The Horns of Ruin (30 page)

"And this is what the Council of Elders would do?
Sharpen their blades and think things through?"

"In a way. They sit and they think and they ask
questions. Like this: Where did the archive come from?"

Cassandra stood up, paced the room, peered out the
slatting, and then sat down again. "I don't know. I don't know why it
matters, either."

"Matters? It's probably the most important thing right
now. It came to us at this time, in this way. You said yourself it was a
message. But a message from whom?" I stopped my sharpening and put away
the stone. "Better yet, why now?"

"Maybe this was only recently found. Maybe whoever
found it didn't trust the Alexians to convict their own god-"

"A reasonable mistrust," I said.

-and didn't think anyone would believe the Amonites. So
they gave it to Morgan."

"No one would believe the Amonites. And yet here we
are. You, an Amonite, asking me to believe what you've read on the
archive." I got out a rag to polish the sword. "And what you've read
is that your god is innocent, and the only god we have left is the true
murderer."

"I swear, Eva, that's what it says."

"Perhaps. And if it does? What are we to do? Proclaim
Alexander as the Betrayer, and lead a popular revolt among ..." I waved my
hand dismissively. "Among the civilians? Lead an army of trash pickers and
fishermen against the Fraternal Army?"

"We would join you! Free the Librarians Desolate and
we would provide you with-"

"Stop. No one will believe the scions of Amon. Joining
you to the cause would only invalidate it in the eyes of the people." I leaned
back against the tower and closed my eyes, the rag and sword forgotten in my
hands. "I haven't said I believe you, yet. The more I think about it, the
less I believe. It's too perfect, and too easy to conceal. Some Amonite cult
mocked up a pretty-looking machine and snuck it into the monastery. It didn't
make any sense to us because it's just a pile of junk made to look nice, so we
summon an Amonite. The Amonite `deciphers' the archive to reveal that the
Scholar has been innocent all along." I opened my eyes and clutched the
rag. "How could you expect us to believe that?"

"How do you explain the murders, then? Someone wants
to keep this hidden."

"Or is willing to kill to make the story look
good," I answered.

"Gods, why are you so stubborn?" She stood up and
threw her arms wide. "They've declared you apostate! For no reason!
Alexander has burned your monastery and is going to kill your Elders! And
you're debating over who the enemy actually is?"

"For two hundred years we have carried the banner of
the Fraterdom. We have hunted the scions of Amon throughout the earth!" I
stood as well, because I looked more impressive standing than this skinny,
curly haired little girl, and I didn't want her to forget that. "Amon has
been the Betrayer for all that time! Do you expect us just to abandon that
crusade, to make amends and turn against Alexander? On your word, you, an
Amonite?"

We stood trembling at each other, fists balled, jaws set. I
at least had my arm thrown over a mighty big sword. She didn't back down. She
wouldn't back down.

"Really, I don't care if you take my word. But it's
true. I don't know what has to happen for you to believe that, but it's
true."

"The timing is crummy," I said, after a space of
many breaths. "The Rethari are marching. They could have spies in the
city. They could be spawning those ... monsters, agitating the Betrayer Cults.
They could have fed the archive to us, and fed false information to Alexander,
implicating us in the attacks. The Alexians could be acting in true faith. The
Rethari could be setting us against each other in the hope of finally throwing
us down and raising up their own gods."

"You have a lot of theories," she said. "But
I'm not hearing a lot of answers, and fewer plans."

I sighed and nodded. "Yeah. It's easy to ask
questions." I sheathed the blade and buckled on my holster. "I need
to know more, though. I need to know that this is true, before I act."

"Who else can you ask? The Alexians? They're not just
going to say, `Oh, yeah, right. We're the ones who killed Morgan. Sorry about
that,' and go away."

"No, they're not. And if it's true, I'm willing to bet
most of them don't know, anyway. No, I need to find a different source. Someone
I can trust."

"Who?"

I looked around the little platform, at the wreckage of our
short stay. This might be a holy place, someday. The last temple of Morgan.

"The Feyr. Amon's research led to them, didn't it?
Maybe they still have the same answers to his questions."

"There aren't many Feyr still around."

"Nope. But I know where to find them." I motioned
to the archive, and her shotgun. "Get that stuff together. We're going,
and we're not coming back."

The echoing hum started up in my bones as we got closer,
the period of the impellor's vibration getting shorter with each step. By the time
Cassandra and I were standing outside of the tall, black tower, every second
breath was washed in the invisible song of the impellor.

There was a time when these had been the tallest buildings
in Ash, save the Spear and the Strength. Mostly for the comfort of the
inhabitants, though even here at ground level the wave of the strange device
inside was ... distracting. Up at the same elevation as the monotrain, you
couldn't stand this close to the impellor, not without jellying your meat. All
across the city, any building this high had a couple empty floors, abandoned to
the periodic thrum.

Cassandra hid in an alleyway near the tower. I had told her
where we were going. There would be a signal for her to come inside. I was
still wearing my new half-cloak, and the sword was bundled into a reed mat
strapped across my back. Not the best disguise, but the best we could manage.
No one had called the whiteshirts on us. Yet. Once Cassandra was good and
hidden away, I braced myself and went inside.

The tower was really just a shell, stitched inside with
catwalks that gave access to the central spinning core. Black-clad Amonites
crawled all over the inside of the tower, checking fittings and monitoring the
impellor's activity. They wore some kind of hard suit, with masks and goggles
over their faces. The sheath twitched beneath the reeds on my back as a wave of
adrenaline spun through my fingers. Up there, in their goggles and masks, they
looked so much like the coldmen. Similar technology, maybe? I swore, every clue
I got gave me more people to mistrust. My instincts yelled for guilt on the
heads of the scions of Amon. Everything else pointed to Alexander. I didn't
like it.

The impellor itself was ... alien. The shaft was a blizzard
of movement, like a tornado of twisting metal pistons and smooth, swooping cogs
that meshed and danced at odd angles and impossible speeds. The structure rose
to the top of the tower, spinning in a near silence that was actually a roar of
movement just below the range of my ears. My skull ached to hear it, but could
not. At the top of the column was a giant cylinder, like the head of a war
hammer. It turned more slowly than the column, though it seemed dependant on
its action. Each face of the hammer was made up of dozens of open drums, their
skin glowing an arcane blue, each drum fed by a dozen conduits that coiled and
were themselves fed by larger tubes that burrowed down into the column. The
whole thing looked like something that had dropped out of the sky, to be
worshipped.

I wondered how Amon had built such a crooked thing, based
on that smooth, clean Feyr artifact that we had fished out of the cistern. Not
a logical jump. Then again, for all that Amon was the Scholar, the Feyr were
something more. Something different. I shrugged, then went to find someone in
charge.

Wasn't even a Healer. Just a guy in city blues, peering at
gauges and checklists through a pair of uneven wire spectacles. His hair was
rusty gray, sticking out all around and bald on top, his naked scalp spotted
with moles. I had to tug on his shoulder to get his attention. There wasn't
much about me to keep his eyes, so I showed him the gun under my cloak. He took
in the whole package, the hidden sword, the revolver, the poorly covered
uniform, then nodded once.

"Yeah?" he asked.

"There are some people here I'd like to talk to."

"Those people are probably busy."

"I'm sure they are," I said. "But I'm sure
they could be spared."

"What's it about?"

"Kidnapping. Murder, maybe." I picked up one of
his checklists, flipped through a couple pages, then put it down somewhere
else. He didn't like that. "Maybe a grand conspiracy to topple the Cult of
Morgan."

"You're the Paladin," he said finally, after a
long pause. "The heretic."

"That's what they're saying. Does that matter to
you?" I asked, flashing the bully again. "Or this?"

"Neither, really. Were you hoping to threaten your way
through this conversation?"

"Does it matter to you that someone has killed all my
friends, burned the house of my god, and now falsely accuses my Cult of siding
with the Betrayer?" I took the revolver out and placed the barrel squarely
on the table, like I was pointing something out in his ledger. "Does it
matter that I'll kill anyone who gets in the way of me hunting those people
down, no matter who they are, or on what throne they sit?"

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

He looked up at the catwalks, like he was doing a mental
count of his crew.

"It wasn't any of my people," he said.
"Whatever you're talking about, it wasn't these guys. I know where they
go, where they sleep, what they eat. Who they love. It wasn't any of
them."

"And if any of them are involved, I guess that makes
you complicit?"

He snorted. "You're trying to threaten me. That's
cute, little girl warrior comes in here to threaten me." He plucked the
glasses off his face and tossed them on the table. "I'm not going to
scare. You pull my people off that machine, you maybe put the Harking line out
of commission. How you like that?"

I scraped the revolver along the edge of the table and
passed it across my body. One long arm stroke and I backhanded him with the
heavy tip of the weapon, the reinforced barrel taking him along the jaw. He
spun away, drooling teeth.

"Took you long enough to lose those godsdamn
glasses." I holstered the bully, shattered the mat of reeds, and drew the
blade. I put the tip on the floor and leaned against the crossbar. The blade
slid into the hard stone of the floor like a hot knife into ice. "Now, I'd
like to talk to some of your crew."

He stood slowly, anger boiling off him in sheets. His voice
was a barely controlled cauldron.

"I said, it wasn't any of my damned people."

"It's not your damned people I want to talk to. It's
your damned Feyr."

He looked at me with steadying calm, wiped the blood off
his chin, and laughed.

"Not my call to make. Those buggers come when they
want, go when they want. And if they do a godsdamn thing while they're here,
that's their business. No. They want to talk to you, they'll talk to you. Not
my problem."

"How do I-"

He dropped like a cut puppet. I leaned away, surprised,
then heard other things: tools falling, glass breaking. Above, an Amonite slid
heavily against a railing, then spun over and fell against a lower platform
like a bag of flour. No one to catch him, because all of his mates were out,
too. I left the sword where it was, swaying slightly in the floor, and drew my
bully.

The Feyr was standing behind me and slightly higher, up on
a piston array. He was wearing a robe, white cloth wrapped tight around his
tiny form. He had a hand raised in benediction, looking all around the tower
with his wide, black eyes. He noticed me and nodded.

"We thought you should know," he said. His voice
was tiny, small as his delicate, pinched face. His palm came around and I
twisted, drawing a bead on his little chest. He shook his head and I faltered,
though if that was something he was doing to me or just my own unwillingness to
put lead into a child-sized target ... who knows? Point is, I didn't shoot and
he put his hand down.

"Know what?" I asked.

He didn't answer immediately, didn't even seem to be paying
attention to me any longer. He looked around the room at all the fallen people,
their eyes open, breathing steadily. Even the broken ones seemed comfortable,
regardless of which direction their legs were facing. For the longest time he
meditated on the silence, his eyes turned up toward the top of the impellor,
breath shallow. He looked back at me.

"You wished to talk to us?"

"Yeah, about-"

"Then we shall talk. Your friend. You should give her
the signal, now," he said, then turned and walked away, disappearing
behind the array. I ran to the door and opened it, almost banging into
Cassandra.