The Iron Ghost

by Jen Williams

  Taking a deep breath, Sebastian reached out for the animals, as he had once reached out to the snakes. The strange reptilian shape of their minds caused him to recoil at first, but he pushed that feeling aside and commanded them.

  Fight for me, he told them. Hunt for me. Tear these dead ones apart.

  He felt their minds turn towards his – they were frightened, confused by the light and the smell of death.

  Kill for me, brothers, sisters. He put every sliver of strength he had left into that connection. Join the hunt.

  There was a hissing roar from down the street and the wyverns leapt forward, long tails pushing them up into the red sky and then down, landing in the midst of Bezcavar’s corpses, thrashing wildly. Long white teeth flashed under the scarlet light, snipping limb from limb, brushing aside Bezcavar’s horde with their powerful tails. They screamed in triumph, and the brood sisters screamed back.

  They cannot stand against the dragon! No one can.

  It was Ephemeral’s voice in his head, clear and joyous. Sebastian bared his teeth, letting the pleasure of the hunt fill his chest. For a time, he forgot everything – his sorrow over Wydrin, his love for Dallen, the desperate horrors that filled the city – lost in a tide of death.

  When he came back to himself, it was almost over. The streets were thick with dead – Bezcavar’s puppets, the Narhl, and more brood sisters than he cared to see – but the demon had lost. The sisters were chasing the final corpses down, tearing their heads from their bodies with a ferocity that no longer seemed out of place. The wyverns curled at the heart of it all, calmly tearing the flesh from the corpses that no longer moved.

  ‘It is done.’

  Sebastian stopped. Abruptly his sword felt too heavy, and his body somehow unfamiliar. He looked up to see Ephemeral and Crocus approaching with one of the possessed held between them.

  ‘This is the last,’ said Crocus. She gave the body a little shake. ‘The last refuge of the demon Bezcavar.’

  ‘Is that right?’ Sebastian reached down and grabbed the corpse by the rags still twisted round its chest. Once it had been a portly man with a beard, although the walking death had made its face gaunt and strange. Its eyes rolled redly in their sockets. ‘No more bodies left for you, Bezcavar?’

  When the demon didn’t answer immediately, Sebastian gave the body a brisk shake.

  ‘There’s always somewhere, for a creature like me,’ said Bezcavar, pushing the words through dead lips with some difficulty. ‘You have no idea, good Sir Sebastian. No idea who I really am.’

  ‘There are no shrines to you here, demon. And no one left to carry your poison.’

  He let go of the rags and hefted his sword in both hands, resting its point on the corpse’s neck.

  ‘You will not do it,’ said Bezcavar, the voice making an attempt at sly now, although Sebastian could hear the tremble of fear beneath it. ‘You are too merciful. You are the good one, the honourable one. You would not—’

  Sebastian plunged the sword down through the middle of the man’s neck. There was no blood, only a sudden waft of rotten stench. Held between Ephemeral and Crocus, the body hung there for a moment, skewered by the blade. Sebastian watched the blood drain out of the accusing eyes until there was nothing there but the glazed, dust-covered eyeballs of a man long dead. With a grunt he pulled the sword free again, grimacing at the muck that now covered the blade.

  ‘And you have no idea who I really am, demon.’

  Ephemeral and Crocus dropped the body, and Sebastian leaned down, wiping his sword clean on the corpse’s filthy rags. It would have to do for now.

  ‘I have never seen them behave like that.’ Dallen came over, stepping around the corpses. He was looking at the wyverns. Sebastian took a slow breath. In all the fighting, he had forgotten to be concerned for the prince, but he was here. Still alive. ‘What did you do to them?’ He turned to Sebastian, half accusing. ‘Is it the influence of your dragon women?’

  There was a thunderous crash from across the city, and every head turned back to the giant battle taking place by the Tower of Waking. As Sebastian watched, the Rivener slashed its claws across the werken’s head, and they all saw the huge chunks of stone that went flying into the air. The giant werken staggered backwards, bringing up enormous spade-shaped fists to ward the other creature off. It was in trouble.

  ‘We need to help them,’ said Sebastian, already moving. ‘Quickly, to the centre of the city. If we can get there in time, perhaps we can harry it from underneath, or use range weapons.’

  ‘Father!’

  Sebastian looked up to see Havoc climbing down from a nearby roof. She jumped the last few feet, landing as gracefully as a cat, and then sprinted over to him, her yellow eyes wide.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I saw something. On the great stone man. I don’t – I’m not sure how. But you should know.’

  Sebastian felt a spike of annoyance. ‘Spit it out, Havoc, for Isu’s sake.’

  She nodded once, gathering herself. ‘Wydrin, Father. She is there, on the giant. Along with the white-haired lord.’

  ‘What?’

  With hope threatening to squeeze his throat shut, Sebastian turned to look once more at the stone giant. It was still desperately fending off the Rivener with shuddering blows which he could feel through the soles of his feet as much as hear. He could see the stone shape of it, and what might be a wooden frame running around its midriff . . . were there people on there? He shook his head in frustration.

  ‘I cannot see. Are you certain?’

  Havoc nodded rapidly. ‘They are alive, Father, both of them, but . . .’

  But for how much longer? Even if he couldn’t make them out, he knew that the brood sisters all had unnaturally sharp eyesight, and every one of them knew Wydrin – she was one of the few humans they had ever spent time with.

  ‘Dallen, how many people can a wyvern carry?’

  The prince looked affronted. ‘They will not fly far in this place, not in this diseased sky. More than three bodies and they cannot fly at all.’

  Sebastian hissed through gritted teeth. ‘Quickly, saddle one up. I am taking a wyvern over there now.’

  ‘You are?’ One of the surviving wyvern riders, a short woman with dark grey lichen covering half her face, sneered at him. ‘A warmling?’

  ‘Dragon blood calls to dragon blood,’ he said bitterly. ‘No matter how diluted, no matter how changed. That’s what they’ve been trying to tell me all along.’ Sebastian bent a knee in front of the nearest wyvern, and when it lifted its snout to him, he placed a hand between its eyes. He could feel the smooth blue skin and the rush of its blood, calling like to like. The animal grunted, and pushed against his hand.

  ‘This one,’ he said, standing up. ‘Have it saddled.’

  Wydrin staggered forward, and for one alarming moment all she could see was the distant street, cobbles half covered in snow, and then Frith’s arm was around her waist, yanking her backwards. He thrust a long piece of leather into her hand and yelled directly into her ear.

  ‘Keep hold of that!’

  She grabbed on to it just as the werken pitched violently to the right, taking another blow from the Rivener. Chunks of stone the size of boulders went flying past them to rain on the city below. Struggling to keep her feet under her, she pushed herself backwards against the stone directly behind them, where Frith pulled her closer.

  ‘What’s this brilliant plan of yours, then?’ she said, trying to gather her breath. It was very hard to think when the ground underneath your feet – the impossibly frail wooden ground beneath your feet – was pitching crazily from one side to another. She was reminded powerfully of being on board her mother’s ship in the midst of a raging storm – with exactly the same chance of survival if you should be thrown overboard.

  ‘This.’ Frith pointed with his boot to a bulky sack still strapped to the platform. ‘It destroys the Edenier. I have to get it to Joah.’

  ‘How, exactly?’
>
  For a moment, Frith only shook his head. ‘When the Destroyer defeats the Rivener, I will be able to climb inside. Somehow.’

  ‘Ye gods. That’s your plan?’

  There was a shuddering crash twinned with a screaming of metal, and more rocky debris fell past them. A number of fist-sized rocks fell on the platform, a few heavy enough to punch through the wood.

  ‘I hate to say this, Frith, but I don’t think our fighter is winning this match.’

  As if to prove her right, the Destroyer staggered backwards, struggling to stay upright. Wydrin and Frith were nearly thrown straight off the platform, and the ground yawned alarmingly close. They clung to one another, and for a brief moment Wydrin found her face pressed to his neck – he still smelt of salt and winter, and his skin was warm under her lips. All at once a number of inappropriate feelings surged to the surface.

  ‘Wydrin . . .’

  She looked up into his eyes, as storm grey as ever. Hopeless, she thought, I am bloody hopeless.

  ‘Look, if we want to get that thing over there, we might have to make a run for it. Otherwise we’re going to be tied to this werken when it goes down, and still tied to it when the Rivener stomps it into gravel.’

  Frith pressed his lips into a thin line. ‘Whatever we have to do, I’m with you.’

  Nuava and Tamlyn screamed as one as the Rivener’s claws scraped across the Destroyer’s blunt head just above them. The werken rocked back on its legs, fighting to stay upright, while Nuava felt herself pelted with rocks. One of them tore open her scalp and she felt blood cover her face in a hot sheet, the taste salty in her mouth. Temporarily blind, she blinked furiously, trying to force it out of her eyes. She needed both hands just to hold on.

  ‘Tamlyn? Tamlyn, are you all right?’

  Her vision came back to her, watery and blurred, just in time to see the very end of the Rivener’s black claw slide into their small, broken alcove and thrust through her aunt’s chest, pinning her to the stone. Nuava opened her mouth to scream, but there was nothing left in her. Tamlyn looked down at the piece of metal and stone that had nearly cleaved her in two, an expression of mild annoyance on her face, and then the Rivener withdrew its claw and her aunt’s body with it. In that moment Nuava felt the Destroyer shudder all around her as the presence that was commanding it to move suddenly left it.

  ‘No!’ Finally she found her voice. ‘Tamlyn! That cannot be it!’

  She struggled against her straps, half out of her mind, screaming again as the Rivener raked its claws over the Destroyer’s chest. The werken swayed sickeningly, and Nuava knew that it would very soon fall and that would be the end of it; the end of her family, the end of her people.

  ‘Mendrick!’ she screamed through a throat thick with tears. ‘Mountain spirit, whatever you truly are! Help me!’ She paused, gasping in a breath over her sobs. ‘You helped me once, and I know you’re there somewhere. I know that now. Please. Please help me.’

  Child of the Skald, the voice was cold and beautiful in her head, what would you have of me?

  Nuava cried out, half in surprise and half in joy. How could she not have known how beautiful the mountain was? How could she not have felt it before?

  ‘Join with me,’ she said. ‘Let us destroy Joah Demonsworn together. He poisoned you, used you for ill.’ She swallowed hard. ‘I know we did too, but there will be no more of that now. Let me stand with you, this last time. Let me do that much for you at least.’

  When the mountain spoke again, there was a note of reluctance there. I can join with you, Nuava Nox, crafter of Skaldshollow. I can give you the deeper joining you crave. But you may not survive it.

  Nuava glanced to the place where her aunt had sat, at the smeared bloodstain that was all that was left of her.

  ‘Do it,’ she whispered. ‘And know that is what I truly want.’

  There was light then, glorious green light that filled her head and her heart, and cold and pain, yes, but that felt very far away, as though it were happening to someone else. She looked down at her hands and saw that they were veined with Edeian just as the rock was. All around her she could feel the mountain, not as a separate thing but as an extension of herself. Everything was connected with that shining green light.

  ‘Of course,’ she murmured. ‘Of course it is. What else does a crafter do but line up the connections?’

  78

  ‘What’s happening now?’

  Frith clasped the sack to his chest and looked around. For the moment the Destroyer had stopped moving entirely. Next to him, Wydrin was peering up into the sky, one hand held over her eyes against the red storm light. He could scarcely believe it. She was here – scruffy and dirty and looking as though she hadn’t eaten in days, but it was her. And that changed so much.

  ‘I don’t know. Look, what is that? Can you see it?’

  Wydrin pointed above them, and Frith could see something: a wriggling reptilian mass, coursing across the sky towards them. The animal’s mouth was wide open, bearing all its teeth, and its eyes were wild. On its back . . .

  ‘Is that Sebastian riding one of those bloody things?’ Wydrin shook her head. ‘By all the gods!’

  Two things happened at once. The Destroyer shuddered violently as the Rivener struck it again, and Frith felt it begin to pitch backwards underneath them. And a bare second later, Sebastian and the wyvern collided with the platform, the huge sinuous body and tail of the dragonkin filling the frail wooden structure with hissing, spitting life.

  ‘Get on!’ yelled the big knight. ‘This thing is really pissed off.’

  Frith let go of the leather strap, keeping the sack pressed tightly under one arm, and he and Wydrin scurried across to the back of the waiting wyvern. Its tail whipped back and forth like that of an angry cat, flinging aside pieces of broken wood and shattered stone. As they settled into place, Wydrin behind Sebastian and Frith behind her, the animal opened its long snout and hissed a low warning.

  ‘Right, hold on tight.’

  With a convulsive shudder, the wyvern shot off the platform and up into the sky, curving round in a tight spiral shape to bring them up out of the reach of the Rivener. Frith found himself almost unseated immediately, clinging to the leather saddle for his life. In front of him Wydrin gave a yelp of combined horror and amusement.

  ‘I’m probably going to be sick,’ she yelled to no one in particular. ‘So you’d best keep your mouths shut.’

  They climbed up and up, the violence of their movement calming down somewhat, until Frith risked a look over the side. Below them the Destroyer still stood, amazingly, and the Rivener was now prowling round it. There was a circle of debris and destruction around them – buildings crushed flat, the pieces of the Destroyer the Rivener had knocked away – and then further out, something else.

  Frith felt his stomach turn over. ‘Sebastian,’ he called ahead, raising his voice over the freezing wind. ‘Can you take us higher?’

  He heard Wydrin mutter several curse words at that, but Sebastian obliged, pulling the wyvern upwards in its slow spiral. The whole of Skaldshollow lay below them, bathed in the unnerving red light. Frith nodded to himself. Of course. He put a hand on Wydrin’s shoulder.

  ‘Look down and tell me what you see.’

  ‘Didn’t I just tell you I was going to throw up?’

  She did as he asked though, and he felt her stiffen in the saddle in front of him.

  ‘Oh that clever bastard.’

  ‘What is it?’ said Sebastian from the front. Wydrin nodded downwards.

  The mage word for Summon had been gouged into the very streets of Skaldshollow. Written there by a man who had very recently gained the power and, apparently, the knowledge of a god. A god who knew even more about the Edenier and Edeian than Joah did, and who had once built a weapon into the very flesh of Ede itself, many years ago.

  ‘Which word is it?’ asked Wydrin. ‘Do you know what it will do?’

  Frith tightened his grip on the sack. He could feel
the weight of the device there, waiting for its time.

  ‘It is the word for Summon,’ he said, raising his voice into the wind. ‘What it could summon . . . I do not know.’

  ‘Oh, that’s just pissing marvellous.’

  ‘It is imperative we use the weapon against Joah before he activates it,’ said Frith, leaning forward in his seat. ‘We must do it now.’

  ‘Look!’

  Now Sebastian was pointing downwards. Frith leaned over to see the Destroyer suddenly lurching back into life. It was riddled with green light now, tracing the complex carvings that covered its hide, and as he watched it drew back its arm and smashed its fist into the Rivener’s unprotected side. Joah’s machine crumpled where it was struck and staggered backwards into the Tower of Waking. There was a splintering sound that Frith felt in his bones, and the Tower itself fell, shattered into thousands of deadly black shards.

  ‘Seb, get down there,’ said Wydrin, a new urgency in her voice. ‘We need to see what’s happening.’

  They dove, swerving down in a graceful curve so that they passed close by the Destroyer’s upper half. There they all saw the slim form of Nuava standing with arms outstretched in the remains of the werken’s head. She was also covered in the green light of the Edeian, her eyes two beacons of green fire. She was smiling.

  ‘Nuava!’ cried Wydrin, half rising out of the saddle. Frith pulled her back down.

  ‘There is nothing we can do for her,’ he said, speaking directly into her ear. ‘The mountain has her now.’

  As they swerved out of the way, the Destroyer reached forward with both its arms and struck the Rivener on either side of its black insectile head. There was a screaming of metal, and its twisted claws flailed at nothing. From their vantage point they could see the ragged opening at the top of the head, still filled with violet light.

  ‘There,’ shouted Frith, ‘if we’re going to do it, it has to be now! Take us down.’

  The wyvern dropped, and they crashed rather than landed inside the Rivener’s central room. For a few moments, everything was confusion – Frith jumped from the wyvern’s back, his arms still cradling the trap, while Wydrin rolled with somewhat less grace into a table. Sebastian leapt away and the wyvern was gone, flicking back up into the sky with an air of relief.