Zero

by Claire Stevens

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  We emerged in the panelled room Oriel had shown me. Neve and the others were long gone and the room was silent save for the faint sound of the sea crashing against the cliffs outside.

  The rippling mercury of the portal faded and popped, sealing the jail dimension back up. Still breathing heavily, I turned to Oriel. ‘What now?’

  ‘We have to find Baeroth’s accomplice,’ he said.

  ‘The Window?’

  He nodded. ‘It’s the only way they could have been communicating. Come on, if we run we might catch them.’ He grabbed my hand and took off at a run along a stone corridor lit with gas lamps, propelling me along with him. I was an okay runner, but Oriel was like a gazelle; all sleek movements and effortless speed. My legs windmilled, like I might take off at any moment.

  My lungs were burning by the time we peeled down a set of stairs and into a large courtyard. It was nearly empty and the only people around didn’t seem too concerned by the son of the king and a girl in a grubby shirt and breeches with a bruised and bloody face running as though their lives depended on it.

  We flew through the courtyard and out through an alleyway, past a pair of astonished guards. The alley opened out into a wide street lined with cramped terraces of shops and cottages. We wove between street traders and pedestrians until Oriel pulled me to a stop outside a large, red brick building. ‘Here. This is the Protectorate headquarters.’

  The door faced right out onto the street and I went to shove it open, but Oriel stopped me. ‘Wait. If we just walk in there, everyone’s going to start asking who you are and what we’re doing. Is there any chance you could turn us invisible?’

  I grabbed his hand, lacing my fingers through his, and flipped the switch in my mind that told other people to look straight through me. ‘Yup.’

  I shoved the doors open and they clattered against the wall of a large common room. I felt Oriel cringe. ‘We’re invisible, but the doors aren’t,’ he breathed. ‘Stealth would have been good here.’

  ‘Then you should have told me to be stealthy!’ I hissed.

  A few people lounged around on battered sofas at the far side of the room, reading or chatting, booted feet up on tables, and all of them wearing the dark emerald uniform of the Protectorate. I ran quietly across the room towards a set of double doors, hardly daring to land my feet on the floor. I thought we’d got away with it until a fierce-looking blonde girl looked up frowning from the sword she was cleaning and peered at the still-swinging doors. ‘Is there an invisible Psion in here?’ she called out bossily to the room at large.

  Her companions looked up at her blankly as she scanned the room. ‘Hey! HEY!’ I carried on running, and the blonde girl called after me. ‘You know, Psion, it’s considered good manners to be visible at all times in the common room. There was a meeting about this just a few days ago, if you remember....’

  We ignored her and Oriel guided me through the doors to the end of a cramped hallway. I unslung my crossbow and locked the first dart into place.

  The room was little more than a broom cupboard. The windowless walls were lined with haphazardly-piled crates labelled in the Gilethean script with sheaves of paper and bits of broken weapon sticking out the sides. Seemingly against all known laws of physics, a dusty-looking red sofa had been wedged in the centre of the room, lit up by the iridescent glow emanating from a large framed mirror on the wall. Oriel didn’t need to tell me that this was the Window; I could feel the power licking out from it.

  The Window created shadows that flickered and danced in the room and by its eerie light I could make out the scarlet dreadlocks of the girl standing before it, swiping from scene to scene with a practised hand. She whirled round at the clatter of the door.

  ‘You! What are you-’ I started, just as Oriel said, ‘Who the hell are you?’

  The girl stood enjoying our confusion, her expression a snakelike smile. My eyes flicked to the Window. It showed a glimmering view of Thornsvale’s main hall, but Baeroth was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘Sit down, and keep your hands where I can see them,’ I more asked than ordered, levelling my crossbow at her.

  The girl’s smile broadened and she laughed. ‘Oh, okay. You’re going to shoot me with that thing, are you?’ Her voice was soft and cultured and kind of at odds with her leather skirt, fishnets and massive boots.

  ‘Damn right, I am,’ I said as casually as I could, like I did this sort of thing every day. The effect was somewhat diminished by my shaking hand.

  She noticed and started slowly backing behind the dusty sofa, edging closer to the open door, pulling my attention with her away from the Window.

  ‘Can I just ask?’ Oriel piped up. ‘Who,’ he pointed a finger at her, ‘is she?’

  ‘You tell me,’ I said, wanting to turn and glare at Oriel for being so bloody obtuse, but equally not wanting to take my eyes off the girl. ‘She’s your friend.’

  ‘Um. No, she’s not.’

  ‘Um, yes, she is. Everywhere we’ve been, she’s popped up and you’re always talking to her. The pub in Saltmarsh.’

  I lowered my arm and turned to Oriel in confusion. He grabbed my hand and trained the crossbow on the spot halfway between the girl’s eyes. She scowled and stopped edging towards the door. ‘Whoever she is, let’s not let her get away.’

  The girl’s mouth curved up in the knowing smirk people give you when you’ve only just cottoned onto something that should be glaringly obvious. ‘Funny thing,’ she said quietly, ‘from a distance and at the right angle you can be talking to thin air and it’ll look like you’re deep in conversation.’

  ‘This is bollocks,’ Oriel growled, and with a swish of steel he drew Tempest. He twirled her around theatrically before levelling her tip at the girl’s throat. ‘Start talking. Who are you?’ The girl tried to inch backwards until she edged into one of the storage shelves, but said nothing. ‘Fine, then,’ Oriel said. ‘We’ll keep it simple.’ His eyes flicked over her clothes. ‘You’re from the Sanctuary?’ The girl nodded. ‘Thought so. You kidnapped my brother?’ She clenched her teeth and nodded shallowly, keeping her eyes on Tempest.

  Oriel shrugged at me. ‘That’s all I need to know.’

  ‘Wait,’ I told him. ‘You’re from the Sanctuary? What’s your name?’

  ‘Molly Taylor,’ she ground out. ‘From Plymouth.’

  I screwed up my face in amazement. ‘I don’t get it.’ I gestured vaguely at the Window with my free hand. ‘How did you even know this thing was here?’

  Molly squirmed, trying to get away from Tempest’s edge. ‘Found it when I was trying to get a job. Here. With the Protectorate.’ She stared petulantly at Oriel. ‘They wouldn’t hire me.’

  He stared at her in disbelief and disgust. ‘Are you fucking kidding me? That’s why you kidnapped my brother? Because we wouldn’t give you a job?’ The girl glowered at him and folded her arms. ‘Keep your hands where we can see them.’ She flung her hands to her sides again.

  Oriel sheathed Tempest again and started sorting through some of the boxes closest to him, growling in annoyance. ‘How is it that this storage room doesn’t contain any rope? Or chains?’ He chucked some metal cogs back into a box. ‘Or anything of any use whatsoever?’

  ‘We could cut off her dreads and tie her up with those?’ I suggested, only half joking. Okay, totally not joking at all.

  He laughed at Molly’s look of alarm. ‘No, it’s okay. Illvelios has some restraints. In fact, he needs to come down here and see this for himself.’ He pushed himself to his feet and walked over to me. ‘I’ll be gone two minutes at the most. Just make sure she doesn’t get away.’

  ‘Hello? You’re the one with the speed and muscles. You stay here with her and I’ll go and find some rope.’

  ‘Okay, Ro... You don’t know what Illvelios looks like or where anything in the Citadel is.’

  ‘Then let’s take her with us!’

  He looked at me in exasperation. ‘We can�
�t just wander round the Citadel with an unrestrained prisoner. It’s mobbed out there; if she gave us the slip, we’d never see her again. Look, just keep the crossbow on her. Don’t get too close.’ He caught my elbows and squeezed them briefly. He looked intently at me, his green eyes shining. ‘You’ll be fine. You just took down Baeroth; you can totally do this. Don’t be frightened to shoot her if she tries to escape.’ The girl stuck her middle finger up at him as he backed slowly out the door and broke into a run.

  I kept my crossbow levelled at her. Oriel’s confidence had seeped through, leaving me almost able to believe I could shoot her if I needed to. Almost. I perched on the back of the sofa, resting my crossbow arm on my knee. ‘Why’d you do it?’ I asked, not really expecting her to answer.

  She scowled at me for a moment. ‘Baeroth told me to.’

  She thought I was talking about her kidnapping Owen. I shook my head. ‘I mean, why’d you sign up with Baeroth? Why are you with him? He’s a nutter.’

  ‘Why’d you think?’ I looked blankly and she rolled her eyes. ‘Power,’ she explained. ‘Okay, picture this: two years ago, I was being chased through Plymouth High Street by the police, and suddenly bam! I’m in the Jeopardy. Well, I’m not in a hurry to get back to Plymouth, so I lie low, keep my head down, and everywhere I go everyone’s always on about the Protectorate, like they’re the second coming, or something. Oh, the Protectorate, they save lives, they’re so powerful, so skilled. So Blessed. But I couldn’t help wondering about the person they’re all afraid of. This king that no one had been able to kill. Now if you ask me, having a whole army frightened of you? That’s power.’ I wondered seriously about her mental health. Then she piped up, ‘This isn’t over, you know? There’s a war coming and here’s some free advice from one Zero to another: you’d want to seriously consider whose side you’re on.’

  ‘Yeah, good luck to Baeroth, fighting a war from inside a dimensional prison. After all, it’s been so effective for the last nine years.’

  She shook her head. ‘I know your boy there has got his flash looks and killer abs, but the Protectorate have got no hope against Baeroth. They think he’s been in prison for the last nine years just sitting on his arse. Has he hell.’ The sneer had gone; now she just looked sombre. ‘If they knew what was coming...’

  ‘They must be shitting themselves,’ I deadpanned. ‘Bearing in mind he can’t even leave his own castle.’

  She laughed quietly. ‘Maybe he doesn’t need to.’

  Rubbish. She was talking rubbish to try and put the fear into me. I tried a different tack. ‘It’s not too late, you know,’ I said quietly. ‘You could change sides. If you offered up all the information you have about Baeroth’s plans, they might let you off.’

  Hope and fear mingled in her eyes. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Why not?’

  She hung her head, her dreads hanging over her shoulder, and mumbled something. My heart started beating faster. This sounded important. I lowered my crossbow and stepped towards her. ‘I can’t hear what you’re-’

  Without even looking up she span round, her foot arcing high in the air to kick the crossbow out of my hand. It skittered across the room and she threw a fist out towards my face; there was no real power behind it, and I managed to grab her wrists just as she made contact.

  For a second we struggled before she shoved me hard. I careened backwards, landing against a set of wooden shelves. Overfilled boxes started to spill down and I dodged to one side, but Molly caught me by the shoulders, bringing her knee crashing upwards into my diaphragm. The impact ripped through me like a knife, leaving me doubled over and gasping for air, unable to move or draw a breath.

  ‘Hey, Roanne,’ she said breathlessly, taking a step backwards and starting to laugh, ‘you never asked me what the rozzers were chasing me for back in the Sanctuary.’ She slid her fingers into one of the pockets of her tunic and pulled out a delicate silver chain and swung it on her finger so that I could see the filigreed amulet weighing it down. ‘Pickpocketing.’ Molly nodded fake-seriously. ‘Those Artificers may be crazy, goggle-wearing geniuses, but they’re not very good at holding onto their stuff. This little beauty has been real handy. It’s an invisibility amulet. There was no way I’d’ve been able to get that jewellery into your bag without it.’

  Realisation dawned. ‘That was you,’ I gasped, my stomach still spasming.

  She shrugged. ‘Baeroth needed someone from the Sanctuary. Someone who could come and go through that Saltmarsh portal whenever they wanted. Someone who could put everything in place. See, I couldn’t just kidnap you. With your abilities, it wouldn’t have worked at all. You had to want to come here. Oh come on, Roanne. Don’t look so pissed off. I made you a jewel thief. That’s, like, the awesomest type of criminal.’

  With a giant effort, I managed to straighten up and took a lunging step towards her. She jumped nimbly out of my way.

  All this time Molly had been one step ahead of us, leading us exactly where Baeroth wanted. I cursed as I thought of all the trouble she had wreaked, all with the help of one necklace.

  As if reading my thoughts, she darted around the red sofa, twirling the amulet. ‘The trouble I had trying to get this damn thing off that Artificer. God, she practically slept with that thing on. You’re much easier to steal from.’

  She span something in her hand that glittered as it caught the light from the Window: my stiletto. My hand went instinctively to the holster in my boot, but of course it was empty.

  With snakelike reflexes, she threw a piece of metal from the fallen boxes at me. ‘Catch!’ she laughed. Caught off guard, my random, unpredictable Blessings came into play and the metal whipped off to one side, crashing into the wall. Molly whistled. ‘Nice! I can see why he likes you so much.’

  We stood at an impasse. I was standing between Molly and the door, but my crossbow was way over to the left and my stiletto was in her rotten, thieving hand. I leapt for Molly even before I’d thought my decision through. I aimed for the knife, but she saw me coming and turned, leaving me to crash into her shoulder. She wrenched backwards with her arm, catching me in the chest before shoving me back against the wall.

  My only thought as Molly swung her arm back was how unfair it was that she was going to kill me with my own knife. Then she drove her fist forward and my stiletto, the knife Oriel had given me to defend myself in cases of dire emergency, buried itself to the hilt in my stomach.

  For a few seconds there was just the sensation of intense pressure, before my internal organs caught on to what was happening and started to scream in protest. The pain overwhelmed me, blocking out every coherent thought and my knees buckled beneath me.

  Molly looked at me for a long moment and it almost seemed like there was sorrow in her eyes. The last thing I saw of her was a shimmer of light as she slipped the long chain of the amulet over her head and disappeared.