Chainworld

by Matt Langley

  Both were dead.

  There was nothing he could do to help them.

  Barl didn’t know which way to go.

  The only times he’d ever left his chamber had been to go to the Training Deck. That meant he knew little of the geography of the ship. The Training Deck was towards the centre. Logic dictated any escape capsules would probably be towards the outer decks of the Minular.

  Signs on the wall pointed in various directions in an alien script.

  Barl walked along the corridor ceiling, heading away from the Training Deck, hoping that it would take him towards the periphery of the ship and a way out of this charnel house. He found more Bantoscree corpses littering the corridors. He sidestepped to avoid light fittings and engineering conduits.

  Engineering conduits…

  Two words that he did not recognise, but that he seemed to know.

  Other images flooded his mind as he half-ran, a door surrounded by yellow lights, a panel next to it in alien script that resolved into words he could read. Suddenly the words on the sign were made from letters of the alphabet his mother had taught him in God’s Heart.

  ESCAPE CAPSULE. PRESS TO ENTER.

  It made no sense.

  A sick feeling rushed through his stomach. Barl had to stop. His knees buckled and he pitched forward steadying himself by throwing out a hand and grabbing at a pipe running along the wall.

  ‘We’re being attacked. Keep going kid. Don’t stop.’

  Summer. Her voice loud in his ear. He spun around, slamming his knee on a maintenance conduit hatch beneath his backside.

  The corridor was empty. There was no sign of Summer.

  The nausea passed only to be replaced by a thumping headache that stole his breath away.

  ‘You have less than a minute before the Minular shreds to atoms. I don’t have the power to get us both out of here, too much dicking about on the Training Deck. We’re going to have to do this the hard way. So, run you little prick! RUN!”

  Barl didn’t care how she had found a way inside his head, he trusted Summer. He scrambled to his feet and ran for his life, head down, arms and legs pumping furiously.

  Explosions rumbled in the decks below, the ceiling beneath his feet shook again, tremendous forces at play, and cracked. Jets of scalding steam spat up, drenching him in boiling vapour. He screamed but ran on. The corridor flipped again and Barl crashed to the floor plates, winded again, but not willing to let even this slow him down.

  He leapt to his feet and pelted along the corridor, running faster than he had ever run in his life.

  He dodged between huge billows of steam that gushed down at random intervals along the widening cracks in the ceiling.

  He approached a junction.

  “Left!” Summer’s voice screamed in his ear.

  Barl used a pipe on the wall to swing himself around the corner and launch himself down a smaller tube-like corridor, lit only with red emergency lighting.

  Emergency lighting?

  “Stop asking stupid questions! I’m sharing brain-space with you, you idiot. You’re piggybacking my thoughts! JUST RUN!”

  Shaking his head to clear the fog of panic, Barl charged down the tube.

  Blue arrows ran alongside him on the walls.

  The nearest explosion yet boomed right above him. The tube split along its full length, torn in two. For a heartbeat—before fast sealing vacuum foam invaded the gap and stopped the violent decompression of the ship’s atmosphere—Barl saw directly out into space.

  The temperature in the tube surged brutally down well to below zero, and down more, until he felt frost crystalizing on his lips.

  The tube swung violently to the right.

  The claustrophobic red lighting pulsed faster and faster.

  And at the far end of the tube, Barl saw the door of the escape capsule—exactly as he had seen it in a memory he didn’t remember happening.

  He ran headlong towards it, his heart hammering against his ribs like a woodpecker trying too…

  “Woodpecker…?”

  ‘Don’t even think…’

  The tube twisted, but not of its own accord; it was breaking apart. Another direct hit on the outside threatened to tear it clear away from the body of the ship. Seven more blasts ran in destructive concussions the length of the corridor.

  A gout of flame crashed in from outside.

  Particles of hull crashed through the metal walls like gunshots, peppering every surface in molten metal.

  The vacuum boomed in from outside.

  A fog of freezing air billowed the length of the tube.

  Barl stopped in the icy, fast draining atmosphere.

  He watched in horror as the escape capsule as the end of the corridor collapsed as if it were a beetle crushed beneath a giant’s thumb.

  The end of the tube broke away into space, leaving the open corridor waving widely across a star-scape filled with one-man fighters buzzing around the Minular, firing volley after volley of explosive missiles at it.

  The explosive decompression reached Barl with its wintry fingers. Grabbing him and dragging him towards the hard vacuum. There was no chance to resist, there was no opportunity to grab onto anything, and even if he could, the speed he had already built up would have ripped his arms from their sockets and sheered through the skin leaving him dead.

  His last thought before he was hurled from the wreck of the Minular into the cold drifts of space was that he’d never taste yellowberries again and that made him unimaginably sad.

  Chapter 15

  Shryke watched from the back of the Movable Church while the Congregation held their evening service.

  It was like a dozen other pointless services he’d witnessed over the years.

  The Church Leader moralised over one point or another, the worshippers nodding along, and then clapping and singing their happy songs.

  There had been further benedictions and rituals—but they didn’t look any different from those Shryke was used to. One type of worship was very much like another as far as the assassin was concerned.

  At the end of the service, everyone had their taste of dirt to show their level of importance in the unfeeling universe, and then trooped out looking happy, smiling and animated with chatter and laughter.

  Shryke wondered what they had to be so happy about?

  There was the constant danger of attack by the single best-trained killers in the galaxy, a single one of whose number could kill every person here with their bare hands before they’d had a chance to finish a worthless prayer. The very fact that they were all still alive after the encounter, told Shryke that the Guild Assassins had been called away which meant they could well feel they had unfinished business with the Congregation.

  One of the uglier truths about his people was that there were some of their number who enjoyed their jobs and that love of violence may yet prove to be the Congregation’s demise.

  Yane’s request itched its way to the front of his thinking as he watched the Congregation clear the tent.

  Initially, he’d given her a blunt refusal, dismissing her request with a snort and a half laugh, but Galdar had thrown him a pleading look. He had agreed to take a day or two to consider the offer properly. The fierce hug of thanks Galdar had given him outside Yane’s tent, without tears, shaking or wild accusations, had been… pleasant. She was a surprising woman. Or was it his reaction to her that was surprising?

  Shryke had been given a shelter on the edge of camp.

  This part of the forest was near indefensible. He would have felt better if they at least found a hill or a rocky outcrop, something they could use to protect their backs. But if he started getting involved in strategies for their best defence, he’d be telling Yane that he agreed to her commission, and he wasn’t doing that. So, he kept his mouth shut about the inadequacy of their defences and his steels within reach. He sat through the prayers with a short sword across his knees.

  Galdar had been one of the novices attending at the ce
remony.

  She carried out her tasks with reverence, everything about her calm and unfussy. It was obvious to him that she was a deep believer. She took her minor role in the rituals seriously.

  Shryke thought he’d caught her eye at one point, as she had walked past waving smoking incense sticks in the air, but she had looked straight through him, immersed in her spiritual duties.

  Carlow helped at the ceremony but was nowhere near as focused on his worship as the girl. Shryke felt Carlow eyes, hot and unblinking, boring into him like bolts from a crossbow, lips thin with distrust and distaste.

  There was genuine hatred in there.

  He’d waited until Carlow left the tent before he crossed the dirt floor to where Galdar was folding beautifully embroidered cloths.

  She opened a large metal-banded trunk and carefully placed the cloths inside. As she laid each one inside, she touched two fingers to her lips, and then placed the fingers onto the cloth. She repeated the little ritual several times as Shryke watched. He waited until she closed the trunk and locked it with an ornate key she produced from with the folds of her robes, before he spoke.

  “You do this every day?”

  “Three times. Yes. Sometimes four if there is a special service of remembrance. Tomorrow there will be an extra service for the three who were murdered by your Guild. We will celebrate their lives and works.” Galdar got up from her knees, smoothing down her robes where they had creased. “What do you believe in Shryke?”

  “Everything and nothing.”

  “But what does that mean? It sounds like an excuse.”

  “It is. Do I believe in Gods…?”

  “God.” Galdar corrected.

  “Gods…no. I don’t. Do I have all the answers? No. I don’t even have all the questions.”

  Galdar picked up the trunk and walked towards the door. “Perhaps you will find them here, with us, if you stay.”

  He followed her towards the tent flap. “I doubt that.”

  “Why so sure? Isn’t your mind open to the possibility of a greater power than you?”

  “That’s not why I’m unsure.”

  They came out of the Church into the chill evening. Torches burned, illuminating the camp, smoke rose from fires, steam rose from pots.

  “Then why?”

  “I won’t eat dirt for anyone. Least of all an invisible God.”

  Galdar sighed and they parted company there.

  Shryke watched her go. He hadn’t meant to antagonise her, but he couldn’t help himself. He’d already given himself up to a greater power in the Guild Nest all those years ago. And look how that had turned out.

  Shryke wasn’t going to make the same mistake again.

  Galdar didn’t want to walk away, but she wasn’t going to beg the Warrior to stay.

  His flippant answer about eating dirt had both angered and saddened her.

  She had felt herself warming to the tall raven-haired warrior for some time; since before they’d discovered the bodies. He was a compelling soul. She found herself drawn to him in a way she did not understand and could not deny. The bond between them seemed to grow stronger all the while, and Galdar would never admit it, but she found herself hoping more and more that Shryke would take up Yana’s offer to stay with the Congregation.

  Galdar was in her eighteenth summer now and knew there would be pressure soon to consider couple-bonding. She had always assumed she would be forced to join with Carlow; a thought which while it didn’t exactly fill her with dread did little for her hope of happiness. The Quest for Safehome had been going for nearly two thousand years now across several links of the Chain and relied the seekers intermarrying and breeding to continue. Shryke, for all his faults and non-secular nature, was turning her thoughts to matters of the flesh, and that was a new feeling for her.

  She allowed herself the tiniest of smiles and looked about surreptitiously to see if anyone in the Congregation had seen the emotion play across her face. She was terrible at hiding her true feelings. Her body and her expressions gave her away time after time.

  “We don’t want him here.”

  Galdar stopped, looking up, startled.

  Carlow emerged from shadows between the tents.

  He still clutched the branch which had felled Shryke.

  Weapons of any kind were forbidden for curates.

  Carlow would weasel out the excuse it was firewood or had been protection when Shryke had woken in the Church, but it was obvious the branch was meant to serve as a threat.

  “That’s not for you to decide,” Galdar held her ground, but gripped the trunk tighter, ready to use it as a shield if Carlow decided to turn the threat into action. She tensed her arms, placed her feet a shoulder width apart, a stance that would give her the stability to fight—or run.

  “Yane is a fool.”

  “Reverend Yane leads us, Carlow. You would do well to remember she is the head of the Church.”

  “Why? She exposes the Quest to danger? This…warrior…is a viper ready to strike at our heart. He is one of them. One of the killers. Surely you understand the danger she is putting us in?”

  “Again Carlow, you have your opinion, but it’s not one I share. I have travelled with him. I have seen him fight. Not just fight but fight for me. I know that he will protect us.”

  Carlow took a step forward. “He might protect you; it’s the rest of us I fear for. Once he’s saved his broodmare, what chance for us mere mortals?”

  Galdar’s anger welled up like a blazing hot fountain of lava from the depths of her guts, but, somehow, she kept her mouth closed.

  Carlow saw the effort she was making. If he expected her to lash out and hit him again, it didn’t show. “I’ve seen the way you look at him. I’ve heard you beg for his release and for us to trust him.” Carlow reached out with the branch, touching it on Galdar’s inner thigh. She wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction of flinching. She wasn’t scared. She was blisteringly angry.

  The branch moved higher.

  Galdar remained still.

  “No point in him being tied up all this time is there? Especially if you want to welcome him to your tent with open legs.”

  Galdar knew the words were meant to provoke her into lashing out. She had already been censured by Yane and the Elders for striking Carlow once, and for running away. If she let her angr loose again, it could see her banished from the Congregation. So instead, she remembered the change in Shryke’s attitude towards her when she’d first mastered her anger, and sought to do it again, biting back on the rage of emotions churning her up inside, forcing them down until, finally she was calm enough to etch the ghost of a smile on her lips. “I hadn’t thought of that, Carlow,” she looked down at the branch. “But now you say it, I’m sure he has a better weapon than yours.”

  The branch dropped.

  She sidestepped the fool and walked on, seething still, but in control.

  She knew Carlow would continue to goad her at every opportunity, but if nothing else, the last few days travelling with Shryke had taught her more about her own strengths than years around the demeaning battery of Carlow and his kind had taught her about her weaknesses.

  Shryke settled down beneath his fern covered shelter.

  His belly was full, the bedding fashioned from saplings was comfortable enough, and the wine he had shared gave him pleasing inner warmth. All the conditions were in place for him to travel into a dreamless sleep, and yet he could not find the route.

  Shryke’s ears were alive to all the sounds of the forest: the low murmur of voices from the members of the Congregation who were still awake and the distant sounds of the river in the valley below, waters dancing over rocks. Perhaps at Quarternight tomorrow he’d be able to rest, once he’d been with the Congregation a little longer and become more accustomed to their strange ways.

  A little longer…

  That surprised Shryke. Was he really coming around to the idea of staying with the Movable Church as some sort of mercenar
y bodyguard? Would they expect him to observe religious niceties—or worse, to convert?

  He rubbed his tired eyes.

  I’m just exhausted, he thought. That’s what’s making my mind wander.

  He tried to think of other things.

  Out in the camp, a robed female figure moved among the sleepers, touching those on the forehead who were already sleeping, bending her head in prayer and placing stones on fires to put them out for the night. She was dressed in a red habit; perhaps it was Yane moving among her people, transmitting strength to them in the certain knowledge that she had their best interests at heart?

  The dimly lit figure moved on. Bent. Touched. Prayed. Put out a fire. Moving towards Shryke and his tiny pyre of burning twigs. The flames in it guttered. It wouldn’t take more than a handful of dirt to extinguish it.

  Yane moved on. Bent. Touched. Prayed. Extinguished a fire.

  Was she coming to him to persuade him to stay?

  Would she look to bribe him with a retainer? For all the Church’s protestations of poverty, there was always money to be found.

  Bent. Touched. Prayed. Put out a fire.

  Shryke rubbed his eyes again—looked at the figure in the habit moving through the camp. It wasn’t Yane. Now that she was nearer, he was sure of that. The woman’s frame was wrong, less stiff, less formal.

  Was it Galdar?

  No. Too short. She walked with a limp.

  The shadows around her face were too deep for Shryke to make a clear identification, but she was coming ever closer.

  A flash in the dark hole of his memories.

  Something…

  The paw of a wolf.

  Bent. Touched. Prayed. Put out a fire.

  Shryke could follow her path through the camp. A line of extinguished fires directly through the centre, heading inexorably towards him. Shryke tried to rise, but his exhaustion was total, he yawned, his eyes smarted with campfire smoke and his limbs felt as though they were made from lead.