Last Argument Of Kings: Book Three (The First Law 3)

‘Still alive,’ Logen whispered, ‘still alive.’ He crept around the corner of a white building and into the park.

He remembered this place full of people. Laughing, eating, talking. There was no laughter here now. He saw bodies scattered on the lawns. Some armoured, some not. He could hear a distant roar – far-off battle, maybe. Nothing nearer except the hissing of the wind through the bare branches and the crunching of his own footsteps in the gravel. His skin prickled as he crept towards the high wall of the palace.

The heavy doors were gone, only the twisted hinges left hanging in the archway. The gardens on the other side were full of corpses. Armoured men, all dented and bloody. There was a crowd of them on the path before the gate, crushed and broken as though they’d been smashed with a giant hammer. One was sliced clean in half, the two pieces lying in a slick of dark blood.

A man stood in the midst of all this. He had white armour on, speckled and dusted with red. A wind had blown up in the gardens, and his black hair flicked around his face, dark skin smooth and flawless as a baby’s. He was frowning down at a body near his feet, but he looked up at Logen as he came through the gate. Without hatred or fear, without happiness or sadness. Without anything much.

‘You are a long way from home,’ he said, in Northern.

‘You too.’ Logen looked into that empty face. ‘You an Eater?’

‘To that crime I must confess.’

‘We’re all guilty o’ something.’ Logen hefted his sword in one hand. ‘Shall we get to it, then?’

‘I came here to kill Bayaz. No one else.’

Logen glanced round at the ruined corpses scattered across the gardens. ‘How’s that working out for you?’

‘Once you set your mind on killing, it is hard to choose the number of the dead.’

‘That is a fact. Blood gets you nothing but more blood, my father used to tell me.’

‘A wise man.’

‘If only I’d listened.’

‘It is hard, sometimes, to know what is . . . the truth.’ The Eater lifted up his bloody right hand and frowned at it. ‘It is fitting that a righteous man should have . . . doubts.’

‘You tell me. Can’t say I know too many righteous men.’

‘I once thought I did. Now I am not sure. We must fight?’

Logen took a long breath. ‘Looks that way.’

‘So be it.’

He came so fast there was hardly time to lift a sword, let alone swing it. Logen threw himself out of the way but still got caught in the ribs with something – elbow, knee, shoulder. It can be hard to tell when you’re flopping over and over on the grass, everything tumbling around you. He tried to get up, found that he couldn’t. Raising his head an inch was almost more than he could manage. Every breath was painful. He dropped back, staring up at the white sky. Maybe he should’ve stayed outside the walls. Maybe he should’ve just let the lads rest in the trees, until after it was all settled.

The tall shape of the Eater swam into his blurry vision, black against the clouds. ‘I am sorry for this. I will pray for you. I will pray for us both.’ He lifted up his armoured foot.

An axe chopped into his face and sent him staggering. Logen shook the light out of his head, dragged some air in. He forced himself up onto one elbow, clutching at his side. He saw a white-armoured fist flash down and crash onto Shivers’ shield. It ripped a chunk out of the edge and knocked Shivers onto his knees. An arrow pinged off the Eater’s shoulder-plate and he turned, one side of his head hanging bloodily open. A second shaft stuck him neatly through the neck. Grim and the Dogman stood in the archway, their bows raised.

The Eater went pounding towards them with huge strides, the wind of his passing tearing at the grass.

‘Huh,’ said Grim. The Eater rammed into him with an armoured elbow. He crashed into a tree ten strides away and flopped down onto the grass. The Eater raised its other arm to chop at Dogman and a Carl stabbed a spear into him, carried him thrashing backwards. More Northmen charged through the gate, crowding round, screaming and shouting, hacking with axes and swords.

Logen rolled over, crawled across the lawn and seized hold of his sword, tearing a wet handful of grass up with it. A Carl tumbled past him, broken head covered in blood. Logen squeezed his jaws together and charged, lifting his sword in both hands.

It bit into the Eater’s shoulder, sheared through his armour and split him open down as far as his chest, showering blood in the Dogman’s face. Same time, almost, one of the Carls caught him full in the side with a maul, smashed his other arm and left a great dent in his breastplate.

The Eater stumbled and Red Hat hacked a gash in one of his legs. He lurched to his knees, blood spilling from his wounds and running down his dented white armour, pooling on the path underneath him. He was smiling, so far as Logen could tell with half his face hanging off. ‘Free,’ he whispered.

Logen raised the Maker’s blade and hacked his head from his shoulders.

‘The fight’s gone out of ’em!’ bellowed Brint, his hair dragged sideways by another gust. ‘They’re in full retreat! Seems as if they were too keen to get the Agriont surrounded and they weren’t ready for us! Now they’re falling over each other to get away to the west. Still some fighting around Arnault’s Wall, but Orso has them on the run in the Three Farms!’

West saw the familiar shape of the Tower of Chains over the top of a ruin, and he urged his horse towards it. ‘Good! If we can just clear them away from the Agriont we’ll have the best of it! Then we can . . .’ He trailed off as they rounded the corner and could see all the way to the west gate of the citadel. Or, more accurately, where the west gate had once been.

It took him a moment to make sense of it. The Tower of Chains loomed up to one side of a monumental breach in the wall of the Agriont. The entire gatehouse had somehow been brought down, along with large sections of the wall to either side, the remains choking the moat below or distributed widely around the ruined streets in front.

The Gurkish were inside the Agriont. The very heart of the Union lay exposed.

Not far ahead, now, a formless battle was still raging before the citadel. West urged his horse closer, through the stragglers and the wounded, into the very shadow of the walls. He saw a line of kneeling flatbow-men deliver a withering volley into a crowd of Gurkish, bodies toppling. Beside him a man screamed into the wind as another tried to secure a tourniquet on the bloody stump of his leg.

Pike’s face was grimmer even than usual. ‘We should be further back, sir. This isn’t safe.’

West ignored him. Each man had to do his part, without exception. ‘We need a line formed up here! Where is General Kroy?’ The Sergeant was no longer listening. His eyes had drifted upwards, his mouth dropping stupidly open. West turned around in his saddle.

A black column was rising above the western end of the citadel. It seemed at first to be made of swirling smoke, but as West gained some sense of scale he realised it was spinning matter. Masses of it. Countless tons of it. His eyes followed it upwards, higher and higher. The clouds themselves were moving, whipped round in a spiral at the centre, shifting in a slow circle above them. The fighting sputtered, as Union and Gurkish alike gaped up at the writhing pillar above the Agriont, the Tower of Chains a black finger in front of it, the House of the Maker an insignificant pin-prick behind.

Things began to rain from the sky. Small things, at first – splinters, dust, leaves, fragments of paper. Then a chunk of wood the size of a chair leg plummeted down and bounced spinning from the paving. A soldier squealed as a stone big as a fist smashed into his shoulder. Those who were not fighting were backing away, crouching to the ground, holding shields above their heads. The wind was growing more savage, clothes whipping in the storm, men stumbling against it, leaning into it, teeth gritted and eyes narrowed. The spinning pillar was growing wider, darker, faster, higher, touching the very sky. West could see specks around its edge dancing against the white clouds like swarms of midges on a summer’s day.

Except that these were tumbling blocks of stone, wood, earth, metal, by some freak of nature sucked into the heavens and set flying. He did not know what was happening, or how. All he could do was stare.

‘Sir!’ bellowed Pike in his ear. ‘Sir, we must go!’ He seized hold of West’s bridle. A great chunk of masonry crashed into the paving not far from them. West’s horse reared up, screaming in panic. The world lurched, spun, was black, he was not sure how long for.

He was on his face, mouth full of grit. He raised his head, wobbled drunkenly up to his hands and knees, wind roaring in his ears, flying grit stinging at his face. It was dark as dusk. The air was full of tumbling rubbish. It ripped at the ground, at the buildings, at the men, huddled now like sheep, all thoughts of battle long forgotten, the living sprawled on their faces with the dead. The Tower of Chains was scoured by debris, the slates flying from its rafters, then the rafters torn away into the storm. A giant beam plummeted down and crashed into the cobbles, spun end over end, flinging corpses out of its path to slice through the wall of a house and send its roof sliding inwards.

West trembled, tears snatched away from his stinging eyes, utterly helpless. Was this how the end would come? Not covered in blood and glory at the head of a fool’s charge like General Poulder. Not passing quietly in the night like Marshal Burr. Not even hooded on the scaffold for the murder of Crown Prince Ladisla.

Crushed at random by a giant piece of rubbish falling from the sky.

‘Forgive me,’ he whispered into the tempest.

He saw the black outline of the Tower of Chains shifting. He saw it lean outwards. Chunks of stone rained down, splashed into the churning moat. The whole vast edifice lurched, bulged, and toppled outwards, with ludicrous slowness, through the flailing storm and into the city.

It broke into monstrous sections as it fell, crashing down upon the houses, crushing cowering men like ants, throwing deadly missiles in every direction.

And that was all.

All snatched away.

The gilded dome had lifted from the Lords’ Round, cracked, split, and been ripped into chaff. The high wall of the Halls Martial was a ravaged ruin. The rest of the proud buildings were nothing more than shattered stumps, torn down to their very foundations. They had all melted away before Ferro’s watering eyes. Dissolved into the formless mass of fury that whirled shrieking around the First of the Magi, endlessly hungry from the ground to the very heavens.

‘Yes!’ She could hear his delighted laughter, over the noise of the storm. ‘I am greater than Juvens! I am greater than Euz himself!’

Was this vengeance? Then how much of it would make her whole? Ferro wondered dumbly how many people had been cowering in those vanished buildings. The shimmering around the Seed was swelling, up to her shoulder, then to her neck, and it engulfed her.

The world grew quiet.

Far away the destruction continued, but it was blurred now, the sounds of it came to her muffled, as if through water. Her hand was beyond cold. She was numb to the shoulder. She saw Bayaz, smiling, his arms raised. The wind ripped about them, a wall of endless movement.

But there were shapes within it.

They grew sharper even as the rest of the world grew less distinct. They gathered around the outside of the outermost circle. Shadows. Ghosts. A hungry crowd of them.

‘Ferro . . .’ came their whispering voices.

They dragged the wounded in through a high doorway, groaning, cursing, or worst of all, saying nothing. A couple they left outside, back to the mud already. No point wasting breath on them who were far past helping.

Logen had Grim under his armpits, the Dogman had him by the boots. His face was white as chalk but for the red blood on his lips. You could see it plain on his face that it was bad, but he didn’t complain any, not Harding Grim. Dogman wouldn’t have believed it if he had.

They set him down on the floor, in the gloom on the other side of the door. Dogman could hear things rattling against the windows, thumping against the turf outside, clattering on the roofs above. More men were carried in – broken arms and broken legs and worse besides. Shivers came after, bloody axe in one hand and his shield-arm dangling useless.

Dogman had never seen a hallway like it. The floor was made of green stone and white stone, polished up smooth and shining bright as glass. The walls were hung with great paintings. The ceiling was crusted with flowers and leaves, carved so fine they looked almost real, except that they were made from gold, glittering in the dim light leaking through the windows.

Men bent down, tending to fellows injured, giving them water and soft words, a splint or two being fixed. Logen and Shivers just stood there, giving each other a look. Not hatred, exactly, and not respect. It was hard for the Dogman to say what it was, and he didn’t much care about that either.

‘What were you thinking?’ he snapped. ‘Pissing off on your own like that? Thought you were supposed to be chief, now! That’s a poor effort, ain’t it?’

Logen only stared back, eyes gleaming in the gloom. ‘Got to help Ferro,’ he muttered, half to himself. ‘Jezal too.’

Dogman stared at him. ‘Got to help who? There’s real folk here in need o’ help.’

‘I ain’t much with the wounded.’

‘Only with the making of ’em! Go on then, Bloody-Nine, if you must. Get to it.’

Dogman saw Logen’s face flinch when he heard that name. He backed away, one hand clamped to his side and his sword gripped bloody in the other. Then he turned and limped off down the glittering hallway.

‘Hurts,’ said Grim, as Dogman squatted down next to him.

‘Where?’

He gave a bloody smile. ‘Everywhere.’

‘Right, well . . .’ Dogman pulled his shirt up. One side of his chest was caved in, a great blue-black bruise spread out all across it like a tar-stain. He could hardly believe a man could still be breathing with a wound like that. ‘Ah . . .’ he muttered, not having a clue where to start even.

‘I think . . . I’m done.’

‘What, this?’ Dogman tried to grin but didn’t have it in him. ‘No more’n a scratch.’

‘Scratch, eh?’ Grim tried to lift his head, winced and fell back, breathing shallow. He stared up, eyes wide open. ‘That’s a fucking beautiful ceiling.’

The Dogman swallowed. ‘Aye. I reckon.’

‘Should’ve died fighting Ninefingers, long time ago. The rest was all a gift. Grateful for it, though, Dogman. I’ve always loved . . . our talks.’

He closed his eyes, and he stopped breathing. He’d never said much, Harding Grim. Famous for it. Now he’d stay silent forever. A pointless sort of a death, a long way from home. Not for anything he’d believed in, or understood, or stood to gain from. Nothing more’n a waste. But then Dogman had seen a lot of men go back to the mud, and there was never anything fine about it. He took a long breath, and stared down at the floor.

‘Something amusing, Superior?’

‘I stood here,’ murmured Glokta. ‘In this exact spot. With Silber.’ He reached out and brushed the iron handle with his fingertips. ‘My hand was on the latch . . . and I moved on.’ Ah, the irony. The answers we seek so long and far for – so often at our fingertips all along.

Glokta felt a shiver down his twisted spine as he leaned close to the door. He could hear something from beyond, a muffled droning in a language he did not recognise. The Adeptus Demonic calls upon the denizens of the abyss? He licked his lips, the image of High Justice Marovia’s frozen remains fresh in his mind. It would be rash to plunge straight through, however keen we are to put our questions to rest. Very rash . . .

‘Superior Goyle, since you have led us here, perhaps you would care to go first?’

‘Geegh?’ squeaked Goyle through his gag, his already bulging eyes going even wider. Cosca took the Superior of Adua by his collar, seized the iron handle with his other hand, thrust it swiftly open and applied his boot to the seat of Goyle’s trousers. He stumbled through, bellowing meaningless nonsense into his gag. The metallic sound of a flatbow being discharged issued from the other side of the door, along with the chanting, louder and harsher now by far.

What would Colonel Glokta have said? Onwards to victory, lads! Glokta lurched through the doorway, almost tripping over his own aching foot on the threshold, and gazed about him in surprise. A large, circular hall with a domed ceiling, its shadowy walls painted with a vast, exquisitely detailed mural. And one that seems uncomfortably familiar. Kanedias, the Master Maker, loomed up over the chamber with arms outspread, five times life-size or more, fire blazing from behind him in vivid crimson, orange, white. On the opposite wall lay his brother Juvens, stretched out on the grass beneath flowering trees, blood running from his many wounds. In between the two men, the Magi marched to take their revenge, six on one side, five on the other, bald Bayaz in the lead. Blood, fire, death, vengeance. How wonderfully appropriate, given the circumstances.

An intricate design had been laid out with obsessive care, covering wide floor. Circles within circles, shapes, symbols, figures of frightening complexity, all described in neat lines of white powder. Salt, unless I am much mistaken. Goyle lay on his chest a stride or two from the door, at the edge of the outermost ring, his hands still tied behind him. Dark blood spread out from under him, the point of a flatbow bolt sticking out of his back. Just where his heart should be. I would never have taken that for his weak spot.

Four of the University’s Adepti stood in various stages of amazement. Three of them: Chayle, Denka, and Kandelau, held candles in both hands, their sputtering wicks giving off a choking corpse-stink. Saurizin, the Adeptus Chemical, clutched an empty flatbow. The faces of the old men, lit in bilious yellow from beneath, were pantomime masks of fear.

At the far side of the room Silber stood behind a lectern, a great book open before him, staring down with intense concentration by the light of a single lamp. His finger hissed across the page, his thin lips moving ceaselessly. Even at this distance, and despite the fact the room was icy cold, Glokta could see fat beads of sweat running down his thin face. Beside him, painfully upright in his pure white coat and glaring blue daggers across the width of the chamber, stood Arch Lector Sult.

‘Glokta, you crippled bastard!’ he snarled, ‘what the hell are you doing here?’

‘I could well ask you the same question, your Eminence.’ He waved his cane at the scene. ‘Except the candles, the ancient books, the chanting and the circles of salt rather give the game away, no?’ And a rather infantile game it seems, suddenly. All that time, while I was torturing my way through the Mercers, while I was risking my life in Dagoska, while I was blackmailing votes in your name, you were up to . . . this?

But Sult seemed to be taking it seriously enough. ‘Get out, you fool! This is our last chance!’

‘This? Seriously?’ Cosca was already through the door, masked mercenaries following. Silber’s eyes were still fixed on the book, lips still moving, more sweat on his face than ever. Glokta frowned. ‘Someone shut him up.’

‘No!’ shouted Chayle, a look of utter horror on his tiny face. ‘You mustn’t stop the incantations! It is a profoundly dangerous operation! The consequences could be . . . could be—’

‘Disastrous!’ shrieked Kandelau. One of the mercenaries took a step towards the middle of the room nonetheless.

‘Don’t tread near the salt!’ screeched Denka, wax dripping from his wobbling candle. ‘Whatever you do!’

‘Wait!’ snapped Glokta, and the man paused at the edge of the circle, peering at him over his mask. The room was growing colder even as they spoke. Unnaturally cold. Something was happening in the centre of the circles. The air was trembling, like the air above a bonfire, more and more as Silber’s harsh voice droned on. Glokta stood frozen, his eyes flicking between the old Adepti. What to do? Stop him, or don’t stop him? Stop him, or—

‘Allow me!’ Cosca stepped forwards, delving into his black coat with his spare left hand. But you can’t be— He whipped his arm out with a careless flourish and his throwing knife came with it. The blade flashed in the candlelight, spun directly through the shimmering air in the centre of the room, and imbedded itself to the hilt in Silber’s forehead with a gentle thud.

‘Ha!’ Cosca seized Glokta by the shoulder. ‘What did I tell you? Have you ever seen a knife thrown better?’

Blood ran down the side of Silber’s face in a red trickle. His eyes rolled upwards, flickered, then he sagged sideways, dragging over his lectern, and crashed to the floor. His book tumbled down on top of him, aged pages flapping, the lamp spilled over and sprayed streaks of burning oil across the floor.

‘No!’ shrieked Sult.

Chayle gasped, his mouth falling open. Kandelau threw his candle aside and sank grovelling to the floor. Denka gave a terrified squeak, one hand over his face, staring out pop-eyed from between his fingers. There was a long pause while everyone except Cosca stared, horrified, towards the corpse of the Adeptus Demonic. Glokta waited, his few teeth bared, his eyes almost squeezed shut. Like that horrible, beautiful moment between stubbing your toe and feeling the hurt. Here it comes. Here it comes.

But nothing came. No demonic laughter echoed through the chamber. The floor did not fall in to expose a gate to hell. The shimmering faded, the room began to grow warmer. Glokta raised his brows, almost disappointed. ‘It would seem the diabolical arts are decidedly overrated.’

‘No!’ snarled Sult again.

‘I am afraid so, your Eminence. And to think I used to respect you.’ Glokta grinned at the Adeptus Chemical, still clinging weakly to his empty flatbow. He waved a hand at Goyle’s body. ‘A good shot. I congratulate you. One less mess for me to tidy up.’ He waved a finger at the crowd of mercenaries behind him. ‘Now seize that man.’

‘No!’ bellowed Saurizin, throwing his flatbow to the floor. ‘None of it was my idea! I had no choice! It was him!’ He stabbed a thick finger at Silber’s lifeless body. ‘And . . . and him!’ He pointed to Sult with a trembling arm.

‘You’ve got the right idea, but it can wait for the interrogation. Would you be kind enough to take his Eminence into custody?’

‘Happily.’ Cosca strolled across the floor of the wide room, his boots sending up puffs of white powder, leaving a trail of ruination through the intricate patterns.

‘Glokta, you blundering idiot!’ shrieked Sult. ‘You have no idea of the danger Bayaz poses! This First of the Magi and his bastard king! Glokta! You have no right! Gah!’ He yelped as Cosca dragged his arms behind his back and forced him to his knees, his white hair in disarray. ‘You have no idea—’

‘If the Gurkish don’t kill the lot of us, you’ll get ample time to explain it to me. Of that I assure you.’ Glokta leered his toothless smile as Cosca drew the rope tight around Sult’s wrists. If you only knew how long I have dreamed of saying these words. ‘Arch Lector Sult. I arrest you for high treason against his Majesty the King.’

‘How would you like to die?’ she asked.

‘Your Majesty, get behind me.’ Gorst hefted his long steel in his one good hand.

‘No. Not this time.’ Jezal pulled the crown from his head, the crown that Bayaz had been so particular in designing, and tossed it clattering away. He was done with being a king. If he was to die, he would die a man, like any other. He had been given so many advantages, he realised now. Far more than most men could ever dream of. So many chances to do good, and he had done nothing besides whine and think of himself. Now it was too late. ‘I’ve lived my life leaning on others. Hiding behind them. Climbing on their shoulders. Not this time.’

One of the twins raised her hands and started slowly to clap, the regular tap, tap, echoing from the mirrors. The other giggled. Gorst raised his sword. Jezal did the same, one last act of pointless defiance.

Then High Justice Marovia flashed between them. The old man moved with impossible speed, his dark robe snapping around him. He had something in his hand. A long rod of dark metal with a hook on the end.

‘What—’ muttered Jezal.

The hook blazed suddenly, searingly white, bright as the sun on a summer’s day. A hundred hooks burned like stars, reflected back from the mirrors round the walls, and back, and back, into the far distance. Jezal gasped, squeezed his eyes shut, holding one hand over his face, the long trail left by that brilliant point burned fizzing into his vision.

He blinked, gaped, lowered his arm. The twins stood, the High Justice beside them, just where they had before, still as statues. Tendrils of white steam hissed up from vents in the end of the strange weapon and curled around Marovia’s arm. For a moment, nothing moved.

Then a dozen of the great mirrors at the far end of the hall fell in half across the middle, as though they were sheets of paper slashed suddenly by the world’s sharpest knife. A couple of the bottom halves and one of the top toppled slowly forwards into the room and shattered, scattering bright fragments of glass across the tiled floor.

‘Urgggh,’ breathed the twin on the left. Jezal realised that blood was spurting out from under her armour. She lifted one hand towards him and it dropped off the end of her arm and thudded to the tiles, blood squirting from the smoothly severed stump. She toppled to the left. Or her body did, at least. Her legs fell the other way. The bigger part of her crashed to the ground, and her head came off and rolled across the tiles in a widening pool. Her hair, trimmed off cleanly at the neck, fluttered down into the bloody mess in a golden cloud.

Armour, flesh, bone, all divided into neat sections as perfectly as cheese by a cheese wire. The twin on the right frowned, took a wobbling step towards Marovia. Her knees gave out and she fell in half at the waist. The legs slumped down and lay still, dust sliding out in a brown heap. The top half dragged itself forward by the nails, lifted its head, hissing.

The air around the High Justice shimmered and the Eater’s severed body burst into flames. It thrashed, for a while, making a long squealing sound. Then it was still, a mass of smoking black ash.

Marovia lifted up the strange weapon, whistling softly as he smiled at the hook on the end, a last few traces of vapour still drifting from it. ‘Kanedias. He certainly knew how to make a weapon. The Master Maker indeed, eh, your Majesty?’

‘What?’ muttered Jezal, utterly dumbfounded.

Marovia’s face melted slowly away as he crossed the floor towards them. Another began to show itself beneath. Only his eyes remained the same. Different-coloured eyes, happy lines around the corners, grinning at Jezal like an old friend.

Yoru Sulfur bowed. ‘Never any peace, eh, your Majesty? Never the slightest peace.’

There was a crash as one of the doors burst open. Jezal raised his sword, heart in his mouth. Sulfur whipped round, the Maker’s weapon held down by his side. A man stumbled into the room. A big man, his grimacing face covered in scars, his chest heaving, a heavy sword hanging from one hand, the other clutched to his ribs.

Jezal blinked, hardly able to believe it. ‘Logen Ninefingers. How the hell did you get here?’

The Northman stared for a moment. Then he leaned back against a mirror by the door, let his sword drop to the tiles. He slid down, slowly, until he hit the floor, and sat there with his head leaning back against the glass. ‘Long story,’ he said.

The wind was full of shapes, now. Hundreds of them. They crowded in around the outermost circle, the bright iron turned misty, gleaming with cold wet.

‘. . . we have things to tell you, Ferro . . .’

‘Secrets . . .’

‘What can we give you?’

‘We know . . . everything.’

‘You need only let us in . . .’

So many voices. She heard Aruf among them, her old teacher. She heard Susman the slaver. She heard her mother and her father. She heard Yulwei, and Prince Uthman. A hundred voices. A thousand. Voices she knew and had forgotten. Voices of the dead and of the living. Shouts, mutters, screams. Whispers, in her ear. Closer still. Closer than her own thoughts.

‘You want vengeance?’

‘We can give you vengeance.’

‘Like nothing you have dreamed of.’

‘All you want. All you need.’

‘Only let us in . . .’

‘That empty space in you?’

‘We are what is missing!’

The metal rings had turned white with frost. Ferro kneeled at one end of a dizzying tunnel, its walls made from rushing, roaring, furious matter, full of shadows, its end far beyond the dark sky. The laughter of the First of the Magi echoed faintly in her ears. The air hummed with power, twisted, shimmered, blurred.

‘You need do nothing.’

‘Bayaz.’

‘He will do it.’

‘Fool!’

‘Liar!’

‘Let us in . . .’

‘He cannot understand.’

‘He uses you!’

‘He laughs.’

‘But not for long.’

‘The gates strain.’

‘Let us in . . .’

If Bayaz heard the voices he gave no sign. Cracks ran through the quivering paving, branching out from his feet, splinters floating up around him in whirling spirals. The iron rings began to shift, to buckle. With a grinding of tortured metal they twisted out from the crumbling stones, bright edges shining.

‘The seals break.’

‘Eleven wards.’

‘And eleven wards reversed.’

‘The doors open.’

‘Yes,’ came the voices, speaking together.

The shadows crowded in closer. Ferro’s breath came short and fast, her teeth rattled, her limbs trembled, the cold was on her very heart. She knelt at a precipice, bottomless, limitless, full of shadows, full of voices.

‘Soon we will be with you.’

‘Very soon.’

‘The time is upon us.’

‘Both sides of the divide, joined.’

‘As they were meant to be.’

‘Before Euz spoke his First Law.’

‘Let us in . . .’

She needed only to cling to the Seed a moment longer. Then the voices would give her vengeance. Bayaz was a liar, she had known it from the start. She owed him nothing. Her eyelids flickered, closed, her mouth hung open. The noise of the wind grew fainter yet, until she could hear only the voices.

Whispering, soothing, righteous.

‘We will take the world and make it right.’

‘Together.’

‘Let us in . . .’

‘You will help us.’

‘You will free us.’

‘You can trust us.’

‘Trust us . . .’

Trust?

A word that only liars used. Ferro remembered the wreckage of Aulcus. The hollow ruins, the blasted mud. The creatures of the Other Side are made of lies. Better to have an empty space in her, than to fill it with this. She wedged her tongue between her teeth and bit down hard, felt her mouth fill up with salty blood. She sucked in breath, forced her eyes open.

‘Trust us . . .’

‘Let us in!’

She saw the Maker’s box, a shifting, swimming outline. She bent down over it, digging at it with her numb fingertips while the air lashed at her. She would be no one’s slave. Not for Bayaz, not for the Tellers of Secrets. She would find her own path. A dark one, perhaps, but her own.

The lid swung open.

‘No.’ The voices hissed together in her ear.

‘No!’

Ferro ground her bloody teeth, growled with fury as she forced her fingers to unclench. The world was a melting, screaming, formless mass of darkness. Gradually, gradually, her dead hand came open. Here was her revenge. Against the liars, the users, the thieves. The earth shook, crumbled, tore, as thin and fragile as a sheet of glass, and with an empty void beneath it. She turned her trembling hand and the Seed dropped from her palm.

All as one, the voices screamed their harsh command. ‘No!’

She blindly seized hold of the lid. ‘Fuck yourselves!’ she hissed.

And with her last grain of strength she forced the box closed.