by David Gunn
Dipping her hand into her pocket, the child pulls out a cheap medallion of legba uploaded. It’s Shil’s.
‘Keep it.’
The man scowls at me.
‘A woman’s good-luck charm,’ I tell him.
He loses interest and the child hangs it round her own neck gratefully.
I have one like it myself, but I don’t see why her father should have it when his daughter gives me Shil’s message.
‘Five gold coins,’ says the big man. ‘And we help you find Pavel.’
‘We can find him for ourselves.’
‘I can find him faster,’ the man says. ‘I know tracks you don’t.’ He smiles at me, before producing his clincher. ‘I know tracks even the snakeheads don’t know exist.’
‘One gold coin,’ I say.
Only Colonel Vijay’s already opening his purse. Makes me wonder just how much gold he is carrying. Also makes me wonder, why?
———
Marching into the wind, we keep going as darkness falls and with it the temperature. The filthy goatskin waistcoat everyone wears round here is beginning to make sense. Our jackets might have ballistic lining, but Neen insists he would happily swap his for something warm and take his chance with the bullets.
Comes of being that thin, I guess. The cold gets to you more.
Our path is narrow and lit by moonlight. Slopes drop away behind us and a lake shines silver grey beneath the dark sky in a valley ahead. We’ve been climbing for hours. And the big man’s right about those paths. Some of them seem to exist only in his head.
‘Now we wait,’ he says.
While we do, I remember to ask his name. It’s Milo.
‘Now we go.’
In the fifteen minutes we’ve been waiting, the lake has finished setting enough to let us walk across its surface. A camp fire burns in the distance, and dogs bark when they hear us pass. Once we’re challenged by a boy with a stick. At his side is a mongrel that hugs the dirt and keeps its ears back.
He throws his challenge into the darkness.
And we wait until he turns on his heel and stalks away, humming to himself louder than necessary. Skirting one of the high-valley farms, we hear a woman cry in the darkness. In the next farm along, a drunk kicks at a closed door. Either he’s locked out or too drunk to find the handle.
A pissing girl displays bare buttocks to nine strangers. She barely bothers to step beyond her door. Hardly surprising, given the cold.
My troops are sullen.
The lives these people lead are close to the lives they abandoned. Upping the pace, I make them march at double time until we are clear of the area. We give the next few farms a wider berth. The Aux assume it’s because daylight approaches.
‘Sven,’ says Colonel Vijay, ‘you’re smiling.’
Thinking about it, I realize he’s right.
‘Thoughts of finding Pavel, sir,’ says Neen. His voice makes it clear this is a compliment. Neen is a different person now we have news of his sister.
‘First we wait and watch,’ Colonel Vijay says, ‘to see how many snakeheads Pavel has.’
‘And then, sir?’ asks Neen.
‘We kill them,’ I say. ‘And get your sister back.’
Milo grins happily.
———
At cockcrow, a boy driving five goats wanders through a gate. He runs his stick along the stones of a wall and disappears around a corner. About ten minutes later, we see him begin to climb a valley slope opposite. Bare knees gripped to a pony, a girl gallops through the gate about an hour later and heads along the valley floor, with her long dark hair streaming behind her.
She’s riding into the warm wind, I realize.
When she returns, an older woman is waiting. From the way she stands by the gate, it’s obvious the old woman is furious. However, the girl just laughs and tumbles off the pony’s back, revealing a flash of hip.
‘Pavel’s daughter Adelpha,’ says Milo.
‘You know his family?’
Milo snorts. ‘I’m his brother.’ The big man’s eyes never leave the girl as she walks under an arch and through double gates that lead into Pavel’s capital.
The village is large for Hekati.
Thirty houses protected by a wall high enough to need a ladder to climb. Also, the wall is thick enough for a guard to walk its length every fifteen minutes. These are Pavel’s men, members of the O’Cruz ejército. Although they’re better armed than I remember.
‘Snakehead weapons,’ says Milo, seeing my gaze.
He’s right. Milo and I are on a slope and higher than the others. A hundred paces higher, maybe a little more. Just enough to let us look over the walls into a square beyond. Milo knows this place; he grew up here.
‘So which house is Pavel’s?’
I expect him to point at the biggest.
‘And that?’
‘The temple,’ says my gun. That’s the first thing it has said since shutting down on the island.
‘Do all villages have temples?’ I ask Milo.
He looks at me, shocked. ‘This isn’t a village,’ he says. ‘It’s a city.’
It’s probably rude of the gun to laugh.
By the time Franc returns from her hunting, I’ve made sense of the city’s layout. Maps are good, but nothing beats seeing for yourself. The outer wall is thick, the streets narrow; houses look in on themselves. Our main problem is the two gates. These are reinforced with wrought iron. Although the hinges are simple, three metal sleeves that slot over pins fixed to the arch.
We could lift them with a crane. Unfortunately, even Milo and I couldn’t move them between us without a crane. And while there’s always explosives . . . they’d fuck with Colonel Vijay’s wish to do this quietly.
‘Water system.’
When Milo says, what? it occurs to me I said it aloud.
Doesn’t matter, and I ignore him anyway; because I’m pulling up an overlay for this valley. It shows a shaft, a tunnel, other shafts and a fat pipe running the valley’s entire length, and straight under the mountain beyond. As I blink, the overlay becomes solid and the buildings transparent.
There is water in the fattest pipe.
Of course there is. I’m looking at a mains system for an off-world habitat. Seven million people were housed here. How the hell did . . . Then advanced schematics feed themselves through.
‘You all right?’ asks Colonel Vijay.
‘Why wouldn’t he be?’ the gun says.
Colonel Vijay looks at the vomit on my boots and remains silent. Seems I’ve lost a few minutes somewhere. Forcing myself to my feet, I follow the colonel downhill. We keep low to avoid being seen from the walls.
The Aux are eating slivers of goat with their fingers. Apart from Franc, who is skewering hers with a knife. Slashing fresh gashes into the animal’s carcass, she rubs herbs, wine and salt into the wounds and turns a crude spit made from a sapling soaked in water. A leather flask sits in the dirt at Franc’s feet. A stale chunk of bread is soaking in wine to make it softer. She must have got it from Kyble, unless one of the fishermen gave it to her.
‘Who built the fire?’
Ajac looks up.
‘Good job,’ I say. It is too. No smoke and plenty of heat.
Just as well: had it been the other way round he’d have betrayed our position, and I’d have been very cross indeed.
‘Colonel,’ I say. ‘If I could?’
He walks with me to the edge of our camp.
A low wall hides us from the city, and Colonel Vijay drops to a crouch when I do. We watch a guard make a trip round the walls. Another two men stand by the gate. They’re carrying rifles and have knives stuck into their belts. One wears an old Uplift helmet, the other carries a pair of field-glasses.
Neither is Silver Fist. Both, however, provide proof that the Silver Fist have been here.
‘See that red roof, sir?’
Colonel Vijay nods.
‘Pavel’s house.’
As mine d
id, his gaze flicks to the bigger building.
‘A temple,’ I say. ‘One priest, old and blind . . .’ How do I know that? I wonder, then realize it’s because the temple told me.
The colonel is watching me strangely. Maybe there’s something in my voice. Or perhaps he read up on the Winter Wind, my fight against eleven-braid Douza, and the last time I let my mind open. A hundred thousand of us made the drop to Ilseville; two and a half thousand survived. Most of these died when Douza blew up our prison ships. We went into the last battle with twenty-five people, and came out victorious.
None of us has a right to be alive. Not against those odds.
‘Sven,’ he says. ‘I talked to Neen.’
‘Did you, sir?’
‘Yes,’ he says, abruptly. ‘I did. A good man.’
‘A good sergeant.’
Colonel Vijay nods, accepting the correction. ‘Neen says this stuff with the kyp might kill you.’
‘Hey,’ growls the SIG. ‘Who wants to live for ever?’ It’s a good impression of my voice.
The colonel scowls. ‘Can’t you turn that thing off?’
‘No, sir. Not without infringing its rights and liberties.’
Colonel Vijay thinks I’m being serious. ‘Fine,’ he tells the SIG. ‘But he dies when I say. Not before.’ Then he has to tell me to stop grinning.
Chapter 34
RACHEL’S ON AN OUTCROP ABOVE, WITH HER SNIPER’S RIFLE. Neen’s hidden on the lower slopes with orders to kill anyone who tries to leave in a hurry. Franc’s with him, and she is sulking at not being allowed into the city.
Iona and Ajac are probably wondering what they’ve got themselves into. As for Haze, he’s crouching over his slab in the afternoon heat. At least, I hope he is. Keeping us invisible from any lenz the Silver Fist might have hovering above us is vital.
And the SIG? It’s locked down, and sulking worse than Franc. I’ve promised it a big battle. Really, really soon. I’m not sure it believes me.
Pulling rank, Colonel Vijay insists on climbing the well first. Handholds help. Milo and I just jab our boots either side of the shaft and walk ourselves up.
We are going to come up just inside the gate.
‘OK,’ I tell Milo. ‘Kill both guards.’
‘No.’ Colonel Vijay shakes his head. ‘I’ll do it.’
What am I going to say? He’s my CO for fuck’s sake.
Rolling over the lip of the well, the colonel finds his feet and sprints towards the arch. A jab takes the first guard in the back. Opening his mouth, the second guard bubbles his life away through a slit throat. A third, who shouldn’t even be there, dies trying to stop blood squirting from his groin.
‘Horse Hito?’ I ask, when the colonel returns.
He nods. It’s his job to hold the gates.
My job is to fetch Pavel. As for Milo, his job is to confuse anyone we meet on the way to Pavel’s house. It’s siesta time, and the whole city is asleep, screwing or dozing in their yards.
The exception is half drunk and carrying a stick. He laughs at whatever Milo says, walks on a single pace and crumples as Milo clubs him from behind. When he wakes, he’ll probably blame his headache on the booze.
The door to Pavel’s house opens outwards. That’s good in one way. A door hung like that is hard to batter inwards. Of course, a door hung like that is easy to jam, if you want to burn a house with everyone in it. We don’t.
Stepping up to Pavel’s door, Milo knocks hard. A voice calls from inside.
So Milo knocks again.
When the door opens, it’s Pavel and he is holding a pistol. ‘Milo . . . ? ‘
Grabbing his brother’s wrist, Milo jumps back and slams the door hard. Bone cracks and Pavel opens his mouth to scream. Only Milo is now holding Pavel’s gun, and using its barrel as a gag. This man is good.
‘Hello Pavel,’ I say, stepping out from behind Milo.
Pavel’s eyes widen. Trying to speak makes him choke.
‘Remove the gun,’ I tell Milo.
‘You’re—’ Pavel says. ‘You’re—’
‘No such luck,’ I say. ‘But you will be if you don’t fetch Shil.’
He looks blank.
‘Go and get my trooper.’
Shaking his head is stupid, because my knee does more than smash one of his balls into the other, it lifts him so high off the floor he smashes his head on the ceiling. OK, it’s a low ceiling. Made from poor-quality lath and plaster. It must be — it splits as readily as the skin over his skull.
‘Shil,’ I say. ‘My trooper.’
Crawling to his knees, Pavel begins pleading when Milo grabs hair. Milo scowls as blood sticks to his fingers, then shrugs and drags Pavel upright. He looks like he’s enjoying himself. That’s families for you.
‘If she’s harmed . . .’ I say.
‘She’s not here,’ says Pavel, dragging in breath. ‘The snake-heads took her.’
‘You’re going to have to stop doing that,’ says the SIG.
‘Don’t see why,’ I say, looking down. Milo’s dropped Pavel, who has his hands rammed between his thighs. He seems to be going purple.
‘Because,’ the gun says snappily, ‘we need to know, which snakeheads? When did they take her? Who do they think she is? Where did they go? ‘
‘Sven,’ says Milo. ‘Before we leave . . .’
‘What?’
‘Something I have to fetch.’
When Milo returns, his brother is still clutching his balls on the floor. And Milo has Pavel’s daughter over one shoulder. She’s wearing a cotton dress. It is a very short cotton dress. When she beats her fist against Milo’s back, he slaps her rump, hard.
‘OK,’ he says. ‘Now we can go.’
I look at Milo, he looks at me. Pavel has the sense to stay where he is. That might be because I have my foot on his chest. ‘Milo,’ I say, ‘put her down.’ This has the potential to get nasty.
‘It’s OK,’ Milo says. ‘We’re engaged.’
Pavel bucks under my foot like a dying fish and goes still when I increase the pressure.
‘Adelpha, tell him,’ says Milo, tipping the girl to the floor. She takes a swipe at his face, then winces as he catches her wrist. He grins, and after a second, she nods. ‘See,’ says Milo. ‘Told you.’
‘How quaint,’ says my gun. ‘How—’ It stops, lost for words. A second later, it lights up again. ‘Apt,’ it says, and I get the feeling it’s been taking in the narrow passage, the living quarters built behind a goat pen, the endless stink of animal dung in the streets.
‘Sven,’ it says. ‘Have you ever thought of relocating?’
‘Shut it.’
‘I’m serious . . .’
‘If you don’t shut it,’ I warn the SIG, ‘Milo gets you as a wedding present.’ The fisherman flicks me a glance, then scowls when he realizes my promise is empty.
Chapter 35
‘STRETCH HIM BETWEEN THOSE TWO TREES.’ AS WE’RE NOT using nails to fix Pavel in place, it is not as if Colonel Vijay can really complain. Let’s face it; we are not even tying the rope that tightly. ‘Now remove his trousers.’
My sergeant looks puzzled.
‘Do it.’ My voice is abrupt and Neen’s lips tighten. He cuts roughly, hacking away until the O’Cruz caudillo stands naked from the waist down, stretched by ropes between two olive saplings.
So far, all he has told me is that the snakeheads took Shil. Who led them and why are questions he seems unable to answer. We’re about to change that.
Stripping off my own shirt, I pull a dagger from its sheath on my hip.
As expected, Pavel begins to struggle. He’d protest, but his mouth is stuffed with a bit of rag. It’s going to remain that way while I work. He already knows that.
I work, the gag stays in.
The gag comes out, he talks. He doesn’t talk, the gag goes back in.
‘Sven . . .‘ Colonel Vijay sounds worried. Must be because I’m using the knife on myself instead of on Pavel. Slitting open my ar
mpit, I force my fingers under muscle until I reach something ceramic. Hurts like fuck. Still, it was bound to.
Closing my fingers around a handle, I say, ‘Got it.’ Before calling, ‘Rachel.’
She is already running to fetch her needle and cotton.
An m3x laser blade is illegal in ninety-eight per cent of the known galaxy. The only reason it’s not illegal in the rest is that no one has got round to passing laws there yet. At least not laws anyone can make stick.
You can buy legal versions of the m3. These have coloured blades and hum when you turn them on. Easy enough to lose the hum. Well, it is if you’re good with software. But fixing the blade . . .
My knife has a blade that adjusts from red to invisible.
I choose pale blue, because Pavel needs to see what’s coming, and pale blue is the colour of flame at its hottest. ‘So hot,’ I tell Pavel, ‘wounds seal.’ Tapping his arms near the shoulders, I say, ‘I can cut here and here without spilling a single drop of blood. But you know where I’m going to start, don’t you?’
He looks down. Doubt if he can see over his own belly, but the shrivelling little acorn between his legs says he knows what to expect.
I’m not big on torturing a man in front of his daughter. Not even a bastard like Pavel; and I killed Racta, his heir. Well, I would have done, if a prospector hadn’t beaten me to it. So he has a right to have issues.
But I really do need to know where Shil is . . .
‘Take Adelpha away,’ I tell Milo.
‘No.’ The girl shakes her head. ‘I’m staying,’ she says.
And that gives me a better idea. Stamping across to where she stands, I grab the front of her dress and yank. It’s made from cheap cotton, rotten with sweat, and shreds easily to reveal heavy breasts and dark nipples. From the way Milo’s gaze fixes on these, before switching to me, he hasn’t seen them before either.
‘Milo,’ says Neen. ‘Don’t.’ He puts his rifle to the huge fisherman’s head. Neen is not happy. Why would he be? Today was the day he thought he’d see his sister again.
Struggling against his ropes, Adelpha’s father shakes his head. He’d be shouting, but the gag prevents it. This is where I should have started, I realize. I file that thought away for next time, because there will be a next time. There always is.
