Reign of Beasts

by Tansy Rayner Roberts

  ‘What are you —’ Crane started to say, and fell silent.

  ‘Shh,’ she said unnecessarily, and untucked his shirt, brushing her fingers over the bare skin of his stomach. He was young, but he wasn’t that young. If Velody was going to be all fussy about it, that was her problem. Delphine was far more inclusive in her tastes.

  Crane stood very, very still as she explored him with her fingertips, up his chest and then down over the taut muscles of his stomach, to the line of his belt.

  ‘If it’d make you feel better,’ she said softly, ‘you can still keep a lookout while we do this. I’m not precious.’

  It was warm, very warm, in the nest. Delphine lifted Crane’s hands under her own shirt and he got the idea right away, tugging her breastband up and groping her gently. A little too gently, perhaps, but she could work on that.

  They made the touching last longer than she had intended. A frig like this should be fast and frantic, a swift transaction, but they had time to kill. She lingered once she had his trews open, stroking and tugging him into hardness.

  Crane was good at staying quiet. Muffled sounds only, when she did something he liked. He gave as good as he got, too. Young though he was, this wasn’t his first time. Delphine found herself twisting on his fingers, gasping and muffling her own cries against his cloaked shoulder as he curled into her.

  Breeches. Why had she worn breeches? She wasn’t even a proper sentinel, and one of her own frocks would have been so much easier to slide up over her hips to let him inside. Obviously the sentinel uniform wasn’t designed for knee-tremblers. A shame, really.

  They managed, peeling clothes back just enough to allow access, and taking the necessary time to get the angle right. Then he was fucking her, harder than she’d expected, against the rough wall of the nest, and neither of them was paying the remotest attention to keeping watch.

  It was her turn to muffle his cry as he came inside her, and she kept her hand pressed against his mouth as the heat surged through her all over again. Damn. She had needed that.

  They stayed quiet for a long time afterwards, just breathing and touching, before they began to reassemble their clothes.

  ‘Still quiet out there?’ Delphine asked.

  ‘No sign of anyone,’ said Crane, shifting around so he could see out of the thin patch again.

  ‘Good,’ she said, buttoning up her trews. ‘So let’s go and steal our swords back while the going’s good.’

  He looked at her in astonishment, and then grinned like the sun emerging bright and fierce from behind a cloud. ‘That is an excellent plan.’

  27

  It wasn’t going to happen at the fecking lake, Macready was certain of it. The place was full of revellers celebrating the Neptunalia. The water was covered in lanterns and paper boats, and its shore crowded with families, sailors and hot-bean sellers. Daylight folk all, and no room for the Creature Court.

  ‘Freezing our balls off, and for what?’ he grumbled.

  Kelpie solemnly placed a paper admiral’s hat on his head. ‘Enjoy yourself, Mac. How often do we get to come to something like this?’

  ‘Fecking waste of time.’

  She tossed a bag of hot chestnuts at him. ‘But it’s not. We know it’s not. The daylight festivals have a purpose — they keep the city strong so it can heal from the battles every morning. Without them, we’d be royally screwed, so suck it up and eat a damned nut.’

  Macready hated chestnuts. Bits got stuck in his teeth. ‘We’d be better off joining the others underground. Garnet’s not going to sacrifice the lamb in front of all these daylight folk.’

  Music burst across the lake. A parade of children dressed as fish danced along the pier, following a boy who carried a shining pearl on the end of a fishing rod. Flute-demmes and drummers heralded the arrival of the Sea-father, decked out in gleaming blue robes and a false silver beard.

  ‘I think,’ Kelpie said faintly, ‘we need to stop making assumptions about what Garnet is capable of.’

  The Sea-father stood up, shaking a staff from which hung many strings of shells. ‘Happy Neptunalia!’ he roared, and the crowd hollered at him, throwing ribbons and sweetmeats into the lake.

  Holy fecking saints and devils, Garnet was playing the Sea-father, right here in front of the whole mother-fecking city.

  ‘Call Velody,’ Macready hissed.

  Kelpie spoke urgently to the mouse she held, before sending it skittering off into the city.

  ‘Bring forth the fish,’ the Sea-father boomed. Several daylight folk dressed as sailors carried a large platter on which a huge moulded-paper fish lay as if ready for a feast. It was traditional to slash at the fish with a sword until it emptied its belly, scattering more ribbons and sweetmeats and nuts into the crowd.

  As they watched the fish being winched up to the roof of the floating pavilion, Macready noticed that it was, in fact, large enough to hold a small person.

  And it was twitching.

  Velody reached the edge of the crowd at the Lake of Follies at about the same time as Livilla. ‘Perhaps we got it wrong,’ she said, seeing how many daylight folk were about. But, no. She could feel Garnet nearby, his animor alight and pulsing with energy.

  Livilla smiled viciously. ‘Trust him to make a spectacle of himself. Silly boy. He does so like to be the centre of everyone’s attention.’

  Macready and Kelpie ran over to them, looking like a couple of Neptunalia revellers with lopsided paper hats perched on their heads.

  ‘The pavilion,’ Kelpie got out.

  ‘He’s using the festival for his own games, sick bastard that he is,’ Macready added.

  Velody didn’t see it at first, but then heard Livilla suck in a breath as she looked at the floating pavilion.

  It was just like every other Neptunalia. The pavilion was hung with blue and white ribbons and paper fish. Children were dancing in costume. The Sea-father held his staff and sword, playing up to the crowd. But the sword gleamed in a way that was seductive and familiar.

  ‘That’s a skysilver sword,’ Velody said.

  ‘It’s my fecking sword,’ Macready said grimly.

  Delphine and Crane came running up, out of breath and grinning like idiots.

  ‘There was no one in the Haymarket,’ said Crane.

  ‘We got the blades,’ Delphine added, half-crashing into Velody as she came to a halt.

  ‘We couldn’t find your sword, Mac,’ Crane said apologetically. ‘Or mine.’

  He handed Kelpie’s sword and knife to her, and she slid them into their empty sheaths.

  Macready gave Crane a hard look. ‘Are you wearing the Silver Captain’s blade?’

  ‘We’re at war, aren’t we?’ Crane said, looking abashed. He handed Macready’s knife to him, and an unfamiliar sword with the hilt wrapped in white leather. ‘I found Ilsa’s for you. You were about the same height. It’s better than nothing, isn’t it?’

  Macready grumbled, but took the sword.

  Livilla let out a cry and ran towards the lake.

  ‘Oh, hells,’ said Velody, and followed her.

  ‘Garnet!’ Livilla screamed.

  The Sky-father turned and waved cheerily. ‘Hello, lover.’

  ‘Stop this right now!’ said Livilla, sounding more in control than ever before. Velody hadn’t known she had it in her.

  ‘But it’s the Neptunalia,’ said Garnet from behind his beard and blue hood. ‘Have to have the Neptunalia.’ He waved and smiled and flourished Macready’s sword. ‘Makes the crops grow, and the rain fall, and the fish bite.’

  ‘Kill the fish,’ the crowd started shouting. Because they were idiots.

  ‘This is it, then,’ said Livilla, her voice dripping with disdain. ‘This is the kind of Power and Majesty you chose to be. You would murder children for your own entertainment. What happened to you, Garnet? Do you hate us all so much?’

  He tilted his head to one side, as if she had said something terribly quaint. ‘Did you only just notice, sweetling?
’

  ‘You take everything and give back nothing in exchange,’ she yelled at him. ‘You dared to make me think that I couldn’t take power, that I was unworthy of you. You think you are so much better than all the others who went before you, but you’re not. Just another paper soldier making children cry and bleed.’

  ‘Pretty words,’ Garnet said, and the air around him seemed to grow colder. ‘I’ll enjoy making you regret them, Liv.’

  Velody joined Livilla at the lake’s edge. Don’t do this, she sent directly to Garnet. Don’t make me stop you.

  Garnet laughed and grinned around at the crowd. Go ahead and try, little mouse. You haven’t seen a fragment of what I can do.

  Nor you, me.

  You don’t have Ashiol to hold your hand any more.

  I’ll cope without him. You, through — they stopped believing in you when you sent him away, you do know that, right? They didn’t want you back.

  Shut up. You can’t hurt me. I’m the Sea-father. All powerful, all wise. The fish is going to die, wriggling on her little hook.

  No. She’s really not.

  Velody stepped out onto the water. It held under her feet. She walked steadily across the surface of the lake, her ragged grey dress blowing around her legs in the breeze.

  The crowd, knowing a spectacle when they saw it, clapped and cheered.

  Garnet gave a cry of triumph and malice, and thrust the skysilver sword directly through the body of the fish.

  Velody and Livilla stopped pretending at that point and flew directly at him, both their bodies colliding hard with his. Animor smacked against animor with a sound like thunder rolling across the sky. Livilla punched Garnet once in the face and he struck her back, his power lashing out in tendrils.

  The Sea-father’s court threw off their disguises as fishermen and mermaids, revealing Poet, Warlord, Lennoc, and their courtesi. They joined the fight, dragging Velody away from Garnet.

  The sentinels crashed along the pier, swords and knives flashing, and the Creature Court turned on them with snarls and bites.

  Velody swiped Lennoc across the eyes with a flash of animor and threw herself at Garnet again, knocking him to the unsteady floor of the pavilion.

  Delphine swept past them both, her sword shining like a beacon, and made it to the swinging, broken paper fish. Crane was with her, helping her lift the fish down. They broke it open and lizards poured out of it, some shiny with blood, some trailing smoke behind them.

  ‘You really think I give a frig about the salamander wench?’ Garnet gasped with laughter as he rolled on top of Velody, his power hot and vicious against her. ‘It’s not a true sacrifice unless I’m giving up something that I love.’

  Topaz couldn’t breathe. The heat under her skin felt like it had to burst out somewhere, anywhere. Water pressed around her tiny, scrabbling bodies and there was pain, so much pain everywhere. It hurt worse than the net, worse than the cage. They had forced her to swallow a potion of some kind that made her dizzy and slow. She had expected to die.

  Lizards couldn’t swim. These lizards couldn’t, in any case. She shaped herself back into human form with the last of her strength, and hands grabbed her, pulling her out of the water.

  ‘She’s still bleeding,’ said a woman’s voice, and then something hot and salty pressed inside Topaz’s mouth. She only realised later that she was drinking blood. Blood! These people were crazy. Life had been so much better when she was poor and living on gruel; at least no one had ever filled her mouth with blood. It tasted good, that was the worst of it, and she found herself lapping, drinking deeply.

  The burning sensation in her stomach stopped. The heat died away. Panicked, she stared at the two who had saved her. Sentinels. The sentinels who had walked away. ‘What did you do?’

  ‘The skysilver wound wouldn’t heal without it,’ said the man, taking back his bleeding wrist and wrapping it tightly with a bandage from his pocket.

  Topaz had no animor. This was worse than the drug. She tried to shape herself back into salamander form, but couldn’t. ‘Take it back. Take it back!’

  ‘It’s all right,’ the blonde woman said, as if Topaz was somehow stupid. ‘We have our blades, we’ll protect you.’

  ‘But who’s going to protect her?’ Topaz wailed.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Another voice broke in over them, one Topaz would know with her eyes closed, even here in the dark with her animor quiet inside her body. Poet, the Orphan Princel. He stood on the bank of the lake, looking down at the three of them.

  ‘Topaz was never the sacrifice Garnet wanted,’ said Poet sadly. ‘She was the bait.’

  28

  Some of the crowd had fled when the battle began between the Creature Court. Others still watched, as if they thought it was some kind of organised spectacle. They ate chestnuts, or drank bean syrup from paper boats.

  Velody, bruised and battered from her fight with Garnet, found herself held down by Warlord and Lennoc, each of them pouring all of the animor they had into keeping of her arms pinned to the floor of the pavilion.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she demanded hoarsely. ‘This isn’t right. Did you know he meant to do this when you pledged your loyalty to him?’

  ‘That’s how loyalty works,’ said Lennoc. He could barely see after what she had done to him in the fight, but his hands were still strong and steady. ‘We serve Garnet, whatever he chooses to do. He is our Power and Majesty.’

  ‘I could tear you to pieces,’ she said.

  She could, even with their power so directed in keeping her down. She could go chimaera. She could make their animor burst out of their bodies. She was a King and they were Lords.

  ‘If you were willing to hurt us, you would have done it by now,’ said Warlord in that rich voice of his. ‘You are weak.’

  Velody could feel her animor uncurl within her body. It was desperate to hurt, slash, kill, to be free. It was all she could do to contain it. Maybe she should just let it go. That was what Ashiol would do. She had done it before, allowed the animor to make the decisions for her.

  She had pledged never to be like Ashiol; and besides, he was a coward and he wasn’t here.

  Somewhere, Livilla screamed. Velody knew it was Livilla: she could feel the wolf-animor in the pain and outrage of the cry. The crowd was protesting now, muttering amongst themselves. The Sea-father’s script was no longer familiar to them.

  Garnet rose slowly above the lake pavilion, glowing bright like a Lord. The blue hood of his costume had fallen back and his beard had slipped away into the waters of the lake. He held Livilla by the throat, the skysilver blade gleaming as he threatened her with it.

  ‘What, such distress?’ he roared at them all. ‘I thought you people were used to sacrifices. You love to cut the entrails out of sheep and deer and poor little birdies. The blood runs thick across the floor of this fucking city. How is this any different?’

  ‘He’s going to kill her,’ Velody whispered. There was nothing teasing about Garnet’s stance, or the hold he had on Livilla. ‘I thought you loved her,’ she hissed at Warlord. ‘How can you let him do this to her?’

  Warlord’s grip on Velody loosened, his animor fluctuating a little. ‘Garnet loves her. He’s just trying to scare her into joining us.’

  ‘Because Garnet has been so kind in the past to those he loves!’

  Garnet had loved Ashiol so much he’d almost killed him. Velody could see that memory in Warlord’s eyes.

  ‘He will kill her,’ she repeated.

  ‘She betrayed him,’ Warlord said, but she felt another waver in his animor.

  ‘He took her courtesa, threatened to sacrifice her to the sky. He set Livilla up to betray him. She can’t change sides with no air to breathe, even if she wants to.’

  Velody sent one sharp pulse of animor stabbing out at Warlord, testing his grip, and then at Lennoc. ‘Get the hells off me. No one has to die this nox.’

  Garnet laughed from far above them, a long and
melodious sound. ‘Do you think I can’t hear you, little mouse? You’re so very wrong. Someone does have to die. It’s part of the deal.’

  What deal? she sent silently at him, but he didn’t reply.

  ‘What deal?’ she demanded of Warlord and Lennoc. Both of them shook their heads, not willing to speak.

  ‘He’s our Power and Majesty,’ said Warlord.

  ‘He’s a fucking lunatic,’ declared Velody.

  ‘The two concepts are not exclusive.’

  Lennoc snorted. ‘We’re all fucking lunatics,’ he observed. ‘But we swore an oath to him. We can’t go back on that.’

  ‘You swore an oath to me,’ she said furiously. ‘You wanted to change the Creature Court. Did you really want this?’

  Delphine and Crane hurried over, half-carrying a young demme between them.

  ‘Topaz says she was never the sacrifice,’ blurted Delphine.

  Crane had wrapped his cloak around Topaz but she shook it off impatiently. ‘It was always Lady Livilla he wanted,’ she gasped out. ‘Please — my animor — it’s my job to protect her! You have to give it back.’

  ‘If the sentinels gave you their blood, there’s nothing else we can do,’ said Velody.

  ‘The sentinels were supposed to give her blood,’ said Warlord. ‘Getting the salamander out of the equation was Garnet’s first thought.’

  Saints, Velody had been so busy trying to find Garnet, she had forgotten to try thinking like him. He really was this crazy. She freed herself from Lennoc and Warword with a single burst of power, and took to the sky, flying towards Garnet and Livilla.

  Stay back, little mouse, or I’ll burst her head open, Garnet threatened.

  I don’t believe you. It’s trick after trick. You want something from me, or you wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble.

  It’s not always about you, Velody. This city is on the edge of falling into the sky and I’m the only one who can save it.

  Talk to me. I can help you. We should be working together.