Chronicles of Gilderam: Book One: Sunset (41 page)

As a torrent of bodies rushed pasted him, Eridanean wondered to himself how he could’ve been so overly confident. That was not elf-like. He was astonished to think that he had acted like a
human
. Or had he? Surely, this was an impossible outcome.

He watched the flagship slide slowly closer, an unstoppable mountain of gun decks, portholes and balloons. Bolts fired from the forest sank into it continuously, knocking away massive hunks of its underbelly with each strike. One after another. But it wouldn’t be enough – the thing was just too big.

Eridanean swallowed dryly.

For every elf that dies,
he thought,
I am the one to blame
….

“Chancellor!”

It was Audim, breathing hard.

“We’ve got to get out of here! They’re going to ram the city!”

“You go, Audim. I need to stay here. Someone needs to –”

“What are you talking about, Aelyia? There’s nothing more to be done. We need to leave –
now!
”

Audim pulled at his arm, but Eridanean tore himself free.

“No, Audim,” he said resolutely. “I’m staying here.”

Audim implored the chancellor with his eyes, but Eridanean met him with earnest tranquility. It cooled him.

“I won’t go with you. I – I can’t. You go.”

Audim wanted to protest, but he didn’t know what to say.

“What are you waiting for?!” the chancellor roared. “Get out of here! Audim, find your fiancée. Find my granddaughter and look after her. That’s all that matters now. Go.”

Audim drew in a pained breath and set his jaw. Without another word, he was gone.

“That’s it,” Cavada encouraged. “Easy does it.”

Shazahd was finally getting the hang of the steering. Cavada had since moved to the helm, where he could control the ship’s altitude with a lever. Together, they maneuvered
Gilderam
with some success.

“All right, now let’s go around that one. Wider, Shazahd – a wider turn. There you go.”

They rounded the last, dying battleship and listened to the
crack-crack
of their gunners taking shots at it, pelting away at the crumbling craft. When they passed it, they got a clear view across the breadth of
Vacthor
.

“
Threithumé
…” said Shazahd. “It’s Owein… and Jerahd! Look, Cavada! There they are!”

“
Cratal!
You’re right! Oops, we’ve got to go up,” he said, sliding the lever. He waited for the buzz instinctively, but it didn’t come. The blimp rose precipitously upward, as if the lever didn’t simply signal an operator, but directly controlled the ballasts themselves.

“Up?! Where are you going?”

“We can’t sail right over the flagship, Shazahd. They’d tear us apart in seconds.”

“But Owein… and Jer–”

Shazahd broke off. Cavada wasn’t looking at her, but if he had, he’d have seen a very peculiar expression on her face. It looked as though she had something uncomfortable lodged in the side of her brain. She stood perfectly still, as though hypnotized, and could hear nothing but a tiny voice inside her head.

“
Shazahd!
” it said. “
Shazahd, it’s me
…
your beloved. It’s Audim
.”

Her necklace burned with green light.

Audim stood alone on a high branch jutting into the sky above the Inner City. It held almost no leaves, and suspended him over the northern side of the tree, directly above where the flagship
Vacthor
, now sprouting pillars of flame down its length, was about to impact.

He held one hand to his temple, and the other clutched his heartroot necklace. His eyes were jammed shut with concentration.

“
Shazahd
,” he thought with all his willpower. “
Come to me
…
find me
…
!
”

Back on
Gilderam’s
bridge, Shazahd shook her head. Blinking, she remembered where she was and what she was doing. But the voice kept calling to her from the back of her consciousness, “
Shazahd
…
come to me
….”

“Okay, take us starboard,” said Cavada. “I mean right, Shazahd, turn us to the right.” His voice sounded distant. Audim’s voice, from within her mind, drowned out everything else.

“Did you hear me, Shazahd?” he asked from the helm. “I said right.”

“
Find me!
” the voice shouted.

Cavada turned to look at her.

“Are you okay? Shazahd?”

“I know what
mlec
starboard means!” she said. “I got it, I got it….”

“Sharper than that, or we’ll run into the city.”

Giving
Gilderam
a tight spin, they watched the Inner City fly past the bridge. Amongst the blur of green, there was a miniscule flash of incongruity near the top. It was the form of a person, perched on a protruding limb.

“Audim!” Shazahd cried.

The
Vacthor’s
bow smashed through the furthest extremities of the Inner City and the entire ship shuddered. It was not because of the tree, however, but because the volatile engines deep inside, reeling from sustained trauma, were about to give out.

On the weather deck, Jerahd still traded blows with Tolora while Owein grappled with the Empress.

Tolora advanced upon Jerahd with a fresh bevy of attacks, steadily gaining ground. Jerahd was forced to concede room until the man with the ponytail opened himself up for counterattack, at which point the Disciple returned with ruthless ferocity. Now Tolora backpedaled, nearly overpowered by a tornado of legs and fists. He tried to get in close to catch him in a hold, but Jerahd manipulated his momentum expertly, spun him around, and landed the side of his hand solidly against his cheek.

Tolora stumbled backward, stunned. Jerahd leapt in close, grabbed him by his coat, and threw him over his shoulder. Tolora slid on the deck. Jerahd still held the collar in his hands. It had ripped clean off the shabby coat.

When Tolora crawled to his feet, his head was fully exposed.

“You –!” Jerahd said hoarsely. “You’re… you’re a…?!”

Tolora took a couple steps closer. Across both cheeks, scrawled in ancient calligraphy, were tattoos… nearly identical to Jerahd’s.

“
I was
…” he said, speaking the language of Val flawlessly.

“
But
–
but that’s not possible! You’re a murderer! An assassin.
”

“
A man can be many things, Disciple.
”

Something about Tolora’s face was intimately familiar to Jerahd, as though it were one he had known long ago, but forgotten.

“
Even a traitor against the gods?
”

His response was a smirk. Then he sprang into the air, flying at Jerahd heel-first.

Owein was dragging, running out of steam, but the Empress was as limber as ever. While he sucked air, she pranced around him with a vigor that suggested she had hours of fight left in her.

His attacks were growing dangerously sloppy, and his blocks, when he even executed them in time, were hurting about as bad as when the hits got through. Eventually, she sent him sliding across the deck again. When he came to a stop, he looked up to see an Imperial guard standing over him.

The Empress laughed.

“I’d tell you to give up, Owein,” she said. “But, frankly, I’m enjoying this far too much.”

He grimaced bitterly and hefted himself to his knees.

“I’d hate to disappoint you,” he said huskily. 

She strode toward him nonchalantly. Behind her, the front end of the
Vacthor
was already exploding in places as it collided with major arteries of the Inner City. The huge trunks snapped with a
boom
beneath the unstoppable tonnage of the flagship. Great boughs of the tree fell out of place as their supports were plowed through.

“I can see why you were chosen,” she said thoughtfully. “You don’t even know
how
to give up. But a
roccrash
…
?
I suppose, in the end, you were right to be so cynical. Really, you’re the only one to make any sense. There is no hope for this world. You knew that. And you can’t save it. No one can.” She came to a halt. “Hmpf. Some savior you turned out to be.”

Owein perked up at that last part. He slowly stood himself up and leveled an adamantine glare at the Empress. But something caught his attention – something in the air behind her. He didn’t respond to it enough to warrant her concern. She chuckled at him.

“Just look at you!” she said. “You can’t even save yourself.”

Owein smiled back.

“I won’t have to.”

The Empress’ smile vanished, replaced with a rancorous scowl, and she flew at him. He took a step back, bumped into the guard behind him, and then one great stride forward. As he did, his hand pulled free the guard’s sword from its scabbard on his hip.

Owein swung it in a clean arc.

The razor-sharp blade found Sraia’s throat just below the jaw, right where her cuirass met the helmet. The Empress’ body carried on past him, her blood spilling everywhere, and her severed head bounced on the deck.

Owein hurled the weapon to Jerahd, who caught it effortlessly amidst his frenetic quarrel. The Disciple pivoted around and stabbed the blade straight through Tolora’s midsection.

Then Owein and Jerahd were running. The guards gave chase, but the fugitives sprinted for the end of the deck and both – without hesitation – leapt right off it into the open air beyond.

A single rope sailed passed them, trailing below a spherical green airship that was going a just little too fast.

Owein had miscalculated, and groped vainly for the line just beyond his reach. But Jerahd hadn’t. He snatched the rope with one hand and Owein with the other.

An icy chill took hold at the base of Audim’s spine. It radiated outward through the rest of his body as he watched the little green blimp sail away. His hands, which had been clasped tightly together, fell apart. His jaw quivered.

He tried to wrap his mind around what had just happened – what was still happening – but the outstretched branch on which he stood started to wobble dangerously. Below, the
Vacthor
cut through the city like a dull, slow-moving knife. A heat wave flew up to envelope him, scorching hot, from the leaked and burning fuel of the flagship two hundred
entilum
straight down.

Branches buckled and fell everywhere. The whole northern side of the Inner City trembled with spectacular spasms as the mightiest trunks of the great tree fractured and split.

Audim crouched low and hugged the limb. Its base splintered beneath, and it bucked and heaved wildly. With a sharp twitch it hurled him off, and sent the elvish noble high into the air.

He fell.

Along the way, he couldn’t take his eyes off the boiling inferno directly below him – the imploding mayhem of the
Vacthor
.

Gilderam
wound around the great tree as the
Vacthor’s
momentum finally subsided. The enormous carcass of the Empress’ ship floundered and came to a halt, stopped at last by the woody mass of the ancient tree. Rivers of silky, black nexane sprayed freely from the crumpled hull.

Varride-filled balloons pulled desperately at their bonds, determined to rise above the carnage. One broke away, carrying half a deck with it into the branches above. Others were engulfed in flame as fuel ignited, and their canvas shrouds oxidized in seconds.

Searing heat blazed up through the city, and the crew of
Gilderam
saw a shower of bodies fall from the tree. Thousands of elves weren’t able to make it to safety, and chose to jump rather than watch their flesh melt from their bones.

As varride escaped, the
Vacthor’s
lift disappeared, and the ship started a rocky descent. The mammoth shipwreck slid straight down, tearing wide gashes into the bark and crushing the boles beneath it with unimaginable weight. It sent a tremor through the whole city. The
Vacthor
shaved off the rest of the tree’s northern face, and its flaming remains sank into the darkness of the forest floor.

There was a moment of stillness before the explosion.
Gilderam
continued to circle, possessed by the sight, but helpless to stop it. Eventually – inexorably – fire spread to the rest of
Vacthor’s
nexane reserves.