“Lesandra had some apprentices, right?” Tobruk said. “Why don’t we take them out?”
“Securing Traviss is more important,” Richard said. “I will deal with Lesandra.”
“What about Shireen?” Rachel said.
“The same applies to her, of course,” Richard said. “Please pass on the message when you see her.”
Rachel hesitated. “And Alex?” Tobruk said with a glint in his eye.
“Your dealings with Alex are and have always been your own concern,” Richard said. “Until your time as my apprentices ends, all four of you are still candidates for the position of Chosen. However, let me make one thing very clear.” Richard looked from Rachel to Tobruk. “Your priority is to guard Catherine Traviss. Should your personal issues with Alex come in the way of that, I expect you to put them aside. Your dealings with each other are your own affair; your dealings with my property are not. Is that understood?”
“Yes,” Rachel said after a moment. Tobruk didn’t answer.
“Excellent.” Richard rose to his feet. “I will be out of contact for some time. The two of you are in charge of the mansion until I return.” He walked out of the room without looking back. Tobruk and Rachel were left alone in the study.
There was a long silence. At last Rachel stirred and turned to face Tobruk. “So who’s on first?”
“Huh?”
“We’re on guard duty, right?” Rachel didn’t try to hide the dislike in her voice. “You going first or second?”
Tobruk laughed. “Yeah, that’s not how this is going to work.”
Rachel frowned. “Richard said—”
“Richard said, Richard said,” Tobruk mimicked. “You’re going to stay here and be a good girl. I’m going to find Alex.”
“Shireen’s—”
“Shireen’s lost it.”
“I don’t have to do what you tell me.”
Tobruk had started to turn away, but as Rachel said that he stopped and looked at her. “What did you say?” His voice was suddenly soft and dangerous.
Rachel flinched but stood her ground. “I’m not—”
Tobruk moved very fast. All of a sudden Rachel was pressed back against the mantelpiece, eyes wide, with Tobruk looming over her. Rachel’s hand came up, light starting to glow around it, and Tobruk caught her wrist. “I fucking hate little rich girls like you,” Tobruk breathed into Rachel’s face. “You think you’re better than me? Well, guess what? Richard’s not going to be around to protect you anymore. And the second—the second—he’s out that door, you’d better be too. Because if you even think of staying . . .”
Rachel struggled, trying to break free, but Tobruk held her effortlessly with one hand, reaching in with the other. Then Rachel summoned her magic, a shield of water pressure flashing out from around her in the same instant that Tobruk called up his dark flame. Fire met water in a flash and a roar, and the room vanished in a cloud of steam.
The mist cleared in only seconds. Tobruk was standing in the middle of the room, shrouded in shadow, black flames licking at his arms and legs. Rachel was on the floor in the corner; her eyes were wide and I could feel the fear seeping from her. “You stupid bitch,” Tobruk said contemptuously. “You’re nothing. You hear me?” He took something from his pocket and held it out; it was black and crystalline, and it gleamed in the firelight. “Know what this is?”
Rachel stared back at him, frozen. “Harvesting crystal,” Tobruk said. “I’m going to find Alex and I’m going to Harvest him so I have his power too. You?” He grinned suddenly; it was wide and genuine and quite terrifying. “You I’ll keep around. I’m going to need a new slut when Richard knocks off the last one.”
“You can’t do that,” Rachel said, her voice high. “Richard won’t let you.”
“Richard doesn’t give a fuck,” Tobruk said. “I can do whatever I want to you. Richard told you all what it meant to be a Dark mage. None of you listened. I’m going to be Richard’s Chosen and if you ever talk back to me again”—Tobruk’s grin faded—“I’m going to fuck you up so bad you’ll be begging me to stop. You know what I did to Catherine? That was just fun. You . . .” Tobruk waved a finger. “You, it’s personal.” He looked at Rachel for a moment longer, his eyes burning into her, and then, like a mask snapping back, his grin returned. “Don’t go anywhere!” Tobruk turned and walked out.
Rachel was left alone in the room, staring after Tobruk. As the door swung closed behind him she curled up and hugged herself, shivering. She stayed like that for a long time before slowly picking herself up and starting towards the door.
* * *
The shift was faster this time, only a flicker, and when it steadied I was standing in a long, dimly lit stone room, with an archway at either end leading into darkness. Murals were carved into the stone: scenes of battles and quests, mages and their servants fighting strange and inhuman creatures, with lettering in odd runic script. To the side was something that looked like an altar, and four statues of armoured men stood in the corners, each carrying tall spears and wide round shields. I remembered this place; it had been the entryway to the lower basements. Rachel had once asked Richard what the murals meant and he’d told her it had been built by the mansion’s creators. We’d taken to calling it the chapel, but we’d avoided spending any time there. There was something eerie about the place, and the longer you stayed the more uncomfortable you got. The archway at one end led up to the ground floor, where I’d set off the trap to summon the nocturne. The archway on the other side led to the deeper basements and to the cells.
Rachel was sitting in the middle of the room. She was wearing the same clothes she’d had on for the confrontation with Tobruk and she was still shivering; the stone was unheated and cold. Apart from her the room was empty, and as I looked at her I felt an unexpected flash of pity. She looked lost and alone.
Footsteps echoed from the stairs, and Rachel was on her feet in an instant. Blue light flashed up around her hands as she summoned her shield and faced the archway, back slightly hunched. There was a flicker in the darkness, the glow of a fire spell. I saw Rachel’s muscles go tense and knew she was ready to fight or flee.
Then Shireen walked in, her spell winking out as she came into the dim light of the chapel, and the tension went out of Rachel in a slump. “It’s you,” she said, and closed her eyes, her shield vanishing. “Thank God.”
“Hi, Rach,” Shireen said. She sounded tired and her clothes were rumpled and worn, but there was something different about her; she looked alert, more focused, as if she’d finally made a decision. Something about it looked familiar, and as I watched her my memory clicked; this was after I’d met her at the old flats, when we’d spoken for the last time. I’d been readying myself to face Tobruk. Shireen had gone back to the mansion. Now at last I was seeing what had happened after.
“Where have you been?” Rachel said, hurrying towards her. “There’s been so much happening, Richard and Tobruk and . . . Where were you?”
“I’m sorry,” Shireen said. “I had some things to think about.” She paused. “I found Alex.”
Rachel had been about to say something else but stopped. “You did?”
Shireen nodded.
“What did you do?”
“We talked.” Shireen looked away. “About a lot of things.”
“Why didn’t you bring him back? We could have—” Rachel shook her head. “Never mind, it doesn’t matter anymore. Listen. Richard’s going away. I don’t know where, some kind of other world, but he’s going to be gone soon. Really soon. And he’s going to pick his Chosen. It’s just like we guessed, he wants someone to take over after he’s gone, but he’s not going to pick anyone, he’s going to leave it all to us. And Tobruk . . . Tobruk’s gone crazy. You didn’t meet him, did you? No, you would have said.”
“Rach,” Shireen said.
“We have to do someth
ing. I’m serious, he’s finally gone off the deep end. I was talking to him and . . .” Rachel shivered. “It’s just the two of us now. Richard’s not going to step in anymore. We can get rid of Tobruk, but—”
“Rach,” Shireen said.
Rachel paused. “What?”
“I’m not going to be Richard’s Chosen.”
Rachel looked at Shireen in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“I’m not doing it anymore,” Shireen said. “I’m not staying on as Richard’s apprentice. I’m not living in this mansion and I’m not watching anyone else get killed. I’m out.”
There was a long silence. Rachel stared at Shireen. “Why?” she said at last.
Shireen nodded towards the archway behind Rachel. “Who’s in the dungeons right now?”
“Just that girl.”
“Her name’s Catherine,” Shireen said, and her eyes didn’t leave Rachel’s. “What’s going to happen to her when Richard leaves?”
Rachel looked away.
“Come on, Rach.”
“The ritual needs her as a component,” Rachel said defensively. “It might not kill her.”
“Oh, come on,” Shireen said wearily. “‘She’s just going to die anyway’—remember? You said it, not me. Well, you were right. It took me a long time to figure that out, but you knew all along.”
“Fine,” Rachel said. “So what?”
“You wanted to know why?” Shireen said. “That’s why. I’m sick of this, Rach. I’m sick of getting sent on these missions and I’m sick of knowing that people are getting raped and tortured in the same building where I’m sleeping at night! And now I get sent out to bring Alex back so they can do it all over again?” Shireen shook her head. “Not anymore. I’m done.”
“Richard never told you to go after Alex.”
“No,” Shireen said. “But it was pretty obvious whose side we were supposed to be on, wasn’t it? We should never have signed up with him.”
“You were the one who wanted to sign up with him! This was your idea! You talked me into it!”
“And I was wrong!” Shireen shouted. “Okay? I was wrong to sign up with Richard, you were wrong to go along with it, Alex was wrong to join up after us, and Tobruk was—” Shireen paused, then shrugged. “Actually, come to think of it, this place fits Tobruk just fine. Guess he really did know what he was doing.”
“But why now?” Rachel said. “It’s— We’re nearly finished. It’s been two years and it’s almost over. Richard’s about to go away.” Her voice was pleading. “It’s only a week or two then it’ll all be done. It’s—it’s like you want to quit school just before the final exam. It’s just a little longer.”
Shireen looked back at Rachel steadily. “Rach,” she said. “The final exam is going to kill the girl in the cell behind you.”
“Can’t you just stay?” Rachel said. “You don’t have to do anything. We can be Richard’s Chosen. Once he’s gone we can do whatever we like.”
“There’s no ‘we.’ There never was.”
“What?”
“Think about it,” Shireen said. “How many Dark mages have we seen? Hundreds, right? How many of them had more than one Chosen?”
Rachel looked taken aback. “I don’t know.”
“Think. Think hard.”
“I don’t know. Some of them.”
“Like who?”
“That guy in Edinburgh. And there was that Traysia woman.”
“Okay, that’s two out of how many?” Shireen asked. “Two hundred? More? Now think about it. Did Richard ever say he wanted more than one Chosen? Did he say there was room for more than one of us? Or did we just assume that was what he must have meant?”
Rachel frowned. “What are you saying?”
“Ever since we’ve been here, what’s the one thing Richard’s kept telling us Dark mages are supposed to have?” Shireen said. “Strength. The strong rule, the weak serve. Can you really see anyone who believes that sharing?”
“We’ve been working together,” Rachel protested. “I know there’s been trouble, but we’re supposed to be on the same side.”
“Uh-huh,” Shireen said. “And that’s why Tobruk went psycho? More psycho than usual, anyway. Tell me something. Did Richard say anything before Tobruk went off the deep end? Like about his protection getting taken away?”
Rachel hesitated.
“This is how it was always going to end up, Rach,” Shireen said. “Richard doesn’t want four Chosen. He wants one Chosen. But he’s not going to pick for us. He wants us to fight it out until just one of us is left, because that’s the Dark way. The meanest and strongest and smartest one gets to be top of the heap. And you know what? We’ve been helping him do it.” Shireen shook her head. “Not anymore. You want me to stay? I’ve got a better idea. We leave.”
Rachel looked confused. “Leave?”
“Leave. Both of us, tonight.” Shireen tried to take Rachel’s hands but Rachel pulled back. “Out of this mansion. No more missions, no more deaths, no more prisoners. We don’t need Richard or Tobruk or any of them. It’ll be just you and me again.”
“And we leave all this to Tobruk?” Rachel demanded. “Just let him be Chosen?”
“Who cares who’s Chosen? It’s just a name! We don’t need anything Richard can give us.”
“And where would we go?”
“Anywhere! Some other mage, some other place, I don’t care. Anywhere but here.”
Rachel stared at Shireen for a second. “You really don’t get it, do you?”
Shireen frowned. “What?”
“How did you find Alex?” Rachel asked. “How’s Tobruk going to find Alex?”
“You know how,” Shireen said. “Tracers.”
“And?”
“And we asked the mages he’d spoken to—”
“And they told you where he’d gone.”
“Yeah . . .”
“So they helped you and not him,” Rachel said. “If we run away, that’s going to be us! The only thing keeping every other Dark mage from selling us out is Richard. As long as we’re with him, we’re safe. But as soon as we leave, that’s it! You think anyone cares about a Dark runaway? You think we haven’t made enough enemies? Everyone who hates us, everyone who wants us, they’re all going to be chasing us down!”
“So what’s your plan?” Shireen demanded. “Stay here and hope for the best?”
“Yes! It’s just a week! Why can’t you wait that long?”
“Because it’ll mean that Catherine dies.”
“So what?”
Shireen drew back a little, startled. Rachel was glaring at her. “Have you talked to them?” Shireen asked.
“Who?”
“Catherine,” Shireen said. “Alex. Everyone who’s passed through those cells. Have you ever looked at them and talked to them?”
“Why does that matter?”
“You haven’t, have you?”
“So?” Rachel snapped. “What, you think talking to them means you’ve learnt something special?”
“YES!” Shireen shouted. “When you actually meet someone who’s going to die because of what you’ve done, when you look into their eyes and listen to their voice, it makes you think about what you’re doing! And that’s why you haven’t done it! Deep down you know what you’re doing is fucked up, but as long as you don’t talk to her you can pretend it’s not real. But it is, and if you keep doing this you’ll be murdering her the same way Tobruk murdered her boyfriend.”
Rachel flinched but didn’t look away. “Why are you doing this?” She sounded hurt, betrayed. “I thought I could trust you.”
“You can trust me,” Shireen said. “But as long as we’re in this mansion we’re always going to belong to Richard.” She glanced around. “Where is he?”
“He’s go
ne after Lesandra,” Rachel said unwillingly. “But he’ll be . . .”
“Whatever,” Shireen said. “I’m not sticking around to see who wins.” She started walking towards the far end of the chapel.
“Wait! What are you doing?”
“What I should have done a long time ago. I’m getting out and I’m breaking Catherine out too.”
Rachel’s eyes went wide. “Are you crazy?” She ran around, blocking Shireen. “You can’t!”
“Can you think of a better time?” Shireen demanded. “Richard’s busy with Lesandra. We’re not going to get a better chance than this. We’ll be out of the country by the time he even figures out she’s gone.”
“He’ll come after us!”
“When’s he ever done anything like that himself?” Shireen asked. “Even when Alex tried to break Catherine out he didn’t lift a finger. He just let Tobruk handle it all for him.”
Rachel stared at Shireen for a long moment, then shook her head. “Wow. You really don’t understand him at all, do you?”
“What?”
“Richard’s let us do whatever we like because we’ve never threatened anything he really cares about,” Rachel said. “He doesn’t care if we mess up the mansion or fight each other. But he cares about this. I don’t know where he’s going or what he’s going to do once he gets there, but it’s really, really important to him. If he loses that girl you think he’s going to say, ‘Oh well, too bad, let’s go home’? He’s going to come after her with everything he’s got.”
“So we go to someone who’ll help.”
“No one’s going to help! They didn’t help Alex and they won’t help us!”
“Maybe they won’t,” Shireen said quietly. “But at least we’ll be doing something decent for once.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Rach, think about it,” Shireen said. “Remember how we always talked about how we’d be the heroes? How we’d change the world? Look at what you’re doing right now. We’re not the heroes. We’re the bad guys.”
Alex Verus Novels, Books 1-4 (9780698175952) Page 104
