‘All right.’ He set down his cup. ‘Rustleaf tea, Mistress.’
‘I’d drown.’
‘Not inhaled. Drunk, in civil fashion.’
‘You’re still here, dear servant, and I don’t like that at all.’
He rose. ‘On my way, O enwreathed one.’
She had managed to push the corpse of Tanal Yathvanar to one side, and it now lay beside her as if cuddled in sleep, the bloated, blotched face next to her own.
There would be no-one coming for her. This room was forbidden to all but Tanal Yathvanar, and unless some disaster struck this compound in the next day or two, leading Karos Invictad to demand Tanal’s presence and so seek him out, Janath knew it would be too late for her.
Chained to the bed, legs spread wide, fluids leaking from her. She stared up at the ceiling, strangely comforted by the body lying at her side. Its stillness, the coolness of the skin, the flaccid lack of resistance from the flesh. She could feel the shrivelled thing that was his penis pressing against her right thigh. And the beast within her was pleased.
She needed water. She needed that above all else. A mouthful would be enough, would give her the strength to once again begin tugging at the chains, dragging the links against the wood, dreaming of the entire frame splintering beneath her-but it would take a strong man to do that, she knew, strong and healthy. Her dream was nothing more than that, but she held on to it as her sole amusement that would, she hoped, follow her into death. Yes, right up until the last moment.
It would be enough.
Tanal Yathvanar, her tormentor, was dead. But that would be no escape from her. She meant to resume her pursuit, her soul-sprung free of this flesh-demonic in its hunger, in the cruelty it wanted to inflict on whatever whimpering, cowering thing was left of Tanal Yathvanar.
A mouthful of water. That would be so sweet.
She could spit it into the staring face beside her.
Coins to the belligerent multitude brought a larger, more belligerent multitude. And, at last, trepidation awoke in Karos Invictad, the Invigilator of the Patriotists. He sent servants down into the hiddenmost crypts below, to drag up chest after chest. In the compound his agents were exhausted, now simply flinging handfuls of coins over the walls since the small sacks were long gone. And a pressure was building against those walls that, it now seemed, no amount of silver and gold could relieve.
He sat in his office, trying to comprehend that glaring truth. Of course, he told himself, there were simply too many in the mob. Not enough coins was the problem. They’d fought like jackals over the sacks, had they not?
He had done and was doing what the Emperor should have done. Emptied the treasury and buried the people in riches. That would have purchased peace, yes. An end to the riots. Everyone returning to their homes, businesses opening once more, food on the stalls and whores beckoning from windows and plenty of ale and wine to flow down throats-all the pleasures that purchased apathy and obedience. Yes, festivals and games and Drownings and that would have solved all of this. Along with a few quiet arrests and assassinations.
But he was running out of money. His money. Hard-won, a hoard amassed solely by his own genius. And they were taking it all.
Well, he would start all over again. Stealing it back from the pathetic bastards. Easy enough for one such as Karos Invictad.
Tanal Yathvanar had disappeared, likely hiding with his prisoner, and he could rot in her arms for all that the Invigilator cared. Oh, the man schemed to overthrow him, Karos knew. Pathetic, simplistic schemes. But they would come to naught, because the next time Karos saw the man, he would kill him. A knife through the eye. Quick, precise, most satisfying.
He could hear the shouts for Tehol Beddict, somewhat less fierce now-and that was, oddly enough, vaguely disturbing. Did they no longer want to tear him to pieces? Was he indeed hearing cries for the man’s release?
Desperate knocking on his office door.
‘Enter.’
An agent appeared, his face white. ‘Sir, the main block-’
‘Are we breached?’
‘No-’
‘Then go away-wait, check on Tehol Beddict. Make sure he’s regained consciousness. I want him able to walk when we march to the Drownings.’
The man stared at him for a long moment, then he said, ‘Yes sir.’
‘Is that all?’
‘No, the main block-’ He gestured out into the corridor.
‘What is it, you damned fool?’
‘It’s filling with rats, sir!’
Rats?
‘They’re coming from over the walls-we throw coins and rats come back. Thousands!’
‘That guild no longer exists!’
The shriek echoed like a woman’s scream.
The agent blinked, and all at once his tone changed, steadied. ‘The mob, sir, they’re calling for Tehol Beddict’s release-can you not hear it? They’re calling him a hero, a revolutionary-’
Karos Invictad slammed his sceptre down on his desk and rose. ‘Is this what my gold paid for?’
Feather Witch sensed the rebirth of Brys Beddict. She stopped plucking at the strips of skin hanging from her toes, drawing a deep breath as she felt him rushing closer, ever closer. So fast!
Crooning under her breath, she closed her eyes and conjured in her mind that severed finger. That fool the Errant had a lot to learn, still. About his formidable High Priestess. The finger still belonged to her, still held drops of her blood from when she had pushed it up inside her. Month after month, like a waterlogged stick in a stream, soaking her up.
Brys Beddict belonged to her, and she would use him well.
The death that was a non-death, for Rhulad Sengar, the insane Emperor. The murder of Hannan Mosag. And the Chancellor. And everyone else she didn’t like.
And then… the handsome young man kneeling before her as she sat on her raised temple throne-in the new temple that would be built, sanctified to the Errant-kneeling, yes, while she spread her legs and invited him in. To kiss the place where his finger had been. To drive his tongue deep.
The future was so very bright, so very-
Feather Witch’s eyes snapped open. Disbelieving.
As she felt Brys Beddict being pulled away, pulled out of her grasp. By some other force.
Pulled away!
She screamed, lurching forward on the dais, hands plunging into the floodwater-as if to reach down into the current and grasp hold of him once, more-but it was deeper than she’d remembered. Unbalanced, she plunged face-first into the water. Involuntarily drew in a lungful of the cold, biting fluid.
Eyes staring into the darkness, as she thrashed about, her lungs contracting again and again, new lungfuls of water, one after another.
Deep-where was up?
A knee scraped the stone floor and she sought to bring her legs under her, but they were numb, heavy as logs-they would not work. One hand then, onto the floor, pushing upward-but not high enough to break the surface. The other hand, then, trying to guide her knees together-but one would drift out as soon as she left it seeking the other.
The darkness outside her eyes flooded in. Into her mind.
And, with blessed relief, she ceased struggling.
She would dream now. She could feel the sweet lure of that dream-almost within reach-and all the pain in her chest was gone-she could breathe this, she could. In and out, in and out, and then she no longer had to do even that. She could grow still, sinking down onto the slimy floor.
Darkness in and out, the dream drifting closer, almost within reach.
Almost…
The Errant stood in the waist-deep water, his hand on her back. He waited, even though her struggles had ceased. Sometimes, it was true, a nudge was not enough.
The malformed, twisted thing that was Hannan Mosag crawled up the last street before the narrow, crooked alley that led to Settle Lake. Roving bands had come upon the wretched Tiste Edur in the darkness before dawn and had given him wide berth, chased away by his laughter.
Soon, everything would return to him. All of his power, purest Kurald Emurlahn, and he would heal this mangled body, heal the scars of his mind. With the demon-god freed of the ice and bound to his will once more, who could challenge him?