The Miocene Arrow

by Sean McMullen

  “No! No! I broke off to attack the palace wingfield after the first pass. I fought till my guns were empty, I claimed clear air victories. You have to believe me, the whole of Condelor saw it happen.”

  “The people of Condelor are being less than cooperative about supplying witnesses to Yarronese inquiries just now. Serjon, Alion, or you may be telling a monstrous lie. Alion rescued Serjon, and is well known for his sense of honor and commitment to chivalric fighting, so few suspect him. Serjon may have concocted the story himself to cover some secret. He is very odd about broken mirrors and the position of the Sentinels amid the constellations, not to mention a fear of thirteen bordering on mania. I happen to think that groundfire brought the super-regal down, but I was not there.”

  Bronlar slowly unclenched her hands from around the daystar. There was blood where the points had dug into her skin.

  “This charge brings death as a sentence for the guilty,” she said in a small, quavering voice. “What is to become of me? Do I return to Wind River and face the Warden Inspectorate?”

  “No, you stay here and train Cosdorans for now. The Cosdoran Airlord has agreed to refuse to release you from your current work, and no inquiry can be held until you are present. Feydamor is back on active duty, and with luck he may be killed before the war ends and an inquiry can be held.”

  “With luck he may be killed?” Bronlar echoed.

  Sartov looked at his watch, then cross-waved both arms above his head. Distant guildsmen backed a steam trolley to his gunwing and spun the compression engine into life.

  “I must go now, Semme Bronlar. I admit that I seem harsh and devious, but what more can I do? Feydamor is adamant that one of his escort shot him down and is demanding an inquiry. His seventy-four victories and the bombing of Condelor’s palace have made him a hero of such stature that even as his airlord I cannot force him into silence.”

  “So, I might face a line of carbineers with assault carbines?”

  “That is unlikely.” Sartov took an envelope from his pocket and handed it to Bronlar. “Here is a transcript of his charges, Warden Alion’s statement, and my assessment. Study it carefully.”

  Sartov walked Bronlar back to the staging area and quickly ascended into the late-afternoon sky. The congratulations and celebrations from the Cosdoran guildsmen and flyers lasted into the evening, and Bronlar lost herself in a reverie of light red wine, dancing, and ballads by the local bards. The revel paraded Bronlar the two miles into Vernal on a galley cart and continued in the largest tavern at the expense of the adjunct. He also rented a room so that Bronlar could spend one night in the comfort of a real bed with a feather mattress. It was early in the morning when Bronlar left the taproom and climbed the stairs to the circumbalcony. She paused at the railing before the door to her room, staring up at Mirrorsun, its band of nothingness amid the stars, and the stars themselves. After what could have been any length of time, Ryban called her name and approached with her embroidered flight jacket.

  “You left this below,” he began.

  “Oh, good, grats. I’d best not lose it.”

  He draped the jacket over the rail and stared out into the night with her.

  “Bronlar, I thought you looked sad tonight, for all your triumph.”

  “It was bought by the deaths of others, Ry. Should I be happy?”

  “I—I worried about you. I hope you don’t mind, but I found papers in your jacket and—Oh Semme Bronlar, he’s a monster, how could he do such a thing?”

  Bronlar took the jacket and draped it over her shoulders; then she put an arm around Ryban as if it were she who was comforting him.

  “He’s jealous of you,” said Ryban. “He wanted to be the only hero of that raid, but then he crashed and Alion had to rescue him.”

  “Do you really think that? Do you think I’m innocent?”

  “Pah, of course. Some carbineer hit him with a lucky shot.”

  Ryban drew Bronlar closer to him and they both looked at the sky for a few minutes more.

  “You’re shivering,” said Ryban.

  Bronlar turned and glanced into the door that she had opened but not entered. She shuddered. Her flight jacket fell to the floor.

  “I’m scared to go in there,” she admitted. “It’s the blackness.”

  “I’ll go first and light the lamp.”

  He picked up her flight jacket and stepped through the door. Bronlar entered too and took his arm.

  “No, I dread the blackness of sleep. Nightmares of those I killed, nightmares of gunwings shooting at me … and now nightmares of Serjon leading a Yarronese firing squad. The bed should be a cloud of balm to restore me, but it’s become a pit of horrors.”

  Ryban put his arms around her and held her tightly.

  “You should relax more, learn to live, Bron.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You play so hard at being neither youth nor girl that your true self presses all the harder at the inside to escape. You are a girl of nineteen, a lovely girl of nineteen.”

  She clung to him, aware that her nipples were erect and her pulse was racing. The floor seemed to spin and precess beneath her feet. There was an odd taste in her mouth.

  “This is an … unpleasing time for me,” Bronlar found herself saying. “The others … I shouldn’t.”

  “I’m proud of you, are you proud of me?” he asked, sounding slightly hurt.

  “Of course.”

  “Then damn what the others think. I offer only to stay with you, to help you fight away the nightmare blackness. Would Serjon do such a thing?”

  “I never let him.”

  “Ho ha, then if only he could see us now!” said Ryban with a curious twist of triumph in his voice. His thigh pressed gently but insistently between Bronlar’s legs, pushing, pushing rhythmically. Bronlar found that she could not pull away.

  “I’ll shield you from Serjon’s guns even if he be above us,” Ryban said, “though he’d care more for another Bartolican gunwing to add to his tally.”

  A skilled duelist, she thought. His words held deference, but his body courted her. He has done this before, he is even good at it … but why not trust experience? Words coursed through her mind. Why am I doing this? Why am I not doing this? Tomorrow I might be dead. What does it feel like? Who will ever know? Safeish time of the month?

  “I’ve fought too much,” sighed Bronlar. “Shield me tonight.”

  Ryban reached down between them, caressing her curves, then pulled a brass button from the fly of his trousers.

  “Take this,” he said, “it’s a Cosdoran customs.”

  Bronlar dropped the button into her jacket pocket, then let the jacket drop to the floor again.

  At that moment Serjon was in fact flying a night gunwing and firing his reaction guns at a black, unmarked sailwing above the tramway through the Green River Basin. The enemy flyer was keeping low, just above the rails, and blending with the shadows on the ground. Serjon climbed a little to get a better perspective. Mirrorsun was in a bad position, but—

  An explosion lit up the countryside as the black, unmarked sailwing hit a black, unmarked steam tram. Serjon circled, wrestled with his conscience, then decided to claim both sailwing and steam tram.

  He was glad of the taste of blood. Earlier that evening he had been told by the presiding Warden of the Inspectorate that Bronlar would be granted asylum in Cosdora until the end of the war. Faced with diplomatic obstructions apparently beyond even Sartov’s control, Serjon sullenly accepted that no more could be done.

  Ryban awoke to find Bronlar already out of bed and partly dressed, and water was splashed about the dresser stand where she had washed hastily. Outside the sky was growing light. She looked around as Ryban sat up in bed. In the morning light he could see that she had nicely proportioned breasts on a wiry figure. She hastily buttoned her shirt to hide her breasts.

  “Not so modest,” he crooned. “I’ve been there already.”

  “This was a bad idea,” Bron
lar said in a tense voice. “The other guildsmen will not take to it well.”

  “But this is not just affectionate fun, this is the beginnings of love,” said Ryban as he slipped out of the bed and padded over. “They must be made to understand.”

  “This was not love, it was revenge. It was not fun either, it hurt—both times.”

  Ryban stood next to Bronlar and put his arm around her. “Virgins always find it painful the first few times. Why I can tell you—”

  Bronlar twisted away from him. She lifted her glittering flight jacket from the floor and draped it over her shoulders.

  “At the end of the war I may take steps to find out if it improves with practice, Guildsman Ryban. Until then I am no longer available to be courted. Is that clear?”

  She managed to come across as vulnerable yet dangerous at the same time, like some small, cornered thing that was all needle teeth and razor claws. Ryban deferred to her.

  “Bronlar, I’m in love with you. Would I do anything that you did not wish?”

  Not trusting him with a parting kiss, Bronlar walked shakily through the door and made her way to the stairs. What she had done with Ryban had solved nothing, she decided as she walked back to the wingfield. Far from keeping the nightmares back, it had brought guilt, confusion, and regret to burden her further. Well, it was a lesson, she concluded. A lesson like the bullet hole she had once found in her gunwing’s headrest.

  19 July 3961: Condelor

  In Condelor the Lady Airlord Samondel was heartbroken by the second desertion of Alion. As Archwarden Stanbury told it, the whole romance had been a sham to get him familiar with the palace so that he could arrange the escape of his wingcaptain. He had not shot down the huge regal at all, it had been the combined firepower of a hundred palace guards and their assault carbines that had smashed its engines and dropped it out of the sky. Faced with betrayal on this sort of scale, Samondel was easy prey. After she had endured a series of carefully orchestrated admonitions by her advisers, Stanbury approached her in a far more conciliatory tone.

  “They should all be ashamed of themselves,” said the Archwarden. “Those who deceived you and those who now blame you for being deceived.”

  The Lady Airlord did not reply for some time. She was sitting on a wide marble rail with her back against a pillar, wearing the embroidered breeches and flight jacket of a warden. The gold circlet of the Airlord was on her head, blending with her ruddy hair, which cascaded over the rail and down to the flagstones of the gallery. Her legs were drawn up against her body and her arms were wrapped about them. Stanbury walked up and looked over the edge of the rail. The drop to the flagstones below was at least seventy feet.

  “I was never groomed for the throne,” she said eventually. “It was such a good life, being a girl at court. I led parades, I was celebrated, people loved me for myself.” She looked up at Stanbury. “Why has it turned so horrible, Archwarden?”

  “The Airlord of Greater Bartolica has power, Ladyship, more power than any other airlord in the known world. People are drawn to power, especially in the hands of someone of goodwill but little experience.”

  “You mean me.”

  “Only friends can be trusted with bad news. All others will bend it to suit themselves.”

  “I met Alion at the coronation last year, we exchanged coy letters, he even dedicated a duel to me. When he shot down the monster sailwing he seemed to sacrifice everything to save me.”

  “More faith could be placed in the palace defenses, Ladyship. My inspectors said the damage came from beneath, not from behind. Warden Damaric saw his friend shot down and bravely decided to try to save him. He defected, lied about protecting you, then used you to free the monster Feydamor after one of the most hideous crimes against chivalry in all the annals of Mounthaven.”

  Samondel looked away across the palace roofs to the city beyond.

  “I have thought a lot about abdicating,” she said, as if to her people.

  “You have a good heart, my lady. All that you need is experience.”

  “And how much damage will I do as I gain that experience, Archwarden? I want to be left in the shadows to learn while someone else makes wise decisions about affairs of state. Archwarden, I cannot even manage an affair with …”

  Stanbury glanced about slowly, and was rewarded with nods from four of the Inner Guard who were visible. Their right hands rested on polished reaction guns slung from their shoulders, and they watched each other as much as for threats from assassins. Clearly there would be no better privacy than this at any time and in any place.

  “I could manage affairs of state very effectively as your consort, Ladyship,” he said with what he hoped was both deference and concern.

  Samondel’s hair swirled out in a red fan as she turned her head to face him. Her face was a study in shock at first.

  “You are twice my age, sair Archwarden.”

  It was a mild reaction, the best that Stanbury could have hoped for under the circumstances.

  “I was not proposing a love match, Ladyship,” he replied with his eyes cast down to the flagstones. “In matters of state I have a great deal of experience, however. Under my hand, Greater Bartolica’s rule has extended across the entire north of Mounthaven, remember?”

  “You would make a better airlord than me,” Samondel said, her voice flat and lifeless again.

  “I would be but a regent, Ladyship, were I to marry you. When you felt ready to rule, you could declare the marriage unconsummated.”

  “But—”

  “I shall testify the same, and the marriage will be declared void. You need never do more than put your hand on my arm during public appearances.”

  Samondel slipped down from the railing and took Stanbury’s hand in both of hers.

  “Sair, sair, you do not know what you are proposing. The courtiers would ridicule you, rumors would spread about you being impotent, homosexual, or poxed. Your reputation would be ruined in a day.”

  “Any warden’s career can be ended in a single day, Ladyship. All it takes is a duel.”

  “Yes, yes, but a duel is honorable.”

  “Where the good of Greater Bartolica is concerned, even honor is not too precious to sacrifice.”

  Samondel pulled back and released his hand, now gazing down at the flagstones as well.

  “Make an announcement for us, noble Archwarden Stanbury. I shall marry you and sign the regency to my new consort. With time, perhaps it will not be necessary to dissolve our marriage.”

  Stanbury walked away through the corridors feeling as if he knew what it was like to fly without the need of an aircraft. Not only had she agreed, she might even consider a permanent union. That would remove the need to push her aside at some time in the future, an act which was always tricky with such a public figure. The announcement of their engagement was a welcome relief in diplomatic circles, while in the court the coming marriage seemed a glorious affirmation of life after so much death.

  22 July 3961: Condelor

  The Call took Virtrian as he sat in his cell within the Condelor palace. His eyes glazed over; then he stood up and shuffled to the west wall of his cell. Here he mindlessly tried to find a way through it, as he had done at least twice a week for nearly three months. He was oblivious of everything around him, and even though he could still eat and drink by reflex, he would remember nothing when he awoke in three hours.

  Ten minutes passed. The door to his cell clanked open and a figure in nondescript robes entered with a strangely designed harness. With some difficulty the woman slipped the harness over Virtrian’s hands and head. It was designed to choke if the wearer struggled too hard to go with the Call. Outside, she led him away after locking the door to his cell. The guards were all in the grip of the Call and their terriers had been shot dead as the woman came past with her prize.

  Virtrian awoke bound and gagged. He was somewhere outside the dungeons, that was immediately apparent. There was carpet on the floor, and the walls were
plastered and draped. A robed and veiled figure sat across the room, watching him stir.

  “Welcome back, Sair,” said a contralto voice in Yarronese. “You will forgive the gags and bindings, but people have been known to get a little excitable when they wake after being rescued during a Call. They cry out in amazement, shout that it is impossible, all that sort of thing. We are still in Condelor, and as soon as your escape is noticed there will be guards and carbineers everywhere.”

  She got up and sauntered across to him with a slight mincing gait in her steps.

  “I am going to remove your gag now, sair Virtrian. Kindly refrain from shouting.”

  Virtrian nodded. She removed the cloth.

  “Who are you?” asked Virtrian.

  “An enemy of your enemy. I am Theresla, a former servant of the Veraguay envoy, and I am a fugitive, like you.”

  “I’ve heard of the envoy. Yarron’s former envoy mentioned her in his reports. So you are from Veraguay too?”

  “No, I am from a continent on the other side of the Earth,” replied Theresla. “I am also a Callwalker.”

  From the look on Virtrian’s face it was clear that he did not believe a word that she said, but she had rescued him from a Bartolican cell and that was difficult to explain by any other means. Another woman now entered, and Virtrian thought that he knew her from some diplomatic function years ago.

  “I’ll untie you now,” she said. “Please do everything that we say. My name is Laurelene Hannan, wife of the late Inspector General.”

  Once freed, Virtrian watched as Theresla and Laurelene unveiled themselves. Laurelene brought tea and fresh grapes, and assured him that a hot lunch would not be long in arriving. Theresla began eating pickles. They were in the house of the Inspector General, and there was an outlook over the palace. As they sat eating lunch a bell began jangling in the distance. The tiny figures of guards could be seen scurrying about on the palace walls.

  “Some warder just tried to give me my slops,” Virtrian concluded. “Will they search here?”