by Ben Galley
‘Do you know who I am, Mr Fever?’ said Calidae, still playing for time.
He wagged a finger. ‘Lady Calidae Serped, orphan and only heir to the Serped estate. Lord Protector Dizali was most informative.’
‘Then know that I can pay you just as much, if not more, than Dizali.’
‘Oh,’ Fever tittered. ‘My dear girl, I doubt that you could, even if I were taking payment for this little escapade. You see, Lady Serped, you are my bonus for the work with Mr Witchazel. It’s so very hard to find willing participants like yourselves these days.’
Calidae pulled at her bonds again. Fever came forward, reaching down to rip the cloth from the sleeve of her grubby dress. ‘Let’s begin here shall we?’ His small hands gripped the white flesh of her thigh.
She recoiled away from the cold touch of the device. Its spike pierced her skin before she knew it; the pain swelling like an afterthought. She could not deny the fear that abruptly swamped her.
The best ideas can come from the tiniest moments. Instinct, for example; or simply reaction to action. Torture is a wonderful way to trim the fat from thinking.
Calidae put all her effort into one lurch, hopping the chair to the side, stabbing one of its legs down onto Fever’s toe. He cried out as her full weight pinned him. As he flailed, trying to wrench free, she headbutted him hard in the temple. The torturer sagged to the floor, his evil implement falling with him.
As Fever fought to clear stars from his vision, Calidae rocked the chair until it teetered and toppled. As it fell, she twisted, causing it to land on its edge. She was rewarded with a splintered crackle of wood.
She had winded herself, but the back of the chair had been broken. The ropes slackened, and she managed to rip herself free. Rope trailing from her wrists, she brought her bound fists down on the back of Fever’s head. He whimpered and slumped again. She could see the panic in him now. Calidae guessed he was not used to his clients protesting so vociferously.
‘Let’s see how you like it!’ she shouted in his ear, before swiping a scalpel from the nearby table and raking it down his back, slicing the suit. Blood flowed, and Calidae bit her tongue at the sight of it. She felt the heat flare in her face; hunger and hatred. Bloodlust at its finest. Fever roared with pain, scrabbling for the door like a lame calf.
‘Sven! Sval!’ he shrieked, but Calidae brought the wreckage of the chair down on his back and sent him sprawling before cutting her bonds.
Breathing hard, she turned back to the table and took a moment to peruse the silver and copper blades, the intricate levers and mechanisms. There was even an array of pincers for Almighty knew what. ‘Speaking of Mr Witchazel…’ she began, treading a circle around him as he fought to get out from under the chair. His eyes were dizzy with fear. She doubted he had ever tasted his own medicine, and she was glad to be his teacher. ‘He asked me to do something for him, if I found myself in such a situation as this.’
‘And what is that?’ Fever whined, unable to get up. The cut along his back had sliced through some of his nerves.
‘“Shove something sharp into his eye” is how I believe he put it.’ Calidae’s fingers found a suitably vicious implement; a sort of corkscrew crossed with a knife. She held it up.
Fever turned a shade of grey. He was a coward, like all men of his ilk. They dole out what they themselves could never stomach.
‘Please!’ he gasped, holding up gloved hands as Calidae came at him. ‘I will do anything you want, anything! I’ll have Sven and Sval stop and I’ll turn you loose! Dizali will never know.’
He cowered, shielding his face. A child afraid of a hungry wolf.
Calidae chuckled as he whimpered. He grew silent, eyes creeping over the edge of his hand to find her shaking her head. ‘So easily scared,’ she scorned him. ‘Fear not, Mr Rowanstone. I still have use for you.’
Fever let himself take a breath, and dropped his shaking hands. It was the last mistake he ever made.
Calidae let go of the knife as Fever sagged to the cold floor, taking it with him. He made not a single noise. It must be difficult to scream, when a blade has found its way to the back of your skull through your eye socket.
With a smirk, Calidae stepped back to the briefcase and wiped her hands of sweat. She closed her eyes and relished the thudding of her heart. Victories are so much sweeter when the tables are turned.
After selecting a scalpel with a long, wide blade, Calidae wrenched open the door and peeked around the corner. Empty. There were muffled thwacking sounds coming from along the hallway, echoing against the harsh concrete. She stepped out of the bright gaslight and into the gloom, scalpel low and ready.
A voice stopped her in her tracks, small and cracking at the edges.
‘That was quick. I’m impressed.’ Rhin stared through the crossed wires of his cage.
Calidae look at him over her shoulder, and shrugged. ‘Never waste time on cowards.’
‘Witchazel will be pleased. Now, get me out of here.’
Calidae frowned and stayed exactly where she was. Rhin’s face slowly dropped. ‘Really?’ he grunted. ‘You’re going to abandon us now?’
‘I do not take orders from a bug.’
Rhin flashed a sharp smile. ‘I am no bug, Calidae Serped. I am Fae, and if you had any wits about you, you’d know how useful a faerie can be. I can help.’
Calidae gestured towards the cell. ‘I think it is clear how little I need your help.’
‘Funny,’ said Rhin. ‘That’s what Merion said to Lilain, Lurker and Gunderton.’
Calidae looked around at the drab walls. ‘And what a fine job they have done.’
The faerie fixed her with a narrow purple stare. What a strange creature he was.
‘And where would you be without him? Probably still playing your little games under your father’s watchful eye. Instead you’re here, fighting for what’s right. Making your own way. You’ve got him to thank for that.’
She ignored his logic, irritatingly similar though it was to her own of late, and stared at the blood on her blade.
‘You just want Merion all to yourself, don’t you? When all this is over, you don’t want obstacles like us around. Should have known.’
‘Clever bug.’
‘Then I wish you the best of luck. Breaking your way into the Emerald House, rescuing Merion and finishing Dizali, all while fighting off the lordsguards and Brothers? No, you’ll be fine of course. Better get going.’
Calidae loathed it when others were right; especially when the other was a twelve-inch tall beast with dragonfly wings and beggar’s clothes. She shook her head, wanting to curse at him.
‘Fine!’ She dealt with the latch on the cage, and Rhin was out in a flash. She half-expected him to lunge at her, but instead he began to jog down the corridor; slowly and with a great deal of limping.
‘Come on! Where I come from we don’t kill our friends,’ he said, making Calidae scowl all the more. The strangeness of the word stunned her. Friend. She couldn’t remember the last time she had used it. The scalpel flashed in the gaslight.
The thudding sounds were coming from the next door. Rhin leapt up to dangle from the handle. He winced as he did so, clearly in pain. He did look rather haggard. ‘Knock,’ he said to Calidae.
She saw the bones of his plan and nodded. She rapped smartly on the door, and then stepped back behind the doorframe. There came a grunt, and several heavy footsteps. Rhin swung upwards with the twist of the handle as Calidae rammed the scalpel into the first sign of Nordic chest. The twin roared, seizing her throat with one enormous hand.
As she was lifted off her feet and dragged up to meet the Nord at eye-level, she saw the spindly shape of Rhin jumping onto his shoulder. The faerie pressed a hand to the man’s head. There was a crackle and a muted flash, and the twin swayed like an ancient oak. Calidae slashed at his throat as she was dropped. The Nord crumpled to the floor with a shuddering bang, blood pulsing from his wound. He didn’t move again.
‘Imp
ressive,’ she murmured, trying to make it sound as sardonic as possible. The faerie had proved his worth. She did not want to give him the satisfaction.
But Rhin wasn’t listening. He was already tending to the figure in the centre of the room, her head hung and quiet. ‘I need the scalpel,’ he murmured, and Calidae saw to the ropes.
‘Lady Hark?’ she asked, gingerly removing the gag from her mouth. ‘Are you awake?’
‘Thankfully so,’ croaked Lilain. She hauled her head back and blinked at the ceiling. ‘Maker, that man can swing a fist,’ she added, trying to get her eyes to move in the same direction. A bruise was already blossoming beneath her left eye and there was a smear of blood at the corner of her mouth. Calidae licked the same spot on her lip involuntarily.
Lilain had caught her stare, and tutted. ‘Lampreys,’ she sighed, before making a tottering path to the corridor. ‘Come on. Let’s get our Brother back.’
Now there were two people giving her orders. Well, one person and one bug.
Calidae followed. Perhaps they could prove useful. Storming the Emerald House would not be easy, and their plan had never catered for it. Calidae was meant to be safe and sound in a lair somewhere, or trussed up alongside Merion. At least she now had some cannon fodder for a charge.
They made their way to the next cell and prepared themselves for the same trick. Only this time, Lilain stood ready with a broken brick. Calidae knocked once more and held her breath. Not a sound could be heard. No footfalls. No wet thwacks of knuckle on flesh.
‘Interesting,’ Lilain murmured. Calidae knocked again and still no sound came from the cell. Together they crept inside, scalpel and brick held high and ready.
They found the remaining twin slumped against the wall, face up and neck bent at an unnatural angle. There was a smear of blood in his yellow hair and more on the floor beneath his shoulders.
In the middle of the room sat Gunderton with barely a mark on him, still bound and gagged. He blinked at them owlishly. Lilain and Rhin moved to untie him, shaking their heads. Calidae frowned. ‘How did you do that?’
Once the rag had been slipped from his mouth, Gunderton spoke.
‘Big men fall harder.’
Lilain had to laugh. ‘You’re a curious one, Dower Gunderton, that you are.’
‘Fever?’ he asked.
‘I did exactly as Witchazel recommended,’ said Calidae.
Within moments, they were striding down the stairs, Calidae bringing up the rear with her scalpel, just where she liked to be.
‘Carriage first, then guns,’ Lilain murmured to them all, as they paused at the door. ‘Let’s see if we can’t give my nephew what he needs after all.’
And a little more besides, Calidae inwardly whispered, then smirked to herself. Settling two scores in one day. Her father would be impressed.
And yet, in that moment something spread across her heaving chest that she did not expect. If she’d had the time for analysis, it may have turned out to be guilt.
*
‘How does it feel, Hark?’
Dizali repeated himself. Merion gave him the same dry scowl he’d been practising since the start of the journey. He let the empty sound of ironclad wheels do the answering as he looked back at the city.
Dizali followed the boy’s gaze. The Lord Protector seemed intent on taunting him, even when they were so close to the end. All but half an hour stood between him and the steps of the Emerald House. It was so tantalisingly close it was painful, and it was all Merion could do to sit quietly, look distraught, and keep his mind on the task.
Strange dreams had kept him from the depths of sleep the previous night. (Hardly a surprise, considering his bed had been a cold and dusty floor.) Echoes of them pestered him: thoughts of his father, faceless yet achingly familiar as with all characters in dreams, and how he must do right by him today. He couldn’t avenge his death, but he would finish his work. He thought of the letter sitting in his shirt pocket, and of the words his father had left him. He had promised to read it once this day was done.
‘Gaze hard upon on it, Tonmerion, for it will be the last time you will have the leisure to do so.’
Merion’s eyes wandered over every curve and line of London’s streets, every face and expression. It was a silent cacophony of humanity; riotous in its diversity. Yet it was almost laughable the way they were all lost in their own purpose, busy in theirs tos and fros, with no idea what future this one passing carriage held for them. He looked to Dizali, then to Heck and Honorford, who sat opposite Witchazel. The lawyer cradled his armful of documents like an hour-old baby.
‘This Empire will discover your lies soon enough,’ said Merion.
Dizali just scoffed. ‘It is that sort of misplaced altruism that would have put Karrigan in the ground, if somebody else had not beaten me to it. At least I can make up for that with his son. You should have stayed put in Wyoming, boy. You should have stayed there until you were eighteen as your father wanted. But you dared to meddle, killing the Serpeds and burning their riverboat to ashes.’
‘They deserved it, just as you do. Besides, you’re quite incorrect. My father never wanted me to stay. He wanted to keep me safe until I learned the truth about this Empire, and the maggots at its core. He wanted me to stamp them out. Finish what he’d started.’
Dizali’s moss-green eyes took on a dangerous glint. ‘Your choice of pets has skewed your mind, Hark. This is no fairytale. You are tied and you are bound, and you have lost. There will be no glorious ending for you.’
Merion said nothing, and merely looked him up and down. The Lord Protector had chosen his finest suit for this occasion; the creases were so sharp they looked like they had been honed by a blacksmith. The lines of his beard were crisp and freshly shaved. There even appeared to be subtle make-up hiding the brandy-borne bags beneath his eyes. He had clearly spent the evening toasting his own over-confidence. His white smile gleamed in the daylight like the sheen of his combed-back hair, dark like mahogany. It was like staring at a portrait of hatred.
Dizali reached up to adjust his purple tie and sighed. ‘You could have had a place at my table, Hark. Or at least served some purpose better than meddling.’
The young Hark shook his head. ‘I would rather die than be part of your Order.’
‘That is why we are in this carriage at this very moment.’
In her messages, Calidae had gifted him with plenty of secrets from her brief time at the lamprey table. He let some of them loose now, trying to rattle the Lord Protector before they reached the House. He let a smile sprout across his lips as he spoke.
‘I wonder if your precious Order knows what’s next for them. You’re clearly biding your time for Lincoln to finish up his war with the Shohari. No doubt you intend to fight a war on two fronts. Or, let me guess, you intend to start wiping out the rest of the royalty. Lead a revolution. All the while you sit at the crown of the Empire, a pretender in your own right, sipping the human shade to stay young and rule forever. Sounds familiar, do you not think? Almost as if that was how the first of the royalty came to power…’
Merion let his voice trail away, watching Dizali’s eyes narrow to the point of shutting. An angry glow flushed into his sharp cheekbones. ‘I’ll take that as a no, then,’ he added with a chuckle. At least he could have a bit of fun, before the crescendo.
Dizali laughed, voice tight. ‘You really think I will tell you my plans now, because your time is short? As though I owe you a last meal? You are deeply mistaken, Hark. That is a mistake reserved for fools of fiction and literature. For villains crowing in a hero’s last moments. You think me that predictable? You continue to leave me unimpressed. I shall be doing the Empire a favour by taking you to the gallows.’
Merion cocked his head to one side. ‘It stings you, doesn’t it? It stings that I took the Serpeds from you. That I foiled your assassination attempt on Lincoln, put Yara the Lightning and her circus in chains, and killed Gavisham just like that.’ He served a snap of fing
ers with his lie, making the Brothers seethe. ‘That I cheated you not two nights ago, and that in the end, I came willingly. It all bites at you. Doesn’t it? And in turn you secretly fear that I could still ruin you, even now.’
It clearly did, though Dizali wore a smile to cover it. ‘You may have had some victories, boy, but it does not win you the war.’
Merion chose silence once again, not trusting himself to say anything more. He looked to the lawyer instead, who was staring quietly at the ceiling, as if waiting for the Almighty himself to rip off the roof and pluck him from danger. It would all be much simpler, that was for sure. No such grace came.
*
Barely a quarter of an hour later, the wheels came to a gentle halt on the flagstones. Dizali had pushed the horses harder than usual. The boy took a sly breath and sat still while the Lord Protector stepped onto the pavement. There was a crowd gathered, chuntering away to itself. A line of lordsguards cut a channel to the steps of the House.
‘Have them taken around the side and readied for their performance. I will need fifteen minutes.’
‘Yes Milord,’ said Heck.
The door slammed and the carriage jolted as the horses set off again. Merion caught a last glimpse of Dizali before the crowd whisked him out of sight, striding towards the House, clad in lordsguards.
It took but a few moments for them to reach the other entrance. Together with Witchazel, he was pushed under the grand and sculpted doorway. Merion had been to the Emerald House several times with his father, but never through this entrance. The smell hit him instantly: that aroma of warm stone, forgotten dust and old leather. It was unmistakable, and it briefly dizzied Merion with memories. Then he smiled privately. All those weeks ago, when he had been swearing revenge for his father’s murder and planning his glorious return to the Benches, he hadn’t quite envisaged it like this. This was better.
They were prodded and poked down the long, arching hallways. Gargoyles hung between the sharp ribs of the ochre roof, clawing at the bricks and glaring down at them. A deep rumble came from somewhere above and ahead. The Emerald Benches were now in session.
