Fall of Sky City (A Steampunk Fantasy Sci-Fi Adventure Novel) (Devices of War)

by Blooding, SM

  “Did he mean we were supposed to get them in the water?”

  “How am I supposed to—”

  Something launched out of the water, long and thin, striped in black and green. It twirled and twisted, hissed, and attacked the bug, its mouth gaping open, sliding over the pincers and capturing the head whole.

  “Oh, crap!” Joshua yelled, stumbling a couple of steps back. “What in the seven skies is that?”

  “In the world of the bully,” I said, stumbling closer to the ocean.

  “There’s always a bigger bully,” he finished for me.

  “But that’s only one. What are we going to do about the other—”

  I didn’t get to finish that statement as all of a sudden, what seemed like hundreds of those snake creatures leapt out of the water and attacked the beetles.

  And me.

  The thing was huge and that mouth? For the love of the great Sky Mother, the mouth was big enough to swallow one of the beetle bug heads whole. It could swallow me entirely in one bite! So why did it need fangs? Really?

  I leapt out of the way as it came shooting out of the water at me. It crashed to the sand with several thumps as the rest of its body joined it. It was longer than three of me, easily, and once it was on the ground, even though it had no legs or fins, the thing was fast!

  I didn’t realize I had any energy left. I ran, dodging the bugs and the other snake things and the vegetation. My feet carried me up a slight incline. I kept running, trying find something to hide behind or in.

  Fallen tree. Beetle. Nope. Just a beetle leg. I grabbed the tree and launched myself over. The rustling slither of the snake creature sounded behind me. I twisted to see how close it was.

  The sky-felled fangs were closing in on my feet.

  I leapt over the tree and the fallen bug leg, raising my pistol. I pulled the trigger, tucking my feet back out of reach.

  Nothing happened.

  But by that time, it didn’t matter. The ground met my back. I rolled. The pistol fell from my grip. I scrambled to my feet. The snake snapped at me. I dodged, lost my footing and stumbled. I took a couple of reeling steps back.

  My feet sank. My arms flailed as I tried to regain some sense of balance. All attempts failed. I fell back, and I found myself completely immersed in mud. I grasped for the dry land, trying to right myself.

  But the more I moved, the more I sank.

  Dread rolled over me as the snake creature stopped. It rose on its serpentine body. The forked tongue darted out. The snake paused for a moment, then slithered away. Safe. Right? Why didn’t I feel like it?

  I was in quicksand.

  And sinking fast.

  CHAPTER 15

  WHAT EXACTLY HAD I GIVEN UP?

  I could leap from one airship to the next with nothing more than a rope and a hope, but this staying on land crap scared me like none other. How was I supposed to cope with mud that was pulling me down, trying to suffocate me? Every move I made to swim out only dragged me deeper. I couldn’t wait to get back to my sky, where it was safe!

  I might have yelled some. Maybe. There’s a very high probability. I was going to die anyway. In mud.

  I heard Haji run into the area. “Synn!”

  “Haj!” Ew! Mud in my mouth. It tasted aweful. “Haj.”

  He looked down, and I swear to the Sky Mother, the man rolled his eyes at me. “What are you doing in there?”

  “Drowning!” More mud in my mouth. I tried everything in my power to keep my face above the surface. “What does it—” More mud. “—look like?”

  He looked at me like I was a sky-felled idiot. “Why—” He held up his hands, glanced back over his shoulder and shook his head in disgust. “Just—” He closed his eyes and let out a long sigh before opening them again and going off in search of something. “Just lay back.”

  “Lay—” Mud. “—back? Are you mad?”

  “Just relax!” He stomped off.

  Was he joking?

  But as soon as I relaxed and laid back, the mud stopped its sucking motion and I floated. Sort of.

  He came stomping back with a stick and shoved it at me. I grabbed hold and he pulled me to safety. He continued to grumble as he stomped back to the beach. “You are the only man I know who would believe he could drown in mud.”

  “That was quicksand, Haji,” I said, pointing back the way we’d come. “It’s named that for a reason. That stuff can kill.”

  “In stories your grandmother told you to scare you.”

  I saw my pistol in the greenery and scooped it up as I followed Haji. We broke through the trees and onto the beach. We found skeletal remains of beetles, but all the snakes seemed to be gone.

  “Stupid air man,” he grumbled some more. “So stupid.”

  Joshua stood up from where he’d been kneeling beside the carcass of one of the bugs. He stopped and took a couple of steps back when he saw me. “Wha’ happened to you?”

  “Mud,” Haji said at the same time I said. “Quicksand.”

  He snorted, blinked, and then started laughing.

  I rolled my eyes and headed for the water. I stank, but then I remembered what had happened the last time we’d come close to those waters and stopped. “Are those snakes going to come out again and eat us?”

  Haji looked at me like I was a moron. “Do you know anything other than air creatures?”

  The incredulous look on my face cracked with the drying mud. “No?”

  “Those were sea snakes, natural enemies of the sphynktor bugs. They caught the scent of the bugs, and that’s what brought them out here. Sometimes, Synn, you are beyond stupid.”

  I glared and headed toward the crashing waves. “So I should be safe, then.”

  “From the sea snakes, yes.”

  My feet were already in the water. I stopped and took in a deep calming breath. “Then what should I be careful of?”

  “Mud nearly killed you, Synn,” my best friend said with a shake of his head and an open handed shrug. “You’re hopeless.”

  That was helpful.

  I used the sand to scrape off a lot of the mud. Now, all there was left to do was to dry off, though I wasn’t looking forward to the feel of dried salt all over my skin and clothes. It was still better than smelling like dung. I swear, something died in that pit.

  The trek back to the plane took much longer, but we didn’t have to worry about getting lost. We just had to follow the trail of dead beetles.

  Joshua kept us entertained with his findings upon his initial investigation of the sphynktor bugs. The man loved science. That was for sure.

  Haji filled us in on things we wouldn’t be able to see; habits, what the things like to eat, which weren’t people. Apparently, the bugs enjoyed eating birds.

  “So why were they trying to eat us?”

  “You assume they wanted to eat you,” Haji said, walking with ease up the dunes.

  I looked drunk in comparison. My feet weren’t used to the uneven ground of the dunes which moved all wrong. They were used to a flat surface that rocked with the air currents.

  “They were probably just curious.” Haji disappeared on the other side of the dune. I had to run to catch up so I could hear him. “When you shot at the one who was investigating, they took it as a threat and attacked.”

  “Just for the record,” I said, sounding winded, “I was not the one that shot them.”

  “No,” Haji said derisively, “you’re the one blowing them up.”

  I sent him a churlish look.

  He ignored me.

  “So you’re saying they’re peaceful,” Joshua said, his long legs carrying him over the dune behind us.

  “They’re a nuisance,” Haji said, glancing up at Kala high in the sky. Sang barely peaked over the horizon. “They’re very curious and easy to upset.”

  “It’s a good thing you knew about the snakes.”

  “Everyone has a natural enemy.”

  We spent the rest of the trip in relative silence. I was
too tired to carry on a conversation and navigate the cursed sand. The pistol might be a fantastic idea for using my gift instead of ammunition, but it wore me down. I needed to find a better way.

  By the time we got back to the plane, the only things visible were the tail and two and a half propellers.

  Joshua groaned. “Do ye have any idea how horrible this is?”

  I paused, drooping in place. Though I tried to stand up straight, I was failing. I imagined the Yusrra Samma being buried in the sands, and my heart wrenched. That was my home and she belonged in the air, not stuck in the ground. I nodded and clapped him on the back. “I apologize for my part in all of this.”

  He shrugged it off. “We knew we had ta leave, but we were stalling. ‘Sides, when the queens see our inventions are complete, they take ‘em from us and send ‘em off to be replicated. It’s better this way. At least no one else will have wha’ we discovered.”

  I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say anything. I followed him into the plane and found the nearest crate to collapse onto.

  He pulled me up, draping one of my arms over his shoulders. “Do ye remember my warnin’ about the effects of using yer gift too much?”

  I did. “I remember you whining about how we were using the wrong components, and that what I wanted to do had never been done before.”

  He nodded. “Ye would remember tha’.” He took us to the stairs that led up.

  I grabbed the rail and pulled myself up the steps, trying to remove my arm from around his shoulders.

  He didn’t let go. “Ye should learn how ta use that gift of yers differently.”

  “They wouldn’t teach me anything.”

  “Nix was probably afraid of what ye’d do if ye ever learned to stand up ta her.”

  I nodded and looked around for Haji.

  He’d found Yvette and the two of them disappeared into the cockpit.

  “Ye worry about ‘im,” Joshua said, motioning toward Haji.

  “Yeah.” I paused to watch them disappear. “He lost his Family and then his best friend. He’s changed.” I shook my head. “He’s different.”

  “We’re always changin’.” Joshua guided me over the mid stair landing and up the other half. “But the big thin’s have a bigger impact.”

  “I just want him to be okay.”

  “I’m sure he will be.”

  I nodded.

  Joshua opened a door and let go of me. “Here ye go. Sleepin’ quarters.”

  Sure enough. A double bunk sat in wedged in the far corner. There were other things too, but the only thing I was interested in right then was a bed. “Thanks.”

  He clapped me on the back, sending me stumbling into the room. “Ge’ some sleep.”

  I didn’t hear him shut the door. I was asleep before my head even hit the pillow.

  * * *

  I woke up to silence.

  I hadn’t realized just how loud the past day had been until I opened my eyes and there weren’t any sounds; not the plane settling around me or sand falling against the skin of the plane, or even people talking. Just. Quiet.

  I was okay with that.

  I turned onto my back and stared at the bottom of the bunk above me, which was flat. There was obviously no one in it. I lightly drummed my fingers against my chest and let my mind go empty.

  A lot had happened, a lot I didn’t want to think about and probably wouldn’t. My feet weren’t itching to move, so it was a good time to reflect, whether I liked it or not.

  The pain in my head was minimal. I couldn’t hear her voice. Aside from a faint pattering against my skull, I would have thought I’d beaten whatever this compulsion was.

  But I felt her. She was waiting.

  How could I escape when I was still under Nix’s control? That didn’t even make sense.

  Something I had promised? Really?

  I closed my eyes and allowed myself to remember the times Nix had tried to break me, reform and train me. She was very good. It wasn’t all about torture. No. I wasn’t so tough that I thought I could handle anything. I had my limits. My father had done a good job in teaching me where those limits were, but he’d done nothing to teach me how to withstand the torment of pleasure.

  Torment. Pleasure. I draped my arm over my eyes and sank deeper into the bunk. Together, they didn’t even make sense, but it had worked. While straight beatings and starvation had only fueled me, a little alcohol, maybe a drug and a little pleasure worked perfectly.

  What had I promised?

  I would have promised just about anything.

  Glossing over the details, though, I couldn’t recall what I might have said, might have given away. Would I have really promised that I’d always come back to her? Even in my worst moments? Really? Had the torment ever been that bad?

  I shook my head. No.

  Then what had she wrought from me? What would I be willing to give away? What oath would I have been willing to make upon my soul?

  A chill swept down my spine and my eyes sprung open, seeing her darkly lashed eyes peering deep into mine, feeling her hand on my lower abdomen, the fan of her breath against my chest.

  “You are mine,” she’d whispered.

  I’d done everything I could to school the contempt from running across my lips as I’d shivered from the touch of her fingertips.

  Her lips ran up my chest to my collarbone, her tongue darting out, tracing the line of it. “Tell me.”

  I closed my eyes and turned away.

  Her hand rose to my bound one. “I can keep you like this all night. I can keep you like this for days.” She rose, straddling my hips, her bustled skirt draped over my legs. “As you well know.”

  I stared at her, fighting to relax my jaw.

  “You want to go back to classes, don’t you? To spend time in your precious laboratory?” She flexed her hands, running her nails down my chest.

  I arched into them, unable to stop myself.

  The corner of her lips rose, and she lowered herself over me, bringing her corseted chest to mine. “Tell me you’re mine.”

  I nodded.

  She put her fingertip to my lips, her breath whispering along them. “With your words.”

  I opened my mouth to force out the words, to make it stop, to regain some semblance of manliness, of pride, but the only thing that came out was a stark, “I am.”

  She smiled. “No. In the language of your old home. Tell me.” Her fingers ran along my jaw, as if to coax the words.

  They were stuck somewhere in my throat.

  She reached between us and took hold of me.

  I bucked violently, needing release, aching with it, but I did not want to with her, in front of her, because of her. I would do so on my terms.

  She wasn’t having it. Her hand moved. “Just tell me.”

  I held off for as long as I could, her body grinding on me as her hand caressed me. I just wanted her gone. I wanted to escape, to get out of there, to be free of her.

  I threw back my head and yelled in my native language, “I am yours.”

  She stilled, a triumphant smile lighting her expression. “And no one else’s,” she said in my tongue. “Only mine.”

  I stilled with hopeful relief. “Only yours.”

  Her smile widened as she crawled off the bed and sauntered to the door. “Remember that. Do not ever forget it. You are mine, Synn.” She stopped at the door. “You always will be.”

  That had to be it. She’d been able to get many promises out of me. Not to meet her gaze at dinner unless she ordered it. Not to speak to anyone unless she told me it was okay. Not to touch anyone. Not to allow anyone to touch me.

  My mind went still. What exactly had I given up when I’d promised to be hers?

  How was I going to get it back?

  CHAPTER 16

  THEY FOUND US

  I soon got tired of lying around with only my thoughts to keep me company. They weren’t really fantastic thoughts to begin with, and they weren’t helping m
e figure out a way out of there. I had no idea where “out of here” we needed to go. Without a radio, I didn’t know how to get in touch with the Great Families, or if the other tribes would even let me back in.

  The soft pounding in my head was like a gentle knock, reminding me that no matter where I went, Nix was always with me.

  I was contaminated by the Hands. I was afraid to admit how much Nix had really changed me. In my heart, I knew I would never be a Hand. It wouldn’t happen, but how much had I changed while in their care?

  Part of me was afraid to find the Yusrra Samma, afraid of finding out I was no longer an airman, that I no longer had what it took to live free.

  I ran a hand over my scalp, my fingers tangling in my hair. I needed to get a grip. Of course I had what it took to be an airman, to live free on the only home I’d ever known. It was going to take more than an entire season with a psychotic woman to change that. I was an El’Asim. I was never, nor would I ever be a Primus.

  I pulled myself off the bunk, my stomach growling for food, and headed down to the cargo bay. No one was there.

  No one was in the cockpit, either.

  I listened intently for the sounds of anyone, but heard nothing.

  I headed toward the stairs and went down where the makeshift lab was. Empty.

  Alarm shot through me. I went back to my bunk and searched the other rooms. I could tell that a few of the bunks had at least been slept in, including the one over mine, but they were all empty.

  I went to the cargo bay, my steps a little faster this time, and headed toward the tail of the plane. The door was wedged. It wouldn’t open and it wouldn’t close.

  Voices.

  I sighed with relief and followed the sound.

  Sang was high in the sky, and Kala was nowhere to be seen. The pale sand shimmered in the bright blue-white light of the smaller sun. Yvette sat on a beetle leg, her chin propped in her hand, staring into the small fire they’d built. Joshua lay sprawled on the sand, one arm bent, supporting his head. Haji was stooped over something in his lap, intent on whatever it was. Keeley sat cross-legged on the other side of the fire, both hands behind her, her head thrown back, her long red hair loose and trailing in the sand.