Aetherium (Omnibus Edition)

by Joseph Robert Lewis

  The pain in her back sharpened suddenly, and she cried out as she stumbled to her feet, and ran.

  Her legs devoured a league or three, or maybe only a half. As she ran, there was no road and no hills and no legs, there was only the blast of wind in her eyes and the burning in her blood. The sun’s fire and gold shone on the horizon, just barely, just enough to banish the black of night and leave the sky a dusky violet in the west and a pale slate blue in the east. And as she came through a dip in the road she recognized the narrow path off to the side, and she darted away from the road into the tall dead grass. She heard the trickle of the water long before she saw it, and she heard the leathery creaking of the little paddles in the stream long before she saw them.

  The mill. And Erik. Erik will know what to do. He knows about animals, and traps, and habits, and instincts. He’ll know about foxes. He’ll know some trick. He’s had hours to deal with this. He’ll know some trick to hold it in, to hold it back. Erik will help me.

  She bounded down to the grassy bank and leapt clear over the water and stumbled into the stone wall of the water mill. The stones were cold against the naked palms of her hands and she paused to look at her hands again.

  The fur. Is it thinner? Lighter?

  She moved toward the curtained doorway of the mill. Over the sloshing and trickling and babbling of the stream, she could clearly hear the slow and heavy breathing of the man inside. For a moment she thought of the miller and his brother, deformed and tortured. But she had only glimpsed the brother after Freya had killed them both, and there were marks on the ground that she read as a body being dragged out of the mill.

  Erik cleaned it out, of course. Those two are long gone, probably floated down the stream when he first got here.

  She took a deep breath.

  He’ll understand. He’s infected too. He’ll look a little different, like me, but it’s all right. We’ll be safe here, for now.

  She exhaled and drew back the curtain.

  Blood painted the walls and floor of the mill, and fat black flies buzzed out at her in a cloud of angry wings. She yelled and jerked back, swatting the flies away, but they hovered over the water and they hovered around her, walking on her.

  Not bloodflies. Just regular flies. Corpseflies.

  She could feel their tiny legs on her face, landing and walking and flying away again. She pressed her lips tightly and squinted with both arms raised around her head, and she stepped inside the mill again.

  The blood lay in thick, congealing splashes on the walls and floor, with small black lumps glistening in the pale morning light. Her gaze swept across the room to the far end, to the shadowy shape lying on the floor. The figure moved, and a chain rattled against the wall.

  He chained himself. That’s good. He’s being careful.

  “Erik?” she whispered. “Are you asleep?”

  The figure snorted and groaned.

  “Erik?”

  The head rose from the floor and two golden eyes stared at her as a long black tongue curled inside a yawning muzzle.

  Wren stepped back. “Erik?”

  The reaver dashed at her, snarling and snapping its fangs. But the chains drew taut and the creature crashed to the floor, twisting and kicking as it struggled to get free of the chains. Wren stumbled back into the blood-soaked wall and felt something soft under her boot. She looked down at the shredded remains of a sheep’s leg. The reaver scrambled up to its feet again and stood at its full height, head bent against the ceiling, arms straining against the chains locked to its wrists.

  Choking on the stench of blood and viscera, Wren turned toward the door and again her foot found a strange shape in the blood. She didn’t want to look, but she heard a metallic scrape so she glanced down and saw a long steel spear lying against the wall. She looked at the spear, and then she looked at the reaver, and then she ran outside and vomited in the stream.

  When her belly was empty, she sat by the water, washing her face and rinsing out her mouth. After a few moments she leaned over the rippling waters and saw the dark smudge on the end of her nose and the tips of her ears poking through her hair. And then she looked at her cold, dripping hand.

  It was bare skin.

  The fur is gone!

  She yanked off her shirt and stared at her bare, fur-less, hair-less arms and she felt their smoothness until the chill air made them dimple with gooseflesh. Then she stood and found that her skirts hung to their proper length against her boots. And as she pulled her shirt back on and reached for her blanket, she realized she could no longer feel the pounding of her heart in her chest, though she could hear it faintly.

  She wrapped the blanket around herself and sat with her back against the wall of the mill and watched the little bone and leather paddles turning in the sparkling water. The sun was up now and the sky was pale blue and soft white clouds stretched across the heavens.

  She shivered.

  “Thank you, Allfather. Oh, thank you, thank you. I take it all back! You’re a perfectly lovely god of seidr-magic and death!”

  And as the sun warmed her face and the stones at her back, she felt her fears melt away, draining out or her weary bones, and she slept.

  Wren awoke slowly. She was lying on her side in an awkward heap, tangled in her blanket. The sun was high and the air was mild, and aside from an empty belly and a pleasant warmth between her legs that reminded her of the dream she had just left behind, she felt wonderfully solid and whole and safe. She touched her ears and found them just as tall as before, and she gently stroked the soft hair on them, feeling the way it swept up either side of her head to two downy tufts. It was a strangeness, to be sure, but it did not frighten her.

  They’ll go away, or they won’t. But I’m still me.

  She leaned over the stream, trying to see her reflection clearly in the rippling waters, and she saw that her eyes were far more gold than green.

  That’s hardly even a change, is it?

  A low shuffling sound rose in the mill behind her, and she turned to look at the blank stone wall. Then she went to the door and held the leather curtain open, letting the light fall on the furry form hunched in the far corner.

  It must be him. He hasn’t growled or barked or anything. He can’t make a sound, even like this.

  “I’m sorry, Erik. But Freya is all right. She made it back. And she said she found another man called Omar. Did you meet him? I think he might be able to help. They were supposed to find a cure, you know. And just look at me. I’m getting better all on my own. Look.” She held out her bare arm. And gradually, as she stood there looking down at Erik, she remembered the bloodfly that bit her as she crept out of the city in the morning gloom.

  A bloodfly. In winter?

  Her jaw dropped and a fresh tear came to her eye.

  Is that possible? Well, for a god, most certainly. It really was Woden. He sent me the cure in a bloodfly!

  She smiled at the reaver. “There is a cure.” She touched one of her tall, hairy ears. “Well, sort of. But it’s going to be all right. I’ll stay with you until Freya comes. Then we’ll find the cure for you too, and then it’ll all be like it was before.” She knelt down and picked up the spear on the floor and dragged it out into the light, and then she washed it as best she could in the cold stream and scrubbed the blood away with a fistful of dead grass.

  And then Wren sat back down at the door of the mill with the spear standing between her legs, leaning against her shoulder. “Well, Woden, it seems you managed to redeem yourself again, this time. And thank you again for that. But I just want to know why I can’t have a simple, normal friend? I mean, really, Gudrun and that woman in the cellar and poor Erik here. Am I really such bad company? I know I shouldn’t complain. I’m alive and well, and free, with the hearing of a fox, no less. But it’s hard not to feel sorry for myself when all I want is a sane person to talk to, like Freya, for example. I know you understand, Allfather. After all, you made me this way. So really, it’s your own fault you ha
ve to listen to me now. So I don’t want to hear any complaints from you about it.”

  Wren rested her chin on her knee and closed her eyes. From the distant north came a cold and lonely howl, and she tightened her grip on the spear.

  Chapter 26

  Freya stood in the cold morning light staring at the rusted door of the cell half-buried in the earth under the castle’s south wall. She could hear Katja shuffling about inside, the noises echoing in the confined space. And she heard a pair of boots crunching toward her across the trampled, icy snow.

  “Good morning, fair lady.”

  “Morning. Is there any sign of Wren yet?”

  “I’m afraid not. Is your sister down in there?” Omar asked.

  Freya nodded. “I slipped her some meat this morning. I hope it was enough.” She hesitated. “That was you shouting over the water last night, wasn’t it?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know who that was. I heard it just as I was coming inside the south wall.”

  “Any idea who it was?”

  “I do not. Perhaps some poor fisherman was out on the water, fighting with a reaver in the middle of the bay,” he said. “Did you sleep last night?”

  “Like a corpse,” she said. “Thank you for keeping watch by my room all night.”

  “It was the least I could do,” he said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small device of shiny brass and blue-tinted glass, which he unfolded and then placed on his face, with the two brass hooks wrapped around his ears and the two blue lenses resting in front of his eyes to shade them. He smiled at her. “I got them in Tingis, a lovely little seaside town in Marrakesh. Do you like them?”

  She smiled. “You look ridiculous.”

  He smiled back. “You know, I brought that nest here to use on your sister, to test my vaccine on a fully-turned reaver and to prove to everyone that it would work as a cure, to some extent. I wanted to meet the sister of the fearless Freya.”

  “I’m sorry that you won’t get to. She’d like you.”

  “Ah, she likes handsome men?”

  “She likes funny men,” Freya said. “But the only ones bitten with the vaccine were me and Leif. Small good that will do. I’m sorry I lost all of your hard work.”

  “Lost?” Omar grinned. “Those bloodflies are out in the city somewhere right now, nipping away at people one by one.”

  “Maybe. But how much good can half a dozen flies do before they’re all swatted to death?”

  “Half a dozen?” Omar glanced toward the courtyard where the guards were standing beside a burning brazier, and then he leaned in closer to the huntress. “That nest I brought to the castle was just a sample, as I said, to test on your sister. Skadi was right to search the city as she did, she knows me too well. I scattered the other nests everywhere, and I doubt the guards will find them before they hatch today.”

  “You made more nests? With more bloodflies?” Freya grabbed his arm. “How many?”

  Omar glanced up at the sky and the sunlight glanced off his blue glasses. “I believe I made thirty-one nests, and they will probably all have between one and two hundred vaccine-laden flies when they hatch. Most of them are inside the city walls, but I left a few outside in the hills as well, just in case any reavers wander too close to the city.”

  “But that’s… that’s thousands of flies!” Freya smiled and threw her arms around him. “In just a few hours, everyone in the city will be safe from the reavers’ venom, and in a few days or weeks, all the reavers will be cured, too!”

  Omar held up his hands. “Let’s not be hasty. As I said, I had no chance to test the flies on people or on reavers. I have no idea what exactly will happen, or when.”

  “But what about me and Leif? We were battered and exhausted when the flies bit us, and within a few moments we were both as healthy as mountain goats. After watching his leg heal, I wouldn’t be surprised if Leif’s arm grew back!”

  Omar snorted. “Let’s hope not. He’s dangerous enough with just the one. Although, growing a new arm would be extremely painful for him, and I would enjoy that a great deal.”

  “Right, you mentioned that you grew an arm back once.” Freya paused, unsure of what else to say. She didn’t have much experience with lost limbs, except for the time when she watched Katja remove a man’s shattered finger that had become infected, and that hadn’t seemed very dramatic to anyone at the time. “You said you lost it when the skyship crashed—Nine hells, I forgot!” Freya’s eyes went wide. “The woman in the cellar, the pilot from your skyship, she’s in the cellar!”

  “Wait, who’s in the—Riuza!” Omar grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the front of the castle. “Take me to her, now!”

  They dashed through the dining hall and down the corridor, and stumbled down into the dark cellar. Freya was about to lead the way across the room, groping through the blackness, when a blinding white light filled the chamber, illuminating the sacks of potatoes, the salted seal meat, the blueberry preserves, and endless other bags and jars and piles of stored food. Omar held his bright blade over his head as he scanned the room, and then he charged past Freya to the far wall where he planted his sword in the dirt floor and wrapped his arms gingerly around the emaciated woman folded up in the corner.

  Freya came to stand just behind him. “I’m sorry. I just found out about her yesterday. Wren found her. Skadi put her here for stealing parts from the drill and trying to build a ship out of metal.”

  Omar ignored her as he gently rocked the frail woman in his arms and whispered quietly into her hair.

  Freya looked away, feeling awkward and useless and guilty for not telling him sooner, as soon as they were alone, but it had been the furthest thing from her mind. And even now as she watched him comfort the broken remains of his friend, her only thoughts were for Wren, Katja, and Erik.

  Omar looked up at her abruptly with a confused and miserable look in his eyes.

  “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Freya said. “I should have remembered sooner.”

  “No, no, fair lady,” he said softly. “You didn’t do anything wrong here. Not you. It’s just that it doesn’t make any sense. Riuza did steal the parts to build her boat, but when she was caught the king simply removed her from the project and made me the foreman in her place. She wasn’t imprisoned, she wasn’t even punished. She and I went on living in our own house not far from the castle. Skadi must have put her here after the disaster at the drill site.”

  “I’m sorry, but is she your wife?”

  A strange smile flickered across his face. “Not my wife, no, not nearly. But when you find yourself stranded at the end of the world where your language and your clothes and even your skin mark you as an outsider, then your closest friend may well be the one person who understands where you came from, even if you’re not particularly good friends. Riuza and I were, well yes, we were friends, eventually. Political allies, when necessary. And lovers, when drunk.” He smiled a bit more. “Just a few times.”

  Freya nodded, knowing that she only partly understood what sort of lives these people had led before she found them. “Is there anything we can do for her?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. She’s very weak.” In an instant all of the memories and sorrows in Omar’s eyes were gone, replaced by his usual clear-eyed certainty. He took up his sword and sliced through the chain on Riuza’s ankle as though the iron was as soft as moldy cheese, and then he sheathed the blade and picked up the woman in utter darkness.

  They made their way back to the stairs and then back to Freya’s room where they gently laid Riuza on the bedding and tried to make her comfortable. The southern woman lay on her side, staring at the wall with glassy eyes, her cracked lips whispering silent words in a language Freya didn’t understand.

  “She kept saying the word Morayo. Wren thought it was someone’s name. Does that mean anything to you?” Freya asked.

  Omar seemed lost in thought for a moment, and then he snapped his fingers and nodded sadly. “Morayo! Ye
s, I remember her now. Morayo was the engineer on Riuza’s airship. She was a very charming young lady. Very clever. I liked her very much, but there was more to her than met the eye. She caused the crash, you know. Died in it too, poor girl. If it hadn’t been for her, we never would have been stranded here, and Riuza, well, she would be at home right now, wouldn’t she?”

  “Oh. I’m so sorry, for both of you. I had no idea. Maybe I should go find Wren. She knows about herbs and things. She might be able to help her.” Freya barely reached the doorway before Halfdan appeared before her.

  The captain of the guard said, “There you are. I’ve been looking all over for you. I have news about your friend.”

  “Wren? You found her? Where is she?” Freya asked.

  “One of my men on the western seawall says he saw her walk off a few hours before sunrise. He says he didn’t stop her because he figured only a fool would go out there alone without a good reason, so she must have had a good reason, so he let her go.” Halfdan shook his head. “She left on foot, heading south.”

  Freya blinked. “She left? By herself?”

  Slowly, Freya turned back to look at Omar and Riuza.

  She must have left during the feast. The changes must have scared her. She must have wanted to get away before they got any worse. Or… or maybe she really wanted to go alone. Maybe she didn’t trust me to help her.

  Hell, the last thing I told her was that I was prepared to kill my own sister because of the plague. Wren must have thought that I would also… Oh, Wren!

  “I have to go. I have to find her.” Freya pulled her heavy leather coat over her shoulders. The coat rustled and flapped over her shirt and arms louder than she had ever heard it before, as though the material was as large as a sail flapping in the sea wind right inside her ear. She looked at Halfdan. “I need you to help Omar, and his friend here. Whatever you’ve been told about him, whatever you think you’ve seen, you need to forget. Just trust me when I say that they are our friends, and we need to protect them for the safety of Rekavik.”