Beware those who would change the ending, O you whose story is the story of rule. For those who wish to master the future also wish to master the past. And in their work to build a tall tower they will undermine the foundations of everything.

21. The Map Entire

21

THE MAP ENTIRE

JAMAN Ryapost’s skull grinned at Baru from its bolted frame.

Suicide upon exaltation.

He had reckoned the costs. He had found himself too deep in debt.

Baru woke from the dream with a shriveled pig’s bladder curled in her arms, drained almost entirely of wine. The dregs had run out like sweet afterbirth down her stomach, and she found her mind cold, hard, and hurting like the length of a nail. She rolled out of the hammock, did her exercises, washed her mouth, and decided to spend her odd focus on the most difficult task available.

“Iraji?” she called. “Iraji, I need you.”

He was not in his hammock.

She bundled up her parents’ letters in her arms and went looking for him. Helbride’s sailors were crowded thicker than ever on middeck, their hammocks pitched two or three deep in some places. The Oriati from Cheetah had set up their camp on the maindeck, preferring the sun and rain and wind to even the appearance of captivity. Enact-Colonel Osa’s sailors were pitching in (literally) with Helbride’s work, helping to tar up the hempen ropes.

Baru slipped aft to Apparitor’s nook, but Svir was not there: he was probably up on the deck, hopping and swinging up in the ropes like a red clown fish darting through his home anemone. She sighed, and turned to go, and then saw Iraji huddled in the right-hand aft corner of the nook, the same corner where Baru had huddled at the last meeting.

Hello,” he sniffled, and tried to smile. “Looking for Svir?”

“For you, actually.…” Baru clutched the letters awkwardly. “I wondered if you’d help me … go through my parents’ letters.”

“Do you need an analyst?”

“No, I just…” She dithered in the threshold, playing with the canvas curtain. “It’s just that I can’t, ah, well, it might become difficult for me, and if someone’s nearby, I’ll be too embarrassed to…”

“To grieve.”

“Yes.”

“So you want me to be with you, so you’ll restrain yourself.”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Well,” he said, tremulously, “I’m sorry, I’m not the right person for that just now.”

Baru felt like an ass. “Are you all right?”

“No,” he snapped, “my ship is full of Oriati!”

Oriati like him. And he had come to Falcrest very young, like Baru. He could never pass as one of the Mbo Oriati, and he would never really be Falcresti: now he had a ship full of both, to make it clear he was neither.