Wandering Soul

by Steven Anderson

  “You do know where you are and what was about to happen, don’t you? Who your stepmother really is?”

  I felt proud of her, more proud than I had ever felt before in my life. “Of course. I am the daughter of Ysabeau Romee.”

  CHAPTER 11

  PARADISE

  “It would have started right then, you know? Another five minutes and she would have been up on that plinth with a thousand people around her shouting her name.” Winn was talking to Cuza while I sipped cold water from my new cup, my head pounding.

  “We’d have had blood in the streets by nightfall,” Cuza sighed, disappointed.

  “They were inside my head,” I whispered to Winona while Cuza started pacing around the room. “It felt so good with them in there. The words felt right, and I wanted to hug all of them, they seemed so precious to me. I had such a feeling of love for every single person there. It was like I was the Warrens.”

  “At least you didn’t feel like you wanted to kill people the way I did,” Winona whispered back.

  “Oh, but I did. And not one or two at a time. I wanted… war. With the Tarakana in my head, I wanted to lead them into war. The whole plan was there in front of me. I still feel it. Four months to unite the clans and then we can take the capital in three weeks. Less than twenty thousand dead.” I nodded to myself. The cold water felt good on my tongue while I waited for what Cuza had given me to stop my head from aching.

  Winona’s display pad pinged and she unrolled it on the table. “Samuel,” she told me.

  He started talking before she could say hello. “Is she insane? Boden was just here asking about what it would take to revoke her Union citizenship so he can have her executed.”

  “I should have anticipated that someone was recording it,” Winona sighed.

  She glanced at Cuza, who just shrugged. “It’s all good. I wouldn’t mind watching it a couple more times myself.”

  She turned back to Sam. “Do I need to hide her somewhere?”

  “No.” Sam sounded frightened and he kept looking over his shoulder like he expected someone to be breaking down his door. “I think you’re going to be on a shuttle by nightfall, though. Ambassador Killian wants you gone. All of you.”

  I leaned in front of Winona, pushing her out of my way. “Sam, I, um, I…” Whatever it was that I had wanted to say, the long explanation and apology that I had been formulating, vanished from my head at the sight of him. All I managed was, “I’m so sorry. I just couldn’t help myself.”

  He sighed. “Yeah, I get that about you.” He frowned at me for a very long moment and then he started to smile, although I could see him fighting against it. My head didn’t hurt quite so much. “I’m starting to understand a lot about ‘couldn’t help myself’ thanks to you. Promise you’ll call me once you’re safely off planet.”

  I nodded, not trusting my voice. Winona shoved me back away from the pad. “I’m tempted to hide her anyway to keep her from doing anything else she can’t help.”

  “Hold on.” Sam was touching things on his screen. “Um, her parents have just been released and are in route to the Mission… two special officers of the Guard… armed.”

  “What are you reading?” Winn asked him.

  “Oh, his mail. Ambassador Killian talks to himself sometimes, like when he’s entering his password. I’ve been reading his mail in addition to listening to his meetings.”

  “Samuel, have you considered that Mala Dusa is a dangerous influence in your life?”

  “Yeah. But what choice do I have?” He tapped at the screen some more. “This is odd. There’s confirmation of the Guard, but Killian hasn’t sent anything to schedule a shuttle. Someone else must be doing that.”

  “What Union ships are on orbit that are headed to Earth next?” Winona’s voice had dropped and her breathing had changed, becoming rapid and shallow.

  Sam tapped, looked, and tapped again. “None. They must be routing you through Dulcinea or maybe Pomplamoose.”

  “Well, the day got a bunch more interesting just now, didn’t it?” Cuza rumbled.

  The door slammed behind us. Winona touched the icon to disconnect and Sam vanished.

  I turned and watched Father Ryczek striding across the dining hall towards us. He was not a large man, and he was old, but the look on his face terrified me.

  “Cuza!” he shouted while he was still ten meters away. “How could you have allowed this to happen?”

  “It’s going to happen, Father, you know that. What you saw today shows just how small a spark it’s gonna take to light it off.”

  He sat down heavily in the chair next to me. “And you, thorn in my flesh, what can I do about you? Or should I call you Joan now?”

  “Joan?”

  He pointed at one of the stained glass windows. “Daughter of Romee, is that your future self?”

  The young woman in the window was kneeling with a large sword in her hands and a halo surrounding her head. There were red flames in the background, hinting at her fate.

  “No,” I whispered to him. “Please, no.”

  “You say ‘no’, but your every action, your every breath is taking you down that path.”

  “I can’t–” I was going to tell him that I couldn’t help myself, but that would’ve been a lie.

  “They’re on the way here, so I’m told, Ted and,” he sighed, grimacing, “Hannah. Cuza, I know you well enough to know what you’ll be planning. Is it in the service of God and of His Mission here in the Warrens?”

  “It is, Father.”

  “There’s no other way?”

  “No, Father.”

  Father Ryczek sighed and struggled to his feet. He looked around the dining hall and started walking toward the exit. “Clean up when you’re finished.”

  “Yes, Father.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked when he was gone.

  “It means that we’re probably not going to make it back in time for the fall semester.”

  “It means the two of you should go to your room and I’ll call you when I’m ready for you.”

  “Please, sir,” Winona asked. “Let us to stay until they arrive. Then Mala Dusa and I can go to our room to get our things. We can provide you with a good distraction.” She was staring at him, eyes large, until he smiled back at her.

  “Fine.”

  Cuza started pacing around the room again, stretching, and rolling his neck around in loud circles. “Damn, I’m gettin’ old.”

  “Winn, what are you planning,” I whispered.

  “There’s no shuttle coming for us.”

  “I figured that part out on my own.”

  “We’ll need to overpower the Guards to make our escape.” She seemed more excited than frightened, her face glowing.

  “And go where? This whole place seems to run on cash and you’re the only one with any coins.”

  “Not any more. I gave you the last of them to buy that cup.”

  “We should run and there’s nowhere to run. I want to hide and there’s no place to hide.” I looked around the room, searching for an answer, panic starting to fill me. Cuza was leaned against the wall examining a knife he had pulled from his boot. The blade alone must have been twenty-five centimeters.

  Winona kissed my lips. “Mala Dusa. Saint Joan.” She giggled, making me smile. “Be brave. Your parents will be here in a few minutes.”

  I took a deep breath and nodded.

  “Let’s go, you two. There’s an office by the foyer and I’d rather have a smaller space for this kind of work. That and I don’t want to mess up the dining hall so close to meal time.”

  I was shaking while I walked between the two of them, trying to absorb the easy confidence they seemed to share.

  The office had a conference table with six chairs, and a desk. Cuza moved things around a little and said,
“Mala Dusa, you’ll sit here, Winona, here next to where I’ll sit. Your parents on the other side with one Guard, and that will leave the desk chair for the other one. When I ask you to go to get your things, circle around to the right first.”

  “Just Mala Dusa,” Winona told him. “I have an idea.” She went to Cuza and whispered in his ear so I couldn’t hear.

  “I don’t get to know the plan?” I realized my voice was shaking badly.

  “No. Your part is to stand up and walk to the door. It’s going to be OK.”

  “And no tears from you,” Cuza warned Winona.

  “Those will come later,” she replied.

  My tears started as soon as I saw my dad. Professor Theodore Holloman, who would have been home teaching a summer class in stratigraphy if it wasn’t for me, had been beaten. They had dressed him in an ugly grey jumpsuit before bringing him to the Mission. His face was bruised on the left side, and swollen. When I ran to hug him, he held me at arm’s length.

  “Gently, Dusa. I’ve got a couple of ribs that are trying to heal.” I rested my head on his shoulder while he rubbed my back for a few seconds. From him I felt sorrow.

  Hannah was dressed in the same sort of shapeless gray jumpsuit as Dad. She seemed unhurt, other than a deep cut on one cheek and a look in her eyes colder than I’d ever seen before. I could feel her need for vengeance. It was so powerful that it was like it was echoing inside my skull. She glanced at Cuza, and for a second I thought he was going to kneel in front of her.

  He took her hand and kissed it. “Been a while,” he said.

  “You haven’t changed.”

  “Not much.”

  She smiled, looking incredibly dangerous. “We’ll see.”

  She held me close and whispered. “I’m sorry for what’s about to happen.” I started shaking again, so hard it was making it difficult to stand; I couldn’t help it or stop it. She kissed the top of my head before letting go.

  We all filed into the office, Cuza telling the Guards what they needed to do. “I am Cuza, representing Father Ryczek and the Holy Church of God’s Mission in the Warrens. These two children were under persecution and have asked for, and been granted sanctuary. You need to reveal to me why their persecution is at an end, and that their passage home will be secure and free of further threat.”

  Senior Officer Steiner was smirking. Looking at his face, I think he must have spent a lot of time smirking. “Is it really necessary that we endure this archaic formality?”

  “It is if you want me to allow these two young girls to accompany you.”

  Steiner drummed his fingers on the table. “Fine. These two ‘young girls’, who fled from the Guardians of the Peace and who, just this morning, spoke words of sedition to an unlawful assembly in the Warrens, are being escorted off this world to a place where they can cause no further trouble.”

  Cuza smiled back at him. “You’ll need to be more specific.”

  Office Trilby answered for Steiner. She was late-twenties and there was a kindness in her eyes that clashed with her body-armor and sidearm. “We will go with the four of them from here to the spaceport, then up to the docks to ensure that they board the merchant ship Gellhorn. Once they are on board, our job is done. Is that specific enough, Mr. Cuza?”

  I don’t think she knew that no shuttle had been requested or that no merchant ship named Gellhorn was currently in the space docks. I glanced at Winona, but she was totally focused on Cuza and Steiner.

  “Yes, thank you Officer Trilby. Children, do you need to get anything before your departure?”

  “Yes,” I stammered. “I have a bag, and I need my cup from the dining hall.” I stumbled to my feet, everyone staring at me.

  “Should I go with her?” Trilby asked.

  Steiner leered at me. “Naw, although I wouldn’t mind going with her myself if I thought we had the time. What a pity.” He looked me up and down and my shaking got worse.

  Trilby glanced at her partner with a look of disgust. “Be quick, girl.”

  I nodded and Winona turned toward Steiner. “I need to go with her. Hold this for me.” She slid a stone across at him and Steiner instinctively reached for it, his hand grabbing it in the center of the table.

  Cuza was quick. The knife left his boot, arced through the air with all the power of his right arm behind it and slammed down, pinning Steiner’s hand to the table, burying the tip deep into the wood.

  I jumped back, feeling like a bolt of electricity had hit me when he screamed. Cuza slammed Steiner hard in the chest a fraction of a second later, driving him to the floor and leaving a significant part of his right hand behind, still attached to the knife. My dad had taken Steiner’s side arm at some point; everything was moving too fast for me to see it all. The sharp bang when the pistol went off in the small office made my ears ring and I jumped again. There was blood on me. There was blood everywhere.

  Officer Trilby was lying on the floor trying to reach her holster. Hannah had knocked her there and was now standing over her watching her struggle.

  Dad handed Hannah the pistol and she aimed it at Trilby’s head. I don’t know what it was that Hannah was feeling. It was beyond naming. I didn’t have to guess what Trilby was feeling; I could see it in her eyes and I could smell it.

  “Enough!” I shouted. I pushed past the overturned chairs and got down on the floor next to her. “It’s enough.”

  “Get out of the way, Mala Dusa.”

  “No!”

  “Do you know what they did to your father while they made me watch? Do you know what they did to me while they made him watch? Get out of my way.”

  “‘They’. You said ‘they’. They did it, not this one, not her. You don’t have to kill her. Cuza, you must have someplace you can keep her until we’re gone and it doesn’t matter anymore.”

  Cuza was wiping the blood and bits of flesh off of his knife onto Steiner’s pants. “Yeah, I suppose.”

  Hannah lowered the gun a fraction. “It’s an unnecessary risk.”

  Trilby looked at me and then at Hannah. “Why are you doing this? Why couldn’t you just get on the damn shuttle and leave?” Her eyes kept darting over to Steiner’s body.

  Winona knelt down next to her, staring into her eyes, her head tipped. “You aren’t stupid. If you think it through, you will realize that there was never going to be a shuttle. And the Union merchant ship Martha Gellhorn? She left Bodens Gate two days ago.”

  “I didn’t know.” She looked at Steiner again and dabbed at the blood that was trickling from her nose. “God damn him. He told me this was going to be a quick, easy assignment, that we’d have a little fun. He didn’t mention killing children.”

  She sighed, shivering and looked up at Cuza. “Get them out of here first. I don’t want them to see it.”

  Cuza nodded. “Alright you two, out. Go clean up and get changed. We’ve a long walk ahead of us.” He turned to Hannah, taking the gun from her. “You should leave too. Go talk with the Little Soul.”

  “No, you can’t do this,” I protested. I felt like all the strength was gone from my body. “You said you could hold her for a while.”

  Hannah took my hand and pulled me to my feet and out of the office. “He was lying to you, Dusa. There’s only one way this can end.” She closed the door behind us.

  It was almost twenty minutes later that I jumped at the distant sound of the bang. Hannah was wiping my face with a damp cloth. She paused, looking at Dad. “Cuza.” She shook her head, rinsing the cloth in the bowl on her lap.

  “He killed her,” I whispered. “Why, Mom?”

  “Twenty minutes? Cuza would never be so cruel as to wait that long. He’ll claim he killed her, but she’s alive somewhere; somewhere out of our way for now, I hope.”

  “Because it was the right thing to do,” I told her.

  “Huh. Tip your chin up a b
it.” She wiped my throat and frowned. “Cuza spared her because you asked him to. I’ll bet he’s called you ‘Alice’ more than once too. He had a soft spot for her. I see it in his eyes every time he looks at you that he loves you in the same way. OK, all done. Winona, stay there, you’re next.”

  Dad sat down on the bed next to me while Hannah started on Winn’s forehead. He winced as his ribs shifted. “Almost ready?”

  “Ready for what? To live as a fugitive in the Warrens the rest of my life? Hannah told me that you once almost killed a man because he was a threat. It must have been satisfying to finally get it done, to kill someone with the bullet that was meant for her.”

  When Hannah wants to know what I’m feeling, it’s like she’s grabbing my brain and shaking it. With Dad it feels more like a hug. He was hugging me hard, so I closed my eyes and let him look.

  “OK, I wasn’t going to tell you about this, but you need to know.” He paused and I could feel him struggling. “Steiner, that man who looked at you when you got up, and wanted to…”

  “The man that wanted to rape me?” I had meant to keep my voice calm when I said it. It still broke, thinking about the man that had wanted to follow me back to my room and rape me before he murdered me and the rest of my family. I was starting to shake again.

  “Yes. He was there when they were interrogating us. They would alternate every few hours, working on one while they questioned the other. He was the one that held Hannah down while another man ripped off her dress.”

  My hand was up over my mouth and Dad continued. “They didn’t physically rape her, but they talked about it constantly, using it as a weapon. They kept her naked the whole time, tied up, humiliating her and me. There wasn’t anything I could do to protect her. They kept at her, touching her, hitting her, saying they wouldn’t stop and that they would rape her if I didn’t admit who she was. Do you understand now why I killed him?”

  He had said it all very calmly, his voice even and flat. I could feel the rage underneath it though, how he would like to go back and kill Steiner again and then again and again, over and over until the pain stopped.