He took a firm grip of the edge of the hatchway before leaning out to cast his gaze towards the rear of the aerostat. The pursuing drakes were spread out in a ragged, undulating line. Clay raised his carbine, using the miniature telescope on top to survey the drakes. They were mostly Reds but here and there he caught sight of a White, flying higher and faster than the others. He put the range at perhaps three hundred yards, which his cousin evidently took as a challenge.
From the rear hatch came the rapid thump of Loriabeth’s repeating rifle followed by the sight of a Red spiralling down from the pack, one of its wings flailing as it vainly tried to catch the air with the other. Her success, however, didn’t seem to deter the others and Clay soon gauged the intervening distance to have shrunk to under two hundred yards.
“Hold still, dammit,” he hissed, aiming the carbine one-handed at a White. He could see the animal’s hide through the scope, mottled and sickly like the others, but its wings were still strong and powerful enough to draw it closer with every beat. His first shot missed as the beast veered left, but his next two struck home on the White’s neck, producing two satisfying crimson plumes, although the animal barely seemed to slow. His subsequent attempts to put a bullet in its head proved fruitless as the White swung high and low, neck coiling as it seemed to discern his intent.
Clay cursed and withdrew from the hatch, casting about until he caught sight of Kriz’s bomb-throwing gun lying next to her pack. She held to the steering lever with both hands, maintaining a tight circular course around the still-trembling shaft.
“How much longer?” he asked, bending to retrieve the bomb-thrower.
“There’s no way to tell. A few minutes, perhaps.”
Clay studied the shaft for a second. The dust that bloomed from the opening was growing thicker all the time and chunks of masonry were cascading down its sides. He tore his gaze away and turned back to the hatch, pausing as she reached out to flip a brass switch on the bomb-thrower’s stock. “Safety catch,” she explained.
Poking his head outside, Clay found the White was no longer flying level with the aerostat. It had closed the distance to fifty yards and ascended, wings sweeping in mighty arcs before flaring and twisting its body in preparation for a dive that would bring it close enough to cast its flames at the gondola. The bomb-thrower bucked in Clay’s hands as he pulled the trigger, the bomb leaving a thin vapour trail through the air as it arced towards the White, passing within a few feet of its torso before exploding a good distance behind.
Although uninjured, the blast seemed to infuriate the White, its jaws opening to scream out a challenge as it folded its wings and began its dive. Clay fired again, the White twisting in the air to evade the projectile, streaking down like a huge pale arrow.
A burst of fire came from the rear hatch, Loriabeth unleashing a stream of bullets that lashed the White from neck to tail. It abandoned its dive, wings flaring and flames gouting from its mouth less than thirty yards away. At that range Clay couldn’t miss.
The bomb exploded in the White’s chest in a cloud of black smoke and vapourised flesh. Its wings folded up and it plummeted towards the earth, flames still pouring from its mouth.
“Well,” Clay said, fixing his gaze on the remaining mass of drakes. “That’s one.”
He could hear Sigoral’s carbine chattering from the other side of the gondola, meaning the drakes were attempting to assail them from both sides. The bulk of the pack was less than sixty yards off now, Reds weaving through the air to avoid Loriabeth’s bullets whilst the Whites flew above. Clay aimed for the densest part of the pack and fired off three bombs in quick succession, grunting in satisfaction at the trio of explosions that sent several Reds tumbling towards the ground. But still the rest came on.
“Clay!” Kriz called, her voice almost immediately drowned out by a loud roar, too vast and deep to be a drake’s cry. He swung himself back inside, finding Kriz staring at the shaft which now seemed to be wreathed in dust from summit to base.
“It’s happening,” she shouted above the roar, which he realised was the sound of the shaft breaking apart. “We need to close the hatches!”
He nodded, setting the bomb-thrower down and moving to the rear of the gondola. “Leave it, cuz,” he told a sweat-covered Loriabeth, teeth gritted as she unleashed another salvo at the encroaching drakes. She was so intent on her work he was obliged to clamp a hand on her shoulder and drag her back from the hatch. “Looks like we’re about to get out of here,” he explained in response to her aggrieved glare before turning to Sigoral. “Lieutenant, time for a cease-fire.”
Sigoral glanced over his shoulder, nodding as he lowered his carbine. The Red must have used the momentary distraction to latch onto the underside of the gondola, rearing up to thrust its head through the hatch just as Sigoral turned to face it. Clay dove forward as the beast’s jaw gaped wide. He caught the Corvantine about the waist, pulling him aside as flames cooked the air. Sigoral let out a scream as Clay bore him to the deck, high and childlike in the agony it conveyed, and mercifully swallowed by the rapid thud of Loriabeth’s repeating rifle. Clay looked up in time to see the headless Red tumbling free of the gondola before Kriz closed the hatches.
A fiery ache in Clay’s foot drew his gaze to the patch of flame eating at his boot and he spent several frantic seconds stamping it out. Looking up he saw Loriabeth clutching a writhing Sigoral, smoke rising from the ruined flesh around his right eye. Clay fumbled for his canteen of Green and held it to Sigoral’s mouth, forcing the liquid past his clenched teeth as he continued to struggle. He gradually calmed as the Green found its way down his throat, banishing much of his pain, a calm that was short-lived as Clay tipped the last of the canteen’s contents over his burns. Skaggerhill had once opined that Green could take the infection from burns but had only a marginal effect on the scars. Loriabeth held Sigoral tight as he thrashed, a torrent of what Clay assumed to be profanity issuing from his mouth in harsh Varsal.
“No way to talk in front of a lady, Lieutenant,” Loriabeth told him, continuing to hold on until the Corvantine’s shudders subsided.
Clay looked around, hearing a thunderous pounding assail the gondola’s hull. The drake were swarming the aerostat, Red after Red crowding the windows, clawing and biting to get at the meat inside.
Clay dragged his gaze away and helped Loriabeth get Sigoral into one of the seats, his cousin strapping him in before turning her attention to his wound. “Can you open it?” she asked, peering at the mottled flesh around his eye. Sigoral grunted and choked down on a scream as he forced his eyelids apart.
“Is . . . it there?” he rasped. “Can’t see . . . through it.”
“Looks whole,” Loriabeth said, sounding more confident than she looked. “Probably be fine in time. Just the glare of the flames.”
Clay left her to tend him and moved to the front of the gondola. “He’ll live,” he told Kriz.
She didn’t seem to hear, her gaze fixed on the shaft. The drakes hadn’t yet reached the front of the gondola and they had a clear view of the great structure’s final moments. The gondola appeared to be completely sealed so Clay watched the spectacle unfold in eerie silence. The whole structure gave a final shudder as a thick rain of shattered stone fell from above. Incredibly, it stayed upright for several seconds, swaying back and forth until another tremor sent it toppling over like the trunk of a giant, limbless tree, trailing dust as it fell. Clay moved closer to the window, watching the shaft slam down onto the mountains below, shattering along its length all the way to the shimmering flatness of the lake where it birthed two huge waves. Clay moved closer to the glass for a better look, fascinated by the sight of the waves sweeping across the distant shore, then reared back as a Red butted its head against the window.
The beast hissed at him, wings thumping in excitement as two of its companions landed close by.
“Don’t suppose this thing’s fire-pr
oof?” Clay asked Kriz. She seemed oblivious to the drakes, staring upwards at the dark void left by the fallen shaft.
“Actually, it’s flame-resistant,” she replied softly. “But I don’t think that will be an issue.”
There was no warning of what happened next, no gradually increasing trickle, just a sudden vast torrent of water descending out of the sky in a white blur. A blast of displaced air hit the aerostat as the torrent struck the ground, clearing the drakes from the windows as they took flight in alarm.
Clay stepped close to the glass once more, watching the deluge swamp the mountains below before flooding the foot-hills and the forests where the strange monkeys made their home. Soon it had all vanished, the mountains, the lake with its matrix of roads, the desert and the forest all submerged in a matter of minutes by an ever-rising tide.
“This is the way out?” Clay asked Kriz, hearing the half-hysterical humour in his voice, which felt at odds with the sudden calm he felt. It all seemed like some huge joke now; her promises of escape, their pointless trek through this place of wonder and terror. A prolonged piece of theatre so they could watch it drown, and them along with it.
Kriz turned to him with a weak, apologetic shrug. “I never said it would be easy.”
CHAPTER 49
Lizanne
The Blood Cadre agent descended through the smoke, blazing away with a revolver in his left hand. Lizanne had time to notice that his right arm was missing, presumably lost in the bombardment, before lashing out with Black to sweep him out of the sky. He landed amidst a ruined gun-position a short way off, struggled to his feet then fell dead as Kraz put three bullets into his chest.
“Loses an arm and keeps on fighting,” he said in reluctant admiration.
“They know what fate awaits them,” Jelna replied, voice rich in righteous fury. It was clear to Lizanne she had been looking forward to this day for a very long time. “Even a cornered rat will fight.”
They had charged through the ruined wall at blurring speed, wreaking havoc on the scratch force of Imperial soldiery hastily assembled to cover the breach. The lingering pall of dust and drifting gunsmoke soon made the whole enterprise an exercise in confusion and unseen threats. One of their number had already fallen to a stray bullet and another had been cut down by a wounded Blood Cadre agent. Despite being pinned by a fallen chunk of masonry the fellow managed to cast forth a torrent of Red-born fire. Kraz set the agent’s head alight with his own Red and they left him to burn.
Ten minutes of confused fighting brought them to the Blue Maze where they found numerous Household troops fleeing across the ornamental bridges, whilst others flailed in the canal waters having been thrust aside by the crush.
“If I were given to believing in the old gods,” Jelna said, depressing the first three buttons on her Spider, “I think I’d be offering thanks just now.”
She sprinted forward and leapt, ascending in a high arc over a series of bridges, casting a wave of Red and Black down at each one in turn. Kraz leapt to join in, moving deeper into the maze, flames and human wreckage rising in his wake. Men burned and were blasted away, bodies tumbling into the canals, which soon began to run red. Seeing Hyran start forward, grimly determined to take part in the unfolding massacre, Lizanne reached out to restrain him.
“Leave the slaughter to the mob,” she told him, casting a pointed glance over her shoulder at the vanguard of the People’s Freedom Army now streaming through the wall. “We have an objective.”
They refreshed their product and she led him on through the Blue Maze, leaping high to avoid the main concentrations of fleeing troops and cutting down only those who tried to bar their way. These stalwarts were few in number, mainly officers or veteran sergeants unwilling to shirk their duty even now. But the panic of the rank and file told an inescapable truth no amount of dutiful courage could deny; the Corvantine Empire would fall this day.
Having traversed the maze, they sprinted through the ring of ornate temples to long-dead Emperors, making for the central palace complex. There were fewer troops this far into the Sanctum, most of the people they encountered being courtiers and chamberlains. Some reacted with outright terror at the sight of them, whilst others could only stand and stare, either in shock or fatalistic acceptance. Spying a familiar face, Lizanne came to a halt, Hyran sliding to her side amidst a cloud of displaced gravel.
They had reached the Horse Parade where the Household Cavalry once staged their equine displays for the Emperor’s pleasure. It was mostly empty now save for a few fleeing courtiers and one rather plump man who stood still and straight-backed, sweat shining on his bald pate as he faced towards the fast-approaching rebel tide.
“Chamberlain Yervantis,” Lizanne greeted him with a bow of appropriate depth.
“Miss Lethridge,” he replied in a surprisingly well-modulated tone, meeting her gaze. She noted that his evident resolve was undermined slightly by the need to blink the sweat from his eyes.
“It would have been better if you had found somewhere else to be today,” Lizanne told him.
He inclined his head. “Logic with which I find it hard to argue, madam.”
“I take it then that you are prepared to survive the empire’s fall?”
His gaze flicked towards the temples where Kraz and Jelna were enthusiastically destroying a band of die-hard troops. “I wasn’t aware that might be a possibility.”
Lizanne stepped closer to him, looping her arm through his and guiding him towards the palace. “All things are possible in the new republic, good sir. For example, were you to tell me where I might find Countess Sefka it will transpire that you have been a Brotherhood agent for years now, as my young friend here will be happy to attest.”
• • •
Countess Sefka had secluded herself on an artificial island in the centre of the Sanctum’s broad ornamental lake. Lizanne recalled strolling the lake-side with poor, deluded Emperor Caranis not so long ago and couldn’t suppress a pang of amused regret at the man’s inventive insanity. Sethamet’s Bane, she thought, judging the distance from the shore to the island. Returned to seek justice for the Guardians’ murdered servant. If he had lived he might actually have been useful.
“Surely it’s too far to jump,” Hyran said. “Even for you.”
She nodded and started to wade into the water. “Take Chamberlain Yervantis to the general,” she told Hyran, waving him back when he attempted to follow her. “I’m sure he has a wealth of intelligence to share.”
“But the countess . . .”
“Leave her to me.” Her voice held a note of implacable command that stopped him dead and she held his gaze until he retreated from the edge of the lake. “I’ll find you later,” she said, softening her tone and trying to quell the rising guilt at the trust she saw in his face. The task she had to perform here would not be easy.
It took a few minutes to swim to the island, a half-second burst of Green making it an easy matter. The island took the form of a domed temple of ancient design and was fashioned entirely from white marble. Various scenes from Corvantine history and legend were etched into the stone and Lizanne considered she would have found it a fascinating place on another occasion. Today she found the ostentatiousness of it somewhat aggravating, another example of how the Corvantine ruling class had indulged themselves whilst their beggared people grew to hate them more with every passing year.
She levered herself out of the water and onto the island’s flat outer surface, eyes scanning for enemies even though Yervantis had assured her the countess was unguarded. “Every Cadre agent in the Sanctum was dismissed this morning,” the portly chamberlain explained. “She just . . . sent them all away.”
Lizanne’s gaze settled on a slim figure seated on a plain marble bench beneath the temple dome. Countess Sefka failed to turn as Lizanne approached, even though she made no effort to conceal the sound of her steps. Fight, she thought,
coming to a halt directly behind the soon-to-be-deposed head of the Regency Council. Fight me, you bitch!
“This must be a great day for you,” Countess Sefka said, failing to turn as Lizanne lingered at her back. Her tone was much as Lizanne remembered it, full of strident surety and uncoloured by the fear she had hoped for.
“Actually,” Lizanne replied, “I find it a singular disappointment.”
Sefka’s slim shoulders moved in a shrug. “Oh well. I had hoped to hear a few choice declarations. A final jibe or two. Were our positions reversed I assure you I would have rehearsed a speech.”
“You are not me. And I, much to my lasting pleasure, am not you.”
“No. I tried to save an empire, whilst you destroyed one.”
“That was never my mission.” Lizanne stepped closer, eyes fixed on the countess’s neck beneath her tied-up auburn hair. The skin was bare and unadorned, the so very fragile bones visible beneath the alabaster skin. “I should like to know,” she said, “did you kill Emperor Caranis yourself or leave it to one of your creatures?”
Sefka’s head moved in a small laugh. “Neither. He was certainly becoming more mad by the day, but I lacked the support needed for a successful coup. The Blood Imperial, however, decided to precipitate matters. The Emperor had resolved to kill him, you see, and all his precious Blood-blessed children. Apparently Caranis got wind of the silly old bastard’s plan to assassinate you upon your return from Scorazin. How was it, incidentally?”
“Improved immeasurably by its destruction.”
“I expect so. Anyway, it seems Kalasin was very keen to get his grubby hands on whatever you had dug out of that dung-heap. Caranis couldn’t risk any harm to Sethamet’s Bane, nor any revenge from the Blood Cadre. So he signed the purge order and went off for his nightly bath where the agent Kalasin had concealed in the ceiling stopped his heart with a gentle application of Black.”
“If you know all this why wasn’t Kalasin executed?”