The Shattered City (21 page)

‘Yes. Most of the buildings were sandstone. Not like Aufleur.'

‘Oh.' And now she wished he would leave, so she could cry or something. Drink. Was there any drink in the house?

‘If you're remembering,' the puppy said earnestly, ‘it's probably because you're becoming a sentinel. Like Macready says. The rules are different for us …'

‘Yes, I know. Shut up. Drink your tea.'

 

Velody only saw the flamebolt when it was too late — as it smashed through the top of an elderly Avleurine tenement. She darted down towards it and found Poet distracted, standing on the roof of the old, abandoned Palazzo at the crest of the hill. A cluster of darkhounds and weasels gathered around his ankles, making their allegiance clear. The brighthounds knelt before him, their slender heads bowed in supplication. Not one of them was fighting the sky.

‘Here she comes!' Poet announced theatrically. ‘Will you bow to her too, liar?'

‘What are you doing?' Velody asked him. ‘We have a city to protect.'

‘Finding the truth, Lady Majesty.' Animor poured from Poet's fingers, scorching the hide of the poor brighthounds. They made a keening noise, but did not cry out.

Velody pushed Poet hard, forcing him to stop. ‘What do you think you are doing? The sky is falling and you stand here playing power games? What can possibly be so important?'

‘The truth,' Poet said with a cruel smile. ‘Tell our Power and Majesty the truth, Lennoc, Lord Brighthound.'

Velody turned and looked at the cringing brighthounds. They looked no different to her. ‘Lennoc?' she said quietly.

The hounds met her eyes with a placid expression, and shaped themselves into glowing Lord form. His hair had always been white, but now he was fierce and uncompromising. He stood silent, his face and body under tight control.

Lennoc was a Lord.

‘See,' Poet crowed. ‘Ask him how long he has been clinging to my coat-tails, pretending to be less than he is. Oathbreaker,' he added in a sing-song voice.

‘I broke no oath,' Lennoc protested, that accusation at least spurring him to speak.

‘Did you not?' said Poet. ‘Whose animor bestowed this exalted status upon you, my pretty? Livilla's children? The damage that the devil inside Priest inflicted on me, on Warlord?'

The new Lord, still glowing, looked only at Velody.
If he is this helpless already, how will he manage in the Court?
she could not help thinking.

‘Dhynar,' Lennoc admitted finally. ‘I quenched my master when he died. I have been a Lord since then.'

Shade reacted first, bolting into his mortal form in an instant. ‘Since Dhynar?' he raged. ‘You could have kept us together. Grago and Farrier — you could have looked after us!'

‘You think I'm strong enough to hold three courtesi?' Lennoc yelled back.

‘We were your brothers!'

‘All very touching,' said Poet. ‘I suppose you will run to your brother now, will you, Shade? Since you would prefer him as a master.'

Shade looked from Lennoc to Poet and then shook his head. ‘I am no oathbreaker. You are my master and protector. I owe him nothing.'

Poet's smile was a deeply unpleasant thing.

Velody walked to Lennoc, seeing the pain in his eyes. She didn't blame him for being afraid. How could she? The Creature Court ate its young. ‘You will serve me now as Lord?' she asked quietly.

Lennoc flinched as if expecting a punishment from her. ‘Aye, Lady Power.'

‘Then we shall speak no more of this.' Velody turned on Poet, glaring. ‘I appreciate your disappointment at losing your courteso. But a new Lord strengthens our Court. You should be glad of it.'

‘Glad?' Poet said, eyes wide. ‘He swore an oath to me as courteso knowing he was a Lord. I should kill him now and let him die forsworn.'

‘I repent,' Lennoc said instantly. ‘I have regretted it every day. My Lord — Poet, I am sorry. I —' He looked at his feet, ashamed. ‘We have always been looked after. I did not know any other way to be.'

‘Have you no weaknesses, Poet?' Velody said. ‘Such a magnificent specimen you must be. Not a single flaw.'

‘Weakness begets weakness,' Poet retorted. ‘If your Lords are made of dainty glass, Majesty, your Court will shatter and there will be nothing left for the rest of us.'

‘The battle has not ended,' she told him, not letting on how much his words stung. ‘I want you all in the sky. No matter your alliances. We have a city to defend. All of you owe it to me to dance the sky and keep the city safe. If you cannot accept Lennoc's repentance, Poet, that is your curse. Not his.'

‘You are less likeable today,' Poet sighed and then took to the sky. Shade shaped himself back into darkhounds and followed, along with Zero's weasels.

Velody looked at Lennoc. ‘If I can manage the newness of all this, so can you,' she said sternly.

He nodded. ‘I will not let you down again, Majesty. May I make my oath to you as Lord?'

‘Find me after the battle. If we are still alive, you can swear your oath.'

Lennoc nodded his head once and took to the sky, a bright glowing beacon. Another warrior to fight the demons. A sharper weapon to combat the sky.

It should concern Velody that she was thinking of the Creature Court as things rather than people — but she did not have time for that kind of weakness. Right now, there was a battle to fight.

 

The battle lasted the whole nox, growing fiercer even as the first lightness of dawn began to change the colour of the sky. They were all exhausted, beaten down by the relentless fight. Except Velody.

Ashiol had his own sky to fight, but he still could not take his eyes off her as she dodged the fierce bolts of warlight until she found one that glowed more deeply orange than the rest. She caught it, pouring all her animor into her hands and muscles, seizing hold of the burning thing until she could feel the heat through to her fingertips. Then she hurled it hard against the other bolts, cracking several open and sealing at least one gaping maw in the sky.

Ashiol still felt uncomfortable in his chimaera form, as if it was not entirely stable. His wings felt false, and his claws and teeth were a fraction slower than he was used to. There was an ache deep in his muscles that suggested he was not healed as well as he had thought. He struggled for a while with a cloudweb that left icy patterns in the air around him, and finally shattered it with a roar from deep inside himself.

For a moment, the sky surrounding him appeared to be made up of snowflakes, or the shards of a shattered mirror.

Finally, the sky calmed. Ashiol descended on the grass of the gardens of Trajus Alysaundre and took his naked human form. In that at least, he felt at home. Velody collapsed next to him, gasping air down into her chest. He knew that feeling. The air at ground level always tasted fresh and good after the harsh tang of being so high above the city.

He felt alive and half-dead and starving all at the same time. Velody rolled over, shifting her body on the grass, and looked directly at him, her dark eyes locking on his own. She looked starving too. Possibly not for meat.

Ashiol pounced, his hard body pinning her to the grass. She tipped her mouth up to his as if it was easy, as
if there was no reason in the world not to, and they kissed deeply, their skin sparking against each other.

He had always known that he wanted her, but this … damn Livilla and her games.

Ashiol broke off the kiss with a grunt of frustration. The sky was alight with pinks and golds for another reason that had nothing to do with war or danger. ‘Safe for another day,' he said. ‘Not from each other, obviously.'

‘No,' Velody said, wrapping her arms tighter around herself, as if she could conceal her nudity from him with her equally bare limbs. ‘Not from each other.' Local mice and cats surrounded them, peeping at the two naked humans with undisguised curiosity. Velody sent one and then another off in search of the sentinels.

Clothes would be good. If Ashiol was not allowed to lick every inch of her body, he would far prefer to be clothed.

‘Look at that,' Velody said suddenly.

Ashiol followed her gaze and saw the ruined remains of a temple that had obviously met the wrong end of a bolt of warlight. He could see the recent scorch-marks, and now that he was paying attention, he could smell the remains of the bolt — it was sour, like old lamp-oil.

‘Isn't that the Temple of the Market Saints?' said Velody in a small voice.

‘Yes,' he said, still not quite believing what he saw. ‘It's dawn, and it isn't healing. The city isn't rebuilding itself.'

‘The city always heals itself,' said Velody. ‘You taught me that.'

Ashiol wanted to scream and swear and break things and throw thunderbolts at the fucking sky until it broke forever. Instead, he said, ‘I know,' and nothing else. What the hells else was there to say? The rules had changed
again, and he had no idea why. He had to find Heliora. When the world fell apart, she was always the only one with the answers.

Ashiol and Velody sat in silence as the sky lightened from dark to daylight, and the temple remained in pieces. Not a stone moved.

N
ot long after the Seer Raoul's death, Ortheus called a formal Court at the Haymarket. I was in attendance with the other sentinels, standing to attention. I had no idea I was the subject of the Court until he called me to kneel before him and hand over my knives. I did so, chilled that he might be blaming me for the Seer's death.

But he wasn't. He took my blades, placing them carefully out of reach, and then he told me to look into the futures for him. I didn't believe it at first. But they all looked at me like I was a prize peach, succulent and ready for the biting. I denied it, protested, but Ortheus just sat there calmly, shiny-headed old bastard that he was, and made his demands.

I wanted to run. I searched their faces for some sign that it wasn't true. Finally, as a last resort, I looked inside myself … and the futures tumbled out so fast I could barely stay upright.

The futures are a white hot pain, a jumble of too much knowledge all at once. That first time, they flashed through my mind like an oil fire. I thought my head would explode, or my tongue would crumble to dust, I was so dry from the gabbling.

I was a Seer, I was alone, I had lost my family of sentinels, I would never get my swords. All so unfair. I thought this even as the futures dragged me deeper. I had no way of pulling out.

Finally, it seemed, I had done enough or said enough to please my Power and Majesty. Ortheus waved a hand and suggested that Tasha allow one of her boys to ‘quiet the bitch'. (Let us not mistake the fact that this was a show for the rest of them, and like it or not, I was intended to be the star act.)

Tasha had never liked me. She could have easily chosen Lysandor, whom I had no grudges against, or Garnet, who disliked me as much as I hated him. In the end I think she chose Ashiol to hurt me. This was her one chance to ruin any hope I had that he might choose me as a lover of his own volition.

She took the choice from him, and I'll never know if he might have loved me if our history was different.

He kissed me first, I remember that, even though I was mostly gone by that stage, howling random futures to the cavernous chamber, so swamped in the futures that I was barely aware of my body. His mouth hot on mine was almost enough to bring me back from the brink — I shuddered and stopped talking as his tongue slid into my mouth.

I couldn't hold on to reality, though. It was slipping away like a shadow at dusk. The futures pressed in on me, shrieking and screaming for attention. I watched every person of that Court die a hundred times before I came, gasping, my back against the wall of the Haymarket, my
legs wrapped around Ashiol Xandelian's waist and a deep almost-pain throbbing inside.

Our first time together, and I had pretty much missed it.

 

Heliora had chosen her hiding place carefully. For all he pretended to have returned to them all, she knew that Ashiol had kept himself away from those places that actually reminded him of what it had been like to be part of the Creature Court, when they were young.

Tasha's den had not been anyone's territory for a long time. Once her golden cubs became Lords and Kings, they moved away from the home they had shared as children. Hel didn't care a flip of her hand about Tasha, but this dusty old den reminded her of that time when the Creature Court was something new to her, bright and irrepressible.

It reminded her of the very young Ash, the boy who dodged every attempt a certain young sentinel brat made to drag him into her bed. Of Garnet before he was broken by power. Lysandor, too soft-hearted for his own good. Even the children, Livilla and Poet, before the Court hardened them and turned them into just another couple of monsters.

It was a good place to sleep. For once, she wasn't dreaming of the futures. Heliora was lost in a haze of Oblivion, and it was the past that was choking her.

Someone grabbed her shoulders, shook her awake. ‘Hel. Heliora. Wake the fuck up.'

She gasped and lost her hold on that sweet drugged warmth. She shuddered with cold even though he was there, already wrapping a blanket around her shoulders. The air was cold, and she could feel the scrape in her lungs.

‘How long have you been here?' Ashiol demanded. ‘I've been looking for you all day.'

Heliora leaned into his heat and rage. ‘Don't know. How did you find me?' The first drop of Oblivion had been so good. She had taken more the next time, and then again. It was so long since she had felt real peace.

‘One of Mars's courtesi saw you come down here. Apparently we all help each other out now. For fuck's sake, Hel.' Ashiol held the vial between finger and thumb and, oh, saints and devils. It was almost empty. No wonder her body felt so slow, as if she hadn't moved in days. One drop and then another … it had been so very easy. ‘We needed you,' he said accusingly.

‘Someone always needs me,' Hel said between sore, cracked lips. Real life was much harsher than dreams. She wanted to crawl back into her slumbering state. How much was left in the vial? She had to get it back off him. ‘I need not to be needed. Or something.'

‘Do you have any idea of what's been happening to the Creature Court, to the city?' Ash demanded.

Heliora laughed. ‘Of course I do. How could I not know? I've seen it all, and I'm done with it. I don't want to see anything else.' Dust. Her thoughts were full of dust.

For a moment she thought maybe he was concerned for her, but no. It was his precious city, as ever, that he was thinking of. ‘Is there worse coming?' Ashiol asked. ‘Is there, Hel? We need to know.'

Fuck you, Ashiol Xandelian.
‘There's always worse coming,' she flung at him. ‘No wonder Raoul threw himself off the balcony. Don't you listen? I said I'm done. I can't hold on until Saturnalia, I'm done now. I can't keep seeing what is to come — not and stay in one piece.'

Poet — why were her thoughts sliding away from him
like he was something for her to be ashamed about? She poked at that strange thought and then memory hit her square in the chest. She had used her gifts to steal his thoughts and memories, to intrude upon his darkest past. She had never done that to anyone before. ‘I'm too broken. You need a new Seer.'

A look crossed Ash's face — sympathy? Pity? Heliora wanted him to care, wanted him (saints, talk about embarrassing) to take care of her, but she sure as hells didn't like that expression on his face.

‘You're just tired,' he said finally.

She laughed, long and hard, the sound of it scraping her throat. ‘I'm squeezed out, Ash. I can't do this any more. Not for you, not for that sweet-faced Power and Majesty of yours. I may as well climb the steps in the Haymarket and be done with it.'

That got his attention. Yet another thing to not be proud of.
Watch me not care.
‘Don't say that, Hel.'

‘Why not?' she demanded. ‘None of you gives seven damns about who the Seer is. You want your prophecies in a neat paper parcel tied up in string. The city's about to be torn apart. I've seen it a hundred times over. I don't want to be here for it. Go tell your Creature Court that, and leave me alone.'

Ashiol was quiet for a moment. ‘Can it be changed? Can we change that future?'

‘The future can always change,' she said sullenly. ‘You know that. I'm sure you can play the hero; it's what you do. I just won't be there to throw the victory garlands.'

She had seen him play the hero, in the many futures. Had seen him fall, seen him swallowed by the sky, seen Velody swallowed by the sky. She really didn't want to be here when that happened.

So damned tired.

‘You're prepared to give me hope about the future,' Ashiol said quietly, one hand reaching out to stroke her hair. ‘Even though you believe that hope is false. But you won't allow yourself even a little.'

‘I don't have a future,' she said flatly, willing herself not to lean into his touch.

‘That's bullshit.' His voice was strong and familiar and did more to bring her out of the Oblivion haze than anything else. ‘Who's to say that your life is over? Raoul made that choice for himself. We don't know if he took that leap because of something he saw or something he didn't see. Just because the futures are closed to you does not mean you're going to fucking die. Maybe it just means you don't have to be a Seer any more.'

Heliora knew. Of course she knew. She still had Raoul's voice rattling around in the back of her skull, echoing her own thoughts and despairs. He had thrown himself off the balcony because of the empty future, because it was his only way of taking control.

Ash's idea was like a shock of cold water. It had never occurred to her — because perhaps it had never occurred to any other Seer — that the futures being closed to her did not mean her own death was imminent. ‘Have you ever met a former Seer?'

‘I've known one who jumped off a fucking balcony, and one who hasn't yet. Not enough for a pattern, is it?'

‘Maybe,' she said numbly. Hope, oh hope. She wasn't sure how to deal with that. All those voices of former Seers running around in her head, and she had never asked any of them how they died, or if they had walked away from being the Seer. ‘I've been seeing visions,' she confessed. ‘Not the futures. Something else. I saw
Garnet.' She would not tell him that she had seen Garnet inside Poet's memory. If there was a scar there, she had no reason to show it to the world. But the other vision, the one in the alley — that worried her.

Ashiol looked as if she had ripped a piece of his skin off. He had always held his emotions and his anger out for anyone to see — she sometimes thought that was why Garnet had been able to hurt him so badly. ‘Me too,' he said finally. ‘I think the sky is trying to drive me mad again.'

‘That makes two of us,' she sighed.

Ashiol wrapped his arms around her, until she felt warmth actually returning to her flesh. ‘Hel,' he said some time later. ‘I have to ask you something.'

To do her job. Of course. It had always been the Court first, with Ashiol. ‘You can ask,' she said.

‘The sky isn't healing itself.'

She nodded. ‘I was trying to tell you earlier, but I couldn't find the words. The others thought I was raving. There's a mirror in my head, and when it's broken, it won't mend.'

‘But how? Why?'

She leaned back, away from his touch. ‘You know why they took over Priest. To cause havoc and pain to the Creature Court. To make you turn against each other. To kill you, one by one. Have you not thought to wonder why they also took over the body of the Duchessa?'

‘Isangell? She didn't get a chance to do much apart from screwing things up for the priests, and trying to seduce me.'

Caught by surprise, Heliora laughed. She hadn't known the part about the seduction. Ashiol looked as
if someone was trying to feed him month-old cabbage ends. ‘They chose the wrong body if that was the task they were after.'

‘Yes, they did.' He was giving her that intense look. ‘The priests. Is that it?'

Heliora nodded slowly. ‘I saw that in all the futures where the festivals were cancelled, the mirror would not mend. All this time, we thought the daylight folk were useless, playing games with their honey cakes and ribbons. But what if they were fighting the sky in their own way?'

‘Aufleur only heals because of the daylight festivals?' Ashiol frowned, thinking it over. ‘So what now?'

What could she tell him that he didn't already know? ‘The dust is coming, and the city can't heal itself. All the rules you thought you could rely on are gone, Ash. When they get here, the city's going to bleed, and there's not a damned thing you can do to stop it.'

Now Ashiol was the one moving away from her, his mind calculating the next move, thinking of anything but her. ‘No, I don't believe that. Now we know the problem, we can fix it. The damned sky won't win, not this time.'

Heliora leaned against the wall, sighing. ‘No,' she said. ‘It won't win. Not against you. How could it?'

 

I'm not still in love with Ashiol. That would be one humiliation too many, thank you.

 

It was business as usual at the Basilica that afternoon. If you knew what to look for, you could see what was missing. Who was missing. Heliora's belongings had been salvaged by some of her kinder neighbours, who had no idea that she was the reason a madman chose to
rampage through their place, killing, maiming and wrecking. The smiles were more false than usual, but Heliora's fellow merchants were carrying on, doing what they always did: taking shilleins from customers.

Ashiol offered to come with her, once he had broken the news of what Priest had done. Heliora had thought she had seen every possibility, but she had not seen this one at all, and it was a strange thing to feel so outside reality. She had refused his help.

Breathing was harder than it should be. The thoughts kept crowding around her, harder and faster than the futures. She sat on the steps outside, a laden swag at her feet, looking out over the Forum. She still had her position, rent paid to the end of the season. She could buy another pavilion. But the thought of telling even one more fortune made her stomach cramp and her head hurt.

She couldn't come back here, not after this. She couldn't bear the Arches either, or any of the territory down below. Now that the Oblivion was leeching out of her system (no more, she had given the last of the vial to Ashiol to be sure of it), she wanted nothing but to curl up in a ball somewhere quiet.

‘Haven't you heard? We're saving Aufleur after all. No need to cut and run.'

Heliora looked up, and saw Poet haloed in the late afternoon sunshine. He was dressed in his fine city clothes, the ones he wore to play the seigneur patron of the Vittorina Royale: a long coat, top hat and a cravat tucked neatly under his chin. A sack sat at his feet, paper masks spilling out of it. Heliora stared at them. ‘You're saving the city with costumes and trinkets?'