The Immortal of Degoskirke

by Michael Green

  Andy felt his arm wrack with spasms and an axe appeared. He screamed out against the pain, reared back, and struck Ziesqe across the chest.

  Ziesqe toppled and Titus tumbled to the floor, singed, smoking, and missing most of his whiskers, but still alive. Titus pointed at Ziesqe and growled angrily, “Focus, Lysander!”

  Andy growled as he gained his footing. He reached out and batted Ziesqe’s feeble blade away before grabbing the ryle by his throat and clamping down hard.

  A shrill scream filled his ears. Andy’s eyes shot up in time to see Kal hurtling through the air. She tackled him. Their armor sparked and cracked as they tumbled away.

  Andy rolled to his feet to find Ziesqe’s retinue had rescued him. Kal broke off and ran to Ziesqe’s side. She held a flask.

  Andy pulled himself to his feet again, the pain making his vision blur.

  The crowd booed and, in its outrage, broke through the barrier of guards before attacking Ziesqe and his retinue with nothing but clubs and their hands. Andy cringed as they were cut down, but he was focused on something else.

  He lumbered towards the ychorons who held Ventalus prisoner.

  They yelled at him to stay back.

  Andy raised his blade and screamed. They flinched, some stumbling as they backed up the stairs, but they were all too distracted to see the city guardsmen closing in from behind.

  Andy watched as the guardsmen slaughtered the ychorons. Once freed, and de-gagged, Ventalus cried out. “Guards! Level arms!” The guards with wheel-locks raised their weapons against Ziesqe’s retinue and Andy as well. “Aim!”

  Andy raised up his hands. “Don’t kill him yet! An attack is coming! It’s coming from the sewers! If you take him hostage, we might stop it!”

  Ventalus paused as the Archatians and the other Exegesuits rushed him from all sides. An argument broke out.

  Titus limped up to Andy, and, too weak to climb, Andy helped him up.

  “You might have done it, Lysander! There’s no coming back from this.”

  Clang and Ithmene pushed through the guards and rushed to Andy. Ithmene snatched the vial out of Clang’s hands and opened it.

  “Letty?” Andy asked.

  “Not back, has half my force,” Clang said.

  Ask the mer where she was kept!

  Andy flinched, but obeyed. “Ithmene, where did Ziesqe keep you prisoner?”

  Ithmene described a counting house as she tended Andy’s wounds. Andy remembered the building from her description. “He has another man chained up there, as well as many caged mice.”

  Andy and Titus both perked up at the news.

  “Clang, take the rest of your force and assault that building. Free everyone inside.”

  Andy had never seen Clang smile before. The sight was a little unsettling, especially as Clang didn’t respond, he simply turned and piled through the guards towards his goblins.

  “Titus, you had better go with him. He looks bloodthirsty.”

  Titus’s face betrayed his desire to argue, but he obeyed.

  Andy looked up at the sky.

  It’s almost noon.

  “We don’t have much time!” Andy called after his friends.

  Chapter 13

  The Queens

  “But how do I get in?” Letty snapped at Blue.The bodies of dead guardsmen made her nervous as she tried to slice through a pile of burning refuse. The pile was barring the single entrance into the queen’s parcel.

  “Can’t you cut a way through? Or maybe, try climbing!”

  Letty loosened her grip on the blade before looking up at the walls.

  “I can’t climb that! They’re far too high. But I need to get inside!”

  “Wait!” Blue yelled. “The map, the sewer map!”

  Letty barely remembered the map she had found so long ago at the sphinx library.

  “Get the map!” Blue demanded.

  Letty found it in a pocket of her pack.

  Blue snatched it and had a look. Letty felt the urge to don her armor, realizing that something foul had happened.

  I hope the queens are okay on the other side. Someone doesn’t want them loose; Andy had the right idea.

  “Wait here!” Blue insisted, bounding up the side of a building.

  “I can’t wait!” Letty yelled.

  The goblins struggled to put out the fire until a local told them where the closest well was.

  “This is better than doing nothing,” Letty said, as the goblins appeared from around the corner with buckets. “But it will still take too long, and they might be dying on the other side!”

  Blue reappeared with a handful of local mice. “The intersticines! Those are the Seer tunnels! They have an exit in the queen’s parcel and we have a map!”

  “How do we get to the tunnels?”

  Blue leaped up to her shoulder with a pair of unfamiliar mice.

  “Lanticward, my Lady,” one said, pointing back the way she had come.

  “I’ll try to get the gate open from the other side,” Letty yelled to the goblins. “Keep working here!”

  “Yes, Mistress!” the goblins answered.

  “Don’t call me that!” Letty cried, racing around the corner.

  They directed her to an alley and then she waited as the mice crawled through a small mouse port.

  She put her ear against the wall and listened to them inside.

  “Just a second!” Blue said, clearly exerting himself. “This thing hasn’t been oiled in ages—come on, keep turning!”

  What are they doing in there?

  Letty stepped away and saw a circular recess appear on the stone wall. The stone unfolded in slow pulses, linked to the noises of exertion coming from the mice.

  Blue poked his head out from the mouse port. “Is there a door handle? Are we getting anywhere?” he asked.

  “I don’t know what this is,” Letty said, staring at something that looked like a plunging lever.

  Blue bounded up to her shoulder for a look.

  “That’s it lads, you can stop!” Blue said. The other mice appeared, clearly exhausted. “Produce a glow and try pulling on that lever.”

  Letty felt a little suspicious, but there was no time for doubt.

  Alright, here goes.

  She summoned the glow and grabbed the handle, expecting a trap to catch her hand or worse.

  Nothing happened.

  She pulled the lever, which took both hands and a fair amount of force, before the frame of a door appeared, loosely in the stone.

  “That’s it!” Blue cheered.

  Letty pulled the door open, and, glowing hand ready, stepped inside. The door snapped shut behind them, leaving the other mice stuck on the outside. There were stairs leading down to a wide, clean tunnel. Signs glowed on the walls; they were directions, but the names were all unfamiliar.

  “I don’t know which way. Left or right, Blue?” Letty asked, staring at the names.

  Blue pondered. “I was right, these weren’t sewers, these are the intersticine tunnels. The Seers of old used them to travel the city in secret.”

  “Which way?”

  “Hold on, girl! These are old names. Things change.”

  Letty produced the map and held it up for him.

  “Ah, that helps!” Blue said, pointing down the left-hand tunnel. “That way!”

  Letty felt safe running through the mostly clean tunnels at a jog and only slowed for turns and signs on the walls.

  She spotted an armored door and a bastion built not far ahead.

  “Is that it?” Letty asked.

  “No. I expect that’s a secret way into a Seer chapter-house. It might hold countless useful artifacts, but we have no time. I suspect we’re under the Greylapse,” Blue muttered.

  Letty grimaced as she came closer and saw bones and ragged suits of armor scattered on the bastions and barricades. Stone blocks on the low walls and several armor elements looked like they had been rent cleanly in two.

  “They were fighting with t
he Argument down here.”

  “Come on, don’t slow down,” Blue whispered, his voice somber.

  Letty continued down the hall.

  “There, turn up those stairs.”

  Letty did. She found another lever, pulled it, and the door popped. However, this door was far harder to open. Letty pushed with all her might and heard a strange, crispy cracking coming from the other side.

  “Something’s blocking us,” she said.

  “Slice through the gap, you might clear it,” Blue reasoned.

  Letty summoned the blade and found it would not cut the door.

  I’ve seen that before.

  She slid the blade through the gap and slowly cut her way through whatever was holding the door shut.

  With a final kick, she forced the door open.

  She stepped out into the queen’s parcel and was astonished at the alien nature of the buildings all around. They reminded her of towering insect hives.

  She shuddered at the sight.

  “Ah, they’d sealed over the door,” Blue said, looking at the building behind them.

  Letty turned and saw he was right. Whatever organic material they used to the build these structures had been pasted over the stone buildings underneath. Letty looked up and saw that the hive spire tapered in width up to an unbelievable height.

  “The core of this is a regular building, but further up, it’s all insect,” Blue said.

  Letty heard the sounds of violence nearby and rooted for her armored suit in the pack.

  “I’d better get ready,” she said. “Go and scout for a second.”

  Blue nodded and disappeared around the corner as she put the suit of brutox armor on over her clothes.

  “Thank God for this,” she muttered before pocketing the map of the Seer tunnels.

  She peeked around a corner and saw three ychorons, wielding rapiers, trying to encircle a lithe brutox queen. Letty felt the pistol in her pocket.

  Five bullets left.

  She tightened her fist around the Argument and summoned her blade.

  “Leave her alone!” Letty cried, racing out from behind the cover.

  The ychorons were startled. Letty cut through them and their steel weapons like they were paper.

  Letty was shocked at how easily she killed all three.

  The queen stared at her. The insect face, inhuman beyond question, still expressed something like surprise.

  Letty lifted the visor on her helm. The queen backed away, and Letty realized that her suit was the problem.

  “I was with the Elazene, and I’ve come to get you out of here.” Letty paused. “Which way to the gate?”

  The queen, a ruddy ant-looking creature raised her claws and looked like she might strike.

  “Careful, Letty!” Blue said, reappearing.

  “I’m on her side!” Letty said, raising her blade to keep the queen at bay.

  “You’re wearing her people!” he insisted.

  “Of course! What’s wrong with me?”

  The queen lunged, and Letty stepped aside.

  What did Ahmet say—that day he gave us the armor?

  Letty dodged another attack.

  “If I bear you as mantle—” Letty said, trying to remember the rest.

  The queen stopped.

  “If I bear you as mantle, will you bear me as—progeny?” she asked, unsure if those were the right words.

  The queen inclined her head. The violence ceased, as if it never was.

  “They know the Elazene,” Blue whispered. “They go back a long way.”

  The queen led Letty through the strange buildings and around the oddly winding streets. Letty raced towards any fighting she saw and struck down ychorons where she could, but she dared not stop for long.

  I must get the goblins through the gate, if we’re to stand a chance at saving the queens. They could split up and cover much more of this parcel than I alone.

  The roadway descended into a tunnel beneath towering, bulbous structures that looked like termite mounds. On the other side of the tunnel Letty saw the parcel wall.

  “Damn!” she grunted.

  The gates were guarded by a dozen ychorons and an unfamiliar ryle.

  Letty took a breath and readied herself to charge.

  I need to get through that gate!

  The queen reached out and grasped Letty by the arm. She shook her head, and then put on an abashed expression. Letty watched as the queen gestured with her hands.

  “You think I should try to surprise—no, you think I should trick them?” Letty whispered.

  Letty looked down at her armor.

  “They’ll think I’m one of you; it won’t work.”

  The queen tapped Letty’s helmet, indicating that she should take it off.

  “That might go over. They will probably be confused by a human in brutox armor.”

  Letty felt a smirk tugging at her cheeks. She pulled off her helmet and rushed out towards the gate.

  “Quick, open the gate, I need to get back to Ziesqe!”

  The ryle and the ychorons responded as expected. They were astonished at the sight of her.

  “Wha—who are you?” the ryle blustered.

  “Do you think Ziesqe lets just anyone know his plans? Open the gate damn it! We have a problem!”

  That flustered the ryle, “No—well, it’s barricaded on the other side, wait! What problem?”

  “What’s your name? I want to know who is being executed tomorrow.”

  The ryle scoffed. “I report to Viqx, not to Ziesqe, let’s get that clear.”

  This isn’t working.

  Letty slid her helmet back on before nonchalantly summoning the blade. She swung through a handful of unsuspecting ychorons. She had aimed for the ryle, but he dodged backwards at the sight of the blade, falling into the debris.

  Letty readied a strike, but the remaining ychorons had raised their weapons. Daggers and rapiers were coming at her.

  How can they not know what happens to steel when it touches the Argument?

  Letty deflected blows and watched the looks of surprise flare up as weapons fell into pieces.

  A recently disarmed ychoron dropped his useless dagger and lunged at Letty while she was distracted with another. Letty felt his blows come down heavily on her armor.

  A moment later, she felt a second and a third grab her tightly. She struggled free and sliced one, but the other two still held on.

  “Get a hold of her blade arm! Hold it steady,” the ryle croaked, getting off the floor.

  Letty saw him summon his weak blade, but then she heard fast footsteps.

  The ryle looked up, surprised. The queen was charging.

  Letty lunged towards the gate, slamming one ychoron into the gate and losing the other. She wrenched her arm free and sliced through the bar that held the gate closed.

  Letty turned and saw the ryle charging toward the queen who had drawn him into a feint. But the ryle, heedless of Letty pressed the chase and rushed after the queen.

  Letty stepped forward to slice the ryle from behind, but she felt a tugging on her feet and fell to the floor.

  “No!” she cried, kicking the ychoron who had grabbed her squarely in the face. She dashed to her feet in time to see the queen crumble to the ryle’s blade.

  A loud creaking from behind threatened to draw her attention, but she stayed focused on the ryle and charged. He was facing the wrong way, turned, lost his balance and failed to raise his blade to counter Letty’s blow.

  Letty felt a deep sting at the sight of the queen crumbling to blackened ash. She put it from her mind and turned to see a hundred goblins pushing through the gates.

  “Takka!” Blue yelled. “Get the bones ready, sound the alarm if you find anything. What took you so long!” he asked.

  Letty, was in no mood for his attitude, though she didn’t protest when he climbed to her shoulder.

  “Search the parcel, rout the ychorons, and save the queens! Assemble in the plaza at the cente
r!” Blue commanded.

  The goblins bellowed shrill cries and stormed down the winding streets. Letty ran to the sounds of violence and found the ychorons retreating or being overwhelmed by goblins.

  These ychorons aren’t very good soldiers, but the ryle can’t use brutox here.

  A long train of queens and their few remaining brutox followed Letty and her group of goblins as Blue led them closer to the plaza.

  A loud scream echoed around the curving structures. Letty wasn’t sure which way to turn. They heard the loud chattering of Takka’s chimes go off.

  “Which way?” Letty asked.

  Blue’s ears tensed at the sound. He craned his neck this way and that, but was still confused

  One queen, a slate gray spider, approached and pointed down a twisting path between the hive buildings.

  Letty took off at a run, she had to duck slightly as the path turned into another tunnel.

  On the other side, they saw a pack of goblins evading a giant ryle woman. Her skin was red, and she screamed as her dragonfly wings flexed and flapped in bursts, pushing her towards another goblin.

  She watched as the ryle skewered the goblin on her blade.

  Letty almost attacked but wondered if she could possibly win.

  The ryle moved with a fury and the goblins barely evaded, climbing up destroyed buildings, and shrinking down into wreckage.

  The ryle I killed at the gate called her Viqx. He behaved like she was an equal to Ziesqe.

  Letty felt the urge to run, but it was too late. Viqx spotted her and the gang of queens trailing behind.

  “Kill every queen you find!” she called out to her ychorons.

  She thinks I’m one of them! I’ve got the helmet on!

  The goblins rushed forward and parted like waves around a jagged rock. Each tried to menace Viqx, but none would chance coming within reach. Their javelins and arrows barely scratched her thick flesh. Letty felt her heart sink at the sight.

  She doesn’t even need armor.

  Letty whispered to Blue. “Get the goblins to pile on from above when I distract her.”

  Blue nodded and leaped from her shoulder towards the goblins.

  Letty stood still as Viqx lumbered towards her, ignoring the goblins.

  Viqx looked amused as Letty refused to retreat. She raised her meaty arm.