Guardian (11 page)

“
Mount it,” Natasha said, with reverence, her eyes bright. “Teeth to your shoulder, claws to your chest.”

It was awkward, at first. The Mob turned it around several times, and even rearranged the fittings of his armour, until he got it right. The dragon
’s teeth pressed against his shoulder and curled over to his upper back. The claws scratched at his breastplate. The tail stuck out long in front of him, and Kichlan realised the final spike on its end was broken. Instead of a smooth point, it had been shattered, so it had many sharp edges fanned out into a rough star shape.

“
And hold on.”

As soon as the Mob placed his hand—ungloved, Natasha insisted—on the dragon
’s deep eye, the weapon came alive. It bit down hard on the Mob’s neck. Even as he screamed those clawed feet tore chunks of his armour away to embed themselves in his chest.

Natasha cried,
“Be silent, be still! Do not resist it!”

Kichlan watched in horror as somehow, the Mob calmed himself down. He ceased screaming, resorted to a painful-sounding panting.

“Good,” Natasha said, voice soft, soothing, and approached the Mob. “Do not try to fight a Hon Ji dragon.”

With his free hand the Mob tore the heavy helmet from his head. Kichlan winced. Those eyes—solid gold with irises roaming—were bad enough when hidden behind the helmet
’s obscuring slit. Set into the bare skin of his hairless face, they were terrible to behold, too large, bulging, and wild. Maybe that was why the Mob never removed their helmets, even in a frozen underground graveyard like this. Not merely professional pride. Perhaps they too were aware of the horror of their own faces.

“
What has been done to me?” The Mob hissed. His teeth were capped with something metal looking and black.

“
Don’t you feel it?” Natasha asked. “You are strong. Stronger, even, than you can know!”

Frowning, the Mob ran his spare hand awkwardly along the tail and muzzle of his dragon. One hand remained clamped to the eye.
“I—” he stuttered, unsure. “I do not know—”

“
Lady Natasha?” One of the Shielders, still perched at the opening to the room, glanced over his shoulder. “Movement in the hallway. Shall we rebuild the shield?”

Natasha dabbed at her skin.
“No,” she said. “No. Let me show you the power of these weapons.” She waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “Out of the way!”

Fresh ice cracked its way across the doorway as the crimson-coated Shielders rose and retreated. Footsteps and voices echoed, closer.

Natasha did not seem concerned. “One weapon,” she said. “And one soldier to wield it.” She pointed to the dragon-clamped Mob, and directed him to the doorway. “And we will triumph.”

Unsteady, still unsure, the Mob advanced. He braced himself, legs strong, and pointed the tail of his dragon to the hallway beyond.

“Strikers!” the Shielders cried, and Kichlan ducked, instinctively, as great shards of ice crashed into the room.

Natasha flung herself to the side,
“Fire!”

“
There is no trigger!” The Mob cried, as ice clutched at his arms, his feet, as spears of it broke against his armour. “How do I—”

“
Your pions,” Natasha said, as she rolled to her feet and pressed her back against a far wall. “Your body is the trigger. You are one with the dragon, Mob. Roar your fury!”

Kichlan, of course, could not see what he did. But all the Mob around him gasped, and the dragon weapon began to glow. It started deep inside, filtered out through the scales like sunshine through lattice, and built at the tip of the broken tail. At first, a warm light. But as it strengthened it lost its colour, became cold, sharp, and reminded Kichlan of Tan
’s suit, when she was angry.

For a moment, the thought threw him. That light was just so familiar. He shook his half-arm free of the layers of clothing that hid it. The silver she had given him was smooth, as ever, but now it seemed to glow. Just a reflection of the dragon
’s breath. Nothing more.

“
The pion bonds that give you heightened strength, reflexes, and senses have been altered,” Natasha said to her Mob. “We have rearranged them into circles, and circles around circles, all of it intricate and deep within the nature of reality itself. Each of you is now the centre of an infinite number of circles, made from your own bodies, powered by your own unnatural strengths.”

The gathered light at the tip of the dragon
’s tail released. It surged forward, into the hallway. For a moment, everything was light, and Kichlan covered his eyes with his single, remaining hand as the dragon-mounted Mob roared, a rage-filled sound that disintegrated, slowly, into an exhausted and pain-riddled scream.

When the light died down, and Kichlan had blinked its residue away, the ice was gone. The Mob had fallen to his knees. He no longer held the dragonhead, and it slipped, inanimate, from his shoulder. Blood ran from puncture wounds on his neck, down his back, his chest, the marks the only evidence that the dragon had ever been so alive.

His fellow soldiers helped him to his feet. He was too weak to stand on his own.

“
One shot, and you will need time to recover,” Natasha said. “You are an infinite circle, but no circle greater than nine is stable. No matter how much research we have done, we have been forced to admit that Novski was right about that, all along. And yet, it is that very instability that fuels the dragon.”

“
What good is your weapon,” one of the Mob growled, “if it leaves us so weakened and exposed?”

The Shielders approached the opening.
“All Striker activity has ceased,” one said. And there was awe in his voice. Awe, and fear. “Their attacks—the ice—is dissolving. Some of the hallway integrity too.”

“
We could not replicate Tanyana’s suit, no matter how we tried,” Natasha said, and held Kichlan’s gaze as she spoke. “But we understood one thing, perhaps better than she did. The silver was not her real strength, no matter how she used it. Rather, the destabilizing properties of the debris it was crafted from. So while we have not had the same success with debris-manipulation as the national veche, we did what we could, to replicate its effect.”

She approached her exhausted Mob. It was all he could do to lift his head and look at her.

“The altered pion bonds within you, when activated by the dragon’s head, create an infinite and extremely unstable pion-binding circle. The dragon draws it out of you—saving your life at the same time—and channels that instability into a weapon. One that will undo any bond it comes into contact with. The Striker’s attack. The Strikers themselves. Any Mob, waiting to advance, and Shielders, providing protection. Even the building. So you see, only one shot, and you have saved us. You are exhausted, yes, but that really doesn’t matter. Because there is no one left to fight.”

In the unsettled silence, something groaned. The earth, shifting above them, the damaged walls, weakening.

“And now we should get out of here, before the building comes down on us.” Natasha pointed at the body of the pion-binder who had set this all in motion. “Bring him. Leave him close to the entrance, so he can be found. Hurry.”

The Mob took up their dragonhead weapons and hurried from the underground labyrinth. One Shielder led the way, the second waited for Natasha and Kichlan, before following. Kichlan tried not to see the cracks, steadily growing in the walls about them. Steam hugged the corners, all that remained of ice undone so quickly, and obscured what was left of the dead soldiers.

“Do you see?” Natasha hissed, as they ran. Behind them, walls were falling, the ground caving in, the entire structure giving way to the strength of Natasha’s weapon. It reminded him of an underground sewer, and an opening door. His missing hand tingled, as though with the memory of his brother’s strong grip. “The national veche will fall before my dragon-headed army.”

But Kichlan shook his head.
“What do you think your infinite circles are doing to the Keepers doors?” he replied.

Natasha glanced over her shoulder.
“The doors aren’t about to suck the world into nothingness, I thought we had already established that.” She kept her voice tight and low. “First, we need to overthrow the veche. When we have liberated this nation from the old families, and halted its aggressive colonial expansion, then we can worry about doors.”

“
Reinforcements, ground level,” the Shielder behind them said. “Strikers, shielded. They will attack as soon as we breach cover.”

Natasha called a halt, and this time mounted up two of the Mob.
“Defend them,” she told her Shielders. “Just long enough to allow them to fire.”

She and Kichlan hung back, as the two Shielders and two Mob crept above ground to take on the forces of the national veche.

“You’re playing into their hands!” Kichlan gripped Natasha’s shoulder. She shook him free, easily. “Opening more doors, weakening the veil!”

Natasha drew back.
“Veil? What are you talking about now?”

Explosions rocked the already unstable underground. Kichlan tried to grab the wall as the earth shook, but his heavy left elbow unbalanced him, and he fell. Too-bright, too-cold light flooded down the corridor. His silver elbow ached.

When he could see again Natasha was standing over him, holding out a hand. He did not take it; rather he clutched the wall and dragged himself upright.

“
Come on,” Natasha said. “That will have cleared the way. We should get out of here.”

He followed her out of the building. Smoke and steam mingled in the cold morning sun. A smell like boiling meat, charred wood and burning hair, rose up with the fog to choke him.

The Mob formed rows as he and Natasha emerged. She left him at the entrance. Behind him, the ruined University sunk deeper into the earth, sending up billowing dust to add to the already heavy sky. Hands clasped behind her back, Natasha stood before her soldiers, bloody face split in a triumphant grin

“
Now the revolution really begins,” Natasha said. “You remember your recon points, I assume?”

As one, her Mob nodded, saluted. Kichlan could feel something in the air, something more than steam heavy with the dead. A dangerous readiness.

“Then, it is time. Return, regroup, and carry out the cleansing mission allotted to you. Maintain contact on a secure pion flow, surprise is the second strongest weapon we have. You are now the first.”

A cheer. Not, Kichlan thought, as strong as Natasha would have liked. Still a little unsure, still concerned about the weapons powered by their own bodies that drained them so fully. But these men were soldiers, regardless.

“Do not be afraid,” Natasha said. “No one can stand against you now.”

Tan could have. Kichlan sighed. Tan
’s suit was debris, not pion-made. So these weapons that destroyed pion-bindings could not have harmed her.

Then the Mob were breaking up again, splitting and disappearing along the ruinous streets. Natasha approached him.
“You and Tanyana helped us, when you destroyed the city centre.” She placed her hands on her hips and surveyed the damaged buildings. Kichlan realised she did not feel the loss of the city the way he did. She did not mourn for the Tear River or the bluestone bridge. She was not really Varsnian, after all, and Movoc-under-Keeper had only ever been a place to conquer, a revolution to wage. Never a home.

No matter how cold, how pion-driven, how veche-run and dangerous, to him the city had always been home.

“You didn’t even leave us any veche chambers to attack.” She reached up to smack his shoulder, companion-like. Kichlan shuddered at her touch.

Three Mob, and one of the Shielders, remained with her. They waited like loyal dogs at her back.

“The veche have massed troops with the refugees outside the wall. We take the city first and cleanse it—one street at a time, if they force us to. Then we liberate the refugees. Once Movoc-under-Keeper shakes free of its shackles, the rest of the country will follow. You will be free, Kichlan.” She held out an arm as she spoke, tried to draw him into walking. “And if only Lad was still with us, he would be free too. No one to hide from, no need to pretend to be what he is not.”

But Kichlan held his ground. He was tired of it all. Tired of carrying the weight of the doors, tired of following Natasha around. Tired of the loss, the hurt. He missed Lad, oh how he missed him. Tan too. Tan—he couldn
’t even think about her.

So he did what he could to cross his arms, and said,
“I’m not an idiot, Natasha.”

She paused.
“What—?”

“
And neither is the veche. Local, regional or national. None of us are foolish enough to believe the Hon Ji are here to liberate us out of the kindness of their own hearts.”

“
Kichlan?” Natasha frowned, waved her military escort out of hearing. “What are you saying? Don’t you trust me? Don’t you believe me?”

He lifted his eyebrows, shocked.
“Of course not. Why would I do that?”

“
Fine.” Her eyes hardened. “Of course the campaign to liberate Varsnia is in the Emperor’s interest. Why would he invest so many resources if it were not? Breaking the hold of the national veche, and establishing a relationship with the regional and local authorities that will replace it: that is the Emperor’s goal. The national veche is aggressive and expansionist—Tanyana and her debris weapon should be proof enough for you! That means that conflict between Varsnia and Hon Ji is inevitable, so we are merely protecting ourselves.”