“Amaranth!” Cyan yelled, motioning with his Sharded axe of pure aether, “take the left. Harlequin, the right. Protect the Forgemistress’ creations!”
Amaranth the Pure nodded, as did the fire-haired Harlequin the Bloodless. People filed around the three vicars as they confronted the scourges, bringing the Arbiter’s fight to the sycophants of the Dark God. Their double-bladed axes sang the Hymn of War.
“Sister-friends!” Cyan screamed, his wispy, yet hardened aetheric axe connected with a scourge’s face, leaving a bloody mess as the scourge’s skull rent in twain. “Now is the time for Justice to guide us!” Cyan the Defiant grunted as he tossed the scourge away, calling upon his Shard Form. A hiss of canistered mist, aetheurgy coming to life. “For the Arbiter!”
The crowd cowered, ran from the fighting vicars and scourges, turning whichever direction they could. Ashe was carried along with them, in no dire need to meet up with Cyan again.
She made it all the way to the entrance of the gondolas when her body abruptly stopped, frozen in place. Urging her legs to move, they resisted. People tried shoving her forward, but she didn’t budge an inch. Frustrated, the people moved past her statuesque form.
“What in the void?” She looked up toward the moon as if that great pale orb would give her clarity. It didn’t.
Turning about, she headed back toward the mezzanine, her legs happily complying with the change in direction.
“How did I even get myself into this mess?” She shook her head as she shoved a burly man out of her way. “Move it.”
To say she was growing angry again was an understatement. She was livid. The mist trailed up her legs, trying its godsdamnedest to soothe her, but it was not working. She had no other choice, it seemed. She had to find that godsdamned Seal.
To do that, she needed to find her way into the Fallen’s hideout.
Before she was able to break the wall of people and reach the compound, an elbow caught her in the face, knocking her to the ground near the base of one of the spires buttressing the compound. Blood drained from her nose as she fought at the legs threatening to stomp on her. People cried out as she kicked. The mist swarmed around her, trying to protect her. She pulled on it as she pawed her wet hair from her eyes.
“Shit!” she screamed as a boot came down on her knee, bone popping in a snap.
Ashe instinctively sucked in the mist and pitched up her hands. Like the vicars using their mist canisters, she let loose. Like she had done all her life, but this time was accompanied by a scream so vicious, so angry, so full of soul.
The ground rumbled underneath her, the very fortress trembling, this time from her aetheurgy, not the bombs trying to blow it from the sky. A piercing whistle rose in pitch, becoming a wail as Ashe screamed. The mist swirling around her turned black as Nocturne’s Pit, her yell and godsdamned power growing. The aether ripped through her body.
Hands pointed, eyes closed, the mist exploded from her. The people close by snapped backward violently, crashing into others. The sounds of tearing flesh and broken bones strong. Blood fell like a monsoon.
Realizing what she had just done, Ashe clamped her mouth shut, cutting off the aether-filled scream. Guilt washed over her. Shit and double shit!
Her knee nearly buckled when she tried to stand. She coughed bloodier tarry. But the crowd left her alone, backed away from her warily as she crawled toward the spire’s gated entrance. Voices yelled for the people to move back, and the scourges stepped into the crowd, swinging their weapons and firing shots into the air, some retreated while others fell dead on the paved stones.
Ashe’s strength waned as she put her hand to the gate of the spire to hold her up. Pushing it open, she dragged herself inside and closed it behind her as she slumped to her knees. She lifted her head warily when she heard footsteps approaching. A man, heavyset, thick of beard and bald of pate crouched down level with her.
“Elian?”
He smiled at her, lopsided and sinister. He motioned with his fat fingers, a strike against the side of her head. And then she drifted into darkness.
XL
Lojen
“WE WERE SUPPOSED to meet the others at the rendezvous point.”
Both drakken and lapin descended down a servant stair, Wick in the lead. Lojen was haplessly lost, this route not the one Emre had planned for his escape.
“The plan has to change.” Wick’s shredded ears bounced as they hustled down the winding stair.
“You know where we’re goin’?”
“Hsst.” The lapin peered around the corner, his whiskers twitching as he sniffed. Lojen couldn’t smell anything, but that’s because he was breathing heavily, his tongue lolling like a mastiff after hare coursing.
The fight with the automaton had sapped him of his strength. He’d never been in a fight to the death like that and his heart argued with his ribcage in a vicious back-and-forth about staying contained.
Part of him was elated with his actions, he’d won, after all. In his first true battle, Lojen Tevunson had gone up against a formidable foe and triumphed. A wardkeeper was nothing if not a victorious fighter. But the other half of him was critical. Fear had nearly been the death of him, it had almost crippled his thinking. True, he had overcome that fear within a matter of heartbeats, but still it ate at him for being there in the first place.
But he’d almost allowed the beast within to come free. His father had once told him that every wardkeeper had two sides to themselves: the draconem chosen by the Arbiter and the beast. The draconem was the civilized half, the reasoner, the schemer, and strategist. The fearless mind, the ferocious heart. All meant to guide and guard a ward. While the beast was the baser foundation, the animal. The source of nature, unpredictable, and volatile.
He could hear his father’s words, ‘Beware the beast, for unleashed, it will rampage untamed. There is strength in the beast, a power only the Pentax Themselves can tap. But if you cannot chain the beast, you will be lost forever. The capability of the draconem will render unto nothingness, leaving only the beast inside.’
Lojen had felt that power radiate within during the fight, it was addictive, and yet, he feared to even go near it again.
“Clear,” Wick said.
They were in the lowest level of the compound now. Gone were the white hallways, the polished concrete. Gone were the smells of the kitchen. Gone were the sounds of soldiering boots plodding through the warren of corridors. Deep in the innerbelly of Gargantua, they were within rough-hewn stone tunnels. Ground underfoot worn, but uneven. Aethecite orbs glowed dimly, attached to heavy piping.
He briefly thought of Ruane, hoping his sister had a better run of it than he did. Be safe, Ru… “Where’re we going?”
“Gargantua can house an entire contingent of airgliders and soldier transports. This is how they were able to attack Dervin in such deadly force without having to rely on their cannons. Like locusts, they can send troops aflight, landing with ease. But they also have airgliders ready in case of an emergency. When Emre blew the tethers, the guests would all be taken to the gondolas, and from there, to the main glider transports. All will have left by now.”
Though it was subtle, Lojen could feel the slight sway of Gargantua, struggling to stay centered on the two remaining anchors. Mostly he could see it from the way the lights moved, their shadows growing and fading as the entire fortress gently rocked.
Wick slowed, putting his paw-like hand up to stop Lojen. “Wait, I think I hear something.”
Absently, Lojen’s taloned claw went to the pack with his father’s horns, tracing the keratin curve within the sack. He felt a sudden urge to pull them free, to gaze upon the glory that was a wardkeeper’s horns. A stirring in his ribs, in his heart. A yearning need.
