Kara moved her big, smelly horse right up to us. “We have to go now!
People die here because however wonderful the things they can imagine, the bad things are always worse. The self-destruction in us always wins out.” A roar interrupted her and the heaped mass of my mannequin soldiers heaved and began shedding plasteek bodies. A moment later Cutter John emerged from it, half a dozen perfectly-formed plasteek women still clinging to him.
“Shit!” I pictured a dragon, all gleaming scales and gouting flame, swooping down on my enemy. A moment later a column of orange-white fire hammered down on the spot where Cutter John stood. The heat of it washed over us. The horses bolted, whinnying in panic, I dropped my wine into my lap, and the couch went over backwards.
I crawled back to the couch, knees squishing on the damp ground, and peered over it. Cutter John stood scorched and blackened, rivulets of molten plasteek running down him, the coils of my huge dragon hemming him in. It opened jaws wide enough to encompass a shire horse, and scooped him up. Teeth like short swords, bright as silver-steel, crunched down. In moments the bastard was gone, swallowed away into the gullet of a vast serpent scaled in fire-bronze and gold.
I should have felt safe—but I saw how those oh so fine and shiny teeth failed to shear Cutter John into pieces, and just before he slid away down that throat, he met my gaze, his pale eyes unafraid and full of awful promise.
Looking around, I saw Snorri and Kara had regained control of their steeds and were veering toward the building I’d seen. Hennan was running for the same place and had covered about a third of the distance. I pursed my lips, thinking that he might have shown a little more faith in the Marshal of Vermillion. I did oversee a successful defence of an entire city against an army of the dead . . . Behind me my dragon collapsed, falling onto its side and scraping at the shiny scales over its stomach as if it had eaten something that disagreed with it. Actually I suspect dragons tend to eat everyone that disagrees with them . . . but by the time that thought popped into my head I was already running.
I got to the blockhouse moments after Hennan, my stomach churning with a mixture of cake and raw fear. Kara had caught Murder’s reins on her way to the building and led him along with her. Snorri had dismounted and set his strength against a large slab of Builder stone that looked as if it might be covering a doorway. If it wasn’t then the place had no entrances—for all we knew it might just be a solid block of poured stone put there to waste people’s time while their own imaginations plotted to kill them.
I glanced back. A familiar and unwelcome figure was running toward us. Behind him the heath still burning fitfully where my dragon had scorched it. The beast itself lay on its side, an ugly hole torn in its stomach.
“What are you doing?” I shouted at Snorri.
He looked around, red-faced with effort, his expression dangerous. “Get out of the way,” I said, and, without waiting for him to do so, waved my hand, willing the slab to slide. “Damn Wheel’s trying to kill us—may as well make it work for us too.” Nothing happened. With gritted teeth I tried harder, staring at the door, feeling the blood pound in my head and prickle in my eyes.
“Not working very well, is it?” Snorri growled.
“If it wasn’t shielded from the wrong-mages it wouldn’t have lasted long, would it?” Kara said. “Why don’t both of you try?”
Normally I try to leave physical labour to the peasant classes, but with Cutter John bearing down on me I didn’t need a second invitation. Hennan and I joined Snorri, throwing our weight against the slab. I strained hard enough to rearrange several internal organs. Panic lends a man strength though and something gave with an unpleasant combination of snap and squelch. For a moment I was sure it was part of me that had broken, but it turned out to be the slab moving. Once started it moved more smoothly and moments later the slab stood a yard to the left in the muddy furrow it had cut through the sod. Revealed behind it was a dark rectangular opening.
Kara jumped down, orichalcum in hand, and entered the building. I spared a glance back at Cutter John. He ran with a degree of awkwardness due to his shortened arm, steady rather than sprinting, as if wanting to milk as much terror from me as possible.
“We’re going to have to leave the horses.” I hated to say it, and not just because Murder was so good at running away.
“I know.” Snorri ducked through the doorway, Hennan behind him.
I raised my hands, turning my palms up in a mixture of outrage and astonishment, but nobody was left to see it. Just me, and Cutter John, a hundred yards off now. “They’re not just fucking cows that you ride, you know!” I shouted at the Norses’ backs. No response. “Ah, shit on it!” I waved one hand at the horses, blinking my eyes to focus. A screeching eagle dived out of nowhere, sending all three bolting. I had the bird swoop again and turn them so they ran away from the Wheel. The other hand I held toward Cutter John and opened my fingers. A huge pit yawned underneath him and he vanished into it. I closed the hand again and the pit walls slammed together. It wouldn’t delay him long. With a last look at the fleeing horses I turned and followed on in to the blockhouse.