Revelation Space (The Inhibitor Trilogy Book 1)

by Alastair Reynolds

A hermetic’s palanquin had entered the room. Or had it been here all along, concealed by some artifice? It was as dark and angular as a metronome, lacking ornamentation, and with a roughly welded black exterior. It had no appendages or obvious sensors, and the tiny viewing monocle set into its front was as dark as a shark’s eye. “You are doubtless already familiar with my kind,” said the voice emanating from the palanquin. “Do not be disturbed.” “I’m not,” Khouri said. But she was lying. There was something disturbing about this box; a quality she had never experienced in the presence of Ng or the other hermetics she had known. Perhaps it was the austerity of the palanquin, or the sense—entirely subliminal—that the box was seldom unoccupied. None of this was helped by the smallness of the viewing window, or the feeling that there was something monstrous behind that dark opacity.