by Andrew Post
“But we were dispatched only two months ago. We barely got here.” She had to sit.
“I know,” Erik said. “I don’t understand either.”
“They pull this shit, even knowing our teams were already on the way? We were coming here because they told us to. What about Sir Gunnar and his men? The Committee sent them to help us, and they abandon them?”
“Where are they? Have they already started in?”
“They’re gone. There was a bomb on the trestle coming over the island. We barely made it across.”
“So they’re . . . ?”
“All dead.”
“Blazes. What about your team?”
“We lost one, not even an hour ago.” Please don’t ask how.
While Erik didn’t have more bad news ready in his hand to transcribe, something on his face said he still had more to share, some of his own.
“What is it?” Anoushka said.
“We had time before your team arrived. We scouted the rest of the island around the city, found the orcs’ supply routes from the docks. With so few of us, we couldn’t do anything but figured it’d be good intel once you and the blackcoats arrived.
“Out in the bay to the east, the orcs had ships waiting. When the water freezes over, they use that to their advantage. It’s thick enough now that they’re always moving supplies in on sleds. But they’re also routing more numbers from Silt to their frozen-in-place armada, as a way station.” In the lantern light his skin was golden, highlighting the creases in his forehead as he frowned. “Mann spent an entire day with a spyglass, counting. He said they’re piling those ships up full. They’re using New Kambleburg as their own front. And—according to him—when the orcs are ready, they’re going to bring the entire group across the ice, through the city, and north through the Scorch.”
“How many?”
“We figure about 5,000, but we’re not sure. Mann thinks they plan to soften Edgewatch with the first salvo, and when the others break through under the Mountain, together, both armies will have little resistance until they reach Yarnigrad.”
“And Yarnigrad won’t pose much of a threat. They’ll roll right over them.”
Erik swallowed, jaw flexing his grizzled cheeks. “They’ll reach New Delta City in no time. All along, it’s been assumed they were taking New Kambleburg because it was an easy target. They have no idea that while they’re watching the Mountain, Edgewatch will get rushed out of the Scorch. I’ve been trying to send a deet, to tell them, but I haven’t heard back.” He had a deeter wired up and tried again hitting short-short-long-short-long-short.
Anoushka stopped his hand. “It’s pointless. The wires came down with the trestle. Did Mann have any sort of alternative plan in the works?”
“Well, we started figuring them out little by little. He sent me into their camp a few blocks from here, to gather reconnaissance. I came across this.” From his pocket, Erik produced what looked like a single-shot pistol with a barrel nearly broad enough to fit Anoushka’s fist.
“A flare gun?”
“They have a signal system with the armada—like if the ice is thin not to bring anything over today, or to bring x number of supply crates over from the ships, et cetera. Those on the ships’ decks, in turn, blow a war horn saying they received the message. Two flare shots for ‘We need supplies,’ three for ‘Send more troops,’ and so on. They’ve only been using flares that burn with green trails. We apprehended one on patrol a few nights ago and found this on him.” Erik produced a black pellet that smelled powerfully of rotten eggs. “I snipped a piece off and put a match to it. This one burns red. They’ve started passing them around, to have on them.”
“And they haven’t used red flares for any communications with the ships before?”
“No.”
“‘Bring everyone over, the march begins’?” Anoushka said.
Erik agreed with a tightness to his voice; the kind typically heard strangling the throats of prefight greenhorns with serious jitters. For all his short-lived careers in dozens of jobs across countless towns, Anoushka knew Erik had never worked a single one that involved fighting. A stint as a pub bouncer was about as close as it got.
“I think they’re near being ready,” he said. “Once word gets back to the war chiefs that you guys made it over, they might take it as a surprise attack from the Crown and begin marching north.”
Anoushka laughed—it just fell out, surprising even her. She apologized, handing back the flare. Frowning, Erik was clearly expecting a word of encouragement. And as much as Anoushka wanted to give one, it’d been a tough trek simply getting here—only for it to hit an abrupt, unmarked dead end? Of course. What else could be expected? “Godsdammit,” she said and let one last chuckle sneak free.
They stood in silence for a moment. The lantern buzzed beside them on the table. The wind beat against the windows. The end is in sight. It was likely the most honest thought she’d ever experienced, arriving fluidly and complete. There’d been a running timer with her all her life. The clock’s hands had never been clear to her when she was growing up—as anyone’s attitude toward their mortality is when they’re young. Now, they were starkly plain to her. When she saw the end was not only cemented but rapidly nearing, the initial reaction was fear. But she was comfortable with the idea of it, at home with it. Perhaps enthused, even. Peace in Rammelstaad could be had. On an individual level, small and here, in her, with no loop of wishing for home while on the road and wishing for the road while stuck at home, it could stop; it could finally be over. She planned to fight to the last. Anoushka was comfortable knowing this could not be won, and in the freedom of that vacuum of hope, something genuine could be allowed to roam. Unfettered and raw, never documented, no need of bards to dig deep in their vocabularies for words to describe it . . . just herself, true.
She pulled Erik close and kissed him.
The returned kiss came on delay. Soft. Warm.
Sliding her hand down his side, she curled a palm up under the edge of his breastplate and found his hip bone, the dent in the skin where muscle edges dipped to meet and bond, toned. Warm. Her touch had an effect—he kissed her harder, nearly crushing her lips back against her teeth. He opened his mouth, as did she. His tongue caressed hers, delicate. She heard a metal rattle between them, his hands undoing his buckle.
“Not yet. Me first.” She undid her trousers, tugged them down, and hopped up onto the squat filing cabinet behind her.
The metal was cold on her thighs, but it soon lost its bite. He stepped close between her open legs, only a few layers of fabric between them. She could feel the heat of his member—pressing, rigid, and desperate. Its heat matched the lingering warmth of the pistol in her holster. Barrel still faintly hot from being used to end one of her oldest friends’ lives. While still pretending, she may’ve felt shame that it aided things. Not anymore. “I think you owe me,” she said.
With small swivels on his hip, he continued to poke at her. “Oh? What for?”
“The book.”
“I said I was sorry.”
“You did,” she said. “But say it again.”
She hadn’t bathed in weeks. Hadn’t shaved her legs in longer. Erik was never bothered by things like that and wasn’t now either.
He eased onto his knees. He drew her underwear down her thighs, then her knees, then to her ankles, and off. He kissed the inside of her thigh. She closed her eyes. His unshaven cheek made a rough sound as it brushed across her equally unshaven leg—an inch closer. Another. He backed away, kissing her knee.
Strangling his ponytail in her clutch, she wrenched him close, directing his mouth to where she wanted it. Reaching her, he kissed in a circle, then tenderly explored. He made a soft grunt, its vibration passing to her.
Gunfire farther out in the city started again—her friends had come across a patch of dug-in orcs, perhaps. She didn’t flinch or tell Erik to stop. The distant pops hit her ears, faint. They may’ve been ambushed, fighting for t
heir lives, or dying . . .
She reached over to her gun belt on the filing cabinet next to her. Squeezing a finger into the holster, she rested two fingertips on the mammoth-killer’s barrel. Warm. Her chest constricted, a tiny gasp escaped. The storm was drawing closer, quick, but not quite here. Thunder, but no flash, no crash. Not yet. Nearing . . .
“Use your hand.”
He did.
Back arching, her head banged against the windowpane behind her. She took his hair in her fist harder and, trying not to, twisted. He kept on, perhaps even taking this as encouragement. She pushed her hips against his fast-working fingers and tongue. Thrusting forward, nearly tipping the filing cabinet onto him. She didn’t care if it had tipped over; she decided she’d only stop when she heard his nose crunch.
The storm hit. She was struck. Gritted teeth. A gasp. Another, smaller. Then, louder, a third. Another strike. It’d been some time; the crashes hit in quick succession.
When she could open her eyes, comets streaked. He was still at task, determined to draw the storms back for more, each of his exhales catching the lantern light. Each small steam gush erupted out the sides of his mouth between stolen, short breaths, rising up off her. She studied the architecture of his body—shoulders under steel, the muscles of his neck as they stretched. And then . . . over his shoulder, his knapsack. Its flap had dropped back, and she could see inside. A canteen, spare wax rolls for his spiralphone, and a wound coil of thin white rope.
No. Not rope.
A fuse.
Paranoid
With the barrel against his forehead, Anoushka pushed Erik away from her. Seeing the gun, he withdrew his fingers from her and raised empty hands.
“Whoa. Wait. What’s wrong?”
She dropped down from the filing cabinet. “What’s wrong?” She didn’t care she was wearing nothing from the waist down besides boots; she tore the coiled bundle from his knapsack and shook it in his face. “Care to explain this? Hands.”
Remaining on his knees, he raised his hands. His chin and two fingers of his left hand glistened. “It’s fuse wire.”
“I know it’s fuse wire. Question is, the fuck are you doing with it?”
“I—I carry the spare supplies.”
“Bullshit.”
“I don’t understand. Please. Why is me having a fuse in my bag—?” He made a small gasp. “I had nothing to do with the bridges. I swear. Anoushka, please.”
“Have the Blaggards made a deal with Lyle?” She held him at gunpoint one-handed to struggle on her trousers. “Or were you working for him the whole fucking time?”
“We’re not working with him, Anoushka, I swear. Why would you think—?”
“That you know of. You’re the blameless packhorse, apparently, right? There were 200 men on that train—all of whom are fucking dead now. We barely made it onto the island alive. In fact, let’s do some math. I counted ten Blaggards when we met at the church, excluding you. Right? Ten Blaggards?”
“Yes, ten.”
“We killed three on the trestle. So if we subtract three from ten . . .”
“What did they look like?” Erik said.
“They were wearing hoods. But that shouldn’t matter.”
“Please, Anoushka, I swear I don’t know where any of them are, where they’ve been, how many are still alive. The orcs, then. They did it.”
“They’re cruel, but they aren’t clever. And they like to look you in the eye when they do you in, not from afar with a detonator.”
“I’ve been here, going through deets, for days. Please believe me.”
Outside the telegram office’s windows, Anoushka heard fighting start up again. The faint cracking reports of rifles, pops of pistols, erratic. And louder than the rest: an inconsistent rattle—the crank gun Peter had appropriated. Maybe it wasn’t the orcs her remaining squaddies had run across but the orcs and the Blaggards.
“Get up.” She dragged Erik to his feet by his shoulder pad and shoved him toward the door. “Remember, I’m right behind you with this pressed against your spine.”
“What’re we doing?”
“We’re gonna go find Mann, see how your stories compare, and count Blaggards.”
With the gun to his back, Erik moved to the door, hands staying raised. “Whether Mann blew up the bridges, I don’t know. The only thing I know is I had no involvement if they did.”
“Don’t care. Go.”
“Wait. I need my bag.” He attempted to swerve away from the door to move to a satchel set near the wall.
She moved ahead of his path. He could have a gun in there, another bomb. “Leave it.”
“I can help. I swear to the gods I had nothing to do with the bridges. I joined only because—”
“I don’t care why you joined. You did. You’re one of Mann’s.”
He had his hands out to gesticulate with his next plea but let them slap against his thighs. “You know me. You know I could never do that.”
“I thought I knew you. I thought I could tell you things without you turning around and selling my stories, but look how that turned out. Go.”
Maybe the Blaggards would surrender, if they liked Erik enough. And if not, she could use him as a meat shield. The newly abandoned part of her resurfaced long enough to remind her that mere minutes ago she’d been sharing a rather nice passionate moment with this man, a man she once loved. Now she stood before him, body still buzzing, but nonetheless ready to end his life. I am done with this.
“I can help you find Lyle.”
“Do you know where he is?”
“Are you asking because you think I’m working for him?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know. Not only because I’m not working for him, but I honestly do not know.” He was getting louder, more frustrated. Good. Prime conditions for a slip. Maybe he’d fib himself into a corner, like he used to. “We’re cut off from ever going home, sure, but we can still make this worthwhile. With Lyle dead, that’s one less thing Skivvit’s army has going for it. One drop in the bucket, maybe, but it’s something. Can you please stop pointing that at me?”
Though not entirely sold, she still bent to pick up his satchel. He might’ve been telling the truth. Might’ve. Anoushka hiked the strap onto her shoulder. “I’ve got your bag. Let’s go see what Mann has to say.”
* * *
With Erik ahead of her, they splashed through the square. She stopped him when passing Joan. As the infrequent bursts of gunfire continued in the distance, Anoushka worked fast to get inside the tank and find her store of spare ammunition. She ducked into the bandolier, double-checked her mammoth-killer, and snapped it closed with a flick of her wrist. As she hopped to grab Joan’s raised armored flank—her side aching from where Peter had kicked her—she noticed Erik had spotted the interior of the tank. Specifically, the pools of Ruprecht’s blood near the forward pedalers’ pit. The cold had kept it red.
“Did one of your team get hurt?” Erik said, his concern genuine.
She closed the flank on the scene within, a questioning gone bad. “Come on.”
* * *
Somewhere far off, something exploded, briefly lighting the overcast night sky orange. Treading light, they followed the trail of spent shell casings winking bright in blood puddles, both red and black.
They made a left, and ahead, a man hung from a street lamp by a thick steel cable wound around his neck, face puffy and purple. Several crudely fashioned blades were left stuck in his torso to the hilts, their points bristling on his back. With Anoushka’s hold on leather cuirass shoulder straps, she could feel his sudden tension. Nearly imperceptibly, he tried steering them around the body. She kept him on straight, making him pass close enough to brush up against the corpse’s dangling boots. The orcs had left the man his pocket watch—it dangled by its chain, still clipped to his waistcoat.
“City Watch,” Erik said. “They only give those watches to the senior officers. He must’ve stayed thinking he’d be able t
o fight them. I hope he didn’t have family. And if he did, I hope they got out safely.”
Anoushka was taken aback by Erik’s show of heart. He used to allow it to catch air once in a while but seldom. Odd, him wanting to now.
Every few steps she’d glance to the sky, expecting to see a red flare arcing up into the smoke and low clouds. Blessedly, none came. No war horns sounded out from the bay.
The gunfire had stopped—she had no idea which way to head. At an intersection, she turned them and spotted evidence of the fight having moved this next direction. Lines of bullet holes detailed Peter’s quick comfort with the crank gun. They passed a dead orc lying in the road, then another, both nearly sawed in half by bullets.
Open, staring eyes watched them pass. Anoushka was prepared, but neither rose.
The storm drains had become blocked with gore—the gutters overflowed onto the sidewalks with black blood. This she let Erik steer them around.
Anoushka pulled Erik aside, close to the building fronts. They crept on after a moment to listen, sidling along quietly. Her heart threatened to burst. They took cover behind an overturned carriage. She peeked around, but smoke obscured the view ahead to less than ten yards. The buildings made the street into a tight man-made canyon. Down the lane, the orcs had set a blockade. An automobile or two, carriages, caravans, and wagon wheels set ablaze. Beyond the high flames and black smoke, not much could be discerned. She stepped back behind the carriage. Erik hadn’t stolen the chance to bolt. He was still next to her, wringing his hands, eyes closed, lips moving, murmuring—like he used to read, except now, it was words of his own, prayers.
“I want to believe you,” she told him.
He opened his eyes, looked over at her. “And I want you to. I haven’t liked working for Mann. Honestly, if he did have anything to do with the bridges, I wouldn’t be surprised. The whole way here, he kept talking about how he had some way to ‘guarantee’ we’d be the ones to get Lyle Eichelberger—but I never thought it’d be that.”
