Don’t hesitate. Don’t hesitate.
Ashlyn turned to him. Opened her palm. “I wouldn’t recommend it, Cabbage.”
His finger trembled.
“If you fire that weapon, I’ll return the bolt to you by way of your brain.”
He dropped his crossbow.
“Step away.”
He obeyed.
Bershad raised his spear and walked over to Simeon with the clear intention of murdering him.
“No,” Ashlyn said, stopping him. “I need to know more about that armor.”
“He needs to be alive for that to happen?”
“Yes. It’s bound to his nervous system and can help me—”
“Don’t need the details,” Bershad said. “Just the directive.”
He grabbed Simeon’s ankle and yanked hard enough for his head to pop free of the sand. Bershad looked out at the sea. Waved at the distant skiff. “Felgor has a Papyrian lens with him. If he’s using it, he’ll turn around and collect us. Kerrigan said she’d leave one frigate along the coast till midday.”
“Who’s Kerrigan?”
“I’ll explain later.” Bershad turned to Cabbage. The spear twitched in his hand.
“Please don’t kill me!” he piped.
“Ain’t gonna kill you, Cabbage. Simeon and I made a deal, remember?”
Cabbage gave a slow nod. Once again, Simeon had saved him instead of the other way around.
Bershad stopped talking. Sniffed. Turned east, back toward the Proving Ground, which was billowing black smoke from the destroyed sublevels.
“Shit. We got a problem.”
“Pirates?” Ashlyn asked.
“No. They’re all dead. But Kasamir’s crops aren’t.”
He motioned to the forest that led to the Bloody Sludge. From where they were standing, they had a good view of the tree line, which was filling with deformed figures—bloated muscles and hanging, broken limbs. Mushrooms leaking from their chest cavities.
“Impossible,” Cabbage said. “The demons don’t cross the Bloody Sludge.”
“They do now,” Bershad said, glancing back to the skiff and then the trees. The creatures were swarming out of the woods at speed—loping toward the Proving Ground like wounded jackals. “Felgor isn’t going to get back here in time. That hand of yours able to explode those assholes, too?”
Ashlyn shook her head. “They need to have Osyrus Ward’s machinery implanted in their bodies. Lodestones. Those are Kasamir’s creations—the ones that Simeon brought and he buried in his garden.” She lifted her hand. “This won’t touch them.”
Bershad cursed. Raised his spear. “This can.”
“You’re falling apart,” Ashlyn said.
“I am, but my nose is telling me you got something that’ll change that tucked into your satchel there.”
“Silas … you need to be careful how much you use it, or you’ll be—”
“No time, Ashe. Give me the Gods Moss, then get to that skiff,” Bershad said. “I’ll slow them down.”
Ashlyn produced a vial full of something green and blue. Gave it to him. Bershad emptied the contents into his mouth, and Cabbage watched in amazed horror as all the damage that had been done to his body healed in a matter of seconds. Nothing remained of the wounds except dried blood and a few fresh scars.
“For sorcery not existing, you two perform an awful lot of it,” Cabbage muttered.
Bershad was already walking across the beach. He picked up the shield on his way.
“Don’t wait for me. Soon as Felgor comes back, you shove off and get clear.”
“How are you going to reach us?”
“I’ll figure something out.”
Then he was off at a run, heading directly at the big line of mushroom people that had just reached the top of the cliffside stair.
52
BERSHAD
Ghost Moth Island, the Proving Ground
Bershad charged the horde of creatures.
Some were soldiers. Wearing full armor and carrying swords or spears. Others had nothing but decayed rags hanging from desiccated skin. Spores and fungus burst from gashes in their guts.
Bershad couldn’t kill them all, but he could get their attention. He didn’t bother spearing the first wave of creatures coming down the steps—just bashed them with his shield, snapping dry knees and caving in half-rotten faces. Mushroom spores and black, infected liquid sprayed everywhere, filling his nose with the horrible reek.
When he reached the top of the stairs—a trail of twitching bodies behind him—he started using the spear.
A thrust to the face or spine seemed to drop the creatures in their tracks, so that was what Bershad started doing. One face, one spear thrust. Again and again and again.
They clawed at him—taking strips of skin and muscle off his bones. But the Gods Moss that Ashlyn gave him was stronger than anything he’d felt before—the healing kept pace with the damage, despite the fact that he was getting torn apart.
He pressed further into the horde. Screaming as he bashed with his shield and thrust with his spear, trying to attract as much of their attention as possible. He jumped onto a boulder and turned to the beach. Felgor had almost reached the shore. Ashlyn and Cabbage were wading out to meet him. Ashlyn was dragging Simeon through the shallows using whatever power she’d imbued to that metal hand.
He hopped off the rock. Looked around.
“Crap.”
The creatures were swarming from all directions—jaws working, infected eyes weeping. He was completely surrounded.
If he cut back through them to the beach, he’d just undo the work of luring the creatures away from Ashlyn and Felgor. There was nothing else to do besides charge farther into the woods, away from the sea. Bershad hopped off the rock and sprinted east—feet pounding over the damp, black grass. Through mud puddles and over broken ground. He fought as he ran, but for every corrupted face or body he skewered, two more appeared in its place.
He reached the edge of the woods, which gave way to an incredibly steep downward slope that ended in a muddy ravine. Bershad turned. Whipped his shield across the faces of two attacking creatures, reducing their skulls to fungal mist.
Then a blinding, sharp pain rippled through his left side.
He looked down. A dripping green claw was sunk deep in his rib cage. The claw belonged to a decaying man in rusted Ghalamarian armor. Bershad tried to spear him through the face, but the point glanced off his jaw, sending the desiccated bone flying across the field.
The Ghalamarian twisted his fist inside Bershad’s guts. Bershad lost his balance. Fell backward down the slope.
The Ghalamarian came with him.
They landed on a pile of sharp rocks. A large number of Bershad’s bones broke. He heaved and wheezed, trying to draw air from his lungs. Having a monster claw still jammed through them wasn’t helping. The Ghalamarian had landed on top of Bershad, but hadn’t died. His rotten breath was hot on Bershad’s face. He wrapped his free hand around Bershad’s throat and squeezed.
Shoots of black, barbed fungus squirmed out of the Ghalamarian’s infected arm, latching on to Bershad’s mouth and nose and ears. Worming inside.
“Join us,” the Ghalamarian growled, voice guttural and low. “Jooooin.”
Bershad could feel his body trying to heal the damage, but the bastard kept rooting around in his chest cavity—the fungus spreading through his guts. This was too much pain. Too much damage. Even with a bloodstream full of Gods Moss, this was killing him.
His skin started to burn. He looked down at his forearm and saw small spires of moss protruding from his tattooed skin—blue flowers blossoming from the inky chests of the dragons that he’d killed. The forest ignited with the croaking murmur of animal and insect heartbeats, but the sensation wasn’t coming from the Nomad above. It was coming from him.
His body hummed and heaved. The earth beneath him turned rich and warm and welcoming. Ready for him. He was on the precipice of something that
felt terrible and wonderful at the same time.
“No,” Bershad growled. “Not like this.”
He stopped focusing on his own body, and instead reached higher, above the trees, into the sky, where the Gray-Winged Nomad was circling.
And he asked for her help.
53
ASHLYN
Ghost Moth Island, Western Coast
“What the hell was he thinking?” Felgor asked, helping Ashlyn onto the skiff. She’d already loaded Simeon using the lodestones in her arm. The unconscious pirate was so heavy, the skiff sagged deep in the surf, almost to the railing.
“You know Silas,” she said. “He never thinks anything through.”
“True.”
“But it’s working,” Cabbage said.
Most of the creatures were swarming toward the forest where Silas had disappeared down into the ravine.
“Not quite,” Ashlyn said, pointing to the beach, where ten of the ones Bershad had battered with his shield were on their feet again, lumbering toward their skiff.
“What do we do?”
“Shove off,” Ashlyn said, bending down to open the black bag of materials she’d taken from the Proving Ground. “And get us into deeper water.”
“That isn’t going to be a quick process,” Felgor warned, already working the rigging again. “Simeon’s got us weighed down more than a greedy merchant’s last carrack of the season.”
“I know,” Ashlyn said. “Just do the best you can. Cabbage, start shooting them when they get in range.”
“I only have one bolt left.”
“What happened to the rest?”
“I, uh, shot them at Bershad.”
“Perfect.”
“Can’t you use your sorcery?”
“No. Not on them.”
“What can you use it on, then?”
Ashlyn chewed her lip. That gave her an idea. She started rooting around in her bag. Found a lodestone the size of an apple.
“This.”
The creatures were about twenty strides from their carrack, and up to their hips in seawater, but that wasn’t slowing them down.
Ashlyn stood up in the carrack. Got ready to throw the stone.
“What are you waiting for?” Cabbage shouted.
“They need to be closer together,” Ashlyn said.
“How much closer?”
She could feel the dense core vibrating low and steady, reacting to the magnet in her arm. She had to be careful. If this went sideways, Ashlyn would—at best—blow her own fingers off. At worst, the attraction would backfire and she’d push the metal through her own brainpan.
“Just a little more.”
When they were almost within arm’s reach of the stern, Ashlyn threw the orb toward them and activated every lodestone she’d implanted along her wrist.
The dragon thread pulsed. Made her teeth vibrate in her mouth. The closest mushroom person’s head simply disappeared. Behind him, the water shuddered and rippled and the rest of the mushroom people were blasted apart in a massive explosion of bile and fungus. The ocean surged with an infected swamp of green sludge. The wretched smell of pus and infection filled her nostrils.
“If that wasn’t sorcery, then there ain’t no such thing as dragons or lies or sins, neither,” said Cabbage.
They sailed in silence for a few minutes, drawing farther and farther away from the coast. Ashlyn stared back at the island, eyes fixed on the edges of the cedar forest.
“You see any sign of him?” Felgor asked, coming up to join her.
“Not yet.”
But as the morning fog started to lift, she could see the Gray-Winged Nomad circling the forest, getting lower with each pass.
And just as its wings were about to start skimming branches, she dove.
54
BERSHAD
Ghost Moth Island, the Wilting Forest
The Nomad snatched the Ghalamarian into her claws and squeezed. Sprayed his corrupted organs in a dozen different directions, then plowed through the forest with the leftovers in her claws. Bershad heard snapping cedars as she skidded to a stop in the distance.
The Ghalamarian’s claw was still inside of his chest—broken off at the elbow. Bershad used all the strength he had left in his body to rip it out of him. Then he just lay back. Went still while his body healed. Whatever had been happening to him seemed to have stopped. It took long minutes of ragged, shallow breaths before he didn’t feel like he was drowning. A few minutes after that he had enough strength to move.
He got to his feet. Cracked his neck. Looked around.
The Nomad was picking at the remnants of the rotten Ghalamarian like a dog gnawing the last scraps of meat off a chicken bone.
“Stop that,” Bershad said. “It’s gross.”
The Nomad looked up at him. Cocked her head. Then went back to nibbling the rotted bones.
Bershad sighed. Looked up at the rim of the ravine. Cursed.
There were scores of mushroom people up there. Some of them were already on their way down. More claws. More angry teeth.
Bershad still had his shield and spear, but his body had burned through almost all of the Gods Moss in his blood. No way he was cutting his way back up that ravine before he ran out. Meant he needed a faster way out to the sea.
He looked back to the dragon.
“Turns out I’m gonna need your help with one more thing.”
55
ASHLYN
Ghost Moth Island, Western Coast
Ashlyn was still staring at the sagging tree line when Felgor banged their sloop up against the waiting frigate. Goll was there to help them aboard with powerful arms, but hesitated when he saw Simeon’s unconscious body.
“Should I kill this one, Kerrigan?” he asked a dark-skinned woman with a blue mohawk, who was standing behind him with crossed arms.
“No,” Kerrigan responded. “Get everyone on board.”
“But he hurt Flawless.”
“Do as I say,” Kerrigan ordered. “Just make sure that Simeon is chained to a mast before he wakes up.”
Goll grumbled, then hauled Simeon up, threw him against a mast, and started wrapping a thick anchor chain around his chest.
“So, I’m thinking you’re the queen of Almira, that right?” Kerrigan asked Ashlyn when she reached the deck.
“That’s right.”
“You really fucked me over with what you did on my island.”
“I know.”
“Where is Flawless?” Goll asked, still wrapping lengths of chain around Simeon.
“He stayed behind to make sure we got clear,” Ashlyn said.
Everyone looked back to the coast, which was now swarming with twitching bodies that stared at them from the shallows. Eyes full of hunger.
“No,” Goll muttered. “No, this is not acceptable. I owe him a blood debt. If he dies, the debt will be forever unpaid. I will never reach my ancestors in the afterlife with that sin on my shoulders.”
“Least you ain’t already with your ancestors,” Cabbage muttered, scratching at one of the holes in his head.
“Neither is Silas,” Ashlyn said.
“What do you mean?”
“Look.” Ashlyn pointed to a copse of wilted, shaking trees. “There.”
The Nomad blasted out of the forest, heading straight up at first, then turning toward the frigate. The sound of her wingbeats boomed across the open ocean like a drum, but as she got closer, another sound rose above it.
Silas. Screaming his lungs out. He was clutched in her claws.
“By Aeternita’s perfect tits,” said Felgor. “He’s riding a dragon.”
“Riding is a generous description,” Kerrigan said. “Looks to me like he’s just hitching a rough ride. A very rough ride.”
When the Nomad was directly above the ship, she dropped him. Silas hit the water at such speed that he skipped off the surface like a thrown stone, limbs and head flailing from the brutal impact. His naked body floated on the churning surf fo
r a moment, then sank.
Without hesitation, Goll dove into the water after him. Disappeared beneath the waves.
“Uh, I might be misremembering, but didn’t Goll say that he couldn’t swim?” Felgor asked.
They all exchanged looks. Vash, Felgor, and Ashlyn all went into the water a moment later, swimming hard to catch up with the two sinking bodies.
Felgor and Vash dealt with Goll. Ashlyn grabbed Silas by the armpits and hauled him back to the surface—her arms and legs and lungs burning from the effort of pulling his weight. She came up with a sputter and wheeze, barely able to keep herself afloat. Someone grabbed her and pulled her back onto the ship.
Ashlyn doubled over on the deck, breathing hard. Nose and ears and mouth full of seawater.
“He’s not breathing,” Felgor said, hand on Silas’s chest.
She stood up, motioning for everyone to back away.
Then she crossed the deck and kicked Silas in the stomach as hard as possible.
He vomited up a bucketful of red seawater. Started coughing. After he collected his breath, he popped his own dislocated shoulder back into place, followed by three of his twisted fingers.
“Oh, that is disgusting,” Felgor said, covering his ears to drown out the loud pops.
Bershad ignored him. Looked around. Sniffed. “Everyone made it. Good.”
Ashlyn put her hands on her hips, standing over Bershad. He looked up at her and smiled.
“What?”
“You have a nice ride?” she asked.
“Well, I tried to explain to the wild dragon that a gentle landing would be smoother on my delicate and scaleless body, but things got lost in translation somewhere along the way.”
“Hey. Queen.”
Ashlyn turned around. Kerrigan was glaring at her. One hand rested on the rapier at her hip.
“Yes?”
“Don’t forget, the only reason you’re standing on this deck instead of getting digested by a dozen of those monsters is because of me. Got that?”
She glanced at Bershad, who gave a nod.
“Yes. I understand.”
“Good.”
Sorcery of a Queen Page 47
