The Throne of Amenkor

by Joshua Palmatier

  But the most telling feature, the thing that struck horror into Erick’s gut, into my gut, was their skin. It was a pale, pale blue, like a winter sky.

  Deep in the White Fire at Erick’s core, one of the voices in the throne wailed in recognition, radiating shock and disbelief. It can’t be them. A sob, almost a wail.

  Who are they? I screamed at the voices, screamed at the Seven, choking on the scent of blood and fire.

  But before anyone could answer, another ball of fire lanced out from the second ship, arced out over the water that separated the two, and crashed into the mast high above, flames shattering and raining down on the deck. Erick and Mathew ducked, lurched out of the way, moving swiftly up the foredeck.

  “Where in hells is Laurren?” Erick hissed under his breath. He shot a glance out toward the half-seen ships that circled the trader ship. He thought there were three others, aside from the one tethered to the trader ship, but he couldn’t be certain.

  “I saw her on the aft deck,” Mathew said, “but then I was cut off from her.”

  Erick grunted. “Head down the port side,” he said, motioning with his hand. “Have everyone move in this direction. We can’t defend ourselves if we’re scattered all over the ship!”

  Mathew nodded, broke away from Erick, clambering down the deck over dead bodies and broken shards of the rigging. Erick turned, caught another blade with his sword, then drove the dagger in his left hand up under the makeshift armor into the gut of the attacking blue-skinned man. The attacker gasped, blood pouring from the wound in his chest, and then Erick thrust him aside.

  “At least they die like ordinary men,” he muttered to himself.

  Someone screamed, a bloodcurdling death cry, and he glanced down the deck. Part of the crew huddled together, swords and axes flailing, two guardsmen with them, but they were surrounded, backed up against the railing of the deck.

  Erick leaped forward, body slipping into old rhythms. Within a heartbeat, three of the attackers had fallen. The rest turned to face him, two more dying as the guardsmen cut them down from behind, and then the group was free.

  “To the foredeck!” Erick shouted, shoving them along toward the prow of the ship. They stumbled forward, eyes wide in shock.

  Erick glanced toward the second ship, noticed another that circled farther out in the glow of the firelight on the ocean. He spat a curse.

  On the second ship, a ball of fire flew up into the air. In the backwash of light, he saw a woman standing on the prow, her black hair flying wildly about her in the wind, her hands lifted before her. Her face was twisted with concentration, her eyes cold and deadly with intent. She wore loose clothing, like the warriors, but her ears were pierced with gold rings, three on each side.

  Then, before the aft deck, the thrown fireball struck something in midair and exploded, fire raining down an invisible wall of force to the surging ocean below. In the fiery light, Erick saw Laurren, her face screwed up in a scowl of hatred. A sharp gust of air followed the explosion of the fireball, but before Erick could react, another ball of fire arched out from the ship circling farther out, striking the same invisible wall.

  A bright ball of light exploded across the ocean, illuminating the other circling ships clearly, flashing hot on the surface of the ocean. In the near-blinding explosion, Erick saw two other women, one each on the other two ships, both dressed like the first, both with gold earrings.

  Then he was hit by a concussive force of wind that shoved him back. Everyone on the ship staggered, some crying out in shock. The sheet of fire winked out.

  The next ball of fire slid past Laurren’s shield, shuddered into the side of the ship, exploded and rained down the side into the water, the pungent scent of smoke prickling in his nose. Erick heard wood creak with strain, felt the ship rock up on a swell and thud hard into the ship already tethered to the port side. As they separated, someone fell down between the two ships into the water with a scream.

  On the aft deck, Laurren raised her hands, drew back, and flung her arms forward as if throwing a spear out into the darkness of the ocean.

  Wood planking shattered on the nearest ship, chunks flying out from its side.

  A weak shout of triumph went up from The Maiden’s crew.

  Erick pressed his lips together grimly.

  Three against one. He didn’t like Laurren’s odds.

  I didn’t either.

  Gathering myself, I leaped out of Erick, sped across the deck, fire dripping down from the burning sails, rigging collapsing to the body-strewn deck, and sank into the Fire at Laurren’s core.

  Laurren, I’m here.

  “Mistress,” Laurren gasped, her face already covered in sweat, her eyes wide, her heart thudding so hard it hurt. “They’re so strong!” Her voice was nothing more than a whisper.

  Another fireball struck her shield and I felt the force rippling as Laurren staggered backward, her hands raised before her. Gritting her teeth, she spat, “And there are so many of them.”

  Anger boiling up from inside me, I said, Give the shield to me. Use your strength to strike back at them. Try to take out the women.

  Laurren nodded, flinched back as two fireballs struck almost simultaneously, the force shuddering through her arms, down into her chest. Jaw clenched, she released the flows of the river, the shield collapsing—

  And at the same moment I reached forward—through the Fire, as Cerrin had reached through the Fire to help me guide the river so many times before—grabbed the disintegrating edges and pulled the shield tight.

  Laurren cried out in relief and staggered forward, her hands coming up to her face, trembling with the effort.

  Grappling with the shield, a fireball hitting it with a glancing blow and shuddering down its length to strike the ship, I spat, Laurren! You have to fight back! I can’t hold the shield and strike back at the same time!

  With an effort, Laurren drew herself upright, breath harsh, choking as smoke drifted across her face.

  Then she gathered the river into a focused rod of power, like a spear, and with a grunt of effort and pure hatred, she hurled it toward the nearest ship.

  It struck with a rending of wood and the bowsprit of the circling ship sheared off, splinters flying up into the face of the woman at the prow. She screamed in fury, arms flung up to protect her face, and then ducked out of sight.

  Laurren chuckled, the sound somehow dead.

  Don’t stop. There are at least two others like her.

  Laurren nodded, sucked in a deep breath, and began to send spear after spear out into the darkness, targeting the three circling ships. The first, naked with the lance of the bowsprit missing, turned back and the attacking Servant appeared again, fireballs shooting out from its side now. The first hit the mast, The Maiden shuddering as it exploded, fire raining down in tatters; the second caught my shield. More fire arched out of the darkness, pummeling the shield, the mast, and Laurren answered, each spear sent with a gut-wrenching growl.

  Then the fireballs shifted. I saw three arch out of the night, had a moment to realize they weren’t aimed at the ship itself, had time to say, Laurren—

  But the warning came too late.

  Even as I strengthened the shield before us, the first fireball hit, followed instantly by the second, the third a breath behind. Laurren cried out, flung her arms up to ward herself as each exploded, fire coruscating out from my shield in all directions, surrounding us in a wash of hellish light. I grunted, pulled the shield in tighter, sacrificing the protection of the ship in order to keep the fire at bay. Heat seared Laurren’s upraised arms, scorched away her eyebrows, turned her skin waxy. I felt the shield shudder again, felt another barrage of fire strike it before the first had even faded, felt the heat intensify, felt Laurren’s hair catch fire. Three different attacks, from three different directions, all with the same purpose.

  It was to
o much. I couldn’t hold the shield, could feel it shredding even as I gasped in a broken, ragged voice, Laurren! I can’t hold it! I can’t—

  And then it collapsed.

  Fire roared into the opening, enveloped Laurren in a seething mass of flames that flung her back. Fire raced up her arms—my arms—seared into flesh, crackling and spitting like a roast thrust onto a spit on the hearth. I screamed, Laurren’s voice rending the night, shrieking, and flames scorched down into my lungs, burning inside and out, choking me, charring deeper into skin, into bone—

  And then I flung myself out of Laurren’s body, still screaming, in pain, in hatred, in denial, my gut clenching and twisting because I couldn’t save her, because I hadn’t been able to hold the shield.

  Laurren staggered across the aft deck, her scream dying, her body a pillar of flame reaching high into the night, and then she came up against the wheel, hard, back twisted. She spun, arms trailing fire, gripped the wheel in desperation, as if trying to hold herself upright.

  And then collapsed to the side and lay there, not moving, not even twitching.

  A fireball arched past where I hovered on the river, my own scream dying as the sensation of being burned to death faded. I gasped, choked on smoke, on fire itself, felt as if I were weeping, sobs hitching in my throat even though my body was over a thousand miles distant.

  The fireball struck the mast, and I suddenly heard the screams of the other men on the ship.

  Thrusting Laurren’s pain aside, I dove down into Erick again.

  “Erick!”

  Erick spun, saw Mathew and a group of men hacking their way down the starboard side. He leaped forward, joined the fray, sword used mainly to guard as his dagger slashed in and out. All horror vanished as calm settled over him, the skills he’d been drilled in as a Seeker coming to the fore, taking over.

  One of the curved rapiers snicked in and sliced along his jaw, nothing but a nick, but the blue-skinned man fell back as Erick’s dagger cut across his throat. Two more of the attackers took the man’s place, black eyes seething with rage. They let out a piercing shriek, but Erick didn’t flinch, cutting in sharply. A blade slashed along Erick’s side, the pain like white-hot fire cutting across his ribs, and he hissed, punching his dagger hard through the leather armor into the man’s heart, and then the entire ship lurched and everyone stumbled to the side, the remaining attacker falling away.

  Erick suddenly found himself among Mathew’s men. He gasped, slapped a hand tight across his side, felt blood—his own blood—coat his fingers.

  “They’ve brought another ship up alongside,” Mathew yelled over the fight. He grimaced as a blow landed hard on his shoulder, then brought his own blade down hard, slicing through the man’s wrist. The blue-tinged man screamed. Blood fountained from the stump as he lurched away, splashing the man next to Mathew before the hand-less man fell to the deck and was trampled underfoot. “And we’ve lost Laurren.”

  Erick shot a glance toward the aft deck, saw the billowing flames where Laurren’s body had fallen, and grimaced. His stomach twisted with regret, with actual pain. The cut along his side was worse than he’d thought. But there wasn’t time to deal with it.

  He drew breath to order everyone to the foredeck, but another ball of fire roared out of the night and landed squarely on the deck, at the base of the mast.

  Erick expected it to explode into fragments, like the other ones. Instead, this one’s flames spread outward like a pool of oil . . . and then began snaking along the deck, tendrils of fire shooting out toward the feet of the men all around it. I could see the forces at work on the river, could see it being guided. . . .

  It caught one of the crew almost instantly.

  Before Erick could yell out a warning, the man’s clothes erupted like a torch, fire seething upward. The man screamed, the sound sending shivers down Erick’s spine. Arms flailing, the man stumbled, hit the mast with his back, then staggered toward the side of the ship, hitting the railing with his hips, then rolling over the top.

  He struck the side of the tethered ship once before vanishing from sight.

  “Shit!” Mathew breathed. He wiped his mouth with the back of one hand as their gazes met, and in Mathew’s eyes Erick saw hopelessness.

  They weren’t going to survive this battle.

  Erick felt the realization settle over him with a strange sense of calm, interrupted only by the pain in his side.

  “Get the men to the foredeck,” he said, voice steady. “We’ll take as many of the damn blue-skinned demons as we can with us.”

  Mathew hesitated. Then his face hardened, grew grim, and he nodded.

  Turning, he bellowed out an order and shoved the men closest to him forward. On the deck, the eerie fire continued to spread, flames streaking out and engulfing men as they ran, swerving around the blue-skinned warriors as they drove Mathew, Erick, and the rest back. I tried to watch, tried to reach out with the river to disrupt the flows that controlled the fire, but Erick was moving too much, dodging and retreating, all in fluid motion, his side screaming at the abuse. Another fireball streaked out of the night and hit the mast, the entire ship shuddering, and then another. Erick fought back, dagger slicking in and out, sword cutting through skin, striking bone, getting tangled in the clothing the warriors wore. And still the men came, pouring in from the starboard side as grapples were thrown from the third ship and the two were tethered together on that side.

  The Maiden’s crew and the few remaining guardsmen, mostly those provided by Captain Catrell, were driven into the prow of the ship, the group tightening up, the guardsmen shoving the regular crew into the back to defend them as the spacing narrowed. Fire resumed arcing over from the outer ships, striking the deck, the mast, flames now roaring along the port railing, eating away at the aft deck. Most of the sails had been consumed; only tatters remained. Rigging dangled down from the crosspieces of the mast.

  Then a ponderous groan shuddered through the ship.

  Erick stepped back from the edge of the fighting, caught Mathew’s gaze from across the group of crewmen.

  The captain of The Maiden nodded toward the mast.

  Another groan, and this time the majority of those still fighting paused and turned.

  Erick heard wood beginning to splinter, a soft, insidious sound, then noticed that fire still roared at the base of the mast.

  With a heartrending groan, the mast listed. Wood cracked, the retort hard and sharp and reverberating in Erick’s chest, and with a slow, ponderous grace the mast began to fall, trailing fiery sails and rigging behind it.

  It struck the aft deck of The Maiden, the decking splintering upward at the force, the shudder running through the ship and vibrating in Erick’s teeth. He clenched his jaw tight, turned back to the surrounding blue-skinned men—

  And then threw down his sword, wincing. It clattered on the deck, the sound small compared to the crash of the mast. His free hand went to the cut along his side. He pressed hard, trying to staunch the flow.

  To either side, the guardsmen tossed their own weapons to the deck, their eyes hard and angry.

  The tension on the ship didn’t decrease. Instead, one of the blue-skinned men stepped forward from the crowd, pointed his curved sword at Erick.

  He spat something in a language Erick didn’t recognize, eyes blazing with anger. His face was covered with tattoos, swirled, like waves, and the lower half of one ear was sliced off.

  The blue-skinned man eyed Erick, then snorted in contempt. His blade retreated.

  Movement came from the back of the attackers, and then a woman stepped out from the crowd. Back straight, head held high, she advanced on Erick and the crew, and the blue-skinned men around her retreated, giving her a wide berth.

  She was dressed in the strange silk-like cloth of all the others, but her dress had lengths of cloth attached at the waist and wrists, and her ears were
pierced with more of the gold rings than the women on the other ships—seven on each side. Her long black hair was held back with a band of gold on her head. Her blue skin was flawless, her eyes black and hardened like stone.

  She halted a few paces before Erick. The man who’d spoken to Erick drew back another step, but his eyes never left Erick’s face.

  The woman spoke, and again the voice in the throne responded—a roar of rage. But I couldn’t distinguish who it was amid the chaos. I couldn’t catch the scent.

  Erick shook his head, frowning in confusion. The woman glared at him, then scanned the rest of the guardsmen, the crew, her eyes falling on Mathew before finally returning to Erick.

  She waved her hand in dismissal, said something low, and the man who’d threatened Erick nodded, smiling tightly, a look of anticipation in his eyes. She began to turn away. The blue-skinned men around her stepped forward, swords raised.

  I suddenly realized what she intended.

  She meant to kill them all.

  I leaped forward, horror causing the Fire around me to flare higher. Seizing control of Erick’s body, I screamed, “No!” using his voice. I reached for the river using the Fire at Erick’s core, wound it tight and flicked it outward like a lash.

  It licked across the front rank of blue-skinned men and they shrieked, thrust backward by the force of the invisible blow, and then the whip slid across the woman.

  And there it met a wall of force, as tightly woven and dense as anything I’d ever seen Eryn wield. The whip struck the wall and leaped back, recoiling, almost snapping into Erick and the rest of the crew before I brought it back under control.

  The woman spun, eyes flashing, and then she moved, so fast I barely saw her, too fast for me to react.

  The wall of force surged forward, shoved everyone back from Erick, and then snapped in hard around his throat, crushing into his neck like a hand and lifting him up. He choked, feet dangling off of the deck, pain screaming up from his side with its own white fire, and then the woman stepped forward, peered up into his eyes.