Роберт Беннет - Foundryside

Get to the Mountain , said the words in Gregor’s mind. Kill the woman. Get the box. Get the key. Destroy anything that tries to stop you. The words echoed over and over again inside of him, until they became him, forming the sum of his soul.

Gregor was still flying through the air, so he twisted his body, reaching down with his leg to scrape the toes of one boot along the floor. He artfully drew himself to a stop, standing in the middle of the office, surrounded by soldiers. He stood in the huge war machine, breathing hard, felt scrived bolts clacking and clicking as they uselessly bit into his armor. He knew that the greatest threat to a soldier in a lorica was the lorica itself: use it poorly, and it would destroy you, literally tearing you apart. Use it well, and you could destroy nearly anything.

He slapped a soldier aside with his shield and slashed forward with his polearm. I have done this before , he kept thinking, over and over again. It was one of the few thoughts his mind could process. I have done this before. Many, many times before .

He whirled and dodged and ducked and cut through the soldiers with balletic ease.

I was made for this , he thought. I was made for war. I was always, always, always made for war.

This fact was written within him. It was as inarguable as the heaviness of stones, as the brightness of the sun. He knew this. He knew this was who he was, what he was, and what he was to do in this world.

But although Gregor Dandolo could not truly think, could not really process anything resembling a genuine thought, he was forced to wonder, absently and dreamily…

If he was truly made for war, why were his cheeks hot and wet with tears? And why did the side of his head hurt so, so, so much?

He stopped and took stock of the situation. He ignored the whimpering old man on the bed — he was no threat — but as he fought, he looked for the woman, the woman, always the woman…There were two soldiers left.

One raised an espringal at him, but Gregor leapt forward and batted aside the man’s body with his shield, sending him crashing into a wall. His polearm flicked out and gutted the man before he could even hit the floor. The second solider screamed and ran at Gregor’s exposed back, but Gregor extended his shield arm, pointed the bolt caster, and released a full volley of scrived fléchettes into the man’s face. He crumpled to the floor.

Gregor retracted the polearm. Then he looked around the office. There seemed to be no one else except for the whimpering old man on the bed.

Get to the Mountain , he thought. Kill the woman. Get the box. Get the key. Destroy anything that tries to stop you.

He saw the box and the key sitting on the desk.

He walked over to the desk, shook off the glove holding his polearm, and let the weapon fall to the floor. Then he picked up the big golden key.

As he did, he heard a clicking sound behind the desk.

Gregor leaned forward, and saw: the woman was there — Estelle Candiano. She sat huddled on the ground, adjusting some device — it appeared to be some kind of large golden pocket watch.

He raised his shield arm, aiming the bolt caster at her.

“ There we go,” she said. She hit a switch on the pocket watch’s side.

Gregor tried to fire the bolt caster — but he found he couldn’t. His lorica was frozen: it was like he was wearing a statue rather than a suit of armor, and its penumbra of shadow had abruptly vanished.

Estelle let out a long, relieved sigh. “Well!” she said, standing. “That was close.” She looked him over. “Interesting rig you have here…Are you Orso’s man? He’d always thought about playing with light.”

Gregor kept trying to fire the bolt caster, flexing every muscle he had against his suit of armor, but it was useless. She seemed to have somehow turned the entire thing off.

She glanced at the big golden pocket watch, frowned, and raised it, running it alongside Gregor’s body like a dowsing rod searching for water. The pocket watch let out a loud, piercing shriek when it passed over Gregor’s helmet.

“My word,” said Estelle. “You aren’t Orso’s man — not if you’ve got an Occidental tool in your head.” She placed a hand on his cuirass, grunted, and shoved him backward onto the floor, his suit of armor clattering and clanking as he struck the stones.

She walked over to one of her dead soldiers, pulled out the man’s knife, and then straddled Gregor. “Now,” she said. “Let’s see who you are.”

She cut through the straps fastening on Gregor’s face plate, and pulled it away.

She stared at him. “What in hell ?” she said. “What are you doing here?”

Gregor said nothing. His face was placid, blank, empty. He just strained and strained and strained against the armor, trying his hardest to strike the woman, to fill her with bolts, to rend her in two — but the lorica wouldn’t budge.

“Tell me,” she demanded. “Tell me how you got here. Tell me how you survived. Who are you working for?”

Still he said nothing.

She lifted the dagger and leaned over him. “Tell me,” she said softly. “I’ve got ten minutes until midnight. Ten minutes to find out.” She found a gap in his armor, and stabbed the blade deep up into his left bicep. He felt the pain, but his mind told him to disregard it. “Don’t worry, brave soldier — I’ll find a way to make you screa—”

Then she paused. Probably because it sounded like someone was already screaming — and the sound was coming from above.

Estelle looked up, through the round window in the ceiling.

There was a speck of black in front of the moon that seemed to be getting…bigger.

Estelle watched, bewildered, as a filthy, dusty, screaming girl in black came hurtling out of the sky to land on the skylight.

“ …aaaaaAAAAAAH-OOF! ” said the girl, landing on the window with a solid thud.

Estelle’s mouth fell open. She whispered, “What…”

The girl rose up, shook herself, and looked down through the window at them. And though Gregor’s mind was overtaken with his commands— kill the woman, take the key, take the box —he couldn’t help but recognize her.

I know this girl…But did she just fly? Out of the sky?

Sancia stared down at the surreal sight below her. Tribuno Candiano’s office appeared to be filled with mangled corpses — one of which seemed to be Gregor Dandolo, who lay bleeding on the floor with blank, empty eyes, clad in a suit of black armor. Estelle Candiano sat on his chest, holding a dagger, and she was staring up at Sancia in shock. Beside them was Tribuno’s desk, upon which sat Valeria’s box — and though she couldn’t see Clef or the imperiat, surely they were in there as well.

She wanted to leap in and save Clef — the person who, for so long, had been her closest friend, her most trusted ally. Her heart hurt to think of losing or hurting him, after all this pain. But she knew there were greater things at risk right now — and she knew that someone as powerless as she would only ever have one shot at taking out someone like Estelle.

One day I’ll live a life that doesn’t force me to make such cold-blooded decisions , she thought. But today is not that day.