The Paladin's Odyssey (The Windows of Heaven) (13 page)

M

nemosynae’s kindly voice
said,
“Child, can you hear me?”

Pyra hear
d
sea birds. The fresh air washed into the chamber and brought her gently back to consciousness. She opened her eyes to find herself under the portico of the Temple infirmary.

“How
…
how’s Mauma?”

“You’ve had a high fever for almost a week. We were all worried about you.” Khallio’Phe said, standing next to her mother.

Pandura was also there. “My beautiful girl, I came as soon as I heard you were starting to regain consciousness.”

“How is Mauma?” Pyra said again.

Pandura’s golden flame hair caught the sun from the window. Her eyes
seemed
tired and sad—so much like Mauma’s—for a moment Pyra almost believed she was Mauma. “Darling, I’m so sorry to bring bad news at your recovery, but your mother had complications during sacred delivery
…
”

Pyra’s heart almost stopped. “I had this horrible nightmare!”

Pandura stooped over the bed and took Pyra in her arms. “Darling, that was just a fevered dream. Your mother passed into the Fields of Comfort peacefully. She told me to tell you how much she loves you and that she will always be with you as long as you keep her in your heart.”

Pyra
saw
the peace in Mauma’s eyes almost as if she had been there herself.
It felt so right.
She
leaned
in
to
Pandura’s luxuriant hair and wept.

THE PALADIN’S ODYSSEY
|
367

Opposite the village of Langemarck, which was held by French Turcos and Zouaves, appeared two greenish yellow clouds, which gradually merged. Then almost as a fog rolls forward, over five miles of the front, the cloud leveled out and came on, stretching from Steenstraat to Poelcapelle. At first it was scarcely higher than the head of a man and it moved as gently as “mists seen over water meadows on a frosty night.” Some who witnessed were transfixed by its beauty. Then gradually it swept over them, visiting slow death, excruciating invalidism, and shock panic on more than 15,000 men.

—S.L.A. Marshal

World War I
(A description of the first gas attack.)

THE PALADIN’S ODYSSEY
|
367

Wurm Bait

U’

Sumi’s world had changed forever, and with it all the people he once thought he knew. Those who had given stability to his life during childhood now seemed possessed by foreign demons; harsh specters of dead titans brought back to life from the Century War for the current crisis.

Only Iyapeti remained familiar—as much a victim of this topsy-turvy new order as he. Their grandfather, once a source of counsel and encouragement, now seemed to go out of his way to make life miserable for them both. He sent junior officers to yell in their faces and to single U’Sumi and his brother out for all the vilest assignments. They cleaned up after the unicorns when their regiment broke camp on some stranger’s farmland
,
washed the officers’ mess kits and laundry
,
or served the officers’ meals
,
or dug their latrines and filled them in again when they moved on.

After leaving a Dragon-slayer
c
aptain
named Henumil behind with a reserve garrison on the coast, they had crossed the Balimar Straits into Lower Balimar in long boats under cover of darkness to avoid Aztlantim
recon
scout drones.

The only advantage U’Sumi saw to being the officers’ lackey was that he got to stand inside the tactical briefings tent to attend his
sires
at
key meetings. There he could listen in on all the latest war news. Today especially might make all the nasty jobs worth the trouble. The main Akh’Uzan Regiment would meet up with the Second Imperial Corps under Field
Marshal
Avarnon-Set that
afternoon.
I wonder if he really has the head of a wolven-hound like people say.

The long southward march on the coastal road along the west side of the Straits halted late in the afternoon at a sprawling pavilion camouflaged with green and brown netting to prevent easy spotting from the air.

U’Sumi’s fathers reported to a large tent at the center of the camp. It had the gryphon crest of L’Mekku with the invert
ed
pentagram of the Watcher, Uzaaz’El, on its banner. Parked under the seemingly endless awning were hulking
Wyvernas
—faster, more deadly descendants of the cumbersome
Behemoth
self-propelled fortress machines of the Century War. Sleek astra
turbine
-impeller
aerodrones
,
undersides painted as gryphons, amphipteres, and other winged dragons or birds of prey, perched in rows along the edge of the netting that faced the road, which doubled as a landing strip.

Real amphipteres circled above, as if sensing the coming battle feast. Their overlarge dragonish heads bent backward over their bodies on Sshaped necks to center their mass between their wings, while they seemed to mock the soldiers with leering eyes and raucous croaks. Diamond-shaped foil-ended serpentine tails
,
held stiff as charmed snakes
,
served as
air rudders in the gentle breeze.

A bright orange phoenix streaked upward through the circling dragonry to drive the carrion eaters away from its nest somewhere in the nearby hills. U’Sumi grew hopeful at the wondrous fire-bird. It had teeth in its bill, and clawed w
ings—unlike most fowl—though it
s feathers and form were in all other ways avian.
T
he phoenix’s bright plumage turned gray every six years
, when
it had to seek shelter in its nest amid the holes of the high cliffs, where no other creature could reach it.

Once safely hidden, its gray outer feathers fell out, leaving it helpless
,
to live off its own fat for a month—until the dawn of its seventh year. Then the phoenix streaked anew from its rock hole, up into the heavens with new-grown feathers, fire from ashes, born again in brilliant golds, reds
,
and oranges. Nothing could catch it. No dragon could
match
its speed
or the confusion of its colors streaking by their wicked heads. The phoenix always rose again to survive the centuries.
So too will the Seer Clan.

A ram’s horn ended U’Sumi’s phoenix watch. A heavy hand rested on his shoulder. He turned to see his grandfather’s grim face.

“I need you and your brother to attend me in the
Marshal
’s tent in five minutes,” Lumekki said quietly, then left.

U’Sumi found Iyapeti breaking out the officer’s tents.

“Tacticon wants us at the Field
Marshal
’s briefing immediately.”

“That foreign captain’ll cane us if the tents aren’t up,” said ‘Peti.

“The Tacticon will be worse. We live with him. Remember?”

Iyapeti shrugged
.

Briefing duty meant just standing around in case somebody needed something.
Surely, work
far more strenuous and menial
would befall them
if they stayed with the gear.

The two ‘tweens
arrived
outside Avarnon-Set’s tent just as Lumekki, A’Nu-Ahki, and the foreign Liaison Captain did. The Tacticon hand-signaled them to follow him inside
, where he had them
take stations on either side of him and behind, at attention.

Within the tent, divisional
s
traticons, their brigade
sub-s
traticons, and all the regimental
t
acticons
,
with their adjutants, stood in a semi-circle around the Field Marshal. U’Sumi’s first look at Avarnon-Set brought an involuntary gasp, which fortunately
was inaudible
over the background murmur of men taking their correct places.

The Creatures’ eyes had no whites to them at all. Bloodshot borders surrounded black vortex pupils that seemed incapable of displaying love or mercy. No part of his huge bestial head did not have hair growing out of it, from the close-cropped gray of his grotesquely flattened brow and cranium, to the wild jowl tufts that sprouted from his lower eyelids and distended nose. Yellowed fang-like teeth grew crookedly behind under-turned lips above a jaw line hidden in greasy whiskers. His towering body
equaled
Uggu’s
height
, but seemed thinner and not so robust. It did
n
o
t
need
to be. That horrendous head made up for whatever the body lacked in thickness.

“Come to attention!”
called
the
Marshal
’s adjutant—a bland face in a gold-braid tunic which
,
for all its decorum
,
could not make its wearer any less of a nonentity.

The
enormous
tent took on a smothering silence.

Avarnon-Set spoke—a
cold gravelly voice, unused to
rais
ing itself
so that others could easily hear it: “Scouts have just reported five divisions of Elyo advancing about a day’s march southwest of here, along the coastal road. We expect them to attack at dawn tomorrow.

“Those new regiments just in this afternoon, that have not dug their trenches yet, had better do so by sunset. I’m pulling the astras out to our
fallback
position near Saar’s Haven. They will provide sky support for you tomorrow morning. The
Wyvernas
will retreat into the hills to take up flanking ambush stations. Our battle line
stretches
from the mountains to the coast. I want that new regiment from Akh’Uzan and those other two from East Balimar to dig in a hundred cubits out front of the line, astride the
main
road, to cover our a fast retreat, if need be. A
re there a
ny questions?”

U’Sumi’s
g
randfather
said,
“Yes!”

The
Beast’s black eyes turned
on Lumekki. U’Sumi
felt
a portion of the
ir
displeasure leveled against his Tacticon—a soul-numbing dread that reached out and imploded confidence from
some
terrible
abyss
within
.

“What is your question, Tacticon?”

Lumekki buckled under a weight U’Sumi also felt. The air somehow reeked with a stench smelled by the mind and spirit rather than the nostrils.

Nevertheless, the Tacticon stood his ground. “My regiment is in the forefront, but we have been outfitted only with swords, spears, and older model thunder-pikes—and not even enough of these. Are there any hand-cannons or heavier weapons available for us to make a better effect?”

“Heavy weapons are for elite units trained to fight with them. Hand-cannons are in short supply. You must make
do
with what you have.”

Before anyone could ask any more embarrassing questions, the adjutant dismissed them all with a wave of his gold sleeved hand.

U’Sumi heard Lumekki mutter one thing angrily to A’Nu-Ahki as soon as they cleared the
Marshal
’s tent. It did not sound encouraging.

“He’s hanging us outside the gate as sacrificial wurm bait!”

B

one tired from digging in the rocky soil all night, U’Sumi barely had time to wolf down some dried kaja fruit before the watch cried out.

“They’re coming!”

He poked his head over the rim of his trench and gazed into the western pre-dawn shadows. Objects moved like giant insects in purple half-light across the narrow strip of land between the sea and mountains. They rolled on metal treads
,
like the flat-topped
Wyvernas
.
R
ounded
gun
turrets
had
two gigantic bug-eye
d
devices wrapped almost all the way around
the
long hemispheres on either side of the
ir
cannon muzzles.

U’Sumi remembered what Lumekki had said about how the Elyo somehow
drank
human blood. Strangely, all he could think of with death staring him in the face, was how horribly fitting it was that their weapon mounts should resemble titanic mosquito heads.

The enemy’s set piece artillery opened its first barrage. Thunder darts whistled overhead to land behind U’Sumi’s position, o
n the main line of trenches. C
rackling staccato
thunder l
ike giant ear-splitting popcorn exploded from the rear, followed by a rain of rocks and dirt.

A whispered order came down the line from the Tacticon, over in the next trench
:
“Hold fire until the command is given.”

U’Sumi watched the advance grow distinct in the increasing light. As dawn broke behind him, he saw row
s
of infantry accompanied the Elyo—more infantry than what held the Balimar Straits Line.
A
first rosy glint of sun lit up the turrets of the nearest enemy machines. The cannon mounts looked more like bug heads now than before. The
bulges
on either side of their barrels sparkled with millions of hexagonal facets, like compound eyes.

From the front of each vehicle wriggled ten black tentacle-like feelers—tasting, testing, and prodding serpent tongues.
A
rmored sides wagged with spiny light cannons
that had
wasp-stinger lives of their own.

A life of their own.

They lived, they thought, they moved,
and survived off the very life-giving essence of men
. F
rom a young age
,
U’Sumi learned
the basic principle of blood sacrifice
:
that
blood carried the
life of all flesh. Here were machines, or an army of un-human creatures inside machines, that fed on the very life force of men.