Of Dreams and Rust (29 page)

But another comes a moment later, and another, and Aysun tears open the tent flap and screams Anni's name. I push past her and exit the tent, needing to escape the enclosed space for a moment, hoping to see Anni rushing toward me, because I cannot drag some of these patients all the way to the carriage by myself—some of them weigh twice as much as I do.

It is strangely quiet in the square as the ground trembles beneath my feet. At the south side of the canyon mouth I hear a shout in Noor, and it draws my eyes along the ground to a spot at the base of a low hill. Melik is there, rifle over his shoulder, holding a long, thick coil of rope with a hook at one end.

In his other hand is a wrench.

Several men, including Baris and Bajram, stand around him, equipped in the same manner. They are going to try to take down the machines the way Bo and Sinan did. They are pointing into the canyon, and I swear I see the stark shadow of a spider leg against the cliffs, the metal gleam of a steel body under the glaring sun.

“Wen!”

I spin around to see Anni waving to me from the front of a large horse-drawn farm cart. She steers the two horses down the lane as we hear the first clatter of heavy gunfire echo against the rocks. My ears roar with the knowledge that these might be the last minutes of our lives, and I look over my shoulder to find Melik staring at us.

He puts his hand over his heart and extends his palm to us before loping out of sight. Anni's hand is still held out when I turn back to her. “We must load them quickly,” she says to me as I climb onto the side.

“Aysun can help us,” I tell her as she guides the animals into the square. My shoulders are hiked to my ears as I jump off the cart. The ground shakes with the horde of approaching killers, and the air splits with the boom of gunfire.

I will fight until I am dead. That is what Melik said. Not until he is wounded or tired or too scared to go on. Until he is dead. And that is what I will do too. Until I am no longer breathing, I will move and I will help. Anni rips the tent flap open and issues a stream of instructions. She disappears inside. I go around the back of the cart and imagine who should go where. The injured more at risk for bleeding should ride at the front, where there will be slightly less jostling, and—

Panicked shouts and crashing metal footsteps steal my breath. Heavy fire shatters the rocks all around the fighters, and they scatter in search of cover. Except for one. As the first machine lumbers into view, Melik runs straight under it, ducking between the columns of its legs. Its front guns are silent and its top gunner slouches limp in his seat, already dead. Even if he weren't, though, Melik is out of the reach of the machine's guns.

But not out of the reach of the guns of the war machine behind it.

Melik throws his rope straight up, and when it catches, he leaps onto it as bullets strafe the ground at his feet. The machine stalks forward quickly with him dangling from the coupling of its thorax and abdomen. It stomps out of the canyon and into the village with the other spider on its tail, the front guns swinging this way and that, trying to get a good shot without damaging its brother. Steam and smoke roll out of the backs of the machines and billow into the air. All I can see is Melik's legs now, the rest of him obscured by the massive body of the monster coming toward us.

Hands close over my shoulders. “We need your help to—” Anni screams when she sees the war machine astride the lane, its massive feet collapsing the cottages on either side as it roars forward, with another right behind it.

I am prying her fingers from my body when Melik is shot.

Blood spatters around his leg and he falls, landing on his back with the legs of the enormous machine caging him. His wrench lands several feet away. His face is a mask of pain. It is one of those grain-of-sand moments, tumbling through the air and allowing me to see every facet. The swell of Melik's chest as he draws a labored breath. His hands reaching for his rifle as blood streams from his leg. The big gun that took him down, dipping to take another shot.

“No.” It comes from me quietly, but as it does, I sprint forward, my hands up. “No!” My feet pound the dirt and my ears roar as I barrel toward my death, unable to watch Melik shot to pieces in front of me. The machine above him steps over his body but by some miracle does not crush him with its enormous feet. It strides along the path as I approach from the other side, screaming and waving my arms.

Melik rolls onto his stomach, and his jade eyes meet mine as the hulking spider that shot him approaches from behind. I run straight toward him while the other spider, the one with the rope still hanging from its belly, makes a turn toward me. Melik heaves himself onto his knees and swings his rifle up. He fires past me at the machine he tried to climb, then pivots, aiming for the other.

“Melik!” I dive for him and grab his shoulders as he fires a few futile shots at the metal beast coming toward him. I drag him backward even though I know it is hopeless.

“No, no, no,” he says, his fingers clutching at my arm. He's been shot through the right calf, and blood soaks his trouser leg. “Run, Wen. Go!”

But it is too late to run. The machines are on either side of us, and as the battle rages in the canyon, we are here, the sole focus of these two monsters. As the guns swing down toward us, I step around Melik and take his face in my hands. “Don't let go,” I say, echoing his words from my dream. I press my lips to his forehead.

“I will never let go,” he says, his voice shredded with pain.

The world explodes with gunfire, deafening me. Melik twists over me, crushing me to the ground. My arm coils around his neck and I press my face against his chest. It goes on and on and on, and I know I am screaming, but I can't hear myself. Melik is a fierce and relentless weight, every muscle trembling as he tries to shield me.

Metal crashes against metal, shrieking and whining. I open my eyes to see Melik's face above mine. He blinks and rolls off me, and we turn to see one of the machines, the one that shot him, crumple slowly to the ground, smoke blooming from its back end. There are large-bore bullet holes across its spider face and along its sides. We twist to look at the other machine, the one with the rope hanging from it. Its front legs are planted on either side of the lane, and the front guns are smoking. With a hissing hum the body of the spider moves lower until it is resting on the lane.

Its top hatch opens.

The pilot's helmet reflects the sunlight as he climbs onto the top of the machine. Melik grabs for his rifle, but as he does, the pilot leaps from the war spider and lands in front of us with an unmistakable metal clank and hum.

We stare into his face as he slides half of his metal visor to the side.

Bo looks at Melik's leg and then at me. “Can you fix that? Or at least make it stop bleeding?” he asks me.

My mouth opens and closes a few times before I manage to say. “I think so?”

Bo nods, quick and matter-of-fact. “Perfect. Because I need him.”

“What are you doing?” Melik asks, grimacing as he holds himself upright.

Bo tilts his head, looking for all the world like a sentient machine. “I'm delivering you eighteen war machines, Red. Do you want them?”

Melik gapes at him.

Bo's mouth curves into a smirk. “Good. Get on your feet and come with me.”

Chapter

“WHAT HAVE YOU done, Bo?” I ask as Anni races over to us, offering forth my satchel and then hovering over Melik, who speaks to her in rapid-fire Noor.

“I created slow leaks in the water tanks and sabotaged the gauges in all the machines except the one I was piloting,” he says, nodding at the small puddle of water forming beneath the downed machine behind us. “They've been slowly draining since we set out this morning, but the firemen have no idea. I calculated the rate of water loss, and . . . ah. Yes. Look.” He points his spindly metal finger at the mouth of the canyon, where one of the war machines slowly sinks until its abdomen and thorax hit the dirt. “If you patch the holes and refill the tanks, they will be fine, but only if they are not destroyed.” He watches the Noor fighters rush forward with their rifles raised before he swivels his head down and looks at Melik. “Which means you have to call your men off. Get them to capture the crew, but tell them not to hurt the machines.”

I open my satchel and pull out several long strips of cloth. Teeth gritted, Melik wrenches up his trouser leg to reveal a long gouge along the back of his leg, as deep and wide as my thumb and twice as long. It is a bad wound, but not a fatal one, and though it needs to be cleaned and carefully stitched, there is no time. “Melik, I can bind this, but—”

“Do it,” he says, “as quickly as you can.” His narrowed, bloodshot eyes are focused on the opening of the canyon, where the boom of gunfire and the shouts of the Noor tell us that a desperate battle is going on.

A shout from the rear of Bo's machine makes me flinch, and we look up to see the grime-streaked fireman, who must have emerged from his hatch when he realized his pilot had attacked another machine. He's aiming a revolver at us, but before he can pull the trigger, Bo's metal hands move in concert, plucking two spiders from his shoulders and flinging them at the fireman. The man's thick arms pinwheel as the two metal demons land on his chest and belly, and I look away as he begins to scream.

Melik and Anni are silent as the fireman hits the ground and goes still. Anni's eyes are so wide, and her lips tremble as she cuts furtive glances at Bo. Melik's every muscle is tense, but he does not cry out as I wind the cloth around his lower leg and pull it tight. I put my hand over his. “This will bleed if you try to walk.”

“I know,” he says. “But I am not dead yet. I can still fight.”

I wish he would not say it like that. I am having trouble suppressing my wish to drag him to the cart onto which Anni and Aysun have loaded the wounded. He is still alive. He could stay that way. But now he is bracing himself and trying to rise from the ground. Bo offers a metal hand, and Melik takes it, using his good leg to push himself up. He leaves bloody fingerprints on Bo's steel palm.

“Do any of your people know how to manage a boiler?” Bo asks.

Melik looks toward the slaughtered fireman. Bo's spiders have buried themselves in the man's chest and are still at work. “What is required?”

“Adding coal to the firebox and monitoring the gauges to keep the pressure at a level that allows me to pilot the machine. There is a communication system inside. The fireman will be able to hear my voice, and I will tell him before I need more power.”

“What more is there to do?” I ask. “You've said the machines will shut down on their own.”

Bo nods. “They will. But the carrier machine is coming, and I did not have time to sabotage it. It is a very powerful machine with two heavy cannon at the front. It would have no trouble destroying this village and your survivors.” His eyes stray toward Aysun and the cart full of injured Noor.

Melik leans on Anni as he tries to put weight on his injured leg. He keeps his mouth clamped shut to hold his groan inside. “I will manage the boiler if you show me how.”

“But your men—” Bo begins.

“Cannot speak Itanyai,” says Melik. “I'm the only one who can.”

“Wen and I will tell the fighters what they need to know,” says Anni. She turns to me. “Many of them will be injured.”

I stand up and swing my pack over my shoulder. I can do little but bind and tourniquet and splint, but that is not nothing. I raise my head to find Bo staring at me, a frown on his face. “Wen, the guns on the war machines will still be functional,” he says. “It is not safe.”

“All the more reason for me to go and help.” I move closer to him, drinking in the sight of his face, of his concern for me. He has allowed that part of him, the human part, to live, and it feels like a gift. “I will be careful,” I add.

Bo looks back and forth between Melik and me, and I know he is wishing Melik would agree with him and tell me not to go. And Melik looks like he wants to. We stare at each other for the briefest moment, and then he says, very quietly, “Remember, Wen.
Mican tisamokye
.”
You carry my heart with you.