Blightcross: A Novel (41 page)

Rovan shoved him aside and approached Capra. Just from the look of her, the cold precision in her eyes, like Alim's but far more lively, she could quarter the kid in half a second with that little knife.

He wished that she would.

“You know what? I'm tired of this. We're all going to the roof. I don't think you two really believe in the power I have.”

Capra's stance relaxed somewhat. “Rovan, what are you doing? You don't have to prove anything. Just come with me.”

“Shut up and follow me, otherwise I'll just have them kill you.”

At last, Capra looked Sevari in the eye, and he noticed a slight glint of understanding. He gave her a shallow nod, though what exactly they were confirming he couldn't tell. That they both recognized the insanity, and probably little else.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Why was she reasoning with a teenager, again? Capra barely contained the urge to bend him over her knee and paddle him, and here she was, following him up the cool grey stairwell. And making eyes with Sevari, as though they were old comrades. Oh the things one can do under the right pressures...

It seemed to her as though some transcendent force had taken their identities and shaken them in a hat. Even the stairwell appeared to be an inverted scheme—cool blue stained glass, calming colours, ignorant of the orange heat permeating the district.

And with that butcher merely a step behind her...

Whispering to her...

“What is your plan, anyway?”

A shiver. “I'm still trying to figure out whether or not I'm supposed to kill you.”

Alim's voice boomed at their backs. “No talking.”

“Oh let them,” Rovan said. “They can't do a damned thing.”

They reached the roof, and Rovan stood at the edge, facing the war machine. A group of shadows flitted about them, and Capra tensed, ready to slash at them but knowing fully how pointless it would be.

“All of you watch this.”

Capra stepped closer to Sevari, even though it felt wrong. “If you want this city to survive, you'd better tell me just what the shit's going on here.”

“Rovan wanted to become rich. He's an arrogant little bastard, and the shadows liked him enough to make him their human leader. He's trying to convince us of the power he knows isn't really his.”

“He's going through all this just to convince us?”

“He is a teenaged boy who grew up with nothing. He killed innocent people to get ahead, and he's looking for approval. Somehow I don't think these shadows count as authority figures to him.”

She almost tripped. “He killed what?”

“Yes, he did. But I think he's not really cut out for it. He's trying to legitimize it by showing us this display.”

Rovan pointed to a tall building. “You think I'm lying? Watch that.”

The war machine made a sudden turnaround, and its engines groaned as it lowered an arm. Rovan had a glazed look in his eyes, as though he were in a game or a dream.

There was a boom. Another. Two more. The building began to crumble in a heap of dust and girders.

“What have you just done?” It was time to put the kid into his place.

“They obey me. Even Sevari's big war engine obeys me now. Get it? Can you bring down a building with a mere thought? No.”

She nudged Sevari. “Distract Alim for me. I've had enough of this.”

Fed up with Rovan's petulance, she came too close to the roof's edge for her liking. It was like watching from the flying boat again, only now she was close to the knots of pipe that stretched from the refinery into the desert. The earth beyond the city was cracked and pipes seemed a perverted sucking of a land that had already been bled for all it was worth. But she knew it was just appearance. There was plenty more fuel buried under the pipes.

And if Rovan were allowed to continue, the city would crumble into the same desolation.

Capra pulled out her necklace, in case Dannac were still alive and in need of a better view. She approached the boy slowly. “You have more than you think, Rovan.”

He spun round. “I have the whole district. I know what I have.”

“I meant your sister. I think you need to ignore the shadows for a minute and just listen.”

Another giant collapsed and took with it two small buildings.

“They tell me you're a coward.”

“Consider the source. They can't even do their own dirty work.”

Rovan sighed. For a second, the ghost of a scared teenager showed through, but his eyes narrowed again and he crossed his arms. “Don't you like it? Don't you think this power is great?” He looked to Sevari. “It's what everyone wants. I'm the guy who won. I'm the guy who did what everyone dreams of.”

“Yes, maybe you are. But you have to think about your sister.”

For a moment she watched him for any decent human reactions, until it became clear that he wouldn't show any. Maybe deep inside, real human emotions stirred and butted against the shadow men's corruption. Whether or not she could coax them into the forefront was another matter.

“You don't like killing, I can tell. You thought it was going to be easy, like what you think Sevari did. But it's not, is it?”

He said nothing. The war machine turned again, and its cannons launched a volley at one of the giants. All the while, buildings crumbled in the distance, and strange screams erupted from gangs of shadows in the streets.

“Till was boring. I thought he'd like what I did. The other Valoii only cares about himself.” Rovan met her eyes. “Don't you see how big this is? Nobody is paying attention. They're all just fighting and worrying about themselves.”

“I see what's going on. I just want to help you. It's impressive, sure, but at what cost?”

“You see? You see what I'm doing? It's big. I've done all this.”

She nodded.

The war machine fired again into its opponent, then made its stiff steps towards them. Capra tried not to see it as a living thing, but on the head of the machine, the panels were strangely arranged in a symbolic approximation of a face. Two rectangles for eyes, and a large grate at its mouth that let out puffs of steam every so often.

She gulped. The machine stopped an arm's length from where they stood.

“Those two don't care. Till is so boring now, but I kind of like you.” He pointed to the machine. “Get on it.”

“What?”

“You're coming with me.”

“No.”

He grabbed her arm. Her struggling amounted to nothing. The damned shadows—had they given him physical strength, too?

“You want to find my sister, so we're going to.”

“Yeah, see what I had in mind was that we'd stop the fighting. You know, so she wouldn't be in danger.”

He shoved her towards the edge. Only now did the tower's height hit her, in all its dizzying glory. The vantage point reduced the fight below to groups of tiny insects clashing.

“Close, but my idea is better. We'll find her, and then she'll be safe with us. It'll be great, I think you'll love it here when I'm finished with it. Both of you.”

Blightcross was bad enough before all this. She didn't want to think of what it would be like after Rovan's reformation.

He prodded her. She elbowed him in the stomach. “No way.”

Rovan's eyes turned black, and he grasped her by the throat. Another voice took over his own. “You will accompany us or die.”

She gulped. “Oh yeah?”

Rovan nodded slowly, teeth bared. Capra boiled inside. She wanted to twist off his head and piss down his neck, and all because she knew that right now, she would lose if she resisted.

Even so, she threw a false punch at him, stopping her fist just a finger shy of his face. They exchanged glares for a few seconds before she jumped onto the ladder attached to the side of the machine. Through her hands came the purring of its engines, and she wondered if it wouldn't numb her hands and cause her to fall.

There was a clunk beneath her. Rovan was there, pointing towards the top. She started to climb.

“Hurry up! If you're not into this, I'll just throw you off.”

She obeyed, heart racing both from the unsteadiness and from her anger at being subject to a teenager's demands. “Oh, I'm into it all right.”

If it weren't a given that the shadows would rescue him in mid-air, she would have kicked him off the stupid machine.

Then again, the machine was the advantage in the battle, the mitigating factor. Rovan had handed it to her. All she needed to do was shut off its engines, and the giants might have a chance at destroying the shadows.

Sevari raised a fist at the retreating machine. His patience was being rewarded—all those hours spent ignoring Rovan's crude remarks and juvenile arrogance, holding back his urge to properly dispense discipline. He had known all along that no amount of help from the shadows could fix the endemic problem of Rovan's flyaway attention span.

“Alim, perhaps you will listen to reason now.”

“Rovan will return, and I will be given my ultimate orders.”

“Ultimate orders, you say? I can't imagine what that even means.” He started towards the staircase. “Come on, old friend. I have some orders for you.”

“It is not the order I want.”

He skipped stairs on the way down, and Alim's heavy steps echoed behind. “Now that the elevators seem to be engaged again, I can reach a signalling station.”

If these shadows thought they had caught the Blightcross Administrative District unawares, they would be delightfully surprised. “Alim, my good man, I know the shadows present the subject with an object of desire.
The
object of desire. The one that nobody will ever achieve. But I think I can offer you an approximation of what they offered to you.”

The guards ignored them, and Sevari led Alim back to his office. From there, he called his personal elevator. Once its clunk sounded in the walls, he grinned and mentally thanked History for not abandoning him.

“Where are we going?” Alim asked.

“To my bunker.” He fished in his tunic for a small decorative dagger. Once he found it, he pulled the handle apart to reveal a key. He then lifted a nondescript brass plate, set away from the main group of studs, and inserted the key into a secret slot.

“I will not allow you to interfere, Sevari.”

“Even if it means taking command of the most elite fighting force ever to grace this world?”

Alim paused. Yes, conflict with the shadows... contradiction would at least stifle Alim's will to act. Even if he never agreed to switch sides, Alim would take time to recover from the fact of Sevari, a mere human, offering the same object of desire as the mystical shadows.

“Listen to me, Alim. This fight is an illusion. Remember the legends? They will both fall in the end.”

“There is no Akhli to facilitate this. Without him, there will be a winner, and it will be the shadow men.”

“I am Akhli.”

Alim's eyes went wide. “Blasphemy!”

Perhaps it was, but one could only fight the transcendent with the transcendent.

“If you are so sure of yourself, why am I still alive, Valoii?”

“The boy still looks up to you. We have strict orders not to harm his friends.”

“And Capra is now his friend, is she?”

Alim winced. Another contradiction.

“So, then, your master has taken up friendship with the woman who took everything you loved?”

There was a bang and a jolt. Sevari clapped, and cranked open the elevator.

He loved his office, his little throne room, but deep down he preferred the stark, grey stone and metal of his bunker. It was his cavern, his haven, and it made him smile that finally, he was using it as intended, rather than walking its silent halls alone, imagining what he might do in a crisis.

“Part of this was already here, you see. I just added to it and made it my own. I suspect the shadows missed it because there are traces of metal from the Hex in its outer framework.” He waved Alim into the bunker's control room. “You are the first besides myself to see this place. Aside from the crews who built it for me, and, well... the secret died with them.”

He took position at a control panel.

Alim appeared even more confused. “Now what are you doing?”

“Preparing to retake the city. You will have complete command of my special unit, and an assured place as an historically necessary implement. I am signalling the sentry in the bunker underneath the armoury. I want him to prepare for your arrival.”

“My arrival? I did not agree to anything.”

He entered the proper sequence, and stood. “These are not an army of shadow-corrupted oil workers. You will lead them, you will conquer this city for me, and you will cast out whatever influence remains of those damned things, do you hear me?”

Alim grinned—an incongruence that seemed to tear the very fabric of the situation. “I hear you.”

Sevari eyed him warily. “Down the hall—the alcove with the red markings around it. There will be a small underground train that will take you to the armoury bunker. There you will meet with my sentinel and take command of my elite unit, of the city's saviour.”

There was a pause. Sevari watched Alim's face for signs of scepticism. The moment dragged...

Alim nodded. “Perfect.”

Sevari's gut twitched. “This is no ordinary unit. They require special equipment, and tactics. Although, I think your people have used quite similar tactics against the Ehzeri. Go now, Alim. Just into the hall, and you'll find the rail car ready, complete with an honour guard to escort you.”

And Alim went without question. With any luck, the lack of shadows in the bunker would weaken him enough.

Sevari eased back into his chair, punched in a few more quick messages to the sentinel manning the signal station below the armoury. He barely flinched when the two hand-cannon shots crashed in the hall outside. Alim's scream relieved him a little—taking out such a wildcard in his operation made it safer, and throwing Alim defenceless into a pack of ravenous lunatics would surely cover Sevari in case officials across the ocean began to wonder why their operative was dead. They couldn't possibly question the cause of death after seeing what the shadows had done to the body.