Page 30 of The Enduring Universe
“Our place in this world the way we see it, not the way you do with your desire for amends.”
The silence in the chamber grew tenser, a tautness to it like a vine stretched tight ready to snap.
Iravan felt Dhruv stir behind him.
Anger simmered within him, that Ahilya took no responsibility for her part in it, but he kept it contained. Whatever transpired in this conversation would affect the Ecstatics. He needed to sway them toward his capital desire, but he couldn’t afford to look weak, not when he had caused the death of their comrades and presented no yakshas to them.
“Your war with the Virohi has damaged Irshar,” Ahilya said. “Listen well to me, Iravan, for my demands are clear. You will help us remake the ashram. You will send your Ecstatics to help us with our designs, to repair our architecture, to grow food and medicines—and not just until Irshar comes back to where it was,but untilIdetermine their service is over. You will do this not merely for Irshar, but for all the cities in the jungle that we are building. You will see this done, and done again, now and for the rest of your years. You will enter into a binding contract with me, as strong as an unbreakable healbranch vow, Iravan, and you will find a way to enforce it.”
There was another silence, a breath taken in and held.
Behind his veil of inscrutability, Iravan felt a rush of relief, relaxing his shoulders.
This was shockingly perfect. Ahilya had given him an easy way to mold the desires of the Ecstatics toward making reparations to the complete ones. Still, he leaned back and steepled his fingers.
“Is that all?” he asked, injecting irony into his voice. “You exact a heavy price.”
“I am not done,” she snapped. “You will also send your sungineers to make our equipment work, to help with our inventions, and to make us independent of you and the Garden. This, you owe us.”
Dhruv shifted behind Iravan, and he imagined the sungineer open his mouth to speak, but Iravan raised his hand and Dhruv subsided.
Iravan knew what his objection was going to be.
All the architects of the Garden were Ecstatics now, even if they had not come to him so. Iravan had wrenched them into the Deepness through the Conduit in an unnatural awakening. Ecstatics usually supertrajected into the Moment, but the devices of the Garden were working because Iravan had taught his most reliable architects to traject into a dark, velvety Deepness the way the falcon had once shown him.
They were trajecting into other worlds though none of them could see those other worlds. Such knowledge was potentially disastrous. It was what the cosmic creatures had done—affectingworlds that were not theirs. Iravan still did not fully know the effect of such a trajection, and only the most critical sungineering was being powered right now.
Ahilya was right in that he owed her a debt. But giving her this would take a heavy toll, one he still could not calculate.
“Anything else?” he asked.
Ahilya bolstered herself visibly, and her eyes bored into his. “You will repair the Moment,” she said, and at that, Iravan finally exhaled.
There it was.
Her real demand.
He met her gaze. “No.”
“Youwillrepair the Moment, Iravan,” Ahilya said furiously, taking a step forward. “And you will do so personally. No one else has that power, and it was your capital desire that wrought this.”
“Why would I want to?” he asked. “Why would you want me to? Do you, of all people, want the world to be dependent on trajection again?”
“You don’t need to know my reasons. You will need to see this done. You owe me this. I saved you from the cosmic creatures.”
For a second, Iravan did not say anything. The hall was so quiet that he might have been able to hear a leaf growing.
“And what about what you owe me?” he asked quietly at last.
She had been prepared for the question, he saw. Ahilya’s jaw tightened, and she said, “Make your demands.”
“You know my demands,” he answered. “All architects belong to the Garden. We will help you remake your ashram, we’ll even help you make your jungle cities. You have no need for architects—you have nothing to traject anymore. They belong with me.”
“No,” Ahilya said, crossing her arms. “I told you I will not force anyone to leave Irshar just so you can fulfill your mission to destroy them. I will not separate families.”
“Then we have no bargain.”
“What if I offer you something else in return?”
