Heart of Iron

by Ashley Poston

  Far above the crown of stars . . .

  He had heard that before. Sitting two in a cramped cockpit. Braiding dark hair. Warm eyes. The sound of—

  “Listen!” she hissed.

  A knife of pain sliced through his head. He winced. I was. I am. I—

  The command was a strike of red in his processors; it was a shift of prompts. When at one moment his thoughts ran one way, she twisted them like readjusting a cog, and suddenly he understood her wholly. And there was no more pain.

  Yes. I will listen, he replied.

  “Good,” she cooed.

  Lord Rasovant droned on.

  He surveyed the room. In the front row, Lady Valerio stood beside her sons. They matched the princess in white tuxedos, although the youngest Valerio’s crimson bow tie was crooked from pulling at it uncomfortably.

  In the rafters, he blinked, watching. He must have stared too long, because the young Valerio glanced up—and saw him.

  The human’s eyes went wide. Shock morphed into recognition. Robb Valerio’s lips formed a name. One syllable, two letters.

  The name did not belong to him. It was a mask. Dust knocked off his core.

  He pulled his hood over his face to hide his hair, so no other Ironblood could spot him. He was clad in black, from his hood to his soft boots—better for mimicking shadows than the human D09 once strived to be.

  Lord Rasovant finally finished the rites, reached forth for the crown. The tines could cut flesh with enough pressure. What an entertaining thought. The crown rusted red against the Adviser’s fingertips, staining his human flesh.

  Above them, like the ticking of a great clock, the planets moved into position. The Goddess stared up at them, as if she had waited a thousand years to see them again.

  His father placed the crown upon the girl’s head. “May the stars keep you steady and the iron keep you safe, Empress Ananke.”

  The girl held out her candle and set it at the base of the Goddess’s feet, a thousand candles for a thousand years. For less than a second, the thousand candles flickered as if the shrine itself had sighed.

  Now, the voice whispered.

  The word filled him with purpose.

  It made him yearn to impress.

  As the crowd rose, erupting in applause, he leaped over the edge of the rafters and landed on top of a Royal Guard stationed by a statue. The human broke in multiple places, fingers twitching on the hilt of his lightsword.

  He grabbed the sword, standing, as a guard a few feet away turned to shout for help. He shoved his sword through the guard’s throat. No one heard her gurgles over the applause. The guard’s blood hissed off the blade.

  In his other hand, electricity sizzled against his fingertips. A gift, she had told him. Currents he could control, in exchange for his thoughts. He was a weapon. Weapons did not need to think.

  Empress Ananke noticed him first as he prowled down the aisle. She took a step back before she stopped herself. Rose to stand tall.

  Something in the corner of his processors spiked, but he shoved back the errant code. A girl kissing his Metal mouth. Honeysuckle vines. Soft lips. A smile.

  Oh, what a pretty lie.

  From under his hood, his eyes glowed a burning, brilliant red.

  “Guards!” she called, but he wanted her to shut up.

  He slashed at her.

  She jumped out of his way, surprisingly quick for a human in a dress. The crown toppled off her head and clattered to the ground. He picked it up. Toyed with the idea of using it to scrape her face clean.

  “It’s an assassin!” someone yelled.

  “Why aren’t the Messiers doing anything?” cried another.

  “Is the HIVE broken?”

  The crowd erupted into chaos. They shrieked. The sounds rattled the rafters, shook the flames in the candles. Frightened Ironbloods clambered over each other, kicking away the dead guards, pushing open the doors, letting the sweet dawn light inside. Abandoning the Empress they seemed to love so much. He reveled in the chaos. The sound spurred him on, the voice in his head crooning sweet promises. He needed to kill her. It did not matter why.

  “Save the Empress!” Rasovant cried as he ran with the other Ironbloods, as if he was worried for his own life.

  But it was a ruse—scripted to make him seem innocent.

  With Rasovant gone, he turned his gaze back to the Empress. Overturned candles set fire to the tapestries.

  The Empress backed up against the altar, weaponless and alone.

  This was no fun at all.

  “You won’t kill me. Whoever you are—”

  He grinned beneath his hood. “You should have burned, Empress.” He advanced, crown tight in his grip, tines pointed toward her.

  “I . . . I know that voice,” she said in horror.

  The crowd emptied out of the shrine like sand out of an hourglass. The HIVE warned him more Royal Guards were arriving—there were only fifty-seven in the palace, not including the Royal Captain. They spewed into the garden like rats from a hole, but their progress was slow against the tide of Ironbloods rushing to leave.

  He lunged at her, raising the crown high over his head. A bullet ricocheted off one of its sharp tines and embedded itself into the floor. He glanced over his shoulder to the source.

  “Robb Valerio,” he greeted the Ironblood, his lips twisting into a grin. “So you have finally joined the fray.”

  “I won’t miss next time,” said the Ironblood, and pulled the hammer down on his pistol again.

  Ignoring the Ironblood, he turned back to the Empress—

  Another bullet clipped his fingers. Made him drop the crown. It landed on the steps with a heavy thud and rolled under the stone pews. Pain blossomed in his fingertips, a hiss escaped his lips. Involuntary. He looked at his metal-tipped fingers, the skin scraped away.

  “Be patient,” he told the Valerio with a growl. “You are next.”

  “No, he won’t be!” cried the Empress. When he turned back to her, she slammed the thousandth candle across his face.

  He stumbled back, wiping the burning wax from his face, and his hood fell back to reveal his identity. “You little bitch.”

  “Di,” she whispered. The betrayal in her eyes burned him to his core.

  His grip on the lightsword faltered.

  Kill her! What are you waiting for? Kill her! Kill her! the HIVE screamed. Louder and louder. Forcing code. Bright red bursts of pain. Splitting his processors, fingers curling around his hard drive, covering up something that was beginning to break through, this whisper he faintly remembered. Kill her!

  Her face brightened. Hopeful.

  Like a sunrise—

  A body slammed against him. Forced him to the ground. Robb Valerio pinned him down, but he threw the Ironblood off like a blanket, tossing him into the pews. The boy got to his feet again, drawing his pistol. At this short range, he would likely not miss.

  “Run, Ana!” the Ironblood cried. “RUN NOW!”

  “But—”

  “You can’t save him if you’re dead!”

  The Empress, pursing her lips, picked up her dress—and ran.

  She slipped between the Royal Guards flooding inside, coming to the distress call. A guard took her by the arm—old, gray hair, a mechanical leg, someone he knew—

  Kill her! the voice in his head cried. Kill her now!

  He went after her, but the Ironblood shot him again, this time in the shoulder. He hissed, but the red code in his head blocked out the pain. Until he was better.

  “You’re just another mindless Metal,” the Ironblood said.

  “And you are just meat,” he retorted, then lunged forward and knocked the pistol out of Robb Valerio’s grip. He grabbed Robb by the throat and sent him swinging into a line of oncoming guards.

  He picked up Robb’s pistol and pointed it at the retreating Empress as she raced out of the shrine. He aimed for her head—not his first choice, but he did not have time to kill her with the crown. Pity. That would
have been so fitting.

  His hand shook. He tried to steady it. But there was a noise in his head.

  A scream, leaking between the tendrils of his new programming.

  Begging, pulsing, swelling.

  No, you are mine, the HIVE commanded.

  The Grand Duchess rounded a statue from where she had been hiding, grabbed a candle, and threw it at him. It bounced off his shoulder, rolling under a pew. “Monster! You will not kill my Ananke!”

  He swung his aim toward the Grand Duchess and pulled the trigger.

  It was not his aim that had made his hand shake after all.

  The old woman slumped back, painting a red streak across the base of the Goddess’s statue as she slid to the ground. He tossed the empty Metroid to the ground.

  After the Empress! the voice cried, the red code grinding, grinding. He winced, wanting it to stop.

  The Ironblood was getting to his feet.

  He pushed Robb back down into the pews. “Get up again and I will kill you,” he warned the boy, not sure why he did not kill him now, and pursued the Empress out of the shrine, plucking a lightsword off a dead guard as he left, the sound of the HIVE so loud and sweet, it tasted like blood on his lips.

  Robb

  Robb struggled to his feet. The Royal Guards, led by the captain herself, drew their weapons on Di—they would stop him. The Metal couldn’t possibly get through half a dozen of the kingdom’s finest and Viera. The hum of their Metroids filled the shrine like a haunting hymn. They’d kill Di. Robb couldn’t watch, turning his face away.

  “You will move!” Di flung out his hand to the guards.

  Robb felt the hair on his neck stand on end. A wave of electricity pulsed from the end of Di’s fingertips, rippling outward like a wave toward the guards. The comms on their lapels sparked—and the voltage sent the guards, including Viera, to their knees in gut-wrenching screams.

  Di stepped over the guards writhing on the ground and was gone.

  Robb cursed, grabbing a Metroid from one of the guards’ holsters, hurtling over the stone pews after him, when a shadow stepped into his way. He hadn’t notice her before—hadn’t all the guests left screaming? The girl was small, fragile, although her eyes glowed as red as death. The same color as Di’s. She cocked the pistol she was holding.

  “You got up—what a pity,” she tsked, and aimed for him.

  Surprised, Robb froze. He didn’t have a moment to think—even a second. Someone screamed his name, and the air around him shifted. A blur stepped in front of him, shielding him. Dark peppery hair spun high into a tight bun, a white dress, tall and cold and—

  The girl fired.

  A firework of red exploded into the air, and warm droplets splattered on his cheek. He quickly wiped them away—blood.

  The world came into focus with a jolt, and his mother stood in front of him, arms outstretched. Blood stained her beautiful white dress—she had made her sons match her, in insufferable white tuxedos. White only ever looked good on her, and now it was stained in red. Robb couldn’t breathe, frozen in a moment when his mother still existed. And then her arms fell to her sides, and she toppled to the ground like a doll and did not stir again.

  He looked down again to the blood he’d wiped off his cheek. Her blood. “No,” he whispered, sinking down to his knees beside her. “No, no, no . . .”

  The flaxen-haired girl aimed again. “Seems I missed.”

  Robb turned his gaze up to the monster with the familiar face. Round cheeks and pursed lips, golden-peach skin and high eyebrows. She was unmistakably Ana’s handmaiden. He had seen her a hundred places before. Mellifare. He stared at her until he had memorized her face—until he could pick her out of a crowd of thousands.

  “I like that look, Lord Valerio. Hate really suits you,” said the girl, and she squeezed the trigger—

  A flashbang ignited the shrine in a blinding white light.

  He winced, covering his eyes with his arm as the explosion swept through the room, extinguishing all one thousand candles in a single puff, until the only light came from the doorway—a bright, burning dawn.

  No—it wasn’t the dawn, it was a woman’s hair blazing as brilliant as the sun. Captain Siege stepped into the shrine, her Metroid fixed on the golden-haired girl.

  Talle hurried over to Robb and pulled him to his feet. “Robb! Where’s Ana?”

  Dazed, blinking, he took one last look at his mother’s corpse on the ground and told her, “She ran—she ran with Riggs.”

  “Perfect,” Talle began, but he caught her shoulder.

  “Di went after them. He’s HIVE’d—Di’s HIVE’d. So is that girl,” he added, turning his gaze back to Mellifare, who was pressing her palms into her hands, unable to reset her optics. “She’s a Metal, too. Like Di.”

  “Shit,” Siege cursed.

  Mellifare blinked, resetting her vision, turning to them—when a Royal Guard slammed into her, throwing her to the ground. Then the guard grabbed a lightsword from one of her dead comrades, turning it on the girl.

  Robb’s eyes widened. Viera.

  “I’ll keep her busy,” said the Royal Captain. One of her ears was bleeding, her coat singed and smoking from the charge that had downed her guards. She could barely stand. “Just get Her Grace to safety.”

  Viera Carnelian’s eyes flashed to Robb, and there was that aristocratic stubbornness he always saw—the kind of stubbornness that had them dueling in their underwear on the Academy rooftop and playing thirteen rounds of Wicked Luck.

  There was no way of stopping her.

  “Iron keep you, Vee,” he said, and turned to leave the shrine. “This way!”

  Siege and Talle followed.

  Outside the shrine, the bulbs of the moonlilies were red with postdawn light, almost red enough to disguise a young man with golden hair in them. A Carnelian pendant smashed in the flowers. Footprints dirtied his evening coat. Robb knew him—one of Erik’s lackeys. Vermion.

  Robb tore his eyes away from the body, hurrying to catch up with the captain. People lay abandoned in the garden, moaning, some trampled, others simply afraid to move.

  Overhead, three large ships dove in close to the palace, so fast they plucked the moonlilies from the ground and spun them into the air, leaving the stench of burning tapestries and airship exhaust. The ships flew pirate colors, painted silver and black.

  Siege’s fleet?

  Smaller Messier fighter ships screamed across the skies in pursuit, painting dawn in exhaust-white clouds. The crackle of explosions lit the skies like bloodred fireworks, rumbling across the palace.

  Robb made his legs go faster, because Viera was a good swordswoman, but she couldn’t hold out for long. He refused to look back. He couldn’t watch her die, too.

  So he trained his eyes on the palace doors, Talle and Siege just behind him, and ran.

  Ana

  “This way!” Riggs cried.

  In the corridors, the Messiers stood guard like metal statues, blue eyes blazing as they watched. They didn’t move, they didn’t turn their heads. They simply stood—not wanting to kill her but not saving her, either. They were supposed to look impassive. The HIVE had planned this all along.

  The booming sound of ships in the skies overhead quaked the walls of the palace in long, terrible growls. The lanterns bobbed frantically overhead, rushing faster as if they, too, knew something was wrong.

  Her heart hammered in her throat.

  Di . . . Di was . . .

  “Why did you come for me?” she asked Riggs, whose mechanical leg made sharp thunks against the ground with every step. “You’re going to get yourself killed! Like Di . . .” Her voice cracked at his name, at the memory of those red-ruby eyes glinting from under that black hood. He hadn’t escaped after all.

  If she hadn’t sent him away—maybe if she’d kept him close, maybe if she’d . . .

  “Erik was right,” she croaked. “I destroy everything—”

  Riggs grabbed her by the shoulders and shook he
r one good time. “Never say that. Never even think it. Wick wouldn’t let you, so I won’t either. We protect our family. We’re nothing without it.”

  Tears brimmed in her eyes. But what about all the family who had died because of her? All the family who haunted her shadow, breathing across the back of her neck?

  The old man pressed a kiss on her forehead. “You’re ours, Ana. And we’ll always come for—”

  He choked, his reply cut short. Blood dribbled from his mouth. Ana gave a cry as Lord Rasovant pulled the dagger out of Riggs’s back, letting him drop to the ground. Rasovant stepped over him, wiping the blade clean on his pristine white ceremonial cloak.

  “I am dearly sorry, Empress Ananke,” he said, turning the dagger on her, “that it’s come to this.”

  Riggs went still on the ground, eyes open, as if he was staring into some great distance. Dead—he was dead.

  Because everyone around her died.

  “At first, I thought I wouldn’t have to kill you after all,” said Rasovant, and she gritted her teeth against the fire-hot hatred inside her. “I loved your father. Your parents were like a second family to me. I had to kill the Emperor, and the fire . . . it just seemed like the best story. It had to be done to stop the Great Dark,” he said as Riggs’s blood dripped from the blade. “It was only by chance you survived—Erik would have been a grand pawn. He still will be, when you meet your tragic end!”

  He jabbed the dagger at her, but he was slow, and she was full of rage and heartache, and it made her blood pump fast as she dodged the attack and wrapped her fingers around the hilt of the dagger.

  “There’s nothing to fight! There’s no war,” she snarled.

  “I have the will to save this kingdom from the Great Dark,” Rasovant declared, “and you will not stand in my way!”

  She twisted the dagger out of his grip and slammed her foot into his gut. He fell back onto the floor, and she pressed her knee against his sternum, the dagger at his throat.

  He looked up at her with wide, unblinking eyes, as if he’d never thought she had that sort of anger. “Mercy . . . ,” he gasped.

  “Mercy?” She pressed the dagger deeper. “You killed my family for nothing. You killed Di for nothing!”