Tinkermage (Book 2) (31 page)

Tenzic handed him a wineskin and plopped down next to him. “Did you find what we need?”

Nikselpik took a pull from the skin’s opening and shook his head. “I don’t think so, Tenzic.” He gestured down the hall. “All of these creatures are too frightened and weak to be of use to us. While I have a feel for their basic needs, which are quite grave at the moment, I fear it will take me too long to acclimate to their minds. And we certainly can’t drag them around the city on a hunt. What about you; have you sensed the bastard anywhere nearby?”

Tenzic shook his head. “No, I’m scrying even now, and there’s not a hint of him anywhere. If he’s not using his wellspring, then there’s not much for me to find. I picked up something earlier, in the north, but you were entranced with one of the ultraworlders.”

“That’s a shame.”

“What about Ribbon, sir?”

Ribbon Dewhickey, the Southland farmer Nikselpik had interrogated back at Rad’s, the fellow who’d enabled him to reach inside the amorph hive mind and destroy them. The farmer was resting at his home once again. One of his brothers and his wife had come to help with the farm responsibilities, but why Ribbon wished to remain in that house of bad memories was beyond Nikselpik.

He scratched at his forearms, the skin having become red with irritation some time ago, now burning as he dug in for the umpteenth time today. A tickle of panic rose at his core, and he suddenly wanted to find Fara,
needed
her, or else… what? Nothing. The Magi Den? No, he was too tired to be bad. That was a good thing. The panic backed off. 

“We’ll ask Ribbon as a last resort,” he said. “But he’s already been through a lot.”

The two sat in silence, sharing wine and watching as Tomtum’s clerics and the precisor guards went about keeping their guests alive. A buzzing energy filled the air, a sense that progress could be made. Even the most exhausted of them had redoubled their efforts, found their second winds, tapped into their hidden stores of energy. Hope hung in the air, and Nikselpik found that a part of him, the good part, felt intense pride that his hunger, his itching, for the bugs was decimated.

“Master Nur!” someone called from the far end of the hall. “Message for Master Nur!”

Nikselpik started to rise, but Tenzic stopped him, rising in his stead and going to collect the messenger. When they got back, the snow-dusted fellow handed Nikselpik a note. He read the message, feeling his stomach drop and his anger rise.

Toz came out of one of the cells with his sleeves rolled up and a mop in his hands and joined them. “Hoping that’s a message ordering us out of this stinking place. No offense, but I won’t be able to smell anything for weeks.”

“You’ve got your wish, Toz. A warehouse in the Iron Industry was set ablaze. Food stores, clothing.”

Tenzic slapped his helmet. “The north. I sensed it.”

“Nothing we could have done, Tenzy. But we do need to go.”

Toz handed his mop off and pushed his sleeves back down. “How do we track him?”

Nikselpik took Tenzic’s hand and allowed himself to be pulled up. He shrugged. “Tenzy will do the best he can, or we’ll do it blindly if we must. Either way, we can’t let Raulnock have free rein to do what he wants in our city to our citizens.”

They gathered Boovash and Elkian and headed for the Municipal Jail’s front gate.

When Nikselpik got back down to the orc (thankful the piss had been mopped up) and saw those shiny black eyes watching from the shadows at the back of the cell, he stopped cold, giving credence to what might be a risky idea.

“What is it, sir?”

He called over Losizza, who was in the process of dropping off her empty wheelbarrow at the front gate. The gnomestress steered the barrow to the side and came up. The gnomestress looked exhausted, but her eyes never wavered.

“Give this brute a tankard of ale. Nothing all that good because he’ll likely spit it back out, then find me his weapons.”

Losizza nodded and hurried off toward the guard room.

“Sir?” Tenzic sounded worried.

“None of these others are fit to move much less track a criminal. This one, though…”

Nikselpik held up the sketch again, nodded at the orc, and then drew his thumb across his throat. The orc looked at him a moment, at the sketch, then back at Nik. It leaned forward, with what could only be described as keen interest, and smiled.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Niksabella blinked. Her breath escaped in mist. She took stock. They were still in the land crawler. Fritzy slept sitting up in the seat across from her. Tomkin was also asleep, wedged in between Jess and Fritzy, his skinny frame bucking from snores and dreams. Jess eyed Niksabella with a twinge of curiosity.

Orcs.

Niksabella clambered from her seat and gazed at their surroundings between the resting legs of their mechanical arachnid. They were positioned at the base of a hill, with trees all ridged defiantly around, their bare branches woven together, covered in shiny ice and hoarfrost. A little creek frothed next to them on the right, and the steaming gnomish niners were stretched out lengthwise along it. Their engines vented light clouds as they rested like thawing bugs alongside the icy waters. On-duty mechanics saw to the machines’ maintenance, filling the boilers with creek water, lubricating joint arrays and checking pressure gauges.

All seemed fine. All seemed well.

Yet a strange discomfort fell over her. It was far too quiet on the hill. She gauged their position. Not an expert strategist, it seemed the creek kept them from being flanked but also effectively trapped them.

Jess chuckled from across the upper deck where she stretched on the seat next to Fritzy. “What’s wrong, little Nika? You look like you’re seeing ghosts.”

“Not ghosts. Orcs.”

“What?”

“Orcs are coming.”

“You’ve been sleeping,” Jess said. “You had a dream.” It was that Thrasperville bravado again. Still, she nervously scanned the top of the hill through the frozen trees.

“I was dreaming, yes. And my dream told me there were orcs coming. I could explain, but it would be easier if you would just raise the alarm.
Now
.”

Jess peered at her uncertainly. “It isn’t nice to cry orc. You’ve never even seen one. How would you know an orc from a furry bunny?”

Niksabella hated to challenge the confident young fighter, but for whatever reason she trusted the Prophetess in this. She’d been too smug about it. Happy to watch Niksabella fail on her own, no longer needing her
help
—if it could ever be called that. “Look, Jess. You need to trust me.”

“That’s what scouts are for. Our
exceptional
scouts.” Jess fixed Nika with a contemptuous look. “And I trust
them
over you.”

“Fine. I’ll raise the alarm.” Niksabella started to rise, intent on plopping down in the control chair and hitting all the buttons until the warning klaxon sounded. She knew there was one. Termund had told her about it when explaining the driving gears.

Jess sprang up and planted her hand in Niksabella’s chest, pushing her back onto the bench seat. “Look here…” The gnomestress froze. She peered at something over Niksabella’s shoulder, squinted, peered again. Niksabella tried to turn, but Jess had her pinned, looking…

Jess leaped over the seat and landed on one of the firing chairs, giving a “
hoot hoot!”
as she flew. She detached hoses from the leg frames and punched them into the crossbow stock. Another gnome climbed aboard and occupied the other chair, activating his mounted crossbow with a sense of purpose as if he’d done it a hundred times before. Others flew into action, securing ponies and positioning the niners into a defensive formation nose-to-end, each one a tight bundle of gnomish defiance.

Niksabella spun, her stomach pressed against the back of the seat.

Dark shapes sped down the hillside like a stain spreading beneath the crystal-laced branches. They moved deadly swift with no question as to their intent. The ponies whinnied as gnomes rushed about, locking mechanisms and clanking their weapons as they readied for combat. They called out to one another in calm, clipped tones that belied the immediate danger.

Niksabella’d never seen an orc before except in photoplasts or depictions in books. The creatures had always been a mystery to her, some distant evil she’d likely never face. But now, with those dark forms slipping down the hillside like death incarnate, she became petrified with fear. A rock seemed to have lodged itself in Niksabella’s throat. Her chest clenched. She felt suddenly sweaty beneath her coat.

Snowflakes danced while the dark stain spread toward them, figures becoming more recognizable with every passing moment. She caught glimpses of tall, scrawny forms with dark blades, their fleet footfalls pelting the snowy ground.

Fritzy was suddenly beside her, and Tomkin as well, his hands on their shoulders. “Keep your heads down, ladies. Orcs collect heads, they do.”

“Nika,” Fritzy said, grabbing Niksabella’s hand and squeezing it painfully. Her breath was racing. Her bottom lip quivered

“Do as he says,” she told Fritzy and both of them hunkered down, their eyes just barely over the back of the seat.

“If it comes to it, use these.” The mechanic placed two arm-length wrenches on the seat between them.

Niksabella picked one up. The weight felt good in her hand. Fritzy took one, too. They exchanged a look. The plump gnomestress gave her a scared nod and turned back to peek over the seat.

An arrow struck one of their niner’s leg frames with a
ping
. Another whizzed by overhead. More banged and rattled against the niner’s steel like raindrops falling on a tin roof. The air was soon full of black darts and the excited swirl of snowflakes. A gnome cried out. Others cursed. Niksabella’s blood ran cold. She wanted to duck down completely, to hide from what was sure to be terrible violence, but her stubborn will held her in place.

If you hide, you won’t see death approaching until those orcs climb into the back of this niner and have done with you and Fritzy. If I’m to die this day, I’ll do it with my eyes open and a growl in my throat.

An arrow tore through the Thrasperville banner, shredding the comet in half. For some reason, that angered Niksabella. “Why aren’t they fighting back? Why—”

And then she found out. A handful of orcs reached the edge of the tree line and entered open ground. That’s when the defenders replied in kind with a hail of arrows and bolts. Pieces of armor shattered. Orcs howled as bone and blood sprayed the hillside. Lanky forms doubled over and collapsed to the ground even as more orcs rushed by to charge their gnomish enemies.

New bolts clicked into place with a hiss of steam and locking of firing mechanisms. In a blink, they were sent on their way to the enemy, invoking orcish howls. And then something new: the acrid smell of magick assaulted Niksabella’s nose. A booming voice shook the sky, and a cloud of putrid, stinging rain descended on the center of the gnomish line.

Thrasperville gnomes cried out and leaped from the middle niner’s steel and wood carriage. They landed, doubled over, and coughed and hacked and spewed bloody vomit from their charred throats. In reply, someone cried out in old gnomish and the ice that covered the branches turned to crystal-sharp shards, which fell like razor rain, raking the ranks of orcs caught behind the tree line.

The sky was death, so Niksabella pressed herself into the seat to escape it, daring to peek over the back.

“Nika?”

She glanced back at Fritzy, took heart in her friend’s suddenly fierce expression, those cold, wintry eyes, yet all she could do was give a weak nod, a pithy assurance that she wasn’t about to soil her smallclothes. And then she felt a hot flush of shame. Fritzy was not asking after Niksabella’s health. She was asking if Niksabella was ready to go meet the enemy, wrenches in hand, to fight to their last. Her friend. Her flowery, lad-crazy, kissy-poo friend. Asking
her
if she was ready to be brave.

And she’d be damned if she’d let Fritzy down.

Yet when she turned to give Fritzy a firm reply to her question her friend was gone.

Niksabella cursed herself for not developing her proficiency with magick more, but then quickly snuffed the thought.
It was always her anyway. She was the only reason you’d shown any promise at all. Everything you’ve ever done, even the elementals you made last evening, were not your doing.

She thought about drawing on her wellspring anyway. Instead, she gripped the wrench and prepared to spring into the seat next to Jess and then down into the snow. An arrow plunged into a gnome just outside the niner, punching through his face with a
thunk
. Warm droplets sprayed Niksabella’s face and her jaw dropped in disbelief.

Jess yelled down at Niksabella. “Get up here in the chair. Now! Or I’ll spin around and put one of these through
you
! I swear it!” The urgency in her words broke through Niksabella’s wall of fear. A direct order… something specific. She dropped her wrench on the floorboard and went to the crossbow assembly instead. She took the handles and pulled the weapon toward her, finding it surprisingly easy to maneuver on its swivel base despite its great weight.

“Dammit,” Jess yelled at her. “You know how to fire that thing?”

“I’m a quick study!”

“On the right side, there’s a knob. Slam your hand against it.
Hard
. That one sticks.”

Niksabella found the protruding knob and hit it. “Ouch!” Her palm stung, but the knob didn’t budge.

“
Harder!
”

Jess’ words rang almost hateful. Niksabella slammed the knob again, this time with all her might. The crossbow shuddered and came to life, shaking and stuttering as the auto lever began pulling the string back.

Jess fired her crossbow, slammed her button, and wiped down the groove and barrel with a rag as her auto lever stretched the string. “Grab that rag and wipe it down. Quickly!”

Niksabella pulled a rag from a hook on the assembly frame and wiped it, her hands shaking as screams penetrated her ears. She dare not look up, dare not see what manner of death rushed howling across the open ground at them. She waited for the impact of an arrow, the swift end to it all. Between her eyes, through her neck, or perhaps punching through her chest. Her shoulders tightened like a wound-up spring as the moments passed, each one an eternity.

“Pull back the loading mechanism.
Pull back the futtering loading mechanism!
”

Niksabella quickly mimicked Jess’ movements by grabbing the lever on the side of the stock and pulling it back as far as it would go. She released it with a snap, just like Jess had done. A bolt now sat in the groove.

“Now aim through the sight and fire.” And before the last word was free of her mouth, Jess’ bolt was gone to seek its target, her knob was clapped shut, and her rag was already wiping the steam condensation off the groove and barrel.

Niksabella’s gaze roved the field. It was impossible to catch any of the spindly orcs out in the open who weren’t ducking and dodging as they closed.

“Shoot! For Tock’s sake!”

Niksabella sighted a fleeting shadow and pulled the trigger, took the steam-driven recoil in her chest, got a face full of oil spray, and watched her bolt completely miss her intended target… but it ripped through one behind it and the orc fell still to the ground!

“Yah-
hah
!” she yelled, the pent-up fear bursting from her belly like overheated pie filling.

“Don’t get all puffed up. That was one. Go again!”

Niksabella repeated the process two more times, not truly knowing if she hit anything due to the growing haze of smoke and blowing snow. Waves of sharp-limbed orcs kept coming. Elbows and knees. Curved swords and spears. Closer now. Shining black eyes. Battle-scored armor. Their growls and yips edged her panic to the surface. She smelled the stench of orc for the very first time—a musky, stale aroma not unlike the smell of the Eye at the end of the Tinkerman’s Festival: ale and food and vomit caked in the gutters and cobblestone crevices like something left to sit and go sour. An arrow whizzed by her ear. Another thunked into the seat next to her.

“Nika!” Jess practically sang, but Niksabella couldn’t be sure whether it was a song of fear or urgency or pain—probably all of these together.

She tried her best to shoot and kill orcs. Tried her best to bring them down. The cries of gnomes were forced from her mind. She heard only Jess and focused on the soothing routine of reload and fire. She wiped down the stock and barrel as ugly creatures darted through the haze. She wondered which bolt would be her last. Would she even hear it when a bit of dark steel found her own thumping heart?

A flash of a spear cut through the smudgy sky and smashed into the seat between them, sending shards of wood everywhere and knocking Niksabella to the niner’s deck. Hands and knees. Teeth crushed together. Sound squeezed inside her head. Smoke stung her face and eyes.

Chaos unveiled itself as a row of scrawny, toothy orcs charging across the remaining distance with howls and doggish yips. They came as sure as the cold, sooty air she breathed. As sure as the tang of blood she tasted on her tongue. As sure as the snarling face that bore down on her, sword black and dripping and poised to strike.

But then brighter swords broke into her field of vision, clashing with the black ones, steel cracking steel, cries and curses mingling with the orcish din.