by Dan Abnett
‘Took me a while to find you,’ she said. ‘What are you doing up here?’
‘Taking a last look, really,’ he said.
From the old walls of Helter, they could see across the valley. It had been raining since before dawn. Rain tapped off the Magistratum slickers they were both wearing. It spotted the lenses of Drusher’s old spectacles, but he could see well enough. Less than a kilometre away, the forest was gone, the earth scorched smooth. Great clouds of vapour were still rising off the scar.
‘You fly well,’ he said.
‘There was incentive,’ she replied. ‘Besides, it’s what he pays me to do.’
‘You’d do it even if he didn’t pay you,’ he said.
‘There is sadly a great deal of truth in that,’ she said. ‘Magos, you and Macks… You could use some support after this. He won’t mention it or offer it, because, well, you know… but trust me. You don’t feel it yet, but you’ve experienced trauma. Physical trauma. And existential trauma too. There is a confessor I can recommend in Tycho. Better still, off-world specialists on Gudrun, if you’re still planning to leave. They have some experience and are discreet. We’ve used them before. The Houses of the ordos could offer you some consolation, but I don’t recommend it. You’d open yourself to a different world of hurt.’
He nodded.
‘By rights,’ she said, ‘you both would be considered… contaminated by what you’ve seen. The ordos would want you restrained from public contact, at the very least. The very least. And even if you speak to the discreet confessors I have recommended, don’t say anything stupid.’
‘Like?’
‘Like mentioning the word daemon.’
‘All right,’ said Drusher.
‘But take a recommendation, please,’ she said. ‘And make Macks do it too. What you’ve seen this last day or so… No one should ever see that. It will scar you, I’m sorry to say. Change you. Maybe for the rest of your life.’
‘I’d be slightly horrified if it didn’t, Mam Betancore,’ he replied. He sipped the caffeine. ‘How is Voriet?’
‘Nayl and Macks have taken him to the infirmary in Unkara. They voxed just now. He’s stable. Young and strong.’
‘Good,’ said Drusher.
‘Eisenhorn wants to see you,’ she said. ‘He sent me to find you.’
‘All right,’ said Drusher. ‘Will he tell me what happened?’
‘Probably not,’ she said.
‘Will you, then?’
She shrugged.
‘As I understand these things,’ she said, ‘it was the Loom in the end. Damaged by the fire, but a volatile mechanism anyway.’
‘Aren’t we all?’ said Drusher.
‘It’s not possible to construct them in real space,’ she said, ‘because of the interference patterns they generate. It was stable only in the extimate fold of the shade hall.’
‘And the…’ Drusher found he really didn’t want to say the word ‘daemon’. ‘And the thing, it opened that up?’
‘Yes,’ said Medea. ‘Reality was no longer overlapping. It was simultaneous. It was just a matter of time before the fabric of… reality… shredded. Imploded. And took everything with it. Keshtre. A sizeable patch of ground and subsoil.’
‘And… the thing itself.’
‘Yes.’
‘Was he counting on that?’ asked Drusher. ‘Eisenhorn, I mean? Was he counting on that happening?’
‘I believe he was hoping. It was the only possible good outcome. Nothing else on Gershom would have stopped it.’
‘Is it still out there?’ Drusher asked. ‘I mean, is it trapped inside the shade hall?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘That extimate fold is gone. Obliterated. An empyrean gravity compression effect that… Well, I won’t bore you with the technical detail.’
‘So it’s dead?’
She shook her head.
‘Things like that can’t die. It’s been cast back into the warp where it came from. It’s still out there… or in there… somewhere. Sorry.’
‘No wonder you recommend unburdening,’ he said. ‘I’m worrying what I will begin to say to the poor confessor I visit.’
He wandered up to the old man’s library. Eisenhorn was tossing books from the shelves into a pile on the floor.
‘We need to burn this place,’ he said. ‘The books, the bodies. Everything. I’ve briefed Macks on how to contain the situation. A cover story. An accident during fleet manoeuvres. Something to keep the governor satisfied. And the ordos off Macks’ back.’
‘They’ll come looking,’ said Drusher.
‘Without doubt, but eventually,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘And when they get here, they’ll find very little. And a lot of people who know zero.’
‘Is this the part where you reprimand me?’ asked Drusher. ‘Or, I don’t know, burn me along with the books?’
‘No, I wanted to thank you,’ said Eisenhorn.
‘Really?’
‘You did more than was asked,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘And your expertise was invaluable at several key points.’
‘Well, you asked for help.’
‘I believe I owe you passage off-world,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘That was the deal. You’re a clever man, Drusher, and a great deal of purpose still awaits you. A greater career you can accomplish. You should not stay here and waste the rest of your life on a backwater planet that you no longer love.’
‘I’ve found it has more to it than I first imagined,’ Drusher replied.
‘I can’t give you passage,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘Things are complicated and we must leave shortly. But there’s a bag on the chaise there. Take it, with my thanks.’
Drusher walked over to the old chaise, picked up the small leather kitbag and opened it.
‘Right,’ he said.
‘There is an alternative,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘Don’t take the bag. Come with us instead.’
‘With you?’
‘It will be more insane adventures, I’m afraid.’
‘Yes, but with you?’
‘I have very few friends,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘Probably none, in fact. And I can’t call on many people for help any more. I could use a clever man at my side. I’m running out of allies, and where I’m going…’
‘Sancour?’
‘Yes.’
‘The city of Queen Mab?’
‘Indeed.’
‘You want me to go with you?’
‘As I said, magos, I can count the people who now stand with me on the fingers of one hand. You are a specialist, an expert advisor, and you have shown your mettle.’
‘I thought you hated me for pulling you out of that cage,’ said Drusher.
‘I’ve had time to reflect,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘If you hadn’t, it would have ended badly.’
‘That’s what ending well looks like?’ asked Drusher.
‘Often.’
‘But you’re still going on,’ said Drusher, ‘to Queen Mab, on Sancour?’
‘Yes, magos.’
‘Will you ever stop?’ asked Drusher. ‘I mean, will you ever know when to stop? When it’s enough… When it is too much…’
‘I hope so,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘I hope at least I will have wise people around me to advise me so. To be honest though, magos, I don’t think a man like me ever retires. That’s not how it works.
‘I don’t think a man like you retires either,’ he added. ‘I think that’s what you’ve been trying to tell yourself all along. That there’s more to you, more to your life. Come with me, if you’d care to. You have seen things now. You have been tempered by this experience. Everything that follows will be less of a shock.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ said Drusher. ‘But I don’t think I will.’
‘I thought there was nothing left to keep you here?’ Eisenhorn asked.
‘So did I,’ said Drusher.
Eisenhorn walked over to him and held out his hand.
‘Then thank you for your service,’ he said. ‘We won’t meet again, but I h
ave appreciated your company.’
Drusher shook his hand.
‘You look well, inquisitor,’ he said. ‘Better than you did when I first met you. Which, given what we’ve endured, is quite something. You seem stronger.’
‘I am.’
‘You’ve been tempered by this too, then?’
‘I think so,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘I feel stronger than I have in years. Ready to face the endgame.’
‘Is that a good thing?’ asked Drusher.
‘Yes,’ said Eisenhorn. He smiled.
‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you smile before,’ said Drusher.
‘It’s not something I’ve done in a long time,’ said Eisenhorn.
THIRTY
The Old Place
Evening was rolling in, a violet haze off the sea. It was two days after Drusher had stood and watched the fortress of Helter burn.
Macks rolled the Magistratum cruiser to a halt and pulled up on the shingle beside the old highway.
‘Really?’ she said. ‘Back here?’
‘It suits me,’ he said.
She shrugged. She was trying to appear cheerful, he could tell. But they were both still in their heads. There was a tremor in his hands that wouldn’t go away. The universe would never seem the same to either of them.
‘Will you come in?’ he asked.
‘I’ve got to get back,’ she said. ‘If I turn around now I can make it to Unkara by dawn. There’s a lot of clearing up to do. A lot of paperwork. A whole lot of crap, in fact, including a meeting with the governor tomorrow night.’
‘Good luck with that.’
‘Oh, well, you know,’ she said. ‘But I’ll come back and visit.’
‘Don’t leave it too long.’
They looked at each other. He leaned forwards and kissed her. He could smell True Heart very faintly. The kiss lingered.
‘Get on,’ she said. ‘I’ve got to go back.’
He got out of the cruiser and hefted his bag onto his shoulder. She pulled down in a circle and drove back onto the hem of the highway. He raised a hand, a little wave. She stopped and slid down her window.
‘Why does this place suit you?’ she called out.
‘Because you’ll know where to find me,’ he replied.
Macks grinned. She roared away onto the highway.
Drusher watched her lights fade into the twilight. He turned and looked at the old shack. He could hear the rush of the waves on the beach behind him. He could see the sky turning dark like a bruise along the wasteland horizon beyond the dunes.
He walked into the shack. It smelled dry and stale. It was just as he had left it. He put his bag on the table, opened the hall cupboard and cranked on the generator.
He lit a lamp. Outside, the Bone Coast evening was falling fast.
He opened his old bag and unpacked a few bits and pieces. Some food he’d bought in Unkara town. A can of caffeine Medea Betancore had given him. His taxonomy. A folded Magistratum rain slicker, just the thing for wet days. The Regit snub, cleaned and reloaded, with two boxes of shells. Eisenhorn’s parting gift, the small leather bag. Esic Fargul’s sketchbook with its faded green cover, and an old, annotated book on bird migration.
He went out into the yard behind the shack to watch the last of the day. Seabirds were circling. It was sort of beautiful, he thought.
The sea raptor was sitting on the beach fence. It watched him. He smiled at it.
It spread its wings, and flew down, landing at his feet.
‘I let you go,’ he said. ‘You wanted to get out so much.’
It stared at him.
‘There’s no hope for either of us, is there?’ he asked.
He went into the kitchen, opened the wax paper bindings of the provisions he’d bought and brought back a couple of slices of good, cured Karanine ham. He held one out to it.
Its beak snapped as it took it. But Drusher still had all his fingers.
‘You old bastard,’ he said.
Several nights later, he was working at his table late when lights went by on the highway. He looked up every time a set of lights went past, hoping.
This set, southbound, slowed down and pulled up on the gravel outside. He heard crunching footsteps.
‘Don’t make a fuss,’ he told the raptor perched on the back of the chair facing him. It turned its beady eyes to the front door. ‘I’m warning you,’ he said. ‘I’ll put you outside.’
He opened the door before the knock came.
Drusher’s smile ebbed slightly. It wasn’t her.
‘Interrogator Voriet,’ he said.
Voriet was patched with dressings, and his arm was in a sling.
‘Magos,’ he said. ‘I apologise for the late hour. Marshal Macks told me where you were.’
‘She remembers then,’ said Drusher. That was something.
‘May I come in?’
‘Why not?’ replied Drusher, holding the door wide.
Voriet stepped inside. He looked with some alarm at the sea raptor. It had taken up a perch on the top of the dresser and clacked its beak at the interrogator.
‘Is that quite safe?’ asked Voriet.
‘Don’t mind him,’ said Drusher.
‘Are you… keeping it as a pet?’
‘Not really. It just won’t leave.’
‘Have you given it a name?’ Voriet asked.
‘No,’ Drusher lied.
Voriet cleared his throat.
‘Speaking of leaving,’ he said. ‘He’s gone.’
‘Who?’
‘You know very well,’ said Voriet. ‘Eisenhorn. He and Nayl and Medea. They’ve gone. Made shift. Left Gershom.’
‘And they’ve left you here?’
‘Yes,’ said Voriet.
‘Are you surprised?’ asked Drusher. ‘I mean, he knew. Eisenhorn knew all about you. He couldn’t trust you, could he?’
‘He could,’ said Voriet. ‘After all that. He should have known that he could. I’m disappointed. I thought… Anyway…’
‘Caffeine?’ asked Drusher.
‘Thank you, no,’ said Voriet. ‘I can’t stay. I’m leaving Gershom tomorrow. I’m going to the ordos, to make a full report.’
‘Are you?’
‘A full report,’ said Voriet. ‘I intend to… to… make the case for him. Insist that they revise their ruling. Reconsider his status. Perhaps offer him support and assistance with his undertaking.’
‘His war?’
‘Yes, that.’ Voriet looked awkward. ‘I want to help him,’ he said. ‘And I need to offer the ordos information to establish good faith. Do you know where he’s gone?’
‘Eisenhorn?’
‘Yes. Did he tell you where he was going?’
‘He’s off on his insane adventures,’ said Drusher. ‘Off to find the King in Yellow.’
‘I know that,’ said Voriet.
‘Then you know as much as I do, interrogator.’
‘He mentioned a place,’ said Voriet. ‘Queen Mab. The City of Dust. You mentioned it too.’
‘It could be anywhere,’ said Drusher. ‘Literally,’ he added, with a smile.
‘You don’t know where it is?’
‘I don’t,’ said Drusher. ‘I’m sorry. I can’t help you.’
‘Did he mention anywhere else? Any other names? Anything?’
‘No, I’m sorry, he didn’t. He’s a very closed person, Voriet. You know that. He doesn’t trust anyone. I was hardly his friend.’
Voriet nodded. ‘All right.’
‘You sure you won’t have some caffeine?’
‘No,’ said Voriet. ‘Thank you, magos. I’m sorry to have intruded.’
The lights faded away. The night highway was empty and quiet. Drusher closed the blinds and sat back down to his work. The raptor clacked its beak.
‘Shut up,’ said Drusher. ‘It wasn’t a big lie. I just decided something was… classified.’
He sipped his mug of caffeine. He thought for a moment, then got up and took
the bag Eisenhorn had given him out of the chest of drawers. He opened it and looked at the fat blocks of pristine currency bonds inside, each bundle mint but non-sequential, wrapped together with treasury ribbons.
A lot of money. Enough for passage off-world, and not steerage class either. Passage to Gudrun, or Sameter, or any number of worlds with extraordinary flora and fauna. Work enough for several more lives, several more taxonomies. And enough cash left over to afford a little juvenat work so he would last those several more lives.
Or, enough currency to buy a nice place in Tycho City or Unkara Town. A really nice place. The sort of place you could retire in and live happily. Especially if you weren’t alone.
Walks in the hills. Sketching. Observing. A good supper every night. Long conversations about everything and anything. Anything she ever wanted to talk about, really.
And time to write a decent treatise on non-indigenous fauna, specifically Chaopterae metalepta, which Drusher had a feeling would soon be a problem for agriculture in the northern provinces.
Time for anything, in fact. He could wait for it. He could wait for the lights to come back, because he knew they would. Next week, maybe the week after. Soon.
He smiled to himself. He offered the last slice of cured ham to the raptor. It fluttered down from the dresser and stood on the table, taking the offering from his hand almost daintily.
The lamplight caught its dark and bottomless eyes. For a moment, they reflected a violet flash.
It was almost exactly the same shade of violet that Drusher had seen in Eisenhorn’s eyes when the inquisitor had smiled at him for the very first and very last time.
CHRONOLOGY
075 (M41) – ‘Pestilence’
198 – Gregor Eisenhorn born, DeKere’s World.
Circa 219 – Endor and Eisenhorn serve as interrogators under Inquisitor Hapshant.‘Master Imus’ Transgression’
222 – Eisenhorn appointed full inquisitor.
223 – ‘Regia Occulta’
240 – Xenos
241 – ‘Missing in Action’
304 – Gideon Ravenor born.
312 – Midas Betancore dies. His daughter Medea is an infant.
Circa 345 – Malleus
– Ravenor crippled.
346 – Ravenor appointed full inquisitor.
355 – ‘Backcloth For A Crown Additional’
