Cowl

by Neal Asher

  ‘What age is this?’ Tack asked, forgetting himself.

  Coptic’s huge hand caught him hard on the side of his head, knocking him to the ground, with lights flashing behind his eyes.

  ‘Did I permit you to speak?’ the big man asked.

  Tack said nothing more, waiting for the inevitable beating, but Coptic was disinclined to take things further and turned to Meelan, who was studying a device she held. After a moment she gabbled something obscure and gestured disgustedly at the forest. Coptic spat a brief reply and pointed out to the sea, whereupon Meelan nodded. More conversation ensued as both of them inspected the instrument, then eventually Coptic turned to Tack.

  ‘We must rest here and recoup. You will go that way.’ He pointed along the beach. ‘In about three kilometres you will come to an estuary. Walk up it until you find fresh water.’

  Coptic took the pack and squatted down to open it. After emptying it of most of its contents, he passed the collapsible water container to Tack. Tack then paused for a moment to observe the big man assembling what, futuristic as it might be, was still identifiable as a fishing rod. He saw no more than this, for Coptic glared at him and gestured him away.

  When Tack came to the desiccated shark, he expected the miniature vultures to take off, but the birds ignored him and continued feeding, their pecking beaks making sounds like pencils beating against cardboard. Amid the empty turtle shells he saw the bones and beaked skulls of the armoured reptiles, and noticed that all the shells had been broken into, and bore large teeth marks. Moving closer to the forest, he nervously eyed the sea, wondering what kind of creature out there had the jaw strength to crack open living turtles like sherbet lemons. Perhaps the dinosaurs Traveller had mentioned? This seemed unlikely to Tack, as he did not see how his two captors could cover a distance through time which Traveller had said would need many separate shifts. Most likely this current era was some ten or twenty million years before that of the deinotherium, which meant perhaps forty million years preceding Tack’s own time. He shivered at the thought, despite the warmth.

  As the beach curved round, Tack’s two kidnappers were soon out of sight, and he realized that he was turning into the wide mouth of an estuary, its further shore now visible to him. He estimated that he had covered just over a kilometre so far. The forest to his right now included the occasional white-barked deciduous tree, bearing autumnal leaves and translucent fruit. Below one such tree he spotted two large animals resembling cats, but which were squabbling over fallen fruit. He picked up his pace, not wanting to discover if they might turn out to be omnivores. After a few hundred paces, he heard their squabbling grow louder—then suddenly cut off. Glancing back, he witnessed a nightmare stepping out onto the beach, and understood why the cat creatures no longer wanted to attract any attention.

  Fear closed its leaden claws around his guts.

  7

  Traveller Thote:

  The attempt to remove the tors from the two Russian hunters, who actually remained together through a number of time-jumps, was a failure that killed both of them and Traveller Zoul when we tried to transplant one tor onto him. It seems these organic time machines genetically encode to their hosts. Zoul was dragged back by the next shift, but the web of temporal energy the tor created in him did not match his physiognomy and what arrived at the shift’s end died, thankfully, very quickly. We need to get to torbearers earlier in their journey, before the jumps accelerate, to give us more time to complete our task. Our chances of doing this are good, as more and more torbearers are being detected every day.

  IT WAS LEOPARD-SKINNED AND it was gigantic. Comparing it against the trees it had just emerged from, Tack estimated it to stand nearly two metres at the shoulder, and be five metres long. Though doglike, its movement was feline, its sinuosity only hampered by its huge weight. But this thing was to the family pet dog what a great white was to a goldfish. And no animal should have jaws of that size: they seemed unnaturally out of proportion, like some cartoon depiction of Father Wolf.

  Tack considered just keeping on walking, in the hope that the beast wouldn’t notice him; he would, after all, provide only a snack for it. But it swung its huge head in his direction, paused for a moment, then began loping along the strand towards him. Tack turned and ran just as fast as he could.

  The sand hampering his progress, he moved to the more compacted ground at the edge of the forest. Glancing into its shadows, he considered heading for one of the fruit trees, which appeared eminently climbable. But the creature behind him looked big enough to stretch its jaws up to the highest branches, and heavy enough to push the trees over. Sweat broke out all over him, soaking his ragged clothing and trickling into his eyes. In this kind of heat he might keep up his pace for a few kilometres only, but wouldn’t have the energy for anything else, least of all defending himself.

  The nearby estuary was narrowing now, and Tack thought about taking to the water, until he noticed that those floating seabirds were in fact fins. No escape that way, then. The forest had become mainly deciduous, but still the trees were too small. Glancing again at his pursuer, he saw that it did not seem in any great hurry to catch him. It kept loping along like some great big dog, as if too lazy to put on that last spurt of speed. Nevertheless, its long stride was eating up the distance between them.

  Keep running, as you are now, and when I give the word, turn immediately into the forest.

  ‘Traveller!’

  There came no reply, but Tack felt suddenly so very glad. Not only did Traveller have the weaponry to bring down this monster, but he would then once again reclaim his charge, and Tack was sure his chances of survival with Traveller were higher than with his more recent companions.

  The creature was now so close that Tack could see a red tongue lolling from its panting mouth between teeth as large as cannon shells, and wide bloodshot eyes dispassionately observing him. The greatest horror, he felt, was that should it catch him he would be one brief crunch then gone; he would be killed with neither anger nor hate and for no more purpose than to assuage an ever-recurring hunger.

  Now he could hear the regular tread of its great splayed paws thumping into the sand. Though it did not possess claws, that was more than compensated for by the sheer quantity of ivory in its huge mouth.

  Now.

  Tack turned instantly, dodging trees as he ran. The beast turned in behind him, clipping a pine and releasing a shower of cones, branches and needles. With its snout raised, there seemed an excitement to its mien—the chase was finally becoming interesting.

  Further to your left.

  Tack changed course again.

  That’s enough. In a moment you’ll see a large tree ahead of you. Climb as fast as you can. 7 don’t want to have to fire on friend andrewsarchus there, as the umbrathants would detect the energy spike.

  Tack soon spotted the tree, and slowed to ascertain his route up it. Then a deep mooing bark behind accelerated him on. He hit the trunk with his right foot, running almost vertically up it for a couple of paces, before grabbing branches at random and hauling himself higher. Under his feet he caught sight of a wide furry back passing like an express train. Pulling even higher, he saw the monster swerve and shoulder into a pine trunk. The tree snapped and went down whip-fast. The creature turned, ploughing up debris from the forest floor. It launched itself towards Tack, its massive paws tearing bark from the tree trunk as its head crashed up through the lower branches. Its mouth opened into a glistening red well, then its huge jaws slammed shut on a bough Tack’s foot had just left. Then the creature slid to the ground, growling in exasperation.

  ‘It would seem you’re hardly even out of my sight before getting yourself into terminal danger,’ said Traveller.

  Tack glanced up at the man lying comfortably along a wide bough, his feet wedged against the trunk.

  ‘What did you say that thing was?’ Tack gasped, continuing upwards until he was higher than Traveller.

  ‘Andrewsarchus. You’ve just eva
ded the largest carnivorous mammal ever to roam the Earth. Don’t you feel privileged?’

  Tack gazed down at the monster sitting doglike at the foot of the tree, its head tilted to one side as it observed them.

  ‘Oh, I can think of better ways to pass the time.’ Tack then clammed up, remembering how Traveller’s tolerance of him was only slightly greater than Coptic’s. Traveller seemed unperturbed, though. His eyes were dead and his expression weary as a result of vorpal travel, but he seemed quite relaxed.

  ‘Can you summon the mantisal to us up here?’ Tack asked hopefully.

  ‘Now why should I do that?’

  Tack gestured to the andrewsarchus. ‘So we can escape him, and those two lunatic umbrathants, and continue our journey.’

  ‘Ah, you are learning. However, sometimes one’s plans must remain protean to accommodate opportunities.’ Traveller paused to gaze at an instrument propped on his stomach. ‘You know, arriving in a time like this, and observing the evidence of predation scattered all along the beach, the seasoned traveller should first locate a handy tree as a refuge. Such caution is only sensible, yet Meelan and Coptic have not bothered to do so, which is a sign of both inherent arrogance and stupidity. That neither of them has bothered scanning the hardware inside your head is another sign.’

  The andrewsarchus, growing bored with sitting waiting, was now up and prowling around below them. Many metres above it they might be, but if the mantisal could not be summoned up here, then at some point they must climb to the ground. Tack did not find the prospect inviting.

  ‘What might they have found in my head?’ he asked.

  ‘Let me put it this way,’ said Traveller. ‘No matter where or when you are, I’ll always be able to find you. Though I might not have the required energy to get to you.’

  ‘You put a bug inside my head.’

  ‘Not quite what I would call it but, in essence, yes.’

  ‘So now you’ve found me shouldn’t we continue our journey to this Sauros place?’

  ‘No, because of those protean plans I mentioned. Now, detail to me what has happened to you since I last saw you.’

  Tack told him about the brief journeys, and that strange communication with the woman in the rock.

  ‘Iveronica: the leader of an Umbrathane cell that has been a thorn in our side for too long,’ Traveller explained. “They seem to follow no coherent plan, so are not amenable to prognostic apperception. We have never been able to predict when they will strike, nor to locate their home base. Her hostility ably demonstrates how Coptic and Meelan are not entirely trusted or accepted by her. It seems those two have never been allowed to that base, but that now you are their ticket there.’

  ‘You seem to know a lot about all this,’ Tack observed.

  Traveller showed him the screen of the instrument he was holding, and on it Tack saw the woman again as he had earlier seen her through his own eyes.

  ‘You see what I see,’ Tack stated.

  ‘I see a recording of what you’ve seen—and I’ve only just been going through it.’

  Tack stared at him and guessed what was coming.

  Traveller continued, ‘Iveronica has supplied Coptic and Meelan with an energy feed to track back to the Umbrathane base. I have availed myself of the opportunity presented and will continue to follow—parasitic on the same feed.’

  ‘But you cannot follow them unless I am with them?’ added Tack.

  Traveller shrugged. ‘Should you escape, Iveronica might learn of it and cut off that feed. You stay with them.’

  Tack felt that the andrewsarchus said all he himself wanted to say by approaching the bole of the tree, cocking its leg, and pissing like a waterfall before finally sauntering away.

  ‘YOU MUST NOT LEAVE us,’ Berthold implored Polly, after taking his nth draught from the second jar of strong beer he had opened, then wiping his foam-covered beard on his filthy sleeve. He had not even bothered to change out of his jester’s suit, which smelt strongly of stale sweat and chicken grease—not the most appealing combination.

  ‘As I already told you, it’s not something I have much choice about. I cannot explain why, Berthold, and I’m not sure I need to.’

  Anger flashed in the man’s expression, as it had done more and more frequently since Mellor had relayed the bad news before himself slumping into drunken slumber.

  ‘Think of the coin! Think of the excellent food we receive!’

  The coin was irrelevant to her, but Polly was thinking more and more about the sackful of bread and pies and shrivelled apples, for indefinable power now networked her body from the scale, hooking into unlocatable places in her and pulling taut. Soon, she knew, she must again travel through time. Presently she might have the choice of when this would happen, but if she left it any longer, that choice would be taken away from her. She had hoped Berthold would drink himself into a stupor, so she could quietly take her leave along with the food sack. But he had passed through the mournful weary stage of drunkenness, and was now growing ever more insistent and aroused.

  ‘You must stay!’ he repeated, staggering towards her and grabbing her arm, eyes glaring bloodshot in the lamplight cast from a nearby tent.

  Polly merely shook her head. But this suddenly became too much for Berthold, for he put down the jug and grabbed her by both arms.

  ‘My Lady Poliasta.’ He pinned her back against the wagon, pushing his face to hers. She turned her head aside, to avoid a mouth that smelt as if its tongue had died and putrefied inside it. Undeterred, he groped inside her greatcoat, first fondling her breasts then trying to find access to her crotch. When her clothing defeated him, he started trying to tear it away.

  ‘Well, this doesn’t exactly convince me to stay with you,’ said Polly.

  ‘I will wed you. You’ll be both my wife and exotic companion. Together we’ll travel the country and people will marvel at your beauty and at my skill!’

  Worse offers than this had been put Polly’s way—as had better ones. She didn’t really need to consider further, since she knew she was out of choices anyway. Swaying her hips closer to his hand as if to encourage him, she brought her knee up hard.

  Doubled over, Berthold staggered back clutching his codpiece, and made a sound like a duck being flattened by a steamroller. He collapsed onto his side, still coiled up tight. The things he said between agonized groans were a revelation to Polly—she hadn’t realized such words had such a history. Quickly she ducked under the wagon’s awning and grabbed up the food sack from where it rested by the snoring Mellor. Stepping out again, she saw that Berthold was up on his knees now, his face lowered to the ground as he clutched his testicles.

  ‘I’m sorry. I have to go now,’ said Polly quietly, turning and walking away into the night.

  The grass was already dew-covered and her breath misted the air. Shortly she reached some trees and turned to look back. The King’s hunting lodge looked warm and welcoming, with lights in its windows and smoke billowing from its chimneys, as did the encampment outside it, where the raucous party showed no signs of flagging.

  Time to go—and to go into time.

  I always felt that you were full of wit,’ she told Nandru, aloud. ‘Or was I thinking of some other word?’

  ‘Poliasta!’

  Berthold.

  ‘Damn,’ she said. ‘Doesn’t he know when to give up?’

  I’m sure he’s full of ardour.

  ‘Shut up, Nandru,’ she growled.

  Polly concentrated on relaxing her control of that internal tension generated by the scale, and she felt a tug into the ineffable.

  ‘Polly! My pretty Polly!’ Berthold gasped. ‘We must drink together and toast our union!’

  Berthold was staggering closer clutching a beer jug in his right hand, yet still, somehow, she found herself unable to leave this time. She drew the automatic earlier secreted in her coat pocket.

  ‘Come no closer, Berthold!’ she warned.

  The man who shot at her during the S
econd World War had not been dragged through time with her, but he had been at least ten paces away from her. But the killer, Tack, from her own time, had been much closer.

  ‘Stop where you are!’

  Berthold ignored her, for how could he possibly realize what she was pointing at him? Aiming to one side, she pulled the trigger, and whatever fates existed were on her side in that moment. Her shot went closer to him than expected, smashing the beer jug. Knocked off balance, Berthold staggered and fell on his backside. But that humiliating position was still more inviting than where Polly now fell.

  ‘Polly!’ his cry echoed after her, and died away. Moving through chill blackness, Polly pocketed her gun and kept a firm hold on the food sack. As the scale pulled her through a void without dimension, she gazed down at the roiling of an impossible sea in all shades of non-colour. Her mind strained to breaking point as it sought to encompass something outside the scope of its natural evolution. Her breath burst from her in a groan—then she was sucking on nothing. There seemed some sensation of movement this time, of actually travelling, rather than the brief black hiatus she had previously experienced. Soon it must end, surely soon … but it went on interminably and Polly discovered how horrible it was to asphyxiate. And even this dark world went away as she blacked out.

  COLLECTING THE WATER CONTAINER from where he had abandoned it, Tack then headed for the tributary to which Traveller had directed him. The andrewsarchus was now, according to Traveller’s instruments, somewhere over on the other side of the estuary. Tack knew that when he did finally attain his freedom, he wanted it to be accompanied with a shitload of the technology these strangers used.

  Finally coming to the stream, he expanded the water container and filled it, then headed back to the beach as quickly as he could. Already he had been gone for longer than he should have been, and though he had a plausible explanation—like climbing a tree to save his life—he wondered if Coptic would allow him time to explain. Building up a sweat as he lugged the heavy container, he soon spotted Coptic jogging down the beach towards him, his weapon drawn.