Use of Weapons

He saw the woman walking calmly towards him through the storm.

She walked on the surface of the hard-packed snow, dressed in long black boots and a long coat with a furry black collar and cuffs, and she wore a small hat.

Her neck and face were exposed, as were her gloveless hands. She had a long, oval face, and deep dark eyes. She walked easily up to him, and the storm behind her seemed to part at her back, and he felt himself in the lee of something more than just her tall body, and something like warmth seemed to seep through his skin, wherever it faced her.

He closed his eyes. He shook his head, which hurt a little, but he did it all the same. He opened his eyes again.

She was still there.

She had half knelt in front of him, her hands folded on one skirted knee, her face level with his. He peered forward, wrenched one hand free from the snow again (it was numb, but when he brought the hand round, he saw the raw flesh he'd torn from the snow). He tried to touch her face, but she took his hand in one of hers. She was warm. He thought he had never felt such glorious warmth in all his life.

He laughed, as she held his hand and the storm parted round her and her breath clouded the air.

'Goddamn,' he said. He knew he sounded groggy with the cold and with the drug. 'An atheist my entire fucking life, and it turns out the credulous assholes were right all along!' He wheezed, coughed. 'Or do you surprise them too by not turning up?'

'You flatter me, Mr Zakalwe,' the woman said, in a superbly deep and sexy voice. 'I am not Death, or some imagined Goddess. I am as real as you…' She stroked his torn, bleeding palm with one long, strong thumb. 'If a little warmer.'

'Oh, I'm sure you're real,' he said. 'I can feel you're rea…'

His voice faded; he looked behind the woman. There was a huge shape appearing inside the whirling snow. Grey-white like the snow, but a single shade darker, it floated up behind the woman, quiet and huge and steady. The storm seemed to die, just around them.

'That's called a twelve person module, Cheradenine,' the woman said. 'It's come to take you away, if you want to be taken away; to the mainland, if you like. Or further afield, away with us if you'd prefer that.'

He was tired of blinking and shaking his head. Whatever insane part of his mind wanted to play this bizarre game out would just have to be humoured for as long as it took. What it had to do with the Staberinde and the Chair, he couldn't tell yet, but if that was what it was all about — and what else could it be about? — then there was still no point, in this weakened, dying state, trying to fight it. Let it happen. He had no real choice. 'With you?' he said, trying not to laugh.

'With us. We'd like to offer you a job.' She smiled. 'But let's talk somewhere a little warmer, shall we?'

'Warmer?'

She made a single tossing motion with her head. 'The module.'

'Oh; yeah,' he agreed. 'That.' He tried to pull his other hand away from the packed snow behind, failed.

He looked back at her; she had taken a small flask from her pocket. She reached round behind him, slowly poured the flask's contents over his hand. It warmed, and came away steaming gently.

'Okay?' she said, taking his hand, gently helping him up. She pulled some slippers from her pocket. 'Here.'

'Oh.' He laughed. 'Yeah; thanks.'

She put her arm under one of his, her hand under his other shoulder. She was strong. 'You seem to know my name,' he said. 'What's yours, if that isn't an impertinent question?'

She smiled as they walked through the few flakes of gently falling snow, towards the slab-sided bulk of the thing she'd called a module. It had got so quiet — despite the snow nearby, streaking past — that he could hear their feet making the snow creak.

'My name,' she said. 'Is Rasd-Coduresa Diziet Embless Sma da' Marenhide.'

'No kidding!'

'But you may call me Diziet.'

He laughed. 'Yeah; right. Diziet.'

She walked, he stumbled, into the orange warmth of the module interior. The walls looked like highly polished wood, the seats like burnished hide, the floor like a fur rug. It all smelled like a mountain garden.

He tried to fill his lungs with the warm, fragrant air. He swayed and turned, stunned, to the woman.

'This is real!' he breathed.

With enough breath, he might have screamed it.

The woman nodded. 'Welcome aboard, Cheradenine Zakalwe.'

He fainted.

Twelve

He stood in the long gallery and faced into the light. The tall white curtains billowed softly around him, quiet in the warm breeze. His long black hair was lifted only slightly by the gentle wind. His hands were clasped behind his back. He looked pensive. The silent, lightly clouded skies over the mountains, beyond the fortress and the city, threw a blank, pervasive light across his face, and standing there like that, in plain dark clothes, he looked somehow insubstantial, like some statue, or a dead man propped against the battlements to fool the foe.

Somebody spoke his name.

'Zakalwe. Cheradenine?'

'Whaa…?' He came to. He looked into the face of an old man who looked vaguely familiar. 'Beychae?' he heard himself say. Of course; the old man was Tsoldrin Beychae. Older-looking than he remembered.

He looked around, listening. He heard a hum and saw a small, bare cabin. Seaship? Spaceship?

Osom Emananish, a voice from his memory told him. Spaceship; clipper, bound for… somewhere near Impren (whatever and wherever that was). Impren Habitats. He had to get Tsoldrin Beychae to the Impren Habitats. Then he remembered the little doctor and his wonderful field machine with the cutting blue disc. Digging deeper, in a way that would not have been possible without the Culture's training and subtle changes, he found the little running loop of memory that took over from what his brain had already stored. The room with the fibre optics; blowing a kiss because it was just what he'd wanted; the explosion, sailing across the bar into the lounge; crashing, hitting his head. The rest was very vague; distant screams, and being picked up and carried. Nothing sensible from the voices he'd registered while he'd been unconscious.

He lay for a moment, listening to what his body was telling him. No concussion. Slight damage to his right kidney, lots of bruises, abrasions on both knees, cuts on right hand… nose still mending.

He raised himself up, looked again at the cabin; bare metal walls, two bunks, one small stool Beychae was sitting on. 'This the brig?'

Beychae nodded. 'Yes; the prison.'

He lay back. He noticed he was wearing a disposable crew jumpsuit. The terminal bead had gone from his ear, and the lobe was raw and sore enough to make him suspect the transceiver hadn't relinquished its grip there without a struggle. 'You too, or just me?' he asked.

'Just you.'

'What about the ship?'

'I believe we are heading for the nearest stellar system, on the vessel's back-up drive.'

'What's the nearest system?'

'Well, the one inhabited planet is called Murssay. There's a war going on in part of it; one of those brush-fire conflicts you mentioned. Apparently the ship may not be allowed to land.'

'Land?' He grunted, feeling the back of his head. Largish bruise. 'This ship can't land; it's not built for in- atmosphere stuff.'

'Oh,' Tsoldrin said. 'Well, perhaps they meant we wouldn't be able to go down to the surface.'

'Hmm. Must have some sort of orbiter; a space station, yes?'

Beychae shrugged. 'I suppose so.'