The Stars Askew

by Rjurik Davidson

  You’re not much fun, you know, said Aya.

  This time Max didn’t respond. He preferred to let his words settle into Aya, and the mage retreated into himself, processing Max’s accusations slowly. Max sensed Aya was conflicted about his attitude toward the world, like someone who had lost something important that they barely recall.

  Finally Aya said, “Pilgrim, won’t you ride behind me? We’ll reach Lixus together a little quicker.”

  —So you have a heart after all—said Max.

  A moment later the Pilgrim tilted his head up toward Aya, as if looking at him. Dried blood ran like thick tear trails down his cheeks. Beneath the bandages, the blood was brighter, still glistening softly.

  “Pilgrim, your eyes.” Aya stared in shock.

  “Burned out, but somehow they were not properly cauterized. They are infected, I fear.”

  “That’s barbaric, to deprive someone of their sight,” said Aya.

  “No, you misunderstand. I did it to myself. One must show one holds to one’s ideas with certainty and commitment.”

  The horse and the Pilgrim both halted once more, as if some understanding had passed between them. After staring a little more, Aya stepped down to the dusty ground and helped the Pilgrim into the saddle. “Let me ride behind you. That would be best.”

  When the horse began to walk again, Max thought he saw movement in another copse of trees. Something was watching them.

  TWELVE

  Evening was falling, casting long rays of gold over the rugged hills. Shadows deepened between the copses of trees. Stringy trees curled up over the road, like ancient twisted men reaching for the sky. Thick bushes clumped together on the slopes around them, blocking much of their view. But Max knew something was out there. He’d seen it several times from the corner of his eye, first in the scrub to the left of them, then flitting through trees to their right. They were just glimpses, for Aya still controlled his head and eyes. Max was uncertain of what to do. He needed to launch an assault on Aya, to take back control of his body, and the creature in the woods might provide an opportunity. But it would be no use if the thing tore his body to shreds.

  —There’s something out there—said Max.—Did you see it in those bushes on the hill?

  Aya glanced to his right. You’re a worrier. Did you know that?

  The Pilgrim halted suddenly, and Aya brought the horse to a standstill.

  “Did you hear something?” the Pilgrim said.

  Aya pulled on the horse’s reins, looked over his shoulder. “No.”

  Then it came again, echoing between the hills, a rumbling report. It might have been thunder, or it might have been a rockfall. That was it: the sound drifting on the wind that Max had heard earlier. It seemed closer now.

  “I think it was an explosion. There, to the north.” The Pilgrim gestured past the ridges and hills, toward the Etolian range, which rose up, snow still capping its highest peaks.

  At that moment a creature burst into view, its powerful legs driving toward them, one of its three horrid dog’s heads raising up, fixing them with a stare from the corner of one mad eye. The central head jutted forward, baring its yellow teeth, drool dripping as it ran. Meanwhile, the third head was lowered to the ground, as if following a scent. For an instant Max took in the horror of the beast in stunned silence, for there was an otherworldliness to it, as if it had been summoned from the gates of the underworld itself. Each head possessed not two but four eyes, the second two above and behind the first. It seemed like a bear-sized dog, but no dog Max had ever seen: its fangs were too long and cruel. There was something of a lizard to it; its fur gave way to gray scales as its powerful tail tapered off.

  —Gods!—cried Max. —It’s a Cerberus. Ride! Ride!

  The horse reared up, and the Pilgrim slid back against Aya, who crashed to the ground behind it. Pain drove up Aya’s back. The Pilgrim came down on top of them as the horse galloped off, its hooves throwing dust into the air.

  By the time the Pilgrim and Aya dragged themselves to their feet, the thing was almost on them, its body a ball of terrifying muscle.

  The Pilgrim held his staff out in front of him, but it would be no match for the savage creature. The knife in Aya’s hand felt tiny and ineffectual.

  With mesmerizing power, the Cerberus leaped into the air. In an instant the monster would crash onto them, rend them with its terrible claws, tear at them with its slavering teeth.

  Then there was a burst of sounds, somewhere between the ffft of an arrow and the striking of wood on wood. In rapid fire, one after another, bolts plunged into the side of the Cerberus, even as it slammed down on Aya. One of the heads howled in pain, twisted around to look at the five figures rushing out of the bushes behind it. A second head lunged down at Aya, who dropped his knife and grasped the powerful neck, holding the head only inches away. The third head, growling fearfully, twisted and snapped at the blows from the Pilgrim’s staff.

  Then Max was aware of nothing but the yellow fangs, the red gums, the terrible smell of death coming from the creature’s gaping mouth. Reverberations from thudding bolts ran through the Cerberus’s body and into Aya’s arms. He looked up into the four eyes of the dog’s head. The front two stared straight into his. The others—above and behind the first pair—fixed his from an angle, giving the thing a monstrously insane air.

  Aya struggled for equations, but he couldn’t grasp them; they were driven away by terror.

  The Cerberus’s head gave a final thrust, spittle striking Aya’s face. The jaws snapped out. Hot breath warmed his face. Inch by inch the creature came closer, then a milkiness clouded the four eyes. The back two lost focus, rotated up and away from Aya. More thudding reverberations, a sudden warmth on his legs, and the Cerberus collapsed onto him, its strength drained.

  Aya’s breath was crushed from his body. He tried to pull himself out from beneath the beast, but the thing was too large, too heavy. Pain shot up his leg as one foot was twisted against the ground. He tried to draw a breath, struggled to take in the air.

  “Get it off me. I can’t breathe.” Aya’s voice sounded panicky, disturbed, not just by the creature but at his inability to fight it. He was a great mage, wasn’t he? And yet the equations had fled from him.

  Max heard the coughing of an engine, and one of the figures approached. He hadn’t noticed it before, but the figure was encased in a strange metallic exoskeleton, a metal birdlike thing powered by engines strapped to his back. Steam and smoke coughed up into the air behind him. The man rolled the creature off Aya, and he could breathe once more.

  When he had gathered himself, Aya got to his knees and looked at the dead Cerberus. “I knew we should never have grown those things. Stupid idea.”

  Five New-Men looked down at him, one standing in an exoskeleton. Like all New-Men, they were slim and slight. They looked like bandits, hands on hips, bolt-throwers—chunky contraptions with short barrels—held across their bodies or down by their sides. Everything about them—the dirty clothes, the shaggy hair—suggested toughness, but this was offset by their diminutive size.

  “Whatever are you talking about?” said one of the five. Max realized she was a woman, her shaggy hair and boyish looks belying the fact that she was clearly a leader.

  “He says strange things. I wouldn’t worry about it,” said the Pilgrim. “By the rapidity of your speech, I’m guessing you’re men from Tir-Aki.”

  The New-Men glanced at one another quickly. “Very good.”

  Their leader looked at the fading horizon, then back to the dead Cerberus. “We’d better set up camp. Maybe a bit down the road, though. This thing’s going to stink before long.”

  “Oh, it stinks already, I assure you.” Aya wiped the thing’s spittle off his face.

  * * *

  Soon the fire was crackling, and the leader of the Tir-Akians, whose name was Kari, settled down to talk to Aya and the Pilgrim. She laid out a thin silk shift in front of her and began to dismantle her bolt-thrower to clean
it. Max was fascinated to see the inner workings of the mechanism, comprised of a compression chamber, a cartridge containing thirty bolts, and internal pins and wheels. He’d seen new automatic bolt-throwers in Caeli-Amur, but this was more complex than those.

  Elsewhere, another New-Man adjusted things on the exoskeleton. “Why do I always have to tune it?”

  “Because you’re the one who gets to wear it,” said two others in unison.

  The New-Men were renowned for their innovative technology. Max thought of Quadi, his New-Man friend who had helped him construct the air-cart Max used in his journey to the Sunken City. What had happened to Quadi? He’d been gone by the time Max returned from Caeli-Enas.

  “We were tracking that beast for a week. Whenever we got close, it sensed us and slipped away. Until it started hunting you, and we could finally catch up with it.”

  “Why were you tracking it?” said the Pilgrim.

  “The creature took seven of our men out in the mountains.” Kari gestured into the darkness. “We were sent to kill it so the workers would be safe.”

  “Workers, out there in the mountains?” said the Pilgrim. “What are you doing?”

  “Building a railroad, of course. Straight through the mountains, to Caeli-Amur.”

  No one said anything until Aya asked, “But why?”

  “Progress.” The little woman’s face lit up with excitement. “The adventure of development. To build new wonders. To change the world.”

  “That sounds awful,” said Aya.

  Kari shrugged. “We are Tir-Akians, you know. Anyway, the Prince of Tir-Aki has thrown his weight behind the railroad. He wants to see it finished before long. Where are you headed?”

  “To the Teeming Cities,” said the Pilgrim. “I have spiritual work to do there.”

  Kari frowned, began to reassemble her bolt-thrower. “Such a strange idea, the spirit. Do you really think there is something other than the material?”

  “It’s a metaphor,” said the Pilgrim. “But the material world won’t help you when the next cataclysm comes. At that point, your railroad will be thrown into the air, torn apart. Your machines will fall to the earth. Their gears will grind until they no longer work.”

  Kari gave a bemused frown.

  “Don’t worry,” said Aya. “He’s always like this. Probably would have been better if you’d let the Cerberus tear him to shreds.”

  “You would have missed me,” said the Pilgrim.

  Aya and Kari both laughed. It seemed the Pilgrim had a sense of humor after all.

  * * *

  In the morning they watched as the Tir-Akians left the road for the journey north into the mountains, where the railway was being built. Aya and the Pilgrim continued. Low foothills ran to their right, along the southeastern side of the Etolian range. Behind them the mountains rose up high, their peaks always capped with white. As they journeyed on, the Pilgrim spoke much of Caeli-Amur and its fate. Aya listened eagerly, grasping at the details, attempting to reconstruct the city’s and world’s histories. The Pilgrim indulged him for some time, then said, “Did you never receive any education, stranger?”

  Aya said, “I come from a foreign country where they do things differently. Everything seems new and strange here.”

  “I sense a deep purpose to you.”

  “How can you be sure you will reach these Teeming Cities?” said Aya. “We barely survived one attack. Without the New-Men, we would both be dead. The wilderness is a dangerous place.”

  “Not as dangerous as Caeli-Amur,” said the Pilgrim. “Out here, the threats are clear and obvious. Back there, everything is hidden. It always has been. When the Houses were overthrown, the seditionists claimed they would build a fairer new world. One of the seditionist leaders, Georges, made me lead him through the Arbor Palace and evaluate each of the objects there. In the north wing of the palace, hanging over the lake, he has a treasury he set up, filled with goods he clearly planned to steal. He was already buying town houses in the city, accumulating a private fortune. Not once did I see evidence of this new world they were promising.”

  Again these truths rattled against Max’s beliefs. The mention of Georges sparked the memory of that strange empty pleasure palace beneath the mountain, where he had seen him with a second figure. Both were headed toward the Elo-Talern. Who was Georges accompanying and what was he doing? Max wondered.

  Aya nodded. “Power corrupts. I have seen it myself. I myself have felt the lure and pull of that fool’s gold. Alerion felt it too, and he capitulated.”

  “Alerion? The god?” The Pilgrim was confused.

  “He wasn’t always a shit, you know,” said Aya.

  —You were friends!—said Max. —You and Iria and Alerion together. You were close!

  “Well, I wouldn’t go that far. Iria liked him more than I did,” said Aya aloud.

  “What?” said the Pilgrim, now thoroughly puzzled.

  —No wonder the war was so bitter—said Max. —No wonder you’re so cold-blooded. There’s nothing worse than the betrayal of someone close to you.

  “There’s nothing worse than listening to you and your amateur speculations,” said Aya.

  “Who are you talking to?” said the Pilgrim.

  “Oh, just another little shit,” said Aya. “Kind of like a memory you can’t get rid of. But all memories fade in the end. Then they’re forgotten.”

  THIRTEEN

  The garrulous Thom had vanished into the ether, and despite scouring the Quaedian for several days, Kata and Rikard had found no traces of him. Kata pictured him squirrelled away in his garret, afraid of his enemies, afraid of what he knew, waiting for the Insurgent Assembly.

  She pieced together what she knew: the Technis official Armand had escaped to Varenis with the Prism of Alerion, said to contain the dying spirit of the god. Aceline and Thom must have discovered the letter in the Technis Complex. Thom was supposed to meet her at the Opera, but he had missed the rendezvous. Terrified of whatever else he’d discovered, he sent Kata with the letter to the baths. There Aceline was meant to show it to the thaumaturgists as evidence that there was a conspiracy afoot. Meanwhile, the thaumaturgists knew someone had been stealing funds from the Marin coffers and smuggling them through the canals beneath the city. To whom? And what was the dark truth Thom would reveal at the Assembly?

  Kata could ask Henri to find Thom, but she wanted the boy to have a better life than the one she had grown up in. She remembered the brutality of her days on the streets. So instead she asked another urchin, a young girl called Rikki, to find him. The whole time Kata had felt the guilt of it: to protect one child and not another, was that what it was to be a parent in the world? Something had changed within her. No longer could she treat lives in the same cold and calculating fashion she’d been used to. When Rikki returned, she said there was a boy in the Quaedian who Thom had sometimes used—a boy called Pol—but Pol had disappeared. Kata told Rikki to stop searching. She couldn’t bear the thought of her disappearing too.

  As she mulled it over in her apartment, Henri said, “I know Pol. I could find him.”

  “If Rikki couldn’t, then neither could you.” Kata tried to convince herself.

  “I could, you know. I know where he hides. I know everything.” Henri broke into his unstoppable cough, which Kata decided she finally had to act on.

  She led him through the factory district and toward the apothecary on Boulevarde Karlotte. Morning fog hung over the city and showed no sign of lifting. They climbed up the cold alleyways and stairs, past half-empty and barely functioning factories. Varenis now refused to trade with anyone who traded with Caeli-Amur. This had immediately closed off all imports and exports to the Dyrian coast, Numeria, the Northerners. Now bedraggled workers lurked around their former workplaces by habit, as if they might find their machines miraculously repaired. Others lay empty, ghostly remnants of industry in the hovering gloom.

  Henri grumbled, “Don’t need no apothecary.”

  Kata th
rew her arm around the boy’s shoulders and pulled him toward her. “Years on the street. We need to have that cough checked out.”

  Henri pushed her away. “Don’t. Anyway, it’s you who should see the apothecary, what with you having fits.”

  “That’s something I’ve had for years,” said Kata. “You know I drink a preparation for that.”

  A group of urchins darted toward them from a side alley. They moved like a flock of birds, sensing one another’s positions and adjusting their scurrying as they went. Several of them broke away from the main body, rejoined. Kata tensed briefly at the sight of them, for she knew their sly smiles were just as likely to hide deadly intent.

  “Henri,” said a girl of about twelve years old, evidently the leader of the group. Her shoulder-length hair was lank and almost a gray color. “Aceline’s been murdered by the Houses. People are all worked up. There’s a big mob marching on the Arantine. Going to be good pickings up there.”

  Henri took a little step away from Kata; she sensed his embarrassment at being caught with a mother figure.

  The girl turned to one of the other urchins, a boy of about six with a dirty face and red hair who was pissing against the wall. She snarled in disapproval, revealing a crooked line of teeth in her pretty but severe face. The boy backed away, still pissing, as the girl turned back to Henri. “Who’s this?”

  “My friend Kata,” Henri said.

  “You want to come?” said the girl.

  Henri took a few steps toward the group but was halted by Kata’s quickly grabbing his arm.

  “We’ve got somewhere to go, Henri,” Kata said.

  The girl shrugged and kicked the little redheaded boy’s dirty shorts. “Jacques! No pissing in public. Come on, let’s go.”

  The group scurried across the street, up another alleyway toward Via Persine.

  Kata did a quick calculation: Ejan had released the information about Aceline’s death. The Assembly was scheduled for that night. Using the citizens’ anger would give his proposals greater force against their enemies.