The House of Binding Thorns

by Aliette de Bodard

  A bodyguard carrying her, and others no doubt waiting for them in the street. And Asmodeus, worn-out and diminished, was still a Fallen, with access to magic that she couldn’t hope to match.

  It was no good. She tried to call on magic, on something, on anything, but there was nothing left in her but emptiness, and the weight of exhaustion, drawing all the strength from her limbs.

  No no no.

  * * *

  PHILIPPE, coming back to the flat, pushed the door with the song of the dead in his ears, and paused when his feet slid on something unexpected. A distraction. He didn’t need one, couldn’t afford one at the moment. He was close. He could almost taste it. He was missing just one thing, a piece that would make it all come together, a final knot that would tie together all the disparate threads of magic and breach the boundary between the living and the dead.

  So close . . .

  In the flat, Morningstar sat in the chair, barely visible behind the cluster of dead, featureless faces, though the shape of his sword pierced even the wall of ghosts. Embracing power at last. Good.

  Philippe took one step inside. The thing under his shoes shifted, and sent a spike of magic arcing through his body, a jolt that was a wake-up call. The ghosts vanished like popped soap bubbles. Morningstar wavered and disappeared, and then it was just him in a cold, dark flat.

  No. No. He was so close. He needed . . .

  He needed to get that thing away from him. He bent down, and picked it up from the floor: a scrap of paper filled with a pale, blue ink, and the flowing, curly handwriting from a bygone century.

  Philippe. Something has gone wrong. She’s giving birth early, and the midwife isn’t available. Please help, I beg you.

  It wasn’t signed. It didn’t need to be. He exhaled, willing the ghosts to come back. They did not. It was just him and the cold flat, and the message, burned across his field of vision.

  She’s giving birth.

  The baby had been barely eight months along: premature, but not catastrophically so. The squalid flat where Françoise would be giving birth, though—the louse-ridden mattress, the infested kitchen, and the broken window that couldn’t keep out the cold . . .

  Philippe crossed the blood-spattered floor, his feet smudging, beyond repair, the patterns he’d drawn. No matter; he could always make more. Behind the desk was his doctor’s case: he grabbed it, and ran for the door.

  At this early hour of the morning, the streets were filling up with laborers and children. The lone bakery was doing brisk trade. Aunt Vy was at the counter, completely recovered from the fever that had seized her. She waved at Philippe as he passed by, to remind him she still owed him baguettes and pains au lait. Philippe nodded, and ran on.

  The air was saturated with the sharp, biting smell of winter. The distant peal of church bells rang in the streets, calling to morning prayers. How long ago had that message been slipped under his door? There’d been no date or anything, and he couldn’t remember how long he’d been away, couldn’t count the days or nights since Olympe had visited him.

  He was so focused on running toward the flat that he didn’t pay attention to what lay ahead of him, and, late, far too late, saw the colors of Hawthorn, the bodyguard carrying a limp, exhausted Françoise away from the door, and Asmodeus, following a step behind with a newborn in his arms.

  They stopped, stared at him. The cold wind bit into the myriad cuts on his arms. His hands opened, dropped the case. He felt alone, and naked, and without recourse.

  “You can’t take them,” Philippe said.

  Silence. There were khi currents in the street: water from the snow on the cobblestones, earth, and a hint of scorching fire from Berith’s flat. Philippe drew everything he could to him, fashioning the threads into a lash.

  “Philippe.” Françoise raised her head, stared at him. Her face was dark, her eyes bruised-looking.

  She shouldn’t be up. Not so soon, not in the cold—and not the baby, either.

  “Leave her alone,” he said. And, before anyone could speak, drew the lash across the ground, toppling bodyguard after bodyguard.

  Françoise moved then. Her elbow dug into the chest of the woman holding her. As they parted, Philippe tumbled that bodyguard, too, but Françoise was already hurtling toward Asmodeus. She’d snatched the baby from his grip before he’d even moved—how could he be so slow? And then she was running, grabbing Philippe’s hand as she passed.

  He followed her, still trying to process it all. This was madness. They couldn’t stand against Hawthorn. Ancestors’ sake, they couldn’t stand against Asmodeus. Philippe had barely managed that the last time, pumped full of Fallen magic, and even then Asmodeus had been only mildly interested; not furious at being thwarted.

  He had little trouble keeping up with her: she was running on sheer desperation, her breath frosting in the air. Street after street after street, people staring at them, and then at what was behind them, though Philippe daren’t look back.

  “They won’t stay down forever,” Philippe said. He was about to suggest Françoise hand him the baby, took one look at the harsh set of her face, and decided not to. “I don’t know where you planned to go.”

  Françoise shook her head. “Away.” Her breath came fogged, heavy. “Has—to—be—some—help—”

  From whom? Olympe? But she wasn’t headed toward Olympe’s flat, or anywhere in la Goutte d’Or where other Annamites congregated. Rather, she was making her slow, painful way out of the neighborhood. “You need to stop,” Philippe said. “There’s nothing out there.” Just the ruined Gare du Nord and Gare de l’Est, and, farther on, la Villette Basin, and the Saint-Martin Canal, leading to the dark and murky waters of the Seine.

  They stopped, finally, on a bridge—rue de Jessaint, Philippe saw, with his heart sinking. Below them were the tracks, and the wrecked trains, and on the cobblestones was the charred circle he’d escaped from.

  Françoise leaned against the railings, breathing heavily. “Bastard,” she whispered. She clasped the baby to her chest. “Not going anywhere.”

  All Philippe could see was khi metal and earth, coming from the trains below them. They were weak, not replenished since he’d drawn on them. Rue de Jessaint was a small side street over bundles of tracks, of little interest to anyone.

  Footsteps, on the bridge. Asmodeus was walking toward them. No bodyguards that Philippe could see—only the shadow of wings at the Fallen’s back, limning him into sharp contrast, light glinting on his glasses, on the paleness of his face. His jacket was bloodied: three gashes across the cloth. Philippe didn’t remember Françoise touching him, other than snatching the baby from him.

  “This isn’t your fight,” Asmodeus said, as he drew near. The stones started to shake under Philippe; he sent earth into them, to steady them. Light streamed from Asmodeus, pallid and wan, the radiance of a spent winter sun. “I’d advise you to leave while you still can.”

  Philippe’s hands had clenched into fists, his fingers curled around the scars Asmodeus had given him, once. “You were kidnapping them.”

  “Merely giving Berith an incentive to come to Hawthorn.” Asmodeus smiled. He gestured, and the railings twisted around Françoise, holding her in an unbreakable embrace. “She will understand.”

  The cobblestones buckled again under Philippe, sending him sprawling to the ground. He pulled himself up, wincing at the pain in his arms. Some of the cuts from the ghosts had reopened.

  There were no khi currents anywhere. No, not quite true. Earth and metal, and a feeble trickling of wood that had pooled on the bridge as the sun had risen. Asmodeus was still walking toward them. Philippe sent a ripple through the khi metal, hardening the currents into an impassable wall. Or tried to: Asmodeus frowned, and slowed down, but didn’t stop. The light coming from him intensified, throwing Philippe’s makeshift weave into sharp contrast.

  Philippe turned to
Françoise. She was struggling, futilely, against the railings that held her and the baby pinned. The magic Berith had infused in her was all but gone, like dying embers, and there was nothing but a mortal, weary woman who had just given birth.

  “You shouldn’t move,” Asmodeus said, gravely. “Your friend—the Annamite woman—she had to give you extract of ergot when you started bleeding heavily. You’re not healed yet, and you certainly shouldn’t be struggling.”

  “Shut up,” Françoise said, her breath hanging in the air, a cloud of vapor in the cold. “Stop acting concerned and friendly. You have no right. Not after this.”

  The railings had fused to each other, forming an embrace of black metal that trapped Françoise. It wasn’t tight, but she couldn’t get out.

  “I hadn’t even started,” Asmodeus said, mildly. He pushed. Philippe’s weave shattered, with a sound like thunder, the threads of khi earth snapping and writhing like beheaded snakes.

  Philippe’s hands were still on the twisted iron railings. Metal. Fire overcame metal. He needed to find fire. A blazing midday sun. A summer day. The heat from dry, cracked earth. None of that here.

  Asmodeus was still walking, straight toward them. No fire. He’d worry about that later. He tried to gather some threads of metal, to disturb the cobblestones under Asmodeus’s footsteps, but it was too late. Asmodeus’s hands seized him, threw him away. “I told you not to get involved,” he said.

  Philippe struggled to rise, but magic held him pinned to the ground, invisible bonds that tightened around him, constricting like the coils of a snake. Footsteps, and Asmodeus, standing over him. “I have no patience left. And you, I’m afraid, have no time.” The bonds tightened around Philippe, slowly crushing skin and bones.

  Far, far away, a burst of magic, the sound of metal tearing—Françoise screaming, “Philippe!”

  But the dead were already rising from the hungry earth, lapping at the wounds on his arms—whispering, slowly, carefully, the words of a spell to call them back.

  “Come,” Asmodeus said to Françoise, and his voice wavered, too, became Morningstar’s, singing about power and magic and the cost of ruthlessness.

  Another sound: footsteps on the raised street. The coils imprisoning Philippe abruptly released him. He pushed himself upward, dragging the ghosts with him, dripping blood on the cobblestones. His vision swam, showed him the wreck of the station, the white, smothering veil of the dead.

  Françoise, standing in the middle of a ruin of bent and torn railings, breathing hard, but not moving, the sea of ghosts parting around her like water scalded by burning metal. Asmodeus, no longer facing her—he turned, his face overshadowed, for a moment, by that of a ghost—to stare not at Philippe, but at the people on the bridge.

  “Nemnestra,” Françoise whispered.

  There were a dozen of them, in unfamiliar House colors, with dark red swallowtail jackets and gold insignia pinned at their throats. They fanned out, like a pack of wolves, across the street. The ghosts gathered around them, but didn’t touch them, as if wary. Magic rippled lazily. And Asmodeus took a step back, and another, until he stood with the iron railings at his back.

  Françoise looked from them to Philippe, to Asmodeus; and then, pivoting on her heel, ran. Two of the House-bound started after her, only to be stopped by an imperious gesture from the woman—Nemnestra—who led them.

  “Let her go. We’ll deal with her and her partner later.”

  “House Astragale.” Asmodeus’s voice was a lazy drawl, but the ghosts were congregating around him, and Philippe could see the blood dripping from his chest. “I should have known.”

  “That old sins always come back to haunt you?” Nemnestra gestured. The House-bound split. Two of them made for Philippe, and the rest for Asmodeus, who watched them come with his head cocked.

  “No. I was warned against you. But too late, it would seem.”

  Nemnestra smiled. “What a shame. The Annamite can join the others working on the wall. As for you . . .”

  Asmodeus’s shoulders were digging into the iron railing. He made no move or spell to defend himself. His face was pale. His voice, though, was unchanged. “You’re taking me to see Ciseis?” His smile was the predator’s, through and through. “I shall be pleased to see her again.”

  “I’m sure the pleasure will be mutual. Take him,” Nemnestra said, and they closed in like vultures.

  * * *

  IT was a large room, and the food wasn’t so bad, although everything, including the sauces, had that curious blandness of Western dishes. Except for the desserts, which were invariably too sweet and harsh on Thuan’s tongue. The door, though, opened only on servants bringing and taking food away; and Thuan still didn’t know when he would be allowed out, or under what circumstances.

  He had the sketching book. The first pages, carefully detached from the rest, were Samariel’s still lifes. But he’d never been particularly good at drawing, and demons take him if he allowed himself to fall into the mold Asmodeus had prepared for him.

  He took the charcoal, and used it as a calligraphy brush instead, copying down the poems he could remember from Uc Trai and his time in Second Aunt’s library—and when he grew bored with that, he composed his own.

  Along the path, frost-white reeds and the moon hushed in the winter sky

  The river stilled, its fragrance smothered beneath oily mirrors

  Inside, wings of smoke on clouded mirrors, reaching out to choke the soul.

  His tutors would have had sharp words, about the quality of it, the awkwardness of classical references, the indifferent verse, the overreliance on similar syllables that created an artificial and awkward rhythm. Still . . . it passed the time.

  On the second morning of his imprisonment, the door opened. Thuan was up before he could think, thrusting the sheets of paper behind him—bracing himself for Asmodeus’s mocking voice, though he wouldn’t have been able to say why.

  It was Nadine.

  “You?” he began.

  She shushed him with a wave of her hand.

  “No time,” she said. “He’s gone from the House, so I went through his office. . . .” Her face was pale, taut. She handed him a thick stack of papers. “Here. It was in the drawer closest to his chair—not locked. He’d been working on it before leaving. You have two hours. They go back after that. They have to.”

  And then she was gone, the key turned back in the lock, running away before any words could reach his mouth.

  Thuan sat down at the desk, and stared, for a while, at the papers. They smelled of Asmodeus, and of lips on his, and a voice whispering “unwise,” the same one running through his dreams, the ones that stubbornly refused to turn into nightmares.

  Some of them were printed sheets from a book that had fallen apart, their long edges still coated with a residue of glue. They’d been heavily annotated, and the rest were drawings, and writings, all in the same forceful hand, with a quill or a pen that regularly blotted on the rough surface.

  A House is, after all, nothing more than a collection of wards, embodied in the person of its head—first and foremost, a territory made manifest by magic. The wards lift it beyond a simple piece of ground or of city, make it something not alive but meaningful, something that lives and dies and grows. And, without a head, there is no House.

  That last sentence had been circled, and a couple of words added in the margin: “the grove. Previous heads. Uphir.” Thuan turned the page. If it was all like this . . .

  What, then, to make of dragon kingdoms? Or, rather, dragon kingdom, as the only other extant one, the Bièvre, didn’t survive. Like Houses, they are territories where other rules apply, where water reigns supreme, and dragons and other sea creatures can exist.

  Great. A travelogue written by a Frenchman. Well, at least it would be somewhat entertaining, he supposed.

  His gaze was drawn to
the top of the next page, and stopped.

  A dragon kingdom, thus, is in many ways a nascent House, one awaiting only the presence of a strong magic user to make it theirs. And there are precedents of using a dying dependent of a House to shatter its defenses and seize its grounds (see Echaroth and House Montenay).

  In today’s Paris, it is impossible to do so because Houses have protected themselves against such rituals, but dragon kingdoms have done no such thing, making them summarily vulnerable. The expenditure of power involved, of course, would be staggering. . . .

  And, beside that, a series of short phrases written on the paper, so deeply they’d torn it.

  Nascent House.

  The proper ritual?

  They have no dependents, but symbolism is key.

  The union of two worlds, and the subsequent death of the old.

  And, in small, neat capital letters, the word “dependent,” struck through and replaced by “consort,” which had been underlined and circled twice.

  Nascent House. He couldn’t mean. He couldn’t— Thuan flipped through more pages, which were formulas and calculations, Asmodeus working through the phases of a spell, adding and subtracting words in an arcane fashion that made little sense to Thuan.

  Words of a spell. A spell to kill him. For something that would take fuel from Thuan’s death, and tear apart all of the kingdom’s defenses, exhaust all of its magic, paving the way for conquest by the House of Hawthorn. It was never going to work. The book had said that the amount of power required made it all but impossible.

  With a sinking heart, Thuan remembered the power that had seized him, outside Asmodeus’s rooms: an artifact, hidden away somewhere, a fuel source for a large, impossible spell.

  The last page, the one Asmodeus had been working on, looked to be the end of the spell—except it was covered in struck-through words. Something had obviously been deeply unsatisfying.

  He read it through, slowly, carefully.

  When he was done, he piled the sheets of paper by the side of the door for Nadine to take back, and he lay on the bed, staring at nothing.