The Copper Promise (11 page)

Frith laughed. The palms of his hands were itching.

‘How did you do that?’ asked Wydrin, her voice shrill with astonishment, and Frith tried to tell her, but she could not hear it over the screaming of the warriors. Those still alive were now retreating for the far door, swords held over their heads. And there was another sound. A deep and ominous rumble from beneath their feet.

‘She is stirring,’ said Marshum. ‘She is not completely free yet, I do not know …’

Frith knelt by Sebastian and took hold of the big knight’s face between his fingers. He was as white as paper and the skin around his eyes was bruised a deep purple, but he could feel the slither of life still there, a tiny hot thread amongst all that cold.

‘He’s still alive, but barely.’

‘Then we need to get out of here.’ Wydrin looked back towards the far doors, but the snake warriors were still crowded there, watching them with yellow eyes.
They will gain their courage again soon enough
, thought Frith,
and then what?
Now that the adrenaline was fading, his legs felt weak and his head was spinning. Could he keep up the fireballs long enough to fight to the surface? Long enough for Sebastian not to lose his grip on life on the way out? He thought not.

Instead he searched the new knowledge he’d wrestled from the mages. It was strange, he did not feel as though he’d learned anything new, but he could remember things about the Citadel, things he hadn’t known before. And he thought there was a way out, after all.

‘I’m going to bring the ceiling down,’ he told them.

‘
What?
’ The portion of Wydrin’s face that was not covered in blood was milk white. ‘Did that little soak in the lake soften your brain?’

‘Just watch, and be ready to run.’

The simmering ball of light and noise had already begun to grow again in his belly. Frith looked up at the ceiling and tried to see it clearly. The smoke from the fire and the height of the cavern made that difficult, but he knew it was there, and the mages knew its weaknesses. He reached out with his mind and he could
feel
the cracks up there, rents and fissures torn by the passage of time. For thousands of years the cavern had supported the weight of the Citadel, for thousands of years it had been strong, solid. And now it was time for it to come down.

Light leapt up out of his hands before he even knew what he was doing, and this time it looked like forked lightning, brilliant and white. It travelled up to the distant ceiling and licked along the surface. For a few seconds they could all see it – black rock and weathered stalactites lit up in harsh blacks and whites – and then it was gone. Wydrin was letting fly a long series of colourful curses. Frith took a deep breath. He needed to concentrate.
Let’s see what I can do.

Heat streamed out of Frith’s fingers towards the ceiling. His heart raced inside his chest so fast that he could hardly breathe, and for a brief second he could feel the broken surface of the ceiling under his fingertips. The fissure was a dark, secret place; he could sense the emptiness behind the rock, the places where the stone was weak. All it took was a little pressure …

Wydrin closed her eyes against the blinding light, but they were soon forced open again when a series of small explosions turned the lake into a frenzy of waves. There was an ear-splitting crash and suddenly it was as though they were being lifted towards the ceiling on a surge of water. It was only when the scaled warriors began to shriek that she realised it was the ceiling coming down towards them.

She flung herself over Sebastian’s body, painfully aware that such last-minute heroics were pointless, and then it all went black.

It was the sun that woke her. It was a gentle, warm hand on her head, and for a few moments she imagined she was back on the deck of the
Haven’s Champion
, sailing on a hot day. She even fancied she could taste the salt …

Wydrin opened her eyes to blue sky and rubble. The Citadel, having stood for thousands of years, was now a mountain of broken masonry and shattered red brick. Pulling herself to her feet she saw that they had been thrown down onto the Sea-Glass Road. Frith was there, standing and looking down at his hands like he’d never seen them before, and Sebastian was lying a few feet away. Of the Culoss there was no sign. They were all covered in a thick layer of dust.

‘What did you do?’

Frith looked up at her. The long twisting scar from his face was gone, and he was standing straight and true, but his hair was still bone-white.

He looked like he was trying to formulate an answer, but then Wydrin noticed something behind him, in the ruins of the Citadel. Red against red.

She ran back up the Sea-Glass Road, weaving through the debris and ignoring the throbbing in her head. Amongst the broken stones of the Citadel were four equally broken bodies, dressed in brown leather armour. A shattered spear still poked from the hand of one of them.

‘The guards,’ she said. Her stomach turned over slowly. ‘They’re all dead, just look at them. Didn’t the Culoss say …?’

A tremendous roar from below caused the words to die in her throat. The ground around them began to shake, and a series of huge cracks ran down the Sea-Glass Road like the lightning that had brought down the Citadel.

‘She’s coming,’ said Frith. ‘We have to get out of here.’

‘What is
she
?’ cried Wydrin. The rubble began to churn, throwing pieces of rock and stone down at them as something huge began to push its way up from below. There was another roar, turning Wydrin’s blood cold. It was the roar of something that ate creatures her size as an appetiser. And she couldn’t drag her eyes away from it.

An enormous reptilian head pushed through the ruin of the Citadel. It was covered in shining scales, each as deep a blue as the ocean. Its huge yellow eyes were full of fire, and when it opened its mouth a belch of greasy flame shot forth. Y’Ruen pulled herself free of the rubble and flapped a pair of leathery wings, each as big as the sails on Wydrin’s father’s largest ship.

‘A dragon,’ said Wydrin weakly. She could feel all the strength draining from her legs, despite her brain’s frantic instructions to
run
.

‘A dragon, a god, what does it matter?’ Frith was next to her, and as Y’Ruen turned her huge fiery eyes upon them he slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her close to him. She had a second to notice that he already had hold of Sebastian by the remains of his cloak before the desert sky began to distort and twist.

‘What are you doing?!’

‘Taking us away. Now hold on.’

Before they vanished from the Sea-Glass Road, Wydrin twisted her head for one last look at the monster they had unleashed. Distantly she could hear screaming as the city of Krete awoke to its long-neglected guest.

Y’Ruen roared, blue scales winking in the sun, and the city began to burn.

The Thirty-Third walked down the cobbled road, her bare feet silent against the stones. Across the way she could just make out the slim shape of her brood sister, the Ninety-Seventh, crouched over something twitching on the floor. It was making noises, and she could feel her sister’s pleasure as a warm space in her mind. The Thirty-Third smiled, tasting smoke on her tongue.

They had no names, the brood army, but the Thirty-Third knew where she had been spawned, and when. She had grown in the cold and dark over many long years, nestled closely to her sisters, tasting their minds all around her until she knew each of them without needing to look at their faces. There were those who were before her, and those who were after, and that was all. And Mother, of course.

A small shape came careening out of an open doorway, skidding to a halt in front of her. Its eyes were wide with panic, and immediately the Thirty-Third was in pursuit. There was no need to think; the creature was small and warm and terrified, a thing of prey. It made the mistake of turning and running back into the darkened household, and the Thirty-Third followed.

The family had gathered in the parlour, and were now huddled together around the remains of the dining table. The Thirty-Third could see the vestiges of relief on the mother’s face, relief at the return of her son who had so foolishly run away. The Thirty-Third watched as the tatters of this emotion were replaced with flat terror. It was fascinating, really. The mother gathered her son into her arms, pressing him to her skirts.

‘Hello,’ said the Thirty-Third. It was interesting to speak. Each word was a new flavour.

‘Get out.’ The father was a skinny man with a shining bald spot poking through the wisps of brown hair on his head. He was crooked from a lifetime of pushing carts and she could see from the glassy look in his eyes that he’d never needed to be brave before, but now here he was, doing it anyway. She grinned. ‘Get out and leave us alone,’ he said again.

The Thirty-Third drew her sword. It was made of blue crystal, and it hummed as it slid against the golden scabbard. The family shuddered as one at the noise; they’d all heard that sound in the last few hours, and already knew what it meant. The Thirty-Third knelt and placed it on the floor in front of her feet.

‘I am only here to talk,’ she said, in what she hoped was a friendly tone. The boy whined, and twisted his fists into his mother’s apron. ‘It is a new thing, this … talking. I wish to ask you questions, hear your answers, and then you can go, yes?’

The man and woman exchanged a look. There was hope in that look, a tiny candlelight you could never quite put out. It was one of the things she was learning about them.

‘We can go?’ asked the woman.

‘Yes. Tell me, what is the boy’s name?’ She pointed to the child with one delicately clawed finger.

‘Ben, his name is Ben.’ Now that they’d grasped the idea, they were eager to run with it. The man nodded and even smiled, just as though all his neighbours weren’t dead and the city burning. ‘Our lad, he’s just had his ninth birthday.’

‘Really?’ The Thirty-Third felt genuine delight at that. It was similar to the feeling of satisfaction that came when something previously unbroken snapped under her foot. ‘So have I! Well, my first. My first birthday.’

‘That’s nice,’ said the woman. Her voice was tight.

‘And you live here, in this city.’ The Thirty-Third gestured around at the four walls of the small room. ‘What does that mean, to live in the city?’

The tentative smile on the man’s face froze, becoming a mask of something else. He didn’t understand the question, she could see that, and he knew that failing to answer would be dangerous.

‘I don’t – what do you mean?’

She took a step towards them, and as one they shuffled back. She smiled a little wider.

‘You build things, make things, and then put them all together in one place, and then eat and sleep and rut and die next to each other. Why is that?’

‘It’s – this is Krete. There have been people here for thousands of years, it’s a place of great civilisation. There was the Citadel …’ he cast around for something else but found nothing.

‘Yes, there was,’ agreed the Thirty-Third. ‘I am done. You may go.’ She gestured to the doorway behind her.

‘We can leave?’ asked the woman. She had not once taken her eyes from the green-skinned soldier during the conversation. ‘You’ll just let us go?’

‘By all means,’ said the Thirty-Third, and then felt pleased with herself. She was picking up their phrases already. Or had that come from somewhere inside? ‘The boy first, please. Send him out the front and follow on behind. If you are quick and do not draw attention to yourselves, my sisters may not catch you.’

‘And you won’t hurt us?’ asked the woman, but already she was pushing the boy beyond the table, her hands on his shoulders. ‘No tricks?’

‘No tricks,’ agreed the Thirty-Third, affably enough. ‘My sword is on the floor.’

The child, Ben, shuffled forward a few steps at a time. He glanced at the empty doorway, to the tall soldier with the pointed teeth, and then back to the doorway.

‘Go, Ben,’ said the father, with forced cheeriness. ‘We’ll see you outside.’

‘Do as your father says, Ben,’ said the Thirty-Third in a solemn voice, but as he passed close to her she reached out with her clawed hands as if to caress his cheek and tore out his throat instead. The hot blood soaked her arm to the elbow, and she felt that warm sensation of satisfaction again. She turned to the parents just as the mother started screaming.

The sword only sped up the process, after all.

Outside, the streets were bright with fire. The Thirty-Third, now full and indolent as a snake, stood and looked into the billowing smoke. She was thinking about the questions she had asked, and some of the things she’d said.

‘By all means,’ she murmured to herself. The words were both strange and not strange. There was someone else with her, in her blood, something that was not her mother. She knew it as well as she knew the faces of her brood sisters.

‘We carry you with us, Father,’ she said to the blood-stained cobbles. ‘Can you feel it?’

Lost in a nightmare of blood and fire and pain, Sebastian heard the voice that called him father – and felt his heart stop.

Wydrin forced her eyes open and stared up into a purple sky framed with black branches.

Enormous trees loomed to either side, with gnarled trunks and branches filled with slick, dark green leaves. Bulbous populations of fungi crouched within the roots, like pale, watchful children, and wind moved mournfully through the treetops. Normally Wydrin disliked asking obvious questions, but on this occasion she felt she could hardly avoid it.

‘Where am I?’

There was no answer.

Krete had the aroma of a slop bucket left in the sun but the air here was fresh and clean. There was soil beneath her, dark and moist. She ran her fingers through it, taking in the smell of mud and trees, the deep earthy scent of an old place long guarded by nature. The dusty ruins of Krete had been replaced by a silent forest, and the dark skies above were mercifully empty of dragons.

She sat up, and all the aches and pains came flooding back. There was a sharp throbbing in her arm that was probably a fracture, and the top of her head was sore where one of those green bitches had surprised her. She looked down and was surprised to see that she was bloody all over. A few more memories clicked into place.