Wrath of Empire

Chapter 39

Walking up the stairs of the Landfall City Morgue was the most painful thing that Michel had ever done.

He rested for as long as he dared – until early in the morning on the eleventh, when last night’s injection of mala had finally begun to wear off. Pulling himself out of the bed in a dark corner room of the underground morgue was almost painful enough to put him on his back, to not care if the entire Yaret Household was about to die to a Blackhat bombing. But he managed to make it out of the bed and even find a bit of horngum in Emerald’s laboratory before slipping out behind the backs of Emerald’s assistants.

“Slipping,” Michel considered as he climbed the stairs up to the street, was probably a poor word. He dragged himself along the walls, then along handrails, up every excruciating step. Emerald had been very clear that he shouldn’t move if he wanted to recover quickly – that leaving the morgue too early might put him back in it as a corpse. Emerald had also made it clear that he would keep Michel tied to the bed if he needed to.

But Michel didn’t have time for any of that. If he didn’t act, Yaret would die, and with him the Household. It would kill Michel’s best chance of finding Taniel’s elusive informant – and it would also kill people whom Michel had come to think of as friends.

Michel stopped on the second landing and bit off a piece of horngum large enough to make his mouth go numb almost instantly. It helped with the pain without dulling his senses, but he needed another bite after just two more flights of stairs.

He mentally detached himself from his body as he climbed, in a vain attempt to ignore the pain. It was something he did when he wanted to get into the right mind-set for a new job – when he had to become a totally different person. It involved floating mentally, a sort of forced high where he envisioned himself outside his earthly body looking in, trying to find a different perspective that would help him infiltrate the next mission.

In this case, he simply attempted to meditate, and he couldn’t help but consider the complexity of becoming these different people – that the man whom his Dynize allies would call Michel Bravis was a different man than the Blackhats, or Taniel, would refer to by the same name. They were all still him, of course, but … not. He couldn’t help but think of his mother, of deceiving her for all those years into thinking he was a loyal Blackhat when in fact he was still the Palo loyalist that she’d always wanted for a son.

He wondered if the guilt of that one deception was what drove him to keep climbing these stairs, even through the pain that cut past the vestiges of last night’s mala and a healthy chunk of horngum. Perhaps saving the Yaret Household – people who had taken him in, given him trust, and defended him to their own allies – would somehow absolve him of all the instances of so-called friends that he’d betrayed in the past.

At some point, he realized, he would have to betray Yaret. He would add Tenik, the Household, and all of Dynize to the long list of people who wanted to kill him.

But not yet.

He finally reached the top of the stairs and froze, staring at the open door of the morgue’s front entrance and Emerald, who had stopped with his foot halfway in, a loaf of bread under one arm.

“So you’re going, then?”

Michel couldn’t find the strength to speak. He nodded.

“You look paler than me. We have an elevator we use to bring the corpses up and down. I would have let you take it.”

“I didn’t think you were going to let me leave,” Michel managed, taking strength from a surge of anger. An elevator would have saved him so much pain.

Emerald nodded solemnly. “I would have advised you stay. But if you’re determined enough to climb five flights of stairs, I won’t stop you.” He tipped his hat. “Best of luck,” he said, heading down the stairs.

Michel hated Emerald for the extra little skip in his step, then pushed out the door and into the streets. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the light and get his bearings. He would have to go directly to Yaret’s House in Chancellor’s Court. It was risky – either from running into Sedial’s people or because he might get caught in the blast himself.

Walking on flat ground was easier than up the stairs, but Michel still found himself moving with frustrating slowness. Each step seemed like another mountain to climb, and whenever he couldn’t find a wall to lean on, he was forced to concentrate just to keep from falling over.

The sight of a carriage rolling down the next street over nearly made him faint. He raised his hand, shaking two fingers at the driver, who pulled up and came to a stop just ahead of him.

“Heading home, sir,” the driver told him. “I worked all night. No more fares for me.”

“Chancellor’s Court,” Michel gasped. “Please, just one more.”

The driver leaned over, peering at Michel. “You don’t look so good.” Carriages were not very common since the invasion. Most had been used to take their owners out of the city ahead of the Dynize. Those that remained had to get licensed with the Dynize government and install a large green sign on their side declaring their license. If Michel didn’t convince the driver, he might not see another till the capitol building.

“I don’t feel so good, either.” Michel rummaged in his pockets and found two Dynize rations cards, as well as the card that Tenik had given him weeks ago that marked him as a member of Yaret’s Household. He damn well hoped that the driver knew what it was. “Look,” Michel said, “here’s these. This card says I’m employed by the state. Take me and I’ll make sure they pay you double.”

The driver looked uneasy. “Look, fella, I don’t want to get involved with the Dynize. Bad luck and all. But I’m heading that direction anyway. Give me the rations cards and I’ll take you to Forlorn End.”

Forlon End, if Michel remembered right, was just a few blocks from Chancellor’s Court. “Done.”

It was all Michel could do to climb into the carriage and collapse on the bench, where he clutched his aching chest and tried not to swear with each jolt and rock of the carriage. His breathing was shallow, his eyelids heavy, and he wondered what he was going to say to Yaret once he arrived. Convincing him to disrupt the Household and evacuate the street over a bloodstained list of addresses was probably going to be harder than it sounded.

He thanked the driver and climbed out at Forlorn End, before shambling as quickly as he could press himself down the street toward Chancellor’s Court. He took a left down a narrow alley, intent on cutting across a handful of small streets to shave precious yards off his trip. He kept holding his breath, watching the sky, waiting for the blast of an explosion and a tower of flame.

Michel let himself through the garden of one of the townhouse mansions and came out into a courtyard less than a block from Yaret’s Household. The moment he stepped out of the garden, he regretted his shortcut.

His eyes caught sight of Forgula at the same instant she saw him. She stood with several members of the Sedial Household, talking in the street directly in the way of Michel’s route. Michel swallowed hard, a cold sweat breaking out on the small of his back, his heart rate doubling.

Forgula tapped one of her companions and pointed, her face growing cold at the sight of Michel. The group turned toward him immediately, walking briskly. “Stay put, spy,” she called to him.

Michel began to walk briskly in the opposite direction, hoping that the effort didn’t knock him off his feet, and backtracked toward the next street over. He needed to get somewhere with witnesses – no, with Yaret witnesses.

He didn’t know if Forgula had guessed that he had searched her home, or if she just wanted him out of the way, but he knew that if she caught him before he could reach a friendly Dynize, he would be dead within minutes. He risked a jog, looking over his shoulder to see Forgula and her cronies do the same.

He felt stitches tear in his chest and a shot of pain that blinded him for several moments. He nearly tripped and fell, stumbling into the mouth of an alley.

A handful of children playing in the mud caught his eye. He recognized two of them – definitely members of Yaret’s Household – and he fumbled in his pocket for a nub of pencil and a paper. He scribbled three words, then signed his name. “You,” he called to one of the girls in Dynize. “Take this to Yaret immediately. Run, and don’t look back!”

The girl looked at Michel with some confusion before her eyes flicked to Forgula’s group coming on behind him. She gave a quick nod, took the paper, and dashed off toward the Yaret Household. Forgula shouted after her, but the girl kept running.

Michel leaned against the corner of a building and wondered if this was the best he could do. Forgula would be on him in moments. He reached toward his pockets for his knuckle-dusters, only to realize that both hands were soaked in blood. As was his shirt, and his pants. He was bleeding so heavily that Forgula wouldn’t need to kill him.

He gave a soft laugh at how close he’d come to reaching Yaret, and resumed his walk. Behind him, he could hear the footsteps of Forgula and her people, which had slowed. They must have noticed his condition, realized that they could take their time. Michel forced himself to raise his head, looking around for some kind of salvation as he reached the next street corner and sought an ally.

No one caught his eye. He half bent, put his hands on his knees, trying to choke back tears of pain. At some point in his journey he had lost the rest of his horngum.

“Shit,” he muttered to himself, and turned to face Forgula.

He was surprised to find that Forgula’s group had stopped less than ten feet from him, and it took him a moment to realize why.

A carriage was parked on the side of the street. It was drawn by two brilliant black horses and had the black and red curtains of a Dynize diplomat. A familiar face was leaning out the window, watching Michel and Forgula.

It was Saen-Ichtracia, the Privileged who’d laughed when Michel punched Forgula.

Ichtracia appraised Michel with a single glance, then turned to Forgula. “You have murder in your eyes, my dear,” she said.

Forgula’s nostrils flared. There was an uncertainty to her stance that seemed at contrast with being waylaid by the granddaughter of her master. “There’s a snake in our midst,” Forgula replied. “I was about to crush it.”

“Oh, come now, is that necessary? It looks like a stiff breeze would knock him over.”

“Then it’s a mercy killing,” Forgula said. Her blackjack slid from her sleeve to her hand, and she took a step toward Michel.

Ichtracia tutted loudly, stopping Forgula midstride. “Michel, my little mongrel foxhead, what are you doing on this street? And in your condition? You should be smart enough to stay on the next street over.”

Michel looked down at the blood now dripping openly from the hand he held over his chest. He used the last of his strength to force a smile onto his face, giving a small bow and grasping for the first thing that came to mind. “I was looking for you, ma’am.”

“Oh? Whatever for?”

“To ask you to dinner.” Michel had just long enough to see the look of fascinated horror on Forgula’s face before he teetered and collapsed, facedown, onto the cobbles beneath Ichtracia’s carriage.

“That is the third time this week I have passed out,” Michel breathed. He lay in a pile on the floor of a carriage, looking up at Ichtracia as she stared dispassionately out the window. One of her footmen crouched beside him, holding his jacket tightly against Michel’s chest. “It’s really unpleasant.”

Ichtracia remained silent, her eyes on something in the street, a troubled look on her face. Michel tried to read something from her posture and expression – why she had saved him, what her plans were, if she was going to help him – but came up with nothing. He couldn’t focus through the pain coming from his wound, nor the great loss of blood. Instead, he found himself considering her striking features. A man could do worse than stare at her face as he died.

The carriage was moving, but Michel had no way of knowing in what direction. “Thank you,” he said.

“Hmm?” Ichtracia looked down at him, her eyes cold, her thoughts obviously far away. “Oh, that.” She snorted a laugh. “Having the chance to annoy Forgula is thanks enough.”

Michel thought of the laugh when he’d punched Forgula back at the war game. Was there some kind of old rivalry between the two? Past hatreds? Shouldn’t they be on the same side? “I have to go to Yaret’s Household,” he said.

Ichtracia ignored him. “Tculu, will he survive long enough to reach the house?”

“He’s still talking, ma’am,” the footman replied. “I think that’s a good sign.”

“Saen,” Michel said, trying to inject some force. “I have to get to Yaret’s Household, please. I have to warn them.”

Ichtracia’s attention snapped toward him with a startling suddenness. “About what? The bomb?”

Michel’s throat went dry. Ichtracia knew. She knew because she was Ka-Sedial’s granddaughter, and Ka-Sedial had arranged the assassination. He had just stepped out of one fire and into a much, much hotter one.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that,” Ichtracia said. “I didn’t put the damned thing there. You’ve been unconscious for about a half hour. Fifteen minutes ago, a bomb exploded, destroying Yaret’s house. We heard the explosion, and word just reached us by courier.”

Michel stared at her, trying to come up with a reply. Maybe she wasn’t involved, but … had he been too late? Had that girl gotten his note to Yaret in time? “We have to go help,” he whispered.

“Do we? Yaret isn’t a friend of mine, and I’ve been given no orders to return and aid them.”

Michel had no strength to feel grief, or outrage, or anything but the pain coming from his chest. He sagged, doing everything he could to keep his eyes open as the carriage finally came to a stop. The door opened, and at Ichtracia’s order he was carried, none too gently, down the drive of a small estate and in through the front door. A candelabra was swept unceremoniously off a large dining room table and Michel was laid down in the middle, with Ichtracia standing over him like she was about to quarter a deer.

“Fetch me my tools,” she told a footman before looking at Michel. “I’m going to do what I can for you,” she said. “You’ve lost a lot of blood, but it looks like you’ve already been patched up once. If we can keep you conscious, you should make a full recovery.”

“Are … are you a healing Privileged?”

“I am not.” Ichtracia took a satchel from one of the footmen, set it next to Michel’s head, and began to lay out tools. “My great-grandfather was a Privileged,” she explained. “He pioneered a combination of sorcery and surgery that greatly increases a patient’s chances of surviving. It is not nearly as effective – and much more painful – than healing sorcery. But it works.” She pulled on her Privileged’s gloves, the sight of which caused Michel to involuntarily attempt to get up and run. One of Ichtracia’s fingers twitched, and Michel was pressed against the table by unseen forces. “Tculu,” she said, “fetch Michel some whiskey from the cabinet. Give him a healthy swig, then put your belt between his teeth.”

Michel could barely keep up. Ichtracia moved quickly, clinically, like Emerald but with a more refined sense of businesslike purpose. “Why are you helping me?” he asked.

Ichtracia looked down at him as if the answer were obvious. She put a hand on his forehead, her gloves soft to the touch, and wiped the sweat from his brow in an almost gentle manner. “I’ll go to a lot of effort for a man who can make me laugh,” she said softly. “Besides, you asked me to dinner. I may be a Privileged, but I’m not a monster. I’ll never turn down a meal with an interesting person.”

Any further questions were cut off by the footman pressing a bottle to Michel’s mouth and pouring whiskey straight between his lips. He coughed, sputtered, trying to swallow as much as he could. The glass rim of the bottle was quickly replaced by the sour taste of the footman’s belt being forced between his teeth.

Michel went bug-eyed as he felt sorcery hold him so tightly he could barely breathe. Ichtracia lifted a scalpel, examined it carefully, and then went to work.

What, Michel wondered as the cutting began, had he done to deserve this?