King Tides Curse

by C J Timms

  One of the kings guard tapped Jacobian on the shoulder and bent down to whisper in his ear. Jacobian sighed. ‘Ah…alas business calls, unless you can chain me to the table. Please, look after my little anvil. There’s always a meal at the Swan house. Feel free to bring any upstanding young friends or siblings that might be marriage material.’

  Jane went an even brighter shade of crimson. Jacobian gathered Jane up in a bear hug and then gave them all a final nod. ‘You should call your brother sometime Jane, he misses you.’

  Jacobian bounced away toward the molten throne and King Wratchet.

  Fiore watched Jacobian go. ‘Well we’re nearly there, after dessert I’ll send you home.’

  The waiter came round with deserts, coffee and tiny biscuits. Fiore took particular pleasure in trying the little sweet treats.

  ‘Your name is Fiore?’ Gale asked.

  ‘Why…is that funny?’ The girl looked at him very pointedly.

  ‘No…nothing…funny about it.’ Gale said

  The girl looked him up and down, then procured more desserts.

  ‘Petit Fiore.’ Gale whispered to Swan and gestured to the dessert tray. Swan’s face tightened, ‘Gale…no’ She whispered.

  Fiore’s eyes blazed orange, and Script surged around her. She hurled Gale back into the wall with locomotive force.

  ‘Noone calls me that. I am not petite. I am Locomotyr, my will is force.’

  Fiore slammed Gale back against the wall again. His head shook from the impact. The children’s table exploded into the air in a shower of cutlery and dessert. The nobility fled for the exit, and King Wratchet’s guard hustled the king away.

  Gale was pinned against the wall by locomotive force. Yip was slammed up into the wall beside him before murky stepping away. Gale wheezed out a breath, horrible pressure built on his chest. Titus was slammed up next to him by the tiny doll-like Fiore, orange and silver Script surging around her.

  ‘Titus, get her.’ Gale wheezed out.

  Titus looked back at him, horrified, ‘I…I…can’t.’

  ‘You can’t? Damnit man you punched a hydra last week.’

  ‘I can’t hit a little girl, I’m not a grub Gale. It's against the rules.’ Titus said, his Canuteian tattoos dull. Another wave of locomotive force smacked Titus into the wall.

  Swan leapt from the children’s table. She ran along the table, turning cutlery into molten metal. She weaved her hands, and a dome of liquid metal surged around Fiore. Swan flicked her hair and stared back at them. ‘Come on you strapping young bucks, you gonna get beat up by a little girl.’

  The metal dome broke open. Kinetic force slammed Swan into the wall.’

  Gale wheezed out another breath. ‘Doing great Swan.’

  Yip’s shape murky stepped around the room in the chaos. What was the little blighter up to? He must have some grand plan to save them. Yip never entered a room without an exit strategy. He must be biding his time, waiting to strike, building…

  Was he stealing a plate?

  With the pressure building on his chest, Gale felt the chestnut of Deep Script being pushed down, compressed into a tiny nut of energy. He tried to tap it, but it was…shy? Awkward? Suppressed? The pressure built, Fiore’s outstretched hand pushed hard against them until Gale thought he would be ground into a paste.

  Then the core of Script in him cracked. Deep Script roared out into him. He saw lines, in reality, cracks and breaks. He saw how they could be shifted like blocks in a game of Jenga.

  He saw images of a forest deep in Wyldfell, a lumbering behemoth in caverns under the earth. He saw a mass of grey cloaked figures gathered beneath a purple sky. He saw the University’s beach. He reached out and pulled the block that lead there.

  Reality cracked open, a portal burst wide.

  The locomotive pressure burst. Gale grabbed the others and pulled them through the break. They collapsed on the University’s beach, and Gale showed the block back in sealing the fracture. His Script gave out, and he vomited onto the sand.

  ‘How did you do that?’ Yip asked. ‘Gale, are you a Sawbones?’

  Gale shook his head, he didn’t think so. ‘A Deep thing?’ Gale shrugged wiping vomit off his mouth. The truth was Gale had no explanation. He’d have to ask Blush if he could bear the embarrassment. Maybe Ash, if she wasn’t still pissed at him.

  ‘We didn’t even get paid. Good job pissing off the royalty of Locomotyr.’ Swan said. ‘However…’

  Swan reached down and grabbed Gale’s butt with a grin. Gale yelped. Swan pulled a jewel-encrusted fork from it. ‘That should cover some of it.’

  From their clothing they started pulling jewelled knives, forks, Yip even pulled a plate from his cloak, he’d been busy while the fight was happening.

  ‘I don’t think Gibraltar will take this as payment.’ Gale said. ‘At least we know a good pawnbroker.’

  Swan sighed ‘Heartstrings is gonna rip us off something fierce.’ Then she brandished a golden spoon at them all. ‘And if any of you tell my dad more stories, I will tear you apart.’

  Gale - Jetpack

  Deep users have been called by many names such as deepstrider, blood-thinner and salt-touched. I however prefer the term Trenchwalker, as it seems the most cheery. I like walks.

  The journal of Grimace the Heretic.

  Gale banged a pipe on the wall and then threw it away. It clanged on the floor of the Eureka room. Gale slumped into the Eureka bath and held up a flimsy paper crown he’d found in the bathtub previously. He was wasting time.

  After a whole weekend spent going over the room systematically had lead him to no clues. It turned out that this room, which he had dubbed the Eureka room, had been the subject of a full-scale inquiry by multiple teams of investigators due to the disappearance of the previous owner. None of them had ever worked out the answer, and as it was...well...a crime scene, it had been left where it was. Hell, Yip had burst into laughter the first time Gale had told him about his assignment. He was not getting access to the archives this way.

  He placed the paper crown on his head and considered his kingdom. It was...needlessly showy...why bother writing Eureka on the bathtub, or Perachora on the water wheel? It was a maddening waste and frustratingly useless.

  He pulled out the book of Ironchurch and thumbed through it, one phrase caught his eye. ‘Glamour muscle is not true muscle. A man’s strength should be used to build a house, to push a pram or carry the shopping in from the car in one load. That said, glamour muscle wins strongman contests. Sometimes a show has value.’

  Well, he thought, what if this was all just for show?

  Suppose someone wanted to disappear and throw a false trail, why not leave an unsolvable mystery? Still, if that was the case, then he would never get approval from Ilmark. Gale thought about where that left him. It did leave him with a room full of mechanical odds and sods that he could explore to his heart's content. Maybe he could reverse engineer some of the technology present here.

  Gale had studied the water wheel first. The water wheel was about the size of a man and connected to a simple pump that seemed to bring fluid from the ocean into a reservoir tank at head height. The water could then be channelled down into the wheel itself or into several other experiments in the lab. The wheel itself had the word ‘Perachora’ written across it, a reference to an early Greek water wheel. Currently Pancakes made use of it like an oversized mouse wheel.

  Next was the man-shaped metal construct in the corner. Gale suspected at some stage it had attached directly to the water wheel and turned it manually. The construct had a deceptively intricate set of pipes and chambers, similar to a human’s circulatory system. Weirdly there was no input point to put water into the pipes.

  One of the most intriguing pieces in the room was what looked like a jetpack without any sort of combustion engine. It had a series of pipes but no input port.

  Gale heaved himself out of the bath and walked to the jetpack. He pulled it off the rack again and tried to put it
on. The pack was heavy, but not unmanageable. He tightened the straps and did a few squats to test it was attached.

  Pancakes leapt off his shoulder into the jetpack.

  Blue light lit up in the jetpack and water erupted out of the back. Gale was catapulted up towards the ceiling. His shoulder collided with the roof, the jetpack, jarred by the collision, turned him and he rocketed towards one of the walls. Hauling on the straps, he managed to turn it before he hit the wall, careening along the side.

  ‘Pancakes, cut it out!’ He yelled.

  The light shut off, the jetpack stopped in midair. Gale crashed down to the floor and had the wind knocked from him. Pancakes gave him a lick on the face before bounding back to the water wheel.

  Gale groaned and shrugged off the jetpack. Gale pushed himself up to sitting his joints screaming at the abuse they’d just been put through. He held up the jetpack, and a faint blue glow came from underneath. A single word was written in dim blue light.

  ‘Pipes’.

  Well, he understood the reason for the high roof now. He flicked his hydrolens from the initial examination of the room onto his eye and reviewed the images. There definitely hadn’t been a signature on the underside of the jetpack before.

  A grin crept over his face, and he held up the water fuelled jetpack.

  ‘Eureka.’

  His communicator buzzed, it’d been augmented to receive texts even through the Penumbra. It was Ash.

  Heyyyyyy….you free?

  I could really use a good coffee, know anywhere good to grab one?

  I know just the place, meet me in Ionhome near the Cathedral in thirty.

  Ash waved to him from the front of the Membranous Cathedral. The silver sails overhead had caught the crisp autumn breeze, sucking what moisture they could from it. The hum of the desalinator was in overdrive, and the harbour churned. Gale’s stomach rumbled in sympathy.

  Ash grabbed his hand. ‘Come on I know a great hipster cafe.’

  Bean Tree cafe was built into a massive glasshouse. It opened up to reveal a small forest of tropical plants around a central pool. Ash led him to one of the big trees with a line of people. The tree had leaves designed to catch falling rainwater, but each leaf was instead slowly filling with coffee.

  ‘No way’ muttered Gale.

  Ash broke a ‘cup’ off the main stem of the tree. Gale took the leaf cup and sipped delicious piping hot coffee. They took it to go and wandered through the miniature rainforest.

  ‘So….how’s your Tempest?’ Ash asked.

  Gale coughed ‘Pancakes’ under his breath. Pancakes materialised in miniature in his pocket. Pancakes poked his head out to stare at Ash. Ash bent in close to study him, and Pancakes gave her a lick on the cheek. Ash jerked back, laughing. Gale gave Pancakes a sip of his coffee. Good sea-hound, he thought.

  ‘Working out pretty well, the chest is less tight, and I’m having less coughing fits.’ Gale said.

  ‘You do look good,’ Ash said, then blushed. ‘What I mean is I’m glad it worked, I was flattered you asked me to help.’

  Wait, had Ash just blushed? He’d never seen that happen.

  ‘It worked out great Ash, I’m lucky you were there.’ Gale said with a smile. Pancakes looked with a pleading face at the rest of the coffee, and Gale gave him another sip.

  Gale’s brow creased. ‘The Blood Knight attacked someone on campus. They’re getting more aggressive.’

  ‘Have you made any progress on the King Tide’s Curse?’ Ash asked.

  Gale shook his head. ‘Nothing, I even asked Blush to try.’ The only Deep Script Gale had sensed on the island was the concentration near the blowhole. He’d even ask Blush for help one time before he’d made things awkward. He’d covered it as a ‘training exercise’, but they’d found nothing. Thinking of that made him go red.

  Ashley studied his flushed red cheeks. She looked down and stirred her latte. ‘So tell me about this Blush.’

  ‘Just one of the tutors,’ Gale waved her off, ‘From New York.’

  ‘Hmmm…I bet she thinks she’s hot stuff. Big city girl from America.’ Ash said.

  ‘So what’d you need to talk about,’ Gale asked, changing the topic.

  ‘We think things are moving faster than anticipated. One of the Abyssals has disappeared, we don’t know where it has gone.’ Ashley said.

  ‘Did you check the last place you left it?’ Gale said.

  Ash looked at him flatly, ‘Dad jokes don’t suit you, Gale. The nine abyssal's are monsters from a time past. Beasts of pure instinct, each driven by a single primal instinct, to hunt, to feed, to corrode. Each dominated by their own nature. Do you know how hard it is to hide one of them?’

  Gale shrugged, ‘I’ll do my best Ash, but I’ve also gotta find a way to pay rent and pass exams. Not only that but victims keep showing up in blood coma's, and they keep trying to pin it on me. Ironchurch is…’ Gale paused. ‘I need to find the Blood Knight soon.’

  ‘Something is coming Gale, we don’t know how much time you have.’ Ash said, stepping close and stared into his eyes.

  Gale stared back. ‘Who exactly is…we?’

  ‘Oy dickhead fancy seeing you here!’ yelled Swan, emerging out of a nearby crowd. Swan had some shopping bags and a takeaway coffee. Gale shook his head slightly trying to shoo her away. Swan ran up and punched him in the arm.

  ‘Hey Gale, what's up, who's your friend?’ Swan asked with a wink.

  Ash laced her arm through Gale’s, flicking her hair over her shoulder and giggling. ‘Oh we matched on Tinder yesterday, I was just buying him coffee to thank him for a great night.’ Ash winked.

  Gale was going to kill her…but it wasn’t a bad cover story.

  Swan snorted, ‘Smooth move hot stuff, well I’m just heading back to the University so I’ll be off.’

  ‘Oh we were just finishing anyway, don’t wait too long to call, me hot stuff.’ Ash winked again. Ash strode away, her hips swaying. Damn, Gale thought, she was a pretty good actor. An outstanding actor in fact. He needed to find out who this ‘we’ she kept talking about was.

  It’s hard to trust a good actor.

  Swan and Gale walked back to the Uni Airship ferry. They ran into Yip along the way. Yip was overburdened with a box of miniature figurines and paint supplies half as big as him. Yip refused to let them handle it. They boarded the airship and took positions along the rail. Yip still kept his distance from Swan.

  ‘Look I’ve meant to ask you two when Titus isn’t around,’ Gale said. ‘What’s up with Titus’s power? I’ve got something in the works I might need him for. Back at the monster hunt, he held off a frakking Hydra, but when those Canutejobs jumped him he couldn’t even take down a few of them?’ Gale asked.

  Swan shrugged her shoulders and looked at Yip.

  Yip looked out at the water, ‘I poked around at his Script a couple of times. There is a vast well of power there, but somebody’s jammed the outlet valve shut.’

  ‘That's not really polite Yip.’ Swan said, pursing her lips.

  ‘Polite ain’t getting us graduated, any opportunity Swan.’ Yip said. ‘I don’t think Titus knows what's going on himself, just goes on about being a man.’

  ‘Does it have something to do with his Canuteian markings?’ Gale asked.

  ‘I don’t think so, the Canuteian markings let him tap a separate well of power, but it still has to go out through the same outlet valve. Titus doesn’t even seem aware of how he turns the valve open when something like the Hydra turns up.’ Yip said.

  ‘Anyway, what have you two got in the works?’ Swan asked. ‘I’m working nights at a pharmacy reception when we aren’t taking pager calls to try to make rent money. If one more person tries to show me their rash...anyway, point being I’m nowhere close to affording tuition again.’

  Gale stroked the stubble on his chin. Swan had earnt her keep. She also hadn’t said anything about Ash to Yip. He needed to trust more people if he was going to pass this year.

 
Gale glanced over at Yip. Yip nodded, and murky shadows drifted out from Yips cloak surrounding them.

  ‘Tell me…what, do you know about Ultimate Frisbee?’

  Gale - Ultimate Frisbee

  ‘What's wrong with supporting the Jaguars?’ Swan said.

  ‘If you have to ask….’ Sterling said, pinching his nose.

  The train clanged around a corner, and the mass of people pushed into Gale. The train was fuelled by Script, and six script-ropes around the outside of the carriage kept it on track. The ropes gave it the flexibility to turn hard and fast, the train swinging out wide, even frakking bouncing from time to time. He was pressed up against the window and given a great view of Ionhome’s coastline. The train was filled with people in the red and blue of Stallions gear. Swan stood out in her bright yellow Jaguars. Every time the crowd shifted, a larger number of elbows jarred Swan than the rest of them. Sterling had given Gale a Stallions jersey, informing him that to do otherwise was madness. Yip avoided the crowd by hunching in the luggage rack overhead.

  Titus was shooting the breeze with everyone around him. Despite not knowing the first thing about Ultimate Frisbee, Titus was great at sports chat. If somewhere there was a ball being kicked, thrown or struck with a racquet, Titus could talk about it. He could catch snippets of conversation through the crowd.

  ‘Well, they're just taking it one game at a time…’

  ‘Full credit to the boys ay…’

  ‘Its anyone's game at this point, the seasons not over till it's over.’

  Out the window of the train, a stadium rose in the distance. A massive coliseum, it extended out over the ocean and the waves beat on its Script enhanced walls. In the Vibe, red and silver Locomotyr Script moved like molten metal, flowing into runes on the wall. Script made of orange and brown shifting blocks ground over one another, showing elements of Strata. From the top of the stadium, giant stallions on red and blue flags contrasted with the Flag of Ionhome. Flickers of Wyldhome green danced around the stallions.