Two Serpents Rise (32 page)

He tried to knock, but collapsed instead. His cheek pressed into the pale wood’s grain. A heartbeat rhythm pulsed in his ear.

Halting footsteps from within: slippered feet approached.

“I have little water, less food, and a blast rod pointed at the door.”

“Teo,” he said. “Glad to see you’re … hospitable as ever.”

“Caleb?”

He grunted.

Chains rattled. Locks unlocked. When the door opened he stood straight for three seconds before slumping into her arms. She shouldered the door closed and latched it with one hand.

“Caleb, gods. What happened to you?”

“Gods happened.”

She sat him in the chair beside her coffee table. The cubist war scene taunted them both from her wall.

“You look like you went ten rounds with the bastards.”

“Only one. That was enough.”

“I didn’t take you for such a pushover.” She disappeared into the kitchen, and returned with water. “Drink it slow. There’s not much left. Three quarters of a pitcher, and the ice in the icebox.”

“Water in the desert,” he said wryly, dipped his finger and flicked a drop onto the floor.

“What’s happened?” she asked as he drank.

He wiped his lips with the back of his hand, then sucked the moisture from his skin. “What do you know?”

“I woke up and saw the shell from my bedroom window. I thought it was a joke before I heard Sam scream from the bathroom. She’d turned on the shower, and they were all over her.”

“Is she—”

“I got them off. The tap shut down pretty quick. She was cut, bruised, one bad tear in her shoulder where they dug in.” Teo exhaled. “We went door to door, telling people not to use the water. They understood pretty quick. Nobody here’s forgotten when the demons came from the taps, during the Seven Leaf crisis. Most of the building’s trying to wait the trouble out, for now. Some went to Sansilva to complain. I stayed here, lucky for you.”

“Good idea.” He savored the water. “The city’s dangerous.” Doomed, he almost said. “Where’s Sam?”

“I don’t know.”

“Oh. Seven hells.”

“She said we had to do something. I said, yes, hide, and wait. She called me all the things you call someone who says a thing like that at a time like this. Coward, and the rest.” She laughed like a razor scraped over piano wire. “My girl loves a riot. She’ll be in the thick of the mob, next to all the other fools.”

“You’ve been drinking.”

“Screw you. There’s a woman out there killing herself for no reason, in the middle of a city killing itself for no reason.”

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“So I repeat: what in the hells is going on?”

“The water’s bad.”

“I noticed, thanks. And if that’s all you knew, you’d say so, rather than trying to dodge the question.”

“Qet Sea-Lord is dead.”

She sat down. Her face went blank. “Oh.”

“Yes.”

“I can’t, I mean.” She ran her hand through her hair, gripping strands that slipped between her fingers. “What happened?”

“Mal happened.”

“Mal? Your Mal?”

“Not my Mal. Nobody’s Mal but her own. She’s been behind it from the beginning. Her, Alaxic, her friends and coconspirators.”

“Behind what?”

“Everything. From Bright Mirror to North Station to Seven Leaf, to this. They poisoned Bright Mirror and blew up North Station to speed RKC’s merger with Heartstone. They turned Seven Leaf against us. And this morning, Mal attacked Bay Station, broke in, and killed Qet Sea-Lord.”

“She would have been slaughtered. She’s, what, mid-thirties? No way she could have taken Bay Station on her own. Armies couldn’t do it.”

“She’s using the Serpents somehow. They feed her power.”

“No.”

“She shattered Bay Station, Teo. I’ve never seen anything like it. Killed the guards, broke the tower, ripped Qet’s heart out of his chest.”

“Caleb.” She shifted her chair back from the table, back from him. “How do you know all this?”

Meaning: you’re crazy. Or worse: are you on their side? Is that terror or eagerness I hear in your voice?

He told the tale from the beginning, as far as he knew it, from the Skittersill Rising when Mal’s parents died to Alaxic’s discovery of her, his tutelage, and her decision, on that naked swim in the Fangs, to strangle life rather than be overcome. He outlined her plot.

Teo interrupted when he mentioned Seven Leaf Lake, Mal cutting Allesandre’s throat—“Because she would have talked. If she survived I mean. The King in Red would have pulled the truth from her somehow.” Caleb did not answer. He finished with his fall from Andrej’s pyramid, and turned to her for solace, for comfort.

“What the hells, Caleb?”

This was not the reaction he expected. “What?”

“You came to me with this? Out of all the people in this city? Not to a Warden, or the King in Red, or any of the board members.”

“The pyramid’s locked in a Canter’s Shell, and I have no idea how to reach the board. Ostrakov, Mazetchul, the rest of them, they’re probably as bad off as the King—comatose, or close to it. They’re as tied to the system as he is. Even if some of them are still moving, they’re probably low on power, and in danger—fighting Tzimet, trying to fix the water, save their own skins. I had to hide and catch my breath. Decide what to do next. Maybe that is looking for the board. I don’t know.”

“You could have died on the way over.”

“Or as I wandered through Monicola on foot with Tzimet loose. Or when I tried to steal the heart from Mal. Or when I jumped off the pyramid. My life isn’t the point now.”

Teo stood and paced. She thought best in motion. “How could we have missed this?”

“You never knew her. Nobody did. She was careful. I got closest, and I was in love. Or thought I was.” The past tense hurt.

“What’s her plan?”

“Take over the city, it sounded like. In the short term.”

“We need more detail. She wants to wake the Serpents up. Use them to chase the Craftsmen out, set up a new government, hail the glorious revolution, whatever. But the Serpents wake up on the eclipse. She’ll have ultimate power for, what, half an hour, maybe less, until the Craftsmen move back in.”

“The eclipse wakes the Serpents up, I think. The sacrifice is supposed to send them back to sleep. Maybe they’d normally sleep once the eclipse ended, but Mal’s used a lot of their power. I bet they’re ravenous. Have you ever tried to sleep with an empty stomach and food in the next room?”

“So we feed them.”

“We’d need a sacrifice.”

“So we find a sacrifice.”

“No.”

“I’m only saying, if we can—”

“We are not going to sacrifice anyone. To anything.”

“Even if it would stop Mal? Fix all this?”

“Hells.”

“I’m just saying.”

“No.”

“Okay. Fine.” She cradled her forehead between her hands. “Why did she let you go?”

“She didn’t let me. I jumped, remember? Off a building?” He indicated his wounds and his ripped clothing with an angry wave.

“She grabbed the heart. I’m sure she could have caught you, if she wanted.”

“I don’t know. Maybe she wanted to let me go. Maybe she still has feelings for me.”

“Feelings.” Teo strangled a laugh. “Sorry. This situation is absurd.”

“It’s serious.”

“Absurd and serious. The worst kind of joke.” She tapped her lower lip with a curled finger. “RKC’s out of commission because it has to spend all this soulstuff keeping the Serpents asleep. That’s the problem. If we could get into the Sansilva pyramid, maybe we could break the contract binding RKC and Heartstone.”

“Won’t work. Craft is more than words on a page.”

“But words on a page are important. Without a contract, without a signature, RKC could weasel out of the deal. We might have a chance.”

“A deal’s a deal, though. Can we really just cancel the contract without Heartstone’s consent?”

“Cancel, no. But weaken, sure, enough for someone as strong as the King in Red to ignore it for a while. If Heartstone had Craftsmen and Courts on their side, nothing we do would matter, but I imagine their Craftsmen are all busy right now, and none of the Courts are open.”

“Fair point.”

“But if that’s so, you’re the only one alive who knows what’s going on, and how to stop it. If I were Mal, love you or not, I’d hunt you down and make sure you didn’t tell anyone.”

“Good thing she doesn’t think the way you do.”

“Maybe she hasn’t caught up with you yet.”

There was a knock on the door.

He and Teo exchanged a brief, deep glance. She picked up her blast rod.

There was a second knock, like the beat of a funeral drum.

Is that her
, Teo mouthed. He did not answer, but tiptoed to her kitchen and returned bearing a long, sharp chef’s knife.

The third knock, the fourth: thick, solid sounds.

Teo edged down the hall, blast rod leveled at the door. Her hands shook. He followed her. “Sam?”

She received no answer.

“I’m angry, and I’m armed. Tell me who you are or get away from my—”

The latch snapped and the door burst from its frame. Black, sharp-edged shadow boiled through. Teo’s blast rod flared twice. A clawed hand grabbed her wrist and twisted. The wand fell from her limp fingers; the shadow figure spun her around and pinned her against the wall.

Caleb stabbed the shadow, and felt a dull thud as if his knife had struck solid wood. Before he could react, something hit him in the stomach. He sunk to his knees, swallowing air.

The blurred world resolved into outline. Teo’s knife lay on the ground beside Caleb, its blade melted. Their attacker was human-shaped, broad-shouldered and massively muscled, clad in darkness and gleaming light; the air about him thrummed with ancient chants. One huge hand held Teo’s wrist. A forearm thick as a column pressed against her throat. Teo’s free arm clawed at her attacker’s face. Her nails drew sparks as they skidded over the steel-smooth dark.

Caleb recognized him.

“Father,” he said. “Put Teo down, or you’ll have to hit me again.”

Temoc released her and stepped back. Teo coughed, and straightened, cradling her wrist. Anger flushed her face.

Shadows passed from Caleb’s father like flowers closing for the night. His scars dimmed, and the man himself stood in Teo’s hallway: naked from the waist up, dark skin distended with muscles and old wounds.

“Son,” Temoc said. “I need your help.”

Caleb blinked. “What?”

40

“A group of fanatics is about to destroy the city,” Temoc said.

“I know.”

“They intend to use the Twin Serpents as a weapon. The last time Aquel and Achal were used this way, they broke the continent in half. I need you to help me stop them.” He blinked. “Wait. What do you mean, you know?”

“Mal, the woman who’s planning all this, she and I. We’re dating, I guess. I mean, we were.” Temoc’s eyes widened. “I’m not a part of the plan. I left as soon as I found out what was going on. About an hour ago.”

“You did not tell me you were seeing anyone.”

“I didn’t know I had to clear my romantic choices with you.”

“Caleb,” Teo said, massaging her throat, “I’ve never met your father. Please introduce me to this man who just broke into my apartment and tried to strangle me.”

Temoc looked at her. She glared back.

Caleb counted to ten and down. “Teo, this is Temoc, last of the Eagle Knights, high priest to All Gods. Dad, this is Teo. She’s a contract manager at RKC, and my friend.” He laid special emphasis on the last word.

“I apologize for hitting you.” Temoc bowed his head. “I do not relish striking women.”

“Thank you,” Teo said with a cold edge, “for your condescending, sexist apology.”

Temoc clasped his hands behind his back and raised his chin, and waited, like a statue staring into the glorious future.

Teo knelt to reclaim her blast rod. “How can we trust you? You’re a theist, a murderer. You tried to kill the King in Red. You could be part of this whole plot.”

“I could have killed you both if I wished. I have not done so. Nor did I break your wrist when you shot me. These are signs of my good faith.”

Teo bared her teeth. Caleb stepped between them. “Swear you’re not part of this, Dad. Pick a god, and swear.”

“I speak truth, on the bones of Ili of the Bright Sails. Your woman and her comrades have betrayed us all. They have abandoned the keeping of the days and the marking of the hours.”

“Add deicide and murder to those charges.”

Temoc drew a deep, rumbling breath. “Then Qet is dead.”

“Yes. And some people, too.”

“Your woman’s master was a priest once. A good man turned sick. I discovered this planned blasphemy too late, when he tried to kill me, and killed himself. I recovered, broke into his house, found his journals, learned the truth. We must stop his student before others die.”

“Yes,” Caleb said. “But how?”

For a time, Temoc did not reply. He should have been a poker player, not a priest. He was immutable as a mountain. Eons could pass about him, civilizations rise and fall, without Temoc registering the change.

“First,” he said, “I would like you to tell me about this woman. Second, I would like a glass of water.”

*   *   *

Temoc, Priest of All Gods, sipped water from a blue coffee mug emblazoned with the words “World’s Best Daughter” above a picture of a goddess suckling a serpent. Caleb shifted in his seat. His wounds hurt, talking hurt, not talking hurt, sitting at a table across from his father hurt. Teo paced, tapping the tips of her blunt fingers together. She scowled as Caleb repeated the story of his relationship with Mal.

Temoc considered for a long, silent time, head downturned, shoulders sloped over the table like a rocky hillside. Since the Skittersill Rising, Caleb’s father had become a myth, to his son as much as to the rest of the city: a name shouted from newspaper headlines and whispered in dark corners. He was a legend, and a legend could not be a father. Nor could a legend sit in Teo’s white living room, surrounded by sensible Iskari furniture, drinking from a World’s Best Daughter mug.

“The Serpents are the great danger,” Temoc said at last. “If all she had were her Craftswoman’s tricks, we could defeat her. We cannot stop the Serpents while they are hungry. We must feed them with sacrifice—feasting, they will be sated, and sleep. The great altars are all destroyed, or under heavy guard, but lesser altars remain, used before the Fall for simple sacrifices, goats and cows, rarely touched by human blood. Two priests, working together, could purify one of these lesser altars and make sacrifice there. Caleb, you are not a priest, but you bear our marks.” The old man touched the scars on his arms. “You can help me.”