Aetherium (Omnibus Edition)

by Joseph Robert Lewis

  “Back away, major.” Chaou stood panting, one hand massaging her neck while the other hovered over the metal railing. “I hated every instant of that, and I hate you for making me do it!” She screamed through a raw throat.

  “Get away from the rail!” Syfax pointed at the woman’s hand. “Don’t touch it. You could kill them!”

  “You’re the one killing them, major.” Chaou began edging backward, closer to the lifeboat. “Don’t come near me. Don’t do anything. As soon as I’m gone, you can take care of those poor old grannies. That would be best. But if you do anything, anything at all to stop me, I will shoot you.” She touched the bulge of the gun in her pocket.

  Syfax raised his empty hands and watched the woman in black glance nervously at the little crane holding the lifeboat. She shook her head and banged her palm on the railing, making Syfax wince. “No,” she said.” You, over the side. Now. Into the water.”

  The major cocked an eyebrow, then shrugged. He stepped to the railing and glanced down. Twenty feet into dark churning waters thick with algae and oil stains. Above them, the slick walls of the canal rose ten sheer feet above the water, and it was more miles than he could guess until the next landing or lock. Crap.

  “By the time you find someone to fish you out, everything will be over,” Chaou said. “You’ll be working for a very different crown, and nothing you report will matter to anyone.”

  His instinct was to make a smarmy retort about how her plan would fail, how stupid it was to leave him alive. Then again, maybe she’s planning to shoot me after I fall in the canal so she won’t have to deal with my body. Glaring at Chaou’s smug smile, he grabbed the railing, hurled himself over, and plunged boots first into the cold black slime of the Zemmour Canal. His last dry thought was, I think she was reaching for the gun.

  When his head broke the surface, he felt the trickles of thick pond scum sliding down his scalp and neck. He tried not to think about the other things that might be thriving in the filthy, sluggish waters of the canal. Syfax reach across the oil-stained surface and began swimming, dragging himself up the canal toward the huge paddle wheel churning away to the east. His long red coat quickly swelled and clawed at the water like a sea anchor, and his boots became concrete blocks on his feet keeping his legs down beneath him. Unwilling to shed the weight, he fought across the canal to the sheer stone wall and jammed his fingers into the cracks between the blocks. But the cracks were only a hair deep, clotted and mortared with slick mossy gunk that denied him any hope of climbing out. The major pulled his broad knife from his boot and stabbed at the wall here and there, looking for a few spare inches of purchase. He worked his way left and right, and finally began lurching up out of the water to jab at the higher cracks that were drier and a bit deeper. Each time Syfax fell harder and deeper back into the canal. The stench of rotting wood and bird droppings and spent engine oil burned his nostrils and eyes.

  He kicked about and found a sludgy bit of footing somewhere down in the dark at the wall’s edge. Planting his feet deep in the muck, he leapt up one more time. When he jammed his knife into the wall, it slid in to the hilt and stuck fast between two stones, holding the man up with only his legs dangling in the water. Syfax wiggled his naked toes in the cold water and rolled his eyes. “Damn it. I liked those boots.”

  After several minutes of swearing and scrambling, he levered himself up on his knife handle and leapt for the top of the wall. He caught it on the second try and hauled himself up onto the warm dry grass. As he lay there, he tugged off his belt and then rolled back over to start fishing his knife out of the wall. It took several minutes and the knife nearly fell back into the canal at the last moment, but he caught the blade between two fingers and pulled it up. Well, that’s better than nothing.

  He shrugged off his soaking, stinking coat and squeezed out as much of the canal as he could. Then he slung the coat over his shoulder on the hook of his finger and started walking. He’d only taken a few barefoot steps before he stopped short and looked across the canal at the outline of Port Chellah, far in the distance. Port Chellah, full of horses and trains. Port Chellah, on the other side of the canal.

  “Aw, damn it!”

  Across the water, a wide dirt road ran parallel to the canal and to his right Syfax spotted two young boys coming toward him. “Hey! Hey, kids!”

  The boys stopped and waved. “What?”

  “How do I get across?”

  The boys looked at each other and shrugged. One of them pointed back toward the ocean and yelled, “Train bridge!”

  To the west, the entrance to the canal at the mouth of the Bou Regreg River looked to be at least five miles back, judging by the hair-thin line of the Atlanteen Ocean beyond it. There was a faint arch across the canal back there that might have been the bridge.

  An hour to run back there, another hour into town to get a horse, and then over sixty miles on winding roads from Port Chellah to Nahiz. The ferry probably only has forty miles to go.

  But how far to the first lock?

  Squinting into the east told him nothing except that the paddle wheeler was rounding a slight bend and bearing a bit to the south, judging by the trail of steam and smoke drifting above the canal. How fast do those things go?

  He didn’t imagine he could outrun the ferry, especially barefoot. But if the lock is slow enough, then maybe…

  Syfax balled up his coat around his belt and slung the whole bundle over his shoulder, and he took off running along the canal using the top of the stone wall as a path. The blocks were warm and smooth, with only the occasional pebble or rusty fish hook to make him swear and stumble. From time to time he would glance at the murky water below and glare.

  Twenty years ago you could wade straight across the river in the summer. And now, this.

  Chapter 19

  A steady westerly wind sped the Halcyon on its way and Taziri landed in a grassy field just outside Nahiz a little more than an hour after leaving Port Chellah. Kenan had lingered by the windows, staring down at the murky lane of the canal and the rustling tree tops, peering intently at the ferry as they passed over it. If he had seen anything, he did not mention it. The rest of the flight had been quiet.

  Taziri shut down the engines and helped Ghanima lash the airship to a pair of old oak trees at the edge of the field. Kenan hovered in the open hatchway as Evander stumbled out onto the grass, groaning as he stretched his back.

  “I guess I need to stay here and watch Hamuy,” Kenan said.

  “I guess.” Taziri glanced up the road at the little village around the ferry landing. “It’ll be another few hours before the ship gets here. Is there anything we can do now?”

  “Probably not.” He shrugged. “Sort of a hurry-up-and-wait situation. Happens all the time in police work. You can go get something to eat or get some rest.”

  Taziri trudged over to him, her hands in her pockets. “Look, marshal, I realize we’re dealing with some very dangerous people, and I’m happy to help out, but I’m a pilot and I have my own responsibilities back home. I’d like to wrap this up as soon as possible. It’s been a long night and a long morning, and I’ve had enough excitement for this year. So is there anything you can do to help get me out of here?”

  Kenan shook his head. “Nope. The major is on the ferry with the ambassador. The ferry is slow. We wait.” His face tensed slightly and he nodded toward the village. “Go get some lunch.”

  For a minute, she wondered if she had the authority to throw him and his prisoner off her airship and just leave them. I need to deal with that doctor in Arafez. And Isoke needs me. Yuba and Menna need me. These Redcoats are just using me for a free ride and wasting my time. “Come on, Ghanima, let’s go get some food.”

  The village of Nahiz had once overlooked the banks of the Bou Regreg River from a hillside several hundred yards away, but after the engineers and masons and dredges had done their work, the village found itself poised on the very edge of the Zemmour Canal. The fishermen had adapted rea
dily enough, finding the stone lip of the canal walls more comfortable seating than the rocks along the old shore and installing makeshift ladders to help unfortunate or clumsy souls back up out of the water. A shaky rope bridge had been suspended between two wooden towers across the canal in the village itself, while a broad stone and iron bridge arched above the canal just south of town. The new landing and ticket office brought a steady flow of workers and peddlers through the village, some heading west for the wealth and promise of the big city, others fleeing east back to their family homes, their reasons and stories rarely offered to strangers.

  As they entered Nahiz, Taziri strolled past the landing and confirmed that the ferry wasn’t expected for at least another two hours, and then they wandered up past the waiting horses and stage coaches to the long stone inn across the hillside where the smell of freshly brewed tea and crushed mint spilled out of the open windows. The innkeeper had a tajine simmering, and so they passed a quiet hour savoring lamb stewed with apricots, raisins, and honey dusted with turmeric, ginger, and saffron. They spoke little, and only to compliment the food or praise the bright clear skies above the dark canal.

  Afterward, they sat outside with their tea and watched the hustle and bustle of Nahiz on a warm spring afternoon. At first, the stillness of the empty streets was disquieting. Then a single fisherman trudged up the road past them. A few minutes later the same man trudged back down past them to the canal.

  “Is your hand all right?”

  Taziri glanced down, unaware that she had been rubbing her numb fingers. Her wrist had felt shaky during lunch just trying to hold a glass. She slipped her hand into her pocket and said, “I’m sure it’s fine. I think something fell on my arm in the fire.”

  Ghanima nodded. “You seem really eager to get home. Family?”

  “My husband and daughter. You?”

  “Just my sister. My twin, actually,” Ghanima said. “I’m a little worried. I don’t know what she knows yet about the Crake. I don’t want her to worry about me if someone reports the wreck.”

  Taziri nodded. “As soon as we get to a town with a telegraph office, we’ll let the brass know where we are and what’s going on.”

  “Okay.”

  The small talk droned on for the next two hours as the sun inched lower in the sky and the fishermen sauntered up and down the lane in ones and twos, sometimes with a few perch, trout, or eels on a string. Finally, a soft toot in the distance announced the arrival of the ferry and the two pilots shuffled down to the landing to wait. When the steamer pulled in and the gangway was dragged into place, the passengers streamed off with bags and children in tow. A considerable crowd began to form along the canal-side road, but after resituating their belongings and waiting for their companions, the travelers quickly dispersed either into the village or down to the main road and the stone bridge.

  Taziri and Ghanima studied every face and figure that passed them, and when the flow of passengers thinned out and finally stopped, they caught the attention of one of the deckhands to ask if there was anyone else left. The young man shrugged and invited them to look around, so they stepped aboard and made a quick circuit of the outer deck and the inner cabin and even tugged at the locked storage bins, but ultimately they were shooed off as the crew got ready to close up for an hour so the boiler could be refilled and the deckhands could get a quick meal.

  “Were we wrong?” Ghanima asked. “Maybe those men at the pier lied. Maybe the major and the ambassador never got on the ferry at all.”

  “Maybe. Or maybe they got off somewhere else.” Taziri jogged after the last deckhand. “Excuse me! I just wanted to ask a quick question. Did you notice a large man in a red coat with an older woman in a gold jacket?”

  The boatman raised a tired eyebrow. “A what? I don’t know.”

  “They were supposed to take the ferry in from Port Chellah to meet us here,” Taziri said, forcing a pleasant smile. “But they weren’t on board. Maybe they got off at one of the locks?”

  The boatman sighed and appeared to actually give the matter a moment’s thought. “Maybe. I don’t remember a guy in a red coat, but I think an old lady got off at the second lock. I didn’t notice what she was wearing.”

  “Oh hey.” A second deckhand, farther up the street, turned to call down to them. “I know who you mean. Yeah, I saw her get off. Second lock, just like he said. Silver hair, right? Black and gold jacket, green dress. I helped her off the gangway.”

  “Oh really?” Taziri forced herself to keep smiling. “That’s funny. Did she mention where she was going?”

  “Nah, but there’s only the one path over the ridge from there, up to the highway to Khemisset. It’s a long walk, unless she managed to catch the two-thirty stage coach from Chellah to Khem.” The deckhand shrugged. “Course, if she was going to do that, why the hell did she get on the ferry in the first place?”

  The two men joined their comrades in the inn, leaving Taziri and Ghanima to exchange confused looks.

  “Now what?” Ghanima asked.

  Taziri said, “Chaou got off, but the major didn’t. I guess we have to trust that the major is still following her. The only alternative is that he’s lost or dead.”

  “Dead? Him? That seems pretty unlikely.”

  They began walking back toward the field where the Halcyon waited. Taziri said, “I think we need to stop playing cat-and-mouse with the ambassador. We’re just wasting time now. We’ll go to Arafez so Kenan can turn Hamuy over to the marshals and organize a proper search party.”

  “What about the Espani doctor?” Ghanima glanced at her. “Are you turning that over to the marshals too?”

  Taziri wiggled her numb fingers. “No. That’s something I have to see to myself.”

  “It’s not your fault, you know,” Ghanima said. “Other people took your idea and did bad things with it. That makes them the bad guys, not you.”

  “Yeah, I know but…after all those other articles shot down my battery design, I decided to put my notes in the university archive anyway. I figured that someone else might want to see my work. Maybe they could come up with something better.” Taziri squeezed her left hand into a fist. “And I wanted the copy fees. It’s only ten percent, but it’s better than nothing. I had this fantasy that hundreds of other students would buy the copies and fix my battery design and I’d make enough to buy a bigger house.” She shook her head. “I was so stupid. Only one person ever bought the notes. I guess now we know who.”

  Ghanima shrugged. “It’s still not your fault that bad people are doing bad things. You need to get over it.”

  Taziri nodded to herself. “I’ll try.”

  Chapter 20

  Cicadas creaked on both sides of the canal, filling the forest with a soft white noise that throbbed like an arboreal heart beat. Syfax jogged along the canal wall, never slowing, never stumbling, just putting one foot in front of the other and waiting for something to appear around the next bend. The first lock appeared in the distance and he approached it cautiously, waving to catch the attention of the two older women in the control house. They said the ferry had passed by more than half an hour ago, so Syfax wobbled across the top of the lock gates to the north side of the canal and jogged on.

  The second lock appeared suddenly around a sharp bend as the major pushed through some thick branches that tried to shove him back into the dark water below. The lock operators were a young man and a young woman who exchanged nervous smiles a little too often, and Syfax was about to hurry on after they reported the ferry was over an hour ahead of him when the woman said, “You know, you’re probably better off taking the road.”

  Syfax glanced around at the thick forest pressing close along the sides of the canal. “What road? A road to Nahiz?”

  “Oh no, the road to Khemisset. I mean, there’s nothing in Nahiz. You’re not actually trying to go to Nahiz, are you?”

  “No, I’m trying to catch up to someone on the ferry.”

  “Oh?” A momentary frown of c
onfusion darkened her smile. “That’s…different.” She suppressed a giggle. “You couldn’t get a horse?”

  “I fell off the damn ferry,” he barked.

  She flinched and her young man glared at him. “Hey, she was just trying to help. Unless your friend is actually going to Nahiz, then he’ll probably be in Khem long before you catch the ferry. You should just take the path up to the road.” He pointed roughly at the dirt track running perpendicular to the canal up into the trees. “It’s an easy hike. An old lady went up it earlier.”

  “What old lady?” Syfax glanced at the path as though expecting to see someone on it.

  “Some old lady got off the ferry and took the path up to the road. I told her she was crazy, but she said she would catch the stage coach from Chellah, and I said whatever, and she hasn’t come back yet so I guess she caught the coach. Or she’s walking to Khem.” The young man scowled and went back into the lock operator’s house.

  “What did this lady look like?”

  The woman shrugged. “Old. Short. Fancy shoes. Little earrings.” She shrugged again and followed her friend inside.

  Syfax clenched his fist as his mind raced back to the Phoenician tomb, and the warehouse, and the ferry. Yes, Chaou had worn fancy shoes. “Thanks.” He resettled his bundled coat over his shoulder and plunged into the forest, scrambling up the winding track and hoping that he didn’t plant a naked foot on anything meaner than an acorn.

  After twenty minutes of crashing about in the shadows of the trees, he stumbled out into the sunlight at the edge of a grassy field and just a stone’s throw away he saw the broad dirt road running west to east up into the hills.

  “How the hell did I end up barefoot in the middle of nowhere?” he muttered. Not seeing anything or anyone on the road, he turned right and set off for Khemisset. “And where’s that damn airship when I need it? There’s plenty of room for it to land out here.”

  As the afternoon descended into evening and the major climbed into the hill country outside Khemisset, he saw the grape and olive arbors in the distance. By the time he arrived in the outskirts of the city, the sun was a crimson glimmer on the edge of the world and a sharp chill rode the westerly wind. Syfax trudged straight down the main thoroughfare, ignoring the occasional stares of the people sitting outside their front doors or shuffling home from the factories. He had only been to Khemisset twice before, and briefly each time. Everything looked the same, like every other town in the hills. Frowning, Syfax grabbed the arm of a passing man and asked, “Where does the stage coach from Chellah usually drop folks off?”