City of Keys, page 47
She climbed the ladder to the deck. The sailors on watch were snug inside the pilothouse. In the heavy rain, they wouldn’t see her unless she came too close. She stripped her clothes off and bundled them in her cloak. The Wayfarer rode up a swell, sinking into the next trough. She didn’t relish swimming through the storm, but the combers were all headed for the beach.
Nikola waited for the next wave to come, timing her jump from the bow. Chill water closed over her head. She bobbed up, took her bearings, and started stroking for the shore.
Chapter Forty-Two
The broad stone corridors seemed endless. Malach strode at Kasia’s side as she led him confidently through the maze.
“How did you learn this place so quickly?” he asked.
She shrugged. “I remember things after seeing them once. I don’t try, it just happens.” A quick glance. “It’s something I was meaning to ask you about. I wondered if all nihilim have the ability.”
“Not that I know of,” he said.
“It’s strange, isn’t it?”
“Your memory?”
“My mind.” She tapped her forehead. “I failed their tests, you know. The Curia says my moral compass is defective. But it seems fine to me.”
He thought of Nikola. She, too, had failed. Once he’d trusted her, but she’d shown her true colors. Or maybe it was just him she cared nothing for.
“I think the real purpose of the tests is to create an underclass,” he said. “People they can pay less and force to take the jobs no one else wants.”
Kasia was silent for a while. “I felt sorry for Nikola Thorn when I first met her as a char. It could so easily have been me in her place. But I knew we were alike even then. Not just Unmarked, I mean.” A frown. “She had power in her. I sensed it.”
“I don’t want to speak of Nikola,” Malach said.
“All right. But you’re not done with her yet. Or she with you.”
The words cut him. Unwillingly, he stopped walking. “You saw this?”
“The first time was when Natalya made my new deck.” She swallowed, obviously thinking of her friend. “The Major Arcana has twenty-two cards, laid out in a very specific order. They represent the basic archetypes and will never change, no matter what happens in a person’s life. When one of these cards appears, we must pay close attention. I’d been so focused on the readings, I hadn’t thought of the deck as a whole, in proper order. But looking at the sketches, I had a revelation.”
She fanned the cards. “I already explained that you’re The Fool. That’s zero. Then comes The Mage and The High Priestess. I’m both.” She regarded him seriously. “Brother and sister. Next is the Empress. I knew that I would meet her someday. That I might have already without knowing it. And I had. That night at the Arx in Novo when she came to my room.”
Malach nodded. It was the same night he’d crossed the Wards.
“Just a chance encounter. But it wasn’t, not really. It was the beginning of something more. When I saw Nikola again earlier, I knew she was The Empress.” She held up the card.
It showed a dark-skinned woman holding a scepter, the other hand clutching a falcon to her breast. She reclined in an open field. Vines heavy with white flowers tangled around her bare feet. A lazy smile curled her full lips.
“That’s her,” Malach said hoarsely. “The silver tooth . . . .”
“Natalya is gifted,” Kasia said. “The ley guided her hand when she painted that, Malach. They’d never met.”
His gaze met hers. The hair on his neck lifted.
Kasia slipped the card back into the deck and drew another. A stern man in purple robes sat on a throne, arms upraised.
“Falke,” Malach said immediately.
“The Hierophant. Keeper of dogma and tradition. He’s the fifth trump. Do you see how she touches both of you? The Empress is a very strong archetype. A force to be reckoned with.”
“I don’t deny that,” he muttered wryly. “But did you see what part she will play?”
Or how she truly feels about me? he thought, though he didn’t voice the question.
Kasia tilted her head. “I’m afraid not. But I can tell you that she values love over power. That is an essential aspect of her nature. Her authority comes from the heart not the head, and is all the greater for it.”
Malach blinked in surprise as Kasia took his hand. “I don’t know what passed between you,” she said. “I only suggest you don’t judge her so harshly. The Empress might act impulsively at times, but there is no cruelty in her. I think she would be an ally if you allowed it.” A pointed look. “And we can use more of those.”
He exhaled and nodded. “So Falke is the fifth. And The Empress the third. Who is the fourth?”
“The Emperor. The Red King.” Her face darkened as she drew the card. “Balaur.”
Malach studied it. A deep hood shadowed his face, leaving only bloodless lips. Arcane symbols were painted in the four corners of the card. He held a ring of keys in one white hand, a sword in the other, also engraved with strange runes.
“What do they mean?” Malach asked, tearing his gaze from the blank face. It dizzied him to look at it, as though he gazed into a bottomless chasm.
“I’m not sure,” Kasia admitted.
“But your friend painted it!”
“And she was ill for a day afterwards. I directed many of the cards, but not that one.”
“You should have left it out,” he muttered. “Put it away.”
She gathered the cards and slid them into her pocket.
“Then the deck wouldn’t work,” Kasia said simply. “All the Major Arcana must be represented for it to have balance.”
“What if you tore it up?”
“It’s just wax cardstock, Malach.”
He forced a smile. “Right.”
“The power comes from the ley. But that I can wield against him.”
They resumed walking. Sweat dampened his palms. The plan would work. It had to. And if he died in the attempt . . . . Malach had no regrets. He didn’t know the children Balaur stole from their homes, but when he thought of them he saw the faces of his little ones in Dur-Athaara. Of his own daughter.
Had the Mahadeva known? Malach was certain he would have made the same choice whether or not he’d worked at the creche, but the experience had changed him. He could still remember the perfect trust in their eyes that he would show them kindness and care. No one had ever looked at him like that before.
That parents would drown their own children . . . it stoked a rage even hotter than he’d felt for the Via Sancta. The Broken Chain of Bal Kirith stood for freedom, not barbarism.
Beleth was dead. Soon Balaur would be, too. The old guard, all gone. The mages who had grown up in the Void, as he did, would realize that they needed to build, not destroy.
A lovely dream if he could pull it off.
Kasia touched his sleeve, drawing him to a halt. She pressed a finger to her lips.
They were nearing a junction. She gestured to indicate that their destination was near. Malach crept forward on the balls of his feet and paused a meter from the corner, listening.
It was quiet for a minute. Then, a rustle of movement. A quick, rasping breath.
He glanced back to find Kasia approaching in stocking feet, shoes dangling from one hand.
Malach sniffed the air. Perditae. A pair at least. The creatures’ ripe odor masked his own, but he knew how to get their attention.
Very slowly, Malach eased a sword from the scabbard at his hip. He drew the edge along the fleshy ball of his thumb, squeezing the cut so drops of blood pattered to the stone floor.
A snuffling grunt came from around the corner.
Stay back, he mouthed.
Malach had been both hunter and prey in the Void. A solitary Perditae posed little danger, but get a pack on your trail . . . . He’d once spent two days up a regnum tree before Dantarion happened along with a group of their kin and rescued him.
Some Perditae could smell human blood five kilometers away. They were strong and fast, but not very smart.
Boots pounded on stone. The stench grew thicker. He gripped the hilt with both hands.
When the first one rounded the corner, he was ready. Malach drove the blade between its ribs, yanked it free, and slit the creature’s throat. Almost before it hit the ground, two more were on top of him. He ducked a dagger and pivoted away, parrying a downward blow from a thick cudgel. Malach lashed out with a boot, kicking the creature backwards.
When they saw Kasia, the Perditae howled. She stared back, gaze flinty, just the way Jessiel or Caralexa would have. A tall, muscular female lunged, lips wet with saliva. Kasia had a card ready in her hand, but only as a last resort. They’d already agreed that she should avoid using the ley in case Balaur somehow sensed it.
Malach let the monster pass him by, then thrust the blade between its shoulder blades. The third was two steps from Kasia when he crashed into it from the side. They hit the wall. A hand gripped his throat, lifting him up. Malach stabbed it twice in the chest. The creature dropped him. Kasia pulled him away from its death throes.
She hadn’t even flinched.
Definitely his sister.
Malach caught his breath. He wiped the blade on one of the leather jerkins. “I guess we’re in the right place.”
Kasia studied the bodies with a frown. “Abyssal ley did that?” she asked. “Changed them?”
He nodded. “Partly. But their Marks came from mages who died in the war. The Void delayed the symptoms, kept it from killing them, but whenever the ley surged, they became what you see here. It’s another form of Mark sickness.”
“That’s horrible,” Kasia said, pity in her face.
Malach was so used to Perditae, he’d stopped thinking of them as human. But the memory of Tashtemir healing an injured girl in a village reminded him that not all were the same. Hundreds of them lived peacefully in Dur-Athaara. It was Balaur’s fault that the jungle had grown corrupted.
But not just his. It was Beleth’s fault, too.
As he stared at the pathetic creatures he’d just massacred, Malach faced a truth he had always known, deep down, but refused to accept. Beleth hadn’t saved him out of compassion or love. She’d wanted a weapon against the Via Sancta. He’d been groomed for that purpose, and that purpose only.
She’d forgotten the central tenet of the Via Libertas.
Free will.
Tempting, that sublime wrath. That glorious thirst for vengeance against those who had cast the nihilim into the Void. But it was just another form of bondage, he saw that now.
Malach followed Kasia around the corner. She stopped before a blank stone wall.
“This is it,” she said. “I used one of Natalya’s charcoals so I’d be certain. See?”
She pointed to a faint smudge near the bottom of the wall. It looked like all the others—but this one had a liminal doorway that led straight into Clavis’s bedchamber where Balaur slept.
Thanks to the Order, Balaur was well aware of the liminal passages. That’s why he’d posted the Perditae outside.
The winged cardinals were guarding the main doors to the bedchamber. Malach had already confirmed that before they entered the secret city. They were more dangerous by far, but Kasia claimed they could be killed.
“Cut off the head,” Malach whispered, “and the body follows. Falke said that. Once their god is destroyed, the Order will scatter like fleas from a dead rat.”
Kasia’s face was calm. “I will burn him to ash. If his foul creations are inside—“
“Their power cannot touch me,” Malach finished.
He hoped it was so.
She drew a card from the suit of Flames. Malach’s own adrenaline was pumping now, readying his muscles to spring. He raised the sword.
Stone faded to dark mist as the doorway opened before them.
He rushed through, Kasia at his heels. The chamber was large but sparely furnished. A lamp burned on a bedside table. The bed itself was unoccupied.
Balaur sat in an armchair by the window. Rachel squirmed in his lap.
“Malach!” she cried.
He was vaguely aware of a sudden heat against his skin that died as quickly as it came. Some part of him understood that Kasia struggled to contain an explosive gout of fire. But all he could see was Rachel’s terrified face. The arms covered in arcane symbols that hugged her small body tight.
He dropped the sword.
“You neglected to tell me about your daughter,” Balaur said. “She’s a delightful child.”
“Please,” he whispered. “Don’t hurt her.”
Balaur stroked Rachel’s cheek with a scarred nub. “I fear my new Nuncio has played me false. But now we’ve found each other, haven’t we? I promise to take very good care of her, Malach. Such a powerful little girl. Why, with her, I won’t even need an army.”
“Give her back.” Kasia’s voice rang with icy authority.
Balaur’s lip curled. “Did you take me for a fool? I pried the truth from your own mind! You betrayed them both!”
“Liar! I told you nothing!” Yet her face had gone pale.
“I come and go in your Garden as I please. Your dreams are an open book to me.” His gaze turned to Malach. “But you . . . I knew the instant we met that something was amiss. All your cousins I drew to me in their dreams, but yours were veiled behind a wall, with not a single chink in the defenses. So I made enquiries.” Balaur laughed. “The witches unmanned you. You let them put kaldurite in your belly.
“I only made you my nuncio because you were toothless. You would hold the throne for me, but had no ability to keep it for yourself.” A flicker of fury contorted his face. “But that is not all of your deceit. Not all of it! You had this child with you at Bal Agnar. You hid her from me!”
He squeezed Rachel tight, eliciting a soft cry. “Just as your cousin did with her own whelp. I scoured the Morho for them yet she eludes me still. No matter. I have the stronger of the two. And when I find Dantarion, she will regret her defiance.”
Balaur bared his teeth. “Now you mean to murder me in my sleep! But your plans have failed. So let us test this stone, Nuncio. Truly, I am curious about its properties.”
He beckoned to the dim recesses of the chamber. The cardinals drifted into the circle of lamplight. Their forms were indistinct, as though the shadows clung to their deep red cloaks. One dragged Falke in its gloved hand, bloody and beaten.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled through swollen lips. “I fought them with all I had. Saints, forgive me.”
A ribbon of darkness unfurled, coiling around Malach’s foot.
He was intimately familiar with pain.
The dull, bone-scraping pain of the Wards. The sharp sting of Dr. Fithen’s scalpel.
But those things paled in comparison to the agony that sank its claws into him now. His fingers dug furrows in the carpet. His life spilled out, draining away into nothingness.
He dimly saw Kasia raise a card. Then she was gone, swallowed up by a square of darkness. It looked like one of the vertical shafts at the Pit, a black well leading down and down.
The hole sealed itself, and he was alone with his agony.
Chapter Forty-Three
A flicker of violet light at her feet was the only warning. The trapdoor opened an instant later and Kasia fell straight through it. She landed badly, twisting her ankle.
Wind tore at her hair. Rain soaked her dress.
She gasped and rolled to one side, teeth gritted. Through tears of pain, she saw dark waves in the distance and a landscape of tiled roofs.
The liminal door had opened atop a parapet of the Pontifex’s Palace. A low, crenellated stone wall enclosed the ramparts. Her stomach churned when she saw the drop beyond. She’d been a hair’s breadth from falling to the bailey below.
Kasia pushed sodden hair from her face, peering through the downpour. Oh saints, Malach! And his poor daughter. My niece.
She had curly hair like Natalya. A beautiful little girl with her father’s bold nose and sturdy build.
Balaur had known they were coming. Known everything.
Her fists balled in helpless anger. She should have killed him when she had the chance. He’d been so close when they were in the library, right across the table.
But there was no time for regrets. She could flog herself later. Someone had brought her here.
And Kasia knew who it was.
“Danziger!” she screamed. “Show yourself!”
No answer came.
Kasia tested her foot. Needling pain shot up her leg. She probed the ankle. Tender, but not broken. She hopped to the wall, leaning against it. She’d held onto her cards with a death grip when the trapdoor opened. The edges of the deck bit into her palm as she scanned the narrow walkway.
“Come get me, you coward!” she yelled. “Or are you scared?”
She inched along, every reflex taut. Square towers anchored the corners of the palace. They would have stairs leading down. She made for the closest one, trying to conceal the limp, her free hand braced against the rain-slick stone. The roof looked empty. But she sensed a watchful presence.
The deck in her hand reassured her. Seventy-eight weapons, each capable of bringing pain like he’d never known—
Kasia reared back as a dark form vaulted over the parapet in front of her. Nails scored her arm, wrenching the cards away. A vicious backhand blow and she was flying through the air. Stone rushed up to meet her. Kasia’s ears buzzed. She lay there stunned, tasting the hot copper of her own blood.
She blearily lifted her head. Jule stood over her. Rain coursed down his face. High cheekbones. A square jaw. Sea-blue eyes. Yet the elegant suit fit him wrong, the shoulders tearing at the seams. And his hands . . . .
“I never wanted to kill you. Why do you fight us, Kasia?”
She scrabbled backwards. Jule advanced, the cards gripped in one hairy fist.
“You have no place with them. Look how they’ve treated you! Balaur offers power beyond your wildest dreams!” His eyes blazed. “Life eternal. Never to bow to anyone save for him!”
