The Descent into the Maelstrom (The Phantom of the Earth Book 4) (25 page)

A new archway formed on the far side of the room. Oriana darted through it and down a long, lit corridor. She entered a ballroom. She slid. A sickle flew over her. It boomeranged across the dance floor, back to the hand of its wielder—the House Adao candidate.

He looked like a gerbil with his teeth set on his lower lip, his big ears, and his wispy-haired mustache. He held a sickle in each hand, and his movements seemed consistent with one of the older styles, though Oriana couldn’t place it. He told her she was his next flag. Flicking his wrists, he sent the sickles spinning wide around the ballroom. Using telekinesis, he guided the sickles toward her neck and knees.

Oriana sensed the candidate’s consciousness in the ZPF. She jumped and twisted parallel to the ground. The sickles passed above and below her, and with her sword she knocked them from their orbit, sending one into the ground, the other into the high ceiling. She discerned the Adao candidate’s rhythm in the ZPF and disrupted his connection.

He focused his mind, seeking to bring the sickles back to his grasp, but couldn’t. Oriana prevented him from doing so. She rushed to him and speared her sword through his heart. He disappeared, leaving behind a golden flag. Oriana sheathed her sword, then took the flag and placed it in her satchel.

An archway on the ballroom’s eastern side glowed with violet phosphorescent light. Oriana approached it. She exhaled deeply, then dashed under the arch. A wooden bridge hung over a dark pit. Oriana pushed her foot to the first few planks, testing their give. It felt secure. She grasped the ropes on either end and took careful steps across.

She entered the next room, where hollowed cubes, large enough to fit twenty transhumans, were stacked like a pyramid. High above hung cirrus clouds filled with lightning and thunder. Oriana touched the cube closest to her. Its exterior shone with white phosphorescent light. It felt hard and cool. She stepped inside the cube and found a ladder in the back, climbed to the next cube, darted across it to the next ladder. She climbed up, and ran, up and over, up and over, all the way to the top. Catching her breath, she turned.

Gaia stood on the cube across from hers. She twirled her
sai
. She didn’t speak.

Oriana unsheathed her sword and held it out across her fingertips. “My friend, I will not fight you.” She stepped to the edge of her cube and dropped her sword. She heard it crash upon the ground, one hundred fifty meters down. Lightning flashed, followed by thunder. Oriana didn’t flinch.

Gaia didn’t move, or speak.

“What do I have to do,” Oriana said, “for you to forgive me?”

More lightning crackled, followed by rolling thunder.

“I want to be your friend. Will you not give me a second chance?”

Gaia ran to the edge of her cube and jumped. She flew twenty-two meters through the air, landed, and tumbled on Oriana’s cube, then regained her footing. She sheathed her
sai
. She stepped closer, closer.

Oriana didn’t move. Gaia grabbed her neck with a strong grip. She pressed her lips to Oriana’s ear.

“Don’t be weakened for love.”

The voice Oriana heard wasn’t Gaia’s. She broke away and looked bemused upon Lady Isabelle. “I don’t get it.”

“You will.”

Lady Isabelle’s likeness disappeared. Lightning struck beside the cubes, blinding Oriana for an instant.

She heard footsteps, then the sound of thunder, then footsteps. She turned.

Gaia strutted along a carbyne plank that forked toward the two cubes at the top of the pyramid.

“I’m sorry,” Gaia said.

“For what—” Oriana began, before she dropped, avoiding Gaia’s
sai
as it flew above her.

Oriana rolled and hung from the cube’s edge. She swung herself to its floor and glided down the ladder inside. Running to the other side of the cube, to the ladder leading down, she went back the way she came, all the way to the ground, where she found her sword. She grabbed it. She looked up.

Gaia leaned over the side of a cube, about midway up, the curls of her long hair dangling like claws.

Lightning flashed, blinding Oriana’s view. When the light dimmed, Gaia was gone.

Oriana darted up the ladder inside a cube, took a left turn, then climbed, up and over, up and over. She heard Gaia’s distant footsteps above. She tried to connect to Gaia but was blocked. She climbed up more cubes, ascending all the way to the top. A golden flag hung at the end of the carbyne plank. Oriana rushed to it and tugged. It indicated only a victory in the cubes could release it.

“You’re
my
last flag.”

Gaia’s voice.

Oriana swiveled on the plank. Her former friend looked winded, steady.

Don’t be weakened for love.
“You were my best friend—”

“I was your only friend,” Gaia said, “and you threw me away for a guy who doesn’t give a shit about anything but benaris and glory.” Gaia wore that naughty grin of hers, the one she always had when she used to talk to Oriana about boys. “I told you not to trust him.” Gaia touched her sex.

“You didn’t—”

“We did.” Gaia tapped her lips with her forefingers. “Hmm … Dunamisian chocolate,” she blew Oriana a kiss, “my favorite too.”

Don’t be weakened for love.
Oriana sprinted across the carbyne plank to Gaia’s cube. She stopped. She held her sword high above her head. “I can’t let you hurt me anymore.”

Gaia didn’t respond. She unsheathed her
sai
and assumed a middle stance, holding the
sai
upright in each hand, waist-high. She moved left. Oriana moved right. She sensed Gaia’s rhythm in the ZPF but couldn’t decipher it.

Gaia struck first, swiping with her
sai
, right and left, left and right. Oriana parried her strikes. Gaia screamed and moved faster, twisting and turning. Lightning scattered over the cubes, which shook from the inevitable thunder.

Oriana danced around Gaia, leading her to the cube’s edge. Gaia swiped with her left
sai
, then her right, and Oriana dodged them and swung her sword for Gaia’s left ankle. She tore through flesh, and Gaia’s blood darkened her bodysuit. The Rastedes candidate didn’t act as if she felt it.

The match continued. Sweat poured down their faces. Gaia’s eyes began to look lazy, the cube smeared with her blood. On Gaia’s next strike, the weakest and least coordinated so far, Oriana parried, then struck her sword to the
sai
blade.

She disrupted Gaia’s connection with the ZPF, easily avoiding Gaia’s strike with her left
sai
, keeping her sword upon the right
sai
, moving it up and down. Gaia screamed.

Oriana swept Gaia’s legs, and when Gaia recovered Oriana roundhouse kicked her off the cube.

Gaia’s cries ceased when she hit the ground.

Oriana peered over the ledge.

Gaia’s head was turned to the side, leaking blood, her legs and arms strewn randomly. Her
sai
lay beside her.

Oriana sheathed her sword and gathered the golden flag. She accepted one thousand points from Lady Isabelle.

Luxor City

Luxor, Underground South

2,500 meters deep

“Look at all these migrant workers,” Marcel said. “They must be
dying
with the heat.”

Gwen agreed. She frantically fanned herself beneath the parasol Juvelle held over her. Her gown had turned mauve. The aroma that wafted from the camels didn’t help. She was still adjusting to her mount’s loping gait. Gwen preferred to use the intracity transports in the Southern capitals where coolant systems weren’t as robust as in regional capitals closer to Areas 51 and 55. But the Janzers forbade travel along those lines here because of enhanced security procedures following terrorist threats, an oversight on Juvelle’s part in preparing the itinerary.

Hundreds of migrants maneuvered parts of a stage and moved thousands of chairs, while still others constructed an alloyed trellis over Pintara Square.

“They must be preparing for the chancellor himself,” Marcel said.

“They are,” Gwen said.

“How do you know?”

“The masseuse we met in Lovereal told me the Autumn Gala is in Luxor City this year, and that he and all entertainers in the commonwealth will be attending. So is the chancellor.”

“Strange, I hadn’t heard.” Marcel swiped the sweat from his throat and cringed. “Will we make it back here for the gala?”

“I hope to.”

Gwen requested a towel from Juvelle and wiped her face, which smeared her makeup, but she was beyond caring. Juvelle closed the parasol, dismounted from her and Gwen’s camel, and put up her palm at a crosswalk. The long row of camel riders halted. Gwen’s and Marcel’s camels scooted across the golden clay path. They dismounted and meandered to the pedestrian path amid fast-moving Luxorians. Juvelle reopened the parasol and held it over Gwen.

“This is because of you,” Gwen said to Juvelle. She lifted her drenched gown. “We’re going to melt right into the earth before we can even meet with the minister!”

“Aha, apologies, mademoiselle.” Juvelle opened a fan and cooled Gwen’s neck. “Would it be wise instead to turn back and return better prepared?”

“The vote was close before that ruckus in Portage,” Marcel said. “I don’t think we can.” He turned to Gwen. “Sweet sister, what did the minister say to upset you?”

“I told you to forget it.” To Juvelle, Gwen said, “We will continue and gain Minister Decca’s support, and remain on schedule to Nexirenna.”

“A fantastic decision, mademoiselle.”

They reached the base of the marble stairs that led to the Palace of Luxor. Gwen closed her eyes and enjoyed the breeze that swam over the palace promenade and down the steps, but the wind died as they climbed, and soon she baked again. Atop the promenade, she clutched a canteen as if it was her last. Marcel did the same.

“Just incredible,” he said. He turned from pyramids as large as planetoids to golden domes, walls of glass, palm trees. The desert gave the appearance of rust over the Granville horizon. The massive glass and alloyed entrance to the palace stood about half a kilometer away.

Gods
, Gwen thought,
I’m not going to make it; I’m going to die right here.

You are strong, and wise, my violin.
Antosha’s voice, through Marstone.
Don’t listen to your detractors.

I live only for you, my love,
Gwen transmitted,
and for our rise as king and queen to the surface of the Earth.

Stay strong. Stay on course, get me the votes.

He disconnected from her then. Gwen shivered. She flipped the lid to her canteen and drank. “Juvelle, remind me that you’ll deserve a punishment for this when we return to Palaestra.”

Juvelle fanned faster. “With pleasure, mademoiselle.”

When they entered the temperature-controlled palace, Gwen wanted to kiss the golden ground. Marcel moaned gladly. Juvelle closed the parasol and stuffed it into her satchel. A keeper bot scanned them and said, “Prime Minister Decca has been expecting you. Right this way.” The bot led them over a sun-filled atrium lined by lofty pillars and up the marble stairs to the double doors of the Polaris Pyramid.

The decorative antique doors opened noiselessly.

Prime Minister Carillon Decca sat upon a polished wooden dais, sipping on a glass filled with Luxorian wine. Gwen could smell its sweet persimmon scent from where she stood. On the glass table ahead of him lay a tray filled with mussel shells. He knocked one down his throat, wiped his hands and mouth, and called upon his keeper bot to clear the tray.

He raised his glass to Gwen and Marcel. “Care for some wine?”

“Water will be fine for both of us,” Gwen said. “Minister, I apologize for our tardiness,” she waved her hand over her dripping gown, “and this …”

The minister wiped crumbs from his light brown silk cape. “No need.”

The bot brought a tray with two glasses of water for Gwen and Marcel. They both downed the water, then handed the glasses back to the bot.

“I’m Gwendolyn Horvearth, and this is my brother—”

“I know who you are,” Decca said. Gwen drew back. “You’re the pretty bird that Antosha decided should fly around the commonwealth to convince all of us he’s best for Reassortment and a tertiary position in the ministry.”

“Excuse me?” Gwen said.

“Did he tell you why he was exiled?” Minister Decca’s eyebrows, bushy like caterpillars, lifted, and he sipped from his glass without taking his eyes off Gwen.

“I’ve heard it all, Minister.”

“I’ll remind you that you’re speaking to the prime minister, and if you’re going to tell all of us how qualified Antosha is to take the helm of the most important research project in the commonwealth and, perhaps, one day, lead from Phanes, you’d best have an understanding of the man you recommend.”

“Supreme Scientist Broden Barão was responsible for Haleya’s death on the island.”

Decca’s lips twisted into a sneer. “So young, so intelligent.” He bit on a toothpick. “So naive.” He swiped his eyebrows. “Did you do any research on your candidate? Do you not even know where Haleya was born?”

He rose and strolled through an archway that led to a terrace overlooking Pintara Square and Luxor Citadel.

Gwen was about to follow him when Marcel grabbed her arm. “He’s a nay, like Minister Charles in Palaestra—and like our time in Palaestra, we should make ourselves scarce in Luxor. We’ll finish this campaign, sweet sister, and afterward you and I will rise.”

“He’s the prime minister, and I didn’t travel all this way in hundred degree heat to be treated so discourteously.” She shook free of Marcel, who remained in the shade, shaking his head.

Gwen stormed onto the terrace.

“And why
are
you traveling around the commonwealth, Miss Gwen?” Decca turned to her.

Gwen noted the tightness in his cheeks, the squint to his eyes, the wisdom in his voice. She sensed no deception in his tone, the way she did with Antosha.

She recalled learning about the Island of Reverie, the day Haleya had sprinted off the stone platform and off the cliff and into the river. She remembered the fear in Haleya’s eyes, followed by the blood that streamed from them before it crystallized. She had looked just like her father. He, like she, had a small mole next to his lips. Gwen felt like she might pass out. She steadied herself.