Songs Of Earth And Power 02 The Serpent Mage by Greg Bear

Author:Greg Bear [Bear, Greg]
Format: epub
Published: 2010-05-16T11:45:37.767000+00:00

"DAMN you," Ruth said, but she was beginning to laugh and cry at once. "God damn everything." She turned to Shiafa. "I'm sorry. We don't know how to react to all this."

Michael could feel tension radiating from Shiafa. If he didn't isolate her soon, he wasn't sure what would happen.

"We have to leave now. I'll be back in a few hours. There are people I have to call � but the phones are restricted. So I may have to talk to them in person. Mahler and Mozart are just the beginning. I came back with many others � about five thousand of them."

Ruth's face went white. "Here?"

"They're in Dodger Stadium. That's where I called you from. I have to make arrangements for them. They've been in the Realm for a long time, some of them thousands of years."

"All right," Ruth said. She pointed with a nod of her chin at Shiafa. "Will she go with you?"

"Yes," Michael said. "This is difficult for her. She can't go home."

"There is no home," Shiafa said distantly.

"So please, bear with me, with us," Michael said. "If I don't miss my guess, Mahler and Mozart are going to be asleep for hours. I hope to be back before they wake up. I don't have much time."

"We'll manage," John said, hugging his wife to him with one arm. "Won't we?"

"We'll have to," Ruth said. "What will they eat?"

"Go easy on the meat," Michael advised. "They haven't had much of that where they've been." Shiafa's skin grayed noticeably at the mention of meat.

"You look very tired," Ruth said. "Both of you. I'm sorry about reacting badly�"

"No time to rest. And no self-recriminations. We'll be back soon."

"Why was the Waltiri house full of birds?" Ruth asked.

"Please, Mother."

"All right. Go."

Michael reached out to feel for Edgar Moffat and found him sitting in the recording room in the studio where they had first met. His probe seemed to be surrounded by razors, the harsh reality now that the Realm had beached itself on Earth's shoals.

"Will we take the machine again?" Shiafa asked.

"It's the easiest way," Michael said. "I think my car is still full of gas."

They walked back to the Waltiri house under the gray, overcast afternoon. "You're wasting energy," he said, as they walked up the driveway.

"This place smells horrible," Shiafa said sharply. "It smells like death."

"Right here?" he asked, glancing at the sidewalk where Tommy had shot himself and turned into dust and rags.

"Everywhere. The entire city."

Michael shrugged. "I've gotten used to it. I don't notice."

"It smells like dead forests," Shiafa said. "Like one of Adonna's abortions."

He realized that what she was objecting to was not just the smell of smog � very light this day, he thought � but of technology and human habitations in general. The houses around them, including Waltiri's, had been made from unconsecrated wood. The power lines overhead could upset a Sidhe's sensibilities. If other human technologies were still working, the air would be full of beamed energy � radar and television and radio.

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