Halcyon The Complete Trilogy (107 page)

Bastet nodded as she curled up on the nearest passenger seat. “I can’t really tell whether most marriages work well or not. They’re all different. The people are different, the problems are different. Some seem happy, but aren’t. Some seem miserable, but aren’t.” The girl took her cat mask off her head and fiddled with it in both hands. “My family used to be happy, but everyone got older and grouchier and touchier. They fought a lot, for a while anyway. Things are quiet now, but not as happy. Not like they used to be.”

Taziri nodded back. “Sorry to hear it.”

“So your friend was killed with a seireiken? That’s rough. His wife must want to get his soul back, I guess.”

Taziri blinked. She hadn’t thought of that. In all the rush, all the planning, all the talk of revenge and killing, there hadn’t been a single mention of Lorenzo’s soul.

But of course, if the sword was made of aetherium, then it would have absorbed his soul. Stupid. I should have realized that
.

She nodded. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“That’s nice. For her, I mean. And for him, I suppose. I didn’t know that people in the west knew how to release a soul from a seireiken,” Bastet said.

Taziri shook her head. “I don’t. I don’t know of anyone who does. We only discovered aetherium two years ago.”

The girl looked up, incredulous. “Two years?! But it’s been…oh, right, the Sons of Osiris have been collecting it all this time. I suppose they got all the sun-steel in the west then a long time ago.”

“I guess so, maybe. We haven’t found any in Marrakesh that I know of.” Taziri leaned forward. “So, you know how to release a soul from a seireiken?”

“Oh, sure.” The girl nodded. “I mean, it’s very hard to do, but you can certainly do it.”

“How?”

“You just need to melt the steel. When it’s melted, it releases the aether and the souls with it.”

Taziri felt a dull weight of disappointment in her chest. “But when the aetherium is charged with souls, it’s already blazing hot. We had a lump of it two years ago that was so hot it burned straight through an entire ironclad warship in just a few seconds. Aetherium can withstand unbelievably high temperatures. How on earth are we supposed to melt it down?”

“I said it was very hard to do. Obviously, it’s easier to forge aetherium when it’s cold, when there are no souls in it. I don’t know how you would melt it once it’s already hot, but that’s what you have to do. Maybe you can drop it in a volcano or something.”

Taziri shook her head and waved the suggestion away. “No, wait, let me think. Regular steel melts around two or three thousand degrees, depending on impurities. Charged aetherium is much hotter, say five thousand. So we need to create a controlled heat source that can generate over five thousand degrees of heat. Focused, controlled heat.” She picked at her lip as she slowly turned to look at the darkened instrument panel of the cockpit.

So what do I have? An engine with five minutes of fuel left. A propeller. A fully charged battery. And some wire
.

“You know, back in Marrakesh, in the factories, they sometimes weld regular steel using electricity. It’s called arc welding.”

“Can you do that to a seireiken?”

“I don’t know. But I was thinking of trying something a little different. Over the last year, I’ve been seeing a lot of articles coming out of the university about new kinds of energy and new kinds of matter. There is a theory that after you heat ice into water, and then heat water into steam, you can heat steam into something else even hotter.” Taziri smiled. “How would you like to help me with a little science experiment?”

“Right now?” The girl’s face lit up. But then just as quickly she frowned and turned toward the hatch. “Someone’s here. A tall one and a short one.”

Taziri slipped out of her seat. “It must be Mirari and Qhora!” She peeked out the little window in the hatch and saw Mirari’s masked face near the glass, so she unlocked the door and stepped back to let them enter.

The Espani woman stepped inside and stopped short when she saw Bastet. “Who is that?”

But Taziri was frowning at the little man behind Mirari and she switched into Espani to ask, “Who is that?”

The young man managed a weary smile. “Tycho of Constantia. Good evening to you, captain.”

Taziri grabbed Mirari’s sleeve. “Where is Dona Qhora? Where is the Italian?”

Mirari didn’t move. “Who is the girl? Why is she here?”

Taziri glanced at the end of the cabin where the Aegyptian girl was sulking in the shadows. “That’s Bastet. She lives near here. She helped me get rid of some people snooping around the
Halcyon
, and she brought me food, which is more than you’ve done, thank you very much. Now where is Dona Qhora?”

Mirari’s shoulders relaxed and she sat down in the nearest passenger seat. The young man hauled himself up the steps into the hatch and plopped down on the floor. The masked woman sighed. “We were separated. We tracked the killer to the home of his lover, and learned that his name is Aker El Deeb. But it was a trap and we barely escaped with our lives. My lady was hurt and chose to hide herself while Tycho and I ran away to divert the men chasing us. But then, after we had gone, Dona Qhora surrendered to them. She just stepped out into the middle of the street and gave herself up.”

“What? Why?”

“To get inside, of course,” Tycho said. “She let herself be taken so she could get inside the Temple of Osiris. Quite a gamble, but it seems to have worked. We followed their carriage across half the city, right to the Temple itself. She’s inside now. No way to help her.”

Taziri blinked. “The temple…of the Sons of Osiris?”

“That’s right,” he said.

She blinked at the dwarf. “I’m sorry, who are you again?”

“Tycho of Constantia. I ran into your friends in the market this morning. They were looking for a seireiken, the same as me and my master, Philo.” He grimaced and swallowed, but then managed another tired smile. “We lost him today. Philo. Killed in the Hellan Quarter. I’m not even sure who killed him, or why. Probably just thieves. Or maybe someone hired by the Temple because we’d been asking the wrong questions. I don’t know. I may never know.” He shrugged.

Taziri glanced at the other two women, who both looked back with tired and helpless eyes that had nothing to offer her or him. The pilot looked down at the young man again with a sudden swell of pity for him, in part for his story but also in part for his imperfect body. It wounded something inside her, the part of her that loved to fix things, to see a person she could not fix. “I’m sorry to hear that. But now you’re helping Dona Qhora?”

“We’re helping each other. I mean to help her find the sword that took her husband’s life, and in turn she is helping me to obtain a seireiken sword for myself. It is my mission to find such a blade and return it to the prince of Vlachia as a gift from my Lady Nerissa.” There was something artlessly kind and hopeful in his bright eyes and valiantly upturned lip.

He’s going to die
.

Taziri put her hand to her eyes and pretended to massage her temples.

Whoever he is, whatever he is, he’s going to die. People like him always die. The good ones. The kind ones. The ones who don’t understand the bleak and terrible truths about people and life and the world. He’s going to die. And it’s not fair
.

“I take it that Señor Fabris has not returned at all today?” Mirari asked.

“No, no one,” Taziri said. “Is he lost too?”

“He went chasing after a green man this morning and never returned. He may be dead.”

We should be so lucky
. Taziri sighed. “So what do we do now? How can we help Qhora if she’s locked in this Temple? Can we break in?”

“No, there’s no hope of that,” Tycho said. “We may be able to buy a few answers from the right people, but there’s nothing we can do for the lady now but wait.”

“Crap.” Taziri pushed her hands back through her hair. “So they may both be dead, or soon to be dead, or locked away in some prison. Damn it. Bastet was just telling me how to free a soul from a seireiken, too.” She shook her head.

“What?” Tycho sat up. “You can’t do that.”

“Of course you can,” Bastet said, her first words since the others entered the cabin. Her Espani had an archaic lilt to it. “It’s just very difficult. But I think your clever captain here was about to figure out how to do exactly that.”

“Is that true?” Mirari asked. “Can you really free Don Lorenzo’s soul?”

“Maybe. I think so.” Taziri shrugged. “Probably, yes. I’ll need to build a special tool, but I should be able to do it.”

“Ha!” Tycho slapped his leg with a wide grin. “Amazing. I’d like to see that.”

“You will.” Mirari stood up. “Dona Qhora must know this, immediately. So we must find her, and we must rescue her and find the sword that killed Don Lorenzo. Captain, can you build your tool now?”

“I suppose so. It would be easier once we get back to Tingis, but since the
Halcyon
won’t be flying anytime soon, there’s no reason why I can’t fabricate the tool right here and now.”

“Excellent. Please begin your work. We’ll be back as soon as we can.” Mirari pushed out through the hatch.

Tycho shoved himself up onto his short legs and hurried after the tall Espani woman.

“Wait a minute,” Taziri said. She reached down and unstrapped the revolver from her thigh. “I want you to have this.”

The Hellan eyed the gun. “I’ve heard bad things about those. Blow up in your hand, rip your fingers off, shoot your toe off when you’re asleep. I think I’ll stick with my knife.” He patted his belt.

“No, that’s all cheap little Eranian guns. They don’t know what they’re doing. This is a Mazigh revolver. No exploding, no jamming, no misfires. Just point and fire.” She quickly showed him how to open the barrel and replaced the six bullets, and then gave him a small box of ammunition. “Fifty shots. It should last you a while.”

Tycho strapped the gun to his leg and practiced drawing it. “Fifty, eh? And all I have to do is aim straight?”

“Do you have good eyes?”

He laughed. “Of course! How else do you think I can tell you people apart from down here?”

Taziri laughed with him. It made the ache in her chest all the worse because it did nothing to dissuade her from believing that she was sending this young man off to die.

“You’re sure you won’t be needing it?” he asked.

“No.” She patted her armored medical braced under her sleeve. “I have a spare.”

“All right then. Thank you very much. I’ll treasure it always. Until it blows my finger off.” He leapt out the hatch with a grin.

And Taziri couldn’t help but grin as she pulled the hatch shut. She leaned back into her pilot’s chair and sighed as she rubbed her hand through her hair, which was starting to feel a bit dry and stiff from spending all day in the oven of the
Halcyon
. She looked up at Bastet, who was picking at her lip. “Well, I guess we need to build a very hot tool, don’t we?”

“What’s it called?” the girl asked. “You said we need to make something hotter than steam to melt the steel. So what’s hotter than steam?”

“It’s called plasma,” Taziri said. “We’re going to build a plasma torch.”

Day Four

Chapter 22. Shifrah

They ran down the dark, narrow passage, their shoulders crashing into the rough stone walls and footsteps echoing over and over, chasing them along in the shadows. Shifrah kept one hand on Rashaken’s arm and the other stretched out in front of her to probe the darkness. Her hand struck smooth wood and she shoved through the door into a small room illuminated by the torchlight in the hall slipping under the other door on the far side. The room was empty except for the dim outlines of a bench, a chair, and a pile of kindling in the corner.

Shifrah dashed to the far door to look and listen, but there was no one on the other side. Behind her Kenan closed the door to the narrow passage and signed that it was all clear behind them as well.

Safe.

Heaving a long sigh, Shifrah slipped away her last stiletto into her ruined jacket and sat down on the wooden bench beside Rashaken. The old man sighed as well, and then began to chuckle. He said, “It’s been a very long time since I’ve moved so quickly. I almost felt young again.” He squeezed her knee. “But not that young. My poor back is aching, but I think yours is a bit worse for wear. Take off your shirt and let me see those wounds.”

Shifrah nodded and slipped off her jacket and shirt. The old man tutted and tsked and patted around in his robes. “This one on your back is not deep at all, but I imagine it stings quite a bit. A little bit of Espani whiskey will help clean it out.”

She winced as he poured the alcohol over the wound.

“And a bit of cloth to keep it clean for now.” He tore the sleeves from her shirt and deftly fashioned a bandage to tie around her back and across her chest. “But your arm, that one will need to be stitched.” He bound another cloth over the gash, knotting it so tightly that Shifrah felt her fingers go cold for a moment.

She slipped her jacket back on gingerly. “Thank you, Master Rashaken.”

Kenan paced from one door to the other, peering through the cracks and listening to the silence in the halls beyond.

“Sit down, young man,” Rashaken said. “We’re quite safe here. No one is allowed down here, and your Italian friend will not leave the forge alive, thanks to Master Jiro.”

Shifrah translated the master’s words and Kenan grudgingly holstered his gun and sat down by the outer door.

“So, Shifrah Dumah, Omar’s little girl is all grown up, I see.” Rashaken’s smile gleamed in the shadows. “I never thought to see you again. I thought perhaps Omar had whisked you away to the ends of the earth with him. Why have you come back?”

She released the last heavy exhalation from her duel with Salvator and felt the heat bleeding away from her arms and legs, leaving her with a sweaty chill. “It’s a long story. But all that matters now is that I’m looking for Omar. Zahra says he went west to Marrakesh eight years ago and never returned.”