‘He is there? Now?’
‘Yes. He has found the entrance to this ruin and seeks to activate it.’
‘Are we too late?’ frowned the hunter.
‘Not yet,’ the young man said hoarsely. ‘It will take some time before he can do it. He has only one helper, a girl. She knows little on the matter.’
‘Why are you here? To tell us this?’
‘Yes, and to offer my assistance.’ The young man slid down off the trunk, pulled back his shoulders and stood straight. He almost looked impressive in the half-light. ‘If you will have it, Joseph.’
Gabel looked at the magus and sighed heavily. ‘Has everyone the same goal as us?’
‘There are many,’ said the young man, moving closer and examining Gabel. ‘I’ve seen Hermeticia just twenty hours ago. It swarms with the Caballeros de la Muerte, who have seized the city from its government.’
‘What? Why?’
‘The city is caught in plague. The Caballeros believe the council members are doing nothing to help end it, that they wish the city to become depopulated. The horsemen also know that the Head Councillor allowed a man to enter the city, and begin excavation at the very centre of the crater. That man was Cleric.’
‘Good. Maybe the Caballeros will do our work for us.’
‘They are afraid to go near him and this excavation site. They say there is a strange energy there. And the sickness frightens them; most have left the city. The leader of the Caballeros though, Captain Alvaros, he stays and leads the rest against this man.’
‘Then we’re not alone in our quest,’ said the magus.
‘And there are yet others,’ the young man added, reaching up and touching Gabel’s face. He felt the lines of his forehead, the rings under his eyes, the tendons in his neck, and his chest and arms. The hunter allowed this, uncomfortably, at a signal from the magus. ‘I was briefly a member of a great Sect who come from a monastery near the city of Goya-on-Lual, who travelled west across the desert toward here. We were attacked by sanguisuga.’
‘How did you find us?’
The young man had lost interest in Gabel’s face and was slowly walking around him. ‘Some kind of spirit drew me here. I’ve had plenty of time to make up my mind regarding you, but I’ve decided that I will join you if you will allow me to. The Sect I travelled with also intends to halt Erebis’ plans.’
‘Erebis? How is that related to Tan Cleric?’ asked Gabel.
‘Cleric has some sort of connection with it. It’s real, Joseph, I swear. I’ve seen it.’
‘Nobody sees Erebis and lives to speak of it,’ scoffed the hunter.
‘No. They don’t. The Ministrati are on a holy crusade to destroy Cleric before he brings a catastrophe down upon us. Now, the survivors and the others Sects are converging on Shianti.’
Gabel and the magus exchanged looks. ‘You mean to say that there’s an army of knights and a large religious cult descending upon one man? Surely, then, we’re not needed? Who are you?’
The young man smiled. ‘Don’t you remember? Can’t you see it in my movements, my manner of speaking? Joseph, we’ve known each other since we were boys. We were once very close, you and I. So close that when I became a theriope, you took it upon yourself to exterminate me. Only, in this world, you can only kill bodies.’ He laughed.
‘William…?’
‘Yes. Pleased to see me?’
‘How are you here?’ Gabel growled.
‘It’s a long, long story,’ William Teague replied placidly.
‘You have a different body.’
‘That I have. Joseph, I’m something else now. I’ve been subjected to Hell. I am now penitent.’
Gabel looked at the magus, and then at Teague’s new flesh. He felt a resurgence of that old fiery rage he had become so accustomed to. The magus’ words rang true now: his strength felt like something that had been forged in Hell.
It occurred to him that this must have been how Caeles felt when the magus approached him in Pirene. Caeles must have known that the old errant signified the beginning of his end, but between themselves Caeles and the magus had communicated the importance of the magus’ undertaking. Caeles was to die so that Gabel’s true self would be reawakened.
What better target for this rage, Gabel thought, than the monster I killed before the winter?
Before he could lurch toward Teague, the magus put out a steadying hand.
‘What?’ Gabel sneered. ‘Is he part of your plan too?’
‘Knowing how best to avoid a catastrophe is not the same as having a plan,’ the magus replied with a scowl. ‘You thought you knew how to protect your loved ones back in Niu Correntia: kill the theriope that was threatening them. But did you kill it?’
‘It’s never that easy!’
‘Of course not. Do not presume that it was easy for this man to surrender to the curse’s base instincts.’
‘Until the end, I always struggled,’ Teague said, but then admitted, ‘but I could have done more.’
‘No-one would agree that you don’t deserve to die again,’ the hunter told him, and lunged past the magus’ outstretched arm and struck Teague across the cheek with his fist.
Teague’s young body adjusted to the shock, but not before it collapsed. A smudge of blood transferred from his lip to the hand he tested it with. It had split from the bottom all the way inside, against his teeth. Gabel didn’t think that Teague’s expression then was one of anger. The young man was looking at him with poorly-concealed guilt and fear.
The magus looked disgusted with Gabel, so much so that the factotum took a step back so that the old man was between him and Teague. The magus spoke as Teague got back to his feet.
‘You also presume that he does not feel guilt for his actions, now that the curse has been removed from him,’ the magus said.
‘There’s no guarantee that he’s free of it.’
‘I guarantee it myself,’ the magus. ‘Hadentes has stripped him of it.’
‘Then…’ Gabel said with great effort, ‘…then perhaps you’ve paid your dues, William. Things seem bleaker than when you left, and I must … force myself to be more lenient than I was then. You may help me, if you wish.’
He extended his hand for Teague to shake.
‘Finally,’ said a quiet voice from behind the trees. It was Rowan. She leant against a giant hollow trunk, looking at them from under a ragged fringe. ‘Finally, our numbers are swelling again.’
~
The next time the night settled in and they had once more set off, Gabel ordered a halt, claiming that he could hear something. It was the sound of a ringing bell. Since there was no path to speak of in the first place, they had nowhere to hide, and so waited in the undergrowth for the carrier of the bell to arrive.
It was dark, just two hours from dawn, and the air was hot and thick. The steady chiming that now came at them from somewhere out of sight made Rowan shiver. She stood by the magus and drew from his seemingly concrete confidence.
He seemed as unaffected about this as he did by William Teague’s reappearance. Rowan could not believe how forgiving he and Gabel were toward the man. Had he not killed two of Gabel’s loves? Rebekah and Bethany? And yet Gabel seemed to restrain his rage so that Teague could help them against Tan Cleric. Rowan could not understand why. Was this danger so great?
A figure unravelled itself out of the hot mist, walking toward them. He or she was alone, and was swathed in loose cowls and a shawl. A heavy hood concealed the face and muffled the voice, which trembled when it said, monotonously, Unclean … Unclean … Unclean…
‘Step back,’ said the magus, and they moved aside. The figure stopped a few metres away from them, giving them a wide berth, and looked up.
‘Good morning to you all,’ she said in a dry voice. The bell tinkled on her staff. ‘Please step aside; the route here is the easiest to travel, and I have neither the strength nor agility to go leaping giant roots.’
‘Are you alone?’ asked Isaa
c. ‘Which way are you from?’
‘From Shianti, less than a day away,’ she said, one eye peeking out from underneath the hood. Her face was covered in bandages, save for the space around the mouth and eyes. There was a space over her nose for her to breathe, but there didn’t seem to be much under the bandage there. Her lips were cracked and peeling. ‘I have left the city. Sickness has taken the place. I have enough for myself already.’
‘My lady,’ said the magus. He stepped forward and took her bandaged hands in his, and kissed her on the cheek. She seemed taken aback, but didn’t have the strength to pull away.
‘Do you know what you do?’ she croaked in alarm.
‘Don’t worry about me,’ replied the magus with a smile. ‘There’s a colony just to the south of here, where there are others. Find company there, my lady. It isn’t far.’
‘Thank you,’ she said, pulling slowly away. The magus released her hands, which had only seven digits between them. ‘You’re too kind, stranger.’
‘I’ll come and visit you shortly,’ he promised quietly. ‘Wait for me at the colony.’
‘My name is Greeley,’ she said and bowed. ‘Thank you again. I’ll surely wait for you.’
She ambled off into the rainforest, picking her slow way through the ferns and roots, moving around branches and leaves instead of pushing them aside, and rang her bell, calling, Unclean … Unclean…
‘She said Shianti is just a day away,’ Gabel said to the old man.
‘We must move quickly,’ said the magus. ‘I fear we shouldn’t have lingered so long in all those warm beds we found along the way. Comfort has hindered us. We should camp only for an hour tonight.’
They climbed a short hill where the trees parted and they could see the sky, and made their fire. It would be the last they would sit by before their journey back – assuming they survived that long. Rowan thought about this as she lay down, unable any longer to sit up or stand, and quietly asked the magus to feed her bread. She would not let Gabel near her. She no longer trusted him.
~
Gabel watched Rowan from the very top of the hill, taking in with unambiguous sorrow her thin limbs, her pallid face, her horrible, butchered hair and her irreversible physical weakness. The steaming forest floor put heat to his eyes, and he blamed the moisture there on the mist.
He was standing, simply watching, when a great succession of white flashes came from close to the west. At first it seemed that it was lightning, but the light was too bright and spun in a rhythmic stutter that was wholly unnatural. He tilted his palm over his eyes and looked to the floor.
‘Cover your eyes!’ yelled the magus from halfway down the hill. ‘Don’t look at it!’
The lights bleached the skies, tearing colour from all the scenery. Then they stopped, and with a terrific crash a single beam of sunset-orange luminescence spewed upward through the atmosphere, a fiery column that pierced the clouds. It stayed there, pulsing, and they looked upon it in fear.
‘What is it?’ Gabel yelled.
‘It’s a sign!’ cried William Teague, pointing.
Rowan was murmuring quietly. The magus, who had been kneeling beside her, stood and looked at the great light now that the flashing had subsided.
‘It is the Hahnium,’ he said. ‘It’s been activated.’
‘Then why are we still alive?’
‘It’s yet to fulfil its purpose,’ he muttered. Rowan was grasping at his coat, and he looked down to comfort her.
‘A sign,’ Teague said, walking up to Gabel. ‘Pillars of cloud and fire, Joseph. Don’t you understand?’
‘I don’t understand you,’ Gabel said. ‘You’ve transformed, William.’
‘It’s all your fault,’ he said with a smile, putting a hand on his shoulder. ‘I’m sorry for the pain I caused before all this. About Rebekah … and Bethany. They were everything to you, Joseph, and I destroyed them.’
‘Your curse is dead, according to the magus. Do not expect me to forgive you entirely, or even a little. You infected Rebekah and made me kill her. She was with child, William, did you know that?’
‘I did not,’ he said, almost expressionlessly, but Gabel could sense that he was shocked and ashamed. No, he was disgusted. Gabel liked that. Let the bastard suffer for what he did.
‘And out of malice you took Bethany from me,’ he continued. ‘Out of spite. I only hope that your curse has truly left you. Do not forget that my pistol carries a few rounds still.’
‘I would expect it. And I’m not entirely certain that the curse has left me. There was something horribly familiar about the spirit that visited me just before we met—’
‘Gabel,’ cried the magus, ‘come here quickly! It’s Rowan.’
Gabel came down and lifted her up. Her eyes were wide, and she tugged at his jacket with spasming fingers. ‘Joseph,’ she said, eyes rolling left and right in their sockets.
‘What is it? What’s the matter with you?’
‘Joseph!’ she cried.
‘The light,’ the magus said quietly, and maybe it was the pillar of fire or the moonlight, but he looked very pale. ‘Joseph, she is blind.’
*
Thirty-One
THE BEATING OF WINGS
Gabel gently touched her closed eyelids. With the tips of his fingers he stroked her face, feeling how dry the skin was. How prosthetic. He knew that he’d never thought this before; he’d touched her skin several times when he’d carried her, and again on the Tractatus. He hadn’t known. Nor had Doctor Fenn in Goya. Rowan was a more sophisticated machine than Gabel had ever heard of, different from Caeles in any number of ways. That must have explained why her heartbeat sounded human, and Caeles’s hadn’t. But none of that was stopping her from deteriorating, which she did with every passing minute.
He recalled how she had first arrived at Niu Correntia, which had become her hometown. Two and a half years ago Father had found her on the outskirts of the town, totally engulfed by her amnesia. Finally this made sense: she must have reawakened, a machine on standby somehow startled into using its last reserves of energy, which staggered toward the first sign of civilization. She had only enough strength to make it to Shianti. Not even enough to rekindle her stored memories…
He lifted her, pulled her closer, and he realised how light she had become. He took both her weakly flailing hands in just one of his own and stopped them from moving, tried to steady her. Her mouth formed shapes but she wasn’t speaking. He shushed her and held her, and told her to be calm.
~
He carried her on his back as they continued moving. None of them had slept. Isaac walked by the magus and asked twice about Sarai – what she had said, what she had done during the time they had known one another. The old man told him she had been brave in battle, and compassionate when need be, and at this Isaac was content. He still wore her clothes.
They were only hours away from the city, and estimated that they would arrive with the dawn. Gabel, with Rowan as his burden, noticed how the trees were thinning; the forest grew away from the great crater as if it was polluted, the ground offering only saplings and ferns, and a few small yet colourful flowers.
The pillar of light definitely came from the crater, and though some trees still obscured their view, it was close enough to half-blind them.
They came to an area that smelled of death. The sun was almost set as they walked through the remnantss of a secret battle. Caballeros knights lay dead on the ground, heads still inside the helmets that lay several feet away from their bodies. Their armour was deeply dented and scratched; blunt and broken broadswords lay on the ground, blood-coated.
It looked like an argument amongst the knights had led to battle, and there were no survivors present. Those who had won must have either died from their wounds, or left. Several horses were milling around, nosing their deceased owners or chewing on the plantlife. Each of the five travellers took a horse and moved on, saying little. Rowan sat silently on the back of one of the smaller animal
s, tied by its reins to Gabel’s own.
They moved through the edge of the rainforest until they passed its boundaries, and could see the city of Hermeticia. Surrounded by roasting desert, dense forest and protected by the Caballeros de la Muerte, it rarely had visitors – now, it would get even less. A large wooden sign attached to a stake had been hammered into the ground, and on it there was a red cross: a warning of plague.
‘That’s a plague warning,’ Isaac said. ‘Maybe we should stop.’
‘We go on,’ said Gabel.
The city was huge and circular, filling the bowl of the crater. The streets were arranged like spokes in a wheel and met at a central hub; from there came the beam of light, leaping into the night’s sky.
‘This light has a heat to it unlike fire,’ said Teague. ‘It is chemical.’
‘Radioactive,’ said the magus. ‘But it has been focused into a beam. It was originally intended to act as a wave.’
‘Why would Cleric do that?’ Isaac asked.
‘He’s not using this as a weapon. He’s using it as a signal.’ The magus pointed up at the tiny black dots that were spiralling around it.
‘They are monsters,’ said Teague. ‘Made from other monsters. They smell like sanguisuga. I have smelt creatures like those by an ancient facility I passed not far from here.’
‘Those animals!’ Isaac said. ‘I was held at that same facility. He has two great animals there, like beasts, like sanguisuga, but not so.’
‘Your mother told us of those,’ Gabel said. ‘They were formidable, she said.’
‘Will they attack us?’ asked Rowan.
‘Almost certainly,’ replied Isaac.
‘Let’s hurry,’ said Gabel. ‘All this can’t be good. More and more of those things are coming.’
They moved their horses down over the rocky lip of the crater, along a small path that meandered down the steep incline. They passed by empty buildings that lined streets littered with bodies.
‘The plague has claimed many lives,’ murmured Teague.
Half Discovered Wings Page 38