The Wraeththu Chronicles (18 page)

"Oh, we have business farther north," Cal told him. I was wondering what this stilted conversation was leading to. Was he going to offer us hospitality or order us on our way

I did not understand why he was cautious of us or that he had good reason to be. He obviously came to the conclusion, however, that as there were only two of us, we were not much of a threat. He raised a hand and snapped his ringers. Instantly, a dozen Hara materialized from concealment, all pointing weapons at us.

"There's no need for this," Cal's voice was beautifully clear and steady. "Let us pass. We mean you no harm."

It seemed ridiculous even saying it. Cal and I; two of us, and a dozen guns aimed at our heads. What did they expect us to do? Shape change into something large and numerous?

"We have to be careful," Spinel said smoothly. "As you see, the town is empty. Varrs were here. About a mile out of town, there's a place that's a heap of death. One whole heap of death. Men, women, children. We come from Phesbe; that's a town up there some way." He pointed. "We saw the smoke. Investigated. Varrs tried to burn the dead, but there were too many."

"Oh?" Cal said daintily, "And how long ago was this?" I caught on to what he was thinking; there was no smell, That much death and no smell?

"Very smart," Spinel sneered. "We dealt with it. You could smell it at Phesbe two days ago."

I could tell Cal was beginning to get annoyed with this pointless altercation. "We're not

Varrs," he said.

"Varrs have whores," Spinel countered, aggressively.

Cal just laughed. "Do they? Saltrock whores even? Oh spare us the shit, Mistcr Irraka, and good-day to you. Come on, Pell." With remarkable sang-froid, he put his foot in Splice's stirrup and started to mount. I swung up onto Red's back hastily, hoping Cal knew what he was doing.

"Are you planning on passing through Phesbe?" Spinel asked him gruffly.

"I don't think so," Cal replied stonily, urging Splice into a trot. I followed.

"They'll shoot us!" I squeaked, catching up with him. Cal did not answer.

Some moments later, I heard hoofbeats behind us and looked round. Spinel and his troupe were galloping toward us on enormous black horses. Spinel caught up easily. His brute of a mount had a huge, curving head with red nostrils. Its mane was cropped, like its rider's.

"You'd be fools to carry on north just now," the Irrakan addressed Cal. "Chances are you'll meet the Varrs. We've decided you can come with us back to Phesbe. Wait a couple of days there."

Cal did not slow Splice's pace. "So kind of you," he said. "Well, what do you think, Pell?"

"It's up to you," I replied.

"OK, lead on," Cal smiled at Spinel.

The black horses poured past us, their hooves throwing up grit from the road. They were very impressive, like part of an army. Soon, all we could see of them was dust, but their trail was easy enough to follow. “I wonder what they want," Cal mused.

"I won't say it!" I said.

"And what's that; 'Oh Cal, you're so suspicious'," he pantomimed, imitating me.''They probably want to steal all we have and ravish our silky bodies!"

"Why are we following them, then?" I demanded, in alarm

"Because a thorough ravishing is good for you now and again!" he joked, or at least I hoped

he did.

Just before we reached Phesbe I asked, "Cal, what are Varrs?"

"Oh, they eat Uigenna for breakfast, darling," he said.

"Be serious for once!" I snapped. He loved to irritate me.

"They're just another northern tribe," he explained. "Hideously arrogant and shockingly

ferocious."

"Thank God it was only the Irraka we met then!" I exclaimed.

Cal pulled a face. "I should save thanking Him for a while yet if I were you," he said.

It seemed that with each Wraeththu tribe we came upon, we were slipping one note lower on the scale of civilization, comfort and morality. Phesbe was a stinking husk of what once might have been a decent, and fairly affluent, community. Now it was merely a rat-heap of broken concrete spiked with rust, rank, seeding weeds and ungodly stenches. Most of the buildings were crumbling into a rapid dissolution, gaping roofs were hastily patched with flapping canvas. All the streets, mostly unsurpassable with rubbish, bore a sad wreath of mulching newsprint nurturing a surprising burst of late summer poppies. I saw two dead dogs and a dripping carcass of what might have been human hanging from a pole.

In the center of the town a rococco town hall stood bravely and still intact. Spinel had made this his palace. He was waiting for us at the foot of a sweeping flight of steps that led to the hall's porticoed facade. Bitter-looking hara with cruel faces lounged about him, all dressed in black leather uniform. Many were heavily tattooed, none wore their hair long, and I noticed quite a few had shaved their scalps completely and scored the white skin with black patterns. Their expressions ranged from outright hostility to mere boredom, and I could not suppress a shiver as we dismounted. Spinel snapped his fingers (all he ever had to do to summon his aides), and a skinny har with pale eyes shambled down the steps to lead Red and Splice away.

"Hold it!" Cal ordered, and removed as much of our luggage from Tenka as we could carry. Why tempt Fate, or indeed the fingers of the Irraka? We followed Spinel into the hall.

Inside, a sickly sweet odor of corruption mingled with a smell of wood smoke. Horses' hooves had cracked the marble floor and it was no longer the least bit white. Tatters of cloth hung without apparent purpose from carvings around the walls. Spinel studied our stunned appraisal of the surroundings.

"We are fighters, not thinkers," he said bluntly. "We have no time for Saltrock fancies here."

Cal raised his shoulders eloquently. "Quite," he said.

There was one large room where all of Spinel's immediate retinue appeared to sleep, eat and lounge around. Rags partitioned the room's perimeter into separate sleeping quarters, but there could be little privacy. In one of these makeshift holes I saw a pitiful creature, little other than a skin-covered skeleton, lying on a pallet. Spinel caught me staring.

"Leg broken" he explained. "The bone came through. Time says he might not heal."

I felt sick. The Irraka were without hope. They did not have any healers and, as there are few Wraeththu who cannot effect some measure of healing, this betokened more than anything, more than the filth and the squalor, that this tribe had fallen from the path. Wandered off it, more likely. I realize now that they must have been a splinter group of Aralids somehow separated from their main tribe. Without the strength of the higher castes behind them, the troubles they had suffered had dragged them down. They had no sense of productiveness; their fire and imagination had been doused by hardship. Most of them seemed healthy enough, however, in a lean, hard way, and their animals appeared well cared for

Two hounds had bounded over to Spinel and he absently touched their heads as they scrabbled to lick his hands. I dreaded that we might be offered something to eat. The smell alone was enough to turn the stomach. I remembered with regret Lianvis's heavy-perfumed chambers. The windows here were mostly broken and stuffed with cloth. Smoke had stained the ceiling and walls; there was little light.

Cal dropped his luggage onto the floor and uttered a long, low whistle. I knew we still carried bread and fruit and cheese from the Kakkahaar. It may have been foolish to waste it then, but I suggested Spinel should share it with us, Cal obviously shared my thoughts for he agreed immediately. I could only admire Spinel's restraint as we unwrapped the food. The dogs were more honest; they howled to get at the cheese, which was dry, fragrant and crumbling.

"How did you get this town?" Cal asked, tearing at a hunk of sweet bread. Spinel did not seem to hear him; he was chewing with utter concentration. Cal repeated the question.

"Eh? Oh, the Varrs had it first. Took what they wanted and left. We were traveling around. Moved in. The men who lived here had fled to Stoor, the town back there, you know . . ."

"What? And they leave you alone?" Cal sounded incredulous.

"Sure, We got nothing they need."

I could not resist asking, "Why did you go to Stoor when you saw the smoke? If you thought it might be Varrs, I mean? Would you have helped the men who lived there, if it had not been too late?"

Spinel's face creased with thought. He brooded over this question for a while. "Fight for men? Help them?"

He laughed bleakly. "By Aghama, men are dead already, but the Varrs are a big badness. They make the sky go black. They should be made gone." He stood up and the dogs pressed around his legs. He still had pride, if little else, looking down through the remaining mired window-panes at the street.

"Why don't you all leave this place?" I asked him, rather appalled that he had used the name of the first Wraeththu in oath.

"For what?" He did not turn away from the window,

"Things are better elsewhere." It was so simple and so true I felt foolish saying it.

"Better!" Spinel scoffed. "Where? All the north is plagued by the Uigenna and Varrs have all the rest. No-one bothers us here, We have nothing. We have nothing for them to take." Muscles twisted in his face. He looked briefly at the figure I had seen lying on the pallet and then back to the window.

"It is safer down south," Cal put in, in a clear, even voice. He was sitting cross-legged on the bare, boards of the floor, unhurriedly rolling himself a cigarette. Lianvis had donated tobacco too, apparently. He looked luminous, soaking up the only available light; almost unearthly; illustrating, by contrast, the dismal squalor of the room. Spinel stared at him stonily. He would never like Cal; Cal was everything he was not.

"There is a town called Greenling on the other side of the desert. If I were you ..." Cal paused, licking the thin paper and pressing it down, "I'd take my people there. Have you got a light?" Spinel ignored his request. Cal shrugged, turning to search our bags, the cigarette dangling from his mouth.

"There are desert tribes. We could never get across." Spinel threw himself away from the window and squatted down beside us again

"Ah, you mean the Kakkahaar," Cal said with a smile. I wished would not make his contempt so obvious.

"Look Spinel, we've been that way," I told him. "The Kakkahaar are not as threatening as you imagine . . . well, nothing like Varrs anyway. There's a Kakkahaar Algomalid named Lianvis. We are known to him. If you mention our names he may well sell you the services of a guide. You could get across the desert that way . . ."

Spinel looked at me with suspicion. Though he did not know the Kakkahaar's name, he obviously knew of their reputation. Perhaps I had been too forward. The patronizing tone of our comments and the implied criticism of the Irraka and their hovel-town did not land lightly on Spinel's ears. He was obviously thinking; "Who the hell do they think they are." Cal was grinning happily to himself.

"Some time, perhaps," Spinel said at last. "Sometime, we may move on.”

Sometime perhaps. The Irraka would linger in Phesbe until they were all dead.

As the sun sank behind the bones of the town, someone lit a fire in the enormous, soot-coated grate. It filled the room with leaping shadows and smoke, but hid most of the unpleasantness. Spinel left us alone. I guessed we discomforted him. I was annoyed by the waste and apathy we had seen. I could not understand why the Irraka wanted to stay here. They did not want enlightenment, that was clear. There was one thing I could do, however. Lianvis had given me instruction on the art of hea.ling the body by force of will. So far, I hadn't had the opportunity to put this talent to the test properly, but if there was a case of having to try, th is was it.

Close to, the Har with the broken leg looked even more pathetic, I knelt beside the pallet and drew back the revolting blanket that covered him. He started like an animal and snarled at me. Dirt was scored into the frown of pain on his caricature of a face. I attempted conversation by thought and projected a calming form. Some of the aggressive fear left his eyes. The leg was not merely broken, it was shattered. Shattered and putrifying. "Why have you no healers?" I asked him. It was all I could say, congested with anger. He stared defiantly at me, a look which told me he was only waiting to die. I put my hand above the wound and my arm went cold, Lianvis had taught me thoroughly the practice of healing. He had been surprised I had known so little. Most Kakkahaar could effect simple cures at Neoma level. I sensed Cal at my shoulder. He threw a shadow over the injured har.

"Why bother?" he asked, with cruel indifference. It did not deserve an answer. "I suppose you are going to invoke water elementals to get rid of the dirt?" he continued, with cheerful sarcasm.

I ignored him. First I had to draw out the badness. Cal was right; the wound did need to

be cleaned.

"Have you water here?" I asked slowly.

"Don't waste your time playing with me!" the Har croaked at me with surprising venom.

"Find some water, Cal!" I ordered. He did not move. "Please." I heard him sigh.

"Alright, alright. If you must. Don't make a habit out of this kind of thing, will you!" He stomped away, still sighing.