Welling crawled toward her with his key, while Dayne grabbed the third key and charged over to her. Welling was able to get the key into one of her leg shackles, but was struck with a ball in his side before he could turn it. Another bladed disc flew, and Welling scurried out of the way to save himself.
It didn’t matter. Dayne was at her, putting himself between her and the salvo. Everything bombarded him, striking his back and legs. He bore it, he had to, as he unlocked the shackle around her waist. Free of that, she reached around him with the shield, protecting him as he bent down and unlocked her legs.
He heard great crashes behind him. He risked a brief glance to see Welling disabling more of the machines with well-thrown steel balls.
One more ball came, knocking Dayne in the head.
Despite his senses spinning, despite the pain, Dayne got Jerinne free, and pulled her off to the side. Though he started to stumble, and she ended up pulling him as much as he did her. They both collapsed on the floor near Welling.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” she said.
“You’d have done the same.”
“How are you?” Welling asked. For the moment, the space they huddled in was safe, and Welling seemed to have an eye out, watching for that to change. “Both of you?”
“Nothing a week in the hospital ward won’t heal,” Jerinne said.
“I . . . I will—” Dayne tried to say he’d recover, but the words weren’t finding their way to his mouth.
“You’re addled,” Welling said.
“That’s his prison, you see,” Sholiar’s voice came. “All I had to do was give him a nice dangerous charge to save someone, and he would move the world to let himself take their pain.”
“Can you walk?” Welling asked, though his question seemed directed at Jerinne.
“I think so.”
“Stairs that way, down and out. Get him and yourself to a Yellowshield or a doctor as soon as you can.”
Dayne grabbed Welling’s arm, and tried to tell him that he wouldn’t leave, he wouldn’t abandon Joshea Brondar, that Welling needed his help. But all that came out was, “You . . . Joshea . . .”
Welling picked up a hammer off the floor. “Get out of here. I’ll get Joshea and be right behind you.”
Dayne wanted to argue more, but Jerinne was pulling him up, dragging him toward the exit. He couldn’t leave Welling, but he couldn’t let her go alone, either. Welling gave him a nod—he understood. Neither Dayne or Jerinne were in any shape to be of any use to him. As Dayne reached the door, he heard Minox Welling call out to the room.
“All right, Sholiar, let’s play the last game.”
* * *
Satrine found herself somewhere dark and cramped, her hands tied behind her back. Mouth gagged. And her head was killing her. She must have blacked out when she was knocked to the floor. She needed to stop getting hit in the head.
So this was trouble.
“What are you going to do with her?” she heard someone ask. “Throw her in the river?”
“See, that’s just wasteful.” That was Quoyell. “There’s no need to throw away something we can get value out of.”
Satrine stayed still for the moment. Let them think she was still out. Wait until it was an opportune moment to try to free herself.
“So put her on the boat?”
“No, no. On the cart. Senek can have her.”
“I thought he just wanted the children.”
Children. They were involved in that. She was right.
“He’s apparently branching out now. I was told he needed ‘mothers.’ More of his . . . experiments.” Quoyell gave an audible shudder. “I think we’re better off not knowing.”
“So the other one?”
“Boat. Young and strong, that one. And a pain in the ass.”
“Older than most of the ones we’re sending.”
“But young enough to sell.” Satrine was suddenly heaved up—whatever she was inside was lifted and moved. She was being placed on the horse cart. “Either way, get that boat launched. In a few minutes we’re going to want to be gone.”
“There’re still a few crates to load.”
“Forget them. Just get the ship launched.”
“And the papers?”
“Burn them.”
“And what about me?” Third voice. Probably Hunsen.
“I don’t care. Lie low here, hop on that boat and see the world. Doesn’t matter.”
“I didn’t sign up for either of those.”
“There’s a lot we didn’t sign for, son,” Quoyell said. It sounded like he was getting into the driver’s seat of the cart. “But this is what we get.”
“After what we did? What we went through? You do get that the two of us almost died in that boiler room? We weren’t even supposed to be a part of—”
“But you didn’t die,” Quoyell said. “Stop dwelling, unless you want to join Tenning.”
“He was just scared—”
“We don’t have time to argue this. You’ve got money on the boat. Sail out or take your share and hide here. It’s not my problem. I have the Brotherhood to answer to.” The reins snapped and the cart started to move.
Satrine took advantage of the noise to see how much she could move. She was definitely in a trunk of some sort. Not much space to move. Her hands were pretty well tied, almost no way to get any leverage. Her legs were bent back behind her, so she could touch her feet. Not that it did her much good.
She could feel that her belt and coat had been taken. So, no crossbow, no handstick, no irons. Not that they would help her in this predicament.
But she did still have her boots, including the one that kept digging into her foot.
She was rolling in the street now. If she didn’t have a plan to get out soon . . . she didn’t want to think where that would lead.
Certainly nowhere good for her. Or for Loren and the girls.
She had to think, for their sake. She tried twisting her hands about, but definitely got nowhere in terms of getting herself loose. She managed to thrash about a little—hopefully not enough to get Quoyell’s notice—and pushed the lid of the trunk a little. So it wasn’t latched. If she could get loose, she could get out.
What had she even said last to her girls this morning? She couldn’t remember. She had left in a hurry with Phillen and Jerinne.
Saints, if nothing else, let Jerinne be all right. She was already fond of Rian. She might just do what Satrine wanted to ask of her out of her own volition.
But if Satrine did get out of this, she was going to ask Jerinne. She needed a plan, in case of the next emergency.
“All right, Tricky, how would you get out of this?” she asked herself. Of course, she didn’t get out of it when this exact thing happened to her at fourteen. And that led her to Waisholm and everything that followed.
“Fine,” she muttered. “What would have made a difference then? What do you have now that you didn’t?” She had training, experience, knowledge. But she’d trade all of those right now for a knife hidden in her sleeve.
“Wait a minute,” she said, even though there was no one to talk to but herself. Why was the boot digging into her foot?
She stretched backward just enough that she could manage a few fingers inside her boot, feeling around. There was something there. A lump pushing inside the boot.
Oh, thank every saint for gang boys and their crazy schemes. The boot had a goddamn secret pocket.
And that pocket had a knife.
* * *
As Minox wound his way up the spiral staircase to the next floor, Sholiar seemed to have gone quiet. No more comments or needling. Perhaps that had been for Dayne’s benefit. Perhaps he didn’t find Minox quite as much fun.
Minox had an urge to call out to Sholiar. So many questions. How d
id he know about Fenner and Evoy? How did he know about Jillian?
Then the answer was obvious. He had had Nyla captive for hours. Surely she divulged much personal information about Minox, if that’s what Sholiar sought.
The real question was, why did he take Joshea? He saw Joshea at the hospital, and at the stationhouse. But why would he know to take him as a means to bait Minox?
As Minox approached the door, the answer came to him: the same reason he had taken Rencir. Sholiar had been planning some sort of “game” for Minox for a while, because Minox was the one talked about in the newsprints, especially in Rencir’s articles.
Though that raised the obvious question, why had Sholiar ignored Rainey? She had been mentioned less in Rencir’s articles, out of the man’s own prejudices. Perhaps Sholiar had assumed that Minox was the inspector to pay attention to.
And perhaps that presumption had allowed Rainey to save Nyla. Hopefully. He had to take that on faith.
The door was shut, and did not open when Minox tried it.
“Sholiar!” he called out. “What’s next?”
There was no response.
“Sholiar!”
The echoy voice reverberated through the room. “What is it, Inspector? I’m busy.” Now, Minox could focus on the source of the voice. Earhorns and pipes lined the ceiling. So where was Sholiar? Was he behind the door?
“Where is Joshea Brondar?”
“He’s not your concern, Inspector. Go home, Inspector. I’m sure you have a long day in the archives tomorrow.”
“Where is he?”
Silence.
Minox decided not to waste any more time. The door in front of him was the only way. He examined it quickly. Heavy wood. New hinges. Possibly reinforced with metal. Not like anything else in this building, and certainly not something he could easily bash down.
Not easily.
But unless it was bolted and bolstered on the bottom, a well-placed kick should crack the door lock and give him access.
He stepped back, and then charged forward, delivering a strong kick. The door cracked a bit, but didn’t give completely. He stepped back and gave it another kick. Then a third.
On the fourth, it opened.
The scene was now familiar. The gearbox machines, the victim strapped down.
Joshea was on the ground, stripped to his skivs and leather straps holding him at the wrists and ankles. Four gearbox machines surrounded him, each with a cleaver poised to drop on Joshea’s limbs.
Not poised. Held back. Joshea’s hands were surrounded in a sickly orange nimbus, thin and barely visible. As were the cleaver heads. They were dropping on him, and only his magic kept them from coming down on him.
But there was also Sholiar’s voice, now a silken whisper.
“Because your duty was to serve, soldier. Yet you failed. What of the Sauriyan Eleventh? What of Casper, and Menkin, and Onterin?”
“Shut it,” Joshea said through gritted teeth.
“And what would your father say—”
“Stop it!” Minox shouted. He stepped toward Joshea. He would get him out of those straps easily.
“Don’t move, Minox!” Joshea shouted. Minox stopped, and then he saw it.
The entire area was surrounded by spiderwire, crisscrossing in every direction. Minox saw no way to get to Joshea without disturbing it.
“Tear this apart!” Joshea called. “I can’t hold it back much longer!”
Minox tried to summon his magic, but everything in him was numb. The gauntlet blocked him; he couldn’t even get a grasp on the power. “I can’t!”
“So sad and helpless,” Sholiar said. “That great inquisitive mind can’t help you here. No puzzle to solve, no mystery to unlock. Just a man facing his inevitable demise, and you as witness.”
“What’s this game, Sholiar?”
“You keep saying game, Inspector, when this is deadly serious.” Sholiar’s voice echoed. “But you know about deadly, right, soldier? You’ve seen it.”
“You let him go! That was the agreement!”
“The only agreement was that if you didn’t come here by nine bells, he would die. I never said he wouldn’t if you did come.”
“Minox,” Joshea whispered, tilting his head up. “Don’t risk yourself for me. Just get him.”
“So noble, soldier. Where was that when your duty was at stake?”
“Shut it!” Joshea shouted. “I did . . . I did. . . .”
“I know what you did,” Sholiar said. “You thought you could hide it, control it? Even with your . . . kindred spirit here, you know you’re out of control. You’re nothing but a dirty, stinking mage. Isn’t that what your father would say?”
“Stop it!” Tears were on Joshea’s face. The magical energy holding the cleavers at bay was faltering.
Minox couldn’t get close. Not without hitting the spiderwire, and there was no telling what that would do.
“Sholiar!” Minox called out. “Your quarrel is with me!”
“No, Inspector. Yours is with me.”
“I promise you—” Minox started.
“Here is my promise, Inspector. I’m going to walk out the front door, and you’re going to helplessly watch your Uncircled compatriot die. And I will vanish into the night. My next murder in this city might be tomorrow, or next month, or in a hundred years. It doesn’t matter, because you’ve helped make me more legend than man. The Brotherhood asked me to orchestrate a symphony of fear, and you’ve so helpfully played your instrument. Killing Brondar here, that’s the grace note.”
“Who are they?” Minox called out. “Who are you talking about?”
There was no answer. No sound but the grinding of gears and Joshea’s strained breathing.
“Sholiar!”
“Go, Minox,” Joshea said. “You can’t save me. But you can get him.”
“I’m not going to leave you.” Minox tried to unlatch the gauntlet, claw it off.
“You have to.”
“No,” Minox said. He dropped to his knees and smashed his hand against the floor. “No one is going to tell me what I have to do.” He hit the floor again. “No one is going to be master over me.” Down on the floor again.
Olivant had said this hand was beyond his imagining. It held power that terrified him. But that power belonged to Minox; he would own it and tame it. No Circles, no special inquests, and certainly no saints-be-damned gauntlet would stop him.
And he would not lose the one person who understood.
He hit the floor one more time, and the gauntlet cracked slightly, and through that crack a spark flashed in the center of his hand. Minox held on to that spark, and pushed it until he could breathe it into a flame. The gauntlet wanted to quash it, dry up every drop of power he had within him. It was almost like trying to fight a living thing, an angry beast trying to eat his hand.
But now that he had that flame, he wasn’t going to let it go. Olivant said he held enough power to destroy the city, and by every saint, he would wield that now, no matter the cost.
“Minox, go—” Joshea whispered.
He couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. All he could do was hold on to the flame inside him. He pushed it against the gauntlet, while bringing up his arm one more time, bringing it down to the floor.
The gauntlet shattered, the floor cracked open, and a rush of magic flooded through him.
And Minox was the fire, the flood, the storm.
Everything poured out of him, enveloping around Joshea as the machines snapped the cleavers down on him.
Minox’s energy hit the machines and turned them to dust.
Minox pulled Joshea to him, the magic burning the spiderwire and gearboxes to ash. Joshea went limp, and Minox held his inert body close as he surrounded himself in a sphere of green fire.
“I can’t—I
can’t—” Joshea muttered.
Minox expanded the sphere. “And you don’t have to. No one will face this house of death again.”
He pushed out farther, burning through the floor, and he and Joshea dropped down to the ground floor, landing as gently as stepping off a curb. His energy followed in his wake, turning every stone, every pipe, every blade and gear and chain into so much ash and dust.
Minox noticed the front desk was now unmanned. Whether the clerk had been let go, or was always Sholiar in disguise, he neither knew nor cared. It didn’t matter.
Carrying Joshea over his shoulder, Minox walked out into the street, as the Kittrick Hotel fell apart behind him.
Chapter 27
SATRINE SLOWLY SLID the knife out of the boot with just two fingers. The cart rolled to a stop while she did that, but then started moving again, turning right. Away from the water. She didn’t know the Trelan streets well enough to know how far they had gone, where she was now. But the distance between her and the dockhouse was growing.
She managed to flip the knife around and work it into the knot of the rope. She sawed away at it, hampered by her lack of leverage. She sensed they were now on a major road, based on the echo of the wheels, the sound of other carts around them. Even at this hour, there would be some people in the streets. If she got out, there would be witnesses. That was all she needed.
Was Quoyell in his uniform? Would people see a constable trying to subdue a marshal, or an ordinary citizen?
Would that matter?
She cut through some of the fibers of the rope. Not enough to get loose, but enough to give her a bit of play with her wrists. Enough to move the knife into a better position.
Minutes were passing. The cart was getting farther away. Was she still in Trelan, or some residential neighborhood? Where was she being taken? They mentioned someone named Senek and experiments. Somewhere on the Royal College campus? No, that was in the other direction.
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