by Brian Keaney
Every nook and cranny of the mountain was covered with birds by now, and every one of them was in perfect communication with its fellows. Suddenly Dante understood what they had all come together to discuss. Him.
“Silence!”
The command echoed across the mountain as every bird ordered its fellows to be quiet.
At the very top of the mountain perched a trio of ancient buzzards. The one in the middle seemed to be the oldest of the three, perhaps the oldest bird of all. One of his eyes was missing, but there was enough cruelty in the remaining eye to make up for it. He surveyed the ranks of other birds with contempt.
“Let the Giddim Carrier come forth!” he declared.
Every bird on the mountain turned its head to look directly at Kidu. Nervously he flew up and perched on a rock in front of the buzzards.
“What have you to say for yourself?”
Kidu began to stammer out some sort of response. He told the Chief Buzzard that he had not invited the giddim to share his body, but that it had come all the same, that he had tried to make it leave him but that he had no control over it.
“Enough!” the Chief Buzzard interrupted. “A sick zimbir carries death to his nest. Everyone here knows that.”
Up and down the mountain, heads nodded and the words were repeated by a million beaks.
“Giddim promise him leave soon,” Kidu assured his inquisitor.
“A giddim is a false creature and not to be believed,” the bird perched to the right of the Chief Buzzard said dismissively.
The Chief Buzzard ignored this intervention. He addressed himself to the assembled birds. “You all know why this has happened,” he declared, “and you know what it means. Shurruppak has returned to the world.”
“Shurruppak!” A horrified whisper spread through the feathered ranks.
“With every day he grows stronger,” the Chief Buzzard continued. “If he is not stopped, he will devour the world. Then there will be nowhere left for the zimbir to build their nests, and annalugu will be lost to us.”
“Annalugu will be lost!” the birds cried despairingly.
“There can be no doubt what this giddim is doing here,” the Chief Buzzard went on. “It is Shurruppak’s spy.”
“Shurruppak’s spy!” Their despair turned to anger.
“Tell them it isn’t true!” Dante urged.
“Giddim not like Shurruppak,” Kidu protested. “Giddim help zimbir defeat Shurruppak.”
The Chief Buzzard’s one eye narrowed. “You are telling me that the giddim that has taken possession of your body will help us defeat Shurruppak?” he demanded.
“Yes. Giddim strong. Giddim powerful. Giddim help zimbir. Make Shurruppak go away. Go forever.”
“And how exactly will the giddim achieve this?” the Chief Buzzard asked.
“Kidu not know,” Kidu admitted in a voice that was barely audible.
The Chief Buzzard nodded. “Just as I thought,” he declared. “The satsumballa has reached its verdict. Death!”
THE HEART OF EVIL
Malachy, who had spent years working in the civil service, had no difficulty preparing a set of false identification papers for Bea. Seersha cut her friend’s hair short, just in case there might be anyone in Duran who had witnessed the raid in Podmyn. There were tears in the old woman’s eyes as the locks of hair tumbled to the ground. Albigen watched the proceedings in silence, but his grim expression spoke volumes.
Every one of them had tried to persuade Bea to change her mind, but their efforts only made her more adamant. “Look for the hardest choice,” Tzavinyah had told her.
When Albigen drove her to Duran the next morning, Maeve and Seersha insisted on coming along, too, to see her off. Albigen stopped the truck on the outskirts and they all got out. First Maeve hugged Bea, then Seersha followed suit. Seersha’s hug was so tight Bea could hardly breathe. Finally it was Albigen’s turn.
“It’s not too late to change your mind, Bea,” he said.
“I know what I’m doing.”
He sighed. “Perhaps, and perhaps not …”
“Well, we’ll soon find out,” Bea said as brightly as she could.
The others nodded. Maeve and Seersha got back into the truck, but Albigen hesitated. “Bea,” he said, “I know that you and Dante were …” Then he stopped.
“What?” Bea asked.
Albigen shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. Good luck.” He leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the cheek; then he, too, got back in the truck and started up the engine. Bea watched while the truck turned around, then left.
As she set off on the last mile towards Duran, Bea asked herself what Albigen had been about to say before he had changed his mind. “I know that you and Dante were…,” he had begun. But what exactly had she and Dante been? Friends? Yes, of course they had been friends. But hadn’t they been more than that? Hadn’t they meant something special to each other? Bea liked to think so.
Perhaps Albigen had been about to tell her that she meant something special to him, too. That thought made her sad, for though she liked and admired Albigen, she would never feel that way about him.
But she had made up her mind to join the Faithful. Who could tell what that decision would lead to? She might never see Albigen again, or any of the others. On the other hand, she might return to them in triumph, having defeated their enemy.
Duran was a bigger town than Podmyn, and there were even more volunteers and well-wishers crowding the railway station. Plenty of people were signing up that morning. Bea joined a line and showed the enlisting officer her papers. He wrote down her details without even glancing at her face. She made her way onto the train and was lucky enough to find one of the few remaining empty seats. Those who came after her were forced to stand. When the train was finally so packed that it could not take even one more passenger, it set out on the journey north.
Despite the overcrowding, the atmosphere was festive. Farther up the carriage a group of volunteers began singing. It was a song Bea remembered her mother singing years ago, about leaving your friends behind but keeping their memory alive, lyrics that had once struck her as trite and sentimental but that now seemed almost unbearably poignant.
It was clear that her fellow passengers were looking forward to what awaited them. “We’re going to show those Tavorians a thing or two,” a middle-aged man with enormous ears told Bea.
“I thought the Tavorians had joined forces with us,” Bea said.
“Some of them have,” the man replied. “But not the diehards. They want to keep their rotten society with its crime and disorder. They’d like to infect us with it, too. They’re the ones we’ll be dealing with. But don’t you worry”—here he tapped his nose with his finger—“we’ll soon sort them out. Sigmundus the Second knows what he’s doing. That’s why he was picked, see? He’s the man for the job. And we’re the ones to back him up.” He looked around the carriage with a satisfied smile as he said this, and several people grinned back at him enthusiastically.
It was an old train, and it lumbered ponderously along the tracks, often slowing down almost to a walking pace. As the journey dragged on, the mood on board began to change. Outside, the bright sunshine of the morning had turned to an overcast sky from which rain now began to slant down across the countryside. Many of the volunteers had brought nothing to eat or drink, assuming that they would be provided with food on the journey. Bea shared the sandwiches that Seersha had made for her with the man with the enormous ears. Others were not so fortunate. Gradually the atmosphere grew more somber. One or two people said that it was not right. The train should stop to let people get out and stretch their legs. Someone ought to come around handing out food. But others assured the complainers that it was obviously a mistake and would certainly be rectified when they reached their destination.
As they traveled farther north, farmland gave way to moorland. Here and there Bea glimpsed rusting machinery and great heaps of rock, like man-made hills. They were ap
proaching the Ichor Belt, where the entire countryside had been turned over to the production of the drug on which Gehenna depended.
At seven o’clock in the evening the train reached its destination, a bleak and windswept station in the middle of nowhere. If any of the volunteers had expected a reception to match their send-off, they were sorely disappointed. There were no cheering crowds, just a line of grim-faced security guards with wooden batons hanging at their sides.
As the passengers began to file warily off the train, the officer in charge shouted at them to hurry up. Bea’s fellow traveler, the man with the enormous ears, walked over to him.
“You don’t understand,” he began. “These people have had nothing to eat or drink since they set out. I realize that this was probably just an oversight on someone’s—”
That was as far as he got. The officer brought his baton down on the man’s shoulder, and he fell to the ground with a cry of pain. Bea tried to run to him, but her way was blocked by a line of security guards.
The officer looked at the rest of the volunteers. “Now you know what to expect if you step out of line!” he barked.
They were marched out of the station and along a newly laid road that cut across the countryside like a scar. After half an hour, during which some volunteers stumbled and had to be pulled to their feet by their companions, they reached their destination—a series of featureless gray buildings surrounded by a fence.
Once they had passed inside the fence, they were made to halt. Then the men and women were separated and led off to wooden huts filled with mattresses. There was still no mention of food, but by now the volunteers knew better than to complain. They lay down in their clothes on the mattresses and slept. Bea remained awake longer than most, listening to the wind shaking the thin wooden walls of their dormitory and wondering whether Albigen hadn’t been right, after all, and she had made a terrible mistake. But eventually she, too, surrendered to the oblivion of sleep.
The next morning she was woken by shouting. Two burly female guards were going round the dormitory, yelling at anyone who did not stand by her bed and using their batons to prod those who were too slow.
The volunteers were given only a few minutes to put on their shoes. Then they were led out of the dormitory across the bare yard to another, larger hut, where they lined up to receive bowls of thin porridge ladled out from a huge black pot. They looked stunned as they ate in silence under the watchful eyes of their guards. There was no doubt that when they set out they had expected to find military discipline waiting for them, but none of them had imagined they would be treated like prisoners.
After the meal was over, they were led to a much larger building. Unlike the wooden huts in which they had slept and eaten, this was made of bricks and mortar and seemed to be some kind of medical center. A white-coated orderly met them inside the entrance hall and led the way to a large waiting room, where they sat on wooden chairs. They were to undergo a series of blood tests, the orderly assured them. The tests would not hurt and would be over very quickly.
One by one they were called away to a consulting room. Bea was seated near the front, so she did not have to wait long for her turn. The orderly led her down a corridor, knocked on the consulting room door and waited.
“Come in,” called a voice from inside.
The orderly opened the door and pushed her forward. A middle-aged doctor was standing next to a filing cabinet. He had his back to her, but now he closed the drawer and turned around.
It was her father.
A look of horror came over his face. Then he dropped a file on the floor, bent down and picked it up. When he stood up again, the look had vanished. “Otto,” he said to the orderly, “I believe I may have left my other glasses in the staff room. I wonder if you wouldn’t mind checking for me? My jacket is hanging on the third peg from the left. They should be in the top pocket.”
The orderly nodded and left the room.
“Bea!” her father said as soon as they were alone. “What on earth are you doing here?”
“I’m a volunteer,” she told him calmly.
“But this is terrible! You must leave this place immediately.”
“Why? What happens here?”
Her father shook his head. “I can’t tell you that.”
Bea shrugged. “Then I’ll stay here until I find out.”
Her father ran his hand through his hair, and Bea saw for the first time that he was beginning to go thin on top. She found herself touched with pity for him. “You were always so stubborn!” he said, his voice tight with anger and exasperation. “The orderly will be back in a moment. Roll up your sleeve and listen.”
Bea did as she was told, and he began the process of taking a blood sample. While he worked, he talked.
“This afternoon you will be given a new drug that is being developed here,” he told her. “It is given to all new recruits. That is why the Faithful was created. To test it out.”
“What is this drug?” Bea asked.
“It’s called Ekktor,” her father explained. “It is supposed to be an improved version of Ichor. But that’s not true. I don’t really understand its purpose at all. Nobody does. All I know is this: those on whom it is used do not survive long, and while they live, they are in agony.”
As he said this, the door opened and the orderly returned.
THE HIDDEN PATH
“Wait!” Kidu called as the birds prepared to carry out the sentence of death. “Kidu tell zimbir great secret.”
The Chief Buzzard shook his wings irritably. “Very well,” he said. “We’re waiting. What is this great secret of which you speak?”
“Giddim show satsumballa Hidden Path,” Kidu told them.
There was a collective gasp as Kidu’s words were relayed to every bird.
“No, Kidu,” Dante protested inside the bird’s mind. “I can’t do this.”
“Then Kidu and Giddim die,” Kidu thought back.
“Do you take us for fools?” the Chief Buzzard snarled.
“Kidu take no one for fools. Kidu offer greatest respect. Only tell truth. Giddim show satsumballa Hidden Path.”
How could Dante bring a million birds with him into the Odylic realm? It was completely impossible. And even if he succeeded, Orobas would be waiting. “I can’t do this, Kidu,” he repeated.
“You’re asking us to believe that the giddim that possesses you has the power to show us the Hidden Path, the path that Anki herself decreed we may only find after we have first flown the thousand paths of the air?” the Chief Buzzard asked.
Kidu nodded. “Giddim can do this.”
“It’s a trick to enable him to escape,” observed the bird to the left of the Chief Buzzard. He was the smallest of the trio of buzzards, with very pale breast feathers. Dante sensed that this was a bird who would one day challenge the Chief Buzzard for leadership. “The giddim is the offspring of Shurruppak,” the pale buzzard continued. “Shurruppak’s greatest wish is to devour all things, including the Hidden Path.”
The Chief Buzzard listened but said nothing.
“How, then, can the giddim possibly show us the Hidden Path?” the pale buzzard demanded.
Now the buzzard on the other side spoke. “Might it be entertaining to see what the accused has in mind? What have we got to lose, after all?”
The second speaker was almost as old as the Chief Buzzard himself, and it was clear from his voice that he resented his younger companion.
Kidu nodded enthusiastically. “If giddim not show zimbir Hidden Path, let zimbir peck Kidu to death,” he suggested. “But if giddim do show Hidden Path, let Kidu go free. Yes?”
All eyes were trained on the Chief Buzzard now, and for the first time since they had arrived on the mountain, Dante noticed a look of uncertainty in his solitary, bloodshot eye. At last he spoke. “For a zimbir to pretend that he can find the Hidden Path before Anki has summoned him is blasphemy.”
“Blasphemy!” whispered the other birds.
“The punishment for blasphemy is death,” the pale buzzard interjected with such eagerness that he was unable to stop himself hopping from foot to foot as he spoke.
The Chief Buzzard turned and gave him a withering look. “As I was saying,” he continued, “to make such an assertion is blasphemy unless, of course, it happens to be true.”
“Unless it happens to be true,” whispered all the birds excitedly.
“How could it be true?” demanded the pale buzzard angrily.
The Chief Buzzard’s eye narrowed. “I did not say it was true,” he pointed out. “Nevertheless, everyone here has heard of the Zimbir That Is Not Zimbir.”
“This is not him!” the pale buzzard cried angrily.
The Chief Buzzard drew himself up to his full height. “Do you challenge me?” he demanded.
The pale buzzard hesitated. Then he bowed his head. “I do not challenge you,” he muttered.
“I thought not,” said the Chief Buzzard, his one eye gleaming with triumph. He turned back to Kidu. “So, zimbir of the Kekkaka tribe,” he announced, “let us see what your giddim can really do. And no tricks, or I will tear out your insides myself. And I will do it so slowly you will wish that Shurruppak himself had devoured you. Do you understand?”
“Kidu understand.”
“Very well, then. Tell your giddim to begin.”
“You hear him, Giddim,” Kidu urged Dante silently. “Kidu done his best. Now your turn.”
Kidu was asking Dante to perform a miracle. There was no other word for it. He had only been able to show Kidu the world of the Odyll because their minds were linked together and they could understand each other’s thoughts. Making the same thing happen for as many birds as could cover a mountaintop was a different matter entirely. It was simply not possible. And yet …
He recalled the strange music that had filled Kidu’s mind earlier, the way that it had seemed to come from all the birds at the same time, the way they had flocked together, each one barely a wing’s breadth away from its fellow but never getting in each other’s way. They had all dipped their wings together, all turned in the air together and all descended onto the mountain together.