by L. Brown
Floorboards creaked with his entering step. But thanks to the war, to Dahkaa and Ioso’s next-door shouts, the creak went unnoticed. Or so Garth hoped, and as he took a second step, then a third, his eyes adjusted, squeezed light from a dark no longer so dense. The outline of a table appeared, then a chair, shelves… and jars? Small, by the look, but he saw dozens, hundreds, and each looked corked. What they contained, he couldn’t tell, so he picked one up and held it aloft.
Still too dim, its contents remained a guess. But then he noticed the label, so he lifted it, held its scrawl to the light. Quite unlike the style of the Clans, those straight-line letters previously seen, this cursive showed such swirl and curve it seemed designed less to communicate and more to confuse.
Then something else distracted, a faint chaos of scents. Odors from odd to foul, they suggested he stood in the shop of a chemist, some alchemist’s lab. Interesting, certainly, but not enough to keep him at risk, so after returning the bottle, he turned to leave.
But his eyes had adjusted, and instead of the door, he focused on the steps. Circular in design, they spiraled up the tower circumference to a second-floor arch, a portal to a dimly-lit room. Spooked a moment — Is someone there? — he tensed to run, but seeing no movement and hearing no creak, he yielded to curiosity, some inexplicable urge to climb.
Treading slow, wincing with every squeak and groan, he nearly turned back. But he couldn’t, not yet, so he climbed until he reached the window, a teardrop of glass. He didn’t intend to stop, but a peek outside turned him cold.
Scorched and maimed, disemboweled of parts, Logaht’s spacecraft looked like salvage, an old Chevy up on blocks. Or in this case, big rocks, but regardless, Dahkaa had told the truth; and forevermore, however long forever might last, he was marooned here, would die on C’raggh.
Garth slumped. Then heard, from the room just above, a faint ring of chimes. Pulse quickening and sweat resumed, he wondered who awaited, what madness would spring. Yet that peek outside had sobered, and after losing all chance of returning to earth, a peek into a room no longer spooked, at least not as much. Abandoning all stealth, any pretense of sneak, Garth climbed for the room without purpose or point, just sought distraction from a life without hope.
He stopped short. Someone peered from the room, looked his way — but when a fireplace flashed a bright lick of flame, he saw the face belonged to a portrait, a painting of a child. A young child, he looked barely two; but he stared, like Ioso, with eyes entirely black.
The ring of chimes turned Garth to the source. A window was open, another teardrop of glass, and suspended within, five silver-blue shapes sparked and rang and turned in the breeze.
Yet something puzzled, didn’t make sense, for the chimes matched those on the roof of the Machine. But would some monstrous G’mach hang the same sort of whimsy found in the room of a child? Then again, did it matter? Did anything? Eylahn was gone, he was wrecked on a world more dysfunctional than earth, and anyone he ever cared about, from Ryan to Miss Kane to even the Sudanese priest, he’d never see again. Curiosity waning, losing whatever strange draw this upper room held, he took a last look around.
A rumpled blanket draped a child’s bed, a wooden chair stood beside, and by the look, fireplace ash coated them both. But now that he noticed, ash covered everything in sight, evidence for a place neither occupied nor swept.
Garth coughed, fanned away smoke. Which carried, he perceived, the same fishy scent as the smoke in the Greenland cave. A glance at the fireplace confirmed the same fuel, a smoldering pile of U-shaped bones, but finding little diversion in fish stink or smoke, he stepped for the exit, the doorless arch.
Nothing left to see, and then he saw the book. Not some odd top with a spindle and scroll, this resembled a real book, something with pages and, of course, layered with ash. Wondering about their stories, what bedtime horrors Clan parents read to their kids, he lifted it from an old trunk and blew the cover clean. Then he just blinked, tried to accept the words he couldn’t believe:
The Hobbit.
Astonished by it, dizzy from whirls of how’s and why’s, he now recalled, seemingly so long ago, Dahkaa’s reference to Gandalf. But how’d he get a book like this, from where and who?
The question sprang an answer, at least a wild hope, so he opened it up, then flipped pages until he found it, until dim firelight lit the original owner’s name. Shivered by it, the smooth signature of Ana Redhawk, Garth touched the ink; then wondered if his mother gave Dahkaa and Logaht and his father the King anything else; was there more in this trunk, things she actually touched?
Popping the lid and also the ash, Garth threw up a cloud. But as it settled and cleared, he discovered treasure, a Blackbeardian trove, things his mother must have owned: Western Horsemen magazines, a Reader’s Digest hoard, empty cassette cases from a BBC broadcast of Lord of the Rings — had she actually bought them, played them, held each with her hands?
Garth rattled deep into the trunk. Fired with hope, he looked for something, anything to connect with the most important woman in his life, the one he couldn’t imagine or recall. She’d never be closer than this, so he kept dredging, flipping first through old National Geographic’s, then three Encyclopedia Britannica’s, then finally, the last jewel found, Veterinary Medicine, 1995.
A textbook, by its heft, a tome well-thumbed. Not promising, nothing like a scrapbook of her life or diary of her thoughts, but perhaps it hid her art, udders on a bull or a mustache on a horse, so he flipped it open, turned a page, then he just went still:
“If somehow, someday, my David finds this—
Savakerrva or not, I love you more than life.”
How long he stared, he never knew. But whatever the time, it was enough for tears to blot her hallowed ink. Panicked by it, by the staining of words never imagined nor hardly believed, he swiped at the moisture, then re-panicked at the smear. Blowing and fanning, he ripped out the note found fourteen years late, yet somehow, just in time.
“Impressive.”
Flinching from the scare, but recognizing the phlegm, Garth glanced back at the doorless arch.
“The son of Kel Vek is also a thief?” asked Logaht.
“No, I—” Garth quickly stood, but since his left leg had fallen asleep, he tilted and swayed, epitomized unbalance in both body and mind. “You don’t understand, I—”
“I understand more than you could ever conceive. But you?” Lingering on the threshold, Logaht eyed the room. “You know nothing, so you need to leave. This was his.”
Following Logaht’s gaze to the portrait, Garth deftly pocketed his torn-out note. “You mean, the boy? You know him?”
Apparently reluctant to respond, Logaht looked away. “I will speak of this now,” he quietly began, “then, never again. But should you ever pursue this with Dahkaa or Ioso, you may, by some horrible accident, lose your tongue. My meaning is clear?”
Mystified by the threat, but decidedly attached to consonants and vowels, Garth answered with a nod.
“The boy—” Easing forward, Logaht entered the room. “Was not just Dahkaa and Ioso’s only child, but because of the ‘history’ between Clan and Tribe, he was also quite rare; few are born with a father from the Ice and a mother from the Sand.”
“The Sand, what— Ioso’s from the Hot side? Is that why—?” Hesitating from habit, from observations factually correct, yet politically not, Garth groped for evasion, a phrasing more fogged. “I mean, not that I noticed, but—”
“If you speak of her eyes,” said Logaht, “you should know those of the Tribes both live without night and harvest a plant unique to the Sand, a rare spice that, over time, has darkened what is normally white. But the result means little, Ioso sees as well as you during daylight and, curiously, even better at night. But as for her child—” He faced the portrait. “It happened, I recall, some years back. Dahkaa and I were up on the ice, he on a boat and I in our craft,” he said, nodding to the disabled V-ship outside. “Which meant Ioso and th
e boy were here alone. And though this house and tower were utterly safe — when she one day awoke, when she came up here and checked his bed—”
Garth swallowed. “Dead?”
“Gone.”
Garth’s eyes narrowed. “Gone, like — kidnapped?”
“Likely, perhaps, but he left only this,” said Logaht, nodding to the unmade bed. “And despite her alarm, all frantic search, Ioso found neither witness nor track. No message was left, no demand ever came, and though Dahkaa and I searched a full year—”
“Nothing?”
“No evidence, no trail — Ioso was never the same.” Pacing near the fire, Logaht blinked, but Garth wondered if the cause was more than smoke.
“But someone must know something,” said Garth. “I mean, children don’t just disappear, they — well, they do, but—”
“These questions and more were asked for years, but neither the truth nor the boy have ever been found,” Logaht replied. “But as for Dahkaa, though he may not say it, I suspect he believes the boy was stolen by Ioso’s people, the Tribes.”
“The Hot side?”
Logaht grunted ‘yes.’
“But isn’t the Sand, isn’t their desert on the other side of the world? I mean, how’d they get all the way here, then go all the way back? Wouldn’t they be seen?”
“No.”
“No?”
“The Clans were decimated by Atta Ra’s plague, so not only could someone from the Tribes travel largely unseen, but—”
“But?”
“But neither would they have to walk. Because unlike your world, it’s not just the winds above they sail, but also those below.”
A bone in the fireplace crackled, sizzled with fat.
“As for what Ioso believes—” Logaht turned back to the fire. “As for who stole her child, she’s quite sure she knows.”
“Yeah? Well, who did it, what does she—”
“Are you blind, boy? Open your eyes!” roared Logaht, suddenly transformed. “Am I not G’mach, do you not see a murderous brute?”
“Uh—?”
“I know what you see, what everyone sees, that’s why she blamed me from the first! She cursed me without evidence, accused without motive or the least bit of fact — yet though my face and hands may shock, though I’m mistaken for a monster? You, David, are just a mistake.”
Wilting in the glare of the fired yellow eye, Garth welcomed the awful sound, the faint wail of an uvah horn.
Logaht turned away. “Then again,” he added, his gritty voice reclaiming its usual calm, “you’re not the only mistake. Care to look?” he asked, and turning toward a teardrop window, he swung open the glass.
But Garth stayed put. Fearful of the location, of getting between an open window and this mercurial G’mach, he considered a sprinting retreat. But as a faint din blew in, curiosity nudged, and craning his neck to see outside, he spied a village harbor, a bay cluttered with boats.
Lots of boats, a nautical parade of V-masted vessels formed three lines. Most looked smallish, iceboat-size, but then came the flagship, some belligerent black ironsides with its length overall a good sixty yards. Another uvah horn loosed a three-note wail, and then Garth saw them, a thousand warriors filling the streets with Z-rifles and packs; and escorted by vaaliks, they marched toward the boats.
“And so, they go,” said Logaht. “The last of the last.”
Not sure what he meant, Garth heard more his tone, an opinion both ominous and resigned.
“But who are they,” Garth asked, “and why all the boats, where are they going?”
“They going to fight, where else do Zahlen go,” Logaht replied. “They’ll sail to the heights, rise to the Great Ice — then attack the J’kel with every blade, bullet, and pound of radiance they have. And then, of course, they’ll die.”
A squall of rhythm joined the horns, a hundred drums shook the docks. And by the surprise in his eye, they rattled Logaht as well.
“So why do they go?” asked Garth. “I mean, if they know it’s useless—”
“They know. But to a Zahlen, to fight on the ice is to live. Though as for the drums—” His tone changing, Logaht spoke as if he smiled. “Unless I’m mistaken, this pattern they play speaks only to one. You’ve heard of Retta Dahz?”
Hearing it from Logaht, the phrase that meant, according to Dahkaa, nothing at all, Garth knew it not only held meaning, it foreshadowed a terror soon to begin.
“David!”
The shout startled. No longer with Ioso, Dahkaa searched for Garth near the tree with the bug. But before Garth could call out, Logaht yanked him back.
“Say nothing!” Logaht whispered. “Return to Dahkaa, but you never saw this room, understand? Tell him you were elsewhere, anywhere but here!”
About to answer, Garth instead jumped from the shriek now flying up the steps. Ioso was coming, and screaming sounds fit for a blazing abyss, she was coming possessed.
A leap over the threshold propelled her toward Garth, but just before impact, she stopped at the bed. Bracing for violence, some gouge of her nails or slash of a knife, Garth instead watched Ioso crumple to the floor. Shoulders shaking, but sobs unvoiced, she twined herself into the bed’s blanket, the muffling years of ash.
Chapter 15
Retta Dahz
The noise thrilled.
A call to the living and coda for the dead, the wail of the horns and rhythm of the drums summoned the Zahlen to the saddest of battles, their last. Which is why, perhaps, the few left in the village — the old and injured, some children under ten — why they watched without shout, just stood straight-faced and saluted in silence, crossed their arms like an ‘X.’
Stoic, the mood, an acceptance of what the wail and rhythm tried to deny. For when these husbands and sons set sail, when they eventually rose to the ice and attacked the J’kel, they would, like their brothers before, just flash into ash, a fine Zahlen grit scattered to the ends of the endless ice. And that, all knew, was how it would end, why nothing now stirred but the cry of the horn and the cull of the drum.
“Wait!”
Solemnity shattered, villagers turned toward the ignorant intruder, toward a boy in a vest chasing the Man of Scars.
“Dahkaa, please, I’m sorry!” yelled Garth. “I didn’t know, so I just went in, but it won’t happen again, I promise!” Dodging Dahkaa’s vaalik, its curled lip snarl, Garth jogged alongside. “But can’t you tell me what’s happening? What’s Retta Dahz!”
“Nothing,” said Dahkaa, weaving through warriors toward the boats in the bay. “Just keep quiet and don’t interfere, I’ll do what must be done.”
“Done about what, is this about me?”
Logaht snorted at this, garbled his laugh as he trailed behind. Some villagers looked shocked at this enemy presence, but warriors appeared ambivalent, had apparently become accustomed to the token turncoat G’mach.
“It’s not about you,” Dahkaa replied, “because Retta Dahz doesn’t apply, can’t apply, it defiles the Law.”
“Defiled or not,” Logaht countered, “should the boy not be told?”
“Told what!” demanded Garth.
“There’s nothing to tell!” Dahkaa snapped, striding onto a pier. “So whatever mistake was made, I will strike it, sweep it away, the Son of a King has nothing to prove!”
“Then bring him!” boomed a voice ahead. “Show us our Promise foretold!”
Garth looked for the source, but the warriors and vaaliks and glint of the guns obscured his view. Then progress slowed, and when those ahead stepped to either side, their parting revealed the flagship, that ironsides in black. Just as imposing, perhaps even more, a man descended its ramp. Thick in the chest, but thicker in beard, his scarlet cloak matched his bramble of whisker and hair. But what struck was his mask, a murderous leer hammered in steel.
“Victory, General!” Dahkaa declared, then crossing his X-blades with a bright metal clang, he gave the Zahlen salute. “I greet the Clan of Blood.”
But while Dahkaa bowed, Garth hoped he misheard. Clan of—?
“And I, Dahkaa—” Advancing now, the General of the Clan of Blood surveyed the crowd. “I’d like to meet the boy who cost us three boats and too many men. He’s here?”
Garth knew he should speak, but the eyes in the mask just stole his breath.
“He’s here,” said Dahkaa, stowing his blades and heading toward Garth. And after sailing the stars down the River Afar, he who was promised, now stands in our midst; Savakerrva has come!” he announced, and reaching behind a warrior, he yanked Garth out.
Expecting a greeting, some salute or huzzah, Garth sensed less. A lot less, so maybe applause was unknown, maybe the Clans never mastered the clap. But whatever their welcome, at least they all agreed, for everyone from warriors to villagers to some Muppet-eyed kid with a bucket of fish reminded Garth of turtles, of hard shell expressions and a craning of necks.
“Huh,” grunted the General. “This is him, the Promise foretold, the boy — who cried on the ice?”
Laughter hit hard. Warriors guffawed, villagers shook, and the Muppet with the bucket nearly lost his fish.
“This boy,” Dahkaa resumed, out-shouting the noise, “is the only son of our last great king! And as proof, he was marked, infected by Atta Ra himself, I cut out the ovik with these very blades!” he declared, hoisting his knives. Garth grimaced at the memory, but the General just stared.
“And if that fails to convince—”
“It does,” said the General.
“Then I offer a witness,” Dahkaa continued, “someone present at the boy’s very birth.”
“And you were not?” the General asked. “Did you not also flee with Kel Vek, sail that River Afar?”
“I—” Dahkaa hesitated, groped for something no longer there. “True, General, I did, but as you might recall, I was betrayed by Choffa upon my return and — since then, no matter my fight to remember— I’m sorry, but after my capture, the G’mach took more than my face.”
The General didn’t answer, just paced the pier’s worn planks. “Your witness, Dahkaa, the one present at the boy’s distant birth; he’s close?”
