Elei's Chronicles (Books 1-3) (2 page)

Chapter
Two

T
he
message was brief and to the point. “Our Ost connection was terminated. Position of expected shipment unknown. Locate it.”

The air left Hera’s lungs.
Terminated? Unknown?
She erased the message, her hand trembling. Sobek’s balls, she’d not seen this coming. She’d assumed all was going according to plan.

Gods. Pelia. Project Siren.  

Hera bowed her head, fighting the cold grip of fear in her chest. Pelia was dead, and Hera had to know what exactly had taken place. She flexed her fingers and willed her pulse to slow.

“Snap out of it,” she whispered to herself. “Do something.” All this waiting and hoping in the dark, only to find that the light would reveal death and despair.

I will not let this happen.

After accessing the classified page of the secret police, she entered another password, opened the newsfeed and scanned the fuzzy images recorded by the surveillance cameras across the street from Pelia’s apartment.

A shooting.

The gunshots sounded tinny on the bad recording of the cameras. Pelia’s long, flat aircar — the new S152 model — appeared. A thin, young man dressed in dark clothes stumbled out of the aircar door, holding Pelia’s limp body in his arms, and laid her down on the deck. He knelt over her. Then more shots rang and fuzzy silhouettes with big guns in their hands moved out of the shadows. The image fizzled and went black.

Hera banged her fist on the desk. Nobody outside the Undercurrent was supposed to know the importance of Pelia’s work. Pelia had been betrayed.

A traitor walked among them.

Icy sweat trickled down Hera’s spine and her hands trembled. Knowing she had no time for a breakdown, she shoved her fear deep inside its box. A quick search of the message pool showed her that the shipment had not yet been found. She sagged in her chair, releasing a pent-up breath. Then who had it?

Her eyes narrowed.
The boy
. He must have the shipment. Pelia’s chauffeur, right? Sort of an adopted son she’d recruited from a monks’ factory on Ost. He’d been with her when she was shot, and therefore was the only person to whom she could have given it.

Hera pushed back her chair, grabbed her longgun and her glitcher from a drawer and stood. Others had already seen the images. They would be searching for the boy right now.
Dammit all to the five hells.

Holstering her gun, she stepped out into the lobby of the administration offices and strode out and down a passage leading to the great auditorium of the Echo Palace. Turning abruptly at the fresco of the butterfly garden, she headed left, to the main hangar. Her mission was compromised. It was imperative that she got hold of the boy, and time was running short.

As she crossed to the helicopters, she nodded a greeting to the hangar officer, a tall, lithe woman with ash blond hair in a braid. While climbing into the first helicopter in the row and powering up the system, she gazed at the woman.

Curvier than most, filling out her gray uniform well, the young officer turned to stare back at Hera, fine features locked in a scowl.

Hera winked, blew a kiss and raised her forefinger and thumb, flashing the woman an “all well” sign. Then she took the helicopter out of the hangar and up over the Tower’s white turrets and green groves, over the grey slopes of the mountains and then the boring plain.

She would find the boy — if he’d made it out of the shooting alive.

Chapter
Three

B
y
the time Elei reached the end of the pier, blood soaked his leg all the way down and black dots danced in his eyes. If he didn’t find water and some food soon, he’d probably pass out.

Unless the street gangs or the Gultur police got to him first.

Joy.

The promenade spread left and right into patchy darkness, discolored walls, dirty windows and piles of trash lit by sputtering lampposts. A cold, sharp breeze sliced his cheeks and he pulled on his hood. A dog yowled and a bell went off somewhere in the distance. The suffocating stench of rotten fish and other organic trash, and the acrid fumes of
dakron
from the generators stifled him.

A sudden movement caught his attention, a sinuous shadow creeping along a wall. Cold sweat rolled down his temples and his fingers flexed on the gun grip. A second later, a huge rat stalked into the light, followed by a black cat. They jumped and skidded away on an exposed tube of
nepheline
alloy.

Elei breathed out and licked his salty lips. He followed the waterfront street to its end and then threaded his way through narrow, wet streets and squares deep and dark like wells. Ghost-like, he placed one foot in front of the other, barely feeling them, step after step, until he exited onto an avenue. Dawn was breaking and the sky was fragmenting into colors — pink, bright red and crimson.

Crimson like blood.
The image of a blood-smeared face flashed through his mind. He leaned against a grimy shop window, grappling with the memory, but it splintered and faded. He breathed in and out and pressed his face to the cool glass of the mullioned windows.

Inside, old, broken dolls sat arrayed on rows of shelves, among ancient teapots and cups.
An antiquary
. A stuffed falcon stared back at him with empty eyes. He shuddered and pushed himself off the shop front, hand pressed against his smarting wound.

Ramshackle buildings leaned against each other like old people, cutting off the daylight. Rusty-barred balconies displayed bright lines of laundry hung to dry. Compared to Ost, everything looked newer and cleaner. A small, two-passenger aircar zipped by him and was gone around a corner, while more aircars, blue, silver, red, of different sizes and models, weaved among old streetcars that creaked by on huge wheels.

He limped down the avenue, alongside shops interspersed with diners and warehouses. A square opened to his left with a gray Gultur temple taking up its center, cold and faceless like a laboratory. There had been a smaller one in Sestos, the capital of Ost, and he’d always taken a detour to avoid it.

A robed, hooded procession of Gultur was climbing the broad steps of the temple. Elei stumbled back to hide behind the square, metallic pillar of an info-pole. It was impossible to make out their faces or the shape of their bodies, but Elei knew them to be women. All Gultur were, as their parasite ensured — an entirely female race.

He liked women as a rule, but the Gultur were more than that. Rulers of the seven islands, they controlled all resources and proclaimed themselves goddesses. Goddesses who, as rumor went, lived in beautiful cities of their own in the mountains. They kept mostly apart, controlling any uprising and forcing taxes on the population of mortals — letting them live in squalor and poverty and not giving a damn.

The robed figures carried lit
dakron
lamps and, the offerings for the daily feast laid on large trays — raw meat and unwashed greens — to renew the connection to their goddess, the parasite they all carried, the one who had changed them in so many ways; Regina.

“Regina, all merciful, all plentiful.” Their voices rose in a strident hymn. A struggling group of naked men followed, surrounded by a group of Gultur in black uniforms. Elei leaned forward, trying to make out details, and wondered what was going on. As he watched, one of the naked men broke from the group and ran away from the temple toward one of the side streets.

Two uniformed, visored Gultur lifted huge machine guns and aimed. The boom of the gunshots set Elei’s ears ringing.  The running man dropped and sprawled. A pool of blood spread around him. Another man screamed and broke away from the group. Again the Gultur turned and gunned him down.

Pissing hells
. Elei’s legs began to shake and he leaned against the info-pole. The Gultur policewomen kept their guns at the ready as the group of mortals struggled toward the temple and the chant to Regina rose once more, implacable and shrill. 

He backed away, his knees weak, when a deafening roar came from above and his pulse rose in his throat, constricting his breath. He struggled to draw air as he drew his Rasmus. A heavy helicopter passed low overhead, hovering there for a moment before darting off to the north.

Dammit, pull yourself together
. He was lowering his Rasmus, his back drenched in sweat, when a young male voice said low, close to his left ear, “Drop it, fe.”

A hand pulled back his hood and a gun pressed on Elei’s neck. The cold metal mouth kissed his skin, promised more pain. His legs finally buckled and he went down on his knees, gripping his gun with numb fingers. Darkness splotched his vision.

A girl’s high-pitched voice echoed strangely in his ears. “Hey there, what are you doing, Tau?”

The male voice said, indignant, “He drew his gun! What does it look like I’m doing?”

“Did you shoot him?”

“I shot nobody.”

“Well, he’s bleeding. You know Kesh said not to draw attention.”

A face swam into view and Elei blinked at large, gemstone eyes, a wide grin and black, rotten teeth. If this was a nightmare, then it was a kind he’d never had before. Who knew even nightmares could evolve? As he stared, he realized the girl's face reminded him of someone, a little girl he once knew.

Small hands drove into his pockets, hard and vicious, and he shoved them away, coming back to the present.

“Don’t… even think… about it,” he ground out. He tightened his fingers around the handle of his Rasmus and managed to raise it, but his vision was still blurry. Fresh blood ran down his hip.

The girl huffed. “Who shot you?”

No clue. A blank in his memories.

Bony fingers jabbed into his side and he hissed in pain. “Did you dig out the bullet, man?”

Yeah, right. When and where?
He drew his jacket closed with a shaky hand and turned his gun on her, sighting down the narrowing tunnel of his vision. “Piss off.”

The girl took a step back and raised her hands. “Relax. Just checking.”

Something glinted in the palm of her hand. “The bullet,” he croaked. “Did you get it?”

“Shof, look at his eyes!” The light-haired boy, about Elei’s age, stumbled back, distracting him. “They’re two-colored. He’s infected with cronion. Shit.”

“What are you talking about?” The girl’s voice wavered.

 “It’s cronion, I’m telling you.”

They backed away, eyes wide, more afraid of the parasite than his gun pointed at them.
Stupid kids
. You couldn’t get cronion like that, not by touching. The protozoan parasites had to go through a maturing cycle inside a fly who’d then lay eggs inside a wound.

Unless of course the eggs were injected directly into the bloodstream on purpose. Like Albi had done for him. She’d explained it to him once. Elei remembered the lines of her face, the deep wrinkles around her smile. He hadn’t thought of her in some time — his first family, long dead. She’d given him the parasite out of kindness, to save his life.

The children left, their steps light like rolling pebbles. The world made no sense as Elei faded in and out of consciousness, struggling to draw breath.

Get up!

He climbed back to his feet, hand pressed against the wound, and the shop fronts wavered in his eyes. The Gultur temple had closed its doors and stood again faceless and gray. Flies buzzed over the pools of black blood in the square. The bodies had been taken away.

With a shake of his head to clear his eyes, gun clenched in his hand, he shuffled down the avenue, not quite knowing where he was going. The paper with the address burned a hole in his pocket. He had to find Aerica, had to ask someone for the way.

“Your gun and your money, boy,” a male voice grated behind him, and Elei whipped around so fast the world pitched. Colors jumped and flashed as he raised his gun. But the man was faster. He closed in and pressed a blade to Elei’s neck, at the juncture where it met his shoulder. Red pulsed rapidly in the man’s chest.

“Drop the gun,” he said. “Now.”

Elei set his jaw, teeth grinding together. If he did, he’d stand no chance in the five hells of getting out of this alive. The blade scraped soft skin, but only a little farther down it would encounter the light gray snakeskin covering his back; a veritable armor. Elei knew from experience that if he turned, the blade would glance off.

The man bared his teeth, showing dark gaps and bloody gums, and pressed the blade till it bit into Elei’s flesh. “I don’t have all day.”

Biting back a retort, Elei took a deep breath and twisted from the knees, turning against the blade, cursing as pain exploded in his wounded side. The knife screeched against the hard skin covering his shoulder blade and upper back.

“Hey, what’s this new trick?” The man moved in, just as Elei expected, to see better. Elei elbowed him in the stomach and then lurched sideways until his shoulder hit the door of a store. It opened with his shove and he stumbled into a warm, brightly-lit room with a long counter.

A diner
. Turning about, Elei raised his gun and aimed at the door.

The man followed him in, lips twisted in a sneer and a revolver in his hand, trained on Elei. “Where do you think you’re going?” He clucked his tongue.

A shriek pierced the air and they both jumped. They whirled toward its source. A tiny, dark-haired woman scowled at them from behind the counter. She held a machine-gun pointed at them.

Oh great, more guns.

“Get out of my diner.” Her voice was clipped and high-pitched. Elei took a step back and she spared him a stern look. “Not you, boy. Stay put.” She motioned with her gun at the man. “You there. If I ever see you again in the neighborhood, I’ll tell Aji.”

The man glared, chewing on the inside of his cheek. “Damn you, Dima. Stop interfering, or you’ll get hurt.”

She just pointed and squinted over the gun barrel. The man held her gaze for a long moment. Then, tipping up his gun, he threw Elei one last angry glance and left, slamming the door behind him.

Relief weakened Elei’s knees. He glanced around and saw no other customers. “Listen—“

“How about you leave as well.” She swung her weapon on him. “I want no shooting in my diner.”

He shook his head. “Wait—”

“Put your gun away,” she snapped.

He sheathed his Rasmus. “Okay.” A shiver wracked his body. “Listen, I need water. I can pay for it.” He fingered an old scar that curled around his upper left arm, ending where the hard tel-marks began. Twisting and running had saved his life before. He could barely stand now, let alone run, not without eating and drinking something.

The tiny woman sucked in her cheeks and let out a hissing breath. “Is that blood on your hip?”

“Yeah.” He licked his dry lips.

“Get out!” She raised her gun. “Now.”

He swallowed hard and dared a step toward her. “At least tell me how to go to Aerica.”  

She grimaced. “Go away or I’ll shoot!”

The world erupted into dazzling colors and outlines and his pulse went into overdrive. He banged his fist on the bar leaving a bloody smear, then pressed his forehead to the cool surface, the flare of cronion inside his head worse than the pain in his side.
Damned parasite
. “Tell me!”

“Go away. If they find you here, I’ll lose my permit and they’ll close down the diner.” Her voice cracked. “Listen, Aerica is near Artemisia. I don’t know how to get there, all right?”

When he looked up, her chest glowed a deep red. His hands began to shake. “And who does?” he ground out, fighting to calm his heart.