Invasion Cycle - Planeshift Part 8

Eladamri stared so intently at the vision that he was startled to realize the proud doyens and doyennes beside him had dropped from their colos to kneel on the ice. Even Liin Sivi bowed low. Swinging his leg from the saddle, Eladamri knelt among them.

A chant came from the leaders. "Kradak and Jezal, doyen and doyenne, fire and hearth, till Twilight we await your return."

Eladamri kept his head bowed until the chant was done. The clang of armor told that his allies rose. He climbed to his feet with the others and remounted. Only then did he dare speak.

"What is this glorious vision?"

Doyenne Tajamin drove her mount forward across the ice. She spoke reverently. "This is the Necropolis, the resting place for our honored dead. All warriors who die in righteous warfare are entombed there. From the Necropolis, they will rise in the day of Twilight to defend Keld from the armies of evil."

"There are lights lit there," Eladamri said, pacing her.

"The caretakers dwell forever among the honored dead. It is the highest honor granted a warlord to guard the Necropolis. To die while serving in the Necropolis is to be a.s.sured a place there."

Nodding in understanding, Eladamri shielded his eyes from the glare. As the war party moved out across the ice, he glimpsed a flash of gold within the open pyramid.

"What rests there, at the center of the citadel?"

"The Golden Argosy, ship of t.i.tans. It was stolen from the lords of Parma by Kradak, first doyen of our people. In it, he sailed all the world and claimed it for Keld. This was before the other races spilled out across the land, stealing it. Since that time, we have journeyed afar to regain the lands that are ours."

Eladamri smiled in appreciation. "Those other races are certainly larcenous, but how can you conquer the world while the Golden Argosy resides in the Necropolis?"

"When Kradak died, the Argosy became his tomb. Only when Kradak arises again in Twilight will the Argosy sail once more. Then the world will once again be ours."

"Then the world truly would end," Eladamri replied ambiguously.

Tajamin responded with a smile. "Now you have begun to believe."

Shrugging, Eladamri said, "If the Necropolis has its own guardians, why do you bring this army of a hundred thousand?"

She gazed levelly at him. "So, you didn't notice the army of invaders beyond?" She jabbed her finger toward a high and distant hollow. There, a wide river tumbled over a bed of shattered obsidian.

"What army?"

Tajamin wore a sly look. "We often see only what we want to see-allies or invaders."

Shielding his eyes, Eladamri stared.

It was not a river that flowed down that high valley. It was a legion. What had seemed shattered hunks of obsidian were in truth the battle armor of a huge Phyrexian contingent. Mere days ago they had been arrayed on the hillsides of Rath. Now they marched toward the most sacred site to the people of Keld.

His voice was a hoa.r.s.e whisper. "How many are there?"

"Scouts have reported two hundred thousand in the main army," Tajamin said flatly.

Eladamri tightly clutched the reins of his colos. "And what is your strategy?"

"Reach the Necropolis before the Phyrexians do."

Nearby, Doyen Olvresk stood in the saddle and lifted high his curve-bladed scythe.

"Full gallop to the troops!" he shouted. He brought his arm forward. His colos bounded out across the ice. Hooves cracked solid footholds and sent crystals cracking away.

Doyenne Tajamin drove heels into her mount's flanks. The colos leaped anxiously. It shouldered past Eladamri's beast, which reared back. The beast charged across the glacier. In moments, doyen and doyenne rode neck and neck. Each of their steeds struggled to gain the lead. The other doyen swarmed in their wake.

"Hearth and fire, they are incomplete without each other," came a familiar voice at Eladamri's shoulder. The elf turned to see the young warlord Astor, astride his colos. The warrior's face was utterly grave, but laughter played in his eyes. "Olvresk and Tajamin each can see only his or her own perspective. Since they both trained me, I can see both."

Eladamri smiled wanly. "Your perspective has saved many lives. What do you suggest we do?"

Lifting heavy eyebrows, Astor simply said, "Follow."

As one, Eladamri, Liin Sivi, and Astor drove their mounts forward across the ice. The hooves of the colos made a brittle rumble as they bore along. Behind them galloped the rest of the Skyshroud commanders. They were eager to be reunited with their troops and to return the colos to their Keldon handlers.

Just ahead, a series of deep creva.s.ses opened in the glacier. The ice sheet had stretched over a rocky ridge, and the surface had cracked. Ice dropped away through blue shadows and into blackness. It was an easy thirty feet across the first creva.s.se, and only a ten-foot wedge of ice stood between it and the next. It seemed an impa.s.sable barrier, but the Keldons did not slow the charge of their steeds.

Side by side in the lead, Doyen Olvresk and Doyenne Tajamin drove their mounts to the creva.s.se. Fore-hooves cracked on the ice cliff. The colos gathered their bulk. Hind-hooves smashed on the edge of the creva.s.se. As one, the great mountain yaks bounded. Though ponderous on the ground, they leaped weightlessly through the air. Doyen and doyenne stood high in the saddle and fixed their gazes on the far wedge. Their mounts soared down. Fore-hooves, hind-hooves, they surged off the ice over the next creva.s.se.

Unflinching, the other Keldon commanders leaped their mounts over.

Eyes wide, Eladamri stared at approaching doom. He shouted to Warlord Astor, "What do we do?"

Astor repeated simply. "Follow!" Then he too hurtled across the crack.

Liin Sivi and Eladamri traded looks. There was no time to stop.

Leaning against the neck of his mount, Eladamri held his breath. The final four hoofbeats sounded like explosions in his ears. Then came a deathly silence.

Ice chips floated in tangled winds above the creva.s.se. Colos hooves pawed the emptiness. Eladamri stared down into unseeable depths. The glacier's heart was as black as death. His own heart hung in the gap. There came not a sound except wind in colos hair.

Hooves struck the ice on the far side. The colos gathered its muscles and bounded again.

Something had changed. Perhaps he knew his mount could make it. Perhaps he had already stared once into death and cheated it. This time, Eladamri sat up in the saddle. He peered with interest rather than fear into this new creva.s.se. His heart pounded excitedly. The dark rip in the white world was beautiful.

By the time he crossed the third creva.s.se, Eladamri was laughing aloud. It hurt the st.i.tches in his face, but in every other way, it felt good. He was becoming Keldon, he realized. His people would not merely dwell in this land. They would be reshaped by it until they were Keldon people too.

Eladamri followed his allies as they closed the distance to their troops. With a whoop, Eladamri rode up before the lines of his Skyshroud elves. In their thick thistledown cloaks, they hardly looked like elves. Even their eyes showed the beginnings of transformation.

Eladamri reined in his colos, and the beast reared up. Its hooves spun in the air as he shouted, "Follow me, Elves of the Skyshroud, Elves of Keld! Follow me to defend our land!"

Chapter 11.

Metal With Memory.

Angels and spirits, helionauts and hoppers were no match for Phyrexian cruisers. Five of the enormous black ships now filled the sky. Their mana bombards heaped death on defenders. Their horn-studded rams chased Weatherlight across the heavens. "I thought we'd gotten rid of these b.a.s.t.a.r.ds!" Gerrard shouted to no one in particular. He couldn't bring his cannons to bear on the pursuing cruiser, but he found a target anyway. His gun hurled a corridor of flack abeam. The red blaze dissolved a dragon engine into claws and teeth. Energy bounded on and melted the stern of a Phyrexian dagger-boat. Deprived of its engine, the ship bobbed drunkenly and plummeted.

On the other side of the forecastle, Tahngarth's cannon shouted. It tore away a gout of black mana that surged toward Weatherlight.

"Perhaps these are the cruisers from Benalia."

Gerrard gritted his teeth. "Oh, you had to say that." His cannon barked. Crimson bolts shrieked from the muzzle. The first shot struck a Phyrexian ram and pocked the metal. The second and third shots cored the ship as if it were an apple.

The pursuing cruiser sent fire in a deadly tunnel up around Weatherlight.

"How 'bout some rear defenses, Squee?" Gerrard shouted into the speaking tube.

Before his words were even finished, an angry protest answered. "You think dis easy, yeah? You think just 'cause Squee save your b.u.t.t hundred thousand million times before, he save you now?"

A glob of black mana struck the port airfoil and ripped a rattling hole through it.

"Yes, Squee! Exactly!" Gerrard growled. "The tail gunner's job is to save our b.u.t.ts."

The rapid shots of the tail gun fused into a single, constant, furious discharge. Squee leaped within the traces, spraying beams across their wake. Defensive fire rose from the cruiser but could not antic.i.p.ate the random blasts. Squee's shots smacked the fuselage, tore holes through conduits, ripped into inner corridors, and clove engine modules. Smoke belched up, and after smoke came fire. The cruiser jolted, dropped backward, and heeled slowly away.

"Nice shooting, Squee," Gerrard called.

"Dat's another two hundred b.u.t.ts you owe Squee."

Tahngarth interrupted the goblin tail gunner. "What's Agnate doing down there?" The minotaur stood and gaped over Weatherlight's rail.

Gerrard peered through his captain's gla.s.s, but even with it, he could not make out the figures in the forest.

A metallic voice spoke for all of them-Karn, who could see through the running lamps of the ship. "He marches. He marches with a company of the dead."

"What?" Gerrard asked, reeling. "Agnate has turned traitor?"

Karn's voice rumbled like distant thunder. "No. They march together against Phyrexians. Agnate allies with evil against evil."

Staring over the rail, Gerrard murmured bleakly, "Desperate times ..."

"Desperate, indeed," Karn replied. "There's a cruiser dead ahead."

Gerrard turned and looked fore. The cruiser seemed only a small black cloud on the horizon, though it swelled outward with alarming speed.

"Evasive!"

"Keep your pants on, Commander," Sisay replied lightly. Weatherlight banked to starboard. Her engines thrummed. She rose on thundering winds.

The cruiser shifted into an intercept course. It grew even bigger, eclipsing half of the sky. Its ram, a stout block ending in hornlike protrusions, reached for Weatherlight.

"She's trying to ram us!" Gerrard called.

"Yes! Yes!" Sisay replied.

Weatherlight pitched toward port and climbed again.

The cruiser shifted its att.i.tude. It loomed, inescapable, before Weatherlight.

"I can't break free!" Sisay called. "She'd drawing us in!"

"She's going to ram us!" Gerrard warned.

"No," Sisay shouted back. "We're going to ram her!"

"What!"

Weatherlight plunged like a cleaver toward the ma.s.sive ship. Multani coursed into the Gaea figurehead, the stabbing spine beneath, and the serrated keel. It struck first.

Wood as hard as diamond plowed through the armor of the cruiser's upper deck and ripped into its fuselage. The spike struck next. It punctured a gun nest and gored the monster at the machine. The beast was wiped away as Weatherlight plunged deeper into the cruiser. Metal parted in black waves before her.

It was as if more than her own momentum drove her forward, as if something in the cruiser's heart dragged at her.

At last, the Gaea figurehead itself breasted the metal wave. Her brow dug in, and Weatherlight ground to a halt.

"Reverse engines!" Gerrard called. "Pull us out of here!"

Weatherlight's engines flared but seemed to wedge the ship only more tightly.

"Reverse engines, Karn!"

The ship's power core went silent. The hatch to the engine room flung back. Steam billowed out above the deck. From that hissing cloud emerged the silver ma.s.s of Karn. He climbed laboriously from the hatch and strode with heavy intent toward the forecastle.

"Karn! What's happening?"

"The power cores," he said, leaping from amidships to the forecastle. His legs drummed the deck. "They're drawing each other together like a pair of magnets. Every time we fire up our engine, it pulls us deeper. The only way to get out is to shut down their engine."

Eyes wide, Gerrard said, "And how do we do that?

Karn gestured toward the prow. Thick metal curled away from the ship's hull. "Give me a door."

Wordlessly, Gerrard nodded. He swung his cannon toward the armor of the Phyrexian ship and squeezed off two shots. Red rays melted air and then metal. It dripped through the breach, revealing the cross section of a corridor.

Dipping his head, Karn vaulted over the prow rail and in through the red-hot hole. His feet struck a floor of metal grate. The sound echoed both ways down the long corridor and was answered by more feet-Phyrexian feet. Gibbering hungrily, monsters scampered down the pa.s.sage toward the intruder. They loped on all fours like wolves, though their bodies were scaly and their mouths could have swallowed a wolf whole. The monsters converged on Karn and leaped, howling.

Rearing his fist back, Karn hurled a roundhouse at the first beast. Silvery knuckles cracked through rows of teeth. Enamel tumbled in the creature's mouth. Karn's hand rammed down the monster's throat. It closed its bite on him, hoping to sever his arm.

Karn whirled, bashing the second attacker down with the writhing body of the first. He withdrew his arm from the creature's throat, bringing with it a handful of innards. A third hound died beneath a stomping foot, and a fourth with a broken back. The last beast leaped on Karn and bit his head, trying to take it off. Sliding hands into the chewing jaws, Karn opened them wider than they ever should have opened.

He took a moment to make sure all the beasts lay destroyed and then shouted toward Weatherlight, "A door for me is a door for them. Defend this breach until I return."

Gerrard's sardonic face shone above the smoking barrel of his cannon. "Aye aye, Engineer!"

Karn looked down, considering the dead. At one time, he would not fight, would not harm a soul. Now, Karn had just torn five creatures apart. Perhaps these were mere beasts, but smarter foes would lurk ahead. They would realize what he was trying to do and would fight-and would die.