Clockwork Heart (25 page)

Was that someone next to the Engine or a trick of the chamber's constantly moving shadows? She tilted her wings and tailset and swept back down.

The figure turned, and Taya caught a glimpse of a startled, uplifted face.

She gasped and tilted too far. The air broke around her and she tumbled, one wing catching beneath her and twisting.

The walls and Engine spun and gravity fought ondium for possession of her body. Heart pounding, Taya contorted herself, throwing her arms wide and arching her back. The fall didn't frighten her nearly as much as the intruder— she knew how to deal with gravity and open air. She gave one last half-spin until she was falling face-down again. Then she swept her arms down, hard, feeling metal feathers snap shut against each other to catch air.

Something burned across the back of her left leg and she flinched, but her downstroke checked her fall and propelled her back up. She aimed for the metal mesh crosswalk overhead, her eyes fixed on the ondium rods that crisscrossed its bottom and held it suspended. She spread her wings again and felt a welcome push of hot air as excess pressure was released from one of the steam engines far below.

Her calf hurt. She craned her neck, but she couldn't see anything beneath the hinged bars that extended from the armature back to her tailset.

She looked back up.

The intruder was crouched on the catwalk, staring at her through the meshwork. Amazement and admiration gleamed in his green eyes.

She hadn't been mistaken.

The intruder was Alister Forlore, complete with embroidered robes, jeweled ornaments, and an ivory mask hanging from his belt.

Their eyes met, and for a second all Taya could think was how relieved Cristof would be that his brother was alive. Then she realized what that meant, and a surge of righteous anger swept away her relief.

The decatur looked up, then leaped to his feet, holding out a hand. Taya craned her neck and saw a lictor standing on the side catwalk, aiming an air rifle at her.

Lady! She swerved, soaring up and to the right to put the crosswalk between her and the gunner.

A series of sharp, metallic pings warned her that the lictor was firing. Taya had no idea where the bullets had gone — buried, perhaps, in the enormous grinding cliff of gears behind her — but they hadn't hit her.

A cross-cable nearly did, though, and sweat broke out on her forehead as she swept beneath it. The shooter lowered the barrel of his rifle to the catwalk floor, unscrewing its used air reservoir.

Out of the corner of her eye, Taya glimpsed a second lictor running along the catwalk, trying to keep abreast of her. He was carrying a rifle, too, but he was moving too fast to aim.

“Stop shooting!” she shouted. “I'm not your enemy!”

Or was she? Were the lictors secret Torn Cards, working for Alister? Or — her heart leaped — could Alister be innocent, somehow snatched from death to protect the Engine?

Another burst of warm air swept around her. She spread her wings, letting the thermal pull her up and over the crosswalk.

Alister's head tilted up, and he held a hand over his eyes to shade them from the bright glare of the incandescent lights as he stared beyond her.

Taya tilted to see what he was looking at.

“Oh, no!”

Cristof must have heard something, because he was plummeting toward them, a dark winged shape hurtling through the empty space between the mountain and the Engine. He was falling fast, his wing-clad arms spread wide but their ondium feathers slotted open to let the air whistle past their metal edges.

Then he swept his wings down, awkwardly emulating the strokes she'd taught him. His flightfeathers snapped shut and his descent slowed. Taya held her breath, watching him fumble through the morning's lessons to angle himself toward the crosswalk.

Lady, he was freeflying! Badly, to be sure, but the ondium counterweights she'd packed into his suit were giving him the margin of error he needed to keep himself aloft.

She tilted, trying to catch the last wisp of her dissipating thermal.

The second lictor was swinging his rifle around.

“Cristof!” Taya plunged, angling herself so that the stretch of her metal wings would be between the gunman and the outcaste. Her leg protested the twist needed to steer with her tailset, but the maneuver worked. The lictor started as she swept past him, and his shots went wild, lead pellets ricocheting off the walls and machinery around them.

She pulled out of her dive and saw Cristof backbeating hard, his feet aimed at the crosswalk where his brother stood. Alister remained motionless, watching his brother with an expression of sheer incredulity.

One of Cristof's heavy boots hit the railing and he hovered, suspended, teetering.

Taya swooped over him.

Alister reached out and grabbed his brother's keel, yanking him down to safety.

Cristof's soles hit the iron crosswalk. He slipped an arm from the wingstruts and swept it upward, his fist slamming against Alister's chin and snapping the decatur's head back.

Taya turned and saw both lictors running toward the crosswalk to assist Alister. She circled wide, her wings teetering as she lost the current she'd been riding. Then she turned and aimed herself at the top of the crosswalk.

Her timing was almost perfect. She swept over the crosswalk just as the riflemen stepped onto it. They ducked, instinctively throwing their arms over their heads, and one of the air rifle barrels clipped the front edge of her left wing.

The impact tore the weapon from the man's hands and sent it falling into the chasm, but it also threw her off-balance. She spun, struggling to right herself. The Great Engine loomed before her with sickening speed.

Backbeating as wildly as Cristof had a moment before, Taya jerked her ankles from the tailset and lifted her feet in front of her. Her thick boot soles hit one of the Great Engine's giant spinning gears, hard. Her left foot slipped against a slick coating of machine oil, but the other got enough of a grip to push her back, away from the mechanism, as the gears' teeth ground against each other. She snatched her feet away before they could be trapped. Sweat dripped down her face, running along the edges of her flight goggles.

She fought her way back up again.

Cristof was pointing his needle gun at Alister, but in his haste to subdue his brother, he'd forgotten to lock his wings up and out of the way. One of the floating wings had become tangled in the iron railing, holding him in place.

The lictor who'd lost his rifle drew a knife. With one hand, he grabbed Cristof's trapped wing and yanked on it, trying to distract the exalted while he waited for a chance to use the blade. The other lictor pressed against the far railing, leaning back as he tried to aim his rifle at Cristof without endangering Alister. Taya swore. She'd missed the lictor who'd replaced his air cylinder.

Then she heard the hissing that signaled a new release of hot air from the steam engines below. Thanking the Lady, she caught the updraft and aimed herself at the crosswalk, starting high and angling down at a forty-five-degree angle. As soon as she was close, she swung herself around into landing position.

The rifleman looked up in time to see her boots slam into his chest. Already off-balance, the impact was enough to flip him backward over the rail, still clutching his rifle. He screamed as he plummeted.

Taya used the jar of hitting him to backbeat. She caught the rail with both feet and a jolt of pain went through her injured leg. She searched for the falling man, hoping to save him. She hadn't meant—

“Look out!”

She heard Cristof's shout at the same time she felt hands on her wing, yanking it down. She tumbled, her back slamming against the crosswalk. The impact wasn't hard enough to knock the breath out of her — the ondium kept her light — but she was helpless as the knife-wielding lictor kicked her in the side, right beneath her keel.

Taya struggled to free her arms. The lictor leaned over and grabbed her harness straps, his blade flashing. She futilely tried to kick him away.

Over the lictor's shoulder, she saw Cristof swinging his needler around.

The weapon spat, and long steel pins abruptly protruded from her attacker's throat. Blood spurted as the man collapsed beside her. The knife fell from his fingers and slipped through the grillwork into the emptiness below.

Taya freed her arms and wiped the dead lictor's blood off her face, her hands shaking.

“Nice work, Cris,” Alister said agreeably, then grabbed his brother with both hands. With a heave, he lifted Cristof by his harness and hauled him over the catwalk rail.

“Wait!” Cristof shouted, his loose wings floating around him. He tried to grab Alister's forearms and missed.

Taya rolled to her feet, her own unlocked wings clattering against the metal railing as they floated upward. She stood just in time to see Alister drop his brother into the depths.

If Cristof shouted, his cry was lost in the roar of the Great Engine and the ugly grating and squealing of his metal wings rattling over the guardrail as he fell.

Taya threw herself forward, leaning over the edge of the railing. She had one boot wedged in the grille, ready to jump, when Alister grabbed her around the waist. She twisted, yanking at his wrists.

“Easy, little swan! He'll be all right.” Alister picked her up and pivoted, planting her on the small platform next to the Engine. “The worst he'll suffer is a broken arm or leg.”

“You bastard!” Taya kicked and ducked. Alister cursed as a floating wing feather cut his cheek. He shoved her against the Engine.

Taya hit the Engine's ondium panel and turned, putting her back against it. Pain burned up the back of her leg, and her tailset scraped and flexed against the catwalk. She kicked it up behind her. Her wings floated at her sides.

Alister frowned, dabbing a drop of blood from his face.

The hem of his robe was covered in dirt, and a few leaves jutted out from the golden hoops and clasps that were slipping out of his once-ornate hairstyle. Gold glittered on his hands, but his fine manicure had been destroyed.

Taya looked down, through the open mesh floor, and saw the receding mass of metal that she was sure was Cristof and his floating, broken wings. Suddenly her anger was replaced by convulsive shivering. Bile rose in her throat.

“How could you do that?”

“I wouldn't have thrown him over if I didn't think he'd survive,” Alister chided her. “You did a fine job of counterweighting him.”

“He thought you were dead!”

“Oh.” Alister blinked. “That.” He looked ashamed of himself. “Was he upset?”

“Of course he was!” Taya felt the Engine thrumming behind her, rattling her wings. She glanced to one side, looking for an escape route — some way to help Cristof. Alister shifted his weight to stand in front of her.

“I would really prefer you didn't retrieve him. He's safer down there, where he won't feel obliged to stop me.”

Still trembling with reaction, Taya wiped her palms on her pants legs.

“What if he's swept toward a gear? The air currents in here are all over the place.”

Alister glanced down, uncertainly. Then he shook his head.

“He'll be fine. And if you rescue him, you'll keep bothering me and I might have to hurt you.”

“He's afraid of heights!”

“I know.” The exalted gazed at her, his green eyes wide. “I was astounded when he leaped down to save you. Or was he simply leaping down to hit me? Hard to say. My brother plays his cards close to the chest.”

“He's not the only one,” Taya said, bitterly. How far down was it to the floor, anyway? The fall would be slow, because of all the ondium Cristof wore. Was a gradual descent a blessing or a curse for someone who was afraid of heights? “What are you doing here, anyway?”

“Nothing that will harm Ondinium, I assure you.” The exalted held out a hand. “My swan queen. I'm sorry. I truly regret any pain I may have caused you or my family.”

Taya ignored his hand and slid her arms into her loose wings. Alister tensed. Realizing there was no escaping him, she simply locked the wings high and pulled her arms free again. She'd have to wait for an opening.

Her calf felt like someone had laid a hot iron across it. She hoped it wouldn't stiffen up before she needed to vault past him.

“What about the pain you caused Pins' family?” she asked. “Her daughter found her body. You're the one who killed her, aren't you?”

“She was a criminal. I didn't do anything the lictors wouldn't have done, eventually.”

“That's a horrible thing to say.” Taya recoiled. “I liked you. I was even thinking about sleeping with you!”

“Really? How flattering.” He smiled, stepping closer. “I still like you, Taya Swan. You never fail to impress me. When you came swooping down out of nowhere like a silver bird, you took my breath away. You're an example of everything that's right about Ondinium.”

“Is that so?” Taya pulled herself as tall as she could. “Then why are you trying to destroy it?”

“I'm not destroying it. I'm fixing it.” He reached out and caressed her cheek. “I'd like to convince you and Cristof not to tell anyone I was here. With your cooperation, nobody will hear about this, and the city will be better off. I won't cause any harm. I'm just going to update a few programs to make everyone's life a little safer and more predictable.”

She turned her face away. “Clockwork Heart was meant to circumvent security, wasn't it? It was never a marriage program at all.”

“Actually, it can do both. All I need to do is switch out a few sets of cards.”

“Some marriage program. It matched up Lars and Kyle.”

Alister laughed.

“They ran it on themselves? That's wonderful. I would have loved to have seen Lars' face when he saw the results. I'd guessed about Kyle, but…”

Taya shoved him in the chest, forcing him to take a step backward.