A Touch of Death Read online

  ‘Where—’

  ‘Just shut up and I’ll see what I can do.’

  Cooper carried him into the prison and stepped into the shoot that brought him up three levels to where the bodyman worked. Blood was soaking through his uniform and dripping onto the ground; the strong metallic smell gathered in his nostrils and threatened to set up there permanently. His hands felt sticky and warm, and the whole ordeal turned his stomach.

  He had seen many a man beaten, some even to death, but he had never been moved to help one of them before. There was something admirable about a man – a traitor – who did not scream or back down. Even with skin coming off his back, the man did not seem weak. Cooper felt a bizarre sort of admiration towards him.

  The bodyman, Faber, was a wizened old man who had been at Redwater Prison since King Markas’ coronation and looked well beyond his years. He stood up stiffly when Cooper brought the prisoner in and laid him face down on the bed.

  ‘My, my,’ said Faber, voice gravelly and halting. ‘What trouble has this young man been up to, hm?’

  ‘A protestor.’

  ‘Goodness,’ said Faber. ‘And he was spared?’

  ‘Spared?’ It was hard not to scoff. ‘He lives, barely. I wouldn’t deign to call such a fate spared, Faber. Don’t let him die. King Markas’ orders.’

  Faber nodded and turned to attend to his patient.

  As Cooper turned to leave, the man reached out and caught him by the arm, his grip surprisingly strong.

  ‘What’s your name?’ His voice sounded like metal on glass but the lilt was impossible to mask. He was Anaitian.

  ‘Cooper,’ he said, startled into informality.

  ‘Cooper,’ repeated the man. ‘Good to know.’

  He said nothing else as Faber injected something into his arm and his eyes rolled back into his head, blissful black sleep overtaking him.

  Cooper appraised the prisoner, his stomach queasy. He felt unable to move or walk away or do anything except kneel beside the unconscious figure, watching as Faber set to work on him.

  The minutes ticked by with impossible slowness, each one more exhausting than the last. Cooper could not have said why he worried for the young man’s fate. He had no reason to. The dissenter had undertaken his actions knowing he was likely to die in the same horrific fashion as his friends.

  Deciding that he was more perplexed than empathetic, Cooper sat down in the chair by the bed and thought of all the reasons a rich man would risk his life to protest that which had no effect upon him. Those in Cutta, and especially in Anais, were not in danger of starvation like those in the Southern Lands; nor of the Thinning, which was spreading rapidly through the Eastern Islands. There was no danger of rogue mutants or rabid animals in Cutta as there were in the newly settled places in Eyre and Nitoib. Not to mention the fact that all Anaitians were inoculated from the Plague at birth, so it was not a threat to any of them the way it was for the rest of the Kingdom. Anaitians were the only ones who had nothing to fear.

  Anais was a beacon of hope and simplicity, dangling above all other cities in the Kingdom with its wealth and prosperity and ease of life. And so he stared at the copper-haired young man, little more than a boy, and wondered what had changed one of Anais’ highest born into a dissenter with welts on his back, pools of his blood staining the floor.

  After a long while, Faber finished treating and bandaging the wounds and announced that the prisoner could go. Cooper carried him down the brightly lit corridor towards his cell. It was cold and empty, completely bare. A stark contrast to anything the man would know.

  Cooper put him down carefully and nodded to himself, glad that the prisoner had not awoken. He glanced at his timekeeper, and left the cell quickly, making for his post.

  It was only when he was back in the yard, all too aware of the bloodstains on his uniform, that he finally realised who the prisoner was.

  Shock filled him with dizzying speed. What possible reason could Nate Anteros, eldest son of the King’s favourite, have for wanting the Kingdom brought to its knees?

  PART ONE

  Infection

  MONTH ONE

  Away from the harsh glare of artificial light, the constant thrum of human activity and the purr of passing hovers, the world seemed extraordinarily quiet. The sort of quiet where even the softest of footsteps or lightest of breezes could be heard, and every creature was aware of the smallest of sounds.

  That said, the two humans who currently joined them were far from quiet. Moonlight illuminated only a fraction of the road and was not bright enough to outline rocks or other sharp objects, and Catherine Taenia found herself tripping and stumbling through the tumbleweeds and gravel which had overtaken the ancient path.

  A wild, untouched world, it had been so long since any sort of transport had touched the ground that the old roads had gone to seed. Sticks stuck up in odd places, sinkholes which had once been obvious were now invisible beneath overgrowth, and treacherous water was hidden in shadow and failed to reflect the light of the stars above, threatening to swallow them whole if they stumbled too near the edge of the road. There were no signs to guide the way, only a vague understanding to go northeast towards the adjacent town. It was galling and overwhelming.

  The Nitoib Mountain Range was known for being desolate, with endless stretches of valley, lowlands, and dozens of creeks and rivers, each leading in a different direction, some safeguarded, some unknown and treacherous. The mountains themselves stretched the length of Nitoib, from the Uncleared Zone in the southeast, to Muntenia in the north, and kept on until the Outlands beyond Franklin’s Wall. Much of the mountains were off-limits due to an increase in rogue rabids and wild animals slipping through cracks in the crumbling Wall, and walking on the roads had been illegal in the fifty years since hovers became the primary means of transportation.

  Far from anything and the least populated country in the Kingdom, the patrols in Nitoib were so understaffed that two weeks often went by between fly-bys. It meant they were safe from being seen but in serious trouble if anything went wrong.

  It was not merely fear of rabids, mutants and animals which frightened her. Catherine had read about wanderers and vagabonds who drifted to the edges of the Kingdom and died of exposure and frostbite. Diseases were rampant even now, and in spite of her injections, she nursed a constant fear of contracting something. Her father had told her many tales as a child and she could still remember his story about the man who had wandered off, froze to death and had his face eaten by a wild dog with two heads. Whether true or not, it terrified her. She did not relish ending up like that at all, and she was so angry at Nate that she half-heartedly told herself that if the guards managed to catch up to them, she would hand him over in exchange for a lift home.

  Renewed anger burned through her chest and she glared around, trying to catch sight of Nate in the darkness. It was impossible.

  ‘Have I told you how much I loathe you?’ She heard a snort from somewhere to her right, and turned her head, staring into the murky darkness.

  ‘Shall I apologise again?’

  His tone only infuriated her more.

  ‘We might be out here for days,’ she snapped. ‘My feet are bleeding in these shoes and I’ve no coat or water or anything that might be of use.’

  A huff of exasperation reached her ears. ‘We’re not going to be out here for days,’ he said. ‘Two at most.’

  ‘Two days meaning more than one.’

  ‘We’ll find something today or tomorrow and we can contact Tommy to come and get us,’ he continued. ‘Everything will be fine. There’s no reason to worry. We both know that you’re not the one who’s in trouble.’

  ‘Fleeing the guards is completely illegal,’ said Catherine. ‘I’m in as much trouble as you.’

  ‘None of them are going to accuse you,’ said Nate. ‘It was entirely my fault.’

  ‘At least we agree on that much.’

  An uncomfortable silence filled the space between them for a moment, and then a sudden cracking sound reached her ears and light appeared. Nate face was illuminated by the match’s flame. He looked horrible. Blood had dried in five or six miserable rivers down his face from cuts which marred his eyebrows, his nose, his forehead and his lip. His eyes were bloodshot and heavy-lidded. It made him look wild and mad. On anyone else it would have been surprising and a reason to fret. On Nate it was almost normal.

  ‘Here,’ he said, after a moment’s pause. The flame disappeared and Catherine couldn’t make out what he was doing behind the spots now performing in rampant explosions before her eyes. A moment later, he tossed something at her. It landed on the ground and she bent cautiously and picked it up. It was his heavy winter coat, well-worn and a bit wet from sweat, but warm and protective all the same.

  ‘Sorry about your feet,’ he added. ‘I’ll try and find us even ground so it doesn’t hurt as much.’

  Catherine said nothing as she accepted the coat. It would have been incredibly imprudent not to. She was so cold that her teeth ached from chattering together, and her legs and arms felt like metal poles. The coat went down to her knees and blocked out a fair amount of wind. Suddenly warmer, her anger dissipated just a fraction.

  They made their way along the twisting road, alternating between the matches and the dying igniter, only turning it on when they reached a dead-end and had to backtrack onto the road to regain their course.

  As they rounded another bend, the sound of rushing water grew louder and louder, to the point of being worrisome, and Nate clicked his igniter once more to see what was ahead of them. Most of the back-roads of Anais were overgrown and rundown, and out here in the mountains it was even worse. Greenwald, the town they were fleeing, and Goodkind, the town they were making for, both had foot
paths within town boundaries, for walking, gliding or cycling, but out here the world was wild and desolate.

  Where once the road had bridged its way across the raging waterfall, the bridge was now completely destroyed and there was a gap far wider than either of them could jump, directly in front of them. The road leading up to the edge was crumbled and broken, as if angry at being neglected. The empty space dropped down into the river. Catherine could hear water thrashing against the rocks far below. Falling in would mean certain, painful death.

  She cursed quietly. Nate, who was holding the igniter out before him like a beacon, appeared only marginally ill at ease. To her fury, he seemed almost amused by their predicament.

  ‘I don’t know about you, darling, but I can’t swim,’ he said, peering cautiously over the edge. ‘I suppose we could take the trail.’

  ‘You must be joking.’

  ‘I saw what looked like a proper trail back that way. I reckon it was the one they used to use to get between the towns during the war.’

  ‘How do you even know where those are?’

  Nate snorted as if affronted by the question. ‘I’m a terrible drunk, darling, not an idiot.’

  Catherine raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Funny,’ he said. ‘I did listen in Cartography. Can’t get Tommy to shut up about it.’

  ‘I opted for Architecture.’

  ‘Oh? Any good?’

  ‘It was all right—Nate,’ she snapped, rolling her eyes. ‘Now is not the time.’

  He chuckled lowly. ‘My point is that I know my way up and over.’

  The trails on the side of the road would potentially bypass the waterfall, and they could cut down the mountain when they saw the road pick up again, but it was a dangerous route and not one Catherine felt inclined to take. She had broken enough laws that night and didn’t feel like tempting fate further. She could just imagine the trouble Thom was going through trying to sort everything out for them. Undoubtedly her father and Cecily Anteros were racing to ensure there was no fallout. Catherine did not even want to think about Hamish’s reaction. Hamish Anteros made no attempt to hide his hatred of his eldest son.

  She stared blindly up at the black mass of the hills and mountains which towered above them dauntingly. ‘The trail’s been there for an age,’ she said. ‘It’s not been used in decades. I’m not walking up an uncharted mountain in the middle of the night with hardly any light. Let’s just think of something else.’

  ‘What if the guards come?’

  ‘Then you’ll be thrown in prison again and you’ll deserve it,’ she hissed through gritted teeth.

  Nate tensed visibly. She was sure she could hear his teeth grinding and in the fading light she could see his fingers tapping out an agitated rhythm on the tree branch beside him. ‘Kitty,’ he said at length, ‘I know you’re exhausted. I am sorry for that. I know this is all my fault and I’m trying to make it right. I’m not going to wait on the side of the bloody road for men who have an incredible, undeniable urge to torture me. Tommy’s going to fix all of this – that’s the beautiful thing about money, it can get you anywhere – but it’s going to take a while and I’d like to be a figment of their imagination until they are called upon to arrest some other unlucky soul. Can we please walk to the village? Up and over, darling.’

  Catherine raised an eyebrow at the enormous cliff beside them. It went straight up and disappeared into the darkness. She wasn’t sure how high it was; from where they stood in the middle of the road, it looked near to impossible to traverse and she felt a rising bubble of nausea in the pit of her stomach. She was not about to admit her fear, however.

  ‘There’s no path,’ she said lamely.

  ‘There is,’ said Nate. ‘I already told you. Back the way we came there’s a turn off that goes straight up and over. Once we’re passed the river, we can climb back down. It’ll be a detour. It’s that or go back.’

  He looked at her beseechingly. Going back before everything was sorted out would put him back in the hands of the guards. It would mean going to Redwater before a release was even discussed. It would mean he’d have to go back into a cell. A beating would be a positive outcome.

  Much as she detested Nate’s entire existence, Catherine was still haunted by the look on Thom’s face when he told her that the guards had tortured him. She couldn’t let anything happen to Nate for Thom’s sake.

  It didn’t mean she wasn’t thoroughly inclined to punch him on the nose.

  Wind bit at her already icy legs and she looked down at her feet. They were throbbing badly. Her legs were covered in shiver-lumps. ‘I rather hate you,’ she said resignedly, and limped past him, back the way they’d come.

  It took almost an hour to find the path. She could feel insects happily biting into her flesh and the bites that didn’t sting itched terribly. One in particular seemed to have swollen to a great size and she started to worry about infection even though she’d had her bimonthlies only two weeks before. Her body felt more tired and woozy than it ever had, even given the circumstances, and she wondered if she was getting a fever. Most likely she was sobering up and paying the price for it, a by-product of stress and exertion.

  When the path began to rise, she was forced to remove her heeled shoes; woefully impractical to begin with, they now proved a hazard. Her feet stung, the ground unforgiving and jagged beneath her toes. Where rocks did not litter the path, the grass was thick, pokey and wet, and soon her feet went numb with a burning cold.

  Thunder boomed in the distance, and a crack of lightning brought a cold rush of wet wind and a streak of blinding brightness across the horizon, giving her a brief glimpse of the terrain. The last of Catherine’s humour left her.

  The thick grass suddenly dropped beneath her feet and her ankle slid into a hole. She spun around and hit her back against a rock. Pain shot through her entire body. She cried out, the suddenness of it keeping away the worst of the pain as shock rushed through her and everything seemed to sharpen; all remaining drunkenness left her, chased away by the pain. She felt the warm stickiness of blood beneath her clothes.

  ‘Bloody God,’ she cursed, holding her ankle with one hand and clutching at her back with the other. Gold stars were exploding in front of her vision and blood was pounding in her ears.

  It took her another minute to realise that Nate was at her side, talking to her.

  ‘… more than just a bruise, hopefully. Darling, you all right?’ He lifted the igniter higher, appraising her worriedly. The rain had mixed with the blood and muck on his face, and he was a strange mess of pinks and browns and reds, and the blacks and greens and yellows of forming bruises. His red hair looked black in the darkness. He looked like Thom. She hated him for it.

  ‘Leave me alone,’ she said. ‘I don’t need any of your help.’

  ‘Look, I’m trying—’

  ‘Just go! You’ve done enough damage already. Why did you even come back?’

  He let out a sigh and she wondered if he was offended or simply biting back a snarky retort. Before she had time to gather her own thoughts into any semblance of understanding or maturity, he said simply, ‘I apologise. I’ve said my apologies and I shall repeat them again if you wish. Please hear them. I’m sorry you got hurt and I’m sorry you saw that back there because I can imagine it didn’t really do much in my favour. I never thought any of that would happen. I never even thought you would be here! You’ve never opted to come before. I thought Tommy would be alone.’

  ‘That doesn’t exactly fix the problem, does it?’

  ‘So my apology means nothing?’

  ‘Not when your actions have turned us both into lawbreakers and disrupters of the peace, no. Yet again your family’s cleaning up your mess, lack-brain, and I’m starting to think you’ve no care at all for anyone in the world except yourself.’

  ‘As you wish.’ Nate’s face suddenly disappeared as the igniter went out. She could hear him stuffing it into his pocket. He stood and stomped off, all trace of him gone in seconds, swallowed by the vicious night.

  Catherine glared after him. Their relationship had always been tempestuous, but when his actions and subsequent arrest lost both her and Thom job opportunities, things had soured even further. No matter their connections, associates of criminals were not trusted. Both of them had had to find a new career path and her annoyance at him had become full blown hatred.