Storms of Lazarus (Shadows of Asphodel, Book 2) (31 page)

Her heartbeat thundered in her ears. “Did you sleep with her?”

“I suppose I did.” He twisted his mouth. “In the literal sense.”

“Now isn’t the time for jokes, Wendel. Was this what you wanted? Vampire venom? Opium wasn’t enough?”

Wendel struggled to sit upright. He swayed and clutched the bedpost.

“No,” he said. “That’s not what happened.”

“Then what’s your version of events?”

His eyes cleared enough for him to glare at her. “I’m telling the truth.”

She glared right back. “Really?”

Wendel rubbed his forehead. “Why would I lie to you?”

“When haven’t you?”

He hauled himself to his feet. “The vampire hunted me here. It attacked me while I was asleep. By the time I woke, it had already bitten me, already drugged me with venom. I tried to fight it, but I wasn’t strong enough.”

Ardis stared at him. “Are you telling me the vampire forced herself on you?”

Wendel lowered his head. His cheeks reddened.

“Perhaps,” he said.

“Don’t lie about
that
.” Tears stung her eyes. “Not to me.”

Wendel met her gaze. “Why don’t you believe me?”

He sounded hurt, but Ardis had seen the vampire in bed with him. Touching him.

“How can I?” she said.

“After all this, you still don’t trust me? Damn it, Ardis, I don’t know what else to say.”

She shook her head. “I don’t even know if I can do this.”

“Do what?”

The vampire had mentioned her unborn baby.
Their
unborn baby.

“Should we even think about starting a family?” Ardis said.

Wendel’s jaw clenched. “Are you saying you don’t want the baby?”

He was still so certain of her pregnancy, when she wasn’t certain of anything.

“I don’t know,” Ardis said. “You don’t exactly have a stellar track record with family.”

Wendel jerked back like she had slapped him. He sat on the bed and said nothing, though his eyes smoldered with emotion.

Ardis knew she had wounded him, and the sickness in her stomach intensified. She tossed aside her sword and strode toward the bathroom. Her footsteps quickened into a run, and she slammed the door. She dropped to her knees by the toilet. The stink of bleach stung her nose. She retched, then vomited into the porcelain.

Wendel rapped on the door. “Ardis?”

She coughed, shaking all over, and closed her eyes. She thought of the decapitated vampire bleeding on the carpet.

“Go away,” she said.

The doorknob turned, but Ardis twisted the lock before he could open it.

“Are you all right?” Wendel said.

Ardis vomited again. Tears trickled down her face. She didn’t want him to see her like this. She didn’t want to see him at all.

“Go. Away.”

Silence outside the door.

Ardis flushed the toilet and washed her hands, her face, her hair. She scrubbed herself dry with the towel. In the mirror, she couldn’t meet her own eyes.

When she opened the door, Wendel was gone. And so was the vampire.

Ardis shuddered. She didn’t think he could reanimate a headless corpse, so he must have dragged the body out. How were they going to explain the bloody carpet to the hotel? At this point, Ardis decided she didn’t even care.

Ardis waited in the lobby, tapping the hilt of Chun Yi. When the line at the desk cleared, she marched over to the concierge.

“Excuse me,” Ardis said, “but I want another room.”

“Any particular reason why?” said the concierge.

“I don’t like it.”

The concierge adjusted his spectacles. “Very well, ma’am. I can move you both to a room on the top floor tonight.”

Both? Ardis didn’t want to share a bed with Wendel tonight.

“Just me,” she said. “I’m moving. He’s staying.”

The concierge coughed. “I will have to bill you double.”

“Of course.”

Ardis paid him for the second room, then walked to the restaurant for dinner.

“Just one?” said the waiter.

Ardis faltered on the threshold of the restaurant. She glanced around to see if Wendel was there, but he wasn’t. Fortunately.

She needed to be alone. She needed to try cooling her burning thoughts.

Ardis sat at a table and unfolded her napkin in her lap. Her eyes felt gritty, and she rubbed them with her hands. The waiter slid a menu onto the table, and she stared blankly at the German. The words swam together.

“Should we even think about starting a family?”

“Are you saying you don’t want the baby?”

“I don’t know. You don’t exactly have a stellar track record with family.”

Her words echoed in her ears. God, she had been an idiot.

“Are you ready to order, ma’am?” said the waiter.

Ardis tried to smile. “I’ll have the Westphalia ham.”

The waiter speedily delivered her dinner, and Ardis ate the ham in silence. It weighed down her stomach like stones.

After dinner, Ardis walked to her room alone.

Rain lashed against the window and rattled on the roof. A storm drowned out the stars. She cracked open the window to breathe in the icy air. Raindrops trickled down her face, and she closed the window again.

When Ardis climbed into bed, she shivered at the cold beneath the sheets. She wished she could sleep with Wendel at her side. She wished she could feel less alone. But she wasn’t sure she was allowed to feel at all.

~

Sand glimmered like gold dust along the beach. Mist drifted over the Pacific.

In her arms, Ardis felt something fidget. She looked down at the most beautiful baby in the world. The shape of the baby’s eyes echoed her own, though the color was a pale green more like sea glass. Wendel’s eyes.

Wind mussed the baby’s wisp of dark hair. Ardis smoothed it back down.

The baby gurgled and gave her a toothless smile. It had quite a lot of drool. Ardis smiled and dabbed at its chin with her sleeve.

Her heart swelled until she wasn’t sure it would fit inside her chest.

Seagulls shrieked and wheeled as a raven played in the sky. The silhouette of a man walked along the beach. Wendel. He bowed his head, his hair in his eyes, and he didn’t see them. Ardis stood and waved at him.

“Wendel!” she said.

~

A knock on the door woke Ardis. She squinted in the sunlight. Another knock, hard enough that it shook the door.

“Just a minute!” Ardis said.

She kicked off the sheets, dragged on her clothes, and answered the door.

It wasn’t Wendel. A telegram boy waited there, breathing hard, his hat askew.

“Urgent telegram, ma’am,” he said.

She ripped open the telegram and read.

Return to pilot Colossus immediately

Ardis tipped the telegram boy, yanked on her boots, and hailed a taxi.

When she walked into the drydock, she dodged a swarm of engineers. The Colossus automaton towered over the commotion.

“Ardis!” Konstantin waved her over to the automaton.

She hurried to meet him. “What’s the rush?”

The archmage gripped her shoulder. He looked skittish and pale.

“It’s time,” he said.

“Time for what?” she said, her hands already sweaty.

“The Russians are besieging Königsberg. They are marching through the farmland to the east. We can’t let them capture the city. A Prussian division of the German army is advancing to fight, but they are outnumbered two to one.”

Ardis whistled softly. “Will the automatons even the odds?”

“Yes,” Konstantin said, “but we only have three. And we need you to pilot the Colossus.”

Ardis squared her shoulders and glanced at the metal giant.

“My orders?” she said.

“Find and kill the clockwork dragon. Before it does too much damage.”

“Yes, sir.”

Konstantin caught her hand and shook it briskly. His hesitant smile betrayed his fear.

“Have you seen Wendel?” Ardis said.

“No. Why?”

Ardis bit the inside of her cheek. “I don’t know where he is.”

“I’m sure the necromancer will turn up when we least expect him.”

“I hope so.”

“Good luck.” Konstantin glanced into her eyes. “Stay alive, all right?”

“I’ll try my best.”

Ardis climbed into the cockpit of the automaton and marched the Colossus from the drydock. She strode through the streets of Königsberg as soldiers directed traffic away from her earth-shaking footfalls. Townspeople leaned from their windows, and a little girl plucked a flower and held it out to the Colossus.

Ardis smiled and shook her head. The flower would only be crushed in her fist.

Trucks rumbled behind the Colossus, burdened with soldiers on their way to war. Children ran alongside them, laughing and shrieking as the tires sprayed slush from the road. It almost looked like a parade.

Ardis hoped that most of them would live to see a victory parade.

They left the city proper and crossed muddy fields. The trucks flattened autumn’s stubble, and the Colossus cratered the earth with its footprints. The soldiers joined a larger battalion of the Prussian division. Overhead, the USS
Jupiter
floated in the sky, perhaps on another observation mission for America.

No sign of the clockwork dragon, or the Russian army.

Ardis stood sentinel behind the Prussians. From this height, the men and horses looked like tin soldiers. Across the field, a ridge bristled with pines, their needles glittering with frost. An eagle soared over the trees.

It was a perfect day, one that would soon be made grotesque by battle.

The Germans marched toward the ridge in regimented rows. Ardis saw swords, pikes, crossbows, even a battleaxe or two. A handful of the blades glistened with the telltale iridescence of magic, but most looked like they hadn’t been polished since the middle ages. Hopefully each soldier knew how to wield them.

Pines rustled on the ridge, and the eagle shrieked. Russians marched from the forest.

Konstantin was right—they were outnumbered two to one.

Ardis lumbered behind the Germans and halted when they did. Some soldiers grinned and whooped at the Colossus, like it was their big brother who the Russians wouldn’t dare attack. Ardis wished she shared their optimism.

The Russian infantry stopped. Their cavalry rode to the forefront. Cossacks, or what was left of them after the automatons.

Hooves drummed the dirt as the Cossacks galloped down the ridge.

But the Germans held their ground. The horses charged nearer, mouths foam-flecked, riders brandishing sabers. A line of German soldiers advanced and, at the last moment, lowered their pikes. The Cossacks reined in their mounts, but for many, it was too late. They careened into the pikes and impaled themselves.

The remaining Cossacks wheeled and retreated.

Emboldened, the Prussian division advanced across the field. They halted halfway. The Russians held their ground on the ridge. Ardis flanked the Germans, her muscles taut, and tried to ignore the screams of horses.

A glint of red caught her eye. The clockwork dragon sailed over the ridge.

The dragon’s shadow darkened the battlefield. A Prussian officer shouted an order, and soldiers armed with crossbows fired a volley skyward. Bolts clattered uselessly off the dragon’s armored belly. It soared overhead, out of reach, and looked down at Ardis with what she would have sworn was cunning in its eyes.

The USS
Jupiter
floated over the battlefield.

Damn, why had they brought the airship? Did they never learn?

Ardis lunged into a run and took off after the dragon. The clockwork dragon pumped its wings and gained altitude. It circled higher in the sky, wheeling over the
Jupiter
, then flattened its wings and stooped into a dive. It flared its wings to slow its descent, then swung its claws forward like an attacking falcon.

The USS
Jupiter
hovered with idle engines. Not even trying to outmaneuver the dragon.

Ardis sucked in her breath. The dragon’s outstretched talons gleamed over the airship, ready to shred its silver skin.

A deep humming trembled the air. With a blinding burst of light, electricity arced from the
Jupiter
and struck the clockwork dragon. The dragon froze and fell from the sky. The beast plummeted earthward, black smoke curling from its mouth, as soldiers scrambled from its shadow. The dragon plowed into the dirt, tumbled across the field, and skidded to a stop, its duralumin wings crumpled and tattered.

Ardis remembered the
Wanderfalke
, and a vengeful smile twisted her mouth.

The dragon curled in a smoking heap. Stray electricity zapped between its claws. Its gemstone eyes looked dark.

On the ridge, the Russians lingered beneath the pines. The German infantry marched toward them, and a squadron of elite Prussian cavalry charged ahead, their lances lowered. But still the Russians held their ground.

Something was wrong.

Ardis ran to warn them, and the wireless telegraph in the cockpit began beeping. She had no idea what the code meant, but it couldn’t be good. She had been in too many battles to believe that soldiers waited patiently to die.