Breaking Chaos

by Ben Galley

  Nilith lowered Pointy until he was hanging by her side. With a grunt, she moved past me and took the horse by the chin to bid him to lie down. With his reins free, he whinnied and started to munch the hay while Nilith took apart the pack. Layers and layers of cloth slid free, revealing a stained bundle that looked suspiciously body-sized, and a naked, wriggling ghost, busy pulling a rag from his mouth. He got up, eyes wild and hand clenched to his breast. He was puffed up with rabid anger, looking between me and Nilith as if choosing which of us to curse first. There was a doughy paunch on him, and he was a hair taller than me. I looked at the ragged gash at his throat, and he saw mine. We traded a brief glance that was something other than anger. Empathy, perhaps. In a moment, it was lost, and rage swooped in to fill the vacuum.

  Emperor Farazar pointed a handless stump at me. ‘You… You eastern filth! You’re a fucking liar! No man can break into my Sanctuary!’

  ‘I’m no man, Emperor of the Arc. I’m a ghost,’ I replied haughtily. This man was definitely no royal to me. ‘And the best locksmith in the Reaches.’

  ‘And my mother! How dare you insinuate she defied my banishment! And a flying machine? She didn’t have the guts to do anything about my father, never mind have the wits to build a flying machine! If you believe this liar, wife, you have finally snapped!’

  I looked to Nilith. ‘Is he always like this?’

  ‘You have no idea,’ the empress replied with a roll of her eyes. ‘Days, Mr Basalt. Weeks, I’ve endured it.’

  ‘Look at what you’ve done to my city, Nilith. Madness! A battlefield! And now the Cult?’

  ‘So you took that bit on board…’ I piped up.

  Nilith ignored him, keeping her gaze on me. ‘When did my daughter hire you?’

  ‘Months ago. I arrived here a few weeks back, maybe a month. I was killed my first night here.’

  ‘And how long had the tal been in the city, building her machine, Mr Basalt?’

  ‘Years. A decade, perhaps.’

  Nilith laughed. ‘And you blame me, Farazar? Did you hear that? If I hadn’t acted, Sisine would have. Or your mother. What do they all have in common? You.’

  With the point of the sword, Nilith steered the emperor into the corner and made him sit down. With nothing but driftwood and stone behind him, he had nowhere to run. She came back with more questions for me.

  ‘My daughter knows about me, and what I’ve done?’

  ‘Her ghost, Etane, told her, shortly after they found the Sanctuary empty. Or should I say your ghost.’

  ‘Lies,’ came a bitter hiss from the corner.

  ‘And what of Etane?’

  ‘I don’t know. The last I saw of him, he was fighting a brute of a ghost called Danib. It didn’t look like it was going well.’

  ‘Ironjaw. I remember him from Milizan’s last days,’ Nilith whispered. I saw the concern in the wrinkles of her brow.

  With a sigh, Nilith took me out into the stable, near to the sleeping centipede. ‘And the Cult? How are they involved? I’ve seen their preachers and their patrols of armoured shades. What has happened while I’ve been gone? How have they resurfaced?’

  I was torn. They had handed me over as if I was still bound, even though my half-coin had been around my neck. And yet they had welcomed me in, given me the gifts of justice. I was honest. ‘They want to fix the city. Provide charity and aid. Freedom for shades. They orchestrated Temsa’s rise and fall to get close to Sisine, and now they say they want to put Sisine on the throne, to start a new era. They brought me to the Cloudpiercer after taking me from Hor—Hirana, intent on me opening the Sanctuary for your daughter. They say all the right words, but…’

  ‘What?’

  I faltered. ‘I…’

  ‘Tell her about the gods,’ Pointy whispered.

  I shook my head. ‘Just a sense.’

  ‘I know what you mean.’ Nilith blew a sigh, running a mitten of rags through her knotted hair. ‘I can’t believe that old bag Hirana is still alive. And here in Araxes all along.’

  I held up a finger. ‘Erm. She’s not exactly… alive.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘After Hirana crashed into the Piercer, when they found nothing but a ghost in place of an emperor, she and Sisine fought. She managed to take my coin. In the commotion, I…’ I bit my lip, tasting mist. ‘I pushed her through a window. Hirana and I fell, and after… well.’

  Nilith had a strange glint in her eyes. ‘You killed my mother-in-law?’

  I was already looking for the nearest door. Knowing where the exits are is half the trick to surviving. ‘I… not intentionally…’

  ‘Well, thank fuck for that.’ Nilith blew a sigh of relief. ‘That woman is sheer evil. The very definition of a royal Arctian. And yet you ran. I’m sure my daughter and the Cult would have been thankful. Why not stay with them? With your coin? Why run and hide?’

  I had no better an answer for that now than I did standing over Hirana’s splattered corpse. It didn’t stop me from trying to make one. ‘It seems it’s what I do. I run. I’ve been running most of my life. I’ve run this far, and so far I haven’t vanished in a puff of air. I can only assume the Cult have my coin, and aren’t finished with me yet.’

  Nilith shook her head, as if she had already galloped ahead of my weak explanations. ‘They want your gift. It’s clear. Their kind always want something,’ she grumbled. ‘Ungh! Why did they have to complicate things?’

  Once more, I was ready to spill the story of the gods, but I held back as I watched Nilith start to pace. Curiosity hooked me. Had I fallen in with just another claimant to the throne? I wondered how far I’d have to run to be free of those.

  ‘What exactly are these ‘things’?’ I asked. ‘What do you plan to do with the emperor?’

  ‘Farazar will be put into the Grand Nyxwell according to the Code, and I will claim the throne.’

  I snorted. ‘And what’s your reason for killing your way to the crown, hmm? You all seem to have one. Spoiled birthright? Jealousy? Vengeance?’

  ‘Change, Mr Basalt. Your story is one of hundreds I’ve heard since living in this godsforsaken city. I seek to change those stories. To bring freedom to your kind. To…’ She bit her lip, and I swear I saw blood. ‘To my kind.’

  ‘Come again?’

  ‘I like to think I can recognise the difference between a cog in the machine and the hand that turns it, Mr Basalt. You seem to be the former.’

  I wondered if that was some sort of veiled insult.

  ‘I have trusted you this far. I don’t know why I feel I can trust you further, but I shall.’ With that, she began to pull aside the wrappings at her neck and reveal a sight I had never beheld.

  A black and ragged tear in her skin separated bone and flesh from dark, angry vapour. Her faint blue glow joined mine as she tore the rags from her arms. I saw the punctures at her wrist, glowing white like my own stab-wounds. She showed me the edges of where ghost met living, reaching across her bosom and down to her hip.

  ‘You asked what that monster was? The slatherghast did this to me. I was told its poison slowly kills a person by turning them into a ghost. It certainly seems to be true. This has only been a few days. All I feel is cold, and a hollowness spreading through me.’ She pointed to the bite marks in her wrist, her tone low and wistful. I knew that pain, although I envied the graduation of her transition to the grave. She hadn’t tumbled into it, as I had, but was slowly slipping. It was a poor comfort to her, I knew, but a richness I wished I had been gifted. I might have taken that over my haunting, just to spend my last days living in all the ways I would miss as a ghost. The first sips of beer. Grease rolling over fingers. A lucky bedding. Or a cheap one, in my case.

  I didn’t share the same worry she did, and so I scowled. ‘I’m sorry,’ I offered awkwardly. ‘A half-life isn’t so bad, all things considered. Better to have half the loot than none of it, my old master used to say.’ Those optimistic words tasted far too sweet in my pessimistic mouth.

>   I got the sense I hadn’t provided the supportive words she might have been seeking. Nilith waved her hand dismissively and wrapped herself back up. ‘All I care about is time, and a clear path to the Grand Nyxwell.’

  ‘And freeing the ghosts,’ I reminded her.

  ‘Abolishing the Code, Mr Basalt. To be exact,’ she corrected me.

  ‘Lofty aspirations, Empress.’

  ‘They are the only aspirations that matter. And now, perhaps they matter even more.’ A glazed look came over her eyes. They were glassy in the dim lantern-light. ‘I don’t trust the Cult any more than my husband, or no doubt his mother, did. I saw their manipulation of Emperor Milizan with my own eyes, before Farazar murdered him. They are a pox on what the dead gods stood for.’

  I cocked my head.

  Nilith went on, working herself up until she was hunched, a bow bending before pressure. ‘They worship a god of chaos, not the true concept of ma’at. Balance, Mr Basalt, in Arctian. Charity? Aid? I highly doubt it. If they’re involved, putting Sisine on the throne is most likely the next step on their ladder.’

  ‘A flood,’ I blurted, seeing whether the word sparked anything in her, testing the gods’ warnings.

  ‘A flood? What flood?’

  I tested her trust some more. ‘Since I came out of the Nyx, I have been… visited.’

  ‘Visited?’

  ‘Visited. By dead things, claiming to be dead gods. There was a dead man called Horush, then a cat called Basht. Then a cow. Haphor. And a shade all green. Oshirim himself.’

  Nilith was cocking her head at me now. I could hear the absurdity of it, and although it felt good to get it off my chest, I could see myself sliding into the same category as the supposedly mad sword.

  Pointy spoke up, deciding to break his silence. ‘He has, Empress. I saw Oshirim with my own eyes.’

  Nilith raised an eyebrow.

  ‘They have repeatedly warned me of the Cult. Say they want to flood Araxes. The Arc. Maybe the whole Reaches. Yet when I was with the Enlightened Sisters, I saw no sign of any such plans. They seemed genuine, devoted to this idea of a new Araxes. To your idea.’

  ‘You trust them?’ Nilith looked at me, shocked.

  ‘I…’ I stammered.

  ‘Caltro, surely not,’ Pointy admonished me.

  ‘It’s not that I trust them. Every opinion is against them, but they speak of freedom and justice just like you do, Nilith. They used me to open the Sanctuary, of that I’m sure, but they have my half-coin and haven’t killed me yet. The dead gods keep saying I need to use this gift to stop them. Begging me, even, and yet I see no malice in the Cult’s plans. Fuck. I thought after getting my freedom existence would be simpler, but I’m even more wrapped up in Araxes’ games than I was before,’ I sighed. ‘In truth, I have no idea what I’m supposed to do now.’

  Nilith reached out to put a hand on my shoulder. It was her left, the dead one, now wrapped in cloth. ‘Me neither. Not day to day, at least, and somehow I’ve scraped through. I just kept moving. I find if a person has enough will, enough determination, a path opens up for them. Who knows? Perhaps the dead gods wanted you to run into me. Do you believe in luck?’

  I shook my head. Luck is a scapegoat for the unfortunate and a trinket for the untalented and noble-born. ‘I make my own.’

  Even as I said it, my thoughts betrayed me. Yet again my half-coin was once again out of my hands. My fight for freedom was far from finished. Maybe the gods did have a path planned out for me, and I was following it unknowingly.

  ‘Luck has seen me through the desert, Caltro. Given me allies when I needed them most.’ Nilith mumbled, green eyes faraway and vacant. ‘I was with someone, a scrutiniser, but she was taken before you arrived. A bargeman. Nomads. A strangebound falcon, too, wherever he is now. And now you, turning up out of the shadows. I’ve learnt not to turn my nose up at company, but suit yourself if you wish to carry on running. Though, I could use the help…’ She took a moment to unclench her jaw.

  I studied her, every twitch of her eyes, every shift of her lips. ‘You’re really going to free all the ghosts in the Arc? You’d take that step? You, a royal with a dead emperor penned up and all the wealth of the Reaches in your grasp?’

  I felt the determination in Nilith’s eyes pressing into me as she stepped closer. ‘Every last one. You, the sword. All of you. The Code is a poison and a plague and I can stand no part of it in this city any more. Balance will reign again, Mr Basalt. Neither the Cult nor my daughter will get their hands on the throne. Then this flood of theirs – if such a thing exists – will be no more. You and the gods can rest easy.’

  Those might have been the truest words I had yet heard spoken in Araxes. I paused to think. There was no trace of duplicitousness in her. No squeeze in that hand on my shoulder. No subtle movements of the sword lest I refuse.

  She saw my hesitation. ‘Make your mind up, Caltro Basalt. Stay or go.’

  ‘Will it get me my coin back?’

  Nilith withdrew her hand, and led the way back to the pen. ‘If I pull this off, locksmith, you can forget about your half-coin.’

  I thumbed my chin. The decision seemed far too easy, almost as if it had already been made for me. Once again, I considered luck and fate, and the weaving of its complex threads.

  A person can live all their life seeing a tapestry woven behind them. See themselves as the product of chance meetings, steered by nothing but the frantic flutter of a butterfly’s wings. I had always refused the notion. Believing such things took the reins from my hands. It was like trusting bolting horses to lead your wagon in the right direction. No, I preferred to steer, and trust to my own choices, even if I chose the wrong direction. I’d had little choice of late, and so I made my decision right there and then, and steered.

  I followed Nilith, heading for the pen. Once again, my finger poked the air. ‘Don’t suppose this means I get my sword back, does it?’

  ‘No.’

  Bare and glowing feet whispered across the white, glasslike marble. Crimson cloth and shade-light stained it a deep purple. The chambers were so quiet that even their ghostly movements seemed loud.

  Creaking doors led to vacant chambers, all opulent and pointless. Studies with blank scrolls on their shelves. Bedrooms themed by colour; here a violently yellow room, there a blue room with fish painted around the walls. Dressing rooms that bore tables laden with jewellery. Lounges with furniture of oryx horn, ivory, and a plethora of silk cushions. And all of them empty.

  The Enlightened Sisters continued their search.

  Not a squeak had been heard from Sisine in hours. Not since she had stormed from the ruined Sanctuary in the aftermath of the battle. Her last words had been a challenge to the Church to find her mother. To prove their worth, as it were. It struck an uneasy truce between them and the Royal Guard. For the first time in two decades, brothers and sisters walked freely through the Cloudpiercer.

  ‘Majesty?’ called Liria, her voice echoing through the honeycomb chambers of marble.

  A wheeze.

  Both sisters heard it, surging towards another bedroom. Another door led on from that, hanging ever so slightly ajar. Liria placed her hand upon its edge and pushed.

  A bloody scene appeared before them. The bedroom was doused in it. Where it hadn’t been left to pool, it was drawn across the pristine floor in great arcs. Crimson hand prints showed here and there, like the grotesque painting of an infant. The sisters’ eyes followed them from the marble to the snowy linen sheets of a great bed. They had been dragged to the floor and were now a patchwork of dirty and clean. Chestnut feathers were strewn across that pile, and at the centre of their explosion lay two bodies. One was a falcon, blood-soaked and with its neck twisted at a horrific angle. The other was a princess.

  Sisine lay crooked, almost horizontal, with her head propped up by a bundle of cloth clamped to her bloody neck. It had been white once, Liria imagined, but now it was as red as her own robes. Stretching out from the cloth’s corner
s, raw, wet gashes stretched across Sisine’s throat. Her bottom lip had been torn in two, and her nose carved down the middle. One eye had been completely gouged out, and not cleanly. Rake-marks of talons crisscrossed her bloody socket like a scribe’s mistake. The skin that had gone untouched had a hint of grey in its Arctian tan.

  Sisine’s other eye glared at the sisters. She drew a breath, and it rasped through her throat. She tried to speak but some of her letters had been stolen from her. Blood sprang afresh from her split lip.

  ‘My mother,’ came the ragged hiss, barely audible.

  Liria knelt at the empress-in-waiting’s side. She did not touch her; she merely looked. ‘We have all available bodies and souls looking for her. If Empress Nilith has made it to the city, we will find her.’

  ‘I will be empress.’ Something caught in her windpipe, and she dribbled more blood. ‘I will be empress.’

  Liria looked to her sister, who wore a sorrowful face. ‘May I, Your Majesty?’ she asked, and after some more glaring, Sisine’s hand peeled away from the rags.

  ‘Fucking cursed bird.’ Sisine tried feebly to lash out at the falcon’s limp corpse, but instead her fingers flopped on the sheets, scoring three red marks.

  Liria peeled the rag away, making the princess hiss. Beneath it, she saw how much skin and flesh the talons had torn away. No wonder she lay in a pool of her own blood.

  ‘All this deception will be over shortly, Your Majesty,’ Liria whispered, leaning closer. ‘No more games.’

  Sisine closed her eye, gurgling something.

  Liria nodded, dabbing her neck and jaw where the blood still seeped. ‘Araxes will have its new empress, we promise you that.’ She tended her lip now, and as Sisine croaked in pain, Liria put a comforting hand behind her head.