The Office of Shadow (4 page)

There was a sound in the alley. A pair of burly city guards were
approaching, their clubs out and ready. Both looked tense and afraid. They'd
been given instructions to remain and to keep the peace until the bitter end.
Neither one appeared happy about it.

Cat spun Paet around and shoved Paet's face hard against the wall. A
knife pierced his back, went deep, and Paet felt something in his body give.
A kidney? The knife traced a path across his back and caught on something
hard, a vertebra. With Paet's enhanced sensitivity toward his own body, he
felt it in excruciating detail, felt the nerve tissue shredding like spiderweb.
Another hard shove and Paet's nose smashed into the bricks of the wall.

Paet slid down the wall and watched Cat begin a methodical slaughter
of the two guardsmen, who barely had time to shriek before he began hurting
them. One of the Bel Zheret's few weaknesses was that they took a bit too
much pleasure in causing pain; perhaps it was an unintended side effect of
whatever it was that created them. Perhaps, worse, it was intended.

With the very last of his re, Paet attempted to repair those nerves, to find
his way into the kidney and send healing toward it. These were still killing
wounds, but perhaps they would kill a bit more slowly now, and give him
time to reach the lock before he died. Paet now reached out, out of his body
and out into Blood of Arawn, looking for life, looking for re that he could
steal. Two children in an adjoining house, huddling in bed. He drew as much
from them as he could without killing them. They'd be sick for a few days,
nothing more. It would be the least of their worries. He would kill the children if he had to, but not unless it was absolutely necessary. And it wasn't
absolutely necessary. Not yet.

While the Bel Zheret continued its work on the guards, Paet exited the
alley in the other direction as silently as possible, picking up the bag as he
ran. The knife wound seared through his back, making the broken wrist seem
mild in comparison. He could sense fluids in his body mixing that should not
mix, blood leaking into places where blood did not belong. Despite his best
efforts, he might not make it.

Again he considered abandoning Jenien. A loose cobblestone would do
the trick, crush her brain until it was utterly unreadable. But he couldn't do
it. Killing her had been bad enough. Nor could he simply toss the cloth bag into one of the now-many burning buildings that lined the street along
which he staggered.

A clock in the main temple struck the hour, and Pact felt what blood
remained in him drain toward his feet. The Port-Herion Lock would be shut
down soon. Any minute now. They would not wait for him.

Running. Breathing hard in his chest. Now no longer caring whether he
was seen or what kind of impression he made. Get to the gate, through the
lock, onto Seelie soil. This was all that mattered now.

There was a side street that ran along the base of Kollws Kapytlyn, where
the Southwest Gate stood, and Paet reached it, out of breath, after what
seemed like hours. The street was empty. It ran along a ridge line, overlooking the endless prairies of Annwn. In the distance, one of the giant, tentacled boars, the Hwch Ddu Cwta, raised its head to the sky in the dark,
amidst the noise.

Paet's legs felt like they'd been wrapped in cold iron; his breath came like
knife thrusts. Blood dripped down his back, thickening along the length of
his thigh. He stumbled once, then again. He should have killed those two
children; it had been necessary after all. He was sworn to protect the children
of the Seelie Kingdom, not the children of Annwn.

He struggled again to his feet. The pain in his back, in his chest, in his
wrist-they all conspired against him, hounding him. Each had its own personality, its own signature brand of hurt.

The city gate was up ahead, left open and unguarded. Beyond he could
see the lock glowing in the distance. The portal was still open!

One of the Bel Zheret tackled him hard from behind, his shoulder biting
into the knife wound. The bag containing Jenien's head tumbled away.
Whether his attacker was Cat or Asp he couldn't tell; not that it mattered
now. If it was Cat, then he'd get his wish to kill a Shadow after all.

But he wouldn't get Jenien. Paet crawled toward the bag, allowing the
Bel Zheret free access to his back, which his assailant readily exploited,
kicking him hard in the kidney.

Paet collapsed on top of the bag and, with the last of his strength,
crushed Jenien's skull with his hands. It was harder than he would have
thought. Mab wouldn't learn any of her secrets now.

The Bel Zheret knelt over Pact and began delivering efficient, evenly
timed blows to Pact's spine, then turned him over and dealt equally with
Pact's face. Pact felt his nose crack, his lower jaw split in two. Teeth rolled
loose on his tongue; he swallowed one. He felt ribs crack, first one, then two
more. Something popped in his chest and suddenly he could no longer
breathe. There was no sound except the dull rush of blood in his ears. The
world spun; the beating, the pounding receded, then faded altogether.

A few minutes later Tract, the Seelie ambassador, followed by a pair of clerks
lugging baggage and valises thick with papers, literally stumbled over Pact's
body.

"Oh, dear!" Tract cried. "How awful!"

"Is he alive?" asked one of the clerks, kneeling.

"We don't have time for that," Tract muttered, walking past. "There will
be casualties."

"Sir, it's Pact!"

The ambassador quickly turned, his eyes wide. "Gather him up, then!
Quickly!"

The kneeling clerk felt for a pulse. "He's dead, sir. Perhaps we oughtn't
to bother......

"Don't be a fool," said Tract. "Hand me your bags and take him. Now!"

Neither the clerks nor Tract noticed the cloth bag that had fallen from
Pact's hand, now resting in a clump of bushes just outside the gate.

Once the ambassador's party was safely through the lock, the Master of
the Gates opened a small door on the side of the massive portal. He adjusted
the ancient machinery, and a loud hum joined the cacophony of flames and
the percussion of war from across the city. While a sextet of extremely fiercelooking members of the Seelie Royal Guard held back the small knot of
would-be refugees that had surrounded the lock, the Master closed the door,
carrying a heavy part of the lock's inner workings with him. He stepped
through and beckoned the guardsmen to follow. They backed slowly into the
silken portal, not so much disappearing as gliding out of existence. The tips of their swords were the last things to vanish. The instant the last of them
was through, the portal went dark, revealing behind it only a veneer of highly
polished black stone. The desperate crowd banged their fists against it, some
weeping, others shouting.

Just before dawn a tocsin sounded in the city and the Unseelie flag was
raised upon the obelisk. All was quiet. The crowd at the Port-Herion Lock
hesitantly turned away from the dead portal and went their separate wayssome back into the city, their heads hung low; some out into the pampas, not
looking back.

Titania is the land and the land isTitania. She reads the song
of birds and feels the brush of the plow upon her skin.

Anonymous, "Ode to Titania"

Today

egina Titania, Fae Queen of the Seelie Lands, Purest Blood of Pure Elves,
sat upon her stone chair, chin in hand, swinging her feet. The lights were
dim in the throne room, and the sound of her heels clicking against the floor
echoed in the gloom.

She looked at her husband, King Auberon, the son of Aba himself, who
slouched insensate in his own seat. He had not spoken in centuries, not since
she had stolen his power and his mind on the day of their marriage.

"A change approaches, husband," she said softly. "Long ago you warned
me this day would come, and I scoffed. Now I stand chastened."

Auberon's head lolled to the side, and he sobbed quietly.

All Gifts are Gifts of Aba, who is God beyond gods.To him
who sees clearly, this is not a matter of faith; it is axiomatic.

-Alpaurle, The Magus,
translated by Feven IV of the City Emerald

ilverdun sat in the antechamber to the abbot's office, shivering. Tebrit had
forced the novice robes over Silverdun's head without giving him the
opportunity to dry off first. He was dripping onto the floor.

After a few minutes, Abbot Estiane opened the door to his office and ushered Silverdun in, groaning at the sight of him. The office was cramped, but
warm-the abbot was allowed a small brazier in his office, due to his rheumatism. Or, at least, that's what he told everyone. Silverdun knew, however, that
Estiane simply didn't like to be cold, and had, in his words, "spent enough
years as a coenobite freezing my ass off for no reason."

Estiane said nothing for a minute or two, busying himself with digging
through the dozens of scrolls and books littering his desk for something in
particular, then giving up and reaching beneath the desk for a metal flask,
which he unstoppered and handed to Silverdun.