‘They’ll have blown every bridge on the way to Adeone,’ Javier said, reining in his horse beside Slvasta. ‘You know that, don’t you?’
‘Yes. And we can’t allow that to stop us.’ Without warning Slvasta urged his horse forward, ’pathing relentless orders into its nervous brain. It galloped along the stones, the gap seemingly expanding as he drew closer. Then the horse was jumping, and the water was a giddy eight metres below. He landed on the far side, clearing the gap easily.
‘Come on,’ he bellowed.
Laughing wildly, Javier charged his own horse along the broken bridge.
*
Fergus and Marek accompanied Kysandra, trekking over the river at the side of the Blair Farm compound, then along a narrow trail that mod-dwarfs had laboriously cleared through the woods. They rode sturdy terrestrial horses, each leading another horse, laden with bags.
She’d never actually explored this part of the countryside before. It was wild land, undulating to create marshy vales and dense spinneys. Nobody had ever filed a claim on any of it, at the county land office; taming it would take decades and cost more than any revenue a farm would ever generate. Far ahead, the foothills of the Algory mountains rose above the jagged rock outcrops and the sparse, wind-bowed trees.
They made good time, their horses walking steadily through the tangled scrub and soft grassland. It was a gradual climb eastwards, with the slopes gradually increasing their gradient and height. A pair of ge-eagles glided languidly overhead, scanning the terrain ahead. Nothing much moved – a few nests of bussalores, some feline daravan slinking about. Birds wheeled through the air, startled by the intrusion.
The sun was low in the west when they topped a tall rise, where spartan raddah bushes formed a meandering spine along the ridge.
‘This should do,’ Fergus announced.
The three of them dismounted. They stood facing the sinking sun, looking across the land they’d just traversed. Kysandra’s eyes filtered out the glare as they zoomed in on Blair Farm, thirty kilometres distant. It wasn’t her farm any more, the sweet homestead where she’d been born. This was a giant artificial square of neat buildings sliced into the valley, surrounded by a geometric pattern of fields. Like something a machine built, she thought. Which wasn’t a bad way of describing it. It was strange to be looking at it, acknowledging what an accomplishment it was, how much work and effort had been expended, and knowing that it was about to vanish in a firestorm.
Rich gold sunlight shone on Skylady, its bold curving triangle shape sitting on top of the solid rocket booster stack. It towered over all the other buildings in the compound, a glorious monument to hope. Kysandra felt immeasurably proud, looking at the old starship as it was about to be given a stormy ride back up into space, where it truly belonged.
I helped make this happen.
But at such a terrible price.
She told her u-shadow to open a link to the starship. The connection was weak, with a very low bandwidth. ‘How’s it going?’ she asked.
‘Hello, ground control,’ Nigel replied. ‘Well, here am I, sitting on a load of pigshit, commencing countdown, may Giu’s love be with me.’
‘Er, are you okay?’
‘Yeah. Running the final test sequences on the boosters now.’
‘How long until you launch?’
‘Maybe five minutes. The systems are simple enough, but I have to be absolutely certain I can ignite all five first-stage boosters simultaneously. So far so good.’
‘Nigel—’
‘Don’t. We promised no goodbyes. Because I’m not leaving, not really. I’m out there, on the other side of the barrier, waiting to say hello. Remember?’
Kysandra closed her eyes, trying to keep the fear at bay. ‘Yes.’
‘And you know it’s true, because I’m—’
‘—always right. Yes, I think I know that now.’
‘That’s my girl.’
‘Where will we go? Out there in the Commonwealth?’
‘Ah, good question. Earth, of course, where it all began. Cressat, which is my own planet.’
‘Nigel! You do not own a whole planet!’
‘Do too!’
‘How?’
‘Told you I was rich.’
She was grinning at his silliness. ‘Yes, but—’
‘Uh, oh.’
‘What?’
‘The cavalry has arrived.’
6
Slvasta had been out in front on the whole ride from Erond. He was always the first to jump the gaps in the bridges, the first to force his horse into the raging waters when the destruction was too big to jump. Javier and Tovakar and Yannrith were with him all the time. Just behind them, Bethaneve struggled to keep up, suffering from her lack of experience with horses. Next was Andricea and the bodyguard troop forming a phalanx around Captain Philious and Brigadier Doyle, who insisted on riding with her Captain. Then came the bulk of the regiment, grim and resolute, carrying the heaviest weapons their horses could manage.
By the time they passed Adeone, Slvasta knew his horse was barely going to make it to Blair Farm. It was sweating heavily, foam flecking its head and neck. Still he rode it onwards relentlessly.
Finally, after hours of riding along the road lined by young follrux trees, he came to the unmarked turning. ‘This is it,’ he ’pathed everybody in the cavalcade. ‘Ready your weapons, and watch out for ambush.’ With that he raced forwards, ignoring the aching exhaustion which punished his horse’s mind.
‘Wait. What’s the plan?’ Bethaneve asked, her ’path laced with worry.
‘Full frontal assault,’ Slvasta replied. ‘We have no time for anything else.’ The ruined bridges had told him that. If Nigel was intent on delaying any pursuit, then time was critical. Besides, you never negotiated with Fallers, never offered concessions, leniency . . . You either killed them or they ate you. This wasn’t politics any more. This was his true arena.
The thick forest with its trees snared in vines was familiar, as were the rush of tatus fly swarms. His ex-sight scanned the carbine holstered on the side of the saddle. Magazine loaded. Safety on. His teekay carefully undid the strap, leaving it ready to draw at an instant’s notice, because he was nearing the turn in the track which came out on the slope above the farm compound.
The promise that the frantic ride would soon be over enticed the horse onwards. And he burst out of the treeline to see the familiar valley spread out below him, awash with the rose-gold glow of the setting sun.
It was his shock which made the horse rear up, whinnying in alarm. Slvasta had to cling on tight, attempting to soothe its simple panicky thoughts.
The fields on either side of the road were filled with mods. Hundreds and hundreds of them: dwarfs, horses, apes, stretching out along the edge of the forest; still and silent, and sitting down (even the horses), all of them facing directly away from the farm. At first he thought they were all dead, but a fast scan with ex-sight revealed that, even more unnervingly, they were merely drowsing. None of them turned to look at the horses dashing out of the forest.
‘What in Uracus is that?’ Bethaneve yelled.
Slvasta stared down towards the compound. Just beyond it, squatting on the side of the river, was a bizarre structure that hadn’t been there when he’d visited before. The bottom section was a clump of thick cylinders standing in a wide circular pond, caged by a bracelet of red-painted scaffolding, while the tip . . . ‘That’s . . . ’ he grunted in bewilderment. It was bizarre, impossible, but the bulbous triangle perched on top of the cylinders reminded him of the old Landing Plane statue on the junction of Walton Boulevard and Struzaburg Avenue. ‘A flying machine!’
Then he knew it was all true. That Nigel and his nest knew how to make the quantumbusters work again. Nigel, who had somehow managed to build a flying machine. Nigel, who was going to kill all the humans on Bienvenido to make way for his own kind. The Fallers.
‘Charge!’ he bellowed, and compelled his horse forwards. He galloped
down the slope, heedless of the animal’s distress, ignoring the silent ranks of mods. All he saw was the flying machine, which was surely carrying the quantumbuster.
‘Lieutenant,’ Nigel’s urbane ’path resonated inside Slvasta’s head. ‘Always a pleasure. But I must insist you stop. In fact, you need to turn round.’
‘Fuck you, Faller!’ Slvasta shouted in glorious defiance. Behind him, the regiment was flowing forwards, horses starting their final gallop as they gathered momentum down the slope.
‘Son, you’re going to get yourself hurt. The blast when my starship takes off is going to be lethal within a kilometre. Please stop.’
‘Liar. I will burn you from our world. I will kill all of you.’ Fields rushed past in a blur. He’d never been more alive, more determined. Never more right.
‘Oh for crud’s sake, you dumbass fanatic. Turn round. Now. Last warning.’
Slvasta yelled wordlessly and tugged the carbine from its saddle holster. The horse was jolting him about so much it was difficult to hold it steady on the flying machine.
‘Oh, no, you don’t,’ Nigel ’pathed.
Slvasta just caught sight of a large chunk of flesh and bone tearing out of his horse’s head where the bullet struck. Then the animal was collapsing, tumbling forward in a crazy broken cartwheel. He was flung out of the saddle, flailing through the air to land with an almighty, rib-breaking thump on the stone road, momentum skidding him along, skin ripping. Then rolling, rolling, rolling, with pain buffeting him from every nerve he possessed.
‘Ten, nine, eight . . .’
One last flip and he was still. Staring up at the clear evening sky with its emerging nebulas glimmering faintly. Too dazed even to move.
‘. . . four, three . . .’
The aether boiled with frantic ’paths as the regiment tried to stop their breakneck charge.
‘Slvasta!’ Bethaneve cried.
‘. . . one, zero. Ignition! Oh, hell, but I’m good!’
Slvasta saw a searingly bright orange flash coming from the base of the flying machine’s cylinders. An explosion, he knew. And he snarled in triumph. The Faller contraption had failed and blown up. Then, as he turned his neck so he could get a better look at Nigel’s destruction, the light dimmed slightly as a phenomenal cloud of steam erupted from the pond. It shot across the ground at a speed he couldn’t even follow, smothering everything in its path and soaring upwards in vast exuberant billows. Strangest of all, it made no sound.
The glaring light returned, shining through the racing cloud, climbing vertically and growing brighter as it did so. That was when the sound hit with the force of a hurricane. It lifted Slvasta from the road and dashed him against the hedge. Despite his strongest shell, its roar shook his very bones, threatening to rattle every joint apart with its vehemence. He screamed as the vibrations hammered into his organs.
A dazzling topaz light burst from the top of the furious steam cloud, five massive flames spearing down from the base of the cylinders, slamming out solid columns of smoke below them. ‘Is this the quantumbuster?’ he pleaded feebly. The flying machine was racing up faster and faster now, its terrible flames surely splitting the sky in half with their power. Is this how the world ends?
The edge of the steam cloud slammed into him. Unbearable heat adding to his agony. He lost consciousness.
*
Kysandra saw the brilliant ignition flash. Then steam hurtled out from the blast pool, engulfing the solid rocket boosters for a long moment. Even from her safe distance, the violence of the event was awesome. Skylady rose in splendid serenity from the elemental chaos, slicing upwards in a smooth curve, trailing fire, smoke and thunder in its wake.
‘She’s up!’ Kysandra cried exultantly. Her feet wouldn’t keep still, her arms flapped as if she was trying to take off in the starship’s wake. Heart racing. Jaw open in magnificent astonishment.
Skylady continued her flawless climb.
‘I love you, Nigel,’ Kysandra shouted. ‘I’ve always loved you.’ By now she was craning her neck to keep track of the painfully bright spectacle. Skylady was so high – ten kilometres at least.
Then there was an almighty burst of smoke, and the five spikes of flame died. Kysandra screamed.
‘Separation!’ Fergus assured her.
A new, single plume of flame stabbed downwards. And the five dead boosters shrugged away from it, still trailing thin tendrils of smoke, arching back towards the ground like a flower nebula’s petals opening.
Skylady was accelerating hard now on its remaining solid rocket booster, rising out of the atmosphere, its smoke exhaust expanding wide as it reached the zenith of the sky. Kysandra watched it go, tears flowing freely down her cheeks. ‘Goodbye, Nigel. But I will find you again, wherever you are.’
*
Pain meant Slvasta was alive. He hadn’t known pain this extreme since the day Quanda had captured him. A pitiful whimper escaped his mouth as he tried to move. Even the slightest motion amplified the pain. His ex-sight probed round weakly, discerning a man looming over him.
‘Ah, prime minister. Glad to see you survived.’
‘Ingmar?’ Slvasta croaked.
‘Unfortunately for you, no.’
Slvasta forced his eyes open. A thin grey mist swirled energetically across the valley, the remnants of the flying machine’s mercurial steam cloud. It was Captain Philious looking down at him, a standard regiment-issue carbine held casually in one hand.
‘What happened?’ Slvasta asked.
‘The machine people flew away. It was incredibly impressive.’
‘Faller bastards. What are they going to do?’
‘No, Slvasta,’ Captain Philious said with a sigh of genuine disappointment. ‘They weren’t Fallers. And I suspect they’ll try and detonate the quantumbuster in the Forest. We’ll be liberated from the Fallers. Won’t that be something?’
‘We have to stop them!’
‘No, we don’t. They really do seem to know what they’re doing.’ Captain Philious flicked off the carbine’s safety catch.
Slvasta gazed up in disbelief. ‘But, our agreement, the new parliament . . .’
‘Oh, absolutely,’ Captain Philious mocked. ‘That’s how my family maintained its position for three thousand years.’ He pointed the carbine down at Slvasta, and pulled the trigger.
*
Five hundred metres back up the slope, Bethaneve heard the burst of gunfire and swivelled round. Just in time to see Slvasta’s body torn apart by the full magazine of bullets Captain Philious emptied into him. Her mouth parted into a desperate O, and her already shaky legs gave out, dropping her to her knees.
She thought she might faint. Most of the regiment’s horses had run amok at the flying machine’s launch. Hers had bolted with the rest, then reared up, sending her toppling from its saddle. She’d stayed curled up in a ball with her tightest shell spun around her as the horses rampaged past and the steam streaked over her. Pain, shock and misery kept her in that position for an unknown time. When the worst of it was over, and the astonishing machine was disappearing into the twilight sky, she threw up. After that, she couldn’t stop shaking.
Captain Philious slapped another magazine into his carbine and began ’pathing orders to nearby regiment troopers, calling them to him and instructing them to search out Slvasta’s bodyguards. Bethaneve’s shakes returned. Slvasta was dead. Dead! Her love. Her soulmate. Already on his way to Giu. All was lost.
‘I’ll join you in the Heart,’ she whispered. Probably quite soon.
It was too much to take in, too much to think about. She closed her eyes and tightened her shell again, withdrawing from the world.
‘You can’t stay here.’
Bethaneve stared up fearfully. She didn’t recognize the young man standing next to her. He wore a strange one-piece garment that was an elusive grey colour; he carried one of the sniper rifles Nigel had supplied to the cells. ‘Who are you?’ she croaked.
‘Demitri. I was grown in the sam
e batch as Coulan.’
‘What?’
‘Sorry. I’m trying to put you at ease. Foolish, given the circumstances, really. But put it this way; Coulan and I are effectively brothers.’
‘Coulan’s dead.’
‘I know.’
‘Slvasta’s dead,’ she said wretchedly. ‘I’m next.’
‘That doesn’t have to be. None of this does.’
Bethaneve started laughing, then trailed away into sobs. ‘We’ll be together. I’ll find him in the Heart.’
‘That’s not going to happen.’
‘He’ll be there. I know he will be.’
‘No, I’m afraid not. In a couple of days there won’t be any Heart, because there won’t be any Void.’
‘Who are you?’
‘We’re from the universe outside. The one your ancestors came from. And we’re going to take you back there.’
‘But . . .’ She glanced up into the darkening sky where a slender thread of smoke was fluorescing a delicate pink-gold in the rays of the sinking sun. ‘Did the flying machine take the quantumbusters up there into the sky? Captain Philious said they’d destroy the whole world.’
‘He’s wrong. That Forest up there, it’s doing something to damage the Void at a fundamental level, but only across a small section. Nigel is rebuilding the quantumbuster to replicate that effect; but when it detonates, its version of the Forest’s effect will be orders of magnitude stronger. Think of the Void as a rock with a single tiny crack in it; to break it you need to put a chisel tip into that crack and give it an almighty whack with a sledgehammer. That’s what the quantumbuster will do. It’ll tear the Void apart. We think.’
‘No more Void?’ Bethaneve asked numbly.
‘No. You’ll be free.’
‘Liberated,’ she said in a tiny voice. ‘That’s what Coulan said. We’ll be liberated.’