Venera groaned. “Oh, Bryce. This is the worst possible time..."
"—The only time I have!"
"All right, all right, I see your point.” She glowered at the plaster ceiling. “What if ... what if I send some of my people in to run the press? We don't need trained insurgents to do that. All I want is to get your people out in the field! I'll give you as much ink and paper as you want."
He flopped onto his back. “I'll think about that."
There was a brief silence.
"You could have asked,” she said.
"I did!"
Venera was trying to think of some way to reply to that when there was a loud bang and she found herself inside a storm of glass, shouting in surprise and trying to jump out of the way, banging her chin while shards like claws scrawled up her ribs and along her thigh.
Scratched and stunned, she sat up to find herself on the floor. Bryce was kneeling next to her. The candle had gone out, and she sensed rather than saw the carpet of broken glass between her and her boots. The little window gaped, the leading bent and twisted to let in a puff of cold night air. “What was...” Now she heard gunfire.
"Oh shit.” Bryce stood up and reached down to draw her to her feet. “We've got to get out there.
"Sacrus has arrived."
* * * *
18
There was still a splinter in the ball of her foot, but Venera had no time to find it and dig it out. She and Bryce raced up the stairs to the roof as shouts and thundering feet began to sound on the steps below.
They reached the roof, and Bryce immediately ran off somewhere to the right. “I need to get to the semaphore!” he shouted before disappearing into the gloom. All the lanterns had been put out, Venera realized; she could just see the silhouettes of the tents where her people had been meeting. The black cut-out shapes of men roved to and fro, and she made out the gleam of a rifle barrel here and there. It was strangely quiet, though.
She found the flap to the main tent more by instinct than anything else, and stepped in. Lanterns were still lit here, and Thinblood, Pamela Anseratte, Principe Guinevera, Moss, and the other leaders were all standing around a map table. They all looked over as she entered.
"Ah, there you are,” said Guinevera in a strangely jovial tone. “We think we know what they're up to."
She moved over to the table to look at the map. Little counters representing Sacrus's forces were scattered around the unrolled rectangle of Greater Spyre. A big handful of tokens was clustered at the very edge of the sheet, where Liris had its land.
"It's an insane amount of men,” said Thinblood. He appeared strangely nervous. “We think over a thousand. Never seen anything like it in Spyre."
Guinevera snorted. “Obviously they hope to capture our entire command all at once and end the war before it begins. And it looks like they stand a good chance of succeeding. What do you think, Venera?"
"Well, I—” She froze.
They were all staring at her. All silent.
Guinevera reached into his brocaded coat and drew out a sheet of paper. With shocking violence he slammed it down on the table in front of her. Venera found herself looking at a poor likeness of herself—with her former hairstyle—on a poster that said, Wanted for Extradition to Gehellen, VENERA FANNING.
"So it's true,” said Guinevera. His voice was husky with anger, and his hand, still flattening the poster, was shaking.
She chewed her lip and tried to stare him down. “This is hardly the time—"
"This is the time!” he bellowed. "You have started a war!"
"Sacrus started it,” she said. “They started it when they—"
But he'd struck her full across the face, and she spun to the floor.
She tasted blood in her mouth. Where was Bryce? Why wasn't Moss rushing to her defense?
Why wasn't Chaison here?
Guinevera reared over her, his dense mass making her flinch back. “Don't try to blame others for what you've done! You brought this catastrophe on us, imposter! I say we hang her over the battlement and let Sacrus use her for target practice.” He reached down to take her arm as Venera scrambled to get her feet under her.
Light knifed through the tent's entrance flap and then miraculously the whole tent lifted up as though tugged off the roof by a giant. The giant's cough was still echoing in Venera's ears as the tent sailed into the permanent maelstrom at the edge of the world, and was snatched away like a torn kerchief.
Another bright explosion, and everyone ducked. Then everyone was running and shouting at once and soldiers were popping up to fire their blunderbusses, then squatting to refill them as trails of smoke and fire corkscrewed overhead. Venera's ears were still ringing, everything strangely aloof as she stood up and watched the big map on the table lift in the sudden breeze and slide horizontally into the night.
Who had it been? she wondered dimly. Had Moss turned on her? Or had Odess said something injudicious? Probably some soldier or servant of Liris had spoken out of turn ... But then, maybe Jacoby Sarto had become bored of his confinement and decided to liven things up a bit.
Venera was half aware that the squat cube of Liris was surrounded on three sides by an arcing constellation of torches. The red light served to illuminate the grim faces of the soldiers rushing past her. She raised her hand to stop one of them, then thought better of it. What if Guinevera had remembered to order her arrest?—Or death? As she thought about her new situation, Venera began to be afraid.
Maybe she should go inside. Liris had stout walls, and she still had friends there—she was almost sure of that. She could, what—go chat with Jacoby Sarto in his cell?
And where was Bryce? Semaphore, that was it; he'd gone to send a semaphore. She forced herself to think: the semaphore station was over there ... Where a big gap now yawned in the side of the battlement. Some soldiers were laying planks across it.
"Oh no.” No no no.
Deep inside Venera a quiet snide voice that had always been there was saying, ‘Of course, of course. They all abandon you in the end.’ She shouldn't be surprised at this turn of events; she had even planned for it, in the days following her confirmation. It shouldn't come as a shock to her. So it seemed strange to watch herself, as if from outside, as she hunkered down next to the elevator mechanism at the center of the roof, and wrapped her arms around herself and cried.
I don't do this. She wiped at her face. I don't.
Maybe she did, though; she couldn't clearly remember those minutes in Candesce after she had killed Aubri Mahallan and she had been alone. Hayden Griffin had pulled Mahallan's body out of sight, leaving a few bright drops of blood to twirl in the weightless air. Griffin was her only way out of Candesce, and Venera had just killed his lover. It hardly mattered that she'd done it to save the world from Mahallan and her allies. No one would ever know, and she was certain she would die there; she had only to wait for Candesce to open its fusion eyes and bring morning to the world.
Griffin had asked her to come with him. He had said he wouldn't kill her; Venera hadn't believed him. It was too big a risk. In the end she had snuck after him and ridden out of Candesce on the cargo net he was towing. Now the thought of running to the stairs and throwing herself on the mercy of her former compatriots filled her with a similar dread. Better to make herself very small here and risk being found by Guinevera or his men than to find out that even Liris now rejected her.
"There they are!” someone pointed excitedly. Staccato runs of gunfire sounded in the distance—they were oddly distant, in fact. If Venera had cared about anything at that moment she might have stood up to look.
"We're gonna outflank them!"
Something blew up on the outskirts of Liris's territory. The orange mushroom lit the whole world for a moment, a flicker of estates and ornamental ponds overhead. Her ground forces must have made it here just after Sacrus's.
Well. Not her forces, she thought bitterly. Not anymore.
"There she is!” Venera jerked and
tried to back up, but she was already pressed against the elevator platform. A squat silhouette reared up in front of her and something whipped toward her.
She cringed. Nothing happened; after a moment she looked up.
An open hand hovered a few inches above her. A distant flicker of red lit the extended hand and behind it, the toadish features of Samson Odess. His broad face wore an expression of concern. “Venera, are you hurt?"
"N-no...” Suspiciously, she reached to take his hand. He drew her to her feet and draped an arm across her shoulder.
"Quickly now,” he said as he drew her toward the stairs. “While everyone's busy."
"What—” She was having trouble finding words. “What are you doing?"
He stopped, reared back, and stared at her. “I'm taking you home."
"Home? Whose home?"
"Yours, you silly woman. Liris."
"But why are you helping me?"
Now he looked annoyed. “You never ceased to be a citizen of Liris, Venera. And technically, I never stopped being your boss. You're still my responsibility, you know. Come on."
She paused at the top of the steps and looked around. The soldiers who had crowded the roof all seemed to be leaping off one side, in momentary silhouetted flashes showing an arm brandishing a blunderbuss, another waving a sword. There was fighting down in the bramble-choked lot that surrounded Liris. Farther out, she glimpsed squads of men running back and forth, some piling up debris to form barricades, others raising archaic weapons.
"Venera! Get off the roof!” She blinked and turned to follow Odess.
They descended several levels and Venera found herself entering, of all places, the apartments of the former botanist. The furniture and art that had borne the stamp of Margit of Sacrus was gone, and there were still burn marks on the walls and ceiling. Someone had moved in new couches and chairs, and one particularly charred wall was covered with a crepuscular tapestry depicting cherry trees shooting beams of light all over an idealized tableau of dryads and fairies.
Venera sat down under a dryad and looked around. Eilen was there, and the rest of the diplomatic corps. “Bring a blanket,” said Odess, “and a stiff drink. She's in shock.” Eilen ran to fetch a comforter, and somebody else shoved a tumbler of amber liquid into Venera's hand. She stared at it for a moment, then drank.
For a few minutes she listened without comprehension to their conversation; then, as if a switch had been thrown somewhere inside her, she realized where she must be and she understood something. She looked at Odess. “This is your new office,” she said.
They all stopped talking. Odess came to sit next to her. “That's right,” he said. “The diplomatic corps has been exalted since you left."
Eilen laughed. “We're the new stars of Liris! Not that the cherry trees are any less important, but—"
"Moss understands that we need to open up to the outside world,” interrupted Odess. “It could never have happened under Margit."
Venera half smiled. “I suppose I can take some credit for making that possible."
"My dear lady!” Odess patted her hand. “The credit is all yours! Liris has come alive again because of you. You don't think we would abandon you in your hour of need, do you?"
"You will always have a place here,” said Eilen.
Venera started to cry.
* * * *
"We would never have told,” Odess said a few minutes later. “None of us."
Venera grimaced. She stood at a mirror where she was dabbing at her eyes, trying to erase the evidence of tears. She didn't know what had come over her. A momentary madness; at least it was only the Lirisians who had witnessed her little breakdown. “I suppose it was Sarto,” she said. “It hardly matters now. I can't show my face up there without Guinevera putting a bullet in me."
Odess hmmphed, wrapping his arms around his barrel chest and pacing. “Guinevera has impressed no one since he arrived. Why should any of your other allies listen to him?"
She turned, raising an eyebrow. “Because he's the ruler of a council nation?"
Odess made a flicking motion. “Aside from that."
With a shake of her head Venera returned to the divan. She could hear gunfire and shouting through the opened window, but it was filtered through the roar of the world-edge winds that tumbled above the courtyard shaft. You could almost ignore it.
In similar fashion, Venera could almost ignore the emotions overflowing her. She'd always survived through keeping a cool head, and this was no time to have that desert her. It was inconvenient that she felt so abandoned and lost. Inconvenient to feel so grateful for the simple company of her former coworkers. She needed to recover her poise, and then act in her own interests as she always had before.
There was a commotion in the corridor, then someone burst through the doors. He was covered in soot and dust, his hair a shock, the left arm of his jacket in tatters.
Venera leaped to her feet. “Garth!"
"There you are!” He rushed over and hugged her fiercely. “You're alive!"
"I'm—oof! Fine. But what happened to you?"
He stepped back, keeping his hands on her arms. Garth had a crazed look in his eye she'd never seen before. He wouldn't meet her gaze. “I was looking for you,” he said. “Outside. The rest of them, they're all out there, fighting around the foot of the building. Sacrus has ringed us, they want something here very badly, and our relief force is trying to break through from the outside. So Anseratte and Thinblood are leading the Liris squads in an attempt to break out—make a corridor..."
Venera nodded. The irony was that this fight was almost certainly about her, but Anseratte and the others wouldn't know it. Sacrus wanted the key, and they knew Venera was here. Naturally, they would throw whatever they had at Liris to get it.
If Guinevera had tossed her off the roof half an hour ago, the battle would already be over.
Garth toyed with the ripped fringe of his coat for a moment, then burst out with, “Venera, I am so, so sorry!"
"What?” She shook her head, uncomprehending. “Things aren't so bad. Or do you mean...?” She thought of Bryce, who might be lying twisted and broken at the foot of the wall. “Oh,” she said, a twisting feeling running through her.
He had just opened his mouth—doubtless to tell her that Bryce was dead—when the noises outside changed. The gunfire, which had been muffled with distance and indirection, suddenly sounded loud and close. Shouts and screams rang through the open windows.
Venera ran over, and with Odess and Eilen craned her neck to look up the shaft of the courtyard. There were people on the roof.
She and Odess exchanged a look. “Are those our...?” she started to say, but the answer was clear.
"Sacrus is inside the walls!” The cry was taken up by the others and suddenly everyone was running for the doors, streaming past Garth Diamandis who was speaking but inaudible through the jumble of shouts.
Venera paused long enough to shrug at him, then grabbed his arm and hauled him after her into the corridor.
The whole population of Liris was running up the stairs. They carried pikes, kitchen knives, makeshift shields, and clubs. None had on more than the clothing they normally wore, but that meant they were formidably armored. There were one or two soldiers in the mix—probably the men who had been guarding Jacoby Sarto. They were frantically trying to keep order in the pushing mass of people.
Garth stared at the crowd and shook his head. “We'll never get through that."
Venera eyed the window. “I have an idea."
As she slung her leg over the lintel Garth poked his head out next to her and looked up. “It's risky,” he said. “Somebody could just kick us off before we can get to our feet."
"In this gravity, you're looking at a sprained ankle. Come on.” She climbed rapidly, emerging into the light of flares and the sound of gunfire. Half the country was struggling with something at the far end of the roof. Venera blinked and squinted, and realized what it was: they were t
rying to dislodge a stout ladder that had been swung against the battlements. Even as that came clear to her, she saw the gray crosshatch of another emerge from the darkness to thud against the stonework.
Withering fire from below prevented the Lirisians from getting near the things. They were forced to crouch a few feet back and poke at them with their pikes.
A third ladder appeared, and suddenly men were swarming onto the roof. The Lirisians stood up. Venera saw Eilen raise a rusted old sword as a figure in red-painted iron armor reared above her.
Venera raised her pistol and fired. She walked toward Eilen, firing steadily until the man who'd threatened her friend fell. He wasn't dead—his armor was so thick that the bullets probably hadn't penetrated—but she'd rattled his skull for sure.
She was five feet away when her pistol clicked empty. This was the gun Corinne had given her; she had no idea whether it took the same caliber of bullets as anything the Lirisians used. Examining it quickly, she decided she didn't even know how to breach it to check. At that moment two men like metal beetles surmounted the battlement, firelight glistening off their carapaces.
She tripped Eilen, and when the woman had fallen behind her, Venera stepped between her and the two men. She drop-kicked the leader and he windmilled his arms for a moment before falling back. The force of her kick had propelled Venera back ten feet. She landed badly, located Eilen, and shouted, “Come on!"
Moss straight-armed a pike into the helmet of the other man. Beside him Odess shoved a lighted torch at a third who was stepping off the ladder. Gunfire sounded and somebody fell, but she couldn't see who through the press of bodies.
She grabbed Eilen's arm. “We need guns! Are there more in the lockers?"
Eilen shook her head. “We barely had enough for the soldiers. There's that.” She pointed.
Analog SFF, June 2007 Page 18
