Chapter Thirteen:.

Unseen Mouths Whisper

Burke the Machinist stood on a hill overlooking Dragon Forge. The continuous pollution of the foundries had rendered much of the surrounding countryside barren; the red clay soil lay naked, cut through with gullies. Here and there a few particularly tough and ancient trees rose above the landscape, gnarled and defiant. In the low areas sat the camps of the gleaners, shanty towns built around small mountains of sc.r.a.p metal and refuge. Burke studied the workings of the town at the heart of this desolation, using one of his inventions, the spy-owl. The spy-owl was a copper version of the night bird with large gla.s.s eyes, standing almost three feet tall. The big round lenses on its face directed light into a series of carefully crafted mirrors. Burke rested the heavy device upon a tripod. Looking into twin lenses at the back of the spy-owl allowed him to see the goings-on in the town below as clearly as if he were standing in the center square. He studied the doorway of the central foundry, counting the earth-dragons who came and went. Knowing how many dragons it took to keep the foundry in operation was crucial information. stood on a hill overlooking Dragon Forge. The continuous pollution of the foundries had rendered much of the surrounding countryside barren; the red clay soil lay naked, cut through with gullies. Here and there a few particularly tough and ancient trees rose above the landscape, gnarled and defiant. In the low areas sat the camps of the gleaners, shanty towns built around small mountains of sc.r.a.p metal and refuge. Burke studied the workings of the town at the heart of this desolation, using one of his inventions, the spy-owl. The spy-owl was a copper version of the night bird with large gla.s.s eyes, standing almost three feet tall. The big round lenses on its face directed light into a series of carefully crafted mirrors. Burke rested the heavy device upon a tripod. Looking into twin lenses at the back of the spy-owl allowed him to see the goings-on in the town below as clearly as if he were standing in the center square. He studied the doorway of the central foundry, counting the earth-dragons who came and went. Knowing how many dragons it took to keep the foundry in operation was crucial information.

He hadn't created the spy-owl to prepare for war. He'd built it to discover the truth behind the stories of life on the moon. The stories were true; the moon was teaming with cities and lakes and forests beneath the glint of crystal domes miles across. Yet, learning the truth had left him wishing he'd never built the spy-owl. What did the knowledge gain him? The discovery of a world he could never reach filled him with a hunger that could never be slaked.

He looked up from the owl, stretching his back. His daughter, Anza, climbed the hill toward him. Dressed in buckskin dyed black, her dark hair in a tight braid, Anza looked quite formidable. She was a walking armory, with a longsword slung over her shoulder, a dagger strapped to her shin, an array of throwing knives on small scabbards lining each bicep, and two steel tomahawks at her belt. Of course, even without all this weaponry, Anza was woman who'd earned the fearful respect of men back at the tavern. She could silence anyone with a glance.

Burke didn't know why Anza had never spoken; she wasn't deaf. She had a keen mind. She could work calculations in her head that took him two sheets of paper to solve. She read voraciously, yet she'd never taken up a pen to write. She spoke to him with a few dozen hand signals that she'd devised while still in diapers. Everything else she had to say she conveyed with her eyes.

She nodded toward the spy-owl as she reached him. He stepped back to let her look inside. She turned the owl toward a new target and stepped back, motioning for him to look inside. He did so, and found his vision focused on the city gates. He quickly saw what she had noticed without the aid of the spy-owl. The gates were sunk into the dirt. Or rather, over the centuries, the grime and dust of the city had built up and covered the lower parts of the gates. Burke guessed the bottom two feet of the doors were buried.

"I'm not surprised those gates haven't closed in centuries. Walls around towns lost some of their defensive value once the winged dragons took over the world," Burke said. He moved the spy-owl around, studying further details of the walls. "This place was built by humans before the ninth plague, when the biggest threat was still other people. That plague gave the dragons their opening; they flourished as mankind withered. Human numbers have built back up, but we've never truly thrived again. As you can imagine, this doesn't sit well with folks like Ragnar, who believe they were given dominion of this world by G.o.d."

Anza gave him a curious look.

"Don't worry that you don't know. I deliberately haven't told you much about G.o.d, the Great Spirit, or whatever. I felt there were other educational priorities for you than the study of invisible men who live in the sky."

She frowned slightly. She glanced toward the horizon, to the exact spot where the moon would be rising in a few hours.

"No, it's nothing like that," said Burke. "The men on the moon are real. Even if they weren't, people aren't going out and launching wars to please them. No one has ever been killed because of the moon men."

Anza pursed her lips. She made a stabbing motion, like she was driving an invisible dagger into someone's belly, then tilted her head, inviting further explanation.

"No," said Burke. "I'm not saying it's wrong to kill, if you've got a good reason: Self-defense, financial gain, political advantage, or even just to stay in practice. Killing for a rational purpose is fine. Killing because you think it will make an invisible man in the sky treat you kindly when you're dead is deranged."

Anza nodded, finally clear on his point. Then she looked down the hills and gave a disgusted wrinkle of her nose. Her eyes said, "Look who's coming." Her nose said, "Ragnar."

"Speaking of deranged," Burke mumbled.

A chill wind rushed over the hill as Ragnar, prophet of the Lord, walked toward them. A whistling moan rose from the rust heaps in the valley below. Burke shivered within the folds of his heavy woolen duster. Ragnar, clothed only by his sunburned, leathery skin and a mane of wild hair looked blissfully insensate to the cold. Bliss was perhaps exactly the right word, thought Burke. Ragnar's eyes were permanently narrowed in an angry expression, yet Burke was slowly starting to see the man underneath this mask of rage. The true dominant quality of the prophet wasn't his anger but his serenity, a calm, faithful confidence that came from his absolute certainty that every breath he breathed had been waved across his lips by the fingers of G.o.d. It wasn't that Ragnar wasn't angry, boiling with vengeance and wrath-he was simply at peace with this rage.

"What have you learned with your magic bird?" Ragnar asked as he drew near.

Anza moved to Burke's left side then retreated several yards, so that she was no longer directly downwind from the prophet.

"The first thing I've learned is that earth-dragons are uniformly near-sighted," said Burke. "If they see anything more than shadows and shapes past fifty yards, I've found no evidence of it."

"How can you tell?" Ragnar asked.

"For one thing, I've been up here two hours without anyone but the human gleaners glancing my way."

"My spies are moving among the gleaners," said Ragnar. "I want to learn how loyal they are to the dragons."

"I don't think loyalty is a virtue gleaners hold in high regard," said Burke. "They make their living destroying relics that could teach us much about the days when humans ruled the world. I personally don't trust them."

"Do you fear they will betray our presence?" Ragnar asked.

"Maybe," said Burke. "We are going to mess with their livelihood. Fortunately, gleaners aren't noted for their bravery. I can't imagine they'll take up arms against us. Once we control the forge, they won't care who they're selling their junk to. Not that we'll be needing to buy much from them. We can pour for weeks just by melting down all the armor and weapons cluttering up the place."

"My men need those weapons," said Ragnar.

"The armor doesn't fit right, and swords and axes are poor weapons to fight the winged dragons. If you want to win, let me outfit your army properly. We need bows more than swords."

"Many of my men already have bows," said Ragnar.

"At Conyers, longbows weren't enough," said Burke. "The sun-dragons can fly above their range. From that height, anything a dragon drops turns into a weapon. At Conyers, they'd fly overhead and drop bucket-loads of steel darts, only a few inches long, weighing barely an ounce. You couldn't really see the darts as they fell, only a dark shadow released by the dragon's claws as they zoomed over you. One minute, the walls are full of archers, vainly firing arrows at dragons out of reach. The next minute, half your archers are dead, ripped to shreds by the dart swarm."

"Now you admit to being at Conyers," said Ragnar.

Burke placed a hand on Anza's shoulder. "Go back to camp," he said.

Anza gave him a worried glance. She detected something in his tone, perhaps.

"I'll be fine," he said.

Anza walked away, slowly at first, then breaking into a sprint. He was envious of her energy, the way her body seemed so light. She bounded down the hill with the grace and speed of a doe.

"You shouldn't have brought your daughter," Ragnar said. "War is no place for a woman."

"Anza is better trained than any of those farmers you've pressed into service. With a hundred like her, I could take this fortress and hold it against every dragon in the world."

"You wouldn't succeed unless it was the will of the Lord," said Ragnar. "He cannot look kindly upon the fact you allow your daughter to dress in such tight clothing. Did the ancient race of the Cherokee always permit its women to dress like wh.o.r.es?"

Burke flicked his wrist, triggering the spring-loaded knife he had in his sleeve. In a flash, he buried the razor tip in the prophet's beard, stopping the second he felt the blade graze flesh.

"You call yourself a prophet," said Burke, his voice trembling. "Can you see what I'm going to do if you insult my daughter again?"

Ragnar's lips curved into a smile. His eyes kept the look of frustrating serenity that tempted Burke to give his blade one last push.

"You've brought bad times upon us, prophet," Burke said, trying not to shout. "You're about to unleash a war. A lot of people are going to die. Cities will be burned. No crops are going to be planted in the spring and by next winter men everywhere will starve. We might see the dawn of the tenth plague, thanks to you. This is a tremendous burden of misery I could spare the world right now by slitting your d.a.m.ned throat."

Ragnar's expression changed from serenity to outright glee. "War!" he said. "Plague! Famine! Death! These things you fear are the Four Hors.e.m.e.n of the Apocalypse. Kill me if you wish; you cannot halt their ride!"

The blade Burke held was among the finest he'd ever machined. It was sharp enough to shave with. The prophet's leathery hide wouldn't even slow it. Burke saw madness in Ragnar's eyes, horrible visions dancing in their black centers. Looking into this darkness, Burke remembered the battle of Conyers with perfect clarity. The deadly rain of darts had been nothing compared to what had happened next. The sun-dragons had dropped onto the fleeing and broken survivors and tore them, simply tore them, ripping flesh from bones with as little effort as a man might use to tear the husk from an ear of corn. Did he want to witness that nightmare again?

No.

And Ragnar was his best hope of never seeing it replayed.

His hand trembled as he pulled the knife away.

"I don't like you," said Burke. "I don't believe in your G.o.d. I don't believe in your prophecies. But you have an army. In a few days, you'll have a foundry. I need both of these things if I'm ever going to show the dragons why humans once ruled this world. Twenty years of nightmares have given me a very strong incentive to plan the right way to fight an army of dragons. I know the weapons we'll need; I know the training we'll require; I know the tactics and strategies we'll follow. I can win this war, but only if you obey me."

"I'm the chosen of the Lord," said Ragnar. "I obey his orders alone."

"d.a.m.nit, no!" Burke shouted, throwing up his arms. "That's exactly what I'm talking about. You aren't going to win by obeying the voices of your invisible friend. If you want even a slender hope of surviving this, I have to be the only voice you listen to. Your mob can take Dragon Forge through sheer brute force, but can they hold it? The sun-dragons will come and take it back from you. I have a plan to defeat them. It's going to require turning a hundred of your farmers into foundry workers in the span of a few hours. It's going to mean that I'm the one mind that will guide their hands in building weapons that you can't even imagine. If we're fast enough and lucky enough, the dragons that fly over us will be slaughtered. Their blood will rain from the sky. Our biggest logistical problem will be clearing the carca.s.ses from the streets before they rot."

Ragnar looked toward Burke's spy-owl. He walked over, lowered his head, and looked into the lenses. He moved the owl on the tripod with surprising confidence and dexterity. For several long minutes, he silently studied the city.

At last, he pulled away. His face was blank; for the first time, there was no hint of anger, no trace of insane joy. For the first time since Burke had met him, Ragnar appeared lost in thought.

"It wasn't the Lord that guided me to you, Kanati," Ragnar said. His voice had lost its normal prophetic vibrancy. With the madness gone from his eyes, Burke realized how much younger Ragnar was than himself. There was something boyish and innocent about him. "When I was a child, my father told me you were the smartest man he'd ever known. He said if the others had listened to you instead of Bitterwood, they might have won."

"We'll never know," said Burke. "We made the choices we made. Bitterwood's plan wasn't a horrible one. We just didn't know what we were up against. No one at Conyers had ever faced an army of sun-dragons. The normal way of the world is for men to waste their energies fighting men, and dragons to focus their aggression on other dragons. We didn't have the experience we needed to plan for victory. Now, some of us have it. Bitterwood, I hear, has been fighting a one man guerilla campaign ever since. It's not a bad strategy if all you want to do is make dragons suffer. But you need a smarter plan if you want humans to once again rule at least a patch of this world."

"An unseen mouth whispers that you have that smarter plan, Machinist," said Ragnar, with sly grin. Some of the heaven-sent madness again flavored his speech. "A rain of blood. Carca.s.ses filling the street. You have the soul of a prophet."

"I have the mind of a man who's seen too much," said Burke, shaking his head. "I wish you'd died in the Free City, Ragnar. But, since you didn't, I'll make the best of a world with you in it. I pride myself on understanding reality. You're my reality now."

"I shall spread the word," said Ragnar. "My army will obey you as they would me."

"Good. Before we take the city, I need twenty men, your brightest. I've been canva.s.sing your mob and have a few candidates in mind. I've got plans sketched out, diagrams. I need to teach them the what, why, and how of the items we'll be manufacturing. They'll be the foremen who lead the rest of the workers when we take the town. With the right advance work, we can pour metal within hours of taking the foundry."

"How long will you need?" asked Ragnar.

"Several days. At least a week," said Burke. "There's a lot to cover."

"That's too long to tarry," said Ragnar as he once more to looked into the spy-owl. "The earth-dragons may be dim-witted and half-blind, but it's only a matter of time before they realize there's an army encamped mere miles from their fortress."

"Haste will lead to failure," said Burke. "Still, you're right. Every hour we wait is a gamble. The gleaners could betray us; a sky-dragon could fly over. Hopefully from the air your rag-tag army looks like gleaners, but that's probably wishful thinking. Let me get started; I'll teach the men as quickly as possible. Anza can help. I can get the training down to five days. Maybe four. There are tests I've written up. Until I have twenty men who can pa.s.s those tests, taking the town will do us more harm than good if the sun-dragons retaliate before we're prepared to fight. The moment we're ready, I'll let you know.

"So be it," said Ragnar. "It's been nearly sixteen years since my parents were killed and I took up preaching the gospel of war. The victory of the Free City has left me hungry to spill more dragon blood; yet, if I must, I can wait a few more days for this feast of vengeance."

Ragnar smiled with the serene rage that Burke found so disquieting. Burke shivered, pulling his collar higher to fight the chill and rising wind.

When Zeeky woke she sensed something was different. The odor and sounds surrounding her had changed. Trisky was gone, as was Adam. The only one with her was Poocher. She reached for the visor, sitting up in the pitch black. She'd been too drowsy to keep her eyes open when Adam had taken her back to his camp. How long had she been asleep? she sensed something was different. The odor and sounds surrounding her had changed. Trisky was gone, as was Adam. The only one with her was Poocher. She reached for the visor, sitting up in the pitch black. She'd been too drowsy to keep her eyes open when Adam had taken her back to his camp. How long had she been asleep?

She froze as she slipped on the visor and the darkness became light. She wasn't alone after all! Leaning against the mine wall across from her stood a tall, broad-shouldered woman in a long black coat. No, not a woman-a man with long white hair and a beautiful, feminine face. He watched Zeeky with an unblinking gaze, smiling as he realized she saw him.

"Sleep well?" he asked with a gentle voice.

"Who are you? Where's Adam?" she asked. Poocher stirred at the sound of her voice.

"Adam was called away. Some trouble with the other members of his squad. He summoned me to take you. I wanted to let you sleep. You've had a tiring journey."

"Are you Gabriel?" Zeeky asked. "Adam said he was taking me to see someone named Gabriel."

"An excellent deduction," said Gabriel.

"You look like the angel in the Bible at the church. At least the Bible that used to be there. I guess it's burned up now."

"Do you believe in angels?" Gabriel asked.

"Sure," said Zeeky. "Are you one? Is that why you're not breathing?"

Gabriel raised an eyebrow. "Adam told me your perceptions were strong. I didn't fool you at all, did I?"

"If you're an angel, why don't you have wings?"

"Who says I don't?" Gabriel asked. He took off his coat, revealing a bare chest. He was well-muscled, yet slender; he looked more like an animated statue than a living thing. He shrugged his shoulders and a pair of golden wings began to sprout, covered in golden feathers. The wings unfolded in an intricate dance, soon reaching several yards in length. He shook his open wings and the metallic feathers sang with the delicate ringing of a thousand tiny chimes.

Poocher sat up. He'd nudged the visor onto his eyes himself and now sat beside Zeeky, staring at the winged man. Poocher grunted.

"I know," said Zeeky. "But maybe angels are supposed to smell that way. It's like summer rain."

"You're a curiously fearless girl, Zeeky," said Gabriel, kneeling down before her. "Adam said you weren't afraid of Trisky. You aren't afraid of the dark. You obviously aren't afraid of me."

"I get scared sometimes," she said. "I got scared in the Free City, when the dragons started killing everyone. I got scared when I saw Big Lick all burned up. Do you know why it got burned? Do you know what happened to my parents?"

"Yes," said Gabriel. "The G.o.ddess decided that few people would notice their disappearance at this particular moment. The other villages they traded with would a.s.sume they'd been killed by Albekizan's soldiers in his purge of the human race. She needed people to help her learn things. She designed the people of your village to help her study."

"Study what?"

"Ah," said Gabriel, with a grin. "That is a difficult question to answer. The G.o.ddess knows almost everything. The few things she doesn't understand aren't going to be easily explained to mortals, not even to a girl as clever as you."

"Adam said the G.o.ddess touched me in my mother's belly and changed me. Did she do this to learn something?"

"Of course," said Gabriel. "Everything the G.o.ddess does she does in the name of knowledge. The alterations to your mind help bridge the perceptual gap between humans and animals. You see the world with the same sensory openness of a beast, yet still possess the cognitive gifts of a human. You're the harbinger of what the G.o.ddess envisions for all future humans."

"What's a harbinger?"

"A forerunner," said Gabriel. "You're the first of your kind. But, you're displaying such promise, I'm certain you won't be the last. We're happy you came back, Zeeky. The G.o.ddess was disappointed you weren't with your family."

"If this G.o.ddess has my family, will you take me to her?"

"Of course," said Gabriel, offering his hand.

Zeeky placed her fingers into his outstretched palm. Gabriel helped her rise. She could hear things inside him as he moved, soft clicks and purrs that sounded nothing like a normal human body.

"How far away are they?"