The Immortal Storm (Sky Chaser Book 1) (5 page)

9
Trust

“The Starmaker made the constellations and planets come closer. The Moon with its seas and craters. Cronian with its hundreds of rings. At night when it was clear I'd go down to harbour and look out over the lake and the stars would sparkle on the water like millions of little diamonds. So many stars. I couldn't count them all. I was floating in the sky. Have you ever seen the stars, Kite Nayward?”

Kite shook the diamond-like stars from his mind. The bothy was cool and quiet. He blushed foolishly. Here he was again, alone once more, listening to Ember’s little voice. Drawn to her secrets like a moth to a flame. He should have been down in the market with Ersa trying to sell the mechanikin like he promised himself he would. So much for no more stories.

“No skyless has seen the stars in a thousand years,” Kite said, bitterly. “No one’s seen the sun either. Only the Weatherens can. Thanks to their weather machine, it keeps the Undercloud away from their pretty little city.”

“The weather machine,” Ember said. “Yes, that’s it.”

Kite realised the voice repeated each new word and phrase in the same, deliberate fashion. Maybe that was her way of remembering.

“So this Cloud Room is some kind of observatory?” Kite said.

“The observatory, yes, yes!” said Ember, excitedly. “High on the hill, overlooking Skyzarke harbour. I remember it now. But we must be careful, Kite Nayward.
He
is in the Cloud Room.
He
is always watching.”

“The Starmaker?” Kite asked.

“No, the one who betrayed the Starmaker,” Ember said, lowering her voice to a whisper. “He must never find me. If he does I swear I will die.”

Kite was taken aback. There was real fear in Ember’s words. “Don’t worry you’re safe here.”

“Nowhere is safe from the Umbrella Man,” Ember said.

Kite scratched at his scalp. He was beginning to lose track of all the new terms spilling from the mechanikin’s tiny lips. “You mean one of those wierdos from Rainchester?” he asked.

“No, Kite Nayward,” Ember said. “The Umbrella Man was sent from Fairweather to find me. The Umbrella Man is alive but does not have a soul. The Umbrella Man breathes but does not have lungs. The Umbrella Man thinks but does not have a mind.”

“That sounds like a Weatheren alright,” Kite said.

“
Arcus said all Weatherens are machines,” said Ember, solemnly reciting the Starmaker’s wisdom. “And any machine with a mind can be controlled. Any machine with a mind can be destroyed.”

“You're sounding like Ersa,” Kite said. He did his best Ersa voice. “The Weatherens are all controlled by the Correctors, boy. You can’t trust a Weatheren, boy. Quit your daydreaming, boy!”

Ember burst into a clumsy wild giggle. “Is Ersa your mother?” she asked.

“The Waste Witch?!” Kite snorted. “Not likely. We're Askian's that's all, we're -”

Ember gasped in surprise. “You are Askian?” she said.

Before Kite could reply, before he realised what he’d said, a dry wind blew against his back, rippling the curtain.

“I knew you couldn't be trusted, boy.”

Kite jumped to his feet. The Waste Witch stood in the open loading doors, her face in shadow. He had no idea how long had she been standing there. How much she’d heard.  A silence stretched between them, punctured by the vein pulsing in his temples. Then he found his voice.

“I-it’s silver, Ersa,” Kite said, hoping the mention of profit might calm her. “I was going to sell it.”

“You are going to sell me?!” The mechanikin squealed.

Kite ignored Ember’s protests. “It’s worth thousands,” he said. “A dealer from Port Howling said so.”

Ersa lowered her bags to the mat. Then she shook the dust from her wind-wild mane. “And I thought you had brains, boy,” she said. “What do you think will happen when this dealer learns Askians are hiding in Dusthaven?”

Kite had forgotten about that. The Foundation’s fat reward. A thousand royals for any information about the whereabouts of Askians.

Ersa breathed heavily. “We’ll have to leave,” she said. “Can’t stay here now. Too dangerous. This Weatheren junk'll give us away for sure.”

“I am not
junk
!” Ember said, her eye flickering angry purple. “Kite Nayward, tell her I am not junk!”

Ersa was aghast. “You told it our name?” she said. “After all these years haven't you learned
anything
. ”

The mechanikin began mimicking in a cruel, cackling voice. “Haven't you learned anything, boy? Quit your daydreaming, boy! You can’t trust a Weatheren, boy!”

Every word from the mechanikin’s cerametal lips was a hook in Kite skin. He bundled the mechanikin into his bag, desperate to silence the voice. Ersa turned away from him.

“And you wonder why I don’t trust you with our secrets,” she said, her words thick with disappointment. “I can't even trust you with our safety.”

Kite’s jaw locked with emotion. He wanted to say something back. Something defiant. But the words had knotted in his throat, sour and hot as bile. He pulled on his patchcoat and pushed out in to the wind, dragging the loading door shut behind him.

10
Stars

“Kite Nayward?”

The boot-sized lump of flint wavered in Kite’s hands. The mechanikin’s body seemed frail as glass lying on the chalk. One swift blow should be enough to smash it. Silver and brass for salvage and that would be that. No real harm done. He'd get a week of cold silences, but the Waste Witch would forgive him eventually. Like when he got into fights with the rivetboys and nearly lost his hood.

“Answer me, Kite Nayward.”

Kite continued to ignore Ember’s voice. Ersa was right, he'd made a big mistake telling it those things. So what was he waiting for?

“Kite Nayward?”

The rock shook in Kite’s hands. He had to do it. What choice did he have?

“You're scaring me, Kite Nayward.”

Kite closed his eyes. That voice again. Somehow he knew no machine could sound that afraid.

“Who are you really?” he said. “Did the Foundation send you?”

“No!” Ember cried. “I hate the Foundation.”

“Then what are you?” Kite demanded.

The mechanikin quietly buzzed for a moment. “Ember is Ember,” she said eventually.

How could he smash something that knew what it was? It would be killing and Kite knew he was no killer. With a heavy sigh he tossed the flint aside and slumped against the chalk boulder.

“Kite Nayward?”

Kite managed a grunt in response and stared down at Dusthaven's metal sprawl. He often made the climb up here, up the ancient steps carved into the chalk cliff. Near the top, in the hollows, where the storm wind made the cliffs moan, he would sit and plot his escape.

“I thought you were going to leave me,” Ember said, sounding relieved and sad all at once. “Just like Arcus. Just like Pazu and Clara. Sooner or later, they all leave me.”

Kite booted a stone and listened to it clatter crack all the way down to the boulders below.

“You are angry,” Ember said. “Do not worry, Kite Nayward. I get angry too.”

He
was
angry. Angry with himself for getting into this daft situation in the first place. Angry because Ersa still thought so little of him after all these years. What did he care? He wasn't her son. The only thing keeping them together was the fear of being alone. But loneliness didn't frighten him as much these days. He was older now. He could take care of himself.

“Back in the bothy you mentioned a name,” he said. “Sky's Ark?”

“You do not know of it? Skyzarke is the great city,” Ember said, excitedly. “The city of the Askians.”

Kite was dumbstruck. He snatched up the mechanikin. “The city of the Askians? That’s where you’re from?” he asked.

“Yes, Kite Nayward,” replied Ember.

Kite’s hands had begun to shake. “Where is this Skyzarke, Ember?” he said.

“Arcus said Skyzarke could always be found north of south,” Ember said.

“Everything's north of the Old Coast,” Kite asked.
“How far north?”

Ember fell silent as if thinking hard about her answer. “I cannot  remember,” she said, sounding fretful.

“Try and remember, Ember,” Kite said, through gritted teeth.

“I am trying, Kite Nayward,” said Ember. “But everything takes much longer to remember these days. Especially things I must never forget. Important things that Arcus told me.”

Kite grunted with frustration.

“Promise me you will take me to Skyzarke, Kite Nayward,” Ember said.

Kite stared across the tops of the containers and twisting, creaking turbines, all stained with a twilight ink. The Undercloud rolled low over the clifftops and the spread of the Thirsty Sea, all the way to the flickering smear of the horizon. He imagined a city beyond the Undercloud. A place of others just like him. Could such a place exist?

“Don't you want to see the stars, Kite Nayward?” Ember asked.

Kite clambered to his feet and stuffed the mechanikin back into his bag. He was willing to bet the mechanikin’s silver that Ersa knew about Skyzarke. She must have kept it from him. Just like she’d kept everything else about the Askians secret.

“Stars are for Weatherens,” he said and set off for the bothy.

11
A Bad Memory

Kite dragged the loading bay door closed on the chill night air, but he didn't bolt it shut.

“You got rid of that thing, boy?” Ersa said.

Without a word Kite walked passed Ersa's chair to his corner, not even daring to look at her. If he did he feared his resolve might crumble and with it the decision he'd made on his way down the cliff path. One he should have made years ago.

“What are you doing, boy?” Ersa said.

“Leaving,” Kite said, hastily rolling his bedding.

“Leaving?” the Waste Witch said, mocking him. “You're a bigger fool than I thought, boy.”

Kite bunched his fists. “I don't care what you think,” he said.

“Don't you talk back to me,
boy
,” Ersa warned him, her bone-hand tightening on her stick.

“I'm not a boy!” Kite snapped, louder and angrier than he'd intended.

Ersa snatched her stick. “You're not too old for this you know!” she said. “
Boy
.”

Kite shook his fists. Something gave and a tide anger burst from him. “I'm sick of it!” he roared. “Sick of hiding. Sick of being afraid. Sick of you treating me like your slave all the time!”

Perhaps a little afraid of him now Ersa became quiet, the stick shaking in her old hand. Maybe she was wondering how she'd cope on her own with her boy to ferry her about the Thirsty Sea.

“You're being stupid,” Ersa said. “Where will you go? Where can you go?”

“North,” he said. “To Skyzarke.”

Ersa stared at him. No laughs, no stabbing comments, just a lingering silence broken the hiss and spit of the stove fire. Eventually Ersa asked him, “How could you know that name?”

A hot rush of bitterness made Kite purse his lips. “The mechanikin told me,” he said stiffly.

Ersa frowned. “Impossible,” she said.

“It’s a city,” Kite said, keen to show off his new-found knowledge. “Of the Askians. In the North.”

Ersa seemed startled that he knew this much. She lowered herself into her creaking chair, seemingly overcome. “Skyzarke is more than a city,” she said. “It's a very bad memory for our people. One that is best forgotten.”

Slowly Kite's anger ebbed away. “But the city exists?” he asked.

Ersa glanced away. “Skyzarke exists,” she said, but Kite knew Ersa wasn’t telling him everything.  “If that thing of yours knows of Skyzarke then it can only be Patriarch technology.
Old
technology, from before the war. The Foundation are always looking for it. To steal it. To learn from its secrets.”

Kite had a sick feeling in his belly. He’d always known Ember was something more than just an old toy and now he knew for sure. “They dug the mechanikin out of the Thirsty Sea,” he said, soberly. “That's why the Weatheren had saved it.”

Ersa gazed emptily into the corners of the bothy, fingering the necklace of illicit buttons. Then she took her stick and slowly stood. “Get the sandboat ready, boy,” she said, wheezing from the effort. “We’ve got to find out where it came from.”

12
The Tunnel

The Savages had left nothing of the
Monitor
.
Patches of oil-soaked sand and a line of soft humps at the crater's edge were all that remained. Graves? Somehow he couldn't imagine Gutter Savage burying Weatheren soldiers. More than likely the Thirsty Sea was doing its wind-blown work, swallowing up what the Old Coast had no use for.

Ghostly dust devils corkscrewed across the dune-tops, dissolving on the wind in a furious dance. The night shadows made for hard, dangerous navigating but Kite had the Weatheren’s map to orient himself by. Before long the sandboat reached Hurts Deep where he'd first seen the
Monitor
crouching in the dunes.

Once he’d moored the sandboat he offered Ersa a hand.

“I can manage,” Ersa said, waving him away.

Kite nodded and went on ahead. Something had changed between them. He could tell. But he wasn't sure he was ready for it.

With a spike of light from a tar-lamp he could make out the grooves left by the
Monitor
's haunches. Bootprints led him the short distance from there to the edge of a ragged gash in the seabed.

“See anything?” Ersa said.

Hurts Deep seemed to suck all the light from the guttering tar-lamp. Granules of sand spun in a pool of oil-black darkness. Slowly Kite's eyes adjusted to gloom. He began to make out fissures and ledges and wriggling tufts of tindergrass. Deeper Kite could make out some kind of structure, traversing across the trench, north to south. Not a wreck but a colossal concrete tube, wide as two containers shunted end to end.

“Some kind of tunnel by the looks of it,” he said. A dry smell of decay rose on the swirling wind. The smell of bones and ghosts. He handed Ersa the tar-lamp. “I’ll take a look.”

Kite looped a rope under sandboat's front axle and then tied it across his ribs with a stopper knot. The edge of the trench crumbled under his boots as he leaned out. The sandboat creaked but held his weight. A few sharp breaths and he began to climb down.

Ersa shuffled to the edge, helpfully holding the tar-lamp. “Watch yourself,” she called down. “If you fall and break your neck I'll have to walk back.”

Either side of his rope the trench curved into darkness. For once Kite was glad of the lightning. His stark shadow imprinted on the rocks, picking out the route the Weatherens had taken.

Eventually Kite reached the broken crown of the tunnel. Down here, out of the wind, the air seemed thicker and full of that same dead dry smell. Kite dragged the scarf over his nose and crouched, squinting into opening made by the Weatheren's drilling equipment.

Lightning picked out the curve of tunnel, its ventilation ducts and dead lanterns, all encrusted with thick grey dust. Two sets of rusted train tracks ran parallel. Kite picked his way down the slab and into the tunnel, venturing  beyond the cone of half-light. A solemn row of triple-decker carriages sat on the tracks further in.

Dozens of Weatherens had been left where they'd fallen on the side of the tracks. Their shrunken bodies nothing more than papery bundles. Most were intact, lying face down while others lay in torment, clawing at their throats. Not all had died in the crash. Something else had stolen their lives.

Kite brought out the mechanikin and roused Ember from her sleep. “Tell me about the train,” Kite said.

“Mindless thing, noisy,” said Ember, and she giggled too-loud in the shadows. “I think it broke.”

“Why were you with the Weatherens?” Kite said, staring at the parched bodies.

“Clara's father was a Commodore or an General, a something anyway,” Ember said. “I had to very careful what I said when I was with Clara.”

Recent footprints had scuffed up the pale dust. Kite traced the scientist's tracks to an open carriage door. Bones lay scattered there.

“So what happened to Clara?” Kite said.

“Clara she went everywhere with him. Or tried too. He was always too busy. She told me you see. Oh Ember, Father's always busy. Poor Clara.”

Kite stopped. One of the bodies was a child, a Weatheren girl in a rag dress with her straw-colour hair still knotted into a pretty plait. Her hollow face was all papery, mouth broken in terror.

“Poor stupid Clara,” Ember hissed. “Spoilt stupid Weatheren girl. Frightened of being underground, frightened of being left alone. I hate her.”

Kite shivered, his skin tightening. The tunnel had become colder somehow. “What happened to the train, Ember?” he said.

“Didn't you hear me? I told you, it broke,” Ember said, irritably. “Poor Clara, all alone in the dark. In the noise and panic and the coughing. Not sure why they coughed, but they did and then they all went to sleep. Clara too.”

Kite couldn't look for long. He'd seen bodies aplenty but something about that dead girl's expression set his blood ice cold.

Toys were scattered nearby, recently tossed from a flowery carry case. A music box, an wooden abacus and a number of books. His scavvy instinct tallied their value. Twenty for the abacus. Ten each for the books.

Kite crouched by the music box. He hinged the lid open. A little porcelain dancer popped up, balanced on a little plinth.  Forty royals. Sixty if it worked.  He wound the brass key. The dancer began to turn. Music tinkled out, eerie in the dust and the shadows. The music seemed familiar somehow.

“I hate that tune,” Ember said. “Clara would always play it...”

Ersa had been right. There was treasure everywhere. Shiny objects flickered with each quick angry flash from the Undercloud. Necklaces slithering against papery throats, watches loose on brittle bone wrists. All within easy reach. His for the taking.

Kite picked up the music box. Any scavvy would fill his pockets. Who cares if these were Weatherens...

The dead-eyed skulls stared back at him. Clara, silently shrieking.

Suddenly Kite couldn’t breathe. Panicking he dropped the music box, leaving the tune tinkling in the shadows. He scrambled out of the tunnel, shoving Ember into the bag. He gagged on the stink of death. Dread stuck to his skin like grease.

Kite climbed, dragging himself out of the grave as if he'd been the one buried down there. At the top he crawled to a safe distance and sat with his back against a boulder. Only then did the dread seem to fade.

The Waste Witch waited patiently for him to speak. Though the horror had passed he couldn't stop shivering. Eventually he summoned the courage to tell her what he'd found.

“That thing is more than just a dead girl's toy,” Ersa said. “If the Foundation wants it then it's dangerous. And that is makes it worth more than any heap of skymetal.”

Kite slowly got to his feet. “The Weatherens'll come back for it won't they?” he said.

“Let them come,” Ersa said. “We won't be here.”

A lucky north wind from the Ashlands blew the sandboat into the container town. The light had lifted a little. Dawn shadows pooled between the containers, but Dusthaven had yet to stir.

Kite was relieved to be back, if only so they could leave. Dusthaven was too dangerous for them now.

The sandboat trundled to halt beside the bothy. Kite jumped down from the stern. He didn't bother lashing the sail or chocking the wheels. They'd be leaving soon enough.

Kite froze.

New footprints scuffed up the sand near the bothy. The padlock had been sheared off. The loading bay door was open an inch and a wedge of light flickered from the tar-lamp.

The Waste Witch tumbled out of the sandboat. Kite tried to stop her but she pushed her way in to the bothy and began screaming.

Cob Savage slouched in Ersa's chair, his grin full of hollows. A shiv dangling idly from his fingers.

“Get out you devil!” Ersa hissed, scissors ready to stab. “Get out!”

Kite caught her arm. He pulled her into the corner. If he let her go they'd both be dead.

Cob had ransacked the bothy. Bedding and clothes lay scattered on the floor. All Ersa's secret things had been tossed out. Things Kite had never seen before. Little books and ribbon-bound letters and old photographs, turned sepia with age. Kite didn't recognised the Askians in them. A man. A boy. A family of three surrounded by salt-white hills.

“Pretty thing weren't you?” Cob said, toying with one of the photographs.

“Bastard,” Ersa said, but her fury had faded. She leaned on Kite now and Kite realised she was afraid, as if she'd done something terrible.

“What do you want, Cob?” he asked, barely keeping his own anger in check. “We haven't done anything wrong.”

Cob tossed the photograph and got to his feet. He spun the shiv around his fingers. “Gutter wants a word,” he said.