by Eric Flint
* * *
"Stop!" came a shout above Romas's head.
It was the archer, but Romas knew he was not shouting at him. He was ordering the others, the fighters, to stop their barrage.
And a moment later, the hail of spears and shou dan from the other side stopped, too. A strange, tense silence fell over the blasted arches. Romas drew one surprised breath, and then dashed for the opening into the ruin.
* * *
Irlen was only faintly aware that the arrows had stopped falling before she reached the breach she had spotted in the tumbled rock. It was little more than a darker rectangle in the dark face of the ruin, but it was there. She stood for a heartbeat in the opening, her eyes adjusting to the dimness. The space was irregular, and close, but big enough for her to wriggle through. She slipped off her coat, to show that she carried no weapon, and dropped it on the ground. A gust of wind caught it, and it sailed out into the abyss like a great bird, its panels flapping like wings. In a heartbeat, it had disappeared into the night. Irlen cried out, shocked by a sudden dizziness, and clung to the nearest chunk of rock with both hands. When she had calmed a bit, she let go of the rock, and sidled into the break in the ruin. She began to creep forward into cold, cramped darkness.
When the torch flared, she exclaimed, and shielded her eyes with her hand. Her voice sounded dead in the narrow space.
"It's all right," came another voice, a deep one. A real one. "Nu mo, don't be afraid. Everything's all right."
Cautiously, Irlen opened her eyes, and let them adapt to the dancing light of a small oil torch. Her companion had left her alone with a tall, dark Alhasa. He wore a thick black braid hanging over one shoulder, and a piece of red ribbon twined around his bicep. Her heart pounded in her ears, but the compulsion that had drawn her all the way from Callis City released its hold, and she could think clearly for the first time in two days. The situation was bizarre, but she could think of only one thing to do.
She took a step forward, and held out her hand. "Ni hao," she said. "I am Irlen Li Paul."
Her new companion smiled, showing very white teeth. It was hard to see him well in the flickering torchlight, but he was tall and well-made, with muscled shoulders and clear eyes. His hand was hard and strong against hers. "Romas Battu," he said. "I am ashamed, now, that I did not believe Angkar Rinposh."
She dropped his hand, and stood back. "Who is Rinposh?"
"He is our lama."
"Oh—you mean the blind monk? I have heard of him. Did he tell you I would be here?"
"He had a vision, he said. Brought to him by a ghost—a Callistan ghost."
Irlen released a trembling breath. "It may be the same ghost who brought me. I can't think why else—I hardly know why I am here, Romas Battu."
"His Holiness seemed to know." The tall man smiled again, and swung a bag from behind his shoulder. "He wanted me to carry something to you." He held the bag out to her, a handsewn burlap sack, tightly filled.
She took it in her hands, surprised to find that it weighed almost nothing. She put her nose to the burlap, and sniffed. "Pursil leaves," she breathed. "And so much!"
"It was all my ama—my mother—had in her garden."
"But—how did you know? Why did you come here, and why . . ." Irlen hugged the fragrant sack to her, shaking her head, mystified, moved.
He pressed his two hands together before his chest, and bowed. "Angkar Rinposh sees truly," he said gravely. "I doubted him, but he was right."
Involuntarily, Irlen glanced back over her shoulder. Was he there, the Old Man, laughing? She lifted her eyes again to Romas Battu. "A vision," she said wonderingly. "You would come here—bring me this gift—because of a vision."
"Why did you come, nu mo? Did you have a vision? It was perhaps even more dangerous, and a further journey, for you than for me."
Irlen laughed a little. "I had no vision," she said. "But I had a compulsion. There are sick children in Callis City . . ."
"Rinposh knew this."
Irlen searched Romas Battu's eyes, trying to comprehend what had happened. She pushed away her awareness of the closeness of the stone corridor, of the peril that awaited them outside. Her skin tingled with the nearness of him, dark and tall and strong, smelling faintly of smoke and sweat and fragrant salt air.
When she found her voice, she spoke softly, her eyes stinging with emotion. "Children will live because of you, Romas Battu. I thank you. And I thank your lama, and your mother."
"They will try to take the pursil from you for their soldiers."
She lifted her chin. "They will not succeed," she said. "I will threaten to throw it over the cliff if they threaten me."
"They will try to come through this corridor."
"Block it, Romas Battu."
He nodded. "We will. Go now, while I light your way."
Irlen hesitated. It was difficult to take her eyes from his face. It was hard to return to the loneliness of Callis City, where she had only a ghost for company. But she had something, now, that she could do to help the children.
She wriggled around, holding the sack closely in her arms. He raised his torch, and its light glimmered on the constricting walls of stone.
She looked back over her shoulder, once. "Romas Battu . . ." she said hesitantly. "What do you—the Alhasi—what do you do with unwanted babies?"
He frowned. "We do not have unwanted babies here," he said. "Someone always wants a baby."
Irlen smiled, and hugged the sack closer. "If this ever ends, this stupid war . . ." she began, but her voice trailed off, weak and wistful. She looked ahead, to her side of the corridor, to the war waiting outside.
"They will tire of it," he said, behind her. "It will end. Someday."
"When peace comes, then."
"Yes, Irlen Li Paul. When peace comes."
Irlen didn't look back again. She worked her way forward, through the cramped space, finding her way back to her own side, and out into the night.
* * *
The silence lay across the ruins of the arches like a blanket. As Romas emerged, he saw that the archers still waited on the heights, their bows at the ready, but their arrows unstrung. Nothing moved. No spear fell, and no hand bomb flew into their midst.
Romas turned his head up to the nearest archer. "We must block this corridor," he said. "Now they know it's here."
"What happened to your sack?" the man asked.
"It's gone." Romas smiled. "Rinposh has given a gift to the children of Callis," he said. He paced away from the ruined arches, up the Spiral Road toward Alhasa. The silence behind him lasted long minutes before another shou dan exploded in the darkness.
* * *
Louise Marley is the author of many novels and short stories.
To see this author's work sold by Amazon, click here.
Rebel the First
Written by Edd Vick
Illustrated by Barb Jernigan
This here's a story about more than a few things, but mostly it's about Duane Fuller, who we all call Reb, so you might as well forget I told you his real name anyway. Now as with most stories about Reb it's got a few things in it what don't make no sense nohow. You're gonna have to bear with me over some of the rough spots; I expect you'll know 'em when you see 'em.
But lemme tell you it from the beginning, which is where I come in.
There we are at Slow Jack's Place lifting a few, Reb and me. The Place is a converted railroad passenger car. Jack painted all the windows black except the one at the end in the door, so it's dazzling to look that way when you're in there in the daytime. It gets dimmer the farther you get toward the back under the box air conditioner he Bondoed into the metal wall. Jack likes it that way, so people who don't know what he really is won't be too shocked right away.
We're at the bar, about halfway down where Jack took out some of the seats. Nobody's in there but us and Jack. Reb's on my left so the low sun throws the brown shadow of his bottle all the way down past mine. I get to thinking and tu
rn to him and say, "You know, I don't recall seeing you around the last month."
Reb says, "I was in Italy. Didn't you hear?"
"No," I say, because I hadn't. "Maybe did you and Maybelle go away that week I was up to Tulsa visiting my niece?" Maybelle, that's his wife.
"Most likely," he says. "It was kind of sudden."
It all started—says Reb—with that box of Cracker Jack.
* * *
Now normally (Reb says) I don't eat the stuff, what with getting popcorn bits between my teeth and just generally being able to take peanuts or leave them. But when a guy's drinking the fancy imported beer that his son brought all the way from Arizona because he wants his pa to like the slip of a girl he's bringing along—why, then a guy's just got to have something to wash that beer down with. So I opened the Cracker Jack and passed it around. Let me tell you, it washed that beer down mighty fine.
Soon enough we got down to the bottom of that box, and all that was left was the prize: a teeny puffy paper pillow with something heavy inside. I tried to give it to my boy Dallas and he gave it back, and I tried to give it to that girl Patricia of his, and she gave it back. Finally Maybelle up and said so open it already.
About then my boy Dallas asked if we've started keeping cattle that are maybe given to stampeding and I said no.
And after that Patricia asked if we're prone to earthquakes here in Anthem, Texas, and I said no.
And then I tore the end of that prize off and tilted it so what was inside rolled out onto my palm. Turned out it was a ring, gold-plated and looking mightily expensive. I resolved then and there to buy Cracker Jack more often. There was a folded piece of paper in the envelope, too, so I asked Maybelle to fetch me my reading glasses.
She was on her way to get them when she happened to look out the window and she said, Law, would you look at that? Dallas and Patricia, they ran to look, so I went to fetch my glasses my own self.
Maybelle yelled something about her pea patch. I ambled over to the window, unfolding that paper as I went. When I got there, the window was rattling fit to burst. I looked out and what do you think was landing out there? A helicopter, that's what, a big old jobber like they use to fly whole tanks around.
Well, we all gawked for a long second or two, afore I remembered the paper in my hand. I looked down at it.
Congratulations, it read, you're the new Pope.
* * *
"The Pope," I say to Reb, peering up at him and setting my beer down. "Imagine that. I thought they'd have a fancier system for picking 'em." I pull out my spiral notebook what the Daily Sun gave me and start writing down keywords.
"Seems they do," says Reb. "It's got to do with them taking votes of people they call 'Cardinals.' Not like the St. Louis variety; I reckon they're more like senators. And they vote and they vote. If they don't decide in eight votes, though, they're deadlocked. And blamed if that ain't what happened this time. First time since Jesus appointed Saint Peter the first Pope, they said."
* * *
But I learned all that later. Just then we were all in a tizzy about having unexpected visitors. The pilot set that helicopter down pretty as you please between the pecan trees, the Well of Youth, and the pea patch, although he did blow over a few trellises. Old Blue the Fifteenth lost his doghouse, but the Good Lord knows you do make sacrifices. Maybelle said Law she was going to have to break out the good china now and Dallas went to get his camera. Patricia asked me did we get things landing on the lawn often, and I said not since that roc-bird back in sixty-four. You remember, Buddy, that's when we lost the first Blue. Or was it the second?
Anyway.
You never saw the like of the troop that come out of that helicopter. There were guys in black suits who held one hand up to their ears, the spitting image of the folks who guard the President. And there were these guys in armor carrying spears, setting up one of those whatchacallits, an honor guard. And then they unrolled a red carpet. I kid you not, a red carpet just like it was the Academy Awards on television or something. A guy came out waving a ball that had smoke coming out of it. I figured they didn't want skeeters bothering them.
The last one out was a man in red robes with a hat like a gimme cap but it didn't have a brim. Wouldn'ta kept the sun off his neck none, hope to tell you. He took one look around and I could tell he didn't particularly cotton to what he saw, and then he marched to the house surrounded by the black suits. I figured, let them knock, and after a little bit that's just what they did.
Dallas let them in and we served ice tea all around in the glasses we brought back from the Alexandria Library. Red Hat introduced himself as Cardinal Matthew Carlino. He said did I get the invitation and I said I got the ring if that's what you mean. He said that means their gee-pee-ess dingus was working just fine.
So Carlino asked me did I want to be Pope and I said I thought they'd already decided themselves. And he said sure they've decided, but I have to say okay too. Now as it happened I was between jobs at the time, so I said yes.
* * *
"Neighborly of them to ask," I say.
"Right neighborly, except I do keep forgetting to ask what a job pays before accepting it. But anyway, then they asked me if I was Catholic."
"You aren't, are you?"
"As it happens, I was." Reb looks down at the bar for one whole entire minute. "The janitor at the high school, Mr. Herrera, remember him, he's the one got sainted last year? He was a Catholic, and he and his wife used to have me over for pie or cake after school. They were the ones who converted me to Catholicism with a—whatcha call, a confirmation and all. There was a time I'd do anything to piss off the folks." His pop, the pastor of First Anthem Baptist, that's who he really meant. "Cardinal Carlino seemed really relieved, and I wondered how many people he'd been to see in that fancy helicopter of his before he got to me. I kinda figured he'd bring up my being married next, since I never heard of a married Pope. But no, he slid right past that subject. So then he said what name did I want to have as Pope."
"How's that?" I say, fixing to get indignant. "They wanted to give you a different name?"
"I didn't get that either, so I just told 'em that the name my buddies gave me in high school was good enough." Reb slaps the bar, raising a cloud of dust that swirls around in the air like dirt behind a big rig. Slow Jack looks over and waves a granite finger at him all slow-like; he likes it quiet in his bar, the way it used to be on the top of that church in France. "Anyway," Reb says, "from then on they all called me Pope Rebel the First."
"The First," I say. "The One and Only is more like it."
"That's what I like about you, Buddy, you're none too subtle." He lifts the bottle to take his last swig.
Well now, that sounds like a compliment to me, so I up and buy him another Coors.
* * *
We all trooped out and got on that helicopter, which took us to DFW airport, where we got on a jet, just the five of us and the cardinal. Boy, howdy, how we all howled—especially old Blue—when that plane took off straight up! I looked out the window and its jets were pointing straight downward, just like a rocket's. That jet took us to an aircraft carrier in the Gulf, the Saint Agricola of Avignon they called it, which took us all the way to Italy. I remember the name of the ship because I kept one of the cocktail napkins for a snotrag.
And then there we were docking in Port Civvy-something. It's near Rome on the west coast of Italy. They got this Hummer with tinted windows, which it took us to a subway station. We didn't have to buy tickets, though—that place was there just for us and whatever other muckitymuck wanted to go to the Vatican. Blamed if that subway car didn't look just like the monorail at Disneyland, excepting there weren't no Mickey painted on the side. Instead there was a painted cross with Jesus on it, all bloody and looking mightily pained.
We took that subway forty miles to Vatican City, just west of Rome. Carlino, he told me the subway's been there a couple hundred years now. It used to be a secret, a back way into the catacombs, he
said, but now they let big celebrities like Judge Judy use it. Her and the President and Dwight Yoakum and all.
Pretty soon I knew what them catacombs Carlino had mentioned was. The subway started up and we're driving between twin walls of bodies, all turned to bones and stacked up like cordwood. I figured the stink in there would be worse'n anything, if the windows was open. But instead it was dark and cool in the car. Restful, like. I reckon I wouldn't mind being planted there myself, once I'm dead that is. For a second I wondered what the smell reminded me of—kind of piney, actually—and then I saw they had one of them tree-shaped freshener things hanging up front.