Gildas wore a Sapient's robe of iridescent greens. His sharp face was washed, his white beard trimmed. He looked different, Finn thought. Some of the hunger had gone; when he spoke his voice was not querulous but had a new gravity.
"This is Blaize," he said. And then, softly, "Blaize Sapiens."
The tall man bowed his head slightly. "Welcome to my Chamber of Worlds."
They stared at him. Without the breathing mask, his face was remarkable, mottled with sores and spots and acid bums, his thin straggle of hair tied back in a greasy ribbon.
Under the Sapient's coat he wore ancient knee breeches stained with chemicals, and a ruffled shirt that perhaps had once been white.
For a moment no one spoke. Then, to Finn's surprise it was Attia who said, "We have to thank you, Master, for saving us. We would have died."
"Ah ... well. Yes." He looked at her, his smile lopsided and awkward. "That is indeed true. I thought I had better come down."
"Why?" Keiro's voice was cool. The Sapient turned. "I don't quite understand ...?"
"Why bother? To save us? Do we have something you need?"
Gildas frowned. "This is Keiro, Master. The one with no manners."
Keiro snorted. "Don't tell me he doesn't know about the Key." He bit the apple, a loud crunch in the silence.
Blaize turned to Finn. "And you must be the Starseer." His eyes looked at Finn with unnerving scrutiny. "My colleague tells me Sapphique sent this
Key to you, and that it will lead you Outside. That you believe you came from Outside."
"I did."
"You remember?"
"No. I just... believe."
For a moment the man gazed at him, one thin hand absently scratching a sore on his cheek. Then he said, "Regretfully, I have to tell you that you are mistaken."
Gildas turned in astonishment; Attia stared.
Annoyed, Finn said, "What do you mean?"
"I mean you didn't come from Outside. No one has ever come from Outside. Because, you see, there is no Outside."
For a moment the silence in the room was appalled, full of disbelief. Then Keiro laughed softly and threw the apple core on the stone slabs of the floor. He came over, took out the
Key, and slapped it down next to the glass sphere. "Ail right, Wise One. If there's no
Outside, what's this for?"
Blaize reached out and picked it up. He turned it carelessly and calmly. "Ah yes. I have heard of such devices. Perhaps the original Sapienti invented them. There is a legend that Lord Calliston made one in secret and died before he could try it. It renders the user invisible to the Eyes, and no doubt has other abilities. But it cannot let you out."
Gently he placed the crystal on the table. Gildas glared at him. "Brother, this is folly! We all know Sapphique himself--"
"We know nothing about Sapphique but a muddle of tales and legends. Those fools down there in the City, whose doings I watch to relieve my boredom, they invent new tales of
Sapphique every year." He folded his arms, his gray eyes relentless. "Men love to make stories, brother. They love to dream. They dream that the world is deep underground, and if we could journey up we would find the way out, a trapdoor into a land where the sky is blue and the land breeds corn and honey and there is no pain. Or that there are nine circles of the Prison surrounding its center, and if we go deep into them we find the heart of Incarceron, its living being, and we will emerge through it into another world." He shook his head. "Legends. Nothing more."
Finn was shocked. He glanced at Gildas; the old man seemed stricken, then anger burst out of him. "How can you say this?" he snapped. "You, a Sapient? I thought when I saw what you were, that our struggles would be easier, that you'd understand ..."
"I do, believe me."
"Then how can you say there is no Outside?"
"Because I have seen."
His voice was so somber and heavy with despair that even Keiro stopped pacing up and down and stared at him. Beside Finn, Attia shivered. "How?" she whispered.
The Sapient pointed to a sphere, a black, empty shell. "There. The experiment took me decades, but I was determined. My sensors penetrated metal and skin, bone and wire. I felt my way through miles of
Incarceron, its halls and corridors, its seas, its rivers. Like you, I believed." He laughed harshly, biting the worn nails of his hand. "And yes, I found Outside, in a way." He turned and touched the controls, and the sphere lit. "I found this."
They saw an image in the darkness. A sphere within the sphere, a globe of blue metal. It hung in the everlasting blackness of space, alone, silent.
"This is Incarceron." Blaize jabbed a ringer at it. "And we live inside k. A world.
Constructed, or grown, who knows. But alone, in a vastness, a vacuum. In nothing. There is Nothing outside." He shrugged. "I am sorry. I do not wish to destroy the dreams of your lifetime. But there is nowhere else to go."
Finn couldn't breathe. It was as if the bleak words drew the life out of him. He stared at the globe and felt Keiro come close behind him, sensed his oathbrother's warmth and energy, and it comforted him. But it was Gildas who surprised them all.
He laughed. A gruff, throaty roar of scorn. Drawing himself upright, he turned on Blaize and glared at him. "And you call yourself Wise! Fooled by the Prison's malice, more like.
It shows you lies and you believe them, and live up here above men and despise them.
Worse than a fool!" He strode up to the taller man; Finn took a quick step after him. He knew the old man's temper.
But Gildas stabbed the air with his knotty finger, and his voice was hard and low. "How dare you stand there and deny me my hope and these their chance of life. How dare you tell me Sapphique is a dream, that the Prison is all there is!"
"Because it's true," Blaize said.
Gildas wrenched out of Finn's grip. "Liar! You're no Sapient. And you forget. We've seen
Outsiders."
"Yes!" Attia said. "And spoken to them."
Blaize paused. He said, "Spoken to them?"
For a moment it almost seemed his certainty was shaken. He linked his fingers together and his voice was tight. "Spoken to whom? Who are they?"
Everyone looked at Finn, so he said, "A girl called Claudia. And a man. She calls him