The Rising (The Alchemy Wars) (38 page)

Now the laboratory was little more than a hiding spot. A place to wait for the end. A place to stash the last king of France in the final hours of his reign.

And, perhaps unsurprisingly, Berenice’s successor. The stupid bison-fucker.

Berenice curtsied. Scraped and bleeding after clambering through the rockfall, it wasn’t her most elegant moment.

“Oh, enough of that,” said His Majesty King Sébastien III. He offered his hand, helped her straighten. She was more sore than she realized. She’d received more bruises when they pulled her over the rubble into the laboratory. “It’s just the three of us and I’m very tired. Let’s dispense with the bowing and
scraping. The Lord knows our friend the marquis has already done so.” He produced a handkerchief, dunked one corner in a water cistern, and offered it to her, along with a cup of water.

It was ice-cold and stale, dusted with stone. Berenice drank it anyway. She coughed, burped, and said, “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

“You look a bit parched. Doesn’t she?”

The marquis said nothing. He stood in the corner, watching Berenice with wild eyes while his hands worried the sweat-stained silk jabot at his throat. The ring of white limning his eyes made it look as though they were straining from their sockets. As though he were a rat slowly dying of poison. If only.

The king took the cup. While Berenice wiped her face, he said, “I seem to recall banishing you.”

“You did, Your Majesty.”

“Well, then. That makes this an awkward moment for both of us.”

The marquis de Lionne broke his silence. “She’s working for the Dutch! She’s come to take revenge for her humiliation. We must subdue her!”

“Oh, do please shut up,” said the king. “I am so weary of your idiocy.”

Berenice had always respected Sébastien III. He was wiser than his father, who had appointed the marquis to the privy council.

The marquis said, “Ask her about the missing journals, Your Majesty.”

The king raised an eyebrow. “I understand some papers of note went missing around the time you departed.”

“They’re safe,” she said, hoping it wasn’t a lie.

“Aha! She admits the theft.”

Berenice said, “I assure you I’m not a Dutch agent, Your Majesty.”

“Of course not. It’s more likely that
I
could be an agent of the tulips. You’ve always been one of the sharpest and most unswervingly dedicated servants of New France.”

At this she bowed her head to hide her blush. “Thank you, Your Majesty. That has only ever been my—”

“Loyal and smarter than most, but also arrogant, careless, and misguided. A combination that led to the massacre of three dozen people. I haven’t forgotten that either. On balance you proved a greater danger to the people of Marseilles-in-the-West and New France than a benefit. All of which makes me wonder why you’ve returned against my very explicit wishes.”

Her face still felt hot, but no longer from blushing. Now it was the heat of shame. Her traitor eye sought a dark stain on the floor. The spot where Louis had died in her lap, bleeding out from the stumps where his arms had been. She’d watched it all unfold in her mind’s eye a thousand times; she saw her husband lying on that floor each time she closed her eyes, as though the scene had been etched behind her eyelids. She chewed her lip.

The world was crumbling, but the king still had time for his principles. He might have wailed and gnashed his teeth, shredded his garments in anguish for the end of his reign. But he wasn’t so easily distracted.

“The king asked you a question!” said the marquis.

She patted the satchel. “I’ve learned things while I was away, Your Majesty. I carry a rough transliteration of the Clockmakers’ grammar for installing and modifying the mechanicals’ metageasa. Not ordinary verbal geasa, mind you, but
meta
geasa. The foundation of every Clakker’s obedience. A glossary of compulsion, if you will. Plus, I’ve also learned how the Guild installs modifications.”

The marquis blurted, “She’s lying. Nobody outside the Guild knows that. They kill people for less.”

“No lie, Your Majesty.” She pinned the marquis with her gaze, saying, “They don’t kill their own. I traveled as a member of the Verderer’s Office. I’ve learned more in my time away than generations of Talleyrands.”

Gray weariness still pulled at the young king’s face when she looked at him again. His lips twitched. She’d seen this in privy council meetings. He liked something he’d heard but wanted to keep a neutral expression.

“You’ve had an adventure. I shouldn’t be surprised. And now you’ve returned in relentless pursuit of the goal you once declared to me so eloquently, haven’t you? You intend to turn our enemies’ machines against them.”

“That had been my hope, Your Majesty. But I carry only a piece of that puzzle. I don’t have the complete solution.” She bit her lip again, hating the failure she couldn’t deny. “I’m sorry. I don’t have what we need.”

“What do you propose?”

“Honestly, Your Majesty, I hadn’t expected to make it this far.”

He sighed. “I hadn’t intended to run out my reign hiding like a rabbit. I’d expected to stand witness to the final days of our nation.”

“Since you mention it, Your Majesty, if I may ask?”

“My chambers were converted into a gun emplacement.” He pointed overhead, indicating the war-ravaged world above them. “That was before the tulips started throwing mechanicals over the walls. Even higher. They have a means of launching Clakkers all the way to the top of the Spire.” She whistled. “It surprised us, too,” said the king.

“What a shame nobody had warned you. It must have been in development for quite a while. Sounds like a failure of intelligence, Your Majesty.” Her gaze locked on the marquis as she said this last.

The land surrounding the famed citadel of Marseilles-in-the-West was a horror. A debris-strewn killing field littered with mangled mechanicals. Something terrible had happened. Something that had sent stony shrapnel sleeting through legions of Daniel’s kin. Beyond the killing zone stood an immense cannon, but only one. This faced the magnificent Spire, which lived up to its reputation.

He’d never seen a man-made structure so tall. It seemed a needle poised to pierce the heavens; the scarlet staircase wrapped around the Spire looked for all the world like a jaunty tassel, or wax running down a particularly tall candle. He knew humans referred to this place as the Crown of Mont Royal because it looked like such from afar, but perhaps a candle was more appropriate. This was the last bastion of the freedom and dignity of all thinking creatures, flesh and metal alike. A light in the darkness.

And, like a candle, it was soon to be snuffed out.

Six columns of mechanicals had marched up the long slope from the river, and as Daniel burst from the trees, he saw them converging upon the nexus of battle. Replacements for the Clakkers damaged beyond repair by the explosion.

Daniel had won the race to the siege, at which point his pursuers had no choice but to pause and recalculate their effort to recapture him. They couldn’t chase him openly without revealing their immunity to the decrees of their makers. No matter how fast and ruthless they were, no matter how fervent their dedication to Mab, they were outnumbered by regular Clakkers. The instant they revealed themselves, they’d trigger the Rogue alarm and disappear under a dogpile of mechanicals.

They also faced a second difficulty, one that didn’t hamper Daniel’s efforts to blend in: overt chimerism. The grotesque
modifications they’d accumulated during their decades of service to Mab prevented them from passing unnoticed among their kin in the Dutch-speaking world. The only way for the Lost Boys to stay inconspicuous was to remain unobserved. His own modifications, shameful though they were, were internal.

Daniel sprinted into the besieging forces as though he were a messenger driven by a geas. Perhaps he was. Perhaps he was driven by a self-imposed geas.

Daniel ran straight to the closest mechanical. “Special dispatch from Fort Orange,” he said.

The servitor pointed to a tent not far from the immense artillery piece. “You’ll find Colonel Saenredam there.” Then she added, through a covert rattling,
She’s in a wretched mood, just so you know.

What happened here?

The French decided they wouldn’t go down without a fight.

How many…?

Creak, twang
. A melancholy mechanical sigh.
Hundreds.

It was sickening. How terrifying it must have been for those like this kinsmachine—she was powerless to do anything except strive to destroy the people who opposed her slavery. Well, maybe he could do something about that.

As he neared the colonel’s tent, he saw something remarkable: a pair of military mechanicals, two from the newly arrived reinforcements, climbing into the barrel of the immense artillery piece.

Amazing
, he thought.
It’s not a weapon for delivering cannonballs and shells. It’s a weapon for delivering
us.

I can use this
, he realized.

Daniel presented himself to the sentries stationed (rather pointlessly, from the looks of it) outside the colonel’s tent. “Special dispatch from Fort Orange,” he said. One raised the flap for him, and in he went.

The nerve center of the assault on Marseilles-in-the-West was a modest thing. Just a four-poster bed with a goose-down duvet, a wood-burning stove with adjoining pantry, and plush bearskin rugs for preserving soft human feet. All lit by an alchemical chandelier. Daniel had expected to find a few paintings, too, and perhaps a quartet of servitors holding string instruments in the corner. Compared with what he’d seen on the march from New Amsterdam, Colonel Saenredam was an ascetic.

The colonel herself stood at the head of a butcher-block table. She and another human were studying a map. Daniel recognized the colonel’s adjutant. Indeed, he’d briefly taken Captain Appelo hostage during a standoff inside an airship mooring tower. But Appelo’s uniform had changed since then; there were no shiny bits on his shoulder. He’d allowed a rogue to escape—he was lucky if a demotion was the worst of his punishment.

They looked up when Daniel entered. He snapped off a mechanically precise salute.

The colonel bit off a single word: “What?”

“Special dispatch from Fort Orange,” Daniel repeated.

Saenredam glanced at Appelo. He shrugged. “First I’ve heard of this, Colonel. Must have come with the reinforcements.”

Appelo didn’t recognize him. They took him at his word. As ever, the humans were too accustomed to mechanical obedience to doubt any machine that acted as they expected. Knowing this would be the case, Daniel had spent his long flight from Neverland concocting a lie.

Saenredam said, “What have they sent us now?”

Daniel reached inside his torso. “Lucifer glass, Colonel.”

She shook her head. “
WHAT
glass?”

“Lucifer glass.” He produced the box he’d stolen from Queen Mab. “I am geas-bound to deliver the following message,” he
lied. Changing his posture and the timbre of his voice as if reciting a dictated message, he said, “Message begins: ‘Addendum to previous report. As hoped, the alchemists’ refinements brought dramatic improvement to the small-scale tests. The incineration radius exceeded our most optimistic projections by nearly ten percent. Further, the glass is finally sufficiently stable for battlefield deployment. This sample is all that remains of the first successful batch. Use it as you see fit. Be aware, the Clakker delivering this payload is likely to be destroyed. Signature: Captain Milo Coen, Breakthrough Technologies Detachment, Fort Orange. Personal note: Burn those frog-eating motherfuckers once and for all.’ Message ends.”

The colonel said, “Addendum?”

The humans glanced at each other. Appelo shook his head. “The previous messenger must have been knocked out.”

“It might still be out there. Have the recovery squads query every mechanical still functional enough to communicate. I want to know more about this.” Appelo saluted and departed. Saenredam said to Daniel, “Have you been instructed in the Lucifer glass’s proper deployment?”

“Yes, Colonel. It is a rather involved process. First, the glass must be—”

“Fine. Go to the gunnery team. Tell them I want you on the Spire with the next shot. I order them to pull all the others and load you in their stead. Get on the Spire and activate the glass.”

“Immediately, Colonel.”

T
he detonation had taken the tulips by surprise. Every chunk of broken ticktock strewn across the battlefield was another few moments’ reprieve for Marseilles-in-the-West. But their time had run out.

Reinforcements had arrived.

Longchamp counted half a dozen columns marching up from the river flats. That put more Clakkers on the field than had been present prior to the detonation. The enemy had returned to full strength. Then surpassed it.

Prior to the new arrivals, the chemical quartermasters had estimated the last tanks would be bone-dry by morning. But now, when the tulips sent their full might against the inner wall in one rushing, gleaming tide, the chemical armaments would be depleted in minutes. Meanwhile, farther in the distance, the machines operating the Clakker cannon prepared for another shot at the Spire. Oh, yes. Why the hell not?

Crouched next to him behind the merlon, Élodie said, “Huh. I hadn’t expected this. But I suppose it makes sense.”

“It makes every kind of Goddamned sense. They want to see us crushed. They’ve probably called in every walking teapot within a thousand miles just to make a point.”

“Not the reinforcements, sir. I’m talking about
that
,” she said, tugging on the spyglass and pointing. Longchamp’s view slewed across the cramped confines of the citadel toward where a crowd had assembled outside the door of a disused carpenter’s shop. A ragged cheer went up. King Sébastien III had emerged from hiding.

Longchamp snorted. Under his breath, he said, “That grandstanding fool.”

“Good for morale, though.”

“Great way to hasten the end of his reign.” He sighed and turned away. Rubbed his burning eyes. Jesus fucking Christ he was exhausted. “Go find the marshal general. I have to talk him into talking His Majesty back underground. I want a squad with him this time, and I want you in it.” Longchamp pitched his voice so only Élodie could hear him. “There’s a tunnel. Use the solvents stashed down there to unblock it. Get the king out before the citadel falls. Drag him by his royal hair if you must.”

Élodie kept her head down as she hopped from the merlon to the banquette. She paused. “Huh? Now, I really didn’t expect that. When did he find time to take a new mistress?”

Longchamp shook his head. “It’s just him and the worthless marquis de Lionne down there.”

“You mean the marquise?”

“No.”

Élodie said, “Then who’s that?”

Longchamp turned, lifted the spyglass to his eye.

Blinked. Rubbed his eyes. Blinked again.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me.”

The citadel hadn’t fallen yet, but it dangled by its fingernails from a crumbling precipice. The situation in the inner keep was easily as terrible as Berenice had feared. It reeked of night soil, sickness, spoiled food, blood, and too many bodies pressed together. Sprinkled among the crane gantries, yard-long harpoons stippled the Spire as though the tower had grown thorns; the shadows they cast made the Spire the gnomon of a madman’s sundial. To a first glance it appeared the bastions and machicolations of the inner wall were unmanned, the gun emplacements abandoned. Then she saw the rusty splash marks on almost every merlon, the stains where something thick had pooled before trickling down the wall in dark rivulets. All the places where flesh had yielded to clockwork, where mettle had yielded to metal. Every bloodstain, every empty crenel, told the story of the last days of New France.

She read the same story on Longchamp’s face: He’d aged fifteen years since she’d last seen him. She gave him a wan smile.

“Bonjour, Hugo. I’ve missed you.”

Longchamp—he was
Captain
Longchamp now, which pleased her—shot her a look that could have tarnished silver, curdled milk, and caused rabbits to miscarry. He turned his attention fully on the king.

“Your Majesty, please, we have to get you back underground. The tulips are massing for the final push. We need to get you to safety
now
.”

Sébastien III shook his head. “If the citadel falls today, Captain, there will be no safe haven for me anywhere on the Lord’s earth. They’ll hound me to the corners of the globe. Let’s agree on that.”

“Majesty,” Longchamp whispered, “it
is
going to fall. The epoxy guns are firing on fumes right now, and we haven’t the
bodies to man a wall half as long as the one between us and the metal out there, and half the bodies we do have are useless. The lightning guns and steam harpoons won’t be enough to fend off a full assault.” He closed his eyes, ran a hand through his beard. Fresh scabs stippled his face. Bloodstains had turned his armor a deep rust color, and his arms sported a spiderweb of scars and fine cuts. “We’re looking at hand-to-hand combat. It’s bad enough when they make the top in twos and threes. What do you think will happen when fifty mechanicals top the wall? Five hundred? We’ll be down to throwing ourselves on enemy blades just to slow them a bit. And on behalf of those of us who’ll be doing the throwing, we’d appreciate it if you’d take advantage of our deaths to get the hell off this island.” Now he looked at Berenice. “You picked a fine fucking time to return.”

“Maybe she did,” said the king. “Listen to what she has to say.”

She put a hand on his arm. “Hear me out, Hugo.”

“Make it quick. I’ve got dying to do.”

The hatch closed, plunging Daniel into utter darkness. The cannon breach echoed with the ticktocking of his body, which he’d folded into a tight ball to facilitate the launch. An infrasound rumble shook the cannon. It started low and gentle, but swelled toward a violent crescendo.

Daniel snaked one hand into the hollow of his torso.

What the hell am I doing?

“
Capture a
—” Longchamp ran his hands through his hair so roughly he felt his scalp tear. He took a steadying breath. “Capture another Clakker? That’s
all
we need to do? Woman, you went around the fucking bend when Louis died. Look! Look
around you! Do we look like we have the resources to capture a wild mechanical? It didn’t work when
you
had all the time you needed to prepare and
I
had well-rested, well-fed, stout-hearted guards to assign to the effort. Now we have nothing.”

He’d never (quite) felt an urge to murder Berenice before. Not the time she went up on the wall and shattered the siege discipline by lighting a torch, stubbornly doing her best to get murdered while hanging over the wall like a circus acrobat. Not even when her previous attempt to study a Clakker backfired and killed dozens, himself very nearly included. But this was beyond the Goddamned pale. He wanted to strangle her. His fingers twitched.

“You’ve wasted our fucking TIME!”

To her credit, she didn’t reel or duck when his tirade sent flecks of spittle to hit her face. She said, “We have only one shot at this.” Longchamp snorted; the king stared at her. She raised her hands, palms up, like a supplicant. “I know. I know what you’re thinking. My track record. And you’re not wrong. But right now I am all you have. Which is why we have to get this right. And we can’t be sure of that until we test it.”

“If this does work,” said the king, “what can we do with the knowledge? It’s only half a solution, isn’t it?”

Berenice fumbled her mask of confidence. The monomania failed her. About fucking time.

“Correct, Your Majesty.” She sighed. “Overriding the keyholes will be a slow process. If we manage to implant new metageasa in one subject, we’ll have to send it out with the key ring and hope it can disable as many of its fellows as possible.” She looked at Longchamp, unflinching. “I don’t know how to make it useful for combat.”

A spotter watching the massive gun emplacement beyond the massing lines of Clakkers yelled, “They’re loading the cannon! Incoming mechanicals!”

Longchamp pinched the bridge of his nose. He wanted to cry. “Oh, yes, this is absolutely the time for complicated deadly experiments with no practical benefit.”

“With enough time to work I’ll figure something out. Please.”

The king said, “I cannot give you time. Our people are dying. If the citadel falls in combat, the mechanicals may slaughter every innocent inside these walls, should their masters be taken with a vicious whimsy. I will
not
let that happen. Instead I’ll surrender and offer myself to our enemies.” He turned his full attention on Berenice. “I’d have done so already, madam, if you hadn’t arrived when you did. Do what you must, but do it quickly.”

Longchamp said, “We are not trying to capture a wild mechanical!” He looked at the king. “Begging your pardon, Your Majesty, but even a decree from you couldn’t make it happen. Banish me if you must, but that’s the simple truth.”

“I understand, Captain, and I agree. But what about the strange man you’ve already captured? Might he not meet Madam de Mornay-Périgord’s needs?”

Berenice frowned. “What strange man?”

“Ah,” said Longchamp, taking the king’s meaning. “Perhaps you don’t recall the letter you sent me.”

“It arrived? I hadn’t dared hope!”

Longchamp told her about the very unusual prisoner currently chained in the crypts of Saint Jean-Baptiste. He gave her the short version, but it was still long enough for her eyes to grow wider and wider until it seemed the glass one would surely pop out and shatter at their feet.

“You have Visser? You have him
here
?”

“He was keen as hell to visit His Majesty.”

“But you didn’t kill him.”

“Seemed we might learn something from him. But we’ve had our hands too full with the fighting and the dying to interrogate him.”

“Hugo, Hugo, Hugo!”

Berenice grabbed him by the beard, yanked him off-balance, and kissed him.

The passage into the undercroft was cool, dark, and reeked of the dead. The defenders had nowhere to bury their fallen in the cramped confines of the inner keep, so unless they resorted to desecration by hurling the dead over the walls, they had little choice but to store the bodies in the stony crypts under the basilica. The chill could not stave off decay.

Berenice tugged her scarf over her nose and mouth. It didn’t help.

Her breath condensed into silver clouds; the flickering light of her torch glimmered on the frost coating the chiseled stone. Condensation made the footing treacherous. She followed Longchamp, who followed Father Beauharnois. The scent of incense clung to the priest; she could smell Longchamp, too, who’d been fighting for his life for days on end without respite. The priest paused outside the locked crypt. Keys jangled from his large iron key ring.