Crown of Ash (Blood Skies, Book 4)

by Steven Montano

  “It has been a long time,” Danica answered. “You dick.”

  Rake calmly stepped up and punched Danica in the stomach. He would never hit her in the face – he’d always told her how pretty she was.

  The blow knocked the wind out of her, and for a moment Danica thought her insides might come spilling out. She wobbled in place and sank to her knees. Her breaths wouldn’t come, and her throat went raw as she tried to suck down air.

  “You know you’re in deep shit, right?” Rake smiled.

  Danica coughed.

  “Just leave her alone,” Cole barked.

  “Shut up, bitch,” growled a deep and monstrous voice. Geist stepped onto the platform. He was a mountain of a man, if indeed he was a man – six-foot-six and as broad as a barn, Geist was half-Doj and so badly scarred and burned he looked mostly dead. A cowl concealed most of his face, and a thick cloak made of grey wool was wrapped around his bulk of muscles and heavy Revenger’s armor. Geist wasn’t terribly intelligent, but he reveled in the act of killing and served Rake without question. A massive war axe and an AA12 auto-shotgun were slung across his back.

  “Should have known…” Danica coughed. “You two lovebirds…are never far apart.”

  Geist stepped up and kicked Cole in the chest. She coughed and fell back. The gigantic steel-toed boot had torn open her shirt.

  “You fucker!” Black yelled. She tried to get to her feet, but Raven secured her bonds and forced her back down to her knees.

  Her spirit struggled in the distance. She sensed his frustration and rage at not being able to reach her.

  “You’re trying to call your spirit, aren’t you?” Rake smiled. “You’ve guessed by now that isn’t going to happen, I hope.” His smile was cold and toothy. He actually would have been quite attractive if not for the fact that he was such a lying and manipulative sadist. “Do you know why?” he asked her. “I’m sure you do.”

  “I’d thought…it was Narcosm…” she coughed. The Revengers had used the arcane drug for years to subdue captured mages, but when the effects hadn’t worn off and Danica had realized she could still detect her spirit’s presence, she’d known something else was going on. “But then I figured out that this ninja bitch behind me is a Fade.”

  Rake smiled.

  A Fade was a relatively new phenomenon, something of an anti-mage whose presence and force of willpower disrupted or suppressed a mage’s arcane spirit. Danica had never actually run into one before, but she’d heard the stories. They were extremely rare, and some believed they didn’t even exist.

  If only that were true.

  “She’s smart,” Raven said behind her. To emphasize her power, Raven exerted her will, and Danica sensed as her spirit slipped even further away. She felt hollow and weak. Her chest went tight.

  “Not too smart,” Rake said. Danica was still on her knees. She looked at Cole, who tried to get up. Behind her, the undead carried Cross towards a transport lift. “If she was smart she wouldn’t have stolen my ship, my prisoners and my men. And she would’ve had the good sense to stay hidden, so I could never find her.”

  His smile was cold.

  Danica smiled back.

  “Who are the new guys?” she asked with a nod towards the leathery undead, the tall and emaciated sentries with oversized grinning skulls and skeletal frames. “Is the Ebon Cities giving you troops now, too?”

  “The Ebon Cities…” Rake laughed. He knelt down, and looked her in the eye. “Oh, Dani, you’ve missed so much in the last couple of years. I’ve missed you. You know that, right?” His smile faded. “You were always one of my favorites. It really hurt when you left.” He stood up. “They’re called Scarecrows: special zombies with the martial skills of a Vath but without the out-of-control bloodlust. They used to be Revengers. The Grand Vizier of Koth sold us the secrets of how to make them.”

  Danica tried not to let her shock show. Koth was a renegade necropolis populated with outcast undead, exiled vampires and others not deemed worthy of rank by the Ebon Cities. The remote city of the dead had been relatively quiet the past few years, ever since Cross had destroyed their leader, the vampire called The Old One.

  “Why are you allies with Koth?” she asked. “And what do you want with Cross?”

  “Koth is the new super power, Dani,” Rake laughed. “The Southern Claw and the Ebon Cities have been so focused on destroying each other that you morons forgot all about Koth. And you forgot all about us.”

  Raven pulled Black to her feet and punched her in the kidneys. Pain flared down her back and into her thighs, and tears of pain ran down her face. Geist picked up Cole, and a pair of Scarecrows stepped up and aimed their massive assault rifles at the women.

  “Don’t worry about Cross,” Rake said. “He’s in good hands.” He stepped closer, until his and Danica’s faces almost touched. His eyes were like icy glass. “You should worry more about what I’m going to do with you.”

  ELEVEN

  CITADEL

  They look into the dread sky and see a vampire fortress.

  An island of jagged rock stands atop a narrow stone tower just a hundred yards away. This new edifice is adjacent to the tower of stone they woke on, and it’s practically a reflection save for one important difference: instead of being topped by a small steel building, the second island is dominated by a citadel made of black rock and red iron.

  It’s a Bonespire. It’s a small Bonespire, roughly the size of a manor, but a Bonespire nevertheless.

  That’s terrific, Kane says.

  Look, Ronan says, and he points between the islands of stone.

  The only way to get to the other mountain is to cross a narrow bridge made of crumbling earth. The bridge is only four or five feet wide but almost fifty feet long. Bits of stone crumble and fall into the air. Both of the thin towers are at least a mile high. They stand over a land of red water, black earth and roiling dark smoke.

  A pile of equipment lies on the far side of the bridge: swords, axes, armor vests, and strange gauntlets attached to short muzzled guns and long ammunition belts.

  Great, Kane says. We’re in a fucking video game.

  Do they expect us to attack the Bonespire? Sol asks. Why not send our mage with us?

  The idea might not be for us to actually survive, Ronan says. They’re probably watching us. This is all probably for their God damned amusement.

  Then piss on them, Kane says. The best thing we can do is stay right here.

  As if in response, the ground shifts. Their mountain cracks open like melting ice. Chunks of rock fly into the air as the bridge between the towers starts to fall apart. The rail-thin mountain crumbles beneath them. The island shakes and tilts under their feet. All three of them fall to their knees. Kane glances up, and notices that the other island remains stable.

  Of freakin’ course, he says.

  Do you guys ever shut up? Sol growls.

  Klaxons sound in the Bonespire. Dark fliers take to the air. Kane smells brimstone engines and arcane fuel. The small keep is five-stories of smooth black rock dotted with crimson battlements, and it stands just a short distance from the stone bridge. A single door slides open and releases hulking Doj zombies with putrid grey flesh and hammers in place of hands. An undulating kaithoren – a mass of billowing tentacle flesh and uncertain mouths filled with grinding canine teeth – follows the zombies.

  The three men run onto the rock bridge, and it falls to pieces behind them as they race for the other side. Kane waits for his feet to fall on open air. Vertigo hazes through his skull, and he expects to be ripped into the void sky at any moment. Everything spins.

  The zombies approach the bridge from the other end. Their monstrous dead forms grow larger by the second.

  The mountain falls behind them with the dissonant roar of crashing stone. They barely make it across. Kane jumps off the crumbling bridge and lands hard on his chest on the opposite ledge. Ronan falls next to him. Sol is the last one to make it, and he jumps forward and lands on
top of both Kane and Ronan, flattening them beneath his weight.

  Get. Off, Kane coughs.

  The Doj zombies draw close. Red sweat pours down Kane’s face as he picks up one of the gauntlets. Hard wind claws at his back. Panic grips his chest as he glances over the edge and sees the blood sky below. Red clouds and shards of derelict rock float like ice in glacial waters.

  He looks up. The nearest zombie is practically on top of them. Its putrid skin drips vile grey fluid and worms. Massive neck muscles strain as the zombie raises its rusted hammer fists and clenches its rotted teeth.

  He takes a breath. For a moment, Kane is back in the arena. He finds his focus.

  He calmly fixes the gauntlet to the back of his hand and forearm. The device is made of bone and pale metal and easily weighs five pounds. The short-muzzled firearm consists of three short barrels, and the ammo belt coils up around his elbow and extends to the mid-point of his upper arm.

  Metal clamps snap shut and pierce his skin. Thin needles in the gauntlets send electric jolts through his body. His flesh tingles, and he feels something shift in his synapses, an understanding of which muscles he has to use in order to activate the weapon.

  He tightens the muscles in his arm and fires.

  Explosive rounds fly from the weapon with such force he’s nearly thrown from his feet. The rounds rip into dead flesh and explode. Skin shreds and bursts open in chunks.

  The first zombie falls off the top of the mountain. The grotesque corpse tumbles like a flank of flayed meat through the open sky.

  Kane growls and shoots again. His arm and side ache from the force of the weapon, but he uses his legs and lower back to keep his body stable as he advances towards the citadel.

  He shoots the next zombie giant in the head. It falls backwards, and its hammer arms flail wildly before the brute rolls down the slope and plummets into open air.

  The kaithoren is further back, a bulk of flailing shadow limbs and dripping razor beaks. Roiling tentacles launch bone shard projectiles. Kane fills the air between them with gunfire and shatters the organic missiles before they can reach him.

  A tentacle reaches for him, but he blasts it apart. The kaithoren roars through the air like a wall of kamikaze slime. Kane throws himself prone.

  Machinegun fire sounds over his head. Shells clank to the earth behind him. Ronan and Sol wear gun-gauntlets and flak vests. Their bullets tear into the kaithoren and drive it back. Putrid emerald slime sizzles on the dark ground.

  Kane lifts himself up. Ronan hands him a saber. He runs forward with the weapon and slices open the kaithoren’s suddenly exposed undead heart, a mass of fibrous tissue the color of old meat. It’s the only solid thing about the creature, an unholy core that holds the rest of the abomination together. Kane strikes at the stillborn mass and cleaves it in two. Red ichors explode outwards as the kaithoren squeals and melts to the ground.

  Streams of red-brown ooze stain his face and stick to his skin like clumps of putrid mud. His nose is filled with the stench of animal rot.

  This sucks.

  Ronan hands him a flak vest, which he hastily puts on. It’s too big at first, but after he buckles the vest in place it automatically resizes itself.

  The sky grows darker. The fliers hang back in the air, a host of gargoyles armed with nets and axes.

  He checks his ammo, and realizes the weapon has reloaded itself.

  Well that’s handy. I guess this hasn’t been too difficult, Kane says.

  The gates to the citadel open again, and a Creed of vampires emerges. They wear blue-black armor with bladed epaulets and yield smoking hand-cannons and pikes. Their greasy pale skin shines dully in the autumnal light. Dark hair is pulled back in severe top-knots. Fangs glisten and drool with anticipation.

  The hollow tower behind them is a shaft of red fog and black steel filled with equipment and machinery parts. More undead wait inside.

  The gargoyles descend and move to flank the three men, while the Creed advances on their position.

  Ronan gives Kane an angry look.

  Don’t say it, Kane says.

  They battle their way through the citadel.

  His arms grow weak from shooting the wrist-cannon and swinging the saber. Ronan and Sol fight beside him. They tear through red armor and black fliers and scorch the air with metal, fire and blood.

  The vampires never stop coming.

  Even after the first Creed falls, another emerges from deeper within the Citadel. Not all of the undead in the Bonespire are soldiers – they fight wight technicians and zombie surgeons, skeletal laborers and ghoul messengers, hulking mountains of zombie flesh meant to carry large loads. Only the vampires are meant for combat, but they still join in the attempt to throw back the three-man assault.

  The gargoyles, also, come at them in seemingly unending waves. The men tear the air apart with thaumaturgic ammo. They shoot and cut down silhouette fliers and send bloody bodies crashing to the ground.

  They battle half-automaton flesh walkers, monstrosities of ebon iron fused to patchwork assemblies of smoking skin. Dozens of eyes leer at Kane as he ducks beneath steam-driven hammers and blasts through limb joints to topple the golems.

  Poisonous air fills the inside of the citadel, making their lungs burn and their eyes sting.

  A vampire armed with twin blades descends upon them from the height of the tower, an unseen void of shadow over their heads. This undead is some sort of champion, a leader accompanied by two more red-armored vampire fiends with dark hair and iron fangs. Their eyes are hidden behind thick goggles, and they wear twisted tattoos on their dead flesh.

  Zombies pour out of vents in the floor and emerge from hidden storehouses of mutated skin.

  Kane feels superhuman. He is more in that shadow world, better, stronger. He senses an arcane presence in him and around him, some subtle augmentation that not only allows him to breathe and exist in an environment that by all rights should be caustic to humans, but to excel in it.

  It occurs to him this is what the Grey Clan did to them on the ship: prepared them for battle on this dread world of shadows.

  The melee is a blur of motion and noise. Everything becomes instinct and reaction. Years spent in gladiator pits and dodging psychotic Black Scar inmates forever altered his sense of reality when he fights. His body becomes an engine. Weapons are an extension of his arms. Killing is as easy as breathing.

  The vampire leader is skilled. Kane uses the saber to deflect it’s swift attacks. He dodges ghouls armed with short knives and zombies with rotating saws attached to their limbs.

  The Citadel protects itself. Kane feels its alien intelligence, some vast and controlling entity that lurks within the walls.

  A sword slashes into his side. He bites through the pain. The wound is the price he pays so the vampire leader comes too close to dodge Kane’s gunfire. He blasts its pale skull into paste.

  Ronan and Sol battle the other vampires and shoot their way through ranks of ghouls. The air is blood meat mist, shrapnel and gun smoke. The air outside has whipped into a fury of black powder and razor rain.

  He finds a dark iron ladder bolted to the bleeding walls, and ascends. His hands grip pitted metal soaked with oil and blood. Gouts of dark steam leak from the iron tower. He climbs up a tube of jagged rust edges and leering bone faces. Phantoms melt through the walls.

  A vampire appears out of a hatch, and Kane shoots it until its body turns to pulp. Another comes at him from behind. It flies through the air as if on wings, and he wrestles with it for a moment before he cracks its fanged mouth against the wall and sends it plummeting to the floor a hundred feet below, where Ronan and Sol tear through the undead ranks.

  He sees munitions and glass spheres as he climbs; rooms filled with corpses awaiting animation; strange whirring devices of thaumaturgic potential; bio-organic machines, skin pulled taut over control panels; strange workbenches covered with beakers and vials of bubbling fluid.

  He and the others have been sent to dest
roy a research station. The Ebon Cities has come to this black wasteland with a purpose. They mean to find something.

  The apex of the Citadel lies hidden beyond a steel hatch at the top of the ladder. The rotary-style door swings up into a cold and utterly black chamber. His wrist cannon glows blue-green and illuminates the darkness.

  The room is filled with sarcophagi. Flat black coffins crafted from iron have been bolted into the walls so the vampire inhabitants can step inside and sleep vertically. Corpse dust forms a runic circle in the middle of the floor. Cold iron candelabras dangle from the ceiling and paint the room with flickering silver light. A black mirror stands at the far end of the chamber.

  He readies his weapon and carefully enters the vampire barracks, his heart in his throat. The hairs on his neck freeze. He walks slowly, careful to avoid the circle at the center.

  The coffins remain sealed.

  He walks up to the black mirror. It’s somehow darker than the rest of the lightless room, an utterly blank void that seems to suck away the ambient glow of his armaments. Deep iron mists float within the mirror’s face. The frame is made of bone and steel.

  He shoots the mirror.

  The glass explodes and throws him back. Shards cut his face and arms.

  The coffins fly open. Half of them are filled with undead that move with chilling speed. He stands in a chamber filled with warrior corpses.

  Kane roars as he sweeps the room with gunfire. He can only see by the flash of bullets and exploding blood. Fanged mouths hiss. Ebon claws reach for him. A sea of pale bodies swarms in.

  He blasts his way back to the hatch door. Claws tear skin from his arms. He shoves the wrist-cannon into a vampire’s mouth and blows open its skull. Another one tries to take him down but he shoots through its torso. He slashes behind and ahead with his blade.

  Teeth sink into his neck. He screams and shoots the top of the vampire’s head off before he falls backwards through the hatch. The fangs break off and remain lodged in his wounded skin.