by Nathan Long
“Demon!”
“It’s got a priest!”
“Fetch the guard!”
The guards were already coming. I could see ’em climbing up the chimney beneath my feet.
“Sorry, fellas. We’re closed.”
With my free hand I grabbed the grate by one edge and dropped it down the hole. Back on Earth I couldn’t have done that trick, because we’re civilized enough to make manhole covers round so they won’t fall down their own holes. These nimrods hadn’t figured that out yet, and they paid for it. The grate wiped them off the ladder like the hand of god and I started looking around for a place where me and Brother Aln could have a quiet little chat.
Unfortunately, somebody had fetched the guard. I could see a troop of guys in green cloaks pushing through the crowd with a bunch of ragged children waving them on and shouting.
“This way!”
“A demon! A demon!”
“Look there!”
I locked eyes with the guard captain as he came around some kind of shish-kabob stand, then saw that a couple of the guys behind him had crossbows. Time to go. And time to go up.
The buildings around the square were all two and three stories, but their fronts were covered with awnings and fancy stone work, so it wasn’t hard finding a way to climb one, but doing it with a stunned priest in one hand made it harder. I threw him up onto an awning, then vaulted up after him and slung him over my shoulder.
A crossbow bolt stuck in the plaster beside me as I climbed for a balcony, but then the guard captain shouted at his men not to fire in case they hit the priest, and they ran into the building instead.
I heaved Brother Aln onto the roof, climbed after him, and picked him up again, then stopped dead, staring out across the rooftops. Any doubts I’d had about what planet I was on were all washed away just like that, ’cause rising up out of the city like a giant white vibrator was the Temple of Ormolu, headquarters of the Church of the Seven, a windowless, spaceship skyscraper that looked as out of place on this medieval planet as a ray gun at a renaissance fair.
I blinked at it, a realization dawning. “That’s where I just was. Duh. The inside matches the outside. That must mean there’s local teleporters as well as long distance. Crazy.”
I turned around to make sure, and saw the Aldhanan’s palace, all red and orange sandstone up on its hill in the other direction. Yup, I was in Ormolu, the capital of the Oran Empire. I was back on Waar! Yay!
The sound of boots thudding on stairs inside the building snapped me out of my happy dance. The guards would be up there any second, and I didn’t want to be waiting for ’em. I clamped Brother Aln to my shoulder, jumped for the next roof, and kept jumping until I was a whole block away, and had put a few cupolas and chimneys in the way besides, then stopped in the middle of a triangle of laundry lines and dumped him on his back.
“Alright, pal. Tell me where Lhan is.”
He didn’t answer, just lay there with his mouth half open. Shit. Had I killed him? I knelt down and listened to his chest. His heart was thumping along just fine. I slapped him, then slapped him again. He came to with a yelp and curled up, covering his head. I rolled him back over and pinned his shoulders flat with my legs, then clamped a hand around his neck.
“Where is Lhan-Lar?”
He stared up at me, whites showing all around his eyes. “I—I know not the name.”
I slapped him again. “Liar! I heard you tell your guys you couldn’t let me escape too. That means you let somebody else escape, and I’m guessing it’s Lhan. Now where is he?”
He sneered up at me, my handprint turning his purple cheek maroon. “You may do your worst, demon. A priest does not give up the secrets of the—”
I reached behind me and clamped a hand on his junk. He squeaked like a dog toy.
“He has fled with the pirates!”
“What pirates?”
“The pirates with whom you defeated Kedac-Zir!”
My heart did a little dance in my chest. Lhan was alive? And he was with Kai-La and her gang of buckle swashers? This was the best news ever!
I gave his nuts another honk. “Where are they?”
“You will not save him. An airship went after them days ago. He will be dead with all the rest.”
I rolled my eyes. “Tell me another one. Kai-La got the personal thanks of the Aldhanan. The navy’s got no reason to go after them.”
He smiled, smug. “The Temple has its own airships. And its own warriors. Besides, it was discovered they had betrayed the Aldhanan’s trust.”
My heart stopped dancing. “You framed ’em. You set ’em up.”
“We did what was best for Ora, as we always have.”
I let go of his sack and stabbed my finger at him. “I don’t know what y’all are up to, but if Lhan is dead, I’m coming back here and burning your goddamned rocketship club-house to the ground. Now where is he? Where are the pirates?”
He shrugged like it didn’t matter. “They are at Toaga, the pirate haven. Or they were. They are dead now, I assure you.”
I slapped him. “And where is that?”
He spit blood and tried to hide his head against his shoulder. I grabbed his chin and forced him to look at me.
“Where?”
“To the south! Near the mountains!”
“Where exactly?”
“Do you think I have a map? It is to the south. I know no more.”
I wanted to shake him, but he was right. Him telling me wasn’t gonna do me any good. I needed to find a map, or somebody who could take me to this Toaga place personally. And how the fuck was I gonna manage that?
Through the flapping laundry I could hear the guards coming across the roofs. I stood up and grabbed a red blanket and a lime green sarong off the clothes line and started to cover myself.
“Thanks for the info. Remember my warning.”
Brother Aln raised up on his elbows. “I did not lie before, demon. The church will give you mercy. Come willingly and you will not be harmed.”
I sneered and backed for the edge of the roof. “Yeah, you’ll just send me back to a place I don’t wanna be no more. Thanks but no thanks, padre.”
I turned and jumped for the street.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE HUNT!
About eight hours later, looking like a color-blind babushka in my clashing blanket and wrap, I stared out from the branches of a purple tree at the ritzy country house of the guy Lhan and I had stayed with the night the priests had grabbed me and sent me back to Earth.
My first instinct had been to go to the Aldhanan’s palace and ask Sai for help, or maybe even the Aldhanan himself. I mean, Lhan and I had saved his country for him, right? Couldn’t he do us a solid and get the church off our backs? But then I remembered how many priests I’d seen in there, and how paranoid Lhan and Sai had been about them knowing what we were up to. They had ears everywhere, Sai had said, and even the Aldhanan watched his ass around them.
Then I remembered that Lhan and the guy who had put us up on our last night together had looked over a bunch of maps while we were trying to work out where we gonna go to escape the priests. If anybody knew where this Toaga place was, it was that guy. All I had to do was find him. I wish I’d had a map. It took me a while to work out where that was from the middle of Ormolu, but after a long day of sneaking and hiding and dragging my ass all over hell and back, and way too many wrong turns, rewinds and dead ends, I finally got to Lhan’s friend’s house about three hours past sunset. Now I was scouting the place like a spy in a movie. It looked like I remembered it, like a villa on some Greek island, with balconies and porches and wings, only all made out of hexagons the way all the buildings were on Waar, and I half expected to see it full of priests, all waiting to ambush me. Well, if they were, they were wearing some pretty good shrubbery disguises, so I made for the wall.
It isn’t easy being a ninja when you’re big and pink and dressed in red and green. You don’t exactly blend in with t
he scenery. Fortunately, the big and little moons were down, and the lights were off in the house and probably nobody was watching anyway. I took a running start and jumped the wall long and shallow, then tucked and rolled on the blue lawn inside the compound and came up near the bushes outside the dining room.
Nobody called out. Nobody shot at me. Nobody opened a window. I let out a breath and climbed to a balcony on the second level, then rolled through an open door—and found myself in the bedroom Lhan and I had shared before the priests had grabbed me. I swallowed hard as little movies of that night flashed through my head. There was a lot of porn in those flicks, I admit, a lot of bouncing and grinding and licking and biting, but there was more too—kisses, hugs, stories back and forth, tears—all the stuff that makes a roll in the hay more than just a one-night stand, even if it only lasted one night.
“Don’t be dead, Lhan. Please don’t be dead.”
I waited for my eyes to adjust to the darkness—and to stop leaking—then crossed the room to the door and out into the hallway. If I remembered the layout right, our host’s room was two down to the left. The hall was darker than the rooms, so I made my way down by feel, and hoped my curses didn’t wake anybody as I banged my shins and elbows into things.
Finally I found what I hoped was the right door, and opened it. It was the right door. Tubby, our host, was asleep on his bed, snoring softly at the ceiling. His name started coming to me as I looked at him. What was it? Ryan? No. Rian? That was it. Rian-Gi. I slipped in and closed the door behind me.
“Psst! Hey, Rian. Hey, buddy.”
Have you ever seen a bulldog stuck with a cattle prod while napping? Neither have I, but now I don’t have to. Tubby levitated about three feet off the bed and did some kind of spastic ballet move before coming down half-off the bed with one hand to his chest and his eyes as round as ping-pong balls.
“Who-who-who-who—?”
“Relax.” I stepped out of the shadows. “It’s just me.”
He blinked at me for a second, then his eyes went wider than before. I was afraid they were gonna pop out onto his chest. “You! But you’re the worst person it could possibly be! Go away!”
“I need your help to find Lhan.”
He squealed. “By the Seven and the One! Go away! They may be watching the house!”
I looked toward the windows. He was making me paranoid. “Come on, dude. Nobody’s watching. I promise. They all think I went south. Now, will you help me? I need a map to some place called Toaga.”
He clapped his hands over his ears. “Do not tell me! They will ask again! They will put me to the question!”
“They questioned you? About Lhan? They…” A lump of ice slid down into my guts and grew into an iceberg. I clenched my fists. “Wait a minute. You told them. You’re the reason they knew he went with the pirates.”
Rian-Gi buried his face in his hands. “Oh, why did Lhan bring you here? The two of you have brought nothing but misery to this house. I wish they had caught you both before you ever darkened my door!”
That was too much. I grabbed him by the front of his robe and hoisted him off his feet so I could look him right in his fat little face.
“Listen, Madam Butterfly, I’m sorry we inconvenienced you. I’m sorry you’ve had storm troopers keeping you up past your bedtime, but if that’s enough for you to wish your best friend killed by those orange house-coat wearing pricks then you’re a fucking coward, and I oughta—”
He slapped me. It was like being hit with a silk glove full of tapioca, but it still brought me up short. He was red in the face. “Inconvenienced?”
He pushed away from me and tore out of his robe in a flinging frenzy, then stood there panting with his belly hanging out. There were red, half-healed whip cuts all over it.
“You see how inconvenient this has been for me?”
I stared, a hot flush rising in my face. I’d been too easy on Brother Aln. Way too easy. “The priests… The priests did that?”
He turned his head. “I—I was strong even then. Only when they threatened Wae-Fen did I—”
“Wae-Fen?”
He looked hurt. “You do not remember? He served us dinner. He ate with us.”
I thought back to that evening. Everything before me and Lhan had hooked up had kinda ended up on the cutting room floor, but now that I thought about it, I remembered. Rian-Gi had given us dinner in his bedroom—this room—and we’d been waited on by this laughing little pretty boy with slim hips and lavender hair.
“Your, uh, servant?”
“It was I who was servant to… to….”
He started blubbing and slumped on the bed again. I looked down at him, feeling guilty about pressing him, but wanting to hear him say it. “So, to save your lover, you told them where Lhan was.”
A hysterical laugh bubbled out of Rian-Gi’s lips. “To save him from the whip. Yes. I did. They… they gave him the knife instead. As soon as I had betrayed my best friend, they cut Wae-Fen’s throat from ear to ear. A corrupting influence, they said. A noble such as myself should not allow such perversion into my home. I must be a model for the morals of my inferiors.”
His dimpled fists balled up and turned white at the knuckles. He hung his head. “I should have thrown myself at them, killed as many as I could before joining my beloved in death. I am a coward. That I live is proof of it.”
I know it was shitty of me, but for a second, I was kinda inclined to agree with him. Then I felt ashamed of myself. Gay guys had it tough enough on Earth, and we were a supposedly civilized planet. Waar was still in the dark ages, and the church was the fucking Spanish Inquisition. Even a rich guy like Rian-Gi couldn’t stand up for himself here. If you fought back, you got killed. End of story. No laws, no courts, no rights organizations, nobody had your back.
I squatted down beside him and put a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. But… you don’t really want Lhan to die too, do you?”
He raised his head, haughty and hurt, but then his face crumpled. “I fear I may have already killed him.”
I was afraid of that too, but I didn’t want to think about it. “There’s still a chance. At least I hope so. But I need your help to find him, to save him.”
“But he is with the pirates. They might be anywhere.”
“They’re in a place called Toaga. At least that’s what a priest told me. I just need a map to get me there.”
He pursed his lips, then nodded and stood. “This way. To my private chamber.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE RACE!
From the way he said it, I was expecting his “private chamber” to be some kind of pervy pleasure room, and it was—at least part of it was. It was behind a secret door, just like it was supposed to be, and there were paintings of beautiful purple naked boys all over the place, and books of porny drawings open to the good parts on podiums. There was also a bed and a wardrobe filled with naughty costumes, but another part of the room was more like a professor’s office. There were scrolls on the desk, and thick leather-bound books with titles like The First Angao Dynasty and Heresies of the Khat Rebellion in piles on the floor, maps on the walls, and ink quills and notebooks and scribbled-on scraps of paper everywhere, which Rian-Gi was digging through like a dog looking for a bone.
I laughed and held up a book called History and the Nature of Divinity. “You have to hide history books too?”
He looked up from his search and pointed to the porn. “They might shun me for owning that.” His finger swung around to the history books. “They will kill me for owning that.”
He was dead serious. I didn’t get it. “What? Why?”
“You truly are from another world, aren’t you? History is the most dangerous thing in Ora. The truth about the Seven and the One? The truth about the Wargod? The church has guarded those for centuries. Men have disappeared for only wondering aloud about their true origins. Professors, men of great learning, they all tread carefully around those subjects, choosing, for
the sake of their own skin, to concentrate on the succession of kings and the wars between them. Those who do not? Gone. They fall out of windows, they die in tavern brawls, robberies, of strange sicknesses, of accidental poisonings.”
I looked around at all the books again, shaking my head. He’d had all these in his house when the priests had come asking questions. “Damn. You’re braver than I thought.”
He shrugged. “Lhan and I and… others, are part of a loose circle of truth seekers, determined to learn the real story of our past, and we spent much of our youth hunting for forbidden books and digging in old dead cities.” He smiled, and his eyes went all far away. “Those are some of the fondest memories of a sad and profligate life. Lhan and I, alone together, full of youth and curiosity and appetite.”
Alone? Together? Appetite? I blinked. “Wait a minute. You and Lhan…?”
Rian-Gi smirked. “Surely, my dear, you knew he slept on both sides of the bed?”
“Well, yeah, but… but….” I couldn’t help it, my eyes dropped to his gut.
He looked down, shrugging. “Well, I was more svelte then, and Lhan more beautiful, if you can imagine. Ah, here we are.”
He pulled a map from the bottom of a pile and laid it across a desk. “It isn’t shown as Toaga here, but it is marked nonetheless. This is a poor copy of an ancient map of the old kingdoms I made for one of our expeditions. You may have it. It shows the route from Ormolu…” He pointed to a big dot on the upper left side of the map, then trailed his finger down to a smaller dot near the bottom edge of the map. “To Udbec the Impregnable.”
“The—the what?” I was still trying wrap my head around the idea of him and Lhan being together and was only hearing every other word.
“A great tower of rock rising from the forest—well, there is no forest now, but there was then. It was so high and so inaccessible that it was thought to be unconquerable, and the King of the Udar built his castle upon it. That, of course, was before the Seven granted us the gift of levitating air. After that it fell to the first Oran Emperor in a day. It has been abandoned since then, but for the pirates.”