Firestarter

by Tara Sim

  “I’ve been told,” he said, “that some of you show great prowess in the field of time.”

  Castor stirred beside him.

  “This isn’t easy, but it’s the only way. I can only hope our God in Heaven will forgive us.”

  Then he pointed straight at Castor. “Take him.”

  “No!” Colton made to get up, but the guard coming to take Castor kicked him, and Colton crumpled back to the ground. “No, stop! Take me instead!”

  “Colton!” Castor screamed, struggling against the guards. “Colton!”

  “Don’t take him, please! Take me!”

  They wrestled Castor from the church, his screams fading into the violent blossom of sunset beyond the doors. People were yelling. Time was skipping, warping, hurting. Colton closed his eyes tight and tried not to sob.

  Within ten minutes, they felt time smooth out like wrinkles being melted by heat. Colton opened his eyes and gasped, looking around the church. All the time servants felt it. They were murmuring, crying, some even passing out.

  Archer returned, wiping blood from his hands. “Release them,” he ordered the guards.

  As soon as he was free, Colton ran at Archer. “What did you do to him? What did you do?” He was weeping and barely understood his own words as they tumbled from his lips. A guard escorted him from the church. He was still weeping when his parents wrapped him in their arms, told him not to look, not to see what had been done.

  But there was no way Colton could escape the truth. Castor was dead. These men would build a clock tower over his grave. A tower that controlled time.

  It should have been him.

  The time fibers unravel around him. They twist into knots. Danny plucks at them, weaving them into patterns, into different shapes.

  He is back on that street outside the hangar, watching as his mother is shot over and over again and helpless to stop it, this fixed moment in his past. The spurt of blood on his face. Her last words. The way the life leaves her eyes. Over and over and over and over and over

  then he sees Cassie in the crowd below as she fires her gun. Her aim is messy. She runs from a Builder and trips. The Builder is about to shoot her. Danny plucks a thread of time and the bullet stops midair. It drops, harmlessly, to the ground. The gun

  There is Liddy, fending off anyone who comes near Edmund’s body. She screams and shoots blindly, tears on her face, until a Builder riddles her with holes. Liddy’s body lies slumped against Edmund’s, her tears drying.

  Revenge, he thinks. It’s a sweet-sounding word.

  He repeats his trick with the bullet. Stops a handful of them, five points across the square like a star, and turns them against their shooters. The bullets fly. They slam into chests, throats, heads.

  Danny grins.

  It shouldn’t excite him, the sight and smell of blood. But flowing from these bodies, it’s something to be savored.

  He begins to laugh.

  Everything that is born must eventually die.

  There is a sorrow too deep to touch. A loneliness that can’t be relieved. He uses it to fuel his desires, turning bullets, striking hearts, forcing breaths to stop.

  Wrong, says the sorrow, says the loneliness. Wrong, wrong.

  Danny sees and hears and tastes and wonders.

  He can’t do anything about what’s happened.

  He can do something about what’s happening now.

  At least, that’s what Colton thinks. His time is tapped to London’s, to Big Ben’s. When it went out, it tapped into something else.

  Danny.

  Everything was colliding. Everything happened all at once, and never happens at all.

  Aetas brooded.

  Colton focuses on London, on the connection, blood and power alike. He sees the jagged remains of the clock face, the shape of a boy framed by shards and death. The boy is tall, with dark messy hair, blood flowing from his shoulder onto a cog he holds in one arm as the other extends toward the city.

  His eyes are amber.

  Danny, he thinks. Danny, what have you done?

  This city is mine now, Danny thinks back. He sees Colton in Enfield, kneeling before his clockwork, eyes turned toward London. He’s always been beautiful, but lit with gold and power, he is even more so. I can control it for as long as I want.

  No, you can’t, Colton argues. You’re bleeding out. Danny, you’re dying.

  And just like that, it slams into both of them, the knowledge: they are dying.

  I can still make this right, Danny thinks. If I can make it all go away—if I can stop it—

  Stop what? Aetas will be free. If you become a clock spirit, you’ll go away. Just like me.

  Danny shakes his head, not even sure he has a head anymore. He can’t feel anything but power. I can keep Aetas locked away. I can make us live forever. You and I can be together.

  Colton wishes he could cry. No, Danny. That’s not what I want, and it’s not what you want, either. He feels the life leaving Danny’s body and panics. Danny, you have to let go. Please.

  I can’t. If I let go, the time around Enfield will start. Your tower will fall. Aetas—

  Don’t worry about that. I’ll be fine.

  They both know it’s a lie.

  Danny is shaking. He’s lost too much blood. His heartbeat is getting slower.

  Let go, Colton urges him. Danny, it’s time to let go.

  I can’t.

  You have to.

  Danny is swaying. His skin is turning from pale to bronze. His hair is fading to gold.

  Danny, Colton pleads, reaching out his hands, his voice, his heart. Let go.

  Danny lets go.

  The two gods clashed together with a warlike blast, the sound ripping through the air and echoing through the water corridor. The golden form of Aetas seemed to almost merge with the galactic entity that was Chronos, emanating a spiral of multicolored light.

  Daphne was crouched above Akash, leaning protectively over him as she watched the titans fight. Aetas was shot into one of the walls of water with a swift attack from Chronos, but he reappeared not a second later, holding fistfuls of golden time threads in his hands. He tied one of them into a knot as Chronos advanced, and the god froze mid-step, uttering a wordless roar of fury as a golden band held him in place.

  Aetas broke another thread, dissolving the bonds around Oceana.

  Hide, sister, he told her in a voice like the soft creeping of dawn. I will not have him harm you.

  This has been both of our fight, she replied. With a sweep of her hands, she gathered whips of water in her hands. I will not have him imprison you again.

  I WILL WIPE YOU BOTH FROM THIS WORLD, Chronos yelled before flaring up and breaking through Aetas’s temporary hold on him.

  Oceana turned briefly to Daphne. Gather the rest of your mortals and flee.

  Aetas burned bright and shot into the sky, Chronos chasing after. Oceana rose to the surface of the ocean as the sky overhead roiled with the storm, the water walls shivering and threatening to collapse. Chronos called down that storm, enveloping Aetas in a swarm of lightning-laced black.

  The god of time multiplied. Five images of him charged at Chronos as the original fought against the lightning, twisting the time threads around him. Oceana used her water whips to latch onto Chronos’s legs as the five images of Aetas attacked with a boom that shuddered across the sky.

  Daphne could only watch, stunned, until Akash grabbed her wrist.

  “We have to get away,” he said, his voice hoarse. “We’ve done all we could.”

  She nodded, running back to the prison where she found Zavier lying unmoving beside the broken columns of stone. His arm was sliced down the middle, and he’d lost enough blood that his skin was pale as moonlight.

  “Zavier.” She patted his cheek, wincing at the crashing sounds overhead. “Zavier, please!”

  He opened his eyes, glassy and faraway, and in them she could see the reflection of the gods’ light. As they came into focus, he gave a st
rangled gasp as he realized what was happening above them.

  “He’s … here,” he croaked. “Freed.”

  “Yes. You did it, you freed him.” She glanced up in time to see Chronos come at Aetas with a sword of lightning, which Aetas dodged and Oceana countered with a spear of coral. “We have to get away from here before—”

  Before Chronos won? Before Aetas or Oceana could be slain?

  But even as she tugged at Zavier, she felt the cold weight of his body and knew. Heart stuttering, Daphne shook her head, wanting to deny the limits of mortality as the strength of immortals was tested above her.

  Zavier had been watching the fight with awe, but now his eyes fluttered, as if he couldn’t keep them open any longer. His mouth moved, and she had to bend her ear close to hear him.

  “Sally … tell her I’m sorry.”

  “You can tell her yourself!”

  His throat bobbed as he fought to swallow, his breathing shallow. “My … mother. I’ll never …” A tear escaped the corner of his eye, rolling down his temple. “Mama …”

  His pulse faded to nothing beneath her thumb.

  The battling powers overhead surged brighter than the sun. Daphne shielded her eyes and felt Akash pull her back.

  “We have to go!”

  “But his body!” She fought to get back to Zavier, but Akash kept driving her forward.

  The water rippled on either side of them as the gods continued to fight. As Daphne and Akash raced toward the distant shore, the earth beneath their feet erupted and knocked them onto their backs. Daphne yelped as her ears rang.

  Chronos! Aetas yelled. Your fight is with me, not the mortals.

  THIS ONE IS YOUR PET, IS IT NOT?

  Hands of water wrapped around Daphne’s limbs, wet and firm. Akash was too slow to grab her as she was pulled into the air with a scream.

  WILL YOU LEACH YOUR POWER OUT OF HER? Chronos boomed. Daphne hovered between the walls of water, struggling against her bonds. WILL YOU RECLAIM WHAT I GAVE YOU, AND ONLY YOU, TO PROTECT?

  The mortals have done their fair share of protecting time, Aetas said. Daphne craned her neck and saw Aetas approach his creator, a sun against the cosmos. I will do it now in their stead. They have suffered in my absence. He turned his burning gaze to Daphne, to Zavier’s body. They suffer still.

  YOUR COMPASSION MAKES YOU WEAK. THEY HAVE NONE TO SPARE YOU.

  So be it.

  A dagger of lightning formed in Chronos’s hand, behind his back. Daphne sucked in a breath, but water flooded her mouth a second later, choking her.

  No, she thought, tightening her hand around the bloody cog she still held. NO!

  She felt the time fibers around her like a loom, ready to be woven. Reaching desperately for those nearest her, she grabbed hold and yanked.

  The water fled her body, and she crumbled back into the corridor. Akash gathered her in his arms as she coughed, fighting to get to her feet.

  Chronos had been aiming the dagger at Aetas when Daphne broke his hold on her, distracting him long enough for Aetas to weave his own time threads, stopping the dagger in its fatal path. Chronos flickered and staggered back, seething.

  YOU HAVE CHOSEN, THEN, the Gaian god rumbled under the growling thunder.

  I chose a long time ago, Aetas replied, keeping his time threads at the ready in case he attacked again. You did not like my choice then, either.

  MORTALS HAVE SHOWN ME ONLY THEIR VANITY AND GREED AND DESTRUCTION. IF YOU WISH TO CONTINUE YOUR LONG LINE OF DEGRADATION, I WILL NOT STOP YOU. BUT I WILL WATCH NO LONGER.

  Before Aetas or Oceana could respond, Chronos disappeared. The storm still churned, and the water walls began spilling their waves.

  “It’s collapsing!” Akash took her hand and made again for shore. “Hurry!”

  They slipped over the sand as the water poured back in, filling the corridor Oceana had created. They had just reached the beach when they were dragged under. Daphne grabbed Akash’s arm and pulled them to the surface, struggling to get to the beach.

  Gasping and shivering, Daphne looked behind her, but the gods were gone. There was only the long stretch of the sea with its silver-tipped waves. Underneath all that water was Zavier’s body.

  Time’s last sacrifice.

  She stood on the shore and let it all build within her, a swell of ending, of something started so long ago that the idea of it being over now was unfathomable.

  She wept when she thought of Zavier’s mother, free now, and what she would say when she found out her son was dead. That he had died, that he had upended the world, all to rescue her. That he had died knowing he would never see her again.

  Nothing more than memories that would fade over time.

  Akash grabbed her arm. “Daphne!”

  She looked up. Standing before them was Aetas.

  The cog in her hand grew so hot she had to drop it. Daphne’s lips parted, but she couldn’t find the words to speak.

  The god did not look happy, didn’t wear his victory in any perceivable emotion, but there was still a glimmer of determination when he looked at her. In that brief moment, Daphne felt all the warmth and power she had come to associate with clock towers, that uniquely singular connection between heartbeats and seconds.

  And then it waned. It left her like blood dripping from a wound, something within her renting open. Daphne staggered against Akash, who caught her.

  It wasn’t all her power the god took. She could still feel him there before her, could still perceive the tentative thread between her and the cog at her feet.

  Aetas bent his head to her. He will be remembered.

  Then he was gone. They were left standing on the beach as the god’s light left their eyes. Slowly, the clouds dissolved, and the brightness of morning began to sparkle on the ocean’s surface. It all seemed fake. Unnatural. But Daphne’s eyes were still clouded in darkness. Part of her was still under those waves.

  Akash held her to him. She rested her head on his chest, and thanked every god she knew that his heart still beat.

  A gentle ripple went up her back. “Time is returning,” she whispered.

  Danny blinked and saw London. His London. No barriers. No time threads. Dawn gave way to morning light, and it was as effortless as breathing.

  Time felt natural. No woven tapestry of controlled order; nothing pulsing from the tower in which he stood. A complex pattern, like a skein of yarn. Like a ball of twine.

  Danny dropped the bloody cog to the floor. He turned and saw Sally on the opposite side of the clock room, staring at him in wonder. He took a step toward her, but his knee buckled and he fell.

  When he opened his eyes, Cassie was leaning over him. She was crying.

  “Thank God! Danny, can you hear me?”

  He groaned. His body was heavy, and he could barely lift his head.

  “When we came up, you were bleeding all over the floor! That Archer woman is dead—she fell somehow—and there was some sort of cog …”

  Danny reached for her, pulled her closer.

  “Enfield,” he whispered. “I have to go.”

  “What? No. You’re lucky you’re alive right now. You can’t even—”

  He rolled onto his side and sat up with Herculean effort. His shoulder throbbed grotesquely, and he threw up.

  “That’s what you get,” Cassie mumbled.

  His shoulder had been bandaged. He couldn’t move his left arm. Looking around, Danny found he had been laid out at the base of Big Ben, the broken clock face gaping above him. The injured were being tended to by nurses. Policemen rounded up the last of the fighters. The dead had been lined up—were still being lined up—in the middle of the square.

  Several of those bodies held bullets he had fired.

  Christopher was standing nearby, in conversation with a handful of other clock mechanics. When he saw that Danny was awake, he excused himself and ran to his son’s side. “Danny!” He planted a messy kiss on Danny’s forehead. “You’re all right, thank God.”
/>
  “Will everyone stop thanking God and take me to Enfield?”

  Prema saw he was awake and came to join them, Astrid wearily holding her hand. Not too far behind them were Anish and Felix, the latter being tended to a weeping Charlotte who couldn’t stop planting relieved kisses over her husband’s face. The only survivors.

  “Will you please tell them I have to go to Enfield?” Danny pleaded with Prema.

  She knelt and checked his eyes, his pulse. “You’ve lost too much blood. You need to wait here until the ambulances come.”

  They didn’t understand.

  Danny turned to Cassie and grabbed her arm, as much to keep himself sitting up as to gain her attention.

  “I have to go,” he said, his voice breaking. “Please. I have to. He’s waiting for me.”

  Cassie’s face softened. She touched his cheek, nodding.

  “He really shouldn’t,” Christopher began, but Cassie looked up at him with an expression Danny had never seen her wear before, something like resolve mixed with grief.

  “I’ll take care of him, Mr. Hart. I promise.”

  Christopher took another look at Danny, and sighed. “All right.”

  Cassie took Christopher’s auto. Prema helped her get Danny situated before Cassie took to the driver’s seat. Danny sat back and closed his eyes, his head too light, his body too heavy.

  “Sally,” he whispered to Prema through the open window. “Is she …?”

  “She’s safe. A nurse took her away from the square, to someplace quieter. Jo is with her.” Prema reached inside the auto to grasp his hand. “Zavier will be so relieved when he returns.”

  Danny wanted to feel relief too, but it eluded him as he kept reaching out to Colton with no reply.

  He didn’t know what he did in that hour of pain and uncertainty as Cassie drove, but when he next opened his eyes, Enfield spread out before him. His heart gave a violent jolt.

  Cassie rolled the auto to a stop, but before she could shut off the engine Danny had already opened the door and tumbled out.

  “Danny—!”

  A crowd had gathered at the edge of the village green. He’d seen the sight so often before, curious Enfield citizens hovering around Colton’s tower.