“For the Archipelago. An infestation of sea-spirits has”—she searched for the appropriate word—“decimated a fishing Concern. They have need of our services.”
Tara noted her use of the plural. “You’ve heard from Kelethras, Albrecht, and Ao, then? I’m not to be cast into the outer darkness?”
“Confirmation of your continued employment arrived two days ago. It did not seem worth mentioning. You know as well as I do that your performance has been exemplary. Though the particulars of the Church’s case are not public, rumor does not always respect client confidentiality. The great firms know your name, and the quality of your work. Your escapades at the Hidden Schools will not be forgotten, but neither will your success here. Management would be fools to let you go, and though they may be risk-averse, they are not foolish.”
Fighting an urge to smile, Tara ran her hand over the pristine surface of Ms. Kevarian’s desk. “Sea-serpents, though. Seems simple, after everything we’ve been through in the last few weeks.”
“Make no mistake.” Ms. Kevarian closed her valise with a snap like the sealing of a coffin. “We’ve just begun our work. The reunification of Justice and Seril remains unstable. Seril’s children are still unwelcome within Alt Coulumb, and the goddess’s return is a secret, with good reason. Many blame her for abandoning the city to fight in the God Wars, and for the deaths her Guardians caused. That’s not to mention the dubious status of Kos’s contracts after his resurrection. We will return here again, soon.”
“I wanted to talk to you about that.” Tara’s hand rose to her stomach. Beneath her shirt, the wound Denovo gave her was swaddled in thick bandages, still healing.
“About what?”
“About Kos,” Tara said. Three weeks later, the afterimage of the god’s rebirth still burned in bruised purple before her eyes. “And one or two related matters.”
“What remains to be explained?”
She wanted to get to the point, but Ms. Kevarian’s patient expression drained her courage. She had prepared for this moment, but it felt worse than she had expected. “When did you first know he was hiding in Abelard’s cigarette?”
“When I met the boy in Gustave’s office. I’ve seen hidden gods before, and recognized the signs. I caught a vanishing glimpse before Kos realized he was being observed and hid himself deeper than I could follow. He was almost dead in truth, comatose by human comparison. I reasoned that he must have mistrusted his clergy if he hid from them, so I kept Abelard away from other priests, in your company or in mine.”
“You said he hid almost as soon as you saw him. It must have happened so fast. How did you know you weren’t mistaken?”
“Simple.” She leaned back against her desk. “I killed Abelard.”
“What?”
“I pulled his life away, slowly. As I drew it from him, more poured in from another source: a fire beyond this world. I half-expected him to realize the truth then, but he was oblivious to Kos’s presence, even as god-ash accumulated in his lungs. He began to see like a god or a Craftsman as he investigated the Sanctum’s boiler room; he used the vision to good effect, but failed to realize its source. Didn’t think anything of it when his so-called cigarette flame nearly killed that shadow-monster, either. Engineers: they spend so much time solving physical problems and obeying physical rules, they forget that nonphysical phenomena obey rules every bit as strict.”
Tara imagined Ms. Kevarian casually snuffing out Abelard’s life to test a theory. “You killed him when you took him to visit the ambassadors. Stand in their offices and look like a good little cleric, you said.”
“I needed an opportunity to make the experiment, and to demonstrate to Denovo’s clients that Kos still lived. They pulled their support from Alexander tacitly. Without that, he would have been more powerful when we faced him.”
The stars beyond the window struggled against the light from Ms. Kevarian’s desk lamp. “Very professional, boss.”
“It was an intellectual challenge: how to draw our adversaries out without betraying our hand?” Satisfaction manifested in the curve of her lips, in the downward cast of her eyes and the sturdy line of her shoulders.
It did not last for long.
“That’s what I thought. And it’s why I wanted to talk to you.”
Ms. Kevarian waited. When Tara did not continue, she said, “Yes?”
“You knew Kos was still alive, but you kept that knowledge from me, from Abelard, from everyone. You suspected Denovo was behind Kos’s death, and maybe even Cabot’s, all along; why else did you agree to meet with him in the dark room at Xiltanda, where you were functionally defenseless? You expected him to control your mind, because only when he had you at his mercy would he feel sure enough to lay all his cards on the table and begin the final phase of his plan. And you sent Abelard to me, knowing that, with his information and my own, I’d be able to piece together the truth, confront Denovo, and distract him long enough for you to get free. You guided my investigation so I would find whatever proof existed of Denovo’s involvement. I’d ask why you didn’t tell me your suspicions, but I already know: you thought I might confront him before you were prepared. You moved all of us like game pieces.”
Those straight shoulders and that curved neck stiffened. “You’re good, Tara. Without you, I could not have uncovered the gargoyles’ role in events, let alone Seril’s existence. Your work was invaluable.”
“Thank you,” she said. “I enjoyed that work, too. All of it. I was at least as manipulative as you. More so, in some ways: I stole Shale’s face, I warped Cat’s mind, while you barely used any Craft at all. But in the end I’m not sure either of us is any better than Denovo. He used other people because he wanted to become a god. We did the same because we wanted to win, wanted to be paid, wanted to see him fall. We’re leaving behind us a broken city, and two resurrected gods. Alt Coulumb doesn’t yet know the depth of the changes we have wrought upon it. And soon we’ll be gone, because we’ve done our job.”
Ms. Kevarian did not respond.
“My family left the east for Edgemont during the God Wars.” Tara willed her voice not to shake. “They had good reasons, but they ran, and I think … I think somehow their running away became my running away. I ran from Edgemont for anywhere else, away from everything I knew. I think for once I shouldn’t run. I know you’ve risked yourself to help me, to give me a chance at the firm. I’m more grateful than I can say. I enjoy working with you, and I owe you my life. But I don’t want to leave. I want to stay here, and finish what we’ve started.”
A terrible silence followed. Ms. Kevarian stood silhouetted by the moon, alone. Tara wanted to apologize, to say she hadn’t meant anything by it, to fall in line. She did not. “What,” said Ms. Kevarian after a time, “do you intend to do in Alt Coulumb if you remain?”
“The Church of Kos needs a Craftswoman on hand, someone who knows the city well enough to help them handle the aftershocks of Kos’s resurrection and Seril’s return. I can be that person. They need me. And I need to stop running away from everything I’ve done. I can’t stay one step ahead of the mob forever.”
“Remaining here might be another form of running.”
“I know. But I think this is different.”
Flickering lantern light cast Ms. Kevarian’s shadow long on the carpet. Tara focused on the velvet sky, and waited. Ms. Kevarian raised her head.
“I understand.”
“You do?”
“It’s a silly idea, and it indicates a degree of immaturity on your part as a Craftswoman. But it’s your idea. And you’re young. There’s plenty of time for you to grow.” They exchanged a long glance, and Tara saw Ms. Kevarian as she must have been decades before, full and young and twenty-five, staring down a long dark path toward power. “Do it. These people need someone to keep them from killing one another.”
“Thank you.” The words sounded hollow, and the room seemed oddly empty.
“I’ll swing back through Alt Coulumb when I’m done in the Archipelago a couple months from now,” she said at last. “To see if you’re ready to get back to work. You’re a great talent, Ms. Abernathy. I will not lose you this easily.”
“Thanks, boss.”
*
Clergies do not accept change well as a rule. The struggle over who would succeed to the office of Technical Cardinal of the Church of Kos Everburning was fierce, pitting three distinct reform factions against two breeds of theological conservatives. Some of the priests praised Seril’s return, and wished to admit Her to the liturgy. Others felt the gargoyles and their Goddess were best left alone. Seril Herself did not deign to address Her lover’s clergy, which only fueled the debate.
Fortunately, the various prelates soon realized that whichever of them held the position of Technical Cardinal would be responsible for working with Elayne Kevarian and Tara Abernathy, and the brewing sectarian violence cooled to a simmer of backroom deals and machinations. Rival factions held long knives ready beneath their robes and waited for the Craftswomen to leave. In the meantime, Cardinal Gustave’s old office remained empty.
With vacancy came uncertainty. None save Sister Miriel noticed when Novice Technician Abelard took advantage of this uncertainty to adjust a few time sheets and schedule his attendance upon God for the more reasonable interval between ten at night and one in the morning.
This was the only reward he claimed. In the preceding weeks, members of each faction had sought him out to promise promotion, elevation, sainthood in return for his support. Abelard had borne Lord Kos inside his heart (or in his cigarette—the difference didn’t seem to matter). Whispers about his miracles resounded through Sanctum halls like echoes off flat rock, but Abelard did not heed them. He knew the truth. The prelates had not saved Alt Coulumb. Nor had Cardinal Gustave. Nor had he, for that matter.
All Abelard wanted was to think, and pray. The rest of the world could wait.
He knelt before the Altar of the Defiant, his back to the window beyond which spread Alt Coulumb’s roads, its elevated trains, its towers and its palaces and the great globe of its sky, all shining like diamonds on black felt. Before him, the Rekindled Flame burned on its throne. Life beat on the drum of his heart.
“Glory to Thy Flame, Thou Everburning, Ever-transforming Majesty,” Abelard chanted, kneeling, before the glistening brass and chrome altar. He exhaled, and waited.
In the space between thoughts, he heard a voice.
Hello there, old friend, God said.
*
Deep below the Temple of Justice was a cell, well-apportioned but spare, walled on three sides by rock and on the fourth by a cold iron mesh. No sunlight reached there, nor starlight nor the light of the moon. A water clock on the room’s sole desk told time, but it lost minutes on the hour and this effect had compounded itself over the last three weeks. The cell’s only occupant thought the time was ten minutes before noon, rather than a quarter past one in the morning.
Alexander Denovo had just finished what he believed was lunch.
A heavy iron door swung open. Heels clicked on stone. He looked up, trying to place the stride, and succeeded a moment before Elayne Kevarian walked into view. She looked as one looks who has been contentedly busy for some time. He looked as one looks who has been idle and happy.
“Hello, Alexander,” she said.
“Elayne.” His nod was a parody of manners. “I would invite you to sit, but my jailers neglected to provide me with a receiving chair.”
“You find your new quarters pleasant?”
“They are to my liking, for the moment. I have had time to read, to think, and to plan.”
“Plan for what? You’re here until the Blacksuits decide what to do with you. You have remained inviolate thus far only because they have not yet formulated a suitable punishment for deicide.”
“I’m quite safe,” he said with certainty. “Justice, possessed or not by your tame gargoyle-goddess, cannot harm me herself. Nor will Alt Coulumb extradite me to the Hidden Schools, or to the mercies of Iskar or Camlaan or even the Gleb; while Justice cannot harm me, neither can she countenance my release, and my crimes against Kos and Seril are not crimes in the lands of the Deathless Kings. So here I stay. Cocooned in iron below the earth.”
“You sound suspiciously comfortable with that fact.”
He shrugged. “I have many friends. They will loose me on the world again. Hell, you would do it yourself, if I asked.”
Even in this cell, he had been able to draw some power to him, devouring the souls of rats and centipedes and deep earth-tunneling insects, feeding off the few taproots that extended so far beneath the city. He put that power into his voice, but Elayne batted it away with a blink of her eyes.
“Not likely.”
“It was worth a shot.”
“You’re a bastard, Alexander.”
“A brilliant bastard. I won’t stay here forever. I’ve learned a great deal in the last few months. How to slay a deity in secret, and seize his power.” He listed these things as if they were items on an invoice. “It’s amazingly simple. I will achieve godhood one day. I’ll find you, Elayne, and I’ll do such beautiful things with you. Twist your soul into a pretzel and skewer your dignity with fishhooks. It’ll be like it once was. You and me.”
His tone was wistful and wicked, calculated for the shudder it invoked in her stomach. She stilled herself before it reached her shoulders.
He stood, and paced the confines of his cell. “There’s nothing you can do. This cold iron grate? Woven with divine Craft. You could smite it with powers the … children … who populate this city have never imagined, and I’d sit here smiling. I’m snug as a chick in its egg, babe, until it’s time for me to break this little world open and come hunting for you. And Tara of course. Sweet, stubborn girl. So proud.” He assumed an airy, daydreaming tone of voice.
Her eyes closed, and so his did, too. He saw her as a python outlined in blue ice, filling the hallway. Her tongue flitted out to probe the iron lattice, found no gap in its protection, and retreated.
They opened their eyes at the same time. An irrational chill pricked up the hairs on the back of Denovo’s neck. For no reason he could determine, Elayne was smiling.