Whispers of the Skyborne (Devices of War Book 3) (43 page)

Which was a real possibility. “A metre’s a lot shorter up here.”

Planes whizzed by in front of her like threads from a crazed embroiderist creating a frenzied pattern on a napkin. The only way to make out the enemy was by the slight billow of smoke that trailed them.

Rose smirked. “They have to be about out of fuel by now.”

“Yeah, well, I’m out of bullets,” Doris shouted. “Going in for a reload.”

Rose needed to do that as well. She’d already sent Bennen’s crew back to the
Najmah
for a reload. Three of the enemy planes turned, heading away.

“Oh, no you don’t.” Rose fluttered first her right, then her left feet to accelerate forward. She buzzed through the other planes, missing more than one of them by what felt like centimetres. She reached for her lightning gun controls and pulled the trigger.

Lightning reached out, latching onto the tail of the one closest to her. The engine seized, stalled, then the trail of smoke emitting from its rear ceased.

Rose’s heart lurched, her eye twitching.

Enemy.

She couldn’t forget that.

Or the fact that a human being, much like herself, sat in that cockpit, fright filling his chest as his plane went down.

Yeah. She couldn’t think of that.

She brought herself into position behind the next one and pushed the button, releasing her lightning.

A flash of lightning joined hers from above, latching onto first the one plane, then the next.

“Good shooting, “
Najmah.
”

“That wasn’t us, Captain,” their communications officer said with a clear tenor.

Rose raised her nose to the sky, her eyes widening in heart-wrenching horror. The storm had gone from gray to green just north of them. Getting caught in that kind of storm could be disastrous for the Sky Gypsies. “
Najmah,
this is Captain Rose. Veer south. The storm is coming round again and growing.”

The
Najmah
banked slowly.

Rose didn’t have time to watch it. Other enemy planes had decided it was time to head south as well, probably to refuel.

A spray of bullets laced the air.

She flipped
Wise Girl
, sending her nose to the ground to get out of the line of fire. “Listen up, boys and girls! Get out of the path of the storm. Head south!”

Rich followed an enemy plane toward the growing storm. His plane was easy to spot with its red tail and feathered wings. His was the only one with feathered wings, and it wasn’t something Rose would ever replicate.

“Rich,” she yelled, bringing her nose back up, shooting lightning at the converging enemy planes. “Get out of there. Head south.”

“I’ve almost got him, Captain!”

“I don’t—” Her breath caught in her throat. She dodged to the left, releasing her lightning spray. The lightning tagged first the one plane, then danced to the next.

Both of the still-wings fell from the sky.

Rose turned
Wise Girl
toward the
Najmah,
intent on getting more ammunition.

The clouds in front of them began to spin. “Funnel. Funnel. Damn it, Rich. There’s a damned tornado building right above you.”

He released a spray of bullets.

The enemy plane twisted in midair, then jerked to the right, the wind taking hold.

“Holy buckets of brass!” Rich shouted. He jammed the nose of his plane straight up, disappearing into the darkened cloud bank.

“Like I said,” Rose said, her heart hammering in her chest. “Get out of the way of the storm. It’s time to bring ‘em in.”

“Agreed,”
Najmah’s
communications specialist said in her right ear. “Call them all in. We’re bearing south as fast as we can. The storm is moving too quickly.”

She relayed the information to the rest of her squad and the remainder of Bennen’s.

The enemy planes rushed back to the landing pad, where ever that was because Rose and the Sky Gypsies hadn’t found it.

Best of luck to them.

She just hoped they could outrun a storm of this magnitude.

Shankara had ceased its bombing. They struggled to stay afloat. The
lethara
was in such agony, that he couldn’t even drop its veil or curtain so they could go below the crashing waves. The rising sea waters battered him. He flailed, trying to help his city by holding up falling platforms, but he simply couldn’t. The poor creature was in too much pain.

Victory.

Ryo closed his eyes, a dark, cold feeling rocking his chest.

When he opened them, something drew his attention.

A ship, like the old sailing vessels of the El’Asim. Blue sails along three masts. Dark ornamentation along the rail. This one, however, had a strange symbol painted brazenly on its dark hull.

Tokarz.

“Suzu!” he shouted.

“Aye, sir!”

“Do you see that ship?”

“Where?”

“Just starboard.” He didn’t understand their form of measurement yet. He’d only been at it for a few weeks, and they were in the midst of changing it. He doubted they did either.

She twisted in her seat. He could see the bottoms of her boots and her seat. She stilled, then lowered her face to look at him through the floor. Her lips formed one word. “Tokarz.”

He nodded, his grin feral. “Let’s give him a little justice. Once and for all.

Suzu needed no further urging.

Four other ships appeared on the horizon, all with different markings as if they were a gathered armada of orphans. Ryo wasn’t interested in the other ones. He only wanted Tokarz.

“Be careful of his lava cannon! The shield doesn’t stand up to it.”

Ryo laughed, laying the center of the much smaller vessel in his sights. He waited for the lava cannon to strike.

It did, sending out a whip of lava that hardened in the air before it closed even half the distance. The air was too cold, the rain too thick.

None of that mattered to Ryo’s plasma cannon though. He pulled the trigger. A pulsing ring of what almost appeared to be smoke raced out of his cannon.

A near perfect circular hole was removed from the center of Tokarz’s ship. Rigging and rope held the two sides together along with the single rib that ran from bow to stern.

Ryo waited.

The other cannons along either side of the
Basilah
continued to shoot, taking care of the remaining four ships.

Tokarz’s ship sank slowly to the ground.

Slow was good. Ryo would have his revenge with his hands. Around Tokarz’s throat.

Kiwidinok: Nix

N
IX TOOK IN ONE DEEP
breath, one hand held out in front of her. “No. You don’t want to do that, not if you wish to live.”

The leader flinched, then regained his sneer. “You are one woman.”

Nix’s Mark lifted off her shoulders, burning through her clothing without her control. They flared over her head in a dark orange light. “I said you don’t want to do this.”

The men stopped, their eyes widening as they took in her Mark.

She looked up. It wasn’t the fire of Ino, but it wasn’t quite the lava of Synn. She narrowed her eyes, her mind running as quickly as it could. What had the programmer said? Something to the effect that her Mark and Synn’s worked differently together.

How differently?

Nix allowed her lips to curl, rejoicing in the sultry feel of pure power that she’d missed for so many long, insufferable months. “Turn around.”

Like puppets fighting their strings, the men turned.

Fire. That could control men’s minds? How incredibly useful.

“Now march.” She might not be able to get far on her own, but with these men in her control, surely she could find a way to get word to Sky City. No need to go sniveling back to Synn. Not now.

One of the men shouted and disappeared as if he’d fallen into a deep hole.

The man next to him did the same thing.

Nix watched as one by one the enemy men in her control walked right over the edge of a cliff. The final man gone, she stood on the edge, watching the surging sea.

Oh, the things she could do with this new gift. Yes. The world was indeed hers.

I didn’t know how far into the mountain we’d traveled. Even as a boy, I’d never ventured this far down. We had taken care of one rigger, four destroyers. All we needed to find were the three land eaters.

We could hear them over the sound of the incoming storm. But we didn’t know where they were. The sounds echoing off the rock walls gave no indication as to their location.

We had passed through Pleron City quite a while ago. Buildings carved out of the rock face. It wasn’t much to see from the staircases, but I knew if you were to step through the doorways, you’d become lost in the maze of rock-formed rooms.

The grandest of which had been the Librarium, the place where all the documents and books the Great Families had possessed had been located.

The Hands of Tarot had stolen it around the time I’d been born.

And then, when I brought Sky City out of the clouds, I’d stolen it again and deposited in Ino City.

Ino Nami. The single most powerful person and controlled by the Skyborne. Our greatest enemy was the one holding our greatest wealth of knowledge.

Though, the Skyborne probably thought our wisdom was rudimentary at best.

The falcons who had flown ahead, reported back through Du’a.

We have found them, Synn
, she said, her soft voice filling my mind with a vision of what she saw.

I gestured to the people who remained with me. We’d left a few people at each of the Han’s mechanical creatures to stand guard. With only one way in or out, having the Han’s men attack from both sides would be disastrous. “They’re just ahead. Three land eaters. They’re focused on mining. There are only a few men guarding them.”

“Finally,” Jamilah said beside me. “I will feel a lot better back on the
Layal.
”

“And in the air,” I agreed.

She released a long, pent-up breath. “Yes.”

We extinguished our torches and piled up at the entrance to the cavern the land eaters worked in. The ledge directly in front of the cavern wasn’t wide. It was simply another landing before the staircase continued down again.

The land eaters emitted a blue glow, similar to the blue dragons that feasted on the poison the air jellies emitted.