The Promise of the Child

Part 12 (updated daily)

The other Perennial closed his eyes, massaging his brow. 'You have to take sides this time,' he said softly. 'You can't keep avoiding these questions.'

They stared at each other, the whispering meadow appearing to amplify the sounds of the game across the lawn. Respect for Sotiris in the Firmament was a bright constant, long-lived and hardy like the artificial sun glowing overhead. He had a good many friends among Perennials on both sides of the debate. Neutrality, while on paper perhaps a cowardly trait, had ensured that he kept them. He took in Hytner, dressed in all his Virginis finery. He, of course, didn't have that problem.

Hytner glanced away in frustration. 'This supersedes friendship, Sotiris.'

Sotiris shook his head, following Hytner's gaze. A visitor, still some way off, was heading towards them across the meadow.

'You won't be allowed to hold on to neutrality for ever,' said Hytner when he received no response. 'They won't talk to you like this, they won't give you a second chance.'

'They are still a minority, Hieronymus. I think you forget that in your panic. This Amaranthine, whoever he may be, however old and powerful he may say he is – though of course I severely doubt his claim – is still just one man on the Old World, with a few devout followers. The kingdom of the giant Melius is where they shall stay; they would never risk coming here, into the greater Firmament.'

'Not yet, at least. But give them time. This . . . Aaron, he has been quick about his work. Gliese, of all places, has already been offered to him – straight into his hands, should he want it. You think he won't accept the capital as a coronation gift?'

'He can't. Not until his claim has been tested.'

'All right.' Hytner leaned forward again, very close. 'And what if he speaks the truth, if he is the Eldest? What are we to do then?'

Sotiris stood from his chair. 'Then all follows the natural order, and we must be thankful.'

Hytner remained seated but turned to watch the man approach. It was Stone, dressed in the apparel of the Devout, the sect that harboured the man now seeking the Amaranthine crown. His sleeves were rolled down despite the mildness of the morning, their heliotrope studs twinkling as he waved away some of the bees congregating in his path.

'Must be hot in that,' said Sotiris quietly.

'What have you come here for?' growled Hytner as the Amaranthine approached. 'I'm afraid illiterates aren't welcome at our book group.'

Stone sneered. 'Quiet. My message is for Sotiris, and Sotiris alone. Leave.'

'Leave? You see, Zacharia, this is why nobody likes—'

'Leave.' Stone withdrew his hand from his pocket, holding it poised against his thigh.

Hytner glanced at Sotiris coldly and rose from his chair. 'I've no desire to spend any more time in such hopeless company.' Shaking his head, he walked away through the buttercups. 'We are ruined, all of us. You'll see, Sotiris.'

Stone watched him go with cold eyes, his fist clenched. Like all Immortals, he looked perpetually young, frozen at the moment when his cells took their last breath of mortality. The look suited some, but not Stone; his body had changed at twenty-two, his face remaining forever unfinished.

Sotiris took his hand without fear. 'What is it?'

Stone's face relaxed. 'It isn't good news. It's your sister.'

He tensed, moving to the table. 'What about her?'

'You'll have to come with me.' Stone took hold of his arm carefully.

Sotiris looked for Hytner, retreating across the meadow.

'Come,' the man repeated.

Sea Hall

'Sotiris Gianakos.'

He stooped to a bow as he was led before the Perennials, his gowns whispering as they dragged behind him on the gleaming floors. Some were decades younger than he, children Sotiris might have chastised for being a nuisance at dinner. Here, in the golden Sea Hall of Gliese, they were his equals. Sotiris's eyes traversed the vaulted cloisters of pocked gold as he took his seat, past pillars studded with globes of black opal to the map of the Firmament beaten in glittering relief across the vast dome above them. His skin still tingled with the shock of Bilocation – its atoms having bridged the gulf of a light-year in a matter of seconds – and he rubbed his hands together like a traveller come in from the cold as he returned his attention to the seated figures.

Stone had taken Sotiris as far as he could, too immature by half a millenium to be present alongside him now. On their way in, crossing the polished floors of beaten silver cobbled with chunks of apple-green jadeite, they had passed a weeping Melius, tall and awkward, his coloured skin blistered from dozens of lashes.

'Perennial Parliament,' Sotiris said, his Unified – the language of the Amaranthine for more than ten thousand years – crisp and formal. 'I have received news of events.'

The cries of the distant Melius grew too thin and distant to be heard as twelve pairs of ancient eyes looked at him. Finally an Immortal, clothed in a shimmering blue hooded gown, stood from his chair.

'Sotiris, your sister is dead. The Terziyan Utopia protects her Immortal remains and awaits your presence.' The Amaranthine hesitated. 'I am sorry to have to bring you this news.' He sat, collecting his cane from its perch at the side of the golden chair and studying its tip.

Sotiris waited for anyone else to speak in the Sighing Silence. The halls, open to the cold grey sea, reverberated like a conch when the storms swept across the Vaulted Lands and over the inlet upon which they perched.

He supposed he had known the moment Stone came for him that something had happened to her. The Insane lived only as long as fortune favoured them. To dwindle to madness and travel to a Utopia was to realise that death would follow, sooner or later.

'I would know, Perennial Parliament, the manner of Iro's fate.'