20

Livia was practicing scales in her cabin aboard the lads' ship when she felt the room flip around her in an especially nauseating way. "What's going on?" she shouted at the ceiling.

"It's leaving!" answered Cicada.

"The annie?"

"It's headed off into the Lethe! I think they agreed to help us."

Choronzon confirmed it when he called a few minutes later. "We promised to protect your people two hundred years ago," he said as his image leaned on the metal door-jamb. "Reputations are at stake here."

"And what about us?" she asked. "Can we go home?"

"Come and go as you please," he said. "The annies won't stop you."

"Thanks." She closed the door on him. It wasn't that she was ungrateful, but Livia really would have appreciated having an anima to front for her right now. She went to sit on the bed.

If she started singing again right now she'd cry. She didn't know whether it would be from relief, or fear.

After her conversation with Choronzon, they had returned to the ship to await the anecliptics' decision. The vote Emblaze had asked to come along, and Livia had reluctantly agreed; but she could only play the gracious hostess for a short time before retreating to her room. Sophia had reluctantly agreed not to contact any other users of the Book so inscape was back on. Given the choice, though, Livia found she preferred to limit her own interactions with the ship to crippleview. Maybe Qiingi was right, and she needed a stable world in which to organize her thoughts.

She sat and looked around the room. Everything was silence; nothing moved. As the seconds dragged by she wondered when she was going to feel triumph that their mission into the wider world had succeeded. She was going to free Westerhaven! Mother and Father, Rene, Esther, and all the rest, would soon be walking the streets of Barrastea again, together and laughing.

Except that they wouldn't. This was what she'd refused to face up to all this time: like any manifold, Westerhaven was fragile. Irreparable. At least in ancient and modern times there had been stable institutions such as the Church and State to pick up the pieces after a war. In Teven, that stability was maintained by the tech locks. So Livia would never again walk the streets of the Barrastea she'd known, never again taste the Societies in their full flower. Whatever came after Westerhaven, they would have to build it from scratch.

She'd been telling herself for the past few hours that she didn't care — that she would try to do her duty by her people, but that she was happy to be free of the manifolds. She could storm Teven with the anecliptics' cavalry and free the ones she loved. And then settle where she chose, whether in Teven or somewhere in the seductive, wonderfully rewarding narratives of the Archipelago.

Except mat the Archipelago was tearing itself apart, too. Its freedom was only the freedom to realize just how insignificant you were — how pointless any ambitions were next to the anecliptics and the gods next door. How had Qiingi described it? Wallpaper: endless repetition of the same streets, same people, same art and intrigues.

Livia groaned and put the heels of her hands to her eyes. This was crazy — she should be happy! Instead, she was miserable.

Someone knocked on her door. Livia gestured for it to open.

"Hello, Respected Kodaly," said Emblaze. "May I come in?"

Too weary to refuse, Livia waved her in. Emblaze held out her hand to shake.

"So," said Livia. "You're a vote." Emblaze nodded. "What's your constituency?" Livia asked, feeling a painful sense that her social graces were about to fail her.

"Well," said Emblaze, "there hangs a tale." Seeing the expression on Livia's face, she hurried on with, "Look, I know you have a lot on your mind, but I may be able to help. But your question's a bit ... awkward ... for me to answer."

Both intrigued and annoyed, Livia stood and motioned for her to sit "Why? I should have thought that it would be straightforward. You're a vote; whose vote are you?"

"I'm yours, Livia Kodaly."

Emblaze sat there gazing at her as if expecting some sensible response. "Huh?" was all Livia could muster.

The vote looked away, frowning. She held up her hand, examined the back of it "We arise," she said eventually, "when the traffic in inscape intensifies and knots up. When the nodes of heavy usage are stable and large enough, an AI is compiled. It doesn't matter to inscape what the traffic is about — so there's votes for pet lovers, gardening, Shakespeare appreciation, the reinvention of obsolete crimes ... every imaginable human interest You know there's a vote for the Good Book."

Livia nodded, remembering Veronique's story. "Yes. Her name's Filament right?" Emblaze nodded. Livia began bustling in her little kitchenette. "Would you like some tea?"

"Thanks. The point is, Livia, I'm a vote but that doesn't mean I had a ... strictly political origin. I'm the representative of all the people who use, or are interested in, the Life of Livia sim."

Livia dropped the cup she had been holding. Laughing, she retrieved it. "You're the vote for my stolen memories?"

Emblaze looked uncomfortable. "I prefer to think that I contain the aggregate feelings and values of seven hundred million people. They just happen to be those people inspired — or outraged — by your recordings of life in Westerhaven."

As she poured some water for tea, Livia thought about what mat might imply. The lads had said they'd gutted the sim. It was full of holes, some of very personal memories, some containing strategic information such as where Teven Coronal actually was.

She shot Emblaze a suspicious look. "So I guess you're curious about some things ... like the tech locks?" What would a vote be willing to do in order to satisfy its constituency?

Emblaze shook her head. "It's not for me to act in place of my people. I'm their advocate, not their proxy."

"Like Filament?"

To Livia's surprise, Emblaze blushed. "I sum to my constituents' ethics, true. They would never harm you, or even pester you, so neither would I. Most are fascinated by the mechanisms that run Westerhaven — these 'manifolds' you and Choronzon were talking about They'd love to know how they work, especially the tech locks. But a very large number of people are also just interested in you. They saw the way your life changed after that strange accident, and many are concerned for you. And your agents disguised you pretty effectively, but now the cat's out of the bag."

She took a deep breath. "Livia, people want to help you."

Livia had one of those little shifts in perspective that were happening all too often lately. "I guess this is your ship, isn't it? I thought Sophia supplied it, but she works for the Book ... "

Emblaze shrugged. "She has multiple allegiances, like anybody else. And yes, this is one of my ships — meaning, it's owned by the Government. That's not what I mean about helping, though.

"Livia, your archive has been laid open to us except for the most private of moments, the ones you edited out as you went Your whole public life is mere for all to see, excepting minutes or hours here and there — but there is one span of eighty days that is completely missing. You know the time I refer to."

Livia felt a cold flush of adrenalin. "After the crash."

Emblaze nodded. "It seemed from your behavior after mat time that you couldn't remember crucial events. And when my people looked at your records of that time, they were a jumble. Your implants were damaged by the magnetic pulse of the explosion, apparently. But they weren't completely shut down. There were fragments and a constant, low-level murmur of data trickling into the system. Nothing any ordinary data processing system could make sense of. But a few million of my people came together in an adhocracy to comb through the bits by hand. It was incredibly tedious work, but they did it willingly. And now they're finished."