the fire already burning through the heavy cloak hanging from the bee-broaches on her shoulders. She remembered the brown naked figures, tiny tiny people rubbed to a high gleam with the same oil that soaked the logs.⦠Aleytys stopped that thought but the smell of roasting flesh drifted past. She swallowed but the sour taste wouldnât go away. Blindly, breathing in short sharp gasps, she stared at the innocent lovely land below. The screaming went on, high descants to the heavy basso chant from the massed choir of hieratic nayadim. The stench hovered on the breathless air.
She felt a presence behind her and glanced quickly around. One of the huddle of strangers standing respectfully behind the kipu had come over to her and was watching her with mild interest, a dark brown man just a little taller than she with dull black hair standing out from his
It spread out in muted patchwork interrupted by scattered towers of rock that were other buttes rising in rugged grandeur above the fields. Beside these buttes were dark blotches where houses clustered in walled cities clinging to the base of the precipitous rock. Here and there, on pale straight lines, vehicles like small black bugs scooted in nervous spasms belching behind them clouds of steam. The river came looping out of the blue in the east in long lazy bends, glinting gently in the light from the setting sun. That way, she thought, down the river in that blue mist where that sick blue sky comes down, thereâs the star city. Thatâs where I have to go.
The river came to them and split in half, one side hugging the base of the butte, the other swinging out in a wide lazy crescent that circled the city and separated it from the farm lands. But I have it backwards, she thought. Funny. The current runs the other way, from me to the east. Whyâd I think of it coming to me?
A hundred meters below she could see the small green patch of her garden sealed within the massive gray bulk of the mahazh and its outbuildings, a walled fortress inside the walled city, smooth and sterile except for that green nodule like a cysted tumor. She studied the city outside the walls of her prison. On the western side there was more greenâscattered trees and shrubs around walled houses like gray beehives, the streets between quiet and empty.
So seductive was the peace and serenity below she could almost hear the cicadaâs drowsy hum and feel the warm sweet breeze ruffling her hair.
On the eastern side the beehive houses crowded in a kind of cheerful elbow-in-the-ribs confusion along twisting streets whose narrow strips of paving almost disappeared beneath awnings striped in brilliant clashing stained-glass colors. These streets were crowded and busy, though she caught only glimpses of tiny nayid figures bustling from shop to shop. Where the city met the river the walls widened into low blocky warehouses with piers stretching a short way into the river. Three ships were tied there, their lengths parallel to the bank, most of their cranes idle, one or two desultorily unloading bales which a few hand-truck pushers were wheeling into the warehouses.
Behind Aleytys the chant broke off momentarily and a single massive basso began intoning a long invocation which she resolutely ignored, running her eyes back along the river until she was staring intently at the eastern horizon.
The invocation finished. A sudden crackling sound closed her hands into white-knuckled fists. She swallowed and swallowed and still the sour taste came back. A chorus of screams from the hiiri trembled through her body. She felt the heat of the fire already burning through the heavy cloak hanging from the bee-broaches on her shoulders. She remembered the brown naked figures, tiny tiny people rubbed to a high gleam with the same oil that soaked the logs.⦠Aleytys stopped that thought but the smell of roasting flesh drifted past. She swallowed but the sour taste wouldnât go away. Blindly, breathing in short sharp gasps, she stared at the innocent lovely land below. The screaming went on, high descants to the heavy basso chant from the massed choir of hieratic nayadim. The stench hovered on the breathless air.
She felt a presence behind her and glanced quickly around. One of the huddle of strangers standing respectfully behind the kipu had come over to her and was watching her with mild interest, a dark brown man just a little taller than she with dull black hair standing out from his
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