She loaded a plate for him.
‘None of it’s spicy,’ she shrugged. ‘The people here don’t have the stomachs for it.’
‘Stop jabbering and let the boy eat,’ Kalayne said, looking up from his plate. ‘Anything’s got to be better than insects and disgusting fish.’
‘You don’t know anything about Rakanese food.’
‘Is that right? Are there not hot-food stalls down by the harbour, where your fellow big-eyed folk do business?’
‘That’s not representative of all our food,’ she said, taking a drink. ‘Have you tried any?’
He nodded. ‘The chilli-infused locust was passable, as was the deep-fried gresyl. But I refuse to eat anything that looks like a slug.’
Shella glanced at Thymo, who was picking at his food.
‘What do you think?’
He shrugged.
‘I should take a look at the study,’ Shella said, ‘though you can’t sleep there tonight. You can have my bed. I’ll take the couch.’
Thymo nodded.
‘A quiet one, eh?’ Kalayne said. His face twitched, and he drummed the top of the table with his fingers. ‘The couch? Hmm.’
‘Yeah, the couch. So?’
He squinted.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘What are you hiding? You’re acting weirder than normal.’
‘The couch might be a problem.’
‘Did you break it?’
‘No, don’t be ridiculous. There may however, be someone already sleeping there.’
‘What?’
‘I may have let someone else stay here.’
She narrowed her eyes. ‘A woman?’
Kalayne cackled. ‘Unfortunately not.’ He glanced over towards the door to the study. ‘Come on out.’
The door opened a crack, and Shella tensed.
‘Hi, Shella,’ said a voice she recognised.
‘Benel?’ she cried. ‘What the fuck?’
The Holdings mage walked forwards, his eyes focussed on the food set out on the table. He sat, and began eating.
‘He’s hungry,’ Kalayne shrugged. ‘Hard enough getting food for one on the sly. Been tricky keeping him fed as well. Actually, now that wee Thymo’s here, we might do all right. We’ll have to make out he’s a big eater, mind.’
Benel looked up at the mention of the boy’s name. He glanced at Thymo, then at Shella.
‘Yours?’
‘He is now.’
He went back to eating.
Shella stared at him. ‘Somebody better tell me what the fuck is going on.’
‘Let the poor man enjoy his food,’ Kalayne said, pouring himself a brandy. ‘I’d rather hear about how your trip to Frogtown went. Did you get a crown?’
She extracted it from a deep pocket in her robes, and placed it on her head, the diamond flashing in the lamplight.
‘I did,’ she said. ‘So fuck you.’
Thymo laughed.
Kalayne stared. ‘In all my fantasies from now on, you’re wearing it, and nothing else.’
Benel raised his eyebrows, and shook his head.
‘One thing I’ll say about your man here,’ Kalayne said. ‘He refuses to divulge any details of your carnal experience together, despite me asking him several times.’
She glanced at the Holdings man. He was looking thinner than before.
Benel shrugged, pushed back his plate and sighed.
‘I’ll have one of those,’ he said, picking up the bottle of brandy. ‘It was me that got them, after all.’
‘What?’ Shella said. ‘Didn’t Kalayne get them?’
‘No,’ Benel replied. ‘All the booze and weed in this house was his price for letting me stay. I had to go into the Kellach quarter for it. Cost me a bloody fortune.’
She laughed. ‘You bastard, Kalayne.’
‘One has to take whatever opportunities present themselves. And I did know you were coming.’
Benel glanced at the boy next to him.
‘So you’re Thymo?’
He nodded.
‘Are you going to be living here?’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’m Benel,’ he said, extending his hand. ‘Nice to meet you.’
Thymo glanced over at Shella, then shook Benel’s hand.
‘We’ve had a long day,’ Shella said. ‘It’s time for his bed.’
She stood, and beckoned Thymo. ‘My room.’ She glanced over to the men sitting at the table. ‘Neither of you have been in there, right?’
Benel shook his head, while Kalayne looked away.
Shella frowned, then led Thymo to her bedroom. She lit a small lamp, and gazed around. Nothing appeared to have been touched, but she knew how careful the old Kellach mage could be. She wouldn’t be surprised if he had been raking through her things.
The boy yawned, and she gave him a kiss.
‘We’ll get your pyjamas tomorrow when we unpack our stuff,’ she said. ‘Tonight, just sleep in your underpants. There’s a chamber pot next to the bed.’
He pulled off his clothes, leaving them scattered on the floor, and jumped onto the mattress.
‘When’s my mum coming?’
Shella paused, eyeing the boy as he sat on the bed. She pulled the covers up over his legs.
‘Not tonight, but I’m sure you’ll see her soon.’
He lay down.
‘Remember,’ she said as she walked to the door, ‘I’ll be through here if you need me.’
He nodded.
‘Sweet dreams, little man.’
She went back into the sitting room, and closed the door. Kalayne and Benel were reclining in the armchairs by the fireplace, each with a drink, and a bottle on the small table.
‘Boys,’ she said, sitting next to them, ‘are you going to tell me what’s going on? Why is Benel here?’
‘Not yet,’ Kalayne said. ‘There’s something I need to ask you first.’
Shella sighed. ‘What?’
‘While you were on your holiday,’ Kalayne said, ‘I came closer to understanding the plan the church is hatching. I realised that they were waiting for something, something important that was missing. They were quite frantic about it. It was only upon your return that I think I grasped what it was.’
‘Stop speaking in fucking riddles.’
Kalayne glared at her, his eyes almost popping out of his head. ‘This is not a joke, young lady.’
‘That’s the first time anyone’s called me young in a while. Oh, and I’m a princess, not a fucking lady.’
Benel laughed. He took out a smokestick and lit it.
‘Me first,’ she said, and he passed it to her.
‘When you returned from Frogland,’ Kalayne frowned, ‘whom did you bring?’
‘Apart from Thymo, you mean?’
‘Obviously.’
‘I brought mages.’
Kalayne’s face reddened and he gripped the sides of the chair until his knuckles were white.
‘Are you having a seizure?’ she asked.
‘You… you…’
She handed him the weedstick.
He took a long hard draw, then pointed at her.
‘You stupid, miserable, wretched, stupid…’
‘You already said that.’
‘Well it’s because you’re double stupid. How could you, Shella?’
‘I was just the delivery girl,’ she said. ‘It was the Rakanese government that decided to hand them over. I told them I thought it was a mistake, but they were worried the Emperor would cut off aid.’ She bowed her head. ‘They reasoned that it was worth sacrificing a few volunteers, rather than let thousands die of starvation.’
Kalayne shot to his feet, and for a moment she thought he was going to leap at her, but instead he began to pace up and down, scowling and snarling.
Shella glanced at Benel, who was biting his nails and frowning.
‘What’s up with you?’
‘The church have everything they need.’
‘What?’
/> ‘They had mages from all the other nations,’ Benel went on. ‘They only needed Rakanese.’
‘Yeah,’ Shella said. ‘I knew that, the Lord Vicar told me.’
‘You knew?’ Kalayne spat. ‘And yet you still did it?’
‘What we did was wrong,’ she said. ‘I already admitted that. But I don’t see why the fate of four Rakanese mages is upsetting you so much.’
‘For their plan to work,’ Kalayne said, ‘they require mages from every land, all five types: vision, fire, stone, life and flow. And now they have them.’
‘So?’
‘They must be stopped.’
‘Why? What exactly is their plan?’
‘I don’t know!’ Kalayne cried, then slumped back into his chair.
He picked up his drink and gulped it down.
‘It involves using the powers of all five mages at the same time,’ he said. ‘But to what end? I have no idea. The funny thing is, I’m not sure the priests know either. I have a feeling the Creator is keeping something from them.’
‘It’s all just speculation, then,’ Shella said.
‘No,’ said Benel, ‘it’s not.’
‘And what would you know?’
‘A fair bit, actually. I escaped from the institute.’
‘What? Escaped?’
‘Yes. Remember I told you that the army sold me out to the church? I turned up for training, and was snatched by wardens and put in a cell under the institute, along with a collection of other mages. I saw every nationality, except for Rakanese. Mostly though, we were chained up and hooded.’
‘Chained up?’ Shella said. ‘Fuck. And I just handed over a group of frail old pensioners to them.’
Kalayne glared at her.
‘Go on,’ he said to Benel, ‘tell her the rest.’
‘Like I said,’ he went on, ‘I was with mages from other nations. Two Sanang men, able to heal wounds. At least twenty Rahain, though I didn’t see much of them, they were kept in a wooden pen by themselves. I saw an old Kellach woman, who could make candlelight flicker. Not very impressive to be honest, not compared to what I know decent fire mages can do. Apart from me, there was a handful of other Holdings mages, none of them from the church, just the odds and ends that slipped through the mage examinations, like me.’
‘What did the priests do to you?’
‘Nothing,’ Benel said, gazing at the fire, ‘after they’d tested me.’
‘Tested?’
‘Yes, to check I was definitely a mage. Rector Tommeus, the guy in charge, read my head, and then I was put back in the cells.’
‘Did they say what they were going to do with you?’
‘They were waiting for Rakanese flow mages to arrive. They said nothing could begin without them.’
‘And you escaped?’
‘It wasn’t easy, but they underestimated me.’
Shella took a long drink. ‘The church are looking for you, I assume?’
‘I’ve hidden his presence from them,’ said Kalayne.
‘Otherwise I would have been caught for sure,’ Benel said. He looked at Shella. ‘So, can I stay?’
Shella narrowed her eyes. Letting the Holdings mage stay was a risk, but she felt in the mood to do something to oppose the empire and its church. An image of chained-up old mages flashed through her head.
‘You’d need to be useful,’ she said, ‘else you’re just an extra mouth to feed.’
‘I’ll try,’ he said, ‘though I’m not sure what I could do. Do you have any suggestions?’
‘We should have a threesome,’ said Kalayne. ‘We could take turns wearing the crown.’
Shella and Benel frowned at him.
‘Go to bed, old man,’ she said. ‘You’re drunk.’
‘I will,’ he said, standing, ‘though I’m not drunk enough.’ He picked up the bottle, then bent over and snatched the weedstick from Benel’s lips. He grinned, then staggered off to the spare room.
Shella sat back in her armchair and watched as Benel lit a fresh stick of weed.
‘How did you really get out?’ she said.
He took a draw. ‘Had to kill two wardens,’ he said. ‘I’m not proud of it. I could have let them live, but they would have seen which way I was going. I used battle-vision, and snapped their necks with my hands. The back wall was unguarded, and I scaled it, then ran to the Rakanese embassy.’ He gazed at her. ‘I’d completely forgotten you’d left for Arakhanah.’
‘Why did you not flee the city?’ she said. ‘You must have known you’d be hunted.’
‘I just thought of you, I don’t know why,’ he said. ‘Kalayne found me, hiding in the bushes at midnight, and let me stay, once I’d told him what had happened to me.’
‘And then the bastard made you go out for booze and weed?’
Benel smiled. ‘Yes.’
Shella shook her head.
‘You take the couch,’ Benel said. ‘I’ll grab a blanket and sleep in the armchair.’
‘I’m not tired,’ she said, sipping her brandy. ‘Do you want to have a couple more drinks, maybe work out how you could make yourself useful?’
Benel passed her the weedstick, and their fingers touched.
His gaze lingered on her for a long moment.
Shella smiled. ‘I get the feeling you’ve thought of something already.’
Chapter 22
Back to Work
Rahain Capital, Rahain Republic – 30th Day, Last Third Autumn 506
Daphne wiped the blood from her knife, and placed the blade back into her boot, ignoring the dead rebel slumped in the chair before her.
Another lead, she thought. Maybe it would be enough. She walked to the back wall of the small chamber, stepping over the blood on the floor. She reached into her pack and lit a cigarette.
Nine days in the capital and she still hadn’t found Douanna or any of the Old Free leadership that Rahain intelligence were convinced were hiding out. She had killed eight in that time, all low-level rebels. The one in the chair was the highest ranking yet. He had been stubborn, and had refused to answer her questions, so she had scoured his mind like a wire brush, ripping the secrets out of him. After she had finished, her knife had been a mercy.
She picked up the pack and slung it over her shoulder, then opened the door a crack and peered out. The corridor was quiet, so she slipped out and locked the door, dropping the key into a deep flowerpot, the contents of which were dried and wilted.
She pulled a hood over her head, and strode down the passageway. She came into a busier hall, and kept going without slowing her step. The great hall had once been a municipal library, but had been turned into a doss house for the poor. It was almost winter, and the caverns of the city were cold and under-heated. The government had encouraged the poorest in society to move to warmer locations, where they could get a bed and meals, and they had obliged in great numbers.
Rows of beds stretched across the floor, and people were sitting or lying on them, talking and mending clothes. Daphne walked between them, and with the hood up, no one paid her any attention. Most of the people were old, she noticed. She wondered how long it would take them to find the body in the back room.
The rebel she had questioned had been hiding out among the poor. How many more were doing the same? She knew from what Laodoc had told her that the upper reaches of government and the civil service were riddled with Old Free sympathisers. He had explained that there weren’t enough qualified ex-slaves around to take up some of the senior positions, and he was relying on people he knew were ambiguous in their loyalties.
Worse, the rebel army had disappeared. The imperial divisions had become bogged down in the mountains, facing the enemy across lines of palisades and trenches, and then one day the imperial forces had realised that the rebels had gone. Their fortifications were deserted, and the imperial soldiers were again isolated far from the capital. Laodoc had fired the commanders of the army, which was now beginning its long march home. Rumours had spread that
the rebels had a supply of winged gaien from the south of Rahain, which meant their army could be anywhere, preparing to strike without warning.
A coup was imminent, Daphne was certain. Even without the support of the ex-slave populace, the rebels had enough soldiers and conspirators to make the attempt.
She passed a couple of Rahain priests by the door, and stepped out into a large cavern. A street led to the centre of the city, while shops and houses formed a square, where a dried-up fountain sat. She noticed her breath forming a cloud, and tightened her cloak.
An hour later, Daphne was crouching on the roof of a low warehouse, deep in the bowels of the city. There was almost no lighting in the cavern, and the shadows were deep over the rows of identical stone buildings.
She was a little early, and her mind drifted to Killop and Karalyn. Disappointment filled her. Despite trying every evening since she had arrived, she had not been able to range with her vision to contact her daughter. She had come close in her latest attempt, skimming the borders of Slateford Estate, before exhaustion had pulled her back.
More practice. That’s what she needed. She should have been training ever since she found out she could range, but had never motivated herself to make the effort. And now when she needed it, she could only practise for an hour or so each night, when she should have been trying flat out for days on end. She had also tried to reach Karalyn in her dreams, but again the distance had defeated her. She hoped they were all right without her.
She smiled when she thought of Killop, and longed to be with him again, once she had finished her work in the city. She had got used to living with him, and being apart made her realise how much she loved him. She had told him it would only be for a few days, and begrudged each extra one that passed, but she couldn’t give up, not when she was so close.
A noise drew her attention. She gazed down into the shadowed alleyways that ran between the warehouses, and saw a lamp. She pulled on a thread of battle-vision, and looked closer. It was an old man, a janitor doing the rounds.
She sighed and leaned back on the tiled roof.
They should have arrived by now.
Had she read something wrong in the rebel’s head? She went over the snatches of memory she had stolen from his mind, and re-examined the brief conversation about the meeting that was due in the cavern that night. Before midnight, they had said.
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