Regeneration

by Stacey Berg

  She turned for a last look at the spire, but it was lost in the haze.

  When she turned back, Nyree had the projectile weapon in her hand again, squared at Echo’s chest. Echo summoned all her strength. The effort would be futile, but she would make it anyway. She served the Saint.

  Before she could move she heard a muffled noise, far away, dull, like a heart bursting. The journey will be short, she thought with a kind of relieved surprise.

  Then Nyree’s head swung abruptly to the north as the other hunter heard it too. The hollow bang sounded again. Saints! It was coming from the aircar.

  “Nyree, we have to—”

  The other hunter spun back. “Cross the forcewall now, or I will kill you inside whether the Saint knows it or not!”

  A last choice how to serve. Echo’s shoulders slumped. She turned slowly away from Nyree, taking half a step towards the desert. Her ankle twisted and she slipped to a knee. Her fists clenched in the gritty dirt. Nyree raised the weapon.

  Then Echo thrust herself to her feet, whirling in the same moment to fling the double handful of sand into Nyree’s face. And then she sprinted hard in the direction of the aircar.

  A searing pain creased her hip at the same time the sharp crack of the weapon hit her ears. How many cylinders? She hadn’t paid attention. One, two, how many times could Nyree possibly miss?

  The wind helped. She let it buffet her in zigs and zags while she ran. She heard another crack and flinched, anticipating impact, but the projectile whined off a rock. No third shot followed. Nyree would have to slow down to reload. Echo forced herself to run faster, despite the pain in her hip and the old ache in her ankle. She cut towards the road, where the footing would be better. She listened for the sound of pursuit as best she could above the howling wind, but all she could hear was her own heaving breath, and the whine of engines.

  There, just over the crest of the hill, was the aircar. In the blur of whirling sand and wind-drawn tears, Echo could see only the outlines of figures crouched in twos and threes in sheltered positions opposite the aircar. And the one on the ground, lying still. They caught sight of her at the exact same moment. One of the figures straightened, raising an arm. She saw a bright spark, heard the familiar crack. And something slammed into her, knocking her off her feet with a crushing blow.

  She landed in the ditch alongside the road, breath driven from her body, vision dark. She gasped for air, but a weight compressed her chest, and something closed around her throat. She thrashed in an instant of animal terror. Then: Think like a hunter, her own voice hissed savagely in her mind. It was a knee in her chest, and hands choking her. She thrust up with both fists to break the grip, and froze.

  “Brit!” she rasped.

  “Echo Hunter 367.” Brit rolled off her, then shoved her back down as she tried to rise. “Do not expose your head. Report.”

  “I had a disagreement with Nyree. What is happening here? The Preservers—”

  Brit made a noise of disgust. “We overestimated the Northers’ common sense. A group of Kennit’s friends came looking for him. We persuaded them that confrontation with us would be foolish. We believed they had withdrawn, but unfortunately someone got the even more foolish idea that they could take the Preservers hostage to trade for him.” She gestured towards the aircar. “As long as the Preservers keep their heads, nothing will come of it. We could counterattack, of course, but it seems safer for all concerned to wait them out.”

  Echo raised her head cautiously over the edge of the ditch. The jammed hatch still hung partway open, but otherwise the aircar did not show the damage she feared. But there was a cable wrapped around one of the landing struts, tied off to something in the rubble. The cable stretched taut as the aircar tried to lift, the straining engines sounding oddly weak. That was the windstorm: there hadn’t been enough sun in days to restore the power. The cable held; the aircar bounced back down with a thump.

  “I heard explosions.”

  “The projectile weapons remain unreliable. Projtrodes are not much more accurate in this wind, but at least they do not blow up.”

  That explained the downed cityen. Echo could only imagine what the Preservers must be thinking, trapped in their aircar, the sounds of a battle around them, no idea who their assailants were, or that the hunters were trying to protect them. “Untie me.”

  Brit took in the wire binding her wrists, the blood staining one whole leg of Echo’s pants. Her brows drew together. “What was the nature of your disagreement with Nyree?”

  “The Patri guaranteed the Preservers’ safety. We cannot break his bargain! Stigir will stop his work on the Saint.” And when the other hunter still hesitated: “The Saint is in danger, Brit. I need to get to the aircar.”

  Brit unwound the cable from Echo’s wrists. “What do you propose?”

  “Draw the cityens’ attention long enough for me to get to the Preservers. We must make them understand it was not the Church that attacked them.”

  Brit asked no foolish questions, only nodded and slipped away. In a few minutes, there was a shout from beyond the aircar, and sand erupting as a flurry of projectiles struck near the cityens. Brit throwing pebbles, but the cityens ducked deeper into cover. Echo shot out of the ditch and dove towards the aircar. The cityens figured it out too late; she had ducked beneath the car, crouching in the shelter of a landing strut, before they could bring their weapons to bear. A few projectiles struck the strut, sparking; but they only scratched the metal.

  “Taavi,” Echo shouted up towards the hatch. “Taavi, it’s me, Echo. I mean you no harm, I just want to talk to you.” She couldn’t tell if they heard. “It’s me!” The aircar engines revved again. The wind sang across the taut cable. Metal creaked, but the cable still held. An energy weapon poked out of the hatch, seeking Echo blindly. Its eye flashed once, twice; red beams reflected chaotically around her. “Taavi!” Echo screamed again.

  She flung herself back just in time to avoid being crushed by the strut as the aircar thumped back to the ground. It bounced, pulling at the cable. The weapon flashed again. The beam missed Echo and ricocheted off the strut. By some fluke of geometry it cut through the cable, which snapped with an enormous twang.

  The broken cable whipped through the air. The aircar, its back end suddenly sprung free, tipped tail up. Echo threw herself flat as the nose of the craft nearly hit the ground in front of her. For one brief moment, the open hatch was in reach. She sprang up, grabbed the lip, and was swung into the air as the craft leveled again.

  For an instant she hung there by her fingertips, body buffeted by the wind and shoulders creaking with strain. The weapon protruded over her head. Instinct screamed at her to drop while she had a chance, however tiny, to survive the fall. Instead, she gathered her breath, made one enormous effort, and flung herself up and over the lip of the hatch. She kicked at the Preserver holding the weapon, knocking it out of the vektere’s hands. It tumbled away through the air. In the same moment her hands slipped, scrabbling vainly for purchase on the smooth metal, and her legs went back over the edge. All that held her were the fingertips of her left hand, caught in the hinge between the hatch and the frame. The craft bounced in the wind; one of her fingers broke with a sickening crack. The pain shot clear to her shoulder.

  She was going to fall, surely as a girl sliding over the edge of a cliff. Time hung, suspended in the air like her body. The aircar was still scudding forward, towards the city. Her grip wasn’t going to last long enough for it to matter to her. She twisted a little as she dangled there, searching one last time for the spire. The distant panels still turned, arms spread for a final embrace. The power flashed, as fast as Echo’s pulse, the Saint’s heartbeat matched to hers. For an instant she imagined Lia’s golden eyes opening to look on her a last time. Heard her voice whisper, Echo. Echo, my love.

  It was all she wanted. She felt her fingers loosen. She didn’t care. She would stare into those eyes all the way down. She would never feel the last blow.

&n
bsp; But Lia would. Echo flung her other hand up, flailing for any grip. Her fingers closed around flesh, sheer reflex as something clamped around her wrist. Then she was being pulled back over the edge of the hatch and into the arms of the vektere who’d caught her. The two of them tumbled into the aircar. Echo had a confused view of weapons swinging to aim as the aircar bucked with the sudden shift in weight. She clutched the vektere in a tight hug, holding him close to shield her body from the beams as they fell together half upright across a seat.

  Not him, her. Taavi.

  “Don’t fire in here!” one of the vektere shouted.

  The craft bounced again, turbulent with the wind gusting in through the open hatch. Somehow the pilot wrestled it into a semblance of controlled flight. “Listen to me,” Echo gasped. “It wasn’t the Church.”

  “Let Taavi go!”

  She had little to lose, and maybe it would calm them. She pushed the young vektere away, not roughly. Others pinned Echo’s arms over the back of the seat. One jammed the end of his weapon into her ear. His face said he was willing to risk a shot inside the aircar if he had to.

  Jole pulled Taavi to her feet. “You should have let her fall.” Taavi, white-faced, only shook her head. Jole let her go.

  “Land the aircar,” Echo said. Her broken hand throbbed in nauseating waves. The scent of the vekteres’ fear was overwhelming. They were not hunters. They did not want to die. That was useful. “You don’t have to get yourselves killed.” The pilot looked back over his shoulder at Jole. “That’s right. We can talk. Just land the aircar.”

  “So your friends can finish what they started?” Jole said. His voice shook.

  “It was cityens, not the Church. They aren’t—” She realized the hopelessness of trying to explain. Saints, she barely understood herself, the claves, the rivalries, the fear that made it easier for men to kill each other than face the changes . . . The Preservers did not deserve to die for that. “Taavi, you know me. I’ll protect you—but I can’t, if you attack the Church. Just land the aircar and—”

  “I do know you. I know that we can’t trust you. No one’s landing anything until Stigir and Khyn are safe.”

  Echo turned her head, ignoring the weapon digging into her ear. Through the forward windows she saw the forceshield shimmering, invisible to cityen eyes. The vektere had forgotten about it in their panic. Another few seconds, and it would do her job for her.

  The forceshield glimmered. Three more heartbeats. Two. One.

  Nothing.

  The barrier flicked and died. Through the rear windows she caught a glimpse as it came up again behind them, letting the aircar pass untouched.

  Saints. Lia, no.

  The car jostled in the wind, but the pilot steered it right down the main road toward the Church. The spire flashed ahead.

  “Set down by the steps,” Jole ordered. “She can get us through the doors.”

  She would never let them into the Church.

  Now she had only one choice. She closed her mind before Lia could hear the thought.

  “Saints help us!” she cried. “Look! They’re after us!”

  Frightened, all senses primed for action, the vektere could not prevent the instinctive response. For the space of an indrawn breath their attention followed her terrified gaze out the back windows. It was just long enough.

  She slammed a boot into the knee of the vektere holding the weapon at her ear, jerking her head back hard against the seat in the same moment. The bolt sizzled past her face so close she smelled the burning air. She sank farther into the seat, and as the vektere holding her arms instinctively pulled up against her, she thrust up and back with all the strength in her legs and hips. The seat back broke; the vektere pinning her arms lost their leverage. Instead of pulling away she pushed back again, into them. They stumbled off balance, all the opening she needed to jerk herself free.

  She saw the road passing beneath the open hatch, close enough for her to risk a jump. That wasn’t her goal. She leapt across the gap towards the pilot. Her fist slammed into his face at the same time she rammed the lever to pitch the nose of the craft straight down into the road.

  There was a screech of metal as the nose skidded along the stone. Somehow the aircar held together. They had not had much forward speed to begin with, and it was a sturdy little craft. As the nose dug in, the tail rose, sending everyone rolling forward. They were going to flip, hit upside down. Echo nodded to herself. That would be good enough. She strained for a last look up at the spire.

  The craft kept tipping, tail up and up, nearly vertical now, spinning in a half circle as the wind blew it in a pirouette around its dragging nose. And then Echo saw the curtain of sand, rising on the wind in front of them as solid as a wall. The blowing grains struck the hull with a noise like innumerable projectile weapons fired all at once.

  Everything slowed. Then, absurdly, another gust blew the tail back down flat. The craft skidded right up the steps, metal and vektere screaming. Echo took one last breath. Closing her eyes, she fixed Lia’s face in her mind. Forgive me. Forgive me for everything. I love you. Then the aircar hit the cathedral wall, and everything went black.

  Chapter 26

  She woke abruptly, facing a wall. Every part of her body hurt, so much that she could barely draw breath. This has happened before, she thought, and then, as someone laughed far away, Gem. She is laughing at me.

  It took a little while to get any farther. She eventually opened her eyes onto a dimness that was intermittently lit by something flashing. The flashes hurt her head; she let her eyes drift closed again. She heard noises: the hum of machinery, and voices arguing, and a pulsing sound that must be some kind of alarm she had never heard before. Metal creaked ominously nearby; while she pondered that, something fell, rattling the floor she lay on.

  There was a curse, and more laughter. Out of the babble one word coalesced: Saint.

  She snapped abruptly conscious.

  The wall in front of her was stone. The machine hum, the dim light—she was in the sanctuary. She must have been thrown clear when the aircar crashed. She let her head fall to the side, hoping that if anyone noticed, it would seem the boneless movement of someone still unconscious. Even fully awake, it took her a moment to understand what she was seeing: the broken nose of the aircar, metal peeled back like one of Gem’s exploded weapon cylinders. It jutted through the cathedral’s stone wall, next to the huge metal doors, which stood defiantly intact. Blowing sand trickled through the gaps; outside the wind howled like the fear in Echo’s heart. She lay unguarded. Either the others in the sanctuary hadn’t seen her, or they thought she was dead.

  At least some of the Preservers had survived as well. Jole said something sharp and angry. It made Gem laugh again. The sharp slap of a hand on flesh stopped her. Echo could not imagine why Gem had let him live so long.

  Echo rolled in a slow movement that would not draw attention. Then she saw, and her stomach dropped, as in an aircar that had lost thrust.

  Gem stood by the Saint. Her hands were raised wide from her body, and she stood nearly as still as the figure on the altar. Jole held a projectile weapon that he must have taken from her. He had been able to because Taavi perched at the top of the altar, her energy weapon clenched in both fists. Its ugly eye stared down at the Saint. She only had to press the button. It would mean the end of everything. Priests sat at their panels, frozen in dismay. Stigir stood by the Saint, the circlet of the new interface dangling from one hand. So close. If Echo had done something, anything, to delay the aircar . . .

  She closed her eyes again. Pain washed through her. Lia.

  The alarm pulsed louder. “The storm is making things worse,” someone said in a voice tight with fear. Dalto. “It’s taxing the city circuits. If the systems overload now, the whole sanctuary may go up.” Wind whistled through the gap in the broken wall. “We don’t have much time.”

  Echo tried to calculate angles, lines of attack. She could barely focus; the alarm seemed to pul
se inside her head. She forced herself to think. By now the hunters would be positioned outside, planning to retake the sanctuary; but they did not dare any action that would endanger the Saint. Taavi was the immediate threat. If Echo could somehow wrestle her away from the Saint before she had time to fire . . . Gem caught her eye, shook her head fractionally, No.

  The Patri, by the panels, said, “Please finish your work, Stigir.”

  “Finish?” Khyn’s voice was incredulous. “If you think he would ever do anything to help you after you—”

  “Hunters would not have attacked the aircar,” the Patri said. It was the tone he would use with the councilors, or anyone else he was trying hard to make see sense. “You are doing what we agreed. We have no reason to break our bargain.”

  “And we would have succeeded if we meant to destroy you,” Gem said. Jole raised his hand again, but she only looked at him, and this time he decided to hold it.

  “It is what you are best at,” Stigir said, but it was sorrow more than bitterness that weighted his words.

  “She tried,” Jole spat. His weapon swung to cover Echo. “I know you’re awake. Get up.”

  Echo climbed shakily to her feet. Partway up she had to stop, hands on knees, until the sanctuary stopped spinning around her. Her pant leg was soaked in blood. It was a struggle to put words together. “It was North. The hunters were trying to protect you. I tried to tell you—I just wanted Stigir to help the Saint.” She turned to the Preserver. “Please.”

  Stigir’s look burned into her like the hot beam of an energy weapon. Then he settled the circlet over his head. “I am thankful that we are not like you.”

  “Stigir,” Khyn whispered.

  “We are Preservers,” he said, leaning back on the makeshift couch. A length of wire ran from the circlet to a panel; it would bring him closer to the Saint than Echo had ever been. Her fists tried to clench, sending a bolt of pain up her arm from the broken finger.

  Stigir nodded at Dalto. “Let us finish this. Begin the sequence.”