The Ace of Skulls

Twenty-Three

Harkins sat on the stairs of the Ketty Jay’s cargo hold, and watched Bess searching for her master. She’d taken to doing this whenever she was left unoccupied. She’d peer into corners, search behind crates and pipes. She’d adventure into the dark recesses behind the sanctum and come back again empty-handed. If she could have got into the rest of the craft, she’d have gone searching there, too. Mercifully, her size prevented her.

Harkins wondered what she thought. Did she believe Crake was still on board, on the upper decks, ignoring her? Did she think anything at all? What a strange creature she was. Strange and misunderstood and treated rather badly, in his opinion. In that, they were the same.

‘You’re sad about Crake, aren’t you?’ he said. He raised one of the ear flaps of his pilot’s cap and scratched the side of his head to relieve an itch. ‘I’m sad, too, a bit. I mean, he didn’t take the piss quite as much as the others. And he was, well. . he’s a gentle sort. That’s got to count for something, right?’

Bess briefly stopped her search, aware that he was speaking. She stared at him without any sign that she’d comprehended. Harkins sighed. He was beginning to wish he hadn’t volunteered to stay behind. They’d been gone an awfully long time, and Bess wasn’t much good as company. He doubted they missed him, though. He doubted they’d even noticed he wasn’t there.

‘You and me, Bess, we don’t get much respect, do we?’ he said. ‘I mean, who’d respect us, right? I’m a big chickenshit and you’re a walking pile of pots and pans with a mental condition.’

Bess made a quizzical bubbling sound.

‘Exactly,’ said Harkins.

Bess went back to her search. Harkins decided he couldn’t bear watching her any more. He needed to do something to get himself out of this maudlin mood. Moping around was no fun, and Bess was bringing him down.

‘Come on, Bess!’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘Enough of all that. We’ve got an important job to do here, you know!’

Bess watched him curiously, her eyes distant glimmers in the dark behind her face-grille.

‘Well, the Cap’n told us to guard the Ketty Jay, right?’ he said. ‘We’re making a pretty poor fist of it, though. What you need,’ — he bonked her with his knuckles — ‘is a little discipline. Like this! March! March! March!’

He went marching off across the hold, arms straight, skinny legs jerking. It felt unfamiliar and a little ridiculous at first, but it wasn’t long before his body remembered. Hundreds of hours on the parade ground as a young man had left an imprint on his muscles, and he found himself slipping easily back into the rhythm.

‘About. . face!’ he cried, and went marching back the other way.

Usually he’d have been too wary of mockery to dare anything like this, even knowing that the rest of the crew were elsewhere. Fear of being caught, detected by some secret method he hadn’t yet thought of, would have kept him from it. But now he stormed up and down, throwing his limbs about, and it felt rather exhilarating. It felt good.

Bess watched him with interest as he came back towards her. ‘What are you doing standing there, soldier?’ he cried. ‘Get in step! On the double!’ He turned and marched off in another direction. Bess trailed uncertainly along behind him.

‘Not like that!’ said Harkins. He turned and started marching on the spot in front of Bess. ‘Swing those arms!’ he said. ‘Legs straight!’ He was enjoying himself now.

Bess clapped her hands and started stomping her feet, rocking left and right.

‘Not good enough, soldier! Arms! Like me!’ He swung his arms harder for emphasis. Bess copied him. ‘Now your legs!’

This was harder for Bess, whose legs were short and stumpy in comparison to her body. Still, she did what she could. Her attempts at staying in time were hopeless, but soon she was wobbling and flailing about in a comical approximation of a military march.

‘Good!’ said Harkins. He was sweating and a big grin was plastered on his face. ‘Now follow me! Quiiiiick. . march!’

He spun on his heel and went off across the hold again. Bess clattered and crashed along behind him, throwing her outsize arms all over the place, kicking the air. ‘That’s the way!’ he cried. ‘That’s the way!’

They paraded up and down the hold, and Harkins felt wonderful. He was so light he could almost laugh out loud. Damn, how long had it been since he was silly like this? How long since he’d done anything with such abandon? He was a red-faced, beaming fool leading a grotesque, clumsy golem around an empty cargo hold and for once, just for once, he didn’t care. He wished this moment could go on for ever.

But it didn’t, and when it ended, it ended in the roar of an engine and the shriek of brakes.

He knew right away that the sound meant trouble. All that good feeling drained out of him in an instant. He stopped, and Bess bumped into the back of him, sending him stumbling forward. By the time he’d regained his balance, he was awkward old Harkins again, fumbling and embarrassed.

He hurried over to the lever to open the Ketty Jay’s ramp. If something was going on outside, it was best to find out what. It occurred to him belatedly that this wasn’t necessarily the safest or most sensible course of action to take, but by then he’d pulled the lever and the ramp was opening. He watched it descend, wondering at himself. An impartial observer might interpret what he’d just done as something other than rank cowardice. He must be getting sick or something.

He went down the ramp, and Bess followed. It was humid, warm and dark outside; the only light came from the moon and the headlights of a six-wheeled armoured Overlander which had just pulled up next to the Ketty Jay. The crew came piling out. All of them were wearing Awakener cassocks, and some had Ciphers painted on their foreheads. He would have laughed, but the gravity of the situation was etched on their faces.

He saw Pelaru snatch the unconscious Jez from Malvery’s hands and come racing up the ramp. The Thacian bounded past without so much as looking at him. Harkins cringed away; there was something wrong about the way he moved, the way he looked.

‘Wait, is Pelaru coming with us?’ Malvery asked the Cap’n as they hurried towards the Ketty Jay. ‘You know that two half-Manes make a whole one, right?’

Frey didn’t seem to be in the mood for humour. ‘We’ll deal with him later. Harkins! Get to the Firecrow! We’re leaving! Malvery, Ashua, go drag out that bloody lad and toss him off my aircraft. We’ve got enough dead weight. Bess, get inside!’

Bess paid no attention, waiting eagerly on the ramp to see if Crake was going to appear. Malvery and Ashua hurried past her. Silo took position at the bottom of the ramp, scanning their surroundings, shotgun ready.

There were the sound of engines in the distance. Even at this hour, there were a few other people in the clearing where the Ketty Jay sat. They were mostly crewmen from the battered freighters nearby, smoking roll-ups or drinking away the night. The dramatic arrival of the Ketty Jay’s crew had stirred their interest, and some were walking over. Some of them looked like they had guns.

‘Cap’n!’ said Pinn. He grabbed Frey’s arm as Frey headed for the ramp.

‘What?’ Frey snapped irritably.

Pinn stood there a moment, thinking. No doubt trying to assemble his moronic thoughts into some kind of coherent grunts, Harkins thought uncharitably.

Frey ran out of patience. ‘There’s no time! We need to get out of here!’ he said.

‘But that’s just it,’ Pinn blurted. ‘I’m not coming!’

Frey stared at him. Harkins stared at him. Silo kept his eye on the people from the other freighters. One of them was calling out. ‘Hey! What’s the trouble over there?’

‘Better move it, Cap’n,’ he rumbled.

‘Pinn, get in the Skylance!’ Frey cried. ‘You can have whatever bloody crisis you’re having after we’re airborne.’

But Pinn shook his head, stubborn as a mule. ‘It’s not right, Cap’n. What we’re doing.’ He pulled out a piece of crumpled paper and held it up. There were several phrases scrawled on it, all but one crossed out. ‘See?’ he said. ‘The prophecy! Look! Journey: that’s Korrene. Death: that’s Pelaru’s mate or whatever. Dark haired stranger: Pelaru. Find something important: well, we just did! Tragedy will fall on someone dear. .’ He looked at Frey meaningfully, and drew his finger across the last phrase, as if crossing it out.

Frey was about to explode. ‘What in the name of gibbering shit are you talking about, arse-wit?’

‘The Allsoul is real, Cap’n,’ said Pinn, his piggy eyes wide. ‘We’re fighting on the wrong side.’

‘What are you lot doing out here?’ Ashua cried as she came hustling out with Malvery, pulling Abley between them. The Awakener boy had his hands tied behind his back, gagged, limping and bewildered. Ashua put her boot in his arse and sent him sprawling on the turf. ‘Bess! Inside!’ she said sternly.

Bess trudged off up the ramp, having given up on the possibility of her master returning. Ashua and Malvery followed her inside.

‘Oi! Hey! What’s up over there?’ called one of the approaching men, in a tone that made a friendly enquiry sound like a threat. Abley tried to yell something through his gag.

‘Do what you like, Pinn,’ Frey snapped, angrily dismissive. ‘Do whatever you like.’ He rounded on Harkins. ‘What did I say, Harkins? Get to your damn aircraft!’

Harkins shuddered at the force of his voice, and fled towards the safety of the Firecrow’s cockpit. A pair of Overlanders raced into the clearing, skidded to a halt and began disgorging armed men. As if that was the signal, the suspicious freighter crew opened up, and the sweltering night was suddenly alive with the snap and whine of gunfire.

Frey and Silo loosed off a few shots and then ran up the ramp, which Ashua was closing. Pinn danced on the spot for a moment, obviously tempted to follow now that he saw his predicament. But he procrastinated too long, and the ramp raised out of his reach, and in the end he fled off towards the trees at the edge of the clearing.

Harkins sprinted for the Firecrow and threw himself up the ladder that led to the cockpit. All his previous joy had faded: he was trapped in a nightmare of fear again. Halfway up, he felt his leg seized, and he was pulled away from the ladder and crashed heavily to the muddy ground. Spluttering, he tried to get up, but a dark figure put a boot in his chest and shoved him back down.

‘You ain’t goin’ nowhere,’ snarled a rough voice. ‘Let’s see what you been up to, huh?’

He struggled wildly, but the man was standing on him and he was pinned. He could hear the sound of the Ketty Jay’s engines powering up; he saw more men rushing in, and Speakers with guns in the lights of the newly arrived Overlanders. Guns cracked as they shot uselessly at the Ketty Jay.

They’ve caught me! he thought, his mind ablaze with panic. They’ve caught me and they’re going to kill me and they’re going to make me pay for whatever the others did and I wasn’t even there!

The only thing in his mind was to get away. No matter what the consequences, no matter what the cost. His terror at being left behind to face the music was worse than his terror of anything else.

‘Quit strugglin’!’ said the man holding him down. Harkins couldn’t even see his face: he was an elemental enemy, an opposing force without character or identity. The man took his boot from Harkins’ chest and leaned down to secure him more thoroughly with his arms. Harkins writhed to one side, pulled his pistol from his belt and jammed it under his attacker’s ribs.

The man froze, eyes wide in horror. Harkins was no less horrified at where he found himself. He had an instant in which to act, and only that.

He pulled the trigger.

He saw the man’s face in the flash of the shot. A folded, weathered face, underlit by the blast. It was there for a fraction of a second and then gone, but it stayed in his mind, burned there like the afterimage of the sun.

He slumped towards Harkins, an avalanche of inert meat. Harkins shoved him aside as he fell, and scrambled out from under him. He heard shouts nearby, but he couldn’t make out the words. The world had closed in around him. Everything had narrowed: he saw as if through a tunnel.

He blundered back to the ladder, his route to safety. The Firecrow’s cockpit had always been his sanctuary, the place where he was the master, where there was no one to mock him or make him feel small. He climbed to it, and opened the windglass canopy, and pulled it shut over him.

Dimly, he was aware of the Ketty Jay rising nearby. The Skylance sat silent and forgotten beyond it. Moving on automatic, he hit switches, pulled levers, strapped himself in. The acrid smell of aerium wafted through the cockpit as the tanks filled. The engine clanked and hummed as it ignited. Bullets pinged off the hull, but the sounds were dulled and he had difficulty connecting them with danger.

That man’s face. He could still see it. The look in his eyes as his life blew out like a candle.

A bullet hit the windglass in front of his face, sending a long crack along it, making him jump. It shocked him back to sense. He looked about himself, and saw men swarming all around, rushing towards the Firecrow with guns firing. They couldn’t harm the Ketty Jay, but a shot in the right place could damage the Firecrow.

He lit the thrusters while he was barely off the ground; he needed to present a moving target. The Firecrow moved sluggishly, not yet light enough for effortless acceleration, but it shifted enough to spoil the aim of the men shooting at him. Harkins hunkered down over the flight stick, banking and climbing slowly as the aerium tanks flooded and the craft lost weight. Bullets pinged off the underside now, and some punched through. But the Firecrow gained altitude fast, and the thrusters pushed harder as they warmed. Harkins pulled out of the clearing in a long ascending curve, circling round the Ketty Jay, which was rising vertically. He saw her thrusters light up, shoving her away over the trees, and he followed her.

The gunfire fell away behind them. Harkins didn’t feel relief. He didn’t feel anything.

That man’s face. .

The explosion caught him completely by surprise. The Firecrow was slammed sideways, swiped by a wave of concussion that sent him into a hard bank, engines screaming. The cockpit shook like it was going to come apart. He’d barely managed to react to the first blast when there was a second, lighting up the sky ahead of him, rattling the windglass. The crack doubled in size, reaching out like a lightning fork.

Anti-aircraft guns.

Blood thumped at his temples. He hit the throttle and blasted forward through the turbulent air. The engines whined, came close to stalling, then kicked in with a blaze. A barrage of detonations pounded him; the noise battered at his mind. Caught in the flashes, he saw the Ketty Jay climbing fast, flying without lights, reaching for the safety of the darkness high above.

Evade. Evade. Evade.

He swung the Firecrow to starboard, climbing as he did so. Evasion patterns came naturally to him. He’d always been hard to hit, slippery in the sky. Shells swatted at his aircraft. The Firecrow shuddered and jerked. Harkins barrel-rolled and banked, g-forces wrenching him around in his seat.

Still the explosions came, near at hand and then far away, immense firecrackers ripping across the night. Harkins flew between them, his hangdog face set, eyes sharp and fixed. He couldn’t see the shells coming, so he couldn’t avoid them if they landed on target. All he could do was keep dodging about, and make sure they didn’t. His body knew what to do.

Evade. Evade. Evade.

But this wasn’t the frantic panic he was used to feeling. This wasn’t hysterical fear. This was cold, sharp-edged, efficient. Death was all around him. He couldn’t control it. He didn’t recoil from it. He just had to negotiate it.

And then, all at once, he was through. The explosions fell away, scattering, random blooms of flame in the distance. They were too high up now, too hard to see, the light of their thrusters pinpricks of blue against the stars. The anti-aircraft gunners had lost their range.

The Ketty Jay was there too. He could just about make it out, not far off, beneath him and to port. So they’d escaped too.

He dropped back so as to see the Ketty Jay’s thrusters. They’d be the beacons he’d follow. They kept climbing until they were high above the earth, and then Frey tacked northeast and they headed back towards the centre of Vardia, out of the Barabac Delta.

Harkins was calm, so very calm as he floated in the dark, cradled by his cockpit amid the warm roar of the Firecrow’s thrusters. Something had changed inside him, in the crucible of the anti-aircraft barrage. He felt it. Perhaps it had been coming for a long time. Perhaps it had begun when he tried to ram a Mane dreadnought in the skies above Sakkan; perhaps when he’d beat Gidley Sleen in a pointless and near-suicidal race in the Rushes, just because he was damned if he’d lose. Or maybe it had begun even further back than that.

Once, he’d been a warrior, until the pressures of war had cracked him. He’d flown with the greatest Navy in the world and he’d fought in battles of such savagery that even the history books shunned them. Death had been at his shoulder every time he flew into combat. But one day, Harkins had turned around and seen him, caught a glimpse of what waited, and his frayed nerves had snapped.

Since then, he’d brushed past death several times. Always unwillingly, sometimes accidentally, but on the Ketty Jay’s crew he’d been hard pressed to avoid it.

None of it was like today, though. Today he looked into a man’s eyes as he died. A man that Harkins had killed, at point-blank range. Today he looked death in the face again. Square in the face. He’d seen it there as he pulled the trigger.

And it wasn’t much. Wasn’t much at all.

Harkins stared fixedly into the middle distance, and thought about that.