Empire of Unreason (44 page)

He took a sip of the coffee she had provided for him, and closed his
eyes. “Coffee! So many years since I have tasted it. What a wonder!

I cannot imagine where you find it.”

“Africa,” Adrienne said simply.

“Ah, yes. With your flying ships. Of course. I am behind the times. I
hope you can catch me up, when convenient. I hear— I am given to
understand—France is no more.”

“Not as such. The people survive, however, if not their kings. Please
go on, Father.”

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“Yes, you see? Digression. Well, the emperor of China suffers the
Jesuits for a variety of reasons. He has no fear or care that we
might convert all his subjects—it is unimportant to him what faith
his people hold. Indeed, there are many faiths in China. Though I
have become convinced that the root of Chinese law and ritual has
its root in Christ—” He broke off. “You see? There I go. No, the only
thing I need to mention here is that we were helpful to the emperor
when it came to negotiating with European powers. Some years
ago, the tsar of Russia was involved in just such a negotiation, and I
was present.”

“This would be the resettling of the Mongols to the New World?”

“Many of them, yes. The ruling dynasty in China, you see— the
Ch’ing—were, a hundred years ago, themselves barbarians not
much different from the Mongol and Juchen tribes. They are thus
well aware of the threat that such tribesmen pose to their own
empire. Twelve years ago, when the world became stranger and
colder, that threat increased tenfold, for the Mongols and their kin
were forced toward China by the climate itself. Thus, the Russian
offer of aid could not be ignored even by the proud Ch’ing. So,
Russians and Mongols settled here, and for years all was well. The
Chinese maintained several outposts on these coasts, to
know
that
all was well. Due to certain studies of my own—you see, I will not
bore you with them just now—I fell out of favor with both the
Chinese court and my own order. By coming here, I was able to
continue my work and avoid any persecutions. Frankly, the
Chinese simply do not care what happens beyond their borders if
they do not see an obvious effect to themselves.

“So here I came. And about two years ago, things began to change
again.”

Adrienne leaned forward, intent on the story.

“More ships than ever came from Russia, and there were rumors of
much construction—of airships and other arcane things. Many of
the natives were enslaved to this end, and the Mongol settlers were
drawn into it for trade. This was a hunters’ paradise for them, you
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see, but there were still things they wanted which they could not
kill with an arrow. And— there was the prophet.”

“Prophet?”

“I’m ahead of myself. The Chinese outpost, where I lived and
worked, grew very quickly in size. While many of those settled here
pursued the life of their forefathers, crossing the mountains to the
rich, horse-loving plains that lie beyond them, others thought to
make for themselves an empire, not unlike the Chinese one. They
built their military might. In time, they nearly came to blows with
the Russian settlements—but then the prophet came, uniting them.”

“Again, this prophet.”

“He was a boy—a European boy, perhaps Russian—who was raised
in the care of a khan named Orcha. Orcha would never say where
he got the boy, or call him anything but ‘son.” From a very early
age, however, the boy performed miracles of all sorts. People had
dreams, summoning them to him. Finally, when the troops
assembled and marched down the coast to this place, the boy
stepped out between the two armies, between their very guns, and
he spoke in a voice that everyone heard. He told them to forget the
differences of the Old World, that it was time to make a new one,
and to cleanse the New World of every bad thing from Europe and
from Asia. I cannot describe exactly what he said, but he was
understood in all languages. And the angels—the angels were with
him, all about him, everywhere. It was deeply moving,
Mademoiselle. Deeply. I wept.

“And so the army kept building, now jointly. Native tribes were
recruited and armed, and more fabulous weapons came from
Russia. Mostly from the church, from the Old Believers, who
thought of the boy as a saint. I, myself, began to grow troubled. I
saw and heard of things—of great machines and weapons of war—

that seemed somehow more demonic than angelic. This sudden
appearance of angels, their sudden presence in our lives, was
suspicious to me. It remains so, and the feeling grows stronger
each day.

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“Then came a day when the army began to march, and near that
time, I hear, the tsar arrived in one of his flying ships.

“Imagine my surprise—they tried to arrest him. I did not see this,
you understand, only heard about it. There was a battle; the tsar
fled into the interior. I have heard nothing of him since.”

“And the prophet?” Her throat felt tight. She had no doubt
whatsoever who the “prophet” was.

“He marched with the army, almost two years ago.”

“For what purpose? What do they hope to conquer? The whole of
the continent?”

The priest’s voice dropped very low. “It is my belief, lady, that the
prophet does not lead the army to conquer but rather to kill. I think
he is the Antichrist, come to lead the army of darkness. I believe—I
fear—that the end of time is at hand.”

Adrienne tried to look serious but felt a sort of giddy humor. She
knew she shouldn’t—perhaps, at last, she was going mad. But if one
more person she met on this strange journey told her that the end
of the world was CQming, and that her son was the cause of it, she
would surely burst out laughing. Not because she didn’t believe it,
but because—like all things repeated too often, thought on too long

—it had ceased to make sense to her.

7.

EMPIRE OF UNREASON

The Frames

The Cowetas confiscated everything: their aegises, their weapons
both scientific and mundane, their horses, the portable
aetherschreiber Franklin had brought along for communicating
with Nairne and the rest. He argued about that last, pressing the
point that he should be allowed to at least inform his government
of what had happened; but it was another argument he lost. In the
end, stripped down to their breeches, they were led into the round
central building and warriors set outside.

“What now?” Robert asked.

“Only God knows,” McPherson replied. “I expect the worst.”

“And the worst is?” Robert asked.

“The Coweta are mighty fond of torture.”

A shadow fell through the doorway. Franklin looked up into
Sterne’s smiling face. “Not quite what I wanted, Mr. Franklin,” he
said with good humor. “I’m under orders to bring you back,
preferably alive. It looks to me as if my new allies might… spoil
that.” He drew a small silver snuffbox from his pocket and took a
pinch. He was returning it to his coat when an expression of dismay
overcame his features.

“Dear me—how rude. Would you care for some?”

“No, thank you. But if you’re granting requests, I would very much
like to see your neck broken.”

“Ah, ever the humorist, eh, Mr. Franklin? I suppose you’ll be witty
to the end, what? Excellent. Give the savages a good show. Let them
see how an Englishman dies. Good man.”

“And what for you, now?” Franklin asked. “You flew here, I
suppose.”

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“Oh, bravo. Now you wear your scientific mask, eh? Yes. Wide
about, of course, to avoid your tricky devices, but it was quite a
pretty tour. And now? It’s off to New Paris, I think— I’ve alliances
to make there as well.” Sterne settled down into a crouch. “I should
tell you that the war is not going well for your folk. We’ve punched
an army in almost to your Fort Moore, and the resistance wasn’t
exactly what we thought it would be. It seems we have some quite
surprising weapons— surprising to your backwoodsmen, at least.

With the Coweta here to keep them from retreating farther west, I
think we can conclude that this campaign will last only a little while
longer.”

“You are allied with demons, Sterne. You ought to know that.”

Sterne’s smile spread across his face, and with breathtaking
suddenness, a red orb, much like an eye, formed above his head. “I
know quite well whom I fight for, Mr. Franklin, so save your
breath. Indeed, I owe you a debt from an old friend of mine. You
may remember him. Trevor Bracewell?”

“I remember him,” Franklin snarled. “A traitor to mankind, like
yourself. A murderer and a rogue. He got his justice, and you will,
too.”

“Did he?” Sterne smiled broadly. “Was it justice that he died for a
crime he did not commit?”

“He murdered my brother, in most foul manner.”

“No, he did not. He set the fire, /did the killing, slipped my long
blade here into your sweet brother’s heart.” He patted the
smallsword at his side. “I just missed you in Boston—I was to
rendezvous with Bracewell the same afternoon you killed him. No
matter—things have ways of working out, don’t they?” He leaned in
and kissed Franklin on the cheek. “You’ve been a naughty boy, Ben.

You’ve tampered with what ought not to be bothered, and now a lot
of men will die. I leave you to contemplate your errors.” He stood
and dusted his breeches. “This wilderness is a dirty place,” he
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complained. “One hopes the French will have more amenities and
less dust. I think I can strike a good bargain with them, don’t you?

If not, well, there they are, just on the coast and not so strong for all
their pretense. I hear they’ve become quite silly there, as the
French tend to do. Anyway, this is all just… distraction. Even war
will be meaningless soon enough.”

“Yes? Then why bother with it? I’ll take your surrender here and
now,” Franklin said.

“Very droll! I said soon—for now, both war and diplomacy have
their uses. Good day, Mr. Franklin.”

The orb above Sterne’s head vanished, but his eyes gleamed red for
an instant.

“I’ve dissected a few of your kind, you know,” Franklin told
Sterne’s retreating back. “I know why your eyes gleam so, why your
strength is so great. It’s small modifications they make to you,
when you are very young. Stronger bones, extra oculatum in the
eye so you can see at night. But whatever they have told you, you
are still human. When they are done with the rest of us, they will
turn on you. You can still defy them.”

“Defy them? Like poor Euler? ”tes, I know you have him. No thank
you, Mr. Franklin. I know a great deal more about my situation
than you do, you know. I know what my reward will be, in the end,
and it is quite worth waiting for. Now, finally—you do have the
ability to keep a conversation engaged!—I go.“

And he did.

“Well,” Robert said, after a moment, “there’s what I like about
fellahs like him.”

“What’s that?” Franklin asked glumly.

“Well, now that y‘ put it
that
way,” Robert mused, “not a damned
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thing.”

* * *

Over the next few hours, there was a great deal of conversation out
in the square. McPherson didn’t catch enough to translate, but
after a few hours a group of warriors came in and laid rough hands
on them.

“Tell chief Chekilli I need to speak to him,” Franklin shouted. “It’s
most important—” One of the warriors buffeted him in the head so
hard that he felt his teeth rattle and smelled the bright copper of
blood in his nose.

“Sons of bitches!” Robert howled. “Fight me, y‘ cowards! Any one of
y’r, any weapons!”

One of his captors answered him by clubbing him with a wooden
weapon that resembled a cutlass with a heavy ball on the end.

Robert groaned, and they dragged him out.

Once outside, Franklin saw what the Coweta had been about for the
past several hours. A number of square frames had been erected,
each made of two eight-foot posts sunk in the ground with cross
pieces at top and bottom. They were carried to these—kicking or
limp, depending—and lashed to them, spread-eagle, with tough
rawhide bands.

“This is where things get bad.” McPherson grunted. The tough
ranger’s voice quavered noticeably, which did more to panic
Franklin than anything else. “Try to stay brave,” the ranger went
on. “Try not to weep or beg. If you’re brave, they might kill you
faster.”

“That’s not that result I’m hoping to achieve.”