Page 13 of The Sunlit Man

You’re despicable,Aux said.This woman saved you. You’d steal her ship?

“She only did it under duress. How do I start the engines?”

I haven’t seen.

Blast. Well, he needed to get rid of Glowing Eyes. Nomad set up with the rifle right beside the seat where the ember woman was strapped down. She glared at him and growled as he insistently told himself he was not going to fire at any person in particular, just kind of randomly.

It worked, though only if he aimed very far away. He blasted the air, and it was enough to frighten Glowing Eyes back for a moment. The woman who had saved Nomad glared at him, shouting something and waving her hands.

I believe she’s mad about your bad aim.

“Lady,” Nomad said, “I’m having a really bad day. If you’re going to scream at me, could you at least do it a little softer?”

She grabbed the gun from him, then fired, keeping Glowing Eyes at bay. Then she gestured at the hovercycle and spoke.

I believe she’s offering to take you,Auxiliary said,if you use the shield to protect her from behind as she flies.

That would do. He shook his wounded hand, eager for the healing to take hold. Then he paused, scanning the field full of quickly growing tall grasses. The podium had been right over there, hadn’t it? He thought he saw something in the grass nearby. A body?

Damnation. Cursing himself for a fool, Nomad held up Auxiliary for cover and dashed in that direction—ignoring the woman’s cries of surprise. There, in the muddy ground near where the center of the arena had been, he found the gap-toothed man. He was almost buried in the mud, leg twisted in the wrong direction, his face bleeding from what might have been a kick—doubtless one delivered by the soldiers who had thrown him free when the fighting started.

The poor man looked up and saw Nomad. And even as bombs fell and a glowing line of automatic rifle rounds tossed up soil and burned grass nearby, something sparked in the man’s eyes. Hope.

Nomad seized the man by the arm and heaved, ripping him out of the muddy soil and throwing him across his shoulders. Unable to keep Auxiliary up with his wounded hand, Nomad dropped the shield and dashed through the battlefield, the weight of forgotten oaths on his shoulders. He somehow avoided being shot as he reached the hovercycle and threw the man onto one of the seats. The back left one, across from the ember woman. Hopefully her manacles would hold.

The man, tears in his eyes, whispered a few words. Nomad didn’t need to know the language to sense the gratitude in them.

That was uncharacteristic of you,Auxiliary said as Nomad summoned him again as a shield.

“He reminds me of an old friend, that’s all.” Nomad looked to the woman, still taking cover beside the hovercycle, and gestured toward his shield.

She growled something at him, then held up three fingers, counting down. At zero, he leaped onto the top of the hovercycle, kneeling on the middle of the fuselage between the seats. The woman took the operator’s seat, front left. Nomad expanded his shield, growing it big enough to cover them both. He couldn’t protect the gap-toothed man, but hopefully attention would be on the driver instead.

Nomad watched carefully as she fired up the machine. Unlike the big ships, which doubled as buildings, these cycles were intended only as vehicles. She pulled a lever and pushed a button, then paused, gazing toward the headless corpse of her companion.

“Fly!” Nomad said, nudging her as blasts hit his shield. Another enemy ship had noticed them and pivoted to come at them. Worse, the other ember people were all rising from the field of grass like Awakened corpses. Several turned toward them—particularly after the one tied to the back right seat, now fully awake, began shouting and raving.

Finally the woman lifted off and sent them in a low flight just above the grass, following others of her group who—together—fled with the rescued captives. For a moment Nomad thought they’d escaped. He saw Glowing Eyes watching from a distance, standing tall on his podium ship.

But the man didn’t need to give chase personally, because in moments, several ships landed to gather the people with embers in their chests. Most of the friendly ships that had executed the hit-and-run attack were far ahead, almost out of sight. Nomad’s craft was the lone straggler.

So, naturally, the ships bearing the ember people targeted him.

Nomad tapped onthe driver’s shoulder and thumbed backward. She quickly glanced over her shoulder, said something he was quite certain was a curse, then bent lower over the controls. He reached for her rifle, but she put a protective hand on it and glared at him.

Great. He could just kick her free and take the vehicle; he was relatively certain he could fly it. But then she pulled up, gaining elevation.

Something about getting away from the dirty ground, up into the sky toward those rings…it had an effect on him. Wind against his face, the landscape shrinking below. It reminded him of better times. Pure, crisp air acting like a moral decongestant.

He smiled at that thought. It was wordplay his former master would have liked. And maybe therewassomething to be said forthe thinner air up here. Maybe he had been, after all, a little bit airsick…

Nah. That wasabsolutelygoing too far.

Still, he kept his shield in place and didn’t try to steal the cycle. Instead he focused on the enemies behind. They crowded onto two sleek war barges. Long and flat, with large decks on the front and cabs at the back. Like flying speedboats, though with the control room farther back and more of a deck on the bow. Ember people stood on those decks, clinging to the railings. Their embers stoked in the wind, growing brighter, like headlights. Their postures determined, eager.

And they were gaining. How had the rescuers expected to pull off their raid when flying inferior ships? A sharpshooter in a white coat stepped out the side door of the cabin onto the deck on one of the warships and took aim. Nomad raised Auxiliary as a shield and noticed that the sharpshooter wasn’t one of the ember people. Those appeared to have only melee weapons.

The sharpshooter fired. Not at Nomad or the driver, but at the central fuselage between the seats. As he’d noticed earlier, this cycle he flew on had a strange construction. It featured a long central core with four open seats at the sides—each one designed to be straddled, with handholds on the front and its own windshield.

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