by Andy Graham
“I’m new. I don’t know anything. My fingers. I can still feel them. Why don’t they hurt? What have you done to me? I don’t know anything.”
“I’ll decide what you know.”
“Why me? Why not one of the experienced guards? Not me. Someone else. Lacky. Captain Lacky. He’s been around for ever.”
“Would Captain Lacky volunteer you as quickly as you volunteered him?”
The guard floundered for an answer. Nobility, loyalty, camaraderie — these were fine qualities and were hammered into the psyche of potential recruits like drugs, but everything paled into insignificance next to the need to survive.
A gust of wind rushed through the room. Papers fluttered in the air, spinning and whirling down to the ground, where they soaked up the red puddles. “That’ll do, Brennan,” said the VP. He slid the balcony door closed with a soft thump. Beyond it, the president’s corpse was spinning dizzily in the wind.
“Thank you. Thank you. Thank you,” the young guard whimpered. Tears splashed onto the bloody bandages wrapping the stumps that had been fingers.
“Lena,” Brennan whispered.
“What?”
“Lena.”
“Lena?” Randall Soulier worried a fingernail with his thumb. “Your sister?” A look of irritation swept across the VP’s face, over these odd-coloured eyes that so many people found so intriguing, so beautiful. “I fucked her, Brennan, that’s all. I didn’t kill her. The Famulus did that and I’ve already arranged your revenge. Is the boy ready?”
“Sir?” Brennan’s fingers tightened around his knife. The artery in the VP’s neck was throbbing. Vulnerable. People were too vulnerable. All the holes you need to get air in and out were too close together. Evolution had protected the brain in a nice thick case of bone but put the vessels that fed it in a soft sheath of flesh. If it hadn’t been evolution and ‘someone’ had designed the body, they hadn’t thought it through very well.
“Brennan!”
He blinked and automatically saluted, “Sir.”
“Stop staring at me like that, Captain. If you’re still punch-drunk from your altercation with Franklin, I want to know. Get me an update on Franklin.”
Brennan made for the door.
“Leave the knife, Brennan.”
And the whimpering guard screamed as he realised his salvation had just been relieved of duty.
The balcony door closed. It shut out the howls of the guard. Brennan wasn’t cruel when he worked; he was efficient. He only hurt people when he had to. Judging by what was happening on the other side of the glass in Bethina’s office, the VP was the opposite — inexperienced and clumsy, but enthusiastic. Brennan would have bet one of his own fingers that the young guard thrashing in his restraints would have preferred Brennan ‘whispering’ at him rather than the VP.
The Folly Tree creaked in the wind, weighed down by its unnatural burden. The leaves frosted with light from the office. Brennan thumbed his screen awake. Muted reds and greens spilled across his hands as he cycled through the security cameras and newsfeeds.
He squatted, waiting, watching. He maintained that position, hunkered down next to a swinging corpse, even as the pins and needles crept into his toes. He should stand to stretch the stiffness out of his legs. Brennan stayed immobile as he caught up with what was happening beyond the president’s office.
He learnt that Corporal Seth was dead. Probably killed by Franklin as he escaped. Seth, as principles went, hadn’t been worn or torn loose; he’d been born loose. There was no backstory there. Seth had been an evil, bad-tempered bastard who liked to get his hands dirty. Not many people like that around. Except Major Henndrik, of course. Brennan had thought to look into the man’s past but felt filthy just looking at him, the kind of dirt that stained you forever.
Brennan’s toes were going numb. He ignored it. Counted down from five. He’d put up with much worse. When he stood, the feeling would return. He’d told himself the same would happen when his younger self had put a bullet in former president Hamilton’s head some twenty years ago.
(“In one ear and out the other,” the stunned soldier who’d found them had said in his report. “The kid’s hand was rock solid.” His colleague had been vomiting on the floor.)
Hamilton had deserved worse for what he’d done to Brennan and the others. But Brennan had been wrong: the feeling hadn’t returned.
He continued his cycle through the cameras, the purple of the newer surveillance systems fading into the greens of night vision and the thermal cam. (What one military comedian had called rattlesnake cam.) Franklin, Dr Swann and her husband had disappeared into the maze of alleys. The new districts of Effrea had been designed as a grid so they were easy to navigate. The old parts by the river were a twisting mass of alleys, passageways and backstreets with doorways to skulk in and bins to hide behind. The chopper had lost the fugitives. The police had lost them. Brennan had lost them. He shut the screen off and stayed hunkered down, staring at the black glass.
The door slid open. The room beyond was utterly quiet.
“Let’s go, Brennan,” the VP said.
Maybe I was wrong about Seth, Brennan thought. Maybe there are more like him in the world — the morally absent, hiding behind suits and smiles and systems. Only, Seth’s violence was limited to those in front of him. Randall Soulier was planning to unleash hell on a nation.
The VP’s polished leather shoes ground tiny bits of stone into the stained flagstone under his feet. “The kid knew nothing. That was a waste of time.” He poked the corpse and Bethina spun away from him, tongue lolling from her mouth.
I was wrong.
“Any news on Franklin or Seth?”
Or Lena? “No, sir.”
5
Remembering The Way
Stella staggered to a standstill. Bent double, curtains of hair shrouded her face. “Tired. Legs hurt,” she gasped.
“Should have done more up-downs,” Ray said, fighting to catch his own breath. “Thought you had a thing for the Legions’ favourite punishment exercise.”
“Not helpful. Which way?”
“This way, I think.” He nodded towards the mouth of an alley that yawned blackly at them.
“You think?” Her chest heaved as she sucked in air to say, “Martinez told me Rose taught you to navigate by the stars.”
“You don’t get stars in a city, too much light pollution. All the sun-fans, drones and choppers don’t help. Neither does that.”
Stella pushed herself upright, her gaze following his finger. Clouds of smoke wound their way through the rooftops and leaked into the sky. It had a sharp, acrid smell that tasted of burnt flesh. Rat? Or maybe the corpses Ray and the others had left behind: Seth and Kayle and Sebb and Seren and Dylan and Rose, his mother. There were already too many people on a list that grew daily.
Rose had taught him stellar navigation. He’d been a child. Now he was almost thankful the smoke hid the stars; it muffled the sound of her voice. “Look for the constellation of the Jester. It always points north.”
The city of Tye, Effrea’s older sister city, lay north. The smoke from the burning buildings and the river fog twisted around their feet. Memories of the Hallowtide fires in Tear burst in his head in that random way that forgotten memories did. Smell was the big trigger, he’d read. The smell nerves in your nose connect directly to your brain. A neural highway from the outside of you to the inside of you. Today’s olfactory highway carried bonfires and roast meat and sweat. Stann Taille, Tear’s bitter old man, hogged the middle memory lane, telling stories of vampires that fed on happiness;
(“They fatten you up with drinks and jokes before sucking the laughter out of you until you can never smile again,” he’d say with a witch-like cackle.)
of fog that rotted your lungs; and Cracks in the pavements that were alive and lurking, waiting for someone to stand still for too long.
(“Ever wonder why your shoes split?” Stann would ask his audience around the Hallowtide fires. “
Not ‘cos they get old. The Cracks get them. The Cracks hide everywhere, in pavements and stone. Dried mud’s the worst for it.” The adults, faces red from the firelight and the alcohol, would smile tolerantly and tousle their kids’ hair. The younger children would shuffle closer to their parents. “That’s the Cracks,” Stann said, wet lips pursed. “They wait for you. Stand still too long and they get you. After they get in the soles of your shoes, they go for the skin on your heel. Then the bones in your legs. They’ll take your knees next. That’s why so many people got creaky joints that pop all the time. Never stand still too long. Always keep moving. Never stop. Always run.”)
They were good times, when the worst Ray had to worry about were his grandfather’s scary stories and the occasional beating. Now? Ray’s mother was dead and he was being hunted by his psychotic half-brother. He was bruised and emotionally numb, tired and thirsty, yet his mouth was full of the spittle that intense exercise and fear brings. Surely evolution could have fixed that by now, channel the spit to where it was useful?
A sound, drawn out and plaintive, split Ray’s thoughts into fragments. “Great,” he muttered, acutely aware that he was talking to himself. “Now you’re hearing howling in the alleys of the capital. What next, werewolves?”
Stella was tending to her husband. Ray had rested Dan against the wall. He was twitching and moaning, his eyes narrow purple slits of colour. He looked like he’d been beaten up from the inside out. A crack in the pavement ran the length of Dan’s body. Ray had an overwhelming urge to move the man, just in case Stann Taille had been right.
“Focus, Franklin,” he said. “No maudlin’, no dawdlin’.” In a louder voice he asked, “How is he?”
“Burning up.” Stella dabbed at his brow with a sleeve. “I’m beginning to think I should have gone on the chopper with Stann. We could have found meds quicker outside the city.”
“If you spend all your life looking backwards, the only thing you get is a sore neck and a stubbed toe.”
Stella stared at him. “Does that count as counselling where you’re from?”
“That’s exactly what Nascimento said.” Ray and his old squad had been in the Kickshaw after Ernest Hamid’s sit-in, yet another unofficial commemoration for yet another dead colleague. Ray had been a legionnaire then. He’d had a mother then. It seemed like another life. In this current life, he wasn’t sure if the look on Stella’s face was curious or exasperated.
“What Nascimento said? When? Are you OK? What—”
“Quiet.”
The shouts of pursuit were louder. Men. Women. That sound again. Howling and barking. Not his imagination. Not a werewolf, a dog. He felt sick. Animals hadn’t been allowed in the city of Effrea for decades except for police dogs. You didn’t see them very often, either, unless they were chasing you. Then you’d best hope the police got you before the dogs did.
He muscled Stella out of the way and dragged Dan to his feet, off the Crack in the ground that clung to the man’s clothes. He was heavy, not a dead weight. Not yet. Just a body fighting whatever evil was churning through its veins. Dan’s eyes snapped open, bloodshot with effervescent purple irises. He saw his wife and bared canines that seemed too sharp. A claw-like hand stretched for her. Ray shoved him away. Dan’s head cracked against the wall. A shower of brick dust pattered down. His eyes closed again as he whimpered.
“Gently! That’s my husband. He needs help not—”
A bark pierced the air, high-pitched, urgent.
Stella’s hands clenched on Dan’s sleeve. Her wedding ring cut white lines into her flesh. “What was that?”
Werewolves, Ray thought. “This way.” He looped Dan’s arm over a shoulder and stumbled off down an alley made of cracked concrete and darkness.
Stella cast a panicked glance back into the mounting fog. “Are you sure?”
“No.”
A second howl. Louder. Hunting. The way they had come.
Stella hurried after Ray and Dan, away from the noise, away from the werewolves. “‘No’ works for me.”
6
Remembering The Future
The ceiling glistened with the sheen of underground water. One drop hung off the end of a stalactite. Lazily, it fell and splashed onto a white sheen of rock beneath it. “I found this tunnel?” the younger of the two women asked, trailing a finger tip along a damp wall. For a brief moment, she had the feeling the mountain was touching her back.
“On one of your nocturnal walks.”
“Why did the tribes never find it before?”
“We didn’t know to look. That’s the problem with what we think we know. It stops us from asking questions. We have the same problem with tradition — it’s a stick in the eye of progress.”
There was a time when the lectures would have rankled. Today, Lieutenant Brooke of the Donian tribes and, more recently, the 10th Legion, was happy to hear the older woman talking. Though she did catch herself wishing the Elder would slow down, and that did rankle. “This isn’t what you wanted to show me though, is it?”
The older woman shook her head.
“You’re being vague, Kaleyne.”
“And you’re being impatient. Are you OK?” she asked.
“No.” Brooke lowered herself down onto a boulder. Her dented brass lantern slipped from her grasp and landed between her feet, the candle within it spluttering and hissing as wax spattered on the glass. Could I really be out of breath from a wander through the caves? Am I really this unfit? It was embarrassing. She’d never had a problem with movement before. It had always been as natural to her as her heartbeat. Now, her body seemed to be playing tricks on her. She smoothed her hands over her rounding stomach. “I’ve got a belly. That’s odd. I’m getting cankles. My back aches and I still have four months to go. God must have been a man to inflict such a bad joke on women.”
Kaleyne squatted next to her. The older woman was lithe and mobile despite her hair being the colour of the steel bobby pins that pierced it. She called them her utili-pins. They hid scissors, knives, corkscrews and a few other items that Brooke could only guess at. “It’s not a belly, it’s a baby. Your baby.”
“Ray’s baby, too.” There was a slight uptick at the end of the sentence, as if Brooke was questioning herself. She did have questions. Lots of them. Where Ray was, was one of them. How big could she get without bursting, was another. Would she be able to lie on her back without needing to piss every two minutes? That was also a pressing issue. Her hand drifted to her belly. Could she feel something moving in there? Did she want to feel anything moving?
Did she?
Could she?
Would she?
Questions. Nothing but questions. There had been no questions in the legions of Ailan, just violence and obedience. Now something inside her was usurping her own body and she didn’t know which of those extremes was best. She grabbed a handful of rocks off the floor and hurled them at the wall opposite. The click clack of the echoes chased themselves into the mountain.
“Better?” Kaleyne asked, once the noise had faded.
“No. Not enough answers. And I never saw myself doing this.” She gestured to her belly.
“The creating or the carrying?”
She blushed as Kaleyne took her hands in hers. “I hate it. I’m slow. I’m weak. I’m—”
“Pregnant.”
“Weak.” Brooke’s voice faltered. “Why not just strap me into high heels and turn my tits into balloons so I can’t run and men won’t know whether to try and fuck me, or protect me from other men trying to fuck me so they can claim some perceived right to fuck me?”
“Motherhood will make you stronger,” Kaleyne said, as she adjusted the leather satchel across her shoulders. “It did me. It gives a purpose to life that only a parent can understand. That brings strength.”
“But I won’t know what to do.” It was moany and whiny and she hated herself for even thinking it, let alone saying it.
“No one does. All the manuals and texts and a
dvice and systems of childcare exist to make the parents’ lives easier, not the children’s. Love the child, hold the child, feed and bathe the child, play with him or her and share your life with the life you have created. There is not much more advice you need.” She winked, her eyes glittering in the candle light. “Other than try and stock up on some sleep now because the first few years are hell.”
“Define few.”
“Two.”
“I could manage two. Just.” Maybe she could do this, after all.
“Give or take another sixteen.” Said without even a hint of a smirk.
“Another six— What? But . . .” Brooke’s voice trailed off as the full implications of what Kaleyne was saying hit home.
“I saw you and Ray stealing glances from each other before you two even admitted your feelings to each other.”
Brooke’s horror dimmed. She offered up a timid smile to Kaleyne’s grin. The older woman’s teeth were lit a cadaverous green by the dying candle. “We haven’t really admitted anything,” Brooke said. “We kind of skipped that bit and just got on with . . . stuff.”
“Share a fraction of the love you feel for Ray Franklin with your little one, and you will be a happier family than most.”
“Woah! Who said anything about love?”
“My dear granddaughter, your feelings are obvious to everyone save you and your mirror. Half the tribe are talking about it and half of those are taking bets on baby names.”
“Baby what?” Brooke lurched upright, a foot lashed out in the process and clattered her lantern into a rock. Shadows rolled across the walls and ceiling, seeming to chortle at her indignation.
“You are going to name the child, I hope?” Kaleyne asked. “I don’t mind whether you use our naming traditions or Ray’s, but history does not look kindly on people and regimes who reduce people to numbers.” There was an edge to the woman’s voice that could have cut rock.
“Yes. I know,” Brook said, squirming. “Of course it will have a name. But, love? There’s no need for that kind of language.” She stared down at her belly. Had it twitched? Sighing like a teenager, she pushed her hands up her thighs until she was standing. Kaleyne was already picking her way along the tunnel, oblivious to the darkness, skirts held up over her ankles. “Love,” Brooke repeated as she scooped up her spluttering lantern. She tried the word out again. It didn’t seem to fit her tongue properly. Maybe she just needed practice. In the meantime, she would find out who was taking bets on baby names and start breaking bits off them.