The Soterion Mission (5 page)

Slipping on wet rocks and ducking beneath overhanging branches, the party scrambled along the bed of the stream before striking out again across country. As darkness fell, they reached a clump of stumpy trees whose swollen trunks rose like the ruins of a vast temple against the glowing embers of the sky. There, thoroughly exhausted by the events of the day, they collapsed to the ground and slept.

Taja woke first. Lying next to Cyrus, she put out her hand and gently shook his shoulder. He yawned and opened his eyes. “Shh!” she whispered, placing a finger to her lips and rolling over so that he felt her breath on his cheek. “Listen, Cyrus. We must talk.”

“Yes?” He was very conscious of Taja’s lips hovering near his and of her hand still resting against his shoulder.

“You know what I think of Roxanne…”

Cyrus sighed. “Yes, you’ve made it pretty obvious. But you’ve seen how she behaves, her reactions to the Zeds…” He glanced across to where Roxanne lay. She was still asleep, her head pillowed on her hands. “She’s honest, Taja. I know she is.”

Taja came still closer. “Alright, I agree she’s terrified of the Zeds. Maybe that’s why she’s acting for them? Odd, wasn’t it, that they knew where and when to ambush us? And in the fight, did any of them go for her seriously, even try to injure her? Think about it, Cyrus,” she added slowly, her lips brushing against his. “Think about it.”

“I will. Of course I will.” Despite her clouded motives, he recognized the logic behind what she was saying.

“And while you’re thinking…” Her mouth closed over his.

Cyrus turned away. “No, Taja. Not now, not here.” What he meant was not her. If there was any time for kissing on this mission, he hoped it might be with someone else.

As soon as it was light, the party rose, ate a little of the bread they had brought with them, and set off again. Urged on by Cyrus, they moved as quickly as Zavar could manage through the heat of the day, walking for a few thousand paces, resting, then moving on again. Where possible they followed the route of ancient roads, but keeping a few hundred paces to the side of the main track for fear of attracting Zeds. For the same reason, they hugged the shadows, avoiding skylines and open spaces.

Cyrus had plenty of time to think about Taja’s remarks. He was sure she was wrong, but throughout the day he watched Roxanne carefully to see whether she was leaving any sort of trail for the pursuing Zeds. He saw nothing.

On the third morning, still pondering Taja’s accusations and looking for an opportunity to get to know Roxanne better, Cyrus fell in beside her and started chatting. Timur and his tribe, he suggested, may well have given up the chase when they lost track of their prey in the stream. Roxanne simply shook her head and said she wished she were so optimistic. Seeing the pain on her face that the subject caused, Cyrus switched to less troubling matters. Life in Yonne, he asked, how was it different from that in Della Tallis?

Roxanne relaxed and spoke eagerly of her past, her upbringing and her children. As Cyrus listened, enthralled by her wit and charm as much as by what she said, he wondered how he could ever have doubted her integrity. After a while, the conversation came round to the Books of Yonne. He had never seen a book, he reminded her, and wanted to know what they looked like and what they meant.

Roxanne laughed as she described how different the three she had read were: one fat and shiny, all bright colours and pictures; another looked dull, though it had very intelligent words inside; and the third – well, the third was the really strange one.

“How strange?” asked Cyrus.

“We don’t know why it was written. The author –”

“What’s that?”

“Author? Oh, that’s a person who writes a book. They set out the words on paper. We think there were several ways of doing this, some by hand, others by machine.”

Cyrus was lost. “OK, you can explain that later. But why’s this book so odd?”

“It’s a story about children living in the time of the Long Dead. One of them doesn’t want to get older. You know how the Long Dead grew older slowly and lived for many, many more years than we do?’

“Years being our winters – of course, yes.”

“Well, this boy doesn’t want to grow up. He’s afraid, like we are of our Death Month. Some Yonne scholars said the man who wrote it – James – knew that the Great Death was going to happen. He saw that one day there would be only young people – young to the Long Dead way of thinking, that is.”

“Sounds really weird!” muttered Cyrus.

“That’s not all. In this story, people fly through the sky.”

“Is it real? I mean, was it actually like that in the time of the Long Dead?”

“We don’t know. Maybe this was just a dream…”

“This book, does it have a name?”

“Yes. It’s called
Peter Pan
.”

“Peter Pan, Peter Pan,” repeated Cyrus to himself. “Roxanne, could you show me how to write that?”

“Of course.”

“I was thinking. If anything happened…Well, it would be good if two of us knew how to read, wouldn’t it?”

They were interrupted by a cry from Navid. He was pointing towards the ruins of a town in the valley below.

Constants normally avoided such places. There was something deeply sad about their rows of crumbling, ivy-clad buildings, fallen wires and the rusting shells of vehicles. The stench of decay lingered like poisonous pollen in the heavy air. Having once feasted on human flesh, the armies of sharp-toothed rats that lived there were bold and aggressive. Birds of prey circled silently overhead, snakes eased themselves between cracks in the hot concrete, and wild dogs lay in the sun, licking their flyblown sores. No Constant, however brave, ever felt comfortable in the towns of their ancestors, for all their faded glory.

Nevertheless, patrols did occasionally venture into the barren and overgrown streets in search of materials that might be useful. Metal was most highly prized, followed by ceramics. Navid had been on a couple of these salvage operations and he wondered whether they might go into this town to look for bandages and medicines for Zavar. Roxanne would be able to read the writing on any packets or bottles they came across.

Taja put a stop to the idea. “I’m the only Mudir on this mission,” she said briskly, “so I’ll make this decision. We’ll press on.”

Navid looked puzzled. “Er, I thought Cyrus was the leader?” he said.

“That was before I arrived. Now it’s different, Navid.”

Cyrus didn’t like the way the conversation was going. Divisions and squabbles over leadership were the last thing they wanted. “Look,” he said firmly, “this will get us nowhere. Out here there are no Emirs or Mudirs or anything. We’re all in it together. I’ll take charge when it comes to fighting, and all other decisions we’ll make together, OK?”

Taking the silence that followed as agreement, he asked Zavar whether he wanted them to go to look for medicine. The wounded swordsman shook his head. It would be far too risky for a few of them to enter a town and they should press on, he said. Time was precious and his condition did not seem to be deteriorating. Although his fractured shoulder was still extremely painful, the wound was no longer hurting so badly.

Appearances can be cruelly deceptive. In the middle of the afternoon, as they were climbing a rocky slope to avoid passing through a ravine, Zavar collapsed.

He staggered forward, cutting open his cheek on a flint, and lay face down, breathing heavily. Taja came up and knelt beside him. “Fever,” she announced, laying a hand on his forehead. “He is very sick.”

Cyrus and Navid turned their friend over and made him as comfortable as they could on the hard ground. Roxanne gave him a drink and carefully untied the bandage on his shoulder. When the leaves were removed, the nauseating stench was overpowering. The wound had become badly infected. To the width of two hands, the flesh around it was red and swollen. Yellow puss oozed from the jagged scar and from the sunset flush on Zavar’s face it was clear that his body temperature had risen alarmingly. Beneath the skin, his flesh was starting to rot.

Leaving Roxanne with the injured man, the Tallins moved away to discuss what to do. The predicament was new to them. Back home an ill or injured person was taken to the Sick House, and when they died – the usual outcome – their body was burned on the Ash Pile. There was little room for sentiment because the passing of friends and acquaintances was a common occurrence. In a world where everyone who had seen eighteen winters knew to within a few days when their life would end, the arrival of that moment might be sad but it was hardly a surprise.

That did not mean they were willing simply to abandon Zavar to a wretched fate. Apart from rare executions and war killing – an ugly necessity to prevent even greater slaughter – Constants still prized life, with its bittersweet mix of joys and sorrows. As their proverb said, what else was there? Besides, Cyrus asked, wasn’t their mission itself about the preciousness of life, a quest for the secrets of those who had once enjoyed it in abundance?

“Maybe,” said Taja, shrugging her shoulders in a matter-of-fact manner. ”But Zavar will die soon. So what’s to be done? The nearest Sick House is back in Della Tallis.”

Cyrus looked at her. She was right, of course, but did she have to be that blunt? “It’s our duty to look after him,” he reminded her, “whatever the circumstances.”

“That’s a Tallin rule,” replied Taja quickly. “As you have never stopped telling us, things are different out here. What do you think, Navid?”

“Er, well, I suppose you’re both right. In a way.” Where possible, Navid avoided abstract questions of right and wrong. He was more comfortable doing what he felt was correct. His instinct for natural justice rarely failed.

“So, Taja proposes we leave him here and press on,” Cyrus announced. “Any other ideas?”

He was playing for time, trying to make up his own mind. Zavar might take days to die. During that time, Roxanne’s life would also be ebbing towards its close and Timur’s dogs might pick up their scent and resume the chase. Once again, he faced the heart-breaking clash of upbringing and instinct.

The discussion was interrupted by Zavar calling to them. The water had revived him, he said, and his fever had subsided a little. With his head in Roxanne’s lap, he looked up at his friends with bloodshot eyes. “Listen,” he rasped, “I know what’s going on. This is the end for me. I didn’t get very far, did I?”

“You saved Taja’s life in the fight,” said Navid.

“Maybe, maybe. But now I’m just a boulder tied to your legs.”

“Nonsense!” said Cyrus, trying to sound reassuring. “You’ll be better soon, Zavar. It takes more than a dead-brained Zed to put you down!”

Zavar’s cracked lips parted in a smile. “Come on, Cyrus! Don’t fool yourself. We’re Constants, remember? We’re honest, true to the old ways. So if this Soterion thing can bring them back, then nothing, absolutely nothing must get in the way of our finding it.”

Raising his right arm, he clasped his friend tightly by the ankle. “Please, Cyrus. This is my last wish. I am a burden. Leave me, and the four of you continue the mission. I beg you.”

4: The Children of Gova

Timur’s annoyance, having swollen to angry frustration, was now close to fury. He did not take kindly to being thwarted by anyone, let alone by a woman who had humiliated him.

Sitting in the shade of a myrtle tree to prevent the midday sun burning his oyster-white skin, the chief of the Grozny Zeds ordered a further six of his personal bodyguard to join the search. Before him slipped the sluggish brown brook into which, two days earlier, the Tallins had waded to throw the pursuing hounds off the scent. Somewhere, upstream or downstream, left or right, he knew his enemies must have climbed the bank and continued their journey. The hunt had been going on for almost two days now, and still there were no clues.

Timur had set off in pursuit of the mission shortly after hearing of the failure of the ambush. First, though, he had watched the execution by impalement of the three men – one of whom was already dying of his injuries – who had brought him the news of the defeat and of their failure to detain Roxanne.

“What can I do?” he had explained to them with a mirthless grin. “I would have to kill you for disobedience if you hadn’t told me of your defeat, and now you have to die for the disgrace of losing a battle. What a pity! No choice. Death or…death!”

The three prisoners stared open-mouthed as they struggled to understand the sadistic logic. Like all common Zeds, they were virtually incapable of reasoning. But Sheza, the chief’s nominated successor, was learning to think and act differently. Standing beside his master, he found the whole situation immensely amusing.
“Clever Timur!” he chuckled, pointing at the doomed culprits. “Die in the fight – or die on the spit! Ha, ha, ha!”

The Malik looked at him with a mixture of contempt and approval. “Good lad, Sheza! You’re getting there.” Nevertheless, he made a mental note to arrange for his heir to receive further education from the next intelligent Constant they captured. The young man still thought in the manner of a commoner, he realised with a sigh, which was barely thinking at all. Unless he showed a marked improvement, he’d never make a Malik of the Grozny.

Timur stared into the muddy water. The longer this went on, the more serious it became. He had lost six valuable hunting dogs to Tallin arrows in trying to recapture that Roxanne woman, and the failed ambush had cost him twenty men. Tribe numbers had been falling recently and he really ought to be raiding Constant settlements or other Zed tribes to stock up on breeding slaves. Of the thirty-five or so female prisoners in the Grozny encampment, only half were pregnant. That was something else he needed to attend to, personally if he had the time.

For the moment, he had to get after those infuriating Tallins and the Yonner they were protecting. If he could find their trail again and see which direction they were headed in…

“Malik! Malik!” An urgent voice interrupted Timur’s musings. He looked up to see a man of around thirteen winters running along the edge of the stream towards him. Reaching the point where his chief was seated, the near-naked youth scrambled up the bank and fell on his knees before him.

“Yes, Giv? Speak!”

“Dog sniff good! Good sniff! Find!” Giv panted, looking up with eyes that were half delighted, half anxious. No Grozny ever knew how their Malik was going to react – that was part of his mystique and his power.

Timur raised a pale eyebrow. “Are you trying to say that a dog has found the scent of the people we’re hunting, Giv?”

The youth nodded vigorously. “Yeah! Yeah! Good scent!”

“Where?”

“There!” Giv waved an arm in the general area of the stream.

“Yes, dungbrain, but which side of the stream is the trail?”

“Side, Malik?”

“Yes, side of the stream, ratspittle. Left or right?”

Giv, beyond the limit of his vocabulary, gawped helplessly. “Eh? Lefrite?”

Struggling to control his frustration, the chief told the messenger to stand in the middle of the stream and indicate which way the dog had moved off. It was left – his quarry was still following the noonday sun.

Timur rose and began pacing up and down in the mottled shadows like a ghost. Sheza and the bodyguard behind him watched in awe and admiration: Malik Timur did more thinking in an afternoon than all of them together managed in a whole moon. Except perhaps for Jamshid and Jumshid, the bodyguard captains.

At some point, Timur realised, the Tallins would have to cross the river which the Zeds bluntly called ‘No-Man’ – no man who entered the broad stream swarming with crocodiles and poisonous water snakes was ever seen again. The only way across was by the one remaining Long Dead bridge, a rusty and dilapidated structure whose central pier had been carried away by floods long ago. Careful travellers could still get to the other bank by balancing precariously for about ten paces along the two corroded steel rails remaining over the void.

At the bridge, Timur planned to cut off his quarry, seize the woman and kill her escort. But how to get there before his prey, which was now at least two days ahead of him?

“Jumshid!”

A squat man of seventeen winters but many fewer teeth lumbered forward from the ranks of the bodyguard. “Malik?”

“The three horses we seized in the rainy season – what condition are they in now?”

“Condition?” repeated the captain. Although more fluent than Giv, many of his master’s words remained a mystery to him.

“Yes, condition, loghead! How – are – they? Can they be ridden?”

“Ah! One is sick and will die soon, Malik. The men want to eat it.”

“Well, they can’t! And the other two?”

“The big one is good for riding. The small one is limping – only light man can ride.”

“That will do, Jumshid,” said Timur, his pallid hands twitching with nervous excitement. “You take the bigger one and Sheza the smaller one, and ride to No-Man River. You know the way?”

“Yes, Malik!”

“Good. When you are there, go to the bridge. Bridge. Do you understand?”

Jumshid hesitated. “Old iron over No-Man, Malik?”

“That’s it.” Timur, who was a tall man, walked up to the captain until he towered above him like a gigantic stalk. “Now, do whatever is necessary to stop the Tallins crossing the bridge. Break the bridge down. Repeat!”

“Break the bridge down.”

“Or stand on the other side and shoot anyone trying to cross. Repeat!”

“Shoot anyone trying to cross,” echoed Jumshid faithfully. He prided himself on being one of the best of all the Grozny at remembering orders.

“Excellent. Hold the Tallins there and we will charge up behind them and destroy them. Simple, eh?”

“Charge up behind and destroy! Simple!”

Timur clamped a hand on his captain’s shoulder and ordered him to leave with Sheza immediately. When they had gone, the Malik looked up at the canopy of leaves above him and paused. It was true that if those Tallins followed the sun they would arrive at the river, but on the way they might meet with something else. Yes, on the same route lay the settlement of the Constants who called themselves the Children of Gova. Well, if the Tallins met with them, anything might happen…

The Malik shook his head. No, the chances of them bumping into the Gova settlement were remote. It was too small and isolated. The river was where he and his men would make for, and fast. There he would take his revenge, making the elusive Roxanne regret with every fibre of her bewitching body the moment she had outwitted him.

All this time, unsure whether or not he was allowed to move, the youth who had brought the news of the rediscovered trail was still standing in the middle of the stream. Timur stared at him for half a second, before he remembered who he was and said, “Ah, yes! Still with us, Giv? Tell the men to stop the search and come here.”

“Stop search? Yes, Malik!” The youth began to wade off downstream.

“And Giv, I am pleased with you,” Timur shouted after him. A grin spread across the young man’s face. “I will give you a prize. Tonight you may play with the breeding slaves.”

Grinning like a new moon and muttering “Prize! Prize!” over and over to himself, Giv splashed off round a bend in the stream. What a useful double order, thought Timur. With a single command I’ve rewarded loyalty and done something about the numbers problem. I must try that again some time.

Ahead of Timur and his tribe, Taja was also issuing commands. “Before anyone responds to Zavar’s request,” she began, looking straight at Cyrus and then down at the wounded man himself, “I feel it’s my duty to make our position clear.”

“Here we go again,” muttered Navid in a half whisper.

Taja spun round to confront him. “Shut up, Navid! It’s high time we got this straight. I am risking – probably sacrificing – my life for a very dubious mission. All of us are. We’re in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by hostile Zeds and almost certainly being followed by the Grozny, the most dangerous of them all. We can’t tell for sure whether Roxanne is one of us, a Constant, or whether she is telling us the truth with her Soterion story. She doesn’t even seem to know where we’re going! And has it ever occurred to you that she may herself have been tricked?”

Eyes flaming, Taja paused and looked round the group. Though the Tallins knew she could be fierce, this was beyond anything they had seen previously and Cyrus decided it was best to let her have her say. He was impressed, sure, but watching her face closely, did he notice a hint of fear behind those flashing eyes?

“If I say no more quarrelling,” she ordered, “that’s what happens. Got that into your heads? We’re Constants. Or at least we say we are.” She looked scornfully towards Roxanne. “And Constants are true to the ideas of the Long Dead: courage, respect and unity. If we lose those, we are nothing. Mere Zeds!” Again she looked hard at Roxanne.

“Zavar, as he has told us himself, is dying. He has asked us to leave him here and continue the mission. He has shown courage. Now it’s up to us to match it with respect and unity. That’s what I demand we do.”

Cyrus looked across at Roxanne. There was no point in trying to argue, ran the unspoken message between them. It would only make things worse.

Navid was less of a politician. Before Cyrus could stop him, he shook his shaggy head in anger and reminded Taja what they had all agreed: although she was a Mudir back home, out here she was just one of them. He had joined the mission because Cyrus was leading it, not her. She had not been invited. If she didn’t like it, why didn’t she go home and do her bossing there?

The situation was getting out of control. When Zavar and Cyrus both tried to speak at the same time, Navid folded his arms and turned his back on all of them. Taja stood breathing noisily, staring at the long hair curling over Navid’s shoulders. To their left, a startled bird screeched into the hot, dry sky.

It was Roxanne who calmed things down. Walking quietly over to Navid, she laid a hand on his shoulder.

“Get off, Taj –” he began, turning round sharply. He stopped, confused. “Oh, sorry, Roxanne. I didn’t realise it was you.”

“Don’t worry, Navid,” she replied. “No need to apologise.” She spoke so calmly and clearly that it was hard to believe she had heard all the harsh insinuations of Taja’s rant. “Since I seem to be the cause of all this trouble, please let me say something.”

“Why not? Please go on.” Taja made no effort to hide her scorn.

In a manner that was close to motherly, Roxanne kept a hand on Navid’s arm. Her voice, as when she spoke before the Majlis back in Della Tallis, was unquestionably sincere.

“You are all, every one of you, brave and wonderful people. I know what you have sacrificed and I hope that one day, when our mission is accomplished, you will be recognised as the saviours of our people.

“I have not lied to you and I will not lie to you. My story is true. I believe there is a Soterion and that we will find it and reveal its secrets. But we can do this only if we pull together. Please.”

Navid nodded his head slightly. “As for our poor friend Zavar,” Roxanne concluded, “his fate is not for us to decide, is it? He had made his decision and, Cyrus and Navid, I believe we would do him a great dishonour if we ignored it. Do you want him to die knowing he may be the cause of his friends’ deaths, too?”

“No, thank you!” cut in Zavar in a manner that brought a smile to every face.

The crisis was over. At Cyrus’ insistence they all shook hands and set about making the dying man as comfortable as possible. Navid and Cyrus erected a shelter from branches to protect him from the sun. While Roxanne settled him within this leafy tent, Taja went off to pick some medicinal herbs she had seen growing nearby. She knew a bit about plants, she announced when she returned, and these would help Zavar sleep if the pain became too great. Cyrus was tempted to ask about the leaves she had placed on Zavar’s wound at the stream: if she knew what she was doing, why had her treatment failed to prevent the infection spreading? In the end he thought better of it, deciding the wound must have been inflicted by a poisoned weapon. Besides, there had been enough confrontation for one day.

They finally departed as the afternoon was drawing to a close, walking fast as if they wanted to get away not just from Zavar but also from their decision to leave him. For a long time no one spoke.

Finally, as the disc of the dying sun dipped beneath the tops of the tallest trees, Cyrus became aware of someone coming up behind him. It was Roxanne.

“Cyrus, why do you think she joined us?” Her voice was different: quicker, more urgent.

The question took him by surprise. “You mean Taj –”

“Yes. Come on, let’s stop pretending, Cyrus. We haven’t known each other long, but I think we can trust each other, can’t we?”

“Of course.” With the smile of recognition that passed between them, he again felt that thrill of delight at just being with her. It was a wonderful emotion, yet painfully confusing when death sat poised visibly on every shoulder.

“So, why’s she here?” Roxanne asked again.

“Tricky. Part of it is that, well, she and I were lovers. Sort of.”

“Were, Cyrus?”

“Yes, were. Nothing serious. She was keener than me – made the relationship a bit lopsided. One day Leiss told me, in confidence, I was ‘unwise’ – that was the word he used – to tangle with Taja. But she was attractive in a dangerous sort of way. I admired her sharp mind, her cleverness, her skill at seeing what mattered and what didn’t.”