by Will Wight
“Something the Architects cooked up, I understand. A mix of Reading and alchemy. Supposedly it draws the island in, pretending to be a ship, and then...poisons it? I’m sorry, Gardener, I’m just not sure.”
“I see. Thank you.”
Lhirin Island was closing on them, sprouting a wide, pinkish mouth. Its feelers snatched up the box, pulling it into the island’s great maw.
Shera headed below, looking from room to room until she finally found what she was looking for: the place where the Architects kept their alchemy.
She plucked a syringe from an open box near the wall, holding it up to a young alchemist nearby.
“Take this,” she said. “Fill it with something that will put me to sleep for the next twenty-four hours. Then hand it back.”
He did as ordered, and she returned to the cabin she shared with Meia.
When next she woke, Nakothi’s island was in sight.
~~~
The island looked much the same as she had last seen it: like a pale corpse, floating in the middle of the Aion Sea. For all she knew, that was exactly what it was: part of the Dead Mother’s gargantuan body, stretching for miles in the ocean.
Ten curving, pale bone spires lorded over the center of the island in two rows of five. They curved inward toward each other, looking like nothing so much as a giant set of exposed ribs. The island itself was covered in pliant skin rather than sand or soil, broken only by patches of dark, waving seaweed that sprouted from naturally occurring wounds.
When Nakothi’s nameless island first appeared as a speck on the horizon, the captain of Bastion’s Shadow had swung in a wide arc around, hoping to avoid detection by the Blackwatch. According to their information, the Watchmen had clustered themselves on the western side of the island, around the makeshift mine they’d created to dig for a Heart.
Shera remembered her last trip here, and couldn’t imagine anyone willingly spending more time in these surroundings than absolutely necessary. It was like crawling around inside a dead body—and one that was infested with monsters, no less. The horrific Children of the Dead Mother haunted this land, and she gripped her shears in preparation for a battle as the ship drew closer.
Nearby, Meia did the same, scanning the ocean’s surface for any sign of Elderspawn. Her eyes had shifted, irises glittering orange and pupils transformed to vertical slits. Shera assumed that it helped her sight in some way, though she had a hard time keeping track of Meia’s powers.
In the hours it took the ship to approach the island, neither Shera nor Meia saw a single speck of motion. The waters around Nakothi’s corpse were entirely dead.
She hoped.
Ordinarily a ship of this size would have to anchor nearby and send smaller boats to shore, but Bastion’s Shadow ran right up to the side.
“It doesn’t slope,” the captain explained. “And it’s soft enough that it won’t damage the hull. We can get as close as we want, so we’ll lower a ramp and hop down.”
It didn’t slope...meaning that there was nothing supporting the island on the ocean’s floor. It really was floating on the surface.
From the disgusted look on Meia’s face, Shera knew she’d come to the same conclusion.
The island smelled like rotting vegetation and bloody meat, though not as strongly as Shera would have expected. The stench should have been overpowering, but it served as more of a backdrop to the ordinary scents of the sea.
Shera and Meia went ashore first, meeting the three Masons dressed in long Blackwatch coats. All three of them bowed at the same time.
“Masons. Have there been any developments since your last report?” Meia asked. Shera was too busy scanning the curving outline of the island for any signs of motion. Last time they’d been here, the place had crawled with the living dead. What had changed?
One of the undercover Blackwatch, a young woman, spoke up first. “We finally found what we believe to be a viable Heart, Gardener. Last night.”
Shera could practically hear Meia’s attention sharpen. “Do they have it yet?”
“Not yet. Attacks from the Children have made retrieval difficult.”
“We saw no Elderspawn on the way in.”
One of the other Masons, an older man, responded this time. “They seem to be concentrating their attacks on our camps at the western edge of the island. But it’s true, they do seem to be tapering off these last few days.”
“I don’t trust it,” said the last of the Masons, an old woman. “The Children don’t back off without a good reason.”
The male Mason coughed politely, as though he were embarrassed to have this discussion in front of the others. “None of them are capable of making plans. They don’t have commanders.”
“They did once,” she responded.
No one had anything to say to that.
“What are our orders, Gardener?” the young woman asked.
“Standby,” Meia said. “I need to consult with my partner.”
She drew Shera off to one side, where they could discuss privately.
“We have to stop them from getting the Heart,” Shera said. “Use everything we have and hit them hard.”
Meia ran a hand over her blond hair, thinking. “Then we’ll be leaving a Heart of Nakothi exposed. What if the Guild sends more people?”
“We mine it and destroy it ourselves.”
“Without anyone from the Blackwatch? Do you know how to counter the powers of a Great Elder? Do you know anything about Elder biology?”
“What is there to know? Cut it out, take it back, destroy it. If we could destroy it here, I’d say we should.”
But she knew they couldn’t. They might be able to kill the Heart with the equipment they had on hand, but not destroy it completely.
“I’m still concerned about the Children,” Meia said. “We’re not equipped to fight both the Blackwatch and a horde of monsters.”
That was a fair point. Whatever the Mason said about the Children not having a commander, Shera had found them more than capable of swarming last time. This silence had her concerned more than relieved.
If the Elderspawn attacked after their fight with the Watchmen, the Consultants might be the ones facing annihilation.
Shera thought for a moment, then proposed, “Let them do the work.”
Meia remained silent, encouraging her to continue.
“They’re going to mine it anyway. We get our people in position, hiding near the Heart. As soon as they get it free, we take it, hit hard, and fade out. Mission accomplished. If the Children attack then, so much the better. The Blackwatch will have to fight them instead of facing us.”
Whatever Meia’s faults, she certainly made quick decisions. She didn’t so much as pause before turning back to the Masons, addressing the three of them as well as the small group of Shepherds from their own crew that had gathered to watch.
“Here are your orders,” Meia said, and proceeded to hand out commands.
Shera liked her role. It involved hours of sitting around, doing nothing.
~~~
The Watchmen didn’t know it, but they were surrounded by Consultants.
Masons moved among them, wearing the silver-buttoned black coats of the Blackwatch. Shepherds crouched behind patches of seaweed, in natural craters, or within the open, porous tunnels that riddled the island.
Meia remained close to the ship, a position she did not enjoy, but one she’d assigned to herself. Someone needed to coordinate all the Consultants, consolidating reports and dispatching new orders according to the situation, and Shera certainly wouldn’t do it.
The mine was a huge crater a hundred yards from end to end, seemingly gouged out of the island’s flesh. Its edges were an angry, oozing red edged with unhealthy patches of green. Holes dotted the crater walls where the Watchmen had dug through veins, each ranging from the size of a man’s arm to bigger than a sewer tunnel.
Pink wires crossed from wall to wall, like a maze of thin tendons, though some of them
had been severed to make it easier for the Watchmen to mine. Only one cluster of wires remained entirely intact, all terminating in a thick cluster at the bottom of the hole.
They were stuck to Nakothi’s Heart.
The heart itself looked exactly as Shera remembered it: a pulsing, gray-green mass the size of a fist, throbbing and pushing sickly liquid into the island’s flesh.
Its appearance brought back a hundred memories, none of them pleasant.
One last time, she thought. We’ll deal with this, and then I’ll never have anything to do with a Great Elder as long as I live.
Of all the Consultants in and around the crater-like mine, Shera had the best view. She was crouched inside one of the widest veins, deep in the shadows where the Blackwatch had no chance of spotting her in her blacks. Last time, the Children of the Dead Mother had haunted these tunnels, so she kept one shear drawn and her hand resting on the sheath at her left.
She was sitting with her back against the disgustingly flexible wall when everything went wrong.
Calder Marten climbed down into the crater.
He was fully dressed this time, thankfully, with a three-cornered hat over his red hair and a blue jacket over his shirt. He wore a cutlass on his left hip and a pistol strapped to his right.
They had no information on when Calder was supposed to arrive, but the captain had assured her that he would more than likely take the long way around Lhirin Island. That meant that they weren’t expecting him for another three days, at least.
It seemed that he had indeed taken the longer route, or he would have arrived days before the Consultants, but the captain’s estimate of his speed had proven optimistic.
Regardless, he was here now. And that meant his crew was here too.
Including the former Champion.
She had caught Urzaia Woodsman off his guard the last time, but she didn’t expect that to work a second time. At least his fire-hurling wife was safely locked up on the Gray Island. Shera had gone to check on her once, back home, but she’d ended up leaving without saying a word. She had spoken to Lucan at length, though, mostly assuring him that her injuries were nothing and he shouldn’t worry.
So Calder and his crew were here, but at least they hadn’t all come down into the crater. At first glance, it seemed to be just the captain—he walked down with a brown-haired woman old enough to be his mother. Alsa Grayweather, if Shera remembered her briefing correctly. Calder’s...mother? Stepmother?
They came down together, joining the six other Watchmen that dug at Nakothi’s Heart.
Six Watchmen, and two Witnesses.
Naberius and Tristania had come down with the Navigator, the former in a dark blue suit, and the latter wearing her coat and bandages. Her black hair stuck up at all angles from gaps in her wrapping, and she turned constantly, keeping a hand on her whip. When the Silent One’s eyes brushed past Shera’s tunnel, she pressed herself back against the wall, hiding her shear lest the bronze glint in the dull light.
They had the worst possible timing.
Mentally, she urged them to leave. The Watchmen had been about to free the Heart. As long as they did it without a Soulbound down in the crater, Shera had a good chance of snatching her objective and leaving. But with Naberius, Calder, and Tristania in addition to the Watchmen, Shera didn’t have much chance of getting through without a fight.
Then again, maybe this was better.
Shepherds with muskets had every angle of the crater surrounded. This could be their opportunity to leave Naberius dead, The Testament without a captain, and the Watchmen without a leader.
Personally, Shera had nothing against these people. But the Guild had a mysterious client, and the client was Emperor.
Besides, she would do whatever it took to prevent a Heart of Nakothi from escaping into the world once again. She’d witnessed the damage the last one had caused, and killing these people was a small price to pay for containing this Heart.
What would Lucan say? This time, she honestly wasn’t sure.
Just when she thought the situation couldn’t get any worse, one of the Watchmen started to wander over to her tunnel. It was a young man, a few years younger than Shera, carrying a shovel on one shoulder and kicked at the island’s flesh as he walked. He peered carefully into the darkness as he walked by, and Shera froze.
He wasn’t checking for her, she was sure. It was good sense to check any tunnels on this island before you walked inside. But she held her breath nonetheless.
After a moment, having ensured his own safety, the Watchman relaxed and leaned his shovel against the wall. Maybe he was trying to sneak a break, maybe he wanted to relieve himself. Shera never knew.
She took the opportunity.
Shera rushed forward before he knew what was happening, driving a needle into his chest and covering one of her gloved hands into his mouth.
He whimpered against her hand, eyes wide and terrified, before she pulled him into the darkness of the tunnel.
A second later, she came back for his shovel.
Shera hid him in the crevice to the side, where she had concealed herself. She hadn’t made the smartest move—they would surely notice him missing. But they would have the Heart free in minutes, and there was every chance that he’d see her before that. She couldn’t take the chance.
She watched the others in the crater closely, looking for any sign that they’d noticed her. Tristania still surveyed everything equally, giving no indication that she saw a missing member of her team. Naberius was on his knees with his arms raised, worshiping the Heart as though it were a primitive idol. Alsa watched Naberius with disapproval as an old man in a Blackwatch coat whispered in her ear. The other Watchman pried and hacked at the wires around the Heart, giving no thought to their surroundings.
Then she saw Calder Marten.
He looked from Watchman to Watchman, forehead furrowed as though something was bothering him.
Don’t count them, Shera urged. Don’t count them. Don’t count.
When he spun to his mother, drawing his gun as he moved, Shera knew her cover was blown. She edged out of the tunnel, pulling a mirror from her pocket as she moved.
She angled the mirror into the light, sending a signal to the top of a nearby shack, where a Shepherd waited with musket ready.
Attack, she signaled.
Two flashes back.
Acknowledged.
“We’re under attack!” Alsa Grayweather shouted, raising her sword.
Then the man next to her died in a musket-shot and a spray of blood, and Shera moved.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
When you must fight a Soulbound, do so with great care. Fight from a distance, or from the shadows, and be sure to gather as much information as you can.
If you must fight a member of the Champion’s Guild, carry with you a small vial of poison. When the Champion defeats you, end your own life.
-Gardener doctrine
Bullets flew down into the crater from the ledge overhead. The Silent One, Tristania, did her order proud by standing over Naberius with her coat spread wide. It was apparently invested to stop bullets, which Shera recognized as a tricky bit of Reading, because bullets pounded against the fabric and failed to penetrate.
Naberius knelt under his partner’s protection, saw in hand, and continued working to cut the Heart free.
Shera ran straight for him, but she found her way blocked by the back of a Watchman in a dark coat. He raised a musket, aiming for the exposed shoulder of a Shepherd locked in combat on the ledge above.
She straightened, plunged her shear into the back of his neck, and slipped away before his body fell.
Even Lucan would agree: there was a time for sparing your enemy’s life, and the middle of battle was not it.
Shera ran around the action, sticking to the shadows at the edge of the pit. She dodged Tristania’s attention more than the bullets; as long as she remained concealed, she had a single opportunity to secure the Heart.
&nb
sp; Calder Marten, fortunately, had decided to make his way out of the crater. He had his mother by the arm and seemed to be moving away from the fight.
Good. That was another pair of eyes out of her way.
Then Calder shouted, in a voice that cut through the sounds of battle, “Urzaia!”
There was no way his Soulbound cook would hear him at this distance, over all the noise. No way.
But Shera froze when she heard an answering roar, and saw a black-clad Consultant fly from one end of the crater to the other, screaming all the way. Urzaia Woodsman would be here in seconds, and if he caught Shera alone in this pit, she might as well attempt to surrender.
Calder changed direction, heading for a rope at the edge of the cauldron. She fought back a sense of relief—maybe he was going to meet Urzaia, and not the other way around. So long as she didn’t have to fight the former Champion.
Almost absently, she cut down another Watchman who had started to notice her. Tristania’s bandaged head flicked to the left, attention caught by something on the ledge. There, this was her chance: Naberius was still absorbed in sawing the Heart free from its bonds.
Shera rushed toward Tristania’s exposed back. She could strike now, kill the two Witnesses, then finish cutting the Heart free herself while the Shepherds covered her from above.
She underestimated the Silent One.
Without turning around, Tristania snapped her whip behind her. The tip blurred toward Shera with invisible speed, already crackling with a Stormwing’s concussive power.
Shera almost collapsed backwards, turning the motion into a sideways roll. There was a wide tunnel in the crater wall next to her, and she guided her body toward it.
The whip shone white and detonated. Heat and pressure blew Shera’s hair back, but there were none of the scalding burns from last time. She continued her roll, sliding into the shadows inside the tunnel.
From there, she levered herself to her knees, keeping a sharp eye on Tristania. If the Witness had seen her, it was all over.