<You’re sure no one can see me?> he asked her.
<No one even knows you’re here,> she confirmed.
<What are those ruins?> he scripted, nodding towards the river. They looked old, which made no sense unless Vanaheim had been occupied for far longer than anyone knew.
<Follies,> replied Zelia. <They’re not real. Just architectural whims, like this auditorium.> There was a note of disgust in her voice, as if she didn’t approve.
He spotted Surendra Finch, Overseer for Temur’s security services, and the man to whom Lethe reported directly; Rosabella Dose, who had fired the fatal shot that killed Lewis Finney when Coalition forces stormed the judicial headquarters on Darwin mere months after the Abandonment; Alexander Maksimov, famous for negotiating the surrender of Yue Shijie’s transfer gates to the Sandoz; and many less familiar faces that nonetheless had in their own ways influenced the course of the Tian Di over the centuries.
It was intimidating company, to say the least.
He saw Father Cheng stand up from a gathering at the front of the auditorium, and step towards the platform, trailed by several mechants and a small entourage that included Cripps. A projector had been set up on the platform, and as Luc watched, this device unfolded broad panels made of thin metal wafers.
After a moment, the air above the panels shimmered, then darkened to reveal a sprinkling of stars, in defiance of the afternoon light. A grey, cylindrical shape floated in the foreground, occluding many of the stars. The curved surface of a world was clearly visible, revealing that the cylindrical object was in orbit.
As Luc watched, brilliant light flared at the rear of the grey cylinder, and it began to recede from the fixed viewpoint above the planet, dwindling within seconds to a tiny point of slightly flickering light almost indistinguishable from the steady brilliance of the stars. Before very long it had vanished entirely. Luc guessed it was Sevgeny Vasili’s coffin.
‘Sevgeny would have liked it this way,’ said Father Cheng, his voice carrying clear and sharp across the hillside. ‘He used to wonder what might lie at the heart of our galaxy; well, in a way, he’ll get to find out now. That ship we placed him on board – the last one he’ll ever travel on – is a modified version of the same craft that carry the seeds of transfer gates to new worlds. I can’t think of a better farewell for a man who worked so hard towards reuniting the two disparate halves of the human race.’
Luc watched with interest as Cheng pointedly cast his gaze around those gathered, and recalled what Offenbach had told him: Vasili had been given the job of Reunification not as a perk, but as a kind of punishment duty.
‘We all know how hard Sevgeny worked towards that goal,’ Cheng continued. ‘He may not have lived to see it fulfilled, but his body, if not his soul, will journey where his heart and his mind often did, to the mystery at the heart of our island universe. God speed, Sevgeny,’ he said, glancing towards the dark projection hovering in the air. ‘We’ll miss you, but you’ll always be with us, in spirit at least.’
Cheng stepped down from the platform, and someone new stepped up to say their piece. Luc meanwhile found his attention drawn to a figure that stood alone on the far side of the auditorium, and felt his skin prickle as if he had just been doused in ice-water.
Whoever they were, their face was entirely invisible beneath a mirrored mask. The mask formed part of a suit of cloth and metal that was covered in turn by a loose, flowing coat that billowed gently in the light breeze flowing down the slope of the hill.
The same figure he’d seen in his dreams, with Antonov’s angry face reflected in it.
<Who is that?> he demanded, pointing.
De Almeida glanced towards the masked figure, then regarded him with an expression of amusement before turning her attention back to the man delivering his eulogy on the stage. <That, Mr Gabion, is the Coalition Ambassador, Horst Sachs.>
<I know him,> Luc insisted. <I saw him in my dreams.>
<He certainly fits the description you gave me a few days ago, yes.>
<
She gave him a sidewise glance full of irritation. <Of course. You know that we’ve had visitors from Darwin prior to the new transfer gate’s official opening. The Ambassador is our most frequent visitor of all. Sevgeny Vasili was scheduled to introduce him to the public during the Reunification ceremonies.>
Luc felt a shiver run through him at the sight of the masked figure. <I’m not sure how people are going to react if he’s still wearing that mask. Doesn’t he ever take it off?>
<Not to my knowledge, no,> she replied. <People in the Coalition are . . . very different from us, it seems. How different may prove to be a shock for many.>
<Then what I saw really was real,> he replied, feeling dazed.
<Clearly.>
<Then you understand what this means?> he sent back. <Antonov must have had dealings with the Ambassador. Why didn’t you tell me he was real before?>
<Because I knew there was a very good chance that he’d be here, and I wanted to see if you genuinely did recognize him.>
‘Zelia.’
Luc realized with a start that Ruy Borges had come over to join them. He stiffened with apprehension before
