Silver Kings: The Splintered Gods Part 4

'You broke his mind.

I know.

'You will not break mine.

I do not need to. I see you, Dragon-Queen. Others did that long ago.

Memories burst like fireworks inside her, snap-firing in dazing succession, flashed then gone again: knocking the blood-tainted gla.s.s out of Baros Tsens hand; the Adamantine Man in Dhar Thosis, his voice, familiar, remembered Get off her, you fat p.r.i.c.k and then a moment later slipping the knife off his belt ten years earlier as the words came out of his mouth, driving it through her fathers ribs, again and again and again until he stopped, the father who thought she was nothing better than his own personal wh.o.r.e to share with whoever might offer him the prettiest crown; Jehal on the day hed told her that her mother was dead, the mother whod done nothing but birth her and then betray her; riding Diamond Eye over the flames of Dhar Thosis, deliriously out of control and yet free, a fleeting moment when shed been mistress of her own self; the dark room of fear and despair, always waiting for her and yet always waiting for the inevitable something worse; imprisoned from birth by who she was, who she must be. Piece by piece, the dragon Silence ripped it out of her and showed her the wreckage.

'Have you come to kill me this time? she asked the darkness. The dragon didnt answer, but why else was it here?

The door of her prison was ajar. Bellepheros must have opened it, but he could have flung the iron door wide and it wouldnt have made the slightest difference. She slumped onto her bed and lay back, arms spread across the silk sheets of her prison. The dragon moved through her. She was in Dhar Thosis. The Adamantine Man was bowing his head and she was remembering his voice. There was a man beside him. Shed had no interest in him then and had no interest in him now, yet she found herself straining to remember his face; and then she knew it wasnt that she was trying to remember his face, it was the dragon trying to pull it out of her. She sensed its edge of wonder.

Who is he, little one?

A longing for something different filled her, for possibilities so long dead they were nothing but dry husks. She pulled the Adamantine Man close, the memory of him, his moment of unexpected kindness. Pulled it close and held it like a lover. Memories inside her burned full of flames.

I will think of you as I kill him, little one.

Zafir sat up. Ice filled her. 'Thank you, little dragon. She bared her teeth and set her mind against the hatchling, barring it from her thoughts. 'Thank you for giving me purpose, little dragon.

Purpose, little one?

'I will take him home. And I will change the world.

The dragon laughed at her. How?

'Youll see. She threw its laughter right back in its face, walked to the door of her prison, opened it and ran outside.

Chay-Liang raced into the open. Thunder and lightning flashed between the eyrie and the gla.s.s.h.i.+ps, three of them now, right overhead, picking off the black-powder guns and the watchtowers. Tsens soldiers were dragging rocket carts into the dragon yard. She dodged around them, smiling grimly. Belli had been loud about the dangers of mixing dragons with things that exploded but Tsen had brought them anyway. Clever tvarr. Already, the first few streaked into the night to detonate in showers around the gla.s.s.h.i.+ps.

She pa.s.sed the hatchery. Silhouetted in flashes of lightning, bodies lay twisted in ways no living man should be, dark stains on the white stone. Her foot slid on something wet and slippery; she tumbled in among the waiting dragon eggs, gasping, lay still and took a moment to catch her breath. The dragon yard was chaos. Men shouting, running. A madness of screams and flashes and thunder and a whirling of swinging clubs. She had no idea how anyone knew who was who.

The fall had shaken her but she wasnt broken. She took her lightning wand from her belt and ran her finger along it until the golden fire inside was as bright as the full moon. Bellepheros had erected a net of heavy chains over the hatchery to keep any newborns from flying away. It was sagging at one corner and there was a broken egg nearby, covered in sticky fluid. Maybe the chaos had confused the hatchling and it had gone down a tunnel instead of simply flying away. She didnt know. Couldnt.

Nearby, the older hatchlings were lunging at anyone who came too close, spitting gouts of fire. On the wall, Diamond Eye sat impa.s.sive, watching it all with unblinking eyes. The great beast seemed almost like a statue until another sled came too close and the dragon swatted it out of the air with a casual flick of its tail. Liang picked herself up and ran again and was almost bowled over as a squad of grim-faced soldiers rushed past her, yelling and swinging their ashgars.

'Tsen! she shouted at them. 'Wheres Baros Tsen TVarr? But she didnt get an answer. They probably didnt even hear her over the howling wind and the screams of the fight and the thunder-cracks of wands. She kept running, as fast as she could. Another flurry of shouts made her look up. The gla.s.s.h.i.+p over the dragon yard had a chunk missing from its outer disc, punched out by the last of the black-powder guns. Cracks ran into its heart and lightning crackled around its ruined rim. It wobbled erratically, drifting slowly. She bent forward, urging herself on. A spray of rockets exploded around the gla.s.s.h.i.+ps core. A brilliant light flashed deep inside and then went dim. The gla.s.s.h.i.+p lurched and slid sideways, tipped and started to fall straight at the hatchery. Liang swore and sprinted, stumbling and tripping over her own feet as she reached the iron door into the spiralling tunnels where the hatchling had gone, where she had her workshop with Belli, where Tsen himself had his rooms. The door hung open. She threw herself through, tried to slam it shut without stopping, slid, crashed into the wall, staggered, somehow didnt fall and instead kept on running, and then the entire eyrie shook as the gla.s.s.h.i.+p smashed into the stone of the dragon yard. The impact shook her off her feet.

Something huge and fast slammed into the half-closed door, buckling the iron and leaving it sagging against the stone. Another flash of light flared like the sun and then died. She heard screams and, for a few short breaths, simply lay where she was, unable to move. When there was nothing more, she pulled herself to her feet. There was a pain in her leg, a pulled muscle. Tomorrow shed have a whole pile of bruises but right now that was the least of her worries. She brushed herself down and set off again and almost tripped over two dead soldiers sprawled across her path. One was missing his head, bitten clean off. A dozen paces further on she pa.s.sed it, misshapen, crushed, chewed and spat out again amid a shower of splintered gold-gla.s.s.

The hatchling. Liang slowed as she went on, holding her wand bright and ready in front of her.

9.

Fire and Lightning Screams echoed through the curve of the tunnel, carried by the smooth white walls. Helpless terror screams. Liang followed the spiral deeper. She pa.s.sed another dead soldier with his head torn off and his side ripped open. Another half-turn and the floor was slick with blood and gore and there were bodies all around, torn to pieces. Slaves. Four or five of them. Shredded enough that it was hard to tell. She was close to her workshop now, to Bellis study and his laboratory. Zafirs prison was just beyond. The corpses were fresh.

She slowed. Strange sensations washed past her, thin and hard to touch but there. A savage glee, a swiftness of movement, a surge of vicious joy. She felt a sense of closeness, of a hunt nearing its end and then an incandescent towering rage, and she knew the dragon was close, very close, and that it had come here with a purpose, not driven by confusion or panic, and had been somehow thwarted. It came closer still, an inferno of anger, and Liang realised that she hadnt given any thought to what, exactly, she was going to do when she found it.

The sc.r.a.ping of claws on stone, moving with furious intent around the curve of the tunnel, echoed fast towards her. She raised the wand and hurled a bolt of lightning as soon as she saw the first sight of something moving, straight into the hatchlings face. The sound, trapped between the hard white walls of the pa.s.sage, stunned her it was like standing next to the firing of a cannon. The flash blinded her too, but she saw the dragon for an instant, burned into her eyes by the light, head low, looking at her, fangs poking from its mouth like a crocodiles, crouched low and ready to spring. She must have hit it it was far too big and close for the lightning to have arced around it but she raised the gold-gla.s.s s.h.i.+eld anyway, willed it to be wider and cringed behind it.

What manner of sorceress are you? A furious voice crashed into her head, streaked with rage and pain. Immediately she felt herself answering, conjuring memories of her life, of the places shed been, the wonders shed seen. Khalishtor, the Crown of the Sea Lords, the Dralamut, her studies at Hingwal Taktse, the powers shed learned, the when and the how and what she could do. The Elemental Men . . .

The dragon was rifling her memories. She forced them back and thought of what first came to mind and held it there: Diamond Eye up on the eyrie, staring at the G.o.dspike and the maelstrom of the storm-dark.

The wounds of this splintered world. The pa.s.sage bloomed into flame. Her eyes hadnt recovered from the lightning and now she was blinded again as the fire came; she could smell it, smell the blistering skin of the dead slaves behind her, the charring blood, the crackling fat and still the fire didnt stop. It licked around her s.h.i.+eld and the s.h.i.+eld held it back but the heat rose fast around her. With a flick of will she turned the gla.s.s from a s.h.i.+eld into a sh.e.l.l, hard and thick and complete. The heat fell back. The fire stopped.

For a moment everything was dark and dim, the soft moonlight glow of the walls too feeble for her dazzled eyes. When she closed them, the image of the dragon was there, lit up by her flash of lightning. When she opened them again it was right in front of her, peering through the gold-gla.s.s. It sniffed and c.o.c.ked its head and tapped with a talon as if to see what sound the sh.e.l.l would make, then shuffled back and stopped and watched her. Its eyes changed as though looking past her at something far away. Then abruptly it lunged, battering its head into the gla.s.s. The sh.e.l.l flew back and tipped over with Liang inside it. The gla.s.s starred and cracked. She willed the fractures away and changed its shape around her to something more stable as she scrabbled back to her feet a pyramid and barely in time before the dragon came at her again, this time with a crack of its whip-like tail which sent her spinning across the pa.s.sage. Her head hit the inside of the gla.s.s hard enough to draw blood and burst fireworks in front of her eyes. There was something about the way the dragon was looking at her now, as though it was enjoying itself.

'Enjoy this. She changed the gold-gla.s.s so the lightning wand poked through it and let fly another bolt. She closed her eyes this time, but the dragon had been right there, the wand pointing at its face, and shed seen it, at the last moment, turn away as though it understood what was coming. The blast sent it flying down the pa.s.sage in a tumble of claws and wings. It took a second or two to recover itself. Liang watched the glow inside her wand grow brighter as it charged again, gritting her teeth as she waited to see who would be quicker.

This world is less dull than the last, Chay-Liang. I will remember you, little one. It was mocking her. She sent another charge of lightning at it but this time it seemed to know even before she willed the wand to fire. It sprang, fast and high and straight over her head, vanis.h.i.+ng into the gloom, back towards the surface. For a moment Liang stayed where she was, wondering if it was truly gone and why it had come here in the first place, but then she realised she already knew the answer to that. It had come to kill the dragon-slave.

She ran on, looking for Bellepheros.

'Run, alchemist! Now! Bellepheros hadnt needed telling twice. A woken hatchling? The worst thing there could be. He turned and fled, running deeper into the eyrie until he reached the rooms at the very bottom that Baros Tsen TVarr kept for himself and his slave Kalaiya. He stopped only when he reached the door at the very end that led into the bathhouse, the deepest and largest chamber under the eyrie. Which should have been the hatchery, but there was no point going over that argument again, certainly not now. He hesitated. The door was ajar and there was blood on the floor and he didnt know what might be inside . . . but whatever it was, it couldnt be worse than a hatchling dragon chasing him. Awake! Great Flame, not awake! He fumbled his fingers around the iron door, pulling it open.

There was a corpse tucked into the shadows of the alcove to one side where Tsen kept towels and robes and the cheaper end of his stock of Xizic oils, an armoured soldier with his throat cut. Bellepheros tugged at the door and slipped in the blood and almost fell, and then the door opened on its own, so abruptly that it knocked him down. He wailed with fear, sure he was about to die in a whirl of talons and teeth and fire, but it was only a woman, a slave in a white tunic. She hurried out and grabbed him by his robes. 'Where is he? Where is he?

He knew her face Tsens mistress or lover or whatever she was. Kalaiya. Bellepheros shook his head and glanced back over his shoulder. 'I dont know. But dont go that way! Theres a dragon loose behind me.

She pushed him away and ran past, shouting Tsens name.

'Kalaiya! Bellepheros wrung his hands for a moment and then closed the door when she didnt look back and barred it behind him. Which might or might not be enough to keep a hatchling back but he wasnt about to wait and find out. Across the bath-house, a second door hung open into the tunnels that led up to the Scales quarters. He ran for it, back up to the dragon yard to look for Chay-Liang.

By the time he reached the surface, he was panting and gasping, almost doubled over, hobbling and cursing his knees. The yard was alive with lightning and armoured men smas.h.i.+ng each other to bits and gla.s.s.h.i.+ps overhead and sleds whizzing past the walls and chaos and mayhem. He cringed and ducked back into the tunnels away from the madness, then screwed his eyes shut as an explosion shook the eyrie. In the flashes of light and thunder after he opened them again, he saw Diamond Eye, perched on the wall, watching with distant interest. Bellepheros sank against the tunnel wall. He didnt know what to do. He couldnt go back, not with a hatchling down there, and he certainly couldnt go outside, and so he did nothing but curl up small and try not to be seen and quiver with fright as he watched Tsens men and the Vespinese shatter one another with their ashgars while sleds darted overhead.

The hatchery outside the tunnel was wrecked, eggs ripped open by ma.s.sive razor-edged shards where a gla.s.s.h.i.+p had come down and smashed into the white stone. As he watched, another fell to Tsens rockets, tipping out of the sky and cras.h.i.+ng into the eyrie rim, shattering as it bounced away and fell in glittering rain towards the void below. The third gla.s.s.h.i.+p came down low, close enough for the gondola it carried to unfurl and spit out its soldiers. Rockets exploded around it. It lurched and drifted away.

Diamond Eye s.h.i.+fted. The soldiers from the gondola had caught the dragons attention as though they were strange and new, although what was different about them Bellepheros hadnt the first idea. He watched them fall, one by one, though they died far harder than Tsens soldiers. Across the yard, in a flash of lightning, he thought he saw Chay-Liang. His heart jumped and he forgot for a moment how afraid he was. He almost ran out, but then he lost her amid the flashes and screams.

Diamond Eye s.h.i.+fted again and turned his head. The fighting had spread across the dragon yard now, broken into pockets, everywhere except around the hatchlings. A handful of Vespinese ran towards the eggs, straight past Bellepheros. One turned his head, saw him and slowed, but then a bolt of lightning crashed among them, skittering sparks from their gold-gla.s.s armour as three of Tsens men charged, screaming and swinging their ashgars. Bellepheros scuttled and jumped like a nervous beetle out into the open and ran up the steps to the wall. His knees were killing him but he kept running as fast as he could around the top, robes flapping around his ankles until he reached Diamond Eye. Back in the dragon-realms hed seen men carelessly trodden on, seen them sent flying by the thoughtless flick of a tail and, most common of all, picked up and tumbled across the ground when an idle dragon decided to stretch its wings. Sometimes men got up and walked away from that, but not often but at least with a dragon he understood the danger. Better than lightning, anyway. Better than howling screaming men charging at him with great spiked clubs. He s.h.i.+fted nervously. It said something about the state of the world when the safest place he could think of was nestled between a dragons claws.

Diamond Eye was gazing out into the night, back the same way it had stared before.

'What do you see out there? Bellepheros asked. 'What?

A shape shot high overhead. And then another, at the end of the wall, much lower. Bellepheros glimpsed the outline of a man crouched, one knee bent forward, head pressed firmly into the wind; and then all of a sudden there were hundreds of them over the yard. They skimmed the ground and hurled their lightning and jumped down with their ashgars swinging, and in minutes the battle was done. Over. The last of Tsens men dropped their ashgars and their wands and raised their hands over their heads. The eyrie was lost.

'You could burn them, you know, he whispered to Diamond Eye. 'All of them. Under the circ.u.mstances I dont think anyone who mattered would mind.

But the dragon was staring across the yard at something else.

The rider-slave wasnt in her prison. The door was open. A cold panic settled over Liang because where else would she be if not up fighting Shondas soldiers? Maybe shed found some other way to escape dear G.o.ds, was that why the hatchling had come down here? To help her? But she bit that back. Zafir hadnt pa.s.sed her, and the rider-slave would hardly leave without her dragon.

Bellepheros! Liang ran to his laboratory and threw open the door. No Bellepheros, but Zafir was standing there in the ruins of it. She wasnt even trying to hide. She simply stood, wrapped in dragon-scale, holding a vial in her hand. Everything had been smashed and burned. Liang pointed her wand. Tempting to let the lightning have her and be done with it, whatever Belli said, whatever Tsen said. The world would be better for it.

'Get up and go to your dragon and do what you do best, she snapped. She looked at the devastation, at the smouldering wreckage, the charred books. She felt the heat and it slowly dawned on her what had happened. Zafir hadnt done this; the hatchling had. And for a moment, as Zafir looked up, her face was so anguished that Liang wondered whether she was wrong. Didnt everyone deserve at least a little pity? But the look was gone in an instant and the thought with it too. Pity? The rider-slave didnt know such a word even existed.

Zafir shook her head. 'All his potions. All gone. She looked at the vial in her hand and shrugged. 'Well, almost.

Liang grabbed Zafirs arm and spun her round, forgetting herself for a moment. Distant shouts echoed through the tunnels, getting closer. Zafir snapped her arm away. Her eyes scanned the room, place to place to place with the tiniest little smile. Liang grabbed at her again. This time Zafir danced away. Liang levelled her wand.

'Why dont you just kill me and be done with it? Zafir sounded tired. Bored, which made Liang want to slap her.

'Its not like you dont deserve it.

'So do it. A crippled smile crept into the corner of Zafirs mouth. 'Youll be doing it for the wrong reasons of course. But you want to, you always did. So go ahead. The hatchling came to do the same. Perhaps it would have changed its mind but I doubt it. Dragons are not merciful creatures. Im afraid I cant fly Diamond Eye for you just now.

Mercy? Another word the rider-slave claimed to know but surely didnt understand. Liang shook her head. 'Get up and do as youre told, slave! Win this day and you can have your freedom. Ill take you back to your own land myself if I have to.

Zafirs eyes narrowed. 'Is that yours to give?

'Yes. Tsen had as good as said so.

'And my alchemist, will you let him go too?

'If thats what he wants. It surprised Liang how sure she sounded of that. Not by how much the thought hurt, though that didnt surprise her at all.

Zafir strode past Liang, out through the door and into the moonlight glow of the white stone tunnels. She spat out a bitter laugh. 'Ha! Perhaps youd like to come too. I doubt wed do well sharing him but I think I might put up with you anyway. You make a good armourer. Have more for me yet? She snorted. 'But no, why would you? Im to ride to war in silks and dragon-skin then, am I? I suppose its a better death than hanging. She stopped. 'But I cant ride Diamond Eye just now, Chay-Liang. I took a potion to hide from the hatchling and so Diamond Eye wont know me. Ill fight for you anyway, if thats what you want, and if I live then you keep your word, whatever happens, or I will kill him. Not you. Him. Zafir laughed again. 'Its a trick I learned from a dragon.

'You will ride! Liang hurried out, heading for the surface. When she looked back, Zafir was walking in long slow strides, falling away behind her. 'Come on! Run! Run for me! But Zafir only laughed.

'Its my death, witch, and Ill come to it in my own time. Ill have that much.

Liang almost turned back to drag her, but no good would come of it and the rider-slave would overpower her with ease. For the third time in as many minutes she clenched her wand and almost killed the woman. There was a battle right over their heads. Time mattered, urgency was everything but no, Zafir never ran. A slave, but the dragon-queen always came as though the world was supposed to wait for her. Liang raced on, as fast as her tortured legs would take her. As she did, she whispered a chant to Feyn Charin, the first navigator, begging him for patience.

The dragon yard was a seething mora.s.s of fighting men, yelling and shouting and scrambling between the ruin of the hatchery and the fallen gla.s.s.h.i.+p. Thunderclaps and flashes dazed and dazzled and the ever-present wind shrieked through everything, tearing at word and thought. Liang stood bewildered by the light and the noise. Another gla.s.s.h.i.+p hovered overhead, its rim glowing bright and angry. There were soldiers everywhere, Vespinese in gla.s.s-and-gold armour with their lightning wands, some with huge crossbows strapped to their other arm instead of a s.h.i.+eld. She almost didnt see as a Vespinese turned towards her and pointed his wand, barely a dozen steps away.

Chay-Liang ducked back into the tunnel mouth and willed her gold-gla.s.s...o...b..into a s.h.i.+eld. Lightning cracked over its surface. The soldier started towards her and raised his crossbow. She jumped aside and he missed but the crossbow reloaded itself as she watched. She fired her own wand as he came at her. Lightning fizzed over his armour and sparked between his fingers but it wouldnt do any more than daze, not with a gla.s.s-and-gold skin; and then another soldier, one of Tsens, loomed behind him and caved in his skull with an ashgar.

'Enchantress! Look to yourself! The soldier pointed across the dragon yard and turned and ran to where the gondola from the last gla.s.s.h.i.+p had opened and more Vespinese were spilling out, throwing lightning all around them. The gla.s.s.h.i.+ps cannon fired and rang her ears with a dazzling moment of light. She reeled, and then a stream of rockets streaked up from behind her, blowing two of the stabiliser discs in the gla.s.s.h.i.+ps heart to pieces. Fragments of shattered gold-gla.s.s as big as horses fell like rain around the gondola, breaking into a million glittering shards as they hit the stone of the eyrie, crus.h.i.+ng and skewering the men beneath them. The spinning gla.s.s disc tipped slowly sideways and began to drift.

'Slave! Liang screamed back into the pa.s.sage. Shed have to protect the rider-slave from those crossbows as well as lightning then, and the dragon was right over on the far wall. b.l.o.o.d.y woman would b.l.o.o.d.y well learn to run once she got up here! That or shed die. Cant ride? My skinny a.r.s.e she cant ride! 'Slave! Tsens knights were being hammered but were holding their own. Shed never seen these crossbows before, never anything like them but they were clearly enchanter-made. She reshaped her gold-gla.s.s into a wider s.h.i.+eld and peered back outside, looking for Bellepheros.

Flashes of lightning cracked in among shouts and screams. The last gla.s.s.h.i.+p slewed drunkenly over the edge of the eyrie and disappeared. The chains on the gondola snapped taut and tore it across the yard. Men caught in them howled as they were dragged away. Vespinese or Tsens she couldnt tell, but either way she couldnt do anything to help them. The gondola smashed into the wall. The chains snapped. Three of them whipped back across the dragon yard, slicing men apart as cleanly as an Elemental Mans blade. Liang ducked and winced as a sled shot over the wall behind her. She loosed a lightning bolt in its wake.

'Slave! Zafir! She couldnt see Belli anywhere. Up by the dragon, maybe? Even now no one dared go near it. Still no sign of the dragon-queen but just maybe that wasnt going to matter Shondas soldiers might be better but Tsen had more, and now that the last of the gla.s.s.h.i.+ps was gone they had no cannon left to turn the tide. Hard to be sure in the chaos but perhaps the first attack was going to fail! And the bulk of Shondas fleet was still a mile or two away. Liang whipped around. They didnt need her here, not right now. What they needed was for her to go back down and drag that heartless wh.o.r.e to the surface by her hair and carry her onto the back of the dragon if she had to . . .

Zafir was right there, head c.o.c.ked, an amused smirk on her face. 'Enchantress?

Liang pointed to Diamond Eye perched on the wall. 'Go on then.

'Do you have a sword for me? Some sort of weapon would be helpful.

'The dragon, you stupid woman. Beside herself, Liang lunged and slammed her palms into Zafirs chest.

Zafir pursed her lips. 'I cant, she said, and as the words hung between them, she pointed to the wall where the dragon sat as a new wave of Vespinese soldiers on gla.s.s sleds whipped past and swarmed into the dragon yard, filling the air with lightning. Scores of them. Hundreds, perhaps. Too many to resist. Liang spat and ground her teeth.

'Go, slave! Serve your master.

Zafir glared and didnt move. Some sort of animal snarl forced itself out of Liangs throat, the sort of sound she didnt even know she could make. She lunged at Zafir again. Zafir caught her arms, spun her round and pinned them behind her back. The rider-slave hissed in her ear, dripping with venom, 'I already told you, witch, that I cant do that just now. I took a potion to hide from that hatchling and so I cant ride. She let go and they faced each other, Zafir looking down on her, cold and haughty. 'And the truth is, witch, that I would if I could, but not for you, because why would I? These are men from the mountain king, are they not? Why would I save you from them? Im just a slave, and one master is as good as the next, and you would never let me go. None of you ever do. At least this one might not hang me. But if I could, Id fly. Because that is what I am.

Liang took a step away and stroked the lightning inside her wand up to its brightest. She levelled it at Zafirs face. There really wasnt any reason now, was there, not to kill this viper that Tsen had brought among them?

Zafir watched calmly. 'I dont think you have it in you, Chay-Liang. But if you do, then have done with it. She slowly walked past Liang out into the frenzy of the dragon yard and tipped back her head to look at the stars. 'My dragon stands on the far wall. Bellepheros sits between his feet. Have a thought for him.

Chay-Liang raised the wand and aimed it at the middle of the dragon-riders back. She counted slowly to five. Then lowered it again.

10.

The Regrettable Man Tsen was in his bath, irritably scratching at his finger, when the Vespinese came. Bronzehand was being insistent tonight, trying to reach him again and again, and Tsen was steadfastly ignoring him because he didnt think that either of them had much to say, not when Bronzehand was a world away in the jungles of Qeled. Theyd all be like that now, all of QuaiShus heirs, or at least they would once they knew what hed done. Bunkered up and watching from a good safe distance, trying to make sure they didnt get caught in the wreckage, watching in case they could pick up any pieces for themselves. It made Tsen unreasonably cross and he was almost minded to take off Bronzehands ring and write him a little letter and show it to him, telling him exactly what he thought of them all. Hardly matters now. Ill be dead soon enough.

The bathhouse door opened. He looked up and felt a vague sense of relief as Kalaiya walked in through the steam, carrying a thick towel. She slid between the circle of white stone arches, climbed the steps and sat at the edge of the water beside him. He hadnt asked for her tonight but it was hardly a surprise that she came anyway. She knew his moods and when she was wanted. She had an instinct. Her movements were quick and sharp and shed clearly come with a purpose in mind.

Without thinking much about it he reached out for her hand. 'Bronzehands being a right . . . His words stuttered and failed as she drew back and opened her robe. She wore tight silks underneath, as black as midnight, clothes hed never seen on her before. She unfolded the towel and inside were more of the same. The biggest surprise came when he saw the Watchers bladeless knife, which hed taken to keeping in his room.

'Tsen. Her voice was strange. Strained and not her own at all. She held out a hand to him. 'Tsen! Shonda comes. Now. Its time to go.

Baros Tsen stared up at this new Kalaiya and frowned at her. This was a Kalaiya hed never seen. He smiled, but nothing about her smiled back and so his own quickly faded to a frown. 'Who are you today, my love?

She beckoned him out of the bath, fingers twitching with impatience. 'Whose face do you see, Tsen? Im who Ive always been. She sounded more like herself now than when shed first spoken. Softer. Kinder. 'Im the slave youve always known. She sighed. When Tsen made no move towards her, she dropped her hand. 'When would be a convenient time? she asked. 'In a few days? Is that long enough to set your affairs in order, Baros Tsen TVarr? Except, knowing you, youd ask for years. She smiled a little. 'And how shall it be? A knife? A metal wire garrotte? For you perhaps the ecstatic poison of the Shabbahk, laced into your apple wine. I would have done that for you.

Tsen gaped. 'Youre one of them? All this time and youre one of them?

He looked for the inner voices that would tell him he should have seen this coming for years, but for once they were silent, as stunned as the rest of him. His Kalaiya was a Regrettable Man? No. Not possible. It simply couldnt be.

'Dont be an idiot of course Im not! She crouched at the edge of the bath. 'Shonda is here. Now. He will kill you and the truth will die. We have to leave.

Tsen shook his head. 'Youre not Kalaiya. I dont know who you are but youre not my Kalaiya.

'Someone sent me to murder you a long time ago, Baros Tsen TVarr. And I chose otherwise. Her voice was still different. Everything about her, her manners, her expressions, the words she chose, the way she moved, all of it was wrong as though the Kalaiya hed known for a dozen years had been nothing but a mask. Perhaps she had. Hed often wondered if she secretly detested him, or if she simply put up with him because she was a slave and he was her master and everything he thought they had between them was in fact nothing at all. But this? This?