by Lucas Bale
Or Samarkand, a sea of minarets and sandstone towers, with its floating township and pale green sunsets.
There were places where he could hide from the coming war, he’d heard himself say, and at the time he’d believed it. So why was he here, doing this, if he truly believed that? Because it isn’t possible to hide in the Republic. If war was coming, one side or the other would find him unless he put serious distance behind him. There was nothing he could do except run from it, just like the rest of them. But what about those left behind? How many can they take with them—can we take with us? How many must we leave behind?
But it wasn’t just that, was it? The truth about his father, his brother—that was what really motivated him. Finding out what the preacher knew. You’re not in it to save people, he thought. You’re in for yourself.
A knock came at the blast door to his room. He was surprised by it, and in truth grateful for it. When the heavy steel doors parted, he saw the navigator standing in the corridor outside. She wasn’t wearing a coat, or even a sweater, only a tight-fitting vest that clung to her pale skin. He could now see more of her tattoo, a serpent of some kind with feathered wings. The long knife was at her belt, and he supposed the smaller one was still secreted behind it.
‘There something wrong?’ he asked.
She stared at him, her red eyes tightening a little, then shook her head. ‘No,’ she said eventually. ‘I just wanted to talk to you.’
‘Is that right?’ he said slowly. Then he shrugged. ‘You want to come in?’ He stood to one side.
She moved lightly, he saw, and gracefully, always on the balls of her feet. But her body was tense, and she played with her fingers as she walked. She was tightly muscled and probably stronger than she looked. She glanced at his hands out of the corner of her eyes as she passed.
She turned to face him and he indicated for her to sit at the desk while he perched on the edge of his bunk. The knife was still taped to the underside of the ceiling above it. ‘What do you want to talk about?’
She didn’t sit. Instead she leaned against his desk, arms folded. One of her slender hands was never far from the handle of her knife. ‘Why are you here?’ she said, watching him. Assessing his reaction, he supposed. ‘Doing this.’
She doesn’t mess around. ‘You heard the man,’ Shepherd said carefully. ‘Back in their camp. What choice do I have? Everyone seems to want my ship, and the Magistratus wants me. We both know no good will come of that. And if I don’t do this, the Bazaar will disown me. That means no contracts and I need to eat.’ He shrugged again.
She took in a breath. She did it quietly, softly, but he noticed it nonetheless. ‘What did you and the preacher talk about?’
He met her gaze. ‘That was between us.’
Her red eyes glistened in the half-light thrown by the streaks of warped stars beyond the tunnel. He shivered.
She shook her head. ‘No. What he said made you come. It’s what motivates you. So that’s between us too, you and me, if we’re going to work together.’
Shepherd smiled thinly. ‘Look, maybe you think it’s melodramatic, but we’re both here because we have to be. If there is war coming, being well away from it is the smart move. And these people, however crazy they seem, may be our only hope of getting out away from the Republic. The Magistratus will stand and fight, and they’ll put us right out in front.’ He sighed and looked at her. The expression on her face hadn’t changed; the suspicion hadn’t faded. ‘Why don’t you tell me how they found you?’ he said.
She gazed out at the strobed stars and smiled wistfully. ‘I don’t think so. You see, I don’t believe you.’
‘You always this direct?’
She turned, and her stare impaled him. ‘We all have secrets. It’s just the way things work—there’s always something people feel they’ve got to hide. And I’m no different. Point is, I’ve seen secrets like that get people killed.’
‘So it’s fine for you to have secrets, but you’d naturally like to know all of mine?’
She said nothing for a moment. For the first time, her face was calm and thoughtful. She nodded after a while. ‘I’m in this for me. I’m not in it to save humanity. I’m in it to survive. You get in my way, or I think you’re a threat to me—’ She didn’t finish. Maybe she didn’t have to.
Shepherd forced a smile. Something tightened in the pit of his stomach. ‘Anyone ever tell you how charming you are?’
She shook her head slowly and smiled thinly as she said, ‘I don’t owe you anything.’
‘What about the Caestor?’ he said. ‘You owe him anything?’
The smile never quite reached her eyes. ‘I don’t trust you. Is that truth enough for you?’
‘That’s much better’ he said, and when she walked towards the doors and raised her hand to the pad to open them, he added, ‘I’m glad we had this little chat. Feel free to stop by any time.’
The doors closed behind her and Shepherd was left staring at them for longer than he expected. He couldn’t bring himself to blame her for her suspicion—a woman like that, a navigator, she’d been hunted most of her life. Who could she trust? Who hadn’t already betrayed her? Skoryk, the Bazaar’s man? He seemed cruel, emotional, full of rage. They had history, the navigator and him, but she seemed ready to slit his throat. Shepherd wondered what it was that had stopped her.
Soteria breached at Samarkand and hammered down to the port. Natasha sat at one of the navigation consoles as the nav systems cycled through breach data and then laid in the course down to the planet.
She had listened with some interest when Shepherd had asked the preacher, long before they breached, just how he intended to hide a ship that was sought by every customs officer in the Republic, but the preacher had waved the question away. He had instructed Shepherd to trust him. Much the same words the preacher had used with her, back at the camp.
When she’d left Skoryk, her blade still clutched so tightly in her hand it cut grooves into the skin, the preacher had come to her. Their conversation—her ‘briefing’, she supposed—had been short, and it had left her with little more information than the troubling revelations that came from the untidy mess of a man she was later told went by the name of Rankin. In Samarkand they would find a way to disguise the freighter so it might enter the Core without detection. There were pipelines in and out of the Core, the preacher told her. A series of freight contracts that had been negotiated by contacts in the Core with this purpose in mind, and which they could now hide behind to gain entry for the freighter. However, in their final escape, with their precious cargo, they would need her to find the tunnel the preacher knew existed. An escape route only she would be able to see.
The preacher was not like any other man she had met. Outwardly, his face cycled through the same expressions she’d seen on the faces of countless other men; yet her survival as a child, perhaps even more so as an adult, had so often depended on a learned ability to read men, to assess the true emotions bubbling beneath their skin. The preacher was unreadable.
She had been forced to visit the freighter-tramp because of the enmity she had seen between the preacher and him, the origins of which were a mystery to her. She’d told him the truth—that she had seen people killed because of secrets. And although the tramp had kept his cards close to his chest, he’d let enough slip in his expression and his words to tell her that she couldn’t trust either of them.
Now, as the port hove into view, and Shepherd reached to open a comms channel, he glanced at the preacher. ‘Now’s the time, preacher,’ he said. ‘If you have a card to play, this is the time to play it.’
‘Tell them the name of this freighter is the Tromso.’
‘Tromso? That ship even exist?’
‘It does as far as they’re concerned. They will find a ship which looks identical to this one and has the correct markings. And if there ever comes a time when they realise their mistake, we shall be long gone.’
‘And how exactly do you know that,
preacher?’
‘Just tell them.’
‘And when we get down there?’
‘We have a contact to meet.’
‘Another Bazaar man?’
‘Of a sort. Out here they consider themselves a little more independent.’
‘Which is why, preacher, I try to steer clear of the Bazaar here. It isn’t really the Bazaar. You never truly know what you’re getting into.’
Shepherd opened the comms. ‘Samarkand port, this is freighter Tromso, requesting a landing platform.’
‘This is Samarkand port. All received, freighter Tromso. Proceed to platform three-alpha. File your licences and nav data at the customs port. Samarkand out.’
After the freighter touched down, Natasha went with the others down to the hold. Shepherd was reaching for the button to open the loading bay doors when the banging started—a metallic, echoey thudding coming from behind her. She turned, and the others did the same.
‘What is that?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Shepherd replied.
Natasha studied the walls from behind which the noise seemed to coming. Concealed compartments? She looked to the tramp. He slid his pistol from its holster and held it out in front of him, directing it at the wall. Then he edged over and appeared to listen.
The thud came again.
She slid her long knife from its sheath. She saw Shepherd tense, then reach down to find the hidden lever to open the compartment.
As the light from the hold flooded inside she saw a boy’s face staring back at them.
Shepherd reached down, took the boy by the collar, and pulled him up. Natasha recognised him—one of the people the preacher had brought with him. What was the boy’s name? Jordi?
‘What the hell are you doing here?’ Shepherd growled. Natasha could see his grip was tight.
‘You’re hurting me,’ Jordi moaned.
‘He who I think he is, Shepherd?’ Natasha said.
‘He’s from Herse,’ Shepherd said. ‘Where we just came from. Preacher, did you know about this?’
‘Of course not,’ the preacher replied. ‘His presence here complicates things.’
‘He has no damn customs licence,’ Shepherd said.
‘We can’t leave him on the ship,’ Natasha said. ‘Customs officers will scan it while we’re away. We need to take him with us.’
Shepherd turned to her. ‘How do you intend to get him through Customs?’
‘We have some coin,’ she said. ‘It ought to be enough. Tell them he’s your mechanic. Your licences are for a short stay—they know we’ll be gone in a few hours. We have freight contracts for the Core. We give them enough, they might look the other way.’ She glanced at the boy, then back at Shepherd. ‘There’s a war coming—they’ll be under pressure, even if they don’t know why. They may be too busy to give a shit about one boy.’
‘And if they do give a shit?’
‘He’ll be arrested,’ she said. ‘But if he stays here, and they find him, it’ll be worse.’
C H A P T E R 36
THE FREIGHT conveyance pulled out of the hangar smoothly, gathering speed briskly until it was powering away from the port. A heavy wind tugged at Weaver’s arms and swept over his face as the conveyance cut through the landscape towards the city. He gripped the edge of the roof more tightly. The trees and mountains disappeared into a wash of vibrant green and blue in the early light of dawn.
The freight lines ran separately to the passenger Conduit, and he knew this one would split off at some point, to head directly to the canton it served. On the stretches where the lines were straight, the conveyance could pick up speed and move swiftly, but Weaver was certain there would be occasions where the landscape forced the conveyance to slow—to turn a corner, or climb a hill. The freight inside a container had to be protected, and getting to derailed freight cars out here would surely be more trouble than it was worth. No, it was easier to just slow them down.
Wherever it slowed, as soon as he was close enough to the city, he would have to jump. He knew it was risky, jumping from a moving conveyance, but it could be done. He’d done it before, even been trained to do it properly, way back when. Thirty years of lethal shadows and bad men looking to slit his throat in the dead of night… jumping from a moving vehicle was a basic necessity.
He would need somewhere soft; grass or mossy ground would be perfect. He would tuck in his head to protect it. Keep his neck muscles tight and cross his hands over his chest to avoid breaking his wrists. If he dropped onto his shoulder, and then forced himself into a roll to disperse the energy of the fall, it would hurt, but he could walk away uninjured.
He watched the landscape ahead of the conveyance as the shimmering lights of the city came into view. Not long now, he told himself. He would take the first corner to come.
He got up onto the balls of his feet, hunkering low against the surging flow of air, and climbed down onto the side of the conveyance. At first the gale snatched at him, yanking him away from the steel hull, but somehow he held on, waiting until the car had slowed as much as he guessed it was going to.
He threw the hold-all first. Then he jumped.
He landed heavily, momentum dragging him forwards. There was an explosion of pain in his shoulder that surged down his back, followed by the giddy sensation of the world spinning as he rolled. The ground kicked and punched, pummelling away his breath. He clutched the lapels on his coat and tucked his head in tight, but still it hit something hard on the ground and stunned him. He didn’t roll far, didn’t hit a tree or fallen trunk. Instead he lay in wet grass, trying to catch his breath. When he was able, when the pain in his back and shoulder had eased enough, he stood, retrieved his bag, and began to walk.
The forest was cool and quiet apart from the songs of birds and insects. The early morning dew hung from the branches in glistening pearls, and a fine mist floated between the trees as he walked. He listened carefully, because he knew gunships overflew the area between the port and the city, and there was no reason for any citizen to be outside the fence line. The fall had been harder than he had hoped and his shoulder ached. He bit his lip, frustrated, but pushed on, shutting away the pain.
He walked like that for two hours before he reached the outskirts of the city. There was no need of anything more than an electrified wire fence out here; the cantons that governed the city’s edge were responsible for border security, and for keeping citizens from leaving. Every citizen caught beyond the city’s environs would result in a fine for the canton concerned, and a one-way ticket away from the Core for the trespasser. So there were dog patrols along the fence line, but no Peacekeepers, not out here. There was no need.
Weaver had considered how to get through the fence from the moment they told him his way into the Core would be through the port. It was electrified throughout, but powered in sections, so it would be possible to short-circuit a single section and then cut through. Alarms would be triggered, and on inspection, it would be obvious to anyone that the fence had been deliberately breached. He would then have very little time to get through the canton’s estate grounds and into the main city. It wasn’t subtle, but he didn’t see that he had much choice. It couldn’t be climbed.
He fingered the synthetic polymer mask he had applied while waiting in the container. With the violent airflow on the roof of the conveyance, and effort of climbing and the perspiration seeping through, it was already beginning to degrade.
He crouched close to a tree a little way from the edge of the forest, perfectly still as the first dog patrol came into sight. The shadows of the trees should, he thought, conceal him visually, but there was no wind, and he had little doubt the dog would be able to pick up his scent. He reached slowly into his pocket and withdrew the pistol. He rested it on his thigh and waited.
The patrol was only a single man, armed with a long rifle fitted with distance optics. The dog with him was on a long leash, and they walked comfortably together. The man walked his route some way
from the fence, scanning the estate to one side and the forest to the other equally. As he and his dog drew level with Weaver, the dog began to strain at the leash. Its snout jerked upwards, then flicked towards the forest.
Weaver had to force himself not to move, had to overcome his natural instinct to run, and his finger slid onto the trigger of the pistol.
The dog strained even more at the leash now, barking madly in his direction. Weaver eased behind the tree so that only a tiny portion of his face was visible, enough so that he could still see the dog and the guard. He held his breath and tensed.
The guard pulled the dog back and lifted the rifle with one hand, bringing the optical system on top of it to his eyes. He panned it slowly, scanning the forest’s edge. Weaver froze and held his breath. The guard was less than thirty metres away, well within the range of the pistol. Two, maybe three shots to take him down, another for the dog. One shot might be passed off as something other than gunfire, but four shots would be heard. Damn dog!
More perspiration crept over his face, and he felt part of his mask come away slightly. His throat was dry and he needed to cough. Just keep going, he thought. It’s just your dog smelling an animal. Be on your way.
The guard stopped panning abruptly and brought his second hand up to the rifle to steady it. The dog strained again at the leash, and he barked a command at it. It settled but began to whine. Weaver’s heart pounded in his ears.
The rifle was directed straight at him.
Weaver eased the pistol slowly, inch by inch, bringing it up behind the tree. The dog began to bark again. Weaver looked beyond the guard at the open ground of the estate. Maybe a minute for them to react and get down here once they hear the shots, he thought. Another three or four to get a gunship down here. It was tight. He would have to move the moment he took the decision to fire.