THE REFORGED TRILOGY: BOOK 3 — HAMMER OF TIME
Chapter 10: In the Black
“Horrible mistakes are simply life lessons that really wanted to get your attention.”
– Duaal Sinnay (234 PA)
Duaal need not have worried about collecting too many Arcadians in Nanpoor. There were no fairies in the city, only a mob of angry Ixthians and humans. They shouted at Maeve and threatened to call the police if she didn’t leave at once. Unwilling to face Sunjarran law enforcement again, Maeve retreated to the Blue Phoenix. Panna, Duaal and Logan were less eager to leave and followed her into the ship only at a distance. Duaal was still yelling at the crowd as the airlock sealed behind him.
Disappointed and dispirited, they finally returned back to New Hennor, where Duke Ferris waited with the other Arcadians at the edge of the sun-scorched cornfield. The fairies all carried their few meager possessions clutched in stick-thin arms: moth-eaten blankets and near-empty sacks of food, a spare change of clothes and an occasional rainbow-hued shard of glass or cloth brought from their homeworld.
Maeve greeted them at the cargo ramp. It would be a cramped and uncomfortable journey, but when they arrived on Stray, they could begin building a true home. A new kingdom. Maeve repeated her promise as reassuringly as she could manage.
Xia and Gripper escorted each Arcadian to where they would be staying for the next few weeks. Every room of the Blue Phoenix was full, everything that could be made into a bed or table pressed into service. The survival raft had even been patched and covered with a reflective blanket. Panna gave up her room in favor of Duke Ferris. The nobleman thanked her in a perfunctory sort of way that suggested he expected no less. Logan volunteered his own bunk to an old Arcadian woman from the city of Hallipon named A’lanu. Duke Ferris watched Duaal carefully guide A’lanu through the crowded hold and up the stairs.
“That is very kind of you,” the duke said.
Logan shrugged. “I never use it anyway.”
“No, I expect not,” Ferris said. “A man as skilled and dangerous as Logan Coldhand is surely busy at all hours. It is said by some that you do not sleep.”
“You’ve heard of me?”
The Arcadian nobleman gave a noncommittal hum and swept off to look after a pair of younger fairies who were having trouble finding space to lay out their small basket of belongings.
Maeve waited nearby. When Ferris was gone, she stepped close to Logan and kissed his illonium fingertips. Many of the Arcadians stared at them and Maeve tried not to blush.
“It is getting late,” she told Logan, “and we need to leave Sunjarrah. Duaal wants you to copilot the takeoff. We are carrying many more passengers and weight than usual.”
“If he needs the help, sure.”
Logan hurried up the stairs out of the cargo bay and Maeve smiled after him. Whatever else her hunter said, she knew better — Logan was Prian. He loved to fly, even if only as occasional copilot on an old cargo ship.
A shadow fell over Maeve and she stepped back, trying to get out of the way of whoever was pushing their way through.
“A queen should not have to carry messages for a mere ship’s captain,” Duke Ferris said. He hadn’t gone far, it seemed.
“Duaal tried to call to Logan over the intercom,” Maeve told the other fairy, “but it was too loud in here.”
“But your ship has others to…” Ferris struggled to find the word in Aver. “Dryan’ii a nyan’ii. Your duties are greater than those of a simple courier.”
“My duties are whatever need to be done,” Maeve said. “Whatever is required, I will do.”
Ferris bowed his head. “Of course, a’shae.”
He dipped his wings to Maeve and the two of them went back to the cargo ramp to bring in the last of the Arcadians. The sun was rising bright blue-violet over the condemned Sunjarrah settlement. It was time to leave.
Every last spare cenmark collected from the Arcadians and the Blue Phoenix crew had been spent on food and fuel, but by the end of the second week, everyone on board had to skip meals. The fairies were accustomed to going hungry, but they had hoped for more from their new queen.
Tempers frayed and in the close confines of the little freighter, there was no place to get away from each other. There were arguments over food and space, and even a few blows traded. Ferris did an impressive job of smoothing things over, but occasionally had to bring Arcadians to Maeve for a royal decision.
The new queen was not above hiding from Duke Ferris when he came seeking her wisdom. He was older and wiser than Maeve, she reasoned. Ferris was a nobleman, probably raised in the heart of the court. Leadership was considerably harder than doing dishes, or than giving speeches. Let those who were suited to it settle the disputes.
Maeve spotted Duke Ferris at the door to her room. His arms were crossed over his chest and he was accompanied by five Arcadians who stood packed together in the narrow hall. Maeve turned and strode quickly back the way she had come. A’lanu saw her in the corridor, though, and lowered her wingtip to the floor, wincing as her arthritic joints struggled with the deferent gesture.
Maeve moved swiftly past, feeling uncomfortable. She stopped briefly in the mess, but it was crowded with other fairies searching for food or sitting listlessly at the table. Instead, Maeve went to the medbay. The Arcadians were mistrustful of coreworld science and while they didn’t refuse Xia and her medicine, neither were they very comfortable around the Ixthian.
But to Maeve’s shock, there was a pair of other Arcadians in the small medical bay. Both were young, less than a century old. Like Panna, they had been born since the fall of the White Kingdom. These two didn’t even remember their home. One of them — a young man about Panna’s age with his blond hair in a pair of long braids — perched on the edge of Xia’s exam table, holding his right arm gingerly. The Ixthian medic sat on a metal stool, cleaning a painful-looking red burn that extended from the boy’s wrist almost to the singed elbow of his shirt.
“You shouldn’t be practicing fire spells on the ship,” Xia said.
“It’s just magic,” the other Arcadian answered sullenly. “I need to practice.”
She looked a little bit older than the boy with the burnt elbow and wore her hair the same way. At least, she used to — now one of the braids was gone, burned away with no more than a few blackened strands left in its place. Soot smudged her face as if the girl had fallen into ink.
Maeve paused in the doorway, struggling to remember the two younger fairies’ names. Malla and… Hanno? No, Hannu. They were brother and sister, but their parents were not among those Arcadians on the Blue Phoenix.
“Fire is fire,” Xia told the pair. “It consumes oxygen and we don’t have that much to spare. If you must practice, please no fire or lightning.”
Malla started to roll her eyes, but caught sight of Maeve halfway through and jerked upright.
“Your Highness,” she gasped.
Hannu sat up straighter on the exam table and tried to pull his hand from Xia’s grasp, but the Ixthian was much larger and had six silver fingers wrapped around the boy’s wrist. He had to settle for inclining his head, cheeks flaming. Xia looked up, too, and smiled at Maeve.
“I thought I was done with this sort of thing,” she said. “Duaal doesn’t butcher his spells anymore.”
“No,” Maeve agreed. “He has become a great mage.”
“That’s the human man who captains this ship, isn’t it?” Hannu asked. “The Hyzaari?”
Maeve nodded. “He used to burn himself, as well. And much of the ship. There is a spot on the ceiling of the hold that still bears the scars of his younger days. That was before Gripper put his planters in.”
“Did you teach him, Highness?” Malla asked. She tugged self-consciously on the remains of her burnt braid.
“No,” Maeve said. “I know only a few charms. I was a knight, not a spell-singer.”
“But I thought that…” Hannu trailed off, blushing even brighter.
“What?” Maeve asked.
Malla exchanged a look with her brother that suggested there was a good smack in store for him as soon as there was no royalty watching.
“We heard that the queen–” Malla began then corrected herself. “That is, Xartasia… Sir Calathan said that she is a great mage. We assumed you were, too.”
“You spoke to Calathan?”
“No,” Hannu said. “Not ourselves, at least. But we heard him in Rassinmar, before he came to New Hennor.”
“It’s a good thing you were more eloquent, Maeve,” Xia said. She finished cleaning his burnt arm and wrapped it in soft white gauze.
Malla and Hannu looked at each other again. This time, it was the fairy girl who colored. Maeve cocked her head.
“What is it?” she asked the younger Arcadians.
“Nothing,” Malla mumbled.
“Tell me, please.”
“Well… We’re very glad to be here, Your Highness,” Malla said in a rush, the words running together like spilled paint. “But we… we would have gone to Xartasia if we had been allowed. Most of the others in Rassinmar went to Xartasia, but Sir Calathan wouldn’t take us.”
“Why not?” Maeve asked.
“He said that we were too young,” Hannu answered. “Anyone born in the core isn’t welcome in the White Queen’s court.”
Maeve scowled. Was her cousin truly so cold? Would Xartasia really turn away the youngest of their people just because they had never known the green grass and endless blue skies of Arcadia? Maeve supposed she should be grateful, whatever Xartasia’s reasons might be. Hannu and Malla were here on the Blue Phoenix because of them.
“Listen to Xia,” Maeve said. “I am glad you are practicing the charm songs. There are so few spell-singers left among our people. But do avoid fire and lightning while we are in flight.”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Malla and Hannu answered.
Xia checked over her work and then released Hannu. He and his sister lowered their wings toward Maeve and edged around the medbay to the door. The siblings vanished quickly down the fibersteel corridor, whispering behind their wings.
“Do you think they will listen?” Maeve asked.
“Did Duaal?” Xia asked as she cleaned up the supplies she used on Hannu’s burn. She replaced the remaining gauze and sighed. The cupboards were looking more than a little bare.
“Not to me, perhaps, but Duaal listens to you,” Maeve said.
The Ixthian laughed. “Really? I hadn’t noticed.”
Maeve closed the medbay door. She didn’t want Ferris walking past and noticing his wayward queen.
“Since Prianus,” she said. “You and Duaal grew very close while we were there.”
“Yes.” Xia locked the supply cabinets. “I suppose we did.”
“What happened after?” Maeve asked. “You are no longer…”
She wasn’t exactly sure how to say it, but Xia seemed to understand. The Ixthian peeled her gloves off, went to the sink and began scrubbing her hands. She had no fingernails, Maeve noticed for the first time — all twelve digits came to smooth, soft tips. They looked fragile, but Maeve doubted that they actually were. The Ixthians were too large to sustain a proper exoskeleton, but their insectoid heritage had made their skin nearly as resilient as one. In a test of strength, Maeve’s short, unpainted fingernails would lose out against Xia’s smooth silver skin.
“No, Duaal and I aren’t seeing each other any longer,” she said. The doctor looked down at the soap on her hands rather than face Maeve’s curious gray eyes. “He just outgrew me, I suppose. Duaal needed someone to take care of him, but that’s a boy’s need. He’s a man now.”
Maeve was sorry she asked.
“That must be painful,” she said.
“It’s not so bad, really,” Xia answered with a shrug. She dried her hands and smoothed back her white hair. “Duaal has his work and I have mine. We all do what we have to, Maeve.”
“Did you love him?”
Now Xia actually turned to Maeve and smiled.
“Not like you love that hard-hearted bounty hunter of yours,” she said. “I’ve been meaning to ask you about that.”
“You are changing the subject,” Maeve objected.
“Only because I’m legitimately curious,” Xia said. “And a little concerned. You really should bring him in for some tests. Logan’s human — they’re a resilient species. And he’s Prian, too. He could be carrying a dozen diseases that he doesn’t even know about. Arcadian immune systems just aren’t up to that sort of challenge.”
“Oh.” Maeve hadn’t thought of that. “That seems wise.”
Xia sat on the corner of the exam table and propped her elbows up on her long, thin legs. “And that’s only one factor of biology.”
Maeve wanted to hide behind her wings, but that wasn’t very queenly. She put her hands on her hips.
“Ixthian males are smaller than their females,” Maeve pointed out, remembering her embarrassing conversation with Panna. “But Duaal is nearly as tall as you are!”
Xia’s teeth flashed in a smirk. “True, but not what I was saying. Humans and Arcadians share a lot of genetics, but not enough. You and Logan can’t have children. Not naturally and maybe not ever.”
“I know.”
“Doesn’t that bother you?” Xia asked when Maeve said nothing else. “You can never have a family with him.”
“I have not given it much thought,” Maeve admitted. “It seems so unlikely we will live long enough for such concerns. With everything else going on, it hardly seems important.”
“With so few Arcadians left,” Xia countered, “maybe you should be considering your population a little more seriously.”
Maeve lied that she would and then fled the medical bay.
“Can you hand me the um… the… um…”
“What do you need?” Logan asked.
“The U-wrench,” Gripper squeaked.
Logan found it on the bottom tier of the toolbox and handed it up to the Arboran. Gripper’s arm vanished up to the shoulder into the vent.
“Even the heavy filters just can’t handle this much feather fluff,” he muttered. “I need to install a five gauge.”
Gripper grunted and pulled the filter out, maneuvering it carefully free of the duct. The mesh was entirely covered in fine white down like snow. Logan passed up a new one and Gripper’s tongue poked out from between his teeth as he examined the new filter. He sighed.
“This kind is for the rear vents. I’ll need to cut it down to size,” Gripper said. He climbed down and began making measurements. He hesitated and looked at Logan. “I… You can go, if you want. I know the captain asked you to help out, but–”
“It’s fine,” Logan answered. He held the filter frame steady as Gripper marked out the cuts with a stick of blue wax. “Maeve’s busy and there isn’t much piloting to be done while traveling SL. Duaal can manage that on his own.”
“Oh.” Gripper chewed his lip as he worked. “We only have a few more of these. Getting to Stray before we all choke on feathers is going to be close.”
Logan nodded, but Gripper wasn’t looking. Instead, the young alien sat cross-legged down on the metal floor, hunched over his work and muttering numbers to himself. Gripper’s large, powerful muscles bunched beneath his oil-stained shirt, knotted and tense-looking. Logan was silent for a moment before he spoke.
“You’re still upset about the Oslain’ii,” he said.
Gripper flinched and didn’t even try to protest.
“Yeah, I am,” he said. “I know I shouldn’t be. They were trying to shoot us and all, but I never wanted to…”
Gripper sighed and took a laser cutter from the dented green toolbox. He flicked it on with a massive thumb and began cutting, wielding the tool with a delicacy that surprised Logan. The fine red beam sliced easily through the filter’s metal frame.
“You didn’t know,” Logan said. “You were just doing what I told you to.”
“I know.” Gripper turned off the laser and picked a file from his case. “The raw edges will tear up the duct lining if I don’t smooth them down some. I told myself that it was your fault. For a while.”
“I was sixteen the first time I killed someone,” Logan said.
He leaned against the wall beneath the open vent and crossed his arms under the small of his back, making his cybernetic arm scrape along the bulkhead.
“Young, but not as young as some on Prianus,” Logan said. “Jess was flying with a gang in those days. The Harrowhawks. Getting her out came down to a duel with her leader. I was too young and too broke to have a bird of my own, but Vorus loaned me his.”
“Vorus?” Gripper asked. The file in his hand wasn’t moving.
“My teacher. He ran the palaestrum where I spent most of my time. Vorus taught me to fight and how to fly a bird. A blue-banded falcon named Bella. On my command, she tore out the Harrowhawk boy’s throat. His hawk gave me this.”
Logan tugged the collar of his shirt down and showed Gripper a set of three faded lines that ran over his right collarbone. They were pale now, but had been livid red for more than a year after the duel.
“And then she went with you?” Gripper asked. “The girl?”
“Jess. Yes, she did. A few years later, we were engaged.”
“To a girl from a gang?”
Logan pulled his shirt back into place. “Everyone on Prianus flies with a gang at some point in their life. Even the cops. You don’t survive long alone.”
“So… are you saying I’m like the hawk?” Gripper dropped the file back into his toolbox. “That I just followed your orders? But I’m not dumb, Coldhand. I should have figured it out, what we were doing. I just didn’t.”
“You’re not an animal,” Logan said. His voice was harder than he meant it to be. “We love our birds, but they’re just animals. They just follow commands and kill when told.”
“I don’t get it.”
“You’re right, Gripper. You could have figured out that we were towing the Oslain’ii into the star,” Logan said. He lifted the cut-down filter and held it out. “But would it have changed what you did? Would you still have done it?”
Gripper didn’t take the filter.
“I had to!” he said. “That pilot was trying to kill us!”
“So?” Logan asked. “One of us was going to die. But you got to decide which one. Choosing yourself is a legitimate option, Gripper. You could have died instead of becoming a killer. Plenty make that choice, even on Prianus. Not everyone has it in them to fight. But you did.”
“I… I had to,” Gripper answered quietly. “We have to stop the Devourers, Coldhand. We’re trying to save the whole galaxy here.”
“And by taking out the Oslain’ii, you saved Maeve, for which I’ll always be grateful. We can’t remake our choices. We live with the consequences of our actions and they make us who we are. We can only hope that we help more than we hurt.”
Gripper finally accepted the filter and climbed up to wedge it into place.
“Yeah. I guess so,” he said. The Arboran’s voice echoed in the duct. “Hey… Thanks, Logan.”
It was strange to hear his given name from the Arboran. It made Gripper seem older, somehow, but Logan doubted that it was just the sound of his name. Death changed a person, one way or the other. He and Gripper finished their work in silence.
“Queen Maeve, Dellan requests an audience.”
The Blue Phoenix wasn’t large enough to avoid Ferris forever. Maeve sat at the dinner table with her chin in her hands. Lunch sat half-eaten in her bowl, a rehydrated salad made from Gripper’s emergency stores. Maeve’s stomach growled.
“Yes, I would be happy to see him,” she lied.
Duke Ferris bowed and went to get Dellan while Maeve finished her salad in a few large, hasty bites. But before she could take her empty bowl to the sink, an Arcadian woman swept it away. Another swiftly polished the table clean with a dish towel. Clean as the old table got, at least. Maeve thought it might have been Malla, but the girl was gone again in a moment.
Panna stepped through the door that led up to the cockpit. She looked around the mess and then squeezed through to take a seat next to Maeve.
“It sure is crowded in here,” she said. “What’s going on?”
“Audiences,” Maeve grumped. “I am not even permitted to do my own dishes. And Dellan wishes to speak with me, apparently.”
“Well, I’ve told you that a queen can’t do dishes,” Panna said. “You don’t think King Illain did the laundry, do you? That was probably some nyad’s job.”
Maeve had no answer to that. Duke Ferris returned a moment later, leading Dellan, a middle-aged man who walked with his head down. He held one of his wings out at a stiff angle from his body and did his best to lower them before the dinner table where his queen sat. Maeve felt ridiculous.
“A’shae,” Duke Ferris said. His expression was pinched with disapproval. “Dellan has asked to speak with you alone.”
“Of course,” Maeve answered. She couldn’t imagine why Ferris objected and didn’t feel like asking. She looked around at the other fairies filling the room. “Will you please give us just a moment?”
Panna stood, too, and filed out with Ferris and the rest. When they were gone, Dellan rose slowly.
“Vaelin, a cerri,” he said. Thank you, my queen.
“Ai’li eru Aver?” Maeve asked. Do you speak Aver?
Dellan shook his head. “No, Highness. I never learned.”
It wasn’t uncommon. How many fights between Arcadians and the coreworlders had started because they couldn’t communicate? If Maeve was really a queen, could she change that? Institute some sort of… educational program? All the Alliance worlds had contributed to Aver and then learned the common language. Maybe the fairies could, too.
But was Maeve truly a queen at all? Her sudden monarchy was not out of any ability or sense of obligation, but because Panna and Duaal were sure that it was the only way to thwart Xartasia. Playing queen didn’t actually mean that Maeve could change anything.
Maeve realized she hadn’t been listening to a word Dellan said. She sighed and apologized.
“Please say that again.”
“It is Gael,” Dellan said. The man was upset — his hands clasped before him so hard that the knuckles had turned pale — but it didn’t seem to be directed at Maeve. “He has never… He is my friend, but Gael lost his whole family at the fall. He takes Deep–” The name was spoken in heavily accented Aver. “–to forget. He falls asleep for days at a time. Please, my queen… Can you help him?”
“Me?” Maeve asked. She sat up and banged her elbow painfully into the table’s edge. “How can I help him?”
“Speak to Gael, Your Highness. I beg you. He is here on your ship so he must believe in you, in the new kingdom that you promise. If you ask him to stop, maybe he finally will.”
“I… can try,” Maeve said uncertainly. “Where is he now?”
“There is one of the closets, full of cleaning things. It is small and dark and no one seems to go there much. Gael sleeps there when he has taken too much.”
Maeve nodded and stood. Dellan bowed and then followed her from the mess. The corridor outside was still crowded by those banished from the room. Ferris and Panna began to walk with her, but Maeve waved them off. The old duke gave her another disapproving look, but Panna just shrugged and returned to the mess.
Maeve and Dellan made their way through the Blue Phoenix to a small door just down the hall from the medbay. The tiny closet was all that remained of the larger storage room that had been converted for Xia’s use. Maeve knocked on the gray metal door, but there was no answer.
The medical bay door slid open and Xia’s head poked out, silver antennae arched. “Anything wrong?”
“Maybe. Did you see anyone go in here?” Maeve asked.
Xia shook her head. “The closet? No. But I’ve been redprinting all of the new blood samples. I only heard you knocking because I was already on my way out.”
Maeve held her breath and opened the closet door. There were shelves of bleach and hylox, all marked with peeling and yellowed labels. The lower shelves held boxes of sponges and a splitting mycolar bag full of old rags. At the bottom of the closet was the curled-up shape of an Arcadian, his limbs drawn close and wings wrapped tightly around his skinny body.
Dellan let out a low, unhappy moan.
Xia emerged from her medbay and gasped when she saw Gael. “We need to get him out of there. What happened?”
“He has been taking Deep,” Maeve said.
With Xia’s help, she managed to pull the unconscious man from the closet and carry him to the medbay. His limbs were tightly contorted, knotted up like rope. Xia peeled back Gael’s eyelids and shined a penlight across his dilated pupil.
Maeve looked up at Xia. “Can you wake him?”
“You say he’s been taking Deep, right?” Xia asked. She went to the computer attached to the wall and slid her fingers across the keyboard. “Deoxyhexabromine, street name Deep or Deepblack. Yes, I can wake him up.”
Xia unlocked one of the medbay cabinets and withdrew an air needle. Muttering to herself, the Ixthian selected a vial of something as yellow as butter. She added a few drops of a thicker blue substance and then shook the vial. The whole thing turned a bright orange as the chemicals reacted inside. Xia slid it into her air injector and pressed the device against the inside of Gael’s elbow.
Within seconds, his arms and legs began to uncurl. Dellan held Gael’s bony hand and he whispered something into his friend’s ear. Gael’s eyes finally fluttered open. One of them was dim and cloudy, but the other fixed on Maeve. He struggled to rise, but Xia pushed him gently down again.
“Relax,” she said. Gael looked up at the Ixthian with fear and no comprehension.
“Anlae,” Maeve repeated in Arcadian. Gael didn’t seem to speak Aver, either. “Dellan asked us for help. He is worried about you.”
Gael’s eye flicked toward Dellan. There was a mixture of anger and gratitude there. Dellan ducked his head and would only look at Maeve.
“Dellan worries too much,” Gael said. His voice was roughened by too much sleep. “I am fine, Your Majesty.”
“You are using Deep to forget.” Maeve took Gael’s hand and tried to summon some sort of queenly bearing. This was just like giving one of her speeches. “We have all lost so much. The Arcadians can only fly forward from that together. That cannot be done from the darkness of a closet or the deeper dark of a drugged haze. Dellan is here. I am here. Fly with us, not away.”
“You are my queen,” Gael said.
There was respect in his voice, but disbelief, too. He didn’t think Maeve understood any of it.
“I have taken more White and drunk more narcohol than the most dedicated human inebriate,” she told the other Arcadian. “There is so much pain that I want to forget, Gael. That I would gladly cut out of my own life and flesh if I had a blade sharp enough. I know the skies you fly now.”
Gael swallowed hard. He squeezed his eyes shut and nodded slowly.
“Yes, my queen,” he said.
“Do you have more of it?” Dellan asked. “Of the Deep?”
The other Arcadian man’s jaw clenched, but he nodded again. “It is in the closet where I slept, wrapped up in the rags. What will you do with it?”
“We will destroy it,” Maeve said. “No one here needs it anymore.”
Gael drew a shuddering breath and visibly steeled himself.
“Yes,” he agreed. “Destroy it before I beg for more.”
