Rias made it to the gates ahead of the marines, and Tikaya trailed close behind. The twenty-foot-tall wooden doors stood open, offering no sign that the fort had been attacked, but two men lay dead at their guard post. At least, Tikaya assumed they were men.
She thought the night spent with the corpses in Wolfhump would have inured her to death, but these were worse. Blisters and burns had seared flesh and muscle to the bone, mutilating the marines beyond recognition. Pustules even coated the bloated, protruding tongues. The eyes had popped like blisters themselves.
She was glad she had not had lunch.
Agarik caught up and walked between them. Sweat dampened his face too. “This way, sir, ma’am. Captain said it’s all right to let you go first.”
Tikaya snorted. As far as she could tell, the shackles meant little to Rias and it seemed he had already determined that he was going in first, captain’s wishes notwithstanding.
Inside the fort, snow had been plowed into piles, so they unstrapped their snowshoes. Sand coated the icy cement. Agarik led Rias and Tikaya past wooden barracks, office buildings, and a couple of cavernous vehicle structures that housed plows, trucks, and other steam-powered transports. If not for the silence and the dead men, she would have guessed it a normal work day at the fort. People had been caught on errands, while practicing combat in an arena, and, in one spot, driving a snow plow that had subsequently crashed into a barracks building. No smoke wafted from the stack, but Tikaya paused to open the furnace door. The fire had gone out, but when she removed a glove and stuck her hand inside, a hint of heat remained in the ashes.
“ People were alive here, no more than a day or two ago,” she said.
But Rias, following on Agarik’s heels, had gone on and did not seem to hear her. His head was tilted back, and she followed his gaze. A two-story office building rose ahead, a large corner of its roof sheered off. Splintered wood and sheet metal roofing shingles scattered the cement around a sleek black cylindrical object embedded in the walkway. Tikaya’s step slowed. It was made from the same material as the artifact in Wolfhump.
She joined the men around the rubble. The landing had not dented or even scraped the cylinder, though it had gouged a hole in the cement, and jagged cracks radiated in several directions. Strips opened like flower petals on one end of the device, and dozens of square indentations lined the insides.
Rias produced one of the cubes and slid it into a slot. It clicked. Perfect fit.
“ The delivery mechanism,” he said.
Bocrest and a couple others approached, though the captain had the sense to keep most of his men from trampling around the artifact. He sent them off to secure the fort with a few terse orders, then stepped closer.
“ What is that thing?” Glass crunched under his foot.
“ Careful.” Rias flung a hand up. “If some of the cubes didn’t release their contents in the air, stepping on a full one could be deadly. For us all.”
For once, Bocrest had nothing sarcastic to say. He gulped, lifted his boot, looked around, like he might set it somewhere else, then decided it was safer back where it had started.
“ In the air?” Tikaya asked. “You don’t think this is like the device in Wolfhump? Something that distributes its deadly load from the ground?”
“ No,” Rias said. “I think it’s a rocket.”
The only rockets Tikaya was familiar with involved fireworks, though she supposed Turgonians might have experimented with more sophisticated fuel-powered projectiles. Rias had studied ballistics in school, after all.
It took a moment for the ramifications to sink in. Tikaya’s eyes widened when they did. “If this is a rocket, that means someone fired it, someone with the knowledge to do so.”
“ Yes,” Rias said grimly.
Tikaya stared at the artifact. Was it possible the original builders were still around? Or-she eyed runes running down one side-had someone already been in the tunnels and translated the ancient language? Such strong disappointment flooded her that she sank to her knees. Surely she had not asked for this gruesome mission, but all along there had been the promise of being the first to translate a previously unknown language and share it with the world. A feat that would earn her a place in the history books.
Rias knelt beside her and put a hand on her good shoulder. “Are you all right?”
Aware of the others, she said, “Yes, just tired.”
“ Nurians,” Bocrest growled. “Those cussed Nurians are responsible, have to be.”
Rias arched inquiring eyebrows at Tikaya. She guessed his question and nodded permission.
“ I don’t think it’s them, at least nothing sanctioned by their government.” Rias explained the orders he and Tikaya had found on board the Nurian ship.
“ Then who?” Bocrest demanded.
“ The Turgonians have many enemies,” Rias said.
Bocrest tugged off his cap and scrubbed his short steely hair. “This whole slag pile is giving me a headache.”
“ There’s something else to consider,” Rias said, tone grim. “We haven’t hidden our approach to this fort, so it’s very possible whoever did this knows we’re here.”
CHAPTER 12
Tikaya sat cross-legged next to the rocket and finished copying the runes into her journal. Coldness seeped through her trousers to numb her backside, and shivers made her pencil hand shake. As if writing with gloves on was not bad enough. She ought to move somewhere warmer. But, oh, there was another symbol she recognized from the table of elements. And interesting how each grouping on the rocket held thirteen runes. Could the different prime clusters alter the meaning of-
Light splashed across her pages, and Tikaya dropped her pencil.
Agarik stood beside her, holding a lantern. Only then did she realize twilight had descended on the fort.
“ Thank you,” she said. “When did you leave to get that? And where’d everyone else go?”
He stared. “You didn’t notice people coming and going, ma’am? Talking? Arguing?”
“ Er.” She vaguely remembered Rias saying something about finding surveying tools. “Not really.”
“ Half the men are retrieving corpses for a funeral pyre while half are off on a mission Five concocted. Looking for people who might have died outside the fort and searching for more cubes and recording where they landed. Seeing how it’s night, that sounds about as fun as hunting for a wrench in a scrapyard. He says he can figure out where the rocket was launched from, though, and Bocrest wants it done tonight, so he can take a team up there at first light.”
In case someone was up there preparing another weapon to launch at the fort. Yes, that seemed wise.
Tikaya rose, an awkward movement with her shoulder in a sling, and her injury twinged despite her care. A noisy yawn escaped her lips. She thought of her bed back home, though right now she would be tickled with a blanket in front of a fireplace.
Agarik’s jaw dropped in a noisy yawn of his own.
“ Sorry,” Tikaya said. “Are you tasked with watching me again?”
“ I don’t mind, ma’am. Of the jobs I could be assigned, it’s not a bad one.”
Men crossed a nearby courtyard, lantern light bobbing at their feet. They worked in grim silence, bringing wood for a fire. She looked away as others dragged a body from a building and laid it at the end of a grisly queue.
Though tempted to ask Agarik about sleeping arrangements, Tikaya wanted to search the fort for other language clues first. If the marines feared an attack imminent, they might march out at dawn. Somewhere, she hoped to find an artifact she could slip into her rucksack to take home for study-and to prove to her people this nightmare had been real.
“ Mind if we find the fort commander’s office?” she asked.
“ I don’t think the captain wants you wandering around.”