In the center of the room was a single chair, on a dais a handbreadth off the floor, facing a collection of knee pillows, where the cabal acknowledged their liege. The room was well lit, though from no discernible source of light.
A man sat on the stairs to Adamat’s right. He was older than Adamat, just into his sixtieth year with silver hair and a neatly trimmed mustache that still retained a hint of black. He had a strong but not overly large jaw and his cheekbones were well defined. His skin was darkened by the sun, and there were deep lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes. He wore a dark-blue soldier’s uniform with a silver representation of a powder keg pinned above the heart and nine gold service stripes sewn on the right breast, one for every five years in the Adran military. His uniform lacked an officer’s epaulettes, but the weary experience in the man’s brown eyes left no question that he’d led armies on the battlefield. There was a single pistol, hammer cocked, on the stair next to him. He leaned on a sheathed small sword and watched as a stream of blood slowly trickled down each step, a dark line on the yellow-and-white marble.
“Field Marshal Tamas,” Adamat said. He sheathed his cane sword and twisted until it clicked shut.
The man looked up. “I don’t believe we’ve ever met.”
“We have,” Adamat said. “Fourteen years ago. A charity ball thrown by Lord Aumen.”
“I have a terrible time with faces,” the field marshal said. “I apologize.”
Adamat couldn’t take his eyes off the rivulet of blood. “Sir. I was summoned here. I wasn’t told by whom, or for what reason.”
“Yes,” Tamas said. “I summoned you. On the recommendation of one of my Marked. Cenka. He said you served together on the police force in the twelfth district.”
Adamat pictured Cenka in his mind. He was a short man with an unruly beard and a penchant for wines and fine food. He’d seen him last seven years ago. “I didn’t know he was a powder mage.”
“We try to find anyone with an affinity for it as soon as possible,” Tamas said, “but Cenka was a late bloomer. In any case”—he waved a hand—“we’ve come upon a problem.”
Adamat blinked. “You… want my help?”
The field marshal raised an eyebrow. “Is that such an unusual request? You were once a fine police investigator, a good servant of Adro, and Cenka tells me that you have a perfect memory.”
“Still, sir.”
“Eh?”
“I’m still an investigator. Not with the police, sir, but I still take jobs.”
“Excellent. Then it’s not so odd for me to seek your services?”
“Well, no,” Adamat said, “but sir, this is Skyline Palace. There’s a dead Hielman in the Diamond Hall and…” He pointed at the stream of blood on the stairs. “Where’s the king?”
Tamas tilted his head to the side. “He’s locked himself in the chapel.”
“You’ve staged a coup,” Adamat said. He caught a glimpse of movement with the corner of his eye, saw a soldier appear at the top of the stairs. The man was a Deliv, a dark-skinned northerner. He wore the same uniform as Tamas, with eight golden stripes on the right breast. The left breast of his uniform displayed a silver powder keg, the sign of a Marked. Another powder mage.
“We have a lot of bodies to move,” the Deliv said.
Tamas gave his subordinate a glance. “I know, Sabon.”
“Who’s this?” Sabon asked.
“The inspector that Cenka requested.”
“I don’t like him being here,” Sabon said. “It could compromise everything.”
“Cenka trusted him.”
“You’ve staged a coup,” Adamat said again with certainty.
“I’ll help with the bodies in a moment,” Tamas said. “I’m old, I need some rest now and then.” The Deliv gave a sharp nod and disappeared.
“Sir!” Adamat said. “What have you done?” He tightened his grip on his cane sword.
Tamas pursed his lips. “Some say the Adran royal cabal had the most powerful Privileged sorcerers in all the Nine Nations, second only to Kez,” he said quietly. “Yet I’ve just slaughtered every one of them. Do you think I’d have trouble with an old inspector and his cane sword?”
Adamat loosened his grip. He felt ill. “I suppose not.”
“Cenka led me to believe that you were pragmatic. If that is the case, I would like to employ your services. If not, I’ll kill you now and look for a solution elsewhere.”
“You’ve staged a coup,” Adamat said again.
Tamas sighed. “Must we keep coming back to that? Is it so shocking? Tell me, can you think of any fewer than a dozen factions within Adro with reason to dethrone the king?”
“I didn’t think any of them had the skill,” Adamat said. “Or the daring.” His eyes returned to the blood on the stairs, before his mind traveled to his wife and children, asleep in their beds. He looked at the field marshal. His hair was tousled; there were drops of blood on his jacket—a lot, now that he thought to look. Tamas might as well have been sprayed with it. There were dark circles under his eyes and a weariness that spoke of more than just age.
“I will not agree to a job blindly,” Adamat said. “Tell me what you want.”
“We killed them in their sleep,” Tamas said without preamble. “There’s no easy way to kill a Privileged, but that’s the best. A mistake was made and we had a fight on our hands.” Tamas looked pained for a moment, and Adamat suspected that the fight had not gone as well as Tamas would have liked. “We prevailed. Yet upon the lips of the dying was one phrase.”
Adamat waited.
“ ‘You can’t break Kresimir’s Promise,’ ” Tamas said. “That’s what the dying sorcerers said to me. Does it mean anything to you?”
Adamat smoothed the front of his coat and sought to recall old memories. “No. ‘Kresimir’s Promise’… ‘Break’… ‘Broken’… Wait—‘Kresimir’s Broken Promise.’ ” He looked up. “It was the name of a street gang. Twenty… twenty-two years ago. Cenka couldn’t remember that?”
Tamas continued. “Cenka thought it sounded familiar. He was certain you’d remember it.”
“I don’t forget things,” Adamat said. “Kresimir’s Broken Promise was a street gang with forty-three members. They were all young, some of them no more than children, the oldest not yet twenty. We were trying to round up some of the leaders to put a stop to a string of thefts. They were an odd lot—they broke into churches and robbed priests.”
“What happened to them?”
Adamat couldn’t help but look at the blood on the stairs. “One day they disappeared, every one of them—including our informants. We found the whole lot a few days later, forty-three bodies jammed into a drain culvert like pickled pigs’ feet. They’d been massacred by powerful sorceries, with excessive brutality. The marks of the king’s royal cabal. The investigation ended there.” Adamat suppressed a shiver. He’d not once seen a thing like that, not before or since. He’d witnessed executions and riots and murder scenes that filled him with less dread.
The Deliv soldier appeared again at the top of the stairs. “We need you,” he said to Tamas.
“Find out why these mages would utter those words with their final breath,” Tamas said. “It may be connected to your street gang. Maybe not. Either way, find me an answer. I don’t like the riddles of the dead.” He got to his feet quickly, moving like a man twenty years younger, and jogged up the stairs after the Deliv. His boot splashed in the blood, leaving behind red prints. “Also,” he called over his shoulder, “keep silent about what you have seen here until the execution. It will begin at noon.” 450
“But…” Adamat said. “Where do I start? Can I speak with Cenka?”
Tamas paused near the top of the stairs and turned. “If you can speak with the dead, you’re welcome to.”
Adamat ground his teeth. “How did they say the words?” he said. “Was it a command, or a statement, or…?”
Tamas frowned. “An entreaty. As if the blood draining
from their bodies was not their primary concern. I must go now.”
“One more thing,” Adamat said.
Tamas looked to be near the end of his patience.
“If I’m to help you, tell me why all of this?” He gestured to the blood on the stairs.
“I have things that require my attention,” Tamas warned.
Adamat felt his jaw tighten. “Did you do this for power?”
“I did this for me,” Tamas said. “And I did this for Adro. So that Manhouch wouldn’t sign us all into slavery to the Kez with the Accords. I did it because those grumbling students of philosophy at the university only play at rebellion. The age of kings is dead, Adamat, and I have killed it.”
Adamat examined Tamas’s face. The Accords was a treaty to be signed with the king of Kez that would absolve all Adran debt but impose strict tax and regulation on Adro, making it little more than a Kez vassal. The field marshal had been outspoken about the Accords. But then, that was expected. The Kez had executed Tamas’s late wife.
“It is,” Adamat said.
“Then get me some bloody answers.” The field marshal whirled and disappeared into the hallway above.
Adamat remembered the bodies of that street gang as they were being pulled from the drain in the wet and mud, remembered the horror etched upon their dead faces. The answers may very well be bloody.
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Contents
COVER
TITLE PAGE
WELCOME
DEDICATION
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
A BENEFIT OF MONGRELS
PROLOGUE
FIRST PART: THE SCREAMING GIRL CHAPTER 1: THE HOUSE ON WELLCLOSE SQUARE
CHAPTER 2: A WOMAN IN BLACK AND THE MAN IN MIDNIGHT
CHAPTER 3: A CHARITABLE DEED
CHAPTER 4: HAND IN GLOVE
CHAPTER 5: THE BLOODSTONE BADGE
CHAPTER 6: THE MISSING UNICORN
CHAPTER 7: BRIGHT KNIVES IN A DARK ALLEY
CHAPTER 8: THE SHADOW GUARD
CHAPTER 9: THE TRIPLE-WOOD CELL
CHAPTER 10: BREAKING THE LIP
CHAPTER 11: THE GREEN MAN
CHAPTER 12: THE HORSE WITH NO SHOES
CHAPTER 13: A HARBOUR AND A HAVEN
CHAPTER 14: HOWEVER…
CHAPTER 15: THE BONE PET
CHAPTER 16: THE SUMMONS
CHAPTER 17: NIGHT ON MARE STREET
CHAPTER 18: FIRST LAW
CHAPTER 19: THE REEKING BLADE
CHAPTER 20: QUIETUS
CHAPTER 21: THE RED LIBRARY
CHAPTER 22: THE TERRIER MAN
CHAPTER 23: A THIEF IN THE NIGHT
CHAPTER 24: THE SMITH’S FOLLEY
CHAPTER 25: WHAT THE HOUSE HEARD
CHAPTER 26: BUNYON’S BLESSING
CHAPTER 27: THE MURANO CABINET
SECOND PART: THE LOST HAND THE POWER OF FIVE
CHAPTER 28: THE PIG-HEADED WOMAN AND THE HAND OF GLORY
CHAPTER 29: NIGHT RIDERS
CHAPTER 30: SINGLE-HANDED
CHAPTER 31: SNICKERSNEE
CHAPTER 32: THE TRAP SPRUNG
CHAPTER 33: A PYEFINCH FOR BREAKFAST
CHAPTER 34: AN ENGAGEMENT TO HUNT
CHAPTER 35: EELS FOR BREAKFAST
CHAPTER 36: RAZORS AND RABBITS
CHAPTER 37: THE DROPPED MASK AND THE DEAD CITIZEN
CHAPTER 38: TWO CROOKED HOUSES
CHAPTER 39: ILL-MET
CHAPTER 40: THE ALP IN THE ATTIC
CHAPTER 41: OUT OF THE PAST
CHAPTER 42: THE SHOWMEN’S DRUMHEAD
CHAPTER 43: A CHAIN BROKEN
CHAPTER 44: THE LONG HAND
CHAPTER 45: THE ALP LOOKS AT THE MOON
CHAPTER 46: ON WITH THE SHOW
CHAPTER 47: THE HUNTER HUNTED
CHAPTER 48: THE MECHANICAL MOOR AND THE READER OF MINDS
CHAPTER 49: A MOSAIC OF DESPAIR
CHAPTER 50: NA-BARNO’S HAND REVEALED
THIRD PART: THE BROKEN HAND THE COMPANY OF HANDS
INTERLUDE
CHAPTER 51: WHAT HAPPENED ON WYCH STREET
CHAPTER 52: A DRINK AFTER DARK
CHAPTER 53: THE COBURG IVORIES
CHAPTER 54: BURNT AS A WITCH
CHAPTER 55: THE INVISIBLE THREAD
CHAPTER 56: TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT
CHAPTER 57: PACKING UP
CHAPTER 58: A DECISION DEFERRED
CHAPTER 59: SAFE HOME
CHAPTER 60: THE BATTLE OF THE WIZARDS
CHAPTER 61: DEAD AWAY
CHAPTER 62: THE EAGLES FIGHT BACK
CHAPTER 63: AN ILL MET BY MOONLIGHT
CHAPTER 64: AN EXCHANGE WITH THE SLUAGH
CHAPTER 65: THE WALKER BETWEEN THE WORLDS
CHAPTER 66: WATERBORNE
CHAPTER 67: SO-HO!
CHAPTER 68: A LILY PLUCKED AND DISCARDED
CHAPTER 69: THE ALP SPEAKS TO A DOG WITH NO BARK
FOURTH PART: THE FIVE PEBBLES INTERLUDE
CHAPTER 70: CLOSE QUARTERS ON BLACKWALL REACH
CHAPTER 71: REGENT’S BASIN
CHAPTER 72: THREE BELLS IN THE FOG
CHAPTER 73: THE PARTING GLASS
EPILOGUE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
ALSO BY CHARLIE FLETCHER
EXTRAS MEET THE AUTHOR
A PREVIEW OF PROMISE OF BLOOD
ORBIT NEWSLETTERS
COPYRIGHT
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2014 by Charlie Fletcher
Excerpt from Promise of Blood copyright © 2013 by Brian McClellan
Cover design and illustration by Kirk DouPonce/Dogeared Design
Cover copyright © 2014 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitutes unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
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First published in the United Kingdom in 2014 by Little, Brown Group Limited
First U.S. Edition: May 2014
First U.S. eBook edition: May 2014
ISBN 978-0-316-27949-9
E3
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