Gavin swept Karris into a huge hug immediately. Relief.
Karris's body was stiff, her arms still at her sides, either shocked or repulsed, Kip couldn't tell. Then, slowly, the stiffness in her arms and shoulders seemed to melt by degrees. Her arms were moving, coming up to Gavin's back to return the embrace.
Then Gavin saw Kip. Surprise. He released Karris, said something.
Karris's open hand cracked across Gavin's cheek.
Gavin's hands turned up. What did I say?
But Karris was storming off, not answering.
Gavin looked from her to Kip to the unfinished barge behind him. Threw his hands down. Kip could swear he heard the curse all the way from here. He wanted to shrink into himself. It was like he'd just seen his parents fighting. All he wanted was to be gone.
He turned toward the city. His vision was still intensely focusing on one thing at a time, losing the wholes for the parts. The lightsickness. He knew it was an army there in front of him, but he only saw this man checking the fuse on his matchlock; this one with half of his mustache burned off fiddling with his musket's ramrod, spinning it in its rest; this man with his plug bayonet out, using it as a back-scratcher and joking with his comrades as if he were totally unafraid, while his tight, dead eyes told otherwise; this man talking nonstop while no one paid him any attention.
Kip looked over empty slips at the dock. Not a single ship left. Even the smallest dory was gone. Almost on the dock parallel to theirs, he saw a huge swarthy man chased down and surrounded by a dozen Mirrormen. Something defiant was written in the man's stance, but the Mirrormen had muskets on him from every angle.
Ironfist.
"Have I gone mad or is that Commander Ironfist?" Kip asked.
"Sir?" a man standing next to Kip's horse asked.
"Move!" Kip shouted. "Move!" With a few curses, the men parted for him.
"Kip! What are you doing?" Corvan Danavis shouted. From his angle, he couldn't see Ironfist.
Kip barely heard him. He dug his heels into the horse and held on for dear life. Breaking free of hundreds of nervous men, the horse ran. Kip was tossed around like a sack of pomegranates being crushed to juice and seeds. The horse galloped along the edge of the docks, going in the right general direction-but it wasn't slowing down. Kip pulled hard on the reins, but the horse had its bit in its teeth. And it wasn't letting go.
The Mirrormen saw Kip coming and yelled. A few had time to discharge shots. Kip swore a musket ball licked his ear with a hot tongue.
I am the stupidest person I have ever met. As the horse streaked toward Ironfist and his captors, still not slowing, Kip kicked his feet free of the stirrups and jumped out of the saddle, diving for the Mirrormen.
Whatever he'd done before with all the green luxin that had cushioned everything-this time he didn't do it. He missed the Mirrormen and hit the ground hard, flipping over and over, smacking his cracked, burned left hand hard against something. It felt like fire traced through every joint in his hand. He smacked his head, skidded on his back, clothes tangling him up, and tried to stand.
He was facing the city. There was no one that direction. He turned toward Commander Ironfist, got his feet tangled, fell. Caught himself with his left hand. Tears sprang out of his eyes unbidden. Agony.
"No!" Ironfist screamed.
Kip was tottering on one knee, dizzy, propped up only by his shrieking left hand. He wanted to fall on his back, show these men he wasn't a threat, beg them not to hurt him.
I spend more time on my back than a rent girl. Enough.
One of the men had his bayonet fixed. He was stepping toward Kip. Kip pushed himself up-off his left hand. The fire of pain shot up his arm.
Kip just pointed his ruined left hand at the Mirrorman and made that fire shoot back down, propping himself up on his good hand. Flame roared out and engulfed the man. He baked, his mirror armor useless.
Staggering to his feet, Kip threw more and more fire into the guards. And then he found out why Corvan had said he wouldn't want to draft for a month when you were lightsick. His stomach boiled; he puked.
He couldn't keep his feet. The dizziness and nausea dropped him like he'd been cut off at the knees. His stomach cramped so hard he bent in half, curling into a fetal position, still puking, splattering vomit on his own pants.
Once again, Kip the Charging White Knight manages to do nothing.
He was dead. He knew he had to be dead. The men had been charging at him and he'd killed at least one of them. They should have killed him by now.
"Let go of the rest of the luxin. It'll make you sick again, but it's better, I promise. Now, boy! I can't carry you and draft at the same time!"
"Ironfist?"
Kip cracked his eyes open, saw dead men scattered around and Ironfist standing over him, his fists bearing spikes of bloodied blue luxin. Ironfist had cuts and dried blood and powder burns everywhere. He wore blue spectacles close to his eyes, the earpieces tied tight around the back of his head. His ghotra had been knocked off his head, and his hair was singed on one side. How had the man gotten away after commandeering a cannon? Surely the whole of King Garadul's army had fallen on him.
Nonetheless, here he was. Bruised, exhausted, injured, but not so hurt that he couldn't save Kip one more time.
"Now!" Ironfist demanded. "I'm lightsick myself. I know what I'm asking!"
Kip let go of the rest of the luxin and threw up again, his insides heaving, all of his viscera trying to rush out of his mouth.
But then, miraculously, he did feel better. Almost able to stand. Ironfist grabbed the shoulder of his shirt and lifted him bodily to his feet.
"Idiot boy, I did all this to save you, and you nearly throw it away. What the hell were you thinking?"
But Kip was in no state to answer.
He was staring at the army, back on the other dock.
Orholam's balls.
A full-scale battle was being waged just two hundred paces away. Perhaps a hundred soldiers and drafters were holding the dock against thousands of soldiers and dozens of drafters. The confined space was all that kept Gavin's men from being overwhelmed. The front lines were a mess of bayonets and swords, a few spears and hoes and scythes and long-handled orange limb shears and magic being thrown and blocked each way. Behind the front lines, Gavin and some other drafters were just finishing the last barge, unable to join the fighting because their drafting talents were needed for shipbuilding.
The mass of invaders was pushing Gavin's men steadily backward, their sheer weight unstoppable. To Kip, it looked like they were already too late. And he was still sick, still dizzy, still feeling stronger than ever in his life, torn between wanting to lie down and feeling like he needed to go running or he would burn up.
"Follow me," Ironfist said. "Stay as close as you can. It doesn't float for long."
With no more explanation-float? what was floating?-Ironfist ran straight off the side of the dock, one hand spraying blue luxin out in a wide stream.
Kip followed, charging down the slick surface, holding his pants tight in his left hand and praying he didn't fall. The blue path dove off the end of the dock steeply and then leveled out at the water, floating on top of the surface like a very unsteady boat.
"Keep running!" Ironfist said.
In front of them, the defense was crumbling just as the great luxin barge pushed off the dock. The last remnants of the defenders were trying to fight and retreat at the same time. Some turned and were cut down as they tried to run to make the jump to the barge. Others abandoned the idea of making it to the ship themselves and stood their ground.
Lord Omichrome's army, though, was so huge and had so much pent-up pressure that without a hundred soldiers pushing it back, it burst down the dock, the men behind shoving the men in front of them so hard and so relentlessly that both defenders and the front lines of Lord Omnichrome's men were pushed straight off the edge of the dock. Dozens, perhaps a hundred men and women splashed into the bay.