by David Hair
‘Gurvon said I could screw you before I kill you if I want, but I really can’t see the point.’ He stabbed a finger at her and flames gushed down the corridor. They were deflected by her shields, but the heat washed through, crisping her feet and singeing her hair and nightclothes. ‘You’re not my type. I’d rather just watch you burn.’ He drew himself erect, gathering a full-powered blast, as she flung up renewed shielding, downward-sloped and anchored to the walls. She could see her feet blistering; they felt like a thousand needles had been rammed into them. She crawled backwards, away from the advancing mage, until her head and shoulders hit the wall: she’d reached the T-junction of the corridor behind her. She had one instant to take in the immensity of the fires playing about Samir’s hand, then she dived sideways. A wave of white-hot energy washed over the place where she had stood, but the flames swirled against her shields and were channelled downwards, turning the wooden floor to ash. For a second, she glimpsed Samir’s bemused face as his own fires backwashed, disintegrating the floor at his feet, then he was gone, tumbling through the space where the floor had been. She leapt up, wincing with pain as the seared soles of her feet touched the ground, and tore towards the stairs she had just descended, screaming warnings to whoever could hear.
The castle came to panicked life, Rimoni voices calling questions, answered by a roar from below and screaming. With a crash the floor in front of her burst upwards, a geyser of fire blasting through the timbers to incinerate the staircase she was making for. Samir was firing blind through the wooden floor from below.
Her mind raced as he bellowed, ‘You can’t escape me, Elena!’
She had to get between him and the children: that was her only function. She threw herself off the ground like a diver, and flew the length of the burning corridor on Air-gnosis as another blast shattered the timbers of the floor where she had been standing a second before. Then she heard Paolo Castellini’s voice below, calling the guards to him.
‘Paolo! The children!’ she called as she powered down the smoke-filled corridor, shot like a hawk into the foyer, three flights up, and poised in mid-air to see Samir, below her, facing Paolo Castellini and a guardsman standing beside the main doors. She fired a bolt of blue gnosis-light at Samir and watched it crackle against his shields even as she began her next working. He roared, and his fires flew amiss, blasting apart a stag’s head mounted above the door instead of incinerating Paolo as he’d intended. She rolled in the air and conjured images of herself heading in three different directions, each firing a bolt of gnosis-energy.
Samir chose wrong; smoke and flame roared behind her and extinguished one of the images. The Fire-mage laughed mockingly as she soared up to the top level.
Lorenzo di Kestria emerged from a corridor, clad only in breeches, with a buckler over his left arm and holding his broadsword in his right hand. He gaped at Elena, hovering before him in mid-air, but she ignored him as she made a slicing gesture – and severed the ropes holding the chandelier beside her. The glass-and-metal monstrosity plummeted, and she saw Samir’s upturned eyes widen as the whole weight smashed against his shields and flew apart. But it left him untouched, shattering around him in a cascade of flying glass and shards of iron. Rukka mio! How can he be that strong?
‘Lori, the children!’ she cried, darting towards the nursery even as Cera emerged, clad only in a white shift, with a pale-faced Timori clinging to her. They took in the burning ceiling and the great plume of smoke pouring upwards.
Cera looked at her desperately. ‘Where’s Mamma?’ Her face was stricken. Elena flashed towards her as Samir flung Paolo aside like a toy and turned his face upwards again.
Timori, his eyes uncomprehending, asked ‘What’s happening?’ and stepped forward to peer through the wooden railings at the scene below, where the echoes of the fallen chandelier were still reverberating.
‘Timi!’ they all yelled, but Lorenzo was fastest, slamming into the bewildered boy, his buckler interposed an instant before fire engulfed them. The knight howled in agony as the flames washed over him, catching everywhere the balustrade and buckler were not covering: his shoulder, his left leg, the left side of his face.
But Timori had escaped the blast, and now Cera grabbed the boy and dragged him away from the convulsing knight. Elena threw herself towards them, vaulting the burning railing. Crossbows sang below, then two guards roared in agony amidst Samir’s laughter.
Cera clutched Timori to her, pouring all her hope and terror into one word: ‘Ella!’
Elena shoved Cera towards the nursery. ‘Inside – now!’
She checked over the railing and quailed: Samir was a devil unleashed. He was walking horizontally up the stone wall, his feet sinking effortlessly into the brickwork. His face looked carved from lava, glowing ember-red; his beard was a tongue of flame. She pulled Lorenzo to his feet. ‘Come on, Lori, we need you,’ she cried as he gasped for breath.
The main nursery bedroom, Cera’s room, was large, with a bed against the far wall and views through windows north and south. She blasted away the glass from both sets of windows, then wrenched a mirror from the wall and set it on a chair. ‘Climb through the window, onto the ledge,’ she ordered, then shouted, ‘Go!’ as Cera, still holding Timori, froze. ‘Go,’ she screamed again, and thrust the girl towards the windows. ‘Lorenzo, get them out of here—’
She spun and slapped her hands together and gnosis-strands gripped the doors, slammed them shut and locked them.
‘What the rukking Hel is happening, Ella?’ the knight shouted at her.
‘It’s Samir – he’s after the children!’ I never thought … damn you, Gurvon— She pulled another mirror from the wall, setting it opposite the other one, facing the door. Smoke rolled under the cracks. She looked at herself in both mirrors at once, moved them with subtle finger-movements, aligning them, marked her position, then darted to one side as the door rattled.
Lorenzo pushed the children out onto the window-ledge, then turned, his face resolute: the look of a man who expected the next minute to be his last. She had no time to do anything but scream, ‘Hide, Lori!’
There was no calling out this time, no gloating or threats, just a coal-like fist punching a hole in the door just as Elena placed herself on one side. She could only see the door through one of the mirrors, but in the reflection she saw it burst open, then smoke billowed into the room, obscuring everything. She stepped into the shadows and began her next working.
Samir grimaced. Gurvon had warned him that the bitch was quick, and so she was, but she was only a half-blood, and a dried-up prune to boot. I have absolute Fire-Affinity, he thought gleefully.
Few on Urte could survive even a single taste of his power, and he’d been preparing all night, building up his powers with meditation. Just before dawn, be ready, Gurvon had said. We’re going to kill them all.
That was an unexpected bonus! So not just running out on them, Gurvon?
No, we’re killing them all: Sordell and I will do the king; you kill the queen and the children.
What about Elena?
She can’t be trusted on this, Samir. She’s gone native. Do whatever you need to.
Everyone knew Gurvon was screwing Vedya these days; Elena was nothing to him now. It’ll be my pleasure, Gurvon – and he’d meant it. He’d been hovering close to that fat dumpling Fadah when the order came. That first burst, the one that crisped the queen to dust, had been orgasmic. Then Elena had shown up, and Gurvon had been right: she was damned quick, and cunning – the way she’d angled her shields so that he’d destroyed the floor at his own feet? That’d been clever; he’d remember that trick.
He smashed open the nursery door. Time to finish this. He let the first rush of smoke pour into the nursery and held his shields ready, but nothing came at him. She was quick, yes, but she had no firepower, and she was running out of places to hide. Somewhere in the dark he heard Lorenzo di Kestria gasping in pain and he grinned widely. That was the great thing about fire – it didn�
�t just damage, it also left mind-scrambling pain, the sort that made master torturers wet with envy. The sort of pain he was going to visit on that prunefaced Anborn bitch before he started on the children …
The smoke rose to the high beams of the nursery, revealing Elena standing before him, between two mirrors, a dagger held in her right hand. She jabbed her left at him and an impotent blue gnosis-bolt dissipated unfelt against his shields. She looked ragged; she must be at the end of her tether.
He smiled, raised his hand and gave her everything he had, crying out in utter bliss as he made the air throb with gushing fire so hot the flames were translucent, warping his vision as they washed over her, through her, and billowed unobstructed to blast the far wall.
She reappeared, right where she had been, twirling two thin blades. Untouched. How? He sensed someone behind him, but too late: two numbing blows struck beneath his armpits and jolted through him. There was a metallic grinding noise as the blades rasped against each other, somewhere deep in his chest. He stared, bewildered, as the Elena standing before him winked out.
Numbness flooded through him, and when he reached for his power there was just a void. He tried to speak, but his legs gave way and he felt his own heart stop.
‘I’m not left-handed. You should have noticed that,’ she whispered in his ear.
Rukka! Mirrors … Illusion …
The floor pitched up to meet him.
Elena slumped to the floor beside the dead mage. After a moment she pulled herself together and extracted her blades, trembling in relief. He had fallen for her mirror-projected illusion. The analytical part of her brain smirked: she’d targeted his weak spot and scored a direct hit. But damn, it had been close … and Fadah was dead.
‘Cut off his head,’ she whispered to Lorenzo. He looked back at her blank horror. ‘I mean it. There are spells that could revive him, even now! We have to make sure he’s dead.’ She sucked in a rasping, smoke-filled breath and crawled towards the windows. ‘Cera? Timi?’
The Nesti children poked their heads above the broken windows. Behind her she heard Lorenzo heft his sword and swing. The thump echoed around the room, making Cera cry out. Then she and Timi were clambering over the broken teeth of the shattered window and throwing themselves into Elena’s arms. She crushed them to her, and Lorenzo crawled to join them, his face puffy and scalded. Samir Taguine’s head lay in a spreading pool of blood, an expression of stunned surprise still on his face.
In seconds violet-clad guardsmen were storming into the room, Paolo Castellini at their head, his craggy face grim and furious. They gently prised the children away, checking they were whole, but Cera wouldn’t let Elena go, and Timi clung to Lori, soundlessly wailing.
Elena let the soldiers draw them to their feet, and then she slowly let them lead her away from the destruction, and the headless corpse of the man who had wrought it.
‘Is Mother—? And Tante Homeirah?’ Cera was in a bed in a room beside the chapel. There were four guards at the door, and physicians and their assistants everywhere. She and Elena were both still in their torn and burnt nightwear. Elena’s feet were a mess, though the pain was only now registering.
‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured, ‘I’m so sorry.’
Cera stared out across the room, oblivious to the servants binding her cuts, washing her limbs, numb to everything but the pain inside. Then she put her hand to her mouth as a fresh thought occurred to her. ‘Father!’
Elena felt hollow inside. ‘I don’t know – I’ve tried to find out, but I can’t reach him. I’m so, so sorry.’ This is my fault, she thought. I should have killed Samir in his sleep. I should have known that Gurvon would never just pull out, not when there was the chance to make even more money by leaving a pile of corpses behind him. Olfuss, Solinde – who else? The whole Nesti clan? There aren’t enough men in Brochena Palace to stop Gurvon Gyle and Rutt Sordell – and who knows if the rest of the gang are there too? I’m an idiot! And now this poor, sweet girl is going to have every blade in the kingdom turned on her. I’ve failed them all …
The day passed in a hazy mist, faces coming and going to a constant wailing outside the walls. Elena woke from uneasy, nightmares to find she’d fallen asleep on the chair beside Cera’s bed, her head on the blankets. A hand was stroking her shoulder.
‘Ella,’ whispered Cera.
She sat up and bowed her head. ‘Cera – I’ve failed you all.’
‘Never! You saved us, Ella. We’d all be dead without you.’ She put a finger to Elena’s lips. ‘Shhh: you saved us all – me and Timi, Lori, everyone. You are Nesti. You’re one of us.’ She reached out and pulled Elena to her, stroking her hair as if she were the child and Cera the elder sister. ‘I will give you a medal, and a title, and land. And a new stallion, from our stables. You’ll have the freedom of Forensa.’ Her face grave and serious, she said, ‘I’ve been thinking. I need to be seen. The people need to know that I am alive. There will be all sorts of rumours until they see me. They need to know there are still Nesti alive here.’ She patted Elena’s cheek, looking just like her mother. ‘You should sleep, Ella. You look terrible.’
Elena looked wonderingly at her young charge. It was as if an adult had overnight supplanted the child. ‘How can I sleep when my princessa is working?’ she whispered.
‘If Father is dead by violence, then no election is required: Timi is his heir, and that makes me regent,’ Cera said in a low, astoundingly composed voice. ‘I need to take charge.’
‘Are you ready for that?’ Elena asked her gently. ‘The men will try and sideline you – they may not mean to, but they will see you as – well, you know.’
‘Yes: “just a girl”.’ Cera straightened, setting her jaw. ‘If I am regent by law, then I intend to be regent in fact. The shihad is coming, and Javon needs a leader, not squabbling factions. I will lead, until Timi is old enough.’
Look at you, child – no, not a child any more. Elena swallowed. I am proud of you. And I am utterly terrified for you.
They got up and helped each other dress. Elena belted her sword-belt around her loose-fitting smock. Cera wore regal purple and gold, and her princess-crown, normally only worn for important dinners, was placed on her head. Then Elena followed her out of the castle, through the charred ruins of the reception hall, still littered with blackened timbers and the ruin of the chandelier.
Outside, on the main steps, the sun beat down and the heat rolled in waves off the confined space. The smell of human sweat assailed them as they took in the hundreds crammed into that small area. A ragged cheer broke from the lips of the people, a mix of Jhafi and Rimoni, and Harshal ali-Assam, busy marshalling some workmen, came over. The mourning of the womenfolk gave way to cheers as the crowd realised who had emerged and they surged forward.
Elena hovered beside her charge, nervous of such a crowd, but there was nothing but sorrow and sympathy in the faces of those who pressed close. One girl reverently kissed the hem of Cera’s skirts. Elena scanned the walls in case Gurvon had some back-up assassin lurking, but she sensed no one. Would he have even considered that Samir could fail?
Cera raised a hand for silence and everyone pulled back and kneeled. When she spoke, the princess’ voice was thin but firm. ‘People of Forensa, you know me,’ she started. ‘I am your princess: I am Cera Nesti, and I have terrible tidings for you. My mother, Fadah Lukidh-Nesti, your queen, the Queen of all Javon, is dead, and so too is her sister, my aunt, Homeirah Lukidh-Ashil. These are bitter losses. But my brother Timori, the heir to the throne of Ja’afar-Javon, is unharmed and well. The casualties were, in the end, minimal. An assassin has struck, his apparent purpose was to slay—’ She stopped and swallowed, the first clue to the effort this display was costing her. But she rallied, and went on, ‘His purpose was to slay my family, and he would have done so but for the heroism of our valiant guards.’
There was a low cheer, particularly from the Rimoni.
‘Foremost in valour and resolution was this woman be
side me, Elena Anborn, my bodyguard – my champion. Though injured herself, she fought and slew the assassin, and protected my brother and me. She is my dear friend, and I commend her to you all.’
Elena was suddenly the focus of everyone’s attention, and she felt the blood rush to her face as she wrestled with her guilt. Her trembling legs gave way and she slipped wordlessly to her knees and dizzily touched her forehead to Cera’s feet. She hadn’t meant to, but this public obeisance, the deepest of self-humbling gestures, won a great murmur of approval, and it suddenly struck her that to these people her Noros manner, treating all as equals, was considered arrogance; they saw this accidental homage as a belated acknowledgment of her true station. When Cera raised her to her feet and kissed her cheeks, the affection and trust between them was obvious to all, and first one woman and then many approached Elena and bowed, touching their right hands to their foreheads: Praise and thanks, they murmured. Sal’Ahm. Peace be upon you.
Even as she accepted this unprecedented acknowledgment, she felt Gurvon Gyle’s first attempt to scry her. She forbade the contact. Gurvon, you murdering bastard: I will make you pay for this.
That night was full of hideous dreams, when she was eventually able to ignore the pain of her scabbed and blistered feet and calves. The next morning was Minasdai – 13 Octen, she calculated. Cautiously, she checked her wardings, unbroken but tampered with, definitely. She repaired the fraying, ‘sniffing’ with her gnosis-powers to confirm: Gurvon Gyle had been trying to force contact with her.
What else did Gurvon have planned? She had to presume that Olfuss was dead, and surely Gurvon would have followed that up with a military strike. The Gorgio of Hytel, without a doubt; they alone among the Rimoni had stuck by the Dorobon kings, so they must surely have marched back into Brochena. Gurvon would have informants here in Forensa: she knew how he worked. He built a network, everywhere he went. He had always told her to do the same, but she had grown slack here in Javon: she was a bodyguard, she had reasoned, so why would she need spies? Wrong again, idiot! Now she was blind to what was going on elsewhere. She was on her own.