Foundryside (The Founders Trilogy #1) - Robert Jackson Bennett Page 0,159

recoiled at the strength of the response. It was like hearing a roomful of children explode with frustrated screams at the announcement that bedtime was imminent. said Sancia.

Sancia wrinkled her nose. This was like being seated too close to two lovers kissing deeply.

She focused, calmed her mind, and looked at the shackles, letting her thoughts sink into them. Without even knowing the words for what she was doing, she examined their argument—what they did, and why they did it—and targeted the part of their argument about how they could become calm, growing sated at the touch of the key, and part.

She paused as she searched their argument for the right definition. <…key-calm?>

said the shackles immediately.

Shit, Sancia thought. This is harder than I thought it’d be.

She thought rapidly, then asked:

A short pause. Then:

Pause.

Sancia blinked.

said the shackles.

Sancia took a breath. This was, to say the least, incredibly frustrating. She understood now what Clef had shown her, long ago when he’d opened the Candiano door: scrivings were like minds, but they were not smart minds. And Clef was better at talking to them than she was. But then, he’d grown much more powerful as he’d corroded.

She asked:

That was surprising. If a scriving wasn’t activated or deactivated by another scriving command—then what?

she asked.

She tried to think of a clearer term for it.

She gritted her teeth. She realized she’d need to phrase each question exactly right.

Sancia glanced at the guards. They were still debating something furiously. They hadn’t noticed the slight movements she’d been making for the past few minutes—but she knew she didn’t have all the time in the world.

A long, long pause.

she asked again.

Finally, the shackles answered.

Another pause. Then the shackles said,

Silence. It seemed the shackles had no idea how to answer that.

So. What was breath that was not a breath? Or not just breath, at least. If she could figure that out, then she could escape.

But before she could think more on it, there was a distant shouting, which grew to a scream, and then the door slammed open and Tomas Ziani stormed in.

* * *

“Useless!” he shouted. “Scrumming useless! We found the goddamn capsule, but it was just that—a capsule, and nothing more! She either lied to us, or she’s exactly as worthless as I suspected!”

Sancia watched them carefully through a crack in her eyelids. She found she could see the augmentations in their blades, in their shields, in their clothing. And there was one scriving on Tomas’s person that shone with an unpleasant, queer red light, like a sunbeam filtering through bloody water…

The imperiat, she thought. I can see it…My God, it’s horrible…

Tomas wheeled to look at Sancia. “What the hell is the matter with her?”

“She, uh, started screaming about two hours ago,” said one of the guards. “Then she passed out. She was bleeding from…Well. Everywhere, it seemed. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Again?” said Tomas. “She started bleeding again?” He looked at Enrico, who sprinted in behind him. “What’s going on with her? Apparently she keeps spurting blood out of her scrumming face!”

Sancia kept her eyes shut. She focused on the shackles, and asked:

The shackles were silent. It seemed they didn’t understand.

she