SIXTEEN

 
 
 

"It isn't over, not yet."

  "What?"

  Tom realised this wasn't exactly what either of the others wanted to hear, but it was the truth and he had to say it before they relaxed, before the urgency disappeared. "The presence that was corrupting the core, Thaiss's brother, it didn't die, it merely fled into the City Below. I've got to go after it and finish things."

  "Why?" Kat asked. "You came here to restore the city's core, and that's what you've done. Job over."

  Why indeed. Not for his own gain, not for some personal advantage, but for the sake of Thaiburley: the city that was his home, the city he loved, the city he belonged to heart and soul. For the good of everyone, not just himself. There, he'd admitted it. He was doing this, all of it, because somebody had to and he was the one in the right place at the right time; the only person who could. Simple as that. If it made him a hero in some people's eyes and a fool in others', that was their problem, not his.

  He shook his head. "I have to see this through, that's all."

  "Where are you gonna look? The City Below is a pretty big place, in case you've forgotten."

  "I know, but the taint didn't just go anywhere, it went into a host, I could sense that much; someone or something that had been prepared in advance. I just have to figure out who or what."

  "Insint," Kat said, as if struck by sudden realisation.

  "What?"

  "The expedition into the Stain, it wasn't just the Soul Thief we were hunting. I made a deal with the Prime Master. He helped us track down the Soul Thief and in return we agreed to help him take down something he called 'Insint', a leftover from the war apparently, some sort of creature or mechanism that's still around and working against the city."

  Tom stared at Kat, reckoning that her suggestion might just be an inspired one. If this Insint had fought against the city in the war, then it was already an ally of Thaiss's brother. The natural place for him to flee. "All right, that settles it. I'll take us back to the Stain."

  "At last!" Kat said. "That'll be one of the Prime Master's promises fulfilled." She gave a wry smile. "I guess the gold can wait."

  "No, stop!" Jayce said. "First we have to report to the council, the Prime Master, to let them know what's happened."

  Tom hesitated, loathe to lose any more time.

  "That's where my duty lies," Jayce added, not quite pleading, but definitely heading that way.

  Tom nodded, reluctantly, but both he and Kat did owe the young Guardsman their lives. "All right, I'll take you to the Prime Master and then Kat and I will head for the Stain, leaving you to make your report."

  "Thank you."

  Tom had Kat and Jayce stand close to him, each gripping one of his arms. He cleared his mind and summoned an image of the Prime Master, concentrating as the goddess had taught him, honing in on that face, drawing it to him and him to it and… nothing happened. He tried again, but still nothing. He thought about the process, trying to work out what he was doing wrong, and concluded that he wasn't doing anything wrong.

  He felt Kat adjust her grip on his left sleeve. "Anytime you're ready," she said.

  "I know," he assured her. "It's not working, and I don't know why."

  "Maybe all the fiddling around with the core is to blame, affecting your power in some way," Kat suggested, as she and Jayce relaxed, letting go of his arms. "Maybe it has to settle into a new pattern or something."

  "Maybe," Tom agreed, but he didn't think so.

  "Try someone else," Jayce said. "Perhaps something's blocking your connection to the Prime Master but it'll work with someone else."

  Good idea, but who? The Prime Master was someone he knew well, but the other council members he'd only caught brief glimpses of and they were just hazy impressions. "Thaiss!" he said at length. There was one other person he could picture clearly.

  "What?" Kat wanted to know.

  He sighed. "The only person whose face I can see in enough detail to try this is… Carla Birhoff."

  Jayce snorted, which, Tom suspected, provided ample comment regarding his opinion of the assembly member.

  "Really?" Kat said. "She obviously made quite an impression."

  Tom glared in response to her mischievous smirk.

  "Go for it, kid," she then encouraged. "It still beats walking back."

  He supposed she was right.

  He waited as they shuffled closer to grip his sleeves again before taking a deep breath, hoping he wasn't going to regret this. He pictured the insincere smile, the avaricious eyes that marred the almost-attractive face of this slender older woman, who struck him as someone past her prime but determined to keep age at bay. This time there was no problem. He felt the increasingly familiar rush of energy, and the anonymous blank-walled corridor they'd been standing in disappeared.

  He trusted the core energy, trusted that it would deposit them safely in a position free of obstructions, and it did. They materialised in what was obviously a bedroom, where a semi-naked Carla Birhoff was in the process of changing her clothes.

  The assembly member shrieked, snatching up a garment and clutching it defensively across her torso while at the same time turning away from them in a cowering crouch.

  "Dear goddess, what… how… how dare you!"

  Kat sniggered. Tom averted his eyes instantly and felt his cheeks burn. He wasn't too certain what he'd seen but he knew it was flesh, her flesh, and fervently wished he could be somewhere else just then – anywhere else.

  Only Jayce seemed unperturbed; as cool and professional as you'd expect from a Council Guardsman. "Assembly Member Birhoff," he said, stepping forward and suddenly all business. "Apologies for the intrusion, but we're here on a matter both grave and urgent. We'll wait in the next room until you're able to join us. I would urge you, though, to please be prompt."

  With that he herded Kat and Tom from the bed chamber into a well-appointed lounge that, if Tom's memory served him right, pretty closely matched the size of the one in which he'd been held prisoner by Miles and Ryan and the gang of renegade boys.

  Kat flung herself backwards into one of two comfortablelooking sofas, arms outspread. "Hey, this is nice," she approved, wriggling a little. "Think I might get one of these for the new home… when I've got one." Tom made no comment, anxious to be on his way.

  They didn't have to wait long, Assembly Member Birhoff joined them within moments, now fully clothed.

  "Right," she said, clearly still angry, "would you mind telling me what the hell you think you're doing popping up in my bedroom like that?"

  "I'm sorry…" Tom began.

  "So you should be!" Birhoff snapped. "You have extraordinary talents, Tom, that's obvious, but they should be used wisely, not in some childish prank or for the sake of cheap thrills."

  "I wasn't…" he began.

  "Hey!" Kat interrupted, now on her feet and generating the sort of menace that Tom knew only too well. "Don't talk to him like that. He just saved the whole breckin' city!"

  To her credit, the assembly member didn't flinch, though she did blink a couple of times before replying, in a much calmer voice, "For which we're all grateful, I'm sure, grateful to all of you." She graced them with a politician's smile. "But there are still such things as privacy."

  "Let's all calm down," Jayce suggested; more for Kat's benefit than the assembly member's, Tom suspected.

  "Sorry for bursting in on you like this," Tom said. "But I had no choice."

  She looked at him quizzically.

  "I couldn't reach the Prime Master for some reason, and… " He stopped, seeing her expression, which conveyed, shock and discomfort at the same time, her mouth forming an oh without any sound emerging. "What?" he said, though, with sinking heart, he already guessed what was coming.

  "I'm so sorry, Tom." She lifted a hand to rest gently on his arm. "Of course, you wouldn't have heard. The Prime Master is dead."

  "What?" Tom was stunned. Even though this was what he'd feared but had tried so hard not to consider, his brain still refused to decipher meaning from what his ears reported. "What do you mean he's dead? He was safe, here, with all of you."

  "After you left the attacks intensified," the assembly member explained. "It was almost as if the Rust Warriors or the guiding intelligence behind them realised they were running out of time. There were so many of them, more than we'd ever imagined… the Blade, the Kite Guards, the Council Guard, arkademics, watch officers reassigned from other Rows, hastily organised militia drawn from ordinary citizens, we needed every single one of them just to hold our own. I don't think any of us imagined how many of our people had fallen victim to bone flu. They just kept coming. It was horrible."

  Tom still couldn't believe it. "And the Prime Master fell defending the Row." What was someone of his importance doing on the front line anyway?

  "No," and she shook her head. "That was the worst part. While we fought, he faced his own battle, alone. He had bone flu, Tom, very advanced. How he held it at bay for as long as he did we'll never know."

  "The gloves," Tom murmured, suddenly understanding. "Didn't anyone guess? You were around him a lot more than I was."

  She sighed. "We were all so busy. There were so many other things to think about, to worry about, and the Prime Master always seemed so…"

  "Permanent," Tom supplied.

  "Yes, exactly; permanent."

  He drew a ragged breath. "So what happens now, for the city?" For me.

  "We go on. We rebuild. We celebrate our survival and the lives of all the wonderful, brave folk we've lost. We assemble a new council, promoting the most worthy of the senior arkademics to replace those members who have passed away or can no longer serve. That's what we've always done, if not generally replacing so many at one time… in short, we go on."

  Tom had only known the Prime Master a brief while but this wise and generous man had his respect and, yes, his love. He could cope, though; he'd suffered losses before. News of this latest one only strengthened his resolve regarding the future. The Prime Master had been Tom's only strong tie to the Heights and the world of arkademics and councillors, and now that tie was severed. In a strange way, this news of the Prime Master's death freed him. A final unwitting gift from a man to whom he owed so much.

  Tom's gaze fell on Kat. He saw the concern haunting her eyes. "Do you still want to do this?" she asked.

  "Yes!" Even more so now. For the Prime Master's sake as much as anything else, he was determined to see this through. "Are you ready?"

  She nodded. They held hands this time. Tom had no trouble summoning the face of the Tattooed Man, M'gruth, and the familiar rushing feeling swept over him.

 

Tylus still led the way. Their company was hardly silent as they stumbled through that deep and dark second chamber, but the further they ventured the more they found that any noise was muffled by the omnipresent roar of what had to be a waterfall. Conversation became difficult and they lapsed into the habit of silence. For no discernible reason one of the torches had packed up within minutes of its being switched on, so they were reduced to using just one at a time, which Tylus held. The resultant cone of illumination that fanned out before him provided a welcome tether to reality in these extraordinary surroundings. He sensed the others behind him but wondered if that was only because he knew them to be there. Part of him suspected that if they should disappear one by one he might never even notice they had gone.

  Although by no means level or even, the ground had at least stopped dropping ever downward, for now at least, though it had taken Tylus a little while to recognise the fact. With no real visual clues and hearing all but negated by the thunder of rushing water, the mind took to playing tricks, and judging anything as subtle as gradient became a challenge.

  Droplets of water drifted onto Tylus' face – nothing obvious, more in the nature of condensing mist. He lifted the torch's beam away from the ground to find the light reflected back at him from myriad such drops floating in the air like ephemeral jewels. Beyond this curtain, he thought he could glimpse more concerted movement – something rushing downward – which could only be the waterfall. As if to confirm the assumption, he nearly slipped over; the rocks beneath their feet were becoming damp and treacherous.

  Tylus was just trying to work out whether he really had heard someone call out his name when he felt something land on his shoulder, startling him, but it was only a hand; Issie's to be precise. She was making a valiant effort to shout and make herself heard above the roar. He leaned towards her, trying to catch the words.

  "The Blade are saying we should stay here," she yelled. "They've sensed something up ahead."

  "Insint?" he asked.

  She shrugged. He wasn't about to argue either way. Who knew what senses the unsettling ebony colossuses could call upon? Tall black shadows slipped past them, three of them, catching the edge of the torch's beam. This left just one to safeguard the arkademic – two of their number having been lost beside the Thair. Despite having encountered the Blade on more than one occasion, Tylus still wasn't sure whether to think of their fallen as dead or broken.

  He became aware of the Tattooed Men gathering in the gloom around them and managed to catch hold of M'gruth's arm, leaning forward to explain what was happening.

  "Hell of a place to call a halt," M'gruth observed. "We'll be drenched through in no time at all."

  It was a fair point but not one Tylus could do much about.

  M'gruth leaned closer to say something further. "Did they give any idea of exactly…"

  Whatever he'd been about to ask was cut short as the world lit up with no warning, dazzling Tylus, while the sharp crack of an explosion boomed out to momentarily override the noise of the waterfall. At the same time the ground beneath their feet shook, causing M'gruth to lose his balance and grab hold of the Kite Guard to stop himself from falling over.

  In the bright flash, a split second before he was dazzled, Tylus caught a glimpse of their immediate surroundings; no more than a snapshot perhaps, but it was enough to show him the waters of the mighty Thair cascading down the rock face in a spectacular fall not far from where he stood. The water plummeted into a swollen pool, at the lip of which a battle was being fought.

  The three Blade had engaged something that could only be Insint, though Tylus couldn't see enough to identify their enemy for certain. Nor could he be sure exactly what had exploded.

  M'gruth had evidently grown tired of hanging around waiting on the Blade's instructions. As Tylus's vision cleared, he saw the Tattooed Men's adopted leader speaking in the ears of his fellows, clearly intent on organising them to join the fray. The Kite Guard wasn't surprised. These were Pits warriors after all, and, from what he knew of them, sitting around and waiting wasn't in their nature.

  Even without the flash of an explosion the site of the battle would have been easy enough to locate. Energy crackled and sparks flew, clearly marking the spot. Tylus was loathe to fly, not trusting the limited scope of the torch's beam to identify any obstructions, but he was hanged if he was going to stand by and let the Tattooed Men and the Blade carry the fight.

  He turned to Issie. "I'm going to try to help…"

  "You can't fly, not down here," she said instantly.

  "I've got to. Would you hold the torch for me, try to follow me with the beam as I fly…?"

  "I can do better than that."

  "Sorry?" He thought he must have misheard her due to the roar of the waterfall.

  "This won't last for long and I can't generate too many of them, but here."

  A silver glow started to form between Issie's cupped hands, a glow which built and strengthened until it became an orb of dazzling light, far too bright to look upon directly. Issie tossed the ball into the air, where it floated upward and outward, drifting towards the battle and bathing the scene in pale luminance. Tylus could see the uneven ground, the combatants, and he could see where the treacherous ceiling sent its sharp, hard teeth of rock downward to snag the unwary flyer.

  "Go!" Issie urged.

  He was already clipping the torch to his belt. With a mouthed "thank you" in her direction, Tylus took to the air.

  He had no clear plan beyond wanting to contribute something – to dignify the vague notion of dousing Insint in the arkademics' blue light by describing it as a "plan" would have been to stretch the concept to breaking point. In the event, he hesitated to do even that, uncertain of how the arkademic's weapon might affect the Blade. The battle was being fought at superhuman speed and it proved impossible to get a clear shot. Beneath him, everything was a blur of black and silver and steel, of flash and spark punctuated by the hammer of impact and shriek of metal rising above the thunder of the falls. Tylus was reduced to circling above in a tight figure-eight, alert for any opportunity. He nearly panicked and lost concentration as the light from Issie's flare started to fade, but held it together by reassuring himself that he could probably keep up this tight pattern even in the dark, especially with the sporadic bursts of energy from the fight below as guide. Fortunately he didn't need to, as a second silver sphere floated out to replace the first before the luminance died completely.

  Below him, one of the Blade took a heavy blow from a metallic limb that sent it spinning out over the pool to splash down into the water and disappear. The pool's surface, already in constant motion due to the proximity of the falls, seemed to froth and boil oddly where the Blade had struck. Curious, Tylus widened the loop of his flight slightly so that he could take a closer look.

  As decisions went, this proved not to be one of his better ones.

  It all happened in the blink of an eye, far too quickly for him to react. He had the impression of something erupting from the water straight towards him – like a thick plant stem bursting from the ground at surreal speed. Before he could even think to manoeuvre, the thing struck and wrapped itself around him with crushing force. Pain lanced through his side and he couldn't breathe. Then he was being dragged downward, to hit the surface of the pool. The force of impact and the abrupt cold would have been enough to knock the breath out of him if he'd had any. The tentacle continued to pull him downward into the cold, stygian depths. He'd had no chance to draw a deep breath and knew that if he couldn't free himself he'd drown in a matter of seconds, never mind the cold or the fact that he might well be crushed to death before that. On top of everything else, his ears started to hurt acutely with the rapidly increasing pressure.

  Despite the death grip around his torso both arms were free, which offered a faint glimmer of hope. Frantically, he reached for his knife, drew it, and stabbed at the tentacle, feeling the blade bite home and the grip loosen slightly. Encouraged, he stabbed again and again, frustrated at how feeble the blows seemed, slowed as they were by the water. The tentacle loosened a little more under his assault, but as he raised his arm to strike again another tentacle, or perhaps the tip of the same one, snagged his wrist and knocked the knife from his hand. He clutched at it in despair, his hand closing only on water.

  His body cried out for oxygen, his lungs demanded that he breathe. He fought hard not to, knowing that there was no oxygen to be had, but he felt increasingly light-headed and it was becoming hard to concentrate. The grip around his body tightened still further. He needed to breathe, to gasp for air became unbearable. He wanted to scream. He tried to prise the tentacle off with his hands. He kicked and wriggled, dimly realising that this would use up his precious oxygen all the quicker, but knowing that if he didn't somehow escape now he never would.

  After a mere handful of frantic twists the effort became too much, the energy drained from his limbs and his kicks became little more than feeble twitches. His head lolled as if his neck no longer had the strength to support it, and everything started to fade. Except the pain. This is it, he realised, with more curiosity than fear or even regret. This is death. And then he stopped thinking at all.

 

They emerged into a surreal world, made all the more so by the unexpectedly uneven ground, which caused Tom to overbalance and nearly fall over. Silver light emanated from a miniature sun, its radiance totally unlike the light from the sun globes or anything else Tom had experienced. Long shadows and eerie rocks surrounded them.

  "About time you got back," said a man's voice; M'gruth, Tom realised, and the comment wasn't addressed at him.

  "Having fun in my absence?" Kat responded, having to shout above the roar of the nearby falls.

  "Not exactly."

  A short distance away a fight was taking place, the combat conducted at incredible speed. A group of Blade were locked in battle with… a thing. It seemed to be all writhing body and jointed legs, with metal predominant.

  "Is that Insint?" Tom asked.

  "Yes," a woman replied – an arkademic, who was in the process of fashioning another mini-sun between her hands. She released it just before the first sputtered and died.

  A Kite Guard flew in loops above, doing little else as far as Tom could see. As he watched, things took an unexpected turn. A thick tentacle shot from the water to wrap itself around the circling figure.

  "Tylus!" the arkademic cried out.

  "That's Tylus?" Kat said.

  "Yes."

  "Breck!" Kat started to run towards the pool.

  "What are you doing?" Tom called.

  "What do you think I'm doing? He saved my life," she shouted back, as if that explained everything. With that, she dived into the water.

  Tom stared after her, stunned, while M'gruth and the Tattooed Men rushed past him.

  There had to be something he could do. Not jump into the water perhaps, but… he still felt invigorated by his encounter with the core, its energy sang through his veins. He felt more powerful, more in command of his talent than he ever had before. Tom reached out, not knowing if this would work, but he couldn't think what else to do. His thoughts connected instantly with an ancient mind lurking somewhere beneath the water. Not intelligence as he knew it, this was something so focused on the need to feed, to satisfy its hunger, that few other considerations got a look in. Tom wasn't sure he could have done this at any other time, without the core energy burning so freshly, but the important thing was that he could do it now. The simplicity of the creature's motivations helped. He saw at once where to apply pressure, where to suggest that this morsel wasn't nourishing or tasty but that one was.

  His tampering had two results. The most obvious being that two further tentacles shot out of the water, one wrapping itself around Insint and plucking him up high into the air, scattering the two Blade as it went. The two tentacles then literally pulled the creature – this last retreat of Thaiss's brother – apart. An agonised scream tore through the thrum of the waterfall – uncomfortable proof that whatever Insint had been, he wasn't all machine – before his bloodied remnants were dragged down into the depths.

  The second consequence was a spluttering, bedraggled Kat, who surfaced at the side of the pool dragging an inert Kite Guard with her. "Give me a hand, will you?"

  Tattooed arms reached down to pull both figures free of the water, where one spluttered and coughed and spat, while the other lay still.

  By the time Tom got there, Kat had recovered enough to start pressing rhythmically on the Kite Guard's chest with the heel of her hand.

  "Do you know what you're doing?" he wondered.

  "Vaguely. Wasting my time, though, aren't I?" She paused. "He's gone."

  "No." Tom could sense a spark, a flickering remnant of life's energy on the very cusp of expiring. Desperately he tried to fan that spark, drawing on his own energy to feed the fragile ember, and was rewarded by feeling it stabilise and strengthen a little, though not nearly enough and it threatened to fade again almost at once. "He's still with us, just."

  "You can save him then, like you did me?"

  "I'm trying…" But no matter how hard he tried, the spark grew no stronger. The man was dying as quickly as Tom was reviving him. Tom grew increasingly frustrated. Why wasn't the man recovering? "We need a proper healer," he said at last. "Someone who knows what they're doing."

  "Shayna!" Kat said at once.

  "Mildra," Tom said at the same instant.

  Tom put his hands on the motionless Kite Guard, feeling Kat take his arm.

  "Not again," he heard someone – M'gruth, most likely – mutter as the familiar rush of the jump swept through him.

  Even after so short a time in the depths of the rear cavern, the full glare of the sun globes took a little getting used to – the light so much stronger than that produced by the arkademic's silver suns. Only belatedly did Tom wonder if Mildra might be asleep. She wasn't. They found her instead chatting to Councillor Thomas.

  "Help us," Kat said. Tom was still busy holding death at bay.

  Mildra was there in an instant, squatting down beside Tom. She assessed the situation at a glance.

  "He was submerged in water, yes?" At his nod, she started rolling the supine figure onto its side. "We've got to clear his lungs of water," she explained. "No matter how much you strengthen him and bring him back, he's constantly drowning all over again."

  Of course, why hadn't he thought of that?

  Within seconds of her expert ministrations, the Kite Guard's chest heaved and he was coughing up water. Tom felt the spark finally take hold and flare to life. Soon Tylus was able to prop himself up a little; enough to be sick on the ground rather than over himself.

  Tom reckoned this a good time to step back. He saw the relief on Kat's face and felt a pang of jealousy.

  "What?" she asked, looking up to catch his expression.

  "Nothing…" But he couldn't stop himself. "You really do care about him, don't you?"

  She rolled her eyes. "Of course I brecking do. If you mean by that 'do I want to have his babies?' Thaiss no! But yeah, I have feelings for him. He saved my life. Why, you jealous or something?"

  "No," he said, far too quickly. "Of course not."

  Kat's fleeting smile was enough to tell him that she wasn't fooled for a minute. Breck!

 

It felt odd, simply sitting and talking, sipping on a chilled drink without the pressing need to hurry anywhere or save anything. All very civilised. The rest of the party had made it back from the Stain unscathed. Mildra had gone to report to her order on all that had happened; Kat had gone off with the surviving Tattooed Men to see what the rest of their tribe had been up to in their absence, and even Tylus recovered enough to lead his Kite Guards away. Only once the man was on his feet again had Tom recognised Tylus as the same Kite Guard who had so nearly caught him on the walls as he fled the scene of Thomas' apparent murder. Funny how these things came around.

  Tom was left in the company of Thomas and Isar – the arkademic with a knack for making silver suns – which made him feel a bit like a privileged child who'd been allowed to stay up with the grownups. Deciding that they were all thirsty, the three of them relocated to a nearby café and were now enjoying a refreshing drink – or drinks in Tom's case; he was already on his second.

  Stopping and simply relaxing was more enjoyable than Tom would ever have thought, even though much of the ensuing conversation bored him rigid. He let the others' words wash over him, and reflected on all that he had been through.

  Touching the mind of that river monster, manipulating it, had been merely the latest in a string of new experiences, but it was one of the oddest yet. He imagined the creature had been washed over the waterfall when much smaller, and had been living there ever since, feeding on everything else that came over the falls, whether alive or dead, growing bigger and more formidable all the while. How long it had been there was anyone's guess, but Tom sensed it was a long, long time.

  Another aspect of the incident gave him ongoing satisfaction, since it provided proof that Kat was a fraud. She might act tough and pretend that she was only ever interested in number one, but in the Stain's darkest corner she had shown her true colours. She stood to gain nothing whatsoever by leaping into the pool to rescue Tylus. It was an act of complete selflessness, putting her own life at risk for the sake of someone else. Proof positive that Tom wasn't the only one who could do that sort of thing after all.

  He clung to that crumb of satisfaction during the days that followed, as Thaiburley gradually recovered and learnt to deal with the aftermath of all that had befallen her.