As the night dragged on, Mr. Nettle crouched among rain-damp wood and piles of rubble, afraid even to light his storm lamp. The smell of rot and ash soaked into his clothes and skin, and stayed there. Stars blinked through the lattice of beams above. No more airships passed overhead, but he heard the distant tremble of their engines from another part of the city. One of them had crashed earlier. None of his business.
Across the lane, the tower kept its secrets in silence.
After a long while the bars of sky visible overhead began to lighten. Angles of wood and rubble stood out more distinctly against the charred brick. The hum of airships faded with the sounds of dawn: birds chirruping, distant shouts and muted clanging from the shipyards.
It grew hot, humid, as morning laboured towards afternoon under a leaden sky. Mr. Nettle shifted position, trying to ease the numbness in his joints. He rubbed tired eyes, then pulled out the flask of water and handful of raisins that were all that remained of his provisions. Both tasted of ash.
His head slumped with fatigue. His clothes, thick with grime, grated against countless small wounds. He cricked his neck and tried to get comfortable. The weight of the cleaver against his leg reassured him.
Murder isn’t something to be relished. Abigail sounded exhausted.
He was too tired to argue.
Gods, how he needed a drink. His gut ached for it. To pull himself back he gripped the handle of the cleaver tightly in his lacerated fist. Something was bothering him: it gnawed at the back of his mind like a rat he could hear but not see. It was something important the Poisoner had said; something Mr. Nettle had since forgotten.
Whatever it was would come to him in time. With some effort he released his grip on the cleaver and slumped back away from the window. The loose bricks all around ground more ash into his clothes. His hands and nails were black from it.
The bastard couldn’t stay in there for ever.
All afternoon the sun made no appearance, cast no shadows. The air stayed thick and humid, almost smothered the distant pounding and clanking from the Scythe shipyards, the shouts of workers, and the occasional chime of bells from the temple.
Mr. Nettle blinked sweat from his eyes, closed them for a moment, distantly aware of the drone of engines.
Something was wrong. Mr. Nettle was suddenly inside Devon’s apartments. In his hand, a Cutter’s blade—an assassin’s weapon.
Devon sat there grinning, his head a hideous tapestry of broken skin.
The Poisoner held up a small bottle, in which blood-coloured liquid roiled and sighed, lapping the glass in slow waves, and Mr. Nettle realized there were whispers coming from the fluid, faint moans and cries of grief. This was wrong too: the angelwine had been clear. No, that had been a trick—a bottle of Rhak. He wasn’t thinking clearly. This here was the true elixir.
The Poisoner spoke, but no sound came from his lips.
Mr. Nettle closed on Devon sluggishly, as though wading through chest-high water. He tried to stab the Poisoner, forcing his arm to the motion. But the knife was gone, his hand now empty.
A silent laugh from Devon, cold amusement in his eyes.
Mr. Nettle backed away, felt the window sill behind him. He turned, dragged himself out into a darkness so complete it felt like the abyss itself. Somewhere overhead an airship buzzed like an angry wasp. He reached for the drainpipe he knew was there.
Nothing. Just brick, black and soft with ash.
He felt the Poisoner’s hands on his back, pushing, and suddenly he was falling. The buzzing of the airship filled his head…and, somewhere distant, Abigail screaming.
He woke with a jolt. Darkness, ash, engine noise. For a few heartbeats he sat confused, trying to clear the fog from his mind, and then he remembered where he was. He sat bolt upright and peered again out of the window. The alley was empty, faintly silver under moon-drenched clouds. The tower door was still shut.
Mr. Nettle wiped his eyes. He must have slept late into the night. The search for Devon had obviously returned to this district. An airship thrummed somewhere nearby, out of sight.
Was Devon still inside the tower?
An image from his dream flitted back to him. How the knife in his hand had disappeared.
Suddenly he was fully awake and swamped with dread. The nagging doubt at the back of his mind had resurfaced: the forgotten implications of Devon’s conversation with the assassin. He realized he wouldn’t be able to kill the Poisoner after all.
Once the angelwine was potent, Devon would take a sip. Mr. Nettle had accepted that. There would still be enough left to restore Abigail. But he’d overlooked the effect it would have on Devon. Like a dirge, the Poisoner’s words came back to him.
Mortal wounds would become mere scratches.
How could he kill such a man?
Now, before it was too late; he had to stop Devon now . He had to reach him before he took a sip of the angelwine. Mr. Nettle surged to his feet.
The tower door opened.
A temple guard stepped into the lane, his battered armour full of pools of moonlight. His face was shadowed by his helm, but Mr. Nettle recognized him from before. Over his shoulder he carried a shrouded corpse, in his hand his dead colleague’s helmet. The bloodhound loped out of the tower beside him, sniffed the air, and then set off in the direction of the temple.
One of the guards had survived.
So Devon was dead.
Mr. Nettle’s heart thumped with too many rapid questions. The angelwine? Was it potent? Could it still be in the tower? Or would the guard take it to the temple? Either way, he had to find it—quickly, before the priests destroyed it. Mr. Nettle slipped down from his hiding place and went to search the tower for his daughter’s soul.
If he hadn’t already abandoned God, he would have prayed.
18
TROUBLE IN THE SANCTUM
DILL WOKE, GASPING,from a nightmare of blood and scars. The echo of a hollow, wicked laugh faded to the sound of bells clanging. His brow was slick with sweat, his chest tight. One of his wings lay curled under him, numb where he had twisted in his sleep. He rose slowly, winced as needles of pain stitched his crumpled muscles.
While he brushed his feathers flat, he tried to shake that evil laugh from his mind. Carnival had haunted his dreams more frequently of late. The lacerations on her skin were always fresh, always inches from his face, the darkness in her eyes a mocking challenge.
Always black. How could an angel sustain such rage? For so long…?
He shivered despite the warmth of his cell.
Morning brooded behind the stained-glass window. Mountains of grey cloud had rolled in with the dawn and threatened more rain. The air hung heavy as a damp curtain.
Dressing himself was like struggling into armour. His black velvet jacket and boots were crisscrossed with snail tracks—not that it mattered. With Devon still at large, perhaps still looting souls for his angelwine, and Scar Night drawing near, no one would pay Dill much attention. By the time he was done dressing he already felt tired. He sheathed the sword at his hip, and trudged off to work.
Borelock was already waiting for him in the Sanctum corridor. The priest muttered something vague about the damned weather and handed the reins to Dill, but said nothing more about the toppled relic. In front of the soulcage the twin mares drooped their heads, their coats already shining with sweat. Dill flicked the reins and they huffed and clopped away with an air of resignation. Even the skeletons above appeared to slouch in their chains.
The temple doors opened on to a flat grey-white heat that forced Dill to blink and turn away. A heavy silence hung over Gatebridge. Behind the gathered dead, the mourners shifted in their heavy robes. One of the guards barked an order, and the others moved slowly to load the soulcage.
It wasn’t until Dill had wheeled the soulcage round and brought it back into the darkness of the corridor that he noticed the temple guard who accompanied him. At first Dill thought the man must be injured. He walked unsteadily, hunched o
ver, and he carried his pike more like a crutch than a weapon. His armour was dented and scratched. He must have sensed the angel peering at him, for he glanced up, and Dill then saw the sickly pallor of his skin, the dark crescents under his eyes, the pain barely concealed.
Dill turned away, ashamed and embarrassed. This man had claimed his right to accompany the dead. Someone he mourned must be inside the cage.
For the rest of the journey Dill kept his eyes averted. He tried to slow the horses to make it easier for the man to keep up. But the mares, long used to this task, chose their own pace. The guard, however, somehow managed to follow just a few steps behind, the clink of his armour punctuating the rhythmic creak of the soulcage’s wheels.
There was no breeze to cool the Sanctum. Deep in their iron hedge, the candles wavered briefly as the doors swung shut behind the departing horses. Presbyter Sypes slouched at his lectern while Adjunct Crumb sat crumpled in a chair at his side. Both men stared at the floor.
Sweat plastered over his face, and, panting in the heat, the guard dragged the chain over to attach to the soulcage. Dill climbed on top of the cage, ready to adjust the hook. He wondered which of these shrouded bodies the guard mourned for. Would the guard even recognize it?
The angel reached down to receive the chain. But the guard did not hand it up to him. Instead, he did something astonishing.
He lifted his pike, aimed it at Dill, and demanded, “Give me the key.”
Dill stared in amazement.
Presbyter Sypes straightened. “Guard?”
“The soulcage key. Give me it,” the guard growled, pressing the sharp tip of his pike into Dill’s chest.
Pain nipped Dill between his ribs. He recoiled, but the guard pressed even harder.
“Now!”
Dill tossed him the key.
Presbyter Sypes rapped his walking stick on the flagstones. “What the blazes is going on?” Adjunct Crumb had risen suddenly from his chair and stood beside him, pallid and wide-eyed.
The guard unlocked the soulcage and climbed in.
“Get out of there,” the Presbyter hissed. “What do you think you’re doing?”
The guard was tearing open one of the shrouds.
“Guard, have you lost your senses?”
Dill peered down through the soulcage bars. The man was grabbing handfuls of cloth and pulling them loose from a corpse.
The corpse stood up.
Dill jerked away in horror and nearly fell off the cage. The corpse’s skin was red and peeling, its eyelids slack. Wisps of white hair curled around blisters, above ears that looked torn and chewed. Worst of all, it was still bleeding.
The cadaver shed the rest of its shroud, then took out a pair of gold, thin-rimmed spectacles from its waistcoat pocket and perched them on its nose.
Then Dill recognized it.
“What a day.” The Poisoner hopped down from the cage. Nothing of his grin belonged to his face: it was a grin wholly owned by the skull inside. “Even the dead are sweating.”
Presbyter Sypes and Adjunct Crumb both gaped.
The guard reclaimed his pike as he followed Devon out of the soulcage. He staggered two or three steps, his gaze sweeping dizzy circles across the floor.
Adjunct Crumb found his voice first. “You’ve decided to give yourself up?”
Devon uttered a curse, his red lips peeling back from skeletal teeth. “Does that seem remotely likely, Fogwill? Is there no link between your mouth and brain? Are you wholly unconnected inside?” The Poisoner mopped his brow with a soiled handkerchief, causing blisters to burst and to leak fluids.
“Soldier!” Presbyter Sypes shook his stick. “Arrest this man.”
The guard clutched his pike with whitened knuckles. He inclined his head towards the Poisoner and hissed, “The pain…I can’t…”
“Soon enough, Angus,” Devon replied. He turned to the Presbyter, who was edging closer to the bellpull that would summon the temple guards. “He won’t help you, Sypes. Move an inch closer to that rope and I’ll have him split you where you stand.”
The Presbyter halted and whispered, “What have you done to him?”
“He has already betrayed his comrade in order to live. Betraying the Church came somewhat more easily.” There was a note of sorrow in Devon’s voice. “Faith, like iron, is strong but brittle. It can support great weights of doubt, and yet a small amount of pressure in just the right place will snap it.” He made a motion like a hammer tap. “One only has to witness Ichin Tell’s…performances to see how easily suffering can shatter faith. Too much of it destroys the man, too little merely strengthens the resolve and extends the whole process.” He grimaced at the guard, as though he found the sight of him distasteful. “This unfortunate fellow suffers from a painful affliction which can either be eased with serum or allowed to proceed on its natural course. He serves me because he wants to live.”
“He won’t save you,” the Presbyter said to the guard. “For God’s sake, help us now and save your soul.”
“There’s a bargain to die for.” Devon sneered. “Even now, you promote faith over belief. Believe me, Sypes, the fate of your soul matters less when every drop of your blood is screaming out for another hour of life. Just look at him!”
The guard winced.
“I had hoped this would not prove necessary,” Devon said, his expression hardening. “The poison inside him is rare and expensive. But I was forced to use it, wasn’t I, Angus?”
Angus nodded like a berated child.
“A concealed knife!” Devon said, indignant. He looked at Presbyter Sypes as though he expected the old priest to share his own disapproval of such an action. “This man attempted to murder me the moment I loosened his chains.”
The Presbyter frowned. “I imagine you have that effect on many people. So what do you want?”
Devon’s spectacles glinted in the candlelight. “What do I want?” He regarded Presbyter Sypes for a few moments. “I want to show you a miracle.” From his waistcoat he produced a syringe full of blood-coloured liquid. “You know what this is?”
“Don’t do this,” the Presbyter said. “Not here. Let’s speak in private.”
Devon rolled back his sleeve. “We’ll speak, Sypes, but later.” He glanced at Fogwill and then at Dill. “This requires temple witnesses.” He brought the syringe to his arm and slipped the needle under his skin. “Of course, I had intended to find a smoked glass bottle for it, or a gold-laced phial, something more appropriate…” A tiny amount of liquid disappeared into his vein. “But ultimately a common syringe seemed more practical.” Devon removed the needle and held out his arms like a showman. “Now watch.”
“Mad as a broom,” Presbyter Sypes muttered.
If anyone had asked Dill later to recount the subsequent events there in the Sanctum, he would have been unable to say exactly what had happened or in which order they had happened. Events, as he remembered them, unfolded with the speed of a dream.
A flurry of expressions—bliss, wonder, and pain—crossed the Poisoner’s face. But that visage changed from moment to moment and made each expression seem to belong to a different man. Skin paled from red to pink to white, then tightened across Devon’s forehead and underneath his eyes. Blisters shrank, their fluids retreating back inside his flesh. Weeping sores dried and healed. The bleeding stopped. Devon stood before the abyss aperture with his arms outstretched and said, “I can feel them inside.” His eyes brightened with each heartbeat and he searched the floor wildly. “All of them, I can hear…their voices.”
With the attention of both Presbyter and Adjunct fixed on this transformation, and Angus folded over his pike, staring into some faraway place, only Dill noticed the man climbing out of the pit behind Devon. A grapple-hook appeared first on the rim, then a bandaged hand, then another hand, and then the largest, ugliest man Dill had ever seen dragged himself up and into the Sanctum. He wore torn rags that exposed a hundred lacerations. Dirt, blood, and stubble had turned his face into a vi
sion of Hell. His eyes were burning with hate.
The newcomer pulled a cleaver from his belt, raised it.
“Mr. Nettle!” Adjunct Crumb cried, suddenly aware. “The scrounger!”
Devon wheeled drunkenly, arms outstretched.
The massive muscles of the scrounger’s arm bunched, ripping apart seams in his filthy rags. He brought the weapon down with a ferocious swing.
The cleaver severed Devon’s right hand at the wrist. Blood sprayed everywhere. The hand, still firmly clutching the syringe, dropped to the floor.
Devon gaped at his wrist as arcs of blood jetted from the stump. He seemed about to say something, then closed his mouth and stood there, just blinking, for a dozen heartbeats, before finally he clamped his good hand over the wound. Blood sluiced between his fingers, spattered on the Sanctum floor.
Dill had never seen so much blood.
Mr. Nettle picked up the severed hand and held it up like a trophy. The syringe glittered red in the candlelight. “Abigail,” he said.
Devon roared and threw himself at Mr. Nettle, slamming into him. Both men fell sprawling to the floor. The hand flew upwards in a high arc towards the pit.
Mr. Nettle rolled aside and was on his feet instantly. He scrambled, crawled, slipped across the bloody floor, after the hand.
He was too late. Hand and syringe fell into darkness.
Angus had been slow to react, but now he rushed towards the scrounger, raising his pike. Mr. Nettle had his back to him, standing on the edge of the abyss, numbly gazing down.
The temple guard put all of his weight behind the impact. The blow connected with a crack. Mr. Nettle tumbled forward into open space.
In a heartbeat he was gone, swallowed by the abyss.
“No!” Devon cried. He ran to join Angus at the edge of the pit, still clutching the stump of his wrist. Both men stared down into the darkness.
Dill felt his eyes crackle with unknown colours.
Suddenly the Poisoner twisted away, face sour, and stormed back to confront Adjunct Crumb and the Presbyter. “Another of your assassins?”
“Not ours,” the Adjunct said quite calmly. “I believe you murdered that man’s daughter.”