Chapter Forty-Eight

Elegy helped as the Charred pulled the weapon into place. A large gun, taken from one of the Beaconite ships for the Cinder King's engineers to study. Instead they now settled the huge weapon down on the rim of his floating city, and a few engineers buzzed about, powering it with a sunheart.

The Cinder King barked in annoyance at them as he climbed up beside the weapon, taking a control device from a nearby official. The engineers were mostly worried about recoil, and had piled a great deal of cushioning behind the weapon—which was wedged against a wall. From the way they spoke, Elegy was hoping she'd get to see the Cinder King thrown overboard as it shook. Perhaps he would get mashed beneath it, which would be amusing.

Sadly the gun fired without difficulty—delivering a ball of glowing energy into the distant dome. It bounced off, but it proved that the system worked. He had them move it to point at Zellion's approaching ship.

Elegy felt a surge of excitement. She'd hoped for something like this.

She shot Rebeke, held captive by a nearby Charred, a grin. Rebeke, in turn, seemed shocked. Had she believed Elegy's fakery too? That gave her even more of a thrill.

This next part would be extra fun. Before the Cinder King could fire his weapon at Zellion, Elegy attacked. Not him, but the other Charred.

She started with the one holding Rebeke. Slipping the little fragment of sunheart from her waistband, Elegy lunged and pressed it against the cinderheart of the nearby Charred, then spoke Zellion's incantation. Immediately the Charred dropped Rebeke, and his cinderheart's color lightened. He stumbled back, gasping, his link to the Cinder King disrupted.

Elegy pulled Rebeke away as that Charred—suddenly allowed to do whatever he wanted—chose the next Charred in line and immediately attacked. Elegy grinned wider and freed a second Charred, then leaped back as that woman went into a frenzy and started laying about with her cudgel.

Elegy only had time to free one more before the Cinder King realized what she was doing. "Treason most foul!" he shouted, shoving aside a freed Charred who tried to attack him. "What is this? How…"

Then he focused again on Zellion's ship. Cursing, the Cinder King fired—but he'd hesitated just long enough. The shots hit behind the Dawnchaser, which maintained a steady pace toward Union. It was remarkable, she thought, what that little vessel had survived.

"Kill that one!" he shouted, pointing at Elegy.

The three remaining Charred went for her, but the three she had loosed were causing chaos, attacking officials and civilians who had gathered to watch. The Cinder King was forced to pull two Charred away from attacking Elegy to protect himself.

Others came running to the scene, and soon she struggled gloriously against four opponents. She lost track of Rebeke in the chaos, and was forced backward toward the edge of the city as she defended herself.

She did…fine. The others had a frenzy that she understood, but she'd been learning to think, and that served her well. She backed away strategically and put the large gun between herself and the others. As they scrambled around it, she was able to spring up and climb over it, dropping down so she could briefly engage one of the Charred alone.

She broke his leg with her cudgel, then was fiddling with her sunheart fragment when a voice called out from behind her. "You are able to think for yourself?" the Cinder King asked. "Do you remember? Does it hurt if you hear this?"

Rebeke screamed.

Elegy looked to see Rebeke in his grip—his bare hand on her neck, leeching away her heat. Strangely it did hurt Elegy—and anger her—to see that. Rebeke was…someone that should be protected. Elegy howled, but then was tackled from behind by one of the other Charred, her sunheart fragment slipping from her fingers and bouncing away.

"Yes, it does hurt you, doesn't it?" the Cinder King said. "Curious. Well, perhaps it will hurt even more for you to know what I'm going to do to her. I'll make her into one of you, take away her mind and her soul, and replace it with devotion to me alone. When you next meet her, she will try to kill you. Does that hurt, Elegy?"

Elegy howled in frustration, losing control, battering at the Charred that had her pinned down. Then another one arrived and slammed his cudgel into her head. She withstood the pain, though, keeping her attention on Rebeke—whom the Cinder King released and pushed into the arms of an official. Rebeke sagged, most of her heat drained.

Another official whispered something urgent to the Cinder King, and he looked out toward the approaching Zellion. "We'll need to go back to the old plan for dealing with him," the Cinder King said. "Is it still ready?"

"Yes, my lord."

"Good. Faith, go to the command center and put the city into lockdown—no ships leaving. I don't want him slipping out of my grip. The rest of you, with me."

Elegy threw aside the Charred holding her, then caught the cudgel as another tried to pound her head. She even kicked at the leg of a third one as he arrived to help. But she saw at least a dozen more running up the street toward them, summoned to the will of their master.

He walked off at a brisk pace, joined by his officials in white, who pulled a weakened Rebeke after them.

They left Elegy to die. But they didn't realize. She could plan now. She had begun to care. She wouldn't just fight until she was killed. So she broke free from the grips of those coming for her.

And she ran.

She ran with full strength of limb and determination. Away from the Charred. Behind, they howled in frustration at her escape. Though part of her longed to engage them, to fight and claw and batter and kill, she ran instead. Farther along the rim of the city until she was able to vault herself up and grab the top of the roof of one of the smaller buildings. A frightened woman closed the window as Elegy reached the roof, then turned and leaped over the street to the next ship.

Below, Charred clambered over one another to try to reach her. But, not working together, they hampered one another's efforts. Elegy moved back the way she'd come, bounding from rooftop to rooftop until she'd returned to where she'd started. Here, she hopped down and grabbed her sunheart fragment off the ground. Then she ran over two streets to a specific point she'd spied earlier: an open portion of steel deck with no buildings nearby.

Approaching Charred from all directions forced her against the edge. She backed to the very lip, growling softly, staring them down. Then she felt the city shake as something impacted it from below. A moment later, a figure sprang over the side—a figure in smoldering armor, trailing smoke. He landed in front of her, metal feet sparking on the metal street. Then he stood up tall, even more intimidating in the armor than he'd been without it.

"You all right?" he asked her, his voice projected somehow out of the armor. He glanced at her, and the slit at the front glowed a deep red-orange, the color of coals—or sunhearts. The suit seemed simultaneously archaic and modern. It was sleek, with no gaps at the joints that she could see. Yet it was also a reminder of a different time, when soldiers had gone to war encased like this.

"Yeah," she said, breathing heavily. "I planned. I saw you flying toward this spot. I planned, Zellion."

"Good."

"They took Rebeke that way," she said, pointing past the gathered Charred, who had retreated at his appearance.

"Was the Cinder King with them?"

"Yes."

"Then that's the way I'm going," he said.

"Do you have your weapon?"

"No," he said. "It's keeping the people of Beacon alive right now—and summoning it would mean instant death to them."

"Then we're both unarmed," she said.

"I wouldn't say that," he told her as the Charred started to move in. "I'll assume none of you have seen Shardplate in action before. Stand back and enjoy this next part. I'll make us a path."

He stomped forward, armor clanging against the deck, and met the first Charred head-on, swinging in a powerful uppercut. The Charred—still accustomed to powering through hits—didn't bother to dodge. So Zellion's punch connected and tossed the Charred like a doll over the nearby ships to land somewhere in the distance.

He spun and seized another, tossing her into several others coming his way. He moved like a demolition machine, using the Charred as weapons against one another. In an incredible sequence of destruction, he threw them, stomped them, broke them.

Unlike before, however, the Cinder King wasn't there to be frightened. So they kept coming. Elegy watched in awe, then noticed the cracks appearing in Zellion's armor. He was a terrible force, with strength like a machine, but he couldn't stop them all. They got in occasional hits with cudgels or machetes—and those blows left cracks in the armor, like it was made of glass.

Shaking free of her awe, Elegy ran forward and began to cleanse the wounded Charred's cinderhearts, one at a time. They, once freed, tried to kill her. But she ducked away, leaving them to attack other Charred instead, increasing the chaos.

In an explosion of light, part of the strange armor actually burst beneath a hit, spraying sparks and glowing metal chunks. It was one of the shoulder pieces, but Zellion kept fighting, breaking bones, and tossing Charred until—at last—the street fell still. Not silent—no, there were too many moans and screams from frustrated, wounded Charred for that. But the supply of attackers was depleted, like a gun running out of energy.

Zellion slumped forward, and she could hear him breathing deeply from within his helmet. Then his armor began to disintegrate, vaporizing to smoke, leaving him—in seconds—exposed. He struggled to his feet and picked up a fallen machete.

"Can you bring it back?" Elegy asked, approaching him on a deck slick with blood.

"I don't know," he said. "Not soon, I suspect. I'm…not sure how the relationship stands between me and my armor. But it felt good to bear it again." He looked around at the destruction he'd wrought. "Poor souls. Taken and forced into this."

"They enjoyed it," she promised. "You gave them a fight like they've never known. Besides, some escaped." She pointed to the ones she'd freed, who had made their way down side alleys, looking for fights with common civilians.

Maybe…she should not be happy about that. Yes, she could see from his frown that perhaps…that was a bad thing.

"We need to find the Cinder King," he said.

"I know where they'll take Rebeke," she said. "He wants to make her into a Charred. I was born in that very place."

Zellion nodded, following her lead as they moved through the city, which had grown quiet as the people hid. Near the center of Union was their Reliquary, where the Chorus was kept. Beside it was the Hall of Burning, where the Cinder King made his Charred.

Together, she and Zellion burst out into the open ground surrounding these two buildings. And there was the Cinder King. Standing off to the right, partway down a wide street, hands on hips. Waiting.

"I'll handle him," Zellion said, hefting his machete. "You go rescue your sister."

"I want to fight," she snapped.

"I know. But is that what you need?"

"They're different?"

"Yes," he said, nodding to the Cinder King, who waved him forward. "He's planning something. A trap. Can you outthink him?"

"No," she admitted. "But I can push through the trap, whatever it is! I can kill him."

"Can you, Elegy?" Zellion met her eyes. "Should you?" He put his hand on her shoulder. "Right now, you need to give up that fight to save your sister instead. That's what your people need. That's the path you need to be on."

She didn't feel his words. But she…she believed them anyway. She nodded.

"Go," he said. "When you rescue Rebeke, tell her something for me. There is a way to recharge sunhearts. Put some heat in an empty one and leave it out in the sun, and when you come back around, it will be renewed. The days of sacrifices are done. The Beaconites know, but I want as many to hear as possible. They deserve this truth."

"I will."

"Oh, and Elegy? Thank you."

"For what?"

"For giving me someone worthy to fight alongside," he said, turning toward the Cinder King. "I think that helped me remember which path I need to be on."

With that, they parted toward their separate destinies.