The Day of Knowledge (cont’d)

Early evening, and everyone is very tired. The sun will soon set. Perdix is still following the cord down and down. It’s cold, and warm, and wet, and dry, and every now and then the wind blows.

Ilba tells Lhimpat that there isn’t really a dungeon. Lhimpat tells Ilba she’s mad. Sonata tells them they need to find their friend, Gi. Where do you think he is? says Lhimpat. He isn’t here in the dungeon, so he might be being tortured in the main hall. I think he’s in the ghost castle, says Sonata. There’s a ghost castle? says Lhimpat. Ilba hits Lhimpat in the back of the head; Lhimpat jumps to her feet; the circuit broken, Perdix falls over, spinning under the cliff under the covenant.

Perdix ends up in the water cave under the covenant. The water’s spinning under them, widdershins to their sunwise spin. Gi’s presence and the cord are orbiting this cave, spinning up into the air, and a tower’s building from the cave to the apex of the orbit.

Their bodies sit upright, link hands, and start to spin, dragging the gravel and the dust. Sonata sits beside them, the book in her lap, and grabs them; she’s dragged with them. She casts the spell to drag them back to their bodies, and they snap back, fall over, and blink.

Everyone can see the tower, now.

Nil pings Perdix, wondering what’s going on. Perdix fills them in on Gi’s disappearance; Nil’s distressed. Is he damaged? He’s insensate, so, yes, says Perdix. Worry about what you’re worrying about.

Cameron really wants to go to the tower. So does Nishoba. All the way out in Ofimitti, Ndapé can feel it; so can Ishta, in Naapiisachi. Nil wants to know where Cameron’s going; he tells him. Cameron also tells Sonata, who asks if he’s going to the tower, or the birthday party. Cameron says he doesn’t know whether this has to do with the birthday party. Well, we’re all going there, says Sonata. So that’s convenient enough.

Ishta leaves Tully and Marzipan in Lhayita, and seven-leagues back to the covenant.

Nishoba, in the secret water cavern, wants to stand to the north of it. He shrugs, and stands to the north. He’s got various lenses and prisms used in vis experiments, and he’s watching what’s going on to the vis structure of the spin and tower. Cameron walks in, and really wants to stand to the east; he’s writing constantly on a wax tablet. When he takes his place, Ndapé suddenly appears, to the west, his sword over his head. Cameron washes his hands. Nishoba spits into the water. Ndapé drinks. Cameron’s tattoos are gone; his hair has grown back, blue. (Nishoba won’t see it until he takes his patch off, but his ravaged socket’s healed over, with a compass rose over it.) And Ndapé knows what he must do, but he doesn’t know what it is. Cameron peers at his tablet; he can’t read what’s written there. He hands it to Nishoba. Can you read this? —It’s a daisy. Cameron doesn’t see that; just writing he can’t read yet.

Nil slumps, and all his maps crash.

Calvus has reassembled his team and is on his way back.

Sonata arrives, follows by Perdix and the apprentices. Ishta shows up and is immediately drawn in. The three apprentices shift clockwise, and Ishta stands to the south. Sonata takes a spot, and Calvus suddenly appears to the west. —His party is standing in the kitchen. Murry tries to leave the kitchen to investigate and can’t. None of the party can. Nil appears, on his way down to the water cavern; the Chatelaine asks if the covenant is safe; yes, says Nil, it is, and he’s telling the truth.

The participants in the ritual are compelled to slow the rotation of the tower, and then to start spinning the water sunwise. I’m beginning to feel concerned that I don’t feel concerned, says Cameron. The water’s spin is reversed, and the tower’s receding. Lights are streaming in through the three narrow moon-windows. They are free to go.

Calvus finds his troops in the kitchen, and prepares to return to Ofimitti. Ndapé knows it will be all right, because Cameron and Nishoba will still be at the covenant to keep an eye on things. Calvus wants to know if Nishoba did this. Of course not, says Ndapé. You felt that. It’s far older and more powerful than any of us. —Ndapé suddenly feels the need to stay, for a couple more hours. So does Calvus. Calvus decides to send Murry, with the Wolf, to Ofimitti, to attack the second Judge.

Ndapé and Calvus write their accounts of what happened.

Nil and Perdix and Lhimpat and Ilba are in one of the side-parlors. Perdix is distressed that major questions remain unanswered, yet Nil is not distressed. Sonata, drawn by the thought of wine and cheese, shows up in the parlor.

Somewhere in the underbasements, Cameron pulls out his tablet. He sees a daisy. That wasn’t there before. But! The daisy is made of words. Cameron finds a light and starts to read. They’re answers to the questions he’d been trying to answer with his tattoos.

Shortly before midnight, Nil feels a compulsion to bring some wine and cheese to the cliff’s edge. So does Calvus. He’s put out. Ndapé feels no such compulsion. Calvus asks him to keep an eye on the cliff’s edge while he heads down there.

Ilba asks Perdix if they think all this is creepy. Perdix does. Ilba asks if everyone else is crazy. Yes they are, says Perdix. They’re each pleased the other hasn’t been taken in. —Ilba asks Nishoba what’s up, and he tells her about the spell he did to uncurse the Fisher Priest’s knife. Wow. You did all that? says Ilba. Because that’s not how you do that.

At the cliff’s edge: Lhimpat tries to walk out onto the steps that aren’t there; Nil drags her back. When she steps back onto the cliff, a door opens in the air, light spills out, and Gi flies out. He’s shirtless, filthy, his hair is matted, he wears a strange breastplate, his arms are full of parcels. He’s unconscious. One boot’s gone. Nil leans over him, and Gi hands him a parcel, then hands a parcel to Perdix, then Ishta, then Calvus, then Ishta. Then he falls over again. Calvus shakes him awake. Ishta hands him a bottle of wine and he starts to drink. He vaguely remembers the Day of Knowledge pageant. After that? Well. The breastplate? (It’s a black breastplate, embossed with a silver lily.) He has it because he needed it. Or will need it. Nil scans Gi’s mind and falls back; Gi’s an open book. What a surprising Savacion to have lost one’s virginity to. —Gi can see Lhimpat’s mother and grandfather.

Perdix opens their parcel: it’s dirty, and dusty, as if it’s been buried: notes, bound, the cover with a metal sigil, a closed hand. Blanching, Perdix stands, orders Ilba to follow them, and heads back to their rooms. Sonata opens hers; a book, embossed with a double axe. She hides the book quickly (but not before Nil takes note) and orders Cameron to follow her and heads back to her rooms.

Calvus, Ishta, and Nil and poking at Gi to make sure he’s okay. Nil’s urging him to pull himself together, or put up his parma, or something. Gi had been talking to something, but the conversation got interrupted, and he can’t remember why. Nil sees Gi being swallowed by the earth and taken down. Gi closes his eyes and puts up a hazy sort of screen. They take him to his room; Calvus takes his leave. Ishta needs to talk to Calvus (her trousers, stained in blood); Calvus needs to find out what’s up with Murry. Ishta lets him know they have pretty much one less town to worry about. She briefs him on the results of the strike, and the likelihood of surviving witnesses who didn’t have their memories wiped. Small, she thinks. Calvus will update Circumcessor and Palpebra and check in with Murry; Ishta will give him a connection to Tully.

Calvus opens his parcel: it’s a lovely, one-headed axe. Full of wind.

Ishta opens her parcel: it’s a lantern. There’s symbols on top: stars, moon, wind, fire...

Lhimpat comes back from arranging Gi’s bath and spots Nil’s parcel. She opens it. It’s a platter with six petals around the outside and a glass dome in the middle. Oh! says Nil, who intellegoes it. It’s an intellego device.

Nil promises Gi he’ll check in with him in the morning, and maybe see what he can do to bring Gi’s memories into better focus.

Ilba wants to know if they can leave now. In the morning, says Perdix. Not now. Promise? says Ilba

Sonata’s down in the moon-pool. It’s a comforting, happy place to be. She’s doing measurements and timing studies.

Nil wakes up in the middle of Gi’s nightmare: running, being chased, shot in the chest. Gi screams. Nil brings Gi a bottle of wine. Gi’s holding a sheet; there’s a glowing patch on his chest. Nil intellegoes it—it’s fæ; very fæ—but a servant walks up, speaking with Somnex’ voice. He wants to know what the hell’s going on and why Gi’s mucking up his space. Somnex gets stabbed in the chest. He punches the servant’s fist into the wall. You need to do something about this whole getting hunted thing, says Somnex. Nil urges Somnex to help Gi close himself up and get some sleep. I’m not sleepy, says Gi. Somnex leaves; the servant wakes up, bleary; Gi heals his hand.

Nil and Gi discuss Gi’s shiny fæ patch. Nil tells Gi about Lhimpat’s determination to finish her apprenticeship in the fæ realms, and asks his help in dissuading her from this course. Nil and Gi stay awake, catching each other up.

Jerry heads to Gi’s door at about three in the morning. What happened? asks Jerry. I don’t know yet, says Jerry. Oh, hey, he says to Nil. I don’t want to interrupt anything. —Jerry asks why the pageant got interrupted. Something holier was happening, says Nil. Oh, says Jerry. I’ll try to explain in the morning. Jerry tells Gi the townsfolk were impressed with his turn as the Priest-King. Less, ah, what’s the word? Stiff! Than Calvus. Hope you don’t mind; I’ve volunteered you for the next two. Good night!

God, I love family, says Gi. That’s why I had to bring some with me.

Nil crashes shortly before dawn.