by Gaie Sebold
It seemed as though the whole of the inside of the mountain had been carved out. The walls were a deep and bloody red, porphyry polished smooth as glass. Translucent slices and folds of agate hung here and there, like swathes of fantastic fabrics in shades of gold and copper and umber and flesh. Piled in mounds here and there, sometimes spreading up the walls, was what I thought, for one confused moment, was snow; but it was rock, smooth white stuff that glimmered where the light hit it as though a billion tiny stars were caught in its substance.
And crowded into this fantastical natural palace were thousands of Ikinchli. Every age, from tiny squirming infants to rheumy-eyed silvery ancients, sitting on low stools, on cushions, on rocks, on the floor. Perched in niches in the walls.
To the left was a great slab of that glimmering white stone, four feet high, six deep, and ten wide.
The altar. Mounds of incense were piled on its surface, sending sweet blue smoke up into the darkness. In front of it, Enthemmerlee and Malleay, tiny and doll-like in gowns of fantastic splendour; so covered with beads and stones and mirror-fragments as to render the fabric invisible. The gap where Lobik should have been was as shocking as a missing limb. In front of them, several Ikinchli priests, in elaborately embroidered gowns. Enboryay. Next to him a tumble of blonde curls, a shimmering gown: Laney.
The core of the guard at Enthemmerlee’s back. Stikinisk, the others, couldn’t remember their names, wouldn’t matter in a moment.
“Enthemmerlee!” My voice was sucked away into the huge empty space, the murmuring crowd. I started to run.
Faces turning to look, shocked.
“Enthemmerlee!”
Cave was too damn big, acoustics shitty, she’d never hear me.
The priests could see me now, but they carried on, ignoring the disruption. They’d probably expected something like this.
More of the guard, seeing someone running, raising weapons, realising who it was, confused, uncertain.
Good. If they’d had proper training I wouldn’t get within feet of her.
I jinked to the side without thinking. Something slapped my cheek, the side of my face went numb, I stumbled, kept running.
Stikinisk saw me, and her mouth opened. Malleay saw me, and suddenly there was a blade in his hand. What, you think after all the trouble I’ve been to I want to finish her off?
Someone hit me in the back, knocking me off my feet. I heaved them off, got up, kept running. “Enthemmerlee!”
Someone else slammed into me, and as I went over I saw Laney, wide eyed and furious, lifting her hand.
“No, Laney! It’s the Ipash Dok, the gift, don’t let it go on the altar!”
Finally, Enthemmerlee turned. I could see an Ipash Dok glittering in her hand; another – her own, I hoped – was already on the altar.
She held the thing up, looking at it, puzzled.
Then an awful lot of people landed on me.
“GET OFF HER!” Laney, never one for ceremony, marched through the crowd, throwing off sparks.
You don’t need to have met Fey before to realise that you don’t stand in the way of one when she’s pissed off. The various people holding me down – some guards but mostly Ikinchli – got up, though several of them still held onto me.
“Babylon, you’re bleeding.”
I was also pretty sore, and still trying to get my breath back. Someone had landed on my stomach and knocked the wind out of me. “Laney,” I wheezed. “That thing Enthemmerlee’s holding, there’s something very bad in it. Very... huuhh... bad indeed.”
“Oh. Well, I’d better take a look at it then.”
Enthemmerlee still stood by the altar, looking at me, as did Malleay. I hadn’t been stared at by this many people at once since the last time I’d been at the centre of a religious ceremony.
Enthemmerlee said, “I hope that you will forgive us for the insult of this disruption, but it seems there may be a problem.”
“Indeed there is,” Fain said. “I apologise profoundly for this, but we had no choice.”
“Please,” I said, “let Laney look.”
Enthemmerlee frowned at me, then looked at the small, glittering oval in her hand. “This.”
“Yes.”
“Surely you don’t think Lobik...”
“No. Not Lobik. Please, trust me, it’s dangerous.”
I saw her fingers tighten, and I drew a breath. Her eyebrows went up, and, still slowly, she handed it to Laney.
“Don’t try and open it,” I said.
“Really, Babylon, I’m not an idiot.” Laney frowned, running her fingers over the glitter and fragments. “It’s... Oh.”
“What is it?”
“A very clever ward,” Laney said. “A ward made to not look like a ward. If I hadn’t been looking for something, I’d never have found it.”
Everyone was looking at us now. “What is it? How did you know?” Enthemmerlee said.
“Later. Please.” I didn’t think she needed the news of her aunt’s betrayal right now. “It should be safe, for the moment. Laney?”
“Oh, yes. I’ll deal with it.” She looked up at the surrounding faces; the guards, the hundreds of watching Ikinchli, Enthemmerlee, the priests, and waved a hand. “Go on, then, carry on. I thought you had a ceremony to do?”
IT WAS ALL very solemn, and involved singing, but fortunately it wasn’t very long.
The Ikinchli seemed pleased, and roared their pleasure when Enthemmerlee was declared the Itnunnacklish; I felt a little ashamed of myself for thinking that a trifle redundant.
AFTER THE CEREMONY Laney rushed over to me and enveloped me in a scented hug. “Babylon, darling, I’m so sorry it took me just the longest time to get here, honestly, what with one thing and another...” She looked closely at me. “Darling, you look quite dreadful, has it been ghastly? No, I can tell it has. I knew I should have come with you.” Tears glittered in her eyes. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be silly, love, I told you not to come. Laney, is everyone well? Are things bad, back home?”
“Oh, well, there have been a few silly squabbles, but nothing dreadful. And that nice little herbalist on Freshwater Street got burned down, can you imagine? So annoying, now I’ll have to find someone else. Which reminds me, you’re going to bruise, I’ll put something on that when...”
“And Hargur?”
“Last I heard he was fine. It was him you meant, wasn’t it? In your first message? About ‘our dear Millie’?”
In everything that had happened, I’d completely forgotten about the message I’d sent from the docks when we arrived. “You got it?”
“Well, I wouldn’t know what it said if I hadn’t, darling, would I? Honestly, Babylon.”
“Sorry. It’s been a long few days.”
“Yes, I can tell. Anyway, I did send a message to Hargur, saying that you thought Fain was watching him.”
“Did he say anything?”
“Oh, you know the Chief, darling. He sent a message saying, ‘I know.’ That was it! And then I got your other one, and I spent forever trying to get passage. Two days in dockside offices!” Laney rolled her eyes. “I was beginning to think I’d been ill-wished.”
Two days, plus the time it had taken to get here. Anything could have happened. Though even on the docks, surely, she’d have heard...
“Oh, and did you find out anything about the silk?” Laney said.
I groaned. I’d forgotten about the bloody silk. “Well, it was on its way to Scalentine, last I heard. But someone planned to rob the warehouse.”
Her face fell. “Oh, no, that’s awful! We must get home and stop it!”
“It should be all right. I got a message back, to warn the Militia. If they have time to deal with it, that is.”
“Oh, well.” Laney’s face brightened again. “That’s all right, then.”
I hoped she was right. It was so good to see her I couldn’t really stay annoyed with her, anyway; having her there was like a little slice of home.
“Have you found out what was in the Ipash Dok?”
“So far as I can tell, it’s a disease. A very, very nasty one; some sort of plague. Without taking it to someone who specialises in these things, all I know is it would probably kill most things within a bee’s flight of human. So, certainly Ikinchli and Gudain and you, and probably me, too. And very, very infectious. But I daren’t look any closer.”
“It has to have been made outside Scalentine, then.”
“Well, I don’t know, darling,” Laney said.
“What do you mean? I thought the portals stopped diseases getting through.”
“They stop them coming in from the outside, but I don’t know if they stop them getting out. People going the other way don’t usually have anything infectious.”
Fain would probably know, and in the meantime, it wasn’t my problem. “Can you make it harmless?”
“I already did. Well, I’ve locked it. It needs destroying, really, but I don’t think I’m that good. I need Mokraine.”
“What happened to him?”
“Oh, it was terribly shocking, darling; I mean I haven’t seen him for so long, I had no idea he was that ill. And that creature of his was looking even more disgusting than usual. I’ve seen prettier slugs.”
“I’ve seen prettier turds than that thing.”
“Darling, ugh. Anyway, I was talking to Mokraine and I heard this scraping noise, and the familiar was lying on the floor, and well, you know it doesn’t breathe, but it looked as though if it did, it would be struggling to, and Mokraine got down on his knees, and I asked if it was sick, and he said he thought it was dying.”
“Did he catchsomething from it?”
“I don’t know, he just collapsed. I did what I could, had him put to bed in his room, but I’m not sure what’s wrong. I mean, this is Mokraine. He doesn’t even get sick like other people.”
“So who else was left behind?”
“A handful of servants,” Laney said, “some rather horrid little guard with hair like a greased hedgehog…”
“Dentor.”
“Well, anyway, I didn’t like him, a few other guards, and the seneschal, of course. Honestly, I don’t think you could get him out of the place unless you put a fireball up his bottom.”
“I hope you weren’t thinking of trying that.”
“Now you know I wouldn’t. By the way, that Captain Tantris is rather sweet, isn’t he? Is he with anyone who’d mind?”
“Ah. Laney, I need to tell you about the Moral Statutes...”
WE HEADED BACK to the Entaire household. On the way, I had the less-than-delightful task of telling Enthemmerlee about her aunt.
I saw the muscles of her jaw tighten. Poor child. As though she hadn’t had enough grief.
Then I saw Malleay put his hand over hers, and clasp it, and I felt a little better.
“I was an idiot,” I said. “I should have seen it much earlier.”
“How could you have?” Enthemmerlee said. “I never saw it.”
“I made a stupid assumption. When I realised she was having a secret meeting with Dentor, I thought they were having an affair.”
“An affair?”
“I thought she was bedding him.”
“Bedding... Oh. Oh! You thought... Selinecree? And a guard? Bedding?”
“Yeah. Sorry. And when she realised what Mokraine could do, she had him shoved into a room as far from her as possible and kept from meals, so there was no chance he’d bump into her and get what was going on in her head. I actually saw her run from the carriage he was in, and it never occurred to me why.”
There was another silence. The pinkish crops bent their heads. It had started to rain again.
“Papa would have died too,” Enthemmerlee said. “She didn’t try to stop him coming to the ceremony.”
“No. And if I’m right, with both of you out of the way, the estate would be hers to manage as she pleased; and she’d be the victim of a terrible tragedy which nonetheless managed to remove a dreadful embarrassment. And she’d have Chitherlee to bring up, properly, in the old ways.”
“Yes.” Her voice was cold.
“What will you do?” I said.
“I will do what is necessary.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE
WE PAUSED JUST out of sight of the house. It was dusk; smoke curled into the damp blue air. “We have to assume Selinecree’s still at the house,” I said. “If she sees this lot coming back, she’ll know things didn’t work the way they were meant to and probably make a run for it. I suppose a few of us are going to have to go in the way Fain and I came out.”
Enboryay spoke for the first time since Enthemmerlee had told him the situation. He had ridden in scowling silence all the way from the ceremony, his face paling and darkening by turns. Now it was locked in a flushed glare.
“Stupid,” he said.
“Papa?”
“Me. Bloody old fool I’ve been. You.” He turned his glare on me. “That was a good bit of riding, though watching you on the way back, your seat’s dreadful. No wonder you’re sore. Got some ointment that’ll help. Meantime, you come with me. I’ll show you a better way in, get closer to the house.” He looked at Tantris. “You too. And if you ever hear any bloody silly rumours about being turned away, talk to my daughter. As though either of us would ever turn out our guard. You should be ashamed, the lot of you.”
“Sir,” Tantris said, flushing furiously, and flushing more furiously when he caught Laney smiling at him. Perhaps he hadn’t been attending privaiya recently.
“Papa?”
“What is it, child?”
“Be careful,” Enthemmerlee said, clutching Malleay’s hand. “Please.”
Enboryay looked at his daughter, and nodded. “I will. Think I’m going to leave you with nothing but this sprig of a boy to help you run the estate? Hah. Come on then,” he said, and we mounted up, in my case with considerable protest from my abused nethers.
We nipped over the wall at a point where it was only yards from the main servants’ entrance.
The seneschal opened the door, letting only the briefest flicker of puzzlement pass over his face before he bowed. “My lord. Was the ceremony successful?”
“For us, yes. Where’s my sister?”
“In the chapel, my lord.”
We opened the gates, and got the chapel surrounded.
I’d got my arms back from Rikkinnet, and had them with me. Having misjudged Selinecree so appallingly, I didn’t trust her not to have another trick up her oversized sleeves.
But there were no guards, no bully-boys, no signs of magic. We pushed open the door of the chapel to see her seated on the low bench, Chitherlee at her side. The old priest shuffled out from his cubbyhole, and didn’t even seem to notice us. Dusky smoke curled from several burners, thick and sweet-smelling; I held my breath. Chitherlee turned as the door creaked open.
“Hello, Aunt Emlee. Is it finished?”
Then Selinecree turned around. She looked simply puzzled, at first, and then her face twisted into a sullen fury that made her look like a distorted child.
“Chitherlee, come out,” Enthemmerlee said.
Chitherlee slid off the bench, and Selinecree grabbed her gown. The girl squawked. “No,” Selinecree said. “No. You’ve taken everything else. You shan’t take her! You shan’t!” She pulled the child towards her by handfuls of material, backing along the bench. The priest, his back to us, oblivious, fidgeted with his bowls and rods.
“Selinecree. There’s nowhere to go,” Enthemmerlee said, her voice calm and clear and very, very cold.
“Let go, you’re hurting me!” Chitherlee wailed, and pulled.
There was a low ripping, and part of the girl’s gown pulled away from the ruff, revealing the armature, a stark ugly thing of wood and wire, like a cage. Chitherlee ran up the aisle, leaving a long strip of cloth in her great-aunt’s hand.
&nb
sp; “It’s torn,” Selinecree said. “Chitherlee, you bad girl, look what you’ve done.”
THE PATINARAI CEREMONY was in less than six hours, and we still had Selinecree to deal with. I hurried along towards the main hall with Laney.
“Laney, what was going on, to keep you in the docks?”
“Well, I was the oddest thing. There was this ship, the Lovely Aurette, and she seemed nice and was going the right way, so I booked a passage, and as I was coming away there was this man, he looked sort of familiar, he said was I going to Incandress. I told him yes and he said, did I have friends there, because it was a bad situation and I said, that was why I was going. So I asked him if he’d heard anything, because, well, you know, I’d had your message and I was worried. The person who passed it on wouldn’t tell me anythingelse except what you’d said.”
“That’s the Section for you. So what did this man say?”
“Only that he’d heard it was bad there, and he’d really advise me not to go. He must have been there to book his own passage and changed his mind, I saw him talking to the captain.”
“Wait a minute. He asked if you were going to Incandress?”
“Yes.”
“But the ships don’t go to Incandress. Incandress is landlocked. The ships come into Calanesk. You can go anywhere in the Flame Republic and half the Empire from there. So why did he assume you were going to Incandress?”
“You know, I’ve no idea,” Laney said, wandering around the room, tugging at a frayed curtain. “Oh, this place needs somuch doing to it. Really, some decent hangings, a good muralist... and these windows should all be enlarged, and the ceilings moved up. It’s so grim.”
“Laney... did you recognise him? The man who asked you about Incandress?”
“I’ve seen him about. Some dreadfully tedious dinner, I think. Oh, I remember; the Guild of Grain Merchants and Seed Dealers. Sucha ghastly evening, I had to play little games with the client under the table just to get him to leave early.” She smiled.
“Do you know his name?”
