Chains of the Earth, page 56
“Hey, what are you doing?” he snapped, too late. Allakawari was already gone, as suddenly as she’d appeared. Shadows swirled around her, silent and dark, masking her as she sped into the ruin, moving toward the square.
No sense staying behind. He snapped to an anchor on an opposite wall, checking to make sure both pistols were lit and hot before he ran after her from the other direction.
The Owl-magi was standing guard, and saw him as soon as he cleared the long hall. Immediately his skin burned, his stomach seized, his throat caught in a hacking cough. He squeezed a trigger and missed wildly, the pistol discharging over the Owl’s head as his body convulsed. He blinked back and fired again, this time with his shot braced against the wall.
The Owl screamed as a red spray appeared where her left arm had been. Blood and sinew and cloth tore away, and her body spun involuntarily from the force of his shot. Suddenly the square was lit from above, and Allakawari appeared in a rush, leaping for the now-shocked Owl. Both her knives were out, a mere armslength from the Owl, when Allakawari froze and slumped forward, hacking and vomiting in the middle of the square.
He shouted something unintelligible, blinking back to his anchor to reload and fire another shot.
This one took the Owl in the head. Her neck snapped as her skull exploded, the body flung down violently in a heap of blood. He saw it clearly, as clear as he’d seen anything since the sky had gone dark. Moonlight shone down on the square, bright and clear, illuminating the bright red splatters through the black powder of his pistol shots. A whistling noise accompanied the light, like a steaming teakettle suddenly set off in the middle of the square. He ignored it, moving to a safer vantage, and willing Allakawari to do the same.
Instead Allakawari gathered herself, collecting the knives she’d dropped, moving slowly, without any grace, in a daze of sickness. If Tigai hadn’t been able to blink to an anchor to reset the Owl’s work he might have done the same. As it was he called out to get to cover. She was exposed, lying in the center of the square, and the Heron was out there, still unaccounted for.
Allakawari was still dazed, coughing as she rose to her feet. He tried to yell another warning, cutting himself off midword with a blink to reload his pistols, when the woman in orange robes and a black veil appeared, both hands extended as though they were weapons, with one of the black-garbed swordsmen at her side.
A Force-bubble expanded from the Heron’s hands, launching itself toward Allakawari as Tigai pulled both triggers at once.
Allakawari recovered some part of her agility, dodging backward as the Force-bubble latched to the ground and became a dome, expanding in all directions in a violent heave. Tigai’s shots were swallowed in its shimmering haze as soon as they entered the dome. The whistling noise was still there, growing louder, loud enough to drown out the cracks of his pistols, but he ignored it, turning his attention to the swordsman.
It had to be a Crane. The black-garbed magi ran toward Tigai’s anchors at the edge of the wall, his steel drawn and held above his head. He would have to snap to a different anchor, one close enough to help Allakawari if—
The swordsman exploded.
He’d been mere moments from snapping away to another set of anchors. Instead he froze, stunned. Something had crashed into the swordsman from above, splattering his body like paste. Those Cranes had moved like whirlwinds, dancing away from Kaladooh’s and Juni’s attacks, and this one had been caught where he stood, by something falling from the sky.
He stared upward and saw the moon looking down, only instead of the usual pale white, a blood-red orb hung at the center of a break in the clouds, paired with a hailstorm of streaks of crimson fire. Comets.
No. Meteors.
Another explosion shook the ruins, then another, and another, and another. Whistling rain came down, faster than he could brace himself. The Force-domes were gone, along with any sign of the Heron, though a stone had crashed into where the Owl’s body had slumped over, leaving nothing but a smoking, fiery crater in the dirt.
He took a risk and raced across the square without looking up.
The smaller building was empty save for a stone bed in the corner. A bed where the sun-haired girl lay sleeping, taking shallow breaths without any sign she’d stirred or even noticed the upheaval rocking the temple around her.
He ran to her side. This was her. The girl from Orana’s vision. The Sun.
He spun around as the light from the outside dimmed, and found a figure standing in the doorway. Allakawari. Dazed, moving with a fraction of her usual grace, but it was her, both knives dripping blood in her hands.
“Thank the fucking wind spirits,” he said. “Get close.”
“What of the others?” Allakawari said. “They could still live.”
“They could,” he said. “But we came for her.”
It stung, even as he said it. This was his mission. His call. He’d left people behind before. Part of him wanted to run back into the ruins, to find Juni if there was any hope at all for him bringing both of Yuli’s sisters back to her, healthy and whole. But four more lives, and maybe the way back home through the storm’s black haze, rested on his safe return of this girl Orana called the Sun.
He blinked, and touched the strands connecting the three of them to the Tarzali foothills.
56
YULI
Deep Jungle
Manacambu Highlands
Trees cracked and fell together, sending leaves and vines crashing to the ground. Yuli wanted to stare, to freeze and let awe control her. But the Twin Fangs moved. It kept moving. It had to study the creature, to stay clear until it learned enough to find a weakness, to turn the predator to prey. Until it found one, the Twin Fangs ran to save itself, to avoid the jungle crashing down around them, to play its part in this stage of the hunt.
Another mighty tree crashed behind them, dwarfed by the size of a single one of the creature’s forelegs, and the Twin Fangs sprang up the face of a cliff, loping up the stone as it jammed its claws into cracks in the wall. Arak’Jur launched himself behind, leaping, almost flying up the cliffside. It had lost Omera in the trees, but the Twin Fangs still smelled him, trailing behind, wafting his clouds of herbs and poison and steel.
The predator slammed the full size of its body into the cliffside, rattling stone and earth as the Twin Fangs and Arak’Jur reached the top together. They vaulted over the stone, sliding down a trench of dirt and leaves, and then the Twin Fangs broke for a thick nest of trees with broad, flat leaves and colorful flowers. Arak’Jur went the other way, and the Twin Fangs lost him as stone cracked behind them. The creature’s great claws powered it over the cliff as it leapt into the air. Impossible, for such bulk to move so fast. But it did, thundering as it landed, smashing the hillside in a cloud of dust and springing forward, away from the Twin Fangs, toward Arak’Jur.
The Twin Fangs circled around, running in parallel to the creature, careful to keep enough distance to be able to react if it pivoted.
The creature ran, and the Twin Fangs ran with it.
Trees that must have stood for a hundred years snapped beneath the creature’s limbs like twigs. In the dusky light of the overcast, poisoned sky it could see only shadows of the creature’s size. It was a mountain, piercing the sky with every step. Four legs, each tipped with claws and thorns like barbs running the length of each foreleg to the joints, which seemed reversed, like a bird of prey. Its mouth was a long snout, a sea of metallic teeth glinting in the dim light, ringed by long, flowing antennae, but the creature was no insect. Leathery hide covered thick muscles, and fur, capped by a great mane, surrounded its shoulders and head like a lion. But this creature could swallow a pride of lions in a single gnash from its jaws.
The creature’s scent flooded the Twin Fangs’ nose. A scent of wrongness. As though a monstrous cloud had descended into the jungle, the sort of storm cloud that swallowed half the sky. It smelled of tainted water, of blood and rot. Enough to overpower the rest of the jungle’s smells. Arak’Jur ran ahead, for now the creature’s primary prey. Omera trailed farther behind but still kept close. And two more. Two strangers. One that smelled of fury, whose scent intermingled with the creature’s until it seemed as though it came from atop its back. And the other… older… more distant… carried the smell of aged flesh, somehow moving fast enough to keep up with their frenzied chase.
Fire blasted through the jungle, illuminating the trees in a flash of light.
Arak’Jur leapt from atop a tree-covered hillside, surrounded in a wreath of flame. Gouts of fire flew from his hands before he disappeared behind the hill and struck the creature between its forelegs, sending up another flash as the flames licked across its fur. Burning smells stank in the Twin Fangs’ nose, but the creature gave no sign of slowing, stampeding through the trees atop Arak’Jur’s hill and vanishing down its back side just as quickly, snapping its teeth as though in anger as it bit the cloud of fire.
The Twin Fangs pivoted, daring to get closer to the creature as it ran. It snaked across a ridgeline, leaping over a chasm in the earth, careful to stay above the mulch of broken trees in the creature’s wake. The creature’s hind legs worked in powerful strides, the inverted joints and musculature giving it the capacity for great leaps and bounding steps in equal measure. Perhaps if it could strike the ligaments, the creature could be slowed. It trailed after, waiting for a stretch of level ground. Then it leapt, when the stride was even enough to be predicted, and landed, all ten of the Twin Fangs’ claws sunk deep into the leathery hide of the creature’s left hind leg.
It grasped tight, clinging to the creature’s skin as it thrashed. A roar sounded, loud enough to split Yuli’s eardrums if she’d been in control. But the Twin Fangs’ claws held. It rose the height of a small hillside when the creature lifted its hind legs to take a step. Rocks and tree trunks split around it, each step a minor earthquake, rattling the Twin Fangs’ bones, but its claws stayed firm, embedded deep in the creature’s hide, enough to draw rivulets of blood to soak its hands and forearms.
Withdrawing a claw would have shaken the Twin Fangs loose; it needed all ten finger points sunk deep to keep it steady and attached. Instead it struck with its teeth. Both its long fangs tore into the creature’s joint in a savage fury, ripping and slashing as fast as it could work its jaws. The creature would whirl, would fling its leg to knock the Twin Fangs loose, as soon as it felt the damage. It had to sever tendons quickly, if it could reach them. And it did. Blood flowed into the Twin Fangs’ mouth, hot and red and touched with iron. No tooth or claw in nature could have broken the creature’s muscled hide, nor cut into the soft tissues between its bones. But the Twin Fangs was no creature of the natural world. It cut, and severed, ripping and snapping until the creature reared up, rising to the height of a mountain as it blared another roar into the sky.
The Twin Fangs dropped, rolling into the leaves as the creature crashed backward, narrowly missing crushing it as the creature fell atop itself. Bloody ruin trailed down the creature’s left hind leg, leaving a trail of gore mixed with the leaves and trees smashed under its weight.
The Twin Fangs bounded away as the creature howled, swiping behind it. The wind shifted. Now the Twin Fangs was the prey. It sensed it, as surely as an elk knew when the steppe lions had marked it for death.
It ran.
It ducked below a copse of thick trees, and heard them smash and rip apart when the creature trampled them. It bounded over a river, taking the full length from bank to bank in a single leap. Water crashed where the creature dipped one of its thundering limbs in the river’s depths. It reached a grassy clearing, pivoting and shifting direction quickly, and felt the ground shake and crack as the creature shifted its massive bulk to follow.
Another gout of fire scorched the air, lighting the jungle in a flash. Ice cracked. Thunder rained from the sky. Arak’Jur’s smell filled the Twin Fangs’ nose, and another roar bellowed out as the creature slowed and whirled, smashing through a dozen trees at once as it spun its claws in a rearward swipe.
Frustration. Predatory instincts flared as the Twin Fangs slowed, rounding on the beast. The balance of which of them was prey hung in the air, thick as any scent on the wind. Now the creature was at its most dangerous. Now it would try a desperate strike.
The Twin Fangs skulked into the creature’s view, ready to spring away if the beast lunged. It had finally stopped moving, the ruin of its left hind leg tucked under its girth while the right hind leg showed scorch and burn marks, the fur still kindling where the muscle burned away. It sat back on its haunches, the rest of its massive height blocking out the overcast clouds, ringed by displaced earth and broken trees and grass, and it roared.
The thundering bellows shook the earth, as sure as its footfalls had, and even the Twin Fangs’ ears rattled in pain. The Twin Fangs saw Arak’Jur moving cautiously, on the far side of the grassy clearing, clearly aware of the danger. If they could bait it now, provoke it to extend itself, the other one could strike. But until it moved, there was no way to tell which of them it would attack. Whatever else the creature was, it was a wounded, desperate animal. Both of them had to stay vigilant, reading the wind for any sign of what it meant to do.
Omera charged into the clearing.
It was wrong. A mistake. The Twin Fangs took a step, hesitating, and felt Arak’Jur do the same. If they sparked the creature’s ire now, it might bolt again, and renew the chase with a surge of adrenaline. But there was no way to call out and be heard. The creature continued its roar, lowering its head in a silhouette against the dusk-lit clouds in the sky. Omera was a miniature in comparison. A tiny man-sized shape charging across the field with his curved sword bared, reeking of the poison rubbed across its steel.
The creature snapped its head and foreclaws around toward Omera in a lightning rush. Yuli’s heart sank underneath the Twin Fangs’ control. He was dead. The creature lunged, the full force of its bulk suddenly uncoiled. It moved, impossibly fast.
Omera moved with it.
The Bhakal man threw himself into the air the instant before the creature’s claw struck the ground. It tore into the earth, rending dirt and undergrowth in a tempest surge, but Omera was above it, a flying leap taking him over the creature’s claw to land on its wrist, and then he sprinted up its forearm without missing a step.
It was all the Twin Fangs needed to see. The creature was distracted by the swordsman running up its arm toward its mouth. If Omera was to live, they had to strike now.
The Twin Fangs charged on all fours, covering the distance before Omera reached its shoulder. The creature twisted its torso upward, raking its other arm across the first, trying to rid itself of the invader who moved like a whirlwind. Its attention was focused upward, on itself, and the Twin Fangs leapt into its belly. Ten claws sank deep into its hide, and this time it needed only one hand to keep itself in place. The other claws plunged in and out of the creature’s skin while its teeth ripped, alternating grips as it moved across the stomach, leaving hide torn open, drenching the Twin Fangs in thick, crimson blood.
Thundershocks rippled across the surface of the beast’s skin as Arak’Jur landed at the same instant, tearing and ripping with spectral claws engulfing him in images of bears, cats, birds, and fire.
The creature crashed onto its side, threatening to throw them both. Earth rumbled outward in a shock wave where it landed, thrashing its broken legs and arms to try and cover its belly. The Twin Fangs expected it, was already moving as the creature convulsed, using its claws to scale the stomach like a crag wall. Only this wall could be torn and ripped, with new handholds dug into its surface by breaking through its hide. Arak’Jur fell, opting to dodge the flailing limbs by going under, rather than over, and the Twin Fangs lost sight of him, though it smelled his spectral attacks raking the beast’s hindquarters without pause as the creature went down.
The Twin Fangs reached its back, and nearly took a spear thrust to its face.
It sprang back, and Omera rushed forward, hooking their enemy’s spear with the edge of his curved sword. A heartbeat later the Twin Fangs recognized the scent: one of the unknown men who it had thought was following along, the younger, furious one. But no. Not following. Riding. Somehow the spearman had been standing atop the creature’s back as it ran. In the dim light it could see only outlines and shadows, naked from the waist up, a single long braid of hair adorned with gold and precious stones. The rider’s spear bore the same ornamentation, plated with gold and gems, though no less deadly for it. He jabbed as quick as Omera stepped and cut, a flurry of strikes and parries too fast for the Twin Fangs to see, almost too fast for it to smell and sense their movements. But no matter how evenly Omera and the spearman were matched, it was enough for the Bhakal to have distracted his opponent. The Twin Fangs left them behind, loping up the creature’s side as it wrenched itself on the ground, rumbling beneath their feet. It went for the creature’s head, lolled to one side as it made a sound a mountain-sized beast might have made for whimpering pain.
The creature’s eyes were open, burning with fury and each one the size of a covered wagon.
It dove for one of the eyes, plunging its claws deep and raking them as it leapt for the bridge of its snout. The beast howled, bringing a claw up to shield itself. The Twin Fangs was ready, racing up the bridge to the crown of the creature’s forehead, then sliding across, grabbing hold of one of the antennae as it lashed and quivered around its face.
It cut on instinct, severing the antenna to a bloody stump, then leaping to another and doing it again.
Blood leaked out, soaking the Twin Fangs’ body before it rained down on the earth. Quaking howls and screams escaped the creature’s snout, sputtered by dry crackles that might have been coughs. Blood poured from its mouth, and white foam like the spray of tides. The Twin Fangs cut and leapt, dodging around the massive claws by instinct alone, never staying in one place for longer than it took to drive its claws and fangs into the creature’s hide. It smelled Arak’Jur maintaining the attack on the creature’s belly and loins, and the duel between the strange half-naked spearman and Omera atop its back. The onslaught seemed to continue for too long, longer than any creature should have been able to endure, even one so massive as this. Until finally, the creature’s claw slumped away, pounding against the ground hard enough to rattle the trees and undergrowth around them.
