Chapter 22

  Strange dreams haunted Emmius in the misty delirium between sleep and waking. The mother stone was angry about something, angry beyond words and thoughts. She woke up, and the whole desert awoke with her. Emmius felt the earth trembling beneath; he dreamed of earthquakes far off in all directions at the edges of this tectonic plate. The anger of the mother stone made him afraid. She was terrible and strange, and the ground objected to her presence here, but she had told him stories of something far worse. His imagination painted this ‘something worse’ onto everything he thought of, everything he felt, everything he saw as he dreamed.

  He awoke violently, thrashing in fear. Something was holding him, carrying him. He fought it, but it was as strong as a dragon.

  “Calm yourself, Emmius.” The voice shook Emmius, but it did calm him. That was the voice of Rasmus. If Rasmus was carrying him, he was safe. “You are injured,” Rasmus continued. The tone of his voice worried Emmius. Rasmus sounded very serious, not like the happy Rasmus he had been playing cards with a while ago. What had happened…?

  The memories came to him piece by piece. A beautiful brown stranger had arrived. Anthea had gone crazy and cut Emmius’s arm off. But it hadn’t really been her, it had been the mother stone. And Emmius had gone to the mother stone and sung her back to sleep.

  And now Rasmus was carrying him somewhere through the dry coral forest. And his arm hurt. A lot. “Rasmus,” he said. Rasmus did not respond. He was looking into the distance, his brow furrowed in thought. “Rasmus!”

  “Hmm?” Rasmus turned his broad bearded face down at Emmius.

  “Like, uh, what happened?”

  Rasmus frowned, and his arda crackled, and for a second Emmius was scared of him. “The situation is this: Fiora and Anthea lie on the brink of death. Rosma and Zayana are wounded, as are you.”

  “Um, oh, bummer. But, like, are you good?”

  Rasmus smiled ahead, but it wasn’t a smile that made Emmius feel better. “Fear not, Emmius,” he said. “I am good.” His tone made Emmius wonder for a moment what it would be like if Rasmus were not good. If he were, in fact, bad. Emmius’s imagination dared scarcely to even brush up against that idea, for it was as dark and terrifying as his dreams of the mother stone.

  “I can like walk I guess.”

  “Are you certain?”

  Emmius nodded. Rasmus gently set him upright on the sand and led him back to the base of the radio tower. It leaned to one side. He probably wouldn’t be able to keep broadcasting.

  His arm hurt more and more as he walked, which was weird since it was not there anymore. Emmius wondered how he would play guitar. Could he brace it against his legs, sitting down? Maybe he could work a capo with his mouth. Good thing it had been his left arm, anyway.

  The gravity of the situation sank in when Emmius and Rasmus entered the clearing where it all had happened. The wind had broken all the fragile coral parts—fans, fronds, filaments. Their debris lay scattered over the clearing. The surrounding coral was coated in turquoise sand that had blown over it and piled up against it in dunes driven by the wind. A layer of salt snow dusted everything.

  A row of figures lay stretched out in the lengthening shadows. Emmius identified them as he approached. Anthea, her wings shattered, covered by a blanket. Fiora sprawled beside a sleeping vesta. Rosma, also asleep. Zayana, trying to get up and being stopped by Derxis.

  “I can help,” she said as Rasmus and Emmius stepped into the shade.

  “I know,” replied Derxis. His skin changed from blue to yellow-green. “but there is no need for you to help. Rest.”

  Zayana scowled at him, but her strength failed her, and she slid back to the sand. “There is need,” she muttered. “You don’t even know how to apply a tourniquet.”

  Derxis giggled. “Well no one’s bleeding out anymore, so that doesn’t matter.”

  Zayana closed her eyes, but the jewels on her forehead still looked like eyes, watching. “We should get them inside.”

  “We, not you, will do so,” said Derxis. “Before nightfall. I promise. Back in the station.”

  “All the salt and sand isn’t good for—”

  “Zayana, I will put you to sleep if you don’t relax. Rasmus and I…” he looked at Emmius and decided not to include him. “…have got this. Uh, so, Emmius. Been disarmed, eh?”

  “Uh…”

  “Know where it is?” Derxis reached up to the top of his head and pulled down his color priest mask. He instantly became wild and unpredictable in the eyes of Emmius.

  “Where, uh, where what is?”

  “Your arm, Emmius. Do you know where it is?”

  Zayana’s eyes flew open. She tried to sit up again, but Derxis had a hand on her shoulder weighing her down. Zayana looked wide-eyed at the place where Emmius’s left arm should have been. She turned to Derxis and whispered fiercely. “What happened to his arm?”

  “It may be missing,” he whispered back. “But we won’t know for sure until he files the proper paperwork.” He almost couldn’t finish his sentence because he broke up into a maniacal giggle.

  Rasmus had been traveling down the line of injured. He returned and tried to whisper. “I will go and find a means of transporting them to the station. I believe the presence of the vesta will protect you from the wildlife.” He stepped off toward the radio tower.

  “Um, like, if you find my arm,” Emmius asked Derxis. “can you put it back?”

  “No,” he said after a moment. “Not without Fiora.”

  “Oh, bummer. But, like, it hurts a lot.”

  Derxis popped open the medkit and handed Emmius two white pills from a small bottle. “Chew.” Emmius chewed them up at once, grimacing at the taste.

  “Now go to sleep, Zayana,” said Derxis. “I’ve got it all…under control.” He undermined his point by failing to control his mirth.

  “Fine,” she said as she relaxed back onto the sand. “Just remember to water Rosma.”

  There wasn’t anything for Emmius to do, and Derxis soon came to the end of his ability to help the wounded. Derxis, in mask and priestly robes, opened his traveling case, took out his pigments, and began to paint on a nearby shell of smooth curved coral.

  Emmius watched for a while, then sat in the sand and built elaborate structures by making the sand hold together. He made a model of Frostfound, which he had seen only once from a great distance. The sight had struck icy dread into his heart, but somehow it seemed appropriate now. When he had finished with the ringed parapets, the spires and curving walkways, he began arranging the debris in the area. Making a rock garden.

  Acarnus returned as the shadows lengthened. He stepped carefully around Emmius’s work, but paused to look at the centerpiece. “Frostfound?” he asked. Emmius nodded, surprised that Acarnus was missing his goggles. Emmius didn’t think he had ever seen Acarnus without goggles.

  Derxis left his partly finished mural to greet Acarnus. “No luck?” he asked.

  “No luck.” Acarnus glanced at the mural, then at the four daimon laid out in the shade.

  “She’s alive, Acarnus,” said Derxis. Laughter crept into his voice, genuine laughter. The painted watchful mask on his face twitched sideways. He swept an arm out to the side; his robes billowed and caught the light. “Come see.” He practically bounced as he marched over to the sleeping figures. “Fiora did it. A miracle.”

  Acarnus followed Derxis to Anthea and gazed down at her. “I am tired,” he said. “I will retire to Nazkhar. You may contact me there.” He turned with a swirl of his cloak and strode toward the ridge where his slider was parked.

  “Very well,” said Derxis, obviously puzzled. His mask tilted the other way. “What happened to your goggles?”

  “Lost them.” Acarnus did not look back. He crested the ridge, and a moment later Emmius heard a slider humming to life, then fading into the distance.

  Derxis turned to Emmius as though in confusion, then back to where Acarnus had gone, then he looked down at Anthea. “Uncharacteristic,” he said.

  Emmius stood up from his project and went to look at Derxis’s mural. He spent a minute examining the looping swirls of color.

  “Its, uh, I like it,” he said. “But what is it?”

  Derxis came up next to him. “Madness,” he said happily. “Madness directed, in things anticipated, unproven, things unseen. Hope in action! Defiance of logic.”

  “Oh. Um. That’s…like, what it is?”

  “It’s a riddle, Emmius, and the answer is faith.”

  “Woah like I’m glad you just told me the answer cause like man I would have never got it you know?”

  “Everything is going to be okay, Emmius. Can you remember that?”

  “Um. Yeah like I guess so.”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  “Good. Does your arm still hurt?”

  “Like a lot, man.”

  “Okay, I won’t keep doing this, but just for now…” Derxis glowed orange, and Emmius’s pain vanished at once.

  “Like thanks, man.”

  Rasmus returned with a massive sheet of metal that he had pried from the siding of the transistor station and intended to use as a sled to gently ferry the wounded back into the shelter of the tower for nightfall. He was surprised to learn that Acarnus had already come and gone. Emmius wandered over to help Rasmus, even though that was like a mouse trying to assist an elephant.

  “You know,” Rasmus told him, “the hero Jarls Wandersong of legend had but one arm.” He winked at Emmius. The sound of his voice made Zayana and Rosma stir in their sleep. Emmius tried to remember if he had heard of Jarls Wandersong. He could not recall. Either way, Rasmus’s words made him feel better. Rasmus was strong and nice, and beloved of the gods when they had lived, and he liked telling stories. Being around him made Emmius wonder how he himself could be strong and nice.

  Emmius was about to ask for a story when a gurgling, screeching roar sounded from up above them. It was the call of a sky dreamer, and it was a bad noise because they only made it when they were upset about something. Emmius looked and saw a juvenile dreamer descending upon them. This one was only as large as a big tree, or several houses, but its long dangling fronds were still dangerous. Emmius had been watching them for weeks, and he’d never seen any other creature of Prax hurt a sky dreamer, not even the leviathan squid.

  Derxis chuckled. “Rasmus?” Rasmus nodded and gently set aside his gigantic piece of sheet metal. “Careful it doesn’t fall on us,” Derxis added.

  Emmius looked at the vesta, who was supposed to make sure other creatures didn’t attack them. It was fast asleep. The sight captivated Emmius for a moment. He’d never seen a sleeping vesta before. With its eyes closed, it looked almost like a normal animal.

  Rasmus was eyeing the descending monster, determining his approach, when a thin but brilliant line of blue light raced through the sky above. It traveled on an unsteady winding path, as though scribbled by an unsteady hand, and it struck the sky dreamer with a brilliant flash. The dreamer screeched loud enough to wake Rosma and Zayana. Blue sparks cascaded down, and then the blue line came out the other side of the monster, where it exploded with a crackling hiss. The line disappeared. Emmius could remember seeing something like that before. It was some kind of space weapon that went around corners and worked even when there was no air.

  A rocket came next—a tiny metal capsule that trailed a pale streak through the late afternoon sky. The sky dreamer tried to dodge, but it was too slow. A large chunk of the sky dreamer imploded where the missile struck, like a bite chomped out of it by an invisible monster. The implosion was loud; the shockwave from the air rushing into the empty space almost knocked Emmius over.

  The dreamer fell, sliding sideways toward the ground. It collided with the radio tower. The tower groaned and collapsed, accompanied by a cacophony of snapping wires and screaming metal. Luckily, it fell away from them. Though the noise was great and the ground shook, neither Anthea, nor Fiora, nor Catch so much as stirred.

  The dreamer, still very alive, began a rapid retreat back to the skies.

  Before Emmius could get his thoughts together, an airship slid into view above them. It was a raven-black triangle, no lights underneath. It stopped smoothly, silently overhead. Blue pulse lights glowed at the back end.

  “Rasmus?” Derxis said it again, but this time it was more of a question than before. Rasmus just nodded, looking up at the ship.

  “Not the Remnant,” said Rasmus in speculation.

  A hatch opened in the ship as soon as Rasmus spoke, and something dropped from the aircraft. It fell like a rock and landed in the center of the clearing where it obliterated Emmius’s model of Frostfound. It was a techsuit, a daimonoid mass of metal, weapons, and armor as big as Rasmus. Black and grey and white, unpainted. Concentric circles of colored lights blinked and rotated where the face would be. The techsuit ignored them. It turned, whirring as it scanned the environment.

  “Aha!” Rasmus bellowed a laugh. “You gave us a fright, Jeronimy!”

  Emmius grinned; relief washed over him. It was just Jeronimy! He knew that triangular black ship had looked familiar. Derxis laughed.

  Something swooped down from the sky—an eagle, coal-black. It dove into the long shadow of the techsuit like a bird into water. That shadow darkened; the black eagle dispersed, reformed, condensed into the tall, thin shape of Jeronimy.

  “You have brought me another tech suit to destroy?” Rasmus laughed loud enough that Emmius stepped sideways away from him and turned his head so the sound didn’t hit his ear directly.

  Jeronimy grunted as he stepped from the shadow of the techsuit. He squinted at the sunlight and glared at the sun, then held up part of his shapeless black cloak to block it from his face. “Won’t be long,” he said, “before I build the one that will just take you the fuck out.”

  “Every time, you say that,” said Rasmus. “I look forward to it!”

  “Heard what happened,” said Jeronimy. He stalked toward the sleeping figures. “Guess I missed the fucking action.”

  “By some time, yes,” said Derxis. “Imagine that. Can you imagine, Rasmus? Jeronimy, missing the action?”

  Jeronimy ignored him. He stopped in front of Emmius and Rasmus. “The fuck happened to your arm? Just kidding, don’t care.” He reached into his cloak and slapped a piece of glossy grey paper onto Rasmus’s chest. “Brought you my fucking shopping list. I’m making something. Need this shit soon as possible. I wrote it in big simple letters so you can read it.” He had been trying to insult Rasmus, not make a joke, but Rasmus chuckled anyway. Rasmus took the paper and began reading. His bushy yellow eyebrows climbed up his forehead as he read.

  Jeronimy stalked past them to the line of wounded. He ignored the groggy Zayana and Rosma, and stepped over Fiora to reach Anthea. “Still alive,” he said. He poked her with a foot. “Lost her fucking wings. Maybe now she’ll give up on all that flying shit.”

  He turned and kicked Fiora’s legs out of the way as he returned. He stopped at Rosma. “Well shit,” he said. “You’re still alive. Can’t Akkama fucking do anything right?”

  Rosma glared up at him with bleary, unfocused eyes. She spat in his direction.

  “And you,” he turned to Zayana, who lay peaceful but awake nearby. “This is partly your fault. Buy hey, whatever, all’s well that fucking ends well, right? Looks like you’re all doing just gods-damned fine without me, just fucking rosy.”

  Zayana did not respond.

  Derxis slid closer. He had a way of moving while wearing his priestly garb that was eerie and unsettling. “Jeronimy,” he said, “why are you here?”

  Jeronimy shrugged, and for him it was a very expressive gesture. His thin shoulders moved way up above his ears. “Just fucking curious, I guess. Looks like we got a real pro squad here. Just the fucking A Team, that’s us, the last daimon, getting our asses handed to us by a crazy bitch. But hey, what do I know? I guess according to her,” part of his formless void of a cloak twitched toward Anthea, “we’re going to pretend to be the dead gods and beat death or whatever. Not real convincing, coming from the half-dead one over there with her arda all shattered to the seven hells.”

  Derxis’s mask was just watchful like always, but his skin became reddish-orange. Somehow, that mask glared, and Emmius felt nervous even though it wasn’t looking at him.

  Jeronimy shook his head in disdain and strode back toward his mech. “Wait,” said Rosma.

  “No.” He kept walking.

  Rosma growled. In a flurry of motion, she rolled to her feet, picked up her spear, and darted in front of Jeronimy. The sudden action left her unsteady, and it broke open wounds that oozed blackness, but it had still been amazingly fast. Jeronimy recoiled defensively. “The fuck you want?”

  She panted and glared at him with a cold, angry gaze. Her spear was angled down; blood dripped down the ivory shaft.

  “Rosma,” said Rasmus, stepping toward her. “Please. You must—”

  She swung the spear toward Rasmus, but kept her eyes on Jeronimy. “Stand down, coward,” she said. “I shall finish thee soon enough. But I have sworn a blood oath against Akkama.” She angled the spear back toward Jeronimy’s feet. “Take me with thee,” she said. “Help me exact vengeance for this.”

  “A fucking blood oath? Holy shit. Well I gotta say, as much as I think we’d all be better off minus one crazy bitch, especially since she just offed the only decent one of you shitheads, I want nothing to do with that shit. Go stick your own fucking ass in that fire.”

  “That is enough,” said Rasmus. It sounded like a proclamation; like a command from the gods. His voice thundered. He took two huge steps toward Jeronimy and Rosma. Rosma again leveled her spear at him but Rasmus reached out, surprisingly fast, and seized the toothy spearhead. He easily yanked it from Rosma’s grip and flung it away onto the sand.

  “You will go nowhere, Rosma, until you are healed. And we will discuss what is to be done about Akkama.”

  Rosma snarled at him. “I will bring her to justice.”

  “Justice will come to the evildoer,” said Rasmus. “But not by your hand. For it would then be vengeance only.” He shook his head sadly. “We cannot have this. It is not what Anthea would have wanted.”

  Jeronimy had made several attempts to interrupt Rasmus, but Rasmus was not easy to interrupt. Jeronimy just shook his head when Rasmus finished. “This is all fucking ridiculous,” he said. “Fuck this shit. I’m out.” He walked around Rosma and stopped in front of Emmius. “Come with me,” he said. “I’ll make you a new arm. A better one.”

  Emmius’s eyes widened. A better one? He tried to imagine what that meant. More fingers? “Uh, like, okay. Thanks, bro!” Jeronimy allowed Emmius, and no one else, to call him ‘bro.’

  “Jeronimy,” said Derxis, who again had come close without seeming to have moved.

  “What now ?”

  “Fiora and Anthea may yet die without medical attention.”

  “…and?”

  “We can’t transport them easily. And there are no nearby facilities that are safe and advanced enough to be of help.”

  “Oh, except for my fucking mountain, right? Just me and the corpse of fuckin Nonpareil Nescience, oh and a fucking horde of voidbound chillin outside on the Dark Plains. Hey, know why I live all alone in a gods-damned dead Iterator on a dead mountain in the middle of fucking nowhere? You got me, yeah it’s cause I just fucking love it when a freak show like you guys rolls up in my business and can just annoy me and hey maybe just fucking kill me in my sleep, ‘cause I guess that’s how we roll, right? Oh, I know, how about we all just get—”

  “Enough,” said Rasmus. Jeronimy trailed off into grumbling under his breath.

  Emmius shuffled up to Jeronimy and tugged on his cloak. It felt cool and soft in his fingers. “Uh, like, bro,” he said, “like, wouldn’t it be okay, I mean, if like we promised not to touch anything?”

  “You were already fucking invited.” Jeronimy noticed something at his feet, nearly buried in the sand. He dug with one foot until he unearthed a broken half of a hairbrush, as well as something else, something white. Jeronimy stooped down for a moment, and when he rose, both things were gone.

  “Jeronimy,” said Rasmus, “you will receive no assistance from me in the construction of your new device if you do not now assist us. Do you not care for Fiora and Anthea?”

  Jeronimy’s cloak boiled. His face became tar-black and melted into the rest of his opaque form. Spikes formed and raced in rows like scurrying creatures. Darkness shone out from him; the rest of them cast shadows of light away from Jeronimy. The black shape of his body collapsed, reformed, flashed through half a dozen variations before returning to his normal shape. All in a few moments, then it was over.

  “She’s the only fucking reason I’m here!” He aimed a long scarecrow arm at Anthea. “I…I don’t…you…fuck…” All the things he wanted to say got caught up together in his throat. He turned and pointed something up at the black triangle above them. It grew larger as it dropped toward them. “We’ll have to leave the fucking vesta,” he said. “Thank the gods.”