Chapter 75 – Chosen by Who

  “We can’t move him,” said Roxy. “It may kill him.”

  “Well we can’t stay here,” said Cole. “Not unless we want to be ape food if that hairy-ass mage comes back with reinforcements. So either we leave him to die, or we take him to work on and maybe die.”

  Roxy growled and pulled a pair of cutters out of her bag. “That arrow has got to come out, then. Help me get behind him.”

  The arrow had punched a hole right through the man’s breastplate, out the other side, and pinned him against the rock. Cole got to the opposite side of the retainer and helped her ease the unconscious man forward. He twitched and spasmed as he was pulled against the arrow shaft. The apes hadn’t exactly made the smoothest arrows, and they were almost as thick as Cole’s thumb. The metal of his breastplate shrieked in protest. But they managed to shift him enough for Roxy to get one end behind him and snap the lodged arrowhead off from the shaft of the arrow. Cole had to catch the retainer as he slumped. Next, she clipped the fasteners holding his breastplate together. The arrow still kept them pinned in place.

  “Besson, I need you for this next part,” she said. She shifted the unconscious man onto his back. “Hold his legs. Cole, when I tell you, pull out the shaft and the front plate, and I’ll try to close up the wound with a charge. Pull it smoothly, don’t jerk it.”

  “Got it,” said Cole. He wiped off his blood-slick gloves and wrapped them as gently as he could around the arrow shaft.

  Besson sat on the retainer’s legs to help immobilize them, while Roxy took position and put her hands on either side of the man’s head. She looked up and met his gaze. “On three. One, two, three!”

  Cole felt her ability pop and tensed his shoulders and arms, pulling the arrow up as straight as he could. The retainer’s eyes shot open, and he screamed as the arrow shaft came out, with the front plate still attached. Cole tossed them to the side, but armored hands, strong armored hands, grabbed his face and the manic retainer pulled him close. Cole grabbed his wrists, but the man’s grip was like steel.

  “Lord Ryan!? Has the tower taken you too?” He grit his teeth and gasped. “I thought you safe in the March."

  Cole’s heart felt like it stopped in his chest. “What did you call me?”

  “Cole!” shouted Roxy.

  The retainer pushed on, giving no indication that he’d heard Cole. “This place, this damnable place. It will be the end of us.” He screamed again as Roxy burned another charge. His head fell back, and the man looked to be losing consciousness.

  Cole patted his face. “Hey, HEY! You know someone named Ryan who looks like me? Come on!”

  When the retainer opened his eyes again, they were unfocused. Rather than a pained grimace, he had a far-off smile. The hands around his face went limp. “I thought… we would be the ones.. to see them driven back.”

  “Hey! Fuck, hey! Rox, heal him!” shouted Cole.

  “I can’t. Cole, look.”

  Cole looked down at the ragged, gaping wound that pumped a slowing trickle of blood that ceased as he watched. Where the arrow struck, it had either been coated with some sort of necrotizing poison or struck with such force that it almost liquified the flesh and muscle beneath, leaving a channel of mangled meat that all the gauze and clotting agent in the world couldn’t staunch. The wound extended so far down that it must have severed the major blood vessels into the man’s arm. There was no saving him from the beginning.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  “I-I couldn’t see how bad it was with his armor on,” stuttered Roxy. “I’m out of Mender charges. But I can’t heal that. Not with five or even ten charges.”

  Cole barely heard her. All these worlds are connected. He left the dead retainer and crawled over to Artian, grabbing the man by the collar. “This lord you were swearing to. Was his name Ryan? What did he look like?!”

  “Cole!” shouted Roxy. “Stop!”

  Artian gasped as his injuries were set on fire. He tried speaking through the pain, but it was unintelligible. Cole felt a hard jerk on the rescue handle of his plate carrier and ended up sprawled in the dust as Artian coughed and sputtered. Besson stood over him.

  “What the fuck, Cole?”

  “What’s going on down there?” Howie called in his ear. “I hear shouting.”

  Cole came back to himself, pushing up and calming his breathing and his heart rate. He rubbed his hands on his face, heedless of the blood he was smearing on his cheeks. He looked up at Roxy and Besson, both staring down at him like they might a rabid creature who might bite at any second. He keyed his radio. “It’s fine, Howie,” he managed. “We’re all good down here.”

  Roxy and Besson deserved an explanation. They all did. Cole closed his eyes. There was a fire burning in the back of his mind as the possibilities churned. “When I was younger,” he said. “My brother went missing. He was never found. His name was Ryan.”

  “Holy shit,” said Besson.

  Roxy gasped. “And you’re attuned. He was probably attuned. Does Bricker know?”

  “Bricker couldn’t say. It was before they could track abductions. Said that I should let it lay and make my peace.” He looked up at the others. “You both heard that, right? He said Lord Ryan?” He looked over at Artian. “You called him a chosen lord. Chosen by who? Where did he come from?”

  Artian shrugged one shoulder, still panting from Cole’s roughness. “The Gods, perhaps? Who knows?” He sniffed. “Not sorry to say, but I never met the man. I will say, though, that I’ve never met a Ryan at all, in my twenty-nine years in the March. Tis quite queer a name.”

  Cole pushed to his feet. Roxy put her hands on either side of him. “Don’t forget why we’re here.”

  “I won’t. We’re here for Beth Black,” said Cole. He nodded down to Artian. “But he’s coming with us. I want to know everything there is to know about his world, and if DOR has some way to trace otherworlders to his home dimension... If there’s a chance, any chance at all…”

  “I get it,” said Besson. He looked down at the criminal, then leaned closer. “But we can’t take him out of the tower,” he said. “He doesn’t have the implant.”

  That was a problem. Cole stalked back and forth. Did they need someone? Or could it be done with something? He moved over to the dead retainer, pulling the man’s knife from its sheath. It had the slight pearlescent sheen of an otherworld armament. The grip was well-worn but the blade was pristine down to the subtle scale etching in the steel. Cole hadn’t killed the man, so the key hadn’t transferred to him, but it was clear as day this was a Lewis Field item, almost certainly from the retainer’s home dimension. He stowed it and looked at the others. Besson nodded down.

  “Is that enough?” asked Roxy.

  “Either they can track from some sort of LF signature, or they can’t,” said Cole. “But I’m not leaving empty-handed.” He looked at Artian. “You good coming with us?”

  Artian looked at the carnage surrounding him, then at the armed and armored individuals still standing after their scrap with the apes. “I seem to be in the market for a new troupe, as it were—and you’ll never find more loyal and honest a companion than I.”

  Cole snorted at that, but Artian pressed on.

  “I can’t leave the hall of He Who Watches until the ninth floor, if the songs hold true. I ought know, I’ve sung them time enough.” He barked a bitter laugh. “Had I but known. If I live, I shall pen fresh ones, I think.”

  “Alright,” said Cole. “Welcome to the team, then. Rox?”

  She moved over and eased the man up onto his feet, though his arm was draped around her shoulder and he groaned with pain every inch of the way. By the time he was on his feet, his forehead was dripping sweat. He offered a weak smile through the pain. “Legends await, aye?”

  “Yeah,” Cole replied, “guess they do. Now, let’s talk about the girl in the photo.”

  “Walk and talk,” said Artian. He looked at the bodies around them. “We ought not linger in this place.”