by Stephen Deas
It burned them to ash and moved on until it came to the great fortress where the little ones had hidden away once before, centuries ago before their Silver King had come. To the place of the three mountains. It hunted through the thoughts and minds of the humans who cowered there, until it found the one it was looking for. And then it did something rare among its kind. It waited.
16
Kataros
Twenty-three days before the Black Mausoleum
Being told that a lot of things came with a blood-bond was one thing; finding out what they actually felt like was something very different. Finding out what they felt like while running through the dark ruin of the Silver City with a shoulderful of pain and feral men on the loose was something else again.
She knew where the Adamantine Man was. She could feel him, always there in a certain corner of her head.
That right there was one of those other things. He was always there, whether she liked it or not, no matter whether she wanted him or couldn’t stand the thought of him. She couldn’t see through his eyes or read his thoughts or send him her own unless she set her mind to it, but she could feel him. The ebbs and surges of his thoughts were like gentle hands placed against the back of her head whose fingers couldn’t be still. She felt his thrill as he broke another feral, the moment of killing like a pinprick inside her skull. Then tension. Anticipation. Satisfaction. For a short time after that, calm. He had Siff with him now, the outsider, a constant annoyance and burden, slowing him down.
Bring him to me, she told him, but he’d hardly gone any way at all before there were more of them. Anger and rage, they came first, and underneath them a vicious joy, a raw and gleeful abandonment, a surrender of anything and everything except the next motion. They were alien and uncomfortable thoughts to an alchemist, taught always to think and consider, never to act swiftly or rashly, never in haste, never on impulse. The Adamantine Man was more like a dragon in a rage, swept up and lost in the moment. It was the blindness that came with that fury that had almost saved the realms in their last days. Almost.
She ran now and never mind how much it hurt. She felt the distance between them vanishing, yet she had no idea what that meant, whether a certain sense of him implied he was still a mile away through the starlit ruins or whether she’d find him round the next corner. She readied herself for either; as it was, she heard him before she saw him, his battle roars and the shrieks and jabberings of the feral men. She slowed as she reached them. Now that she was close, she didn’t know what to do. The Adamantine Man had Siff on the ground, lying almost between his feet, weaving his axe in arcs too quick to follow, daring anyone to come close.
‘Come on then! You wait much longer it’ll be dawn. Or would you rather wait for a dance with a dragon? It’s all the same to me, little men. This is my axe! Dragon-blooded! She’s killed dragons before and she’ll kill them again!’
The Adamantine Man had his back to a wall so the feral men couldn’t get behind him. They’d spread out in a semicircle, eight of them. She glanced at the sky. Dawn was hours away and she doubted he could keep his axe swinging for that long, so she had to do something or else they’d all die, and the only weapon she had was her own blood. Try to blood-bind some of them? Easily said, but she had to get her blood inside one first.
The Adamantine Man then – he’d have to drive them away. Or lure them. She hadn’t given much thought to what she was going to do with him once she was out of her prison. Get rid of him. Use him to escape and then send him away, or perhaps watch him fall on his own sword – that would have done nicely. One day it still might, but now the alchemist in her warned caution. Siff couldn’t move, it reminded her, not on his own, and she certainly wasn’t going to be the one to carry him. It whispered of how useful he still might be. Why throw away a tool like that? it asked. He’s no threat to you now. She remembered his hand at her throat, squeezing while the other crippled one pawed at her. But now he’s yours and you are his mistress. You can end him whenever you like. Why do it now?
Because I want to. Fight them, you bastard! Fight them and get yourself killed!
The Adamantine Man leapt away from the outsider and towards the nearest of the men around him. He lunged and swept, but the man darted out of the way and then the others were closing in, one or two of them already eyeing Siff as easier prey.
Stone scratched on stone behind her, a sharp noise that didn’t belong. She turned and saw a shape, a shadow, a silhouette falling towards her, an arm, a head, a knife-glimmer in the starlight, and when finally she started to move aside, she was much too late. Something hard slammed into the muscle between her neck and her shoulder. She felt a burning pain and then the shadow was on top of her, a feral man, his weight pressing her against the stone wall at her back.
‘What are you? Not one of them bastard soldiers.’ The knife was up in the air again. She felt warm breath on her face. Blood ran down her back and along the curve of her collarbone. That was warm too. She felt dizzy. ‘You’re not one of us. A woman? What do you want out here?’
She couldn’t speak; all she could to was watch the knife, waiting for it to come down. The shadow shook its head.
‘Why’d you come out? Doesn’t matter. Whoever you are. Shouldn’t have come out. Shouldn’t.’
He tensed. The knife drew back while fingers grabbed her throat, pushing her down.
. . . squeezing while the other pawed at her . . .
‘No!’ She jerked a hand to the blood on her shoulder and clawed at his face. Fingers pulled at the skin of his cheeks and his chin.
‘Shouldn’t have come.’ He was still shaking his head.
She screamed at him: ‘Burn!’ The word reached out to the blood on her fingers. Her blood. He stiffened. She screamed again.
‘Burn! Burn!’ Her fingers tightened, tearing at his face.
He dropped the knife and tried to pull away. She heard him gasp: ‘Mercy!’
‘No!’ The Adamantine Man’s battle rage was with her, seeping through the blood-bond. They were wearing him down, pecking at his strength while the fury grew ever more. ‘No!’ Her other hand went to the blood flowing out of her shoulder. She took a great handful of it and flung it at the man with the knife. This time he screamed.
‘Mage!’ He broke away from her, clutching at his face and staggering towards the others. ‘Blood-mage! Help me! Ancestors! Help me, please!’
With a calm she didn’t understand, Kataros picked up the fallen knife. One whole side of her was covered in her own blood. The knife was covered in it too. She looked at it, dull-edged and notched. Her head was spinning. The one who’d attacked her was lurching as though he could barely see, shrieking and hooting. She smeared her hands with her own blood again, both of them, and walked after him towards the fight. She’d seen a mage do this once, a true blood-mage, and he’d burned the whole front claw right off a dragon in a matter of seconds. He’d had a darker power than any alchemist, but it was a dragon he’d burned, and men were infinitely easier.
‘Mage! Blood-mage!’
They’d started to notice, but most of them were still caught in the whirlwind around the Adamantine Man, poking and prying for a way through the blur of his axe while skittering out of its reach. One lay dead now, split in half. Another was crouched over Siff, going through his pockets. For a moment Kataros thought that must mean the outsider was dead.
‘No!’ That one then. She ran at him, hurling a spray of her own blood from her fingers at his head. He looked up and flinched as the blood spattered his skin and then screamed as it melted his face. Kataros staggered. For a moment the world slipped out of focus. She forgot where she was. She’d lost too much blood. She squeezed her eyes shut and pinched her arm, and when she opened them again, everything was sliding back and forth. She ran her finger over the knife cut in her shoulder. Deep. Straight through the muscle.
Mend!
She gasped. As the man who’d been bending over Siff screamed again and ran into the night, she fel
l to her knees. ‘Mage! Blood-mage! Abomination!’ They were shouting. Someone was shouting. Louder and louder with the roaring of water rising until it filled her head and there was no space for any more.
‘Alchemist! Alchemist!’
She didn’t move. She was somewhere else, somewhere dark. A cave perhaps and her ankles hurt and her wrists too and her face and her head was filled with straw.
‘Alchemist! Wake up! Kataros!’
Kemir? But Kemir was dead. They’d hanged him for looking like a dragon-rider.
‘Please . . . help.’
The light changed. Someone was standing in the cave mouth.
‘Dust,’ shouted Kemir. ‘Take dust. It numbs the pain.’
The noises stopped. She was lying on her back. The night was still and quiet and the Adamantine Man was crouched beside her, staring at her. He had the knife she’d picked up in his hand.
‘Alchemist?’
He was going to kill her. She reached into him through the blood-bond. No! Back away!
He stood up and withdrew, smirking as he did, mocking her fear. ‘If I was going to do anything, alchemist, I would have done it by now. We’re not ones for hesitation. It’s not our nature.’
There was no lying when you were blood-bound. She sat up and looked around but the feral men of the Silver City were gone.
‘You chased them off,’ he said. ‘They thought you were a demon. A blood-mage. They screamed and ran. I don’t know what they saw.’ He laughed. ‘All I saw was a half-dead woman covered in her own blood.’
‘I burned them.’ She tried to stand up but the world started spinning again. ‘Burned them with my alchemy.’
‘Right.’ He tossed the knife up in the air, caught it by the blade and offered it to her, hilt first. ‘Whatever you did, you put the fear of the Great Flame into them. Doesn’t mean they won’t be back in a bit. Maybe if they get some courage from somewhere.’ He poked at the wound on her shoulder, already scabbed over and half healed. ‘That’s a lot of blood from a little hole. Can you walk? Can’t carry both of you.’
‘I’ll manage.’ She took a deep breath and forced herself up. The world still wobbled but it wasn’t as bad as before. She was hungry, she realised. Ravenous. ‘So now what?’
The Adamantine Man shrugged and laughed and bent down to throw Siff over his shoulder as easily as if the outsider was a child.
‘You’re the one who wants to be somewhere. You tell me. But if it’s to be the Raksheh then I’d go down. I’d go south to Farakkan and then make my way up the Yamuna at night. Longer than going the straight way but safer. Not so many dragons, a lot more places to hide and not so many of these sort to deal with.’ He nodded to the bodies on the ground. There were three of them, ripped apart by the bloody axe across his back. ‘There’s tunnels from the Silver City to most—’
‘I know.’ She shivered. The Adamantine Man was still looking at her with those hungry eyes. She didn’t know what he wanted from her, but he wanted something, something he hadn’t taken while she’d lain out cold on the stone of the ruined city.
‘Suppose I’ll be showing you the way, then.’ He sniffed. ‘Best be under the ground before any dragons wake up. Can’t promise we won’t have more of this lot to deal with either.’ He kicked one of the bodies. He didn’t offer her a hand; he didn’t even look back at her.
17
Skjorl
Twenty-three days before the Black Mausoleum
The alchemist they’d set him to guard had been stupid enough to leave the Purple Spur and come to the Pinnacles. Rumour said there had been others, a group of them. Some rebel faction, or else a delegation from the speaker under the Spur. Came with a company of Adamantine Men, who either fought like demons or surrendered like lambs, depending on who was doing the saying. They made him her watcher, but they were always going to kill her. Something brutal and pointless, full of harsh words and empty ceremony. Seemed like a waste. And he hadn’t had a woman for far too long. And he was an Adamantine Man, at war with the dragons, and that gave him the right to have her.
Except then she’d reached into his head with her witchery and they’d fled the Pinnacles on Prince Lai’s wings, him with a half-dead fool over his shoulders, and here he was. Comforting himself with steel and hard sinew instead of soft skin and writhing flesh.
Either was a pleasure. When the feral men came a second time, he saw his own death and saw that that was no bad thing. He let the fury drive him among them, sure that none would be able to stand against him, but knowing that in the end their numbers were too many. He took that knowledge and forged it into strength and fell upon them like a storm.
‘Mage!’ Another one, lurching out of the shadows. Barely seen. Hurt and half blind. Not a threat. Skjorl ignored him.
The cry jarred the others. He saw one fall back, another beside him hesitate, and that was all he needed to leap and cut the man in two.
‘No!’ That was the alchemist. He felt her cry more than heard it, twisting inside him through whatever tether she’d made to him. Blood and anger and pain, all to feed his own.
‘Mage! Blood-mage! Abomination!’ Someone unseen in the shadows, back where he’d left the outsider. The feral men around him fell away, and when he lunged and rushed them, they turned and fled and he was still alive, and this wasn’t going to be his death after all.
He let them go. Took an effort of will to do that. When he was sure they were gone, he shouldered Dragon-blooded and went straight to the outsider. Keep him alive. That was what he had to do. Didn’t want to, but the alchemist demanded it. He was compelled.
A few steps later and he almost trod on her in the dark, stretched out at his feet. Might be dead, but he knew straight away that she wasn’t, before he even touched her. He could feel her, tied to him, could feel the faint flicker of her life, heart still strong. Could feel all that inside him.
Covered in her own blood, when he took a closer look. He crouched beside her and took the knife out of her hand
‘What have you done to me?’ he asked but she couldn’t answer. He thought about touching her. Finishing what he’d started back in her cell. Thought about it, but did nothing, because another thought crushed it: he could kill her. Would that end what she’d done to him? Surely it would.
Kill her. Leave her body. Leave the other one too. Go down to the tunnels, fight his way to the underground gates of the Pinnacles. That would be easy. Go back to the fortress of no hope and take what punishment would come for stealing Prince Lai’s wings.
Kill her and be free. Tempting, but his hand didn’t move.
She stirred.
‘Alchemist?’ Now! Now or not at all! And still his hand didn’t move, and then her eyes flickered open and he felt something slam inside him, hurling him away from her.
No! Back away!
He stumbled, silently cursing. ‘If I was going to do anything, alchemist, I would have done it by now.’
Begged the question why he hadn’t, though.
‘You chased them off. They thought you were a demon.’ He gave her back her knife. Blood-magic. Wasn’t that supposed to be against everything an alchemist stood for? He poked at the wound on her shoulder. Small for so much blood. Looked like an old wound, one that had closed days ago, but it hadn’t been there when she’d been in her cell, he was quite sure of that. Was that something that alchemists could do?
‘So now what?’ she asked.
He laughed. Now there was a question. To go with Why didn’t I kill you when I could? He shrugged and picked up the outsider. Now what? Down, that was what. Down into the tunnels to Farakkan. At least that far they’d be safe from dragons.
She shivered. She looked so weak most of the time. He should have killed her. A part of him knew that with a stone-cold certainty. Should have killed her and set himself free while she’d lain flat out on the stone.
‘Suppose I’ll be showing you the way then. Best be under the ground before any dragons wake up. Can’t promise we won’t have
more of this lot to deal with either.’ He kicked one of the bodies. He didn’t offer her a hand; he didn’t even look back at her.
18
Kataros
Twenty-two days before the Black Mausoleum
They took alchemists to the City of Dragons before they could walk or say their names, when they were little more than babies. She could have come from anywhere. The alchemists had tested her and declared her promising. Someone had been paid ten golden dragons, the same for every child no matter who they were. The alchemists had given her a new name. Kataros, and for the next ten years of her life she’d never left the shores of the Mirror Lakes. Her head had become filled with words and dragons and a very particular understanding of the world.
When she was fourteen they took most of her friends away, declared their minds too dull for alchemy and named them Scales instead. She hadn’t understood, back then, what that would mean, until they were gone and scattered across the realms to the great dragon eyries where they would fall in love with monsters and slowly lose their humanity from the inside while Hatchling Disease turned their skin to stone.
They didn’t send her. She’d passed the first test, and now they kept her close for five more years. They taught her the true nature of dragons. She learned how they were kept subdued, of the terrible things that the alchemists did and would do again to preserve the nine realms. They taught her the first scratchings of blood-magic too, dressed up in lessons on herbs and potions.
She passed the second test. This time the ones that failed were set free, released into the wide world to be teachers or traders or whatever took their fancy, although they would always and for ever belong to the Order of the Scales to be called upon when there was a need.