The Promise of the Child (11 page)

Since the exploration of the first extrasolar worlds twelve thousand years before, it had been noted that around twenty-five per cent of the totally lifeless planets and moons discovered already possessed atmospheres that were perfectly agreeable to human habitation. No forms of animal, plant or microbial life existed on them and yet the air beneath their topmost clouds was harshly breathable, often with a higher concentration of oxygen than that of the Old World. After much of the Firmament was colonised by the proto-governments and kingdoms that would make up the Immortal Amaranthine, it was speculated by some that the specific concentrations of gases in many of the newly discovered realms were all roughly equivalent to that of the Old World's early atmosphere, many millions of years before. In essence, the smell of Port Obviado—or perhaps more accurately the
stench
—would be perfectly recognisable to a beast of the ancient past such as the early mammalian progenitors of Amaranthine and Prism alike, perhaps even to a dinosaur. Why such facts felt important to him now was suddenly beyond him, and yet as his mind finally dissolved into sleep, Corphuso wondered what would happen if he just stopped breathing the rich, prehistoric air, what they would do with him and his fabulous machine. Its operation, though not exactly simple, could perhaps be understood through trial and error, even though many would surely perish in the process. There were others—some still locked in oubliettes on Drolgins and Filgurbirund—who had worked with him on various stages of the Shell's design, but Corphuso knew that whoever eventually came for him would prefer the machine's architect alive and functional. With a bitter irony he reflected that the Soul Engine (as his technicians had referred to it before the more popular name was chosen), would keep him alive only so long. Corphuso had other plans, of course, other ideas and inventions, but none so grandiose or life-changing as the machine they were currently dragging through the darkness. If he could only remain under the Immortals' wing—unfailingly cruel and selfish though they might be—he might yet live to see them through.

The Hiob Ranges, stretching like a pocked, serrated belt around Port Obviado's black waist, were positioned directly between the moon's two warring Threen Principalities. It was impossible to cross the Light Line—whether in sub-orbit or higher—from the northern to the southern hemisphere due to Lacaille corsairs, battleships and privateer fleets patrolling the shipping lanes, and since Port Obviado and its parent planet Port Cys represented the invisible border between the outer Prism Investiture and its inner regions, the only practical and efficient way around was to traverse the Hiobs. A motorized convoy in or above the blackness of the jungle was an instant and slow-moving target, and so it had been deemed necessary to land in one Principality and transport the Shell on foot through the rainforest into the next, one hundred and thirty miles south.

If all went to plan, a squadron of Vulgar cutters would be waiting in the capital port to take them further into the Firmament and out of the Lacailles' reach. The Vulgar were occasionally loyal and useful allies to the Amaranthine, always on call if enough influence and capital could be thrown their way. A brief end to the Vulgar's dispute with the Lacaille—their close cousins in all but name—was theoretically possible if enough territory could be awarded to both sides, but it was a process those among the Amaranthine who oversaw such things considered one step closer to giving over the Firmament entirely. The Prism as a whole—a loosely related amalgam of eleven hominid races populating more than a thousand individual kingdom-states—represented an encroaching and eventually terminal illness to the Firmament, a system of tumours gradually strangling the Amaranthine until there would be nothing left of them and their worlds. It was only through careful management of allies and influence that the Amaranthine still held any real power at all. But time was running out, and whenever one species was strengthened to repel another, the Firmament suffered.

Corphuso knew that the Threen—known Amaranthine-killers—had been punished most. Their holdings were among the poorest and most dangerous places in the Investiture. Despite their resentment of the Amaranthine, they were being offered a comprehensive pardon now—on the condition that they assisted Voss and Corphuso's safe passage across the Hiobs—as well as new lands elsewhere around Kapteyn's Star and a lifting of many of the crippling sanctions the Immortals had imposed on them over the centuries. Corphuso knew other Prism species would be taking note of the Amaranthines' diminishing ability to honour their promises, and yet still he doubted the Immortals' word.

He was awoken by the feeling of someone being retied to his wrist, and together they were guided further into the camp so they could be attached to another of the still-sleeping Vulgar. When all were accounted for, he felt the rope stiffening and the sounds of the camp being packed up.

“Corphuso?” It was Voss he'd been tied to.

“Good morning, Amaranthine,” he squeaked as they trudged in darkness again, the rain pattering harder through the leaves. “Did you manage any sleep?”

“Very little, Architect.” She sighed. “I expect I shall get less and less as we near the Light Line.”

“Correct me if I'm wrong,” he said, wary of sounding overconfident in his knowledge of their ways, “but is it not the case that Amaranthine need less sleep than us mortal creatures?”

The quality of Voss's voice changed, as if she had turned to face him in the dark. “Perennials, perhaps, but I am not so old as you appear to think, Corphuso.”

He hesitated, embarrassed. “I did not mean—”

“Quiet,” she whispered.

He felt her nudge his shoulder. The Threen were talking among themselves with an apparent urgency, and he heard one dash by them up the forest path to the front of the line, its feet slapping in the mud. He strained to listen. Something had happened.

“What are they saying to each other?” she asked.

Corphuso dropped his head as they walked, listening intently to the commotion up ahead. His understanding of Threen was imperfect—it did not share many similarities with Vulgar—but he could make out enough.

“They are worried, Amaranthine. The one close by says …” He paused to listen again. “He is saying it is possible that we are being hunted. What should we do?”

Voss stopped and Corphuso reluctantly slowed, feeling the rope tighten around his wrist. He listened to the sounds of the rain in the lightless forest. Eventually the rope around his wrist was tugged, softly at first and then harder. He waited, hearing a Threen mutter and turn back to them, the pattering of its feet growing louder.

Before it could reach them, its sounds ceased as if it had stopped abruptly in the path ahead. Corphuso held his breath. Suddenly it screamed shrilly, the rope yanking him and the Amaranthine to the ground. Sounds of a scuffle and more of the Threen running back down the path came out of the darkness as he was dragged along by the rope, the Vulgar behind falling and cursing one after another. They were pulled across the mud, bumping into trees and stones, the Vulgar men at his rear screaming now, too. The rope became warm and wet, thick chunks of hot material sliding into his hands, and a spray of damp droplets spattered his face. He tasted the iron in them.

“Pull!” Voss shouted, “pull backwards!”

Corphuso rammed his boot into the earth until it gripped. More Vulgar piled into their backs. Whatever was yanking on the rope stopped and snarled, and Corphuso found himself trying to remember the names of all the evolved Old World animals that had come to live here as he leaned backwards with all his paltry weight. The thing would come for him first—being at the head of the line—maybe sparing the Vulgar behind who were pulling the Shell, and that was perhaps just as well, but for a moment he hated the idea of sacrificing his life for them. He steeled himself, staring into the darkness, hoping Voss might have one or two of the Amaranthines' fabled tricks up her sleeve.

Something, most likely the leading Threen's corpse, crunched in the animal's jaws. Blood splattered Corphuso's feet with a sickening spurt as some organ inside its body burst, and then the rope went slack. He heard the thing move away, still eating, the smell of blood and shit and bile strong in his nostrils.

The sickly Threen had attracted the predator, their interpreter said in the darkness as one of the guides spoke, the corrupted stench of whatever disease had ailed it likely fragrant in the jungle air for miles around. They would be safe now in this territory with the hunter so recently sated, and could move on. Voss said she wasn't sure if she could believe what the Vulgar was saying to her, but in the blackness of the forest path they recounted and retied the ropes, fastening the Shell's heavy chest back onto to its pallet and resuming the long slog up into the mountains. The rope in Corphuso's hands was still wet but the warmth had leached out of it, and over the course of several silent hours he felt the clotted blood drying, stiffening the weave. His hands, he had no doubt, would be almost totally brown with the creature's blood.

By the evening of the fourth day he could hear a distant rumbling. At first it had presented itself as nothing but a nagging vibration through the soles of his feet, but when they stopped he thought he could make out sound, too. They were many miles from the nearest front, one of four chaotic Maginot Lines that had sprung up during the course of the small conflict, and the majority of artillery-based conflict was taking place in the moon's troposphere between the Threens' allies, the Zelioceti, and rival Lacaille fleets. It dawned on Corphuso as they approached the source of the sound that it couldn't possibly be the clamour of fighting but rather some natural phenomenon—a landslide, perhaps, though more likely a waterfall. He thought back to the maps he had seen before leaving the Voidship, remembering the concentric red lines of altitude as the foothills rose into the mountains, but could recall no sign of a waterfall on their proposed route. Either the maps had ignored large features, which struck him as unlikely since he had seen individual holy trees marked, or the Threen they travelled with were taking them an alternate way.

When the sound had become a roar, he knew the guides had taken another path. The Vulgar behind were growing anxious, registering at last the dampness in the air, possibly on the very lip of the thundering cascade. Corphuso could feel a mist of spray entering his nostrils as he breathed, everything else drowned out now by the falls. The rope in his hands suddenly became slack.

“What—” Voss began, the fury evident in her voice.

A presence stepped forwards, jostling Corphuso. The Amaranthine's scream as she was shoved from the edge of the falls was like nothing he'd ever heard, a shriek of rage and fear that brought him out in a tingling chill. Corphuso realised through nothing but sensation that he was standing alone, cut from the rest of the rope line.

A sudden flare of light forced his eyes shut. Through narrowed slits he looking down with difficulty to see the rope around his wrist had indeed been cut. The Amaranthine's screams had faded into the bellowing waterfall, visible at last. The forest loomed over him, the light reflecting from dozens of nocturnal pupils. Around him the Threen stood, their goggled eyes gleaming blackly.

“Lacaille say you, and only you,” burbled the closest Threen in Unified. So they could speak it all along. He glanced behind him, knowing before he did so that the rest of his party would be gone. The huge metal case still sat on its pallet, mud caking the sides where it had been pulled, sled-like, through days' worth of undergrowth.

“What Lacaille?” he asked, wrapping his arms around himself and glancing between the tall, strange creatures.

“We take you to him now,” the Threen said, its long, glistening tongue snaking from its mouth as it smiled. It hoisted the simple lantern and turned a knob, extinguishing the light.

Bloodfruit

They rounded the caves, aiming for a mottled swathe of darker green where the sea became deeper. Beneath them the sandbanks sank away into gloom, the depths hard to judge. The water was much cooler out here, and when Lycaste looked over the side of the boat he couldn't see any fish at all.

Drimys and Impatiens sat between a stack of baskets filled with the stinking sap of Lycaste's overripe bloodfruits. Drimys lifted a lid and peered inside. Lycaste thought he was going to say something but the man simply nodded, replacing the lid and looking off out to sea. None of them was feeling particularly talkative. Spots of crimson from the basket dappled the floor of the boat, their colour softening as they faded and mixed with salt water that had slopped over the edge.

“Leave it alone,” Impatiens said softly, not looking at Drimys. He turned his frowning gaze out to sea, deep-set eyes lost in strong shadow. The two had argued that morning over preparations, Impatiens accusing his friend of not making enough netting for the trip. Now they were barely on speaking terms.

Lycaste carefully stretched a leg over the baking rim of the boat, lost in daydreams. A hot wind buffeted his face and he closed his eyes, secretly delighted that for once he and not Drimys was Impatiens's favourite. He relaxed into memory, letting the gentle swells that rocked the boat take him there. The crazed pink glow of the sun behind his lids was the firelight from last night; the breeze on his stubble the brush of a soft, uncertain mouth.

“Lycaste, wake up. We ought to go over it again. Drimys, are you listening?”

“Yes, Captain,” Drimys sighed, bundling the nets and spitting overboard.

“You find something amusing, Lycaste?” Impatiens asked, ignoring Drimys. Lycaste sat up and shook his head, composing himself. Impatiens clapped his hands together briskly. “You both know your jobs. Once we sight it, I get within range. Drimys has the nets ready, Lycaste is at the harpoon.”

Lycaste looked over at the weapon, a crude assembly of metal tubes welded together and bolted to the side of the boat on a long armature. Iron chains pooled on the floor, connected to a pile of barbed projectiles, their heavy edges still rough from the lathe.