The Broken God Machine (7 page)

“Enjoying yourself, then, Jace?” Pehr called up to the boy, and Jace’s grin
widened, though his eyes never left the perimeter.

“Not dead yet, Pehr?” he asked. “I knew it. I knew you would last longer
than I would.”

“You are the wettest wet-head that ever walked the earth,” Pehr told him,
but he was surprised to find himself grinning as well. This would be their end,
of course, but oh, what an end it was.

“Do you still doubt my stories, cousin?”

“Not as much,” Pehr admitted, and Jace gave a coughing laugh.

“Is Nani still close?” he asked.

“I’m here,” Nani called. She had come to stand next to Pehr, Josep at her
side. Her mother, too, had come.

“The perimeter is failing,” Josep said to Pehr, who glanced out and saw that
it was true. Women were fighting now, alongside farmers and merchants and the
last few hunters still standing. “I must join them. So must you, Pehr, but …
Nani, I have thought of something. It should’ve occurred to me earlier, but
these Gods-damned drums must have driven it from my brain. I only pray that
it’s not too late.”

“What are you talking about?” Nani asked, turning to face him and tilting
her head.

“You asked me once how I found such pure and large fragments of jade for
your necklace … how I could have done so when the cliffs have been chipped and
scraped by so many hunters before me. I did not tell you then, but there is a
cave. I found it not so long before my Test, and have kept it a secret all this
time because … I don’t know why. Because it was mine, I suppose. Something I
had that the other hunters did not.

“It lies below the water’s surface, near the edge of the lagoon, but it
opens up to clean air inside. There’s jade there, but more importantly there’s
a spring of fresh water. It will fit you and your mother, but no more than
that. I should have thought of it sooner, but there is still time. You can go
there—”

“I won’t!” Nani cried. “You want me to leave you and Pehr and Jace here to
die
?! Josep, I won’t!”

Pehr, whose heart had begun throbbing painfully in his chest at Josep’s
words, put his hand on her shoulder. “Nani, you must do this.”

“No!”

“Think of your mother! Gods … think of yourself!”

“And what of you, Pehr? What of Jace and Josep and my father?”

Josep closed his eyes at this, and put a hand to his brow, before looking
back up at her. “Your father … he fell on the front lines.”

Tears welled in Nani’s eyes and spilled out over her cheeks, but the
expression of fury never left her face. “I won’t leave the rest of my family! I
won’t dishonor my father like that.”

“Would you have him die for nothing, then?” Josep asked her, and before Nani
could respond, Jace spoke from above them.

“You must do this, Nani. Pehr and Josep and I … we have to stay and fight.
We can keep the Lagos from you as you flee. You and Mother must go.”

“Why me?” she asked. “Why not any other woman in this circle?”

“Because you’re the daughter of a hunter, of course,” Jace said, his voice
tinged with surprise at the question. “Your sons will be hunters, whoever
fathers them. The village will need hunters more than ever.”

“There’s no honor in this!” she cried up at him. “There’s no honor in
fleeing like a coward from—”

Anna put her arm on the girl’s shoulder. “Do as he says.”

Nani was aghast. “You’ve broken your vow! Mother … you mustn’t. The Gods
will be angry!”

“So angry they might unleash the Lagos upon us,” Jace said, hopping down
from the boulder.

Nani glared at him, unimpressed, but Pehr could see that her resolve was
crumbling. “Damn you for this,” she croaked, her throat tight with tears. “Damn
you all.”

None of them had words of comfort to give. Josep took Nani’s arm and led her
forward, and the others followed, making their way back through the burning
homes and toward the outer perimeter. Pehr glanced over at Jace, who looked
back and nodded. They were determined; they were going to die, but here was a
chance for those deaths to mean something. They would die not only as hunters
but as heroes, and if they were damned for that, then so it would be.

In the distance, past the edge of the lagoon and over the raging ocean, the
first flickers of lightning heralding some monstrous storm began.

The Lagos whose hands Pehr had crippled was still waiting for them, past the
alleyway between the two buildings. He had been joined by three others, and all
four stood at the edge of arrow range, baiting those inside the circle to
expend the last of their ammunition. When they saw Pehr and Josep emerge from
between the houses, they began hooting and snarling, gesturing to the hunters,
inviting them out into the dark to battle.

“Four is too many,” Pehr said.

“Could we find others to help us?” Jace asked.

Josep shook his head. “Would they abandon their families in order to embark
upon a suicide run to save ours? I think not, Jace.”

“Then we’ll need a distraction,” the boy said, and the five of them stood in
silence for a moment, thinking. It was Nani who finally spoke up.

“I would distract them,” she said.

Pehr put a hand to his face, and Josep groaned. “No,” he said.

“What do you mean, Nani?” Jace asked.

“If I run out, at least one of them will chase me. Maybe more than one.”

“Perhaps all of them,” Josep said, turning to look at her. “Nani, with all
respect to Mother Anna, this endeavor is pointless if you don't make it to the
caves.”

“Wait,” Jace said. “Josep, wait. Nani, do you remember the split rock out
that way, just before the dunes?”

She thought for a moment and then nodded. “Yes, on the border of Arianus’s
land.”

“Can you bring the Lagos there?”

Pehr put his hand on his cousin’s shoulder. “Jace—”

“Let me finish,” the boy said. “If she can get there, then we can take them
all.”

“How?”

“They see only the two of you as threats. If I back away, they’ll assume I’m
fleeing. I can enter that hut, there, from behind, and aim through the window.
You and Pehr charge first, then Nani breaks off behind you. They won’t keep all
four for you. If they send one after her, I take him with the bow and Nani
comes back around to meet me, while you lead the others into range. If they
send two, then I still take the first, and when Nani reaches the rock, she goes
through the middle of the split and wedges herself inside where they can’t
reach her. No matter how it plays out, one of them dies under my arrows, and we
break the others into smaller groups.”

There was silence for a moment, and then Josep spoke. “If she stumbles?”

“I won’t,” Nani told him.

“Nani, if they catch you, they will blind you. Strip the skin from your
face. Fill the wounds with whatever vile, festering toxins they keep under
their claws …”

“Do you think I don’t know that, Josep? I will
not
stumble.”

“She has a knife,” Jace said. “She won’t be defenseless.”

“What if we never get there?” Pehr asked him.

Jace shrugged. “We’re going to die here either way. We have a chance to save
my mother and my sister. It’s worth the chance that we won’t be there to … to
…”

He stopped, and looked at Pehr and Josep, who made no reply.

“Be there to do what?” Nani asked.

Her mother said her name, putting her arm around the girl’s shoulders, but
Nani threw it off.

“Be there for
what
, Jace? To have the chance to kill me yourselves?
That’s it, isn’t it?”

Jace swallowed, looking ill, and nodded.

“You coward bastards,” Nani said, her voice tight, her hands clenched into
fists so tight that it seemed all of the blood had been driven away, leaving
them stark and white.

“Beloved …” Josep began, and Nani whirled to face him.

“Do you think I would
let
them?!” she cried. “Did you believe even
for one second that I would ever let one of those things do that to me? Oh, you
stupid, pig-brained fools. You big, brave sons of hunters … so concerned for my
well being that you would cut my throat with your own hands. I am
daughter
to a hunter, and I will die by my own hand before I allow
myself to be touched by any of theirs,
or by any of yours
!”

There was another silence, broken only by Nani’s harsh breathing. She was
staring at Josep, who seemed unable to meet her gaze. At last, Jace spoke.

“Oh,” he said, and smiled a little as his sister turned to glare at him.
“Well in
that
case … let’s send her first.”

Pehr snorted, and after a moment a rueful smile flickered across Nani’s
face. Josep, however, failed to find the humor. He only sighed, knowing that
any hope he might have had of preventing Nani from putting herself in harm’s
way was now gone.

“Are we going to do this, or shall I just cut my throat now and be done with
it?” she asked.

“I’m ready,” Jace said.

Pehr shrugged and nodded. What choice was there?

“So be it,” said Josep, and his voice had hardened as he locked away his
concerns.

Jace was positioned in moments, his mother huddled with him in the hut,
looking out at the Lagos who still sat at the edge of arrow range, calling and
howling to the diminished group still visible to them. Nani, Pehr, and Josep
huddled together momentarily, the two hunters making a grand show of pointing
in a direction that Nani had no intention of running. It was a transparent
ploy, perhaps, but they were desperate for any edge that could be gained.

There was nothing left to do but execute their plan. Pehr and Josep leapt
forward, running toward the group of Lagos, who roared in anticipation,
brandishing their terrible weapons. The Lagos with the crippled hand stood in
the front, clearly relishing its opportunity for revenge. Then, the group as a
whole swung their heads suddenly sideways, following what must have been Nani’s
path of escape. One of them broke off immediately and another, after glancing
at his friends, also gave chase.

“Two, then,” Josep said, and Pehr grunted an acknowledgment. At least now
the numbers were fair. One of the two remaining warriors was the cripple, but
it appeared by its stance that it was comfortable fighting with its left hand.
The other was at full strength, which would have made it a match for either of
them individually, but Pehr and Josep were fighting for their own lives and
that of the girl they both loved. Desperation lent Pehr strength and a kind of
wild excitement that he had never felt before. Josep called out instructions as
they ran.

“Cripple first. I’ll go low, you go high. I’ll roll to the second. Can you
take the first?”

“Yes,” Pehr replied, and then there was no more time for discussion. The
battle was upon them.

Josep attacked as he'd said, ducking low as the Lagos with the crippled
right hand lunged at him, swinging for its knees. The creature was too fast for
this and managed to leap before the club connected, so Josep shoved out and up
with his left hand. It connected solidly with the Lagos’s chest, catching the
thing off guard, and it made a kind of squawking noise as it lashed out with
its left hand. Pehr heard Josep snarl an oath and knew his fellow hunter had
been hit, but there was no time to worry about it. Josep kicked at the thing’s
feet, still moving forward, and managed to knock it off balance.

The crippled Lagos was now fully exposed, falling forward, arms held out to
break its fall. Pehr had gone high as instructed and was in a good position to
plant his feet. He did so, dropping the club low and swinging it in a
two-handed arc upward nearly from his ankle, as a man with an axe might swing
to cut the bottom half of a notch into a tree. The club connected squarely with
the Lagos’s breastbone, producing not a crunch but rather a horrific crack,
like a strong piece of wood snapping suddenly under tremendous pressure. The
Lagos shrieked in pain as it continued its fall to the ground, and Pehr raised
his club up over his head. He brought it down once, twice, a third time, and
the Lagos’s skull shattered, flattening out in a pulpy mass of bone and blood
and brain.

There was no time to celebrate his victory. Pehr turned, ready to help
Josep, only to see the hunter take a slashing hit to his midsection from the
Lagos’s metal blade. Josep screamed and stumbled, dropping to one knee, and
Pehr knew that he was too late to help the hunter even as he began to run
forward. The Lagos, roaring in triumph, raised the blade over its head to swing
down, much as Pehr had done to its companion. The blow would surely split
Josep’s skull in two, and Pehr found himself screaming in rage. Not now, not
yet, not before they could save Nani!

The blade never fell. Instead there came first the shrieking sound of an
arrow in flight, and then the sharp twang of the bowstring caught up to Pehr’s
ears. The arrow came out of the night and pierced the meat of the Lagos’s right
wrist, throwing its arms backward, and it lost its grip on the blade. For a
moment Pehr could do no more than stare. The flames from the village were dying
down, and to Jace the Lagos must have seemed merely a dark stain against a
darkening backdrop.

Josep, though hurt, fought on like the hunter he was, pulling a stone knife
from the sheath on his leg and plunging it into the nearest part of the Lagos’s
body, which happened to be its groin.

Pehr found some small satisfaction in the knowledge that – sent from the
Gods or not – the Lagos were no more fond of massive trauma to their sex organs
than any other creature would be. The monster howled and grabbed between its
legs with both hands, spearing itself in the thigh with Jace’s arrowhead in the
process. It doubled over in agony, and Pehr leapt forward, pounding it into the
ground.

“It’s dead,” Josep said after a moment, and Pehr ceased his attack, drawing
in harsh breaths, holding the club at his side. Josep made his way slowly to
his feet and looked over at Pehr. His face was a red mask of blood; the
crippled Lagos’s claws had struck his forehead and flayed off some of the skin
there. His chest, slashed by the second Lagos’s blade, was bleeding
thickly.

“How is it?” Pehr asked, still gasping.

Josep grimaced, but said, “A hunter without scars is not really a hunter.
That’s what they say.”

Pehr had heard that, too, and he smiled. “Can you run? We must—”

He was cut off by a shrill screaming ringing through the night. It didn’t
sound to Pehr’s ears like Nani was in pain, only afraid, but he couldn’t be
sure until they reached her. Jace and his mother came running up from out of
the shadows.

“I owe you my li—” Josep began.

“Go on!” Jace cried. “We’ll follow. Take the beast if you can, and if not,
try to draw it out into the open. I have six arrows left.”

Josep turned and began running in the direction of the scream. Pehr glanced
at Jace and nodded, then turned and followed him.

* * *

Nani counted to five and then sprinted forward. She was still young and
healthy, fit from years of hard living, and she had always been fast. She knew
her only chance for survival was to be faster than she had ever been before.
She had no intention of letting go of her men, but she would address that point
when they reached the shore. For now, she could only run.

The group of Lagos registered a moment of surprise at her actions – the
telegraphing from Pehr and Josep had led them to believe she would break in the
opposite direction – and so she gained several lengths before they reacted. Two
of them came loping along behind her, howling madly, and Nani found herself
praying that they were not quite so fast as the stories told. She ran, hearing
the sound of her own breath over the snarls of the creatures behind her
that were slowly gaining.

She did not waste her breath on prayer, but found herself using her thoughts
to beseech the Gods, over and over, for some small mercy after all of this
terror. She did not know whether the twang of Jace’s bowstring meant that they
had heard her plea, but the howl and thud that followed it were most
satisfying. The other Lagos paused for only a moment, and Nani risked a glance
over her shoulder, but by that time it had already resumed the chase. Jace’s
bow sounded again, but they had moved out of range, and the arrow fell just
short. Now her only hope was the rock and the safety of the cleft therein.

The Lagos warrior was soon hot on her heels, making noises that sounded to
her like laughter. She could feel something in her side that she knew was the
beginning of a cramp, and she tried to will it away. Close, now … this was no
time to falter. For the first time since all of this had begun, Nani forced
herself to fully visualize just what exactly it was that waited for her, should
she fall into the creature’s hands. There would be no swift and merciful death
for her, only pain and horror and the chance to be left lying, abandoned in
agony to live or die as the Gods saw fit.

And if she survived? What would there be for her then? Her village was
decimated, most of the men dead. Her husband, cousin and brother already
expected to join them. Some small number of women and children might escape
with only minor injuries. Perhaps she would be one of those left to care for
all the rest, cripples and invalids, their eyes destroyed, ears cut off, faces
all but erased. Yes, she might survive the torment, might even end up like old
Luce and keep her sight and hearing. Perhaps she could live out her days
cleaning merchantmen’s dwellings, pining for those she had lost.

Nani was unwilling to consider that option, and unwilling to let the
creature behind her get its chance to perform its despicable ritual of
mutilation; she would reach the rock – that Gods-damned rock that had seemed so
close when Jace first detailed his plan – or she would take the knife that she
had carried with her every day since her eighth birthday, and she would hold it
to her chin, and she would fall upon it, driving it up into her skull.

Nani was not sure that she could run much longer, and the Lagos warrior,
screeching in anticipation, was only feet behind her. She was making choked
coughing noises as her lungs struggled to draw enough air into her body to fuel
her burning muscles. It would not be enough merely to reach the rock; she must
have the strength to make her way deep inside of the split, lest the creature
behind her simply grab her and haul her back out. The only way would be a
dangerous, flying leap. If she tried to climb in, she would be overtaken.