The Royal Sorceress

by Christopher Nuttall

  Lucy took the basket and opened it, revealing a hunk of bread and cheese. Jack ate his share absently, thinking hard. The soldiers had to be driven out of the poorer parts of the city before they gained complete control, or the underground would have to scatter and hope that the soldiers eventually left. Jack’s network of underground leaders would be broken up even if no one important was arrested by the authorities, for whatever trust had linked them together would be gone. An idea crossed his mind and he smiled, even as he took another sip of cold water. They would have to provoke a far more serious incident between the soldiers and the civilians before it was too late. And he knew just who to ask.

  Pulling on his coat and picking up a set of stolen papers that claimed that he worked in a nearby factory, Jack nodded to Lucy and strode out of the door. The plan was already unfolding in his mind as he reached the street and walked down the middle of the road. It felt odd, almost deserted. The hawkers and traders, the drunkards and the whores, they all seemed to have slipped into the shadows, intimidated by the presence of the soldiers. He crossed an intersection and glanced down the side street, shivering as he saw the mounted horsemen patrolling the district. The intimidation would be enough to keep most of the underground in their place, unless rage broke through and destroyed the fear. And if it failed...

  Jack had no illusions about the high cost of freedom. He’d been willing to pay it ever since he’d discovered the truth behind his origins. And yet...so many others had never been consulted. They had never made the choice to risk their lives for freedom. Jack hesitated, on the verge of turning around and slipping out of the city, and then his resolve firmed up. It was war, a war that had been waged since time out of mind. Freedom was worth any price.

  ***

  Her name was Flora McDonald, a legacy from her Scottish father who had made his way to London to find work. He hadn’t found anything better than manual labour and had drunk himself to death before Flora had reached her tenth birthday. Despite being young and pretty – with fiery red hair and a seductive smile – Flora had been one of the luckier women in the poorer parts of London. She had never been forced to sell her body just to remain alive; indeed, her husband, one of the handful of teachers and labour organisers in the city, treated her surprisingly well. Flora had come to share his passion for his cause and hadn’t hesitated when she’d been asked to help the underground. The soldiers, mercifully, were less interested in harassing the women near the factories. There were simply too many other problems to tackle.

  The factory was a massive black building, stained with soot and a hundred by-products of British ingenuity. Flora had been inside several factories – always without the permission or knowledge of the management – and she’d found them hellish, places where men worked to produce Britain’s vast catalogue of mechanical goods for small wages. A man who was injured on the job would find himself out on the streets. The factory owners didn’t care about the constant stream of cripples from among their employees. There were always more where they came from. Flora had helped tend men who had lost arms or legs to industrial accidents and it had torn at her soul to see how helpless they’d become. None of them had ever found other employment.

  She braced herself as she walked up to the soldiers outside the gate. It was lunchtime at the factory, which meant that about half of the workers would be off-shift, waiting for their wives or daughters to bring them their lunch. None of the factories fed their workers; it was yet another expense that helped keep men in the gutter. Flora had had no difficulty in joining the stream of women making their way towards the factory, holding a basket in one hand. None of the women would recognise her, but they’d say nothing; new employees often arrived without notice, their wives unknown to the rest.

  Most of the women were looking away from the soldiers, unwilling to make eye contact with the leering men at the gate. Flora braced herself and smiled at the soldiers, trying to make herself seem as inviting as possible. Far too many wives would sell themselves while their husbands were at work, trying to earn extra money to feed their children. The soldiers responded to her smile, grinning at her as the line slowed to a crawl. Flora knew that it was now too late to run. If something went wrong...

  She reached the end of the line and paused, licking her lips as the soldiers smiled at her. They’d been asking the wives the names of their husbands, a question that would have made them feel harassed even though it was easy to answer; instead, the leader stepped forward and leered at Flora. Instead of checking her basket, he put his lips close to her ears and whispered a rude suggestion to her. Flora, pretending to be shocked, slapped him and ran for the gate, screaming for help. Confused, the soldiers gave chase.

  Inside the factory gates, hundreds of men were milling around. They’d been bullied by the soldiers before they were allowed to enter the factory and then informed that their wages would be docked by the management. Mutiny and violence were in the air, even before the men saw one of their wives being chased by soldiers. One of the factory workers yelled aloud and charged at the soldiers. The others followed his lead. They were hardly weaklings – factory work was physically demanding – and the soldiers had no time to react before the workers were upon them, beating them to death. The soldiers at the gate lifted their weapons, only to find themselves swarmed by a mass of angry women. There was no longer any fear. It had been driven away by anger and resentment.

  The soldiers were rapidly killed, but the riot was spreading. As Flora watched, the workers swarmed back into the factory, smashing their way through the building. The manager came out of his office and tried to speak to the crowd, but it was already too late. None of them had liked him even before he’d docked their wages, making his contempt for them all too clear. They ripped him and the clerks apart in seconds, setting fire to the paperwork that chained them as surely as cold iron. And then they headed out onto the streets, racing towards the soldiers and the other factories. The chaos spread faster than any warning.

  ***

  Jack watched from his rooftop vantage point as the riot spread further. The handful of agents he’d inserted into the crowd were doing their job well, directing the factory workers towards the soldiers and their checkpoints. They could have been broken by quick and decisive action on the part of the soldiers, but they’d been caught by surprise and hadn’t been able to react in time. Each riot would spark off other riots as long-held resentments erupted to the surface, challenging the soldiers directly. The government would find itself faced, not with a limited series of riots, but with a serious uprising. They’d be forced to send extra troops into the poorer parts of the city, stripping their defences bare.

  He smiled as he leapt from one rooftop to the next. An officer was trying to take command of a small detachment of soldiers, showing remarkable presence of mind in the face of an oncoming storm of rioters. The crowd was too angry to be deterred by anything other than force, yet the soldiers were clearly nervous. They hadn’t signed up to crush urban insurrection in London itself. Their officer might have been able to get them into position, given time, but Jack had no intention of allowing someone to take control. He reached out with his magic, despite the pain in his head, and picked the officer off his horse. The redshirt struggled against his invisible tormenter as he rose several yards into the air, before Jack finally lost his grip on him. He plummeted to the ground and shattered both of his legs. His men, realising that they were facing magic as well as an uprising, started to retreat. But there was nowhere to go. The smart ones scattered into side streets and tried to lose their uniforms before they were caught. The others died before they could escape.

  Years of pent-up hatreds were exploding. The troops found themselves bombarded by slops and stones from the windows, forcing them to take cover even as they tried to retreat. Thousands of unemployed men – and even a few women – were coming onto the streets, baying for blood. Jack’s inciters were doing a wonderful job; the soldiers, despite their weapons, couldn’t hold the line agai
nst the crowds. Barricades were already being thrown up in the streets, each one cutting off the soldiers and breaking them up into small isolated detachments. They’d be screaming for help from the government, Jack knew; there would be a handful of Talkers assigned to the force. And there was only one place where the reinforcements could come from; the Tower of London’s garrison.

  ***

  Major Thomas Keighley was no coward. Indeed, he had won several medals for bravery during campaigns in India against the Sikhs. As the second son of middle-ranking aristocracy, he’d been sent into the army after an undistinguished educational career and, rather to his surprise, discovered that he enjoyed the army life. He prided himself that he understood his men – like Mark Antony and many others from the classical period, he had shared their hardships rather than insisting on special treatment – and that they knew that he would never ask them to do anything that he wouldn’t do for himself. Besides, what sort of officer issued orders from the safety of the rear?

  He’d seen war...but this was different. The streets seemed to have come alive with angry civilians, each one intent on dragging down one of his men and tearing them apart. His men had killed a handful of rioters, but it hadn’t quelled the riot – somehow, it had only made it worse. One of his officers had been brought down by a woman wielding a meat clever who had cut down his horse and then killed the man himself before anyone could react. Keighley himself had had to abandon his horse after a thrown knife had injured the poor beast, a horse that had served bravely in India. The entire world seemed to have gone crazy.

  Another hail of stones crashed down among them from the rooftops. A gang of street children were pulling slates from the houses and throwing them down at his men. Keighley prided himself on never having killed a child in his life, but this was too much. His men fired back at the children, knocking several of them off the roof. But the others kept throwing stones and his men were running out of ammunition. What would they do once they ran out? The only thing keeping the crowds from swarming them was their weapons – once they were gone, the crowd would overrun them and they’d all die.

  He led his men around a corner and froze. A street barricade had been erected in front of them, blocking their escape. Hundreds of men were swarming over it, some carrying weapons that had clearly been taken from other – less fortunate – detachments of soldiers. Keighley had been in the midst of the sack of Lahore, but this was something different. He could almost sense the morale of his soldiers dropping as they saw the barricade. If they could have surrendered...but blood was in the air. They couldn’t surrender to the rioters. The bastards were so enflamed that his men would be cut down before their enemies even realised that they were trying to surrender.

  Bracing himself, he did the only thing he could think of – and charged. He led the charge in person, running towards the barricade with sword in one hand and a pistol in the other. His men followed him, firing on the rioters with brisk efficiency. For a moment, he thought that they could drive the enemy off the barricade and make it out of the affected part of London, before enemy reinforcements streamed out of the nearby house. He saw a woman die, her head smashed open by a bullet at close range, before he found himself and his men surrounded by the enemy. His sword was torn from his hand, seconds before he was knocked to the ground and trampled under the feet of the advancing rioters. There was a brief moment of pain and fire, and then nothing.

  ***

  “We’ve got most of the bastards,” Davy exulted. Between the rioters and the rebel soldiers, the dragoons had been largely wiped out. Their weapons were already being distributed to rebels, who were pushing the barricades out throughout the city. “We’re winning!”

  “We haven’t won yet,” Jack said. “Send a runner to the outer detachments. It’s time to move.”

  He scrambled up to the rooftop and stared out at London. Flames were rising up from all over the city, great pillars of smoke reaching up into the sky. The rioters wouldn’t stay in the poorer parts of London for long, he knew; they were committed now. If the government won, they would be shown no mercy.

  Jack smiled and leapt into the air. Whatever happened, he told himself, the world would never forget the day that it had turned upside down.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Cavendish Hall shook, violently.

  Gwen, who had been reading in her room, stumbled to her feet as a second explosion shook the building. She could sense minds flaring with alarm as she stumbled over to the window and peered outside. Flames and smoke were rising up from the outskirts of London, while there was a small plume of smoke rising up from the gardens. She turned, unsure of what was going on, just before the window smashed inwards, scattering glass everywhere. Gwen shielded herself automatically, throwing herself down to the floor. Now the window was gone, she could hear the sound of gunshots; seconds later, there was a third explosion. The building was under attack!

  Abandoning her book, she crawled towards the door and used her magic to pull it open. Outside, one of the maids was having hysterics, even though she appeared to be in no immediate danger. Gwen slapped her hard and she stared up at her, her eyes wide with fear. Who would dare attack Cavendish Hall? Gwen suspected she knew the answer. A man’s face danced in her mind, a reminder of the man who had shown her the farms and exposed the true cost of Britain’s Sorcerers Corps. Jack would dare, of course. He’d attacked the Tower of London – and Cavendish Hall’s defences were flimsy in comparison. But there were hundreds of magicians in the building...

  “Go down to the basement,” she ordered the maid. Gwen helped her to her feet, pointed her in the direction of the rear staircase, and then headed towards Master Thomas’s rooms. A quick tap on the door produced nothing, so she twisted the knob and tried to open the door. It refused to open for her, even when she tried using magic to Change the lock. Master Thomas protected his privacy very well. She tried to concentrate, to send her mind out of her body and into his room, but she was too nervous to focus. Instead, Gwen headed for the stairs herself and walked down towards the lower levels. The sound of shooting was growing louder; a loud thump had her drawing magic up to shield herself before realising that it was only a door slamming. Below her, an elderly magician walked out of a side door and headed down the stairs. Gwen followed him, bracing herself for the worst.

  Master Thomas was on the ground floor, speaking to one of the guards. The big stained-glass windows that had once depicted the first magicians – the ones who had served with General Howe in the Battle of New York – had been shattered. A cold wind was blowing into the building, bringing with it the stench of smoke and fire. Outside, she could see a handful of bodies lying on the lawn where they’d fallen, twisted and broken. Her gorge rose and she had to swallow hard to prevent herself from being sick. Master Thomas finished talking to the guard and turned to look at her. He looked older and grimmer than she’d ever seen him.

  “There won’t be any help from the garrison,” he said, tightly. “There’s a war going on all over London.”

  Gwen looked up at him, sharply. Jack was powerful – and not a little insane – but how could he have sparked off a civil war in the heart of London? Master Thomas seemed to be listening to a voice in his head, perhaps one or more of the Talkers serving with the army. His face grew longer and longer as the seconds ticked by. Gwen realised that the situation was far worse than anything he’d seen in his long career. It struck her, suddenly, that her parents – and her brother and his wife – might be in danger. The depravation suffered by England’s poor and unhappy citizens wouldn’t leave them filled with friendship for those who had grown rich at their expense.

  “The streets are on fire,” Master Thomas said. “I’m not hearing from several of the Talkers. They must have been killed...”

  Cavendish Hall shook again. This time, Gwen heard the sound of falling rubble. Whatever was being used to attack the Hall, it was clearly powerful enough to upset the magically strengthened stone that had been used to bui
ld the building. The shockwaves alone would do a hell of a lot of damage. She remembered the books in the library and blanched. What would happen if they caught fire? Some of them were unique, never published openly or withdrawn from publication after the Church or the Government objected. Jack wouldn’t want to destroy them, not when he could use them to complete his education, but his allies might not have the same attitude.

  Master Thomas shook his head. “The reports I’m getting are confused and contradictory,” he said. “Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace are apparently under attack. The Tower of London is being shelled. Entire armies are advancing through the streets...the French have apparently bombarded the coast...we don’t know what’s actually going on.”

  Gwen narrowed her eyes. “This building is under attack,” she snapped. Another explosion underlined her words. “We have to get the staff out of here.”

  “I’ll deal with the gunners,” Master Thomas said. “You start people moving down towards the jetty. We’ll have to take a boat downstream and get out of the line of fire.”

  Other magicians were starting to come down the stairs. Gwen couldn’t tell if they’d only just realised that the building was under attack, or if they’d spent several minutes running around like headless chickens before recovering control of themselves. She had certainly never anticipated an attack on Cavendish Hall.

  She pushed the thought out of her mind and raised her voice, thinking hard. “I want Movers and Blazers up front,” she bellowed. They might hesitate to accept orders from a woman, in which case she intended to use her powers to enforce obedience. “Movers are to shield everyone from attack; Blazers are to fire on the enemy. Move down to the rear doors and prepare to depart from there!”