Fazekiel blinked weakly.
‘That really hurts,’ she whispered.
They heard the wailing rush of blades nearby. It was very close.
‘Oh shit,’ whispered Merity. ‘It heard us. It heard the shots. It’s coming.’
‘Leave me,’ said Fazekiel.
‘Balls, I will!’ Merity replied. She tried to hoist Fazekiel up, but the woman had blacked out and become a deadweight.
‘Come fething on!’ Merity snarled.
‘I came looking for you,’ said a voice behind her.
Merity looked around in surprise.
It was Dalin.
‘Oh, thank Throne,’ she said. ‘Please help me, quickly. We don’t have much time.’
‘Papa’s dead,’ Dalin said.
Merity laid Fazekiel back down gently and rose to face Dalin. His face was blank with shock. He appeared to be bleeding. She couldn’t tell where he had been wounded, but his hands were dripping with blood. Drips spotted the floor around his feet.
‘Oh, Dal,’ she said. ‘Gol? He’s dead?’
‘Papa’s gone,’ he said.
‘We have to go, Dalin,’ she said, stepping towards him.
‘There’s nowhere to go,’ he said. ‘I don’t understand. I don’t understand any part of this. It’s all just chaos in my head.’
‘I think you’re in shock, Dalin,’ she said. ‘You’ve been through too much. If Gol is… and Yoncy…’
‘She was my sister,’ said Dalin.
‘I know. You believed that for so long. We all–’
‘She was my sister,’ he repeated.
‘Let’s go, all right? Dalin? Let’s go. You’re not feeling yourself.’
‘I’m not myself,’ he said.
‘Of course you aren’t–’
‘I came to find you,’ he said, ‘because I don’t understand anything. I don’t know any more. Except I know I trust you. I like you.’
‘I like you too,’ Merity said.
‘I think I might have been in love with you.’
‘Oh,’ she said. She smiled. ‘Might have been?’
He shrugged, expressionless.
‘I want to understand,’ he said. ‘And you know.’
‘Know what?’
‘You know what it’s like,’ he said. ‘To hide yourself. To hide your real self. Hide it inside and look like something else.’
‘That?’ she said. ‘Oh, that was just a game. It was childish, and I regret it.’
‘Childish,’ Dalin echoed. ‘Everything’s childish. Just games. Games that Papa makes us play.’
Merity turned to Fazekiel. Dalin grabbed her arm. His grip was strangely hard.
‘Ow,’ she said in surprise. ‘Let me go, Dalin.’
He didn’t.
‘That hurts. Please, let me go.’
He released his grip.
‘I don’t want to hurt you,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to hurt anyone. But Papa’s dead, and I miss his voice. He’d tell me what to do. He’d explain it all to me.’
‘Some things… they can’t be explained,’ Merity said. ‘Life is cruel and hard. It’s unfair. You just do what you can.’
He thought for a moment.
‘The difference,’ he said. ‘The difference between you and me. You knew what you were hiding. You did it on purpose. I never knew. I never knew at all. I never knew what I was hiding.’
‘I don’t understand, Dalin,’ she said.
‘Papa’s dead,’ he said. ‘He can’t explain it. I thought you could. But you can’t either.’
He raised his left hand. It was soaked in blood.
The sword sliced through him from behind. Dalin lurched, ripped almost in two. His face remained impassive. Gaunt hacked again, driving the sword of Hieronymo Sondar through the husk of Dalin’s body. He struck repeatedly and without mercy, until the Ghost was mangled on the floor.
Merity screamed. ‘Oh Throne! Stop! Stop! What the feth are you doing? What the feth are you doing?’
‘Get back,’ said Gaunt. ‘Get well back. He was vulnerable for a minute. He wanted to talk, so his defences were down.’
‘You killed him!’ she yelled. ‘You fething sliced him to ribbons–’
‘Look!’ Gaunt hissed.
She looked.
There was no blood, except the blood that stained Dalin’s hands. The deep cuts in his body revealed nothing but odd, dark strips, like thin metal leaves sheaved together. The ends of his fingers on both hands were split, as if they’d ruptured from within. Gleaming points, like the tips of scissor blades, protruded from the frayed skin.
His eyes were still open. A dull yellow light, like a pulse of neon, flickered inside his severed torso.
‘Oh, Throne,’ Merity whispered.
‘Inquisitor?’ Gaunt called. Laksheema stepped into the chapel, followed by Hark and Baskevyl. Baskevyl gently drew Merity aside. She gazed at Dalin in utter bafflement.
‘That was a risk, my lord,’ said Laksheema.
‘A chance,’ Gaunt replied. ‘His guard was down. Please, while he is still dormant. The self-repair is rapid and alarming.’
Laksheema nodded. She aimed her right hand, arm outstretched.
‘Look away,’ she said.
The disruptor made a high-pitched squeal. A steady, pencil-thin beam of blinding mauve energy lanced from her wrist and scored into Dalin Criid’s body.
She kept it burning for almost a minute, until there was nothing left but cinders and flakes of ash, like the soot in an empty grate.
Twenty-Two: The Victory
‘When were you hit?’ asked Mabbon.
‘Doesn’t matter,’ said Rawne.
‘You’re hit?’ asked Varl.
‘I said it doesn’t matter,’ said Rawne.
They struggled on through the rain, past the silent rockcrete blocks of the mill.
‘It does,’ said Mabbon. ‘You can barely walk. Let me see.’
‘Get off me,’ said Rawne.
‘Oh feth, Eli,’ said Varl. ‘Look at you. I don’t know how you’re standing. Why didn’t you say?’
‘Because it’s something that happened and there’s nothing we can do about it,’ said Rawne.
He looked at them. His face was pale. He had to lean on the wall just to stay upright.
‘You can’t even lift that gun,’ said Varl quietly.
‘I can if I need to.’
‘You know they can smell the blood,’ said Mabbon.
‘I do now,’ said Rawne.
‘Doesn’t matter,’ said Mabbon. ‘They’d have our scent anyway. Sweat, pheromones, fear. But blood is always strongest.’
‘We just need to keep moving and lay low,’ said Rawne. ‘That’s all. Oysten will come through. I know she will.’ He tried to straighten up, but he couldn’t.
‘And if we have to fight?’ asked Varl.
Rawne held out the lasrifle to Mabbon.
‘You take it,’ he said.
‘No,’ said Mabbon.
‘For feth’s sake!’ Rawne growled.
‘I won’t fight anymore, Rawne,’ said Mabbon. ‘I’ve fought for too many sides. Too many causes. None of them have made sense to me. So rather than make an oath to others, I made one to myself. I would fight no more. It’s the only pledge I think I can keep.’
‘Pardon me, pheguth,’ said Rawne. ‘You’re hardly one to give a lecture on principles. You fething traitor.’
Mabbon looked away.
‘But you fought for us,’ said Varl. ‘In the end, you came to us. Crossed the lines.’
‘Not to fight,’ said Mabbon. ‘Even if you had let me.’
‘You came to help us win,’ said Varl. ‘To help us stop the war. That’s the same thing!’
‘No, that was very different,’ said Mabbon.