Part 7 (2/2)

Juda was marching quickly, telling them his story as if to lure them on. Bon Ugane and Leki followed, apart from Juda and together in their silent acknowledgement of each other. They walked without looking or touching, but a connection had been made which Bon felt would not be broken. Leki might act distant and aloof at times, but he knew that she felt the same. She hadn't needed to tell him.

'I'd heard of them before, and thought them fools,' Juda said. 'Maybe that made me a fool's fool. Because they have records, and knowledge, and what they do can't be denied.'

He's talking about people who openly seek forbidden magic, Bon thought. He had heard and read so much, and his doubts led to him continuing his son Venden's research into the war. That was sedition, and such dissidence had resulted in him being deported to Skythe. Now, Juda was talking about the forbidden magic that Bon and many others believed had been borne by the Ald to a.s.sault Skythe's manifested G.o.d. There had been no plague, and the war had left dregs of magic scattered across both lands. Bon believed that as fact, but proof had always been much harder to find.

Though terrified, Bon could not help being fascinated by Juda's tale.

'I spoke to the Broker,' Juda said, 'but I've always been ... on my own. People didn't like my Regerran blood, though it barely meant anything to me. The green eyes are unusual. So I stayed another day, and late that afternoon I showed them what I'd found. I was expecting a certain reaction. A certain ... shock.' Juda leaped a small stream easily six steps wide and carried on, not once looking back. After Leki crossed she did look back, one eyebrow raised, smiling gently.

'Come on, then,' she said softly, and Bon kept his eyes on her as he jumped. He landed awkwardly and tipped back, and Leki grasped his hand and pulled him upright. He staggered forward, exaggerating his momentum so that they ended up face to face with their arms around each other.

'My saviour,' he whispered.

'The Brokers knew exactly what they were looking at,' Juda said. He'd stopped away from the stream but hardly seemed to see them. He was looking elsewhere, at another time. 'Finding it is all very well,' one of them said. 'But do you know how to use it?'

'How much further?' Bon asked. He and Leki disentangled themselves, and he felt a warm flush as her hand swept across his back.

'Far enough to tell you the rest.' Juda looked up the slope they had descended, scanning it quickly with his telescope. 'And we have to reach the gas marshes before nightfall. I don't have many scamp smokes left, and ...'

'We know,' Leki said. 'Don't worry. We'll tie you tight.'

Juda's green eyes flickered strangely, and Bon realised then that he would never know this man. It wasn't his part-Regerran ancestry that made him a mystery. It was his quest. The Brokers were considered one of the most dangerous criminal organisations on Alderia by the Ald, and there were frequent cases of the Ald's personal army, the Spike, a.s.saulting a suspected refuge. Bon had once pa.s.sed the site of such an a.s.sault in the slums of New Kotrugam's eastern quarter. Five properties had been gutted by fire, a dozen bodies were laid under blankets in the street outside a several adults, the rest children. The bitter memory had always remained with him.

'I found the second and third dregs inside an Engine,' Juda said, and as the shock hit Bon so he heard Leki gasp.

'You've actually seen an Engine?' Bon gasped.

Juda continued, ignoring the question and telling the story his own way, at his own pace.

'I came to Skythe ... on my own. The Brokers are an organisation. And no organisation can be as personal as you need to be about magic. As subjective. Because magic is a personal thing, like love or hate. I love differently from you.' He pointed at Leki. 'And you.' He nodded at Bon. 'And if either of you took to magic, your experience of it would be very different from mine.'

'You won't find me touching it,' Leki said softly, but Juda seemed not to hear.

'We're close to the river,' he said. 'There's a rope bridge a mile upstream.'

'Can't we walk or swim it?' Bon asked.

'You wouldn't want to.' Juda moved on, falling quiet and contemplative.

Bon looked up at the cloudy sky, seeing the smudge of sunlight behind a spread of clouds and comforted by its presence. He had never wors.h.i.+pped the Fade sun G.o.d, Flaze, but it was a presence that no one could do without. It bathed his face with warmth, and as he blinked slowly he could almost be somewhere else. He had a sudden, unbidden memory of his wife falling, and his hand reaching out terribly slowly to stop her. How he had loved her. How he had almost feared her, on days when a distance hung between them. She had come into his life, and left it, entirely of her own accord.

They reached the river without Juda saying any more, and Bon feared his revelations had ended. I want to hear about the Engine, he thought. I want to know where it was, what it was like. There had been much talk of the Engines amongst the circles he orbited a the devices used by the Ald, so it was said, to gather and channel magic during their attack on Skythe. They were almost mythical creations, product of stories told in the shadowy corners of bars and private meetings where fear kept watch at the doorway. Some said that there were ancient Engines, thousands of years old, buried deep in western caves on Alderia, and even older constructs had been taken apart, their elements broken down and melted and scattered to the winds. The further back in history Bon looked, the more mythical the Engines were. But here on Skythe they suddenly seemed so much more possible.

It was obvious from first sight why they needed the rope bridge to cross the river. It was not too wide, and it flowed at a sedate rate, but something in there exuded menace. Silvery, sharp things with membranous wings, leaping above the waters and taking any unfortunate bird that happened to fly too low. The length of a person's arm, Bon could see the stark glint of their teeth even from the river bank.

'They're only the ones that let themselves be seen,' Juda said. 'Sometimes, others come out. There are water pigs, similar to those on Alderia but twice the size, with ragged teeth that seep poisonous blood.' He shook his head as he walked. 'All gone wrong.'

'What's all gone wrong?' Leki asked.

'This place. Don't you feel it? See it? The war did more than destroy millennia of Skythian civilisation and history. It set a rot in the land.'

They walked until they saw the rope bridge a a rickety affair, half of its planks rotten and dropped away. To cover his fear Bon asked, at last, about the Engine.

'They're here, if you know where to find them,' Juda said. 'There's the remains of one on the coast, maybe twenty miles from where you landed. And there are others. More whole.' He tested a plank on the bridge and started across, walking quickly from plank to plank and gripping the rope rails. They were frayed, and strung with dried, crackly growths that crumbled beneath his touch.

'More whole?' Leki asked, probing.

Juda glanced back at her but said nothing.

Bon looked down at the river only a few steps below. Shadows moved across its smooth surface. They might have been clouds or reflections, or larger things beneath the surface.

'So what was it like?' he asked at last, because Juda seemed to be toying with them. But the man simply walked on ahead, checking each board as he stepped across and barely pausing to drop his weight.

'I think we'll see one,' Leki said. Bon glanced at her, eyebrows raised.

'What makes you think that?'

Leki shrugged. 'I'm good at reading people.' She was staring down at the river, and there was a look in her eyes that Bon did not like. It resembled hunger.

'And amphys can read the water,' he said.

Leki started across then, and Bon followed her footsteps over the swaying bridge. It reminded him of the feeling in the hold of that awful s.h.i.+p, and his stomach lurched.

'You won't be sick,' Leki said, her voice almost a laugh.

Bon paused, watching her increasing the distance between them. She moved with such grace, and even beneath her long coat he could see the delicate sway of her narrow swimmer's hips. It had been a long time since he had been with a woman, and- Leki glanced back over her shoulder, mock-stern. Then she looked down and moved again, and Bon knew that she was looking between the boards, at the water. Using her strange amphy's gift, she had sensed Juda's intentions and let Bon know that she could perceive his as well.

He smiled. And as he crossed he allowed his imagination to swell, seeing Leki lying naked in a warm bath of scented water, webbed hands closed around him and his fingertips playing across her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. He chuckled, the image helping him smother his fear of falling. But even if he did drop through into the river, he was sure that Leki would be there to save him.

She had saved him before, after all.

When he reached the other side, Juda was already heading towards what looked like a dozen mounds of moss-covered rocks. Leki was waiting for him, an enigmatic smile picking up the corner of her sensuous mouth.

'So what else did you see?' Bon asked.

'Those mounds are the ruins of a Skythian village,' Leki said. 'He's taking us there to ... it feels like to meet someone. But the urgency's growing in him, too. The slayers might be closing. And I think the Engine ...' She closed her eyes, frowning. 'He won't talk about them, because he's going to show us. There's rumour of an Engine beyond the marshes.' She opened her eyes again. The frown remained. 'And you. Your name, in his mind. He thinks you might lead him to magic.'

Bon snorted, confused. But then he asked the real question. 'And what else did you see from me?'

'Something wet.' Leki went after Juda, and Bon thought, I'm going to see an Engine!

Following Leki, troubled by what she could see and yet aroused as well, he could not help dwelling on how much things had changed in a matter of days.

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