Trapped lop-6

by James Alan Gardner

  I thought about it. She was right — this wasn't really about rescuing Sebastian. I wanted to do that, of course; but that was just the job, not my reason for doing it. I'd still have come this far, even if we were chasing a complete stranger.

  So why was I here? Why did I intend to pick myself up and keep going to the bitter end?

  Loyalty to my friends.

  Curiosity about what lay in Niagara Falls.

  Anger at the monster that killed Rosalind and a hope we could make it pay for its crime.

  The desire not to act like a coward in front of Annah. (How much of everything done in the world is an attempt to impress the opposite sex?)

  But above all else… the feeling that I was finally doing something. No longer waiting for life to begin. Like Impervia and Pelinor, I'd always had a secret belief I was destined for something more important than marking tests and trying to keep my students awake until lunch. It was a ridiculous, dangerous fantasy: an adolescent delusion that God would single me out as special. Blame it on my privileged background, my vanity, or a simple lack of common sense; but I'd always assumed I would someday hear the Call to Adventure like some mythological hero.

  Trials and tribulations. Physical ordeals. The love of beautiful women. Tragedy and betrayal. Victory and vindication. Heroic joy, heroic pain, heroic life, heroic death.

  "I'm here," I told Annah, "because I'm an ass. There's a dead woman at my feet, killed in an ugly ignoble way… and I'm still not as afraid of dying as I am of being ordinary."

  She took my hand — my blood-smeared hand — and pressed it to her lips. "Me too," she whispered. "No more being ordinary. I will drink life to the lees." She paused. "Alfred, Lord Tennyson. 'Ulysses.' " She paused again. "I've been a teacher way too long."

  Impervia and Pelinor set off toward the central square, supposedly to scout the town and make sure there were no more Ring thugs waiting in ambush. In truth, Impervia was just too keyed up to stay in one place; Myoko couldn't be moved in her current condition and Impervia couldn't bear watching helplessly while our friend looked so pallid and frail. There was nothing anyone could do except keep Myoko warm and hope her blood would soon start circulating normally. That wasn't enough for Impervia: she went off on the prowl, and Pelinor tagged along to keep her out of trouble.

  I too was feeling keyed up. I trotted down to the lake to fill a canteen so we could splash Myoko's face… then I couldn't decide if splashing would help or just add to the level of shock. Every teacher at the academy had been trained in first-aid; but our textbooks had been OldTech ones. That meant we learned the best temporizing techniques OldTech experts knew, but most of the write-ups ended with OBTAIN PROFESSIONAL MEDICAL HELP AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.

  We were four hundred years too late for that.

  "She's waking up," the Caryatid said. Annah and I knelt beside her; we all saw Myoko's eyelids flicker. As soon as her eyes opened they closed again, squinting against the sun. We'd laid her in the brightest spot we could find in an effort to keep her warm.

  "How are you feeling?" I asked.

  "Like shit." Her voice was a thready whisper. "Who's…" She couldn't finish the question.

  The Caryatid said, "Oberon died but took Xavier with him. Everyone else is alive — thanks to you."

  "Okay… good…"

  "Rest," Annah said. "Don't waste your strength."

  "Too late," Myoko whispered. "Way too late."

  "Don't say that!" the Caryatid told her. "You'll be fine."

  "I am fine," Myoko said. "Did my bit. What I was… here for…"

  "Myoko!" The Caryatid's voice had gone steely. "Goddamn it, don't you dare surrender. It's stupid. People don't just die when it suits them. Don't give up. Myoko! Myoko!"

  The Caryatid shook Myoko by the shoulders. Myoko's head flopped limply in response. A little more blood trickled from her mouth. Then a bit from one ear.

  When the Caryatid let go, Myoko slumped to the sand. Bright sun. A spring breeze. And death.

  Impervia and Pelinor returned. With them came a wagon driven by two sullen teenagers: one boy, one girl, both about sixteen, both with flaming red hair and freckles, both glaring resentfully at Impervia. The wagon held a single coffin.

  "I found an undertaker," Impervia announced, jogging up ahead of the cart. "It was—"

  "You only brought one coffin," the Caryatid said. Her voice was flat and lifeless.

  "For Gretchen," Impervia said. "There was nothing big enough for Oberon, and Xavier can lie where he is. Let the crows pick at his…"

  She stopped. She'd seen Myoko.

  "We need another coffin," the Caryatid said.

  Impervia closed her eyes and let out a shuddering breath. When she knelt beside Myoko, she needed almost a full minute before she could speak the first words of a prayer.

  The grumpy teenagers were named Vickie and Victor: twin children of the local undertaker. Pelinor prattled on about the whole family having bright red hair, mother, father, all the children who'd been hanging about the shop. No one listened to what he was saying, least of all Pelinor himself — he was just filling the silence, trying not to break down in tears.

  Myoko was dead. Gretchen was dead. Oberon was dead.

  Only ten minutes had passed since we left Dainty Dinghy.

  The red-haired teenagers lumpishly hauled the coffin off the wagon and dragged it to the jolly-boat. They set down the coffin beside Gretchen; I suppose they thought Gretchen looked more dead than Myoko. Impervia immediately broke off her prayers. "This one," she said, pointing at Myoko. "This one first. Then the other."

  "You want them in the same casket?" Victor asked.

  "Of course not!"

  "We only got the one casket," Vickie said. "Either we double up or somebody goes without."

  "You'll get another casket." Impervia's voice was the hissing fuse on a bomb. "You'll put this woman in the casket you have and you'll get another casket for that woman there. You'll be quick about it and you'll handle them with respect."

  "Here," I said, stepping forward. I had my trusty purse out and enough cash in hand that I hoped Vickie and Victor would shut their mouths. "This will cover your expenses. Just do what needs doing."

  Vickie and Victor stared at the money a moment, then both reached to grab it. They had a three-second shoving match over which of them would take possession of the gold.

  Under other circumstances, it might have been funny.

  Impervia stomped away to the edge of the lake and stared out over the water. She kept her back turned as the teenagers picked up Myoko's body.

  Pelinor drew me aside. "While Impervia was speaking with the undertaker," he said, "I arranged for a coach to Niagara Falls. There's no regular run scheduled, so, uhh, we'll have to pay extra."

  I nodded; whatever the price was, I could cover it. Didn't I always pay for everything? I could afford the coach and the coffins as easily as I bought the first round of drinks whenever we went to a tavern.

  (It occurred to me, we'd probably never go bar-crawling again. With Myoko gone, we couldn't bear the hollowness. We might even start avoiding each other.

  (Nothing would ever be the same.)

  Annah went with Vickie and Victor back to their wagon. She spoke with them quietly for several minutes. When she returned, she said, "The undertaker will hold all the bodies while we're in Niagara."

  "And if we don't come back?"

  "If we don't return in three days, they'll take the corpses to Gretchen's ship."

  At which point, Zunctweed might throw Gretchen into the lake — or worse. The spells that made slaves obey their owners didn't apply once the owner was dead… and I'd seen slaves commit gross atrocities on their late owners' bodies. Even slaves who seemed resigned to their lot might take posthumous vengeance for years of indignity. Kicking, mutilating, attacking the corpse with any weapon they could find. Then, after the savagery was over, they'd docilely report to their owner's heir. Slavery spells didn't end with one owner's death; they j
ust took a brief holiday, then reasserted themselves with a new master.

  I wondered whom Zunctweed would go to once he learned Gretchen was dead. Maybe me. Sometimes when Gretchen got into a huff, she'd threaten to leave me Zunctweed in her will.

  As if I didn't have enough problems.

  18: BING BANG BOOM

  We left Vickie and Victor moping over the impossibility of lifting Oberon's body into their cart. With all of us heaving, we might have been able to move his massive weight, but Impervia refused to let us try. She was furious with the world, and the undertaker's children were the most immediate targets for her wrath. "I saw how much Phil paid them," she told the others. "They can deal with this on their own."

  Perhaps she just wanted to get moving again. Away from the beach and the corpses. With seething glares, she forced us to gather our gear and depart.

  Leaving our dead friends in the less than capable hands of Vickie and Victor.

  As we walked up the street into town, Pelinor gamely tried to fill the silence with overhearty remarks about our surroundings—"Pretty little sign on that store there, what's it supposed to be, a hammer do you think?" — but no one else responded to his efforts at conversation. That didn't stop him: Pelinor was the sort who handled his grief by talking trivialities.

  I didn't mind his babble; it was better than empty quiet. No one else tried to shut him up either — not even Impervia. She was putting up a good front of being in control, but underneath… underneath, she was a deeply emotional woman who thought most emotions were sinful. Someday that inner conflict might rip her apart.

  But not yet. Not yet.

  So we trudged through Crystal Bay's central square. Along the way, we passed numerous tethered horses, all of whom received a "Good day," from Pelinor and comments on their hocks and withers. Local residents who saw us coming ducked into stores or side streets until we were gone. Considering Impervia's mood, I'd say people were smart to hide… but it was still unnerving to see our presence turn the place into a ghost town.

  Therefore I was glad when we finally reached the stagecoach company. If you could dignify it with the name "company." Its meager excuse for an office was nothing more than a windowless shack in front of a stable. The stable was not much fancier — room for only one coach, and perhaps eight horses if they doubled up two to a stall.

  Not what you'd call a big operation. Quite possibly, the stage ran only once a week, doing a circuit of nearby villages, then ending back at Crystal Bay. The rest of the time, the coach driver apparently served as the local blacksmith; a shed beside the stables had its door open to reveal an anvil and a furnace, neither of which were currently in use. In fact, there was no one in sight at all. The only promising sign was that the coach had been trundled out of its shed and hitched to a team of four, all of whom looked adequately strong and healthy.

  Pelinor went off to talk to the horses while Impervia stuck her head into the office shack. "Empty," she reported. The glowering look on her face suggested dark suspicions — that the driver had absconded with our down payment, that he was hiding and ready to ambush us, or perhaps that he'd been murdered by Ring agents — so it must have come as a letdown when a man emerged from a privy at the back of the yard, his trousers still half-undone.

  "There you are!" he called, buttoning his pants with no great haste. "Hope I didn't keep you waiting, but my pa always said to empty the chutes before takin' folks on a drive."

  He smiled as if we should be impressed by his father's acumen. That smile seemed to sum up the man: sunny, casual, and his idea of inspired advance planning was remembering to visit the outhouse before leaving on a trip. Our driver (who introduced himself as Bing: "Fred Binghamton, but my pa always went as Bing, and that's good enough for me!") was nearly as dark as Impervia and almost twice as muscular — he was, after all, a blacksmith — but he had none of the holy sister's knife-edge aggression. Though he was young (mid-twenties), Bing's face already had abundant laugh lines; his eyes showed a permanent twinkle and he moved with the contented slowness of a well-fed bear.

  Bing obviously enjoyed life… and if his wits were less than lightning-fast, his good nature had a contagious quality we badly needed at that moment. It would be ridiculous to say the sight of him cheered us up — that was impossible. But Bing was so pleasantly normal, he served as a reminder that the world contained more than grief. His smiling presence eased a bit of the tension wrapped around my heart.

  I couldn't help noticing his smile grew wider when he looked Impervia's direction. He obviously liked what he saw, and didn't mind anyone knowing. I doubt if he even recognized Impervia's tunic and trousers as nun's apparel — Magdalenes weren't often seen in backwaters like Crystal Bay, and besides, Impervia's clothes were still clinging wet from getting splashed. I could forgive Bing for ogling a nun; the question was if Impervia could forgive him.

  Several long seconds passed: Bing smiling broadly, the rest of us holding our breaths to see what Impervia would do. Slowly she lifted her hand… then, incredibly, she brushed it through her snip-clipped hair as if trying to comb it into some more orderly arrangement. A moment later, she dropped her gaze; with her jet-dark skin it was impossible to tell, but I would almost have said she was blushing.

  I shook my head in amazement. Any other man on any other day would have received a sharp-tongued reprimand; Impervia might even slap his face. But today… grief affects people unpredictably. I could have sworn Impervia was so angry over Myoko's death, she'd lash out at anyone who gave her the least excuse. Obviously, I'd been wrong. Maybe she'd been ready to roar at Bing — to go through her usual routine of instant hostility toward male attention — when suddenly, she just didn't have the heart. Not enough energy to work herself into a rage: especially not over someone as transparently harmless as Bing. I don't know if that's what actually went through Impervia's mind, but I could see the bottom had dropped out of her fury. Nothing left but that weak almost-feminine gesture of straightening her hair.

  Her fire had turned to ashes. She looked exhausted.

  Bing was not the sort whose smiles lengthened into leers. After only a moment more, he turned from Impervia and began talking pleasantly with Pelinor: explaining some nicety about the way the horses had been hooked to the coach. ("My pa made that harness; it's got special features.") When Bing bent over to point out some detail about the cinch under one horse's belly, Impervia's gaze flicked over to study him behind his back. As if he was a puzzle and a challenge.

  But her eyes still looked tired.

  I walked over to her. "How are you doing?" I asked.

  She sighed. "Praying for strength."

  "Really?"

  "Really." She glanced my way, then back at Bing. "Nothing's ever simple, Phil. A few hours ago, I was so… excited… about going on a holy mission. Now Myoko's dead, and we haven't accomplished anything. Not yet, anyway. I, uhh… I regret how I felt. Excitement was naive. Perhaps even a sin. Thinking that I'd arrived and would never have another silly little problem."

  "What silly little problems do you have?"

  Impervia nodded toward Bing. "When I see a man like that, the devil whispers in my ear. It's not lust — not much — but it would be so uncomplicated just to… you know. Fall into someone's arms right now. To let go. To have someone who would… oh, just to have someone. To live like other women. Marry or not, settle down or not, have children or not: I don't know what I'd do, but sometimes I look at a man who's simple and decent, and I think how much easier it would be. Just to be someone other than Sister Impervia."

  She gave a weak snort. "Impervia. What a stupid name. I chose it when I took vows at fifteen. Cocky little kid, sure I was stronger than anything. Why on Earth would anyone let a fifteen-year-old girl make such an important decision?"

  "What's your real name?" I asked.

  "It's…" She stopped suddenly. "My real name is Sister Impervia. I'm praying for strength, Phil, remember?" She stepped away from me, then yelled at the others, "Why are
you all just standing around? There's no time to lose!" She stormed a few steps forward, then whirled back to glare at me. "Quit lollygagging, you! Get into the coach. Now!"

  Impervia still looked tired; but she also looked strong.

  The ride to the Falls took three hours — cramped bumpy hours, bouncing over OldTech roads whose potholes had been patched with dirt rather than asphalt or gravel. The dirt was now mud; the potholes were mudholes. Every time a wheel hit one, the whole coach jolted.

  Pelinor rode beside Bing on the driver's seat. No doubt they spent the entire journey nattering about horses. I sat in the carriage next to Annah, with Impervia directly opposite me and the Caryatid on the other side. Every now and then we'd hear Bing's booming laugh, roaring about something Pelinor said… and I'd look across to see Impervia listening keenly to the sound. If she wasn't careful, she might work herself up into a bosom-heaving crush on the big man; but then, Impervia was always careful, wasn't she?

  Anyway, there were worse things than crushes. I thought about that as I held Annah's hand. The coach was small enough that we were pressed in tight on the narrow bench; and for some reason, we held our hands down low at our sides, as if trying to hide what we were doing. I'm sure Impervia and the Caryatid knew perfectly well that Annah and I had covertly linked hands, but they pretended not to notice. Mostly they were lost in their own thoughts. So was I. So was Annah. Until some wincing moment when the memory of some corpse surfaced in my brain (Myoko, Gretchen, Oberon, Xavier, Rosalind, Hump, Dee-James), and I would find myself desperately squeezing Annah's hand for reassurance. She would always squeeze back… and sometimes she would fiercely squeeze on her own, as if some similar horror had silently risen in her mind's eye.

  But we didn't speak. None of us. We passed the hours staring out at the late afternoon. Damp fields of muck. Orchards with bare branches. Less snow here than back in Simka, more melt-water streaming through the ditches.