With Anchor leading, the party of warriors tightened their grips on their reins and urged their horses deeper into Cinderbark Wood.
A soft growl greeted Rachel as she swung open the circus wagon door. There, on an empty sleeping cot, sat a small dog. A pathetic little creature with a scabrous coat and ragged, chewed ears, he glared up at Rachel with tiny black eyes.
“Poor thing.” Rachel scooped the dog up.
He tried to bite her, but lacked the strength to do any harm.
“Where’s your mistress?” Rachel ruffled the pup’s ears. “Has she abandoned you, eh?”
Of the puppeteer there was no sign, yet all of her possessions remained undisturbed within the gaudy carriage. The wagon was much more spacious than it had appeared from outside. The front half had been given over to living space: the narrow cot, some wall-mounted cabinets full of clothes and books and pots and pans, a small sink and a bucket, and even a neat little potbelly stove for heating and cooking. Beyond this, a door opened into a storage space at the rear where Mina Greene kept the treasures of her trade. Rachel moved towards it.
Trench took one look inside and said, “Check for provisions. There’s nothing to be gained by searching through that junk.”
“I saw this circus in Sandport,” Rachel said. “I just need to check on something.” She squeezed into a narrow aisle between a wall of packing crates on the right-hand side and shelves on the left. The shelves were crammed with all manner of strange objects-hound skulls and monkey paws, beads and carved wooden figurines, glass spheres and bottles, and bell jars in which floated bizarrely misshapen creatures. On display were dead fish with jaws full of needlelike teeth, tiny skeletons, and grotesque creatures with too many eyes or limbs. Some of them even looked partly human.
“Even in my day,” Trench observed from his seat on the cot, “Deepgate received its fair share of showmen and tricksters. These are nothing but the fetuses of camels and other beasts. There’s no magic here.”
“This wagon came to Sandport,” Rachel said. “The show-woman displayed something…” She shrugged. “Something I’ve never seen before. It looked like a living demon.”
Trench shook his head. “Unlikely,” he said. “Hell’s creatures can survive as shades for a while, if they keep themselves in darkness, but for them to physically walk upon the earth they require another source of power. That’s why I required your friend’s body to carry my soul beyond Deepgate, and why the Mesmerists must spread their Veil over the lands they plan to conquer…” He hesitated, as though considering another option, and then finally said, “No, this show-woman simply tricked the crowd.”
Rachel continued to search through the packing crates, looking for the one Greene had displayed to the Sandporters. And then she saw it, stacked on the top of the pile. “Help me down with this, will you?”
Between them they lowered the crate, and carried it back outside where they set it down upon the white sands. Rachel pried the lid off with her knife to reveal the wretched creature cowering within.
Trench hissed when he saw the contents of the crate. “I had hoped not to see one of these things here.” He rubbed a hand across his furrowed brow. “I would advise killing it quickly, but that won’t be easy.”
The creature in the crate was breathing in wet gasps. It had assumed the same form Rachel had first seen in Sandport: a knot of flesh and muscle and wood combined. White eyes peered up at them from a bulbous lump which might have been a head. It made a pitiful whimpering sound.
“Then it is a demon?” Rachel asked.
“The term ‘demon’ is meaningless-it applies to all of Hell’s creatures. All demons are simply physical incarnations of souls on earth.” His eyes narrowed on the creature. “By rights they require a bloodmist to survive in this realm, but this…no, not this.”
“What is it?”
“An abomination. A Mesmerist experiment. King Menoa has long been trying to construct a form for his warriors that could survive on earth without relying on the Veil. He had limited success with shape-shifters such as this one, part living and part dead. However, they lack the will to maintain a single physical shape for long because they are unable to resist persuasion.”
“Greene turned it into a chair before the mob.”
The angel grunted. “It will assume any shape you order it to, within certain limits. Smaller objects must be denser, larger ones less substantial, as it can only stretch its flesh so far.” He inclined his head at the thing. “Try it and see.”
“No,” the creature wailed. “It hurts. Send me back to Hell.”
“Mesmerist filth,” Trench spat. “Menoa sent you here to spy.”
The thing’s bulbous head shook. “No,” it moaned. “I have been the victim of sorcery. The mortal woman who owns this wagon summoned me here. I was powerless to resist.”
“Mina Greene is a thaumaturge?” Rachel asked.
“One of the greatest.”
Rachel cast an instinctive glance around the forest. “And where is she now?”
The demon’s many muscles flexed and glistened. “She left six days ago to look for a door into Hell. This forest is riddled with them: old doors through which many phantasms have passed.”
Trench scoffed. “Yes, phantasms. Portals like those are useless to anything except ghosts. No human could pass through such a vaporous gate.”
“But she has help,” the demon said.
The puppy in Rachel’s arms gave a low growl.
The shape-shifter’s eyes widened momentarily. “I have said too much,” it said. “Please change me into something small and quick-a hare, perhaps, or a bat. Let me go to the Veil.”
Rachel studied the puppeteer’s dog. Its growl had been…opportune, if nothing else. Could this mangy creature also be a shape-shifter? But the pup ignored her stare, lapping at the assassin’s thumb instead. Rachel sighed. This forest was making her paranoid.
Cinderbark Wood remained deathly still. Nothing moved among the painted boles and soft sands except a few wisps of fog creeping in from the north.
Fog?
In the desert?
“Ignore everything it says,” Trench said. “Menoa’s creatures can’t help but lie. If you don’t wish to kill the thing now, I propose we put it to use.” He leaned over the crate.
The demon cried out again.
Before Rachel could stop him, Trench had whispered a word into the demon’s ear. The thing in the crate screamed as its shape began to change. Its bones folded inwards with cracking sounds, and its flesh turned from pink and red to the colour of raw steel. With every heartbeat it grew smaller and its cries became more distant.
“What are you doing to it?” Rachel cried.
“We’ve walked far enough without a decent weapon,” Trench growled. He reached inside the crate, and then withdrew his hand.
He was holding a sword: a shining steel weapon with a plain leather-bound hilt and copper-coloured pommel. Rainbow colours swept across the blade as the angel examined it by the light of phosphorescent branches. “This is an example of one of King Menoa’s first experiments to fuse the souls of the dead with corporeal materials,” he said.
Rachel stared in horror. “Is the demon conscious? Does it still feel?”
“It does,” Trench replied. “But do not pity it. It is more deceitful and cunning than it appears. It has intimate knowledge of the shapes of many weapons and can change between them in a heartbeat. Such creatures were once given to Pandemerian nobles as gifts-they can be far stronger than normal steel or glass, and capable of adapting to any combat situation. Shiftblades, we call them in the Maze.”
Rachel dragged her eyes away from the strange sword. A thought occurred to her. “Menoa’s first experiments?”
Trench grunted. “He moved on.”
Rachel was about to ask him to expound, but she suddenly noticed that the fog had grown much denser. Whorls of mist drifted through the trees like the tentacles of some creeping monster. She could barely see ten
yards to the north of them. A sudden chill gripped her. “We’d better get going,” she said.
But Trench didn’t move. He was staring intently into the grey pall that seemed to roll through the trees towards them. “Is such weather normal for this time of year?” he asked.
“Not this deep in the Deadsands,” she replied. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.” And then she noticed an odd briny odor in the air. “That smell…” she whispered, suddenly on edge. Her senses were tingling. “Trench, this is a sea mist.”
The angel grinned, and for a heartbeat Rachel could almost believe that it was Dill. Despite his ruined hands and missing wings, Trench’s expression was so unexpected and natural that it seemed to Rachel that her old friend was back before her.
“Cospinol,” Trench said.
Throughout the trek through Cinderbark Wood Jack Caulker prayed for another accident-a fetlock brushing against a protruding root, a poison cache cracked open by a clumsy hoof, a rider failing to duck in time below overhanging branches-anything to make these heathens appreciate the utter insanity of this adventure.
He dwelled on the vision Anchor’s soulpearl had given him-that terrifying plummet from those airy heights into the mist-chilled valley below-and he shuddered. Caulker had experienced that woman’s death. He had been punished for her crimes, and each time Caulker slept, the tethered giant would become his judge and executioner once more.
Up ahead, John Anchor laughed at something Ramnir had said. Despite the dangers of this hideous stone forest and the stench of these heathen riders and the great weight of the skyship he dragged behind him-and the countless souls he had eaten-the tethered man had laughed. What terrors did those consumed souls bring to Anchor’s slumber? If the giant relived the deaths of those he had murdered, then how could he laugh?
Caulker felt small and weak and bitter, and he hated Anchor for that feeling.
He considered the Mesmerists, imagining himself striding through the halls of some glorious castle in Hell. And why should Hell not have castles as glorious as any of those in Heaven? Ayen had spurned mankind, but now Hell sought to embrace it. He pictured John Anchor in chains-real chains, not just this greasy harness he carried on his shoulders.
For the first time in days, the cutthroat smiled.
The horse lurched, bringing him back to the here and now. The Heshette horseman sharing Caulker’s saddle had pulled sharply on the reins to steer his beast around a clutch of violet branches. Caulker realized he had been staring at Anchor’s pouch of soulpearls.
All those dreams of death. These were ghosts trapped in glass-every one of them murdered by Anchor. Caulker recalled the battle-archon’s spirit he had released from its pearl amidst the ruins of the Widow’s Hook, and now he began to understand exactly why that apparition had attacked the tethered man so vehemently.
What would happen if all of those soulpearls were broken at once?
The woodland thinned as they crested a shallow rise. Ancient trees loomed at the limits of the fog like gaudy harlequins, their painted claws reaching out to each other as though frozen in dance. Anchor took advantage of wider gaps between the poisoned boles, steering his rope so that he avoided the worst of the branches overhead. Behind him the rest of the party moved in silence but for the rustle of tackle and the clinking of the horsemen’s fetishes. The air filled with the steaming breaths of their mounts, the occasional snort.
Anchor halted and raised his hand. The Heshette reined in their horses behind him. A moment passed in which every man strained to see through the fog.
Caulker stared into the grey gloom, moistening his lips. Had Anchor spotted the scarred angel, or one of her companions? Perhaps even a Spine patrol? He failed to suppress a smile. A diversion might prove fruitful.
And then a cheerful voice came out of the mists. “The Adamantine Man! By the Seven Gods, I am glad to see you.”
Caulker watched in disbelief as a figure in tattered mail approached them through the coloured trees. He held before him a naked sword, but slackly, without any apparent intention of using the weapon. A second figure-a female Spine assassin-followed behind him.
Caulker ground his teeth and spat. He could not believe this turn of events. It seemed that even Anchor’s supposed enemies, the very companions of those he was here to kill, were welcoming him.
14
REVELATIONS
With his rope and harness, his night-hued skin, and arms and shoulders that looked powerful enough to crush an ox, he was certainly the strangest man Rachel had ever seen. Yet he beamed at Trench and herself with such open delight that she felt herself relaxing, despite the crowd of mounted Heshette warriors hovering in his wake.
“The very people I look for,” the giant boomed. “Yes? The boy angel and his assassin friend from Sandport. Good, good-we have much to discuss.”
Rachel frowned. The very people he was looking for? Her unease began to creep back. She clutched the puppeteer’s dog to her breast. It gave a gentle growl.
Trench clasped hands with the big man. “I must speak with Cospinol at once,” he said. “I have an urgent message to deliver.”
Now Anchor’s brow creased. “You have the right body, but the wrong soul,” he remarked, staring down at the angel. “Very strange.” He flicked his eyes to Rachel and studied her dog for a moment, before returning his attention to Trench. “It is just you with the wrong-shape soul. Wrong-shape sword, too-a shiftblade, yes?”
“That’s not important,” Trench replied. “Tell Cospinol-”
“It is important,” Anchor persisted. “You were dead, yes? Dead souls should not be moving the living like puppets. Dead souls should not carry demons with them.” He turned to Rachel and pointed at the pup she carried. “And you…where did you find this creature?”
“The dog?”
“It is not just a dog.”
Rachel hesitated. “It belonged to a thaumaturge.”
Anchor grinned. “Belonged? No, I think it is the other way around. Basilis is much older than he appears. Older than John Anchor, even.”
A soft sound came from the animal’s throat.
Rachel looked closely at the pup. It nuzzled her fingers. She could feel its heart beating, the warmth of its tiny body against her palm. It weighed nothing, a harmless ball of fur.
Basilis?
Trench was becoming agitated. He quickly told the giant all about his ascent from Hell, his possession of Dill’s body, and their escape from Deepgate. As his story unfolded, the Heshette edged their horses nearer. Soon Rachel felt their dark eyes slide to her Spine armour. She held the puppy close to her chest. Quietly she began to note their various weapons.
As Trench and Anchor continued to converse, Rachel learned that the giant had come here in response to the Mesmerist threat against his own land. At Anchor’s talk of gods and skyships, the assassin found her eyes lift in awe to follow that huge rope up into the foggy skies. The god of brine and fog? Trench refused to relay his message to Cospinol via Anchor, insisting instead on an audience with this sea god himself. The tethered giant thought about this for a long moment, then agreed. “Cospinol will hear you,” he said. “But you must leave the shiftblade down here. He fears assassination.”
Behind him, the rope trembled.
“He does not fear assassination,” Anchor corrected himself. “But leave the shiftblade anyway.” His gaze lingered on Mina Greene’s dog, but then he peered up and studied the poisonous canopy. “I fear to bring Cospinol’s ship all the way down through these branches,” he announced. “But there are gaps between the trees through which it may be possible to lower a rope, if the ship is near enough to the ground.”
He reached behind his back and began to heave the rope down towards him.
Rachel, it seemed, was not the only one here to be witnessing this spectacle for the first time, for all the Heshette turned their gazes upwards and began to mutter among themselves and point at the heavens in nervous expectation. She wondered how Anchor h
ad come to travel with such a ragged crew, but then her attention snapped quickly to the sky. The shadow of something massive was descending upon Cinderbark Wood.
As Anchor pulled the rope down hand over fist he called out, “You stay with your friend’s body, Rachel Hael? Even though his soul is gone to Hell.”
Rachel realized he had spoken to her. “I…” she began. The object above seemed impossibly vast; it was difficult to pull her eyes away from it. “We made a deal. I help Trench deliver his message, and he gives up Dill’s body.”
“And where is your other companion? The scarred one.”
“She…” Rachel’s instincts shouted a warning. How did this stranger know about Carnival? How did he know how to find them? The very people I look for. The answer dawned on her at once. Cospinol was Ulcis’s brother.
Oh, shit.
“I haven’t seen her in weeks,” she replied quickly. “She abandoned us before we reached Sandport.” Rachel dared not tell the man about her suspicions that Carnival had been shadowing them. A clash between the scarred angel and this stranger would not help their situation.
Anchor grinned as he continued to drag span after span of rope down from the sky. “Not such a good friend, then, eh?” The stench of brine intensified as the fog above the canopy grew ever darker. “A friend does not leave her companions behind.”
“I wouldn’t exactly call her a friend.” Rachel could hear chilling sounds issuing from above now. Distant howling? She kept her gaze pinned to the heavens. The dog in her arms barked, and she stroked its coat to calm the little thing. “What do you want with her?”
The big man beamed. “I bear her no grudge.”
Great spars of timber appeared through the gloom over their heads, thousands of them. Like the upturned masts and yards of a whole flotilla of ships, they formed a vast, cluttered mass of wood which stretched as far as Rachel could see. There were armoured figures hanging everywhere among this construction-the source, the assassin now realized, of the growing clamour. She gave an involuntary gasp.
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