Bound

chapter 18

It was two hours later.

Luna and I were sitting in Arachne’s cave. I’d patched up my wounds with a first-aid kit and the healing salve I carry, though it had been a poor job compared to what Anne could do. Arachne was gone. She’d listened to my story, examined Anne, then disappeared into the tunnels. The few words she’d said before leaving hadn’t been reassuring. Luna had arrived shortly after, by which time I’d been exhausted and only half-coherent from the aftereffects of the adrenaline rush. It had taken Luna a long time to get the story out of me.

“What happened at the War Rooms?” I asked at last.

Luna grimaced. “The Council aren’t saying. But I managed to get through to Landis and he filled me in. Short version: it was a disaster.”

“How?”

“Okay, so originally it was supposed to be a protest march, right? Whole lot of adepts all gathered outside the War Rooms with signs. Well, the Council knew it was coming and they’d cleared the area out. No TV crews, a damping field to mess with phone signals, police cordons on the outside, the works. Only it turned out the Council had underestimated the numbers, as in by a factor of ten. The Keepers and the security were jumpy; the crowd started getting angry. And then someone started shooting.”

“Who?”

“The Keepers are saying there were Dark mages hidden in the crowd, and the security men fired back. But that’s what they would say, isn’t it? Not like they’re going to admit to gunning down a crowd of innocent people.” Luna sighed. “I don’t know. The EM field messed up everyone’s phones, so there aren’t any recordings. Sonder and the time brigade are going over the place. Maybe they’ll figure it out.” Luna looked at me. “If they do find out it was the Council’s fault . . . you actually think they’ll admit it?”

“Probably not,” I said. And that’s what everyone else is going to think too. “How many ended up dead?”

“They’re still counting. At least a dozen.”

I winced. Relations between adepts and the Council had been bad enough already. Even if this had been a setup by Morden and Richard—which seemed likely—no one was going to be in the mood to listen.

Luna’s eyes had drifted over to Anne. Anne was lying on one of the sofas, her eyes closed and her breathing slow and regular. “Is she going to be okay?” Luna asked.

“Physically, she’s fine,” I said. “She woke up while Arachne was checking over her, but I don’t think she recognised us. Drank a little water, went back to sleep.”

Luna looked at me. “Physically she’s fine.”

I nodded.

“What about not physically?”

“She touched the relic that jinn was bound in,” I said. “I don’t know what happened after that. But I’ve got an ugly feeling that when she does wake up, we’re going to find out that she made some kind of contract.”

Luna looked alarmed. “You mean like the monkey’s paw? If she made a wish . . .”

I shook my head. “You didn’t see the way she was looking at Lightbringer and Zilean. If it were as simple as granting wishes, they’d both have been dead by the time I got there. But something drove off a full team of mages and gunmen.”

“You said you felt something when you were linked to Anne by the dreamstone,” Luna said. “Was that it?”

“I hope not,” I said. “Because if it was . . . it was a lot more powerful than me.”

We fell silent, looking at Anne’s sleeping figure. I didn’t give voice to what I was really afraid of. With some things, it’s a lot easier to invite them in than to get them out.

“Do you think this was what Morden was planning all along?” Luna asked. “Setting Anne up in that vault to make her desperate enough?”

“It wasn’t the only thing,” I said. “Those Dark mages looted practically everything in the Vault. God only knows what the consequences of that are going to be. But I’m pretty sure it was why he involved us.”

“I was just thinking,” Luna said. “Remember what Anne told us? About how Morden asked her to be his apprentice, all those years ago? Then when Richard came back, he didn’t go straight away to meet you, did he? I mean, he could have done it at any time, but he waited for months. Until Anne got taken into Sagash’s shadow realm.”

I nodded.

“Do you think that was why?” Luna asked. “I mean, when he made you two that offer . . . we thought it was because of you. What if it was the other way around? Anne was the one he really wanted, you were just there?” Luna looked at me. “It would mean they’ve been planning all this for years. All the time that we were spying on them, they were watching us . . .”

“There’s more,” I said. “Last year, when that kill order went out on me, you got out of it by passing your journeyman tests. Vari got out of it by transferring his apprenticeship to Landis. But when we tried to do the same with Anne, it was rejected. We never found out why that happened, did we?”

“But that was Levistus . . .”

“Levistus was responsible for the vote on me,” I said. “But we never found any evidence that he was behind what happened to Anne. Why would he care about her? And even if he did, why hide the evidence? And then Morden swoops in. And because Anne was under the same death sentence, he could put her under his protection as well . . .”

“And we never thought about it, because we thought it was just to keep a lever on you,” Luna finished. Her eyes were angry. “That bastard. All that time we were running around, he was pulling strings to make it worse!”

“Yeah, well, it’s not going to do him any good.” I couldn’t keep the savagery out of my voice. “After tonight, Morden is done.”

“He wasn’t there . . .”

“Onyx was,” I said. “And then there were those rumours that he was planning to attack the War Rooms. They worked in his favour before, because they drew the Council’s attention away from the Vault, but there’s no way in hell anyone’s going to believe that he didn’t have anything to do with this. The only reason Morden’s been able to stay on the Council this long is by keeping himself squeaky-clean, and now that’s over. If there isn’t a Keeper team on their way to arrest him already, there will be soon. I’ve done my last job as his aide.”

Luna frowned. “But what if he just makes the same threat? You work for him, or . . . ?”

“I’d love to see him try,” I said. “Last time, he held all the cards. He was the one holding off our execution order, and we had nothing on him. Now it’s the other way around. Not only is the execution order gone, but he ordered me to attack a Council facility. If he tries to pull that same shit again, then I can just go straight to the Keepers. They wouldn’t have done anything before, but now? He’ll be even more screwed than he is already. No.” I shook my head. “Anne and I are loose from him and away from the Council for good.”

“Yeah, well,” Luna said. “Morden wasn’t the one trying to kill you tonight.”

“No, that was a Council aide,” I said, and sighed. “And that’s another thing. If the Crusaders decide to go public and accuse me of being party to Jarnaff’s death, then I’m dead, and probably Anne is too. Our only chance is that they might have too much to lose. I’ve seen too much of their own dirty laundry now for them to be comfortable bringing it to a Council trial, not to mention that it’d mean publicly admitting that their elite black-ops team just got slaughtered by one Dark mage and one diviner. The loss of face might actually scare them more than a trial would.”

“Is there anything we can do either way?”

“Wait and see.”

Silence fell again, and this time, neither of us broke it.

| | | | | | | | |

It was late into the night when Variam finally arrived, and when he did, the first words out of his mouth were, “Have you heard?”

Luna and I shook our heads.

“The Council passed an emergency resolution ordering Morden’s arrest,” Variam said. He was still wearing his battle gear, but from the looks of things, he’d had an easier night than we had. “They sent a whole freaking battle group over to his mansion to get him. Keepers, constructs, the works.”

“Faster than usual,” Luna said.

“Because they all agreed for once,” I said. “Go on, Vari. What happened?”

“You might want to be sitting down for this,” Variam said. “Morden surrendered. I wasn’t there, but from the sound of it he just walked out into the middle of the Keepers and demanded to see their warrant. When they showed him, he went along quietly. Wasn’t a shot fired.”

Luna’s eyebrows climbed. “Seriously?”

“He’s demanding a full trial,” Variam said. “Lawyers and prosecution and everything. Says the evidence will prove his innocence.”

“Are you sure about this?” I asked.

“Landis saw the whole thing.”

“Can they even put a Council member on trial?” Luna asked. “I mean, who’d he be tried by?”

“Christ knows,” Variam said. “They were running around looking up the laws when I left. I don’t think they’ve even figured out what to charge him with yet.”

“They won’t, not anytime soon,” I said. I remembered how long the Council had dragged their feet on Cerulean’s trial, and he’d only been a Keeper. A Council member being charged would be the legal event of the century. This was going to take months.

“You think Morden is actually nuts enough to believe the Council’s going to find him innocent?” Luna asked.

“Of course they won’t,” Variam said. “Everyone knows he did it.”

“And even if he didn’t, they’d find him guilty anyway,” I said. I shook my head. “This is crazy. First Morden loots all those items from the Vault, then he just gives himself up? All the imbued items in the world won’t do him any good inside a Keeper cell.”

“Then that’s it, isn’t it?” Luna said. “Morden’s off the Council. It’s over.”

“Not quite,” Variam said.

We both looked at him.

“So like I said, they were still looking up the laws when I left,” Variam said. “Turns out there hasn’t been a Council member arrested like this in living memory. But they did find one thing.”

“What?”

“So, Morden’s under arrest, right?” Variam said. “But until he actually dies, or until he’s sentenced and stripped of his position, then he’s still a Council member. They can’t assign his seat to anyone else.”

Luna shrugged. “Who cares?”

“Oh?” Variam was looking at me and grinning, and I held quite still. I had a sudden horrible suspicion where this was going. “Think you’re about to start caring soon. Turns out, when this happens, until the trial’s over, Morden’s place on the Junior Council goes to his second. Which means his aide.”

Luna stared at Variam, then slowly turned to look at me.

“You’re now Acting Junior Council member and official representative of the Dark mages of Britain,” Variam said to me, still grinning. “Congratulations. Oh, and when you have a free moment, the other members of the Council would like to have a chat. As in, all of them.”

I just stared.

“I think you just broke Alex,” Luna told Variam. She turned back to me, her expression curious. “What are you going to do now?”

I sat down heavily. I did not have the faintest idea.