by Gregory Ashe
Chapter 61
The air of the basement stung Siniq-elb’s nose. The smell from the pit had penetrated even here, near the staircase in the abandoned servants’ wing. A mixture of something like urine and alchemist’s salts, the smell was unnatural, like a poisoned spring. Vas wrinkled his nose and glanced at Siniq-elb, but Siniq-elb just shook his head. Khylar would be far ahead of them, but there was no telling if he had brought guards, or who else might be working with the su-esis.
On crutches borrowed from Agahm, Siniq-elb swung himself forward. He ached all over from Khylar’s attack, and balancing himself on his bandaged stumps made him grit his teeth. Vas’s looks of concern told Siniq-elb that he was not doing well at masking the pain, but at this point, it did not matter. The crutches were faster, and Siniq-elb did not have time to lose.
Khylar would be in the pits with Mece; Siniq-elb was sure of it. The timing was too perfect: Dakel missing, the High Harvest begun, all the other su-eses busy with either the rebels or the harvest crowds. Or with the fire Siniq-elb had started, a distraction that would only help Khylar. If Khylar were to raise the seiri, he would do so now; they would tear through the city easily, without opposition.
The question was: why?
Siniq-elb did not know the answer; perhaps the tair had grown tired of human servants and the seiri would eliminate them. Punishment for the rebellions in the other Paths. Or perhaps the seiri army was not to be used against Khi’ilan at all; perhaps it was meant to be used against the rebels.
Neither seemed likely; Khylar’s actions were too secretive, and Dakel too fearful about the seiri, for either option. For the first time since he had known Vas, Siniq-elb found himself convinced that the stout man was wrong. If the seiri were the servants of the tair, why weren’t the tair’s highest officials involved—the tun-esis and the three lap-eses? Why a su-esis? Why such secrecy?
It made little difference; Siniq-elb did not know why Khylar was creating the seiri, but he knew that he could not allow it to happen. Not after seeing what one seir had done to his squad—the ease with which it had killed his men. Good men. Men of the army of Khi’ilan.
No, the seiri were not servants of the tair. They would bring nothing but destruction to Khi’ilan.
They moved as quickly as Siniq-elb could go through the basements, but it felt agonizingly slow. At times he tried to go faster, but the wood floors were warped in places, and only Vas’s intervention kept Siniq-elb from falling more than once. A cool, steady breeze met them as they made their way through the storage chambers, and it carried with it the stench of the pits: something buried and unearthed, something rotting on the river bank. In spite of the breeze, sweat covered Siniq-elb’s arms and shoulders by the time they reached the hidden passageway.
The blind archway stood open, to Siniq-elb’s grateful amazement. He would not have known how to open it, but it seemed that, in his haste, Khylar had forgotten to close it. After a moment of consideration, though, Siniq-elb clutched at Vas’s arm and motioned for him to stop. Khylar was too clever, and Siniq-elb had underestimated him before.
“He’s waiting for us,” Siniq-elb whispered.
“What?” Vas said.
“The hidden passage. Why else would he leave it open, unless he wants us to find him? Or maybe he wants someone else. Regardless, it’s a trap.”
Vas blanched, his pallor obvious even in the flickering lamp that the stout man held.
“Be careful.”
Vas nodded in response, but the lamp light slid back and forth across the walls.
They moved forward, down the wood-floored passageway, until they reached the final door. It too stood open. They stopped for a moment as Siniq-elb freed the knife strapped to his thigh and, pressing it against the crutch, nodded for Vas to leave the lamp. Then, heart pounding, stomach as sick as before any battle he had ever fought, Siniq-elb entered the dark chamber beyond.
The first step onto the packed earth, littered with pebbles, was the hardest. Siniq-elb tensed himself, waiting for the attack, for a crossbow bolt or an arrow to take him, flashing in the darkness.
There was nothing. Darkness, the slow stir of air that hinted at a vast space around them, cold against Siniq-elb’s flushed cheeks. Ahead, the lanterns marched down the pit in steady succession, as they had the last time Siniq-elb had been in the chamber. This time, though, lanterns ran all around the terraces, marking out additional staircases, and giving Siniq-elb, for the first time, an idea of the dimensions of the pit.
It was vast, larger than a city block, perhaps larger than two, and the trails of lanterns made the space between the narrow expanse of floor at the bottom, and the vast opening at the top, all the more precipitous. As though the darkness threatened to tumble into the pit, drawing the world after it, in a single, long breath. Siniq-elb huffed, almost expecting to see his breath hang in the air before him; he had heard tales from soldiers who had served along the Atasi mountains, where the edges of the foreign winters touched the Paths. If his breath misted, though, the darkness hid it.
Tapping Vas on the shin with his crutch, Siniq-elb signaled him forward. The two made their way across the packed dirt, loose stones twisting and scraping away beneath Siniq-elb’s crutches. Made as they were for Agahm, the crutches were a bit short for Siniq-elb, and his back ached as he slouched to compensate. Halfway to the lighted staircase, Siniq-elb tied the knife to his forearm; it would be more accessible there, and holding it in his hand made using the crutches too difficult.
As they reached the staircase, Siniq-elb hesitated, keeping clear of the ring of yellow lamplight. Below them, almost three quarters of the way to the bottom of the pit, he could make out two figures. One in green. The other in brown.
Khylar and Mece.
For another heartbeat he paused. To enter the light would be to reveal himself to Khylar; filled with the power of the gods-made-flesh, the su-esis would kill them in a matter of moments. Below them, Mece let out a moan; it sounded as though she were just waking, half-aware and frightened. It felt like someone had gripped Siniq-elb by the spine and given him a shake.
Without thinking, he started into the light, down the stairs. The crutches helped him move faster than he could have crawled, they let him negotiate the steps, and he moved with reckless speed, not caring as the crutches flexed and bent under the rapid shifting of weight. Vas came behind him, short, whining gasps marking his difficulty.
Whether from the noise of the crutches, or Vas’s gasps, Khylar gave a start and turned. He spotted them almost immediately. Even at that distance, Siniq-elb could see Khylar’s storm-grey eyes widen. The su-esis’s mouth curved up into a smile, and with casual ease, he turned his back on them and continued down the stairs. Slower, now. As if there were no rush in the world. No need to draw the sword that hung at his side. He still held Mece by the throat, and the blonde woman clawed at his hands. Without turning to look at her, Khylar cuffed her on the side of the face with his free hand, and Mece went limp.
If the darkness had threatened to collapse into the pit, to swallow the weak lamplight and the vertiginous abyss, now Siniq-elb saw the opposite. It was as though every lamp had become a flash of lightning, etching the scene before him in his mind. The world moved by fits and jumps around him, as though his mind could only capture pieces of what he saw, for his rage had eyes only for Khylar. Siniq-elb hurtled down the steps, barely aware of the ache in his arms, the throbbing in his back. There was only Khylar, and Mece, and himself.
Khylar turned around just as Siniq-elb reached him, surprise running across the man’s thin face. His hand released Mece’s throat just as Siniq-elb crashed into him, sending both of them down the steps. The edge of hard-packed earth, striking hard enough to send flashes of pain even through Siniq-elb’s anger, and then they struck the bottom level of the pit and bounced once.
The world spun lazily around Siniq-elb, but he had been trained to fight, and he forced himself to move, even as his lungs burned for air. He flipped over and
pulled himself onto Khylar just as the man was stirring. Before Khylar could rise, Siniq-elb drove his fist into the man’s jaw, and Khylar’s head snapped to one side. Another moment of lightning clarity, Khylar with a trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth, grey eyes glazed. Siniq-elb landed another punch, knocking Khylar’s head to the other side. Another punch. Then another. There was no sense to it, no plan. Only anger and those lightning clear moments between.
And then somehow, Khylar knocked aside one of Siniq-elb’s punches, and the blow sent a chill sting up Siniq-elb’s arm. Khylar set a palm against Siniq-elb’s chest and gave a tap, as though calling at a door. Siniq-elb flew to one side, rolling for several yards until he came to a stop. The world did not spin this time; the lightning flash clarity stopped. There was only a general, dull ache that ran the length of his body, and the cold earth against this neck, and the awareness that he was a dead man.
Khylar straddled his chest and, with a grimace, spat blood and a single, yellowed tooth on Siniq-elb’s face. Then, without a word, he drew his fist back. Siniq-elb bucked and flailed at the su-esis, but the man was immovable; he weighed as much as the darkness above, as though the pit pulled him toward itself, seeking fulfillment. It would take only one blow; the su-esis would part his skull the way a hammer broke a walnut. With a glance at Khylar’s sword, Siniq-elb realized it was out of reach, that he had no hope of drawing it while trapped on the ground. He wrenched at the binding of his knife, felt the hilt fall into his hand as Khylar’s fist began to fall.
Vas slammed into Khylar’s side, throwing off the man’s punch, and rocking him to one side. The crack of bone and a nasal cry echoed throughout the chamber. Vas’s hands clutched frantically at Khylar’s robes, pawing at him. With a shrug, Khylar sent Vas flying backward, and for a moment Siniq-elb saw a sparkle of rainbow light.
Khylar rolled his shoulders and drew back his arm again. The punch fell, and Siniq-elb drove his knife up. It was a fool’s hope; the su-eses could survive mortal wounds, and their speed was legendary. But he would die making a choice, not letting the world control him.
Khylar’s fist connected with Siniq-elb’s cheek, rocking his head back for a moment. The blow brought tears to Siniq-elb’s eyes, but he had taken worse hits in sparring, and it did little to slow his forward movement. The blade in Siniq-elb’s hand met flesh. The dull kitchen knife sank in easily, almost without resistance, as though there were no muscle or cartilage to stand in the way. Easier than cutting onions. Siniq-elb pressed up and twisted the blade.
It was hard to identify the sound at first, the way it broke the silence into a thousand pieces. For a heartbeat, Siniq-elb thought it was bats—thousands of bats, chittering and shrieking as they descended from the crouching darkness above. Then he realized it was Khylar. A high-pitched squeal that went on and on, beyond the length of any man’s breath, as though, instead of falling in on them, now the darkness would draw everything up, and had started by stretching the su-esis’s scream out into an wire-thin band of pain that connected the pit and the stretching shadows.
The su-esis gave a small twist and went silent. Blood fell from his mouth, and he toppled to one side, revealing Vas standing behind him. Hand spattered with red, Vas glanced down at the su-esis, where a second knife hilt protruded from his back, and then at Siniq-elb. Crimson-dotted hands quavered. With a whimper, Vas dropped to his knees, hands leaving faint red streaks as he probed his injured shoulder and arm.
Siniq-elb fell backward; for the moment, he did not even have the strength to disengage himself from the dead man’s legs. The darkness above him still coiled there, waiting, threatening to rush in and devour the pit and the flickering lights, and he closed his eyes against the shadows. There was only the warm, frantic beat of his heart. The cool earth beneath him. And something vast and deep within him, empty as the shadows above him, mournful as a foreign winter.
He had had his revenge. The man responsible for crippling him, for bringing him to the Garden, was dead. And Siniq-elb felt hollow.