Fallen, p.28
Fallen, page 28
part #10 of Alex Verus Series
We reached the edge of the ridgeline and again Meredith tried to stop. The bulk of Sal Sarque’s fortress loomed before us, lit up by the flashes of spells and weapon fire. The machine gun fire was still going, but it seemed to be coming from the other side of the fortress. At least one thing was going our way.
“Wait, we’re going down there? We can’t—Alex! Stop!”
I was already picking us a path down the slope towards the walls. No immediate danger flashed up in the futures; it might be premature, but it looked as though we might be able to make it all the way there without running into anyone. Some possibilities of contact flickered and I adjusted our course to steer away. “Keep your voice down.”
“We’re going to be killed!”
“No, we’re not.”
“What happens if they see us?”
“They won’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I’m a diviner and that’s what I do.”
“I don’t like this. Please can we go back?”
I wondered if Richard had to deal with stuff like this from his followers. It was giving me a new appreciation for what he had to put up with.
The battle was still raging by the time we reached the walls. There’d been fighting on this side too, but it had apparently moved away, though not without casualties; we’d passed several bodies in the darkness. I was scanning through the futures, looking for ways to gain entry. The main gate was on the far side and moving around would take too long. Maybe another entrance . . . There. I changed direction and started walking.
Meredith tripped on the rocks and I held her as she caught her balance. “Where are we going?” she whispered. The looming shadow of the walls felt a lot more menacing up close.
“Back door,” I said quietly. I could feel the futures I needed; reaching out with the fateweaver, I picked the one I wanted and began feeding it. “We’re going to have to talk our way past a few people. Back me up.”
The futures settled, and I moved up against the wall and waited. I couldn’t make out the line of the door, but I knew where it was. Thirty seconds later it opened, light spilling from the crack. The muzzle of a handgun appeared, followed by a young man, peering out cautiously.
I snatched the gun out of the man’s hand, caught his arm as he tried to punch me, twisted it behind his back, and pushed through the doorway into the fortress before he’d finished his shout. The door led into a guardroom. Half a dozen men were scattered around, ranging in age from teenage years to thirties. They were armed but raggedly equipped; they had the look of Richard’s adepts, which was confirmed when fire lit up around the hands of one at the back and another created a force blade. The rest levelled guns.
“I’m here to see Richard Drakh,” I said. I pushed the guy I’d been holding away; he took a few steps, stumbling, then turned on me. “Where is he?”
“Whose side are you on?” the man with the force blade said. He was light-skinned, standing in a combat stance with his left hand holding a shield; the force blade was a long triangle, stretching from his right hand and narrowing to a point. He was staring at me suspiciously, but he wasn’t attacking yet.
“My side.” I ejected the round from the gun, took out the magazine, then tossed the weapon without looking at the man I’d taken it from. He caught it in surprise. The other adepts exchanged glances. “And I’m here to see Richard.”
Meredith was hanging behind me in the doorway. “I don’t know who you are,” the force adept began, “but—”
“Wait,” another adept said. “That’s Verus.”
“The one Deleo said—”
“Yeah, that one.”
I saw the force adept’s eyes shift. The futures of violence leapt closer and I knew I had seconds before they’d start shooting. I met his gaze and spoke clearly and calmly. “I have killed twenty-eight normals, adepts, and mages in the past two days. Come at me with that force blade, and you’ll make twenty-nine.”
The adept hesitated, his futures wavering between life and death. I pushed at them, but the fateweaver wasn’t mind control; it couldn’t override a direct choice.
Then a wave of emotion rippled through me, fear and horror and nameless dread. I pushed it off with an effort of will, but it had been aimed at the adepts, not at me. Several went pale and one dropped his gun with a clatter, backing up to the wall. The force adept flinched, taking a step back.
“Deleo gave you those orders for her own reasons,” I said. “You weren’t expected to survive them. I’ll ask again. Where’s Richard?”
“I don’t know.” Fear showed in the force adept’s eyes; his voice shook. “He was heading for the control room.”
“Good enough.” I beckoned to Meredith and walked through the room. No one stopped us. Only when we were through the far doorway and walking down the corridor on the other side did I breathe a little easier.
“Good job on that spell,” I told Meredith once we were out of earshot.
Meredith didn’t look happy at the praise. “Why do you want to find Drakh of all people?”
“Because he made me an offer. Now stay quiet while I focus.”
The fortress interior was stone and metal, brutally practical. The thick walls muffled sound, but even so I could hear gunfire. As the futures branched ahead, forking and dividing, I saw danger in every direction, but no sign of Richard.
But the only reason for Richard to be here was to come after Sal Sarque, and Sarque would be at the control room at the centre. “This way,” I said, heading for a set of stairs.
We climbed to the first floor. The corridor at the top had been fortified; a junction had been turned into something like a bunker, with blast shields and weapon racks. It hadn’t done the defenders any good. The remains of several constructs were scattered around, along with outlines of black dust.
“They’re fighting all around us,” Meredith said. She was looking nervously from side to side at the walls. “If the Keepers see us—”
“They’ve got their hands full,” I said. There was a battle going on on the ground floor below us at this very moment. But the corridor we were in was empty, and I was pretty sure I knew why. We were following the same route that Richard and Anne had taken, and they’d blasted their way through anyone who’d tried to stop them. Right now, the path to the control centre was undefended.
Of course, just because a route’s undefended doesn’t mean it’s going to stay that way.
Running footsteps sounded from a side passage up ahead. “We’ve got a speed bump,” I said. “I’ll handle it.”
“Wait, a speed bump? What kind—?”
The footsteps grew louder, and a Keeper came running into our corridor just ahead of us, skidding to a halt as she saw us. It was Caldera, dressed in her working clothes and webbing belt with the dust and sweat of combat on her. “I’ve found them,” Caldera said into her communicator. “Moving to engage.” She started towards us. “Verus, you’re under arrest. Stay where you are.”
I came to a halt, picking out possible futures and identifying candidates. One jumped out and I started feeding it, watching it grow. Force mage. That’ll do.
Caldera came to a halt twenty feet away. Her eyes flicked to Meredith, who took a half step back behind me. “And Meredith Blake,” Caldera said. “You’re wanted for questioning as well.”
“You’re in my way,” I told Caldera.
“You’re here with Richard?” Caldera said. “Because if—”
“I don’t have time for you right now.”
Caldera planted herself. “Looking for a rematch?”
“I don’t have to. There’s a Dark force mage one level below you who’s a really bad shot.”
Caldera frowned. “What’s that—?”
The force blast tore out the floor under Caldera, destroying a section of corridor about ten feet wide. With a rumble the flooring collapsed, sending Caldera tumbling down in an avalanche of concrete and stone. I saw Caldera’s hands fly up, earth magic reinforcing her as she fell, then she was gone.
I walked around the hole in the floor. Dust clouds obscured the view down, but I could hear shouts and the sounds of combat. “Keep up,” I said over my shoulder.
“This is crazy!” Meredith whispered. “They’re going to be after us!”
A chunk of concrete came flying up through the hole in the floor, shattering against the ceiling and raining fist-sized chunks of stone onto the other side of the hole. “Like I said, they’ve got their hands full.” I’d already plotted out the rest of our course. We were clear all the way to the control centre.
Admittedly, part of the reason we had a clear route was because right now, that route was a dead end. The corridor went through two right-angle turns and then ended in what was apparently a mirrored wall, slightly convex.
“We can’t get through that,” Meredith said nervously, looking over her shoulder. “That’s a stasis sphere.”
“More likely a barrier,” I said absently. I could feel the time magic radiating from the “mirror.” There’s no way to see how deep a stasis effect goes, but putting a stasis effect on yourself makes no sense as a defence against any kind of prolonged attack. I finished checking the futures and nodded. The wards on the fortress would bar standard gates, but they were less effective against the dreamstone, and the stasis spell had weakened the wards immediately around it. With the fateweaver’s help, I could push through. “Okay, showtime. Once we’re inside, there’ll be no more talk. You remember what you have to do?”
“Yes . . .”
“Are you going to do it?”
“All right.”
I looked at Meredith. That had been too easy. “You’re afraid of them.”
“Of course I’m afraid of them! They’re going to kill me as soon as they see me!”
“You don’t need to be seen.” I walked closer to Meredith, forcing her to tilt her head back to meet my eyes. “Last year at the Tiger’s Palace, Deleo tried to disintegrate you. You remember what she said right before she did it?”
Meredith didn’t answer.
“There are two ways in which I’m different from Deleo,” I told Meredith. “The first is that I won’t ask you to do anything you aren’t capable of. If I give you an order, it means I know it can work, and I’m using my power to make sure it will work.” I paused to make sure that Meredith was listening. “The second way I’m different from Deleo? I’m a lot faster to write off losses. Do you need a demonstration of that?”
“No,” Meredith said quietly.
I nodded. “Let’s do it.”
I reached out through the dreamstone and opened up a gate to Elsewhere, then took Meredith’s hand and led her unresisting through it. I don’t think she recognised what it was. She certainly didn’t have time to look around or notice the trails of light coming from her skin before I opened a second gateway and took us back into the real world.
The control centre of Sal Sarque’s fortress was a two-storey room, with a raised gantry running around the second level. We’d arrived on the upper level, and my feet hadn’t even touched the floor before I knew we weren’t alone. I silently motioned Meredith to a position where she’d be able to look down into the room by craning her neck; her eyes were wide with fear but she nodded. Then I strode out onto the gantry.
The floor of the control centre held desks filled with computer equipment. The far wall was covered with flat-screen monitors, most of them blacked out or showing static. There was only one entrance, a pair of thick steel double doors at ground level.
I’d come in at the aftermath of a battle. Bodies lay unmoving around overturned swivel chairs and broken desks. Some were still recognisable; others were scatterings of black dust, only the magical residue giving away that they’d once been human. There had been casualties on both sides, but from the positioning, most of them had probably been Council.
Six people were still alive and upright: four from Richard’s side, and two from the defenders’. Richard was standing close to the entrance. He’d glanced up as I appeared, registering my appearance with no sign of surprise, then turned back to what he’d been looking at before. By his side was Anne. The jinn formed a flickering black aura about her, looming up and behind her like a vast shadow. Behind them was Crystal, hanging back where she could watch everyone, and a little ahead of Richard to the other side was Rachel.
Facing them was Sal Sarque. The Senior Council member had been backed up nearly to the far wall, but he looked uninjured, and he was holding a remote control of some kind above his head. Hiding behind him was Solace, eyes darting left to right as she tried to look for a way out. Sal Sarque was standing in plain view—he didn’t even have a shield up—but none of Richard’s cabal were making a move to attack.
Several pairs of eyes glanced at me as I appeared on the gantry, though most of them flicked right back again. Only two people kept their eyes on me. Rachel, and Anne.
For just an instant I hesitated. This was way, way too many enemies together in one place, and my old instincts—the ones that had kept me alive for so long—were shouting at me to back off and leave them to it. But then I shook the feeling off and walked forward to rest one hand on the railing. “I’m sorry,” I said, pitching my voice to carry. “Am I interrupting something?”
“Calling in more?” Sal Sarque shouted. “Bring them on!”
“Oh, Richard didn’t call me,” I said. I walked down the gantry, feeling Rachel’s and Anne’s eyes follow me. “I just decided we should talk.”
“If you wanted a discussion,” Richard said, not taking his eyes off Sal Sarque, “you could have chosen a more convenient time.”
“What can I say?” I came to a stop at the corner of the room, just above the stairs. “You’re a hard man to track down.”
I’d moved in this direction for a reason. Meredith was still hidden back in the alcove, and I needed to draw as much attention from her as I could. Crystal and Anne would be able to tell that there was someone there, but there was a good chance they wouldn’t know who.
“I’m afraid we’re a little busy at the moment. Could you wait?”
I made an openhanded gesture. “Go right ahead.”
“He’s going to interfere,” Rachel told Anne. Her eyes flicked to Sal Sarque, then back to me. “Kill him.”
“I don’t take orders from you,” Anne told her.
“Neither of you will attempt to kill him without my express instructions,” Richard said calmly. “As I was saying, Sarque, your position is lost. It is time you came to terms.”
Sal Sarque laughed. He looked keyed-up, ready to die any second. “You’re the one who’s fucked, Drakh. Every Light mage in the country is on their way here right now.”
“Most of your combat forces are committed to the assault on Arcadia,” Richard said. “I expect they’ll be successful, but Morden and Vihaela will slow them down significantly. Your remaining reserves are currently attacking this fortress from the outside . . .” Richard paused for a moment. “. . . and losing. By the time reinforcements arrive, the battle for this fortress will be over.”
“Bullshit.”
“Why do you think I’m still talking to you?”
“’Cause of this.” Sal Sarque gestured with the remote. His eyes flicked to me. “And as for you, Verus, you piece of shit, after today every last member of the Council will be hunting you down.”
I just looked at him. “As opposed to the last few days?”
“Now they know you’re working with Drakh, your last few days are going to look easy.”
“I wasn’t working with Drakh, you fucking idiot,” I told Sal Sarque. “I was one of the only members of the Council giving him any effective opposition. And I would have been happy to keep doing that, if you and Levistus had just been willing to work with me. But you had your heads so far up your collective arses that it apparently never occurred to any of you that making an enemy of me might be a bad idea.”
“You were always the enemy,” Sarque said.
“Always a Dark mage?” I shrugged. “Probably. But becoming your enemy was all you.”
“Just kill him,” Rachel said again. “He’s lying.”
“Glass houses, Rachel,” I said. “By the way, did you ever pass on my message to Richard?”
“I’m sure these are all fascinating conversations,” Richard said, “but I would appreciate it if you could table them until Sarque and I have addressed the matter at hand.”
“Yeah, come on, Drakh,” Sarque said invitingly. “Try it. I’ll blow you and your pet monster into dust.”
So how’s things? I said through the dreamstone to Dark Anne.
How do you think? Dark Anne said in annoyance. We took out the small fry but Sarque’s claiming he’s going to blow the place sky-high if we make a move. Make yourself useful and tell us if he’s bluffing.
I’d already checked the futures in which I attacked. If Sarque pressed the button that his thumb was resting on right now, the entire control centre would be torn apart by demolition charges. The fateweaver could protect me from a lot of things, but fifty tons of concrete collapsing on my head wasn’t one of them.
He’s not bluffing, I told her.
Well, that’s just frigging wonderful.
“As I have already said,” Richard told Sarque, “your death is not a requirement. That goes also for your aide.” He nodded towards Solace. “I would much rather have you alive than crushed in the remnants of your fortress.”
“Yeah, I bet you would.”
“I am not going to torture you,” Richard said. “You will be kept in custody with a view to trading you back to the Council in some sort of exchange.”
“Bullshit.”
“This war isn’t going to last forever, Sarque. I have no intention of wiping the Council out to the last man. I’d rather come to a mutual agreement. To that end, you are far more useful to me as a bargaining chip than as a corpse.”
