by Mark Hodder
Clarissa rubbed her wrists and looked at the Koluwaian. “Your wife is dead. Her ability to hide away failed her and she was killed by a Blood God.”
The old man shrugged and said, “She means nothing to me.”
I prodded him with the pikestaff. He jerked and gave a screech as the weapon’s tip sent a shock through him.
“Take off your robes,” I ordered, and turned back to my companion. “There are no Blood Gods, Clarissa. Those bumps on your head—I think some sort of paired parasitical creature has burrowed into your scalp. The things endow the Yatsill with increased intelligence and telepathic abilities, while also causing them to slowly metamorphose into the creatures that inhabit this mountain, the Mi’aata.”
Seeing the look of horror on her face, I added, “Judging from Pretty Wahine’s long life, they’re somewhat incompatible with human physiology. They can’t transform you, other than to correct the malformations you suffered as a child. They also extend your lifespan and connect your mind to the other hosts.”
Iriputiz was now standing in nothing but a loincloth, though the crystal he wore was still hanging against his narrow chest. I passed the pikestaff to Clarissa, gestured for the islander to hand me his robes, and started to put them on.
I said, “I’ve been piecing it all together. I was wondering why, after Pretty Wahine arrived on Ptallaya, the Mi’aata used to die before reaching the sea. I think it’s because, when they break out of their Yatsill shell, they must immediately feed. It gives them the strength required to make their way here to Phenadoor. Quee’tan were their natural prey, but the Yatsill, who fashioned their society on Pretty Wahine’s memories of Koluwai, drove the Quee’tan out of the forest when they built tree houses.”
I glared at Iriputiz, finished dressing, and pointed at his crystal. “I want that, too.”
Reluctantly, he removed it and handed it over. It tingled against my skin as if charged with electricity. I looped its string around my neck and continued, “The Mi’aata were then further hampered by Pretty Wahine. She interpreted their emergence as a demonic invasion. The mental powers she’d gained through the consumption of Dar’sayn allowed her to counter it by suppressing the Yatsills’ metamorphosis. The natural evolution of the species was almost completely halted.”
With a jerk of my hand, I ordered the witch doctor to the door. Clarissa followed him, limping slightly, and I fell in behind. We exited the room. The guards were still in a stupor. We passed them without incident and started up the ramp.
“Yissil Froon was the first Yatsill to drink Dar’sayn,” I said. “He took it in large amounts. It gave him greater mesmeric control—and insight. He saw the true nature of the relationship between the Yatsill and the Mi’aata. That’s when he approached you, isn’t it, Iriputiz? After he realised.”
The Koluwaian swallowed nervously and nodded.
“And what did he do?” Clarissa asked.
“Answer her!” I barked.
Iriputiz moaned and said, “Some of my people fell through the rupture. They were brought to Yatsillat. When the Heart of Blood rose, what few Mi’aata hatched fed off their blood and fled to the sea. Yissil Froon could listen to their thoughts. He could influence their actions. With his mind, he followed them and discovered Phenadoor.”
We came to the door that led to the platform where the flier was parked. I pushed Iriputiz through it, whirled him around to face me, and kept shoving until he was standing with his heels at the very edge of the precipitous drop. I repeated Clarissa’s question. “And what did he do?”
Glancing fearfully down at the streets far, far below, the old man stammered, “He—he—he sent me back through the rupture to fetch more people.”
“For the new Mi’aata. To make them insane. To make them susceptible to his influence.”
“Y-yes. Pretty Wahine had disappeared. We could not find her. But she was still interfering. Even so, some Mi’aata were born at every rising of the Heart of Blood. They required food.”
I placed my right forefinger in the middle of the witch doctor’s chest and held it there while addressing Clarissa.
“Yissil Froon knew of Earth from this hound. And he knew from the sick Mi’aata that Phenadoor was scientifically advanced. He realised that, with its manufacturing power and the growing number of Divergent, he could create an invasion force.”
“Surely you don’t mean that he intends to attack our world, Aiden!”
“I mean exactly that. Get into the vehicle, please.”
I applied a slight pressure to the Koluwaian’s chest. He swayed backward, his arms windmilling as he fought for balance.
“Please!” he yelled.
“Clarissa,” I said. “Can justice be evil?”
So softly that I could barely hear her, she replied, “If it’s true justice, I don’t see how it can be, Aiden.”
I gave a grunt of agreement and pushed.
The witch doctor’s eyes went wide, his mouth opened, and he toppled backward and vanished from sight. A long receding wail rose from below and quickly trailed away to nothing.
I turned, paced over to the flier, climbed in, and began to manipulate the controls.
Clarissa remained silent.
“There are certain matters,” I said, quietly, “that I am beginning to see in black and white.”
The vehicle moaned quietly and rose into the air. I steered it high over Zone Four.
“Is there a way out of here?” I asked.
“To the left. A shaft of red light is shining in—there must be an opening.”
I spotted the beam and directed the craft toward it. The light was streaming into the cavern at an angle that suggested the red sun had made considerable progress across the sky since I’d last seen it.
“I was Yissil Froon’s plague carrier,” I called back to my friend. “His means to overcome Pretty Wahine’s influence. He needed me in New Yatsillat. So when Yarvis Thayne tried to raise opposition to our presence, Froon had him murdered.”
“By whom?”
“The same Yatsill that attacked you, I expect. My guess is he dominated them mentally and made them train to fight. I doubt they really understood what they were doing. Froon made a show of supporting those who wanted us banished from the city, but in reality, the only one he wanted gone was you.”
“Because I was trying to find a cure?”
“And also because the Yatsill were mimicking your inventiveness. You weren’t meant to be transported to Ptallaya—and you certainly weren’t meant to be a host for the parasite. He was afraid your level of intelligence, transmitted to the Yatsill, might lead them to realize what he was up to. That’s why he tried to have you banished to the Whimpering Ruins, and why, having failed, he then orchestrated the attempt on your life. Later, in surreptitiously investigating your mind, probably in search of a weakness, he encountered the plans that you and Lord Hufferton had drawn up for war machines. That’s when you suddenly became useful to him.”
“So that’s why the blueprints were going around and around in my head!” she exclaimed. “But, Aiden, I was immature when I dreamed up those machines. It was done as an exercise, nothing more. The designs are impossibly extravagant. I doubt they would even function.”
“Perhaps not if constructed by men on Earth, but here on Ptallaya, with Mi’aata science, who knows what’s possible?”
A long moment went by, silent but for the air whistling past, then Clarissa said, “There’s something I still don’t understand. Why are the parasites entering fewer and fewer Yatsill? Why is the Ritual of Immersion failing?”
“I have a theory, but if you don’t mind, I’ll wait until I have evidence to support it before I share.”
“I don’t mind, but why keep it to yourself?”
“Because,” I answered, “if it’s true, I will have to completely revise my understanding of what it means to be evil.”
I saw that the sunlight was streaming through a large orifice in the side of the cavern. I steered our
vehicle into it, sped through a short tunnel, and shot out into the open, veering around and down to fly low along the base of the mountain.
Dock Twelve was easier to find than I’d anticipated. There were a great many caves around the base of Phenadoor, nearly all of them with docks visible just inside, mostly empty, the fleet of underconveyances obviously out at sea. However, after completely circling the vast mountain, we passed a solid vertical cliff along which vast doors were lined—all closed.
“The manufacturing plants,” Clarissa declared.
“How do you know?”
“The Quintessence was obsessing over them. I picked up his thoughts when he was digging around in my head.”
The twelfth cave to the right of the plants was occupied by one of the underwater vessels—Underconveyance 98.
I brought our vehicle to a halt and allowed it to sink down until it was just five feet or so above the gently rolling water.
“That’s the ship we’re looking for,” I said. “The one that’ll transport us back to the mainland. Shall we try it?”
“I don’t see that we have much choice.”
“Hopefully, Colonel Spearjab will be somewhere nearby.”
“The colonel? Here in Phenadoor?”
“He’s Mi’aata now, but hearing me speak English restored his memories. I wouldn’t have found you without him.”
“Then I owe my life to both of you.”
I turned to face my one-time sexton. She was almost naked. Like my own trousers, hers had been reduced to little more than tatters. Her shirt was lacking sleeves and buttons and did little to cover her. The goggles still hung about her neck. Her skin was smudged with dirt and bruises and scored with scratches, her hair lank and matted, and her weird yellow eyes slightly wild with urgency, fear, and excitement.
She looked spectacular.
“I love you, Clarissa Stark.”
She smiled, and her face, already stained red by the crimson light, blushed a deeper hue. I didn’t need any other response.
We stood. I took the pikestaff from my friend, we climbed over the side of the flier, and jumped into the sea.
It wasn’t far to swim but, even so, I’d underestimated the severity of my exhaustion and found myself struggling, especially with the heavy weapon—its shaft was made of buoyant wood but it was difficult to drag through the water—and Iriputiz’s robes tangling around my limbs. By the time we climbed up onto a shelf of rock beside the cave entrance, I could do nothing but lie on my back panting. Clarissa put her hands under my shoulders and dragged me a few feet to one side to ensure we couldn’t be spotted from the dock. She sat beside me and said, “Rest a moment. Get your strength back.”
We were silent for a while, before Clarissa asked, “When did you realise the truth?”
“When the Quintessence showed no knowledge of the Yatsill. I remembered all those Workers entering the sea, thinking they were going to Phenadoor. Suddenly I recognised that they were the Yatsill in their most natural form, just animals sporting in their natural environment, free from telepathic influence.”
“And free of the parasites,” my friend said. She touched the two lumps on her forehead and grimaced.
“Yes.” I thought for a moment, then asked, “What does Phenadoor normally make in those manufacturing plants?”
“From what I could gather, underconveyances and large dome-like structures that the Mi’aata affix to the seabed to house farming communities. Also, Phenadoor’s infrastructure is constantly being replaced, so parts are always required.”
“I noticed as much.”
“Very little actually needs replacing. The work is demanded of the Mi’aata simply to keep them occupied and enslaved. The Quintessence is a dictator, Aiden. Phenadoor is all the trinity wants it to be and nothing more. Inevitably, in reaction to such despotism, extremes are born, giving us monsters like Yissil Froon, whose desire to escape his fate as a component of this languishing autocracy has led him to seek power elsewhere. It’s sending him along a path of destruction that threatens to annihilate millions of innocents.”
I sat up, removed my robes, and wrung the water from them. “You think that’s his motivation? Well, one way or another, we’ll defeat him, and when we do, his hold over the Divergent will be gone. Perhaps when they reveal the truth of their origins to the rest of the Mi’aata, it will stimulate questions, and discontent at the suppression of imagination and creativity will cause an uprising. The Quintessence’s days might well be numbered.”
“What chaos Froon generates!”
We rested for a few moments longer. I looked at the sun. It was very low—its nadir almost on the horizon—and I realised my journey to the Forest of Indistinct Murmurings and subsequent time in Phenadoor had occupied a far, far greater period than I’d initially estimated. A deep longing overcame me—I wanted that infernal globe gone! I yearned for two little yellow eyes to look down upon Ptallaya again!
“We’d better move,” Clarissa said. “I can feel the Quintessence searching for me. I’ve learned from bitter experience that I can only resist his mental intrusions for short periods.”
I stood, put the robes back on, and, after wrapping the hood around my head to conceal my face, took up the pikestaff and led my companion around the ledge, into the cave, and onto the dock. A few Mi’aata were working at its far end and three were standing by the underconveyance’s gangplank, but otherwise Dock Twelve was sparsely populated. We slipped behind a stack of crates and, remaining concealed, moved around the periphery of the cave until we came to an arched opening. I took a tight hold of Clarissa’s arm, as if she was my prisoner, and strode into the open, giving the impression that we’d just entered through the doorway. One of the Mi’aata moved away from the gangplank and met us halfway to it.
“Mr. Sepik, we’ve been waiting.” I saw that his four eyes had a peculiarly distracted quality about them. Yissil Froon’s doing, for certain.
Imitating the witch doctor’s whispery voice, I replied, “Can we depart at once?”
“Yes. One of the Discontinued came aboard moments ago and our hold is now full. If more want to make the trip, they’ll have to try another vessel.”
I had no idea what he was referring to, but, acting on intuition, I asked, “What was this latecomer’s name?”
“Tharneek-Ptun.”
I gave a nod of satisfaction. Good! Colonel Spearjab had found his way aboard!
We followed the Mi’aata up the gangplank and entered the ship. Its corridors were narrow and its rooms small. We were escorted to a chamber and I was told, “These are your quarters. What shall I do with this one?” The Mi’aata looked at Clarissa.
“She will remain in my custody,” I answered. “I have to interrogate her.”
The floor suddenly vibrated.
“Ah,” the other exclaimed. “We are leaving Phenadoor. There will be time to sleep if you wish it. You can place your prisoner with the Discontinued in the hold at the end of this corridor.”
He departed.
Safely ensconced in the small room, I drained its trough and put my robes in the bottom of it. “This will be your bed, Clarissa. I’m afraid it won’t be very comfortable, but it’s better than nothing. I’ll sleep on the floor.”
We settled down, both too worn out to worry any more about our security.
“What happened to you in New Yatsill?” I asked.
“Poor Pretty Wahine,” my companion replied. “She pushed herself beyond all endurance trying to protect the Yatsill and her abilities eventually failed her. I’d just returned to the cave after a fruitless search for Yissil Froon when three Mi’aata burst in. Two grabbed me while the third killed the old woman. I was then dragged into the sea. I lost consciousness, woke up in one of these vessels, and was taken to Phenadoor.”
“I should never have left you,” I said. “My trek to the Forest of Indistinct Murmurings was a complete waste of time. Well, almost.”
“Almost?”
“I met a Zu
ll. I’ll tell you about it after we’ve slept.”
I was conscious of nothing more until I was awoken by the touch of a tentacle against my leg. A Mi’aata had entered the room. I sat up and immediately became aware that my face was exposed. The creature didn’t react—probably, I realised, because it was unfamiliar with Iriputiz’s appearance.
“We have arrived,” it said.
“Already?”
“Yes.”
As Clarissa stirred, I thanked the Mi’aata and told it we’d be on deck presently. It handed me a tray, on which there was a skin of water and an assortment of fruits and vegetables, then left us alone.
Clarissa groaned. “My muscles are as stiff as wood.”
“Mine, too. Good gracious, Clarissa, we must have slept for hours and hours. Phenadoor is a long way from the mainland, yet the voyage is already over!”
“I’d hoped for an opportunity to study the vessel. How do Phenadoorian machines function? I can hear no engine, have seen no fumes, can smell no oil—I’m intrigued!”
“Crystals and frequencies, that’s all I know,” I replied. “Perhaps we’ll one day have an opportunity to learn more.”
“Unless we find our way back to Earth.”
I looked at her. She returned my gaze. There was no need to say it—we both saw an odd reluctance on the other’s face. Despite the wounds and exertions and losses, the dangers and our merciless opponents, we were both more engaged with the business of living than we’d ever felt on our own world.
We ate, quenched our thirst, left our quarters—taking our captured pikestaff with us—and followed the corridor to a ramp that led to the ship’s deck. A group of a dozen or so Mi’aata had gathered outside. A great many of them were of an unhealthy hue, their skin pale and blotchy, their limbs quivering uncontrollably.
The creature who’d ushered us aboard at Dock Twelve—the “captain,” though the Mi’aata don’t use such terminology—met us and indicated the group. “The Discontinued. The strongest of them will help you to shore.”