Elayne expected the crowd, the red-arms’ array. She wasn’t ready for the suppressed anger of Chakal Square, for the tension like a long-held breath. She hoped Temoc had stopped the broadsheets. So large a mob, confused and mad, was a solution awaiting a seed to crystallize it into action.
A misplaced word would be enough. A shove, a laugh. A shift in the hot dead wind. Sand blown in the wrong woman’s eye. The path they walked to the tent where Temoc waited might seem wide, but was in fact narrow as a blade.
Temoc, she saw as they drew near, had brought his family.
She almost wrecked it all in that moment: almost grew a hundred feet tall and threw him across the square and shouted, What were you thinking?
But she controlled herself. Caleb and Mina seemed like messengers from a cleaner, more composed world, somewhere beyond the stars. Elayne met Mina’s gaze, offering as much reassurance as she could without breaking character. For the boy, Caleb, she risked more: she smiled at him, and he smiled back.
The King in Red stepped forth, and Temoc advanced to meet him. “We have drawn up the deal,” Kopil said, with the barest touch of Craft woven through his voice so the words would carry. “Are your people ready?”
He offered the amplification Craft to Temoc: a nice gesture, to make his first act surrender. “We are,” Temoc said.
Elayne’s cue. “This briefcase contains our deal.” Likewise amplified. Blood and hells, but she was ready to stop playing for the cheap seats. If she wanted to act out before judge and jury, she’d have gone into another branch of Craft.
Nothing for it. Sometimes even a necromancer had to appear in public. At least there were fewer torches and pitchforks than usual, so far.
“Thank you,” Temoc said.
Before Elayne entered the tent for what she hoped would be the last time, she glanced back to Mina—but she did not meet the other woman’s eyes again before she passed into shadow.
* * *
Entering the meeting tent felt like slipping into a limpid pool after a long hike. They all felt it: even the Major relaxed, free of the Square’s anxiety. Bel laughed at something Kapania said, and Hal poured them all water. The King in Red sagged, and for a moment he resembled a kindly, ancient uncle who just happened to be a skeleton crowned with red gold. Tan Batac was the only one who looked nervous, and one for ten wasn’t a bad ratio.
Temoc entered the tent last. Elayne caught him before he could take his seat. “What do you think you’re doing, bringing them here?”
“This is a historic moment.”
“Historic and dangerous.”
“I did not expect the crowd to be so tense. We are on the verge of victory.”
“To them, victory and defeat look a lot alike.”
“Then let us show them the difference,” he said.
She released him, and they sat. Silence fell. With her thumb Elayne rolled the briefcase tumblers to her combination, opened the latches, rolled the tumblers random again, and lifted the lid. Bill Kemal tensed as if he expected something to explode, but the case was empty save for a manila folder, a dip pen, and a shallow silver bowl. She removed folder, bowl, and pen, set them on the table, and closed the case. “Here we are.”
She opened the folder and slid the document into the center of the table. Five pages, with a signature on the fifth.
“So small,” Kapania said. “I thought contracts like this ran for hundreds of pages.”
“Hundreds,” Elayne confirmed, “or thousands. This is a special case. We’ve done most of the work. These papers alter the original pursuant to your requirements, most substantially the preconditions of fee simple sale and the insurance and protection mandate. I’d like to walk through the terms of the agreement one by one. Please pay attention. I’ll pause for questions after every subsection. I appreciate your holding questions for a pause, since there’s a good chance your issues may be addressed in the text.” Nods around the table. “Section one.”
Fewer questions than she expected, and no outbursts. No major changes—a few words here or there, easy emendations Tan Batac and the King in Red let slide. Before her watch ticked quarter past ten, she turned the final page and said, “Are we agreed?”
The King in Red nodded.
Tan Batac said, “Yes.”
“We are,” said Temoc.
“Sounds good,” said Bill Kemal, and Kapania, “Sure.”
“Yes,” said Bel after a long, slow nod.
“Acceptable,” said the Major in a steel-string twang.
Xatoc said, “Yeah.”
And Hal Techita said, “Sounds good.”
And that was that.
Almost.
She drew her knife from the glyph above her heart, savored that old shiver of corruption and universal wrong. They’d been through a lot together, this blade and her. She kept it subtle; only gathered a little light into the edge. The oculus dimmed to pale gold. “Some of you,” she said, “may find this next part unpleasant, but it’s necessary. You may use your own blade, but unless you do this sort of thing often best let me do the honors.” With a stroke of her finger, she honed the moonlight curve.
They all let her make the cuts, even Temoc. She needed only a drop, in most cases so fine a cut the victim felt no pain until Elayne was done. Temoc did not flinch. Tan Batac bit his lip as the blade descended; she did not warn him this was a bad idea if one expected jaw-clenching pain. She added her own blood, to lend the firm’s seal to the contract. When the bowl reached the King in Red, the others caught their breath. Kopil held out one hand, palm raised. The sparks of his eyes blazed, and wind howled from a distant, blasted plane. The universe blinked, and when light returned a tiny sphere of ruby liquid hovered over his outstretched hand. He turned his hand sideways, and the blood fell into the silver bowl with a plop. No one asked him for an explanation, and he offered none—only leaned back and sipped coffee.
With water added, and fixative, the blood became tolerable ink. Each party signed in turn. A wheel turned beneath the onionskin surface of reality, giant weights fell into place, and, as Tan Batac signed, the work was done. A long-drawn note on the deepest edge of Elayne’s hearing shifted pitch.
This was the part of the job she loved: the world changed, and she changed it. They changed it, together—these people she dragged to the table and guided through darkness.
She clapped. Even Tan Batac joined in her applause.
“Good work, everyone,” she said, and returned the contract to her briefcase. They looked around, stunned by victory achieved in spite of themselves.
Then they rose, and as one left the tent.
30
Elayne emerged into the silence of the crowd. The contract pulsed in her briefcase, drawing power from the gathered masses, settling into shape. The sun hovered above the RKC building to the east, a bright orange fire in a bright orange sky whipped by demon wind. People called questions, jawed and joked. Someone even sang. But the voices masked emptiness. Eyes turned toward her, and she read a question in them.
What now?
By the tent flap, clutching Caleb, Mina faked academic detachment, but her concern showed through. Elayne wished she hadn’t noticed. She felt as if by noticing she betrayed the other woman.
Temoc’s scars blazed, and he climbed into empty air as if ascending an invisible staircase: taller now than the King in Red, his boots above the rolling crowd. Sparrows settled onto the RKC building’s rooftop. Wardens marched behind their barricade. Temoc cleared his throat.
“It is done.” At first Elayne feared he might stop after those three words. But Temoc knew how to milk a pause. “The deal is signed. People of the Skittersill. My people. We have won.”
A dam broke and noise burst forth. Women shouted, men yelled, children screamed. All through Chakal Square the Skittersill’s people cheered. Protest signs twirled in whirlpools of dance. The King in Red did not seem to mind the noise. Neither did Tan Batac: he waved into the crowd, his eyes squinted as if searching for so
mething.
Elayne heard joy in the sound, no doubt, but more energy than joy, a month of harbored rage and fear allowed its first release.
Temoc let the cheer build, but long before it might have reached crescendo he held out his hands, palms down. The noise receded. He lowered his hands further, and the silence returned, deeper even than before. Pressure built.
Tan Batac did not seem to notice the change; he kept smiling and waving, even as the applause died.
Temoc opened his mouth.
Chakal Square was so quiet Elayne could hear her own heartbeat.
Chakal Square was so quiet everyone heard the shot.
A high, sharp crack—Elayne leapt at Temoc, grabbed him by one ankle and pulled, wrapping them both in a diamond-hard shield. Temoc fell to one knee on his platform of air, fought to stand. No bullet struck Elayne’s shield, no arrow or Craftwork missile or fléchette. She glanced around, confused: the space swarmed with Wardens, black and silver blurs flocking to the King in Red. Futile. Any weapon meant for him would not be stopped by killing a few Wardens first. They should be guarding—
Oh, gods.
She would remember, later, that when the shot came she’d seen Tan Batac wheel around, hand still raised. Signs she should have noticed: body stiff, face glazed with adrenaline and shock. But she’d dived for Temoc instead.
Tan Batac fell. A red stain spread across his white shirt between his thin suspenders. He flapped at the stain as if to daub the wetness up. His lips framed words she could not hear. Blood gushed from his wound in rhythm, and his hands left red prints on his jacket.
His eyes focused on her.
Noise, everywhere. Rush of her own heartbeat, her own breath. Wardens shouted spells she remembered from decades past, handed down to them by veterans of her Wars, Wars which had never ended and, never ending, never changed.
“Have visual.”
“Man down.”
“Single shot.”
“—Perimeter—”
“—Need cover—”
“Get down get down get down.”
“Medic.”
“I see him I know I see him.”
“Medic!”
“Engaging.”
And beneath those spells she heard other cries, the crowd understanding—or not—
“—Who—”
“They can’t—”
“Temoc’s down!”
Another shot. She raised a second shield.
This time no one fell.
Temoc landed beside her; shadow and green flame swallowed his skin, the gods’ aspect summoned to protect him. He glanced from Tan Batac to his family, to Mina covering Caleb with her body, to Chel covering Mina, to the Wardens. Elayne knelt by Batac, pulled a handkerchief from her jacket and wadded it against the wound. The yellow sky reflected in his eyes. She woke glyphs on her hands, wrists, temples—different glyphs than those she used for work, older, cruder, made with makeshift tools in time of war. Darkness swallowed her, an instant’s utter vacancy as if some high all-sustaining God had blinked (as, if such a Being existed, she must have done mere seconds before). Elayne pulled poison sunlight down—enough, she hoped, and closed her eyes: Tan Batac’s soul was a torn sheet whipped by hurricane winds, but he could bear, for a while, the touch of her Craft. Longer than he’d last without. The cost of magic was ever the calculus of healing.
Tan Batac was an engineering project broken.
Subconscious systems tracked unfolding chaos. Situational awareness: once drilled in you never forgot, time and therapy be damned. The King in Red drew power to him. “Find the assassin. Bring him to me.” Assumptions, always. Might be a her. Might be many enemies. The Wardens aren’t police here, now—they’re a force in hostile territory. Don’t send them in without a clear mission.
“No,” she shouted, to convey all this at once, but Batac slipped beneath her, damn hopeless, couldn’t even lie still. She turned back to him, cursing. Not that she could have stopped the King in Red, not that Kopil would have heard her over his own anger’s roar.
Zoh charged into the crowd. The other Wardens circled around Elayne, Batac, Kopil. The red-arms did not give way fast enough and Zoh struck two men with wrecking-ball force. He swam against a human current. The crowd responded: some fell, but others pressed against Zoh, clawing, biting. Zoh raised his arms to ward off blows: “Out of my way!” With muscles reinforced by Craft he hurled protesters aside, carving a path step by step through thrashing bodies, searching for the shooter he’d seen, might have seen, hoped he’d seen.
“Cop!” “—fucking—” “What the hells are you—” “Temoc!” “—The hells you—” “—broke my godsdamn arm—”
Focus. Gut wound. Blood flowing. Find the slug, easy, but was he safe to move? Entry wound below the rib cage but slanted to one side, and back there he had kidneys to worry about, and liver and gall bladder. This would all be easier if he was dead. At least she could stop the bleeding—or contain it, by convincing his blood it ran through unperforated vessels.
Batac spoke. Skin blanched white, lips trembling, he found breath to whisper. “Not at all.”
“Not at all what,” she asked, faking calm. “Not at all what, Tan?”
His too-pink tongue flicked out, wet his lips, withdrew.
Rocks arced through the air at Zoh. Pebbles first, then larger stones thrown faster. Most bounced off—a fist-sized chunk of masonry hit the Warden’s head, but his mask saved him. Made him angry, though—he shoved harder. “Make way” he bellowed with enhanced voice, but there was no room for the people to fall back, no way for them to make.
A chill spread across her skin. The King in Red held fire in his hand, and contemplated the crowd near Zoh. “No!” she cried, and he heard.
“Justice must be served.”
“You want to help? Help me. If you throw Craft into this crowd, people will die.”
“They will bow to us.”
“You’ll kill them!”
Temoc shouted: “Be calm. Everyone be calm.” But even he could not drown out the roar, or stem the tide of bodies that surged against the red-arms. The King in Red snarled, but at least he let the fire die. “Can we move him?”
“If we’re careful. I have the wound contained.”
“—At all. Not at all.”
They could recover. This was one nail in their coffin, just one, with many pry bars to hand. If they reached safety they could cool this down. Batac was stable, would be stable, had to be. He would survive.
The second nail sounded like a mother, crying.
Fear seized her, but that wasn’t Mina’s voice: she had drawn back toward the tent, behind Chel. No, the cry came from the crowd, near Zoh.
The King in Red swore in High Quechal, which she hadn’t heard him speak since the Wars. His eyes blinked off, then on again.
“What is it?”
The mother screamed.
“Zoh. He—”
She stood, saw for herself the ripple spreading from Zoh, the space where there’d been no space before: a widening circle around the Warden and a kneeling woman. She held a child of maybe six, younger than Caleb. The child’s eyes stared unblinking at the sun. Blood poured from his scalp. On the flagstones beside them lay a rock, stained red.
Later Zoh would claim he hadn’t thrown the rock on purpose. Caught it by reflex, rather, and tossed it into the air with more strength than he should have used, a Warden’s throw, Craftwork-enhanced, and what goes up most of the time comes down. Others said he’d aimed for one of the rock-throwers, to break a collarbone or shatter a rib, but someone jostled him and the stone went wild and by dumb bad luck the kid was in the way.
“Killer,” was the word the crowd spoke as the mother wailed. Zoh turned in a slow circle, and maybe he could have saved the peace even then with the superhuman compassion the Diamond Sage of Dhistra showed in tales of his billion incarnations, maybe he could have gone to the mother and knelt and removed his mask and let himself be torn apart. But Zoh
was no saint. Masked, he did not even seem a man. He stepped back, arms raised, and if he said “I’m sorry” it was lost in the crowd’s roar.
“Temoc!” Elayne shouted, turned, searching—the priest stood transfixed beyond the Wardens’ circle, a sculpture of black and jade. “Talk to them.”
But the crowd closed in, and the red-arms didn’t stop them. The vanguard of the charge was a big man with jowls and a thicket beard: he reached the Wardens and fell, almost too fast for Elayne to see the silver fist that struck him. Others jumped over their fallen comrade’s body, only to bounce off a shield of solid air, while a second shield enclosed Zoh. Kopil’s Craft cut off the sound of screams. Bodies wadded against the shield, cheeks and hands and stomachs flattened by its curve. Lightning cracked where they touched. Kopil’s crown was a dark halo.
The King in Red drew his hands apart and the shield grew, sweeping protesters aside without apparent effort. His teeth ground together. Wardens, braced to resist the riot, stumbled into suddenly empty space. Temoc pressed to the front of the crowd, scars radiant. “Get back,” he shouted to his people, and some obeyed, but only some, and others rushed to fill their place.
With her glyphs awake and power chilling her blood, Elayne wanted to fight, to shatter the crowd, to open their road to safety. She was a spring, and did not want to hold herself compressed. The King in Red, too, was ready to fight—weapons formed around him, trembling on hair trigger.
“Give us that man.” Temoc pointed to Zoh. “The killer.”
Kopil laughed, the same laugh that almost brought the mob down upon them two days ago. Only two days. Then again, only minutes before, they had been about to finish this in pride and peace.
“No,” Kopil said. “He will be punished. But I will not give him to your mob. Find the assassin among you first.”
“Give him to me and we can stop this,” Temoc shouted through the screams.
“Do it,” Elayne said. “I’ll stay with Zoh.”
Kopil shook his head. “Unacceptable. We all leave together.”
“I need a concession. Something to calm them down,” Temoc said.
Last First Snow Page 15
