Crystal Rain

by Tobias S. Buckell

  “I swam.” Pepper had left the Teotl’s submarine on the bottom of the harbor to sneak up the side of the ship.

  “What makes you think I don’t already believe you’re crazy?”

  Pepper pulled his finger out from between the slats and rearranged the ropes behind him so that he could lean back comfortably. He could see John’s arms through the slats as John turned to walk away.

  “By the way, John, Jerome is safe.”

  John turned and pointed his hook at Pepper. “If you’re—”

  “He’s with the Frenchi. He’ll be safe.” Pepper settled back farther in the darkness of the locker.

  “And Shanta?”

  “Your wife? I did not meet her. Sorry.”

  John walked over to the rail, his back to Pepper. “If you’re messing with my head, Pepper, I swear I’ll throw you overboard.”

  “Okay.”

  John let go of the railing and walked away. Pepper leaned back for a short nap, but as always, half of him remained alert. John deBrun had no memories, Pepper thought as he drifted. It made sense that John might have done something drastic like that.

  Pepper had spent almost 298 years trapped in a near-dead escape pod before landing on Nanagada. Both he and John had expected the pulse that had shut down civilization. It was that or let the Teotl own them. They had also expected it would be a decades-long journey back from the destroyed wormholes in tiny, barely functioning vehicles that they’d hardened to survive the pulse. But things went wrong, and instead of decades, they saw centuries. They both had the modifications, and the pods the recycling equipment, needed to hunker down for that kind of time, though.

  It had almost driven Pepper mad. Apparently John suffered as well.

  Pepper spent months after arriving on Nanagada catching up on the changes and trying to hunt down John. He’d thought he was close when he’d arrived in Brungstun, but the Azteca invaded. He’d thought he was close in Capitol City, when he tracked John down, but John didn’t remember a thing.

  Now he was on a steamship with John going north, but John didn’t have a clue as to why this was all so important.

  Apparently the Loa remembered the Ma Wi Jung, though, and had ordered an expedition. That they’d chosen John to lead it meant they knew something about his past. The Teotl knew something about John. Pepper knew a lot about John. Everyone knew something about John’s past except John.

  Damn annoying that he would find John alive and that John wouldn’t even know who either of them was.

  Still, the right people were going to the right places. So Pepper was content to doze off on the bundle of ropes and see what happened.

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  Haidan walked with Dihana down the dirt road toward one of the great arches leading out of the city into the towns and forests around Capitol City.

  “When I was just a little girl,” Dihana said with a sweep of her hand, “I used to sneak away to explore it all. It’s beautiful.”

  Haidan looked around. “They was putting up a new iron mill,” he said, a twinge of sadness in his voice. “Now it on hold, they coming in behind the walls and getting ready for the Azteca.”

  They had argued about such progress before the Azteca threat. Dihana had been excited to see the city spill out beyond the walls into the land of the peninsula. Haidan loved the jungle and worried about how to defend the settlements outside city walls. But now Haidan was interested in seeing more airships launched into the sky, and he wanted to observe tests of the wheeled guns on the great walls. He wanted the gunners to have the Azteca in their sights when the fighting began. He wanted Dihana’s factories to build more guns, more bullets.

  The land outside Capitol City’s walls had taken on a nightmarish quality. Men worked in shifts to pull down trees and give an unobstructed field of fire around the walls for defense. Arced trenches inched their way out around the walls. Haidan had created three zones of alternated trenches, then fire zones lined with explosives and flammables between them. Long fences of barbed wire sagged everywhere between large pointed stakes in the ground.

  Caravans of Nanagadans trundled through the defenses on roads manned with mongoose-men and spiked gates to seek safety inside Capitol City. Thousands every day. And whenever Haidan doubted more could be fit in the city, Dihana managed to find ways.

  “How many gates are shut?” Dihana asked.

  “We got half of them,” Haidan said. Mortared over, guns and bombs ready to defend them. “By the end of today only two will remain open.” The northernmost gate, a small road-gate, would allow defenders out in the trenches. The southern one was riskier, a full railroad access gate; it would allow trains in and out of the city under heavy guard.

  “How long will it take for them to get the gates?” Dihana asked.

  Hard question. Haidan looked out over the mongoose-men’s battle plans made real, carved into the landscape. “A month if everything go right, and they go lose a lot of men,” he guessed. “We retreating, and losing men, but here we ready.” The Azteca would come in along the north rails, and Haidan intended for them to stay there. In addition to the trenches, he’d flooded the land between the north and south rails and put men all along the southern rail to keep it in the city’s control. The strong guard along the southern rail and the flooded middle area should convince the Azteca to continue to funnel themselves along the north rail, and Haidan would make good use of that. And having the southern rail kept open meant that they could still receive volunteers, and more important, any supplies, from southern coast towns such as Linton or Hawk’s Nest.

  The best minds in Capitol City had considered how best to defend the city walls. With Dihana and Haidan leading them, they had made sure many Azteca would die trying to cross the ground in front of Capitol City. If Haidan could juggle this battle just right, he could drag it out for the Azteca much longer than just a month outside the walls. Maybe two or three. And once they camped along the walls, it would be a waiting game. Who starved first?

  Haidan worried about the threat from above. Massive numbers of Azteca airships had come over the mountains to fly with the moving army. They supplied it and guided it over the land, sped up the invasions of towns along the way. His airmen spoke of a miles-long line of gaudy Azteca airships coasting over columns of Azteca along the Triangle Tracks near Petite Mabayu, halfway along the Tracks to Capitol City. They could fly over Capitol City’s walls and bomb it. They could get warriors into the city later into the battle by air as well. Haidan tried to compensate for that with what few igniting shells they had on hand. He’d also armed their own airships with weapons.

  “We lost a lot of men in the retreating. They still in the bush, hiding. Lot of them dead most likely.” Dihana walked with him under the thick walls. “It make me crazy trying to think of every way they could get in,” Haidan said.

  “Yeah,” Dihana agreed.

  “Someone say we need extra gun up on the wall to defend the harbor.”

  “The harbor?” Dihana shook her head.

  “I doubt we need anything there. No one ever hear of any Azteca ship. Still, I have some smaller weapon mounted out there.” Haidan kept walking. “If it happen, we can wheel gun out there.”

  Dihana nodded. “I could get some lookouts there, just in case.”

  “That good.” Haidan pulled out a handkerchief and started coughing into it.

  Dihana paused with him. “You okay?”

  Haidan stopped, wiped his lips, and continued on. He didn’t want Dihana to know how bad the cough had gotten. He stayed up later and later, pushing himself to plan for as much as he could think of. And he tried to delegate it so that if he died, he’d have done as much as he could have.

  “year.”

  By sea, by land, by air.

  The hardest part was the waiting. The tense expectation in the air, the worried and weary looks on everyone’s face. Haidan saw the occasional nervous look back to the edge of the jungle from random people in the street. And in front
of the jungle a whole mile of stripped, brown earth.

  The best thing, Haidan knew, was to keep busy.

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  John sat with Oaxyctl at the rear of the steamship. The moon remained covered by threatening clouds. A lantern swung on the mizzenmast’s boom overhead, throwing its light around in time to the gentle swaying of La Revanche.

  “Marlinespike,” John said. More knots, trying to tie away the time that slipped past them every day. He wondered how much closer the Azteca were to Capitol City. “Sailors been tying knots for centuries and centuries. On all different worlds.” He held up a six-foot length of half-inch rope. “Or so they say.” Just floating here, waiting for the repairs to finish, caused his stomach to knot with impatience.

  “I know some knots.” Oaxyctl held up his piece of rope.

  “But do you know many knots used on a ship?”

  Oaxyctl shrugged.

  John held up the end of his rope in his hand. “This is the bitter end of the rope.”

  “Bitter end. And the other end?” Oaxyctl pointed at the part by his feet.

  “Standing part.”

  “Bitter end and standing part.” Oaxyctl looped the rope over itself and tied it. “There is a good knot.”

  “A square knot. A child’s very first,” John chuckled. “You can tie your shoe with it, but that isn’t the most useful on a single line, but for tying two lines together.”

  “Oh.” Oaxyctl looked down at the knot as if it were about to bite him.

  “Here is a knot you should know.” John held out his hook arm. He took the rope and laid it over his arm, brought it back around in a loop toward himself, then crossed over the first loop and back under itself. He snugged it tight around his arm. “Clove hitch.”

  “They taught me that for the fenders we had over the side when we were in harbor.” Oaxyctl lashed his piece of rope to the nearby rail.

  “Glad to see you quickly learning things out Here.” John untied the rope from the rail. “This next one is a sailor’s favorite knot.” He held the rope in his hands for a second. He’d never even got to teach this one to Jerome. He should have. Too busy sailing about, having fun.

  He looked up the deck toward the brig. Was Jerome really safe?

  “You okay?” Oaxyctl asked.

  “Yeah.” John looked back down at the rope. He pinched the burned end with his fingers, running a thumb under the smooth nubbin. “Yeah. I’ll do this one-handed. You take the end and make a loop overtop, then come back around under and through the loop, dip under the standing edge, and come back into the loop.” John held the loop with his hook and cinched the knot tight. “Makes a fixed loop. Good for anchors and towropes. The reason we like it is”—John tugged the knot and it fell apart—“because it doesn’t bind itself so tight you can’t undo it.”

  “I see.”

  “That one was called the bowline.” The rope draped over his hook like a pale, limp snake.

  Oaxyctl copied the moves.

  “Make sure the bitter end goes back in—yeah, like that.” John watched.

  Barclay, his blue uniform scuffed and wet, squatted next to them. “Marlinespike?”

  “Yeah.” John nodded. “Bowline.”

  “That the good stuff there.” Barclay smiled. “Mr. deBrun, we got the patch welded on, and we already pull up the canvas.”

  “Right, right,” John said, excited. “And it’s holding?”

  “Yeah. We add some crossbeam, the spare boom, to push against it.”

  “Good. And the rudder cable?”

  “Fixed. And it go hold.”

  John clapped the commander on the back. “Then let’s get back in motion. Now. Waste no time.” Barclay ran off and John walked back from the aft rails toward the cockpit. “Get ready to sail!” he ordered. Crew napping by the rails or on cabin tops stirred and sat up, rubbing their eyes. “Bring in the sea anchor. Move everyone, move!”

  They were moving forward again. That was good. They didn’t have time to waste.

  Much later, once John had men up in the crow’s nest with binoculars to comb the horizon, he sought out Oaxyctl below in the crew quarters in the forward cabin. He passed the galley and gimballed stoves. The rank smell of pea soup clung to the heavy belowdecks air.

  Dodging swinging hammocks of sleeping men, he found Oaxyctl sitting under his limp hammock. “Hey.” John lay down and rested his head against the hull as Oaxyctl put down the piece of rope.

  “I’m sorry about being short, when I talked to you about Azteca.” John could feel the ship flexing as it moved over the waves. Everything creaked in time to that rhythm. “We’ve been on the run since the invasion began. I’ve had no time to stop, or think.”

  Oaxyctl folded his hands and looked at John.

  “I’ll be honest,” John said. “I know … some things about Azteca. Assumptions. Rumors from other people. But I have seen and known Tolteca. And you. So I know there must be some way to talk through this. We must have some common ground. Right? It’s just the mountains that divide.” John shifted to lean on his good arm and looked at Oaxyctl. “What’s it like on other side of the mountains, Oaxyctl?”

  “It is the land of the gods.” Oaxyctl spoke softly, and slowly, deep in the ship’s hull, surrounded by sleeping men in their hammocks. “They carry them through the streets in full procession, with finery. All the way up to their pyramids, where the steps flow with blood in their honor.” Oaxyctl leaned his head back and closed his eyes. He smiled. “Where the people are all bronze and almondeyed. Smooth-skinned, and well-toned. You know, I even miss the ladies of the night chewing chicle by the lakestreet side.”

  John shifted quietly, trying not to break Oaxyctl’s attention.

  “Capitol City is in fear,” Oaxcytl said. “They should be, because the priests have already arrived and demanded the city’s surrender. Soon the first waves of warriors will arrive to capture as many Nanagadans as possible to be their servants, and the most honored prisoners will be sacrificed. They will capture Capitol City. With these new sacrifices, the sun be convinced to rise again, and the crops will be full and good.”

  “Do you think they can take the city?”

  “Yes.” Oaxyctl’s eyes remained closed, his mind in another country.

  “Why?”

  “Because they are the best. For hundreds of years they have fought each other in the Flower Wars. All of the seven kingdoms do this. Over and over. We capture the priests, show whose god is more powerful, and take the prisoners to the altars to offer blood, or to our homes as servants. And all seven of these kingdoms march towards Capitol City now.”

  “But why now? The Flower Wars, are they not enough for the gods? What have we done to provoke this?”

  “The gods command it,” Oaxyctl said. “That is all.”

  “Which gods? The ones you say are captured during Flower Wars? What happens to those? Are all the gods united in purpose? How do they rule? How do—”

  “Mortals don’t question the gods. They talk among each other. The gods decide our fate.” Oaxyctl’s voice quavered. “That is the land and the people”—Oaxyctl opened his eyes and looked around—“that lie on the other side of the Wicked Highs. That is how it is like.”

  “Once your land,” John said. “But no longer.”

  “Right. But I still miss it.”

  John reached out with his hook and tapped Oaxyctl’s shoulder. “That must be very hard.”

  “It is. It is very hard.”

  “But at least you have a life to remember. I don’t have anything to go back to when I lie awake at night. And the life I made for myself now has been taken away from me.”

  They fell quiet. La Revanche pierced the waves and drained seawater back into the ocean through the scuppers on her sides. The clouds eventually hid the moon giving them light through the portholes. Everything became swathed in pitch-black.

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  The swells calmed. The steamship no longer plunged its bow into
the troughs of the vicious north seas, but cut its way through a small white chop that sprang up with a strong wind. A lone seagull swooped down into the small waves by La Revanche’s side. It plunged its beak into the water to pluck out a struggling fish that glinted silver in the sun.

  “I see reef.” John held a brass spyglass to his left eye, balancing it on the end of his hook. He handed it over to Barclay.

  Barclay stared through it. “Yeah, that look right.”

  “Good, good.” John smiled. Barclay’s blue uniform looked ragged and unwashed. “You ever navigate the Lantail Reefs before?”

  “Once I see them, I know the reef.”

  “Then take the helm. Put us right through the middle channel.” If they skirted the islands, there was always a chance of hitting hidden offshore reef thanks to faulty charts. The islands and the channel were well-known, a safe bet. “I’m going up the mast.” John walked down the deck, pulled himself up onto the rail, and took to the ropes to clamber up and join the men in the crow’s nest. They watched him use his hook to maneuver up through the ropes and gave him a hand getting in.

  “It a nice view from up here, eh?” John stood up with them.

  “Yeah, but it look like a lot reefs is around.”

  They could see the craggy hills of the Lantails, and the water brightened from a dark blue into an aquamarine as the water got shallow. John shared the nest with his men until they passed through the worst of the reef, barking down warnings as they sidled too close to the brown patches of coral and rock.

  The islands loomed up on either side as they went up the middle of the channel.

  The Lantails. It meant they were over a third of the way there. They were making good time.

  When John was navigator on the outbound expedition, the Lantails had been the edge of the map: the place where the largest fishing vessels stopped and turned around. The reefs extended outward for miles and miles, notorious for sinking explorers this far north.