by Oisin McGann
‘Listen to me,’ Kellen urged him. ‘I’m only concerned for the safety of my son. There is a mission planned against you tonight, a glider mission. It will be completely silent; you won’t hear them coming. I am telling you this so that you can save yourselves and take my son with you. Over.’
Chamus lifted his head. What was that about gliders?
‘We are not afraid of your aeroplanes,’ Elbeth smiled. ‘What is one more bombing to a people who have suffered hundreds? Yes, we await your gliders, Mr Aranson. Let them come. Over.’
‘This is serious,’ Kellen insisted. ‘You’re in danger and my son with you. Over.’
Elbeth leaned over and looked out towards the entrance of the cave. The light outside was starting to fade.
‘Your son will be released to authorities in the Altiman flatlands tomorrow. Goodbye.’
He put down the microphone and turned off the radio.
‘We don’t have much time,’ he said to his comrades. ‘Tell the rest of the men to start packing up immediately. I want the camp cleared by the time we return from the Blessing. Tell them not to wait for us. Now, let us take our young warrior up to prepare him for his release.’
Chamus’s mind was racing. A glider attack, it would be silent. No one would hear it and no one would see it in the dark – not until it hit. No, he thought, they wouldn’t even realise it then. Not this kind of attack. The scale of the plan stunned him, it was not intended to kill the terrorists, at least not directly. He remembered the drawings on his grandfather’s desk, the mounting for the glider, the compressed air cylinders. They were going to fly low over an area, spraying dust, radioactive dust. No one would even know about it. There would be no sign of it until people started getting sick. And then the Bartokhrians would not know what to do. They would have what looked like an epidemic on their hands and no way of dealing with it. They would ask for help from Altima and that help would be sent immediately, in the form of emergency medical services with the support of the military.
The army would roll right into Bartokhrin, at the request of the Bartokhrian government, and they would seize control of the area and then any other area to which they suspected the ‘disease’ might spread.
He reeled at the idea of it. His country was going to invade Bartokhrin in the hunt for the Hadram Cassal, and they were going to kill scores, possibly hundreds of people to give them an excuse.
Two men came over and picked up his stretcher.
‘You should listen to my father,’ he called after Elbeth. ‘You don’t know what they’re going to do. This is more than just a bombing run …’
‘You mean the radiation?’ Elbeth asked, turning around to stare at him. ‘The plan to contaminate my country, to leave hundreds of my people dead and dying? I know all about it Chamus. We have our spies in your military and it wasn’t hard to put the pieces together. They will have found out that we are camped near Kemsemet and that will be good enough for your air force. They will seed the whole town with radioactive powder.’
He gestured to the two men carrying the stretcher and they walked out of the cave and started up the steep climb to the top. Chamus was taken aback. How could he just stand by and do nothing?
‘But if you know about it, why don’t you stop it?’ he gasped. ‘It won’t work if people know about it beforehand. There’d be hell to pay if people knew about this. They wouldn’t dare go ahead with it. You only have to get on the radio and start telling anyone who’ll listen.’
‘Yes,’ Elbeth nodded solemnly, ‘you’re right, I could stop it right now.’
His face darkened as he climbed, setting in an expression of grim determination.
‘But if you think there would be hell to pay if people heard about it beforehand, think about what will happen after it has happened…when we tell the world what Altima has done to us.’
The full impact of what he was saying hit Chamus like a physical blow.
‘You’re going to let it happen?’
‘Of course. Think of it. Your country launches a new weapon on us, contaminating thousands of our people, its army sitting at its borders waiting to invade. When the truth emerges, there will be an uprising like the world has never seen. Altima will bring down the wrath of all the “Fringelands”, as well as its own wealthy allies. And then there will be all the vengeful young men who will rush to join our cause. Instead of one or two Blessed Martyrs sneaking into your cities, there will be hundreds, swarming across your borders, bringing death to your doorsteps. Altima’s great plan will be its own destruction. Praise Shanna for her infinite wisdom.’
Chamus felt sick. The stretcher swayed from side to side and he gazed up into the sky, watching the clouds scudding across from the deep orange of the east to the purples and yellows of the west. The whispering in his head was stronger than ever and his muscles knotted with hatred and rage. These men were insane, as mad as the men who had conceived the plan to release the radiation. Everything his parents had taught him about life, about right and wrong, none of it meant anything as long as men like these were able to steer countries with their insane logic.
They reached the top of the hill and the stretcher was laid down against a bank that faced Chamus straight into the setting sun.
‘You are a privileged young man,’ Elbeth said to him. ‘You are to be the first heathen to be given the Blessing of the Martyrs. Normally, we would indulge in a more elaborate ceremony, but it takes a lifetime of religious devotion to prepare the soul for what you are about to undergo and we are somewhat pressed for time. Do you remember this?’
He held a photo up in front of Chamus’s face. It was the picture that had been stolen from his locker, Chamus with his father and grandfather standing in front of the prototype of an aeroplane they had named after him. It had been one of the proudest moments of his life.
‘You won’t make an assassin out of me!’ he spat. ‘I won’t kill for you!’
‘You won’t have to,’ Elbeth said, soothingly. ‘It will all be done for you.’
Chamus watched the five men make their preparations, his breaths short and shallow, his heart beating wildly with fear. They lit a fire and threw the contents of his bag into the flames, then tossed in the bag itself. His imagination ran riot, trying to anticipate what was about to happen. Images of pagan sacrifices flashed through his mind. Would it be painful? Would he still be alive afterwards, or would his body just be a walking corpse, steered by ghosts? Please God, give me strength, he thought. The men kneeled, covered their eyes and prayed. Chamus looked up at the sky again and cursed to himself. He wondered if they were doing this to torment him. But as long as they prayed, they left him alone.
He heard the word ‘Glahmeth’ and knew it was over. The men lifted their heads and Lakrem Elbeth kneeled stiffly by his side and rubbed something on his face. The priest then produced a stone mask from a bag at his hip. There were no holes for the nose or mouth and in the place of eyeholes, there were two purple crystals. The other four men grabbed Chamus’s arms and legs. He was terrified. Why did they have to hold him when he was already tied? What were they going to do to him that would make him go wild enough to break his bonds? The strangeness of the mask filled him with dread and when Elbeth placed it over his face and clamped it to him by gripping the sides of his head with his fingers, Chamus screamed. He could barely breathe and he thrashed around, but they held him firm. Inside his head, the voices had suddenly gone quiet when the mask had been pressed against his face and this scared him even more. It was completely dark, then the shadow that was Elbeth moved aside and the sun’s light shone through the crystal eyeholes. A purple glow bathed his mind and he felt a presence reach deep inside him. Then suddenly he was reliving the moment his classmates had died. He was standing at the door of the briefing room, the Fringelander was in front of the desk, Ellese was demanding to know who he was. Chamus wanted to warn him, to tell all of them to get out and then the Fringelander opened his mouth and Chamus saw the street in the town with t
he adobe buildings and the sireniser plunging like a spear into the ground, standing straight up like some kind of modern-day totem pole and then the sound …
The vision disappeared, the purple glow was back, drawing something out from him along the path of the light. He felt the voices then. They started from deep in his torso, rushing up frighteningly fast, filling him with panic and bursting out of him in a deafening shriek. For a moment, the sireniser was real again. Its detonation, carried back from some devastated village to be unleashed in the hangar’s classroom, had been reincarnated once more as it was channelled up through Chamus and exploded out, the sound’s shockwave crashing into the men around him.
The stone mask shattered over his face and he squeezed his eyes shut against it. Some part of him registered a terrible noise, but he did not hear it, as if it were there but had nothing to do with him. When he became fully aware again, he found the cords holding one of his hands was loose and he twisted free of it, wiping the stone dust from his face and opening his eyes. Three of the five men lay dead. There could be no mistaking the lifeless sprawl of their bodies. Elbeth and another were still alive, Elbeth sitting some distance away and staring at Chamus in shock and confusion, blood leaking from his ears. The other man staggered around with his hands to the sides of his head.
The man saw Chamus open his eyes and snarled. Pulling a knife from his belt, he walked over, the blade poised to deliver a backhand stroke across the boy’s throat. There was a loud pistol shot and the man was knocked backwards. He toppled to the ground and groaned, clutching his shoulder. Riadni came up from behind Chamus, pistol still raised.
‘Good shot!’ was all Chamus could think of saying.
Riadni shrugged. She had been aiming for the man’s chest. Still, he was down. She helped Chamus free himself from the stretcher and supported him as he stood up. He winced as he put weight on his injured leg. Casting one wary look at Elbeth, he considered getting Riadni to reload the pistol and finish the job. But he just wanted to get out of there. With one arm over her shoulders, he went with her down the narrow, winding path. It took some time to reach the bottom of the hill and he was pale, sweating and exhausted when they got there.
Standing near the mouth of the main cave was her father. He had a revolver in his hand.
‘Papa …’ she started, but then there was the sound of a stone bouncing down the path behind her and Elbeth stumbled out of the shadows.
‘Ah, Sostas,’ he said, speaking very loudly. ‘You’ve arrived just in time to see the true nature of your daughter. I didn’t know you had it in you to raise such a traitor.’
‘Let her go,’ Sostas said, ‘for the sake of our friendship, Lakrem.’
‘Can’t hear a word you’re saying,’ Elbeth held up his hands in helplessness. There was an automatic pistol in his right hand. ‘You could say your words are falling on deaf ears. The Altimans sent a martyr of their own, it seems. Something had already planted the seed. Didn’t see it coming. The ceremony brought the death out of him. And here he stands, untouched by it. I didn’t see it coming.’
‘Lakrem,’ Sostas pleaded, ‘there’s no need for this …’
Elbeth kept Chamus and Riadni between himself and his friend, but his eyes did not leave Sostas.
‘I’m deaf, Sostas, but I can still hear the dead.’
Both men stopped moving. Chamus and Riadni looked from one to the other, directly in the firing line. Riadni turned to gaze into her father’s eyes. Sliding her foot behind Chamus’s and her hand up behind his neck to clutch his collar, she tensed.
Elbeth began to stride towards where the two were standing and Sostas started forward at the same moment. Sostas reached out for his daughter, but Elbeth was going to get to them first. Riadni threw herself backwards, pulling Chamus with her and the two men were suddenly facing each other, only feet apart. Elbeth, his gun hand coming up, was distracted by the movement for an instant and Sostas whipped his gun up and fired at near point-blank range. Elbeth’s gun went off, but he was already falling backwards. He stepped back to catch himself, tried to aim his gun again and Sostas fired once more. The Hadram Cassal leader jerked as the bullet struck him and spun to hit the ground face down. He rolled over, but the gun fell from his limp hand and he gurgled a few slurred words before dying. Sostas calmly slid his revolver back into his belt and knelt to say a brief prayer over his friend. Then he turned and took Riadni into his arms.
‘It’s not over, Sostas listen,’ Chamus said to them. ‘I need to get to a radio, right now.’
‘The Hadram Cassal are all gone,’ Sostas said. ‘They took everything with them.’
‘There’s a glider mission heading out here tonight,’ Chamus told him. ‘They are coming to spread a disease. You know the rumours? The plague? They are going to release it all over this area.’
‘We’ve heard the rumours. They’re not true,’ Sostas shook his head. ‘I haven’t heard of a single case. It’s an Altiman lie.’
‘There haven’t been any cases, not yet,’ Chamus grimaced with pain as he stood up, ‘but tomorrow there will be. The rumours were all being spread to set up the story. Elbeth knew it and he was going to let it happen.’
Sostas glanced down at the dead man. He scowled and then nodded to himself.
‘And you think you can stop it?’
‘The plan can’t work if people know about it before the gliders take off. I need a radio.’
‘There’s none in Kemsemet since old Barark sold his,’ Sostas said.
‘What about the aid column,’ Riadni put in. ‘They have one. But we’ve no horses. They’re hours away on foot.’
‘Elbeth wasn’t planning to walk out of here,’ Chamus said. ‘Where are their horses?’
‘They weren’t going to ride,’ Sostas said. ‘They were going to drive.’
He pointed to a small four-wheel-drive car sitting under camouflage netting near one of the caves.
‘Can you drive?’ Chamus asked.
‘Well enough.’
They helped Chamus walk over to the vehicle, but before getting in he stopped. There were spare fuel cans on the back of the car and seeing them had reminded him of something. He limped into the cave and came out a few minutes later with a piece of polished, carved wood under his arm.
‘What’s that?’ Riadni asked.
‘My propeller.’
It took them twenty minutes to reach his plane, during which time Chamus told the other two everything he knew, or suspected, about the glider mission. The car’s toolbox had the tools he needed to reattach the propeller and the job itself took very little time. There was no way to carry a passenger, short of lying one of them on the top of a wing, and he would not be able to land safely in the dark anyway, so flying to the aid station was out of the question. But if Riadni and Sostas failed to get to Yered in time, he hoped he might be able to somehow delay the gliders. Sostas shook his hand, then Riadni gave him a quick, timid hug, before he pulled on his helmet and climbed into the cockpit. He had shown Sostas how to spin the propeller, so once the engine was going, he waved and immediately started down the field. It was a bright moonlit night, but still far too dark to take off from an unlit strip under normal circumstances. It didn’t matter. He had seen the terrain in daylight. It was more than long enough and there was no time to clear the path of any small obstacles.
He pushed the throttle forward, the engine bellowed and the plane lunged forward. It bumped and bounced down the rough earth of the field, eventually speeding into a shuddering run and then he was up.
He peeled away and set a heading for the north-west. He had a map on his knees and he had already marked the most likely route the gliders would take. They would need to cut loose from their tow-planes far enough away from the area that the planes’ engines would not be heard. He had flown with his father and grandfather in gliders and knew a bit about them. Flying a glider in the cooling air of the night was a tough job, without engines they relied on air currents for lift. The best rout
e to take would be one that gave them plenty of thermals and updrafts on their way to and around their target. Like the range of hills that led down from the north-west to Kemsemet. And they would never make it back to their airfield, there was none close enough, but they would need enough lift after the strike to get a safe distance from the area. That narrowed down the routes they could take.
He flew to a point over an area of desert at the foot of the hills that Sostas had told him was uninhabited, calculating that if he could keep them there, they might lose their lift and either land or have to drop their heavy loads. Staying low, he hoped to catch sight of the gliders silhouetted against the moonlit sky. He flew large circles there, looking at his watch and waiting, hoping that he had chosen the right place, and knowing that he would not find out if Riadni and Sostas had succeeded until he landed in the morning, or until he spotted those gliders.
Sostas was driving as fast as he dared along the rough road. He could have cut across country on a horse, but the car could not jump ditches or fences, or scramble up and down banks.
‘Listen to me,’ he said to his daughter, ‘when we reach Yered, I have to leave you and get back to the farm …’
‘I’m coming with you.’
‘No, you’ll stay there. Send out the message. I’ll come back for you later.’
‘Leynid can send the message, Papa, I’m coming back home with you,’ Riadni looked up into his face. ‘I want to be with you and Mama and the boys. You can’t stop me.’
Sostas nodded grimly, taking her hand and giving it a squeeze.
They jolted along, chasing the light of the headlamps, Sostas having to refresh his rusty driving skills as they went. They had been driving for less than fifteen minutes since they had left Chamus when Sostas suddenly slammed on the brakes and brought the car to a skidding halt. There, in the glare of the headlights, was a boulder blocking the road.