The Anzu's Egg 2
Page 9
Grishma must have read my mind. She aimed her rifle at the dark-grey airship and fired.
Nothing happened.
Grishma studied the airship. Her facial muscles froze. She blinked and then faced me.
‘The others have confirmed that bullets have no effect on it,’ she said.
It had to be magic.
‘I bet they’ve warded its skin.’
Grishma nodded, her expression grim.
Movement along the beach drew our attention.
Leyakians dressed in off-white armour, the visors of their conical helmets covering their faces from the nose up, waded through foam-flecked waves and approached the beachhead.
A thunderous rifle volley rang out from the tall grass and the rocks leading to the beach. Only one of the advancing Leyakians fell.
‘They’re wearing warded armour,’ I said.
The Leyakians returned fire. I ducked. Someone slower cried out. The Savanans’ jumpsuits offered no protection against bullets.
I reached for Grishma’s long knife. My qi would toughen my skin against the Leyakian’s bullets. If I could just take down one soldier, avenge Biyu before my qi failed me, I’d die unhappy but satisfied.
Grishma grabbed my wrist before I could take her knife.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Watch the airship.’
I peeked above the grass and saw a red javelin hurtle skywards. It gained in size and length as it drew closer to the airship.
‘The daughter staff,’ I said.
As it flew, the staff continued to grow, its diameter close to a quarter of the airship’s height. The airship’s propellers began to turn. The staff struck the centre of the airship, the impact causing the metal main frame inside the balloon to scream as it crumpled.
But still the balloon’s skin didn’t tear.
I glanced at Grishma. A grin stretching her lips.
Behind the airship, water erupted. A curled brown mass of muscle and suckers rose into the air. The tentacle, the length and breadth of a seven-storey tower, leaned back and uncurled. The tip of the colossal limb hung in the air, water dripping from it. The Leyakians turned their lightening rifles on it. Anyone onboard the airship had to be firing, too. Without warning, the tentacle whipped forward, slammed against the airship and coiled around it. A loud prolonged screech filled the air as metal yielded to the pressure exerted on it. The airship exploded, discharging a smokeless yellow flame from both bulging ends. The tentacle sank and continued to grip the fiery, mangled tube of twisted metal and torn grey skin until both disappeared beneath the water.
I smiled at the deaths of those on the airship. A detached part of me, however, watched with fascination and terror: fascination that such creatures existed and terror at how easily a single tentacle had taken down the airship.
‘The Deepdown has done its work,’ I said to Grishma. ‘We need to attack.’
She didn’t move.
‘That was their Protector.’ She pointed. ‘Those are the Deepdown.’
Figures rose from the waves on spindly legs and muscular arms, their hands and feet webbed. Their eyes were black impenetrable disks, and their slit-like mouths curved downwards. The sun cast a sheen on their mottled skin of blue, black and green. All of them had tails as thick as a man’s thigh and at least four feet long.
Once a Deepdown fixed on a Leyakian, it moved with frightening speed. It blurred and then reappeared behind the soldier. A second later, it had disarmed the Leyakian and had begun to drag him into the sea. The Leyakian’s kicking and elbowing had no effect.
The Savanans stopped firing as the first of the Deepdown set foot on land. The unwary Leyakians already on the beach were too slow to fire on them.
Grishma rose. I joined her.
Anger burned my chest. I’d come here to exact revenge on those who’d killed Biyu.
I strode through the grass, desperate to kill at least one bastard.
‘Don’t,’ Grishma said, and caught up with me. ‘The Deepdown are targeting humans. If you go near the water, one will claim you for her prize, and she will devour you before you finish drowning.’ She touched her temple and closed her eyes. ‘We wait here. A Deepdown will share her prize with us.’
Yesterday, news the Deepdown ate their captives would have turned my stomach. Today, I’d be happy to watch one gorge itself on a Leyakian.
‘She isn’t sharing her meal, Sanjay,’ Grishma said. ‘I have questions for the Leyakian.’
A Deepdown approached us. She halted at the line of grass and dropped the Leyakian she’d been dragging by the breastplate. The Leyakian had lost all colour as he hyperventilated. The Deepdown, all seven foot of her retreated a step, her black shiny eyes never leaving her prize.
Grishma held a hand over the Leyakian’s forehead. The soldier’s breathing slowed, and colour returned to his face.
‘Strange,’ Grishma said. ‘When they left their base last night, their orders were to capture you. Just before dawn, they received new orders: to sink the boat and to make sure there were no survivors.’
I touched my shoulder where the baton round had struck it. Back in the library, the Leyakians had wanted us alive. What had changed?
‘No one saw the city from the airship,’ Grishma continued. She puffed out her cheeks and exhaled. ‘They dropped grenades into the sea to make sure you were all dead,’ she said. ‘This soldier and the others came ashore to find and kill any survivors who made it to the beach. They also had orders to search and kill an unusual-looking animal.’
It had to be Cubchick. Caught up with losing Biyu, I’d forgotten about it.
‘Was the creature described as half-lion and half-eagle?’ is said.
Grishma squinted at the soldier. He lay on the sand as though he’d woken from a deep sleep. Grishma raised her head and nodded.
‘They had orders to kill everyone, including the hybrid you described.’
Damini stood beside me, her hands on her hips. I hadn’t noticed her arrival.
‘But that doesn’t make sense,’ I said. ‘The Leyakians wanted the anzu, and now they don’t. What’s changed?’
The Deepdown snarled. Her arm swung down, across the soldier’s throat and then up. Between her webbed fingers hung a chain and a vial filled with white powder.
The soldier tried to rise. The Deepdown’s webbed foot thumped him into the sand. He flailed his arms and began to scream. The Deepdown removed her foot, dropped the vial and grabbed the Leyakian by his breastplate. The soldier kicked and shrieked as the Deepdown dragged him through the sand.
I picked up the vial. Grishma frowned.
‘That’s poison,’ Damini said. She bit her lower lip. ‘Taking it would have been a kinder death.’
The burning in my chest had lost some of its intensity. I was weary, but still I wished it would take a long while before the screaming Leyakian drowned.
I crouched at the edge of Rasa’s old airstrip. The approaching airship, a dot on the horizon ten minutes ago, had grown larger. This one was white. Susilo Tarigan had chartered it. Without the dhow to return us to Rasa, the Savanans had used one of their submarines to ferry us across.
Damini strolled along the cracked compacted earth, giving me space and leaving me to my grief. She occasionally looked up to gauge the airship’s progress. She had the second-generation daughter staff, a gift from the Savanans to Anganera. Before offering to help with war effort, they made us promise to keep the underwater city and the Deepdown a secret.
I reached into my pocket and slipped my fingers around the Leyakian vial.
I had to go home and tell Mr Lee his daughter was dead. It was my duty, and I would not avoid it by taking the easy option. Perhaps after the funeral rites, when the priests confirmed Biyu’s soul had begun its next incarnation, I’d crush it between my teeth.
‘Sanjay.’
I rubbed my face and exhaled. To my right, the airship nosed its way along the strip of dried dirt.
I rose. I was ready to go home.
Without Biyu’s remains, her father and I had wrapped some of her clothes in a white sheet. We then took it to the temple district to be burned. Mr Lee had worked tirelessly to organise the funerary rites for easing Biyu’s passage into her next life. He had remained stoic since I’d broken the news. He hadn’t blamed his daughter’s death on me, the Leyakians or anyone else.
After he’d seen how angry I was, he’d said, ‘The next twelve hours are about Biyu. There’ll be plenty of time for feelings after the rites.’
As the handful of close family and friends passed the pyre, each pouring water into an overflowing cup to mark Biyu’s good deeds, I reminded myself that what lay on top of the oil-soaked wood and under the white sheet were only clothes.
Susilo Tarigan and Damini Utsmani were the last of the mourners to file past the pyre. I didn’t see Toojan among them.
A priest rang a bell and began to pray out loud. He nodded to Mr Lee to light the pyre.
Mr Lee lit the taper. The skin around his jaw and beneath his eyes had slackened after my return yesterday. His eyes hadn’t lost their faraway gaze. The taper hung over the wood. It didn’t matter we were burning clothes. No father should have to light his child’s funeral pyre. I joined him and placed my hand under his. He summoned a pained smile. We lowered the taper.
My eyes watered as the fire took and the priest continued his prayers. The relentless hollowness in my core reminded me of how much I missed her and of how she’d been the centre of my existence. Whether my eyes were open or closed, I kept seeing her sinking into the darkness.
Someone squeezed my forearm.
The pyre still burned, but the priest had finished praying and the mourners had left.
‘Time to go,’ Mr Lee said.
I nodded.
‘Just give me a minute,’ I whispered.
Before letting go, he squeezed my forearm again. Stooped and shattered, Mr Lee traipsed away.
Somewhere, Biyu had started a new life. Her death had dented my faith. If I believed the gods would bring us together in the next life, I wouldn’t hesitate to end this one.
I took the Leyakian’s vial from my pocket, dropped it and ground the poison into the dirt with the heel of my shoe.
‘Without you, I have no purpose,’ I told the flames. ‘The burning inside me won’t stop. I have to do something before it consumes me.’ I took two steps back from the pyre and bowed. ‘Bee, I’ll always love you.’
I turned and strode towards my father-in-law.
We’d mourn together for ninety days. After that, I’d leave Bagh-e-Khuda, join the Resistance in the east and fight the Leyakians.
END OF PART 2
Another note from the author
A big THANK YOU for reading the second part of The Anzu’s Egg.
Before moving on to your next read, please consider leaving a rating and a review. Ratings and reviews are an author’s life blood. They help new readers decide whether to take a punt on an unknown author’s story, and they’ll also help me decide whether to write more Relic Hunters stories. A rating alone makes a huge difference!
Thanks for your support.
Fancy keeping in touch?
Then, why not sign up to my newsletter for free books, updates, book release details and more. Just click the link below or visit www.jfmehentee.com.
Click me!
Copyright © 2020
J F Mehentee
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior written permission of the publisher and copyright owner.
Published by P in C Publishing
ePub ISBN: 978-1-912402-25-0