Rise of the Falsemarked (Spies of Dragon and Chalk Book 2)

by Samuel Gately

  The tunnels under the Shields ran haphazardly in every direction. Some were well-lit and in good condition. Others were old, dark, and out of use. Cal never would have been able to find his own way out amongst the endless dirty, wood-framed corridors.

  Cal said, “Aaron didn’t know you were crossed, so it’s not SDC. Are you working for Castalan? Porcenne? Just looking for a payout?”

  “I’m working for your father. He said he’d pay if I was able to save your life. Which I just did. No way DaNeel was letting you leave that cell alive.”

  “DaNeel? The beggar?”

  “What? Yes, that one.”

  Cal half turned and slowed, looking at Clay. “So the note I pulled off DaNeel was for me then. The person in the inner circle was you.”

  “What note?”

  Cal quickly explained how he’d found the note on the beggar.

  “That makes sense,” Clay replied. “Embassy said it tried to get word to you. DaNeel must have taken down the messenger right before he came for you. You could have saved yourself some beatings if you’d figured it out days ago. And a fight with poisonous snakes. While we’re getting so intimate, how did you survive the poison? How are you walking?” Clay shoved Cal back into motion with the crossbow.

  “An acquaintance gave me a sort of ointment. Seems like it did a lot more than I gave it credit for.”

  “Yeah, who’s that?”

  Cal didn’t answer and they kept walking deeper into the Shields. Headed down a flight of stairs. A group of blues were at the bottom. They turned to face Clay. One of them, when he saw Cal, immediately ducked into a side tunnel and vanished.

  “What’s going on, Clay? We got word from Aubrey you’re supposed to go right to the top. We’re supposed to go with you.” All three men had their hands on their sword hilts but none had drawn yet. Clay calmly raised his crossbow just over Cal’s shoulder and loosed a bolt. It struck right between the eyes of the blue who’d spoken. Cal pulled the knife from behind his back and buried it in the neck of another. The third had nearly cleared his sword of its scabbard when Clay bashed him over the head with the unloaded crossbow. He fell hard.

  “I thought the blues were yours?” Cal asked as he wiped the knife on the dead man’s shirt.

  “Not all of them. Those were Aubrey’s. First one who ran was DaNeel’s. He’ll be after us shortly if he isn’t already.”

  “What’s going on upstairs? You said EU is attacking.”

  “Yeah, but it won’t last too long. They can muck around in the tunnels all they want. They’ll never take the Shields with the dragons up top. Go that way then turn right.”

  Cal hesitated, watching as Clay reloaded his crossbow. “Aaron up there?”

  “I’m not sure. You wanna find out, just answer the question and I’ll let you on your merry way. I’m out of here. I find out you lied, I come back.”

  “If I tell you, I’m telling you the truth. I just still don’t trust you not to put a bolt in me once you know it.” He started walking in the direction Clay was pointing. “Where are we headed?”

  After a pause, Clay said, “Almost to ground level. There’s a back door of sorts.”

  They traversed more tunnels. Another group of men attacked them near a different staircase. Cal took a sword off their bodies when he and Clay had finished them. Finally they came to a door that was in much better condition than the decaying wood that ran through most of the bluff’s interior. Cal opened it and was surprised to find them in the second story of an ordinary house.

  “Functions as a back entrance. The exterior door will be guarded. But we go out that window,” Clay said.

  Clay walked over towards a large window. The sun was streaming through. As he opened it, the roars of an enraged dragon came into the room from somewhere high above. Moments later a body fell down, crashing among the crowded Ellis streets below the bluffs. Then another.

  Cal looked past Clay out the window. “That was a falsemarked.” Clay nodded. After a moment’s hesitation, Cal said, “I’m not going. I’ve got to get back to the top.”

  Clay turned back, frustrated. “Why? Why do you keep putting yourself in the worst possible place?” Clay took a step closer to the window, bent down to peer out, never lowering the crossbow. “Short jump and we’re out of here.”

  “I’m going back up,” Cal said.

  Clay pointed the crossbow back at Cal’s chest. “Then answer the question. What did you catch when you were fishing with your father? Answer it now or die. I’m going out this window either way. I’d rather have what I earned with me.”

  Cal stared at Clay, stared at the crossbow for a moment before answering. “It was a body. We were fishing and I caught a body. I thought it was a fish, then a shirt. By the time we saw it was an arm we already knew. It was a dead man. It had a uniform on, House Tragall. My father told me never to tell anyone. We think the body was a plant, put there for us to find. Some sort of frame-up. Easier to pretend we never found it than for him to address it. It was the only secret I ever shared with him. Ruined our fucking fishing trip, the only one he ever went on with me.”

  “Touching story.” Clay stared at Cal as though making up his mind. The room was quiet, roars of dragons and clatter of fighting fallen silent. Clay tightened his finger on the trigger and, with a slight twist of his body, fired a bolt to Cal’s right. A horrid screech rose as Pallor DaNeel, who had been creeping closer with a knife in hand, took it in the gut. He fell to the ground writhing, immediately seeking his feet again, all the while making horrible noises.

  Cal whipped back to Clay, who was already up on the windowsill. “So long, Castalanian.” Clay jumped out the window. Cal was only able to half turn back to DaNeel when, with a gurgling roar, the beggar was on him.

  Chapter 37. Shields of Glass

  Shale calmed herself, sweeping back the hair plastered to her face. She stood over the corpse of Aubrey Narrows, splayed next to Captain Drew Yorke. She couldn’t do anything about the blood on her, so she left it rather than smearing it around. Matt James approached her, more tentatively than usual. Sounds of fighting were all around them.

  “Everything going well?” she asked. Without waiting for an answer she smiled and looked around. “I can’t wait to do some redecorating here.” She turned, completing a full circle. “Their leadership is broken. Get everybody we have up here. Bray is the priority target. If we lose some of the rats fleeing the sinking ship, so be it. Find the treasury. After we lock this place down, I’ll want crews up there, breaking every single piece of glass on this structure. I want this nest covered in broken glass. Let the dragons know they are no longer welcome in Ellis.”

  As she mentioned the glass, she looked up, only to see Aaron Lorne and Hideon Bray trading blows on the clear ceiling of the Shields. “First things first. Help me find a way to get up there.”

  …

  Aaron’s borrowed sword crashed heavily into Bray’s two-handed broadsword. Finally, blade on blade, nothing standing between him and the man who would be the Slaughter’s second coming. No men to send to do his deeds, pay his weight. No dragons to ride above the bloodshed on. Only one of them would leave alive.

  The top of the Shields was a misery, the calm beauty of its curving glass a lie. The bright sun hammered down on them, magnified and reflected in unpredictable, blinding angles. The glass was scorching hot in places, so clear it was impossible to get a sense of where it was rising and where it fell. The bronze swirls embedded in the glass didn’t help, weaving in disorienting patterns. The only reason Aaron was still alive was that Bray was just as uncomfortable in this hot, unpredictable hell.

  Aaron tried to keep his eyes on Bray even as he had to deal with the unusual sensation of a dragon flying past below his feet. Somewhere farther below Shale fought for her life. Cal was trying to escape with Clay Duren. Pallor DaNeel was still loose, but this was the lynchpin of NEST before him. Hideon Bray. This was where it began and this was where it ended.

  Bray came a
t Aaron hard, swinging low. Aaron deflected the strike, sliding on the uncertain footing. Bray, grunting loudly, pivoted and spun, seamlessly spinning his blade overhand into a downward strike. This one Aaron let go past him as he dodged to the left. The sword clattered into the glass. Aaron countered with a thrust but Bray had recovered enough to deflect it. They circled each other, preparing for another exchange.

  Bray slipped and went down to a knee, hissed as the hot glass burned his leg.

  “Don’t get up here often?” Aaron mocked, then attacked. Bray calmly blocked his thrust, drove it low into the glass. As Aaron ducked to get some balance below his weapon, the sun blinded him. His knuckles scraped the glass, burning, and he threw himself to the side an instant before Bray’s counter. He fell over a small rise and slid a few feet before the toes of his boots caught on one of the near invisible seams between the glass panes. Aaron found his weapon and feet before Bray managed to close.

  “And why would I come up here?” Bray asked as he closed the gap between them. “All the action is down there. There’s nothing of interest up here beyond my soon-to-be dead rival. Maybe I’ll leave the body as a decoration. It will be fun to look up after I reclaim my army and the Shields. ”

  “You led us up here,” Aaron replied. “I would have rather pulled you down to the streets. Show you what your ambition really looks like. Maybe we could have done this dance out by the mass graves I hear are west of the city. Or that hospital where Narrows had the children killed. Is that far?”

  Bray swung at Aaron’s shoulder then launched into a sequence of strikes. Aaron tracked them, but the last one got past low. Bray’s blade raked across Aaron’s calf, spilling blood on the glass. He retreated back over another rise, Bray following in measured strides, gaining more certainty with his footing.

  Aaron needed to bring this to an end and quick. Bray was winning the fight, and even if Aaron could hold out, Bray’s reinforcements were much closer at hand. The patrol was nearing. Aaron shouted to Bray, “Was it worth the price to get to the head of the line? The top of the heap? Who do you share it with? Narrows? Your beggar? Sounds as though Clay Duren betrayed you. Guessing he won’t be part of the Hideon Bray coronation ceremony.”

  “You talk entirely too much.” But Bray paused. “I’m not the only one. Cal Mast betrayed you. He led us right to you. If you hadn’t survived the attack at Gestlin, he’d be sitting beside me down there.” Bray gestured to the floor of the Shields. “Here. Right now. Laughing at the fate of Aaron Lorne.”

  The patrol was too close. Aaron needed to end this. “I have so many worries,” he said, limping towards Bray, thin trail of blood behind him. “They dig at me like hooks in my flesh. But Cal betraying me isn’t one of them.”

  “It’s true. He led us right to you.”

  “That was your beggar. He’s been hunting Cal. I’m not sure that dog is as well leashed as you think.” Aaron noticed Bray’s face tighten, his muscles tense. Talking about the beggar made him uneasy.

  “I’ll admit,” Bray said as he slowly approached, “a part of me was hoping it would come to this. My only rival on this world. No fun to have my men kill you, sacrifice you to my dragons. Better to do it myself, once and for all. Settle the question.”

  “Nobody cares about that question except you, Bray.”

  “Fair enough. Luckily I am the only one who matters. You think…” Bray cut off as Aaron leapt towards him. A flurry of strikes ended with Aaron landing a hard blow on Bray’s wrist. Blood sprayed on the glass. Bray backed away, hurt. Aaron attacked again. This time Bray overreached on a counter strike. Aaron ducked low, letting the strike sail harmlessly past, then drove his sword up hard into Hideon Bray’s stomach. The thrust drove through his body, nearly lifting the heavy man off his feet.

  Bray fell forward into Aaron, face next to his, pulling them both down to the hot glass. Bray gasped as the pain and shock of the mortal wound slid through him. He looked at Aaron, only inches away. His confidence, his calm had abandoned him and for a moment he looked vulnerable and scared. “You seem to fit,” he said, pushing the broken words out painfully. “I never did.”

  “I’ll make this quick,” Aaron said, locking eyes with Bray. “The way it should have been years ago.” He pulled his sword out and drove it deep into Hideon Bray’s neck.

  Bray fell to the glass pane, blood pouring from his neck. It pulsed down the long clear arc, casting a deep reddish shadow on the ground far below. The bronze marks on the glass seemed to soak in the bright red.

  Aaron slipped to a knee, panting. His injured calf bled freely. He looked down. Much of the chaos of the Shields was settling. More and more dragons were leaving. It looked like EU forces were taking control, but it was hard to tell. Aaron looked up for the dragon patrol that had been approaching. It was gone. Bray’s rescue had turned aside at some point as they fought.

  Aaron pondered dragging Bray over to the edge, throwing him off. Aaron had never had a chance to ask Bray where he dreamed of being dropped. Back in the far east Vylass lands, where he first rose to power? Here at the Shields where he grew to become the most powerful man in the world? Someplace else? Some dark corner of the mountains to the north where he found his first dragon? The place where he escaped the Corvale, handed his servant over to the Chalk? Aaron didn’t know or care. He left the body where it was and began limping towards the cliff edge.

  Chapter 38. The Torchless Path

  Cal tracked Pallor DaNeel through the dark tunnels under the Shields. The beggar was hurt, trailing blood. Their initial skirmish had been brief and ugly. Cal had managed to hold off the beggar’s knife long enough to get a hand on the arrow Clay Duren had put in him. Then Cal twisted. The beggar fell back, enough of a reminder that he was badly hurt. Then he’d fled. Cal followed, determined to put an end to a story that had gone on far too long.

  DaNeel was taking the torches from the tunnel walls as he went, leaving Cal a path to follow. Cal ignored each intersection which blazed with light and pressed forward into the darkness. He was being led. He didn’t care. After a time, walking through the dark tunnels, regretting each step forward more than the last, the beggar’s voice began to drift back to Cal. He was mumbling indistinctly.

  “More words from a dead man,” Cal said quietly. Then more loudly, “DaNeel, why do you keep trying to kill me? Why do you hunt me? It isn’t what your boss wants.”

  The muttering stopped. A raspy voice came back from the dark, loud, as if he were just beyond the sputtering light of Cal’s sole torch. “You seek my place. You seek to be Bray’s second. You don’t know what I’ve paid for that role.”

  Cal held his sword, stolen off a dead blue, in front of him in case the beggar attacked. “I know what you paid for it. I know you paid more than it is worth.” Cal could almost make out a silhouette in the tunnel ahead of him, but it vanished when he stepped forward. “He made you pay his debt, Neil. Neil Rast, servant to the Vylass warlord Hideon Bray once was. Three years in the hands of the Chalk. He made you pay his debt. He’s a coward.”

  “He found me!” Again the voice was far too close for Cal’s comfort. Almost on top of him. “He came back.”

  “Did that make up for the years? Did that stop the nightmares? How do you sleep, Neil?”

  “That name is dead. He gave us new names, gave me a place of honor at his side. A place you cannot have!”

  The beggar attacked from a side tunnel, rushing Cal. Cal tried to thrust into his torso but missed. He’d misjudged. The beggar wasn’t going for Cal. He was going for Cal’s torch. DaNeel nearly got it, only a desperate swing from Cal held him back. Cal held the torch high, defending it. The beggar retreated back out of the light. DaNeel wanted the light. If Cal lost it, that would be the end. Cal would die down here in the tunnels the Prisoner called home.

  Who knew what long dark hours the Prisoner had passed here? Who knew how well he could see in the dark after years in a Chalk prison? Cal shifted uneasily, trying to look all directions at once.


  It was silent in the tunnels. There were no sounds of the battle between EU and NEST this far below the surface. The beggar made no noise. Cal could just hear his own ragged breathing. His torch was the only light. He pressed forward.

  “Three years, Rast. Then he lets you out and puts you back to work and you forgive him just like that? Why didn’t you walk away?”

  “Three years?” the voice floated back in a mocking tone. “Why is that number familiar? Abandoned by my master for three years. Which one of us are you discussing, Cal Mast?”

  “It’s not the same,” Cal replied, but DaNeel had him on edge. The beggar was shrewd, no less dangerous because of his damaged state, maybe more so. “Aaron’s my friend, not my master. He had to take care of his business. It’s not his fault I didn’t take care of mine. He didn’t leave me with the Chalk.”

  “Friend? Master? The difference is small, Steward’s son. Here we are, far below their feet. One of us will die. One will live to continue to serve their bidding.”

  “How long do you think Bray will keep you around? He might need you now, but he’s ashamed of you. You remind him that he’s a coward, a liar. You won’t last this war. I’m surprised you made it this far.”

  Nothing from the beggar. The sharp squeal of rusty hinges ahead. As Cal crept forward, he saw the tunnel ahead ended in a small wooden door, thrown open. Cal stepped inside carefully. His torch threw light into a dark chamber. One doorway off to the side. A large pit in the center of the floor. The beggar would be in one of those two places if he hadn’t gotten behind Cal.

  The chamber was filthy, littered with small bones. Atop the smeared mud on the floor Cal could see fresh droplets of blood leading towards the pit at the center. The air was foul. These were Pallor DaNeel, Neil Rast, the beggar’s chambers. Filthy and dark. Hidden from the world. The opposite of the open beauty above them, where Bray resided under the clear skies. This was the price of Bray’s ambition. He’d split himself in half. By making his servant pay the price for his rise, he’d transferred all of his darkness to the other. Bray lived openly, surrounded by beauty, riches, and strength. Neil Rast lived in a dark hole, still paying for the rewards he would never be able to enjoy. His time as a captive of the Chalk had left him broken and buried. He was the real Prisoner.