Chapter XIII: Confluence
Sharp cracks rolled about the Alzandia basin, breaking the silence and filling the air with the sharp smell of gunpowder. The Alzandians, despite the protestations of the same Elder who had so berated Cédes, had decided to accept the humans’ offer of help. And to prepare for what was to come.
Thanks to one elderly Furosan man who had donated his long rooftop lawn and kitchenware, the ten Alzandians most promising with the rifles had themselves a temporary firing range.
“That friend of yours is a good shot,” Djidou said with a smile as Radus calmly fired off several bullets. His pot split in two with a sharp tinkle. More shots and the halves were quarters. Then they were only useless shards.
“Radus good?” he asked, his face beaming.
“Oh yeah,” Djidou laughed. “Pretty damn good.”
“Damn?” Radus asked, cocking his head curiously. Then, deciding that the new word was good, “Damn!”
Once the Alzandians had exhausted their carefully rationed training ammunition and the remaining sunlight, Djidou rallied them together for a debriefing. They had all done well for their first time, he explained, and he expressed his wish that they could have had more practice. And time.
“Do we have a chance?” Stefi asked once the Furosans had dispersed, proudly clutching their strange new human weapons. They certainly seemed to think so, she thought; hope and excitement were visible on their faces.
“I really don’t know.” Djidou shuffled uneasily, unable to stand still as nervousness invaded his body.
“Good chance,” Radus said as he and Kei-Pyama approached, rifles in hand. “Cool Stefi and Sister Cédes here. Our chance.” He laid his hand on Stefi’s shoulder, his touch light yet reassuring. I know you’re worried, it said, more articulate than his Common Language, but we’re all here together. “Still hate war. Why war?”
“Because war is what happens when we run out of words for talking and don’t try making new ones,” Kei-Pyama said.
The following morning, shouts and commotion hauled Stefi and Cédes from their sleep. Right away they knew what it was, both feeling the same welling of nausea and faintness.
Their door flew open with a crash, revealing a very excited Radus shaking with adrenaline. “Stefi, Sister, come,” he said. “Elder meeting.”
“This morning we received news of the humans,” the same Alzandian man Stefi had met yesterday, an Elder named Kas-Rovet, said, addressing the assembly before him in both languages. Tails quivered and ears twitched as he repeated himself in Alzandian, making sure all present understood him. “The Otsukuné returned in the early hours,” he continued, “bearing news from afar. They have brought with them three flying ships, just as the human Djidou said was most likely. They bring with them several hundred soldiers to our sixty or so who are able to fight. They have alighted fifteen yalters from Alzandia. Assuming they left on foot shortly after we spotted them, we have as little as two hours to prepare for their arrival.”
Unease rippled through the crowd, exciting and terrifying in equal measure. Flying ships? Several hundred soldiers? “Impossible!” some shouted.
“Only if we believe so,” the Elder replied. “We have new weapons. And,” he pointed at Stefi, “the Fieretsi.”
More noise from the crowd, this time much more enthusiastic. A few of the younger Furosans let out excited whoops.
“And with her, the White Demon Cédes.”
A stony silence erected itself about the crowd, mortared with somber expressions. She, returned? The one who had driven out the humans years before only to condemn Alzandia to the fog and seemingly isolate it from the rest of Feregana? And yet if she had defeated the humans once before…
“We must protect Alzandia with what we have,” Kas-Rovet continued. “We hold a readily defensible position. With riflemen and archers spread across the upper reaches, we may yet keep them at bay. The flying ships, however, are another matter altogether. For them we must rely on Cédes.”
Defeated groans rose from the some Alzandians, prompting Stefi to take a stand next to Kas-Rovet.
“It’s not Cédes’s fault for what she is,” she told them, stern and commanding, resisting the urge to shout. “Your own Elders made her what she was: a weapon to protect home. She did just that, didn’t she?”
Murmurs of agreement and nods answered that yes, she had, despite everything else.
“And she’ll do it again, I’m sure. But she needs help. Your help.”
More noise, a rumble of rising agreement.
“I’m just a human, but I’ll do my best to help too. Fieretsi or not, human or Furosan it’s the right thing, even if I don’t know how to destroy with my… powers… I’ll do my best to protect everyone” She looked to her new friends, familiar faces amongst a sea of strangers. “Radus, Kei-Pyama, everyone. Because if we fail here, like the Acharnians did, Mafouras is next. Ariga too. The humans may want a war because they’ve run out of words to talk over differences. Let’s show them we can still speak words of hope.”
Once translated, her impromptu speech was met with a surge of applause and waving weapons: rifles, bows, swords, even farming tools. With little else to believe in, it seemed the Alzandians had chosen to put their faith in a human girl, something even one of her own kind probably wouldn’t do. It was a strange and unnerving prospect even to Stefi…
Between themselves, Stefi and Djidou, with much additional input from the Alzandians, pondered the best course of action: hole up in Alzandia’s palace. The natural basin in which it sat, along with the broad lake, provided ample protection from foot soldiers. Any that approached could be dealt to from afar with either rifles or bows. But the airships… only Cédes had any means to destroy them before they could rain death upon Alzandia, and only if she could still call Raphanos.
“The pressure is great,” she whispered to Stefi. “I have summoned Raphanos easily with him as part of me, yet I am not practiced in any other way. I can call… yet I do not know if he will listen, being only half-Mafouran by blood.” Her earlier attempts with both Raphanos and Guratzu had produced only flashes and sparks. Of course, only she and Stefi knew this.
“W-w-what if they manage to get in?” one particularly timid girl asked. Her unbrushed hair all but concealed her eyes, and her rifle was nearly as long as she was tall. Still, her accuracy had impressed even Djidou and Adnamis.
“All underground entrances are sealed and guarded, Kei-Tenla,” Elder Kas-Rovet said. “It is unlikely they will ever gain the opportunity to cross the lake.”
“But w-what if they reach the tunnels?”
He laughed and slapped her back so hard she nearly toppled over. “Then we blow the supports and see if they can swim as a whole lake falls on them!”
“Oh… Okay,” she said and lowered her head.
“No worry,” Radus added with a wink. “Stefi here. Radus protect Stefi. Stefi protect us.”
“Your Common Language is improving,” Kei-Tenla said, a smile shining from behind her hair. “I thought you said it was useless to learn to talk to humans.”
“Stefi moto… motivation to learn.”
“Whatever you say.”
After the meeting, Radus took Stefi’s hand and led her outside to a quiet balcony away from the commotion. He let her hand slip through his and leant over the railing, where he peered westwards to the perpetual fog.
“Everything all right?” Stefi asked after a stretch of silence. His shoulders were hunched, his head hung low with a weight only he could feel.
“Everything all right,” he echoed, not turning around. Then, after an awkward silence, “Most thing all right.”
“Something’s wrong, I know,” she said, placing an arm around his shoulder. “You’re a Furosan. You can’t hide much from me.”
“What Stefi… you… mean?”
She giggled nervously. “I can feel these things. I can do more than talk to ferrets, you know.”
“I do know. I see Stefi in there, I worried I
not like her, not good enough. Stefi is Fieretsi. Radus is… Radus.”
“You’re more than good enough,” she said, a light laugh highlighting her amazement at both his use of “I” and his concern for not being worthy of her company. “There’s no such thing as “good enough” for me, silly. If there is, though, you’d be it.”
“Stefi is good.” His voice came as cold as the wind about them, and Stefi felt a shadow of sadness in his words. His violet eyes, the color of a winter twilight sky, stared into the fog. “What you do when fighting gone?” he asked. “Stefi and sister Cédes be gone too? We make wait so long for sister, then she just make leave again?”
“That’s what’s got you worried, huh?” She leaned her weight against him, reaffirming her presence for the time being. She had met many people, said goodbye to all but a few so far. It was the best part of the journey, she thought. And the worst. It wasn’t until now that she started to see things from their perspective, to realize that, should all else fail, she had at least touched others along the way. “I’ll keep going,” she said, reluctance in her voice, “to look for Arolha Se-Baht. ”
“No make stay here?” he asked, eyes showing a flash of hope that maybe she would.
“I wish I could. Feregana needs me. The ferrets and Furosans, anyway. Sometimes… I wonder if it’s all worth saving, given the nastiness in the world.”
“Worth lots.” He put his arm about her waist and leaned his head on her shoulder. “You not stay, I go with. Stefi worth lots to me.”
A new feeling bubbled in her stomach, one she had only felt once before, and even then only briefly. A feeling, she knew, that Ifaut had probably felt every few minutes. It crept into her face, bringing a giddying warmth with it.
“You’re worth lots to me too.”
Sharp bangs shattered Alzandia’s air, bringing with them the first signs of war.
“Scouts,” Radus reported, panting after the long climb to the high courtyard. There, above Alzandia, Stefi and Cédes watched and waited.
“The air is heavy with the stench of death,” Cédes muttered.
“Ours or theirs?” Stefi asked, worried at her friend’s sudden morbidity.
“Perhaps both.” Cédes’s reply sent ice stabbing up Stefi’s spine.
Radus continued, oblivious to their conversation. “Scouts, only few. Some flee. Djidou say they all come now. Radus… I… go back to post.” After a second of hesitation he patted Stefi’s head, for too long to be casual, too short to be really intimate.
More shots punctured the air, and from their vantage point Stefi had a commanding view towards the east and the advancing humans. Perhaps no more than fifty had approached, stealing through the cover of the empty aqueduct as she and Cédes had done. But their progress was marred by a rain of bullets and arrows from Alzandia’s defenders. The few that did venture for the stairway into the basin were met with a swift death. The rest waited and watched, letting fly unaimed rounds. Superior numbers against superior defenses. A stalemate, with the only way to force a check on the humans’ side.
“Scared?” Stefi asked Cédes. She already knew the answer. The Furosan, staff in right hand, stone of Raphanos in left, was shaking as if freezing to death.
“Terrified, dear heart. Absolutely terrified.”
“We’re here,” Pheia whispered as the airship Bold’s Fairun-powered engines at last fell silent, their whines dying into murmurs before going quiet. It had been a rough journey for her, crammed away in the airship’s storage area inside the hull. At least a hundred men were aboard the colossal ship, making hiding no easy task. Yet she managed it, and was persuaded by Shizai that the best course of action was not to bring the airship down with her on board. No, there would be better ways to deal with its cargo soon enough.
Stefi is here too, the bubbly voice of Shizai said from the confines of her stone. Raphanos, Guratzu, Fairun. Everyone but Makora. It’s a real confluence of elementals.
“Is that good for us, or bad?” Pheia asked, stringing her bow as she prepared to leave her cramped confines.
Perhaps it is both.
A quick look around showed Pheia that the Bold had already disgorged its load, and she easily slipped outside into the fresh air. The scent of rain and pines met her nose, a clean perfume after days spent in stale air.
After clambering down the Bold’s side, she flattened herself against the scented grass. She crawled beneath the gap between hull and earth created by the landing skids. Behind she saw the deep ruts they had torn, and smelled the loamy soil laid bare.
A pop came from beside her and there crouched a watery ferret. Shizai.
There sure are a lot of them, the elemental said. Looks like some have already left.
“Then we should too. My guess is they’ll send scouts on ahead, then try to take Alzandia with the ships’ cannons. Or even drop soldiers right on their white-haired heads.”
How do you know that, princess?
“It’s what I would do,” Pheia said through gritted teeth. She turned to the elemental beside her, and her breathing was shallowed by adrenaline. “Can you provide a watery distraction?”
There is no water source nearby, Shizai said and let out a bubbling dook. I sense a stream, no, an aqueduct, some distance away. If memory serves, many of them once led water to Alzandia. Now it is empty.
“Straight to Alzandia?” Pheia said, her voice louder than she intended.
Yes, a road to our destination. Her nose pointed south.
“Then the humans will follow it too.” Certain that the way was clear, she broke from cover and sprinted in the direction Shizai had pointed. No shouts followed her, no gunshots like the one near Chalja. Within a minute she had tumbled, panting, into the empty aqueduct.
I thought you’d be more afraid of getting shot, Shizai said. Or isn’t it as bad as I thought it might be?
“Oh, it’s bad,” she replied sharply as Shizai wandered off with a rolling gait.
The watery ferret’s nose skimmed the ground, sniffing as she went. Water!
“No, it’s empty,” Pheia said with a sigh. The only water lay in shallow puddles after the rain of a few days before. Not enough for the elemental to provide a large distraction or attack, at any rate.
Underground! she said excitedly. I smell an old artesian spring, sweet and crisp, sleeping beneath the land.
“And th…” But any further words were blown away as the smallest of the airships, Force, swept overhead, its massive propellers ripping the air apart. It was followed a moment later by the second, Faith, then at last the Bold.
“We need to hurry!” Pheia knelt to grab Shizai, but her hands passed straight through her watery body.
Can you swim, princess? she asked as her body melted into a puddle and drained away between the flat stones that made up the aqueduct.
“No.” Pheia gasped as realization hit her a second before the water that gushed up around her feet. “What the herek are you doing?” A wall of roaring water slammed against her, yet she didn’t drown like she thought she might, didn’t breathe water instead of air. Instead she felt an insubstantial hand lift her above the frigid spring-water and hurry her along in its current.
This is the way to travel! Shizai whooped as her racing current bore her and a soaking wet Pheia along at a brisk pace. They passed beneath the airships, soon leaving them and the hundreds of foot soldiers far behind.
Many minutes of icy tumbling passed, and suddenly a group of soldiers rushed into view. Pheia barely had time to register the shock on their faces before a surge hurled her from the aqueduct. Tumbling across the grass, she felt the world invert itself and Shizai’s stone fly from her hand. It disappeared from view. Before she knew what was happening, the ground about her exploded in tiny bursts and half a dozen arrows sank themselves half-deep into the soft earth.
Humans shooting at her? No, it couldn’t be. Even as she was lying there she could hear their screams as they tumbled into open air. The aqueduct had ended, empt
ying into a massive basin. And somewhere down there Shizai’s stone had fallen. As she staggered to her feet she reached for an arrow. Her quiver was empty, its arrows swept away. But that was the least of her worries. There, looming from the lake the humans had just been dumped into, was Alzandia’s palace set against a backdrop of fog.
Her wonder was shattered as Force crawled overhead and laboriously turned so that the five cannons protruding from port faced Alzandia.
No arrows. No Shizai. Nowhere to run.
“Great…”
Stefi barely had time to wonder at the sudden current that had swept several dozen humans to their deaths in the lake, for death turned to face her in the form of the airship Force.
“Cédes…” Stefi’s voice rose into a trembling cry. “Now would be a good time to call Raphanos. Guratzu. Anybody!”
“I cannot!” she screamed in reply. “Raphanos is no longer a part of me! What was in me is now a worthless little trinket!” Her grasp tightened around the pebble in frustration.
Stefi felt the weight of her own stone, Fairun’s, grow heavy in her pocket. Its weight brought with it an idea. “Cédes, the pebble’s kinda like the stones the humans made from Fairun, yeah?”
“Yes.” She trembled, nervous sweat settling across her face.
“Then we destroy it. The energy should find its way back to Raphanos’s stone. He’ll be whole. Try that, and fast.” The airship began to level its course, ready to fire at any moment.
“The energy released would likely kill us both,” she said soberly.
“Then Radus destroy.”
They both turned to discover Cédes’s brother had joined them, panting from running up the many stairs to reach them.
“Come to find why Cédes not boom ship,” he said, bent over and out of breath. “Radus hear Stefi and sister. He destroy stone, help Raphanos. Help home.”
The next second bullets screamed overhead, a volley released by soldiers aboard the airship. The burning metal ricocheted off the rooftop about them, missing the three by sheer luck.
“Time gone,” Radus shouted and snatched the pebble from Cédes. Before either Cédes or Stefi could react, he flashed a reassuring smile and winked. With a sharp snap of his wrist the pebble sought the air above the lake, hung shining for a moment like a fallen sun, and at last began to fall.
“For Stefi.” Radus’s rifle stock flew to his shoulder, and its barrel tracked centimeters before the pebble’s path, predicting every twist and wobble as it fell. A crack barked from the rifle, and a second later the fallen sun erupted in a supernova of heat that knocked all three off their feet.
“Now, Cédes!” Stefi shouted above the roar of noise and heat.
“A weapon created to protect home,” Cédes said, drawing herself to her feet. “Weapons do not protect, they only destroy. Then let me at least do that!.” She stood tall and defiant, facing an enemy she couldn’t see. She tore off her robes and let the wind carry them away. Clad now in a shirt and long skirt, staff in right hand and stone in left, she began to speak. “Ers… Fosan… Sikernin… Yarun!”
Just like in Valraines, a white-hot flame consumed her hand and a circle of blazing symbols seared itself across the rooftop. With a boom that rivaled the pebble’s explosion, a mass of fire arced from her staff and across the sky, growing in size every second until it became a flaming lance. It punched its way through the airship’s hull and left a gaping hole that stared at the sky.
As if taking on water, the Force listed to starboard, firing off rounds from the four remaining cannons. Two missed altogether, vanishing into the fog. The other two found their target.
Like an earthquake had struck, Alzandia’s palace rocked and shuddered as two explosions blew debris into the air and scattered smoke and stone with equal ease. It wasn’t real, couldn’t be, Stefi thought, as a white figure below seemed to hang in midair for a second before plummeting out of sight. From such a height it was impossible to see who it was. But she didn’t need to. War and death wore no faces on the humans’ side; why should they on hers?
Cédes’s flaming lance twisted about sinuously, stabbing into the airship again and disappearing. It left only silence in its wake.
“Cédes?” Stefi said. Her voice felt quiet and distant, feeling more like a fading echo than a real sound after the explosions.
“If they must die for me to protect home, then let them die and be done with it!”
The airship blew apart in a flash of light and heat, and all aboard were strewn across the heavens, now little more than fog themselves.
It wasn’t the concussive blast that worried Cédes’s ears; the cries of multiple lives ending were far louder, and their echo was one that lingered long after the rain of embers and ash had ended.
“You have our thanks, Lady Cédes.”
“There will be more before long, Elder Kas-Rovet,” she said, her attention more on Raphanos as he orbited Alzandia like a comet around the sun. She didn’t even notice that he hadn’t called her “White Demon”.
“We have suffered casualties. Two archers, Kas-Rada and Tenmoh, are dead. Kei-Tenla is lost too.”
The strength left Stefi’s legs and she fell to her knees. Her hands found the ground. Kei-Tenla, the young girl who could barely hold her rifle. In that instant war and death gained a face. It may have been twelve and hidden behind white hair, but it fixed her with a bloodied, accusing gaze.
She barely even noticed when she felt more blasts rattle Alzandia, barely noticed that they were fired not from the air above, but out of sight on land. The remaining ships had landed and were firing blind.