Iriya the Berserker (16 page)

Suddenly the mayor sank. He settled into the chair behind him—well, not so much
settled
as
collapsed
. The twitch in his face that rocked his white beard and the vacant look in his eyes announced that he’d realized nothing short of his own fate. Nothing could be crueler.

“My daughter . . . Annette . . . is coming home from the Capital . . .” he said as if delirious, squeezing the words through parched lips. “The university’s on holiday . . . This afternoon . . . she’ll be arriving at Calico’s airport . . . Tomorrow, she’ll head back here . . . And
they
know it . . .”

“How?” the sheriff asked, furrowing his brow. He wanted to throw his badge in the trash at this point.

“Jagos . . . My daughter’s nanny lives in the village . . . I’ve heard she and my daughter still correspond . . . I’m sure she’d know about her vacation plans . . .”

“I see. First, they’ll hit you where it hurts, eh? Tear the descendant of their hated foe limb from limb—no, they’ll probably make her one of them. That would be the ultimate revenge!” the Confessor said with relish, but the mayor didn’t even have the strength to rail at the man.

“Set off at once. First, my daughter—you must protect my Annette. Once she’s safe, destroy them. Turn every last one of them to dust.”

The mayor’s words had begun to spin from dazed to crazed, but they sounded like derisive laughter to Barry Dawn as he said, “The town of Calico’s a full day’s ride on a fast horse. We’d better get going. You happen to have a picture of your daughter?”

“Come to my house,” replied the mayor, staggering to his feet.

“She’s a hell of a looker,” Barry Dawn said, holding the photo up over his head and shutting one eye.

“You can say that again. If I’d known that, I’d have told you to pay me half wages and throw in this little lady!” Hiki chimed in.

The group was on the street in front of the mayor’s house. All of them were astride cyborg horses, and at first glance they just seemed to be hanging around chatting, yet an air of danger emanated from them. The battle wouldn’t begin when they came into contact with the Nobles. It would begin sooner—right now, in fact. The chances of them cooperating seemed about as likely as an atheist believing in God. The instant they’d learned the deaths of their peers would increase their own compensation, they’d all become enemies—almost as much as the Nobility were.

High in the saddle and looking as gloomy as ever, Leica said, “We’re all in the same boat. From here on out, we’re rivals! Godspeed to you.”

And saying that, he gave a kick to his horse’s flanks and galloped off to the north.

“Oh, no you don’t!”

“You won’t steal a march on me!”

With those cries, the Confessor and Barry Dawn gave chase.

Quake Resden was also about to gallop off, but he quickly pulled back on the reins to stop his horse, then craned his bull neck toward the last of the group—Hiki. He alone showed no signs of following the pack.

“Aren’t you going?”

From the back of his steed, the slim seraphim of a man grinned faintly.

“Sure I am. Last to leave, and first to arrive. Off you go, and don’t you worry about me. We’ll meet again after I’ve taken care of those lousy Nobles.”

In response to those strangely confident remarks, the giant raised one hand and rode off.

Once the figure who looked like he’d crush his horse at any moment had disappeared down the road, Hiki spread his arms from his spot in the saddle. The sleeves of his thin garment that ran from his wrists to his ankles almost like wings became taut membranes.

“No wind, eh? Let’s make some, then.”

His slender foot kicked his horse’s flank. The cyborg horse galloped off down a road in the opposite direction from the man’s four colleagues.

“Last to leave, and first to arrive,” Hiki murmured as if the words were a spell—then he lightly jumped up on top of his saddle and spread his arms.

The pair of membranes caught the wind, billowing out behind him. Like the wings of an angel. And then Hiki’s body drifted into the air, quickly rising higher and higher. Just like an angel. Perhaps that was why his name was written with the ancient characters for
flight
and
demon
. Catching the wind—or the airflow from his cyborg horse’s mad gallop—he had become a bird.

It seemed the animal had been well trained, because on losing its master, the cyborg horse halted and raised its head, spotting the figure that’d already been reduced to a speck. Before long, the speck was flying north at a speed no bird could ever match, and the horse began to give chase with the wind swirling in its wake. No one save this faithful steed knew that its sky-bound master was now flying at a rate easily in excess of the speed of sound.

Three hours later, a comm bug from the town of Calico brought the sheriff shocking news. With the insect in hand, the lawman ran to the mayor’s house and had it repeat what it’d told him.

“The village of Jagos is gone? Burned to the ground?” the mayor asked once more, and the locust-like comm bug responded in the affirmative. As a product of the Nobility, not only could the insect understand human speech and engage in conversation; it could also fly to its destination at supersonic speeds.

“Five days ago, someone attacked the village of Jagos, turning its inhabitants into servants of the Nobility. For four days no travelers passed through there, but on the morning of the fifth day the town of Calico received this information via a comm bug from a traveler paying a call on the village.”

Word of this incident had shocked the town of Calico, and the reconnaissance party that was immediately dispatched had confirmed the accuracy of the traveler’s report. In Jagos, they found the villagers sleeping in their houses with all the windows shut, their fangs exposed. However, there’d only been five of them—the rest were in the village meeting place. They’d been reduced to brutalized corpses, their limbs ripped or chopped off. The reconnaissance party had been reminded of the end the Xeno clan had met.

According to the comm bug, the strange devastation had come as evening approached. Having completed their investigation, the reconnaissance party had left the village, but they’d spotted an aircraft before making their exit. For roughly an hour it’d circled at an altitude of about a thousand feet as if waiting for the group to leave, and once the reconnaissance party was some fifteen hundred feet from the village, the craft dropped something. Purely by chance, one member of the reconnaissance party happened to see it fall.

“And then, the village was enveloped in flames.”

At that last remark from the comm bug, the mayor closed his eyes. The sheriff couldn’t tell whether the old man was trying to picture the fiery inferno or expel it from his memory. The lawman immediately thought of something else: the subject he’d discussed with the five Hunters just before they’d left.

After slaking their thirst in the village of Jagos and playing out their bloody vengeance, where had the Noblemen vanished to? And then, on noticing a certain sound, he turned his gaze out the window to a world approaching nightfall.

Damn it all. Rain at this, of all times? If they run into those bastards soaked to the skin, they’ll be off to their final reward! Of all the shitty luck.

In the blink of an eye, the light rains that’d started just around noontime had become a torrential downpour—the kind of heavy rain unique to the Frontier that would hammer those on the road.
Hammer
them? The terrible precipitation could strike a person with the same force as hail, leaving unprepared travelers unconscious on the road and openly inviting death. On meeting with the kind of downpour that occasionally killed even monsters, people would go into their homes, while travelers would either make use of a portable tent or retreat to one of the emergency shelters situated along the highways, where they’d pray that the savage rains wouldn’t become a thunder-and-lightning storm. Out on the Frontier, lightning would split massive trees and shatter boulders just like the spear of a great god of antiquity. Even greater fire dragons and armored beasts wouldn’t escape instantaneous death if they were struck. As a result, the people of the Frontier had come to refer to the lightning that bleached those downpours as “the Glittering Gates to the Land of the Dead.”

Out in those fearsome rains, a carriage raced recklessly on. It was a coach that’d been hired in town. Unfortunately for both thepassenger and the driver, the day of their departure had been blessed with sunshine and blue skies. The crowning piece of misfortune was the fact that the aircraft carrying this passenger had arrived from the Capital more than an hour ahead of schedule. By the time the downpour hit them, the coach was in the middle of a high pass where both pressing on and turning back seemed impossible. While the driver recommended turning back, the passenger had insisted that they press on. She said if they continued for three miles beyond the pass, there’d be a shelter there. The driver, who’d actually been on the fence about what to do, decided to go for it.

Now the rain sprayed off the carriage so hard it left a white haze over it as it was coming up on the crest of the pass.

“We made it,” the driver announced with an approximation of relief from beneath his vinyl slicker.

It was unclear whether the flash of white that bleached the world then was a celebration of that fact or just a mocking bit of irony. Only a heartbeat later came a crack of thunder like the howl of a colossal beast.

The pair of cyborg horses reared on their hind legs in an expression of an instinct they’d had since before their conversion: fear.

“Gates to the Land of the Dead?” the driver murmured in a dazed tone as he desperately fought the panicked horses. “Got no choice but to shoot down from the pass in one go. Don’t know if the footing will be safe or not, though.”

As if his grumbling had been overheard, a voice from the brass communication tube to the right of his seat said, “It’s okay. Just keep going.” It was the strong yet cultured voice of a young lady.

Like I needed you to tell me that
, the driver thought to himself, but recalling how she’d overruled him when he wasn’t sure whether or not they could make it over the pass, he responded, “Well, I aim to.”

He raised his whip in defeat.

Before he could strike a fresh blow with that coiling serpent of a whip, its length drooped down weakly. The driver had raised his right hand high but then forgot to follow through with the motion as he peered into the darkness ahead. He was certain the lightning that’d just flashed had picked out the form of a horse and rider.

One more time
, the driver pleaded in his heart.
I’m begging you, just let me see that gorgeous face one more time.

His wish was answered. Answered by a voice even more lovely than the face burned into the back of his eyelids.

“It would seem you’re in a bit of a jam, are you not?” said a voice that issued from the vicinity of the rider’s face. It had a ring to it so mysterious that it made the driver tremble again. However, its tone was no more than a whisper. So how could it reach his ears through such a deafening downpour?

As if to respond in kind, the driver lowered his voice as well, saying, “No, not really. I was just thinking over whether to head down now or to sit the rain out here.”

“And which did you decide upon?” the rider asked, apparently able to catch the driver’s hushed tone as well.

Even as his body melted into warm putty with rapture, the driver felt a chill.

“Well, I’m gonna head on down.”

“That’s the proper choice. Though sitting the rain out here would also be the proper choice.”

“How’s that?”

The voice rang out again, gloomy and gorgeous in the darkness.

“However, there’s an even
better
choice!”

The driver was at a loss for words.

“The passenger in your coach is a young woman, is it not?”

Still nothing from the driver.

“She would’ve arrived at Calico Airfield from the Capital just past noon today. Is that not correct?”

The driver had the feeling he’d been caught up in some awesome fate—a fate gone horribly wrong.

“I should like to confirm her name with you. What does she go by?”

Silence spread. On the road through the pass, with the darkness and the rain.

Yet through it all, a sharp tone replied, “I’m Annette Krishken! Do you have some business with me?”

Before the driver could open his mouth, a trembling voice like a plucking of golden harp strings covered with blood said, “Yes—just as I thought.”

To the driver, the speaker sounded moved nearly to tears.

“I was so excited, I set out before my compatriots and arrived first. I knew out on the plains it would be impossible to miss you. It was in this auspicious spot that long ago our clan discovered Grand Duke Jekyll’s army in a driving rain, striking the first blow and wiping them out. Come to think of it, the hour is nearly the same, and just look at the weather. It must be through divine providence that I can now make the daughter of our nemesis one of our kind in this very place. Woman—descendant of the Krishkens—step down from the coach.”

“Now wait just a minute,” the driver interrupted. The speaker’s words had returned him to his senses. Letting the whip in his right hand lie across his knees, he said, “Just who in the name of hell are you, buster? Since you’ve flat out ignored me, I don’t give a good goddamn about anything you have to say.”

“And you shall stop me?” the voice from the darkness asked with amusement.

“It’s my job to see to it my passenger makes it safely to her destination. Sorry, but as a rule, this is how I deal with thieves, highwaymen, and kidnappers.”

He turned the butt end of the whip toward the source of the voice. A concealed trigger was revealed, and the driver’s finger curled around it and pulled. Though he held the weapon at waist level, long experience guaranteed the accuracy of his aim.

With an impact like a scorching blow from a small dragon, a ball of hot lead was swallowed up into pitch-blackness. The man’s gut. While that wasn’t as lethal as a shot through the heart, ninety-nine times out of a hundred it would take the fight out of an opponent.