Bright Ruin

by Vic James

  ‘Gavar, Gavar.’ Father spoke as if to an especially slow and stupid child. ‘We are still in an emergency Chancellorship. I am the law. Everything can be changed to suit the needs of the time.’

  ‘All right, a question: where are you going to find a replacement heir of Kyneston? I hear my insane little brother has just freed his entire staff. We all know what that means – the “great penalty”, isn’t it called? No slaves can ever again be allocated to Far Carr. Silyen has just doomed his estate. He and his inheritors can sell off land to pay people to work there. But sooner or later, when they’ve pawned the last candlestick, Far Carr will be ruined. You’d never entrust Kyneston to him and risk the same.’

  ‘I’m not intending to entrust Kyneston to him. But you seem to have overlooked other deserving candidates.’

  ‘There are no other . . .’

  The scoff on Gavar’s lips died as Father turned towards the couch and with one hand gestured towards Bouda, and with the other, towards Jenner.

  Was he serious?

  Gavar looked at the pair of them. Really looked at them. Jenner was tense and pale beneath his freckles. The skin was ivory and dull around his eyes, which regarded Gavar with a mixture of defensiveness and resentment. As for Bouda – his wife had always been a woman of sharp edges, from her fine cheekbones to her cutting tongue. Now, grief over her dead sister Dina had ground her to a knife edge.

  ‘A woman with none of our blood, or a Jardine with no Skill,’ he told Father. ‘Nice try, but I’m not buying it.’

  ‘More fool you,’ said Father. He walked round to the back of the couch and stood between the two of them, resting a hand on Bouda’s shoulder. ‘Spouses can act as surrogates in the event of an inheritor’s mental incapacity – until such time as their offspring are of age to succeed. Bouda could perfectly legally be Heir and Lady of Kyneston, until your eldest child reaches eighteen.’

  ‘There aren’t any children – and won’t be, as long as I have to worry about my wife sinking a knife in my back when we’re in bed.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Father. His hand slid from Bouda’s shoulder up the back of her slender neck. His meaty fingers rested there at the base of her skull. Bouda’s expression never altered, though Gavar was sure he saw her flinch. ‘When a man gets drunk as often as you do, he might do all sorts of things that he doesn’t remember. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there wasn’t a new generation of Jardines before too long. Am I right, dear daughter?’

  Those fingers squeezed. Bouda had become so thin it looked like her neck might snap with no effort at all.

  What was Father implying? That he’d ordered Gavar’s wife to seduce him next time he was so pissed he didn’t know what he was doing?

  Or . . . something worse? That hand was blatantly proprietorial. Would Bouda really submit to Father just to have a shot at stealing Gavar’s position? It was unthinkable. But then, sitting beside her was Jenner, proof of just how far members of this family were prepared to go to get what they wanted.

  Too revolted to look at his wife, Gavar turned to his brother. He’d told Abigail Hadley that Jenner’s betrayal could have been the result of their Father’s control. But she’d shaken her head and told him that she had looked at Jenner in the Equals’ viewing box in Gorregan, as she was led onto the platform. He had been unable to meet her eye. He wasn’t dull or blank. Not acting under his father’s compulsion. Jenner knew what he had done, Abigail said.

  Looking at him fidgeting on the couch, nervy and drawn, Gavar knew she was right. Jenner had lured her in and turned her over. And now Gavar understood why. He didn’t know whether to feel sick or sorry.

  ‘Your brother, of course,’ Father continued, ‘is presently Skilless. But this, also, may soon change. Arailt Crovan has graciously agreed to remain in London a few days longer, to examine Jenner.’

  ‘You can’t believe this bullshit,’ Gavar told his brother. ‘No one’s been able to create or transfer Skill. Ever. You sold out Abi Hadley for an absolute fantasy. That girl really cared for you.’

  Jenner’s brown eyes were bloodshot, and his skin flushed angrily beneath the freckles.

  ‘Don’t lecture me. We all know what you did to the girl who loved you. I was there when you shot her dead.’

  And that was a low blow. One Gavar was still wholly defenceless against, because it was true.

  ‘What has he promised you? Because everyone did all they could when you were little to try and get Skill into you. I saw it. It wasn’t pleasant, but they tried, and nothing worked. Now Father tells you he can do it, right when he needs something? He’s only dangling it because he’s finally found a use for you – to put pressure on me.’

  ‘Screw you, Gavar. You think this is about you? Oh, I forgot – everything is about you. The heir. The golden boy, even when you were snorting drugs and failing your exams at Oxford. Well, who’s in the family office every day, keeping Kyneston running? Me. Do you know how many tenants we have? How many slaves? How many properties? Do you know the first thing about the estate you’ve always blithely assumed you’re going to inherit, even while you stagger about with women and booze and disgrace the family name?’

  Gavar clenched his fists. He could feel his Skill roil angrily in his chest, like flame in the heart of a dragon, ready to pour out of him. This was one fucked-up family reunion, even by Father’s standards. The man was watching him with a predator’s lazy interest, and Gavar’s temper flared.

  ‘You’ve really told him you can give him Skill? I know you’re a bastard, but that’s cruel even for you.’

  Father kept his cool. ‘You’ve seen what Crovan can do. He can manipulate Skill. Draw it out.’

  ‘I saw him destroy it. Breaking things is easy.’

  ‘You’d know.’ That was Bouda, primly folding her hands in her lap. ‘You’ve made rather an art out of wrecking things for the rest of us. Soiling the Jardine name. Being a neglectful husband. Ruining the Blood Fair. Remember what I told you yesterday? It’s time you started working with us.’

  ‘Father’s making threats, you and Jenner are circling like I’m some kind of wounded animal. That’s your definition of playing happy families?’

  Father moved from behind the couch – after what looked like a final caress to Bouda’s neck – and came to stand very close to Gavar, their chests almost touching like prize fighters before a bout. Gavar had several inches on his father, but the man radiated menace.

  ‘Gavar, none of us want to see you replaced as heir. Jenner will be content to have Skill, and Bouda will be content with her position at your side – as long as you don’t force our hand. But your wife is correct. We need you to show your loyalty and work with us. We want you to go to Midsummer Zelston.’

  ‘Midsummer?’ Gavar stared at them. Of all the things he’d anticipated, that wasn’t one. ‘If you want an assassin, I think Astrid Halfdan would be rather less conspicuous and a whole lot more effective. Or if you want a diplomat, then Jenner’s shown himself pretty good with the oily excuses.’

  ‘We don’t want you to be an assassin or a diplomat,’ said Bouda, smiling for the first time. ‘We want you to be a traitor.’

  Father patted his shoulder and, dumbfounded, Gavar sat down to listen as they unfolded their plans.

  He wasn’t sure what he was hearing at first. Midsummer’s ‘ridiculous show’ that Bouda had mentioned yesterday turned out to be some sort of spectacular attack involving . . . a dragon. A sculpture from the roof of the House of Light, but astonishing nonetheless.

  ‘If she’s got you that worried, why don’t you simply arrest her?’ he said.

  ‘Because we have to eradicate not just her, but this cancerous emancipation movement,’ Bouda replied. ‘I knew Midsummer was part of it, thanks to one of my sources, but I had no idea she would step up like this. It seems that every time someone who’s involved comes to grief, there’s another person waiting to take over: after Meilyr died, my sister. After DiDi . . .’

  And
there it was, a crack in her composure that betrayed that Bouda was, after all, only human. Her hands knotted together, the knuckles white.

  ‘After my sister, Midsummer Zelston. Given that Silyen has just freed every slave at Far Carr, he might be part of it, too, and we all know how dangerous that could be, with his power and his unpredictability. We need to find out everything we can. Need to know how far it goes, then end it, root and branch. This country needs to be cleansed, Gavar. Then we can heal it. Reunite it. Make it our own.’

  Gavar nodded. That all made sense – if you looked at the world from Bouda’s perspective.

  ‘I can see your logic. But . . . me? You seriously think she’ll fall for that? What about these other “sources” of yours?’

  ‘But you’re perfect,’ said Jenner, sitting forward. ‘Don’t you see? You derailed the Blood Fair. You’re known to have a rocky relationship with your father. Your weakness for commoner women is notorious. You even have a baseborn child. What would be more understandable than you taking up the cause of ending the slavedays, partly to spite your father but mostly out of love for your daughter?’

  It was the worst idea Gavar had ever heard. Or the worst since a university teammate had suggested climbing Magdalen Tower at dawn on May morning, gagging the choir singing there, and bellowing obscene rugby songs instead. He’d been rusticated from Oxford for a term for that.

  ‘It’s ridiculous,’ he said. ‘Anyway, Midsummer hates me. Until Rix’s confession, she was convinced that Father and I had conspired to murder her uncle, and that I fetched the Hadley boy out of Millmoor to do it.’

  ‘Until Rix’s confession,’ said Bouda. ‘She doesn’t think that now. Besides, we’ll make sure she believes you. Just wait till you tell her how your cruel father has your little daughter under lock and key at Aston House, and is still drafting the Bill of Succession that will send her to a slavetown.’

  At Bouda’s slow smile, Gavar’s guts knotted in a way that usually took two bottles of whisky to achieve.

  ‘Libby,’ he said urgently. ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Safe, Gavar. She’s perfectly safe.’ Father was nodding his great lion-maned head. ‘And we’ll keep her that way while you do this. Then when it’s over, we will all be family together. I could even issue a writ of legitimization for her – although of course her lack of Skill would disbar her from succession.’

  The door opened and closed behind him, and Gavar twisted around. It was Mother. She didn’t look at him, but walked straight to Father and slipped a hand into the pocket of her silky housecoat.

  ‘All done,’ she said, handing a small key to Father. Only then did she turn to Gavar with a gentle, vague smile. ‘She’ll have a lovely time while you’re away, darling. I’ve had all sorts of new toys delivered. It was such a good idea of yours, to bring that Daisy girl to look after her while you help your Father.’

  Gavar gripped the arms of the chair so tightly he expected to be clutching splinters any minute.

  What was this?

  His family had well and truly done a number on him, that was what. They had found every one of his weak spots, his hopes and his fears, and dug in their sharp claws. For all that he’d spent his entire life wishing to be free of his estate responsibilities, if he was not heir of Kyneston, then what was the point of him? Who was he?

  He was Libby’s daddy. And that meant both keeping her safe, and securing her future.

  And all he had to do was win the confidence of – and then betray – a woman who hated him.

  It should have been the easiest decision ever.

  It was the easiest decision ever, he told himself fiercely. He owed Midsummer nothing. He’d be protecting his daughter and her interests. Gavar didn’t believe Father’s insinuations about legitimizing her, but he owed it to Libby to maintain his own position at the heart of the family, because that was what kept her safe.

  He drew in a deep breath. Unpeeled his fingers from the arms of the chair.

  ‘Yes, Libby will have a wonderful time staying with her grandmother,’ he said, giving his mother his most winning smile, ‘while her daddy takes care of some family business.’

  5

  Abi

  The thing about fear is that no one tells you how big it is. How hungry.

  Two things have the power to eat you alive. To swallow up everything else, until you’re just scraps and leftovers: love and fear.

  Abi knew. They had feasted on her down to the bones. She could feel her ribs and sharp elbows as she slid the bag off her back to retrieve her shopping.

  Thank goodness for Griff’s little roll of banknotes. She’d changed into the jeans in the loos of the supermarket where she’d bought them, but had wanted to get away from anywhere with security cameras before using the other two items. Which was why she’d pulled the bike into an overgrown motorway layby, too grotty even to host a burger van.

  The scissors first. The stupid hair extensions had been the last look she’d worn in public, at the Blood Fair. Off they came, the blades close to her scalp. Abi doubted she was rocking the pixie-crop look, but who cared. Jenner had liked her long hair, and it felt weirdly liberating having the weight lifted from her neck. She rolled it all into a plastic bag and stuffed it into the layby bin.

  Then the phone.

  She’d had a cup of tea in the supermarket’s dingy cafe while it charged, and had repeated to herself two numbers. She had been petrified she’d forgotten them in those final moments of the Blood Fair, up on the platform, when everything had been driven out of her mind except how much she loved her family and how afraid she was to die. But no, they’d been stored away safely in a brain well trained by years of exam revision.

  Jon’s. And Midsummer’s.

  She’d nearly called one of them, after the safe-house raid that had picked up Renie and the men from the Bore. But she had rung Jenner instead. The mistake had almost cost her her life.

  Which of these numbers would be the right one this time? Her fingers paused over the buttons.

  ‘You’re left-hip phone,’ Midsummer had told her, laughingly pulling out a handset, then producing two more from other pockets. ‘That’s your hotline. Zero-seven-nine . . .’

  . . . seven-nine-seven-five . . . Abi’s fingers moved across the keys. The call connected after a few rings.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Midsummer. It’s Abigail.’

  There was a moment’s pause, then a throaty, disbelieving laugh.

  ‘You’re safe?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘When I realized I couldn’t see you, I—’

  ‘It’s okay,’ Abi said. ‘I’m safe. You didn’t see me because someone rescued me.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘You wouldn’t believe. No, really you wouldn’t. I’ll explain when I see you. Midsummer, I overheard Bouda saying something yesterday. I think they have Renie back in custody. And they’ve . . . they’ve got my parents, too. Pulled them out of Millmoor, and they plan to start interrogating them if I don’t turn myself in.’

  Midsummer made a noise of disgust.

  ‘I know about Renie – Jon alerted me and I watched it happen, but I was on the other side of the river and couldn’t stop them taking her. Abi, there’s a lot to do. Almost too much: Renie and your parents. The dozens of people taken at Riverhead are being detained at Fullthorpe maximum security unit, and I’m worried they’re destined for another Blood Fair.’

  ‘My brother’s still with Crovan,’ Abi said. ‘Even my little sis has been hauled back to Aston House. They think that’ll lure me to make contact, so they can recapture me.’

  Down the phone, Midsummer exhaled.

  ‘They know what they’re doing. They’ve got us racing round trying to put out small fires, so we won’t notice the massive bonfire of freedoms and rights they’re planning.’

  ‘Can you help me?’

  And Abi fought to keep her voice level when she asked, because everything rode on this question. What she was up agains
t now – her whole family scattered and in danger – was more than she could tackle alone.

  ‘Abi, that’s not how it’s going to work. Can you help me? Because the only way we’re going to win this thing is by putting out that bonfire before it catches hold. Resisting Jardine’s regime has to take priority. There will be choices – hard ones. Can you accept that?’

  Abi held the phone away from her ear for a moment as she took in those words. Choices. How could she choose between the commoner cause, and her family?

  But then without Midsummer, she’d have no way to reach any of them, and so no choices at all. She put the phone back to her ear.

  ‘I can accept that.’

  ‘Good. We’ll do all that we can. We have people working on this all over the country, Abi. In Exton, Portisbury, Auld Reekie, and more. Jardine’s regime has to end before it becomes our new normal.’

  The Equal gave her a time and a place, and hung up.

  It didn’t take Abi long to get there – an abandoned industrial estate on the outskirts of Harlesden, north London. The time on the phone said she was an hour early. Abi made sure the bike was concealed, sank down against a wall and hugged her knees. She’d had a sleep earlier that morning – a few hours round the back of a farm outbuilding, not long after leaving Griff’s cottage – so she wasn’t tired, and her thoughts were as restless as ever. They circled round and round the moment when she had watched a man ripped to pieces by a crowd and had known that she would be next. Even though she’d escaped, the terror of it had marked her forever. Turned out you could scar on the inside.

  You learned in school about countries that went backwards. Peaceful nations that flared up in civil war. Democracies that fell under the sway of fanatics. You never imagined such a thing might happen here in Britain. But it could. It was happening right now.

  Could it be stopped? Or was it part of some great cycle of history?

  No, Abi refused to believe that. History only appeared inevitable because it was written in a world where it had already happened.

  The bag lay at her feet, and to while away time she pulled out Griff’s book – the comical tales of England’s kings and queens. Here was the story of vain and foolish Queen Elizabeth, who never married after rejecting every one of her Equal suitors. Idiotic Henry V, who thought he could take on a French army four times bigger than his own at Agincourt, and only escaped annihilation when his Equal adviser wove illusions to suggest that the English forces were superior, making the French retreat.