“What, trying to murder me?”
Charra shifted so she was behind his back, hand on the hilt of her sword. Layla tested the edge of a knife. He didn’t seem to care.
“Yes.” At least he wasn’t hypocritical enough to try to couch it in prettier terms. “The Archmagus instructed me that a sacrifice might be necessary for the greater good. Whatever sort of degenerate you are, you did save us in the Boneyards. I apologize.”
“Worthless,” I said. “We both know you’d do it again in a heartbeat. Take your apology and shove it up your arse.”
“I see there is no reasoning with you. I shall not persevere.”
“Finally,” I said, mocking a cheer, “some good news!” Something prickled my senses, a vibration on the air. “Hsst – do you hear that?”
“Is that coming from Lust?” he said, brow furrowed.
A muffled whine from the titan’s insides grew into a thrumming shriek of barely-constrained power.
“Er, perhaps we should move?” Martain said, staring at the thing. By that point Charra, Layla and I were already in full retreat.
A heat haze shimmered around Lust. It rose with a hiss of steam and clank of metal, looming above the tenements. Massive as the war engine was, it was dwarfed by the mountain of flesh and bone flowing towards us. Undaunted, it tore its massive sword from the earth and took a single ponderous stride towards the Magash Mora, testing its balance, and then another, each step a small earthquake. It picked up speed and began ploughing straight towards its target, carts, bodies and buildings crushed beneath anvil tread.
Without the terror of battle to distract me, the waves of agony radiating from Lynas’ mind were threatening to pull me into madness. All I wanted to do was claw my eyes out to get to the source of the pain and tear it from my skull. I’d thought I was prepared for it this time. I was wrong, but with the thrill of magic singing through my body it had become a perverse union of pleasure and pain that proved bearable. Just.
We followed the trail of devastation left by the titan. If killing that fleshy abomination wasn’t the only way to ease the pain, the only way to let Lynas rest, then I might have laughed at myself. Me, acting like a sodding hero. Ha! Even if I made for a poor one, it was ludicrous. In the end it came down to a simple animal truth: fight or flight, and I’d had a gutful of flight – ten long years of it.
Martain drifted closer to me. I brandished Dissever and glared. He got the message. He looked cast adrift and confused, and rightly terrified. “What now?” he said, voice lifeless.
“We let Lust tear it a new arsehole, and if needs be we ram ourselves up there and cut out its heart.” I hoped the titan would do all the work for us but I never relied on anything as ephemeral as hopes and dreams.
Whatever else I thought of him, Martain didn’t whine and snivel or try to run. Perhaps it was loyalty induced by the Forging, but to my chagrin I suspected that it was just a man making a hard decision. The right decision. If the titan failed then nobody else would be mad enough to try to save this dark and dangerous cesspit of a city by diving in to headbutt death.
The other magi were doing their best to incinerate chunks of flesh and bone but it was nowhere near enough. With the creature’s resistance to magic they couldn’t hope to destroy such a vast bulk while the strongest artefacts the Arcanum possessed were buried deep below the ruins of the Templarum Magestus.
Lust crashed straight through an already-listing tenement and waded deeper into the warrens. Shoals of terrified people parted before it, fleeing their homes. Packs of armed looters and Skallgrim infiltrators were overwhelmed and trampled underneath the feet of the terrified mob. The shattered bodies of a dozen families who’d hid behind barred doors lay amongst the ruins, blood winding in little rivulets through the dirt. A dog with a broken leg whined and licked a dusty hand jutting from a pile of broken beams and stone. I lowered my head and ran on, avoiding tendrils of warped flesh that wormed through the debris. The dog yelped once and then fell silent. I shuddered and detoured to avoid another questing tendril.
Earth and sky burned as the Arcanum assault reached its climax. We passed through a ruined intersection choked with bodies. Breda ceased her sobbing.
Martain held her close. “Are you well?”
The girl’s eyes were bleak. “I am well enough to do my duty,” she said. “For my brother.”
Martain’s reply was blotted out by a droning horn blast from the titan, louder than a thousand trumpets.
The massive sword began cranking upwards as the ancient war engine closed on the Magash Mora. Outlying worms of flesh latched onto metal feet and began crawling upwards. The titan didn’t shudder to a stop, drained of all magic; instead it looked down and the seething magic in its eyes bubbled over to blast the ground with liquid fire. Flesh that ate the Arcanum’s magic charred and died, smoke and ash billowing into the air. I was shocked, was this ancient Escharric magic? Or was it artificer alchemy beyond anything Setharis had ever dreamed of? The titan resumed its advance, leaving flaming footprints in its wake.
“Breda, stay close,” Martain said, holding her tight. “Can you do that for me?” The girl was terrified, but she fought it down, loosed a shuddering breath, and nodded. He patted her on the shoulder. “Let us watch the titan end this.” His words lacked conviction.
The five of us chased after the metal giant, the sanctors in the lead. All around us the Magash Mora’s appendages burrowed through debris and crept through windows. The closer I came to Lynas’ flesh the greater the pain in my head became. It sizzled like a red-hot nail in my skull.
Charra limped beside me, barely keeping pace as I puffed and panted down a ruined alleyway. Layla had no such problems, eyes darting to every window and doorway checking for threats. She gaped in amazement at the armoured bulk of the titan ahead of us. “I had thought those old stories about the statues were just stupid legends.”
Old? I guessed most adult Docklanders lived, what, into their thirtieth or fortieth year? That would make it about eight or nine generations since the titans had last walked. An age to them, but not so long to the mind of a magus. The gulf between them and me widened.
“Would you care to explain why are we running towards that monster and not away?” Charra said.
“You don’t get to come,” I said. “There is nothing you can do to hurt it.”
“We can kick your head in, old man,” Layla replied. “You fight like a drunken oaf so don’t dare try that with us. I could take you both at once so it should be me that goes. I have trained for years to fight and kill. What is the point if I run away from this, when my skills are needed most?”
“I’m not going to kick it in the head,” I said. “You two will be in our way. Layla, if I needed somebody offed I would ask you in a heartbeat, but only magi can fight something like this.” And more importantly, I need to keep you both safe.
Layla shook her head. “But, I–”
“I don’t have time to debate,” I shouted. “Cut your way out of the city if you can, or hide deep underground if you can’t. There is an entrance to the catacombs below the Collegiate if those tunnels survived the collapse of the Templarum Magestus. Gather what food, drink and oil you can find and stay down there as long as you can.” Charra started to protest but I cut her off and rattled out directions. “If you don’t go now then I’ll force you. You know I can do it.”
We locked gazes. She was seething. “You swear to the gods that we would be of no use?” she said, looking up, and up, at the mountain of flesh. It was close, and the smoke was thin enough to make out individual faces amongst the revolting mass looming over the Warrens.