Kameron Hurley - God's War

He heard her continue to bang around, now in the bedroom. She gave a strangled sob, and the sound cut at his gut, but he did not dare go to her. Let her alone, he thought. She will push you away.

“You need to hurry,” he said.

She stepped out of the bedroom wearing her housecoat over her skirt and blouse, and had put on a hijab. She had carpet bags in both hands. Her face was red, but she had wiped her tears away. She stopped at the little figure of Mhari, saint of women scorned, that sat in the niche outside the kitchen. After going through the prayer rote, she bagged the statue of the saint as well.

Taite took one of the bags from her before she could protest, and headed down the stairs. He listened to her plod behind him.

Outside, they walked quickly. Inaya was stubborn and kept pace with him. She was breathing hard, and he slowed down. A couple of women hung out under the awnings of their buildings. A solitary dog trotted across the street.

Khos was still waiting in the bakkie. He’d slid down into his seat and pulled his burnous over his head.

“Hello, Inaya,” he said.

“I’d prefer a quiet drive,” she said without looking at him. “Where’s your regular bakkie?”

“I’m borrowing a friend’s,” Khos said. He opened up the door from the inside and then started the bakkie. “Get in. There’s too many dogs out tonight.”

Inaya got into the back. Taite put the second bag in next to her, and sat in the front.

“Let’s go,” Taite said.

Khos turned into the street. A swarm of red beetles pooled across their path. A dog barked.

Taite looked back at Inaya, but in the dim light of the street, her face was unreadable.

An hour out of Punjai, Nyx hit a hastily erected security checkpoint. She slowed the bakkie and rolled down the window. The bakkie hiccupped and belched, and she caught the rabid stink of coagulant. There was another leak somewhere.

A couple of women carrying acid rifles stood in front of the barricade across the road. There were half a dozen military vehicles on the other side of the barricade, and as Nyx got closer, she saw that they were directing traffic away from Punjai. Nyx was a little drunk and sen-numb, so the whole convoy had the fuzzy half reality of a dream. She’d bought whiskey and sen at the mechanic’s in Jameela before she got on the road again, and she hadn’t been sober since.

She stopped, and one of the women leaned toward the bakkie. Nyx looked out past her, to the stir of figures around the military vehicles. They were men. Nasheenian men. Not old men or boys, but men in their prime, dressed in organic field gear and carrying standard-issue rifles and flame throwers on their backs. She had a jarring flash of memory—men all coming apart, bubbling flesh, melted field gear.

“We’re redirecting through Basra, matron,” the woman soldier said.

“What’s going on?” Nyx asked. She tore her look from the men.

“We have a breach in Punjai. Minor skirmish. Should be cleaned up in half a day.”

“What’s the threat level?” Nyx asked.

The woman narrowed her eyes.

“I spent time in Bahreha,” Nyx said. “I laid the mines that took out Lower Azda.”

The soldier shrugged and looked blank, and Nyx realized all that had been a decade ago. A lifetime, in terms of the war. Thousands had died since then. Bigger cities had been contaminated or overrun or blown up. You’re an old woman, Nyx thought.

“A couple of bursts contaminated the southern half of the city, and a small terrorist unit got through. Nothing serious. We’ll have it cleaned up, matron. Go on toward Basra. We’ve cleared the road through to there.”

The southern half of the city. Nowhere near the Chenjan quarter, which meant her storefront might be safe. Had her team gotten out before the quarantine? Fucking hell.

“Thanks,” Nyx said. She looked again toward the men on the other side of the barricade. “You take care of the boys for me.”

“Yes, matron,” the soldier said. “We always do.”

Nyx turned the bakkie down the temporary sticky-graveled road that the military had put down to bypass Punjai. Punjai under quarantine would buy her time. Anybody—even a bel dame—would have a tough time getting into Punjai, and once in, would have a tougher time wading through the chaos of contaminated quarantined quarters. If her team had gotten out, they might have bought enough time to regroup in Aludra and bolt the fuck off to Chenja without any bel dame knowing the wiser.

Maybe.

A whole heap of maybe.

Nyx ducked and rolled under Husayn’s right jab and threw a right uppercut to her body. Husayn blocked with her left elbow and pushed forward again, throwing a left hook followed by another right jab.

Husayn had gotten a good deal more skilled with age. Not quicker—just smarter. Still, Husayn moved forward when other boxers moved back. Nyx should have remembered that before agreeing to a “friendly” spar with Husayn.

Nyx stopped trying to drive her back and stepped sideways instead. She threw a punch at Husayn’s kidneys, but her heart wasn’t in it. Husayn swung and caught her with a left hook to the jaw, another left hook to the face. Nyx saw darkness move across her vision. Something flashed at her from the back of her brain, some other fucked-up memory. She deflected a double right jab, but she didn’t see the uppercut coming until it knocked her backward onto the dusty mat. Her head felt like it was floating.

Husayn laughed. “You’re getting slow, old woman.”

Nyx used the ropes to help herself up. She waited for her head to clear.

Husayn’s gym had two rings, and a couple of kids were sparring in the other one, far more effectively than Nyx had been.

“I’ve been out of the ring for a while,” Nyx said. She worked her jaw. She was going to hurt tomorrow. Hell, she hurt now.

Husayn grinned crookedly. She had gained a little weight and broken her nose a couple more times, but otherwise, she was the same Husayn. She’d stopped fighting for the magicians not long after Nyx went to prison, and she got leave from the magicians to start her own gym. Lots of young kids came her way hoping to gain some experience before testing their mettle in a magicians’ ring.

“How’s business been?” Nyx asked. She found one of the discarded corner stools and started unknotting her gloves with her teeth. Nyx’s team was around, Husayn had assured her when she drove up just after mid-morning prayer; they’d shown up a day before the quarantine, then scattered their own ways. Probably to mosques and brothels, Nyx thought.

Husayn shrugged and pulled off her own gloves. She never laced them very tightly.

“Been good, as things go.”

Nyx nodded at the sparring kids in the other ring. She let her gloves drop to the ring. “I thought you kept a busier gym.”

“Huh,” Husayn said. “Used to. Most of them headed out to Chenja. There’s a fighting ring out there taking away my best fighters.”

“You know where in Chenja?”

“I heard they’re out of Dadfar.”

“That so?” Nyx said. If they were going after Nikodem in Chenja, the fighting rings were a good place to start. And Husayn had spoken to the aliens before.

“Yeah, heard that from a couple girls now,” Husayn said.

“You remember a fight in Faleen, about seven or eight years ago? You fought an outrider named…” Nyx realized she’d let the name slip again, and had to fish for it. “Jix. Jaks something, Jaksdij, maybe?” Fuck, Nyx thought, I cut up the kid’s brother, and I don’t even remember her name.

Husayn crinkled her mouth. “I fought a lot of girls, been knocked around a time or two.” She rapped her knuckles against her head. “Don’t remember all the girls I fought.”