by Juliet Kemp
She didn’t care to risk it.
But she was here, following them, and she could see Cato. The sense of doing something was intoxicating. What exactly she was going to do, she didn’t quite know yet. But there would be something. There had to be something.
Daril was a couple of steps ahead of Cato, his back stiff. Couldn’t Cato make a run for it? Could she just grab him and run? Then she got a better look at them through the crowd in the street, and realised that there was another man there, shorter by a head than both Daril and Cato, walking at Cato’s sleeve.
The other man’s head turned slightly, and, with a shock, she recognised him, from that rooftop ten years ago. Urso – a cousin of sorts of Daril’s, who’d had a small amount of talent. But surely not enough to do whatever it was they were doing here? Although – that, presumably, was why they wanted Cato. She squinted at the three of them. Urso didn’t exactly look physically strong, Daril was up ahead not paying attention. Couldn’t Cato make a break for it?
Unless Cato really does want to be there.
She thrust the thought away. If Urso was a sorcerer too, maybe he had more on Cato than Marcia thought. That would explain it.
k
Beckett stood by the closed workroom door and watched Reb take the instruments out of their case and lay them out, ready for use. She expected her fingers to shake, but they were rock steady. She laid the twin steel blades – silver was traditional but not essential, and it did tarnish annoyingly – next to the vials, and took out the wide-mouthed container for the later stages of the spell.
“What will you do?” Beckett asked. “This can hardly be an established protocol.”
“Make it up as I go along,” Reb said, flippantly, then made herself focus. “I know a little of the protocols for speaking with spirits, though of course you’re already here in this case; and a lot more of the protocols for banishing them. Though the last time I did that it was Marek-style magic.”
“I remember,” Beckett said.
Ten years ago. In her mind’s eye, she saw Marcia that night, an overwhelmed, terrified teenager suddenly realising what she’d been involved with. The woman Reb had met yesterday, Marekhill-poised to her fingertips, was nothing at all like that girl.
Marcia hadn’t saved Zareth. She’d tried, to give the child credit, but neither she nor Reb had managed it. Maybe Reb could have, if she hadn’t been banishing that damned demon at the time, but if she hadn’t done that they’d all have been in even more trouble. And then again, if she hadn’t tried to save Zareth, she might have caught Daril b’Leandra; but she hadn’t done that either, and she hadn’t been able to make anything stick to him afterwards. The other sorcerers of the Group had held her back from throwing herself at Marekhill privilege, arguing that they couldn’t risk upsetting the balance between Marekhill and sorcery. Marekhill rules banned sorcery amongst their own, and turned a blind eye to it in the rest of the city. House Leandra would have torn the whole edifice down, Reb’s colleagues insisted, if that was needed to defend one of its own. Reb and Zareth had stopped the raising, and there was no sign that Daril b’Leandra was about to repeat the experience, and whilst Zareth’s death was a tragedy, taking House Leandra down and sorcery down with it wasn’t going to bring him back.
They might even have been right. But Reb wasn’t in a state to hear that, back then.
And somewhere in the years since, gradually, Reb had abandoned the magics which were about looking after the city, the magics that had belonged to the Group. She’d limited herself to spells and charms for people in need, and told herself (accurately enough, even) that it was good and useful, and (less accurately) that it was enough. Then there had been the plague, and after she’d emerged from the swamp-thick months of nursing and burying and fruitlessly seeking a solution; after she’d forgiven herself for the trick of biology that brought her through it with nothing more than a winter cough; after that, the idea of returning to true sorcery (alone? With Cato of all people, the only other survivor?) had seemed laughable. Minor charms. That would keep her busy, and damn the rest of it.
Now here she was, with something truly important, and even now she wasn’t returning to the work of the Group. She was using a form of magic she’d sworn off when she first came to Marek, barely an adult.
Zareth would know how important this was.
Would he? a tiny voice in the back of her head asked.
k
Daril was moving fast, and Cato and Urso were struggling a little to keep up. Marcia nearly bumped into people several times, trying to keep them in sight, getting sworn at more than once. Obviously her disguise was more effective than she’d thought. People never swore at her when she looked like Fereno-Heir. She could read some of Daril’s emotions from the way he was moving, a frantic excited anxiety that she’d last seen… She swallowed. The last time. Anxiety churned her stomach.
House Fereno was in sight at the end of the street, and Marcia wondered if she saw Cato tense, for just a second. He looked calm otherwise, moving with the laid-back slouch that disguised his limp.
The three of them turned up the narrow alleyway next to House Fereno, which led up towards the Park. After a moment’s hesitation, Marcia doubled back and turned down the mouth of the alleyway before the House she was just passing. She was too likely to be seen if she followed them up that quieter street; they’d only have to glance back over a shoulder. But she should be able to catch them again at the top… Coming out at the other end of the alley, a House garden back wall to each side, she was rewarded by the sight of the three of them walking into the scrubland at the edge of the Park.
She hesitated. How could she follow them in the open ground of the Park? As always during the day, there were groups of people strolling in different directions. Where could Daril be headed? She let them go as far as she dared, then came out herself, walking diagonally across their track, ready to turn again in a few moments, like a sailboat tacking. She tried to look like she was sauntering aimlessly, stopping to admire this plant or to stare back down the hill towards the city. But as far as she could see, none of them so much as turned to look behind them.
She realised then where they were going. Where they must be going. The monument, right at the top of the hill. The monument to Marek’s founders, Eli Beckett and Rufus Marek, who had done that first deal with the cityangel (with Beckett); the monument that had Rufus Marek himself buried under it. She could keep going around the hill, spiral up it… And then, maybe, she would get there in time.
And then what?
She would think of something. She had to think of something.
k
“Well then,” Reb said, and picked the knives up. She drew the first knife across the inside of her arm, then swapped it for the first vial. Wordlessly, Beckett held out their arm for the second knife, and the second vial.
Beckett’s blood smelt different to hers, sour-sweet.
She took a deep breath. The next stage would be to mix them together in the bowl, and bind them together for the summoning-and-banishment which she was trying to piece together in her head; banish-and-summon Beckett to their true place, rather than away from here. Bind them to the gaping hole around Marek.
k
As Marcia got closer, she saw that the area around the monument was unusually empty; then, saw a couple strolling together up the hill smoothly change their course to head away again, apparently unaware. Cato must be doing something. Even thinking about that, as she got closer, she found herself turning to move away, finding it strangely important that she go down the hill, not up, why up? She had to stop for a moment to persuade herself to go against that urge. It was Cato. It was just Cato. She could ignore it. Cato’s manipulations had never worked well on her.
She was sweating by the time she stopped behind a clump of trees a little way from the monument. Daril and Cato and Urso were visible nearly at the top. She leant against a tree with her back to them, and racked her brains. Whatever they were doing here,
it had to be to do with the cityangel. Up at the monument, how could it be anything else? But what? Beckett had fallen, from what they and Reb had said, before Cato’s disappearance. So the fall must have been Urso, nothing to do with Cato. And they were recruiting Cato – to fix whatever problem the fall had left them with. Such as, for example, not having a cityangel.
She wanted, desperately, to believe that they were going to reinstate Beckett themselves, that Cato was working with Daril voluntarily because Daril had realised it was all a terrible mistake. Cato just saving the situation. But…
But that didn’t ring even slightly true.
Had it really been a good idea to walk out on Reb and Beckett like that? Certainly, Reb had been hugely insulting, but… She rolled the beads of her bracelet between her fingers, staring outwards over the river. She wanted, very badly, to fetch Reb up here; but there was no time to do that. She had to save Cato. That was what she was here for. Save him from whatever he was being forced into. He had to be being forced. He couldn’t be working with Daril of his own accord. And that meant that whatever it was Daril was planning – she didn’t want it to happen. Whatever it was, it was bound to be a bad idea.
She looked round, trying still not to be seen, not to be noticed. Urso and Cato were facing one another, just to one side of the statue; Daril stood slightly to one side. He was staying out of the magic itself this time, then? Maybe he had learnt something last time. Just not enough. Daril gestured to Urso, and Marcia knew. It was now.
The only thing she could think of was to disrupt the ritual. Any way she could. Surely, if she timed it right, surely just that would be enough? And she wasn’t entirely on her own. Once Cato knew she was there, he would help her. He would.
She made her way between clumps of trees, moving whenever none of them were looking in her direction. Daril had his back to her. She could only see the edge of Urso’ cloak and shoulder past the bulk of the monument. She could see Cato clearly, but he was looking at the monument.
The he looked over, straight at her. His look was, for a fraction of a second, sincerely apologetic, like all those times in their childhood…
Then her head rang as if she’d been hit inside it with a giant bell, despite the fact that no one was near her. Lights flickered across her vision, and the muscles in her legs gave way. She hit the floor, and blacked out.
k
Reb was lifting the first vial to pour when it happened.
She could never after describe it in words, that seismic shock that reverberated through her skull. It made the physical effects – her flying across the room; the noise of both vials and the bowl shattering; the nasty crack as she landed on her wrist – all feel unimportant.
She never forgot Beckett’s face, in that moment. The incomprehensible loss carved deep across it for a fraction of a second before Beckett shuttered it away.
She’d missed her moment. She’d broken her promise, and it hadn’t even mattered.
“They did it,” Reb whispered hoarsely, as the pain of her arm – broken, she was miserably aware – filtered through. “Daril, Cato. They replaced you.”
NINE
Jonas’ efforts to sleep late that morning had been sabotaged, initially by Asa, with the room opposite his, banging doors first thing in the morning; then by the sun coming bright through the window. That, he supposed, was the downside of sleeping in a room fully open to the sun. Usually he just got up at daybreak. He really should get curtains; he understood now what land-dwellers saw in them. Except he’d be leaving here soon. Wouldn’t he?
He burrowed under his blankets and sought sleep again; but it was patchy and full of dreams that alarmed him yet fled like minnows through his mental fingers as he surfaced towards wakefulness. He woke for good, thick-mouthed and muzzy-headed, in the late morning. Thumbing sleep from the corners of his eyes, he remembered his intention of visiting Kia for that early lunch. It seemed less appealing now than it had in the early watches; but then again, running messages on an empty stomach to get the coin to fill up that stomach didn’t appeal much either. And now Asa was out he couldn’t even get a loan off them.
And it was still better a time of his choosing than to be watching over his shoulder for Kia.
He hesitated for a moment over dress. Salinas formal was overkill, tempting though it was in the cause of making a point. His shipboard wear would do well enough, except that then it would be near-impossible to find jobs afterwards, even with an armband; he’d look like a sailor and no one would believe he knew the streets. He didn’t want to have to come back home yet again, and he was flat broke; he had to do some work today. He pulled Marek trousers and shirt, the neatest and cleanest of the lot, out of his chest, and Kia would have to like it. That made a point, too, of course; that he had Marek clothes, that he had a job and a place in the city, without her sponsorship.
He dressed rapidly and threw the window wide. Sitting on the window ledge, he wriggled further and further outwards, feet dangling over the three storeys below, until he could twist round, grab the helpfully uneven brick to one side of the window and the top of the window frame, and pull himself up and onto his feet. From there it was an easy couple of moves to the roof itself, and away towards the Old Bridge and Marek Square. He liked being up here, the air fresher than at street level, the city laid out before him the way it had been from the top of Marekhill the night before. He could see properly, up here.
He had to drop down to street level to cross the bridge, and the smells of the various food carts he passed tugged at his empty stomach. The walk felt longer than usual, and Jonas rubbed more than once at his eyes, stinging still with tiredness, on the way. The embassy was on the far side of Marek Square from the Old Bridge, at the foot of Marekhill, a few roofs away from the Guildhall he’d sat on last night. The young woman who answered the door looked very much like she was about to turn him away until he told her his name, with heavy emphasis on “t’Riseri”. She blinked at him, eyes wide.
“Oh, of course. I didn’t realise…” She broke off and flapped a hand at him, then ushered him into a waiting room.
Of course. Salinas to everyone in this benighted city. Marek to his own people here, just from the clothes. As if he didn’t look Salinas anyway, regardless of what he wore.
The waiting room had a combination of traditional shipboard decor and Marek-style furniture and paintings, presumably to set what would mostly be Mareker visitors at ease. But he didn’t have long to look around before Kia arrived.
“Jonas!” Kia said, throwing her arms open as she hurried in. “The way you were yesterday, I quite expected to have to seek you out myself. But here you are. How splendid.”
Kia, annoyingly, looked fresh and awake and nothing like Jonas felt.
“Perhaps you could use lunch?” she added.
For that, he could forgive a great deal. She led him to what was clearly her office, a small room deeply reminiscent of the captain’s cabin in all the ships he’d been on, but with three good Marek-style chairs and a table between them which the maid, introduced as Xera, was already busily loading food onto. Kia gestured him to a seat, and Jonas let himself relax into it as he reached for a Salinas-style bread wrap. Just for a moment, he indulged himself with the idea that he was back home, on board any one of the ships his mother had captained when he was a child.
It wasn’t quite as reassuring as he wanted it to be.
“So,” Kia said, after the requisite few moments of silence in courtesy to the food had passed. “You were with Fereno-Heir last night. How on the seas do you know her?”
“We met when she was across in the squats looking for her brother,” Jonas said. “She was curious as to what a Salinas lad might be doing in Marek, and invited me out for the evening.”
“When she believed you living in the squats?” Kia said with a frown. “Or did you admit to your background?”
Jonas shrugged. “We chatted for a while. I believe she understood enough not to expect me to attend the ball
in messenger-garb.” Well, she hadn’t, if only because she’d been ready to dress him herself.
“Well,” Kia said, pursing her lips. “House Fereno. You could do worse.”
Jonas blinked. “Marcia – what? No. I do not – we have barely met! We are merely friends, I assure you.”
“As you say,” Kia said, shrugging. “She is a pleasant enough young woman, though, and from one of the Thirteen Houses.” She looked sharply at him. “So Marek has not gained your loyalty from Salina, then?”
This conversation kept taking unexpected turns. “Loyalty? No. No, I do not intend to become Mareker, if that is your meaning. I am hoping to take passage when the ships leave after Year-end.”
It was true. Wasn’t it? And what if he hadn’t solved his little problem by then? But he could hardly mention that to Kia.
“So soon?” Kia said. “Well. Very wise. The climate here doesn’t grow on one, I have to say. I miss the open sea.” She sounded wistful. “Still. Fereno-Heir is a useful person to know. I am acquainted with the family myself.”
Slowly, too slowly Jonas caught up with her meaning. Diplomacy. House Fereno must be involved in something that Kia, and Salina in general, had an interest in.
“You wanted to speak to her,” he remembered.
“And she may well hold to that agreement anyway,” Kia agreed. “But it might not hurt if her young Salinas friend was involved.” She nodded at Jonas. “Ne?”
“I… Of course,” Jonas said, helplessly. “If it would be of assistance.”
Kia nodded briskly. “My thanks.” She hesitated again, obviously thinking something over. “In fact, someone else involved in this particular issue will be here later today. Perhaps you should meet him.”
Jonas blinked at her, feeling trapped. His mother would have his hide if Kia asked for assistance and he didn’t provide. But neither did he want to be embroiled in some complicated matter of diplomacy that kept him from his purpose here. The purpose he’d already been neglecting for entirely long enough. If he really meant to leave in the next week… He narrowly restrained himself from grimacing. A week. Put like that, it seemed rather unlikely; but if Beckett held the key, it could be done by tomorrow. Still. This kind of involvement was exactly why he had been avoiding the embassy, damn Kia’s hide. He sought for a way to refuse.