34

  On the loom of Fate, at the Wheel’s next turning:

  A strange place, the Heavens, and full of division, since that first great God fractured to pieces. All of the shards were mighty, but even the strongest had enemies, and everyone bowed before unyielding Fate.

  A judgement had been rendered, then cast aside by divine interference. The traitors Galadin, Nalderick and Daazra were meant to pay a steep price, learning a very hard lesson. Instead, they’d been rescued and even rewarded. This had been done by Firelord’s upstart faction, and ought to have earned them a brutal correction from Oberyn, first among shard-gods. But the Lord of the Dawn stayed his hand, despite this flouting of the tribunal’s decision.

  Such a perversion of justice could not be allowed, in the name of those who’d perished when three vile turncoats opened their hearts and their realm to the Whispering Tree. Hyrenn, Lord Winter, determined to set things right, after Oberyn failed to rein in His favorite. Firelord’s arrogance had to be squashed, but in order to bring down a general, first you must cripple his horse. In this case, Builder of Cities.

  With Ashlord’s grudging assistance, Hyrenn reached into the distant future for an important bit of technology called a ‘control chip’. Not of much use in a realm of great manna… unless some newly-spawned arse of a technomancer burst on the scene, making hash of its timelines.

  Hyrenn cupped that small rectangular chip in the palm of his frigid right hand.

  “It doesn’t look like much,” he grunted, flipping the mechanism over to examine its glittering back. Ashlord signed,

  ‘It shall prove highly effective on Builder of Cities. I have the Shopkeeper’s pledge, Winter.’

  Hyrenn watched tiny zigzags of metal dart like fish through the chip’s translucent white substance. Very strange.

  “I doubt her not,” he said, adding, “All we require now is someone who has the power and will to place this small weapon where it will do the most harm. For that task, Daazra’s whelp is perfectly suited and eager.”

  Ashlord shrugged, forming a body and hooded face out of swirling grey cinders.

  ‘Eager or not, willing or no, the drow will perform his duty, for so it is fated.’

  Next, the Silent One gestured, opening a window onto the deck of a wind-driven pirate ship. No more than a scrap of wood to Hyrenn and Ashlord, the vessel contained their instrument, Kaazin, son of a priestess and slave.

  The drow’s mind ran thick with strategy as he waged a fight that wasn’t going the Flying Cloud’s way. Loose Ends, it seemed, could do magic, wielding the talents and spells of its crew. It had already shut down the Cloud’s mind. Now it was trying to seize control of the ghosts and officers. High overhead, Pilot shielded the phantoms, Kaazin and Tess, but he had to keep changing frequencies to match the enemy’s lightning-fast rewrites. Meanwhile, his allies were trapped aboard ship.

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  Then Hyrenn emerged from beyond their dimension, visible only to Kaazin,

  “A barter, half-breed,” rumbled Lord Winter. “See that this object is set on the back of yon construct’s neck, at the base of his skull. It will place him under control, while he remains in his avatar form.”

  Kaazin was too caught up in the fighting to pay much attention. Yes, he wanted the mech-god destroyed, but not if it meant defeat or the loss of that drekking prize money. He spat on the tilted deck, as another cannon round flew wide of its mark, missing Loose Ends completely.

  “I have no time for gods,” he snarled, not even looking around at the source of that deep, hissing voice. “Hire or train up a hero. I suggest Bone-setter.”

  Ashlord would have smothered the insolent drow with boiling volcanic mud, but Hyrenn held up a glittering hand, saying,

  “You shall prevail in this fight and gain your desired reward, child of Chaos and force. You have My oath as Lord of the Wild Hunt. Take this weapon, place it as described, then see that the mech-god is imprisoned where he cannot escape to cause further harm.”

  Though that shuddersome voice made his bones rattle, seeming to come from inside him, somehow, the albino drow kept to the matter at hand. He ordered another broadside, ducking a screeching shot from Loose Ends’ forward cannon. It cratered the hull nearby, launching a storm of sharp splinters. Three of those blazing skewers hit Kaazin's face, just missing his throat and eyes.

  Wiping blood, still calling orders, Kaazin stared as Loose Ends seemed to split into multiple targets, only one of them real.

  “Prove it,” he demanded. “Strip away their illusion so we can hit the right ship.”

  That was easily managed, though Hyrenn vowed that Kaazin would pay for his arrogant tone. Lord Winter nodded at Ashlord, who strode forward to raise a volcano out of the seafloor. It hurtled out of the ocean, spouting rocks, lava and blazing hot gas. Water exploded to steam with a BOOM that was heard for hundreds of miles.

  A rolling, fire-shot cloud blasted completely through the illusory ships, but coated the real Loose Ends… once Maree… in dense and gummy, heavy dark ash. The speeding airship dipped suddenly lower, engines shrieking like cats.

  “There is your target!” shouted the drow. “Fire!”

  The Flying Cloud’s guns roared in unison, nearly flipping the pirate ship over. At the cramped, tilted helm, Tess wedged her own skinny body between the spokes of the ship’s wheel, gritting her teeth and bracing hard. The girl’s collarbone cracked, but she stayed in place, holding firm so they could fire another volley. Skelly and Tidbit jumped onto the wheel next, perching themselves on the spokes, pitting their mass against Tessa’s push because… after all… they were cats.

  Outside, Loose Ends corrected its trim and came at them head-on, drawing lightning out of the rumbling volcanic clouds. The attacking airship presented a very poor target, but some of their shots hit home, crushing its prow like a dried leaf underfoot.

  The noise and vibration seemed to shake the last stars and moon from the sky. Loose Ends veered off, dribbling torn copper plates and shattered timbers. Its keel had been scorched, and that was serious trouble, for it was the sentient tree that housed an airship’s intelligence. But ‘Loose Ends’ was no stranger to conflict.

  As ‘Maree’, the airship had murdered its crew twice before, changing its name and appearance each time. It had no trouble at all shedding this lot of assassins. As Kaazin and Pilot looked on, five people were swept from the vessel’s suddenly open deck. They would have tumbled directly into the ocean, but one of the females was mage enough to levitate some her comrades, leaving another to drop like a screaming and flailing child.

  Pilot swooped through fire and ash to capture them all in a prison of crackling force. As the murderous ship banked away, he hauled his captives across to the Flying Cloud. Probably, Kaazin ought to have chosen a safer moment, but when the control chip appeared in his hand, the drow did not stop to think.

  Repeated shock waves pounded their hull. Tess cursed and grunted inside, fighting to hold the Cloud steady. A great plume of ash collapsed like dark hail to the ocean, poisoning its water. And then, just as Pilot touched down, Kaazin lunged forward, slapping one hand to the back of the cyborg’s neck.