The Curse of the Winged Scorpion
Hell is other people

Theship – Rashari called her Vedeca - swept over fallow fields and rolling hills;the landscape of southern Tabris passing underneath them like an unfurledcarpet. The colours were bright and dazzling under the warm sun. Fantel hadvisited the kingdom numerous times in the last twelve years, including thecapital city Remenes. Tabris had been a pivotal trading hub for centuries,mostly due to its location situated on a peninsula in the south central regionof Tybur. Tabrians often claimed to be the centre of the world. There was sometruth to the boast. The Adran Empire threatened to the east, neighbouringAramant rested to the immediate west, and the Bhuvam islands sat just off theeastern coastline. The southern continent of Dushkuland waited to the southbeyond the Verus channel. Remenes had grown affluent due to trade coming infrom air, land, and sea routes across all of human dominated Aldlis. Tabris’ location also threatened hersovereignty. Dushkuland had long sought the annexation of the kingdom and afoothold upon the Tybur continent. The Adran Empire likewise, would do whateverit must to ensure that Dushku, its great rival, never gained control of theessential trading routes running like arteries in and out of Remenes. Thespectre of invasion forever loomed large upon the green and golden splendour ofthis ancient kingdom; Fantel had always thought that the shadow of destructiongranted an almost ephemeral quality to Tabris’ glorious countryside. It wasfleeting and fragile, all the more beautiful because it was inevitably doomed tofall.

Thesilence inside the main cabin remained unbroken until Vedeca swept northward.Fantel watched undulating green hills and golden bands of arable land give wayto clusters of buildings, quaint farming villages and thriving towns, ringed bysolid walls. Finally the ground below became rougher, valleys giving way tocraggy moors and finally a pock-marked canyon dominated by a deep crater in theground. Vedeca began to slow, sinking lower to toward the ground as itapproached the crater.

Thered stone city of Remenes sat within the crater, like a ruby set in earth andshadow. Rashari banked in a lazy arc and Fantel saw the whole of the city laidout before her. The crater formed a natural wall around Remenes, sheltering itin a swath of cooling shade. The city looked like a carving made by a skilledartisan, as unreal as the Aerie of the Gods. The needle-like spire of thetemple of Cirroc, patron god and protector of the ancient city, dominated theskyline. The entire city stretched out around this one magnificent structurelike the ripples on the surface of a circular pond. Fantel could see wideavenues striking out from the temple at diagonal angles. The royal palace, theoldest building in the city, was carved directly out of the rock of the crater,its enormous pillars and wide walkways wrapping around the city and rising tothe very top of the crater. Fantel had heard a rumour that the same ancientrace of men responsible for the Aerie of the Gods had also carved Remenespalace out of the solid rock. Having seen both wonders with her own eyes Fantelwas willing to give some credence to this belief.

TheVedeca continued to spiral downward in a controlled descent. Fantel could seethe oval shaped open roof of the skyport, one of the largest buildings in thecity. Rashari carefully brought the ship into dock. The sky above Remenes wascongested with a number of private and commercial skycraft; a large lumberingfreight ship, built like a floating brick, rose laboriously out of theskyport’s roof, while other smaller craft zipped in and out of docking bays setinto the sides of the building. The entire structure reminded Fantel of ananthill.

“Youhave permission to dock in Remenes?” She asked, her voice sounding inordinatelyloud in the tense quiet of the cabin.

“Ina manner of speaking,” Rashari half-shrugged, as much as he could with his leftarm stuck in the interface and his right hand busy twiddling dials and flickingswitches. “Remenes is surprisingly accommodating when it comes to unscheduledarrivals, and as I said, I have contacts in the port. Even if a berth is notavailable for Vedeca the goblins working the bays will let me lay over an houror two at any rate.”

“Convenient,indeed,” Fantel quirked an eyebrow, “Almost it would seem that you meant toland in Remenes all along.”

“Notat all, actually; I’ve had to grease a good many palms and perform severalhighly irritating favours to ensure Vedeca’s anonymity in this city – it justso happens that today offers me opportunity to enjoy the rewards of my hardwork.”

“Thisship is yours?” Fantel reached out to touch the console in front of her,letting her fingers glide over the cool metal.

“Yes,”He said firmly, fingers flipping a number of switches so that Vedeca came to ahalt hovering in mid-air, waiting for one of the docking ports to becomeavailable. A monitor in front of Fantel swam with incomprehensible lines oftext, both letters and numbers. Rashari was keeping one eye on the readout ashe held the ship steady. “Tell me Madame Chimera, have you ever flown co-pilotbefore?”

“No.”Fantel frowned at him. The question seemed absurd to her. The Chimeri had nouse for flight; they were creatures born of Aldlis, if they had been meant totake to the sky they would have been born with wings.

“Hmm,”He reached out with his right hand and tapped a finger against the screen infront of her, “Vedeca’s made contact with flight control; they’ll sendconfirmation about which bay to land in via this screen. I’d appreciate it ifyou could let me know when they give the all-clear.”

Fantellooked from the screen filled with gibberish to Rashari and back again. She didnot try to keep the suspicion from her tone as she asked, “You are incapable ofdoing this yourself?”

“OhI can do it,” he replied breezily, “but it’s a trifle busy at the moment andunless we wish to be knocked out of the sky by that tub over there I’m going tohave to take us out of hover mode – meaning that I’ll have to concentrate onflying instead of watching the port bays or the monitors. Chances are we couldlose our docking space to some cheeky Johnny-come-lately should that happen.”

“Ido not know how to read the screen.” Fantel admitted refusing to feel in anywayabashed to make the admission.

“Ohthere’s nothing to it, really.” Rashari tapped his finger on a scrawling lineof text running across the screen, even as he used his left hand to pull Vedecaout of hover mode and banked gently to the right to allow the commercialskyship to pass. “See this line here? When there’s a free spot the readout willgive the bay number followed by Vedeca’s ID code – triple seven, one, five,nine, quadruple eight. Just look out for the code and the bay number precedingit and call that out to me.”

Fantelfrowned. She wanted to refuse but to do so would be churlish. She gave a short,sharp nod of grudging assent and focused her attention on the screen. She staredat the screen hard enough to make her head hurt as Rashari manoeuvred Vedecaleft and right, up and down, to avoid the constant flow of skycraft buzzing inand out of the busy skyport. The cabin hummed with the vibration of theengines, forced to work especially hard to keep the ship aloft while idling inthe air. There was a faint tingle to the air inside the cabin, but it was notunpleasant. In fact it reminded her vaguely of the feeling she gained whendigging her fingers into fresh tilled soil – the slightest pulse of life-energyrode the air making Fantel doubly curious about this ship and her peculiarmaster. The energy did not feel like Phantasma to her, but she did not knowwhat else could make a skyship fly.

Themonitor screen refreshed, old codes and digit strings wiped clean and replacedby new ones; Vedeca’s code flashed up on the screen. “Bay thirteen.” She turnedto Rashari. “You can replace it?”

“Mmhmm,”Vedeca glided forward, the engines rumbling as the ship broke out of hover modeand swept toward one of the circular port bays. Fantel watched out of thewindow as they entered the skyport. Her initial impression of an anthill wasreinforced further once she saw the inside of the small craft docking bays. Oncethrough the entrance tunnel they emerged into a huge chamber criss-crossed bylayer upon layer of skeletal walkways, gangplanks and platforms. Fantel couldsee dozens of craft held in huge metal docking clamps. She watched as a lightcruiser skyship very like Vedeca came into dock; the ship floated into placebetween the upper and lower clamps, the upper of which slowly lowered until theship was pinched between both clamps, held suspended from the edge of one ofthe platforms. “Vice clamps,” Rashari murmured having noticed her interest inthe procedure. “Terribly old fashioned. They favour magnetic clamps in Adrathese days – safer on the paintwork.” The Vedeca drifted over to a mid-levelbay close to the far wall of the chamber. Fantel noted a small cluster ofgoblins, dressed in habitual grey cowls, waiting on the bay platform. The uppermost vice clamp was already beginning to descend when Rashari brought the shipto a halt and cut the engines. The walls of the cabin shuddered as the ship wascaught between the two clamp arms. Rashari pulled his arm free of theinterface, almost managing to hide a grimace of discomfort, and the interfaceretracted smoothly back into the console.

“Rightthen ladies,” he said brightly, rising carefully from the pilot’s chair andfacing the rest of the escapees – who up until this moment had been so silentFantel had all but forgotten them – “Shall we disembark?”

“What‘appens now?” The hatchet faced Adran woman who had advocated death overslavery peered at Rashari warily. “Yer just gonna let us go then? No tricks, nonofink?” One or two of the other women murmured in shared sentiment, each facewrit large with queasy suspicion. During the chaos of their escape they hadbeen happy to throw in with this extravagant youth but now, so close tofreedom, and jaded by their experiences, they questioned his altruism and theirown luck.

“Quiteso,” Rashari nodded. “I assure you I have no interest in going into business asa slaver. You are free to go.”

“Justlike that?” Another woman asked. Her accent marked her as either Tabrian orAramite. She brushed a curl of mousey hair behind one ear. “Aren’t you aRaider? Why would you help us for free?”

Fantelwas also interested in this answer. She turned to Rashari and waited for his response.He shrugged then froze in pain, the gesture clearly not agreeing with hisinjury. “Why not?” He asked almost flippantly. “You have nothing I want, andreally, I only freed you because I thought you might help cover my escape.” Hethrew up his right hand, made a meaningless circular gesture with his wrist.“It cost me nothing to bring you with me - so I did.” He smirked at the womanplayfully. “You can pay me for the rescue if you wish; I certainly won’t stopyou.”

Thewoman opened her mouth to reply but at that moment someone knocked on the outerdoor. “Ah,” Rashari smiled, “the docking crew is getting impatient.” He bouncedup the step from the cockpit to the passenger area and strode toward the backof the cabin, right hand clamped to his left shoulder. “It’s never a good ideato leave a goblin waiting.” At the door to the cabin he turned back to the restof them. “Ladies, believe of my character what you want, but I will have to askyou to please vacate my ship. I have no intention of taking on excess baggageonce I leave Remenes.” He turned and hurried down the corridor to the hulldoor, to the echo of more knocking, leaving Fantel and the other women to staremutely after him.