by Adam Browne
Janoah puffed on her ember, before speaking in a dangerous tone. “Good. Because if I thought you were doing this for material gain, or to procure my favour, I might have to report you. You can’t buy me, Linus. Not trying to buy me, are you Trooper?”
“N-nnn-no, Grand Howler.”
“You’re sure?”
Linus closed his eyes and licked his lips, summoning his courage. “C-c-captain Rufus… he’s my hero and I-”
“Hero!” Janoah spluttered, shooting orange vapour in all directions like a boiling pan. “Howler Rufus is your hero?” she finished, with a wry chuckle.
“I-I admire him greatly, Grand Howler.”
“Then I had better accept on his behalf, hadn’t I?”
Linus nodded, “Please, marm.”
Janoah reached for the tube, but paused, asking, “How did you even know he needed it?”
“Uther said that you-”
Uther kicked Linus in the shin, silencing him.
“He said what?” Janoah cooed, looking at Uther. “That my husband is going to croak without your help? What an offensive supposition. Bedridden he may be, but Rufus could still blow the both of you out the window behind me without getting up, such is his power.” Janoah hummed, “That’s why they did this to him. They fear him. Not the hyenas, no, it’s someone else.”
Linus and Uther remained silent.
“Very well,” Janoah said, snatching the sting and swivelling round to the window amidst a swirling cloud of orange vapour. “This meeting never occurred. If either of you breathe a word of this to anyone, or in any way try and force my paw, you’ll be ant food long before me.”
Another, prickly silence.
“Dismissed.”
The Howlers saluted and filed towards the door.
“And Mills,” Janoah called after them.
“Yes, Grand Howler?” Linus barked back, standing smartly to attention again.
“I’ll remember this.”
Linus said nothing, though his eyes darted about.
Janoah waited an eternity before she deigned to release him, “Off you go.”
No sooner had Linus took his leave and shut the door than the phone rang again.
Brrring!
Janoah answered it with the same celerity as before, her paw slightly checked by first slipping Linus’s precious donation into her cloak pocket.
“Yes?” she said, facing the window. “Speak up, it’s a bad line.” Pressing the phone to her ear she repeated, “He’s got off the train in the Arkady District, did you say? He’s probably headed to the university; Werner says he goes there a lot. He’s not a student, but his girlfriend is. Yes, she’ll make good leverage if he proves difficult. Stay on him, but wait until he’s left Eisbrand territory before you move in and arrest him, we can’t overstep our jurisdiction. Right. Carry on.”
Janoah put the phone down. Stubbing out her ember, she headed for the door, fondling the cardboard tube in her cloak pocket all the way, unbelieving of her luck.
*
Uther wordlessly led the way through Den’s twisting, lamp-lit innards to the ground floor. With his mind dwelling on what had transpired, Linus didn’t even think about where Uther was taking him until he got there. The pungent odour of imperium fuel and machine oil woke him from his worries as he stepped into Riddle Den’s vast garage, with its rows of cars, trucks and monos, most of them black and red and marked on their bonnets or flanks with the smart Bloodfang crest.
Slipping on his long, dark red coat, Uther marched down the rows, keys jangling, and picked out one of the few monobikes that wasn’t painted in Bloodfang livery, or in any way marked for the pack. It was a robust, green-bodied machine with a dragonfly motif stencilled on the side.
Linus hurried over. “You’ve got your own mono?” he gasped at Uther.
“Yeah.”
“It’s beautiful. Giacomo Valerio Model 20?”
“Aye, an original GVM-20 Dragonfly,” Uther chuckled, patting the dark green bodywork and pointing to the dragonfly logo. “Not as fancy as Ivan’s Spider,” he said, glancing across at the intimidating black mono parked nearby, its right flank decorated with a white spider, “but still a rung up from the little Springtail all the cubs ride. Hah!”
Linus could but smile and nod.
“Nothing wrong with the Springtail, of course,” Uther tactfully rowed back. As a fresh face, Linus was likely the proud caretaker of a standard issue Giacomo Valerio Model 12 Springtail. “Where’s your wheel, mate?”
“I-I-I don’t have a wheel.”
Uther frowned, “Haven’t they sorted you out with one yet?”
After a moment’s hesitation and neck-scratching, Linus guffawed, “Not yet.”
“Typical! Here, hop on.”
Donning his blue coat, Linus sat behind Uther. The seat was firm, but comfortable; the antithesis of his admission.
“Actually, Uther… I-I-I can’t really, uhm… ride.”
“Can’t ride?”
“No. I meant to take lessons at the academy, but I was trying to keep up with my imperiology studies at the same time. Everything went so quickly and well… uh… there it is.”
‘Woodlouse’ braced himself for a tide of mockery.
Opening a compartment in the bike’s contoured bodywork, Uther took out some goggles and strapped them about his eyes. He passed a pair back to Linus, sniffing, “It’s not unusual, mate; lots of Howlers ain’t ready for a mono until they’re a bit older. You’ll get there.”
Linus was surprised to be let off so magnanimously.
Uther gripping the conductive kristahl steering bars and glanced behind at his goggled partner. “Ready?”
A hearty thumbs-up.
“Hold on then.”
Linus gripped the edges of the seat with both paws.
“Mate, hold onto me,” Uther clarified with a laugh. “Thump me! You’ll come off tail over tit otherwise.”
“Right.”
“Never even been on a mono before, have yer, Woodlouse?”
Laughing, Linus said, “Not since my father took me for a ride and he always put me in front.”
Hugging Uther around the waist, Linus knitted his paws tight. Even with a big, heavy coat on Wild-heart was enviably trim around the middle. Linus wished he half as fit. Running after that hyena had shown him up.
“Where to?” Uther sniffed.
“Uhm… the pictures, wasn’t it?” Linus replied.
“Pub first, yeah?”
“Right,” Linus said. “Actually, s-sss-speaking of pubs, do you know the Crab and Kettle?”
“Yeah, it’s a tavern down on the canals. Run by otters. I wouldn’t recommend it. I know better joints.”
“Maybe, but I need to see the Buttles.”
“Y’what? Buttles?”
“Montague and Penny,” Linus clarified, adding, “The cats from this morning.”
“Oh, the two lah-di-dahs you hijacked!” Uther hooted humorously.
“Yes. Vladimir wants me to apologise to them.”
“Puh! He can thump off. We’re not wasting our well-earned rest sucking up to no cats!”
“It’s an order, Uther,” Linus said worriedly. “What if he finds out? I’ll be in for it.”
Gauging his partner’s unease, Uther caved in. “Fine. Just don’t take too long.”
“I-I-I won’t.”
With a kick of the pedal, Uther’s Dragonfly coughed and spluttered into quivering life, its single wheel lighting up in a fiery ring of red-imperium. Linus felt the gyroscope whirring inside; as a Howler he could sense it and might yet command such a device himself one day, but for now he held on tight as Uther steered his awesome monobike through the garage and out into daylight.
The clouds were dispersing, giving way to muted sunshine and a surprisingly lovely afternoon.
Chapter 7
“The queen produces chemical smells, ‘pheromones’, which both tell the hive what to do and stops its members maturing into adults. The worker bees, which are
the queen’s own eternal children, exist solely to serve her, never once having a thought of their own, controlled as they are by these chemical… edicts.”
The hoary old bear ceased lecturing and peered over his puny glasses at the small, black-furred wolfess whose paw had shot into the air.
“Yes, Sara?” he urged.
“What about Toggle, sir?” Sara asked, slowly lowering her paw, and only half way.
“What about her?”
“Will she nae think for herself, now that she’s nae under control from her queen?”
The bear nodded, “Possibly. There is limited evidence that bees separated from their hive mature into queens, though nobody has observed the entire process satisfactorily.”
Clearing his throat, the teacher slipped one huge paw into the pocket of his waistcoat and returned his attention to the black board, using his pointer to pick out the rear end of a honeybee on his lovingly paw-drawn diagram. “Now then, the pheromones are released from the abdomen-”
“How long will she live for, Professor Heath?” came the brown-furred wolfess sitting beside Sara. She glanced at Sara, then back to Professor Heath, “Toggle, that is.”
Heath looked to the elegant student. “I can’t rightly say, Olivia. We think queen bees last decades, though even records from the Hummel apiary are inconclusive. The rest of the hive may manage a year or two, except the poor males, of course; they reach senescence soon after pupating whether they mate or not.”
“Senescence, sir?”
“Natural death,” Heath clarified. He wagged his pointer at the class, “So, you boys best be thankful Arkady University’s not a hive, for not only would we ‘drones’ live merely a day, but queens Sara and Olivia here would be in charge for the duration!”
The class, mostly wolfen and male, laughed boisterously. One whistled at Olivia. Sara rolled her eyes.
“Now bee-have!” Heath chided, to a chorus of groans. Looking far too pleased with his terrible pun, the Professor returned to the board and the finer points of bee anatomy. “So then, the sting is located in the….”
Sara switched off and daydreamed; she knew bee anatomy like the back of her paw. Resting her little chin on one palm she cast her golden eyes to her right, beyond the sinks, taps and imperium-burners of science class, beyond the ceiling-high windows, to the university grounds; one of the precious green spaces in Lupa, with its grand cedar tree and well-kept lawn. Sara checked Arkady’s ornate clock tower; it was nearly lunch break and some classes, thanks to generous lecturers, were emptying out before the bell. Students hurried back and forth under the cloisters that enclosed the green, mostly wolves, but the odd cat and hog too, even a lumbering bear.
“Saraaa,” the present lumbering bear cooed, tapping his pointer on the board. “Are you still with us?”
The little wolfess looked at the board, at where Heath’s pointer was on the diagram, and guessed, “Thorax?”
The Professor stared at her with his beady brown eyes, but had to concede, “That’s right, yes.”
“Nice dodge,” Olivia whispered to her friend.
Before Heath could move on, the bell rang and his pupils started piling their books into their bags. “I want your talks ready by tomorrow, please,” the Professor shouted over the hubbub of chatter and activity. “Any bug you choose, ant, butterfly, slug, whatever, but please confer and avoid covering the same species, or it’ll be a rather dreary exercise for all.”
Sara packed her bag and threw her knee-length green coat over her matching tunic and cream breeches. Before she could desert her desk and catch up with Olivia, the enormous Professor Heath beckoned the diminutive wolfess over.
“Aye, Professor?”
“Sara, I know as a Hummel you’re streaks ahead on this subject but do try and look like you’re paying attention, for my sake.”
“Sorry, Professor, I just….”
“What?”
“Ah keep thinking about Toggle, sir,” Sara admitted.
“Ohohooo, I see,” Professor Heath woofed, his countenance lifting at once. “Yes, it’s rather strange, isn’t it? We haven’t had a bee come this way for years and just as we’re starting on social insects one turns up! It’s a gift from Gaia.”
“Aye,” Sara agreed, picking her claws and looking out the nearest window. “It’s so sad she’ll nae get tae fly home, though. Do you suppose she came from Hummelton’s hive? Ah could take her back there myself if she did.”
“It seems too far for a worker bee to wander, even if she were lost,” Heath said gently. “And if she’s put into a foreign hive they would tear her apart, as you know.”
Sara grimaced, “Aye.”
A thought crossed her teacher’s mind, “If you’re not too busy maybe you would you like to help me feed her again?”
Sara squeaked excitedly, “Oh yes, Professor! When?”
Heath checked his pocket watch, even though there was a perfectly good giant clock looming outside. “After lunch, say half one? You can skip your gym class on my authority. What do you say?”
“That’d be grand, sir.”
“I’ll meet you on the green then,” Heath beamed, thumbs tucked in his waistcoat, proud of his munificence. Looking out the window he added, “Let’s hope the blasted rain holds off. It’s looking quite pleasant out there now.”
*
The blasted rain did hold off as Sara partook of lunch in the shelter of the cloisters. The muted sunlight – about as good as it got under Lupa’s eternal shroud of polluted haze – warmed Sara’s dark face as she watched passing ash clouds from the university’s central heating boiler cast playful shadows across the clock tower, before floating off into the sky to contribute to said haze.
“What’re you going to do?” asked Olivia, lying on the floor armed with a pencil and paper
“Eh?” Sara replied, biting into her honey sandwich. “Did you say something?”
“Your presentation. What bug?”
“Oh! Bee.”
“Ask a silly question,” Olivia snorted, sketching the beginnings of an anatomical drawing on her paper.
Sara recognised Olivia’s efforts as a spider. “Well ye always do everything on spiders.”
Olivia had to concede, “True. But they’re fascinating.”
“So are bees!”
“Yes but… spiders are just so….”
“Creepy?” Sara provoked. “Evil?”
“Elegant,” Olivia corrected flatly, and also, “Patient.” She glanced up at Sara with her wonderful, almost unnaturally violet eyes, “You don’t really think they’re evil, do you?”
“Och! Ah was only pulling your leg. Bugs cannae be evil, they are what they are.”
Relieved, Olivia returned to her sketch.
Like many a student at the Arkady University, Olivia Blake hailed from a wealthy Freiwolf family with a prestigious history. The adopted daughter of industrialist from the Greystone Pack’s territory, she had never wanted for anything, not even beauty, for she was very lovely-looking in Sara’s opinion. Deep brown and elegantly short-furred, sporting a pink blazer and spotless white breeches, she turned heads amongst the male faculty with ease; her stature and poise made Sara feel an inadequate dumpling.
“Any word from Bruno?” Olivia hummed, swinging her long legs and flicking her lovely tail as she sketched away with enviable ease.
“No,” Sara replied at length,
“Did you check his gym?”
“Nobody’s seen him there either.”
Olivia put down her pencil and sighed. “It’s been weeks. Maybe he’s gone for good this time?”
Sara shrugged, “He’ll get back tae me when he’s settled in. It’s the same old Bruno routine.”
“It’s not him, it’s that daft rabbit, always running from his own shadow, like anyone cares what he did in the war. I feel sorry for Bruno, I really do; can’t be easy having a little beast for a dad. If only a nice Freiwolf family had adopted him like mine did me. Makes me feel very lucky, you
know.”
Sara wasn’t listening, for she had noticed something strange out the corner of her eye. A silver, lozenge-shaped object was slowly emerging from behind the university clock tower, as if a giant invisible magician was pulling a penny from behind its ear.
“Och!” Sara gasped. “Olivia, it’s an airship!”
Sandwich fluttering in paw, Sara leapt over the cloister wall and ran into the garden to get a better look; the saturated grass squelching underfoot.
Olivia followed leisurely; the airship, being very far away, appeared to stand still whilst the clock tower obligingly shuffled over, at least from her point of view.
The girls watched, necks craned skyward, paws sheltering eyes from the muted sun.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” Sara marvelled.
“Is it Professor Heath’s cat friends?”
“Maybe.”
Suddenly, an enormous dark beast in a long coat appeared beside the girls.
“What’s up?” he quipped.
“Bruno!” Sara piped with further joy, looking the big brown wolf up and down. “Och! We were just talking about you!”
“Oh yeah?” he woofed. “All good things, I hope.”
“Aye, of course, ye great lump!” Sara giggled, slapping his arm. “Where’ve ye been? We’ve been worried sick.”
“Sorry, been busy,” Bruno said simply, shrugging his shoulders.
Olivia raised a paw and said gently, “Hi, Bruno.”
“Olivia. You all right, yeah?”
“Yes, thank you. How are you?”
“Not bad, not bad.”
Olivia smiled warmly and swivelled side to side a little, paws behind her back as she looked Bruno over.
He pointed at the balloon. “I was watching it on the train the whole way here.”
“Aye. Where’d it take off from?” Sara asked.
“I dunno. It just popped up out of nowhere. It’s been circling for ages. I think it’s over the Common.”
“Must be for a show,” Olivia supposed.
“Yeah,” Bruno agreed, adding excitedly, “Oi, wanna go see what’s happening?”
Sara laughed, “We can’t, silly, we’ve got lessons yet.”
“Oh, right. Yeah.”
“You go.”
Bruno shrugged that off, “Nah. They’ll probably be packing up by the time I get there.”
