Chapter Nineteen #3
to run, ducking quickly through the tunnel of bones. Ossein continued to recede
in front of her, pulling back like the white foam of a wave. Isaac followed
behind at a stumbling pace, trying to keep pressure on the knife in his chest.
They made their way through the cemetery of ancient ships.
Zaria slammed her weight through the curtains of ossein wherever they were
thin. When they were thick enough to compose an actual bone, she guided him
through the remnants of the necromancer ships, taking him through a blurry
series of rooms and compartments and tunnels. Each of the vessels varied wildly
in size, and many were obviously the detached sections of even larger vessels,
ones that had been cleaved away and butchered into pieces. He passed by dead
instrumentation, narrow hallways, crew decks that were still dotted with bunks.
Most of the ships were lying buried beneath the festering colony of bone.
He couldn’t imagine all that had been lost.
Eventually, the receding ossein led them towards a
particularly large hull, standing like a bulwark against the concrete and bone.
The entrance was overflowing with ossein, but the fibers on a nearby wall were
already peeling away, and they managed to squeeze through a disassembled gap.
Inside, they found something close to a command deck. There was a row of
devices along a wall, followed by a collection of metal stations in the center
of the room. Isaac wasn’t sure how a captain could command a ship from inside
the deck, but he was quickly losing all mood to speculate.
Outside, the titan was still searching. Despite the constant
cover of bone and metal, Isaac was always keenly aware of where the beast was
looking, which he based solely on the massive shadows cast upon the earth, as
well as the gusts of wind that erupted with every one of its motions. At the
moment, the quakes in the ground were telling him that the beast had moved its
search far to the right. The colossus was shifting its weight. He could imagine
it bending down, beginning to search closely.
“You alright, love?”
Isaac collapsed into one of the metal command chairs. He was
finding it more and more difficult to breathe, and it wasn’t solely from the
knife jutting above his lung. He had cast many spells today, most of them in
the last few hours alone. The fatigue was beginning to mount.
Zaria threw the cutlass to the floor, pulling out the last
of their blankets and wrapping a section of fabric around the blade. With a
grunt, she drew her flint and began to strike them together, creating rapid
bursts of sparks.
“What’re you doing?” Isaac asked.
“Cauterizin’.”
The sparks caught. The flames grew tall on the sword. She
came over, kneeled in front of him, and gripped the hilt of the knife in his
chest. The slight touch made him gasp.
“Gotta come out,” she said. “You’re bleedin’ too much. It’s
now or never.”
The ground shook beneath them. He had no time to argue.
She began to pull. If the pain did not strike the breath
from his lungs, he would have screamed. When it was out, she retrieved their
rations, wiped a thick crust of salt off the meat, and stuffed it in the wound.
This time, he managed to scream. After the brief disinfection, she wiped the
salt away, grabbed the sword, unwrapped the burning fabric, took him by the
shoulder, gave an apologetic look, and pressed the searing hot cutlass to his
skin.
He must have fainted, at some point.
The next thing he knew, he was on the floor, and Zaria was
groaning as she pulled the knife out of her eye. It came in two ragged jerks.
She flung it off into a cluster of ossein, pressing a trembling hand to her
face. The noise she made was barely above a sob. Around them, a shockwave
ripped through the room, dislodging a flurry of metal sheets. It almost felt
like the capsule might lift from the floor.
Still clutching her face, Zaria sank to the floor, breathing
raggedly, tearing the last of their blankets into bandages. She whimpered every
time she had to move her hand. After a moment, Isaac crawled over to help,
ignoring the utterly delirious pain in his chest. He wrapped a section of cloth
around her eye, and she managed to loop the rest of the bandage around his
shoulder. Both times, the fabric was immediately stained with red.
“Isaac,” she said. “Your uncle’s a cunt. Have I said that
before?”
He tried to speak. His voice was weak and trembling.
Instead, he pointed at her eye.
“Sure, love,” she replied. “I’m feelin’ grand. Right as
rain. All set to join a tourney, as it happens.”
He nodded, beginning to push himself from the floor.
“We can’t do this much longer,” she said.
He gripped the seat in front of him, trying to stand. “I
have a plan.”
“Aye. You said that.”
“If we can get close—”
“Isaac!”
The voice came from far away. It echoed across the ancient
capsule, bouncing through bone and steel and wires. He recognized it at once.
Even now, after all he had learned over his journey, it still made him flinch.
“Come out!” Berith shouted. “I know you’re in there!”
Around them, the earth quivered.
Metal groaned.
Bones shattered.
There came a growl from the sky, echoing like claps of
thunder.
“The resurrection is complete!” his uncle shouted. “The
colossus is mine! I am now a tyrant of the ancient gods!”
Outside, the wind shrieked in fury.
“There is no need for this! Only the Archons wanted you
dead! And with this,” there was a pause, as if Berith were taking a moment to
gesture, “this creature of unimaginable strength, this titan of bones and age,
they will find my position greatly enhanced! Authority is ultimately derived
from violence, is it not?”
A silence came through the air. It was the kind of silence
that begged for a reply. Isaac took several breaths, gathering his strength.
“I never wanted this! You know that, don’t you? You know how
much I hated our lives! Do you understand, Isaac, that I could have been a
better person, in a better world, if only I had been allowed?”
Isaac did not answer.
“Come out!” Berith shouted. “Join me!”
Isaac gripped the armrest of a chair.
“I offer you my mercy! Protection! I will keep you safe at
my side! The gods only know I never wanted to hurt you!”
Isaac squeezed the metal until his knuckles were white.
“You can still come home, Isaac! Take revenge with me! Help
me teach those old wizards exactly what their conspiracies have earned!
You can show your wrath to the people who deserve it!”
Another silence came. Again, it waited for a reply. Zaria
was looking at him with something close to apprehension.
He shook his head. She nodded, squeezing his shoulder.
“If you don’t show your face,” Berith yelled, his voice
growing hoarse, “then you will be crushed! I won’t risk you rising against me!
I’ll sweep this boneyard like a field of chaff! There won’t be enough of you
and your pirate to fill a petri dish!”
The earth rumbled. The wind shrieked. Around them, the shade
began to thicken, like a blanket falling across the sun.
“You have five minutes! Five minutes to emerge from wherever
you’re hiding! From then on, I will consider you my enemy, boy, and I will
smite you like the gods!”
His words echoed out through the cavern. Isaac could imagine
how it looked—his uncle standing before an ancient altar, surrounded by
thralls, a cloud of bone poised like arrows above his head, waiting in the
shadow of a colossus with a sneer on his face. His patience was always thin
when punishment was due.
“Help me stand,” Isaac said.
Zaria pulled him to his feet. She leaned over, checking the
knives still in his arm. Instead of removing them, she tightened the splints
and bandages. “Likes to talk, does he? Seems like the sort that’d piss in some
wine and expect praise for the vintage.”
“You do get used to the taste.”
She snorted. “Something about a plan, you were saying?”
He thought about distances. Throughout the conversation, he
had been tracking the location of Berith’s voice, trying to determine how far
they still had left to travel. The fact that he could hear his words at all
suggested they were already very close.
“I don’t think you’re going to like it,” he said.
“Oh, aye? Was I supposed to be liking all this?”
“It’s a simple plan, if inelegant. All it requires is that
sword in your hand. If I could just—”
Ossein snapped.
Someone had entered the room.
It was a blur, at first. In the shadow of the colossus, the
room was dark, leaving only a vague impression of bone and steel. After a
moment, Isaac saw blood. There was a glistening curtain of red dripping down a
torso, clinging to a motley collection of leather and fur. There was a broken
jaw, dangling like a horseshoe. Finally, there was a satchel of black powder,
clutched tightly in a white-furred paw. The fuse was small, and the bag was
packed to the edge of bursting. It was enough to vaporize the capsule.
Zaria dashed forward, nearly knocking him over. “Oh, look
what the cunt pissed out!”
Soren gurgled, lurching forward.
“Afternoon, captain! Bright day, isn’t it?”
Something wet spilled at Soren’s feet. She raised the
satchel of powder above her head, attempting to point with her other hand.
“Try it,” Zaria replied, baring her teeth. “Bet I’ll floss your guts ‘fore you spark the flint.”
Soren took another step, her leg limp and dragging. She
pointed at the satchel again.
Zaria snarled and charged.
“Stop!” Isaac shouted.
The hyena stopped, if only because Soren took another step
forward, and her face entered the light. Her skull was completely split. There
was only a ruin where her face had been, a dribble of pinkish brain spilling
over the empty socket which had once held her glass eye. Beyond a doubt, the
bunny was dead.
With a gurgle, she waved the bomb back and forth, stumbling
on unsteady legs.
“I know that’s you, father,” Isaac said.
Soren nodded frantically, her jawbone snapping like a broken