His Ancient Heart

by M. R. Forbes

  She saw the door to the bastion fly open, pushed so hard that it bent and twisted on its guide, hanging off at an unnatural angle. Oz ducked through it, moving out into the courtyard. It pulled its huge sword from its back, shifting a small package over its other shoulder in one smooth motion. The people's screams grew louder at the sight of it rampaging across the courtyard towards her.

  A soldier tried to intercept it, and was met with a kick that sent him rolling through the air, landing ten feet away and staying on the ground. An alarm bell started ringing, a call to arms to the hundreds of soldiers in the palace barracks.

  Perhaps not a miracle at all. A joke from Heden.

  Eryn looked back and saw that the Historians were out of the palace. Two were running after her while the other two unslung their bows and worked to string them. The painted man was standing behind them, still watching her with the same strange expression.

  She met Oz near the center of the courtyard. The juggernaut used its elbow to push her beneath it, bending over her and catching the first volley of arrows from the soldiers. A pair on horseback broke through the gates and charged them. Oz let the sword of the first slide off its armor and speared the second from the saddle, steam pouring from its mouth. The second horseman whirled. He saw what had happened to his partner, and paused to reconsider his attack.

  "We need to get out of the city," Eryn said. She took the chance to rest on one knee, staying beneath the juggernaut.

  "It is pleased to leave the city," Oz said, catching more arrows off its ircidium hide.

  "Start moving towards the exit. I wish I had a horse."

  "It would shoot it," Oz said.

  The two Historians arrived. They were big men, closer to Oz's size than most men could claim. They attacked in a paired ferocity that left the one-armed juggernaut twisted and shifting, using his sword to keep one at bay, and taking the strikes of the other. Each hit from the blades put a chip or a dent into the armor, getting through the top plate of ircidium and down into the steel, slowly destroying his immunity to magic.

  More than that. They were keeping them pinned in the courtyard, giving the soldiers time to arrive. The juggernaut was fierce, but a thousand men could surely bring it down.

  Eryn called on the magic, feeling it fill her. There was no difficulty in it, no effort. A thought was all it took to bring it to her control.

  "Ignatus," she said, waving her hand in front of her. Two missiles of light streamed from her fingers, making the short trip from her to the chests of the Historians, and through.

  The two men fell back, dead.

  Eryn scooted forward, picking up one of the swords, and then scrambled back under cover just in time to avoid another volley of arrows.

  "Oz, start moving," she said again.

  The juggernaut began taking quick steps backwards. The soldiers were becoming more organized, gathering into a line to charge the creature all at once. Eryn aimed her hands at them and called on her magic.

  "Incaendium," she shouted. A wall of flame rose in front of the soldiers, reaching a dozen feet into the air. She heard them shout in fear, and could see them backing away through the flames.

  She tried to step back again and stumbled. Oz leaned down and offered its elbow, and she gripped it to get back to her feet. She turned towards the gate. It was beginning to close.

  "They mean to trap us," Eryn said. "We need to move faster."

  "It cannot move faster," Oz said.

  "Yes, you can."

  "It cannot."

  Eryn realized the juggernaut was referring to her. She was too slow, too tired.

  An arrow whistled past her, planting itself in the dirt right next to her feet. She looked up, seeing a row of archers had gained the wall. They might not have been able to harm Oz, but if they could get their aim right, they would kill her.

  "Ignatus," she said again, sending the bolts towards three of the archers. The men dove behind the parapets. Two managed to escape the attack, but one was struck in the neck and fell off the wall.

  More arrows rained in.

  Eryn dropped the pack at her feet. She bent over it and tugged it open, reaching in, digging through the cans of liquid, past the books.

  Wilem's wand is in here somewhere.

  She found it resting at the bottom. She gripped it and pulled it from the pack, the green stone at the end sparkling in the light of her flames. She let them die out and held the wand up instead, pushing her magic through the ircidium and into the crystal.

  "Crescat," she said.

  The ground began to shake.

  The magic kept coming, the tingling in her ears so sharp she could almost hear it. The feeling was electric, exciting. It left her entire body warm as it poured into the crystal.

  The shaking intensified. The soldiers stopped. The commoners and nobles either tried to hide or simply lay down on the ground, hoping to escape the apocalypse. A vine burst through the surface, and then another, and another. They rose from the lawn, growing to twenty feet or more in a matter of seconds. They lashed out at anyone who was near with thorny tips, wrapping them up, lifting them to the sky, and squeezing them to death.

  The soldiers joined the people in their panic.

  Oz and Eryn were almost forgotten.

  "Eryn!"

  She turned in the direction of the cry and saw Trock and the jailers dressed in their full armor, hanging to the sides of a barred prison wagon that Trock was trying to guide through the vines. They lashed out at him, too, threatening to kill the old Commander before he could rescue her.

  She stopped the magic, and the vines began to shrink away. Trock brought the wagon to them, and one of the men held out his arm to swing her up onto the side.

  "Oz, come on," Eryn said as the wagon started towards the gate. It was still half-open, the soldiers working it killed by the vines.

  "It is coming on," Oz said, walking backwards behind the wagon, keeping an eye on the soldiers. They wanted nothing to do with any of them.

  Eryn looked back one last time as they went through the gate, beyond the courtyard to the palace. She found the painted man there, surprised to feel his eyes lock onto hers the moment she located him. He stood stiff as a board, hands at his sides, his face not blank, but still carrying an expression she couldn't identify.

  General Spyne appeared next to him a moment later, sword in hand, his face twisted in rage. He followed the man's gaze out to Eryn. For a moment she thought that Spyne was going to kill him, but he appeared to think better of it, storming down the steps and into the courtyard instead.

  The horses whined as Trock guided the wagon around a corner, leaving the palace, Fehri, the Overlord, and any chance to rest and recover behind.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Eryn

  "We need to get out of the city," Trock said. He held the wagon's reins tight in shaking hands, snapping them and urging the two horses to move faster.

  Even now they could hear the sound of more soldiers, hoofbeats and shouting. The roads outside the palace were crowded this time of day, and people screamed and shoved one another to get away from the speeding wagon, away from the soldiers that were converging on it. Eryn heard windows being shattered, people cursing one another, orders to stop, the whistle of arrows. Oz ran next to the cart, staying alongside where she hung from the bars, using its height to shield her from incoming missiles.

  One of the jailers was hit in the chest, and he toppled to the street.

  "The gates will be closed, Commander," Bryant said. "There is no way out."

  "It can get out," Oz said. "It is this way." It pointed in the direction of Davin's old property.

  Trock shouted at the horses, pulling them hard aside, following the juggernaut's aim. The heavy wagon lurched at the sudden shift, coming up onto two wheels and threatening to tumble completely. Oz slipped its sword over its back and reached up, grabbing the bottom of one of the bars and holding tight, using its weight to keep it from flipping. They made the turn a
nd sped down the street, two blocks into the Heart, and then north.

  The streets were quiet in the Heart. Deserted. The people had heard the noises, the screaming and commotion, and made themselves scarce. They were rebel sympathizers, already under scrutiny, and they wanted no part of the fighting.

  Or did they?

  Eryn saw a man with a heart tattoo on his wrist lean out of a doorway with his bow pulled back. She saw another positioned in a second story window. For a moment, she expected more arrows to come for them, but instead they fired behind, and when she looked back she saw one soldier fall from his mount, and then another.

  Like Elling, her presence had killed her friends, and inadvertently started a war.

  Like Elling, these people would be slaughtered, too.

  Her heart sank. She didn't want to be responsible for more people dying. She could already see it in her mind, the entire Heart in flames, Urla and Patina homeless, without their husband and father. It made her sick to her stomach.

  A second squad of soldiers made their way around the riderless horses of the first. Eryn knew the men of the Heart would kill them. She didn't want them being blamed for it.

  "Ignatus," she said again. The magic came so easily, so willingly. The Overlord had offered to teach her control, but she didn't feel like she needed teaching. She had it, at least right now.

  It's trying to protect you.

  That's what Caela had said. Was that why it responded so eagerly to her desire?

  A dozen bolts launched from her outstretched hand, winding and sizzling backwards, slamming into both horse and rider. The sound of the screams was more than she could bear, and she closed her eyes and tried to will it away.

  "It is almost there," Oz said. She opened her eyes, and saw the juggernaut running out ahead of the wagon, its sword back in its hand. A troop of soldiers was trying to get into position ahead of them, swordsmen in front of archers. They managed to loose a volley before the creature made it to them, the arrows bypassing the metal man and sinking into the wagon. Bryant fell from the side with an arrow in his throat, and a second arrow pinged off the metal bar above her hand.

  Then Oz met them, smashing into the line like the stone from a catapult. Men fell beneath his massive blade and heavy feet, and by the time the wagon caught up there was no one left to attack them.

  Oz pointed to the left, to what Eryn knew was the burned out remains of Davin's home. "It is this way."

  Trock brought the wagon to a stop. The three remaining jailers jumped down with Eryn. The Commander stayed at the front.

  "Someone needs to lead them away," he said.

  "Trock, no," Eryn said. "We've lost enough already."

  "You'll lose more if I don't lead them away."

  One of the jailers went forward and hopped up next to him. "Go, Commander. I'll take care of this."

  "Colam, no," Trock said.

  Colam responded by kicking him in the side, the force of the blow pushing him from the wagon. It was already moving by the time he landed on the ground and rolled to his feet.

  "Amman take him," Trock said, watching the wagon for a few seconds.

  "It is this way," Oz said. They followed the juggernaut at a run. Eryn stumbled after a few steps, dropping her pack, only to have Trock pick it up. They moved together, reaching the wall of the barn and pausing while another squad of soldiers on horseback thundered past.

  Once they were gone, Oz led them to the tunnel in the ground, lifting the heavy cover aside with ease. Eryn went down first, gasping when she found Talon's sword resting against the wall there. She picked it up and carried it with her, making room for the others to descend.

  Oz was the last one down, and he put the cover back in place.

  "Ignus," Eryn whispered. A small ball of light formed in her hand, expanding and rising into the darkness of the tunnel. The jailers watched with frightened fascination as it floated past their heads.

  "And he calls it a Curse," Trock spat.

  "We need to keep moving," Eryn said. "It may take some time for the soldiers to find this, but they will find it, and once they know we've escaped, they'll be crawling all over the woods."

  "Colam was a good man," Wallace said. He had tears in his eyes.

  "So was Bryant," Trock said. "So was Sous."

  "So was Fehri." Eryn's voice cracked when she said it.

  "Fehri, too?" Trock asked. "To Heden with all of them."

  "Everywhere I go, people die. Everyone I know. Everyone I befriend. I feel like I really am Cursed."

  She felt Trock's arm drape over her shoulder, and he pulled her into him. She resisted for a moment, and then let herself be enveloped in the older man's arms. He squeezed her tight and kissed her head, unconcerned with her near nakedness, or the blood that wound up on him.

  "This is war, Eryn. It may be that our side only has a dozen men or fewer, but that doesn't matter. It's war, and that means casualties. It means loss. I wish it weren't so, but even Amman can't change that cold truth. Stay strong, keep fighting. You may lose, and you may die, but at least you can die proud."

  "I'd drink to that if I had one," Wallace said.

  "It would be pleased to have a drink," Oz said.

  Eryn pulled away from the Commander, kissing his cheek as she did. "It's hard to keep losing."

  "I served under General Rast," Trock said. "This is the first time I've lost a fight." He smiled and let out a hoarse laugh. "You don't know my other boys. This ugly one is Wallace." He put his hand one the man's shoulder. Wallace was of average height and lean, his nose large and crooked, his hair dark and long. "The other one is Gesper. We all served under the General."

  "A long time ago," Gesper said. He was short and wide, muscular and square. He smiled, revealing a mouth where only a few teeth remained.

  "I'm thankful for all of you," Eryn said. "Now let's get away from this city. The next time I come back, it will be to set it free."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Spyne

  General Spyne watched the wagon slip out through the half-open gates of the palace, into the square in front, and then to the left and out of his sight. The entire palace was in chaos. Hundreds of soldiers lay dead on the ground, killed by the juggernaut, pierced by magic, or crushed by the massive vines. Even more were milling about, trying to look busy, making it appear as if they wanted to give chase to the Whore and her traitorous companions, when it was obvious they wanted no part of it.

  Spyne glanced over at Worm, standing bone stiff on his left. Why in Heden had he been standing there, when he should have been going after the girl? Of all his Historians, Worm was the most nimble, and probably stood the best chance against the power of the metal man.

  Even more, why hadn't the blast that had knocked him full across the corridor and stolen his consciousness had the same effect on him?

  He kept staring at the painted man, his curiosity growing while that specific anger diminished. There was more to him than he understood, and he would be sure to find out what it was before he reconsidered killing him.

  If he even could.

  "They've escaped, General," Peyn said, lowering his bow. He had done his best to hit the girl, but the juggernaut had deflected the straightest shots. "Ollie and Cain are dead."

  Ash joined Peyn, turning to the General and bowing. They kept their heads down, hoping they would keep them.

  "Captain, round up the soldiers down there and get them in pursuit. Worm, kill anyone that hesitates."

  Hearing his name seemed to bring Worm out of his trance. He loosened up and nodded, holding his daggers near his chest. He trailed behind Captain Peyn as he raced down the steps and out into the courtyard, barking orders to the soldiers. Worm only had to put his knives into three of the men before they all jumped into action, quickly forming up around the Captain.

  "What do you want me to do, General?" Ash asked.

  Spyne looked at him. He had lost half of his Historians in a week. "Get the palace guard reorganized. I wa
nt it secured immediately."

  "Yes, General." Ash stood and headed for the nearest soldiers, to find what remained of the guard.

  Spyne surveyed the scene one last time, seeing that Peyn was restoring order, and then spun on his heel and headed back inside. The Overlord had been lying to him after all, hiding the juggernaut in her dungeon and conspiring with the jailers. How could she turn on him like that? How could she believe Talon's lies? He smirked at the thoughts that raced through his mind, the ways that he would punish her for her treason. Physical, mental, sexual. Whatever means he could find to make her regret her decision to help his brother. She had cost him two Historians. That alone was an unforgivable crime.

  He stormed into the antechamber, where Reema was still cowering near the wall, her face wet with tears. The old woman should have died in the excitement. He glared at her as he passed, and she lowered her head and continued to sob.

  The echoing of his boot steps down the corridor broke the uneasy silence. It rebounded and sunk into his mind, serving to remind him that despite the Whore's escape, he was still in control. She might get a short lead on them, but Worm would be able to hunt her down. If he even wanted that. She may have been able to kill a number of soldiers with her Curse, but Talon was still the true danger. The head of the snake. She was nothing without him. None of them were.

  He stepped over the lifeless body of the Captain who had attacked him, kicking him in the side on the way by. Then he approached the Overlord, her body slumped against the wall, her head resting on her chest.

  "Caela," he said, kneeling down next to her. He spoke softly, tenderly, the anger hiding beneath a false calm.

  She didn't respond.

  "Caela."

  Nothing.

  He put his hand to her neck, feeling for a pulse.

  Bitch is already dead.

  He rose to his feet, a low growl gurgling up from his chest. The calm exploded with the force of his anger and frustration. He screamed and howled, drawing his sword and bringing it down on the dead Captain, cutting into the corpse as though it were a log. He turned and whipped the blade into the wall, pulling chunks from the stone.