Breaking Chaos

by Ben Galley

  She patted Bezel’s wing and got to standing, catching Farazar eying the falcon from his pile of clothes, watching him carefully. Nilith frowned.

  Anoish took some water from a nearby communal trough. Something nice about the city, for once. It had its beauty and conveniences, Nilith had to admit. But so did any city, and most of them didn’t see murder as a national pastime. She listened to the horse’s slurping as she stared up at the Piercer between a gap in two narrow spires.

  Smoke still poured from its tip, a fainter grey now. There were no flames, at least that she could see. She wondered where this supposed flying machine had come from, and which sorceress or sorcerer had a hand in it. Prince Phylar? Surely not. How untimely that would be, for him, at least. He would find the prized Sanctuary as empty as a bad gambler’s pockets.

  ‘How far to the Grand Nyxwell, do you reckon, Heles? It feels like an age since I was in the city.’

  ‘As the rook flies, maybe forty, fifty miles? Through the streets, avoiding certain places… sixty.’

  Nilith sighed. ‘That sounds like such a small number, considering all the miles behind me, and yet such a huge number at the same time.’

  ‘It’s the last stretch. That’s always the hardest part, or so they say. I haven’t left the Core in more than a decade.’

  Nilith looked at the scrutiniser, who was staring up at the Cloudpiercer with narrowed eyes, as if blaming it for all those years.

  ‘What made you work for the Chamber?’ she asked.

  Heles snorted. ‘The more important question is why did I carry on working for the Chamber?’ she replied, knuckling the tattoos on her jaw and the side of her head. ‘Twelve years, I’ve given Chamberlain Rebene and your so-called emperor. But that being said, it was my father’s job before mine. I was a wayward child, no proper daughter of a scrutiniser. I refused to follow in his footsteps, though he wanted it desperately for me. He used to come home stinking of shit, or covered in blood. One time he came home half-dead and I decided that night, only ten years old, that I didn’t want that life. I took to trying to keep him from working. Hiding his shoes, getting in fights. Ran my mother spare, I did, but his dedication was absolute. He punished me black and blue, but he always maintained this idea I would change. That I would come right. I proved him correct, in the end, but not before being so angry with him I started a fire in the cellars beneath our hole of a building. A child’s idea; it was soaked in emotion and utterly without sense. I wanted to show him he was wrong: that I would match his view of me. The fire spread to a bucket of tar-rags, and all too quickly, I couldn’t stop it.’ Heles eyes were glazed with memories. ‘Two houses burnt. Fifteen souls in all died that night. Two families, including mine.’

  ‘I—’ Nilith began to speak, but Heles shook her head.

  ‘Don’t do that. I’ve had plenty of time to torture myself with those memories. I know I was scared, stupid. Young. The past is for keeping mistakes in, and that’s what I did. I dodged the soulstealers and orphanages and survived the streets until I was old enough to hold a spear and guard a door. That door was in the Low Docks, and one night I’m chasing some fuckhead thief along the piers, and I run into my father, literally speaking. Stopped my heart nearly dead to see that proud face a-glow and dark from the burns. I wouldn’t have recognised him if he hadn’t said my name. He was bound to some stealer boss in their warehouses.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘First thing I did was forget about the thief. Then I went to find the foreman of the warehouse and punched him right in the nose. Dragged him to his boss, stabbed them both in their guts, and then left their bodies in the gutter. Didn’t wait for the scribes and their towers of claims, as I should have, but at least I gave them the justice they deserved. As for my father, him I set free. Put him out of his misery as kind as I could. Not the way of the Code perhaps, but seeing as the rest of the city bends the Code, why shouldn’t I? I took a job at the nearest Chamber office and didn’t look back.’

  Nilith shared Heles’ bitterness. Though the details were changed, it was a story she had heard many times before. And like all the others, she tucked it away in her mind. Those stories had been like bricks of a wall to her. Once, they had built a purpose; now, they shored up her reserve.

  Heles continued. ‘That’s what made me work for the Chamber, Majesty. I swore to serve fifteen years for the fifteen innocent people I killed. Call it guilt, if you will. It might have been that at the start. Now it is duty, and I know why my father stepped out our door every day with the black uniform on. For all the other fathers and mothers, brothers, sisters, cousins and plain old fucking neighbours who don’t have a choice in life or death.’ The anger got the better of her, and Heles shuddered. ‘You know they say there are more dead in this city than there are living?’

  ‘I can tell you it’s true,’ said Nilith. ‘I’ve seen the city charter.’

  Heles shook her head, but the empress was firm.

  ‘I looked at the charter not long before I had this grand idea of mine. It was one of the things that pushed me over the edge. This kingdom is more dead than alive, and if it doesn’t stop here, the same will eventually be true of the Scatter Isles, then Krass, and Skol, and whatever lands lie beyond.’

  ‘And that is why I bend the Code now, and choose to help you,’ said the scrutiniser, as if shoring up her own reserve, and proving to herself her decision had been the right one. ‘Might I ask a question?’

  Nilith nodded, and Heles leaned close, conspiratorial.

  ‘How are you going to do it?’ she muttered.

  Nilith shook her head. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The Grand Nyxwell. You’re going to just throw him in? Claim him there and then?’

  ‘I—’ Nilith had thought long and hard about that very moment. ‘I’ll announce myself to the Nyxites. Have them protect the body while I call for the Cloud Court and Sisine. The citizens will gather to witness the crowning, as is tradition, and after Farazar is bound, I’ll have my say.’

  ‘I have to ask: what if you run out of time?’

  ‘Then Farazar will vanish into oblivion, and Sisine will be empress. Her father made sure she stood above the rest of the Court, gave her a share of the army, too. I am empress in marriage only. But I have time.’ Though barely.

  ‘Then what?’

  Nilith was about to answer when she heard a gasp from behind them, previously masked by Anoish’s last slurps. She whirled, hands on the sword.

  Bezel was in the middle of twitching, still half-asleep but rousing quickly. Soon enough his eyes were open and wide.

  ‘She’s…’ The falcon paused to shake violently. His eyes scrunched up in pain. ‘She’s ringing the fucking bell!’ he hissed.

  Nilith rushed to Bezel’s side. She tried to hold his wings still, but it just hurt him more. ‘How many?’

  ‘Seven? I… agh!’ The falcon’s beak opened wide as he cried out. ‘It’s been a fucking pleasure, Nilith. If I ever see you again, you owe me big, remem—’

  Bezel convulsed again, and in that moment the spell began to bite. At the same time, Farazar leapt for the falcon, placing a hand on the falcon’s feathers just as he was whisked into a crackling rift in the air.

  ‘Farazar!’

  The ghost’s hand was dragged into the rift, somehow keeping it open. His arm began to stretch into the flashing light, pulling his shoulder and head towards it.

  With a ring, the obsidian sword was brandished high aloft. The air and dust rushing around her, Nilith swung down as hard as she could manage.

  Sisine barged into her room so quickly she sent her guards flying. Apologies had not passed her lips since early childhood, and she was not about to break that streak now, exhausted and covered in blood as she was.

  She stormed onwards, winding deeper and deeper into her chambers until she came to her private bedroom.

  The chest flew open, splintering the foot of her bed with its metal edges. Sisine snatched up the small bell and
wrapped white knuckles around it.

  ‘Mother!’ she yelled, thrashing ring after ring out of the bell. Clang, clang, clang! Seven, eight, nine…

  With a crackle, the air before her split. A sudden wind buffeted her torn and blood-washed white silks. Feathers flew at her, and as the thrashing shape of the falcon began to form, she heard a long, drawn-out wail accompany him. It sounded like her father’s voice. Bezel collapsed onto her bed-linens, still somehow wrapped up in the spell. Above him, where the air was still split, a spectral hand appeared, groping for her with blue fingers. Behind it came a face Sisine recognised. It was faint, its vapours barely holding together, and it lasted but a moment before the spell broke, and the air rejoined with a wobble.

  Sisine slammed the lid of the chest, staring the falcon in the eye. He looked damaged somehow, bloodied on his side, and stiff as he pulled himself up to match her stare.

  ‘Explain yourself, bird. Where is my mother? If you’ve been lying to me, I—’

  ‘Had a spot of bother, have you, Sisine?’ he croaked. He had seen the blood on her. Spots of crimson still decorated her face and gold-wrapped forearms. A strand of ebony hair hung across her eyes, and she slapped it away. ‘I saw the smoke, too,’ he added.

  ‘You…’ She paused to wrestle her trembling lip. ‘You’re in the city? They are in the city?’

  Bezel was attempting to shuffle forwards. One wing hung at an angle. His hopping steps were slow and unsure. He spoke as he approached, and Sisine saw the contempt in the curve of his beak.

  ‘Yes, they are.’

  ‘Yet another fucking traitor!’ snarled Sisine. ‘I have had my fill of those today!’

  ‘My, my, and it’s barely past noon.’

  ‘Where is she? Where is my bitch of a mother?’ She thought of the blue face, crying out to her. My father. ‘Were you with them?!’

  ‘Just to the north of here, in fact. Sitting comfortably in the Low Docks, right under your nose. We were just about to have lunch, in fact.’

  ‘You despicable creature. You dare to betray me, your master?’ Sisine raised her hand to cuff him, to break his little neck, when he raised a pinion feather.

  ‘Tut tut. I wouldn’t do that. She had a message for you. One she asked me to deliver should you finally open the Sanctuary and realise how stupid you’ve been.’

  Sisine bared her teeth. ‘Speak quickly then, bird. Give me Nilith’s message, and then you will find out the punishment for crossing me.’

  Bezel stared at her, holding his smile. He shuffled forward, coming to a halt a mere foot from her face. Sisine saw the crusted blood under his wing. She could smell the rot on him. The bird was nothing short of worthless.

  He stared deep into her burning eyes, his own as black as old tar, ringed with sickly yellow and flecks of red. ‘It was long-winded and frankly a little sentimental for my tastes, so I’ll condense it down into the short version for you, Princess,’ he said, taking a ragged breath. ‘Fuck you and your dreams. Fuck you to death.’

  With a piercing screech, Bezel flew for Sisine’s face, wings flared and hooked talons reaching. Sisine was already reaching for his neck, a strangled roar of rage in her throat.

  Chapter 19

  Shelter

  Nothing is certain in Araxes. Not even death.

  Old Arctian proverb

  ‘My fucking hand!’ Farazar yelled, clutching his white, fizzing stump of a wrist. Nilith had swung so hard the sword was halfway into the flagstone. She pried it free and held it to his neck.

  ‘Go on! Finish the job!’ he yelled. ‘Make your journey pointless!’

  Nilith found Heles’ hands on her arm, and with a grunt, she shrugged herself free. Nilith thrust the sword into her belt and began to throw blanket after blanket at Farazar.

  ‘You shut your face, ghost. Heles, we’re moving on.’

  ‘Now?’ the scrutiniser asked.

  Nilith fixed her with a look, daring her to protest further. ‘If my daughter didn’t know Farazar was gone before, she does now. And Bezel might…’ Her voice cracked on the last word, and she turned away to get Anoish ready.

  ‘Good luck, you irascible bird,’ she muttered beneath her breath, as she coiled Anoish’s tether about her fist.

  They walked north until the sky turned the colour of burned oranges. The smoke hung in the air, like a stain of soot on silks. The docks and factories and warehouses that had woken their furnaces that day added their smog to the haze. The sun made stark silhouettes of the buildings, making jagged teeth of the towers and spires. High-roads crisscrossed the gaps like morsels stuck between them. The last rays of the day fell in red and angry bars on the streets. The light drew out their shadows, making elongated monsters of them.

  Silence had been the order of the afternoon. The two women each kept to their thoughts, timed to Anoish’s brisk plodding. The streets had remained mostly vacant. Horns had blared from the Piercer shortly after noon. Battle-horns, and dozens. Any guards or soldiers left in the outer districts had sprinted north at the sound of them. The horns had sounded intermittently until sunset, receding ever northwards. That was some comfort.

  Thin trails of ghosts occupied some streets, where businesses and merchants couldn’t stay closed any longer. No braying and charming clatter of night markets yet, with their rainbow lanterns and mishmash of music. No rattle of armoured carriages, or tramping of soldiers jogging alongside a litter. Even the beggars were few, though that may have been the quality of the district.

  Street brats there were plenty of. Alive and dead, filthy or glowing faintly, they ran in flocks through the adjoining alleyways, teasing what few shades they could find. If a basket was dropped, or a satchel slipped from a shoulder, the brats would descend, thieving whatever it was they could lay their grubby paws on. They were clearly nimble enough to dodge the street-guards and mercenaries; and with few, if any, of those around, they were having a ball. Twice, they tried to rob Nilith and Heles. The first time, the scrutiniser cuffed one around the ear. The second, Nilith showed them her sword. There was not a third attempt.

  The sun surrendered itself to the earth, and the horizon turned a dusty pink. The night swooped in from the east, a blanket of darkness that smothered the colours from the sky. Once again, the horns crowed. Closer this time, nearer the Cloudpiercer again. Nilith cursed that great pillar, now speckled with lanterns. It was closer than ever before, and it dominated the skyline. Against the dusk, she could see a ragged edge to its peak, though it hurt her neck to crane up at it.

  ‘Shelter?’ Heles spoke up, surprising her.

  The empress shook her head. ‘No. We press on.’

  With that, the matter was settled. They kept their pace and their direction, though their eyes became more watchful. Darkness swallowed the city. A few lamplighters crept out to keep it at bay with whale oil and tinder. Other ghosts hurried across their path here and there, painting the flagstones blue. Ghosts with stubborn, uncaring masters. Nothing was exchanged between passersby, not a word. Not even a polite nod. Fearful glances, maybe. Everybody was an island in Araxes, and like the volcanoes of the Scatter Isles, the results were explosive when they collided.

  Only once was the rule broken, and that was by a rotund man on a shiny beetle that passed them. The insect’s clip-clopping on the flagstones seemed hurried. The man held on to a floppy hat with one hand, the reins with the other. He puffed a sigh from red, sweaty lips.

  ‘Not a good time for trade, misses. I’d head back the way you came if I were you,’ he advised, half-breathless.

  But they did not, and they let him go by with blank looks. Nilith tried to forget him, even as the dust from his beetle’s scuttling stung her eyes.

  ‘Something’s got him rattled,’ muttered the scrutiniser.

  ‘We keep moving,’ Nilith said firmly.

  Another hour passed, and they spent it following a winding street that led slightly west. Nilith spent it staring down at her feet, counting paces until Heles touched her arm. It was t
he one the ghast had poisoned, and Nilith flinched away.

  The scrutiniser pointed ahead. She’d been staring up at the lofty spires, now glittering with their own lamps and candles. A high-road stretched between two of them before winding into the city. A row of torches perched on it. Tucking Anoish behind a wooden stall, Nilith and Heles peeked out from the curve of a wall. The torches wandered slightly, held by hands rather than sconces. When the night breezes played with them, they betrayed the glint of armour and spears.

  ‘That’s not good. They’re hunting for something.’

  ‘Who do you think?’ Nilith said. ‘We need shelter. Until they grow bored or move on.’

  Heles dutifully began to limp around, poking in alleys and testing doors. This was a populous area, and what wasn’t a soaring face of a building was tightly locked. A few warning shouts followed a few shoves of a shoulder on one particular door. Heles moved on.

  ‘This way,’ she said, and they took an alley onto another street, where awnings for a large soulmarket had been left over vacant, quiet stalls and pens. It was dark here; the awnings blocked starlight instead of sunlight, and no lamplighters had bothered to come here. It added more shadow to an already murky night.

  Heles pointed. ‘There.’

  A small shop sitting on a corner had been boarded up, and poorly so. It looked as if the owner had run out of planks before they were finished. It was their own fault for having walls that were practically all archway. Wooden stools and tables sat piled up against the boards as an extra measure.

  One by one, Heles and Nilith began to stack them elsewhere. The boards were pried away easily enough, and they ducked into the darkness.

  It turned out to be a coffee tavern, or so Nilith thought. The proprietor’s last measure had been taking away anything of worth. She saw dark rings on the stone counters where amphoras and brewing pots had recently stood. All furniture was missing. The floor was bare of carpets. Even the tapestries had been rolled up and carted off. Despite the effort, the bitter-sweet aroma of coffee still hung in the air. In one wall was a hatch leading to the next shop, and a stomach-rumbling smell of grease and pastry wafted through it.