Siege and Sacrifice (Numina)

by Charlie N. Holmberg

  I’m sorry, Anon. She put one foot in front of the other. The streets had opened, only stragglers passing her. I’m sorry I can’t save you, too.

  “You!” a familiar voice barked. Sandis almost didn’t turn, but a man in scarlet uniform stepped in front of her, blocking her path. “Oz needs you, blasted girl! Where have you been?”

  Sandis turned her head, not to look at the scarlet in her path, but at the man who’d shouted at her. Chief Esgar jogged up from the north, surrounded by a half-dozen policemen.

  His gaze dropped to the ripped back of her dress. He gawked. Why? He knew what she was. She wouldn’t hide it, not anymore.

  When she saved them, they would all know what she was.

  Chief Esgar shook himself. “Oz is west of the Innerchord. Go! Before it’s too late!”

  Sandis shook her head. “My path has changed.”

  The ground rumbled, and all of them looked skyward, to the red light blotting out the stars.

  Hissing through clenched teeth, Chief Esgar grabbed her forearm and jerked her toward him. “Insolent woman! You will—”

  “Unhand her.” A new voice finished the sentence for him. Low, feminine. Sandis knew it immediately.

  Twisting her arm the way Arnae had taught her to do, she broke free of the chief’s grip and turned around. Sherig’s lamplight highlighted the lower half of her face: a strong jaw and lips painted red. Two burly men on horseback lingered just behind her.

  “Sherig!” Sandis exclaimed, and the scarlets immediately tensed. She rushed toward the taller woman. “I need to get to the Innerchord.”

  Sherig studied her for half a second before nodding. “Pete, take her.”

  Chief Esgar pulled a club from his belt and marched forward. “I must deliver her to the west flank!”

  Pete offered a hand, and Sandis bolted toward his horse.

  Sherig squared her shoulders. “I trust her more than you, old man. And we haven’t time to bicker about it.”

  Pete clasped Sandis around the wrist and hauled her onto the saddle behind him.

  “Don’t kill my mare,” Sherig snapped over her shoulder.

  “Please.” Sandis grabbed Pete’s sides. “Hurry.”

  The mobsman kicked his heels into the mare’s flanks, bringing her toward the sound of screams.

  Rone watched in horror as Kolin fought Kolin. Whatever magic Kolosos worked, he wielded it efficiently, transforming ten men at a time into mindless minions. They dropped nearly as quickly as they rose, save for when the soldiers second-guessed their kill orders. In those cases, they died instead.

  Behind Kolosos, the gold plate began to grow—and so did the epicenter in the ethereal plane. It glowed faintly at first, then brightly. The light slowly leaked outward, illuminating the crystal floor.

  Drang howled, unleashing his fury against the lucent ground. All the numina did. They beat it, sprayed it, engulfed it in flames. Every numen, large and small, Ireth included, attacked the epicenter as though it were Kolosos himself.

  Their attacks reached Kolosos on the mortal plane. He ticked. Winced. Every now and then, the monster would jerk and step on one of his minions or send an elbow into a standing building, lighting the interior on fire.

  But the numina didn’t stop him. Couldn’t hurt him.

  The epicenter and the Innerchord gleamed with power. The merge was beginning.

  He searched the army ranks for Sandis, but didn’t see her. He didn’t know where she was, what she was doing, or how to find her. His belly tightened, and not from hunger. Where are you?

  The epicenter reddened. Rone stepped away from his porthole to spy through the one in the center of the numina ring. It revealed the top of Kolosos’s head. The center of the battle.

  Some of Mahk’s spray rained on Rone’s head and shoulders. He barely noticed.

  “He’s ignoring us,” Rone murmured, though none of the numina responded. “This isn’t enough.”

  His hands formed tight fists at his side. Gritting his teeth, Rone muscled his way into the circle, pushing between Pesos and another numen.

  “Kaj, you rank bastard!” he shouted. “Fight us yourself, you coward!”

  Beneath the glowing glass, Kolosos tilted his horned head back and looked up with both brilliant eyes.

  Chapter 29

  Kolosos tilted its head back, as though distracted by something in the sky.

  Whatever. Oz would take what he could get.

  “Go!” Oz flung his hand forward, and Akway, the armless mermaid in Inda’s body, flew forward, swimming as though the air were the sea. She couldn’t get much altitude, but right now, Oz didn’t need her to attack high. He wanted to keep his vessels low, beneath Kolosos’s reach.

  The mermaid vomited water on Kolosos’s hoof, darkening the lava seeping between cracks. Steam consumed her.

  “You, next!” Oz spun around and gestured to the tallest of the vessels. The resistant one with hard eyes and square shoulders. Rist. He scowled, but he came forward.

  “Kill me and I’ll haunt you,” he spat as he lowered his head.

  “You die, I probably will, too.” Oz smacked his hand against Rist’s head and chanted. “Vre en nestu a carnath. Ii mem entre I amar. Vre en nestu a carnath. Kuracean epsi gradenid.”

  Oz barely closed his eyes in time to avoid being blinded by the white light. The vessel grew upward too quickly to make sense, his body contorting and hardening faster than Oz could snap his fingers. He’d always envied Kazen this enormous, armored creature. Wanted it for himself, almost as badly as he’d wanted the fire horse. A creature he still didn’t have, thanks to Sandis’s ill-timed absence.

  Kuracean bellowed, stretching out arms ending in claws not unlike a lobster’s. One was significantly larger than the other, and when it dropped to the ground, it cracked the cobblestones.

  “Go where Akway has tempered the heat on that monster’s foot. Break it.”

  Unable to resist the command, the numen stormed forward, its pointed legs spitting up rock as it scuttled. A cannonball flew overhead, striking Kolosos in the navel. Good; the general was keeping up his side of the bargain. Distract the monster so the numina had a chance to weaken it. Let’s see how the bastard likes fighting with only one foot.

  Pulling Teppa forward, Oz summoned Grendoni into her, killing the sickly mouse he had in his pocket to do it. It followed after Kuracean. Kolosos moaned and retreated a step. That meant their dual assault was affecting it. Excellent.

  Oz turned back, meeting Bastien’s eyes as he did so.

  The summoner let out a long breath and rested his hand on the Godobian’s uninjured shoulder.

  “This ain’t the end yet, is it?” he asked.

  The Godobian shook his head, all seriousness, his eyes watching the war and not his old master.

  “You ain’t shaking.”

  Bastien blinked. Looked at his hands. “Not much,” he answered.

  Oz grinned. “Now that’s something.” He patted the lad’s shoulder once before putting his hand on his head. “You were always a shaker.”

  Now Bastien met his eyes. “Be smart, Oz. M-Make us win.”

  Oz frowned. “Now when have I ever not been smart?”

  Bastien shrugged. “I w-want the chance to be.”

  Oz considered that a moment, then nodded. “I’ll try, Bas. I’ll try. We’ll see the dawn together, eh?”

  The slightest smile touched Bastien’s lips. Oz hoped he hadn’t just lied to him.

  The ground shook as Kolosos lunged for the army. Screams and worse sounds soured the air.

  Oz summoned Pettanatan and offered a prayer for Jansen, wherever his spirit had gone.

  Perhaps they were about to join him.

  General Corris Istrude gaped as he watched fifty of his men die under a single blow.

  His throat squeezed tight. Bile burned in his chest. Cold numbed his legs, his hands. Sergeant Yunter was in that group. The private he’d trained himself, pretending he wasn’t two years too young to e
nlist. That boy had fire. He had aspirations—

  The general set his jaw and snagged the canteen from his belt, forcing himself to swallow the hot water within.

  How many more would Corris lose?

  More men, his men, charged at the creature’s minions. Those who hadn’t held on to their guns wielded knives and swords.

  Nails digging into his palms, Corris shouted, “Shoot them!”

  Explosions surrounded him. Bullets zinged and hit their targets.

  Thank the Celestial, the light was at their backs, and Istrude couldn’t see their faces.

  “Load the next volley! Advance!” Kolosos had turned its attention to the numina surrounding it, namely, the armless mermaid flying nearby, slowing the monster’s movements by spraying its joints with water. Corris marched with his army, moving closer to that damned glowing plate. What did that light mean, anyway?

  Kolosos spun, pitching its arm through the air. It took a long moment before Istrude could tell what it intended.

  He saw the cannon sailing for his men too late.

  It crashed into them, instantly smashing the bodies it hit, then trampling over others as its momentum carried it through the crowd. When it stopped, lying on its side, Corris registered the spark on it—the thing had been lit before it was tossed.

  And it was aimed at him.

  He couldn’t move fast enough. The cannon exploded, its ball clipping another soldier before sailing straight into Corris’s pelvis. He felt his body shatter as his feet left the ground.

  He didn’t remember falling. He was suddenly on the ground, on top of something hard and rough—debris, maybe. Staring up at the sky. At the smoke that poured off Kolosos and danced across the heavens.

  Celestial, won’t you save us?

  He couldn’t feel his legs. He couldn’t feel anything, except pricks of pain in the numbness. Pricks that grew sharper with each breath. It was alarmingly hard to breathe. His mouth tasted like copper.

  “Forward!” a voice called. But it wasn’t Colonel Wills, his replacement. No, the colonel was in the south battalion.

  Corris tipped his head. That made the pain flare. He still couldn’t feel his legs.

  His sense of hope flickered like a candle in the wind, but then backups arrived. Hundreds of them, filling the gaps Kolosos had torn open in the army. They didn’t wear uniforms, but simple civilian clothing. Many had guns. Others had clubs or pipes. Kitchen knives.

  The Riggers. The citizens. They’d come to fight. Corris hadn’t seen such unity since—

  Since—

  It wasn’t enough.

  Rone screamed again, calling Kolosos by his true name once more, but that tactic had lost its effect. He and the numina were like flies buzzing about Kolosos’s horns. Annoying, but easily ignored.

  Rone’s blood turned to lead as he watched Kolosos carelessly kill person after person, often multiple at a time. They screamed, burned, bled. It made him think of a human crushing anthills in the street. Nameless, moving dots. Easily exterminated. Except Kolosos himself had been human.

  Grendoni, the feline numen, vanished from the ethereal plane, summoned to join the fight down below. Moments later, Pettanatan did the same. Ireth would likely be next.

  Rone turned to look at the fire horse. His flame continued to shoot at the glowing epicenter, but his eyes were distant, distracted. Was he communicating with Sandis? Let her be all right, Rone pleaded.

  God’s tower, she’s one of the ants.

  They had to do something. Something more. Their window was so slight, and at this rate of destruction, Dresberg wouldn’t have enough resources for another fight. And if Kolosos returned to the ethereal plane . . . what would he do to those resisting him?

  The epicenter glowed brighter and began to cave inward, forming a shallow bowl in the glassy floor. Rone wanted to think the plane was buckling under the numina’s attack, but his gut told him the warping was a bad thing. A very bad thing.

  The planes physically pulling together kind of bad thing.

  Biting his lip, he looked around the numina. Those who had faces looked strained, exhausted. Turning to Ireth, Rone said, “Tell them to try harder. We need more.”

  Ireth’s skin brightened as his fire increased by a hair. They already give what they have. They know the stakes.

  Rone’s tongue burned with curses. What more could they do? And here he was, standing by while he watched his world disintegr—

  Wait.

  Wait.

  He could do something. Maybe. Did it work both ways?

  “Tell them not to hit me,” he murmured.

  Ireth’s dark eye slid to him, confused.

  Rone ran into the circle.

  Rone! What—but Ireth didn’t finish. Perhaps he understood what Rone meant to do.

  The floor glowed bright enough to hurt Rone’s eyes, now that he stood on top of it. His shoes slid down the slick bowl that grew slowly deeper beneath him. Drang shifted away as he passed, as did a scalding beam of yellow jetting out from another numen. Rone inched as close to the center of the bowl as he could. His skin burned with both hot and cold from the power surrounding him. Hair stood on end. His stomach turned with the feeling of something wrong.

  He pressed both hands against the bowl. He was mortal. He could push into the mortal plane.

  Not for long. Seconds, really. But maybe that was all they needed.

  “Here we go,” he whispered, and pushed against the glass.

  His last thought before it parted was to wonder who would tell his mother if he died.

  Sandis grabbed Pete’s sides as the horse reared. The saddle’s edges bit into her thighs. Only blocks away, Kolosos crushed the top of a building. Men screamed beneath the raining debris.

  “Whoa, whoa!” Pete shouted, but the mare bucked and writhed beneath them.

  Sandis dug her nails into Pete’s ribs and clenched her jaw to keep from crying out. The Rigger finally got the mare turned about and guided her back several yards, calming her, though her sides shook as she snorted each breath. Sandis slid from the horse, sore, and stepped away quickly, wary of the animal’s dancing hooves and flaring nostrils.

  “She won’t go no farther.” Pete pulled the reins tight, the leather whitening his fingers. The mare turned for an alleyway; he brought her back around. “I got to hurry back.”

  Sandis nodded. “Go.”

  Pete kicked the mare’s flanks, and she gladly took off the way they had come.

  A gush of cinder-laden wind hit Sandis, ferrying the scent of sulfur.

  Clutching the amarinth in her pocket, Sandis sprinted toward Kolosos, not entirely sure what she would do when she reached it. She only knew she needed to be close. Closer than she was.

  Gunshots stung her ears. Smoke dried her eyes. She heard a groan from the gutter and spied a blue-clad soldier there. She took a step toward him, intending to offer her assistance, then stopped. The gold loops of the amarinth bit into the underside of her knuckles. Time was slipping by.

  She had promised.

  Turning away from the injured man, she ran for the Innerchord.

  It was too wide and too cluttered, its stateliness obliterated by the war. Between buildings, she could see Kolosos’s wing-laden back as it crushed fighters underfoot. Sandis winced. Behind Kolosos, the gold plate glowed like a fallen sun. The sky reflected it, as though a second sun were trying to pierce through the night. She blinked spots of color from her eyes.

  Closer. Closer. She looked around, spying the closest standing building to the monster.

  The citizen records building.

  A trickle of relief ran down her exposed back as she sprinted for it. She’d broken into this building before—she knew how to get in and where to find the stairs. That would save her time. She wasn’t sure how much of it she had left.

  The smell of sulfur was pungent inside, like it had collected there and festered. Sandis ran up the stairs, her footfalls echoing in the dark stairwell. Her lungs burned. Soles th
robbed. For a minute the darkness blinded her, forcing her to rely on the rails for guidance, but her eyes adjusted. Her heartbeat became a song she couldn’t hear the notes to.

  She burst onto the roof, and the heat stole a gasp from her throat. She shielded her eyes with her arms and turned away, blinking back tears.

  The city was on fire.

  Still shielding herself, she crept toward the edge of the roof closest to Kolosos. The Innerchord shined with the light of the gold plate, which already burned brighter than it had mere minutes ago. She couldn’t see the army, but she heard them. Someone barked orders unintelligible from this distance. Cannons exploded. Screams tore the air. She’d never stop hearing those screams, whether she lived or died tonight.

  Lowering her arm, Sandis beheld the monster. She stood level with its horns. She retrieved the amarinth from her pocket.

  How? How was she supposed to do this?

  White light like an enormous falling star blazed overhead. Sandis staggered backward when it cut through the sky, striking Kolosos in the crown.

  Rone?

  Kolosos threw out his arms and arched his back, bellowing in agony.

  Sandis looked at his open mouth, and knew.

  Pinching one of the amarinth’s three loops in her fingers, she spun the device.

  Then, lips moving with practiced speed, she summoned Ireth.

  Rone was . . . tired.

  Focus.

  His mind spun. Dizzy.

  From the corner of his vision, Ireth winked from existence.

  Just a little longer. A little longer—

  It was blissful.

  Power surged through Sandis, starting at her scalp, filling her like molten metal. It poured down her neck and filled her arms to the fingertips. Glowed in her stomach, washed down her hips and legs, burned in her feet.

  Yet it didn’t hurt. Sandis was on fire, but it didn’t hurt.

  One. Two. Three. The seconds ticked by. She had only sixty.

  She turned toward Kolosos, her muscles bright and strong, her skin gleaming with flame. Beneath it all, she felt his presence. Ireth.