“And the Ghost Walls? It takes you longer to get to the point than it does to get to Khebesh.”
“They cut the aether of Khebesh off from outside influences, creating a placid zone. And the sorcerers record every act of magic, so they can compensate for it. Maintain the balance of the world.” Myri’s grown breathless. And irritated, as if the discussion of the Ghost Walls angered her. “But speaking of Khebesh – where is the grimoire of Doctor Ramegos? Where did Hawse hide it?”
Cari takes a deep breath. She’s been anticipating this moment for some time, and hopes she’s right.
“I think – right here.”
She shucks off her rags and steps off the rock shelf.
Diving down, to reach the muck of the drowned land.
Falling into the hands of the Lord of Waters.
Cari thinks of that thorn-bush goddess on the mountain, renewing herself after being destroyed. Tethered to that shrine, to the Rock of Ilbarin. Thinks of Hawse’s altar on the Rose, his devotion to a vanished god. His promise that the Lord of Waters had a plan for her.
And her vision in the rift — the Bythos swimming over the grave of the god. Something must have survived. Gods cannot die. There has to be something left, some meaning to Hawse’s long vigil, his martyrdom.
Her thoughts become a prayer.
She reaches the seabed and holds on, sinking her fingers into the mud. Holding on as her lungs burn, her vision darkens. Hoping she’s right.
Movement, in the deeps.
Cari kicks back up, breaching the surface, gasping for air. She swims back to the rock and pulls herself out of the sea, turns in time to see the first of the Bythos emerging from the water behind her. Half a dozen of the fish-creatures swim towards her, lowing softly, their iridescent scales gleaming wetly like jewels.
Only one follows her out of the water. It stumbles as it climbs up the rocks, the sudden weight of its fishy upper body nearly too much for the withered human frame beneath to bear. The human portion of the Bythos is naked, headless, bloated from weeks underwater, but Cari still recognises it by its gait, by its broken hands.
It’s Captain Hawse.
How much of Hawse survives in this hybrid being? Is there still something of the captain in there, or it is just using him, a divine parasite animating that stumbling human form? Did the captain want this, in the end? Is it reward or punishment – or is she applying human words, human intent, to something beyond human comprehension?
As the Bythos approaches, her eyes are drawn not to the holy fish-body that trails behind the creature, nor to the remains of Hawse that carry it, but to the point of union, the spot where Hawse’s neck fuses with the underbelly of the fish. She doesn’t know why it fascinates her so, nor can she draw any meaning from it, but that point of balance draws her eye, as if she can discern whether the Bythos is more god than man.
It stops, and extends its ruined hands – Hawse’s hands, familiar and loved – offering her a bundle wrapped in oilskins. The fucking book, at last.
She takes it, reverently, and lays it on the rock beside her.
Without a word or gesture, the Bythos turns and slips into the ocean, vanishing instantly from sight.
Cari chooses to take it as one last jest from the captain, that he walks away without a word, just like she did six years ago. He doesn’t speak, but the return of the book is proof enough of his friendship.
“To Khebesh,” she says through the tears.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
In the house on Lanthorn Street, Rasce holds a wake for Vyr. He was not well liked by any of the thieves: not by his Ghierdana kinfolk, nor the Eshdana, nor the Guerdon thieves, but he was one of them, and they honour that bond if nothing else. Bottles of wine and casks of arax, then the common ground of whisky.
Vyr’s body, still wrapped in the sheet, lies on the table in the room downstairs. In time, they’ll bring it back to the isles of the Ghierdana and bury him in the crypts. Once, it was the tradition of the Ghierdana to murder a priest as part of the funeral ceremony, to show that the sons of the dragon bow to no god, but in these days of alliance between the isles and the Lyrixian mainland it wouldn’t be politic. At least, it wouldn’t be wise to kill a Lyrixian priest; no doubt Baston would happily murder some cleric from the Sacred Realm of Ishmere and drag the corpse back across the border, but that wouldn’t be wise either. They’ve already strained the bounds of the Armistice this day.
Rasce feels restless no matter how much arax he drinks, and the singing irritates him. There’s too much he doesn’t know about Vyr’s death – and how he feels about Vyr’s death. He had no love for his cousin, but he’s honour-bound to avenge the murder of a Ghierdana. Those papers suggest Vyr was plotting against him, or at least reporting on his efforts in Guerdon – and if Vyr was reporting to Great-Uncle, then Vyr might have lied to the dragon, poured deception in Great-Uncle’s ear.
Worse, it’s a sign that Great-Uncle doesn’t trust Rasce. That Great-Uncle fears Rasce might fail.
He wants to act. To strike. Instead, he feels weighed down, surrounded by obligations and duties. Surrounded by people. It was so much easier to soar heedless, to take and move on, to let the dragon-fire scorch the cities and move on – this connection to Spar is a curse as well as a blessing. He’s aware of Vyr’s body in the house, aware of those who were wounded on Mercy Street. One woman was shot – an accident, her gun went off when the watch grabbed her. She’s dying a few streets away, despite the efforts of the surgeon. The sensation of her blood running down on to the floor mixes with the taste of the arax.
Outside, another obligation. Rasce emerges on to Lanthorn Street and bows before Thyrus.
“My thanks, Great-Aunt, for your assistance earlier.”
“My assistance,” she echoes. “Nearly breaking the truce, and for what? A band of stray dogs from the Wash?”
“Allies. Trustworthy allies, so we can extend our reach beyond the occupation zone.”
The dragon enfolds him in a tent of wing-leather. Thyrus’ green-tinged scales eclipse the world.
“Dragons have servants, not allies,” hisses Thyrus. “Have they all taken the ash?”
“I – almost all, but—”
“Almost all. Ah, you clasp only a handful of disloyal vipers to your bosom! My estimation of your competence only decreases. So tell me, nephew, who shall pay me for my assistance? Who is to blame?” Her eyes burn in the hot darkness of her embrace. “Do I blame the dead boy, for whatever foolishness got him killed? Do I blame you, for breaking the truce line and marching a host down into the free city?” She snarls, acidic spittle steaming on the cobblestones of Lanthorn Street (and distantly, Rasce feels the acid eating into the stones). “Or do I blame my brother? He has still not returned! What did he command you to do?”
“To take control of Guerdon’s trade in yliaster,” replies Rasce. Great-Uncle commanded him to remain silent, but he owes Thyrus a debt.
“Are we pedlars now? Do we grub in the dirt for the leavings of gods to sell on for a few coppers? The margins on yliaster are miserly.” Thyrus hisses again. “End this. Do not cross the border again, for any reason.”
“My Great-Uncle set me a task, and I would sooner die than fail.”
“My child,” says Thyrus, “you are mortal. Death and failure are inevitable for you. You only get to choose which comes first.” Her tone suggests she’s done with the conversation, but Rasce isn’t finished.
“A Ghierdana has been murdered. All of us are honour-bound to avenge him.”
Thyrus yawns, showing him three rows of razor-sharp teeth. A few small gaps, where knives were harvested for her adopted children. Tooth-buds are already sprouting in the gaps. “Bring me those responsible, and I shall devour them.”
“The alchemist Mandel—”
“You have no proof of that.”
“This letter,” says Rasce, producing the sealed letter. “Mandel’s company enchanted the hands that strangled the life from Vyr.”
&
nbsp; The dragon breathes softly. Wax melts. Paper scorches and burns. “I am not unsympathetic, child, but young Vyr is dead, and the dead can wait. Sometimes, vengeance must be slow, and it may be all the sweeter for it.” Thyrus spreads her wings, releasing him from the confessional. “Know your place, Chosen, and be the better for it.”
Spar watches the dragon depart, part of his mind following Thyrus as she climbs, circles once over the New City, then strikes out for the designated hunting grounds north of Guerdon. He can feel her, too, with senses he doesn’t have a name for.
I think she may be right. If the Armistice fails, then everybody loses. Secure what you’ve won.
“You owe me,” says Rasce, rising to face the house on Lanthorn Street. “I saved you. We made a bargain, you and I.” He shouts, his voice echoing off the New City. “Show me my enemies!”
Spar tries. Again and again, he reaches out. He can see the pebbles planted by Baston, across the city, gleaming in his mind like a constellation of stars, but it’s too far. He strains until his mind dissolves, until his soul burns, all to no avail. He can no more reach those stars than he can fly.
“Damn you!” Rasce roars. “I shall not fail Great-Uncle!”
Inside Lanthorn Street, Baston rises to investigate the commotion outside. Karla looks down from an upstairs window.
“On Glimmerside,” says Rasce, “you took my strength to fuel the miracle. Do so again, then.”
Spar hesitates. A Stone Man must be cautious. If he takes too much from Rasce, the spiritual loss could kill him – and then Spar himself would be lost, falling back into the abyss. He tries to think – and then Rasce’s knife plunges into the wall of the house, or into Rasce’s own flesh, Spar can’t tell. The overlap is too complete, and his mind’s already scraped over the city from the seawall to Gethis Station. Pain rushes through him, although he cannot be sure what “he” refers to at this juncture.
Is he the Ghierdana boy on Lanthorn Street, sawing madly at the glowing stone walls like he’s trying to cut the house free from its foundations? Is he the New City, defiant labyrinth, a thing sprung from neither victory nor defeat, but something else entirely, an act of faith in no known god? A thing the scholars have yet to name, a magical accident as misshapen as the alchemical waste-poppets that crawl from their birthing vats in agony?
Is he the spiderweb of consciousness drawn across Guerdon, the ghost of a Stone Man who died two years ago, animated by miracles stolen from the Black Iron Gods, his brief afterlife bought with the coin of a thousand thousand sacrificial victims?
He falls.
He flies.
His consciousness leaping across the city, focusing on another point. His stepping stone across the abyss is a single pebble, lodged in the wax of a Tallowman.
This Tallowman is new-made and knows it. Life flows through it, artificial but no less sweet. The flame burns clean and bright, a tongue of fire dancing across the finely drawn glyphs and runes engraved on the inner surface of its skull, illuminating them in order to form ersatz Tallow-thoughts, an approximation of mind. Artificial but no less cherished.
For now, it’s content to follow orders. It was told to stand guard, and stand guard it will! It’s so young that the simple act of standing and watching is fascinating and novel. Why, it could stare at a blank wall for hours, and find joy in watching the light moving across the bricks. Some part of it knows that, as the wax hardens, so too will it become jaded, and it’ll be harder to think. It’ll have to do cruel things, hurtful things, to feel anything. It’ll have to be blood spraying across the bricks. But for now – bricks! So intricate, the lines and patterns like veins and arteries.
And this Tallowman has something much more interesting to look at. This room is circular, the ceiling a glass dome, ornate ironwork made to resemble astronomical glyphs – although only a tiny patch of sky can be seen through the forest of pipes and storage tanks above the dome, and that sky is choked with fog. This place was made as an observatory, but instead of a telescope, an aethergraph has pride of place. A Guerdon-made model, its thick connecting cable of rubber-sheathed orichalcum running into a socket in the floor.
Mandel – the Tallowman’s maker – sits at the aethergraph, his lined face bathed in the glow from the machine. His lips move in silent communion with the other minds in the circuit. His scribe waits patiently, heavy ledger balanced on his knees.
There’s something in the Tallowman’s side, between where its ribs used to be, before rib and lung and everything else got rendered down in the vats. It doesn’t hurt but having something lodged in its flank is interesting. A chip of stone. Oh, yes, when it fought that human. Humans, so slow and stodgy and messy on the inside. The Tallowman’s glad to have left that behind. It thanks the alchemists, thanks Mandel, for making it better. Nearly perfect.
The glow from the aethergraph fades.
“Cowards,” says Mandel, “Rosha left us with a guild of jellyfish pretending to be human.”
“What was the consensus?” asks the scribe.
“There wasn’t one. Most of them are just piddling around in their breeding vats or sniffing around the edges of the Great Work. Demanding praise for creating condensed aether or grinding mummy to ninety-nine-parts pure. The rest… either they talk only of rebuilding the factories, or they see the peril posed by the Ghierdana, but think fleeing is the better option. That the Armistice is unsustainable, and the threat to the yliaster supply is the final straw. The new guildmaster… gah, what’s the fool’s name again?”
“Helmont,” supplies the scribe.
“He leans towards decamping to Ulbishe. But he doesn’t command the guild the way Rosha did. He can’t bring them with him, so it’s war between the jellyfish and the accountants.” Mandel shoves the aethergraph in irritation, sending the fluid inside sloshing against the glass.
“You should let me talk to them.”
“Ha. Wouldn’t that be a thing? ’Twould be almost worth the risk of revealing you to see their mouths drop open like gaffed fish.” Mandel groans. “Maybe we should consider evacuating. Third time’s the charm and all. Khebesh was too isolated, Guerdon too welcoming. Maybe Ulbishe will be right. Ready supplies of the base materia, and while their athanors may not be as advanced as Guerdon’s, at least we would be away from the front lines.”
“And end up as Kept as the gods. You know you cannot trust the mirror princes of Ulbishe.” The scribe lays down his pen, rubs his weary eyes. The Tallowman watches in fascination, enchanted by the idea of having little flaps of skin that cover the eyeball! Tallowmen do not blink.
“And anyway,” adds the scribe, “young Duttin has us in a vice.”
“Ach, I know. What a debacle it was to let Aloysius Ongent of all people get hold of both Thay heirs. Now Duttin’s got her stable of monsters and rogues to meddle with us. Not to mention Ongent’s homunculus skulking around the city. I swear, I’ll wake some morning to find the creature sharpening his knife on my ribcage.”
The scribe passes Mandel a letter. “This arrived while you were in conference. Parliament has voted in emergency session. In response to, ah, the growing threat to the peace and stability of Guerdon, they’ve agreed to reopen the Tallow Vats. They’ll be under the auspices of the Ministry of Security, not the alchemists’ guild.”
The Tallowman doesn’t have a heart. Or blood. Or, really, anything but wax and wick and fire. But wax and wick and fire all thrill at the thought of more of its kind. There have been so few since the making of new Tallowmen was banned.
“Under Nemon, then. Bah. Another of our works taken from us, and all in pursuit of Duttin’s lunacy.”
“Like old times,” laughs the scribe. “A Thay ruining us.”
“I fail to see the humour,” says Mandel.
“The Great Work endures, my friend. We are close. A little longer, and we can set all the world to rights.”
Mandel replies, his mouth moving and making sounds, but the Tallowman’s lost interest. Now, it’s fascinated by th
e motion of Mandel’s jaw, the way his beard hairs move when his mouth opens, the moistness of his tongue, the pulsing of the arteries in his neck. Wouldn’t it be enlightening to bludgeon his skull open with a brick? Or a knife, a sweet sharp knife?
The flame in the Tallowman’s skull dances through random fantasies of cruelty. Unseen, the stone in its side begins to slip as the wax around it softens.
Spar’s mind retreats from the Tallowman, the backwash of a psychic wave.
“What are you doing?” hisses Rasce. He’s distantly aware that his body is soaked with sweat, the dragon-tooth knife slipping from his slick grip, but that body is many streets away and mostly irrelevant.
I can’t hold on.
“We must divine if there’s a way in. Heinreil’s tunnel – does it still exist? Look deeper! I care not for the mystic jabbering of alchemists!”
The Great Work. In his death throes, Spar swallowed the old Alchemists’ Quarter of Guerdon. Portions of their library are still lodged in his bowels, in the tunnels below the New City, and knowledge leeched into the stone. The Great Work is the long-held mystic obsession of the alchemists’ guild, the goal of spiritual transformation and perfection. For some, it was metaphor – lead in gold and flesh into transcendent matter just another way of talking about coaxing fire from phlogiston. A secular philosophy in a godless city to lift the alchemists’ work above grubby commerce, just like the Brotherhood clung to Idge’s writings.
A memory opens up beneath Spar, triggered by words he heard while eavesdropping. Professor Ongent’s querulous voice, asking him, Are you familiar – I would assume not, not to cast aspersions on your education – with the Theory of Forms?
He once was. He’s not any more. That knowledge is scattered across the city, tucked away in odd corners and alleyways, memories left stranded on rooftops and attics, buried in cellars, and he doesn’t have the strength to collect it all. Something to do with the movement of souls, with the physical plane of mortals and the aetheric plane of gods and spells. It’s important, he knows that. Help me, he pleads to Rasce. Rasce is the fixed point of his consciousness now – he can use Rasce as an anchor as he collects his scattered thoughts.
The Broken God Page 33
