Storm of Ash

by Michelle Kenney

  Aelia squeezed my hand, and I knew what she needed as though she’d spoken the words aloud.

  The cry that left my lips was the rally Arafel hunters used to gather other hunters in the forest. It belonged in the jungle, not here, and yet its meaning somehow transcended its sound. It had the effect of drawing every pair of eyes in the forum towards us.

  ‘Citizens of Isca Prolet!’

  Cassius had designed the perfect stage, and my voice echoed authoritatively around the large stench-filled square. I sucked in a breath, so aware of the irony, that we were attempting to stop the Prolet citizens from inflicting precisely the torture that had been inflicted on them for generations. A crowd of Pantheonites, penned in beside the platform, fixed their anguished faces on us.

  ‘And who are you to address us?’

  A thick-set male Prolet responded, pushing through the crowd to the bottom of the temple steps. He was flanked by two more Prolets of equal stature, and I scanned for their weapons instinctively. This could turn ugly very quickly.

  Fragments of whispers had begun floating up from the watching crowd.

  It’s her! The one from the outside … I thought she died in the circus … or Ludi …? No, didn’t you see her charm the sabre-tooth? But she’s with Aelia …’

  The three men had begun climbing the steps, clearly uninterested in negotiating anything.

  ‘She is Talia Hanway!’ Aelia’s authoritative voice rang out as she lifted her drooping head with what seemed to be herculean effort. ‘Descendant of Thomas Hanway … one of the … founding fathers of Isca Pantheon.’

  I glanced across at her valiant profile. She was using all her remaining strength to project a calm voice that sounded so much like her old self. Only the dark veins creeping up her neck showed how much it was costing her.

  My chest ached violently.

  ‘I stand before you all as General of the Prolet Freedom Fighters and swear to you now … Talia Hanway is the one I told you all about … the one from the outside … we’ve been waiting for … She is the only Outsider capable of controlling the Voynich’s last secret and weapon … Hominum chimera!’

  She twisted to smile briefly at me, her eyes translucent with the effort of maintaining her show. I tightened my hold on her slipping body as August stepped forward out of the shadows to support her on the other side.

  A mutter went up instantly.

  ‘Yes …! The Commander General is alive …’ she rallied ‘… disgraced by this Civitas because he dared to believe in something different … Yet he fought for your freedom … risked his own life … to protect you from Cassius’s final plan … And I know this because … he is also my beloved brother.’

  Her voice cracked as she turned her face to smile at August and this time the crowd fell silent. A General of the PFF owning a blood relative in the Order of the Equite Knights was clearly a leveller.

  ‘He had Prolet blood?’ one of the men on the stairway interrupted suspiciously.

  ‘Yes!’ August’s voice boomed as Aelia’s legs buckled. ‘I have Prolet blood just like you, in the same way I have Roman Equite blood … and now I fight as an Outsider … To put an end to Isca Pantheon’s Biotechnical Programme, and to Cassius’s rule once and for all!’

  ‘For what?’ someone jeered from the crowd. ‘So you can wear the crown yourself?!’

  ‘Yeah … and we heard about your precious outside! We saw images of your village, Arafel, burned to the ground by the Eagle squad,’ another of the men added.

  And in that moment I saw how it all looked to them. This was all they knew, and they were seizing the moment to make it theirs. Any way they could.

  ‘Yes, Cassius murdered my people!’ my voice grated above the noise of the crowd, never clearer, never more raw.

  A strange hush fell over the crowd, as hundreds of surprised eyes swung towards me.

  ‘… as he will murder each and every one of you, if you don’t hear us. You think that by executing a few Pantheonites you can bring this house down? You aren’t enough! You will never be enough. These people are pawns in Cassius’s game, just like you. Right now your Emperor is raising an army far stronger and uglier than even you can imagine. And you are using what little time you have to cut the throats of his pet dogs?’ My voice rose in livid anger.

  ‘So what? We are all dead anyway. Why not take a few with us?’ One of the burly Prolet men scowled, making a tight swiping gesture with a curved blade.

  ‘No!’ I countered in a steely voice that reverberated endlessly around the silent forum.

  And finally I knew this was it. The moment Grandpa had foreseen so long ago, that my blood would be a last lifeline between the old Outsider world and the hope of a fragile new one. Images of Arafel crowded my head, so many faces, smiles and hopes. My people had bequeathed a legacy far stronger than any despotic regime. Cassius had called my Outsider emotion my weakness, but he was wrong. It was my core strength.

  ‘There is another way!’

  And this time you could have heard a pin drop throughout the entire forum.

  ‘For all of us – but we have to stand together. The world outside is recovering. It survived the Great War, and enabled isolated communities to recover in disparate places. We may all be different, but we are united by one common purpose, ridding the world of a future that is full of darkness. And I believe we can do this, but it will take every man, woman and child standing here now.

  ‘Come with us and fight – as Outsiders! If we die, at least we die as free people. But if we succeed, we will live the way Thomas wanted us to live. A real life between the red earth and warm sun, free from tyranny and pain … A life worth the fight!’

  And as my words spilled into the air one of the moving planets far above our heads whirred and clicked into action; it descended at breakneck speed and pulled up sharply just above us before rolling over to display its flat-sided screen.

  I knew then that whatever small reprieve we’d won from Cassius was over. So instead I looked squarely into the soulless black screen and smiled, before whispering the words that echoed our own personal war.

  ‘And feral means free.’

  Chapter 21

  Forty of us. It was a small but vital army. Prolets who’d rejected the vaccine, a few who hadn’t but were unwilling to be divided from friends, and a handful of Pantheonites who once freed, decided not to hang around to see whether Cassius was in a good mood or not.

  ‘It’s blocked,’ I whispered to August.

  We were standing at the back of the aurochs’ stable, facing August’s exit. Or what had once been an exit, and though there was an old faded plaque emblazoned with ‘Danger, Waste Disposal Only,’ together with a small black figure in an infection suit, there was still only a faint outline in the wall where a door had once opened to the outside world.

  ‘It can’t …’ August scanned the wall, holding his sister’s slumped frame.

  He hadn’t let her go since the forum, though she’d lost consciousness now and the black veins were webbing across the bottom half of her left cheek.

  I’d never felt more helpless. I knew our only hope lay in finding Eli. He wasn’t a medic but he’d performed countless operations on the animals he’d helped, and his were the only hands I’d trust other than those of Tullius. But that was assuming we could leave at all.

  A few Prolets with clubs and knives stepped up, and tried to find some leverage or small opening, but the doorway might as well have never existed at all.

  ‘Now what?’ I asked August in desperation.

  His swarthy profile was pale with exhaustion. And the exuberant mood at making it through to the stables was dissipating fast, our new army growing uneasy.

  ‘The Sweeper hold is the only other …’ But whatever else he might have said was lost to the heavy crunch of boots. Boots moving in unison.

  My chest contracted with fear.

  And before we could assemble any sort of line of defence, a battalion of guards rounded the corner
. There had to be fifteen at least, and they were all armed.

  ‘Halt! You are all under arrest, and we have orders to shoot anyone who runs.’

  My blood chilled, as I stared at the gladiator in charge. Forest-green eyes that were so at odd with his pristine Pantheonite uniform. Could it really have come to this? Max, an Outsider, to turn over the last of the feral souls in this hellhole?

  ‘Max?’ I appealed, stepping forward with my hands held out.

  ‘Halt! In the name of the Imperator Cassius I command you to remain where you are!’

  ‘Max!’ I entreated. ‘You have to let us go … Arafel … the outside … we can try to protect it if you let us go now!’

  ‘I said halt! I have had orders to show no mercy.’

  ‘Tal, he can’t …’ August started forward and found several Diasords levelled at him instantly.

  Some subjects … have no intrinsic ability or resource to reject the vaccine. They can have extreme reactions, a form of induced psychosis. Aelia’s words echoed through my head warningly.

  I gritted my teeth, refusing to believe he wasn’t still in there.

  ‘Max … you don’t belong here … you have to remember! Building treehouses … hunting in the forest … tree-running trials … swimming at the lake … apricots … this!’

  And bringing my hand to my neck, I yanked open my indigo top and pulled out the tiny treehouse dart tube he’d given me, still dangling on its leather.

  His eyes dropped to the only piece of Arafel I had left, and there was a heavy silence as his muscles contracted and a fleeting shadow passed across his face.

  ‘Guards!’ His voice filled the space finally. ‘Take aim!’

  And I watched in horror as the guards dropped to their knees in formation and a murmur of terror went up among the people behind me.

  ‘No!’ I yelled, running forward. ‘You don’t have to do this … You’re one of us – an Outsider! Max!’

  ‘The back wall … fire!’

  Then the entire stable filled with the sound of laser fire lacerating the back wall, sending up spirals of grey chemical smoke. And whether it was the power of the laser fire in such a small space, or just Grandpa smiling down on us, the floor of the stables lit up with dancing spirals of real fresh air. Outside air.

  Several of the large Prolets ran forward, and slammed their combined weight into the wall, pushing until the whole stable wall shuddered and fell outwards, leaving a gaping hole three Cyclops could walk through. And the fresh air that rushed through smelled and tasted as sweet as heaven.

  August sprinted to the stabled aurochs and yanked open their door. They spilled out – every colour known to Pantheon – and whinnied incredulously at the new world that presented itself. The sun was just creeping over the horizon, throwing out a soft dawn hue and the outside had never looked so intoxicating. I threw a look back at Max, his hand held high and still, halting any further action by his battalion while we mounted the aurochs bareback. It was clear many of the Prolets and Pantheonites had never so much as sat on a horse, but no one was being left behind. August was astride his winged stallion Bellerophon in a heartbeat, Aelia slumped in front of him.

  ‘For the love of Nero, Tal?’ he yelled over his shoulder as I skirted the back of the anxious herd.

  ‘Go … go on … find Eli … I’ll follow,’ I yelled.

  His face twisted with anxiety as he accepted there was no more time, that Aelia’s need was greater and this was something I needed to do. He nodded abruptly.

  ‘Yahh! Yahh!’ he yelled, as though to muster every ounce of strength he had remaining, and as the aurochs spilled into their first dawn, I sprinted back to Max.

  ‘Come with us? Come home?’ I breathed erratically, every Diasord still raised and ready to do his command.

  The tiny treehouse dart tube was still dangling outside my indigo charioteer outfit. His clouded forest-greens, eyes that had once meant home, lowered slowly to fix on it. I knew then it was the same as my moment with the girls’ leathery back. The vaccine could be overcome with the right trigger. And the dart tube he had carved with his own Outsider hands had opened the door a fraction. He was still in there somewhere, in the shadows. My hopes soared.

  I could bring him back, I knew I could. If I could just get him out of Pantheon.

  ‘Max, trust me,’ I urged desperately, so aware of the emptying stable now, ‘you belong with the Outsiders, not here. I can help you …’

  ‘I … am a sworn gladiator of Isca Pantheon, citizen …

  ‘No!’ I hissed. ‘You aren’t! You’re Max Thorn, outside hunter and beloved son of Arafel.’

  ‘I … just … can’t,’ he forced out, as though the words themselves were mountains he had to climb. He reached out halfway, before faltering and dropping his hand.

  ‘Just go … before I change my mind!’

  His tone was abrupt, the familiar muscles around his mouth trembling, as though it was taking every effort to control himself, to resist his conditioning. And to see his torment was more than I could bear. I reached up and kissed his quivering cheek.

  ‘I’ll come back for you,’ I whispered, ‘I promise.’

  Raw words, slicing me open, and yet without Lake, none of us stood a chance.

  Without looking back, I leapt straight onto the back of the last auroch and out into the sunrise, unable to believe how it ever ended up this way – August on the outside and Max … being so damned Max.

  I leaned low in my auroch’s indigo mane, and let her have her head, catching the others with ease. Then we streamed out like one of the old forest herds, Bellerophon and my auroch galloping wide to take the lead, with the runaway army behind us, the thundering of hooves on the dawn soil one of the most glorious sounds I’d ever heard. And I could feel Grandpa’s faded smile as we headed towards the start of the mined land separating Pantheon from the outside forest, giving our aurochs’ wings.

  As the faint healing warmth of the sun reached through my Insider clothing, I focused my eyes on our last challenge. Too many of my ancestors had died trying to cross this stretch of the brown dirt in the aftermath of the war, believing there to be sanctuary on the inside. Now we knew the truth and if I was going to die, I was going to die out here securing a path for the survivors, nowhere near Pantheon.

  August threw me a sideways glance as he drew level, his face stony grey in the fragile light, Aelia quiet and still between his arms. We both knew the danger of this last stretch, despite our proximity to the forest. Instinctively, I leaned forward into the mane of my nervous auroch, gleaming like rivulets in the brightening sun.

  ‘I trust you,’ I whispered.

  She tossed her head in understanding, before pulling ahead of the herd and slowing to a purposeful trot, her head low and focused. Then the herd narrowed into a single line as we started across the brown dust, a cloud kicking up either side of our progress. It was a test of faith, fuelled by the rhythm of the remaining aurochs and tendrils of amber reaching through the forest ahead.

  Which was when I glimpsed her, silhouetted on the other side of the mile-long stretch, her sleek body glowing against the trees.

  ‘Jas?’ I whispered incredulously.

  My last sighting of her had been when she fought Brutus in the research centre inside Isca’s old castle grounds, but it was clear her genes had influenced the sabre-tooths. Had she been among the laboratory animals we’d released? Or perhaps she’d escaped in the aftermath of Ludi Cirque?

  Either way, her silhouette was as welcome as the rising sun – and then another figure stepped out of the trees behind her, a figure I knew as well as my own.

  ‘Eli!’ I yelled in jubilation, and even though there was still a mile of lethal dirt ground between us, and he was too far away to lip-read I could tell he knew me too, that his gentle smile was widening into a grin.

  And then Jas was sprinting towards us, taking a circuitous route through the dirt, looping back and forth until her lithe, athletic body was leaping up at
my suspicious auroch, and covering my outstretched hands with huge soppy licks.

  ‘Jas, Jas … yes, I missed you so much too … but lead us, go on, girl!’ I encouraged, aware my auroch was spooked enough without having an overemotional snow leopard sending her veering off course.

  ‘Tal …’

  August’s voice behind me was low and urgent. I didn’t need to look back at him to know why.

  ‘Go on, Jas … go on … take us to Eli as fast as you can!’ I urged.

  She didn’t need a second telling and bounded ahead, retracing the same looped path she had a few seconds previously. And as we galloped for our lives across the remaining dirt, an animal of the forest and survivor of Pantheon our beacon of hope, I was struck by how alike we all were.

  Creatures of nature, creatures of design, Outsiders of the forest, Insiders of Pantheon. Our differences were merely coincidences of creation – of time and place. And yet here we all were fighting tyranny in the pursuit of the same fundamental thing: freedom. The freedom to be who our DNA meant us to be. And I’d never felt more feral.

  I threw a look back at the receding silhouette of Pantheon’s main dome. It looked quiet and uninterested in our escape. But I knew that its appearance hid a multitude of lies. Inside, a war was brewing, and it was only a matter of time before Cassius brought it outside. To my world. And we had to be waiting.

  I’d never been more ready to feel the shadow of the boundary trees spilling over my skin, but their solace was nothing to the comfort of Eli’s arms as I slid off my auroch’s steaming back. I buried my face briefly in his comforting scent before pulling myself away.

  ‘Aelia,’ I whispered, knowing he would lip-read everything into my one word.

  Between us we lifted her down from Bellerophon as August slid off behind. Then no one uttered a word as he carried her to the base of the Great Oak just a few metres away. I glanced up into its ancient, whispering branches and felt almost as though we’d come full circle. It was a tree that had known so many hopes and prayers, a tree that had comforted me when Grandpa slipped away, and a tree that watched over us now as Aelia drew faltering breaths.