“There and there, those are the Turks. And there and there, and back there, are ours, and just about everything up that way are the commercial ships.”
“Thank you. Now get down again.”
He dropped back down behind her. “So you’re going to sink the Turks?”
“No. I’m sending them home. I’m sending all the warships home.”
“What do you mean, home? And what do you mean, all?”
Wren drew in a deep breath and hurled out her aether lines for the third time, but instead of a whip in each hand she hurled a slender white wire from each finger tip, half to the south and half to the north, and she seized the crews of all the Turkish ships and all the Hellan ships. There were hundreds of souls packed into the warships, and as she grabbed hold of them she could feel all of their little bodies fly across their tiny wood and steel rooms and flatten against the walls as she hauled the ships from their anchorages.
The huge warships groaned and popped and creaked, and then they began to move. They dragged their anchors, grinding slowly through the waves, heaving up and down against the pull of the aether, but they did move and then began to move faster. Tiny rippling wakes formed around their armored hulls, and then those wakes rose higher and foamed white and green as the massive warships surged through the Strait faster and faster, and when they were all whistling through the spray, nearly skipping over the waves, Wren twisted her hands and turned them all aside.
The Turks bore off toward the docks of Stamballa as she let them go, and their tremendous momentum carried them on, crashing through the cold black waters and then crashing up onto into the wooden piers and stone quays of the Turkish city. The ironclads slashed inland like a dozen enormous hatchets slicing into the shore and grinding up higher and higher, crushing the docks and sea walls and houses and roads, until they finally shrieked to a halt, all leaning at sharp angles on their exposed hulls above the high tide line.
At the same time, the Hellan destroyers were surging straight into the Seraglio Point and the gunboats smashed up on the pebbled beach one after the other, sliding up side by side and crashing into the sterns of their sisters and nosing all the way up to the sea wall just below Wren’s feet. The wooden ships crackled and splintered and burst and shrieked as their hulls scraped up on the land and a huge wave swept up out of their wake and crashed against the wall, sending a curtain of freezing white spray high into the air.
And then it was over.
Wren stood very still as the last wisps of aether flew off into the sky and vanished from her fingertips, but her soul was still whirling and her skin was still tingling. She ran her tongue across her lips and said breathlessly, “It’s done.”
Tycho stood up and stared down at the ruined Hellan fleet at the base of the wall below them, and then across the sea to the ruined Eranian fleet, and then to floating wreckage of the airships out in the middle of the Strait. As he stood there, one of the Mazigh pilots emerged from an airship cabin, pointed a gun into the air, and let a bright red flare shoot up into the sky above the water.
The bright red star shot upward into the colorless cloud of gas from the crashed balloons and a brilliant golden fireball erupted across the sky, rolling about in a cloud of smoke, and then vanished from sight.
Tycho nodded. “I don’t know if it’s over, but it’s definitely going to be very quiet out there for a long time.”
“Good.” Wren took a step toward him. It was her first attempt at moving her feet since she began to summon the aether, and her legs shook beneath her, sending her stumbling into Tycho. They fell together to the floor, and he held her to his chest, and they laughed.
“Good catch,” she said.
His hand was cupping her breast, and he moved it. “Sorry.”
“I’m not.” She pressed her mouth to his and sought out every corner of his mouth with her tongue. Her hips pressed against his, and her jaw trembled, making her gasp. Her thighs were still pulsing with heat, still throbbing with tiny thrusts almost entirely on her own. And she felt Tycho quickening against her shaking skirts. She smiled, her lips still grazing his. “Don’t move.”
“Wait,” he whispered. “I don’t know if… I’m ready.”
“Neither do I.” She smiled. “Let’s find out.”
In half a moment she had his trousers around his knees and her skirts up around her waist and she plunged down onto his warm flesh and felt them suddenly become a single, shivering, thrusting body. She clenched him between her thighs and wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her cheek to his, feeling his hot breath on her neck as she rolled her hips over his again, and again, shaking and gasping in silent ecstasy.
Chapter 28. Aftermath
When it was over, Wren lay on her back staring up at the sky, listening to the sea and the birds. She floated inside her body as her soul finally stopped whirling about, leaving her feeling infinitely still and solid and real.
She kissed Tycho, and he kissed her, and they watched the clouds drift overhead.
“The sailors will be coming off the ships soon,” he whispered.
“We should probably get up,” she whispered back.
They both sighed and groaned and sat up, and then moved apart to stand up and fix their clothing. Wren felt a last lingering tingle in her veins, down in her legs and back, and it slowly faded as she stood there, looking out over the city.
“What would you like to do next?” she asked.
Tycho laughed. “I don’t know. I suppose we should go tell someone that the war has been indefinitely postponed.”
“Let’s.”
They climbed down the stairs in the watch tower and headed back across the park, and then through the broken palace and through the quiet city streets to the gates of the cistern. Everything after that was a blur of faces and the same conversation, over and over. Tycho would tell someone what had happened, and they would run off to tell someone else. Soldiers spilled up out of the little mausoleum, followed by squinty-eyed clerks and weary servants, and the calm Duchess and the haggard Italian.
Tycho did most of the talking, and Wren was happy to let him answer the questions, over and over. What happened, and when, and who, and on and on it went. She let her thoughts wander off to other things, to images of them both lying on the wall, breathless.
I wonder if we can do that again.
Soon.
As the afternoon became evening, things began to happen more quickly. Soldiers and sailors began patrolling the shores and streets, though they found the city quiet enough. The Duchess moved her army of clerks and papers into the Cathedral of Saint Sophia, where the priests graciously found rooms for most of the staff to sleep and work.
The priests also produced a small feast of roast lamb and red wine for their guests, and Wren found herself sitting in a corner with a warm belly full of food and her brains floating gently in alcohol as she watched Tycho on the far side of the crowded room doing very boring things with men in uniforms and piles of papers. She played with the ring on her finger, wondering what sort of talks she might have in the days to come with the ghosts of the valas, and the ancient witch Yaga. She also played with her bracelets, wondering what else she might one day learn to do with them and the aether they commanded.
“Wren?”
She looked up as Omar sat down across from her with a glass of wine in his hand.
“Hello, old timer.”
He nodded and forced a smile. “I see you’ve been busy saving the world without me.”
She smiled. “I learned from the best.”
“Hm.” He sipped his wine. “You learned from your valas, and I suspect you even learned a thing or two from Yaga in your brief time together. I…” He sighed and sipped his wine.
“Everything all right?”
