basements—probably intended for sea craft, he guessed. Just being near the burning projectile made all the paper lanterns curl and crisp—but even though he’d trapped it, the shrieker pushed and pushed against him, worming through his grasp, poking farther into the cocoon of floating lanterns…
Crasedes watched as the little paper lanterns crackled and burned around him, and for a moment he was allowed a window into the gardens—and he saw that Gregor was now gone.
The other lanterns shoved themselves closer, indifferent to the flame and the heat. With a grunt, he flicked his hand and snapped the metal arrow in two. He cast the pieces to the ground and smashed through the cocoon of lanterns, crushing dozens, hundreds, thousands of them with but a thought…
And he looked up just in time to see a dozen more metal arrows rise from the distant Dandolo walls, curve, and fly right at him.
43
Sancia staggered over and helped Orso to his feet. He was gasping and panting miserably now, and Sancia and Berenice had to throw his arms across their shoulders.
he said.
A burst of terrible shrieking outside, and the rumble of explosions.
said Sancia.
The three of them started limping for the door, pausing only to scoop up the imperiat where it lay on the floor.
asked Orso.
said Sancia.
* * *
—
Crasedes growled and snarled as he fought his endless war in the skies. He ripped stones from the buildings and hurled them at the shriekers, bursting them apart; he ripped gravel and sand from the earth and used it to shred the countless lanterns, and when the espringal batteries below started firing on him, he smashed them as well; and through it all he kept moving, dodging and tumbling and darting through the city spires, the projectiles slamming into the buildings around him while the night filled up with screams.
I won’t let it end like this, he thought. Not like this.
A rumbling to Crasedes’s left. He turned and saw the supports of one spire had somehow collapsed—just perfectly for the whole tower to fall on top of him.
The very stones, the very buildings of the city were making war on him.
Crasedes raised a fist and flew up toward the tumbling building, bracing himself.
This, he thought to himself, is not how I wanted things to go.
* * *
—
Together Sancia, Berenice, and Orso limped out of the gates and through the smoke-filled Dandolo enclave. Everything close to the estate was practically deserted, but the areas close to the enclave walls were in a complete uproar. Campo folk left and right fled their homes as Crasedes screamed and raged and fought above, shrapnel and flames hurtling over their heads.
But fleeing was no longer as easy as it should have been: none of the scrived doors or gates or carriages were working anymore.
said Sancia when she saw the screaming crowd at the enclave gate. She watched as the people beat their hands on it, crying for it to open. She looked up and saw the espringal batteries along the top of the walls tracking Crasedes’s movements, peppering him with bolts.
said Orso.
said Sancia.
said Orso.
There was a dull roar in the skies, and they watched as Crasedes smashed a shrieker out of the air before flitting forward and punching through one of the campo towers like it was made of floss candy.
said Berenice,
Sancia gritted her teeth, ran to