Ninth City Burning

by J. Patrick Black

  Kizabel and I both agree that to rechristen the equus she built and I rode into battle would be as unlucky as renaming a ship and as offensive as defacing a work of art. We have remained steadfast in this conviction against all inveigling, invective, and complaints about the dignity of the Legion and the solemnity of war. As far as the Sixth Cohort is concerned, I ride the X-2020, the model number assigned to Kizabel’s singular design, but legionary protocol requires every equus bear a name inscribed on its breastplate, and no exceptions have been made for this one:

  IX EQUITES 126-013

  SNUGGLES

  He’s something of a runt compared to the other equi of the 126th, the StarHunters and RuinMakers and FireChasers, all Coursers, as their model is called, taller and broader than my Snuggles, but no match for his speed and power and grace. His white armor has been patched and polished, and fairly glows beside the deep, stony gray the others wear. Beneath that smooth plate, he has been prepared to do violence, armed with an assortment of deadly tools befitting an equus of the Legion.

  Today, the Stabulum is deafeningly loud, thunderous with the pounding of hands and feet as the Sixth Armored awaits the call to battle. Lunar Veil cannot be opened except during the span of a few hours each month, meaning that the day and time of this fight was set the moment we decided to make our stand. Rather than leaving us each to hold a quiet and lonely vigil as the hour drew near, the planets and stars grinding down like the gears of a watch, Centurio Kitu summoned us all to the Stabulum, and, with artful speechifying and heroic words, worked the Sixth Armored into a lather hot and fine enough to shave a man’s face. We are to fly with the vanguard, the first charge to break the enemy onslaught and win the Legion a foothold in battle. It will be a perilous enterprise, but Kitu has us eager for it. I feel the excitement as much as anyone, but I leave the fervor behind, so that I can say good-bye.

  I have a ritual, one Reaper Thom taught me to perform whenever the time comes to risk my life. I close my eyes, and in one breath I set aside the world and everything in it, all the loves and hopes I have ever felt. Once there is nothing for me to lose, I can fight without hesitation or fear. This came foremost of all Thom’s lessons to me, before shooting and riding, before learning how to grip a knife. He would never have taken me on as his pupil were he not certain I could cast my life away at a moment’s notice, step out of it like a second skin. But I had watched Papa die, seen my brother and sister taken. I knew how it felt to lose everything, and I could find that feeling again.

  It is what I did each time I rode out with the scouts. While Mama kissed the part in my hair and implored me to come back to her, and heard me promise I would, what I was really saying was Good-bye. I say it now, silently, amid the pulsing shouts and stomps echoing down these corridors of giants.

  Good-bye, Mama.

  Good-bye, Baby.

  Good-bye, Naomi.

  It is as if I have shrugged off a warm blanket before a chilly wind. I am lighter, colder, alert, awake, free. I am ready for war.

  The call isn’t long in coming: a booming howl, loud enough to drown out our racket and every thought but the summons to battle. The walls and roof of the Stabulum glow with red light as equites sprint to their posts, and in the rows of stalls, towering shapes begin to stir.

  Snuggles responds to my touch like a living thing, growling and keen for a fight. He kneels, laying one great hand on the ground to lift me aboard. His fingers have grooves where I can stand, handles I can grip to steady myself as I rise toward his core. His interior abounds in comforts and niceties missing when he was only Kizabel’s Project, but he is the same Snuggles, the same fierce spirit I came to recognize in our first weeks together. The core folds around me like some huge and gentle palm, and I awaken to the formidable strength and senses of his giant’s body.

  I am reminded momentarily of Envy, my companion on so many journeys, killed in the desperate flight to Granite Shore. I am glad I did not have to watch her fall, her beautiful black-and-white coat marred in blood, her strong legs slack in death. She would have done anything for me, I know, and proved it on more than one occasion. And while I have been told time and again that unless joined to a human spirit, equi are nothing but dead rock, I feel a similar connection with Snuggles now, the will to face any obstacle and never stop running so long as the heart this beast and I share keeps beating.

  Like the others of my escadrille, as a war party the size of the 126th is called, I keep my mount in a kneeling position as Imway calls each of us to count off. Above, the ceiling of the Stabulum pulls slowly back. It is an hour or so after dawn in this part of the world, a dry southern continent where we have awaited the reopening of Lunar Veil, and the light stretching over the Stabulum’s rows is the rich, juicy orange-pink of a ripe peach. As number thirteen, I am the last to sound my readiness for launch. Once that is done, Imway waits half a moment, then orders us together up into the glowing morning.

  We rise into a sky swarming with equi of the Legion. Ours is not the only Stabulum mounted onto this flying fortress, and as we spin over dizzying views of towers and spires and sinister barrels of artillery, I mark glinting armored figures streaming from points all across the island, gathering and parting like shifting ocean waves. Sun shines across the tides of hard-plated bodies, and for a single breath I am taken by the beauty of this scene, the fighters sparkling and prismatic as spray washing over the city’s stone peaks.

  I sense Imway issuing orders by Directed Speech, the peculiar form of communication equi use, and obediently I circle Snuggles into cruising formation. The 126th has altered its habitual flight patterns to account for my presence, generally by wedging me someplace out of the way. While most of them have acknowledged my skill in flight, I am not trusted in battle, and whatever position I occupy is presumed to be our weakest point.

  The vanguard has begun to gather into a sweeping arc some distance ahead of the IMEC, and Imway guides us toward our position, slightly to the right of the formation’s apex. We have with us fighters from all twelve of Earth’s Legions, including the overwhelming majority of our Armored Cavalry, a force built for swift and powerful assaults. Two fontani fly close behind, each a seasoned warrior, I’ve been told, though to me they seem nothing but small blossoms of sparkling night, an unlikely thing in this warm and lustrous dawn. I cannot keep my mind from wandering to Naomi—another fontana, as she is, posted behind us on Earth—but my thoughts are distant, abstract, as though they belong not to me but some figure from ancient history, sentiments found in the journal of a person long deceased.

  Ahead, Lunar Veil has begun to shift, the twist of its edges rendered distinctly in the morning’s brilliant pastels. I have one last glimpse of us as shimmering droplets, now descending toward a vast surface of stirring water, and then the battle begins.

  The first wave of enemies arrives like a flock of sparrows descending from a cloud, a scattering of dark specks swooping suddenly across an expanse of bright pink. Hardly have the Valentines made their appearance than they are met with a clattering of explosions, artillery rumbling across our mobile fortress. The sky before me explodes with incongruous colors, concussions shaking through the clouds and down into my armor to rattle my very bones. Distantly, I note my quickening heart, everything beyond this place and time receding into shadows, faces I loved taking on the pallor of ghosts.

  Even before this first volley is finished, a second hits, fired from one of our cities below, so far from here that it is hidden behind the curvature of the world, yet still close enough to level its guns at Lunar Veil. When the sparks and thunder clear, all but a few of the invaders are gone. Of special note among the survivors is a single point of darkness, hanging in the sky like some backward reproduction of a morning star: a Valentine Zero.

  Our enemies will have expected a vigorous defense. Very likely they had an idea of the placement and armament of our cities and knew their opening gambit would incur a heavy
cost. What they did not expect was that we would bring one of those cities with us into battle. Where the Valentines might have counted upon a lull in our bombardment as each spray of shells crossed the long miles from our stationary guns, time that would have allowed them to recover and maneuver, our flying fortress is ready with a new barrage almost before the last one has ended. The shots pass neatly through the formations of our vanguard, causing no more disturbance than a warm wind, and collide with the faltering enemy. There is another jangle of reverberating flashes, and when it passes, the sky it leaves behind is empty. Even the Zero’s dark star has fallen.

  I hear Imway ordering our party to hold steady, but there is no waver in our ranks nor anywhere along the vanguard’s line. We keep our course while the call and answer of gunfire goes on, the flak and debris of spent energy and shattered enemies whirling with our passing.

  The Valentines are slow to relinquish their offensive, but they are no fools, either. Once two more swarms of shadowy shapes have sallied from Lunar Veil, only to be flattened beneath the determined hammering of our guns, the Valentines perceive the danger, and fighters cease to emerge from the sky.

  Centurio Kitu orders the Sixth Armored to close ranks. The time has come to move, to press the advantage we have won before the enemy can gather up some new strategy. The vanguard bursts forward in a roar of speed, and together we charge into Lunar Veil.

  The last time I came this way, I did not realize I had entered another world until I was nearly back out of it. It was only after poor Snuggles began to succumb to his injuries, rent to shreds by horrible talons and jaws, that I took in the night around me and the distant view of Earth like a patch of blue glimpsed from a well’s bottom. I recall some disappointment that I would not get to die under my own sky, but I have never been overly concerned with the choices denied me, and this seemed no great tragedy. What mattered was that my task was accomplished, and there was nothing left to do. The crossing now is much the same: a shroud of mist hiding the world from sight, then a wide sky of alien stars. I do not wonder if I will see Earth again. The place is one more pale memory, and I have a new errand before me.

  Gradually, I perceive the 126th on my wings, and the lines of the vanguard spreading wide on either side. Imway calls out, warning us to brace for combat. Already my senses have begun to prickle across the many articles of mayhem at my disposal, bolts and pulses of destroying energy I can wield like arrows and scythes and long-reaching fists, and the slender, chalk-white lance we carry for close combat, now forming in my hand like a crackling icicle as I sight ahead, waiting for the enemy to appear.

  It seems at first that there is nothing before us but a haze of dust sprinkled across the firmament, but with alarming speed those far-off specks become glinting motes, and the motes a multitude of terrible monsters, all claws and teeth forged in sleek, matted metal. I have one brief instant to contemplate this flying wall of blades before it comes crashing onto me.

  It is chaos, simple and complete. The enemy is all around, a multitude of metallic creatures built for war. They come in all sizes, configured according to their preferred mode of attack, arms to slice and grapple, mouths to bellow out fiery blasts, bodies built like bullets or the jagged edge of a saw. Their ranks extend in every direction, twisting and curling like thorny vines. Snuggles and I circle and dip, striking out at the seemingly endless tangle of foes. The voices of the 126th fill my mind, calling out warnings and advice, and without quite realizing it, I have joined in, registering dangers and opportunities, offering and summoning assistance. Imway can be heard above them all, coordinating our maneuvers, rallying and guiding our attacks.

  We set upon a collection of good-sized fighters, flattened shells bristling with clawed arms like nightmarish crabs, and cut them to pieces with our lances. The Valentines use animated armor much like our equi, and each cut draws a splash of gushing, bright green gwayd. Their fighters are different from ours in at least one respect, however: They destroy themselves the moment they are defeated, crumpling like burning paper until only twisting threads of ash remain. It shakes my rhythm, the first time an adversary folds and vanishes under my blade, but only the once. My enemy is the spirit inside the armor, and once that is gone, it makes little difference what sort of husk is left over.

  The crab-warriors dispatched, we turn to join another unit from the Sixth contending with a long, tangled thing that brings to mind an endless, razor-legged millipede. We have turned over a rock, and now we must tangle with every awful creature hiding beneath.

  The vanguard has hit with speed and power, but our momentum can’t last. I count at least five Valentine fighters for every one of ours, and once we’ve exhausted the first feverish exchanges of our assault, it’s plain the shock we delivered is quickly passing. Soon, we will have to deal with our enemy’s full and enraged strength.

  I find myself with three equites of the 126th, isolated among a forest of Valentine claws and teeth. Without any of us announcing an intention to do so, we draw our lances and edge together. We fight head to toe, so that each has plenty of room to strike, cutting back the horde around us. But the whirling attacks edge closer, advancing and retreating but slowly constricting around us, until the vise is so tight we can hardly move without angry thorns digging into our armor.

  The deepening danger and desperation of our position sharpens my focus, and as I work Snuggles farther into the fray, he responds with a surge of eager power. We were both fashioned for this work, each in our own way, and it feels natural to our shared body, neither one of us drawing back, even from oncoming death.

  As a pair of pincers narrowly misses my shoulder, I spot a hole in the attack, like a worn patch of cloth, and aim my lance there. My comrades do the same, and together we shred our way out, a luminous pea soup of gwayd splashing away in heavy globules. Only when we are clear, floating above a new onrush of enemies, do I understand what allowed our escape. Our city has found its way through Lunar Veil, guns blazing to scatter the Valentine lines.

  A voice I recognize as Haiyalaiya’s springs into my mind. Her equus, 126-012, EndIsWaiting, hovers at my shoulder. Hot boiling shit! Glad you’re on our side!

  The rest of the 126th has joined us now. We close ranks and dive back into the fight.

  FIFTY-TWO

  NAOMI

  A solemn mood has fallen over the Basilica of Tenth City, quite a difference from when I arrived this morning. The lively scene then reminded me of my coda readying to break camp for some long journey. I suppose that is not so strange. Our Legion was about to set forth into another world, after all, though no one here would be going anywhere. From where I stood, there seemed nothing so solid and stationary as this Basilica, with its stone walls and ceilings high enough to dwarf the tallest pine canopies of the northern forests. The great map at its center, what they call the Board, appeared as delicate as the rest of the Basilica was sturdy. By the look of it, a loud cough might have brought the whole thing tumbling down. I found myself thinking of Baby, and the way he would play soldiers with chess pieces, arranging knights and castles in elaborate formations without any regard whatever for the rules of the game.

  Likening the Basilica’s Board to a chess square seemed apt enough once the call to battle came. The silent concentration of those gathered around was as tense and focused as that attending the pitched grudge matches between Reaper Thom and Randy Tinker Bose. You could almost forget that somewhere, real soldiers were fighting, until the order came to fire Tenth City’s guns.

  The report of our first fusillade sent a shudder through the Basilica’s floor and proved the Board was more robust than it appeared, for not a piece was knocked out of place. Instead, a scattering of small green orbs appeared above our position and sailed toward the site of combat. When they found their mark and word came back of a direct hit, you would have thought we’d won the war, the way people cheered. But I suppose we had to take our victories where we could.


  I knew Rae was somewhere among those specks and blocks, and my sentiments then were much the same as those I felt whenever she went scouting. I was afraid she might not return, true, but such a possibility never seemed real to me. I could not imagine the enemy that would be too much for my sister. Far more genuine was my dread that when the time came for me to stand in her place, I would not live up to the example she had laid out. And here she was riding forth again, and me at the rear, my nerves quivering at the mere echo of battle.

  After two more volleys, each as successful as the first, the great double-ended pyramid used to signify our flying island met the wide disk marking the border of Lunar Veil and dissolved into a scattering of golden fairy dust. Thus ended our part in the fighting, or so we are given to hope.

  Most of our commanders now appear at a loss for what to do next. We all know the fate of the world is being decided at this very moment, but to us it is as if we have loosed an arrow and now can only wait and hope it finds its mark. We cannot even watch because Lunar Veil is by its nature impassable to nearly all signals that could bring us news of the battle. Legionaries who only minutes ago were feverishly coordinating our attack on the Valentines now stand motionless along the tiers of raised platforms, staring at the Board as though, by dint of sheer concentration, they might see past the curtain of sky. Only the man standing beside me seems to suffer no uncertainty regarding what the situation requires of him. “Back at it, gentlemen and ladies,” he bellows into the Basilica’s quiet. “This still is an active engagement. You’ve all got your orders, and none of those include using your mouths as flytraps. If you’re monitoring an observation post, keep at it. Everyone else, get moving.”