Chapter 8
Stronom materializes in the courtyard of Claustria castle. His dark robe blends in with the shadows cast by the setting sun. He tucks the golden orb and silver compass into his sleeve before walking past two stunned guards. He walks first down one hallway, then another before ending up in the castle’s kitchen.
He finds Aristhmus sitting at a small table.
“Stronom Singularis, Maximagus of the Fifth Circle, the most hated wizard in Arcania. The rumor was that Rassamander killed you. You look good for a dead guy,” Aristhmus says.
“How’s Lilia?” Stronom asks.
“She is no longer with us,” he says, fixing his gaze upon his hands.
“You always were more focused on acquiring treasure than appreciating its true value,” Stronom says.
“She wasn’t safe with you and you know it. You were always the one she loved most.”
“Seems she wasn’t much safer with you. And the boys? I’m guessing they’re somewhere around here. Where can I find them?”
“Novanostrum’s up in the Flatlands preparing to fight an army of homicidal clocks, and Zanther’s with Madra on a suicide mission to attack Mortesia.”
Stronom nods. “And did you tell them?”
Aristhmus gives a shrug. “No. I figured they’ve got enough to worry about. It can wait ‘till they get back--if they make it back.”
“So you’re just going to sit here while your son charges blindly into peril?”
“Is that not what you’re doing?”
“I came here to help mine. I intend to find him,” Stronom says.
“You were always a better man than me.”
“Don’t I know it. Also, you said earlier that I was a Fifth Circle. You should know that I’m an Nth Circle now.”
“An ‘Nth Circle’? What the High Hell is that? Just how does one become an Nth Circle?”
“Kill a god,” Stronom says as he walks away.
Madra walks through the Willowood, stumbling across roots and bumping into trees. Her blindfold makes it difficult to navigate, but she knows she is in the right general area.
“Varello!” she shouts for the dozenth time, hearing no reply.
She trips over something squishy, falling on her face. She reaches around to feel the obstruction, recognizing the object as the leg of a corpse. She runs her hand across the body, finding the shaft of a bolt protruding from its chest.
“Madra! What are you doing out here?” Varello asks.
“I’ve come to apologize. You were right about Desa. I never should’ve doubted your judgment.”
“Yes, well, don’t you think it’s a little risky for a queen to be bumping around in the woods blindfolded?”
“Well, now I’ve got you to protect me. Let’s get Desa and get out of here. I’ve got a skyship waiting for us.”
“Where are we going?”
“Mortesia.”
Varello gives her a suspicious look which she does not see. “What’s in Mortesia?”
Madra smiles. “Thousands of men who need to learn to appreciate true beauty.”
“So you would use her as a weapon.”
“Yes, that’s the plan,” Madra says.
“I don’t know that I approve of that.”
“Well, think of it this way: she can spend the rest of her life in hiding, or she can do something which will save lives and secure the freedom of all the peoples of Upper Kleighton.”
“I will consult with Desa. If she wishes to help you, I will go along with this. If she does not, I will not force her.”
Meteorites fall from the sky, each one smashing half a dozen automates as it crashes to the ground. Bolts of lightning strike automates, exploding them into piles of metallic rubble. Soldiers rush around, dodging shots from gatling powderblasts and trying in vain to stem the oncoming tide of automates.
The ground shakes, toppling ranks of clockspring soldiers. They simply get back up.
The captain of the guard stands next to Novanostrum, who is frantically casting spells and summoning devastation.
“It’s working,” Novanostrum says, “but it’s not doing enough to reduce their numbers. At this rate, we won’t win this battle. I need...I need a moment to think.”
On the other side of the battlefield, behind the main ranks of the automate army, there are only a few human soldiers here and there fighting desperately against their mechanickal foes. A black-robed figure casually tosses a ball of shadow at an automate, vaporizing it. The figure approaches the confused Claustrian soldier.
“Hey, give this to your wizard, Novanostrum,” he says, holding out a sealed letter.
The soldier, taking a moment to regain his composure, grabs the letter and dashes off.
After is out of his sight, Stronom licks his finger and sweeps the area around him as if trying to determine which way the wind is blowing. He focuses his attention on a cluster of trees fifty man-lengths away and walks towards it.
In the center of the trees, he can see three robed figures huddling over a symbol drawn on the ground with white dust.
“You did it all wrong,” Stronom says as he crouches next to them, “yes, it’ll work if you do it this way, but the effects won’t be as strong. Ground up dragon bones are powerful, but you need something with more of a water element.”
The three wizards immediately point their staves at him.
“Who are you? How did you find us?” one of them asks.
“Just followed the energy of your atmospheric stasis spell to its epicenter. A tenth circle could’ve done that much,” Stronom says, casting a woeful eye on the sun partially obscured by the horizon.
Fireballs erupt from each of their staves and Stronom raises his hand as he prepares to deflect them.
The fireballs pause in midair. Meteorites and bolts of lightning hang suspended all around the battlefield. Stronom’s hand reflexively goes to his bare wrist.
“The Ristwatch,” he says to himself as he snaps his fingers at each of the frozen wizards in front of him, reducing them to piles of black ash, “well, that was convenient.”
Stronom wipes his foot across the symbol drawn on the ground, smearing it until it is completely unrecognizable. He looks once again at the sun.
“Well, gotta get back before dark,” he says to himself.
Novanostrum finds himself surrounded by a dozen frozen automates. He ducks between two of them to find a Claustrian soldier a few paces away, his outstretched arm bearing a letter. Novanostrum sees that the letter is addressed to him, so he plucks it from the soldier’s stilled hand. He rips it open and sees three words written in the center of the single page:
Make it rain.
He looks up and notices the peapod sky regaining the normal orangey haze of a typical sunset.
Time resumes its normal flow as the circle of automates near Novanostrum crash into each other and the clamor of the battlefield is restored. Feeling energized, Novanostrum waves his staff and the wind begins to swirl around his body until it forms a massive tornado. Automates and corpses and soldiers and all the small trees in the immediate vicinity are swept up, spinning around Novanostrum as he summons huge storm clouds which soon cover the sky.
A moment later, thunder cracks and the rain begins to fall.
The soldiers still fighting automates watch in awe as their mechanickal enemies twitch and sputter, shooting sparks from their edges and joints before toppling all across the battlefield. Before long, the surviving men cheer in victory as the tornado around Novanostrum dissipates.
Zanther sits on a cot in a cabin below the deck of The Rakehell. He scratches his eyebrow under his blindfold, then reaches his hand out to find Madra’s hand.
“So you’re telling me that the most beautiful woman in the world is right above my head?”
“Yes.”
“But I can’t see her or I’ll go comato
se and die?”
“Correct.”
“But if she’s up there and we’re down here behind a locked door, why are we both still wearing blindfolds?”
“Can’t take any chances.”
“Fair enough. So, if no man has seen her without dying, and every woman who looks at her becomes cultishly obsessed--crazy, even for a woman--how can you be sure she’s the most beautiful woman in the world?”
“Varello’s seen her. He told me so.”
“Yes, well, I wouldn’t exactly call Varello an expert on female beauty.”
“He’s often told me how beautiful I am.”
“Exactly my point.”
Zanther dodges the first slap, but Madra connects with the second.
“It’s kind of boring, sitting here being blind,” Zanther says, rubbing the side of his head.
“Agreed. Still, I know something we could do to fill the time,” Madra replies.
“At least I’m already wearing a blindfold,” Zanther says as he swings his head to try and evade her next slap. He fails to anticipate her fist before it connects with its target.
Zanther doubles over onto the cot, clutching his nethers and gasping.
The Quester of Righteousness feels around the bottom edge of his cell, exploring. With the small size of the cell, it does not take long. He feels the steel door with a finger’s width of clearance above the stone floor. The walls themselves are huge stone bricks, hewn and stacked so precisely he is unable to get even a fingernail between them. He stands, running his hands over the walls and the door. He feels the hinges of the door, the stone ceiling, trying to gauge the cell’s escapability.
Outside the thick door, he can hear guards. He listens to their breathing, to the periodic thuds as they lower their weapons to change their grip. Spears, he guesses from the hollow wooden reverberations.
Without warning, he begins to sing:
“There’s a duck from the south with a fish in its mouth,
There’s a frog on a log by the shore,
And if you didn’t hear, well, open up your ear!
And I’ll sing it for you once more:
There’s a duck from the south with a fish in its mouth...”
The Quester of Righteousness sings the song over and over, repeating it only a half-dozen times before getting the desired reaction as the metal tip of a spear bangs against his door.
“Keep it down in there!”
Undeterred, the Quester of Righteousness continues to sing and starts to clap his hands with the rhythm of the song, losing himself in the ecstasy one is only able to achieve when truly annoying someone else.
The door to the cell flies open as the guard thrusts his spear inside the cell and hits nothing. Standing behind the door, the Quester of Righteousness slams the steel door into the guard, knocking him off his feet. The Quester of Righteousness feels around for the spear and snatches it up, immediately plunging its metal point into the chest of the dazed guard. Hearing the stunned gasp of the other guard, the Quester uses that small sound to gauge the location of that guard’s chest and slams the spear through.
After a few moments, the coughing and burbling of the two dying men ceases, and the Quester cautiously begins searching for new sounds.
Oversized cannons mounted on turrets atop towers throughout Mortesia are trained on The Rakehell as it passes over the city. Four white banners of surrender flying from poles at each corner of the skyship are all that prevent the Mortesians from blasting it out of the sky.
The skyship lands in the open square of the plaza in front of the Threaded Spire. The gangplank is lowered, and a bard is the first to disembark. In one hand he carries an ornate lute, in the other he carries a rope. Three figures wearing hooded cloaks follow behind him, each grasping the rope.
The square is filled with close to a thousand Mortesian soldiers. A commander approaches Varello, who begins to speak.
“My name is Varello Punchinelli. I am the emissary of Queen Madra of Claustria. I was sent here to negotiate the terms of surrender with the Vinch.”
The commander nods and eyes the three hooded figures behind Varello. “And those three?”
“Blind seers, personal advisors to the Queen.”
The commander takes a look at the ship, then returns his attention to Varello. “Well, there’s a problem. You see, the Vinch isn’t really interested in ‘negotiating’ with Claustria or anyone else. He will settle for nothing less than unconditional surrender.”
Varello turns and nods at one of the figures, then looks at the commander. “Actually, I was referring to your surrender.”
It’s at this point when one of the hooded figures removes her cloak and tosses it to the ground, revealing her full, red locks and nubile body.
All activity throughout the square stops. The soldiers who are close enough to hear the exchange have their powderblasts trained on the four figures, but upon seeing Desa, they drop their weapons and fall to their knees, dazed.
The clatter of weapons falling to the cobblestones and armored soldiers dropping to their knees echoes throughout the plaza. Everyone in sight is affected. A few dozen women who were observing from the edge of the square smile and step forward, tentatively.
“I can’t see what’s happening,” Zanther whispers to Madra, “are we winning?”
“How should I know?” Madra whispers back.
The women from throughout the square drop their laundry and their sacks full of produce as they swarm toward Desa. Desa walks to a dazed soldier and picks up his powderblast. She motions for her new female admirers to do the same.
Varello turns toward Zanther and Madra.
“Well, the first part of the plan worked. Would you like to go with me to see the Vinch, or stay here next to this highly explosive target surrounded by cannons?”
Zanther gives the rope a tug. “Lead the way, maestro.”
Varello and Desa walk side by side to the front doors of the Threaded Spire, with Zanther and Madra following behind, grasping the rope. Desa’s posse trails the four of them by but a few steps. The guards at the doors attempt to take a step forward to intercept them, but immediately fall to their knees.
Once inside the main chamber of the Spire, the doors all slam shut. Desa’s women immediately form a protective circle around the four of them, their weapons drawn.
Zanther turns his head, trying to hear what is going on. “I don’t like the sound of this, Varello. Are we bonked?”
Dozens of automates begin swarming through unseen entrances to the chamber, their metal footfalls clamoring ominously against the polished granite floor.
The clockspring soldiers encircle them, seemingly undaunted by Desa’s beauty.
Varello turns to Madra and Zanther. “In retrospect, this possibility should have been obvious. Any ideas?”
Zanther shrugs, and Madra drops to the ground, clutching her knees.
The automates begin their charge. The crazed women take shots at their metal heads as they dodge powderblast shots and the swings and thrusts of bladed arms. Desa leads by example, weaving between automates, causing them to attack each other as they miss her.
Zanther tosses his overcloak aside and draws his longknives, blindly diving into battle, using the sounds around him to direct the movements of his blades.
“Can’t you do a songspell or something?” Madra asks Varello.
“I don’t think...wait,” he replies, having a sudden realization as he grasps his lute. He takes a look around the vast chamber, searching for the appropriate spot before bounding there in a few steps. A pick materializes from his sleeve, and he positions his pointer finger and carefully plucks a single note.
The reverberation of the note bounces off the walls and ceiling and floor of the chamber, magnified by the acoustics of the room.
Every automate in the chamber bursts into pieces as the single note continues to echo.
The women stop fighting. Zanther stands still, trying in vai
n to hear the movement of any clockspring soldiers. Desa, feeling the vibration, nods her head in understanding.
“What did you just do, Varello?” Madra asks.
“I recall your songspells being a little more complicated than a single note,” Zanther muses.
The answer comes from the descending spiral staircase above their heads.
“Resonant frequency amplified by the precisely-engineered acoustics of this chamber,” the Vinch says as the bottom step of the staircase lowers to the floor in front of them. Varello and Desa take him in: his red vest, his white trousers, his dark red goggles, his clockspring arm. In his human arm, he holds a longknife whose blade is the color of blood.
Instinctively, Varello glances at Desa, then at the Vinch, who smiles.
“Yes, I’m sure she’s quite lovely. I watched what she did outside through my optiscope.”
Varello stares at the Vinch in shock. “Are you...?”
“Am I what? Impotent?” the Vinch asks before knocking his metal hand against his own crotch with a hollow metallic clang.
“I lost that part of myself a long time ago. Luckily, I was able to rebuild. Bigger, harder, stronger, as they say.”
The Vinch turns toward Desa, who begins to back away cautiously.
“Looks like someone would like to find out firsthand,” he says, looking her naked body up and down.
At the tone of threat in his voice, the circle of frenzied women charges him. There’s a scuffle as he uses his metal arm to deflect powderblast shots and thrusts from longknives. One by one, he cuts them down. He decapitates one, stabs another through the chest, killing with every swing and thrust of his blade until all of the crazed women are dead.
For a moment, there is silence in the chamber.
“Did those girls kill him, or do I have to fight him?” Zanther asks.
“How chivalrous,” Madra says.
“What? I was operating under the assumption they were expendable. Was I wrong?”
The Vinch clears his throat. “I’m over here. Come take your shot at me so that I may kill you, then this fellow,” he says, pointing at Varello, “and then show these ladies pleasure and pain they have never known.”
Varello spies a movement at the corner of the chamber. “Zanther, I am confident you can handle him. Maybe you can intimidate him with a fierce battle cry as you charge.”
Zanther nods. “Well, I am pretty intimidating. Okay, here goes!”
He screams as he charges with his blades raised. Varello watches Zanther approach, then sticks out a foot as he passes by.
Zanther trips and flies forward, falling on his face. The Vinch gives Varello a confused look which contorts into a grimace of intense pain as he looks down to find a giant blade sticking through his chest. The blade is attached to the arm of an automate.
The Vinch topples to the granite floor. Standing behind him is the Quester of Righteousness.
Desa rushes to the Quester, embracing him and planting a luscious kiss upon his lips, paying no attention to the bloody messes where his eyes should be.
“Judging from this young woman’s reaction,” the Quester says, “I’m guessing I saved the day. I’ve got to ask, though--she’s good-looking, right? I mean, I have a reputation to think about.”
“She’s the most beautiful woman in the world,” Zanther says, sarcastically, as he staggers to his feet.
The Quester of Righteousness runs his rough fingers across her face, “You aren’t kidding,” he says. He wraps a hand around her shoulder, feeling around in surprise, “Are you...naked?”
She laughs and gives him another kiss.
“She doesn’t speak,” Varello explains.
“She’s perfect,” the Quester of Righteousness says.
Seductive Silence Page 8
