Whispers of the Skyborne (Devices of War Book 3)

by S. M. Blooding

  Close enough for his ammunition to tag her and her Gypsies?

  A cloud of smoke emitted from the gaping maw of the cannon.

  Another cloud filled the air directly in front of her, blocking her view with a concussion that vibrated her feet.

  “Anyone got eyes on the target?” she asked as she blew through the smoke from the cannon’s blast. There were more, blocking her view.

  “Aye, Captain!” Bettie called. “They’re preparing to fire again.”

  “We’re closing in on their range, Captain,” Jake commented.

  She neared the last cloud and debated. Did she go through it? Dodge under it? Around it?

  Through it.

  “Here it comes again!”

  Rose cleared the cloud just in time to see another cloud burst from the cannon’s mouth. “Keep it steady.”

  The shell cleared behind them, having, miraculously, missed all of them.

  The guns along the sides pulled up and pointed to the sky.

  Rose willed her plane closer, close enough for her bomb to find its mark, but not close enough for her Gypsies to sustain too much damage. Flicking her gaze at her instruments, she kept her eye on her target. She flipped the switch on her bomb to prepare it. A hard click vibrated up her right leg. It was armed. She pulled the trigger and pulled up on the joystick. “Away and away!”

  Her Sky Gypsies took to the air, gaining in altitude.

  A boom pushed at them, vibrating through Rose’s chest.

  She turned Wise Girl around to survey the damage.

  With the help of the rain, the dust settled.

  The land eater wasn’t getting up. Forms that could have been bodies or fallen trees were scattered around.

  Rose’s heart pounding painfully in her chest, she said, “Let’s go get the others.”

  Being in the control dome of the Layal, I felt helpless. I’d spent so much time in the thick of the battle, that sitting around felt weird. I wasn’t the brains. I had a Mark. I could fight. Being here? Not the best place for me. But I was the commander. As had been pointed out to me on multiple occasions, I couldn’t go off and fight like I used to.

  Wa-sna-win turned to me, her expression pained. “We’ve lost contact with the Umira Nuru, sir.”

  My skin itched with the need to be in the battle. My best friend needed me and this was exactly the excuse I needed to leave.

  I was at the rear door and spinning the wheel to open it before I’d even completed the thought.

  “Sir!” Jamilah called from the center of the room.

  I turned to her, my hand raised to shush her.

  She raised her own, her expression hard. “Be careful out there,” she commanded softly. “And try to not do anything too stupid.”

  I cocked a half-grin and bowed my head before leaving. She knew me too well.

  Air Battle: Rose

  “DOES ANYONE HAVE EYES ON that second land eater?” Rose shouted into her mic. Not that she needed to shout. It might be loud inside the cockpit of her plane, but her voice was going directly into the ears of her pilots.

  Richard “Sparks” buzzed in front of her. “Nothin’, Captain.”

  “Get back in formation, Sparks,” Rose commanded, searching the green rambling landscape below her feet, then out in front of her. “Continue to head east. Let’s complete our sweep. Second three, ready your bombs.”

  Sparks pointed his nose up and took his bird around to regain his position, his wings stilling for a moment before sweeping up and down again.

  Rose continued to search the horizon. The storm retreated farther, the rain slacking. Large mountain. Lots of hills. Lots of trees. Rocks. Cliffs. Water.

  “Storm’s clearin’,” Agnes said, her voice low. “Good for us.”

  “Good for them, too,” Rose murmured.

  “Such a downer,” Doris called. “Wait! Did you see that?”

  Rose leaned forward in her seat, pulling at the belt keeping in place. “Where? Direction.”

  “Just there—yes! There’s that big bay. Somethin’ silver just sparked.”

  Rose didn’t see anything, but she changed her heading and pointed Wise Girl toward the bay. Clearing a tall ridge, she took a sharp intake of breath. “What in the mother crackin’ buckets of piss is that?”

  Something large, orange and multi-limbed crawled out of the ocean waters, scaling the tall, black, sheer cliff walls. Long legs with clackers on the ends of them reached for the people splayed to the cliff face. They stood precariously on a series of thin, long ledges.

  “Well,” Jake said, “I believe those are crabs, but I never saw none so far west before. At least none that size.”

  Those “crabs” were about three or four times the size of the people. And it looked like the people on the cliffs were trying to get the crabs to come out of the water.

  Weird defense. Rose raised her eyebrow, but something shiny caught her attention at the top of the cliff. “Land eater.”

  The contraption sat on the edge of the rock face about two body-lengths above the people trapped on the cliff. The guns had been pointed down, but then the large mechanical behemoth’s front end rose unexpectedly, pointing to the sky. A spray of bullets spattered the air.

  The empty air.

  Not entirely empty. A few of the Khayals were up there, just outside the storm. Too high for the land guns to hit. There was no way the bullets would reach them.

  That couldn’t have been intentional.

  Orange claws wrapped around the mechanical beast’s belly, squeezing. Men spilled out from crushed contraption, some staggering.

  Rose and her formation buzzed over the scene and she lost sight of them as she circled back around.

  The people on the cliffs were encouraging the crabs to attack the Han. Brilliant. But how were they getting the crabs up to the top of the cliffs? They had to crawl over the humans splayed on those cliffs to get there.

  “Do we attack the land eater?” Bettie asked, her tone crackling with disdain, “Or the big crabs trying to eat Garrett’s people?”

  As Rose circled back around, she saw the crabs closing in on the civilians.

  Children raced along a thin trail on the cliff’s face, scrambling up the side of the rock face as nimbly as mountain goats, drawing them away, goading them upward toward the Han’s machines.

  A buzz of bullets skipped through the air between Rose and Jake’s planes.

  “Land eater,” Rose commanded.

  “It’s too close to the civilians to use the bombs,” Bettie said.

  Another spray of bullets filled the air around them.

  “They don’t even know what they’re doing,” Ethel shouted.

  “They’re fighting to stay alive,” Rose said. “Evasive maneuvers. Use the bullet guns.”

  A cloud erupted from the end of the cannon pointed directly up, followed quickly by another.

  Sparks, Rich, and Doris banked hard right while Percy, Reuben and Walter banked left.

  Bettie and Ethel went for altitude.

  “Are they trying to kill themselves?” Doris asked, staying with Rose and Jake.

  Rose watched the path of the shadow that was the first ammunition ball. It was slow. She didn’t know what it was. If it had been the ammunition the other land eater had used on them, it would have exploded already.

  It gained in altitude, then fell, gaining speed as it neared the land eater that had fired it.

  The mountain exploded in a rain of rock, leaves and broken bits of wood, along with pieces of the crab.

  Rose buzzed over the scene again and banked hard to the right to circle round again.

  Bettie and Ethel joined them from above.

  The land eater lay on the ground, the silver mechanisms unmoving.

  “Did they take themselves out, do you think?” Doris asked.

  Rose kept watch as they drew closer.

  The cannon slid in their direction.

  “They’re alive and they’re hot!” Rose exclaimed.
“Ready for attack. It’s time to take that thing down!” She pointed her nose down, aimed with her sights, and fired at the repulsive metal beast, the civilians safe on the other side of the cliff. She didn’t fear hitting them accidentally, though, bits of rocks and dirt might fall on them on her way over. She couldn’t worry about that, though.

  Rose ground her teeth.

  The air shook at her tail.

  She twisted around to see what had nearly clipped her, but it was already gone.

  “Captain,” Bettie called, her voice dangerously high, “we have company. The Han. On all sides of the bay.”

  Two more land eaters rolled toward the edge and the Han’s men lined the top of the cliffs in their dark, leather skirts.

  Rose released her trigger and pulled up on her joystick to gain altitude and circle back around. The winds had died down considerably, making the flight a lot easier.

  How was she supposed to help these people, kill the Han, and not kill the civilians? The bullet guns weren’t accurate.

  Also, the Sky Gypsies didn’t have an unlimited supply of ammunition. “Who brought lightning guns?”

  Bettie, Doris, and Percy all answered affirmative.

  “Hit the south side of the bay.” It was lined with soldiers, and no big machinery. But how many were hiding in the thick vegetation? “Clear it so those people have some place to go since they’re not going back inside the mountain. Sparks, Agnes, and Rich, take the north side and take out as many of those land eaters as you can.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Agnes affirmed and broke away from formation.

  Reuben’s voice shot into Rose’s ear with a deep rumble. “Our bombs are primed, Captain.”

  “Try to draw the land eaters away from the cliff’s edge,” Rose said as she buzzed over the scene and back toward the mountain again.

  “We can do that,” Reuben said, his voice rumbly. “They seem to be following our flight path anyway.”

  “Good. Take Ethel and Walter and go to the right.” The mountain offered a sort of small valley to the right, something that might protect the civilians on the cliff when Reuben and his team used their bombs.

  If they didn’t manage to get the land eaters into that valley, when Reuben used his bombs, people would fall into the waters. The water was far enough below to kill them on impact, and those that survived the fall would probably be eaten by the crabs.

  This was a crappy situation.

  Rose banked slightly left, Jake, Eugene, and Sigmund following her lead. “Bullet guns only, ladies.”

  Jake grunted and rode nose to nose with her. “I love it when you call me that.”

  “I know.” She pulled the trigger, concentrating her fire power on the soldiers firing their pistols at the people on the cliff below them.

  Soldiers fell.

  Civilians dropped into the waters.

  Crap!

  “I’m hit!” Sigmund cried.

  Rose glanced to her right where Sigmund should have been and saw his tail on fire, one wing ripped off. His nose pointed squarely to the ground as he spun.

  He couldn’t parachute out even if he wanted to.

  She pulled up as she flew over the soldiers and swallowed hard. “You did good, Sig.”

  “Yeah.” His voice shook. “You, t—”

  His voice cut off as an explosion of fire erupted from the ground.

  Rose’s heart shook. Her hands trembled. She’d known she would lose people. She’d known it. This was the game they’d all signed up for.

  She banked back around, focusing on the land eater that had taken Sigmund down. The large gun was pointed to the sky as it rolled up the hill Reuben, Ethel, and Walter led it up.

  Close enough to count. That’s all Rose needed. She pulled the trigger and sprayed the ground around the eater with bullets.

  A spray of dirt came at her from the other side.

  Reuben.

  She pulled up to stay out of his path.

  More bullets scoured the area as Ethel and Walter followed on his tail. Quite a few bullets pierced the silver skin of the behemoth.

  Rose banked, coming back around, Jake and Eugene staying close to her tail.

  “The thing’s going down,” Jake yelled.

  An explosion of fire erupted from the mountainside.

  “Ethel,” Reuben said calmly.

  Rose licked her lips and turned Wise Girl back toward the mountain, gaining altitude to get out of the way of Ethel’s bomb. “Is that damned thing dead yet?”

  “Nearly,” Walter’s crackly voice said. “Just one more go.” He made a low pass.

  Too low. One of the Han’s men in the jungle shot at his plane. Smoke pillowed out of the rear end moments before it exploded in the air.

  Rose’s heart hammered her chest. She turned to the troops of leather-armored men pouring out of the jungle. “Gypsies, let’s kill these assholes.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Jake growled.

  In the Peacock Rock command cave, Garrett’s knees bent as another explosion ripped chunks of stone and dirt from the ceiling. “Where’s Kiey?”

  Shawn shook his dust-covered head. “Haven’t heard from her since she went to Rose Cavern.”

  “Sir!” Jezayl burst into the small cavern and skidded to a halt, her hand on the hilt of her long blade. Her dirtied face was smeared with blood and water. “Rose Cavern has been destroyed.”

  Garrett straightened, all the blood draining from his face. “Destroyed?”

  Jezayl nodded, swallowing. “We saw it from the other side, sir. We don’t know how many are wounded. The digger had just been removed. More than half the Han’s men went in and then it exploded.”

  Garrett closed his eyes, his heart threatening to beat again. “It sounds like we did that then.”

  She shrugged. “I hope so,” she whispered. “There’s more, though. The Umira Nuru were there. They were just getting ready to attack. They’re buried.”

  “The Umira Nuru, you say?” Garrett opened his eyes with the beginnings of hope. “The El’Asim. Well, if we couldn’t get the Vash, we got the second best thing.”

  Jezayl frowned at him as if calling him on his mixed signals. She’d heard him rant and rave over Synn’s stupidity more than once.

  But today they were desperate, and he was a valuable ally in battle.

  “Spread the word.” Garrett thumped the stone table with his knuckles. “No more bombs. We can’t risk caving in any more sections unless we know we’re not also destroying our allies.”

  Jezayl saluted, spun, and disappeared.

  “The El’Asim?” Shawn’s face melted into relief. “I’ll spread the word.”

  Garrett clapped him on the back. “You do that, and figure out what happened to our people in the Rose Cavern. And get some people to help the Umira Nuru.”

  Shawn disappeared down the other tunnel.

  “And find me Kiey!”

  I flew low over the far side of the mountain with my metal wings, the sounds of bullets, explosions, and cries filtering through the rush of wind pouring over my ears. The rain was now a cool mist.

  Something had caved in the side of the mountain. Trees lay on their sides, half covered in rocks and other trees.

  All three of Haji’s plows worked to move large boulders and trees away. Eight of the twelve skitters were in the trees on the opposite side, their guns blazing brightly in the growing light. The dragoons were nowhere to be seen, neither was the shield unit. Not that he would have been able to find them anyway. Their ability to remain hidden astounded me.

  The area around the hollow was clear except for the plows. I swooped over once, banked while dropping altitude and took the ground in four running steps. Tucking my wings away, I ran up to the nearest plow, shouting up at the burly man inside, “Where’s Haji?”

  “He was leading, El’Asim,” he shouted back. “He was caught in the blast!”

  I searched the rubble at my feet, seeing rock and vegetation, but nothing else.

 
A large tree limb wobbled and rolled down the side of the mountain toward me.

  I stepped out of the way and moved to a location where the plows weren’t uphill from me. I scanned the debris field for any sign that my friend might be all right.

  Rocks dribbled down the mountain, sliding and bouncing past me.

  The plows were on either side. Their movements should not affect the earth directly above me.

  I stopped, narrowing my eyes as I searched for the source.

  A black-metal leg fought to find the sky. It was quickly followed by three others.

  I scrambled up the mountain, pulling at the larger rocks with my hands.

  A large boulder kept the skitter unit pinned in place.

  I couldn’t see who was in it. I hoped. I hoped it was my best friend. My Mark lashed out with a whip of lava lightning and the boulder split in two, rolling down the mountain.

  The skitter pulled itself out of the rubble and staggered to its feet. The body cover shot open and Fahd fell out of it, kneeling on the ground and kissing the dirt, his unit drooping over him.

  I lowered my head and took in a deep breath. If Fahd had survived, others could have as well. I couldn’t give up. “Fahd, three others are still buried in there!” I grabbed at the rocks, my Mark halving the ones that were too big to move. “Help me find them.”

  He looked up at me for a short moment, then nodded, his face serious. “He’ll be all right, sayyd.”

  I certainly hoped so.

  Neira crept through the jungle, listening intently. The whir of engines filled her ears. Their wings snapped at the leaves as they passed close to the canopy. Rose and her squad shot at the Han’s soldiers who had left the protection of the forest.

  A large crabs crested the cliffs, grabbed two soldiers, and disappeared.

  What had Garrett been thinking to place his people in such jeopardy?

  But as she watched, two boys scaled the cliff face several hundred feet from her and ran directly toward the soldiers.

  A few of the men turned toward them, their weapons lowered.

  Two giant crabs scaled the cliff face, hot on the boys’ tails. They paused, their eyes rising from their heads, swiveling about as they took in their new situation. Their claws snapped at the air several times. Then they launched with a speed Neira hadn’t thought possible of something so huge.