Ghost in the Storm (The Ghosts) (18 page)

One such patrol approached now.

Six men, Caina saw, and the lead man bore a torch. Yet as they drew closer, Caina counted two men in front and one behind. Between the soldiers walked a pair of women and a boy of five or six years, rope collars around their necks. For a moment Caina felt a surge of hope, but the boy was not Nicolai.

She hesitated. Getting involved would be a risk. With the enemy preparing to attack the Plaza of the Tower, Caina would never have a better chance to find Nicolai. A chance she could not use, if she died here. Best to remain hidden. Yet that meant letting these slavers and their captives walk past her.

Caina found she could not endure that.

She took a deep breath and slid the ghostsilver dagger from her belt. The Istarish soldiers and their three captives marched past, the women weeping. They passed the doorway without seeing Caina. The torch had spoiled their night vision, and Caina’s cloak made her blend with the darkness.

She slipped into the alley behind the rear soldier, clamped her gloved left hand over his mouth, and raked the ghostsilver dagger across his throat with her right. Her fingers muffled his scream, and blood poured down his scale armor. Caina eased the corpse to the ground, and ducked back into the doorway. 

It took the soldiers a few moments to realize something had gone amiss.

One of the women stumbled and cringed, no doubt expecting to receive a blow. Instead she saw the soldier lying dead in a pool of blood, and she froze in sudden alarm. 

“Keep moving!” snarled one of the soldiers in Istarish. “I told you to keep moving!”

The woman flinched and pointed at the dead man. 

The soldier cursed. “Devils of the desert, Hazan, are you drunk already?”

Hazan did not move, and then the soldier saw the blood pooling beneath the corpse. 

The soldier cursed and stooped over Hazan.

Caina stepped out of the shadows, both hands wrapped around the hilt of her ghostsilver dagger, and buried the blade in the soldier’s neck. She ripped the dagger free and whirled to face the soldier with the torch, expecting him to charge.

But instead he stood frozen, gazing at her with horror. 

He did not see an exhausted twenty year old woman, Caina knew. Instead he saw a hooded shape, wrapped in a cloak of shadow, a dripping dagger in hand. The soldier flung down his torch and fled. For a moment Caina considered pursuit, but decided against it. If the soldier lived, he would spread fear among his comrades. And if Caina chased him, he might well lead her to a larger group of Istarish soldiers.

His fear would vanish then. 

So instead she crossed to the captive women and cut away their ropes. 

"You," said one of the women, picking up the boy. "Who are you?"

"No one important," said Caina, speaking in the rasping voice she used while disguised. Theodosia had taught it to her, and it made her sound like a devil from the pits. "Take your child and go to the city gates. Marsis is going to fall to the Istarish and the Kyracians, and anyone left in the city will become a slave."

"I know you," said the second woman, voice awed.

Caina frowned behind her mask. How did the woman recognize her? Her nightfighter clothes gave no indication of her appearance, let alone that she was a woman...

"My brother is in the Twentieth Legion," said the second woman, "and he said you rescued the slaves below Black Angel Tower and slew the demon. You are the Balarigar."

Caina's frown turned into a grimace. Gods, how she hated that name. A Ghost nightfighter was to remain anonymous and unseen.

"Go!" said Caina. "Quickly. Else the Istarish will find you, and put you into chains for the rest of your lives."

The fear returned to their faces, and they fled into the darkened alley. Caina hoped they had the sense to stay off the main streets. For a moment she hesitated, wondering if she should see them to safety.

No. She had other responsibilities. She had to rescue Nicolai and return him to Ark and Tanya.

Assuming they were still alive.

Caina had to believe that.

And she had to report what she had learned about Andromache and Rezir Shahan to Halfdan. He had to be warned about Rezir's necromantic ring, about Andromache's overwhelming sorcerous power. 

But first, Caina had to learn more about what Andromache sought. 

About the Tomb of Scorikhon.

Whatever that was. 

She continued into the night.

###

A short time later Caina came to a dead-end street lined with abandoned houses. 

Marsis’s dockside district had a reputation as a den of thieves, but this street looked exceptionally sinister. The open windows of the abandoned houses gaped like empty eyes. The docks stank of salt and fish, but here a heavy chemical reek hung over everything, along with the faint hint of rotting meat. 

The corpses of four Istarish soldiers did not seem out of place.

Caina edged closer, ghostsilver dagger in her right hand, a throwing knife in her left. The dead men lay heaped before the house at the end of the alley, a ramshackle structure with a noticeable lean. The soldiers looked as if every bone in their body had shattered at once, and as Caina crept closer to the house, she felt the crawling tingle of sorcery.

The soldiers had blundered into a ward, and a powerful one. Not surprising, really. The occupant of the house had little desire for company.

He would not be happy to see Caina. No matter. He had information she needed, and she would get it out of him.

She paused over the corpses, hand extended, feeling the crawling tingle of sorcery in the air. There…yes, there. The ward lay over the cobblestones of the alley. Caina sheathed her weapons, jumped up, and grabbed the wall, her gloved fingers gripping the rough bricks. She pulled herself along, and then landed on the other side of the ward.

She climbed the stairs, lifted her hand, and knocked on the door.

For a moment nothing happened.

Then a small iron plate in the door slid aside, and Caina caught the gleam of eyes in the darkness.

“Nicorus,” she said, using her disguised voice. 

“Who are you?” said a quavering, rusty voice. “How did you get through my wards? If you are a sorcerer of power, I wish no quarrel. I only want to be left alone.”

“I am no sorcerer, Nicorus,” said Caina. “I am a Ghost, and I require your aid.”

Nicorus cursed. “No. I want nothing more to do with the Ghosts. Leave me!” 

“You will aid me,” said Caina.

“I will not,” said Nicorus. “I am already in disgrace with the Magisterium. If they learn I have aided the Ghosts…”

“The Magisterium is the least of your troubles,” said Caina. “When the Istarish and the Kyracians take the city, they’ll kill the chapterhouse’s magi. A stormsinger of immense power commands the Kyracians. Do you think she’ll permit a renegade magus to live in her city for long?”

Nicorus was silent for a long moment.

“Damn it,” he said at last, and Caina heard the sounds of locks opening. “Damn it. And damn you, Ghost.”

The door swung open with a rusty groan, and Caina stepped into Nicorus’s home. The room beyond the door was cavernous, the walls lined with wooden shelves of jars, vials, books, scrolls, and bones. Various organs and dead animals floated in jars of brine. The only light came from a pair of corroded bronze braziers. Nicorus himself was a squat, hairless man in a greasy brown robe, his skin the color of kneaded dough.

Nicorus had once been a master magus of the Magisterium, high in authority and prestige. Then he had made the mistake of seducing the First Magus’s favorite mistress. The First Magus retaliated by castrating Nicorus, expelling him from the Magisterium, and leaving him to live in exile in Marsis. Now Nicorus lived in dread of the First Magus’s wrath, and sometimes assisted the Ghosts out of sheer fear.

The man was a snake. But a snake who knew useful things.

“A shadow-cloak,” muttered Nicorus, looking her over. “That explains why my wards didn’t sense you. You…I know you, yes. The woman. Halfdan’s Ghost. The one scarred with sorcery.”

“Observant,” said Caina. More observant than she would like. 

“It has kept me alive this long,” said Nicorus. “What do you want? Be quick about it. No doubt the Istarish and the Kyracians are hunting the Ghosts. I do not want you here when they find you.”

He was more right than he knew.

“What,” said Caina, “do you know about the Tomb of Scorikhon?” 

Nicorus’s face grew even paler.

“How do you know about that?” he whispered. “No one outside the Magisterium should know about the Tomb.” 

“The Ghosts know many things,” said Caina. “An emir named Rezir Shahan leads the Istarish force, and he cares only for conquest. But a stormsinger of great power named Andromache of House Kardamnos commands the Kyracians. She came to Marsis to find the Tomb and claim it for herself.” 

“How can you possibly know that?” said Nicorus.

“Andromache has been interrogating prisoners, asking them for the Tomb’s location,” said Caina. Which was entirely true.

“Oh,” said Nicorus, scratching his jowly cheek. He blinked several times, as if something suddenly made sense to him. “Oh, that’s not good at all.” 

“Where is the Tomb of Scorikhon?” said Caina.

“That is a secret permitted only to the master magi of the Magisterium,” said Nicorus.

“The Magisterium cast you out,” said Caina. “Why protect their secrets?”

“The First Magus’s reach is long,” said Nicorus. “The Motherhouse is far away, but he can still find me here.” 

“His reach has been cut short,” said Caina. “You saw the spell battle over the city, the lightning that struck the Citadel’s war engines? That was Andromache. The Magisterium couldn’t stop her. Which means you’re on your own.”

“And you have a way to kill a stormsinger of such power, Ghost?” said Nicorus, sneering. 

Caina shrugged. “All men are mortal, are they not?”

Nicorus scowled. “You are either brilliant or a fool. I cannot decide which. Why not? We might all die tomorrow. Why should you not know? The Tomb of Scorikhon is in the cellar of the Citadel’s northern tower. At least the entrance to the Tomb. No one has ever gotten inside it.” 

“Does the Magisterium know who Scorikhon was?” said Caina. 

“Any historian knows who Scorikhon was,” said Nicorus. “He was one of the greatest necromancers of the Red Circle.” He titled his head to the side. “You were the one who slew Maglarion, correct? Halfdan said as much.”

“I did,” said Caina. She did not like to think of Maglarion. Of how he had corrupted her mother and killed her father. How he had almost killed over a million people to feed his own power.

Of the things he had taken from her.

She would never bear a living child because of his sorcery.

“Did you know that Maglarion learned his first necromancy from the scrolls of the Red Circle?” said Nicorus. 

“I killed the man,” said Caina. “I did not write his life story.”

“Pity,” said Nicorus. “You might have learned much. Do you at least know of the Kingdom of the Rising Sun, the realm of the Maatish Great Necromancers?”

“Yes,” said Caina. She remembered that Maatish scroll sitting upon her father’s desk. “I do.” 

“When the Kingdom of the Rising Sun was devoured by its own necromancy,” said Nicorus, “one of the Great Necromancers fled north. He settled in Black Angel Tower, and built the Citadel to house his Red Circle, a school for necromancers. His successors and students ruled what is now the western Empire for centuries.” 

“Was Scorikhon the Great Necromancer?” said Caina. She remembered something that Tanya had told her, that Jadriga had once studied under the last Great Necromancer. If Scorikhon had been Jadriga's teacher, that might explain why Andromache sought his tomb.

“No,” said Nicorus. “That Great Necromancer had been dead for centuries by Scorikhon’s birth. Scorikhon was the last master of Red Circle. Not as powerful as a Great Necromancer, but still potent. When he was slain, the students of the Red Circle fought among themselves. The Kyracians caught them unawares, wiped them out, and founded Marsis. Then the Emperor took the city from the Kyracians, and it has been part of the Empire ever since. At least until Rezir Shahan arrived.”

“This Scorikhon,” said Caina. “Do the histories ever mention that he was a student of the Moroaica from Szaldic legend? Or that she was his student?” 

“Some of the histories do,” said Nicorus, his broad shoulders rippling in a shrug. “In one account she was his teacher, and he was her apprentice. In another account, she was his student and lover.” Remembering Jadriga, Caina thought that unlikely. “But it's all nonsense. The Moroaica is a Szaldic legend, a myth the Szaldic peasants whisper in the dark.”

“Truly,” said Caina.

“Regardless of what Scorikhon did,” said Nicorus, “he has been dead for centuries, since the era of the Third Empire.” He shook his head. “And ever since, the Magisterium has tried to enter his Tomb.”

“Why?” said Caina. “Was he buried with books or scrolls? Secrets to his necromantic powers?” 

“No one knows,” said Nicorus. “Every preceptor of the Marsis chapter has tried to break into the Tomb, and they have failed. Necromantic wards of surpassing skill and power shield the Tomb. At best, the preceptors only suffer a loss of pride when the wards repulse them. At worst, they are slain, or deformed, or suffer...other fates. None of them pleasant.” 

“That doesn't answer the question,” said Caina. “Why do you even want to enter it? Just to gaze upon Scorikhon's bones?”

“Hardly,” said Nicorus. “He might have been buried with scrolls and books, true, in the fashion of the old Maatish necromancers. But that is chancy. There is great power within the Tomb, Ghost. Anyone with even a modicum of arcane talent can sense it.” He titled his head to the side, a cunning glitter in his beady black eyes. “You have the ability to sense sorcerous force. Have you not felt it?”

“I have never been inside the Citadel,” said Caina. She had been in the vaults below Black Angel Tower, and felt the dark sorcery of the place. Had some of it come from the Tomb of Scorikhon in the Citadel? “And that's why the magi want to enter the Tomb. To claim that power, whatever it is, for themselves.”