A Deepness in the Sky

"They let us get this far. If I can talk to Parliament, I think there will be an accommodation." General Smith smiled at the Southlander, an almost conspiratorial look.

Fifteen minutes later, the elevator had deposited them at the main esplanade. Three sides and the roof simply lifted off.That was an embellishment he hadn't seen before. Unnerby the engineer couldn't resist: He froze and stared up into the glaring lights and darkness, trying to see the mechanism that had such a large and silent effect.

Then the crush of police and politicians and reporters swept him off the platform...

...and they were climbing up the stairs of Parliament Hall.

At the top, Southland security finally separated them from the reporters and Smith's own combateers. They passed by five-ton timbered doors...into the hall itself. The hall had always been an underground affair, in earlier generations squatting just above the local deepness. Those early rulers had been more like bandits (or freedom fighters, depending on your source of propaganda) whose forces roamed the mountainous land.

Hrunkner had helped design this incarnation of Parliament Hall. It was one of the few projects he'd worked on where a major design goal was awesome appearance. It might not really be bombproof, but it looked damned spectacular:

The hall was a shallow bowl, with levels connected by gently curving stairs, each level a wide setback with rows of desks and perches. The rock walls curved in an enormous arch that carried fluorescent tubes—and a half-dozen other lighting technologies. Together those lights had almost the brightness and purity of a mid-Bright day, a light rich enough to show all the colors in the walls. Carpeting as deep and soft as father's-pelt covered the stairs and aisles and proscenium. Paintings were hung on the polished wood that faced each level, paintings done with a thousand dyes by artists who knew how to exploit every illusion. For a poor country, they had spent much on this place. But then, their parliament was their greatest pride, an invention that had ended banditry and dependence, and brought peace. Until now.

The doors swung closed behind them. The sound returned deep echoes from the dome and the far walls. In here, there would be just the Elected, their visitors, and—high above, Hrunker could see clusters of lenses—the news cameras. Across the curves of desks, almost every perch was filled. Unnerby could feel the attention of half a thousand Elected.

Smith and Unnerby and Tim Downing started down the steps that led to the proscenium. The Elected were mostly quiet, watching. There was respect here, and hostility, and hope. Maybe Smith would have her chance to keep the peace.

For this day of triumph, Tomas Nau had set North Paw's weather to be its sunniest, the kind of warm afternoon that could extend all the summer day round. Ali Lin had grumbled, but made the necessary changes. Now Ali was weeding in the garden beneath Nau's study, his irritation forgotten. So what if the park's patterns were upset; fixing the problem would be Ali's next task.

And my task is to manage everything together,Tomas thought. Across the table from him sat Vinh and Trinli, working with the site monitoring he had assigned them. Trinli was essential to the cover story, the only Peddler that Tomas was confident would support the lies. Vinh...well, a credible excuse would take him offline for critical moments, but what he did see would corroborate Trinli. That would be tricky, but if there were any surprises...well, that was what Kal and his men were here to handle.

Ritser's presence was just a flat image, showing him sitting in the Captain's chair aboard theHand. None of his words would be heard by innocent ears. "Yes, Podmaster! We'll have the picture in a moment. We got a functioning spybot into Parliament Hall. Hey, Reynolt, your Melin got something right."

Anne was up in the Hammerfest Attic. She was present only as a private image in Tomas's huds, and a voice in his ear. At the moment, her attention was split in at least three directions. She was running some kind of ziphead analysis, watching a Trixia Bonsol translation on the wall above her, and tracking the data stream from theHand. The ziphead situation was as complicated as it had ever been. She didn't respond to Ritser's words.

"Anne? When Ritser's spy pics come, pipe them directly to Benny's. Trixia can do overlay translation, but give us some true audio, too." Tomas had already seen some of the spybot transmissions. Let the people at Benny's see living Spiders up close and in motion. That would be a subtle help in the postconquest lies.

Anne didn't look away from her work. "Yes, sir. I see that what you say is heard by Vinh and Trinli."

"Quite so."