Prisoner of Fate (13 page)

H
e made the swim across the bay’s dark waters after sunset, moving with the steady rhythm he learned as a boy playing on the harbour, but the water was much colder than he anticipated and the pain wracking his body made every stroke difficult. Huddled in the dark against the pylon of the rotting wharf, shivering, desperately trying to find warmth from within his sodden body, he listened to the steady wash of the ocean rising and falling around the wooden structures of the old docks, a rhythm that threatened to lull him into a fatal sleep. He dared not sleep.

The thought of his sister, Passion, stirred him into motion. He clambered unsteadily across the barnacle-encrusted beams between the pylons, slipping and cutting his hands and arms on the knife-like shells, reopening wounds, until he found a rickety ladder. He cautiously climbed to the decking and, by the glow of a cloud-hindered pale half moon and the halo of the city lights, he surveyed his situation.

The old docks were home to vagrant seagulls, discarded dogs and cats, resident rats, and desperate homeless individuals who made the detritus of the
city’s history their refuge. Chase knew the place. Passion and he had survived in its depths for three years until she was employed in the Perfect Pleasures brothel. There were lonely old men lurking in its darkest corners, creatures no one knew and no one loved, the refuse of humanity. Some were mad and lost souls, prone to outbursts of raving and deep depression, their minds addled by heavy drug abuse over the years. Some were sad but kindly individuals to whom life had dealt a harsh and unfair hand and who, in different circumstances, would have been quiet, friendly citizens—someone’s mother or grandfather. Some were sinister creatures—men with little self-worth and even less compassion for other living beings—shadows that lurked in the deepest recesses, preying on weaker souls that wandered into their lairs.

Aching, shivering, bleeding, Chase moved through the darkness, weaving cautiously between the creaking, rotting buildings and piles of long-abandoned cargo and equipment, hoping he would avoid stumbling into any of the dock denizens. A she-cat leapt aside and stared with moon-green eyes at him, surprised that a human could move so silently, and a dog growled from the shadowy depths of an old building, but he pressed on.

Only when he glimpsed flickering firelight did he pause. A fire burned at the centre of a courtyard between three old buildings—a large fire—and shadows moved around it. Curious, he crept forward, clinging to the darkness for protection, watching and listening for anything that might emerge from places close by, until he was near enough to hear the low rhythmic chanting that identified followers of Jarudha conducting a prayer session. He was puzzled to find someone of formal religion in the godforsaken ruins of the old docks because the Seers had designated
temples for gathering the faithful dotted throughout the city. Shunning his pain and discomfort, he edged closer.

Around the fire, a small host of men, a few women and children on their knees, their faces upturned in the manner of supplicants, their features disfigured by the dancing firelight, were repeating, ‘Jarudha is one. Jarudha is all.’ Their ragged clothing revealed their poverty. Two men closest to the flames wore the traditional yellow robes of Jarudhan acolytes, men training to become Seers, their heads shaven to demonstrate their discipleship. If they graduated to Seer status they would be allowed to grow their hair and they would wear the sky-blue robes of the Seers.

He’d witnessed the privileged ministering to the destitute in the city on street corners, trying to attract them into the temples to become part of the evergrowing Jarudhan faithful, but finding them in the old docks disturbed him. Something was amiss. And then he saw one disciple moving amongst the people, distributing small pinches of purple powder to the upturned palms. Euphoria.
Why are the priests giving out doses of the drug
? he puzzled.

He crept from the scene and headed for the streets that led into the Foundry Quarter where his sister waited in their tiny home, hoping that she was safe in his absence, but the vision of the Jarudhan acolytes leading the most miserable poor in the city in a session of drug-induced prayer troubled him, and he carried an irritating burden of conscience from a dead and mad old man.

‘Interesting news, Your Eminence,’ Word announced as he sat in a plush, dark-blue chair in Seer Scripture’s private chamber.

‘Go on,’ Scripture grumbled, looking up from a
manuscript he was proofing concerning Seer Creator’s experiments.

‘Rumour is that an old irritation has been cured,’ said Word.

Scripture’s eyebrows knitted in irritation. ‘Forego the riddles, Word. I’m a busy man and it’s late.’

Word smiled wanly and said, ‘An old inmate of the Bog Pit died yesterday.’

‘Sunlight?’ Scripture asked, suddenly interested.

‘The same,’ Word confirmed.

‘This is an absolute?’ Scripture insisted. Word nodded. Scripture put down his autoscribe and smiled. ‘Jarudha’s work is done then.’

‘It took a long time,’ Word complained. ‘You said that he wouldn’t last a year in there. He lasted seventeen years.’

Scripture’s smile faded as he crossed the chamber from his desk and sank into a second blue chair beside Word. ‘Patience is essential in understanding how Jarudha works. Consider it as both a test of our faith that our former colleague should live so long and an example of the strength Jarudha gives to all of us who walk the righteous path.’

‘There is still the matter of the artefact,’ Word reminded Scripture. ‘Sunlight never revealed where it was hidden after its theft from the old palace museum.’

‘The artefact is lost. We are the only ones who knew of its existence and knowledge of its whereabouts died with Sunlight.’

‘Can we be sure about that?’

Scripture met and held Word’s gaze. ‘I will tell you something that must never leave this room. Swear on your love for Jarudha that you will never speak of what you hear from me.’ Word’s eyebrows rose. ‘Swear it,’ Scripture insisted.

‘I swear by my love for Jarudha,’ Word answered.

‘So swearing, you understand that your soul is forfeit should you speak of this matter ever again?’

Scripture’s intensity surprised Word. ‘I know the teachings, Your Eminence,’ he replied with deliberate formality.

A smile fleeted across Scripture’s lips at Word’s response. He took a deep breath, made the holy sign of the circle and said, ‘My confession may damn my own soul, but my task in this worldly existence is to fulfil what my predecessors have put in motion. I act as Vision would have acted and Diamond before him. Not for myself but for Jarudha’s Paradise have I perjured my soul, and I do this knowing that what I might lose my brethren will gain.’ Again he made the holy sign, and clasped his hands on his lap. ‘Sunlight did not steal the artefact. It was stolen and destroyed under my order.’

Word stared, waiting for Scripture to explain. When no explanation followed he asked, ‘Sunlight was not guilty of heresy?’

Scripture shook his head, annoyed. ‘Of course he was guilty of heresy. He was tampering with the one item that could prevent Jarudha’s servants from cleansing this world of evil. Remember what he argued? Did he not say that we should study the artefact more thoroughly?’

‘I don’t remember what he said,’ Word replied. ‘It was a long time ago.’

‘The records have been kept,’ Scripture said firmly. ‘If your memory needs refreshing you can read what he said.’

‘I thought we burned all of his writing and research.’

‘His work, yes, but not our records of his heresy,’ Scripture explained.

‘So who stole the artefact?’

‘It was carefully arranged,’ Scripture replied. ‘Some matters must remain for me to bear in silence.’

Word nodded, saying, ‘And I am freer for not knowing.’ He sighed and met Scripture’s intense stare. ‘I have no memory of what has been said, Your Eminence,’ he said reassuringly. ‘Perhaps for this you will still walk in Paradise for serving Jarudha so selflessly.’

‘It is my constant prayer,’ said Scripture quietly.

‘Impossible! How could you get out of that place? No one gets out,’ the dark-haired young man exclaimed.

Seeing disbelief on the faces of his three friends Chase considered how he would tell his tale of escape. Mentioning the old Seer probably wouldn’t add to the credibility of what he had done. ‘I pretended to be dead,’ he said, and related the events as they happened thereafter. He showed them the cuts and abrasions along his arms, chest and neck, and the bruising on his face.

‘You’re telling us that you swam all the way across the harbour from the Bog Pit,
through
the sharks?’ the dark-haired young man asked incredulously.

Chase looked Hammer squarely in the eyes and said, ‘Yes. That’s what I’m telling you.’

‘You’re full of shit!’ Tiny, a mousy-haired individual, declared. ‘And that calls for another drink!’

‘My round,’ said the third young man, a slim, elegant youth named Fingers, and he rose to push through the revellers to the bar.

‘So officially you’re dead,’ said Hammer. ‘They can’t arrest you now because you don’t exist.’

‘Business should improve dramatically,’ Tiny suggested.

A sudden outburst of song flooded the tavern, swallowing the conversation, so Chase quaffed the
dregs of his ale and joined in on the chorus. ‘
Cos she was my lady, my fair budding rose, and I was a rover a-roving away!
’

When the song was done, Hammer asked, ‘Seen your sister?’

‘She wasn’t home when I got there. She’s at work. I got cleaned up, found some clothes and came looking for a drink.’

‘Wise man,’ said Tiny. ‘Does it taste better now that you’re dead?’

‘Better than ever!’ Chase declared, as Fingers returned with four foaming mugs of ale clutched in his hands.

‘Is it as bad as they say?’ asked Hammer.

‘The Bog Pit?’ Chase asked. ‘Worse. Think of the slimiest place you’ve ever been in, fill it with dying and desperate men, take away any rules and you get half the idea of what it’s like.’

‘Sounds like my house,’ said Fingers. ‘When my old man comes home drunk and gets stuck into everyone, it’s a bloody hell to be in.’

‘Is that why you come down here for a drink?’ asked Hammer.

‘Yes, indeed!’ Fingers replied and lifted his mug to toast the idea.

Chase staggered out of the Gum and Wattle tavern with his three companions after they’d spent their money and they stood in the middle of the narrow lane in the brief pale moonlight, singing the strains of the last ballad that had been boisterously butchered inside. ‘I can’t pay any of you back, you know,’ Chase apologised as they finished singing. ‘I just got out of the Bog Pit.’

‘Bloody poor excuse, mate,’ Tiny slurred. ‘Bloody poor excuse.’

‘It’s on your promise-note,’ Hammer said, and then unexpectedly sank to his knees, adding, ‘I think the ground just got up from under me.’

‘You’re drunk, you drunken sod,’ Tiny said, as he helped Fingers lift Hammer to his feet.

‘Where you going?’ Fingers asked, looking at Chase. ‘Home?’

‘You can stay at my place,’ Tiny offered.

‘No. I’ll find Passion. I’ll surprise her.’

‘You’ll surprise her if she’s working on a customer!’ Hammer blurted, but his following attempt to laugh at his own wit ended with him spewing against the wall of a house.

‘You’re a filthy dog!’ Tiny yelled, and started laughing. ‘Filthy, dirty, mongrel flea-riddled piece of shit!’

Chase laughed at his friends’ drunken antics as he headed towards the Main Way. The streets were dark and quiet, but when he emerged onto the wider Main Way, he saw there were at least some citizens who didn’t hold with the daylight hours for work and night for sleeping. The ale, throbbing pain from a host of his injuries and his exhaustion were befuddling him, but he would find his sister and he would finally feel like he’d made it home.

‘Come and listen to
The Word
of Jarudha with your brothers.’

Chase blinked and focussed on the smiling face of a Jarudhan acolyte above his yellow robe. ‘I don’t have any brothers,’ he protested.

‘Everyone is your brother,’ the acolyte told him as he took Chase by the arm. ‘Even I am your brother.’

‘Let go.’ Chase shrugged out of his grip. ‘I’m not a believer.’

‘Then you need to hear
The Word
, my brother.’

Too much alcohol
, Chase told himself, as he stepped around the acolyte. The Perfect Pleasures and his sister were only a few paces away.

‘Let me light your way,’ the acolyte offered and a small sphere of light appeared in the acolyte’s outstretched left hand. ‘The light of Jarudha can save you.’

‘Piss off,’ Chase grunted. ‘I don’t believe, all right? Keep your cheap magic tricks.’

‘Perhaps,’ said the acolyte, opening his right hand to reveal a small leather pouch, ‘perhaps you would like to share the soothing taste of enlightenment.’

Chase saw the drug pouch and hesitated.

He hadn’t had a dose of euphoria for more than a week and he felt the temptation rise. But then he remembered what he was doing, stormed away from the acolyte and pushed between two men standing in the night shadows of a dark building as he headed for the brothel. He was stopped at the door by a brutishly built dark-skinned man who stood a head taller than him.

‘Wahim!’ Chase protested. ‘It’s me, Chase.’

The brothel bouncer pulled Chase closer and stared. ‘I’ll be buggered. You’re supposed to be in the Bog Pit.’

‘Is Passion working?’

Wahim released the young man. ‘Just went home,’ he said. ‘How in Jarudha’s name did you get out of the Bog Pit?’

‘I’ll tell you about it, but not now. I’ve got to see Passion.’

Wahim grinned. ‘You do that. She’s a good girl and you should be looking after her.’

‘I will,’ Chase replied as he turned to leave. Then he asked, ‘What’s with all the acolytes?’

Wahim shook his head. ‘They’ve suddenly come out of the woodwork these past three days and they’re
everywhere, trying to talk to people about Jarudha. They’ve even knocked on our door.’