Justice

by Ian Irvine

  A faint movement caught the light, a distinctive shimmer of black and red, then blue and red, like polished opal. It surely came from one of the Heroes. He tensed and edged across, ready to strike. A slender figure lay on a window seat, the reflections coming from her opaline fingernails.

  Yulia!

  Though she was the least aggressive of the Heroes, Yulia was a powerful magian, and very dangerous. What was she up to? Her head was slumped to the side and her breath came in agonisingly slow rasps, half a minute apart.

  He took another step. The room was otherwise empty and there was nowhere for anyone to hide. It did not seem like a trap. She must have seen him coming yet she did not move. Was she ill? Did the Heroes get ill? He checked the door again, then warily bent over her.

  Yulia’s eyes were glazed, her lips blue, and he saw a faint trace of white powder clinging there. Beneath the white specks her lips were blistered. A tiny copper box lay on the floor, its lid open, and more white powder had spilled out. Was she an addict?

  He licked a finger, placed it in the powder and was about to taste it when his fingertip began to sting and blister. He wiped the powder off, very carefully, then wiped it off her upper lip as well, bursting several of the blisters. It must have been painful but she did not react.

  She took another faint breath. Her chest barely moved. Had it been anyone else Rix would have said they were dying, but the Five Heroes had always seemed immortal.

  “Yulia?” said Rix. “What happened?”

  “All… for… nothing,” she rasped. Her right hand opened and a rolled parchment slipped free. It looked very old. “Dishonour… can’t… be endured.”

  Surely she hadn’t taken poison? But why would she try to kill herself when the Five Heroes were on the verge of completing their two-thousand-year-old quest? Of all the Heroes, Yulia was the most honourable… perhaps the only one with a conscience. What could the dishonour be?

  She tried to take another breath but the rasping note was not completed. Her head sagged sideways; she was dead. He glanced at the parchment, which was a familiar rant about the racial superiority of the Herovians. He put it in her hand and closed her fingers around it.

  He had spent too long here. Conscious that he had been present at a fateful moment, Rix closed Yulia’s staring eyes and went out, but he had only gone a few yards along the corridor when he heard Grandys shouting, far below.

  “It wasn’t there?” said Lirriam. Her voice was silky, smug.

  “Lyf turned up,” Grandys snarled. “He changed to a wrythen and snatched it from right in front of me.”

  “How did that feel?” she said, as if she cared. “You must be wondering if you can do anything right these days, Grandys.”

  He must have drawn Maloch and hacked at the wall, judging by the racket that followed. Rix imagined that Grandys would sooner have hacked at Lirriam’s neck.

  “How did Lyf find me?” said Grandys.

  “Maloch,” said Lirriam.

  “What about it?”

  “It’s always been a double-edged sword, if you’ll excuse the pun. When you chopped Lyf’s feet off the enchantment put a perpetual curse of pain on him… and now he can use the pain to locate you. Ironic, isn’t it?”

  “What was that crash a few minutes back?”

  “I don’t know; I’ve been in the lower basement. Though it sounded like the door.”

  They would discover the tower door broken down, Grandys’ guards dead and Rix’s men in their place. Rix prayed that his men would hear them coming and retreat. There was no point in dying for North Tower now.

  He heard the sounds of a short, sharp battle. The moment it was over the Heroes would come looking for Yulia. He had to get away before they found her body, but the tower only had one stair and Grandys was on it. Rix squeezed out the first window he came to and caught hold of a rusty cast-iron drainpipe that funnelled roof water into one of the cisterns, hoping the drainpipe would not fall to pieces under his weight.

  They came up the stairs: Grandys’ heavy, wincing tread, the lumbering, rock-like thud of Syrten, and Rufuss’s jerky, lopsided gait. If Lirriam was with them, she made no sound.

  “Yulia?” said Syrten in anxious tones. Then, more loudly, “Yulia!”

  Rix heard him run to the window seat and fall to his armoured knees with a crash. He let out a howl of anguish. “Yulia!”

  “What’s the matter with him now?” said Grandys.

  The other Heroes came running. Rix took advantage of the clam-our to climb down the drainpipe another twenty feet. There was a moment’s silence, after which the Heroes all began talking at once.

  Grandys’ voice broke through. “No, I can’t accept it. Yulia would never kill herself.”

  “The evidence seems plain to me,” said Lirriam. “She took a fatal dose of undiluted gloxime.”

  “Where did she get it?”

  “I gave it to her.”

  “Why?” Grandys snapped.

  “She’s been in constant pain from the arrow wound she took at Reffering. Nothing but gloxime could relieve the pain.”

  “I still don’t believe it,” said Grandys. “Her body is still warm, and Maloch tells me there was an intruder—Rixium! Rixium murdered her, and he can’t have gone far. Find him!”

  Rix scrambled down the drainpipe. The noise no longer mattered, nor the risk of falling.

  “How could she do this to me?” said Syrten in a bewildered voice. “It’s the end, Grandys. The end!”

  “We’ve never been closer to victory,” said Grandys.

  Syrten howled in anguish.

  As Rix reached the ground, Grandys came to the window above him and looked down. Rix ducked around the corner out of range.

  “There he is! Heroes, the hour has come,” roared Grandys. “Storm Garramide. Find Tali, and get Rixium!”

  CHAPTER 72

  “You can’t cut the pearl out here,” said Errek. “It’s too dangerous. Carry her to Turgur Thross.”

  Tali wasn’t paralysed; she could move her fingers and toes, and everything felt normal—she simply could not move her limbs. Lyf floated a yard above the floor, carrying her in his arms. He wore the circlet on his brow and it gave him a regal air she had not seen in him before. Clearly, it also greatly increased his power.

  “Flying burns magery,” said Lyf. “Even wearing the circlet I couldn’t fly her that far.”

  “You’ve got people at Turgur Thross now, and you can call more through the Sacred Gate.”

  “It’s miles away and they’ve no way of getting here. I’ve got to take the pearl now.”

  Lyf carried Tali up several levels into a long, cavernous ballroom which, Tali knew, had been closed off for decades. It was dusty, cobwebbed and smelled of damp and wood-rot. There was a stage at the front end and a large pair of outside doors across the ballroom, twenty yards to her right. A gallery level, high above, extended around the four sides of the ballroom. In the gloom at the rear she saw narrow stairs leading up and down, and beside them a long, curtained alcove.

  Errek drifted beside Lyf, a tenuous, frowning figure, thin and wispy. Yet despite his appearance he exuded strength and self-confidence, and she had no idea how to deal with him, even assuming that she could get away from Lyf.

  Lyf bound her to a hard wooden chair, so tightly that she could feel her hands and feet going numb.

  “Where’s your gear?” said Errek.

  “Below, where we slept last night,” said Lyf.

  “Better hurry.”

  Lyf barricaded the doors and clattered down the stairs.

  “The master pearl is eggshell-thin,” said Tali. “It’ll burst as soon as he tries to cut it out.”

  “Who said anything about cutting it out?” Errek said mildly.

  “That’s how the other pearls were taken. I saw one hacked out of my mother’s head.”

  “Do I look like such a brute?”

  “No… but Lyf does!”

  “I’ve given him instruction in t
he necessary magery. You’ll barely feel it as he takes the pearl… at least, I hope not.”

  “It’s part of my life—a very painful part. Even if you could remove it without breaking the skin, I’d feel it.”

  Lyf flew up the stairs, lugging a wooden case. As he snapped open the latches, Catlin, the chief cook, appeared behind the rail of the gallery level, then headed quietly for the shadowed stairs. A group of kitchen women followed, and last of all Glynnie, who looked ferocious—Benn must have told her how Tali had used him. Tali’s innards clamped painfully. Though, given the circumstances, it seemed unlikely she would have to face Glynnie’s fury.

  Lyf was facing the other way and did not notice as the women crept down the dark stairs to the alcove. Tali assumed Glynnie and the kitchen women were planning to burst out and take Lyf by surprise. It wasn’t much of a plan. His magery would be a match for a score of warriors; the kitchen militia could not hope to take him on.

  Without warning there came a heavy thump on the main double doors, as if someone had driven an armoured shoulder against them. The doors did not yield.

  “Grandys!” said Errek.

  Heavy, thudding footsteps were followed by a colossal crash. The doors moved an inch or two.

  “That’s Syrten and the doors can’t hold him,” said Errek.

  Lyf extended an arm towards the doors. Fzzt! Blue light surrounded them. The blows continued, though now his binding spell held the doors firm.

  Errek went ten yards along the wall and put his head through it. “Lirriam and Rufuss are with them. How long will it take you to get the master pearl?”

  “At least ten minutes.”

  “That’s way too long! Call the gauntling to the lookout on the top of the dome, then put every binding spell you know on the door and carry Tali up.”

  Lyf summoned Grolik and began to bind the doors, drawing such vast amounts of power through the circlet that it left him shaking. While his attention was on the doors, Glynnie came creeping down the shadowed stair.

  The doors were struck from the outside with a blast of magery that made the handles and hinges glow red. It faded, then they were struck again by such a massive impact that it could only have been Syrten running at them full bore. The doors splintered, but held.

  “They can’t take another blow like that,” said Errek.

  “And I haven’t got anything left,” said Lyf. He drew a knife to cut Tali’s bonds.

  Glynnie was only ten yards away, behind the dusty curtain. The kitchen women had gathered in the darkness behind the stair, awaiting her signal.

  Glynnie waved an arm. Now!

  They raced at Lyf, brandishing knives, pokers, skewers and cleavers. He whirled, his right hand flashed red at them and several women fell, unconscious, though the others were unaffected. He was weak, Tali realised. Lyf had used too much power, too quickly.

  Catlin swiped at Lyf with a meaty fist and caught him on the side of the head, sending him flying. Glynnie slipped behind the chair that Tali was bound to.

  “Radl was right about you,” Glynnie hissed in Tali’s ear. “If we do get away with this, you’re dead!”

  She hacked through Tali’s bonds. Tali tried to get up but the ropes had cut off the circulation. She stumbled and fell, dragging Glynnie down with her. She caught Tali under the arms and heaved her towards the stairs.

  “Retreat, everyone!” Glynnie yelled as Errek flew at her.

  She dropped Tali and swiped at the wrythen with her knife. It passed straight through him. The kitchen women retreated to the stairs, and up.

  Lyf recovered and flew after Tali but the moment he took his eye off the door the blue light surrounding it went out—the Heroes had broken his binding spell. Syrten’s next charge tore the left-side door off its hinges. Lyf managed to create a shield where the door had been, an oval of seemingly solid air. For a full minute he held the Heroes, and even forced them back a couple of feet, but the effort was draining him visibly. His right arm began to droop.

  Tali’s circulation was returning. She hobbled, supported by Glynnie, for the stairs.

  “I’m all right now,” said Tali. “Go!”

  Glynnie ran up to the first landing and stopped. Tali was halfway up when Grandys burst through Lyf’s shield and charged. Lyf was slow to react; Grandys was within a foot of snatching the circlet from his head when Lyf shot in the air, out of reach. Grandys cursed, skidded for several yards before he regained his balance, turned on one foot and sprang after Tali.

  She had not considered that such a big man could be so agile. She scrambled up, missed the next step, fell and landed hard. Before she could get to her feet, Grandys leapt ten feet forward and eight feet high, smashed straight through the banisters and landed on the steps in front of her.

  He picked her up in one giant hand, sprang down and turned towards Glynnie. She hurled her knife at him. He batted it aside with an armoured forearm. Glynnie hesitated for a second, then raced up and out of sight.

  “You’ll keep,” said Grandys, glaring after her.

  He tossed Tali fifteen feet to Rufuss, who caught her and held her in an unbreakable, one-armed grip. Lirriam was duelling Lyf with red spikes of magery. He did not seem to have the magery to float up out of reach.

  Grandys came at Lyf from the other side and managed to prick him in the shoulder with the tip of Maloch, in the same place where he had wounded him at Glimmering months ago. Though it was a minor wound, in seconds it had swelled to the size of a half-lemon.

  “The only conflict in Maloch is with you,” said Grandys. “It aches to drink your blood.”

  Lyf went backwards, the circlet teetered on his head and Grandys made a wild swipe at it, but again missed. Lyf sprayed a burst of orange fire at Grandys’ feet, setting his boots ablaze.

  Grandys howled and tore his boots off but the bale-fire clung to his inflamed feet. He snatched out Maloch, touched the fire with the tip and spoke a word of command. The flames roared up to his knees. He staggered through the door and plunged himself waist-deep into a water-filled barrel across the courtyard.

  “Up!” cried Errek. “Now!”

  Lyf propelled himself through the air, up over the gallery rail and disappeared from sight.

  Rufuss’s arm was hard across Tali’s throat, as if he wanted to throttle her. “I haven’t forgotten the way you mocked me at Red Mesa,” he hissed in her ear.

  She could not reply; she could not draw breath.

  Grandys limped in, dripping. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he bellowed. “You’re choking her.”

  He tore Tali out of Rufuss’s grip, crushed her to his massive chest and headed down several flights steps to an empty basement. Using the tip of Maloch he opened a concealed passage in the right-hand corner of the basement.

  “Rufuss, get my boots. Syrten, run to the camp; fetch Holm and the box of surgeon’s instruments underground to North Tower. Bring everything Holm requires—he’s cutting out the master pearl, right now. Tell my army to attack the walls with everything they have. And send through a full company of my doughtiest defenders; nothing is stopping me this time.”

  Grandys did not give Lirriam any orders. Perhaps he no longer dared.

  Syrten plodded off, his footsteps shaking the floor. He looked as though his heart had been cut out.

  Grandys carried Tali through pitch-dark underground passageways to North Tower and re-barricaded the broken doors. He set her on her feet and prodded her up to the open top of the tower. Lirriam followed, then Rufuss, carrying Grandys’ charred boots, his nose upturned as if he could not bear the stench.

  The sky was heavily overcast, the light as dim as a midwinter day. The air was still and a fine, misty rain drifted down. Grandys’ surviving guards lugged up chairs, a trestle table, a telescope, and a gigantic rectangular object covered in canvas. Finally they staggered up bearing two ominous marble slabs, each eight feet by four, which they set down on the trestles.

  Syrten reappeared with Holm and a
hundred heavily armed Herovians. The weeks of imprisonment and bad treatment had aged Holm. He looked thin and old, and Tali’s heart went out to him.

  “I’m sorry about this,” he said quietly.

  “There’s nothing to be sorry about. We do what we must.”

  “You,” said Grandys, indicating most of his soldiers with a sweep of his right hand, “go down and guard the main doors, and every window and opening into North Tower. Syrten, bring Yulia’s body up. I’ll have the Five Heroes together for one last time.”

  Ninety of the soldiers went down. The other ten stationed themselves around the roof wall, on watch. Syrten plodded down the steps, each thudding footstep a beat of a death roll.

  Lirriam sat in one of the chairs and peered into Incarnate. What did she hope to find? Grandys scowled but said nothing. Rufuss slumped in an angle of the five-sided tower, nursing the stump of his arm. He looked paler than usual and was, clearly, in great pain.

  “Not in as much pain as you’ll be in, in a minute,” said Grandys, evidently reading Tali’s thought.

  She began to regret resisting Lyf earlier. If her pearl had to be taken, having it magicked painlessly out of her head was preferable to anything Holm would be able to do, even at his gentlest, with scalpel and bone auger.

  Grandys pulled his boots onto his raw, scarred feet. It must have been agonising but he allowed himself no more than a wince. This was it—the moment she had dreaded ever since her mother’s murder. Lyf was beaten, and Rix had no way in. Nothing could save her from her mother’s fate.

  “Holm hasn’t operated in decades,” said Tali.

  “Actually, he’s been working as my healer for weeks,” said Grandys. “And Rixium’s healer before that.”

  “He’s never done this kind of operation before. He can’t do it safely.”