by Dawn Steele
A man on a horse was making his way across the river. Snow White tapped Aein’s shoulder. “A survivor!”
The man saw them, panicked, and bolted his horse. The horse whinnied as it tried to ford the river, but slipped instead and was carried away with the current. The man flailed his arms and went under.
“Oh no,” Snow White cried.
One of the Sporadean soldiers swooped down to hitch the man up from under his armpits. He gently laid the man down on the ground beside the river while Snow White, Aein and Gnomica descended.
“We mean you no harm,” Snow White said. She knelt beside the man, who could not have been much older than she was. “Please, tell us what happened.”
The shivering man shook his head, his frightened eyes looking from her splotchy face and bald scalp to the others. He must have thought them all horrors. To Snow White’s surprise, Gnomica spoke to him in Finnish.
“She learned it,” Aein said with a hint of pride. “She thought it would be the first human language she would speak.”
The man rattled something back.
Gnomica translated for everyone present, and Aein for Snow White: “When the monsters poured out of the lake, we were already warned. The King’s men rode through the towns and villages, and told us the monsters were afraid of fire. We burned every forest and field as we ran from our homes. The monsters destroyed our homes with cannons that punctured walls. Those who were not buried under the rubble fled to the fortress.”
“Rova.” Snow White saw again Kalle’s castle with its battlements and walls. They were ten feet thick, if she remembered correctly. “They will make a stand there. If Lapland falls, Dimynedon will spread his wings to the south.”
To the lands beyond the Enchanted Forest. My home.
They flew to Rova after rescuing the man’s horse. As they finally approached the fortress on the hill, Snow White heard the distant booming of walls being struck, as though thunder itself snaked through the city streets. The fields and houses outside the fortress were aflame. No human was in sight. Whether they were all dead or behind the castle’s walls, she had no way of knowing.
The fortress’s battlements were lined with flaring torches, all throwing out plumes of grey smoke. A rebel battalion of Sporadeans massed a distance away from the walls like landed creatures, even though they possessed flight. Several cannon-like weapons were mounted on tripods. The weapons were made from the same luminous material that formed the Hives’ walls.
“What are those?” Snow White asked Aein.
“A type of electromagnetic ballista.”
“Electro what? Oh never mind. Why aren’t Dimynedon’s soldiers flying into the fortress?”
Aein pointed at a flotilla of balloons that blanketed the castle’s immediate airspace. “I am not sure what that is.”
Snow White wasn’t either. She gazed at the balloons. Unease prickled her newly grown skin. The balloons were each roughly the size of a small cottage, and tethered to the watchtowers by ropes. Each wore a pattern that would not have been out of place in one of the festive balls she had attended when she was a child.
She could not pick Dimynedon out from the rest. The area between the rebel Sporadeans and the fortress walls was littered with fallen rubble and arrow shafts. The grass was charred in patches.
Aein frowned. “Thulrika is not here. The unit down there looks too depleted.”
Snow White felt hopeful. “You mean Kalle is winning?”
“No. I believe this is an offshoot of the main army. The rest are elsewhere.”
“What do we do?”
The ballistas emitted a high-pitched whine, and part of the fortress’s walls crumbled to reveal yet another layer of fortified brick. It would be a matter of time before the outer curtain was breached. A rain of flaming arrows arced into the air but fell short once again, adding to the bed of fallen shafts. The ballistas whined again. Another section of wall crumbled, revealing more brickwork. The large wooden gates, fortified by steel, remained standing.
Snow White strained her eyes but could not see Kalle on the ramparts. She wondered if he was ensconced in his throne room, plotting the next move. Where were the Bambenga? Holed up with him? Or had they even survived the exodus into the castle walls? She suddenly felt terrified for everyone trapped in there. The entire area was a volcano waiting to erupt.
She had a hunch that nothing would go the way it was planned.
“I must find Dimynedon and speak to him,” Aein said.
“No!” Gnomica rattled a few more words to him in their own tongue. Her manner was terse.
“It has to be done,” Aein replied curtly.
The grounded Sporadeans espied them. Those manning the ballistas halted and turned to view the newcomers with distrust. Several rebel Sporadeans took to the air to meet Gnomica’s approaching units headlong. The soldiers behind Snow White fanned out, red rods ready.
“Snow White,” Aein said, “I must drop you off. It is not safe.”
“No.”
“Do not be foolish.” He veered the Karskh away from the fortress grounds. “I cannot fight if I have to worry about your safety.”
“So you’re going to get yourself killed?” she challenged. “You intend to fight your winged cousin wearing this body?”
He ignored her and landed the Karskh on a grassy hillock a little distance away from the potential battleground. “I will come back for you,” he said.
“Is that a promise?”
She was ashamed of how peevish she sounded. If he got killed, this was not how she wanted their final moments to be. So she steeled herself and grabbed his face with both hands. She kissed him, pouring out all her hope and sorrow and dread in one lingering connection, and pushed away all images of Aein being tossed from his Karskh three hundred feet above the ground.
When their lips parted, he whispered, “I love you.”
“Keep remembering that every time you decide to become a hero.” Her voice trembled.
She dismounted and kept her eyes trained on his lithe form as he looked back longingly at her. With an expression that suggested a heavy reluctance, he forced himself to turn away. The Karskh flew off at his bidding.
Snow White sped up the hillock to watch Aein join the battle. The two Sporadean factions were at each other in full force, kin against kin, mandible against mandible. She wondered what the archers on the battlements and the castle dwellers must think of this. Would they even understand what this was all about? The sky was filled with high-pitched whines. Red beams lasered through the air. Pairs dueled, their wings fluttering like petals in a maelstrom. Now and then, one would fall from a tussling pair, broken wings fanning weakly as it plunged to the ground.
Snow White had only eyes for one. Aein stood out in the melee, the Karskh easily being three times the size of the aerial beings out there. He zeroed in whom Snow White presumed to be Dimynedon. Her heart leaped as Aein rose unsteadily to his feet on the Karskh’s back.
Oh no, she helplessly thought, unable to tear her eyes away.
Aein made the jump from the Karsk.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Aein flew into the air, almost certain the fall would kill him if he didn’t land on his target, the surprised Dimynedon. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Gnomica tussle with a rebel Sporadean. Dimynedon’s left wing, which Aein semi-ripped in their last unfortunate encounter, fluttered wholly healed. Aein aimed for it, but caught his cousin by the muscle-bound midriff instead.
Dimynedon’s carapace was as hard as steel, a warrior honed by years of pounding. His cousin’s warmth seeped into Aein’s skin, and he was reminded this was his own flesh and blood that he intended to beat to death here.
Mother would be weeping back in her cave.
Was death what Dimynedon craved? High treason was punishable by death, but Aein preferred to rein Dimynedon in and parade him in shackles down the avenues of Spora. All his instincts told him that it would have to be settled right here because Dimynedon would
never allow himself to be taken home.
Both of them plunged to the ground many feet below. Dimynedon tried to slow their fall by flapping his wings hard enough to attract the attention of another dueling pair. Nevertheless, Aein’s insistence in letting gravity take its toll won over. The two of them crashed onto the ground. If it had been a straight fall, they would have sustained severe injuries. But cushioned by Dimynedon’s flight attempts, they both rolled on the grass, relatively unhurt.
With more purpose than rage, Aein struck at every part of Dimynedon: his head, his bulging jeweled eyes, his red carapace and hugely muscled limbs – aware that he was striking against every hurtful taunt, cruel jibe and malicious joke made at his expense. Dimynedon had far been the stronger of the two in Spora where the gravity was lighter, but Aein’s sojourn on Earth had thickened the human muscles he now wore like a glove.
“Trying to get the better of me now, are you, Crawler?” Dimynedon jabbed a right hook into the side of Aein’s skull. “You’ll find it’s not so easy.”
“You underestimate me, cousin.”
“It’s wholly intentional.” Dimynedon’s uppermost appendages circled Aein’s neck while his four lower legs held Aein’s body in vice grip. He was making the extra limbs count. “You could never beat me at wrestling. What makes you think you’ll triumph now?”
The stranglehold around Aein’s neck tightened.
“Because,” Aein said, gasping, “you have always been too confident.” A sharp blow to Dimynedon’s abdomen caused his cousin’s lowermost limbs to unlock their hold. “You’ve never learned to brawl on the ground because you’ve always had flight.”
A vicious kick sent Dimynedon doubling in agony. Aein ripped his cousin’s grasp off his neck and struck Dimynedon’s softer face with his clenched human fist. Dimynedon rolled, and grabbed a rock. He leaped onto Aein, trying to bash his head in, but Aein averted his head in time. Aein seized his cousin’s upraised limb. It was a contest of strength: Sporadean flesh against genetically enhanced human flesh.
“What?” Dimynedon snarled. “Mommy’s not coming to your aid now?”
Aein made a twisting movement and Dimynedon’s arm bent at an unnatural angle. But Dimynedon recovered enough to slam to another of his appendages onto Aein’s chest. Aein felt one of his human ribs crack. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a strange sight – a flotilla of balloons racing from the fortress to the battlefield, buoyed by natural winds that rushed down the hill slope.
What in this world – ?
The archers on the distant battlements notched their bows. He could see the pointy tips of their gleaming arrows. No flames this time. Sporadean flesh was not their target.
“Wait,” he gasped.
“Had enough, cousin?” Dimynedon raised his upper limb like a machete. “Because you’re not going to leave this place alive.”
A cry sounded on the ramparts. Even if he didn’t understand Finnish, Aein knew it said, “Fire!”
Arrows zinged. Soft bodies plopped. Not flesh, but the cloth carapaces of the balloons. The air-filled fanciful pieces, buoyed by hot gases, popped in succession. Although visibly unchanged, the atmosphere suddenly felt pregnant with humidity, as though a squall were descending.
Dimynedon averted his face, and Aein took the opportunity to deal a blow to one of his cousin’s eyes. Dimynedon gave a cry. His grasp on Aein’s torso slackened. Aein upended his human knee to force Dimynedon off him.
And then the shrieking began.
Both their heads snapped up in alarm. The air was rent with the shrill cries of a hundred voices in agony, and all of them were Sporadean. Aein’s heart skipped a beat. The Sporadeans nearest to the fortress were melting. That was the only word for it. Their carapaces receded, as though liquid, to reveal the red muscles beneath. Wings and antennae fell off as though lopped by an invisible scythe. The red flesh, now revealed, blistered immediately.
“Gnomica,” Dimynedon gasped. He took off into the air, towards the direction of the mutilation that was taking place even before Aein could register what was happening.
What indeed was happening?
Then the realization struck him. Gnomica! She was still out there, if she hadn’t been slain. The fact Dimynedon realized it before he did shamed him.
The bloody tide of mutilation continued to roll down the hill slope at alarming speed. Somehow Kalle and his people must have harnessed something in the past few days that disintegrated Sporadean flesh. What terrible thing could it be? It was obviously airborne. Aerosol poison? Virus? What did these primitive people even know about viruses?
Whatever it was, it engulfed all Sporadeans alike – those who were foes to the humans, and those who came to save them.
Aein’s heart sank.
No way Spora would see this as anything but an act of war. Misunderstandings and ancient laws be damned. What was Kalle thinking of when he ordered the release? Had he even understood what was going on in the confusion? Or had Dimynedon’s earlier destructive path wrought so much hatred that the humans had no recourse but to launch an assault the moment they had a chance?
The remaining Sporadeans were fleeing the balloon spatter now. Those whose wings had fallen off succumbed to the crushing tsunami of the blood tide.
“Gnomica,” Aein cried. Amid the profusion of fleeing and dying bodies, he could not glimpse her. Perhaps she was dead. Perhaps Dimynedon had saved her in time. The invisible plague continued to roll down the slope, engulfing the laggards, the wounded, and the dewinged. It would soon wash over him – crawling and born with a stunted wing.
Unless his human shell protected him.
Sporadeans everywhere would unite, and Earth would be their battlefield. Thulrika and Dimynedon would be hailed as the heroes who knew what they were doing, and Aein – the crippled prince – would once again be the outcast who tried to mislead his Queen into helping the enemy.
All for the love of an indigenous female, they would say in disgust.
The history tablets would bleed from his name.
“Snow White,” he cried, her face shining before him as it did when he first met her in the woods. He was not sorry he loved her. Not sorry that he did everything because he believed that it was right.
A large shadow fell upon him amid the other fleeing shadows and blocked out the sun. When he looked up, he saw Snow White on the Karskh, her face scarred and pitted like the landscape of Spora, but every bit as beautiful to him.
“Aein,” she said, and her voice was honey to his blood-filled ears.
The Karskh landed. Flinging herself off, Snow White sped to Aein. Every breath he drew caused his chest to spasm.
“I love you,” she said fiercely, helping him up. “If you die on me, I’ll kill you myself.”
As Aein stumbled onto the back of the Karskh, he caught sight of Gnomica – thank God! She flew with Dimynedon above him, heading for the far hills.
“Cousin!” she called, her face full of sorrow and despair. “Why did you betray us?”
His heart shattering, Aein knew that war had truly begun.
EPILOGUE
Snow White, Aein and the Karskh perched on the top of Mt. Nordstrom. The winds swept across the craggy peaks, causing Snow White to shiver despite the wolf pelt wrapped around her. They had stopped at an abandoned village to appropriate clothes that were more suitable to the dipping temperatures.
Below them, the green glacial lake boiled with MegaPods of all sizes. No birds wheeled in the sky – they had all since fled to southern sanctuaries. The smell of alien metal and bioengineered flesh rose from the furiously churning waters. Within her womb, she felt a tightening. Whatever the babe would look like, it would be born into a world of blood and steel and smoking, hunted bodies.
“This is the largest assault we have ever mounted, by the looks of things,” murmured Aein.
“We,” Snow White echoed.
He eyed her, his expression sober. “I am not on their side, in case that is what you are wondering
. I am now a traitor to the cause.”
She crept closer to him, feeling his warmth through the bearskin coat he now wore. “I’m sorry,” she said, putting an arm around his waist.
He shook his head. “It cannot be undone. They are bringing out the heavy artillery.”
Down at the lake, the green waters seethed like a volcanic hotbed. Its eruption would bring the purposeful and systematic annihilation of her species.
“You do know I can’t let that happen, right?” she said softly. “I’ll have to fight on, with whatever kingdoms I can harness.”
Her own decapitated kingdom lay south, bereft of its ruler. It was now time to make a homecoming, she decided. She took a deep breath, the sudden weight of responsibility pressing down on her shoulders.
“I understand. And I will be by your side.” He hesitated, the pain obvious on his beautiful, unscarred face. “This will be very hard for me. My family is down there.”
“We can’t undo what has happened. But I love you no less.”
He wrapped his arm around her. In his earnest hazel eyes, she saw her luminous reflection. She refrained from the temptation to touch her own damaged cheeks. But his eyes were pools of warmth, and comfort, and enduring, heartfelt devotion.
She turned back at the churning lake. She grabbed his hand, the only thing she was secure in anymore.
“Let them come,” she said.
READ THE FIRST THREE CHAPTERS OF ‘BURN’, AN EXTREMELY SENSUAL NEW ADULT ROMANCE
