Beasts of the Walking City (21 page)

“You’re a subject of a lot of conversation, Hulgliev. The only reason you’re not dead now is that I had Semper make them not kill you.”

I figure I won’t mention that was technically Kjat.

Nadrune takes a gulp of beer that hisses as it goes down her throat. Steam comes out of her nose. Then she sits back down next to me on the cushions, facing the windows. “You’ll want to see this, by the way. It’s quite impressive when it gets going.”

The fleet has come to a stop, and I watch as the ships launch the globes of magefire out into the sea. It must be the same way they attached the Port city. The globes fly in a high arc away to either side of the fleet, hit the water, and drop beneath the surface.

“Now, the fact that you’re here talking to me bothers the Tel Kharan,” Nadrune says. “They wouldn’t have made use of your talents, of course. But the fact that someone else might make use of you annoys them, now that they’ve had time to think about it, particularly given the history of their order. After all Hulgliev created them, under Dekheret’s direction. In the future, under my direction, can they be un-made? They’re wondering about that now. I’ve already had a letter of protest from the division Lieutenant Marshall.

“So let me lay out some scenarios for you. Say I give you that podship, and you fly it away from here to some place that we Akarii don’t have an interest in, off-lei somewhere, and you go back to doing whatever it is you do now—arms smuggling, retrieving, mercenary work, assassinations, whatever. Within a month, and frankly I’d be surprised if it took that long, the Tel Kharan will find you. They will find you and despite their history with your kind they will spend long hours stripping away the very thinnest layers of that thick, furred skin of yours one after another until you tell them just how you did what you did back there in that warehouse. They’re very good at that, you know. You’ll still be alive when they’re done with you, but you won’t want to be for very long.”

She shifts on the cushions. I can feel the heat rolling off her in waves. “Let us try out another scenario, though. Let me get creative with this one, yes? You make contact and confess everything you know immediately to the Tel Kharan. You explain to them in minute detail how you, some ragtag retriever mage, took out one of their combat-hardened veterans, and you beg them to take you under their wing and protect you from my political schemes.”

She smirks to herself. “They’ll certainly tell you what you want to hear for a few days. They’ll bring you aboard that bright new ship of theirs, put you up in a barracks and feed you what they call food, which frankly I can’t really recommend. And then, seemingly out of nowhere, comes a personal challenge from one of their battalion leads. You can’t refuse a Tel Kharan challenge, you know. Not on their own ship.

“You might stand up to the first one of those. And maybe the second. But they are nothing if not persistent, and they make up for their lack of finesse by being stubborn. It might be the fifth one, or the thirteenth one, or the twenty-seventh one that will do you in, but they have the numbers and they have the time. You have neither.”

Nadrune takes another drink of beer. I do the same, but I’m having trouble swallowing. If she’s right, I
am
done for. 

Beneath our feet, I can feel the heavy explosions from the globes of mage fire under the water. The blasts send ripples across the surface of my cup.

“But there’s another way,” Nadrune says quietly. My ears swivel around to listen. 

She sets her own cup down and turns to me, crossing her hot hands in her lap. “I’ll lay it out for you directly because I’m on my way to reshape a world and I don’t have a lot of time, all right?

“Very publicly, you become the close and personal friend of Fleet Captain Nadrune Akarii VII, and you stand with me as I lead our armada of Akarii warships against Tamaranth. We take control of the city and bring it back into the Akarii Family, where, after all, it belongs anyway. You stand beside me as we bring the Houses to a new Lunar Council, whether they want to be there or not.

“Really, Hulgliev, it’s ugly face of yours I want, the face that looks so much like the Hulgliev that came before you. Our images will be echoed around the world on the knife when we reopen the Council chambers, and again as all of the representatives of all of the Families are forced to take their seats. I don’t really care how good you are at what you do, or what you like to comb your fur with, who or what you sleep with and whether you floss or not. I want you very visible, and very quiet, and you will be
very
well rewarded. How hard can that be for you? 

“Afterwards, at my
very
public
direction, to ensure your safety, the Tel Kharan train and refine whatever talents you do have. If you have the aptitude you will learn how to lead members of my Family, and if you have any skill at all you will take on ever-increasing administrative responsibilities within the newly-established
Akarii
city of Tamaranth. And who knows? Maybe you’ll be some minor functionary, content to move some papers around and go home to a nice house on a good street with a view of the lagoon. Or maybe you’ll want to climb higher than that. Akarii is a Family that rewards
initiative
, Hulgliev. If you’re smart and you put in the time, and someone doesn’t kill you along the way, who knows where you’ll end up.”

My thoughts are spinning, and I don’t think it’s the beer. Be honest, what would you do? 

Between you and me, being poor in a city at war sucks wurf ass. As much as I’d like to be principled, and to stand up for myself, I have to admit I'm paying attention.

Nadrune turns to the drone and instructs that the fleet be brought about. Then she calls me over to the windows. “Come up here. They’ll be here shortly,” she says. "They always come when we call, and I do want you to see this.”

The ships come about precisely and then they spread themselves across the flat expanse of ocean in an open V, other ships flanking the 
Seafire
, the Tel Kharan ship, which takes the center position. I’m frankly impressed by the movements of the ships—it all looks carefully coordinated, as if they’re all part of a single entity. Each wing of the formation is almost a mirror of the other. Then the two vessels in the far outer edges of the formation come around and seal off what is now a large section of ocean surrounded on all sides.

Mages climb into position on the matrix platforms on the foredecks of each of the vessels. Marines in full powered armor are lifted up by crane and strapped into platforms that hang high in the ships’ lines. When the last marine takes the peak position at the top of the
Seafire’s
center mast, he raises his knife aloft and brings the full matrix of the ship up. Every other ship does the same—fire leaps from point to point across the rigging. And then each ship joins itself into the
Seafire
.

I can’t imagine how much aether is flowing to that marine. I’ve fought other mages before, in matrices, but never have I seen a coordinated matrix of this scale.

Then, the sea in the center of the ships’ formation began to churn and boil. Something is beginning to rise there, something black and tentacled is writhing just beneath the surface.

“A cephaloch!” I say. The hair that’s left on my shoulders and neck ridges stands up and goes white. Can you blame me? The big, endless stretch of ocean is frightening enough if I think about it too much. The idea that something huge and carnivorous is living in it is even worse.

“Cephaloch,” Nadrune confirms. “And a lot more than just one. They’ve been following us for days now, since the Port.”

“You’re luring them in?” The idea takes a minute to sink in. Then I’m wondering if all the people in the perpetual party downstairs have any idea of what’s going on? I suspect not.

“Watch,” says the Fleet Captain.

The cephaloch are moving toward the
Seafire
. I have a clear view as the Tel Kharan at the head of the matrix throws a bright tracer at the creature and, as it sticks and holds, quickly reinforces the conduit and follows with a blast of aether. The creature hisses and steams, and then it shoots aggressively toward the ship as another one rises behind it, off to the left and closer to the
Cridona’s Beard
, another warship. The
Cridona
mages don’t not respond. They hold their matrix, waiting, as the
Seafire
reaches out and hits that one, too.

Within a minute, there are a score of cephaloch in the sea between all of the ships, splashing and boiling across the surface of the water and churning it into grey froth.

As the
Seafire
lures them all in, the other ships close in more tightly around them.

Then, I’m startled to see one of the cephaloch throw off a tracer of its own to the
Seafire
. It reinforces it, and sends its own aether swirling down the conduit to the
Seafire’s
matrix.

I feel like I’m watching a horror film, something based on a Lovecraft story. “They’re intelligent?”

Nadrune nods. “Some of them. Their raids on our shipping fleets have shown patterns. They’ve been studying us. Now they’re using our own techniques against us.”

Another of the cephaloch grabs and reinforces a tracer from the
Seafire
as they close on the ship. There are five of them in the water now with live energy, and as they moved into a rough semblance of a formation, a loose circle closing tighter in around the
Seafire
, I see them bring their own matrix online and drop more tracers onto the Seafire. Where the tracers touch fire blooms. The ship starts to burn, but mechs are ready and they race to the scene of the blaze, spraying white foam.

More cephaloch rise out of the water. There are more than fifty now, encircled by the Akarii fleet. Their loose matrix has ten, no twelve, participants that I can see. The ones not in the matrix are climbing the sides of the ships nearest to them. Men there aim and fire aether cannons, while others draw knives and fight hand to hand.

A cephaloch tentacle reaches across the windows in front of us, and a creature hauls itself across our view. It hangs there at the window, looking in.

I look back at the drones in the niches, and take a step back. I realize I’m grabbing at my chest, where my knife should be. The cephaloch brings up a large rock, and it smashes it against the windows. Nadrune and I jump, just as a net of blue fire spreads itself across the glass, coming from one of the drones in the niche.

The rock rebounds into the water. The cephaloch’s skin began to smoke where it holds onto the ship, and then as the fire glows more brightly it lets go and falls back into the water. 

There’s a large crack across the glass now. 

The marine on the
Seafire’s
peak draws up more energy, and starts slaving the cephaloch mages into his matrix, one after another. 

Then he turns them against their own kind.  It’s not a fight any more. It’s a slaughter.

“That is Bakron Akarii,” Nadrune says, pointing the marine who now channeled the energies of more than seventy other marines. The man’s armor burns so white it leaves afterimages in my eyes. “He’s a tremendous ally, when he’s not off treasure hunting,” the Fleet Captain says, frowning. “And if he has his way, he’ll kill me one day soon. Quite possibly you too, you know, since it was his retriever ship you seem to have encountered in Tilhtinora.”

I get that sinking feeling again. My stomach flops over, like all of those fish I’ve just eaten weren’t chewed very well.

“Fleet Captain Nadrune.” The drone in the niche behind speaks in a flat voice. “Lieutenant Marshall Bakron Akarii of the Tel Kharan presents his work for your satisfaction.”

The drone projects from her knife. The man in the image is tall, with long, thick black hair and Akarii sideburns. 

Thick, white scars run down each side of his face.  I recognize him as the same Tel Kharan I saw aboard the Retriever ship in Tilhtinora.

As the image’s lips move, the man's deep voice emerges from the drone.

“Nadrune.”

The Fleet Captain doesn’t turn from the windows. “You’re a bit premature, aren’t you Lieutenant Marshal?” She points to a section of the floating cephaloch, where one was waving tentacles in its death throes. “I think I still see some life out there.”

I see a flash of bridled hatred across the marine’s face, but it’s gone just as quickly. A blast from the
Seafire
finishes the last of the cephaloch.

“Very well,” sighs the Fleet Captain. “Your adequacy is evident, lieutenant.”

The flickering image frowns at the Fleet Captain’s back, and then nods. Then it turns to study me.

“Is there anything else, Lieutenant Marshal,” the Fleet Captain says from the windows.

“This is the Hulgliev, Nadrune?”

“Well, clearly.”

“And you have received my letter of concern?”

“I have.”

“May I remind the Fleet Captain about the importance of tradition? That the Tel Kharan have a duty to uphold the laws set down by our fathers?”

“You may not,” the Fleet Captain says, flatly.

Bakron’s image frons, and then performs a brief bow. As it begins to fade, it turns to me, meets my eyes, and his face splits in a wide grin that’s full of malice.
I am coming for you,
it mouths.

Great, you and the rest of your army. 

You might have to get in line,
I mouth back, but he’s faded out now. I can’t tell if he saw me.

Each marine is only a mage, and each mage is only a person. Regardless of what sort of technology they wrapped themselves in. 

I’m just going to keep telling myself this until I actually believe it.

I could really use that bourbon about now.

Nadrune stands quietly at the windows. The
Seafire
lets down the shared matrix, and then mages from the other fleet ships burn away the bodies of the cephaloch until the surface of the water is clear. Marines are lowered back down to the deck, and darkness returns to the night. Somewhere on the ship, I can hear a bell calling crews to dinner.