The Vanishing Throne (11 page)

“What
is
that?” I ask as I follow her from the room. The explosions are so loud that I can barely hear myself speak. I grab the balustrade for balance and it wobbles beneath my hand as we descend the stairs.

An awful crashing drowns out Aithinne's response. Rock and wood splinter above us, and then the roof caves in.

A
ITHINNE'S BODY
crashes hard into mine. She rolls us to the ground, fallen detritus digging into my back. Debris drops all around us. A stone slab smashes into Aithinne so hard that the bones in her body would have shattered had she been human.

We're pressed against the building, buried under rubble. A curved slab of the collapsed staircase blocked the fallen ceiling from crushing my limbs. I see nothing but a few spots of daylight between the remains.

There's a moment's silence, stark and heavy. No more distant rumbles, no falling rock.

“Aithinne,” I whisper. “Are you—”

Then I hear it—what sounds like a mechanical whirring—and something crashes through the rubble to pick Aithinne right from off top of me.

“
Run
!” she screams.

I look up, my muscles braced for a fight—and freeze.
What in god's name is that
?

A mechanical creature, at least thirty feet tall, towers over the remains of Charlotte Square. It's built like a redcap, with thick limbs and long, hanging arms, but it appears made from the dark metal I saw in the
Sìth-bhrùth
, all smooth and semireflective with ebony liquid pushing through the veins of its giant hands.

It's covered in black armor, the plates glistening as if created from polished obsidian. Between the links of armor at the creature's core, a bright blue light pulses like a heartbeat. When it reaches its other hand toward me, I see a whirring mechanism in the center of its palm, the pieces moving fast and glinting with blinding light.

With a sharp cry, Aithinne wrenches out of its grasp, ripping her coat right down the back. “Run!” she screams at me again. “It's activating its weapon!”

We shove our way out of the rubble, vaulting over a collapsed wall of the house and into the back garden. The whirring grows louder, a constant hum that rings in my ears.

The creature is right behind us, its massive treads shaking the ground beneath our feet. I look back in time to see it reach for us with its weaponless hand, and I yank Aithinne out of the way just in time, pulling her through the ruins of an empty house on the street.

The creature crashes through easily, sending brick and dust flying. Aithinne and I pick up speed, flying across the cobbles.

Aithinne tries to shout something, but the humming is deafening. We scramble through the overgrown shrubs and vault over the garden wall.

The weapon must be almost ready now—just over the hum I can hear parts clicking and locking into place.

Aithinne shouts again, this time pulling me closer to put her lips at my ear. “We need to find shelter to block the blast.
Now
!”

Her power is rough in my mouth. It's not like the usual flower petals and honey—now it's thorns and smoke. Strong and overpowering. She's readying something of her own.

At the top of the street, I spot a stone wall left standing.
There!

I pull Aithinne with me, gesturing to the wall. The ground beneath me quakes and I'm nearly thrown off-balance. We hurl ourselves behind the wall and I tuck my knees tight into my chest, keeping my head down.

Aithinne locks her arms around my shoulders. I'm startled by her eyes, the whirling silver glow of her irises that only grows brighter.

She mouths something and this time I don't need to hear. “Hold on tight.”

Aithinne's power scorches my tongue and paves a path of fire down my throat. I've never felt anything like it. It intensifies just as a near-deafening blast sends dust, dirt, and debris flying all around me. I hold my breath, cradling myself tighter. The wall behind me shudders and strains. My hearing is muffled, a ringing resounding inside my ears.

Then, silence. A heavy stillness. Aithinne's power ebbs, leaving a dry coating inside my mouth. I raise my head. I'm completely covered in dirt and fine dust.

Crawling out, I peek around the wall and gasp. There's nothing there.
Nothing
. Every building in the square was obliterated by the metal creature's weapon. All that remains are smoking piles of brick and a crater of blackened dirt where my home once stood.

The fallen creature lies amid the rubble, blown back by the force of the explosion.

“What did you do?” I whisper to Aithinne.

Aithinne pushes to her feet, dusting off her clothes. “I redirected its blast away from us so it used its weapon on itself.” She scans the destruction. “Easy.”

“Ah, yes,” I murmur, trying to quell the emotions that rush through me at seeing my childhood home destroyed. “Simple's sibling, Easy. I don't even want to imagine the levels of chaos that would prompt visits from their cousins Straightforward and Uncomplicated.”

The creature's limbs begin to twitch, its metal bones clicking back into place. I reach for the blunderbuss on my back, but Aithinne is already ahead of me. She has her sword in her hand before I can blink.

“If you'll excuse me . . .”

She strides over to the creature. In a single, clean motion, she rams her sword into its neck. The creature immediately stops moving. Then she's walking back to me, muttering, “That bloody bastard Lonnrach. I can't believe he sent a
mortair
—”

There's another distant explosion. We turn and see another
mortair
running toward us with incredible speed. It rounds the castle crags, long arms pumping by its sides. With every leap, the ruins of old buildings in its path are pulverized. Its massive body tears through brick walls like paper. It'll be upon us in seconds.

“Go!” Aithinne pulls me with her. “Don't stop running.”

“What is that thing?” I can barely hear myself over the creature behind us.

“
Mortair
,” she gasps. “They only have one purpose: Seek and destroy.”

We're not fast enough. Rather,
I'm
not. Aithinne is slowing down for me to catch up. My human speed can't ever match hers, or the
mortair
's. It's gaining on us, the ground shaking as it runs. The hum of its weapon quickens to an agitating trill and I glance back as it raises its hand, the metal shifting to a blinding light in its palm as it aims.

The direct blast slams into Aithinne.
BOOM
. Light surrounds us and the ground beneath us cracks and breaks with the impact. I'm thrown back by it, my body slamming into the cobblestones. I roll hard, my shoulder landing painfully on a fragment of brick. Aithinne's sword skitters across the street just out of my reach.

I look up as the light clears. Aithinne is on the ground, bruised and bloodied all over. Her eyes are glazed over with pain.

I can't stand this anymore. I push to my feet, pulling the blunderbuss from my back holster before I even think. It's
the simplest thing in the world. Hunt and kill, the game I've played since the night my mother died.

“Falconer,
don't
!”

Aithinne reaches for me, but I dart out of her grasp. The creature is still advancing toward us, moving breathtakingly fast. It's reached the ruins of Charlotte Square now, racing down the street right for me.

With Aithinne injured, the
mortair
won't draw its weapon again, not if Lonnrach needs me alive. That makes it vulnerable—I can hurt it, but it can't hurt me.

I'll leave it for Lonnrach to find. A message:
I'm not yours. You don't have me anymore. The next time we meet, you'll realize that I'm the one who's going to end you
.

I let the creature come to me. The ground quakes as I plant the base of the blunderbuss against my shoulder and aim for its legs. I let out a slow breath to calm myself. As the creature approaches, I have to readjust my aim: Up and up and up.

There
. Just before it reaches me, I pull the trigger.

The blunderbuss recoils into my shoulder hard enough to bruise. The air fills with smoke between the
mortair
and I. I watch as the
seilgflùr
-laced scrap metal sprays wide and blasts into the
mortair
's armor.

The smoke clears and the creature is still standing. There isn't a mark on the obsidian plates that cover its chest. Christ, the blunderbuss didn't even cause a dent with the
seilgflùr
. It should have. It should have worked.

The
mortair
raises the weapon in its palm at me. “Oh, hell,” I whisper, backing away. My hand goes to the hilt of my blade and I pull it out, ready to fight. “
Hell
.”

“I gave a simple instruction,” Aithinne says from behind me. “
Don't
. Which means
Don't do that; it's a bad idea
. Nothing can break its armor except my own blade.”

“
What
?”

The mechanism grows brighter and brighter, a blinding sun in the center of the
mortair
's hand.

Nothing can break its armor except my own blade
.
Then my only option is to disable the
mortair
's weapon. Before it can act, I sheath my own weapon and snatch Aithinne's sword from the ground.

Then I'm on my feet, leaping at the
mortair
. I aim to slash at the
mortair
's weapon hand, but the creature turns at the last second. The blade slices through its other hand, severing it right at the wrist in a single, clean swipe. The metal piece arcs into the air and hits the ground with a mighty thump.

The
mortair
roars, a ghastly high-pitched, mechanical whine. Its jaw opens so wide that the clockwork structure of metal in its throat is visible, the jagged pieces of its teeth.

Its foot sends a massive chunk of wall flying and I narrowly avoid getting hit.

“Falconer!”

My moment of distraction is all the
mortair
needs. It takes a swing at me, but Aithinne puts herself between us. The
mortair
knocks her off her feet and she smashes through the
remains of a stone building across the square. Bricks collapse on top of her.

The
mortair
advances on me, the light in its palm brightening. Soon it will release its destructive weapon and I'm trapped; there's nowhere to go. Steeling myself, I leap at the
mortair
, arcing the blade into the air to try to sever its weapon hand again.

Metal breaks beneath my sword, but I didn't curve the blade high enough to detach the limb. With a growl, the
mortair
knocks into me. I roll to the ground, using the momentum to land cleanly on my feet. I spin out of the
mortair
's reach, slashing with the sword again, and I catch its armored finger at the knuckle. The screech of breaking metal echoes across the square, and the finger lands in the overgrown grass.

Before the creature can recover, I launch myself at it, climbing up its plated armor. The
mortair
thrashes and tries to throw me off, but it's too damaged to make a grab for me. It growls deep within its clockwork throat, the sound vibrating through its body. The blade almost slides from my grip, but I recover, taking advantage of the swinging motion of its body to lever myself up.

Aithinne shouts, “You have to slit its throat!”

The
mortair
aims for a building and scrapes its large body through the rubble to crush me. I swing down at the last second and grab an armored plate on the underside of its arm as the
mortair
smashes through. Its armor takes the brunt of the impact, destroying the side wall of the building.

While it's occupied, I grasp the scale-like armor, pulling myself up plate by plate. My muscles burn with the effort, my limbs trembling to keep hold. The plates are warm beneath my palms, textured like rough rock instead of smooth metal.

The creature bucks to throw me off, but I leap up to its left pectoral. The whirring mechanisms inside its body are deafening, a hum of clockwork beneath my palms. The blue light between the strong plates is hot and blinding as I climb past the cracks in its armor.

Finally, I reach the
mortair
's shoulder. I hang on with one hand and aim for its neck. My blade slashes and bites through what feels like skin between the armored plates.

I don't stop. I hack and hack until the metal insides give way, and even then I don't let up. The creature sways beneath me. I pause only when it falls, maintaining my hold as it slams into the grass and dirt in the square below. I continue my assault. I slice through more metal. I slash until I'm out of breath, until I'm covered in its thick ebony blood. Until tears sear my cheeks and my muscles ache.

Until the
mortair
's head lies in a heap of scrap, severed and destroyed.

Then I reach to draw the fae fabric out of my coat pocket, and slice off a long piece. I slide a strip beneath one of the plates of the
mortair
's armor so the fabric drapes across its face like a shroud.

So it's the first thing Lonnrach sees when he comes looking.

This is my message
.
I picture him finding the fallen, mutilated
mortair
.
I don't belong to you and I never will. I spent
daysweeksmonthsyears
picturing this, and now I'll wait for it. I'll wait for you. I'll savor the moment when we meet again
.