House of Reeds

waiting for me at the apartment? But the brief perception of them on a rooftop implied they were already on the run, and somehow she thought they had heard her cry out of the green void. The kalpataru was connected to every other communications device and comp on the planet in that one instant, I know it was. Mother Mary, please keep them safe. And me too. Keep me safe until we're all together again.

'All right,' Anderssen said, trying not to chew her lip. 'Will you take me to this place? Are you sure we can get to Parus by morning?'

Several hours later, Gretchen and Malakar emerged from a tunnel on the eastern side of the city, following a footpath between disintegrating rows of concrete pilings. The sun was setting, the eastern sky growing dark, though the fields of grain on either side of the old subway line were gilded pink and bronze. Anderssen glanced up automatically and was disturbed to see the sky to the west bruised with odd, harsh colors. Auroralike patterns of filmy lights were strewn across the twilit sky.

Long trails of smoke rising over the city glowed in the failing light. High up, what looked like contrails criss- crossed the sky, though she didn't think any aircraft could have survived the electromagnetic shock wave from the explosions in orbit.

'How far is this station?' Anderssen wondered aloud, seeing the orchards on the far side of the grain fields were dusky with oncoming night. She automatically checked to make sure she still had her flashlight, and was relieved to feel cold metal under her fingers. 'Have you taken this path before?'

'Not so long ago,' Malakar answered, her stride quickening. The Jehanan's snout was raised, tasting the evening and the hum and chirp of insects rose and fell as they walked. There was a moist, humid feeling to the air and Gretchen was reminded of the lowland farm country around New Canarvon back home. 'There is a wood-lot and then a village. The station is beyond, on the old road – but it is not far, not far at all.'

They walked in silence for a time, passing out of the fields and onto a larger path – not quite a road, but close – which ran through rows of planted trees. Long straight trunks rose up over their heads, merging into a spreading roof of branches lined with heavy leaves. Anderssen's eye was drawn to the signs of pruning and trimming and guessed the section of woodland was a farm growing lumber for the city markets. Some of the newer prunings revealed a hexagonal pattern in the underlying wood.

'These are lohaja?' She gestured at the rows of trees. 'This is a plantation?'

The old Jehanan grunted, twitching her nostrils. 'Not every soil is suitable for the better woods – but these hills around Takshila are famous for their abundant crops and strong-growing trees. Even the Nem flourish here, though you cannot claim their taste is sweet.'

Then the creature sighed, grief settling over her and she fell silent.

'I'm sorry,' Gretchen said, feeling guilty at having raised the question. 'I've been lucky to do so much of what I wanted. My family sacrificed a great deal to see me on this long road – they still do, with my mother taking care of my children – and the pitiful wage the Company pays is not enough, not really, to make up the difference.'

A low humming sound rose from the back of the Jehanan's throat. She fixed Anderssen with one dark eye. 'And you say you've not found the right path to yigal? Do you bite your own tail in spite? Do you have two mouths to argue with yourself?'

'Ha! I suppose.' Gretchen smiled. 'I know how it feels to be denied, ridiculed, opposed at every turn. My clan is poorly favored in the Empire. We have no powerful friends. There are no tenured positions for me, no research grants or stipends. Most of my fellows from graduate school have actual posts at actual universities – or they oversee important sites – and me? I grub in the refuse on the edge of human space for a scattering of quills a day, looking for sites of interest to others. Then they do the real work, and I'm on to another world, bag in hand, exhausted, my boots needing repair…'

Malakar trilled, her mood entirely restored. 'A perfect path for your tiny feet to walk! Do you truly enjoy the dull work of counting and measuring and making reports which must come after all this poking and prodding and prying into dusty, hidden places?'

'Yes, I do.' Anderssen's professional sensibilities were outraged at such a suggestion, though at the same time a little voice was saying Oh god, no! 'Survey is only the first step in a long process – the real work is in the analysis and conclusions at the end. I mean, how else will I get a position somewhere without publications? Without discrete evidence of my work?'

'Hur-hur-hur!' The gardener hid her snout behind both claws. 'This old walnut thinks your path does not lead to the stuffy chambers of a Master, with acolytes fawning and snuffling at your feet. Your path lies at the edge of furrowed soil, it does, where there are strange shadows and queer lights among the trees, where every step is into the unknown. What wonders might you see, with undimmed eyes?

'Hoooo… Now, how do I interpret such a look as you now wear?'

Gretchen felt pressure grip her chest, driving the breath from her lungs, and a startlingly clear vision overwhelmed her seeing eyes, blotting out the rows of trees looming in the twilight, covering the wagon-tracks they had been following through the grass…

Bitterly cold wind lapped around her. Her hands were in the sand, one leg throbbing with pain. Glorious jewel-colored lights shone beneath her, lighting her face. Threads of crimson and sapphire and diamond- blue clung to her forearms, dragging her down. Something was moving in the darkness, a voice was speaking, but all she could see were the glittering pinpoints of the hathol and the firten swarming to the bounty of her exhaled breath, drinking her carbon dioxide and waste gasses; growing, swarming, building chains of fire to trap her so they might feast on the energy reservoir of her body…

'Ahhh!' Anderssen flinched back from Malakar's reaching claw and she stumbled into the brush lining the road. The Jehanan drew back in surprise, hissing. For an instant, before she blinked, Gretchen thought the rule-straight trees were limned with pale light, and the gardener was softly glowing in the twilight, every scale distinct in disturbingly clear sight. Then twilight enveloped her again and there were only stray glints of the sun on clouds high in the sky.

'What happened?' Malakar regarded her warily. 'Your countenance changed.'

'It's nothing.' Anderssen was trembling and she batted uselessly at her legs and arms. There aren't any crawling threads of living light on me. None. Not even one. She felt strangely hot, as if she'd plunged her face, hands and arms into boiling water. I don't think I was supposed to remember that. Hummingbird should complain to whoever sold him that memory eraser. 'Just old memories. Don't think this business of poking and prying is without peril.'

'Hooo! True words.' The gardener took hold of Gretchen's shoulders and set her back on the track with a gentle touch. 'Paths are dangerous – if you follow, does it not lead? If you follow all the way, it must take you far from the safety of your own garden, out into brambles and marsh and among twisted rocks.'

'I suppose.' The last gleam of the sun faded, leaving them in complete darkness. Anderssen produced her flashlight. A cool light sprang out, illuminating the roots of the trees and setting stems of grass in sharp contrast. The flashlight made her feel better. See? I can drive back the darkness! 'I don't want to follow a dangerous path! I want to do my job, get paid a reasonable wage and go home and talk to my kids about how their day went at school.'

She laughed hollowly. 'I've already been offered your far-traveled path, filled with spines and pricking wounds and bitter pills. A path into shadows and hidden places – where true secrets lie, not just the grave-goods and barrows of the dead. I said no then, and I'd say no now.'

The gardener made a deep humming sound in the back of her throat. 'Hooo… Of course. But this old walnut wonders…' Malakar reached out her claw into the beam of the flashlight, making a jagged, monstrous shadow spring up against the silver-barked trees. 'Shadows imply light.' Her claw withdrew, revealing the track winding ahead of them. 'And a path, direction. You remind me of how much I have lost by fearing both.'

'Fearing?' Anderssen began walking, finding the bare, widely spaced tree trunks oppressive. 'You didn't fear to oppose the Master and his policies!'

'Hooooo… I feared to leave the Garden. What sprouts have gone untended elsewhere as I lay anguished on a mat in the common room, biting my own tail and dreaming useless thoughts of revenge and malice? Will I ever know?' Malakar lifted her snout, pointing ahead. 'Do you see the lanterns?'

Gretchen angled the flashlight towards her feet. Her eyes adjusted and she saw – ahead, obscured by a line of