Lightning Tracks

by A. A. Kinsela

  ‘Hook him up before he comes to his senses,’ a familiar voice said.

  Something cold clamped around Cal’s wrist. He tried to shake his vision into focus as indistinct shapes swirled in front of him. The first thing he identified was the iron shackle on his wrist. His gaze traced the chain to a bolt in the wall. Next to this stood a pair of black Bandála boots, and Cal wasn’t the least bit surprised to find that they belonged to Julian.

  ‘On your knees,’ Julian commanded.

  Not wanting another beating, Cal pushed himself up. His skull felt like it was splitting open, and he hurt in a dozen different places. Behind Julian, in the corner of the room, three more soldiers stood watching. In the darkness Cal couldn’t distinguish their faces, but he felt sure they were the same men as last time. One of them appeared to be nursing a broken nose.

  ‘You were supposed to reveal Nick’s identity to the Bandála,’ Julian growled. ‘Not become his personal combat trainer.’

  ‘It’s like you said, sir. Roan trained me well.’

  Julian hit him hard. ‘I own you, Cal. You will do what I say.’

  Cal snarled. ‘You don’t own me. Nobody owns me!’

  Julian ducked out of range as Cal strained against the iron cuff and swung a kick at him. The movement sent Cal’s head into a spin. A blow knocked him against the wall. The next was so solid it rattled Cal’s teeth and weakened his knees. He collapsed onto all fours.

  Julian crouched down so he was eyelevel with Cal and said, ‘Refusing to comply makes you a liability. I’ll have to kill you if that’s the case. No one will miss a stray Highlander.’

  Through the sparking agony, Cal replied, ‘Nick will notice I’m gone.’

  ‘Ah, yes. Kári. He’ll be next.’

  Cal shuddered. He couldn’t help it. ‘You wouldn’t dare.’

  But even as he said it, he knew Julian was more than capable of making Nick disappear for good.

  Julian didn’t reply. He didn’t have to.

  ‘Alright,’ Cal said through gritted teeth. ‘I’ll make sure everyone sees his tattoo.’

  ‘How do I know you’re not lying again?’

  ‘I said I’d do it!’

  Julian shook his head. ‘I need more than that. An acknowledgement of ownership.’

  Cal swallowed. ‘What?’

  ‘You’re not an Arai, Cal, and you’re not Korelian, so that makes you a slave. My slave. And if you want Nick to live, you’ll say it. You belong to me.’

  Cal clenched his fists and ground them into the stones. He couldn’t. The mere thought of speaking those words made him feel ill.

  ‘I won’t.’

  With a signal from Julian, one of the Arai yanked Cal’s head back by his hair and pressed a hunting knife against his throat. The blade stung him, and a warm trickle worked its way down his chest.

  ‘If you don’t obey me, Cal, in less than a week, Rayámina will find Nicholas Kári hanging from a tree on the banks of the Defender’s River, with the evidence leading directly back to Artemis.’

  ‘No!’ Cal gasped.

  ‘The Bandála will fail, all because you couldn’t swallow your pride.’

  This time, Cal’s protest shrivelled in his throat.

  Julian leant over him. ‘Say it.’

  ‘I...’ Cal gulped, shut his eyes, somehow found the strength to spit out the words. ‘I belong to you, Commander Julian.’

  ‘That’s right, Cal. You do.’

  The delight in Julian’s voice made Cal want to throttle him. His hair was released, and Julian held out the key for the iron shackle.

  ‘You have three days. We’ll be watching you, so don’t do or say anything you’ll regret. And don’t draw attention to yourself.’

  The key clunked onto the stones in front of Cal. Then Julian and his Arai faded into the night.

  Chapter 27: The governor’s house

  ‘Get a move on, Nick! Inspection starts in half an hour!’ David hollered from the hallway.

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ Nick muttered, buckling his last bootstrap before opening his bedroom door.

  It had been a month since his first session on the training field, and he’d had to do twice as much work as everyone else, what with drills in the morning and shielding practice in the afternoons. He’d run the mountain eighteen times already, and although he was pretty much used to the physical routine, it was taking him a lot longer to adjust to living with David, Xanthe and Jinx. David was demanding and impatient with him, Jinx was as annoying as the day he’d met her, and while Xanthe often treated him with kindness, she was rarely home, and he was forever trying to avoid knocking over her mysterious bowls of goo that she left all over the place.

  David looked Nick over and said, ‘Get your jacket.’

  ‘I’m not cold.’

  ‘You have to be in full uniform for the inspection. Hurry up!’

  Nick snatched his jacket up off the floor and David let out a loud sigh.

  ‘What now?’

  ‘Didn’t Mía teach you to look after your belongings?’

  Nick slapped the dust off his jacket and snapped, ‘There. Happy?’

  David spun away without answering and marched downstairs to where a young Bandála soldier stood guard at the foyer door. She snapped into a salute.

  David strode across Market Square, and Nick almost had to jog to keep up. People gawped at David like he was the Pope, some reaching towards him in awed devotion. Any Bandála soldiers he passed stopped what they were doing to salute. One dropped an oilskin sack containing something squishy, which hit the cobblestones with a sloppy thud. Nick wondered how all these people would respond if they learned his secret. Would they salute? Would they laugh or throw scraps at him? Would they want to hurt him? With this last thought, Nick checked that his Arai tattoo was still hidden under his collar.

  By the time David and Nick arrived at the training field, Bandála soldiers were already forming tight lines for the inspection.

  ‘Go and join Pan’s group,’ David said.

  As Nick walked away, David barked, ‘You’re forgetting something!’

  Nick rolled his eyes and gave a half-hearted salute. David nodded dismissively.

  ‘Having trouble with Rayámina?’ Cal murmured as Nick stepped up beside him in the back row.

  ‘Always.’

  Cal had a black eye, a split lip, and a painful-looking cut on his neck.

  ‘Shit. What happened to you?’ Nick asked.

  ‘I stepped out of line.’

  ‘Seriously? You must’ve stepped a long way. Wait. Did Miles have anything to do with this?’

  Cal’s jaw clenched. ‘I wouldn’t put it past him.’

  ‘You mean you don’t know?’

  ‘It was dark. I didn’t see their faces.’

  ‘Have you reported it?’

  ‘What’s the point?’

  Nick was about to start listing the reasons why Cal should report the attack when David strode towards their group. He moved up and down the lines, scrutinising uniforms and posture.

  ‘Not bad,’ he said as he passed close to Nick.

  It took all Nick’s self-control not to retort.

  Julian was inspecting the older groups in the weapons training area. Cal stared at the commander with the look of a caged tiger. When he noticed Nick watching him, his expression changed to something unreadable, as if he’d slammed a lid on his rage.

  It made Nick wonder if Julian had anything to do with Cal’s injuries.

  ‘CAN I HAVE A LOOK AROUND the city today?’ Nick asked as he and Kráytos walked back to the apartment after training. He knew Cal was stationed at the aqueducts. Perhaps if he went there, he might learn a bit more about what had happened to him, or even find out where he lived. Over the last few weeks, Cal had been careful not to reveal much about himself, despite spending almost every day training and running the mountain with Nick.

  David punished Cal more harshly than he did the other recruits, and Kráytos regarded him with abou
t as much warmth as a midwinter frost. Nick sometimes caught Jinx staring at Cal as though he was an unexploded grenade. Even Artemis seemed to avoid him. If she’d known who Nick was before they’d even met, then the chance of her knowing Cal’s secrets too was pretty high.

  This only fuelled Nick’s determination to learn the truth.

  Kráytos shook his head. ‘You know Rayámina doesn’t want you wandering the streets, even with protection.’

  Nick scuffed onwards. He heard laughter and gazed down an alley at three women stretching uncooked dough into flatbread. They reminded him of Mía, and he ached to hear her laughter again. He slowed to let Kráytos walk ahead a few paces then, in that instant, while Kráytos wasn’t looking, Nick took his chance and bolted up the alley. Kráytos bellowed but Nick ignored him and ran faster. He ducked under clothes lines and flung loose shutters aside. He leaped over baskets and old people sitting in doorways. He ran up stairs and down ramps and through narrow gaps left between spice barrels and stone walls. In his haste, he thumped a horse’s snout. The animal snorted and backed up. The cart it was harnessed to toppled over, smashing an entire load of oil-filled ceramic jars.

  ‘Sorry!’ Nick shouted.

  He ran down lanes as tight as a doorway until he was convinced he’d waylaid his bodyguard. For several long minutes, he crouched panting among the rubble of a crumbling building. A jungle grew in the courtyard, with trees towering well above the rooftop and honeysuckle vines covering the back wall. Beyond this soared a line of dark stone arches. Nick moved to an empty window to get a better view and saw a bare and ruined temple, its basalt arches stretching across the sky like scorched clouds. He could hear singing. Nick ventured over to investigate.

  The temple was packed with Yándi people. A smoky haze smelling of sweet herbs hung in the air. Nick crept along the wall, trying to be quiet and inconspicuous. The stone floor was sunken and scraped from centuries of use, and the grooves tripped him up. Judging from the state of the blackened beams jutting out of the stone arches above, he reckoned the building must have burnt down some time ago. Now, currawongs nested in the sooty hollows.

  Large carvings covered the walls, with pictures similar to the ones in the council chamber foyer. In the first picture, a god rose out of the ocean in his sun chariot, then he handed fire to two men. Next, he stepped behind a mountain with a strip of stars above his head. Just like the council chamber, the god’s face had been hacked off.

  Behind the altar, a huge sandstone sundisc stood leaning against the wall. It was smooth, and Nick imagined it might once have been polished till it shone, but now it was grimy and split right down the middle. Positioned in front like a set of prison bars were six thick totem poles, each of them decorated with carvings and bright colours.

  Nick paused to listen to the words of the song.

  As you, our dead, drift softly to the stars,

  Do not despair, do not look back.

  Remember those you’ve left behind.

  Eternal peace you now shall find.

  You are the wind that shakes the trees.

  You are the path beneath our feet.

  You are the sun and moonlit night.

  You are our sadness and delight.

  Your memory shall never fade.

  Lying on the altar in front of the totem poles was a body wrapped in black cloth. A fine dusting of ochre covered the cloth like caster sugar and wildflowers rested on its chest. Without warning, Mía’s soft face swam before Nick’s eyes. He stumbled through an archway to the street and ran down the hill. Eventually, he stopped in a weed-choked alley, panting and trembling. Pedestrians ambled past, a few glancing in his direction. To escape their curiosity, he scaled the stone wall at his back and dropped into a crouch amongst an overgrown garden.

  If Mía had died here in Auremos, would she have had a funeral like that? Would the Yándi have raised her up on a ledge and sung songs for her? Did anyone apart from David, Nick and Xanthe even know that she’d saved David’s life all those years ago?

  The crack of splintering wood brought Nick’s thoughts up short. He glanced around for a moment before figuring out that the sound had come from inside the derelict house.

  ‘Hello?’ he called.

  No one replied.

  He ventured through the tangle of wattle and banksia towards the double-storey basalt mansion. Its closed shutters and ominous front door made it about as inviting as the entrance to a prison. He tried the door and found it unlocked. With a final glance over his shoulder, he slipped inside. Thin shafts of daylight cut across the stone floor, and in the corner Nick saw an assortment of weapons – daggers, knives, swords, sheaths of arrows, and a couple of long wooden staffs. Scuffing footsteps and the odd thump was coming from further in. He crept towards the sound, crouched beneath a window, and peered through to a large internal courtyard with hard packed dirt. A room on the opposite side of the courtyard had ropes secured between the floors and ceilings, crossing each other like a manmade cobweb. Through another window, Nick saw a workshop, with a furnace, a heavy bench, and an array of sooty tools. At the edge of the courtyard was a pile of smashed up wooden planks.

  Movement caught his eye and Artemis tumbled into view. Nick smiled, and was about to call out to her when a second Bandála soldier appeared and launched into a swift attack. As the soldier circled Artemis, Nick saw that it was Cal.

  ‘You can do better than that, Artemis,’ Cal said.

  ‘I’m just warming up. I’ll slaughter you.’

  He grinned. ‘Go on, then.’

  She shot forward and fought fiercely. She was mesmerising to watch, and for a while, Nick couldn’t take his eyes off her.

  ‘Ow!’ Cal cried, clapping a hand to his side and doubling over.

  ‘Sorry!’ Artemis gasped. ‘I forgot. Are you okay?’

  He straightened, wincing, and nodded. When they started sparring again, Nick’s attention shifted to Cal. He moved like lightning, ducking and weaving and striking and spinning with incredible speed. Even in his bruised condition he was still better than Artemis.

  Nick sat back on his haunches, frowning. Was Cal’s talent for combat what concerned David so much? It didn’t make sense. David should be pleased to have such a skilled soldier in his ranks. After all, the Bandála had trained Cal.

  Hadn’t they?

  The question left Nick cold, and he sank further into the shadows to watch.

  When Artemis scooped up a knife, Cal’s grin returned. He avoided several swipes from the blade before catching her in a headlock and wrestling the blade from her.

  With a chuckle, he said, ‘You’re dead.’ Then he turned the blade and stabbed her in the neck.

  ‘No!’ Nick choked. He raced across the courtyard, snatched her out of Cal’s grasp, searched for blood, but didn’t find any.

  ‘Nick, I’m okay,’ she said, her eyes wide with alarm. ‘It was just a slide knife.’

  ‘A what?’

  She took the knife from Cal and pressed the blade till it disappeared into the hilt. When she released it, the blade sprang back out.

  ‘Cal disengaged the locks so we can use them for training,’ she explained, tossing the knife aside.

  Nick’s gaze swung from Artemis to Cal. They both looked as shocked as he felt.

  ‘How did you find us?’ Cal asked.

  ‘I was just passing. I heard wood breaking and...’ Nick swallowed, his mind racing with questions. ‘Why are you training here? Together? In secret?’

  ‘Because we have to,’ Artemis replied.

  ‘Why? What are you hiding?’

  Neither of them answered. Something about the way they were watching him sent a shudder of fear through him. That undercurrent of danger he’d initially sensed in Cal was emanating from them both now. He stepped away.

  ‘Cal,’ Artemis said, as if it was a command.

  Nick turned and ran. He made it to the front door, but as he opened it, Cal kicked it shut again. Nick scrambled into a corner.


  ‘We’re not going to hurt you, Nick,’ Artemis said. ‘I promise.’

  Nick held up a shaky hand. ‘Stay back. Tell me why you’re training in secret. Who are you?’

  After glancing at one another, Cal and Artemis tugged their shirt collars down to reveal identical Arai tattoos, both with the horizon line inked beneath the sun.

  ‘Shit,’ Nick breathed, and his shields ran hot over his skin. So this was what David meant when he said Cal’s purpose might not match the Bandála’s.

  ‘Are you here to kill me?’

  Their eyes widened.

  ‘No,’ Artemis replied.

  ‘We’re here to help,’ Cal added. ‘Don’t you want to stop Thanos?’

  Nick’s mind was in overdrive. Cal knew who he was. Of course he would. Artemis would have told him. Or perhaps Valerius. That’s why Cal had been spending so much time with Nick over the past month. But was it to protect him, or spy on him?

  ‘That’s what we want,’ Artemis said. ‘And we’ll do whatever it takes to get rid of Thanos.’

  Their eyes were bright with some emotion Nick didn’t understand.

  ‘David knows who...what you are?’ he asked.

  Artemis nodded. ‘So do Valerius and Xanthe and a few others on the Auremos Council.’

  ‘And...you’ve deserted the Arai?’

  ‘Yeah, although we haven’t been initiated into the Bandála yet. Until that happens, we have to lie low.’

  Nick swallowed as he tried to process this. ‘The other recruits don’t know about you. That’s why you have to hide who you are and what you can do.’

  ‘We’d rather not have our heads staked,’ Cal said.

  ‘Why did you leave the Arai?’

  They both stiffened at the question.

  ‘Different reasons,’ Artemis replied.

  ‘That we’d rather not talk about,’ Cal added.

  Nick shook his head. ‘You can’t expect me to trust you if I don’t know why you left.’