City in the Sky (22 page)

In the first ring, the lowest and largest portion of the city, a reservoir covered the western portion of the walled area, lapping against the outer walls themselves in places. The rest of the lowest city was mostly warehouses and boulevards, statues and barracks.

The outermost ring of the city was not, Erik realized as the ship descended towards the water, a place for people to live. It was a showcase of the Draconans wealth and power, a meeting place for merchants, and a contained zone in which the Aeradi and their sky ships could be carefully watched.

As they drifted over the wall, Erik noted vast batteries of Dwarven cannon and crys-bows. Like the Aeradi and the Duredine, the Draconans had the Sky Blood, and produced Melders and Aligners of their own, and the latter weapons were their own production.

For this citadel, however, the walls and cannon and crys-bows were the last defense. The first defense was their vast hosts of dragons. Four greens represented those hosts, escorting the
Cloudrunner
to her berth.

According to Enviers, who stood next to Erik at the front of the ship, the normal escort for a ship during peace was one dragon,
maybe
two. Four was a wartime escort.

Which, in and of itself, told Erik that all the warnings they'd had were perfectly true.

In Black Mountain, the courier dragon didn't land in a tiny pen designed to hold two, maybe three dragons at a time. Here, in one of the Draconans' own Citadels, the dragon landed on a section of packed earth in the Fourth Circle, large enough for two or three dragons to
land
at once. Attached to the landing ground were the stables for dozens of courier dragons.

The sight of that sign of power and strength – a reminder that his city could afford to turn dozens of dragons into little more than messenger boys – reassured Brane. Surely here, in his own city and with all its resources, he could not fail to eliminate the man who'd killed his brother.

He thanked the rider who'd brought him here, and turned to leave, heading for the Red Dragons' headquarters. The sight of who stood waiting for him, however, caused him to freeze in place.

Five men, dressed in a deep red version of a Claw officer's dress uniform, stood just inside the gate to the landing compound, waiting for him. At the distance, it was hard to be certain, but the glint of red off one man's collar suggested that he was wearing the dragon ruby – an insignia only worn by the commander of the Red Dragons.

As Brane drew closer, his eyes confirmed his suspicion. The center man was General Tel Machieava, the leader, high priest, and commander of the Red Dragons. The four men with him were a cross between staff and bodyguards.

The hundred or so yards Brane walked across the yard seemed like miles, but he reached his commander soon enough, and sank to one knee.

“My lord,” he said simply. The Dragon Lords, the city of Black Mountain, and the nation of Dracona held Brane's
loyalty
, but
this
was the man who
commanded
him.

“Welcome home, Captain Kelsdaver,” Machieava said calmly. “Rise.”

Brane did, brushing dirt from his knee. “What does my commander wish of me?” he asked.

“To speak, Captain,” Machieava told him. “Walk with us.”

The Red Dragon captain fell into step besides his commander. For several blocks as the group traveled up towards the inner circles, Machieava was silent. Finally, he spoke again.

“I am sorry to hear about your brother, Captain,” he said, his voice as calm and emotionless as ever. “He was one of our most promising agents.”

“Men die, my lord,” Brane said flatly. “All that remains to us to see that justice is done.”

“Justice,” Machieava snorted. “Justice, we do not pursue. The pursuit of fear – that is why we kill those who kill our own. The pursuit of fear, and the pursuit of
vengeance
in the case of those who carry out that policy.” He said nothing directly against Brane, but that made the accusation all the sharper.

“It is policy,” Brane replied. He refused to make excuses, as he knew his commander was right. It
was
for vengeance that he pursued Tarverro, but it was a vengeance the Dragons' policy supported.

“So it is,” Machieava agreed. “But so far, we have spent money and blood like water on this. The blood is not our own –
so far
– and money we have plenty of, but there comes a point at which we must limit ourselves.”

“Are you commanding me to give this up?” Brane asked carefully.

“Not yet,” Machieava told him. “But I will have other tasks for you soon, Captain Brane Kelsdaver. You are running out of time to deal with this man.”

“He is coming here,” Brane said flatly.

“I know,” the commander of the Red Dragons replied. “That is the sole reason why I will permit this. I will allow one last strike, Captain Brane. If you fail again, there will be no more.”

“What resources will I have?”

Machieava shrugged and gestured to one of his men. “Captain Doren will assist you.” For a moment, the commander's face showed a single sign of emotion, a slight hardening of his eyes in anger as he spoke. “Strike hard, Brane. For both our policy and your vengeance, Tarverro must die.”

As soon as the ship had touched down in the water, Erik turned First Platoon out on the deck. All the marines stood on the deck, watching as Albiers and Demond discussed something at the front of the deck.

Finally, the two seemed to come to an agreement and walked back to the marines. Albiers nodded to the two platoon sergeants, a group Erik was still uncomfortable to be included in.

“All right, people,” he said loudly. “Second Platoon is going to remain aboard ship as security detail with me. First Platoon is going to escort Captain Demond to meet the merchant here.”

The marine Lieutenant looked Erik in the eye before glancing on to the men. “Remember, gentlemen, the Draconans don't seem to be very welcoming here. We've heard some of what's gone on, but we don't know everything. Stay on your toes, we don't know how they're going to react.”

His short speech done, Albiers gestured for the men of Second Platoon to break up and Demond walked over to join Erik.

“Is this a good idea, sir?” Erik asked him in an undertone. “I hesitate to seem afraid, but if the Draconans are after me specifically…”

“They’re unlikely to attack you in their own city,” Demond replied. “As long as you stay in the First Circle, you'll be fine.”

“Where's the merchant we're meeting?” Erik asked, more loudly.

“In the First Circle,” the captain answered with a grin. “We Aeradi, treacherous bastards that we are, aren't allowed outside it, so all the merchants who deal with us keep their offices down here.”

Demond shrugged. “His name is Kalt Teller. He's a good man, as Draconans go, but we'll still watch our step. Understood?”

“Yes sir,” Erik acknowledged.

Brane Kelsdaver stared at the arrogant infantry officer in complete shock.

“What do you mean, you cannot help me?” the Red Dragon demanded. He gestured at the papers in the Claw of the Dragon Major’s hand. “You have orders from General Machieava and a warrant for Erik Tarverro’s arrest in your hand. What more do you need?”

The Officer On Duty for sky port security in Black Citadel, Major Jodias Kale, laid the papers down and looked at Brane with unreadable black eyes.

“Yes, a warrant,” he said slowly. “For the arrest of a non-citizen of Dracona for a crime committed outside Dracona. I’m familiar with that type of warrant,
Captain
Kelsdaver.”

Brane’s wrist half-completed the motion that would bring his crys-rod into his hand before swallowing as much of his anger as he could. As the Major had so
subtly
pointed out, he was junior to the Claw. Even being a Red Dragon wouldn’t keep his head on his shoulders if he murdered a superior officer.

“My
orders
,” Brane said slowly, “are to bring Tarverro in. We both answer to the General, Major.”

The Claw shrugged.

“And the General answers to the Lords,” he replied calmly. “And they, in their munificent wisdom, have commandeered the majority of the soldiers assigned to sky port security for a large scale assault exercises. This desk is normally manned by a Colonel, Captain, with an entire regiment on standby.”

“I have little more than a company,” the Major concluded. He looked at the papers Brane had handed him again and grimaced.

“The General’s orders are to provide any aid I require,” Brane told him coldly. “I don’t care about your problems – the sky port hardly requires thousands of troops to secure it. You can spare the men.”

The officer tapped the warrant again, and gave Brane another unreadable look.

“Fine,” he finally spat. “You can have two squads – I’m keeping my damn company together,
Captain
, because there are real issues that come up in this Circle.”

Brane considered arguing for more troops for a moment. He even considered going back to the General’s office and getting higher-ranked support. The General, however, had made it clear that there was a limit to the resources Brane could commandeer to end Tarverro.

There weren’t many forces in the world that could stop twenty fully equipped Claws of the Dragon. It would have to be enough.

Maybe it was the knowledge that there was probably someone in the city that wanted to kill him, but the First Circle of Black Mountain made Erik nervous. Even in Vidran, the Trade Quarter had been neatly laid out with straight avenues and neat lines of buildings.

The First Circle wasn't. It looked far older than any city Erik had ever seen before, and the roads through it looked like they'd been laid out by the random paths of somebody's cow. They twisted and turned, with alleys and new roads seeming to appear at random intervals.

The close quarters and lack of sight made the rest of the marines nervous as well. First Platoon's perimeter around Demond was tight, and the men marched with their shields on their arms and their hands on their swords.

The first warning they had was a slight smell of smoke and ash upon the breeze, then they turned the corner of one of the twisting roads and beheld a horrifying sight. An entire block of warehouses and offices had burned to the ground in a fire. The primarily stone outer shells of the buildings were still mostly intact, but windows, shutters, interior walls and doors had all been burned away.

It was clearly recent, less than a day old. The smell of smoke was still in the air, and the Draconan's fire services were still there, laying out the bodies under white linen wraps. The buildings at either end of the burnt-out block still dripped water, showing how the fire had eventually been contained.

The platoon stopped at the sight, but as Erik stepped forward to tell them to keep moving, Demond raised a hand.

“There's no point, Sergeant,” he said quietly. “Those were Teller's offices. His home, too, for that matter.”

“We should still check if he's alive,” Erik replied, equally quietly.

Demond slowly nodded and stepped forward again. At a quick gesture from Erik, the platoon moved as well. The Aeraid captain crossed to where a man in a black and red uniform seemed to be directing things, and then gestured for the marines to stay behind as he approached him.

Erik accompanied Demond, and eyed the Draconan. Much taller than even the humans Erik had grown up among, the Draconan had high, arched cheekbones like most Aeradi but lacked the slanted eyes that caused Erik's father's people to stand out.

“I'm looking for Kalt Teller,” Demond told the man. “Do you know if he's all right?”

“Not unless you have an unusual definition,” the fire warden replied, his voice hoarse as if he'd recently inhaled smoke. He gestured towards the neat row of white-covered bodies. “He's over there. He was the last one we pulled out – he'd apparently tried to get his family out first.” The Draconan shrugged. “He didn't manage it. We were too late,” he added, his face turning dark.

Demond shook his head softly. “He was a good man. I'm sorry to hear about this. Do you know what caused the fire?”

Erik wished his captain hadn't asked that. He wished with all his heart, but Demond had, so he listened to the answer.

“We're not sure yet, but there didn't seem to be any spilt lamps or anything, and they certainly didn't have enough warning to escape,” the warden replied. “I don't know, but I can't see any natural reason.”

Arson was the word, Erik knew. Someone had intentionally set the fire, and he’d bet he knew why.

As if his thoughts had triggered it, the Draconan fire warden finally turned around and really
looked
at the man whose questions he'd been answering. The Draconan and Aeradi dialects had both been shaped by similar concerns and philosophies. This had left them close enough that even a native speaker could mistake them for each other if he was distracted.