Valley of Fires: A Conquered Earth Novel (The Conquered Earth Series)

by J. Barton Mitchell

  Above, Castor flipped up and off one of the cables and landed in the middle of the Crux, his Lancet a blur of blue light. The rebel snipers stopped firing and stared at the masked boy wielding a glowing, dual-edged weapon. It was their mistake.

  It took about six seconds. Castor dodged their strikes and gunfire in flashes of purple light, sending them screaming over the railing and falling toward the Nonagon below. The match had abruptly stopped and Holt could see the crowds were emptying out of the different sections in a rush, but Holt knew they were going to be too late. It would take minutes for them to get here, and the rebels would be done long before then.

  Bullets kept flying. Holt noticed the plunder bin next to him. Inside lay a row of things in separate containers of foam. Grenades. Several dozen. As he studied them, an idea occurred to him, an insane one, and he was surprised by how little aversion he felt toward it.

  Holt grabbed two of the grenades, one in each hand. They felt cool and heavy. He peered out from behind the conveyor one last time … then simply stood and stepped out into the open, walking forward.

  Bullets whizzed through the air, barely missing him. Holt didn’t even flinch.

  “Holt!” It was Ravan’s yell, horrified, from behind him. The shout registered, just barely, but he ignored her, kept walking casually through the bullets screaming past.

  Some of the rebels saw him. Their guns turned, flashed, but Holt felt nothing. What would happen would happen.

  A few more steps and he was at the pipeline, where the two rebels were working with the torch. They stared up at him in shock. Holt dispatched the first with a grenade-laden fist to the head. The second he slammed into the pipe and watched as he fell to the ground.

  Bullets sparked all around him, but he didn’t duck, he just reached for a smaller wheel on the big pipe, the line’s blow-off valve, used to bleed off excess gas in case of high pressure. He spun the wheel, and there was a loud hiss as white vapor shot into the air.

  “Hold fire!” a young, masculine voice shouted, and the bullets from the rebels silenced instantly. Holt heard Ravan shout the same order. No one wanted to fire a bullet now, especially toward him. Igniting the gas spewing out of the massive pipe would set off the whole thing, and probably blow the entire Pinnacle to pieces.

  Which was what made it all the more shocking when Holt pulled the pins from both grenades and casually stood on top of the pipe.

  Everyone on the platform—rebels, Menagerie, Ravan—stared at him in dismay.

  Holt hadn’t released the grenade handles, which meant they hadn’t primed. But if he were to drop them, say, from being shot …

  “Doesn’t happen often,” a voice observed with slight amusement, “but I am at a loss for words.” It belonged to a hard-edged-looking kid, with long blond hair tied behind his back. He was covered in grease and grime, but Holt had a feeling it didn’t have anything to do with the battle. Rogan West, Ravan had called him, the leader of this futile rebellion, but Holt didn’t recognize him. “I suppose the idea is if we shoot you, you drop the grenades … and boom.”

  Holt just stared back, without emotion. There was a resourcefulness in Rogan’s eyes, charisma too. Holt could see why the others followed him, though it wouldn’t amount to much.

  “That, of course, means you would be dead too,” Rogan continued. “That what you want?”

  Holt shrugged. “It’s funny. Not really sure what I want anymore.”

  Rogan stared back at him consideringly, like he were some riddle to figure out. Maybe he was, Holt thought, but the answer was simpler than the kid knew. There was just a lot of power in having nothing to lose.

  “Holt Hawkins,” Rogan said. “That’s you, isn’t it?”

  Holt didn’t reply.

  “You did this place one hell of a solid when you killed Archer Marseilles. You’re the last person I’d expect to help Tiberius, much less die for him.”

  “I need him and the Menagerie intact, and you’re screwing that up.”

  “Ah.” Rogan nodded, interested and skeptical at the same time. “So, it’s about you, not him.”

  Holt was losing patience. He felt the cold orbs of the grenades in his hands.

  “Call this scrub’s bluff,” one of Rogan’s men said next to him, gun aimed at Holt.

  Rogan shook his head. “There’s no bluff to call, he’s pulled the pins. He’s committed. I like that. Not enough people really put their money where their mouth is anymore. Why don’t you come work for us? Make real change instead of just adding to Tiberius’s power base?”

  The answer was simple. “Because you’re going to lose.”

  The rebels tensed around Rogan, the guns shook in their hands, but their leader looked back without malice. If anything, he seemed more impressed.

  “Straight shooter,” Rogan said. “I like that too. When you see Tiberius … tell him I said hi.”

  Holt frowned. The rebels stood up and moved for their wounded, helping them to their feet. No one fired at them, because the blow-off valve was still venting. Seconds later, they were zipping away on the Skydash.

  When they were gone, Holt shut off the valve, sealing away the gas stream. Menagerie reinforcements were swarming onto the platform now, weapons drawn, but there was no longer anything to fight. Castor landed next to Holt in a flash of cyan, and Holt noticed a broad, contented smile on his face.

  White Helix …

  Castor reached down and grabbed the pins Holt had let fall to the ground, and while Holt held the grenades, slipped them back into place, disarming them. They felt no different to Holt either way, he noticed strangely.

  “What is your problem?” Ravan’s voice yelled from behind him. The look in her eyes as she advanced was pure fury. Clearly, she didn’t approve of what he’d done, even if it had pushed back the rebels.

  “The Holt I know would never pull a stunt like that,” Ravan spat as she closed the distance, stopping in front of him. “Who the hell are you?”

  Holt sighed. He just wanted this day to be over, the trade to be complete, and to be on his way. More than anything, he wanted to be alone, where he didn’t have to pretend to be something he wasn’t, where he didn’t have to be anything to anyone else. Ravan was angry because she cared about him, but it stirred nothing in him. It was just another burden.

  “What do you want me to say, Ravan?”

  “I don’t want you to say anything, I want you to screw your head on right, because what I just saw were not the actions of a rational person, especially not one with as much responsibility as you have. Do you even remember why you came here?”

  Holt stared back at her absently. “Do you remember that you don’t believe in any of it?”

  “You’re right,” she replied with fire. “I don’t believe in any of it, it’s insane and pointless, but you believe in it. Passionately. Or at least you used to.”

  “What do you care what I believe?” There was an edge of ice in his own voice he’d never heard before. “You said it yourself: you don’t care, so why not just leave me the hell alone? We’d both be better off that way.”

  Ravan looked at him scornfully, almost with disgust. She probably saw his ambivalence as weak, and there was nothing she hated more than weakness. She held his gaze and moved closer, punctuating her words. “She’s gone, Holt.”

  It was the last thing he wanted to hear. Holt tried to move off, but she grabbed him and held him in place.

  “She’s gone. It sucks. But you live with it.”

  “You don’t think I know that, Ravan?”

  “I know it hurts, but if you would just let me help you, if you would just see that—”

  Holt grabbed her now and pulled her close, the anger inside him, the frustration at all the responsibility he was forced to bear, finally poured out. “I don’t want your help. I don’t want anything. Not from you, not from anyone. You need to think of me as someone who’s gone, because that’s how it is. You’re right, she is gone. And so am I. Got it?”

>   Ravan held his stare a moment, and then, to his surprise, in spite of the venom and the scorn in his voice, shook her head defiantly. The emotion in her eyes became anger. “You’re a coward, you know that? You repulse me, but I’m not giving up on you. I won’t, no matter what you say to me or how hard you try and push me away. I’m going to hound you until you’re the person I remember again, I will beat it out of you, I swear to God. You have exactly no choice in the matter.”

  She yanked away from him and started moving, pushing through the crowd. Holt watched after her, and for the first time since Currency, he felt a slight twinge of emotion. Guilt maybe, or something fonder, he couldn’t be sure. He watched until she disappeared in the direction of the platform’s edge, and blended in with the rest of the Menagerie, and when she was gone, whatever he felt was covered up and buried just as quick.

  * * *

  MASYN PERCHED NEAR THE top of one of the strange city’s giant towers. The flames whipped upward above, and she could feel the heat even over the intensity of the sun.

  Castor was easy to spot, leaping up the tower opposite hers in flashes of yellow and purple, engaging the Menagerie on the platform over the giant arena in the very center.

  Holt was harder to find, he blended in with the crowds, but eventually she spotted him, one of the few not running away. She admired the rebels’ strategy, leaping from those wires onto the platform, firing their primitive weapons. They had drive and fearlessness. She liked Holt’s strategy even more, walking into certain death, the grenades, willing to risk everything just to win.

  Masyn smiled and decided she liked this Faust. It was dangerous. Unpredictable. Chaotic. She felt more at home here than she had felt anywhere since the Strange Lands, and it had only been a few minutes. She wondered what else this place had in store for her.

  When the battle was over and the dark-haired pirate had finished with Holt, Masyn watched them all move off.

  Castor and Holt had already gotten themselves in trouble, and there was little doubt it was a trend that would continue. Masyn would keep an eye on them, but, of course, that was the whole plan. Infiltrate the city and watch. She’d stay here until nightfall, then try her hand at that cable system connecting the strange towers, with their flames at the top. She wondered if she could run across the entire length of one.

  12. TIBERIUS

  THE SPEAR POINT EXPLODED through the armor plate in a shower of green sparks, and then hummed back through the air to Castor’s Lancet with a reverberating, harmonic ping. The plate was just under a foot thick, something from an old tanker ship, and the crystal punched through like it wasn’t even there.

  Tiberius’s only reaction was the slight raise of an eyebrow, but it took a lot to impress him, and even more to generate a reaction. The power of the White Helix weaponry would be obvious to anyone. It was all but assured now: he would make the deal and Holt could finally get out of here.

  They were at the top of the Command Pinnacle, where Tiberius’s private quarters rested. A large balcony overlooked all of Faust, and Holt tried not to think about where he was. Archer’s room had been just below this one.

  “And the rings?” Tiberius asked, in his slowly thoughtful voice.

  “Off the table,” Avril replied, standing next to Holt. “They’re too dangerous to use without training.”

  Tiberius gave no indication whether that was acceptable or not. He simply beckoned for the Lancet in Castor’s hand, and the Helix studied him warily.

  “That’s not appropriate,” Avril said, forcing herself to be civil. “A Helix never parts with his weapon. It’s a grave insult to even ask.”

  Tiberius’s eyes slanted slightly toward his daughter. “I am to agree to a deal of this scope without even touching what you offer?”

  Avril frowned, then, after a moment, nodded to Castor.

  Slowly, he handed Tiberius the Lancet. It made Holt uneasy, seeing a weapon like that in the hands of Tiberius. But what did it matter? He would make the deal and be gone, and the Menagerie could do whatever they wished. He wouldn’t be around to see it.

  “Each Lancet is unique,” Avril said. “The shaft is honed and shaped by its owner when they earn the right, from wood and materials they gather on a quest into—”

  “Do you really see the Menagerie fighting this way?” Tiberius cut her off like she wasn’t even speaking, slowly twirling the weapon in his hands. “With spears?”

  Holt expected the question. He spoke up, and when he did, the weapon seemed to spin faster in Tiberius’s hands. “It’s the crystal you should be interested in, that’s where the power is. It can be formed into pretty much any shape you want.”

  “Like the tip of a bullet,” Tiberius said.

  “Exactly.” Next to Holt, Avril closed her eyes. To her this was a nightmarish deal, but, like him, she had no real choice. They needed the Menagerie if they were going to save Zoey, and the weapons were their only real tradable commodity.

  Holt and Castor had been led here by Ravan and then left in Tiberius’s quarters with Avril. The room was not what you might expect. It was comfortable, certainly, but completely absent of materialistic possessions. There was a bed, a dining table, chairs and a sofa, a workbench with tools, an entire wall full of shelves lined with books on technical and engineering subjects, and a drafting table, the wall around which was lined with blueprints and schematics of Faust and its original infrastructure.

  The only thing that might count as an indulgence was a large, very old crossbow mounted to the wall near the bed. It was the only thing in the room whose purpose wasn’t immediately perceptible.

  Besides Tiberius, there were two large guards, and a heavily muscled officer named Quade, who had a strange habit of looking at everything sideways. He wore an orange Taurus on his right hand, and his Menagerie star had seven of its star points filled in, marking him as an Overseer. Two silver .45 pistols were sheathed in double shoulder holsters under his arms. He was Tiberius’s master-at-arms, and Tiberius trusted his counsel on all military matters.

  “Quade?” Tiberius asked, moving away with the Lancet. “Your thoughts?”

  The boy seemed unimpressed. “It’s powerful, no doubt, but I’m not sure how we would mass-produce enough ammo for it to be worthwhile. From what I understand, it’s difficult and dangerous to shape these crystals.”

  “The deal includes the ability to mass-produce this crystalline ammunition to our specifications, so that’s not an issue,” Tiberius observed. “There’s a bigger concern I was hoping you would see.”

  Quade seemed impatient. “Which would be?”

  “The Wind Traders. They’ve already entered into a bargain for this technology. If they adopt its use and we do not, the balance of power will shift. The ramifications of that I find troubling, and so should you.” For the first time since Tiberius had entered the room, he looked at Holt, the Lancet still spinning in his hands.

  Holt stared back at him. It was strange, the lack of emotion. This encounter was something that had been building for a long time, but it, like everything else now, failed to move him.

  “I heard what you did in the Handover Ward,” Tiberius said. “It was … surprising.”

  “Time changes people, I guess,” Holt replied. He wasn’t sure he meant it, but it was what he figured Tiberius wanted to hear.

  The Menagerie leader studied him a long moment, but there was no way to read his thoughts. “You have changed. You’re … harder now. Colder. You’ve been hurt, haven’t you?”

  Before Holt could say anything, Avril cleared her throat. “I think we should get back to—”

  Tiberius held up a hand to silence her, his eyes still on Holt. “Engineering has always been my passion. I used to be an engineer here—in fact, I helped design this facility back before it was Faust. Did you know that?”

  Holt wasn’t surprised. Tiberius knew far too much about the inner workings of the structure, had played too prominent a role in the city’s construction, and there was no
denying his mechanical genius. The Nonagon, for instance, was a work of horror, but the skill it took to design was unquestionable.

  Tiberius tossed the Lancet to Quade and it hummed as it split the air. The big kid studied it skeptically when he caught it, testing its weight, still unimpressed.

  “You’ve noticed the crossbow, certainly,” Tiberius said as he removed the ancient weapon from the wall. It was bigger than it had looked, almost as big as Tiberius himself, but he held it easily. “Do you know why I keep it? Why I find it relevant?”

  Holt said nothing, he was growing tired of this show and tell. He wanted to be done here, to be on his way, but Tiberius just kept talking.

  “Because it represents the taking of power,” the man said pointedly, as if it was meaningful. “One of the first accounts of a crossbow came from the Greek engineer Heron, of Alexandria. He described a weapon called the ‘Gastraphetes,’ a primitive crossbow, but it still could fire with far more energy than an arm-drawn hand-bow. Impressive, no doubt, but that wasn’t why it caused such a major shift in how wars were fought. What do you think the real reason was?”

  The question, oddly, wasn’t directed at Holt or even Avril. Tiberius was asking Castor. It took a moment for the Helix to realize he was being addressed. When he did, he thought about it for a moment, then answered. “To use a bow requires years of specialized skill. But anyone can fire a crossbow, once it’s primed.”

  A smile from Tiberius was a rare thing, but he wore one now. He seemed impressed. “Exactly. The crossbow was simple, cheap, and physically undemanding enough to be operated by large numbers of regular, conscripted soldiers, no matter how dim-witted. It shifted everything, and all because some ancient engineer sat down and thought of a way to overcome human limitation. I find that … inspiring.”

  What happened next happened so quick, not even Castor’s honed instincts could save him.