“I presume they’re invoking the Recovery laws. We should have wiped those from the statute books years ago.” Ram Kikura seemed more radical and bitter to Lanier than when they had first met. Age and the Recovery had worn on her, as well, yet she did not appear any older than when he had first met her. She had kept her style and looks largely unchanged the past four decades.

Olmy completed a slow walk around the table, his gait smooth and leonine. “You’ve absorbed Ser Mirsky’s story?”

Ram Kikura nodded. “As much as I care to. It’s hideous.”

Mirsky’s eyes widened in surprise. “Hideous?” he asked.

“The ultimate pollution. The ultimate sacrilege. I was born and raised in the Way, and yet now…” She looked as if she might spit. “To open the Way again, and keep it open, is more than folly. It’s evil.”

“Let’s not get extreme,” Korzenowski said mildly.

“I beg the Engineer’s pardon,” Ram Kikura said.

“You’re being shrill,” Olmy picted privately to her. She turned on him with a stone-heavy glare. “These men are here to ask your help. So am I. There’s no sense being self-righteous before you know what we need. Or what we believe.”

This message passed in an eye’s blink. Lanier only knew that Olmy had picted with her; he was not in the line of picting, of course, and did not consider himself adept at translating picts anyway. Ram Kikura’s shoulders slumped and she stared at the carpet, eyes closed, taking a deep breath.

“My apologies. Ser Olmy reminds me of my manners. I happen to be passionate about these things. Seeing the aftermath of the Death gave me a strong impression of what our hubris can do.”

“Please remember, until now I have opposed the reopening of the Way,” Korzenowski said. “But the pressures on the Hexamon are enormous. And Ser Mirsky’s return—”

“Excuse me, Ser Korzenowski,” Mirsky interrupted. “I am curious why she calls my story hideous.”

“You tell us the Way clogs up our universe like a snake,” Ram Kikura said.

“Not precisely. It makes a project carried out by our very distant descendants more difficult, perhaps impossible. But the Way itself is not thought of by these being as ‘hideous.’ They regard it with wonder. That such a tiny community, traveling between worlds, still locked into the realm of matter, should accomplish so much in so short a time…this is unprecedented. Constructs similar to the Way exist in other universes, but none of them were created by beings so early in their development. To our descendants, the Way stands out as the Egyptian pyramids did in our history, or Stonehenge. If they had their preference, it would be preserved as a monument to early brilliance. But that is not possible. It must be dismantled in a particular fashion…and that can only begin here.”