by J. S. Morin
The last hour had been spent on a tour of harbors across Takalia, Acardia, Hurlan, and Khesh, as Cadmus looked for ships that wouldn’t be due in Tinker’s Island for days or weeks. He started east and chased the setting sun as he hopped from one city to another, cross-referencing with a map of Tellurak that was marked to correspond to the machine’s controls. He recorded ship names in a log book and made guesses at their status based on what he could see of crates and sacks.
Satisfied with his shipping updates, Cadmus slumped in his chair. The world-ripper was left viewing the harbors of Darkport, watching the sunset over the low hills west of the city. “Requests cost a pint apiece,” he called out to the audience. He needed something to dull the day’s aches. Since none of the anti-inflammatories of Korr were available to him, he settled for treating the feeling of them, rather than actually reducing the pain.
The request came along with a pint of Acardian lager, fresh from the tap. It was from a foundry worker named Flenthan who had just arrived and gave up his own drink, untouched. “I want to see me some of them critters in the Savage Lands. Something big with fangs the size of dock pillars.”
There was a chuckle from the audience at the whimsical request, but Cadmus just nodded as he sampled his payment. “Let’s see what we can find.”
With no listing of coordinates, Cadmus left the screen active as he spun the gross adjustment dials and sped the view in the direction of the setting sun. Most of the audience had to turn away as the illusion of motion overwhelmed the senses—especially with sensations of weak knees and nausea. Hurlan passed below in a blur of hills and trees, cities and villages blinking past too fast to even guess at names for them. The sun rose on the horizon as the view outraced Tellurak’s rotation. The Katamic Sea appeared again on the far side of Hurlan, and the view continued to speed over the water, the glistening reflections of the sun’s light dazzling the eyes of the stalwart few whose nerves could stand the sight.
Cadmus wondered if there was a proper name for the ocean between Hurlan and the Savage Lands. In ancient Garnevian, “Katamic” meant “universal” or “unending,” but it was only a name. The official boundaries of the Katamic Sea were roughly Acardia, Takalia, Khesh, and Krang, but it was used for the sea around Tinker’s Island, as well any other place that sailors from within its hazy borders traveled.
“Here we come,” Cadmus said, slowing the view as land appeared on the horizon. The Savage Lands were half fable to any one-worlder from Tellurak but merely a mirror of the Lumberlands to the twinborn of Korr. After a blink of white sand on the beach, the view sped inland. Cadmus eased them up over the tops of the thick, shining green jungle that choked the landscape as far as the horizon. “The Savage Lands,” he proclaimed grandly. “A place untamable by men—unless you bring along a hundred repeater rifles and fire at anything that moves.” Chuckles identified twinborn in the audience, since they knew that was how kuduks had tamed their version of the Savage Lands and plundered it for lumber—a pricey commodity in tree-poor Korr. “Let’s see if we can find Flenthan his monster.”
The view plunged through the canopy and into the gloom of shadows below. They had traveled into the deep jungle, where trees were as wide as a man stood tall, and branches hung with vines and moss. Things moved before the eye noticed they were there—lizards, insects, snakes, birds. Everything seemed alive, wondrous, potentially deadly. An insect floated past as the view drifted along, only to be plucked from the air by the tongue of a tree frog the size of an ale keg.
“That doesn’t count!” Flenthan said for all to hear, drawing laughs.
Up ahead, one of the trees shook. The world-ripper conveyed no sound when it was merely viewing, but the imagination supplied a crash of underbrush, a creaking and crackling of mistreated wood. “This seems promising,” Cadmus said. He angled the viewer and lowered it as he brought it closer to the shaken tree.
If the viewer did one thing exceptionally, it conveyed scale. Everything was as lifelike as if it were on the other side of a pane of thickened glass. The beast stood twice the height of a man, cat-like in form, but with a savagery the oozed through the viewer and into the stomachs of the audience on Tinker’s Island. The creature was striped in alternating light and dark, though the precise colors were impossible to tell in the low light. It dipped to one side and butted its back against the tree, rocking back and forth, sating an itch and sending shudders through the whole trunk. Bark sloughed off against the massive cat’s fur, and it shook itself clean of debris after it finished. The cat then sat on its haunches, twisted around, and began grooming itself with a tongue like a bath towel. Cadmus edged the viewer ever closer, getting right up next to the stationary beast. Between licks, hints of its fangs glinted.
“How big’s a dock pillar, anyway?” Cadmus asked.
“About that big, I’d say!” Flenthar agreed amiably. Cadmus knew the tooth was probably only two or three inches in diameter, and that a dock pillar was closer to eight, but he had no intention spending all night monster-hunting in the Savage Lands.
Cadmus let the audience marvel over the beast a few minutes longer, chattering among themselves and coming up with pithy remarks. “Wonder if them beasties like the taste of kuduk.” “We’re going to have the finest zoo anywhere, once this thing’s ready to really go places.” “I’d like a coat out of that fur.”
Cadmus raised his voice to carry over the buzz of conversation. “Where to next?”
“How about seein’ if you can find the Darksmith?” someone suggested.
“Tempting,” Cadmus replied, “but it’s dark over that part of the Katamic now. I’d never find a moving target in a space that size. It would be like ... like ... dash it to shambles, like finding a bloody analogy in the bottom of a tankard.” Cadmus accepted the laughter at his own expense with cantankerous good humor. “Sure, how ‘bout one of you comes up with the inventions and acts the rutting poet about it, spewing flowery nonsense for the crowd? Next suggestion.”
“How about one of them little islands in the warm waters. I heard they don’t wear hardly nothing,” a voice called out.
“Do I need to get you limp-wits a map and a clock? It’s well after dark there, it’s almost due south of us, skipping over Takalia,” Cadmus replied, using the technical barrier as a glove to avoid touching the moral question of spying on underdressed islanders.
“How about a look at the Princess of Khesh?” the same voice suggested. It was punctuated by a meaty slap and a yelp from the offender.
“Thank you,” Cadmus said to whoever had doled out corporal morality on his behalf. “I will admit that we could do those sorts of things, but I assure you that we will not, even if I have to place a guard. We are neither savages nor juveniles, and we’re not going to behave like either. Now, does anyone else have a suggestion before I shut this thing off for the night?”
“How about looking in on Powlo at the new mine?” Greuder suggested. It was a voice that Cadmus could easily pick out of a crowd of fifty-odd in a darkened room. It made sense too, since Powlo was one of Greuder’s recruits, from back in the days when he still worked as a field agent.
“It’s after dark there, too, but at least they’ll have lights,” Cadmus said. His hands set to work on the dials, and the view of the Savage Lands whooshed by, leaving streaks of color in the viewer. It was a shame that the targeting coordinates were relative to the machine, because from Kezudkan’s workshop, Cadmus knew the settings for the Kheshi mining operation by memory. Instead, he had to blunder around the Kheshi countryside by starlight.
The audience chatted among themselves. A few who thought highly of their nocturnal geography shouted out instructions as Cadmus searched—some helpful, most not. Several availed themselves of the lull to supplement their refreshments, including a pint of a dark stout that Greuder offered in payment for his turn.
Fortunately Cadmus knew the Dragon Fangs by their peaks, same as those of the Homespires in Korr. The nighttime made the task of identifying p
eaks tedious, but eventually he caught sight of a tiny community nestled against the mountains. There were only a scattering of buildings, but the location was right, and he didn’t expect to find much more there.
“Got it!” Cadmus said. Those who hadn’t been watching the process turned their attention back to the wondrous machine once more, and everyone started settling back into their seats. It took the operation of multiple dials to guide the view down on something resembling a bird’s flight toward the mine entrance. Though it would have been easier to adjust the axes of translation and rotation one at a time, Cadmus figured that it was more about showmanship than just finding a target with the least effort.
“Anyone want to wager whether Powlo’s gotten to gold yet?” Greuder asked, standing up and addressing the crowd.
“Naw, you probably already worked out with him what he’s dug up,” someone replied. There were murmurs of agreement from the audience, and Greuder found himself with no takers for his bet.
“I’ll bet you a week’s wages that he hasn’t yet,” Cadmus said.
“You’re a funny man, tinker,” Greuder said with a low growl in his voice. “Since you don’t pay me anymore.”
“I admit, it would be a much richer bet if you weren’t retired,” Cadmus replied, still working the view on its swoop toward the mine. “Want to hire on as a cook, just to make the wager worthwhile?”
“I’d teach those stove-torturers of yours a thing or three, that’s for sure,” Greuder said. “Who’d you think—MERCIFUL EZIEL!”
The minor distraction of the Mad Tinker’s banter with Greuder was forgotten in an instant as they saw the scene unfolding within the newest Errol Company mine. Helmeted figures in dark clothing were dragging bodies out of the mine. The darkness made more detailed observations impossible from a distance. Cadmus spun the dials frantically to get them a closer look.
Kuduks.
In Tellurak.
“Get guns!” Cadmus ordered. “Grab whatever you can, pistols, rifles, just get here and get ready in a hurry.”
The audience scattered. There was no question of what Cadmus intended to try. The viewing party had turned into a rescue mission. Cadmus slung the view through the entrance and down the main tunnel of the mine. Blood smeared the floor in streaks as kuduk soldiers dragged body after human body from the tunnels. Rifles leaned against the wall, out of the path of the grim workers as they filed out.
Rifles set aside. Battle’s over. He had brought the view too late to witness the battle, but it had to have been recent. It seemed like a small blessing; he wasn’t sure how much worse it would have been to witness the slaughter.
Cadmus followed the trail of blood until he saw it. There was a wavering archway in the air down the main tunnel, pressed against the side wall. Through the hole in Tellurak, he could see through into Korr. Standing side by side was a peculiar pair. One was a kuduk who looked to have been half replaced by clockwork parts, the other was an elderly daruu, leaning on a cane.
As the theater refilled with hastily armed Errol Company employees, Cadmus addressed them. “I’m going to count down, and I want a swarm of bullets in the air. Those two you see there, first of all.”
There were a dozen questions in the air at once, but Cadmus ignored them. The questioning voices quieted down one by one as Cadmus began his count. “Three...”
Cadmus looked to the dynamo, sputtering along, doing the best it could.
“Two...”
He reached up and gripped the heavy handle of the switch that controlled the world-ripper’s eponymous function.
“One...”
Eziel, Lord of War, grant us this chance to attack.
“Now!”
Cadmus threw the switch and the world-ripper shuddered and crackled. The theater erupted with the deafening din of dozens of shots being fired in an enclosed space with wonderful acoustics. The machine went dark as bullets tore into the wire meshwork that crisscrossed the open expanse of the frame.
Kuduk and daruu stood side by side, watching through the world-hole as the mine was cleared of human bodies. For a brief moment, there was a silvery flickering of light across the hall. It was gone as quickly as it had arrived.
“What the bleeding rutting blazes was that?” Draksgollow asked, pointing where the light had been a moment earlier.
“Haven’t the muddiest notion,” Kezudkan replied. “We can shut the machine down and examine it once the clear-up is done.”
Chapter 13
“Lord Eziel, grant us mercy from our enemies. Let us find peace among our fellow man. I am your servant, teach me to persevere.” –Invocation to Eziel, modern phrasing
A spark bulb that was about to burn out had the curious habit of glowing brighter than usual. Rascal was no expert on suns, but the one that hung over Yellowcorn Sky seemed ready to pop any minute. It threw off waves of heat like an open furnace door in the heavens. Sensible folk took refuge in the deep, where the pervasive earthy cool sheltered them from the abuse under the sky. Sensible folk didn’t build Yellowcorn, which sat on soil too loose and soft for even a proper basement. The lack of a deep kept most kuduk away though, and that went a long way toward excusing the weather.
Rascal was dressed in the local fashion—or what passed for fashion in the northeastern farmland of Ruttania. He wore a dull white cotton shirt with wooden buttons the size of monocles (he was now the sort of man who could afford wooden buttons), with the top two undone to let out the heat. His trousers were twill, the pale brown of the local hay, and durable but stiff. They were made for field work, but it was all that was sold in Yellowcorn; everyone from plowhands to wheat mill owners wore them. A pair of stiff, calf-high leather boots had taken weeks to break in, but with streets pockmarked with horse and ox dung, low slung footwear was inadvisable.
The one indispensable companion Rascal had met during his stay in Yellowcorn was his hat. It was a paltry thing, made of woven straw and shaped like a deep-dwelling gentleman’s hat except for a brim that was as wide as his shoulders. When the noontime sun could boil the sweat from your brow, a portable source of shade was essential.
Rascal took refuge under both the hat and the porch roof of the Blistered Saddle Ale Hall, occupying one of the painted wicker chairs. The Saddle didn’t take kindly to loiterers, so Rascal sipped at the cold beer he’d purchased to earn the use of their shade. It was a weak brew, easy on the stomach in the hot hours but not something he’d recommend to a friend. Rascal pressed the glass to his forehead, wiping the condensation across his skin and letting it leech the heat out of him.
Traffic on the street plodded along, mostly wagons and horses led on foot, with a few simple pedestrians mixed in. There was a general cessation of work in the fields each midday, to keep the workers from overheating in the worst of the day’s sun, but not everyone worked out in the fields. The couriers, drovers, and deliverymen of Yellowcorn still had jobs to do. They dressed in light fabrics, dyed in pale colors. Most wore hats like Rascal’s own, at least ones of similar function if not style. He had lost a bit of his deep-dweller’s pallor in his days on the run, but Rascal’s skin was still pale by comparison to the sunbaked locals.
If there was a bright spot to Yellowcorn—besides the one cooking them all from above—it was the women. Rascal had grown up in the deeps, where Korr’s temperature rarely varied. There were boilers and steam pipes in plenty keeping buildings warm, but out in the tunnels and caverns there was a chill that never went away. Residents wore sturdy cloth and dressed in layers. Sensible humans wore light jackets or coats when out of buildings. In Yellowcorn sweat poured openly and beaded in droplets on the skin, so garments tended to cling. When not fighting with the resistance, Rascal served as a priest of the Church of Eziel; he had avoided establishments where women’s forms were on such display as they were daily in streets of Yellowcorn.
A woman in a pale yellow dress caught his attention with a wave. She was blonde and slim, with delicate limbs. Rascal guessed she’d grown up in
the city, not among the outlying farms. “Excuse me, sir,” she said, briefly grasping the edge of her bonnet between thumb and finger and giving a nod.
“Afternoon, ma’am,” said Rascal, lifting his own hat with a fingertip. “Care to join me?” He indicated the empty chair next to him, then took a sip of his beer.
She accepted the offered seat, perching on the edge with her back stiff and straight. “Do they call you Rascal?” she asked. Her voice was slow and soft, with a quaint accent common among sky-dwellers that kuduks considered uncivilized.
“You have the advantage on me, ma’am,” replied Rascal, finding himself mimicking her cadence.
“I’m Pella,” the woman replied. Rascal tried to guess her age, but the tan of her skin made his assessment difficult. The sun seemed to bake years off the body, but crisp the skin in return. She could have been anywhere from twenty to forty for all he knew. “Your big friend asked me to come find you.”
“Did he now?” Rascal asked. “Just to make sure we’re talking about the same big friend of mine, how many fingers has he got on his right hand?”
“You’re one for tricks, Mr. Rascal,” Pella replied. “He’s got five, just like you and me. It’s his left that’s missing two, not that a lady should pay any mind to those sorts of things.”
Rascal took a sip of his beer. “You get to be cautious, living around kuduks.”
“Mr. Hayfield said—”
“We ain’t landowners, and we ain’t kuduk,” Rascal said. “Me and Hayfield ain’t ‘misters.’ We’re just regular folk getting away for a bit of travel.”
Pella pursed her lips and gave him the long eye. “You may be, but you’re still strangers in these parts, carrying a hearty heap of coin. Seemed only polite. You have my apologies if I offended you, Rascal.”
“I don’t offend easy,” Rascal said, smiling to reassure her. “I think Hayfield likes people puffing him up though. Before the hand, he used to play crashball, and—”