Steel Sirens

by Maxx Whittaker

The cord she wanted me to search for. The ability is hers. I must draw the power from her somehow, through our connection. I scramble across leaves and twigs, struggling to my feet as the slavers chase me. The injured one stumbles over the log, falling flat on his face. The other looks back, curses, then charges after me.

  I’m faster, and I almost laugh at the madness of my lack of protection giving me mobility that he lacks in his heavier armor.

  Emeree is retreats, at least twenty paces distant. Her blade is alive, dancing, her steps precise, but it’s not enough. A fallen log, the same we sat on so long ago when we rested after our sparring, is just behind her. She’s backs another step, stumbles against it, almost falling as her opponent presses his advantage. All the while, the black arteries under her skin pulse darkly, like some ravaging infection.

  If we survive this, will she?

  My breath comes in huge gasps, and I push aside worry, panic, everything else, and once again, reach inside myself. Find the part of my soul connected to her, feel its shape, taste its color.

  Desperation and fear fuel my discovery more than Emeree’s lessons.

  Black and silver. A thread of spirit connects us. I can’t see it, but somehow my soul knows it’s there, knows its nature.

  I skip past rocks, stumbling as I concentrate on the bond’s shape, it’s thickness and texture. It almost costs me my life, but I trip over a loose stone and go down in a tumble as a whisper of steel feathers my hair.

  I land, roll, face the slaver. He’s just behind me, heartbeats from delivering death.

  With my mind, I grip the thread.

  Emeree snaps up. “Ewan! Wait! It’s too –”

  Too late. Whatever she was about to say, the words have changed. I seize our connection and pull.

  Something of her falls into me, part of her lifeblood. Maybe her soul.

  The world slows, turns golden, air changing color and shape. Leaves freeze in midair, their slow dives trapped. A grasshopper, startled by my flight, hangs before me, and even its blindingly fast wings move as slowly as a bird’s as it hangs in an updraft. Even the ever-present breeze stills against my skin, its gentle caress absent.

  My heart pumps, once, twice, like a great bellows too full of air, like it wants to explode. I gasp, but don’t lose my hold on the thread stretching to Emeree.

  The slaver hangs in the air, face frozen in a rictus of hate, his progress so glacial that I can’t tell if he’s moving at all. I don’t waste time, rush him, and my blade snicks out, a quick cut to his throat. I follow this with another stab to his partner, trailing close behind him. Their necks open at the speed of my strikes, but when my blade draws back, no blood pulses from severed arteries. The only signs of my passage are harsh red wounds across pink skin.

  Emeree’s on her knees, sword raised. Her opponent twin blades hang above her, coming down for the kill like birds of prey. I can tell by her posture she can’t take his hit.

  I flow across the clearing, parting round obstacles of flesh and nature. My vision darkens, pulsing at the edges, but energy inside guides my progress.

  One fluid swing. I slice clean through the man’s tree root neck. Time still crawls. His head holds in place. His body looms, limbs twitching with inertia. He’s not yet aware of his mortal wound.

  I let go of my blade, falling hard to the dirt, carried by my momentum. I’ve saved her, saved us. Killed them, killed them, can’t think. Gods. Can’t breathe. Can’t think. Am I dying?

  No. Push through. Breathe, gods dammit. Breathe.

  Can’t. Can’t.

  Emeree. Help…

  Too weak. I release the thread between us.

  With a rush to my unhearing ears, time explodes back into motion. The slaver’s head tumbles after his dead body. Leaves finish their journeys to the earth. The breeze caresses me.

  Face down in the dirt. I can’t breathe. I try to raise, pull my face from the loam, but I’m too weak. My heart beats once, doesn’t beat again.

  Hands on me, rolling me. “You stupid, beautiful idiot.” Her mouth on mine, perfect lips. Not a bad way to die. Her kiss, a last token as I leave for Cailleach’s embrace. But it’s not a kiss. With a rush, her breath fills me, inflates seized lungs that spasm in agony. Then again, and again.

  It won’t be enough. Blood trickles through my shriveling veins. My mind chants one thing against the pain: I’m sorry, Briet. I’m sorry, Kel.

  She rests her hand above my heart. The weakened muscle responds to her. Emeree murmurs something, soothing and unhurried.

  With a mighty pump, my heart beats, sending lifeblood along numb veins. I gasp, moan, even as my vision clears.

  Emeree crouches over me, hands on my chest. Her hair veils us, a sanctuary. Her silver eyes are luminous, and fat tears roll down her cheeks as she stares at me.

  An angel? No.

  She’s no angel, no thin being of light.

  A Siren. Sent by Cailleach to aid me.

  “Ewan?”

  “So… So beautiful,” I breathe. “So terrifying.”

  She laughs, and there’s a bit of madness in it. She collapses onto my chest, her breath coming in great sobs. “That was so, so stupid. So dangerous.”

  She lifts, and this time, when her lips slip over mine, it is a kiss. “So stupid and brave.”

  I can’t answer, so I don’t. Just revel in the feel of her warm flesh over mine, her hand on my face, soft lips at my ear. She lies atop me, the long lines of her mirroring mine, every inch of her over me.

  We stay that way a long time. Slowly, my pain recedes, and the world comes back into focus. My vision clears, as does my hearing.

  I’m alive. We both are.

  And I know this is where the average man gathers his things and goes home, vigilant after a terrifying education. But some part of me can’t wait to do this again.

  I struggle up and wrap her in my arms.

  Emeree shifts to protect her arm, her face a mask of pain. Her head falls to my shoulder. I swear our closeness heals me, inside and out.

  I search the trees, the clearing. It’s a bloodbath, parts of slavers, blood, bone littering the ground. Glaer and Falnir, as predicted, have ripped free of their tethers. Farm horses. At least we won’t have to go far to find them.

  But Emeree… Close up, the black lines resemble a broken windowpane, and the skin between the cracks is pallid, sweating. “What do we do?”

  She sits up. “Told you we’re hard to kill.”

  I nod to the gore-littered ground. “Nothing trying kill us any time soon.”

  “Good. Give me a few hours?”

  “To what –” She shimmers, misting into thousands of particles. “Emeree...” Her sparkling essence whispers through the air, settling over her sword. They spread along its length and disappear into the channel.

  She fades inside me, a low but steady and peaceful presence.

  I wonder how long it will take until things like this stop screwing with my head.

  Searching the bond for signs of her, I try to sense what she’s doing. A soft pulse of reassurance answers me before she shuts me out and the bond goes silent. It’s still there, but at its far side is nothing, a vast wall of dark that my probing my can’t penetrate.

  Staggering to my feet, I pick her up, reverent. Cradle her as I carry her to our now scattered camp and nestle her in soft moss. I’m not sure what she’s doing in there, hope she’s healing, but there are things to do.

  Wrestling into my armor is a special kind of torture, but I won’t be caught defenseless again. When I’m done, I set about dragging the bodies of the slavers to the center of the clearing, where Gruhl’s mangled corpse lies prone. It’s several trips, dragging armored men, and by the end I’m wheezing, drinking water from my canteen.

  I curse, realize I’ve forgotten the last one, whose skull I’d put an arrow through. I wander into the tree line, find him, and yank him in little bursts toward the pile, my energy almost gone.

  Even lacking the same necrotic feel of
the other slavers, I’m not taking chances.

  I burn them all.

  Gathering the horses, I pack our scattered supplies and then slip Emeree into her scabbard. She’s so light, but still rests heavy across my back as I struggle into my saddle. I take Emeree’s reins and pass into the tree line, east, chased by the smell of burning flesh.

  The horses are well trained, maneuvering around trees and keeping to their direction without my prodding. I thank the Gods for that as I try to stay awake, and it’s almost too much. The fight, Emeree’s power, the mad flight of it. Almost dying, and then the strangely exhausting process of burning the bodies. I have nothing left inside. I hope more of them aren’t following.

  The canopy fades into a soft green blur as I drift in and out of a restive doze. I snap awake, over and over, sure we’re caught and searching the forest for signs of slavers or something amiss before exhaustion steals my mind again for long moments.

  I shake my head, try to think of something, anything other than sleep. I drop from my saddle and push forward, my heavy steps breaking twigs and trampling leaves. And all the while, my mind drifts.

  My thoughts turn to home, and for a moment, I yearn for my old life. The Fortingall. It’s smells, sounds, the animals and trees. Of lumbering into the village in the predawn hours, a fresh stag spanning my shoulders, as my friends and family crowded me. Of the celebrations in the town’s square, the laughter and dancing, the fellowship. Of the silence, after, when I’d slip away before Bri could find me and drag me home.

  Oh, Bri. If only you could see me now.

  Gods, I hope they’re safe.

  Guilt, black and consuming, threatens. I’d neglected them. For a long time. I didn’t deserve them.

  I swear to Cailleach I’ll make it right.

  ***

  A soft touch startles me, fingers running through the back of my hair. Her contact breaks through memories of fire and death. I realize how dangerously focused on the wrong things I’ve been for the better stretch of two miles. I didn’t hear the horses stir, or Emeree’s boots hit the ground. Nothing.

  “Shhh,” Emeree whispers, laying her head on my shoulder.

  I question her through our bond.

  She rotates her arm and nods. “Ready for a fight.”

  “Whoa there. Easy, mankiller.”

  She grins and takes Falnir’s reins.

  Signs of her injury have disappeared, along with the blood spatter and dirt.

  I smooth her repaired sleeve. “Nice trick.”

  “A perk of retreating into the weapon for healing. If we take enough damage, we have no choice. If the damage had been more widespread, I might have been in there for days. But just my arm?” She rolls her shoulder. “Good to go.”

  I raise my arm, showing off a few open scrapes. “I’m a touch jealous.”

  Emeree laughs. “Better get used to it, or you’ll never survive Siri.” She nips my ear.

  Despite everything we’ve done, my skin heats. “Survive?”

  “Exactly what you think. Why are we walking?” She makes a disgusted noise and bounces into the saddle. I follow, rather less athletically.

  “You and I…” This feels like dangerous ground. I keep my eyes locked on the terrain.

  “Oh no. Did that offend you? I never meant to hurt –” Emeree falls behind a little, gnawing her lip. “When you live for hundreds and hundreds of years, and you live side by side, closer than blood family in some ways…” She shrugs, still staring down at her saddle. “You share everything.”

  “Everything?” I swallow, throat tight.

  “Everything.” Emeree raises a hand. “Not that you have to be. Shared, that is.”

  “Oh.”

  She rolls her eyes. “You’re a person. You have a choice, after all.”

  “Hm.”

  “Just maybe not with Siri.”

  “What?” I draw up to match our mounts. “What did you say?”

  “Thora and Aleska have tremendous regard for a man’s boundaries,” she offers brightly.

  She doesn’t fool me.

  Everything. I’m an everything, and I’m going to be shared.

  9

  The Gem of Dissent

  A chill breath whispers over the Seer’s hand.

  This card depicts a broad-shouldered lad searching the moors on a windswept day. It is associated with a banishment, an introduction, a dire deed, and a contest. Inverted, it represents a thwarted plan, violence, and an act of kindness. The card is torn on one corner to secretly mark its place in the deck.

  Its reverse is amber with an arrowhead in relief.

  I know the forest’s hem is coming by a series of long, rolling descents, but the end is still abrupt. We are concealed, then exposed to autumn winds that cut a short, sheer cliff top.

  A thick tree line stretches evergreen arms around a basin ringed by hillocks and low mountains in a near-complete ring. Far to the east, ancient forces have cut away the land, and civilization spills through to whatever lay beyond. I realize I can’t conceive of what that is because before us sits the first city I’ve ever seen.

  Minster Lowe swallows me before I’ve even passed through its gates.

  There are so many buildings. Tile roofs, not thatch. Cobble in the public squares. Shops and houses don’t wedge haphazard into leftover spaces, the near-random sprawl of a village that tosses expansion in any direction because it will never be large enough for small chaos to matter. Structures fit lock and key along a grid of streets and alleys. An aqueduct runs like a strip of lace from north to south. This order almost comforts to my vertigo.

  It’s the sheer amount of people, wagons, and beasts moving through the city’s arteries that undo me. Like an ant colony, each path is filled with activity, a flow that makes sense to everyone but me.

  “Look at that…” I whisper this to myself, but Emeree squeezes my arm in answer.

  A cathedral rises at the heart of Minster Lowe, spokes of grand streets radiating from the stone and glass gem. Our church is a long, low river-rock chamber with iron grate windows and a yew steeple.

  Minster Lowe’s Cathedral stands above her people, towers and peaked roofs reaching up and beckoning the All-Father. Her buttresses stand wide as angel wings.

  I don’t think my beliefs will really...sail here. There is clearly one faith.

  But it isn’t the only law. Castle Lowe stands on the city’s far side, on a man-made hill that lifts it noticeably higher than the cathedral. A river flows from the hills and over the castle’s feet; a small channel forms the city’s motte but the best and most beautiful of the river’s silver ribbon belongs to the lord of this place. His square-towered fortress watches down on his people to the west, and danger from the east.

  At least, this is what I imagine. I have no actual idea what a lord of someplace like Minster Lowe does, or watches for.

  This feels like resting in an open field, staring up at the vault of the night sky, and realizing what an insignificant speck you are compared.

  Minster Lowe consists of what must be several hundred buildings spread over at least a mile. Two and three stories, they crowd each other like puppies jockeying for a meal, and in places I can’t tell where one ends and the next begins.

  A mirror blinds us in the afternoon sun. I have to squint for a long moment to make out the bright canvas points. A lake; it stretches like a small sea out on the horizon where the river disappears. Its face is dotted with fishing vessels greeted by a lattice of docks.

  “Everything all right?” Emeree asks, stroking my back.

  “Mm.” I watch the city’s clockwork movement. “I just never imagined. I mean, some of our people had been into the Midlands. Thom, our mayor was a soldier out here. He’d tell stories, but they may as well have been fairytales.”

  “This is nothing. Compared to great cities like Cor Torvan...if it is still a great city…”

  “It is.” I know of the capital even if it’s essentially a place of legend.

&n
bsp; “This is provincial by comparison. Buildings stretching from horizon to horizon, tens of thousands of people.” She sighs, wistful. “Belching smoke. Heaps of horse shite. Silk dresses. Men. Women.” She laughs. “And the wines. It’s been a really long time since I’ve had a cup of Cor Torvan red.”

  “Maybe we can remedy that,” I say, nodding to Minster Lowe. “Maybe a vintner down there stocks it.”

  “I love a man who’ll buy a round.” She raises an eyebrow. “Got any money?”

  “Two silver marks, and three copper tabs,” I say proudly. “Kept in my stash and added to for years despite Briet’s keen nose for coin.” Household coffers were never full enough for my sister.

  I wilt under Emeree’s look. “Not much, eh?”

  “Down there? No. Luckily, your travelling companion isn’t just a pretty face, hopefully. Follow me.” She turns her horse, wind whipping her hair in a stiff wind, and cuts a path along the top of the ridge.

  “Won’t they see us up here?” I call. We must be perfect silhouettes to the pinpoint guards atop the walls.

  “This is probably the last major trade hub before the open Midlands. Travelers from all directions are hardly novel.”

  In Braemar we practically quizzed anyone passing through the Wood.

  I pull up next to her, nodding to her blade. “Well, I won’t. But you?”

  Emeree pulls it free, still sheathed, and hands it to me. “Won’t be a problem.”

  “Uh.” I frown. “What am I… Do you need me to hide it?”

  The wind carries her laugh across the ridge. “Nope. Watch.” Her face scrunches slightly, eyes narrowed.

  The blade heats, vibrating so suddenly that I almost drop it out of surprise. The air around it shimmers, much like Emeree did when she took refuge inside of it. With a pop, it disappears, sheathe and all.

  “See?” She winks.

  “That’s incredible. Where did it go?”

  Emeree taps her chest. “Just as I can hide inside my blade, I can do the reverse. Comes in handy behind enemy lines, in a hostile court, or when you need to surprise a group of thugs in back alley.”

  “Speaking from experience?”