We don’t know what happened. That was our story. We would stick to it. Benny wasn’t on trial for murder, just attempted burglary. We didn’t need to know anything about Imela Rush’s death. All we needed was a reason for Benny to be in Thousand Walls. I would back him up, say he was my servant if I had to. (And, boy, would he not like that.) I had brought him along, I would claim.
I would get him out of there, and then we would worry about what the Depths was going on.
Confidence. Arrogance. Certainty.
Someone stepped out of a side alley, coming right at me. I saw a black cloak, a black hood hiding a face. A mage. I heaved in raw magic, fast, and threw up a shield.
Just in time. The other mage’s magic smashed into my shield and shattered. The force threw me back. I hit a wall, rolled, dropped my shield, and flung a counter spell. It took the man’s feet away from under him. He hit the ground, swearing. He had come too fast and too confidently, expecting to take me out in a single hit, and he hadn’t protected himself. Beginner’s error.
I kept rolling, and it was a good thing. A spell hit the road where I had been just a moment earlier. Stones cracked, sending shards through the air.
Depths!
A second mage was running towards me. I threw fire at him, but this mage wasn’t so reckless. He brushed it aside.
I tried to get to my feet, but my head spun. I stumbled, falling to one knee, then the mage was in front of me. I saw the magic gather in his hands, broiling and frantic. I wouldn’t be able to block that one, so I did what he wasn’t expecting. I swung my mage’s rod. The heavy obsidian end caught the side of his knee. He dropped with a scream.
I pushed myself up and staggered away before either of my attackers could come again.
A net fell over me. Not a net made of rope, but strands of bright green magic. I fought against them, but it was no good. Nothing I did affected them. I fell again, arms and legs trapped at awkward angles in the tightening net. My joints burned with pain. My head was forced agonisingly to one side. Tears obscured my vision. I blinked them away.
A mage stood over me, peering down dispassionately. In the moments before I lost consciousness, I recognised her: the mage who had attacked me in my bedroom. Then darkness closed in.
When I awoke, everything was still black. I felt hard stone under me and throbbing pain in my joints. I tasted stale chalk and garlic on my tongue from the magic that had hit me.
This was becoming a habit.
“He’s awake,” a voice said, and light flared. I squinted. A stone floor. Stone walls. Tapestries.
Panic gripped me. I scrambled to rise, but I was too weak, and I fell back.
I knew where I was. I had sworn I would never come back here. I had done everything I could in the last five years to avoid this place.
This was the Countess’s palace. For a second, everything turned red, and I couldn’t get any air.
Breathe. Breathe.
I could not be here.
Then a second thought shouldered its way in: Benny’s trial. I should be at the magistrate’s court right now. If I had had enough breath, I would have screamed in frustration.
Calm. If I wanted to get out of this before it was too late, I had to be calm. Concentrate on breathing.
Hands grabbed my arms. They weren’t gentle. I tried to reach for magic, but I was too nauseous. It was all I could do to get my feet under me as I was dragged across the floor. Everything spun around me. I sucked in breath, trying to steady myself. My chest was too tight, my pulse thrumming madly.
Slowly. Breathe slowly. Control yourself. I shoved my fingernails into my palms so hard I felt the skin break. A door opened in front of me, and I was hauled through.
The hands supporting me let go, and I dropped, this time, thankfully, onto a rug.
At last, and just in time, I regained control of myself. I lifted my head.
There, on a chair so grand it really counted as a throne, sat the most powerful high mage in Agatos, the Countess, Senator Coldrock, peering down at me with emotionless eyes.
I took a deep breath and forced myself to straighten.
“Hello, Mother,” I said.
Chapter Fourteen
My mother wasn’t really a countess. ‘Countess’ wasn’t even an Agatos title. It was a Lidharan title from far to the north of Agatos, and, as far as I knew, my mother had never left the Erastes Valley. She, like me, had grown up in the Warrens. She had been picked out by the Wren to be one of his acolytes when she had been only thirteen and had worked for his criminal empire for three decades. Eventually, though, her power had grown too great. By mutual agreement, when the previous high mage died, Mother had left the Warrens and reinvented herself as the Countess, claiming the title of High Mage. She had abandoned her birth name. The name Solone Thorn would never mark her out as anything other than a child of the lower city. She hadn’t quite managed to flush the Warrens from her accent, but there were very few stupid enough to argue with a high mage. Now Mother sat in the senate as Senator Anatase Coldrock, and the government of Agatos didn’t make a move without her approval.
“I hear you are still using that ridiculous name,” my mother said.
I shrugged. It hurt my shoulders to do so, but it was worth it because I knew how much it irritated her. “It’s the name you gave me.”
She stiffened. “You could be a Coldrock.”
“No, thanks. I like being a Thorn.”
She sighed and waved a hand. Someone brought a chair. I heaved myself gratefully into it. I wasn’t too proud to let her see me like this. She could hardly think less of me.
“You disappoint me.”
“Nothing new there, eh, Mother?”
As far as I could tell, my entire life had been a disappointment to her. From the moment she had become a high mage, she had decided I should be her successor. She had dedicated her efforts and the efforts of her acolytes to training me. She had pushed me, tested me, punished me, and, I had to be honest, broken me. Until it became clear even to her that I didn’t have the talent to be anything other than a mediocre mage. Then she had dropped me the way she would yesterday’s newspaper. I was a disappointment, a failure, not worthy of her consideration. I could remain a minor acolyte, that was all, carrying out tasks too menial for her personal attention. Instead, she had switched her focus to my little half sister, Mica, whose burgeoning magical abilities had exceeded mine by the time she was twelve. Mother wouldn’t see me, talk to me, or even reply to messages, anymore. I was too irrelevant to the high-and-mighty Countess.
Two years after she had given up on me, I had left, and I hadn’t seen her since. I had done everything I could to separate myself from her and everything she stood for. I had made myself think of her as ‘the Countess’, a distant high mage who had nothing to do with me.
It had almost worked, and I was not fucking keen on her becoming ‘Mother’ again.
I tried to keep my face neutral. Benny’s trial must have started by now. I had lost most of my friends when my mother had taken us out of the Warrens and all the rest when I had walked away from the power and the wealth the Countess represented. Only Benny had stuck by me. Benny had never cared about any of that, only about debts, obligations, and promises. And I had promised I would be there for him. Breaking a promise or refusing a debt were the only true sins in Benny’s book. Bannaur’s balls! I didn’t have time for this shit.
“You could just have sent an invitation, Mother,” I said. Depths. Can’t help yourself, can you?
“Would you have come?”
“No.”
There was a streak of grey in her long black hair. And I used to think nothing ever touched you. Even the Countess couldn’t hide from age forever.
“Well,” I said, pushing myself up. “This has been lovely. We must do it again some time. Now, I have somewhere more important to be.”
A hand pushed me back down. I looked up to see the mage who had attacked me in my apartment and captured me with the net. I
grimaced.
“I don’t much like your new pet, Mother. I think it might have fleas.”
The mage stiffened, but she didn’t say anything. Don’t dare in front of the Countess, do you? I could feel the resentment rolling off her.
Mother waved a hand. “I know about Benyon Field’s trial. I have been telling you to stay away from that lowlife for over twenty years. He is not a suitable companion for my son.”
I gripped the arms of my seat. “You knew about Benny’s trial and you decided to kidnap me anyway? What’s wrong with you?”
“You are being tiresome, Mennik. You are here because I asked you to leave the Silkstar matter alone, and you ignored me.”
I felt my face redden. “No, Mother, you didn’t ask me. You sent your dog to tell me. I don’t take orders from her or from you. Not anymore.”
“You are acting like a child!” she snapped. “The high mages of Agatos exist in a fine balance. I will not have you blundering in and upsetting that balance.”
Upsetting the balance? Upsetting the fucking balance?
“I’m not the one going around murdering high mages’ servants.”
Mother’s face tightened. I could see the same anger that I sometimes saw in my own mirror. Sharing an expression with the Countess only made me more furious. How dare she? How dare she think she could kidnap me and sabotage Benny’s trial and blame me for whatever fucking game the high mages were playing?
“You are my son,” the Countess ground out. “When you interfere with the business of Carnelian Silkstar or the Wren, they see my hand at work.”
“Then stop treating people like your fucking puppets!”
Her face creased in shock. I doubted anyone had sworn at her in the last decade.
“You do not know what you have got yourself involved in. We have all felt the power unleashed in the city. You play with candle flames. This is a volcano. It will obliterate you.”
“I never knew you cared.”
She looked coldly down at me. “Don’t be crass, Mennik.”
I leaned forwards, catching her gaze and refusing to let it go. “Are you behind this, Mother?”
Her gaze hardened. I forced myself to hold it in the face of her contempt.
“This is something new in Agatos. I do not know if it is wielded by one of the other high mages, but it is not me.”
Not that you would tell me if it was.
My mother stood from her chair-throne. “I will now make myself entirely clear. You are to abandon this investigation of yours. You will have nothing further to do with Silkstar or the Wren. I have given them my personal guarantee that you had nothing to do with any of this and that you will stay out of their business.”
I stared at her. Of all the fucking cheek. She still thought she could order me around like one of her acolytes. She expected me to hang Benny out to dry. Fuck that.
“That is all,” she said with finality.
Mother’s acolyte took me by the arm and pulled me out of the room. I shook myself free the moment we reached the entrance hall of Mother’s palace.
“Here’s an idea,” I said. “Keep your fucking hands off me or I’ll break them.”
She laughed. “Your bravado is pathetic.”
I wouldn’t have gone with ‘pathetic’. ‘Unconvincing,’ maybe. I didn’t really have anything to threaten her with. She had beaten me twice without breaking a sweat.
“Do not rely on Senator Coldrock’s maternal instincts to protect you if you disobey her.”
Oh, I wouldn’t. Even when I had been Mother’s intended successor, even before I had become her greatest disappointment, I hadn’t fooled myself on that.
I didn’t answer. I headed for the palace doors.
The mage called after me. “Your friend’s trial is over.”
I stumbled, stopped, and looked back. “What happened?”
She smiled.
Shit! I broke into a run.
The courthouse was closed when I reached it, the trials done for the day. The crowds of stone throwers on Bad Luck Way had mostly cleared, leaving behind only those few who hadn’t come down from the rush of making the city’s unfortunates’ lives even more painful and miserable. A couple of small groups still stood, stones held loosely in hands, not knowing what to do with themselves. I didn’t bother asking them if they knew what had happened to Benny. I doubted they cared whether the prisoners were guilty. The mob wanted blood. It didn’t mind whose.
I had messed up badly. I should have gone straight to the courthouse as soon as I had awoken instead of taking that pointless diversion to the university. Then, even if my mother had grabbed me, I would have been free in time to get there.
Why do you always fuck things up, Nik?
I didn’t have an answer for that.
Maybe the court had believed Benny. Maybe that thin story about bringing a message from the Countess had convinced them, even without me as a flesh-and-blood-and-mage-cloak witness.
If so, Benny would have walked free. He would have been pissed off, though, and he would have headed straight for my apartment to tell me what he thought of me. I wasn’t looking forward to that, but I would take it if it meant my failure hadn’t had any consequences.
I ran up the steps to my office, ignoring the aches in my joints, and threw the door open.
“Benny?”
There was no one there, not on the tatty couch, not sitting on my chair, not trying to pick the lock on my safe again.
Depths.
A knife pressed against the side of my neck. I felt the skin go taut under the pressure right over the artery. The slightest slip, and I would be bleeding out on the floor.
“Where were you?”
Sereh. The realisation sent a shiver across my skin. I would take a high mage’s anger over hers any day.
Scarcely daring to whisper, I said, “Put the knife down.”
The pressure increased. My pulse beat against the blade.
“You were going to be there. You were going to help him.”
She was furious. I didn’t blame her. I was furious at myself, too, and I was furious at my mother. But Sereh could kill me with just a twitch of her wrist. I didn’t want to die from a misunderstanding or a mistake.
“Whatever has happened, we can make it right.” Somehow.
“You can’t make anything right.” Her hand trembled. My skin parted, and for a moment I thought that was it.
Then the knife was gone. I stumbled away from her, into the office, and turned, putting a hand against the cut on my neck. It wasn’t deep, but I felt the blood run across my fingers.
Sereh stood in the doorway, knife still held loosely in her hand. She was utterly still, and the way her eyes were fixed on me terrified me. I had no illusions. I might count as family, in a way, but her loyalty to her father was unbreakable and very sharp.
“You said you would be there,” she said again. “Dad was relying on you.”
I winced. “I know. I tried.” I wet my lips. “I was kidnapped.”
Her expression didn’t soften. I wasn’t going to get any sympathy from her.
“You’re a mage.”
“So were they, and they were stronger than me.”
“So do better.” Her normally cool voice was stretched with emotion. “If you’re not good enough, be better.” Her knife moved hypnotically in her hand. Easy for her to say. I had found my limits a long time ago.
Did you? Or did you just stop trying? When my mother had given up on me, had I given up on myself as well? I would never be a high mage. I would never have the talent or the power of my mother’s new pet, either, but could I be better than I was right now? Maybe I could. Maybe I really had just given up.
“Just tell me what happened,” I said, as gently as I could.
I reached out a hand, not touching her but inviting her further in, like enticing a scared cat. And she was scared, for Benny and of feeling helpless. She was also very dangerous right now.
I backed slowl
y towards my desk. Reluctantly, Sereh followed. I indicated the couch, then slipped around my desk and sat. She mirrored me. There. At least I felt a bit safer now.
“Dad told his story,” Sereh said, “then he called for you to back him up, but you didn’t come.”
“I know.”
“They didn’t believe him.”
Of course they hadn’t. I had never truly thought they would, even though I had tried to convince myself they might. My word shouldn’t have been worth more than his, but it was, all because of my black cloak. I tore it off in disgust and dropped it on my desk.
“They found him guilty?”
She nodded. “Burglary, they said. Aggravated by murder.”
Pity! Aggravated by murder? That was insane. “Benny didn’t have anything to do with that! How could he?”
“They said it was too much of a coincidence.” Fury flashed across her face again. “I’ll kill all of them.”
Her knife snapped forwards, skewering the air. I had hardly seen it move. My mouth turned dry.
“What … What did they decide?” Benny. Come on. None of this could be real. I could scarcely remember a time when we hadn’t been best friends.
“What do you think?” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Death. They sentenced him to death.”
I closed my eyes. How could they? It made no sense. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t even think I could speak. Death? For burglary? It was crazy. And a burglary that had been a set-up? Why couldn’t they see it? How could they claim Benny could even do something like that? Hadn’t they seen the aftermath? No ordinary human could have been responsible. Benny didn’t deserve to die for it. It wasn’t justice. It just wasn’t.
Someone is cleaning house.
I wasn’t going down that easily. Benny wasn’t.
Time to throw out all caution and move to plan B.
I forced the words out. “Did they say when?”
Sereh’s eyes were still fixed on me. Was she never going to blink? “Tomorrow. At dawn.”
Whoever was behind this wanted it over fast. It had to be Silkstar leaning on the magistrates. Fuck him and fuck every other high mage.
Shadow of a Dead God: A Mennik Thorn Novel Page 16