Inversions by Iain M. Banks

large dark smoky stone which, when I held it up to the light, I could just see through. Round the pommel’s bottom rim what I mistook at first for some wavy carving was really a line of little pits which had lost all but one of the small pale stones.
    I ran a finger down them. ‘You should have this repaired, mistress,’ I told her. ‘The palace armourer would oblige, I’m sure, for the stones do not look expensive and the workmanship is not of the first order. Let me take it down to the armoury when I am well. I know the deputy armourer’s assistant. It would be no trouble. It would please me to do something for you.’
    ‘There is no need,’ the Doctor said. ‘I like it well enough just as it is. It has sentimental value. I carry it as a keepsake.’
    ‘From whom, mistress?’ (The fever! Normally I would not have been so bold!)
    ‘An old friend,’ she said easily, mopping off my chest and then putting the cloths aside and sitting back on the floor.
    ‘From Drezen?’
    ‘From Drezen,’ she nodded. ‘Given to me the day I set sail.’
    ‘It was new then?’
    She shook her head. ‘It was old then.’ The thin light of a Seigen sunset shone through a cracked-open window and reflected redly on her netted, gathered hair. ‘A family heirloom.’
    ‘They do not take very good care of their heirlooms if they let them fall into such disrepair, mistress. There must be more holes than stones.’
    She smiled. ‘The stones that are missing were used to good effect. Some bought protection in uncultured places where a person travelling alone is seen more as prey than as guest, and others paid my way on some of the sea passages that brought me here.’
    ‘They do not look very valuable.’
    ‘They are more highly prized elsewhere, perhaps. But the knife, or what it carried, kept me safe and it kept me moving. I have never had to use it well, I have had to brandish it and wave it around a bit but I have never had to use it to hurt anyone. And as you say, that is just as well for me, for it is quite the dullest knife I have seen since I arrived here.’
    ‘Quite so, mistress. It would not do to have the dullest dagger in the Palace. All the others are so very sharp.’
    She looked at me (and I can only say, she looked at me sharply, for that was a piercing gaze). She gently took the dagger from me and rubbed a thumb down one blade. ‘I think perhaps I will have you take it to the armoury, though only to have an edge put on it.’
    ‘They might re-point it too, mistress. A dagger is for stabbing.’
    ‘Indeed.’ She put it back in its sheath.
    ‘Oh, mistress!’ I cried, suddenly full of fear. ‘I’m sorry!’
    ‘For what, Oelph?’ she said, her beautiful face, so concerned, suddenly close to mine.
    ‘For for talking to you like this. For asking you personal questions. I am only your servant, your apprentice. This is not seemly.’
    ‘Oh, Oelph,’ she said, smiling, her voice soft, her breath cool on my cheek. ‘We can ignore seemliness, at least in private, don’t you think?’
    ‘May we, mistress?’ (And I confess my heart, fevered though it was, leapt at these words, wildly expecting what I knew I could not expect.)
    ‘I think so, Oelph,’ she said, and took my hand in hers and squeezed it gently. ‘You may ask me whatever you like. I can always say no, and I am not the type to take offence easily. I would like us to be friends, not just Doctor and apprentice.’ She tilted her head, a quizzical, amused expression on her face. ‘Is that all right with you?’
    ‘Oh, yes, mistress!’
    ‘Good. We’ll’ Then the Doctor cocked her head again, listening to something. ‘There’s the door,’ she said, rising. ‘Excuse me.’
    She returned holding her bag. ‘The King,’ she said. Her expression, it seemed to me, was half-regretful, half-radiant. ‘Apparently his toes are sore.’ She smiled. ‘Will you be all right by yourself, Oelph?’
    ‘Yes, mistress.’
    ‘I’ll be back as soon as I