The Fifth Vertex (The Sigilord Chronicles) (39 page)

"That depends," she said.

"On what?"

"On how many farm animals you can get to the southwest shore before dawn."

29

Goodwyn lay on his hands and knees, dry heaving, wondering when the ship would stop moving. He'd lost track of whether they were moving up and down or side-to-side, it was all the same to him. The stomach of a Kestian warrior had no business in the belly of a steel ship in the middle of an ocean.

He tried—carefully—to get to one knee, then climbed up the wall, hugging a lit sconce as though without that grip he would fly off in any direction.

A knock at the door startled him. He let go of the sconce, lost his balance, and fell back to his knees.

"Come in," he coughed, feeling as though the mere effort of talking might make him vomit.

Therren strode through the door carrying a large flagon, his usual grin brightening his face.
 

"You look terrible," he said.

"Thanks," Goodwyn replied, clinging to the floor as though his life depended on it.

"Try some of this." Therren sat down on the floor nearby. "It's a tea the briene make. They're giving it to all of us 'sand people'. That's what they call us, you know. Sometimes they call us giants. Can you imagine that? Us, giants?"

Goodwyn crawled closer, grabbed the flagon, and took a few gulps. The concoction tasted terrible, like boiled dirt. He didn't care. It could taste like boiled underclothes and he would drink it if it made his stomach feel better.

"Why are we bouncing around like this?"
 

"It's almost dawn and the fleet has come up to the surface. The waters are rougher on the surface than they are down below."

Goodwyn choked down another few slurps of the disgusting brew. "Can we go up top? I need some fresh air."

Therren clapped him on the shoulder, which made Goodwyn's stomach churn. "That's why I came to get you. We're gathering up there. Corliss, Aegaz, and the briene are working out an attack plan."

"What do we know about naval attacks? Kestians don't even build ships," Goodwyn commented, climbing up Therren to get to his feet this time.

"I don't know, but they want all of us up there."

Therren helped Goodwyn to the door and turned to face him as they stepped into the hallway. He bent close for a kiss, but Goodwyn held him away.

"We can't do that here; there're too many people around," he said. The defeated look on Therren's face hurt him, a lot more than he thought it should.

He grasped Therren's hand, tightly. "I don't know who or what I am anymore, Therren. Everything I grew up believing just seems so wrong now. I don't feel all that stable, and that's not just because I'm seasick. You're the only thing I'm sure of right now. You have to believe that."

Therren nodded and squeezed Goodwyn's hand in return. "I suppose I should go on ahead. Are you okay following?"

"Yeah, I'll be right behind you."

Goodwyn watched as Therren left, listening to his boots clatter against the metal walkway. The whole world was in chaos and they were about to fight a naval battle—Kestians, fighting in a navy!—and he just wanted to be with Therren and leave it all behind.

"Is Therren the mate of the fein duras?" asked a familiar voice from behind him.

Goodwyn spun to see the blade, by all respects a tiny little man, but easily the most formidable fighter he had ever encountered.

"My mate?" Goodwyn asked, unsure what to say.

"Yes, mate. Partner for life. Has the fein duras chosen a mother for the children yet?"

Goodwyn took a step back.
Mate? Children? What in the hell is he talking about?

"When the briene choose partners that do not produce children, it is an honor for others to volunteer to bear children on their behalf," said the blade. "Do the sand people have similar customs?"

"No, no we don't. I'm afraid the sand people wouldn't understand how Therren and I feel about each other."

The blade smiled and clapped Goodwyn affectionately on the shoulder, an action that actually required a hop on the little briene's part. "Come, the blade will discuss this on the way up to the deck. The blade is sure that any briene woman would be honored to bear the children of the fein duras and heart-mate Therren."

Goodwyn gaped at the little man and swallowed down a wave of panic.
 

They made their way topside, with the blade going into excruciating detail about marriage ceremonies, how briene couples chose surrogate parents, and the fact a briene woman carried a child for eleven full months before giving birth. A briene child was such a rare blessing that when a briene mother became pregnant, her entire village would pamper and protect her and provide for all her needs, including the birthing itself.

Goodwyn listened intently, trying not to throw up or stumble. Thankfully, the entire trip passed without such an embarrassing event.

Maybe that nasty tea does work. I hope they've got enough for the return trip
, he thought.
If we survive, that is
.

They climbed a set of stairs and stopped before a circular steel door.

"Before we go up," Goodwyn said, giving the blade an intense look, "you can't tell anyone about Therren and me. The Kestians, the sand people, they wouldn't understand. It could be…bad for me. For us."

"The sand people are a strange people, but the blade will keep the fein duras secret. But when the fein duras and heart-mate decide to have children, the fein duras must let the blade know. The blade will find a most suitable mother."

"You need a better name, something other than 'blade,'" Goodwyn said, ignoring the comment about bearing children. "A blade is a tool you use to kill, or a tool you use to survive, but it isn't who you are."

"The blade is the blade, there is no other name," said the blade as he used two big wheels to push the door in and roll it to the side, revealing a narrow cylindrical chamber with a ladder leading up.

They climbed the ladder, stepped up through another hatch, and Goodwyn found himself standing on the vast, flat metal deck of the briene ship. Dozens of briene stood up on the deck, where Aegaz, Corliss, Therren, and the foreman waited near the front edge.

The rest of the fleet appeared as dark shadows bobbing up and down on the rough, dark seas, all bathed in the bright pre-dawn moonlight.

"If this wasn't about to be a battlefield, it would be beautiful," Goodwyn remarked, marveling at the moonlight reflecting off the ocean's surface.

"It's the battle that makes it beautiful, soldier," laughed one of the nearby Kestian soldiers. It seemed like just yesterday that Goodwyn was one of them, and felt that these were his people. Now, it was as though he looked at some foreigner from a distant land, someone with whom he had nothing in common save skin color and ancestry.

"That's them." Corliss pointed to a cluster of shadows in the distance to the northeast.
 

"What's that beyond them?" Goodwyn asked. "The dark outline on the horizon."

"That's Aldsdowne, a waypoint for trading and traveling ships. Most of the trade ships making their way to Waldron stop at Aldsdowne first."

"Is that where the fifth vertex is?"

"Could be," Aegaz answered. "They've brought their entire fleet to that island for a reason."

"Is there anyone defending the island?"
 

"No; technically Aldsdowne isn't even part of a kingdom. It has no protectors," said Corliss. "We need to take out that fleet's biggest advantage—the mages."

"Can we get close enough to attack without them knowing?" Goodwyn asked the foreman.

The foreman smiled up at Goodwyn. "Not with these slow ships, but maybe with those." He nodded past Goodwyn's shoulder.

Behind them the briene moved out to the edge of the platform while huge square sections of metal sank into the ship below. Loud grinding and clanking noises followed; then the square metal blocks returned to the deck, each carrying a briene flying machine.

Goodwyn and Therren rushed to inspect them.

"These are amazing, like machines out of some fantastical tale from a book," Therren said.

"Urus flew one. Actually, he flew one, crashed it, then jumped onto another one while they were still flying," Goodwyn said, enjoying the memory.

"Urus? Urus-the-
culled
did all that?" Therren said with an equally big grin.

Goodwyn shrugged. "He's full of surprises lately."

"These are equipped with spear launchers," the foreman explained, inspecting each of the machines, taking a moment to caress the metal as he walked by each of them. "The blood witches need time to make the blood magic. If the attack is quick enough, the blood witches will die like any other man."

The foreman gave everyone a quick demonstration of how to operate the flying machines, then stepped to the front of the platform. "There is enough fuel in these to get to the island and back, but no more. Get within range, skewer the blood witches with the spears, then return. Any blood witches left alive will surely use blood power to try to shoot the briene and sand people out of the sky."

Each of the other platforms seemed to be getting the same speech from each of their commanders. Members of the First Fist, Goodwyn and Therren included, jumped into flying machines on every platform, as
 
did the briene and Corliss's men.

"May the blood of our enemies run beneath your boots!" Aegaz shouted to the First Fist. They replied with enthusiastic shouts of "For Kest!"

"For Kest!" Goodwyn shouted, though it felt a little half-hearted. This was for far more than Kest. If Murin was right, the whole world was at stake if the Order should succeed. He just hoped that Urus and Murin were alive and keeping the fifth vertex safe.

The foreman gave the signal, and the fleet of metal birds took off. At first Goodwyn almost crashed into the water, but managed to pull the bird's beak up just in time. Then he somehow got going the wrong direction and had to swing back around to catch up to the others.

He settled into formation just behind Aegaz and Therren, each piloting their own birds.

Warriors born and bred in the desert who see one rainstorm a year, and we're flying over an ocean in metal birds. Nobody back home will believe this
, Goodwyn thought, then remembered that likely there was no home left, no one there to appreciate what was happening.

As they flew toward their target, the first orange and yellow tinges of the sun broke over top of Aldsdowne, their trip strangely quiet save for the buzzing noise of the birds.

"The noise is too loud!" he shouted ahead to the others. "They're going to hear us coming!"

Therren heard him and relayed the message, which got passed to others in their group.

Aegaz turned back and signaled him, jabbing his finger at the target twice. It was too late to back out now; they had to attack even if the enemy could hear their approach.

A bright yellow flash of light erupted from the island. At first Goodwyn thought it was the sun peeking between mountains, but the light came from the near shore, not from the horizon beyond. A moment later another flash lit up the shore. Then another, and another.

The flashes turned into balls of fire, soaring up from the shore into the air above the Order's ships.

The Order responded with a similar volley, huge balls of flame launching from the decks of their ships and arcing high into the sky over the ocean between the island and the navy.

"Now! Hit them now while they're busy!" Goodwyn shouted, and pressed down hard on the foot pedal that controlled the bird's speed. He pointed the nose of the bird down a little and aimed for the nearest ship, which still seemed small and distant from that height.

Who in the hell is throwing fireballs at the mages?
Goodwyn wondered.
Could it be Urus, or maybe Cailix?

The sky over the shore lit up with hundreds of little suns. As the fireballs launched from the shore collided with the ones launched from the ships, bursts of light preceded deafening thunderclaps. It was like a dozen winter's-long-night celebration fireworks displays, all happening at once.

Falling now more than flying, Goodwyn pushed his bird as fast as it could go toward the nearest ship, which was the furthest from the shore. A fireball slammed into the ship to the left of his target, shattering the deck into a thousand flaming splinters. Burning bodies flew in all directions, including a few white-robed mages. Pieces of wood bounced off the metal hull of the bird, and Goodwyn had to duck to avoid losing his head.

He could see the blood mages on the ship in front of him now. They stood on the foredeck, chanting something while holding hands. The foredeck was slick with blood, and the bodies of sacrificed sailors lay strewn about, broken limbs sticking out at terrible angles.

He aimed the bird's nose down just a bit more, then pulled back on the lever to release the spears. They shot from springs in the bird's talons. Two shot straight through the blood mages' backs, pinning them to the ship. The other sank into the back of a mage's thigh.

Goodwyn veered off to the left and pulled up. He looked back to see how the others were doing. Metal birds buzzed around ships, diving and launching spears onto the decks. Some spears hit, others missed. There were definitely going to be enough mages left to retaliate.