The news was an irritation. More important was his bloodied, helpless son. Eyes fixed on King, he said, “As I told you and everybody else. Shoot the slayer’s damned ship.”
“It’s very maneuverable, sir. And we’re short of gunners.”
“It’s no warship,” the Archon said. “Kill it, and the coronas forget about us.”
The crewman nodded, saluted, and ran out the door with his hat.
Diamond’s chewed hand was half-healed. He grabbed the hilt of the sword with both hands, lifting the tip off the floor.
The cannon under them fired again, seven fast rounds followed by nothing. None of the Ruler’s guns were firing, and the captain had given up trying to maneuver, the engines running hard and straight now.
The Archon decided this was good news. He smiled and let himself breathe deeply, some of the original smugness shaping his face. Looking at Diamond, he said, “I suppose Merit was trying to lure the coronas out of their house.”
“He is,” Diamond said. “Father told me his plan.”
“What exactly did he tell you?”
Diamond looked at the strong blade and the bright sharp edge. “While you were chasing me, my father’s men chopped the special lights out of the dead corona and tied them to a slayer ship. I don’t know how, but those dead lights can be made to shine again.”
The Archon nodded, and then he began to speak again.
And Diamond swung the sword. He didn’t think that he could, but he got the blade into the air and turned his entire body around once before the tip dropped again.
The Archon and bodyguard reflexively jumped back.
Diamond swung a second time, driving the hard steel into the middle of the tall darkened pane.
But the glass was thick and far too strong to break.
“Except Merit’s scheme is finished,” the Archon told him, finding a good sharp smile. “Drop your weapon, son.”
“I’m not,” Diamond said.
“What’s that?”
“Your son,” he said.
Then the cannon beneath them fired twice, and after a pause, it threw one more shell into the air.
Several voices shouted from the ceiling tube at once, no word making sense.
Suddenly the Archon felt less certain about everything.
The bodyguard was standing beside the injured man. Relieved, he said, “Just a blow to the head, by the looks. I think he’s coming around.”
“This boy is what matters,” said the Archon.
The guard came around the chair. He finally saw King lying on his back, fighting to breathe, and the man opened his mouth and said nothing and closed his mouth again.
Boots ran in the hallway. A uniformed crewman appeared in the open door, his scared face visible in profile.
“Status?” said the Archon.
But the crewman was racing for the stern.
“Status!” the Archon shouted.
The third bodyguard appeared. He was sweating too, pain more than any terror responsible. He came into the doorway and tipped himself against the jamb, blood seeping through his bandages and his face pale as milk.
“That little fletch is too close,” he said.
“What does that mean?” asked the Archon.
“It means that the asshole is near enough to kiss,” said the crippled man. “Fire again, and we’ll cut our own guide wires and likely puncture our bladders too.”
“This is madness,” the Archon said.
Nobody else spoke.
“Why would the man put the boy at risk?” He looked at Diamond and tried a smile. “What else is planned?”
Again, Diamond swung at the window.
The glass shook but held, and the Archon watched him. Recognition came into that narrow plain face, bringing doubt and amazement and a sturdy capacity to do nothing, not quite believing what he knew to be true.
Several cannons started firing from the ship’s stern.
The healthy guard thought that was good news. “Merit’s getting punched now,” he said.
But the crippled man just shook his head. “Those are long shots. Don’t you know anything? We’re shooting at the coronas, now that they’re nipping at our tail feathers.”
“Both of you, shut up,” the Archon said.
The men fell silent.
Turning to the healthy guard, he said, “Grab the child. Now. We’re going to the hanger, to the escape ship.”
The guard took a wary step toward Diamond, and then he paused.
Talking to the crippled man, the Archon said, “Stay here with King. When he’s strong enough, come join us.”
“I can carry your son now,” the healthy guard volunteered.
“No, he has to save himself . . . after trying this crap . . . ”
King laid still, armored eyes closed tight.
Looking at his new hand and the long steel blade, Diamond marshaled his strength for one more swing.
The guard took another step toward him.
“I told you to grab him,” the Archon said.
“But he’s got that sword.”
“You think the baby’s dangerous?”
“He put your son down. That’s some kind of power.”
Furious, the Archon said, “You have a gun. Shoot him. A bullet in the chest and you carry him like a sack.”
The guard looked down at his pistol, apparently surprised to find it waiting in his hand.
Diamond lifted the sword and spun, ready to try another desperate whack at the window. But he didn’t have time. The guard lifted the pistol. King was still flat on the floor. Then the guard started to aim, and King moved. Furious and swift and nearly silent, he reached for the guard’s hand and the gun. Diamond hit the window once more, accomplishing nothing. The guard’s wrist shattered with a hard crack, and the man crumbled and screamed, and King was standing over him, the pistol inside his strange hand.
The Archon shouted, “No.”
He told the guard in the doorway, “Shoot both of them.”
“I could try doing that,” the crippled man replied. “Or I could do nothing and finish out this damned awful day.”
King turned to Diamond, and the one mouth asked, “So what’s the rest of your father’s plan?”
“I jump and he catches me.”
“What if he misses?”
“A corona eats me, and Father spends the rest of his life hunting for that corona and for me.”
King’s mouths made different little sounds, and then he turned to stare at the Archon, saying nothing. For a long moment he was as still as any statue. Then he said, “Save myself,” and the pistol lifted. King aimed carefully and pulled the trigger and six bullets struck the glass, ricocheting wildly across the suite. But the seventh bullet pierced the pane, cracks spreading out from the center.
Once again, Diamond swung the sword, and this time shards of heavy glass tumbled free of the airship, and the sword followed the glass downwards, spinning fast as one boy leaped into that chaos, plunging toward the late day sun.
SIXTEEN
Diamond was on his back, flattened against the roaring air, waiting to be scared. He promised himself to act brave when the terror grabbed him, crying a little maybe but with the stiff-faced resolve of a wooden soldier. Except he wasn’t scared. Not so much. He felt safer while falling than when he was standing with King and the Archon. And what surprised him even more, he was comfortable. A warm wind blew up into him, and nothing was touching him, and the airship was slowly growing smaller while the little fletch flew just beneath it. The fletch’s belly looked as if it was burning, bright purple flames flowing around stubborn patches of blackness. Diamond’s skin seemed to be dipped in the same rich purple. Both ships were pressing ahead, desperate to leave him behind, but they still felt close. Only a few moments had passed since he jumped free. And now the flames weakened and then dissolved, save for one stubborn blotch that meant nothing. Diamond’s father had taught him today: to coronas, significances were carried by a light’s patterns and rhythms, and even more so, by the intricate darkness between.