Rob Scott - The Larion Senators

Their progress slowed, then stopped. It’s working.

Steven, calmer now, looked down at his own hand and thought of an illusion he and Mark had seen at a carnival. A third-rate magician in a hand-me-down tuxedo and his flat-chested hippy assistant had performed a traditional set, nothing spectacular or novel, and halfway through the show Steven was thinking of bailing out when the magician reached suddenly for a cleaver and, chopping down dramatically, severed his own hand. It was masterful: a spray of arterial blood, an unnerving scream and a hand with a gold wedding ring lying palm-up in a crimson puddle of blood on a wooden stage. Mark had yelped and spilled his bucket of popcorn. Before anyone could move, the lights went out and the curtain came down, protecting the integrity of the illusion for all time.

They’d been three or four drinks into the evening and Mark had wanted to believe that the magician had gone insane, lost his mind right then and there. ‘What could be more real?’ he’d said as they made their way back to the beer tent. ‘What could be more real than actually cutting it off?’

‘Not cutting it off,’ Steven had answered. ‘Who in the audience knows what it’s like to actually lose a hand? Probably no one, right?’

‘So?’

‘So if no one knows, then chopping off his hand can look, sound, smell and feel like whatever this guy wants it to. Who are we to argue?’

Mark hadn’t been convinced. ‘If you’re right, then the beer guys ought to be cutting him in at the end of the night, because half the audience is lining up for a stabilising drink right now.’

What does it mean to chop off a hand? Does anyone know? Did Nerak know? He looked down through the darkness. He felt for the hand he could see with his mind; he imagined it had been lost in a childhood accident, a car wreck, a disease, maybe a shark attack. He imagined getting dressed, shaving, brushing his teeth, reading a newspaper, typing at the computer, all with one hand. He tied his shoes, phoned his sister, ate a lobster, folded his Visa bill…

When the riverbed released him, Steven kicked wildly against the walls of the cave and clawed his way back into the light. He broke free with a cry and swam a good distance away before realising that he was alone; Gilmour was still trapped inside.

Shit! Oh shit! He turned in a turbid cloud of silt and swam back as fast as he could The explosions knocked him backwards and he covered his ears as he tumbled downriver. These were different, no flash of a white-hot fireball but more traditional explosions, like the bombs that had levelled Dresden or blew up the bridge on the River Kwai. Steven felt like his head had caved in; he was sure his sinuses had filled with blood, which might even be spilling from his ears.

Finally he was able to grab a submerged tree trunk to stop his downstream fall and, pulling and kicking as hard as he could, he started back against the current, watching for any sign of the old man, blood, torn cloth, or even body parts, through the almost impenetrable cloud of mud stirred up by Gilmour’s attempts to free himself.

By the time he reached the moraine, the water had cleared again to its crystalline clarity. And Steven’s worst fears were realised: the cave at the base of the rock formation had collapsed.

The storm blew in diagonally through the forests of southern Falkan, a howling, ceaseless roar that rolled and bounced off the slopes of the Blackstone Mountains. Lieutenant Blackford did a quick mental calculation and shook his head. It’s not enough. He entered the barracks and made for Captain Hershaw, who was sitting behind Lieutenant Kranst’s old desk, worrying over a goblet of tecan.

‘Six days?’ Hershaw asked.

Blackford nodded.

‘Why?’

‘I don’t know. Could we be invaded from the south?’

‘Over the Blackstones, in the dead of winter? Sure, Lieutenant, that happens here all the time.’ Captain Hershaw frowned. ‘She’s lost her mind.’

‘I’ve got to go and tell her we won’t be ready.’

‘Don’t do that.’ Hershaw stood, looking alarmed. ‘She’ll kill you too.’

‘I have to,’ the lieutenant said. ‘We’ll lose men, unnecessarily, if we attempt this before spring.’

Hershaw said, ‘Good luck, then.’

‘You want to come with me?’

‘Rutters, no!’ He grimaced. ‘I don’t think you should go anywhere near her, either. Wait for Pace; he’ll clear this up.’

Lieutenant Blackford folded a sheaf of parchment under his arm and started up the stairs to Major Tavon’s private office. ‘Major?’ he called, approaching from the outer hall.

‘Yes, Lieutenant?’ Tavon smiled, but it was a glassy, distant look, devoid of any real emotion. Something about her had gone tragically awry in the past three days, and Blackford hoped her illness – that’s what it had to be, some kind of crippling mental illness – had not done any irretrievable damage; maybe an Orindale healer might be able to cure their battalion commander. He and Captain Hershaw had already dispatched a rider to the capital to bring Colonel Pace and a team of healers as quickly as possible. Three officers and two soldiers were already dead, their bodies reduced to ash, and Blackford trembled every time he was forced to enter this room – but he was the only one man enough to actually do it. Everyone else, including Hershaw and Denne, who ought to be reporting to her, were unwilling even to come up the stairs.

‘We don’t have enough supplies – horses, food, blankets or wagons – to make a six-day forced march.’ He froze, waiting for the major’s wrath to explode. Sweat trickled under his collar.

‘Get more.’ Tavon perused a map she had spread across her desk.

‘Yes, ma’am.’ Blackford turned to leave, then said, ‘Uh, Major?’

Tavon looked up. ‘What is it, Lieutenant?’

‘I’m not certain where we’ll find supplies enough for the entire battalion for that length of time.’

‘Then we will make the journey in fewer days. We’ll run the men day and night.’

‘Yes, ma’am, but-’

‘Lieutenant,’ Tavon cut him off. ‘I am not stupid.’

‘No, ma’am. Of course not, ma’am.’ Blackford kept his eyes on his boots.

‘I know that you have been keeping this battalion running smoothly and well-supplied for the past thirty-five Twinmoons.’

Yes, ma’am. Thank you, ma’am.’ His hands shook, and he clasped them together behind his back.

‘So I am not going to kill you, Lieutenant,’ Major Tavon clarified, as if it had been obvious all along. ‘Naked and drunk you’re still worth more to me than any dozen of these rutters.’

Lieutenant Blackford had no idea what a dozen might be; he promised himself he would ask Hershaw when he escaped the office. ‘Thank you, ma’am,’ he muttered. He could think of nothing else to say.

‘So I want you to figure this out, Lieutenant. You have until the dinner aven tonight. We’ll march south after everyone has eaten.’ Tavon returned to her map.

‘That’s just it, ma’am,’ Blackford said. ‘There isn’t enough food. We have daily shipments from Orindale, but we have never had the entire battalion stationed in Wellham Ridge at the same time, so we haven’t ever stockpiled that much food, that many blankets, tent shelters, boots, uniforms, any of it.’

Major Tavon glared at him. ‘Mark me, Lieutenant Blackford. I don’t give a pinch of pigeon shit if half the men expire from hunger, cold or even herpes between here and Meyers’ Vale. It is your job to locate supplies and resources for this battalion. You have done an admirable job of it in the past, and that is why you are still standing here breathing. Take what you require from Wellham Ridge itself. Break into civilian homes, requisition their blankets, food, carts, horses, even trainers, if that’s what you need, but have this battalion ready to move by the dinner aven!’