We didn’t see. We didn’t hear.
What if the young couple had fled here and, finding their way barred, had hidden the things that mattered most to them, the things that symbolised their love and commitment? Maybe they hadn’t expected to be killed. Maybe they had expected to be able to return one day to retrieve them. Or maybe they had known they were dead but hadn’t wanted their murderer to take something so important to them. That would be enough to hold the ghosts of the murdered couple.
This is all just guesswork. You could be a million miles off, heading in the wrong direction.
With a flare of power, the beast threw itself against the circle again. The last of the silver scattered. The charcoal and arevena lifted and spun away. Then the beast was through, shaking its head, temporarily stunned.
I dived for the corner of the cellar. I didn’t have time for subtlety. I drew in all the raw magic I could summon, fed it into my mage’s rod, and swung it down. The flagstone shattered. Fragments rocketed through the air. A sharp sliver cut across the side of my forehead, and blood flowed over my cheek.
There. Under the flagstone. The glint of gold. I had been right. Two spiral bands big enough to enclose forearms, dirty, strung with generations of spiders’ webs, but there. These were what the ghosts had attached themselves to.
The cellar shook with a roar as the beast launched itself towards me. Claws as long as my arm lashed out. I roared back and smashed magic into the spiral bands. They flattened then melted, gold dripping and running.
Ectoplasm washed over me, leaving my skin feeling cold and tight … then was gone.
I was alone.
“Bugger me,” I muttered. I really hadn’t expected that to work.
I lay there in the darkness, too weak to even conjure a light. I had done it. I had beaten the murder-ghost. I had de-haunted the house. Ha! I caught myself laughing and stopped. It was too creepy in the dark, and frankly, it made me seem a little mad.
Eventually, I managed a light.
The cellar was a mess. The rubble of the wall, dust, scattered charcoal and flowers, dented and bent silver everywhere.
I was not going to be popular.
Screw it. I had already been paid.
Gently, carefully, I reached out with my magic, searching for traces of the ghosts, but there was nothing. This time they really were gone, and that thing was gone with them. No one would be able to summon them again.
You did it, Nik. You actually did it. No one was more surprised than me.
Chapter Twenty
My limbs were weak and trembling from the after-effects of the adrenaline, and I was starting to feel my new crop of bruises. I should have felt happy, relieved at least, but I didn’t. Dissatisfaction picked away at me. I had beaten the murder-ghosts. I had won. Why couldn’t I just enjoy it?
You know why.
I liked things to make sense, and this had more holes in it than my shirt. Winning was empty when I didn’t know what the Depths had been going on. Until a couple of weeks ago, nobody had seen or heard of these ghosts. Why had they risen now? Had someone summoned them? And why? If the ghosts had been tied to the spiral bands buried in the cellar, how had they ended up in Thousand Walls and the warehouse by the docks? The flagstone had been dirty. It certainly hadn’t been lifted recently. The bands themselves had been encrusted in old spiders’ webs. The ghost-beast had been big — stupidly big — and its claws had been like a handful of swords. It had been large enough to leave the wounds on the priest. But had it been big enough to kill Imela Rush and Uwin Bone? Bone had been cut through at the neck and the thighs with a single swipe. I didn’t think my beast had been anywhere near that size.
It was constrained by the silver. You have no idea how murder-ghost-beasts operate.
I just couldn’t shake the feeling that this whole thing had been too easy. I didn’t know why any of it had happened or who was behind it.
You’re still a hero, Nik. Try being pleased about that.
I had got rid of a murderous ghost causing death and chaos around Agatos. How many people could say they had done that? But I didn’t feel like a hero. Benny and I were no better off than we had been yesterday. No one was going to let us go free just because I had saved uncounted lives. There was a reason this city wasn’t full of heroes.
So find out who’s behind this without having to worry about that thing ripping you apart.
With those words of encouragement, I left the mess of the Sunstones’ cellar behind and headed out into the early morning of Agatos. I would take a couple of hours of quiet, uninterrupted, thoughtful reflection. I would work out a plan. I would find whichever fucker had caused all this shit. I would clear my and Benny’s names.
All of which would have been easier if I hadn’t turned the corner onto Feldspar Plaza and seen every single one of my worldly belongings piled in front of my apartment.
Standing around, like a collection of unemployed statues, were half a dozen men, each apparently assembled from solid slabs of meat. In the middle of them was my landlord, Jusip Broom.
Son of a goat! In the excitement and terror, I had forgotten: I was being evicted. They had even hauled out my heavy, steel safe and dumped it upside down on the paving stones.
I had had enough of this shit. I was a mage. I had just dealt with the most terrifying and murderous ghost in the history of Agatos (probably). I was doing a fucking public service. I wasn’t going to be thrown out of my home by a bunch of thugs.
I gripped my mage’s rod (no, there’s no way of saying that without it sounding dirty), pulled in raw magic, ignored the sudden ache in all my cuts and bruises, and strode towards the men.
Jusip Broom saw me coming and held up a hand to stop his thugs. I swore. A straightforward smackdown with some mindless slabs of muscle would have been therapeutic right now. Particularly when magic gave me an unfair advantage.
“What the Depths is going on?” I demanded.
Jusip Broom was an oil slick of a man. He had been known to kill seabirds at half a mile with just the force of his personality. He was a small man, only just coming up to my shoulders. I pushed myself into his face so he had to tip his head back to look at me. I was being an arsehole, but I didn’t care. Drooping eyes stared up at me.
“You did not pay your rent.” His hands lifted mournfully. “What can I do?”
You can shove it up your arse with a long pole, I almost said, but I managed to keep my mouth shut. Antagonising the snub-nosed little turd wasn’t going to get my apartment back.
So I did what I had to and forced a smile. “Good news for both of us, then! I’ve come into some money. I can even pay the next two months in advance.” Yeah, that’s right, Nik. Grovel. I had done worse things over the last few years. A mage-for-hire couldn’t ply his trade from out of a doorway.
The corners of Broom’s mouth turned down.
“It is too late.”
Too late? I paused, studying him. I was offering him guaranteed money. I wasn’t Broom’s only tenant who sometimes defaulted on the rent. None of us were here because we were swimming in money.
“You’ve already let it to someone else?” I found that hard to believe. The place was kind of wrecked after the Countess’s pet mage had attacked me. I doubted there were tenants lining up to pay what I was paying.
He shrugged, looking shifty.
Yeah, that’s what I thought. You haven’t let it. You’re just throwing me out because… Well, I didn’t know. I knew I should keep my temper, but I had my limits, and I’d passed those several streets back.
I took a step forwards, forcing him to give way. “You’re going to give me back my apartment, or I’m going to take this” — I shook my mage’s rod in his face — “and shove it so far up you, it’ll loosen your teeth.”
His thugs stirred at that, and I had the uncomfortable realisation that I was completely surrounded. Maybe picking a fight wasn’t the smartest thing to do.
Broom didn’t look intimidated. I was us
ed to people treading carefully around mages. I was at a bit of a loss as to how to respond to someone who didn’t.
You’re a hypocrite, Nik. I had always said I hated the influence mages had in the city, but I was quick enough to lean on it.
“I hope,” a man’s voice said, a little muffled, but loud enough to carry to me, “that we do not have a problem here.”
I looked up. A mage was limping down the steps from my apartment, looking like someone had just pissed in his breakfast. I recognised him. His name was Rylic Lamb or Rylic Goat’s-arse or something like that. He was one of the Wren’s mages. No wonder Broom was acting so casually, despite my intimidating mystical powers.
Like most of the criminal enterprises and half of the semi-legitimate ones in Agatos, Jusip Broom answered to the Wren. That was normally an arm’s-length arrangement, a regular tax to the high mage for protection or territorial rights. Just occasionally, like now, it was something else. The Wren wanted me evicted, and he had sent a mage to back that up. It didn’t make things easier for me, and it kicked the legs from under any threats I had been making. I didn’t know whether I could beat this mage, but I did know I was in enough trouble with the Ash Guard already. I didn’t want to start a mage battle in the middle of the plaza.
Rylic Goat’s-arse was one of the Wren’s older mages. I didn’t know much about him. I tended to keep my distance from other mages. He must have taken down my wards, the bastard, but he hadn’t had it all his own way. His nose was swollen and his shirt beneath his cloak was soaked with blood.
Got you.
Jusip Broom stepped back to let the mage approach. I smiled.
“You’ve got something…” I gestured to his nose.
Goat’s-arse wiped his sleeve across his face and winced. Yep. Good and broken. That’ll teach you to go poking around another mage’s apartment.
His expression soured.
“The Wren is growing impatient. Pay your debt, or I will not be the one to visit you next time.”
“And we were getting on so well,” I said.
Inside, though, I was cursing.
“The Wren —” Goat’s-arse started again.
I waved a hand. “I’m on it. Tell the Wren not to get overheated. He’ll get his information.”
The mage drew in a sharp breath. “The Wren does not get overheated.”
“Yeah, yeah. Never too hot, never too cold, the mighty high mage.”
No one had ever accused me of common sense. I was relying on Rylic Goat’s-arse not having the balls to repeat all of this to his boss’s face. The Wren was not a forgiving man.
The mage heaved himself up like a fish being hooked out of the sea.
“You’ve got something on your nose,” I said.
His hand lifted towards his face again, before he caught himself. Twice. Got you twice! I grinned. Yeah, I could be an arsehole when I put my mind to it.
The mage spun away and with a curt gesture summoned my ex-landlord and his goons to follow. One-nil to Nik Thorn in the game of childish victories. Ten-nil to everyone else in everything that actually mattered.
With a sigh, I went to hire a cart to carry my worldly belongings to Benny’s house. It wasn’t like he was using it right now. Then I sat on the steps of my former apartment and watched the carter and his assistant load everything I had made of my life into the back of the cart. It didn’t take long
“I brought a pastry,” a voice said beside me. “Looks like I should have brought more.”
I turned to see Elosyn, my contact from Nuil’s coffee house. She was holding out a wrapped package. I took it, even though I wasn’t hungry. Elosyn baked some of the best pastries in Agatos. I was hardly going to say no. She nodded towards the loaded cart.
“Ah, it’s nothing,” I said. “A temporary disagreement. I’m fine.”
“Yeah. I can see that.” She lowered herself onto the step next to me.
“You’re up early.”
“I’m a baker, Nik. I’ve been up for hours.”
“You should have been a mage,” I said, gesturing at the remains of my mattress being manhandled onto the cart. “Look at the kind of lie-ins I get.”
She shook her head. “I can’t imagine why I didn’t. Anyway, I’ve got your list.”
“My list?” For a moment, all I could do was frown.
“You know. You wanted to find out about Carnelian Silkstar’s new wool contracts? I can’t tell you how he managed to get control of the wool trade. Everyone’s being too cagey. But I did discover who lost out.”
Ah. Yes. That list. What with breaking Benny out of gaol, fighting murder-ghosts, and being evicted, I had forgotten all about the wool contracts. Let’s be honest, no one ever killed anyone over wool. No one unleashed this kind of shit on the city because they had lost out on some deal. Did they? What the Depths did I know?
Maybe they did. Maybe they didn’t. People like Silkstar or the Wren? I didn’t understand how their minds worked.
Elosyn handed me a piece of paper.
“How much do I owe you?” I asked.
She eyed my pathetic pile of belongings. “Keep it. It looks like you’re going to need it.”
My throat suddenly felt hard. Shit. Why did she have to be generous, now of all times?
“Thank you,” I managed. “Really.”
“Yeah, well.” Elosyn looked awkward. “Holera would kick my arse if she thought I wasn’t helping you.” Holera was Elosyn’s wife, she of the tears-of-blood curse I had once broken.
Elosyn stood. “Now. Some of us have work to do.”
I watched her stride away across the plaza. Then I opened the list and scanned it.
My eyes stopped halfway down. According to Elosyn’s notes, this particular merchant had lost almost everything to Carnelian Silkstar.
Energy surged through my body, and I leapt to my feet. Finally, finally I might have found my connection.
The unfortunate merchant was someone I had become far too familiar with these last few days. The name on the list was that of the Estimable Larimar Sunstone.
Coincidences happened every day. Walk around the corner and bump into the person you’d been thinking about for the first time in five years? A coincidence, because it didn’t happen the other ten thousand times you walked around a corner thinking about someone. There was no significance to it. It was just numbers.
On the other hand, if someone punched you in the face, that wasn’t a coincidence. They knew your face would be there, and they wanted to introduce it to their fist. The connection between the Estimable Sunstone and Carnelian Silkstar felt more like a punch in the face than meeting your long-lost friend in an unlikely corner of Agatos.
Sunstone had lost his entire livelihood to Silkstar, and Silkstar’s Master Servant had been killed by the same murder-ghost that Sunstone kept in his basement. I knew a link when I saw one, even if I didn’t know exactly how Benny and I fitted into it. Had the Sunstones only hired me in the first place to assess my candidacy for biggest sucker in Agatos? If so, apparently I had won the position with flying colours. I racked my brains trying to remember what information I might have let slip to Galena Sunstone that would have allowed them to set me up like this.
I still didn’t know how they could have pulled it off. How could they have moved the ghosts and set the whole thing up in Silkstar’s house? Neither of the Sunstones were mages. Neither of them could have set the booby trap unnoticed in the heart of Silkstar’s power, even if his wards were down for the Feast of Parata. Maybe the Countess could have, or the Wren, or perhaps even Mica, if I were any judge of her new power. The Sunstones? Not a chance.
Which made the other possibility more likely: that Sunstone was another patsy, set up to take the fall if Benny and I managed to wriggle out of it. Layers upon layers, plans upon plans. Whoever was behind this wasn’t leaving anything to chance.
But they were making a mistake, because every complication they set up came with a link, no matter how well they thought th
ey had hidden it. It was another strand to the web. Find enough of those, and I would find the spider at the centre. If I watched Sunstone, if I dug into him, his connections, and his past, I would come up with something.
I didn’t trust the carter with my safe full of money, so I rode along, thinking hard all the way, to Benny’s. The Estimable Sunstone had a separate business office on the Royal Highway, not far from Mile End Market, where his staff worked and he spent much of his time. I had done a bit of research before taking the job, because you always wanted to be sure someone could afford to pay you. I had seen his office and his employees. If I had poked further, maybe I would have found out about his wool contracts, too.
I tapped the carter on the shoulder as we approached Benny’s and indicated where to stop, then leapt down and crossed to the cedar door. Someone had watered the flowerpots on either side. I felt a brief twinge of jealousy. I had never had neighbours who would do that kind of thing for me when I wasn’t at home. Depths, I hadn’t even known most of my neighbours at my apartment, despite having lived there for five years.
A quick spell popped the lock again, and I swung the front door open.
Benny might not have bothered about security, but Sereh would have booby-trapped the house when she left, and I didn’t fancy dying horribly today. I kept my eyes open and carefully shuffled in. Even so, I had scarcely taken two steps inside before a knife touched my neck. Sereh stepped from the shadows.
“What are you doing here?” I said. “I thought you’d gone to Mica’s house.”
“I did. I came back for my violin.”
I shuddered. Why was it that Sereh could terrify me by just saying perfectly ordinary things?
“Your dad isn’t going to be very happy about that.”
She didn’t react. I guessed I had run out of leverage on the Benny angle.
“Why are you here, Uncle Nik?”
“I, ah, thought I should keep an eye on the house while you were both away. We wouldn’t want anyone breaking in.” I cleared my throat. “Um. I don’t suppose you could put that knife away?”
Shadow of a Dead God: A Mennik Thorn Novel Page 24
