The Promised Lie

by Christopher Nuttall

  Dawn, she thought, as she stood.

  Her legs felt unsteady. She hadn’t had such a powerful dream since she’d experimented with pleasure-potions, back in her final year at the Peerless School. It wasn’t a pleasant memory. Her father had threatened her with a fate worse than death if she even thought about drinking the brew again, and he’d given her such a beating that she’d been bruised for weeks afterwards, but she’d already learnt her lesson. Giving her thoughts to someone else to control – even indirectly – could be very dangerous.

  She pushed the thought aside with an effort. It was hard to escape the sense that the dream had been a warning, in some way. But a warning of what?

  Get something to eat, she told herself, as her stomach growled. And then you can start the interrogation.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  The guard looked scared, Isabella noted, as he escorted her into Emetine’s chambers. It didn’t bode well.

  She scowled at the thought. Outside the Watchtower – now gone – she’d never known guards to be afraid of their prisoners, even prisoners who might be restored to their former positions in the very near future. There was certainly no reason to believe that Emetine would be freed any time soon, not after she’d tried to kill the prince. Isabella didn’t intend to allow Emetine to go free, even if the city was recaptured by her wretched brother. But the guards might reason that it was time to treat the former queen better ...

  It didn’t seem right, somehow. The guards would have been obsequious if they’d expected Emetine to become queen again, or even merely to be in a position to insist on having them punished for mistreating her. But instead ... the guard looked scared, as if he expected something to jump out of the shadows at any moment. Isabella gritted her teeth as she glanced around the chamber, half-expecting to see traces of magic or ... or whatever Emetine used to contact her gods. She’d given explicit orders that Emetine was not to be allowed to perform any rites. And yet, there was nothing.

  Emetine sat on the bed, looking surprisingly calm and composed for someone wearing an undershirt in the presence of a strange man. It wasn’t the nightclothes she was accustomed to wearing, Isabella was sure, but she’d been extremely paranoid when it came to fitting out the cell. Reginald would probably have objected if he’d known the full details – it wasn’t as if Emetine was a commoner – yet Isabella found it hard to care. The prince might have problems wrapping his head around the idea of a dangerous woman, but Isabella knew – all too well – that the female could often be deadlier than the male.

  “Lady Sorcerer,” Emetine said, pleasantly. “How lovely to see you again.”

  Isabella glanced at the guard. “Leave us.”

  The man scurried away, looking relieved. Isabella didn’t like that, even though she didn’t want witnesses. She’d given signed orders for Emetine’s treatment, orders that should have absolved the guards of all responsibility ... although she knew, as well as anyone else, that a sufficiently angry former prisoner might choose to ignore the fact that the guards had only been following orders. And besides ... why would the guard be scared of an imprisoned woman? Emetine didn’t look formidable ...

  “My brother gave you quite a thrashing,” Emetine said, as soon as the man was out of the chamber. “Did he not?”

  Isabella’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know what happened?”

  Emetine smirked. “Do you expect me to tell you all my secrets?”

  “I could have you killed right now,” Isabella said, sharply. It was hard, so hard, to contain her anger. “The prince wouldn’t complain if I told him you accidentally fell down a flight of stairs.”

  “And destroy your only chance of getting answers?” Emetine gave her another smirk. “I don’t think you’d do that, Lady Sorcerer.”

  Her eyes seemed to grow brighter, just for a second. “You met her, didn’t you?”

  Isabella frowned. “Mother Lembu?”

  “Is that what she told you she was called?” Emetine shrugged. “She has many names.”

  “What is she?” Isabella demanded. “And what did she teach you?”

  “She’s a teacher,” Emetine told her. “And she taught me to see the world in a whole different light.”

  Isabella took a moment to gather herself. “How did you know about the defeat?”

  “I heard it whispered on the winds,” Emetine said, cheerfully. “I heard it humming through the air and echoing through the ground. Words sang to me as I lay on my bed ...”

  “The truth,” Isabella interrupted.

  “It’s all true,” Emetine assured her. “You just don’t understand what I’m telling you.”

  “Then explain it to me,” Isabella said. “Now.”

  Emetine smirked, once again. Isabella had the feeling she’d lost control of the conversation.

  “I told you,” she said. “Magic. Female magic.”

  “Explain.”

  “Women are naturally better at this sort of magic,” Emetine said. She smiled, as if she was thinking of a joke. “But you, Lady Sorcerer, are practically a man. You have yet to grasp how the magic truly functions.”

  She stood, her undershirt flowing down to her knees. It would have been considered indecent practically everywhere outside the Golden City – Isabella had protected women who would have screamed blue murder if they’d been forced to show their ankles to a man – but Emetine moved as if she didn’t care. Perhaps she didn’t, Isabella reflected. Emetine had been a king’s wife, whatever else she’d been. Lesser people were nothing to her. The guards were so far below her that she probably didn’t consider them human.

  “You can explain it to me,” Isabella said, tensing. The sense of danger was suddenly overwhelming. “I’m sure ...”

  Emetine pressed herself against the stone wall ... and stepped right through, as if the stone was somehow as insubstantial as air. Isabella stared in disbelief, then ran forward – and right into a solid wall. Cursing her own mistake, she scrabbled for the ointment and splashed some into her left eye, peering at the place where Emetine had been. She was walking down a long corridor ...

  She didn’t go through the wall, Isabella thought, numbly. The other world was growing brighter, pressing against the castle. Emetine’s chambers were growing larger, the walls parting to allow the other world to step inside. She went around the wall.

  Gritting her teeth, she ran for the door. Emetine would have to return to the real world at some point, wouldn’t she? It was hard to escape the sensation that Emetine could just keep walking, picking her way through the other world until she could find a safe place to return home. She could practically fly, able to simply pass over walls and defences while Isabella was stuck on the ground. Isabella could see ghostly corridors and passageways opening up around her, intersecting with her world, but she couldn’t see any way to enter them. Some instinct told her that trying would be a very bad idea.

  The guard gaped at her as she ran out of the cell. “Go to the prince, go directly to the prince,” Isabella snapped. “Tell him that the prisoner has escaped and tell him ... tell him to make sure the iron swords are passed out!”

  “Yes, My Lady,” the guard said.

  He hurried off. Isabella glared after him, then looked around with her left eye. Emetine was clearly visible, walking down a long corridor that wasn’t really a corridor ... Isabella reminded herself, once again, not to look too closely. There were things lurking at the corner of her eye, terrifying things. She split her attention, silently blessing her father for drilling mental disciplines into her head as she hurried down the real corridor. She wanted – she needed – to be close when Emetine returned to the real world.

  This must be how she got out of her chambers, back when she tried to kill the prince, Isabella thought grimly. Teleporting was rare, so rare that even the most powerful sorcerers often didn’t bother to ward against it, but this ... she wasn’t sure where to begin blocking the other world. How the hell do we defend against someone stepping through the ot
her dimension?

  She ran past a trio of tired-looking maids, who gaped at her. Isabella barely noticed them. It was growing harder to see Emetine, as if she was moving further and further away from the real world. And yet ... she was also coming closer. Isabella’s head started to hurt as she ran through a pair of doors and into a large room. The pool of water she’d noted weeks ago – back when the castle had been occupied – was still there. She could see things moving in the water.

  Emetine materialised in the middle of the pool, water splashing against her undershirt. It clung to her skin, revealing every last inch of her curves, but there was nothing vulnerable in her. She looked ... transfigured, as if she’d changed while she’d been in the other world. Isabella remembered the impressions she’d taken from the Red Monks and shivered, helplessly, as Emetine looked at her through bright eyes. Anyone who walked the other world was vulnerable to its denizens ...

  “It is time,” Emetine said. “Farewell, Lady Sorcerer.”

  Isabella saw something unbearably vast moving through the other world, heading right towards the pool. Emetine changed, growing larger and larger, her body expanding in directions Isabella couldn’t comprehend. She was a doorway, Isabella realised as she backed away hastily, a doorway allowing something far larger than herself entrance to the real world. The water started to steam as things splashed through the gateway, things Isabella’s mind refused to comprehend. They were humanoid, but ... they weren’t humanoid. Some of them wore recognisable livery ...

  Lord Havant forced his men through the other world, she realised. The floor shook below her feet. In the distance, she heard something crashing to the ground. He turned them into monsters.

  She felt sick. She’d grown used to aristocrats who treated commoners as if they were nothing, but this ... this was a level of horror that passed understanding. The soldiers were no longer human. Teeth, claws and inhuman arms were the least of it. Warped forms rushed towards her, just as their master emerged from the gateway. Isabella couldn’t even look at him directly. Lord Havant hadn’t just warped his men, twisting them into nightmares given flesh; he’d warped himself too. No ... he’d been overshadowed ...

  Something is riding him, she thought. Her back bumped against the far wall. He’s become something else.

  A creature that – might – have once been a man lunged at her. She tried to cast a spell, but nothing happened. Of course ... her defences had already failed. The drain had been so bad that she hadn’t even felt them go. She drew her sword – an iron sword she’d taken from the collection that had been marked for disposal – and stabbed the creature through the heart. It seemed to wilt, then collapse into dust. She had the strangest feeling of gratitude a moment before it died.

  “Run,” a voice said. The gateway was growing larger, tearing through the stone walls. The castle was the sturdiest building in the city, but it was already starting to crumble. “Move or die!”

  Isabella swung the sword at the next creature – it flinched back – then turned and ran for the door. The world seemed to shift and change around her, the distance growing longer and longer, but the ointment let her pick out a viable route to the door. Behind her, she could hear growling as the enemy bridgehead continued to expand, more and more monsters flowing into the castle. She threw herself up the stairs as fast as she could, hoping that she’d find help and knowing that it wouldn’t be enough. Secret passages were hardly unknown in castles – they’d found and blocked two when they’d searched the building – but no one had anticipated someone managing to bring such a large force into the castle. Prince Reginald’s men were on the battlements or manning the walls, not patrolling the lower levels.

  A scream echoed behind her. One of the maids, perhaps. Or a guard ... she wanted to turn back, but she knew there was nothing she could do. The lower levels were infested now, infested with so many monsters that it was only a matter of time before they surged upwards and blocked all lines of retreat. Once they held the ground floor, the end was just a matter of time.

  She turned the corridor and practically ran into a small force of guards. They looked terrified. Isabella didn’t blame them. The castle was shaking so badly that it felt as if the entire building was on the verge of collapse. She was impressed they’d actually stood their ground after the rout. Morale had been in the pits ever since Prince Reginald and his men had been forced to retreat from Rupert.

  “Set up a chokepoint here,” she snapped. The castle had been designed to cope with a prisoner revolt, although it would require an extremely careless guard to let the prisoners break free and grab enough weapons to be dangerous. Normally, prisoners were chained up at all times. “Use the iron swords, nothing else. They’ll kill those monsters!”

  The guards didn’t even try to argue. Isabella glanced at them, silently gauging their ability to actually slow the enemy down for a few minutes. She doubted they’d last long, even with iron swords. The chokepoints hadn’t been designed to defeat foes who could simply walk around the stone walls. She had a feeling that it wouldn’t be long before Havant – or the creature that had overshadowed him – would start doing just that.

  She reached out with her mind, feeling for the wards, as she ran up the stairs. The wards were gone, unsurprisingly. Her magical senses seemed useless ... she felt blind, so utterly blind that she might run straight into a magical trap of her own making. It was a grim reminder that magic was feared, outside the Golden City. And why not ...?

  A second group of guards was standing at the top of the stairs, aiming their swords at her. She barked orders, hoping and praying they’d listen to her. Thankfully, their commander didn’t seem inclined to object to taking orders from a woman. But then, he’d probably been grateful that someone knew what to do. The bodyguards knew how to handle assassins and attacks on the castle walls, but monsters coming up from below the ground? Or slipping through the walls ...?

  Prince Reginald was standing by his door, holding a longsword in one hand and a shield in the other. He looked relieved to see her, even though the building was shaking again and again. His senior officers were glancing around nervously, torn between loyalty to their prince and an overwhelming urge to run. Isabella didn’t blame them. They might not know precisely what was happening, but they knew it was bad.

  “Emetine allowed them access to the castle,” she said, shortly. “The lower levels have been infested with monsters!”

  A week ago, they wouldn’t have believed her. Monsters? But now, after the rout, they believed her. They’d seen the dead come back to life, they’d seen trees grow legs and march upon their foes ... why not monsters?

  Reginald raised his voice. “I want everyone armed,” he said. He sounded surprisingly calm, despite the situation. “We’ll make our way down to the ground floor and seal off the lower levels.”

  Isabella was impressed, almost despite herself. And yet ...

  “We have to get out of here,” she said. “They’ll overrun the castle soon.”

  “Better to keep them penned up until we can call in the reserves,” Reginald said. A row of armed soldiers clattered up, swords at the ready. “And ...”

  “You can’t keep them penned up,” Isabella said. “They can walk through the walls!”

  A thought struck her. “I’ll give some of the ointment to the men,” she said. “Whoever has it should be able to see attackers approaching, if nothing else.”

  “Good thinking,” Reginald said. “Now, hurry.”

  Isabella followed him down the stairs, careful not to trip and fall as the building shuddered again and again. It struck her, suddenly, that the ointment might not work for the men, that perhaps she should summon the remaining maids and give them the ointment, but she doubted Reginald would be happy at allowing the maids to join the battleline. He’d object to putting them in danger ...

  They’re in danger already, she thought, sourly. They were all in danger. We have to get out of the castle.

  “I’ve got two companies rushi
ng in from the walls,” Gars reported, as they reached the bottom of the stairs. “We should be able to hold the line.”

  Isabella gritted her teeth. They didn’t understand. Lord Havant could funnel as many men – as many monsters – as he wanted into the castle, simply by making them walk through the other world. They’d keep advancing over the bodies of their own dead, even if they couldn’t simply walk around the chokepoints and appear in the rear. The castle was untenable. And yet, she could see the prince’s logic. Out on the streets, it would be a great deal harder to contain the situation.

  Except it can’t be contained, she thought. She dabbed more ointment on her eye and looked down. Something immeasurably vast was rising up beneath her. She could see it. She could see the power flaring down the link to the other world, the presence imprinting itself on the real world. Everyone in the city, soldier or mercenary or civilian, is doomed.

  “Here they come,” a voice shouted.

  “Stand your ground,” Prince Reginald ordered. He moved from man to man, speaking words of encouragement. “They shall not pass!”

  Isabella grinned, feeling a flicker of admiration. There were worse commanding officers, she supposed. And worse people to die beside. And ...

  She reached for her magic, feeling it flickering and failing. Perhaps, just perhaps, she could do something. But any spell she used would fail before it reached its target. Even her reserves were failing ... she’d failed. Whatever forces Havant and the Red Monks had unleashed wouldn’t remain confined to the Summer Isle. Alden and his allies wouldn’t have any warning before it was far too late. They certainly wouldn’t realise that their enemies could walk around the channel, or raise storms to shield themselves from view.