City of Air (Lost Cities Saga 1)

"Sebastian! No!" Leona screamed, and tried to run to him. Cedric yanked her back, grasping her other arm and locking her arms in his behind her. "No!"

Lady Diana did what Leona could not, dropping to her knees beside the fallen magician and turning him over. He groaned and whimpered and Leona released a breath she did not know she had been holding. But there was a spreading pool of blood on the icy cobblestones and staining Lady Diana's dress and her and Mr Suda's hands. Leona screamed again at the sight of it and Cedric shook her fiercely to shut her up. Lord Aries said, "You did not have to do it in front of them, Hugo."

Mr Diamond shrugged. "This way they know you're serious."

Lord Aries sighed and said, "Calico, Baihu, keep an eye on them; Bonnie, Alphonse, get the other ship down and make sure that this one cannot leave. Saraswati, Hugo, with us." He took hold of Leona's arm from Cedric and said, "Come along now, Miss Ruby. I have waited long enough."

He pulled Leona after him so hard she had trouble keeping her footing. No one else seemed to notice. The Garnet sisters, holding hands, led the way with Saraswati behind them in a bright orange and turquoise sari that drew attention to the incongruity of the guns holstered at her sides and the wicked dagger in her hand. Cedric and Generous followed, with Mr Diamond playfully aiming his pistol at one and then the other, while grinning at Leona. Generous kept looking over his shoulder at his sister, apparently not noticing. Leona kept her gaze on Mr Diamond. If he shot her brother like he had shot Sebastian she would kill him. Lord Aries said nothing, and did not relinquish his hold on Leona's arm. She glanced up at him, tears welling in her eyes, and said, "You did not have to do that."

Lord Aries replied without looking back at her, "He won't die immediately. Unless Mr Diamond hit something important. There was quite a lot of blood."

Leona remembered the blood on Lady Diana's dress and hands, and the way Sebastian had stumbled. She swallowed to release the tension building in her throat and said, "Please let someone help him."

Lord Aries tightened his grip on Leona's arm until she winced and said, "Forget about that boy. He is of no use to us."

Leona tried to peel his fingers off her arm, clawing at them when his grip tightened. He gave her a little shake and she tried to get them to stop, digging her heels in. He was forced to stop too but pulled her into him, crushing her against his side. Leona looked up at him, wide-eyed, and felt her heart rate speed up at the rage on his face. He was glaring down at her, lips curled into a snarl, teeth clenched. She turned her head away just as Mr Diamond cocked his pistol again and pressed the tip to the back of Cedric's head. Cedric stumbled at the touch and then went still, hands hanging loose at his side. Generous beside him just stared at Mr Diamond, his face pale.

"Problem, ma cherie?" asked Mr Diamond. Behind him, she caught Rose glaring at her in the faint light, though Lavender was not, her expression completely blank as Orchid cried into her shoulder. They had already seen their father die. Leona fighting back could only get more people killed.

Leona stopped struggling, her vision blurring as the tears ran free and shook her head. Lord Aries let her out of his arms, put a hand on her shoulder and said, "Next time I'll tell Bonnie to shoot Sebastian again, and this time in the head. He won't be a problem for you then, will he?"

"Please," said Leona, not looking at him. "Please don't kill him."

When Lord Aries started walking again, she kept her head down and matched his pace.

The question of how Lord Aries and his crew had managed to escape was answered when they returned to the ballroom where the Garnets had held their ill-fated play. Kara stood in the centre of the room with Mrs Howard, Ghislaine Marcel, Arthur Teach and some of the Sylphide's constructs alongside a few of the Garnets' and one or two of the guests from the first party in New Amsterdam. Lord Aries must have expected treachery from the beginning but then why did he allow the Garnets' to succeed? There was no reason for him to let them go to the Confederacy or to kill Mr Garnet. And at the sight of them those in the room broke into light but hearty applause.

"Here, here!" said one of the men.

"Good showing, old boy! Good show!" said another Leona recognised as having been with Mrs Howard at the party.

"The reports are calling it the 'Restoration' even though the fighting is still going on in the Confederacy."

As they advanced to the centre of the room, Lord Aries was then greeted with hearty pats on the back and handshakes though no one seemed to notice Leona beside him. No one seemed to care either that they were shaking the hands of a cold-blooded killer.

Mrs Howard greeted them when they got to her with a broad smile and said to Lord Aries, "Right on time, James. Everything points to this being the place. So all we need now is for your magicians to do their thing and we'll be making history."

The woman was so excited she was practically bouncing, in stark contrast to the stone-faced Valkyrie beside her. Kara let her gaze drift coolly over them all, pausing only slightly on Leona and Lord Aries, before focusing on a distant point somewhere behind them.

Lord Aries twisted his mouth into a half-smile and said, "Now, now, Ophelia, you know that I wanted Miss Ruby to be here for this. It was her teacher who set this all in motion after all."

Leona looked up at him sharply, brow furrowed. His smile widened and he said, "Your teacher made quite an impression on the Zodiac Society when he showed up and demanded a place among them…and well, the acknowledgement of the Society's role in the fall of the Order. It was quite a bold and, well, suicidal thing to say. But John Opal, as he styled himself, was every bit the romantic idealist that Sebastian is…or was, I suppose." He waved away the thought with an exaggerated movement of his hand and Leona's throat seized up again. Lord Aries, oblivious, continued, "Ah, well, the important thing is, they all left that encounter a little wiser: John Opal, with the understanding that the Zodiac Society was every bit as dangerous as he feared, and the Society with the realisation that the legends were true and that the knowledge of where the…weapons the Order once wielded and ruled the world with were in the hands of their descendants."

"I am not a descendant of House Ruby," said Leona, glaring at him. She was desperately trying to ignore the chill that crawled up her spine when he called the items weapons. What had happened to "treasures"?

At this, Lord Aries chuckled lightly and said, "I know, I know, Miss Ruby that you are not. You are something far more valuable. You see, in order to retrieve one of the weapons, such as the Book of Earth, I would need a magician specialising in that particular element. An Earth elemental magician, in other words."

Leona opened her mouth but Lord Aries spoke over her, "Surely you did not expect me to simply hand over my prize to Sebastian, did you? No, I have something better, an aether magician."

Now Leona was even more confused. She began again, "But you…."

She stopped, remembering their audience, then wondered why she should care, and opened her mouth again as Lord Aries said, "Indeed, I could probably do this myself, but did I not tell you my vision? We will stand together, Miss Ruby, to oversee the start of a new world."

Mrs Howard wrinkled her nose a little at this last part, glanced between them and then said to Lord Aries, "Oh, James, can't you see that you've frightened the poor thing? She looks near faint."

Lord Aries ignored her question, and turning to Saraswati, said, "Bring the girls. We need them to perform the summoning."

"You don't need all three of us," said Lavender.

Leona looked to the eldest Garnet sister and wondered why the girl was even bothering to protest now. Then Lord Aries said, "True. I only need one of you to summon the gate, or so you claim. But I am not about to walk into hostile territory without…insurance. One of your sisters will accompany us into the city and take us to the book."

Lavender and Rose exchanged a look but Orchid kept her face turned to her older sister's shoulder. Lord Aries' eyes narrowed and he said, "Do you want to choose, or should I?"

Lavender stroked Orchid's hair a few times more before putting her hands on her youngest sister's arms and gently pushed the girl away. Orchid looked up at her sister, eyes red, but Lavender's expression was firm.

"Come on, Orchid," said Rose, taking the girl's hand. "She'll be fine. Come on."

The two sisters started walking over to Lord Aries then, but he put up a hand to stop them. When they halted, he said, "Miss Orchid Garnet will accompany Mr Leroy Ruby and Mr Cedric Miller back to the Sylphide. A little more insurance if you will. Saraswati."

The Bharata woman stepped forward and took Orchid by the arm as Noor took hold of Rose. Cedric and Generous voiced their protests.

"No!" cried Generous, looking between Lord Aries and his sister.

"B-but, Your Lordship," Cedric sputtered, watching the gun in Mr Diamond's hand.

Then Generous declared, "I'm not leaving Leona. I want to go to the city too. I'm a Tinker, you said so. I can help you. Please take us with you, please."

Orchid tried to shake off Saraswati's hold. The woman did not look troubled in the slightest, merely adjusted her grip on the girl's arm to press a talon-long fingernail into the tender flesh and the girl cried out, "No!" at the same time that Lavender snapped, "Orchid!"

The girl stopped and looked at her sister, the protest already forming on the upturned curve of her lower lip. Lavender narrowed her gaze, and Orchid bowed her head. This time when Saraswati pulled the girl, she went willingly. Cedric and Generous received no such command from Lord Aries, but Mr Diamond did press his pistol into Cedric's chest and Lord Aries grasped hold of Leona's arm and squeezed. Saraswati did not turn back and after a moment, the two quietly followed her and Orchid out of the room.

When the doors shut behind them, Lord Aries turned back to Lavender and said, "Your youngest sister will remain on that ship until we safely return from our expedition. If you do as I tell you, then you and your sisters shall be released to the care of your father's people and we shall take our leave. We do not want any trouble. It pains me to see unnecessary suffering and bloodshed."

"You say that," Lavender began, her eyes shining with tears, "but I was there. We were all there when you b-burned my father to death."

"Yes, I did do that," said Lord Aries, nodding. Then he pushed Leona forward and said, "But he had taken something of mine. If he had not tried to cross me, I would not have had to resort to such measures. Your League is so completely out of their depth here that they can no longer feel which way the wind is blowing. The Zodiac Society did not rise to power overnight by being careless. Now, do we have an agreement?"

Lavender looked at her younger sister with Noor and said, "Yes."

"Wonderful!" exclaimed Lord Aries. "Now let us begin. Come girl, summon our gate."

Lavender walked across the room to the rear wall, whispering an incantation as she went. Leona turned with the others to look at her, just as the pentagram painted there began to glow. Mrs Howard gave an excited squeal and whispered to Lord Aries, "You magicians are an amazing group."

"You say that only now? Did you not see what Leona can do?" asked Lord Aries with a hint of humour in his voice.

Mrs Howard gave a sniff and replied, "Yes, quite the display your girl can put on."

Lavender turned back to them then and said, "I need a knife."

Mr Diamond stepped forward, grasped hold of Lavender's arm, turned it over and slashed her from elbow to wrist. She grunted, but Rose screamed and Leona gasped. Lavender ignored them, walked to the wall, dipped her fingers into the wound and then traced her bloodied fingers along the wall, chanting the incantation louder.

"White Tiger of the West,

Master of Air and Metals,

God of the Wind and Iron,

I call your name: Air!"

The pentagram glowed brighter and she stepped back, ripping her dress as she went to wrap around her arm. Then Mr Diamond stepped forward and stabbed the blade into the centre of the pentagram.

There was a crack of thunder and the wall beneath the pentagram split white, then crumbled away to reveal a wall of white mist. Everyone was silent, Leona could suddenly hear the wind howling around Aerie and hoped that the Sylphide had landed and that someone had gotten Sebastian help. A rush of wind they did not feel dispersed the mist then, revealing a steel and glass walkway, a circular, metal gate in the midst of a towering wall and beyond that a city of steps and white, metal-roofed buildings that stretched to the heavens surrounded by great, white clouds and the russet colours of sunset. It looked like some of the pictures of the Orient that Master Opal had kept in his study, though the trees here were dying, leaves yellow, brown and dark red. Leona's eyes widened as she noticed the movement of cloud below the walkway and then remembered that she had seen this before.

The sea below was purest cobalt, calm and welcoming. She imagined skimming the surface just enough to dip her toes and maybe catch a flying fish or two before someone spotted her and she was scolded. If she jumped now, she might even have a moment to herself to enjoy the freedom of soaring through the air with the clouds, for once, at her feet. She lifted her arms and leaned forward.

"Kara!" someone called. She stopped at once, jerking backwards so that she would not fall and turned to look. It was—

Leona turned to the Valkyrie, just as Lavender said, "You cannot enter the city without an air elemental or magician."

Kara met Leona's gaze and nodded once. Lord Aries said, "Hardly a problem. Mr Diamond will escort you. Mrs Howard will be accompanied by your sister, Noor and our Valkyrie."

Mr Diamond grabbed hold of Lavender's wounded arm, but she merely grunted again. Leona could not help but admire the older girl's tolerance for the pain, even as blood soaked through her makeshift bandage and stained her dress. Mr Diamond shoved Lavender ahead of him towards the wall.

For a moment, Leona expected the girl to hit the wall, even as they saw a cloud sweep over the bridge. But Lavender had done the summoning right because between one movement and the next, the girl and Mr Diamond stood on the bridge, looking back at the others to follow. Lord Aries beside Leona barked out a laugh that startled everyone and headed for the wall.

"Don't worry, Miss Ruby, we do not require an air elemental or magician. This is the power of an aether magician, begin a summoning, only the first part, mind, and follow me," said Lord Aries.

Leona, not at all keen on the idea of walking into a wall, did as she was told. Then Lord Aries said, "Now hold that power over you and walk with me."

She shut her eyes as they approached the wall and stepped through it. The temperature shifted, dropping several degrees in seconds, the air filled with a chill that clung wetly to her clothes and the air thinned. Lord Aries laughed again and Leona opened her eyes and looked down.

That was a mistake. Below her was nothing but white clouds, broken here and there to reveal a cold grey-blue sea. Grey-blue like Sebastian's eyes. Leona felt her vision swim and tightened her grip on Lord Aries' arm to stop herself from fainting. He pulled her into him to grasp her firmer and marched her over the bridge to where Lavender stood with Mr Diamond, looking back at the others.

Mrs Howard was next with Rose and Noor. The djinniyeh moved warily, for the first time looking concerned about something. But it was Kara who drew Leona's attention. The air elemental stepped through the barrier and stopped in the middle of the bridge, her face turned to the sky, eyes closed.

"Oh, James," Mrs Howard began, eyes wide and bright with her glee and not noticing at all that the Valkyrie had stopped. "This is more fantastic than we imagined! Look at this place! It is grander than anything I've ever seen! How on earth does this float? Look at the sails, or are those banners? And are those paddlewheels? The Western City of Air, at last!"

Lord Aries nodded and said, "City of the White Tiger, home of the Book of Earth per the agreement to keep the peace among the Great Spirits…look around, Miss Ruby, we are the first of our kind to set foot in this place in centuries, possibly a millennia!"

Leona kept her gaze on the Valkyrie, and at that moment Kara opened her tear-filled eyes and smiled at the girl. Then her metal suit fell apart in a clatter and she floated into the air and disappeared.

That drew the attention of the others, swinging around just as parts of her suit rolled off the bridge into oblivion.

"Oh dear," said Lord Aries, all trace of humour gone from his voice.

Mr Diamond was still grinning though as he said, "Well that does not seem good."

It was eerie, Leona thought, walking beside Lord Aries through a great promenade on the lowest level of the City of Air, how empty the city was.

It was not uninhabited. No, with the aether summoning half-done, Leona could feel the auras of more than one hundred beings at all times, but they were elementals all, mostly, and with Lavender and Rose to escort them "nothing to worry about". Or so Lord Aries said. Leona was not so sure.

According to Lord Aries, and the two Garnet sisters, the West City was a place that celebrated craft and the arts. It was here, said the sisters, that the first airships and steam carriages came to be, and the engines that powered them. Here now was also the home of many great works of art, be they paintings or novels, poetry or plays. Certainly all along the promenade, amidst the towering spires that supported the great white sails or towers that were the homes of the inhabitants, the sisters pointed out pedestals for street performances or theatres for plays. The walls were dedicated to great murals of scenes of nature, or people at work or play, or even more sombre processions of death and war. Then Leona realised that one great forged metal mural they had walked alongside from the gates was telling one story and Lavender, who had glanced at her, said, "That is the Legend of the Five Cities…and their fall."

Leona stopped at once and Lord Aries let her so that she could look back along the wall to see the story unfold again.

The Great Spirits had lived in the world since it began, concealed in the elements that are part of all things: earth, air, fire and aether. For millennia mankind had only drawn sparingly on these elements to do the things that they needed and only enough of it to keep them alive. The Spirits noticed these men, and rewarded the most notable of them with the talent to shape small spirits from the elements to do their bidding. This they did through the use of four special items, a roll of parchment, a dagger, a mirror and a staff. In gratitude, mankind built great cities to honour the spirits and protect the treasures within. And then mankind discovered that they could use these items to create more people like them.

Leona and the others were standing at the part of the story where the humans had just begun to shape the first magicians, coincidentally right around the time that they began to build their first cities. She started walking forward, watching as the groups of elemental-summoning humans began to grow larger and spread further until they built their own cities in different locations, though all in the same land. The air elemental magicians went west to the mountains and high places where they carried out great performances and made things that sent lightning forking into the air. The earth elemental magicians went east to the caves, carting great wagons of books until they had a library underground. The water elemental magicians went north to the seas, where they formed places of healing among steaming hot pools. The fire elemental magicians went south to the deserts where they waged war on others for their resources and built a great fortress on the sand. And the aether magicians remained in the city at the centre where they taught those that remained.

Leona stopped again watching the cities. Before she had met Lord Aries she had never seen mountains so tall that they were capped with snow. She had heard of caves, but never been to one. She knew of the sea but had been no further than the neighbouring colony of Tavaco. And deserts, like snow, were things she learned of in her books. The world described in this mural was more incredible than anything she had ever seen before and she was standing in the middle of a floating city!

The story continued that those that remained in the city with the aether magicians were as if stuck in time, stagnating under famine and illness and war. The aether magicians, who had no special power, tried to save them but failed. Eventually most of the people left died and the aether magicians, grief-stricken and desperate, turned to their spirit, the Golden Dragon for aid. He granted them a gift, the Philosopher's Stone, formed of a rock that had fallen from the sky, still glowing with heat, with which the magicians called at the aether within the sick and dying, the aether that lives in all things, and brought them back. The people were not alive, but they were not dead either.

When the other magicians learned of this, and the ordinary people who flocked to the Central City with their own dead, they were horrified. They met together and decided that the aether magicians needed to be stopped. Leona paused here, thinking of the frightful similarity between the legend and the story of the massacre of House Ruby and the fall of the Order. She glanced at Lord Aries but he was not looking at her, but further down the wall. She turned back and continued.

The other four groups of magicians and their guardian spirits banded together and attacked as one. The aether magicians did not stand a chance. They were slaughtered to a man, their city and its contents burned to the ground and the Philosopher's Stone smashed into many pieces and scattered with the wind. The Central City was gone and to prevent a reoccurrence of the events that led to its fall, and ensure balance, the others swapped their treasures with their opposite power.

The tale ended there, but Lord Aries said, "Of course the damage had been done. Over time the ordinary folk moved away from magician power to form cities and civilisations that employed magicians but were not beholden to them. They carried this story with them in different forms as well, a cautionary tale against unchecked power that you may know simply as 'power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely'."

Leona stared at him, then back at the mural and said, "Yes, but…the aether magicians they…they brought the dead back to life. They made people into ghosts!"

"And what of it?" asked Lord Aries. "They were trying to help the people and received no aid from the others. They tried what they believed to be right and thus discovered a new form of their gift. If anything, the ones who turned that against them and punished them with it are wrong."

Leona thought of Master Opal dying in a debris-ridden street and asked, "Is that why you think so little of killing people? Because those people were fine before you got them."

At this Lord Aries levelled her a serious look and asked, "Did you wish for Charles Garnet to kill you or your rescuers?"

"Sebastian got shot because of you!" Leona snapped, ire rising.

Lord Aries scoffed and said, "And now you know you have the power to save him. Look at the mural again, Miss Ruby. Not everyone the aether magicians tried to save became ghosts."

Leona turned back to the wall, confused. She chose a section in the midst of the chaos of the dying and the healing and sure enough there were not the same number of bodies in the air above the dead. Some of those upright were standing among the bodies. She gasped just as Lavender said, "Abomination."

They all turned to look at the eldest girl, and Lord Aries said, "Is that what you were taught? Tell me, Miss Garnet. If you had the power to bring your father back…no that would be dreadful for all involved, say one of your sisters." Noor pushed Rose over to him and both girls paled. Leona felt her heart seize. Lord Aries grabbed Rose by the arm and said, "What if Miss Rose here suddenly died and you had the power to bring her back…would you go back to Miss Orchid and tell her that you did everything that you could?"

Lavender stared at her sister for a moment before she straightened her spine, lifting her nose in the process and said, "She would not be back. She would be a shadow of herself, a shell completely at my mercy."

Lord Aries' features settled into a smile that did not reach his eyes and he asked, "Is that so? Do you know this for a fact?"

Lavender closed her mouth, and Lord Aries' grin grew wider. "I know of no such thing. There is a price to be paid for this, certainly, but no harm comes to the individual. Isn't that right, Ms Howard?"

All turned to look at the woman. She smiled and said, "Yes, I am well. I certainly have noticed nothing amiss. My affection for James is because he is the first true friend I have made in the years since my rebirth."

Leona stared at the small, short woman, with her long dark hair, light brown eyes and light complexion, a hint of something brown in her heritage somewhere. Ophelia Howard certainly looked alive enough, if a little flushed from excitement. But…if she had died before and had been "reborn", who had she been before? How had she died? Was "Ophelia Howard" even her real name? No one else associated with Lord Aries seemed to have one.

Then Lord Aries pushed Rose away from him, took Leona's hand again and said, "Come along now, we have dawdled long enough. It's time we got what we came for. Can you feel the power, Miss Ruby? It's calling to us."

Leona let him lead her, realising for the first time that yes, she could feel something on the periphery of her senses. It was a force that, now that she was aware of it, made her hair stand on end, her palms sweat and limbs tremble. Lord Aries appeared not to notice, striding confidently ahead of them to the stairs of the next level. But of course, where better to keep power like this than the city's heart?

It was then that Leona was struck by a terrifying thought. In the mural she had not seen the city afloat. In fact, she was very sure that it was perched on a mountainside like Aerie. But here they were, high above land and sea, not the blizzard-covered range in the Union state, suspended in an eternal twilight. Surely something was keeping this city in the air, powerful enough to make stone and metal and glass as light as air, powerful like the source that was calling to her now.

She blinked, realising then that something was pulling at her as if an invisible tether had been made to her flesh. Then her legs gave way beneath her and she stumbled and fell to her knees.

Lord Aries tightened his grip on her arm, just saving her from landing face-first on the hard-metal ground and said, "Ah, ah, Miss Ruby. Watch where you put your feet now."

Leona felt shaky and light-headed, her limbs heavy. Lord Aries glanced down at her and then said, "Oh, so that's what happened."

"What's happening?" asked Leona, her mouth suddenly dry. She tried to lick her lips but could not summon the moisture.

Lord Aries pulled her to her feet and let her lean against him, even as her mind willed her to push away. He put an arm around her shoulder and replied, "A combination of things. For one, you are not used to such an extended use of your true power so it is draining your strength."

Leona released her hold on the power immediately. Her lungs filled with air—when had she stop breathing?—and her mind cleared. Then Lord Aries said, "And I believe our host has sensed your presence."

"Our host?" asked Leona, stepping away from Lord Aries. Her legs were strong enough to support her again, though she supposed the thin air accounted for her feeling light-headed still.

"Yes," he replied. "The White Tiger is here. This city is as much his tomb as the depository of the Book of Earth."

Leona could not help looking around again, which was how she caught the triumphant gleam on Lavender's face a moment before the girl announced, "You'll never make it out of the city alive, Your Lordship. This is the stronghold of the White Tiger League."

And then, as if on cue, they were surrounded by air elementals and magicians.