Dangerous Gifts

DANGEROUS

GIFTS

A BABYLON STEEL NOVEL

GAIE SEBOLD

SOLARIS

First published 2013 by Solaris

an imprint of Rebellion Publishing Ltd,

Riverside House, Osney Mead,

Oxford, OX2 0ES, UK

www.solarisbooks.com

ISBN (EPUB): 978-1-84997-466-0

ISBN (MOBI): 978-1-84997-467-7

Copyright © 2013 Gaie Sebold

Cover art by Jake Murray

The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners.

To Dave. My constant star.

CHAPTER

ONE

I
WALKED INTO
the humid, faintly citrus-tinged air of The Swamp, an Ikinchli hangout run by my friend Kittack, looking for a chat and maybe a sip of one of the few things he serves that don’t dissolve the top off my tongue.

The minute I was through the door my shoulder-blades started to itch. There were a lot of hunched shoulders, a lot of people looking at me out of the corners of their eyes, and that sharp silence of conversations that have finished in mid-air. Several of the males’ cranial crests were up; not a good sign in a normally laid-back bunch of lizards.

Kittack’s customers are mostly, like him, expatriate Ikinchli from Incandress, their home country, where the self-appointed master race, the Gudain, are in the habit of giving them a pretty wretched time.

I glanced around for Kittack, but he must have been down in the cellar. The barmaid, Talia, was looking worried. Being a lamia, she can normally calm down punters just by giving them the eye till their knees buckle, but nobody seemed to be in the mood.

I walked up to the bar as though I hadn’t a care in the world, but I kept my hands free. “Hey, Talia. Kittack around?”

“Hey, Babylon. He’s just...”

I felt the Ikinchli come up behind me. He was a big lad; only half a head shorter than me, with dark chestnut scales on his head and arms fading to creamy yellow on the chest and belly; solidly muscled. Pretty, but unfortunately he didn’t look friendly. He stood a foot or so along the bar, leaning on one elbow and looking me over. “When you start serving Gudain in here, Talia?” he said, without taking his eyes off me.

Oh, dear.

“I told Kittack this place needs better lighting,” I said. “I’m human, not Gudain.”

“Oh?” the Ikinchli said. “Funny. Look like Gudain to me; darker, maybe. Maybe you got dirty doing Gudain’s dirty work.”

“Excuse me?”

“She called you Babylon, right? Only one person I know called Babylon in this town. Someone who messed in our business. Someone who helped the Gudain pull one big trick on my people.”

“I don’t know what you think I’ve done, mate, but...”

He leaned forward and hissed,
“
The
Itnunnacklish.
There
is
no Itnunnacklish.”

Ah.

The Itnunnacklish was a girl born, to all appearances, Gudain, who, if mated at the right time to both an Ikinchli and a Gudain male, became a fusion of the two species, proof that they had once, as Ikinchli legend had it, been one and the same. She’d been in Scalentine for her transformation, and I’d been sent to find her, not knowing, at the time, who or what she was.

She was still here, under the eye of the Diplomatic Section, but she was due to go home and take up her role as one of the ruling council of Incandress. And I had agreed, for reasons that seemed more ill-considered by the minute, to think about going with her.

Right now, though, that wasn’t my problem; getting this guy out of my face without a fight,
that
was a problem.

“What she is or isn’t is no business of mine,” I said.

“She is
Gudain.
Only thing any Gudain wants is to live high on our sweat. She is a fraud, and you...”

I saw the fist coming in and got my arm up before it connected with my argumentative friend’s head. The hitter – another Ikinchli lad, taller, skinnier and with paler colouring – looked shocked when my forearm connected with his. Lucky for him I wasn’t wearing studded bracers; those are strictly for when you
want
to rip someone’s arms up. Even so, there was a loud slap,and he winced.

“You want to hit someone, why don’t you take it outside?” I said.

He hissed something in Ikinchli. The other hissed back. What little Ikinchli I know mostly means something on the lines of “bring it on, big boy”; this conversation sounded similar in meaning, but rather less friendly in intent.

People were watching, some were pushing back their chairs, as if about to join in.

The cellar door swung open and Kittack walked into the room and swore. At least, I think he swore. It can be hard to tell in Ikinchli. “Babylon?” he said. “You for hire today?”

“You think this is the time?” I said, still holding my arm up between the two angry customers.

“I think this is a fine time for me to hire someone who can rip off heads and spit down necks,” he said. “You want to start with these two?”

“Now, Kittack, you
know
I don’t rip off heads. Generally. Fingers, perhaps. Even arms, if necessary. But no heads. And no spitting. Spitting is vulgar.”

“I will pay you very much money. Maybe all the money they will never be spending in here again because
they will have no arms left to lift a drink with
.”

The two had stopped arguing and were looking at me uncertainly.

Talia slid out from behind the bar with a pot, and I heard a rattle as she dropped in a couple of coins.

“Talia,” I said, “what are you doing?”

It really isn’t possible for a lamia to look innocent, but she tried. “I just thought maybe I’d see if anyone wanted to, perhaps, place a little wager...”

“No bets, Talia. Besides, I don’t want to fight anyone. I just came in for a nice quiet drink and a chat.”

“Yes,” Kittack said. “Like most people. Anyone who wants to have a big argument, they can get out of my bar, now, and not come back until they can act like respectable citizens, and leave the political stupids at home where they belong, okay?”

The first Ikinchli hissed disgustedly and turned away. “I have no home, not any more. You know why? Taken for Gudain taxes.” He snatched up his coat, catching the chair and knocking it over. “You believe Gudain lies if you want. Gudain and human, I don’t see no difference; humans beat up on us too. Me, I got better things to do. No pretenses, no One who is Both. When our land is cleansed of all the Gudain,
then
we can go home.”

He slammed his way out, pulling a puff of cold air into the warm moist atmosphere.

His opponent let out a breath, and his crest sank. He sat down and put his hands to the sides of his head, as though it hurt, and muttered something. One of his friends reached over and slapped him on the shoulder. “More drink, hey?” he said.

Kittack signalled Talia, and turned to the lad. “You going to be any more trouble?” he said.

“No.”

“Ah, is stupid peoples everywhere,” Kittack said. “You drink up now, don’t talk any more politics, okay?”

A few other people got up and left quietly; but I didn’t like the way they were looking at me.

“Kittack, can I have a quick word?”

“Sure.” He looked around, sighed, and said, “You come on in back. Talia, get Babylon a drink. On the house. And one for me.”

Once she had done so, he shut the door behind us, shaking his head.

I know Kittack pretty well. We’ve been friends and occasional lovers for a while. “You all right, Kittack?”

“What I just did, maybe that wasn’t so smart.”

“How do you mean?”

“Never mind. What you need?”

“Advice,” I said, watching his face. “I’m thinking about taking up a job guarding the Itnunnacklish, for a few days.”

He looked away from me, fidgeting with his glass. “Why you got such a thing for her, Babylon? You done her one pretty big favour. Now you want to walk into a pile of
guak
for her?”

“I haven’t said I will, yet.”

“Thinking about it.”

“Yeah,” I said.

Why
was
I thinking about it? Sure, I needed money, I always seem to. Besides, I know what it’s like to be a symbol of something important. Been there, done that, got the screaming nightmares. She needed friends.

But already this job was putting my back hairs up, and I hadn’t even spoken to her.

“I haven’t said yes, Kittack. But I’d be grateful for some pointers about Incandress. So long as you don’t mind...”

“Mind? No. Some of them talk about home all the time: ‘oh, so wonderful, why we ever leave,’ you know? Sometimes I say, if it was all so wonderful, what you doing here, wailing all over my bar?” He shook his head. “Me, I don’t talk so much. But okay. Incandress, she is warmer than here. Lots of hot pools, too.” He looked mournful for a moment. “Very good for the blood, hot pools.”

“I’m sure they are. But I really meant the people.”

“Ah, okay. Well, you know, Gudain, some are maybe decent. Treat you okay. But to many, anyone who is not Gudain is a beast, made to work, and just waiting to sacrifice Gudain maidens to the Old. The Old don’t want sacrifice maidens, what good is a Gudain girl to some Ikinchli who is dead for two hundred years? But some Gudain, they believe this, or maybe they just want to.”

“I remember you told me.” The Maiden Sacrifice legend got dragged out whenever someone wanted an excuse to beat the Ikinchli up, it seemed like.

“Oh, and the Gudain, they are very...” He paused. “They don’t like to talk about bouncy. Or think. Or do, much.”

“What? They don’t talk about sex?”

He grinned at me. “All this bouncy is very animal, you know? The Gudain, they are most superior and have no animal needs.”

“They must
do
it, otherwise where do little Gudain come from?”

“Not many little Gudain. Also, just don’t
mention
. For Gudain bouncy is only to happen with the one person, after much delicate ceremony, and in private, and never, ever to speak of. Not even jokes.”

“You’re kidding.”

He shook his head, still grinning. Bloody lizard;
he
wasn’t the one who was going to have to weld his mouth shut if he went to Incandress.

“And religion?” I said.

“They worship the Great Artificer. Who is like big super-Gudain who raise Gudain up from rolling around in hot mud with the rest of us, and make them all special. They go to a special house and burn smelly smoke to talk to him.”

“All right. So what about your people, Kittack? Anything I need to not mention?”

“The Itnunnacklish, she is a good subject to stay off.”

“Since,
if
I take the job, I’m going to be standing right next to her most of the damn time, I’m hardly going to be talking about her. Like that’s going to help. And Ikinchli religion?”

Kittack’s tail shuddered; it took me a moment to realise he was actually embarrassed. It’s not a state he visits very often.

“They say, every Ikinchli who dies has all the wisdom of their life, and all those bits of wisdom, they are the Old. So gods and ancestors, they are pretty much the same thing, for Ikinchli.” He gave a long, hissing sigh. “You don’t accuse anyone of kidnapping maidens for sacrifice, probably you be fine. Me, I don’t go to ancestor ceremonies in a long time. The older I am, the more it seems is all smoke and mirrors, you know? And I see people get treated like
guak
all the time, what are the Old doing? Nothing. Is no surprise some Ikinchli get tired waiting for the Old, and start fighting back. You sit on someone long enough, one day they will bite your bottom.”