Death's Angels

  He told himself not to get cocky. There was always the possibility of some Inquisition trap. One of the rival Brotherhoods might be involved. It never paid to underestimate the cunning of those sorcerous conspiracies. The organisations had not survived through a thousand years of Terrarch oppression by recruiting stupid men.

  He thought of how long it had taken him to reach his current position, the layers of deceit he had needed to penetrate; the endless succession of oaths he had been required to swear and deadly missions he had been required to perform, the tests he had needed to pass. And he reminded himself he still had no idea how many levels lay above him and who ultimately he reported to.

  He could see the sense of that. After all, of all the members of his cell, Bertragh, the leader, was the only one who knew who Zarahel was. The cell structure made the Brotherhood more difficult to destroy. No one member could betray too much.

  He had to admit, he had still been shocked when Alzibar showed up out of the purple, bearing all the required signs and talismans to command his obedience. He had never expected a Terrarch to be a member of the Brotherhood although the Exalted sorcerer had swiftly convinced him of his sincerity and the actuality of his position.

  Some of the things he had let slip had been disturbing though. Alzibar had been in the East, had spent time in the Dark Empire and seemed to feel some loyalty to it. Zarahel was not reassured by the thought that ultimately the whole organisation might be a tool of Sardean foreign policy, that the money and the weapons he had supplied the hill-men with had come from the East, and not secret human benefactors.

  “I am sure. His mark was on the folio page. The text was written in Exalted Script. It was the third volume of a set of what I am absolutely certain is the Book of Skardos annotated by our Brother Alzibar himself.”

  “And you let them walk out of your warehouse with it?” Try as he might, Zarahel could not keep the anger out of his voice. He was irritated. His familiar had started biting him. The bites themselves were not so bad; they were quite pleasurable in fact. In small doses the beast’s poison was a euphoric drug but small itchy blisters had risen everywhere he was bitten. And he wanted those books very badly. It had been bad enough when he believed them lost forever, but to know they still existed and that this fool had let them go…

  “What else could I do? It was only one volume and they have cached the rest away somewhere.”

  “You could have held them and sent word to me. Believe me I would have made them give up their secrets.”

  “Perhaps.” For all his bookish appearance there was steel in Bertragh. “They did not look like men who would have given up without a fight. They were armed.”

  “You had half a dozen bodyguards within call”

  “They might have been overcome. All three of the soldiers might have been killed.”

  “You might have been killed, you mean. My hill-men were upstairs. So was I. You could have sent for us. Believe me, I could have over-powered them myself if need be.”

  “You told me you prefer not to be seen. And I would prefer our association to remain secret. It would not have done to have those soldiers witness a Selari factor consorting with hill-men.”

  “No witnesses would have survived,” said Zarahel.

  Bertragh gave him a cold smile. “Many things could still have gone wrong. If those men died you would have been none the wiser about what they knew. This way we are certain to get what we want.”

  Zarahel could see the wisdom of what the factor was saying. Diplomacy seemed called for. “Forgive me, my friend. It is merely excitement and anticipation that made me speak that way. You did the right thing.”

  “We will get the books quickly enough. Those soldiers will sell them to us. Why would they not? We are offering them a lord’s ransom.”

  Zarahel considered this. “There might be some who would come asking questions if three common soldiers show up with so much money.”

  “I have thought about that. Let them bring the books and then you can do with them what you will.”

  Zarahel grinned. “And you will get your gold back.”

  “An excellent arrangement, don’t you think?”

  “Most excellent. Who will care if three soldiers show up dead in the Pit? Especially if they are ones who were known to have hill-men seeking vengeance against them.”

  Rik walked through the gloom, ignoring the chatter of his comrades. Events were moving beyond his control. It looked like he would have to give up the books to the factor. A small part of him was almost relieved. He would swap the texts for money, and enjoy the spoils for a little while. But part of him seethed with a barely suppressed rage to possess them. Their effect on the merchant shouted that they were a thing of great value. Bertragh’s attitude virtually spelled out that they contained secrets worth more than gold.

  A look at his companion’s faces told him that there was no way he could ever make them appreciate this. They wanted the money, and were happy with the prospect of getting it. Perhaps they were right. Perhaps the lust for the thing he felt was a warning to Rik. Perhaps the books were a danger to his immortal soul. Perhaps the price of their secrets was more than any man should pay, and they should best be left to the merchant or his master.

  And yet, deep within himself, Rik felt that even if the price was his soul, he would be willing to pay it. Just the thought of the possession of such diabolic knowledge thrilled him in a way that it should not. He found, much to his shame, that part of him was keen to possess forbidden secrets. That part thought even damnation might be preferable to his current place in the world. A sour smile quirked his lips. At least then, he would be somebody, he thought.

  This was a futile exercise, he realised. Even if he owned the books, he was a long way from being able to use them. He had neither the skills to decipher the text nor the power to invoke any of the secrets the text might contain. Should he keep the books, he would most likely still be a nobody, a worm looking up at the stars. A strange soft despair gnawed at him, even as he listened to the boasting of his comrades.

  At that moment a sense of the wrongness of things overtook him. It was not right that he or any other man should be made to feel this way. There was something deeply flawed with the ordering of the world when anybody’s spirit could be so crushed down by the way things were. He felt the first stirrings of the rage that the Clockmaker must have felt, and all the other rebels he had fought. Somewhere, somehow, he thought, things had to change. This world would have to be put right, and somehow he would have to find a way to contribute to that.

  The moment passed, leaving him feeling strangely empty. The world did need to be put right, he thought, but not just yet. The doorway of Mama Horne’s emerged from the darkness. Now there were diversions to be had, and a mind to be put back to sleep.

  Rena was waiting for him.

  Sardec strode the boundaries of the camp and looked up at the stars. It was the last night of Mourning and he felt the need of prayer and contemplation. Down below he could see the lanterns of the sentries. From the hilltop, he could see the stars emerge through a break in the clouds.

  It came to him then that those were not the stars of Home. They were not the stars under which his people had been born and under whose light their civilisation had been raised up. The moon in the sky was not the orb that had filled the night of Al’ Terra. It was like it but not exactly the same, just as this world was like the home-world but not exactly so.

  He paused for a moment and spoke a prayer. He knew of the discussions of the mages and philosophers who claimed that all the worlds of the great cosmos were the same world, and all of them were in some ways twisted reflections of all the others. He had heard the claims all worlds were pale shadows of some central and perfect world.

  He was not in a position to know. He knew only that the Shadow argument was a heresy that had bedevilled his people ever since they set foot on this world. Certain sects claimed that if this world was but a shadow of home, it must belo
ng to the great enemy, and that his people were tainted by their mere presence here.

  Certainly such an interpretation was easy to support. His people were diminished. Their numbers were increasing once more but their purity was lessened. It was almost as if the presence of so many men had contaminated them by their nearness, and the Terrarchs were becoming more like the lesser breed they must live alongside. They were losing sight of their glorious past, and becoming dwellers in this tawdry age. Perhaps there was some way of regaining their former glory but he could not see it. Only by passing once more through the Eye of the Dragon and reclaiming their ancestral home could they hope to do that, and this was an impossibility. Even could they overcome the Princes of Shadow, Al’ Terra could no longer be the place it once was. It had been tainted by the victory of the Shadow.

  It was said that the people of the East thought differently now, and bent all their thoughts to opening the forbidden paths back to Al’Terra and cleansing their home-world. He wondered how much of that was Scarlet propaganda and how much the simple truth. Maybe Arachne’s people had the right of it anyway. Perhaps it would be better to pass through the gate once more, to conquer or die in a final blaze of glory. Surely that would be preferable to this long, slow fading away.

  He told himself that these were gloomy thoughts, and although perhaps suitable for the last night of Mourning in that sense, they were inappropriate for a time when he should be considering the sacrifices of the Fallen, and the Promises the Dragon Angel had made for the future. Had she not said she would return, and lead her people once more to their destiny? He knew he should have more faith, but he knew he did not live in a time that reassured the faithful, that there was something awry in the state of the world, and that many things would have to be set right once more.

  He reached the top of the hill, and considered the camp below him. He could hear the bellowing of wyrms, and caught their acrid scent on the wind. Beyond the camp he could see the town. The great rotating lantern atop the Dragonspire burned bright and fierce, ready to guide any night-flying dragon rider to the temple. The tower atop Asea’s palace blazed with a light to rival it, as if the Lady of the First was at this very moment working some sinister and powerful sorcery.

  Tomorrow was Solace. Tomorrow he would attend Asea’s ball and see her once more. She was a daunting figure but, now he had time to consider, there seemed to be undercurrents to the situation that were intriguing, if she were not just leading him on for her own unguessable purposes.

  He decided that he did not like being a fish on the end of anyone’s line. He did not like the feel of being out of control.

  Tomorrow was Solace, he repeated to himself, feeling a faint thrill of anticipation, a time of license and extravagance when anything was possible. When masked revellers caroused in the streets, and sometimes even the most restrained Terrarch lay with human.

  That thought excited him, and he wished that it did not.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Rena surprised Rik by handing him a package. She smiled and looked a little embarrassed as if she half expected him to reject it but he took it from her hand and rose from the bed. They were in the same room in which he woken the previous day. This was getting to be a habit, he thought. He was not sure if he liked the idea. Sabena had left him wary of being close to any woman.

  “What is it?”

  “A Solace Gift,” she said. Now he felt a little embarrassed. He had nothing to give her but some coin. It was not something he had expected from one of Mama Horne’s girls.

  “Thank you.”

  “Open it if you like.” He unwrapped the package and discovered a small prayer crystal on a copper chain. It was inscribed with Malok, the Elder Sign of protection. He performed a swift valuation and judged that it had probably cost the girl all the money he had given her and perhaps a bit more.

  “This was unnecessary,” he said with more coldness than he intended. Malok was a sign traditionally given by parents, wives or sweethearts to those going into peril. He was more touched than he cared to let on. No one, not even the Old Witch, had ever given him such a gift before.

  “I wanted to give you it. The spell-carver said it would keep you safe on your travels. It’s a very powerful ward, he said. And you are going to war.”

  “Then I thank you for it, and am glad to have it. I am sorry but I have nothing to give you in return.”

  “I did not give you it in expectation of anything of the sort,” she said. “I just want you to live and come back so that maybe I can see you again.”

  She was obviously hoping for him to say something. Something more was going on here than he had expected. Things had become more ambiguous than the simple commercial relationship of soldier and brothel girl, even he was prepared to admit that. He had been half-looking for her when they had come back to Ma Horne’s last night and he had not been surprised when she approached him.

  “I am sure you will see me again,” he said, the lie being easier than anything else, for he was not sure whether he wanted to do so, or to even acknowledge the small claim she seemed to be making on him. It was perfectly possible, he told himself, that he would march away from here and never see her again, and not regret it at all, but now was not the time to mention that.

  She grabbed him and kissed him with more emotion than he expected and it came to him that she was not really seeing him at all, but the promise of something that she held in her own mind. There was no way she could really know him. If truth be told, there was no way he wanted anybody to really know him. He was certain that if they did, they would be horrified.

  “I worry about you,” she said and then shut her mouth swiftly as if she had said too much.

  “There’s nothing to worry about.”

  “There’s the hill-men. There’s whatever strange business you and your friends are involved in. There’s the fact you are going to war soon.”

  “If I don’t worry about them, why should you?”

  “That’s all the more reason to worry. Put the prayer crystal on.” Somewhat reluctantly he did so, and he had to admit he felt better for it.

  “This must have cost you a fortune,” he said. “Let me pay you for it.”

  “No,” she said swiftly. “It’s a gift. I don’t want anything for it. Such things should be given freely and unstintingly to be effective. That’s what the spell-carver said.”

  “He would. It lets him jack up his prices and claim it will increase the effectiveness of his wares.”

  “Are you always so cynical about everything?” He considered it for a moment.

  “Yes,” he said at last.

  “Maybe you should try being less so. The whole world is not your enemy.”

  “Maybe.” She playfully punched him and they wrestled on the bed, until their play turned into something else entirely.

  “Good morning, Halfbreed” said Weasel as Rik and Rena entered the saloon. He sat alone at the table playing patience. The girls he had been with the night before were nowhere to be seen.

  “A pleasant Solace to you,” said Rik.

  “We should get back to the camp, pick up the stuff and get ready for Solace night.”

  “It’s going to be a big party,” said Rena. “Solace always is.”

  Weasel produced some coin. He tossed it to the girl. “Go get yourself a nice mask,” he said. “I want to talk with your boyfriend alone.”

  “More of your mysterious business?” Rena asked.

  “You guessed it - now scat!”

  Rena went. Weasel looked at Rik. Rik met his stare openly.

  “You been telling her anything?” he asked. “Men sometimes say things as they shouldn’t when they are a-bed with a pretty lass.”

  “It’s the Barbarian you should worry about. You know me better.”

  “Aye, I do.”

  “So?”

  “So why do I feel there’s something I should know about?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There?
??s something odd going on with you right now, Rik.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Me neither. Something’s bothering you, something about the books. I noticed it last night.”

  Weasel was acute. Rik had to give him that. The man’s instincts were very sound. Rik considered his reply carefully.

  “This whole business makes me uneasy. These are magician’s books. Who the hell wants a dark sorcerer’s books? I think this might be Brotherhood business. I think Bertragh might be Brotherhood.” Rik knew that invoking the ancient sorcerous conspiracies would make Weasel uneasy, and that would help explain his own unease. No one really knew what the Brotherhoods were about; mostly they were associated with tales of demon worship and human sacrifice. As he considered the matter, Rik thought his lie might even contain more than a grain of truth.

  “He might be. In which case that’s a good reason to dump the books as quick as possible.”

  “And I don’t like Bertragh,” Rik said. “And I don’t trust him.”

  “Me neither but I like his gold, and if it talks to me sweetly I will believe it too.”

  “He was too keen to buy. He agreed to our price too quickly.”

  “You think we could get more?” Weasel asked.

  “I think we could get dead.”

  “Keep talking.”

  “If these books are so valuable, and so filled with dark secrets, will he really want us around afterwards, our fists filled with gold, our guts filled with beer? We might talk to the wrong people.”

  “Killing us might cause people to ask the wrong questions, too.”