Aetherium (Omnibus Edition)

by Joseph Robert Lewis

  Back in the dining room, she found the Italians and the young Eranian lady huddled in the corner while Kenan was quickly becoming fast friends with the young Espani fencers by exchanging bits of old songs and bawdy jokes filled with juvenile double entrendres. Taziri got the room’s attention with a sharp whistle and in her best Espani she told them the plan. The young fencers brightened a bit at the idea of going home for the winter, but the Italians, Shahera, and even Kenan looked slightly horrified when she said they were going north instead of south.

  Taziri held up her hand to fend off their objections even as they opened their mouths. She said, “I think we’ve all realized over the last few days that this is not just some inconvenience or unfortunate detour. We’re in very real danger, all of us. And right now, instead of trying to get on with our lives we need to be focused on staying alive. Not just for a few days, but for as long as it takes for us all to get safely out of the country.”

  “Are you completely incompetent?” Dante slammed his fist on the table. “All we have to do is walk to the nearest fishing village, throw some coins at the first slack-jawed idiot we see, and row away back to Mallorca, or even all the way to Marrakesh if needs be. They don’t know who we are. They don’t know what we look like. They’re probably not even looking for us at all. And you want to run and hide in some church cellar? Absolutely not. I’m leaving, with or without you fools. I’ll probably be better off on my own anyway.”

  The young Italian stood up and snatched a crumbly black loaf from the table to stuff in his pocket. He turned to find Major Zidane in the doorway behind him, and Syfax reached out to gently shove the smaller man back into his seat at the table. “You’re not going anywhere, except with the captain. This Magellan character knows we were in a plane, so we’ve got to be Mazigh, and he knows we were coming from Italia, so he knows you’re Italian. So unless you think you can cover up that stupid accent of yours, I guarantee you’ll be in a cell by the end of the week. If this bastard is as paranoid and controlling as everyone says, he’ll be rounding up every poor fool from Valencia to Madrid just for looking or sounding funny.”

  Dante slumped back in his seat, scowling. He took out his bread and began picking at it.

  Taziri used the commotion to slip back out into the hall, but she had barely taken two steps before she felt a hand on her shoulder.

  “Captain?” It was Kenan, but the earnest young lieutenant wasn’t grinning for once. “If it’s all the same to you, ma’am, I’d rather go north with you instead of south with the major.”

  “It’s not the same to me, Kenan. The major is going to need your help if he runs into trouble. And knowing him, he will run into trouble. I’m counting on you to be the sensible one. Keep your eyes open. Give him options and ideas before he pulls out that knife of his.” Taziri raised an eyebrow. “I thought you’d be okay with this. It’ll be like old times.”

  “That’s just it, captain,” he whispered. “I transferred to Section Four to get away from him. I didn’t like the old times, even if it was only a year or so. He treats me like a little kid. And the things he does to people, I mean, I know they were criminals, but still.” The lieutenant looked queasy. “He’s dangerous.”

  “Well, I’m sorry you feel that way, lieutenant, but you’ve got your orders,” Taziri said. “If things go well, it will only be for a few days and you’ll be safe and sound back home before you know it.”

  “And if it doesn’t go well, I’ll probably end up in front of an Espani firing squad.” He turned and sulked back into the dining room before she could say anything else. Her instinct was to call him back and give him a severe dressing down for his attitude and threaten him with some sort of disciplinary action, but she couldn’t think of any way to punish him beyond forcing him to accompany Syfax. And the truth is, he’s right. He very well might end up in front of a firing squad. On any other day, that thought might have troubled her more, but she had too much to worry about already.

  Three passengers to shepherd. An experimental engine battery to protect. A family less than four hundred miles away that I can’t reach. And unknown days or weeks holed up in the basement of some freezing Espani church listening to Dante complain.

  It took almost two hours for the hidalgo’s household to pack up and lock up, but eventually everyone was properly dressed for a long walk down a cold road, every back was aching under a pack laden with food and blankets, and every animal in the stable had been trotted out into the yard. Taziri wasn’t particularly shocked by the huge striding bird that the hidalgo’s wife had saddled and mounted. Its clicking talons and massive beak were worrisome, as were the blood red plumes around its eyes, but she could almost think of it as a giant ostrich, and that was a bit less frightening. Not that she had ever seen such a thing before, but there were more than a few strange and enormous beasts from the New World in Marrakesh. Tamed megatheras labored in the factories alongside the huge engines, while the smaller sivatheras drew the carriages of the wealthy, as well as those who wished to appear wealthy for a night. She had even heard of the racetracks where giant birds sprinted for the gamblers and the well-dressed ladies, who watched from a safe distance in their tents, through their binoculars.

  But the cat. The cat was something else altogether. When the beast called Atoq padded silently out of his pen, Taziri had nearly screamed. In fact, she probably would have screamed if she had not been surrounded by perfectly calm young Espani who barely gave the monster a second look. She had nothing to compare it to except the great lions of the eastern plains, but standing in the snowy yard, only a stone’s throw from the creature, she was certain that Atoq was larger than any lion. His shoulders were thicker and broader than any great cat or dire wolf, his head and neck were muscled like an elephant’s leg, and the huge fangs spearing down from his mouth told her not only that he could slice her apart without even opening his maw, but also that he could open his jaws at least as wide as the fangs were long. And they were very long.

  When Dona Qhora emerged from the house, Taziri almost mistook her for the Eranian girl. Unlike everyone else who was wearing black and brown and gray coats, gloves, and scarves, the hidalgo’s wife strode out into the snow in buff colored trousers that disappeared into her tall, shining black boots. Over her high-necked white blouse she wore a tight purple vest, and over that a long blue coat decorated in silver threadwork across the breasts with elaborate silver ropes draped from her shoulders. Qhora paused to adjust her white leather gloves, then took her white fur coat from one of the students and wrapped it over her tailored blue one. And lastly she set on her jet black hair a blue and silver hat that by rights should have been identical to the hidalgo’s wide-brimmed black hat, except that she had folded up the edges of the brim and fixed them to the top of the hat with large blue satin ribbons. The result was a tricorn headdress resembling a festival ship ready to set sail.

  “I’ve never seen a hat quite like that,” Taziri said. No need to mention that the Italians wear them that way, too.

  “It was my husband’s dress uniform, as was the coat.” Qhora gestured to the blue and silver affair under her furs. “When he put them aside, I had them tailored to my own use. Military service is nothing to be ashamed of. It should be recognized and celebrated. But since he is too modest to parade for the masses, then I’m happy to do it for him.”

  Don Lorenzo gave some final instructions to his students and staff, rattling off directions to each person in rapid-fire Espani. The horses were all heading north, but there weren’t enough for everyone. Taziri had meant to insist that she not be given one, at least not yet, but the gallant young diestros insisted that the ladies ride, and she knew enough about Espani men to give them their moment of chivalry. After all, she was still exhausted from the long march up the road from the crash, and, she reasoned, she was no good to anyone if she collapsed.

  So when they set out, the hidalgo led the way with his wife at his side and her huge cat trailing, and behind them rode Taziri, Shah
era, Nicola, and the scowling Dante. The four senior students followed them on foot, talking and laughing quietly. She envied them.

  They aren’t afraid of anything. Still young. Still immortal. No responsibilities or duties. Only possibilities, egos, and libidos.

  Taziri gave Kenan one last, sharp salute. The sad-eyed boy returned it half-heartedly and trudged away after the hulking major and the other junior students heading south.

  The rough road north to Zaragoza was a far cry from the machined highways of Marrakesh. This was a dirt and gravel track, pitted and muddy and icy, winding its slow way around hills and through villages and over ancient stone bridges across tiny frozen creeks. For the first half hour, Taziri sat miserably in the saddle trying to remember the last time she had sat on a horse. Maybe when she was nine or ten when she visited her uncle’s farm in the highlands. Trapped between the lumbering mass of the horse under her legs and the sweltering mass of wool, leather, and fur on her back, she was almost ready to offer the horse to one of the young men trailing behind on foot, but the gentle rocking of the saddle and sighing of the wind through the pines soon had her eyes drooping and her head nodding.

  She awoke with a start and a terrible ache in her neck and shoulders. The sky had grown gray and dim and dark clouds were gathering in the north. A light dusting of frozen rain was falling all around them, tinkling on the road and the frozen snow drifts to either side of the uneven lane. Taziri straightened up and glanced over at Shahera. She looked much older and even a bit thinner now that she was out of her jester’s costume. The Eranian girl offered her an exhausted smile, and then looked away. Lorenzo and his wife were still plodding along just ahead, but the saber-toothed cat was nowhere to be seen. Behind her, Taziri saw Dante leaning low in the saddle to talk to the youths, but she couldn’t hear what they were saying. She turned to face forward again and was about to trot ahead and ask the hidalgo where they would be staying the night when she realized that they were a rider short.

  “Nicola? Nicola!” She stared up and down the road for some sign of another figure, another horse.

  Everyone looked at her, looked around, and came to a full stop as they realized they had lost one of their party. Don Lorenzo questioned his students, but none of them could say when the tall Italian woman had disappeared or how long she had been gone. Taziri felt her heart racing.

  How could I let this happen? How could I fall asleep and just lose one of my people?

  But looking around, she realized that everyone had been nodding off or staring miserably at their boots, and at any given moment their little group had been strung out over as much as fifty yards. The road had wound through heavy woodlands and tall stone houses, and plenty of other places where a rider might have left unseen at just the right moment.

  Why would she leave the road? Taziri tried to list the possibilities, but the only one she could think of was the need to answer nature’s call, which she was currently trying to ignore herself. Unable to think of anything else to do, she turned her horse to backtrack up the road but the hidalgo was suddenly beside her and he reached over to rein back her mare.

  “No. Qhora will go. We will wait and see what she finds.”

  The little Incan woman nudged her towering bird into a sprint and they vanished up the road, Wayra’s talons digging deep gashes in the frozen gravel.

  Taziri sat and waited. Dante complained, though everyone ignored him. Shahera said nothing. The four boys asked permission to spar in the road, but their master said no. After half an hour, they heard a faint squawk and whistle and soon heard the rider returning. Qhora let her mount strut into their midst and said, “Over two miles back, I found a fresh horse trail leaving the road in a thick stand of pine trees. She circled around to the road behind us and went back south. I couldn’t see her over the hills.”

  “I’ll go back,” Taziri heard herself say. She didn’t want to go back. She didn’t give a damn about Nicola, or Dante, or even poor Shahera. She just wanted to fall asleep and wake up in her own bed with Yuba and Menna beside her. But I have to. I just have to. “I’ll find her.”

  “No.” Don Lorenzo pulled down the high stiff collar of his coat to speak. “She chose to go back. God only knows why, but we must stay together and continue north. If your friend is smart, and lucky, then she’ll survive. I wish her well, but she’s gone now, and we need to be moving on. It will be dark soon, and we still have a few miles to go tonight.”

  Taziri nodded, grateful to him that he had saved her from herself, and hating him for making her turn her back on her duty. Or am I just hating myself? Some captain I’m turning out to be.

  Chapter 9

  There was no one at the Diaz estate. No smoke rising from the chimney, no lights in the windows, no animals in the stables. But the snow in the yard wasn’t as deep as the snow outside the fence, and when she stared at the dimples in the fresh snow beyond the gate, Shifrah could see the telltale patterns of boots tramping along the lane to the left and the thinner trails of horse legs walking up the lane to the right.

  “Another dead end,” she said. “What a waste of time.”

  “No, this is the place.” Salvator shook the locked doors and pressed his eye up to the dark glass of the windows.

  In Madrid there had been more than a few witnesses who said a procession of strange people in strange clothes had arrived in town, asking for Don Lorenzo. A man splitting firewood at the bottom of the lane had described as many as half a dozen of these travelers, which matched the furrier’s description.

  And here is Don Lorenzo’s house. His dark and empty house.

  “It looks like our Mazigh friends arrived around noon, and then left again just a few hours ago. Assuming this Don Lorenzo was at home when they arrived, it is possible the gentleman is with them now.” Salvator swung back up into the saddle and studied the darkening sky. A light snow was falling, but the evening promised to be mild by Espani standards.

  Shifrah glared at the dark gray clouds. She had been daydreaming of desert oases and hot sandy beaches for the last three days. She sighed, the exhaled vapor frosting in the chill air. “So where did they go?”

  “South. And north.” Salvator grimaced at the tracks. He rode a few yards one way and then a few the other, staring at the tracks in the fading light.

  “Well, which is it?” Shifrah demanded. “I’m freezing. What the hell is wrong with you people, living in the cold like this?”

  “I can’t be certain who went where. They may have split up. There’s more than half a dozen people heading both ways.” He sounded, as always, perfectly calm and focused. There was no excitement, no frustration, no fatigue. It was infuriating.

  Shifrah shivered. “Well, can’t we assume the Mazighs would go south to get back home?”

  “The Mazighs could have gone south from their original crash site straight to Villa Real or Albaset. But they went north to Madrid instead, on foot. They asked for a Don Lorenzo on the road. And at that same time, our dearly departed Rui was stealing a journal also written by a man named Lorenzo. What if it’s the same Lorenzo? Clearly, this Lorenzo is an important person. I can’t be certain how or why, but I believe he may be the key to a much larger puzzle.”

  “Well, I don’t care about your Lorenzos. I only care about the Mazighs because that’s who Magellan wants, remember?” Shifrah pulled her hood tighter around her head. “Come on. We’re going south.”

  “No, wait just a moment. Consider the possibility that they aren’t trying to return home at all.” Salvator peered into the northern gloom where the long shadows of the hills and trees were already masking the contours of the land. “Maybe they meant to go north all along. They might be continuing their mission as planned, but on foot instead of in the air.”

  “What mission? What the hell are you talking about? And why would a bunch of stupid Mazighs be coming to see this Lorenzo person?” Her face was tight and pinched, eyes narrowed to slits, mouth compressed into a long thin line.

  Salva
tor looked up at her. “Wasn’t it you who mentioned that name to me about two weeks ago? A Lorenzo?”

  “Did I?” She paused, then smirked as the conversation came to mind. “Oh, yes, I remember. I overheard Faleiro talking to another officer about going to meet with a Lorenzo. It must have been this Lorenzo, this meeting.”

  “Did Faleiro say why he was going to meet this Lorenzo?”

  She grinned a little wider. “To hire him.”

  “To do what?”

  Shifrah turned her smile on him. “To replace you, of course. I told you they didn’t like you. I told you they were unhappy with your progress teaching the sailors to fence. But as I recall, you said it was nothing to worry about.”

  “Replace me? He must be a diestro, then. A diestro named Lorenzo.” Salvator leaned back and studied the skies again with wider eyes. “Ah! Don Lorenzo Quesada. Yes, I’ve heard of the man. A religious idiot, I think.”

  Shifrah looked at him sharply. The swordsman in Marrakesh! The duel on the road, and the chase at the train station. “Quesada? I know that name. That’s the bastard who sliced up my hand on the road to Arafez! Didn’t I tell you? He wanted me to run away with him.”

  Salvator raised an eyebrow. “Run away with him?”

  Her grin returned. “To a nunnery.”

  “Oh, yes. That sounds like him. He’s a zealot, from what I hear. Spends too much time in church talking to the dead, and he won’t kill a man for any reason. I suppose he wants to keep his soul nice and clean for Judgment Day.” Salvator scowled. “And you saw him in Marrakesh. He must be working with the Mazighs.”

  “On what?”

  Salvator shrugged. “I have no idea. But when I bring Magellan a platter of Mazigh heads and Quesada’s skull for a centerpiece, I don’t think I’ll need to worry about my job for quite some time. And then I can return to business of sinking his precious warship.”