by David Hair
Kore! She’s got to be a pure-blood!
The impact drove him staggering backwards into a wall of shelves that collapsed behind him in an avalanche of smashing crockery. The shifter battered him onto his back with head-slamming force, and only his automatic back-shielding kept his skull from fracturing on the stone floor. But his staff bent almost in half, then pinged back, barely still in his grasp. The woman loomed above him, and with a terrifying backhanded blow, tore out the ayah’s throat. The nursemaid went down silently, even in death shielding the twins with her body.
The two infants wailed in terror, and the sound galvanised him. He rose and thrust with his staff, slamming the wolf-woman backwards. Perhaps it was just the unexpectedness of the blow, but it was enough to hurl her into a heap of broken crockery with a crash.
She climbed to her feet, salivating, as he gripped the staff and kindled gnosis. She’s a shifter, she’ll be all Earth and hermetic … He sought the point where Air and theurgy met again – illusion – conjured an illusory knife, and threw it at her heaving breasts. She shrieked as the ‘blade’ seemed to imbed in her chest, reeling backwards. Such an attack could induce heart failure, and as she reeled, clutching at her chest, he thought for a second it might work. But all it purchased was a moment in which he put himself between her and the twins again. The giantess swiped away the blade, the illusion winked out and her amber eyes locked on his. Something like words rasped from her bestial maw as she bunched her muscles to leap at him again.
Then with a smash that filled the air with billowing dust and shook the floor like an earthquake, half the ceiling dropped on her head.
*
The door and walls were giving way and Hanook looked shattered. The ceiling above was beginning to crumble from the shapechanger’s assault and Ramita could feel Huriya’s mind inside her own: Sister, she was calling, do not fear. I have come to help you.
What makes her think I’m that stupid?
The twins’ voices below were tearing at her and when she looked down, she could see the huge beast-women beginning to clamber towards a defiant Alaron. She did the only thing she could think of: she used Earth-gnosis to collapse the floor onto the head of the wolf-woman and used kinesis to ride it down as it dropped.
She felt rather than heard the woman’s cry as she was crushed beneath the tiles.
Hanook fell with her, keeping his balance with surprising grace. Even as the floor shattered on impact, she was spinning to face Alaron, who was surrounded by fragments of stone and wood and plaster, all hanging in the air about him as his shields protected him and those behind him.
Ramita heard herself wail with desperate elation as she launched herself at the twins, lying in the dust behind Alaron and screeching for her.
She was sobbing deliriously, the boys in her arms, when Alaron regained her attention. ‘Hey!’ he shouted, ‘Ramita, we’ve got to move.’ He pulled Nasatya from her reluctant grasp. ‘Come on!’
‘Shukriya, Al’Rhon bhaiya,’ she babbled, overcome with relief. ‘Thank you so much!’
He saved my babies …
It took a few seconds for her to push her emotions aside and realise again what was happening. The rumbles and crashes from every direction told her the building was being torn apart from all sides as Huriya and her Dokken tried to reach them. Some still hammered on the door to the room above, where they’d been until she collapsed the floor. Then she noticed the poor ayah was lying by the crushed wolf-woman, her head almost torn off. She clutched Dasra to her. ‘Dear gods …’ she whispered, utterly appalled.
‘We must escape,’ Hanook said, composed again. ‘Follow me!’ He led them through the scullery and out into the kitchens, then down the corridor beyond. When she turned to the stairs leading up, the vizier gripped her arm. ‘No,’ he said, ‘we must go the other way.’ He looked Ramita in the eye. ‘To the palace.’
From above, the sound of a door splintering jolted through them.
‘Of course,’ she replied, wondering if even the mughal’s soldiers could protect them. They hurried after the vizier, Alaron taking the rear. He had Nas clasped to his chest, a satchel over his shoulder and his staff in one hand. His sword appeared to have been lost.
They took us utterly unprepared, she thought, shuddering. It is a miracle we are still alive.
They hurried after Hanook through the silent halls of the servants’ quarters. Though they saw no one, they could hear voices: the screaming echoed down through the whole level. ‘My people,’ Hanook gasped, ‘they’re being slaughtered—’ For a moment he was overcome, but then he shook his head and set his jaw. ‘We must see you safe, Lady. Come!’
Hanook led them to the same hidden door he’d taken Ramita through before, to meet the mughal. He opened it with a gesture, and after they’d entered, sealed it behind them. He turned to Ramita and Alaron, his face almost preternaturally calm. ‘Lady, you know the way.’ He pulled a key from around his neck – the one that opened the door at the other end of the tunnel – and gave it to her.
‘No,’ she protested, ‘you must come too.’
The vizier shook his head. ‘They will find this door and they will break it down in seconds if there is no one to maintain the wards. The tunnel is only half a mile long, and they can move much faster than us. Someone has to remain to slow them down.’
Ramita and Alaron stared at him. Then Alaron, his face utterly white, took a step forward. ‘Then I will do it, sir. You are too valuable.’
She felt her heart thud with terror at the thought of losing him.
Hanook shook his head. ‘No, young man, I am old, and you have all your life.’ He turned back to the door with a grim look on his face. ‘And you have reasons to live. They killed mine.’
Ramita seized his hand and kissed it. ‘I wish we could have had more time.’
‘I too, widow of my grandfather. I too.’ He smoothed her hair affectionately. ‘Now go.’
*
Huriya stalked the vizier’s palace in absolute rage while her remaining kindred, while seeking the fugitives, wrecked everything they could lay their hands on. The servants were all dead now, their souls gone to replenishing the pack’s gnosis, but she was furious with the surviving pack-members, and she made sure they knew it.
How could they have escaped? Those outside had seen nothing – no shutter or outside door had been breached. She was shaking with anger, so livid she could barely think. We’ve lost more than a dozen in here, and they’ve still escaped!
‘Huriya,’ Malevorn Andevarion called to her.
She whirled to face him and spat venomously at him. ‘What is it, you slugskin bakrichod?’
He didn’t flinch. ‘You’re wasting time and effort: they’ve gone to earth – literally! It’s the only place they could have gone: downwards. Bring all the pack downstairs and look there. There must be an escape tunnel.’
Her rage boiled, but she had to admit he was making sense. And there were soldiers outside now, with archers and spearmen. Those of the pack who’d been stationed out in the plaza had been driven inside and a full-on assault was inevitable.
‘Very well. Do it!’ She turned, seeking Wornu and Hessaz, and found them timidly hovering in her wake. Their usual bravado had been completely undone by the terror of facing actual, real magi.
‘Get everyone down here,’ she ordered them. ‘Look for a tunnel!’
Malevorn dared to speak to her again. ‘Free my gnosis,’ he pleaded. ‘I’m one of you now.’
She whirled on him and stabbed a finger. ‘I still don’t know if we even need you, Inquisitor! Perhaps your soul might better serve us as food after all?’
‘Oh, fuck off, Seeress,’ he sneered. ‘Impressed with your kin? Half of them can’t even shield while casting another spell. Even the most incompetent novice ever – Alaron bloody Mercer – has been carving them up like humans!’
It felt too much like truth. ‘We’re doing our best! Bu—’
‘Your best? Well, bravo, you! Don
’t you see? You people aren’t anywhere near as powerful as you think you are. You’re only up against some street-girl and Alaron fucking Mercer and you still lost!’ He jabbed his finger into her chest. ‘You need me, Huriya. I’ll swear any oath you like, just for Kore’s sake, free my gnosis!’
‘For Kore’s sake?’ That word killed any momentary temptation she had felt. ‘How can I trust any oath you might swear to your false gods, Inquisitor? Come with me!’
Malevorn threw up his hands in utter disgust and fury and stormed away. But he didn’t go far, instead hovering like a moth about her fire. She summoned the pack with her mind and set them, yammering in frustration and fear, to scouring the lower floors.
Yet it was still Malevorn who found the secret entrance, even without the gnosis. He pointed a finger at a blank wall and said, ‘There.’
‘There?’
He ran his mailed hands over it, his eyes closed, and grunted in satisfaction. ‘Arcanum training, Huriya: they teach us to penetrate illusions, even if your gnosis is blinded to them. You close off your senses and use touch alone, filtering out all other senses.’ He reached out and seized her hand, then pressed it to the blank door. It encountered a door knob she could not see. ‘Feel that? Hidden by illusion, but it’s there.’
She scowled and wrenched her hand away, then glared up at him. He looked so smugly knowing that she wanted to slap him – but he’d found what they sought. Kraderz and Darice are dead. Wornu is broken. I’m surrounded by beasts and idiots. And him.
Still she shrank from trusting him. Instead, she turned to the blank wall and wiped away the illusion. The door appeared, and wards immediately sprang into life around it. Even though she battered at them with all her power, she could feel them being renewed, and then she sensed another presence on the other side.
Someone is there, waiting for us.
Fear of what Dareem had almost done to her made her flinch and step back. She glanced at Malevorn, knowing that he could most likely have the door down in seconds, but it was fear of that very competence that continued to hold her back.
Let them do it, she thought. She turned to the pack. ‘Tear it down.’
37
Without the Gnosis
The Scytale of Corineus
After the Ascension and the overthrow of Rym, Baramitius gradually retired from public life. But he emerged in the later years of his life to present Emperor Sertain with the Scytale of Corineus, which preserved the secrets of the Rite of Ascendancy. The Scytale is the greatest treasure of the empire, worth more than every ounce of gold and every gem ever to be found on Urte. It is the greatest gift a ruler has ever received.
THE ANNALS OF PALLAS
Baramitius was, to all intents and purposes, the world’s most celebrated drug-pedlar, a man for whom no amount of suffering was too great a price to pay for knowledge – provided someone else did the suffering for him.
ANTONIN MEIROS, HEBUSALIM, 793
Teshwallabad, Lakh, on the continent of Antiopia
Rami (Septinon) 929
15th month of the Moontide
Alaron hurried along the tunnel, lighting the way with a gnosis-light affixed to his staff. Nasatya was cradled in one arm and the satchel containing the Scytale and his notes was slapping against his thigh. How on Urte he was going to be able to fight when burdened like this he didn’t know.
Better hope I don’t have to.
Ramita followed, rattling off prayers under her breath. She’d been teary-eyed since Hanook’s decision to remain behind, but she was holding together, and her gnostic aura was formidably bright. Then they heard the first beasts, howling in the tunnel behind them, and he thought of Hanook, his serene and kindly face, his intelligence and wisdom.
Ramita’s face was stricken.
‘Did we do right?’ he asked, slapping the satchel holding the Scytale. ‘Should we have told him?’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t know.’
‘Can you run?’
The brick tunnel was well-made, square-cornered and fairly straight. Alaron kicked into a trot, and Ramita tried too, though she wasn’t a natural runner and the heavy gem-encrusted sari impeded her movements and left her gasping for air after just a few seconds. And the twins were a burden to both of them, awkwardly heavy and thrashing about. They were covering ground, but Alaron was increasingly frightened that they weren’t going anywhere near fast enough. Then they rounded a gentle bend, and he saw light at the end of the tunnel.
Ramita cried out in hope—
— and from behind them came an echoing cry, the many-throated voices of the pack, boiling after them like rats along a flooding drain. He threw a glance over his shoulder and saw low shapes bounding into view. ‘Run! Run! For Kore’s sake, move!’
He let Ramita pass so he could guard her back, loping behind her with his every instinct screaming in warning. Every glimpse behind showed the beasts getting closer. He realised it was his turn to do as Hanook had done: to sacrifice himself so that she could go on. He grabbed Ramita’s shoulder. ‘Listen, you’ve got to—’
She immediately understood – and refused. ‘No! No more! We stay together!’ Her face was adamant, freezing his protests. ‘Together, bhaiya!’ She stepped past him, faced the darkness and reached for Earth-gnosis, and he understood immediately what she was trying to do, but unlike at the palace, with its clear layout, she was unsure how to proceed. He linked hands with her and used mysticism to link their minds, and her eyes widened as she felt his gnosis link to hers.
He pulled her awareness with him, and suddenly the earthworks above began to reveal themselves. He could see the pressure points and the buttresses. This wasn’t something he could sustain for long – he was only a quarter-blood – but then her strength came in behind him, dwarfing him, and he rode that wave, expanding their awareness together.
She called amber-coloured gnosis to her hands and sent it into the roof of the tunnel. He provided the guidance, she the raw powerand with the two of them working as one, as the amber light surged upwards. He shielded his mind– her strength scared him, and he couldn’t help feeling like an egg in her grasp. She dropped his hand and snapped, ‘Now we run again!’
The snarling, yowling beasts got closer and closer and he looked back again as the pack reached the spot where they’d paused, barely sixty yards away. Their eyes and teeth were gleaming in the lamplight and their howls echoed, savage and unearthly in the confined space.
‘Now!’
*
Malevorn ran in the wake of the barking, yelping brutes, counting as he went. Huriya had only sixteen of the pack left. Sixteen. There were a few more of them outside in the street, perhaps, but more than thirty had entered the vizier’s palace and now half were dead – at the hands of four enemy magi. He was grudgingly impressed. Damn you, Mercer. I didn’t think you capable.
Without access to the gnosis running in chainmail was hard, and it made him realise how much he depended upon his magic in all he did. There was a silent place inside his skull which had always been pumping energy to his limbs, or drawing information from all about him. Now the silence inside was deafening and deadening.
Huriya did not deign to run: she floated beside him, sparing her little legs but burning gnosis like lamp-oil. Yes, run through all your energy, little princess. Then you’ll be helpless and I’ll snap your neck.
The pack stormed along the tunnel ahead of them both, their calls louder and more eager—
—until he heard a violent crack! that reverberated through the enclosed space. He was an Earth-mage and recognised it instantly, even without his gnosis.
He stopped dead, grabbed the startled Lakh girl and threw them both to the ground, then he rolled so that she was on top, because if one of them was going to die it might as well be her. With a roar, the lights vanished and the tunnel before them filled with noise and dust and the screams of those who had gone before them.
&nb
sp; His luck held: they were outside the main collapse. Huriya shielded them, keeping rocks as big as their bodies from crushing them, and his last sight before all light vanished was of her face above his, her eyes filled with so much hate and fear it paralysed him in the darkness.
*
Alaron stared at Ramita as the roof collapsed. Her mind was still fused with his and he could feel her emotions as if they were his own: protective fear for the twins and for him, and absolute determination not to be taken. Her almost savage will to survive was tempered only by her cool practicality.
She was staring at him with glowing eyes, seeing more than just his physical form. ‘Sivraman,’ she breathed. ‘You are my Sivraman.’ She was trembling with primal ferocity.
He fell utterly in love. Her face, full of protective fire, was instantly imprinted onto his soul for all time.
Then dust engulfed them as they clung together, using Air-gnosis to call fresh air to keep them alive for the coming moment. They bowed together, turned away from the onrush of dirt and dust, shielding as they pulled all the air they could into a tiny bundle of space containing the two of them and their tiny shrieking burdens. Linked still, she fed more power into the shields, and once again her sheer strength awed him. He wondered how she could possibly be so strong – it was as if she was made of the same stuff as the rock beneath their feet.
They clung together and weathered the storm of dust and debris until, gradually, it ebbed and they could dimly sense the lamp they had been making for. Wrapped in their bubble of air, they began to edge forward. The twins were kept from full-blown panic only by Ramita’s use of mystic-gnosis to calm them. He pulled energy from everywhere as they went: Air-gnosis to breathe, Earth- and sylvan-gnosis to solidify the roof above, healing for scratches and cuts, even divination, to predict any incoming threats. There were holes in the roof from the collapse, even the dim light shone from the moon shining through the dust, and distant shouts from the street above, fearful or in pain. He could not even begin to imagine what damage they’d wrought up there. The air wasn’t good, but it was enough, and they staggered onwards, retching and spitting out dust, until they emerged into the golden haze of a glowing lamp before a door. His eyes were streaming, but his heart was dancing.
