Knight of Wands (A Steampunk Fantasy Adventure Novel) (Devices of War Book 2) (5 page)

I watched her warily.

She continued to munch, air and water flitting through the room cleaning and tidying.

I picked at the long noodles and vegetables. I was so hungry my stomach didn’t even complain—didn’t growl, or clench. I’d survived some pretty bad winters, so I knew what that meant. I had to be careful of what I ate and how quickly. Nothing too rich and nothing too fast.

The corners of Carilyn’s lips rose, her head bouncing as her eyes scanned the room. “You do look good all broken and bloodied. I can see why they torment you. Probably cuddle you too, right? Hold you close? Comfort you, pat you? That type of thing?”

I sat back with a dry chuckle. I was used to people showing me sympathy or scorn. This wasn’t the first time I’d tangled with the queens, after all. I found Carilyn’s approach to be . . . refreshing.

“Those women love to rough their men up so they can ‘save’ them later. Just be careful, or you’ll end up like Varik. Nix’s the worst when it comes to breaking her play toys.”

That got my goad. “I have no wish to be a play toy.”

“Too late, kiddo.”

There was no way she was old enough to be calling me “kiddo.”

“You’re already it! I’d say, you’re probably the best chew toy these dirt-fearing women have had to play with for turns.” She blinked. “Centurns, even.”

It was time to change the subject. “So what are you?”

“I,” she said, her fingers to her chest with a preening expression, “am your intelligence officer. Aren’t too many knights I know what get the likes of me and aren’t even knights yet.” She chuckled. “I’m still trying to decide if I pissed someone off, or if this is a promotion.”

I couldn’t peg her false accent. Why had she chosen it? “Where are you from?”

She ignored my question and rose. “Are you ready to go?”

I stared at her, trying to figure out how to get answers out of her.

She led the way out of the room. No guards stood beside my door. The walls and floors were tiled in a hard, gleaming rock that I’d never seen before, black and silver with specs of blue.

“Do me a favor, Carilyn.”

She glanced at me over her shoulder.

I opened my gait to walk even with her. “Don’t play me. Speak naturally and plainly.”

She quirked her lips and looked away, slowing her footsteps. “You’re a lot brighter than anyone’s said.”

“Thank you.” I winced. What did they say about me behind my back? That I had a powerful Mark, but was dumber than a colcat? “I think.”

“Don’t. I’ll be expecting more out of you, have higher expectations.”

I raised my eyebrows, keeping pace with her, though I was getting winded. “What family are you from?”

“I’m not,” she said with a snort. Her hard-heeled shoes clicked lightly on the tile down the wide staircase as we headed for the main doors. Here, people walked with a purpose, barely glancing in our direction. “I was born to the Hands. They’re the only family I have.”

“Oh.”

Carilyn sighed. “My mother is a priestess. Not a high one, or the like. She was allowed to mate by choice. She picked some bloke from the regiment of Swords and out popped me. When I was three, the queen at the time chose me, and I’ve been here ever since.”

“Dyna?”

She nodded once to the guard at the door who opened the heavy stone doors with a lever. “How old do you think she is? I can assure you, she’s not that old.”

I stopped on the other side of the door and raised my hand to shield my eyes. The sunlight wasn’t bright, but it still made my eyes burn. Pale, white Sang ruled the sky. Hot, orange Kala hid behind the massive building we’d just exited from, but it was still more light than I’d seen in a while. “I never paid much attention to Hand politics.”

She was halfway down the pale gray steps by the time my eyes adjusted. “Just shows you for a fool.”

A stone path led away from the building. Squares of short, green grass lay on either side, dotted by an occasional lamp post. The street ran parallel to the House of Swords. A lone motor car rumbled by, spitting out steam. Where was everyone?

Carilyn twisted around to see my progress, her pale eyebrows raised in acknowledgement of whatever was in my expression. “Yeah. Well, when you decided to bring down Sky City, you really emptied the streets. Everyone jumped ship.”

I jogged a couple of steps and thought better of it. I really wasn’t up for that quite yet. I walked up to her as she waited. “Are they safe?”

“Safe?” She shook her head and turned the corner.

This street was marginally busier. We were coming up to the café my friends and I had often frequented during my last stay.

“If you think fleeing one tyrant as a someone and becoming a nameless no one in the city of another tyrant is safe, then yes. They’re all quite safe.”

I shook my head. “I know who picked up the survivors. They’re not tyrants.”

Well, were they? Ino City was ruled by my mother and she wasn’t the cuddliest of people. She could be ruthless, but a tyrant? No.

What did I know of the Shankara, though? Only that Nix thought she’d annihilated the lot of them turns ago.

How had
I
dealt with the survivors of Egolda City when Varik and Nix had destroyed it trying to get to me? I’d taken care of them the best I could. The truth of the matter was, they’d been a strain on our resources, and they hadn’t made things any easier.

“Look, knight-tight,” Carilyn said as she ducked around another corner, forcing me to walk faster to keep up. “You had your heart in the right place, but your head was somewhere in the clouds. The idea is to get you thinking straight, and doing something for the people that actually makes sense.”

“Like what?” There was no way she failed to interpret the derision in my tone.

She stopped, her nose inches from mine. “The tribal cities of the Great Families don’t need more survivors.” Any hints of slang were gone. The only thing that remained was a stone cold officer of the Hands. “The people don’t need war, but they don’t need the Families or the Hands ruling them with an iron fist either. Our world works best when everything is fluid, mobile. It’s best to remember that.”

“That’s fantastic, Officer Domitius, but what do you think I can do about it?”

She turned away, open frustration filling her expression. “Talk to the Families. They’re revolting not only against the Hands, but against one another, taking it out on cities and tribes who are protected by the Hands.”

“It sounds like they’re following in your footsteps.” I clenched my hands into fists, fighting to keep my voice under control. “Giving them a taste of their own medicine.”

“Yeah. That’s a great idea. How about we just slaughter all the innocent people to prove our point.”

I bit off my immediate reply, and watched the streets instead. We were heading to the industrial district, where the laboratories were. It was also where the airfields were located.

We didn’t speak as we walked past several metal warehouses, all eerily silent, the massive doors closed.

Birds called to one another high above us and the smell of the sea grew heavier. Bugs buzzed around our heads.

She took me to the edge of Sky City.

The ocean lay far below. No rails stood to protect us from falling off the side of the black, metal city. Slats riddled the floating cliff, spewing air from the fans churning behind them. The wind took the spray and threw it in our faces.

“We know she’s the one who sank our city,” Carilyn said, tossing her head to get her hair out of her face. “We also know the Great Families were the only thing that kept Sky City from sinking to the bottom of the ocean.”

I leaned against the last building, fighting the tugging wind, and stared into the rolling waves. Several kilometres away sat a rocky island. From here, it was hard to see which one it was. But the crisp bite of spice lacing the breeze told me exactly where we were.

“Nix wants war.”

I nodded. “She does.” I tipped my head back and drank in the sight of the sky, wishing I was up there. If I could just get off this city, I could head to those islands, find the ally I knew was there and radio home. But I had to stay here in this place that felt so alien.

“She has her war.” Carilyn picked something off the black metal street and threw it into the ocean. “She’s been building it for several years. Why?”

“She wants to conquer the world, to rule it.”

The intelligence officer shook her head. “That’s the easy answer, knight-tight. Try digging a little deeper and you’ll find the real reason.”

“Does it matter?”

“If we can diffuse her at her source?” Carilyn nodded. “Yeah. It could matter. Otherwise, people are just going to die senselessly.”

“And what do you want me to do?”

“Be her knight.”

I’d already signed on to do that.

“In any way she asks.”

I shook my head. “I’m not turning out to be Varik. No. I’ll be her knight. I’ll do what I can to bring peace to the Great Families, the Hands, and the lesser tribes. We’ll figure out a way to oust Nix. That’s what I’ll do.”

“And how are you going to be knighted?”

I didn’t know the answer to that. Everyone just acted like I already was.

“She needs to give you that power.” Carilyn turned and met my gaze. “So whatever you need to do to earn it, do so because we’re dead in the water—literally—until you get that figured out.”

I let her walk off. I knew where I was and there didn’t seem to be any guards on me. Where could I go? Really?

I rubbed the scratchy scruff on my chin and let out a long, frustrated sigh. What was I doing?

Nix didn’t need to be convinced to give me the knighthood. That was the carrot
she
was dangling.

So, why hadn’t she given it to me?

It was time to find out.

CHAPTER 4

DOING WHAT’S RIGHT

Getting
in to see Nix wasn’t my problem. I really was Nix’s toy, and she was excited to play with me.

The problem was, she wasn’t just going to hand over the knighthood. I had to prove myself to her, that I could be trusted, that I’d earned the position.

What would I have to do in order to accomplish that?

What had she made me do in order to earn the freedom of taking a few classes the last time she’d had her hands on me? Or to be able to spend time with my newfound friends in the laboratory?

I’d had to play her game of seduction. She taken her hand and wrapped it around more than just my body. She’d forced herself into my soul. How was it even possible to loathe and crave the same person?

I wasn’t skilled in the area of seduction. I’d never even really thought about it. Yes, I had to do my duty and find a woman to marry, but I knew all of the available women to choose from. I had time, time to pursue other things like inventing. And as I’d discovered with Nix, I simply lacked the fortitude of finesse to play the seduction game.

So why put myself through that again? Did I really
need
the knighthood? I didn’t want it, didn’t want to become what I would have to in order to earn the title of her knight. I didn’t want to be the person she sent out to blindly destroy entire cities so she could get what she wanted.

My heart said I needed to be with my family, fighting with them instead of possibly being pitted against them.

I shook my head and listened to the ocean move around the city over the whir of the fans. If I left, if I joined the Great Families again, Nix would destroy anyone who stood in her way. She’d already proven that.

What I really wanted was to be free of her, of her plans, of her control. “Off her leash.”

I took in a deep breath and stared at the large red planet hovering halfway over the horizon. What did I hope to achieve? What did I think I could do?

For one, I could talk to Mother. She was the leader of the Ino, the strongest of the seven Families. The El’Asim was a close second.

No. We had been when my father was alive. I had no doubt that while we might remain one of the largest, we were no longer among the strongest.

What could my mother do?

She could convene the Great Families, have a council to—

Wait. As leader of the El’Asim, I could do that.

But not as the Knight of Wands.

Dirt!

What would I lose by becoming Nix’s knight, her chew toy as Carilyn had so aptly put it?

I would lose the Families’ trust, their loyalty.

What would I gain?

Protection of the Great Families and the tribes. Nix wouldn’t be forced to destroy them in order to find me, to control me.

But would that stop her? She wanted to control the world. She’d just find some other reason to destroy the cities of the Great Families and the tribes.

What had drawn me to this idea in the first place?

Dyna. She thought I could gain Nix’s trust. I shook my head, my lips tight. In order for that to happen, I’d have to trust Nix. That wasn’t going to happen. Ever.

Would I have the inside edge?

I snorted, folding my arms over my chest. Not likely.

Could I negotiate a treaty?

We weren’t even at war yet.

Maybe not physically, but in our hearts, we were.