I shook my head.
‘Good,’ said Sister Bismillah.
‘I may have hurt her,’ I admitted.
‘I see,’ she said, and gave me a hug for comfort.
‘I really should have known her,’ she said, ruefully. ‘Our paths had virtually crossed. We were just of different times. It is ironic, I suppose. I’m just glad you got out safely. I should have had more faith in my Beta.’
‘I think Tharpe was Cognitae,’ I said. ‘Do you know what that means?’
Sister Bismillah looked at me in surprise.
‘I do know what that means, Beta. I’m surprised you do. The Cognitae usually covers itself very carefully in other masks. To answer your question, no, she wasn’t. Sister Tharpe was not Cognitae. Her name was Patience Kys, and she was a high-level operative of the Holy Inquisition.’
‘What?’ I exclaimed. ‘How could she be–’
‘She was,’ Sister Bismillah assured me.
‘Please explain this!’ I begged her. ‘I am so lost! There is nothing I can trust!’
‘You can trust me,’ she replied.
Behind us, through the trees, a savage explosion blew out part of the front of Feverfugue house. Flame light licked up into the darkness. The trees around us became partly visible, and suddenly they were casting hard shadows in the orange glare.
We had reached the clearing. I saw the night sky, and a handful of familiar stars, the constellations that watched over Queen Mab at that time of year: Orpheul, Geminus, Sagitar, Lupo.
More explosions rattled the air behind us. We felt the heat of them as a warm wash of air. I heard bolter fire. One of the Traitor Marine factions had, I believe, called in reinforcements.
I scarcely cared. My mental fortitude was exhausted.
Sister Bismillah pulled out a vox hand-held and cued it.
‘Gauntlet wishes Thorn,’ she said. ‘By Moon of Pain, waxing.’
‘Confirmed,’ crackled the vox.
‘Do it well,’ she scolded into the vox. ‘I’m not there to show you how.’
‘Oh blah blah,’ the voice replied. ‘Have some faith.’
She glanced at me.
‘It’s usually my job,’ she said. ‘At least, it used to be. But I knew I had to be the one who came in for you. I was the only one you’d trust.’
‘I do trust you,’ I said. ‘I just don’t know who you are.’
‘I hear engines!’ Lightburn hissed.
So did I. They were powerful engines, main lifter units, but they were also muted as if suppressed for stealth operations. I suddenly realised that part of the night sky above us, a huge black cross, had separated from the rest of the darkness and was descending into the clearing. I saw the pale blue tongues of burner jets. We all felt a fierce down-rush of air. It swished the grass and the black trees.
‘What is that?’ asked Lucrea.
‘It’s called a gun-cutter,’ said Sister Bismillah.
The massive flier settled into the clearing on its landing claws. We felt the thump of its weight underfoot. I heard fallen twigs and branches crack as the claws crushed them. Even though it was dark, I could sense from the silhouette that the craft was heavily armed and armoured. I saw a faint green luminosity coming from the small cockpit windows above the beak nose. A drop hatch opened under the nose, letting greenish light spill out into the clearing.
‘Come,’ said Sister Bismillah. We ducked our heads down into the murmuring downwash and ran for the ramp.
We boarded a half-lit, spartan cargo cabin. As soon as we were in, the ramp closed, and we felt the sway as the craft lifted off. Its engine nose rose. There was a little swing to all motion as it swept up and away from the woodland site. Cables, chains and other suspended instruments along the cargo bay wall sashayed slightly as the nose turned.
‘Follow me,’ said Sister Bismillah, and led us up the short, sloped companionway into the craft’s main passenger space.
A man I knew all too well was waiting for us. He was seated behind one of the built-in tables. The bulk of his frame barely fitted.
‘You made it,’ he said to Sister Bismillah.
‘It was right that I did it,’ she said.
He nodded.
‘Take over from Nayl, please,’ he said. ‘I get so unsettled when he flies.’
Sister Bismillah nodded. She took off her starched wimple, and her red gloves. I realised I had never seen her hands or her hair before. She was much more elegant than I had assumed. She seemed younger too.
Her hands seemed to be covered in some kind of intricate circuitry.
She smiled at me, and then hugged me again.
‘My name is Medea Betancore,’ she said, ‘and I am very glad to be able to greet you properly and honestly at long last, after all these years. Welcome, Alizebeth.’
She broke the embrace and went forwards to what I presumed was the cockpit.
I looked at the man. He was regarding me with no expression. The last time I had seen him we had been in the stone porch of the basilica.
‘I recollect shooting you,’ Lightburn said.
The man nodded.
‘You did. Not very effectively, it seems.’
Lightburn shrugged.
‘You did what you had to do,’ the man said. ‘I bear no grudge. You were protecting her.’
He looked at me.
‘Many people seem hell-bent on protecting me,’ I said. ‘Sister Bismillah is the only still point I’ve known in my life and now I discover she’s… Medea, was it?’
‘Medea Betancore,’ said the man. ‘My pilot, my oldest friend. An Inquisitorial agent of very long standing. She gave up the last two decades of her life to watch over you, girl.’
‘Who are you?’ I asked.
He reached into his heavy coat, wearily pulled out a leather wallet and opened it to show me the ornate rosette within.
‘I am Inquisitor Gregor Eisenhorn,’ he said.
CHAPTER 37
Interrogator
I walked over and sat down at the table facing him.
‘What is my life to you?’ I asked.
‘I value it,’ he said.
‘Why? Because I am an operative of the Holy Ordos?’
He shrugged.
‘You represent a direct connection to someone I once cared for,’ he said. ‘It is a connection I never expected to discover. My team came to Sancour years ago, attempting to infiltrate what we believed to be a heretical coven. Medea was taking point in the field, and discovered you. We altered our plans so we could watch you.’
‘Why?’
‘To protect you,’ he said.
‘As an asset to the Inquisition?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘And as a key to open a vast and treacherous conspiracy. But also, as the living legacy of a lost soul.’
‘Who was that, inquisitor?’
He paused before replying.
‘Her name was Alizebeth Bequin,’ he said. ‘I lost her… many years ago. She was, in effect, your mother. You were… manufactured from her genetic material.’
‘A clone?’ I asked.
He shrugged again.
‘You are her daughter, technically, because you are not identical to her. Not genetically identical. However, you are quite remarkably similar to her.’
‘Your face shows no emotion, sir,’ I said. I had been trying hard to read it.
‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t any more.’
‘But the timbre and pitch of your voice,’ I said, ‘and some of your micro-subtle body language does. I see sadness. Regret. What was she to you, this woman?’
‘A friend,’ he said.
‘More than that?’
‘Perhaps. She was also a blank, a carrier of the pariah gene. That is why her genetic material was used in your manufacture. As an untouchable, she served the Inquisition at my side as an outstanding operative.’
‘What happened to her?’
‘Just a variation on what happens to us all eventu
ally.’
A man came into the cabin space from the direction of the cockpit. Lightburn and Lucrea had taken seats nervously on a wall bench, and regarded him cautiously.
‘I see we’ve got her at last,’ he said.
‘I believe you’ve met Harlon Nayl,’ said Eisenhorn.
‘Yeah, we’ve met,’ Nayl said, glowering at me somewhat. ‘I met her, saved her life, she left me in the lurch to deal with certain death…’
‘If you had identified yourself as a servant of the Inquisition,’ I began. I looked at Eisenhorn. ‘Or if you had…’
Nayl glanced at Eisenhorn.
‘Do we do that still?’ he asked.
‘When it’s useful,’ Eisenhorn replied.
‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ said Nayl.
‘Sister Bismillah,’ I said, ‘told me that another agent of the Inquisition, a Sister Tharpe, led the attack on the Maze Undue. Her real name, I believe, was Patience. Why would that be the case? Why would the Inquisition raid an Inquisition facility?’
The man Nayl looked unhappy and reluctant to answer.
‘Lines of demarcation are difficult to draw clearly sometimes,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘There are many factions on either side. Patience Kys was following the orders of a man who believed that the Maze Undue was a compromised facility.’
‘Do you believe that?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘but not to the same degree, and my approach to dealing with it would have been rather different. For more than twenty years we have been following this case. In prosecution, it requires infinite patience, and not the kind of patience this man used. You need to see the long game, to appreciate how only the most careful long-term strategy can result in a truly worthwhile achievement. The Maze Undue was simply a door that led to something far greater, a vast conspiracy. Attacking that door simply ensured it would be closed.’
‘Are the Cognitae behind the door?’ I asked.
Eisenhorn and Nayl exchanged glances. There was an amused look on Nayl’s face.
‘They are,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘You surprise me.’
‘I notice things.’
‘Clearly,’ said Nayl.
‘Had the Cognitae compromised the Maze Undue?’
‘No,’ said Nayl. ‘They built the damn place.’
I thought about that. It came as no surprise.
‘We were always told we were in training to serve the Inquisition,’ I said.
‘Of course you were,’ said Nayl. ‘It’s easier to explain to ambitious young minds.’
‘I knew, though,’ I said. ‘I suspected. A man came. This was a year and some ago. They said he was Cognitae come to kill us, but he had a rosette. His name on that was Voriet, an interrogator.’
‘Did they kill him?’ asked Nayl.
‘Yes, I saw it done.’
Nayl looked at Eisenhorn. ‘That was when Talon started his investigation on Sancour. Voriet was one of his team. That’s where this mess started to gain traction.’
‘Who is Talon?’ I asked.
‘My rival,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘His approach to this is rather different, as I said. He has come to it lately, and with much more urgency. He is not prepared to wait and see what might develop. His people took down the Maze Undue. He seeks to locate and stop the graels.’
‘Because they are weapons of the King?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ he said. He nodded. ‘Good.’
‘And what do you want?’ I asked. ‘No, wait. I can guess. You don’t want the graels. You want the King.’
Nayl snorted.
‘I do,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘That’s the point. There’s no point hunting for the small fish. It simply allows the big one to swim away. I want the King in Yellow. I want Orphaeus.’
‘For a while, you know,’ I said, ‘I thought you were Orphaeus.’
That made Nayl burst out laughing.
‘Why would you think that?’ asked Eisenhorn.
‘I saw what you did to the Word Bearer,’ I said. ‘You’re not normal.’
‘Stop it,’ Nayl protested, flapping a hand. ‘I’ll wet myself.’
‘What do you want from me?’ I asked Eisenhorn.
‘I want to make sure you’re safe,’ he said.
‘Because of the bond you feel towards my mother? Some duty? Some debt?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘What else?’ asked Lightburn.
We all looked at him.
‘Well, there’s always something else,’ he said.
‘I want you to help me,’ Eisenhorn said to me. ‘I want to recruit you. You are the key to the puzzle. My rival has vast resources at his disposal, many agents and operatives. My options are rather more modest. I have just five operatives. You’ll meet them all. If I am going to win this, and achieve a true victory over heresy, I need to move before Talon blunders in and ruins it all. So I need an advantage. That’s you.’
He looked at me. In many ways, his expressionless face was as chilling as Teke’s constant smile.
‘I want you to help me defeat the King,’ he said.
CHAPTER 38
Bifrost
We flew into the morning and back across the southern limits of Queen Mab. It was a dull, hazy day. Under Medea’s steady hand – I confess I could not think of her as Medea yet, though I also could not reconcile the idea of Sister Bismillah piloting a gun-cutter – we flew through the low cloud, past the great cooling towers of the Farek Tang manufactories, and settled on a rooftop landing platform in the Talltown district west of Feygate.
These were old and weather-beaten buildings, all of dressed grey stone and wrought iron, most of great height and architectural complexity. Talltown had once been one of the finer and more respectable parts of the city, but chemical outfall from the manufactory plants had stained it and spoiled its looks. It was a dignified area, haggard but noble, like a proud old man whose life has been lived full. The jumble of rooftops, zinc gutters, ridge-lines, aerial masts, cables, tin chimneys and tar-paper slopes formed a second landscape far above the ground.
The landing platform served a particular building called Bifrost that Eisenhorn seemed to own or lease. We went in through a scruffy roof dock, and I found the place old but clean enough. It lacked character. The walls were white-washed and the floors tiled. There was some old furniture. It felt rented. It felt borrowed from previous users.
Medea showed us to rooms where we could rest. I was ready to sleep, though I was boiling over with questions. I knew that rest would make the asking of those questions, and the import of the answers I received, more effective.
Lightburn stopped me as I was going to my room.
‘What happens now?’ he asked quietly, watching to make sure we were not being overheard. ‘I do not trust these people any more than any others.’
‘I trust Medea,’ I said.
‘I think that may be a mistake,’ he frowned. ‘As far as I can tell, she’s done nothing but lie to you for twenty years.’
‘It was her function,’ I said.
‘And mine was to fetch you back to Eusebe. That’s my burden. I’ve been trying to do that from the very start, and I’ve been thwarted too often. As far as I’m concerned, that’s what I must do. The people you come from, surely they’re the ones you should trust most?’
I considered this. The Curst made a certain facile sense, but I felt he simply did not understand the complexity of things. My world had become a place of interlocking identities, of falsehoods, of lies slipped inside truths, and of truths locked inside lies. Agendas overlapped, and I did not yet know which I should share and which I should oppose. Sister Bismillah, Medea, had indeed lied to me for twenty years or more, but I felt she had done so for good reason and from a genuine sense of care. Mam Mordaunt and the Maze Undue had cared for me for almost as long, and I felt a habituated loyalty to them, but perhaps that was the more false. They had been raising me for a purpose, like a cash crop. Their apparent care and investment had been selfish.
&nb
sp; Had they intended to make one of their graels out of me, I wondered? Would I have served the King and become one of the Eight? Would a blind, white spider have been encouraged to weave its web-nest in my gullet? Would I have liked that? Would I have fought it?
I believe I would have. I had always thought of myself as a true Imperial servant and a staunch warrior of the Inquisition. If I had been made by the Cognitae, they had not conditioned me to think so. The idea that I was heretic, polluted Cognitae was revolting to me. If they had confronted me with that truth, I would have rejected it.
I think I would have.
I slept on this thought.
When I awoke, it was late afternoon. I hadn’t dreamed. Exhaustion had simply carried me through the hours like a dark river through lightless woods.
Medea had left out fresh clothes for me. I showered in a small, leaky cubicle and put on a blue bodyglove, boots and a worn leather coat. Into the pockets I placed the bent silver pin and the little blue commonplace book, which I had taken back from Renner.
I went down several flights of stairs and found Eisenhorn in a day room, reading data-slates, while Medea sat by a window, drinking caffeine and poring over street maps.
I fetched myself some caffeine from the pot on the stove, and sat down facing Eisenhorn. Here, in the daylight flooding the high room, and the calm away from strife, I could see that he was a noble man, and powerful. I could also see that a long life, perhaps over-long, had treated him cruelly. He was worn and broken, tired and long-suffering, held together by augmetics and calipers. I wondered if he had chosen Talltown as a lair because its character matched his own.
‘You want to catch the King?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Why?’ I asked.
He looked at Medea, who had stopped her work to listen, and she smiled.
‘That’s a good question,’ she said.
‘It’s the question no one asks,’ said Eisenhorn.
‘Because?’ I asked.
‘Because the King in Yellow is a creature of myth,’ he replied. ‘He is folklore. A version of him has existed for centuries, perhaps even longer. The point is, the question can’t be answered in any satisfactory way, because we don’t know enough about him. We don’t know who he is, or what he is; we don’t know his purpose or ambition at all, except that it concerns the immaterium.’