Paw-Prints Of The Gods (42 page)

“Everything okay up
there?” asked Kedesh.

“I’m fine. Is Artorius
with you?”

“He’s taking another
nap.”

Ravana paused to fire
another volley, the third so far, at the encroaching slime.

“Athene, your watcher,
spoke about the Falsafah prophecy,” she told Kedesh. “She called
Artorius a star man and said something about him fulfilling his
destiny.”

“A star man?

“Also, at Missi’s
dome, when he was safe she said there was no paradox.”

“Interesting.”

“Is that all you can
say?”

For a while Kedesh did
not reply. “It’s nice the way you’re looking out for him,” she said
eventually. “I’m not sure I would have the patience with such a
rude little boy.”

Ravana was shocked.
“Kedesh!”

“Sorry. Obviously, I’m
also grateful you’ve stepped up to the crease on my behalf more
than once. When Missi tried to suffocate us, why didn’t you
collapse when I did?”

“I grew up on a world
with a thin atmosphere. If you remember, the greys were affected
even less. I owed you that one. You rescued us after we
crashed.”

There was another
brief silence. Ahead, a short stretch of ridge dipped below
slime-infested water and Ravana released a couple of plasma bolts
to clear the way.

“I have a confession
to make,” said Kedesh. “I was going to leave you there.”

“But you didn’t.
That’s all that matters.”

“The greys threw a
curved ball. I was about to drive away when they hammered on the
hatch. They had dragged you from your transport and somehow kept
you alive long enough to get you into my airlock. Nana and Stripy
saved your lives, not me.”

Ravana’s blood ran
cold. “You were going to let us die?”

“You don’t
understand.”

“Damn right I don’t!
We crashed trying to avoid running into you!”

“I was scared of
creating another paradox,” protested Kedesh. She uttered a shriek
of alarm as Ravana released a volley of plasma bolts into the sand
bank ahead, more out of anger than necessity. “I am not allowed to
meddle!”

“Really?” retorted
Ravana and scowled. The transport swerved around the miniature
impact craters she had just created. “So you’re a watcher,
too?”

“I am Commander Marion
Kedesh,” snapped the terse reply. “Field agent for the Grand
Priory, the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of
Jerusalem.”

Ravana blinked.
“You’re what?”

“It is a bit of a
mouthful,” admitted Kedesh.

“A field agent for
Saint John?”

“Sent here to report
on the Dhusarian Church, but with no authority to intervene.”

“I don’t believe
you.”

“Suit yourself.”

Ravana silenced her
headcom with a vicious mental stab. The transport rolled on and
soon there were fresh patches of slime to divert her attention.
Eventually even these became fewer and far between, then the ridge
widened into an expanse of smooth sand and suddenly the strange
lake was behind them. Ravana was tired and hungry, her legs ached
from her earlier frantic run, her shoulder throbbed from the weight
of the cannon and her mind felt heavier still with the day’s
revelations. When it was finally time to climb from the roof and go
back inside, Ravana ignored Kedesh’s request to talk and went
straight to her bunk, kicked off her suit, buried herself under a
blanket and tried to get some sleep.

* * *

Ravana awoke to find
the transport had once again fallen still. She brushed her matted
hair aside and saw several hours had passed; dusk was upon them and
through the windscreen Tau Ceti was setting below a sky awash with
brilliant pinks and purples. They were no longer in the caldera and
instead were high upon a hillside of windswept rolling dunes.

The interior lamps
were on their lowest setting, save for a single bright light above
where Kedesh sat at the table. Ravana watched curiously as the
woman slotted a glass vial into a portable medical analysis unit
and scrutinised the machine’s display. Ravana wriggled free of the
blanket, stretched wearily, then frowned when Kedesh reacted to her
awakening by trying to hide what she was doing. A trio of gentle
snores from the heaving shapes on the opposite bunk was enough to
locate Artorius and the greys.

“Are we out of the
mountains?” asked Ravana, keeping her voice low.

“Almost,” Kedesh
whispered back. She shifted upon her bandaged feet and winced.
“It’s a lot less rocky this side, so if you’re up to driving we can
probably keep going through the night. I was too tired to carry
on.”

Ravana dropped lightly
off the bunk and shuffled to the table. Kedesh relaxed her
defensive gesture but still wore a guilty look.

“There’s no need to
hide that,” Ravana said, indicating the medical equipment. “I saw
you with the vial at Missi’s dome. So what did you find? Is there
some magical element in Artorius’ blood to explain why the
Dhusarians think he’s so special? Are you on a mystical mission
from Saint John to find the saviour of the universe?”

Kedesh caught the
smirk on the girl’s face and smiled.

“No ingenious little
nano-probes buzzing through his veins?” suggested Ravana. Her voice
betrayed a tone of solemn mockery. “Athene said he was a star
man.”

“Very funny. You’ve
been watching too many fantasy holovids.”

Ravana ignored her
quip. “Not that I care. I haven’t forgiven you, by the way.”

“Fair enough. At least
you’ve come out of that mood you’ve been in these last few days.
Anyone would think you didn’t like battling acid snot whilst
stinking to high heaven.”

Ravana experimentally
sniffed an armpit and screwed up her face in disgust. Despite her
unpleasant body odour, she did feel more optimistic, though all
things considered she was not sure why. Her lost trust in Kedesh
had let feelings of isolation return.

“I will take a
shower,” she promised. “Then I’ll be ready to drive on.”

“Before you do, I have
something that may interest you.”

Kedesh reached across
the table and handed her a small touch-screen slate Ravana had not
seen before. The notepad function was live and showing twelve lines
of text. As Ravana began to read, the words of the
Isa-Sastra
flooded back to her:

frozen traveller
created anew

watchers to history
stir

hidden by slaves and
masters

Tau Ceti’s wandering
tomb

reborn beneath twin
suns

orphaned child of
Sol

pawn to watchers and
weavers

king by the great
game

father of the
twelve

believers unite as
one

Sol’s children shall
not fear

paw-prints of the
gods

“The so-called
prophecy of Falsafah,” she murmured. “Is this from Artorius?”

Kedesh nodded. “It
took him hours to remember it all. What do you think?”

“I see watchers get a
mention,” mused Ravana. After what Kedesh had said about Athene,
she found the phrase ‘paw-prints of the gods’ intriguing. “And I
can see how ‘Tau Ceti’s wandering tomb’ identifies Falsafah. The
lines about ‘twin suns’ and ‘orphaned child’ could even describe
Artorius. But why ‘reborn’? Was there anything odd in his
blood?”

“I got distracted by
the green slime mould,” Kedesh said. “I analysed a sample and it is
fascinating stuff. It’s a clump of single-cell organisms that work
together to...”

“Stop changing the
subject,” Ravana said irritably. “If you really are from some
secret society sent to spy on the Dhusarians, you must have an idea
what this is about. Is Taranis the ‘father of the twelve’? What
about ‘frozen traveller’ and ‘slaves and masters’?”

“The Order of Saint
John is not a secret society!” retorted Kedesh. “It is an old
Commonwealth institution set up to protect the health and wellbeing
of humankind. The Grand Priory tries to guard against future
threats and so employs field agents like me.”

Ravana frowned. “Is
this a Christian thing? Do you see other religions as a
threat?”

“As far as I’m
concerned, people can believe whatever they like if it helps them
cope with the chaos that is humanity,” Kedesh retorted testily.
“What they should not do is try to impose their beliefs on others.
The Dhusarian Church in particular is bowling wide from Raëlism and
becoming a dangerous cult. The one is an off-shoot of the other,”
she explained, after Ravana gave her a blank look. “The Raëlian
Church is an old UFO religion that still has followers today.
Taranis was a Raëlian priest at Lanka, who mixed his beliefs with
Hindu mythology to create Dhusarism. Did you not know any of
this?”

“UFO religion?”
remarked Ravana, baffled.

“Unidentified Flying
Objects,” said Kedesh. “Don’t ask. Even in the midst of the
communications revolution, the twentieth century was not a period
of enlightenment.”

“My brain hurts. I
think it’s time for my shower.”

“Good girl. All will
be revealed when we reach Arallu.”

Ravana was not so
sure. She made her way to the shower cubicle with an uneasy mind.
Her thoughts continued to whirl as the hot jets of water washed
away the accumulated sweat and grime of her ongoing Falsafah
odyssey.

* * *

The last rays of Tau
Ceti were fading fast by the time Ravana slipped back behind the
wheel. Billions of tonnes of wind-borne sand, dumped over millennia
in the lee of Hursag Asag, softened the western slopes into a lofty
cascade of dunes and she soon lost herself in their relentless
journey, the headlamps falling upon one dry valley after another.
Kedesh retired to her bunk once they were underway, leaving Ravana
alone with her thoughts and some soothing Shanghai jazz from the
transport’s music player. On the console before her, next to a cup
of tea and inevitable slice of cake, the slate mocked her with its
twelve lines of text. The more she stared at the words, the less
sense they made.

The long Falsafah
night drew on. A few hours into her drive, the smell of her
hastily-grabbed carton of noodles awakened Artorius, who in turn
disturbed Nana and Stripy from their slumber. Driving in the dark
was a gloomy affair and Ravana was glad of the company.

“Have a good sleep?”
she asked.

“Thraak,” replied
Nana. “Thraak thraak.”

“I’m hungry,” grumbled
Artorius.

“Help yourself to
food,” she said. “Try not to wake Kedesh while you’re at it.”

Artorius instead came
and sat glumly in the co-pilot’s seat. In the end it was Nana who
went to fetch something to eat, leading the short-limbed grey to
climb onto the table to reach the overhead lockers. Much to
Ravana’s irritation, all three decided to join her in the cockpit,
where she was soon bombarded by strong smells and some very noisy
slurping.

“Hey Nana, Stripy,”
said Ravana, after a pause. “Kedesh told me it was you who saved me
and Artorius after we crashed into that crater. Thank you.”

“Thraak thraak,” Nana
said solemnly.

“It was not nothing!
You saved our lives!”

“Fwack,” said Stripy.
“Fwack fwack.”

“Well, I am really
grateful,” Ravana replied. “And I’m sure Artorius is too.”

She looked expectantly
at Artorius. When he did not speak, she gave him a prod.

“Thank you for saving
me,” he said in mock sincerity. “I didn’t want to be dead.”

Ravana sighed. The
transport rolled on to further sounds of munching.

“Kedesh showed me your
rhyme,” she said to Artorius and pointed to the slate.

Artorius presented her
with a beef-and-noodles grin. “It doesn’t rhyme, stupid!”

“I’ve done that joke.
What does it all mean?”

“Fwack,” Stripy said
solemnly. “Fwack fwack fwack.”

“Thraak thraak,”
interjected Nana.

“That’s wrong!”
Artorius protested. “I’m king of the great game! I was in
Gods
of Avalon
and pulled the sword out of the anvil when no one
else could. They said it was not fair as I was not supposed to be
playing but the nurses said it meant I was special.”

Ravana frowned. She
did not watch the holovid show herself, but knew it was based upon
challenges inspired by Arthurian mythology. Artorius was too young
to be a contestant, yet the coincidence of his name being the Latin
version of Arthur was puzzling.

“So you think the
great game is
Gods of Avalon
?” she asked him. “But the greys
just said the passage is about something else entirely and is to do
with watchers.”

“Lots of people watch
Gods of Avalon
,” Artorius said stubbornly.

“I didn’t mean that
kind of watcher.”

“Thraak?”

“Nurse Jizo said I was
a star man and a traveller,” the boy said. There was a defiant look
in his eye. “I was to meet masters and slaves and they would tell
me what it meant. She said all those who believe would come
together and not be afraid.”

Ravana gave him an odd
look. “Believe in what?”

“In the greys.”

“Fwack fwack!”

“Exactly. They’re
right here, dropping food all over the floor. What’s not to
believe?”

Artorius looked
sullen. “I don’t know.”

Ravana saw confusion
on the boy’s face and did not press him further. Beside her, Nana
picked up the slate and carefully scrutinised the twelve lines of
text. Ravana was amused to see that the elderly grey looked as
puzzled as she herself felt.

* * *

Kedesh awoke a few
hours later to take over driving duties. Their descent through the
dark dunes seemed never-ending. Ravana’s revived spirits faded and
she spent the rest of the long Falsafah night curled upon a bunk,
leaving Nana to keep a watchful eye on Artorius’ and Stripy’s
latest round of the increasingly-noisy slapping game. The gentle
wallowing of the transport was soothing, though the loud clunking
from beneath had returned and Ravana saw Kedesh give a worried
downwards glance on more than one occasion.