The Thousand Deaths of Ardor Benn

by Tyler Whitesides

  “What do you see out there?” Ard called, desperate to float to the front of the carriage, but not willing to abandon the safety of his seat harness.

  “Rocks,” answered the pilot. “Lots of jagged rocks.”

  “That sounds like a delightful place to land,” Ard answered. “Do you see anything softer?” Was it too much to ask for a well-positioned mountain pond?

  “I’m thinking about throwing you out for a landing pad,” Raek replied. He was wiggling levers, but Ard couldn’t tell if they were actually doing anything. “There’s a clearing below us. We’d have to drop fast,” Raek explained.

  “How fast?” Ard asked.

  “Almost straight down,” said Raek. “Too much residual heat in the balloon for that. The Grit’s burned out, but we’ll never get the air discharged in time.”

  Ard drew his Roller and put two balls through the thin wooden ceiling of the carriage. The resounding shots caused everyone to shout something in alarm, and Ard grinned at the insults and threats.

  “Will that do the trick?” Ard asked, holstering his gun and brushing little chips of wood out of his hair. The holes wouldn’t be enough to lose containment of their Drift cloud, but those Roller balls would really tear through the sailcloth in the overhead balloon.

  Raek checked the gauges on his console and glanced through the front window again. “We’re going down at a rate of … Holy slag! Everybody hold on to something!”

  Ard alway found it strange to be inside a contained Drift cloud because it was impossible to tell how fast he was really moving. Glancing through the front window now, he saw the green mountainside coming up fast! Sparks! Maybe one shot through the balloon would have been enough …

  “Ard. Ard. Ardor!”

  He looked over at Quarrah, every muscle in her body tight. Did she realize she had just said his name three times? She didn’t seem like she really wanted to start a conversation.

  “Anticipation is the worst part,” Ard lied. “Maybe just shut your eyes …”

  “Maybe you should shut your mouth!” Quarrah shrieked.

  Behind him, one of the Kranfel brothers laughed. There was the unmistakable sound of one of the Tracers retching. Then the carriage made impact.

  It was a disorienting jumble of cracking wood and jolting force. The housed Drift cloud was suddenly released from its containment as the hull of the carriage smashed. The cloud rushed out, assuming its natural spherical shape, which it had been denied while in the box. The cloud still enveloped them, but it served them no protection. The crew was strapped into seats that were anchored into the carriage, and the carriage was splitting like a boiled potato against the mountainside.

  The crash was over faster than Ard expected. With a jolt, everything came to a halt.

  Ard lifted his head, but everything was blurry. He blinked hard, calling out to Quarrah and Raek. There was something wet on his forehead. That would be blood, he realized as it dripped from his forehead and splattered on his knee.

  Ard knew he had been thrown out the front of the Drift cloud. He thought he was still in the carriage, but there was blue sky above him. Gripping his restraining straps, Ard worked them loose, falling from his seat the moment they came undone. He wiped his bloody brow and turned to take stock of the wreck.

  The carriage was in pieces, the bulk of it rising at an angle from where Ard knelt in the dirt. There was dark smoke venting out the back.

  “Blazes, Ard.” Quarrah crawled through the torn earth toward him. “That plan sounded a lot better when we were sitting around a chalkboard eating pastries.” She was favoring one arm, her chair toppled sideways on the ground behind her.

  “Have you seen Raek?” Ard asked. Or the Kranfel brothers? Or Nemery Baggish? Sparks! Half the crew was missing. And the ones he could see didn’t appear to be in great shape.

  Lence Raismus looked unconscious, his seat dangling at a precarious angle. Ulusal was tearing at her safety restraints, and Moroy Peng was half-buried under a pile of rubble.

  The spherical Drift cloud hung to one side of the carriage, full of debris. Ard saw Sojin Wint floating in the center of it, the Tracer struggling against the straps of her chair. The top chain was still anchored into the carriage ceiling, pulled tightly, holding her chair horizontally in the weightless cloud.

  A wooden panel next to Moroy was suddenly heaved aside, and Raek appeared, dirt smeared across his bald head. “Smoke!” he shouted, peering at the back half of the carriage, where their cargo was stored. “Smoke means fire. We’ve got to get everybody out of here!”

  Ard felt the urgency strike him. There was a lot of Grit back there. Blast Grit. If the fire found it …

  Ulusal dropped from her chair, crashing across the sloped floor of the carriage to land beside Raek. The Trothian woman helped him pull back a piece of debris, and Ard saw Moroy scamper out of the wreckage and disappear outside.

  “We’ll get the old man.” Raek gestured to Lence Raismus. “You two find Sojin.”

  Quarrah was already on her feet as Ard rose, head throbbing. In order to reach the floating Tracer, Ard and Quarrah would have to climb up the exterior of the carriage. Ard was still thinking about it when Quarrah took off, hoisting herself atop the carriage framework and scrambling upward to the Drift cloud.

  Ard turned, scouring the wreckage for his pack. He found it, still strapped into the seat, headrest burrowed into the moist soil. Pulling the pack free, he untied a coil of rope and shouted to Quarrah.

  She was crouched at the edge of the Drift cloud, smoke curling up around her. From her position, Quarrah wouldn’t be able to reach Sojin’s seat without leaping into the weightless cloud. Ard would have to serve as an anchor for the jump.

  Holding on to one end of the rope, Ard threw the coil up to where Quarrah was waiting. She knew what to do without any explanation, quickly lashing the other end of the rope around her middle.

  Shouldering his pack, Ard dug his boots into the ground as Quarrah sprang upward. He gave her slack as she soared up through the large Drift cloud, ramming into Sojin Wint. The force of the collision pushed both women upward, the anchored chair swinging on its chain like a pendulum.

  The rope went tight in Ard’s hands, their momentum yanking him forward. He leaned back, holding them in place. Quarrah and Sojin now floated upside down. They were exchanging a few words, but Ard couldn’t hear the conversation. Then Quarrah slipped a knife from her belt and began slicing at the straps that held Sojin to the chair.

  Ard saw Ulusal and Raek moving outside, carrying Lence Raismus between them. The old man was conscious now, muttering something about finding his Feeder equipment.

  “Ard!” Quarrah shouted. “Reel us in!” Sojin Wint was clinging to her rescuer in the weightless environment.

  With the rope in both hands, Ard sprinted out of the carriage wreckage and across the grassy clearing, tugging Quarrah and Sojin through the Drift cloud and away from the smoking debris. They were being towed earthward, but it would still be a bit of a drop from the bottom of the cloud to the meadow.

  The ruined carriage suddenly exploded, blowing the top out of the back and sending smoldering scraps of wood into the ground like deadly spears. Ard fell to the ground, losing his grip on the rope. Rolling over, he popped his head up through the grasses to see Quarrah and Sojin stumbling toward him.

  The two women reached Ard the same time Raek did. “Come on,” his friend said, hoisting Ard up. “Rest of the crew’s over here.”

  The four of them moved around the decimated carriage and up the grassy hillside. Ard was squinting one eye against the blood dripping down his face. He did a quick count of the beleaguered faces he saw waiting.

  “Hey! Look at that! Nobody died!” Ard exclaimed. Miraculously, everyone was conscious and accounted for, though everybody appeared to have their share of bumps and bruises.

  “You’re a blazing maniac, Ardor Benn!” shouted Moroy Peng. He started to say more, but then decided to storm off toward the trees.
r />   “Moroy!” called Sojin. “Moroy!” She jogged up the hill after him, both Tracers disappearing into the woods.

  “They’ll be back,” Ard reassured the others. “Tracers always tend to be the prigs of the bunch.” Ard used to get a good laugh out of Tanalin by impersonating the ones from his old Harvesting crew. He didn’t have the energy to do so now. Sparks, his head hurt!

  Ard studied his new crew, realizing that they were waiting for instructions. He sort of felt bad for them. This was nothing but a bunch of petty criminals, some too young, and others too old. Little did they know that Ard had just brought them into a bigger game. Like a runner competing in a horse race. It almost wasn’t fair. By casting their lots with Ardor Benn and the Short Fuse, the king would consider them personal enemies.

  “First things first …” Ard couldn’t finish the sentence. The dizziness from his head wound and the exertion of getting everyone away from the carriage caught up to him, and he almost fainted. Raek caught him, lowering Ard to a seated position on the grass.

  “First things first,” Raek took over. “Our captain needs a few minutes to recover. The rest of you get down to that wreckage and see what we can salvage.”

  Raek led the way, Ard watching through dim eyes as the others followed him. Quarrah suddenly appeared at his side, wincing as she examined the wound on his forehead.

  “Guess that’s what I get for sitting in the front,” muttered Ard as he slipped out of his pack. He was glad to know the regalia shell was safe at his side, rather than scattered across the meadow.

  Quarrah gently touched his brow. “That’s going to leave a blazing scar. You’ve got to get that stitched up.”

  “Nah,” Ard said, reaching blindly for his pack. “I’ll just use my pot of Health Grit. That should at least stop the bleeding. Maybe even close the cut.”

  Raek had brought half their stash of Health Grit, divvying it equally among the crew members. Each person’s detonation would be enough to mend a small injury, but Ard knew that Pekal had a way of dealing out big ones.

  Quarrah dug in the pack for the item. “Is it a good idea to use it so soon?” She handed him the clay pot.

  Ard shrugged, putting on a smile for her. “Well, I don’t plan to get injured again. That would be purely reckless.”

  Quarrah squeezed his hand, and Ard realized that his smile was now genuine.

  “I’ll get down there and help,” she said, standing up. “Don’t want anyone calling me a prig.”

  Ard waited until Quarrah was about halfway down the hill before lying down in the tall grasses. Reaching up, he struck the Grit pot against the ground next to his head. The first attempt wasn’t hard enough to shatter the clay, but the second one sparked the detonation.

  The Health cloud was probably only two or three feet in diameter, but it was plenty to envelop Ard’s entire head. He closed his eyes and felt the Grit working on him. It seemed to stabilize his mind, washing out the dizziness and pain and letting him think straight. The cut on his forehead tingled, and Ard knew the flesh was trying to seal itself.

  The Health Grit burned out long before Ard was ready. A headache returned, but it was nothing like before. Slowly sitting, Ard reached up and ran his fingers across the wound. It was heavily scabbed, feeling more like a week-old injury than a fresh one.

  Ard watched his misfit crew at work. Quarrah was helping young Nemery Baggish with her Caller’s equipment. Lence Raismus was also standing beside the girl, his large Feeder’s pack on the ground beside him as he pointed at one of Nemery’s amplification horns resting in its hardened leather case.

  Farther down the hill, the Kranfel brothers were loading their slag picks into a Drift crate that Ulusal was repairing with some pitch. The picks stood about Raek’s height, with heavy wooden shafts wrapped in rawhide to improve grip. The tips of the slag picks were fashioned from fragments of dragon teeth, one of the only materials durable enough to make a dent in a pile of fired Slagstone.

  Raek must have seen that Ard was alert, because the big man promptly moved up the hill toward him. There was sweat on his bald head from the effort of extracting the equipment from the rear compartment of the ruined carriage.

  “One of the Drift crates took a serious beating,” Raek reported. “Smashed to firewood when the Blast Grit blew.”

  “That doesn’t give us much carrying capacity,” Ard said. The single Drift crate they had left might not even be enough to house the entire Slagstone.

  “The rest of the equipment should pull through,” Raek answered. “Everything needs a little love and repair, but we can have it all in full working order within an hour or two.”

  That was plenty of time. Even if the Redeye Scouts had seen the carriage go down, the harbor Regulation wouldn’t arrive until that afternoon. Based on their location, Ard estimated it was at least a fifteen-minute hike from the harbor to the crash site. By the time the Reggies arrived, Ard and his crew would be long gone.

  “You figured out a plan for the Slagstone yet?” Raek asked.

  Ard shot him a sideways glance. Of course he had. Moving the fired Slagstone off Pekal was an essential step. Ard wouldn’t have come without a plan in mind. Still, he had been careful not to tell a soul. Problem was, he needed Raek’s vast knowledge as a Mixer. The plan was really just a good theory at this point. Raek’s expertise would make it happen.

  “You’re not thinking about the harbors, are you?” Raek asked.

  “Flames, no,” Ard said. “That’s far too expected.”

  “And impossible.”

  Like the other islands of the Greater Chain, Pekal was lacking in any regular sense of a beach. Dark cliffs completely surrounded the island, making Pekal look like some sort of tower that had risen from the sea.

  The island only had three natural harbors where the rock cliffs were tempered enough to gain access into the mountains. All traffic to and from Pekal had to pass through one of those points, so the Regulation had established significant security—lighthouses, which doubled as lookout ports, built on the high rocks at the edge of the harbors. A wall spanned the accessible areas, with a heavy gate, and firing niches for Fielders and crossbows.

  “I imagine you’ve got something more clever in mind?” Raek asked.

  Oh, what was the point in keeping this a secret? Raek clearly wasn’t the king’s informant, no matter what logic Quarrah might have tried to spell out. It would be safe to tell Raek.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Ard said. “It’s complicated, but I think—”

  A gunshot interrupted him. It was the distinctive crack of a Roller somewhere in the trees behind them. In the direction where Moroy had stormed off.

  Then another.

  The sharp man-made sounds caused a collective freeze among the crew, each looking up from his or her current project.

  “What the blazes?” Ard’s hand flashed to his own Roller as Moroy Peng burst through the trees beside the wrecked carriage.

  “Get up! Get up!” he screamed. “They shot Sojin! We’ve got to move!” Moroy’s lean form, trained for sturdy running on these mountains, staggered with frantic fear. The crew erupted, quickly stowing equipment and scrambling for weapons. Raek leapt down the grassy hillside, calling commands to get everything loaded into the Drift crate.

  Ard sprinted forward, the dragon shell fragments clinking in the big pack across his shoulder. He caught Moroy as the Tracer reached Quarrah and the others. “What’s going on? Who’s out there?”

  “Sojin’s dead!” His eyes were filling with tears of panic. “You said they wouldn’t be here for hours! You said they wouldn’t see us land.” Moroy turned. “They’re here! Sparks, the Reggies are here!”

  Another gunshot rang out, and this one was followed by a torn tuft of grass not ten feet away as the ball struck. The need for survival quickly outweighed any need for answers. Ard picked up one of Nemery’s leather cases, his eyes locking with Quarrah’s as another lead ball cracked into the hull of the ruined carriage.

>   Lence Raismus had already retreated, making his way toward the Drift crate that Ulusal had propped open. Quarrah hefted another of Nemery’s cases and Ard pushed the young girl forward in a mad dash for cover.

  New gunshots rang out, but these were returning fire from the Kranfel brothers, shooting their long-barreled Fielders blindly into the forest. The tactic was less about hitting a target and more about warning the approaching enemy that they, too, had weapons.

  Ard and Quarrah reached the others, huddling between the Drift crate and the smoldering ruins of the carriage. Raek held Moroy by the shoulders, attempting to get any useful information out of the terrified Tracer.

  The Drift crate was mostly full, all the salvageable food and gear loaded inside. They tossed Nemery’s cases into the wooden box, but Ard hesitated for a moment with the pack on his shoulder. He didn’t want to let the shell fragments out of his grasp, but he might need the mobility of running without a load on his back.

  Ard tossed the pack into the crate and Ulusal closed the door. She began loading Drift Grit into the hopper chamber, where the spark would fall, funneling the detonation into the wooden box.

  As the gun balls increased and the sound of the shots drew nearer, Ard determined the direction of the assault. Gratefully, the bulk of the carriage sat between them like a bunker, taking a fair amount of fire and buying them time to make a getaway.

  “All right.” Ard addressed the crew. “We need to get into the trees before they have a chance to flank us. Raek, Ulusal—you carry the Drift crate. Kranfel brothers keep laying down fire while the rest of us make a run. Once we reach the trees, we’ll return the favor and you can join us.”

  “What about Sojin?” Nemery asked. Sparks, this girl was so young. What was she doing here?

  “They shot her in the blazing neck!” Moroy cried, weeping. “She wasn’t twenty feet from me.”

  Nemery’s eyes welled and Ard felt a pit in his stomach. How was this happening? They hadn’t been on Pekal for half an hour and one of the crew was already dead! It didn’t make sense. According to their calculations, the Regulators shouldn’t have been able to reach the harbor until midafternoon.