Perdition (The Dred Chronicles) (6 page)

9

Bitter Bargains

The new fish was crazy.

There was no other explanation for the challenge he’d extended—without Dred’s sanction. And she couldn’t object without looking like she couldn’t control her people. She remembered Wills’s prediction about how this one would destroy everything.

Suddenly, it didn’t seem so unlikely. The man was reckless beyond bearing.

Yet she let the offer stand. Worst-case scenario, he died, and she stood no closer to an alliance. Then she’d leave the corpse with Silence and follow Tam back through the shafts to Queensland and start trying to come up with a plan B before Grigor and Priest completed their battle strategies. Overall, things didn’t look so bright at the moment.

“Does he speak for you?” the Speaker asked, after conferring with Silence.

Yeah, we’ll be talking about that.

Tameron maintained a watchful air, but she could tell he didn’t approve. There was no way to deny it without losing face and the situation deteriorating, so she nodded. Then Silence turned to Jael.

Wordless, she pointed to the center of the hall, past mounds of gray, withered bodies, beyond the bone pickets spiked into the metal flooring. Dred had been here before, carrying messages for Artan, but the horror of the place never ceased to overwhelm her. But she couldn’t give any sign of that. Weakness led to teeth on your throat.

“Let the Dread Queen’s champion face the Death Knight,” the Speaker pronounced.

Dred found all the titles and posturing tiresome. She hadn’t come up with the Dread Queen mythos, but the men ran with it, as it pleased them to have a figure around which to build a world better than the one they lived in. Without these trappings, they were all just beasts scrambling for scraps in a rusted metal cage.

An enormous male, dressed only in black leather pants, strode to the center of the hall. His arms were easily the size of Dred’s head, and he stood two meters in height. Unlike Einar, he had no scars, unless you counted his expression. He wore pain like a wound, a suffering so deep it dug brackets beside his mouth, furrows etched into his brow and between his eyes. Silence’s other men had eyes like hers, full of nothing, but this was a beast in chains.

Except he wasn’t.

He carried no weapons, but Dred suspected he needed none.

Jael should be worried. Terrified, even. She knew he was fast—and stronger than he looked—but to beat a gladiator like this, he needed to be a hero from the ancient stories. And if he were one, he wouldn’t be here.
Just as well I didn’t get attached.

Instead, the new fish strolled to the center of the hall. At some point, he’d traded his prison-issue gray for other clothing, handmade by Queenslanders. It let him blend in better, but at the moment, he looked oddly nondescript, considering what he was about to do. He raised his hands in a defensive posture, and she bit back the desire to chide him or warn him or call him names for being stupid enough, cocky enough, to toss his future down the recycling chute.

I could’ve used somebody like you,
she thought.

The giant lashed out with a ferocious right cross, but Jael wasn’t there. He danced—and it was such a graceful movement that it seemed taunting—to the side. Then he spread his arms. “I’m right here, mate. Go on, then. Show everyone how terrifying you are.”

Silence’s warrior rushed, head down, like an enraged beast, but Dred could tell his heart wasn’t in it. Somehow, he had been forced to this role, and his body was only going through the motions. He’d killed until there was no joy in it if ever there had been. She hadn’t even known that was possible, that one could rehabilitate a murderer via aversion therapy. But then again, no wonder; it required an endless number of worthless lives and the complete absence of anything like mercy or remorse. It required a certain conflation of factors.

It required Perdition.

Quick as a snake, Jael flipped the larger man in a strike so powerful, it snapped his shoulder out of socket. A normal fighter would’ve groaned in pain, either at the dislocation or when he hit the ground. The giant only breathed, his lungs hauling hard. She swore she saw pleading in his face as Jael kicked him in the head. In another zone, men would be cheering, taunting, placing bets. Not here.

This poor Death Knight seemed eager now. His movements became rushed, sloppy. He threw punch after punch and landed none of them. His breathing grew hoarse, which could’ve meant desperation, but when she closed her eyes, she read them, and saw the fluttering orange eagerness that raced through his psyche like a psychedelic.

He wants this, more than anything. Don’t make him wait, Jael.

As if he heard, the new fish grew focused. The room fell to absolute stillness as Jael finished the Death Knight. He was merciful when he broke the man’s neck. She’d never seen anyone fight as he did—with reckless confidence combined with such skill. It was like he could tell what his opponent would do before he did it.

Maybe he’s Psi. Limited precog, applied to combat.
Such a skill wouldn’t surprise her, and it would explain a lot. Nobody had heard of her empathic permutation until she started trying to explain it to prison doctors, but they diagnosed her with all kinds of mental illnesses as well. They claimed the men she called killers were good family men; and she was absolutely delusional. As soon as she admitted it, then they could help her. Fix her.

Bullshit.

Dred preferred life inside to the lies they crafted and placed on her tongue in pill form. Once she spat the meds out enough, they took to feeding them to her intravenously. That kept her quiet in the planetside prison for a while. She had the dubious honor of being dubbed belatedly too dangerous for the common criminal.

As Jael stood over the Death Knight’s body, she didn’t move; this had to play out between Jael and Silence. He’d thrown the dice, so it was up to him to cast the winning roll. Or eat his losses. If he survived, they’d talk about his impulse-control problems.

Moving with quiet confidence, Jael presented himself to Silence, standing before the bone seat with his hands laced behind his back. Oddly, Dred thought he’d never appeared more impressive, a military cast to his stance. He actually looked like a queen’s champion. While he waited, Silence conferred with the Speaker, and Dred glanced at Tam, hoping he’d offer a clue as to what was going on. He only shook his head; talking would be rude at this juncture and might screw up negotiations.

Fine. I’ll wait.

“The Handmaiden will honor your bargain,” the Speaker announced. “It was a good fight and a clean death. But she has terms for your agreement.”

“I’m listening,” Dred said.

“You are correct in that if the Great Bear swallows Queensland, he will turn his eyes to Entropy. That one has a hunger that can never be sated even should he swallow the stars.”

It was a poetic way to describe the savage, murdering conqueror, but Silence wasn’t wrong about Grigor. So Dred nodded, showing they were on the same page.

Then the Speaker went on, “But the threat alone would not have been enough to push the Handmaiden to War, even though War is Death.”

Weirdly, she could hear the capital letters in that sentence, as if War and Death were people. To Silence, maybe they were.

“I understand,” Dred said, though she didn’t, really.

This shit hole required a constant fight for survival. People who lay down, died, unless they were crazy in a sufficiently terrifying manner, so that nobody wanted to screw with them in case doing so stirred a nest of snakes so poisonous that it could end only in certain death. Silence had that down to an art, and maybe it was why she’d created the persona, ages ago. By this point, however, she believed in her own legend.

Not the sign of a stable mind. But she’s my best shot.

“These are her terms. First, if this alliance results in new territory, she claims half of it as her right for aiding Queensland.”

“That’s fair,” Tam whispered. “No need to bargain.”

“Done,” Dred agreed.

“But if the battle is joined and Queensland is lost, then the Handmaiden must be recompensed.” The Speaker stepped forward, indicating Jael. “She will have him as the new Death Knight. The Handmaiden says while she is Death’s lady, this one is his son.”

“I’m nobody’s son,” Jael muttered.

Tam motioned him to silence, as Dred stepped closer to her self-proclaimed champion. “You had no hesitation about risking your life before. Again?”

Something like surprise flashed across his face, then he inclined his head, granting permission. It was a lightning exchange, not enough to weaken her position, but Jael seemed glad she hadn’t disregarded his sovereignty. Dred wasn’t even sure why she’d bothered.

She answered, “Of course, provided he’s alive. If Grigor or Priest takes my territory, Jael could be killed in the fighting.”

“This one always survives,” the Speaker intoned. “The debt will be paid.”

Dred had no idea if that was a prophecy or a prediction, but it sounded like a done deal to her. “Do we shake on it, or sign something?”

The skull face seemed affronted. “Death requires no documentation. You cannot force him to come for you, but the Handmaiden’s word is good. Or do you doubt her?”

Silence stared.

“No. As far as I’m concerned, we’re set. How soon can we start planning?”

The Speaker watched Silence’s signs, then answered, “She will soon send me with instructions.”

She wanted to protest that she was an equal partner, but if she had been able to handle Grigor and Priest on her own, she wouldn’t be in Silence’s boneyard. Nausea rose in her throat, suppressed all this time through sheer will, but the smell was intolerable. Somehow, she didn’t flinch or weaken, kept her gaze sure and strong, until the Speaker dropped his eyes and dipped at the waist, acknowledging her dominance.

I win, you bizarre bastard. Time to go.

“Will the password hold until we reach the edge of your zone?” she asked.

“The men will see you out.”

“Thank you for your time and hospitality,” Tam said as he signed.

Dred guessed he was spelling out the same thing in graceful hand gestures. Silence inclined her wild mane, regal in her visceral madness. So strange, pretending she had any idea about diplomacy or courtly nonsense.
My father would’ve forgotten to put on pants if my mother hadn’t reminded him.
But Perdition was as much asylum as prison, and when you were standing in somebody else’s delusions, it was both polite and politic to play along.

As promised, the Speaker sent an escort with them all the way out to the access panel. Once they boosted up into the ducts, shivering set in. Entropy was worse than all the stories.

Jael put a hand on her arm, and it horrified her that he felt those tremors. She couldn’t afford for anyone to realize how close to the surface her sensibilities ran. The Dread Queen had to be all determined iron, an ice maiden incapable of disquiet or remorse, or her enemies would eat her alive.

“Thanks for giving me a choice. I don’t understand why, but—”

She substituted bravado for composure. “Step back. Or you’re three seconds away from the death you seem to desire.”

We don’t have a connection, pretty lad. In here, people will gnaw you to the bone if you let them. It might even be me.

He narrowed his eyes. “Not even in your best dreams, love.”

“Let me explain how this plays out. If you don’t remove your hand, Tam has a needle full of poison that will put you to sleep. He has several in fact, so if you shake it off quickly, we’ll jab you again. I’m not positive what you are, but I’m pretty sure you can’t live without your heart.”

A reckless laugh echoed down the ducts. “Poor, foolish queenie. I’ve done it for years.”

10

Sneak Attack

Tam didn’t want to kill the new fish, mostly because it would be a waste of resources. The man might be useful; certainly he’d proven he could fight. He thought Dred was overreacting, but he chose not to countermand her orders. Instead, he watched the two size each other up, then Jael stepped back.

He was smiling. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to lay hands upon the queen.”

“Don’t let it happen again,” Dred snarled.

Tam could see that she was unsettled by the visit to Silence’s domain. He would be, too, if he hadn’t seen—and smelled—it many times before, during his surveillance runs. Once, he’d witnessed their Festival of Death, and it had been the most grotesque and macabre spectacle imaginable, with fountains of blood and swords made of bone arming men whose sole aim was to die in a manner pleasing to Death’s Handmaiden. Despite his external calm, Tam suppressed a shiver. This alliance made him uneasy, but it was necessary.

“Let’s head back,” he murmured, revealing none of his misgivings.

Tam knew the route with his eyes closed, but smudges in the dust and smeared palm prints made it fairly obvious, even to the other two. Maintenance tunnels riddled the ship like a honeycomb, and sometimes, he had to avoid other explorers. He motioned to Dred and Jael to step lightly as footfalls rang out in the distance. This convict must be new to the art of stealth, as he banged around, running into walls and stumbling so loud that Tam suspected they could hear him in the Warren.

“That’s not normal,” Dred whispered.

He only nodded. It seemed prudent to find out who this was and from what sector, so he answered in an undertone, “Wait here. Don’t move.”

With quiet approval, he noted how the other two hunkered down into the shadows. Their posture wasn’t perfect, but Jael obviously had some experience in skullduggery. That startled Tam not at all, given the man’s overall predatory air. But some predators could be trained to guard territory, and if that was the case, then Tam definitely had a use for the new fish.

He crept along the metal wall, tracking the thumps and bumps until he was right up behind the other party. At that point, he realized the man’s clumsiness stemmed from injuries, not lack of care, and in the larger sense, it wasn’t a man at all, but one of Katur’s aliens. The creature stumbled again, reeled against the wall, and this time, its limbs wouldn’t hold it. Tam weighed the risks and decided his course; he slipped back to the others without speaking.

“Who was it?” Dred asked.

He lied without compunction. “Just an oversized rodent, dying badly.”

He had no way to be sure how long it took, given their relative lack of agility, but eventually, they dropped down from the access panel just inside Dred’s borders. An ominous feeling stole over him when they came to the last checkpoint. Four bodies littered the ground, blood everywhere, and there was no sign of the men who had killed them.

“Grigor?” Jael asked.

Dred shook her head as she knelt. “This looks like Priest’s work. See the holes punched through their palms? It’s a calling card of sorts.”

“A raiding party?” Tam suggested. “If so, we should look for the other incursion site. The Bear mentioned a two-pronged attack.”

“Possibly. I didn’t think they’d organize this quick. We need to move quietly and assess the situation.” So saying, she didn’t unwind the chains from her forearms.

Tam approved of that caution. If things were worse than anticipated, he could lead her away from the danger and find refuge elsewhere. He had scouted more than a dozen locations that few other men were likely to find. It was impossible to store provisions, as supplies were so scarce, but if they couldn’t find Dred, then neither Priest, nor Grigor, could claim they had destroyed Queensland. Tam understood that it was a risk in setting so much power behind one woman, but he felt confident he had read her correctly. She was not a lesser metal, and she wouldn’t crumple beneath the weight before the game played out.

“Follow me,” he whispered to the other two.

They fell in behind him, and Jael went up in Tam’s estimation. Some men saw his lack of stature and tried to shove him aside to get close to Dred. It spoke well of Jael that he was smart enough to understand that Tam’s value lay in something other than battle skill or muscle mass.

The enemy had been careless, leaving bloody footprints all the way to the hall. That let Tam gauge roughly how many lay ahead. He expected a fight, but when they reached the hall, he saw a number of enemy corpses instead. Einar looked like hell, but he was organizing the cleanup. His scarred features showed immediate relief when he saw Dred returning unharmed.

“What happened?” Dred demanded.

“Skirmish.” Einar indicated the damage to the main hall, along with the wounded men being tended. “Twenty-five men. It wasn’t enough to seize control, so I’m not sure what Priest was thinking.”

“I am,” Jael said. “It’s a classic guerrilla tactic. Send pawns to weaken the queen. Weaken with wave after wave of expendable forces. And once your opponent has nothing left in reserve, you send the full might of your army to crush them.”

Dred turned to him. “You sound like a soldier.”

“I’ve been one, among other things.”

That surprised Tam. He wouldn’t have guessed that Jael had enough discipline or self-control to accept orders on a daily basis, but as he mulled what to do with this new information, Dred said, “Good. Then you’ll be in charge of tactics. Confer with Tam while I work with Einar in getting things squared away.”

An admirable allocation of resources.
Sometimes Tam wondered if he underestimated her. He didn’t know much about her life before she had been sentenced to life—and death—in Perdition. She made it a point not to discuss her past, and she didn’t ask many questions of other people, either.
Just as well. I would’ve lied.

To Jael, he said, “Meet me in Dred’s quarters in a couple of hours. I’ve something to take care of first.”

Still calculating odds and scenarios, Tam hurried off to collect food and medical supplies. He hoped it wasn’t too late for the creature in the ducts, as that would upset all his plans.

Astonishment colored everything for a few, brief seconds, then Jael nodded, though Tameron was already leaving. He had some time to kill, so he went to the hydroponics garden. There were a couple of workers inside, but they took no notice of him. The lights were bright, almost like the sun, and it was the most peaceful place he’d found on Perdition. Little wonder the other leaders wanted to take this oasis and burn it down. For a few seconds, he simply breathed, enjoying the way the plants scented the air.
It would be nice if I knew their names, too.

A woman glanced at him belatedly. “Can I help you?”

He shook his head. “I’m just exploring. I’ll be working here eventually, so I wanted to learn my way around.”

“Let me know if you have questions,” she said.

He
did
have some, and she wound up showing him how to care for some of the vegetables. Therefore, the time went fast. Eventually, Ike ambled in.

“Tam’s looking for you. Just thought you should know.”

Jael swore, thanked the woman for her time, and jogged toward Dred’s quarters. The door swished open to reveal Tam; Jael stepped inside, and the other man indicated he should make himself comfortable. Since the room consisted of a bunk, a couple of hard chairs, and a broken entertainment console, it wasn’t much, but since he was happy to be consulted on anything, he had no comment on the paltry accommodations. The merc commanders who recruited him paid him to march or kill; they didn’t ask his opinion. It occurred to him that he’d only been a part of things in this way once before, and he’d thrown it away in fear the situation would sour. Fear had driven him to trade potential friendship for a payday.

Even in a place like this, he wouldn’t repeat the mistake again. Lab techs had called him subhuman, but he was capable of learning from his mistakes. Of course, they’d said those things because they were rationalizing their choice to experiment on him. Jael was lucky they had never plumbed the full extent of his regenerative gifts or learned how they could be useful to other people . . . or he’d never have left the lab that last time.

They were wrong about me,
he told himself.
I’m a person. I can learn. I
can
.

Deep down lay the cold, curling fear that, in fact, he couldn’t. That he was a broken thing, born of mechanical bits, electrical impulses, and a scientist’s meddling.
Perhaps I cannot learn.
But he meant to try. He had read a story of spirits being refined in pits of fire, so that they were better and stronger when they climbed out. Back then, it had seemed likely they would only be destroyed.

But maybe not. Hope tormented him.

Jael was surprised to identify the anger he felt over the attack. Not because he was so attached to the sentries but because of what it represented. Priest and Grigor were determined to take Dred’s territory.
Not on my watch.

* * *

AFTER
he sat, Tam said, “Grigor has the greater number of men whereas Priest has zealots. If he orders them to come and die, they’ll do so without protest.”

Jael nodded. “Priest will supply the shock troops. He’ll attempt to wear us down. It will be imperative to defend, as every loss will impact morale.”

“You think there’s such a thing as morale in a place like this?” Tam eyed him as if he represented a question to which there was no answer.

“In Queensland, yes. It’s better than Munya or Entropy or—”

“I take your point. And yes, it is. Dred tries to run this place like a city. A city where all the citizens are right bastards, but she keeps the torture and bloodshed to a minimum.”

“Is it better than it was under Artan?” He didn’t even know why he was asking.

Tam surprised him by answering, “Much. I was his spymaster first, but Artan was too like Grigor. No ability to plan, he only cared to take or own. There were food shortages. The hydroponics garden stopped producing, and Artan’s solution was more blood sport.”

“Why?” Jael asked.

“Because he knew we’d end up with less mouths to feed.”

“Is that when you decided to dispose of him?”

Amusement flickered in the other man’s dark eyes. “Is that what you think? I took care of Artan quietly, then deposited Dred on the throne to give the men someone prettier to serve?”

Put like that, it did sound offensive. Not only to Tameron—because it implied he couldn’t lead men himself—but to Dred, as it suggested she lacked the wherewithal to seize power on her own. He suspected neither implication was true.

“Then tell me what really happened.”

“I think it best that we focus on battle plans. It’s too good a story for me to deprive Dred the pleasure of telling you herself.”

For some reason, that sounded ominous. Jael pretended he didn’t detect the faint burr of ambivalence coming from the other man. Maybe Tam thought he posed some threat to their arrangement or wanted to stretch the triangle to a quadrilateral. That couldn’t be further from the truth. So few things had been his alone that he could never share a woman, even if she were his for only an hour.

“Fair enough.”

For the next half hour, they discussed the probable progression of the attacks and devised strategies to counter that wouldn’t end in a massive outlay of resources or in a pile of Queenslander corpses. It felt odd to play such a role, but he didn’t mind. In a way, it was nice to feel like he was fighting for his home ground.

He didn’t mean to stay, of course.

As soon as they dealt with this situation, he’d evaluate the ship and figure out a way to force himself back on one of the automated transports.
If I have to smash one of the Peacemaker units with my bare hands, then that’s how it’ll be.
He was shamed by his inability to flee the Bug planet. Mostly, that came from the absolute isolation. He hadn’t left his cell in turns. The food was delivered once a day, and the bars were too strong for him to break. He’d tried tunneling out, but after he dug through the floor, he ran into a rock face so strong, it would’ve taken a diamond drill to cut it. If the Conglomerate hadn’t extradited him, he would’ve died there.

However long it took.

“Those are good ideas,” Tam said, seeming surprised.

“You thought I was just a pretty face?”

“No. Rather that you were conning Dred.”

“Give me more credit than that,” the woman said as she entered, Einar behind. Another man followed; Jael recognized Ike, the old man with eyes that missed nothing.

“Sorry,” Tam said. “I should’ve known you only took him up because you saw real potential.”

Jael cocked a brow. “Must you make me sound like a stray pet?”

“Don’t let it bruise your ego. But Tam’s right; I’d have let you come to Queensland, but you wouldn’t be in on the planning if you weren’t a cut above.” By her expression, she meant nothing against the men currently wandering her domain, handling patrols, playing cards in the hall, sleeping and taking up space.

“So it’s a full council meeting,” Ike said then. He dropped onto Dred’s bed as if they had done this before, away from prying eyes.

“Tell me what you saw, just before the attack,” Dred demanded of the old man.

Quietly, Ike summarized the assault: how Priest’s hunting party came in the west corridor, fighting like madmen. There had been casualties, Jael knew, but he wasn’t sure how many dead or wounded. That wasn’t his purview anyway. In Perdition, it would be hard to find anyone who could be pressed to play medic. Most men inside preferred cutting people up to stitching their wounds.

“The men rallied well,” Einar offered. “Considering how Priest’s people are, I’m pleased with how quick we killed them.”

Dred nodded at that, still looking at Ike. “Did anyone look nervous . . . or expectant? Did anyone take cover a little too soon?”

Tam copped to her line of thought at once. “You think we have a traitor?”

“I don’t believe in coincidences. We set out for Entropy, and while we’re gone, Priest strikes? Someone sent word, I think.”