Kip threw orange at the ground and leapt hard to the side. He felt something whistle past his ear. The giant stomped right next to him, his foot splattering in the slick orange luxin as he tried to change direction. His nonsword arm wheeled crazily and, slipping, he shot right off the edge of the tower.
Kip watched him spin into space with grim satisfaction. Fat kids know how hard it is to stop once you get up to a sprint.
The nearest merlon was empty.
Without warning, the empty merlon exploded in scraps and shrapnel of green luxin that hit the side of Kip’s face and his left arm like a swarm of hornets as the cannonball struck it.
One thousand six, I guess.
Still standing, stunned, bewildered, and bleeding, Kip heard the delayed, distant roar of the cannon. Those bastards up there really were trying to kill them. If he had been two steps closer, he’d be dead.
But there was no time. Gavin was bleeding from a slash down his chest, and Karris was literally smoking as if she’d recently been on fire. Baya Niel’s nose was streaming blood. Several giants were dead on the ground behind them, and the light at the center of the tower was dimming, revealing a figure. That should be a good thing. Kip didn’t think it was. He ran to the next merlon, stabbed the fully formed giant there, and ran on to the last one.
This giant was awake, pulling herself out of the merlon, getting her bearings.
Kip leapt at her, slashing.
The giantess brought up her forearm and blocked the slash, her arm catching Kip’s forearm. Kip’s momentum carried him forward into his own hands, his doubled fists smacking into his face.
He dropped at her feet, stunned, blood pouring into his eyes. He saw death in the giantess’s twisted visage.
“A miss!” the spotter cried. “Fifteen paces long, twenty paces left. Tore off a tower on the southeast. Nearly killed Breaker.”
Curses went up, but there were no recriminations. Everyone knew that merely hitting the top of the tower from five thousand paces was an incredible feat. There was skill, and there was art, and there was simple luck. They were operating at the uttermost of the first two. The last couldn’t be counted on.
But the crews didn’t slow. Men were already swabbing out the culverin. The powder was already measured.
“We’re certain that there’s no more shot?” Commander Ironfist asked.
“Triple-checked, sir,” Hezik said. “Just the one explosive shell. If by some miracle I hit the tower, it’ll kill all our people, too.”
Commander Ironfist’s face was grim. A second passed. Everyone looked at him.
“Load it.”
A cannonball right about now would be nice, Kip thought, looking up at Death.
But there was no shot. No rescue. Even if they fired a ball right now, it would be six seconds before it saved Kip-and in six seconds, he’d be dead.
He flailed, slashed. His dagger punched into the giantess’s calf muscle.
He thought it was over then. He’d hurt her, but not badly, and now she would kill him. But the giantess didn’t do anything. She stood as if locked in ice. Through the blood in one eye, Kip blinked up at her. She was blanching-literally desaturating from the head down as if he’d poked a straw into her and was sucking out all the color. The green luxin that covered her features was unraveling. Her green hair fell off, the green mask of perfection over her face drooped, sloughing off, dissipated in a smoke redolent of fresh cedar. Her jade eyes sank, her body shrank, deflating. In moments, a woman with the rags of a dress torn by her recent huge size and now draped over emaciated limbs stood over Kip. The broken green spars of her halos shimmered in the whites of her eyes and disappeared. The green in her irises shimmered and disappeared. Her skin was bleached to its natural Ruthgari-pale hue.
Limp, she fell across Kip, her motion tearing the dagger out of her bleeding calf.
He pushed himself up to his knees. She raised her hand as if to draft.
Kip slashed her throat, and she sighed. Her eyes rolled back in her head and she relaxed into death.
She’d raised her hand to draft, to kill Kip. He’d had to do it. Or had she raised her hand in supplication?
The green light from Ru went out.
“Enough,” a voice said. It wasn’t loud, but it seemed to cut through everything. It shook Kip to his bones.
The dead woman forgotten, Kip looked to the center of the tower, where a new god stood.
Atirat, the queen of lasciviousness, the green goddess, the consort of heaven, the lady of moonlight, was supposed to be many things, some of them contradictory. But whatever else this goddess was, it wasn’t a she. Unlike his twelve giants, he was no taller than Gavin. Apparently he thought real power didn’t need to be vulgarly demonstrated in superior size. Though avoiding vulgarity didn’t seem to particularly concern Atirat otherwise.
He had no human flesh left. Everywhere, luxin knit so thin it could be silken cloth formed his skin. Long, intertwined figures were incised atop the vast hempen ropes of his muscles, seeming to copulate with every motion of his arms or legs. His hair, worn long, was a tapestry of vines and serpents. A gold choker around his throat held a single black jewel. As he moved, his muscles split and slid past each other, revealing seams of scarlet that might have been the bark of the red birch, or simply veins unprotected by his luxin skin. He was bare-chested, living vines forming a kilt. Moss curled on his chest as hair, and leaves and grass bloomed and withered spontaneously on every surface.
It was so good, even Gavin couldn’t tell if it was real or illusion.
The god’s eyes were chips of flint, and he seemed lit from within, with power, with light, with magic, with life. Gavin supposed it all would have been far more impressive if he could see green. But something about the way he moved was familiar. Oh, Orholam have mercy. The spies had been right.
“Dervani Malargos,” Gavin said. “Never thought I’d see you wearing a dress. I’d ask what you’ve been up to since the war, but I suppose I can probably hazard a guess.” A cockroach emerged from the god’s armpit and disappeared into his arm. “Nice beetle. Be careful of termites.”
Inside, Gavin’s heart was lead. He’d fought beside Dervani Malargos. He, Dazen, not he Gavin. His mother had confessed to sending an assassin after the man. Apparently the assassin had lied about his success. Dervani was Tisis’s father. Either way, Dervani had no reason to love Gavin-nor, truth be told, Dazen.
Dervani had been worth killing because he had known Dazen. He’d been there, right at the end at Sundered Rock. He might have seen everything. If Felia Guile had been right, he might unmask But then perhaps I should be more worried about him killing me now than ruining my life in some hypothetical future.
Atirat raised his hands and Gavin felt the giants behind him lifted and pushed backward.
“Gavin,” Karris said. “Gavin!” She was reloading her pistol, already fitting the lead ball in wadding and ramming it home. Though he couldn’t see green, Gavin could see the darker thread of luxin from her eyes down to her hands. “Gavin,” she said, “I’m not doing this. Run!”
“You won’t shoot me,” Gavin said.
“Damn you! It’s not me!”
“You’ll stay,” Atirat said in a voice like stones rolling together. Atirat pointed a finger at Gavin and a spidery thread of luxin crawled up from the very ground at his feet. Gavin batted it away. “What’s this?” Atirat laughed. “So that’s how we’ve succeeded. You’ve lost green. You are a broken Prism, and yet you’ve held your office. I suppose I should thank you for your stubborn pride, Guile. Thank you, and goodbye.”
Karris raised her pistol like a marionette and fired at Gavin’s head.
He slapped her hand aside at the last moment. The bullet burned a crease along his neck. Vines shot up his legs and he slashed at them with his sword, freeing himself. A cudgel the size of a tree limb blasted him off his feet. Gavin rolled, stood, and found himself right at the edge of the tower. He whirled his arms in circles.