Vengeance

CHAPTER 74

Lady Ricinus would do it, too. No wickedness was beyond her.

Tali’s stomach knotted, though not only from fear. If Rix discovered that she had informed on his parents it would destroy her friendship with him and Tobry. Well, she had started out alone; she would finish it alone.

‘I’ve so many enemies,’ she said, trying to pretend indifference, ‘I don’t see that one more matters.’

‘This one does.’ The chancellor steepled his fingers, which were as soft and smooth as a noble lady’s, though somewhat twisted, and stared at her over the tips. ‘Your evidence had better be good.’

She related how she had been hiding under Rix’s tub while the chancellor had given that ultimatum, and what Lady Ricinus had said afterwards.

‘The viper!’ he hissed. ‘I’ve always detested her. And Rixium heard this threat?’

‘I–I can’t say.’ She had not expected the question and knew her stumbling reply had betrayed him.

‘Of course you can. You’re trying to protect him and it won’t work.’ He met her eyes. ‘If he doesn’t inform me of this threat, he’s also guilty of treason and must suffer a traitor’s death.’

‘But you know, now,’ cried Tali.

‘Rixium doesn’t know I know.’

‘Why does he have to pay? He’s always defended you.’

‘In war, a leader has to know who he can rely on, and whom will betray him wilfully — or by omission. In war, one’s country must always come before one’s family. Let him stew on that conflict.’ His laughter was like a set of false teeth chattering on a draining board.

‘He’s a good man!’

‘And I’m a swine who’ll enjoy seeing him squirm,’ said the chancellor. ‘But a tough swine, just what our country needs. What else do you allege Lady Ricinus said?’

Tali related the conversation she had overheard with Lord and Lady Ricinus through the peephole, and as she spoke, the chancellor’s thin face set in ever grimmer lines. He questioned her about every detail, then leaned back and studied his fingers.

‘The question is, do I believe you?’

Tali felt the blood drain from her face. She had not considered that, either.

‘A despicable Pale,’ he went on, ‘a habitual liar desperate to save herself, might make up false accusations against one of our noblest families. Accusations so incredible that no one could believe them.

‘Should I call Lady Ricinus over and give her the opportunity to defend her house?’ he said after a menacing pause. ‘She’s savage in protecting her own. She would tear your face off with her nails.’

Tali remembered how red her nails had been, and how sharp.

He looked her up and down. ‘You’re terrified, yet you neither defend yourself nor attack House Ricinus. Why not? You must have heard dirt on the lady of that house — everyone else has.’

‘I’ve told you what I overheard,’ said Tali, fighting to keep her voice steady. ‘I don’t smear my enemies’ names.’

‘I put my boot heel through their teeth,’ the chancellor said matter-offactly, ‘and grind them into the muck until they drown in it.’

Again she felt the weight of his regard, as if he were peeling away skin and bone to look inside her head and heart. Nothing could elude him. What was he going to do to her?

‘Extraordinary!’ He withdrew his boots from the table with a small thump. ‘I read much falsehood in you — hardly surprising in one who has lived as a slave — yet not an iota in this matter.’

‘You believe me?’

‘Never trusted House Ricinus. The lord’s a pig, the lady an adder. There’s nothing so foul that she would not do to raise the family higher.’ His eyes met hers. ‘And you’re not going back to warn them.’

Gulp! ‘Why would I?’

‘Because you’re friends with Rixium and Tobry, and if they don’t tell me about the treason, they’ll swing for it.’

‘But Tobry doesn’t know anything about it,’ she cried, caught off-guard.

‘I’ve never liked the man,’ said the chancellor chillingly, as though that were reason enough for Tobry to die. ‘Can’t trust a fellow who believes in nothing.’

‘What are you going to do to Lord and Lady Ricinus?’ said Tali, with a kind of fascinated horror.

Again, that malicious smile. This was not a man she would want to make her enemy.

‘I’ll see their necks settled into the noose, first.’ The chancellor studied Tali’s slender neck in a contemplative way, then called for a large sheet of blank paper, a pencil and a wedge of brown rubber. ‘Draw me a map of Cython. Mark every tunnel and chamber, and its purpose and use, and everything you know of Cython’s defences. Then tell me all about the Cythonians.’

‘I only know the main level of Cython. I’ve never been lower down.’

‘All I ask is what you know. Rannilt has also helped me, and some of the captured enemy will reveal a scrap or two before they die. It should be enough.’

‘Enough for what?’

He rang the bell and the tall redhead Tali had seen earlier appeared. ‘Note down everything she says, Verla.’

Though Tali could envisage any route she had ever taken through Cython, the underground city proved surprisingly difficult to map. After some hours, and many sheets of paper, she was still ending up with rooms and workshops where she knew they could not be.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said, when her latest sketch showed the eastern edge of the heatstone mine intersecting the straight line of the main floatillery. ‘The mine should be half a mile this way.’

‘Note it on the map. My cartographers will sort it after we’ve tortured enough of the enemy. Describe the kinds of wall carvings in every area — their art may prove more reliable than signposts.’

‘What are you going to do with all this?’ she said at the end, after Verla had gone as silently as she came, without saying a word the whole time.

‘That’s my business.’ He met her eyes. ‘You have done me mighty service today, and I pay my debts.’ He sent the spectible spinning across the table towards her. ‘It’s yours.’

She caught it before it hit her in the belly and felt it with her fingers. The metal was cold; the mica felt warm to the touch.

‘How is it used?’

‘One puts it across one’s eyes and forehead, then turns the knobs until the emanations of magery come into focus.’

Tali had no idea what it was supposed to show, but she saw nothing save the lustre of the dark mica and the chancellor’s blurred features through it. She slowly turned the knobs. Nothing, nothing, nothing. ‘You said it’s dead.’

‘So my chief magian says. But Hightspall’s magery has dwindled over the centuries and perhaps he lacks the strength to work it.’ Again it felt as though he was peering into her head. ‘It’s said you have a unique gift.’

‘Who told you that?’ she said sharply.

‘One of my rangers caught an eyeless fellow called Wil, a Cythonian seer. Unlike the other prisoners, he was eager to talk. Especially about you.’

‘Mad Wil,’ said Tali. ‘You can’t take any notice — ’

‘Oh, yes I can,’ he said softly, the gleam back in his eyes. ‘A mad seer might see more clearly than all one’s spies and advisors together. Wil said you’re the one, and I believe him, because I’ve also read something rare and wild in you.’

Whatever he really wanted of her, she did not like it. She kept turning the knobs until they would go no further, but saw nothing. ‘What does the one mean?’

‘The one who changes the future, and not to Cython’s advantage. The matriarchs are afraid of Wil’s foreseeing, which they call shillilar.’

She squirmed. Her life was being moved by forces beyond her understanding.

‘Years ago they had dozens of little girls killed, to make sure the one was dead,’ said Tali, shivering. ‘But Wil lied — he told the matriarchs I had black hair and olive skin.’ She raised her head, looked him in the eye. ‘What do you want of me?’

‘If I fail,’ said the chancellor, ‘Hightspall will be swept away. And the war’s going so disastrously you can’t possibly make things worse. Yet if you are the one …’ Tali held her breath, but he shook his head. ‘I must think on it. Wil says he’s been all the way down. What does that mean?’

The sudden change of tack was disconcerting. ‘To the lowest level of Cython?’

‘If you don’t know, don’t guess. What about the Hellish Conduit?’

‘I overheard the master chymister mention it once. He said I’ll have to send down the Hellish Conduit for more.’

‘More what?’

‘Alkoyl.’ Tali told him about the young woman whose leg had been eaten away.

‘Fascinating,’ said the chancellor, ‘though not immediately useful. What’s the Engine?’

‘Cythonians believe that everything in nature comes from the working of a great machine, at the heart of the world, called the Engine.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘If the Engine gets a wobble, the ground shakes. If it overheats, the Vomits erupt …’

‘And?’ he said when she did not go on.

‘They also believe the Engine is fuelled by an unstable cauldron deep in the Earth. And sometimes it blows up. That’s all I know.’

‘It’s said that Lake Fumerous fills the chasm where a fourth Vomit blew itself to pieces.’ He made a dismissing gesture. ‘How goes the spectible?’

She looked down. ‘I’ve turned both knobs as far as they go. Did the chief magian say why it stopped working?’

‘He said the source it drew from could no longer be reached.’

‘If a new source could be found, might it work again?’ An ebony pearl, perhaps? Careful, don’t even think about them here or he’ll have the secret out of you — and perhaps the pearl, too.

‘Possibly. Hold the first knob steady and turn the other all the way. Then rotate the first knob one notch and the second all the way back, and so on.’

She began to do so. Nothing for the first notch, nothing for the second, nothing for the third. Then, as she moved her head from side to side, a pinkish rainbow flashed across the black mica.

‘Ah!’ said the chancellor.

‘You saw it?’

‘No, but you did.’

‘What was it?’

‘The emanation of magery from this speaking egg.’ He picked an oval yellow object, egg-sized, from the shelf behind him. ‘Abbess Hildy has another. It’s how she told me about you, soon after you arrived.’

‘So the spectible does work.’

‘It does for you.’

But could she use it to locate her own magery? Tali set it down on the table. ‘What are you going to do with me now?’

‘In return for my concession to the Pale you must do me a service — assuming you’re a woman of your word?’

Tali swallowed. ‘I said it, and my word holds.’ She fought to hold her voice steady. ‘What must I do?’

‘A trifling task.’ He examined his buffed and manicured nails, drawing out the tension.

‘How trifling?’ she rasped.

‘Before we counterattack, you will return to Cython and rouse the Pale to rebellion.’

‘No!’ She snatched at the table edge for support. ‘I’m no leader. And the enemy will kill me on sight.’

‘If you’re truly the one, you’ll find a way.’

‘And if I’m not, I die an agonising death.’

‘Thousands of my people have already died such deaths in the war,’ said the chancellor, ‘and more fall every minute. Until the enemy is stopped they will continue to die.’

‘Unless they wipe us out first,’ said Tali.

His head shot up, the impassive face cracked. She had shocked him. ‘You think that is their intention? Not just to take back the land, but to erase us from Hightspall forever?’

Tali considered everything she knew about the enemy. ‘Yes, I believe it is.’

He did not speak for a very long time, and when he did, though he fought to control his voice, it had the faintest tremor. ‘Worse than I had thought; far worse. What can I do?’ He thought for a moment. ‘I have no choice but to go on — and neither do you.’

‘I’m not up to it, Lord Chancellor.’

‘Do you imagine you’re the only one tormented by self-doubt?’

Had she not seen his anguish a few minutes ago, she would have said he had no demons. Perhaps he was more practised at hiding them. She shook her head.

‘A while ago you argued passionately for the Pale. You must know what the enemy will do to all eighty-five thousand of them when they no longer need slaves.’

She thought about the people she cared for — Nurse Bet, Waitie, Little Nan — and the people she owed, like Lifka and the first eunuch at the loading station. How could she let them be cut down?

‘Well?’

‘I know,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve long feared it.’

‘Can any other Pale save them? Or anyone from outside Cython?’

‘No. They have only me.’ And she had sworn that oath on Mia’s blood, to make up for all the injustices done to the Pale. To free them from bondage. Even her enemy, Radl.

‘Then your duty is clear.’

‘Yes,’ she said despairingly. She could not do it, but neither could she refuse. ‘It is.’