Michael Flynn - Up Jim River

“No. We are sons of the same trainer—years apart, but the semen of his mind has generated us. You are the prodigal son, and I the faithful. You have gone off and lived among the pigs.”

“It wasn’t that bad. Really.” After a moment, he said, “You killed the jawharry.”

Billy tilted his head in thought; then resumed his watch of the catwalk. “After I overheard you and the harper in the restaurant on Harpaloon, curiosity sent me to question the woman. But she knew nothing. The effort was wasted.”

Donovan heard a distant clatter, like a wheel rolling along jointed rails. It seemed louder than before. “Yes,” he said. “Such a waste.”

“Not so much of a such. In the eternity of the universe, what is a life but an eye-blink. What matter, then, a few years more or less?”

“Yet you saved Méarana on the endarooa.”

“Am I a sociopath? Do I kill for no reason? The harper drove our quest, and I wished to see what lay at its end. And saving her caused you to trust me a little bit more. My duty is to report to Those what they need to know, not to slaughter unsuspecting Leaguesmen.”

“Although you do that, too.”

Billy shrugged. “Sometimes. When needful.”

“When Bridget ban recognized you.”

The Confederate nodded. “Yes. That was one of the times.”

“You could have bluffed it out. Méarana would have vouched for you. You panicked. Listen.”

Above them, from the depths of the ship, came the sounds of shingling metal, like a wind chime in a blustery gale.

“Something is coming,” Donovan said. “You might make it out of here if we all work together. You’ll never make it alone.”

Billy Chins sighed. “Brother Donovan, from the moment I saw this ship and learned of the secret road , was there ever a chance that I would return to my masters?”

“We could have arranged…”

“A comfortable prison? No, thank you. There are simpler ways to silence tongues. If you are too squeamish, others are not. I judged the moment my best opportunity, and seized it.”

“And yet you fought by my side at Roaring Gorge and in the Pit atop Oorah Mesa.”

The Confederate shrugged. “I thought then that I might yet warn the Lion’s Mouth. Now, if I cannot inform my masters, at the very least I can prevent you from informing yours. If you and the Hound die, I count my life cheap.”

“And the trade ship?”

“She must not take word back.”

“And the harper?”

Billy hesitated. “It cannot be helped.”

Donovan sighed. “I will not let that happen.”

“I know. If only you had remained a loyal man.”

“If only you had become a better one.”

One does not chat with Naga the Cobra without a vigilant eye on his motion, for the words are but a screen to lull the attention. Inner Child had been keeping watch through the scarred man’s right eye and saw Billy’s hand move perhaps before Billy knew he had moved it. The Brute seized the gun arm and deflected the aim, although the umbra grazed him; and that gave Billy the opening to deflect Donovan’s own return blast.

Locked in embrace like eager lovers, the two men toppled to the decking, and a swift sequence of moves and countermoves passed between them. Hands, knees, feet, a head butt. Then Billy smacked Donovan’s hand on the maintenance walkway, and the scarred man’s dazer skittered out of reach.

They fought in silence, only grunts and gasps escaping their lips, for only fools waste breath in taunts. They rolled, still embraced, over the edge of the pod block.

And they were “atop” the side of the tanks. Donovan glanced at the catwalk and barked, “Hurry!”

Billy turned his head, realized the trick immediately, but immediately was too late. Instead of holding off Billy’s gun, Dononan yanked and tucked it between their two bodies, pressing the muzzle against the Confederate.

This close, the neural blast was overpowering. Billy spasmed. His legs splayed like two logs and his head threw back. Blood oozed from between his clenched teeth.

Donovan, caught in the umbra, went numb. He rolled to the side; but it was the gravity grid and not volition that moved him. Inner Child cried out soundlessly. Sleuth could not form a coherent thought. Random memories and imaginings flickered through his consciousness.

A young girl in a chiton squatted above him on her heels and with her arms wrapped around her knees. The others , she said, will now have a chance .

He saw the face of Bridget ban, and she smiled as she used to smile years ago. He blinked and it was Méarana, not Bridget. Then even the tingling in his limbs faded, and there was no sensation at all, and darkness had him.

Lucia Thompson, d.b.a. Méarana of Dangchao, mistress of the harp, turned to her mother, feeling once more a child, but also impossibly old, and buried her face in Bridget ban’s hair and shoulders. “It wasn’t supposed to end like this,” she said. At her feet, Donovan and Billy lay like lovers.

The Hound pulled her away and shook her. “It isn’t ended yet,” she said.

The ship’s AI had come awake, and had dispatched the same monster that she had encountered once before. Slinky-Chinky, she had called it, for it moved fluidly with the sound of brass coins falling onto a plate.

“Lucy!” she said sharply to the weeping girl. “We must get to my ship. Time afterward for weeping, if there is time for anything at all. There’s his dazer. Hand it to me.”

“Your ship is wrecked, Mother. And how can we find our way to the shuttle I came in?”

“Fash it, girl! I can find my ship, whether she can fly or no. And you can have your shuttle meet us there. Nothing is lost until all is lost, and that time is not yet.” The Hound unfastened a pocket and pulled out a flat instrument. “This way.”

Méarana brushed her hand against the Fudir’s cheek. “Good-bye, Father…,” she said.

Bridget ban scowled and slapped the slack face of the man on the deck. It rocked to the side, and the bright red of her palm glowed on his skin. “That is for all the years since!”

“Mother! Why did you do that?”

“Because he can’t feel it now.” She stared at the palmprint. “Come, take his left side. He’s a used-up old man. He can’t be all that heavy.”

Méarana and Bridget ban lifted Donovan to his feet and wrapped his arms around their shoulders. The head lolled on Bridget ban’s shoulder and she shrugged it off onto her daughter.

“Is he…?”

“Enough to show red when he’s slapped. That is a feat few dead men master. Run in step with me. Slinky-Chinky will come along the catwalks. If we stay atop the tanks, it cannae reach us. But when we cross the space from one block to another, it will have a shot. And remember, the catwalks run in three directions.”

“I’m not afraid to die, Mother, if I’m at your side.”

The Hound laughed. “And terrified at any other time? It’s nae death ye risk, bairn. It will stun ye and stuff ye like sausage into one of yon pods. I will shoot you myself before I allow that to happen.”

Méarana did not have her harp with her, but her voice was true and she sang a running song while she and her mother loped across the tops of the sleep tanks, holding Donovan between them. She maintained an easy gait, holding his arm around her neck with her left, and holding the belt of his coveralls with her right, lifting his feet slightly above the ground. She did not know how long she and Mother could carry him; but she did not know how long she could not carry him, either.

They stopped to rest and catch their breath, and listened to the metallic sounds of their pursuer draw ever closer. Bridget ban had set her beacon to respond with sharper pings as they drew nearer to where her field office lay. Méarana contacted Franq and told him where to rendezvous.