by Liz Williams
“Here,” Sek said. She gave Dreams-of-War a shove between her bare shoulder blades. The blue flame sizzled around her wrists and disappeared. “This is your weapon.”
It was a gutting knife with a scale handle. It fitted Dreams-of-War’s palm as though made for it.
“What am I to fight? These folk? I thought they were here to watch.” There were at least two hundred of them, too many with which to do battle. Dreams-of-War resolved to kill as many as she could before she herself escaped. She would not countenance the possibility of being vanquished; that was the first lesson that she had learned as a warrior.
“No, you are correct. They are the audience.”
“Then whom am I to fight?”
“Wait.”
Dreams-of-War could hear a low humming note echoing throughout the chamber. Minutes later, a glide-car appeared, swiveling on low-slung motors so that its back was toward the audience, and sending spirals of dust up from the floor. The vehicle was large, with a high back. As it drew to a halt, something within the enclosed section thudded against the wall. The glide-car rocked on its jets. The crowd sent up a low murmur of pleased anticipation. Sek gave Dreams-of-War another shove.
“Go.”
Dreams-of-War moved forward into a crouch, with the gutting knife drawn. A hatch slid open in the back of the glide-car, to reveal a cage. Something stirred heavily within. The cage door rattled up. Two beings leaped out and sprang to either side of the chamber, dodging behind pillars. Dreams-of-War had a fleeting, confused impression of striped skins, gaping mouths, hot yellow eyes, and human hands. The crowd howled. Dreams-of-War glanced from right to left and back again. There was no way out.
The change-tigers closed in, one on each side.
The Crater Plain
CHAPTER 1
Mars
At first, Lunae thought that the long voyage back in time had been no more than an illusion. The place in which they now stood was also small, dark, and filled with smoke. It took her a moment to realize that the smoke was coming from a fire, blazing a little distance from the entrance to a cave. Snatches of muttered conversation came from the direction of the flames: harsh voices, abrupt words. The cave was filled with a pungent smell, a bloody, overwhelming odor.
“Someone is cooking meat,” the kappa hissed, picking herself up from a bone-strewn floor.
“Is that what it is?” Lunae had never smelled anything like it before. Cautiously, she stepped to the lip of the cave and peered out.
Two slender crescents hung low over the horizon, against a sparkle of stars. After a moment, Lunae recognized familiar constellations, angled differently through clear sharp air. A blue star shone in the heavens between two ragged peaks.
“There,” the kappa said in her ear. “Earth!”
There was rough sandstone under Lunae’s hand, red in the light of the fire. And huddled around the blaze were three figures: squat, maned, licking short-clawed fingers.
“Hyenae.”
Very quietly, Lunae and the kappa made their way back into the recesses of the cave.
“What are we to do?”
“Perhaps there’s a way out at the back of the cave,” Lunae said. But investigation proved fruitless. The cavern ended in a smooth wall of rock. The only exit lay past the hyenae, whose home this all-too-clearly was.
The kappa nudged her. “If worse comes to worst, you must bend time for us.”
Lunae shivered. “I wish never to bend time again. Look where it’s got us.”
“Yes, but now we are back on Mars, in what I fervently hope to be the present day. And it is thanks to your gift. Or,” the kappa amended, “what your gift is to become.”
“I don’t want to take the risk.”
The kappa sighed. “Then we must find another way out.”
Lunae returned to the entrance of the cavern. The hyenae still sat, bickering over snatched scraps of gory meat. The smell of the meat, and of their bodies, was so strong that she hoped they would not be able to detect either herself or the kappa. But at some point they would surely return to the cave, when the night became dangerous and colder, and there was nowhere within it to hide. She could almost feel eyes on her back ... The sensation was so overwhelming that Lunae whipped around.
There was, indeed, an eye, yellow as a lion’s, peering out at her from within the wall.
Lunae sprang away and cannoned uncomfortably into the kappa.
“What is it?”
“Look!”
The kappa stared. The eye rolled around, angry and alarmed.
“Someone is in there. They’ve walled them up!”
A breath of sound, nothing more. Lunae, after a moment’s hesitation, put her ear to the wall. The kappa was already beginning to scrabble at its base, where a small pile of stones had been accumulated.
“Help me, Lunae.”
“We must be quieter!” She cast an anxious glance at the cave mouth. The hyenae were still there, but their meal was almost over. A mound of bones, glistening with saliva in the firelight, had grown behind them. Lunae clawed at the stones, placing each one gently on the ground. The kappa’s broad hands paddled away, scraping stone and mortar both. The mortar released a clear, gummy substance that clung to Lunae’s hands and stank. Soon, bound feet were revealed, then legs. The prisoner was not, Lunae noted, wearing armor. More space was cleared and the prisoner writhed downward, angling her body through the newly made hole and struggling clear. The kappa hacked at the bonds on wrists and ankles with a rock, freeing her.
There was a high-pitched yell from the mouth of the cavern. Lunae turned to see a hyenae bounding toward them on all fours, jaws gaping. The teeth were like a baboon’s; claws rasped on the rocky floor.
The prisoner tore a filthy gag from her mouth, gave a yell of her own and rushed forward. Lunae snatched up a rock and threw it at the hyenae. The kappa emitted a warbling cry like a trapped frog. Her tongue lashed forth to catch the hyenae underneath the ear. It fell, with a bloody puncture staining the matted mane. Two more entered the cavern, fanning outward. The prisoner kicked up, catching one of the hyenae in the groin. It reeled back, whimpering. The second creature grasped Lunae around the waist and lifted her up, spinning to avoid the kappa’s tongue.
The prisoner cried out in Martian, a long and hissing string of syllables. Something—fire-blackened, stained, unnatural—rose up in a liquid column from the floor. It fell upon the hyenae that held Lunae and flowed smoothly about his head and shoulders. Lunae, abruptly released, dropped to the floor. Muffled cries came from within the enveloping mass, but soon were stifled. The mass glided away, to rest at the warrior’s feet. The hyenae lay where it had fallen, tongue lolling, quite dead.
Lunae stared at the corpses in fascinated horror. When she next looked up, the prisoner was encased in armor that resembled that worn by Dreams-of-War, except that this was ochre and fawn instead of burnished green. There was a faint facial resemblance, but Lunae could not tell if this might be due to genetics, or simply Martian arrogance. Besides, this woman had red hair.
“Who are you?” the kappa gasped.
“I am a warrior!” The voice could have been that of Dreams-of-War: arrogant, irritated. “Who are you?” the warrior demanded.
Improvising hastily, Lunae said, “We have come in search of a—kinswoman of yours. We last saw her on Earth. Perhaps she has returned to Mars.” As far as she knew, this was far from the truth, but she felt compelled to offer some explanation for their presence.
The warrior frowned. “It was as though you appeared out of the air.”
“Not so. We wandered the region and found ourselves in the hands of these creatures. Perhaps you lost consciousness for a moment,” the kappa remarked smoothly.
“Perhaps,” the warrior said reluctantly, clearly unconvinced.
“And yourself?”
The warrior’s face became a rictus of anger and disdain.
“I was captured.” Having spent months in the company of Dreams-of-War, L
unae could tell what this admission cost her. “They knocked me unconscious and stripped me of the armor. They prize such things, though they do not understand how to use them. They fight and snap and bicker endlessly, trying to coerce our technology to do their bidding. They never succeed.”
“But they didn’t kill you.”
“No. I was with others, who are now dead. The hyenae are not wholly unintelligent. They walled me up, to make sure that I was secure, until they wished to eat me.”
“I am surprised,” the kappa said with care, “that a meal was all they had in mind for you. I know the reputation of males.”
The warrior snorted. “It would have been the worse for them had they tried. I have internal modifications, like all members of the warrior clans.”
A short, contemplative silence ensued.
“What manner of creature are you?” the warrior asked at last, scowling at the kappa.
“I am a kappa, from the northern regions of Earth. I am the nurse of this girl.”
“You are an amphibian or some such?”
“An amphibian, yes.”
The warrior’s scowl deepened. “You will not find it easy in this part of Mars. This is the Isidis Reach, the southern part of the Crater Plain. We are far from the Small Sea or the lake lands.”
“I will have to manage,” the kappa said with a sigh.
“What is your name?” Lunae asked.
The warrior drew herself up with a familiar show of pride. “I am named Knowledge-of-Pain.”
“I think I have heard that name before.”
“Naturally. I am infamous.”
“I think it may have been spoken by my guardian, a woman of Mars—the person we have come here to find.”
“Her name?”
“Dreams-of-War.”
The warrior gave a slow nod. “I know her. She and I grew up in the clan house together. We do not make bonds, as you know, but she and I are not wholly antagonistic, except insofar as is natural. I had heard that she was sent to Earth. I don’t know anything of her return.”
“Do you know the ones who sent her?”
“Of course. They are the Memnos Matriarchy, who govern us all. They will know what has become of her.” The warrior paused. “How did you become separated?”
“It’s a long story.” Lunae was thinking of the words of her future-self: Do not trust the Matriarchy.
The warrior nodded. “Very well. As you can see, it is dark, and I am hungry. I have had no food for three days. They would not remove the gag, in case I summoned my armor.”
“There may be roots or berries, perhaps,” the kappa ventured. Knowledge-of-Pain gave a hiss of disapproval and rolled the body of a hyenae over with her toe.
“Nonsense. There is plenty of meat.” She plucked a knife from some inner fold of the armor and tossed it at the kappa’s feet. “Start gutting.”
CHAPTER 2
Earth
Dreams-of-War ran backward until she was up against one of the stone pillars. The crowd kept up its muted sound, almost a low growl. It did not sound like anything that should come from a human throat, and perhaps, Dreams-of-War grimly reflected, it did not. The change-tigers were prowling, playing, paying little attention to her. They bore a faint resemblance to the hyenae of the Martian mountains: of similar height, but less bulky, products of ancient and whimsical engineering, crude soldiers for another age. Dreams-of-War had to admit, however, that they were impressive. Upright, the rib cage was massive; she could see the complex weave of bone beneath short, shaved fur. The legs bent forward at the knee, like a human’s, but the jaws and skull were long. They moved with blurred speed, almost faster than she could track, occasionally dropping to all fours and bounding. One of them pranced up to her, tail coiling, jaws agape.
“Get away from me,” Dreams-of-War hissed, and struck out with the gutting knife.
“Oh no,” the tiger said, low and purring. “That would be no fun at all.”
Some kind of mechanism whirred and clicked in its throat, permitting speech. Its eyes were noon-bright, filled with amusement. It batted Dreams-of-War with a casual clawed hand, a blur of stripes. She dodged away, shifting aside from the feint, but the next blow sent her sprawling. The change-tiger turned and loped away. Dreams-of-War scrambled to her feet.
The second tiger was sitting in a neat heap between two pillars, energetically licking a hind foot. Dreams-of-War stole a glance at the crowd. Sek stood, arms folded, with the dour woman at her side. The faces of the crowd were impassive, and Dreams-of-War realized with a shock that this was not some frenzied audience baying for blood. This was just an ordinary night out for them. The muted howling was the equivalent of polite applause. They did not really care who killed what, as long as killing was done and they got to see some blood at the end of the evening, to puncture the tedium of their everyday lives. And if by chance she killed the change-tigers, what then? They would only capture more, and the same scenario would be replayed until Dreams-of-War was torn to pieces or the crowd became bored.
But what option did she have? Flight was next to impossible and so was strategy, of which Dreams-of-War was not in any case enamored. No, it would have to be direct battle, she decided with relief. She uttered a yell and rushed forward.
One of the change-tigers, still coiled in a knot to wash, glanced up with mild yellow surprise, and rose languidly to its feet. It towered above her, perhaps seven feet or more. Telling herself that it was no different from the hyenae, Dreams-of-War feinted, darted aside as the tiger swiped, stabbed again, leaped aside. She fought with grim determination; the tiger had not even begun. It grinned at her, tolerant, a human adult confronting an angry child. Dreams-of-War fought as though the whole of her concentration had become focused upon this single foe, as if the odds against her had caused her to grow desperate. She fought as though there was not a second beast, sidling up behind her, discernible from scent and shadows and the growing, expectant hush of the crowd.
Ghostly claws, like some monstrous shadow puppet, appeared on the pillar before her, cast by the flickering light. The beast before her grinned again, made a small, mock pounce. Dreams-of-War dodged, and without looking, stabbed back in a sweeping arc with the gutting knife.
The change-tiger was too close to avoid the blow. Dreams-of-War felt hot, wet satisfaction, as thick as the blood that spattered her bare spine. She ripped upward with the gutting knife, almost losing her grip on its handle. She did not glance back to see what had become of it; she saw the shadow go down. The beast before her uttered a wailing snarl and dived forward. Dreams-of-War stepped with precision into the widening pool of blood and slid, fetching up with her back against the pillar.
The tiger turned and threw itself upon her. She did not think it cared any longer if it lived or died. In all the old stories, the cunning warrior-maiden would have turned the tale around: spoken softly to the tiger, offered it inducements to flight, fled with it into the mountains, away from the people who exploited it. But Dreams-of-War knew she did not possess the necessary guile. She brought up the gutting knife as it leaped. It speared itself, burying her in a tide of blood and torn skin and fur. She felt its final hot breath wash across her face, stinking of old meat. It winked at her as it died: a last cat-joke.
The crowd surged forward with a howl. Dreams-of-War thrust the corpse away, sprang to her feet, and ran for the nearest door. If the crowd were in the way, she thought as she ran, so much the worse for them.
Behind her, a terrible baying filled the air. At first, she wondered if it might be one of the tigers, not dead as hoped, but a swift look back told her that it was the normally languid Sek: head thrown back, eyes tightly shut, mouth open in an animal howl. Dreams-of-War decided not to waste time on what this might mean. Thrusting the scattering crowd out of her way, she kicked open the door and was through.
Hours later, Dreams-of-War stood on the edge of a headland, staring out across the ocean. It was not long since dawn and the maw of the Chain glittered
in the west, catching the light of the rising sun like a skein of captured stars. Dreams-of-War chafed cold, scraped hands and cursed beneath her breath, but inwardly, she exulted. She had thrown off her pursuers at some point in the night, running through the tangle of forest behind the combat ground.
Sek’s howls still echoed in her head. Dreams-of-War frowned. Memnos has a new Matriarch now.
What did that imply? Nothing good, surely. At least she no longer had to suffer Yskatarina’s creature’s crawling presence.
Somewhere out there was Lunae, floating in those green waves, tossed by the world’s tide. Dreams-of-War’s exultation faltered and faded. Whatever her current state of freedom, she had failed, and Lunae’s loss bit at her, sharper than a tiger’s tooth. She did not like feeling so helpless. Instinct told her to go on searching, but Dreams-of-War knew that in this case, instinct lied.
You do not mourn the dead. They are gone, and will not thank you.
The Martian way was to remove all traces of the person: warrior’s insignia melted down, images destroyed, the name never mentioned, even to oneself. There were, of course, exceptions, relating principally to armor and weapons, but that was a legacy of haunt-tech rather than any ingrained stoicism in the face of mortality. If the spirits of the dead can be used as a source of power, then that power must be contained and limited. Dreams-of-War knew that it was not so superstitiously simple as that, but she still could not help but believe.