Paladins of the Storm Lord

by Barbara Ann Wright

  “Where are the other yafanai?”

  “Gone to fight the fire.”

  Her grin was slightly terrified, but she made the effort. “Good thing I came looking for you, then.”

  *

  The undertaker had removed Paul’s body, but the leathers who were supposed to guard the house never showed. As night fell, Cordelia wondered if she and Liam should just ask Reach to guard the place, but she seemed on the cusp of leaving, too, as if she had no more business here with her love dead.

  “Will they put his body in a box before they put it in the ground?” Reach asked.

  Cordelia glanced at her from where they all sat around the quiet table.

  “That’s a hell of a question right now,” Liam said.

  Reach held her poleaxe closer. “I will take his body. I will give him to the soil the proper way, so he can be reclaimed.”

  The muscles around Cordelia’s right eye jumped, but she couldn’t will them to stop. “He would have liked that.”

  Reach’s face twitched as if she wanted to wrinkle her nose, but she couldn’t quite manage it.

  In the street, someone screamed. A little bit ago, Cordelia thought she’d heard a cry of fire, but when it died down, she thought someone must have taken care of it. She had one duty to attend to already. But someone screaming? She had to check.

  As she stood, an animal roar rattled the windows. “What the fuck?”

  Reach shot to her feet. “That was a saleska.” Tendrils of wood sprouted from her poleaxe and held it fast to her hands.

  “A what?” Liam asked as they rushed outside.

  A house down the lane collapsed, wood groaning toward the street as walls snapped like kindling. A tail slithered from the wreckage as a huge snout emerged, forcing beams aside like matchsticks.

  Saliva flooded Cordelia’s mouth, and she fought the memory of long teeth grating over her armor. “A fucking prog in the middle of Gale.”

  Someone behind the prog screamed, and its head whipped around. It pushed off through the wreckage, following the sound.

  Cordelia ran, pulling her sidearm. She fired a few shots into the prog’s flank, but it didn’t slow. She kept running, holstered her gun, and leapt.

  She grabbed the bony plates that followed the line of the prog’s spine from neck to tail, and she crab walked toward its head. The pop of a gun sounded behind her, and she put her faith in Liam’s aim as she reached the prog’s short, fat neck. It slowed and twisted, but she slammed it between the eyes with an armored punch.

  It screeched and tossed its head, throwing her into a building, her armor absorbing the impact that still made her teeth knock together.

  Liam shot it twice, and it turned, forcing him to leap out of the way. Reach shouted, waving her arms. The prog lunged at her, but she swung her poleaxe around to cling to her back and leapt atop a porch, clambering onto a short roof.

  The prog reared, snapping at her. Cordelia grabbed its tail and yanked. It slipped a bit, then slammed her into the ground. The breath whooshed from her lungs, and Liam pulled her clear. The prog was back after Reach in a moment, snapping and drooling, coming ever closer.

  Well, that was it. Cordelia had failed her uncle again, and now Reach would be joining him in the afterlife, if there even was such a thing.

  The prog’s mouth went wide as if to swallow Reach whole, but she rammed her poleaxe down its throat. Before the prog could fall, she jumped on the weapon, clinging to it as if climbing a tree. She sawed back and forth, and the prog gurgled, blood flowing from its long, wide jaws. It toppled sideways, and Reach leapt clear, rolling across the lane as the prog fell to the street, legs twitching with death throes. Its sides worked hard for a moment before the dull, pebbled green hide stuttered to a halt, and it breathed its last. Cordelia couldn’t stop staring at the stubby arms that protruded halfway up its side, halfway between its front and back legs. She vaguely remembered hearing that they had something to do with mating, but she really hadn’t wanted to know at the time.

  Instead, she gawked at Reach, who gave her a tiny smile, cradling one side. Cordelia crossed to the dead prog and pulled the poleaxe free in a rush of blood. “That was impressive.”

  “What’s it doing here?” Liam asked. “Is that the one that almost ate you?”

  “I killed that one.” But the thought of it following her home almost made her laugh crazily. “Something else is going on.”

  He prodded it with a foot. Reach took her sticky poleaxe and stuck it to her back again. The street was a disaster, and now that the prog was still, Cordelia heard more screams and the crack of gunshots. And the calls of fire hadn’t gone away; they’d just moved through the city, stemming from an orange glow to the east.

  “What the fuck?” Cordelia gritted her teeth, angry that some city emergency was intruding on her grief, but relief made her pause. If she was fighting progs or fire or whatever the fuck else was going on, she didn’t have to think about her uncle. “Let’s go.”

  “Which way?” Reach asked.

  “Pick one.” Cordelia gave her a nod, grateful she’d still help the city that had caused her so much pain, but maybe she just didn’t want to see anyone else suffer. They started down the street together, toward the closest screams, following the path of destruction caused by the prog.

  “Everything smells of blood,” Reach said. “So much that I cannot…” She tilted her face high in the air, sniffing.

  “What is it?”

  Reach took off toward a smashed building, leaping up through the debris.

  “Reach!” Liam looked to Cordelia. “Should we—”

  “Help me, Sa!” Reach called.

  Cordelia followed, picking over the largest piles of detritus, trying to keep on Reach’s track as she clambered through what used to be a small apartment. Bodies littered the wreckage, and the second floor dangled, exposed to the street.

  Reach bent over a body impaled on the wall of a bedroom. “This was his mother.”

  For a second, Cordelia thought she meant Paul, but his parents had been dead a long time. “Whose?”

  Reach sniffed the air again and moved to a small cabinet, its doors blocked by debris. “Here. He is here. His parents must have hidden him before they died.”

  “Reach, what—”

  A little sound came from the cabinet, a child’s cry. Cordelia grabbed a beam and lifted it. Reach tore open the doors, and her crooning song filled the shattered space, cutting off the little boy’s cries as she pulled him forth.

  He looked like the same child Reach had rescued in the alley, and her song calmed him now as it had then. Cordelia grunted as she laid the beam back down. “Kid must have made an impact on you.”

  Reach pulled down a curtain and bound the boy to her back. “Life means us to be together.”

  Cordelia didn’t know about that, but she couldn’t argue it at the moment. Liam was waiting when they came down, and he eyed the boy curiously, giving Cordelia a glance, but he wisely said nothing, and they followed more screams into the night.

  *

  When a prog came roaring out of an alley, the yafanai scattered, but Lydia froze. The Storm Lord unleashed his lightning and turned the beast into a pile of charred meat. He stared as if equally amazed by himself, but the skin around his eyes was tight with pain, and his breathing seemed a lot harder than before.

  “Look out!” Freddie dragged on Lydia’s arm as another prog snapped at them from a side street. They ran, and Lydia tried to warn against getting too far from the useful yafanai, but the prog followed them, and the words died in her throat.

  Ahead, a group of people had gathered, talking, shouting.

  “Run!” Freddie called.

  They scattered, but their noise made the prog roar, and it pushed forward in a rush of speed.

  Lydia let time flow away and saw the prog leap, watched Freddie crash into her, sending her flying to the side of the street. She sped through the part where the prog’s foot crushed Freddie into t
he stones before it barreled after the people ahead. As with all futures, there was nothing she could do to stop it.

  As the skein of time rewound, Freddie rammed into Lydia’s side, knocking the breath from her as she slammed into a wall. Freddie screamed, the sound cut short by a sickening crunch denied to Lydia in her future sight, the sound of bones breaking.

  Lydia clambered to her feet, knowing it was bad, that she had to hurry. Freddie sobbed a pain-filled keen as she lay facedown. Her arms flailed at nothing while her motionless legs told a tale of dreadful finality.

  “Sweet baby.” Lydia fell to her knees, smoothing Freddie’s hair and resisting the urge to sink down to the street. “Be still. Try to be still, please. I’ll get help. I’ll get…”

  All the people had fled, chased by the prog. Lydia spied a rickshaw leaning against the mouth of an alley. She stumbled into a run and hauled it over to where Freddie still sobbed.

  “I’m sorry, sweet baby. I’m so sorry.” Lydia eased her hands under Freddie’s body, whispering apologies as Freddie wailed. Sticky warmth coated her hands, but she tried not to think about it. She didn’t know how to fix Freddie, but the healers at the temple would. Lydia just had to get her there.

  “This will hurt, and I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, but I have to.” She kissed Freddie’s tearstained cheek. “I have to.” She flipped Freddie over as fast as she dared. Freddie shuddered, convulsing, and her lips opened in what would surely be a howl. Lydia pressed a bloody hand over her mouth and leaned over her, muffling the scream.

  “You have to be quiet, baby. Shh, shh. You’ll bring it back.” She sobbed the words, and when Freddie drew another shuddering breath, Lydia lifted her, using the rickshaw for balance, straining and grunting as she hauled Freddie into the seat.

  She muffled Freddie’s cries when she could. Halfway up, Freddie’s eyelids fluttered, and Lydia hoped she might pass out, but once secure, she sobbed again.

  Lydia took her place behind the bar and hauled the rickshaw forward. She turned toward the temple, apologizing for every jarring step.

  *

  Horace listened to the screams of the city as he paced in front of the temple doors, smacking his hand against the wall. Frustration had been building in his shoulders ever since he hadn’t been able to find Cordelia Ross. Now all the healers were ordered to stay at the temple and wait for the wounded to come trickling in. He’d have preferred to be out there, doing something. But at least the Storm Lord wasn’t at the temple trying to ferret out who had listened in on his thoughts earlier.

  He slapped the wall again, and Kessy glared at him. “Do you mind?” she asked. “Your emotions are leaking everywhere.”

  “Sorry. It’s just, we should be out there!”

  “We’re supposed to wait,” Will said. “The wounded will know to come here, and then—”

  “Look!” Kessy pointed into the darkness at someone hurrying toward them.

  Horace breathed a sigh. At last, someone to help.

  A leather-clad paladin stepped into the torchlight. “The Storm Lord needs you in the city.”

  “What’s happening?” Horace asked.

  “There’s a fire and something else. Boggins or progs. I’ll escort you.”

  “Shouldn’t someone stay to care for the wounded who come here?” Kessy asked.

  The paladin scowled. “The wounded are out there! Are you coming, or are you cowards?”

  Kessy glared right back, but there was nothing to do but follow the paladin. If the wounded were out there, that was where the healers needed to be. Horace spared one glance back at the temple doors. Anyone who made it there would hopefully be healthy enough to take care of themselves for a while.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  With the chanuka gone, Nettle knew she should relax, but troublesome thoughts would not be banished easily. The darkening swamp was alive with sound: bird calls fading before the croaks of night creatures, the ever-present insect hum. Standing among the queen’s branches, all should have been as it once was, with the drushka content, but Nettle could not make herself forget the lives lost. The swamp had changed. The chanuka had changed it. The humans had changed everything.

  And not all for the worse. Nettle’s thoughts drifted to the night she had spent with Sa until her body tingled. If the drushka moved closer to the human city, they could have many such nights. The Anushi tree had already come closer to the city than it ever had before, still within the swamp, but now a few hours away. Should they move closer still, into the flatlands? But then the humans would all know of the tree, though they might not realize its importance.

  The Anushi’s branches creaked, setting Pool down beside her. “I feel your thoughts jangling in my mind, hunt leader.”

  Nettle dipped her head. “There is much to think about, Queen.”

  “Ahya, our troubles with the chanuka cannot be over so simply, though the swamp seems quiet tonight. The humans say that too much silence means trouble.”

  “Like when a predator is near.”

  Pool rested her head against the bark. “Lately, it seems as if predators are everywhere. Perhaps we should go far from the humans so we will not become ensnared in their plans again. The world is wide, so they say.”

  The thought darkened Nettle’s heart. The world might have infinite possibilities, but there was only one Sa. “Perhaps, or maybe—”

  Pool staggered as if struck. She grasped her head, and Nettle grabbed her arm as several branches twined in front of her, shielding her, but from what?

  “Queen?”

  Pool blinked, widening her eyes as if trying to see past the dark. “What is this?”

  Nettle felt something humming through the queen, passing to all her drushka as if her mind was full of wasps. “What is it?”

  “They are coming.” Pool shook her head rapidly, and the hum of the swarm lessened. “They know we are fewer than we were, and they are coming!”

  Nettle gasped as her mind filled with images of leaping drushka, too many to count, all with long, braided hair, the mark of the old ones. Behind them, the roots of the queens whipped to and fro as they guided their massive trees through the forest. Six of the nine queens lashed out with their minds, trying to subdue Pool as their warriors would subdue her tribe.

  “Warriors, to me!” Nettle shouted.

  “I must remain free,” Pool said. “They will not lead me into war with the humans. They will not have me under their sway!”

  Her rebellious desires flooded through the mental link, and Nettle snarled. She leaned Pool against the trunk, the better to steer the tree. The warriors readied their weapons, and Shiv climbed to Pool’s side, cradling her sapling.

  “I will guard my mother’s body,” Shiv said. “In case the queens seek to harm her.”

  “If any warriors reach you, call for me,” Nettle said.

  “You think they would hurt me? Will the color of my hair not stop them?”

  Nettle chucked her under the chin. “What there is left of it.”

  Shiv grinned and gripped her simple knife. The green hair could save her, if anyone took the time to look.

  “Mind the queens’ limbs.” Pool’s eyes glazed as she guided the tree. Her snarl had not dimmed. “Do not approach their bodies. They think they will punish us like errant children when they should have forgotten us!”

  “Shi’a’na,” Shiv said, “should we flee?”

  “There is no time, daughter. They will soon be upon us.”

  Shiv laid her sapling behind her mother. “I wish our armored lovers were beside us, hunt leader.”

  “Have courage, queen’s daughter.” But she was right. It would have been nice to feel Sa’s armored presence.

  *

  If the situation had been less dire, Usk would have felt compelled to simply watch the sight of six queens striding into battle. Their roots and branches whipped around the trees of the swamp, propelling them forward, their trunks swaying and bending, rustling and cracking, and their limbs aliv
e with drushka.

  Six queens, more than had ever fought together before. Two had stayed behind: the Shi—far too large to move—and the eighth, who guarded the Shi. Still, their minds were with their drushka, the Shi speaking to Usk through these queens and making her wishes known. She wished the dissenters punished, that the Anushi be gathered back into the fold. The rogue queen would have to submit; how could she not after a sight such as this? Even now, her drushka were probably lying along her branches in supplication, their queen waiting docilely to be guided home.

  Nata climbed to Usk’s side. “Hunt leader, the renegades are waiting with weapons drawn.”

  His surprise reached the Shi where she waited far underground, but she felt only satisfaction. A little blood would help the lesson stay learned.

  “Let us hope they see their error before we are forced to kill them all.” He clapped Nata’s shoulder. “Stay with me, young one. We will slip through the guards unnoticed to kill those surrounding the Anushi queen. Then the Shi will be closer to her mind.”

  Nata looked at the queens arrayed around them. “Will their warriors harm our queens? Have they strayed so far?”

  He spread his hands. “I hope not, but if they are willing to fight, who can say what they will do? After being led by a rebel for so long, perhaps they are too unpredictable.” They were probably crazed. He wondered if it would show in their looks somehow, if their bodies had remained drushkan, or if their rebellious queen had tainted them. Maybe killing them would be a mercy.

  *

  Shiv kept close to her mother, watching the fight through her connection to the tribe, through the tree. All her life, drushka had attacked silently, not howling like humans or beasts as they closed on their prey, but now everyone cried out as if attacking their kind pained them, no matter that the old queens had ordered it.

  Nettle gave the call to fire, and a hail of sling stones whizzed through the trees; the old drushka had nothing to match the humans’ gift. Many fell to the spinning rocks, but there were more, too many, and soon they drew close enough to fight with claws and blades.

  Shiv sought out Nettle again, watched her draw her daggers as she dodged a blade meant for her throat. So, the old drushka wanted corpses rather than prisoners. Shiv’s anger mingled with her mother’s, and they fed that power to those fighting around them. A pile of dead drushka grew around Nettle’s feet until golden blood covered her in a thin sheen.