Ascendant's Rite (The Moontide Quartet) (43 page)

‘Special prisoners, Sadikh!’ Molmar called. ‘The emir wanted it kept quiet.’

‘We should still have been forewarned,’ Sadikh complained. ‘Who are they?’

Molmar smiled darkly. ‘These are Elena Anborn and Kazim Makani.’

The three Hadishah faces went from suspicion to vindictive triumph. ‘They’ve been captured? Ahm be praised!’ Sadikh exclaimed. Kazim and Elena’s killing of Gatoz and his men had clearly reverberated through the Hadishah ranks.

He strode forward, kindling the gnosis in his hands. ‘Well, well, well,’ he murmured, almost salivating. His face had turned so violently ugly that Kazim wondered whether they might not have miscalculated.

What if he just kills us?

The other Hadishah man cupped Elena’s chin and spat in her face. ‘I want first use of this one,’ he growled. Then he turned to Kazim. ‘As for you . . .’ His hand went to his dagger.

‘No, Yimat!’ The woman behind him caught his arm. ‘We’ve been wanting more like him,’ she said in a low voice that was no less hate-filled.

It was plain they knew that he was a Souldrinker. Kazim held his breath as Yimat toyed with his dagger.

‘As you wish, Gulbahar,’ Yimat said resentfully at last, then abruptly he backhanded Kazim across the face. The blow was gnosis-enhanced and Kazim’s head rocked sideways, his mouth filling up with blood. ‘A Rondian screwing a Souldrinker?’ he snarled. ‘Ahm only knows which is the more degenerate.’

The woman Gulbahar went to Elena, grabbed her hair and yanked it brutally. ‘Hello, Bitch. We’ve been
longin
g to get hold of you.’

‘Have a care,’ Molmar put in. ‘She is with child.’

Elena flinched and looked away, so convincingly that Kazim found his heart leaping.
What if she is
—
?
But he knew it was a lie; they’d already agreed to say this, to make it less likely they’d abuse Elena on arrival.

Gulbahar added her spittle to Elena’s face. ‘She’s an obscenity,’ she hissed. ‘Pregnant by choice to one of these Souldrinker monsters!’

Soldiers were summoned to manhandle them below while Molmar drew Sadikh aside. Kazim watched worriedly: if Molmar was going to betray them, it would be in the next couple of minutes – it wouldn’t take much, after all, not with them both properly restrained. The pilot’s expression was unreadable, and Kazim found himself increasingly nervous.

The soldiers took them down one level, to the top floor of the blockhouse. A pair of stony-faced guards in armour stared at them, their eyes going round in astonishment, their normal rigid discipline overcome by their fascination with the identity of the new prisoners. Someone called aloud for Scriptualist Tahir; the name rang dim bells in Kazim’s memory, but he couldn’t take the time to work out where he’d heard it before, not while Sadikh was whispering to Molmar.

Molmar’s eyes met his, and then he whispered something else in Sadikh’s ear.

Something unseen passed between them, and the grip on Kazim’s arms tightened.

Then a blade was pressed to his throat.

17

Breeding-House

Hadishah

The advent of the Leviathan Bridge had another effect, Majesty – the inciting of many of the heathen Amteh towards a more violent and fanatical expression of their religion. The Hadishah are the most dangerous of these sects, and have committed many atrocities even against their own people. I urge you to send further resources so that we might stamp them out once and for all.

G
OVERNOR
T
OMAS
B
ETILLON,
H
EBUSALIM, 918

The Jackals of Ahm are as feared by their own people as by the Rondians.

O
RDO
C
OSTRUO
C
OLLEGIATE,
P
ONTUS, 917

Northern Kesh, on the continent of Antiopia

Zulhijja (Decore) 929

18
^th
month of the Moontide

Elena staggered as the two guardsman wrenched her along the corridor towards a door at the end. As she glanced back at Kazim she saw a hidden web of meaningful glances: Molmar whispering in Sadikh’s ear, the guardsmen looking about with sudden tension on their faces, and blades coming out. Then the men holding her tripped her and shoved her to her knees.

She struggled, trying to twist and catch Kazim’s eyes.

If Molmar doesn’t release him in a moment we’re going to have do this alone.

The doors at the end of the corridor flew open and a tall man dressed in heavy black velvet ceremonial robes emerged. He had a hawkish face and wore a big emerald periapt on his forehead. ‘What is this?’ he demanded. ‘New prisoners? Why wasn’t I told?’

‘Secrecy was required,’ Molmar replied, stepping forward and bowing. ‘This is Elena Anborn.’

Damn it, Molmar,
free us
!

The newcomer’s eyes widened. He yanked on her hair to force her to look at him. ‘I am Scriptualist Tahir,’ he said in stilted Rondian. ‘So, you are the famous Elena Anborn?’

She averted her eyes and the man, still gripping her hair, slapped her hard, making her eyes water and her scalp burn. ‘Speak when you are spoken to, whore!’

Molmar . . . I trusted you . . . Please . . . do it!

‘My Lord Tahir, have a care,’ Molmar reminded them all. ‘She is with child: it is a unique situation!’

‘How so?’

‘It is the child of a Souldrinker.’

Elena exhaled in relief. Molmar was sticking to the story.
But if he’s really with us, why isn’t Kaz free already?
She winced as Tahir pulled her hair again; she could feel his eyes boring into her.

‘Whose Chain-rune is on her?’ the Scriptualist asked. ‘I don’t recognise the touch.’

You wouldn’t . . . it’s Kazim’s
 . . .

Tahir released her hair and tried again to break the spell, then pulled back, puzzled. ‘It is damnably strong. Whose Chain is it?’

‘Rashid himself,’ Molmar lied. He stepped away and bowed again, casually laying a hand on Kazim’s arm.

He really is with us . . .
Elena braced herself to move.

Molmar waited until Tahir looked back at Elena, then a gentle glow suffused Kazim’s aura – dissipating one’s own spell took none of the time and energy needed to dispel something done by another mage. As the three Hadishah magi stared, puzzled by the light, the Chain-rune vanished. The moment Molmar freed him, Kazim was in motion, rising in one flowing moment and grabbing the wrist of one of the soldiers, spinning him with brutal force to smash into the other. There was a sickening crunch as he burned his bonds away and slammed kinetic force at Tahir.

The Scriptualist flew backwards through his own double doors while Kazim roared his war cry and splayed his hands, smashing the two men holding Elena off their feet. Then his counter-spell knifed through her chest, breaking his own Chain-rune – it was a lost second, a necessary one, but it meant Molmar had to face Sadikh, Yimat and Gulbahar on his own.

Molmar spun, his shields kindling, then he was hammered by three instantaneous flashes of blue light; the first was deflected, but the second two, from Sadikh and Gulbahar, blazed into him at once. His shield coalesced against Sadikh’s bolt, but Gulbahar’s struck his chest and smashed him over backwards. The smell of charred meat filled the air.

Even before the Chain binding her vanished, Elena was in motion; breaking her bonds as she evaded a mage-bolt from Gulbahar and as her own gnosis re-engaged she hurled mage-fire back, then launched herself forward, using kinesis to pull her own blade from the scabbard at Molmar’s waist, dodging a bolt from Sadikh before ramming her shortsword at his chest. He was shielding, but blocking a handheld weapon with just shields was hard; he managed to cover his chest, but her other blow, a brutal kick to his right ankle, passed through effortlessly. She heard the crack of breaking bones and he collapsed to the tiled floor.

She barrelled straight on, knocking Yimat’s arm sideways with her forearm as she passed him, and drove her shortsword straight into Gulbahar’s breast. The Keshi woman gaped down at the steel, then fell backwards, the blade sliding free with a sucking sound. Yimat threw a kinetic shove at Elena, but her shields absorbed it and she spun, catlike, as he drew his scimitar.

Sadikh was sitting up, kindling fire in his hands, and other doors were opening along the corridor. Kazim had followed Tahir back into the room at the end of the corridor and Molmar was down.

Elena didn’t have time to wonder whether they’d gotten in over their heads this time.

*

Kekropius felt rather than saw his people slithering into place. The slopes above the compound were rough, studded with boulders and rockfalls, clear signs of neglectful security. Finding and moving under cover was easy for the lamiae, practised hunters, and they got to within sixty yards of the walls undetected, and settled in to wait. As the twilight deepened and Molmar’s skiff landed, they began to fret, anxious to be on the move.

His people were uniformly young: even he, an Elder, was barely twenty; most of the young warriors, with the exception of a pair of nineteen-year-old females who were too old to breed, were in their mid-teens and unused to patience. The Animagi who had made the lamiae had created them to die young, to avoid them ever becoming a problem.

But we became a problem anyway. You wanted warriors, Emperor Constant, and that is what we are.

Simou, the other Elder on this mission, added.

The war-party broke cover, slithering faster than a running man towards the walls. Someone must have been paying attention, for the alarm went up almost immediately, with panicked shouts and ringing bells. Arrows flew, but the lamiae were moving fast and erratically, and none were hit. They reached the walls and began targeting defenders with their own gnosis, sending boulders smashing through the battlements and bringing down whole sections. Then mage-fire flashed and they started swatting aside the guards with kinesis.

Kekropius went through the breach he’d smashed with a gigantic boulder, moving at a sprinter’s pace. His spear caught the first guard he saw and skewered him. Arrows bounced off his shields – and then the defenders saw their enemy: not men but monsters. The resistance wavered, then those who could, ran.

Kekropius shouted, to keep his kin, so young and easily distracted, focused on their mission. He swerved that way himself, cutting down another soldier as he passed, then racing unopposed between the small huts. His kindred swarmed behind him.

He almost didn’t see the vivid blast of blue light from above; it slammed into his shields and hurled him backwards, tearing the breath from his lungs. He was semi-stunned and still gasping for air when someone grabbed him from behind and pulled him backwards into cover.
Simou.
As he recovered he glimpsed a man on a balcony above. His head filled with the cries of alarm from his kin, then someone shouted

with all the exuberant foolishness of youth, and they all surged on again, into the fire.

It took him a few seconds to realise that the one who’d shouted was him.

*

Kazim realised he was in trouble half a second after he burst through the doors and into the most opulent room he had ever seen. It was positively
dripping
with luxury, from the smallest trinket on the elaborate marquetry table to the largest marble statue, a representation of a naked woman preening at her own magnificence.
Not a traditional Amteh work
, he thought, shielding as the current of energy between him and Elena flowed again, full of power and information. She was fighting in the corridor, outnumbered and under pressure.

I have to finish this, fast.

Tahir had taken up position to the left of the statue; he had dropped to one knee, with his scimitar drawn. As the Scriptualist blazed at Kazim with gnostic-fire, his shields went critical and Kazim realised,
He’s a pure-blood!
He concentrated on his shielding, and pretended to falter.
Come and get me, Scriptualist
. But Tahir was no fool; Kazim could hear him calling silently for help.

I’ve got to stop him warning the rest
 . . . He jumped towards Tahir with a kinetic-empowered leap, his blade sweeping towards the man’s neck – but the Hadishah wasn’t there; he’d whisked himself backwards and sideways, putting the marble statue between them, then he hurled it at Kazim with a kinetic push. Kazim caught the statue and sent it back, three times as hard, and the Scriptualist bellowed in alarm, barely wrenching himself aside in time to avoid the massive marble figure, which went through the wall with a crash, bricks tumbling after. The ceiling in that corner, no longer supported, wobbled, and began to come down.

Kazim didn’t let up; he kept attacking with blade and gnosis. Steel belled on steel, and then Tahir was gone again, leaping to the far side of the bed. Kazim jumped over it too and their blades locked. They shoved each other, momentarily matched, until Tahir gave ground, panting.

‘You are Kazim Makani?’ he gasped. ‘Why do you fight us?’

Kazim ignored his question, driving him back with another flurry of blows, scouring his shields and almost breaking through. Tahir defended well, with scimitar and gnosis, but he was being beaten and he knew it. He shouted for help again, and this time Kazim heard responses. Then Elena cried out, and his heart almost froze.

Kazim could see Tahir take heart as someone burst into the room behind him; he counter-attacked, trying to drive Kazim back onto the newcomer’s blade.