by James Maxey
On the bank above him he saw a flash and heard thunder. A bloodied dragon toppled down the bank, limp and lifeless.
Thorny popped to the surface beside him. His lips were dark blue.
“Keep moving,” Burke said, grabbing his friend by the collar.
“If y-you knew,” Thorny asked, “why d-didn’t you k-kill me?”
“You were the only halfway decent chess player in town.”
“Anza’s b-better,” said Thorny.
“Anza beats me,” said Burke.
They hopped, floated, and scrambled downstream a hundred yards, seldom bringing anything more than their heads above water. In the darkness, the fallen bridge and the upended war machine were nothing but shadows. On the far bank, Burke saw movement. Vance?
The shadow he saw was too large and had a tail. The shadow brandished a large hammer and shouted incompressible words of rage at the fallen bridge. So much for the hope the brute had been crushed in the collapse.
“It’s been too long,” said Burke. “The fuse should have—”
The night went white. The shockwave knocked them beneath the water. Hot shards of metal rained down, sizzling as they punched into the river. Burke lost all sense of up and down as the water roughed him up. Finally, he surfaced. Thorny popped up too, gasping. Burke spun around, trying to get his bearings, until he spotted the pillar of bluish flame on the water where the Angry Beetle had once been. The burning goom, no doubt. Black smoke hung heavy in the air. All around, little plips sounded in the water as shrapnel continued to fall.
Burke wanted to call out Vance’s name, but didn’t dare. He didn’t know how many men or dragons had survived. No matter who was still up on the banks, it wouldn’t be long before sky-dragons swarmed the area. Their only chance was to stay quiet, stay low, and keep moving.
“Do you th-think he…?” whispered Thorny.
“Shh,” said Burke. “Keep moving. He’ll find us.”
As the minutes dragged on, Vance didn’t find them. Burke helped Thorny crawl from the water after a mile had passed. They were both freezing, drenched to the bone. Their only hope was to keep moving. They raced not only against the sky-dragons who no doubt searched the area, but against hypothermia and frost-bite as well.
They limped along with Burke’s arm wrapped around Thorny’s shoulder for balance. Burke had the shotgun and his crutch pressed against his chest with his free arm. Any time Thorny slowed, Burke pushed him on, ever eastward. Stopping even a minute to catch their breath could prove fatal.
They’d traveled a few miles when Burke smelled smoke. At first, he thought it might be his imagination, until Thorny whispered hoarsely, “S-smells like a f-fire.”
They limped on, rounding a bend in the river. Like some dream, a windowless log cabin sat high up on the bank, with smoke curling from the stone chimney. Burke hobbled toward it, not caring who might be inside. The cabin was tiny, barely ten feet by five. He let his crutch drop from his numb hands as he fell against the door.
The door opened. Vance looked down on them. His hair was sopping wet. He was wrapped in a thick wool blanket. The redness of his burned cheek had faded. Behind him, a fire roared.
“This place used to belong to my uncle Jig,” Vance said. “He’s back at Dragon Forge. He won’t mind us passing the night.”
“How did you…”
Vance shrugged. “I must have passed y’all in the darkness. Get inside before you let the heat out. We need to put out the fire before dawn. Don’t want the dragons seeing the smoke.”
Thorny stumbled into the cabin. He fell before the fireplace, rolling toward it, until he was practically in it. Steam rose from his clothes.
“Don’t cook yourself,” said Burke, dropping to the floor next to him.
Vance shut the door.
Burke closed his eyes and instantly plunged into sleep.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:
WE SHALL ALL BE HEALED
ANZA PRESSED HER back against a stone dragon atop the roof of the palace. The night sky was full of aerial guard and valkyries. Within the palace a dozen ox-dogs bayed. They were all searching for her. She’d spent most of the day skulking around the palace, trying to establish who’d seen the scroll containing the secret of gunpowder. Tonight, she’d acted. Two dozen sky-dragons were dead in her wake. The only important target she’d missed was Chapelion himself. She hoped he hadn’t committed the formula to memory. She’d recovered Bazanel’s original scroll and two copies and burned them.
Unfortunately, it had proven impossible to execute her plan in complete secrecy. The first bodies had been discovered long before she was finished with her targets. She’d been increasingly on the defensive as news spread through the palace that an assassin was present. With the ox-dogs now on her trail, she’d spent the last hour retreating to ever higher ground.
She pressed her cheek against the cold marble scales of the carved sun-dragon she hid beside. The wind whipped around the peaks of the palace. She looked toward the southwest. Somewhere in that direction lay Dragon Forge. She imagined how her father would stand when he heard the news of her death. She could feel the sag of his shoulders.
The wound on her chest throbbed with each heartbeat. It felt as hot now as the night the fire had actually touched it. Not a quarter mile distant was the river where she’d swum with Skitter little more than a week ago. It would feel good to dip back into that water.
The door to the rooftop terrace burst open and an ox-dog emerged, dragging an earth-dragon handler behind it, followed by a squad of nine earth-dragons and a second dog. Anza could handle the guards. The ox-dogs were another matter. Standing six feet tall at the shoulder, ox-dogs had a bite that even sun-dragons envied. Pound for pound, there were few creatures on the planet who matched them for sheer muscle. Like all dogs, they were fiercely protective of their pack, and would fight to the death once combat began. Worst of all, their sense of hearing and smell made them nearly impossible to elude.
If there was ever a moment in her life when it would have been useful to sprout wings, it was now. Given the improbability of that development, she improvised.
She pursed her lips and let out a long, loud whistle. As all heads turned toward her, she scrambled onto the stone dragon, climbed its long neck, and stood on its head. The statue looked out over the edge of the roof. Below her was a five-hundred-foot drop into darkness. To her right, in the distance, she could see the lights of Richmond, gleaming. If she could make it there, she could disappear among the crowds. To her left, there were other lights. She cocked her head, trying to make sense of what she saw. It looked like a second city, but her study of maps of the area hadn’t revealed a city there before. Was this the Free City? She’d heard that was abandoned.
The earth-dragons and ox-dogs surrounded the base of the statue. The ox-dogs were too bulky to climb up the statue’s neck to reach her. One of the bolder earth-dragons looked ready to make the attempt. She loosed a throwing knife. It shot like an arrow to the exact spot on the stone that the dragon’s thick claw was about to grasp, throwing up bright sparks. The earth-dragon pulled back and cast a wary eye toward her.
Anza looked up. Her true target wasn’t the earth-dragons or the ox-dogs. A sky-dragon dove at her, a valkyrie judging from the armor. In her hind-talons she carried a spear nearly twenty feet long, with the point on a path that would stab right into Anza’s heart.
Anza counted the seconds, her legs tensing until the last possible instant.
She leapt up, slapping the tip of the spear down and to the side. The shaft painlessly slid along her rib cage and hips. At the apex of her leap, she closed her fingers, clamping onto the sky-dragon’s leg.
Her feet jerked from the statue. The sudden weight sent the valkyrie into a spin. Anza held on with all her might as the world whirled around her. The dragon fell at a sharp angle, beating her wings furiously to regain control. Anza tucked her legs up as they dashed past the tips of the trees that lined the river. The dragon carried her out o
ver the dark water and she let go. She tumbled through the air and smacked into the water with the full surface of her back, her arms and legs outstretched. It was the most painful landing possible, but it wasn’t fatal. She sank beneath the icy water, breathless from the impact.
She kicked, driving herself further downriver, struggling to stay below the surface. Her lungs were burning. White stars danced before her eyes. At last, she could take no more. She rose to the surface, turning to her back, floating gently upward so that only the tip of her face broke the water. She drew in a long silent breath as she scanned the sky. Dragons were everywhere. She plunged below the surface again, kicking hard to get as close to the bottom as possible. She wanted to leave no ripples that they might follow.
The current was strong, lending her speed, but she was swimming blind. She had no way of knowing how far she’d come. She swam until she couldn’t help herself. She had to surface again. This time, she rose with much less grace and control. She’d pressed too far. Her heart felt full of needles. She splashed to the surface, gasping loudly. She fumbled to free a knife from her belt, but it fell from her trembling fingers. She tried to catch it but the sudden motion plunged her face underwater.
She inhaled a chilling lungful of icy liquid. She grew still, trying to calm herself, letting the buoyancy of her body carry her upward. She lay immobile at the surface, drifting, her nose barely above water. She wanted to swim for shore, but anytime she tried to turn her head she sank back beneath the river.
She closed her eyes, feeling numb. Water washed into her throat. She coughed violently, her limbs flailing uselessly in an attempt to find something solid to grab.
She forgot where she was or why she was so cold and closed her eyes again.
A HAND WRAPPED around her wrist. Her eyes fluttered open as she was dragged through shallow water across smooth river rocks. Her rescuer was a woman about her own age, dressed in a long white robe that was wet from the knees down. Anza coughed again, so violently that she pulled her arm free of her rescuer. She rolled over onto her belly on the stony bank and coughed up water. Her coughing triggered something deeper inside her and she started to vomit, bringing up teaspoons of clear, pale, bitter fluid. In the aftermath, she lay on the uneven stones, completely empty. All her life her father had trained her to treat her body as a machine. She knew how to push it the limits of its engineering. Her muscles and bones composed a finely-tuned master clockwork. Now her gears were stripped. She couldn’t even lift a finger.
“Poor thing,” the girl who had pulled her from the river said as she squatted next to her. She placed a hand under Anza’s shoulder and rolled her to her back. “We have to get you back on your feet. If you don’t keep moving, you’ll freeze. You’ll go to sleep and never wake up.”
Anza found this thought acceptable. Her eyes closed. It would feel good to drift off peacefully, never to—
SLAP!
For a half-second, Anza wondered about the source of the sound. Her ice-cold skin was numb. She dimly felt the pressure of the blow on her cheek but no actual pain. Slowly, a tingling set in, as if her cheek were being stung by a thousand bees.
She lifted her hand to her cheek, rubbing it.
This small motion wore her out. She noticed fingers lingering near her face. The fingertips were pale white and puckered. Were they hers? She dropped her arm back to her side, and released a long, shuddering breath as her eyes closed once more.
SMACK!
Anza's eyes snapped open. The girl had her hand raised, preparing to strike a third blow. Instinctively, Anza caught the girl’s hand as it raced toward her face.
She sat up, giving the girl a stern glower.
“Sorry,” the girl said. “Can you stay awake now? Do you think you can stand?”
Anza shook her head. She was surprised she was even sitting. The white-robed woman moved behind her and wrapped her arms around her torso, lifting her. Anza found her footing and was soon standing on wobbling legs. The girl draped Anza’s arm across her shoulders to support her.
“My goodness,” her rescuer said, looking down at Anza’s buckskin clad body. “You certainly have a lot of knives.”
Anza shrugged.
“I’m Colobi,” the girl said. Anza looked more closely at her rescuer. She was shorter than Anza and a bit heavier, with large breasts and plump shoulders. Her hair hung loosely around her face, so blonde it was almost white. Colobi’s face was flawless as porcelain, without a scar or blemish. Her eyes were a bright, crisp blue.
“Let’s try walking,” said Colobi, taking a step forward.
Anza strained to move her feet. She had to look down to see if they moved. She really couldn’t feel much save for the two burning suns in her cheek where Colobi had slapped her.
“What’s your name?” Colobi asked.
Anza made no effort to answer. She focused on putting one leg in front of the other as they slowly walked away from the dark river.
ANZA REGAINED CONTROL of her legs by the time they reached the Free City. The town was surrounded by a palisade of logs. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of tents had been erected by the road leading to the gates. Anza sniffed the air. There were earth-dragons nearby, a lot of them, as well as humans. She tried to remember everything she knew about the Free City, but her head still felt stuffed with snow. She did remember, however, that the place had been abandoned in the aftermath of the attempted genocide within its walls. So who were all these people?
A tent flap lifted and a sky-dragon stepped out. The sky-dragon looked straight toward them and raised a fore-talon in a gesture of greeting. “Good evening, sister,” the sky-dragon said. “I see you’ve found an injured soul.”
“I pulled her from the river, brother,” said Colobi. “I think she’s the one the aerial guards were hunting.”
Anza pulled free of Colobi, stunned by this betrayal. She raised her hand to the scabbard on her back. Her fingers were still too numb to grasp the sword.
She shoved her fingers beneath her armpits to try to warm them.
“There’s no need for alarm,” the sky-dragon said, shifting half his body back into the tent. “No one will betray you. Everyone is welcome here, human or dragon, no matter your past. I was once a tatterwing, surviving as a bandit, until the healer found me. He repaired my body and then charged me with the duty to repair my soul.” The dragon pulled back from the tent carrying a heavy quilt. He approached Anza and draped it over her shoulders.
Anza frowned, her body tensing. Was this some trick? Through sheer will, she commanded her fingers to move again, opening and closing as blood flowed back into them. The bones of her fingers ached.
“I can see you’re skeptical,” said the sky-dragon. “You’ll see the truth once you meet the healer.”
“We shall all be healed, brother,” Colobi said.
“We shall all be healed, sister,” said the sky-dragon. He gave a respectful nod, then spread his wings and jumped into the sky, journeying toward whatever his original destination had been.
Anza lowered her hands from her armpits to the steel tomahawks on her belt. The handles had been machined to fit perfectly in her grasp. She felt a little stronger as she held them. Colobi looked toward her with a gentle smile.
“There’s no need for weapons here,” she said. Anza looked down. The quilt wasn’t fully closed around her. The tomahawk in her left hand was plainly visible. “The Free City is the safest place on earth. The healer sees to all our needs. He restores our bodies so that we may work on the more difficult task of restoring our hearts and minds.”
Anza ground her teeth. She didn’t have the energy to deal with crazy people. On the other hand, she also didn’t have the energy to flee. She was dead on her feet. And right now, following Colobi offered the greatest probability of survival. Anza hooked the tomahawks back onto her belt.
“Are you able to talk yet?” Colobi asked.
Anza shook her head.
“Once the healer feeds you, you’ll feel better,
” said Colobi. “I imagine you have an interesting story given the commotion at the palace.”
Anza shrugged, attempting to convey the impression that she didn’t have a clue what Colobi was talking about.
“There’s nothing to be ashamed of,” said Colobi. “I once lived the most violent life imaginable. I was a Sister of the Serpent, a sworn devotee of the Murder God. I fell victim to his dark seductions due to painful events in my past. I grew up believing the only law was to kill or be killed. Until the healer opened my eyes, I was blind to the magic of simply being alive. You, too, will be freed from all your pains. Are you ready to be healed?”
Anza wasn’t sure how to respond. The Sisters of the Serpent were deranged. They killed because they thought it was an act of holiness. Anza had never taken a life in the name of a higher power, nor had she ever struck a blow in hatred, anger, or fear. Her father had taught her that it was only ethical to use violence when it was guided by the rational mind. Colobi was obviously not a rational mind.
Still, Anza was cold, her legs felt like rubber, and she couldn’t remember when she’d last eaten. Dawn brightened the eastern horizon. Off in the distance a cock crowed, joined quickly by another, and another. Within the Free City, she could see the smoke rising from hundreds of chimneys and could smell oats boiling as people rose to greet the day.
The most rational path was to stay near Colobi, at least until she could knock the chill from her bones and get some food in her stomach.
“Are you ready?” Colobi asked again.
Anza nodded.