Roil (21 page)

Pre-emptive Counselling provided free of charge.

David found a bookstore, the
Vellum Shore
. The place made him ache for home and the days when a bookshop was enough. The shop was poorly stocked, but David reasoned that had more to do with the imminent evacuation of the city rather than poor ordering. He bought a small foldout map of Chapman and a sachet of map powder to go with it.

Now he had a chance of finding Chadwick Street and the safe house.

Of course, he had already found a supplier of Carnival. That had been the easiest thing of all and never knew for certain if he’d see Cadell again.

David had enough money left over to buy a fried sausage at a street stall. The thing tasted lovely. The anticipatory buzz of the Carnival, the festival itself all helped to lift his mood. He ate the sausage as he sat under a statue of Councillor Elmont, founder of Chapman. He unfolded the map he’d bought over his legs. Chadwick Street was at the other end of Chapman. His shortest route followed the wall. He took a little powder and the wall came into focus. Grey old stone, fringed with dead mould. Wanted posters for Buchan and Whig fluttered in the wind.

DEAD OR ALIVE.
Less life met with Largition.

The image ruined his mood. He finished his meal, strode two streets over and climbed the stony steps to the great circle wall.

He was sweaty, breathless and dizzy by the time he reached the top of the wall, but the dry wind stripped away the sweat and his breath returned to him.

From up here, you could see everything with almost as much clarity as Map Powder provided. Chapman was a city of circles within circles, split only by the fat River Weep. Well, a tributary of it; the Lesser Weep. the Greater Weep disgorged into the sea twenty miles north of the city. Where Mirrlees was undulate and coiled around the river, up and down and side to side, her streets like a nest of serpents, Chapman was an example of much more careful civic planning.

Everything was constructed around a central landmark: the Field of Flight. David could just make it out, patches of green through the balloon and Aerokin heavy sky. To the west of it was Chapman’s Tower of Engineers a smaller version of Mirrlees’ Ruele tower. With night just a few hours off, its twin searchlights were already lit, at its base would be the famous motto of the Engineers: “In Knowledge Truth. In Truth Perfection”.

From the Southern Wall where David stood, you could see the Deserted Suburbs. The gaudy wrap of the Festival of Float failed to conceal the poor condition of Chapman from even the most cursory of inspections.

The streets were empty. Only around the pubs and the buildings near the Field of Flight could people be seen in any numbers. And those areas were overflowing with crowds, few from what David could tell, actually locals.

David stood on the Southern Wall, staring into the city and then out beyond the wall to the Roil, alternating between two forms of dreadfulness, though one was by far the worst. Down south, past the lost suburbs there was little to look at… or too much.

Every time he glanced that way, a thrill of terror rushed through him. It was a visceral dread. Indeed, the mere sight of it gripped and damned and made every doubt come bubbling up like a sickness.

The Roil dwarfed his imagination; transformed Chapman to an insignificant scrap of human clutter. This close it, and its vast mute prophecy, was impossible to ignore. How were they ever going to stop that?

David had seen Cadell work his power over cold, he had seen the sky rain ice and the frozen remains of poor creatures caught in that furious boiling chill. However, impressive as it had been, the Roil made it seem like nothing. But then he saw, in the distance far, far in the heart of the Roil, the coruscating finger of light that was the Breaching Spire. Mirrlees was just too far away to see it, but here at last was revealed the greatest work of the Old Men, the diamond tower that breached the atmosphere. Then the tower dimmed, or a cloud passed across the sun, and all he could see was the Roil again.

A distant almost plaintive bell sounded out the hour.

He turned his back to the Roil, but could not escape its presence. It was there as much as the beating of his heart or the heat in his blood. Try as he might it would never leave his thoughts. He had seen the Roil. He had seen the end of the world.

The
Dolorous Grey
hadn’t even begun to prepare him for the Roil’s terror
.
He had expected to read about the train on every broadsheet in town but the papers had been silent on the matter, though the subject was broached several times on the street. People knew, they were just too afraid to admit they knew after the first few were arrested and hanged.

David was musing over this when he saw something that nearly had him jumping over the side of the wall. No more than a hundred metres away stood Mr Tope.

All this had begun with him, the knife swift and fast across his father’s throat. The Verger leant against the wall staring south, his face heavy and stern, weighted with worries. Had the Roil disturbed him too? David doubted that Mr Tope had spotted him, but it would not be long. The walkway was relatively narrow and besides the sentries at regular intervals there were few people up here. He couldn’t risk trying to walk past him.

There was a steep stone stair descending from the wall nearby. David ducked down there, choosing not to hide but flee, just in case the Verger wanted to use these stairs as well – a distinct possibility the way David’s luck was going.

David reached the ground and the road, and he ran, not stopping until he had put a few streets between himself and the wall.

Then he realised where he was, the map returning to him as a sort of flashback.

This was an inner deserted suburb, just a few streets from the Chadwick safe house. The thought of being alone here made him uneasy, but he reasoned all he needed to do was follow the road and it would lead him to the safe house, which by definition
must
be safe.

He closed his eyes and picked the most direct route. It took him through the dour and forsaken retail district that ran alongside the Southern Wall. Here businesses had failed months ago; he stared through broken windows at bookstores empty of everything but shelves, and curling posters for the latest histories. Some shops seemed half-stocked as though, one day, their owners had just locked the doors and never come back. No one had even bothered to loot them.

He looked around sadly, stared morosely through curtains of peeling newspapers and dust-choked webs, as though even the spiders had left this part of town.

A few more minutes of walking and he was there: standing before the burnt out husk.

David wasn’t sure what he had expected, but not this. Though he didn’t know why he was surprised. He stood there for a while, not knowing what to do. At last, he reasoned, his best chance was back in the city proper.

Once he’d had another shot of Carnival.

He scarcely noticed the woman until she was directly behind him, her face a ghostly reflection in the glass window front of a deserted millinery.

A Verger! He spun on her, his ice pistol out, and then faltered. She was like no Verger he had ever seen. She loomed over him, her eyes wild, her white hair a mass of knots and curls, pistols gripped in both hands, rifles and swords holstered all around her waist. He recognised the weaponry; it was similar to the ice pistols Chapman’s sentries brandished, but there was something about it; a precision, matched in the way she moved. Scars streaked her pale face, not all of them were old. What was she? Some sort of bandit?

She glanced at his pistol dismissively, and David had a sense that she could knock it from him before he could even pull the trigger.

“Step away from the glass, addict,” she said.

She’d seen him, she’d seen him take the Carnival. Despite the drug, he felt his face burn with shame. David raised his hands, but he did not let go of the gun.

“If that’s what you want,” he said.

“Down,” she said and aimed her pistols at his chest. “Get down!”

David dropped, as the window shattered behind him. He rolled onto his back, and found himself inches from a Quarg Hound’s flexing teeth – and in that moment of desperate clarity, David marvelled that the beast’s teeth really
did
flex and shiver and shift.

Keep moving. Keep moving
. He shuffled back on his arse.

There were two loud shots. The Quarg Hound shrieked, its teeth gnashing as the force of the shots drove it to the ground.

Its legs shuddered, then the shuddering stopped. All at once the air stank of ammonia and cinnamon.

“You’re safe now,” the woman said.

“Thank you,” David said, feeling particularly less than safe because the woman had not lowered her weapons.

“Don’t thank me. I’ve been tracking that hound for hours. And when it came here, to a place I’d been told might be safe...” She looked back at the wall. “Don’t know how it got here, the walls are high and well guarded, but there’ll be more. There always are.”

The woman regarded him curiously. “My name is Margaret.” She took a step towards him.

“David.”

“One thing’s for certain, David, you’re not from around here are you?”

“How do you know?” David asked, blinking.

“Well you’re the first person I’ve seen in this part of the city all day, and you seemed awfully disappointed that the safe house was burnt. Only an idiot or a tourist would wander around these streets, or someone desperate. The Roil is less than two miles south of the city and, as you probably haven’t noticed, half these buildings are booby-trapped.” David wanted to argue that point, but in truth he really hadn’t noticed. “Chapman’s leaders have already given these parts over to the Roil, but it’s going to pay when it arrives. Unless, of course, some idiot or tourist sets them off. So, what are you, idiot or tourist?”

“I’m neither,” David blustered. “I wanted to think. And let me say, you are most obviously not from around here. What I mean to say is I have never seen anyone with such pale skin. And if only an idiot would be hanging around here, what does that make you?”

Margaret pointed one of her pistols at his head. “Let me remind you, it isn’t that wise to shout at the person with the most guns.”

David blushed, and bowed his head. “I’m sorry. It’s just the things I’ve seen. Such terrible things.”

Margaret nodded, lowering, then holstering her guns. “We live in terrible times,” she said.

The second Quarg Hound came out of nowhere, leaping at Margaret’s back.

David had no time to utter even a warning. He fired his pistol. The bullet struck the beast squarely in the head, but the pistol was a small one, not capable of a fatal shot. The Quarg Hound fell to the ground, pawed at its skull then scrambled to its feet. Its body bunched up, the muscles across its back rippling, as though it was ready to leap again.

Margaret swung around with her rifle and finished the job, as though it were the easiest thing in the world. David couldn’t believe how fast she moved, even Cadell might have trouble matching her.

“You’re full of surprises,” she said.

David blinked and looked at her. His fingers burned from the chemical residue of the pistol shot, his ears were ringing.

“I guess I am,” he said, and it may have just been the Carnival, but all of a sudden he was very pleased with himself indeed.

The city changed, as all metropolises change, be it Chinoy,
the
Channon or Mirrlees. But none so quickly, the Roil ever a catalyst had accelerated. Even as Chapman
’
s population slept, even as they armed and reinforced the city
’
s walls, Chapman itself wasn
’
t Chapman any more, but a dreaming city nascent. Soon it would sleep, and drag those who lived there down with it.

Have I set the scene enough?

Of course not, you who were not there and could never understand.

CHAPMAN

Margaret’s limbs shook. When had she last slept? She could not remember the last time she had slept. Her brain kept circling this, though the question held no real relevance. She wanted to ask David if he knew.

Of course he didn’t. He didn’t look like he could possibly know anything. All those capable friends and allies she had lost. And now this addict, barely a man, he was as lost as her.

Every time she looked up and saw the sun or the blue sky, no matter how smoke and spoor shrouded, reality sloughed away and her head spun. This sky had been all she had ever dreamed of as a child. Now she would happily trade it back if everything could be the way it once was. A few weeks ago, all she had known was darkness and the cruel comforts of her city. Now she was alone, stalled by the light, and with no one to help her. She didn’t even have her
Melody
.

She did not know where to turn.

Maybe David, after all he had been looking for the safe house and that suggested links with Anderson’s allies.

Who was this idiotic window-shopping addict, with his dark and innocent eyes? She wondered if her eyes had ever been so innocent, her worries ever so simple.

She wanted to clip him under the ear and alert him to his foolishness.

But, then again, it was all relative.

Not too many days ago she had made her empty vigil at the walls of her city, wondering when her parents were coming home. Back then she had rarely needed to make decisions, her parents had always been there to guide her (even if she had not really noticed) and to ensure that she was safe.

And now she was alone.

How does one go about saving the world?

She didn’t even know how to go about talking with this stupid drug addled boy.

“This weaponry, this cold suit, they were built in Tate,” she said. “My home.”

David’s eyes widened. “But Tate fell years ago, decades ago.”

Margaret shook her head. “Tate stood and fought and survived. No thanks to you Northerners. I grew up there, it was my home for twenty years. But it’s gone now.”

“How many made it out?” David asked.

“Just me,” Margaret said, the words meaningless and all too heavy; she was surprised she didn’t choke on them, that she could relate the facts so calmly. “The city was destroyed and everyone there. If they were lucky.”

“I think I know what you mean,” David said. “The Witmoths.”

“Yes,” Margaret said. “The Roil grew a mind and it took everything away.”

Cadell was weary, and angry.

Two tunnels beneath the city had collapsed, the third had involved a slog through dusty crevices then half-flooded sewers. His clothes were soiled by the time he climbed out into the street, and then the hunger took him. He’d heard voices in the sewers, so he descended again: gripped in a madness that did not pass until his clothes were drenched in other, ruddier, fluids.

Cadell woke from the killing to guilt and rage. His hunger was growing strong again. The stress of the journey was taking its toll.

Lucid and remorseful, he went to a bathhouse, one in a shadier district of Chapman where few questions were asked. As he washed away the blood, he had heard all manner of rumours, every bit of it disturbing. The least of which were explosions in the Deserted Suburbs.

Perhaps something had gone wrong with Stade’s Project.

By the time he had bathed and changed from soiled clothes to marginally fresher ones, it was late, and he hurried to the meeting place.

David wasn’t there, but he could just sense his scent.

Cadell rushed to the safe house and found it a blackened husk, the boy nowhere to be seen. He cursed David as he searched the shell of a house. He found evidence of recent habitation and, curiously, a fuel cell for an ice rifle of a make he was unfamiliar with.

He picked it up and regarded the stamp at its base. Now
that
was peculiar. It was stamped with Tate’s symbol. He slipped the cell into his pocket.

He sniffed at the air, eyes closed. There was Roil Spore everywhere and the deeper musk of Quarg Hound, and faintly, just faintly, David. The young man had been here. And, a Quarg Hound had started hunting him, and something else. He was missing something here, and he wasn’t at all sure what.

He cursed David again, and returned to the scent trail.

It didn’t go far.

He found the boy talking to a young woman, pale as the moons, and nearly as tall as him. Another one, another damn stray, punishment for his sins: he checked his nails for blood. Nothing, but he knew it was there.

Cadell cleared his throat and was suddenly staring down the barrel of a gun. Maybe he deserved such an ending. He raised his hands slowly, studying the woman’s rifle as he did so. The weapon was sophisticated, better than any he had seen in Mirrlees. The sort of thing a man could approve of being killed by.

“Cadell!” David said, sounding for once as though he was pleased to see him.

“David,” Cadell said calmly. “Could you please tell your friend to put down that gun?”

“Her name’s Margaret, she’s a Penn,” David said. “Margaret, this is Cadell.”

The woman lowered the rifle and Cadell relaxed. The Old Man pulled the endothermic charge out of his pocket. “Well, that explains this. A Penn, eh, I’ve heard of your family. Didn’t expect to come face to face with one. I believe you have quite a tale to tell. Tate remains, eh, when all had thought it fallen decades past.”

Margaret shook her head. “No, it’s gone. Taken by the Roil,” Margaret said. “My parents designed ice moats and endothermic cannon. But even those could not hold forever. Tate has fallen, as you said, but less than a week has passed since she fell.”

Cadell passed her the spent charge. “I can refuel this for you, my dear.” He smiled. “Oh, this would be such a foreign world to you, but we can help.” Already he was seeing ways he could use the girl, her aid would be useful in the journey north. A little luck had come his way.
A useful stray at last,
he thought. “There is so much you need to know.”

“I have learnt my share.”

Cadell snorted. “Slinking around these suburbs I am sure you have.”

On the wall Tope had thought he’d caught wind of David Milde’s scent, then whatever smell or presence was gone again as a gust blew in from the south. The damn Roil Spores drowned out his senses, no matter how much Chill he devoured.

It was the blasted cuttle-blood that made the Roil such a rush, burning in his veins, the blood and the looming Obsidian Curtain. That was why the Vergers of Chapman were not blooded, just men, who had not suffered a childhood of transfusions, and training to control the rages. He envied them their weaknesses sometimes. And they, for their part, feared him.

He sniffed the air again. No, there was no hint of David at all, just the Roil, just its mad promise.

He slipped another lozenge in his mouth and bit down hard.