Sand and Scrap

by Chris R. Sendrowski

  “Just curious,” Waypman said. “Meant no harm.”

  “Curiosity is a dangerous thing out here, squiddy. You should keep that in mind next time you go asking someone stupid questions.”

  In the distance, a dull glow blossomed at the base of the horizon.

  Cumlety.

  Carts began appearing beside them, insectlike shadows crawling forth from the Waste like lamenting ghosts.

  Waypman stood as one drew up alongside them. Five men sat in the back, each fanning a set of cards in their gloved hands.

  “How was the haul?” he shouted.

  The largest man in the group looked up from his cards. His face was covered in oozing blisters, and the front of his laptane suit was striped with black scorch marks. “What’s it to you, squiddy?”

  “Just wanted to know if you had better luck than we did.”

  The man grunted as he turned back to his game. “Uncovered a section of the fifth Brigade. All of ’em petrified, of course.” Without taking his eyes from his cards, he held up a rusty helmet. “Pulled this off ’em. A lot more scrap there, too. A nice amount of it Tritan armor.” The two vehicles were now moving side by side, matching each other’s pace.

  “Lost a couple of workers, though,” the man continued. “One of ’em your kind. Heat elemental. Made for a nice fish fry, though, eh, boys?” His companions broke into laughter.

  Waypman sat down as the two carts slowly drifted apart.

  “Fools,” Drexil muttered. “That metal is infused with poison. They will be dead by morning.”

  “How can you tell?” Waypman asked.

  Drexil chuckled. “When have you ever known Tritan steel to be green?”

  Trembling, Harold gripped the wagon’s controls. His newfound power haunted him, and he yearned to discover its source. I haven’t even learned the white arts yet. he thought. And my bloodline . . . we’ve never wielded the true power.

  His heart quivered with excitement. Perhaps there is pureblood somewhere in the family line. But he immediately pushed the thought aside. It was too rare a thing, too much of a gift for one such as himself to hope for.

  But it was wonderful, he thought. Every nerve heightened with electric awareness, every ounce of strength stacked tenfold upon itself. Back in the ruin, he could have moved mountains, destroyed entire cities. Unbridled power, he told himself. Is that how it feels to be true born?

  Harold pulled his suit tight about his body. Ever since the incident, an insatiable chill lingered in his bones, and not even the suit’s thick layers could staunch the sensation. Something has changed within me, he thought. But what?

  Cumlety was now visible against the horizon, a cancerous tumor above which thousands of draba birds circled endlessly. Harold’s stomach turned at the sight. We need a storm, he thought. A great sand wash to sweep away this filth.

  Excited dock men began shouting and whistling as the wagons approached, for most of the survivors were returning rich men, their wagons overflowing with precious scrap and relics. Even the dock merchants scuttled about excitedly, eyeing the wagons with ravenous greed.

  The gob stood up and stretched, taking in the revelry with cold indifference. “Broke and Chargerless,” he mumbled. “But look at them. . . .” He swept his hand passed the overflowing wagons. “They won’t be going hungry tonight.”

  Harold cast him an angry glance, as did the Garfaxman.

  Behind them, a pair of smoldering wagons limped along like wounded animals. The smallest held only a single scorched body, its skeletal hand still clutching the melted drive rod as it plowed ahead. As for the other, three men sat huddled together in the back, their faces and hands black and blistered, their eyes white with sandblindness.

  The many pimps and merchants lining the docks brushed back their laptane hoods and began scanning the new arrivals. As always, they were only too anxious to line their pockets with Culver craft and coin.

  Harold sat silent, embarrassed. Already the merchants were glancing at him and moving on.

  “Rough night, eh, boy?” one particularly dumpy merchant barked as they rolled past.

  “Would be better to sell this group to the fleshers,” another spat, “than see ’em wasted in the Red Room.”

  Harold dry heaved over the side of the wagon. When he caught his breath, he sat back and stared across the docks. Dozens of wagons were now unloading their plunder, the many work crews laughing and eyeing the distant whores with playful glee.

  Waypman and the others watched silently as dozens of girls poured onto the docks. They were emaciated and discolored, their stained garbs barely concealing the many lesions and scars that adorned their flesh.

  Drexil sighed. “It’s been too long.”

  “Since what?” Waypman asked.

  Drexil gestured to a woman flashing him her breasts. “Since that!”

  “Can’t argue with you there,” Waypman replied.

  Sun-bleached tents were now being erected at the end of each dock. Atop each one were flags representing everything from steel scrappers to alchemists and antique collectors. Even the body hunters waited beside black cages, their sickly, sunken eyes scanning the approaching wagons for wounded and dead.

  Waypman watched a crew unload rusted armor and weapons onto the dock. Beside the relics, two guards stood with weapons drawn, their eyes scanning the crowd.

  “Those fellas have coinage, all right,” Waypman said. “Guards don’t come cheap here.”

  “Probably professionals,” Drexil noted. “Hired out by a Circle house who chartered the salvage run.”

  Another wagon slowly approached from the east. When it docked, half a dozen men in fairly new looking laptane suits quickly disembarked carrying rust-colored sacks. Several guards quickly took up positions beside them, ushering them through the crowds toward their respective buyers.

  “Probably plunder from a necromancer cache,” Drexil stated with envy. “I bet it’s worth a king’s ransom.”

  Harold sat silent as workers bartered back and forth with the sleazy merchants. Everywhere one looked, shady figures squeezed in and out of the fray, their wild eyes darting from one crew to the next. Even the guards took part in the action, accepting bribes from the wealthier traders who wished a more lenient inspection of their goods.

  Harold shivered as one of the body hunters walked past. Two workers bearing an unconscious comrade followed close behind him, their eyes diverted to the ground.

  “Shame guides their every step,” he said.

  Waypman watched as they dragged their companion toward one of the black cages. When he was safely stowed inside, one of the body hunters slammed the door shut and tossed a swollen sack at his comrades’ feet.

  “Scum,” Waypman hissed. “They’d rather trade him in than be docked for his injuries.”

  Drexil turned back to the other workers and watched them with growing envy. “What a waste,” he mumbled. “We could have outbid every last one of these measly hauls.”

  Harold found an empty bay at the far end of the field and brought their wagon to a halt. Seconds later, a pair of burly guards approached.

  Harold’s heart stopped. It was all he could do just to force a smile upon his face. “Good day, gentlemen,” he said as the men halted before him.

  “Your driver rods,” the lead guard demanded emotionlessly.

  Harold quickly bent down and removed the cloth he had laid across them. They were caked in mud, their inner cores dim and useless. Without a word, he lifted them one by one and handed them to the guard.

  One, two, three, four . . .

  Harold’s heart sank.

  One of the rods was missing.

  Damn it! he thought, horrified. That Charger must have walked off with one of them.

  Hesitantly, he turned back to the guards. “I’m . . . I’m afraid we have only four of the five that were originally issued.” He held his breath as the guard began scratching something onto a piece of yellowed parchment.

  “Well . . . l
et’s see here,” the guard said as he flipped to a new page. “According to our logs, you left with five bodies.” He eyed Drexil and Waypman. “Yet I see only three now.”

  Sweat poured down Harold’s back. “Well . . . uhmmm . . . we . . . you see, both the boy and the Charger . . . they wandered off in the middle of the night . . . got lost in a storm. W—we tried to find him, but it was no use.”

  The guard shook his head. “This is not going to bode well with the district elder. And I see here you’re already on report.”

  Harold swallowed, his heart rate climbing.

  “How about cleansing parameters?” the guard continued. “Or did you and your men simply slog about the Waste in search of scrap?”

  Harold’s world began to crumble. “All of the reports were lost with our Charger.”

  The guard sighed as he handed his clipboard to his subordinate. “What am I supposed to do here then, huh?”

  “My apologies, sir. I’ll make credit amends with the district supplier as soon as we’re stowed and cleared.”

  A cloaked figure stepped behind one of the guards and placed a hand on the man’s shoulder. “What the—” the guard began. But when he turned and saw who it was, he quickly bowed and backed away.

  A high necromancer, Harold thought as the wraith’s icy stare fell upon him. His legs weakened as his bowels turned to water.

  “A boy,” the necromancer noted, his lips moving behind a silken, black mask. “Soon they will have infants working the Culver.” He stood over six footfalls tall, clothed in a black cloak similar to Nicodemus’s, save for the gold piping outlining the cuffs of his sleeves.

  This is no man, Harold thought, his heart racing. This is a monster.

  The necromancer reached into his robe and withdrew an egg-sized lens. When he held it up before his silken mask, its transparent core turned a deep black.

  “Well, well,” he whispered as he stared through it at Harold. “You have seen quite a wonder this day, eh, my little fledgling? I see traces of meridium all over you.”

  Harold stood silent; his mouth was too dry to speak.

  “Quite a wonder indeed.” The necromancer dropped the lens back into his pocket and gestured to the guards. “Take him to the Keep. I wish to have him . . . spoken to.”

  Harold’s heart stopped. “Please! It . . . it was out of my hands!”

  But the necromancer turned and faded back into the dusty mob.

  “Don’t plead,” one of the guards whispered in Harold’s ear. “He’ll only make it worse for you.”

  Harold’s body went numb. By the gods! I’m a dead man!

  “P—p—please . . .” he pleaded. “I—I can’t g—go back t—there! I will do b—better! J—j—just give me another ch—chance! Please! Just one more chance!”

  Indifferent, the guard clasped a pair of shackles over his wrists. “You will be tried in due time,” he said. “Until then, I recommend you keep silent.”

  And with that, the brutes hauled him off into the hungry mob.

  As the mystic’s screams melted into the dockside clatter, Drexil stepped beside Waypman and smiled.

  “What are you so happy about?” Waypman asked.

  “One less runt to deal with. Now we can get out there and lay claim to our prize.”

  “Just like that?” Waypman asked.

  Drexil laughed. “That’s right, just like that. Unless, of course, you’re more interested in joining your little friend there.”

  Waypman shook his head, disgusted. “You’re all the same, aren’t you?”

  Drexil lit an adreena stick. “The smart ones are.”

  Waypman sighed as the distant work horn signaled the start of a new shift. Within seconds, mobs of laptane-clad workmen flooded the empty square, the squeaks of their chaffing suits filling the dusty air.

  Drexil smiled as the men poured around them. “I guess this is where we say goodbye then, eh, squiddy?”

  “If you go back there alone, they will kill you,” Waypman said. “You know that, right?”

  “Stay here, and it’s just the same,” Drexil replied. “I’d rather take my chances out there . . . with the haul.”

  “You’re on your own then,” Waypman said.

  The gob shrugged. “Aren’t we all?” And with that, he ducked into the throng and vanished.

  “Fool,” Waypman mumbled, rubbing sweat from his eyes. The sun was riding high now, baking the back of his neck. What’s next? he wondered as he watched the desert sands shimmer in the distance. Several carts were already departing the docks, their flatbeds filled with fresh workers. Lemmings to the sea, he thought.

  Someone cried out behind him. When he turned, he saw three guards skewering a young boy on their rusty spears. The crowds immediately parted around them, gawking as the boy took his final breaths.

  I have to get out of here, Waypman thought as the boy’s cries filled the air. Collect whatever pay I’ve got coming and skip town. But he couldn’t go; something in that poor boy’s cry had flipped a switch inside him. He saw his son down there dying. And the mystic. Every soul that deserved another day but received the sword instead.

  No. There needed to be a reckoning this time. Justice. The mystic had stood up for him when others hadn’t; he couldn’t just leave without him.

  But if you do this, there will be blood . . . trouble you don’t need.

  “I’ll welcome it then,” he whispered to himself.

  As the crowd slowly dispersed, a drunkard scuttled to the dead boy’s side and began tugging off one of his boots.

  Waypman approached him, his gnarled hand balled into a fist.

  To hell with it, he told himself. We start here.

  Without a word, he slammed his twisted stump into the drunkard’s face. As the lout fell backward, choking on his own blood, Waypman kicked him in the chest.

  Perhaps you can rest better now, son, Waypman thought, staring at the boy’s bloody corpse. And with that thought, he turned and ran off into the city.

  13

  Michael could hardly believe his eyes.

  A massive metropolis loomed before him, hundreds upon hundreds of brick and adobe structures lit by dozens of flickering bonfires.

  How is this possible! he thought as he looked up at the cavern’s enormous ceiling. The shadows of a thousand fanglike stalagmites writhed in the flickering firelight, shifting against one another as if alive.

  Someone slammed into Michael’s shoulder, drawing his attention back to the street. Life was everywhere, a blurring mass of souls caught in the tides of everyday existence. Garfaxmen, Tritan gobs, Algian merchants, Blind Scavengers — every race was represented, all trading, cooking, and working alongside one another in the belly of this massive cavern. And most amazingly of all, they were all mutants.

  Michael watched it all as if in a dream. Never had he dared think such a place existed. There was such order to it all, as if this place had been here for the last hundred turns. Even the chatter had a distinct, rhythmic pulse, the many languages of the Culver morphing into a single dialect all its own.

  “This place . . .” Michael breathed. “How in the gods can it be?”

  Lining the cavern’s enormous, sloping walls were thousands of hand-carved huts. Each twinkled with inner firelight and had a canted chimney belching forth ribbons of fetid smoke. Michael warmed before the odd yet familiar sights. He’d always heard the mutants lived like animals. But to stand here and see this . . . it was mind-boggling. And wonderful.

  “Can I tickle your tongue, my lad,” a passing merchant asked, thrusting a loaf of what smelled like onion bread beneath his nose. Michael’s mouth watered. But to his disappointment, his captors quickly pushed the merchant aside.

  “Ah, piss off, you rusted buggers,” the merchant shouted before vanishing into the crowd.

  “Where are we going?” Michael asked.

  “East end,” one of the men replied.

  As they passed a dilapidated hut, a group of young women began shouti
ng at them.

  “He’s a fresh one!” one cried.

  “Give him on up to us!”

  “We’ll take care of ’em!”

  More girls soon flooded the street, laughing and shouting until Michael and his captors finally faded into the distance.

  “Jarak’s girls seem to like him,” the short guard laughed. “Perhaps there’s value in him yet.”

  “Natrane seems interested enough,” the taller guard huffed.

  To their right, a group of men sat outside what appeared to be a bar, slugging back great steaming cups of adreena ale between hands of Skulls.

  “Are you going to Chamber tonight?” the nub asked his partner as he watched the game.

  The tall guard huffed. “What’s the point? We all know what’s coming.”

  A group of armor clad men pushed through the mob. To Michael’s surprise, each man held a repeat bow and had a poison blower dangling at his side. That stuff would be worth a fortune back at Cumlety, he thought.

  “See,” the guard said, gesturing toward the armored men. “They’re already preparing for the worst. What good would a vote do now?”

  Michael eyed several merchants as they passed. Each stood crooked over tables of various oddities: nagra teeth, dried baby scorps, skewers of roasted draba, ancient knives, and rusted Tritan bows. At one stall, two guards stood before a table covered in tiny, leather satchels.

  “Pure meridium dust!” a haggard woman cried behind the counter. “Scavenged in a cache deep in the unknown Ripple! Make me an offer!”

  The narrow road soon opened into a wide courtyard surrounded by a handful of temples painted in varying hues of blue and black. In the center of the courtyard, standing in perfect symmetry to the surrounding temples, was the most enormous structure Michael had ever seen: a great pyramid. It rose all the way to the ceiling, its surface painted in banded levels of black and silver.

  “By the gods,” Michael breathed as his escorts ushered him forward.

  The temple’s sole entrance was a gaping twenty-foot-high door guarded by half a dozen armor-clad mutants. As they passed beneath a steel portcullis, a strange aroma permeated the air. Cinnamon and burning fat.