At the Edge of the Game Read online

  Just visible behind the earthworks are a few of the low mud-and-thatch huts of their settlement. These buildings stand in the midst of fruit-bearing trees that probably serve to lend them additional structural stability. A single vulture is circling above the settlement.

  With a sequence of calls running down the line, the heavy infantry begins to ascend the hill. Their progress has none of the discipline of a typical Sapient military manoeuvre. They are not ten paces forward before the line starts to lose its shape, as some warriors proceed more quickly than others, while some groups cross over the paths of their fellows, causing additional confusion. When they have gone about twenty paces, the light infantry begins to move, though more slowly. When the first line reaches about halfway up the hill, a few the defenders, men and women, appear over their earthworks and roll large stones down the slope. The stones accelerate rapidly and bounce off crags hidden in the grassy hillside. The attackers' line disintegrates further as individuals move this way and that to avoid being struck. All are successful, but the stones career past them into the light infantry with almost no warning and strike down several warriors. The heavy infantry give an angry roar and resume their climb with more focused intent. Before they have gone more than another few steps, the defenders' archers step up and send volley after volley of steel-tipped arrows into the ascending throng. Many are struck down in this withering barrage. Those that remain brandish their assegais and their zurks and press forward in fury. The archers' onslaught continues unabated.

  At last the heavy infantry are within throwing range with their assegais. The archers retreat behind the earthworks and are replaced immediately by a line of armoured assegai-bearers. The attackers suffer heavily as these steel-headed shafts are flung expertly downhill upon them. Their own flint-headed shafts are less effective, particularly as they are being propelled uphill by rapidly tiring warriors. A few attackers make it across the dry moat, past the sharp spikes of the circular mound, and swing their zurks at the defenders. These braves, however, are quickly cut down by pikesmen.

  A call from a captain further down the hill signals the withdrawal of the heavy infantry. They have suffered a good many casualties, including more than a score of fatalities that I can see from where I stand. As they descend the hill, the light infantry moves up to take their place. The archers follow these, about twenty paces behind. The light infantry moves to within assegai range of the defenders with more ease than the heavy infantry had enjoyed. It seems as though the defenders are now running short of arrows. The attackers' archers shoot over the heads of the light infantry and into the settlement. So many arrows rain down with such unrelenting intensity that it is difficult to imagine that any of the defenders have not been struck. However, as the light infantry attempt to cross the moat, a few last, desperate volleys from the village archers fall upon them. These again retreat into the settlement and are replaced by pikesmen and assegai-throwers, who thrust and slash at the attackers, keeping them at bay. The village archers return shortly, their quivers replenished, apparently with the arrows lately shot into the settlement by the attackers. Their renewed barrage drives the light infantry further back. Another captain's call from down the hill signals a second retreat.

  Old Neanderthal women at the foot of the hill tend to the injured. The others regroup halfway down the slope, where the defenders' arrows can cause them little trouble. The remains of the light and heavy infantry combine with the archers, who fling away their bows and empty quivers. They swiftly form into a wide line. The defenders stand on their earth battlements and call to them scornfully, brandishing assegais, pikes, even swords. They, drunk on the elation of their success, are keen for more. The attackers, a single wave hundreds strong, begin a fresh assault. The villagers jeer and taunt them until they are within thirty paces of the earthworks. Then the battlefield goes almost silent. When the attackers are almost at the moat, the defending archers have at them with all remaining arrows. Many attacking warriors are stricken down. Their fellows respond with a mighty roar. They charge forward in a headlong rush onto the battlements, answering the thrusts of the defenders with slashes and blows of their own. The villagers hold them at bay for several minutes, until at last the defensive line is breached and attackers pour into the village. The remaining defenders lose hope and drop their weapons, crying for mercy. Some are spared. Others are cut down without compunction. The screams of villager women and children carry down to where we stand and watch. Presently, these screams are drowned out by the joyous cries of the victorious warriors as they realise that the village is completely theirs.

  The Sapient audience is silent and sombre. Gone is the giddy festiveness of a short time ago. Nobody wants to see any more. In small groups, people turn and walk back towards the train. I and my three protectors turn away from the blood-soaked battlefield and join them. Even my tough Plainsmen seem to have been moved by the spectacle we have just witnessed. Parents carry along their silent children, who clutch them tightly. Paz notices the growing number of vultures now circling overhead, and grunts angrily. His hand goes to his weapon as though he would like to start firing into the sky at them.

  The train is about three stadia away, down a gentle slope that dips into a wide, shallow valley. Beyond it, the railway line curves around to the right and follows the valley southwards, back towards the rain forest we have so lately left. Ripples, driven by the breeze, run through the wide expanse of grass. I take a kind of desolate pleasure in the feeling of the cleansing fresh air in my face.

  An engine noise becomes audible. At first I think it is the train, but it more closely resembles the sound of a low aircraft. I spot a vapour trail in the clear eastern sky and follow it to its source, a glistening silver object flying very rapidly at a low altitude. As I watch, it flies wide to the north and banks around, its red-painted, stubby wings briefly becoming visible. I and my bodyguards instantly recognise it for what it is. We drop to the ground and cry out to those around us to do the same. Some obey immediately, while others look at us in puzzlement. We call out to those far ahead us, but they do not hear. The missile is close enough now for us to see its glowing rocket exhaust behind it. It is approaching at incredible speed. It slams into the stationary train and detonates with a tremendous explosion. The train is ripped to shreds, and the heat and the force of the shockwave cut down those closest to it. Debris flies high into the air, and soon is raining down upon us, shards of glass, bits of metal, pelting the empty landscape around us, cutting down the exultant warriors behind us celebrating their recent victory.

  There are screams and men falling. Need to get out of here, need air, even air tainted with the rising steam of cooling corpses.

  I stumble to the stairs and clatter down, unsteady on the thin, loose carpet held on by burnished metal stays of times long gone.

  ‘Hey!’ Heathshade shouts. ‘Grab him, lads.’

  I fall through the front door, splash in the runoff-diluted blood. Two of the lads catch me and drag me back to the hallway. One of the IRA corpses is not dead. He’s wounded in the side, or maybe in the arm, his tough combat coat ripped open. He’s shooting up at the windows. Sense of direction as poor as tactical sense: not only is he about to be cut down, but… you’re running the wrong way mate. That’s the river down there.

  ‘Stay here.’

  They shove me into a sitting position on the bottom stair. Their aim is even worse than the fugitive’s direction and tactics. He gets all the way to the bridge without being hit. He’ll make it to cover, fools.

  No. After all, he won’t. The sight of the women at the other side of the bridge is too much for him. Over the wall he goes, into the brown torrents, and is seen no more.

  The remainder of the paramilitary garrison surrendered last night, and to celebrate Heathshade went to bed with Daisy Carruth. To the hero, the reward. He’s commandeered a prime duplex apartment above the bicycle shop, and claimed her into the bargain.

  To us, also a reward – plentiful food, a com
fortable berth in the Main Street, repose in a soft bed, fire-warmed water with which to wash.

  Meanwhile, the IRA survivors are stuck in Garda station cells, their weeping and gnashing women and children locked in unsanitary St Nicholas’.

  Heathshade got us this admirable property, for which he must be given some credit. But what Heathshade gives with one hand, being the judicious chap he is, he takes away with the other. He’s remained silent on the crucial role I played in the town’s triumph. So I remain the coward pariah, the unconscionable reject who would not put his life on the line. They say what about the twenty dead men stretched out in the Green School hall – should not one of their families get the flat instead of the coward and his woman, who have done nothing for us.

  I know the mentality well – congenitally angry people whose innate instinct for antagonism is in constant scan mode for an easy target. Never mind that all survivors are billeted within a one-minute walk of the Main Street; nor that we, unlike so many, have not taken part in the looting, nor in the stupid wastage of food, nor the squabbling over stockpiles of drink. How am I to tell them what I did to save them? What if Heathshade didn’t back me up? He mightn’t, and I can’t take the risk. Even Helen didn’t fully believe me.

  I hate this feeling. It might as well be a lie, feels like it is one even though it isn’t. But I shall hold horns high, hood up, ignore their looks and their muttering as I turn the corner onto bloodstained Bridge Street.

  The river level has fallen – no need to wade through water to get to the Old Bridge. Plenty of time, and no excuse not to get to the Friary for twelve o’clock. Friar Aspen put it about this that there would be a Mass of thanksgiving at noon. Not sure whether it’s a Sunday. Think it is. It would be disrespectful not to show up, I figure. Helen can stay in bed. I’ll represent both of us.

  More blood on the damp bridge stone washing slowly through drainage holes, dripping into the Suir. Broken glass in the shops at the far side. That red-brick house opposite the Friary has burnt down. How did that happen? A great pile of rubbish outside the church doors. The Friars have been busy, clearing out the place. Inside there are no pews – chopped up for the fires. We shall play the part of Orthodox Christians for the day. I wish I were really Orthodox, sitting outside some café in a clement Aegean harbour. But where are the people? Five here – three old women, a man and a child. None I recognise. They know who I am though, judging by how they look at me.

  The Friar stands in non-ceremonial anorak and Wellington boots. His face is wet, eyes raw. He is spitting fire in a voice raspy with pain:

  ‘The Body too. Even that...’

  There will be no Mass after all. Someone has stolen the unconsecrated wine and wafer. Putative Body and Blood doomed to become of like substance with the iniquitous physical vessel of a thief.

  Since I’m not a welcome part of this group of tut-tutters and comforters, I feel that I have every right to back away, take my leave.

  Yet I lack stomach for the immediate prospect of a return to that chilly, silent apartment where there is little to be said, and even less to do. So I head up through the graveyard, past the other church, trudge through the mud and the strewn rubbish up the deserted slope towards the pineta above the town.

  Walking is a mild mental anaesthetic. But what kind of a balm is it when I have to look at these sad clusters of houses. How many hundreds of dead am I walking past? What tragic still-death tableaus await observation behind those front doors?

  It would make sense to break into a house, see if I could find keys for one of the cars sitting around here, because one of these days it might be safe to get out of here, and we’ll need wheels. But I’m not going to do it. The rain damps down any smell of decay, but I can sense well enough that there’s a surfeit of decaying flesh round these parts, and I’ve had enough of unpleasantness for the moment.

  The slope is getting too steep for my underfuelled legs, so I follow the road that veers to the left, still shallowly uphill through the deadened quiet. Ahead is an obstacle. A whole section of hill has slumped, slid across the road, slammed into a council house, collapsed its front. Dark earth has filled the living room, lifted the red wooden-frame sofa high to the ceiling. Brown, viscous solution leaks down through the slippage from the higher reaches of the hill, carrying small stones, sod, bits of tree. Banlian all over again. Is the whole country a great tub of slime? Wasn’t it always, ha ha.

  The ancient stone wall at the other side of the road was breached by the slide, and what remains of it looks to be giving up the ghost. This stand-off between gravity and masonry will not last much longer. So I hurry back the way I came.

  A good decision. Twenty paces and the earth heaves again. Mud and stone ooze, smashing glass, crushing car, toppling wall and fence. A reservoir of clear supersaturation water gushes as from a pulped melon, washes down the road, over my shoes.

  Did I cause this, like a sneezing Alpine skier? The water bypasses the full storm drains, spreading into muddy gardens, under front doors, over brittle, withered hedges.

  Behind it the dark sludge wall advances more slowly. Primitive brain centres say it sees me, wants to get me. I splash around the corner, down towards the New Bridge. The released water pours in focused torrents down these steep steps, heralds my arrival at the end of the bridge for those standing on it, and there are many of them, leaning against the railings like spectators at a regatta.

  But no regatta could be held in those evil waters. The excited citizenry observes a more primal sport. Heathshade’s shiny scalp is to be seen down below on the quayside. He’s appropriated some IRA man’s combat gear, and is inspecting the line of IRA prisoners at the Suir’s edge. Their bare feet are in the lapping flood. They face outwards. Only two are blindfolded, but all are bound behind the back. Heathshade walks up to one suddenly and – my reaction is too slow, I see it – puts a bullet in his head. The IRA man sinks into the river with no splash, floats away in the swift current, is gone around the curve.

  The shooting goes on, men and women egging Heathshade on until it’s complete.

  Like a football match has ended, the crowd is streaming away. They are only a few really, a few dozen. Mostly male, but not all male. Mostly young, but not all young. These are the ones to fear, the jabbering and the slack-jawed, the dead-eyed and the guffawers. Heathshade’s constituency, his people. He gave them bread, and now he’s given them a circus.

  Back in the warm flat, Helen is drinking tea, sitting by the fire. Was there really a time when this felt normal, not a precarious interlude in a world cut from its moorings? That belongs to a distant land to which, I suppose, there can be no return.

  But now she smiles, and the world inverts in an instant. I can believe that there never was a fall, that we really have returned to the land where a smile, the sly intimacy of her approach, the feel of her hand, were the kinds of things that coloured existence.

  ‘Close the curtain,’ she says.

  I do, blocking out the afternoon half-light, and she pulls away my coat, opens my shirt. All is done slowly. Dormant axons fire. This hand to my shoulder says I need do nothing.

  When my clothes are on the floor her smooth coaxing is constant. Soon, very soon, all too soon I reach that infinitesimal eternity that belongs to another world entirely.

  Past the precise instant, pitching through others, ionised in stellar wind, piercing the inner layers of creation, God just beyond the final veil. Another reality again. So many come close together.

  ‘I wanted to do that for you.’

  Her voice is the ember of my existence. The cold on my bare skin is the chill of the space between worlds.

  And now it’s only the chill of the room.

  She cradles my head. Cooling fluid trickles. I open my eyes, and she smiles again. I take a breath to speak. But that would mould the moment. Silence maintains the state of potential. No probing word shall shoot from me to her, altering momentum or position. Not right now. There’s a morsel of wisdom, one of
my few.

  We go to bed to huddle, breathing silly things to each other. For now we’re safe, and nothing beyond these walls matters; not gunfights, nor summary executions; not anarchy, nor the threat of starvation.

  As I drift towards sleep, and she does too, I know it will be a deeper, more sustaining sleep than we’ve slept for a very long time.

  ‘George,’ she breathes.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘We need to go to Waterford.’

  Eyes open and focus, register squalid details - mildew patches on walls and ceiling, the stirring of dirty curtains in the draught. The coarse sheet beneath me is scratchy on my back. Through the wall emanates the soft coughing of a child. From down the damp street an excited conversation progresses, involving much hilarity.

  ‘My mother and father…’ she says.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘We have to go.’

  ‘I know.’

  It’s come out more snappish than I meant. She turns in the bed so that her back is to me. I conjure a softer tone.

  ‘As soon as we can, we’ll go. All right? I know we have to go.’

  She says nothing.