Heart of Veridon (39 page)

“You have no patience, Jacob,” he said. “That is your failing. No patience and—”

I leapt at him. One of the guards yelled and tried to intercept me. Together we bowled into Sloane. The three of us started sliding down the hill, arms and legs banging against the stone, fingers bloody as we sought some purchase on the old rock. I ended up with my arms around the guard, my fingers around Sloane’s throat. The Badgeman was trying to beat me around the head, but the leverage was bad. I squeezed closer to him, to keep him off balance. Sloane was kicking pathetically at me. We came to a stop among some coiled wires. Sloane’s struggles were slowing down.

More Badgemen came to help. A crowd of arms descending on me, punching and grabbing, wrestling me off the dying Sloane. I dragged at his clothes, felt something tear away in my hand. They had me upright in a moment, and two of them were taking turns slamming their fists into my midsection. Sloane was on one knee, watching, a hand to his throat and the other steadying himself on the ground. I was yelling, but I don’t know what I was getting at. Just a lot of yelling. Sloane stepped forward, weaved on his feet, then slapped me across the face. One of the Badgemen behind me dropped. Another yelped and spun away. Sloane looked startled.

Wilson stepped forward, the blade of his knife smeared in blood. The ropes that hung loosely around his chest were frayed, gnawed through. I picked up one of the shortrifles. Sloane was running.

“Good of you to show up,” I gasped.

“Same,” Wilson said. “I take it they weren’t downstairs.”

“No.”

“Figured. You see anyone, down there?”

“No,” I said. “I don’t think I did. Sloane have the Cog?”

“Yeah. In a pouch around his neck.”

I squinted at him, then picked up the fabric I’d torn off Sloane a minute earlier. The Cog slid out into my hand.

“Huh,” Wilson said. “Good for us. Maybe we should try to run?”

“No. They’ve still got Emily.” I gripped the Cog, watching the tiny wheels spin free against my palm. “Maybe we can make a trade. Or pretend to, at least.”

“That sounds like it could get us killed,” he said. We looked around. The guards had fled, though a cluster of them was organizing their courage down near the entrance to the Chapel of the Air, near the foot of the Torch. Sloane had disappeared into the hangars. “Let’s clean up.”

“What is that thing up there? The thing holding Emily?”

“Some kind of… machine. A brutal surgeon, Jacob. It’s preparing her.”

“Preparing her?” I clenched my teeth. “Preparing her for what?”

Wilson looked up at the sky. The Angel.

I started up the hill. Wilson put a hand on my shoulder. “Hold, son. Sloane’s got the key. You’re going to want to hunt him down, first.”

“Is she okay?” I asked.

“You’re going to want to hunt him down,” he said, quietly.

I gave the Torchlight a look, squinted at the slowly lumbering darkness there, then turned my attention to the hangars. They shivered in the wind, their charges banging against the walls and straining at their moorings.

“Where’d he go?”

“Down there, somewhere.” Wilson was on one knee, reloading a stolen shortrifle. I checked the chamber on the one I was carrying. It hadn’t been discharged, not even once. Wilson stood up. We crept down the stone hill, into the lee of the nearest hangar.

Inside was one of the city’s warships,
FCL Thunderous Dawn
. It filled the hangar, its battle sponsons grinding against the wooden walls of the long building. As we snuck along the perimeter of the hangar, I loosened each of the moorings that we came to.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Thinking ahead,” I said. “Just keep an eye out for Sloane.”

We made it three quarters of the way around the building when the guards who had been cowering among the derricks put in an appearance. They kicked in the door and began rushing around the tight confines of the hangar. As soon as they saw the free moorings, they rushed the main carriage of the ship. The
Dawn
was larger than the
Glory
had been; there were dozens of ways into and out of the ship. The guards disappeared into the warship’s armored interior, spun up the running lights and started yelling at each other as they searched. Wilson and I snuck out.

“How do you know Sloane didn’t do that? Hide in the airship? He could be in there right now, talking to the guards.”

“Could be. I think he went straight through that hangar, quick as he could.” I crawled over to some barrels laid out between the hangars. “He’s not really interested in running from us, Wilson. He doesn’t get paid that way.”

“So where is he?”

“Don’t know. Waiting for us somewhere. We find a good place to hold up, he’ll come find us. He can’t afford to lose us.”

“If that Angel shows up, do you have a plan?”

“I don’t know. Kill it again?”

“You really think this shit out, don’t you?”

“Yeah, yeah.” I popped my head over the barrels, tried to get a good sight of the Torch. Too much bad weather, not enough light. There wasn’t much cover between here and there, nothing but the night and the rain. “I’m not waiting around. Let’s go get our girl.”

We went up the hill slowly, squatting and peering into the night storm. There was light flickering around the Torch; not much, just enough to show forms and silhouettes in the darkness. We followed a trail of barrels and supplies that were strewn across the hill, cutting closer and closer to the Torch. When we got as near as we could, I gave Wilson a nod then we both jumped out and rushed the Torch.

Sloane stood next to a massive iron and brass machine, not usually native to the Torchlight. I imagined that it had been brought up from those basements. Probably why they cleared out the cadets. You didn’t want something like this in the public eye.

Installing cogwork takes time. You inscribe the mnemonic engram in the patient’s mind, usually through pattern memorization or hypnosis. Then you inject the foetal metal into the body. The metal latches on to the pattern in the engram, which directs how the cogwork forms in the body. Over time the foetus replaces the natural tissue of the patient with the prescribed cogwork enhancement. For me, it replaced my heart, parts of both of my lungs, enhanced and restructured my bones to serve as conduits and rebuilt my eyes. Even my blood is still flooded with foetal metal, anxious to rebuild any part of my body in accordance with the master pattern. It’s how I heal so fast. Of course, my implants are different, something to do with hidden Camilla and whatever bit of her dissected form ended up in my chest. But that’s how it generally works.

You can also hot-load the foetus. Give it some general pattern to follow and inject it into the patient without any sort of preparation. That’s a much messier way to handle things, because you don’t know how the foetus will interact with the body. Bones can break, skin can burst, but the foetus doesn’t notice.

This is what happened with Emily. She had turned into a tumor of metal and wire. Blisters of metal traced her arms and shoulders. A thin brass cage covered her face, and a contraption of pipes and boilers had erupted from her chest and neck. That device was puffing smoke into the air, a black sooty discharge that smeared the near walls in grime. Her arms and legs were held spread, clamped in metallic shackles that were thick with cogs and pipes. Something was pumping into her blood from a hundred needles, intravenous lines bristling from her exposed shoulder and breast. Foetal metal, slate gray, dripped from the few needles that had pulled free. A belt of leather fit across her ribs and belly, laced shut with chain and a padlock.

Sloane stood next to her, grinning like a knife. He held a pistol to her temple. Above her a slow torsion pendulum twisted. She was dying, being made ready for the Angel’s possession.

“You’re showing a little spark, Jacob,” Sloane said through gritted teeth. “A lot of trouble these last few days.”

“Let her go, prick.” My voice was incredibly tired. “You’ve got us here. Now let her go.”

“Not yet. Hardly yet. Besides, I think she’s getting used to it.” He trailed the pistol down her cheek, touched it against her lips. “And I don’t think she could survive, anyway. I think it’s done too much damage. Would you like to find out?”

“I’m going to cut you, Sloane,” Wilson said. “Cut you and cut you until your blood runs black.”

“You’re a brave bug, Mr. Wilson. I’m a little surprised you survived our visit in the sewers. Regardless, I’m glad you can be with us now. Our friend should be here any moment. The Cog please, Jacob.”

“You don’t need her anymore. You’ve got me,” I said, and took the Cog out and held it up. “And I’ve got this.”

“Ah, but that flying bastard’s still around. And I don’t think he’ll let us go until we’ve come to some sort of… resolution.”

“About what?” I asked.

“We’ve made a deal, him and me. The Cog for Camilla. A very noble bunch, these Brilliant. That’s what the Church calls them, you know.”

“You can’t give him Camilla. You don’t have her. And he can’t live without the Cog.”

“We can guide him, though. Give him your girl here, in her improved form, and he’ll last for years. Long enough to get back to wherever he came from. And certainly long enough to retrieve precious Camilla. As soon as we tell him where she is.”

“You’re going to get him to destroy the Church for you.”

Sloane smiled. “Excellent. And yes, then we’re going to keep the Cog, and set up a new God. More of a factory, I think, than a Church. Very good trade to be made in miracles.”

“Go to hell,” Wilson said.

“Yes,” He said. “Eventually. For now, though, kindly lay down your weapons or I kill the girl.”

“If she dies, you’ll have nothing to give the Angel.”

“Perhaps. But I’m sure arrangements will be made.” He cocked the gun and pressed it against Emily’s temple. “Your weapons, please, and the Cog.”

Sloane’s eyes flashed. Wilson gawked at me, turning slightly, his knife dipping towards the ground. I let my shortrifle drop.

“Very good, Mr. Burn. A good choice. If you’ll be so kind.” He took a step forward.

I only had a lightning flash of his wings, the steel-gray lined in electric blue as he swept down from the skies. The Angel landed behind Sloane. Sloane’s eyes rolled up in shock, then the Angel’s blade-arms rose out of the man’s chest. He scissored apart like a rag. The Angel looked at me. His blades folded away, and he held out his hand.

“The Cog is mine. Return it, and you will live.”

Chapter Eighteen

Last Flight Down

I
DROPPED THE
Cog and swung my shotgun around. The Angel’s eyes followed the Cog to the ground. I fired twice before he even remembered I was there. I put my foot on the Cog and fired again. The shot rippled across his body like pebbles striking a pond. Wilson yelped and threw himself forward, knife in hand.

Mistakes; I couldn’t bend to pick up the Cog without letting down my guard. I couldn’t keep firing with Wilson closely engaged. My shotgun was choked down, meaning the blast had put some shot into Emily’s unconscious form. So many mistakes. Wilson’s mistake was worse.

The Angel batted the anansi aside then advanced on me. I kicked the Cog behind me then fell back, firing as I went. The hammer eventually fell on an empty chamber. I dropped the gun and went for the shortrifle at my side. The Angel charged.

I raised the ’rifle across my body, deflecting the blow of his arms. His wings beat across my face, eclipsing the storm and blinding me. The feathers were knife sharp. They fanned across my arms leaving behind superficial cuts and thin streams of blood. I bashed his face with the butt of the ’rifle, kicked his knee out from under him, then lost my balance and tumbled down the hill. My head was resounding with the impact of stone against my skull. I crawled to my knees and peered up the hill.

He was searching the ground, looking for the Cog. I carefully checked the load on my shortrifle, sighted down the barrel and put a slug in his head. He put a hand on the ground to brace himself. A light dust of cogwork poured onto the ground, like sand from a cracked hourglass, hissing as it scattered down the rock. It clumped into the pools of water. He wavered there, staring down at the ground for a minute. Eventually, he resumed his search.