The Drowned Vault (29 page)

Dan drifted through wall after wall. He found a man in a pink shirt chained to a bed. And then another chained man, big and dark-skinned like the girl. Dan could see the fatherhood on him while he slept, the worry and the love he wore all over his soul.

In other rooms there were guards. Some slept and some were waking. They were rotten inside, dying, but on the outside he could see their strengths, stolen and molded and stitched together from other men. When he
looked at some of them, he could see only tattoo bones floating in the air around emptiness, and he knew that these had already cheated death.

And then he found the freezers. Behind each door, he saw a relic of pain, bodies broken but laid in cold unrest, seeds unplanted, souls and flesh unhonored.

And limping in front of the coffin freezers, he saw the man called Phoenix. To Daniel’s eyes, he looked to be made only of ash, held together by the weave of his white coat. Daniel felt anger swell inside him, and his anger bloomed into hate for the ash man who had broken his eyes and undone his heart.

“Daniel.”

The voice was his father’s.

“Daniel?”

There was a freezer near the bottom of a stack, beside a clear glass pool. He saw the tall body lying on its back. He looked past the frosted glass and saw the face and the puckered holes in the chest where flying lead had done its violence.

“I see you,” Daniel said. “He has you? Why are you here?”

“Dan, son, I am not here.”

“I see your body. He stole it.”

“Yes, he stole it. But that is not my body anymore. There is more of me in you than in that cold and broken bonehouse where I once lived. That is ash where my fire
once burned. My fire burns brighter now, and in flesh that will not decay. Look at him.”

Phoenix was preparing the shallow pool, emptying vials into the water.

“He clings to
his
ash until he can steal another’s. He wants to mold slaves that will call him god, men and women who will take up and lay down their souls at his word. He wants to call me back, to make that frozen body new and chain me up inside. But I pity him, Dan. Can you pity a destroyer?”

“No,” said Daniel. “I can’t.”

“You will,” his father said. “In the end.”

“Am I dead?” Daniel asked.

“You are dying,” said his father.

“But why?” Daniel asked. “Why do I have to?”

“Because you are flesh, and flesh is grass. It burns and is consumed. But your fire will not go out.”

“What will I die of?”

And then his father laughed, a laugh Daniel had not heard in years, a laugh he had never really heard, because this laugh was bigger and richer and deeper than any that had ever echoed in the chest of that body in the freezer.

“Son,” his father said. “Run faithfully to the end, and like all good men, you will die of having lived.”

The room went dark. Daniel was drifting away. His father’s voice followed him, fading: “When you see your mother, your sister, your brother, there you see a part of
me—of who I will always be. Help your brother understand.”

“Wait, Dreamer.” The whisper was female. Daniel was back in the room with the freezers, looking at a wide-eyed girl crouched in a corner. He had seen her before, in his dream of Cyrus and the grave. Her hair was like a mound of ropes, too big and too heavy for her body. Her arms and legs were chained to the wall, and she was looking straight into Daniel’s soul and he into hers. She was a tangle of loss and sorrow and slavery. But somewhere in it all, he saw pride. When she spoke, her mouth didn’t move.

“Bridle your eyes and ride them. The Phoenix is ready. He has found the dark road. The seventy weeks begin. Mark this place.” She blew on Daniel and he passed up through the roof, looking down at the huge building. He could still hear her whisper. “Mark this nest where he will hatch his young. Mark the muddy river. Bring the Desolation.”

Daniel opened his eyes. His face was pressed deep into moss, and he’d been snotting all over it. A heavy limb pinned down his head, and something larger was on his legs, digging into his back. Everything around him smelled burnt. Even the moss was smoking.

He shifted beneath the weight and realized that he had found his limits—his body truly hurt.

• • •

Cyrus sat shivering on the gravel beach. The shallow slice on his throat stung with salt, and his teeth were chattering. If Patricia had been around his neck instead of his wrist when the Captain had raised his blade, she probably would have tried to take his arm off. She was back around Cyrus’s neck now, once again carrying the keys.

Captain John Smith paced on the beach, water squelching out of his high boots. He held the iron head of Vlad III on his left hip—the only head Cyrus hadn’t opened—and had coiled the iron chain around his forearm. His naked saber was in his right hand, and his eyes were on the sea. Cyrus’s eyes were on the sea as well. There was no sign of Rupert anywhere, and they’d been out of the water for at least twenty minutes. He’d hoped Rupert would be waiting. He’d been afraid that Rupert would be floating.

The Captain spun on his heel and pointed his sword at Cyrus. His beard was lopped off in an uneven square and his hair was a wild mane of jagged lengths. His brown eyes glowed with anger.

“Fool, fool, fool!” He chewed the word like toffee, his voice as thick and sticky as syrup.

“You said that already,” Cyrus said. “And before you ask again, no, I’m not sure what exact move we were planning next.”

“I see no we. I see a thee.” The Captain strode
forward and spat. “And ye, lad, haven’t the feel nor the timbre of a Smith—waking a Lord of the Order and a Knight of the Queen without cause.” He turned away, letting his eyes sail back across the sea to the horizon. Cyrus watched the man’s ancient battered hands clench and flex at the sight.

“Aye,” the man said. “But the world is yet grand and worth the waking, and the sea remains my true queen, fool though ye be.”

“I’m going to look for the others.” Cyrus stood up slowly. “I need to change my clothes.”

“Sit!” the Captain bellowed. Water shook out of his beard. His eyes were alive with fire as he pointed his sword at the wet rocks under Cyrus. “Down, trespasser, or I’ll loose your head from your cursed bones!”

Cyrus squinted at him. “What is it with you and heads? Listen to me: The current Avengel told me to wake you up, okay? He was hoping you’d help us fight the transmortals, that you’d be on our team. And I had to cut your nasty hair and hack off your sicktastic fingernails. So I’d appreciate it if you would stop yelling at me.”

Cyrus raised his hand to the slice on his throat. It felt like a nasty paper cut. “And this hurts, by the way. You didn’t have to cut me.”

The Captain snorted and shook back his hair. He held up the face of Vlad III. “Young gutterblud, count it blessed providence that I did.”

Cyrus circled around the Captain to the little boat that still held his coat and his bag.

“Better your head roll free,” the Captain continued, “than this chain be loosed.”

“Stop it!” Cyrus yelled. He tugged his shirt out of his bag. Shivering, he pulled it on. “Enough with the heads!”

“Cy!”

Cyrus looked up. Dan was leaning over the cliff’s edge. He was filthy and favoring one leg, and his shoulders were smoking.

“Is that him?” Dan hooded his eyes. “Where’s Rupe? The planes had to leave, and some massive guy with a beard grabbed Antigone. We have to go!”

“Antigone …”

“Gone, Cyrus! He took her.”

The world spun, and Cyrus felt his knees sag. The Captain was yelling something and pointing his sword at Dan. Cyrus slid to the ground and leaned against the boat. Without Rupert, where would they even start? They were on an island. The planes had left. Antigone … no. He shook his head. A massive guy with a beard?

Gil
.

The Captain was looking down at him, forehead creased, eyes questioning. Cyrus realized that he’d said the name out loud.

“Gilgamesh,” he said. “It had to have been Gilgamesh. He took my sister.”

The Captain’s brows collided. “Gilgamesh? He wouldn’t lay a Persian finger on any lady of the Order. I bound his treaty charms myself.”

“The treaties have been voided,” Cyrus said. “He’s in the
Ordo Draconis
now.”

The Captain’s mouth fell open, his solid beard thumping against his metal chest. “Daft damnation! Voided? Does the Brendan know? Have the Keepers mustered? Who leads these dragons against us?” He turned and strode down the beach. “The kings … Christendom … old alliances must needs prove strong. The Maltese. Prester John.”

The Captain paused, stared for a moment at the iron head on his hip, and then turned around. “The dragons rekindling … you were right to wake me. Has Ashtown Keep held firm? Have the Burials been opened?”

“Only yours,” said Cyrus.

The Captain nodded. “Well, there’s some hope in that. Who leads these—”

The rumble of jet engines rolled across the water. The Captain tensed. Dan limped quickly down the cliff’s goat track. Cyrus looked at the horizon. A plane was heading toward them, flying low and fast.

The Captain hopped onto a boulder and faced the plane. He let Vlad III drop and dangle from his left
wrist. His sword spun and flashed in his right, and then stopped, poised and ready.

He glanced back at Cyrus. “Cover, fools, or burn.”

Cyrus looked back at his brother. “Theirs?” he asked. “Or ours?”

Dan was squinting. “That’s the Boones’ plane,” he finally said as the plane touched down, hundreds of yards out from where Cyrus and Rupert had been diving, sending up two long plumes of sea behind its wings as it cruised toward the little cove.

The Captain watched with narrow eyes as the plane turned sideways at the harbor mouth and let its two jet engines whine. It was longer than Gil’s plane and had a sleeker silver body. On the side, just beneath the cockpit, there was a gold rampant lion holding a musket.

A side door slid open and Diana leaned out, scanning the beach and then the cliff. She looked at Cyrus. “Antigone? Rupe?” she mouthed.

Cyrus cupped his hands. “Gone!”

Diana shook her head. She couldn’t hear. She beckoned them to come. Cyrus threw on his coat and grabbed his bag. Then he and his brother pushed the boat off the beach and splashed into the shallows.

“Come on!” Cyrus yelled to the Captain, still perched on his boulder.

“What is this wizardry?” the Captain cried, his eyes wide in wonder.

Cyrus and Dan teetered and rocked the little boat as they tried to climb in at the same time. The Captain jumped down and splashed into the water.

“Get in!” the Captain yelled. “Before ye shame the sea!”

He tumbled Cyrus in over the side and Dan behind him, and then Vlad thumped against the bottom. Gripping the square stern, the Captain whooped and drove the boat forward, churning through the water with high splashing knees. And as he did, he began to chant: “Dead men sink, and dead men sail, ho for the bottle and the bonehouse! Ho for the bottle and my lady so lovely, ho for the Queen’s Virginia!”

Somehow, while the boat glided out, the Captain vaulted over Cyrus, flinging a waterfall from his coat as he dropped onto a bench. Then he struck out with the two wooden oars for the waiting jet.

Diana was still in the door with her mouth open and her eyebrows up.

“Cyrus!” Daniel sat up. “Seriously, where’s Rupe? We can’t leave without him. I think I know where Phoenix is.”

Cyrus turned back to his brother. “What? How?”

“And he has Dad!” Dan shouted. “Phoenix has his body in a freezer!”

Dan continued shouting, but there was nothing else to hear. The jet engines swallowed it all.

His father … he was supposed to be in the sea. His
body was in a freezer? With Phoenix? Why? Why would Phoenix keep a body—

The tooth. The Reaper’s Blade.
The Resurrection Stone …

Cyrus felt sick. The Captain turned the boat and slid it up beside the plane. Diana reached down. Cyrus grabbed her hand and was pulled into the crowded plane. Everyone was in there. Everyone but Antigone and Rupert.

Dan followed, but the Captain balked at the door. Finally, with shoulders hunched in worry, Diana and Alan dragged him inside, while Nolan shut and sealed the door. As the plane began to turn, the Captain spread his legs, grabbed at the walls, and began to bellow a prayer. Cyrus barely noticed.

“Cy!” Diana yelled. “Cy! What’s going on?”

The plane accelerated, and Cyrus collapsed onto the floor. Exhaustion and horror washed over him. He needed to throw up. He rolled slowly onto his knees and began to crawl over legs and feet toward the rear of the plane. He wanted a corner, someplace dark where he could pass out or die. His arms wobbled, and his chest shook.

Cyrus Smith dropped onto his face, clawed at the tight carpet, and shut his eyes. Diana sat down beside him. He felt her fingers check his pulse. Dan lowered himself to the floor on the other side. Cyrus heard his brother’s voice and felt his hand on his back, but he couldn’t open
his eyes. Not yet. Not for a long time. Deep inside, deeper than anger or fear, inside his gut, inside his bones, his soul was shaking.

The plane flew. And flew. Cyrus slept and he woke and he slept again. But he didn’t move. Hours passed, and the world around Cyrus slowly became still. And when the sun began to set in the windows and the whole cabin glowed with fire, Cyrus rolled onto his back. The plane was descending. He didn’t care where. He stared at the ceiling and wondered how he could throw a stone at a giant and a monster at the same time, when he didn’t know where they were, and he had no stone.

Phoenix sat back in a rickety chair and surveyed his preparations by the light of a single lamp on the floor beside him. For months, he and his men had worked only in deep darkness and quiet morning light. But today had been different. Today had been the final day of preparation. Tonight would be the final night. He massaged his stump and pressed the cool silver head of his cane to his lips, listening to his freezers hum.

His men were exhausted. They had done good work. Five pools had been prepared. Five wombs. By tomorrow night, each pool would have given birth nine times, and he would have forty-five sons … if all survived. Which they wouldn’t. He expected some chaff. And those that survived would be tested more quickly than he had planned.