City of the Forgotten: The Orphan Fleet, #3

By Brendan Detzner

The Dragot Empire's first invasion of the Mountain Skyport has failed, but the war isn't over. Jiaire's actions in the first attack have made him a hero, but also a target, and on the eve of a second invasion he is kidnapped in the dead of night and spirited away to the Blackfire Penal Colony, an underground labyrinth in the heart of a dormant volcano. He has never been more alone, or further away from the people he loves. Escaping the colony will be difficult. Making it out with his soul intact may be impossible.

Brendan Detzner's work has appeared in Podcastle, Chizine, Pseudopod, One Buck Horror, Bizarrocast, Edge of Propinquity, Untied Shoelaces of the Mind, and many other venues. He is the author of the short story collections "Scarce Resources" and "Beasts", and of the novels "Millersville" and "White Rabbit Society". "City of the Forgotten" is the third installment of the Orphan Fleet series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brendan Detzner
• Release date: Oct 23, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393702269

Book preview

1

The Reptile grabbed the Sparrow by the neck and lifted her up over the edge of the platform. A violin shrieked, and twin columns of fire surged on either side of the stage, baking the faces of everyone in the front row. The yellow backdrop became orange, and then red. The Sparrow kicked her legs but couldn’t get free. The Reptile laughed. They made the sound backstage by shaking barrels full of ball bearings. Tiny little green lights circled the inside of the balloon, passing over the faces of the audience.

No one made a sound. No one cried out, no one cheered. Even worse, no one booed. They just sat there, those who were there at all. The tent was half empty.

Jiaire watched the Show from a perch above the stage. He remembered how excited he was when they’d shown him this secret place only a few months ago. The thrill had already worn away to nothing. He could barely remember what it was like to watch the Show from the back row instead of looking down at the top of the performer’s heads. A year ago, he hadn’t known what stage makeup looked like up close.

It wasn’t the performers’ fault that the crowd wasn’t into it. Hunleigh was the Reptile now, and he’d surprised everyone with how fast he’d gotten the hang of the role, and Jiaire didn’t think that Aevin and Lana could be part of a bad match even if they wanted to, but the Old Residents couldn’t help but think of Hunleigh as a replacement. The New Residents, on the other hand, had been looking forward to seeing Fate’s Soldiers fight the Spinning Liberties, but one of the Liberties had hurt her shoulder unloading a ship, and the Soldiers were still too green to change routines at the last minute.

It twisted Jiaire hard to even have to think like that. Old Residents. New Residents. If this was going to work, and it had to work, there could only be everyone. One family, one Mountain. Brothers and sisters together.

All this might not have mattered if there were more guests in the audience to do the gosh and wow, but trade had been slow. It still wasn’t all that long ago that the Mountain had been attacked. According to the incredibly boring meetings Jiaire was now obligated to attend, many of the merchant houses were waiting to make sure the situation was resolved before they got back to business. The Council, all elders whom Jiaire would never have looked at twice back when his only worry was getting to lunch on time, all assured each other that this had happened before and would happen again, and that there was too much money on the line for the bean counters to stay away forever.

Jiaire believed the Council, and he trusted them, but this had been his first war. He wasn’t the only young one who had never been through this. There would be many more smiles once things were back to normal.

In the meantime, the crowd was half-asleep. Lady Lightning was supposed to have burst through her bonds by now and swung down to the Sparrow’s rescue. She was stalling. She knew that her bout wasn’t getting over, and that they’d need some time backstage to figure out how to make adjustments.

Someone tugged on Jiaire’s shirt.

Heroboy.

Keeva. Jiaire turned around. Keeva was wearing her stagehand clothes, all black from neck to toe. Sometimes Jiaire would worry about all the skills that’d been lost in the fight with Dragot, but since Keeva had started working on the Show crew, she’d been doing her best to convince everyone that all that missing knowledge had been magically absorbed into her skull.

You’re wanted. Vrai had his bout moved up to next and he’s gotten himself nervous. She stood and waited for Jiaire to get going, as if he could not be trusted to turn his head in the correct direction unsupervised. Jiaire made a mental note to spend some time making fun of her later. No time for that now—if Vrai needed a pep talk, Jiaire wanted to make sure that he got one as soon as possible.

It was strange to think about now. The first time Jiare had met Vrai, they’d been opponents in a knife fight. Jiaire had later learned that Vrai had defeated so many opponents in similar duels that none of the New Residents could agree on an exact body count. If the sun had been in Jiaire’s eyes instead of Vrai’s that day, there was no doubt in Jiaire’s mind that he’d be dead right now.

Jiaire had once asked Vrai how he could have been in so many fights for his life and still fall for such a simple trick. Vrai had been amused by the question.

In the place where I learned to use a knife, sunlight was not an issue.

Still, combat was one thing, and show business was something else. Jiaire swung down from the observation deck and climbed a ladder to Vrai’s changing tent.

2

It was the dream of every young fan of the Show to not only perform in it themselves one day, but to invent their own character. As you got older, the usual path was to pick up a bit more respect for tradition and to understand how important it was to keep the old characters going. It had been Jiaire’s idea to make Vrai a performer. Not everyone was comfortable with the idea, and neither was Vrai himself. When Jiaire had finally convinced him to join the Show, he’d assumed that he’d be filling in an old costume for someone who had died in the battle.

That was the biggest leap of all, the gap that Jiaire had needed to throw Vrai across. Vrai needed a character of his own. Someone that the Dragot soldiers who’d defected would take to heart.

Vrai’s costume was covered with chains and sharp hooks, or at least that’s what it looked like from a distance. Nobody wanted to perform weighted down by real chains, and no other performer would be crazy enough to get anywhere near someone whose body was covered with real hooks, and so the chains were plaster painted silver, and the hooks were cloth patterns inlaid into the costume. The rest of the fabric was black and red. In motion, Jiaire expected Vrai to look like he was either bleeding or on fire.

Jiaire still didn’t know exactly where the idea had come from. It seemed to be something personal, but Vrai didn’t want to talk about it and Jiaire had the sense it wouldn’t be a good idea to press the issue. What Jiaire did know was that it worked. Only a few people had seen Vrai in full dress, but a couple of those had been former Dragot, and Jiaire had seen the look on their faces. Whatever it was, it meant something.

Vrai hadn’t yet put the mask on, as Jiaire pushed the curtain aside and entered his tent.

They’re moving up your bout, Jiaire said. You’re up in a few minutes. You need to get yourself to staging.

The changing rooms were one of the only places on the mountain with head-to-foot mirrors. Vrai was staring, looking himself right in the eye and not blinking. It wasn’t that different from the look on his face when he’d first met Jiaire, when they’d each been a ten-foot platform and a six-inch blade away from ending the other’s life. The look had intimidated Jiaire the first time he’d seen it, and scared him in a different way when he realized it was Vrai’s standing expression. It had been months now, and Jiaire still wasn’t sure he’d ever seen Vrai smile.

Vrai kept waiting for his reflection to blink or stand down.

I was never scared to die. Why am I scared that they’re going to laugh at me?

Jiaire thought of a number of comforting things that he could say. People had been coming to him for comfort quite a bit since the battle. But Jiaire didn’t think that was what Vrai wanted from him now.

He wasn’t sure what Vrai did want. It seemed quite possible that Vrai didn’t know either. It took Jiaire a few precious moments to think of something.

All those people in the crowd, they’re here to see you.

Vrai gave himself one last hard look before he turned away from the mirror. He reached for his mask.

3

Jiaire wasn’t able to catch all of Vrai’s bout. He had to get himself to staging to get ready for the main event. Short show tonight, the powers that be had decided. Either they’d save the day and