Children of the Wastes (The Aionach Saga Book 2) (7 page)

Lethari came close to moving his hand; to lifting the flap on
his satchel and bringing forth the goatskin he had tucked safely inside for
this very purpose. But when his father’s words began to resound in his head, he
found he could not.
Decide where your loyalty is strongest
, Eirnan
Prokin had told his son.
Many are the faces of betrayal, but there is none
so seductive as that which turns a man against his own household
. Lethari
had thought much about what it would mean to give up this most precious of
items. The soothsayer’s visions had only reinforced his decision. “He carried
no record with him. Not this time. I have searched his belongings this very
morning and found nothing of that sort to be among them.”

The master-king slumped his shoulders. “Search them twice
more before you bury him.”

“You mean to let me take him south, then.”

Tycho pitched himself hard against the backrest, folded his
arms, and brooded. “Go. I have already chosen to delay my journey to the place
of the hidden sands. What is another string of days in obedience to the great
scheme of the fates? I have no freedom to leave my throne vacant for so long a
time. There is war now, and I cannot very well leave my city in the hands of
these
methachti
…” He flung a hand toward his advisers, who shared
glances with one another as though they were innocent of the slight.

Across the room, one of the young pale-skins whispered
something to Jiren, who laughed briefly before stifling himself.

“As for you and yours, Raithur Entradi,” said the
master-king, “be gone to your steel city. Find your star-tracker or your seeing
device there, so that we may know the way to your home. When you come back to
me, then shall I return your young Ros to you.”

Raithur and the pale-skins raised a cry of complaint. Even
when Tycho Montari lifted a hand to silence them, they kept on with their
protest.
Perhaps they are not so nimble-minded as they first appeared,
Lethari
thought.
To think the master-king would give up his hostage and trust them
to return. They misjudged Tycho Montari not to assume he would ensure their
compliance
.

“Remove these ungratefuls,” the master-king yelled. “Remove
them from my hall.”

As the guards moved to surround
yarun merouil
, there
was a flash of crimson light. A bright red ball of crackling energy lit up
around Jiren Oliver. “We’re not leaving without Ros,” he said, gritting his
teeth.

The guards stopped short and pointed their spears. The hall
descended into hysteria. The king rose to his feet and began to scream at the
pale-skins as his guards formed a protective arc in front of him. Raithur
turned to face his pale-skin brother and tried to calm the young man down.

Against anyone else, Lethari would not have hesitated to join
the confrontation in defense of the master-king. But he had seen how powerful
these pale-skins were—and lost
Tosgaith
in the process. After a few
tense moments in which Lethari thought he might need to get involved anyway,
Jiren dropped his arms and let the red shield wink out.

The chamber calmed, and the master-king sank back onto his
throne. He was flustered and nervous, though he was trying not to show it. “You
have taken shelter in my city, and I have granted you safety. This is your
response? You would do violence to me in my own hall after I have treated you
with good will?”

“You’ve abducted our brother so you can force us to do what
you want,” said Jiren Oliver. “You’d make us betray our own people by revealing
our home to you. We don’t want you in Decylum. Outsiders have never been
allowed to come and go as they please without the rule of the council. We live
a peaceful existence, free from the war and treachery you cultivate as a way of
life. We’ve been on our own for years without having anything to do with
above-worlders, and I for one won’t stand by and let Decylum become a tourist
attraction. If you really want to grant us safety, let Ros go. You’ll never
become a blackhand. You’ll never discover a way to gain the powers we were born
with. It’s impossible. You’re a deluded, power-hungry idiot if you think
otherwise.”

A devious smile spread across Tycho Montari’s face. “My halls
are deep,
duireh
. As I live and breathe, your young Rostand Beige will
never
see daylight again. Test me in this. You may think you are one who knows the
below-world, but you have never faced the darkness of my galleries. What more
do you think I must do than issue the command? The next time you think to enter
my chambers and cast your vulgar shame upon me, remember that it is I
alone—Tycho Montari, Lord of Sai Calgoar and Master-King of the
Calgoarethi
—to
whom you owe your lives. It is only by my provision and my grace that you stand
before me this day with dry backs and full bellies.

“Had not my steward and warleader, Lethari Prokin, taken pity
on you in your time of trouble—had not my agents in the steel city found and
safeguarded your lost brothers there—where would you be now? What do you
believe the fates had in store for you before Sigrede Balbaressi delivered you
from the scum who reside in that cruel city? Tell me,
duireh
… what
answer would you give me? Rostand Beige lounges in the richness of my house.
Give me no answer unless it is to thank me that he will not shed his water and
turn half-mad in the heat, as you will. Praise the wonders of my name that he
will remain fresh and comfortable while you drag yourselves across the horizons
to scorch and wither.”

Jiren Oliver was silent.

Raithur Entradi cleared his throat. “Your people have kept us
alive. And so I’ll remind you that I have pledged to keep my promise in return.
We’ll go to Belmond and reunite with our brothers. There, we’ll look for the
others we’ve lost, and when we have found either a navigator or a device that
will let us see home again, we’ll come back for Ros. Tell him we’ll be back for
him. Tell him I am sorry we had to go, and I hope he understands. But also,
know this: if, upon our return, you refuse yet again to release Rostand Beige
into our custody, the next movement my living body makes will be to tear your
beating heart from your chest. I swear it to the fates, as surely as I stand
here now.”

The master-king threw back his head and howled with laughter.
When he was done, his face snapped straight, rigid and humorless. “Leave me
now, pale-skin slave-mongrels. I will keep my pledge when you have kept yours,
and not before.”

Raithur Entradi’s massive chest rose and fell with a deep,
slow breath. Without raising another word, he and his companions turned and
left the hall, grim and silent. Something in their manner put Lethari on edge;
their silence was hostile, somehow, as if they’d agreed on some secret plan for
revenge without speaking it aloud.

When the pale-skins were gone, the master-king shot to his
feet. He paced the floor in front of his throne, spitting curses and insults,
the likes of which any self-respecting man might cite as means for a challenge.
After a few moments he’d gone red in the face, the veins in his forearms
standing out above clenched fists. He wiped away the spittle that had gathered
on his lips and plunged himself onto the throne once more. “Lethari Prokin.
Approach.”

Lethari knelt before the king, felt his satchel shift forward
on his hip and hang loose in front of him. When he opened his eyes, he was
looking down over the satchel’s leather flap, from the corner of which
protruded a few hairs of the goatskin record. He stood quickly, hoping Tycho
Montari hadn’t noticed. “I am here to do your will,
gisheino
.”

The master-king was too agitated to have noticed the contents
of Lethari’s bag. “These mongrel dogs have become troublesome. They think
themselves above my authority. They have no respect—no gratitude for what I
have given them. They are not like you, who sees his master’s kindness and
knows to whom he is indebted. Tell me, Lethari. Do you serve your master
truly?”

Lethari frowned. This was a strange question for Tycho
Montari to be asking him. He had never heard its like from the king’s mouth
before. “I serve you truly and without reservation, my king.”

Tycho Montari lifted his chin to look Lethari over, pausing
for a long moment to search his servant’s face. “Yes,” he finally said. “I know
this to be true. You are the most extraordinary of all my warleaders. I know
you would never…” The master-king’s voice broke off.

Lethari tried to remain calm. “Am I being accused of
wrongdoing? Is that why you have summoned me here today? Or is it that you find
the personal matters of my life so unworthy of my efforts?”

“Have I reason to accuse you?”

“I do not question my master’s justice. I only regret his
doubts,” said Lethari, bowing his head.

“I do not doubt you, Lethari. I have no doubt that you will
find great success wherever I send you, and that upon your return, you will
honor me with the profit and glory that are my due. Come now, and touch my
hand.”

Lethari approached the throne, where the master-king extended
slender ringed fingers for him to take. Tycho Montari’s perfumes disclosed a
bouquet of sweet canyon roses, purple sage, and cactus flower. The
master-king’s hand was clammy to the touch. Lethari grasped it lightly and
touched his forehead to it, bowing low as he backed away.

“Rise, my warleader, and go forth with my favor.”

Lethari lifted his eyes to find the master-king’s. “By your
fortune I am favored, my master.” He left the hall with the image of the king’s
face set in his mind like a stone carving. Tycho Montari sat poised and serene,
but his smile was hard and insincere.

The walk home seemed to last an age. Lethari knew there was
neither slave nor servant in his household who could keep Frayla from leaving
for the day’s errands if she wanted to, but still he did not hurry. He was
relieved to find her seated in the great hall, finishing her first meal of the
day. She was still in her bedclothes, her hair mussed and her eyes swollen with
the touch of long sleep. When he entered, her eyes flicked up at him, but she
looked away when he met her gaze.

“I am happy you are here,” he said. “Come with me to my den.
I must speak with you privately.”

Frayla said nothing, but followed him obediently. She
grimaced when she entered the room, pulling the collar of her bedclothes up
over her nose and covering her face with both hands. Daxin’s body lay in the
open casket behind the pile of personal effects Lethari had dumped on the
floor. He was embarrassed to have left his den in such disarray. The day had
warmed while he was gone, thickening the air to a stifling degree even in this
dark corner of the house, and the closed door had encumbered his den with the
heavy smell.

Lethari lit a censer and circled the room, waving it on the
end of its pendulum chains. He locked the door and put his satchel into the
sideboard drawer, then sat his wife down on the lounge and took her hands in
his own. “I know you are displeased with me,” he said, studying her. “I know
you did not understand why I would take something that is mine by rights, and
give it to the king. But I tell you now that I have seen the good sense in your
wishes. Your displeasure was justified, and… it has changed my heart. We will
keep the secret of the goatskin record to ourselves. It will be yours and mine
only—as will all the favor and glory that comes with it. I will not yield to Tycho
Montari’s will this time. We will be eminent and powerful together, my love.
Only you and me, my dearest one. And the generations of our household will live
in abundance.”

“Did you tell your father that these were my wishes?” she
asked, all but overlooking his confession.

He hesitated. “Seeing my father today was not what changed my
heart. We spoke of my mother, but he is still too far beyond grief to make
sense of anything I say to him. I have changed my heart for you, and for the
truth of what Amhaziel has shown me.”

Frayla ran her fingers over Lethari’s new flaw—Amhaziel’s
sigil, the creature that was both beast and man. The wound was still fresh, the
skin around the cuts bright and inflamed. Her touch was painful, but Lethari
did not flinch.

“I sensed Amhaziel had been here,” she said. “This flaw is
deep, but the lines are smooth and skillful. Tell me what he has shown you.”

Lethari told her everything of the visions he had seen, the
tides of the future, the man-beast and its sacrifice, his success in war and
trade and spoil, the envy and resentment of lesser men, and of the children.
The children who would shake the foundations of the Aionach. He would travel to
the town of Bradsleigh to deliver Daxin Glaive’s body to his family for burial.
Along the way, he and his
feiach
would begin to conquer the pale-skin
traders and fulfill his destiny.

All this, Frayla Prokin absorbed with reserved interest, her
eyes intent and focused on him, never leaving his own. When he was done, she
gave him a soft smile, tender and alluring. Then she laid a gentle hand on her
stomach, toned and flat though it still was. “You must not be away long,” she
said. “You will miss the birth of your son.”

CHAPTER 7

The Waiting

Merrick Bouchard’s stomach grumbled. He tugged a plump tomato
from a half-withered vine and examined it before dropping it into the till. His
mouth watered. The rooftop gardens were no place for a man of his ability, but
the Gray Revenants had begun to treat him just as the Scarred Comrades had—like
a useless, second-class citizen.

Back in the city north, Merrick had eaten twice as much on a
given day as he received in rations here. Being in the gardens only made him
hungrier, but he never seemed to find the chance to sneak any extra food under
the watchful eyes of the rooftop guardians.
It’s just as well
, he
thought.
In a city where everyone is bone-thin, the overweight man sticks
out
. He’d already lost weight thanks to his new diet, but he had a ways to
go before he could truly blend in with his new companions.

Cluspith Porter and his twin brother Swydiger were rolling
out the planter boxes from beneath their shaded awnings for their periodic dose
of daylight. Farming under such harsh conditions was a delicate art, but the
Gray Revenants had positioned their gardens only where they could keep them
hidden and watered without trouble from the gangers and muties and vagabonds of
the city south.

The Armitage Building was the highest Revenant-controlled
structure in the organization’s hidden network of outposts. Every morning when
the light-star rose, Merrick would climb to the top and look out past the
eastern edge of the city, watching the wastes for a sign of Raithur and his
companions. Often he would turn his gaze toward the city north, dreaming of
days gone by and holding out hope for a future there. If the day was clear, he
could make out Bucket Row, the city’s longest road and the impenetrable bastion
of the Scarred Comrades’ power.

As each day passed without sign of the Decylumites, Merrick’s
dream of returning to the city north had begun to dwindle like the last length
of wick at a candle’s end. Hayden, one of the Decylumite foreigners he’d met at
the nomads’ camp, had seemed sure Raithur would return from Sai Calgoar. People
down here seemed to like the nomads—trust them, even. Merrick wasn’t convinced.
The savages were devious and scheming, if sentiment in the city north could be
believed. There was no telling what might’ve happened to Raithur and his men in
Sai Calgoar, and Merrick often found himself convinced he was waiting on a
deliverance that would never come.

He knew the blackhands were the only ones who could teach him
to use his gift, but he had begun to wonder whether he was using their absence
as an excuse.
I’ve healed before
, he reminded himself.
I can do it
again, and I can teach myself to do it better. Maybe I can even figure out
whether I’m capable of performing some of the tricks I’ve seen the other
blackhands do. The orbs, the melting of stone and metal, the heightened speed
and reflexes
. He had seen one of them turn a concrete wall to dust with
only the touch of his hands. If he could figure out how to do things like that,
the barriers the Scarred Comrades had erected to keep out the southers would
fall before him like torn cloth.

At the far end of the rooftop, Bucyrus was cursing his own
existence, muttering to himself in his usual colored language as he mopped the
sweat off his brow. “Coffing light-star, every coffing day. Ain’t had a drop of
good rain or a sniff of cool breeze in weeks. Wind feels like a coffing
furnace, crops are weak… ain’t sweated this much since the last time I got
laid. Can’t even remember that, it’s been so coffing long. Why, I—”

A disturbance from beneath the awning halted Bucyrus’s
complaints. One of the big clay vegetable pots had fallen from its rolling
table and cracked on the ground. Cluspith was having another one of his
outbursts. Swydiger was trying to calm him, but the conditions that triggered
his brother’s episodes were not always easy to identify. Cluspith ambled away,
his arms at his sides, and let out a whooping, nonsensical shriek that sent a
chill through Merrick’s bones.

“Merrick Bouchard is a spy,” Cluspith said, his voice falling
to a deep, gruff rumble. “He’s a Comrade, sent here to learn our secrets and
root us out.”

“Clus… let’s quiet down,” said Swydiger, moving slowly toward
him. “We’re outside, we need to hush.”

Cluspith gave another shriek. He shuffled off a few more
steps, out of Swydiger’s grasp. His voice changed again into a nasally midtone.
“I haven’t trusted him since he got here.”

“Cluspith Porter, that’s rude,” said Swy, edging slowly
toward him.

Cornered, Cluspith crouched and tried to crawl away on all
fours, but Swy grabbed him by the arm and pulled him to his feet, wrapping him
in a heavy bear hug. Cluspith shrieked again, but Swy tightened his hold and
put his mouth beside his ear, shushing him with a steady, even voice.

Merrick could see the color rising in Swydiger’s cheeks. He
felt sorry for him, knowing how much his brother sometimes embarrassed him in
front of the others. Swy was always so patient with Cluspith, so understanding,
despite how much harder their lives were because of Cluspith’s condition.
I
don’t know how he does it
, Merrick thought.
I’d have given up on him a
long time ago
.

“Merrick Bouchard ought to be cut up and sent back north in
pieces,” Cluspith shouted, his voice altogether different this time.

Swydiger continued to soothe him. “Clus, it’s time to settle
down. Let’s have a seat over here.” He brought Cluspith to the brick ledge and
guided him to a seat. He was firm, but not forceful.

Cluspith began to rock back and forth. Swydiger rubbed his
back with a gentle hand and continued to speak soothingly to him until the
episode passed. The other workers looked on with disdain. The guards heightened
their vigil, wary now thanks to the volume of Cluspith’s outburst.

“I’m sorry about that,” Swy whispered when Merrick came
around to pick peppers from the planter boxes in front of them.

“It’s alright.”

“You know he repeats things,” said Swy. “He didn’t mean
anything by it.”

“I know.” Merrick did know, but that didn’t make hearing
those things any easier. The other Gray Revenants were always yammering when he
wasn’t around. Ever since their attack on the old church had claimed the lives
of Caliber and Leuk, Merrick had felt as though Swydiger and his disabled
brother were his only allies among the Revs. On days like today, he wasn’t sure
he could count Cluspith among his friends, whether the dway knew what he was
saying or not.

Peymer came out onto the roof through the low doorway, which
the Revenants had concealed with a brick privacy wall to match the building’s
exterior. A cadre of Revenants, dirty from their slog through the city,
followed him out and stood beneath the awning, spraying themselves with the
misters and rummaging through the baskets of fresh-picked produce.

Oban tossed up a plum tomato and leaned back to catch it in
his mouth, but Rhetton’s hand shot out to snatch it before it could fall. He
popped it into his own mouth, giving Oban a devious smile as gobs of seeded
flesh spilled out between his missing teeth. Oban glowered at him, then picked
up a whole handful of tomatoes and began tossing them into his mouth, one by
one.

“Those aren’t yours,” Merrick said, approaching.

“They are if I say they are,” said Oban, his baggy eyes
narrowing. “Who put fat boy in charge of the food anyhow?”

The others laughed.

Merrick could feel the heat of his anger rising inside him,
though he had little energy to spare. The gloves he now wore at all times would
melt off his hands if he ever let himself ignite uncontrolled. After a calming
breath, he said, “If there are any three men here who deserve to go hungry, you
point them out. We’ll see how they feel about you taking more than your share.”

Oban swallowed the tomato in his mouth. With a sour smile, he
held his fistful of tomatoes over the till and squeezed. Red juice squirted
through his fingers and dripped down to spatter on the tin. He held his hand
out to Merrick. Empty tomato skins clung to his palm, oozing with fluid.
“That’s your share,” he whispered.

Merrick bit back another wave of anger. “Did you come all the
way up here just to be a dick, or do you have a good reason?”

“Sure do,” Oban said, licking tomato flesh from between his
fingers. “We’re here for you.”

“Me?”

Peymer gave him a sly smile. “We’re going on a special
mission, and you’re coming.”

This would’ve been just the thing Merrick was after, if he
trusted Peymer and his buddies one iota. “What kind of mission?”

“The kind you’ll be good at.”

Merrick pulled his heels together, a habit turned instinct
after years of taking orders in the Scarred. “I’m listening.”

“There’s a gang in these parts, calls themselves the Grits.
They’ve got a brewing den not far from here, and we just got word there’s a
cache of zoom hidden somewhere inside. Time to go shut ‘em down.”

“And you need me because…?”

“‘Cause I think it’s about time you showed us what you’ve
got. See how well the comrades train their own.”

“Does that mean I’m finally getting my coilgun?”

Peymer’s thick black eyebrows buckled. “Now don’t get ahead
of yourself, Comrade. You do well today, we’ll see about what comes next.”

“Alright. What do you want me to do?”

“What you’re best at. Looking hungry.”

“How, exactly?”

“You’re going to be our decoy. Show up on their doorstep and
tell them you’re fixing to get doped up. Flash them a ten-inch of copper to
prove you’ve got the hardware for a couple of rocks. Go inside and have a peek
around. Come back out and tell us the layout of the place. Then, assuming our
information is correct, we go in and have a little party. That’s all there is
to it.”

When Merrick glanced at Swydiger, there was warning in his
friend’s eyes. But the chance to do his share—to make himself more than just ‘
another
mouth to feed and another back to clothe
,’ as Peymer had put it—was too
enticing to pass up. “I’m in.”

Rhetton grunted his approval, giving Oban a back-handed slap
on the chest.

“Good,” Peymer said. “We set out at dawn tomorrow. Meet us at
the old fire station on the corner of Brooks and Hilliard an hour before
dayrise. Make sure you’re in your plainclothes—no gear, no mask, no sign you’ve
ever had any affiliation with us.”

“I don’t have any plainclothes,” Merrick said. “All I’ve got
is my trencher, a brown t-shirt, and the camouflage pants I was wearing when I
came south.”

“That so?” Peymer was amused. “Boys, who’s got a spare set of
clothes for our decoy here?”

“Oban’s got plenty,” said Rhetton. “Oban likes his clothes,
don’t you? Why don’t you lend him some of yours?”

“None of mine’ll fit over fat boy’s belly without splitting
their stitches,” said Oban.

More laughter.

Bucyrus dropped his trowel onto one of the rolling tables and
came over. “I’ve got some clothes he can use.”

“Keep your clothes, farmer. My men will find him what he
needs. Won’t you, boys?”

They laughed, louder than ever this time.

Laugh all you like. When I’m Commissar of this whole
Infernal-forsaken city, I’ll remember who was generous and who wasn’t
,
Merrick promised.

Jinks came back a minute later holding a shirt and a pair of
pants. The wide-nosed man handed them to Peymer, who tossed them at Merrick.
“There should be room for a man of your size in these,” he said with a chuckle.

Merrick held them up. There was a cotton tunic and a pair of
denim so smudged and torn they looked more like shredded lettuce than any pants
he’d ever seen. They smelled of urine and motor oil, with a musty undertone
that spoke of the inside of a damp garbage bag.

“How ‘bout he goes and tries them on?” Rhetton suggested.

“Yeah, give us a fashion show, fat boy,” said Oban.

“Leave him alone,” said Bucyrus. “And get out of my garden,
unless you’re keen to help with the afternoon watering.”

That cleared them out pretty quickly.

“An hour before dawn tomorrow,” Peymer reminded him.

“And don’t be late,” Oban added.

After the men had left the roof through the concealed door,
Merrick looked down once more at the rags in his hands.
These aren’t clothes
,
he thought.
These are part of some cruel joke they’re trying to play on me
.
Merrick didn’t want to play into another one of their jokes. But if he ever
wanted them to take him seriously, helping Peymer and his men complete a
successful raid might be the only way.
It’ll be like the old days in Mobile
Ops
, he told himself.
Only I’ll be undercover this time
.

Caliber and Leuk had seen Merrick’s value; they’d been the
only ones to realize what he had to offer—a chance to overthrow Pilot Wax’s
regime. Now Caliber and Leuk were gone, and Merrick was left pandering to a
bunch of clowns in painted masks who would rather treat him as a laughingstock
than as one of their own. They had no desire to see Wax unseated. The highest
goal Peymer and his men had ever pursued was rooting out zoom junkies so they
could sell them to the nomads for beer money.

That night, Merrick could hardly shut his eyes for fear of
oversleeping the mission. He was up well before dawn, dressed in the putrid
rags they’d given him to wear. Both garments were a tight fit, stretching
around his waist and across his chest despite being nearly torn to shreds. It
was all he could do for the first few minutes not to gag at the stench of them.
Even if I don’t look like a drug-riddled vagrant, at least I smell like one
,
he told himself.

The Revenants were all inside the fire station when he
arrived. He had half-expected to show up and find a group of them waiting there
to point and laugh at him—or worse, to find no one there at all. But the worst
he got from them as he entered the old mess hall were a few sniggers and some mumbled
one-liners.