Ancillary Justice (Imperial Radch #1) - Ann Leckie Page 0,66

them were for, or who built them. They were here when humans first colonized Nilt.

Theories abound, each one less likely than the one before. Inter-dimensional beings feature prominently in many of them—these either created or shaped humanity for its own purposes, or left a message for humans to decipher for obscure reasons of their own. Or they were evil, bent on destruction of all life. The bridges were, somehow, part of their plan.

Another whole subfield claims the bridges were built by humans—some ancient, long-lost, fantastically advanced civilization that either died out (slowly, pathetically; or spectacularly as the result of some catastrophic mistake) or moved on to a higher level of existence. Advocates of this sort of theory often make the additional claim that Nilt is, in reality, the birthplace of humans. Nearly everywhere I’ve been, popular wisdom has it that the location of humanity’s original planet is unknown, mysterious. In fact it isn’t, as anyone who troubles to read on the subject will discover, but it is very, very, very far away from nearly anywhere, and not a tremendously interesting place. Or at the very least, not nearly as interesting as the enchanting idea that your people are not newcomers to their homes but in fact only recolonized the place they had belonged from the beginning of time. One meets this claim anywhere one finds a remotely human-habitable planet.

The bridge outside Therrod wasn’t much of a tourist attraction. Most of the jewel-bright arabesques of glass had shattered over thousands of years, leaving it nearly plain. And Therrod is still too far north for non-Nilters to endure comfortably. Offworld visitors generally confine themselves to the better-preserved bridges on the equator, buy a bov-hair blanket guaranteed hand-spun and handwoven by masters of the craft in the unbearably cold reaches of the world (though these are almost certainly turned out on machines, by the dozen, a few kilometers from the gift shop), choke down a few fetid swallows of fermented milk, and return home to regale their friends and associates with tales of their adventure.

All this I learned within a few minutes of knowing I would need to visit Nilt to achieve my aim.

Therrod sat on a broad river, chunks of green-and-white ice bobbing and crashing in its current, the first boats of the season already moored at the docks. On the opposite side of the city, the dark slash of the bridge’s huge trough made a definitive stop to the straggling edge of houses. The southern edge of the city was flier-parks, then a wide complex of blue-and-yellow-painted buildings that was, by the look of it, a medical facility, one that must have been the largest of its kind in the area. It was surrounded by squares of lodgings and food shops, and swaths of houses, bright pink, orange, yellow, red, in stripes and zigzags and crosshatches.

We had flown half the day. I might have flown all night, I was capable of it, though it would have been unpleasant. But I saw no need for haste. I set down in the first empty space I found, told Seivarden curtly to get out, and did so myself. I shouldered my pack, paid the parking fee, disabled the flier as I had at Strigan’s, and set off toward the city, not looking to see if Seivarden followed.

I had set down near the medical facility. The lodgings surrounding it were some of them luxurious, but many were smaller and less comfortable than the one I’d rented in the village where I’d found Seivarden, though a bit more expensive. Bright-coated southerners came and went, speaking a language I didn’t understand. Others spoke the one I knew, and fortunately this was the same language the signs used.

I chose lodging—roomier, at least, than the suspension-pod-size holes that were the cheapest available—and took Seivarden off to the first clean-looking and moderately priced food shop I could find.

When we entered, Seivarden eyed the shelves of bottles on the far wall. “They have arrack.”

“It’ll be incredibly expensive,” I said, “and probably not very good. They don’t make it here. Have a beer instead.”

She had been showing some signs of stress, and wincing slightly at the profusion of bright colors, so I expected some sort of irritable outburst, but instead she merely gestured acquiescence. Then she wrinkled her nose, slight disgust. “What do they make beer out of here?”

“Grain. It grows nearer the equator. It’s not as cold there.” We found seats on the benches that lined three rows of long tables,