“On the way back,” he said. “Don't want the others to be alarmed. And if they ask, it's just what happens sometimes.”
“He's the second-in-command though.”
“There are others. The monster-captain will complain, but they know they can't fight us.”
“Still...”
“They get what they deserve.”
She stayed silent. Red light playing behind his eyes, Ticuo watched.
*****
A folded cloth pressed to his split lip, Linciard watched the Averognan soldiers work. They'd found two of their fellows among these prisoners and were talking intensely to them in low voices; further away, the others were tied-up tight, with three being held pinned by their captors. Across the barrier, one of the scouts was unconscious and the other was dead from overzealous pummeling; Linciard didn't know if that had been his men's doing or the Shadow Folk's, but several of those black-clad agents were watching now as the bracer detached from the dead man's wrist.
There were the usual injuries on his side: scrapes, bruises, busted noses, and one sprained ankle from exiting the shadows too fast. They'd harried the Seethers back and forth, using Shadow Folk to lure them and scare them and kick crates down from the high shelves on top of them, then Blaze men to administer the subdual beatings. It was a good system.
He'd taken a forehead to the lower jaw, which felt weird and tight but still worked fine. Bleeding was a problem in the Shadow Realm, though. He could hear the floor hiss underfoot any time he pulled the cloth away, and two other bleeders stood in their own corners, staunching their noses under the same scrutiny.
The discussion phase of the mission seemed to last forever, making even the Shadow Folk shift on their feet from boredom. Finally he saw the Averognan Blazes offer their hands to clasp, and the two Seethers reciprocate. Two small charms were passed over.
Dimly he wondered if they were trustworthy. Averogne sat in the western shadow of the Rift, and therefore wasn't properly Imperial. It had a reputation for smuggling up the cliffs to the Corvish and north to Gejara and Krovichanka, and of swallowing Imperial troops as if its forests had teeth. It had been an Imperial protectorate for a few quiet decades, but still…
Pikery, stop thinking like you're still an Imperial.
“Is it done?” he called, and got a nod from the Averognan lead.
In short order, the Shadow Folk passed the Seether pair back through, and grabbed the unconscious scout to be thoroughly shackled—bracer included. An argument broke out over the dead one's bracer, particularly when they spotted it following the retreating Seethers; with some unease, Linciard ratified the decision to kill it, and watched it vanish into a splotch of toothy darkness. Then they all headed through the umbral wall and back into the realm proper, onto the spidery white road that stretched out toward home.
Linciard brought up the rear, feeling like a herd-dog with his men strung out ahead of him. Jogging made bruises light up along his ribs and one hip; the guy who'd headbutted him had done some work below the neck before Linciard managed to feed him the concrete floor. His missing toe-tips ached even with the padding he'd added to his boot.
Overall, this felt like a success. He didn't think they'd have many more chances; the officers at Old Crown had to wise up eventually, especially now that they'd sent men back to report. But grabbing a full platoon over the course of two days, at the expense of some kicks and bites and scratches, was a great result.
He was eager for whatever came next.
The umbral wall loomed up ahead, unwelcoming but still home. As his men begin to cross, he slowed and fumbled the cloth back into place over his lip. The eiyets clung thick in those spaces and he didn't want to rile them.
Someone shouldered past him, making him sway to the edge of the road. “Hoi,” he told the back of Ticuo's head, but Ticuo didn't answer, just jumped into the wall lantern-first.
Irritated, Linciard steeled himself and followed.
Darkness closed tight around him, rustling, hissing. He pushed forward but found more of it, and with the next step even more, until it was crawling on him—pinching at the skin that showed through his armor, yanking at the tips of his braids where they peeked out from the base of the helm. Clamping the cloth tight over his face, he took another step, puzzled but not scared. If he'd crossed over wrong, the Shadow Folk would find him shortly.
Another step, tiny fingers yanking at his ears and eyelashes—
And then there was a hand on his shoulder, pulling him backward, and he moved with it gratefully. His feet went off a lip and he fell sideways-down onto a hard floor, cursed, staggered upright, raised his head.
Saw the lantern vanish through the wall.
The room went black.
“Hoi!” he shouted. His voice came back loud in his ears. His glimpse of the space had showed it small, with one of those privacy-screens against a wall. The air tasted stale, bottled.
“Hoi!” he tried again, and heard something giggle.
The hairs on his neck went up. It came again, a ripple of childlike laughter. Other voices joined it from the walls, high and sharp, shifting, swarming. Faint sparks lit the dark: the glint of tiny eyes.
His muscles locked. He wanted to lash out, but at what? He had nothing useful; one of those narrow shields and a fighting gauntlet, enough armor to make this take a while, but no light, no escape. There had to be something—a candle, maybe—to make those little glitters, but he couldn't see it and he dared not move.
“Ticuo?” he called warily. “Ticuo, I saw you leave. What in pike's name is this about?”
No answer, but it didn't take a genius to make a guess.
“I told you we had nothing to do with the crush!”
Silence.
“We didn't know it was gonna happen. We did nothing to assist it. The only reason we were there is that the Field Marshal called us over to deliver some prisoners. And I regret that, all right? I regret we obeyed that order, and so does the captain. But whatever this is…”
Oh no, the captain. He tried to cue the earhook, imagining Sarovy in similar straits, but nothing happened. Touching the outer curve of his ear, he found it bare.
“You shit,” he snapped, “you stole my stuff? Scared to get tattled on? Joke's on you; Scryer Mako can find me anyway. Just let me out and we can pretend this never happened.”
Nothing but the giggles and whispers of the eiyets.
“Ticuo, hoi! Is this how you want to fight? Because it's a cowardly way to do it!” Silence. “If it's revenge, it's piking stupid! We're against the guy who did this to you!” Silence. “Come on, be rational. If you did this to anyone else, I swear…” Silence. “Say something!”
Only whispers. Only shadow-creatures tittering and rustling on the walls. Teeth bared, he swiped for them blindly but caught only concrete. He should have been scared, but all he felt was a boiling in his chest—a fury at the futility of this, the absolute lack of sense.
“I don't owe you my blood!” he shouted. “If you think this'll be some kind of justice, you're wrong! Send me to Corvia if you want to see me get mine! Your Shadowland was nothing compared to that. You hear me? Your pain was just a slap from the Empire. If we'd wanted to actually hurt you—“
All sound stopped, and the floor dropped out from under him. He yelped and flailed in nothingness, then came down knees-first, gloved palms grating on the concrete as he clutched at it. It moved again, heaved, lurched, and he realized in horror that he'd never left the Shadow Realm. This was just some concrete box caught within its grip.
His shoulder hit a wall, and he scrabbled to find the corner—some place, any place to brace himself in as the room shook like a dice-case. He didn't know why the privacy screen hadn't flown into him. Maybe it was bolted down.
“Asshole,” he yelled through the shaking, “come out and fight me! I'll give you the first hit free, you stupid shit!”
The chamber stilled. Panting, distrustful, Linciard levered himself upright and squinted into
the dark. Nothing glinted, nothing moved, nothing made a sound.
“Look, we can come to—“
Air left him in a gust as something slammed the small of his back, sending pain up his spine and buckling his knees before him. He tried to lurch away as he went down, only for unseen hands to clamp on his helm and wrench him sideways, forcefully, straight into the wall.
Stars burst in his vision. He scrabbled for those hands but they disappeared, leaving him beating at the cold concrete. Another hard strike to his helm floored him, the whole right side of his head flaming with pain. He curled up to protect himself, but a boot caught him in the back where he'd been hit first and another nailed his thigh just short of the groin. A heel hammered his defensive forearm, sending sick shocks through his ringing skull.
The next stomp glanced off his helmet, and he snapped out his arms toward where he thought the other leg should be. His narrow shield scraped on the concrete; his wrist hit boot-leather and he grabbed it, pulled, yanked his way up that leg to bring its owner down and put himself on top.
It wasn't Ticuo. A woman by the shriek, but that didn't matter—not with his skull full of wasps, the taste of copper behind his teeth. He lurched up to bodyslam her, but someone caught him across the chest and hauled him backward. Remembering the wall, he swung his shield-arm back just in time to brace himself from being yanked into it.
“Piker!” he spat. “Festering crow-bait dung-sucker! This what you call a fight? Those little kids by the tavern put up more of—“
A heavy body hit him straight-on, bearing him to the floor. Hands sought for his throat. “Those were my friends, my neighborhood,” Ticuo snarled. “You monsters murdered them all—“
Linciard crammed his fingers into Ticuo's open mouth. He felt teeth lock down but this was the fighting glove, metal-studded, and now he had his enemy by the jaw. “Shut your stupid face,” he growled, leveraging Ticuo half-off as the man's fists hammered at his arm. “I get your rage, I'd do the same, but it's not! our! fault!”
Bright light filled his world then, washing everything out. Limbs, senses, breath. He was floating in white nothing, only the dim buzz of the wasps as company, and—
He snapped back to his senses enough to feel the throb in his jaw and temple, the acid lurching torment of his guts, but the world itself was still fuzzy with sparks. Punch-drunken instinct made him heave onto his front so that the vomit wouldn't choke him, but the move nearly whited him out again. The hive in his skull pulsed furiously. Words broke and spat above him, only half-coherent:
“—tattled on me—“
“—beat his piking head in?”
“—admitted he was—“
“—means nothing. Done is—“
“—never done! We can't just let—“
“We can. We— Zhahri, take him. All of you, go. We'll follow soon.”
A hand clutched his shoulder. He tried to grab for it, to keep fighting, but the movement brought that light back and he was falling…
More hands. More words he couldn't make out. He felt himself rolled, then swung, then lifted—moving somehow though he was flat on his back, everything drifting by like trees above a river. He thought he saw sunlight, but when he tried to touch it, they pushed his hand back down. Then the dark enclosed him with its whispers.
*****
Enforcer Ardent waited until everyone else had left the chamber—including the other two shamefaced imbeciles who would be turning their badges in to the Office of Oversight—before she let go of Ticuo's chestplate. The Illanite Enforcer rocked back on his heels, face still fixed in a snarl; the orange light of her eye-slit lantern painted him ghastly, like the stone guardians of Bahlaer's brickwork.
She wanted to pitch him at the wall like he had been doing with the lieutenant, or order him stationed in this shadow cell indefinitely with just the stink of vomit for company. No, worse—throw him into one of Blaze's cells and let them express their displeasure directly. But that was beyond the boundaries of Kheri law and procedure, and she wouldn't follow Ticuo over that edge.
“You know what you did,” she said. “You know the punishment.”
“Demotion? Dismissal?” He sneered. “I'll take it. I'll take it a thousand times over. How dare you protect them?“
“We have an agreement.”
“We had an agreement with the piking Crimson Army, and they murdered us anyway! We can't trust them! You let their mages into this facility, their piking mentalist—“
“Who allowed us to capture them in the first place.”
“Did she? Or did she 'allow' you to absorb a hundred spies into our midst?”
Ardent consciously refrained from clenching her fists or her teeth. She'd been accused of being cold but had never understood how that was a problem; it kept her capable of speaking now instead of trying to remove Ticuo's face with her nails. “We went over those concerns almost a week ago, and again four days ago, and again yesterday. You assured me last time that you were satisfied.”
“It sounds sensible when you speak, but when I see them—“
“What incited you now?”
Ticuo gestured broadly, frustrated. “They're too easy about this. Jumping their own people, fighting their army. How do we trust that? How do we know there aren't secret mentalists or abominations just riddling their troops? And they don't regret shit. That lieutenant said—“
“I don't care what he said. The captain has vouched for all of his men.”
“The captain is a shapeshifting monster!”
Physical violence was not condoned between Shadow Folk, but Ardent found herself sorely tempted. “The captain is our ally,” she intoned slowly. “He has pledged to our cause and has given me no reason to doubt his intentions. Likewise with Scryer Mako.”
“You're delusional. Worse—besotted. We know how you watch him, coddle him—“
“We equip his men. We feed them. We are trying to integrate them, Ticuo. We do this all the time. You may not have experience of the process, but you must understand—“
“I don't!” Pain drew deep furrows across his face, and she held her tongue as he struggled with himself. He would be demoted, yes—that was a given. Most likely reassigned as well. But behavior toward outsiders was rated at a different standard than that between Kheri, and he had controlled himself thus far. She was obligated to hear him out.
“I don't see how we can let them live,” he said finally, plaintively. “Even if it wasn't them who destroyed the Shadowland, we know for sure that it was that captain and that lieutenant who killed our folk in the Merry Tom. We know it was that company who assaulted us on the cliffs. They drew blood first! They broke our agreements! And we just… We're expected to suck it up and move on?”
“We retaliated.”
“Not enough!”
“Ticuo, they're not like us.”
“I don't—“
“They're soldiers. Multiply-mindwashed, conditioned soldiers who know little but doing what their superiors tell them to. If they don't, they get locked up, converted or executed. We have the Right of Refusal, which I encourage you to take; frankly I don't understand why you didn't take it from the start. You know we don't shed blood in the shadows.”
“You do!”
“I've done it out of necessity. I will not do it out of spite or some misplaced sense of vengeance. And we need them, for the same purpose they served in the army. It took, what—three of you to drop the lieutenant? We need that because we can't do it.”
His jaw clenched. “We could if we tried.”
“No. We can't. Because it's against our rules. We are not an army; we are security and disaster relief. We protect people and investments or else remove them from the source of danger—and we cannot move this whole city. We need another way.”
“Their way?”
“Yes.”
He showed his teeth but didn't talk back, instead lapsing into sullen silence. “Recuse yourself if you can't do this,” she urged softly. “I know you
fear for your city, and I wouldn't remove you from its defense if I could help it, but this can't continue.”
“If they betray us...”
“I'll feed them to the Dark. Do you trust me or not?”
His face twisted, but after a moment he nodded.
“Good. Then give me your piking rank badge. I'm demoting you to grade eight.”
Scowling, he undid the tiny clasps that kept that lozenge of black metal in place over his heart. To outsiders, it looked like a plain bit of armor; to ranking Enforcers, all of whom were shadowbloods, the eiyenriu mark showed on it like ink on slate, ultrablack. His said twelve.
“Six years of my life,” he muttered.
“Your own fault. Go wait in my office. I'll need you for the report.”
With a grunt, he turned and walked through the shadow of the screen, out of the room. She looked around for another moment, taking in the flecks of blood and vomit, and grimaced. They'd have to seat this place in the real world to get it cleaned and aired out.
Then she shuttered the lantern and followed, past the tiny darklight that kept this place accessible, into the shadows. She had to catch Captain Sarovy before the news did.
*****
Linciard opened his eyes to find a familiar face frowning above him, haloed by migraine light. Shit, he thought dimly.
“We keep meeting here,” said Medic Shuralla. “I'm concerned.”
A sideways glance told him he was in an infirmary bed, the cushions at his back propping him into an inclined sitting position so the medic could scold him up close. He grimaced, felt a flash of pain across his cheek and scalp, and mumbled, “Sorry.” At least the word came out right.
“It seems every time I see you, something else is busted or bleeding.”
“That's just standard for my life.”
He'd been trying for wryly funny, but the look she gave him said he'd fallen short. Beyond her, the infirmary was empty but for Messenger Cortine still behind his curtain. It seemed the rest of his team had been treated and discharged before he'd woken up, and if he'd managed to injure any of his attackers, they weren't being held here.
The Drowning Dark (The War of Memory Cycle Book 4) Page 37
