Dragonseed da-3

by James Maxey

  Thorny took the bag. "When all this is over and you get back to Dragon Forge to start your school, count me in as one of the teachers."

  "Thanks," said Shay. He looked at the barn down below. "I should go. You all have a revolution to save."

  "You're a good man, Shay," said Burke. "We won't let you down."

  SHAY SWOOPED BACK toward the barn. Now that the sun had set, the night was biting cold, with a steady wind blowing from the north. Despite this, the streets were full of men, women, children, and earth-dragons dressed in white, crowding together, watching as he came to a gentle landing on the packed earth of the street.

  Someone in the crowd said, "Our healer denies his divinity, but who else would be visited by angels?" There was a general murmur of agreement.

  Shay knew nothing of Blasphet save that he was a mass murderer of both men and dragons. He didn't like the idea that his presence might somehow be helping Blasphet's reputation. For the moment, however, he had bigger things to worry about.

  Within the barn, the underspace gate was still open. Jandra, Hex, and Bitterwood were gone, as was Jandra's mentor, Vendevorex. Skitter, the long-wyrm, was now in the barn, his copper-scales reflecting the various hues of the rainbow. Zeeky sat alone upon his back, cross-legged, with a glass orb roughly the size of a baby's head perched in her lap. The surface of the orb reflected the shimmering rainbow edges of the gate. Zeeky didn't take her eyes off the orb as Shay walked toward her.

  "We're at the end," she said. "After we go through the gate, I don't know the future."

  Having lived his life so far without knowing the future, Shay didn't feel as nervous as Zeeky sounded. He wondered how Skitter had slipped into the barn without him noticing. He must have been more preoccupied with getting Burke and the others on their way than he thought.

  Zeeky said, "You know that Jazz is still in control of Jandra."

  "I know," said Shay. "When she wasn't coated in silver any more, I had a flicker of hope that Jandra was back, but knew it was too good to be true. But, I can't just give up. Is there no way to save her?"

  "I don't have any idea. The villagers won't tell me. They've stopped using words. All I hear are howls of rage. They want vengeance against the goddess."

  Shay grew closer. In addition to the rainbow reflected on the surface, there was a tiny rainbow floating inside the orb. When he'd first met Zeeky, he'd been skeptical of her claims that she could hear the voices of ghosts predicting the future. Now that he had wings and a flaming sword, he found it difficult to be skeptical of almost anything.

  "I don't understand how this works," he said. "How can people be trapped inside this glass ball? Even if they are, how can they see anything other that what's right here around us?"

  "The ball looks solid," said Zeeky. "But, it's not, really. Touch it."

  Shay moved his hand toward the glassy surface. His fingers stopped as they encountered a pressure. It reminded him of the magnets that Chapelion had kept for study. Turned one direction, the magnets would pull toward one another. But, if you flipped one of the magnets and tried to force them together, they wouldn't touch. Some unseen force held them apart. The orb produced a similar sensation on his finger tips.

  "There's a whole world inside this ball," said Zeeky. "In underspace, people exist as pure thought, ghosts without bodies, forever looking out at the world. Past, present and future are all visible. The villagers tell me that, even though they don't have bodies, the things they imagine become real inside the void. It's like they're gods, creating a new world with their minds." She looked up at him. "Gods don't like to be trapped. If they could get out, they'd punish Jazz."

  Shay looked at the gate to Atlantis. The black rip in reality yawned like an open mouth. "If they're in underspace, can't they get out through that portal?"

  "No," said Zeeky. "The goddess has trapped this sliver of underspace in the orb. It's like a loop of space folded in on itself. Until this ball is broken, they can't get out. Jazz said nothing on earth can hurt it."

  "Really?" asked Shay, his hand falling to the hilt of the angel sword. "Mind if I give it a try?"

  Zeeky handed him the orb. "Be my guest."

  The ball was strangely heavy for something that wasn't solid. He squeezed it with both hands; it was hard as stone. Shay sat the orb on the floor and pulled out his sword, willing it to burst into flames. Skitter jerked backwards as a hot wind washed across the room.

  The white-robed women around the room stepped toward him, looking highly alert. Blasphet, who had been watching attentively, said, "Have a care. I'm committed to non-violence, but my followers are zealous in defending me."

  "Lucky for me I'm not planning to attack you," Shay said, as he willed the blade to white hot intensity. Smoke rose from the frayed edges of his coat sleeve. The hilt of the sword protected his hand, but the air was so hot he could barely breathe. Gritting his teeth, he took a powerful swing at the orb.

  The sword bounced off. Needles of pain shot up his wrist from the force of the blow.

  Feeling dizzy from holding his breath, he lowered the heat of the blade back to a dull cherry red. The air swirled around him as the temperature dropped. He frowned as he looked down at the orb. The straw around it was burning, and there was a black, glassy gouge on the earth beside it where his sword had hit. The orb wasn't even scratched.

  He stamped out the straw, and then picked up the orb.

  "That was my best shot," he said. "Could Skitter bite it open?"

  "I'm pretty sure he can't," said Zeeky. "And if he swallowed it, it might take weeks until it, um, came out."

  Shay nodded. "Maybe there's something in Atlantis that can free them. I should go. I need to chase after Jandra and the others. I mean, Jazz and the others."

  "I'm coming with you," said Zeeky, uncrossing her legs and taking on a more traditional mounted position astride her saddle. "Bitterwood is probably already fighting the Atlanteans. Let's hope we find Jazz before they finish the job."

  "You're right. Once she no longer needs Bitterwood and Hex, she'll kill them." He offered her the orb.

  She shook her head. "This is the last part of the future they told me. They said you would carry them through the gate."

  Shay frowned. If the fortune-telling ghosts had seen that he would be taking them through the gate, had they seen Jazz possessing Jandra? If so, why hadn't Zeeky warned him? All of this might have been avoided. But, he decided it was the wrong moment to confront Zeeky on this. He placed the orb into the last bag he carried, Jandra's backpack, resting it on top of her coat. He ran his finger along the silky fabric. Though it was smudged with soot from their work digging up Jazz's heart, it still had the smell of the crystal clear pool beneath the waterfall.

  His heart caught in his throat at the memory.

  He willed the sword to bright yellow flame once more and held it toward the portal. The void within the rainbow devoured the light, revealing nothing, not even shadows. He breathed in slowly through his nostrils, staring into the darkness. Even his bones felt cold, despite the heat of the sword.

  Leaping into the unknown was the job of heroes. He was only a skinny former slave with an aching heart and unusually crisp handwriting. It was just as well he didn't know the future. Closing his eyes, he leapt. The last thing he heard before the void swallowed him was Skitter clattering at his heels.

  CHAPTER THIRTY:

  PARLOR TRICKS

  HAVING BEEN THROUGH an underspace portal before, Hex was braced for the disturbing sensation of nothingness that enveloped him as he stepped into the gate. Blasphet's description of death as feeling as if he was falling from his own body echoed the experience, though not fully. For the briefest flicker of time, Hex simply ceased to exist, and all his senses ended.

  When he emerged on the other side, the first sense to return was touch. He stepped into air that was positively balmy. It was night; he stood in a well-manicured garden full of statues, male and female nudes of exquisite perfection, their skin and hair c
rafted from precious metals, gold and platinum and palladium. Bright pink and white flowers filled large terra-cotta pots, lending a sweet scent above the sea breeze that swirled gently around him. In the center of the garden was a fountain made of glass with a central spike taller than Hex. Water poured from a large golden disk atop the spike in an unbroken circle and fell in a shimmering column to the pool below. Goldfish that looked crafted from actual gold darted about in the softly lit pool.

  Beside him, Bitterwood tilted his head upward, then higher, then higher still. They were surrounded by towers that rose until they vanished among the stars that shimmered in the cloudless sky.

  When he looked down, he found Vendevorex and Jandra standing on the broad glass rim of the pool. She said, "Gentlemen, if you're done gawking at the architecture, we need to get to work. The second I start construction of the antenna, the city mind will know something is happening. We need to get you ready for the fight."

  "I'm as ready as I'll ever be," said Bitterwood.

  Jandra smirked. "Your thorn-tipped shafts aren't going to scratch the guards here in Atlantis. You need an upgrade. Draw an arrow."

  Bitterwood frowned. Hex sensed that the hunter didn't like being ordered around so brusquely. Bitterwood was here for the same reason he was; not to fight the city, but to stay close to Jandra. He was almost certain that Jazz was the controlling personality within her. That last sliver of almost was enough to keep him from lunging out and snapping her skull between his jaws while he still had the strength. On his empty stomach, he felt every muscle in his body trembling.

  Bitterwood drew an arrow from his quiver and stared at the tip, perplexed. The shaft now ended in a tiny rainbow, with an almost invisible spot of black at the point.

  "Now when you draw an arrow from the quiver, it will be capped with an electromagnetic field encompassing an underspace gate only a millimeter across," Jandra explained. "This tip can carve through any matter it encounters and send it on a one way trip to the Mare Ingenii."

  "Where's that?" asked Bitterwood.

  "The far side of the moon. There's a city there now. If you shot Hex with that arrow, some moon man would no doubt be mystified as to why a long spaghetti-shaped strip of dragon entrails had fallen on him."

  "Spaghetti?" asked Bitterwood.

  "Moving on," said Jandra, turning to Hex. "You've suffered brain damage. It's slowing you down, and I don't have time to fix it. Luckily, I have a sort of whole body crutch you'll find useful."

  Hex shook his head. Jandra might be about to put underspace gates on the tips of his teeth, a prospect he found worrisome. "No thank you. I've fought with more severe injuries than this." He hadn't.

  "This really isn't a situation where you get to choose to accept my help or not," said Jandra, casting her gaze toward the statues. Suddenly, the gold that coated them began to drip to the ground, exposing naked flesh beneath. Around the garden, men and women fell to their hands and knees gasping as the nanite shells that supported them flowed into a large golden river that snaked toward Hex. Hex flapped his wings and hopped backwards, avoiding the liquid metal.

  He landed in an even larger pool of gold. Flecks of the cold metal splashed onto his belly and wings. Instantly, they began to slither and expand, coating his scales. He flicked his wings sharply to fling the metal off, to no avail. The gold crept upward. He craned his neck and held his breath as it reached his jaws. He instinctively closed his eyes as the liquid metal washed over his face. When he opened his eyes, he was completely encased in a flawless sheet of gold.

  "Gold seems ill-suited for armor, daughter," said Vendevorex. "It's too soft, and too heavy to allow him to move freely."

  "Gold is merely an aesthetic component," said Jandra. "The armor actually incorporates several different elements, including titanium. There aren't many things that are going to be able to cut through it. The added weight is offset by the exoskeleton's power, which will multiply Hex's strength by a factor of ten."

  Hex spread his wings. She was telling the truth. He didn't notice any additional weight. He still didn't feel good, but he no longer felt as if he were about to collapse.

  He looked around at the score of men and women who lay on the ground, groaning in agony. Some of the statues still stood, unaffected by Jandra's spell.

  "Were they prisoners of the shells?" he asked.

  "No. The statue act is a kind of art. They stand out here for years at a time. Visitors to the garden try to figure out the real statues from the living ones. They're like very, very, very slow and focused mimes."

  "Why are they in pain?"

  "Severe nanite withdrawal," said Jandra. "The city knows we're here by the way. Heads up."

  Hex looked toward the sky. The stars were blotted out by an army of onrushing angels.

  "Keep them out of my hair," said Jandra. "I've got an antenna to build."

  BITTERWOOD KNEW HE was being manipulated into this fight. He pondered Zeeky's counsel that Jandra could be saved. He placed his new arrow against his bowstring. If the shafts were as powerful as Jazz said they were, would they slay even her?

  Unfortunately, this wasn't a moment for contemplation. A throng of marble angels swooped toward him. Despite their wings, they were objects explicitly out of place in the sky. They appeared carved from polished marble, too heavy to do anything but plummet.

  If these creatures were like Gabriel or Hezekiah, the danger they represented through their sheer numbers made them more of a threat than the goddess for the moment. Yet, the angels weren't bearing any obvious weapons. Their faces were placid, devoid of emotion. They looked as if they were here to investigate, not to fight.

  Yet, against foes this powerful, the element of surprise was something Bitterwood couldn't afford to lose. As so often happened in his battles, he would draw first blood… though he doubted they had blood. A rainbow-tipped arrow launched from his bowstring in a glowing streak, punching into the brow of the nearest angel. The winged statue lost control of its flight, its body wracked with spasms as it dropped, crashing onto the granite tiles that surrounded the fountain, sending a shower of gravel and dust skyward.

  The other angels instantly halted their descent, their eyes narrowing as they turned their gaze to Bitterwood, assessing the threat. Bitterwood needed no time to think. A second arrow raced skyward, then a third, then a fourth, his bow singing a song of one-note staccato plucks. Three more angels dropped from the sky, silently, with no sign of pain on their faces. They crashed into the ground, shattering.

  A strong wind suddenly swept over Bitterwood as Hex beat his wings, launching himself at the angels. They were only a hundred feet overhead, barely two body lengths for the giant dragon. They had no time to focus on him before he grabbed the first angel in his toothy jaws. He whipped his head about, tossing the angel into his nearest brethren. The wings of both shattered from the impact and they plummeted.

  It had been almost twenty years since the first time Bitterwood had shot a sky-dragon in flight and watched it fall to earth. Watching the angels fall, he felt the same pulse of adrenaline wash through him. He didn't know if he was on the right side in this battle. He didn't know if Jazz was manipulating him into an act of unspeakable evil here in the city of gods.

  Mere moments ago, all he had wanted was to save Jeremiah and take him and Zeeky far away, to a place where war was only a distant whisper, to live in peace as something almost a family. He had wanted to put his life as a killer behind him. Yet, as he watched his opponents fall from the sky, all these desires faded, washed away by the battle lust that surged through his veins. He targeted the next angel with a feeling approaching glee, and let his arrow fly.

  JAZZ PAID NO attention to the throng of angels. Her experience with the two warriors at her back left her confident that the next sixty seconds would pass in relative quiet. She clapped her hands and the water falling into the pool trickled to a halt. The golden disk atop the fountain would make an excellent conductor for her transmitter.

 
; She needed to concentrate. She allowed the shell of light that clung to her like her third skin to fade away, revealing her second skin, the silver genie that was affixed to Jandra's pores. It had been an obvious mistake to wear her genie in such a compact form inside her old body. Balling it up like that had left it vulnerable to Gabriel's sword. By spreading it out along the full surface of her new body, she had a greater chance that, should any part of it be damaged, the rest of it would survive. Her personality was still mostly located within the computer memory of the genie. Once all the excitement was over, she'd spend a few days relaxing on the beach, soaking up some sun, and rewiring the synapses of her new brain so that it would be truly her own.

  Threads of silver shot from her fingers and wrapped around the glass spire at the center of the fountain, twining upward around it, sinking into the gold at the top, etching elaborate maps across its surface.

  An angel crashed into the fountain on the other side and the glass rim shattered. The pool water surged out the new opening, leaving goldfish flopping about beneath her. She didn't mind that she was about to kill or cripple six billion people, but she felt bad that the fish had to suffer.

  She was vaguely aware that Vendevorex was standing right beside her. She was a little perplexed as to what she should do with him. He wasn't part of her plan. If she'd killed him back in the barn, it would have made her Jandra act less convincing. On the other hand, Hex, Bitterwood, and all the others were recent acquaintances according to Jandra's memories. They were easy to fool. Vendevorex had known Jandra her whole life. Was he buying her act? She'd called him by his full name earlier, which was a slip up. Jandra had a more affectionate term for him.

  "Ven," she said. "The key to talk to your nanites once the pulse is activated is 17351. It's about twenty seconds in coming. Since you're not doing anything in the meantime, could you save the goldfish?"