“I have been thinking,” he told Petra in a merry tone.
She closed her eyes. She thought she knew what he would say, though not because her magic had returned. She would never gain that back. But she remembered what she had seen in the tent. She remembered his plans for her. Perhaps, though, he had changed his mind.
He hadn’t. “You should marry me,” he said.
It still shocked her. “I can’t marry you. I’m only fourteen.”
“Which means that you are of age. You are an adult. In the Hapsburg Empire, you have the legal right to marry.”
“You’re too old.” The words blurted out of her mouth before she could remind herself that people in cages have no luxury to be rude.
“Twenty years old is a fine age for a husband. What is six years between us? They only mean that I am wiser, with more experience, and can better guide you in life.”
“I don’t understand,” Petra said. She decided that people in cages have a very dim future, and should be honest while they can. “Why would you want to marry me? You hate me.”
“Yes, but the people love you.” He leaned on his horse, looking up at her. “And if they think you love me, then they will love me, too. It will be like a fairy tale. In fairy tales, a prince always marries some unworthy peasant girl. Of course, in the stories, the girl is beautiful. But I am willing to overlook your shortcomings. Who knows? Maybe you will look better in a few years.”
Petra kept her eyes trained on the front of the army. The cavalry had passed over the bridge.
“It does happen,” the prince said encouragingly. When he received no response, he said, “Your choice is simple. Either you will marry me, or you will be executed at my coronation. As a traitor to the crown, you can expect a painful death. Well? What is your answer?”
She looked down at him. “No.”
“Death, then,” he said cheerfully, and rode away.
* * *
ZORA STEERED THE TANK under the river until its lights caught the pillars of the Zim Bridge. She pressed a button that brought it to a halt. It hovered below the water’s surface, humming quietly. She pulled a tube out of the wall and pressed a button that would send the other half of the tube out of the Tank’s hull, snake it through the water, and pop it through the surface. Zora peered through her end of the tube. She studied what was marching over the bridge and cursed. Treb would have been impressed to hear that an aristocratic lady knew as many swear words in her language as he did in his.
She sat back in the pink chair and considered what she had seen. Rodolfo had changed the order of his army. This would make things more difficult for the Roma forces, but what should Zora do about it? When should she give Lucas the signal he needed to blow up the bridge?
Zora had a good mind for strategy. She wouldn’t have done well in the thick of a battle, seeing blood and bodies all around her, but there are different kinds of strengths. Some people might have panicked alone in a ship underwater, cut off from any communication with their friends. Zora, however, calmly listened to the engine’s heartbeat, and realized that pure numbers weren’t so important. It made sense to cut an army in half, but Rodolfo’s was no ordinary army. The Gray Men surrounding him were worth several soldiers, and given the fact that Rodolfo had moved more of his army in front of him, maybe a blown-up bridge shouldn’t split the army exactly in half. Lucas should do it right after Rodolfo and the Gray Men had crossed to the other side. That would give the Roma slightly more than half of Rodolfo’s total forces to deal with at first, which wouldn’t make things easy. But the most important thing was to eliminate the threat of the Gristleki, every last one.
She peered through the tube again, and turned it so that the view focused on Lucas. He was a small figure dressed in brown to match the dirt, huddling under the end of the bridge on the Roma’s side of the river. He was waiting for her signal.
Zora turned the tube’s view back to Rodolfo’s army, and squinted when she saw a cage being dragged across the bridge, surrounded on all sides by a rippling gray flood of monsters. She looked harder and gasped. Petra was in that cage. Relief and worry warred within Zora. Iris had told her what Petra had done, and now Petra was clearly in a desperate situation. Yet she was alive.
Zora wished she could tell her friends what she had seen. But, well, she couldn’t. She could only do what she was there to do. She focused, and when Petra and Rodolfo and his monsters had crossed the bridge, Zora brought the Tank to the surface.
* * *
PETRA EXHALED when she saw Rodolfo cross the bridge into the valley. Gray Men flowed after him, and the horses hauled her cart off the stone bridge and onto the dirt road. Bare brown hills rose steeply on either side of her. There were few trees, and they stood naked, waiting for spring to truly show itself.
Petra was in the valley. There was no wind. Soon, she told herself. Lucas would blow up the bridge soon. She kept herself perfectly still. She could not look behind her. She could not alert Rodolfo or anyone else to what was about to happen.
But then she heard it: shouts of surprise from the foot soldiers following the last lines of Gristleki that traveled behind her. Petra decided it wouldn’t seem strange if she turned to look now, so she did. Archers ranged along the bridge, shooting arrows into the water below.
“What is going on?” shouted Rodolfo, who swung his horse around and passed Petra’s cage, heading back toward the bridge. “Why are you firing without my command?” The Gray Men turned their heads and followed their master, flowing toward the Zim Bridge.
“No,” Petra whispered. Her father might be among those lines of Gristleki ready to creep back onto the bridge they had just crossed. He could not step onto that bridge. In minutes, it would be gone in an explosion of gunpowder and flame. She stared at the slithering Gristleki. What could she do to make them stop?
Petra ran her hands over the cage, searching for something, anything that could help her. She found a rough edge of metal. She looked at it, then at the Gristleki. She set her bare arm against the edge and began to saw at her skin.
* * *
AS ARROWS thunked harmlessly against the hull of the Tank, Zora saw Lucas dart from his hiding place. He crawled along the dirt under the foot of the bridge to the barrel of gunpowder he had wedged there during the night. She saw small sacks of gunpowder stretching in a line along the arc of the bridge, below the sight of the soldiers—unless they happened to peer down at the bridge, and not at the Tank below.
Zora fired one of the Tank’s metal spears. It soared up through the air and over the bridge to bury itself in a man.
A small flame burst below Lucas’s swift hands. He turned, ran, and jumped into the water below. Soldiers trained their arrows on him and fired as he swam toward the Tank.
The fuse Lucas had lit sputtered and seemed to go out. Then it flared again, and burned its way toward the gunpowder.
* * *
BLOOD STREAMED from Petra’s arm and dripped to the ground below. A Gray Man crawling toward the bridge whipped his head around toward Petra. Then another did the same, and another.
With an inhuman howl, the entire pack of Gristleki launched itself at Petra’s cage.
They battered it, shaking it, snaking bony arms through the bars. Petra recoiled to the center of the cage, gripping her bleeding arm. Her breath shuddered, and she couldn’t help a cry of fear when a Gray Man, frustrated by the smell of blood it couldn’t reach, leaped on the neck of one of the horses pulling her cage. The Gray Man rubbed its scaled skin against the horse, which squealed and reared, slamming into the other horse. The cage tilted, and threatened to topple to the ground.
“Stop!” Rodolfo’s horse was surging through the monsters, pushing to reach Petra’s cage. Rodolfo pulled out a whip and brought it down on a Gray Man’s back. “You can eat her in front of the Hapsburg court, not now! Has everyone gone completely mad?”
There was a crackling sound, and the bridge exploded behind him.
46
T
he Battle Begins
ASTROPHIL FLINCHED AT THE SOUND of the explosion in the valley below, then clung harder to Treb’s shoulder.
“Now,” Neel told Treb, and wheeled his black horse to take the center of the front line, alongside Iris.
“But,” Treb said in a low voice only Astrophil could hear, “he’s supposed to say something to our soldiers. Something to rouse their ire. Neel’s supposed to make a speech.”
“It seems that he does not want to,” said Astrophil. “Perhaps you should do it. You are the general.”
“Neel … he’s good with words. But me…”
“You do not have to sound noble,” said Astrophil. “Be fierce. Be mean. You can do that.”
“Yes,” said Treb. “That I can.” He turned his horse to face the Roma cavalry and the foot soldiers behind them, and began to speak.
Astrophil didn’t listen. He was too nervous. He glanced at the two sides of the valley—at theirs, the southern side, which was steep but not too treacherous for the Roma horses, and at the northern side, where Tomik, Shandor, and a small portion of the cavalry waited in hiding. The northern side of the valley looked impossible for any horse. It was perilously steep and stony, and the hope was that Rodolfo’s forces would assume an attack was coming from the south, and would direct their attention there.
It was difficult to say which portion of the Roma army had the harder task, Neel’s or Tomik’s. Tomik’s force was small, and would have to come down a tricky slope that could break their horses’ legs. Once they reached the valley, they would make hard for the Gray Men, and try not to be taken down along the way.
Neel’s force would bear the brunt of the battle. It would divert the attention of Rodolfo’s army and clear a path for Tomik and his Marvel. Astrophil had read enough on warfare to know that the logic of this plan was sound, but he had also read enough to know that both parts of the Roma army could expect heavy losses.
Treb shouted something incoherent, and Astrophil startled. “Oh, yes,” said the spider. “A battle cry.” He sucked in his breath and screamed as loud as he could.
Treb winced. “Not in my ear, Astro.”
The cavalry charged down the slope.
* * *
FROM THE OTHER SIDE of the valley, Tomik watched the rest of the Roma army spill toward Rodolfo’s forces.
“Just wait,” said Shandor, keeping his horse still alongside Tomik’s.
Tomik touched the Marvel where it bulged inside his breast pocket, then wiped sweaty hands against his legs. “I told you. I told Neel. I can’t ride. Somebody else should throw the Marvel, somebody who could actually make it down this slope. I should be with Neel, or Zora, or Lucas.”
“Would this ‘somebody’ of yours have a magical gift for glass, too, so that his aim might be better than anybody else’s?” asked Shandor. “Would this ‘somebody’ be able to touch the Marvel’s glass and spin it into the air with a special sort of energy that will fling it farther than anyone else could manage? Because I haven’t met that ‘somebody,’ unless he is you.”
Tomik bit his lip. “All right,” he said softly.
“These are my horses. They’re good horses, and they’re trained to follow each other. The hardest thing about going down this slope will be picking out the right path. You follow me, and you’ll be fine.”
* * *
ZORA THREW OPEN the Tank’s hatch, grabbed her brother’s arms, and hauled him inside. He slumped against her, and it took her a frantic moment to realize that his blood was streaming down her. “Lucas!” He had an arrow sticking out of his shoulder, and another in his thigh.
She lowered him gently to the metal floor, slammed the hatch shut, and punched her fist against a button. The Tank slipped below the river’s surface. She kneeled by her brother’s side.
“It’s not so bad,” Lucas said weakly. His blond hair was dark with river water and plastered against his face. “These aren’t the kinds of wounds you die from.”
“Unless you bleed to death!”
“Very comforting, Zora. You are a terrible nurse.”
That made her laugh a little—until Lucas told her what she would have to do. “Get one of those dresses and tear it up. You’ll have to pull out the arrows and bind me.”
Zora went pale, but fetched a dress and shredded it. She gritted her teeth and tugged the arrow from Lucas’s shoulder.
He screamed.
“Lucas! Are you all right?”
He screwed his eyes shut and gasped. “I know all brothers say this to their sisters,” he finally said in a halting voice, “but you are a pain.”
They both laughed, slightly hysterical, and the second arrow came out more easily.
When Lucas’s wounds were bound as tightly as possible, he said, “Tell me what’s going on out there.”
Zora looked through the tube. She saw the Roma cavalry narrowing the gap between them and Rodolfo’s forces. There was her aunt, and Neel, and Treb in the front line. Zora swung the tube back toward Rodolfo’s army, and saw a man who could only be the general, sitting on his horse, shouting commands at his soldiers. Then the general went still, staring at the front line of the Roma cavalry. Zora stared as well, and realized how utterly recognizable Iris was—an old, pale woman streaming white hair, standing out like a flag against the dark Roma army. Zora realized, too, what a public figure her aunt was, and how everybody knew her—and to stay away from her, because of her acid skin that could melt stone floors.
“Oh, no,” Zora said.
* * *
“JUST GET ME CLOSE ENOUGH,” Iris shouted. The reins in her hands and the saddle beneath her were smoking. “I’ll get down off this horse and show Rodolfo who’s in charge! I’ll rain acid destruction down on him! I’ll—”
Rodolfo’s general notched an arrow, and shot it straight through Iris’s heart.
* * *
TREB YANKED ON THE REINS, hauling his horse out of the way as Iris’s careened. Her body slumped, toppled to the ground, and was lost in a maze of stampeding horses.
“Iris!” Astrophil shouted. He tugged on Treb’s earlobe. “We must help her!”
“She’s gone,” said the general. Gripping the reins with one hand, he pulled out a curved sword with his other. The front line of the Roma army was about to crash into Rodolfo’s.
“No, Treb, listen to me—” Astrophil stopped when he heard the man suck in his breath. Astrophil followed Treb’s gaze to the wagons behind Rodolfo’s infantry. They were being unpacked. In fact, several of them had already been unloaded, and it was only now that Astrophil could see what had been inside.
“Cannons,” Treb whispered. One was aimed directly at him. “Jump, Astro! Jump now!”
The cannon boomed, and a black ball sped toward them. Astrophil froze. Then the ball slammed into Treb’s horse and Astrophil was flung into the air. He spiraled, tumbling, his legs waving in every direction. He shot silvery webs randomly, hoping one of them would cling to something solid. They didn’t. He wheeled, and fell to the ground.
Astrophil jumped to his feet. “Treb!” he shouted, but then saw the ruins of the man and his horse. Astrophil ducked away from a blur of galloping hooves, and tumbled. He shot a web to a horse’s saddle, and was climbing up its side when the Roma army finally clashed with Rodolfo’s. The force of Astrophil’s horse ramming into another one sent him flying again to the ground.
He stood and looked around, then up.
A soldier’s boot came crushing down on him.
47
The Marvel
NEEL TORE HIS EYES from Iris’s falling body just in time to see the cannonball sailing through the sky. “Veer left!” he shouted at the cavalry and spurred his horse out of the cannonball’s path.
Treb and his horse exploded. Something silvery shot through the air like a tiny comet.
Neel’s heart clenched. “Astro,” he whispered. He galloped toward where he thought Astrophil had fallen, and plunged into the thick of Rodolfo’s army. A sword slashe
d at him. Neel’s ghost fingers shot out, wrapped around the blade, jerked it out of the man’s hands, and threw it down. Though Neel wasn’t an expert swordsman, he was good at cheating. With one ghostly hand around the man’s neck, holding him still on his bucking horse, Neel used his other hand to stab his sword into the man’s side. The soldier fell to the ground.
“Astrophil!” he shouted, then spotted the spider climbing up a horse’s flank. Astrophil fell again. Neel was chopping a path through Rodolfo’s army to reach the spider when another cannonball sailed overhead and slammed into the Roma infantry.
Neel wheeled his horse and snared the arm of the nearest Roma. It was Shaida. “Here.” He took a fireball Marvel from his pocket and shoved it at her. “Destroy those cannons. Tell anyone who’s got a Marvel to use them, and use them now. Aim for the wagons. Aim for the cannons.”
“What are you going to do?” she yelled, but he rode ahead, scanning the ground for a bright bit of tin.
A fireball Marvel arced through the air and hit the wagons. The explosion shook the ground, and several horses fell. The black mare scrambled under Neel, but found her feet. Neel steadied her, and in the glare of the fire he saw something shiny and crumpled lying on the ground near a fallen soldier wearing Rodolfo’s livery. Neel sheathed his sword to free both hands. His ghost fingers unfurled in front of him, and with one hand he batted aside a charging foot soldier, then shoved back an enemy’s horse as it stomped toward where Astrophil lay. Neel’s other ghostly hand swept down then, scooped up the spider, and brought him close.
More Marvels flew into the air. The segment of Rodolfo’s army that had been infantry, wagons, and cannons turned into a blazing hole.
Even though this was the most dangerous time to look down at the palm of his hand, Neel did. Astrophil was twitching. One of his legs was crushed, and two were simply gone. He bled brassica oil.
The Jewel of the Kalderash Page 26