by David Hair
THE BLACK HISTORIES (ANONYMOUS), 776
The Winter Garden, The Bastion, Pallas
Junesse 935
Lyra saw Takwyth fall, crashing off the wall of the garden and slamming into a tree, where his body was caught in the branches. Wailing silently, she looked up again to see Twoface dropping from the hole in the wall. Impelled by kinesis, he floated towards her.
The night air was full of shouting and the distant sounds of fighting on the walls in the south corner, but here, there was only her and the masked knight.
She turned and ran deeper into the grove, making for the pool. ‘I’m not your enemy,’ Twoface called, his voice hollow and metallic, echoing as if he were an empty casing of bronze and steel. ‘The Master wishes you to join us.’
The Master? A glance backwards showed the hulking metal figure striding towards her. The rose bushes seemed to shrink from his path, but the birds were shrilling fit to waken the dead.
‘Only my Master can secure your realm for you,’ Twoface called.
She staggered through the last veil of roses into the Oak Grove, heard the crunch of boots and spun around to see Twoface only a dozen paces behind. He stopped as she raised a hand, his wards flaring to protect himself – then lowered them when she failed to do anything.
He still thinks I have the gnosis . . . He fears . . . something. She felt a stirring, a thrill that ran through her. Wind came whipping at her skirts, stinging her bare shoulders. Aradea is awake, she thought giddily. ‘Get out,’ she shouted, ‘you don’t belong here!’
The wind hit him and Twoface staggered momentarily, but came on, raising his axe. ‘I’m not here to kill you but to save you.’
‘Save me? You’re insane!’ she retorted. She turned, cradling her belly, and lurched towards the thicket of elms and her Winter Tree.
She heard Twoface curse and felt the wind slap him as he crashed after her. At times she felt him reach for her and grip her with unseen force, only for that force to shred, but he was only a few feet behind, his gauntleted hand reaching for her – then a branch from an oak tree slammed down and struck him, hard enough to make him stagger sideways. Another came at him, but his axe swung, blue fire on its edge, and it hacked the branch in half.
She heard something like a scream, and the oak quivered and recoiled.
He slowed, more cautious, and she ran on, across the magpie lawn, through the elms to the pond where her Winter Tree grew. She didn’t stop at the edge but stumbled into the water, where she fell to her knees, briefly going under. She struggled to her feet as the armoured figure reached the edge. He stretched towards her, his hand impotently groping the air, but he wouldn’t enter the pool.
Her heart in her mouth, she turned her back on the hulking knight and focused on the Winter Tree above her. There was a berry on the lowest branch; without thinking, she plucked it, thrust it into her mouth and swallowed. It was like biting on light: a golden glow that bloomed in her belly and spread. She exhaled, gulped down the clean air of the grove, and an incredible sense of nurture filled her.
Aradea is here . . .
Eloy is here . . .
Twoface felt it too: she could see it in the way he moved, warily stalking the edge of the pool. He tried a mage-bolt, but it died on the air, so too a fire-spell. He lowered his axe and his voice. ‘Lyra, I know what you are – we can help you unlock it.’ He extended a gauntlet to her. ‘Join us, and we will be invincible.’
She ignored him. Invincibility? What was that, when she could feel a silent avalanche in the air, a hidden inferno, drawing closer and closer . . .
It’s here.
The nearest of the oaks suddenly ripped free of the earth, changing as it moved. As Twoface turned to face it, the tree became a giant twig- and moss-encrusted vaguely human form, but the aura that shone about it, encased in and encasing the wooden form, was human-like: a leafy-visaged woman with barked skin: just as Aradea, Queen of the Fey, had been depicted in the edition of the Fables Lyra had grown up with.
Twoface looked paralysed in awe. ‘A genilocus?’ he gasped. ‘I’ve never—’ Then he leaped, his axe a blur as he went at the creature.
Lyra froze . . .
. . . and the oak tree’s branches hammered in from all sides on the masked knight’s shielding and armour, smashing into him and tearing aside his defences. Then a single shaft of wood exploded up from the ground and through his back. He convulsed on the spike – and a cloud of darkness erupted from his mouth, a foulness that sprayed across the lawn. Aradea stamped him to the ground, then looked back at Lyra.
*
The Throne Hall, the Bastion, Pallas
What Ril was doing made no sense to himself.
He was dimly aware that the men of the Imperial Guard were grappling with the waves of Reekers, and that Mort Singolo was behind him, performing miracles of butchery to keep them both alive. But his world was focused on only two beings: the masked woman, Tear, and the boy-prince, Cordan, who clung fearfully to his leg. He pushed the boy behind him again, raised his sword and prepared to do what was necessary to keep the Sacrecour heir alive.
I can’t believe I’m about to die protecting this little turd.
Tear seemed to grow in size and menace as she stalked forward, a blade of purple shadows forming in her right hand. He kindled gnostic-light to ward his blade, swallowed and dropped into a crouch.
Then something like a bell chimed, and in a rush of shadows, Tear staggered, stumbled backwards and fell through the curtains behind the dais. Ril went to follow, but Cordan was still clinging to him, and it took him a few seconds to extricate himself – and by then, the space behind the stage was empty and the doors at either end were open. He guessed at one, got it wrong and took the other.
He found nothing but an empty corridor, and a Lantric mask hanging from a picture hook, as if to taunt him.
*
The Celestium, Pallas
Dominius Wurther felt Jest’s hand cup his chin to bare his throat for the sickle. Helplessly, he allowed his gaze to be drawn up to the mocking mask of his killer—
—as amber light blasted out of Saint Eloy’s cave and scythed through Jest and his people. The masked man’s wards went from scarlet to critical and he was hurled into his followers, who shrieked and collapsed. Wurther pressed his face to the ground and prayed as he’d never prayed before: in fervour and in certainty that these prayers were perhaps the only prayers he’d ever uttered that had an iota of being heard.
As the golden light faded, only one man moved: Jest.
Wurther felt the moment of hope wink out and despair reclaiming his soul: Is he indestructible?
But Jest was no longer even looking at him. Around him, his diseased minions stood motionless. There was an eerie silence before they all sagged to the ground at exactly the same moment.
‘Saint Eloy?’ Jest said, his voice finally uncertain. ‘Impossible—’ Then he threw a look over his shoulder, towards the Bastion, as if hearing something from faraway, and murmured, ‘How could she . . .?’
Then he too collapsed.
The grand prelate stared, not quite believing the evidence of his eyes. The night had fallen almost silent, then he heard a ragged, distant cheer, from the direction of the tunnel through which he’d fled. He really hoped that meant what he thought it did.
Looking back at the shrine, the golden glow was fading so fast it wasn’t hard to believe he’d imagined it. But for a moment he fancied he saw something in the amber: a face, a woman’s face – one he knew.
“How could she . . .?” Jest’s dying words . . . Wurther stored them, certain they were the key to understanding what he’d just seen.
But he had more pressing concerns. He staggered to his feet and went to the fallen Jest. He pulled off the mask – and stared, because it wasn’t Ostevan Comfateri.
‘Brother Junius?’ he breathed, faintly incredulous. ‘How can this be?’
Then Lann Wilfort and a handful of his Kirkegarde knights arrived, picki
ng their way through the tunnel. ‘Grand Prelate?’ Wilfort called. ‘Are you here?’
Wurther looked back at the shrine, but the glow was gone and only the bodies remained. Wilfort was striding towards him, his face filling with what looked like unfeigned relief as he saw Wurther. The Supreme Grandmaster of the Kirkegarde looked like he’d gone through a battering: his left eye was all but closed, and his right arm was bleeding and limp. ‘Good to see you, Lann,’ Wurther told him, waddling forward and embracing him.
I don’t think I’ve actually hugged anyone in twenty years . . .
‘You too, your Holiness,’ Wilford said fervently. ‘You too! They had us,’ he muttered in Wurther’s ear. ‘Half the spells we tried didn’t work – they could survive anything except beheading or total destruction, and they fought like berserkers. Then they all just dropped dead.’
His eyes held a question: Did you do this?
While claiming credit for a miracle wasn’t outside Wurther’s moral code, right now he wasn’t sure this was a miracle he wanted to claim. ‘I don’t know. Maybe Saint Eloy? A Seraph? Maybe the Winter Tree itself? But a miracle it was. I was about to die and Kore saved me.’
They both turned to stare at the stark, rocky mound that housed the cave and the tree above. The leaves were withering, a sign that summer was on the way. ‘What did you see?’ Wilfort whispered.
‘A golden light that blasted the life from our attackers.’
‘And the masked man, their leader?’
‘Gone.’ Wurther indicated the fallen Brother Junius. ‘It was him.’
Wilfort cocked an eyebrow. ‘Junius? Really?’
‘Exactly,’ Wurther rasped. ‘Junius was a servant, with no ambition and no thoughts beyond his duties. He’s not a traitor, much less some kind of super-magus!’ He stepped close to Wilfort, and whispered, ‘Someone came very close to destroying us today, and I have no idea why they didn’t succeed. They made slaves and monsters of our prelates – pure-blood magi every one – and they turned a horde of sick citizens into berserkers and loosed them in our midst. This was almost a disaster.’
Wilfort didn’t look like he needed to be told. ‘There has been an assault upon the Bastion also, Holiness. Reports are sketchy at this point, but apparently a horde of people – just like those who assaulted us – broke out of a quarantine zone and stormed the walls.’
‘They held?’
‘It appears so, but there’s visible damage to the Imperial apartments. There’s no word of casualties, but the queen’s banner still flies.’ Wilfort pointed back towards the destruction in the throne hall. ‘The prelates are all dead – many without a death-wound. Whatever destroyed Junius appears to have slain them as well. As for the rest of the attackers who burst in – those citizens who came from Kore-knows-where – they’re all milling about in confusion, no idea what happened or what they did. We’re locking them up.’
Wurther didn’t care much for the peasantry. ‘The prelates are all dead,’ he echoed, as his nose for opportunity twitched: I thought some of those old bastards would never die. Now I can fill their ranks with my people . . .
But there were more pressing concerns. He grasped Wilfort’s shoulder. ‘If a threat remains, as I’m sure it does, we must reach out to the Bastion – but they must not know how close we came to death today.’
He and Wilfort shared a silent, shaky look, filled with shared fears.
‘Our first step on that front is to contact someone – anyone in authority – and have them seize Ostevan Comfateri – he must be interrogated, for that was him, not Junius. I know it was him.’
*
The Winter Garden, The Bastion, Pallas
Aradea’s face was never still, never just one thing: it changed from young to womanly to old from moment to moment, but the expression remained the same: not fond or empathetic, but curious, an animal’s wonder at seeing another creature. Lyra saw hunger and fury, matched by something more human: a desire to understand. Her senses felt stretched, as if she occupied the whole grove and could sense every twig and root and blade of grass, every crawling insect, all the squirrels and the birds nesting here, all the burrowing secrets . . . and a man teetering between life and death in the branches of a tree. She felt timeless, old and young, weary and renewed. This was only a small place . . . but it belonged to her . . . and the Queen of the Fey.
For a long moment they just stared at each other, then the young-old face creased into a smile and her big, alien eyes softened. Together, they made a wish.
Then voices called, men shouting for the empress, pounding closer, fearful and furious, and Aradea was gone. The tree she’d inhabited slammed roots back into the earth, her branches retracted from the dead knight and reached again for the night sky. The owls took to the air and something rushed out of the grove. The sense of being bloated with energy receded, leaving Lyra feeling relieved, thankful and deflated.
A mass of Corani knights arrived, brandishing torches to light their way. Some of the tree branches swayed away from the flames, but she was the only one to notice. ‘My Queen!’ the first man shouted, the cry taken up with relief as her guards found her alive. Then she heard more voices, from men who’d found Solon Takwyth and were easing him gently from the branches. ‘He’s alive – get the healers!’
They wanted to herd her to safety, but she stopped them. ‘The danger’s passed,’ she told them. ‘Where’s my husband? Where’s Prince Ril?’
‘We don’t know, Lady – we’re under orders from Lord Sulpeter to stay with you.’
They were all Corani knights, and they looked . . . wholesome . . . but there was something she had to know first. ‘I’ll join you shortly,’ she told them. ‘I’m safe here.’
She waited until they had reluctantly retreated to the other end of the gardens, where Domara was tending Solon Takwyth, then she bent over the broken body of Twoface and lifted the mask.
Sir Esvald Berlond.
But he was Takwyth’s man . . . he must have taken up the offer Solon refused?
She shivered, then replaced the mask and walked away, making a small wish, that by next morning, the earthworms and the roots and vines would have consumed him, flesh and bone.
*
The Bastion, Pallas-Nord
Ostevan Comfateri came awake through the rough jostling of a gauntleted hand on his shoulders. He looked up to see a circle of grim mage-knights; Corani all, led by an even grimmer-faced Ril Endarion.
‘What . . .?’ Ostevan slurred, not feigning his disorientation.
What the Hel did that? It came from Saint Eloy’s shrine . . . Then the answer came: Pandaemancy . . . it nearly destroyed me . . . it would have, except that my soul regained my body in time . . .
The nearness of his escape took his breath away.
Thank . . . whoever . . . for the impulse that led me to switch bodies with Junius!
‘My Prince! What’s happening? Why—?’ Ostevan was in control of his faculties now, and made sure to infuse his voice with panic. ‘Junius – you must find him! He did this—’
One of the other knights bent over Ostevan, his eyes lit by gnostic-sight. ‘The Comfateri’s gnosis is under a Chain-rune. I’ll see whose.’
Ostevan held his breath: this was the biggest test. He’d cast the Chain-rune using Abraxas’ powers and his own intellect, but channelled the spell through Junius, so some residual trace of the hapless brother should remain. He waited, tensing . . . and then the knight grunted. ‘It’s Junius’, I think. Not a good reading, but it’s there. I’ve worked with the old coot at times in the healing bays – I know his trace.’
Ril Endarion stared down at him, his dark-toned face battered and bruised, his eyes suspicious. ‘We have information out of the Celestium that you’re involved in the night’s attacks. You have questions to face, Confessor. The queen is on her way.’
Ostevan closed his eyes to mask his thoughts. So Lyra survived . . . He was surprised by how much relief he felt. Then the deeper implication
s struck him: Then we all failed – Bastion and Celestium. We failed! He feigned dizziness while reaching out to Abraxas, the link undisturbed by the Chain-rune.
Naxius’ Puppeteer mask filled his inner eye and in moments he learned what had transpired in the Winter Garden that night. Somewhat chillingly, Naxius had been following everything they did – including his own movements.
Ostevan expected admonishment, perhaps even punishment, for the failure to attain their goals, but instead Naxius made an ironic gesture of blessing, as if he were the priest, and vanished from the link. Ostevan opened his eyes again as Queen Lyra Vereinen swept into the chapel, escorted by a cluster of knights.
But no Dirklan Setallius. No Solon Takwyth. And no Esvald Berlond . . . that wasn’t who I’d expected . . . Nor who Tear thought, I suspect . . .
Lyra looked utterly exhausted, her eyes bruised, black circles beneath. Her face foreshadowed how she’d look in a decade’s time. There was fear in her voice as she anxiously asked, ‘Ostevan? What happened here?’
Her voice told him her mood: She wants to believe I’m innocent.
‘Majesty,’ he babbled, ‘thank Kore you’re here – Junius did this . . . he took me by surprise, and . . . and he bit me, Majesty, on the neck. It was ghastly – I thought I would die—’
Lyra’s eyes went wide, but caution took over. ‘Dominius Wurther swears you led the attack on the Celestium tonight. He is adamant.’
‘I’ve been unconscious all night,’ Ostevan protested. ‘And under a Chain-rune. Junius did this.’
‘It was Junius’ Chain-rune,’ Endarion confirmed reluctantly.
‘After he bit me, he taunted me: how he would use me as a slave,’ Ostevan said, pitching it to pluck on Lyra’s heart-strings. ‘I truly don’t know how I survived.’
That was the weakness of his tale – he should be a slave – but Naxius had seen certain things in the queen’s suite, through the eyes of all Abraxas’ minions – including Coramore. There must be a tale he could spin – but nothing came.