Now that she knew the truth about her less-than-substantial meal, Erde was no longer so confident about how recovered she felt, or about the apparent comfort of her current situation. If the Presence was a prisoner in this wood, could that not mean that she was also? If she couldn’t leave and couldn’t eat, starvation became a real possibility. And how could she even be sure the Presence was telling the truth about itself? Perhaps it was holding her prisoner.
Certainly, she needed to talk to it further, but an in-depth discussion was going to prove difficult if the only way the Presence could communicate was by making the wood and its creatures act out each intended meaning. There was a game at home something like that, intended for long winter afternoons by the fireplace. But Erde didn’t feel much like playing games, even in the interests of communication. It seemed that the Presence could manage to convey its emotional state, particularly assent or dissent. It just wasn’t very good at actual information. So perhaps if she asked only questions with yes or no answers, she might make more progress.
For instance: “Do you know a way out of this wood?”
The leaves rose and fell, rose and fell. Negation.
“Does that mean I’m a prisoner, too?”
A definite stirring. Negation.
Erde pondered the apparent contradiction. “You mean . . . I can get out, but you can’t?”
A stillness, tinged with melancholy. Assent.
Perhaps it would tell her about its own situation. “Are you a prisoner because of something . . . you did?” she asked carefully.
A sudden rotating gust snatched at Erde’s clothing and tousled her hair. Fistfuls of leaves detached and threw themselves in her face.
“Please! Please! I’m sorry! I apologize!”
The gust died as if it had never been. Fallen leaves were nowhere in sight.
“If you have all this power, why can’t you just leave?”
No response at all. Not a yes or no question.
Erde chewed her lip. “I can’t say why, but I believe you. And of course I’d like to help you, but I don’t see how I can.” She found herself thinking about the dragons again, both of them this time, and recalling how Earth had at first been able to talk to her only in mind pictures. Finally, an understanding bloomed.
“Is it the dragons’ help you want?”
Not a leaf or blade in motion. Total assent.
She couldn’t figure out a way to shape, “How did you know about the dragons?” into a yes or no query. If the Presence had known she was thirsty and hungry without her saying so out loud, probably it had learned about the dragons the very same way.
“I’m sure they would help you if they knew, but they’re never going to unless I find a way out of here.”
The silent wood came alive again. The ginger cat, the brown mouse and the blue swallow all appeared from different directions and met on the grass at Erde’s feet. Once there, all three of them promptly settled down and went to sleep.
Erde stared. This really was like a child’s game. “Is it something about sleeping?”
Assent.
“You need to sleep now?”
Negation.
“Ummm . . . you think I need to sleep?”
Assent.
“But I don’t want to sleep! I want to get out of here!”
A long silence. Assent and reassurance.
And as she watched, the three sleeping creatures woke up, not as animals usually do, instantly on the alert, but stretching and yawning like humans. Then, as one, they looked up and about them, as if in realization, then jumped up and took off joyfully, each in the direction it had come.
“Oh, dear,” said Erde. “I think I understand. I’m still not awake yet, am I?”
Assent, softened with sympathy.
“So, to get out of here, I have to go to sleep in my dream, this dream that I’m still in, then I have to wake up, and hope that I’ve woken up for real this time.”
Assent. Assent. Assent.
She had said she didn’t want to sleep, but suddenly, she did. The urge was so overpowering that even she knew it wasn’t her own. She wondered if the Presence understood that the chances were about even: She could end up in 2013 with the dragons, or a thousand years earlier. She thought of Köthen, and decided it didn’t matter. Either would be preferable to starvation for an eternity in this weird, weird wood.
As she lay down and tried to prepare herself for any eventuality, she noticed a queer thing: A long line of soldier ants were picking out a very eccentric trail through the velvety grass. They were . . . Erde yawned. Sleep was approaching faster than she’d expected . . . spelling out letters? Words? Why not? In a dream, anything was possible.
She lifted her head the barest inch, all she could manage as sleep rushed toward her. Words, definitely words.
They read: RESIST TEMPTATION.
* * *
He flattens himself back into the deepest part of the chair. At first, he can’t even think.
Baraga. Here.
His heart races. He stares into the fireplace, sees only darkness.
Baraga. Baraga!
But the roof doesn’t cave in, and the man at the other end of the parlor continues his recitation as if nothing has changed, and finally, N’Doch gets hold of himself.
Kenzo Baraga, the Media King, the man he now and forever most loves to hate, is sitting not thirty feet away from him. The slick-black Asian hair of Baraga’s Japanese mother might have clued him in if he’d been thinking, but . . . whoever would have thought? Kenzo Baraga, in person, right in this room. And what’s he doing? Not forging dreams and deals or ending careers and hopes, like he’s supposed to be, no—he’s complaining about some stupid dream he’s had! N’Doch can’t believe it.
Not that he supposed the Big Man wouldn’t have problems. But they should be world-class problems, and Baraga should be eating ’em for breakfast, not be sitting there pouring his heart out like a schoolboy to some fawning woman! But in a way, N’Doch likes it that the Big Man’s got a soft side. It humanizes him.
“I’m on this road,” the Media King is saying, “and it’s hotter ’n hell, and dusty. The road is crap, like it was paved once, a very long time ago and never kept up. And I’m alone, and walking, can you imagine? My . . .” He stops, and in the still room, everyone listens as sirens wail past outside the gates. “So my clothes are all torn, and all I can see, everywhere around me, is burned-out buildings.”
“There, you see?” Lealé soothed. “It’s just the riots that have you worried.”
“I had this dream before the riots started. And besides, this place looked like a city, or what’s left of one, but I knew . . . in the dream, I knew it was really my life, my business, all of it. Everything! Everything I’ve built, gone up in smoke!”
“I know you’ve been very anxious lately, darling, but . . .”
Now N’Doch’s brain is working overtime. He recognizes opportunity when it finally comes knocking. It may take some pondering, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t figure a way to turn this bizarre coincidence to his advantage.
Briefly, he reviews his options. First, he could just go up and introduce himself to the Big Man as Lealé’s . . . as Glory’s dear friend of a dear friend, then work the conversation around to asking for an audition. N’Doch’s mouth twists. Yeah, right. Probably the next thing he’d see would be the business end of Nikko the bodyguard. The Media King’s not known for being free with his time to unknowns like N’Doch. Besides, if he’s as jealous as Lealé says, he might jump to the wrong conclusions and think his woman’s taken a younger lover. That would about finish his chances right then and there. No, the only way is, he’s gotta figure out some pressure he can bring to bear. Which means, entirely powerless as he is compared to Baraga, that he’s gotta either have something the Media King wants, or something he wants to keep from everybody else.
N’Doch hears other copters in the air outside, and the occasional crack of a sniper’s rifle. Probably chasing the rioters out of the square. If things get worse out there, Baraga will probably bolt for his safe-hole on the beach, but meanwhile, the recitation continues.
“. . . suddenly there’s this guy in front of me in a spotlight, all decked out in gold, with this huge wall of flame behind him—great pyro, you know? And this amazing looking woman . . .” Baraga pauses. N’Doch hears him take a sip of his brandy. “In fact, he’s pretty amazing looking, so I think he must be one of my groups, but the guy’s not wired or anything, and I don’t see his backup anywhere. I can’t even hear them—it’s like the sound’s gone dead—and I really want to, ’cause what if they’re good?”
“I think it must mean that you will hear them,” offers Lealé. “Perhaps very soon. And they will be good, and your worries will be over.”
“That’ll take a lot more than one group.”
Lealé laughed. “I know, darling. We all need people to start making some money again.”
“The hell with that. I need a better way to make ’em spend what they already got on me now! I need a miracle! And even that it looks like somebody’s got to ahead of me . . .!”
Yup, nods N’Doch. Salesmanship or blackmail. His only choices.
But the catch is, he’s got nothing to sell but his talent, and that ain’t worth anything until Baraga gives him a chance and an audition, which he’s not gonna bother with unless he knows it’ll be worth his very valuable time. N’Doch sees opportunity slipping away already.
He takes a gingerly look at the blackmail angle. He’s done it before once or twice, mostly for food, real small-time stuff, when he was really desperate. Trying to blackmail Kenzo Baraga would be raising the stakes into the stratosphere. But if his information is good and he can hold on to his nerve . . .
He knows the dream-reader angle is nothing. All the big business types check in with their tarot lady or astrologer or feng shui master before making the big decisions. But, for instance, N’Doch knows—the whole world knows—that Baraga is married to the vid mega-star Francinetta Legata. Does the spectacular Francie know that her husband hangs out with the Mahatma Glory Magdalena for reasons other than sound business advice? Does he care if she knows? What would she give for the information? N’Doch sighs. He’d probably be fool enough to just let her take him to bed. None of this is sounding like much so far, he’s gotta admit.
And then, because all along he’s been listening with at least half an ear to the conversation at the far end of the room, his brain’s autopilot registers a word that drops out of the sky like his next shipment of manna.
“. . . dragons . . .”
The desirable Francie is backburnered in an instant. N’Doch switches over to full manual and listens with all his instruments.
“. . . or something that looked like dragons. I saw ’em on the tapes myself when they rolled it back for me. And two kids with ’em. Ask Nikko, he was there. And six of my crack beach patrol. Can you believe it? Some asshole’s managed to gengineer dragons, and he’s keeping it a secret!”
Again, Lealé’s throaty, sexy laugh. “You mean, he’s not telling you about it.”
Wait a minute, N’Doch realizes. This isn’t his dream anymore. This is us. He’s talking about us!
“I had all the labs checked. Only a handful of people left who could pull off that kind of work since the university closed down, and I own most of ’em. Or did. I fired ’em all this morning. Dragons! Can you imagine the market share for real live dragons? Nikko! Get in here!”
“Yessir, Mr. B.”
“I’m telling her about the dragons.”
Nikko clears his throat. “Saw ’em with my own eyes.”
“Well, where are they?” Lealé laughs.
“Lost ’em,” says Nikko.
“But were they big? Really dragon-sized? How ever did they manage to elude the beach patrol? And those terrible dogs!”
Baraga pauses, and N’Doch knows exactly why. He’s just at the part that’s gonna be real hard to explain. “Well, that’s the thing. They just disappeared.”
“No. On the spot. Right out from under the noses of six sober, tough-minded men. And the damned dogs. Two dragons, two kids. They were there and then they weren’t. I got that on tape, too.”
He’s got us on tape. N’Doch realizes he’s chewing his knuckle to shreds. I can’t put the touch on him—he’ll know me for sure. At first he feels exposed, trapped, but then in a little breathless moment, it occurs to him that he’s just been handed the tools he most needs and was sure he did not possess: something to sell and the status necessary to get the Media King to listen.
The grin comes shooting up out of the depths of him, fastens itself onto his face as if of its own accord. He has no control over it. He has a hard enough time choking back the laughter that wants to rise up with it. Terrified, exultant laughter, filling him until he’s sure he’ll burst if he can’t let it out somehow. But he can’t. Not right now. ’cause, of course, this could be it. Right now could be that chance in a million he’d just finished convincing himself he wasn’t ever gonna get. That’s the exultant part. The terror part is, if in dealing with Kenzo Baraga, he doesn’t play his cards just right, he could end up even worse than he was before. He could end up dead.
First thing is, he’s got to talk to the dragons. A few special appearances? Shoot a few vids? Maybe even a series. What’s the big deal? He’s sure they’ll go for it. And if they don’t, well . . . he’ll just have to cross that bridge when he comes to it.