Kings of the Wyld

by Nicholas Eames

  “Young?” asked Gabriel. “How did he die then?”

  Moog scratched at one bushy eyebrow. “Well, you see how big he was. Apparently he broke through a latrine seat and drowned in the sewage below.”

  A shitty way to go, Clay was about to remark when a muffled shout echoed from beyond the recessed columns fronting the shrine. “Did you guys hear that?”

  Edwick was cupping one ear. “It sounded like Matrick,” he said.

  More incomprehensible words drifted into the plaza. Gabriel slipped over the skyship’s low rail and moved a few paces ahead. Clay looked down the side street; gnoll corpses littered the ground, but there was no sign of Barret and the others.

  “ … rt … ip!” came the voice from within the temple, still faint.

  “That was Matty, no doubt,” said Moog. “But the words … Gabe, could you make out any of that?”

  Gabriel shook his head. “It sounded like—”

  “‘Aren’t the shrimp’?” Moog guessed. “What the heck is he talking about? What shrimp?”

  “‘Start the ship,’” Clay said under his breath.

  Matrick came bolting from the shadows between two columns. His legs were pumping furiously, and he was cradling something against his chest that looked like a white stone wheel. “Start the ship!” he shrieked. “Start the ship start the ship start the fuckin’ ship!”

  Gabriel spun. “Edwick—”

  “Starting the ship!” yelled Edwick, already dashing toward his chair.

  The entire front of the shrine exploded outward. Blocks of stone rained down on the plaza, bursting on impact into spinning shrapnel shards, and a dragon—a real live you-gotta-be-shitting-me dragon—came roaring from the ruin.

  Akatung looked much as Clay remembered him: vast and malevolent, armoured in jet-black scales and bristling with enough horns and spines and spikes to hang every hat in the world. And what was more: he still looked fairly pissed about the You guys nearly killed me thing from way back when, so that was probably bad.

  Matrick sprinted past the statue of Elavis.

  The dragon burst through it without slowing.

  Matrick took the steps to the square three at a time.

  The dragon was up them in a single stride.

  Matrick was halfway to the ship when a chunk of stone clipped his heel and sent him sprawling, huddled protectively around the relic in his arms.

  “Stay here,” shouted Gabriel, and took off running.

  The dragon lunged at Matrick. Its jaw hinged open like a snake’s, lips peeling back from a double row of razor fangs. Matrick was fumbling with something at his waist, but if he hoped to stop a dragon with a knife …

  Not a knife, Clay registered. Something else. A … horn?

  The blast Matrick blew made no sound at all, but a plague of insects boiled out from inside—bees and beetles, wasps and weevils; grasshoppers, moths, crickets, cockroaches, horseflies, butterflies, dragonflies, and fireflies that glimmered like stars through a veil of pestilent cloud—straight into Akatung’s mouth. Its jaws snapped shut just short of the king. Its yellow eyes bulged, and then the dragon made a sound like a cat summoning a sticky hairball from the depths of its stomach.

  Gabe helped Matrick to stand and the two of them stumbled on as Akatung began coughing plumes of insects into the sky. When they’d climbed aboard, Gabriel took the white wheel from Matrick and offered it to Moog. “Is this it?”

  The wizard took it reverently, a look of astonished wonder on his face. “This is it. This is Teragoth’s keystone! See this groove here? When you—”

  “Moog.”

  “Yes?”

  Gabriel pointed. “Dragon.”

  “Oh, yes, sorry. Plan B, then?”

  “Will it work, do you think?”

  Clay looked from the wizard to Gabriel. “There’s a plan B?”

  Moog nodded determinedly. “We have to try,” he said, before leaping over the opposite rail and taking off at a sprint toward the eastern gate.

  “Where’s he going?”

  “The Threshold,” said Gabriel. “Edwick, we need to keep that thing busy until he gets there.”

  “Can do,” said the bard. “I’ll take us up—”

  “Not up!” Gabe told him. “Not yet. We need to find the others first. Stay as close to the ground as you can.”

  “But the dragon—”

  “—will be the least of our problems if Lastleaf knows we’re here.”

  Clay turned to Matrick. “What’s plan B?”

  “No idea,” said Matrick, still gasping for breath. “But it can’t be any worse than plan A.”

  Akatung, meanwhile, had fixed them with a baleful glare. His eyes were roaring, hateful hearths. He bellowed something in the incomprehensible tongue of dragonkind that Clay assumed wasn’t a friendly greeting.

  “We’d better move,” Gabe warned. “Now!”

  Edwick sent the onyx orbs spinning. The dhow veered sideways as the dragon pounced. They plunged between its legs, but a tail swipe clipped the stern and rocked the Old Glory onto her side. The skyship tipped like a riverboat hit by a tsunami, but Edwick managed to steer them straight. The engine frothed as they shot like an arrow down a branching avenue.

  They soared over a pile of sloughing rubble, slipped beneath the arch of a towering waterway. Edwick dared a glance over his shoulder. “Is it following us?”

  “I don’t—” Clay looked back in time to see the street behind them detonate. Three stories of stonework burst like a sundered dam as the dragon charged through on a tide of billowing dust. “Yes,” he answered. “Definitely yes.”

  They swerved onto a narrow lane. The ship bounced between walls and the sail pulsed with static discharge. Akatung came skidding around the corner. He shouldered through leaning pillars and stooping pediments as though they were drunks at the pub.

  Another turn saw them speeding down a wide thoroughfare divided by massive plinths displaying a succession of sandaled feet. The statues to whom those feet belonged lay toppled to either side. The skyship swooped between them, left and right. Matrick snorted to himself, watching with amusement as Moog’s owlbear cubs slid and scampered from one side of the deck to the other.

  Clay risked poking his head over the rail. Akatung was gaining fast, loping like a dog on all fours, heedless of anything in his path. He saw the barbed fins on either side of the dragon’s head flare open. “Turn!” he yelled at Edwick’s back.

  “Why?”

  “Turn!”

  They cut right as bright blue fire flooded the street behind them. The bard made a left next, hoping to throw off the pursuit. It appeared to have worked, so when Gabriel spotted Barret and his crew in an alley half a block over they doubled back, halting just as Tiamax cut the head from a gnoll with clashing swords.

  “Get in!” Gabe shouted.

  Barret was cranking the winch on his crossbow. “There’s more of them!” He pointed at a gang of gnolls fleeing down the alley, but then Akatung’s head appeared in the street beyond. There was a sound like ten thousand matches being struck at once, and the gnolls evaporated in a cone of blue-white flame.

  “Never mind!” hollered Barret. He tossed his crossbow and scrambled inside. Tiamax gave Piglet a push up over the rail and leapt in after him. The dragon’s breath funneled toward them, near enough that Clay could hear the howls it carried and feel the heat sear his face like a brand, but Edwick was already palming the orbs—they hurtled forward, weaving through a maze of tarnished splendour as fast as the Old Glory could manage.

  Clay found himself thankful that Kit wasn’t on board. There’s the art gallery, he could imagine the ghoul droning on. And here was the most delectable little bakery. I’ll tell you one thing mankind has not improved upon in twelve hundred years: scones.

  “I see Ashe!” Barret pointed over Edwick’s shoulder. She and Ganelon were pelting headlong down the avenue ahead. They were gaining fast on Kit, who had hiked his bedsheet robes to his knees and was shambling
for all he was worth.

  “Something’s after them,” said Gabriel.

  Not gnolls, Clay thought. There’s no way Ganelon is running from gnolls. He’d as likely see a wolf running from a flock of sheep.

  His fears were confirmed as the Old Glory cleared the ruins. Akatung was there, long neck extended, the fins alongside his head fanning like a bellows.

  “Hold on!” yelled Edwick. He grappled both orbs and kicked the lever that powered the tidal engine—it shuddered off, and the dhow went slewing sideways, angled so that Ashe and Ganelon, who saw it careening toward them, could leap over the lowered rail. Kit got clipped midwaist, but the Glory swallowed him anyway. Tiamax, who was already holding both owlbear cubs, managed to snatch the ghoul’s ankle before he rolled out the opposite side.

  The skyship kept on spinning until the bard wrenched the lever again. Every hair on Clay’s body went rigid as the sail above him crackled with energy. The gyres roared to life, and the Glory straightened out as a wave of blue-white fire splashed by them on the left.

  Gabriel stepped over Kit on his way to the pilot’s chair. He put both hands on Edwick’s slim shoulders. “Can you get us to the Threshold?” he asked.

  “I can try,” said Edwick, “but we’re too slow to outrun that thing!”

  “Too slow …” Gabe turned to survey the deck, then threw a questioning glance at Barret.

  The frontman sighed. “Gods damn it. Dump the furniture.”

  Out went the couches, the chairs, the chests crammed with clothes and armour. Out went the mattresses, the barstools, the bar. Matrick himself tipped the booze cabinet over the rail, wincing as he heard it smash.

  Clay caught Ganelon sizing up Piglet. “Hey,” he said, drawing the warrior’s attention, “no.”

  Ganelon at least had the grace to look ashamed.

  They were out of the city now, racing east above the broad Dominion highway. The Threshold was directly ahead, a soaring black arch that straddled the road. And beyond that, across a wide, flat stretch of devastated farmland … a sight almost beyond comprehension.

  Castia, and the Heartwyld Horde.

  There were a pair of giants striding among the monstrous multitudes, and a whole mess of creatures Clay had never seen or couldn’t discern from this far away. The sky above the city swarmed as well: plague hawks and long-necked wyverns turned lazy circles beyond reach of the city’s formidable defences. Harpies, rot sylphs, bloodshot eyewings, and countless other flying atrocities frolicked among smoke and cloud.

  The Horde didn’t just fill the horizon—it was the horizon. It was all there was to see, and for a moment everyone on board the Old Glory simply stared at it over the prow.

  Nine hearts shared a scale with the leaden weight of fear, and even the stoutest watched the balance tip against them. And then Kit, whose heart weighed less than an orange rind, and whose head was sticking over the rail, called out, “The dragon—”

  “I know!” yelled Gabriel.

  “It’s right behind us!”

  Leaning out as far as he dared, Clay saw that Kit was right: Akatung was practically on top of them, so close that when the dragon roared Clay could smell the metallic char on its breath. He turned his face into the wind, and there was Moog, standing beside the Threshold, pushing the keystone into place.

  “Where am I going?” hollered Edwick.

  Gabriel’s eyes were fixed dead ahead. “Straight through.”

  They sped below the empty arch, and in the split second they spent eye-to-eye Clay could have sworn he saw the wizard wink at him. Glancing back over the stern, Clay saw the dragon duck beneath the arch just as the space below it shimmered like the surface of a soap bubble.

  And then Akatung disappeared.

  The Old Glory banked sharply. Clay could see, though not rationalize, a huge volume of water surging from the west-facing side of the Threshold. Moog was standing just wide of the torrent, frantically turning the keystone with both hands as though he were shutting off a valve—which, apparently, he was. The deluge ended as abruptly as it began.

  Clay and a few of the others sighed heavily. Edwick was chuckling like a madman, and Gabriel, behind him, wore an expression of exhausted relief.

  It was Matty who broke the spell of baffled silence with a joyous hoot. “Hells yes!” he bellowed. “Let’s hear it for plan B!”

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Immortality

  There was a merman flopping on the wet earth. He gasped and gazed up at the sky, no doubt wondering where he was. He sputtered something at Clay and the others as they leapt clear of the dhow, but since none among them (not even Kit) spoke the liquid language of the mer-people, the poor fellow died, as so many of us do, without ever knowing the truth of why he was here.

  Although the truth, in this case, was hard to believe.

  Moog was beaming as they approached. “I opened a portal to Antica!” he said.

  “What’s Antica?” asked Piglet. The boy had produced a mangled pastry from somewhere on his person and was scooping the cherry filling out with two fingers.

  When both Moog and Kit opened their mouths to explain, Gabriel cut in. “There’s three of these things,” he said, gesturing to the arc of black stone above. “One here, another in Kaladar, and the last in a city called Antica, which is at the bottom of the ocean.”

  Barret looked confused. “Antica? I thought that was—”

  “It’s not.”

  “So the dragon—”

  “—had better be able to swim,” said Gabriel, before turning to Moog. “Is it ready?”

  “I believe so, yes.”

  “Good. Show Tiamax how to use it. You’re coming with me. You too, Barret.” Vanguard’s leader nodded grimly. “The rest of you need to protect this portal, no matter what. It’s a good bet Lastleaf knows we’re here, and he might even guess we’ve got the key to Teragoth’s Threshold. He will come for it with everything he’s got, and if he succeeds—”

  “He won’t,” said Ganelon.

  Gabriel met the southerner’s gaze. It looked as though he would say more, but he only nodded.

  They moved to the eastern side of the Threshold. Clay surveyed the land between there and Castia: blasted farmsteads, the burnt-out husks of storehouses, gently sloping fields turned to mulch by the tread of foot, hoof, and claw. The city was three, maybe four miles distant, surrounded on all sides by the enemy. From here Clay could barely make out flashes of flame and arcs of lightning as Castia’s defenders kept their airborne assailants from getting too near the city walls.

  Moog inserted Teragoth’s keystone into the smooth black stone of the Threshold and pointed out to the arachnian which of the engraved runes signified their intended destination.

  Tiamax scratched beneath one of his leather eye patches. “How did you know which of the two was Antica?”

  Moog shrugged, and then answered with unnerving sincerity, “Lucky guess.”

  Gabriel moved to stand before the portal, flanked by Moog and Barret. He smoothed his hair and rubbed a hand over his face. “How do I look?” he asked.

  Barret grinned. “Old.”

  Moog glanced over appraisingly. “Tired.”

  Gabriel snorted a laugh. “Fuck you guys.”

  Tiamax turned the keystone; the air below the arc shone with lucent colour, as it had just before the dragon had disappeared through it.

  And then, a single, impossible step away, were the ruins of Kaladar, where every band in Grandual, every weathered merc and wannabe warrior, every man or woman looking to carve their name into history with a blade, had gathered for the War Fair.

  Assuming they would be able to secure the keystone and open Teragoth’s Threshold, this had been the second half of Moog’s audacious plan. Everything now depended on what they were able to accomplish on the other side.

  “Clay?”

  Clay blinked, looked over to where Gabriel and the others were waiting. “What? You want me to come?” he asked.

  Ga
briel nodded. “I think I need you to.”

  The War Fair was, as Barret had mentioned earlier, the biggest party in all of Grandual. For three days every third year, the hills around the ancient Dominion capital of Kaladar were home to half the warriors in the world. There were Kaskar berserkers draped in heavy furs, silk-robed swordsmen from southern Narmeer, swaggering Phantran pirates adorned with ink and gold, and bowlegged Cartean plainsmen all mingling, laughing, gambling, shouting, and quite often fighting with one another. The older mercenaries and established bands came to rub shoulders and swap stories, while young adventurers and new bands sought to make a name for themselves and, ideally, land a gig that paid.

  The ruins of an enormous theatre had been retrofitted as an arena, though there were plenty of less illustrious venues where fledgling fighters could test their mettle among themselves, or else square off with some captive creature brought in for the occasion. There was a makeshift labyrinth in which thieves seeking employment could showcase their skills by picking elaborate locks and evading (mostly) harmless traps, and even a nearby moonstone quarry where a storm witch or an alchemic sorcerer could really cut loose.

  There were, naturally, several casualties during the course of the fair, but what was any good party without a few deaths?

  Also, a gathering of so many warlike individuals meant that numerous other sordid types descended upon Kaladar like crows to carrion. All the usual suspects were present: claw-brokers, charm dealers, merchants selling arms and armour. There were more bards than you could count in half a day, and bookers prowled the grounds in search of ready-made heroes, because who knew if the next Saga-calibre band was out there, like chips of gold in a riverbed, waiting only to be sifted from the sand?

  It occurred to Clay as he stepped from the Threshold into spitting rain that the War Fair was a great deal like Conthas, only with less rampant fire and considerably more pissing out of doors.

  The Threshold in Kaladar was nestled in a copse of black pines and maples turned red by the Autumn Son’s mouldering touch. There was already a crowd gathered, gawking through the portal at the scene beyond, and now that Clay and the others had come walking out, there were hundreds streaming in from the surrounding camps to see for themselves.