by Jack Conner
She grinned when moonlight illuminated his ghastly face, as she saw in his eyes that he knew his fate better than she. Watching him drop his bullet-battered saber to the ground and wrench another from his next victim, her grin fell away.
Looking at the man in all his agony and rage broke something in her, or unlocked it. For a fleeting instant, she felt empathy. She felt pity and sorrow at the countless deaths she’d caused because she wanted to be Queen. Then the moment passed. No self-doubt would cripple her victory, she told herself. She was stronger than that.
She leaned against the window, her blackened hands holding her in place within the blackened window, and watched the demon float over yet another soldier and decapitate him.
“Get in your licks while you can,” she said. “Your end won’t be long now.”
* * *
D’Aguila, standing in the alcove of the tower, turned to the other four jandrows and inspected them. All bore wounds that proved their loyalty to Maleasoel and to him, as well as their willingness to fight. Only one still wore clothes. They were a gaunt and hardened bunch, their singed wings tucked behind them, ready to spring at his signal. Satisfied, Raulf turned to glance back out the doorway and caught sight of the Ambassador hacking a Libertarian soldier into pieces. Bullets continued to riddle the kavasari, and his concentration seemed to grow weaker by the moment.
Any time now, Raulf thought.
In all fairness, he didn’t really want to kill the Ambassador—but then he hadn’t wanted to kill all those Castle soldiers, either. War was war, and D’Aguila was resigned to it, though he still hoped that, at some point, Malie would show her old self again and rescind the order to kill Subaire and her Half. If she did that, Raulf would be satisfied. If she actually went through with it ...
His thoughts stopped when he saw Mauchlery leap to his next victim and miss on not just the first swing of his blade, but the second.
Raulf turned to his men, all armed with the most powerful guns the army could provide (except himself, who carried only his blade), and said, “All right, folks. It’s time.”
He flew out and they followed. They rose into the air and advanced on the Ambassador, who was drenched from head to foot in many bloods, most of all his own; he was so bullet-ridden he was probably as much metal as flesh now. And still he kept up his indomitable fury, diving over the badly-diminished ranks of Libertarians and hacking soldiers apart, one by one.
Mauchlery saw the advancing jandrows, with D’Aguila in the lead, and his pale blue eyes locked onto the Captain. Raulf nodded in grim acknowledgment, shifting into his reptilian form. With his enormous crocodile mouth, he smiled at the pleasure of being in this shape, of enjoying the freedom it gave him, then forced the smile from his face and shouted towards the kavasari, “Surrender or die!”
Silent, Francois rose into the air as if to accept the challenge. All the while, bullets continued to pour into him and Raulf felt momentarily unnerved at how much pain this creature was undergoing simply to avenge a death. Had Raulf ever loved someone so much, to endure so much on their behalf—or had he ever hated an enemy so much that pain would be subordinate to rage? No. And, looking upon the wasted form of his intended victim, he was glad to have escaped those passions.
Raulf barked an order and his team fanned out, forming a loose semi-circle around Francois, who simply hovered at the focal point, unsmiling, almost serene but for the angry slant of his eyebrows. Wind, gusting in through the empty space where the eastern wall used to be, tickled the Ambassador’s blood-matted hair and whipped the remnants of his clothes. It all created the illusion that the kavasari was a fierce blur, every part of his otherwise stationary figure rippling and quicksilver in the air. The only parts of him clearly visible were his pale eyes, and they fixed tight on Raulf, who felt his blood grow cold.
“Now!” said Raulf.
His team fired their machine guns, and, in the next few instants, time seemed to slow. As the bullets streaked toward their target, Mauchlery snapped an arm up and pointed upward over Raulf’s shoulder; the Captain didn’t have to ask what he was pointing at: Maleasoel.
The kavasari’s blue eyes lifted from Raulf to bore into the future Queen, and the bullets tearing toward him were averted. They hummed angrily, circled around Mauchlery like maddened bees, then shot up over Raulf’s shoulder. Raulf heard the loud roar as they passed over him and, a brief moment later heard Malie cry out in pain and surprise.
The four jandrows at D’Aguila’s command ceased pulling the triggers of their weapons, but that didn’t stop the guns from firing. Under the telekinetic control of Mauchlery, their aims swiveled, they tore lose of the jandrows’ hands and hovered in mid-air, relentlessly firing at Malie until their ammunition ran out. Instantly, the spent guns fell to the ground. Raulf heard Malie’s surprised exclamations turn to whimpers of pure physical agony.
Raulf lifted his saber high and charged the kavasari. Mauchlery’s face remained hard. The only change occurred in one of his arms, which cut his own blade back and forth so that its coating of gore flew in all directions. But the kavasari had no intention of blade-to-blade fighting, and he showed absolutely no fear at Raulf’s beast form.
Instead, as Raulf drew near, the wind changed.
All of a sudden, a gust blew with terrible fury, knocking him off course and spinning him through the air. Within seconds, he was aware of circling the kavasari at a dizzying speed, the other jandrows in similar positions, as if Mauchlery were the eye of some invisible tornado and the fliers its sole targets of destruction.
Dismay swept Raulf. He’d never heard of a creature that possessed enough power to control the very wind.
His eyes stung. His guts churned. He felt nauseous and wanted only to get off this hellish ride, but he was all but paralyzed. Caught in the cyclone, with the world receding and becoming an ever faster blur ... he couldn’t even move his tail ... or wings ...
He cried out but couldn’t hear his own voice above the wind. He felt like he was being smashed against a wall—flattened.
Then, as suddenly as it had started, it stopped.
All five jandrows, including Raulf, were flung to the ground. He struck the courtyard hard, felt one of his wings snap, and rolled until he smacked against a wall. Things grew dark, but he shoved the blackness away and puked quietly—at least, it seemed quiet; temporarily deafened, he could hear nothing.
When he was able, he rose unsteadily to his feet—to his feet!—he had unconsciously changed forms. He saw his saber off to the side and crossed to pick it up, keeping his eyes open for the kavasari.
Across the courtyard from him, Francois hacked apart the body of one of Raulf’s jandrows, who—like Raulf—had been flung against a wall. Unlike Raulf, he wasn’t being given time to recover.
A few missiles—the Libertarians weren’t quite out yet—flared through the night, but none penetrated Mauchlery’s telekinetic net.
Done with the jandrow, Mauchlery rose back up into the air, but slowly. The man must be extraordinarily drained, Raulf thought, after his recent display. As if thinking the same thing, Francois leapt toward a burned soldier, a man pretending to be dead in order to escape the kavasari’s wrath; Mauchlery plucked the man from the ground and carried him up into the air, where he cradled the man in his powerful arms and bent his neck to sink his fangs into the soldier’s throat.
Raulf shivered. If the ancient kavasari was strong enough to have done all he had, the fates alone knew what he could continue to do if he kept feeding. Quite conceivably, he could destroy the entire army.
Mauchlery paused.
He looked down on the face of the shuddering man in his arms. Francois, coated in blood, the winds whipping his clothes and hair, his vibrant eyes gone dim with exhaustion, gazed down upon the face of his helpless victim and studied it. Next he looked all around the courtyard, at all the butchered bodies, and something went out of him. He seemed to know, in that instant, that he could indeed kill the entire army. Apparently he�
��d not thought himself so strong. Probably he’d never had occasion to expend such energy before, at least not in a long, long time.
As he took in the carnage, an actual tear rolled down from one blue eye. Francois ran a hand through his victim’s hair, gently, then dropped the soldier to the ground. The man, though unharmed, did not move. Shocked, his eyes stayed transfixed on the Ambassador.
Francois floated up, his arms outstretched and his head thrown back.
Five missiles flew through the air at him. Mauchlery did not turn them away. Instead, he encouraged their approach. As Raulf watched on with wonder, Francois gave himself up to death. Tears and blood dripped from his face as the missiles struck him.
He exploded in a conflagration that shook the night. When the blossoms of fire receded, there was nothing left of the Ambassador but ashes on the wind.
Chapter 13
“Damn,” said Subaire, watching Francois Mauchlery’s destruction from the mountaintop. She’d hoped that the kavasari would kill the rest of the Libertarians before she had to lead her Half down to the Castle. Now it seemed that the Libertarians would still have a force adequate to fend for themselves. Subaire began to think that she might just have to let them live.
She shifted her attention to the northern tip of the mountaintop, where those five kavasari were still engaged in battle with her thirty soldiers.
Obviously they were much weaker and younger than the creature that had destroyed half the Libertarian Army. Still, they were holding their own against her troops. She saw Kharker floating through the air in beast form, a female soldier clutched to his shaggy chest with his one arm while he chewed on her back and clawed at the soldiers just below him with his legs.
Subaire recognized two others by sight. Jean-Pierre, the Hunter’s companion, stalking through the remains of the thirty soldiers, prowling side by side with some woman Subaire did not know, both causing their fair share of damage. And Ruegger, the fucking Darkling, the Darling of Lord Kharker, whom Subaire now recognized as the tall kavasari she’d assumed to be the leader of the quintet. He fought back to back with a short black-haired waif that Subaire assumed to be the Gutter Angel, Danielle. Subaire’s thirty troops were dwindling fast. She had to make her move, now.
“Keeg,” she shouted to the leader of the seven Sangro Sankts-gifted soldiers. “It’s time.”
“Yes, my lady.”
Within a minute, all her remaining troops (just under thirty) had boarded their skiffs. Most of the outpost had been incinerated during the quintet’s attack, but there was just enough debris to be used as conveyances. Subaire climbed aboard hers and gave the order to proceed.
Under the power of the seven, her army rose from the mountain and flew down through the chilly night and the softly falling snow to land in the northern courtyards. At the far end, she could see the bulk of the Libertarian Army pouring from the western wall to inspect the remains of Francois Mauchlery and that of their own dead or dying.
Subaire spied Maleasoel standing up, surrounded by half a dozen lackeys, draped in a heavy jacket and receiving blood, one at a time, from those clustered around her. Obviously the bitch had received some injuries. Too bad she hadn’t been killed outright.
Subaire issued orders, then led her soldiers quietly up through the wreckage of the courtyards toward the Libertarians. She counted over forty of Maleasoel’s misguided troops still living. Damn.
When Ludwig’s widow spotted the advance of Subaire’s Half, Maleasoel could be seen issuing orders. Her army fanned out and, warily, approached the newcomers. Maleasoel took the lead.
When they were about twenty yards apart, the two armies stopped and eyed each other.
Subaire stepped into the open. Suddenly, she felt very exposed.
Maleasoel, naked except for the heavy jacket, marched into the blighted clearing to join her.
“So we meet again.”
“Indeed,” Subaire said. She forced herself to breathe deeply. “It seems you’ve lived up to more than your share of the agreement. Job well done.”
“Thank you. A shame those dragons assaulted you. I had no idea about them, or I’d have sent you word.”
Subaire hid a sneer. “I’m sure. And too bad about that kavasari attacking your army like that. Who would’ve guessed him to be so powerful?”
Maleasoel’s smile froze. “Yes. Too bad. I notice that neither you nor your army intervened.”
“Alas, there wasn’t time.”
“Of course.”
“Now, about the conditions of taking the Castle ...”
“Yes, time to get down to business,” Malie said. “I say that since my Army and my allies ensured victory, that those conditions be altered. Further, I say that I, more than anyone else, hereby deserve to rule and be crowned the new ruler. What say you, Subaire?”
“I think not, Maleasoel. I, as part of the Council itself, initiated the war and have seen it to its conclusion. I’m the only one properly qualified to be crowned. However, I recognize your achievements and would be satisfied with awarding you a membership on the Council, once the Castle has been restored and I’m rightly in my place of power.”
“Councilwoman Maleasoel.” The jandrow seemed to think that over for a minute, her face composed in an artful frown. Then: “I like Queen better.”
She whipped a blade into her hands (it had been hidden under her coat) and plunged it into Subaire’s stomach. Subaire screamed and threw herself backwards. She had been wrong, she thought, as she saw the bullets and missiles start to fly: the war hadn’t ended yet, after all.
* * *
Cutting through what was left of the thirty soldiers with Jean-Pierre, Sophia felt both invigorated and disgusted. The latter came from killing these soldiers; their ruler might be evil and certainly they’d been a party to her atrocities, such as sacrificing all their human fodder to be used as a protective mound in which to hide—but did they really deserve death?
Pretty much, was her conclusion. Actually, she felt great satisfaction in gutting them and taking off their empty heads.
Before long, the battle was over. The few surviving soldiers ran off into the night in retreat, but the coven did not pursue.
When Jean-Pierre, wounded severely (as was everyone, but he was worse off than the others), clutched her hand, she indicated the battlefield and said, “They’re not all dead, baby. We can drain the ones still alive and get some strength back.”
“Just drain them?” he asked, coughing blood. He clutched his knees, then fell sideways onto the ground.
She crouched and ran her fingers through his hair. “If they still have a chance to make it, yes,” she answered. “I think we’ve hurt them enough.”
He nodded, coughing up more blood.
Ruegger and Danielle, both bleeding and wobbly on their feet, drew close. When Danielle saw Jean-Pierre’s condition, she said, “Goddamn.” She darted off, snatched the torso of a largely-dismembered but still-living soldier, and carted him over to the albino. “Go on. Drink.”
Unlike Kharker, he didn’t have to be told twice. Once all the members of the coven had replenished themselves, they set off toward the southern tip of the mountain, where the stairs descended down to the Castle. Sophia stopped so as to catch her breath. Down in the courtyards, the Libertarians were engaged in mortal combat with Subaire’s Half. It looked to be a bitter and bloody battle, fought hand-to-hand for the most part. The armies must have run out of missiles.
Sophia glanced over at Jean-Pierre, who looked much better now. “Should we intervene?”
“No.”
“So we just stand here?”
“Yes,” said Ruegger, his sad eyes on the fight. Behind his stern mask, Sophia detected real inner turmoil.
“What about your friend?” she said. “Malie.”
He shook his head. “It’s Maleasoel, now.”
“And that’s supposed to mean—”
“She’s lost to us. I’ve got to let her go her own way.”
Sophia looked to Danielle, but the dark waif seemed just as grim.
“She traded Ruegger’s life for nukes,” Danielle said, her voice harder than Sophia could remember. “One of which killed over two hundred shades and God knows how many mortals.”
“But surely she didn’t authorize—”
“It doesn’t matter. She’s a killer, Sophe. All of them down there are. I wish ... well, it doesn’t matter. They’ve chosen their fates. Let them live with it, or not.”
“Surely we’ve got to do something,” Sophia persisted.
“No,” said Kharker. He’d robbed a body of some cigars and he lit a stick now with his one hand. His brown eyes were not as troubled as Ruegger’s, but they weren’t happy, either. “We’ve done everything we can, Sophe.”
She swore. “That’s just it! We’ve done so much. And now just to sit back and watch?”
“Kharker’s right, Sophe,” Jean-Pierre said. “We’ve done all we can. We ... that is, the side of the righteous, if there is such a side in all this … we’ve failed to triumph over evil. So let evil be destroyed by evil.” He squeezed her arm.
“Look at it like this,” Ruegger said. “What we accomplished, everything we did, what we went through, it all meant something. It allowed us to reduce Subaire’s Half to a manageable number. After the fighting below, maybe the Libertarians are similarly reduced. Everything we did was worth it, just for the chance we’re giving them.”
“What chance?” Sophia said.
“To destroy each other. If we hadn’t killed most of Subaire’s people, she would have easily defeated whatever’s left of the Libertarians and become the new Dark Lord without question. Now who knows? And whoever wins, we take down, and what’s happening now makes it that much easier for us.”
