Battle Across Worlds

by Dean Chalmers

  Next he pointed to her eyes. “Gold like the sun, lovely one,” he whispered. “This is a depth of beauty such as I have never before witnessed."

  She didn’t need to understand his words to get his meaning. It was hardly an original sentiment; men had likely been using that ploy since well before the first Phaedon, Udaeon, had unified the Dameryan kingdoms.

  And yet … with this one, it was all so damn sincere.

  Now his hand was gliding up to caress her cheek, and his face was coming closer, those blue eyes sending chills over her with their confident gaze.

  A voice in her mind was screaming: Dammit Tesha, you’re not falling for an obvious trap like this, you can’t be …

  But it was too late for such misgivings.

  She leaned forward and let him kiss her, feeling his soft beard brushing her face and the warmth of his mouth on hers as he wrapped his strong arms around her and pulled her close.

  -32-

  Ed had expected a white dress.

  But the wedding gown Julea wore was a pale sky blue, with a matching bonnet festooned with bows, and a gossamer veil. When she came out of the bedroom into the hallway where Ed stood, she lifted the veil and smiled at him.

  “Is it pretty?” she asked. “Mrs. Starks didn’t get a chance to get it pressed before she … Well, you know. But is it nice?”

  “Yes,” Ed said, “It is.”

  The petite girl was almost lost in the silk and lace of the puffy blue dress, but when he looked above the high collar to her girlish face and saw those big brown eyes, he knew he would say anything to make her happy.

  Four of the ghoulish servant-things were clustered around him; they’d watched him in the hall while Julea had changed in her room.

  Now that she was ready, they moved in, forcing both of them back into the bedroom and closing the door behind them. Once more, they were locked in the room with the deathly Reverend Mott, who stood sentry in the corner.

  “Thhhhennnnn sssaithhhh he too hissss sssservantssss, the wwwedding isss rrready,” Mott hissed. “B-but they wwwhich att-tend-ded too himmm wwwere not wur-thee, soooo that the yune-yun wasss not inn the hole-lee waay.”

  “Just shut up!” Ed sneered back.

  He was beginning to get used to the well-roasted Reverend’s presence, and he no longer cared to be afraid of him.

  He had other things to worry about …

  Julea sighed and covered her eyes. “They say it’s bad luck to see the bride before the wedding,” she said. “But I’m glad you’re here, Edwyn.”

  “It’s okay,” he replied. “Don’t think our luck could get any worse. Who knows, it might have the opposite effect.”

  What did you say, you idiot?, he thought, hearing the reassuring words come out of his mouth as if they’d been spoken by someone else.

  Put me in the worst situation possible and I suddenly become a rutting optimist!

  “Is that suit of clothes all right?” Julea asked. “I think you look very handsome.”

  He nodded. The old mud-brown coat and knee breeches were about twenty years out of style and fit awkwardly on his lanky frame, but he was hardly concerned with fashion at the moment. He still wore his own mismatched boots, and he’d tucked the breeches into them so that he didn’t have to put on stockings.

  “I need one more thing,” he said.

  “What?” she asked, tilting her head up, her big eyes anxiously studying his face.

  “The knife you hid,” he whispered.

  She flinched at the words. “Now?”

  “I need it for when we go down to the cavern, where he is,” he whispered. “Like I told you before. When you run for the door to get outside, I’m going to go down into that pit and stab him.”

  “I was hoping we’d get married first. And … have a little time together,” she said. Her big eyes were quivering.

  Ed touched her chin and tried to sound reassuring. “Look, it’s not … I really would marry you, okay? Your being happy means a lot to me. But I can’t just wait for that bastard Krotan to turn us all into corpse things and take our souls and everything. I have to attack when they don’t expect it.”

  “But Edwyn … what if you can’t kill him?” she asked, shivering.

  He shrugged. “Does the knight run away just because the dragon is too tough? Or the necromancer or whatever … He’s not going to let them kill all the townspeople, right? He has to try and stop them. Even if it means that he goes down fighting.”

  He shuddered inwardly as he spoke the words. It sounded like something that one of the damned Dragoons would say.

  Maybe it really is love that’s doing this to me, he thought. Making me brave … or stupid, which is pretty much the same thing most of the time.

  “But I don’t want a knight anymore,” she sobbed, her eyes pooling with tears. “I want you, Edwyn.”

  She turned her wet eyes up to him, and her trembling lips whispered: “I want my Edwyn Bocke.”

  Her words made his chest ache, and suddenly Ed couldn’t breathe.

  He grabbed her slim shoulders and kissed her forehead, trying to stay in control, not wanting to start crying himself.

  She meant it, didn’t she?

  She wanted him—not just as a stand-in for a storybook hero, not just because he had a dark and stormy countenance—but she wanted HIM, Edwyn Bocke?

  No one had ever really wanted him. It was an odd thing to hear, and it made him feel vulnerable at a time when that was the last thing he needed.

  Because he still had no choice. He still had to try and kill the thing in the pit.

  He pulled back from her, looked her in the eyes. “Listen, Julea,” he said. He’d rarely used her name with her before, and now she jerked when he did so, as if frightened by his commanding tone.

  “LISTEN,” he repeated. “Even if the knight’s reasons for fighting are all a crock of tripe, there are good, strong, Edwyn Bocke reasons to do this, okay? My reasons. Like that bastard Krotan tried to tear my mind open, and I hate him. Like he’s going to turn everyone into these corpse-things, and then I’ll never get a chance to make people respect me, and I’ll have lived my whole life as someone who got spat on.”

  “And,” he continued, leaning close to her, “he’s going to turn you into one of those things if I don’t stop him, and that makes me so rutting angry that I want to rip out his guts and smother him with them.”

  Julea’s face was now slick with tears. “I love you Edwyn,” she sobbed. “I don’t want you to die.”

  “Give me the knife,” he whispered. “Please. You know I’m going to need it.”

  Nodding slowly, she reached forward, wriggled her hand into the deep inner pocket of his coat. He felt something solid and heavy slide down into it from the sleeve of her dress. She wriggled some more, and a second something dropped down before she pulled her hand away.

  He turned to see if their overseer, Mott, had reacted to this clandestine exchange of cutlery.

  As far as Ed could tell from his blank skeletal expression, Mott hadn’t noticed a thing.

  Good.

  Ed patted his jacket to feel the items she’d given him.

  “What’s this?” he whispered. “There’s a knife and—“

  “A fork,” she said. “I found it on the floor under the dinner table at the same time that I got the knife. I thought it might help … Well, just in case.”

  A fork?

  But she had given it to him, his little, faithful Julea … that made it feel like a holy talisman to him.

  “Thanks,” he said. “I’m glad I have it. That and the knife, I mean.”

  Now, Mott slowly turned his head, his neck creaking as his burnt, shriveled eyes came to rest upon them.

  He was hissing softly as his jaw worked, his remaining teeth tapping together with a clack-clack-clack.

  Did he know what they’d been doing after all?

  “What are you staring at?” Ed asked.

  He was so sick of this! He stepped forward
and shoved Mott hard, his hand pressing on the thing’s desiccated chest, feeling the sharp, cold ribs under the papery skin.

  “Edwyn, no!” Julea warned.

  Mott’s arms flashed up and he grabbed Ed’s wrists, his bony hands clamping down in a grip like iron.

  Ed twisted in his grasp, growling in pain and rage as he felt his fingers tingling from the loss of blood flow.

  “Let me go, you burned-up piece of God-hated stinking—“

  The door to the room suddenly flew open with a loud creak, interrupting his cursing.

  The Guardian stood there, red eyes wide, glaring at the struggle.

  “Reverend Mott!” he exclaimed.

  The corpse-thing abruptly released Ed’s arms and turned towards Guardian Crandolph.

  The Guardian relaxed, once again giving them a nervous, giddy smile. “I require the Reverend’s presence,” he explained, ignoring Ed’s obvious discomfort as he rubbed his aching wrists. “I must instruct him so that he can perform the ceremony.”

  “He’s going to marry us?” Julea asked, her face slack in shock.

  Her father nodded. “Of course. I cannot give my daughter away and preside over her union at the same time, can I? Is this a problem? He is ordained, after all.”

  Ed forced a smile. “I’m sure it will be fine. We have come to know the Reverend so very well—haven’t we Julea?”

  She nodded meekly.

  The Guardian smiled. “Soon now, children. Such a momentous day for you, and for all of Garatayne!” He waved Mott forward and they exited, the door thudding shut behind them.

  While the heavy locks clicked into place, Julea grabbed Ed’s arms and pulled him close, rubbing her forehead on his chest. “I wanted it to be pretty,” she whispered. “But now Mott’s going to be right there with us.”

  Ed stroked her hair and hushed her. “That’s okay,” he said. “Better sooner than later, right? He’s going to be right there in front of us? Fine. That mother-rutting bastard is the first one I stab …”

  -33-

  Jack woke up with Tesha’s tightly-curled tresses tickling his shoulder. Her skin smelled faintly like peaches and cinnamon. She was on her side in the bed, breathing softly, her arm resting across his bare stomach.

  He opened his eyes and looked around the candle-lit room. The clay-brick walls enclosed a very small space, and the narrow bed, sloping lengthwise down towards the floor in the Dameryan fashion, had been a snug fit for both of them.

  But it had been well worth the effort …

  Her room was part of a complex of such apartments set on the cliff’s edge near the great fortress of Xai Kaor. The interior was spartan, containing only the bed and a low wooden chair, a chest for clothes, and a few tools and grooming implements on a shelf.

  The only decoration was an iron figure hanging on the wall. Careful not to wake his sleeping lady, Jack gently moved her arm and rose from the bed to examine it.

  At first, he thought it to be angel. But then he saw that the “wings” were actually the outstretched arms of a female form, the triangles of rippled metal below the arms suggesting the long sleeves of heavy gown. There were bumps which had been pounded out of the iron to form an ample bosom, and the face of the figure was suggested by tiny holes, one for each of the eyes and the mouth. The whole of it was speckled with rust—but that only seemed to add a sense of antique wonder to the piece.

  Elegant and beautiful, he thought, yet strong and sharp in its way. Much like her.

  He turned and looked at Tesha’s sleeping face, the bold lines of it only highlighted by her repose.

  She has such passion for her craft, he thought. It burns inside her, gives her the magic she uses to keep the flyers soaring high.

  It echoed his own infatuation with the magnificent flying machines.

  He found himself sending up another silent little prayer.

  Please God, let me spend more time with her, get to know her …

  Her yellow-brown skin, glowing softly in the candlelight, made him want to forget all of the pampered and powdered ladies of his past, to fill his mind only with her.

  As he stood there with his musings, he felt a slight current of cool air and looked up. There was a wooden ladder fastened to one wall, leading up to a trap-door in the ceiling.

  Quietly as he could, he took his Dragoon trousers from the chair, pulled them on, then grabbed the rungs, climbing the ladder and pushing the trap-door open.

  He emerged on the roof of the place, a kind of porch with a reed mat spread out in the center. It was surprisingly cool outside, the heat of the desert day long dispersed in the late-night air.

  They were close enough to the cliff’s edge here that he could look down and see the looming disc of the full moon reflected in the river, shimmering with the current.

  Dear heavens¸ he thought, gasping at the beauty. It wasn’t only the lovely Tesha who had taken his heart—it was this entire land.

  As he looked down upon the water, a shadow broke the perfect circle of the moon. It glided like a hawk, but its shape was that of a wide pincer, or claw …

  His muscles tensed as he snapped to alertness. Yanking up the trap door, he clambered down the ladder. Just as his feet hit the floor, there came a sound from outside. It was a steady whistle, which he recognized as an ambia sound.

  Not a gun-blast, though; the tone was slightly lower and it continued on and on, shrieking like a steaming teapot.

  Tesha’s eyes flashed open and she sat up stiff in the bed.

  Jack was in the chair nearby, hastily tugging on his boots.

  “Yar den si?” she exclaimed, looking about panicked.

  “Baek Tayon,” Jack said, hoping that would explain enough. He grabbed his coat, thrust his plumed hat on this head, and blew her a hasty kiss before sprinting out the door.

  There was a bright cone of white light shining up from the top of the fortress, and the whistling sound seemed to be coming from there.

  It’s a battle alarm, he thought. They know. Good.

  He threw himself down the path to the fortress, heading towards the landing platform. Other men joined him, shouting and running, pilots he recognized—including the man Uhon, who’d been there the day that Panna Jael had been injured.

  Uhon waved Jack forward as they ran onto the landing platform. Several of the flyers were already rising, ambia jets flaring as they shot off into the night.

  He followed Uhon, who lead him to a craft at one side of the platform.

  “Jack,” he said, pointing to the flyer. “Aen Jack.”

  This one was for him, then? Jack thanked the man and bowed, and Uhon ran off towards his own ship.

  Looking over his new flyer in the torchlight, Jack saw that it was of the same type as Jael’s, a little, snub-nosed two-seater with a long, needle-nose gun: a Hummingbird.

  On the front right side of the craft, just below the canopy, someone had painted a yellow plume like the one in his hat.

  That made Jack smile even as he jumped into the pilot’s seat and pulled down the canopy over him.

  But there something else inside—a shiny, white cloth-wrapped package set on top of the control panel.

  He quickly examined it, pulling at the edge of the cloth. He found that it wasn’t a package at all, but a long silken scarf which had been tightly folded into a square.

  A silk scarf? The pilots all wore them; perhaps it was some totem or symbol of good fortune.

  Ah well, he thought, quickly draping the soft cloth about his neck and shoulders, with a lucky scarf AND my lucky hat, I should be well-nigh invincible, yes?

  Taking a deep breath, he grasped the control harness, pushed the rods down, and felt himself pressed back into his seat as the flyer rushed up into the night sky …

  #

  As Brace Aubren stepped onto the bridge of the giant flying fortress, he felt like he was walking on air.

  When he looked down through the near-transparent floor to see the great river cutting through the des
ert hundreds of feet beneath him, he felt like a god.

  But if he was a god, then there was a goddess to whom even he was subservient …

  His Pai Lanaya stood at her console at the front of the bridge, her well-muscled body clad deliciously in black leather. Watching her, Aubren felt a surge of desire in his loins.

  But then, the anticipation of violence always made him feel a bit lustful.

  She turned, sensing his presence, and Aubren’s eyes met her bloody gaze.

  “Pai Lanaya,” he said, bowing. “I take flight now to fight in your honor.”

  As he rose from his bow, his eyes were drawn to her leather-clad form. He couldn’t stop staring, tracing his gaze from her broad shoulders down to the subtle spread of her hips and her powerful thighs.

  She noticed this and stepped forward. Grabbing his chin, she pulled his head up, bit his lip hard—then thrust her tongue deep into his mouth.

  He felt himself respond to her attentions. Ah, it was bliss! It almost made him forget about the coming battle, wanting to satisfy those urges now.

  He knew he’d enjoy it if she took him in front of others again, displayed their lust for all to see …

  That is how the strongest of the beasts mate, openly, both their desire for each other and their dominance over the pack expressed in their joining.

  But then she pulled away, and pushed him back, grinning.

  “All right,” he said, shaking his head. “We do have work to do. But I hope that’s a little taste of what I’ll get later, yes?”

  She laughed—a low, rumbling noise in her throat—and slapped his arm.

  “Yao si ka em duar, Aubren!” she hissed, grinning ferally.

  She used my name.

  The goddess spoke my name!

  It was the first time.

  Hearing it from her mouth made him feel invincible.

  “I shall deliver death unto your enemies, my goddess,” he promised.

  He bowed again and left the bridge, taking the sloping passage to the lower tunnel which led along the bottom of the ship to the flight bays, where his Axehead flyer was waiting.