“Shrane! Stop us! You’ll kill us all!” he shouted.
The boat turned on its keel, tipping sideways. Men’s screams ceased awfully as they fell out and were smeared to paste under the sliding hull. Supplies and sleds, so carefully stowed for the landing, broke their ropes and fell overboard; crates smashed, scattering their contents down the slope. The scree banked up under them. Persin hoped it might reach a sufficient mass to stop them, but a small avalanche rushed out from under the rupturing keel.
“Shrane!” he shouted.
Lightning arced around Shrane’s staff. She still had her eyes closed, muttering her strange words to herself. The ice wall came closer. The snow of it was dusted brown, the crevasses were deep and a stunning blue. Persin watched them rush at him, arrested by the colours, sure this was his final sight.
The boat lurched, and slowed. Shrane held up her staff, and turned it slowly. As if hand and the ship were the same, the Marie Sother followed, righting itself to the scree. The ride became smoother, the horrible crunching of broken floatstone lessened.
Almost delicately, the ship came to a stop in the angle between ice and scree at the foot of the slope. Boulders rattled down into the hull, bouncing in decreasing numbers until finally, they stopped.
A slew of debris described their path, the rocks marked with the chalky white of pulverised floatstone and the red of obliterated men. The deck was in disarray. There would be more casualties there.
Shrane stopped chanting, and sagged into her staff. Persin grabbed her.
“You have wrecked my ship.”
“We are upon the Sotherwinter continent, where few men have ever trod,” she said wearily. “The prize is yours for the taking, and you have two other vessels to bear you home. No venture can be completed without a little sacrifice. Now leave me be. You have witnessed a great work of magic, and I must rest.”
She moved slowly toward the tower stairs. Persin moved to follow her, but she stopped him with a dangerous stare.
He went to the rail, and began shouting orders down to his men to prepare for disembarkation.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Aftermath
GARTEN PUSHED A broken body from his chest. Shouting and alarms rang under the dome of the Hall of Assembly. Soldiers ran pointlessly from place to place, yelling, weapons out. Garten was drenched in blood, already drying sticky on his face. With trembling hands he probed his body, relieved to find no shock-numbed wounds. So far as he could tell he was, miraculously, unharmed.
He wished he could say the same for Lucinia. The speaker’s podium was a mess of twisted iron and blazing wood. Tongues of orange flame twisted where she had been standing.
“Fire, fire, fire!” someone called, far above. A bell rang, then another. The soldiers ran, some fled. Those with a presence of mind hurried to the epicentre of the explosion, the end of the Petitioners’ Quadrant. Garten’s seat had been upended by the blast, and he struggled to locate his original position. When he did, his stomach flipped. There had been four other embassies in the quadrant along with Karsa’s: Macer Lesser, Mudai, Rodriana, and Tellivar. Members of the smaller groups were scattered willy-nilly, strewn like corpses in a melodrama. Two men sat blinking, holding their bloodied faces in their hands, another clawed at the splintered remnants of his left leg, screaming without taking a breath. The rest of them lay still. They might have been alive or they might not, but it was the Karsans who had been closest to the blast, and they were all certainly dead. Scraps of them adhered to the walls. The ivory shrapnel of teeth studded wood. Garten picked his way through scattered limbs and shredded finery, searching for Abing. He stood on something soft, lifted his foot to see a hand adorned with Mandofar’s ring of office. He was staring at it, unable to move, when a groan spurred him back into action. He followed the pained sounds, overturning an upset bench to find Duke Abing.
“Damn it Kressind!” he said. His thunderous voice had faded to a pained whisper. “Damn it all!” His hands were bright red, his sleeves soaked in blood. A length of bent iron protruded from his gut. Blood flowed around it, so slowly it looked almost decorative; a lazy, pulsing fountain in a summer courtyard, not a sign of harm.
“The Morfaan! Get them out of here. I don’t trust any of this lot. Not one!”
Garten looked up for the first time. The force of the blast had directed itself upward, reducing the Maceriyan box to a bottomless square. Planks of wood and bodyparts dangled from it. The Morfaan balcony had fared better, and both the emissaries lived. The male looked to be having a seizure or a fit of panic; the woman’s face was a picture of outrage.
Living soldiers reached the Maceriyan balcony—all those guarding it had been flung outward, colourful and dead as a scattered bunch of cut flowers.
“The Comtes are dead!” one was shouting.
“Secure the house. Get that fire out. Send for the physics.”
“At last one of those bloody idiots is showing some wit,” said Abing. He grunted in pain. “I’m going, for the love of all the Earth, I’m going! Gods damn it, not like this!” he said. He gritted his teeth, his lips parted to show teeth stained crimson. “Get to the Morfaan Kressind, get to them and get them out of here before someone else finishes the job.”
Garten nodded and backed away. “Whatever you say, your grace.”
“Bloody lucky you were late, or you’d be dead too. There’s just you now. They got the bloody lot of us! Hold the fort until help arrives from home, and don’t do anything bloody stupid.”
“Yes your grace,” said Garten. He hurried away, past his seat. On his way out he turned his ankle. He felt it go and flicked his foot out before he could put his weight down and twist it, kicking aside a small, brass bound box in the process. “Issy!” he said, and plucked up her case. “Issy, Tyn Issy, are you hurt?” he opened the door. Issy stared back at him, her hair rumpled but otherwise unhurt.
“Take more than that to kill a Tyn of my degree. I am tougher than lesser beings.”
“I’ll take that as a no then.”
“Wait! I slipped and tumbled though. I think I broke a nail,” she said peevishly. “After all I did. My art saved you.”
“You?”
“How else do you think you still live, by which I mean not dead? Foolish man. Ungrateful. And you forgot me.”
“I did not,” he lied.
“You did.”
“I’ll give you flowers when this is done,” he said. “Thank you.”
Garten stumbled over the bomb’s wreck. A spine glinted whitely from the red ruin of the floor. There was an inch of blood in the bottom of the Petitioner’s Quadrant. He never knew so much fluid was contained within the human form.
He exited the box. Away from the blast the effects were superficial, debris tossed from the explosion, not structural damage. He had enough of his family’s affinity for engineering to see that. He took the stairs up to the balcony at a run. There should have been two soldiers guarding the Morfaan box, but they had fled or gone to the carnage in the Maceriyan balcony. A scabbarded sabre lay discarded on the floor. Not his favoured weapon, but Garten retrieved it before pushing through the curtain unmolested.
The curtain was a divide between two degrees of order. On the side of the corridor, there was no sign of anything amiss. On the other, devastation. The ornamentation of the box had been blasted into a thin spread of plaster glittering with scraps of gold leaf. Splintered wood poked dangerously from broken beams and panelling.
The male Morfaan was cringing into the female, weeping like a child, her clothes bunched in his fists and pressed into his face. Garten stepped back. The woman heard him and whirled round, provoking a fresh round of wailing from the male. There were representatives still in the building, and some had stopped to point from the galleries above, astounded by this performance from the erstwhile masters of the Earth.
“You must come with me, now,” said Garten. He held out his hand, ridiculously feeling that he had intruded upon a private moment.
<
br /> The female—Josan—looked imperiously at the scabbarded blade. He held it in the same hand as Tyn Issy’s box, leaving one free.
“You come here armed. You may wish us harm, we are safer here,” said Josan.
“I think not,” said Garten. “I cannot say that the bomb was intended for you, but it is likely.”
The male began to titter. “Bomb, bomb, bomb.”
“Yes,” said Garten, “an explosive device, most likely a mixture of glimmer and iron, it—”
“We know what a bomb is,” said Josan.
“So clever you have become,” said the male wiping tears from his face with the back of his hand. “We are very proud of our protégés.” He turned his face to look at Garten. His eyes were rimmed red with weeping, and although they were inhuman, there was no mistaking the madness in them.
“My lord, are you hurt?” Garten asked.
“My brother is shocked,” said Josan defensively. “That is all.”
“Please,” Garten said, “come with me. I will take you wherever you wish. I am Garten Kressind, the sole survivor of the Karsan embassy. My lord’s dying wish was that I see you safe.”
The woman’s odd nose flexed. She looked up to the faces peering over the balcony at her and her simpering brother.
“To our rooms in the palace,” she said. “That is far enough away from here, and guarded by more than men.”
By now the outflow of people had become an influx. Soldiers, physics, Guiders and the curious came into the dome from every entrance. Soon those soldiers who had come to help were occupied with holding back the crowds and keeping order.
“This is a mess. Which way do we go?” he said to Josan.
“I will show you, Garten of Karsa.”
She parted the curtain, and moved out of the remains of the box with difficulty, for her brother still clutched at her skirts. A long hall led back from the Hall of the Assembly. Toward their end, staircases swept up from it to the circles and boxes of the representatives. Josan moved very quickly, half-dragging her brother. Josanad had stopped weeping, and peeped at everything with fearful eyes. Encumbered, the Morfaan moved faster than a human could walk and Garten jogged to keep up. Men rushed past them in both directions, bearing the wounded, shouting. The assembly was an ant’s nest disturbed.
“How did you come away unscathed?” she asked Garten.
“I have a friend.”
Josan eyed Issy’s box. “You have an Y Dvar guardian? Those of the half-will?” She slowed, putting space between herself and Garten.
“A lesser Tyn,” he said. “She is under many geas, do not fear.”
“One should always fear the Y Dvar,” she said.
They went down a fan-shaped stair that opened into a lobby area, and headed for the doors. Josan slowed, yanking her brother back.
Outside, the sun was shining. She approached the edge of a rhombus of sunlight on the carpet and looked fearfully skyward.
“The mist! It is gone!” she said.
Josanad blinked myopically. “Gone, how?” he straightened, changing completely. A different man emerged from the cowering thing of a few moments ago.
“The mage,” said Josan. “The one at the rock. The lackey of this ridiculous church.”
“Shrane,” said Garten.
“You know her?”
“She has been causing trouble. Have you not been told?”
“We have been told very little,” said Josan.
There was shouting outside.
“What’s this?” said Garten. He drew his sabre. “Get back.”
A line of men were advancing up the steps, armed with a motley collection of weapons. A soldier moved to confront them. One of the men raised an ironlock pistol and shot him down.
“Get away from the doors!” said Garten.
A bullet shattered the glass.
“Sister!” said Josanad. For a second, Garten feared the return of the frightened boy, but the Morfaan shook off his cloak and drew matching swords of strange design from his belt. To Garten’s surprise, a second, smaller pair of arms emerged from slits in his tunic, and plucked daggers from crossed baldricks.
“We will fight together, goodfellow,” said Josanad.
There was no time to think on this change in the Morfaan. Their attackers opened fire, destroying the glass of the doors, forcing the Morfaan and Garten round the corner into cover. The men ran in, expecting their quarry to have fled, but Garten and Josanad were waiting.
“Karsa!” Garten shouted. Josanad added a cry in a high, piping language, and they ran into the knot of assailants. Garten despatched two before he had finished his charge, opening one’s face as he fumbled his gun up. The second made a pathetic attack with his sword that Garten evaded easily, skewering him through his throat.
Josanad moved with amazing speed, swords blurring, hacking down men as he span. Garten would never advocate turning one’s back on the enemy as the Morfaan did, but Josanad came through it unscathed. In seconds, he had incapacitated or killed five men. The three left threw down their weapons and fled.
Soldiers thundered into the lobby, and trained their guns on Garten.
“Lower your weapons!” demanded Josanad, stepping between the guards and Garten. “This one fights for me!”
An officer ran down the stairs. His jacket was soaked all down one side in blood.
“My lords Morfaan! I was told you departed by the south exit.”
“And I by the north,” said another, coming to join them.
“Distractions. There are agitators in this building.” said Garten. He hunted about the wounded, and grabbed a man clutching a deep gash in his arm. “You!”
The man spat at him. Still energised from the fight, Garten hauled him up and pressed his fingers into the man’s wound, making him scream.
“Tell me why the Morfaan were attacked,” demanded Garten.
“Gladly!” said the man. “I have nothing to hide. The gods! They insulted the gods! The Assembly, the Morfaan.” He snarled. “You will all die for it.”
Garten shoved him back. Disgusted with himself, his rage abruptly left him, leaving him feeling ill.
“Round these bastards up,” said the officer. “Get them to the physics, those that look like they’ll live, then deliver them to the Fortress,” he said. Soldiers pushed past Garten. Two lived. He pitied them for their fate. “Get the Morfaan back to their apartments via the south wing tunnel. Keep them out of the sun. Triple the guard. Men of good standing only, no foreigners.”
“This is a matter for all the kingdoms,” said Garten.
“It will be my head if they die, not yours,” said the officer. “Only those men I know personally will watch over them.”
Josan looked helplessly over her shoulder at Garten as they were hustled away. Everywhere there was shouting and bells. More and more soldiers were coming into the building, flooding past him like the tide past a rock.
Now the excitement of combat was leaving him, a weight of dread drew Garten’s gaze to the dead on the floor. Their wounds were bright scarlet ways into the meat. Their most intimate parts were unknown even to themselves, revealed for all the world to see. It was abhorrent, this lack of dignity, worse than death in its way.
These bodies were opened by his blade. He screwed his eyes shut against the sight, but the images remained. He had trained with the sword all his life, but he had never yet killed a man. Not until now.
Garten’s sword clattered from his hand.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The City of Ice
THE SOLSTICE WAS a week away. The nights were a bare purple bruise on the western horizon before they drained away. The effect on the men of so much light was simultaneously energising and enervating. They had little desire for rest, and the few hours of sleep they took were fitful. When awake and engaged at their tasks they went at them with a feverish intensity, but when not gainfully employed many of them fell into a nervous, twitchy daze. Between them Bannord, Trassan, Heffi
and Antoninan kept the crew hard at it, preparing the camp and sleds to bring back whatever wonders were within the city, and surveying the outer bounds of the dome. Ullfider and his assistants chipped away at Haik’s icy tomb. The city waited, but Trassan did not give the order to investigate. Fights broke out, especially between members of the more radically opposed Ishmalani sects. Other men became maudlin.
Bannord grew concerned at the wait, and sought out Trassan. The aft hold had been emptied of the larger items of equipment. Although the walls were still lined with shelves of supplies not needed on the ice, there was sufficient space for a modest workshop.
Trassan spent most of his time there when not dealing with the day-to-day running of the expedition. Sure enough, Bannord found Trassan with his sleeves rolled up, tinkering on a device Bannord didn’t recognise.
“We,” said Bannord, “are going to have a problem if we don’t get in there soon.”
Trassan sighed and leaned on his workbench. “I agree, lieutenant, but what’s to be done? The Ishmalani have to observe their rituals, and we have to set up camp. I’ve learned enough from the writings of Haik about the importance of a proper base in the Sotherwinter.”
“The weather’s fine,” said Bannord. “The city is five hundred yards from this perfectly adequate dock. We’ve enough supplies to last us months. We’re not camping on shifting pack ice.”
“Are you challenging my judgement?”
“Hells yes I am. What are we doing sitting out here?”
Trassan wiped his hands on a rag. “Bannord, to be frank with you, I’ve not idea why Guis recommended you over Captain Qurion—”
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