the wind off the sea. She eased close to one of the structures. Something screeched, leaped clear, and fluttered away. Lines of symbols and pictographs and geometric designs circled the towers. Most appeared to be abstractions, but she could see representations of birds and squidlike creatures and other beasts. In a niche just above the water, a pair of reptile legs were broken off at the knees. There must have been a shaft or stairway within. Her lights penetrated two embrasures and she caught a glimpse of stone walls. A Quraquat female with wings and a weapon, a sword probably, stood atop one crest. An arm was missing. The remaining hand shielded its eyes. She knew the Quraquat had not been winged creatures, smiled at the concept of a flying gator, and wondered whether all intelligences dreamt of angels.
At the water line, the towers were worn smooth by the sea. Wide wakes trailed toward shore, as if the hoary sentinels were on the move.
The floatpier lay a short distance beyond. It was U-shaped, and big enough to accommodate several vehicles. The Temple shuttle lay on the shoreward side. Alpha's lights skimmed across its blue-gold lines.
She drifted in, and slipped into the water. Moonlight fell on the coastal peaks. She opened a channel to the Temple. 'I'm down,' she said.
The shuttle rocked. 'Welcome to the Temple of the Winds, Hutch. Frank's on his way.'
The outside temperature was 30° below, Celsius. She activated her Flickinger field, opened up, climbed out. The floatpier rolled with the tide, but it had good footing. It was wide, maybe three meters, equipped with thermal lines to keep ice from forming. And it had a handrail. The sea was choppy, and spray flew, but the field kept her dry.
Alpha's lights cast a misty glow across the two shuttles and the pier. Beyond, the towers were murky shadows. Lines of waves broke against the shoreline.
'Look out you don't fall in.' Carson's voice came out of her earphones. But she didn't see him.
'Where are you?'
'Look to your left.'
Lights were rising out of the water. Carson sat inside a bubble housing. It surfaced near Alpha's prow, followed by a long gray hull. Steam drifted off the deck, and the sea washed over it. The submersible rolled, righted itself, and drew alongside the pier. The bubble opened. Carson paused, tuned his move, and strode onto the planks with a grace born of long experience. 'Temple Limo Service,' he said lightly. 'Stops at 8000 B.C., Henry's Hotel, the Knothic Towers, the Yakatan Empire, and points south. What's your pleasure?' The engines gurgled, and the boat rocked.
'The hotel sounds good.' The vessel was low in the water.
Its cargo hatch, located on the afterdeck, swung open. Barrel-shaped containers lined the interior. Carson removed one of the containers, lifting it with surprising ease, and muscled it onto the pier. 'I've got six of these,' he said. 'Can we put them in Alpha! Thought I'd save a trip.'
'Sure.' She watched him go back for a second barrel. Each of the containers was almost as big as he was. 'Don't break anything,' she said. They were big and awkward, but light. She starting moving them off the dock and into the shuttle's storage bay.
'Most of it's foam,' said Carson. 'And artifacts.'
She felt cozy and safe, wrapped in the warm, dry cocoon of the energy field. The wind sucked at her, and mournful cries floated over the water. 'Chipwillows,' said Carson. 'Oversized, ungainly carrion-eaters. They raid the beach every morning.'
'Birds?'
'Not exactly. More like bats. They like to sing.'
'Sounds like something lost.'
'They make the sound by rubbing their wings together.'
She drank in the night. It was good, after all these weeks, to be out in the open.
'What's it been like, Frank? Closing down, I mean?'
He moved next to her and leaned on the handrail. 'We do what we have to. It would have helped if we'd known six months ago we were going to get thrown out. We could have done things differently. But the word we kept getting was that the Academy was going to win. 'Don't worry, they said.'
'It's a pity.'
'Yeah. It is that.' The pier rode over a wave. The comber broke, rolled toward the beach, and lost its energy against the outgoing tide. 'I'm ready to go home. But not like this.' He looked discouraged. 'We've put a lot of work in here. A fair amount of it will go for nothing.'
Something luminous swam past, approached the sub, and sank.
'What will you do next? Where will you go now?'
'They've offered me a division director's job at the Academy. In Personnel.'
'Congratulations,' she said softly.
He looked embarrassed. 'Most of the people here are disappointed in me.'
'Why?'
'They think it's a sell-out.'
Hutch understood. Only the people who couldn't make it in the field, or who were less than serious professionals, went into administration. 'How do you feel?'
'I think you should do what you want. I'd like regular hours for a change. A clean, air-conditioned office. A chance to meet new people. Maybe watch the Sentinels on Sunday.' He laughed. 'That shouldn't be asking too much. After all these years.'
She wondered whether he had a family to go home to. 'I wouldn't think so,' she said.
The western sky was starless. The Void. She looked into it for a few moments.
He followed her gaze. 'Spooky, isn't it?'
Yes. Somehow, it looked more arresting from a planetary surface than it did from space. She had noticed the same phenomenon from Nok and Pinnacle, which also floated on the edge of the galactic arm. She could just pick out the dim smear of light from stars on the other side. 'According to the Quraquat,' Carson said, 'that's Kwonda, the home of the blessed, the haven for all who have fought the good fight. On nights when the wind is still, you can hear them singing. Kwonda, by the way, means 'Distant Laughter. »
The pier rose and dipped. 'That was a big one,' said Hutch. 'How old is the Temple of the Winds?'
'The main temple, what we call the Upper Temple, was built somewhere around the thirteenth—' He stopped. 'Difficult to translate time. Around 250 B.C., our calendar. Those' — he indicated the towers—'are not the Temple of the Winds. You know that, right?'
'No, I didn't.'
'They're the Knothic Towers. Sacred ground, by the way. Built approximately 8000 B.C. They were used for worship, and were maintained as a historical site, one way and another, for seven thousand years.'
'So where's the Temple of the Winds?'
He looked at the water. 'Believe it or not,' he said, 'The Temple of the Winds is in the drink.' He tied down the last of the containers. 'And we should probably get moving. Where are your bags?'
'Only one.' She got it out of the Alpha, and allowed him to take it.
'This area used to be a crossroad between empires,' he said. 'It must always have been of strategic importance. And we know settlements thrived here almost right up until the species died out. At the end,' he continued, 'the Quraquat had no idea why the Towers had been built, or what they'd meant.'
'That's very sad,' she said. 'To lose your heritage.'
'I would think so.'
'Are we sure the Quraquat are really extinct?'
'Oh, yes. There was a long-running debate over that for several years. It seemed unlikely that we could have missed them by so short a time. Ergo, they had to be here somewhere. Watch your step.' He planted a foot on the deck of the submarine as if that would steady it, and offered his arm. 'There was always at least one team looking for survivors. We got so many false alarms it got to be a joke. Quraquat seen here, seen there. Seen everywhere. But never any living natives.' He shrugged. 'They're gone.'
They lowered themselves into the cockpit and drew the bubble down. The interior lights dimmed. The sea rose around them. 'The Towers are by no means the oldest structures here. This was a holy place long before they were built. There's a military chapel and outpost in the Lower Temple which predate them by millennia. We're
