by John French
Ahriman paused, the slightest of shrugs moving his shoulders.
+There is an order of humans that keeps the Athenaeum – its curators. That was what the inquisitor called them.+
+Humans?+ sent Ignis, the flatness of his thoughts struggling against disbelief.
+Yes. A dozen at most.+
+A dozen?+
+That is what was in the inquisitor’s mind,+ sent Ahriman.
At the edge of the circle Gilgamos shifted, lips pursing on his wide face. Sanakht caught the taste of doubt from his brother as it rippled from his open mind. He looked at the former Corvidae prophet, but Gilgamos was looking at Ahriman.
+If this is truly the place we seek, then the Imperium will make us pay a blood price to break it.+ Gilgamos’s thought voice rumbled like stone grating on stone. +A door is rarely left open in a fortress. I have looked down the paths, turned the courses of fate over one by one, but I cannot see how this ends. Uncertainty clouds it. I do not like it.+
+And you are right not to,+ sent Ahriman. Slowly he reached up, and released the catches of his helm. The face beneath was a mask of fatigue. Sanakht felt the wave of surprise run through the Circle. Ahriman looked around each of them, a wan smile on his lips but not in his eyes. +It has cost us much to get this far, and it may cost us more. Nothing is certain. Nothing can be certain. Not with what we intend, not in the war we fight. We are fighting fate, not being guided by it. There is always a chance that we may fail, that we may fall.+ He paused, closing his eyes briefly. +But that is as it must be. We are not on a path of certainty, but a path to break what is fated.+ Silence filled the warp, trembling like a taut string. Then Ahriman turned from the Circle. The image in the crystal sphere vanished.
‘Ignis,’ said Ahriman, his true voice thin as it came from his mouth. ‘Coordinate the rest of the fleet. We will make warp passage within a cycle. The rest of you, order your forces.’
‘Do we accompany you again in the assault, lord?’ asked Gilgamos.
‘No. Sanakht, Kadin and a cadre of Rubricae will go with me.’
‘By your will,’ said Gilgamos.
Ahriman turned away from them, not even making the sign of passing. Sanakht thought he saw Ahriman’s image flicker at the edges, as though it briefly had cast shadows from a light that was not there.
And so, we will have our chance, Sanakht thought within the hidden reaches of his mind. Around him the rest of the Circle moved away, their unsettled thoughts flavouring the warp. The Cyrabor slunk back from the edges of the bridge, cooing over the space the Circle had left. Ignis was the last to go. He caught Sanakht’s eye, and gave the smallest of nods.
‘You are injured,’ said Carmenta. The lenses of her eyes refocused, and Ahriman’s face was overlaid by the rainbow colours of infra-sight. His face was red with warmth, cooler than the white-yellow of the Cyrabor priests in the background, hotter than the cool green and blue of his armour. He did not say anything. She watched a muscle in his jaw twitch. He closed his eyes. ‘You are, aren’t you.’ It was a flat statement. ‘Worse than before.’
‘Is that you speaking?’ he asked, his voice low, heavy with tiredness. ‘Or the ship?’
Something connected to her thoughts clicked through the question and formed an answer.
‘Yes,’ she said.
Ahriman laughed softly, then nodded, and let out a breath.
‘The information extraction did not proceed as intended?’ she asked.
‘No,’ said Ahriman, then shook his head and said no more. He leant on the arm of the command throne, head bent. She could hear a wet click in his breathing.
‘There are cracks in you,’ she said. ‘And they are widening.’
He gave her a long look, then shook his head with a low humourless laugh. She wondered why.
‘Keep Kadin close,’ she said. ‘The others… they are unsure, Ahriman. Remember that they followed Amon once, and that they tried to destroy you. They serve you now, but they do not trust you.’
Ahriman stood slowly, his armour purring.
‘And I should trust Kadin?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she said.
The muscles in his jaw hardened as he turned away.
‘Sleep, mistress. We are almost there.’
‘The end,’ she said, but the word stuck in her throat, and became a hiss of cogs and code. Ahriman walked from her. On her throne, Carmenta’s head drooped and she went back to listening to the machine within.
‘We must have an advantage,’ said Ignis.
‘This is our advantage,’ said Sanakht. They had walked far from the bridge of the Sycorax, down through the High Citadel into the layers beneath. The space they walked now was a narrow gully between dust-covered machines. High above them, sparks discharged between the metal cliffs. False thunder broke the humming quiet as blue flashes of light stole the gloom. They spoke with their true voices, their minds shut away from the warp by the brass discs that floated beside them. Acid-etched lines and circles covered their surfaces, and each floated and turned in time with each other as though invisible cogs and threads connected them. Inside their orbit they could talk and no other mind could hear them. The discs, like the tongue they spoke, were old and had been made on Prospero before it became ashes. Credence walked three paces behind them, clicking to itself.
‘I will have him alone, separated from the rest of the Circle while you command the fleet in space. How many of the mongrel warbands now will answer to you alone? What would you call that if not an opportunity?’
Ignis stopped and the orbiting discs slid to a halt around them.
‘He is going into the labyrinth alone apart from you and Kadin. Why?’
‘Trust, brother. He does not trust any of you.’
‘But he still trusts you.’
‘I almost died for him once,’ said Sanakht quietly.
Ignis shook his head.
‘There are too many unknowns, too many values that are not set. This may be an opportunity, but we need more than opportunity, we need an advantage,’ said Ignis carefully. ‘You will be alone with Ahriman beneath the surface of Apollonia, but so will a guard of Rubricae bound to Ahriman’s will. And can’t be ignored that abomination Kadin – he might take some killing, even for you. That and we are still talking of Ahriman, no matter how isolated. And all the while here in orbit is a fleet’s worth of firepower and troops. Carmenta is loyal to Ahriman alone, and the Sycorax is strong enough to break us if we move against him.’
Ignis stopped, and frowned. Sanakht wondered if the Master of Ruin had ever spoken so much before.
‘We have an advantage. Several in fact,’ said Sanakht.
Ignis simply stared at him and waited.
‘There is something that Ahriman does not know about Apollonia and the Athenaeum.’
Ignis raised an eyebrow.
‘But you know this fact that has escaped him?’
‘Yes.’ It was Sanakht’s turn to wait in silence.
‘What is it?’ asked Ignis, eventually.
‘That,’ said Sanakht carefully, ‘is something I will keep to myself.’
Ignis shook his head very slightly.
‘How does he not know?’
‘Because the witch inquisitor he captured kept it from him before she died,’ said a voice from above them.
Ignis whirled, his bolter arming with a metallic ring. His eyes went to the dark above, found his target, and pulled the trigger.
Sanakht’s blow sheared the muzzle off Ignis’s bolter an instant before the trigger clicked back. The bolt in the gun’s chamber exploded. Credence surged forwards with a hiss of pistons, fist rising.
‘No!’ shouted Ignis. The automaton halted.
Sanakht held the tip of his sword steady in front of Ignis’s eye, its power field throwing electric blue shadows over his face. Credence stopped.
‘Peace, brother,’ said Sanakht, carefully. Ignis’s blank eyes looked back at him. For a second Sanakht wished he could read the play of the Mast
er of Ruin’s thoughts. Then Ignis nodded, and glanced at Credence.
‘It’s all right.’
The machine burbled back at him in machine code.
‘Yes,’ said Ignis. ‘All right in all senses.’
Credence lowered its fist, and took a slow step back. Sanakht let out a sigh and turned to look up to the shadows from which the voice had come.
‘I did not summon you,’ he said.
‘Summon? No but you called, oh yes you did. I heard, you see. I heard and came.’
Behind him he heard a heavy clang as Maroth dropped from the machines above. Out of the corner of his eye, Sanakht saw Maroth half rise then fold into a crouch on the floor.
Ignis’s eyes flicked to the figure. He stared, and then looked up and nodded once. Sanakht moved the sword away, and felt the blade shiver as the power field shut down.
Ignis stood, looking between the crouched figure and Sanakht.
‘So, another traitor,’ he said.
Maroth laughed, the noise cracking down the machine gorge. High above, a false peal of thunder rolled. Sanakht could smell ozone and lightning charge. ‘This knowledge that Ahriman does not have, it came from…’ Ignis paused, his tongue twitching against his teeth. ‘From it.’
‘The other secret, yes,’ said Maroth. ‘The one that the witch held back before she died. Ahriman thought he had it all but she held one thing back. Clever, strong. Very strong.’
‘But you took it from her after she died?’ asked Ignis.
Maroth nodded, fingers tapping the snout of his hound helm.
‘How?’
‘I ate her corpse.’
Sanakht felt his hands twitch on the jet and alabaster handles of his swords.
‘And what did you learn?’ asked Ignis.
‘Oh no. No. I have told once, and that is too many times to tell it, perhaps.’
Ignis looked at Sanakht.
‘A secret is best kept by ignorance,’ said Sanakht.
Ignis inclined his head.
‘So you have an advantage, but the matter of Kadin and the Sycorax remains.’
‘The iron crone and the beast,’ gurgled Maroth. Sanakht felt his skin itch as he heard the words.
‘The ship is a matter that can be dealt with.’
‘And Kadin?’
‘Will fall before he ever reaches battle.’
‘Treachery is an answer to many questions,’ said Ignis, then smiled, lips pulling back to show teeth etched with black digits. It was one of the most unsettling expressions Sanakht had ever seen on the face of another living thing.
They don’t even see me. Hemellion watched the figures move around him as he crossed the upper platform of the bridge. At least, he thought, they do see me, but none ask why I am here.
A tall spindly figure in billowing ochre moved past him, its long beaked mask not turning to notice him. He shivered, though the air was as warm as blood. I am part of this place. I am marked by one of their masters, and any who see me just see one of themselves.
This part of the bridge was broader than the widest town square he had ever seen, and its roof hung higher than the tallest temple he had ever stepped into. Beyond its distant edge the next level of the bridge extended on, its vast space cleaved by gullies filled with machines, and crowded with cable-hung stacks of metal. He turned his head, blinking, allowing his eyes to adjust to the dappled half gloom. Thirty or more paces away a vast sphere of crystal hung above a plinth of black stone. The air around it shimmered, and its surface seemed to flow like oil poured onto water. A sharp pain brightened just behind his eyes. He coughed, and tasted blood in his spit.
The throne sat before the crystal. Carvings of beasts with claws, feathers and crooked wings covered its back and arms. Polished stones winked from the eyes of the metal beasts. Cables snaked away from its base to vanish into the floor. He could see a figure on the throne, wrapped in red, its small shape shrunken by the seat’s bulk.
He took a step towards the figure and then stopped. He looked around, suddenly uncertain.
Why am I here? There is no need for me to be here. He looked around him, eyes flicking between twisted figures and hissing machines.
This impossible city will burn one day. This throne room will be a coffer of ashes. It will happen. It is certain.
He frowned, pausing, his steps halting on the azurite-inlaid floor. It felt like someone else had spoken those last thoughts. He shook himself, and the questions and doubt vanished. He looked back to the throne. Is this the king of this star city? Ahriman rules here, but is this a monarch of a different kind?
He moved closer, waiting for someone to stop him, for a bone and metal hand to close on his shoulder, or a challenge to ring out. A bloated figure with a mask like a mutilated bear glanced at him from the base of the throne’s dais. Hemellion stopped, wondering if he should run or speak. The figure looked away again. Hemellion waited a second, breathed once, and waited for his heart to slow. He stepped onto the throne’s dais, and felt the stone and metal vibrating beneath his feet. The smell of hot metal and cinnamon that filled the bridge was much stronger here.
Now he was closer he could see that the figure on the throne was slumped in its embrace. If it had a body or shape, it was lost beneath a ragged robe. Cables connected to the throne vanished within the folds of fabric.
‘Who are you?’ said the figure on the throne.
The voice was a half croak.
Hemellion staggered back, and almost fell from the dais. The robe was moving, a head beneath a deep hood rising slowly to look at him. The face within the hood was a mask of cracked red lacquer. Its eyes were lenses of glass lit by green light. He stared back. The mask made him think of someone beautiful, and the voice sounded very human, female, young even, though worn and brittle.
‘I… I am Hemellion,’ he said at last.
‘Yes. The One Time King. That is what they called you when they told me of you.’ She paused. Hemellion heard something click and whir inside the hood. ‘I am Carmenta. I am mistress of the Sycorax.’ Hemellion stared at her. ‘And why are you here?’
Mistress. So this ship, this city of the stars, had a mistress, a queen who ruled it for its master. He glanced at the cables running over the throne to the floor, and then out across the bridge at all its movement and thrumming metal, and out beyond that at the mindbreaking bulk of the Sycorax beyond the viewports. All of it extended from this point. This throne was the centre, and this hooded creature, with the voice of a weary girl, ruled from here.
‘You wander much. Is there no purpose to it?’ she asked. Hemellion looked down again. There was genuine curiosity in the words.
What are you? he wondered, as his gaze flicked over her false face and eyes.
‘I watch and I see,’ she said as though his silence had been a question.
Still he did not reply. She did not look like the Cyrabor, with their yellow robes and beast masks, and hands which could be metal or could be flesh. She sounded different too, like a voice speaking from the sanity of his lost life. Yet here she was.
‘You have a question,’ she said.
‘No,’ he said, and shook his head.
She laughed. Far off across the bridge, machines crackled with blue sparks.
‘Everyone has a question.’
He felt odd, as though, in all the months of hate and strangeness, this moment was a window into something he had lost.
‘Why did they keep me alive?’ he asked. She let out a breath. He found the gesture strangely disconcerting.
‘Forgiveness.’
‘Forgiveness?’ He felt his face twist in puzzlement and disbelief.
Carmenta nodded carefully.
‘And perhaps hope. What else can creatures like them want? What can any of us want?’
Hemellion found his gloved hands had knotted together, his skin prickling. He opened his mouth.
The light in Carmenta’s eyes fizzed. Her head rocked from side to side. Her robed body jerked in the thr
one, sending the mass of cables thrashing. Jagged sounds spilled from her. He took a step back. Discordant noise filled the vast chamber: clanking, crackling, hooting. Cyrabor froze where they stood, their masked faces turning towards the throne. Hemellion stepped back. A brass hand whipped out from beneath Carmenta’s robe and fastened on his wrist. The hand clamped tight. Hemellion cried out as he felt joints begin to pop under the pressure. Carmenta’s head was twisting, eyes scanning the room.
‘Who are you?’ Desperation and panic bubbled in her voice. Behind him Hemellion heard running feet, and raised voices. ‘Why are you here? What is your name?’ He tried to pull his hand free but the brass fingers just squeezed tighter. She yanked him closer, so that his face was inches from hers. He could smell machine oil and human sweat and burning. ‘Please, what is your name?’ she pleaded, and her voice was no longer that of a woman or a machine, but a child. ‘Please tell me why I am here? Where is father? Is he coming back? Help me. Plea–’
The light in Carmenta’s eyes cut out. Her body slumped back into the throne, her head lolling on her neck. The light from glow-globes and terminals dimmed across the bridge. The vast space was suddenly quiet, as though every breath was being held, every machine waiting for a delayed command. Hemellion stood staring, unable to move. Hands and metal pincers and bronze-cased tentacles pulled at him. His arm was pried out of Carmenta’s grasp. Voices were whispering angrily in his ear. He shook his head, still looking at the collapsed figure beneath the red robes. A moan trickled into the silence.
The lights flickered back on. The air clicked and buzzed as thousands of machines woke to life again. Carmenta’s head rose slowly. Hemellion could see the smallest tremble in the movement.
‘Let him go,’ she croaked. Only then was Hemellion aware of the Cyrabor clustered around him, holding him. Their touch was warm, and their cinnamon stink made him want to gag. They hooted and clicked in reply. Carmenta shook her head. ‘No, it was not his doing. Besides he bears Sanakht’s bond, so I would not consider that course of action wise.’
The Cyrabor glanced at each other, muttered in low machine noises, and let Hemellion go. He shivered, and pulled his robe closer about him. He had no idea what had just happened. He could not remember why he had thought to come here in the first place, but he was very sure that he did not want to be here now. He turned and began to hurry away.