|
Exordium: DESRIEN Lokri looked once around the vast, elegant stone church and felt betrayed. It was not a new emotion; he'd lived with it for years. Deliberately turning his eyes away from the priceless treasures in the church proper, he looked instead for the quickest exit. The damn nicks had forced him along on this farcical pilgrimage, the devil knew why. He would not stay to find out. He had not expected a chance to escape nick 'justice,' once he'd been identified. But that chance had been presented in this senseless sidetrip to Desrien, and he meant to take full advantage of the miracle. He clasped his hands behind him and looked up at the artifacts as he steadily made his way toward a badly lit side hall. Pausing only to check that the Marines were occupied with the others, he slipped into the hall, then strode quickly along it, trying every door he came to. They were locked. At the end of the hall he saw stairs, and after a brief hesitation, he started down them. Surely there would be another exit somewhere. Some time later, he was still walking down narrow stone halls, lit at intervals by iron-wrought wall lights of some unimaginably old design. The air was cool and still, as if it had not stirred for centuries. He never passed anyone, and all the doors he tried were locked. This amused him as much as it annoyed him: even religious nicks didn't much trust one another, it seemed. From time to time he heard faint noise, and saw the rhythmic flicker of holo-lights around a corner. The first half-dozen times he saw this evanescent light he plunged down an adjacent hallway, trying to make his way as quickly away from an obviously populated area as he could. But the seventh time he neared the end of a long, cold hallway and saw the now-familiar purple flicker he realized he'd gotten himself completely lost; he was wandering around in circles. So he turned toward the light and noise, figuring he could always make his way through and find an exit. And if the place was as full of people as it sounded, then there had to be an exit. He'd certainly seen no one approaching it on his wanderings through the empty halls. Rounding the last corner, he was considerably surprised to see an open door with lumensquiggles in an unfamiliar script above it, giving off the pulsing light. The noise, the smells, reminded him of the Galadium on Rifthaven. He laughed to himself and almost ran the last few steps. Why had he not guessed that the high-end religious nicks would have a gambling den underneath one of their buildings? I wonder if there's one for every faith? All designed to take money from the gullible, just as those long-faced fools with their nasty art and their solemn music do topside. And of course this place would give their off-duty clerics something to do with their time and credit. He passed through the door, looking about him for the expected bouncer. A hulking man whose face was in shrouded in a black mask held out a hand. Lokri lifted his own, palms out. "I'm broke," he said with cheerful honesty. "But I won't be long if you'll point out the Phalanx or Xi tables." The man shrugged massive shoulders, reminding Lokri suddenly --and uncomfortably--of one of Vi'ya's Dol'jharians. "We don't play in that kind of coin," the man stated in a rumbling voice. "I'll play in any kind of coin," Lokri said. "Let me in." And if I don't like it, I'm out the other side, he thought, smiling. This time one shoulder lifted, and the hand waved him forward. Lokri passed on inside, breathing deeply of the head- twisting scents of expensive dream-smoke. The room was crowded with flash and shadow pleasure-seekers, their outlines diffused by a weirdly glowing red haze. Lokri watched the smoke swirl up from censers, back-lit by the ruby lumens overhead. The affect was like something from the lowest precinct of hell, an observation which Lokri found highly entertaining. "Jess," came a pleasant tenor voice, one Lokri hadn't heard for a long time. Stung at first, for he hated reminders of his real name and origins, Lokri swiftly turned to see the crimson outline of a short, thin man with long, wispy hair. Lokri choked on a laugh; he would never have expected to find in a place like Desrien the most dangerous man in Rifthaven. I never expected to see him again at all, he thought belatedly. "Digge Kelar," he exclaimed aloud. "I thought you were dead." Kelar lifted his hands, his round, young-seeming face smiling with childish delight. "Appearances belie." "What brings you here?" Though Lokri was beginning to appreciate Desrien--the real Desrien--more each moment. "To play," Kelar said. "For greater stakes. The greatest." Lokri laughed. "I might have known." "Come, Jess. Join us." "Willingly," Lokri said, "but please. Call me Lokri." Hearing his old name reminded him of the damned nicks and their battlecruiser, waiting to take him to his execution--if he didn't escape them. Except I met Kelar after I changed identities, not before... The anomaly made Lokri wary, but Kelar did not seem to notice. Still smiling, his hand warm as he took Lokri's shoulder, he said, "Come within. I'll have you know that we play for souls here." "Souls," Lokri repeated, instantly diverted. "Everything open and understood, always, in matters of play or pay." It was the same thing he'd said when he first started the Galadium, out of nothing but a plasma-scarred derelict ship he'd flown in, empty except for a mysterious case in the cargo bay, and no hint where he'd been or how he'd gotten it. Within two years he had the best club in the station. Lokri laughed. Souls. That made two things he hadn't got; he'd walked into the Galadium without money before, which had not stopped him from from the risk of betting anyway. How much easier to stake something that didn't exist? It's what you might expect on a planet like this--but still, finding Kelar talking religious comes as a surprise. "Xi game's this way," Kelar said. Lokri followed, looking up in surprise at the most elaborate Xi setup he'd ever beheld. Twelve circles of speeding lights intersected in a tall, revolving column. Lokri's retinas registered brief lineups of one color, then another, at odd intervals. Gathered around the base of the holographic display intensely focused players stood, hitting their freeze-key when they thought the next color bar would line up. Lokri stood back, watching. The circles spun faster than he was used to, and he'd never seen a tower of more than eight bars. But the odds for Xi had always been a lure--sometimes as much as fifty to one for color bars, and exponentially higher for repeated patterns. Lokri looked over the gathered players. In his experience, pilots and navigators were drawn to Xi; anyone who had a knack for seeing patterns in objects moving in space. He remembered Ivard's sister Greywing being drawn to Xi, and felt a mild regret at her loss, followed by a jolt of recognition. He blinked, tried to rub the reddish dreamsmoke haze from his eyes, and stared at the short, scrawny female in the old flightsuit. Short spacer-style haircut, ugly freckled skin, guarded expression: it was Greywing. A player fell away from his position, giving a low cry, and Kelar, who had slipped into the dealer's cage, motioned Greywing to take the man's place. Greywing stepped forward, her thin, wary face underlit in ghostly hues by the glowing colors on the console at her fingers. "Five tries, pilgrim, five tries," Kelar said. "Your call or mine?" "Mine," Greywing said. It was definitely her voice. Lokri stood well back of the crowd, watching. Nausea gripped him; he could not explain this woman's resemblance to Greywing, whom he had watched die under a Tarkan's jac-shot on the Mandala. "Red," Greywing said. "Try red," Kelar repeated. The whirling lights gleamed in Greywing's unblinking eyes as she watched the tower, her chin uplifted, shoulders braced. She'd always faced the universe in that stance, ready for attack, but she'd had courage. Lokri hoped she'd win now. "Bets?" Kelar turned to the crowd. Some of them moved forward, betting for or against Greywing's ability to call a solid line of red lights intersecting. Her head moved unconsciously in the rhythm, her gaze went abstract, then suddenly her hand pounced on the large key--and the tower froze, nine red lights, two yellow and one blue. "Ooooh," a sigh went up. "Four left," Kelar said, smiling. "Your call or mine?" "Mine," she said firmly. "Red again." This time she hit only seven; she caught all the rest orange. She called for red a third time, and lost to three lights. "Two left," Kelar said. "Your call or mine?" "Yours," Greywing said, looking uncertain. "Green." A green line-up was now promised, and she only had to watch for it. But the lights whirled faster, and when she hit the key, she was badly off. A cry went up from the watchers. "Last try," Kelar said. "Give you four to one. You get this, walk free. Pattern: blue-white-yellow." The patterns were the hardest, and took the longest to pay off, but when they did, the payoff was great. Bets ran up into high numbers among the watchers, but Lokri gave them no attention. His focus stayed on Greywing, who stared up at the tower, her lips parted and her breathing still. Suddenly she slammed her hand down--and missed the pattern by four lights. As Lokri watched, her eyes went wide with horror and a neat red hole appeared in the center of her chest, then she fell away into the crowd, swallowed by the shadows. "What's--" he started to say, but the roar of the crowd swelled, and a new victim took Greywing's place: a huge, merry- faced man who Lokri recognized as his very first captain. "Ghosts," Lokri whispered as Kelar told the man he had five tries. "The place is filled with ghosts." Lokri watched, tightlipped and silent, as the old man lost. At the end, his face grayed and he too disappeared into the shifting shadows behund the game. Whatever the game behind this game is, I will not play, Lokri thought narrowly, fighting the urge to push through the people and smash his knuckles against Kelar's smiling teeth. But as Lokri scanned the crowd he saw yet more of the dead, some of them people he'd killed in action, others he'd crewed with or had known. The ones who played the Xi game were once some manner of companions. They appeared, always, as he had seen them last, and when they lost, their death-wound took them from sight. Four times this happened. Lokri tried once to leave, but found that the smoke and shadows led him inexorably right back to the Xi game. So he crossed his arms, his jaw aching around clenched teeth, determined to wait it out. Three more people from his past came and lost and disappeared, and then a tall, rawboned figure pushed his way through the crowd with the easy grace that made him achingly familiar. Lokri looked up at the long blond hair and laughing blue eyes of Markham vlith-L'Ranja. Markham gazed across the heads of the gamblers, smiling at Lokri, and then he stepped up to the Xi console. Markham had always admitted freely that Lokri was his superior in this game. The urge to push through and take his place gripped Lokri, but he shook his head. Markham was already dead; whatever Lokri did would would make no difference to the nightmare being spun out here. "Blue," Markham said. "Blue!" Kelar repeated, his smile a challenge. Markham lost, and lost again. And when his fifth time came and went, Lokri tried to look away, but he couldn't; he saw Markham's features crimson and run together and his smoking skull gleam, bony and white, while around him the crowd yelled and laughed. And then he too was gone. Lokri drew in a shaking breath, and then the last blow knocked his lungs airless. Through the crowd glided a small figure, no older than Ivard and already beautiful: Fierin ban- Kendrian, Lokri's sister. She looked this way and that, and her face changed when she saw him. Uncertainty gave way to delight. He stared at her, unable to move or speak. How could she be dead? Four times he'd checked on her, always from a distance. The latest one was mere weeks before Eusabian's attack: she'd been alive. More unsettling, she too exactly as she had when he last saw her, which had been years ago. He knew she was older now, full- grown; she'd inherited Lokri's place. She would not be this child. But she came right up to him, and threw herself in his arms. He hesitated, then closed his hands about her thin shoulders, and hugged her warmth against him. "Jess," she said, her upturend face smiling. "How happy I am to find you! Where have you been?" "Hiding," he said, trying to force a distance, to regain control. They said she was part of the plot, he told himself. To gain my inheritance. But there were times--when he was very, very drunk--when he'd not believed it. "What are you doing here?" "I've come to play." She lifted her hands and spun around, her glinting silvery dress the same shade as her eyes. Silver eyes, the same shade as his--the same shade as the dead eyes of their father-- "Get out of here," Lokri said. Fierin looked hurt. "But I found you at last, and now I'm ready to play." Lokri jerked his head up, met Kelar's gaze. The dealer's eyes were pitiless in the glare of the holo-lights. I know what it is, I'm already dead, Lokri thought. The thought brought a mixture of self-mockery--and relief. I must have already gone through the farce on Ares and they've executed me. But he didn't really believe it. What he did believe was that Fierin, the only one of the family worth anything, was in danger. With one hand he thrust his sister behind him. "You go home," he said. "I'll run their damned play for them." "You know the risk," Kelar said. "Yeah, you told me. Souls." Lokri tried hard to keep sarcasm out of his voice, but didn't quite succeed. "You have to understand," Kelar said. "This is not for a night's fun, and it's not for a decade of bond-slavery like Piriag's favorite forfeit. This is forever." The platitude There is no forever came to Lokri's lips, but in his mind was a terrifying image of falling, falling, through the void of space. "Call it blue," he said. Fierin's thin fingers gripped his tightly. The circles whirled, faster than ever, but Lokri watched, feeling the patterns... losing them. Catching them -- losing -- catching -- Hit. He slammed his hand down, then looked up the line. Blue...blue...blue...blue..blue...green-- The crowd yelled. "White," Lokri said. Murmurs around him splintered his attention. He forced them back, concentrating, and again thought he had the pattern, and missed. Kelar laughed, his face cruel. "Give up, Kendrian? Give up?" Lokri tried again, this time letting the house declare the pattern. When he lost for the third time, a strange sense of fatalism settled over him. He squeezed his sister's fingers, feeling her pulse racing under his hand. Kelar's words echoed in his mind. Give up? That must mean there is an exit somewhere...a way out. He looked up. "If I lose, does she go?" Kelar gestured back toward an open door. At eiher side stood two shadowy figures with ready weapons. It was either Lokri or Fieren. He looked down into her face, saw her watching him steadily. Trusting him. He could leave her and try his own escape, or he could -- "Call it," he said. The lights whirled, this time so bright it hurt the eyes. The roars of the gamblers rose to a scream and then died in a weird echo. Lokri felt a cold wind blow against his face, and he staggered, righting himself against a wall. Opening his eyes, he stared straight into one of the flaring torches. He looked down, saw his fingers spread against a stone wall. One hand slipped, leaving a sweat-mark. "Kelar?" He swallowed. "Fierin?" His voice echoed. He was alone. Rage fired through him. He began to run, faltering only a moment when he rounded a corner and saw a short figure in a long robe standing just before a stairway. He recognized the High Phanist. He raised his fist to strike her out of his way, and continued at a dead run toward her. She did not move, not even when he was three strides from her. He was angry enough to bowl her over, but he made the mistake of looking at her face first. Not that she had any arcane powers; she just stood there, very still, but her eyes were steady and humorous and very, very humane. He stopped, lowered his arm, but his hands were still rigid. "Damn you," he said hoarsely, "and damn this chatzing hellhole." "It was not an easy one, I take it?" she said. He glared down at her. "How do you arrange these things?" he snarled. "Do you hire holovid makers? And where," he felt his voice rise and forced it to flatten, "do you get the ghosts?" "You bring the ghosts with you," was the reply. He shook his head, expelling his breath in a strangled sound midway between a laugh and a shout of anger. "Are they all dead, then?" She gestured invitingly, and sat on the next-to-lowest step. "Tell me what you saw." "Ghosts. In your gambling den." Her brows lifted just a little. "You're going to tell me there is no gambling den here." "If you wish..." She left it at that. "What I wish is to be out of here, and free," he said. "And I want to know why my sister was forced into your farce." Her jerked his thumb back over his shoulder. "I don't know anything about your sister," the woman said. "But I would hazard a guess that there is business left undone, perhaps something on her behalf, which you might attend to. Does that strike a chord?" "It strikes a death knell," he said sardonically. "Any business I try to take care of will end with me in the execution dock, for a crime I did not commit." "Ah," she said. "Then there's a question of justice." "There is no justice," he rejoined. "There's power, which buys all the 'justice' it needs. I don't have any power." She pursed her lips, then looked up at him. Her eyes in the flaring torchlight were tired, but very kind. "You are from Torigan, are you not?" He said nothing. "I travelled a great deal between planets when I was a girl," she said. "Torigan has a small population. But there's much wealth there, correct? And the people speak with a distinctive accent." She shook her head slightly. "Never mind. You need tell me nothing." "Then why are you here?" "It seemed the right place to be just now," she replied, smiling. "My clerk reported an angry young man ranging about the corridors down here, probably lost. I wouldn't want you to miss your flight...should you choose to leave Desrien." "'Choose'." He scorned the word. "Well you could stay and become a pilgrim," she said, smiling wider. Pilgrim. It was the word Kelar had used. The echo made the hairs on the back of Lokri's neck prickle, and he knew that he could spend his lifetime denying whatever it was that had happened in that lower-level gambling den, but it had had an effect. There was some kind of power here, something he could not even remotely understand, much less subvert. "Maybe it'll be easier to take my chances with Panarchist notions of justice," Lokri said, leaning against the wall. The woman smiled. "I am not one given to predictions, but from what little you told me, it seems there is a family member important to you who might need your aid. And," she added, frowning a little, "it may transpire she will aid you." "Right," he said, "to the firing squad." "Will you run forever, then?" "The universe is big," he said. "And often leads back to the same path, and the same nexus, to be confronted yet again." He thought of the gambling den, and was silent for a moment. "So," he said finally, "if I do go to Ares -- and face their justice -- do you promise me I'll get out of it alive?" "In the end we get out of nothing alive," she said w ith irony to match his. "And I promise nothing. But I ask you again: will you run for ever?" There was just the faintest emphasis on the last word as she got to her feet. "This way," she said over her shoulder.
|
