The night had no moons, no stars. Even the sharpest mortal eye couldn’t have seen their arrival in the tiny cove.

The departing ship, a smuggler’s vessel, was a dark indistinct shape against the lightless night. Miiya cast it a last lingering glance and sat down by her companions sheltering by a heap of rocks. Jubi was huddled into a heap against Cillo. His armed enfolded her.

During the first few hours of their sea journey, Jubi had hung on the railing, gazing at the far horizon, her eyes bright with hope. But as they neared the shore of Draca, she turned edgy, resisting even Cillo’s attempts to draw her into conversation. By the time the journey ended, she had retreated into herself completely. She had spent most of her time in the tiny cabin, lying on her bunk, curled almost into a ball.

“I’m going to look for some shelter,” Miiya whispered. “The sun will be up soon and we need to get away from the beach before that.”

Cillo nodded. “Take care, Miiya.”

Jubi said nothing. She had been appalled when Miiya told her that they had no choice but to land near the Mere of Trees, and seek shelter there. Landing in the Port of Draca, or in any other inhabited area was out of question. Miiya and Cillo wouldn’t be allowed to leave their vessel, and Jubi would be arrested immediately. The only unpatrolled area in the entire island was the shoreline by the Mere.

The Mere was an endless hulking shape under the night sky. Even Miiya’s witch-eye could discern only the shadows.

She stepped into darkness and recoiled as if struck by lightning.

The Mere was haunted, not by the dead, but by the emotions they left behind. The grief and hopelessness that had driven them to seek death had seeped into the soil of the Mere. Those emotions had created an invisible forest within the visible forest: trees of pain, branches of guilt, leaves of despair.

Jubi and Cillo wouldn’t survive long in this place. Sooner rather than later, its aura of despair would invade their minds and sap their will to live.

After some prowling, Miiya discovered a shallow cave. She started circling it, first clockwise, then counter-clockwise, using her happiest memories to create a counter-aura.

Once the cave was secure, she strode out of the Mere. The sea air enveloped her in a life-giving embrace. She inhaled gusts of it, wishing she didn’t have to take Jubi and Cillo into the Mere. There was no choice. That graveyard of all hope was their only shelter.

Cillo’s strained face relaxed into a brief smile when she knelt by them. “Did you find a place, Miiya?”

“A cave in the Mere. I’ve secured it. Getting there will be hard, but once inside we’d be safe.” She rummaged in her pack and found the pouch with grounded nidra leaves. She took out a pinch and turned to Jubi and called her name. Jubi lifted her head and stared blankly, the way a blind person would.

Miiya said, “Open your mouth,” half expecting Jubi to ignore her command or even to object. But Jubi opened her mouth at once. Miiya placed the leaves on Jubi’s tongue. “Swallow them.”

Jubi swallowed the leaves obediently, and slumped against Cillo’s shoulder within seconds. Miiya grabbed her by an arm and pulled her up into a standing position. Cillo scrambled to his feet took hold of Jubi’s other arm. Miiya picked up Jubi’s pack and her own, slung both over her shoulder. “Come.”

At the treeline Cillo jerked to a stop, as if he had encountered an invisible barrier. His eyes were dark hollows in his suddenly bloodless face.

Miiya turned around and touched Cillo’s arm briefly with her free hand. “Follow me.”

Cillo pulled himself together. His face distorted with the effort. He was shivering, but his hold on Jubi didn’t slacken. He panted and groaned all the way, but didn’t utter a word of protest. Once they were inside the cave, he let go of Jubi’s arm and collapsed, his face pressed against the sandy floor, his body twitching.

Miiya let him be. He would recover his senses soon, in the salubrious atmosphere of the spell-protected cave. She lowered Jubi gently to the ground, pulled out her sleeping rug and covered the inert form with it. Then she busied herself lighting a candle, getting food and water out, deriving some comfort from these mundane tasks.

“What was that, Miiya?”

Miiya looked around. Cillo sat huddled against the cave wall, hugging himself.

“The emotions of those who came to this place to die. The Mere is fetid with their pain and despair. Are you feeling better?”

Cillo nodded and looked around. “What is this place? How come it feels normal?”

“I’ve woven a spell-cover over it. You and Jubi should be safe here.”

He heaved a sigh. “What are we going to do now?”

“I need to Share your dragonfly-buzzard for a while, Cillo.”

His eyes opened wide in surprise. “Share Seedevii? But...but...why?” He tried to smile. “Do you want a pet bird?”

“I expressed myself badly. When I said Share, I meant Share his mind, so I can fly into this Castle of Eternity and see things for myself. To do that, I must have his consent. And he will consent, if you make the request on my behalf.”

“Why do I have to convince Seedevii? Is it dangerous, this sharing?”

“Most animals and birds don’t like to Share their minds with witches. And yes, there is risk involved. If things go wrong, the animal or the bird can end up injured or even dead while the witch who did the Sharing will become catatonic.”

A shadow of fear darkened Cillo’s face. “I don’t want to place Seedevii in danger.”

Miiya touched his arm, feeling it trembling under her hand. “I won’t run any unnecessary risks. I promise to take the greatest possible care of him. But I need him, Cillo.”

“Can’t you turn invisible or something? I know witches have the power.”

“Opaquing? I can. But for it to work, I will have to expend a great deal of my remaining power. And I might need that power for later. Please understand.”

Cillo’s arm was like deadwood under her hand. He sat in silence until she could bear it no more.

She said, “This way I can visit the castle, see what’s happening there, without actually breaking any taboo.”

He staggered to where the dragonfly-buzzard was perched and fell on to his knees. The bird screeched and flapped its wings. Cillo touched the luminous crest with a trembling finger and started whispering.

Miiya closed her ears and turned away.

So you want to use my mind?

The question, asked in a gravelly voice, startled Miiya. She opened her mouth to answer and realized the words were in her head. .

If you don’t object.

She waited for the bird to respond, but there were no more words. She would have to find some argument to persuade the creature.

I need your help to find Jubi’s father?

Human affairs don’t interest me. Humans cage us and hunt us, eat us and turn us into feathered puppets.

Some do; some don’t.

Miiya waited for an answer, but inside her head silence reigned.

Cillo had been looking from the dragonfly-buzzard to Miiya, his expression perplexed. Suddenly his face cleared, as if he fathomed what had happened. He turned to the bird and said, “Help us, Seedevii. We need you.”

The bird’s voice was nail-sharp inside Miiya’s head. I know your kind. You use words as weapons and snares. I have no trust in you. But I cannot refuse him.

I thank you.

I don’t need your thanks. What I’m doing, I do for him.

I understand.

Miiya turned to Cillo. “Thank you, friend. I will lie down and in a little while it will be as if I had fallen onto a deep sleep. Let my body be that way. Do nothing with it, until your bird returns. Then, if I don’t wake up on my own, call me. Don’t lay a finger on me for whatever reason.”

She smiled at him and laid herself down at the back of the cave, closed her eyes, emptied her mind of all thoughts and reached out to the bird. The last thing her ears heard were Cillo’s, “Take good care of yourselves, Miiya, Seedevii.”

**

She was out of the cave, rising above the trees, and soaring over the Mere.

The transformation from earth to sky was overwhelming. The wind, the space and the freedom combined to create an intoxicating brew, leaving her light headed. All she wanted to do was to soar and soar, until she left the world with its cares and burdens, below her.

You are losing control.

It was the bird. Miiya grabbed her mind and tethered it.

Sorry.

Now you know what it is to be a caged bird.

I’ve never caged birds.

No, and you gave me my wings back. Without you, I’d have been a crippled bird. For that, I owe you.

The bird circled over the ocean, moving into an air current and flowing with it.

You could have left when you were healed. Yet you stayed.

I can’t leave the old man behind.

Love, thought Miiya, comes in unimaginable forms.

Yes it does.

There was laughter in the bird’s voice. Miiya joined it.

The sun was ascending, filling the world with its warmth. The air was permeated with the smells of the sea. The world was open and free. She could go wherever she desired.

The bird’s words scraped against her mind. You are taking me away from where you need me to go.

I am sorry. It won’t happen again.

The bird started to move away from the sea, towards inland, flapping its wings again.

We are here. Where do you want me to land?

Miiya looked through the bird’s eye, saw humans and human made structures, enmity and danger. Her human mind transformed those sights into a magnificent palace of white marble, set within flower and water gardens, fruit orchards and groves of ancient trees. There were no guards to be seen. From Jubi’s talk she had imagined a fortress; this looked like a charmed castle in a children’s story.

The grounds were deserted apart from two gardeners, one bent over a bed of butterfly-lilies, the other pruning a pink-jade vine. They both worked with not-quite human efficiency, their whole attention absorbed by the task they had been given.

Miiya shivered, without knowing why; and the bird shivered with her.

There’s something wrong in this place. The bird’s voice held an alien note. Fear.

I know.

The silence.

Apart from that soft tinkling of the fountain, and the louder roar of the sea, no sound emanated from the castle or the grounds. No voices, no laughter, not even a dog’s bark. And no birds; or bees. No life; just silence. A graveyard would be noisier.

What is this place?

That is what we need to find out. Can you fly around the castle?

She felt the equivalent of a shrug in her mind. Seedevii started circling the gardens. On the second round, she noticed something that intrigued her.

Go to that tree.

The one with long vines like an old man’s beard? Next to the glass cave?

Miiya smiled. That’s why it’s called the hermit’s beard tree And yes, the glass cave.

The bird was still for a second. You have a nice smile.

Miiya smiled again, as the bird landed on a leafy branch. Thank you.

The ‘glass cave’ was an octagonal structure made of glass. Four women sat inside, three on low stools. The fourth reclined on a daybed. She was heavily pregnant and might have been beautiful had her face not been pinched, like a squeezed out lemon-quarter.

The reclining woman shifted her position. A cushion supporting her upper body fell. One of the attendants picked it up. As she turned to replace it, Miiya caught sight of the face.

What are you doing?

The bird’s words were a shriek of pain and incomprehension. Miiya tried to regain control of herself.

Your mind, it almost burned me.

I’m sorry, it’s...do you notice them?

The three in light blue? Yes. They look like human, but they don’t seem human. What are they?

Tailosii.

What is that?

Humans whose life force had been sucked out of them. Humans who are only a body, no mind, no will, no emotions. That was what the gardeners were; more Tailosii.

So the people are brought to the castle and turned into these…things?

It looks like that.

The girl’s father?

I’m afraid so.

And the other one, the one who’s breeding, she’s human. I can sense her.

Yes.

The three Tailosii women were clad in tunics and trousers made of a linen-like material. They looked like normal humans, except for the eyes, open slits, silvery white, with no eye balls.

Miiya shuddered and the bird shuddered with her.

The human woman shifted on the daybed, as if trying to find a comfortable position. After a while she got up and walked about the glass structure in aimless circles. She wore an ankle-length dress in peacock blue spider-silk. Her long brown hair was threaded with silvery pearls. More pearls adorned her neck and her ears. One slim hand clutched at a silver talisman made in the shape of a sea dragon, believed by the archipelagans to be the familiar of their Sea God. Her purple eyes had a dead look.

The heavy wooden door connecting the glass octagon to the castle opened. The young woman hurried to her daybed. Through the door, an elderly woman came out. She was no Tailosii, going by her shrewd purple eyes. Though attired plainly in a long grey dress, her confident bearing denoted authority. She walked up to the little group and bent solicitously over the woman on the daybed. “It’s time for your midday meal, my lady.”

The girl didn’t look up. “I’m not hungry.”

“You must eat to build up your strength...”

“For what, Karila?” Her voice rang, angry, bitter. She pointed a hand at the three women, still seated in their places, looking as if they’d sit there until the end of time, if necessary. “So that I can become like them? I’d rather die in childbirth, with my child.”

“Hush, my lady, you mustn’t say such things.”

“Words won’t change anything Karila. You know that. I was fortunate I got another chance to continue. But...” she choked and fell silent.

“You worry needlessly, my lady.” The older woman’s voice was firm, but not unkind. “Come in with me. I have ordered your favorite soup. Afterwards you must rest for an hour or so. The midday heat is not good for you. The physician warned about it, particularly.”

The girl shook her head. “I look at them and I see my future, Karila.”

“You mustn’t give into these morbid thoughts, my lady. They are not good for the child.”

“I have done everything I can, Karila. I’ve tried so hard to please him...”

Karila cut in. “There is only one way to please him, my lady. That is to bear a living child. All this was made plain to you when you came here.”

“Came here? Came here?” The young woman’s laugh was short and sharp. “I didn’t come here. I was brought here in that infernal carriage. Do you know what I was doing, when the carriage came for me? I was putting my baby to sleep. I had a baby, a daughter. Don’t pretend that I came here because I wanted to. I had no choice.” She indicated the three Tailosii women with one hand. “I know they had no choice either.” Her eyes blazed at the older woman. “Did you have a choice, Karila? Did you come here willingly or were you brought here weeping and wailing in the silver carriage too?”

Karila’s mouth tightened for a second. Then she shrugged her shoulders. “No one has a choice, my lady.” Her voice was impersonal; her face blank.

“How many of them are here, Karila? How many? I try to count, but there are too many. Which one was my predecessor? I keep on looking at them, wondering which one it was.”

“My lady, you are becoming hysterical.”

“Have you seen how it’s done, Karila? I know it happens in the Past Nursery. Do they do it while you are asleep? Or does it happen when you are wide awake?” The girl was laughing and crying; her voice had risen to a shriek. She kicked at the nearest Tailosii. The force of the kick made her body arch, but the Tailosii didn’t even flinch. The girl burst into another peal of laughter, a demented sound. “They don’t feel anything do they, Karila? But they were like you and me once. They felt pain.” She paused, and said in a lowered voice, “Does it hurt Karila? You have to know. You go there with them, don’t you? Will it hurt a...”

The slap was a sharp staccato sound. The girl’s voice stopped as if cut by a knife. She stared at Karila, her large purple eyes wide with shock. Then she collapsed back on the day bed, crying quietly, the sobs shaking her slender frame.

Karila watched her impassively for a moment and then said, in an almost gentle voice, “Every moment is precious, my lady. Enjoy them. If you like sitting here, I’ll have your meal sent here.” She turned to the three Tailosii who had waited motionless while this exchange was going on. “You,” she said pointing to one of the women, “Go to the Sea Chamber. Your services are needed there. You,” she said pointing to another woman. “Go to my lady’s dinning chamber and bring her midday meal out here.”

The two women departed with neither eagerness nor reluctance. Karila too turned to go, but the girl’s voice stopped her. “So in a week, or two, that will be me, won’t it? A slave with no mind, no will, always available for whatever is required of me.”

Karila didn’t turn around. She shrugged a bony shoulder, said in an indifferent voice, “Don’t think too much, my lady,” and was gone.

The girl gave a cry of rage and threw the silver talisman at the glass wall. The Tailosii woman stood up, picked the fallen talisman and proffered it to her mistress. The girl stared unblinkingly at the blank silver grey slits which were the woman’s eyes. The Tailosii continued to hold out the talisman, her face as empty as her eyes.

The girl collapsed on the day bed, in a paroxysm of tears.

Miiya reached out to the bird. I’m going to use my Farsight. Which means a part of my mind will be gone from here. Stay here until I return.

I will.

Miiya’s Farsight caught up with Karila as she started climbing up a narrow staircase. She reached the top, hesitated for a second and began walking down the corridor towards a door guarded by two Tailosii men. She knocked and a male voice bade her to enter.

One of the Tailosii men opened the door for the woman and closed it after her. Both men looked young, no more than eighteen or nineteen.

Miiya’s Farsight essayed the large airy chamber with tall windows overlooking the sea. A human man sat at a massive desk covered with papers. The woman perched on a chair facing him.

The man didn’t look up from his writing. “Yes, Karila?”

Miiya’s vision blurred. She retreated back to the bird’s mind.

The bird sounded surprised. You are back early.

Fly, I will guide you.

The dragonfly-buzzard took wing. Guided by Miiya’s memory he glided over the palace until she spotted the window she was seeking. The bird swooped down and perched on the lintel, hidden from the occupants in the room.

Miiya could hear the two people in the room, but not see them.

Karila was speaking. “…control her.”

“Poor devil.” The man’s voice was soft.

“I was never a mother. But you were once a father. Don’t you care about what will happen to this creature when the child is born dead, as we know it will? When you see her, don’t you think of your daughter?”

The man’s voice hardened. “We will keep my old life out of this conversation. That life is dead forever. I survive by not thinking about it. The problem is your sudden change, Karila. If you allow the hysterics of these women to get to you, you’ll suffer. You know the rules. You know the consequences.”

Karila sounded as if she was speaking through gritted teeth. “Do not condescend to me. I was here decades before you. I know that even if the king mates with every woman in the world, he’ll never be able to father a living child.”

The man’s level voice held a warming. “You were here decades before me, Karila. Yet you let your emotions rule you. You forget the danger of allowing your tongue free rein.”

There was a pause. Then the woman said, “At first it was hard and the only reason I went along was to save myself and my family, my two sisters, their children. The same tactics they use with everyone else; do as we bid you or the person you love most will suffer; and you will be forced to watch it before you are turned into a Human Husk yourself.” She laughed, a harsh, grating sound. “At first it was hell. I cried every time I had to deal with a newcomer. But with each one it got easier until I reached the point of not caring. Now it’s turning around, becoming hard again. I think of escorting that wretched creature to a living death, and I want to kill myself.” She laughed again. “No need to remind me that I won’t. I’ve taken the drug of immortality, and I’m lost.”

The man voice was mocking. “I think I must be on the upward curve. Currently I feel nothing.”

“You don’t have to be there with them, when it happens.”

“And do you want to end up like them? I won’t judge you. Don’t judge me.” There was the soft rustling of paper. “The chief priest has identified two candidates. I’ve been assured that both are comely enough to please our master’s aesthetic sense. They also come from fertile families unaffected by the plague. One will be picked, if the need arises.”

Karila’s voice was like a hard unending winter. “You’ve certainly made yourself indispensable to the king, and in a very short time. The perfect minister.”

“The prefect servant, Karila. That is all I am. That is all you are. Even our revered chief minister is nothing more than a servant, just more glorified than the rest of us. And no servant is indispensable.”

There was the sound of a door being opened. Then the woman spoke again, her voice unpleasantly intimate. “But there are advantages too, aren’t there? A chance of cheating death, the pick of the king’s discards. I suppose in the dark you don’t see their eyes.”

The man spoke without heat. “They never close their eyes, Karila. And in the dark, those eyes shine. But then, I’m sure you know that.”

The door closed with a bang.

The bird’s voice was knife-sharp in Miiya’s mind. What are they?

Humans who have forgotten how to be human. Can you land on the window-sill? A second is all I need. Then leave. He mustn’t notice you.

Yes.

The bird flew down and perched on the sill, pretending to groom its feathers.

The man was sitting, staring ahead of him.

Go.

Stop screaming at me. I’m going. You want to return to the Mere, the cave.

Yes.

The bird soared in the air and headed towards the sea.

Miiya shivered. She had seen that face, twice, in Jubi’s dreams.

Jubi’s father was alive.