The Stolen Child (50 page)

Tired and frustrated, she dropped down onto one of the beds.  It all felt so familiar, despite how strange it should be.  Another cage, as beautifully gilded as the last.

Arsha stood by the door looking nervous and confused.  Rachael couldn't bring herself to say anything.  She just lay back and closed her eyes, as the ship swayed into motion.

The journey was an empty succession of silent hours spent staring at the same four walls.  Their meals were brought to their room
by the guards
.  Their plates were collected an hour later.  They were permitted to use the bathroom, one at a time, always accompanied.  They woke up, ate in silence, passed empty hours, and slept.  They said little, none of it meaningful.  Sometimes they invented games or read some of the books that lined the room, but neither of them found the slightest joy in any of it.

Rachael began to relish sleeping.  It was an escape from the agonising grey
ness that filled each
day.  In her dreams she would catch glimpses of Justin's face, the smell of his body, his hair, the feel of his hands on her skin, the touch of his lips against hers.  Always she woke with an aching feeling, as if reaching for something distant.  Sometimes she dreamed of London, but those dreams were brief, flashes of fire and crumbling towers of rusted iron, black smoke blinding her, filling her lungs until she fell to her knees,
gasping for breath
.  Then the dream would pass, and she would wake to sheets soaked with sweat, white lines scored into her palms where her nails had dug in.

It might have been the
seventh or eighth
day when something else woke her.  She sat up in her bed, in a room dimly lit by a single
slumbering
ghostlight.  She could hear the sound of the engines humming through the walls, a softer note than the Triskelion's, but nothing seemed amiss.  
Then she heard other sounds
.  A muted shout.  
A
sudden thump.  Footsteps on wooden floors, hard and heavy.  Glancing
at the other bed
she saw that Arsha was also awake.  Just the girl's face could be seen, peering out from under her sheets, looking at Rachael as if waiting for directions.

The
n the
sound of
a
gunshot rang out clear and sharp,
careening off the walls to reverberate through her bones
.  Two more followed, in quick succession.

Rachael didn't waste a moment.  Rolling out from the covers, she hit the floor and immediately ducked under the bed,
gesturing
for Arsha to do the same.

“Rachael...”  Arsha hissed.  
Before the girl could say more,
Rachael turned and pressed a finger to her lips.  Arsha swallowed and bit back whatever she had been about to say.

The sound of shouting grew closer, before they heard something heavy slam into the wall from outside.  
A
nother pair of gunshots rang out,
deafeningly loud
.  
Then
the lock clicked open.  The door swung wide, as the light from the hallway framed a figure in silhouette.  
Rachael
slid back deeper beneath the bedframe, already beginning to realise what a futile gesture it was.

Footsteps, slow and measured as the man crossed the room.  A swaying pool of light ac
c
ompanied him.  He wore heavy looking boots and his trousers were patched and grease-stained.  Standing between the beds, the man dropped to one knee and set the ghostlamp he carried down on the floor as he glanced to the left and the right.

Rachael recognised Korban's face immediately.  His eye almost seemed to slide over her, fixing on her face only long enough for her to be sure that she had been found.  Then he rose to his feet and turned to survey the room again, as if they were little more than incidental details.

“That's both of them.  Bring them to the bridge,”
h
e barked to the men outside the door.  Then he turned and stalked out of the room.

More men entered, and rough hands pulled them out from their hiding places.  
Between the two broad shouldered thugs she could see Korban talking to someone, his voice too low for her to make out clearly.  Then Korban stepped aside and her breath caught in her throat.
 

Justin's eyes were cold and impassive as he nodded silently in Korban's direction.  His hands were folded behind his back, as if he was
a soldier standing at ease
.  It was only as Korban turned away that she caught a glimmer of anger in Justin's expression.  As she met his eyes he
glanced
away
immediately
.

She called out his name, but he didn't seem to be listening, and as she tried to run to him one of the guards caught her shoulder.  Holding her put, the man thrust a dressing gown into her hands.

“Let's have you decent
first,
”
h
e growled.

Feeling her cheeks burning, Rachael slipped the dressing gown on as the men watched impassively.  A semblance of dignity observed, the men proceeded to march them
both
out of the cabin.

The blood splattered walls were the
first
thing she set eyes on as they stepped through into the corridor.  Two crumpled heaps of cloth turned out to be
a pair of dead men,
their clothes soaked through with blood, faces ashen and still.  She couldn't even make out where they had been shot.  The blood had
drenched
everything, splashing onto the walls and spilling out over the ground.  Someone had taken the time to throw a
couple of
sheet
s
down.

Arsha doubled over, heaving out what remained of their dinner from last night.  The sound of the girl retching seemed to
come to
 her from a long way off.  The walls were spinning.  Rachael reached out a hand to steady herself, and when she brought it away she saw that her fingers were smeared with red.  There was an acrid smell in the air.  She supposed it was gunsmoke.

“Why?  Why did you have to kill them?” Arsha sobbed, barely able to get the words out.  
Rachael turned to see Justin watching them both with those same cold eyes.
 

“What the hell is this?  What did they do?”
s
he snarled.

“What we had to.  You should be happy, Rachael.  I promised I would come for you, and I did.”

He knelt down and tore a clean strip of cloth from the clothing of one of the dead men.  Then he went to Arsha's side, gently lifting the girl's chin to wipe the spittle from her lips.  Rachael watched, scarcely able to believe it was really him.

Arsha's eyes focused on his
and she
recoiled, slapping his hand away.  Rachael saw the hurt expression on his face, but she couldn't even say why it mattered to him.

“What is this Justin?  Why are you with these guys?  They tried to kill you, remember?”

He looked up at her, sadly.

“They're not what we thought, Rachael.  Manindra saved me from their prison.  He showed me what he really is.  
We were wrong about him, this whole time.
”

She couldn't even understand what he was saying any more.  She stared at him, feeling like she was falling, spinning through the air.  
One o
f Korban's
men
gave them a hard look
.

“
That's enough talk.  
Get moving,”
h
e growled.

They were marched
towards the stairs
at the end of the hallway
.  Half-stumbling, unsteady on their feet, they were forced to ascend until they emerged onto the bridge of The Dawning Light.

Like everything on the ship it was a study in clean white lines and silvered edges,
now smeared with blood, riddled with bullet holes and scorch marks.  Strewn as the floor were the shattered remains of Reuben's automs.  She couldn't say what had been used to destroy them, but Korban's men had certainly been thorough about it.
 

Re
uben Ben Mahir
was sitting in the captain's chair, but it was clear that he wasn't the one giving orders anymore.  Manindra stood with his hands clasped at his back,
Korban
standing to his
left
and
Rakesh
on
his
right
.  More of Korban's men were standing around the edges of the room, their weapons held loosely but with obvious menace.

In the stillness Manindra
sighed
.

“
I am deeply sorry that it came to this, Reuben.  Your father was a great man.  This will sadden him greatly.”
 

"
Are you insane?”
Reuben said, almost seeming to spit the words out.  He leaned forward in his chair, red faced with anger.
  “This is open war
.  The whole Guild will be after you for this.  My family will see you dragged before the Inquisition in chains.
"
 

“
Yes, I am quite
sure
they will try.  However it's rather too late for that now, don't you think?”
 

Manindra spoke with an icy calm, and Rachael saw how Reuben shrank back a little, his confidence already waning.

"
Fates, Manindra, w
hat can you possibly hope to gain from this now?  The
S
eed is
awake, whether you like or not
, and it's tearing open the
Veil
around it.  Whatever secrets you meant to unlock from the thing, they are buried under a sea of rust. The whole city is contaminated,”
Reuben stammered, his hands tightening around the arms of his chair.
  “If we don't put a stop to it now, the
Hearth will descend into chaos
."
 

"You think I mean to study it?”
Manindra said, incredulously.
 “To put an ancient wonder in a box and poke at it until it reveals some meagre insight?  If I give my son a sword, I do not mean for him to study it, I mean for him to use it."

"Use it?  Manindra, you can't actually
be planning
to open a gateway in the middle of the city.  The Dream will coming flooding through, the damage will be irreversible."

"A regrettable outcome.  If we had been able to secure the
S
eed and the girl we might have forged our gateway somewhere safe
ly
secluded.  Alas, Rishi's meddling put
an end
to that."

Reuben's eyes seemed to grow even wider as he stared up at the old man in disbelief.
 

“
But why?  What could you possibly hope to find out there that was worth condemning an entire city to die?”
 

“
Our salvation, my boy.  There is a darkness coming, and she is the only thing tat can stand in its way.”
 

“She…
?”  
 

Reuben looked perplexed, but Rachael had the uncomfortable feeling that she already knew what Manindra meant.  Then Reuben's eyes narrowed, as if a piece of a puzzle had just fallen into place.

“So that's what you were doing at Fallen Peak.  Searching for one of the Dreamwalkers.”

Manindra gave him a measuring look.
 

“
Seven years, and you really think that all we did was try?” he said, pausing for a moment as if to let the words sink in.  “The gateway was destroyed during our return, unfortunately.  One of Rishi's little parting gifts.  I have been forced to wait a very long time for a chance like this.”
 

“
You told me they was dead,” Rachael exclaimed, unable to restrain herself any longer.  “All of them.”
 

Manindra's eyes flashed with cold anger as he turned to look at her.
 

“
Yes.  I lied.  Never give the truth when a lie will suffice.”
 

“
So I am connected to them,” she said.
 

“
Unfortunately for you, my dear, there was a great deal of truth in what I told you.  Yes, the Lady of The Falling Leaves still lives…  But you are not her daughter.”
 

“
Right.  Cos I'm just an echo,” Rachael said, her lip curling in a sneer.
 

“
No, I'm afraid you are barely even that.  A cheap copy, perhaps.  A sacrifice play.”
 

“
Only you just said yourself that you're nothing but a lying bastard,” Rachael spat.  “Tell him, Justin.  Tell him it's not true.”
 

As she caught Justin's eye, his gaze remained cold, but only for a moment.
 

“Rachael...”

He shook his head, sadly.

“I can't.  I'm sorry, he's right.  You're not her daughter.”

For a moment her breath caught.  She almost felt as if she had been struck.  It was strange that, even after everything that had just happened, she could still feel betrayed.
 

“
But you told me...”
 

“
Rachael, I promise I didn't know.  I was tricked, just like you were.”
 

“
Tricked...”
 

She stared at him, coldly.
 

“
By Chandra,” he said.
 

“
For what it's worth my dear, you companion truly was deceived,” Manindra said, with a barely concealed smile.  “Chandra's plan was most resourceful.  It took me years to puzzle out precisely what he'd done.  After our return from the Deep Wild, he knew that his daughter could not be safe within Guild lands.  And of the great houses would be eager to lay their hands
on the child of a Dreamwalker, even if interested parties in the Guild didn't snatch her up first.”
 

As Manindra spoke, he turned to look at Arsha.  The girl took a step back, seeming to shrink under the man's commanding gaze.
 

“
His daughter…” she said, her voice seeming quite small.  “What do you mean?”