Chapter 14

"Take cover!"

Caris tumbled to the ground behind a building's corner, dragged there by Blaine as gunfire erupted from the heavily guarded boulevard leading to the palace. Hands grabbed at her, hauling her farther back amidst the group of fighters that had grown since they'd left the jail behind. In the intersection they'd been attempting to enter, a bomb exploded. Starfire called forth by Soren erupted between them and the threat, melting whatever shrapnel might have tried to find a home in their bodies.

"All right?" Honovi asked, staring down at her through his brass goggles, voice coming out a crackle through his gas mask's filter.

He, like the other E'ridians with them on the ground, had jumped from their airships when several had dived low on a bombing run, following Blaine's marker he'd shot off. Not all of the aeronauts had made it to the ground—their parachutes made them easy targets in the sky—but Honovi had, and Caris was grateful for his presence.

"I'm fine," Caris got out as he helped her back to her feet.

She wiped at her throat with the back of her hand, smearing the sweat there. Like the others in that first group to infiltrate Amari via the catacombs, Caris had discarded her Daijalan uniform jacket. They no longer needed to wear it, not after what had occurred in the jail, nor did they want to risk any friendly fire. Pretending to be something they weren't would no longer aid them. Besides, Eimarille knew they were coming, their arrival impossible to miss as buildings went up in flame ahead of them.

Some of it was her doing. Most of it was Soren's. He'd taken it upon himself to cleanse the city the same way he might cleanse the poison fields. Except no alchemy was in use here, only starfire, the aether never in fear of running out. Even now, Soren stood near the intersection, hands moving as he wielded starfire with a sureness Caris wished she could emulate.

The raging fire that had eaten through a block of buildings on the other side crossed the street under Soren's control, starfire cascading over cobblestones. An Ashionen magician had their wand pointed at the fire that remained burning on the buildings, using magic to create wind that drove the smoke upward rather than into the street they huddled in.

"We need to break through their defenses," Blaine said as he planted himself next to Caris. "Soren said he can burn them out."

Caris flinched behind her brass goggles and gas mask, grateful that both hid her dismay. "Can he ensure the fire won't spread? We aren't here to cause another Inferno."

"He says he is able to."

Caris wanted to call up starfire but knew she needed to conserve her strength. She didn't have Soren's training that enabled him to press forward no matter what, for the poison fields were never kind to a lone warden who let their guard down. Caris had spent her entire life growing up loved and cared for, never needing to fight until she became a cog and then queen, and she'd repaid that love by letting her parents die.

She wrenched that knot of grief aside, trying not to cry. Soren had seen that her mother and father had become ash, and that was better than the horror of the revenants they'd been turned into.

"Then let him. What of the airships?"

Honovi tipped his head back for a brief moment, staring at the sky. "Caoimhe said she and the other airships would keep bombing the streets around the palace to keep the Daijalans at the barricades from reaching our position."

Caris hated that they'd resorted to bombing runs, knowing far too many citizens would die from the attack. Not everyone who called Amari home was beholden to Daijal, but she knew enough about public sentiment these days that their side would take much of the blame in the near future. Perhaps the history books would look upon their choices with a better eye, but Caris could see no positives in war.

Maurus pushed his way through a knot of royal guards, giving Caris a sharp nod. "We're moving forward behind Soren's wall of starfire."

Caris let herself be put in the center of a group of soldiers, Blaine ever by her side as everyone readied themselves for a march. She couldn't see Soren up ahead, but she saw his efforts clear enough when it was deemed safe enough for her to turn the corner.

Starfire extended from one side of the street to the other, a white-gold wall of heat that warmed the air to an uncomfortable degree. It was stifling but not deadly, and it was a defensive wall that no bullet or bomb could get through. Fighting starfire with guns was a useless gesture. One had to fight starfire with starfire to win.

Caris shouldn't have been surprised Eimarille knew that.

The wall of starfire abruptly flared higher than Caris had seen Soren command it to burn, spinning like a vortex. Caris froze, watching in horror at the way it jerked and twisted in the air, arcing back toward their position in the street, bringing with it a searing heat that would burn the air in their lungs before it even burned their skin if given half the chance. She knew it wasn't Soren's doing, and Caris desperately threw up one hand toward the threat, reaching for control of the starfire.

"No!" she shouted.

She sank her awareness into heat, into the aether, broadening it in a way she hadn't experienced before. Like years before, in a moment she only half remembered, instinct drove her power, enabling Caris to sink the very essence of herself into the roaring starfire threatening to consume them and rip it free of the person wielding it.

Threads like sun flares seen through an astronomer's great telescope burst into the sky, filling her vision with a brightness that should have hurt but didn't. Caris gasped, arms held overhead, hands clenched into fists, watching as the vortex of starfire ripped itself apart between the forceful will of three people.

Blaine's hand on her shoulder was an anchor Caris leaned into as she gasped for breath. She stared through the shimmering heat of diminishing starfire at the end of the boulevard and the park that resided there over the grave of the old palace.

In the center of that intersection, surrounded by a large group of soldiers and backed by automatons, all of whose weapons were pointed in their direction, stood Eimarille. The crown she wore glittered brilliantly gold from the afternoon sunlight and the fierce glow of starfire that she summoned back to her. Beside her, gripped tight in the Klovod's hold, stood Nathaniel. Caris couldn't help the soft, pained noise that escaped her lips.

"Steady," Blaine said in a low voice.

Maurus and others put themselves between Caris and Eimarille, their own rifles and pistols at the ready. Burning brightly between both sides was a thin wall of starfire controlled by Soren. Caris squared her shoulders and pushed her way to the front, ignoring everyone's protest. Blaine remained by her side, Honovi a comforting presence at her back. When she made it to Soren's position, Caris placed herself to his left, shoulder to shoulder, and raised her chin.

"You've been telling lies to the people of Ashion," Eimarille said, her voice pitched loud enough for them to hear, even over the distant sounds of explosions. "You are no queen, and traitors to the crown will be executed."

Caris stared at Eimarille through the shimmer of starfire, aware of their people fanning out around them, behind them, preparing to fight. They were outnumbered, outgunned, but they hadn't fought this hard, come this far after so many months, to give in now.

She reached up and removed her brass goggles, then her gas mask, clipping both to her belt. She no longer wore the veil, that woven thread magic tucked away in a pocket. Here, now, she would stand as herself. "The North Star declared my right to the Rourke bloodline."

The starfire gathered in Eimarille's upturned palm twisted and grew, becoming a burning sphere. "You are not written in the royal genealogies. The Midnight Star ensured my name remained. Give up your road. Both of you."

"No," Soren said. "I have no desire for your throne or your crown, but I won't let you keep it. Not after what you did to the wardens."

If there had ever been love between Eimarille and Soren when they were young children, it had withered like dry prairie grass amidst a drought-filled summer heat. Caris wondered what their lives might have been like if they'd all grown up together. She'd never know, and Eimarille would never care.

"Very well. Then your roads end here."

Starfire exploded from Eimarille's hand, streaking into the sky like launched grenades, coming their way. Soren couldn't get his defensive wall of starfire high enough in time to block all of it, which left it to Caris to counter the assault that broke through. She raised her hands to the sky, threading her awareness through the starfire, trying to break Eimarille's control of the aether. The starfire jerked to a halt midair, burning like a dozen stars come down to earth. Caris grimaced, arms shaking with the effort to hold it back.

Guns went off, the sound coming from above them—someone must have made it to an unburned roof—and down the street, Eimarille made a wide cutting motion with her arm. The starfire ripped itself away of Caris' tenuous defense, streaking to the side toward the buildings on either side of the street. Starfire hit with an explosion of heat that nearly knocked Caris to her knees. It would have if Blaine hadn't grabbed at her to keep her upright.

Soren threw his right arm outward to the side, fingers spread wide before slowly curling toward his palm as he fought to make a fist. Caris watched as the starfire in the building there began to decrease as Soren put it out. She could sense what he was doing and tried to emulate it on the starfire burning to the left of them.

The starfire went out, leaving blackened, smoking buildings behind. Whoever had been on the roof was no longer shooting, most likely dead. Caris glanced over worriedly at Soren when he wavered on his feet. The wall of starfire moved with him, Eimarille clearly fighting him for control.

"I will ask one last time for your surrender," Eimarille called out, not sounding fazed at all from the effort she was putting into the fight. "Do so, and I will give you the merchant you are so very fond of."

Caris' heart lurched painfully, one hand coming up reflexively to press over the ring hidden beneath her shirt. She looked at Nathaniel through the shimmering heat of Soren's starfire, aching to have him by her side. "You have never granted mercy."

"Mercy? When you've turned half of Ashion against me? This is my country."

"A queen is meant to rule, not inflict cruelties on their people. But that's all you've ever done inside and outside our borders."

"You know nothing about ruling."

"I never wanted to, but I do now because I had no other choice."

Eimarille didn't seem impressed with her statement. Perhaps she saw it as bluster; Caris doubted she saw it as a threat. Eimarille raised her arm and rotated her wrist, the gesture causing the automatons to aim their Zip guns and fire. Soren's starfire wall went opaque, so white Caris nearly felt scorched by it. The dull roar of the Zip guns echoed in the air, but no bullets made it through.

The Zip guns went silent a minute later. Then the starfire Soren controlled was ripped apart in the center, sending their entire side scattering out of range of the bullets that streamed through that opening. Blaine hauled Caris away while Honovi handled Soren, both dragged to opposite sides of the street.

"We need to double back and find another way into the park," Blaine said.

Caris shook her head, blinking sweat out of her eyes. "Eimarille will have soldiers at every entrance and down every street. It's not worth it to try."

"Caris—"

"I can't run, Blaine. I won't."

He shoved his brass goggles off his eyes, leaning in close while their side exchanged fire with the Daijalans. His eyes searched hers before he bowed his head. "If I were Ashionen, I would be proud to call you my queen."

She managed a smile somehow, knowing it was as close to a vow of service Blaine would ever give her. He was E'ridian in every way that mattered, but the Westergard bloodline had long been struck from the royal genealogies, and her name had never known its pages. Yet here they both were, determined to fulfill their duties to Ashion.

"I don't have a throne yet."

Blaine helped her to her feet, the pair of them hemmed in by Royal Guards and other soldiers for protection, no one ready to back down. "Then let's get you one."