The Blood Debt (53 page)

None of the guards answered, if they even heard her. Their attention was fixed on the flood. She gave in to the urge to look and the sickening reality of it struck her full in the face. Wind howled past her, flattening her hair and stinging her eyes. It brought with it a smell of wet dirt — and lots of it. The flood was a roiling, tumbling mass of mud and stone. Boulders rolled in and out of sight like grains of sand during a heavy swell. She wondered if any of them were man’kin or people from further up the Divide, and she fought the desire to throw up.

The Wall shook as the vanguard of the flood struck. The sound it made was a physical blow, and she staggered backwards into Sal, who was himself having trouble standing. She could hear nothing but the roar of water and stone. It overwhelmed her, and for a moment she could think of nothing else. She forgot the Wall, the city, the man’kin, herself. Her world was washed away as surely as if the flood had literally struck her.

A vertical wall of water shot up in front of her. The winch jerked, and would have been snatched away in the upside-down waterfall had not the giant man’kin grabbed it and yanked it down. The rope came with it, pulling Skender and a second person out of the torrent. The three of them fell in a tangle on the top of the Wall. Dirty water doused them all. Dozens of tiny fists seemed to be pummelling her as she clutched at Sal and the guard rail, terrified she might be swept away.

Then the deluge ebbed and she let herself fall. The roar of the flood hadn’t subsided, but the front had passed them. The top of the Wall was several metres above the roiling currents filling the Divide from side to side. She sat up and stared in shock at a muddy deluge where the canyon had once been. The Wall shook at its passage. The stones flexed and didn’t part.

Over the thundering current she heard voices and turned to see the guards cutting Skender and the person he had rescued from the rope. She hurried to join them and was surprised to see a blood-spattered Eisak Marmion next to her friend from the north, not the Homunculus. Both of them were dripping wet. Skender was out cold but seemed otherwise unharmed. His hands were empty. One of the guards torc Marmion’s robe into strips; another tied the strips around the grisly stump where Marmion’s right hand had once been. Scorch marks along his wrist and arm and the ragged edge of the wound told her some of the story.

Marmion would have a great deal to say about this, if he survived. She was already dreading the accusations. He had lost a great deal of blood and his face was deathly pale. For all her dislike of him, and her regret over a bond that would never exist between them — and her disappointment that he had been saved, not the Homunculus — she couldn’t bring herself to hope he wouldn’t recover.

Sal bent over him and the Change flexed. He reached out for her guidance, and she concentrated on the task at hand. The bleeding had to be stopped. The two of them descended with one will into the torn tissues and encouraged them to heal. Blood vessels sealed with sudden sparkles; skin tied itself in knots. They were small charms, something any village healer could have attempted, but they did the job.

A shadow passed over her, and she glanced upwards to see the heavy lifter sailing cautiously across the Wall, inspecting the waters before the daylight completely faded. She thought of Kail and the Homunculus and an unknown number of man’kin who had been caught in the deluge. She didn’t know if the flood was a natural accident or part of some macabre design, but she was certain she wouldn’t be the only one looking to apportion blame. Somehow, she swore, the dead would be honoured.

Her attention returned to Marmion’s wrist and the small work that would save his life.

* * * *

The Brother

‘A thousand years ago, when the Goddess trod

this Earth, the Change was stronger than it is

today. All were rich in it, but few possessed

mastery over it. From the chaos emerged two

heroes, wise and true, who led their people to

victory over madness and misrule. Between them

they sundered the Change, so all would possess

some and none possess all. The Mage claimed the

red earth and fiery sun while the Warden took

dominion over the deep ocean and stirring breeze.

Since that day peace has reigned. The Goddess

help us should they ever be reunited.’

THE BOOK OF TOWERS,
FRAGMENT 141

awn painted warm colours over a tense and exhausted city. After a night of plugging leaks and shoring up foundations that had taken the brunt of the flood, the worst was finally over. Water surged along long-forgotten and poorly sealed tunnels; the yadachi turned their song onto the Wall and the foundations of the city, fine-tuning its natural resilience. Streets filled with water, but the stone barriers held. The torrent remained at bay. Thousands of people who never thought they would be troubled by too
much
water breathed easier.

Sal wasn’t one of them. His problems hadn’t ended with the safeguarding of the city — and his contribution to that had been minimal, once the flood had arrived. Barely had he finished healing Marmion when a new set of guards had arrived with instructions direct from the Magister herself. They had taken him, Shilly and Skender into custody. Where Gwil Flintham had got to, he didn’t know, but there had been no one to bail them out that time. As unimaginable forces assailed the Wall, they were frogmarched back to the Black Galah and placed in custody with the others. Only Marmion escaped that fate, and then only temporarily. Taken away by the yadachi for emergency medical treatment to his injured arm, enabled by the Blood Tithe he had given, he had returned six hours later, unconscious and bound heavily in bandages from the elbow down. Nothing remained of his right hand but a padded stump that stank of antibiotic salves.

Sal sighed, feeling responsible for the grievous injury. Yes, Marmion had tried to murder the Homunculus — and yes, Sal had done his level best to save Marmion’s life, despite their differences — but no one deserved mutilation. That in the end it had been Skender who had blown someone up, not Sal, didn’t assuage his nagging guilt.

Get over it,
he told himself.
You didn’t drag Marmion down there. You didn’t place his hand on the chopping block. Even if he tries to blame you, you know he’s as responsible for what happened as you are. Telling yourself otherwise is just a twisted sort of hubris you should have grown out of years ago ...

The wind carried with it a plethora of new smells, fair and foul. He had come out onto the roof of the hostel to watch the coming of day, unable to sleep and needing space to be on his own. The guard standing outside the room he shared with Shilly had been reluctant to let him go, until Sal explained that he had nowhere to run to and no reason to run without Shilly. That much was the truth.

Getting onto the roof couldn’t have been easier. A steep flight of stairs terminated in an access hatch and a short ladder. The roof itself was mostly flat and tiled in red. He picked a place at random and watched the light of the sun creep across the sky, turning the water in the streets yellow. The view was impressive. He could see man’kin on rooftops closer to the Wall, doing much the same as him. Their stone eyes stared blankly at him. The city’s population had accepted the stony refugees as a necessary evil, just so long as they abstained from demolishing the buildings around them. An uneasy truce remained between the two very different populations.

‘The weather-workers are quiet,’ said a voice from behind him. ‘What do they call them here? Yadachi?’

Sal turned to see Highson Sparre easing himself slowly out of the hatch. He got up to help and was surprised at the lack of flesh on his real father’s arms.

‘What are you doing up here? It’s cold, and I thought —’

‘I’m not dead yet, Sal; I’ve just been sleeping too long. The guard told me where you were. I’m sorry I wasn’t awake to meet you when you arrived.’

‘That’s okay. I completely understand.’ Sal helped Highson down onto the tiles, then sat next to him. His father had been out cold when he and the others had returned to the hostel. Shilly had seemed disappointed by that, but wouldn’t let him be disturbed. Sal hadn’t pressed the point.

They enjoyed the view for a moment. Immediately after the deluge, Sal had seen people filling reservoirs while they had the chance. Now, however, a century’s worth of refuse had burst out of the city’s underground places, disturbed from desiccated graves. He didn’t want to think about what such filth might contain, and hoped the city had sanitation measures sufficient to deal with it. Somehow, he doubted it.

‘Yadachi, yes,’ he said, belatedly remembering Highson’s question. ‘They’ve been singing all night. I guess their job is done for the moment.’

Highson nodded distantly. His eyes gleamed in the light. The beginnings of a peppery beard spread like a stain over his brown-skinned features.

‘I want to tell you,’ Sal’s real father said, ‘that I’m sorry.’

‘For what?’

‘For dragging you all the way out here.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. You were in trouble. We had to come.’ It was easier to parrot Shilly’s logic than confront his own conflicted feelings.

‘But it shouldn’t have happened that way. You were safe in Fundelry. I’ve jeopardised everything we worked for. If you’re caught now, it’s my fault.’

‘First we’ve got to
be
caught. Then let’s worry about who’s to blame.’

Highson nodded, grief writ deeply in the lines around his eyes. A squad of guards on clean-up duty splashed by below, sending ripples along the street. The fingertips of Highson’s left hand rubbed the rough edge of a cracked roof tile as though trying to get rid of a stain.

‘Did Shilly tell you what I did? Why I called the Homunculus?’

‘She told me.’

Highson nodded again. He seemed relieved.

‘Sal, I want you to know —’

‘Don’t say it. Don’t tell me you’re sorry again, or that you loved my mother. I already know that. And don’t tell me that you were just trying to put things right, because it’s too late for that. Bringing my mother back wouldn’t have fixed anything. I didn’t know her, and she didn’t love you. The man she loved is dead, and nothing you can do will bring
him
back, ever.’ He irritably blinked back the beginning of tears. ‘I don’t think she would’ve thanked you.’

‘No,’ said Highson, ‘but I don’t regret trying. And that’s what I was going to say. I had to make the attempt. To let the opportunity go would have been too much for me to bear. Her death was so pointless. She deserved better. I needed to
try
to make it better, before I could truly let her go.’

Sal studied his father for a moment. Highson wasn’t meeting his gaze. The muscles of his jaw and throat were tight, making talking an effort.

‘You said you’d redeemed yourself last time,’ Sal challenged him. ‘How long will this go on?’

That earned him a flash of irritation. ‘What do you mean?’

‘You saved me from the Syndic five years ago. You said that was to make up for what happened to my mother. And now here we are one more time, except this time you’re guilty of theft and at least one man has died. What’s to stop you doing something stupid like this again? The Goddess only knows what you might bring out of the Void, given another chance. Or what Marmion might do to stop you trying.’

Highson’s face set. ‘I don’t care about Marmion.’

‘You should. He’s come to arrest you. I hope you realise that much.’

‘He can try.’

‘He might succeed, given your present condition.’

‘You wouldn’t help me?’

Sal glanced down at his hands. There was a long silence.

‘I’m not going home, Sal. Not yet, anyway.’

Sal looked up to find his father staring at him. He remembered his naive hope that Highson might come to Fundelry to recuperate.

‘You’re going to try to escape.’

‘It’s not escape I want. I want to see this thing finished.’

‘What
thing?’

‘The Homunculus. Whatever it —
they
— are.’

‘When you say
finished
—’

‘I mean resolved. Not dead.’

That was good. Sal didn’t want another Marmion on his hands. ‘The twins were down in the Divide when the flood hit. The chances are they’re already dead.’

‘I doubt it. If the desert couldn’t kill them, why would a little water?’

‘Are you sure about that?’

‘As sure as I can be. I made the body they’re in, after all.’

Sal nodded, imagining the Homunculus tumbling and tossing in the giant surge of water as it raged through the Divide, battered by detritus caught up in the flood’s path. He couldn’t conceive of the violence it must have endured — but if it
did
endure, he could see it striving for the Divide walls, reaching for handholds on the raw rock, and clinging there until the initial fury subsided. Then crawling its way out of the water like some supernatural cockroach, and from there resuming its implacable journey.

His
brother
...?

And suddenly he was wrenched back to the last time he and his father had spoken in private, as they walked down into the caverns beneath the Haunted City, where the Way would take them back to Fundelry.

‘There’s one other thing you should know,’ Highson had said to him. The memory was as fresh as yesterday. ‘I knew you were there, Sal. I knew I had a child growing inside the woman I loved. I gave you away, for her sake — and yours, too.’

‘Was it hard?’

‘Unbelievably. Even then I think I had an idea of what you could be, given the chance. But I wouldn’t be there to find out. Your mother was never supposed to be found; no one was ever supposed to know you existed. That was supposed to be the end of it.’

‘But it wasn’t.’