Ironshield Read online

  Gaul remained where he was. The only part of him that moved were his eyes as he glared at Paulson. There'd been no love lost between the two of them, since Paulson's antics at Yannick Mal's execution.

  Samuel entered the president's office.

  Davids sat with his fingers laced at his chin. He waited for Salkirk to close the door and stand beside Samuel before addressing them.

  "Well, you two certainly know how to make a mess of things in short order."

  "Always been one of my strong points." Samuel’s lips curved in a wry grin. "Although I think I've been outdone, this time around."

  Nathaniel Davids' face darkened as he turned to the other man. He picked up a newspaper from his desk, then hurled it at Salkirk's feet. "You should give your writers a raise," he said in disgust. "I can't imagine it was easy, to spin an assassination attempt on your opponent as being all about you. I only wish I'd been there to see your hypocrisy live on stage."

  Samuel watched loose sheets of newsprint flutter to the floor. The front page of the Arkenian Star was easy to spot, its bold headline splashed across the entire sheet:

  SENATOR MUTTON FLEES EDINVILLE BOMBING. ABANDONS CITIZENS IN BURNING DEBATE HALL.

  Samuel watched the page settle on the floor, and re-read it several times afterward, honestly wondering if he'd become illiterate. "This has to be a God-damned joke, Elliot," he said at last.

  "I doubt the audience in Speaker's Hall found it funny, Sam, when you scurried off."

  "Someone had just tried to kill him!" Davids shouted. "For the second time, all because you thought your career meant more than the wellbeing of the nation." The president rose to his feet and paced back and forth behind his desk. The man seemed to have aged even more over the last year than in all the previous ones combined, as though wartime had been the only thing holding his advancing years at bay. His limp seemed more pronounced, the result of a shrapnel wound during the Revolution.

  "Industrialist flags hanging from windows. Fringe groups coming out to riot in broad daylight. Threats of a second Civil War. Worse, a second Revolution, with our heads in the noose!"

  "The people never were happy with the Quarrystone debacle, Nathaniel," said Salkirk.

  "That's Mr. President to you, Elliot," Davids snapped. "And displeased as they were, at least we had a story, a shred of deniability to protect the good name of the man you -my pardon - we put on the political chopping block. Now? If by some chance of fate Samuel wins, he'll have the most hostile populace a leader of this nation has presided over since our colonial days. All the chaos we tried to avoid will break forth!"

  "Then I suppose I'll have your vote, Mr. President?" Salkirk drew out the title in long syllables.

  "Was the ink even dry on your attack plan, Salkirk, before you figured to turn it against me?" Samuel asked. "Because from where I'm standing, it seems less and less like Quarrystone was proposed as our best chance at victory and more like it was your best way to gain ammunition."

  "Can't argue with results, Sam," Salkirk said. "We won the war."

  "And we could have done so with you and Radiance in the north," Samuel snarled, losing what tenuous hold on calm he had. "Strange, that it was my Warsuit being ferried up there without my knowledge to carry out your plan."

  Salkirk shrugged. "I've never been much of a fighter. Killing is your expertise, and while I did my duty from the southern end of Quarrystone, I thought it best not to risk the ambush in my inept hands."

  "You slimy shit." Davids slapped a hand on his desk, leaning forward. "Save your lies for the papers. I trusted you. I gave your plan my stamp of approval, and we all agreed on how we'd handle the aftermath. There was a deal."

  "Really?" Salkirk lifted an eyebrow. "My dear President, I apologize if I've violated an agreement between us. If you will only show me the contract I signed with you, I'll be more than happy to issue a retraction in the next issue of the Star."

  "Don't think your cheek will win you this, Senator. You're as implicit in what happened at that war camp as Samuel is—"

  "As. Are. You." Salkirk's coyness evaporated, replaced by a sharp, biting tone. "Would you like me to instead tell the whole truth, hm?" He turned to Samuel, including him in the question. "I mean it, gentlemen. In no way am I preventing you both from coming forward about my involvement. You, Samuel, could write to the papers whenever you wish. You can even submit it to the Star and I'll let them print it. Mr. President, can you not address the nation via a Senate gathering or press conference on any given day? Because if you want to rob me of what my esteemed opponent calls 'ammunition' that is what it will take."

  Samuel's hands clenched, fingers itching to grip his saber. "Perhaps I'll do just that, Elliot."

  "No, Sam." Davids sank back into his chair. "You won't. You can't."

  "Why not?" Samuel demanded. "Because that would besmirch you? Like it or not, Nathaniel, you are involved, and in no small way. Should I lay myself to be broken on the wheel for the sake of your legacy?"

  "My lega- have you not been listening to a word I've said? The country is on the verge of bursting open at the seams at the mere accusation that you planned the Quarrystone Massacre. Do you care to imagine what happens when we confirm that the president himself sanctioned the strike?"

  "If you fear being discovered so much, maybe you shouldn't have given my plan your blessing to begin with," Salkirk said. "But you did, and Mutton helped carry it out. Now I have an advantage, and I will press it. If the two of you are unwilling to come forward and rob me of that upper hand, that's your prerogative." He turned on his heels.

  "I'm still your president," Davids growled. "And I did not dismiss you."

  "I've kept my piece about you, Nathaniel. And I'll continue to do so. If you want to throw yourself on the pyre for Mutton's sake, go ahead. But unless you're going to have me arrested, I've got a campaign to run." Salkirk got to the door and paused. "A free piece of advice, Sam," he said.

  "There's nothing you have to say that I want to hear, bastard—"

  "Don't give the accusations power by denying them. If you're to be called a war monger, lean into it. Embrace the mantle with pride." Salkirk pushed the door open. "It's your best shot."

  The door clicked shut, leaving Samuel alone with the president. He and Davids looked at each other for several moments, at a loss for what to say.

  Chapter 17

  James tossed and turned on his narrow, creaking bed.

  Music and noise from the hotel's bar downstairs drifted up, along with the shouts of drunks in the street, but these were sounds James had grown accustomed to, after the time he'd spent living in Goethegar.

  Now, in Helmsburg, he found himself once more living in a room above a tavern, what he could call his own confined to this cramped, moldy box, its age-yellowed walls lit by the luminescence of a streetlamp streaming through the curtains.

  The innkeeper had looked at him suspiciously until James gave him Matthew's letter and flashed his Industrialist pin. The man had still scowled, but it was a respectful scowl, if that was possible.

  James couldn't sleep. He kept thinking about Annabelle, wondering if she'd taken his advice and gone to her family's estate, or if she were still in that God-awful room even now, alone and scared.

  Or, worse, she could be in a military base being interrogated by Prentiss and his colleagues. Annabelle was nothing like Tessa, but their faces blurred together in his mind. She too had been left alone to tend to something that wasn't hers. She'd climbed into that Warsuit, desperate, no doubt afraid, and taken on a fight that should never have been hers. A fight James had done everything he could to keep her away from. Now, he'd left someone he cared about behind and brought potential disaster to dozens of men and women who only wanted to lead normal lives, same as him.

  James almost wished Matthew were running a rebel cell, just so he could pretend, if they were caught, that it had nothing to do with his coming here.

  No one found you on the road. You were clumsy with y
our alias, Jim, but with Matt's help and some luck, you can stay hidden for good this time. He tried to believe it was more than wishful thinking.

  The state knew the Ironshield was alive now. They'd stop at nothing to find him. He would stop at nothing.

  James sat up in bed, teeth clenched and hands balled into fists.

  Samuel Mutton. James almost hoped the son of a whore did find him, if only to give him his chance. If it comes down to that, I'll go to the gallows happy, knowing I'll see you in hell.

  Someone let out an unintelligible shout outside, followed by the crash of a breaking bottle.

  Screw it. James swung out of bed. Not going to get any sleep. Might as well take a walk.

  According to the cheap mechanical clock ticking away above his door, midnight was approaching. A good hour for visiting ghosts.

  Helmsburg was larger than Goethegar, but that wasn't saying much. Once James passed the taverns and inns clustered around town, he found the night quiet, the streets all but deserted.

  Arkenian flags hung limp from storefronts. Dark windows lined his path. Somewhere, a solitary dog barked.

  James breathed in the cold air, tasting the tang of winter's chill with each breath mingled with the aroma of chimney smoke. The frosted dirt beneath his feet glittered in the light of the moon, or in the yellow glow of the occasional lit window.

  The buildings thinned the farther James got from town, stores and apartments giving way to houses, houses giving way to repair shops and warehouses as he crossed into the industrial district.

  He spotted what he was looking for soon enough, skeletal shadows silhouetted against the moonlight from behind a high chain-link fence. James stepped into the shadow of a garage across the road and looked at the graveyard. Its fence was topped with razor wire. There was no doubt a guard or two on site as well.

  Probably the worst place for me to be, James thought. Especially with this. His saber was slung across his back, still wrapped in cloth.

  Although, if he were caught and taken in, would it be such a tragedy? Or would it come as a relief?

  It could give me my shot at Mutton. The senator had made sure to spare time for his little talks when he had James in a cell before. Would the man be able to resist the chance to gloat again, now that his side had won?

  If he's that stupid, I won’t miss my chance next time. I'll strangle the fucker with my bare hands if I have to. Rage boiled within James, as it did whenever he thought of Redstripe's pilot. His father's former friend and comrade.

  Tessa Kolms’ murderer.

  James shivered. Now that he'd stopped walking, the cold sought him out, piercing through his coat and sweater. Slipping his hands beneath his coat, James leaned against the garage's brick wall and continued to watch the fence.

  Time lapsed as James' mind wandered. He relived scenarios in his past, imagining what would have happened had he done this or that differently. What if he'd taken out Redstripe's legs at Graytop Hills? Or maneuvered Ironshield in time to dodge the blow that wedged the enemy Warsuit's blade in his chest plate? What if he'd won the duel, and used the Krieger suits in the open, routing the Appeaser army away from the Northern lines without bloodshed? With Striker Crimson and his Warsuit captive, and a strong message sent about Industrialist resolve, how much longer might they have lasted? Would Matt have still been angry with him then?

  And then there was Tessa. The poor girl. It wasn’t that James hadn’t wanted her. She was a beauty in her own right, and as fierce as anyone James had ever known. But seeing her resolve to pilot a Warsuit, all James could picture was his mother, Emilia Edstein, who’d died in her Kaizer, Iron Wrath, during the Xang War, mere months before her husband suffered the same fate at the Bay of Rust.

  What could you do? James asked himself. Tessa’s own father couldn't keep her out of it. So what was there to gain, denying yourself for the sake of something you'd never accomplish? And if he had given in, what then? Where would that have placed her, when the Southern Warsuits descended on Quarrystone?

  Wouldn't have made a difference, James decided. So it doesn't matter. Dead is dead.

  Her face swam in his mind, on the night he'd finally told her nothing would happen between them. Somehow, he hadn't been able to imagine her crying. A twenty-year-old woman, as impulsive as they came, but always somewhat stoic when it came to emotions. The anger, James had expected. He’d anticipated it, expecting to be cursed at, punched, maybe even spat on. That, he could have accepted.

  Those tears, welling in her deep blue eyes when the rage simmered down, those cut him deeper than a thousand strikes or epithets ever could.

  No. It would have been different. I could have... she could have been happy, before the end.

  A dog's bark brought James out of his reflections. He shrank deeper into the shadows as a man with a leashed rottweiler passed by outside the graveyard's fence. He wore the dark, plain uniform of a hired guard, complete with a rubber-coated bat hanging from his belt. He probably had a sidearm on the opposite hip.

  The guard pulled at the chain links as he passed, reining in his dog as it sniffed about and barked into the night.

  James saw his breath drift in a steamy cloud, and held his next one in. The dog stopped, sniffing the air, and barked in James’ direction.

  “What is it, mutt?” The guard peered into the darkness, until James was looking right at the man's face under the shadow of his cap.

  Fuck. Fuck. James thought fast, piecing together what his excuse would be, figuring on a name to give the man.

  But the guard kept looking about, "C'mon boy," he tugged at the leash. Man and beast wandered off to continue their patrol.

  Their timing couldn't have been better. Lungs burning for release, James let out a long breath and gasped in fresh cold air.

  This is ridiculous. He'd never get in. There was no sane reason to go in.

  James stepped out of the shadows into pale moonlight. He'd go back to the hotel, try to get some sleep.

  Before he'd stepped onto the road, a group of silent figures materialized out of the darkness.

  James stopped dead, watched as the black-clad strangers converged on the fence. Someone pulled out a pair of cutters and snipped through the barrier, link by link. The others stood watch, looking every way at once.

  James flattened himself to the ground. These people seemed more attentive to their surroundings than the guard had been.

  Once the one with the cutters had created a large enough slit, he pulled the section of fence back for the others to duck inside.

  The last person waited a few moments to make sure they weren't followed.

  Can't be much more than a boy, James thought, judging by the figure's slight frame and short stature. Masked as he was, and dressed to blend in with the night, there wasn't anything else to discern by.

  The masked man's gaze passed over where James was.

  James reached into his coat for his machine pistol, only it wasn't there.

  Idiot. He'd left the damned thing in his room. Brilliant idea, Jim, bringing the one weapon that would incriminate you and nothing else. He started to loosen the knot tying the saber's wrappings. He didn't see a rifle, but he'd stake a fortune on this person, boy or not, being armed. Don't give him a chance to draw if he sees you.

  The masked man slipped through the fence after his accomplices.

  Minutes stretched by, and James listened for the sound of a barking rottweiler or the cry of a guard. Nothing.

  Close call. Had someone seen him, there was no telling what sort of predicament he'd be in. Those masked intruders didn't seem likely to ignore a man bearing witness to their trespassing.

  But he'd gone unobserved. He was safe to return to the hotel.

  Instead of dashing back toward town, James crossed the road. Before he understood what he was doing, let alone why, he'd pulled back the edge of the severed fence. Cursing himself for a moron, James hunched down and entered the graveyard.

  Once past the fence, he weave
d his way into a maze of rusting metal. The great shapes of scrapped Warsuits loomed in every direction. Their dull, bullet-riddled carapaces cast shadows in silver moonlight that brought every crag and contour into surreal relief, ordnance-churned steel plating that could pass for the rocky surface of some barren, ghostly world.

  Metal scraped on metal somewhere to his left, on the other side of a heap of piled scrap. Whatever the thieves were after, James didn't care to meet them. A year ago, he'd have been outraged at such scavenging, at looters desecrating the memories of fallen Warsuits and their pilots. Now? Even though he knew he should care, James couldn't find it in him. Something inside felt as broken as these decaying machines.

  So, if he didn't care, why was he here?

  Because I want to, he thought. Because I want to care about something. I want to believe in something again.

  He thought he recognized some of these sundered machines. The Northern Dread, the Boltfist. Arkenguard, Deliverance. Kaizers spanning over a generation of warfare, and dozens if not hundreds of smaller remnants from unnamed Kriegers, the short-lived light Warsuits of the North's final push for a victory they were never destined to win.

  Iron Wrath had never been recovered, but part of James still expected to turn a corner and see his mother’s Warsuit. There’d been nothing left of the machine worth hauling back from the Quarish island its pilot died on, just as there’d hardly been anything left of Emilia Edstein to bury.

  Among the Warsuits that were here were machines James had seen time and again, both on the battlefield and in the repair shop. He'd known the pilots. Those who weren't dead were either in prison or hiding. From being in control of multi-million-mark war machines to living a hunted existence in backwater towns like Goethegar, or scrounging unknown in the mean streets of city slums. Industrialist Warsuit pilots, gone from revered warriors to disgraced fugitives, trying to blend into a society that spurned everything they'd stood for.