Authors: Christopher Priest
‘Sir?’
‘Peace be unto you,’ Tarent said. ‘Weren’t you the driver of the Mebsher that brought me here?’
‘I’ve only just arrived, sir.’ The Glaswegian accent was the same.
‘Two or three days ago. I was in London at the end of last week, when I joined other passengers. The road was flooded and you helped me climb aboard the Mebsher. We ended up at a base at Long Sutton, but the next day you let me off the vehicle somewhere not far from here.’
‘I have to follow a strict route, sir. We haven’t come from London, and I don’t recall being at the base you mentioned. Long Sutton is a closed unit.’
‘Not this trip. It was just a few days ago. Surely you remember?’
‘We are here to collect and transport materials. Two passengers as well. Inshallah.’
Presumably hearing the sound of their voices, the second crewman raised himself through the open hatch. He stared across at Tarent.
‘Ibrahim!’ Tarent said. ‘Peace be unto you. Don’t you remember me?’
He stared back at Tarent, but said nothing. He shook his head vaguely. The two crewmen spoke briefly to each other, a soft burr of slang, and then Hamid clambered quickly to the ground. Ignoring Tarent, who was now less than three metres from the side of the vehicle, he worked the outer mechanism of the main hatch. With a smooth mechanical sound the hatch raised itself on its hydraulic rods. The built-in steps also unfolded and lowered themselves to the concrete. Tarent had an angled glimpse inside, but because the hatch was too high above the ground he could see almost nothing of the interior.
The security guard approached them, putting away his handset.
‘Mr Lepuits has confirmed these two passengers may join the personnel carrier,’ he said to Hamid. ‘They are to be taken only as far as the DSG in Hull.’
‘Inshallah.’
Tarent said to Lou, ‘After you.’
As she moved forward, Tarent also took a step towards the
Mebsher’s hatch. Now that he was as close as this he could smell the air drifting out from the passenger compartment. It was so familiar to him: the smell of people inside, recirculated air, bare metal, old seat fabric, bringing a mental image of the cramped conditions, the hard seats and the fluorescent lighting. Lou walked past him.
‘You are coming too, aren’t you?’
‘I left my bag over there,’ Tarent said, indicating the place outside the residential block where he had earlier dumped his luggage. ‘I have to get that. I’ll be back in a moment.’
Lou went up the steps, lowered her head and went through into the compartment. Tarent saw her come to a halt just inside. A moment later she turned and leaned back out, a glance around the Warne compound, one last look. She was smiling, and she looked at him.
‘Thanks, Tibor,’ she said.
Lou went on into the compartment but a moment later someone else came to the opening, leaned through the hatch and moved out to stand at the top of the steps. She glared briefly down at Tarent, but looked away again immediately. She was wearing a scarf over her hair, and her left hand was pressed lightly to the area behind her left ear. It was Flo.
To Hamid she said, ‘What’s the delay out here?’
‘We’ll be restarting shortly, madame,’ he said. ‘We have to pick up two passengers.’
‘We are running late. I have a ministerial meeting in less than two hours’ time.’
‘Yes, Tebyeb Mallinan. There will be no more delays after this. We will depart soon.’
Flo then looked directly at Tarent.
‘Have you been authorized to board this vehicle?’ she said.
‘Flo?’ Tarent said, his heart racing.
She looked at him more intently. ‘Why do you call me that? Who are you?’
She sounded as if she genuinely did not recognize him. Tarent was staring at her, feeling shock, disbelief, even terror, sensing his own hold on sanity had been released. Only the evening before, in the clinic –
In the Mebsher hold below –
He said weakly, ‘Don’t you remember me, Flo?’
‘Should I?’
‘We met a few days ago. Travelling.’
‘I don’t – travel, as you call it. What business do you have here?
Let me see your security clearance.’
Tarent was aware of the other people: Lou inside the compartment was probably hearing this, Ibrahim and Hamid were just behind him, the security guard was there. Flo was speaking loudly, authoritatively, dominant.
‘Flo – you are Flo, aren’t you? You wouldn’t tell me your second name, but I know now it’s Mallinan.’ He still had the white-covered passport in his hand, so he held it up for her to see. ‘I’m Tibor. Tibor Tarent. We know each other. You wanted me to –’
‘Are you here on ministerial business?’
‘No.’
‘This is a government vehicle on official duties. You are delaying me.’
‘I have been travelling for the government.’
‘Why did you use my family name? Do I know you? Have we met before?’
‘Yes, we met on the other Mebsher, before the attack.’
‘What attack?’ She looked around at the other men. ‘Leave us,’ she said in an imperious voice. ‘This is a confidential conversation.’
She stood immobile, waiting. Hamid and Ibrahim went around to the front of the vehicle and climbed up swiftly into the drive compartment. The security officer retreated towards the clinic. Tarent looked back towards the buildings, half-expecting to see others coming to find out what was happening, but the quadrangle in all directions was empty of people. In a moment, the drivers’ hatch closed and sealed itself.
Flo said, ‘Let me see that passport.’
He handed it to her and for a fraction of a second their fingertips brushed against each other. She opened the passport, read the information on the front, then looked at the photograph of him inside the back pages, and simultaneously pressed two fingers to the hidden implant behind her ear. She raised an elbow to try to conceal what she was doing.
She handed the passport back to him.
‘I don’t know who you are, Mr Tarent,’ she said. ‘Nor what your business here might be. But you have been using that passport illegally. You have no diplomatic credentials and as far as I can determine, no legitimate business with either the Office of Overseas Relief or the Ministry of Defence. I have cancelled the passport, so if you wish to travel abroad you must apply for a new one. Now I have work to attend to.’
‘Flo, please!’
‘What is it you want?’
‘May we speak privately?’
‘This is a private conversation. I have never met you before. Under what circumstances were you issued with that passport? And you haven’t told me why you are using my familiar name.’
‘Do you really not remember me?’ he said. On an impulse he raised his Canon, pointed it at her face and exposed three shots in rapid succession. She recoiled slightly. ‘The quantum lens, Flo. You warned me about it.’
‘You have no right –’
‘That’s what you said before. And Rietveld – he told me too, long ago. I remember now. He warned me that quantum adjacency was dangerous. You said I had met Thijs Rietveld, and you were right.’
A man moved behind Flo, taller than her, but he was inside the Mebsher compartment, so it was not easy to see who it was. He raised a camera above Flo’s shoulder, close to where her implant lay, pointing it towards Tarent. A shutter opened and closed.
The man stepped back, and Tarent could no longer see him.
Flo moved her hand against her ear. She waited, then inclined her head slightly. ‘If you don’t hand in those cameras today, they will be confiscated.’ She was shouting. ‘There is nothing more to say.’
She turned away from him, ducked her head and returned to the compartment. On an impulse Tarent ran up the short flight of steps behind her, gripping the two support rails. Flo had already moved towards the front of the compartment and was leaning over to speak to the man Tarent knew was called Heydar. Lou Paladin was sitting on the row of seats beside the hatch. She was looking at Tarent with wide-open, panic-stricken eyes. She seemed to lean away from him, keeping a distance.
He realized then that he had forgotten his bag, still there on the far side of the quad. He would have to go back for it. The engine of the Mebsher was building up speed, and black smoke was pouring past him.
His mind was blurring, unable to interpret what he was experiencing, what he was actually seeing.
He saw –
He saw there was a man sitting next to Lou. It was the man who had come to the Mebsher door behind Flo. He had the straps of several cameras draped over his shoulder, and was holding a camera in both hands, a Canon Concealable. He pointed the camera
towards Tarent’s face, and held down the shutter release.
Beside the man, Lou seemed overcome by confusion and fright. She stared at Tarent, to the man who looked just like him, back to Tarent.
Tarent backed away. He felt the hydraulic door mechanism starting to move above him. He climbed anxiously down the steps, stumbling as he used the last one because it was already lifting away from the concrete and swivelling up towards its storage compartment. He felt something snag against the heel of his hand as he stepped hastily to the ground, and he winced with pain.
He half-stumbled across the concrete floor but as he recovered he grabbed one of the cameras strapped to his shoulder, and with trembling fingers held down the shutter on continuous exposure, taking three frames a second: the Mebsher, the shrinking glimpse of the dark interior of the compartment, the smoke, the hatch lowering on its hydraulic rods. As the door seated itself, a piece of torn, jagged metal was snagged by the weight of the hatch, but as it finally closed the sharp fragment jerked free again, standing out from the smooth metal of the Mebsher’s outer skin.
The vehicle drove off. Tarent took no more photographs. The Mebsher swung around towards the security gate and Tarent backed away.
He stood watching as the vehicle pushed through the entrance, lurching on the uneven ground. The tall, dilapidated tower loomed above it. Tarent sucked the blood that was flowing from the cut in his hand, a reopened wound, inflicted in the same place as before. The Mebsher had reached the access road, where the surface was smoother, and it began to drive away more quickly.
Tarent stared after it, finally realizing, comprehending and accepting, but still unable to believe, whose body it must have been, there in the cargo hold of the Mebsher, inside the sixth coffin.
LIKE ALL THE ISLANDS IN THE ARCHIPELAGO PRACHOUS IS
neutral territory, but it is the most fiercely independent of all the island states. It has always been a closed island – the name means FENCE in island patois. Although visitors are allowed entry on strictly monitored short-stay visas, permanent immigration to the island is forbidden and for centuries Prachous has maintained a navy of its own to protect its borders. It is anyway a difficult island to navigate towards, because of a complex system of uncharted undersea reefs and shoals. Many unpredictable currents flow in the waters around Prachous and although there are some large areas of coastal swamp or tidal flood plains, much of the coastline of Prachous has high cliffs, with rocky outfalls. Along the southern coast of the island there are four major ports, two of which are reserved for use by the Prachous Seigniorial Navy.
To the north of Prachous lies the Glaund Republic, a belligerent nation on the northern continental mass, engaged in a war that has been fought for so long there is no one alive who remembers the beginning. No end to it is in sight. It is known as The War at the End of War, and both sides believe it is imperative not to yield. No truce or peace negotiations have ever been entered into. The hostilities are with the distant nation of Faiandland, which lies on the far side of the world, but is also a coastal state on the continent. Glaund and Faiandland each have an intricate array of allies, treaty states and co-belligerents, approximately but not rigidly divided between east and west. The hostilities do not directly affect life on Prachous,
which is a peaceful place, although the proximity to Glaund does sometimes have an indirect impact on Prachoit foreign policy. Like all archipelagian states, Prachous is determined not to become involved in the war, and to a great extent succeeds in this wish.
A large part of the interior of Prachous is desert. In this, the terrain is similar to the part of the Glaundian coastal desert to which it is a neighbour. Because of the southern latitude, extreme high temperatures are common on Prachous, especially in the dry season. There are two large coastal mountain ranges, a high central massif north of the desert area, and along the north-western coast and all around the south there are extensive areas of fertile land. Prachous is more or less self-sufficient in food, although because it is a wealthy island many delicacies are imported from other islands, and also from Glaund.
There is no single seignior on Prachous, the land, mineral rights and tithes being divided between a number of Prachoit families, whose secrets are guarded as closely as the island shores. The economy is seigniorial in name only. Although constituting a closed feudal society, the leading Prachoit families are legendary throughout the archipelago for their business activities and commercial methods. Many of the big archipelagian commercial corporations are owned by Prachoits, and Prachoit families are the largest employers throughout the islands, with interests in mining, shipbuilding, shipping lines (including most of the inter-island ferries), construction, IT, internet and printed media, and many thousands of hectares of agricultural land.
Prachous is a secular island. Religious observation is tolerated but not encouraged.
Prachous is thought to be the second largest island in the archipelago, although it has never been properly surveyed or measured. Should cartographic drones venture into Prachous airspace they are invariably shot down.
HE LEFT THE DESERT ENCAMPMENT IN THE EARLY MORNING,
before the worst of the heat began, and walked south. He was accompanied by a woman missionary who was to guide him – she had made the same journey several times before. They both wore
loosely fitting, lightweight robes as a protection from the sun’s heat. These covered most of their faces, so Tomak Tallant did not even glimpse the woman’s face until the second day. On the first day they were carrying supplies of food and water, enough for the first long section of the walk, but they were expecting to be able to obtain extra supplies on the way. They saw no sign of any settlement during the first day, nor did they come across any streams, water holes or wells.