Back in the booth, Pyke first lit a grubby stub of candle sitting on a small shelf near the door. Then he removed the wooden cover and looked down into what was clearly another lockbooth directly below. But it was so murky that he had to poke his torch down through the hole to see; the booth below seemed largely full of grimy household junk covered with a thick layer of dust. Except for a second hole right underneath the one he was peering into. He retracted his arm, sat back and said to T’Moy, “Take a look.”
What the heaving hell is all this about? he thought as T’Moy took the torch and thrust it into the hole, followed by his head. Who breaks into a storehouse from below then drills through into the storage locker above? Well, that would be someone eager to get their paws on some juicy items before … before the key to the lockbooth comes up for auction!
So what was missing? He shifted his position and took a proper look at the booth’s interior by the candle’s shifting light. There were shelves on either side with the lower ones crammed with boxes, tied-up pairs of army boots, armour buckles, split dagger sheathes and battered tin pans for cooking and eating. Carefully he got to his feet and lit another couple of candles located in holders higher up. A couple of long oilskin-wrapped packages were stacked against the back wall—when Pyke prodded them he heard muffled clanks.
“So, someone broke in before us,” said T’Moy, coming up from the hole, but remaining seated on the floor. “Robber scum, most like. But why leave a body behind? Perhaps they had a falling out …”
Pyke gave a knowing smile. “T’Moy, I’ll bet you there’s not a wound anywhere on our dead friend’s body, no blood, not a drop.”
The Bargalil raised an eyebrow. “Very well, I accept the challenge and shall search the cadaver. And you?”
“I will be trying to figure out what they broke in to steal.”
Without T’Moy the booth felt almost roomy. Pyke stood and began to scan the shelves, trying not to stir up the dust while scrutinising it for any recent disturbances. He quickly realised that he was surrounded by the accumulated detritus and knick-knacks of the good sergeant’s life. There was a bundle of pennons, a nest of crockery bowls, a group of rough wood carvings of dogs, a ribbon-tied roll of maps, a shabby hat with a gorgeous blue feather in it, empty wine bottles whose labels bore various signatures, a plaster figurine of a milkmaid, a grubby box containing a score of spindly game pieces, a cluster of rusty armourer’s tools …
And on the highest right-hand shelf was a row of leather-bound books of various sizes, the last of which was missing, made obvious by the brushed-out gap in the even layer of dust. Most of the other titles were no help, a collection of poems, a geography of the Northern kingdoms, a gazetteer of the Shylan river towns, a construction handbook, Drinking Songs of the Westerly Pirates … for a second he smiled in appreciation. Whatever the psychotic flaws of the Legacy, that machine intelligence had an exceptional take on simulation details.
Then he noticed the last two books, a biography of Emperor-General Mogori and a book on ancient battles and tactics, which made Pyke pause and ponder. Why steal a book? What would it contain? Then he smiled. Soldiers sometimes keep a diary or journal—bet that’s what they came for!
Just then T’Moy appeared at the booth door. “I think we may have a problem.”
Pyke left the booth and followed him to the head of the stairs where they stopped and listened. Despite the thick walls Pyke could hear voices calling back and forth and once heard the big heavy door rattle as if given an annoyed kick.
Pyke cursed under his breath and T’Moy looked worried. “I don’t think we’ll be able to fight our way out, Captain—it sounds as if there are three outside at least.”
“Well, lucky for us that we have an alternative escape route, eh?”
“Going out the way the robbers came in?” T’Moy said. “But what is down there—sewers? Caves?”
“Right now, don’t know and don’t care!” Pyke slapped T’Moy on the back. “First, we get you into the downstairs booth, then I’ll lower Vrass to you, then you descend to the space below and I’ll lower Vrass down again. Then I’ll clear up any tracks and clues before locking the booth from the inside and joining you. Got it? Right, let’s get to it.”
What had started in Pyke’s head as a straightforward 1-2-3 operation began to reveal its snags when T’Moy climbed down into the booth below. It turned out to be full of old garden pots stacked in tall, tottering towers. Some had already been dislodged by the robbers during their foray and, when T’Moy lowered himself into the booth, one swinging leg knocked over a stack, creating a crashing, splintering din. But they persevered, eventually manhandling Vrass down into the space beneath the boxhouse, which turned out to be a cellar.
Once Vrass/Virl was lowered into T’Moy’s waiting arms, Pyke clambered back up to the topmost booth where he’d left his torch. Those outside, most likely city watch guards, were banging on the door, shouting obscenities and threats about what they were going to do to anyone found inside. Pyke just had time to arrange the dead robber next to a booth near the stairs, along with a sliver of torn paper sticking out of the bottom of its door, when he heard the jingle of many keys then a series of rattling attempts at the lock.
Someone’s roused a locksmith out of his scratcher at this time of night, a someone who wants us badly!
Back in Sergeant Dalyak’s booth, he pulled the door shut and locked it from the inside. Then he climbed down through the hole and reached up to move the thin wood covering over the hole. There was little point in concealing the second hole so he dropped down into the shadowy cellar where T’Moy was waiting in the torchlight.
“Which way?” he said.
T’Moy pointed to a corner of the cellar where a broken bedstead stood against one wall, next to the ruins of a staircase. “There’s a tunnel entrance behind that bed.”
They carried Vrass/Virl over to the corner, pulled aside the bedstead and shuffled with their burden into the gap, only pausing so that Pyke could reposition the bed behind them. The short, rough-hewn passage ended in a broad wooden panel that sounded hollow when Pyke rapped it with a knuckle. A thick frame surrounded it and a quick search revealed a handpull switch set into the beam. The panel slid aside to reveal a set of stairs leading up for about twenty steps before reaching a short passageway that turned to the left. A dozen paces brought them to yet another stairway up which they struggled with Vrass’s weight for two flights till they came out in a bare, dingy room with a sloping floor and a single window. The sole remaining torch was nearly played out by now, but T’Moy found a shelf with a few tallow candle stubs which he lit from the guttering torch.
With Vrass/Virl stowed in a seated position against one wall, Pyke flopped down beside him.
“For what’s supposed to be a simulation,” he said, “the designers sure went for accuracy in physical exhaustion. Skag it, but I’m officially knackered …”
“Captain,” said T’Moy who was standing at the window. “There’s something happening outside that you might find interesting.”
With a groan, Pyke hauled himself upright and went over for a look. The window looked out on a dark huddle of uneven roofs and beyond them to the main road where torches were being held aloft by city watchmen on the roof of Raskol Boxhouse. Pyke chuckled while a visibly irate watch captain harangued his men as he marched around the building.
“By the way, Captain,” said T’Moy. “You were correct—there were neither blood nor wounds around the head, neck and chest of our dead friend. And there was almost nothing in his pockets, just these gloves and a handful of groundnut shells.”
Pyke ignored the shells but took the gloves—they were man-sized woollen mittens with the fingertips missing, just the kind of thing a professional thief would wear. And they hadn’t been cut off, they’d been knitted that way. Poor bastard, he thought. Gets hired by mysterious types, breaks into an old soldier’s private booth and ends up dead for his trouble. Be worth tracking down his killers, just
for a spot of payback.
T’Moy grunted and Pyke looked round. There was sudden activity over at the boxhouse—the watch captain was urging all his men inside.
“Ah well, seems like they’ve found our escape hatch so game’s a bogie!” Pyke slapped T’Moy on the shoulder. “Time we weren’t here.”
The still-bound Vrass/Virl moaned as they carted him out to a landing where creaky stairs went down two floors to ground level. A light rain was falling as they paused at the open door. After a brief discussion they decided to head further into the Ithlyr slums and see if they could find a small cart with which to transport Vrass around.
For the next twenty-odd minutes they struggled through the rainy darkness, trying not to slip in muddy puddles as the downpour worked its magic on the unsurfaced streets. It felt like an infinity of squelching, sodden trudging until T’Moy stopped suddenly while they were halfway along a back lane between rickety fences.
“What’s up?” whispered Pyke hoarsely.
“I can smell cut wood, Captain,” T’Moy said, his nose raised towards the fence on their right. “This could be a builder’s yard.”
Pyke shrugged and, once they’d placed Vrass/Virl in a safe spot, they went for a look. A loop of rope was all that kept a side door shut. Inside, T’Moy lit a stub of candle and they found that it was indeed a builder’s yard, full of stacks of timber, barrels of nails, pallets of bricks, and—blessed relief!—three small handcarts. They chose a two-wheeler with sides high enough to keep Vrass from falling out.
Back out in the lane, they loaded Vrass/Virl into the cart and trundled off. Along the way they liberated some laundry left out on a line, draping it over their passenger to avoid attracting attention. With caution and brief scoutings ahead, they managed to evade clusters of chanting monks, knots of fighting drunks and marching city watch patrols. At last their winding progress brought them to Dragoon’s Row and the entrance to Haxy Nightmarket. What was a dingy, faded looking façade by day now seemed like a glowing mysterious portal hazy with the fumes of the food and incense stalls waiting beyond the entrance.
Inside it was even more of a busy parade of wonders and illusions than it was by day. All the stalls were now occupied by vendors and the air overhead was crowded with lanterns, bells, drifting gauzy ribbons, paper pennons scribed with good luck charms, clusters of papermould masks, and even cages from which creatures like snakes with six legs chirruped and sang. The press of customers and travellers and gawkers made for slow progress, and more than once Pyke had to dial back the impatience, biting down on the florid curse-bombs begging to be launched from the tip of his tongue. But with determination and T’Moy’s unexpected affability in the face of near-apocalyptic stupidity, they reached Qalival Square.
Since the last time Pyke had been here someone had scattered pot plants around the feet of the huge statues, along with a few brightly coloured paper lanterns. There weren’t many people loitering nearby, just a noisily inebriated group clapping along to a woman playing a lute or something. After a muttered exchange Pyke and T’Moy decided to keep Vrass/Virl in the purloined laundry before lifting him out of the cart. Their luck held, despite grunts and snarls from their unwitting baggage, and they managed to haul him up onto the plinth and over to the big Gomri statue. Rather than risk unbinding mischievous hands Pyke pulled a worn, scuffed boot off one hairy foot which was then solidly pressed against the statue’s leg.
Vrass went tense, almost rigid for a moment, then relaxed, a full-body limpness accompanied by a long sigh. T’Moy leaned over and removed the gag and said, “Are you well, Vrass?”
The Gomedran made as if to speak but all that came out were hoarse sounds until T’Moy offered him a drink from his water bottle.
“So … so good to see you, T’Moy!—and that is Captain Pyke, yes?”
“In the flesh, the worn-out, bruised and battered flesh, that is.”
Free at last of the binding ropes, Vrass blinked as he sat up and looked about him. He rubbed his furry snout and sniffed audibly, then a look of surprise came over his features.
“I’m remembering … things, actions, places—the memories of this Virl, who was guarding something … a building.” He gave T’Moy and Pyke a rueful look. “I also recall how much of a nuisance I was—please accept my apologies.”
Pyke waved it away. “You weren’t to know, Vrass—this personality triggering thing with the statues is clearly the Legacy’s idea of a joke, assuming he or it can be bothered watching our puny struggle.”
T’Moy’s expression was sombre. “We are its toys. Perhaps we should abandon this puzzle-dance, defy it.”
“I like the idea,” said Pyke. “But I suspect that our lord and master probably has some imaginative punishment in store for those who don’t play along.”
“What puzzle are we trying to solve here?” Vrass said. “I recall our discussion with the drone, so was it right? About having to unravel a new mystery?”
Pyke tried to summarise what he’d been through, with T’Moy adding remarks and details that in the end turned into a long summary. As they talked, the trio descended from the statues’ plinth and wandered off to the side where they stood conversing.
Vrass was, unexpectedly, both amused and enthused by all that they told him. “A key, a body and a missing book—and some odd gloves! This is all most intriguing!”
“Of all the words,” Pyke said, “that I might use, ‘intriguing’ wouldn’t even make the top ten.”
Vrass smiled. “After spending such a long, unexciting time on the Isle of Candles, this is uplifting by comparison. So, what is the next step in our investigation?”
Pyke was tempted to engage in some off-hand mockery, but somehow just couldn’t stir himself.
“Whoever broke into the boxhouse was a professional,” he said. “And he wasn’t alone—someone accompanied him all the way to Sergeant Dalyak’s lockbooth then poisoned the poor bastard.”
At that moment T’Moy slapped the side of his neck, muttering something about biting insects. A second later Pyke felt a tiny nip on his neck, too—and sudden suspicion flared into fearful alert. He fumbled in panic at the spot on his neck, felt a tiny splinter of something sticking out of the skin.
“What the hell …” he said.
He exchanged a horrified look with T’Moy, just as he heard Vrass say, “Ouch!,” then he noticed figures lurking in the shadows at the corner of Qalival Square. One look was all he needed before he turned to start running. But the toxin was already racing through his bloodstream. His legs felt wobbly and he fell to his knees after only a few strides.
Next thing he knew he was lying on the ground, cheek pressed against the mossy cobbles. All sound seemed muffled. He could see T’Moy sprawled a few feet away, his mouth widening into a roar as he struggled to get back onto his feet, the sound of it distant and mute. Then a pair of legs walked up to him, crouched down, and a hand grabbed his shoulder and rolled him onto his back. A face leaned in, came nearer and said faintly, “It’s them—get them inside.”
Pyke would have laughed if he could—it was the unmistakable face of the Shyntanil Klane.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Dervla, on the planet Ong, inside a wrecked section of the Mighty Defender
Dervla cowered in the corridor corner, blaster held in shaking hands, trying in vain to shut out the emanations of the Steel Forest. That metallic clicking, rustling, scraping and grinding, all the noises made by that grotesque undergrowth merged into a disturbingly fluid ambience. The cool blue bioluminescence from the tuber-clusters dotted around the walls and ceiling came in slow, mingled pulses, similar to the patterns she’d spotted in other passages. At least here there was a blessed absence of wildlife. Under less hazardous conditions she might have considered this a good place to strike out from on a search, but the truth was that she had no idea where she or any of the others were.
In retrospect, the clues had all been there, from the moment they had entered in pursuit of Ustril, the abscond
ed Sendrukan scientist. The unmarked access panel led into the narrow space between outer and inner hulls, where rough, improvised steps went down to a trapdoor hatch. Opening it, they dropped down one by one into a corridor whose deck, walls and ceiling were swathed in a plethora of plant-like growths. Colours ranged from virulent yellow to vibrant green and sky-blue, while textures seemed bizarrely industrial, ridged, dimpled and perforated patterns that looked as if they had been punched out by machine rather than grown.
Crouched in the corner, she drew in a shuddering breath and allowed herself to relax a little. The flock of spiderbat things seemed to have retreated to the blood-red corridor, so she felt safe for now.
Colours, dominant colours, were of vital importance. She hadn’t figured it all out yet but red and purple were the danger zones, whereas cool blue corridors like this one were largely free of the nastiest critters. The first lesson they got was just after their arrival when they were moving cautiously along that multi-coloured corridor. They had slowed at a turnoff which glowed as red as a furnace but throbbed like a dancefloor. The red flickered with a strobe-like intensity at times and, just as Pyke was about to venture into it, Ancil caught his arm and said, “Look!”
He pointed to a vertical, irregular shape laid against one wall. Covered in a leafy creeper, the shape suddenly resolved out of the quivering scarlet light and became a man standing upright, pressing up against the growth-choked bulkhead. No, not against—he was partially sunk into it, one terrified eye regarding them, mouth half-full of writhing tendrils. The lips tried to form words but nothing came out, then a cluster of chrome pincers unfolded across his upper face from behind and tugged open part of his skull as if it was on hinges.
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