Golden Tide (Song of the Aura, Book Four) (18 page)

~

Long before he reached it, Lauro recognized the burning building as a dalheim. It was a small one, probably the easternmost of those that had guarded the borders of Vastion in past, stronger days. It should have been abandoned before… it certainly was now. But who had attacked it, and who had defended it? He raced on to find out.

“
By my Oath, Vale… slow down!” Lauro slowed and waited for Mudlo to catch up. He hadn’t realized he’d been using the winds to abet him.

“
Sorry,” he said sheepishly.

“
Look, Prince Too-Fast-For-Me, this isn’t the way to go about things at all. The building’s burning, for the love of Allfar… Ah, anyway, you’re going to walk into a trap at that speed! You need to slow down and
think!
Why isn’t there a siege, I’d like to know? And where have the attackers gone? Did you think of that?”

They were almost beside the out wall now. Lauro shook his head. “I’ll go in, and you hang back to snag anyone who tries to get the jump on me. Simple, see? Now come on!” The prince suspected that a senior ranger like Arlin would have refused, but Mudlo just grumbled and followed him anyway.
The thing about being prince,
he thought,
is that everyone always thinks you’re confident, even when you’re not. Sometimes good… sometimes bad.

When he rounded a corner, stepping over the twisted remains of the dalheim’s gate, Lauro goggled at the damage that had been done. There was almost no two stones left together in the dalheim; everything had been burned to a crisp, pulled apart, and thrown about as if in a whirlwind. What was more, it all looked so
recent!

Then he began to find the bodies. In the midst of what had probably been the stables, he found three nymphs, burned to death where they stood defending the door. One of them had stuck a knife in his killer before the end, though… his corpse was still holding onto the black-skinned creature, who seemed to have clawed out its own eyes in its death throes.

Lauro stood up quickly, horrified, from where he had been examining the scene.

“
By the Aura, Mudlo… it’s one of the same creatures that attacked Gribly and I at… Mudlo?” He looked around, but there was no sign of the ranger anywhere among the wreckage.
Of course,
Lauro thought,
I told him to slink around and wait. But why is it so bloody quiet all of a sudden?
There had been a few birdcalls before, as they had approached. The dalheim. Why not now?

Without warning, the earth and stones behind him rocketed skyward. The force of the explosion threw him off his feet, but he never hit the ground. Danger set his instincts in motion instantly, and he turned the air to his benefit, soaring up and away to land atop a huge pile of rubble that had once been the dalheim’s barracks, fifty feet away.

Lauro could only watch from there, shocked, as a beast like he had never seen lifted itself up out of the hole it had blasted. It was the size of a giant, taller than many of the Greenwood’s trees, with short, powerful hind legs and long, agile front ones; an eyeless, noseless face, and a jagged maw. Worst of all… it seemed to be made entirely of
metal
, with plates and gears like the ones on the draiks he’d fought before… only this time, its whole body was a machine.

And it stood there, facing him from across the open space, doing nothing to attack.
Why doesn’t it move?
He wondered, and then it hit him.
Because it’s not the one who’s going to-

“
Goodbye,” hissed a gritty voice.

Lauro leaped up in a desperate gamble for safety. A fireball burned through the air where he had been a half-second before, singing his back as he twisted out of the way. Without thinking, he kicked out mid-flip at the shape he glimpsed behind him. As he landed, he was rewarded with a grunt and curse as the
thing
stumbled back, slipping and falling off the rubble, bleeding from its face.

Without waiting to see what the huge metal monster’s reaction was, Lauro pounced on his foe, pummeling him with fists and blows of wind. He didn’t blink to discover that he was fighting one of the black-hides like the one in the ruined stable; it made sense, after all. Another Pit Strider, trying to kill him like Gramling had, and like the fools in the golden warships had.

Just another enemy to slay. An enemy who could summon fire and burn the blood in his veins with a single thought. Very well. He could handle that. Lauro’s fists fell again and again. He would not give his enemy time for that thought. Fire bloomed, hurling him backwards. His face and body burned, but he pulled his motion into a tight flip, hurling lightning in mid-air.

Stone crunched underfoot as he landed. The Pit Strider was a smoking husk, sprawled at an unnatural angle, one hand still raised from throwing his fireball at Lauro. The prince smirked, snuffing out the flames that licked his clothing with a wave of his hand. Now his
enemy
was the one who burned.

But he gloated too long. By the time he heard the harsh whining of gears behind him and tried to dodge, it was too late. There was a shuddering
BOOM,
and the world spun around him blindingly fast, a whirlwind of pain and pressure and falling rock.

Then it was over, and he was laying on his side, arms pinned in awkward positions by the landslide of rock and earth that had been thrown up by the ambushing metal monster.
Caught by surprise, twice in one fight,
his fevered mind almost laughed at the notion.
General Winter would not be happy.

He tried to move, but couldn’t. He felt sharp, deep pains in his ribs and arms; sprained or broken, he wasn’t sure. Perhaps he could still escape if… but his legs would not move, and without legs or arms his powers were meaningless.

The golden monster stomped up to hover over him, eyeless face looking almost thoughtful. It looked like a golem from one of the nightmare stories he’d read out of books as a child… books his father had forbidden him to read.
Well, I’m certainly paying for not listening, now.

With a grating and shrieking of metal on metal, the monster lowered its face until it was mere feet from Lauro’s. Gears turned and its maw opened wide, blasting the prince with intense heat. There was a glow inside, growing brighter every second: the angry glow of flames.

“
No! NO!” Lauro squirmed, trying desperately to get an arm or leg free, no matter the cost to his health. Broken bones wouldn’t matter if he was dead!

Crack!
A sound like a miniature thunderbolt rang out through the ruined dalheim. Someplace on the golem’s leg spurted a foul-smelling black liquid that nearly squirted Lauro in the face. The monster emitted a piercing half-wail, half-roar, and wheeled around to see what had dared attack it. Lauro could see a blurry image of his savior through the dusty haze, some sort of wood-and-metal device raised to his shoulder.

Mudlo. Creator bless the man… it was Mudlo, and he was holding what looked like a larger version of Byorne Hallifar’s fire-spitting contraption. As the trapped prince watched, the ranger lowered the weapon and began to fiddle with it, cursing, taking something from a pouch that’d been hidden under his cloak.

With a bellow, the golem spat fire into the air, pawing the ground in rage, and charged. Lauro felt like a fool: his mistake would likely cause
both
of them their lives now…

…
unless he could get free. Turning back to the rock that pinned him, he concentrated on getting free. If he could defeat that, the rest would follow. So he closed his eyes, concentrating. The pain and exhaustion in his head throbbed every second like a heartbeat that would kill him. Without being able to move…
no
, he
would
be able to, and he
would
defeat-

Something changed. It was untouchable, possibly un
knowable
, but he realized in an instant that a barrier in his mind had broken down, or died, or disappeared. He was
free
, mentally if not physically.

So he
pushed.

The rocks and debris blew away from him on all sides. The rock on his body flew high, bursting into a thousand fragments. A blessed sensation of wind rushed across him and through him, and his pain faded away. Lauro leaped to his feet, throwing his body upward as if it were the most natural thing to do after being nearly crushed to death. Somehow, he knew… this was even more important than learning the wind tunnel, or casting lightning. He had just Sky Strode with his
mind!

Whirling, he prepared to Stride towards Mudlo and the golden golem… but it was too late. Faced with the monster’s charge, Mudlo threw his dangerous contraption to the side, desperately raising his bow and pulling an arrow from his quiver. He fired before the golem reached him, and to Lauro’s surprise the head punctured the thing’s face armor- but it did not even slow. That was when he saw the black-skinned creature strung up
inside
the body of the machine.

“
Mudlo!” he called, leaping skyward, “It’s being controlled by someone inside it! You need to get away so I can…” But the grim-faced ranger leapt to the side, barely dodging the jet of flame the golem blew as it charged. Lauro couldn’t tell whether or not he’d heard, but it was obvious he couldn’t make it in time. “No!” he screamed, hurtling through the air, summoning a bolt of lightning. The golem lifted one limb, ready to pound Mudlo into the ground.

Suddenly there was a large dark shape rushing along the ruined wall, leaping, snarling, and throwing itself bodily onto the back of the golem. The larger monster was over-burdened by the smaller, and fell sideways to the ground, away from Mudlo. Lauro almost fell out of the sky in shock.

It was
Steamclaw!
The draik was less than a fifth the size of the unnatural machine-beast, but it made up for the disadvantage with a hellish ferocity and frequent blazes from its own jaws, blasting its foe again and again, leaping and snapping, trying to keep the thing on the ground. Mudlo was scrambling for his discarded fire-hurler, and Lauro changed direction to join him.

Whump.
The prince came down in a gust of wind, landing sleekly and coming up to face the ranger. “Thank the Aura for you, Mudlo. I thought I’d snipped the thread that time, for sure.”

“
No talk, just fight,” grunted the ranger, lifting his strange weapon again. Motioning Lauro aside, he pointed it at the battling titans before them, slipping something from a coat pocket into a slot near where he held the thing. It was a red-orange gem, run through with sulfurous tendrils of rock.

“
What…?” Lauro asked, but before he could word the question the ranger had knelt and aimed his fire-hurler.

“
Just… need… a better… view!” The draik and golem were at it head-to-head, and the larger monster was suddenly on top, blasting Steamclaw with fire and bludgeoning him to the side with both huge clawed fists. The next second it reared up, ready to finish the draik off…

-Crack!-

Mudlo had fired. An all-too-mortal howl broke from the golem’s body, and crimson splashed down one of the golden plates. Lauro was sure the sound had come from the thing inside, and not the machine itself. With metallic creaks and grindings, the golem toppled backwards and crashed to the ground in an explosion of rock and dust. It did not move again.

Mudlo turned to Lauro. “I heard what you yelled. All I’m wondering now is, ah… is it
always
like this around you?” The prince laughed, though his eyes strayed uneasily to where Steamclaw was picking itself up again, covered in burns and soot.

“
You should meet Elia sometime, Mudlo. And Gribly.
Then
you’ll know what excitement is.”

He reached to his back for the weapons he’d never drawn, striding tensely towards Steamclaw. Mudlo trailed behind.

“
Wait, Lauro! You didn’t answer my question!”

“IT HAS BEEN LONG, SON OF THE WINDS.”
Steamclaw’s voice had the same strange metallic sound, the same raw finality, that Lauro remembered.

“
Yes,” he agreed, walking up to face the enormous beast. “It
has
been.”

“
DO YOU STILL REGRET MY COMPANY? YOU KNOW NOW THAT I HAVE KEPT YOU ALIVE THIS FAR.”

The prince’s face grew hard. He didn’t want to admit it, but it was true. “I do not deny it.” Suddenly his eyes narrowed… could it be? “Correct me if I am wrong,” he added, “But you’re only following me now because you thought
Gribly
would be the one on this quest.”