Halcyon The Complete Trilogy (23 page)

If I had kept working on my batteries instead of hiding them in an airship, I could have made the world a safer place. Bright clear lights at night, out on the streets to keep people safe and in the factories to keep workers safe. More telegraph lines. Better clocks. Electric safety shut-off switches. So many things I could have been building all this time.

But I didn’t. And now the pastoralists are ready to burn the country to the ground. Innocent people will die. Innocent people have already died.

I could have stopped this.

This is my fault. 

She stopped under a streetlight and looked around at the unfamiliar buildings, their dark windows offering only dim reflections of the cobbled road.

I can’t just go to bed now. I need to do something. I need to fix things. I need to find that doctor. Medina.

Slowly, Taziri turned and headed back toward the marriage celebration still roaring its strange and angry songs into the night.

If they know so much about people getting hurt, then I’m sure someone there will know about the local doctors, especially an Espani doctor.

Chapter 22. Lorenzo

There had been a brief uncomfortable moment in the bedroom as he set the bags down in the corner when Qhora had stared at him with a strange softness in her eyes. She parted her lips as if to speak, but after a brief hesitation she merely thanked him and turned away. So after depositing the cubs and other luggage, and pausing in the kitchen long enough to stuff his pockets with a few rolls, a chunk of cheese, and two apples, Lorenzo returned to the train station.

Standing on the deserted platform, he was grateful for the quiet and the stillness. No people. No fighting. No yelling. No games. Just a broad wooden deck and little dark office, a smattering of early stars in the evening sky, and two iron rails pointing out through an old neighborhood to the vast wilderness beyond the city where two beasts from the far side of the world were slowly making their way south toward their mistress.

A cool breeze rippled through the grassy plains and stirred the dust in the streets. He counted four blocks of small houses between himself and the end of civilization. Four cross-streets and a few hundred homes, but precious few lights and no voices. The hidalgo tugged his hat down firmly on his head and gathered his long black coat tighter around his belly, but he needn’t have bothered. It was only a lifelong habit as the night drew closer, but here in the south the night was scarcely colder than the day. At least to an Espani.

Feeling foolish, he relaxed his shoulders and let his coat flap open as he pulled out one of his apples and began to eat. For a time, he considered walking out beyond the houses to the very edge of the plains to try to catch sight of Atoq and Wayra before they came too close to the city.
No
, he reasoned,
this is where Qhora stepped off the train. This is where her scent will be strongest. This is where they will come.

The sky faded from slate blue to violet to black. As the last glimmer of color vanished from the northern horizon, he thought he glimpsed a small dimple, a tiny black figure that hadn’t been there before.

Well, either it’s them, or it isn’t
.

He tossed the gnawed core of his apple off the edge of the platform and began alternately biting off chunks of his cheese and bread. The rolls weren’t as dark or rich as the bread at home and the cheese was far less pungent, leaving the meal somewhat tasteless and hollow. The last apple beckoned from his pocket, but he refrained. His eyes had adjusted to the brightening starlight and now he was certain he could see something in the distance, a hard black shape far out on the train tracks, still small but distinct in the silvery sea of grass that rippled and shivered in the rising wind.

It was a train. He heard it huffing and clacking before he could see the trail of steam above it. Maybe ten minutes away now.
Did they send someone to get the other engine from the crash site?
He glanced around the empty platform again.
If they did send someone out there, they sure forgot to leave anyone here to meet them. No. What if it’s the woman in white?
 

Lorenzo rested his left hand on the pommel of his espada.
I only cut her hand. I didn’t mean to hurt her much, but maybe I should have hurt her a little bit more. Enough to scare her away.
He took his hand off his sword.
No
.
No more blood today.

When the train rolled slowly into the station, the trail of steam from the funnel had already been reduced to a few pale wisps in the night air. The wheels hardly squeaked as the brakes were applied and the locomotive halted at the edge of the platform. It was too dark to see much of the boiler but the twisted and broken outline of the cab was distinctive enough. Lorenzo strolled down to meet it, but stopped well away from it. “Hello?”

The woman in white stepped out of the crushed and mangled remains of the cab. In the half light, he couldn’t make out the details of her face, only the pale gleam on her nose and cheeks, and the white bandage wrapped tightly around her left hand. She gave him a long, tired look before shrugging and saying, “You again.”

“Are you all right?”

She held up her bandaged hand. “You’re better than Salvator Fabris.”

He blushed and was grateful for the darkness. “I doubt that.”

“He could never cut me.”

“You were lovers. I doubt he wanted to.” Lorenzo exhaled slowly, praying for a visible trace of his breath, but his prayer went unanswered. It was too warm. Still, he touched the medallion beneath his shirt and tried to imagine what a kind and saintly person would say to this woman. “Why did you attack us?”

“For the money.”

“Our money? Whose money?”

She shook her head. “No names. I still have my knives, Espani.”

“And I have my sword. We both have things. How nice for us.” He gestured down the platform, inviting her to walk with him. “Your name is Shifrah, yes? I’m Lorenzo.”

She stared at him and then at the platform. Slipping her hands into her pockets, she began walking slowly parallel to him, never closer than three yards. “Why are you guarding that savage girl, Lorenzo? For her gold?”

A flicker of anger in him wanted to slap her. But only a flicker. “In her country, she is a princess. And no, she has nothing but her cloak, her animals, and her name,” he said. “She had one other friend, but you killed him today.”

“I did indeed. Will you kill me for that?”

“I don’t know yet.” He really didn’t know and that question loomed large in his mind, not only for his bodily safety but that of his soul as well. “Do you believe in God?”

Shifrah laughed. “Whose god? Yours? The one with the happy little family that came down from heaven to learn what it means to be human?”

“God comes to different people in different guises. You’re a Persian, aren’t you?”

“No,” she said sharply. “I’m a Samaritan.”

“I see.” He frowned. Her answer only raised more questions. The Samaritan sect was tiny, a footnote in the Espani holy text about a group of people claiming to have the only true Word of God hidden away on their sacred mountain and lording it over the Judeans, Syrians, Babylonians, and anyone else who claimed to worship the one God by any name, be it El, Adonai, or Ahura Mazda. Whatever their claims, he knew the Samaritans only to be scholars, not warriors. “I’m sure the path that brought you to this place was a hard one.”

“No harder than most.”

“I didn’t mean the road from Persia to Marrakesh.”

“Neither did I.”

Could she be a holy scholar as well as a killer?
He swallowed.
Why not? Aren’t I?

“You’re a mercenary? An assassin? That seems a hard road. I’ve killed quite a few people myself. Some were in duels. Most were in war,” Lorenzo said. “But I haven’t killed anyone since I returned from the New World. I vowed not to, though I haven’t told anyone of my vow yet. I’ve even faked killing for the sake of my lady. For her peace of mind.”

“You fake it? For a woman?” Shifrah smiled a flash of white teeth in the darkness. “How perverse.”

From the dark streets behind them, a chorus of little children shouted and squealed and laughed. Lorenzo did not look back toward the sound. “She wouldn’t understand. I thought that my vow would free me from so much sin and darkness, but it’s only plagued me with questions and doubts. Like this one here tonight. You.”

“To kill me or not to kill me?”

Lorenzo stopped and stared up at the night sky. “If I kill you, I break my vow. If I give you to the law, they will kill you, and I’ll have just as nearly broken my vow. And if I let you leave, you’ll only kill others and I’d be complicit in those deaths as well.”

“And now you know why I left my people,” she said. “There are no paths to God, if there even is a God. The high and narrow paths only lead to misery.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” He saw no glint of light on steel but he heard the light flutter of cloth and in an instant he had drawn his espada and parried her stiletto thrust. She stumbled half a step and he grabbed her shoulder and shoved her away as he slipped his sword back into its sheathe and let his coat swallow him up once more.

Shifrah straightened up, the knife still in her hand. “Seriously? Are you going to keep me here all night, blathering on about your three-faced god until I give up a life of wealth and murder for some drafty cloister in España?”

A wooden clatter at the edge of the platform drew his glance for an instant, but if there was anything out there it was lost in the shadows. The hidalgo looked back at the woman. “That would solve my dilemma, actually.” He sighed. Each time he blinked his eyes closed it was a struggle to open them again. To lie down, to rest his back, to rest his mind, to retreat from the world, even for a few hours. At that moment, sleep became the ultimate temptation. He said, “So you reconciled a merciful God with a merciless world by renouncing your faith?”

“It was never my faith. It was the faith of the people around me. I was just born there. Faith is just the clothes and food of your homeland, not a shining path to the next world, or some eternal truth. It’s just words and candles and old books no one can read.” Her stiletto dangled from her fingertips. “It’s just like that lie about your precious Son of love and mercy.”

“What lie?”

“That he ever existed!” Shifrah rolled her eyes. “The Mother and Father descended the mountain from heaven with the Book already written in their hands, detailing the lives they were about to live. They never had a child. That was all made up long after their return to paradise. And you know why? So the stinking Italians could corner the market on religious truth and set up their precious pope in Rome.”

“Blasphemy.”

“It’s the truth. There is no Son in the original text. I know, I’ve read it!” She looked away and tightened her hand into a fist. She relaxed by small degrees. “You see? This is why I don’t like to talk about religion. So what’s it going to be? Kill me or let me go? If you don’t choose, I will. I’m hungry and tired.”

Lorenzo inhaled slowly.
What if I’m already damned? I’ve killed so many. Perhaps there are sins God cannot forgive. And if there are, then my only solace would be in knowing that this woman will never harm another person
. He reached for his sword. “This isn’t what I want. But it is the only choice you’ve given me. I’m sorry.”

Shifrah shrugged. “At least you’re not going to bore me to death.” She presented her blade in a formal salute.

He returned the gesture as she broke into a sprint, racing toward him, her soft boots thumping on the planks. Suddenly the patter of her feet was doubled and trebled and Lorenzo knew that they were no longer alone on the platform. A lifetime of training kept his eyes firmly fixed on his opponent, but his belly was knotted with the fear that someone was about to stab him in the back. At the last instant before he would have raised his blade, Lorenzo dove to his right and rolled across his shoulder to the far side of the platform. As he came up to his knees, he saw a silent blur of fur and fangs leap onto the woman in white.

“Atoq! No!”

The saber-toothed cat stood on the woman, crushing her into the platform. He looked at the hidalgo with eyes like shining golden coins. By the light of the streetlamp behind him, Lorenzo saw that the cat’s fangs were still clean. “Here! Atoq, here!” The kirumichi hunter had never obeyed his commands before, but then again, they had never been alone together before and the cat had never shown any interest in the hidalgo, except as a provider of fresh meat and clean water.

 The cat glanced down at the woman pinned beneath his paws and roared into her face. And then he padded silently away toward Lorenzo, sat down, and licked his teeth.

  The hidalgo exhaled a breath he didn’t realize he had been holding. Atoq had never given him any reason to fear for his own safety, but in the absence of affection, the man’s natural fear of inhuman eyes and enormous claws ruled his pounding heart. “Good boy.”

The cat blinked.

“Shifrah, it’s two against one now. If you had any chance before, it’s gone now. Please, see reason. Give up your weapons. Surrender to the police. I’ll come with you to see that you’re well treated, and I’ll even testify on your behalf. Perhaps we can negotiate some lesser punishment at your trial. Prison or labor.”

The Samaritan sat up and slowly got to her feet. “That’s just another sort of death sentence,” she said. “I won’t go willingly. I didn’t cross the width of Ifrica just to rot in a cell.”

Lorenzo circled the cat, who continued to lick his chops and gaze intently at the woman. “Well, maybe we can arrange something else. What you said a moment ago. You could come with me back to España. There is a nunnery in Madrid where I have a few friends. You could—”

“Give up my life of crime?” She smiled, shaking her head. “You’re a sweet boy. Some day you’ll make a dim-witted whore very happy, I’m sure. Maybe for a whole month, even.”