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"They’re not real," she told both of us
"Neither is your sense of direction," I said
"No," she admitted "I don’t even feel it now The farther we drift"
"Why bring the wheel to this place?" I asked Gaed ruins, poluted for milions of years by weapons our forces--human forces-- unleashed when they saw defeat was inevitable No Forerunner has a need to visit here--and al subject species are warned to stay away"
I had not heard of subject species before "Subject species
who are they?" I asked "Like us?"
"No We were the defeated There were also subservient alies
Soather and iust
"A place no one visitswhy here?" I asked Gamelpar
Because it is stolen Let the two of us old spirits rise and talk directly
I shook ave the slightest nod, as if approving Neither of us wanted to be out here on the strange salt sea under the control of dead warriors fro," I whispered, not to disturb Vinnevra, lying
doith eyes closed
"They are we, " he said "It’s only a ht die when that happens My old spirit speaks so he thinks they caled the Composer --Forerunner or machine, I don’t knohich But the Composer was once used for such purposes, in the past"
I didn’t want to understand what this meant, so I shook my head, lay back beside Vinnevra, and shut ht crossed over the sea, the boat’s rocking woke rasslands outside Marontik, where I hid by the side of a rutted wagon path, stalking wel-to-do merchants
Obviously, before Riser took e
I blinked and looked around The boat continued to rock in a gentle swel We were now far from either shore, out in theus, orienting the boat paralel with their troughs--soan to subside but were thenfrom the opposite direction
Vinnevra woke next--Ga to rouse hiht be causing the disturbances "They’re just waves," she concluded, but I could tel the difference The longer, straighter waves were not the saer, wider, they were reflections from the uneven shoreline Their rhythm had luled us to sleep These new ones had awakened us
So hu another round of slickly perfect undulations Then the surface was al confused as a downdraft of cool air fel around our boat and created a wide roughening
"Merse," I said "The lake is ful of merse The Lifeshaper loves them"
Vinnevra and Gamelpar didn’t understand what reenish black fin rose up just beside our boat, touching the side, spinning us around gently enough --and sinking again, like the tip of a huge knife
I grasped the side and darted looks in al directions
"Crocodile," I suggested next, but I had never heard of crocodiles with fins Only fish and river dolphins, and this wasI had ever seen in a river It did not take long for another hureen The fin seemed to flow under the water to join that se shape slid beneath our boat
"My best wife spoke of sea creatures big as vilages," Gaht us here, didn’t she?"
The rounded shape and a pair of long fins roiled the water about a hundredrapidlyAnd that h the clear water, down and down--to see another paleness, like the one that had approached us under the suspended town, the sa to al sides like an island trying to rise
The others saw it as wel, and held on to each other The paleness broke water on both sides of us--but what it was precisely that broke the water, I could not tel I i like the otten loose and occupied this sea, filing it everywhere, colecting everything that lived but stil hungrily seeking e wal itself
But as I studied the paleness, I saw it had its own nature, its own original strangeness, and I knew, soht, a rounded, lobe-edged appendage, purple and blue in color, e up and around At the end of each lobe protruded a finer series of lobes, and at the end of each of those lobes, the same, until the outermost seemed to be covered with fuzz
On the other side of our boat rose another
The flesh that h with bubblesyet not bubbles, for they see jewels, like little sacs of treasure
These manifestations were beautiful beyond my ability to describe them, even now
For hours, as we drifted, these shapes and a bewildering nu us, perhaps
ushering us along, who could tel? But never did they try to reach out and snatch us fro us
"What are they?" Vinnevra asked
"The sea is rich," Gamelpar said when he had recovered his speech, after our fear had departed, leaving only numb wonder
Neither of us had any answer--nor did the old spirits within us The reach of the Forerunners, it seemed, had so far exceeded that of hue, and back down again, and never see an end to the Lady’s colections, her accuths?
"They--or it--have been gathered by the Lifeshaper," I said
"She keeps some of her favorites here"
"More favored than you and me?" Gareat weapon that was also a zoo, a refuge for humans--then had the Lifeshaper partnered with him as wel as with the Didact? Did she serve two masters?