When the River Ran Dry

by Robert Davies

  Ricky stopped the recording, swallowing hard against the dull pain of the old man’s passing. Maela waited in silence giving him time to pull his way out from the sadness. She placed her hand gently on his shoulder.

  “We couldn’t save him, but at least we know there was a reason for all this.”

  He nodded silently and deactivated the drive.

  “The sooner we start, the sooner we can find out where the trail leads and why these files were so important to him. I’ll wait until Elden’s agent transfers those tokens; there may be a lot of bribes and payoffs, so the money will come in handy for buying the stuff I’ll need.”

  “Bribes?”

  “Maybe Felicitas will help, but the people in her village will expect payment in return; it’s how Agros live.”

  “Agros don’t accept Novum tokens, Richard.”

  “I know that, but the things they will accept cost money, so I have to stock up.”

  “We have to…”

  Ricky looked at Maela, surprised by her words.

  “You heard him, Richard; Veosa is on the far side of the western Broadlands, all the way to the coast. How long do you think you’d survive out there without help?”

  “I wasn’t going to ask.”

  “You didn’t need to; I’m in this as much as you are and the bastards who murdered an old man in cold blood are still out there. I’m heading home to pack, but I’ll see if I can borrow my neighbor’s repair van; call me when you’re ready.”

  Ricky nodded with a smile. The prospect of venturing kilometers out beyond the wire had been intriguing when he and Vinnie were young, painted in the shades of adventure and excitement without consequence or risk, but the reality he faced and the prospect of days away from Novum was something much different and it would not be so easy as dispatching Nubian warriors in the service of Hatshepsut, safe within an experience cocoon at Reese Street; Maela’s skills would be welcome and useful.

  For three days, Ricky scrounged or bought outright those things most desired in a strange and far-off place where value was measured by utility and sturdy construction. The Agros’ economic system, governed by the unique and ever-changing rules of barter saw little need for anything that could not be used to cultivate crops or fashion the ordinary pieces of a simple life. When Maela arrived early on a cool morning, she smiled at the containers, jugs and crates cluttering his living room.

  “This isn’t exactly Novum underground market gold, Richard.” she said, side-stepping a long, plastic carrier filled with new shovels.

  “None of that stuff is any use to Agros, Maela; they value most what they can use in their everyday lives.”

  “Glad I brought my neighbor’s van.”

  “Why does he own one?”

  “He uses it on his rounds, taking machine parts to fabrication shops across the city that still make finished products. He’s often gone for days, so he had it fitted out with a bunk, a kitchenette and a little lavatory so he could pull off the road whenever he needs to piss.”

  “Is it big enough to carry all this?”

  “Oh, it’ll fit, but we may be a bit cramped for a while.”

  “What about guns?”

  She grinned at Ricky’s question and one made, she was sure, in the wake of his run and a reinvigorated survival instinct.

  “Yes, Richard, we have guns.”

  She bent on one knee to inspect a shipping manifest tucked into a plastic sleeve affixed to one of six heavy boxes.

  “Gear and bearings assortment; alloy, brass and nylon?”

  “They use a lot of old equipment—some of it built before the Fall,” Ricky replied. “Steam turbines and water wheels are their traditional power sources and I remember Mister Anthony always brought these with us when we met them at the wire on trading days.”

  “Moving parts wear out,” Maela observed.

  “Yeah, and he did a lot of side deals using this stuff as currency.”

  Maela picked through an open crate filled with bolts of synthetic cloth, eyeing Ricky from across the room.

  “What’s the story with this guy, Anthony? You always refer to him as Mister.”

  Ricky smiled at the memories suddenly awakened.

  “He insisted on it. In the days after the Dawn Insurrection, your people came down hard. MPE cops were everywhere and they used to stop him at all those checkpoints. He was still young then, but he hated being treated like a nobody. After things settled down, he went to the Registry offices and paid the money to get his name changed.”

  “I don’t understand,” Maela said with a frown.

  “Well, every time the cops would shake him down, they called him by his full name and it always pissed him off. See, he thought it made him sound like some ordinary goof when they called him ‘Aaron Anthony.’ Anyway, he changed his first name to ‘Mister’ so the cops would always have to sound like they were treating him with respect, whether they meant it or not. Elden never went along with it, but for Mister Anthony, it was enough because the MPE guys had to.”

  She smiled again and said, “I guess we better get started.”

  After an hour, zig-zagging through city streets in the pale, morning light, Maela let the van glide gently left to find the abrupt end of Walling Road. Beyond, a small MPE checkpoint bathed in harsh vapor lamps and Ricky pointed through the van’s windscreen, directing Maela to approach slowly.

  “Have you been here before?” she asked.

  “Yes; it’s expensive to take the highway, so Mister Anthony always stayed on the streets.”

  “The Agros come here? I thought they congregated at that place near the southern wire.”

  “Most stay around the big trade center, but others—the ones we met up here—usually had regular customers who didn’t want others looking on, so…”

  “The MPE border guards don’t mind?”

  “As long as no one starts trouble, they usually stay inside that shack.”

  “What about illicit items or contraband; don’t they even stop you to inspect?”

  “On trading days, the Regulators have dozens of inspectors down at the southern wire, doing checks on the transfers. It’s a pain in the ass, so most people who want to stay out of sight started trading up here at Walling Road on off days or late on the weekends. The Regulators don’t bother because it’s pretty small stuff.”

  “They’re going to ask about all that equipment we have in the back,” Maela said.

  “Maybe, but there’s not much they can do about it; we’re going out to the Broadlands, not trying to sneak anything inside through the wire. But Elden was right; we have to figure out how to keep the Watchers from seeing the crossing from standard MPE reports.”

  “I might be able to help with that,” Maela said.

  As they squeaked to a halt, two MPE guards moved quickly from their bunker. The lead officer—a ruddy faced corporal—stepped onto the van’s running board and Maela held up her badge and Sector pass quickly.

  “Maela Kendrick, S. I. D.”

  The officer hesitated, looking also at Ricky and unsure what would bring an investigator to his tiny corner of Novum in a land transporter.

  “Good morning, Detective,” he replied cautiously, but his tone suggested more confusion than suspicion. Maela nodded over her shoulder.

  “Support equipment for my field team, then I’m heading out west to question a witness in the Banyan investigation,” she said automatically.

  “I’m sorry, the…”

  “Some rich guy named Banyan went missing last month and they found evidence. Didn’t you get the briefing last night when you came on duty?”

  “No ma’am, we didn’t hear…”

  Maela closed her eyes in mock disgust and shook her head.

  “Do you read the briefings?”

  “Of course we do!”

  “I have to drive this stuff out to my forensic guys and I don’t have all day, all right?”

  “Hold on a second while I verify,” he answered, obviou
sly flustered and unwilling to provoke a detective quickly running out of patience.

  He scanned through a reader pad, but found only the name ‘Banyan’ in the unresolved cases listing.

  “I can see it here, but there’s nothing about a transport order.”

  She spoke slowly and with the impatient tone one uses to scold children.

  “That’s because the Deputy Prosecutor doesn’t want half the population interfering with her case!”

  “We’re supposed to empty and inventory all vehicles crossing the wire, Detective, so…”

  Maela cut him off.

  “How about I call her office and tell them Corporal whatever-the-fuck-your-name-is wants to empty out my van and put us two hours behind schedule?”

  “Well,” the guard said, but Maela went in for the kill.

  “Look, genius, I had to get up early to do this, all right? You want us to turn back, we’ll turn back and then you can explain it to your captain and I can go back to bed because frankly, I don’t give a shit one way or the other what they do to you for obstruction of an investigation!”

  “Uh, no…no, that won’t be necessary,” he said, stepping back from the van. “Have a safe trip, Detective.”

  “Thank you!” Maela said sarcastically and at a near shout, accelerating through the gateway and across the unmarked line where Novum’s outer boundary met the Broadlands.

  Ricky frowned from the passenger seat.

  “You’re not worried he’ll call in the van’s registration number?”

  “Would you?”

  “I guess not, but…”

  “They’ll log an outbound crossing and note the Banyan investigation, but that’s as far as he’ll go. He’s a kid on his first duty assignment where he’s actually in charge of something and the last thing he needs is a pissed-off watch commander asking him why he delayed a detective without orders.”

  Ricky smiled and nodded; there was the official way, and the ‘street way’; no one up above seemed to understand the difference, but it was unlikely a young border guard at a lonely security station was prepared to push the issue to his superiors.

  At once, the pavement made a broad circle, mostly to provide a convenient turnaround point for MPE land cars and beyond, a wide apron of bare dirt. Ricky recognized it as the place where Agros parked their clattering steam wagons in neat rows on trade days, but farther still, the meandering line of a gravel road leading west showed them the way.

  The morning light grew as each mile passed, giving Ricky and Maela a clear look at rolling hills and groves of trees from a perspective few in the city ever saw. Through the windows of any mega-tower in Novum, the distant view was a mosaic of green or beige patches and a foreboding wilderness no one wanted to test. In winter, stands of barren, leafless trees, like islands of black and brown across a sea of white, made the Broadlands seem an even less inviting, mysterious place.

  Near mid-day, a modest valley revealed low, earth-tone buildings of a small settlement and before them a signpost where parallel lines of a cart path veered to the north. Remembering Elden’s caution about staying on the road, they sped on. Almost two hours later, another village—this one toward the south—flirted from within a dense grove of oaks, but they moved through without a pause. In late afternoon, where the road curved easily through a ragged line of heavy undergrowth, a simple wooden sign with the words ‘Landsdon’ carved into its surface leaned sharply on a length of rusted pipe driven into the weed-covered dirt.

  Maela slowed the van to a crawl when the first Agros appeared, moving quickly from their tasks in the middle of a soy field beside a worn cart path. Even at distance, they heard the machine and with its approach, a rare meeting with travelers arrived from distant Novum. Ricky held up a hand, watching a graying man in a soiled, blue frock step carefully over the maturing plants. Behind him two younger women followed, moving quickly to his side.

  “Stop here,” Ricky said.

  “Are you sure?”

  “They need to see and understand we’re no threat to their village; Agros can be a little twitchy around strangers and getting them to trust us is essential.”

  She braked gently to a halt and Ricky stepped from the door, waving immediately at the nearest group like a nervous tourist determined to show benign intent. They gathered cautiously, still inside the boundaries of their field as though stepping onto the cart path might invite danger and the old man spoke first.

  “Who are you?”

  Maela peered out from the van for a moment before joining Ricky where he stood atop a berm the farmers built up to contain irrigation water.

  “I’m Ricky Mills; this is Maela Kendrick.”

  Ricky waited for a response in awkward silence, but the gathered Agros said nothing. Ricky continued, offering his best smile.

  “We’re on the road to Veosa, but I’m not certain as to the shortest route. Can you tell us which way is best?” he asked with as cheerful a tone as he could manage.

  “Maybe,” the elder replied at last.

  Maela saw the sheen of perspiration on their faces.

  “It’s hot today,” she said suddenly.

  “No hotter than yesterday,” replied another who stood close to the old man.

  “Still, I admire you for tending your crops when the sun is so high.”

  The Agros looked at each other with darting eyes and obvious worry until she motioned them closer.

  “We have a large supply of cold water inside our truck, if you’d like to take a few moments and refresh yourselves?”

  No one moved. Ricky saw and pointed toward the east for no particular reason, but mostly to distract the farmers and ease a growing tension.

  “I trade with Felicitas now and then; we’d like to speak with her for a moment, if she has time?”

  The words seemed to carry special license, but the old man cocked his head to one side, suggesting more would be needed to ease his caution.

  “When did you last see her?”

  Ricky’s mind ran furiously, though he tried to conceal it. After a second or two, he smiled and nodded.

  “It was in the autumn last year, I think; she had some beautiful cabbage and peas. My mother loves those peas, so I made a point of speaking with Felicitas about getting some more before the season ended.”

  “You know her well, do you?”

  “We’ve traded a few times,” Ricky answered.

  The old man wasn’t convinced.

  “If that is so, then you must know of her injury.”

  Ricky nodded quickly again, grateful he remembered so innocent and seemingly meaningless a detail.

  “You mean her finger, yes. She never told us what had happened but the little finger on her left hand is missing.”

  Their expressions changed at once, suddenly softer, and with a familiarity of association that meant the difference between acceptance and hostility. But one, a younger woman with a toddler clinging to her legs, saw the gun in Maela’s holster. Maela noticed and pulled the tail of her gauze shirt to conceal the weapon, but it was too late.

  “We don’t make trouble here,” the woman declared, nodding at the pistol.

  Maela held up a hand to reassure and said, “I carry it for my job. I’m a detective, you see, and…”

  The woman returned a confused look and said, “A what?”

  “A detective,” Maela replied slowly.

  “She’s a constable, Miriam,” the old man interrupted suddenly; “a law keeper.”

  “Yes, that’s it,” Maela smiled; “a constable.”

  He motioned for her to show them the weapon and Maela drew back her shirt. The gesture seemed to satisfy them and the tone changed quickly.

  “Welcome to Landsdon,” he said, extending his palm, “I am Bartholomew Corder. Our village lies farther along the path and through the forest there, but it would be better if we accompanied you; our people are not expecting visitors, especially ones who have come out from the cathedrals.”

  “Th
ank you, Bartholomew,” Ricky replied.

  The old man motioned the others to return to their work as Ricky and Maela climbed into the van, easing it along the cart path at a walking pace. Bartholomew and two others he hadn’t named trudged on ahead, unwilling to risk the ride Maela offered. She let the truck meander at a near idle, turning to Ricky with a frown of confusion.

  “Cathedrals?”

  “It’s what Agros call Novum. I have no idea what it means, but I’ve heard it a few times when we meet them at the wire.”

  Maela chuckled at the obvious connection.

  “Cathedrals were churches—huge buildings from the past and long before the Fall. People used to go there and pray to the Old God. They look at our buildings from a distance today and probably see them the way the ancients looked at one of those old places.”

  Ricky eyed her for a moment.

  “How do you know about that?”

  “I saw images of them in one of my neighbor’s archives—they were made of stone, and…”

  “No, I meant praying to the Old God.”

  Maela returned a strange smile.

  “My neighbor knew some of them—believers. He never told me who they are, probably because I’m a cop, but he always kept that a secret.”

  “Like the books?”

  “I suppose so. The Regulators don’t fool around if they catch you with books, but they are merciless if you’re named as a believer.”

  Ricky nodded grimly and said, “Yes, they are.”

  Now Maela regarded Ricky for a while, sizing up his answer.

  “You know some, too?”

  “I knew one.”

  “Knew?”

  Ricky nodded toward the supplies behind and Maela understood at once.

  “I see,” she replied with the image of Elden Fellsbach in her mind.

  As they wound their way through a divide in the stand of trees, she spoke again.

  “I hope this woman remembers you.”

  “She’ll remember,” Ricky replied. “Felicitas doesn’t forget anything.”