A third one leaps over its dead comrades and is coming right at me and I’m struggling to nock another pointer and Circ is too far away, slicing at three or four Cotees that are surrounding him…
Acting on instinct without really knowing what I’m doing, I drop my bow—the Cotee’s leaping at me now—and fall backward. As the Cotee is flying over me, I shove the pointer in my hand up as hard as I can, feeling my wrist bend backwards when the momentum of the beast carries it past me.
I leap to my feet, stumbling slightly as my two left feet both decide to turn the same way, but maintaining my balance enough to see the Cotee slump over and die, the feathers of my pointer sticking out of its flesh, right above where its heart should be.
My bow’s at my feet, and I grab it, fit another pointer, whirl ’round to locate another Cotee, and see—
Circ’s down, animal bodies piled on all sides, a beast chewing on his foot and another on his arm, even as he’s slashing at ’em with his sword. I’m not thinking, just acting, like that time I almost got us both killed during that Killer attack so long ago. But this time I have something to offer more’n my two left feet and tentpole skinniness.
I shoot and shoot and shoot, the first pointer cutting into a Cotee’s ear, the second into one of their eyes, and the third, well, that one goes right down the throat of another Cotee that was looking to bite Circ in the head.
Circ’s still slashing at them, yelling himself hoarse, not realizing they’re already dead. I rush to him, crying, “Circ, Circ!” and he stops, looks over.
His eyes widen and I spin ’round, thinking maybe he sees something scary behind me, like a dozen Cotees snarling and leaping, but there’s nothing. The last few Cotees are dying at the hands of Skye, who seems to be the only one still fighting, like she’s somehow attracting the final, desperate attackers. I watch her slash one across the neck and impale another one through the gut ’fore I turn back to Circ.
He’s clutching at his arm and at his leg at the same time, which is ’bout as awkward as I’ve ever seen Circ look, but he’s smiling while he’s doing it. If my heart weren’t still pounding so much and if I weren’t still hearing the cries of the injured, I’d almost want to laugh at how wooloo he looks amongst a sea of fur, lying all crooked like that.
Instead I drop my bow and go to him, help him escape his furry prison, pull him down in a patch of empty durt.
I check his leg first, and it’s not too bad, no worse’n my leg. A few bite marks, yeah, but we’re Heaters, not some weakling group of pale-faced Glassies. His arm is worse, and I can see from the way he’s holding it that it hurts something fierce.
“Am I gonna live?” Circ asks.
“Maybe, maybe not,” I say, hiding my smile.
“I hope it’s maybe,” he says. “I’d miss you too much.”
I touch his durty, blood-spattered cheek. “You’ll live forever,” I say.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Tristan
Even as the Sun Realm appears to be exploding from within, I rain down death upon the enemy. They fall before me, and even as their return fire whizzes over my head and skips off the ground next to me, I keep firing. Who am I to hide and live when those who would stand with me are falling and dying around me?
The black wall is advancing, moving up the hill toward us. I’m aware that it’s not all of them, because the rest are heading the other direction, trying to hold off the moon and star dwellers pouring out of the tunnel. We have them surrounded but they still seem to have the advantage in numbers.
Something bites me in the left shoulder and I cry out, rolling behind the truck and clutching at my torn uniform, now slick with blood. Gritting my teeth, I look through the hole, seeing a chunk of flesh missing from my arm. A flesh wound, I think. The bullet went clean through.
My back against the truck, I watch men and women shooting past me at the enemy, their faces full of determination. One falls, then another. Not flesh wounds. Death wounds.
Taking a deep breath, I roll out, shooting with my good arm. But it’s pointless; there are too many and they keep on coming, climbing over the dead like the bodies are sacks of dirt on an obstacle course. They’re so close now that some of them are drawing swords, preparing for the hand-to-hand combat that’s becoming more and more inevitable.
Their mouths are contorted into snarls, their eyes full of anger and violence, and they’re running, running, shooting, and then suddenly…
They stop.
All of them as one, as if responding to a command. Just stop.
A few shots ring out, from both sides, but then even the shooting stops.
What the…?
The enemy soldiers are staring off to the right, down a side street, where—now that it’s quiet, I hear it—the sound of a drum tap tap taps out a rhythm. But it’s not just a drum; there are voices, too. Many voices, singing a song so familiar it’s like coming home or seeing Roc or swinging a sword…
The Tri-Realms anthem.
A hundred, no, a thousand voices just belting it out, raising their voices as one, stopping the entire freaking battle in its tracks, like a pregnant woman crossing the street will stop traffic. I stand, step forward, toward an enemy who could shoot me dead in an instant, in awe of what I’m hearing.
There’s still a mix of firing and explosions beyond, closer to the tunnel entrance, but even that slows and then stops as the song gets closer and louder. I take another step forward, drawn by the music.
In front of me there’s shouting and grumbling and the wall of black slowly parts, opens up, making way for…
General Aboud.
He’s waving a gun in each hand, pointing them at his own soldiers, threatening them to “Move aside or die!”
And when he steps out he looks right at me, narrowing his eyes, but then, even his anger is drawn away by the sound of the singing voices. “What is the meaning of this?” he says, turning to look down the street, but then he takes a step back, shocked by whatever he sees that we cannot.
He raises his arms, both weapons aimed down the street toward the singing. “Go home!” he shouts. “This is not your place!”
I raise my weapon, center my aim on Aboud’s side, hesitate. If I start shooting, everyone might start shooting, and whatever happens, I don’t want whoever is singing the Tri-Realms anthem to get caught in the crossfire.
I wait. Aboud yells, “Go home!” again, but the singing continues, so loud now it’s practically on top of us.
Aboud takes another step back. And then…
A line of drummers emerges into the intersection, hammering out a beat, their heads held high, their backs straight, their eyes on Aboud. And behind them…
A line of people, then another, and another. Marching as one. Singing, singing, singing their hearts out.
“I’m warning you!” Aboud says, but everyone can hear it now. The doubt in his voice. The false promise.
The drummers surround him, and between the flash of their drumsticks I see Aboud drop his guns, cover his ears. The people are sun dwellers. Not soldiers, just everyday citizens, come out from hiding in their lavish homes to show us all where they stand. And where they stand is clearer than the red sky on the earth’s surface:
They stand for Unity.
Hundreds upon hundreds of people, men and women and children, young and old, crippled and whole, pour onto the street that’s become a warzone, splitting in both directions, surrounding the soldiers on both sides. A graying man with soft eyes grabs my arm, which I realize is still up, still aiming my gun into the crowd, and gently pushes it down, until my trembling fingers release their grasp and let my weapon fall to the ground with a clatter.
“President Nailin,” he says, and I can see that while the look on his face is one of confidence, his eyes are wet. “No more. Be at peace.”
And then he moves on, leaving me stunned, gone to disarm the next soldier.