Vengeance

CHAPTER 64

The carpet came up to Tali’s ankles and her bare feet made no sound. Could this possibly work? The drunk was a large man and if he caught her she would be lucky to get free. But if she could push him over and smash the bottles, the distraction might give her a chance to check the door.

She was only a few steps away when he turned, raising the second bottle to drain it. He gulped and gasped, dropped it to the carpet and was levering out the cork of the third bottle when he saw her.

The drunk choked and swung the bottle as if to knock her out of the way. ‘No!’ he slurred. ‘You’re — ’

She thrust him hard in the chest. The bottles fell together and broke, then he staggered backwards and his head made a soggy thud as it hit the corner of the wall. He collapsed into the servants’ passage, blood pouring down his neck.

Tali stared at him, appalled. Had she killed him? The hall reeked of blood, urine and wine. She bent over him, not knowing what to do.

‘Tam?’ one of the door guards said loudly. ‘Sounds like the Lord’s done it again.’

Had they seen her? No, she was fully in the cross-passage, out of sight, but if she remained here they would find her in seconds. She ran down to the next corner and stopped to check.

The guards were bending over the drunk. ‘Is he dead?’ asked the second guard.

‘Wish the pig was,’ said the first. ‘If we’re to survive the war, the sooner the young master takes charge the better.’

‘Shh! That kind of talk can get you flogged. Get a pad on that gash, quick.’

Tali went cold inside. The drunk must be Rix’s father, Lord Ricinus, and if he died, she would have killed him. But if he survived they would turn the palace upside-down looking for her.

She hobbled down and was hesitating outside the door when it was opened by Rix. ‘What the blazes are you doing here?’ he hissed. ‘If you’re seen — ’

He caught her wrist, yanked her inside and locked the door.

D i-DA- doh?Di-DA- doh? It was coming closer. Tali clamped down on her shell but the pressure was trying to force it wide open.

Rix took her by the shoulders, holding her so tightly that it hurt. ‘Why have you come here? It’s not safe.’

She glared up at him. ‘Let — me — go.’

‘Sorry.’ Rix released her and stepped back, rubbing his hair until it stood up in tangles. ‘What am I supposed to do?’

‘Do you want me to go?’ she said stiffly.

Go where? Back to the manor, which was probably being searched at this moment? She looked around. She was in a broad hall. The tiles underfoot were polished white marble, large paintings were hung down either wall, and through an open door she glimpsed a bed the size of ten slaves’ cells in Cython. The one imperfection was a faint, rotten-egg-gas smell from the hissing gas lanterns.

He hesitated a long time before saying, ‘Of course not. But … why are you here?’

Di-DA- doh?Di-DA- doh? Tali forced her shell closed. ‘I had nowhere else to go,’ she dissembled. ‘They’re after me.’

‘Who’s after you?’ said Rix.

‘My mother’s killers.’

His eyes were bloodshot and sunken, with dark circles around them. He looked as though he had not slept in days and her heart went out to him, but she had to harden it. She had to confront him about the murder, now. She might not get another chance.

‘Rix?’ she began.

He groaned and wrenched at his hair.

‘Are you all right?’ she said. ‘You look dreadful.’

His laugh had an edge of hysteria. What could have happened since she last saw him?

‘Mother has just searched the palace for you. She’s also ordered that I marry.’

‘Marry?’ she said, bemused.

‘I have no heir and she won’t allow me to fight until I produce one. Also, Father’s portrait is a disaster, the war is a catastrophe — and dear, sweet Luzia, who never hurt anyone in her whole life, has been murdered.’

‘Your childhood nurse?’ said Tali, her belly throbbing. Her voice rose. ‘The woman you sent Rannilt to?’

‘Yes, and she’s run away. Tobry can’t find her. He’s looked everywhere.’

Tali slumped back against the wall. Murdered? And Rannilt lost in a city at war, with no one to look after her. ‘Why was she murdered?’

‘To stop her talking to me. I wanted to ask her about my childhood, a fever that nearly killed me — ’

‘When you were ten,’ said Tali.

‘How did you know? I suppose Tobry told you.’

He was shaking. Impulsively, she put her arms around him and he clung to her for a few seconds as though she was the only solid thing in the world. How could she confront him about the murder now? She would have to wait.

‘Why did Rannilt run?’ said Tali.

‘She tried to heal Luzia but the wound was beyond any healer. Perhaps she ran in panic or terror. Poor child, the things she’s witnessed. What are we going to do?’

‘I don’t know.’ She could not focus. ‘Rix, I keep hearing the call.’

‘Call? What call?’ He picked up a water carafe and gulped at it, spilling water down his front, then put it down so abruptly that it shattered.

‘The strange note in my head. My enemies are using it to track me.’

Rix paced towards the front door but spun on one foot and came back, almost running, his limbs jerking. He looked as though he was cracking up.

‘My family enemy is the wrythen you fought in the mountains,’ said Tali. ‘He ordered my mother’s death. I told Tobry about all this — ’

‘Yes, yes!’ cried Rix as though he had finally succeeded in dredging up the memories. ‘He told me, but what’s the call?’

Tali explained. ‘I had it blocked. At least, I thought I did, but now I keep hearing it in my head, di-DA- doh?Di-DA- doh? Louder than ever, and closer. I’m sure it’s them, Rix. My mother’s killers are hunting me.’

Her thigh throbbed. She pressed the flat of a hand onto it. Without direct skin contact she could not renew the healing charm but she imagined the pain had eased a little. ‘Why has the palace been searching for me?’

‘Mother has some mad idea that I’ve got you hidden away.’

Tali swallowed. He was head and shoulders above her and from this close she had to tilt her head at an uncomfortable angle to meet his eyes. ‘Why would she think that?’

‘She thinks I fancy you.’

She took a step backwards. ‘That’s ridiculous …’

‘Isn’t it?’ said Rix. ‘How did you get in, anyway?’

She could not admit that she had knocked over his father and might have killed him. ‘Sniffed out an old tunnel. Having lived underground all my life, I’m good at that.’

‘But how did you get here unseen?’

‘Er … someone fell and hurt themselves … down the hall. The guards went to help.’ The half-truth slipped out and it was too late to correct it.

Rix led her along the hall. Away to the right, a set of stairs ran up steeply into a tower. ‘How did you find me, anyway?’

‘Um … I’ve a very keen nose.’

Laughter exploded above them. ‘Rix, you really must bathe more often.’

Tobry was coming down the stairs, beaming, and Tali felt an unfamiliar surge of happiness and belonging. Tobry wouldn’t panic; he would know what to do.

Rix scowled. ‘I spent an hour in the tub.’ He looked over her head. ‘Tobe, what the blazes are we going to do?’

‘I don’t know. The chancellor’s turning Caulderon upside-down to find you, Tali. There’s a reward on your head big enough to buy a castle.’

Tali blanched. If any of the servants discovered she was here, they would turn her in.

‘What’s the matter?’ said Rix. ‘You’re trembling.’

Tali had thought that she was hiding it. ‘It’s just … I was … You’d have to …’

‘We defend our friends with our lives,’ said Rix stiffly, as if she had insulted his honour. He grimaced. ‘What if the palace is searched again?’

‘Why would it be?’ said Tobry.

‘It’s frightening how much Mother knows.’

‘Does she know we’re friends with Tali?’

‘Since Mother has no friends, she assumes I’m acting from an ulterior motive.’

‘What motive?’ said Tali hoarsely.

‘She believes I sneaked out the other night to bed you.’

No one spoke for a minute. Tali felt flames creeping up her face.

‘Is the war going badly?’ she gabbled. There had been no news since their desperate flight through the city gates.

‘It’s going disastrously,’ said Tobry, turning to a map on the end wall. ‘The enemy have captured Suthly County and most of the land south of Caulderon between the Crowbung Range and the Vomits, and they’re racing up the western side of the lake. Kleng must fall within days, Reffering after that, then Nyrdly County will follow. We still hold Lakeland and Fennery, but once they fall, the centre of Hightspall will be in their hands and they’ll starve Caulderon out within weeks.’

‘What about all the counties over the mountains? When they march to our aid — ’

‘They’re too far away. By the time they hear about the war, it’ll be over.’

‘But Hightspall has stood for two thousand years.’ Never had Tali imagined it would crumble like this. ‘We must be beating them somewhere.’

‘We haven’t had a single victory,’ said Tobry. ‘Their weapons are too strange and deadly, our generals too hidebound. Their tactics belong to the first war and they can’t adapt them to this new enemy.’

‘The swine won’t stand and fight,’ said Rix. ‘They melt away, fire on our armies, fields, towns and bridges from cover, then run and hide again. We can’t get a grip on the bastards, and all the while they’re killing us by the thousands.’

He looked down at Tali. ‘But I’ve forgotten my manners. Come this way.’

He led her into a vast and magnificent salon, bigger than the combined cells of a hundred slaves in Cython and with a painted ceiling soaring up to a point like a six-sided tent. A large fireplace in the right-hand wall was set with unlit wood and kindling, yet the room was pleasantly warm.

Pain spiked through her temples and she turned, knowing what she was going to see: the baleful coruscations of a heatstone the size of a cottage wall, set into a gilded metal frame. She could still see the marks of crowbar and chisel on the stone.

Genry had died mining heatstones for the idle rich, baked like poor Sidon. Rix’s chambers were too big, just as he was. The ceiling must be forty feet high. How could all this be for one man?

‘Sit down.’ He indicated a couch covered in a fabric so fine that it shone. ‘You must be starving.’

Tali remained standing, the forgotten sandals dangling from her hand, mortified to realise that she was covered in the dirt and dust of the underground. She could smell it on herself and she couldn’t possibly sit on that magnificent couch. No speck of dust had ever entered this room and every surface was waxed until it gleamed. What must Rix and Tobry think of her?

‘Tali might like to freshen up,’ said Tobry. ‘I’ll find something for her to wear.’

Rix showed her into a room which he called the scalderium, and explained how the bathwater was heated.

‘My father was killed in the heatstone mine,’ she said coolly.

Rix shrugged, turned on the cold taps and went out. Tobry returned with a fawn linen shirt and pantaloons, and a braided belt. When he had gone Tali stepped into the tub and yelped. The water was icy. She scrubbed clean and was getting out when she realised that she had not heard the call again. Had the killers lost her, or had they stopped searching because they now knew where she was?

Shortly, pink and glowing and dressed in clothes three sizes too big, she came out. Tobry was speaking.

‘Better that Lady Ricinus thinks you’re bedding Tali than she realises you’re friends with a Pale.’

‘That she could never forgive,’ said Rix, who was calmer now. He looked up and smiled. ‘We’ll have to get you out of here — Lady Ricinus wants you badly. If she can hand you to the chancellor, he’ll be most grateful, and the house needs his gratitude right now. She’ll search the palace again at the least hint of anything suspicious.’

Like Lord Ricinus being knocked unconscious fifty yards from his son’s door and gabbling about being attacked by a small blonde woman. Tali felt the trap tightening. Where could she go when the whole world was hunting her?

A furious rapping echoed down the corridor. Tali jumped and looked for a hiding place.

‘That’s Mother!’ Rix cried.

‘Go and see. It’s probably nothing.’

‘Who but Lady Ricinus would make such a racket at this time of night?’

Rix headed for the door. Tobry ushered Tali around the corner and up the stairs.

‘What are you going to do?’ she said. If the only entrance was guarded, any search must find her in minutes.

‘Tobe, Tobe?’ Rix yelled from the door.

Tobry went halfway down the stairs. ‘What is it?’

‘Father’s fallen and knocked himself out. It could be bad.’ The door banged.

‘There,’ said Tobry, leading the way up the stairs. ‘Nothing for you to worry about.’

She limped after him, dread gnawing at her like a stomach full of alkoyl. Lord Ricinus would wake, describe Tali and accuse her of trying to kill him, and Lady Ricinus would be relentless. An attack on the lord of the house was an attack on the house itself and must be savagely punished.

It must also destroy the friendship that had developed between her and Rix, and perhaps Tobry too. They would know she had deceived them. They would believe she had attacked Rix’s father while he was drunk and helpless, then had run away. Rix could not forgive that, any more than Tali could have forgiven an attack on a member of her own family. Why hadn’t she told the truth?

Because the slaves’ way was so ingrained in her that it was instinctive. Never admit anything, never notice anything and always be ready to lie yourself out of trouble.

‘You’re shaking,’ said Tobry. ‘Have you eaten?’

‘Not — ’ Her voice went hoarse. ‘Not today.’

‘Sit down. I’ll bring something up.’

Tobry headed for the stairs, then turned back, as if he had forgotten something. Picking up a small canvas that was facing away from her, he put it into a storeroom full of other canvases and closed the door.

Now that she had no distractions, pulses of pain were spearing through Tali’s abused thigh, following the line of the arrow wound, which had been repeatedly broken open in the past days. She forced herself to concentrate. When Rix discovered what she had done to his father, he would be furious. He had risked his life for her and she had betrayed his trust.

Would he give her up? No, he was too noble for that. He would put her out and tell her he never wanted to set eyes on her again. After all they had been through together Tali could not face that. She had to get away before he returned, and the only place she could go was back to the tunnels.

Could she glean any evidence about the murder first? How long did she have? Lord Ricinus had been very drunk when she’d encountered him in the cellar, and in the minutes after that he had swilled two more bottles. After he came to, he would probably sleep for hours.

Settling on a red leather settee, she pressed down on the hot arrow wound, working the healing charm as best she could, and re-examined the clues. There was no subtlety about Rix; his feelings showed on his face. If he knew anything about the killing, he would have given it away when she had told him about it. Therefore, he knew nothing. And yet, he had been there. She was not mistaken about that.

Tali desperately needed someone to share her doubts and fears with. What if she broached the subject with Tobry? She trusted him, but Tobry’s loyalties had to be with his friend. If she told him that Rix had been a witness to the murder, Tobry would ask him about it.

‘Here you are,’ said Tobry.

He set down a tray beside her. It held four wedges of something firm — one wedge white, the next two yellow and the last threaded with grey mould — plus sausages and slices of preserved meats, little onions with long yellow stalks, a green apple and a red one, and a couple of dishes whose contents quivered.

‘What’s that?’ said Tali, pointing to the plain yellow wedge.

‘Cheese. You don’t have cheese in Cython?’

‘There’s no milk.’ She nibbled some cheese. It was pleasantly nutty.

‘Wine?’ He was holding out a brown bottle.

She could only see the drunken old man swilling it then peeing on the wall. ‘I’d rather have water.’

He fetched some and sat on the other end of the settee. ‘I’m intrigued to know how you got into the palace.’

‘You mentioned tunnels, so I sniffed them out.’

He was smiling. ‘That’s quite a nose you have.’

Was he mocking her? She did not know how to reply. ‘If this place is searched, what are you going to do with me?’

‘Take you out the window and down into Tumbrel Town.’

‘If they know Rix sneaked out, won’t they be watching the windows?’

‘I expect so. We’ll have to be quick.’

‘What if they’ve got men waiting below to catch us?’ Panic flared. She was going to be caught and sold to the chancellor like a slave.

‘I’ll have men there too,’ said Tobry. ‘Trust me, I’ve played this game before. I’m going out to make the arrangements now. In the meantime, you’ve got to eat and sleep and give your thigh a chance to heal. Then, if we need to go in a hurry, at least I won’t have to carry you.’

‘You once said you had a friend who was skilled in magery and might help me find — ’

‘And you said, “Don’t tell anyone about it”.’

‘I’ve got to have help. I can’t do it by myself.’

‘Unfortunately she left Caulderon when the attacks began. If the enemy wins, those with magery will be taken first, and tortured longest.’

‘I’ve lost, then,’ she said bitterly. ‘And I’ll be one of them.’

‘So will I,’ Tobry reminded her. He sighed. ‘Lie down, close your eyes and empty your mind.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘A little test.’

‘But you said … what if he sees into me, through you?’

‘I’m not using my magery. Just the elbrot’s. But only if you trust me.’

‘I trust you,’ said Tali. But she could also trust her enemy to use every advantage. And yet, without magery she was lost anyway. ‘I’ll have to take the risk.’

She closed her eyes and tried to think of nothing, but the memory of di-DA- doh?Di-DA- doh? kept intruding. Did the killers know she was in the palace? And what if her enemy still lurked within Tobry, just waiting for the right moment, this moment, to possess her? She would not be able to endure it the way Tobry had. A slave’s mind was her last refuge when all else had been taken. If the wrythen invaded that sanctum she would go insane.

Tobry moved the elbrot back and forth over the top of her head, around the sides, and above her face. She could detect its glow through her closed eyelids.

‘Your mind’s so full it’s bulging out your ears,’ said Tobry.

‘Sorry,’ she said hoarsely. Don’t think of the notes. Don’t dwell on the call. Di-DA- doh?Di-DA- doh? What made the notes, anyway?

‘Blank it all out.’ Tobry laid his callused hand across her forehead. ‘Turn yourself into a cork bobbing in a pond, just drifting, drifting.’

She imagined that she was floating, empty, uncaring where wind and currents took her or what happened once she got there, at peace … But what if he was possessed, and her enemy was reading her gift at this moment, sneering at her weakness, preparing to enter her …?

‘Ugh!’ cried Tobry, screwing up his face in pain. ‘For a minute there, I thought I was close, but it dropped away.’ His tanned skin was pale, his lips bloodless.

Because I blocked you, she thought guiltily. Despite all you’ve done for me, I didn’t trust you. ‘Are you all right?’

‘It was more painful than I’d expected.’

‘You knew it would hurt?’

‘My magery often does.’