The Deathless

by Peter Newman

  Though the tent’s occupant had not come out to meet her, she could make out his tensed silhouette against the fabric. Here is a man ready to take action.

  She looked over her shoulder, sure that someone would be there, but the courtyard was empty, save for the slow-turning shadows of the wall.

  Chandni turned back to the tent and whispered, ‘Varg?’

  The flap opened almost immediately and a man’s face appeared, broad and bearded, with a high, weathered forehead. He took a long look at her and the baby, his lips paling as he mashed them together. One arm held open the tent flap but the other was kept out of sight and she was in no doubt that he was armed.

  ‘My name is Honoured Mother Chandni of House Sapphire,’ she said carefully, watching for any hint of malice, ‘and this is my son, Satyendra. Lady Pari sent us. We need you to get us to safety, urgently.’

  ‘Piss off,’ said the man, vanishing back into the tent.

  Chandni crouched down, unsteadily, and slid Pari’s earring under the entrance flap.

  There was a pause. Then, from within: ‘Fuck.’

  Seconds later he was scrambling out of the tent and throwing a pre-packed bag into the back of the wagon. ‘I’m Varg,’ he confirmed as he bent down to grab the edge of the tent, pulling until the under-suckers came free of the stone with a loud pop. ‘Where’s Pari?’

  ‘She’s not coming.’

  ‘Fuck.’

  ‘Varg, if we are going to travel together you will need to broaden your vocabulary.’

  He was halfway through hauling the tent onto the back of the wagon when her words sunk in. ‘Doesn’t bother Pari, and she’s a lady.’

  If things weren’t so desperate Chandni would have laughed. ‘That’s a debate for another time. What can I do to speed things up?’

  ‘Start waking Glider. But watch out, she’s a biter.’

  She went straight over to the Dogkin, taking a large floppy ear and shaking it, while calling Glider’s name. Satyendra leaned forward in her arms, trying in vain to make contact with the glossy coat.

  Eyelids slowly lifted, revealing a dark eye, hostile, and a second lighter eye, glassy, unseeing, human. One legend had it that Dogkin were the reincarnated souls of children who had wandered so long between lives they’d forgotten what they were. Another, that Dogkin were descended from people cursed by the old gods during the Unbroken Age.

  Chandni preferred the first legend as it came with the promise that if a Dogkin could remember its true nature, it would be reborn as a human child in the next life. She liked to think that there was always a way to make things better.

  ‘It’s time to get up,’ said Chandni.

  Glider growled meaningfully and then shut her eyes.

  Refusing to be ignored by an animal, Chandni tried again. This time Glider’s growl was louder and her teeth snapped in the air, coming awfully close to Satyendra’s reaching hands.

  Rather than intimidate, the animal’s behaviour converted all of her pent up worry into anger, and Chandni slapped the Dogkin across the muzzle so hard that a lance of pain shot through her bandaged hand.

  Glider looked up in surprise, before opening her mouth to snap again.

  ‘No!’ said Chandni, pitching her voice as deep as it would go, and slapping the Dogkin’s mouth a second time.

  Glider whined pitifully and lowered her head but Chandni resisted the sudden urge to cuddle her, and kept her expression stern.

  ‘Better. Now get up.’

  Glider stood up.

  ‘Good.’ She reached into the left hand pockets of the cook’s cloak, searching, and found one that contained some dried sausage. She held it up in front of Glider. ‘If you run fast and without complaint, I have more.’

  Glider’s mouth opened and Chandni threw the sausage in. The little chunk of meat vanished, like a coin into a well. Glider’s mouth remained open however.

  ‘No more until you’ve earned it.’

  The Dogkin made to lick the grease from Chandni’s fingers but she pulled back her hand. ‘No more I said, not even a sniff.’

  With another noise of disgruntlement, Glider padded over to the front of the wagon, where Varg stood staring at Chandni in astonishment.

  ‘Well don’t just stand there,’ she said, ‘help us up.’

  She placed Satyendra within the wagon but was forced to rely heavily on Varg’s strength to climb on – her own was fading fast.

  ‘You don’t look right,’ he muttered. ‘Are you sick?’

  ‘No. Just tired.’

  Varg didn’t look like he believed her but gave no argument, fitting a harness over Glider’s head and untangling the reins.

  Chandni looked back to the castle. The great doors remained shut, and all appeared far too peaceful. On a normal day the early risers would already be up, preparing for business, and Chandni was always one of them. It forced the staff to match her example and made sure things started when they were supposed to.

  She didn’t believe that people were inherently lazy, but it was better to take away the temptation just in case.

  How many of the castle’s inhabitants would be rising early today? she wondered. How many would not be rising at all?

  Varg leapt up alongside her on the seat, bumping against her as he settled into position. ‘Sorry,’ he muttered.

  She glared, about to reprimand him, when she realized she’d naturally sat dead centre of the driver’s block. He’d been forced to squeeze onto the end, one of his buttocks hanging, precarious, from the side.

  Not quite willing to apologize, she made a noise that she hoped sounded sympathetic and slid away from him.

  It only took one shake of the reins and Glider was off, pulling them bumping across the courtyard.

  ‘You certainly got a way with Glider,’ he said. ‘She’s been a stubborn one ever since she was a pup.’

  ‘Animals know authority when they meet it,’ she replied.

  ‘Usually have to scream murder to get her arse off the mud.’ He shook his head. ‘Never seen her so obedient.’

  ‘Not even for your mistress?’

  ‘Pari?’ He laughed, a short and nasty sound. ‘Pari’s no good with Glider. They can’t stand each other.’

  Chandni quickly turned her head away so that Varg wouldn’t see the pleasure she took from hearing about Pari’s shortcomings. She’d felt usurped by the Tanzanite in her own castle and it had awakened a petty need to score back some points. However, it wouldn’t do for Varg to realize that. Sapphires were supposed to be above such things.

  The wagon was soon approaching the gap in the outer wall, big enough to manage a unit of ten soldiers marching shoulder to shoulder. A short lip of rock stuck out on the other side before cutting off, abrupt, leaving a long fall to the chasm below, and then another, longer fall after that.

  There was nothing to bar their exit, no gates, no guards, which was odd as there was usually someone posted at the outer wall at all times.

  Chandni shook her head, feeling sleep draw her in.

  As they continued forward the Bridge of Friends and Fools came into view. Made of chains and planks, it was the only way back to earth. It had to be flexible to account for the air currents that moved the castle in constant, shifting increments.

  The bridge was also the main defence. Two mechanisms held it fast to the rock. If the castle came under attack, it took only one soldier to release them both and send the bridge, and any unfortunates still on it, plunging to their doom.

  She remembered being terrified of the bridge as a child, and a single look down reminded her why.

  Through gaps in the slats she could see the crack in the earth far below. And from those depths, plumes of mist rose, pale purple, green, and yellow, seeming to hold some shape as they first broke free before dispersing, like mouths stretched so far they tore themselves open and scattered on the wind.

  It was the power of the rising mists that held Lord Rochant Sapphire’s castle in the sky. Chandni did not understand ho
w or why, but accepted it as part of life.

  Meanwhile, the wagon bounced its way across the bridge. Satyendra watched for a while but it soon became too much stimulation for young eyes and he buried his head in Chandni’s chest.

  ‘Sshh,’ she said, stroking his dark gossamer hair.

  ‘Be best if you get in the back,’ said Varg. ‘Keep quiet and out of sight. There’s a little den back there you can use.’

  This was true though it was also smelly in the back of the wagon, a mixture of musty cloth and Pari’s perfume. The idea of resting in a place where Pari had no doubt slept filled her with horror but she did not complain. Varg was right about the need to hide.

  Her mind was full of worries, for her own health, for the safety of her son, and how this treachery and murder would impact on the family in general. She tried to process what she’d seen and make appropriate plans, but as soon as she’d arranged herself and Satyendra had settled down, the warmth of his body and the exertions of her own lulled her into a swift, dreamless sleep.

  Even as she fell, and Pari’s mind was questioning the sanity of her decision, her body was reacting, adrenaline overriding fatigue, lifetimes of training overriding fear.

  The chute was short and steep, taking a near vertical route through the floor of Rochant’s floating castle. In the seconds it took to reach the end of it, Pari cursed that she had left her climbing claws in the wagon. But in her belt she had her silk rope, and the gland of the Spiderkin that spun it. Twisting her body, she pushed her feet against one side of the chute, pressing a shoulder and one hand against the other. Warmth then pain flared against her palm, and rough stone scraped viciously across her scalp. Her descent slowed but did not stop as she gripped the rubbery gland in her free hand and raised it to her mouth.

  The flesh of the organ slid under her teeth as she found purchase, then stretched out absurdly, before tearing open. One end of the rope was still joined to the gland, the other to her belt. Pari squeezed hard to force the milky ooze to the surface of the new hole before jamming it against the roof of the chute. With a sound like a wet kiss, it adhered to the stone, sticking fast.

  There was just long enough for Pari to shudder at the flavour on her tongue – a muddy bitterness with a stomach-turning gritty aftertaste – and then the edge of the chute thrummed past her feet, past her fingers, and she was spinning through space.

  She tumbled for only a second before the silk jerked taut at her back, stopping her fall but leaving her at the mercy of the winds. And if Pari had thought the breeze that blew up the chute was cold, it was nothing compared to being fully exposed to the elements.

  As she spun there, like a child’s toy dangled between the underside of the castle and the great chasm waiting below, buffeted back and forth, Pari considered her options.

  In many ways the simplest thing to do would be to detach herself and allow this lifecycle to come to an end. There would be a brief moment of pain when she hit the ground but that would be tempered by the memory of the fall, an exhilaration that she would treasure for many incarnations to come. The next thing she knew, she would be rebirthing in a Tanzanite stronghold, in a younger body. Several had been prepared, raised elsewhere in preparation for her next life. From what she had heard, the primary match, Rashana, her granddaughter was perfect.

  However, her family would want to wait for an auspicious day for the rebirthing ceremony, and the required alignment of the suns was months away. That would be months for Rochant’s enemies to act freely. Chandni was a spirited girl, and Varg, despite his coarse edges, would be an able protector for baby Satyendra, but neither of them were Deathless, and a single life only got you so far. Pari could feel the hand of another immortal behind all of this and did not dare a long absence.

  She took a long hard look at the crack in the earth below. Its dark was thick, fathomless: the combined light of the three suns did not penetrate its depths. All floating castles of the Deathless were built above similar fissures and were kept aloft by the ethereal energies they exhaled. Nobody knew how deep they went, or if they even had an end. There was a chance that if she let go, she would not die. She would simply fall, endlessly. Perhaps her soul would travel too far, beyond even the reach of the Bringers to call back. Or perhaps she would travel beyond this world, into the realm where the demons lived. Pari normally had little patience with such superstitious nonsense, but dangling there, gazing into the hole far below, her usual bravado faltered.

  Taking death out of the equation, there were few roads open to her. Her recent adventures were fast catching up, and she could feel a great wave of fatigue building, heralding a sleep that even the winds and the cold would not disturb.

  It was tempting to simply hang there and sleep. Scaling the underside of the castle might be possible if she were more rested.

  Pari laughed at herself, knowing that such thoughts were folly. The truth was that the next time she woke would be agony, her body already preparing to punish her for all she’d put it through in this ill-considered venture. Besides, she would never wake from such a sleep. Either the cold would finish her off, or the constant swaying of the silk rope would work the Spiderkin gland loose from the chute.

  Come on, she exhorted herself. Putting this off isn’t going to make it any easier.

  Gritting her teeth, Pari hauled herself upwards. Three times, she heaved, placing one hand above the other, before she had enough slack to wind the rope around her right foot, taking some, but not nearly enough, of the strain from her shoulders.

  It was dizzying, the way the wind spun her, but she blocked it from her mind, narrowing her focus down to the silk, her hands, her feet, and the next stage of the climb.

  Soon, she had a rhythm, and her left foot was looped too, allowing her to progress swiftly back to the mouth of the chute.

  She leaned against the back of the chute, letting it and the silk share her weight. The fatigue threatening to overwhelm her, and again she pushed it away.

  I can’t climb any more. I can’t. I daren’t fall. If only I had my wings!

  In her mind she could picture her armour mounted on its stand. How she longed for its embrace, the feel of the crystal against her skin, protective, supporting. If she were wearing it now, it would be a simple matter to ride the essence currents to safety.

  How strange, she thought, that the great mass of Rochant’s castle could defy gravity, while she would fall as swiftly as a common stone.

  Her eyes were drawn to a cluster of sapphire poking from the rock. Over the years the crystals had grown, giving the castle greater stability and, to her mind, beauty. As the essence currents met the base of the castle, it made the crystals vibrate and sing, soft, like the murmurings of a sleeping giant.

  The crystal …

  By leaning out and trusting her weight to the silk she could just reach a long slender lance of sapphire that cut a diagonal slash across her view of the horizon.

  The crystal …

  She tapped along its length with her nails, attending to the way it chimed, until one of the notes sounded off. She tapped that place a second time to be sure. Again, the note was dull, flat. The crystal here was flawed.

  Pari pushed against it, so that she swung backwards on the silk rope. When the momentum drew her forward again, she leant with it, striking the crystal with the heel of her hand. There was a sharp crack and then a chunk broke away. Pari tried to snatch it from the sky but the crystal tumbled from her tired grasp, splintering into fragments, leaving her to watch, powerless, as it fell.

  But the fall was only momentary, the next updraught catching each splinter and making them tinkle, like rain on a rooftop, as they rose once more into her waiting arms.

  Once she was wedged into the chute again, Pari bound the sapphire pieces into her cloak, bundling them tight, binding the ends together, and tying each to her wrists.

  She worked the gland free of the wall, paused, and sighed.

  This is it.

  Too tired to jump, Pari
simply released the tension in her legs, flopping out through the hole.

  As soon as the bundled crystals entered the current, they began to push upwards, taking the cloak with them and snapping Pari’s arms vertical. Not enough to hold her there, but enough to allow her a measured descent.

  Perfect.

  It was not the same as hunting. She had little control beyond being able to nudge slowly to the left or right. But she had spent many lifetimes in the air, and made the most of that skill to keep to the stronger currents, dropping in gasps and stutters.

  To the east she could make out the Bridge of Friends or Fools and, despite the early hour, a cart rumbling along it. Though it was flying no house flags, she was certain it was of Sapphire design, and moreover, that Rochant was tucked away inside it.

  They are taking you from me, my love. But where?

  She stared after it, straining her eyes until it was swept from view and she was forced to consider her own predicament again.

  Gradually, the crack in the earth below grew larger and darker, and she could make out individual wisps as they first emerged, a pluming flurry of purples, yellows and greens. Rather than be repulsed, she found herself drawn, a part of her wanting to give herself over to that place and be swallowed up. But it was a false part of her, and she repressed it with a shudder, forcing her eyes away from the hole and towards the rocky ridge that surrounded it.

  The further she moved away, the weaker the currents became, turning her landing into a barely controlled fall. She hit the ground at speed, falling naturally into what would have been a graceful roll had she not become tangled in her own cloak.

  Several tumbles and groans later, she came to a stop amid moss and stone. Pari allowed herself a victorious grimace before taking a tally of her injuries. No bones were broken but she had sprained muscles in her shoulders, thighs, and ankles. And the bruises! She managed to count three on her cheek and was just about to start on her arm when sleep embraced her.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘Tell us the story!’ said a voice from one of the far tables.

  ‘Yes,’ chorused several others. ‘Tell us!’