The Promise of the Child

by Tom Toner

  “Ready?” Sotiris asked, taking up his reins.

  “Bilocation, Elumo, is one of those phenomena that is quite impossible to describe to those who’ve yet to achieve it,” Stone said, sitting back in the chair with a satisfied smile and listening to the rumble down below. “It is the product of a gradual settling of the iron particles within the brain, a process that takes many thousands of years.”

  “Until they are aligned into a certain pattern,” supplied the Princeling Elumo, somewhat doubtfully. His glass rattled on the table and he put out a stubby little hand to steady it.

  Bonneville looked at the rings on the Vulgar’s fingers: thick wedges of precious metal spotted with stones. Since his youth, the thrill of stealing had been like a drug to him; he would take those rings for himself one day, when the Princeling was no longer useful to him.

  “Exactly, Elumo. The alignment is transitory, we are sure, possibly shifting to another pattern within a few millennia that will be of no practical use—certainly not for faster-than-light travel. It may be that we require our ancient fleet again before too long, and the further support of our dependable allies, the Vulgar.”

  “How do you know when you are able to do it?” Elumo asked, waving away the pleasantry. His other hand remained at the ready in case the drink shook again.

  “It always accompanies other physical, and often detrimental, changes—the inability to keep time, a lack of awareness of one’s surroundings, but also a swelling of the innate powers of the mind.”

  “Are you not afraid of these changes?”

  Stone looked at Bonneville for the first time. “Ask Reginald here, he is yet to experience them.”

  Bonneville smiled, performing a little shrug for the benefit of the Vulgar. “It is our curse.” He took another sip of his wine and washed it around inside his mouth.

  The three were drinking Vulgar alcohol as a courtesy to the Princeling, who apparently refused to drink anything else. It was impossible for an Amaranthine of any age to get drunk, but Bonneville could already feel the strong mixture burning his gums slightly.

  The Princeling took out his helmet briefly to check the time. He had changed from his shimmering gown into a beautifully made Void-suit in preparation for leaving. Bonneville glanced at the inside of the helmet as it was returned to the chair.

  That was supposed to be the signal.

  Elumo remained seated, staring at his hands, a smile forming on his small white mouth.

  Bonneville looked to the door, waiting for it to burst in. He had taken no chances; beneath his waistcoats he wore a plate of treated iridium, plundered from the tomb of an ancient Amaranthine.

  The door opened slowly, a couple of silent Vulgar soldiers entering to stand behind the Princeling, the tips of their pointed helmets only just reaching the arms of his high chair. Stone’s eyes remained fixed on the table, his hand cradling the cup of Vulgar wine.

  The realisation that he had been betrayed came to Bonneville slowly. He felt the smile dying on his face.

  Lycaste swore again and again beneath his breath, his hands squeezing the reins. He kicked and the beast galloped on, swerving through a plume of smoking wreckage as a shell landed nearby.

  Sotiris waited, circling the screaming zeltabra, his hand outstretched as if to shield his eyes as he stood in the stirrups. When the harsant was alongside, he put out his hand to catch Lycaste’s reins and swung one leg over the broad upholstered saddle.

  Lycaste shifted, the Amaranthine’s metal toe plates scuffing his shin, and they cantered on. The terrified zeltabra skittered away across the bridge through the flames.

  “Now!” Sotiris screamed, kicking his metal spur. The beast charged sideways along a crater in the stone, their teeth rattling with the impacts of shells slamming into the bridge. High above, the city of Vilnius Second burned.

  Lycaste—even among the encompassing, deafening bombardment of cannon-fire and hand-to-hand battle on the bridge—could hardly take his eyes from the metal monsters that ripped and wheeled across the skies. The Voidships, as Sotiris had called them. He closed his eyes at last, gripping the harsant’s neck, and let Sotiris do the steering.

  They flashed through the heat of a flaming tank, Lycaste’s eyebrows and beard singeing, and landed among a legion of thirty or more Jalanbulon directly engaging the small Firstling cavalry units with pikes and sabres. Amid the throng, an armoured Asiatic had hold of a Zeltabra’s hind leg. He roared and swung, unseating the Firstling soldier and snapping the animal’s limb, the beast’s scream made silent by the huge, reverberating noise all around.

  A Jalanbulon turned as they approached, raising his rifle. Sotiris leaned past Lycaste and stretched out his hand, engulfing the giant in an instantaneous blast of white flame that poured soot from its blazing tips. Three nearby Jalanbulon began thrashing and roasting in the heat given out by their burning comrade, whose armour pooled and bubbled amid the rubble. A shell followed through the smoke, bursting from a gun emplacement on the parapet, and once again the Amaranthine opened his palm, dissolving it into a molten bloom of falling sparks that showered the bridge ahead. Lycaste ducked his head through the coiling, rolling heat of another fallen war machine, the harsant bouncing madly as it galloped. It knocked a Firstling down, crushing him with a sickening crunch of bones, and slammed a Jalanbulon furiously to one side, the Asiatic rolling and clattering where his metal armour bit at the stone.

  A single, concerted bombardment suddenly lit up the edge of the bridge nearest to the city walls, shattering one side into the river below and dumping the chaotic crowd of hundreds of fighting Melius a hundred feet into the water. The harsant adjusted, swerving away from the shattered stone edges where troops still crawled and dangled, maimed and mauled by the bombardment, leaping a regiment of standard-bearing Firstlings and thumping to the ground amid a shattered tangle of spiked wire. It howled, stamping the wire down, but was snagged. They twisted, turning the beast as best they could while Melius thrust pikes and spears at them through the coils of wire. A sharp edge nicked Soti-ris’s chin, flinging blood across Lycaste’s arm, and then they were free, the burned skin on his legs ripping away. Lycaste stared at the Immortal blood, astonished for a moment as they cantered on. Sotiris extended his hand while they shook off the last of the wire, sweeping a host of charging Firstlings into nothing but a slanted column of sparks and ash. Blood streaming from cuts across the harsant’s own flanks flicked into their faces with each bouncing gallop.

  Lycaste looked up as a formation of the metal ships thundered overhead. They loosed rounds of erratic projectiles and angled away, the pale evening sun catching their coloured fins and strakes like glittering fish. He followed the trailing smoke of the flying mines until they encountered the walls, some blooming away in falling fragments of light before they could impact, others detonating and hurling stone far into the sky. Lumps of wall began raining down upon the throng of troops, smashing into the bridge. Legions and battalions stared upwards to watch the fleeing Voidships being overtaken by others of a different, even more threadbare design. Lycaste gaped in wonder, watching them tangle in mid-air. Tiny black specks—the strange men who made the Voidships—were slinging hooked ropes to leap between the craft as they rolled and twisted, many falling to their deaths. One of the vessels, the largest of the initial squadron, was suddenly blown in half in a lightning burst of flame and hurled detritus, screaming downwards to strike the bridge in an erupting fireball. The blast swept upwards from orange to black, engulfing the city gates and the hundreds of troops defending it.

  “Grab the damn reins, Lycaste!” Sotiris yelled, the barbed elbow of his suit scraping past Lycaste’s own. He did as he was told, pressing himself as low as he could into the harsant’s back. Sotiris stretched out a hand as they approached a lumbering tank, its guns swivelling in their direction. As they galloped past, the Amaranthine reached and snatched up one of the shocked little creatures that were climbing about on it, swinging him in an arc by the end of his helmet
and depositing him roughly in the saddle facing Lycaste.

  Lycaste stared at the creature and it stared back, huge blue eyes wide in its pale face.

  “Vulgar!” Sotiris shouted, lifting his faceplate, “You will take this Melius into the city and to the House of Gellesh. You will not stop to engage Lacaille, you understand?”

  The little head nodded, glancing uneasily back at Lycaste. “Yes, Amaranthine,” it squeaked in Unified, “the House of Gellesh.”

  The harsant swerved again, the flames of the downed Voidship rumbling across their path. Sotiris took Lycaste suddenly by the arm. “You remember my instructions?”

  He stared back into the Amaranthine’s eyes for a moment. “I do, but I still don’t understand why you won’t come with us.”

  “Just do as I say and all will be well,” Sotiris said, sliding down his faceplate. With one hand still on the reins, he pulled the harsant to a stop and dismounted quickly, slapping it hard on the rump with his gauntlet. As they raced through the smashed wreck of the guttering Voidship, Lycaste tried to look back, but Sotiris had already disappeared in the pall of smoke.

  When they were through, Lycaste and the creature regarded each other dubiously, both ducking under a sudden volley of shots. The Vulgar glanced around and shook his head, muttering.

  “You know where this house is?” Lycaste asked in First, taking in the intensely foreign look of the creature.

  The Vulgar twisted in the saddle and unholstered a side arm, twining a length of the reins around one arm. “We have to get through the city first, Melius—just steer this thing while I shoot.”

  Lycaste pulled on the reins, directing the stumbling harsant through another bank of smoke. Up ahead a pulverised section of the city walls, charred black and scattered with burning bodies, spilled out towards them. They climbed the huge blocks of smashed stone, clopping among stunned, half-dead Secondlings shuffling and coughing. When at last a wounded soldier thought to raise his weapon, Lycaste spurred the beast on, galloping up into the flaming city streets.

  “What are you?” he asked as they cantered, dodging running troops and tents.

  “Just steer!” The little man aimed and fired at a doorway, blowing it to splinters. “Through there!”

  Lycaste yanked the reins and the harsant went smashing through the house, knocking furniture and screaming Secondlings out of the way. They emerged in an ash-settled back garden stacked with supplies, ploughing through the boxes of fruits and meats and on into the next house.

  “Where—”

  “Short cut!”

  Another two houses later, they emerged into an empty street, sheets of ripped linen flapping around the pommel of the saddle. A group of Firstling soldiers in polished silver armour strung with long green standard capes rounded the corner, stopping when they saw the animal cantering towards them.

  “Jégeresső a Vulgáris, jégeresső azt Első!” the little man shouted in High Second as they swept past. Lycaste looked back to see some of the Firstlings cheering. Hail the Vulgar, hail the First.

  The streets narrowed as they ascended, coiling in a corkscrew fashion up the cone-shaped hill of the citadel. The guns at the top fired in stuttering bursts, their voices louder as the harsant climbed higher, but Lycaste could also hear the shouts and screams from below, where the Jalanbulon had made their way into the city. Secondling citizens scrabbled across the streets before the harsant, clothed in whatever makeshift armour they could cobble together from pans and plates and pots. They yelped and scattered at the animal’s approach, and Lycaste found he was enjoying himself despite his fear.

  The thundering of monstrous engines came suddenly from above. Lycaste looked up into the raging evening clouds to see more of the elaborate Voidships screaming down upon the citadel. Bursts of repelling fire pulped the closest of them to a fireworks display of glowing cinders, the others banking away.

  “Ha!” screamed the little man in First again, almost falling from the mount. “Not so easy!”

  He swivelled to face Lycaste as they clattered through one last empty encampment of colourful tents and up to the gates of the mighty house. “What happens now? Who are we looking for?”

  “Just get us in there,” he grunted, urging the beast up some stone steps to the gardens. He found that he’d become quite a proficient rider since leaving the forest with Sotiris, barely half a day earlier.

  The Vulgar shrugged. “Very well—you’ll have let me know who I’m allowed to shoot at, though.”

  The harsant clambered, grumbling, over the lip of the garden wall and onto the sunken lawns surrounding the estate, now strewn with smouldering pieces of the Voidship that had dared to attack the house. A column of guns, each of their barrels longer than three Melius men, pointed to the darkening sky or looked out over the bridge. Some clearly exhausted Secondlings plated in old-looking cuirasses were loading shells and ducking as they fired. Two five-legged tanks painted a lurid orange were still waiting, un-crewed, at the edges of the path to the house. Lycaste led the harsant to the edge of the wall, the animal panting and coughing, so that he could look out while they remained hidden from the house. The bridge, far below, had been almost completely destroyed, with only one or two connecting paths of stone remaining between the craters and towers of rising smoke. Massed troops still swarmed upon it, bottlenecking at the crossings, their voices like the distant roar of a waterfall. He watched a few being picked off by snipers higher in the city and retaliating fire from below. Down at the ruined gates the battle raged amid the decimated carcass of the Voidship. Heaving crowds of Jalanbulon and Firstlings struggled and shot at each other, the First soldiers outnumbered and surrounded. Lycaste’s eyes moved to the city streets where shots rang out among the white stone buildings, many already gutted by the fires. Some mounted Jalanbulon were cantering back down to the aid of their comrades at the gates; it would not be long before they had the city. Over the dark, misted jungle, the Voidships were massing again, the throaty rumble of their movements cutting a low bass note beneath the crack of shots and the boom of shells.

  The Vulgar sat up in the saddle. “Quick now, Melius, they’re coming back.”

  “My name’s Lycaste,” he growled, looking up to the grand house. “We’ll have to leave the harsant here.”

  “The what? Oh.” The little man seemed to consider dismounting on his own, finally turning and raising his arms impatiently.

  Lycaste set him down, wiping his hands with mild disgust, then dismounted himself. He stood on tiptoe to look over the inner wall, taking in the Voidship stationed at the top of the building. “Around the side, there are some outhouses—probably a necessarium. We could get in there, couldn’t we?”

  The Vulgar shot him an inquisitive look, and Lycaste wondered once more what he was doing with such a strange little person. “A necess—?” the soldier began to ask.

  “A place where you, you know …” Lycaste mimed a squat.

  The Vulgar’s eyes widened and he looked away. They were modest people, apparently. “Yes, yes, that’s enough.” He sighed, pushing back his spiked helmet. “Come on, then.”

  Lycaste kicked open the necessarium door, the Vulgar soldier sitting atop his shoulders with his rifle poised. The house kitchens were deserted and bare, with nothing but crumbs and empty sacks scattered across the vast oak tables. Long windows let in the last light of the falling dusk but were too high to see out of. He looked over to the three huge hearths, their fires still stoked and roaring.

  “All right, Melius, let me down,” the Vulgar said, swinging his little legs.

  “Lycaste. My name’s Lycaste.”

  “Yes, yes, Licasse, very good—let me down now.”

  Lycaste grabbed the soldier by the foot and dangled him upside down. “What’s my name?”

  “Lycaste! Lycaste!” the Vulgar screamed, his helmet clattering to the floor.

  “Good. And what do I call you?”

  “Huerepo! Huerepo Morimiel Vuisse! At your service!”
r />   “Pleased to meet you,” he grumbled, setting the soldier down.

  “How dare you!” the Vulgar spluttered, sweeping his wiry hair back from his reddened face. “You wouldn’t like it if I did that to you!”

  Lycaste smiled as he investigated one of the larders quickly. He’d not eaten a thing since his dinner with Envoy the night before.

  “I’ve done my job, you know. I got you here, like the Amaranthine asked. He didn’t say anything about being dangled upside bloody down!”

  “All right,” said Lycaste through a mouthful of starchfruit. He stared at the peculiar person—apparently from some unimaginable place beynapping from the silken fibres ofond the sky—marvelling for a moment at how poor both of them were at spoken First. “Do you know the inside of this place?”

  “No, I don’t. Why should I?” Huerepo slung his rifle across his shoulder and peeped over the edge of the table in search of his helmet. “Now, if it’s all the same to you, I’ll be on my way.”

  Lycaste’s ears twitched as he took another bite of the fruit. He grasped the Vulgar by the end of his rifle and hurled him into the larder, closing the wooden door behind them and covering the struggling little man’s mouth.

  Through the crack in the door he saw a Firstling dash into the kitchen and stare wildly about. His armour looked blackened and burned, his face bloodied. “There are tables!” he shouted in Second, grabbing the edge of one and pushing it further into the room until it slammed up against another.

  “Here! Here!” yelled more voices, the thundering of their metal boots reaching the kitchen. Lycaste saw perhaps a dozen fully armed Firstlings and Secondlings swarm into the chamber, suddenly remembering the last time he’d been trapped in a cupboard. The soldiers rushed about, sweeping the sacks and crumbs from the surfaces of the oaken tables before dragging more of them together.