The Gutter Prayer, page 46
The Herald is near, thinks the elder ghoul. He should leave. Instead, he finds himself drawing closer to the door. His powerful soul ranges ahead of his body, probing the minds of those beyond. This one will be a suitable voice.
“I SHALL OPEN THE DOOR,” says Hedan, in a voice like treacle. “STAND BACK.”
A swipe of Rat’s claws, and the chains fall to the ground. He catches them before they can clatter. With his other arm, he wrenches the door from its frame and pulls it open.
Aleena steps out. She keeps her sword between herself and Rat, but the blade is cold and dark, not fiery. “Might have guessed you’d beat us here.”
Hedan stumbles out and falls to the ground, staring up at Rat in terror. His mouth opens. “I MUST KILL THE HERALD. CARILLON.”
“Aye, so you fucking said when you kicked me down the stairs, shithead. Listen, it’s not Cari who’s in there. It’s her cousin Eladora—and you’re not killing her either. They’ve got her prisoner, the worms do. They’re using some amulet to make her the Herald, or look like the Herald, or—I dunno, I didn’t follow that nonsense. We’re going to get the amulet, all right?”
“I WILL KILL THIS ONE,” says Hedan, gurgling on his own vomit. Rat extends a long, claw-tipped finger and points it at Miren.
“No.” The sword doesn’t ignite, but it flickers. “He’s going to bring the amulet to C—to stop the Ravellers. There’s thousands of poor shits corralled in the middle of the Wash, and the Ravellers are going to kill them all unless we get the amulet there quick as a Haithi fuck, see. So we need the teleporting twerp.”
“I WILL KILL THIS ONE,” says Hedan, and Miren finishes Rat’s sentence, “LATER.” Miren’s eyes blaze with helpless fury when Rat manages to seize control of his voice.
“No time to lose,” says Aleena. “They’re in the Thay tomb.”
“I KNOW IT.” They start the march up the shady slope towards the tombs.
“First part of this whole shit-show is easy,” says Aleena. “We go in and get the amulet, and Miren takes it out. Smash and grab, right? But it’s the second part where we get fucked. All the Crawling Ones on the hillside are going to come after us, and we’ll be stuck at the bottom of a fucking dungeon. If you’ve got ghouls nearby to take some of the fight off us, we might not all die.”
Rat chuckles. “THERE WILL BE WAR, OH YES.”
“Marvellous.” The sword catches fire. “I don’t know what I’d fucking do with peace,” says the saint.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Rockets arc high over the city, their glare mirrored in the waters of the harbour. The city watch gunboats that launched the salvo stay well clear of the docks at the end of the Wash, which is still enemy territory. There could be Ravellers hiding among the shadows, or even disguised in rat-form or gull-form. The gunners use the damaged spire of St. Storm as a reference point when aiming, a trajectory that goes just east of the church, over the docklands and warehouses, and into the heart of the old city. The rockets howl over the dome of the great Seamarket, so close that the terrified crowds in there scream. Some try to flee, but their Raveller captors won’t let anyone go. Hundreds perish in a split second, sliced into bloody chunks.
The rockets land beyond the Seamarket, on the far side of Venture Square. Offices, shopping arcades, covered markets—all are consumed in a flash. There’s screaming in the inferno, but only briefly. Too quick to tell if it was human or Raveller.
A second barrage screams in across the city. These rockets are fused to explode in mid-air, showering the area below with a thin spray of flame-retardant foam. It’s nowhere near enough to put out the fires—the Wash is burning now, a gathering conflagration bigger than any Guerdon has seen in recent history—but it makes a clear path through the debris, a sudden road between the edge of Glimmerside and the Seamarket, cut through a dozen blocks in an instant.
The Tallowmen advance in a ragged, wild line. Skirmishers. Behind them are heavier troops, more disciplined but fearful. Armoured mercenaries, their services bought with the guns they carry into battle. The city’s entirely human and mortal watch, with Warden Nabur at their head, follow after them, a stamp of official sanction on the bombing of the city. Civic necessity—the needs of the whole city must be weighed against a few buildings that were probably empty of anyone important. The alchemists need to get their weapon as close to the army of the Black Iron Gods as they can.
Guildmistress Rosha rides with the bomb. At least, one of her copies does. As long as the mould survives, they can cast new Roshas for all eternity. Still, despite the knowledge that her essence will go on, the wax effigy in the bomb carriage cannot quite control the trembling of her freshly cast hands as she adjusts the weapon she has made. She struggles to ignore the inchoate psychic battering from the remnants of the Black Iron God in the wreckage. This wax body is disposable, but the mould-shrine containing the distillation of her soul is not far away. The god, once imprisoned and truncated, is now mad as well, and full of hate for its tormentor. Rosha knows that if the gods break free from their prisons, the thing in the carriage beside her will manifest as some misshapen avatar of wrath, and all imaginable suffering will be visited on her.
By her reckoning, such a fate is less than twenty minutes away.
Up on Holyhill, the guild engineers who were ordered to safely recover the bells from the spires of the cathedrals now receive fresh orders under Rosha’s own seal, commanding them to stop the bells from ringing by any means necessary. One work team, careless and unaware of the true peril, simply remove the ropes and think their work done. They are surprised when the bell begins rocking back and forth of its own accord, moved by invisible forces, and shocked when a presence manifests in the air around the bell tower, the shade of a god not worshipped in any of the cathedrals. None of the engineers survive; the dismembered remains of three of them are found scattered on Glimmerside rooftops over the next week, and the other two are never seen again. In the cathedral below, the icons of the Kept Gods shatter.
Cari hears the explosion of rockets and quickens her pace. The three of them—Ongent, Cari and Spar—climb through a seemingly endless series of storerooms and abandoned offices backstage at the Seamarket. Ongent, though red-faced and puffing, has the most energy of any of them, urging them onwards. He even has the breath to point out interesting architectural features.
“This was the temple to the Black Iron Gods. These would have been priest quarters and ritual chambers where sacrifices were prepared before they were brought downstairs, to what is now the main market. Back then, the Black Iron statues stood there on a dozen plinths, with an altar in front of each of them. There are tunnels and cisterns underground where the Ravellers were kept. When they sacrificed an offering, a Raveller would rise up and unmake the, ah, victim, carrying everything—body and soul and everything else—into the spirit world. It was exceedingly efficient, as these things go. Their high priest—more than priest, arch-saint or avatar is a better translation—shared in their power. A demigod—or goddess.” He casts a sidelong glance at Cari.
“If they’re down there,” whispers Cari, “why the fuck are we up here?”
“This leads up to a ring of balconies overlooking the main hall,” answers Spar. “Fuck,” he adds as the building shakes, sending dust cascading from the ceiling. The noise of another blast rolls over them. “Are they targeting the market?”
“Doubtful.” Ongent runs his hand lovingly over a carving that’s half concealed behind the remains of an old puppet theatre. “The bombing won’t kill all the Ravellers, and even one of them is enough to carry all the souls to the Black Iron Gods. Rosha dare not offer holocaust within the temple precincts.” The carving is ruined. Worn by the passage of time, hacked by both victorious crusaders and idle boys, and covered in the graffiti of three hundred years, but Cari guesses that it once depicted one of the Black Iron Gods. “We have time,” Ongent declares. “We can wait for Miren.”
“When they steal the amulet, how long will we have before the Ravellers here work out what’s going on?” asks Spar. “How long before they start killing people?”
“My boy, those Ravellers are emanations of the gods. They’re not living creatures, remember? Spirits given material form. No, they know what the gods know. Once the Black Iron Gods know that the ersatz Herald is gone and that door is closed, they’ll start a mass sacrifice and try to break through by sheer brute force.”
“All right, let’s get up as close to the balcony as we can without getting spotted. We want Cari giving her commands right away.” Spar hunches his shoulders as another barrage comes down outside. Cari can’t meet his eye; she knows he’s thinking about what command she’ll give them.
May as well be hung for a sheep as for a lamb, she thinks, or an unholy army of monsters as for cursed visions. “One sec.” She dares a quick peek at the city entire, opening her mind to the visions. Flash-image of Holyhill, of Glimmerside burning below, and then the impression of a great door opening up above Gravehill—but the door’s blocked. Held shut from the far side.
Cari’s presence in the spirit world doesn’t go unnoticed. THE HERALD tolls one voice. DIVIDED, DIVERGENT! says another. The thing in the wagon outside shrieks like some demonic newborn, this keening wail equal parts hatred and raw need. And then, closest of all, a presence. There’s a Black Iron God no more than fifty feet away, hanging at the apex of the great domed ceiling of the Seamarket.
It knows her. Knows what she must be.
Transformed, transfigured, made divine.
High Priestess, dark queen, immortal and invincible.
In the vision, the Ravellers bow before her. The crowds, driven like cattle onto the killing floor of the temple, fall to their knees and love her. Some are so enraptured that they willingly hurl themselves on the altars, dashing their brains out against the stone so she can consume their souls. She leaves the temple on wings of darkness, her knife transforming into a blade of black iron. Single-handedly, she destroys the armies of the alchemists. She annihilates the prison of metal that holds a portion of her soul captive with a word, and girded in godbone armour she rises, casting down the cathedrals of the false gods on Holyhill. They fall like marble landslides down the hillside, and she calls up a throne fit for her divine glory, so she might rule over her city eternal. Alchemists, watchmen, Heinreil’s thieves, all her enemies are dragged from their filthy hiding places and sacrificed in front of her by robed priests and Ravellers, so she might bathe her feet in their life’s blood and—
Cari slams shut the door in her mind. Spar’s suddenly beside her, holding her upright.
“A vision?”
“Tried to check on Miren.” She takes a gasp of air. Fish mixed with blood and dust. “They’re near the tomb, I think. Oh shit. One of them—one of the gods—it saw me.”
Ongent pales. “They have enough awareness to recognise you?” She nods.
“Run,” says Spar. “Climb!”
Through the door, faster now, no point in stealth. Crashing through rooms and hallways, looking for stairs.
She’s the one who finds a locked side door. Spar smashes it open with a stony kick. It leads onto another circular hallway. The right-hand wall is studded with doors every few feet, but the left-hand side has little arched windows that look out onto the market floor below. A strange sound; thousands of people weeping silently, in terrified unison. Cari stares down at that sea of faces. The reality of what’s about to happen falls into her stomach like an iron ball—all those thousands of people are going to die if she screws this up. The responsibility is a physical weight, slowing her down, and she hates to be slowed down.
Two hundred feet below, a surging black tide scrambles up the interior of the dome. The Ravellers move as one, slithering towards them.
“This way,” shouts Spar. The crowd below ripples in confusion as his voice echoes around the huge dome. Some people must think it’s an escape attempt. Cari spots explosions of black-then-red, like flower blossoms, and nearly vomits when she realises what they are. Someone tried to run, and a Raveller reached out and killed everyone nearby. Dismembered in an instant.
She runs after Spar, half blind with tears. Ongent shouts something, a spell maybe. She finds the stairs up, climbs them like a dog, on all fours. The balcony offers a better view of the Seamarket. From this height, it’s like her visions. The people below are dots; the distances all seem warped.
It’s not enough. The Ravellers are too close. They change shape as they climb, budding stolen limbs and tentacles to grip onto the cracks in the stone when needed. A thing of darkness clambers towards Cari, climbing on the stolen hands of a hundred children, sprouting a hundred eyes as it closes.
We need to get higher, she thinks, but Spar’s already ahead of her. He points up. There’s the Black Iron Bell, hanging another fifty feet above them. Four ribs, like the horns of a giant’s crown, rise up from this level of the building to support the upper dome. She can see two little doors distantly, one at the end of each of two ribs, on either side of that central bell. There’s a little ledge—not a balcony, a ledge—running around the circumference of the dome from one door to the other. Iron handholds, recessed into the stone, so you can cling on and not fall three hundred feet to the floor below.
Getting up there is as high as they can go, but she can’t see a route up.
Spar turns right and smashes straight through a wall. They follow.
The Ravellers are right behind them now, calling on Cari to come back and join them. Without the amulet, it’s a false promise—she’ll be consumed by them, hollowed out and used as a mask. They don’t need her to have a soul to complete the ritual.
Ongent points to a narrow stairwell that goes up. It must be the access stairs to get up to the bell, she thinks, even as she wriggles through the entrance. Ongent follows after her, groaning as he squeezes in. Spar has to smash away some of the door, and the stairs beyond is even narrower. She hears the scrape of stone on stone behind as her as she climbs.
The stairs go on forever. There’s no light here, nothing at all. She can see nothing. All she has to guide her is the feeling of stone beneath her hands and the ever-tightening turn of the stairs. Ongent can’t breathe behind her—she can hear the old man wheezing and coughing. She can’t hear Spar at all. He’s too far behind to be audible, she tells herself, but he’s there. They haven’t caught up.
The climbing becomes automatic, even ecstatic. She’s leaving her body. It’s Ongent’s spell all over again, when they healed Spar. The three of them, suspended in the void between the city below and the gods above, stealing power from the divine. Surely she’s climbed all the way out of the world by now. Or is this some trick of the Black Iron Gods, some last illusion? She imagines an infinite tower, like a thread of black, rising out of Guerdon forever and ever, and she’s condemned to climb it for eternity.
Up and up and up.
She can’t hear Ongent now either. Her hands are numb, her legs aching with the exertion. All she can hear is her own pounding heartbeat and gasping breath.
And up.
The stairs so narrow now she has to squeeze around every turn.
And up.
Every step brings the terror that this is the one where the Ravellers catch her. Phantom sensation of a tentacle closing around her ankle, dragging her down.
And up, and she’s at a door.
Stunned, she grabs the handle, and it’s unlocked. It swings outwards, out into the void. She edges forward onto the little stone ledge, inching to the right. A spur of stone runs out to the gigantic bell that hangs before her. It’s the largest of the Black Iron Gods, the head of their nightmare pantheon. Unlike the other bells she’s seen, at the Holy Beggar and St. Storm and in the alchemists’ furnaces, the reforging process could not completely erase the thing’s features. It has a face, and she will never, as long as she lives, forget the sight of it.
The professor emerges from the stairwell. “Oh fuck,” he whimpers at the sight of the fall before him. Weak-kneed, he clings to one of the handholds. “Oh gods,” he says, but he has to move to leave room for Spar. He takes two terrified steps to the right, and Cari grabs his hand.
“You’re okay!” she shouts to him. “I’ve got you.”
Spar crawls out, covered in the cobwebs and dirt of the stairwell. His shoulders are scraped shiny. Blood wells up between the cracks of his stone plates. He crawls out onto the little spur, kneeling in front of the Black Iron bell. Then, very cautiously, he turns and places his massive hands on the door. “I’ll hold it shut!”
It’s no good. More Ravellers are climbing up the inside of the dome.
“Miren!” shouts Cari.
Her cry echoes around the dome—
—Echoes off the bell.
CHAPTER FORTY
Eladora’s view of the battle is confused. Her soul is like a rag on the wind. At times, she’s dragged up to the heavens and is in alignment with the Black Iron Gods. In those eternities, she sees everything—the armies clashing in the heart of Guerdon, the gods moving through the skies over the city, the thieves who have come to rob her from her family tomb. The Black Iron Gods thunder at her, booming with church bell voices, demanding that she be their Herald and let them in.
In those moments, she’s transfixed between two immense magical constructs. The Black Iron Gods hammer at her soul from without, trying to use her as a door out of their prison. Jermas Thay’s spell claws at her from the inside, from the amulet that is like a burning coal on her chest, trying to force her to let the gods into his trap. His spell would make her soul into a furnace, a second remaking of the Black Iron Gods. The priests trapped them in physical bells; he wants to trap them in abstract purpose.
The pressure to give in to one or both is unbearable, but all she has left is pride in herself. She endures.
She falls back down into her body. She knows, intellectually, that she is badly hurt. She wonders if she is dying. The tomb was very cold, but now it is hot. She tries to focus, and sees fire. A flaming sword, and then there’s a Crawling One on fire. Its black robe ignites, roasting the column of grave-worms inside. It collapses into a horrible swarm, but Aleena swings her sword again, low to the floor, and the worms catch fire. Scattering is no defence from the wrath of the saint.
