"Is it?" I said.

"Oh I think so. Don't you?"

"I don't know what to think," I said. "That's why I'm here."

"I think it's the end of the world, yes." He sat back. He looked comfortable. He drank and looked at me. "Yes I do. Everything you know's finished. You know that, don't you? Yes, I can see you do." I saw his affection for me. "You impressed me," he said. "Such an intense girl. I wanted to laugh. Even while you were looking after your poor friend. Who breathed Host air."

"Yohn."

"Anyway. Anyway." He smiled. "It's the end of the world and you're here why? You think I can help?"

"I think you can tell me things."

"Oh believe me," he said, "no one in that castle wants me to know anything. They keep me as out of it as they can these days. I'm not saying I've no ins at all-there are those who keep an old man in gossip-but you probably know at least as much as me."

"Who's Oratees?" I said. He looked sharply up.

"Oratees?" he said. "It really is? Oh. Well. Christ Pharotekton." He smoothed down his shirt. "I did wonder. I thought maybe that must be it, but . . ." He shook his head. "But you doubt. You can hardly believe it, can you?"

"Oratees isn't a person," Bren said. "They're a thing. They're junkies."

"Everything that could happen has happened sometime," he said. He leaned towards me. "Where are the failed Amba.s.sadors, d'you think, Avice?" It was so shocking a question that I held my breath.

"If I put it to you outright, you wouldn't imagine, would you, that every single one every single one of the monozogs the Emba.s.sy raises is suited to Amba.s.sadorial duties?" he said. "Of course not. Some doppels don't take-don't look enough like each other to be fixed, have quirks, can't think enough alike, despite all the training. Whatever. of the monozogs the Emba.s.sy raises is suited to Amba.s.sadorial duties?" he said. "Of course not. Some doppels don't take-don't look enough like each other to be fixed, have quirks, can't think enough alike, despite all the training. Whatever.

"You'd have known that without being told if you let yourself think about it. It's not exactly a secret. It's just not thought. You know that doppels retire, when the other dies." He raised his hands, slightly, indicating himself. "You've never been in the Emba.s.sy creche, have you? There are those who never get out of it in the first place. If you've been grown and raised and trained for one job, and you can't do it, what's the profit in letting you out? That could only cause trouble."

Little rooms of rendered twins, mouldering. Slack and separate doppels gone bad, one whole, one like a melted image; or perhaps both wrong; or neither wrong in any physical way but with some bone-deep meanness; or just not able to do what they were born to.

"And if you're already out," Bren said, "by the time you realise you hate your job or your doppel, or whatever? Well. Well." He spoke gently, breaking something to me. "When he died, my . . . it was an accident. It's not as if we were old. People knew us . . . me. I was much too young to disappear. They tried to entice entice me to the rest home of course. But they couldn't force me. So what if my neighbours don't like me? So what if they see something crippled? No one likes a cleaved showing off their injury. We're stumps." He smiled. "That's what we are. me to the rest home of course. But they couldn't force me. So what if my neighbours don't like me? So what if they see something crippled? No one likes a cleaved showing off their injury. We're stumps." He smiled. "That's what we are.

"There are trainees who can never never speak Language. I don't know why. Just can't speak in time no matter how they practise. That's simple: you don't let them go. But there are harder cases. They might look like any other pair. It's happened before, to varying degrees. We had a colleague, when I was training. WilSon. Whatever joined-up mind it was behind their Language, for the Hosts to understand, it must have been a little out. A tiny bit. Nothing I could hear, but the Hosts . . . well. speak Language. I don't know why. Just can't speak in time no matter how they practise. That's simple: you don't let them go. But there are harder cases. They might look like any other pair. It's happened before, to varying degrees. We had a colleague, when I was training. WilSon. Whatever joined-up mind it was behind their Language, for the Hosts to understand, it must have been a little out. A tiny bit. Nothing I could hear, but the Hosts . . . well.

"We were doing exams. We'd been tested by other Amba.s.sadors and Staff, and in our last practical we had to speak to a Host. It was waiting. I don't know what it thought it was doing, how they asked it to help. h.e.l.lo h.e.l.lo, WilSon say, when it's their turn.

"Straightaway we can see something's wrong," he said. "From how the Ariekes moves. Every time they talk to us, they taste our minds, and we're alien alien. So it's heady stuff. But if the two halves of an Amba.s.sador aren't . . . quite enmeshed enough? Not two random voices: close enough to speak Language and for them to get it. But wrong? Broken?" I said nothing.

"You know what Language is to them," Bren said. "What they hear through the words. So, if they hear words they understand, they know are words, but it's fractured? Amba.s.sadors speak with empathic unity. That's our job. What if that unity's there and not-there?" He waited. "It's impossible, is what. Right there in its form. And that is intoxicating. And they mainline mainline it. It's like a hallucination, a there-not-there. A contradiction that gets them high. it. It's like a hallucination, a there-not-there. A contradiction that gets them high.

"Maybe not all of them. Every Host WilSon spoke to knew something was strange, and a few of them . . ." He shrugged. "Got drunk. On their words. Didn't matter what WilSon said. Isn't it a nice day Isn't it a nice day; Please pa.s.s the tea Please pa.s.s the tea; anything. The Hosts heard it and some of them got swoony and some of them them wanted it again and again. wanted it again and again.

"Amba.s.sadors are orators, and those to whom their oration happens are oratees. Oratees are addicts. Strung out on an Amba.s.sador's Language."

OUTSIDE PEOPLE ran through the streets in frightened carnival. There was the noise of fireworks. Bren refilled my gla.s.s. ran through the streets in frightened carnival. There was the noise of fireworks. Bren refilled my gla.s.s.

"What happened to them?" I asked.

"WilSon? They were quarantined, and they died." He drank.

"Everyone respects me, but that can't stop them hating me," Bren said. "I understand that. They don't like to see my wound." He wrote his name in the air-his full name, seven letters: BrenDan. There'd been a time he was BrenDan, or more properly[image] . Then his doppel had died, and he'd become Bren . Then his doppel had died, and he'd become BrenDan,[image] . He couldn't say his own name correctly. . He couldn't say his own name correctly.

BrenDan looked at me thoughtfully for a long time. He went to a desk. "Let me show you something." looked at me thoughtfully for a long time. He went to a desk. "Let me show you something."

He threw me a shallow box. Inside were two links. His, and his doppel Dan Dan's. I examined the filigree circuits, the wires and contacts, the carefully carved initials and silver leaves. Their clasps had been cut open. I looked at him and could see the tiny marks on his neck where his had been embedded.

"What are you thinking?" he said. "Are you thinking that I keep them so they're close at hand? Are you thinking I hide them away, to try to forget them? Avice. If I'd thrown his away and kept mine, you'd think I was clinging to my dead ident.i.ty, or resenting his death. If I threw them both away, you'd see me in denial. If I kept his but not mine you'd say I was refusing to let him go. There's nothing I can do you won't do that to. It's not your fault. You can't help it, it's what we do. Whatever I do, it'll be one story or another."

(Later, the next but one time I was with him, because I did come back and after that he came to me, he said to me, "I look at that link and I hate him." I said nothing. What could I say? We were sitting on the sofa in my rooms. They were nothing like as splendid as Bren's. "I don't know when it started," he said. "For a long time I thought I hated him when he died, because he died, poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d. Now I think it might have started earlier. You mustn't blame me." He was suddenly plaintive. "I'm sure he hated me, too. It was neither of our faults.") "They must have suspected what would happen, you know," Bren said. "The Amba.s.sadors. It was always the oddb.a.l.l.s who seemed to risk . . . unplaiting . . . just enough to make a few Ariekei oratees. Those were the ones they restrained. Other sorts of troublemakers went AWOL or native."

"You think they knew?" I said. "And who went what what?"

"They must have hoped EzRa were were a drug," he said. "So they'd affect one or two of the Hosts and not be usable. One in the eye for Bremen. They've all been very concerned about who was calling what shots, what agendas were being forced, since they heard EzRa were coming." a drug," he said. "So they'd affect one or two of the Hosts and not be usable. One in the eye for Bremen. They've all been very concerned about who was calling what shots, what agendas were being forced, since they heard EzRa were coming."

"I know," I said. "But Bremen must've known too, if this has happened before. Why would they send them . . . ?"

"Known about oratees, you mean? Why would we tell Bremen about that? I don't know what they had in mind, but this, letting EzRa speak, was the Emba.s.sy's riposte, I think. Not that they expected this, though. Not like this. Language like this, right there but so so impossible, so doping, that EzRa are infecting impossible, so doping, that EzRa are infecting every, single, Host every, single, Host. All of which are spreading the word. All hooked on the new Amba.s.sador."

OUR EVERYDAY pantheon gone needy, desperate for hits of Ez and Ra speaking together, fermenting Language into some indispensable brew of contradiction, insinuation and untethered meaning. We were quartered in an addict city. That procession I'd seen had been craving. pantheon gone needy, desperate for hits of Ez and Ra speaking together, fermenting Language into some indispensable brew of contradiction, insinuation and untethered meaning. We were quartered in an addict city. That procession I'd seen had been craving.

"What happens now?" I said. It was very quiet in the room. There were hundreds of thousands of Ariekei in the city. Maybe millions. I didn't know. We knew hardly anything, at all. Their heads were all made of Language. EzRa spoke it and changed it. Every Host, everywhere, would become hardwired with need, do anything, for the blatherings of a newly trained bureaucrat.

"Sweet Jesus Pharotekton Christ light our way," I said.

"It is," said Bren, "the end of the world."

10.

THE A ARIEKEI told us how it would be. I was ahead of this curve, but it didn't take long for the rest of the Emba.s.sytowners to understand that the Hosts were junkies, though they may not have known how or why. I suspect there was a power struggle in the Emba.s.sy, that some would have tried, out of habit, without rationale, to wall up information. They didn't win. told us how it would be. I was ahead of this curve, but it didn't take long for the rest of the Emba.s.sytowners to understand that the Hosts were junkies, though they may not have known how or why. I suspect there was a power struggle in the Emba.s.sy, that some would have tried, out of habit, without rationale, to wall up information. They didn't win.

The streets of Emba.s.sytown were something between carnival and apocalypse: moods of ending; hysteria; happiness, or its giddy approximation. Constables apprehended people walking determinedly toward the edge of town, in biorigging that might let them breathe the city air.

"You're going nowhere!" the officers said. "Get that off. People are dying . . ." Some would-be city voyagers must have got through. Emba.s.sytowners wanting something from the Hosts. Pointless-the Ariekei wouldn't perceive them as people, but as the meat belongings of Amba.s.sadors.

I was able to bluff my way back into the Emba.s.sy. Seeing the way the Amba.s.sadors were scurrying I felt for a moment almost protective of them. They didn't question me. Even JasMin seemed to have forgotten they disliked me. One of EdGar gave me a kiss, to my surprise. I couldn't see his doppel. I saw the discomfort in Ed or Gar's eyes, from stretching their link's field.

"Where . . . ?" I said.

"Coming, coming." Being so separated must have made it hard to concentrate. We didn't say much until his doppel turned a corridor corner and joined us.

"Have you been into the city?" I said. ("Of course." "No one'll talk to us.") "D'you know what's happening?" ("No." "No.") "Where's EzRa? Where's Wyatt?" ("Don't know." "Don't care.") "You don't know where EzRa are?" I said. "After they caused all this s.h.i.t? So what, you've just left them to f.u.c.king conspire?"

"Conspire?" Ed and Gar laughed. "They won't even talk to each other."

AN A ARIEKENE ship-beast came toward us over their city, in which the outline of that obscure malaise was spreading, building to building. When the flyer touched down on the pad, we rigged up something like an official welcome. It's perhaps tendentious to say "we", but I made myself part of that community then, around the Staff and Amba.s.sadors, and I think no one resented it. ship-beast came toward us over their city, in which the outline of that obscure malaise was spreading, building to building. When the flyer touched down on the pad, we rigged up something like an official welcome. It's perhaps tendentious to say "we", but I made myself part of that community then, around the Staff and Amba.s.sadors, and I think no one resented it.

Every Amba.s.sador I could think of was there. The Ariekei entered the hall with gusts of aeoli breath, our wind, with the gilted curtains snapping like capes around them. They walked on the altwood floor with the sound of fingernails. Not a fraction so many as had come that last pilgrimage time, but this was a more formal group. JoaQuin and MayBel stepped forward, and others shuffled behind them. Our two sides watched each other. Eye-corals craned.

The Ariekei spoke so quickly only the most fluent listeners could follow. I turned to see how the crowd were taking all this, and with shock saw my husband. He stood in the doorway, and with him was the new Amba.s.sador.

I WAS THE FIRST WAS THE FIRST, but a few other people in the room started to notice them, and there were gasps. Ra, tall and looking very tired, stood in a pose midway between hopeful and resentful. Behind him, Ez looked at the floor. His bantam swagger was gone. His augmens were off.

Scile saw me. He met my eye, then looked around the room again. Standing where he stood, he could have been shoring EzRa up, could have been protecting them, could have been menacing them.

I recognised some of the visitors. On one fanwing I saw a moment of bird-shape in tree-shape. Pear Tree. I stared at it. The Hosts said EzRa's name.

EzRa found a reserve of dignity, and met that attention. The Ariekei spoke in a confusion, one then another, squabbling even, until at last something like sense emerged. Someone began to translate what they said.

This is how it will be.

An unqualified future tense, rare in Language. This wasn't an aspiration: the Hosts could only envisage that this was how it would would be. They didn't allow discussion: later we would make sense of it all. They didn't raise details. They didn't present requests or even demands, not really. They expressed need. All they could say, repeatedly, in various ways, was that they needed. be. They didn't allow discussion: later we would make sense of it all. They didn't raise details. They didn't present requests or even demands, not really. They expressed need. All they could say, repeatedly, in various ways, was that they needed.

We will hear EzRa speak. This is how it will be. We will hear them speak. First now we will hear EzRa speak.

I could see some Staff making calculations, muttering: the best of them could strategise even during this. I admired that. They were working out what to do, what relations could remain and how others would be saved, how we could live live, what we would make Emba.s.sytown be. They made me hope, and I'd not expected that.

The Hosts had a simple and single priority, it seemed. I was never a fool; I'd known there must be antagonisms, camps and struggles among them, before I ever saw that b.l.o.o.d.y result of one; and now a paradox, that that memory rose in me at that that moment, when all that was evident was one implacable agenda. moment, when all that was evident was one implacable agenda. First we will hear EzRa speak First we will hear EzRa speak.

Ez came forward, then, grudgingly, Ra. They looked at each other with very different emotions, those two unalike men. They whispered. They spoke Language together, and brought the Hosts to rapture.

11.

AS THEY UNFOLDED those times seemed pure chaos, but by the prodigious efforts of the better Staff, a kind of life emerged. Even routines. It's shocking how fast a whole city can be made to change. those times seemed pure chaos, but by the prodigious efforts of the better Staff, a kind of life emerged. Even routines. It's shocking how fast a whole city can be made to change.

Trade, all the moments and minutiae of exchange: knowledge, services, goods, promises and extras. Our culture. The way we lived. All of those things had to be fixed.

There was a dangerous excitement, an amoralism manifesting in small cruelties and ma.s.s indulgence, that some let take them, while others struggled to make things work. In the first weeks, if you came to the Emba.s.sy, it would probably be guarded, but perhaps not. Meeting rooms and galleries might be uncleaned, might contain detritus of parties. I didn't find much pleasure in transgressions. I knew the vomited-up red wine wasn't puked in ostentation, nor left to rot in libertine performance, but because those who partied had seen or heard about the Ariekene demand; couldn't conceive of how we could keep going or what would happen if we failed to fulfil them; so didn't know if they would live another week, and had never been so afraid.

Ehrsul did not answer my buzzes, and I was so overwhelmed I didn't pursue it or visit her, as a good friend perhaps should have. EzRa was at some parties, I heard from others, then saw myself. After a short time it was only Ez who was there, at the millennial debauches. Ra did other things.

There were a.s.signations and the collapses of relationships. There were many marriages. I had my own hurried liaisons. Really those first days are hard to talk about. The heroes who ensured that Emba.s.sytown wasn't swept away by insistent addicted Hosts were the clerks, who set up structures while the rest of us failed not to fall apart. A little later I became something again, something important to Emba.s.sytown: just then I was not.

In those days Emba.s.sytown felt as small as it ever had to me. Not two days could pa.s.s without me meeting, at some gathering, eager or desultory or both, people I'd avoided for thousands of hours. Burnham, a simile from back when, caught my eye from the other end of a crowd gathered because of a bulls.h.i.t rumour that information was about to be imparted by the Emba.s.sy gates. He looked away as carefully as I did, as I had every time since Ha.s.ser's and Valdik's deaths, since way before this new cataclysm, that I'd b.u.mped into him or Shanita or any of the dispersed Cravat crew.

I wandered Emba.s.sytown while civil servants took pills to stay awake and worked out plans to keep us alive. I b.u.mped, more than once, into older friends: Gharda; Simmon, the guard. He had nothing to guard. He was terrified: his biorigged prosthesis seemed sick.

Staff too lowly had no idea what to do, and those too high were crippled by the loss of everything. So were all those Amba.s.sadors who told people that it was the viziers' faults, that they would never themselves have let things come to this, that it had always been Staff who were the real powers and who had let everyone down. No one listened to that fairy tale any more.

It was ignored people who'd done the same thing for years who changed themselves for the sake of Emba.s.sytown, and changed Emba.s.sytown. Our bureaucratic feudalism of expertise became a remorseless meritocracy. Even a few Amba.s.sadors proved themselves. Rarely the ones I'd have guessed. That's true but a trite observation.

One of the first of the new leadership's achievements was the defeat of Wyatt's insurgency. Simmon was key to that little war. He told me about it afterwards, invigorated again. "You saw how suddenly all Wyatt's lot got moving? They were opening the a.r.s.enals opening the a.r.s.enals. I guess whatever's going on triggered some b.l.o.o.d.y Bremen emergency protocol. That's what all that chaos was, a few days ago."

I'd not noticed whatever uprising of our overpower's representatives he was talking about. There was plenty of chaos enough.

"We got wind of it-never mind how-and we were ready for them. But we had to take risks." He was drawing the plan, the actions, in schema, with his hand in the air. "We could probably just have pre-empted them, you know? But that Bremen tech they've got-we reckoned it had to be pretty d.a.m.n useful. So we waited and went in after after they'd opened the silos. We had a few officers placed with them-it's not as if we hadn't been preparing for this before. We took them with only a few casualties, they'd opened the silos. We had a few officers placed with them-it's not as if we hadn't been preparing for this before. We took them with only a few casualties, and and we got the weapons. Although honestly, they're not as useful as we'd hoped. Still. we got the weapons. Although honestly, they're not as useful as we'd hoped. Still.

"They didn't put up much fight. It's only Wyatt who was the problem. We've put him away. Incommunicado. There are bound to be Bremen agents still out there, and we have to make sure he can't get codes or instructions or whatever to them." I didn't tell him I hadn't noticed the drama. Even ignorant of it as I'd been, I was galvanised, hearing of it.

RA, THE DIFFIDENT half of our cataclysmic Amba.s.sador, was allowed his solitude and whatever his little projects were; Ez was allowed his louche collapse. But they were on orders, and they were guarded. They had duties. They were what kept us alive. half of our cataclysmic Amba.s.sador, was allowed his solitude and whatever his little projects were; Ez was allowed his louche collapse. But they were on orders, and they were guarded. They had duties. They were what kept us alive.

"A city of brainwashed," EdGar said to me. "Stronger than us, armed. We need them hospitable."

There was no thinking or strategy from the Hosts in those first days. I who was so used to glossing all their strangeness with special pleading-it's some Ariekene thing, we wouldn't understand- was aghast to become convinced that they were not indulging any inhuman strategy, but mindless addict need. At first crowds of Ariekei were gathered permanently outside the Emba.s.sy. When they became agitated and their demands particularly insistent, every few hours, EzRa would be fetched, appear at the entrance, and in flawless Language say something- anything at all-amplified to carry, to the crowd's obvious stoned relief.

The second time EzRa said to them We are happy to see you and look forward to learning together We are happy to see you and look forward to learning together, the oratees reacted without quite the degree of bliss they'd shown previously. The third time they were unhappy, until EzRa announced some new pointlessness about the colour of the buildings, the time of day or the weather. Then they were rapt again. "f.u.c.king fantastic," I said to someone. "They're building up tolerance. Keep EzRa inventive."

We watched news programmes that after kilohours of trivialities now had to learn to report our own collapse. One channel sent an aeoli-wearing team with vespcams into the city. They were neither invited nor barred. Their reports were astonishing.

We were not used to seeing Ariekene streets, but there are new freedoms during a breakdown. The reporters edged into the city, past plaited ropes tethering gas-filled Host rooms, past buildings that shied away from them or rose on spindled limbs like witch-huts. Ariekei crossed our screens. They saw the reporters, stared and ran over sometimes like tottering horses. They asked questions in their double voices, but there were no Amba.s.sadors to answer them. The reporters knew Language, translated for viewers.

" 'Where is EzRa?' " That was what the Hosts said.

The reporters weren't the only Terre in the city. Their vespcams glimpsed men and women in Emba.s.sy suits moving among the skittish houses. They were routing cables and speakers- Terretech that looked jarring in that topography. They were extending a network of hailers and coms boxes. In return perhaps for our lives, the maintenance of our power, water, infrastructure, biorigging, they were getting ready to bring EzRa's voice right into the city.

"We need EzRa now," EdGar said. "They have to perform. That was our deal."

"With them, or the Hosts?" I said.

"Yes. More EzRa, though. And that means we need Ez."

He was drinking and drugging. More than once, he'd disappear at the times he was scheduled to speak Language to the Ariekei, leaving Ra speechless and waiting. I didn't care if Ez killed himself, but that he'd take us with him if he did.

"They're like normal Amba.s.sadors in one way, right?" I said. "Recordings work? So build up a library of EzRa's speeches, then let the f.u.c.ker do what he wants. Let him drink himself dead." They'd thought of that, but Ez would not comply. Even begged by Ra or threatened by Staff or guards, he would only speak with his Amba.s.sador-colleague an hour or so at any one time. We could grab the odd snippet onto dat, but he was careful not to let them collect a store of EzRa's Language.

"He knows he'd be redundant," EdGar said. "This way we keep needing him." Even in his decline and terror, Ez thought with ruthless strategy. I was impressed.

BY VESPCAM, I saw the first times that EzRa's voice was played into that strung-out city.

The buildings had been unhappy for days. They were rearing and breathing steam, purging themselves of the biorigged parasites they bred, that were Ariekene furniture. Look out from the Emba.s.sy, to where the city began, an organic vista like piled-up body parts, and the motion of the architecture was clear. The wrongness was endemic.

The city twitched. It was infected. The Hosts had heard EzRa's impossible voice, had taken energy from their zelles and let out waste, and in the exchange the chemistry of craving had been pa.s.sed, and pa.s.sed on again by the little beasts when they connected to buildings to power light and the business of life. Addiction had gone into the houses, which poor mindless things shook in endless withdrawal. The most afflicted sweated and bled. Their inhabitants rigged them crude ears, to hear EzRa speak, so the walls could get their fix.

EzRa spoke. They said anything in Language. Their amplified voice sounded through all the byways. Everywhere in the city Ariekei staggered and stopped. Their buildings staggered with them.