The Burning World

by Kris Austen Radcliffe

  Ladon scowled at Billy-Terry as he wiggled around to the back side of the unit. “Do not move,” he yelled.

  Billy nodded.

  Ladon waved at Rysa and Daisy. “Out of the way, please.”

  Dragon herded them off to the side of the copter.

  One push and the entire unit slid down the ramp to the cold ground. Dragon then pushed it away from the back of the copter. He picked up the duffle and gun, and walked up the ramp.

  Headlights approached.

  “I—” Gavin, Rysa’s present-seer whispered, and all her concentration, all her attempts to see where they needed to go, yanked toward the road.

  But they also screamed that they needed to leave now.

  With the containment unit out of the way, she had a clear view of the cockpit door. Ladon leaned in and hauled the enthraller who had flown in with Billy out of the copilot’s seat. He pointed at the ramp. The enthraller nodded and smoothed his jacket. A faint smile appeared as he saluted Billy, then he ran down the ramp to Rysa and Daisy.

  “Too bad we had to meet like this,” he said. He shook both their hands. “It’s an honor.” Then he saluted again, and ran for the bus.

  In the cockpit, the pilot flicked a few switches. The ramp began to lift.

  Rysa grabbed Daisy’s hand. “We have to go.”

  Daisy watched the headlights as they moved closer, but she nodded and ran up the ramp behind Rysa.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Ladon strapped the Praesagio new-killing gun’s holster around his chest. Bigger than his semi-automatic and smaller than one of the rifles, it was too big to be worn like a handgun. He pulled it from the holster and rolled it around his hands and wrists, to get a feel for its weight.

  Andreas said it had an onboard semi-compensating targeting system that the techs put in place for long-distance shots. Ladon ran his finger over the touchpad along the spine of the barrel.

  Time to turn on the little cannon, he pushed to Dragon, as he entered the codes Andreas had given him.

  The parts of the big cannon would assemble themselves soon enough.

  Dragon stood through the copter’s lift-off. He dug his talons into the floor as they turned south over the open fields. His hide slowly, methodically seethed, with his grand dragon eyes level with Billy Bare’s.

  Ladon sat with his back against the wall between the cargo compartment, and the cockpit. His wife sat in the copilot’s seat because she needed to guide the copter. Ladon readied the gun because he needed to make sure they survived the trip until surviving the trip wasn’t an option anymore.

  Daisy sat on the other side of the cockpit door with her back also against the wall. She didn’t say much, only gripped the duffle.

  Billy watched Dragon as much as Dragon watched Billy.

  “Not sure if I should ask if you see him, beastie-boy.” Billy stood also, and gripped the ties on the copter’s wall. Sitting with a sword through your side did not work well. “He’s blabbering in German again.” He twisted slightly to keep Poke’s point from knocking the wall. “Not that German is a language built for blabbering.”

  Dragon did his best not to flash his blinding “angry” lights, but he couldn’t quite hold it, and the entire compartment turned noon-bright for a split-second.

  Billy squinted. “Aye, Great Sir, I agree.” He scratched at his cheek. “I don’t want her to die, either.” He leaned a little closer to Dragon’s snout. “Either of the ladies, really. Or you and Boyfriend.” He leaned back. “No way out of it for me, but the world’s not really losing anything, ya know? And I get to take Terry here with me. That’s got to count for something, huh?”

  Dragon snorted. He had begun flooding Ladon’s mind with dragon-perceiving the moment they stepped onto the copter. Ladon had just as strong a sense of Billy’s emotional state as did the beast.

  Billy seemed resigned. They didn’t know about Terry beyond what Billy said. Rysa’s sensing of Ladon’s fellow Progenitor wasn’t giving her a lot of information.

  Daisy, though, was a ball of adrenaline. She sat next to Ladon and did her best not to cry.

  The duffle holding the midnight blades and the one final shard of Janus’s talisman sat on her lap. She squeezed the handles rhythmically with the chopping of the copter’s rotor. Squeeze, release, squeeze, release, except the release wasn’t a true release.

  Ladon gently covered her hands with his. “Don’t dig your nails into your palm,” he said. “It’ll throw your grip.”

  She looked up at his face, but didn’t respond. Her hands loosened, though.

  He watched Dragon watch Billy. Dragon, like Sister-Dragon, was much better at not allowing what-ifs and might-nots interfere with the present. Other dragons attacking their home did not deter them from protecting what they held most dear. Understanding that they would likely never see each other again did not stop either of them from standing between the threat and their humans.

  Dragon knew he was likely about to die, as did Ladon. But they’d spent twenty-three centuries walking into situations that would likely kill them. They knew to save the unavoidable emotions for the next day, when they woke up on a battlefield surrounded by everyone else’s death but their own.

  He patted Daisy’s arm again, then twisted through the port into the cockpit and placed his hand on Rysa’s thigh.

  Rysa, those damned goggle-like glasses over her eyes, turned toward him. A surprised smile danced over her lips, and she squeezed his fingers. “Thank you,” she said.

  The smile vanished. She squeezed his hand again. Squeezed and released; squeezed and released.

  “You’ll do it right,” he said.

  The pilot flicked a switch over his head. “Aye, sir, my brother said the wee lass here is the best of us.”

  Ladon was pretty sure he winked under his helmet.

  “Turns out Connor is my distant nephew.” Rysa shrugged and held out her hands.

  “Descended from Mira of the Jani, I am.” He flicked another switch. “She’s the one who gave us our lodestone talismans. Said we’d be best at what we do, one day.” He flicked a switch on the instrument panel. “I remember you too, sir, from when I was a lad. I told Missus Rysa here to ask you and her mum about the Highlands.”

  Ladon chuckled.

  “Dougal’s in Europe,” he said. “He’s alive and he’s a better pilot than I.” He continued to check his instruments. “Our sister is in the Antarctic. She was piloting one of those BBC Earth nature documentary crews through the ice when this started. Their boat’s on its way north to help.”

  Rysa pointed at the ground below. “From above, the line looks more like a backward comet than a road,” she said. “The head is bright and tiny, probably because it’s the last point from which we can launch.”

  “I’ll get you in and I’ll get you out when this is done, so no more worryin’, lass. Okay?”

  Rysa nodded again.

  Connor McJanison leaned toward Ladon. “I don’t die this day, sir. Dougal is sure our triad makes it through intact. That means you all will, as well.” He sat up straight again. “No one dies on my watch.”

  And with that, he returned to flying them southeast, toward a moving target they had no choice but to catch.

  Daisy leaned against the cockpit wall and jostled the duffle on her lap.

  They had left Anna, Sister-Dragon, and Andreas to fight an onslaught. Officer Seaver and his cousin could hold their own.

  Daisy and the others had gotten on the copter with a living bomb and flown away into the night on the slim chance they could save the world.

  She lifted off just as Gavin drove into a hellhound attack.

  He wouldn’t have stopped no matter how Officer Seaver argued with him, and cuffing people right now wasn’t smart.

  Andreas will get him onto the bus, she thought. He, Ian, and the dogs will be safe.

  She had to believe they would be safe.

  One of the midnight daggers had already pierced a hole in the side of the duf
fle, and she needed to be careful. The last thing she wanted was to lose the shard before she started making the cage.

  Would she need to take it into her gut? She didn’t know and she wasn’t about to ask Rysa. Her friend had other things to worry about.

  Daisy didn’t want to know, anyway. Rysa’s healing had stopped her slippery activation and saved the baby, and the last thing Daisy wanted to do was to make Rysa think she hadn’t done enough.

  Brother-Dragon continued to stare at Billy as if his dragon-perceiving would make Terry visible in real-space. What Daisy didn’t understand was how Terry crossed over on his own centuries ago, and how he continued to affect real-space when he wanted to.

  She set the duffle on the copter’s floor and carefully used Brother-Dragon’s tail to help her stand. When she tripped, he snorted, but didn’t push her away.

  “Sorry,” she said.

  He had a halo, as did Ladon and Rysa, and the pilot. Billy had two. The halos felt different, but she had yet to figure out how or why.

  Becoming a good Shifter or Fate took training. Talent helped—Prime Fates and class-one Shifters were the equivalent of athletic and musical prodigies—but you still needed to learn how to use it.

  Seemed her new alchemist ability was the same way.

  “Billy,” she said, “do you think the glass in your neck is what’s allowing you to see and hear Mr. Schmidt?”

  Billy wiggled his shoulders. “I suspect so,” he said. “I saw that woman in the parking lot, also. The other princess.” He nodded once. “The Whispering One? I remember her.”

  So Billy Bare, the Burner, had no issues remembering Maria Romanova, though Daisy’s mother, Daisy, and Daniel did.

  Hadrian and her mother were correct; they were all interacting with new-space differently depending on their abilities and their exposure to the glass and the talisman. “There are a lot of variables on the table here,” she said.

  And every combination could provide her a bit of information she might not otherwise have.

  “Aye, Miss Daisy,” he said.

  “Hadrian said he thinks you’re hearing telemetry.” She looked Billy right in his bright, Burner eyes. “Is that correct, Mr. Barston? Are you hearing something that no one else has access to? Information that might help me make this cage correctly?”

  He frowned. “Why does the geezer think that?” He tilted his head as if listening to his Progenitor and his frown deepened. “Shut it, you miserable wanker.”

  “Mr. Barston?” she said.

  “He’s switched to English so that I know how tasty he finds you.” Billy’s lip twitched.

  “Mr. Schmidt needs to concentrate on his job,” Daisy said. Perhaps not seeing and hearing the Burner Progenitor was a blessing.

  Billy shifted his feet. “Poke don’t hurt, now,” he said. “It did going in but not as much as you would have expected.” He touched the tape-covered hilt. “It’s that sharp.”

  Daisy nodded to the duffle. “I have Stab over there, and George and Ringo.”

  Billy grinned. “The names stuck, huh?”

  Daisy grinned, too. “Rysa insisted. She’s determined to make sure the world knows about you. I am, too. Hadrian and Trajan know. We’ll make sure they treat your people like people, from here on out.”

  He opened his mouth, but slammed it shut. “You know nothing,” he hissed to his Progenitor.

  He leaned toward Brother-Dragon. “In his version of the future, both the beasts die.” He pointed at Daisy. “And you, Ms. Pavlovich.” His hand dropped to his side. “Everyone, really.”

  Daisy moved closer, but not too close. “You and I both know this is not the future he remembers.”

  Billy sniffed and stood up straight. “No lie there.” He touched Poke’s hilt again. “For one, he’s not vesselling inside the princess this time, so he can’t distract her with his bitchin’ and whinin’.”

  He twitched as if the Burner Progenitor lunged at Daisy.

  Brother-Dragon growled and placed his big forelimb between her and the Burner.

  Billy pointed at the beast. “Smart, that one,” he said. “Terry says they’re all smart. He says the people who survive need to be careful. He says the dragons raining down on us today are a step up from Special Forces. A lot of them are also doctors and engineers and scientists. And they’re all desperate.”

  She’d lived with the Dracae long enough to know that the dragons were practical beyond anything else, and practical people only invade if they’re desperate.

  “What else, Mr. Barston?”

  “He was in Europe when it started. The Progenitors, here in America, tried to close the Incursion. The reports said they had no idea what they were doing, or why it was they thought they could do it. He remembers meeting the princess after the fact. Other than that, he doesn’t know shit, miss.”

  Brother-Dragon shuffled. Ladon pulled out of the cockpit door and slowly made his way toward his beast’s head.

  “We’re over the line,” Ladon said. “Our pilot’s trying to get us far enough in so you have time to do what you need to do.”

  Billy lifted his chin. “I want you to know, Ladon-Human and Ladon-Dragon, that I will do my best to help Ms. Pavlovich and Ms. Torres.” He pointed at Daisy’s belly. “He’s going to do good things, that one.” Then he raised his chin to Ladon. “All the babes.”

  “Incoming!” the pilot yelled over their headsets. “Hold on!”

  Billy planted his feet and grabbed a second strap. Ladon also snagged a strap.

  Brother-Dragon snagged Daisy just as the copter banked.

  “Large ship coming in from due east,” the pilot said. “Reports are that they haven’t crossed the Mississippi yet except for the scouts lookin’ for your crew, so this one’s likely alone.”

  The invaders were methodical and, as Daisy suspected, practical about their invasion. They targeted the most populated areas of the planet first, and started over the eastern edge the widest landmass, to minimize time spent over the oceans. They dropped debris onto many of the cities, which they followed with one, maybe two, large, controlled landing ships full of hellhounds and soldiers.

  Chasing down the Dracae was not practical. If anything, it was emotional. Or they, too, understood the cyclical nature of these events and were trying to cut off the Legion before the Legion cut off the dragons’ entry point.

  “Mr. Barston,” Daisy said. “Once we are off, it’ll be you and me, got it?” They were about to land in a damned frozen wheat field.

  “I need to drop you lot here. That ship is closing fast and if I’m going to come back and pick you up, I need to get out of the way, yes?” Connor said.

  He wouldn’t be picking up anyone. “Connor,” she said. “Make sure Gavin knows I tried, okay? Make sure he knows I love him.”

  “I think ye need to have a talk with the pessimistic ladies, Ladon-Human, sir.” The comm buzzed for a second. “If need be, Ms. Pavlovich, I will deliver what needs deliverin’.”

  The copter lowered toward the frozen ground.

  Ladon touched Daisy’s shoulder as she picked up the duffle. “We have your back, little sister,” he said, and then tossed his headset and flung open the copter’s side door.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  The sun inched up over the eastern horizon. The approaching dropship glinted like a fast-moving star, a mirror-reflective piece of alien technology with a deeply non-alien intent: To take. To colonize and to control. To strip of resources. To make its own.

  To make the traitors pay.

  Rysa wiggled the optimizers and tucked the interface wire Dan-Addy used behind her ear. Connor McJanison lifted the copter into the air. He waved once, then pulled back on his stick. The warbird accelerated into the retreating night to ride out at a safe distance any concussive waves from the Incursion-closing bomb they were about to set off.

  Under Rysa’s feet, the “ley line” brightened and dimmed. The line itself was wide enough that if Ladon stood on one side and Dragon
at the other, the discomfort would pull them back together. It stretched for a good two miles southeast, with its leading edge currently out of sight.

  Its back edge appeared as a strong, obvious border in the optimizers, and was also far enough to the northwest that it was out of sight.

  They were right in the middle of their window of opportunity.

  They needed to stake out the location, set up the cage, and be ready when the Incursion moved directly overhead.

  And now, it seemed, to hold off more than hellhounds.

  Daisy unzipped the duffle and set it on the ground. Slowly and with deliberation, she placed the two daggers tip-to-tip, then Stab hilt-to-hilt at an angle to the daggers as if forming two sides of a triangle. The shard, she held in her hand.

  “Billy,” she said. “Stand here.” She pointed to the inside of the two-sided triangle.

  Terry swirled his arms like a toddler. “You ready to let me go, Sohn? Ready to lay down Poke to close the loop?” He pivoted out of Billy, then back.

  “Be quiet, troll,” Billy said.

  Terry tapped his chin. “Do I eat the Shifter first? Or the useless little bitch.” He lifted his hand to his eyes and clicked his teeth at Rysa.

  Billy slapped him. Literally swatted his hand through the air next to his own face as if he were trying to kill a mosquito. “This is our chance to make it work!” The slap didn’t do any good, but he did it again anyway. “You’re going to die either way, so stop being such a tosser and act the man for once in your pathetic, horrific, dumbfuck life, got it?”

  Terry hissed.

  On the horizon, the alien ship flickered like ice in the sunlight. Did the glinting ship have guns? Would they be shot from the air?

  They were in a war zone. Up until now, even with the conspiracies and the puzzles and the fights against new-space-using villains, even with hellhounds attacking the bus and the Incursion opening in the sky, it hadn’t really felt like a war.

  Rysa wasn’t on the front lines. Dmitri was. Trajan was. Every single military personnel and first responder on Earth was on the line. Officer Seaver. Hadrian, too. But not her.