Chapter 203: The Penguin Swam Inside the Guild’s Killing Spear

White fire reached the first link buried in Skykeel.

The chain’s glassy sheath flashed, and every feather along Jiang’s breast lifted away from his skin. Heat had not touched him yet. Ahead of its own heat, the weapon pushed water aside.

Captain Olsa tore a white wedge from the fastening beneath her collar.

"The coolant seam runs beside the lower links," she said. "Open the return gill before the fire reaches the lance head."

She offered the wedge to Jiang.

Aylin caught Olsa’s wrist. "You have six hunters."

"Their shoulders will break the sheath. His will not."

"He has one shoulder left."

Jiang took the wedge between the unburned sides of his beak. It tasted of salt and old smoke.

Olsa watched him test its weight. "If you bite the bright vein, we all die."

He set the wedge down long enough to answer. "That sounded almost like concern."

"It was instruction, nothing more."

"I still preferred concern."

Aylin released the captain and knelt in the flooded lip. She uncoiled the center line from her forearm, checked its frayed end, then looked at Jiang rather than reaching for him.

"Behind the right foot?" she asked.

His left could no longer be trusted against a sudden pull. Jiang lifted the right one.

She passed a loose loop above his ankle and left the release tail where his beak could find it. Her fingers slid away before the knot tightened.

"If I pull steadily, come back," she said. "If I start screaming, come back faster."

"What if Olsa screams?"

"Take your time coming back."

Olsa turned toward the burning chain. Perhaps the water moved the corner of her mouth.

Jiang retrieved the wedge and entered the seam.

Cold current caught his belly. He found the route between the chain’s bronze underside and the clear wall holding air around each link. It was scarcely wider than his breast. A hunter’s helmet would have lodged at the entrance; a rider’s open sail would have torn the wall.

Only a penguin fit without breaking it.

Fitting brought no comfort. Narrow water pressed his torn shoulder against bronze whenever the chain turned. His bad foot dragged along a groove lined with metal teeth. Each breath pulled heat from his tongue and returned it as a deeper ache in his beak.

No skill met him there.

Jiang kicked with the foot that answered, used the other as a rudder, and let the current flatten his flippers close to his sides. Ordinary swimming carried him past the first link while white light filled the one behind.

Three cold surges came from the ship.

They did not arrive together. First came a shove against his tail, then a press into the sheath, and finally a surge that nearly stopped the fire pulse crawling beneath him.

Across the star-water, Olsa’s sea-wyverns were still fighting the bronze wheel in their own rhythm.

Jiang waited for the next uneven push before crossing the open joint.

Above him, the chain showed how it held Skykeel. Curved catches unfolded whenever the links stretched. Each catch drove backward into whatever the lance had pierced. When the chain slackened, the catches folded flat and let the weapon travel farther in.

Capture did not share the path with fire. It surrounded it.

White fire ran through the hollow center of every link. Coolant water moved outside that vein, gathering heat and carrying it back toward the ship through narrow side grooves. Its severed guide had occupied a third channel no thicker than the wedge in Jiang’s beak.

Inside the bronze, three hungers stayed apart: guide, chain, and fire.

Losing one would not prevent the others from killing.

Another hot pulse entered behind him. Jiang hurried, struck his split beak against bronze, and tasted blood beneath the salt. He kept the wedge clenched. Losing it would make the swim nothing but an elaborate way to cook himself.

Aylin’s line moved along his leg, slack but present.

As the line crossed an open joint, one curved catch folded. Rope pinched between bronze teeth. Its loop above Jiang’s ankle tightened hard enough to pull his right foot backward.

Its release tail brushed his beak. He could free himself with one turn of the head and continue without any path home.

Through the warped sheath, Aylin became a dark shape leaning against the chain. She did not drag him back. She followed the trapped rope to the joint while the nearest hunter slid a white hook beneath it. His fin-winged companion wrapped both forelimbs around his waist and held him against the pull.

Together, Aylin and the hunter lifted. Their rope slipped out before the bronze teeth closed.

Slack returned around Jiang’s foot.

She had not ordered him onward. She had kept the road open and left the choice with him.

He reached the buried lance head.

Crystallized root enclosed the spear on both sides. Through clear wood, Jiang saw empty rooms crushed around the bronze point. Impact had opened the head. Four hooked jaws held the south root apart while the chain drew the city deeper over them.

White light gathered behind those jaws.

Overlapping bronze scales beneath the core formed the return gill. Most had sealed when wood entered them. One remained open by the width of a feather, leaking hot water into Jiang’s face.

He placed the white wedge against it.

Nothing moved beneath his push.

Jiang braced his good foot against the chain and pushed with his neck. Pain traveled from his beak through his torn shoulder. His wedge slipped free and spun toward the burn vein.

He caught it against his breast.

Light passed under his feathers. White flame singed a narrow path through the black before he rolled away. Keelturn remained silent. Bronze, current, and whatever strength his injured body still had decided the ending of this roll.

Jiang hooked his bad foot into the side groove.

For once, its refusal to straighten helped. Bent toes held him while both flippers folded tight. He pushed the wedge with the hard front of his breast, using his whole body where his neck had failed.

Another sea-wyvern surge struck from behind.

Cold water drove Jiang and the wedge together.

One bronze scale lifted.

With a violent gulp, the return gill opened. Heated water rushed around Jiang, tore loose feathers from his breast, and ran backward along the coolant grooves. Approaching fire dimmed inside the nearest link.

Outside the transparent root, white-armored bodies scattered from the vented heat. Olsa could have pulled her hunters into the air bell. Instead, she drove them toward the damaged nursery brace and the ropes holding the south tower open. Their companions caught armor, wall, and one another until the new current stopped carrying people toward the spear jaws.

From outside came Aylin’s muffled shout.

A steady pull tightened the retrieval line.

Jiang began to back out, then saw the main chain pin directly above the open gill. It was thin enough for Olsa’s wedge. One hard shove could separate it from the lance head.

He touched the pin with his beak.

Freedom sat beneath the point of Olsa’s wedge. He could brace it against the pin, wait for the next cold surge, and let the chain tear itself loose. Skykeel would drift away before a second command crossed the water.

Heat answered from both directions.

Fire crowded the chain behind him. More waited in the spear core ahead. Nothing about the pin offered release. It was the wall keeping those loads apart. Break it now, and the lance would empty one burning half into Skykeel while the other ran back toward Olsa’s ship and the three animals at its wheel.

Jiang left it whole.

Olsa’s ship had attacked first. That did not turn the hunters on Skykeel or the animals at the wheel into acceptable fuel. Jiang hated that the weapon had left him room to understand the difference.

Instead, he drove the wedge farther beneath the lifted scale. Coolant flooded the gill faster than the burn vein could heat it. Three links from the spear head, the white pulse stopped.

He had delayed the weapon.

He had not disarmed it.

Around his right foot, the line pulled again. Jiang released his bent toes and let Aylin draw him toward the open joint.

Then the chain tightened.

One of the spear jaws shifted inside the crystallized root. Its bronze arm dragged across the core housing with a sound Jiang felt through his bones.

A hairline split appeared in the white chamber.

Jiang kicked for the seam entrance.

Star-fire escaped through the crack.

It did not travel along the vein. It entered the coolant water around him, a bright liquid ribbon between Jiang and Aylin’s line.