by S. J. Ryan
“The captain was all but screaming, sir,” the soldier replied. “The general tried to calm him down.”
“Did you hear any specific words?”
“The captain said the general had 'no authority' and that he would 'see' that he no longer commanded.”
“That's a lie!” Geth shouted.
He advanced a step and hands grabbed his arms and restrained with a pain hold. The colonel stared impassively. Geth, who had been in battles and storms, felt for the first time in his life overwhelmed enough to faint. This cannot be! He cannot be!
“Put him in the jail with the other conspirator,” the colonel said coolly.
Under the guard of four this time, Geth was shoved from the command hut to what had been a storage hut. It was already heavily guarded. He was thrust inside and the door was made fast. The interior was empty, save for a man in civilian clothes curled on the floor against the wall. At the sound of Geth's entry, the man lolled his head and stared dully.
“Ral!” Geth exclaimed. He knelt alongside and placed hand on shoulder. “Are you all right?”
“Faron is Letos,” Ral murmured. “Did you see? Faron is Letos.”
“Yes, I've gained that. What of Morant?”
“Murdered. A plot, and we are falsely accused. Carrot and the Wizard warned us what Romans do.”
“You believe Romans have done this?”
“Geth, you are an intelligent man, but you can't see guile, can you? Letos is too much a thug to have conceived this himself. He is with the Romans, and now he's infiltrated and assassinated his way up to command half the Leaf! If I could send a message to the Inner Circle, they could – what am I saying? They'll suspect me before 'Faron,' who's made himself a hero in their eyes. Oh, the damage he will do!” Moaning, Ral shook his head and buried it against his knees.
Geth felt his own composure melting away. “The legions are moving toward us. Morant issued orders to prepare a defense at the Dark Forest. Were they implemented?”
“Started, but then Morant was killed – a blade in the back, undoubtedly by a Roman infiltrator in league with Letos – and then Letos as 'Faron' returned from the post at the Dark Forest and took authority over the base and rescinded Morant's orders. You see how it works, Geth? The Romans have their agent in supreme command, and before he is exposed, they will seize the West while our soldiers are ordered to remain idle.”
Ral started to moan and rock. Realizing that Ral had descended into an all but useless state, Geth inspected the walls. The wattling was hard, the window in the rear was too small even for Bok, the run to the woods was too far without receiving a back full of arrows to show for it. Geth examined the roof and wondered if he could pry a hole through the sticks – but no, the guards would hear and see. He looked at the bare dirt floor, then stamped in a spiral pattern.
“What are you doing?” Ral asked.
“Trying to find a trap door for a secret passage.”
Ral laughed coldly.
The despair was contagious. Realizing the futility, Geth ceased stamping and settled onto the floor and adopted Ral's pose as his mind raced. Sometime later, he opened his eyes, aware that something was wrong. Ral was too quiet and still. The taylor-spy had collapsed, mouth open and eyes blank. Geth crawled over and cradled Ral's head.
“Can't let them know what I know,” Ral mumbled. His eyes closed and his head slumped.
“Ral!”
Geth pressed his face to Ral's. He felt no breath. He shook the body. It was limp and unresponsive, and already noticeably cooler. The fingers of Ral's left hand, Geth noticed, were tightly curled. He pried them open, revealing in the palm a half-eaten lump of what seemed clay. Geth wept and cursed. In revulsion he wanted to fling the clay out the window. Instead, his fury died and with it his pride, and he took the remaining portion of the poison and hid it in his shoe.
Shortly after, guards arrived with meals. They saw what had happened, and returned with others. Geth was dragged into the woods and shackled to a tree. Alone, he waited for the arrows of execution he was certain would come.
Instead, he heard thrashing through the brush, then saw a lantern bobbing in the twilight gloom. Faron – Letos – sauntered casually, by himself.
“Geth, old man,” Letos said, making a mirthless smile. “Did you kill my brother just now?”
“Ral killed himself,” Geth said. “Rather than betray the Leaf under your tortures.”
“I would never allow my own brother to be tortured. To be roughened, yes. But not unto serious harm. I would not allow that, any more than I would wish unnecessary torment upon you or any good Britanian.”
“You tormented your own wife how many times?”
“She betrayed our wedlock, as you know. So it all evens, doesn't it?”
“The betrayal only came after the torments. Is it even betrayal when a contract has already been broken? For how many times before that did you betray her? And what contract in the name of love serves as an excuse for beatings?”
Letos acted as if he did not hear. He set the lantern down, folded his arms, and shook his head. “Geth, we were comrades for so long, yet it's come to this!”
“What do you want, Letos?”
“Simple answers. Where is my daughter?”
“You mean, my daughter?”
Letos, to Geth's surprise, was unoffended. “I mean, Arcadia. Tell me, and I'll see you are well treated. Otherwise when the Romans arrive, I'll have nothing to say in your defense and you'll be host to their mercies.”
Geth stared for long seconds. “All your speeches, all those years, about Britan's fight for freedom. It was all just to advance yourself. And now you simply change sides like clothes after a bath.”
“I do feel as if I have bathed my spirit, Geth. For now I see hope under Roman rule.”
“What did they promise you?”
Letos straightened. “To be made King – not of a fraction of Umbrick, but of all Britan!”
“You trust their word?”
“I trust Romans to act in their interest. Given my skill and experience of this land, I would be their best choice as vassal.” Letos paced around Geth. “What about you? I will need a chief of staff, a man I can trust not to stab me in my sleep. I know you are that man, because you were that man for so long.”
Geth forced a laugh. “If I had known it would come to this, there would have been a night from which you would not have awakened.”
Letos remained stoic. He shrugged. “Well, I owed you the offer. Think about it while you can.”
And then, swinging his lantern lackadaisically, he calmly paced into the brush.
Guards returned and unshackled Geth. They followed the path back to the base. Halfway through the woods, Geth spotted a cleft in the brush that he thought might be a side trail. He tripped one guard, butted another, swung his bound arms at a third. While they were stunned, he delved into the darkness of the brush, but four steps later he was tackled and piled upon.
Struggling and cursing, he was thrown into the hut. Ral's body was gone. A warm meal was brought but Geth wasn't hungry. By then night had come and he sat in near-perfect gloom, squeezing Ral's clay in his palm.
Sometimes death is the only path of escape, Geth thought.
He told himself he would get out of this and he put the poison away. Minutes later, he took it out. He repeated the motions several times. What he did not do even once, however, was consider that Letos could be trusted. Letos was a man who understood trust in only one direction.
For years, Geth had been ridden with guilt for sleeping with the wife of his king. At the moment, he wished he had done it sooner. If he felt any guilt over their affair, it was in not spiriting Prisca far away from North Umbrick the moment she had told him that she was pregnant. But then she would have lost her title as queen, and her daughter the title of princess, and where would be Ral's prophecy be?
Where Ral is now, Geth thought. At best in a shallow, unmarked grave. At worst –
H
is thoughts were interrupted by a clink against the outside of the wall. He peered through the tiny window at the rear of the hut, the side facing away from the base. Beneath the canopy of leaves in the woods beyond, a lantern flashed. He recognized the dot-dash code that Carrot had taught her army. Unfortunately, he had been too preoccupied in those days to attend her code classes and had no idea what the message was. He nonetheless waved in response.
A second later, a smoking projectile arced toward the hut. Geth understood that message. He fled to the front of the hut, crouched and shielded himself.
The explosion shook the earth and rained debris. Geth lowered his arms from his face, saw in the clearing smoke the gap in the wall, and lunged through. As he sprinted toward the woods, projectiles of fire and smoke streaked from it toward his general direction, but landed all about, clearly avoiding him as their target. Arrows streaked past him going the other way, but the archers must have been rattled, for he reached the woods and rolled into concealment without injury.
In a space within the brush, Bok held the lantern while Archimedes held a smoldering stick. Geth recognized the cylinders propped on the clearing floor as fireworks, cruder versions of the ones that he had seen Archimedes use in the Coliseum yet plainly just as effective in creating a distraction.
Archimedes touched the match in his hand to the fuses attached to the bases of the cylinders. The fuses were varying lengths, and Geth could see that the purpose of that was to spread the timing. The first fuse burned to its cylinder. Sprouting flame, the rocket leaped toward the guards. They had been advancing, but the jabbing finger of flame that terminated in explosion had them scurry in retreat.
With all the fuses lit and shortening, Archimedes hobbled upright and said, “Let's go. Bok, can you see the trail markers?”
“This way, sir.”
Bok's lantern, shielded from the sight of pursuers by his intervening body, illuminated the foliage ahead. Geth trotted after. Archimedes lagged. Geth halted, watching the old man limp on his staff, breathing hard. The lantern light hastily bobbed back. Archimedes clawed a branch for support. Bok tugged his arm.
“Sir! We have to hurry. Please!”
Geth offered his hands, but Archimedes recoiled. “Take him, Geth. Hurry.”
“I won't leave you, sir!” Bok cried.
Archimedes patted Bok's shoulder and met his eyes directly. “Son, you have a job to do.”
Bok bent over, sobbing so hard that he staggered off balance. From the direction of the base, shouts and cries approached and lanterns zigged and zagged to the clamor of thrashing. Geth squeezed the boy's arm, gently pushed him forward. Pausing, he offered the ball of clay to Archimedes.
“Ral used this. You might need it. To avoid questioning and worse.”
Archimedes snorted. “If Valarion interrogates me, I'll have the pleasure of telling a thousand lies to mislead him!” Nonetheless he pocketed the ball, gave Geth the same grave look he'd given Bok, and added softly, “Thank you, Geth. You'd best leave quickly now.”
The old man sank sat against a tree. Geth saw how he clutched the staff, remembered the damage it had done in Rome, and wondered if it was reloaded. Letos might yet receive a surprise.
The three of them were beyond words, and they had no time. With another light shove from Geth, Bok mechanically led through the woods, diverting at markers that Geth never discerned. Bok and Geth approached a clearing and Geth heard a rustling. He automatically reached for his sword that wasn't there, and then they were close enough to see it was Gonda, chomping on underbrush.
Bok started to untie the donkey, but Geth heard the near thrashing of their pursuers and stayed him. “It will be faster and safer to make our way on foot.”
“We can't lose the glider!”
“It won't be lost. The men chasing us are misguided but they are of the Leaf. They will take the wagon back to Ravencall and store the glider where it will be safe.”
“Then the Romans will have it!”
“I promise you they will not.” Geth had no idea how to keep that promise, only that there was no time for argument and he had to say something to have the boy leave the glider.
From the flatbed he took a sack of food and a hammer, the latter for a weapon. He stroked Gonda, and sensed in the depths of her eyes that as animals mysteriously did, she was aware of the loss of her master and friend.
And then they were off. The trail opened to a rutted road. Bok doused the lamp and they headed north in moonlight.
After some trudging, Geth spoke. “You care much about Archimedes.”
Bok, whose face was dry by then, said levelly, “He treats me as an equal. To everyone else, I'm just a child. A burden.” He seemed to choke. “Without the glider, I'm nothing.”
“We'll get it back. We'll get him back. Now, tell me, how did you learn that I was taken prisoner?”
“Archimedes figured it out. After talking to them.”
Geth followed the gesture to a point down the road. Squinting, he perceived a cluster of lanterns. There were scores, spread too wide to avoid. Seeing that Bok seemed unperturbed, Geth continued walking on the road, but kept his hand ready to grasp the hammer – for all it would do against so many.
Faces emerged from the gloom. The men were weary and dirty and haggard, bruised and cut. Geth recognized them immediately. They were veterans from the Battle of the Dark Forest. Geth had once thought of them as happy-go-lucky farmer-boys who treated war as vacation from the plow. At the moment, their eyes were vacant. Their bodies emerged from the darkness, limping and wounded.
“Renth! Lome!” Geth said. “What happened?”
Renth had been a colonel in Carrot's temporary army. At that moment, he wore the pips of a major on the collar of his Leaf uniform. The chest of his shirt was torn and splattered with blood. He stared at Geth for a long moment before recognition reflected in his features.
“Geth,” Renth rasped. “We met the legions! Thousands of soldiers, well-equipped! Faron told us to hold fast, that help was on its way. Then he rode off! We tried to hold, Geth, but it was like a flood! We were too heavily outnumbered and there was no sense to holding what couldn't be held! Why, Geth? Why did he order us to die in futility?”
Geth listened as Renth told how Faron had kept their scouts in camp and forbade work on fortifications, setting the Leafmen for surprise and slaughter. Geth in turn explained that Faron was a traitor named Letos, once a king and presently a Roman agent.
“He killed Morant and accused Ral and I,” Geth concluded. “Through his treachery he now commands the whole Western Leaf on Rome's behalf.”
“Not with me in it he doesn't,” Renth replied. “Geth, you were our leader at the Dark Forest, and you are the only officer of the Leaf I'll follow now.”
He stiffened and saluted, and the others traded glances and saluted also and let a cheer that caused Geth to crack a smile.
“What are your orders, General?” Lome asked.
General for now, Geth thought. He wondered what rank he would be tomorrow, if he lived.
As Geth gazed at their expectant faces, his mask of command slipped on so casually that he was hardly aware of it himself. He smoothly replied, “We shall send spies to Ravencall and recruit from among the deserters.” He suspected there would soon be many; Letos was the kind of leader whose charms lessen with familiarity. “For now, we shall regroup to the west.”
Silently he added, And await there for my daughter's return.
8.
“Kid – Matt! Are you there? Can you hear me?”
Since being separated, Matt Four had tried continuously to reestablish communication with his template-twice-removed. Ivan Beta reported that not even a locator signal could be detected from the original Ivan.
Matt Four paced the floor with his hands behind his back. The room that he had been locked inside for the past day was small, made of concrete, and located in the basement of the main building of the Project Zeus Complex. It had a bed, a chair, a table, a s
ink, and the oddest toilet that he had ever seen.
The room wasn't the worst place he'd ever been in (there were no flying monkeys) but for a place where he was wide awake, it was certainly the most boring. He considered going into zombie mode just to pass the time. But no, he had things to think about. If only he could think . . . .
“What do you think happened to him?” he asked Ivan Beta. “Don't answer that.”
They had gone through that routine several times. The first time Ivan Beta had answered.
Matt Four plopped in the chair and picked up from the table the sole reading matter, a yellowed copy of the Victoriana Gazette, which was a kind of coverless, binderless book made of large sheets of low-quality paper. It was filled with brief writings about notable events and prominent citizens, none of whom was named Athena. It also contained the worst torment in the room: a crossword puzzle completed by the previous occupant.
“Matt Four,” Ivan Lite said. “My external microphones are detecting acoustic vibrations consistent with the gait of Big Guy.”
'Big Guy' was the nickname Matt Four had bestowed upon Athena's hulking servant, who had unlocked the door every few hours to deliver meals. This time, the giant was holding a hanger with what Ivan Beta's AR labels identified as a formal dinner attire.
“Lady Athena extends to you an invitation to dine,” Big Guy said. “As she wishes you to be presentable, you will dress in this. Cologne is provided. It is recommended that it be used sparingly.”
Matt Four tilted back in his chair. “What if I decline her invitation?”
“Having anticipated that response, Lady Athena says it is unlikely that her schedule will have another opening for at least a month.”
Matt Four considered calling her bluff, but hours of isolation had taken their toll. If she called his bluff and he was trapped in this room for a month, he would go into zombie mode.
“You win.”
The suit, vest, pants, and tie were indeed formal wear; they were uncomfortable enough. He slipped on the shiny black shoes and Big Guy inserted a rose into the buttonhole of the suit lapel. A cylindrical black hat topped the antiquated fashion statement.