Havemercy Page 44

  It was like everyone was holding his breath. Waiting. Watching. That sound tore through us all; even the wind seemed to die down. And there was Spiridon, like someone’d loaded her into a catapult, slamming right through the gales like they meant no more to her than smoke.

  Something moved past me on my right, and I thought it was debris or something caught up in the wind before I saw the flash of copper and silver, and I realized it was Thoushalt, with Al Atan swift on her tail. Both our other Jacquelines at once rising up on either side of Spiridon, more beautiful than anything but Have, and Adamo shouting himself hoarse from somewhere behind me, like there was any control left to be had now.

  I saw them break past the wall of wind—saw Thoushalt switch her tack without warning, which must’ve meant Ace had seen the blue dome. He had better eyes than the other two. It was why he came second on the board. Spiridon came after her, and Al Atan pulled even, like it’d been their secret plan all along. Have screamed and I couldn’t hear anything above that, though I’d like to think, just then, the boys were screaming too, only theirs sounding like triumph.

  Then Al Atan started howling fire, just seconds before the three of them hit the dome right smack in the middle. A split hair of a second past that, the winds dropped, and so did the rest of us. Into the moment’s silence spilled the sound of the explosion that followed just on the heels of our boys’ descent.

  No way man or metal could survive that.

  That was about the time all dragons started their wailing, and they twisted free of us, following Ace, or Compagnon or Jeannot and their girls down upon the buildings below.

  Like hell, I thought, were they going to get all the glory for themselves.

  “Ready,” Have said, just like old times. Just like she could read my mind, and like hers wasn’t even more scrambled than breakfast.

  The wind howled in our ears as we descended, shooting straight down to the remains of the dome, where flames were belching and walls were collapsing, and somewhere beneath the louder noises I thought I could hear the Ke-Han wizards screaming, or burning, or both. The air stank. We flew straight in, everything so hot I could almost feel my skin peeling. It was just like flying straight into the sun.

  Can’t say for sure what anyone in the lapis city was thinking right about then. The fire gods were wreaking vengeance on their heads, circling haphazard and reckless over the round roofs, raining smoke and burning gasoline down onto the wreckage. The dome was shattered—burning—and, because this was where the sun rose, I saw dawn begin to stain the sky, pink as a lady’s thighs.

  I screamed as Have brought us down too close—not for fear but for the pulsing heat of it. We poured fire into the crack in the magicians’ dome; beside us, Compassus turned a flip too smooth for her size to tear away a piece of its wall with her tail. Proudmouth was there too, doing the same thing on the other side, and just behind the bigs were the fire-belchers on either side, coming up along the holes Compassus and Proudmouth had torn for them and spewing fire straight inside.

  The whole building had gone from Ke-Han blue to Volstov red in no more than a minute. Maybe less.

  Then something came whistling past me and Have, something pretty damn big, and we almost didn’t duck it soon enough. Catapults, I figured, lobbing huge rocks at us to bring us down. The Ke-Han weren’t stupid—they’d proven that much already—and of course they had a defense plan. Normally they weren’t a problem, but caught limping the way we were, even trebuchets were a real threat.

  They all started coming like the mountains themselves were exploding toward us. Like as not, they were going to hit some of us, and the rocks they were slinging were big enough to take us down.

  I saw one of the boulders go hurtling toward Proudmouth’s back—she couldn’t see it, not to mention she was too big to get out of the way quick enough—but we needed the bigs for sheer force. I was too far away to get between the speeding rock and Proudmouth’s back legs when Luvander streaked into place on Yesfir, got caught smack in the side, and went down all at once, rock and man and dragon together.

  It was panic in the skies because the skies had been brought down too low. All I knew was that I couldn’t pay attention to the others and set to ducking the catapult fire even as Have twisted and struggled against my commands.

  All I could hear, all I could smell, was fire.

  I brought my girl away from it, from where we were making a real mess of the dome, vomiting fire on everything that moved and ripping out chunks of whatever was left of the walls with Have’s tail. What we really needed now was to take down those whoresons manning the catapults.

  They were positioned on the outer reaches of the city, which wasn’t hard to figure, that being the most strategic place to have them. Have took down a pagoda with her tail as we raced too low overhead, and we had to duck a fucking shower of debris as it rained down on us from above, one of the catapults spotting our progress. We twisted around the one that’d fired on us—Have wasn’t big enough to smash through it like one of the crushers might’ve—but then she threw herself at the tower of wood and knocked it off center. I felt one of my molars crack against the impact, but the catapult went down.

  That’s my girl, I thought. There was no one in the whole world like her.

  We headed for another of the catapults, and Have nearly tore her wing in half to get the second down same as she’d done for the first. There was blood in my mouth and smoke streaking my goggles so bad I could hardly see—but I could hear, and there was a crash nearby, too close to be any of the fighting going down in the center of the city, where most of the action was taking place. I brushed the smoke from the lenses of my goggles and saw Chastity and Magoughin to the left of me, doing a better job with the catapults than I ever could.

  I whooped it up, though I didn’t think Magoughin could hear me, and set my girl to the next one.

  We had about half of them down when Chastity arched sudden and painful, and I saw the catapult she was wrangling go down on top of her.

  We were out two Jacquelines, two of our fucking bigs, and one of the swifts, and who knew what else since I’d stopped paying attention. I was so fierce and shaking with rage that Have must have picked up on it, which I guessed was why she turned about quick as a gasp and had us headed back into the city, where our boys were making their last stand.

  It was a fucking nightmare, everything on fire no matter where you looked, and scraps of torn-up metal shimmering on the ground as the flames heated it shapeless.

  I couldn’t think about that kind of stuff, couldn’t listen to the screech and groan of what dragons had already been brought down when I was flying, but the sound of it was what brought Havemercy up short, and that was when the boulder got us by the tail, sent us into a spin, and brought us down.

  The impact broke some ribs, I was fucking sure of it. It was a good thing we landed the way we did, or else it would’ve broken both my legs, and I needed those for running and otherwise putting myself to good use before I was through. It was tough work to untangle my wrists from the harnesses, especially while Have was twisting her head back and forth like she was in agony, and in the end I had to cut myself free with one of my knives.

  Growing up the way I did, I always kept my knives with me, even when I was flying. There were two of them, prettier than the ones I’d had when I was a kid and dirt poor on top of that, and their blades were real sharp. They’d come in handy now, since there were plenty of Ke- Han warriors on the scene—some trying to douse the fire, some aiming arrows at the men still left flying.

  I could see Compassus sweeping low, her shadow like an omen as it passed above us—I heard Ghislain screaming, then I saw him actually picking Luvander up; was he out of his mind? Anastasia was practically falling out of the air—I didn’t know where the fuck Adamo was; there were too few shadows overhead. Even Have was down for good.

  I twisted myself around with a snarl and a grin, knives held for fighting the way I knew almost as well as I knew
flying. I couldn’t take on a whole city by myself—sooner or later, they’d bring me down—but before me was the dawn. It was the same dawn that would rise over the mountains between me and Volstov, the same dawn that would bring the news of what had happened here to Thremedon.

  Inside that city, my city—somewhere—sleeping or not sleeping, crying or not crying—doing bastion only knew what with himself—was my brother. I knew sure as that same dawn that I loved him, same way as how the blood was flowing too fast for lying to myself. I was fighting now, and I was fighting for him alongside of revenge.

  A Ke-Han warrior came at me with one of them long, flat Ke-Han blades, and I met him head-on, screaming his own war cry right back in his face.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  ROYSTON

  Hal was holding my pocket watch with white fingers and staring at it when I lost consciousness, so in fact I knew the exact moment it happened, down to the very second.

  It was three past seven in the morning when I collapsed, and forty-eight past when I came around afterward, Hal looming above me, one hand against my chest while the other still clung to my pocket watch.

  “What time is it?” I demanded.

  In retrospect, it wasn’t the most sensible thing to say, but there must have been something in the sound of my voice that gave Hal hope, for his whole face lit up.

  “Forty-eight past seven,” he replied, not letting me go.

  “How long was I out?” I asked.

  “Forty-five minutes exactly,” Hal replied. “ Royston, you sound—”

  “As though fever has no longer made water out of my brain?” I offered. I blinked my eyes a few times to clear them completely and took stock of my surroundings. I wasn’t in a room I recognized—it was far too ornate to be my own home, the ceiling decorated like a midday sky blushed with pale cloud wisps—and I appeared to be lying upon all of Volstov’s most uncomfortable couch. I had no idea how I’d come to be here, much less where “here” was, though I was sure knowledge of the latter might inform me as to the former. “Hal,” I added, momentarily tentative. “Where in bastion’s name am I?”

  “Oh,” Hal said. “This is one of the Esar’s sitting rooms.”

  I thought about it. No, I decided at last; I needed more help than that. “And—why exactly am I here?” I asked.

  Worry damped down the light in Hal’s eyes. “Have you forgotten everything?” he asked, and I saw his fingers tremble.

  “Hardly everything,” I replied, covering his shaking hand with one of my own. I was stiff and sore all over, the reason for which I was certain I knew—only I couldn’t quite remember it. “I’m aware of my own name. And yours, as you may have noticed.”

  “Yes,” Hal said. There were dark circles under his eyes. “Yes, of course. Only we were waiting here—the Esar said we might—and you were very ill, then you collapsed completely this morning. I’m—I haven’t slept.”

  “Forgive me,” I said, and meant it sincerely.

  “For making me think I would lose you?” Hal asked, fingers tightening against the front of my shirt. “No. I don’t think so.” He drew in a steadying breath. “To answer your question,” he went on, voice calmer, “we’ve been here since yesterday afternoon, when you demanded an audience with the Esar and—I assume because you were so loud about it—you secured us one.”

  I began to remember, or thought I did. It was still somewhat difficult to decipher. “Ah yes,” I said, more confident than I felt. “And then we . . .”

  “And then we explained our theory to him,” Hal said. “Or, I did. And whenever he threatened not to listen, you began to scream again.”

  “How clever of me,” I replied.

  “I thought so,” Hal agreed. “At least, it seemed to work.”

  “And then?” I prompted.

  “And then,” Hal continued, “when the Esar had listened to our full solution, he called for the Dragon Corps. They all flew out, even though they were suffering something the same as the magicians. I hope—” Hal broke off, and looked up at the ceiling. “Only they haven’t returned,” he finished gravely. “None of them. They’ve been gone a long time.”

  “Bastion,” I swore, memory flooding back to me all at once. “But if I’m better—”

  “Then presumably it means they managed to take down the Ke-Han magicians,” Hal replied. “All of them. If our theory was correct.”

  I passed a hand over my eyes and swallowed, the full impact of our actions settling as a deadweight tied to my heart. “We’ve been very busy,” I said. “You haven’t slept.”

  “If I look even half as tired as I feel,” Hal admitted, “then it must be a very unpleasant sight to get well to.”

  “You look terrible,” I said, ruthlessly honest. “That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t prefer seeing you to anything else.”

  I would have expected him to be too tired even to blush, but the familiar pink color touched his cheeks, and I felt properly aware of him for the first in a long time.

  “Well,” he said. “I feel as though I’m liable to collapse at any moment, just so that you know.” Then, presumably having used up the last of his stamina to explain the situation, he leaned his head against my chest where I knew he would fall asleep if I let him. “I am glad you’re all right. I thought maybe—when the others started fading away so quickly—I could barely keep track of how many had died, were still dying—”

  “You need to sleep,” I told him, and wrapped my arms close about him even while knowing perfectly well that this would not be the place for managing sleep. The Esar’s couches might have been designed for a great many things, but neither rest nor comfort was one of them.

  There were other forms of comfort though, and Hal had been awake and worried for a very long time.

  “I know,” he said, voice heavy and warm. I could practically hear the drowsiness in his voice rising up to claim him. “I will. It’s just—We were so busy.”

  “And we’ve accomplished something quite unheard of,” I reassured him. “You’ve not even been in Thremedon a quarter of the year and already you’re saving the city.”

  He made a self-deprecating noise in his throat, but didn’t protest any louder than that, and so I knew he was likely settling to sleep. Despite the unforgiving architecture of the couch, and the entrenched stiffness in my joints, I thought that I could be quite pleased to lie here and enjoy Hal’s repose.

  Then the door opened. The Provost wasn’t a man prone to kicking down doors—as, after all, he had people to do that for him—and only directly involved himself in matters that required a touch of finesse, or those that were critically important to the security of the city. This—judging by what Hal had told me—had to be the latter.

  “Margrave Royston,” he said, sounding decidedly more flustered than he had the last time we’d spoken. “By decree of His Majesty the Esar, I am to inform you that your company is to be deployed within the hour, and he expects you to be punctual.”

  For a moment, I had to admit I was dumbfounded. Against me, Hal stirred, then sat up, rubbing sleep from his eyes with a sheer stubbornness he rarely displayed.

  I felt sure that the groaning in my muscles wasn’t only in my head. As I sat up, it seemed impossible that the sound wasn’t loud enough to echo off the Esar’s outlandishly decorated walls.

  “Talk sense, Dmitri,” I said, perhaps more curt than one could afford to be with the Provost of the city, but then I’d never had much good common sense to speak of.

  The Provost folded his arms as though he were dealing with an obstinate child, and when he spoke again his voice had lost its gilded edge. “The army’s moving out. Today. The Ke-Han city’s in flames over there, and no one knows what’s happened to the dragons, but we’ve got to leave now if we want to get there in time enough to make a difference. If we want to hit them hard enough that maybe this time they really won’t get back up again. And,” he added, after a pause, “we’ve got to get the dragons out.”

  “No,”
said Hal. He spoke quietly, as if he’d only been thinking it and hadn’t really meant to utter it aloud. “You can’t—You’ve only just got well again. What if—No.”

  “Hal,” I said. “Everyone who’s well again will be heading out to fight. I cannot linger.”

  His eyes were more gray than blue as he considered this, then he leaned up to kiss me with a suddenness that made something in my chest burst open like the seedpods William had collected in the country. I took his face in mine and—though this wasn’t to be any kind of a farewell—took my leave from a loved one the way countless soldiers had throughout history. Hal murmured in surprise, at my sudden capitulation no doubt, and he lifted his fingers to touch my throat.

  We were interrupted by the sound of the Provost scuffing his boots uncomfortably against the carpet, and Hal pulled away with his cheeks burning fiercely. I myself felt no remorse over our actions. It was as though all the most sensible parts of me had been burned out by the fever.

  I couldn’t bring myself to regret it.

  “Well,” I said. “It would seem you’ve made your informed decision.”

  “I don’t want you to go,” said Hal, and even though he couldn’t bring himself to smile, his expression was lit with a fire that flared beneath his evident exhaustion.

  “I must,” I said, feeling suddenly wretched that there was no real comfort that I could offer him.

  “If I’ve heard correctly,” said the Provost suddenly, buoyed by impatience or discomfort or both, “there isn’t much left of the lapis city. Not to say that them as are there won’t be fighting hard as first-time convicts, but,” he paused, as though examining the wisdom of his reassurance, then seemed to think the better of it. “Well, you never know.”

  I felt an odd sense of gratitude at the effort he’d made, however misplaced. The city had indeed been turned on its head if I was feeling a grudging sort of appreciation for the Provost. I nodded and stood.