by Oliver Higgs
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“Send back a carefully worded counterproposal, praising Last Bastion and telling them we’re eager to join their cause, but with an apologetic stipulation: that before we open our doors, we want a more solid assurance that you two won’t be wrongly punished for any previous misunderstandings. We attach to this your own account of events, in such a way that it might provide some moral compensation to any overeager Justicars. Something they can use to overlook any perceived breach of justice.”
Echo and I share a look.
“Can we do that?” I ask, turning back to Cormac.
“That’s how diplomacy works, m’boy. The key will be the wording. Our proposal has to reflect the power of their city-state. We have to let their leaders know we’re not opposing them, but that we have our own honor to satisfy, our own people to protect. That’s something they can understand. We’re going to kneel before the king, so to speak–but we’re going to do it with dignity, as a knight in the field, not an enemy in chains.”
“What if they say ‘to hell with it’ and attack the town?” I ask.
“I don’t see that happening. Look at it from their perspective. What’s more important–trying a few teenagers on the word of a single confused soldier, or gaining a fortified outpost on the edge of enemy territory? If we make it clear we’re not opposing them but simply watching out for our own, they have every reason to assent. It’s giving an inch to take a foot. It’s good policy. We can’t win in a siege but we can certainly do some damage, not only to their soldiers but to Haven itself. Why risk all that when they can pardon you and take the town intact? One option costs lives and resources. The other costs a few paltry words.”
It makes sense to me, yet I’m still wary. I don’t know much about history, but I get the feeling it was filled with leaders who did things that didn’t make sense. Still, Cormac’s idea seems like our best option.
“All right. Let’s draw up something official,” I say.
It takes all day and half a dozen drafts. Cormac obsesses over every line. He’s good at this sort of thing. He thinks about how the leadership at Last Bastion will interpret things. When it’s done, we call the envoy back in. He sighs at the document. Raises an eyebrow. Has suspicions. He talks some about taking me and Echo with him to present the terms. But Cormac argues against this, and it isn’t long before the envoy agrees to take it back to the city-state with his men.
At the end of a very long day, I and Echo stand on the roof of Haven Hall beneath a cloudy black sky, looking out over the town.
“Cormac was made for this sort of thing. He’ll come out stronger,” Echo says.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“He put his name to the paper that will bind us to Last Bastion. When they send people, they’ll look for the names on that paper. He’ll work with them. Last Bastion may have someone in mind to lead the town, but if they hold elections, I think Cormac will still come out on top. If not in the first one, then the second.”
“Our names are on that paper too,” I say.
“Yes, but we’re already outlaws. If they don’t arrest us, they’ll want us to leave the Council. If … If we’re still here.”
Echo looks at me.
“I know you’ve thought about it,” she says.
I stare at the line of white trees leading away into the forest.
“Whether we should be here or not when the envoy returns,” Echo clarifies.
“And?” I ask.
“If we leave, they’ll people after us.”
“Maybe. They’d still have Haven though, so they may just say ‘good riddance.’”
Echo lets out a quick breath.
“I wonder if Cormac thought of that too. I wonder if he knew we’d think of leaving. That would basically put him in charge,” she says.
I look at her, blue eyes pale in the darkness.
“So what’d you think?” she asks.
“Annabel Lee, who lived by New Sea, here to love and be loved by me,” I say.
She’s thrown by the words. Her soft, wet lips are molding a response when I kiss her.
Chapter 23.
The envoy has been gone a week when Jarvis decides our course for us. He wants to return to his family in Apolis. Knowing her mom is there too, Octavia is already onboard. Apolis may have even sent out search parties for the two, urged by Jarvis’s family and returning caravaners. They both would’ve returned immediately after their implants were destroyed, but something in them wasn’t ready. They needed time to recover, to cope, to adjust. Now all they want is the comforting arms of their loved ones.
“They can endorse you,” Jarvis says to me after declaring his intention.
“Endorse me?” I ask.
“Yeah. Like give you a Writ of Protection. Last Bastion has merchants in Apolis. They won’t want to screw things up with another city-state, right? Apolis may not have a big army, but it’s an important fortified trading post and gives an easy path through the z-line. I’ll get my mom to ask the Governor for a Writ. He can put you under our protection–you know, in case Last Bastion ends up wanting to arrest you or something. Then you can come back to Haven with it. Or … or you could just stay in Apolis.”
Jarvis shrugs, making the last part half a question.
We’ve never been to Apolis. The journey will be dangerous, but the trip makes sense. An endorsement of some kind could prove valuable. Also, Jarvis and Octavia are going regardless, and we have to be sure they reach Apolis safely. Echo and I are in agreement from the start: we’re going.
Cormac proves wary of the plan. He doesn’t know how Last Bastion will react if we’re not in Haven when the envoy returns. Our names are involved in the pending agreement. Nonetheless, he likes the idea of gaining some support from Apolis, and truthfully I don’t think it would screw things up for him if we simply never came back.
When the time comes to leave, everyone gathers in the courtyard to wish us well. Journeys like this are never a sure thing, and we’ve made a lot of friends and admirers here. We receive a lot of gratitude for killing Vermillion. Hell, if the town survives, they’ll probably build us monument. We take rations, new weapons and EMP grenades from Vermillion’s old supply. We’re also given small personal gifts and knick-knacks people have made. We can’t carry it all. I have to remind them we’re coming back–but are we? Can we tolerate living in Last Bastion’s shadow? Depends on how much we like Apolis, I guess.
The four of us on the road together brings more joy than it should. Cyberians and slavetraders travel these parts, and we should be worried. We are worried, but we feel secure at the same time. Travelling with friends, it’s easy to be lulled into a sense of group invulnerability. There are times when we laugh too loud or don’t watch our surroundings as closely as we should. A cold fear strikes me when I realize our incaution. Still, we’re not dumb enough to stay on the main roads. We use them when necessary, but more often we parallel their course a few miles into the forest. More than once, we lie quiet in the brush and use my spyglass to watch strangers pass in the distance. A group of twenty armed robots goes by at one point, scouts and all, and for a while we’re terrified. But they pass, yielding no sign of detection, and I let out the breath I’m holding.
We don’t dare light fires at night. Instead, we sit back-to-back and huddle under blankets while relaxing and eating our rations. Jarvis and Echo set occasional traps, though more for therapy than game. The familiar activity sets their minds at ease and makes them feel useful. Jarvis finds an oak walking stick. It’s the proper height with a good amount of gnarl, and he wields it like a miniature wizard. There’s nothing like a good walking stick to make you feel like a true sojourner of the forest. Before sleep, he and Octavia talk of their families and the things they’ll do in Apolis. Ambrose and Starbucks inevitably come up in conversation. Each mention is like a sliver chipped away from a wooden block of grief; the slivers hurt, but eventually the hands will become numb, and the w
ood will be worn down to nothing.
We keep a watch posted at night. It’s Octavia’s turn–when it happens.
I’ve already taken the second shift and fallen asleep next to Echo. Jarvis is on her other side. A twig cracks in the forest. The crunch of a boot. I think it must be Octavia returning, but then he speaks. My body responds immediately as if it were waiting for just such a trigger. Icy liquid pours into my heart. Fear binds me in invisible coils.
“Wakey, wakey, scream and shaky,” Cabal says.
Perhaps I haven’t mentioned this much–because I shy away from the subject even in my own mind–but even with all we’ve been through, after facing death and enslavement and growth and change, there has lingered a quiet shadow of terror in the background of my mind: the understanding, the belief, that he would one day come upon us unaware. That he would take from me, if not my own life, then that which I had come to cherish even more–the life of Annabel Lee. Here is the demon from under the sea. Here is the jealous angel who would take her away from me. I suspected all along, secretly, that I do not deserve her, that the moment I could allow any admission of feelings for her, she would be ripped away as a matter of principle. Now here is the world’s old and terrible promise, come seeking fulfillment: love and you will suffer.
My eyes shoot open. If you’ve never slept in a forest at night, you don’t know how utterly black it can get. If the trees are full and thick, you can’t see the hand at the end of your arm. It would be like that now, but dawn is drawing closer and the sky has gone from black to a deep blue-gray, enough to provide a general outline.
Two men tower over us.
One is Cabal, bearing a weighty weapon whose end consists of six tubes arranged in a circle. It gives off a low-pitched hum, like a tiger’s purr. I haven’t seen one since Farmington: a particle cannon, the shotgun’s high-tech grandson. The handle of his scimitar pokes up over one shoulder. He carried the sword in the Library, though I hadn’t seen it in Hapsburg; either this is a new one or he didn’t have it on him last time.
I don’t know the second man, but he’s got long greasy hair and stands over Jarvis with a handgun. As Jarvis comes awake, he makes sounds of confusion and dismay. Echo draws a long, panicky gasp as she too wakes into a nightmare.
“All awake? Yes? Good. Always good to see old friends. Imagine stumbling across you way out here. What a surprise,” Cabal says with the amusement of a sadist. His expression is hard to make out in the dim light, but there’s a smile in his voice. It’s his moment of triumph.
“What’s going on? What is this?” Jarvis asks.
“Stay down,” the second man says, pressing a boot to Jarvis’s chest as he tries to rise.
“Where’s Octavia?” Jarvis asks, struggling.
“Stay down,” the man says.
“Where is she?” Jarvis demands, squirming. Crom, is she already dead? Beautiful Octavia, whose sweet lips touched mine in another life …
“I don’t see your robot friend around to save you this time. You turn on him like you did Ballard and Fin, Echo?” Cabal asks.
Echo swears at him.
“Oh, don’t be sore. That’s no kind of language for a lady. But then, no one ever claimed you were a lady, eh? Just another whore. Down, Tristan.”
I’ve risen to my elbows when he swings the particle cannon toward me. I should be furious that he talks to Echo that way. I am, but the outrage is slow to penetrate. It bubbles around the exterior, seeking a way in. The fear has immobilized my mind, sealed itself into a fortress in my brain. I can’t find the words to speak. We’re to be victims of injustice and violence, ambushed in the dark. I wait for the shot that will kill Echo. I see it in my mind as always, and my terror of that end makes it feel inevitable, like our fate is locked into place by the very fear to which it gives rise. I have to master the feeling somehow, yet it imprisons me.
Coward.
Conan would be ashamed. I’m no fit companion, no warrior, no hero. Just another failure. I can’t protect her, can’t stop him, can’t change anything that will happen. If only I could stand up. Lying prone makes us awfully vulnerable.
“How’d you find us?” Echo asks.
“Your little escapade in Haven put your names on a lot of tongues in Last Bastion,” Cabal says.
Since when was he in Last Bastion? But then, of course that’s where he’d go. He was on his way north last we saw him, deserting Foundry’s broken army, on the run from Cove. He must’ve crossed the z-line at Apolis. He’s a mercenary, a cowboy. Strife pays for his dinner. What better place for that than Last Bastion and their private war with Cyberia?
“We’ve got a treaty with Last Bastion,” I say.
“That so? I’m … on vacation,” Cabal says. “After I heard you were at Haven, I couldn’t resist a visit–for old time’s sake. But it almost didn’t happen. You left maybe half a day ahead of us. Ensine’s been tracking you ever since. He’s as good as Fin used to be. You remember Fin, don’t you Echo? I do. I remember how he was walking just ahead of me, laughing, when you gunned him down. What a good person you are. How far had we come together? You wouldn’t have survived without us. But you didn’t even hesitate, did you? Ballard should’ve left you in that cave to starve. Ensine, tie them up.”
His voice turns grim. We can’t let ourselves be bound. He didn’t come here to talk to or steal from us or abduct us. There’s only one reason to tie us up, and that’s to do something terrible before we die. The fear is still there, but a small part of me is calculating, scheming, and it says–
“Wait! We can pay you. We’ve got gold, rare finds.”
I reach for my bag. He’ll stop me, but that doesn’t matter. I’ve just got to get a hand in.
“Don’t move,” Cabal warns, covering me. I freeze with my hand in the bag, looking at him, but my fingers are moving subtly within. I feel the spherical mass. I press and twist.
Five seconds.
“Slowly, Tristan. Take your hand out. You think I care what you’ve got? You’ll pay, oh yes, but not in gold. Ensine, what are you waiting for?”
Ensine holsters his weapon and takes out a black cord, crouching to wrap it around Jarvis’s wrists. There’s a muffled click from the EMP grenade activating its invisible charge, but Cabal talks right over the sound, doesn’t even notice. It’s another few seconds before he frowns, his brow furrowing, looking down at his weapon. The constant hum of the particle cannon has died. The weapon relies on electrical components. His eyes go to mine, to the bag. Fury.
“Son of a–”
I’m scrambling up, lunging at him. He pulls the trigger–but the gun is fried. He swings the butt instead and it thuds into in my left side as I tackle him … which proves harder than I thought. Instead of falling, we only shuffle backwards. It’s like toppling a stone pillar. He’s bigger, stronger, more experienced. He twists and rebalances. My feet are too far behind–I’m heading to the dirt, and I can’t even drag him with me. I hit hard. My hand bumps something wooden. There’s motion in that direction. Scuffling. Grunting. Echo screams. A shot echoes through the forest. Ensine’s gun is the kind that shoots bullets. The EMP won’t help. All this is going on in my periphery, a meter or two away. It might as well be a mile.
As I turn, Cabal is falling on me, the butt of the gun coming down. I shield my face, take the impact on my arms. Again. The gun drops in the dirt. His hands grasp my throat. His teeth are gritted, his eyes wild. I’m prying at his fingers, but they’re like iron. It’s all I can do to keep him from crushing my airway.
Pop, pop, pop …
More flashes to the right. Flecks of dirt hit my eyes, as though ant-sized bombs are detonating a foot away. I glimpse Echo on top of Ensine, Jarvis tangled somewhere in their midst. She’s flailing and clawing, screaming, a crazed animal, one desperate hand struggling with the gun as Ensine squeezes the trigger, pumping shots into the dirt. The gun keeps firing until it makes an empty clicking sound.
I’m writhing, trying to get out from under C
abal. I stop prying with one hand to swing ineffectually at his face. He returns the favor, albeit more solidly. The impact sends black stars radiating outward from my left temple. Through them, I glimpse Jarvis on the ground, Echo and Ensine rolling. He hooks her in the jaw. The blow is very clear, drawn out in time, disheveled blonde hair swinging around in tow.
It’s the sense of injustice that finally triggers the rage. Life has never been fair, but after all we’ve been through, to die like this, to see Echo struck like that, to be incapable of stopping it … The anger is a balloon inflating in my chest. It bursts in a river of rage. It takes everything with it. The spell shatters. Awareness breaks down. Time becomes disjointed.
To a passive observer, a fight like this may occur in a distinct sequence of events, but from the inside, things are fuzzy. Most of it happens very fast, while some crawls by in microseconds. I can’t tell you how I manage to twist free, to topple Cabal sideways, but somehow I manage. Then we’re rolling, grappling, punching, twisting, choking. We’re covered in dirt and grass. He hits me and I don’t care, not in the slightest. My elbow goes into his eye. Somehow we roll up against the struggling trio; we merge into one big clusterfuck. Ensine is on top of Echo with a knife in one hand. The hand is drawn back, ready to plunge, but Jarvis is behind him, restraining his wrist with both hands. There’s blood on all three of them, but I have no idea where it’s coming from.
Then Cabal is off me and I’m halfway to my feet, screaming-mad. There’s wood in my hand–Jarvis’s walking stick–and I’m swinging it, smashing Ensine in the side of the head. He topples sideways. Jarvis falls with him, still holding his wrist, and Echo screams my name in warning, looking past me with terror in her eyes, and I turn–
