Ashes of the Earth

by Eliot Pattison

  The captain’s glass stopped in midair. “No,” she said in an uncertain tone. “That’s old world. We don’t have such things now. It was ammunition. Everyone has the right to bear arms, I don’t care what the damned governor says.”

  “Do yourself a favor. Find one of those shells and cut it open. It was the powder inside that got your son killed. It’s killing others in the colony. You’ve been helping the jackal drug runners.”

  Captain Reese spoke no more, just stared into her whiskey. She seemed not to notice as Hadrian rose and left the cabin. The grey cat escorted him off the ship, then ran back inside.

  HADRIAN MADE HIS way carefully up the darkened back stairs of the theater building. He had confirmed that Buchanan’s carriage was parked at the front and knew he would have to be subdued if Hadrian confronted him in the Governor’s Box in the middle of an act. But as he peered around the corner of the back hallway he froze. Bjorn hovered in front of the door. Buchanan was taking his bodyguard everywhere now. Hadrian retreated down the stairs.

  Minutes later he slipped over the fence into the governor’s compound and found a hiding place inside the little smokehouse at the rear of the property. As he closed the door something glinted in the moonlight that leaked through a gap in the planks. Atop an upright log lay a small hammer and a piece of shiny metal. As he stepped toward it a piece of porcelain broke under his foot. He picked up the porcelain, then found three more pieces nearby. They were from the face of a doll, a blond doll that had been beaten with the hammer. He lifted the metal. It had been a badge, one of the replica police badges the governor gave away as tokens of appreciation. It had been pounded flat, its embossing destroyed. He looked back at the doll, realizing he had seen it before, at the mill. Someone had taken a hammer to the angel.

  He lowered himself to the ground, leaning against the wall. In a little pool of moonlight the angel’s eyes stared unblinking at him.

  Hadrian did not realize he had dozed off until he was awakened by the furious barking of a dog. The door was flung open. He was still groggy as Bjorn seized him by the collar, dragged him outside, and heaved him toward the kitchen of the governor’s house.

  “I knew the rumors of your death were too good to be true,” Buchanan said as Bjorn shoved him into his downstairs office. “You were seen at the theater. Bjorn doesn’t work alone when I am out in public.”

  “I should have known you would need protection round the clock now.” Hadrian stepped to the fireplace to warm himself. “The citizens are restless.”

  Buchanan stared at him without expression, then gestured Bjorn out of the room. “Where have you been?”

  “Discovering a whole new world. Meeting the people who have turned you into a puppet.”

  A glint of amusement appeared on the governor’s face. “We went ahead in your absence and updated your official record. Just in case. Permanent exile will just take a quick vote of the Council now.”

  “The new face of justice in Carthage. Condemn the accused without a hearing.”

  “She will hang,” Buchanan said coldly. “I will make you watch.”

  “And when I find the real killers your political career will be finished.”

  “You have no notion of what is happening in this colony. Don’t evade your responsibilities for weeks then show up just to criticize me.”

  “It is not me you need worry about. It’s your Council. They’ve begun to wonder about the guild heads taking over the government. Fisheries, merchants, shipwrights. The ones crucial for smuggling. Have they actually begun paying you cash, or is it still just extravagant gifts?”

  Buchanan said nothing, but glanced out the open door as if deciding whether to let Bjorn take over.

  “And now the millers. Have you wondered at all about that, Lucas? Have you done an inventory of the grain?”

  “Don’t be so naive. The guilds pay the taxes that support the government. And having the guilds provide administrative support saves government expense. The millers are now responsible for security at the silos and administering the retail distribution. A waste of time for government.”

  “It doesn’t hurt that they bring you so many things you treasure. Brandy. Fine furniture from God knows where.” Hadrian ran his hand along the back of an elegant settee and gestured toward the grandfather clock and a sideboard with a dozen bottles of salvaged liquor. “Have you ever seen a duty certificate for any of this?”

  Buchanan took a step toward the door.

  “The last head of the millers’ guild was murdered,” Hadrian said to his back, “and the new one was probably living in the north until a few months ago. If he’s confirmed on the Council, the guilds won’t have to listen to you ever again. They will control you, and control the Council. The colony will be theirs. No need for messy revolutions. They will probably even let you stay in the mansion. So far you’re doing fine as their figurehead.”

  Buchanan seemed distracted. Defiance was certainly on his face, but as he looked back out the door so was pain. Hadrian edged across the room to follow his gaze. Bjorn was not outside the door as he expected, but sitting at the end of the hallway, at the base of the stairs to the second floor.

  “You have no proof of anything,” Buchanan said flatly. “You flee the colony on a lark and leave me to clean up. That bitch had a fair trial. A jury convicted her. Kenton provided testimony that she invaded a citizen’s house, held the owner prisoner. Witnesses saw her running back there from the library after Jonah was found dead.”

  “Lies. Who was there to defend her?”

  “Emily made a statement. More like a plea for mercy.”

  Hadrian lowered himself into a wingback chair by the fireplace, within sight of the stairway. “The town in the north is called St. Gabriel. They are sitting on treasures you cannot imagine. They stole the Anna and had Fletcher lie about its being sunk. They killed your scouts to keep their operations secret. Then a policeman. Surely you haven’t been able to sweep Jansen’s murder under the rug too?”

  The sound of crashing dishes suddenly erupted from the kitchen next door. A woman called frantically from somewhere. Buchanan cursed then strode out of the room, snapping at a maid who appeared in the corridor.

  An instant later Hadrian was at the sideboard. He grabbed one of Buchanan’s precious bottles and hurried to the cellar door. With a glance toward the kitchen to make certain no one watched, he opened the door, rolled the bottle over the first step, and ran back into the study as the bottle noisily bounced down the darkened stairs.

  Seconds later he heard Buchanan’s furious curse. “Bjorn!” the governor shouted. “He’s in the cellars again!”

  As soon as the two men disappeared into the cellar Hadrian darted down the hall and up the stairs. A stout woman in an apron lay sprawled, asleep, in a chair by the first door. He slipped past her and pushed open the door to find himself in a bedroom lined with shelves full of books and dolls. Dora, the governor’s youngest daughter, sat in a chair by the bed, her cheeks red and swollen. She had been crying. The girl held the hand of her older sister, who lay under a heavy quilt.

  At first Sarah appeared to be sleeping. But then Hadrian saw her pallid cheeks and the tremors in her fingertips. He knelt at the bedside and gently took the hand held by Dora. Sarah’s pulse was slow, dangerously slow.

  He did not move as footsteps pounded on the stairs. Bjorn seized Hadrian by the shoulder and seemed ready to pummel him when he was restrained by the voice of the governor. “Wait. Hadrian is an old friend of the girl’s.”

  The bodyguard scowled but retreated into the hall. Buchanan moved to Hadrian’s side. “Speak to her. Maybe she will react to your voice.”

  Hadrian uttered the girl’s name, twice, three times, then very carefully lifted an eyelid. Her iris was fading. “She should be in the hospital,” he said.

  “They have more than they can handle already,” Buchanan said. “The first one died in their care, as you know.”

  Hadrian glanced up. Was the governor
acknowledging that he now knew the truth about Jamie Reese? “I just saw her two days ago at her rehearsal. How long has it been, how long since the coma?”

  “That night.”

  “Before that?”

  “School. Homework. Her usual routine. But she was acting restless. And distracted. Went out in the backyard at all hours, looking at the sky, sitting in the smokehouse.”

  ”They’re bringing it in from the ruined lands.”

  “It?”

  “Drugs, Lucas. My God don’t you see? St. Gabriel is eating away Carthage from the inside while it erodes our resolve with treasure from the outside. You don’t control the colony anymore. You don’t even control what comes into your own house.”

  “Impossible. My Sarah doesn’t do drugs. I’ve had guards here these past weeks. No one could get drugs to her without being noticed.”

  “Unless she wanted them,” Hadrian shot back. “You’ve got to close down the smuggling depot in the cave beyond the icehouse. Pull back your patrols from the farms and put them in the fisheries where they belong.”

  “The outsiders are nothing but peasants,” Buchanan said stubbornly. “Powerless shadows. We have nothing to fear from them.”

  But as he spoke Bjorn reappeared in the doorway. The big Norger’s face was a storm of emotion. He said nothing, only pointed down the hall, out the window at the end. Hadrian rose and followed Buchanan, seeing with panic the flames that flickered over the town, then running, reaching the window as a long, agonized groan left Buchanan. The shadows had power after all.

  The flaming structures at the south end of town were like five giant fingers about to close over Carthage. Bells began ringing. Fire brigades were already galloping. But Hadrian knew they would be too late. The silos containing the colony’s winter grain were engulfed in flame.

  THE END OF the world had come again. More than a few of the older men and women who had labored to build Carthage sat against trees and openly wept. Mothers held young children tight against their aprons so their tears would not be seen. People walked about with blank expressions, not wanting to believe the catastrophe before them.

  The entire winter’s supply of grain was gone. The dry kernels and the seasoned oak walls of the structures had provided the perfect fuel, burning so hot that the silos had been impossible to approach. The fire companies could do little more than spray water on the nearby buildings, and even then two stables and a dozen horses had been lost. There would be no bread, no porridge, no pastries, no pasta, no more of the grain coffee drunk by many. The supply of wild game would quickly be exhausted. Milk cows would be confiscated for meat. The colony would be left with salted fish and pickled vegetables. By midwinter even those supplies would be short.

  Lucas Buchanan walked among the ruins with an impassive expression.

  “How will you feed us now?” a woman with a child angrily yelled at him.

  “What’s the point of your damned police if they can’t stop this?” a man shouted.

  Buchanan ignored them. His police were out in force now, surrounding him, guarding the rope barrier Kenton was erecting to keep the onlookers from the ruined silos. Only one of them showed any interest in examining the site.

  Jori knelt, studying a large crockery pot that had been shattered by the heat. As Hadrian approached he spotted more of the ceramic shards, from demijohns and larger containers. Jori held one of the pieces up to him.

  “Smell it,” she instructed.

  The acrid odor was faint but unmistakable. Turpentine had been in the crock. Hadrian picked up another shard and discovered the same scent.

  “They wanted them to burn all at once, fast, so there would no chance of saving even one. They got away fast. One of the ice freighters is missing,” she added. Her face twisted with emotion as she watched a woman, pale as a ghost, walk by with an infant pressed to her breast. “The children,” Jori said in an agonized tone. “My God, Hadrian, the children.”

  He walked among the ashes, considering the night’s work. It had taken several men, with a wagon full of the solvent used to accelerate the flames. History was indeed repeating itself. The agony of their first winter would be theirs again. He did not respond at first when he realized Buchanan was standing next to him.

  “There are small inventories scattered about at bakers and the mills,” the governor said in a hollow voice. “The farmers always keep a little extra. We will establish a rationing board.”

  “It’s taken months, probably more, to put this together. Wheels within wheels. Crimes within crimes. I never suspected the scope of their ambition.”

  “Speak plainly,” the governor snapped.

  “The pieces were all there. The guilds always cut corners. The merchants had secret salvage trips. The fishermen had their smuggling. The millers had found a way to divert some grain to eventually sell to the exiles. It took the genius of those in St. Gabriel to combine it all. When they found they could make drugs they were unstoppable. The sum of the parts became far greater than the whole. The smuggling made them rich. Now destroying the grain brings Carthage to its knees. The drugs provide the deathblow.”

  “Nonsense,” Buchanan said, but his voice lacked conviction.

  “With our granaries gone, they’ll expect you to beg for food,” Hadrian said.

  “They can’t possibly have enough.”

  “They were running the Anna back and forth for months hauling salvage one way and grain on the return. And what’s enough? Their point isn’t really made until people start dying. But they won’t offer us the means to stay alive, not yet. St. Gabriel first wants the people here desperate, so they won’t question what their new government does so long as it feeds them. Then the drugs will destroy any resolve to resist. You’ll end up begging.”

  “Like hell,” Buchanan growled.

  “And when you refuse they’ll make it clear to the people that you have turned down the means to avoid starvation. They won’t have to get rid of you then, because they know the people will. How long will your flying squad last when five hundred citizens storm your mansion?”

  “To hell with them!” Buchanan remained defiant. “I will not beg!” As he spoke a wagon drove by, laden with a family and their household furnishings, no doubt bound for relatives on some distant farm. A man struggling with belongings jammed into a blanket on his shoulder walked by. The disintegration of Carthage was beginning before their eyes.

  “You will beg for it,” Hadrian said, “you’ll pay double, triple what it is worth, transfer the entire government coffers to St. Gabriel if that’s what it takes.”

  “You forever misjudge me. I will destroy them.”

  “No. You misjudge them. I am not speaking of the governor. I am speaking of the father. They will keep Sarah addicted for a while, then withhold the drugs. She will start to scream, scream until her throat is bloody. She will weep with pain, she will shout hideous things at you and her sister. She will suffer things no child should ever suffer. You have already shown those in St. Gabriel that there is no boundary between what you do for the state and what you do for your family. As part of the negotiations they will secretly offer you what Sarah craves. You will not refuse.”

  Buchanan’s expression turned desolate. “My little Sarah,” was all he said.

  Jori approached, with cool determination in her eyes. She held his gaze a moment before he turned back to the governor. Hadrian sighed and gazed toward the western horizon as he spoke.

  “Their power rests with the drugs and the grain, but also with their secret allies in Carthage. Unless we find those working inside Carthage, the ones who always seem to know our every step, we can trust no one. And the truth is not here. It is out there,” he said, gesturing toward the wilderness. “So we will go find it, the three of us, and follow the trail of evidence back here.”

  Buchanan watched a family of older colonists go by with their belongings piled on an oxcart. The veterans were the first to leave, because they knew what lay ahead. Hadrian knew t
he governor was glimpsing the same nightmarish memories of their first two winters, when dogs and cats, sparrows and mice had gone into stewpots, when bodies had gone into mass graves, when women had offered their bodies for half a loaf to keep a child alive.

  Hadrian did not believe Buchanan had heard until he slowly turned to him. “Three?”

  “Nelly’s coming. She can get us inside closed doors. She possesses secrets that will help. But she will never reveal them in your prison.”

  “The people have to see we are still in charge,” Buchanan said.

  “They need a distraction,” he said after a moment. “I should move up her hanging.”

  “Nelly is a thorn in St. Gabriel’s side. They made sure she was here when Jonah died. They’ve made her a pawn in this, just like you. They want her hung, to eliminate any dissidence on their side. Her death will mark the point of no return. She must go with me. Say she is still in official custody.”

  “Never.”

  Hadrian closed his eyes a moment, then opened them to the sound of an animal-like whimpering. A young man was traveling with his fleeing parents, who had been obliged to tie him down in their cart. He was laughing hysterically one moment, muttering gibberish the next. Their voices were despairing, stoic pain on their faces as they tried to soothe him.

  Buchanan watched them, saying nothing.

  Hadrian fingered the shell of powder in his pocket. He hated himself for saying the words even before they left his mouth. “I will leave you enough of the drug to last Sarah a week.”

  Buchanan stared at the family disappearing over the hill before speaking. “Bjorn will go,” he suddenly declared. “He will have orders to kill her if she tries to escape.”

  CHAPTER Fourteen

  THE FISHERY HAD a haunted air about it in the winter night. The larger boats lay trapped by ice against their wharves. Smaller ones, hauled by teams of oxen onto log racks, resembled stranded whales. The moonlight, filtered dim and blue through a bank of fog, rendered the solitary sentry an otherworldly scarecrow.