Reign of Beasts (10 page)

V
elody could hardly breathe, could hardly think. She had done this. Once again, she had wrought destruction on the Creature Court. She could no longer remember anything good or rightful she had done since she'd stepped into their world.

The sentinels were shattered, all of them. Kelpie had turned to Garnet's side. Ashiol was gone. Velody didn't even have her animor, not as long as she had the taste of Delphine's blood between her teeth.

It was early morning when they let themselves into the house, which was quiet and still. No fire burned in the stove.

‘Rhian must be asleep,' said Delphine, leaning against Macready. ‘What do we do now?'

‘You were happy enough to give up your swords,' Macready muttered. ‘You tell me.'

‘The next big festival is the Pomonia,' Delphine said, sounding horribly gleeful about it. ‘You can hold the green satin while I cut ribbons.'

Macready swore at her and stamped his way upstairs. They heard a door slam above.

Velody came very close to telling Delphine not to tease him, but shut her mouth. Who was she to comment on their relationship? Macready wasn't her sentinel any more.

Delphine didn't seem to care that she had upset her man. ‘At least this whole wretched game is over,' she said, shrugging. ‘We can go back to our lives.'

‘If you believe that, you're stupider than everyone thinks you are,' Crane said angrily.

Velody had never heard him be so rude to anyone.

Delphine put her hands on her hips, giving Crane a dirty look. ‘Take out the rubbish, will you, Velody? I think we have our full complement of sponging, non-rent-paying guests.' She flounced up the stairs after Macready.

Crane looked faintly ashamed of himself. ‘Sorry,' he said to Velody.

‘Don't worry about it,' she told him. ‘We've all said and done things worthy of regret this nox.'

It was all so huge. Velody had no idea how to deal with this, no way to understand it.

‘Has this ever happened before?' she asked. ‘Kings and sentinels exiled from the Court?'

‘It happened to Ashiol,' Crane reminded her. ‘Reinforced with enough damage to make him stay away for five years. No sentinel I've ever heard of gave up his swords.'

Velody rubbed her stomach. The skin was smooth over the wound that had almost let her life leak away onto the cobblestones. She had really thought she was going to die this time around, and part of her had welcomed it, reaching out for Sage and her family, hoping for peace and rest.

Though if she had wanted peace and rest, she should have stayed in the empty remains of Tierce and let the sky take her.

‘Do you think Garnet will come after us?' she asked Crane.

‘If you stay in the city, then yes, sooner or later.'

‘And what are you going to do?' she asked. ‘You can stay here. Don't worry about what Delphine says.'

Crane shook his head slowly. ‘No, I don't think so. It's time I had a go at this real world thing. The daylight life. I don't think I can do that if I'm living here.'

He had been a part of the Creature Court his whole life, had lost everything because of Velody.

‘Crane, I'm —'

‘Don't,' he said, cutting her off before she could apologise. ‘We all made our choices. I wish I'd been strong enough to walk away from Garnet last time. This is for the best.'

‘I'm still sorry.'

He gave her a flicker of a smile. ‘Do you think it's too late for me to find something real?'

Velody had spent months of her life in a timeless unreality that was still under her skin. She could smell that false Tierce every time she lost track of where she was.

Reality. If it was an option for any of them, it was for this bright-eyed young man with his whole future in front of him.

‘It's never too late,' she said, and meant it.

 

Delphine wasn't sure how to do this. The supportive, caring, domestic partner wasn't a role she'd ever had to play. And she couldn't pretend to be anything but glad that she'd given up her swords, that this whole wretched, violent game was over. She had never wanted to be a sentinel; had only taken up swords because she felt she had no choice. Macready, she was pretty sure, felt differently.

She opened her bedroom door and looked at him. He lay on her bed, so exhausted and broken that her heart turned over.

Oh, no. No going soft. Not this demme.

‘If you're going to feel sorry for yourself, you can sleep at the foot of the stairs,' she said firmly.

He opened his eyes and looked at her. ‘Make me.'

There was a thrum in his voice that made her skin prickle. This was the annoying thing about him. He had spent the last couple of months making himself indispensable to her. There weren't many men who could make her wet with a word or two, said in a certain voice.

Delphine pulled her dress over her head and kneeled on the bed next to him. ‘Or, you know, you could make yourself useful.'

‘Got anything in mind?' Macready reached out, fingering the soft cotton of her breastband with his damaged hand.

That was something, then. If they didn't have sex, they might have to have a conversation about what they had done, what he had lost, and Delphine was happy to put that off until the world ended.

‘Frig me like you mean it,' she said, her voice catching just a little. ‘I can make you forget this whole mess.'

Macready gave her a cynical look. ‘No offence, love, but I don't think you're that good at it.'

Oh. A challenge.

Delphine gave him a shove back onto the bed. ‘You're going to regret saying that.'

 

Ashiol limped back to the Palazzo. He didn't want to speak to anyone. Rage burned deep in his chest. He hated Velody, hated Garnet, hated Kelpie, hated them all.

He climbed in the window to his rooms with more difficulty than usual and headed straight for the bath, where he sponged off blood and prodded with distaste at the long cut on his leg. It was nearly dawn. It would have to stop bleeding soon.

‘My Lord Ducomte?' he head from the other room.

‘Fuck off.'

Armand the factotum entered with his usual ‘something smells bad in here' expression. ‘My Lord —' He broke off when he saw the wound. ‘Can I get you anything?'

‘Aye, you can get the hells out of here.'

Armand rolled his eyes with prissy patience and began pulling bottles and jars out of the cupboard at the back of the room. ‘Beeswax tincture, and henwort to staunch the blood. You'll need a leaf poultice to clean the wound or you'll end up with a fever.'

‘Might be fun.' Ashiol nevertheless let the factotum fuss over his leg and smear it with some cack that actually felt oddly good. ‘Did you want something?'

‘Her high and brightness needs you,' said the factotum, making it clear by his voice that nothing could be of less use to Isangell than her troublemaking cousin.

‘You could tell her I'm asleep,' Ashiol suggested.

The factotum glared at him. ‘I can undo all this work in under a second.'

Ashiol felt calm for the first time in months, damn it all. His mind felt clear. Velody was not in league with Garnet. Garnet had the Creature Court. No one wanted anything of Ashiol … no one except Isangell. ‘Fine,' Ashiol muttered. ‘I'll see her. But I need a drink first.'

‘I'll send up a vat of wine, shall I?' the factotum said with surprising sarcasm.

 

The Duchessa's rooms were filled with trunks and maids. Ashiol, well fortified with two shots of imperium warming his stomach, watched for a moment as they went back and forth with armfuls of frocks and shoes and other fluffy items. ‘Are we moving house?'

Isangell emerged from her bedroom, arms full of papers, looking harried. ‘Please don't assume I have a sense of humour right now, Ash. This is all your fault.'

‘What am I being blamed for now?'

She stepped closer, and he saw that she looked more tired than she should, shadows under her eyes. He was used to his cousin being loving and forgiving, not this … vibrating anger that was more like himself.

‘I am preparing for my visit with the Duc-Elected of Bazeppe to negotiate a marriage with one of his sons,' she told him crossly. ‘Because the cousin who was supposed to stand in as my consort so I could establish my rule in this city before giving myself over to marriage has consistently let me down.'

‘Oh,' he said. ‘That.'

‘The City Fathers have been putting pressure on me about all these spates of bad luck in the city this year,' said Isangell. ‘The theatre collapse was the last straw for them — and I've spent enough time with their various eligible sons to put me off wedding cake for life. This way, at least, we can forge stronger bonds with Bazeppe.'

‘I didn't think you were serious about that.'

‘I don't see any other option,' she said sharply. ‘Oh, don't blame yourself for a moment — it's all my fault.'

She went back to her packing, giving further instructions to several maids. Just when Ashiol thought she was done with him, she added: ‘Mama warned me. No one thought bringing you here was a good idea, or that it would solve all my problems. No one but me.'

Now he felt bad. Bad, bruised and far too sober. Seven hells of a combination. ‘Isangell —'

‘No, let me finish.' She dismissed the maids with an impatient wave and waited until they were all gone before she spoke again. ‘I put you in this ridiculous situation, expecting you to be strong for me, to play the hero. But that's not what you do. Everyone could see it but me. I understand now. I've looked past the veil of that Creature Court of yours. I saw your friend die. I might not be able to see everything that happens in that nox of yours, but I do know that nothing in this world matters to you like being a … Creature King.' Her face was calm. ‘I don't blame you for it, Ashiol. But I have to stand on my own two feet, and stop pretending you can be what I hoped. If that means I change my plans and acquire a husband to
play public consort to me earlier than planned, then so be it.'

Nothing in this world matters to you like being a Creature King.
Her words were a cold knife to the neck. Ashiol had lost his chance to beat Garnet at his own game. Velody was unforgiving, and after the stunt he'd pulled he had little hope that she would be on his side. He'd tried to kill her. He was an idiot.

He could still feel that slow burn of anger, the desire to kill the Lords and Court, one by one. To kill Garnet. It had regressed somewhat since the fight with Velody, but the bloodlust was still there. He did not know if it was part of his madness, or just a reaction to Garnet's return, but he knew he could not unleash it again, not without killing someone he loved.

They didn't need him. The Lords and Court had chosen Garnet. After everything he had done, Ashiol couldn't blame them. He'd had his chance, when Velody was swallowed by the sky, and he'd wasted all that time being weak. Being useless.

‘Let me come with you,' he said impulsively.

Isangell looked at him. ‘Aren't you needed here?'

‘No,' he said, almost laughing with joy at the revelation. ‘I'm not. You can't go alone. This is too important. You need support, and I've given you little enough of that. Let me do this.' The Creature Court were better off without him.

She hesitated, as if not sure whether to believe him. ‘Pack your things, then. We have a train to catch.'

I
was the one who brought Livilla to Tasha. Didn't see that coming, did you?

Three-quarters of a year had passed since I first fell sick (since Tasha made me hers) and I hadn't been back to the Vittorina Royale in all that time.

Saturn took an interest in me still, and Tasha let him. That was part of a deal between them. He took me with him sometimes when he went out during daylight. He bought and traded books, and supplied dusty leatherbound volumes to the city librarion as well as to some private collections — at the Palazzo, or in other fine houses. He made me practise my reading, reminding me that someday I might want to know how to read a script if I wanted the theatre life back. I humoured him in that, trying to mimick his perfect copperplate handwriting.

‘Knowledge is power,' he told me once. ‘Books have far longer memories than people do.'

I knew he was wrong. Power was blood and heat and claws and Tasha's smile of triumph when someone did exactly what she wanted. Books had nothing to do with anything real.

 

The first time I saw the sky fall, I was so busy trying to figure out the trick of it, I almost got myself killed. Even after I saw Garnet's arm slashed and blackened from a cloudwight, I remained convinced that it was all some kind of grand performance. No one would do this for any other reason.

Only question was: who was the audience?

I got used to it, though. It became as normal to me as a pantomime. After a battle, the cubs were usually wired, bright eyed and fierce. They would swap war stories, teasing each other over who had slaughtered more devils, who had flown higher or harder, who was the best.

Tasha loved them at these times. She would loll on cushions, laughing throatily as they attempted to outdo each other. The prize, of course, was her. When one of them had suitably impressed her, she would drag him into the bedroom for a personal reward.

When Tasha wasn't watching, the mood among the cubs was darker and their cups ran deeper. Sometimes Garnet wouldn't return straight away from battle, but would turn up hours or days later, high as a kite, jumping at shadows or laughing hysterically at nothing. More than once, one of the other cubs distracted Tasha while the rest of us went to drag him out of some seedy club. I didn't understand how he could be part of this life when he hated it so much. But then Tasha made him stay home with me one nox because his arm was wounded, and I saw the impatience in his face, the frantic movement of his foot bouncing back and forth, and I realised that he hated to be left behind even more.

It gets into your blood, this sky of ours. It captures your soul.

They wouldn't let me fight yet. Not even Tasha was that much of a monster. They teased me about training me up to dance the sky, but I knew they thought of me as a pet rather than truly one of them.

Also, I suspected that Tasha thought if I spent much time in the city above, I might run away.

It was a bad season. Nox after nox, that familiar tug came and Tasha and the cubs went running out to save the city. Garnet's arm didn't heal well, and on the third nox in a row of being left behind, he cracked.

‘Come on, little rat. Let's see what's out there.'

We scampered along tunnels, emerging from the lock where the canal ran out of the side of a hill.

‘Stay low,' said Garnet, already fierce and bright eyed, as if he'd been taking something. Perhaps he had and I'd missed it. ‘Don't want the lioness to know what we're about.'

We both shifted into creature form and ran up the slope together, my rat bodies keeping close to the paws of the two gattopardi. One of them limped badly, but I knew better than to refer to it. He was still angry he'd been caught in such a way.

Being outside made my skin tingle. I had been underground so long, and had no idea how much I'd been craving the sky. It called to me. To Garnet, too. As we crested the hill, he let out a sound halfway between a growl and a cry of triumph.

The sky was full of lights and colours and shapes swooping back and forth. Garnet's eyes glowed with it. Something smashed into a nearby bush and exploded into flames and sparks, and Garnet leaped towards it rather than away, savaging the bush with his teeth. Something bright and cold squirmed in his jaws and he took off into the sky, dragging it with him.

I was alone. Part of me wanted to go after him, to see what it was really like up there. To please Tasha, and make her realise how useful I was. To be part of the family. On the other hand, this was the first time I'd been alone and free in the best part of a year.

I scampered back to where my clothes lay near the lock, and changed into boy shape. I didn't know where I was, but this looked like a main street, and everything in
Aufleur was connected. I followed the street around until I spotted a familiar piazza, and kept going.

All the way to the Vittorina Royale.

The shops and houses along Via Delgardie were lined with boughs of green and I realised it was Saturnalia. Had I really been underground so long?

Finally I found myself standing in front of the theatre. It was too late for the lanterns to be lit, and the whole place seemed smaller and grimmer than I remembered.

Aye, I was such a wise old man at nine years old.

I crept around to the alley where Madalena had been found, and let myself in at the back, making my way past the dressing rooms and scenery. It smelled like home — of gin and cosmetick and the detritus of an audience. I made it to the stage, and found it set for the last scene of a saints-and-angel, with satin orange-blossom wreaths tossed over every prop. No one was about.

For so long this had been my world — the Mermaid back home, and then the Vittorina: layers of facade pretending to be something grand and exotic.

I'd always thought the theatre was my future. My dreams had been shaped by it — I wanted to be a mask, a songbird, a gaffer, a harlequinus, a tumbler …

My new world was smaller, darker, or at least it had been until I realised what the sky had to offer.

Standing on that stage, I remembered a song that Madalena used to sing to me. It was a number from the old days, when she and my mother dressed up as urchin boys and sang their guts out, turning the audience from laughter to tears on the change of a verse. I sang it there and then, remembering the steps, running through the old routine. My voice knew how to project to the gods. I could do this. I could live this life.

Halfway through, a creature padded into the theatre, then another. I half-expected a pair of gattopardi, and my voice faltered, but it was two half-grown wolves, ragged
and matted. Come to bring me home, no doubt. I didn't know how many Lords and Court were out there — I'd only met Tasha and the cubs, Saturn, Celeste and the snake man they called Power and Majesty.

I finished the song, then slid off the edge of the stage. ‘Are you one of them?'

Two pairs of deep, miserable yellow eyes stared back at me, and then they shifted into each other, forming a naked demme only a few years older than myself — old enough to be a columbine, but only just. She looked half-starved and she was shaking. I didn't have the words yet for what she was — I'd heard the others talk about animor, courtesi, and the meanings hadn't settled into my head like something that mattered — but I knew she was like me. Like Tasha and Garnet and the rest. I could feel it.

I reached out my hand to her and she flinched back. I recognised her then, though she had grown a bit in all directions since I'd seen her last. Liv. Saints, it was Liv. There were bruises all down her side. Someone had been beating her.

‘Is this your first time?' I asked her.

She said nothing, just shivered all over. It reminded me of that fever I'd had, though she seemed cold and not hot.

I could have gone two ways. I had a choice. I could have taken her backstage and thrown her on the wardrobe mistress's mercy, hoping the real world could make her better. But those bruises made me think that maybe she needed something else, a new life.

I took her to Tasha.

 

Livilla. I hadn't even known that was her proper name. She was just Liv to me, the one who wasn't as pretty as Ruby-Red, and didn't talk as much as Kip and Benny, and could sing when she thought no one was looking but clammed up when she had an audience. She was broken and sad, and skinny and ugly enough that Tasha didn't see her as a
threat. At first, she withdrew from the rest of us, but the cubs treated her like a princessa and eventually she warmed up to that. No one at the theatre had thought she was anything special.

On the third day of Saturnalia, Ashiol brought her a sugar pig from the market, and she sucked every crumb of sweetness from it, rolling it around on her tongue like she'd never had such a feast.

On the fourth day of Saturnalia, Garnet and Lysandor brought paper sparrows to make her smile, and heaped her lap with them.

On the fifth day of Saturnalia, I snuck back into the Vittorina Royale and stole her a dress. It was red and shiny and I thought maybe it belonged to Adriane, if she was still there and a stellar and not off having babies or whatever. When Livilla smiled at me, her mouth was red and shiny, too.

The older boys became quite stupid over her — enough that it began to irritate Tasha — but Livilla liked me best. I enjoyed someone else being the pet for once. She would let me brush her hair and fetch things for her.

On the seventh day of Saturnalia, Tasha discovered that Lysandor was bedding Saturn's courtesa Celeste, and all the seven hells broke open.