The Steel Remains

CHAPTER 26

We tried to stop them. But they took her.

For long moments, the words made no kind of sense. Ishgrim was a gift of the Emperor; you’d steal her on peril of a very slow and unpleasant death when the King’s Reach caught up with you, which they inevitably would because with Jhiral they themselves would be facing some pretty stiff penalties if they didn’t. Sure, she was long-limbed and beautiful, but so were a lot of northern slave girls. You wanted one badly enough, you could pick them up down at the harbor clearinghouses for less than it cost to buy and tax a decent horse these days.

Never mind that. Krin-driven brain, screaming in her head. How did they even fucking know? Ishgrim’s a gift of the Emperor since yesterday. No one knew she was here. You didn’t even know she was here until the early hours of this morning.

She hugged at Kefanin, worried at the impossibility of the situation. “Who? Who, Kef? Who took her?”

The mayor-domo made a grunting noise deep in his throat. Rapid, battlefield-trained assessment told her his wound wasn’t fatal, but the blow had stunned him badly. She wasn’t sure how much sense he could make in this state.

“Citadel . . . livery,” he managed.

And then it all came tumbling into place, like some circus trick performed by a dozen inanely painted, grinning clowns.

Not Ishgrim—get that pale flesh out of your head, Archidi, get a fucking grip—not the Emperor’s gift at all.

Elith.

Menkarak: She’s an infidel, a faithless stone-worshipping northerner who would not convert when the hand of the Revelation was extended to her in friendship, and who persists in her stubborn unbelief deep within our borders. The evidence is plain—she has even torn the kartagh from her garb to blind the eyes of the faithful she dwells among. She is steeped in deceit.

The mix of hysterical accusation and cod-legal posturing rang around the inside of Archeth’s head like a rolling metal ball. Not much doubt what awaited Elith once they got her inside the Citadel.

“How long?” she whispered.

But Kefanin had lost consciousness again.

Footfalls outside. She spun to her feet, a knife in her hand like magic. The stable boy, dazed looking, hesitant in the doorway, backlit by the blast of morning sun.

“Milady, they—”

“How long?” she screamed at him.

“I—” Now, as he stepped inside, she saw the bruise blackening beneath his left eye, bubbles of fresh blood at his nostril on the same side. “Not half an hour, milady. Not even that.”

A map of the south side’s maze of streets flared into view behind her eyes. The krinzanz collided with the fury in her veins, inked in the Citadel and the path they’d likely take on their way back to it, stitched it onto the map in pulsing red.

“How many of them?” she asked, more calmly now.

“It was six, I think, milady. In the livery of—”

“Yes, I know.” She sheathed the knife, felt a muscle twitch in her cheek. “Get the doctor. Tell him if Kefanin lives, I’ll double his fee. If he dies, I’ll have him driven out of the fucking city.”

Then she took off, running.

SIX MEN, CITADEL LIVERY.

The streets were packed, no way to ride a horse through it faster than a slow clop. She wasn’t uniformed, had no baton and whistle or blunted saber to clear her way. And anyway, they’d see her coming a hundred yards off.

She cut left, up a little-used dogleg back alley she knew, sprinting flat out as soon as she had the space. Abrupt relief from the heat of the sun in the narrow angles of the passage. A couple of chickens panicked screeching away from beneath her booted feet as she took the corner, but nothing else got in her way. She hit the teeming cross street of Horseman’s Victory Drive—where now, ha fucking ha, you couldn’t even take a horse unless it was hauling produce—shouldered through the crowd, and got to the whitewashed stone steps that led up onto the roof of the Lizard’s Head tavern. From there, she could get her bearings, make a match with the map in her head. Then vault the alley on the other side, get onto the onion-domed rooftop sprawl of the covered bazaar.

“Hoy, you can’t come up—”

She shoved the heavy-gutted publican back in his deck chair as he tried to rise. Danced past, ducking and dodging lines of washing. Grabbed a look amid the glaring white of hung sheets and rooftops beyond. Right, Archidi. Think. Bazaar. Clothmaker Row. The Hustray strait-back Narrows. If they’d taken the most direct route for the Citadel, by now they were headed up Desert Wisdom Drive, off the main boulevard at a forty-five-degree angle. To cut them off . . .

She ran at the lip of the roof, flexed legs into the jump, and over onto the flat top of the bazaar. Pain jarred up into both knees, but she came up running. No time, no time. Around the first of the onion-dome protrusions, and shit, shit, right onto a broad stained-glass skylight. She—

Staggered, threw herself into an ungainly, flailing leap.

Caught a fragmentary glimpse of shoppers moving fishily through a red-and-blue-tinged crowd below, saw herself crashing through and down among them—

Made the other side instead, cleared the glass by inches, landed awkwardly, swayed back, pinwheeled her arms desperately for balance and—

Upright. Running again, looping between the onion domes and roughly southeast.

It was like sprinting across the top of the world. Sounds of the city lost below, the glinting sword of sunlight and a cooling breeze out of the west. The tall rows of houses that fringed Desert Wisdom Drive angling in, closing from the left.

The market beneath her feet was one of the largest in the city—not quite up to the sprawling grandeur of the Imperial Bazaar north of the river, but it still covered several city blocks. She used its roof to cover ground in minutes that would have taken the best part of half an hour at street level.

Fetched up on the eastern edge, trotted rapidly along the guttering until she spotted a grain cart parked below and leapt down into it. Startled oaths and the slugging pain of the impact along arse and back and one thigh. She rolled up from the fall, stood unsteadily, up to her ankles in the grain. Faces peered in at her.

“Fuck was that?”

“Hey. Listen, bitch, that’s my—”

“Oooh, no, but look at ’er, Perg, she’s black as a burned bun. It’s a fucking keeriass, it is.”

“Kiriath,” she snarled and jumped down among them. Shoved her way clear and set off at a fast jog along the sparsely used delivery and storage alleys that constituted the Narrows. She dodged among tradesmen laden with trays of produce, past squatting laborers sharing bread. Six men, Citadel livery. If Menkarak was playing true to type, that meant an invigilator—advocate general to oversee the legality of the proceedings—he’d be oldish—and five men-at-arms.

In the pulse of the krin, it seemed like pretty good odds.

The Narrows spilled out at various points along a curved and crooked street called Bridle Trail Walk. It was lined with low-end jewelers and curio shops, and busy with citizens browsing the iron-caged windows. Archeth skittered through, pushing and cursing, getting angry looks until her color registered, and then averted eyes and a few wards against evil.

Three blocks up, savage elbows and flat hand shoves, Come on, come on, Archidi, pick it the fuck up, and right, into Sailcloth Yard. A few seamstress stalls set up in corners, otherwise quiet. She sprinted the short, right-angled length of it, slammed into the railing at the end, and stared, panting, down a loose soil slope onto a bend in Desert Wisdom Drive.

Citadel livery, Citadel livery, Citad—

There!

Desert Wisdom was tangled up worse than Bridle Trail Walk or the boulevard. They’d made even less headway than she’d thought. She spotted the invigilator-advocate’s robes first, black and gold and the gray silk hood that marked his legal standing. The men-at-arms, a worn, white-clad figure trudging among them, head bowed, arms tied back. If they were in a hurry, it didn’t show.

Archeth sucked in a sobbing breath and vaulted the rail.

Her feet hit the slope six feet below, tried to sink in the soil and tip her headlong. She tore loose and ran, long, uncontrolled flopping strides to stay ahead of her own falling weight. Came hammering down into Desert Wisdom Drive hard and fast enough to smash passersby in her path to the ground. She got back control of her gait, swerved through the confusion she’d sown, and started into the crowd. Couple of hundred yards to close up, at most.

“From the palace, from the palace!” Chanting it at the top of heaving lungs. “Move! Get out of the fucking way!”

Slowly at first—the cry met only with jeers and unresponsive backs turned. But then the people she cannoned into started to look around, saw what she was, and almost fell over themselves to obey. They opened passage for her, and the scramble transmitted itself through the crowd ahead like a wave on water. A hundred yards on, she barely needed to push.

“From the palace, from the—”

Two of the men-at-arms had turned back, stood now squarely in her path. She saw wolfish grins, a short-sword drawn, a raised club, went for her knives with less thought than it took to blink. In the crowd beside her, someone screamed. Panic in all directions, the scream found a mate, and then another. The crowd swayed apart, scattered like frightened fish.

Archeth threw left-handed, put the knife in the sword wielder’s right eye. It was Bandgleam, narrower than the rest, eager and skipping white in the sun. It went in up to the hilt. The man staggered back, squalling like a scalded infant, sword gone, scrabbling at his face and the worn metal thing that now protruded from it. Archeth came in behind the throw, yelling, and she had Laughing Girl light and low in her right hand. The second Citadel thug started visibly at the sound she made, panicked like anyone else in the crowd, and swung massively with his club. He succeeded only in knocking down his shrieking companion. Archeth swayed back in and grabbed, rode the momentum of the swing, carried the man to the ground and cut his throat before he could recover.

She came halfway upright, splattered with the blood. Saw the invigilator-advocate at bay fifteen yards off, amid fleeing and stumbling bystanders, one hand locked around Elith’s upper arm, staring in disbelief at the bodies of his men and the bloodied black woman crouched over them.

The remaining three men-at-arms bracketed the street, a cordon of sorts around their master and his prize. Two swords, another club. The club wielder had a crossbow, but it was on his back. On the ground, the man with Bandgleam buried in his eye had curled up in the dirt and was screaming.

Left-handed, reflexive, Archeth drew Quarterless from the sheath in the small of her back. She stalked forward, Laughing Girl raised and pointing.

“That’s my guest you’ve got there,” she called. “Whether you live or die, you will give her back.”

The street had cleared—impossible to believe it had been crowded scant seconds before. Archeth came on, boots crunching detritus underfoot. Quarterless glinted as she hefted it in the sunlight. The men-at-arms glanced at one another uneasily.

“Are you insane?” The invigilator-advocate had found his voice, if not a very deep timbre for it. His face darkened with rage as he screeched. “How dare you impede the sacred work of the Revelation?”

She ignored him, stared down the three men-at-arms instead.

“Sacred?” she asked them, tone rich with disgust. “Among the seven tribes, a guest is sacred. You know this much, or at least your forefathers did. Which of you wants to die first?”

“Fuck you, bitch,” said the one with the club uncertainly.

“Mama,” screamed the man on the ground suddenly. “It hurts, I can’t see anything. Where are you?”

Archeth smiled like winter ice.

“Want to join him?” she asked.

“This Kiriath whore is an abomination, an affront to the Revelation.” The invigilator-advocate had mustered some depth of tone now, was bellowing at them all. “It’s your sacred duty to cut her down where she stands, it’s a holy act to take her fucking life.”

The injured man gave out an inarticulate, sobbing cry, then trailed off into soft, hopeless weeping. Archeth waited.

The swordsman on the right broke first. Flung himself forward, yelling something garbled at the top of his voice.

Laughing Girl took him in the throat at the second step. He went down choking and coughing blood. Archeth had Wraithslayer in her right hand before he hit the street. The club wielder, surging forward in his comrade’s wake, stopped dead as he saw the new knife. Or maybe he spotted the hilt of Falling Angel, still sheathed in her boot. Or both. Archeth met his eyes, showed him the smile again. He broke and ran.

The final man-at-arms hesitated a moment, then fled into the press of the watching crowd with his friend.

Archeth drew a long, deep breath. Over.

The invigilator stood with Elith collapsed in a heap at his side, bawling at Archeth and the bystanders and apparently everyone else in this city of sinners to get down on bended knees, to humble themselves before the majesty of the Revelation, to repent, to fucking repent before it was—

Archeth strode up to him and slashed his throat open with Quarterless.

He staggered backward a few steps and fell into the arms of the crowd behind. Blood welled up along the line of the knife wound, spilled down his front and soaked into his robes. His mouth worked, chewing, she supposed, on the rest of the unfinished sermon, but no sound came out. Archeth knelt beside Elith, satisfied herself that she was only doped up and with something innocuous. Her breathing was fine. She spared a final glance for the invigilator, whom the crowd was now gathering around as he flapped and bled out, then she went back to the man-at-arms with Bandgleam in his eye. He was still alive, and when she crouched beside him and reached for the knife, he put his hands softly on hers and made a faint mewling sound. She pressed one hand onto his forehead for purchase, and he smiled like a baby at the touch.

When she pulled Bandgleam out, he died.

“GOD DAMN IT, ARCHETH, I AM NOT PLEASED WITH THIS MESS.”

“No more am I, my lord.” She felt sick and shaky, but there was nowhere to sit down and no acceptable way to ask for a chair. “I am at a loss to understand the Citadel’s behavior.”

“Oh, you are, are you?” Jhiral paced tigerishly back and forth across the floor of the emptied throne room. He’d thrown everybody out in an incandescent display of imperial rage, and now Archeth stood alone with him, still thrumming from the chase and combat, still covered in blood, and chilled in the stomach with too much krin. “Come on, woman, don’t be so fucking naïve. This is a power play, and you know it.”

“If that’s so, my lord, then it’s a remarkably unsubtle one.”

“No.” He stopped and came up to her with one menacing finger raised. “What you did about it was remarkably unsubtle. Had you not chased, caught, and slaughtered this little crew of zealots in full view of half the fucking city, then we would not be facing this particular crisis.”

“No. We’d be facing a different one.”

“Precisely.” He turned away, went back up the steps to the throne, and dumped himself into its burnished arms. Stared gloomily into space. “We’d be facing a politely impassive Citadel, everybody closing ranks, whether they’re happy about it or not, around a clique headed up by that little cunt Menkarak, who’d strenuously deny ever making off with your guest, while at the same time loudly and semi-publicly insisting that the secular powers of Empire apparently just lack the force of will to protect the faithful from outside evil forces.”

“That’s probably still going to be his line now.”

“Yeah. Going to be like the fucking Ninth Tribe Remembrance Brotherhood all over again.” Jhiral shot her a brooding look. “You remember those guys, right? I mean, you were around for that.”

“Yes. Your grandfather had them all executed.”

“Don’t fucking tempt me.”

It was empty noise, and they both knew it. Those days were over. Akal had long ago mortgaged himself to the Citadel to feed his wars of expansion—loans and blessings and a firm helping hand from prayer towers and pulpits to recruit extra troop strength from the zealous masses. Yhelteth marched to its conquests under Akal the Great with fully a third of its soldiery believing they were holy warriors. Not nearly enough of them were killed in the process for Archeth’s liking, not even when the Scaled Folk came. There were still far too many hot-eyed young men out there, trained and hardened in war under false pretenses, looking now for continuance of the struggle. Wouldn’t much matter against whom.

Jhiral inherited them all, along with the debts and the solemnly agreed twining of secular and spiritual authority at court.

“How many of the Citadel’s mastery can you count on?” she asked him quietly.

“Situation like this?” He shrugged. “Not many. Archeth, you slit an invigilator’s throat. In broad fucking daylight, on a busy street. What are they supposed to say about that?”

“How many, my lord?” An edge on her voice. She was getting past caring about throne room etiquette.

Jhiral blew out a dispirited breath. “The ones we can bribe, the ones we can blackmail? I don’t know, maybe fifteen or twenty. Add in a few of my father’s old friends on top of that, men who can see the dangers if things get out of hand. That’s half a dozen more at most.”

“So—twenty-five, say?”

“If we lean hard, and if we’re very lucky, yes.”

“It’s not a majority.”

Jhiral grimaced. “Tell me about it.”

“All right, then.” The queasiness in her stomach took a new twist. She held out her hands at waist height and stared at them, flexed her fingers wide and willed them to stop trembling. “So let’s see. They’ll vote, reach an obvious decision, and at a minimum they’ll require me at the Citadel to face an inquisitorial court. They’ll drag Elith into it as well, if only as a witness. Chances are, they won’t get the answers they want and that means further questioning. After that—”

“Don’t you fucking worry.” The sudden, grim vehemence in his tone jerked her gaze up to where he sat. “I made my father a promise on his deathbed, and I aim to keep it. There’s no fucking way I hand you over to that scum.”

Shocked gratitude stung tears into her eyes. It was like a different man speaking, a different man sitting there on the throne. She’d have fled the city before she gave herself up for questioning, was already at some level in her mind beginning to lay the first tentative plans for it. But this . . . ?

“I . . . thank you, my lord, I have no words to express—”

“Yes, all right.” He gestured it away. “I think we can take all that as read, don’t you? I wouldn’t like to be facing the Citadel’s grubby little inquisitors and their toys, either. The question is, how exactly do we get out from under this without having to roll out the troops. It’s the Prophet’s fucking birthday at the end of the month. Going to be enough breast-beating hysteria in the streets as it is. I don’t need a mob marching on the palace as well.”

“From a legal point of view—”

He shook his head. “Forget the law. It isn’t going to help. They’ll cite it where it suits them, ignore it where it doesn’t. They’re clerics, Archeth. They spend their whole fucking lives selectively interpreting textual authority to advantage. We have to hamstring them before they even get started.” He bridged his hands and brooded. “Basically, Archeth, you have to disappear for a while.”

“And Elith.”

“Oh, all right, yes. Fine. Your northern witch as well. Works out better like that anyway, I suppose. With both of you gone, the whole basis for their grievance collapses.” He nodded slowly, but with building vigor. “Yeah, that’ll work. That will work. We get you out of the city under cover, before nightfall. I’ll have Faileh Rakan put together an escort squad to do it. Meantime, I agree to an emergency session of the mastery and field the Citadel’s demands. We send for you, you’re nowhere to be found. Repeated summons, no result. With a bit of prevaricating—and the Holy fucking Mother knows it’s what the court does best—that gets us to some early hour tonight. By the time it’s clear that you’ve fled, it’s dark and you could be anywhere. I undertake to have the militia out scouring the streets for you at dawn. When they don’t find you, we say we’ve sent out the King’s Reach as well. Might even do it with a few of them I can trust to look in the wrong places and keep their mouths shut about it. Anyway: Rumors of you heading northwest for Trelayne, or maybe into the wastes. Doing all we can, gentlemen, thank you for your time. We’ll keep you posted.” He wagged a finger at Archeth. “Meantime, we stash you . . . where? Any idea where you’ll go?”

And something moved in her head like the oiled components of a fireship hatch mechanism, everything sliding and locking into new configurations. She almost heard the solid clunk as it happened. A fresh excitement shouldered the krin crash aside, picked up the beat in her veins. She cleared her throat.

“I had thought of Ennishmin, my lord.”