The Emperor of Everything

It arrived and Ruiz descended the narrow steps set into the sub’s bulging topsides. Albany leaned on the sub’s conning tower, looking down at Ruiz, his face obscured by the darkness. “I still think we ought to go to ground until this excitement blows over. I know places where we’d keep fat and happy.” He spoke in an oddly dispassionate tone. It suddenly seemed to Ruiz that perhaps some vital mechanism had broken down in Albany. He wondered what it might be, and how it had happened — and why it hadn’t happened to him, yet.

“You’re probably right,” Ruiz said. “But I don’t think I have any choice. If you want, I’ll put you ashore here, no hard feelings.”

Albany sighed. “No. I’ll stick. You still have your luck, Ruiz Aw. I need something; maybe that’s it. Besides, who’d keep an eye on our benevolent employer?”

Ruiz didn’t know what to say. The bumboat nudged the sub’s flank and beeped insistently. “Thanks,” he finally said, and stepped into the bumboat. He looked back at Albany as the bumboat backed water and drew away.

Albany waved and spoke in a low voice that carried across the water. “Good luck, Ruiz. Find what you need.”

The bumboat beeped again, inquisitively. “The Celadon Wind’s ingress,” Ruiz told it, and it carried him away.

Ruiz joined a procession of odd persons, walking up the ramp toward the Celadon Wind’s gate. To his right were a pair of old pirates, much scarred, wearing typically gaudy flamesilk shipsuits, arms affectionately linked, whispering endearments into each other’s dirty ears. To his left, uncomfortably close, was some sort of barbarian from a desert world, muffled in black robes, from which came the clink and rattle of many weapons. Ruiz edged away slightly, and slowed his pace so that the man passed him in a waft of ancient sweat and strong hashish. Farther up the ramp was a gang of devolved beasters, a half-dozen men and women with thick, crusty skin and swinish white-tusked faces. They skipped along like schoolchildren on an outing.

Just ahead walked a tall slender woman, naked except for steel-scaled slippers and a great mane of pale hair, confined by a headband set with pigeonblood rubies. In other circumstances, Ruiz might have been distracted by the pleasant rhythms of her movements.

But all he could think of was the terrible efficiency with which Remint disposed of his enemies. It was foolish to worry that he might meet the slayer in the fabularium; no one could be that stupid, or arrogant. But this was the beginning of a trail that might lead to Remint, and Ruiz was growing more and more afraid of the slayer. He felt his heartbeat pick up, he felt sweat break on his forehead, though the ramp was cooled by powerful ventilators, and he cursed himself for this weakness, which might lead not only to his own destruction, but to Nisa’s as well — if she still lived.

As he approached the top of the ramp, he managed to suppress the worst of his panic, though he could still feel it at the edges of his mind. He shook his head and tried to unobtrusively shrug some of the tension from his shoulders.

The gate was a tall structure of simulated stone, set against the metal wall of the fabularium. The deeply carved arch displayed elements of a hundred mythic traditions — most of the human persons who might pass beneath it would find some familiar imagery in the carvings. Old Earth gods sported with Jaworld dybbuks and Androsian chickcharneys. Avatars of the Serpent Mystery coiled about icons of the Chlorophyllic Eye. Nilotic succubi clung lasciviously to Dead God saints. The effect was of riotous chaos.

In the center of the arch was an inscription in some archaic Old Earth script Ruiz could not read.

To the side stood a tall Moc bondwarrior in a jewel-encrusted cape — the gatekeeper. A strategically placed spotlight struck an eye-hurting glitter from the cape, but Ruiz noticed that the cape was designed not to hamper the creature’s movements. With a carefully proclamatory gesture, it raised a vocalizer and then activated what was obviously a canned speech. “You may keep your weapons,” the vocalizer sang in a sweet androgynous voice. “But remember! Within, you are subject to the law of the Celadon Wind. Attempt to maim… and you will be maimed. Attempt to kill… and you will be killed. We possess the latest semi-sentient security devices, so do not think to circumvent our vigilance.”

“I won’t,” said Ruiz in a wistfully hopeful tone, and passed into the Celadon Wind.

Chapter 21

Corean arrived at the adjacent joypalace just before Ruiz walked up the ramp into the fabularium. The joypalace was a run-down operation, its lobby dirty, threadbare, and at that moment devoid of customers. A person of indeterminate species sat behind a cloudy armorglass security enclosure, reading an ancient printed book. It ignored Corean and her guide as they walked toward the elevators.