Ginn Hale - Lord of the White Hell book Two

"Can you keep it hot?" Kiram asked Nestor.

"Will do." Nestor too flinched from the sight of the groom's corpse. Kiram turned to Elezar. Sweat soaked his already stained shirt and a dark bruise colored the scab that cut across his nose.

"After we've strapped Scholar Donamillo's body into the red harness, we'll need to hand crank the mechanical cure until the steam engine's built up enough force to drive it," Kiram told him. "Can you do that?"

Elezar nodded and hefted up the drive bar.

"Now we just need Donamillo's body."

"Are you sure?" Genimo scowled at the rough monstrosity that Kiram had created from Donamillo's beautiful mechanical cure. "That thing looks like it's about to fall apart."

"How it looks doesn't matter," Kiram snapped. "And I'm not asking you in any case."

"No need to shout, Kiram. I'm just saying what everyone is thinking. It doesn't look like it will work for shit and if it doesn't, then what happens to all of us?"

"Genimo," Elezar said flatly. "Shut up before I shut you up."

Kiram found himself smiling at Elezar with exactly the same happy expression as Nestor. Genimo dropped back against the wall, sulking.

"Scholar Blasio?" Kiram called.

Blasio rose from his chair at his brother's bedside. Kiram didn't have to say anything more. Blasio lifted Donamillo's emaciated body easily and carried him like an infant into Kiram's rebuilt machine.

Master Ignacio stood next to Javier, watching Kiram and Blasio strap Donamillo into the harness. His expression seemed equal parts revulsion and confusion. Kiram wondered what all Javier had confessed to the war master during their quiet, tense conversation.

"It's pitch black outside" Nestor nodded at the barred windows. Suddenly something smacked against the window. A second blow cracked apart the glass. A bleeding blue jay shrieked at them through the opening. Then dozens more birds threw themselves against the glass, breaking the panes as they shattered their own bodies. Black blood poured from them and an acrid steam began to rise from the wrought iron bars that held the windows closed. As the bars crumbled and streams of viscous darkness spilled down the walls, Kiram felt a terrible, sick pain twist through his guts.

"Get behind the wards!" Javier shouted. He all but hurled Master Ignacio into the circle of Bahiim symbols. Genimo scurried into the circle and stared wide-eyed as the entire window casing collapsed. Blasio dropped to his knees near the steam engine and covered his face with his hands.

Kiram tightened the last strap of Donamillo's harness and let the old man's body hang limp. He grabbed the wires of the second harness and leapt out from the mechanical cure.

Jays crashed into the infirmary and a seeping darkness followed them, pooling across the floor, burning stones and eating through pieces of iron. The birds screamed and swooped, but none of them seemed capable of flying over the wards Javier had laid down.

"Get the mechanical cure moving!" Kiram called to Elezar. To Kiram's relief, Elezar pumped the drive bar fast and the iron ribs of the mechanical cure swung around, building speed. Faint sparks lit up along the harness wires. Javier and Master Ignacio joined Elezar and the mechanical cure spun like a gigantic top.

Something struck the infirmary doors. They broke open and a wall of darkness flooded the room. Only the blaze in the belly of Kiram's steam engine and the faint sparks given off from the mechanical cure offered them any illumination.

Hissing screams and the shrieks of blue jays rose from the darkness. Master Ignacio groaned and Elezar swore as the discomfort of the shadow curse intensified. Kiram gritted his teeth against the pain. And yet Javier's wards still held the darkness back.

Javier glared at the black mass roiling over them and mouthed Bahiim incantations as he pumped the drive bar.

"Nestor? The engine?" Kiram had to shout over the screams and shrieks that tore the air.

"It's hot!" Nestor yelled back. Even in the dim light Kiram could see the pain in Nestor's face but he still locked the boiler door down and gripped the engine release as Kiram had shown him earlier.

"Let the steam engine take over!" Kiram shouted. "Let go of the drive bar!"

Elezar, Javier and Master Ignacio released the bar and jumped back as the pistons of Kiram's steam pump took over. The ribs of the mechanical cure whirled by at a blinding speed and suddenly the faint sparks inside the mechanical cure erupted to brilliant light.

Only then did Kiram see Genimo crouched over a patch of Javier's wards, scrubbing them away.

"Stop him!" Kiram shouted.

Nestor tackled Genimo and flattened him to the ground but it was already too late. Cold blackness hit Kiram. Agony stabbed through his chest and hot blood spilled down his belly. His knees buckled.

Elezar and Nestor both lay on the ground writhing from pain, as did Master Ignacio and Scholar Blasio. Blood erupted from wounds that opened wherever the curse touched them. Only Genimo remained unscathed, but he looked terrified when he met Kiram's gaze. Then suddenly hot white light blazed over them all.

Javier stood, hands raised with walls of white light pouring from him. As Kiram forced himself up to his feet Genimo bolted from the sphere of the shajdi's light, fleeing back to his master in the darkness.

"Javier, this doesn't need to go on." Fedeles' voice silenced the cacophony of screams. And suddenly he stood there, smiling, at the edge of the shajdi's light. His eyes were too dark and his skin too luminous. This was not Fedeles, Kiram reminded himself. This was Donamillo wearing Fedeles' body.

The whirr of the mechanical cure's spinning ribs and the steady hiss and clang of the steam engine created a strange rhythm, like the beat of a mechanical heart that even Donamillo's shadow curse couldn't stop.

"Your friends don't need to suffer, Javier" Fedeles circled them as if he were enjoying an easy stroll. "Give me the white hell and I will release them. You know I don't want to hurt Kiram. Why force me to kill him?"

Javier didn't respond, but a shudder passed through his body. The light around him intensified, illuminating his bare bones.

"I'm a patient man, Javier. I can wait while you burn away like a candle." Fedeles paused only a few feet from Kiram, though he hardly seemed to take notice. Instead he stared at Javier with an expression of rapt avarice. Kiram could almost see Donamillo's want rising up through Fedeles' features. "We both know you won't kill me, big brother. You promised me you would keep me safe."

Javier trembled and Kiram hated Donamillo, not just for taking such a cruel tactic, but because he knew it would work. Javier would let the shajdi burn him hollow before he would kill Fedeles.

Kiram gripped the wires of the second harness. Donamillo was only a foot from him now. He just had to step into the killing darkness of the shadow curse and close the wires around Fedeles' body. Donamillo's spirit would be drawn back into his own body and they would all be saved.

It was the only way.

Kiram didn't think beyond that.

He threw himself onto Fedeles, embracing him and closing the circuit of the harness. Black blades punched through Kiram's body. Fedeles shouted and shook in his arms. Pain ripped deeper into Kiram, but he held his grip and saw the white sparks of the mechanical cure flurry over Fedeles.

They both fell to the floor. It was hot and slick with blood and Kiram knew it was his own. He tried to draw a breath but his lungs only brought a red froth up into his mouth.

He couldn't survive this. The thought hurt him nearly as deeply as his wounds and yet there was light overhead. The shadow curse had fallen back. This agony hadn't been for nothing.

Kiram tried to hold onto Fedeles even then, but strong hands pulled him away.