Dark Realm: Book 5 Circles of Light series

by E. M. Sinclair

  ‘Mistress of Death?’ she repeated faintly.

  ‘So I am known. Well, not here perhaps. In the Dark Realm.’ Her hair hung motionless and she smiled again. ‘Now you must be Snail the Embalmer. Seola described you to me once. She was quite accurate.’

  Before Snail could reply, ghosts streamed into the kitchen, surrounding Ferag in a swirling cloud. Snail could hear only the faintest susurration, but Ferag was clearly hearing much more. Finally Ferag raised a hand and the ghosts fell back, churning restlessly along the walls.

  ‘You heard one of them?’ she asked Snail.

  ‘Yes, but only faintly.’

  Ferag nodded. ‘Enough to heed a warning another time though I trust. They have given me much food for thought.’ Ferag smiled brilliantly. ‘I have asked them to protect you as they can while also continuing to scout the Citadel and the City.’ She paused. ‘Or should I say – haunt?’

  When Snail didn’t smile, Ferag scowled. ‘Oh darling, not another one with no sense of humour.’

  Snail blinked, but Ferag was gone. Snail poured herself another bowl of tea and returned to the sunny doorstep. She only allowed herself to tremble once she was safely sitting down. By the time she’d stopped shaking, Drengle had ventured cautiously back downstairs.

  ‘She’s gone then?’

  Snail rubbed her forehead. ‘Yes Drengle. Does she often – erm – drop in like that?’

  ‘No. She doesn’t. Come once before she did.’

  He sat down next to Snail. ‘Then them other people turned up.’ He turned to give her an accusing stare. ‘They said you sent them here.’

  ‘If you mean a woman called Tika, then yes, I did.’

  ‘And two men and a girl. I didn’t know them.’

  Snail gave an innocent smile. ‘The taller man was from the Dark Realm and the girl was Shea, daughter of the Imperatrix.’ She hooted with amusement at Drengle’s expression of horror.

  ‘Simert’s Balls! What were they doing in my house?’

  ‘I think they were on their way to remove Lady Kerris from the Citadel. And I understood this was Gossamer Tewk’s house, not yours.’

  Drengle’s mouth hung open, his pale blue teeth gleaming between his lips.

  ‘The Lady Shea?’ he finally managed.

  Snail nodded, but then patted Drengle’s shoulder, her compassionate nature getting the better of her.

  ‘Don’t worry Drengle. We’re all right here.’ She thought for a moment. ‘The man from the Dark Realm, I’m sure he visited me before, but I suppose I was so frightened, I didn’t recognise him.’

  ‘You were frightened?’ Drengle List was so appalled that the invincible Snail should be afraid that it took her all afternoon to calm his nerves.

  The ghost who’d led Snail from her house was once more searching the City for signs of Tomin. Of the seven who had joined him, three remained. They knew it would be far harder to locate the creature once the streets became busy and shops and businesses began their day’s work. But they redoubled their efforts after learning what Ferag believed this creature to be.

  The leading ghost rested for a while in a cemetery. He’d been a gardener in life and now found cemeteries and public parks the most soothing places where he could think without distraction. Ferag said this creature had possessed the tutor to the Imperatrix’s young daughters. Then it really wanted to be close to the Imperatrix, the centre of power in Kelshan. So the ghost reasoned. He feared it would be dissatisfied with Tomin’s comparatively unimportant position and would surely have to shift again to someone more useful. But who? A Council member? A senior army officer? A scribe within the Imperatrix’s own offices?

  The bush in which the ghost rested rustled gently with the ghost’s agitation. He came to a decision and streaked away towards the Citadel. It must be a person close to the Imperatrix who the creature would attempt to take over. So he would examine every person he could find within that grey building.

  At least it seemed that Beslow had slept a little, Veranta thought when the old man arrived in her office. He looked less tired, but considerably more worried.

  ‘Beslow.’

  The General sat down. ‘The agent watching the man Tomin was murdered my lady.’

  Somehow it wasn’t a great surprise. ‘In what manner? Was there a fight?’

  ‘His heart was torn out – we haven’t found it in the immediate vicinity, and his throat was ripped. Ripped by teeth we think, not slit with a knife. The body is completely empty of blood, but there is not a drop on his clothes or the ground around him.’

  Veranta swallowed. Worse than she’d anticipated. ‘None of that jelly stuff near him, or within his body?’

  Beslow shook his head. ‘A torn green gown in his rooms. I imagine he changed into less recognisable clothes, but we have no way of knowing what they might be. Obviously, I have alerted the City militia, and I have put extra guards on the streets. They have sketches of the man and a fairly good verbal description to work with.’

  ‘But he won’t be found,’ said Veranta, leaning her elbows on her desk.

  ‘I would very much doubt he will,’ Beslow agreed. ‘But we still have to look.’ He massaged his left hand with his right, and Veranta saw an old scar tracking from the back of his thumb, round, and under his wrist. She wondered if it was a habitual gesture or if he still felt pain in the hand.

  ‘I’ve spoken to the heads of the infirmary and to those who worked closely with Tomin. All accounts describe a modest man with a sense of humour, kind to colleagues and patients, obsessed with his anatomical studies. He had a particular interest in the physical structure of birds. Everyone agreed his work was his life.’

  ‘Where does that leave us?’

  Beslow met her eyes. ‘I am restricting access to you my lady. For the moment, I am allowing only a specific number of guards, scribes and staff to enter your presence. They are all men and women whose records are without blemish, who have served here for several years. They are familiar with each other, within their own spheres, and they would notice any change of behaviour among their fellows.’

  Veranta blinked. ‘You really think that something came from Ternik, which affected the anatomist, and could move again?’

  ‘I fear I do my lady. I would have advised you not to employ Ternik knowing, as I believe you did, that she was a mage. I have checked and the information pertaining to her and her past is ridiculously vague.’

  Veranta frowned, disliking criticism however obliquely it was phrased.

  ‘But Ternik did not kill Mellia, and I don’t believe she caused the disappearance of Shea or Kerris. She never, in any way, attempted to discuss affairs of state with me. None of this makes any sense Beslow.’

  Beslow nodded. ‘I have informed the Council Members and Guild Representatives that you will hold no meetings for a time. Anything they consider needs your urgent attention is to be submitted in writing. They believe you have temporarily withdrawn from public life due to the loss of Lady Mellia and Lady Shea. News has not yet got out about Lady Kerris’s disappearance.’

  Veranta had been so occupied with thoughts of Ternik’s death and Tomin’s absence she’d almost forgotten her youngest daughter. General Beslow read as much in her expression and quelled his own surge of disgust. He got to his feet.

  ‘Three officers – Captains Triak and Gomer, and Senior Sergeant Draig, will share the command of guarding you my lady. I would trust all three with my life.’

  When General Beslow left the Imperatrix’s presence, he checked that all the orders he’d given had peen put into effect and his officers in particular knew exactly what he required of them. He made his way to the guard post at the main landing of the next floor down. The post comprised an office with a room leading off where guards could rest between shifts. A large book rested on the solid table in the middle of the room. Here, names were noted of any visitors who registered at the post giving the reason for the visit to the top floor.

  The General slumped into t
he chair behind the table. A stack of files had arrived in his absence, files he’d requested. But now that he saw the number of them, he rather regretted asking for them. The ghost hovered above the General and read through the first papers with Beslow. By then he realised the General was thinking along the same track as himself: someone close the Imperatrix had to be the obvious choice for the creature to possess.

  The ghost left the General to his files, exiting through the small metal grill set in the door. He floated up the staircase, far less busy than usual. He peeked into the scribes’ room: only a third of the desks were occupied. The door to the Imperatrix’s own office was ajar and the ghost slithered easily through the narrow space. He rose, resting in a corner of the ceiling, and watched her.

  Veranta stood by the great map, her expression unreadable. She moved to the window. If only he could hear her thoughts, like that woman Tika had been able to do. After a while, with Veranta still unmoving by the window, the ghost left, making his way through the corridors to the Imperatrix’s apartments. He halted. The door was firmly closed but no guards stood outside it. The ghost was puzzled. Whether the Imperatrix was within or not, guards always stood watch at these doors. He didn’t think the old General would have changed that custom, he would surely have reinforced it.

  He turned back, drifting through nearly deserted corridors, into empty galleries and waiting areas, until he reached the guard post again. General Beslow wasn’t there and the ghost felt that he must be wrong. He was wasting precious time here. Annoyed and worried, the ghost whirled away, down the marble staircases and out into the City.

  Tomin sat by the docks and watched waves slap against the sides of boats large and small. He was perched under a raised pier in the cleft of two great timber struts. The shrivelled bodies of several rats floated in the water beneath him. He was nearly invisible, perched here. Very few of the men toiling along the docks thought to look up. The sun was a dazzle of sharp light over the water and the workers kept their eyes on the goods they were loading and unloading.

  The creature was struggling. It wanted to leap among these weaklings, shred their puny bodies and guzzle down their blood. They held a surprisingly large amount of blood. But something was interfering in his mind, if such a creature could be said to have a distinct mind. He felt another urge beyond his blood lust. He wanted to go back to the large stone edifice across the City.

  Whenever he thought of doing that, his body contracted into Tomin’s shape and he felt constrained and increasingly angry. But when he looked at the workmen, Tomin receded, and the creature’s teeth became sharpened tusks, his fingers curved into claws. He squirmed on his perch, snarling to himself, watching the men below. The twisted shape suddenly went rigid and stayed thus, frozen, while men shouted and called among the boats and crates of goods.

  Some considerable time passed. Most of the men had piled into the taverns and pie shops for their midday break when Tomin slid down from his hiding place. Sweat soaked his hair and his tunic; his face was pale and his eyes glassy. He walked unsteadily along the edge of the dock, stepping around bollards and piles of thick rope and stinking nets.

  He headed towards one of the many narrow alleys that ran between high warehouses, and which led in towards the City. Whatever possessed him, for now, he was Tomin.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  ‘Lemos, what do you actually know of the Splintered Kingdom?’

  Tika and the Bear mage were tucked away in Emas’s workroom. Jemin and his officers were still ensconced in Lemos’s house, and Emas was cleaning the den with Gossamer’s vague assistance. Lemos touched his scarred throat before replying, still amazed at the return of his voice.

  ‘Very little I’m afraid. What you call the Places Between, we know as the Planes of Existence. They are everywhere, all around us, and we can enter some of them, sometimes, by way of dreams, ritual, trance and so on. The Splintered Kingdom is not a Plane of Existence. It is not of this world, as the Planes are. It came here violently, plunging into our Planes and causing a long, long period of disruption.’

  ‘You are talking of mental disruptions?’

  Lemos shrugged. ‘Ancient tales tell of floods, fires, volcanic eruptions, land rising and falling. Everything was in a state of violent flux.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Roughly four or five thousand years ago.’

  ‘But does some being rule each of your Planes, as the Crazed One apparently rules his Splintered Kingdom?’

  ‘We believe that Mother Dark rules all, but in Kelshan it is said they have some small knowledge of some of the Planes, and they attribute a god or goddess to be the ruler of each one.’

  Tika pondered Lemos’s words. ‘And are there gods and goddesses? What is Ferag after all? She is titled Mistress of Death, so is that the same as being the Goddess of Death?’

  Lemos groaned. ‘Ferag is of the Dark.’

  Tika huffed in irritation. ‘And I don’t understand the Dark either.’ She scowled at the mage.

  ‘We are taught that everything comes from the Dark. Once, everything was Dark, but Mother Dark bore children. Her First Daughter ruled the Dark Realm.’ Lemos saw Tika’s mouth open and anticipated her question. ‘First Daughter is the title passed down through the generations but always in a direct female line from the real First Daughter. The First Daughter rules the Dark Realm in this physical world. Some of Her other children discovered Light and they argued that Light should share all power with Dark. Mother allowed them their freedom and to have their Light during half the daily turnings of this world.’

  Tika stretched her legs out in the cramped space of the workroom. ‘But it wasn’t as civilised and straightforward as that, surely?’ she said sceptically.

  ‘No. Those children broke completely with Mother, and claimed that She was everything evil. Thus most of this world fears all things to do with the Dark.’

  ‘So Light and Dark are opposed?’

  Lemos took his time considering his reply. ‘Those of the Dark, the true Dark Ones, such as Daylith or Favrian for example, are still blessed, or cursed, with longevity. Whereas those who chose the Light so long ago have a brief span of life in this world. The tribes here are long lived, nothing like as long as the Dark Ones, but yes, far longer than most other peoples.’

  His hand strayed again to his scarred throat, as though soothing a habitual pain which was no longer there. ‘The connection has long been forgotten. I don’t think those who follow Light realise they chose to do so, or remember they were originally born of the Dark. They are so short lived, their brief struggle is occupied with far more mundane matters.’

  ‘These Planes of Existence, as you call them, are they of the Dark?’

  Lemos shifted uncomfortably on the chair, which fitted his sister but was far too low for him. ‘They have always been.’

  Tika stared at him. ‘What sort of answer is that? Do you mean they were here before Mother Dark started messing about with things, or did She cause them to come into being?’

  ‘They have always been,’ he repeated with a helpless gesture.

  ‘Right. So you don’t know. Would one of the Dark Ones?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  Silence fell in the workroom. Lemos broke it.

  ‘There could well be creatures, each ruling one of the Planes of Existence. But if so, they are benign towards us. The Crazed One is malignant in every regard.’

  ‘Would Ferag know?’

  Lemos straightened in alarm. ‘It is very unwise to summon Ferag. She is capricious at best. You’ve met her I think.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Tika was unable to repress a shiver. ‘I can’t say I enjoyed that experience, but I do think she might know more of these things. Or Hag,’ she added.

  Lemos grabbed hold of Tika’s arm, his eyes wide. ‘Don’t. Hag is as dangerous in her way as the Crazed One, although, thank Mother Dark, she seems unaware of her powers.’

  Tika’s emerald eyes set within silver studied Lemos carefully.

>   ‘How would I go about summoning Ferag?’ she asked calmly.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Lemos replied. ‘You must ask Favrian.’

  Tika got to her feet. ‘And Favrian returned to the Palace last night. Farn can take me there.’

  ‘Tika, Jemin plans to go to Kelshan tomorrow, or the day after that at the latest. It will take you two days to travel with Farn to the Karmazen Palace, two days back. I thought you intended to travel with Jemin?’

  Tika stopped in the doorway. She leaned against the jamb and folded her arms.

  ‘I do need to have some questions answered, Lemos.’ She scowled at him. ‘You’ve made your point though. Questions will have to wait until I get back from Kelshan. If I get back.’

  Lemos went quickly to her side, bending until his eyes were level with hers.

  ‘You must return here, Tika. Listen to me. If the danger is suddenly too great, to you personally, return.’

  She laughed in his face, a bitter laugh.

  ‘Abandon the others, you mean? You forget Lemos, I don’t know how to open these Dark gateways of yours. And if I did, you think I would just leave the rest of them – Shea, Jemin, the Kelshan officers?’

  Lemos shook his head. ‘I know. It seems impossible.’

  He paced around the small table heaped with coloured wools and threads.

  ‘The mages among the tribes believe the greatest danger is yet in the future. The near future.’

  He returned to stand in front of Tika. His face was sad.

  ‘It is the gravest danger which we think you are called to confront. It will not be in Kelshan.’

  Lemos’s new, deep voice rang in the workroom and Tika knew he was speaking the truth. After a moment she nodded.

  ‘I’ll find Daylith.’

  Lemos looked a little wary and she grinned at him.

  ‘I want to ask him about these gateways. I’m not going to ask him to summon Ferag.’