Noriko, most silent of them, ascended the stairs well in advance of Zeb and Rudi. When she peeked around the final turn of the stairwell, she could see three Sonnenkrieger on duty at the upper landing. One had his back to her, leaning against the rail that overlooked this flight of steps; Noriko could only see the heads and shoulders of the other two, who were partway across the chamber, facing the first man.
In moments, they'd hear Zeb and Rudi pounding up the stairs behind her. There would be a gunfight. Whoever was beyond the doors these men guarded would hear.
She drew her sword. Keeping as low to the floor as she could, she moved around the turn. The men were distracted; she was in dark clothes. She had a chance . . . Leaning so she was almost at the same angle as the stairs, she moved up, one step, two, three, four . . .
As more of the chamber came into view, she could see there were no more than the three men she'd seen. They talked among themselves. The man with his back to her and one of the men opposite held rifles at the ready. The third, an officer, had a pistol holstered.
She heard, faintly, the footfalls of her companions behind her. In a moment, the Sonnenkrieger would hear, too. She gathered her feet under her and charged.
The soldiers' eyes were still widening when she reached the landing and swung her sword back. Her blow, thrown against the man at the rail, cut entirely through his right forearm. He shrieked; his severed arm and the rifle hit the concrete floor.
Noriko spun. Her blade took the other rifleman in the neck. It seemed to pass through him harmlessly, but she felt the blade bite and knew better.
The officer threw himself at her, bore her backwards. She twisted, trying to free herself, and broke his grip, but he still drove her ahead of him. She was peripherally aware of the second rifleman falling, his head detaching, falling separately. Then she hit the metal rail beside the first man she'd cut. She felt ribs on her right side give way from the impact and suddenly she had no breath. Her vision began to contract almost instantly.
The officer shoved, straightening, pushing her further over the rail. She could not bring her sword to bear. He was grabbing for his pistol. She let go of the sword hilt, wrapped a leg around his waist, and got her hands on his pistol hand, struggling to keep it from the gun butt.
Then the officer was torn from her. He staggered a couple of steps back. A night-black silhouette, Zeb, stood beside him. The officer tried again to draw his pistol, but the silhouette shoved him, then spun into one of the beautiful side kicks she had seen Harris execute so many times. Zeb's foot caught the man in the gut and threw him back into the wall. He staggered there, momentarily unable to move, and Zeb moved forward to hammer him with blows of the fist.
Meanwhile, Rudi reached the landing. He spared a glance for Noriko, for Zeb and the officer, then he swung the pistol in his hand against the temple of the one-armed rifleman, who still stood, his face paling in shock. The rifleman and the officer went down at the same moment.
Noriko smiled and slid down to sit on the concrete.
Zeb leaned over her. "Norikooh, Je-zus. Are you all right?"
"I will be fine," she said. It was a lie, and one she couldn't quite conceal, as her voice was weak, but she couldn't have him waiting for her. She drew her pistol out. "I will guard your back. Find Doc."
He hesitated, then straightened. He held his right hand before him and swung around as though he were consulting some sort of gauge. He turned to face the central door. "Ready?"
Rudi pulled out his second automatic. "Ready."
Zeb reached up and swatted the light bulb overhead, shattering it, plunging the landing into blackness.
Ritter moved beside Förster and poked his head into the dais chamber. Yes, there was a definite pounding noise coming from the hatch overhead.
Förster seemed to have things in hand here. Doc, avoiding a kick from Volksonne, was rolling to his feet in the center of the chamber. Förster no longer needed Ritter and his rifle; Doc would never be able to reach the balcony.
Ritter moved to the main doorway and stepped out. "Go to the Flame," he told the Sonnenkrieger on guard there. "Someone is trying to batter his way through. Bring him here. If at all possible, keep it inconspicuous."
The lieutenant in charge saluted and led his men away at a trot.
A combination attack finally got through Doc's guardDoc ducked one hand but Volksonne caught him with the other. The blow threw him against the concrete wall, searing his left shoulder. He rebounded from the concrete and fell, stunned or unconscious.
Förster contemplated him. He brought Volksonne upright and made the god stand still, though he could feel that Volksonne wanted to finish this fight, wanted to take his due. Förster would wait until Ritter returned. It was only correct that Ritter get to see Doc's last moments.
"Förster."
The voice echoed through the chamber, mocking, seeming to come from everywhere at once.
Förster looked around. Some trick of Doc's? It couldn't be. The man was barely conscious at best.
Then Förster saw the speaker.
The man stood at the balcony level, a mere six or seven paces away, around to Förster's right. He wore black from hat to shoes, making him a silhouette, so he could have entered from below and crept up the stairs while Volksonne chased his prey around on the other side of the chamberbut that meant the guards . . .
The darkness of the man's clothes didn't conceal the fact that he held a pistol in his left hand and had it aimed at Förster.
"Alpdruck," Förster said.
"Drop the glass thing," the silhouette said, in Cretanis.
"This?" Förster held it up before it. It required only a slight mental adjustment to think through it, to make Volksonne detect the silhouette's presence. He sent the god into motion, commanding it to reach toward the silhouette. Then Förster tossed the control mechanism forward. "Catch."
Alpdruck shouldn't have been able to do it. Volksonne's motion was too fast. Yet Alpdruck threw himself backwards and the hand missed him, slamming into the wall beside him. The control mechanism clattered to the floor at his feet.
Förster threw himself forward, clean over Volksonne's arm, and crashed into Alpdruck. They went down hard together. Förster struck out blindly at the man's gun hand, connected, heard the pistol go clattering off into the darkness. He raised his hand for a coup de grace.
Alpdruck's knee came up, connecting with his side, knocking him over. Had he not been in the condition he was, Förster knew that his ribs would probably have caved in under the blow. As it was, his breath was nearly driven from him. He felt his opponent roll away from him, heard the man rise.
Just across the rail, Volksonne looked between the two men and then down at his original target, Doc.
Doc slapped the flames licking at his shoulder until they subsided. He rose, ignoring the pain he felt.
A pale figure raced past Doc, to the stairs on his right. Doc shook his head and focussed. "Rudi"
The gunman just said, "Present for you." Barely looking in Doc's direction, he tossed something.
Doc caught it. It was one of Rudi's automatics.
He turned. Volksonne stood mere paces away, staring dispassionately down at him. Doc saw Förster on the balcony just beyond the god, squared off in fighting stance againstno one. No, there was someone there. Zeb, barely visible in the glow Volksonne cast.
Volksonne turned back toward Zeb and Förster. He reached up toward them.
Zeb saw Förster spring to his feet as nimbly as though he hadn't just suffered one of Zeb's best knee strikes. The colonel ignored the god-thing standing mere paces away. He was smiling again, the invincible smile he'd offered in the preliminary round of the All-Out. "Whoever you are," Förster said, "you really should not be here."
"I have to be somewhere," Zeb said. "Might as well be kicking the hell out of you."
Förster's eyes widened. "Watson." He brought up his hands and advanced in a boxing stance. Then he stopped and looked at the glowing figure reaching toward them.
Volksonne grabbednot for Zeb, not for Förster, but for something on the balcony behind Förster. It seized the object, picked it up, the object ridiculously tiny in its giant hand.
The paperweight.
On Volksonne's fingertip, the glass of the paperweight began to glow. It deformed, flowed. Drops fell away to sizzle against the floor. A moment later, all that was left was the arrowhead that had once been its center. Volksonne pinched it between thumb and forefinger and glowing gold began to drip down after the glass.
Volksonne changed, his form flowing as freely as the glass and gold had.
His skin faded, became transparent, leaving behind only a latticework of glowing golden light, a framework suggesting a complete body. It twisted, malformed, until it was not human in proportion; its arms and legs became thick and short, its torso long, its head round and disproportionately large.
And everywhere from the latticework protruded spindly lesser arms, thirty or more, their hands grasping, clutching.
Zeb heard whispers now, the voices of dozens of unseen mouths, their incomprehensible words filling the chamber. Coldness blew through him as though his insides had a vent to the outside air.
The center door on the balcony level crashed open. General Ritter entered, his rifle raised . . . but his expression of anger vanished, replaced by one of wide-eyed shock, as he saw Volksonne.
"Take a good look at your work, Ritter," Doc said.
Ritter turned and ran.
Rudi swore. He reached the balcony level just in time to see Ritter disappearing through the door. He scrambled after the man, rounded the doorway, and aimed. "Stop right there!"
Ritter skidded to a stop, glanced back at Rudi, and raised his hands.
Rudi ran after him.
The new Volksonne turned away from Zeb and Förster. It moved unsteadily, as though it were unused to walking, as though those thick legs bore a tremendous weight. It faced Doc.
Doc took a deep breath. So often he'd been lauded for the speed and ingenuity of his improvised devisements. On occasion, he had to wager his life on their success.
Such as now.
He knelt, relaxing into the flow of his meditative state.
He heard and felt a footstep. Volksonne, coming closer. He shook away the stray thought, the unwanted awareness of the god-thing's proximity. And as he descended into the state he wished, he sought a mind, a name.
Skoll, he thought. Fleet of foot and ferocious of jaw. Surely you cannot sleep with your enemies so active.
Distantly, he felt another footstep.
Why chase across the sky when your prey is here? Come to me. Invest me with your rage, your power. I will give you form. I will put the throat of the sun between your jaws.
Another footstep.
With Skoll, there was no laughter. There were no words. But a new sensation cut through Doc's body. It was hunger, a need so aching and pure it drove all thought from Doc's mind.
He opened his eyes. Volksonne stood above him, reaching for him with one great arm, all the lesser arms on it at full extension toward him, grasping.
Doc felt his body all around him, extending in all directions from the little bit of flesh that was his mortal form. He bared his teeth and leaped for Volksonne's throat.
Zeb saw the sun-thing advance upon Doc, saw Doc look up. And then there was something around the man, shadows and fog. Only when it moved did he recognize its outlinethat of a giant wolf, crouching, Doc's form lost somewhere within it.
The smoke-wolf sprang upon Volksonne, carrying the sun-god backwards. Volksonne fell, the impact shaking the chamber, the wolf atop it. Doc, still kneeling, was visible behind the two gigantic things. The wolf's growl vibrated throughout the chamber, making the metal rails sing, causing the floor beneath Zeb's feet to rattle.
Förster advanced and Zeb wrenched his attention away from Volksonne. Förster, seemingly uninterested in the spectacle of combat between the sun-god and wolf-god, led off with a combination, left-right-left, fast and sure. Zeb backed away, blocking the first shot and putting himself out of range of the next two, gauging his opponent's attack.
Zeb's hand burned. His right palm was in more pain than it had been at any previous solar event. He couldn't hold a gun in it. He could barely keep it in a fist. His second pistol was still in his right-hand pocket, but the way his hand was misbehaving, he couldn't possibly get it out before Förster would be all over him.
He parried Förster's next jab and put his toe into the man's kneecap. Förster grunted but did not falter; he closed before Zeb regained his footing and put two blows into Zeb's ribs.
Zeb leaned into, not away from, his opponent, brought his forearm across Förster's face, felt the man's nose go flat under his blow. Förster staggered back. Zeb put a weak right into his stomach, followed through with a beauty of a left hook to his right side. He avoided striking at Förster's headthe surest way to crush his own knuckles and fingers was to pound them into a bony target like a man's jawbut was rewarded anyway with the sight of Förster backing away.
Förster recovered almost instantly, dropped back into his stance. "I will win," the colonel said. "I'm fighting not just for myself. My cause lends me strength."
"It lends you cliches, anyway. Besides, I've got something you don't."
"Which is?"
"I can really take a beating." Zeb moved in, parried part of Förster's wicked hook, and threw his own combination, left-right-left, side-gut-side. His right-hand punch landed harder this time. He ignored his own pain, fighting through it, fighting with it.
There was no one else in sight in this hall. Mindful of the doors that lined it, Rudi ran up to Ritter and stood a mere pace away. "It was you, wasn't it?"
Ritter looked around, but seemed to find no rescue at hand. His expression was pained. "I, what?"
"You who convinced Albin to come along on this plan of yours. You're going to kill Aevar, so it wasn't him. Albin would never have thrown in with a mere colonel or with your mad deviser. So it was you."
"It was I." Ritter grimaced. "And now it appears that I am your prisoner. Unless you'd like to be very rich."
"How rich?"
"How rich is the king of an industrial nation? In a few moons, Weseria will seize Donarau. You can rule it. Not as a puppet king, as a true ruler."
Rudi grinned. "You know how Albin died?"
Ritter shook his head.
"Pretty much the same way you're going to."
"I have surrendered. I am defenseless."
"You've mistaken me for one of the good eamons." Rudi aimed at Ritter's eye and pulled the trigger.
Doc tore at Volksonne's throat. He felt its greater arms wrap around him, squeezing, crushing, burning. He howled his pain, scrabbling at it with his pawsthen remembered.
This was the sun beneath him. He was destined to win. He had pursued it across the skies since before man walked the world. He was destined to kill it, no matter the cost. He surged forward again, clamped his teeth on its throat, and tore.
Substance that was not flesh came away under his teeth. Doc swallowed, bit again. He felt his back compressing, his fur and skin burning, but now his jaws were growing out of proportion with the rest of his body. He bit again and again, swallowing more and more of his foe's godly form.
And suddenly the pain diminished. Volksonne was thrashing about, not gripping him mercilessly, not burning him. Doc lunged for a flailing arm, one of the greater ones. He grasped it, tore it away, swallowed.
Förster felt his strength flagging. He knew a sudden moment of fear. He'd hit Zeb Watson again and again, but the black man in blacker clothing just wouldn't go down.
He backed away, past the opening in the rail that led to the stairs, and then threw himself forward as Watson reached that spot. He felt Watson's fist connect with his ribs, his increasingly-vulnerable ribs, but shoved and saw Watson flail as he went over sideways and back.
Then Watson's hand caught him by the collar and Förster, too, fell that way.
He hit the stairs hard, cracking his kneecap and suddenly tasting blood, and his own consolation was the knowledge that Watson must have hit harder. He rolled across more steps, then the ground dropped out from under him.
He tried to twist in midair, tried to rotate to land well. He hit back-first and pain jolted through his entire body, particularly where Watson's blows had weakened him.
But Förster was Sonnenkrieger and Watson was merely a dusky. The colonel forced himself to rise. He turned.
Paces away, the smoke-wolf stood astride the spasming body of Volksonne, growling, eating.
But immediately in front of Förster, Watson was already up, already on guard again. "Weren't you listening, stupid?" His voice sounded pained.
Watson lashed out, his trademark combination. Förster got his hands up. But the attack was a feint; Watson faded back and came around with a side kick that took Förster in the gut. Förster slammed back into the concrete wall, the little bit of his breath remaining now leaving him.
Watson stepped in, brought his left knee up into Förster's vulnerable side. Förster felt ribs crack. He unloaded a hook into his enemy, connected with his shoulder, but the blow had no strength to it.
Watson swarmed over him, and Förster could no longer keep up with the blows, with the bewildering complexity of the combinations. He felt impacts against his gut, sides, knees, face. Curiously, the blows seemed less and less painful. Yet he could not defend against them.
There was a final blow. Somehow Watson had slammed the entire floor into Förster's body.
Watson knelt beside him. Increasingly detached, Förster knew that, with the alleged humor with which most New Worlders seemed to be afflicted, Watson would now begin to count him out.
But Watson didn't count. He leaned in close and whispered, "Sie sind wunderbar, ich würde gerne Ihre Tochter heiraten."
The last bit of Volksonne disappeared down Doc's throat. He shook his head and looked for more to eat.
Before him were two morsels wrapped up in cloth. He sniffed. They were made of raw meat and blood. He lunged. The one in black cloth jumped away. Doc seized one in flesh-colored cloth, shook it briefly until he heard its spine snap, and gulped it down. He turned to the one in black again.
It spoke, its voice dim and distant: "Je-zus, Doc, turn it off!" But the words meant nothing.
He bared his teeth and advanced on it. It backed away. It smelled delicious.
Then there was another voice, far louder, shouting right in his ear: "Wake up, you daft eamon!"
Startled, Doc opened his second set of eyes. Before him, he caught a glimpse of the giant smoke thing shaped like a wolf; then it faded to nothingness, revealing Zeb beyond it.
Doc turned his head. Rudi stood beside him, eyes wide. "Thank you," Doc said.
"Think nothin' of it. Time to go."
Doc stood. As his hearing cleared, a new noise came to him, a clanking from high in the dais chamber, voices speaking in Burian: "Almost there, Majesty."
Zeb held up his right hand and swore. "Doc, it got worse just before Volksonne disappeared. Fireball time."
"The palace"
"Worse than that. It's coming here. Harris rigged it." Zeb turned toward the lower exit. "Time to run."
But Doc ran the other way, up the stairs and into the dais chamber, with Rudi at his heels.
Zeb swept Noriko up and ran down the stairs, his rate of speed dangerous, his jarring gait sending waves of pain through her.
"Fireball?" she asked, when her breath would allow her.
"Yep." He hit the first landing, skidded into a turn, continued down.
"Thank you."
"For what?"
"Coming back for me."
"Had to."
"You had to? Why?"
He rounded another turn. "I'm your guardian spirit. You were waiting for me, weren't you?"
"Yes." She tightened her grip on him. "You'll bring me harmony?"
"Count on it, Noriko." He rounded another turn.
"Stand back, Majesty," the colonel in charge of this unit waved Aevar back. "We have to make sure it is secure"
White arms emerged from the hole his soldiers had battered open, followed by a torso, and Doc emerged. The soldiers surrounding the spot backed away, bringing their rifles into line.
Aevar glared. "Doctor MaqqRee. You're going to explain"
Doc flashed him an unfriendly smile. "This is my explanation: Run. Or die."
"You don't speak to me"
Doc reached back into the hole and pulled. The hole sprouted Rudi Bergmonk as though it were part of a magical gangster garden. Doc set Rudi onto his feet.
"Fireball's coming," Rudi said. "You're about to be the crispiest king in Europe."
Aevar looked Doc in the face and decided that the man wasn't joking. "Evacuate," he told his officer.
They ran.
Dr. Trandil Niskin watched as the tiny glowing ball appeared above the model of Bardulfburg. He staggered, released by the completion of the devisement from the awesome drain it made against his strength.
When he'd done this in the past, he'd known the pleasure, a sense of accomplishment perhaps no other man could know.
This time there was no elation, just a sense of duty.
His daughter was gone. The last person in the world who had loved him. He would now have riches, titles, fame. He would serve his leader wellbut, as the only one living who knew how to summon the sacred suns, the only man who could maintain the machinery that summoned Volksonne, he would be indispensable and would dictate the terms by which he spent the rest of his life.
But one thing he could not dictate. Adima was gone. He'd feared it when lines of communication to her in Neckerdam broke off. Now he knew. Bitter tears rolled down his cheeks. He did not care whether the Sonnenkrieger guarding the two doors into this bullet-pocked office saw them.
Curiously, the little sun did not begin to arc toward the model of the Royal Palace and the little chip of white stone lying atop that building. Its course took it further south and west, toward . . .
He swallowed the lump that had suddenly appeared in his throat. "Oh, please, no."
The Sonnenkrieger officer looked at him. "What is it?"
Niskin glanced at him, then looked back at the model.
There was no mistake. The ball was dropping straight for the Temple of the Suns.
He could disrupt the devisement, of course. Interpose his flesh between the miniature sun and its target. But the god would demand its due of him. He would die.
He would die either way.
But Desmond MaqqRee, the man responsible for his daughter's death, was here in the temple.
What did it matter that the entirety of Ritter's plan would die? At least Adima would be avenged.
Niskin returned his attention to the officer. "Nothing is wrong," he said. "Here, come take a look. You will find this interesting."
Some of the soldiers tripped descending the stairs outside the temple. Their fellows hauled them to their feet. Others shouted for the crowd to move back.
The crowd didn't have to be told. A sun was high in the sky, roaring down toward them. People ran in all directions, even up the stairs toward the temple; the soldiers kept them from reaching their objective.
Doc, Rudi and the royals were across the street and crouching behind cars when the sun of Volksonne came to earth for the last time. It struck dead center in the temple dome and burned its way through as though the stone roof were paper. The temple's walls blew out, hurling columns before them, and chunks of column bounced down the temple steps. The explosion hurled burning debris out across the city for blocks in all directions.
Doc had no trouble descending into his meditative state. Hear me, O Trickster. Here is the gift I promised you, a loathsome trick, done by my command, done in your honor. I pray it brings you laughter. He opened his eyes again.
The roar of the blast was done. Flaming cinders still fell among the crowd, but Aevar rose, unconcerned by the danger they posed. Assuring himself first that his daughter was unhurt, he turned to his officer. "Bring in the fire guard," he said. Then he turned to Doc. "As I was saying, you're going to explain this."
Doc gave him a smile that was as cold and distant as only a Daoine Sidhe could offer. "Oh, yes, I am."
Under the bright noonday sun, Zeb watched Geert Tiwasson and Hathu Aremeer fight for third place in the All-Out.
Zeb affected alert interest, but he could barely manage to concentrate on the fight. Every part of his body hurt. Alastair's medical devisements had in fact worked wonders on his nose, restoring it to its proper shape by morning, but they hadn't stopped it from hurting. His ribs hurt, his arms hurt, his joints hurt, his back hurt.
He managed a smile. Hurting wasn't bad. It was much better than one of the alternatives.
Tiwasson put Aremeer in a hold the man from Donarau could not break. Aremeer tapped out, an expression of disgust on his face.
"Congratulations," Zeb told Tiwasson when the big man returned to the sidelines.
Tiwasson afforded him a faint smile. "I would rather be where you are. Facing Förster."
"It's not that much fun."
A referee approached Princess Edris in the royal platform. He held a pocket watch and shook his head, speaking. She spoke to him briefly. He came to the edge of the platform, to the microphone set up there, and addressed the crowd in Burian.
"The appointed time having passed," Tiwasson translated, "and Conrad Förster not having presented himself"
The crowd, having already heard the last words in Burian, groaned.
"Förster is disqualified from this competition." Tiwasson cocked his head. "It looks as though I am second instead of third." He extended Zeb his hand. "And you are first. Congratulations."
Zeb shook it. "Thanks."
"Think of me fondly now. Soon enough, I will take the title from you."
"I welcome a fair challenge, man."
They called Zeb, Tiwasson, and Aremeer up onto the platform. Princess Edris smiled as she placed the wreaths upon their headsgold on Zeb's, silver on Tiwasson's, bronze on Aremeer's.
The athletes turned to face and wave at the crowd, and the band began the royal anthem of Novimagosa song as tediously old-fashioned and predictable, Zeb decided, as Weseria's.
He found the corner of the field where the Sidhe Foundation stood and waved to them. Most of them were bandaged beneath their clothes, especially Doc, and Ixyail still looked a little disorientedwhat she'd been through, iron poisoning and overuse of her own special gift, had left her that way. But she was smiling, too.
Swana was with them, and the Bergmonk Boys. And out in the crowd he saw Kobolde and other duskiesnot many, but more than there had been in the audience during his first bouts.
Okay, he told himself, you're not Jesse Owens. But you're doing your part. He sought out Noriko again. And you didn't let anyone down.
"Coming with us?" Doc asked.
Rudi shook his head. So did his brothers. "We're going to watch the Games until the end. In fact, I think we'll use the Foundation's rooms. If you've a mind to let us."
Doc took the key from his pocket and passed it over. "Don't do anything I have to pay for. I don't want to have to come after you."
"I expect you might . . . someday. If we're not smart enough. But, no, I won't make it soon. Why are you leaving before the Games are done?"
"Personal business to take care of."