by David Hair
His mother swooped towards Alaron, laid a hand on the knife in Cym’s back and pulled it. The weapon came free and she thrust it into her belt, then laid her hand on the wound, sealing it with a searing flame that made Cym cry out, almost twisting from Alaron’s grasp.
Tesla placed a clawed talon on his shoulder and drew him with her as they swept across the waves to the statue.
Gron Koll lay convulsing on the ground below the statue, inches from the water’s edge. He had been scalded by the steam where his water-shield had met Tesla’s fire – a water-shield was an effective defence against fire, unless the attacker was more skilled. In that case, it was supreme folly. Koll had been hugely overmatched; every inch of exposed skin was blistered and broken, revealing scarlet under-layers raw and weeping with seams of white fluids.
Alaron looked towards the flood-bank.
Tesla snorted dismissively. ‘The valiant Watch Captain Muhren is more or less alive. He seemed to think he could take on Darius Fyrell head-to-head and win.’
‘Is he—? What happened?’
‘He was losing. Then some of his watchmen came and got killed trying to defend him. Then I came. Fyrell wasn’t expecting me.’
‘Is he dead?’
‘Fyrell is a Necromancer, dear. They’re like head-lice – those bastards can survive almost anything. But you won’t be hearing from him for a while.’ There was a touch of satisfaction in her voice. ‘Did you and your friends really think you could keep all your little conspiracies from me, boy? Did you think I was deaf and stupid as well as blind?’ She glanced down at Gron Koll. ‘This was one of those slimes you schooled with, yes?’
Alaron looked down, nauseated by the agony of his old rival.
Tesla appeared to have no such qualms. ‘Good. Then let him suffer a little longer.’ She picked up the cylinder. ‘So this is it?’
He tried to push the sight of Koll from his mind. Cym gave a faint sigh and he lowered her to the ground. Cym, please be all right!
Tesla stroked the cylinder. ‘The Scytale of Corineus. So this was what it was all about, back in 909 … All that patriotism and speechifying that got half our menfolk killed. Stolen, lost and now found.’ Her empty sockets blazed with some emotion and her shoulders shook, but her voice was its usual raven’s croak when she spoke again. ‘What do you think you’re going to do with it, son?’
‘I don’t care any more. Ma, I have to go. Ramon—’
‘Was still breathing. I got to him about a minute after you left. I did enough.’ She brandished the Scytale. ‘You might not care what happens to this thing, but the rest of the world does. The fate of nations, Alaron: that’s what this thing is. What did old Jari have planned?’
‘A new Order, dedicated to peace.’
‘Really? How sweet.’ She suddenly sucked in a distressed breath and staggered slightly.
‘Ma!’ He grabbed at her. ‘What’s wrong? Are you hurt?’
She shook her head. ‘I’ll tell you later. Come on, we’ve got to go now. Jeris Muhren is with his men; they’ll look to him. I know a safe place nearby.’ She handed Alaron the knife she had pulled from Cym’s back. ‘I’ll look after the girl, Alaron. You deal with that little prick in the mud over there.’
He stared at her as she wafted her hand to lift Cym and began flowing away across the dappled waves. Someone called across the waters: a watchman. Tesla ignored the man.
He walked back to Gron Koll. He was lying totally still, his breathing laboured and shallow. His eyes flickered at Alaron.
What is mercy? To spare an enemy so he can come after you?
A memory of Auntie Elena, when he was much younger: If you pick up a weapon, you must be ready to kill with it – that’s what they tell us at weapons-training, Alaron. But the thing is, for a mage, our whole being is a weapon. Even healing-gnosis can be used to kill … We pick up our powers and use them every day. We are killers by nature.
It had sounded wrong then. Aren’t we shields too, he had replied, don’t we protect people too?
She had looked at him thoughtfully. Perhaps we are, boy, she’d said. The next day she’d left for Javon. That was the last time he’d seen her.
Now Alaron steeled himself and forced his eyes to take in the ruined youth, his gorge rising as he looked at the bones exposed where the skin and sinew and flesh had been boiled away. He realised that there was only one mercy he could give. He knelt and placed the blade on Koll’s chest. This is mercy.
As he pushed it into Koll’s chest, Koll wheezed, ‘Fuck … you … Mercer—’ Then his eyes went misty and lost focus. His head fell back and his features went slack, empty.
Alaron knelt over him, his emotions churning as hard as his belly, and then he straightened. Dawn kissed the mountains and shafts of light burst across the sky. He turned his face from what he’d done and took to the air, skimming across the water in his mother’s wake.
Belonius Vult stumbled down the slope, shouting with the remainder of his gnosis for some kind of response:
He stifled a groan. Fool: rest, recover – Langstrit is dead, Fyrell and Koll are either dead or not answering and exhausting yourself won’t change that. Rest for an hour or two. You will still triumph: when you want something enough, the whole universe conspires to aid you. The Scytale will be yours.
You are still governor. You are still Magister. There are no enemies here.
But no fresh energy rose inside him. He’d reached his limits, softened by nearly two decades of ease and luxury. It won’t matter. A few minutes’ rest. A few minutes of sleep.
Sleep; Alaron craved it more than anything else as he carried Cym through the waking streets, his mother clutching his shoulder, her gnosis exhausted, once more a helpless blind woman. Occasional people stared, but no one approached, not even Watchmen, daunted perhaps by Tesla’s battle-mage robes and blasted countenance.
She guided him to a side-street and down a filthy flight of stairs. A furtive man with white whiskers kissed his mother’s hand and led them to a rough wooden door. ‘And this is young Alaron?’ he murmured reverently. ‘I served your Aunt Elena in the Revolt, so I did. Pars Logan, I am. You remember me to your aunt if you see her.’ He took Tesla’s arm. ‘Come this way, milady.’
Logan led them down many stairs, deep beneath the earth, where they’d be safe from scrying. Cym was ashen-faced and breathing shallowly; Tesla was tottering on her feet by the time they reached the room, where a woman, Logan’s wife, was watching over an occupied bed. Alaron almost burst into tears when he saw that the occupant was Ramon. He carried Cym to the other bed, then sagged against it, his knees turning to jelly.
Ramon’s breath was laboured, but his burns were already half-healed from Langstrit’s earlier aid. Alaron whispered thanks, wondering where the old man was.
Cym clutched his hand when he bent over her, her eyes flickering open, wide and frightened. ‘Alaron?’
‘It’s me. You’re okay.’ Stinging tears welled from his eyes.
‘Where is it,’ she whispered, ‘the Scytale?’
‘Ma has it,’ he whispered back. ‘It’s okay, we’re safe.’
‘What about Muhren? And the general?’
‘Muhren’s alive, but not here.’ He swallowed. ‘We don’t know about the general.’ He glanced at the other bed. ‘Ramon’s here. He’s healing up.’
‘Good thing you’ve got a mother to haul our asses out of the fire, eh?’ Cym murmured, and Alaron nodded mutely. ‘Go to her. Let me sleep.’
He bent down and pressed his lips to hers and she started to turn away, as usual, then stop
ped resisting. She tasted tart and cool, and he wished he could freeze this moment for ever. ‘I love you,’ he whispered.
Her eyebrows twitched. ‘Idiot. Piss off.’ She smiled sadly, nothing but sympathy in her eyes.
He turned away to hide his face from hers, brushing away tears. I love her and she feels only pity. He felt his heart crumble inside his chest. ‘You rest,’ he whispered huskily, and stumbled away.
He found his mother in a small room at the end of the hall, in one of two armchairs beside a fireplace. Pars Logan had lit the fire and left them a goblet of red wine each. Tesla turned at the sound of his feet, cringing as she did when her gnosis was not engaged. The Scytale cylinder lay in her lap, unopened.
He kissed her forehead, fell to his knees and hugged her. ‘Thank you, Ma.’
She snorted slightly. ‘It’s what mothers do, isn’t it? Clear up their children’s messes.’
‘Where’s Da?’
‘Stuck in a ten-mile swamp on the Verelon Road with all of our worldly goods. Idiot man.’ She stroked Alaron’s head. ‘Idiot son. Lucky for you I’m not dead yet.’
He remembered her earlier faltering. ‘Are you all right, Ma?’
She gave a small sigh. ‘I’m still alive, Alaron – but not for much longer. I have a cancer, you see. It would have killed a non-mage, years ago, and most of my strength has gone into fighting it.’ She grimaced. ‘I’ve got a few weeks, maybe. That’s all.’
‘I’m sorry we dragged you into this. You should have saved your strength.’
‘Nonsense. I’ve always wanted to give that shit Fyrell a good kicking. A shame Vult wasn’t there too. I’d have given him something to think about, pure-blood or not. You don’t mess with an Anborn.’ Her voice held all the bitter combativeness he remembered. She touched his face. ‘Life is struggle, Alaron. You have to be strong and fight for what is yours.’ She brandished the Scytale. ‘Right now, that includes this.’
He nodded mutely and Tesla stroked his face with her ruined fingers, reading the shape of his nose, his mouth, his chin. ‘You know, I’ve never seen you in the flesh, only with the gnosis, and that’s not the same as real sight.’ She gripped the back of his head and pulled him to her neck, pinioned him to her. ‘I could have been a better mother, I suppose, but it’s not easy, being a burnt-out wreckage like this. In the end I gave up. It was hard on you and your father. I’m sorry for that.’
He gripped her thin body and wept. ‘I love you, Ma.’
She grunted thickly. ‘I know, boy. Go and sleep, now. I’ll still be here in the morning.’ She kissed his forehead with cold lips and he felt her mind brush roughly against his:
At the door he half-turned, but she was stroking the Scytale, lost in reverie. Logan was outside the door. He led Alaron to another spartan chamber with a mattress in the corner. He staggered forward and collapsed onto it. All of the terror and adrenalin ebbed away. It was all too much.
Pars Logan shook him awake, countless hours later, murmuring, ‘Young master, you better come. It’s your mother.’
Alaron stumbled up from the mattress. ‘What time is it? What’s happened?’
‘Almost midday, lad.’ Logan led him back to the lounge, where Tesla was still huddled in the big armchair.
Alaron waited for her to turn her head, for her sightless eyes to pin him down. But she didn’t move.
‘I came in to check on her,’ Pars whispered, ‘but she wasn’t breathing.’
Alaron swallowed a sob, tiptoeing to her side as if scared to wake her. Her hand was cold, the scarred face slack and unmoving. Her face was uncharacteristically calm. She used all that she had to save me and it killed her. He dropped to his knees and hugged her cold body to him, fighting the welling grief.
Her taloned hands were gripping the blanket tight. His eyes fell to her lap and then cast about the room. The cylinder containing the Scytale of Corineus was gone. His heart pounded.
Pars Logan handed him an envelope. ‘This was on the mantle, young master. It’s got your name on it.’
Cym’s writing. Alaron tore it open.
Dear Alaron
Do not think the worst of me. Your mother was dead when I found her. I would never have wished her ill. She told me one night when I was tending her that she ought to be dead already. My deepest sorrow for your loss.
I can never repay you and Ramon for your kindness. You risked your futures to teach me. You are my heroes.
The Scytale – yes, I have taken it. I couldn’t just hide here until Vult returned to take it from us. I had to act. I’m sorry.
I’ve never told you about my mother. I will now, so that you know that my decision is the right one. Her name is Justina, and my grandfather, the true and rightful owner of the Scytale of Corineus, is Antonin Meiros. My father and mother were lovers one summer. She never wanted a child, so Father took me away.
I know you have spent most of the last seven years in love with me. Perhaps I love you back, but not in the way you want. Maybe when this is all done, we’ll see one another again, free from danger. How we will laugh! But until then, please don’t hate me and please don’t try to find me.
Show this letter to Ramon. Tell the little sneak that I love him too, in the same way I love you: as a brother.
Be safe,
Cymbellea Meiros de Regia
He looked at Pars Logan. ‘She gone, isn’t she? The Rimoni girl.’
Pars hung his head. ‘I’m sorry lad. She must move like a ghost. Like a moonbeam.’
‘Like a moonbeam,’ Alaron echoed bleakly.
EPILOGUE
Endings are Beginnings
Destiny
The greatest lesson of the art of divination is that there is no such thing as destiny. Some futures can seem crushingly inevitable, but they are not certain until the moment they occur. I find this a source of great hope.
ANTONIN MEIROS, 904 (YEAR OF THE FIRST CRUSADE)
Hebusalim, on the continent of Antiopia
Junesse 928
1 month until the Moontide
‘I hate you,’ Ramita hissed at Kazim. ‘I will hate you for ever.’
There was some horrible power inside him now, something she could almost see. He had killed her husband and then he’d done something horrible that made him flare up with some ugly energy she could almost touch. She had almost lost control then, almost betrayed herself and her fledgling powers, until Rashid had snuffed her consciousness out like a candle. Oblivion was a blessing: only when she was completely unconscious could she escape the dreadful image of her husband as he fell. It replayed over and over whenever she shut her eyes. Antonin, husband …
His hand touched her cheek and she woke—
But it was Rashid Mubarak, sitting beside her on a bed. She stiffened in dread.
‘So, you are awake at last,’ the emir said softly. He reached out to caress her face again and she flinched from him. ‘You should rejoice. You have been freed from your unwanted marriage. Your dishonour has been made good, delivered by the hand of the young man who crossed the continent to rescue you. It is quite the epic tale.’ He sighed regretfully. ‘But I fear just now that you don’t appreciate it. The trauma is too much for you. And no doubt you have been bewitched by some Shaitanic evil, the sort of foul magic Meiros employs when he couples with young girls like you.’
‘Go to Hel,’ she whispered, despite her terror. ‘Murderer.’
He leaned over her. ‘He has poisoned your mind, Ramita. You have become his creature. But there is hope for you. We can save you.’ He stroked her hair. ‘What happens to you next depends upon whose children you carry. If you bear Kazim’s child, then he shall have you to wife. But if those are Meiros’ children you bear, then I shall have you to wife myself, as you will gain the gnosis through bearing his babies.’ He bent closer. ‘Does this please you?’
She spat in his face.
He wiped her spittle away and stood. ‘You will not do that again.’ With a sudden cr
ack he backhanded her across the face and her vision swam. ‘You will obey me, or every one of your family in Baranasi will be put to death.’
She cowered, her resistance shaken by his sudden brutality. He bent over her, his expression baffled and angry. ‘Why you, girl? Why a Lakh, and why you? How could he think children who will not play a part for decades could affect this shihad?’
Rashid spat on the floor and shook his head. ‘He told you nothing?’ he demanded, and when she shook her head he spat again. ‘Fertility – was that all it was?’ He squeezed her cheeks between fingers and thumb, hurting her. ‘Well, you’re certainly fertile – just to the wrong man. Or perhaps not. Time will tell.’ He whirled and stalked out in a swirl of rich clothing and glittering gems.
DAVID HAIR
Hebusalim, Antiopia
Junesse 928
1 month until the Moontide
Jai looked him in the eye. ‘Kazim, please come home.’
Kazim scowled and drank another mouthful. His senses were blurred from the alcohol, but it felt pleasant. This Hebusalim fennihouse was one the warriors frequented. Jamil and Haroun were with him – but Jai had found them and was begging him to leave.
Jai did not seem to realise that the Kazim Makani he knew did not exist any more.
I am a Souldrinker. I have the gnosis. I am a murderer.
He shook his head irritably. ‘No, Jai. This is my place, here with the shihad.’ He jabbed a finger at him. ‘It is you who should go home, Jai. This is not a place for you.’
‘Please, brother,’ Jai said, more insistently. ‘Please! Ramita is gone. Huriya is gone. The world is going mad. Please, come back with me to Baranasi.’
Kazim stood. ‘No, Jai, I do not belong there now. This is my place.’
Jai stood also, tears running down his cheeks. ‘Brother – please,’ he said in a broken voice, ‘all our lives we have done everything together. We are half of one soul: you have always told me this. Let us leave this accursed place and go home, please. We belong together.’