Forged

chapter 11

You can tell a lot about a mage by where they live. Some live in little terraced houses in the suburbs. Some live in mansions out in the country. Others live in places that are so well hidden you’ll never see them at all. Levistus’s house and base of operations was a house on a street in London called Kensington Palace Gardens.

Calling Kensington Palace Gardens rich is like saying that Heathrow Airport is big. It’s true, but doesn’t explain the scale. Let’s say you live in the U.S. or the U.K. or some other Western country, and let’s say you work full-time earning an average sort of salary. If you managed to save fifty percent of that pretax salary, then the amount of time it would take you to save enough money to buy a house on Kensington Palace Gardens is longer than the amount of time between today and the birth of Christ. If you decided to get the money by playing the lottery, you’d have to win the U.K. national jackpot five times running to get even halfway there. The people who live on that street are the sort who buy Ferraris without noticing the difference in their bank balance.

So I have to admit, I got a particular satisfaction out of watching Anne blow Levistus’s front door into a thousand pieces.

Wooden splinters went skittering across the floor. The doors had been warded against scrying, three or four different types of sensory magic, and against any attempt to pick or bypass the lock. They hadn’t been warded against overwhelming force. Anne and I came through side by side and scanned the front hall, seeing a room floored in white marble, with black veined pillars flanking open doorways, all decorated in an elegant, minimalistic style. A curving staircase disappeared upwards. Running footsteps sounded from several directions, and Anne and I halted.

Men appeared from both sides. They were wearing polished shoes and well-tailored suits, but they were clearly security guards. More interesting to me was the way the lines of their futures moved: they were human, but unnaturally rigid and constrained. I suppose it shouldn’t have surprised me that Levistus had mind-controlled guards, but I hadn’t expected quite so many. All six of the guards were holding handguns, which they levelled. “Freeze!” one shouted.

Anne stared at the men, eyebrows raised. “Seriously?”

“Stay where you are,” one of the men called. “Hands up and get down on your knees.”

Anne looked at me. “These guys aren’t even worth my time.”

I shrugged.

“Second warning,” the man announced. “Hands up, now!”

Anne sighed. She raised a hand and clicked her fingers.

Black death streamed in out of the night, flowing around us and into the mansion. There was the flash and bang of gunfire. It wasn’t aimed at us. Claws flickered; screams rang out in stereo; blood painted the walls. A bullet hit the chandelier, sending a tinkle of broken glass falling to the marble.

As quickly as it had started, it was over. Six corpses lay on the floor. Spindly figures stood over them, man-sized but thin and inhuman, moving in fits and jerks. These were jann, lesser jinn that Anne could summon. Or that the jinn could. I’d fought against the things, but it was a new experience to have them on my side.

“This is what he sends to stop us?” Anne said. “I’m honestly kind of insulted.”

“These were just the sentries,” I told her. Glass crunched under my feet as I advanced. A jann looked up from where it was crouched over a body, hissed, then flitted away. I heard a scream from deeper in the mansion: the jann had fanned out ahead. I felt a flicker of conscience and ignored it. Gunfire sounded from the first floor, and I sensed the signature of spells; I headed for the stairs.

The stairs led into a big drawing room which had been converted into an office. Desks near the bay windows provided work spaces for the men and women who worked here. Or had worked here. Two bodies were shapeless heaps on the carpet: near to them, one jann was dissolving and another was kicking weakly as it died.

A woman was standing behind one of the desks, her face pale and spotted with blood, holding up a focus item like a holy symbol. It was a force magic focus, and it was generating a transparent cylindrical barrier a few feet in radius. Three jann tore at the barrier with their claws. Pressed up behind the woman, a young man was shouting into a communication focus. “—need help now! This is an emergency! We need Keepers here now!”

A female voice spoke from the communicator, calm and unemotional. “No Keepers are available to respond at this time. We recommend you withdraw from your present location and await instructions.”

“There isn’t any time! We need—!” The man heard a gasp from the woman behind him and whirled. He saw me with Anne at my back and brought up something in his other hand.

Anne reacted instantly. Green-black death tore through the barrier as though it were tissue paper, stripped the life and flesh from the bodies of the man and woman, and smashed their remains through the bay window and sent them falling into darkness towards the lawn below.

I wanted to tell Anne that killing them hadn’t been necessary, but stopped. She wouldn’t care and we didn’t have time. “Lifesight readings?” I asked instead.

“Few more on the second and third floors,” Anne said, looking upwards at the ceiling and frowning. “No sign of Levistus or Barrayar.”

“Hmm.” I strode over to the nearest desk and glanced quickly through the papers, searching in both the present and future. “This isn’t well guarded enough.” A thought struck me. “What can you see down below?”

“You mean the basement? I don’t think there’s . . .” Anne’s eyes widened. “Oh. It’s shrouded. How’d you know?”

“It’s how the Council builds. Let’s go back down. And please stop your jann from going up through the house killing Levistus’s maids and cooks.”

Anne shrugged.

—

It took us a couple of minutes to find the hidden entrance down to the basement, and another minute to disarm the traps and descend the stairs. Long enough for the defenders to get organised.

The wood-panelled staircase went down a long way before opening up into a wide chamber. It was an entrance hall, but while the one on the ground floor had been sized for a house, this one was sized for a palace. A white-and-black stone floor stretched out to the size of a tennis court, engraved with geometric patterns, and wrought iron staircases wound up to a gallery running around the walls at half the height of the ceiling. Doors at the far end led into what must be the heart of Levistus’s operations.

The hallway was crowded with people, and all of them were waiting for us. More security guards were stationed up on the gallery and down on the ground floor, crouched behind bulletproof barriers. Unlike the men above, they were carrying submachine guns. Behind and between the barriers were icecats, graceful and low to the ground, panther-like constructs with wisps of cold rising from their claws.

The next group were the adepts and staff members, and it was clear they weren’t here by choice. They were wearing outfits more suited to an office than to a battle, and wielding a highly uneven collection of weapons. They were shooting uneasy glances around them, and seemed unsure whether to huddle together for protection or to scatter.

And finally there were the mages. There were three, standing at the very back of the formation, evenly spaced across the hall. One was a man I’d never seen before, tall and slim with a refined cast to his features: he watched us both with an expression of boredom. The second was Barrayar. He was wearing his expensive business suit and looked as if he’d just been interrupted from work and was very irritated about it.

But it was the third mage who caught my attention. She was round-faced and heavyset, her arms and legs thick with fat and muscle. Unlike the first two, her face was blank as she watched me. To my magesight, the pale brown of earth magic glowed around her.

I hadn’t expected Caldera. I’d expected her to have gone with Talisid’s hit team; how she’d ended up here instead I didn’t know. The last two times I fought Caldera, I’d been able to disengage and avoid her. There’d be no avoiding her this time.

“Okay,” I said to Anne. “This is what I’d call well guarded.”

Anne and I had come to a stop only a couple of feet from the doorway. A half cylinder of force magic barred us from going any farther, running from floor to ceiling. It didn’t block sound—I could hear the breathing and the shuffle of feet of the crowd facing us—but it would take significant power for any intruders to break through. Assuming they had the chance. There was an antipersonnel mine buried in the floor right beneath our feet, and I knew from glancing at the futures that Barrayar was holding the detonator in one hand.

But Barrayar obviously didn’t know everything that I could do, or he would have pressed the button already. As soon as I’d detected the explosive, I’d started to work on it with the fateweaver, picking out the futures in which it failed. Behind us, the jann started to sidle into the room, staring at the security guards with hungry eyes.

“Verus,” Barrayar said coldly. “You’ve gone too far this time.”

“Hello, Barrayar,” I said. “So, that exchange that was supposed to happen today? I didn’t like the delegation you sent very much. Thought about sending a strongly worded letter, but figured I might as well tell you in person.”

“You know, Talisid had one job,” Barrayar said. “I should have known he’d fuck it up. Did he tip you off, or was he just that incompetent?”

“Do you care?”

“I suppose I don’t.”

“Hey,” Anne interrupted. “You two going to kiss, or shall we kick this off?”

Beneath our feet, the mine’s electronics failed. It was easier than the ones in Sal Sarque’s fortress had been: Levistus hadn’t kept this one well maintained. Probably he’d never seriously expected to need it. “You know, I really thought your boss would be here,” I told Barrayar. “What’s he doing, watching on camera?”

“Whatever you’re hoping to achieve, it won’t work,” Barrayar said. “I’ll give you and Miss Walker one chance. Turn around and leave.”

“Hey, Barrayar,” Anne called. “Just curious. Was it you who signed off on that order for Lightbringer and Zilean to torture me?”

Barrayar looked back at Anne with raised eyebrows. “Is that why you’re here?”

“No, I’m going to kill you anyway. It’ll just make it a bit more satisfying.”

Without changing expression, Barrayar pushed the button on the detonator. The faint click was loud in the silence. There was a moment’s expectant pause.

I spoke into the vacuum. “Now you can kick off.”

Black energy stabbed from Anne, meeting the force barrier with a crack of black lightning. The barrier flickered and died. The jann charged, flowing past and around Anne in a black wave as Levistus’s forces opened fire.

Light and sound hammered the entrance hall, a dozen battles and duels breaking out across the room. Fleeting images caught in my memory, fractions of a greater whole. An icecat and a jann hit each other in midair and tumbled to the floor in a whirl of claws and teeth. Fire stabbed down from the gallery on the left, grim men almost invisible behind their weapons, jann falling as they tried to close the distance. Cutting blades of air and force flew the length of the room to shatter against Anne’s shield. More jann poured down the stairs, throwing themselves into the meat grinder, drones dying for their queen.

I had only a second to take in the larger battle before I had to focus on myself. Two icecats charged me as fire tracked in, and I snatched futures from the rushing tide. One icecat was struck mid-leap by a jann; bullets whistled by on my left and right. The second icecat leapt for me, missed, and was pounced on before it could turn.

There were so many enemies that they were blocking each other. I broke into a swerving run, aiming for a doorway on the right side of the hall, firing a burst from my MP7 as I did. A burning red line streaked past my head, carrying the smell of ozone. More security men and one of the icecat handlers tried to bar my way; I wove through the attacks, death waiting in the futures and in the present, snapping off short bursts, only vaguely aware of the men falling away as their futures wisped out. It was a surprise, somehow, to reach the door and realise there were only bodies left to guard it.

A storm of air and force magic drove me to cover. I crouched inside the doorway, my back against the wall as bolts of electricity crackled off the stone. My MP7 was empty and I reloaded, taking a second as I did to scan. The icecats were all crippled or destroyed, along with a good number of the jann. Many of the security men were dead, but on the left side of the hall a tight group had held their ground and were killing any jann that tried to approach.

Anne was duelling the mages. Shadowy black wings seemed to stretch out from her shoulders; things that might have been limbs overlaid her arms. Her eyes were alight, and she fought with a fierce joy. Barrayar and the third mage were engaging her with force and air, but the translucent black threads of the jinn’s magic formed a shield that deflected all their attacks. It was the first time I’d had the chance to watch the new Anne going all out, and it was frightening to watch. She had all of her old speed and lethality, with the jinn’s power behind it. The jinn’s magic didn’t seem to follow the rules of most combat spells. What it reminded me of most was death magic, pure destruction and nothing else.

Pounding footsteps sounded from around the corner, and I stepped back as Caldera appeared in the doorway. She aimed a punch at me that would have broken my neck, and I backed into the room. Caldera stalked after me, heavy footfalls ringing on the stone.

The room I was in was a swimming pool. God knows why Levistus had one. The water, tinted blue-green from the pool tiles, stretched out down one side of the room, sculptures and houseplants standing around the other. I backed away into the side of the room where there was space to move, Caldera following.

A young man appeared in the doorway behind Caldera; one of the adepts. He was carrying a wand with a glow of red energy hovering at its tip; he levelled it at me but I’d already moved to place Caldera between us. “Keeper!” he called over the screams and gunfire behind. “Move!”

Caldera didn’t take her eyes off me. “Back off.”

“Give me a clear shot!”

I raised my MP7 and fired. Caldera moved instantly, trying to block the shots; the adept in the door activated a shield ring. I’d seen both events and compensated accordingly. The first and second shots of the three-round burst deflected off Caldera’s hand and the adept’s shield; the third blew his brains out.

Caldera whirled, saw the body, then turned on me with her face twisted in rage. She charged and I dropped left, leaving my leg extended. Caldera tripped, sliding on the polished tiles to crash into a display of plants. I turned and waited for her to rise.

Caldera came up, earth and leaves in her hair, breathing heavily. “You murderous piece of shit.”

“Pot and kettle, Caldera.”

Caldera thrust out her hand at the entrance hall behind, where shouts and gunfire mixed with the flash of battle-magic. “You did this! You set it all up!”

“How many times have you come after me?” I said harshly. “Did you expect me to just sit there and take it?”

Caldera lunged. Her arms and limbs were wreathed in earth magic, giving her the toughness of stone and the strength of a bear. I stepped away from her punches, blows like hammers whistling past my head. “I’m here for Levistus,” I told her. “Not you.”

“I. Don’t. Give. A. Shit.” Caldera sent a punch with each word.

I stepped back from the blows, putting my back to the swimming pool. “I’m not here for you,” I repeated. “But I’ll kill you if I have to. First warning.”

“Fuck your warnings!”

Caldera tried to slam me into the pool. I ducked, caught her shoulder, twisted in a hip throw. Caldera went over my thigh and into the water with a boom of displaced water, sending a wave splashing up over the sides.

I was already moving, crouching by the adept’s body. As Caldera broke the surface, floundering and gasping, I scanned the adept’s items. The shield ring I discarded at a glance. The wand was more interesting. It was a combat focus that produced some kind of directed energy attack; I didn’t recognise the effect but it looked powerful. I clipped it to my belt and strode back into the main hall.

The tempo of the fight had changed while I was gone. All of Anne’s jann were dead, but they’d done heavy damage: all the icecats were gone, the adepts were down to a couple of survivors, and the only remaining security men were in a cluster up on the gallery on the far side. Barrayar and the other mage had closed ranks; their shields were overlapping and they were engaged in a furious long-range duel with Anne.

But the biggest change was that Levistus had sent in reinforcements. There were two giant four-armed gold-and-silver constructs at the far end of the hall, radiating magic and power in equal measure. Mantis golems. One had its feet planted and was spitting golden death at Anne from an energy projector. The second had been advancing towards my door with a heavy tread; as it saw me its energy projector came up and it fired.

No time to think. I acted on instinct, darting forward to the nearest staircase, then up the stairs to the gallery. The golem’s energy projector tore fragments from the wall, melted the iron steps just behind my feet. I reached the gallery and sprinted clockwise. The security guards on the opposite side added their fire to the golem’s, shots glancing off pillars and striking sparks from the railing. I caught a glimpse of Anne below; Barrayar and the other mage and the golem were battering her shield with attack spells. The roar of gunfire and battle-magic hammered at me from all around.

As I reached the corner of the room I went into a roll, coming up in a kneeling stance with my gun levelled, aiming down the gallery. The knot of security guards had been waiting, but a pillar had blocked their view of me for just long enough and their aim was high. I fired down the length of the gallery, sending three-round bursts as fast as I could pull the trigger. Caught out of cover, the guards were slaughtered. Bullets drilled through flesh until the MP7 clicked empty.

Only one guard was left, half-shielded by a dying man in front of him. His gun sighted on me as I pushed hard at the future I needed; the guard pulled left as he fired and the bullets plucked my sleeve. I closed the distance in five running strides, ducked his panicked blow, hit him in the throat and face. On the floor below, the mantis golem aimed its energy projector: I shoved the guard back against the railing and the energy blast caught him in the back, exploding his body and spattering me with blood.

Down on the lower level, Anne and the two enemy mages were still engaged. Anne was more powerful, but the overlapping air and force shield from the other two mages was deflecting her attacks, and I could see frustration on her face as her death spells were turned away. I scanned the battlefield below, analysed it in a split-second, then grabbed one of the dropped SMGs, clicked it to full-auto, and threw it with an overhand swing.

The gun went flying over the heads of Barrayar and the other mage, and as it did I sorted through the futures, pushing away hundreds, choosing one. The weapon hit the floor and went off, chattering flame. Bullets tore into the shield’s weaker side, some breaking through. The other mage staggered, his shield flickering.

Anne struck instantly. Green-and-black death flashed down the hallway, and the other mage died.

My precognition shouted a warning. I looked across to see Caldera in the doorway to the swimming pool, dripping wet and furious. Ignoring Anne, she raised a hand towards me. The gallery cracked and broke under my feet, the metal railing twisting as the stone came rumbling down.

I jumped clear of the avalanche, hitting the floor and rolling as the gallery fell in a cloud of dust and a roar. The mantis golem was lining up another shot, and I sprinted through another doorway and out of sight.

I’d come through into a canteen. White tables dotted the room, with orange-upholstered benches along the walls. Trays and half-eaten food were still laid out. A cloud of dust hung in the air around the doorway, obscuring sight.

I could still hear shouts from the entrance hall, combined with flashes of magic and the sounds of running feet. Caldera had broken off her pursuit—even she wasn’t going to run right past Anne in battle mode—but the mantis golem hadn’t. It would be on me in another ten seconds. I unclipped the wand from my belt and waited.

Heavy footfalls sent a tremble through the floor, and the mantis golem loomed out of the dust, striding forward before planting its feet and coming to a halt. I studied the construct, watching the solid line of its future shift in response to my actions. The golem was seven feet tall and looked like an enormous insect sculpted in silver and gold, with faceted eyes and triple-jointed legs. The upper two arms held a sword and some sort of stunning weapon; the lower two held the metal energy projector. Mantis golems are enormously strong, and invulnerable to all but the most powerful attack spells. But this wasn’t the first time I’d fought one, and I knew their weaknesses. They’re slow moving, they’re stupid, and those energy projectors they carry are deadly but unstable.

The mantis golem aimed its projector at my chest.

I’d been waiting with the wand aimed. I sent a surge of energy into the focus; its tip glowed red and a beam of scorching red light went down the energy projector’s barrel, piercing its inner workings just as it tried to fire.

The projector exploded in a burst of golden light, shards of white-hot metal flying in all directions. I’d closed my eyes against the flash; as I opened them I saw that the middle section of the golem was melted and shredded. Both lower hands had been destroyed; the armour on the abdomen had been burned away to reveal glowing silver veins with deep gouges from the shrapnel.

The golem ignored the horrific damage. It stood still for a moment, momentarily blocked in fulfilling its command, then the futures shifted and it began striding forward, its footsteps sending tremors through the floor, the sword and stun weapon lifted. I studied the golem as it closed in. I could make out the spell powering the golem, chains binding the spirit at the construct’s heart. It was enormously complex, energies working in weave and counterbalance. The sword whistled out and I stepped back, still calculating. There were holes in the construct’s armour, and a shot would hurt it, but if I wanted a kill . . .

There. A tiny node where several lines of energy met. I didn’t understand how it worked or why that spot was the one that mattered, but that’s how it is when you’re a diviner. I used the fateweaver, sifting through the lines of the construct’s future.

The construct attacked again and I dodged, my movements neat and precise. A table came between me and the construct and was crushed to splinters. The sword made a whistling noise as it passed my head; that blade was heavier than any normal sword and one hit would explode my skull like a water balloon. The future I needed drew closer and I set my foot back, getting into position. Duck the sword, step aside from the stun . . . and for an instant, the golem’s movements caused the rents in its armour to line up, exposing its core.

I fired the wand, and the scent of ozone filled the air. The golem didn’t react, reversing the sword for another strike. I ducked the backswing and fired again, the beam spearing the construct, burning into its heart.

The energy node snapped. Strands of magic lashed as the spell went wild, restraints breaking. The golem shuddered and came to a halt, the light going out of its eyes. Something huge and formless seemed to flow out of the construct’s legs and down into the earth: I had a fleeting sense of some ancient presence, cold and massive, then it was gone. The golem was a lifeless statue, arms extended and still.

Weakness rippled through me, the wand suddenly feeling like it weighed twenty pounds. There’s a reason I don’t like these kinds of combat focuses: those three shots had used up too much of my own energy. I clipped it to my belt and strode out of the canteen.

The entrance hall was empty. Bodies of humans and constructs littered the floor, and a haze of dust hung in the air, but there were no traces of the survivors or the other golem. Skirmish battles are fast: my fight with the golem had taken only a minute or two, but that had been more than enough time for the battle to move on. I could hear running footsteps in the distance, but there was no sign of Barrayar or Anne.

At the end of the hall was a pair of closed double doors that looked like they led somewhere important. I started walking, and as I did reached out through the dreamstone. November.

Oh! Oh good, you’re still—I mean, I’m glad you’re well.

What’s the status at the War Rooms?

They’re restricting official communications to synchronous focuses, November answered, but I’ve managed to gather some data. Apparently they’re quite agitated. Orders are still to stay on high alert in preparation for an anticipated attack on the War Rooms.

Levistus getting any reinforcements?

No. Actually, one call I intercepted gave the impression that he’s been calling personally. No one seems very keen to help.

I was nearly at the double doors: I looked to see what would happen if I opened them and walked through. Send the money and notices we discussed to that adept team now.

. . . Done. I have receipt of transfer.

Good.

The double doors were thick wood, heavy and unlocked. I pushed them open and stepped to one side.

A violet disc of force blurred past, cutting through the space I’d been occupying a second ago. “Hi, guys,” I called from around the wall.

The room beyond the doors was a gate room, designed for entry and exit. The floor was dull metal with a polished sheen. Columns of rough, unworked stone ran from floor to ceiling, illuminated with an eerie green light, and flanking the columns were plain metal walls spaced to allow for gating. At the back, a raised observation gallery ran from wall to wall; the gallery was fronted with one-way glass that made it impossible to see in. At the centre of the room, three mobile barricades had been set up, heavy steel shields reinforced with magic and standing five feet tall.

There were four people in the room: Caldera, and the three adept mercenaries I’d run into at Heron Tower. Caldera and Crash were behind the left and right barricades, while Stickleback and Jumper were behind the back one. I could sense defensive spells designed to deflect ranged attacks coming in from outside. On top of that, the wards that prevented gate and teleportation magic over the mansion were limited within this specific area, meaning that Jumper would be able to use his teleportation abilities just fine.

I stayed behind the wall and waited to see if the four people inside would make a move. They didn’t. I knew that Stickleback would attack the instant I poked my head out into the doorway, but until then, it seemed they were willing to wait.

“Not coming out?” I called.

“Why don’t you and your pet monster come in?” Caldera called back.

“Anne’s not here,” I told her. “Far as I can tell, she’s chasing Barrayar.”

“That’s nice.”

I smiled to myself. “Let me guess. Planning to camp out till reinforcements arrive?”

“You tell me.”

It wasn’t a bad plan. The wards made ranged attacks almost impossible. Anyone wanting to force entry would have to advance through the choke point under fire from Stickleback, then fight Crash and Caldera at close range. Anne would still kill them all, but she’d have to work for it.

“Crash,” I called. “As I understand it, you’re the spokesman for your group.”

There was a pause. “What if I am?” Crash said at last. It was the first time I’d heard him speak. For a tough guy, he had quite an educated voice.

I nodded. “I am hereby notifying you that your employment with Councillor Levistus has been terminated, effective immediately, as per section seven of your contract. Authorisation codes have been sent to your contact details as specified. Your outstanding fees have been paid to the account specified in appendix one, including a cancellation fee as per section twelve.”

There was a moment’s silence. “What?”

“Go ahead and check,” I said.

Another pause, then through the futures, I saw Crash pull out a phone. He tapped at the touchscreen, keeping a wary eye on the door.

“What are you doing?” Caldera demanded.

“Any problems?” I asked.

“Our contract’s not with you,” Crash said.

“Your contract’s with the Council, as represented by Levistus. I’m still a member of the Council and authorised to make negotiations in their stead. In any case, the contract doesn’t specify who has to deliver notice of termination. Only that they need the proper authorisation codes, which I’ve supplied.”

“You don’t seriously expect anyone to buy this,” Crash said.

“Put it this way,” I said. “You have two options. Option one is you and your team take the money and leave. The Council won’t be happy, but you can point to the fact that you fulfilled the letter of your contract, even if it wasn’t in the way they wanted. Option two is you and your team stay and fight against me and Anne, who have, in case you haven’t noticed, killed pretty much everyone else in the building. You will lose at least one member of your team and probably more. I don’t personally think you’re being paid enough to make that worth it, but it’s up to you. So. Which is it going to be?”

Silence. I could sense Crash, Stickleback, and Jumper looking at one another. Caldera stared between them. “What are you doing?” she said again, more sharply. “You’re not listening to this shit?”

Jumper said something to Crash, and Crash answered, both of them speaking rapid-fire Japanese. Stickleback interjected something, and a quick three-way exchange took place.

“Hey!” Caldera said. “Talk to me!”

Crash looked back at her. “We need to confer.” He made a signal. Jumper and Stickleback moved up, closing on his position in a few quick strides. Crash watched my position warily right up until Jumper put his hands on Crash’s and Stickleback’s shoulders, and the three of them teleported out.

And all of a sudden, Caldera and I were alone.

“Well,” I said. I took the sling of the MP7 off my shoulder and walked out into the open. “Looks like it’s just the two of us.”

Caldera glared at me. “If they come back—”

“You really think they’re going to?”

Caldera didn’t answer. There was a kind of baffled fury in her eyes. Once again, the ground had been cut out from underneath her, and she didn’t know how.

I nodded past Caldera to the glass observation gallery and the door set into the wall underneath. “Levistus is through there. I’d appreciate it if you could let me pass.”

“Well, you’re shit out of luck then, aren’t you?”

“I suggest a compromise,” I told her. “You withdraw and call for reinforcements. Once they show up, you can come after me again and we’ll carry on where we left off.”

“A compromise?”

I shrugged. “Nobody’s happy, but nobody’s dead.”

Caldera stared at me in disbelief. “Screw you.”

“Fine,” I said. “A contest, then. Just like our old sparring matches. I get one good hit through your defences, you withdraw. If you get one good hit on me, then I will.”

“A contest? You think that’s what this is?”

“I’m trying to—”

“No,” Caldera said. “Shut up. You do not get to talk. You and your psycho girlfriend just walked in here and killed everyone in this room. And before that, the two of you helped kill an entire base’s worth of Council people, including a member of the Senior Council. And before that, the two of you killed another base’s worth of security at San Vittore. And now you walk up and tell me you want me to withdraw so you can add another Senior Council member to your body count, and you actually have the fucking arrogance to think I’ll let you?”

I looked at Caldera in silence.

“I can’t believe I ever sponsored you to the Keepers,” Caldera said. “Slate and the rest gave me so much shit for that, but I stuck up for you. I put my neck on the line for you! And you pay me back with this?” Caldera snorted in a half laugh. “You are going to go down in history as the worst traitor the Light Council’s ever had! And when mages look up the records to find out how you ever made it into the Keepers, they’ll find my name as the reason why!”

“I think you should be less worried about the history books and more about the next five minutes.”

“Shut up!” Caldera shouted. “I’m sick of how you think this is a joke! Being a Keeper is supposed to matter! The law is supposed to matter! But all you give a shit about is yourself!”

“The law is whatever the Council says it is,” I said. “They signed a piece of paper, and I became a criminal. They signed another, and I wasn’t. Their whims write the laws; the Keepers enforce it. And at the end of the chain, some unlucky mage or adept gets sentenced to death because a Senior Councillor was able to get four votes instead of three by blackmailing the others with a bunch of sex tapes.”

“You sound like every other Dark mage,” Caldera said. “You think I don’t know about the Council’s dirty secrets? I was dealing with this shit back when you were fleecing teenagers for crystal balls. But at least I work for something bigger than myself. For you, all that matters is Alex Verus.”

“Working for something bigger than yourself? All the times we hauled off some adept to the cells, or played the heavy, you think that makes it okay?”

“Yeah, I’ve arrested a lot of adepts,” Caldera said. “Mages too. You know what I didn’t do?” Her arm shot out towards the corpse-filled hallway. “I didn’t go fucking judge-jury-executioner on everyone who got in my way!”

“No,” I said contemptuously. “You just threw them in a cell and washed your hands of what happened afterwards. Just following orders, right, Caldera? That way, nothing is ever your fault.”

“You know, I’m done talking with you,” Caldera said. She stepped back into a combat stance and beckoned. “Bring it.”

“I gave you one warning,” I said softly. “This is your second. That’s more than I’m in the habit of giving these days.”

Caldera spat.

I closed in. Caldera held her ground, watching me narrowly. I made a few attacks, probing. Caldera batted them away but didn’t try to counter. She was fighting defensively, not giving any openings.

I’d sparred against Caldera many times, back when we were both Keepers. Once we’d had a chance to get a feel for each other, the matches had usually ended in stalemate. Caldera wasn’t quick enough to catch me, and I wasn’t strong enough to hurt her. In the end I’d have to back off, or be worn down.

I slipped past Caldera’s guard to hit her with a palm strike to the head. The impact stung and jarred my arm; Caldera barely noticed. I withdrew slowly, leaving a clear opening, but again Caldera didn’t take it. She just watched, eyes hard and suspicious.

No good. I wasn’t going to lure her into a trap. Well, in that case . . .

I focused my magesight on the spells reinforcing Caldera’s body. The earth magic flowed through her limbs, sluggish and heavy. In one pocket I carried a slim metal dispel focus. It could break Caldera’s protective spells, leave her vulnerable. Trouble was, I’d used that trick before, and Caldera would be expecting it. She’d pull back instantly, giving ground while she rebuilt her spells, and she could do it fast.

Well, I’d give her what she expected, then.

I slid the dispel focus into my left hand, my dagger into my right. I kept them concealed, but Caldera shifted her stance in reaction. I began circling, feinting and sliding, looking for an opening. As I did I began to weave together a future, twining several strands to converge on a single target.

The future grew, strengthened, drew closer. I feinted again and struck.

The dispel focus discharged into Caldera’s side. A pulse of countermagic surged through her body and instantly she jumped back, weaving a new set of spells to replace her defences.

I pushed with the fateweaver, the future snapping into place. The spells I’d disrupted went wild, maintaining their pattern but discharging their energies in the wrong way. Surges of strength went through Caldera’s muscles, uneven and erratic; her stoneskin magic poured all its energy into hardening parts of her body while leaving others unprotected.

Caldera staggered, almost falling. Her new spells fizzled out; the malfunctioning spells were blocking them. To fix the whole mess she’d have to rebuild it from scratch. I wasn’t going to give her that long.

I attacked again and this time Caldera struck hard, trying to drive me away. I ducked the punch and sliced her arm, the blade cutting across an unprotected piece of flesh. Caldera flinched and pulled away. She gave ground, trying to gain herself the chance to rebuild her defences, and I pressed her harder.

My knife stabbed, opening up wounds in Caldera’s shoulder and thigh. Her movements had lost their smoothness: they were jerky, almost fearful. It was probably the first time Caldera had ever been cut with a blade; all of a sudden she was discovering that when you aren’t invulnerable, knives are scary. I drove her back against one of the rough stone walls, getting in close. Caldera swung a hook; I ducked and the punch smashed chips out of the rock face, and as it did my knife sank into her gut.

Caldera lost her breath in a gasp. I pulled back slightly, watching Caldera put a hand to her lower stomach. It came away red, and she looked up at me in shock.

“Last warning,” I said quietly. “Walk away.”

Emotions flashed across Caldera’s face; shame, fear, rage, others too fleeting to read. The futures jumped wildly. A dozen Calderas stood and fought, walked away, went berserk and attacked, broke down and screamed. Flicker-flicker-flicker . . .

The futures settled. Caldera stared at me in pure hatred. “Screw you.”

My face hardened and I moved in.

Though Caldera still had her magic, and though her wounds weren’t crippling, what followed was more like an execution than a battle. The stone wall heaved, trying to pull me in, and Caldera swung wildly, her punches still carrying enough force to kill. I evaded, stabbed, stabbed again. Red bloomed on Caldera’s shirt and jacket. Caldera tried to tangle my feet and I put my blade through her thigh. The only sound was the panting of breath, and the scuff and thump of footsteps on the tile. Light flashed on my knife, blood dripping to the floor.

Caldera broke away, bleeding from a dozen wounds. I watched her steadily as she pulled herself upright, trying to rally. I’d taken a couple of bruises, no more. Our eyes met and I saw a kind of dawning realisation, then her expression went blank.

I don’t know why Caldera went in for that last attack. I think at some level she had to know what was going to happen, the battle experience that had served her for so many years turning on her at the end. Maybe she just didn’t know how to do things any other way. Or maybe she was like so many battle-mages, and when it came right down to it, she could never really believe that someone as tough as her could ever lose to someone like me.

I met Caldera’s rush with my own. Her strike missed. Mine didn’t.

Caldera staggered, turning to me with an odd sort of surprise. Then, slowly, she crumpled to the floor.

I looked down at Caldera. She was still breathing. My knife was red with her blood, and I looked from her to the blade and back to her again. Seconds stretched out as I hesitated.

Then, from the direction of the entrance hall, I heard the sound of clapping.

I turned to see Anne, strolling towards me unhurriedly. “Nice,” she said with a smile. “Very nice.”

“What were you doing?” I snapped. I forced my muscles to stay still to stop my hands from shaking. “Sightseeing?”

“Oh, I’ve been watching for a while,” Anne said. “Was tempted to step in, but I figured it wasn’t fair if I got to have all the fun.” She nodded down at Caldera. “Do you mind?”

I paused, then stepped aside.

“Thanks.” Anne crossed the room and knelt at Caldera’s side, careless of the spreading blood. “Huh, you really did a number on her. Did you drag it out on purpose?”

“No.”

“I would have.” Green light glowed around Anne’s hand, her life magic weaving through Caldera’s body.

“What are you doing?”

Anne rose to her feet, brushing off her hands. “Just first aid.”

I looked down and saw that the blood had stopped spreading. “Why? You’ve never liked her.”

“Hey, don’t make it sound like it was my fault,” Anne said. “She hated me from the first time we met. Tried to hide it with that I’m-an-impartial-Keeper act, but I could tell. And that was before she suffocated me.”

“Why the act of mercy then?” I asked. “Also, where’s Barrayar?”

For answer, Anne clicked her fingers. Four of the summoned jann stalked in from the entrance hall. One of them was carrying Barrayar in its claws, the mage’s head and arms hanging limp. I scanned ahead and saw that Barrayar was alive but unconscious.

I looked at Anne, eyes narrowed.

“What?” Anne asked innocently.

“What are you up to?”

“Me?”

Two of the jann stalked past, their eyes resting on me coldly as they passed. They bent down and picked Caldera up, shifting under her weight. “You’re taking prisoners now?” I said. “Why?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“You telling me that is a very good reason to worry about it.”

“Oh, relax,” Anne said. “People are more useful alive than dead, right? Seems like the sort of thing you’d say.” The jann turned and began moving in the direction of the entrance hall, leaving us behind. “Anyway, this is where I get off.”

“What?”

“I’m done here. You have fun with Levistus.”

“The whole reason I brought you here was because of Levistus!”

“And that’s my problem how?” Anne gestured to the entrance hall. “Look, I took out most of his private army, plus a mantis golem, plus Barrayar. Oh, and that other mage. What was his name again? Ilmarin? No, that was some other guy.” Anne frowned, thinking, then shrugged. “Well, not like it matters. Anyway, I’m sure you can finish up on your own.”

“While you do what, take a tea break?”

“Hey, I’m not your bodyguard anymore.” Anne turned and walked away after the jann. “You’ll be fine. Good luck!”

I stared after Anne’s retreating back. She didn’t turn to look at me, and I very briefly considered going after her. But that wasn’t what I’d come here to do.

Anne disappeared, leaving me alone. From the look of the futures, I didn’t think she was coming back. I picked up my gun and walked forward.