by Sara King
“Zenaida!” Kaashifah shouted up at her sister, as she flew towards a third jet. “Fight me, damn you!” She found her weak arm clenching its fist on the sword in impotent frustration. Her wing twitched, but would not extend, forcing her to watch the devastation from below.
Her sister ignored her and, laughing, knocked another craft from the sky. Like a child batting at whuffle balls, Kaashifah thought, following her sister’s progress on the ground. It looked as if Zenaida would go for another, but the remaining jets pulled up, arcing away from her before she could meet their trajectories.
“Zenaida!” Kaashifah shouted, as her sister spun in a circle above her, laughing at the jets as they swung wide arcs around the city. Frustrated, having no way to get there on her own, Kaashifah dug a chunk of concrete from the ruined mess at her feet and hurled it at her sister. “Zenaida!”
She had been aiming for her sister’s spine, but instead it caught her sister in the back of the head, ending her laughter abruptly. As Kaashifah watched, stunned, from below, Zenaida went limp and tumbled forward, falling out of the sky.
Heart hammering, Kaashifah yanked her wings back into her body and broke into a run, aiming for the place where her sister would hit the ground. “Excuse me!” Kaashifah cried, dodging over cars—and the men and women that were huddled behind them. “Sorry!” she called, weaving between startled onlookers, who were only then starting to pour out of the storefronts, now that the explosions had ended. “Excuse me! Sorry! Let me through please! Excuse me!” She tried to push through two big men that were blocking the road with their backs, standing between two cars, looking over the smoking ruins of a jet engine, but they continued gawking at the smoking husk, ignoring her attempts to get past them.
More people were coming from the shops and behind their cars, calling to each other about angels fighting, packing the area with bodies, ignoring Kaashifah entirely. Somewhere up ahead, Kaashifah heard the ripping sound of metal, followed by the whomph of a crumbling building. Car alarms started going off in the distance.
“Let me through!” She shouted, shoving her wings back out on a tide of Fury. “Get out of my way, mortals!”
People screamed and scattered, but at least they cleared a path. Kaashifah yanked her wings back into herself and ran again, lunging down an embankment, sliding to the parking-lot, leaping over the cars and towards the collapsed department store where a piece of her sister’s radiant wing was showing through the rubble.
Already, people were packing around the collapsed building, crawling over the rubble to get a better look at the fallen angel.
“Get away from here!” Kaashifah pushed her energy down her sword again and it flared into a blinding radiance as she landed in the rubble of the department store. She twisted on the onlookers, who were stumbling away from her, eyes on her sword. “Run!” she shouted, waving it at them. They turned and ran.
Behind her, she heard something shift just before a concrete support pillar caught her in the back. Kaashifah grunted and hit the ground hard as the pillar bounced, then rolled off of her, crushing several cars in the parking lot.
“You…bitch!” Zenaida hissed, getting to her feet. She was wiping blood from the corner of her mouth. She’d lost, Kaashifah noted, her sword. Insanity in the woman’s eyes, Zenaida reached down and yanked another support pillar from the debris. Then she was twisting, hurling it at Kaashifah’s body as it began to shine in a column of white.
“Zenaida, no!” Kaashifah cried, but the Fury had already released the column. Kaashifah ducked and it went sailing over her head, hitting the parking-lot and eating through a dozen cars as it began sliding into the earth.
One nice thing about being so small, Kaashifah thought, watching the concrete pillar sink out of sight out of the corner of her eye. It’s easy to disappear.
But Zenaida was already wrenching another piece of debris from the rubble, infusing it with her energy. “You want to fight that way, sister?” she screamed, her eyes alive with rage. “Fine. We can fight that way.” She hurled the object at Kaashifah, who easily deflected it with her sword.
“I told you I don’t want to fight,” Kaashifah snapped. “I want you to listen, you addle-brained child.”
Zenaida’s head cocked at the last, and for an insane moment, merely stared at her with the uncomprehending emptiness of a lunatic. Then the Fury lunged, wings and magics buoying her at impossible speeds, and she slammed into Kaashifah and they went barreling across the parking-lot in a tangle of limbs and wings. Somewhere along the way, Kaashifah dropped her claymore.
“You are dead,” Zenaida screamed, using her wings to stop the roll, dragging them to a halt, her on top. One knee in Kaashifah’s chest, she cocked back an arm to punch her, her fist lighting up in a searing white.
As Kaashifah twisted to the side of the blow, her fingers found the tire of a car and she locked her digits into the steel and yanked. The rim came off the frame in a spray of broken bolts, and Kaashifah used the momentum to slam into the side of her sister’s head, knocking the Fury off of her.
“Please, sister,” Kaashifah cried, scrabbling up and backing away. “Just listen. We can change things.”
Zenaida picked up the dragon’s Damascus longsword, still left where Kaashifah’s numb fingers had dropped it in an attempt to get out of the way of Zenaida’s fist. “The only talking, sister,” she said, shoving her energy down it in a beam of radiance, “will be done with our blades.”
Kaashifah hurriedly backed away and retrieved her claymore, cursing herself for losing her preferred weapon. While she appreciated the dragon’s gesture, the claymore was two feet longer than she was tall, and about as maneuverable as an oil tanker. In close combat, the longsword was easily the better weapon.
And she’d lost it. She cursed again.
“Nice sword,” Zenaida said, admiring the smaller Damascus. She slowly got to her feet, smiling at the master’s weapon she now carried in her hands, “Where did you get it?” A few parking-lots over, helicopters were coming in low and fast, and black-clad soldiers on ropes were dropping into streets nearby.
Kaashifah cursed again and backed away. Her arm was still tingling, but at least it was regaining some of the feeling. It would be long hours, however, before she would be able to take back to the air. Hydra venom was instantly lethal to most immortals, and she would probably still have sluggishness in that side of her body for ten years to come. What was worse, with the soldiers dropping in behind her, she had nowhere to run without endangering more innocents. “Zenaida,” she said carefully, “we don’t have to do this. I forgive you, you understand? What was done to you was wrong.”
Zenaida’s face twisted. “Do you really think I care about your forgiveness, sister?” She swished the blade back and forth, testing its heft. “After all these years, you think I wanted to be forgiven?” She laughed. “You’re as bad as the damn priests.”
Desperate for more time, Kaashifah began to circle warily, keeping the shining blade of the claymore between them. “You could start a new family,” she suggested. “You could protect the new ways.”
But Zenaida’s eyes darkened. “I told you,” she snarled. “There are no new ways. I’m going to kill you, then, once I’m the last of our kind, I can do whatever the fuck I please.” And she lunged, swinging in earnest, and suddenly Kaashifah was in a fight for her life.
Imelda paced the back of the dragon’s cathedral-like cave as they waited for it to return, trying to rehearse what she would say in her mind. She was dealing with dragons. She needed to be forceful, yet still retain her humility. She needed to be confident, yet not arrogant. She needed to be witty, but not cunning. She needed to lay out her concerns for their welfare and outline the strategies of the Order, while at the same time maintaining an emotional distance, calling upon their logic. She had to clearly delineate her appeal, but had to keep it from sounding like she was begging. She had to make them see…
She was sure they would test her in some way, some t
rial to judge her character, some surprise ordeal to determine her merit, and she had to keep her head throughout. She couldn’t show emotion or weakness, fear or temper.
In short, she had to be perfect.
She continued pacing, planning it all out in her head, fighting the ever-present glassy shards of a migraine. Calm and collected, she told herself. Appeal to their honor. Show why the Order must be stopped. Speak of the damage they’re doing. Of the souls that need their help.
It took much too long for the dragon to return. When it did, Wyst was alone.
“Where are the others?” Imelda demanded, her heart spasming as she considered whether or not she had been tricked. She hadn’t thought so, because the texts were rife with examples of a dragon’s prickly honor. Once they gave their word, they would die for it. Often, that had been how the Church would make a capture.
“They refused to come,” the dragon said. “The Council declines to hear your argument. You are hereby asked to leave, at the request of the Forger.”
For a long moment, Imelda forgot to breathe. The Forger, by legend, was a dragon so old that it was a god, a forger of new souls. And he was telling her to leave. All of her mental preparations shattered, she blurted, “But people are going to die.”
The dragon looked tired as he shuffled past her, deeper into the cave, making the very floor vibrate beneath her boots. “The only reason you are not dead right now, Inquisidora, is I gave my oath of protection. There is something about you that the older dragons do not like, a tug that unnerves even the eldest, and it stinks of anguish and ashes.”
“She’s a Fate,” the unicorn said.
The dragon froze, slowly twisting to face her, his amber eyes suddenly wary. “Get out.”
“But…” Imelda began.
“Now!” the creature roared, flaring its wings. “Leave my cave and never come back.”
“I’m not a Fate!” Imelda cried, but already she was being pushed backwards by an invisible barrier, out of the warmth of the cave, into the snow. Whatever it was shoved her, then, hard, and she started rolling down the slopes in a cold, windy ball of ice and snow. Her world became a spinning rush as she barreled down the hillside, unable to regain control, the buttons on her trenchcoat snapping and the garment tearing open under the force of her descent.
A few hundred yards later, she came to a sudden, rib-breaking halt against the legs of the unicorn.
“I told you nobody likes a Fate,” he said, as she sank into the snow beside his cloven hooves. Imelda saw him leaning down, taking his human shape, before she blacked out.
Chapter 22: Angel of Vengeance
‘Aqrab clung to the dragon’s back as it spun towards the earth, evading the helicopter that was somehow following them despite the dragon’s magics.
“It’s coming…turn, turn!” ‘Aqrab cried, glancing over its shoulder as the machine started spraying bullets at them once more. This machine was using tiny shards of faespar, not lead or gold, and they got hit with another strafe of projectiles, which pounded through their shields and peppered their bodies like tiny fire-ants. ‘Aqrab hissed as he felt them hit his lower leg.
“Ow, fuck!” the dragon screamed. Already, his once-luxurious scales had the same general look as a teenager’s pocked, pimply face. “Much more of that and they’re going to break my shielding for good!”
Up ahead, Thunderbird took a shell from behind—some sort of poison-soaked shrapnel, by the way the demigod suddenly stiffened and lost what little altitude he had maintained, once more plowing into the treetops, snapping off branches as he tumbled back to the ground. Up above, the clouds were boiling blackness, and lightning began retaliating against the craft that had hit him, bolt after bolt, driving into it with blinding force well after the machine had crashed to the ground. Another helicopter, unseen until then, fired another missile at their fallen friend, making the air reverberate in an avian scream.
“How many of them are there?” the dragon demanded, through the lashing rain. “This is insane!”
“I don’t know,” ‘Aqrab cried, still clinging to the serpent’s wet back with a death-grip around his neck. “We have to get out of sight!”
“We’re in the middle of a thunderstorm,” the dragon shouted back. “You can’t get a much better place to hide!”
Indeed, it was difficult to make out the black helicopter that tailed them, its silhouette only appearing when lit up by lightning flashes from behind. The Inquisition, it seemed, had better means to cope with the weather than they did.
“All right,” ‘Aqrab said, “I have an idea. Thunderbird’s not going to like it, but the two of you are magi, so you should survive.”
The dragon twisted to catch him with an icy blue eye. “Not a chance, djinni.”
But ‘Aqrab was already wrenching the veil open. “Guard against the heat!” he cried, shoving the dragon through. Then, suddenly steedless, he tumbled through the trees to the ground, snapping branches off as he made his own small furrow in the snowy forest floor.
“Owwww,” ‘Aqrab groaned, lying on his back, staring up at the rain-blackened sky. He wondered again how the others could take such beatings, when it hurt so much.
A second scream from the Thunderbird made him jerk and stumble back to his feet. Jogging, now, dodging fallen trees, the rain sizzling on his body from the stress, he found Thunderbird in human form, curled in a small ball on the ground, whimpering.
At first, ‘Aqrab had the horrified thought that the great beast had been injured again, but closer inspection made him realize that the Thunderbird was just rocking back and forth, crying.
Cursing, ‘Aqrab fell to his knees beside the demigod. “Are you going to be all right?” he cried, reaching for the great beast’s shoulder.
“I’m scared,” Thunderbird babbled, his electric eyes wide and filled with soul-deep terror. “It hit me in the back…I was going down…I lost control…my wings…”
Damn the dragon. “You’re on the ground now,” ‘Aqrab said. “I need you to put up a barrier. I’m taking you to the Fourth Realm.”
Thunderbird ignored him, continuing to rock and whimper. The helicopter that had fired upon him was settling overhead, and opened up with both cannons upon them. ‘Aqrab grabbed Thunderbird and dove out of the way. Behind him, the ground became a churning fluff of snow and twigs and moss as the helicopter’s guns twisted to follow them.
“I’m taking you to the firelands!” ‘Aqrab cried. “Shield yourself!” Then, as the second helicopter with its load of faespar settled into place in front of them, he said a prayer that Thunderbird had been listening and twisted to his homeland.
The dragon was stalking the sands back and forth, pacing like an angry cat. When he saw ‘Aqrab, he leapt at him.
“Shield Thunderbird,” ‘Aqrab snapped, throwing the now-screaming demigod between them. Wisps of the demigod’s hair and clothing were catching on fire.
Reluctantly, the dragon did, and Thunderbird went back to rocking, his arms clinging to his chest, eyes wide and staring.
“What’s wrong with him?” the dragon asked warily.
“You are what’s wrong with him,” ‘Aqrab snapped. “He fell from the sky, you fool.”
“Oh shit.” The dragon at least had the decency to look ashamed. Licking his lips, he glanced down at the whimpering creature at his feet. “You could give me another wish…”
“I’ll swim across the Dead Sea and suck the filth from feet of pigs before I give you another wish,” Aqrab snarled, yanking the limp Thunderbird off of the ground and throwing him bodily over his shoulder. “Let’s go. We’re heading south.” He started over the dunes, at that point not really caring if the moronic serpent followed or stayed. As he walked, the great dunes of his homeland, flashing under the heat of the sun, had been pushed into pale, sinuous curves, reminding him of a Fury’s wings.
Mon Dhi’b, he prayed, a pang of worry tugging at his heart, please be well when I see you again…
Kaashifah lau
nched herself out of the way of another swing, using her root to the earth to buoy her on a pillar of energy towards a distant rooftop, temporarily lifting her out of range of her sister’s sword, but Zenaida laughed and hacked through it, sending her tumbling back to the ground before she could reach her goal.
Above her, luminous wings spread, Zenaida alighted on the rooftop she had been aiming for and grinned down at her where Kaashifah now stood between two walls, given the option of either fleeing to the east or to the west. To the east, she saw men in military camouflage rounding the closest building, and immediately they opened up fire at the angel on the ridgeline.
Zenaida yanked a satellite dish from the roof, infused it with her Fury, and hurled it at them.
“They’re innocents, damn it!” Kaashifah screamed, as the dish sliced through the wall shielding them, cutting several men cleanly in half. The survivors, as their comrades before them, retreated, screaming into their mics as they dragged their companions’ bodies out of sight.
Zenaida snorted and glanced back down at her, that dark insanity back in her eyes. “No one is innocent, sister. Those who claim to be are always the worst offenders.” Another spat of machine-gun fire punctuated the last of her sentence, and Zenaida broke off an antenna, her eyes on something out of sight.
“Stop killing them!” Kaashifah screamed, slamming her claymore through the building where Zenaida was perched, knocking its walls in. Above her, Zenaida stumbled, then dropped the antenna. It sank into the ground like a hot nail through butter. Kaashifah used the moment to lunge up onto the roof, pressing her advantage. Zenaida’s eyes widened and she stumbled backwards, just evading the tip of Kaashifah’s sword as it tore through the building’s tin roof, aimed at her legs.
