Omniphage Invasion

by Claudette Gilbert

  Chapter 7: Jak

  The sun was high in the sky as Jak headed back toward the tiny room he called home. He’d wrapped his purchases in the tunic he’d bought for Kumara and tied it so that the bundle hung from his waist. With the heat of the day pressing down on his shoulders like a heavy hand, he pulled the hood of his cape a little closer to give him some protection from the sun as well as to hide his scarred face. He moved steadily down a street packed with people, all crowding into the shade near the walls so that there was a narrow path down the sun-baked center of the way that a man could take if he were in a hurry and didn’t mind baking his brains. Jak, who didn’t want to call attention to himself by hurrying, chose the slower route near the walls, winding through the crowds. Just a few blocks further and he’d be able to duck inside his own building.

  He passed a beggar who called from a doorway, holding out his bowl on the stumps of his wrists. Jak thought the man must be blind as well as crippled to think that such as he had any alms to give. He admired the flash of a passing woman’s silver ornaments and sidestepped a thin mobbie boy with innocent eyes and clever fingers.

  He wasn’t fool enough to think that he’d be able to get the Terran woman to Tekena alive. They’d both die trying, no arguing with that, but he had a chance to save Tessa. With the first half of the fee plus what he was sure she’d saved, she’d be able to establish herself comfortably on a safe, civilized world . . . .

  Daydreaming about Tessa, Jak stepped into the mouth of an alley, to allow a scarlet-robed priest of Nish to pass. He’d been pushing his luck to bait the priests at the Pit, the result of too much free ale on an empty belly. People who angered Nish or his followers had a way of disappearing. Today, Jak was sober and respectfully cautious. He was still watching the red-robe pass when the men stepped out of the alley's deeper recesses and boxed him in. The leader had a needler, and the barrel nudged Jak’s spine.

  "Bolon wants to see you," he said.

  Jak knew that voice. It sounded the way a moki would sound, if those poisonous desert lizards could speak. The holder of the needler was called Field, short for some clan and family name too long for Jak to remember. Field was a hard man from one of the farming villages further along the river Ur, and he was one of Bolon’s enforcers, second only to n’Tau. Jak glanced around cautiously. He didn’t recognize the others, but the four men with Field made a matched set. Shorter than Jak but taller and broader than the natives of Shadriss, their hairless heads and all the rest of their bare skin were marked with patterns of brown swirls. Jak didn’t know if they’d been born that way or had the pigment altered, but the patterns gave them a fluid, ghost-like quality that made them hard to see.

  A trickle of sweat ran down under Jak’s vest like a warning of things to come. Had they found out about Kamura? Had the girl left his rooms and been caught?

  Despite all the questions in his mind, Jak went along quietly. As long as he was alive, he still had a chance to escape. They turned down the narrow alley, moving away from the street, and marched single file, three men ahead of Jak and two behind. He thought about twisting, driving his elbow into the chest of the man behind him, and grabbing the needler from Field. He was stronger than even Tessa knew and faster, too. His strength and speed were part of the strangeness, and he was sure he could have taken all of them in a fair fight. But Field held the needler firmly, and strength was no match for a beam that could set his nervous system on fire. So, he waited, hoping for an open space where he’d have room to dodge. But they kept to the maze of alleys that twisted between the few broad streets of Namdrik. Anyone who saw them coming scuttled out of their way.

  "So, where are we going?" Jak asked, trying to sound as if it didn’t really matter to him.

  The first and only time he’d seen Bolon in the flesh was when he’d been summoned to one of the back rooms at the Pit. There, the Regent’s bastard had offered Jak work as a killer for hire. Jak had said no, and that had been the end of the interview. Still, Bolon wasn’t one to take a turn down lightly, not even on so minor a matter as hiring Jak.

  "This doesn’t look like way to the Pit," Jak said when his question got no answer.

  "Just shut up and walk," Field said. "The Boss wants to see you at his place."

  So, they were headed to the crime lord’s personal lair. He’d heard it was hidden amid the ruins at the center of Namdrik, but he’d never expected actually to go there. This was looking bad. He walked on with the others, and the adobe walls curved in above them in buttresses and arches that gradually had less and less space between until there was a continuous roof over their heads.

  It wasn’t long before they were deep in the oldest part of the city, where the structures were piled against each other in a crumbling jumble like so much discarded trash. They passed more plastic here, more prefab walls and floors, less adobe. Jak knew the early settlers’ culture had been much more advanced than the primitive construction and recycled tech their descendants employed, but today was the first time he really understood just how far they’d fallen. The men’s boots scuffed through room after room, linked together like cells in a hive, most of them dusty with decaying furniture and cobwebs. Small creatures scuttled into shadows as they passed. Jak fought the urge to sneeze. He didn’t want to do anything that might startle Field who still walked with the barrel of the needler pressed against his back.

  Bolon’s private apartments, Jak noted when they finally reached them, were in better repair than the rooms they’d passed through getting there, but not by much. At least he assumed this big, nearly empty room was their destination, although it was so large it seemed more like a natural cavern than a man-made hall. Tarnished silver filigree encrusted the walls and ceiling, and dusty tapestries covered what might be doorways. Jak wrinkled his nose. The whole place stank worse than the Pit, redolent of dust, sweat, and the reek of stale drug smoke.

  Field and the others led Jak past random clusters of furniture that was once expensive, but even Jak could tell the styles were a hodgepodge of old and new, large and small, ornate and plain. It looked like a collection of every pricey piece ever made on Shadriss since the days of the first settlers, all scattered in the enormous room with no regard for style of comfort. Jak ignored the tawdry, mismatched luxury as he tried to spy an exit that would let him out of here without having to go through Field and his men to get to it. So far, nothing looked like a good possibility. Two of the strangely patterned men had stayed to guard the way they’d come in. There must be more than one way in and out¬—Bolon would never let himself be trapped in a den with only one exit—but in the dim light and the clutter it was impossible to guess where another exit might be hidden. Best to keep his eyes open, his mouth shut, and be ready to take advantage of any break that came his way. Jak took a deep breath and schooled himself to seem calmer than he felt.

  A few small light-globes hung near the ceiling, ancient technology nearly ready to flicker its last. In the dim light Jak could make out the big man seated behind the huge desk at the far end of the room. He tried not to think of Kamura as Field and his two remaining men led him forward through the gloom. He let his head droop and made his face go slack and sullen. He’d be the thug Bolon expected.

  They came to a halt across from the ornate desk where Bolon sat. He was a huge man, especially for a native of Shadriss. Standing, he would be at least half a head taller than Jak and probably twice as heavy. It twisted Jak’s gut to think of this monster anywhere near Tessa. Bolon wore his hair in the usual cascades of long curls and multiple braids, and his heavy, clean-shaven face rose pale and unhealthy looking from the gloom. Over his bulk, he wore an ornate tunic and trousers of dark blue silk. Small, red stones studded all the way around each ear, glistened in the dim light like drops of blood.

  The Regent’s bastard ignored Jak and his captors as he worked his massive fingers through some game made of colored rings. Yes, Jak could
see why the sight of this great slug-like slab of a man playing with the children’s toy gave Tessa the creeps. He seemed almost damaged, as if something important was broken. Bolon’s chair creaked as he shifted his bulk from side to side, and Jak could hear the heavy, animal panting of his breath. He watched in silence. Like his escort, he knew better than to speak first.

  Jak was pretty sure he was about to die. What would happen to Tessa now? Kamura was as surely dead as he was, but could clever Tessa escape? Would her High Lord protect her? He felt sweat trickling down his face and under his arms, and he had to fight down his anger. Why didn’t Bolon get it over with?

  At last, Bolon looked up. His face ought to have been handsome, his features were well shaped and evenly placed, but it seemed to Jak that there was something wrong with his heavy lidded eyes. The rubies in his ear sparkled a bloody warning.

  "I have a use for you, outlander" Bolon announced without preliminary. His voice was a light tenor, without inflection, his face expressionless. He almost seemed bored. "Do well, and you’ll have enough credits to live a while longer."