Ship of Smoke and Steel

by Django Wexler

  “I don’t care what you think he is. I need him to close the door to the Garden. The crabs are breaking through!”

  “Don’t worry. We’re perfectly safe here.”

  “Safe? Everyone is going to die!”

  “Everyone down there, yes.” His smile widens. “Regrettable, but necessary.”

  “You have got to be rotting joking.” I take a step forward, and Erin and Arin tense. “Let Hagan go now.”

  “Or what? You’ll kill me?” He pushes his spectacles up his nose. “Then you’ll never be able to bring Soliton home to your beloved Blessed Empire. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

  There is a moment’s pause, a silence filled with the crackle of my blade.

  “Which sort are you? I wonder,” he says. “You seem too smart to be a patriot, doing it all for Emperor and Empire. A mercenary? What kind of fortune did they promise you? Or was it the other kind of promise?” He cocks his head. “Yes, that seems more like the Kuon Naga we all know and love. Who does he have? Your lover? Your parents?”

  “My sister.” The words force their way out before I can bite them off. I grit my teeth. “How…”

  “How do I know?” He pushes his spectacles up with one finger. “Poor Isoka. Do you really think you’re the first young fool the Emperor’s spider has sent to try and take Soliton? Do you think you’re the tenth?”

  He laughs, and my head whirls.

  “I killed the first few,” the Scholar says. “Seemed logical. Eliminate the competition. It took me some time to realize I’d overestimated Kuon Naga. His attempts were shots in the dark, wild guesses. His agents weren’t dangerous. Most of them got themselves killed anyway. Some gave up as soon as they got here. I think Shiara was one of those, actually.”

  “You…” I shake my head. Focus, Isoka. “You’re here for the same reason, aren’t you? To try and steal Soliton.”

  “I was. His Royal Majesty the King of Jyashtan, Master of the Six Thrones and rightful ruler of the world, bade me capture the great ship to add to his navy for our next attempt to crush the unrighteous. He promised to make me a prince if I succeeded.” He shrugs. “I may still take him up on the offer. On the other hand, even the King doesn’t really understand Soliton’s power. Maybe I’ll just take the throne for myself.”

  He leans forward. “The difference between us, Isoka Deepwalker, is that I was prepared. In Jyashtan we’re not so obsessed with burning old books as you Imperials. His Royal Majesty knew that Eddica, the power of the ancients, was the key to Soliton, and so he sent me here. Your Kuon Naga just got lucky when he chose you. Tenth time’s the charm, I suppose.

  “The Well of Spirits. We thought that meant the ship would be haunted, but it’s not like that at all. The spirits are stripped of everything that made them human, all but a few leftover memories, like a fading stain. They’re changed into raw energy and channeled into the mechanism. The greatest source of power you can imagine. And this thing, this incomparable machine, has just been wandering around the oceans of the world because it’s slipped a gear and no one can figure out how to catch it.” He laughs again. “Have you ever heard of anything so absurd?”

  I’ve heard enough. “Close the rotting doors. Now.”

  “I’m afraid not. Soliton’s basic controls are too powerful for you or me to take command of, under ordinary circumstances.” He pats the dreadwurm’s eye. “But this focuses and amplifies Eddica power. That is, the power of spirits. The power of death. For which our little massacre downstairs is a convenient source.” He taps the deck with his cane. “When it builds high enough, I’ll rewrite the machine to recognize me as its master.”

  “You rotting bastard.” I’m within a few paces of him, now. “They’re fighting and dying downstairs.”

  His lip curls. “That’s what they’re for.”

  I thrust for his throat.

  A pair of Melos blades cross in front of mine, catching my weapon. Fat green sparks jump between them, energy crackling and popping. Erin stands on one side, Arin on the other, each with a green energy blade emerging from her forearm.

  “Isoka’s usefulness is at an end, apparently,” the Scholar says, with a sigh. “Kill her.”

  * * *

  Instinct takes over. I dismiss my blade, escaping the bind, and hastily backpedal a few steps. When they don’t follow at once, I settle into fighting stance, ignite my blades, take a breath, watch.

  The twin sisters look perfectly calm. They fight with opposite hands, Erin’s left and Arin’s right, each half-turning toward me to lead with a single Melos blade. I don’t see the telltale crackle of Melos armor around them, though. So they’re not full adepts, which means I should have the advantage.

  If they don’t have any other tricks. The Scholar is too confident. He’s seen me fight, so he knows—

  “You don’t have to do this,” I tell the two girls. “I don’t know what he’s promised you—”

  “He’s going to take us home,” Erin says. Arin nods, silently.

  Rot. Worth a try.

  Arin comes at me first, footwork smooth as fine silk, feinting high and then cutting at my waist. I parry the blow with my left-hand blade, and she spins past. It leaves her open, and I lash out. The blow would cut deep into her side, but she’s not there, fading away like a shadow with a liquid spray of dark energy.

  I’m already turning back, knowing what comes next. But Erin surges forward, much faster than I anticipated, her limbs outlined in golden sparks. She twists her blade neatly around my parry, and I’m just able to turn in time to take a long slash across my belly instead of a hard impact. Melos energy spits and wars as blade and armor meet, and violent heat stabs at my skin. As I stagger away, I can feel blisters forming along the line drawn by her blade.

  Xenos and Rhema. Shadows and Speed. Rotting wonderful.

  The sisters look at each other, and something passes between them. Some plan, no doubt. They’ve clearly trained together, and I need to break up that coordination. So I charge at Erin, blades swinging horizontally, before they can set up their next attack. She dances backward, spinning out of reach of one of my blades and parrying the other with a fat green spark. I whirl, just in time to catch Arin coming at me from behind. She fades into shadow at my thrust, materializing to one side, blade swinging at my face. I bring my left hand up, dismissing the blade and unfolding my armor like a flower, summoning a shield of Melos energy that intercepts her weapon with a screech. She hops backward, pausing, and we square off again.

  “Nice trick,” says the Scholar. “Zarun taught you, did he? He’s a tenacious little cockroach, that one.”

  Erin and Arin come at me together, a coordinated flurry of swinging blades. I give ground, parrying furiously, staying ahead of them only by blocking strike after strike with the shield on my left hand. Their style is elegant, studied, nothing like the street brawlers I’m used to facing. Erin is fast, so fast she nearly gets around me more than once, and Arin switches positions with her shadow, trying to trip me up.

  Rot. I don’t have time for this.

  Elegant forms have their advantages, but so do street brawlers.

  I surge to the side, switching my shield back to a blade and driving Erin away with a furious combination. She backs up for a moment, and I turn on Arin. This time, I’m watching her shadow. She’s expecting the first strike, which she evades by shifting postion; expecting the second, which she blocks, her blade held vertically. She’s not expecting me to bull forward afterward, my knee coming up hard into her stomach. She doubles over, gasping, and I spin around her, driving my blade into the small of her back. I rip it free with a twist and a spray of blood, and she collapses onto her knees, then falls forward.

  “Arin!” Erin’s scream is high and piercing. Golden light flares around her, speeding her up until she’s a blur. She comes at me at a run, subtlety forgotten, trying to push through my defenses with brute force. I fade sideways, and it’s barely any effort at all to leave one blade hanging in front
of her. It punches into her chest, my clenched fist pressed against her sternum as the spike of Melos energy emerges from between her shoulders. She coughs blood on my arm, where it sizzles against my armor, and then I step back, dismissing my blade. Erin staggers drunkenly for a moment, and then falls shuddering across the body of her sister.

  I step around them, toward the Scholar. He’s watching me through his spectacles, unconcerned at the demise of his servants. Still too confident. Which means he still has a trick—

  There’s a crack, like a tree branch breaking. The red glow from the dredwurm’s eye in the Scholar’s hand is matched, suddenly, by another. The great gray egg, behind the pillar, has sprouted a crystal like the one the Scholar holds, pulsing with crimson light in perfect time.

  With another crack, part of the egg separates from the whole. It shudders, changing shape, becoming a leg, long and multi-jointed. Another crack, and another, as the thing comes apart.

  Slowly, the angel rises to its feet.

  * * *

  Too late, I lunge for the Scholar.

  A slender leg of hard gray stone comes down between us before my blade reaches him. Melos energy slashes against the angel’s flesh and rebounds, leaving little more than a burn scar. I dodge around it, but another leg intercepts, and then another comes straight at me, tipped with a vicious claw. I jump backward, and look up.

  The angel is a sphere, held off the ground just a bit higher than my head. The glowing red eye pulses in the center, while around it the stony flesh is shaped into a sea of twisted, screaming human faces, one melting into the next, covering its entire surface. The faces shift as I watch, mouths widening, eyes darting, one swallowing the next and being swallowed in its turn. From the churning mass extend long, stick-thin legs with five or six joints, spread evenly over the surface like a halo of pins sticking in a pincushion. Underneath the angel, the legs fold in on themselves to support its weight, while those protruding from the sides and top hinge down to jab at me with horrible agility.

  “I hope you didn’t think I was relying only on those two to protect me,” the Scholar says. He steps sideways as the angel advances, its legs passing neatly around him in a complex ballet. “I may not have control of the whole ship, but it’s simple enough to use the dredwurm’s eye for this.”

  I keep retreating, drawing it forward. A leg swipes at me, then another, and I block them with my Melos shield.

  The dredwurm was a rogue angel. I killed it, so I should be able to deal with this one the same way. I don’t have Aifin to attract its attention, but—

  Focus, Isoka. I reach out to the thing, feeling for the currents of Eddica power that animate it. Last time, I gave those a twist, and it froze the creature in place. Just a little twist—

  When I take hold of the energy churning inside it, it feels like being slapped in the face, a jolt that leaves every muscle twitching. I stumble, and the angel swats me, a claw scraping across my armor. Heat ripples through my chest, and I feel myself tumbling through the air, landing hard against one wall.

  The Scholar is laughing.

  “I imagine that’s how you killed the dredwurm,” he says. “I should have known. A good try. But a dredwurm has nothing driving it, no force behind it, just a leftover loop of energy cut off from its natural state. This is an angel, and the will behind it is mine.” He grins nastily. “You will not be able to subvert it so easily.”

  Rot. So much for that plan.

  I get up, my back to the wall. Eddica energy pulses through the metal behind me, and I can hear tiny almost voices, like whining gnats. The angel, moving ponderously on its folded legs, swings a dozen limbs in my direction, closing them around me like the jaws of a trap. I duck, dodge, and swing both blades against one leg, right into the joint. My arms get hot as I pour in power, and with a mighty crack the joint gives way, the last third of the leg sheared off and crashing to the floor. The angel twists, swinging the damaged leg away and bringing a dozen fresh ones to bear.

  One down. At least twenty to go, and the skin on my arms is already burning. This is not going to work.

  The eye. If I’m going to kill it, it has to be the eye. I push away from the wall, dodging claws or letting them scrape my armor. I grab a leg and lift myself up, swinging closer to the angel like a monkey pulling itself through the jungle canopy. More legs close in, the forest getting tighter and tighter around me, until I’m facing a solid grid of gray stone. Through the gaps, a foot away, the angel’s eye gleams mockingly. For a moment I’m poised there, straining, the angel with all its legs folded inward like a dying insect. Then it uncoils, hurling me across the room.

  I do my best to brace, wincing at the impact and the blast of heat it sends through my armor. Eddica power pulses in the wall where I hit, rising briefly before returning to its regular rhythm. I stagger back to my feet and start to run, straight for the Scholar, ignoring the angel.

  “You tried that already, Deepwalker,” he says. Legs snake out, blocking my path like reaching vines. “Getting desperate?”

  He has no idea. I shove my arm through a gap in the wall of limbs, one blade reaching toward the Scholar’s head. Letting the other blade vanish, I pour power into the outstretched weapon, lengthening it into something closer to Karakoa’s two-handed sword. The blade grows, stretches, and the Scholar jerks backward as the crackling tip swings wildly in front of him.

  But it’s not enough. I can’t make the blade any longer, and the angel has ahold of me now, throwing me backward again. This time, when I hit the wall, I’m not so quick to get up. My limbs feel like lead, and the skin of my back and shoulders is already charred from powerburn. I just manage to get to my feet as claws arc down toward me, blocking the strikes with my Melos shield. Each impact rings me like a gong.

  Hagan is hanging limp in the luminous gray bonds. His body is flickering, blurred, as though on the other side of lumpy glass. But I hear his voice, just for a moment.

  “… Isoka … follow…”

  There’s a familiar tug in my chest. For a moment, I think a claw has taken hold of me, but I see the thread of gray light that led me to the Garden has gone taut again. It wraps around me, leading into the wall.

  The wall—

  Not just into the wall. It leads to a large, cylindrical strut, which pulses with gray light, heavily loaded with flowing Eddica power. I risk turning my head, and see the thread join the flow, right where the big strut meets two smaller ones. They merge in a complex knot of power.

  Time to place the big bet.

  The angel rears back, raising four legs at once to batter my shield. I spin sideways, letting the shield fade away, summoning both my blades. Instead of slashing at the enfolding legs, I swing both blades against the wall, right where the thread from my chest joins it. Melos energy cracks, and there’s a rush of heat along my arms as my blades cut into the metal. The knot sags for a moment, and then gives way.

  Like water spilling from a broken pipe, a torrent of Eddica energy blasts from the shredded metal, spraying into the air in a million tiny gray motes. I reach out and take hold of the flow, bending it with all my strength. It twists, fighting like a raging python, but just for a moment I manage to direct it where I want it to go.

  Right against the eye of the angel, looming over me.

  I can feel the organized, looping structure of the thing, the magical machine the Scholar is so fond of, come apart under the blasting pressure of the wild, chaotic energy. The angel spasms, then freezes in place, its legs shuddering to a halt.

  I can’t hold the flow for long, and I have no idea if the angel will recover, so I move fast. I grab a leg, swinging myself up and over, traversing the creature like an obstacle course, heading for the Scholar. He takes a half step back, not quite realizing what’s happened, and then I see panic breaking across his face. He throws up one arm, as though that would protect him from my blades—

  And then I’m past him, the dredwurm’s eye in my hands, red light draining out of it like blood from a
wound.

  “No!” He turns on me, eyes wide. “Give it back! Quickly! The ship will—”

  Hagan’s scream returns, sliding from high and terrified down toward a bass roar, a thundering growl that sets the room around us to shaking. The bands of gray light that had wrapped him dissolve, and he drops into a crouch on the pedestal.

  “Give it to me!” the Scholar shrieks. “Please!”

  I stand stock-still, waiting.

  With a shriek of twisting metal, conduits and pipes all over the room tear themselves away from the walls, animated by the wild pressure of the Eddica flow inside them. They converge on the Scholar, jagged ends lancing toward him like spears. His scream rises as he’s pierced a hundred times over, disappearing in a matter of moments inside a compacting sphere of broken, twisting metal. After a few seconds, the bottom of the sphere begins to leak blood, thick and red.

  Hagan tries to rise, stumbles, and falls to his knees. His body still flickers with distortion, growing fainter by the moment.

  “Hagan!” I rush to the pedestal. “The doors. You have to close the doors!”

  He looks up at me and nods, face clear for an instant before the distortion sweeps over it again. I feel a rumble through the floor, the sound of metal shifting far below.

  “Thank you.” I reach out a hand to him. “Are … are you…”

  And then he’s gone, fading into a spray of gray light that dissolves like mist. A quiet settles over the room. The angel is still, the bent and torn pipes fixed in place. The Scholar’s blood drips metronomically into a spreading puddle.

  I pick my way out, past the splayed metal, past the still bodies of Erin and Arin. In the corridor, in spite of the pain all through me, I start to run.