Going Under

by Justina Robson

  No offence… Lila mouthed with a snotty expression, sick of hearing it.

  Zal smiled, the first time she’d seen him really smile that day, and she realised he was tense too.

  The imp shook himself and huddled against Lila’s neck as if it was freezing. “What I mean is they can just overrun you with simple numbers and various subraces, like the poison elf says. No need to bother arming. Just send them across the breach. I guess I’m not talking to the organ grinder here or else you’d be knowing these things, your lot being such experts at all the worlds and science and stuff like that. I do keep wondering what they put in that metal head of yours because it sure wasn’t anything useful and you can bet your ass they know a lot more than they let on. Course, they wouldn’t have bothered making you in the first place unless they knew the kind of trouble they were in once they realised we demons were around. I guess you’re some kind of prototype. Probably in a few months they’ll have made some better ones and you can retire to the scrapyard, so don’t sweat it. I guess that explains why they just send you into situations without telling you anything either. You’ll be the… what do you call it? The guinea pig.”

  “No offence?” Lila asked.

  “The truth don’t offend and it’s my job to say out loud the stuff you keep trying to repress,” the imp grumbled. “Wish I’d never said it now. But who else was gonna tell you? I’ve been adding it up since we met your boss and ex-boss, the ego on a stick. Things would sure be a lot easier if she was still in charge. Easy to manipulate, that sort, like putty in yet hands. Now you got someone who cares in charge and that’s gonna be trouble. But I bet she knows all about it. Like Madame. And are they helping? Nah. Give you jobs that’s all.”

  Zal’s smile vanished. “Madame gave you a job?” As usual he was sharp when it mattered.

  Lila couldn’t bring herself to touch the thing in her pocket. “Maybe.” She found herself wanting to tell him she didn’t know how much longer she could stick it out in Demonia; that the gruesome deaths nauseated her and her own growing indifference was making her feel strange and out of her depth.

  “Now you’re squeamish?” the imp sneered.

  “I can squeam as much as I like,” she said. “Think yourself lucky you’re still here.”

  Zal gave the imp a glare as Lila related what had happened at Madame’s. “At least there’s only one of him, even if you can’t bring yourself to dislodge it.”

  “She doesn’t really need me. I’m a pet of affection,” the imp protested.

  Zal scowled and sighed, his shoulders sinking. “I wish you were.”

  Lila felt awkward. “I don’t want…” she began but at that moment there was a shout from the Master.

  “Set fires!” he called. “To defensive positions!”

  They had crossed the narrowest part of the lagoon and were heading out over open land. It was still dotted with settlements and occasional large houses and gave every appearance of well-being. Beyond the cultivated areas could be seen a line of low hills where the deserts began in earnest and beyond them the mountains that circled Bathshebat in three-quarters of the compass.

  “Possible attack by land or airship from rival houses,” Zal said, dismissing her unspoken question about the wild demons. “Standard practice.”

  “Shouldn’t we do something?”

  “There won’t be an attack,” he said.

  The Master gave him a calculating look from over his shoulder and stalked back to the helm. The fans at the rear of the ship beat steadily, their shadow pulsing over Lila and Zal as they turned their backs another degree to the sun. Lila felt a momentary chill. From below came the sounds of revelry.

  They are complacent, Tath said. Even Zal has too much confidence in the white demon.

  From her position forward Sorcha sauntered over, her tail whipping but otherwise appearing calm. “Not going below?” she said. “Girl with a new man shouldn’t be out here boring her butt off.”

  Zal smiled a laconic, entirely elfin smile, “Good things come to those who wait.”

  Sorcha snorted and sneered at the same time, “Better things seized in the moment than lost in time. Elves. Think they’re gonna live forever.”

  Something in Sorcha’s manner made Lila realise she had come over to ease her nerves, not just to make fun, and her chill deepened. Only now did she realise she’d been dallying with Zal herself, waiting for him to make a move on her. Disappointed that he hadn’t she’d stumbled through that conversation about Madame again, wondering what was going on. And if he were confident that they were safe he’d made no move to budge from his position.

  “Heh,” whispered Thingamajig into her ear. “Heh heh heh. Hesitation.”

  Around them the rigging and the net of the balloon creaked as the wind turned. “Where are we going?” Sorcha snapped.

  “To the wall,” Zal said airily but quietly.

  Sorcha’s ears moved and she shifted her voice to a soft purr, “Why so far south, brother dear? Where do we go from here?”

  “Down to the lake, I fear,” he sang quietly and then reverted to his normal voice. “You may well ask. I am looking for something.”

  Lila snapped up a map of the terrain quickly in her AI mode and saw that, as Sorcha had suspected, they were not taking any direct route to the regions mentioned. “Territorial boundary?” she whispered.

  “No,” Zal said, his head moving very slightly but his eyes not at all as he took on what in a human would be termed the thousand-mile stare. Legendary elf sight or irritating tic? “Sorcha,” he said gently. “How long since you were actually in a fight?”

  “A real fight?”

  He nodded, fixation unmoving.

  “A couple of months I guess,” she said and rolled her eyes. “Don’t tell me this is a nail-breaking opportunity, man. I just had these plated with real gold.” She flashed her clawlike nails and Lila saw tiny jewels studding the yellow metal shine.

  Zal spared them an unimpressed glance, “Do you have any other weapons?”

  “Only my talent, darling, I’ve never needed another.”

  “Lila, suit up,” Zal murmured very quietly, a somewhat unfitting smile fixed to his face which had taken on a stony quality.

  “Why?”

  “What can you hear?”

  They listened. Lila heard the wind, the rigging…

  “Nothin’,” Sorcha whispered with a fierce, black relish Lila had never heard from her before. Her green flare lightened and shifted towards yellow, then red. On Zal’s back the flickering fire tattoo became darker, tainted with purple and black.

  “Poisoned,” Zal said with a sigh. “Ladies, down below some miles ahead of us is a Sikarza raiding party equipped to the gills. I suggest we remove our treacherous crew and abort course. If we come within range of fire we will defend ourselves with the deck guns. Should the balloon fail we will abandon ship but continue towards the wall. Lila, I’m trusting you to take care of that. Be alert for opportunists.”

  “Sikarza?” Lila said.

  “His mother,” Sorcha snarled. “Blasted bitch. That family has no class.” She spat on the deck and the wood hissed and burned where she’d struck it.

  Lila realised Sorcha was referring to Teazle’s mother, the Principessa. “And he’s in on it?”

  “Shouldn’t think so,” Zal said, finally turning to face her and grinning. “I got the impression he really liked you.”

  “They’re not doing this for me,” Lila said with a snort of derision.

  “True enough,” Thingamajig sighed, shaking himself out with a rustling and a sizzle. He began to sharpen his tiny claws on some equally tiny whetstone that he produced from about his person. “They’re doing it in the hopes that she’ll give them a big lot of treasure and a better position in her house for pulling Teazle down a peg or two. Risky game. She’s probably gone a bit doo-lally since you offed her favourite son. If she wipes out one or both of you, then she’s sundered the alliance with the Ahrimani and Teazle’s b
ack on his bachelor lonesome own again under Mummy’s thumb. He isn’t the power over there. She is. Probably doesn’t like the idea of him being competition and, to be frank, she’s quite right. Give him another month and he won’t bother with her anymore and then that’s the end of her. Soo… in light of all that I’d bet we can look forward to a lot more than a raiding party and a few moronic crewmen. Figures now what that decrepit-looking hydromancer was doing hanging around outside the house this morning. I thought that load of dross he told me about the drains was bull. Probably waiting to see if Teazle was going to have a bit of lastminute vice, which of course he was, and then, soon as he’d gone, send the word that the chance had come. She’d guess this would happen at some point and have a few different plans up her sleeve. My guess is these chumps are all delaying tactics until the real thing can get here.”

  “The imp is right,” Zal said with dislike. “We must stay aloft as long as possible and turn for the mountains immediately.”

  “Unless the real thing is coming from the mountains,” the imp added. “They might be mad but they all have their price.”

  “Teazle is out there,” Zal said. “No more time to talk. Sorcha, there are four staff below. They’re yours. Lila, take the Master and the rear deck crew then alter our course and gain some height. You should count six. I’ll go forwards for four. Fourteen is the full complement. Stay ready for stowaways.”

  Lila wanted to ask if he was sure Sorcha could handle four on her own but decided to trust him instead. They parted as if their conver sation were over, even though their changing colours must have given away their mood. Only Lila had no colours. She stuck to the dull black of her original styling, crossing the few metres of deck to the aft stairs in a few strides which transformed her simple-seeming uniform fatigues to thick battle armour. Plates grew to cover her human skin, until only her face, her red hair, and her silver metal eyes remained the same. Thingamajig was toppled from his perch and went darting to a coil of rope beside one of the capstans. From there, he could see everything and was small enough to be well covered.

  In another place and time, perhaps by now another lifetime altogether, Lila would have paused to question whether or not the entire crew was guilty of treachery. But it wasn’t scruples that prevented her from shooting first and asking questions later, it was simply a matter of time. Any attack worth launching would be devastating, and to leave potential enemies at liberty was too much like a fatal mistake. This flashed through her mind as she took the stairs in a single leap and landed on top of the first mate, her hands lifting him into the air with her and delivering a lethal jolt of electricity before the two of them hit the boards. She had only lately taken to electrocution. Now there wasn’t even time for a fair fight. Not that fighting her felt fair anymore. It used to, but she had become too good at it with so much practice.

  In less time than this took to consider she snapped the neck of the demon seated diligently at the gas supply valves (must not look into his face or eyes, then it’s better because you don’t recognise one another and you can avoid that sense of killing someone who was no worse than you).

  All living things recognise one another. You simply don’t want to meet the soul whose existence you are about to extinguish, Tath whispered and put out a feathery tendril of ash grey aether, allowing this spirit to trickle past him and away to wherever they went, uneaten.

  In fact, who is worse than you? she thought to herself.

  “I’m sensing radically undemonic thoughts here,” piped the shrill voice of the imp from the roof of the wheelhouse as he watched Lila chase down the Master at the door, place her hands over his face, and deliver enough current to melt steel. The smoking corpse slid into an oily mass at her feet. With a yip the imp launched himself to her shoulder and gripped on, cutting her neck with his claws. She felt it as punishment and criticism. Without pause she swiped him off again with a snarl, watching him land on the wooden deck with a rage in her head so fierce that a spasm of pain went through her left eye socket.

  From the launcher in her right forearm she sent a small missile at the last escapee, which took it over the rail in a blaze of chemical fire. She heard it screaming a long way down but kept her gaze riveted on the tiny Thingamajig, now cowering in a small ring of his own watery orange flames, his paws clasped together in front of him. She felt how good it would be to stamp on him and crush the irritating, nagging life out of his tiny chicken bones.

  He held up his paws, fingers wide, his head held back as far as it would go and piped, “Guilt, lady. We don’t do guilt. Ask them. Well, next time ask them. They don’t mind it really. All’s fair in war. Big girl like you has to know that.”

  Lila glared, her face hot, “I am not like you,” she said distinctly. “I am not.”

  “Sure, sure, I’m just sat’in’ that you’re wasting perfectly good guilt on those as don’t want it and would feel bad if you were feeling it, since it’s out of the way of right killing, that’s all.”

  “They were unarmed,” she said, feeling every second more and more self-hatred.

  “Their choice,” the imp said. “We all choose. You chose to be a kick ass death machine, so why the long face now?”

  “I did not choose!” Lila slammed her hands over her ears, “Shut up,” she said. “Choice. What the hell do you know about it?” And all the time she was aware of Tath in her chest, curled up like a fat, satisfied cat. For once he said nothing. Maybe it was mercy and maybe not.

  She ran down to see if Sorcha was all right. In the dim clutter of the party room bodies were strewn across the furniture like ragdolls, some with the arched backs of poison rictus and others simply floppy, like toys filled with jelly. These last were crewmembers. There was no sign of Sorcha, but Lila found her in the galley, singing to the cook. Only her AI was able to detect the sounds she was making as they were both above and below any human range. Her hands were gripping the cook’s arm at the wrist, holding back the blade of a seriously large knife, but she only had to maintain the pose for a moment. He was blinded by a spray of venom from Sorcha’s tail, weakened by it, and in any case, the pulse of her voice reached its crystal-pure pitch just then and all his internal organs liquefied. Sorcha let him go, stepping back to avoid his falling deadweight, and rubbed at a spot of something on the exquisite voile of her tunic before checking her nails.

  “Heh,” she said, apparently finding them all intact, and as she turned to meet Lila she was already humming a jaunty little tune. “Darling,” she said, “you just can’t get the staff these days. What’s the matter? You look like you swallowed a storm cloud.”

  Lila stepped back to let them both out of the narrow serviceway. “Doesn’t any of this bother you?”

  “Well, the relatives were a bit tiresome so it’s no great loss there. The staff were clearly too cheap so I suppose it’s going to be quite costly and tedious to clear up, if we survive… is that what you meant?”

  As she moved back and Sorcha moved forwards Lila saw a subtle change take place. Sorcha’s amused, low-lidded gaze was perfectly honest and clearsighted, and she saw what Lila meant quite easily. At the same time her colours changed from a dark red shot with grey to a much more intense scarlet and black. Lila didn’t need a catalogue to decipher the meaning. Sorcha seemed to become twice as alive as before, and her red eyes glittered as she stared at Lila. They were suddenly in a dominance conflict because she, Lila, had shown weakness.

  Lila immediately shot her arms out to the sides, placing her fists against the walls, and planted her feet hard on the floor, blocking the exit. She let her chin drop and fixed Sorcha with a flat metal stare.

  Sorcha twitched and rattled her tail with a sound like Death’s maracas. For a moment she was poised and then she just loosened up and laughed merrily as if nothing had happened. She slapped Lila’s shoulder, “You funny one.”

  Demons, Lila said to herself, turning and leading the way out.

  Be careful, Tath whispered. He knew as well as she d
id that Sorcha had been quite serious. One day she could easily get herself into trouble. She had no illusions that even the friendly demon behind her would take advantage in a second given the opportunity. It was just the way they were made. Belatedly had she started to realise that, promises aside, it was likely true of Teazle and even, maybe, of Zal. Actually, on third and fourth thoughts, it was likely true of everyone, just that humans had a hard time acknowledging it these days.

  Just then the airship lurched and they both stumbled against the wall. Distantly she heard Zal shout, “Hard about!” and there was the brief, dull snapping sound of a fiendishly expensive manicure getting stuck in an unyielding hunk of timber.

  “Oww! Zal, you freak, kinda late with that,” Sorcha moaned, following Lila back onto the deck.

  The first thing Lila saw was the ship approaching them through the air from the city. The first thing she heard was the whine of escaping gas from the balloon and then a sputter of dull raindrops and suddenly multiple hissings as arrows struck the huge blue curve above them. They began very gently, almost infinitesimally, to descend. At the wheel Zal was turning them directly to the mountains. Below them on the ground a comically distant little army of demons were storming closer. In the air their assault team was much more daring and a volley of new flights struck the balloon, some of them igniting the thin fabric as they flashed home. Lila smelled an ominous sharp ness in the air and knew that she was facing chemistry here, not magic. Then the archers became bored with the huge target and started to pepper the deck around them. At this Sorcha leapt to the open doors of the cocktail lounge for cover, closely followed by the tiny figure of the imp who reappeared a second later on an entirely new vector and flew into the wheelhouse wall with a thud.

  Lila darted to the engineer’s station, where various barrels of metal powders were kept, and began tipping as much as possible into the hopper that fed the acid baths which in turn gave off the gases that filled the balloon. She spun all the valves open to maximum. Aetheric conductors shimmered, transmuting the raw molecules of the gas into charmed forms that were immune to explosion, but not, sadly, immune to escape. She knew the acid would soon be nothing but salty water and the balloon nothing but a limp rag, but she hoped it would buy some time.