Servants of the Nexus (Wayfarer Chronicles #1)

Chapter 6

Long before the warehouse door burst open, Saenu was ready. She’d ushered Cam out, telling him to regroup with his guardian and find her once was this over. He’d looked dubious but hadn’t argued, perhaps seeing the gleam in her eye, her teeth bared like fangs. She might not make a point of it, but she was furious Gaesten had escaped her. A good fight - a proper fight - might shake some of the tension from her shoulders.
By the footsteps outside, she’d guessed half a dozen attackers, and sure enough six of them spilled through the half-open door. They were dressed in black, nondescript clothing that could allow them to blend into worlds of almost any level of advancement. Their weapons were a motley collection, though: firearms that must have come from Howl itself, unwieldly broadswords and slender rapiers, and a single mace that looked archaic enough to have been stolen from a museum.
The agents - for these were Gaesten’s agents, she was sure - spread across the warehouse like a slick of oil. Even as they formed a cordon around her, Saenu knew they had been ordered to capture her. To take her alive. That would make things easier, though there was an awful lot of damage they could do, pain they could inflict, before it became fatal - Kin healed quickly, after all.
If the fight against Gaesten had been a dance, vicious but elegant, this was nought but bloody slaughter. Where Gaesten had found these six, Saenu couldn’t imagine, but he had to have known they were no match for her. That sending them against her would be an act of butchery and nothing else. Perhaps he’d simply wanted to piss her off.
Certainly, Saenu’s good humour rapidly drained away. She took out the mace first, lopping off an arm before whirling to plant her sword through the belly of a man with a rapier. The remaining four were more cautious, after that, leading her a merry chase around the room even as they pelted her with gunshot and throwing knives. Saenu spun each and every missile away with a flick of her sword, sending the nearest agents ducking for cover.
Two of them made a break for it and Saenu cut them down before they could bring their weapons to bear. This wasn’t a good fight, not by a long way, and it left a bitter taste in her mouth. She wanted this done, over and finished, so she could forget their foolish bravado and move on.
Unfortunately, when it came to a swift resolution, her foes had other ideas. The last man, wielding a broadsword with strength but little panache, swept in. Saenu ducked under the blade and knocked him off his feet, slashing him across the thigh before kicking the broadsword away. He groped for it, then went limp when Saenu’s sword settled at his throat.
“Move, and you’ll bleed out,” she told him. “And that’s assuming I don’t slice open your throat. I suggest you hold still.”
He took her suggestion, thankfully, which left a single agent, a woman armed with a fencer’s rapier and a brace of throwing knives. She wore a black veil across the lower half of her face, but her eyes were clear and they met Saenu’s unflinching gaze. Met it, and slid away, toward the door which lay between them. Saenu started for it, but the other woman was faster, spurred by desperation. She flung down her rapier and ran.
By the time Saenu reached the street, the agent was halfway down it, almost in a crouch to make herself a smaller target. Saenu couldn’t imagine what good that was going to do - she was hardly going to throw her sword and impale the woman through the back. She was going to follow though, and follow she did, letting her legs find their stride as the agent pelted round a corner, bouncing off another warehouse wall before righting herself. She was panicked, it was clear, aware how unmatched she was and how badly her mission had gone. Not aware, it was also clear, that simply surrendering would have spared her life. Saenu had no interest in killing the woman, but she did need to know where she’d come from, what her orders had been, and what Gaesten was up to. Answers, in other words, rather than blood.
The agent careened onwards, weaving a zig-zag path through the warehouse district with Saenu always a dozen steps behind. If the woman had any notion of a destination, she didn’t show it. Perhaps she’d simply keep running until she could run no more, or until Saenu gave up the chase.
Well, that wasn’t going to happen. Saenu had had a hundred lifetimes to hone herself, to forge a weapon out of her own unaging body. The fleeing agent hadn’t a chance.
Within a minute, they’d left the warehouses behind and barrelled into a street of oblivious shoppers. It had gone midnight, but the city was still busy with revellers and spenders, shops and stalls and cafes open to the night. The agent barged her way through, leaving disgruntled shouts in her wake; Saenu followed more smoothly, threading her way through with barely a ripple. She’d sheathed her sword, glamoured it to look like an umbrella tucked beneath her coat. Without it, she might still look an unlikely sight - tall and dressed as dark as an undertaker - but she was a curiosity, not a source of panic.
The agent turned a corner into a street busier still and was brought to a standstill by the crowds. She glanced over her shoulder, strained and pale-faced, before struggling anew to find a path. The road was clogged with people, though, and up ahead with a knot of automatons pulling a huge, ornate carriage. There was no way through.
At least, Saenu didn’t think there was, but desperation had filled the fleeing agent with an extraordinary determination. She wheeled away from the press of people, darting off to the side of the street before launching herself at the canvas awning above a cafe door. The awning sagged but held and she scrambled up, before boosting herself onto an ornately carved stone windowsill above.
Saenu made to follow, stifling a curse, only to realise there was no need. The agent, despite all her best efforts, could find no way to climb higher and escape over the roofs; all she could do was flee along the window ledges, scrambling from one building to the next, forging a clear path along the first storey that, from the ground, Saenu could follow at her leisure.
Or she could have done if the agent didn’t have another trick up her sleeve.
The crowd had settled again, ignorant to the flight taking place above their heads. It was immediately obvious, then, when a fresh disturbance erupted, spilling dawdlers in every direction with a burst of shouts and screams. Saenu lunged forward, to see the massed crowd breaking apart, fragmenting around the chaos in their midst. Chaos erupting from the carriage that had been idling in the centre of the street, or more specifically from the automatons that pulled it.
Saenu glanced up in time to see the agent shove something into her pocket, before vanishing round a corner into a sidestreet. Whatever she was carrying, Saenu could take a good guess at what it had accomplished: disrupting whatever ruled the automatons, overriding their orders, and causing them to decide they had better things to do than be glorified packhorses.
It was looking up that saved her. The agent might have gone, but Saenu saw the swinging automaton fist moments before it ploughed right into her. She dived sideways, rolled, and came up with sword in hand - but what could a sword do against these beasts? They were twice her height, roughly humanoid in shape and with great domed heads, brassy and polished, reflecting Saenu’s face back at her as if she were trapped inside their globe. And she would be trapped, if she couldn’t find a way to bypass them soon.
There were four automatons in all, though even as Saenu watched, one juddered and died, head bowed as though it were sleeping. Out of the others, one remained beside its static companion, lights running up and down in sequence upon its chest as though conflicting orders were warring within. The last two had no such compunctions.
Saenu rolled again as another fist came for her, then shot upright as a heavy foot came down inches from her head. The second automaton moved in, stamping and whirring, to aim a clumsy kick that Saenu easily dodged. They were noisy, these beasts, all whines and creaks and groans; she could avoid them on sound alone. Except that didn’t stop them filling the entire width of the street, blocking every exit.
Well, except one. The agent had gone up, and so might she.
Darting around metal legs, Saenu made for the two immobile automatons. She chose the dormant one, for safety, and scrambled up the back of its leg, right up to its broad shoulders. From there, it was only a short hop to the roof of the gilded carriage. A glance through a window in its roof told her the vehicle had, thankfully, been vacated.
The two lurching automatons came closer, peeling off one to either side of the carriage. Exactly as Saenu wanted them.
When they struck, it was with bone-shattering force, two massive hands swinging towards her. Saenu, though, was already gone, darting out of their lumbering attack. The two fists struck one another instead, with a shower of sparks and a screech of metal. The carriage rocked violently, then sagged beneath their weight.
Then, as the automatons struggled to free themselves from the morass of twisted metal, Saenu made her move.
A quick binding spell, simple but effective, was enough to trap the automatons together. It took but two swift thrusts of her sword, now that she had time to use it, to shear through metal and wires and gears in the chests of the two automatons, and bring them both to a shuddering standstill.
Saenu hopped lightly down from the buckled carriage. The whole street was a scene of devastation; how easily civilians could have been caught in the maelstrom, given the agent’s, and by extension Gaesten’s, disregard for their safety. What was it he was so keen to protect, that he’d go to such lengths?
She turned away, making for the street down which the agent had fled - only to find a new obstacle in her path.
There had been three functioning automatons, after all, and the last of them had apparently now chosen which of its orders to follow.
Saenu faced it, studying the gleaming monument of brass as it in turn seemed to watch her. Even as it advanced, she held out a hand, searching the currents of this very non-magical world for the magic she was certain compelled the creature. It was there, sure enough: strands of sorcery wrapping around its innards, crude but eminently effective. As the automaton came closer, Saenu stood her ground, sword in hand.
There were several heartbeats in which she wondered if she’d made a mistake. The automaton lumbered on, giving no sign of slowing down. Saenu had to stop herself taking a step back as it came within striking distance, the tip of her sword grazing its gleaming chest.
And then it stopped, freezing as though its power had been cut. Saenu took a deep breath, forcing her sword hand not to shake. She could feel it, the tendrils of magic unwrapping, fraying away into nothingness under the influence of her blade. Without their influence, the automaton reverted to its original persona, one that didn’t involve crushing the life out of people, Kin or not.
Warily, Saenu stepped away, then lurched into a run. No time to see if the automaton stayed put. She had to find the agent before she fled, taking all her secrets with her.