The Vastness

by Hausladen, Blake;

  “That is one hell of a contingency.”

  Rahan wasn’t done. “If that fails, you can signal to them by crossing one of my pennants with one of white and they set fire to the out ring and withdraw to the next. Cross with blue to strike the second. Crossing with red and will order the freemen to set fire to ever structure in the Warren and withdraw to Central Plaza to make their final stand. And should all that fail us, there are tunnels beneath the tithe tower that run west beyond of the city walls and back east across the river to the Copper Quarter. I have loyal there who know the routes. The password is Kyoden.”

  “It better not come to that,” I said.

  “Anything else up your sleeve?” Barok asked.

  “That was the best I could manage in the time I was allowed.”

  And then he went, Barok and Yarik moving fast behind him.

  I wish that someone else had been there to see us. Then I wished I had thought to say farewell.

  80

  Admiral Soma O’Nropeel

  The Battle of Errera Landing

  The road remained dark as the human screams and animal howls moved closer.

  “I heard a song in close,” Lady Jayme said to me again. “I swear it.”

  I’d swung the barge back onto pier on her word, but our rider were nowhere to be seen.

  “Eyes south,” a yellowcoat called and every ready bow aimed at the tree line beyond the darkened outbuilding. Shapes and sounds rushed at us through the trees.

  “Hold fire,” a voice shouted back before arrows were let fly, and Akal-Fells began to burst through the trees. Many of the horses were empty, but they moved too fast in the darkness for me to recognize the living or learn our casualties.

  “Make way,” Dia bellowed and galloped toward the pier, “Get everyone aboard. They are on us.”

  I added my voice to hers as hooves and boots rumbled down the pier. They flung themselves into the barge while arrows stabbed at the black things that chased us.

  “Where is Pikailia?” I asked.

  “Too many of them to fight here,” Fleur hollered at the archers. She was cover in blood and looked ready to collapse. “Move, damn you, move. Casts off now. Now.”

  My yellowcoats abandoned all cautions, cut lines and broke poles as they heaved the heavy barge away. The last yellowcoat upon the pier missed the jump and went into the water. I line was throw, and it was a stroke of luck that she caught it. I helped haul her through the water up as the first shape appeared upon the pier.

  It was a young deer with the head of fox. It galloped at us, leapt high over the rail, and landed upon the deck near Lilly. Three yellowcoats tackled it away, and the startled Sermod struggled for a moment to protect us from its black touch. While my sailors heave the twisted thing over the side, a new thunder began to rise from the pier.

  “Make ready,” I said. “Here they come.”

  One after another, galloping beast began to leap onto our gathering spears. A second made it over the rail while flashes of despair twisted my gust. A pair of yellowcoats with ready war hammers caught the creature on the back and neck with savage strokes the destroyed whatever magic had held it together. The leaping forms began to impact the side of the barge as we withdraw, and I would have laughed if not for the madness in there eyes. I searched the shorelines.

  “Eyes up,” I called. “There will be things that can swim and climb the sides. All idle sailors to polls and oars. Get us out of the shallows.”

  The gnashing and wailing of Geart’s beasts rose sharply and the trees along the landing tumbled over. Things large and small poured into the water. Yew bows barked back at them, and the heavy shafts tore through dark bodies. My childhood home became a frothing cauldron.

  “Stop pushing aft. All polls fore. Keep us angled into the current. Drummer, sound a quick stroke.”

  The barge was sluggish, but the current was swift and our rowers were strong. We began to pull away while arrows peppered the broiling water.

  “Thousands more, ma’am,” came the call, but I knew not to despair as I saw the things trying to swim at us.

  “The river will take them,” I said, and the crew cheered as they watched the current push the creatures downriver as we rowed out toward the Whittle. None of the Hessier would get near us unless they got smart enough to swim upriver instead of straight at us. I thought it unlikely but left nothing to chance.

  “Check the sides. Are we clear?”

  A few yellowcoats called all-clear as they leaned over the rails, but it was the Sermod I wanted opinion from.

  “Lady Jayme?” I said and spotted her amidships with the group that had gone to Dagoda. I had to make my way through the wall of Akal-Fell to get to them. All the wounded were gathered around Emi. Liv was covered in so much blood I could not immediately see where she was wounded. A Sermod was there as well and knelt down next to Emi to sing.

  “Shit,” I said, and then called out. “Healing magic coming, everyone hold on.”

  The blast of white light shocked me back and soaked my skin with love. I’d never get used to the surprise of it, and struggled with the rest to keep my feet and my wits.

  The Sermod collapsed, and her light was extinguished.

  Fleur and Dia were there, and I had questions, but needed us safe. “Lady Jayme, is the barge free of beasts?”

  The old witch was dazed from the struggle against the Hessier and the touch of the healing magic. She turned and woke in slow stages to my presence. I took her by the arm.

  “Are their any Hessier on the ship?”

  She shook her head, her gaze fixed east on the moon and its halo of patchy clouds. “There,” she said and pointed.

  It could not be, but as I stared at the clouds I saw movement. Thousands of winged forms were pouring toward us.

  I reached for the pouch at my hip before I remembered that we’d left all trace of Vesteal blood behind. I called out to the officer behind the drum stand, instead. “Ready a sprint. Double time on the catch.”

  Her mallet and her voice began to boom, and as the barge dashed toward the Whittle, I leapt to the prow and waved a lantern back and forth toward my great ship.

  I spotted Tayler along the rail and she signaled back. She already had the crew moving to sails and anchor, and I tried not to be distracted by the black cloud moving on us as we swung ship and barge side by side in the current.

  Up the side they went four at a time as soon as we were secured.

  “There is no time for the horses,” I said to Fleur.

  “I’ll not leave them to die or be used to make more beasts,” she said back.

  “They are coming on fast,” Tayler called from above. “Get the druids below deck. Archers, damn you all, find a bow and prove you are Edonian.”

  Liv, Dia, and Ghemma made it up over the side and I started up after them.

  The yapping of foxes and the wailing of children came at us from all direction as the winged things began to circling the ship in the darkness. I reached the deck and hoped to see our archers at work, but they had no good targets in the dim moonlit. A snake with falcon’s wings dove past me, and I snatched the Shadow from it in a panic. It fell dead near Emi and three yellow coats leapt after it with hammers. The swing of one caught another on the shoulder.

  Confusion was going to get us all killed.

  I could feel the weight of the barge still dragging upon us and looked over the rail. “Fleur, get up here now.”

  “See you in Enhedu, Admiral,” she replied with hatchet in hand, and stuck the line securing the barge. The Whittle lurched as the barge sprung free.

  I wanted to scream at her, but shouted down instead, “Move as many lanterns as you can along the starboard side and stay to the west side of the river all the way to the delta. You’ll go aground in the shallow if you try the eastern shore.”

  “Forget about me, damn it. I’ll be fine,” she said, though she hurried to get hold of the nearest lantern.

  Around me, the yew bows were s
till silent and the circling creatures grew only louder. Fear began to creep into my bone. They would gather around and come at us all at once. Geart had hold of them, I could feel it. All his attention was upon us.

  A fresh source of healing magic leapt up amidships. It was Lady Jayme standing over Emi. Her song was small, but the effect of the girl’s presence remained as profound as ever as the blue light blasted away the darkness.

  The sight of the Hessier fowl that swooped around us was too much. Some had baby’s eyes and mouths. Other had tiny hands instead of talons, a serpent’s tail, or the fur of mammals. Those with the great wings of an eagle or albatross had the bodies of tiny children and the heads of foxes, owls, or rabbits. The flock was an aberrant terror, each twisted form containing an entombed soul.

  I began to scream. I saw my dead children in their misshapen eyes. I saw the end of the world their touched promised.

  A bowstring twanged above the bedlam of shrieks and the largest of them fell.

  “Have at them,” Tayler shouted and other archers struggled to do likewise. I flung away my hat, as ashamed of my weakness as I was proud of her metal. A few more beasts fell while I tried to use angry to purge the terror that swirled in my head.

  Where was Pikailia?

  Above me, Hessier began diving onto our sail and ropes, tearing at them with their teeth and talons. Beasts began to fall onto the deck, smashed by well shot arrows.

  “Soma,” Emi called, and I turned to see her sitting up against the mainmast next to Liv’s unconscious form. “Come closer.”

  I got to within ten paces of her and stopped as the air began to crackle loud and hot between us. “This cannot be wise. How can we control this?”

  She batted at her ears, and I saw the blood on her hand. She yelled, “Singer will start trying to get hold of me to sacrifice themselves to save us. I am already covered in ash. I can’t take any more. The globe that forms around us might steal the Hessier’s magic. Get over here now.”

  Lady Jayme was eying Emi while she sang. Ghemma and other singers were close by with their eyes closed as if they were trying to invent new magic from dark whispers.

  Emi was right.

  I reached out my hand and started again toward her. The globe rose fast, and the blue lighting leapt across it hot and mean. Lady Jayme and the other singers cried out and fled.

  Emi closed her eyes and I took another step toward her. She was doing something, and my skin began to burn. Everyone screamed in pain. Having nothing else at hand, and I threw my hairpin at her. Her eyes came open and she saw the effect she was having. The heat upon my skin vanished, and the smoky globe expanded fast around the entire ship. Its surface churned with violence and the terrible pain lanced through me once again. Emi was still seven paces away.

  Emi had tried some new magic. I began to yell at her for lying to me, but she’d closed her eyes again. I got ready to jump away from her when a Hessier flew into the globe and fell into the river.

  The cries of babes and the laughter of foxes tortured my ears again, and it would be for the last time.

  I took three fast steps toward Emilia, and the globe leapt high above the ship. Hundreds of black forms plummet into the river around us while my tortured ship fought it way up the steady current.

  “I’ve almost got it, I think, “ Emilia said. She was trying to aim her magic at the Hessier, but my skin began to burn again.

  She did not have control. I leapt away from her and tried to aim the Spirit’s anger up at the Hessier, but I could not focus. Emi screamed and anger broiled around my eyes.

  How dare she use me.

  I made fists and tired to find a weapon. Everyone was screaming and tearing at each other. I found a spear and charged her.

  My limbs went numb and I fell to the deck. The spear bounced away from me and I looked to it with longing.

  Murder, murder was what I must do!

  A song slapped me.

  Burning black forms began to fall like rain around us and the air filled with ash and the stink of burnt hair.

  It was Lady Jayme and her magic assaulted my ears and eyes. She had hold of Emi’s arm, her body sheathed in white flame. Around us the swarm fell, their hair and feathers blazing crimson as the magic raced east through the black cloud.

  Then with a soft pop, Lady Jayme’s turned to ash, and the burning scrapes of her clothes drifted down around Emi.

  I sat up and could do no more. The ship was hushed and coated with ash and black carcasses. The stink shocked me awake, and made it to the rail and what fresh air could be found there.

  Emi stood and joined me at the far end. She banged Lady Jayme’s ash from her arms and her clothes and did not say a word.

  I’d not seen Pikailia or Earinne.

  “Emilia, where is my daughter?”

  She said nothing, but I knew the answer.

  81

  Queen Dia Yentif

  Emilia Grano

  My ears would not stop popping and my hands would not stop shaking.

  Mercanfur and three of his tall ships had swung in alongside to screen us from the hostile shore, and fresh crew had come aboard, but the Whittle was still listing hard left and her masts and sails were a shambles. The watch fires atop Bessradi’s tower had come into view while the east bank of the river remained an undulating carpet of beasts. If any were attempting the current, none had been strong enough yet to catch us. The sky was mercifully clear.

  Emi and Soma had not moved from the rail that tipped toward the swift waters. None had dared yet to approach them.

  As we limped between the great towers that guarded the river, the carpet of creatures jammed themselves into the corner of torn ground where the Moat River met the Bessradi. The waterway was the same seething rapids I’d almost gotten swept down, and I was glad we’d not tired it. The water smashed upon thousands of boulders before it dumping into the Bessradi over a short but violent waterfall. Beasts were attempting to leap from one rock to the next, as I imagine Yarik’s men might have tried, but the route crossed three long bowshots worth of savage water. The few that made it within range of the towers were struck by a dozen arrows.

  Many men were there worked along the north side of the rapids upon some wide construction—the start of a proper dam or a spillway perhaps. I lost sight of it as we passed through the towers and started to turn.

  It was Tayler at the helm as we labored around to a wide harbor filled Edonian ships. When we came to a halt upon wide pier, a numbed stillness gripped what remained of us.

  Tayler ordered us to abandon ship. Some managed an amount of urgency. The rest struggled to lift their heads. As I approached the rail, Soma grabbed my arm. “Tell me it was worth it.”

  Everyone came to a halt and looked to me. I had not good answer.

  “Tell me something. Tell me what happened.”

  My teeth and bones hurt and words came hard. “A ghost leapt up from the stone as vivid as Leger, its black ash bathed in blue flame. She was a Druid, old and brutalized and flung her voice at the sky as though it was the only one left in the world. She was so angry, so confused, in such pain. It was the Song of the Earth, but she was not singing it. She attacked the world with it. The verses killed several of the druids as the words poured into their ears and the grip of the Sprit fell hard upon all of us, especially us mothers. The Hessier came for us and would have killed us all if Emilia had not turned them to ash.”

  Soma took two fast steps toward Emilia. The girl had not moved. “You were able to target only the Hessier?”

  Emilia would not answer.

  “She tried very hard,” I said, “but, no.”

  “Admiral, we must abandon ship,” Tayler said and pointed the yellowcoats tending to Lilly toward the rail. They hurried her around the gray blast of ash that had been Lady Jayme, but Soma was in the way, her attention fixed on Emilia.

  Tayler said, “The beasts may be strong enough to swim between the towers and get onto this shore. We cannot linger here. E
milia, can you see any approaching?”

  Neither of them were interested in her words, and Soma took a step toward Emilia. Spark began to arch all around us. “You meant to do it, didn’t you?”

  I stepped in her path. “This is not you, Soma. Step back.”

  “Get out of my way,” she said and started moving. “She murdered my daughter.”

  Tayler snatched Soma by the arm and held fast. “Admiral, stop.”

  “Let me go. My daughter. She killed my Pikailia.” Soma said and knocked her away.

  “Don’t you dare talk to me about a dying daughter,” I said and snapped her head back with a punch. She fell limp to the deck, and the yellowcoats looked on with shame, anger, or sadness.

  Tayler’s righted herself. Her concern had not changed. “Everyone over the side, now. Liv, Dia, Get Emilia moving.”

  They did as she said, taking their admiral with them, as the furor of the Chaukai moved closer. I did not hear the shrieks or scream of Hessier, and I did not want to.

  Liv and I approached Emilia and we leaned upon the rail on either side of her. She stared at the nothingness above the Warrens lantern-lit streets.

  “Your plan for how to use me didn’t work, Dia,” Emi said.

  Liv shot a hot and distrusting look at me down the rail and tried to move the girl around behind her, but Emilia pushed her away.

  She was no more in control of herself than Soma had been. Punching her would not work the way it had with Soma. I could not think of a way to calm her.

  “Emilia, what happened?” Liv asked.

  “Dia tried to make me into a weapon the same way their precious Spirit does to everyone that loves Her. She’d have me burn the Hessier and half the city to death, as long as she and her children were out of the way.”

  I was reconsidering hitting her when Tayler grabbed my arm and pulled hard. “Now. All three of you, or I will throw you over the side and let the healers sort you out.”