The Ruby Celeste Series - Box Set, books 1 - 3: Ghost Armada, Dire Kraken, and Church of Ife

by Nicholas J. Ambrose

Francis nodded. “That okay?” he asked Ruby.

  She nodded, just once.

  “I’ll see you soon, Brie.”

  Eyes—whole face, in fact—downcast, she said sadly, “S-see you …”

  Francis stepped off the ship. He paused by the dock for a moment, nodding a farewell to each of them. Brie gripped the rail where he’d gone. She was only a few short feet away, but going by the look on her face, it might well be a mile.

  Natasha spoke into her communicator. “Take us out, Wren.”

  A few moments later, the ship began to rise.

  “Be careful!” Brie shouted.

  It pulled away. Francis watched, one hand lifted in farewell.

  The span between ship and dock filled with empty air. It grew longer and longer. Brie ran by the rails, calling to him, looking as though she might try to vault it at any moment—Please, don’t; not again—

  Finally, the ship completed its turn. Francis had one last look at bouncing blonde hair—then Brie, and Ruby, Mikhail, and Natasha with her, were masked by the Harbinger’s black steel hull.

  5

  Francis watched until the ship was far enough that he could lift a hand and blot it from view.

  His friends were on there. And he was here: alone.

  He took a deep breath. Gripping one of the rucksack’s handles and pulling it up, he turned to New Calais proper, and began to walk. The first steps were unsure, but the larger the central cathedral grew, the steelier he became.

  No room for fear. No room for worry. Now, he had a job to do.

  Task One

  (Chapter Seven)

  1

  Although it was just past dawn, people were already out and about when Francis came into the city. A pair of women in the church’s red robes tended to pots of bright flowers beside the flagstone path Francis walked upon. They smiled warmly. Francis nodded back.

  Further on, a man and woman walked with a child between them. The kid looked little older than three or four. He had to reach up to hold both his parents’ hands.

  Before Francis could work on worming his way into the church, he had a conundrum. Where exactly should he go?

  He thought of yesterday. Abraham had said he was one of the people in charge of the church, so he had to be the best avenue.

  It was just a case of finding him.

  The cathedral seemed the likeliest place. And if Abraham wasn’t there, someone else might be; someone who could point Francis in the right direction.

  Before long, he was at the bottom of the cathedral’s enormous steps. He breathed a shaky breath, rearranged his rucksack, and began to climb.

  Halfway, the ambient noise of the outside world grew muted. Birdsong quieted, as did the soft buzz of a city waking. Francis’s footfalls took over … and, as he came nearer the top, a calm voice.

  He paused.

  The speaker was in the cathedral. Male. Any more than this, Francis could not tell. Although he pricked his ears, he was unable to make out the words.

  Whoever it was, Francis would be in luck. He could find his way to Abraham now.

  Once more, he pulled at the rucksack. It seemed to want to slip—why hadn’t he bothered adjusting its straps before setting out? He wished it wouldn’t. Gun or no, he wanted to keep his kit as close as possible. If the bundle so much as hung an inch down his back, someone might stalk up and snatch it off, turfing its contents out. The gun would spill into view, and Francis would be ousted before he’d even exchanged word one with the church’s head.

  That was ridiculous. All of it.

  Then again, it had been a pretty ridiculous year all-round. Anyway, paranoia was good. It kept his guard up.

  Slower, Francis resumed climbing.

  When he finally came to the top—

  “Oh—”

  The pews were full of men and women and, more irregularly, children. Through the aisle, stood behind the simple lectern, was a wizened old man midway through a sermon.

  He paused at Francis’s interruption, casting a look his way.

  The churchgoers followed suit.

  “Sorry,” Francis mumbled. “I’ll just …”

  “It’s okay.” A person rose at the front: Abraham. He stepped into the aisle and came Francis’s way. Grace followed, eyes watchful.

  “Let us speak outside,” he said to Francis.

  The service resumed, and Francis went back down the stairs with Abraham at his side, and Grace at Abraham’s.

  “How may I assist you?” said the priest when they were back in the courtyard.

  “I wish to join your church.”

  “You do?”

  “Yes.” Francis nodded firmly. And then, either because he thought it would help, or because he could not help himself—didn’t bad liars tend to spew spurious information with all the care of a hose? Or was it just that people in general needed to fill holes in conversation, by any means they could?—he said, “Your introduction to the church yesterday stuck with me. I spent all day thinking, and half the night.”

  Abraham looked pleasantly surprised. “You are Francis, is that right?”

  “Yeah, that’s me.”

  “Francis, walk with me. The exercise does an old man good.”

  They set off. Abraham set the walk at a sedate pace. Grace followed.

  “Ife’s tale must have struck a nerve with you,” said Abraham, “for you to have come to your decision so quickly.”

  “It was a moving story.”

  Abraham smiled. “It is quite.”

  A young brunette woman came by clutching a bundle of cloth. Abraham lifted his head; she did the same.

  “Young Layla,” he said when she had passed. “She approached me much the same as yourself.”

  “Has she been with you long?”

  “Since the summer. I keep telling myself summer will draw to a close soon, but …” Abraham lifted his hands. “The trees have barely begun shaking loose their leaves. I swear, each year winter grows shorter than the last. Or perhaps not,” he added, eyes alighting. “Childhood has a way of stretching things out, does it not?”

  “I suppose so.”

  Their walk brought them through an arch. They now ambled along a path cut in the gardens around the cathedral’s side. The sun was still low, and the cathedral’s many spires and central cone loomed, so their journey was in cool shadow. Dewdrops clung to the grass, and wetted the toes of Francis’s boots.

  “I filled your ears with stories yesterday,” said Abraham. “Tell me about you.”

  “There’s not much to tell,” said Francis. “I’m a deckhand on a ship.”

  “Were those your crewmates you came with yesterday?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And how are they?”

  “They’re great. Really great.”

  “And what of your family?”

  Francis hesitated. In the short twelve hours since announcing to Ruby he would be the one to infiltrate the church, and setting foot off the ship this morning for the last time in who knew how long, none had thought to discuss this detail. Should he talk? Or should he lie?

  The first thought went to lying. But doing so might become complicated. He’d need to stick to his story for the sake of consistency, maybe even add to it. A web of lies like that could quickly spiral out of his control. One wrong detail somewhere in the chain, noticed by the wrong person, and he’d be under immense scrutiny.

  It could blow the whole operation apart.

  The truth, then.

  “I lived with my parents until the start of this year,” he said.

  “Not around here, I gather? Your accent is different than most people in this region.”

  “Not around here, no.” Francis chose his words very carefully. “I lived in a town called Cressing. It’s on the surface.”

  Shock would surely crease Abraham’s face. Yet it did not: the old man simply continued his walk, eyes on the path as he navigated its curves. The only move he made was a plain nod.

  “You�
�re not surprised?”

  Abraham laughed. “No, but I can tell you are.”

  “Very few people believed me. Even my ship’s captain, at first.”

  “The challenges are rife,” said Abraham. “And people are rarely educated on what does not concern them.” Smiling, he gestured heavenward. “One day, I’m sure, we’ll set foot on the moon. Just the same, there will be disbelievers, and there will be people whose lives keep the knowledge we ever did so from them.”

  Francis followed Abraham’s gaze. Unbothered by the sun’s presence, the moon still hung in the sky. Its face was a white pock in a soft blue sea.

  “I expect,” Abraham went on, “your circumstances are a part of what led you here.”

  “Hm?”

  “Ours is not always a peaceful world; particularly the lives of travellers. Our islands; our cities; our settlements—they’re all so far apart, so the skies are not policed—or are, by self-appointed sheriffs with their own rules.”

  Francis nodded. He had an echoing thought of Rhod Stein’s pursuit of Ruby following Francis’s ‘theft’. Never mind that Francis was stolen in the first place.

  “I expect that is part of what brought you here,” Abraham finished.

  “You could say that.”

  Abraham grinned. He stopped, and bowed to Grace. Placing a hand on her back, he said, “Would you please get Remie for me?”

  Grace nodded. She cast a quick look at Francis, then turned and scampered back the way they’d come.

  “She’s wonderful,” said Abraham, straightening and watching her go.

  “She’s very sweet,” Francis echoed of Vala yesterday.

  “To return to the matter at hand: I am more than happy for you to join our number here at the Church of Ife.”

  For something Francis had been so nervous about, and something he had expected to be so huge, he was almost taken off-guard by the conversational plainness of Abraham’s statement. It was only at the last moment before he blurted, “What?” that his brain corrected to, “Really?”

  “Of course. We are a family here, and always welcoming to our number. Especially you, Francis. I have a strong feeling about you.” Hand on Francis’s shoulder, Abraham smiled.

  For all his sweeping relief, Francis could not help but smile back.

  2

  When Grace returned, she was accompanied by a slight woman. She was brown and weathered. A puff of hair coming to her ears had once been midnight black, but was now faded to deep grey.

  She smiled happily. “Good morning.”

  “Good morning, Remie,” said Abraham. “And how are you?”

  “Well! Very well. All the better for seeing little Grace.”

  Little Grace had returned to her spot by Abraham’s leg. She looked just as impassive as ever.

  “Remie, this is Francis. Francis, this is Remie.”

  They shook.

  “Hello, Francis.”

  “Nice to meet you.”

  “Francis will be joining our number here at the church,” said Abraham.

  “You will?” Remie said. “Oh, that’s wonderful! You’ll love it, I just know. It’s a beautiful place here, and everyone is very kind.”

  Francis smiled politely.

  “Remie, I thought perhaps you could act as Francis’s buddy during the next few weeks.”

  “Happily!”

  To Francis, Abraham said, “Is that amenable to you?”

  “Yeah, absolutely.”

  “It can be hard coming to a new place full of new people,” said Remie. “But we’re all friendly.”

  “I’m starting to see already,” Francis said. And he was, though he said it more to earn points. Now he’d slipped through the door—and how easy it had been!—he needed to do everything he could to endear himself to his new friends.

  “Would you find Francis a place for his things?” Abraham said. “One of the central dorms, I think. Then he’ll need a set of robes. Francis, do you know your measurements?”

  Francis began to reel them off, but Abraham laughed and held up his hands.

  “I’m no tailor, I regret. Remie will take care of things once she has shown you to your living quarters. Then the tour, okay, Remie?”

  “Of course.” Grinning brightly, Remie said to Francis, “Let’s go, shall we?”

  3

  “Abraham must be very sure of you.”

  The party had split. Abraham and Grace had gone back the way they had walked with Francis. Remie had waved to Grace—there was no wave back, but Remie was not deterred in the slightest—and then continued up the path. She led Francis through archways, skirted pillars, and came to a wide courtyard at the cathedral’s rear. It was open and grassy in the middle. Buildings formed a partial outline, broken by walkways leading out to the rest of the island.

  “What do you mean?” Francis asked.

  “The central dorms are usually reserved for our older members,” Remie explained. “New recruits enjoy the housing around the rest of New Calais.” Looking sideways, she said, “You must have impressed Abraham.”

  “Oh.” Francis fumbled for more to say. All he could do was lift a shrug and respond, “I just answered his questions.”

  “Abraham is a very good judge of character. Perhaps what he saw was less in your answers than the way you delivered them.”

  Francis was at a loss for what to say to this, too.

  He decided to shift the focus. “Do you live in one of the central dorms?”

  “Oh, yes. On the other side of the cathedral.”

  “Have you been at the church long?”

  “A long time, yes! Most of my life. I was fourteen when I joined.”

  “Pretty young, then.”

  “Pretty young,” Remie agreed. “Not the youngest ever, of course. Little Grace owns that title.”

  “How old is she?”

  “Eight.”

  Francis thought back to yesterday’s tour. Vala had asked about Grace, and Abraham had said … what was it? That Ife herself had delivered the girl?

  Vague. Francis wondered what the true cause of her coming to New Calais might be. Maybe her parents had been caught in an accident; the sort of thing Abraham had touched on earlier. Ours is not always a peaceful world. It would explain her quiet detachment.

  “Our family came here, you see,” Remie went on. “My sister was a little younger than me—she’d have been eleven, maybe twelve—and there was also my mother and father. Abraham welcomed us, just as openly as he has welcomed you this morning.”

  “He was here then?” Francis asked before he could stop himself. He sounded shocked, and cringed. Red flushed his cheeks. He’d known Remie all of six minutes, and here he’d gone and insinuated she was old. “Not that I mean—” he started.

  Remie laughed and waved him off. “Worry yourself not, Francis. Yes, Abraham was here back then. He would’ve been in his late twenties, I suppose. Head of dark curls. Of course, that was the fashion. And very handsome, he was.”

  “Was he in charge back then?”

  Remie tilted her head. “Well, no one’s ‘in charge’, per se. Not as we like to see it. Though I can see how it looks from an outsider’s perspective. He is our go-to man. He’s been here longest, you know. It makes him quite the resource!” She laughed heartily, top teeth on show in the morning’s growing light.

  Rubbing the top of her belly, Remie finished, “I suppose he was the go-to man then, too. There were others, of course, but ask half of New Calais and they’d agree Abraham was among their ranks.”

  “What about the other half of the island?”

  “Dunno,” said Remie. “Never asked them.” She tipped Francis a wink.

  “He has always had our respect,” she went on. “But not in a commanding sense, you know? He simply is who he is; kind, and gentle, and caring, and patient, and a million other things. We all look up to him.”

  They’d come to the courtyard’s far corner. A wide building loomed up a step, doors beneath a kind of
extended porch running its length. Each door was paired with a single square window. Six of these pairs stretched the dormitory’s front, posts between each of the domiciles.

  Remie took the corner door. She twisted the knob, and it opened.

  “After you,” she said cheerily.

  Francis stepped in.

  He’d come into a very short hall. At its end, a door led to a water closet. To the right was an open entryway. It led into a thin kitchen—if it could be called that, with its single counter, with one cupboard and one drawer, and a plain stove. Another doorless entryway forked directly off, ninety degrees anti-clockwise from the last. Leaning to peer around the corner, Francis saw a small living area. Not unlike his quarters on the Harbinger, it held nothing more than a bed, a desk and chair, and a closet.

  “It may not be what you’re used to,” said Remie from behind.

  “Believe me,” said Francis, “this already feels like home.”

  Remie clapped a hand. “Excellent!”

  “Does the door …?”

  “Oh, yes, of course it locks,” said Remie. “We just leave the vacant ones open for easy access. Never know when a new face might show! The key is just in here.”

  She edged past Francis into the kitchen. He pressed back as close to the wall as he could, which was not very, considering the rucksack on his shoulders.

  The key had been stored in the kitchen’s sole drawer. Remie handed it over.

  “There’s another key for the windows just here.” She lifted it from the kitchen window’s sill. It had been hidden just behind the folded-back curtain. It was tiny. Francis would have to be careful not to lose it.

  After she’d replaced it, and given Francis a brief tour—he finally unhooked his backpack, laying it at the foot of his bed—she asked Francis for his measurements. He relayed them as best he could, giving mental thanks to Vala for telling him before they’d arrived at Survoix, ready for suit-shopping.

  “Excellent,” said Remie. She’d written the numbers down on her palm. “I’ll be back shortly. I hope red is okay?”

  Francis laughed. “Red’s fine.”

  Remie grinned. “Great. Back soon.”

  Francis waited until she was halfway across the courtyard before he twisted the key in the lock. Then he edged back into his bedroom, pulled the curtains shut, and stooped by the rucksack. Fortunately the wall kept all but his feet out of view to anyone who might deign to peer in from outside the kitchen.