by Lyn Lowe
It clicked into place and came into focus.
Oil.
Why would Mola tell the Urazians about the passes? Because she wanted all her enemies in them at the same time. A time when her people would be safely out of the depths, making their way to whatever hiding place Dau thought would keep them safe. She was crazy, but she wouldn’t set Silvertongue on him just to make sure he was dead. She hated him enough for that, but a part of what drew him to her in the first place was that Mola was after things bigger than one life. Just like him.
No, Kaie’s hair was the bribe, and Silvertongue the insurance. She tried to kill him, but was slow enough for Henry and Judah to follow her to an entrance to the passes. Because Kaie was the only one capable of finding such an entrance on his own. She wanted as many pouring in after her as possible. And, just in case they moved too quickly and got too close to the last of the Huduku leaving the city, Mola arranged for Silvertongue to know of that same entrance. In doing so, she undoubtedly managed to reveal more than enough about the passes to convince the Fourth to pile into the depths. No doubt, she told them that’s where the Twelfth was hiding.
And the oil, the smell of rotten eggs, it was exactly what she intended; what the Huduku always intended. Maybe Dau never knew about it, or maybe the old woman just didn’t want to reveal their last great trick. The people of the city were not going to let Huduku belong to the Urazin Empire. They were going to destroy it.
“We’ve got to move!”
He scrambled to his feet, using Judah to help him balance until his head stopped spinning. Kaie scanned the mass of faces swimming before him. They were all looking to him with expressions of confusion and fear, but he barely saw them. He was looking for two special ones.
He turned to Judah. “Where’s Peren?”
The giant wanted her. He hated it since the moment he first noticed it. Now, Kaie was grateful. The soldier was going to keep track of her. “Back by the stairs,” Judah answered. “I told her to wait there until I found out what the noise was.”
“We’ve got to get her.” Vaughan would be with her. “And we’ve got run.”
Judah hesitated for a moment, then nodded. The giant surged forward, using his massive arms to clear a path through the people milling about trying to get a glimpse of the fallen monster. Kaie heard him barking orders, and was aware of the soldiers behind them forming into much more cohesive units, but didn’t pay any attention to either. The important people were ahead of him.
Peren was right where Judah said. Vaughan was beside her. Kaie faltered for a second, shoving down his surge of relief. Vaughan was the one he needed. He wasn’t supposed to care about her.
He grabbed her wrist, telling himself it was the logical choice. Vaughan seemed loyal. Gregor taught him better. Peren made sure that her brother stayed in line. Kaie needed to be sure he was the one holding on to her from now on.
He didn’t offer them any explanation. They would figure it out soon. He just ran.
The world blurred. Stale, sour air slapped at him. His eyes burned. He saw nothing. It was amazing. Peren wasn’t even a weight on his arm. She matched him, stride for stride. He knew that, if he were healthy, he would easily outpace her. His legs were longer and they were made for running. Somehow, he forgot that. Kaie remembered now. His legs screamed and his lungs burned. The last two years fell away. The fury fell away. There was only the sound of their feet hitting the floor and their gasps for air.
It was free.
Kaie didn’t know if it was minutes or an hour, but his mad dash came to a sudden halt that nearly sent him straight into a wall. He’d given no thought to direction when he started running. He didn’t pay attention to the turn-offs or the stairs becoming less numerous. He didn’t even notice the lanterns growing more sporadic. Now, with walls on every side and nothing but a rickety ladder in front of him, Kaie realized the depths of his foolishness.
The others were on his heels, even Judah trusting that he knew where he was going. The giant was supposed to be the navigator. But there was no time to undo it. The Huduku could be lighting their fires any instant, and then it would be too late to escape.
With no other choice left to him, Kaie pushed Peren at the ladder. She climbed without a word of protest. He followed so close behind she almost stepped on his hands twice. He felt the brush of someone else’s fingers brushing against his ankles too. It wasn’t a long climb, but every rung seemed a small piece of eternity.
He couldn’t see what Peren was doing when she stopped climbing, but he felt the cool night air against his face when she opened the door. Another seven seconds, and he joined her up top.
Kaie stared up at the massive wall, startled by how close they were to it. It was close enough to brush his elbow up against the smooth surface. The end of the tunnel was exactly beneath the beginning of the wall. He didn’t expect that. The passes were supposed to go under the wall, opening up into the desert. He couldn’t figure out why this one stopped so close to freedom.
There were stairs nearby. They were just as steep as the ones below, but were a much longer climb. Kaie nudged Peren, pointing them out to her. She was breathing heavy, and the black dye from her hair was mixing with the paint and running down her face in rivers of sweat. It was obvious that she was exhausted, and wanted to stay where she’d fallen on the cobblestone street. But she nodded her understand, hoisted herself back to her feet, and started the climb.
Kaie waited just long enough for Vaughan to join them, ushering the small man ahead than began the ascent himself. The burn in his legs during the run was nothing compared to the climb. It was will that kept him moving, and nothing else. He stopped counting the seconds. He couldn’t spare the attention. He needed all his focus to tackle the step in front of him. Then the one after that.
They stopped six times on the way up. Peren or Vaughan would simply sit down, and Kaie couldn’t bring himself to urge them up again without taking a rest himself. Judah and the rest of the soldiers seemed to be fairing slightly better, but even they took advantage of the breaks. He didn’t let them last long, though. Once he felt feeling returning to his legs, he forced them all up and moving again. It was just as much to get the numbness back as it was to get to safety.
It felt like days, but the sky was only beginning to lighten. Kaie’s head crested the top of the wall. The space up there seemed endless. It was wide enough for two carts to drive side by side. All along the length he could see small huts that served to house the guards. They were newer constructions, made out of wood and grey stone instead of the pale stuff of Huduku. He was too exhausted to do anything but slump down against the side of the nearest one. Peren dropped down beside him an instant later.
He passed out for a little while. The next thing he knew the whole of his small army was scattered about the space and Peren was shaking him gently.
Kaie knocked her hand away and rubbed at his face. The skin there was tingling, as if just waking from numbness. It was a strange sensation.
“What do we do now?” She asked him softly. He was absurdly grateful she was there. She was the only one who would be able to help and would know better than to share it. She wouldn’t like it. But Peren understood what survival cost.
“First, we get down,” he muttered. She made a face at the obvious statement. “Then we head to the bay. You, me and Vaughan. There are supposed to be fishing camps littered up and down the coast. There are nomadic tribes that stay at them from time to time, draw in a haul, and sell it at the Merchant’s Gate. If we’re really lucky, there’ll even be a boat waiting for us. If not, we’ll make one out of whatever gets left behind. Then we get out past the Chain.”
Her lips pursed into a thin line, and Kaie could almost hear the rebuke lurking behind them. Vaughan was the important one. The blonde man could keep a boat from sinking, or signal a ship passing by outside the Chain, or protect them from a thousand other eventualities Kaie couldn’t plan for. He needed her, too. Peren was necessary to keep Vaughan.
No one else mattered.
“There’s going to be a ship out there,” he whispered before she could say anything. “We just have to get out there and survive another three or four days. Five, at the most.”
Assuming the crazy man wasn’t lying about the timing of the ship coming for him. And that the ship wasn’t just part of the man’s lunacy. Either was possible, but Kaie believed the purple-eyed man.
“The Namer’s ship?”
“Not the Namers. It’s supposed to head back to Lindel. We might be able to negotiate another harbor, but if not that’s still worlds better than here.”
She didn’t ask how they would negotiate it, or even how he could be so sure. She just nodded. She was an amazing woman. He almost wished there was some way to undo all that was broken between them.
Every single muscle in his body screaming in protest, he lurched back to his feet and kicked Peren’s slumbering brother awake. Then he stumbled to the other side of the wall, hoping some magical means of descent would be waiting for him there.
His stomach heaved and his head spun wildly as he stared down at nothing but miles of empty space and crashing waves. The passes ended at the wall, because he led them to a place where the only thing on the other side was the bay. If there was a day to travel, they might make it around to the Merchant’s Gate where they could hurry back down more stairs and pile out into the desert beyond. Even the other side of the bay would be better. There would be more stairs, leading down to the docks. They would need to swim out from there, but it would be freedom. But he managed to take them to the one part of the wall that offered no way out.
Save one.
As his eyes grew used to the incredible distances, they picked out a strange form swinging back and forth along the wall. It was just on the other side of the guard post and about a quarter mile down. At first he thought it was nothing but a tightly packed flock of gulls. But the shape stayed more or less the same. Several of the gulls moved away at once, and he caught a flash of color. He knew what he was looking at.
“Is that what I think it is?”
Kaie’s startled jump nearly sent him tumbling off the wall. The giant was decent enough not to laugh. He didn’t ask the obvious question. “Yes.”
Judah nodded. They sent more than one soldier to their death, fetching that bright yellow dress. They were staring at what remained of the late Lady Autumnsong. There wasn’t much of her left. The gulls weren’t fighting over meat anymore. Now it was scraps of the dress causing the aerial battles. Soon it would be nothing more than bare bones. They were by the Villain’s Gate.
It wasn’t actually a gate. In practice, it functioned more like a chute. Criminals were chained by the wrists to the wall above, and by the ankles to some spot below. Then they were shoved into the Villain’s Gate, which flung them out just far enough that they wouldn’t be able cling to the wall before the chains around their arms jerked tight. After two or three weeks, they used the ones around the ankles to draw the corpse back into the city via a small hole down at street level. The whole wasn’t truly big enough for a fully-grown person to fit through, but it was plenty large enough for the remains. Rather than trying to cart a sack of bones and rotting flesh down the stairs, they simply brought it in below.
That meant the chains that attached to the wrists would need to be long enough to stretch all the way to the bottom of the wall. There would still be the fall into the bay, but it was a way down.
Kaie didn’t need to explain this to Judah. The giant was already moving, barking at the other soldiers on the wall to get up and form ranks. They fell in without a word of complaint or a missed step. Getting his own people sorted out wasn’t quite as seamless a process. Vaughan’s exhaustion was so palpable it made Kaie feel his own more acutely. He managed, though. They all managed.
The chains were bound up in pair of thick winches. It took some work, hoisting the bones below back up. Both legs pulled free when they got the body up to the lip of the chute, and there was more flesh hidden underneath the skirts than Kaie realized. The smell of rot hit them all as the body parts tumbled out. Peren wasn’t the only one to retch over the other side. Kaie was actually leaning over the other edge, sucking in the cleaner air for several seconds, before he was sure he was going to be okay.
Judah waited for him. Kaie wasn’t sure if that was out of respect, or because the giant wanted someone else to test the viability of the plan. It didn’t matter. It just meant he didn’t need to argue with someone else trying to go first.
The instant his hands touched the warm metal, a strange feeling came over him. He closed his eyes for a moment, half convinced he was going to be sick after all. Kaie knew he was still kneeling on the wall, his eyes screwed closed, gripping that weather-worn metal. But he also knew he was moving. His feet pushed off the edge of the wall, and he slid out into space. His legs flailed, and he was falling.
The chain jerked as it reached the end of the length they played out and ripped out of his hands. He expected to go hurtling toward the water. But something tied around his waist kept him still. Surprised, he looked down and was startled to find his shirt tied through the chain and looped around him. The fabric was showing signs of strain, and would rip if he depended on it much longer, but it worked. He didn’t remember tying it. In fact, if he concentrated, he could still feel its weight around his neck and shoulders while he crouched up on the wall. But that didn’t make any sense.
He was grateful. He wrapped his hands around the chain again, taking strain off the shirt and putting it back onto his arms. He shouted for the people up above to start lowering the chain. After a moment, he was moving at a slow and jerky pace.
Then there was a boom.
From his place on the wall he couldn’t see what was happening. He didn’t need to see. It was Mola’s explosion. He was sure of it.
He did see the cloud of dust and ash as it blotted out the sky. He even saw the chunk of stone hurtling into the section of wall where the winch for his chain was attached. He watched, helpless, as the winch tilted forward and then broke free of the wall.
He fell in truth then.
He managed to turn around in the air, under the theory he wanted to see his death coming.
It was a bad theory.
In his last second, he remembered the dragon. Words slipped past his lips before he realized he was speaking.
Maal! Help! Please!
Kaie dropped the chain and stumbled backward, on the top of the wall again. He sucked in several deep breaths of air, regretting it immediately as the last traces of the corpse’s stench hit his lungs. In an instant, he was gaging.
Kaie didn’t like to think about the dragon – or the man inside the dragon. It marked him, and he was sure that all sorts of supernatural attention was focused on him now because of it. But what else could it be? It felt real, every bit of it. He looked down at his hands, certain he would see them torn raw from when the chain jerked out of his grip. But they were fine.
Not important!
Still, Kaie wasn’t able to convince himself to tie his shirt to this chain. After half a second of arguing with himself about the stupidity of it, he moved over to the second chain, which was left untouched in the vision. Or, as much of it as he saw. It got him some raised eyebrows, but no one said anything. He was the Whore King now. No one was going to question anything he did. Not yet, anyway.
He shoved his shirt through two of the links and then tied it around his waist. Then he pushed himself into the chute. He shot downward and out into space. His legs spun, instinctually looking for purchase. He reached the end of the length of chain and it ripped free of his hands. The shirt held, swinging him back and slamming him into the wall. His head slammed into the stone and he nearly blacked out. Then it was over and he could wrap his throbbing hands around the metal and take the pressure off his fraying shirt.
He shouted and the people above began lowering him. To his right, he saw another man hurtling down on the first chain. He thoug
ht the soldier’s name was Roman.
There was a boom.
Kaie closed his eyes. He didn’t want to see the sky turn dark again. And he didn’t want to watch the chunk of stone collide with the winch holding his life a second time.
Someone screamed. It wasn’t until the sound plummeted past that Kaie was sure it wasn’t him. His eyes fluttered open, a surge of relief taking his breath away and making his whole body go slack for a moment. He wasn’t going to fall again. For the first time.
He didn’t check on Roman. There was no need.
After a long handful of moments the chain began to descend again. Smoke billowed out to surround him. The opening below was spewing it forth as the city burned. On this side of the wall, he was safe from the blaze.
Of course, the smoke was another matter. It grew thick around him, obscuring his vision and coating his nose and throat. He did vomit then. The bile burned like acid as it poured out of him. The chain stopped going down, though it took him some time to realize it.
He couldn’t see the ocean. From above the drop didn’t look so bad, but he remembered his fall. Or the vision of it. He remembered the water rushing up to swallow him.
He couldn’t breathe. Every gasp for air left his head feeling lighter and his eyelids heavier. Kaie knew he had a minute – maybe two. Then it didn’t matter how far the water was. Once he lost consciousness he was dead.
He swung his feet out toward the wall. He hoped to push himself free of the smoke just long enough to see the ocean. But it didn’t work the way he planned. Where there should be stone, his legs found nothing but open air.
His mind was sluggish. He tried to will the fog out of his head, but there were other matters demanding more attention. Breathing, for example. If his feet weren’t hitting the wall, that meant there wasn’t a wall for them to hit. That made sense. Probably. The chains… There was something about the chains, if he could just managed to think of it.