Grail - By Elizabeth Bear Page 0,40
lessen our adaptability.”
Jordan tilted her head. “You want to keep them alive because they want to fight you?”
Tristen smiled his haunting, half-feral smile. “Can you think of a better reason? We may have to kill a few of the leaders to make our point, but diversity—ideological as well as biological—is the name of the game.”
Jordan’s armor was not new then—she had broken it in, and it liked her—but it was not the scarred and war-weary creature it would become. When she slipped into it, the reactive colloidal lining wrapped her like an embrace, cool at first, and warming rapidly as it molded to her body and absorbed and reflected her heat. The armor was a paradox, a cipher; it massed more than twice what Jordan did, and it made her feel strong and supported—but also light, friable, adrift, as if the strength of the machine could peel her out of her body and make her fly. Logically, she knew that some of it was the feeling of invulnerability, and some of it was the biochemical support.
It didn’t change the sensation.
She stroked a gauntleted hand down the vambrace and felt the armor purr at her attention. Inanimate objects could be so needy. She turned to Tristen with a spring in her step—and that of the armor, too, as it was excited by the prospect of an outing, though it was naïve and not as apprehensive as Jordan at the equally imminent prospect of a fight.
Tristen had come to the meeting in his own pristine white suit of mail—a clear message to anyone with eyes that his understanding of the situation implied a martial solution. But he still stayed to watch Jordan kit herself with an impassive eye, suggesting one adjustment to her armor’s program. That done and all the checks completed to his satisfaction, he allowed her to help him seat Mirth’s sheath in its clasps across his back, adjusting the angle of the blade with great solemnity. He carried an array of nonlethal ordnance—flashbangs, stickies, a sonic stun unit, and extra power cells augmented the armor’s intrinsic microwave projectors until they could be considered weaponry. Additionally, he placed a holstered pistol on each thigh, the magazines full of tightly controlled explosive rounds.
Jordan regarded him dubiously. Nanobullets, needle rounds, hard plastic cartridges—those were all reasonable options for use inside the walls of the world. Explosives—
But Tristen smiled at her, showing teeth the color of skimmed milk behind the cat blue lips. “I won’t miss.”
“All right, then,” she said, and loaded an extra oxygen canister anyway. Just in case.
They crossed gazes, and Tristen sealed his helm. “Let’s go find our army.”
Army was a strong term for the array of war-kitted Engineers awaiting them inside Engine’s main meeting hall, but Jordan had to admit they looked impressive, garbed in armor and draped with weapons some of them probably even knew how to use. More, she suspected, understood the drones and toolkits that bobbed and hummed and sidled among them, eagerly waiting to be put to whatever design their masters saw fit.
In the shadowed doorway leading to the lectern, Tristen took a moment to pause and scan the crowd before entering the room. If what he saw pleased or satisfied him, his armor hid all sign.
Still, he drew a deep breath before he said, “We’re on.”
He led the way out into the front of the room, conversation stilling as they entered, and turned and paused, Jordan at heel. She had the uneasy sense of being something less than actually present; invisible, an accessory, Tristen Conn’s aide rather than her own person. It was as reassuring as it was irritating. Whatever happened today, responsibility would not rest on her.
Tristen smoothed his helm back, revealing his face. Now a true silence swept the lingering murmurs from the room, and every eye fastened on him. Engineers in armor creaked, hardly breathing; drones bobbled on their wheels or armatures. Tristen gazed back, seeming to catch each person’s attention in turn, saying nothing. And then he did nod, visibly, as if his assessment of what he noticed pleased him.
“Right,” he said. “Let’s give them hell.”
When he sealed his helm and turned, Jordan felt the wave of excitement that gathered the army up and moved it into a column behind him. This is going to be easy, she thought, and knew she wasn’t alone.
* * *
She was both right—and wrong.
The army of Engine lay in wait for the invaders at the mouth of the River, and through the Broken Holdes,