For A Few Souls More (Heaven's Gate Book 3) (8 page)

“Something awful,” said Veronica. “Something really, really awful.”

They stared out into the mist for a few minutes, neither of them saying another word.

Then they turned their back on paradise and began their walk into Hell.

WHAT AM I DOING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE REVOLUTION?

(An excerpt from the book by Patrick Irish)

I
MIGHT HAVE
expected that the finding of Alonzo’s Observation Lounge would be an act beyond us. To explain why I must clarify a number of natural assumptions you must have with regards to the geography of the Dominion of Clouds. Put simply, it was a preternaturally large building that housed a massive courtyard garden. Yet that is, in itself, a reductive description. By physicalising it, rendering it as a place of bricks and mortar, I steal away some of its scope. This is, again, where our language, designed to pin things down, simplify them into descriptions and natures we can understand, is a hindrance rather than a help. The geography of the place was not a simple matter of feet and inches. The place shifted, altered, adapting itself around you as you walked. I have mentioned already the seeming absence of population but there can be no doubt the Dominion of Clouds had been designed for inhabitation. It was a place designed to hold every soul there ever had been or ever would be. The idea that a place on that scale can be summed up as a ‘large building that housed a massive courtyard garden’ is patently absurd. It must have had the capacity for our entire globe multiple times over. It was a place beyond description. That is why I think it presented itself as something far simpler.

Yet the briefest of investigations broke down the lie. Corridors appeared where they hadn’t been before, sometimes running at an angle that contradicted the sense of location you had already developed. An example: we had walked through a set of cloisters, the beginnings of the garden to our right. After ascending a set of steps we found ourselves faced with a large hallway that was extending out to where we knew there should be nothing but fresh air. There had been no sign of such a construction from the floor below, the perfect line of the cloister unbroken, but there the hallway was. I believe the entire building was far more a place of the mind than it was an actual, physical object. I suggested as much to my companions, moreover, I wondered whether the best way of finding the Observation Lounge was simply to expect it—to wish it, if you like—and let the building respond accordingly.

“If we ask it to be in there,” said Joe, gesturing to a doorway, “it will be?”

“It’s a theory,” I replied, “and there really is only one way to prove it.”

Filling myself with as much conviction as I could muster, an utter, unshakeable belief that I would open that door and find what we needed, I marched up to it, turned the handle and found myself face to face with a saloon bar. I closed the door immediately, accepting that this building might know me better than I had given it credit for.

“Well?” asked Hope.

I decided to experiment.

“Looks about right to me,” I said, “though I’ve not seen it before, take a look for yourselves.”

They opened the door and stepped inside.

“You were right,” said Hope, “it is the Observation Lounge.”

Which proved that my theory was right in principle but would take some getting used to in practice. What was needed in this place was a clarity of thought and intent that I had spent the vast majority of my life striving to avoid. I could only hope I’d develop the skill of it; if I planned on staying in the Dominion any longer it was something I needed to learn.

Simply stepping into the Observation Lounge was an act of bravery. It seemed to be entirely made of glass, hovering over the world, its walls and ceiling filled with sky, its floor looking down on the earth beneath. Currently, that view was of the plain outside Wormwood, the large camp that we had all so recently been a part of until Alonzo had brought us in here, ignorant cogs in the lunatic machine of his plan.

“The view changes,” Hope was explaining, walking across the invisible floor in utter fearlessness, “depending on what you ask to see.” She closed her eyes, focusing on Alonzo’s face. “Find him,” she commanded and the plain blurred and sped away, making me fall to my knees in disorientation. I could only imagine the effect the room would have on a drunken man, or one let loose from his senses by opium. It would be more than either could bear.

The view was now closer to home, the white walls of this very building visible to one side. We were looking on the outside of the Dominion, though, not the garden at its centre but a desert of off-white sand. Lying in this sand was Alonzo, his face vacant, a pair of ragged holes in the front of his shirt, blood seeping into the cotton. The first thought that entered my head was surprise that he could even bleed; surely, I thought, that was the province of mortals. Then, the absurdity of that came second, he clearly was mortal: he was dead.

“The celestial are not quite as invulnerable as I always assumed,” I said, leaning back against the far wall so as to remind myself that the room was solid and that I wasn’t about to fall anywhere.

“How can he be dead?” Hope wondered.

“If God can take a bullet that doesn’t offer much hope for anyone else, does it?” suggested Joe.

The view was changing once more.

“What did you do?” I asked, slapping my hands against the wall to steady myself.

“Nothing,” insisted Hope, Joe shaking his head.

“It has something else to show us,” I said.

The view now was of a white circle, pulsing with a liquid light. It was like molten rock, rippling and glowing with a brightness that suggested unimaginable heat. Around this circle, the ground was also on the move, rocks swaying, sand undulating, as if the entire area was living, unable to be still.

“What is it?” Joe wondered.

“Who can tell?” I said.

“It’s the Fundament,” came a voice from the air above us and we looked to see an ethereal form moving around the uppermost corners of the room. The shape descended and, briefly, it took on a face we all recognised: Alonzo.

“You’re not dead then,” said Joe.

“Death is just a change of state,” the voice said. “When mortals experience it they pass from their world to one of the Dominions. When one of the inhabitants of the Dominions experiences it they pass into the Fundament. It’s where our essence, our souls if you like, go. It’s the core of all life, in a few moments, my essence will merge with it and, one day, I will have flesh again. It will be different flesh and I won’t remember the actions of the old but that’s probably for the best.” The form soared towards the ceiling once more, hitting it and dissipating in all directions, like smoke blown against a wall. After a moment it coalesced again. “I did my best,” it said, “but I’m not sure I will be fondly remembered so ignorance will be a blessing.”

“On the subject of ignorance,” I said, “what exactly are we supposed to do now?”

“Whatever you like,” it replied. “It’s no longer any of my concern.”

And with that, it vanished.

“Well,” said Hope, “that was helpful.”

We sat there for a few moments, continuing to stare at the Fundament. Then Joe got to his feet. “I’m not going to hang around here,” he said, “not if there’s Paradise to explore.” He looked towards Hope.

“I’m coming,” she said.

“I’d like to stay a little longer,” I said. “Maybe see what’s happening to my friends.”

“There’s nobody left behind I care for,” said Joe, “the future’s here.” He extended his hand towards Hope who took it with a happy smile.

“I’ll find you later,” I told them.

They left and I settled down to get to grips with the workings of the Observation Lounge.

CHAPTER THREE

PRICE OF POWER

1.

O
N THE
P
LAINS
of Balthazar, just north of that viscous and unpleasant place known locally as the Bristle, a lone rider made his way towards the city of Golgotha.

The Choir of the Heat watched him as he passed, their cracked and dusty eyes grinding in their sockets as he crossed the horizon, trailing a dissipating tail of red earth behind him. As always, they sang their opinion on the matter, the birds in the sky above them circling away from the advances of those sharp and lethal notes. The rider, pre-warned, had taken his own precautions, his ears clogged shut with mud from the banks of the Bristle. It fizzed and popped, filling his head with a sound like cradles burning.

He skirted around the Forest of Truth, having no wish to hear its leaves pronounce on his future. Whether their name was accurate or not, he wasn’t a man who believed in destiny. You made your own way in this world or any world, you carved it out with bullet, knife or tooth.

As Golgotha rose in the distance, the road widened and began to fill with other travellers. Carriages of people, carts of produce, the occasional car, foul, black smoke pouring forth from their exhaust pipes. The rider stayed to one side, not comfortable negotiating so much traffic.

At the edge of the city, a lone beggar baked in the dirt by the road. Desperate for cool air, he had pulled the flesh of his head away to hang around his neck like a glistening scarf. The low sun glistened off his wet skull as he brushed the flies away from their egg-laying in his shed cheeks. As the rider drew close, the beggar stared at him, eyeballs dry from a lack of blinking. If he had lips he’d not have looked so happy.

“Spare a memory?” the beggar asked.

“None I’d be willing to share,” the rider replied.

He continued along the road as it began to curl between the buildings.

He had once spent a little time in New York. The city had felt suffocating to a man like him, used to the feeling of space and distance. Of course, later had come prison and then he had known real suffocation.

Golgotha was not unlike New York. As in so many parts of the Dominion of Circles the landscape was influenced by the mortal world, some would say infected by it.

He was surrounded by demands on his attention. Signs begged him to buy their wares, everything from a hot meal to a hearty fuck presented to him at bargain rates. Their pleas went unnoticed. So much smoke and steam billowed from the sidewalk gratings and the open windows that the whole city looked to have been built on a fire, every building on every street ready to become kindling. To him it was just chaos, a crowding in on his senses that made him desperate for the simple, easily negotiated world of the plains.

“Long time on the road?” a man shouted from the sidewalk, scratching at a face of shedding skin. “Got what you need to relax and unwind.”

“Doubt that,” the rider told him, continuing past him.

“Don’t know what you’re missing!” the man shouted after him.

“I know exactly,” the rider replied, more to himself than the seller. “Wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

After a few more minutes, he had to stop. The constant barrage of people and buildings felt as if they were choking him. He had sunk low in his saddle, flinching from things that weren’t there, sick to his stomach by the smells of cooking, sweat and death.

“You look just about done in,” said a voice to his left. “Not used to the city life?”

It was a young girl, though he knew better than to take such things on face value. He was about to tell her to begone when common sense kicked in.

“I’m heading for The Exchange,” he said. “Lead me there and I’ll see you well paid.”

“How about I see some proof of your worth first?” she said. “I’m not stupid.”

He took off his hat and scarf, the latter stiff with dust and spittle. He turned his face towards her. “You can take me at my word or not at all.”

She gave a small laugh. “Maybe I can at that. You the man they’re all talking about? You don’t smell familiar.”

“Maybe. What are they saying?”

“That they want you dead, for the most part. Reckon I could be set up just fine if I took you there. Bet there’s a reward.”

“Then it’s your considerable good fortune that I want to go. Hop on and lead me there.”

“And I can get whatever they’re paying for you?”

“As long as they pay upfront, and don’t make no stipulations about my being dead first. I don’t think you want to take on a deal that risky.”

“I don’t want to kill you, what would be the point these days?” She climbed up onto the rakh. “Now cover your face back up. I don’t want someone else trying to take you off me.”

“I’m all yours.”

As they moved through the streets he tried to blank out the ceaseless assault on his senses. The crowds moved like a storm raging around the buildings, flowing in and out of every available space. While some appeared human, other species loomed on either side of them that could not be so easily placed, absurd, grotesque shapes that he didn’t even try to process. Monstrousness was not something you judged from the outside, it lay at the heart of you. How could he not know that with a heart as black as his?