Roil (20 page)

The Margin closed around them, its mass of sky devouring trees arching over the highway, swallowing the light. The Council guards rode to the rear and front, a small army dwarfed by all that unthinking forest.

The road in the Margin was unlike anything else the Council had ever built. It did not stretch on straight and true, but wound crookedly through the Margin, as though its engineers had lost their way. Medicine was not surprised by this; he could imagine all their machinery failing here, compasses making soft circuits of their cases; determination and madness driving them on.

What it meant though, was that their scouts were rarely seen, the road and the Margin conspiring to hide them around the next curve.

The forest stank, trees dripped and rotted. Dank miasmic fog drifted through the trees like the tattered ghosts of diseases long ago lost to memory. The Margin clung to everything like a nightmare-haunted fever, wet and close and hot.

And always, scattered throughout the forest, were the decaying remnants of the Cuttlewar, a goodly portion of that battle had been fought here. Machines lay shattered and discarded, rusting leviathans, half overgrown. One section through which they passed was a graveyard. Here the trees had grown back through tombs. Medicine paused for a break and rested his feet upon a rock, only to discover it was a skull half swallowed by tree root. Eye sockets shadowy and dull stared up at him. He removed his feet and left the dead to its slumber.

The air in the Margin thickened, deadening sound but for the distant clatter-shriek of birds – blood wings most like, predatory and cunning – and the howl of beasts, as they made their passage through the muddy lower ground. And yet, at times the reverse occurred, noises were amplified, transformed. The most innocent sounds suddenly took on baleful significance.

Night was worse.

The wet heat was just as bad, the air just as stifling and still, but the forest shuffled in even closer. Creatures called out in the darkness, their cries at once distant and thunderous, brute and knowing, and always cruel. A shriek or a howl might echo, so close, that Medicine would spin, heart pounding, expecting to see a beast on top of him.

Inquisitive bats, their skin slippery and soft like a frog’s, flitted into the camp drawn by the lights.

They were stupid creatures, flying into campfires in such numbers that the campsite was soon thick with the stinking smoke of their burning bodies. Better the blinding smoke, for when they did not fly into flame they flew into people, biting and screeching as they tangled in hair or clothes. Those bites festered over the days ahead, the wounds darkening, the rot spreading like a contagion from the forest to people’s skin.

Many died, despite Medicine’s efforts. His medical training had ill prepared him for the Margin.

While it was bad that first night it was something that lingered and worsened.

The rain did not stop, just dripped down through the trees, descrying holes in tents and makeshift shelters and splashing on faces or skin; grey and greasy droplets, that stained or, if swallowed, caused nausea and stomach cramps.

Medicine was starting to miss the Factories.

“This place stinks,” someone complained to Medicine, as he treated a wound caused by one of the bats.

“Everything stinks,” he said.

The next day the mood was grim. And, though he was surly and tired, Medicine put on his brightest suit, his most cheerful expression and walked the length of the campsite. He spoke to as many people as he could. Showed them all that he was in good spirits, that he believed they were doing the right thing. And it seemed to work.

They packed quickly and were on their way before ten.

Halfway through the day, Medicine realised something was wrong. No one from the front had reported to him since early morning. He was worried enough to insist that he and Agatha ride up there.

They passed the wagons at a gallop and continued riding for another ten minutes.

There was no sign of them.

“Where did they go?” Medicine asked.

Agatha looked bewildered.

“I have no idea. No shots were fired that’s for sure or we would have heard them and there’s no sign of them having left the highway.”

“What on earth could take ten Council guards without so much as a peep?”

Agatha turned her horse around. “I would rather not find out.”

They rode back to the convoy and Medicine half expected them to be gone as well. Three thousand snatched away as easily as those ten. He was sure if he was relieved or disappointed to find them still there.

After that he drove them on, walking into the night but, at last, with everyone too exhausted and no end of the Margin in sight, they had to stop and make camp.

Another night of bats and other less savoury things that moved more silently than breath.

The next morning found one of the tents empty, but for a Verger’s knife, the blade partially eaten away by what looked like acid. Another tent contained a more grisly find, every single person sat dead, at a table made of some dark and alien wood, their blood drained, their eyes taken, tiny glittering stones put in their place. But for the fact that they were corpses, it looked like a party mid swing. The dead still held glasses, their mouths remained curled in smile or silent talk.

Indeed, the people in the tent nearest claimed to have heard laughter and song until the early morning.

Medicine, always curious, had wanted to examine the bodies and the peculiar method of exsanguination; it appeared they had been drained through the veins in their feet. But Agatha over-ruled him, and had the bodies and table (which had not been carried here or ever seen before) and chairs burned at once.

“I’ve heard dark tales about such things,” she’d said grimly. “Sometimes people come back.”

Agatha called in the guards from the rear, eschewed scouts and had everyone travel close.

It was a long and tense day’s travel, the forest closing in, the road almost lost twice, but at last, just as it looked like they would have to spend another night in the Margin, they reached the plains. Medicine had never felt so happy, still he held back until all had made it out, only then choosing to walk onto the open land.

He stared back at the Margin. What was most disquieting was that he was unable to shake the feeling that it was looking right back at him.

Once out they made a head count.

One hundred and forty people had been lost to that forest and, with that knowledge, any sense of triumph.

To destroy a political career like that...

What makes a man decide to turn against the tide? What makes a man decide to destroy not just his life, but those around him, those nearest and dearest?

I know this only too well.

MIRRLEES-ON-WEEP 260 MILES NORTH OF THE ROIL

Warwick Milde had never been a stranger to controversy. After all, he had crossed the floor, gone from Engineer with promise to Confluent, and he’d dragged his brother with him. Stade had never forgiven him for that. But this was far, far worse.

“I told you it was true.” Medicine grinned.

Warwick Milde shook his head. How could a man smile in such a place? “It wasn’t so much that I did not believe you but, well, that I didn’t believe you.”

Sean wasn’t smiling, but looking back at the door. “We don’t have much time, and only one exit. They find us here we’re dead.” The pistol he held tightly in his hand shook a little. Sean didn’t like guns.

Warwick looked over at his brother. Three of them, councillors, sneaking around the basement of the Ruele Building like children. Buchan and Whig were waiting, just beyond the tower, with enough men to keep the Vergers at bay if it came to that.

“We’ve time enough, Sean. For a little wonderment.” It was cold down here, his breath plumed, but that was the least of his discomfort. There was an endless whispering coming from the eight metal doors set into the stony walls of the basement.

“We’re dead, if we’re caught here beneath the Council Chambers.” Medicine didn’t look too worried. He’d lost his fingers to Stade and sometimes Warwick wondered if he hadn’t also lost his mind. The man was reckless. He had disarmed the alarms, he had bribed the guards and those who’d proven resistant would wake in the morning with sore heads and little memory of the past twenty-four hours. Medicine’s familiarity with pharmacology had proven extremely effective. But was it enough, and what did it make of him that was down here too, in a basement filled with Old Men? The Old Men. Every child in Shale had heard of them.

Old Men hungry and Old Men wise,

Old Men’s truth and Old Men’s lies.

Old Men’s wisdom against the heat,

Crack your bones for the marrow meat.

But he’d thought them just that, a fairy tale, a series of myths; the fabled progenitors of Shale, Masters of the Engine of the World. Yet here they were.

Be gone.

Be gone
.

The eight voices chanted.

Medicine had placed his head against one of the doors. “This one’s Cadell.”

“The Engineer.”

Medicine nodded. “They’re all Engineers, but he...”

“He’s the right one.”

Sean considered the locks. “I’ve the skill for this.”

This was the sort of thing they had done as children, Sean grinned, he’d have made an excellent peterman.

“I’m watching your back,” Warwick said. He had an old revolver in his hand. Damned if he knew it would even work. Medicine looked more comfortable with his own weapon: a long knife that looked even crueller than a Verger’s blade.

“I know,” Sean said, cramming his powders into the lock. He lit a short fuse, turned from the door, and covered his ears. There was a soft detonation, Warwick had been expecting something louder, but it was enough. The door opened, Sean poked his head through doorway.

“Mr Cadell–”

“Shut it. Shut it,” came a soft voice.

“I can’t,” Sean said.

A hand snatched out and dragged him through the opening, lightning fast.

Then the screaming started.

In the few seconds it took for Warwick to reach the door, Sean was dead. Cadell, little more than skin wrapped around bone looked up, his mouth rimmed with blood.

“Sorry,” he breathed. “Sorry.”

But it didn’t stop him swallowing down chunks of Sean’s flesh.

“Sorry.”

Warwick raised the gun, aimed it at Cadell’s head.

“No,” Medicine snarled, grabbing his arm, and pushing Warwick out of the room.

“We need him,” Medicine said.

“He just killed my brother.”

“Get out there,” Medicine said, pointing to the hallway. “People will be coming. Keep our exit clear.”

Warwick fled the room. The single door leading into the basement opened, a Verger stormed through and Warwick discovered that his revolver did indeed work.

“We have to go,” he yelled

There were too many of them. Warwick expected he would soon be dead, he thought of his wife, of his brave son.

Forgive me
. He fired at the next Verger, trying to keep them at the door. How they were ever going to make it out was beyond him. He’d use up his bullets and then he would just sit on the floor.

Cadell was a blur racing past and the Vergers began to scream.

“You don’t want to go in there,” Medicine said, as Warwick walked back towards the room. “Warwick!”

But he didn’t stop, Sean deserved that much at least. In the centre of the room was a bloody pile of broken bones and a skull. That was all, nothing to signify that he had ever been his brother. The room itself was bare but for claw marks in the walls.
We were so stupid
. What had they unleashed upon the world?

It took Warwick a while to notice the screaming had stopped. It never would inside his skull.

“Hurry, Warwick,” Medicine yelled, his voice cracking. “We need to go. Now!”

Warwick left the room.

“Hurry.” Medicine slung a cloak over the much less emaciated Cadell, though he remained more bone than meat. The Old Man couldn’t meet Warwick’s gaze.

“I’m sorry,” Cadell whispered.

Warwick lifted his pistol, pointed it at Cadell’s withered face. His hand didn’t shake. He took a deep breath.
What have we done?
He lowered the gun.

Bring him back
, the other voices chorused.
Bring him back.
Warwick looked at the blasted door, that wasn’t going to happen, just as Sean wasn’t going to walk out that door.

Warwick stepped over the ruined bodies of the Vergers. Turned his back on the Old Man, and the broken door.

“I’m sorry.” And that was all Cadell said for two days, over and over again, he didn’t say it enough times. He could never say it enough times.

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