Tim Akers - Heart of Veridon

“Marcus had this?” she asked.

“Yeah. Wanted me to get it back to the city. Gave it to me, then went on about how he had killed the captain, wrecked the ship.”

“It looks like a Church thing.”

I shrugged. The Church of the Algorithm was a strange group. That being said, they were the dominant religious organization in the city. Veridon was blessed with many mysteries, but the most profitable mysteries were the strange vessels that floated down the river at regular intervals. No one knew where they came from, or who sent them. They contained random collections of cog, half-built machines and enigmatic autonomic artwork. The Church of the Algorithm was built on the belief that these vessels were messages from a hidden God far upriver. They lived their lives trying to reassemble the machines, to reveal the nature of their deity. They worshipped a hidden pattern. We owed them a lot, sadly. Their divinations led to many of the technological discoveries that kept Veridon the dominant power on this edge of the world.

“Maybe,” I said. “I’d rather not go to them. They’ll saint me.”

“I doubt that. No one’s going to mistake you for a holy prophet.”

“Stranger things have happened. Besides, this came from downriver. Their god is upriver, right?”

“So maybe the devil sent this?”

“Then the devil can have it back. I just want to know why Marcus had it.”

“He gave it to you and told you to take it to the city?”

“He did. Hell if I know why.”

“Hm. I have to ask, Jacob. Why’d you shoot Marcus?”

I shrugged. The details weren’t important, but I felt like I’d done him a favor. I had offered finality, a clear judgment on his actions and a clean end. Lots of my fellow passengers lingered on for days before they passed. My friendship with Marcus had bought him something easier, even if he was responsible for the disaster to begin with.

“I wonder,” she said. She set the device on the table. “Why did he do that? Give it to you, for one thing, but everything before? Why he took an axe to the Captain, and killed all those people by proxy? It seems he got off a little easy, dying at your hand.”

“Maybe. He seemed to think someone was following him, someone he couldn’t kill. Something wrong with his head, maybe.” I cleared my throat. “I think wrecking the ship was his way of escaping, ensuring that no one could follow him, wherever he was going. He meant to get off. He was making for the glideboats when someone jettisoned them.”

“Well, he certainly made sure no one followed him.” She held the Cog out to me, held it between her hands like a plate. “Everyone who could follow him on that ship died, sure as fire burns and water drowns.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I remember.” I took the Cog from her, placed my palm under it and lifted. My thumb brushed the inside of her wrist, and I hesitated. Felt her pulse through my hand, the warmth of her skin on my callused knuckle. We stayed there a second longer than we should have.

“Cacher’s on the way,” she said. “He’s coming by to pick up these ledgers. Valentine wants monthly reports, now.”

“He’ll be here,” I said, “sooner or later.”

“Sooner.”

I took the Cog and held it up, blocking her face from my view. “Sure,” I said. “Soon enough.”

She shuffled papers, retrieved the ledger and started checking it again. I stood still for a moment, looking at her between the workings of the Cog.

“Look, if you’d like, I could hold on to that. Ask Cacher about it, or maybe Valentine, later on. They might know something.”

I hesitated again. She was a good job-boss, good as any in the city. Like me, she was independent. Like me, she was in this for herself. Anything she did with the Cog would be in her best interest, not mine. But she had a wider base of contacts, and a better chance of getting Valentine’s attention, through Cacher.

“Sure, thanks.” I held out the Cog again, waiting for her to take it. She didn’t look up, just nodded and motioned to the desk. I set it down and left.

Tomb had set up a private zep shuttle from the city up to their estate on the heights. There was a road, but it left the city and traveled twenty miles up the Ebd before crossing at the port town of Toth and winding up into the Thalleon Heights that overlooked the city of Veridon. It was a half-day’s journey in most cases, and the zep was simply quicker and more glamorous. Expensive, too.

The Tomb Estate was a grand place, perched on the side of the Heights that overlooked Veridon’s gentle slopes like a crown on a stony forehead. There were many such estates on the Heights, though not all of them were as dramatically situated as the Tomb. Most of the founding Families had preferred a little more privacy, perhaps more of an escape from the city to their country homes. Elizor Tomb wanted a view of the delta he had helped found, the wide arms of the Ebd and Dunje, the flat plain of the Reine, and all the buildings in between. More buildings now than when he set the first stone in this estate.

Yes, a grand place, and probably one of the last old holdings still in the hands that had built it. The rest of us were just glad to hold onto our seats on the Council and the pared down manors of the city. Most of the old estates that dotted this ridge now belonged to factory bosses and Guild capitalists, along with a bare minority of the Councilorships. Old names weren’t worth much in Veridon anymore, not in the new city, the brave city of cogs hatched by the Church a couple generations ago. The city of my father was passing, with its traditions and lineage, and a new city was breaking through. Old names got you nostalgia and the occasional invitation to parties, and maybe a certain amount of tolerance with the Council and its agencies. And that was the product I sold, to Valentine, to Emily, to anyone who needed it. Someone else’s tolerance, and a name people would recognize, maybe respect.

The crown of the Tomb Estate glowed under us. Night had already fallen, the countryside deep in velvet blackness that hummed with wild insect life, but the estate was lit up like a torch. It was early spring, and the weather was still wildly variable in the city. It was usually cooler up here on the Heights, but tonight was firmly in the grip of a promised summer. Most of the estates were still closed up, but Tomb had brought in the Summer help early, to host tonight’s party. There were stepped balconies that crept down the rock face, and I could see people gathered, musicians playing. We passed over the estate to the landing square. A loose ladder rolled down the zep, and Ensigns clambered across to secure us. A more permanent mooring gate was hauled up, and soon we were debarking.

On my zep there was a cluster of Corpsmen, young officers, Academy-fresh and anxious to mingle with the city’s elite. They kept looking at me sidelong, trying to see my eyes without having to make eye contact. Tricky. Did they know who I was, exactly? Did the instructors still tell my story, or did they leave it out to keep the youngsters from getting too nervous?

An avenue laid in river stone led from the mooring gate to the main hall. The stone crunched under my dress boots. The lawns were green and smooth, spotted with natural rock gardens and alcoves of trees. The house seemed to emerge from the lawn, another rock formation fitted together, smoothed in place by time. Like the lane, the walls of the estate were river rock, as smooth and black as night. It looked like darkness bubbling up out of the earth, darkness riddled with laughter and light and wealth.

The guests had been arriving for a while. When I stepped inside there was already a crowd in the grand hall, though most of the voices were coming from the balcony beyond. A man slipped up to give my invitation a glance and then take my coat and travel hat. The remaining envelope fit comfortably in my jacket, along with the trim wooden box I was to give Angela. The man looked me in the eyes and smiled, nodded towards the hall, and disappeared. Apparently my best suit was good enough to appear on the grounds of the Tomb Estate, or maybe it was my eyes that were good enough. Either way, I was in.