Forged in Blood II (16 page)

As if to remind her of the fact, someone fired in their direction. She ducked her head. The rifle ball skimmed across the snow six inches to her right and ricocheted off the hull. She didn’t know where it went, but heard it whistle by her ear. Far too close for her tastes.

“Cover, where?” Amaranthe tried to wriggle deeper into the snow. “There aren’t any trees left around—there isn’t any anything left around.”

“Uhm—oh, those’ll be frozen solid.”

Without rising from his stomach, Maldynado grabbed one of the corpses and dragged it toward them. Amaranthe couldn’t squelch her grimace—or her squeamish repulsion at the idea of using dead human beings for cover.

Less squeamish, Maldynado did the work, piling the three corpses up in front of them. Before he’d finished, a rifle ball slammed into one, proving his words true. Frozen solid, indeed.

“Gruesome, but effective,” Maldynado said.

“I’ll say. All we’ve bought ourselves is a stand-off though. Those people probably brought tons of ammo to lay siege to the ship.”

“I could thump them all into the nearest snow drift if I could make it over there without being shot.” Maldynado pounded a fist into his gloved hand for emphasis.

He probably
could
if given the opportunity to hurl himself into the middle of the pack.

“So you need a distraction,” Amaranthe mused. “Where’d that cube go?”

Maldynado pointed far to their left, toward a couple of trees by the lake with the tops shorn off. “It’s been incinerating the fallen needles, one at a time, around the base of that pine.”

“Its job
is
to clean things, I understand.”

“If we could arrange to lob a few tons of pine needles over to land on top of that cannon, it might drift over and pay those blokes a visit.”

“Unfortunately, I forgot to pack my pine-needle-launcher,” Amaranthe said.

“Mercenary leaders are supposed to be prepared for anything, you know.”

“I’m failing on all sorts of levels lately.” Amaranthe flicked a finger toward the cube. “I wonder if it’d get annoyed and come visit if you shot it.”

“I’d think that would be a given, but why would you
want
it to visit?”

“I wouldn’t, but maybe we could convince our enemies to shoot it.”

“Uh, yes, and how do you plan to do that?”

“I noticed that the curving hull of the
Behemoth
causes projectiles to ricochet off at an angle,” Amaranthe said. “In fact, that first cannonball landed not far from where the cube is now.”

Maldynado stared at her. “You’re not thinking…”

“It couldn’t hurt to try. If one of their bullets comes anywhere close, and the cube notices, maybe it’ll drift over there and say hello to them.”

A long moment passed with Maldynado staring at her before he said, “There are times like this when I wish I’d gone to the military academy and joined the army.”

“Why?”

“Because there’s a soldier axiom about not sharing a foxhole with anyone crazier than yourself. If I’d actually joined, I’d be able to quote it precisely. That would be apt right now.”

“Ha ha.” Amaranthe considered the curving hull again, then pushed up to her hands and knees. “Don’t worry. I think we need the bullet to strike a few meters in that direction if there’s hope for it to land anywhere close to the cube. I won’t draw fire to our foxhole, such as it is.”

“I don’t want you to draw fire at all.” Maldynado reached for her.

Amaranthe sprang away from him—she didn’t want his protectiveness to convince him to volunteer for the drawing-fire assignment. Utter foolery shouldn’t be delegated; one should take the risk and accept the consequences oneself.

“Wait,” Maldynado blurted as she ran from cover. “They’ve got the brand. They’re going to light the—”

A cacophonous boom tore across the field, and Amaranthe flung herself into the snow. The cannonball didn’t come anywhere close to hitting her—it wasn’t a weapon meant to fire at a moving target—but it startled all the needles off her branches. Instead of landing in a controlled roll, she face-planted in the snow as the cannonball clanged off the hull. The reverberations thundering against her eardrums made her feel like the clapper in a clock tower bell.

Ignoring her pulsing eardrums, she jerked her head up, trying to see where the ball landed. It’d already struck its target. The tree next to the one the cube had been working around wobbled, then fell to the snow.

The cube, lacking any animal instincts, didn’t draw back with a start, but its beam did wink out, and it paused, hovering in place.

A hand clamped around Amaranthe’s ankle. “Get back here, you fool woman,” Maldynado growled, hauling her back to the barrier of bodies.

The action sent a barrage of snow down her trousers and she would have cursed his ancestors if she could manage anything so coherent. As soon as he let her go, she scraped handfuls of the cold stuff out of her undergarments. “Not calling me ‘boss,’ anymore?”

“Not when you—emperor’s teeth, Amaranthe, it’s just as likely to think the attack came from here.”

She’d thought of that and pointed toward the hull overhead. “We can flee inside if it heads this direction.”

She lifted her head to see if it was going to head anywhere at all. It’d left its position by the pine tree, and it took her a moment to find it. The dark form was floating across the snow, not toward them but toward the cannon and clump of men around it.

Amaranthe refrained from a triumphant fist pump and a chortle, instead extending her arm, palm up toward the cube, as if showing off a particularly fine dish she’d delivered to the table.

“I see it,” Maldynado grumbled. “That doesn’t make you any less crazy.”

No, probably not, Amaranthe thought, wondering if she’d take such risks if she weren’t feeling like she herself deserved to die after all the carnage she’d wrought. Nonetheless, she took satisfaction in the startled cries and curses from the cannon men. The two soldiers took advantage of their distraction, firing fresh rounds into their midst. Maldynado had reloaded, and he fired again as well. A yelp of pain announced someone’s shot finding flesh.

Then the cube had closed sufficiently, and its red beam lanced out. It struck the iron barrel of the cannon. Amaranthe expected shards to blow off, but the intense heat melted the metal on the spot.

The men stumbled backward, their clothing and features illuminated by the beam. Not soldiers, Amaranthe verified from their unshaven faces and longish hair, though she’d already guessed as much.

Torn between fleeing and needing to avoid being shot, the men tried to crawl away on their stomachs. She hadn’t thought anyone over there had had time to reload the cannon, but the cube’s beam found black powder somewhere. An explosion rang across the field, hurling smoke and shrapnel into the air.

Amaranthe and Maldynado ducked low behind their barrier, but not before she glimpsed the men abandoning their crawl. They leaped to their feet and sprinted across the field, impressively fast given their lack of snowshoes.

When the rain of shrapnel abated, Maldynado rose to his feet. “Huh.”

“Don’t overwhelm me with your enthusiastic approval.” Amaranthe stood as well, still trying to scoop and shake snow from her trousers.

“No, I don’t think I will.” Maldynado bent a knee toward her and laced his fingers again. “Come on, let’s jump in there before that cube grows bored with disintegrating the cannon and comes to visit us.”

Though she, too, wanted to catch up with the others—she hadn’t heard a peep from inside and had no idea what was going on—Amaranthe lifted a finger. “Wait, we need to check on the soldiers we stayed behind to help. After all, they helped
us
with that initial warning.”

One of those soldiers was already running in her direction.

“The professor,” he blurted, glancing around. “Where’d she go? Is she all right? And her daughter?”

“Inside.” Amaranthe pointed up. She couldn’t answer the second and third question yet. She decided not to feel disgruntled that these men were far more concerned about Starcrest’s family than her and Maldynado. The soldiers had traveled across the continent to help Starcrest, after all.

“That thing is…” The man stared up at the hull, doubtlessly having a hard time imagining a door up there, but he had to have seen at least part of their group scramble through it. “Unbelievable.”

“Among other things, yes,” Amaranthe said. “Where’s your comrade?”

Not dead, she hoped. Not another one….

The soldier’s chin jerked down. “Shot. In the leg. I need to take him to…” He looked bleakly at where Fort Urgot
should
have been. “Back to the city. To a doctor. He’s bleeding a
lot
.”

“Take him to the submarine. It’s not nearly as far to drag him, and I bet Tikaya’s nephew has some first aid gear in there.” Amaranthe had bandages in her own pack, but she didn’t want to delay—she wanted to find out what was going on inside. For all she knew, Basilard needed first aid right that second. Besides, the soldiers ought to have the same gear as she had.

“Yes, right,” the man said, “but what about…” He waved toward the hidden entrance.

“We’ll take care of them.”

The soldier hesitated, glancing back and forth from his fallen comrade to the ship.

“Krater?” his comrade called. “Hurry up, I’m bleeding all over the slagging field.”

That made up his mind. He nodded once. “Understood. I’ll tell the others. Good luck, ma’am.”

Ma’am? She’d apparently been promoted to an actual person, thanks to their shared battle.

“Here.” Maldynado, back on one knee again, shook his hands. Yes, he was as worried about Basilard and the others as she.

Amaranthe stepped into his hands, and he boosted her up. She scrambled through the membrane and found herself in a dark tunnel. Dark? Odd, the ship had always been illuminated when she’d been inside, every tunnel, ramp, and chamber brightened to daylight intensity.

A scrape and grunt sounded behind her. Amaranthe turned to see if Maldynado needed help, but he’d jumped high enough to catch the ledge on his own. The snowy field lay visible behind him, as if this were a window instead of some hidden door.

“Do you have the lantern?” Amaranthe asked. The others weren’t visible anywhere. She thought about calling out, but decided to wait. Just because those would-be relic raiders with the cannon hadn’t found a way in didn’t mean other enemies weren’t about in the tunnels.

“Yes, one moment.”

After a few clanks and thumps, a match flared to light, illuminating Maldynado’s face. The grim expression didn’t match the foppish nest-of-snakes hat he’d managed to keep on his head through everything.

He lit a lantern and held it aloft.

A long black tunnel stretched out ahead of them, an intersection visible at the edge of the light. There wasn’t a sign of anyone else.

T
wo hours before dawn, Sicarius glided through Flintcrest’s new camp, following paths freshly tramped into the snow, his feet soundless on the hard crust. None of the perimeter guards spotted him, none of the sleeping soldiers heard him, and nobody saw the heavy bloodstained bag hanging from his shoulder. He wound through the trees and tents, searching for the Nurian area. Flintcrest had moved his men in the night, marching south, choosing a wide route around the lake, up the eastern side of Stumps, and into the Emperor’s Preserve. Though the wilds were dense, they didn’t span that many acres, and the army wouldn’t remain hidden for long. Flintcrest must intend to strike soon. What target? The Imperial Barracks?

Sicarius found the Nurian tent, not by the lack of activity around it this time, but by voices coming from within. Elsewhere, only snores emanated from the tents, the soldiers sleeping hard after their night’s work. From dozens of meters away, he heard the Nurians, speaking in their own tongue, their voices raised in argument.

Though he suspected Kor Nas would know his precise location, Sicarius slowed his approach to listen.

“The assassin is acceptable,” a young man said. “Nobody back home objects to that method of dealing with enemies, and using one of their own people to deliver the killing blows, it’s a better choice than the soul construct, but I don’t want you to send him after Enemy Chief Fox.”

Who? Sicarius stopped outside the tent flap. He knew the Nurians gave animal nicknames to their honored chiefs and some of their enemies as well, but he had only worked in Nuria once and wasn’t familiar with many of them.

“Your attitude… puzzles me,
He shu
,” Kor Nas said. Ah, he was speaking to the diplomat. “To lay his head at your father’s feet, would that not be a great prize? Resulting in great honor and prestige for your family? For twenty years, he made the Turgonians untouchable at sea, and he destroyed more of our ships—our crews—than one can count.”

An uncharacteristic bout of anxiety wormed into Sicarius’s belly. Starcrest.

“If he dies in the fighting here, so be it,” the diplomat said, “but I do not wish to be the cause.”

Kor Nas did not speak for a long moment, and Sicarius expected to be called inside, anticipating that the practitioner had paused because his senses had alerted him to Sicarius’s presence. But when Kor Nas spoke again, it was to continue the conversation.

“I do not understand why you feel that way,
He shu,
but if you do not wish to lay Enemy Chief Fox’s head at the Great Chief’s feet, allow
me
the honor. As soon as his hiding place is discovered, I will send the assassin, and—”

“No.”

Another long pause. “Your stubbornness in this matter mystifies me. He
is
an enemy of Nuria. To have a chance at him and not take it is tantamount to treason.” Kor Nas lowered his voice to a harsh whisper. “Your father would not be pleased if he learned that you could have arranged his death and turned your back on the opportunity.”

“I do not appreciate the implication that you would go to my father and speak ill of me, Kor Nas.” The young man managed an impressive amount of cold menace in his voice. Was he a practitioner as well? One capable of standing toe-to-toe with Kor Nas? It seemed unlikely in one half of Kor Nas’s age. If he was one of the Great Chief’s sons, perhaps he believed himself untouchable because of his father’s influence. An unwise assumption, perhaps, if he chose to let Starcrest live. Indeed, the Nurians
would
likely see that as treason, even if twenty years had passed since the war. Sicarius understood Kor Nas’s logic, but he found himself hoping the younger man had a way to stand up to him effectively.