Bound

chapter 2

Only when we were most of the way down into the valley did I begin to relax. I’d searched for danger in all the futures that I could see and found nothing. “I suppose that was the something worse,” Anne said at last.

“I think you’re being optimistic.”

A cold wind blew across the hillside, making the grass ripple and Anne’s hair flutter, and I shivered. The fight hadn’t been long enough for me to warm up. “Keep scanning with your lifesight,” I said. “We’re not out yet.”

“Was that Rachel?”

“Safe bet,” I said. Rachel is the other survivor of Richard’s apprentices, though she goes by Deleo now. Disintegration is her speciality and she really hates me. Anne’s never met Rachel, but she’s heard the stories.

“Why didn’t you see her coming earlier?”

I looked at Anne and she coloured slightly. “I didn’t mean it like that,” she added. “It’s just that you can usually—”

“Spot things further ahead,” I said, and sighed. “Yeah, that’s one of the problems with divination. The crazier someone is, the less predictable they are.”

“I thought Rachel was Richard’s Chosen,” Anne said. “If he wanted us here . . .”

“Yeah,” I said. Now that I thought about it, that flash of anger had been the only moment today that Richard hadn’t seemed in control. Maybe Richard had ordered Rachel not to attack us, and she’d disobeyed. If that was true, it was the first crack we’d been able to find in Richard’s forces. Was there some way to exploit that?

“You were thinking of using that knife on him, weren’t you?” Anne asked.

“Was it that obvious?”

“I saw your adrenaline levels,” Anne said. “You were gearing up for a fight, then . . .”

“It wasn’t the right time,” I said. “Maybe it’ll never be, but . . .” I shook my head. “What did you see when you looked at him?”

Anne frowned, diverted. “He’s . . . strange.”

I looked at Anne. “Strange how?”

“He’s human,” Anne said. “But his body seems . . . enhanced, somehow? It’s like there’s more output than there should be input. I’d have guessed it was a boosted metabolism or something, but those accelerate aging, and he looks like the opposite if anything. From his bones he has to be fifty at least, but he’s got the cellular and muscular structure of a man of thirty.”

“Longevity magic?”

“I think so, but not one I’ve seen.” Anne looked up at me. “You never did tell us Richard’s magic type.”

“That’s because he doesn’t give it away,” I said. “Uses items and general spells . . .” I trailed off as a movement in the futures caught my attention. We were halfway up the other side of the valley and almost to the trees, but as I looked ahead I saw that the woods we were about to enter weren’t empty. “We’re about to have company,” I said. “Someone in the trees.”

Anne looked upwards towards the tree line, narrowing her eyes slightly. “Hostile?”

“No, or I would have seen earlier. What can you see?”

“It’s just one,” Anne said after a moment’s pause. “Male, early twenties. He’s healthy, I think . . . oh.”

“What?”

“He’s got an artificial leg,” Anne said. “Left side from the knee down. Might be a construct graft.”

“Anyone you know?”

“I’d remember something like that.”

I’d had time to check out the futures more thoroughly, and I was as certain as I could be that the person waiting for us wasn’t here to fight. “Then let’s see what he has to say.”

The guy waiting for us wasn’t hiding. As we entered the woods he stepped out from behind a tree, keeping his hands in plain view. Tall and athletic, with blue eyes and a crew cut, he had the look of a fighter but wasn’t carrying any weapons or magic items that I could see. There was a woven bracelet on his wrist. “My boss wants to talk to you,” he told the two of us.

Anne had come to a stop and was staring at the guy. I wasn’t quite sure why—okay, he could have been good-looking, but I wouldn’t have thought Anne was the kind to get caught up on that. “You had anything to do with that?” I asked, jerking my head back towards the distant debris across the valley.

“Wouldn’t be hanging around if I had.”

“So what, you stood around and watched?” I said dryly.

Crew Cut shrugged. “You did all right.”

“Who are you?” Anne asked.

“Just the messenger.” Crew Cut nodded back over his shoulder. “My boss is a quarter mile that way. He says you’ll be able to find him.”

I noticed that he hadn’t asked who either of us were. I was more interested in how he’d known that we’d be coming here. “And how did you—?” I began.

“I know you,” Anne said suddenly.

Crew Cut looked back at Anne, then to my surprise dropped his eyes. “Two and a half years ago,” Anne said. “It was you, wasn’t it?”

I glanced at Anne. “You know this guy?”

“So do you,” Anne said. “He tried to kill you.”

“Doesn’t narrow it down much.”

“As in, more than once.”

“You’re going to have to be more specific.”

“Three years ago.”

“More specific.”

“In the summer.”

“More specific.”

“Oh, come on,” Anne said in exasperation. “Your memory’s not that bad. The Nightstalkers. Remember?”

“I don’t—” I started to say, then stopped. The Nightstalkers had been a group of adept vigilantes looking for vengeance on Dark mages in general and Richard’s apprentices in particular, and by the time they arrived on the scene, the only apprentices of Richard still alive had been Rachel and me. They did okay against me and really badly against Rachel. Most of them had died in the basement of the mansion behind us.

But now that I thought about it, I hadn’t seen all of them die. A seeker adept called Lee had escaped. And there’d been another, a weapons and explosives expert, who’d gone by the name of . . .

“Kyle,” I said, and saw the slight reaction on Crew Cut’s face. “That was your name, wasn’t it?”

“Still is,” Kyle said.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll admit, having you talking to me rather than trying to cut me in half with a sword is an improvement. However, given that the last time I saw you, you were trying to shoot me, I’m not too inclined to follow anywhere you lead.”

“Not just you,” Anne said. “He nearly killed me as well.”

A trace of embarrassment showed on Kyle’s face. “That was an accident.”

“You put a bomb on the roof of the flat we were sleeping in!”

“It wasn’t aimed at you,” Kyle said.

“Yeah, you’re kind of just digging yourself deeper at this point,” I said.

Kyle exhaled slightly. “All right,” he said. “I’m not going to say I’m sorry and that I didn’t mean it.” He turned to Anne and seemed to brace himself. “But I am sorry about planting that bomb. It was wrong, and I knew it was wrong when I did it. You want to come after me, I’m not going to blame you.”

Anne stopped, looking at Kyle in surprise. “Wait. You think I’d want to . . . ?”

Kyle didn’t answer. “Okay,” I said. “I think Anne and I need to have a word.”

Kyle stood with his arms folded as I touched Anne’s shoulder to lead her away through the trees. “Is he telling the truth?” I asked once Kyle was out of earshot.

“I think so,” Anne said. One of the side effects of Anne’s abilities is to make her pretty good at reading people. Few people are cold-blooded enough to lie to your face without tensing up. “You don’t think the Nightstalkers are still around?”

“No, they’re gone.” The leader of the Nightstalkers had been an adept named Will; he’d died in that mansion, and without him, the group had fallen apart. “I think I know which boss he’s talking about. You haven’t met him, but his word is good. Do you want to go?”

“With Kyle?” Anne thought for a second, then shrugged. “Well, he said sorry. That’s more than most of the people who’ve tried to hurt me have ever done.”

We walked back to the adept who’d once tried to kill me. “Okay, Kyle,” I said. “Let’s go.”

| | | | | | | | |

We walked through woods and across fields, tall grass brushing against my trousers as we picked our way between gnarled trees. The air was bitterly cold and my coat did little to keep away the chill. Anne stayed close by my side, quick and alert, and from her reactions I was able to tell exactly where the person ahead came into range of her lifesight. The trees opened up into a small clearing, and standing at the centre, a man was waiting for us.

Cinder is as tall as me and a good deal heavier. Not much of it is fat; he’s got the look of a weight lifter, with a thick neck and a barrel chest, though it isn’t his muscles that make him dangerous. He’s also Rachel’s partner, but while Rachel is crazier than a coked-out wolverine, Cinder is trustworthy, more or less. Piss him off and he’ll kill you, but his word is good and if he’d invited us to talk, I was pretty sure we were safe.

“Verus,” Cinder said in his deep voice.

“Cinder.”

Cinder looked at Anne, waiting. “You can call me Anne,” Anne said.

Cinder nodded. Most people would have missed the fact that by waiting for Anne to introduce herself, Cinder was showing good manners. It’s a point of etiquette among Dark mages to only call each other by a name that they’ve told you. “Need to talk,” Cinder told me. “Alone.”

I glanced at Anne. She gave a small motion, and I started walking.

“Wait here,” Cinder said to Kyle as I reached him. Kyle nodded and Cinder turned to walk by my side. We disappeared into the trees, leaving Kyle and Anne alone in the clearing.

“First things first,” I said once we were out of earshot of the two younger spellcasters. “Did I miss something, or is Kyle working for you now?”

Cinder nodded.

I thought back to the last I’d seen of Kyle, lying in the basement of Richard’s mansion, crippled and cornered. Cinder had warned me off, and I’d taken the out. I hadn’t had any reason to believe that Kyle was still alive. “Why?”

“Bonded.”

I stared at Cinder in surprise. “You bonded him?”

Bonding is an odd and very specific tradition among Dark mages. If a Dark mage defeats someone in combat, then he can offer to bond them. If the defeated party says no, they’re killed. If they accept, they become the Dark mage’s servant. Under Dark customs they’re considered property of their owner, and from the point of view of the Council they’d be a slave, but calling the relationship master-slave isn’t quite accurate. A bonded servant is closer to an apprentice or a junior partner—if a Dark mage chooses to bond someone, it’s a sign they respect them enough to want to keep them around.

Not many Dark mages take bonded servants. The only ones who still follow the tradition are the more martial and honour-oriented types, and they’re a minority. Of course, now that I thought about it, that described Cinder pretty well, so maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised.

But there was one thing I couldn’t understand. “Don’t you have to agree to be a bonded servant?”

“Yeah.”

“Kyle and the rest of those adepts were on a crusade to kill as many Dark mages as they could,” I said. “How the hell did you persuade him to say yes?”

Cinder shrugged.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Ask him.” Cinder looked at me. “You done?”

We’d walked fifty yards or so. “All right,” I said. Cinder wouldn’t have called me here unless he had something important to say. “Let’s hear it.”

Cinder stopped and turned to face me. “You’re working for Morden.”

“Yeah, that’s not exactly a secret.”

“So’s Del.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Thought she reported to Richard.”

“Less now.”

“Huh,” I said. The last I’d heard, Del—aka Rachel—had been first among Richard’s servants. For her to be reporting to Morden sounded a lot like a demotion. All of a sudden her trying to kill me made a bit more sense.

Though come to think of it, of all the people I’d laid eyes on today, the only one who hadn’t tried to kill me or do something horrible to me at some point or other was Anne.

My life is really messed up.

“So what about you?” I said.

Cinder raised an eyebrow.

“You working for Morden again?”

“If I have to.”

“You don’t sound that enthusiastic.”

“I’m with Del,” Cinder said simply.

And that was Cinder’s problem in a nutshell. “So I gathered,” I said. “Were you around when she took that shot at me?”

Cinder shook his head.

“And I’m guessing you’re not here to finish the job.” I folded my arms. “So what do you want?”

“Split her from Richard.”

I stared at Cinder. “Are you out of your mind?”

Cinder just looked at me.

“In case you didn’t notice, your partner just tried to turn me into a dust cloud,” I said. I almost said girlfriend instead of partner but changed my mind at the last second. “And you want me to do her favours?”

“Tried talking,” Cinder said. “Didn’t work.”

“What, and you think she’ll listen to me?” I was pissed off now. Only a month ago, I’d had Shireen tell me the same thing. She’d been Rachel’s best and closest friend while she was alive, and now both she and Cinder were expecting the same impossible task. “I have met Deleo exactly twice in the past year. The last time she saw me, she didn’t make it five minutes before trying to kill me. This time she didn’t make it five seconds. Expecting me to talk to her is one of the stupidest plans I’ve ever heard in my life.”

“Isn’t anyone else.”

I looked away, frustrated and angry. Rachel showed up and tried to murder me, and now not only was Cinder expecting me to put that aside, he wanted me to help her. I had more enemies than I could handle in a lifetime, and both Shireen and Cinder were expecting me to pick a fight with yet another. “Maybe you should find someone else.”

“You’re smart and you’ve known her the longest,” Cinder said. “Besides. Doing shit that’s supposed to be impossible is your thing.”

“Doesn’t feel much like it at the moment,” I muttered. “What’s in it for me?”

“You help Del, I’ll watch your back,” Cinder said. “Long as it takes.” He looked at me. “Well?”

I wanted to say no. I didn’t have the slightest clue how I was going to get Rachel away from Richard. I didn’t even know how to stop her from trying to kill me on sight. Shireen (or Shireen’s spirit, or whatever that creature who’d spoken to me in Elsewhere had been) had asked me to redeem Rachel, and I had no idea how to do that either.

Except . . . Shireen had also told me that if I didn’t succeed, then I was going to die. And given where she’d got that prediction from, I had a nasty feeling that it wasn’t the kind I could dodge. Which meant that I really didn’t have a choice: I was going to have to help Rachel anyway.

If I was going to do an impossible task, I’d need all the help I could get. I’ve fought both with and against Cinder, and I much prefer the former. “Fine,” I said. “I’ll try. But if you want me to get anywhere, I’m going to need your help.”

Cinder nodded, turned, and started walking. And as simple as that, I had an ally. I wonder how long it’ll last.

| | | | | | | | |

Anne and Kyle had been talking quietly; they fell silent as we appeared through the trees. Cinder drew Kyle to his side with a jerk of his head, then opened up a gate between the trees and stepped through into darkness. Kyle followed. The gate closed behind them and we were left alone.

“What did he want?” Anne asked.

“The same thing that Shireen did. I’ll tell you about it on the way.” I looked at Anne. “You ready?”

Anne gave me a nod. I took out a gate stone and began the process of opening a gate to take us back to London. I’d faced my enemies. Now I had to face my friends.

| | | | | | | | |

We made the journey back to London in silence.

Now that we were away from Cinder and Kyle, my thoughts kept going back to Richard. I suppose, to an outsider, it might seem a little bizarre that I was worrying about Richard and not the people who’d actually attacked us. Vihaela had gone for Anne, and Rachel had come far too close to assassinating me, while all Richard had done was give us some orders. But Richard frightened me in a way that Rachel and Vihaela couldn’t. That mansion is a place of horror to me, and being connected to it, even at one remove, felt like all of my old nightmares come to life. Maybe Richard hadn’t seemed to ask much, but then, it had been the same way all those years ago. One of the lessons my apprenticeship taught me is that it’s the things with no price tag that end up costing you the most.

Anne stayed at my side but didn’t speak. Anne can be very quiet sometimes and she was quiet now, her eyes downcast and shadowed. I knew it wasn’t the first time that she’d been forced to work for a master that she’d rather avoid, but from her expression it was hard to know what she thought of it. Maybe she saw it as just more of the same. I hoped not. I hated that Anne was involved in this almost as much as I hated that I was, and I wasn’t sure she was ready for what was coming.

A gate stone took us to a park in Camden. Variam had told us to meet him near Great Portland Street, and so we walked south across the wide expanse of Regent’s Park, skirting the edges of London Zoo where birds roosted in the aviary. Even in the winter cold the park was crowded, tourists and locals strolling along the paths and sitting on the benches. The place that Variam had directed us to was on the other side of Marylebone Road, next to the big hotel, and we walked around to the front of the building.

And there was Variam, pacing up and down the pavement, a small wiry brown-skinned figure wearing street clothes and a turban. He made a beeline for us as soon as he saw us. “You okay?” he asked Anne.

“For now,” Anne said quietly.

Variam looked at me. “We’re fine,” I said.

Variam nodded and then to my surprise gave me a quick hug and clapped me on the back. “Glad you made it.”

“Uh, sure,” I said. Displays of affection make me uncomfortable, though I’m pretty sure that’s less to do with my personal issues and more to do with me just being English. From the corner of my eye, I could see that Anne was hiding a smile. “You’re all right?”

“Come on, let’s get out of the street.” Vari started towards the hotel. “Too many prying eyes.”

| | | | | | | | |

The inside of the building was white and antiseptic, with the vaguely soulless look that all hotels seem to have. We took the lift up to the sixth floor. “So what happened?” I asked Variam once the doors had closed.

“When?”

“Back on Boxing Day.”

Variam looked startled. “That long ago?”

“We’ve spent the last month being hunted,” I told him. “It was kind of hard to get news bulletins.”

“Yeah, that might not have changed as much as you think,” Variam said. “I wasn’t kidding about being watched. That escape of yours from Canary Wharf got a lot of attention, and it turns out Keepers don’t like it when you make them look stupid. You were right up there on the most-wanted list.”

“I’m hoping not anymore.”

“The notices went out, but right now you’re kind of the mage equivalent of O. J. Simpson. Might want to keep your head down.”

I grimaced. Meeting Morden in front of the War Rooms tomorrow was really not going to help with keeping a low profile.

The lift stopped with a ding and we walked out into a carpeted hallway. Variam led us to the left. “What about you?” Anne asked.

“Oh, I was fine.”

“Didn’t sound like you were that fine,” I said. The last I’d heard, Variam had been in custody.

Variam shrugged. “Got knocked about a bit. Could have been worse. At least Anne got away.”

“Thanks to you,” Anne said.

“Eh. Landis sorted it out.”

Variam came to a halt in front of one of the rooms that looked exactly the same as all the others. “By the way,” I said. “What’s with the hotel?”

“What do you mean?”

“I thought you were living with Landis.”

“Course.”

“Then why . . . ?”

“It’s not for me,” Variam said. “It’s for Luna.”

I looked at Variam, puzzled. “Wait,” Anne said. “You said she got out safely.”

Until a day and a half ago, Anne and I had been on the run from the agents of a member of the Senior Council, a mage called Levistus. We’d stayed far enough ahead to force a stalemate, which had been broken when Levistus’s principal agent, a slimy little bastard called Barrayar, rigged Luna’s flat with explosives while she slept. I’d shown up ready for a last stand, but before Barrayar could finish me off, Morden had stepped in. He’d appointed Anne and me as his liaisons, giving us a place with the Council and putting our death sentence on hold. I hadn’t had the chance to see or speak to Luna since then. If something had happened to her . . .

“She did,” Variam said. “But she wasn’t exactly going to stay in that flat afterwards, was she?”

“So can we see her?”

“Yeah,” Variam said. “About that.”

“What?”

“There might be issues.”

“What kind of issues?”

Variam hesitated, then seemed to give up and knocked on the door. “Hey,” he called. “Luna?”

Silence.

“Luna! You there?”

I gave Anne a questioning look. Anne nodded, and from her manner I knew that Luna was inside and unhurt. But she wasn’t opening the door either.

Variam took out a keycard and inserted it into the door’s slot. A light flashed green, and he turned the handle, but the door opened only an inch before coming to a halt with a clunk. “Oh, for—” Variam muttered, then raised his voice. “Take the chain off!”

Silence.

Where is she? I mouthed at Anne.

Other side, Anne mouthed back.

“I’m not in the mood for this shit, all right?” Variam called through the door.

“Go away!” Luna shouted back.

I raised my eyebrows. It was Luna’s voice all right, but I’d been hoping for a slightly happier reception.

“Anne and Alex are back, you dumb-arse!” Variam called.

“I know!”

“Then open the bloody door!”

Silence.

“Screw this,” Variam said. Fire mages tend to have short tempers, and Vari is not an exception. “How about I just burn a hole and we’ll see if—”

“Vari?” I touched Variam lightly on the shoulder. “Maybe let me try?”

Variam glowered but moved aside. I stepped up to the door. “Luna?” I said. The door had opened just a crack before the latch had caught it, and through the gap I could see a sliver of wall.

There was no answer, but I could feel Luna listening. “Are you okay?” I said. I kept my voice gentle.

A pause. “Yes,” Luna said in a small voice.

“You got out of your flat? You weren’t chased?”

“No.”

“Good.” I paused. “Can we come in?”

Silence.

“You know, it’s not that comfortable out here,” I said.

“I don’t want to talk to anyone,” Luna said. She sounded miserable.

“Okay . . .” I said. “Is there a reason?”

“No, it’s just—” Luna’s voice broke. “Just go away. Please.”

I looked back at Anne and Variam. Variam lifted his hands with a shrug.

All of a sudden, I wasn’t sure what to do. Maybe I’d been naive, but I’d been expecting Luna to be happy to see me. Okay, the way in which I’d made my return hadn’t been the best, but I’m used to Luna wanting me around. Having her tell me to go away hurt in an unexpected way.

And the fact that she was doing it at all was confusing as hell. Luna is tough, and I’ve seen her jump into full-on battles without hesitating. I really wasn’t used to her acting like this. “All right,” I said. “If you change your mind, call us, okay?”

No answer. I walked back to the others. “Told you,” Variam said.

“You have any clue what’s going on?” I asked Variam.

“I might have an idea,” Anne said quietly. “Give me some time alone with her?”

“You think she’ll talk to you?”

“Most people do.”

I thought briefly. I still wasn’t sure what was going on, but if anyone could get Luna to talk, Anne could. “All right,” I said. “We won’t go far.”

| | | | | | | | |

With all the chaos of the last few days, I hadn’t had much chance to eat. There was a Pizza Express a few minutes’ walk from the hotel, and Vari and I took shelter inside from the cold winter air.

“So,” I said once we’d ordered. “What have we missed?”

“A lot,” Variam said gloomily. “After you and Anne were chased away, the Keepers tore your flats apart trying to figure out where you’d gone, and then they posted sentries waiting for you to come back. Took them weeks to figure out you weren’t, and by then all this shit with the Dark mages had started up again. Basically, the White Rose thing—you remember that?”

“I was right in the middle of that, Vari.”

“Yeah, well, turns out that big raid didn’t get all of them. There was a guy who used to be third-in-command or something who got away, and after Marannis died he laid low for a bit, then tried to start the whole thing up again. People find out about it, everyone wants to go in and take him out, but the Council tell us to wait. So we’re waiting, and everyone’s getting pissed off, but the Council keep telling us we’re not authorised. Then Morden takes a bunch of Dark mages, goes in and cleans it all up. Frees the kids, seizes the base, everything. So the Council try to prosecute him for it, and we’re like, what, we’re going to bring a charge against the guy for breaking a slavery ring? And the prosecution falls apart and now everyone’s listening to Morden even more than before.”

“Mm,” I said. If what Variam was saying was accurate, it was a mix of good news and bad. White Rose had been a particularly nasty organisation and I was glad to hear it wasn’t going to be reborn from the ashes any time soon, and from the sound of it Levistus might have taken a hit too, which made it that much less likely that he’d be in a position to come after me. On the other hand, it sounded as though what Levistus had lost, Morden had gained. Apparently Morden had been busy.

It also occurred to me that Variam would never have been able to summarise political developments this well when I’d first known him. Maybe fire magic wasn’t the only thing that Landis had been teaching.

“And just so you know,” Variam added, “you and Anne got appointed right after that, when Morden was still in the news. So now everyone’s convinced you were the ones who helped him set it up.”

That brought me back to earth with a bump. “Are you serious?”

Variam nodded.

“We were getting chased around half the countries in the world! How the hell would we be helping Morden? We literally didn’t have time!”

“Yeah, well, far as everyone knows, you just disappeared,” Variam said. “So now they’re bringing up all the rumours about you from before, and saying how they always knew you were bad news, and how you must have been working for Morden and Richard all along and this is him paying you off.”

“Jesus,” I muttered. This was just going from bad to worse. “They giving you any trouble for being connected to me?”

Variam gave me a look. “Think you should be worrying about yourself.”

“Wouldn’t do much good,” I said. It came out more bleakly than I intended. The Council hated me, Richard’s faction was using me, and I couldn’t see a way to get away from either of them.

A shift in the futures made me look up to see Anne threading her way between the tables towards us. “So?” Variam demanded as Anne reached us.

“Luna’s . . . not doing so well,” Anne said, sitting down.

“Is this shell shock from what happened at her flat?” I asked.

“Not directly,” Anne said. She looked at Variam. “Have you two talked since Christmas?”

Variam shrugged. “Not much.”

“Why not?”

“I dunno.”

“Vari . . .”

“What?” Variam said. “Look, ever since her journeyman test, she’s been moody. I tried calling but she was just really weird. After a while I figured I might as well leave her alone.”

Anne gave Variam an exasperated look. “What did you mean, not directly?” I asked.

“It’s nothing to do with that attack of Barrayar’s,” Anne said. “Luna’s just had problems.”

“With what?”

“She didn’t go into detail,” Anne said. “I think it’s to do with her graduation and what happened afterwards. Most especially, it’s to do with you.” Anne looked at me. “I think you’re the one she really needs to talk to.”

I thought about it for a second and decided it sounded more believable than my earlier theory. Luna’s very good at handling physical dangers—she thinks that they won’t touch her, and she’s usually right—but she’s not so good with emotional ones. All the times that I’d seen her really off balance, it had been because of something along those lines. “What if I went there now?”

Anne hesitated. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why?”

“I promised her I’d give her space.” Anne thought for a second. “I think she’ll come around in a day or two. I’ll come back and try again.”

“Okay,” I said slowly. As I looked at her, I was struck by how sure of herself Anne looked. Dealing with these sorts of problems seemed to be natural to her, and I wondered just how many of Anne’s skills had been ones she’d learnt because she was forced to, not because she wanted to. Anne’s a skilled healer and combat mage, but maybe given a choice, she would have ended up spending her life dealing with things like this . . .

But Variam had other things on his mind. “Okay, fine, she’s got issues,” he said. “You two have got bigger problems. What are you going to do?”

“There isn’t much we can do,” I said.

“So what, you’re going to do what Morden says?”

There was a challenging note to Variam’s question. It pissed me off a little. “We don’t exactly have much choice.”

“I thought the idea was to work against Richard,” Variam said. “Not for him.”

“I’m not on Richard’s side,” I snapped. “But we can’t turn on him unless we’re damn sure we can make it stick.”

“And until then?” Variam said. “You’re going to work for a Dark mage?”

“We worked for Jagadev,” Anne said.

“That was different.”

“How?”

“He wasn’t the Dark representative on the bloody British Council, was he? Anyway, we didn’t have a choice.”

“Neither do we,” Anne said quietly.

I was silent. Jagadev (or Lord Jagadev, as he likes to be known) is a rakshasa, and one of the more influential magical creatures currently operating in the British Isles. After Anne and Variam broke away from the Dark mage who’d been holding them prisoner, they’d been alone, with no allies and few relatives, and Jagadev had taken them in. Although I’d never been able to prove it, I had circumstantial evidence that Jagadev was the reason that they had so few relatives. I hadn’t told Anne or Vari that particular detail, mostly because I was sure that if I did, Variam would immediately try to hunt Jagadev down and kill him, which would in all probability end in Vari’s death. When you’re a diviner, you have to face up to the fact that if you give out information, you’re responsible for the consequences.

But all that had been a long time ago, and no matter how I tried to justify it, I couldn’t help feeling uncomfortable about the fact that I still hadn’t told Anne and Vari what I knew. The awkward truth was that I’d been putting off dealing with it. I didn’t know what would happen when I opened that particular can of worms, and it was always easier to kick the can down the road.

While I’d been lost in my thoughts, Anne and Variam had been arguing. “Turning Morden down isn’t an option,” I said, interrupting Variam. “First, he’s made it clear that if we do, he’ll kill all our friends and family. Second, that appointment of Morden’s is the only thing keeping Levistus’s death sentence off our necks. So even if we took him on and somehow won—which we wouldn’t—then it’d just put us right back on the Council’s hit list.”

“Then what are you going to do?” Variam said.

Neither Anne nor I had an answer, and as the seconds ticked away, I felt the pressure of just how hopeless our situation was. The pizzas arrived, but Variam’s last question had killed the conversation and we ate in silence. Once we were done, we paid the bill and left. Vari headed back to Landis’s house in Edinburgh, and Anne and I headed back to Wales.

| | | | | | | | |

Both Anne and I had lost our old homes. Mine had been gutted by fire just before Christmas, while Anne’s had been repossessed when the Keepers had shown up to arrest her. For now I was staying in my safe house in Wales, and with nowhere else to go, Anne had stuck with me. My bank accounts were getting low—weeks on the run will do that to you—but I knew I could build them up again with a little time. Anne, on the other hand, was almost flat broke. Life mages have their own ways of making money, but they can’t do it as easily as diviners, particularly if they have scruples. For now, the house in Wales was the best we had, and if the Keepers knew we’d returned, they weren’t raiding it. At least, not yet.

Later that evening, I shut the front door behind me and walked out into the darkness. My little house in Wales is at the end of a deserted valley, and it’s far enough away from any towns that it’s the next thing to pitch-black. Only the tiniest trace of light filtered down from the overcast sky, leaving the valley a mass of shadows. The nearby river rushed and splashed, steady and reassuring, its babble drowning out the sound of my footsteps and those of the local wildlife. Anne was back inside making dinner, but I was alone in the cold and the dark.

I walked absently, hands in my pockets, picking my way along the path in the darkness. Variam’s question kept going through my head. What could we do? I took a breath and let it out, trying to let the silence of the empty landscape calm my thoughts. I needed to figure out an answer.

There are four basic responses to a threat. Fight, flee, deceive, submit. Fleeing was out. Anne and I had tried that, and Levistus and Barrayar had dragged us back. Morden had made it clear that he’d do the same thing. Anne and I could escape eventually—maybe Luna as well—but the price would be the lives of everyone we cared about. I wasn’t willing to make that trade.

Submitting was out as well. I’d decided a long time ago that I wasn’t going to become like Richard. Surrendering to him, letting him decide who I was and what I was going to be, would just be an uglier and slower form of dying. I still wouldn’t be me, at least not any of the parts of me that I really cared about. I could tell that Anne was still holding out the hope that working for Richard and Morden wouldn’t be so bad, but I didn’t believe it. Whatever they wanted us to do, I knew it was eventually going to lead to something horrible. The only question was when.

Fighting was, if not hopeless, then pretty close. Both Richard and Morden had enough power to crush me in any straight-up contest without breaking a sweat. But that assumed it was a straight-up contest. Like a lot of kids, I grew up with stories of heroes in shining armour who ride up to the bad guy and challenge him to a duel. I’m nothing like the heroes in the stories—I’d rather hide than go into battle, and most of my time in fights has been spent running away. But when it comes to combat, stealth and surprise are the great equalisers. Richard might be powerful, but Anne had already confirmed that he was still human. A knife through the ribs would see him dead enough. The trouble would be getting it there.

The final choice—deceive—seemed at first glance to be the best. Pretend to follow Morden’s and Richard’s orders, then bring them down from within. It was an obvious plan . . . and that was the problem. If it was obvious to me, then it had to be obvious to them as well. Morden and Richard knew we had absolutely no reason to be loyal. They had to have anticipated that we’d betray them, and while I didn’t know what they’d done to prepare for that, I knew that there’d be something.

So while flight and submission were out, fighting and deception were almost as bad, and I still didn’t have a plan. I remembered that last conversation I’d had with Arachne, back in December. Maybe I needed to look further afield.

I sighed. My feet had taken me far down the path, away from Anne, and I turned back towards the house, its windows the only light in the darkness. Tomorrow we would face Morden.