Birthright-The Technomage Archive (43 page)

Out of the tower came three Jaronya. Their wings were fully Conjured and spread, but they were not flying. It was the first time Ceril could remember them just walking around, and the sight terrified him.

Each of the Jaronya was covered in thick plates of purple armor, and each plate connected to the others with swatches of cloth. The three Jaronya were each armed with a staff that had green energy spiraling up and down its length. Occasionally, a bolt would arc from the top of one staff and bounce to another.

Ceril pushed between Saryn and Chuckie, taking point. He was going to talk with the guards and apologize for being late. Before he could, green arcs of energy shot from the three staves simultaneously into Ceril's legs and stomach. He collapsed.

Chuckie braced his feet and held his hands in front of him. He wasn’t going to let that happen to him. His fear and anger drove him to Conjure red fire from his palms. He directed the walls of flame at the left-most Jaronya, and the Conjured fire encompassed the angel.

The Jaronya took another step, and Chuckie gritted his teeth. Veins popped up on his forehead as he pushed at his Conjured flames.

The Jaronya fell, its wings dissolving along with the rest of its body as it died. Chuckie whipped his fire toward the second angel, but more arcs of energy came from the staves. This time they zapped both Chuckie and Saryn at the same time.

Chuckie’s fire dissipated, and he whimpered as he collapsed, too drained from the force of his Conjuring to resist the attack. Saryn fell, too, interrupting whatever she had been Conjuring before it could even take form.

The Jaronya kept walking toward them.

Chapter Thirty

“
Where can I get one of those?”

The large purple man just stood there, his hand wrapped around the hilt of a golden sword. He stared at Swinton.

“
Really, I mean it. I want one.”

The angel just stared ahead without acknowledging that Swinton was speaking.

“
Not yours, you know, but one like it. You think that would be possible? I mean, that’s why I became a soldier in the first place; to get a Flameblade. I started out as a scholar—a nerd, you know—but I saw one of those and knew that I had to have one.”

Still no reaction.

Swinton hardly noticed. “You and your buddies all have them, right? Which means that they’re not as rare or as hard to get as Roman and Bryt made out.”

“
I take it you’re feeling better,” Easter Harlo said.

Swinton turned away from the stoic guard. “I am. Thanks by the way, Harlo. I owe you one. Really. I’m not sure how you did it, but it doesn’t feel like one of these guys ever stabbed me.” He rotated his left arm in a circle and threw a couple of punches at the air in front of him. “See? I owe you one, doc. For real.”

“
You can pay me back right now, actually.”

“
Yeah? What do you need?”

“
For you to give it a rest, Swinton. Please.”

“
What do you mean? What’d I do?”

“
Talking to the guard like that. You’re going to get us killed,” Harlo said. “And I’m thinking that I don’t really like the sound of that.”

“
What would you prefer me to do?”

“
Sit quietly and wait for a while. That sounds pretty good.”

“
That sounds awful. I can’t sit still, anyway. I can’t just sit here and do nothing while these…things plan to kill us.”

“
We don’t know they plan to kill us. They saved you when you fell off the building, remember?”

“
Yeah, but how do we know that wasn’t just, you know, buying time. We don’t know what their plans are. They might want to kill us. They
did
kidnap us, remember?” Swinton said.

“
You’re right,” Harlo sighed. “Whatever, Swinton. Do whatever you want, but do it quietly. And without bothering the guard. Please.”

Swinton scowled at her and sat with his back against the wall. It had been hours since he had been thrown into their cell, and they still had no idea what was going on or why they had been taken.

Their cell was round and fairly small. It had no windows, and only a single latticed door in or out—if you didn’t count the disintegrating wall that Swinton had been thrown through earlier. A guard dressed in purple robes stood outside the door, his eyes staring straight ahead into the cell. He had not moved or spoken since Harlo had finished operating on Swinton’s arm.

There was no furniture in the cell, not even a bed or somewhere for them to relieve themselves. Swinton assumed that meant it was a short-term residence, but whether that was good or bad for them, he didn’t know. The walls were purple and shiny, and the floor and ceiling were made out of lacquered tiles that had green symbols embossed in their centers.

“
You didn’t see Ceril or anyone when you were out there, did you?” Harlo asked.

“
Nope,” Swinton said. “All I saw was this tower and the ruins around it. The big angel guys were everywhere, but not Ceril, Chuckie, or Saryn.”

“
I hope they’re okay. I mean, we heard shots after they were taken. I hope that they didn’t get themselves killed.”

“
I doubt they did,” Swinton said. “I took some potshots at one of those guys, and I’m still here.”

“
Barely. You got stabbed in the shoulder, and you had your neck cut.”

“
We have to assume they’re alive, either way. Saryn and Ceril are smart cookies, you know? And Chuckie…well, he’s Chuckie.”

“
So where does that leave us?” Harlo asked. She was sulking now, Swinton noticed. Her mood had drastically changed since she had finished fixing his arm. She had been so focused, so intent on making him better—saving his life, really—that everything else had kind of faded away. Now, though, she had time to think. She was bored now that she didn’t have a goal to work toward. And he could tell that it was getting to her.

“
Well, it leaves us here. Which doesn’t mean that much,” he said. “We have to find a way out of here.”

“
How?” she asked. “You messed with the wall forever, and it’s still solid. Even if it wasn’t, we’d just fall to our deaths if we went outside. And the door isn’t likely to come open with him,” she jerked her thumb toward the guard without looking, “standing there the whole time.”

“
Umm, Harlo.”

She grunted acknowledgement.

“
He’s gone.”

She looked up. Swinton was right. She rushed to the door and slid her fingers through the lattice. Swinton followed suit. It was warm to the touch, and Harlo pressed her face into it, trying to see as far as she could down the hallway, which wasn’t very far, considering the corridor was curved just like the cell walls.

“
Where’d he go?” Swinton asked.

“
Beats me, but this is our chance to get out of here.”

“
And you plan on doing that how?”

“
Watch,” Harlo said. The holes in the door were just big enough for Harlo’s hand to fit through. She pushed her arm out as far as she could, and held her hand out, palm up and open. Her nanite sleeve began to rush toward her hand, and within seconds, Harlo was holding a throbbing sphere of black liquid.

She closed her eyes, and a yellow dot appeared on the ball of nanites. It rotated around on its base like an eyeball out of its socket.

“
There’s a panel beside the door,” Harlo said. “It looks like it’s made out of the same kind of tiles that are on the floor in here, just smaller. I think it’s a keypad.”

“
How do you know how to do that?” Swinton asked, amazed.

“
I’ve used this Conjuring for surgery before,” she said. “Well, I was taught how to do it, and then Dr. Howser used her own to actually perform the procedure.”

“
It’s awfully big to be inside someone,” Swinton said.

“
This is an enlarged version, Swinton.” As she spoke, the dot on the nanite scope turned red. A tendril extended from the sphere from beneath the red dot and snaked its way through the air to the left side of the door. “The panel hasn’t been used in a while. There’s no residual heat left on the buttons.” The dot turned blue, and Harlo smiled. “There are, however, traces of oil or something left on some of them. I know which buttons open the door, at least.”

Swinton beamed. “Well, that’s good news. How many are there?”

“
Four,” she said. “It could take forever to get the right sequence, though. Any suggestions?”

Swinton thought about it. He had no idea. “No,” he said. “I have no clue. Just start pressing them and hope you get lucky. If the guard comes back, pull yourself back in here and wait till he leaves to try again. We know he leaves now, at least.”

“
Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I’ll try that.” Her nanites pressed four buttons on the keypad.

Nothing happened. Four more. Still nothing. Another combination and another and another. None of them worked because the door never opened. Then, when Harlo thought she heard someone walking outside the cell, she pressed one last sequence of keys, and she heard a slight hiss. She jerked her hand back inside and recalled her nanites just in time for the door to the cell to slide open, granting them access to whatever was outside.

At roughly the same time, the guard reappeared from around the corner. If he was surprised to find the door open, his reaction didn’t show it. He simply walked into the room, grabbed Swinton and Harlo by the necks, and pushed them against the back wall. They hit hard, and Harlo sagged as her head bounced off the wall.

The guard released her, and she fell into a pile. It let go of Swinton, too, and took a step backward. The large purple man cocked his head to the side and looked inquisitively at Swinton. The guard began to speak without moving his mouth, but it was the same language Swinton had heard them speak to each other on the balcony, and he couldn’t understand anything it was saying.

“
I don’t understand,” Swinton said. “What do you want?”

The guard’s eyes narrowed. “What do…you want,” it said, its mouth never moving.

“
Umm…” Swinton said.

“
You want…”

Swinton didn’t answer.

The guard held out his hand, and his Flameblade appeared. He put his other hand beneath the blade and held it out to Swinton. Swinton blinked twice.

“
You want…”

“
Umm, yes,” Swinton said. “I do. But why are you giving it to me?”

“
You want…”

The conversation was going nowhere, and Swinton had no idea why his guard was offering him a weapon—a Flameblade!—but he wasn’t going to turn it down. He reached out and grabbed the glowing weapon by the hilt. The aura dimmed from a steady purple to a pale yellow.

“
Thank you,” Swinton said. “Why give this to me?”

The guard looked at Harlo, unconscious on the floor. He walked over and kicked her.

“
Hey, stop that!” Swinton said.

The guard kicked Harlo again. Swinton rushed his captor with his new weapon, but the angel blocked the attack with his arm and knocked Swinton off his feet. The guard kicked Harlo one more time and pointed at her. Then back to Swinton. Then back to Harlo.

It didn’t take Swinton long to figure out what the angel wanted. “I’m not going to hurt her,” Swinton said. “If that’s the price of this thing, you can have it back.” He tossed the Flameblade toward its previous owner.

The guard looked at him and cocked his head to the side once again. It made a fist, the Flameblade appeared in it, then he placed it back in Swinton’s hand.

“
I said—AAAAHHH!” Swinton’s refusal was cut short when the guard made a slicing motion with his sword arm. Swinton’s arm mimicked it involuntarily. The Jaronya was controlling Swinton like a puppet, making him hurt himself with the Flameblade he had wanted so badly.

The guard smiled, and he made another slashing motion toward the ground.

Swinton screamed as his arm made the exact same gesture. But where the guard’s movement was harmless because he was unarmed, Swinton used the Flameblade to slice directly into his own calf. The sword lodged halfway through, and the angel lifted his arm and slammed it back down. Swinton did the same thing, finishing the job and lopping off the lower part of his right leg.

He cried out and sputtered incomprehensibly at the guard. He let go of the sword, and it reappeared in the guard’s hand.

Swinton just screamed again. Harlo stirred at the noise, and she tried to focus on the source of the noise. Even in her stupor, she knew something was wrong. “What is it, Swinton? What happened?”

Another scream.

As her vision cleared, Harlo saw the details of what was going on. The guard stood over Swinton, who lay crying and stammering, his leg in front of him. She tried to stand up, but stumbled and fell. The room spun, and she tried again when it stopped. The guard moved over to her and pushed her back down.

She watched as the guard knelt down beside Swinton and grabbed the young man’s severed leg and jammed the Flameblade against the stub. Swinton screamed, but the guard just kept working. Eventually, the sword’s aura flared, and Swinton’s leg began to heal.

Within moments of being inside the purple flame, there was no wound on it at all. Swinton’s screaming subsided into mere panting and gasping.

The guard stood up and looked directly at Harlo. Then he walked out of the room as the door slid shut behind him and he took his place outside the cell once again.

***

“
I can’t stand another one, Harlo. I mean it.”

“
Maybe there won’t be another one,” she offered. She didn’t believe it, but she had to offer the poor guy some kind of hope. For the past three hours, as close as she could tell anyway, the guard had regularly come into their cell and accosted Swinton. It handed him the Flameblade and somehow puppeteered him into slicing off one appendage or another.