The Dream Widow (31 page)

The deafening shouts filled the chamber and vibrated the glass beneath Badger’s feet.

THE SURGEON RAN HIS FINGER down the punctures on the dead man’s neck.

“The bite didn’t kill him, I can tell you that much. Not enough blood loss at the point of entry.”

Darius stared at the open mouth and yellow eyes. A good soldier, he remembered. Phillus was his name. Used to be his name.

“If it wasn’t the bite, then what?”

The surgeon stood and stretched. “From the skin discoloration and presentation of the body, I’d say a neurological poison.”

“But I’ve seen bites like that before. That demon-child Wilson had one on his arm that had almost healed.”

“This could be a different species. It’s hard to tell without samples or blood work.”

“Could it be that black dog?”

“Even if that animal found his way into the tunnels, the spread of the punctures is much too wide.” The surgeon rubbed his chin. “These aren’t marks from a canine.”

Darius straightened up and pointed at a pair of soldiers in the crowd of green uniforms. “You and you––take away the body and arrange a military funeral. The rest keep going deeper into the tunnels.”

“Wait!” The surgeon pulled Darius down the corridor. “We’ve lost too many men this week,” he whispered. “You can’t––”

Darius pointed at the surgeon’s nose with his gleaming thumb-spike. “Don’t tell me what I can’t do. I’m not going to sit around and wait while those savages pick us off one-by-one.”

“Maybe if we talk with them ...”

Darius leaned close, his forehead almost touching the surgeon’s. “Are you volunteering? The last messenger we sent returned in a bag. And not a large one.”

The surgeon closed his eyes and shook his head.

“That’s what I thought,” said Darius. “Felix! Let’s go.”

His bodyguard pushed through the cluster of soldiers and Darius followed him through the crumbling tunnels with a lantern. At last they squeezed through a moldy crack in the concrete and climbed a spill of rock to the lighted corridors of Station.

Darius mulled over the surgeon’s comment about the recent deaths as he walked toward the rectory. Instead of turning right at the connecting corridor, he turned left.

“Sir?”

“It’s fine, Felix. I need to see someone.”

Darius meandered through the dim tunnels and stopped at a door guarded by two masked soldiers. He knocked three times and a husky trooper opened the door. Darius brushed by him into the room.

Only stains and cracks decorated the bare concrete walls. A jug of water and cold plate of food sat near a pile of blankets in one corner. Across the room a bearded man in hemp rags struggled to his feet, his back against the wall. His sunken cheeks and dark circles under his eyes contrasted with the balled fists at his waist.

“Leader Yishai, I’m coming to you as a friend,” said Darius. “Stop doing this to yourself.”

“Leave this place,” said Yishai in rasping voice.

“If you don’t eat and die of starvation, how does that help your people? They need you now more than ever. It wounds me deeply, this compulsion you have to blame me for the destruction of David. I say to you again, that man was sent to the capital in chains for what he did.”

“Lies.”

Darius shrugged. “I don’t know who’s given you these delusions, but all I can do is repeat the truth. We simply want peace with your tribe. Wilson and the girl are the real problems between us. If it weren’t for them your people would still have warm, happy homes in David. Due to a chain of events caused by them––not me––this bad luck has fallen on both of us.” He pulled off a glove and held out the pink stump of his thumb. “Don’t you think I’d be happier if none of this had happened?”

“Let me out,” said Yishai.

Darius crossed his arms. “I can’t, and it’s for your own safety. Your people have already given up. They’re working happily for me cleaning up these tunnels and hunting in the forests. Many of the women have already partnered with our soldiers. So if you fight against us, you’re fighting against the happiness of your own people. Honestly, a contract and agreement of peace is only a formality at this point. It is a moot point, but one that needs to be taken. Let me put it to you this way––if I was a crazed madman, would I ask for your signature?”

“You can sign with my dead fingers, you disgusting worm,” said Yishai.

Darius nodded slowly. He left the room and the door shut after him.

“Someone’s gotten to the chefa,” he said to the pair of guards. “Has anyone else been here apart from myself?”

“No, sir. There’s always two men here and one in the room. No other visitors.”

Darius slapped the man on the back. “Fine, Arnel. Keep up the good work.”

Felix escorted him through the tunnels to the rectory and stood at attention near the entrance hatch.

“Thank you, Felix.”

Darius leaned into his office. His assistant glanced away from the viewscreens and stood from his chair with a salute.

“Good day, sir!”

“Yes, good day. I think we’ve talked about this before, but remind me––the screens track animal movement, don’t they?”

“Certainly, sir. But only aboveground, not in the tunnels.”

“Is that because we don’t know enough about the system? Or is it normal?”

The assistant bowed his head. “It could be a limitation of the machines. Underground, only living things in the powered tunnels are tracked. I will search the books to see what can be done, Your Grace.”

Darius stared at the moving triangles on the wall screen and nodded. He walked down the corridor to a metal door. After listening for a moment, he rapped his knuckles on the surface twice.

The door hissed open. A tall guard in a black mask and helmet blocked the entrance, a naked blade in one hand. He sheathed the knife and stepped aside.

Consul Nahid leaned over the black slab in the center of the room. She wore a yellow robe that protected her clothing and hung to the blood-spattered tile floor. When she turned Darius saw crimson smeared across the front of her robe and the slashed body of a man. A white sheet spotted with red covered his face.

“Find anything?”

The Consul shook her head. “Same as the others. Removal of the implanted machinery causes death.”

Darius walked to the other side of the body. A wide gash yawned from the left forearm and trickled blood. The sides of the neck, the upper abdomen, and right arm had also been precisely cut open.

“Cardiac arrest?”

“Yes. Electrical shock made no difference.” The Consul used a white rag to wipe her forehead and chin.

“Your Grace–”

“I know what you’re going to say. There are plenty left to take back to the capital. I don’t need to save every single one.”

“Of course you don’t,” said Darius with a smile. “I’m simply concerned about your health. Please don’t stress yourself over these strange and unfamiliar devices. When we reach the capital and have more resources at our disposal, I’m certain you can discover the secrets of this old machinery.”

The Consul sighed. “Maybe you’re right.” She waved at a table scattered with dozens of yellow and white implants of different sizes. “I haven’t learned much from these.”

Darius lifted the corner of cloth covering the face. A short stubble of gray hair grew on the man’s head and chin. It was a weather-beaten face and lined with years of stress, Darius thought.

“What was his name?”

The Consul looked up at the display. “Simpson ... Doctor Eileen Simpson.”

YISHAI SAT IN THE BATHROOM and pretended to use the toilet.

The guards made him leave the door open but most of the time they didn’t want to watch, and unless the slab-faced gorillas stood in front of the door they could only see his knees and feet. The stupid guard that was inside now constantly shuffled a dog-eared pack of square playing cards. Yishai wondered what bounced around that thick skull.

Thick Skull had been on duty for half a day. The evening meal approached, and time for a message, if there was one.

Yishai leaned back and felt along the wall beneath the white toilet. He felt something in the crack and pulled out a small glass tube wrapped in paper.

“After the signal rub this on yourself head to toe,” read the blocky script on the note.

Yishai crammed the note into his mouth and held up the transparent tube full of yellow oil. Thick Skull shuffled his cards loudly and Yishai stuffed the tube into his pocket.

BADGER SQUEEZED SIDEWAYS through the narrow space behind the rooms, trying not to jostle wiring or vibrate the pipes of plumbing. To even fit in the tiny gap she’d had to strip to her underwear and bare feet.

She lay sideways, stuck her arm through the wall, and left the final tube above a toilet fixture.

As she stood up her toes crunched on the body of a huge spider, as dry and brittle as a dead leaf. Badger pushed it away with her foot and kept sliding along.

After a few minutes of quiet shuffling through the utility space, a metal grate blocked her way. She carefully lifted and pushed it to the right, then crawled on her side through a long concrete shaft to another grate.

Zhang waited in the dark tunnel outside.

“Holy spit, Kira,” he whispered. “You’re filthy.”

“Quiet.”

Badger brushed dust and thick cobwebs from her arms and legs. The tiny scars on her skin still showed even with all the grime.

She wiped her eyes and mouth with Zhang’s handkerchief. He looked away as Badger pulled on her trousers and leather jacket and buckled a knife belt around her waist. She pulled the wedding bracelet from her jacket and slipped it on her wrist.

With one hand on the wall she followed Zhang down the pitch-black corridor. He turned a corner and metal snapped near the floor.

Zhang inhaled sharply. “Trap–”

The grenade shattered and he flew backwards across the corridor into Badger. The back of her head struck concrete.

A second or minutes later, she opened her eyes halfway, confused by the darkness and ringing in her ears. The air smelled of red-hot metal and dust. A heavy weight pressed on her arms and warm liquid covered her neck and chest.

She grunted and pushed Zhang to the side, and his slack limbs tumbled on the rocks of the corridor. Badger searched the darkness and found his neck––no pulse.

Although she couldn’t hear, she felt vibration through the concrete. A mass of red lights bounced toward her from the far end of the corridor.

Badger scrambled to her feet and ran.

She’d been chased through the tunnels before, but never deaf, alone, and with such a headache. Pain stabbed hard between her eyes and made the darkness sparkle.

After feeling the edge of several corners in the dark, she found the entrance of a stairwell and ran down a dozen levels before finding a door, only to discover it was jammed shut.

She squatted in a corner and felt the blood on her face and neck. None of it seemed to be hers. Badger thought that over as her hearing came back slowly.

The top of the stairwell glowed red. Badger thought she heard scrapes and a bark. She pulled with all her strength at the handle and the metal door cracked wide enough for her to squeeze through.

The air smelled stagnant, like a pond covered in green scum. Water roared in the darkness.

Badger brushed the wall to her right and chose each step carefully. The walls of smooth concrete changed to damp, broken rock and droplets of water misted on her face.

Her right foot dropped into empty space and Badger jerked back. She knelt and slid her hands across the slime-covered rock in all directions.

Ahead lay nothing but spraying water. To her right Badger felt the jagged corner of the wall and a narrow ledge.

The dog’s bark echoed from the stairwell. A voice yelled in the tribal dialect and something smashed against the metal door.

Badger stood and inched along the ledge toward the increasing spray of warm water. Wilson had said not to get it wet, so she pulled the sleeve of her jacket over the wedding bracelet.

The door groaned and scraped and crimson strobed through the dark tunnel. From the dim flashes of light, Badger saw a torrent of water pouring over the wall to her right. She followed the path of the water down with her eyes and sucked in a sharp breath. Tiny droplets froze in the Circle lamps and cascaded into a pit fifteen meters below.

The voices of the soldiers blocked the way back, and the only way forward lay over the ledge and the sheet of water. If she made it to the other side, the dogs would lose her scent and she could wait for them to leave.

But the wedding bracelet would be soaked.

Badger closed her eyes. “Sorry, dear,” she whispered.

She held onto slick cracks with the nubs of her fingernails and crept through the waterfall. It poured over her head and soaked her clothes in a stench of sulfur. On the other side the ledge widened and she crouched against a wall, away from the bouncing red light.

Even though the water was as warm as fresh blood Badger shivered, her arms crossed and knees bouncing.