The Memory of Sky

by Robert Reed

  “Me,” Diamond said.

  “Coronas are public property. You don’t belong to this man, and it’s only taken a thousand days to bring you back to where you should be.”

  Master Nissim made an angry sound.

  The Archon looked at him. “Yes?”

  “That’s a narrow interpretation of law,” said the Master.

  The Archon’s smile was stern, sharp. “An assistant of mine was hamstrung today. The criminal responsible deserves five thousand days in the penitence house, locked inside our tiniest cell, with nothing to read and no one to listen to his educated wind. I suspect that sentence would destroy the man. But I don’t want to throw anyone into such miserable circumstances. So I’m cultivating a gracious, charitable mood. I’ll interpret those laws so that Diamond’s friend remains free for now, and for as long as there is cooperation.”

  Diamond said nothing.

  “Walk,” the Archon insisted.

  Diamond found a slow, even pace, and the humans formed a tidy line that marched up the wooded hillside. The old papio were out of sight. The doctor was in the lead, looking backwards as much as he looked ahead. The rest of the papio were waiting over the crest of the hill. Where the ground was still falling, they stood in two neat lines, watching the odd parade pass between. King was worth close study and a few comments, but it was the slayer’s son who was fascinating. One and then another papio chopped at a leg, describing the miracle about the foot that rejoined the body and healed, and they spoke to him in their language and with guttural human words.

  “Are you smart?” one asked.

  “Are you grown?” asked another.

  Then a third whispered some papio words, and others barred their incisors, someone saying, “Quiet, you. Quiet.”

  Then the Archon was surrounded by the papio, and that conversation ended, big golden eyes turned on him and that relentless, unnerving smile.

  “List,” several of the papio said.

  At the bottom of the hill, the Archon stopped suddenly and turned.

  “Come here,” he said. Then he waved, attempting the same words in their language.

  His bodyguards were flustered. One whispered some little warning, and the Archon laughed, giving the air a dismissive sweep of the hand.

  The papio formed a half-circle above them.

  “I have something to tell you,” List began. “Something important, something you need to tell all others.”

  The smallest papio was larger than any human male. Men and women were the same size. Those strong mouths and thick arms were remarkable. Every face was decorated with elaborate, beautiful tattoos. Guns and knives were carried in plain view. Every head had the same bright pink hair, and the men often sported dense blood-colored beards while the women fancied soft beards hiding shyly under their chins. One woman made a low growling sound before wrapping her mouth around the words, “Talk to us.”

  “These two children are marvels,” said the Archon. “And you might remind yourselves that they’re only just beginning to grow into men. Think what they’ll mean to my species, to humanity. Which is why on this momentous day, I want to graciously offer the papio some enlightened advice.”

  The woman broke into a wild, quick laugh, asking scornfully, “What advice?”

  “Take these boys from me,” the Archon said. “You should do that now. Immediately, no hesitations.”

  The world fell silent, every face watching him.

  “Kill me,” he said. “Murder me and steal these two treasures. That brings war, I’m sure. Assassinate the political leader of humanity, and you have to expect outrage and a terrible long fight. But if you can hold onto these warriors, and if you use them effectively in the future, your descendants will celebrate your bravery and vision. That’s my advice for the papio species. Start one awful war today and win the world. Or do nothing, let us walk away, and the world is lost.”

  The hair on the woman’s scalp lifted. “Why make such stupid noise?” she asked.

  “Because I know you,” the Archon replied. “This is a proven fact: creatures that live on solid ground are slow, unimaginative thinkers. Climbers adapt and change every moment of our lives. It’s a great lesson, knowing we can’t trust a branch to be here tomorrow. Meanwhile you live as you always have, and every tomorrow is the same as yesterday, and it’s impossible for you to believe that anything changes or that there is any better existence for your dusty kind.”

  The papio stared at him, teeth bared, eyes blazing inside those deep sockets.

  Then the tree-walker laughed and swept the air with his hand before he turned and walked away. The doctor was far ahead. The other humans followed the Archon. Diamond and King followed. They walked between the tents and past the dead corona. The chase had lasted for a long while. Scales had been yanked away from the carcass. Ugly holes were hacked from the flesh beneath. But the men who had done that quick work had already vanished, and nobody seemed curious where.

  Master Nissim walked past Diamond, touching the boy’s head. He looked at him sadly before calling ahead. “Is this why you wanted to come here?” he asked the Archon. “So you could parade what you have in front the papio?”

  The Archon stopped and turned.

  “Oh, I have nothing,” he said. “The boys are blessings from the Creators, and they belong to all of us.”

  Nobody spoke.

  The narrow face was satisfied, smug. “I know the full story,” the Archon continued. “Four gifts were inside that ancient corona. Two of them are ours now, and two more remain missing. But big as it is, this world doesn’t hide anything for very long.”

  “And you want to capture the others,” the Master said.

  “I want what’s best for our species.”

  “Which is what?”

  But the Archon didn’t respond. He shook his head and turned, spending a long moment admiring the view from this rough little valley: the vastness of air and the hanging forest and the coronas’ scalding realm and that thin yellowing light of a sun that no human had ever truly seen.

  The doctor hurried up the gangway, happy to vanish.

  The crippled man stood at the bottom, carried by his last good leg. Holding a long rifle, he glared at Master Nissim, lifting the barrel and lowering it again while cursing quietly.

  “Have you seen anyone else?” the Archon asked.

  “A couple of the slayer’s gang,” the man reported. “Gawking at the ship, a little too curious for my mood, so I sent them on their way.”

  “Good.”

  Father and Mother dropped to their knees, and Mother pressed her thumb against her son’s wet cheek.

  She said, “Honey.”

  Diamond wasn’t sure when his tears started flowing.

  “There has to be another way,” she said.

  Then Father touched Diamond on the shoulder, saying, “About our plan.”

  Mother looked at Father.

  “King is a complication,” Father said. “I might have guessed something like this . . . but I couldn’t . . . ”

  His voice faded away.

  “You have a plan?” Mother asked.

  “Something risky,” Father said. “And that was before we knew about the other boy.”

  She looked at both of them, and then she looked at the ground, saying, “You have to save our son.”

  “I know, and I will.”

  Diamond’s face was wet and sore, and his body shook, and looking up the gangway, he was nothing but weak. Too exhausted to move, much less climb any distance, he found hope. Maybe he was finally sick. Too much had happened too quickly, and his strength was gone, and the often-promised illness was going to push him into a scorching fever, destroying the powers that he never wanted in the first place.

  Was that something to wish for?

  The Archon whispered to the crippled man and then started up the gangway, looking back just once.

  “King,” he called out.

  Diamond’s brother hurried to catch the Arc
hon, walking beside the human and out of sight.

  Again, the long gun lifted.

  “Hugs and kisses,” the man said. “Hurry up.”

  Mother sobbed, grabbing hold of her son, squeezing until her joints cracked. Father put his arms around both of them, leaving his eyes open. He looked up at the airship until the man again said, “Hurry up.”

  “We have to go,” Father told Mother.

  His parents walked away. Diamond was dreadfully weak, but he didn’t collapse. Another bodyguard came close and motioned for him to follow, and Diamond took one little step and a long step. Then he stopped and turned, looking at Elata and Seldom.

  “Thank you,” he told them.

  Surprised, Seldom asked, “For what?”

  “For buying me that food,” he said. “And everything else.”

  The children nodded, faces dipping.

  Elata said, “Good bye.”

  “Yeah,” said Seldom, sniffing. “Bye.”

  Diamond walked up to the Master. “And thank you, sir,” he said.

  “I wish this had gone better,” Nissim said.

  The boy nodded in agreement, and the bodyguard gave him a nudge.

  Reaching under his shirt, Diamond pulled out the knife and sheath, handing them to the Master. “These are yours. I don’t need them anymore.”

  “All right then.” The missing fingertip helped grab the hilt, and smart eyes winked at him, one eye and then the other.

  Diamond passed the crippled man, starting up the gangway. What seemed like weakness had turned into something else. The lightness in his body came from boundless energy, nervous and relentless. He had never been this awake, this alert. Every detail in the world was obvious. Time was slowing. Without trying, Diamond pulled ahead of the three men who had followed him this morning. Then he paused, looking back at the sad people standing close together.

  “Seldom,” he called out.

  The boy swallowed and said, “What?”

  “Wings,” Diamond said.

  “What?”

  “I can feel them,” he said. “I feel them growing.”

  FIFTEEN

  Humans were easy to scare, and they remained afraid afterwards. Yet they hated that emotion, so much so that they would do any mad thing to get free of the fear that made their hearts hurry and their soft, fragile hands shake.

  King wasn’t at all like humans.

  King was always afraid, and he was happy because of it.

  There were days when the boy believed otherwise. It was easy to imagine the creatures surrounding him were right and smart while he was plainly wrong inside. Humans didn’t measure every face as a potential threat or a temporary ally. King did. They didn’t consider every shadow and closed door as hiding places for enemies. But the boy’s deep nature was to do exactly that. Even in the presence of well-known enemies, humans could relax enough to keep their breathing slow, their manner easy. A man like King’s father—a leader who had accumulated status and great power—could allow himself be surrounded by his worst foes. King would be too alarmed and pensive to ever do that, at least not for long. Yet those wicked people would smile at his father, and the Archon would show his teeth to them, and it seemed deeply unnatural that nobody would ever make fists, much less start to batter each other’s face.

  But as King grew older, more experienced and quite a lot smarter, he began to understand what was true and what was weak.

  Fear had more than one shape, more than a single definition. Human fear was a small wild shambles, tiny when set beside King’s magnificent fear. Among his tutors were retired soldiers who had won medals by battling bandits and wild beasts. They were proud bold men, but when they spoke to one another, usually with drinks in hand, they eventually confessed that their fears had to be controlled with training and iron resolve and more training. In their experience, the finest warriors could fight only so long before the terror became an enemy, making them physically ill. Sometimes they discussed the great old wars against the papio and how soldiers came home afterwards but never truly came home, how they couldn’t sleep a normal night again and cried often and drank too much. Some of those broken men even did the unthinkable, climbing to the bottom of the canopy, insulting the Creators by falling into the air, letting the coronas and the sun claim their defeated selves.

  The humans were cursed, and they were cursed because their emotions were too small and untrustworthy.

  King was nothing like a human.

  He was unique and significant and blessed.

  Even the simple task of standing was a different experience for King. Humans didn’t care about the floor under them, or the tree branch, or the dusty patch of coral. One place was as good as another, in their eyes. But King always knew what was beneath him and what was nearby. Everybody was a threat. Even the most familiar, benign face had to be measured for its intentions, and the body below that face had to be weighed for weaknesses and blind spots. Everyone scared King, without fail. Even his father—no, particularly his father—had to do very little to worry the orphaned boy. Was he going to punish King today? Or worse, was he going to spoil him? Or maybe this would be the terrible moment when the powerful Archon decided that the armored boy had become too much trouble, or he showed too little promise, and the good in King’s life was about to be stripped away.

  Every space that he occupied had to be defended or surrendered.

  There was no third choice.

  Whenever the fright was its largest—paranoia running wild with every bad dream—the boy would be treated to a keen rush of blood and oxygen, and his hearts felt happy, and his thoughts were slick and sudden, and the great world looked richer and more colorful and small enough to hold in either hand.

  If the space beneath him was especially precious, or if he was in a certain mood, King felt gigantic, invulnerable.

  Yes, his physical power was a benefit, and so were the armored body and his durability and the endless quick memory. But fear was the richest tool woven through his nature, and that was the emotion that he nourished now.

  Today, inside this one recitation, King was straddling the entire world.

  Everything was at risk.

  Panic, muscular rich panic, made him ready.

  His great life had been lived to reach this moment, and how very wonderful it felt to be so afraid.

  Stopping at the top of the gangway, Diamond waited for the bodyguards. The longest hallway in the world ended with a tall metal door. Voices came from behind the door, from inside the bridge—men and women making ready to drop anchors and fly away. Then the Archon spoke, and everyone else fell silent. “When do we get home? Before night, or after?”

  “As night rises, sir,” said a man.

  “I want to see the palace sooner,” the Archon said.

  And a different man shouted, “Engines. On.”

  The entire ship trembled and began to sway. The crippled bodyguard finished his long miserable climb, slamming a sweaty hand on an important red button, and the gangway hissed and began to rise. Standing on his toes, Diamond caught a last glimpse of his friends and the Master looking up at him, and his Mother mouthed a few words as she waved her hand.

  Father was missing.

  “Where do we put him?” another bodyguard asked.

  “Second suite,” the crippled man said. “You stay with him, always. You? Stand watch outside.”

  “Easy work,” the first man joked.

  The crippled man stared at him, hard. “You said that this morning. ‘This is baby snaring.’ ”

  The floor was vibrating and the walls too. Explosive thuds ripped the anchors from their cables, and water ballast was dropped from a dozen reservoirs, and the long airship began its lazy ascent. Diamond was flanked by two guards, walking in the middle of the long hallway, moving away from the bridge. The ship’s engines grew louder, and he looked up at the faces in profile, and when one man looked down at him, Diamond told him, “You should leave.”

  “What?”
/>
  “If you can get off this ship, you should.”

  “Why are you saying that?”

  “I don’t want you to die,” the boy replied.

  The men blinked and fell into the same hard laughter.

  Every room along the hallway wore a heavy blue door. The first door on the left was marked, “Archon,” and after that was, “Two.” Across the hall was another suite wearing a handwritten sign over its number. “King,” the sign read. The first man unlocked and opened the door to Suite Two and walked inside. The doctor emerged from behind a smaller door farther down the hallway. Hands in his pockets, he called out, “All this is for the best, son.”

  Diamond didn’t react.

  The guard showed the boy a smile. “Aren’t you going to warn him to jump clear?”

  Diamond shook his head. “No.”

  Nothing could be funnier. Both men laughed as Diamond walked through the open door, and then the man who came inside with him shut the blue door, turning two locks. Diamond examined the enormous room, the heavy furniture and big bowls of fancy glass, corona bones and scales embellishing everything. Dark dead wood had been carved by trained hands. The tanned hides of special animals had been stretched across pieces of open floor. He couldn’t imagine the wealth poured into this space, and the prestige was beyond his imagination. But the high ceiling was impressive, as was the entire outer wall made from glass windows, thick and sealed.

  He walked toward the windows but stopped short.

  Something was wrong.

  The inside man was standing beside the locked door with his arms at his side, watching nothing but that odd little boy who couldn’t be worth half this trouble.

  “Who else is here?” Diamond asked.

  “Nobody.”

  Diamond tipped his head, listening. But the huge engines were roaring, accelerating them into a long turn that would carry them farther over the reef before they could start for home. He heard nothing but the rumbling, and maybe he was wrong. Maybe. But a deep breath caught a familiar scent, and stepping toward the man, Diamond asked, “Where’s King?”