Ecko Rising (15 page)

Kale said, “It didn’t smell right. Even when he brought it in. It smelled –” he searched for a word and came up with “– wrong.”

Ecko snorted. “That’s some nose you got there.”

“I don’t understand.” The Bard stood up, fingers now rattling against his thigh. He was restless, pacing. “This is the first time our rumours have been realised. And nartuk... that lore is lost. We’ve not practised such alchemy since the high days of Tusien. This – all of this – both defeats and intruiges me.”

There was a flare in the Bard’s amethyst eyes, a flame of something less than sanity – or something more. Hell, this place was getting more like a home-from-home asylum with each day, for chrissakes. Ecko watched, barely suppressing a grin.

Maybe I’m not the only one who needs a shrink...

Roderick took a breath. “Our world is afraid. In her thoughts, she fears something she can neither name nor remember. I’ve spent my whole life, everything I have, seeking to understand that fear. It’s why I have The Wanderer.” He picked up the small terhnwood blade that he’d shown Ecko earlier and gestured with it as he spoke. “I’m Roderick of Avesyr, Guardian of the Ryll, once hailed as the hope of my people. All my life, I’ve searched for lore and insight, and still, I don’t understand.”

“So? Enough with the OCD shit. The guy’s outside, let’s interrogate the crap outta him. He tells us where he got it – we’re good. Let’s go.”

Roderick said, “The Ryll is a waterfall, far to the north of here, where the thoughts of the world are manifest – and where her nightmare was shown to me. And you’re not going anywhere until I understand how this
fits.
”

“How ’bout we just get off our asses –”

“I’m not jesting,” Roderick said. He pointed with the blade, his expression cold. “The world knows
fear
. And this, this is a tiny fragment of that larger picture. There have been sightings and rumours all through the central Varchinde. It’s not just one nartuk, it’s more than that. It’s the beginning of something
huge.
”

“Says who? It’s one fucking critter!”

“Did you not listen? I am – was – a Guardian of the Ryll. I watched the thoughts of the world in the water. And I saw –”

“Yeah, a nightmare, I got it already.” Ecko grinned. “How many mushrooms were you doing?”

The Bard went white. He said, slowly and very carefully, “It’s not just one creature, Ecko. It’s the
beginning
. The world has a fear that she had forgotten – and we must assemble the pieces.”

“Chrissakes.” Ecko came up to a half crouch, facing the Bard across the table. His targeters crossed Roderick’s forehead, the weapon in his hand. “It looks pretty fucking simple to me: wherever that thing came from, that’s where we go. We follow the trail, we do the Grand Quest, I get my hands on the God of Evil, he’s shish kebab, I go home.” He grinned. “This should be as easy as... hey, let’s say ‘a booze up in a brewery’.”

“By the Gods, Ecko! Where do you think I got my scar? You talk so glibly of a ‘God of Evil’ – legend tells that there indeed was once a creature who may fit that description. I went looking for him – and I found
nothing.
” The Bard’s passion was powerful, but Ecko didn’t care. “There is so much more we must know. The soil of the Varchinde does show remnants of some ancient war – but I know not how the pieces fit together!”

“This is
bullshit
!” Ecko snarled back at him. “You can’t just sit on your fanny in here doing shit-all, waiting for... what? The sky to fall on your head? Your God of Evil to drop in for a chat and a pint of the good stuff? Go question the guy with the nartuk. You should be doin’ your investigation or whatever, not –”

“Investigation?” Roderick’s snarl marched Ecko’s own. “Ecko, I’ve been searching almost a hundred returns – I have dug every ruin, I have found every treasure, I have learned every tale, I have faced every foe. Wherever these alchemical creatures are coming from...”

“Gimme a map, already, I’ll tell you where they’re comin’ from. Where’s your realm of death and decay? Your pits of fire and mountains of ash? That’s where the source is, that’s where the Bad Guy always hangs out – hell, his shadow’s rising even now.” He sneered. “Let’s get our butts down there and wake him the fuck up. We can take him an espresso.”

“A
what
?”

The tension in the room crested, paused, and shattered. Either side of the table, Ecko and the Bard were intent on each other – Ecko’s small, tight frame coiled in a crouch facing Roderick’s height and presence. Kale had quietly slipped away.

Then, as if Ecko had snapped his back like the fibres of the resin sword, the Bard dropped into his chair.

“I’m sorry,” he said, softly. “Sera is asking about the nartuk, and we’ll learn what we can. But unless we see something more, I fear Vanksraat can’t shed the light we seek.”

“Save it.” Ecko’s snarl was subdued. “Feeling sorry for yourself won’t get you shit. Unless Eliza’s stuck me in some
Kobayashi Maru
, there’s a solution. Let’s go get it.” He blinked. “Unless you’re any good with pentagrams and goats?”

“When we come to the capital city, to Fhaveon, we can speak to Rhan. He is...” He stopped himself, then said, “...I shall be interested to see what Rhan makes of you, Ecko. Or perchance, if The Wanderer allows, I can take you to my home city, Avesyr, and the Ryll’s ever-falling water.” He stared at the broken sword for a moment, perhaps not even seeing it. “They will not welcome me.” Then a ghost of his former chuckle danced from the walls. “In the meantime, we can pray that our nartuk will give us some answers.”

8: TRIQUETA

                    
THE RIBBON-TOWNS OF ROVIARATH AND THE CENTRAL VARCHINDE

The Wanderer thumped with noise.

The taproom was heaving with bodies and shouting and drunken laughter. The air was hot and close, it reeked of sweat and animal.

Crouched like a bilious gargoyle on the end of the bar, Ecko reckoned he was going certifiably fucking loopy. The noise and the stink were overpowering, nausea had closed his throat and his nerve endings were sparking with exasperation. All he wanted to do was get on with this, track down the Uberboss and kick the shit out of it.

Wasn’t that how this stuff worked?

The nartuk’s owner had told them a simple tale – that the thing had befriended them en route to the fiveday market at the local tithehall. The poor, clueless bastard seemed more upset by its death than by the fact that it was apparently a thousand years old.

Hell, wasn’t like they could even dissect the damn thing. Ecko would’ve given a hefty weight of that terhnwood stuff for some decent forensics.

Communications.

A fucking
library.

That morning, they’d jumped from the Vanksraat riverside to the ramshackle unrolling of a Grassland “ribbon-town”: one of the twin, thin stretches of deadwood that bled out along the trade-roads from the major cities. The place was a dump, abundant in two things: dirt and poverty. The roadway looked like some jingle-booted sheriff should have a high noon shootout and leave the bodies to rot like the nartuk had done.

But noon had come and gone and no sheriff had manifest to demand his sippin’ whiskey. Now, the evening was warm, the sun low and red and fat. It rested on the rickety roofs and sent long, bloody shadows through the dust.

And Ecko was crouched on the bar top like a silent and stone thing, realising something that annoyed him...

He missed Lugan.

Missed his humour, his decisiveness, his forward motion. Lugan would’ve been on the move already, shaking shit down, sorting shit out. None of this “the world’s had a nightmare” crap.

Hell, he’d’ve been the one causing it.

Across the heave of bodies, the front doors were propped open and revellers spilled out into the dusty roadway, laughing. On a nearby bench, leaning back with his black boots on the table, Roderick lived up to his moniker with a stringed something-or-other that he apparently played with some skill. His listeners stamped their boots in rhythmic appreciation and sank more booze.

Ecko wanted to rail at him:
Get up, already, ask some questions, detain someone, torture the shit outta something – just move!
His adrenal boosting was misfiring, twanging on his nerve endings like anxiety. He flashed random crosshairs.
Go on, kickstart it, you know you wanna
! Hell, a bust-up might shake something loose.

Lugan would’ve known the danger signs, distracted him, given him something else to focus on – in here, no one even looked up.

Behind the bar, Karine had a sweat on. She and Silfe tapped barrel after barrel. Every so often, Sera would stir himself to roll one away through the kitchen door, and then come back with a full one on his shoulder. There was no sign of Kale – only the lush food smells that the door wafted in Sera’s wake.

More stink.

Jeez, it was
suffocating
in here.

Ecko was used to people, the crush of the crowd, the press of flesh – but this? Too much reek, too much skin and dirt and resin and critter. The smells were closing in around him like street kid bullies; his guts were still playing up from the change in diet. Chrissakes, he couldn’t
breathe.

You gotta love the grand-quest-fantasy-romance. No one tells you it comes with stink and gut ache and a lack of sanitary plumbing.

“Oi. Make yourself useful, mush. I need water.” Behind him, Karine lunged for another ceramic bottle. She was sharp as a knife, fast as a circus juggler. Arachnid eyes and feline reflexes and hands that were everywhere at once. Remembering to wink lasciviously at the lad ordering drinks, she chased Ecko with a foot. “Well go on then!”

“Who died and made you Empress?” Ecko half turned, found himself with a rope-handled bucket in his mottled mitt. He glared, his oculars flickering fire. “What am I, fucking staff now?”

“You live here, mush, you work.”

The lad paid for his drinks with a twist of something in a tiny cloth bag.

Salt? Sugar?

Columbian?

Ecko curled a black-toothed grin.

The lad grabbed his ale and retreated to safely. Muttering, Ecko took the pail and ducked out into the yard. Fucking with the drinkers was at least one way of cheering himself up.

* * *

When he returned, the room had stabilised, grown a tight edge of focus like the silent rasp of a whetstone.

His reactions instinctual, he handed over the bucket and was back on the bar top, crouched, cowl down, one shoulder tight against the wall. He curled still, adrenaline wary, nerves shivering with anticipation – but Sera stood casual, arms folded. Chrissakes, the doorman’d almost cracked a grin.

Curious, Ecko followed his gaze.

Well
, he thought dryly,
whaddaya know.

In the centre of the room, ten or so drinkers had collected loosely round a clutter of tables, others had gathered to watch. Flicking his targeters, Ecko took note of emblems stitched onto jackets, woven bands around wrists and forearms. Some of the drinkers had standardised weapons, bound into belt-rings by lengths of braided string.

Military? Name, wristband and serial number? They sure as hell drank enough.

Some of them, though, looked like something else entirely.

“Who’s up then? Go on, you know you want to.” Commanding the tables was a small, tightly sprung woman, rattling a leather cup in one slim hand. She was the first exotic Ecko’d seen: skin, hair and eyes all different shades of bright yellow-gold. She almost glowed in the sunset. His heatseeker showed skin-warmth, a fierce energy that burned from her like she was radioactive. In each of her cheekbones was embedded a pale stone like an opal, cooler than her skin, but shimmering in the dying of the light.

She wasn’t beautiful, but the force of her presence was undeniable. Her deft fingers cleverly flicked the angles of the cup.

Almost in spite of himself, he grinned, a slash of darkness buried deep under the cowl.
Looks like we got us a card sharp.
He spun his telescopics and watched.

“C’mon, then!” She was daring them. “Doesn’t Larred Jade compensate you? You can’t all be cleaned out.”

“CityWarden doesn’t compensate us!” Ribald challenge and friendly abuse answered her, the gaggle of onlookers called for drinks, bets.

At the bar, an older bloke nudged his mate and called, “Go on, Triqueta, take ’em all on!” There was laughter.

Still flicking readouts, Ecko watched.

Across the scarred tabletop, one man unwrapped a red, metal bracelet – copper? – and chucked it into the pile, another had a chip of stone, striated with colour.

The woman, Triqueta, chuckled and rattled the pot again. The slanting sunset edged her in bright neon – she was a holo-projection, a fantasy. She had the room and she knew it. Grinning, she threw her hair over her shoulder – but the move was a distraction. Ecko’s targeters caught it: her other hand was twisting the cup with a long-practised gesture.

You cheeky fucking bitch...!

She was cute, all right, smart, fast and intruig–

Oh for chrissakes.

In his head, brakes screeched. Long wheals of rubber scarred his thoughts as they careened to a dead stop.

You hafta be kidding me.

The blatancy of the gameplay floored him completely. For an endless, timeless moment, Ecko’s breath was a ball of disbelief tight in his throat.

Basic instincts... no way...

In front of him, the woman called, “Any more?” She mock recoiled, laughing, as they cussed her.

On the bar top, Ecko watched, now captivated for a completely different reason. He could see what Eliza was trying to do, see the moves that she was making...

Oh no you fucking don’t. This is one damned psych test I can’t take.

A leering patron whispered something in the woman’s ear.

She laughed, but her elbow in his chest sent him crashing to the floor, his ale –
splosh
– in his face. Around him, guffaws and slow handclaps celebrated his fall.