Reign of Beasts (32 page)

She drew her skysilver sword and led the way out of the glass pavilion, and her army of dead-eyed courtiers in candy-striped suits and feathered frocks followed her.

‘Are you coming?' Crane asked in the silence that followed.

Macready shook his head. ‘Do what you have to. We'll work on keeping Velody and Ashiol safe.'

Crane nodded, and went after Delphine and her followers. Kelpie and Macready stood still, watching them leave.

‘So that's it, then,' Macready said lightly. ‘Delphine will save the world while the rest of us sit back and have a cup of tea.'

Kelpie closed her eyes briefly, looking pained. ‘I saw a city die only a few days ago,' she said. ‘I'm not so sure there's much left of our world to save.'

R
hian was everywhere. The pain in her body — plant, stone, fire, water — was so great that she had folded inside herself and flown free. She could see the whole city from here. Stone and water, path and grass, mortar and cement.

There was no pain, this way.

She saw beneath the city: the broken buildings, the bodies in the dirt of the Angel Gardens, the bright sunshine in the Killing Ground and the army Delphine was building. Oh, Delphine. If Rhian was capable of laughter, of sheer joy, that would do it.

She saw the Palazzo and the rooftops and the Forums. She was unable to contain a wave of heat from her body, and it hit the Lake of Follies, making the water churn and boil.

It was starting. She was going to destroy the city and there was no one to stop her.

The scent of mint and lemon brought her back to her body, to the pain and stiffness and stone and dirt and the
ruined remains of her room. She could barely see; her eyes were swollen and crusted with blood.

‘I brought you a cup of tea,' Macready said softly, and that did make her laugh, though it was a broken and wretched sound.

‘Glad you're here,' she whispered through lips that barely seemed to work.

‘Oh, lass.' He came nearer and she felt the brush of his rough hand against part of her — she did not know what. A hand, a tendril, a hip. ‘What can I do?'

‘You can kill me.'

He was silent. All she could hear was his heartbeat.

‘Macready, you must.'

‘Not that, love.'

‘Something has awoken in me. I'm tied to the city, and I will destroy it if you don't stop me.'

‘How is that possible?'

‘I don't know.'

She was tired, so tired, and the stone would be coming soon. She might never have another chance to convince him.

‘Something has been inside me since that day — the Lupercalia, the lake …' But no, those words meant nothing to him. ‘I thought it was being the Seer, but that was wrong, it wasn't supposed to be me. Heliora made a mistake. I am the seed of destruction, and I will be the end of all of you.'

He leaned his forehead against hers. ‘You just have to hang on, Rhian. You're stronger than this.'

She opened her mouth to say, ‘You never knew me, Macready,' but her mouth filled with roses, silky perfumed petals, vicious thorns, and by the time she had spat them all to the floor, the stone had hold of her body. ‘Please,' was all she managed. Kelpie. She needed Kelpie, but the words would not form in her throat.

Macready kissed her briefly, his mouth pressed to hers,
and then it was cold, so cold, and she couldn't see him any more.

 

Velody awoke in the early afternoon of the first day of the Saturnalia festival. It was strange to not being able to see anything out of her windows. Delphine had made the right call in turning the house into a nest, but it meant that every brick and floorboard felt a little bit wrong. There was no sign that Delphine's bed had been slept in.

She looked in on Rhian, and found her moaning quietly but apparently sleeping. Water dripped from her skin to form puddles on the floor. Macready sat beside her, asleep against the wall.

Downstairs Kelpie was asleep in a chair.

Velody made tea for herself, and stared at the shapes the steam from the kettle made against the ceiling. She shivered. This might be a nest, but there was nothing that made the house feel safe.

Garnet was nearby. She could feel his presence closing around her. She could stay in here, but what was the point of being safe if she had no chance to change anything?

She stepped outside. The city opened up to her, as if recognising her. The air smelled more real than inside the nest. And yes, there was Garnet; she could all but taste him on the chill winter breeze.

A body hit the ground, bursting in front of her. Velody jumped back, and then pressed her hands to her mouth, bidding herself not to wail or faint or be sick. It was a child, oh saints, it was a child, and she knew nothing about him, who he was, what animal he had been.

She should have protected him from this. From Garnet.

She stepped into the air and flew up to the rooftop where he was waiting for her. It was freezing, with the smell of snow in the air, though none had yet fallen. The wind was icy. Garnet wore a dark red woollen coat, his
cheeks ruddy in the wind and his hair a bright beacon against the grey sky.

‘Why would you do this?' Velody screamed at him. ‘What's wrong with you? How can you possibly think this is the way to be Power and Majesty?'

‘And what do you know about it?' Garnet said calmly. ‘What ordeals have you ever passed, Mistress of Mice? How many times have your ideals been tested?'

‘It's not hard, Garnet,' she said furiously. ‘Don't kill
children
. Surely that's one of the easier rules in life to follow?'

‘So precious, so innocent,' he said, shaking his head. ‘Don't you get it, Velody? Sacrifice means giving up something important. Something that it hurts to give up. This city of ours runs on that particular rule.'

‘No,' she insisted. ‘There's another way. There's a better way. You stopped looking for it.'

‘You are not Power and Majesty!' he yelled at her. ‘You never were. If you were Power and Majesty, you would have heard the voices.'

Velody sucked in a cold gulp of air. ‘What voices?'

Garnet gave her a suspicious look, as if she should already know. ‘The voices that swallowed Tierce. The voices that made me choose.'

 

Topaz was shaken awake by Bree, who was none too gentle about it. ‘
He
wants you,' she said, and it was clear from her tone that she hadn't come around to the new way of doing things.

‘What have you got against Poet?' said Topaz, deliberately not calling him Lord anything. It didn't sit right on her tongue to do that with anyone but Livilla, not now.

‘He's one of them,' Bree said bitterly. ‘But he's not ours, is he? He hasn't offered us a Lord's protection.'

‘We don't need protection,' said Topaz, pulling on her clothes, the nice ones that Livilla had given her. ‘We have the fire. We all have the fire.'

‘I was happy being a bird,' Bree blurted. ‘I hate being a salamander. It's all hot and scratchy.'

‘It's power,' Topaz said sternly. ‘If we have it, they can't hurt us. Remember that.'

Bree rolled her eyes.

Topaz found Poet in Livilla's room, fully dressed, hair combed, primped up for company. He looked too thin, and his wrists still bore the marks of the skysilver chains they had wrapped around him when they first captured him. She felt bad about that, but only a bit.

His two courtesi were there, too: the dark-haired man and the weasel boy. Topaz nodded to them both, then turned to Poet.

‘You're not going to go running to
him
the second you leave this place, are you?' she asked bluntly. The one flaw in their plan was Poet going dizzy for Garnet all over again.

Poet hesitated, took his specs off to polish them, buying himself some time. ‘I won't kill him. I won't let him be killed. I plan to save him from everyone, including himself.'

‘How are you going to do that, then?'

‘The skysilver cage is at Velody's house. If we can get him there, we can take him out of the battle. It should be enough. The sky is using him, I know that. I think it's my fault.' His voice broke slightly. ‘That bloody watch. It gets inside your head. It only had hold of me for a short time, but Garnet … I think he was lost long ago.'

‘It would be simpler just to kill him,' said Topaz.

Poet laughed and tilted his head to one side. ‘You think so, do you? Think it's easy to kill? We were supposed to be doing things differently now. Isn't that the point of all this? We're breaking the rules and behaving like seigneurs for once in our lives.'

Bree was right. There was no trusting Poet. He might be willing to protect them, but he might equally take his dratted head off and hand it to Garnet on a plate. Topaz
hadn't missed the wary looks that his courtesi were giving him, either.

‘Well?' Poet said politely. ‘I believe you were going to share something with us before we march into battle with you?'

Topaz nodded. A small voice inside her (sounding a lot like Bree) complained that it was too much of a risk, but a promise was a promise.

She went to Zero first, put her hand over his heart and felt the weasel shapes squiggling and wriggling inside him. She showed him her shape, the shape of the salamander, putting the images right inside his head.

‘It's hot,' he said, sounding surprised. Then he blinked and shaped into a sudden pile of fire lizards, scrambling all over each other and burning brightly.

‘Excellent,' said Poet, his eyes bright. ‘Shade next, my dearling. Then me. Isn't Garnet going to get a surprise?'

 

Ashiol found Velody and Garnet on the roof of her house in Via Silviana.

‘There you are,' Garnet greeted him with glee. ‘I seem to have misplaced the entire Creature Court, Ash-my-love. They no longer come when I call. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?'

‘They're safe,' was all Ashiol would tell him. He nodded distantly to Velody, not wanting to give too much away of how close the two of them had become.

‘Well now, how can that be true?' Garnet challenged. ‘They don't have their Power and Majesty to protect them. I'd say that makes them the opposite of safe.'

‘I've seen your idea of safe,' Velody said, sounding distressed. ‘How many more of them will die in the name of your madness, Garnet?'

‘Now, that's not nice,' said Garnet. ‘I'm pretty sure I'm not the mad one here. Wouldn't want our darling Ashiol to feel neglected.' He looked from one to the other of them
and laughed out loud. ‘Oh, that's rich. You're frigging like rabbits and you still haven't made the sacred marriage. So much for gaining any advantage over me.'

‘Who did you suck this so-called wisdom out of?' Ashiol demanded. ‘Are you making this up as you go along?'

‘I read books,' Garnet said sweetly. ‘I keep my ear to the ground.'

‘And, oh yes, he hears voices,' Velody said sharply.

Ashiol narrowed his eyes at his old friend. ‘Since when?'

‘Oh, Ashiol,' said Garnet. ‘Isn't it sad? You never knew me at all.'

Ashiol felt the presence of Kelpie and Macready, and wanted to shout to them to keep away.

‘Sentinels!' Garnet laughed as the two of them clambered up onto the roof. ‘Let me guess. You, Macready, have come to inform your Kings that something is dreadfully wrong with our Seer. And Kelpie thinks you should both know that your rogue sentinel Delphine is building an army against me. You see, I know everything. There's no point in playing, my friends. I know all your secrets and you know none of mine.'

‘I know your secrets, Garnet,' said a voice, and Poet joined them on the roof.

‘Ah,' said Garnet, sounding sad. ‘But you wouldn't tell, would you, sweet boy? Your loyalty has always been to me.'

‘That's the funny thing about loyalty,' said Poet, a fragile figure even in his fine clothes. ‘The more you share it, the more you have. That boy on the ground down there was called Wils to his friends. He couldn't dance worth a centime, but he was the best tumbler I've ever seen under ten years old and he had a voice like a Sweetheart Saint. His brother, his only family in the world, was crushed under a sandstone block in the destruction of the Vittorina Royale. My theatre.' His feet slipped a little on the roof tiles. ‘Did you never wonder what it would take, Garnet, for the loyalty I have for you to run out?'

‘Not for that,' scoffed Garnet. ‘A street lamb. You made them for me in the first place. Bred them for sacrifice. They all left you for Livilla.'

Poet glanced briefly at Ashiol and Velody. ‘He's getting all of his knowledge out of a book, one of a set that Lord Saturn collected. A history of the Creature Court. He stole it from me.'

‘Stole,' Garnet said dismissively. ‘You would have given me the world and stars.'

‘Yes, I fucking would,' Poet snarled. ‘He has a pocket watch, too. I gave it to him … I didn't know —'

‘Clockwork,' said Ashiol slowly.

‘It's been talking to him through it. The sky. Promising him things. Demanding greater and greater acts of sacrifice. Though what's greater than sacrificing a whole city, Garnet?' Poet flung out.

‘You know nothing,' Garnet spat.

‘I know the choice you made! Then and now.'

‘Everything I've ever done has been for Aufleur,' declared Garnet. ‘I have protected you all from the sky.'

‘The sky took you a long time ago,' said Poet. ‘You just won't lie down.'

A cruel smile played over Garnet's face. ‘You brought me back, little rat. It's your fault I'm here.'

‘I know,' Poet sighed. ‘And I'm sorry for it. Maybe if you'd stayed dead, I could have let you go.'

He shaped himself in a fast blur, but not into the usual white rats. Instead, he was salamanders, blazing with fire.

Garnet cried out in alarm, stepping back and back until he teetered on the guttering of the roof.

More salamanders poured up and over the roof from below, hundreds of them, far more than one lamb or two or three could make.

Garnet went chimaera and flew off across the sky, and the horde of salamanders followed him, blazing with flame.

Ashiol breathed out for one long moment. Velody looked at him with sympathy and he didn't know if he wanted to touch her, or if he would hit her if she tried.

‘We have to take him down,' he said grimly, and she nodded.

Yes, that was obvious. It had been obvious for a long time. Whatever it was that Garnet thought he was doing, it was clear the sky had a hold on him. The only thing Ashiol had to hold on to was that this was not Garnet — the corruption had started in him long ago, and he was no longer the boy that Ashiol had loved.