The Iron jackal

Forty-Six

Samandra Bree had predicted that getting out of the power station would be much harder than getting in. She was wrong. There wasn’t a Samarlan left in the building.

When they got outside, they saw why.

The gates had been left open and unguarded, black doors with a faint sheen of green like a beetle’s carapace. The Century Knights went forward with Bess, cautious of an ambush. Silo heard Samandra let loose a deeply unladylike oath as he followed them out.

The upper platform on which the power station sat was deserted. Samarlan bodies lay here and there, remnants of the earlier firefight, but the living had abandoned this place.

The lake was at their back and the city spread out before them, rising up the bowl-shaped sides of the oasis. The slopes were speckled with the light of many windows, peeking through the dense foliage. The moon hung high overhead: full dark had come. Surrounding them was the excavated zone, where Azryx boulevards and plazas flay revealed. They could see men running there, and hear their shouts and hysterical shrieks.

The platform trembled beneath their feet. Silo looked up, and saw what had caused Samandra to swear. Further up the slope, just beyond the edge of the city, something was rising from beneath the ground, sloughing off soil and vines and trees. Something enormous.

The sheer size of it beggared belief. It was bigger than the power station that towered behind them. As it rose, it tore up the earth around it, sending a landslide of dirt through the foliage, which rolled over the city’s outermost buildings and buried them.

At first he wondered if it was an incredible aircraft, or some kind of massive subterranean machine. But then its legs began to unfold, and it shook itself. A cloud of displaced earth cloaked it from sight, and clods rained down on the jungle canopy for kloms around.

But the cloud settled, and the upheaval ceased, and then it was revealed. The most colossal creature he’d ever laid eyes on.

‘What in the name of the Allsoul’s sacred bollock sweat is that?’ said Pinn, ever one for a bit of creative blasphemy.

Nobody had an answer. In form, it was something like an ape, with large powerful forelegs and smaller hindquarters. But there the resemblance to any living animal ended. It was covered in interlocking plates of white armour, made of some material with the matte smoothness of eggshell. At the joints, where it was necessary to flex, it was possible to see the wet glitter of dark red muscle. Its face was like a gas mask, with that same disconcerting lack of expression. Two blank white eyes without brows or lids bulged above a short round tube of a mouth, like the turbine intake of an aircraft, forming a grotesque muzzle.

Silo stared in horrified awe. He recognised the same technology he’d seen in the custodians of the power station, the same unnatural fusion of organic and inorganic. But this was on such a scale as to make the hybrids seem like toys.

The Murthians had tales, told by the witch-sisters in the dreaming-house. Tales of the Tall Walkers, whom Mother had sent to cleanse the world of her first twisted brood that the Vards called Gargants. When these new monsters had destroyed the old, they died and left the world to the new generation, the humans.

But only the Murthians still kept the faith with Mother. Samarlans had a different version of history, and their own legends. Their versions of the Tall Walkers were malevolent, sent as punishment by their absent gods, and they had a different name. Silo could hear them screaming it in the streets below, but the word that came to him was Vardic.

Juggernaut.

‘You think maybe we woke that thing up?’ Ashua asked, her voice small.

Malvery put a hand on her shoulder. ‘Welcome to the man"› amp;lsqucrew of the Ketty Jay,’ he said. ‘You ain’t a member till you’ve caused at least one major catastrophe.’

There was an explosion from deep in the bowels of the power station. Silo looked up at the hourglasses to either side. The lightning within was becoming frenzied, striking everywhere with rapid fury, pummelling at the walls of its prison. The sweeping arms that orbited around the inner edges had slipped out of sync and lost their rhythm.

The city lights wavered and went out.

Darkness came suddenly. The slopes turned black, as if a hundred thousand glowing eyes had all closed at the same time. All that remained were the clunky Samarlan lamps, running off their fuming generators, in the streets of the excavated quarter. All else was moonlight.

The Juggernaut slowly turned its massive head towards the city, towards the screams and the light. Its expressionless eyes regarded the scene, its mouth an idiot O. Then light began to gather in front of its face. A million sparkling particles ignited in the air around that turbine mouth, and were pulled inside, as if the creature were sucking in a huge breath. There was an ascending squeal as it drew in more and more of the bright motes that twinkled out of the dark.

It stopped. The twinkles faded. The squeal fell silent.

A heartbeat passed.

Then the Juggernaut fired.

The mouth wasn’t a mouth. It was a cannon. A beam of scorching, seething white energy screeched forth, down into the buildings and streets where the Sammies ran. Where it touched, everything exploded. It raked the beam across the city, leaving billowing clouds of fire blossoming in its wake. The detonations were more than a klom away from where they stood outside the power station, but they felt the hot air on their faces, and the sight was enough to make them cry out and shield themselves instinctively.

It lasted no more than a few seconds. But those few seconds left a flaming scar of devastation across the width of the excavated zone and beyond. Leaves burned and buildings slumped into blackened alleys.

Pinn lowered the sling-wrapped arm he’d thrown up in front of his face. ‘I need to get a gun like that,’ he said reverently.

‘Silo? Are you seeing this?’

Silo remembered the earcuff he was wearing. The Cap’n must have just put his on. Frey hated wearing it when he didn’t need to; he found the background babble of other voices distracting. Of course it meant they could only talk when the Cap’n wanted to but, well, that was his way.

‘I’m seeing it, Cap’n. You alright?’

‘Never blsquetter. How are your lot?’

‘They all in one piece so far. We oughta head for the Rattletraps, though.’

‘Is that the Cap’n? Is he alive?’ Pinn was asking. Silo, who was trying to listen, waved him away with a terse nod. It only occurred to him then that the Cap’n really was alive, that he must have overcome the curse.

The mantle of owner of the Ketty Jay and leader of her crew wouldn’t pass to him after all, then. He’d been so focused on his task that he hadn’t fully taken in the gravity of Frey’s request. Now he found himself deeply relieved. Maybe he didn’t want to be a slave any more, but he didn’t want to fill the Cap’n’s boots either. First mate would serve him just fine.

‘Hey, everyone!’ said a chirpy voice in his ear.

‘Jez!’ said the Cap’n. ‘How was your coma?’

‘Instructive,’ she replied. ‘Listen, you ought to know the Ketty Jay ’s up and running again.’

‘You fix her?’

‘Nothing to do with me. Everything just came back at once.’

‘Reckon whatever was suppressing the Ketty Jay ’s systems died when the power did,’ Silo said, then flinched as another explosion sounded from the building behind him.

‘Are we gonna get moving anytime soon?’ Samandra demanded, pointing towards the Juggernaut, which was lumbering down the slope towards the edge of the city.

Silo ignored her. ‘Cap’n,’ he said. ‘Forget the Rattletraps. Ain’t gonna have time to get to ’em. This power station ain’t stable.’

‘Jez, can the Ketty Jay fly?’

‘Don’t see why not.’

‘We’re gonna need a pickup,’ said the Cap’n. ‘Now.’

‘On it,’ said Jez. ‘Where am I going?’

‘Due east. Look for the landing pad, we’ll meet you there. You ought to be able to see the city now the power’s out.’

‘City?’

‘Long story. Get going. Oh, and Jez?’ oman"›‘Cap’n?’

‘Watch out. There’s one awfully mean-looking bastard between you and us.’

The Cap’n’s voice went silent as he took off his earcuff again. The others, having only been privy to Silo’s voice in the conversation, looked at him expectantly. He pointed to where a landing pad sat on the edge of the excavated area, supported by a thin pillar that branched as it rose, giving it the appearance of a flat-topped, skeletal tree.

‘That’s where we’re headed. Move!’

‘At last!’ said Samandra, who viewed plans as an unnecessary impediment to action.

They made their way down to street level. The Juggernaut was still visible upslope. It was some distance away, but not far enough for Silo’s liking. As he watched, it reared up on its hind legs, and he saw that it had wide, spatulate feet with four armoured toes at ninety-degree intervals. It came down hard on a particularly large building, smashing in through the roof. The earth shook as it landed.

The Juggernaut was making its way towards the excavated zone, where the Samarlans were concentrated. Silo didn’t know if it was attracted by the lights or Sammies, or if it was simply engaged in mindless destruction. Whatever its motive, it was perfectly willing to obliterate the city of its masters. Why would the Azryx – for it had to be Azryx in origin – build something like that?

Impossible to know. Maybe it had malfunctioned after millennia of inactivity. Maybe it was supposed to destroy the city, but had never been activated. Or maybe it recognised the people it was sent to annihilate, thousands of years ago.

None of it mattered now. The gulf of time was too great for guesswork. His only concern was getting them away from it.

A burst of gunfire shocked him. Two Sammie soldiers, caught between duty and self-preservation, had spotted them and opened fire. Samandra, who was in the lead, forward-rolled under their bullets and came up with both shotguns aimed. She fired them together, and the Sammies were blown backwards, minus their faces. Somehow, she managed to do it all without dislodging her tricorn hat.

She spun the shotguns, chambering a new round in each, and looked over her shoulder. ‘Better be careful,’ she said. ‘Ain’t just that ugly feller we got to look out for.’

Silo didn’t take them straight towards the landing pad. That would have meant crossing the entire expanse of the excavated zone. Instead he struck out for the edge, where it was bordered by foliage and there were no electric lights. That way he could avoid the majority of the Sammies, and hopefully the Juggernaut’s attentions too.

They heard the sucking noise again, the squeal of power building, the dreadful pause before the devastation. T washis time it came close enough to terrify, lashing the streets nearby. They were forced to shelter as pieces of ceramic pelted them from the sky.

The Samarlans were still in disarray, but Silo could hear the sound of machine guns drifting up from distant streets as some of them attempted to fight back.

Just like Sammies, he thought. Too wrapped up in ideas of nobility and codes of behaviour to save their own hides. Ought to be runnin’ as far ’n’ fast as they can. Ain’t a weapon in this city can hurt somethin’ that size.

But he’d have bet they were under the highest orders to keep hold of this place, no matter what the cost. So hold it they would. It kept them occupied, at least.

Silo and the crew made good time, and only encountered a few soldiers on the way. The Century Knights took them out with no hesitation. Most of them didn’t even have time to raise their guns.

The Juggernaut pounded onward, dragging a trail of destruction with it. Despite Silo’s attempts to avoid the monster, it was getting closer. It may have been slow, but its stride was long, and it didn’t trouble itself with following the streets. The ground shook as it barged buildings aside, blank gas-mask face turning this way and that as it scanned for targets.

A barrier of tangled greenery rose up before them as they reached the edge of the excavated zone. Silo would have liked to take them into the trees, where no one could see them, but one glance at the power station changed his mind. Smoke was fuming from its empty windows, and as he looked back, a section of the roof blew outward. One of the hourglasses had cracked near the top. Gas leaked out in a pastel cloud. Lightning flickered and roved around the damaged area.

The trees would be safer, but making their way through the undergrowth would take three times as long. They couldn’t afford the delay. Silo didn’t know how Azryx technology worked, but that power station looked an awful lot like it intended to explode sometime soon. So he led them along the streets, staying close to the foliage and as far from the conflict as he could manage.

For a few minutes they lost sight of the Juggernaut. They hurried along narrow, curving ways between high buildings, where there were no Sammies. Though they were hidden from the monster’s view, they could still hear it and feel its footsteps, nearer and nearer each time. There was nothing to do but keep going. Sometimes their way was blocked by encroaching trees and vines, or piles of banked earth, but for the most part they made progress towards their destination.

The foliage drove them on to a street which ascended sharply, becoming a ramp to a higher level. With no other option, they took it. It slipped between the shoulders of two close-set buildings and became a thin, graceful bridge that spanned a street choked with trees and undergrowth. Vines and creepers had made their way along its length, to clamber up the buildings on the far side.

They emerged onto the bridge, ked n and there was the Juggernaut.

Silo’s breath caught in his throat. It stood a few streets away, taller than the rooftops, near enough to hear the massive muscles creak as they stretched beneath its armoured plates. He was pinned like a mouse in sight of a cat, crushed into insignificance by its appalling size. Though he knew it to be Azryx in origin, he felt as if he were standing in the presence of some vast, incomprehensible god.

The Juggernaut hadn’t seen them. Its attention was elsewhere. The ascending shriek had begun again, and bright motes were being sucked out of the air, warning of an imminent blast from its cannon.

‘Go! While it ain’t lookin’!’ Samandra urged the group. She ushered them past her, onto the bridge, her eyes never leaving the beast.

Bess led the way, with Malvery, Pinn and Ashua close behind her. Silo and the Century Knights brought up the rear.

The shriek reached its apex. There was a taut moment of anticipation. Then the beam blasted forth with a scream of expelled energy, devastating everything it touched. The Juggernaut swept its head left to right, raking the beam in a wide arc through the streets in front of it.

Swinging towards them.

Silo saw it coming an instant before it happened, but far too late to do anything about it. There was an instant of blinding light, and a terrible sound like the fury of Mother herself. Then the bridge behind him exploded.

A wave of heat and force made him stagger. The world tipped. The ground shifted beneath him, and was suddenly gone. He threw himself forward, clinging to something, anything that would save him. His chest smacked against the surface of the bridge, now tilted almost vertical. He slipped and scrabbled, pulled down by invisible hands. Then his fingers found an edge and locked there.

Behind and below him was empty space. The bridge was a ruin, ripped through the middle. The sides of the tear drooped downwards in broken sections, attached to the main structure by thick cables of a tough, rubbery material that ran through the ceramic.

Silo lay flat against a dangling piece of the bridge’s floor. He got his other hand up to the edge and hung there. Ten metres below him was a moon-grey mass of treetops, vines and rubble.

Up on the bridge, the others were shouting over one another. He heard Malvery and Pinn calling out names and arguing, and Samandra was swearing repeatedly through gritted teeth.

To his right, he heard the Juggernaut lumbering away. It hadn’t even noticed his plight. They were insects to it.

His fingers were already beginning to burn. He pawed for a toehold, but the surface was frustratingly smooth. Looking around, he saw a thick cluster of vines to his left, straggli

‘Hey!’ he shouted. ‘Hey!’

Ashua’s face appeared above him, face shadowed against the moon.

‘Silo’s down here!’ she called. She scanned the terrain beneath her, a crazed ladder of cracked ceramic and strings of rubbery Azryx substrate. He was only a few metres below her, but it was too far for her to reach without climbing down herself.

In that moment, he froze her image like a ferrotype. His mind, suspecting the end, was eager to drink in every detail before his extinction. He saw her quick, wary eyes, the delicate tattoo on the left side of her face, her lean, spare frame to match her lean, spare existence. She was an opportunist, a scavenger, a survivor. Merciless and unemotional, because that was what she had to be. Whatever her true motives for joining the Ketty Jay, they were certainly selfish. The crew were useful to her, nothing more.

She wouldn’t help him. Not at the risk of her own life. She wasn’t crew.

If it had been Jez there, or Frey, they might have come down to save him. But Pinn was wounded, and Malvery too hefty. The Century Knights might have tried, but the noises coming from Samandra sounded like someone suppressing a scream, and he’d heard nothing of Colden Grudge.

His fingers began to shake. His tendons were on fire. He was going to fall. It might not kill him, but it would probably break him enough to make no difference.

Ashua’s eyes shone, hard in the shadow. Then she shook her head and gave a tut of disgust. ‘Shit,’ she muttered. And she slipped over the side and went climbing down towards him.

She was from Rabban, a city of rubble, and she negotiated the shattered face of the broken bridge with ease. When she was low enough, she found a good foothold, hooked one hand into a crack and reached down with the other.

Silo didn’t question his fortune. He reached up with his right hand and grabbed on to hers. She hauled, thin arms straining. He added what strength he could, but he didn’t have enough left. He tried again for a toehold and failed.

‘You’re too heavy,’ she said.

Malvery and Pinn had appeared at the lip of the bridge. Gunfire rattled in the distance. ‘Hang on!’ said Malvery. ‘I’ll find something to throw down!’

But there wasn’t time for that. Ashua was willing, but she didn’t have the muscle to lift him, and he was weakening fast. If she didn’t let him go, he’d pull her off time fwith him. And besides, what would Malvery find up there? Vines?

Vines!

‘Swing me!’ he said. He looked to his left. Ashua saw the bundle of vines, just out of his reach. She nodded, her jaw tight with the effort of holding him.

‘Back and forth, alright?’ she said.

‘Ready.’

‘Go.’

He let go with his left hand and grabbed on to her wrist, putting his whole weight on her dangling arm. At the same time he pushed himself away from the vines with his feet, swinging out like a pendulum, then back again. He heard Ashua cry out with the effort of holding him up, and then he felt her jerk and she shrieked and her grip came loose. He let go, flailing through the air for the briefest of instants – and his hands clamped firmly to the body of a thick vine. He crashed into the bundle, scrabbled for an instant, and then his feet found a loop and he pressed on it, taking the weight from his arms and hands. Relief flooded through him. He clutched himself to the vines, enveloped by their sharp green scent.

Ain’t dead yet.

He looked over at Ashua. Her arm was dangling by her side, the other still hooked in a crack. Above her, Pinn was lying on his belly, reaching down.

‘Doc!’ Pinn called. ‘Quit messing about. Get back here and help!’

She let Pinn pull her up, and once Silo saw she was safe, he began his own climb. Malvery appeared at the top in time to lend his arm.

Silo wasted no time on recovery. He was assessing the situation the moment he had his feet under him. The crew was all safe, thankfully. Bess sat on her arse against the side of the bridge, looking as bewildered as a faceless metal golem could. Samandra was sitting as well, in the midst of several slabs of rubble. Her teeth were clenched in agony and one leg was stretched out straight in front of her. The foot of her boot was twisted at an unnatural angle.

‘Where’s Grudge?’ Silo asked.

Malvery looked about as if it had only just occurred to him. ‘Dunno,’ he said. ‘ ’Scuse me, I gotta see to Ashua.’

Silo followed. Ashua had collapsed to her knees, holding her shoulder. Her face had gone a darker red than her hair. Malvery took one look at her and said ‘You popped the socket.’

‘Yeah,’ she said, between deep breaths. ‘You gonna pop it back?’

‘Have to,’ he said apologetically. ‘I ain’t joking. This’ll hurt.’

‘You think?’ said Ashua, with a sarcastic and slightly hysterical laugh. Then she sobered. ‘Do it.’

He told her to lie back, and she did so. He put his boot on her chest and lifted her arm so it stood out straight. She screwed her mouth shut, trying not to make a sound.

‘On five,’ he said. ‘One… two! ’

There was an audible crunch of cartilage as he pulled on the straight arm. She made a small whimpering noise in the back of her throat, then let out a long gasp.

‘Better?’ Malvery asked.

‘Shit, yes,’ said Ashua, with transcendent joy in her eyes.

Malvery snapped his fingers at Pinn. ‘Come here. I need that sling.’

‘It’s my sling!’ Pinn whined.

‘You’re wearing a sling ’cause you shot yourself like an idiot. She just saved Silo’s life. See the difference?’

‘No,’ Pinn said stubbornly, but he let Malvery undo the sling anyway.

Ashua sat up, massaging her shoulder tenderly. Her eyes met Silo’s. He gave her a grave nod of thanks. He’d misjudged her, it seemed. He didn’t do that often.

‘Colden!’ Samandra cried. He looked up and saw the Century Knight trying to get to her feet.

‘Hey! Stay down!’ Malvery barked at her. ‘I’ll get to you in a sec. That ankle’s broken.’

She ignored him. ‘Where’s Colden?’

Silo went to the break in the bridge and looked over. Colden had been behind him when the bridge went. He wasn’t there now. He felt a detached sort of regret, but he was more concerned with his own people.

The Juggernaut was moving away from them, but the ground still shook with its footsteps. Silo heard a crunch behind him, and saw a new crack appear in the floor.

‘This place ain’t safe,’ he said. ‘Everybody off the bridge.’

Pinn helped Ashua up, muttering jealously about her new sling. Silo went to Samandra, after checking that Bess was doing what she was told. Malvery followed›

‘Colden!’ Samandra cried. The desperation was plain on her face. ‘Colden! Answer me, damn it!’

‘He gone,’ said Silo.

‘He’s down there somewhere! We need to go back! Find a way down!’

Silo was impassive. ‘I ain’t riskin’ my people. He ain’t one of us. Nor are you.’

‘Then I’ll go!’

‘You ain’t in no state to save anyone. And this bridge could be comin’ down any moment.’

He put his arm under her to take her weight, but she fought him. ‘Colden!’ she called over his shoulder.

‘I’ll go,’ said Malvery.

‘He ain’t one of us,’ Silo said again, firmly.

But Malvery had that look on his face, a look that Silo knew well. Like a man who just had to do a thing.

Samandra gazed at the doctor with feverish hope. ‘Please!’

‘I’ll go,’ said Malvery again, hefting his shotgun.

Silo knew there was no more to be said. He wouldn’t order the man. Malvery wouldn’t obey if he did. There was only so much responsibility you could take for another man’s life; after that, it was all down to them.

‘We’ll wait for you at the pad, long as we can,’ he said.

‘See you there,’ said Malvery, and headed off.

Silo lifted Samandra’s weight again, more roughly than he needed to. He was suddenly angry with her. For getting injured, for asking Malvery to save her companion, for putting one of the crew in danger.

‘Satisfied now, Miss Bree?’ he said. ‘Now get movin’, or you gonna end up down there with your partner if this bridge goes.’

For once, Samandra Bree had no comeback. She leaned on him and hopped alongside, white-faced and silent.