Elfri didn’t know whether to let the sad person leave, keep her out of Kolosos’s clutches, or put her out of her misery.
Swallowing a growl, she trudged down the hallway and up the stairs, where tendrils of daylight poured through gaps in their metal-bar-reinforced windows. She barely got a few more steps before Rufus appeared with a middle-aged couple, thin and wide eyed.
Elfri sighed. “More?”
The man dropped to his knees and clasped his hands together as though in prayer. “Please, Sherig. Please help us. I’m still fit enough to fight. And Marg, she can cook. She don’t mind physical labor—”
“Stop.” Elfri waved a hand. She looked to Rufus. “See what you can find them.”
The Rigger nodded and escorted the couple back whence they had come.
Changing route, Elfri took a narrow set of stairs up to the second floor and pushed open a set of double doors that led into a large space—a sort of meeting room for boardinghouse visitors. A smattering of her original men were in there, along with some of the newer, more competent recruits. One had put together a map of the city, and it was pinned to the far wall. Two others were dividing up their quickly dwindling rations. All silenced upon her arrival.
Elfri rubbed the palms of her hands into her eyes. “This is too much. Too many people.”
One of the older men, Arnae Kurtz, said, “Must we begin turning them away?”
The thought made Elfri sick. Her husband, may he rest in peace, would have cut off the beggars days ago. “We’re going to help them in a different way. We’re going to evacuate them ourselves.”
Pat stood from where he was separating rations. “Can’t, boss. Just this morning word came in that the wall was still guarded.”
“Then we take care of the guards,” Elfri snapped. “I’d rather break a few necks to save a hundred. The sooner, the better. We’ll storm the pass, or head up north to the farmlands.” The latter was a better bet. Promise of food. But how long would it take the refugees to reach it?
“Might be tough,” another Rigger said.
Elfri glared at him. “Remind me when any of this was easy.”
He didn’t dare open his mouth a second time.
Turning toward Kurtz, Elfri said, “With all that seugrat training under your belt, any chance you’re also versed in stratagem?” Elfri couldn’t maneuver this herself. There was too much to oversee already.
Blessedly, Kurtz nodded. “You give me the men, I’ll make it work.”
“Done.” She turned toward Pat. “Release the captives and pull the guards for Kurtz. Then gather up the strongest citizens. They might need to run once we have an opening.”
Pat hurried to the door, barely remembering a “Yes, sir,” as he went.
The handle of Rist’s stolen lamp creaked every time he leapt between buildings, but Sandis supposed stealth wasn’t absolutely necessary. Not yet. She chose only the six-story buildings, not wanting to risk a jump to anything lower. Without Bastien with them, they moved faster, though Hapshi would have been useful. She walked the perimeter of each roof, searching for signs of the monster. Once she thought she saw burnt brick, but was that from Kolosos’s most recent stint through the city or a past one?
The moon was full, and the factory smoke had cleared enough for the stars to shine through the smog—a sliver of mercy from heaven. On a normal night, the city was bathed in light from homes and factories and streetlamps, but most were extinguished, save the occasional hairs of firelight that peeked through closed shutters.
Darkness aside, time was ticking. Kolosos, so far, had kept to its pattern. It wouldn’t be long before the amarinth reset and the monster returned to finish whatever it wanted finished.
Fatigue weighed on her limbs like heavy mud. Even Rist was starting to wobble on his feet. If she didn’t succeed soon, she’d have to repeat the chase again tonight. But would Bastien be ready to summon again? Would he let her summon on his weakened body?
Had she made the wrong choice again?
Yet just as she made to turn back, her eyes caught on the roof of a building slightly shorter than that on which she stood. Specifically, on the thick, black shadow engulfing the roof despite the fact that it was bathed in moonlight.
It wasn’t a shadow but a hole. A massive hole, like the building had been cored.
“Rist,” she said, some of her strength returning. She pointed.
Rist squinted, confused, but she saw the moment it dawned on him. The lifting of his features, the rounding of his mouth. “It’s a pit.”
“Made from above.” She couldn’t jump to the place, so she searched the building she stood on for a way down. Finding none, she crossed to the next one and used the butt of her rifle to break a lock on a doorway on the southern corner of the roof. It opened to stairs.
Reaching the street below took only a moment, yet it felt like eternity.
There were more soldiers in the neighborhood than there’d been during the day. Sandis and Rist hugged the wall of a narrow alley, waiting for one pair, and then another, to pass. Were they heading for the Innerchord, where they knew Kolosos was destined, or were they still searching?
Rist nudged her with his elbow, and they ran across one street, hugged an alley, and came upon a canal that separated them from their destination. It was completely dry. Kolosos’s destruction might have blocked it somewhere or drained it into the sewers.
No bridges were close by, so Rist dropped into the rounded concrete basin, and reached back to help Sandis down. She marveled at the act of kindness, but didn’t comment on it. Whatever motivated him, it was frail, and she dared not risk shattering it.
Climbing back out was harder. The concrete was at a steep incline and smooth. It took Rist a few runs at it to catch the lip and haul himself up, shoulders shaking. He wasn’t weak, but his body was still recovering, and like the rest of them, he needed food and rest. He stretched a long arm down. Sandis ran at the wall the way he had. On her second try, she snagged his wrist, and he pulled her up.
The building they sought loomed before them, half-cast in shadow, lively as a tombstone. It was another set of flats, with wider windows and smoother brick. From the street it looked unscathed, minus a few broken windows, but no light peeked between the shutters or beneath the closed doors.
Rist chewed on his lower lip.
Sandis moved first. She tried the doors to the bottom flats, finding them all locked. Her hands began to sweat as the moon crawled across the sky. Time was running out.
Pulling out her rifle, she tried to break one of the knobs as she had before. The noise of the gun striking metal was deafening in the silence of the city. Rist grabbed the rifle’s muzzle and yanked it from her hands, offering her a scowl in turn.
She knew why. The soldiers from before weren’t far.
Rist, gripping the muzzle, swung the firearm at one of the windows instead, shattering it. He moved the rifle around, clearing out as much glass as he could. The window was a little high, about even with Rist’s chin. He returned the gun, took a few steps back, and ran for the sill.
He grabbed it, cursed under his breath, and pulled himself up. He cursed again when he helped Sandis after him. It wasn’t as easy as the canal, and a piece of glass bit Sandis’s knee. When Rist released her, she noticed dark streaks smeared across her hands and forearms. He had cut himself badly.
“Are you all right?” she whispered.
There was just enough light for Sandis to see him roll his eyes. “I’ll survive.” He pulled out his stolen lamp and retrieved a match from their collected goods. The light blinded her and filled her nostrils with the scent of kerosene.
“Hurry.” Rist turned to jump down. “Not much fuel.”
Sandis leapt after him, landing smoothly on the glass-strewn floor. The flat looked abandoned, its walls empty but its rooms furnished. It smelled a little musty. She and Rist split apart, searching.
The back wall in the kitchen was burnt out.
“Rist,” she
called, and he appeared with the light. Sandis passed through the opening first, stepping on ash and sheet rock. She entered another flat’s kitchen from the side. This one had two missing walls. Those that remained were scorched black.
Rist moved close enough that heat from the lamp burned the back of Sandis’s neck. She moved inward, angling for the center of the building. She stepped through a bathroom littered with broken ceramic before entering a charcoal cavity. It was black and sooty, carved by fire. When Sandis stood in it, she could see all the way up to the moon. Lamplight followed her, highlighting the charred destruction.
“Hello?”
The word was so weak it could have come from a dying bird. Sandis whipped around, gooseflesh devouring her.
“Anon?” she croaked, running toward where she thought she’d heard the voice. She tripped on a fallen, half-burnt beam. “Hello?”
“SSSSSandis?”
She whisked to her right. The light was too slow to follow. A shadow writhed against the floor.
She didn’t recognize him at first. He was covered in cinders, save for a few pale streaks on his face. His naked skin was stained black with soot. His hair was streaked heavily with gray. The whites of his eyes were dull.
He winced at the light. Shielded himself from it. Were his arms always so skinny?
“Black ashes,” Rist muttered.
Sandis cried, tears pouring down her face. “Anon!” She ran to him, clasped his filthy shoulders. “Anon, we’ve been searching so long . . .”
She pressed her forehead against his dirty neck and washed away the soot with tears.
“Go,” he whispered.
She reeled back. “What?”
His eyes, the same shade of brown as hers, widened and trembled. “Run, Sandis. Go!”
Sandis found her feet. “But—”
Anon squeezed his eyes shut and grabbed his head. “I can’t stop it. It’s c-coming—”
A soft whirring seasoned the air, and from behind her brother, a glittery light rose, surrounded by twirling gold loops. They spun faster and faster, and the amarinth’s center turned a deep shade of red.
Rist cursed and dropped the lamp. He grabbed Sandis’s arm and jerked her back the way they’d come.
“No!” Sandis fought him. “Anon!”
Rist shoved her ahead of him. “We will die if we don’t get out of this building, now!”
Sandis hesitated. The whirring of the amarinth had turned into a keen cry. Or was that her brother?
Rist blocked her view and grabbed her by the back of her neck, yanking her toward the nearest exit. He’d barely gotten the door unlocked when red light swallowed them, bringing with it unbearable heat.
Rist and Sandis spilled out into the street, and the building behind them burst into flames.
Chapter 24
The red light pulled her back into herself, even before the heat licked her skin.
She didn’t know if the next choice she made was selfish or not, but it would likely save their lives—hers and Rist’s—and she could only hope it would save Anon, too.
As Rist shoved her through the door, she grabbed his hair and whispered the words. His eyes met hers when they hit the cobblestone road, and in that fraction of a second, realization and fear lit them.
The flash of light burned her eyes, but when the building exploded, the heavily armored back of Kuracean shielded her body.
We have to run, she told the enormous crustacean. The smaller of its two front claws swept down and scooped her up, but Kuracean was not gentle. Its pincers were hard and sharp, and the bony barbs dug into her ribs.
Kuracean made it about twenty feet before something—perhaps a hunk of ruined building—slammed into its back. Kuracean stumbled forward, throwing Sandis ten feet into a garbage pile. Rank, dark liquid spilled over her shoulder, but the mass of garbage had likely saved her life, for however long she would have it.
Kolosos loomed over her, larger than ever, the cracks in its obsidian skin wider and brighter. Hot, smoke-laden wind rushed from its body. Letting out an earth-shaking roar, it lifted a hooved foot and brought it down on Kuracean—
A blur whisked down the road, colliding with the hard-shelled numen and knocking it aside the moment before Kolosos’s hoof smashed the street. Cobblestones hissed and cracked under the pressure of its hoof-fall, and Sandis pushed her way out of the garbage, heat searing her skin. It had happened too quickly for her to see what had pushed Kuracean aside. Kuracean, hide!
A spray of water misted the air from an unknown source, cooling it down dramatically. It hit Kolosos’s shin, and the enormous numen stepped back, knocking down what remained of the hollowed building behind it.
Someone was helping them, but there was no time to wonder about their allies. Kolosos roared again, stepping free of the burning ruins and trudging right through another building. Distant screams pierced the night.
It wasn’t going back toward the Innerchord. It was fighting.
Embers sprayed up from Kolosos’s hooves, forcing Sandis to seek shelter farther down the trash-laden alley. When the monster passed, she rushed back into the street, over the broken cobblestones. She tripped, crying out as the hot stone burned her skin. A dark mass filled the way ahead. Kuracean! Come!
To her shock, the creature that turned was not Kuracean, but another numen. It had an enormous feline-like head with long, twisting ears. Its skin was leathery and tight, and two massive black tusks protruded up from its wide jaw. Its enormous rounded eyes reflected light. It crouched on short but well-muscled hind legs.
“Grendoni,” Bastien said in her memory. “He’s a six, I think. I’ve been told he looks like a goblin cat.”
This was the numen Bastien had been bound to, before Oz sold him to Kazen. But then, who . . . ?
Teppa? That would mean—
Kolosos roared behind her, pulling Sandis from her reverie. A second numen floated near the monster—not flying, precisely. She was a bare-chested woman without hair or forearms. A large, hinged fish tail protruded from her hips. She swung it, and another gust of heavy mist encircled the block. Kolosos threw its clawed hand forward, sending lava hurtling through the air. The mermaid swished away, but Sandis thought she heard her cry. The lava collided with another building, crumbling its side.
Sandis hesitated only a moment before continuing on her path. Grendoni’s ears flicked, and it rushed past her. Around the corner she found Kuracean, one of its legs trapped under an enormous hunk of brick.
Use your pincer! she cried in her thoughts. Knock it off! Celestial above, if Rist died . . . if Rist died—
A hand grabbed her elbow. Sandis spun, the seugrat she’d practiced guiding her limbs as she twisted out of the hold and swung the side of her stiff hand into a man’s neck. She made contact, and the man stumbled back, wheezing.
In Kolosos’s red light, she recognized Oz.
“What are you doing here?” she cried.
Oz shook his head, rubbing his neck. “Followed you, you foolish girl.” He looked up as Kolosos’s light brightened and a new building caught fire.
Kolosos was going to burn down the city.
Sandis shoved her shoulder against the brick mound pinning Kuracean. It didn’t budge. “We have to run—”
“We have to fight. We can’t outrun that. Not until the army comes.”
Sandis whirled toward him. “We can’t fight! You don’t have Jansen anymore. Rist is stuck—”
Oz whipped out a switchblade. “We can fight. Long enough to get the hell out of here. But we need all of you.”
Sandis stared at his blade. A new opera of screams punctuated the night.
Hugging herself, she said, “No. I’ll summon him myself.”
Oz scowled. “Now is not the time for parlor tricks!”
Something exploded, and Oz jerked her forward, sheltering them behind the brick as something hot and flaming sailed into the street ahead of them. It bounced once before landing in an alley, lighting a heap of garb
age on fire. The smoke was thickening the air, making it hard to breathe.
Oz winced—was his leg injured?—and looked her in the eye. “Where is Bastien?”
“Safe and asleep.” Her heart pounded so hard in her throat she couldn’t speak. Beside her, Kuracean whined.
Oz set his jaw and spoke through clenched teeth. “You’re special, I get that. But your self-summoning gives us a few seconds of firepower, and that’s it. I summon Ireth into you, and we have a chance to save our skins. Don’t you hear them, Sandis?”
Tears tried to form in Sandis’s eyes, but the heat steamed them away. Her knee throbbed. Her skin burned.
A new choice lay before her. Give up her control, or listen to the screams of a burning city?
But Oz . . . he was a grafter. He was just like Kazen. Just like—
Kazen is dead.
She glanced back toward Rist. Thought of Bastien. How long until Kolosos made its way to the empty flat hiding him?
Rone. What would Rone do?
Rone isn’t here. The thought stung her like the tip of a lit match, though the burn radiated outward, making her whole body sting.
It hurt worse because it was true. Rone wasn’t there. She couldn’t lean on him, not anymore. He couldn’t be her bandage, her crutch.
This was on her. Just her. She had the power to choose what happened next.
Gritting her teeth, Sandis snagged the knife from Oz’s hand. Three nights had passed since their last blood exchange; it was time to renew. She shallowly pressed the tip of the blade into the inside of her elbow until dark blood bubbled beneath it. Shots fired nearby. The sky blazed crimson.
“Do it!” she barked. “Free Kuracean. With my blood, you’ll control it, too. Can you handle it?”
“I can.” He took the blade and carefully cut the underside of his own arm, avoiding veins, before pressing the wound to Sandis’s. She forced herself not to wince.
Looking Oz in the eyes, she said, “Get us out alive.”
Nodding, he placed his hand against her forehead. His words were precise, practiced, and quick. “Vre en nestu a carnath. Ii mem entre I amar. Vre en nestu a carnath. Ireth epsi gradenid.”
Siege and Sacrifice (Numina) Page 19