‘You left him his Gift, I see,’ he said.
Claus looked momentarily worried. ‘I thought it best to leave that decision to you.’
‘Remove it now.’
Claus fisted his own chest then strode over to the old man in the frame.
‘No . . . no, you can’t,’ Amoloran gasped as Claus closed his fingers around the scaled aug behind the old man’s ear. Amoloran screeched when Claus tore it off and cast it on the floor. There came an ominous muttering from the crowd, quickly stilled as Loman glanced around at them.
To all, through his aug, he broadcast, ‘He loved the Gift more than God. Will anyone here listen to his spoken confession?’
No one stepped forward.
‘Have you chosen the program?’ Aberil asked.
Loman glanced at him. ‘No, brother. Do you have any suggestions?’
‘I have, and with a healthy individual it can last for eight hours.’ Aberil stared at the aged Hierarch, his expression now containing more animation than was customary. ‘Let me.’
Loman waved him to go ahead and Aberil quickly went over to a console at the side of the pillar and started tapping away with relish. The frame began to rise, and all around it the knives and bone saws, electric probes and injectors began to sprout and revolve. Amoloran let out a yell, then bowed his head and began the prayer of the Fifth Satagent – the choice of many who faced this fate.
Loman gazed around at the crowd again. They were all watching with avid and in some cases slightly sick expressions – but they were all watching. Aberil’s torture programs were legendary, so perhaps many of them hoped to learn something here.
‘See the betrayer of God’s word,’ said Loman out loud, holding up one admonitory finger. ‘He would have had us attack each other while our enemy encroached upon our world. He would allow Behemoth back amongst us. And in the end he would have had us sacrifice love of God for love of technology.’ Amoloran was now babbling quickly through the last verses of his prayer, which was somewhat distracting. Loman raised his voice. ‘See, this is what will happen to any who would undermine our destiny. Ragnorak comes now to lance the infection on the planet below us, and as it heals we can turn outward to face our enemy. We are—’
The low thud perfectly punctuated the last verse of Amoloran’s prayer. Loman glared upwards and gobbets of flesh spattered his face, just as they did with many of those who stood about him. He pulled something lumpy from his forehead and stared with disgust at the piece of bone and brain he held between his forefinger and thumb. Amoloran hung quivering in the frame. He retained his jaw, but the rest of his head had disappeared. Loman turned and marched angrily away – Claus, then Aberil, hurrying to catch up with him.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Claus. ‘I’ll punish that idiot on the scanner.’
‘Interesting one,’ admitted Loman. ‘Explosive grafts in the bone of his skull. Detonated, apparently, by a recitation of the Fifth Satagent.’
Upon reaching the stairs, he turned once again to face the vast room. Studying face after face in turn, he detected only blank or sympathetic expressions – no one in sight dared show any amusement at his embarrassment. Glancing at Aberil he sent, ‘I think you know.’
Aberil’s knife was out and slicing across Claus’s throat before the man had a chance to realize he was in danger, then Aberil tripped him and sent him flying face-down to the floor, to prevent him spraying too much blood over Loman.
Wiping a few spatters from his robe, Loman said, ‘It’s good to have family with one in such situations. Welcome home, First Commander Aberil.’
Scar was behaving quite strangely, but then perhaps that was understandable considering he was now inside the twin of the vast entity that might have been described as his mother. The dracoman, rather than holding himself to his customary stillness, had released himself from his seat and was pushing his way round the craft in agitation. Cormac was also agitated – they had survived, but it seemed debatable how much longer they might do so. The clonks and slitherings had centred on the airlock and now he could hear a low ratcheting sound.
‘Dragon, what are you doing?’ he asked, his finger pressed down on the com button.
‘I am coming in,’ Dragon replied, which was not exactly a comfort.
Cormac noticed the Outlinker’s head come up at this, and how the boy reached his hand up to the hood of his exoskeleton.
Noticing Cormac’s attention, Apis said, ‘Both airlocks can be opened from outside.’
Of course – this was a fact of which Apis was well aware.
‘I wouldn’t bother with your hood or mask,’ said Cormac. ‘If Dragon wants to kill us now, there’s not a lot we can do about it.’ He glanced towards Gant, noticing that, even though the Golem cradled an APW as he undid his seat straps, his expression was resigned.
‘It seems to me that Dragon must have some purpose for us,’ opined Mika, her attention focused on Scar. She still looked ill, but the inhaler she had just used seemed to be having some effect; at least she hadn’t yet required another sick-bag.
‘But what purpose?’ asked Cormac. ‘We know it’s pissed off at the Masadans and intends some damage there, but in my experience when Dragon intends to do some damage it usually involves large smoking craters. I can’t see why it wants us at all, unless it intends to throw this landing craft at one of the Theocracy cylinder worlds.’
Now there came sounds from the inner door of the lock, and as a group they pushed themselves up from their seats and moved over to the opposite side of the craft. As the wheel of the lock spun, Cormac sensed something of what the previous occupants of this craft must have felt when Apis had opened it to vacuum. The door cracked open, and all down its edge fleshy fingers intruded, dark red and covered with scales. Slowly, working on its hydraulics, the door continued to open, and in this Cormac felt some comfort. Knowing Dragon’s capabilities he felt it a good sign that the door was being allowed to open at its own rate and had not been already ripped off its hinges. This meant it likely Dragon wanted to keep this landing craft in a usable condition. He just hoped it wanted the same for its occupants.
Fully open, the door revealed fleshy chaos: a pit of ophidian pseudopods terminating in flat cobra heads, each containing a single pupilless blue eye where a mouth should have been; tangles of thinner red tentacles; fleshy webs as of those between the toes of an aquatic reptile binding much of this mass together; and visual flashes of cavernous life beyond. The craft filled with the smell of cloves, of burnt meat, and of a terrarium. The mass oozed its way in, pseudopods hooking up into the air with their blue eyes darting in every direction; then a new addition forced its way through, and rose above them. This had a ribbed snakelike body, pterosaur head and sapphire eyes. Cormac experienced definite déjà vu and wondered what opaque conversation would now ensue.
‘I am dying, Ian Cormac,’ said the pterosaur head.
Cormac pushed himself away from the wall towards the centre of the craft, hooking the toe of his boot on the seat back and folding his arms across his chest. ‘I’ve heard that one before.’
The head turned so that its eyes focused on Scar. ‘But I will live,’ it added.
This was more like the Dragon of old: conversations that were like a sorting of wheat from chaff and discovering potatoes.
‘What do you mean?’
The head swung back towards Cormac, spraying milky saliva across the rows of seats below him. Not for the first time Cormac wondered how many heads like this each Dragon sphere possessed, or if they could manufacture them at will – as they did dracomen.
‘I will destroy the laser arrays,’ it said.
‘Well, that’s . . . helpful.’
‘They have five ships equivalent to Polity mu-class battleships.’
‘Of the type you’ve already encountered?’ suggested Cormac.
‘That one did not survive the encounter.’
Cormac noticed Apis flinch.
‘You didn’t exactly get off lightly,’ Cormac said.
br /> ‘I will not get off at all this time.’
Now, despite not intending to be dragged into one of those circular and somewhat pointless conversations Dragon seemed to specialize in, Cormac could not help but yield to his own confusion. ‘So why the hell are you going there?’
‘To live again.’
It figured.
‘What do you want with us?’ Cormac asked.
‘As I destroy their laser arrays and satellites, your descent will be unhindered. Rebellion will then come to the Theocracy, and my legions will arise.’
‘What the fuck are you talking about? Did that mu-class battleship fry part of your brain?’
The head swung once more towards Scar.
‘I name thee Cadmus,’ it said, and withdrew as it had come, the lock closing behind it.
‘What was that all about?’ asked Mika, and all that had just occurred had sufficiently bemused Cormac so that it took him a moment to realize that she had actually asked a question.
He turned to her. ‘Shame you chose that question for your initiation into the world of normal conversation. I haven’t a clue.’
‘Seems things are going our way . . . sort of,’ said Gant, easing his grip on his APW when he found that he had crushed the stock.
‘Yeah, and that worries me,’ Cormac replied, then turned to Scar. ‘What was that Cadmus stuff about?’
Staring fixedly at the airlock, Scar replied, ‘I do not know.’
‘I know who Cadmus was,’ Apis suddenly said, and they all turned to gaze at him. He went on, ‘He is a man from Greek myth – on Earth. We were learning about Greek myths in our history lessons, as Farins, our teacher, says that a general knowledge of humanity is necessary even if your intended career is only in metallurgy.’ Apis paused and took a breath, and Cormac wondered if this same Farins had been on the destroyed Masadan ship. Apis continued, ‘Cadmus was a man who killed a dragon then pulled out its teeth and sowed them in the ground. From the teeth grew men who were going to kill him, until he threw a precious stone amongst them. They started killing each other as they sought to possess this stone. Those that remained alive joined him, and helped him build something . . . a city I think . . .’ Apis ran out of words.
‘I remember now,’ said Mika. ‘There’s something else: a Cadmean victory is a victory purchased at great loss.’
This was a discussion Cormac no longer wanted to pursue. ‘Let’s get those cold-coffins ready,’ he said.
Soil had often become displaced by slippery stone and spills of scree descending from above, and now there were very few lizard tails – those they did see appearing stunted – and no sign of any flute grass. The molluscs she had earlier seen lower down were here flatter to the rock, duller in colour, and more chaotic in their patterning. Coming to a steep rocky cliff face, Fethan led the way to the right, cutting across the slope.
‘How much further?’ Eldene gasped, stopping to remove her oxygen pack and change to her last air bottle.
Fethan stopped to observe her. ‘We’ll need to find some shelter for the night, and with luck we’ll be there sometime tomorrow. You’ve got more than enough to suffice, girl.’
Was he just saying that to comfort her, perhaps hoping that her remaining oxygen might stretch to their destination? She gazed around her as she stood to hoist her pack back into place. Well, if she was to die, then this was a better place than keeling over in a sluice ditch down by the ponds. She resolved that on her last breath, when the breather’s display tag on its oxygen tube clicked down to zero – as it had just then with the previous bottle – she would remove the mask and put the barrel of Volus’s gun in her mouth.
Fethan led the way around the side of the mountain, onto a narrow path that – Eldene noted by the imprints – must have been made by some animal. A grazer of some kind? Or something more sinister? She was about to pose this question when they rounded a promontory on which something stood observing them.
The animal squatting on its hindquarters had the same double sets of forelimbs folded across its triple-keeled chest as a gabbleduck. Its head was not beaked though: below its tiara of green eyes, it had a pendulous snoutlike protrusion that must serve it as a mouth.
Fethan gestured at it dismissively. ‘Grazer. They suck a fungal slime from the underside of rocks. Completely harmless.’
Hurrying to catch up with him, Eldene was not so sure – she did not like the way it was watching her as it contemplatively scratched its snout with one of the hooked foreclaws.
‘And what eats them up here?’ she asked.
‘Hooders and siluroynes,’ Fethan stated briefly.
After the promontory, they came upon a vista of valley cutting through the mountains, and began to descend by natural stony steps. On the flat stone Eldene saw the rain-etched shapes of fossilized worms glinting with iron pyrites, and she suddenly felt the huge injustice of it all: she had been born on this planet, raised on it and now, as she entered womanhood, was the first time she had really seen or experienced it. For generations there had been surface dwellers who had lived and died without seeing a fraction of what she had seen over the last few days. Was this fair? Was this what any God would intend?
As they descended, Eldene heard the rumble of a river, and gazing down could see it glinting between stands of flute grass, but slowly this view was becoming obscured by waves of mist rolling down the valley. The path began to get slippery and she almost fell twice, so rapt was she in studying the odd, brightly coloured outgrowths on the rocky slopes to either side of her. These things were something like blister moss, but smoother and flatter, and grew in pure colours of blue, orange and red. Set in the ground between them ran strands like inlaid silver.
‘That’s what the grazers up here feed on,’ Fethan explained, noting the focus of her attention. ‘Watch your footing now: that’s sporulated slime on the rocks, and it’ll get worse.’
It did get worse, and Eldene went down twice on her backside – the second time sliding down right behind Fethan. However, she did not manage to knock him over – colliding with him was like running into a deep-rooted tree. He himself did not slip once on the way down.
Soon they were walking up again, through cold mist beside the river, mountain slopes on their left and long grass rustling on their right. Despite all the exertion, Eldene found herself getting colder and colder as now, closely following Calypse, the sun dropped from sight behind the mountains and afternoon slid into twilight. In this poor light Eldene could only just discern the squarish things that flapped overhead and honked mournfully.
‘What are those?’ she asked.
‘Kite-bats – harmless again,’ Fethan replied.
As it got darker, the bats moved higher up and further away, their cries echoing in the mountains. When something emitted a gasping hiss in the flute grasses behind her, she jumped, then suddenly found herself shivering. For a time she kept silent, not wanting to keep asking about every strange sound, but when the same sound came again she could not stop herself.
‘What was that?’ she asked of Fethan, who had stopped and was peering back in the direction of the noise.
‘I haven’t a clue,’ he replied, then waved her on past him. ‘Just keep going.’
She did that thing, feeling her flesh crawling as she remembered the old man’s mention of ‘siluroynes’ and ‘hooders’. She even considered drawing the gun, but her hands were shaking so badly now she’d probably shoot her own foot off.
‘About another two hours and we cut back up the slope,’ Fethan told her. ‘There’s a cave there where we can shelter for the night.’
Great: a nice cold, damp cave – just what she needed.
As night descended the sound was heard again, as if whatever made it was keeping pace with them. Now they distinctly heard something pushing through the flute grass, its passage followed by a clicking sigh. Eldene wondered if she would feel so frightened if she knew what that sound issued from.
‘Let’s move back up the slope,
’ Fethan suggested. ‘We’re a bit too close to the grass here.’
Eldene quickly obeyed him, with images of something like that gabbleduck or the heroyne lunging out at her, clamping down and dragging her screaming back into the flute grasses to be consumed. She laboured on up the slippery slope, spilling rocks and dislodging fungi, slipping and grazing her knees. That didn’t matter – she just wanted to get higher. Glancing back she experienced a sudden terror – Fethan had vanished. She moved faster, fell hard, got up and kept going. The slope finally levelled and she found a flat stretch where she could pick up her pace. Down below, more movement, and she could just about discern something huge thrashing about in the grasses. Next thing, Fethan was running along beside her . . . She did a double take: it wasn’t Fethan. It was a big heavy-boned man dressed in combat gear, breather mask and helmet. He caught her arm and dragged her off course.
‘This way. He’s leading it off.’
She considered fighting him off, but was just too frightened. He certainly did not look like a proctor. So she ran with him, sometimes supported by him, sometimes supporting him when he stumbled. Gasping for breath, she was wondering how much further she could manage to run when he tugged her by the arm towards a tumble of massive boulders. Rounding the first boulder, two other people appeared and shoved her past them into a cave in which a fire was burning. Standing amid equipment stacked on the floor, she stared at the three now crouching at the cave mouth, heavy rifles clutched in readiness.
‘What was it?’ asked the only woman of the three: her hair and one side of her face concealed under a military-issue coms helmet.
‘Didn’t see it clearly,’ said the man she addressed. ‘I’d just eye-balled Fethan and this one heading our way when it started to come out of the valley after them. It was big.’
The woman studied him for a moment then turned to Eldene. ‘Did you see it?’
Eldene shook her head in bewilderment.
‘Whoa,’ said the woman, now speaking into her helmet mike. ‘That you, Fethan?’ She listened for a moment then her expression paled. ‘Fuck,’ she said succinctly and stared out again into the night.