He
shrugged. Right. The basic incuriosity of this world. “It does not matter,
Cassan Vala. You sounds like a Historian. Either we will find these ships
tomorrow and save this world and Jerem Cozak or we will not. There is no time
for anything else.”
He looked
at me strangely and stood, then shambled off into the darkness toward his tent.
I kept on
staring into the flames. I don’t know exactly when Suriel showed, but then I
never do. One moment I sitting there staring at a nice patch of nothing, my eyes
beginning to droop, and he was there, between blinks. Exactly where Nogilian
had been. With the way the Niskivim thought, that was probably supposed to mean
something.
Suriel did
not seem entirely himself, though. I could see Nogilian’s tent through his
chest, which meant that he was more transparent than normal. And he had lost
much luster, not shining as he should have been.
“You must/
go/ down,” he said, bowing forward. Long moments passed.
“You’ve got
to be kidding me,” I replied. “I already did that. It was pretty spectacular.
It got us all the way here. Tomorrow, we climb this pass and see what we can
see.” Apparently, I was still in something of a mood.
“You must/
go/ down,” he repeated. I tried another
round of the waiting game.
“Look,” I
said. “I understand if you’re confused about time and causality and all that.
Sounds like that might not be all that clear cut for you. But I can tell you:
it’s done. We’ve all moved on. Bigger and better things, and I have to say I
didn’t exactly appreciate the vagueness of the instruction. You’d think
super-intelligence would find a better way.”
He replied
with the same damned injunction. Nothing further seemed forthcoming.
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