The Stone Light Page 2

  The field over which the mummy factory hovered was gone. The soil was churned up as if by an army of invisible giant moles. The glowing net was no longer attached to the underside of the collector, but was unraveled into an immense number of glittering ropes of light and hooks, no one formed like the next. They were all aimed downward, approaching the ravaged ground and pulling something out of it.

  Bodies. Gray, fallen-in corpses.

  “So that’s how they get their mummy soldiers,” whispered Vermithrax, and his voice was faint with the horror of it.

  Merle pulled at his mane. She had averted her eyes, could no longer look at what was taking place before her. “Let’s get out of here!”

  “No!” said the Flowing Queen.

  But Vermithrax had the same feelings as Merle. Just get away from there. Away from the suction of the collector before they themselves ended on one of the glittering hooks and were pulled up into the mummy factory, where slaves and machines would turn them into something that was satisfied by a different kind of life, of submissiveness and obedience and the will to kill.

  “Hold on!” he roared. The Queen objected loudly in Merle’s voice, but the obsidian lion paid no attention to her. In no time his wings raised them into the air. In a daring stratagem, he turned to the east, against the fast-approaching darkness. At the same time he shot forward, careless of all the sunbarks and high priests who might become aware of them at this moment.

  Merle clung so tightly to Vermithrax’s coat that her arms vanished up to the elbows in his mane. She bent deep over his neck, to offer less wind resistance, but also to avoid the shots of the Egyptians. She hardly dared look up, but when she finally did, she saw that half a dozen sunbarks had detached from their formation around the collector and taken up the chase.

  Vermithrax’s plan was as simple as it was suicidal. He had surmised that in the massive body of the collector there must be weapons that could easily shoot a flying lion from the sky. But if he got close to the vicinity of the sunbarks, the commanders on board the collector would perhaps think twice about shooting at a target in the midst of their own people.

  It wouldn’t work, Merle thought. Vermithrax’s plan would have been a good one if they were dealing with ordinary opponents like the ones the winged lion knew from his own times, when he was not yet a prisoner of the Venetian City Guard. But the sunbarks were occupied by mummy soldiers, each of them only too easily replaced, and they would even sacrifice one or two priests.

  Vermithrax cursed when he came to the same conclusion. Only a little way ahead of them, a wooden bolt the length of a man whizzed through the air past them, fired from one of the ports in the collector body. The mummy factory itself was too cumbersome for a pursuit, but its weapons were vicious and long-range.

  Merle felt sick, worse than ever as Vermithrax kept doubling back and maneuvering turns that she would not have believed possible for his heavy stone body. Up and down, often in such quick succession that Merle soon lost any feeling for over and under. Even the Queen was silent with concern.

  Once, Merle looked back. They were now almost at the level of the observation platform. Several figures stood behind the battlement. Merle could see their robes and their grim faces. High priests, she guessed.

  Among them was one who caught her eye especially. He was a good head taller than the others and wore a ballooning cloak that looked as if it were woven of pure gold. His hairless skull was covered with a network of gold-colored filaments, like a jeweler’s engraving on a brooch.

  “The Pharaoh’s vizier,” whispered the Flowing Queen in her head. “His name is Seth. He is the highest priest of the cult of Horus.”

  “Seth? Isn’t that the name of an Egyptian god?”

  “The priests of Horus have never been known for their humility.”

  Merle had the feeling that the eyes of the man were boring into her forehead across the distance. For a heartbeat it seemed to her that the Queen groaned in pain inside her.

  “Everything all right?” she asked.

  “Look away! Please … not into his eyes.”

  At the same moment a whole swarm of bolts rushed over their heads. Two of them struck sunbarks that were quite close to the lion. Smoke billowed from one as it went down in a tailspin of jerky spirals. The other fell like a stone and smashed on the ground in showers of steel splinters. The rest of the sunbarks pulled back a little so as not to be caught in the hail of shots from the collector.

  This was the chance Vermithrax had been waiting for.

  With a wild cry he plunged down. On his back, Merle screeched as the ground shot up toward them. She already saw them lying smashed beside the debris of the bark.

  But a few yards over the rocks, Vermithrax pulled out of the dive, swept across the ground and the edge of a wall of rock, then sank down deep again, behind the wall and out of the collector’s line of fire. Now they had to deal only with the four remaining barks, which would follow them over the rock wall at any moment.

  The Flowing Queen had recovered from the penetrating eyes of the vizier. “I know now why I chose Vermithrax for our flight.”

  “Because you had no other choice.” Merle hardly heard her own words; the headwind tore them from her lips like scraps of paper.

  The Queen laughed in her mind, which was a strange feeling, for it seemed to Merle as though she herself was laughing, entirely without her own effort.

  The lion flew across a labyrinth of ravines before he discovered one that was broad enough to hide in. Shots were striking to the right and left of them, steel bullets this time, fired from barrels in the noses of the sunbarks. But none came close enough to them to be dangerous. Stone fragments were raining on them from all sides. Sparks flew when ricocheting shots skidded over the rock walls and ate furrows in the stone.

  The ravine was not deep, with hardly more than twenty feet or so to the surface level. It narrowed as they went farther into it, the walls just far enough apart so that Vermithrax could fly through at a lower height. Two sunbarks had followed them into the rocky labyrinth, while the other two were gliding over the maze of ravines and lurking, in case the obsidian lion surfaced again. It wasn’t difficult for Vermithrax to fly around sharp corners and curves, while the long sunbarks had to slow down before each bend in order not to crash against the rocks.

  Beneath them the gorge filled with water, the blind arm of a brook or mountain lake. Vermithrax followed its course, and soon they were racing over the surface of a river. The rock walls were farther apart now, offering the sunbarks enough room to maneuver. But Vermithrax’s lead was still too big, and the two barks overhead had not yet discovered the ravine.

  “We cannot keep flying so low if we want to get to the other side of the mountain.”

  “We have to survive first, don’t we?”

  “I am only trying to plan things, Merle. Nothing else.”

  It was hard for Merle to concentrate. Not at this speed, not with death hanging over her. They might have escaped the collector, but the sunbarks were still after them.

  “Vermithrax!” She bent toward the lion’s ear and tried to talk over the noise of the wind. “What do you have in mind now?”

  “Sundown,” he replied shortly. His tone revealed that he was more exhausted than she’d realized. In fact, it hadn’t occurred to her at all that a creature like Vermithrax could also just run out of breath.

  The river under them grew faster. Merle saw that the water no longer glowed red, as it had a few minutes before, but only reflected the shadowy rock walls. Also, the sky had lost its glow and changed to violet blue.

  She felt like screaming with relief. Vermithrax was right, his plan had worked. He’d outsmarted the Egyptians. The sunbarks had vanished. Merle imagined the sickle-shaped flying ships going back to the collector at a creeping pace, crippled by the failing daylight, as useless as pieces of iron salvage.

  The stream became faster, wilder, and above all louder, and soon a crown of white foam rose up before the
m, spreading across the entire span of the water. Behind it there was nothing but darkness.

  With a jubilant cry, Vermithrax raced out over the waterfall, which crashed to the ground about a hundred yards below. The obsidian lion maintained his level so that Merle could look out over the country at the foot of the mountain, over forests and fields slumbering in the darkness of the falling night. The lion slowed his wing beats, but he continued flying forward unswervingly. Merle stared silently at the landscape passing below for a long time before she again addressed the Queen.

  “What do you know about this Seth?”

  “Not much. Followers of the cult of Horus recalled the Pharaoh to life over thirty years ago. Since then they appoint the high priests of the Empire. That means that Seth has been their leader since then.”

  “He didn’t look that old.”

  “No. But what difference does that make?”

  Merle thought about how she could make clear to someone who was timeless like the Queen that a human being’s exterior should give information about his age. When it didn’t, it could mean two things: Either the person was not showing his true face or, though he might look like a human, in reality he was not one. At least not a mortal.

  When Merle showed no sign of answering the question, the Queen went on: “The Horus priests have much power. In truth, they are the ones who steer the fortunes of the Empire. The Pharaoh is only their puppet.”

  “That would mean that Seth, if he is the leader of the priests of Horus and in addition the vizier of the Pharaoh, that he also—”

  “Is the true ruler of Egypt. Indeed.”

  “And the world.”

  “Unfortunately.”

  “Do you think we’ll meet him again?”

  “You should pray that it does not happen.”

  “Pray to the Flowing Queen? The way all Venice is probably doing right now?” She was immediately sorry for the words, but it was already too late.

  In the hours that followed, the Queen was silent and withdrew herself into the farthest corner of Merle’s consciousness, wound into a cocoon of her cool, alien, godly thoughts.

  They crossed the mountains a little bit farther to the east without meeting an adversary again.

  At some point, it must have been after midnight, they saw the other side before them in the gray icy light of the stars, and now finally Vermithrax allowed himself a stop to rest. He landed at the top of an unapproachable needle of rock, just wide enough for him to lie down and for Merle to climb from his back.

  She ached all over. For a while she despaired of ever being able to walk again at all without every step, every bone, every muscle hurting.

  In the darkness she kept looking for signs of pursuers, but she could discover nothing suspicious. Only a predatory bird circled in the distance, a falcon or a hawk.

  No sound came from the broad lands at the foot of the mountain, not once the cry of an animal or the fluttering of the wings of birds. Her heart shrank, and apprehensiveness overwhelmed her. With alarming certainty she realized that there was nothing alive down there anymore. No human beings, no animals. The Egyptians had even abducted the dead, to man their galleys, sunbarks, and war machines.

  She lowered herself down at the edge of the tiny plateau and stared out into the night, lost in thought. “Do you think Lord Light will help us?” It was the first time in hours that she’d addressed the Queen. She didn’t really expect an answer.

  “I do not know. The Venetians treated his messenger badly.”

  “But they didn’t know what they were doing.”

  “Do you think that makes a difference?”

  “No,” said Merle dejectedly. “Not really.”

  “Exactly.”

  “All the same, Lord Light did offer to support Venice in the fight against the Empire.”

  “That was before the Body Guard killed his messenger. Besides, it is not in the nature of humans to enter into a pact with Hell.”

  Merle grinned mirthlessly. “I’ve heard entirely different stories about that. You really don’t know much about us humans.”

  She leaned back and closed her eyes.

  In the year 1833, the English explorer Charles Burbridge had discovered that Hell was anything but an old wives’ tale. It existed as a real, subterranean place in the center of the earth, and Burbridge had led a series of expeditions there. He was the only one to return from the last one. Many of the things he saw and experienced were documented and, up to the beginning of the great war, were taught in school. But there was no doubt that this was only a fragment of his actual discoveries. According to the rumors, the remainder were too dreadful, too shocking, for him to reveal them in public. Therefore, after Burbridge’s last expedition, no one else had dared the descent. Only since the outbreak of the war had new signs of life come up from below, which finally climaxed with Lord Light, the storied ruler of Hell, offering the Venetians his support in the battle against the Pharaoh. But the City Council, in its arrogance and self-satisfaction, refused his help. Merle herself had become a witness when Lord Light’s messenger was murdered in the Piazza San Marco.

  And now Merle, the Flowing Queen, and Vermithrax were on their way to ask Lord Light personally for help, in the name of the people of Venice, not its city councillors. But it was questionable whether—even if their mission were successful—they’d be in time. And who could say anyway that Lord Light wouldn’t do exactly the same to them as had been done to his messenger in Venice?

  But the worst thing was that there was nothing else left for them to try except to climb down into the abyss on Burbridge’s trail. And none of them, not even the Queen, had any idea of what they would find down there.

  Merle opened her eyes and blinked over at the sleeping Vermithrax. She was dog tired herself, but she was still too excited to be able to rest.

  “Why is he helping us?” she whispered thoughtfully. “I mean, you’re the Flowing Queen and somehow a part of Venice—or the other way around. You want to protect what belongs to you. But why Vermithrax? He could simply fly back to his relatives in Africa.”

  “Assuming he would still find them there. The Empire has not only spread to the north.”

  “Do you think the other talking lions are dead?”

  “I do not know,” said the Queen sadly. “Perhaps. Possibly they have just moved farther on, so far away that the Egyptians will not find them for the time being.”

  “And Vermithrax knows that?”

  “Perhaps he surmises it.”

  “Then we’re all he has, right? His only friends.” Merle stretched out a hand and gently stroked one of the lion’s stone paws. Vermithrax purred gently, turned on his side, and stretched all four feet toward her. His jowls fluttered each time he took a breath, and Merle could see that his eyes were twitching under the lids. He was dreaming.

  She pulled her dress more closely around her body to protect her from the cool wind, then snuggled up close to Vermithrax. Again he purred blissfully and began to snore softly.

  The Queen is here, she thought, because she and Venice belong together in some sort of way. One can’t exist without the other. But what about me? Really, what am I doing here?

  Her closest friends, Junipa and Serafin, her master Arcimboldo, and the mermaid Eft, they were all still in Venice, where they were exposed to the dangers of the Egyptian invasion. Merle herself was an orphan. She’d been found in a basket on the canals as an infant and had grown up in an orphanage. Today the thought that she had no parents who might have been concerned about her was, for once, a comforting one.

  Still, it wasn’t that simple. Sometime she’d find out what sort of people her mother and her father had been. Sometime, most certainly.

  Lost in thought, she pulled the magic hand mirror from her pocket. The surface consisted of water that could never leave the mirror, no matter how she held it. Sometimes, when Merle thrust her arm inside it, she could feel her fingers enclosed by those of a gentle, warm hand. The water mirror h
ad lain beside her in the basket when she’d been found. It was the only thing that bound her to her parents. The only clue.

  There was something else in the mirror: a milky veil, which constantly flitted over the surface. The phantom had escaped from one of Arcimboldo’s magic mirrors and settled itself in the small hand mirror. Merle would have been glad to establish contact with it. She only wondered how. Serafin had told her that the phantoms in Arcimboldo’s mirrors were humans from another world who’d succeeded in crossing to this one—without, however, realizing that they appeared here only as phantoms, blurry hazes trapped inside mirrors.

  Serafin … Merle sighed inaudibly.

  She’d hardly begun to know him and then they were separated by the Body Guard of the city councillors. They’d spent only a few hours together, wearing, dangerous hours, in which they’d snatched the crystal vial with the essence of the Flowing Queen from the Egyptian spy. And although they knew so little of each other, she missed him.

  She fell asleep with the thought of his smile, of the roguishness in his eyes.

  In her dreams it seemed to her that she heard the scream of a falcon. She was awakened briefly by a gentle draft of air on her face, the scent of feathers, but there was nothing anywhere near them, and if there had been, it concealed itself in the darkness again.

  2 THE MASTER THIEF

  THE TOWER CLOCKS OF VENICE HAD STRUCK MIDNIGHT long ago. Deep darkness lay over the city and the waters of the lagoon. The streets were empty, nothing was stirring except stray cats hunting their prey, untroubled by the threat of the Empire.

  It was quiet on the bank of the narrow canal, alarmingly still. Serafin sat on the stone curbing and let his feet dangle. The soles of his shoes were a mere handsbreadth above the water. The alley between houses that he’d followed here was narrow and dark; it dead-ended at the water’s edge.

  Not so many hours ago he’d come here with Merle and shown her the reflections on the surface—reflections that might not really be there and were only to be seen between twelve and one o’clock at night. They showed the houses on the bank of the canal, and yet they weren’t reflections of the reality: Some of the windows mirrored in the water were illuminated, although in reality the buildings were abandoned and dark. Now and again something moved, such as the reflections of pedestrians who didn’t exist at all—not in this Venice, the city in which Serafin and Merle had grown up. Instead, there were rumors that a second Venice existed in another world, and perhaps even a dozen or a hundred of them.