TERRA (The Portal Series, Book 2)

by Bowker, Richard;

  "But you're a soldier!" I shouted at him.

  "Soldiers don't go into battles they know they can't win," he replied softly.

  He looked at Valleia again, and I knew that Carmody wasn't going to leave her. He was in love.

  Nobody loved Palta—except, maybe, me.

  I wanted to argue, but I knew it would be useless. I went and knelt before Affron. His face looked empty, as if he was in a trance. What had happened to him? What had gone wrong inside his brain? Had the speckness overpowered him, the way it had overpowered the pawnbroker and Decius and the soldiers? Or was it something more?

  "Please, Affron," I said. "Come back to us. I need your help. Palta needs your help."

  But he didn't come back.

  Finally I got to my feet. I finished the cup of wine Carmody had given me and went off to my room. Valleia and Carmody both tried to say comforting things to me, but I ignored them. I wasn't interested in being comforted. I lay on my bed in the darkness, wide awake. I didn't want to sleep. My robe was still wet, and my injuries hurt more when I was lying down, but I didn't care. My mind was filled with more than the usual regrets and worries, but I tried to stay focused.

  I waited, and I thought.

  It seemed like a long time, but finally I heard movement and footsteps and murmuring voices. I listened. I heard toilet sounds, and more whispering, and eventually silence. The thunder had stopped, the rain had stopped, the city and the house were quiet.

  I kept listening.

  I remembered early on Christmas mornings when I was a kid—Matthew and me lying in bed and listening for some sign that our parents were awake, because we weren't allowed to go downstairs and open our presents until they got up. Matthew was younger and more impatient than I was, and this was just torture for him. "It's okay," I'd whisper to him. "They have to get up eventually."

  And now I was thinking: They have to fall asleep eventually.

  I had to make sure they were asleep. If I moved too soon, I wouldn't be able to rescue Palta, and she would be doomed.

  But what if Valleia and Carmody were taking turns staying awake, guarding Affron, watching out for Decius and his men? Maybe they didn't think they needed to, with the gant.

  I kept listening for signs that people were asleep. Regular breathing, light snoring, silence.

  Finally I decided I couldn't wait any longer, or I would probably fall asleep myself. I stood up in the darkness. I listened. I moved carefully out into the atrium and listened some more. I inched forward into the room that Valleia and Carmody shared.

  A bit of starlight shone in on the room through its single window. I looked down at the bed and let my eyes adjust to the darkness.

  Carmody lay next to Valleia, on his side facing her, his arm stretched out across her naked back.

  I looked for the gant's blue glow, but I didn't see it. Valleia's robe was draped over a chair. I leaned over and felt it up and down. The gant wasn't in it. It wasn't on the chair. It wasn't on the table next to the bed. Did the table have a drawer? I felt for one; nothing. I went over to the small chest in the corner. I knelt down in front of it, opened it slowly and looked inside. No glow. I felt around inside. I felt clothes, maybe a blanket. No gant.

  And that was all the furniture in the room. I looked under the bed. No blue glow; nothing. Maybe Valleia kept the gant under her pillow, or under the mattress. But that didn't make any sense—pillows and mattresses on Terra were thin; the gant would have made them too uncomfortable. And she couldn't waste time looking for it if Decius and his men broke into the house. Still, I tried sliding my hand around on the mattress between the two sleeping bodies. I tried sliding it under the pillows.

  Valleia stirred then and muttered something, and I pulled my hand away quickly. She didn't wake up. But it didn't matter whether she was awake or asleep. The gant wasn't there.

  Maybe she had suspected what I might try to do and hidden it somewhere else in the house. But of course that made no sense. And anyway, if she had hidden it, I'd never find it.

  I backed out of Valleia's room, feeling completely defeated.

  My brain was woozy. I was exhausted; I couldn't think. I should have been in the emergency room, with my mother fussing over me. I shouldn't have been in this awful world, trying to save a girl from being sold into slavery in Barbarica.

  I turned. I stood in the atrium. I had to make a decision. Go, or stay? And then I saw a movement. A shape. A person.

  It was Affron, sitting cross-legged on the floor, making those strange motions in the air. Like he was trying to find something that wasn't there.

  I took a step forward. He lowered his hands.

  He spoke without turning around to look at me. "It seems," he said, "that the plan was flawed. I am not the person I thought I was. My powers are still... unshaped."

  I didn't know what to say. "I'm sure you tried," I replied. "But right now—"

  "Palta," he said.

  "We need to save her. It might already be too late. But we can all go to the waterfront and..."

  Affron turned to face me. "You must save her by yourself," he said.

  "How can I? Valleia hid the gant or something. I can't free Palta without it."

  Affron reached into his pocket and pulled out the weapon, glowing with its own blue light. He held it out to me.

  I went over and took it. This was the first time I had touched it. It was heavier than I had expected, and warmer—not like cold metal. Like something that was almost alive. "But why?" I said. "Why just me? Why can't we all be together and hire a ship and go to Barbarica?"

  Affron shook his head. "It's time, Larry."

  "Time for what?"

  "Time for you to grow up."

  My sister Cassie said stuff like that to me sometimes: When are you going to grow up? But I knew that Affron didn't mean it as an insult. "Why do I have to grow up right now?" I asked.

  "Because you are more than you think you are, and a burden comes with that. Alas. Now go, and bona fortuna."

  I didn't understand, but maybe that was because I needed to grow up. "Thank you," I whispered.

  He inclined his head to me, and then he turned away.

  I put the gant in the pocket of my robe, and I headed out into the night to save Palta.

  Chapter 16

  I started walking. Parioli was silent; the streets near our house were deserted. My knee was sore, my eye and groin hurt, my mind was still fuzzy. But I had the gant, and I knew where I was going.

  I reached the main road and walked as fast as I could along it. Before long I saw a half-dozen soldiers marching towards me along the road, one torch-bearer in front of them and another behind. I quickly ducked into an alley and tried to think. Had they been sent by the Decius to capture Affron and the rest of us? Should I race back to the house and warn the others?

  I thought for an agonizing minute, and then I ran down the alley and away from the soldiers, away from Parioli.

  Maybe they were just a night patrol. And I didn't have any time to waste.

  But I decided I had to make sure I knew how to use the gant.

  I stopped into another alley and took it out of my pocket. I looked at its faint blue glow; I felt its warmth in my hand. I heard movement in the alley, and I saw a large rat feasting on a pile of garbage. The rat stopped and looked at me. I slowly raised the gant and aimed it. The rat didn't move. I tried squeezing the gant's handle.

  Nothing happened.

  My heart raced. That couldn't be right. I couldn't have gotten this far—I couldn't have the gant in my hand and not be able to use it. I squeezed again. Nothing. What if its battery or whatever had run out? But it looked like it still had power; it felt like it. What if my hand was the wrong shape or something? What if only certain people could use it? The rat turned back to his garbage. Maybe my hand needed to be in a different position. I tried moving my thumb to the top of the handle; I noticed a little notch there. I pushed down on the notch with my thumb while squeezing the handle with m
y fingers.

  I felt something—a release, a momentary lightening. I saw a flash of white light.

  The rat disappeared.

  And most of the garbage disappeared as well, leaving behind nothing but fine ash and that odd, bitter odor in the air.

  The gant felt a little hotter, but it quickly cooled down.

  I had fired a rifle in Carmody's world—to kill a young blue-jacketed soldier from New Portugal, and later to kill wild turkeys. It was nothing like this. Firing a rifle had felt physical—the roar of the bullet, the recoil. Firing a gant was more like playing a video game with the sound turned off. It was like a fantasy; you squeezed it, you felt a sense of something powerful leaving the weapon—and you—and then the thing you aimed at disappeared.

  It was far scarier than a rifle.

  But knowing that I could shoot the gant made me feel safe as I headed back to the waterfront. If I ran into any more soldiers, they wouldn't capture me without a fight.

  But I didn't see any more soldiers. I saw a beggar lying asleep in a tangle of ragged blankets in the shadow of a building. I saw a drunk throw up on the street and then stagger away, muttering to himself. I saw a couple having sex in an alley. I saw a black cat walking along a ledge. I saw a dog with wet fur trotting down the center of a street as if he owned it. I saw wet trash everywhere.

  I tried to focus on what I was going to do when I reached the building where Palta was being kept.

  Don't let yourself be surrounded. The gant would take care of anyone in front of me, but it couldn't protect me from people sneaking up from behind. If I only had to deal with the two men I had seen in the colonnade, I figured I'd be all right. But there would be more than two, as Carmody had pointed out. The whole building might be full of people. I have seen movies where at some point one guy takes on a whole crew of pirates or orcs or whatever, and those scenes have always seemed stupid to me. The pirates never have any strategy, they just come at the guy one by one or two by two, so he can take care of them all without getting a scratch himself. In real life that wouldn't happen. Someone would do something clever, something I'd never think of because I'd never done anything like this before. And even though I possessed the most powerful weapon people here had ever seen or could conceive of, they might still be able to defeat me.

  Or maybe they'd all be asleep.

  Or maybe they'd all be gone. And that would be the worst outcome—an empty building, a ship already headed for Barbarica, Palta lost forever.

  I got closer to the waterfront. I smelled a strong fishy smell; I could make out the ships at anchor. There was no activity, no sound. The taverns and ships and warehouses were in darkness except for occasional dim lamplight. And then at last I could see the building, with the flaking paint and NAVIS or NAVES spelled out on the side. A lamp still shone in one of the second-floor windows. I stopped walking. I thought some more.

  I would have to kill them all. I could show no mercy. They would show no mercy to me, or Palta, or anyone else. I would have to shoot the gant again and again and again until they were all dead. I had to hope the gant kept on working, that it didn't need to be recharged or reloaded. I had to keep my mind as clear as I could, and I had to get Palta back.

  I thought again of the person I had killed in Carmody's world—a boy, not much older than me. He just happened to be fighting for the other side. I killed him because I had to, because he would have killed me if I hadn't killed him first. I still had nightmares about him. I realized that I would have nightmares about what I was about to do, if I survived. But I had to do it.

  I took the gant out of the pocket. I walked toward the building and up the steps to the door that one of the men had pounded on. I tried the latch; it was locked. I took a deep breath. I aimed the gant at the latch, and I squeezed the handle. A brief flash of light, and the latch disappeared, along with most of the door and part of the door jamb. I stepped through the hole in the door and inside.

  I paused to let my eyes adjust to the darkness. I saw a staircase ahead of me, doors to my left and right. I listened for voices, for sleep sounds, for sobs or cries of pain, but I couldn't hear anything.

  I tried the door on the left. It was unlocked. I opened it. I could see movement in the blue glow of the gant. I heard the snickering of horses. I smelled hay; it made me want to sneeze. This was where they had brought the wagon. Was somebody in here with the horses? I couldn't spot anyone. I could search, but I didn't want to make any noise. I decided to move on. I shut that door and opened the door on the right.

  In the gant's blue glow I could make out a table with papers on it, a pile of clothing on the floor, a narrow bed in the far corner. I smelled sweat and stale wine. I heard breathing.

  I made my way carefully through the room to the bed. A bald man was sprawled on it, asleep. He wasn't one of the kidnappers. Was he the guy who had let them in? It didn't matter. I raised the gant, aimed, and squeezed the handle while pressing the notch. Another burst of light, and the man was gone.

  I expected this to be silent, but it wasn't—I had also vaporized part of the bed, and what was left of it came crashing to the floor.

  I stood there, my heart pounding, waiting for someone to call out, to come rushing down the stairs. Nothing.

  So now I had killed again.

  I couldn't stop to think about that. I moved slowly out of the room and up the stairs, still using the gant as a kind of flashlight. I didn't want to trip. I didn't want to make any more noise.

  I paused at the top of the stairs. I saw a short hallway, again with doors on either side. Dim light shone through cracks in one of the doors on the left.

  I could smell piss and sweat and fish.

  I needed to sneeze. I felt dizzy. My pulse was racing. I tried to calm down.

  I walked up to the door with the light under it. I pulled up the latch and opened the door.

  In front of me was a large, dimly lit room. Half a dozen girls were lying on the floor. Palta was one of them. The other girls looked to be her age or a little older. On a bed in the corner, next to a flickering lamp, a man was sleeping.

  All the girls were bound and gagged. One of them was moaning a little, but she—and the other girls—seemed to be asleep. I went into the room and looked down at Palta. She was breathing. Her robe was torn; her face was smeared with dirt. I needed to take care of her, but I had to do something else first.

  I went over to the bed and looked down at the man. He was the one who had punched me and kicked me in the groin. He was short and ugly. He was still wearing the colorful robe he had been wearing in the colonnade, but now it had ridden up over his hairy legs. He was muttering in his sleep. I spotted a metal bar on the table next to the lamp, and I found myself wanting to slam the bar down on his head, over and over. I wanted to make him suffer, instead of just snuffing him out of existence. But I couldn't risk it.

  I squatted down this time so that I could shoot him from the side and avoid hitting the bed. I aimed the gant at his head and fired. The head disappeared, but the lower part of the body remained, gushing blood onto the bed and floor.

  I threw up into the blood.

  I stood up unsteadily. I hoped I wasn't going to pass out. I went over to Palta and knelt beside her, keeping the gant pointed at the door. I bent over and whispered to her. "I'm here," I said.

  She opened her eyes and saw me, and her eyes filled with tears of joy.

  I worked her gag off. "I knew you'd come," she whispered.

  That didn't seem entirely plausible, but I was glad she said it. "You're safe now," I said. "Well, pretty safe."

  She looked around. "Are you alone?" she asked. "Are the others with you?"

  "It's just me. I'll explain later. I killed a guy downstairs, and that man who was sleeping over on the bed. How many others are there?"

  "Two, I think. The other man who took me, and fat woman. A fat woman. She brought us food and then left. I don't know where they are."

  "All right. I've got to kill them before
we do anything else." I thought for a second. "I want you to scream," I said.

  Palta looked puzzled. "Scream?"

  "If they're in the building, they'll think something's wrong and come to check. Then I'll take care of them."

  "Can you untie me first?"

  "Sure." I struggled with the knots in the thick rope, but eventually I got her untied. We stood up, and she hugged me. She was shaking. "Are you okay?" I asked.

  She just held me for a moment without speaking. Finally she said, "Yes. I'll be all right. Are you ready?"

  I went over and stood by the door, far enough away from it to be out of range of a knife or a fist. "Ready," I said.

  Palta screamed. It was a very loud scream. The other girls stirred. After a moment I heard a door open upstairs. "Quid?" a man shouted. What? Then: "Clagge?" The other guy's name?

  I gestured to Palta to scream again. She did. She was an excellent screamer.

  I heard a door slam and footsteps coming down the stairs. "Clagge, quid agitur?" the man called out. Clagge, what's going on? He spoke Latin with a foreign accent.

  The footsteps came closer. And then the man stuck his head inside the door. He was wearing nothing but a short gray tunic. He was holding a knife in one hand and a lamp in the other. "Ubi est—" he started to say. Where is–. And then he saw me. His eyes widened. He raised his knife.

  I squeezed the handle of the gant and snuffed him out of existence.

  I could hear the girls murmur and gasp, even behind their gags.

  "Untie them," I said to Palta. "And put a blanket or something over the guy on the bed. I'll go look for the woman."

  "Be careful, Larry," she whispered.

  I nodded and left the room. I looked in the room across the hall. It was large and filled with random stuff—I could make out pottery and baskets stacked up on tables. I walked down the hall and checked the other rooms on the floor. More random stuff. Fine. I made my way back in the darkness and climbed the stairs to the third floor. At the top I stopped and listened.

  "Vente?" a frightened female voice called out softly. "Clagge?"

  The voice came from a room to my left. The door was open. I walked over to it. The room was small; gray pre-dawn light filtered in through a shutter.