Forged

by Benedict Jacka

  Beyond the door was an entrance hall. Square pillars lined the hallway, making two rows down the length of the room, and a long, shallow pool stretched between them. The floor was white marble, the walls and columns were decorated in pale yellow, and the pool was lined a rich gold. More of the faux torches were mounted on the pillars, and their flickering glow was caught and reflected from the waters of the pool, casting a thousand sparkling points of light across the hallway. Doorways on both sides and at the end led deeper into the caves.

  The entire room was littered with bodies. Men lay sprawled between the columns, spread out on the floor, and propped against the walls. One had fallen into the pool and his body floated face down, bobbing slightly. As I looked more closely, I saw that not all the bodies were human. Creatures of some kind were mixed in amongst them, man-sized but covered in brown fur. But all were very much dead.

  When Variam didn’t move, I slipped past him, glancing from left to right as I moved through the bodies. The men had been geared for battle, armed and armoured. Some had been carrying guns, while others were bare-handed or wielding focus items. The furred humanoids had been using curved metal claws with a handle shaped to fit into the palms of their hands. Up close, they looked like a cross between humans and monkeys, with intelligent-looking faces and thin tails.

  “She did all this?” Variam asked.

  “This was their defensive strongpoint, I think,” I said, scanning the room. “The traps and the earth elemental were to slow attackers down. They would have gathered here to make their stand.”

  “You mean to get slaughtered.”

  “Or that.” Jagadev’s defences would have been enough to handle a life mage. A life mage augmented by a marid jinn was another story. Looking through the futures, I could see that the bodies weren’t yet cold. “Still some heat in them. I don’t think this happened more than twenty minutes ago.”

  “Guess we might catch up,” Variam said. He still didn’t move. The sight of the massacre seemed to have cooled his temper.

  It was more than a little disturbing to me as well. It’s one thing to know that someone’s capable of dealing out this kind of death, and another thing to walk through it. Every time I thought about what had happened here, I’d remember a quiet, shy girl with red-brown eyes, gentle and kind. As I looked at the bodies, that image wavered and warped. I didn’t want to think about her doing this.

  “You know what the creatures are?” I asked Variam, trying to distract myself.

  “Vanara,” Variam said. He sounded uneasy. “Why would she want to kill . . . ?”

  “Looks like they were with Jagadev.”

  “It feels wrong,” Variam said. “Why’d they be helping someone like him?”

  “Jagadev had humans working for him,” I said. “Not much of a stretch to think he could get other creatures too.”

  “Yeah.” Variam shook his head. “Yeah. We should move.”

  We picked our way through the bodies. I stepped over a vanara’s legs, placed my feet to avoid stepping on a man’s outflung hand. “Jesus,” Variam muttered to himself. “I think I know some of these guys.”

  “Jagadev probably brought them along when he left London,” I said. As I walked, I looked at where the defenders had fallen, trying to read the flow of the battle. It must have been fast. There were a couple of scorch marks on a column and a few bullet chips on the walls, but very few. Most had probably died without realising how outmatched they were.

  There was one man at the far end of the hall a little apart from the others. He was Chinese, dressed in a white suit, with a pair of sunglasses covering his eyes. He was sprawled on his back, arms outstretched.

  “That’s Kato,” Variam said, staring down at the body. “He was majordomo at the Tiger’s Palace.”

  “Hmm,” I said. I crouched down, studying the corpse. Behind the sunglasses, Kato’s eyes were open, staring sightlessly at the ceiling. “I don’t think he died in the battle. Positioning’s too neat.” I glanced up at Variam. “Did he ever give you guys a reason not to like him? Especially Anne?”

  “Few reasons, yeah. Why?”

  “I think he might have gotten special treatment.”

  Variam looked back at me with a frown, then shook his head again. “Come on.”

  I followed Variam deeper into the mountain, leaving Kato’s body behind. The fight in the entrance hall must have broken any resistance, because there were no further signs of combat. If anyone had escaped from that room, they’d kept running. I couldn’t blame them.

  I kept searching as we walked, mapping the tunnels and watching for any further traps, and as I did an old memory surfaced. Back when Variam and Anne had been living with me, I’d tried to find them both a master, and the search had taken me to Dr. Shirland, an elderly mind mage in a terraced house in Brondesbury. We’d sat and talked while a fat black-and-white cat watched sleepily from an armchair.

  If I approached anyone to refer Anne as an apprentice, they’d ask whether she was dangerous. And I wouldn’t honestly be able to answer no.

  Anne won’t even kill flies, I’d said. She might be powerful but she’s not dangerous. She’s innocent.

  I don’t think she’s quite so innocent as you believe.

  The massacre in the entrance hall floated before my eyes, and I shook my head, trying to make the image go away. It wasn’t like that was Anne, anyway. Or not just Anne.

  I don’t think she’s quite so innocent as you believe.

  She was innocent. Well, not completely, but I could understand her reasons. She’d been pushed into it, first by Sagash, then by Jagadev, then by Levistus and Sal Sarque, finally by Richard. It wasn’t as though I’d been wrong.

  Anne won’t even kill flies.

  Okay, I might have been wrong. But I’d been right with the bits that mattered. Anne might have snapped in the end, but she’d never done anything to me.

  Well, except at the Tiger’s Palace. And afterwards, in San Vittore. And then there was what she’d done to my hand . . .

  I don’t think she’s quite so innocent as you believe.

  Focus, I told myself.

  The image of those corpses in the entrance hall came back, followed by an image of Anne. Anne, bodies. Bodies, Anne.

  Angrily, I shoved it away. It didn’t matter. I just needed to find a way to fix all this, then I could take Anne away and we could go back to how things were.

  I don’t think she’s quite so—

  “Shut up!”

  Variam stopped and looked back at me with a frown. “What?”

  I breathed in, closed my eyes, breathed out. “I didn’t mean you.”

  Variam gave me a sceptical look. “Starting to think you’re the one who shouldn’t be here.”

  The rooms and hallways had been growing richer and more opulent the deeper we went. This hadn’t been some last-minute hidey-hole—Jagadev must have been preparing this retreat for a long time. Maybe he’d been using it as his base for centuries. Right now we were in what almost looked like a museum. Thick glass cases stood on marble pillars, each holding some odd item to catch the eye. A pile of small bones was within one case, an ancient handwritten diary within another. A wrought iron polearm was contained in an especially long case, while another held a dark brown cloak with a magic aura I couldn’t identify.

  As I looked around I realised that unlike the last few rooms, this one had signs of battle. There was no blood, but a gilded chair had been knocked over and a leather pouch lay discarded on the floor. Concentrating, I could sense a faint magical residue. It must have been very strong to still be visible.

  “Someone went through,” Variam said. He was staring at a set of gold-inlaid double doors at the end of the room.

  “Yeah,” I said. I was focused on scanning for danger. There was no threat around the doors, no threat in the next room, but I didn’t like th
e look of the futures in the middle distance. “Let’s see who.” I strode to the double doors and pushed them open.

  The room within was a bedroom, and dripped with wealth. Gold rugs and tapestries were scattered upon the floor, silks hung upon the walls, and the furniture was a dazzle of precious metal. The gaudiness made me blink: I’d been scanning only for danger, and anything that wasn’t a potential threat hadn’t registered on my radar.

  Which was why I hadn’t realised that Jagadev was on the far wall, crucified against the stone.

  The rakshasa looked like a humanoid tiger, as tall as a man but far more heavily muscled. Ornate spears had been driven through his hands and feet, pinning him against the wall, and all around him some kind of net of magical energy hovered, glowing a menacing black-green. The energy in the spell was so powerful that it made the rest of the room look dim. Jagadev’s eyes were closed and he didn’t move.

  “Shit,” Variam said, staring at Jagadev. “Is he dead?”

  “No,” I said, frowning at Jagadev. The spell around Jagadev was incredibly complex. It was life magic, but with thick strands of the jinn’s power woven in, grey-black and opaque. It was interacting with Jagadev in some way, but I couldn’t figure out how.

  Variam was staring at Jagadev like a dog at a hunk of meat, but he managed to tear his eyes away and look around. He ignored the gold and silver as though it wasn’t there. “Where’d she go?”

  I swept the room with my diviner’s senses and nodded to one of the silk hangings. “Escape tunnel behind there.”

  Variam looked at it, then back at Jagadev, clearly torn. “Can we catch her?”

  “No,” I said with a sigh. I’d been searching for futures in which either of us caught up to Anne, and I hadn’t found a single one. “I don’t even know if she took the tunnel. For all I know she used that jinn to punch straight through the gate wards.”

  “You got some other way to follow her?”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. Use that new hand of yours.”

  “If it were that easy, I’d have found her already. Anne is at the top of the Council’s hit list, and she is taking a lot of care to be hard to trace.”

  “You’re saying you can’t find her.”

  “Yup.”

  “Shit.”

  There was a moment’s silence. “Well,” Variam said. “I guess we’ll just have to take him as the consolation prize.”

  “Mm,” I said. I was wondering how long Anne had taken to overwhelm Jagadev and pin him like this. How long had we missed her by? My instincts said not long. Maybe no more than a few minutes. If I’d been faster, we might have been able to catch up with her . . .

  . . . and do what? Well, that was the problem, wasn’t it? “How long until you need to be back?”

  “A while.”

  I looked at Variam. Something about his tone of voice gave me the feeling that he was cutting things closer than that. “We should probably stop talking about this anyway. Jagadev’s been listening since we walked in.”

  Jagadev opened his eyes. The pupils were golden and slitted like a cat’s, and they stared down at us without expression. Variam took a step forward. The fingers on his right hand twitched, and the futures of violence suddenly spiked.

  “Vari,” I said warningly.

  “Can he hear?” Variam said.

  “And speak.”

  “Why?” Variam spat.

  “Because Anne left it that way,” I said. I wondered what she’d had to say to her old enemy, and how I could get Jagadev to tell us.

  “Hey, asshole,” Variam told Jagadev. “Remember me?”

  Jagadev stared down at Variam.

  “You’re going to tell me exactly what you did,” Variam said. “And who helped you. If not”—he flexed his right hand—“we’re going to see how well that fur of yours burns.”

  Jagadev didn’t so much as blink. The rakshasa’s features were hard to read, but even pinned to the wall and motionless, he somehow managed to look down on Variam as if the fire mage were some sort of insect.

  There was a dangerous tone to Variam’s voice, and I could sense violence flickering very close now. “I’m not going to ask again.”

  “He’s not going to answer, Vari.”

  “Yes he will.”

  “No, he won’t.” I was still sorting through the futures, snatching glimpses between the shifting possibilities. “Setting him on fire won’t make him talk. Burning pieces off him won’t make him talk. He’s not afraid of you.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Variam said. “Let’s change—”

  Jagadev spoke suddenly, his voice a purring rumble. “Your brother was a coward.”

  Variam went very still.

  “He died begging for his life,” Jagadev said. He raised one eyebrow slightly. “Would you like to know how?”

  “Shut up,” Variam said.

  “He pleaded for us to take his family instead,” Jagadev said. “He wept and cried that he would give up the rest of you if we would only spare him. First he tried to offer his mother. Then when that failed, he offered you. He told us that you would come at his call, that you’d be eager, because you blindly trusted him, worshipped him as a hero even though—”

  Variam’s hand snapped up.

  My hand hit Variam’s just as he loosed his spell, and the heat burst hit the wall to Jagadev’s right. There was a whump of superheated air. A tapestry flashed into ash and burning sparks, and a section of gold-friezed marble melted and deformed.

  “Vari!” I snapped.

  Vari had turned on me, orange-red light glowing around his hands. They weren’t aimed at me—not quite—but they were close. “I told you not to get in my way,” he said through gritted teeth.

  “He’s manipulating you,” I said sharply. “He’s had years to plan out this encounter, figure out exactly how to push your buttons. Stop and think!”

  Flames surged around Variam and his eyes lit up red. Death and violence danced in the futures, and not all of it was aimed at Jagadev. I stared back at Variam and stood my ground. For a long moment, everything was still but for the flickering fire around Variam’s body; I could feel the heat at my face and hands but didn’t flinch.

  Then Variam withdrew. The fire around him dimmed and he let out a long, hissing breath. The futures calmed and settled. “Take a walk,” I said. “Five minutes. I’ll make sure he’s still here when you get back.”

  “He’d better be,” Variam said.

  “You have my word.”

  Variam gave Jagadev one final look, then turned and left the way we’d come in.

  I turned back to Jagadev. The rakshasa had fallen silent again. “Hello, Jagadev,” I said. “How long’s it been, six years? Though I suppose that’s not much to you.”

  Silence. Jagadev’s slitted golden eyes stared at me without expression. But no—there was an expression there, something unfamiliar. I’d been searching through the futures, picking out glimpses and clues, and all of a sudden I understood what I was seeing. “You’re in agony right now, aren’t you?” I said softly. “That’s what that spell is doing. It’s not just paralysing you; it’s inflicting the most pain it possibly can. It’s a wonder you’re even able to talk.”

  Jagadev’s expression didn’t shift, but I knew I was right. “So that was why Anne left you alive,” I said. “She could have killed you in an eyeblink, but that would have been over too soon, wouldn’t it?” I tilted my head. “So what did she have to say? I’m guessing she wasn’t all that grateful for all you’ve done for her.”

  Still no answer.

  “If you’re not going to talk, I might as well call Vari back in to finish you off.”

  “Anne knows you will betray her,” Jagadev said.

  I paused, caught in the middle of turning around. “You think to ally with her against yo
ur shared enemies.” There was no trace of pain in Jagadev’s voice: it was silky, contemptuous. “She knows you will turn on her as soon as you can. She will expect it, and you will fail.”

  I felt a stab of fear. I knew Jagadev had to be guessing, but his guesses were dangerously close. “Nice try.”

  “She knows your plans, Verus. But do you know hers?” Jagadev raised an eyebrow. “I think not. When she strikes, all your divination will not foresee it.”

  “This is what you always do, isn’t it?” I said. “Plant suspicion, turn people against one another. All those people out in the entrance hall, those men and the vanara . . . I bet you spun them a very convincing story. How well did it work out for them?”

  “And yet here you are,” Jagadev said. “Because no matter how you try to hide it, you wish for my knowledge, my wisdom. Like all mages. Like all humans.”

  Jagadev had a point. The rakshasa was hundreds of years old, if not thousands. He would have had the time to amass wealth and secrets beyond most mages’ dreams. The secrets would be worth the most: locked away in his mind would be the keys to entire kingdoms. I felt the temptation of Jagadev’s unspoken offer. Help him, and I’d have access to the knowledge that only he possessed. Of course, to do so, I’d need to keep him alive . . .

  . . . and in doing so, I’d be betraying Variam. And once I’d protected Jagadev, he’d betray me as well. The rakshasa had spent centuries practising these deceptions. He’d promise me everything, and give me nothing but death.

  “You know, it’s funny,” I said. “You could have killed Anne and Variam so many times, when they were living as your wards in the Tiger’s Palace. I mean, they were the last living descendants of the mages who killed your wife, weren’t they? And you managed to get them under your power, living under your own roof. So why did you hold off?” I looked at Jagadev. “I think it was because they were the last. Once they were gone, you’d have nothing left. And when you finally decided to kill Anne, you didn’t just have her assassinated cleanly, because that wasn’t enough for you, was it? You tried to destroy her in every way you could. And now she’s doing the same thing. She could have finished you off, but instead she decides to play with her food. I guess she learnt it from you.” I shook my head. “So much for your wisdom.”