He panted there, waiting. It had been quick last time, but this time there was no voice in his head. He stood up, looking worriedly at the stone bowl. He’d used the same ingredients. He’d done it the same way. What had gone wrong? Was it because he hadn’t taken a big enough breath?
No man would wear such a ridiculous costume. Any fool could see you sneaking in the night.
Strong hands ripped off the skull belt and purple cape. And then Tamerlan was kicking the hook to the side and reaching into his wardrobe to find the old worn cloak he’d worn the first night. He shrugged it on as relief filled him. He’d drawn in enough smoke. It had worked.
I suppose the rest of the clothes will do.
But the voice in his head was rasping and masculine, not at all the voice of Lila Cherrylocks. What had he done wrong?
Nothing. When you open the Bridge of Legends you get whoever will come – or whoever can come. You opened. I came over the Bridge. And now here we are. I assume things are dire.
Finally! A Legend who understood!
Your city is ruled by corruption and evil.
Yes!
Freedom is what you need most.
Freedom for my sister.
Freedom for all who live under the chains of oppression.
Sure. But after my sister is saved.
Come. We fight tonight! Where is your bow?
There weren’t any bows in the Alchemist’s Guild.
We will make do. A weapon will come when we need it.
That seemed like a haphazard way to plan.
“Tamerlan? Are you ready?” Dathan called through the door. “Last call for the gondolas!”
“I’m coming!” Tamerlan threw the door open and Dathan’s eyebrows rose. He was wearing a Byron Bronzebow costume. A dashing outfit of close-fitting leathers and a curved bronze bow in his hands.
He looks more of a man than your outfit did, but that bow is a forgery. An arrow would not go five paces from so weak a draw.
Um. Sure. But we needed to go with Dathan now.
“You look just like Byron Bronzebow,” Tamerlan said with a smile, surprised that the Legend was letting him speak. Lila Cherrylocks had done all the talking when she took him over.
She’s like that. And he’s supposed to be me? I wouldn’t wear such tight clothing. It makes movement difficult. And I would pay better attention to the quality of my weaponry. A man is nothing without the correct equipment.
“And you look terrible,” Dathan said, as they ran down the corridor and the back steps to join the others below. “What happened to your costume?”
“I improved it.” This time Byron took over my voice.
“If by ‘improved’ you mean that you look like a street beggar, then sure, you improved it.”
We followed a group of other apprentices through the streets toward the nearest canal, words pouring out of Dathan like a flowing fountain as we went.
“I heard there is gambling so I brought extra coin, and it’s customary to dance. Do you know how? And...”
Tamerlan tuned him out. Dathan didn’t want replies. He was just nervous about going to the Palace. Everyone was. And now Tamerlan was, too, because he was realizing that it might be harder to break into the Sunset Tower with Byron Bronzebow in his head than it had been with Lila Cherrylocks. Byron was no master thief. He might not have the skills Tamerlan needed.
You were planning to steal? I can do that.
I need to save my sister from the Sunset Tower tonight.
To rub defeat into the face of the Landhold that runs this city?
We could do that. But mostly I need to save Amaryllis.
Bronzebow was concerningly quiet about that.
Could he help?
We shall see when we get there.
Sweat broke out along Tamerlan’s hairline. It had been such a foolproof plan!
But it was foolproof no more. He should have broken into the Sunset Tower that first night with Lila instead of insisting that she prove her skills first. Now he was stuck with Byron and there was no way to know if Byron could do the job.
I find your lack of faith insulting.
They stepped onto the waiting gondola, tipping the gondolier with coins, and let the city flow around them. Tiny lights reflected on the water, and around the canal, the sounds of merrymaking filled the air. The canals were filled with people – decadent Landholds and the invited Alchemists were richly dressed as they skimmed along the water heading for the Seven Suns Palace.
In Tamerlan’s mind, Byron muttered and grunted with every sight of elaborate wealth in the costuming. And with him directing Tamerlan’s eyes, Tamerlan’s gaze was drawn inexorably to the darker boats along the sides of the river. The ones that were not filled with elaborate decorations and arrogant partygoers but were instead the modest homes of the Waverunners, or the run-down gondolas peddled by lesser classes. Had there always been so many of them?
“We’re almost there, Tam!” The excitement rang in Dathan’s voice as he bounced on his toes trying to look into the Seven Suns Palace from their line of gondolas. The gondola two ahead of them was disembarking and there was a flash of rubies from the costume of a man dressed as Deathless Pirate. Maybe it was a good thing that Tamerlan had left most of his costume behind. He’d look like a fool next to a man in rubies. They might even throw him out.
They were almost at the Water Gate of the palace, an impressive gate guarded by men with even more impressive polearms – there would be no sneaking past them – when a loud gong sounded, startling Tamerlan.
But he was even more startled when Byron shed his cloak, slipped off his boots and shirt and leapt from the side of the gondola into the water.
18: Sunset Tower
Marielle
WHEN MARIELLE HAD BEEN a small child, the story she had hated most of all was the story of the Lady Sacrifice.
“But why does she have to die,” she would ask her mother again and again.
“It’s tradition,” her mother said. “Someone must die for the city. And it’s best to do it in a civilized manner. They don’t just grab someone off the streets, they let the people choose. It’s a choice. We believe in choice in Jingen. The Lord Mythos purchases the sacrifice of the people’s free choice. That makes it different than just killing someone. It’s someone who was sold at the choice of the people.”
Marielle had gasped. “You can’t sell people.”
Her mother’s laugh held no humor at all.
“Yes, little frog, you can.”
“But who would sell a person?”
Her mother’s voice had been sad. “Someone who has nothing else to sell.”
“But you said it was a free choice. What if the sacrifice doesn’t want to be chosen?”
“Oh, it’s not her choice. It’s the choice of the people around her. No one said it was a nice thing, but not everything necessary is nice.”
And after that, Marielle had done what every person in Jingen did. She tried very hard not to think about why they had so many parties on Summernight or why they kept their sacrifice locked away in a high tower where no one could hear her screams. And she tried to only think of the bright lights and the pretty Nightbursts and the wild costumes.
But like everyone else in Jingen, she still knew.
“THE BOOTS ARE AN EXCELLENT touch,” the Lord Mythos said as he led Marielle to a door guarded by two men with long halberds. They opened it before he arrived, ushering him from the grand hall with its noise and excitement and into a warren of rooms and passages intriguing in their own way.
Marielle’s face felt hot. “I didn’t mean to offend. It’s just easy to turn an ankle in delicate slippers and I’m an officer of the City Watch.”
They passed a door lit with low lights and hushed words. Marielle glanced at the opening as they passed. It looked like a game of cards was going on, but the expressions around the table were so intent and sober that she couldn’t imagine what might be riding on the games.
“That’s not where we’re headed,” the Lord Mythos – Etienne – said and his scent was of wood smoke and fuchsia. Danger and a warning not to cross him. “And I was not finding fault with you. One of the laws Junfa wrote in The Clash of Spirits is this, ‘Perfection carries a sting.’ He commends the use of a single minor flaw to disarm the enemy and keep him off balance.” He regarded her with a smoldering look in his eye that made her insides squirm like river eels. “Consider me disarmed.”
Marielle met his gaze, refusing to flinch from the intensity of it. She swallowed, still meeting his eyes.
What did she see in their depths? There was domination there and charm, but something else, too, something hard that made her wonder if he really did hang the dried skins of women he had seduced on hooks in his closet. She should not be away from the main party with him. It was like following a viper into his pit. But would she be any safer there? She had a feeling that if Lord Mythos wanted someone dead he could kill them in a crowded room as easily as a lonely hallway. And he’d get away with it, too.
She clenched her hands at her sides. Being ready for an attack wouldn’t be much of an advantage when she had half the muscle power of her attacker, but it was better than being caught completely unaware of what was coming.
“You are wondering why I brought you here in these deep corridors, aren’t you?” he asked as they passed a red door.
A man dressed in a closely fitted Byron Bronzebow costume winked as they went by, placing a single finger to his lips before slipping through the door and closing it behind him.
The actions made Marielle’s heart beat faster. She had smelled corruption and a sickly green mist as he’d entered. He had something twisted on his mind. Every instinct within her demanded that she open that door and prevent anyone inside it from breaking the law. But what if it wasn’t the City Law that they were breaking? What if it was the moral law or the Real Law? She shivered.
The further she followed Lord Mythos into this warren of back rooms, the more complicated things seemed to be and darker the scents that she smelled. The red door was not the last door she thought hid dangerous secrets and not the last one that closed suddenly when they appeared, though often those who were closing the doors winked or nodded at Etienne Velendark.
“The managing of a city-state of this size takes a certain ... flexibility,” the Lord Mythos said. “I might not like it any more than you do, but that is how cities are run.”
If he felt the way she did, he would have already rooted out every infraction in these rooms and sent the people in them back to their homes – or to the jails to be prosecuted and likely executed. His words were empty – a veil to hide his approval of what happened. There were only two stances when it came to breaking the law – opposition, which was always strong and definite, or approval which could be strong or weak and hidden. Agreeableness, keeping the peace, these things were not the same thing as morality.
She gritted her jaw, but now a new scent washed over the scents of rust-red depravity which smelled like blood, pink-purple deception smelling of fragrant lilies, and the foaming yellow-orange of greed that burned the nose like washing soda.
The new scent was all vanilla and lilac and turquoise with little golden sparks bursting from it. It joined the magic of the Lord Mythos, amplifying it, increasing it and overpowering everything else. Like the drunks they pulled from city gutters or kicked into the canal, Marielle stumbled, suddenly in a stupor as if she had drunk too deeply into her cups and now her mind was both dull and marvelously sensory.
“What is that?” she asked, trying not to slur her words. She was not certain that she had succeeded, but the wide smile on the Lord Mythos’ face, still open and welcoming despite the predatory flash in his eyes told her that she had failed.
“Magic lets our city continue to thrive and flow like the Albastru River that feeds our canals and allows the gondolas and barges access to every part of the city. Have you ever wondered about why there are so many types of names in Jingen?”
“Names?” It seemed like a strange turn for the conversation to take.
“Some names are of the ancients who were here before, like the name of our city, ‘Jingen’ or the ‘Albastru’ river and some are parts of the Smudger religion. Other names sound like they are from another place entirely, like my name, Etienne. Or the words used by the Timekeepers’ religion. Or your name, Marielle.”
“The cultures of the mountains came down and joined the people along the river many generations ago,” Marielle answered by rote. “That the whole would become more than the sum of its parts.”
“That is the catechism,” the Lord Mythos remarked as he led her to a dark staircase that led upward, winding around huge gears bigger than the house Marielle had grown up in.
He grabbed a candle in a candleholder from the wall beside the staircase and began to lead her up into its spiraled tangle. It made Marielle’s skin crawl. It made her want to turn and run. And yet, with every step the scent of magic grew stronger, pulling her feet down step by step.
The Lord Mythos kept talking, unaffected by the magic swirling around them. “In the time of the dragons, men had to form strange bonds. And when the dragons were finally bound, we were forced to stay near them to keep them ever held in our thrall. The Dragonblooded of the mountains – people like you with violet eyes, and often with pale blond hair – and the people of the plains and sea with their dark skin and curls. They made blood-oath together, formed the five cities and vowed to keep our promises together. For every year, to renew the bond and keep the dragons captive, the blood of a Dragonblooded must be spilled.”
Marielle clenched her jaw as he spoke. She didn’t believe the old legend about the dragons. Everyone knew the cultures had melded and that the five cities had been formed and everyone knew that someone died for tradition every year, but no one really believed those tales about dragons. They were just things people had made up a long time ago to justify how they did things. They were no more real than the stories of Queen Mer or Byron Bronzebow. Tales for children to teach them bigger things. Tales to delight or horrify. Tales to explain the inexplicable. But not truth. Never close to truth.
Probably, they’d executed a criminal the first time they “sacrificed” the “lady” or perhaps it had been some barbaric way to force one group under the heel of the other. It had been so long since the first time no one knew what really had happened, and no one had to be told that the official story was just that ... a story. Something interesting for the religions to talk about and paint on their walls or set in glass. Nothing of real value to anyone.
Nevertheless, he’d asked her if she was Dragonblooded when he met her. He mentioned it again now. That was worrying.
The staircase curved around something and then began to head downward again, skirting more large gears wreathed in shadow.
“I thought you already had your dragon sacrifice,” she said through gritted teeth.
“We do,” he said. “Sold of her family’s free choice. We are below the Sunset Tower right now. Below the spot where she awaits her service.”
Marielle felt a stab of pity mixed with horror. Above them, some poor girl waited, knowing that her family had sold her like an ox to be slaughtered. It could just as easily be her. That was what Lord Mythos was hinting. Did anyone mourn that girl? Was there anyone out there who wished it didn’t have to be this way? Anyone other than Marielle?
Even in her magic-drunk state she felt torn by the thought of the unknown girl. A tiny voice in the back of her head suggested that if she was so troubled, then why didn’t she offer to switch places with her? The rest of her mind received that advice with trembling fear, begging Marielle to ignore it.
“Then why have you brought me here?” Marielle asked and she was proud of herself that her voice did not shake with fear, though her chin trembled a little.
“There is magic missing.”
“Missing? Are you suggesting there has been a theft? Of magic?”
The had finally reached the end of the stairs – Marielle thought that perhaps they were just a little lower than ground level – and now the magic was so strong that the scent made Marielle reel and cling to the wall. She felt as though she might be sick.
“And now we reach the spine of the dragon. See his scales where your boots stand on the floor?” the Lord Mythos asked.
Oddly, the stone here did almost look like scales – if dragon scales were twice the size of Marielle curled in a ball. But rock often formed strange shapes and patterns and the room was small, much smaller than she would have imagined, though by the echoes the ceiling was very high. Dark stains splashed over the slick rock of the ‘scale’ puzzling Marielle for a half-a-heartbeat until the smell of old blood rose up from them.
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