Metal of Ambition (Evocation Book 2)

By Ivana Skye

Pelekri has been leading a double life: mechanic by night, mysterious vigilante of the city of Mangtena by day. But when the circus performer Nena shows up and claims that she also has magic, Pelekri decides it’s time to show her who’s really the coolest in town...

Pelekri and Nena launch themselves into a competition of who’s really more awesome, dragging Sedge and even Cijaya into it with them. But when Pelekri comes up with lir wildest idea yet, everything might just change.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ivana Skye
• Release date: Apr 3, 2018
• ISBN: 9780997854435

Book preview

1

Pelekri

legend

Mangtena, past noon. The streets were empty. The sun was bright. Something skittered up the side of a building.

It was metal and it had six legs and many segments on its back. It was the length of a forearm, and it had pincers at the front of its face, although its eyes were shiny and endearing, at least in my opinion. It easily crawled up both metal and glass; it had suckers on its feet that could attach to smooth things.

And in its prehensile tail, which was very strong, it carried a solar panel and a few important wires, kept in a small separate bag that no one needed know was once a makeup bag.

About two miles away, I sat on the floor of my room and saw through its eyes. I controlled and I oversaw the motions of each of its legs. I saw the brightness of the sun, and I held on tight to the solar panel with its tail.

There was a building that intended to have some installed, but did not have the resources to do it for at least another year. So instead of leaving them to wait, I skittered my creation up its side, intending to install the first of several panels myself, as I had done many times before.

I had. I had. I was more and stronger and much greater a legend than anyone who knew me in my normal night job suspected. I was the vigilante of Mangtena, the one who performed improvements on buildings in the dead of afternoon. And so long as I kept on feeling my own ambition, I could propel my metallic creatures to do everything I intended them to.

Never mind that I was tired, having not slept. I had coffee in front of me, and while still focusing on making it up the last few stories of the building, I took a sip.

I drank a lot of coffee, those days.

My metal creation, which I called a Locari because those syllables happened to sound cool together, finally ascended the top of the building. I smiled.

And then I got to work.

Wires were connected by six slightly adorable clawed legs. The panel was assembled with little difficulty. In my nightly life, I was a mechanic; setting up solar panels was no big challenge for me.

But this was just the warmup.

Because following this, I began to propel five separate Locaris to ascend the building all at once, each carrying more than one solar panel. By the time the sun set, this building would be fully outfitted in them, and the newspapers would say that the vigilante had struck again.

But then my door creaked open.

My eyes snapped open and I snapped to my feet, trying to pretend that I’d just gotten out of bed at the sound and that I hadn’t been doing anything technically impossible. I no longer focused on my emotion of ambition, and so the Locaris paused in their ascent up the building.

My little sister poked her head through the door. Pelekri, she said in a small voice. I’m sorry I woke you, um, but, I had a bad dream…

Right. Yes. She definitely woke me. I was prepared to go along with this story. I nodded to myself, just to prove it.

What are you doing? Ntira, my sister, asked.

Just nodding, I said quickly, deftly covering all my tracks. Which, you know, is a common response to bad dreams. And to little sisters.

Kay… she muttered. Can I come in?

Sure, I said.

She walked in gingerly, each of her steps quiet. I couldn’t do that. I tended to walk loudly; that was part of why I used the Locaris to do my important vigilante work. Which I definitely was not just doing. I nodded again to myself.

Um, sis, Ntira said. Why do you have a cup of coffee…?

Shit. I blinked, because she surprised me with the question. But this was actually a very sage move, as looking surprised almost certainly could be used to lend weight to my story that I had no idea the coffee was there. Or that I’d forgotten it.

Must be left over from earlier, I said, nodding again. I was good at nodding. Nodding covers up all secret things. I was sure of this.

That sounds fake, Ntira said. Can I sleep in your bed though? Since you’re obviously staying up late, and don’t want to tell me…

Uh, sure, I said. I closed my eyes, almost cursing myself. I was so much better at lying in signed language—I was better at most things in signed language, I really barely even understood why people bothered talking with their voice at all—but Ntira had engaged me in spoken language. Oh well.

She’d be asleep soon, once she climbed into my covers. And I could get back to installing solar panels.

She wouldn’t have to know anything.

Dusk. The shop, where I worked. I was there, my mentor Ekhri was there, my fellow apprentices Meho and Lintana were there.

It was early in the night, the sky was barely a dark blue. Our windows were open, but candles supported the waning sunlight. I was blinking, bleary-eyed, fucking exhausted.

But I had a cup of coffee in my hand. No one would suspect anything.

Evening! Ekhri said, chipper as li often was. Lir crooked, gear-covered hat was on lir head. Li was only ten years older than me, young as mentors went.

Evening, I muttered back, taking a sip of my coffee. I’d only had two hours of sleep. But I was fine. I was absolutely fine.

Meho just waved, and Lintana said evening as well.

What do we have to, uh—I was not too good with words when I was low on sleep—uh, work on today?

We usually worked on the fun stuff: small devices, things that flashed aesthetically pleasing lights, cameras, things like that. And if no one had contracted us, we would just make stuff of our own, some of it to sell. But sometimes we were sent out to handle bigger problems.

Today was one of those days.

A friend’s entire building has a broken air conditioner system, Ekhri said. So, li shrugged, it seems to be that’s what we’re doing.

Lintana groaned, tossing back aer braids as she did. As usual, ae was wearing a fancy-looking but secretly durable dress, and three different hairclips.

I didn’t mind our plans for the day. I was used to large-scale projects from my months of being a vigilante, not that any of my coworkers knew that. No, I hadn’t told a single person. I was waiting for the ideal moment of utterly dramatic reveal.

At least, I was pretty sure that’s what I was doing. I was also just getting used to keeping it a secret.

Pelekri, Meho said. Why are you staring blankly at the wall?

Uh… I started.

Did you sleep? Ekhri asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Uhh," I said, and sipped my coffee.

Not judging if you didn’t, Ekhri said. I’ve pulled many all-nighters in my time. And you seem to have a habit of taking after me.

"My gender is not because I’m imitating you," I said. We were both tellurian, yes. We both used li/lir pronouns. But I’d determined that on my own, and I was not attracted to the gender of feeling connection to the ground just because I looked up to Ekhri. Probably.

Got it, Ekhri said with a smirk. Now, how close to ready are we to head out?

I pointed at my coffee. I want to finish this. Then maybe refill it…

Ekhri laughed, but Meho’s eyes wandered to the corner of the room. I knew that facial expression on them; they were thinking. Maybe I should have some too… they muttered.

Ekhri shook lir head, still laughing as li rolled lir eyes, but none of that was in annoyance—li was just amused at us. Li liked us. I knew that well.

I took a deep sip of my coffee and Meho made their way to the coffee maker. Lintana leaned back against something. Ekhri took off lir watch and started twirling it.

It was a normal evening for us, friends and coworkers. These were our rhythms.

But I listened to all banter with hopes that the subject of the vigilante would come up, as it sometimes did. The people of Mangtena were talking about me; I enjoyed hearing it.

Maybe a little too much.

"So we’re going to actually leave here once everyone’s nice and caffeinated, right?" Ekhri asked.

Yes, yes, Meho said, not sounding chastised at all. This was good. Sometimes Meho got timid at unnecessary things.

I replaced Meho at the coffee maker and filled up my own second cup. I can walk with this in hand, you know, I said.

"We really don’t need you losing another mug," Lintana noted.

They’re my mugs, I said with a shrug. I can lose them if I want.

Still…

Fine, fine, I said, and took a sip. But there were things I wanted of this early-evening banter, and I wasn’t getting them. So, that weird solar panel vigilante is still at it, huh? I said.

Oh, me. Of course I said that. Of course. I wasn’t sure what I felt about my own actions, sometimes, but I wondered if I should maybe be a bit ashamed.

Eh, I decided. Shame would be boring.

What, is there a new report in the newspaper or something? Lintana said, still leaning back on aer wall. Ae didn’t consume caffeine at all, so any coffee-related slowness in the morning tended to bore aer.

I shrugged; I honestly didn’t know.

The vigilante is interesting, Ekhri conceded, but not the weirdest thing around, not right now. Not since Nena started performing with that oddly appearing fire last week.

She says it’s magic, Meho said.

Ekhri just chuckled. And what does that mean, I wonder? Maybe it’s a new technology she’s invented. Or maybe some new partnership with a Vitality.

It could be faked, Lintana said. "Fuck, the vigilante could be fake, or at least overhyped. Maybe there’s some kind of construction company that’s just really bad at submitting any kind of reports of what they do."

"That’s definitely not it," I said, and swigged a bunch of coffee to hide any strange expressions I might have been making.

I wouldn’t think so, no, Ekhri agreed. "The newspapers would all, each of them, have to be incompetent for that, and while I wouldn’t be shocked if a few were, I highly doubt all are that bad at their jobs. And besides, a few who’ve been out at day have seen odd metal creatures putting up the solar panels and so forth. I would think that would be hard to fake. And besides, what would fake even mean? Even if a construction company had made those creatures, having done so would still be impressive, so I wouldn’t really call it fake at all."

"I wonder if it’s the