“It’s in a little copse of trees, though,” says Signe. “Perhaps that can give us some cover.”
“If we can get to the trees, that is. If Biswal’s troops are entering the harbor works, that means the roads away from this place are going to be watched.”
“Are you sure it’s her?”
“It must have been. She quoted Petrenko to my face, and the Watcher over there said they’d been visited by a student of his. And Rada would know which families were isolated enough for her to test her swords on—one of the dead boys in Poshok had some kind of horrible rash, and they said in Ghevalyev that the man was always fretting over his wife’s health….She must have visited each of their homes.”
Signe shakes her head, disgusted. “I can’t believe this.”
“And Petrenko was the saint who invented the method of making Voortyashtani swords,” says Mulaghesh. “Rada must have gone to the Teeth of the World, found the tomb…”
“Which must have been Petrenko’s tomb.”
“Right. Petrenko’s sword acts as a blueprint for how to make more. And now here we are.”
Mulaghesh checks the sword of Voortya, though currently it’s still more like a handle. She has it stuffed in the belt of her pants for easy access, though she still has no idea what she’d need it for. Once she’s confirmed it’s secure, she scans the walls. “You got any rope around here?”
“I’m sure I can find some somewhere, bu—”
“And you’re a pretty good climber, right?”
“What are you suggesting?”
“I’m suggesting that that arch over there,” she says, pointing at a spectral sculpture designed to look like the bones of a whale, “rises almost to the top of the wall. Meaning we wouldn’t have to use the door. Rada’s house is just up the slope from this yard, provided we go over the wall.”
Signe sighs as she takes in the scale of the arch. “You do have a knack for getting other people to stick their necks out for you.”
“Recall, please, that I just plummeted into the afterlife to save the necks of this city.”
“Good point, I suppose.” Signe fetches a few lengths of rope from a storage area in the statue yard, and the two begin to run over.
“After you get me over the wall,” says Mulaghesh, “what next?”
“What next? Why, I’m coming with you, of course. You’re making me climb up on a damn wall, I might as well go all the way.”
It’s the answer Mulaghesh wanted to hear, though she didn’t want to ask the direct question: to guilt others into your dirty business is bad sport, in her opinion. “Are you sure?”
“You’ll need the backup, won’t you?”
“Yes. But I want to make sure that you’re sure. You could see some fighting. I can’t guarantee that it won’t be dangerous.”
“General, this woman apparently wishes to destroy everything I’ve made so far,” says Signe. “Though frankly I’ve no idea why. I intend to stop her, at the very least, and then find out her reasoning.” Signe begins to deftly climb up the arch. “She isn’t even a true Voortyashtani. She’s from Bulikov, for the seas’ sakes!”
“Feel like you’d be decent with a rifling tonight?”
Signe vaults up and straddles the edge of the wall. She sighs, bowing her head. “I do despise combat, you know.”
“Yeah. I know how you feel.”
She begins uncoiling the rope, lowering it down. “But I’m still willing to do it.”
“Yeah,” says Mulaghesh, grasping the rope. “I know how you feel.”
* * *
—
As they rappel down the wall Mulaghesh looks out and sees the dark cityscape littered with beams of lights, the roving torches of soldiers on a search. She does a quick count and gauges their number at fifty or so. She can tell by the way the lights are bobbing up and down that they’re running, and it looks like a lot of them are running for the statue yard.
“Hurry up and get down!” says Signe.
They slide down the rest of the wall and lurk in its shadows, watching the search beams.
“Oh my,” whispers Signe. “There’s rather a lot of them, isn’t there?”
“On my mark we run to the fence ahead, all right?” Mulaghesh points across the industrial yard to a chain-link fence about ten feet high.
“We’re not climbing that, too, are we? There’s razor wire at the top.”
“I have wire cutters. But it’ll take time.”
“Why do you have wire cutters?”
“Because every damn soldier worth their salt has wire cutters!” snaps Mulaghesh. “Anything else you want to know?”
Signe cranes her head forward. “I don’t think anyone’s coming. On the count of three?”
“Works for me.” She counts off with her fingers and then they bolt forward. They dart around a stack of rebar, then through piles of soil and pulped wood until finally they come to the chain-link fence.
They squat and look behind them: bright beams of light are slashing through the night air. “Not torches,” says Mulaghesh quietly as she pulls out her wire cutters. “Spotlights. They’re really looking for us.”
Signe takes the wire cutters and goes to work, snipping through the fence. “Will they shoot us?”
“They might if we run. Likely they expect we’re armed. And you do have a rifling strapped to your back.”
“And what if we succeed tonight? What if we get to Rada and stop what she’s doing? Do you think Biswal would forgive us?”
“If we got Rada to tell him the story, maybe,” says Mulaghesh.
“Would she do that?”
“She might if I beat the shit out of her a little.”
Signe looks at her, shocked. “Would you do that?”
“Hells yeah I’d do that. If it keeps me from ducking a firing line, I’d beat her ass like a drum. Keep cutting.”
Mulaghesh keeps watch. The metallic walls of the statue yard reflect the light a little too well for her tastes, bouncing off and sending rays scattered around the yard. Both of them keep ducking down as beams strafe over their heads. Mulaghesh turns and looks up through the fence and up the slope to where Rada Smolisk’s house sits in the trees below the cliffs. It’s about five hundred yards up, by her guess. She can see one cheery yellow window burning among the trunks, and the chimney, of course, is belching up merry gray smoke. But it’s not your average wood fire, is it? thinks Mulaghesh.
Then she spots a few sparks of light to the right at the same elevation as Rada’s house. She shields her eyes against the other strobe lights to see a band of soldiers, perhaps five or so, walking along the road to the polis governor’s house.
“Shit,” says Mulaghesh. “We’ve got company. Soldiers on their way to Rada’s house.”
“I’m almost done here. How much time?”
“Twenty, ten minutes away. Maybe.”
“Then we’ll have to book i—”
She’s cut short as Mulaghesh drops down and clamps a hand over her mouth. Signe’s eyes widen and look at her, surprised. Then Mulaghesh shakes her head and nods backward, behind the mounds of earth.
At first it’s quiet. Then they hear it: footsteps, slow and uncertain.
Mulaghesh takes her hand off of Signe’s face and pulls out her carousel. She squats down low and readies her aim.
For a moment, nothing. Then a beam of light surges out of the darkness and falls on them.
Mulaghesh almost shoots. It takes a lot of training not to, but she’s more worried about giving away her position than anything. She waits for the owner of the light to say something, anything, identifying themselves—but they don’t. There’s just a long pause.
Then a voice: “Uh…CTO Harkvaldsson?”
Signe lets out a breath. “Damn it all, Knordstrom!” she says. “You almost gave me a heart
attack!”
The beam lowers. Mulaghesh blinks until she can make out a thickset Dreyling guard with the SDC insignia on his breast standing among the dirt mounds. “Oh. Uh. Sorry, ma’am. I didn’t realize you’d be here.”
“Well, obviously, I am!”
“I see. Can I ask…Uh, what’s going on? I’m hearing reports of Saypuri troops storming the harbor….”
“Yes,” says Signe grimly. “It seems General Biswal has gone mad with power. He’s looking to arrest me. This will be a serious diplomatic incident, I’m afraid. Do not report back that you saw us, and I recommend you usher all Saypuri troops away from this part of the yard. Am I clear?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And one more thing. Find my father and tell him to meet us up at Rada Smolisk’s house, up the hill.” She points through the chain-link fence.
Knordstrom looks where she’s pointing. “The, uh…the polis governor’s house?”
“Yes. We’re to have an emergency rendezvous to discuss the situation. Tell him that. Understand?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Excellent. Now hop to it.”
Knordstrom, despite his ample bulk, hurries away through the piles of dirt.
“That was smartly done,” says Mulaghesh. “I hope like hells he gets Sigrud over here.”
“Me, too.” Signe clips through the last of the chain-link fence, and Mulaghesh kicks it open. The two crawl through, the bits of wire biting at their shoulders and backsides, then stand and sprint away.
The hill stops being a hill and starts being more like a cliff, with Rada’s house sitting above. “Why are soldiers coming in the first place?” asks Signe as they begin to climb.
“Standard protocol,” says Mulaghesh, breathing hard. “First thing you do during a security threat as regional governor is secure the safety of all other Ministry officials. I just never thought that I’d be the threat to the polis governor.”
Signe looks up along the cliff. “It’s a straight climb up the rest of the way,” she says. “Do you need any help?”
“I’ll manage,” says Mulaghesh. Then, quieter: “Maybe.”
They climb, and climb, and climb. Mulaghesh doesn’t say so, but it’s extraordinarily difficult for her, trying to compensate for her left arm. More than once she’s certain she’s going to topple over and plummet down to the streets below. She’s so focused on not falling that she’s shocked when something soft strikes her shoulder. It takes her a moment to realize it’s a rope.
She looks up and sees it dangling from Signe’s dark form above. “Tie that to your belt,” she says. “I’ve got it tied to mine. I’ll steady you.”
“So I can pull you to your death, too?”
“I’m bigger than you,” says Signe. “I’ll be fine.”
Tying the rope to her belt on the side of a cliff one-handed is a tall order for Mulaghesh, but after a few minutes of fumbling around in her pants she manages it. She gives Signe a thumbs-up and the two of them start their ascent again. She has to hand it to her: Signe is bigger than her and much better at this than she thought.
Finally they get to the top of the cliff. Signe vaults over it, then turns, lies down, and reaches down to Mulaghesh. “Here. Give me your hand.”
Mulaghesh looks up to see a beam of light shoot through the air just above Signe. They’re close, she thinks. Too close. We were too damned slow!
She hurriedly begins untying her end of the rope. “Signe! Get away! Get down, they’ll see you!”
“Just jump up and grab my hand!”
“Signe, you—”
“Just do it already!”
Mulaghesh jumps up. Her entire body fills with terror as she’s suspended over a precipitous drop for one blistering moment.
Her fingers touch Signe’s. At first she’s convinced it won’t work, that her grip will pass through and she’ll go tumbling down the slope. But then Signe’s fingers clutch together, seizing Mulaghesh’s hand. She then leans down and hooks her elbow into Mulaghesh’s left arm, above her false hand.
Then everything goes bright as a beam of light falls on them. “Halt!” cries a voice. “Freeze!”
Neither of them speaks. Signe pulls Mulaghesh up, though their progress feels agonizingly slow.
“I said freeze!” cries the voice. He sounds worried, agitated. Mulaghesh can see that Signe’s rifling is very visibly strapped to her back. That’s bad, thinks Mulaghesh.
Mulaghesh kicks at the cliffside and pushes herself up and over. She tumbles over the edge and rolls away from the light. Signe tries to follow her, but she’s still recovering and moves just a little too slow.
A shot. Mulaghesh hears Signe cry out. Mulaghesh rises up onto a knee and draws her carousel.
Even in this moment, when she’s being fired on and she’s aware her comrade has been hit, she’s still painfully aware that these are her own soldiers, her own colleagues and brothers and sisters—and, as an officer, her own responsibility. So she fires three shots up into the trees above them, high but not too high—just enough that they seek cover, fast.
It works: the beams of light go skittering through the trees, fleeing the shots. Mulaghesh hooks one arm around Signe and hauls her up, not bothering to look for where she’s hit.
The two of them limp along through the trees, Mulaghesh stumbling and flailing and trying not to fall. Shots ring out, but none of them come close.
“Where did you catch it?” she says as they run.
“My calf,” says Signe. “It’s…It’s not too bad….” But she’s talking through gritted teeth, suggesting it definitely feels quite bad.
Mulaghesh turns, takes cover behind a tree, and looks for motion. She spies three of them lurching up through the ferns and the bracken toward her. She takes careful aim at the tree above them, then fires. The bark erupts just above their heads, and they dive for cover again.
“They must not be the cream of the crop,” says Mulaghesh, hauling Signe up toward Rada’s house. “Otherwise you’d be dead.”
“Put me down,” whispers Signe.
“What?”
“Put me down and leave me here,” she says. “I’m just slowing you down!”
“I’m not leaving you, damn it!”
“And you won’t make it to Rada’s house with me!” says Signe. “They’ll catch up to you and either shoot us or arrest us both! Either way, we’re dead. If we get arrested and the sentinels invade, we’re dead, Turyin. You know that!”
Mulaghesh slows to a stop. She looks around and finds a large clump of bracken underneath one of the pines. “Do you think you can tend to your own wound if I give you the supplies?”
“I can deal with a wounded leg,” says Signe, though she’s wincing. “Give me the rifling, and I’ll give you more cover fire and buy you some time.”
“I won’t have you killing a Saypuri soldier on account of my dumb ass. Don’t use it unless you have to.” She sets Signe down and sees her face is twisted in pain. She takes a look at the wound and immediately assesses that it was almost a clean shoot, though it looks like it might have nicked the bone a little. She reaches around and pulls out her med kit. “I’d see to you myself if I could.”
“I know,” says Signe, taking the kit. “Now go! Get out of here and stop her!”
Mulaghesh turns and sprints up through the trees.
* * *
—
Mulaghesh darts up the hillside to the other side of the house, to Rada’s living quarters entrance. She dives into the bracken and peers through the leaves, watching, waiting. She can hear the soldiers calling out to one another, signaling their positions as they comb the forest. None of them seem to be near her, and she doesn’t think any of them can see her.
She starts creeping toward the house. It’s dark, but not dark enough for her to feel safe. Finally she comes to
the base of the house, where a large bay window spills golden light across the trees. She can see the door, but she’ll be plainly visible if she moves toward it. She rises to a squat, reloads the carousel, watches the trees, and, seeing nothing, sprints for the door.
She makes it. There’s no sound of a shot or a shout. But she can hear something coming from the base of the house: a soft ping! ping! sound, like metal on metal.
I know what that is, she thinks grimly.
She reaches down and tests the knob. It’s locked. She feels around for the door frame and confirms that the hinges are on the other side. Then she steps out from the cover of the wall, squares herself with the door, and delivers a powerful kick just beside the knob.
The door cracks open. One of the soldiers out front shouts, “What was that?” But Mulaghesh is already charging into the house, carousel ready.
The lights are on inside, but she doesn’t hear movement. She shuts the door and shoves a cabinet in front of it, knowing it won’t stop them. Then she quietly begins to move throughout the house, searching from room to room.
Rada Smolisk is not home, or so it seems: no one in the kitchen, the living room, or any of the clinic’s quarters. Mulaghesh walks to the fireplace and feels the ashes there. They’re quite cold, as are the stones. Yet she just saw smoke pouring out of the chimney, and heard that sound below….
Mulaghesh inspects the chimney and the fireplace. She knows that her time is limited, but Rada must be hiding around here somewhere. She doesn’t see any cracks or paneling in the walls around the fireplace, but as she paces over the carpet she suddenly stops, thinks, and looks down.
One corner of the carpet is strangely askew, as if someone tried to pull it into place from an awkward angle.
She grabs a corner of the carpet and hauls it up.
Set in the wooden floor underneath is a wide trapdoor with a metal handle set in its side.
She holsters her carousel and lifts the trapdoor. Below is a set of winding, curving stairs down.
There’s a pounding at the door she came in through. She can hear the cabinet she tipped in front of the door creaking and cracking. Mulaghesh glances around, grabs a fire poker from the fireplace, and enters the staircase. She shuts the trapdoor and slides the fire poker through the handle, locking it. She wipes sweat from her brow, draws her carousel, and continues down.
The Divine Cities Trilogy: City of Stairs, City of Blades, and City of Miracles, With an Excerpt From Foundryside Page 91
