The Emperor's Edge (a high fantasy adventure in an era of steam)

by Lindsay Buroker

  Maldynado was chasing a chicken around the building. Shrill squawks bounced from the walls.

  “Isabel,” he called. “Come back here, girl.”

  Isabel? Amaranthe rubbed crud out of her eyes. He had named the chickens?

  Books, manning the press, said, “Apparently you’re not as smooth with the women as you claim.”

  “Oh, be quiet. You could help. Isabel, stop running!”

  “I have real work to do.” Books had shaved his matted, unkempt beard, and would have looked good, except for his red-rimmed eyes and snow-pale face.

  An alarmed curse brought her attention back to the chicken chase. After ramming his hip on a counter, Maldynado fell behind. Isabel rounded a corner and sprinted for the exit, her tiny claws clacking on the floorboards.

  Sicarius appeared in the doorway. The chicken squawked and tried to dart past him. He bent and deftly plucked it from its escape route.

  Maldynado skidded to a stop, arms flailing to keep from crashing into Sicarius. A stricken expression twisted his face as he looked back and forth from bird to man, as if he feared Sicarius would snap Isabel’s neck. Surprisingly, the agitated chicken calmed in his grip. Though his slitted gaze was cool, he extended his arms so Maldynado could take her.

  Shaking her head, Amaranthe swung her legs over the edge of the bunk. Sicarius might be pragmatic to the point of deserving Books’s ‘utterly heartless’ tag, but he was not sadistic.

  Maldynado accepted the chicken and headed back to the makeshift pen he had constructed. Isabel promptly began fussing in his tight grip. Amaranthe almost smiled, imagining Maldynado as an overprotective father, until Sicarius strode her way. Wholt’s slashed throat invaded her mind again. She closed her eyes against the vision.

  When she opened them, Sicarius stood before her. He held out a sealed envelope. “A boy came to the dock with a message for you.”

  Ugh, she wasn’t supposed to be getting mail here. That meant people knew where she was and possibly what she was doing.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “I would not presume to read your private correspondences.” His tone was as warm as the ice under the dock.

  Maybe Books was right. Maybe she should apologize. It wouldn’t hurt her, though it seemed a betrayal to Wholt’s spirit. Would it even mean anything to Sicarius? He never said “please” or “thank you” or seemed to have any use for social rituals.

  She fiddled with the envelope. “Did you question the boy?” Perhaps it was one of the children she had seen spying on her.

  “No.”

  Amaranthe frowned up at him. “Why not?”

  “If you would curse me for defending you from enforcers, I suspect you’d want me to interrogate a child even less.”

  “I said question, not interrogate.”

  “I don’t differentiate,” he said bluntly.

  Jaw slack, she stared as he walked across the room and out the door. No, she did not need the image of a broken and battered child joining Wholt’s dead body in her mind. Emperor’s teeth, she would have to be careful what she asked Sicarius to do in the future.

  Maybe you shouldn’t be working with him at all.

  She broke the seal on the note and read: Time to redeem your favor. Mitsy.

  “Feh.” Amaranthe glared at Maldynado and Isabel, wishing neither had conspired to wake her.

  • • • • •

  By day, the towering building that housed the Maze loomed silent and lifeless. Amaranthe tightened her parka against a breeze that whipped at the fur edging her hood. A twinge of trepidation stirred in her belly. What could Mitsy want?

  “Thanks for inviting me to come,” Books said as they navigated an icy sidewalk toward the steel double doors. “I needed a distraction.”

  “How long since your last drink?” Amaranthe asked.

  “A couple—three days maybe.” Sweat gleamed on his forehead. “It’s been hard to sleep, and I can’t stop thinking about it. I hope I can be of use to you today.”

  “Me too. I don’t trust Mitsy. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t owe her a favor. And, now that I know the Forge folks have their fingers in the gambling arena, I wonder if she may be a member of the coalition.” Still, Mitsy deserved to know Hollowcrest’s men were rounding up her gang members for medical experiments in the Imperial Barracks’ dungeon. Maybe sharing the information could help turn her into an ally.

  “What’s her full name?” Books asked.

  “Mitsy Masters.”

  “I didn’t come across it in my research.”

  “She leads the Panthers gang. I’m not sure she’d be quick to volunteer her life’s details to journalists.”

  Amaranthe tapped on the steel double doors. They swung inward with a hiss of escaping steam. No one waited on the other side.

  She and Books walked into the empty building. Before, the crowded arena had instilled claustrophobia, but the absence of people made the place feel eerie, like a long-abandoned ruin. Not a single janitor, bouncer, or maintenance man moved through the descending rows of benches. Nothing moved behind the dark window of Mitsy’s office in the rafters. In the corridors of the Maze, the ambulatory walls stood immobile, and no treasure sat on the dais.

  “Maybe we’ve arrived prematurely,” Books said.

  A hiss of steam came from behind. Amaranthe turned in time to see the big doors swing shut. The clang echoed through the building. She ran to them, grabbed a handle, and yanked. The door did not open.

  “Oh, I think we’re perfectly mature,” she said.

  Two internal doors on opposite walls flew open. Five bouncers marched out of each, veering straight for Amaranthe and Books. Their heavy footfalls echoed from the walls and rafters. The bouncers bore a mix of muskets and repeating crossbows, all loaded and aimed toward Amaranthe.

  Books tried the door, as if he might have better luck opening it. “This is more of a distraction than I had in mind,” he said, fear creeping into his voice.

  “Stay calm,” she murmured, as much for herself as for him.

  The men fanned out and surrounded Amaranthe and Books. Mitsy entered from the door behind the bettors’ cage.

  “You didn’t need to send out quite so many men, Mitsy,” Amaranthe said. “I’m just an average fighter without any special training in dodging crossbow quarrels and musket balls.”

  Mitsy stalked across the aisles. Her frosty eyes felt more dangerous than the weapons. “I thought you would bring Sicarius. I hear you two are close now.”

  “Not exactly.”

  Mitsy stopped at the edge of the semi-circle of bouncers. Her flamboyant “my dears” and superior smile had vanished. Pink swam in the whites of her eyes, as if she had been crying.

  “I came to redeem my favor,” Amaranthe said quietly.

  “You came to die, bitch.”

  The words stunned Amaranthe to silence.

  “Don’t look at me like you don’t know,” Mitsy said. “You people have been stealing our brothers and sisters from the streets for months. They disappear mysteriously until we find them dead in a canal, their bodies mutilated. And if that wasn’t appalling enough, now you’ve thrown this…creature into the streets to hunt us down. The other deaths were hard enough, but Ragos…”

  Amaranthe remembered Ragos, the friendly bouncer who had showed her to Mitsy’s office. He was dead now? Surely, he had not deserved such a fate.

  “I know of the creature,” Amaranthe said, “and the medical experiments in the Imperial Barracks may be responsible for the earlier deaths, but I don’t believe they’re connected. I don’t know why you—”

  “You lied! You’re a govie, not some businesswoman. You’ve been an enforcer for years—did you think I wouldn’t find out?”

  “I’m not anymore,” Amaranthe said. “Now I’m—”

  “Working with Sicarius. That’s even worse. He’s Hollowcrest’s man, everybody knows that.”

  Books sucked in a startled breath. Amaranthe was less surprised by
the statement, since she had already guessed Sicarius had been associated with Hollowcrest and old Emperor Raumesys at some point.

  “My boys have seen you,” Mitsy whispered, voice low and hoarse. “All over the city with some warrior caste dandy and Sicarius—Hollowcrest’s every-whim-doer. Don’t pretend you’re not working for the government. They’ve probably got you finding targets for whatever it is they’re doing to my people.”

  Mitsy’s boys? Amaranthe remembered the child who had followed her through Ink Alley. So, he had not been an enforcer informant but one of Mitsy’s. And the dish boy in the Onyx Lodge—had he been one of hers too?

  “I’m trying to help the emperor.” Amaranthe spread her arms in a conciliatory gesture. “I don’t have anything to do with Hollowcrest or that creature.”

  “If you’re working with the emperor, you’re a murdering govie.”

  “I haven’t murdered…” Amaranthe could not get out the “anyone.” Thoughts of Wholt and his dead men reared in her mind. She may not have personally killed the enforcers, but that did not make her any less responsible.

  Mitsy sneered. She wanted Amaranthe to argue, wanted a fight.

  Amaranthe eyed the bouncers and the weapons trained on her. She needed to try something else if she and Books were going to get out of here alive.

  “I’m sorry,” Amaranthe said, meeting the other woman’s eyes.

  Surprise stole the sneer from Mitsy’s face.

  “I met Ragos when I came to see you last time,” Amaranthe said. “It must have been devastating to lose him.”

  “He didn’t deserve to die like that,” Mitsy said. “I should have been able to…”

  “I know. When I lost my father, I was powerless to save him. It’s frustrating. You feel you have to hurt somebody. But if you can’t hurt the ones who were actually responsible, what’s the point? It’s not your fault, Mitsy. It’s not mine either. I don’t work for Hollowcrest. I want to put an end to that man’s machinations. If we work together, we’ll be strong enough to do it, to keep more of your people from being killed.”

  For a moment, Mitsy was nodding and listening, but then her eyes narrowed and she snorted.

  “You almost had me, Amaranthe, but I remember you from school. You could always win over the teachers with that tongue, but not me.”

  “Mitsy—”

  “Silence!”

  Even the bouncers jumped.

  “No more speaking for you, my dear,” Mitsy said. “It’s my turn to leave mutilated bodies in the streets.” She waved to the bouncers.

  Two of the brawny men headed for Amaranthe, two for Books. The rest kept their weapons trained. There was no chance of escape.

  “Wait,” Books said, shying away from the approaching men. “You need to listen to her. She’s—”

  The bouncers grabbed him beneath the armpits, lifting him from his feet, despite his height. Books lost his composure. He kicked and thrashed, trying to claw and bite his captors.

  Two men grabbed Amaranthe in the same manner and dragged her down the steps between the rows of benches and to the railing. Below, a corridor ran parallel to the outside wall. Twenty feet down, the Maze’s brick floor promised a hard landing.

  “Mitsy, this won’t change anything.” Amaranthe doubted her words would sway anyone at this point, but she had to try.

  “It’s not about change, my dear. It’s about avenging the family.” Mitsy nodded to her men. “Throw them in.”

  “Release me!” Books yelled.

  The bouncers hoisted him up first. He grabbed the rail on his way over, so he hung over the side, legs dangling into the pit.

  When Amaranthe realized her destination inevitable, she slithered over on her own, the better to take the fall without hurting herself. She landed with a roll. The floor pounded the breath from her body, but no excruciating stabs of pain announced broken bones.

  The bouncers laughed as they peeled back Books’s fingers. When he would not let go, one man lifted his leg, boot aimed at the tenacious digits.

  “Let go!” Amaranthe called.

  Whether out of obedience or because he could not hold himself up any longer, Books released the rail. He dropped, hitting first with his heels and collapsing onto his back. He cried out. Face contorted with pain, he curled onto his side and made no move to rise.

  Amaranthe knelt beside him and put a hand on his shoulder. “Did you break anything?”

  He panted, tears filming his eyes, and did not answer. Amaranthe glared up at Mitsy, who stood at the railing with one of her bouncers.

  “Turn on the Maze and set the clacker to kill,” Mitsy said. “Then you men go outside and make sure Sicarius isn’t hiding somewhere. There’ll be no rescue attempts.”

  As the bouncers withdrew from the rail, Books clambered to his feet. He gritted his teeth against the pain from whatever injuries he had received.

  “Mitsy,” Amaranthe said, “you’re making a mistake.”

  “It won’t be my first.”

  “I can help you!”

  “Save your words for the clacker. A machine would be more likely to listen.” Mitsy moved out of view.

  “Fiends.” Books turned one way, glanced down the corridor, then spun the other way and did the same. “She’ll have all the exits secured. A clacker. The army uses those on the front lines, doesn’t it? They’re automated to fillet people like fish. We’re doomed.”

  “Books,” Amaranthe said.

  A low rumble pulsed through the earth. Next came a cacophonous screech. The walls started their peregrinations, leaving slots, grinding along tracks, and clicking into new slots. In the distance, a clang sounded—a cage door going up.

  Books’s head spun toward the noise, face stricken. “That’s it, isn’t it? It’s out. There’s no hope. We’re dead.”

  “Books.” Amaranthe grabbed his arm. “We’re going to escape.”

  His gaze latched onto her. “How?”

  How indeed. As Books had said, Mitsy would not have left a gate unlocked. Amaranthe craned her neck back. The only way out was up.

  She touched the cold, copper-plated wall. No handholds or crevices marred the surface. The exterior walls were too high to reach even if she stood on Books’s shoulders. The interior maze walls were a few feet lower. Maybe they could reach the top of them.

  “Clackers run on treads; they’re not built for jumping,” Amaranthe said, “and these walls are too smooth for them to climb.”

  “Yes, we share that problem.”

  “Get on my shoulders.”

  Amaranthe placed her palms against an inner wall and leaned toward it, feet planted. She bent her legs, so he could use her thigh as a step.

  “You should go first,” Books said.

  “I want you on top.”

  “I don’t think I can—”

  “Books, go!”

  He approached her uncertainly. “You’re too small. I could hurt you. This is a bad idea.”

  A clank echoed through the Maze. The clacker was near, no more than a couple corridors away.

  “Good idea,” Books muttered. “This is a good idea.”

  He stepped on her thigh, put a hand on her head, and pushed himself up. Amaranthe grunted as he clambered onto her shoulders. His boots ground into her muscles like a pestle working the bottom of a mortar. Once he was standing, she pushed her heels into the ground and, back rigid, inched up.

  Heat rushed to her face, and her legs trembled. Sweat sprang from her skin.

  “I can almost reach it,” he whispered.

  A piece of wall detached to Amaranthe’s left. It pulled away from the main section and followed the tracks in the floor, eventually disappearing around a corner. Through the vacant orifice came an ominous rumble and the soft clacking of metal on metal.

  Amaranthe pushed up to the balls of her feet.

  “I think I can…” Books jumped off Amaranthe’s shoulders.

  The force drove her to her knees, but Books grabbed the top of the wall
first. Legs scrabbling against the smooth surface, he inched himself higher until he hooked his armpits over the edge. He swung his leg up and straddled the wall. Once he found his balance, he flattened onto his stomach and reached down to her.

  “Hurry,” he whispered. “It just turned into the corridor over here. It seems to be finding us awfully quickly for some machine running on a random loop. “

  A flaw in her plan presented itself. Books’s hand hung too far above to reach. Amaranthe tried to jump for it anyway—and missed by three feet.

  Books’s eyes widened with distress. “That’s never going to work. You need to, ah, to…”

  “Yes, professor?”

  He pounded his fist against the wall. “I’m good in a classroom, I swear.”

  “Don’t panic,” Amaranthe said. “I’ll think of something.” Yes, Amaranthe. Think of something.“What’s it doing?”

  “It’s looking at me. Technically, I know it’s just a machine taking directions from a punchcard brain automated for a simple task. But I swear it’s looking at me. And it’s rubbing a pair of razor-edged pinchers together. Actually it’s clacking them. I suppose that’s where it derives its name.”

  Brilliant analysis. Amaranthe kept the thought to herself. She was just as guilty of nervous rambling at times. She could not do so now though. One of them had to think of something. She looked around, seeking a tool to use, anything.

  “Uh oh,” Books said.

  “What now?”

  “It says Tar-Mech on the back.”

  “Larocka’s company?” Amaranthe asked.

  “I think it heard you—it’s heading toward that gap in the wall.”

  “It can’t hear me, Books. Let’s be logical here.”

  “Maybe Mitsy bought an upgraded version with special features.”

  Amaranthe froze, hands on the wall. “Like magic?” If Larocka could protect her home with it, what else might she be able to do?

  “I don’t know, but it’s coming your way. You’ll be dead soon.”

  “Thanks for the optimism.” Amaranthe looked down at her boots and her clothes. “Parka, of course.” She tore off the garment. “Catch the end.”

  She swung it up. Books grabbed the hood and let the rest dangle.