Rob Scott - The Larion Senators

‘Right,’ Gilmour said, ‘at the rate they were moving that table, they’ll be in Wellham Ridge in a few days.’

‘Tomorrow, most likely,’ Kellin said. ‘They passed by here yesterday.’

‘Then we need to strike them soon,’ Gilmour said. ‘The soldiers are falling down with fatigue, and the officers are just leaving them to die or to drag themselves back on their own. Some are dragging their weaker mates along, but none of them are strong enough for a real fight.’

Steven shook his head. ‘Neither am I, Gilmour.’

‘That’s right, my boy. How are you? What was it, a seizure? Some sort of attack? Any permanent damage that you can sense?’

‘No, but I feel like a warm barrel of pigshit.’ He looked depressed. ‘I’m not up for much of a fight.’

‘Tomorrow?’

‘Another night of rest and some decent food would do me good.’ Steven didn’t try to hide the fact that he was pale, weak and tired.

‘Very good.’ Gilmour smiled. ‘Tomorrow, then. What do we have to eat? Something more than those onions, I hope.’

‘We’ve got a bit,’ Kellin said, ‘but not much, I’m afraid.’

‘Garec, any chance you and Kellin can find some game out along the edge of these fields? Brand and I will raid that farmhouse for any dry stores.’

Kellin said, ‘We did that already; there were some pickled vegetables and a few jars of preserves.’

‘Any flour?’

‘No.’

‘Rutters.’ Gilmour shook his head and his hair swept over his shoulder. ‘We’ll have to make do with what we have, but I promise I’ll buy everyone as much hot food as they can eat the moment we reach Wellham Ridge. By the way, why aren’t we hiding in the farmhouse?’

‘You’ll see when you go inside,’ Kellin said. ‘This is much more comfortable.’

Brand added, ‘We figured soldiers would search there first, maybe giving us a few extra moments to mount a defence here in the barn. And Kellin’s right; whoever farms this land left more than just rotting pepperweed in there.’

‘Meat?’

‘Meat, chamber pots, an assortment of disagreeable, albeit unidentifiable, heaps of something covered with burlap sacks…’

‘Nothing you’d spread on a crust of bread, Gilmour.’

‘I see. Is there a fireplace?’

Kellin said, ‘Yes, that they do have.’

‘It would be good for Steven to spend the night beside a real fire. It’s draughty in here with only that tarp hanging over there.’

‘I’ll be fine,’ Steven said.

‘You rest, leave dinner to us. Before we go, I’ll get a fire going, a big one.’

‘Don’t burn down the building!’

‘Don’t worry,’ Gilmour assured him, ‘we need you back in shape, and quickly, so rest now, and sleep if you can.’

‘He’s right,’ Garec said. ‘You don’t look very healthy, Steven.’

‘What do you expect with that stench in here?’

‘Trust me, Steven, it’s worse in the farmhouse,’ Kellin said.

‘No arguments,’ Gilmour said. ‘Take a nap; we’ll be back with dinner.’ He motioned with one hand and stoked their small fire into a crackling blaze. ‘That’ll burn all night now,’ he said and gestured for the others to join him outside.

Steven furrowed his brow but wrapped himself back into his blankets, thumped his pack into a makeshift pillow and closed his eyes. It was not long before he was sleeping again.

Later, fed and resting comfortably, Steven dreamed again. He and Mark were biking north on Tower Road, the old two-lane stretch that ran out past the airport. It was the first Magellan Tour, and there wasn’t much of a hard shoulder along Tower, so cyclists were regularly pushed off the road by the passing trucks hauling shipments out to the mail and cargo jets that used Denver Airport. Mark had called this ‘getting buzzed’, and they’d perfected their protection manoeuvre pretty quickly. Steven had a small mirror affixed to his helmet, so he rode behind, watchful for trucks hugging the shoulder too closely. When one approached without giving them a wide enough berth, Steven would shout, ‘We’re getting buzzed!’ and he and Mark would bail out, turning onto the hardscrabble where the vast rolling prairie pressed up against the northbound lane.

No matter how many trucks rumbled by en route to the freight terminals, they were always uncomfortably aware that any one could have flattened them both to jelly. Now, in his dream, Steven saw in the small circular mirror a massive, eighteen-wheeled beast lumbering towards them. It was a heavy-bodied semi, something prehistoric and clumsy, dragging an open trailer with slat sides. A northerly wind carried the aroma of foetid onions, rotten vegetables bound via Fed-Ex to ports unknown: somewhere, eye-wateringly rank onions had some value. The truck driver, hugging the right shoulder, gave no sign that he saw the two cyclists.

‘We’re getting buzzed,’ Steven shouted.

‘What’s that smell?’

‘Mark!’ he shouted again, louder this time. The rumble of the truck’s engine was deafening; it was too close. In the tiny mirror, the grille and twin headlights looked like the maniacal grin of a homicidal creature bent on running them down. As if to terrorise them further, the driver pressed down on the monster’s air horn. Steven felt the blast tickle the hairs on the back of his neck. His eyes blurred with the foul stench of decomposing onions and he screamed at Mark as he pulled off the road and into a clump of dry chaparral, ‘Mark! Bail out, Mark!’

Mark gave no sign that he heard, and Steven watched in horror as the great truck bore down on his friend. At the last second, he turned away, closed his eyes and screamed.

The magic woke him. It was at his fingertips, ready for battle, ready to blast the vegetable truck to scrap metal. Instead, Steven rolled onto his back and released the spell into Gilmour’s chest. The Larion Senator’s new body, the young Malakasian with the crooked teeth, bent nose and bloody wrist, was looming over him, a short knife drawn and poised to strike. The others slept on beside the fire.

‘No!’ Steven screamed as the magic crashed into Gilmour, shattering his bones and crushing his organs. It was as if the Malakasian soldier had been hit by a lumbering truck loaded to the brink with rotten vegetables, onions or pepperweed…

Gilmour was thrown back, his body turning a lazy half-somersault in the firelight. One foot smashed through a wooden gate near the vegetable storage bins and the impact flipped his body back over itself and his head thudded hard against a support beam. Something cracked, his skull or his neck, and his body finally tumbled to rest inside one of the larger bins along the far wall.

Garec and the others were on their feet.

‘Steven,’ Garec cried, ‘what did you do?’

Steven was breathing hard, the magic still coursing through his veins, invigorating and charging him for another attack. He stared at Garec, his eyes wide in disbelief.

‘You killed him,’ Garec said, hustling towards the vegetable bin.

‘Don’t!’ Steven finally managed.

‘But-’

‘It’s not Gilmour!’

‘What?’ Garec looked at him as if he had gone mad.

‘It’s not him, Garec.’ Steven repeated. ‘It’s Mark, or sent from Mark, anyway. It’s not Gilmour.’

Garec moved back into the firelight and knelt beside Steven.

‘Get me some water, will you?’ Steven held his head in his hands. ‘That was too close.’

Kellin brought a water-filled wineskin and Steven drank deeply before emptying the rest over his head, trying to calm down enough to explain.

‘How do you…’ Brand ventured.

‘It was the things he said, what he did,’ Steven said at last. ‘He mentioned onions today, twice, even after Garec had told him it was pepperweed. Gilmour wouldn’t have done that; he wouldn’t have thought of onions first, like I did.’