Shadows Against the Empire (Folkestone & Hand Interplanetary Steampunk Adventures Book 1) Page 2

  He wound his way to the canal’s edge and sat upon a platform above which arched two double curves of stone, coming almost together like the horns of a deadly animal. He meditated in the gloaming as stars spread across the welkin and hated Earth rose eastward. The glittering stars manifested themselves in shimmering canal waters as the watery sun’s light fled, and the navigational lights of paddle wheelers and great-sailed xebecs formed floating constellations and slow meteors, and the gaslights of New Cydonia flickered among the far towers and domes.

  The Entity had instructed him to recruit followers, to share with them the power that bound them together, to distribute the spice that made them dream of the Dark Gods in their prison. He would do all the Entity had instructed, but first there had to be a reckoning, a settling of accounts. He would obey his commands, but the desire for vengeance burning so long in him could not be quenched so easily, not even by one of the Dark Gods.

  So he crossed the canal to this ancient city, a nexus of power in olden times, a numinous site where he could better raise and control the powers once wielded by the shadow lords of Mars. Thoza-Joran felt an invasive vitality he had never before known. The Entity had somehow planted within him a seed of power, some small aspect of the souls of those ancient blood-drinkers, so that he might do their will. He would serve then, walk the path to dominion, but only after they had served him against the humans and their planet-sprawling empire of steam and steel.

  Especially the British, Thoza-Joran thought secretly.

  He would become the dark lord’s avatar.

  But, first he would be avenged. He had kept this side of his nature hidden even as he absorbed the secrets and mysteries of the Dark Gods.

  There were always secrets, Thoza-Joran assured himself.

  Even from the Dark Gods.

  Especially from the Dark Gods.

  He sat upon the pedestal above the murmuring canal waters. Setting aside his brooding thoughts, he meditated, as he had been taught, then reached inside his own soul that he may nurture the seed of darkness now burning like black fire. The new habitation of humans and Martians on the far side of the canal faded from his thoughts, from his vision, and he became more aware of the ancient city surrounding him.

  The lengthening shadows coalesced into solidity.

  Old Cydonia seemed a ruin no more, but a place of newly spilled blood and old nightmares.

  The terrors surged and crashed around him like the coming of the primal waters.

  Thoza-Joran tasted blood anew.

  The temples and palaces rose about him, shadows ascending to the soul-numbing strains of music not heard by Martians for aeons, and never by the ears of mere humans. Despite the advent of twilight, Thoza-Joran felt only warmth, as if he sat before the life-sustaining flames of an obsidian fire. He seemed to actually see it, the leaping black flames, the eyes watching from its depths.

  With slitted gaze, Thoza-Joran perceived a sort of indigo glow about him, which crept up the pedestal as if it emanated from the ancient soil itself and flowed up the curved stones meeting above him. At the apex, a void formed, a seething blackness. While maintaining his meditative concentration, Thoza-Joran exulted in his heart of hearts for he had accomplished what no Martian had accomplished since the dream-time, when Shadows held sway and shed blood, glorious blood.

  Thoza-Joran frowned suddenly.

  Something was intruding upon the delicate moment.

  He heard the steady drone of propellers beating the air, the steady thrum of a steam engine high above. A patrol craft was approaching. Perhaps it had been attracted by something seen in the old city; perhaps it was just on a routine patrol. No matter. It could not stop him.

  But it could distract him.

  And it did.

  The power concentrated in the void which he had summoned seemed to ebb.

  It was a steam-craft of human manufacture, not of the court of the Red Prince, and that realisation made him pause. It might carry British markings, but at this nexus of trade lanes, the reason they had constructed the blasphemy of a new city so close to sacred ground, it might just as easily carry the flags of America or Texas or Germany, or any of the terrestrial invaders.

  But please, Thoza-Joran prayed, let it be British.

  Let it be of the devils who had taken his family during the food riots years before. The British still denied they had fired upon the rioters who wanted nothing more than food, still blamed the pirates and black marketeers that had surged against the authority of the military governor and the August Majesty of the Red Prince.

  Lies, all lies, Thoza-Joran thought.

  The bile that rose in his throat now no less bitter that it had been that pale dusty day he had cradled the bloody and bullet-riddled bodies of his family.

  He watched the solitary steam-flier approach Old Cydonia through narrowed eyes.

  The difference between now and then, Thoza-Joran reflected with a wide smile of sinister satisfaction, was that he was no longer a weakling, a timid and broken being beneath the heel of the British invader. Now he had the power to strike them, and strike them he would.

  The steam boilers of the patrol craft hissed fitfully and the blades of the propellers chopped at the twilight, and control surfaces groaned as it dropped out of the purple sky to investigate the strange luminosity at the edge of the dead city…the once-dead city, Thoza-Joran thought.

  Closer, come closer, he thought, have a good look at the vengeance that has come to Shemosh.

  Thoza-Joran could see the tiny figures scampering upon the deck in their sky-sailor uniforms, but he could not yet make out the ensign fluttering at the stern.

  Let it be British, he thought fervently.

  As the craft reached the middle of the canal, a beam of harsh and naked light shot from the sputtering and crackling arc-lamp upon the prow. It swung this way and that before settling on the gaunt form of Thoza-Joran upon the platform bathed in cold black fire. A voice boomed through a speaking-tube, but the human tongue was a mere babble to the Martian.

  The flier slowly closed upon him.

  He could see its flag now, fluttering at the stern.

  He uttered a harsh maniacal laugh, much as he uttered years ago in the streets of Syrtis Major, in the blood-washed streets when a British soldier prodded him with his rifle and told him to move along or face arrest. Now, however, the laugh was not accompanied by a pathetic whimper, a timid sob as he crawled like a cur; it was accompanied this time by jagged bolts of searing energy flung from the apex of the edifice soaring above Thoza-Joran.

  Men burst aflame.

  The boilers exploded, steam roaring from its ruptured guts.

  Its propellers whirled away like flashing knives.

  The hull and superstructure of the craft hurtled into the black waters like a comet thrown from the heavens by the gods.

  In the dying light of the fires, Thoza-Joran saw that which he had searched for so fervently come fluttering in the gloaming.

  The Union Jack settled like a falling leaf, floated a long moment among the slicks of burning oil, then sank beneath the black waters.

  Thoza-Joran exulted.

  And he waited.

  Chapter 2

  “Fine, I don’t need to go all the way in, chappy,” Sergeant Felix Hand said. “I just need in so I can…”

  “You cannot enter,” the tall bulky human said in low rumbling tones. “You are not a member.”

  “I know damn well…”

  “Please control yourself, my good man; your rough language is not…”

  “I am not your good man!” Sergeant Hand nearly shouted. “All I need you to do is go into your little clubhouse and get…”

  “As I explained…” The club doorman paused, the silence laced with unspoken disdain. “…Sergeant, the membership of the Red Sands Club is both strictly limited and utterly confidential. Since I can in no way tell you whether or not Captain Folkestone is a member, or the guest of a member, there is no way I can…”

/>   “Look, chappy, I know…”

  “My name is Mr Giles…Sergeant.”

  “Whatever,” the short barrel-chested highlander Martian interrupted. “I know Captain Folkestone is here because he always comes here when we stop in Syrtis Major. He comes to drink and smoke and gamble. If you don’t turn yourself around and get him now I’m going to go right past you and…”

  “I do not respond well to threats…Sergeant.”

  “And that’s another thing,” Sergeant Hand snapped, his rapid breaths not matching the even motions of the clockwork heart in his chest. “I am a goddamned non-commissioned officer in Her Majesty’s goddamned 63rd Martian Rifles, on special assignment to the goddamned Admiralty, so you better well show me some goddamned respect before I…”

  “What is going on, Mr Giles?” a voice asked from behind.

  The doorman paled suddenly and stammered: “I…Sir, I was explaining…trying to explain to this…this uncouth…this person the impossibility of…”

  Sergeant Hand turned, smiled and saluted. “I’ve been trying to get Captain Folkestone out of this place, Commodore. His presence is urgently required at the Admiralty.”

  Commodore Bentley’s face lit up in recognition. He returned the salute and extended his hand. “Well, it’s Sergeant Hand!”

  “Yes, sir, it’s good to see you again.”

  “I didn’t know you and old Folkestone were back in Syrtis-Major,” the Commodore flustered, smoothing his moustache.

  “Just back from India via Mercury.”

  “All very hush-hush, I suppose?”

  “Yes, sir. Very, if you know what I mean.”

  The Commodore winked almost conspiratorially, though he had not a clue. “Needed at the Admiralty, you said?”

  “Yes, sir – urgently.”

  Commodore Bentley fixed the doorman with the sort of stare that in his younger days would have made Zulu warriors or Venusian Nagas wither, and the club functionary learned that time had not much dimmed the old warrior’s gaze, if at all.

  “I will get Captain Folkestone immediately, Commodore Bentley,” Mr Giles replied stiffly, words barely able to escape his constricted throat, and tiny beads of perspiration layered his brown. “If the, uh, Sergeant had perhaps explained…”

  “Just get him,” the Commodore growled softly. “Now.”

  Without a further word, Mr Giles turned on his heel and vanished behind a red velvet door.

  “It’s always something, isn’t it?” the Commodore muttered.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “So, tell me, Sergeant how have you and that reprobate Folkestone been getting along,” the elderly officer asked, leaning just a bit on his silver-tipped walking stick. “Still saving the Empire from itself?”

  “Yes, Commodore,” the Martian soldier answered. “As much as we can these days.”

  “Good show!”

  Nursing his wounded pride, silently cursing uppity wogs with friends in high places, Mr Giles made his way through the lounge, bypassed the smoking room, the library and the dining room, and entered the card room. Yes, of course Captain Robert Folkestone was here. Where else would the scoundrel be but in the card room of the Red Sands Club taking the money of his betters by, Mr Giles was certain, every foul means known to man? That Folkestone was a member was a mystery to Mr Giles, and a grating one, as Folkestone was not even a proper captain of the Royal Space Navy, but a mere captain of Marines, and Mr Giles was all but certain he had somehow obtained even that commission through some sort chicanery or guile.

  Probably blackmail, Mr Giles thought.

  Mr Giles positioned himself behind Folkestone’s chair and leaned forward. As he did, he noticed the captain did not hold a winning hand, though he was playing as if he did, and the doorman murmured: “Captain Folkestone, I regret this interruption but your presence is required in the foyer; your…assistant asked for you.”

  “My…assistant?” To the man sitting across from him he said: “I believe it is still your play, sir.”

  “Your native man,” Mr Giles explained. “Your batman, I assume.”

  A faint smile flickered over Folkestone’s thin lips, but his gaze and concentration did not waver from the game before him. He said softly, only loudly enough for red ears, “I trust you did not say that to him, Mr Giles, else your voice would be much higher pitched than it is now and you would be applying for emigration to the Ottomans as a eunuch in service to the Sublime Port.”

  “Sir!”

  “Mr Giles, please remember the decorum,” Folkestone urged. “The Red Sands Club is a respectable establishment,”

  Mr Giles gritted his teeth.

  “Give me a chance to finish this up,” Folkestone said after a moment. “Tell Sergeant Hand I shall be with him momentarily.”

  “Yes…sir.”

  The trouble, of course, Robert Folkestone reflected as he returned his full attention to the game, was that his hand was utter rubbish. Fortunately, he was the only one aware of it, at least he thought so; that damnable Giles had no doubt taken a good look at his cards, but Folkestone was fairly certain he’d managed to keep the functionary off balance enough to prevent his expressions from sending messages to the others.

  “Well, gentlemen, I must be going, but I do mean to finish this hand; after all, there will be debts to settle, and rather would I have you gentlemen attend to them with your money than I with mine,” Folkestone declared jauntily. “We must make haste.”

  He gazed over the top of his cards.

  The other players scowled to one degree or another, natural since they were all behind and looking to recoup their money from the man who had taken it, but Bowie, oil baron from the Republic of Texas, who’d been admitted to the Red Sands Club under the aegis of Lord Alfred, grinned mightily.

  “I can’t say I’d like you to run off with my money just yet,” Bowie said, his voice possessing the natural boom of the outdoorsman, even in the more tenuous Martian atmosphere. “And I don’t know as you have the cards to pull it off, Captain.”

  “Only one way to find out, Mr Bowie.”

  “Let’s have at it then.”

  Wagering began in earnest, fuelled by a sense of urgency, which Folkestone did his best to promote. While the others sweated and dropped from the hurried play, Bowie kept pace with Folkestone, and even seemed to push it along himself with his banter. Within minutes, the sums involved and the pace of play had caused the timid and the lean of purse to drop by the wayside; predictably, only Bowie and Folkestone remained with counters.

  “I think you’re bluffing, Captain,” Bowie asserted. “It’s in your eyes.”

  Folkestone smiled thinly and pushed a mountain of counters forward, almost all of which had been donated by his former companions of the table over the course of the evening.

  “I invite you to discover for yourself, sir.”

  Bowie’s face revealed nothing of the emotion coursing through him. Back home, on Earth, back in Texas, the empire of cotton, cattle and petroleum, there was not a man to stand up to him the way this Brit did, and he was sure he did not like it. This was no man to be bullied, not by wealth or position or reputation, and Bowie was damn sure he did not like that either. He had called the game as prerogative of the dealer, certain none of these barbermongers would be up to a real man’s game, but it may have turned on him. He could call Folkestone’s wager, but just barely, but with no other counters remaining before Folkestone the Brit would be forced to turn up his cards, and Bowie was certain Folkestone was a bluffer, more sure than anything else in his life.

  “I’ll call your wager,” Bowie said evenly, pushing forward all his own counters. “Let’s see those cards, partner.”

  “I am not so certain you are not, as you say… ‘bluffing’ yourself, Mr Bowie.”

  “You’re called, Mister,” Bowie growled, “so, unless you can pull something out of…”

  “No, I really do believe you are overestimating the strength of your hand, Mr Bowie,” Folkestone
interrupted, reaching inside his tunic and withdrawing his chequebook, quickly dashing out a sum, tearing it from the book and adding it to the pile of counters. “If you can call that, you may see my cards; otherwise I shall see yours.”

  “What is this?” Bowie demanded.

  “Good as gold, drawn on Lloyd’s of Mars,” Folkestone explained.

  “Captain Folkestone is quite correct, Mr Bowie,” interjected Pips, one of the Club officers, stepping forward. “As a member, Captain Folkestone has the privilege endorsing a cheque.”

  “I can do the same,” Bowie asserted, reaching inside his jacket for his own chequebook.

  “It is drawn on a bank on Mars or in London?”

  “No, the First Republic Bank of Houston.”

  “I am sorry, sir, but Club rules prohibit that.”

  “It’s the biggest bank in Texas,” Bowie said with rising voice. “I am on its Board of Directors; we have more gold in our one vault than you do in all the vaults in London and Mars combined!”

  “Perhaps, sir,” Pips admitted, “but the rules are quite specific, and may not be amended without a vote of the Board.”

  “Fine, I’ll just go get…”

  “If you leave the game,” Pips interposed quickly, “you will forfeit both hand and play. I am sorry, sir, but the rules...”

  Bowie’s gaze shifted between Pips’ bland countenance and Folkestone’s smug one. Back in Texas, he knew what he would have done to these cheats, but his hog-leg was locked in the office of the Provost Marshal, taken from him the moment he disembarked from the aethership from Earth. The Texan scowled.

  “Very well, Captain Folkestone,” Bowie said.

  Folkestone reached forward to draw back his winnings.

  “I’ll see your cards, Captain.”

  “As the game was your choice, Mr Bowie, I assume you know the rules of play, so I will not embarrass you by quoting them to you.” He drew back the counters and stacked them on a gaming tray. “Perhaps you should have stayed with the club standard, which would have been fair to all, rather than choosing a game of cards in which you would assume you possessed a natural advantage over the other members and guests.”