The one on Eyul’s right charged him, hachirah held high. The other, lame, pulled himself forward with some effort. Foolish.
Perhaps the person guiding them had grown impatient. Eyul rolled below the slice the first made through the air and got to his feet so close that he could smell the Carrier’s stale breath. His head struck the man’s chin as he rose to his feet. Teeth snapped together, and part of the Carrier’s tongue fell clear. Knife scraped bone as Eyul stabbed him in the heart.
The last Carrier wrapped an arm around Eyul’s neck, lost his balance and pulled them both to the floor. Eyul held the Knife firmly as he fell. The twisted metal of the hilt was easy to grip, despite the blood. He lay on top, the Carrier cutting off his breath from behind.
Eyul twisted in the Carrier’s grip, found the man’s ribs and stabbed down. Immediately he could breathe again. He rolled over to the last, the one with the broken ribs, and slit his throat.
Only then did he notice that the Knife had been silent. He looked over at the stairs and found Govnan looking down at him. “You didn’t use your fire,” he said, neither accusation nor question.
Govnan smiled. “Prince Sarmin separated me from Ashanagur.”
The mad prince? Eyul stood and sheathed his Knife, surprise taking his words.
Govnan descended the last few steps. “Ashanagur was always able to sense flesh,” he said, “and though he is gone, it appears he has left that echo of himself with me.” He looked out, beyond the archway. “There are more coming.”
“Let’s get to the ways.” Eyul moved to the secret door. He twisted an arrow shaft in the hole to release the catch and together they entered the darkness, tracing their way from memory.
“They are all around,” said Govnan in a low voice, “closing in. They think I have the power to get in their way.”
“You don’t?” Eyul’s thoughts turned to Tahal in the church, to Amalya in her tent. Had all hope been lost? Had it all been for nothing? That didn’t feel right-it couldn’t be right.
“I don’t.” Eyul felt the man’s robes brush against his arm and caught the scents of char and sulphur. “But Prince Sarmin does. His magic is older than anything the Tower can access.”
So, Tuvaini, you missed something in all your scheming. The mad prince, Tuvaini had called him; useless. He had been wrong. The spark in the line of emperors that had begun with Uthman the Conqueror lived on in his descendants. Would the power that vanquished a continent be enough to defeat the pattern?
Eyul tried to conjure an image of the prince. He remembered Sarmin as a young man, quiet and bookish. Tuvaini had described him very differently.
“The magic in your Knife is similar to his, incorporated in metal.” Govnan touched the hilt of the Knife and Eyul jerked away. Another man’s hand on the Knife felt like a violation. Could Govnan hear the dead princes? He thought about them and their brother Sarmin.
Govnan led the way up thin, crumbling stairs. “What were you doing there, at the bottom of the burned-out tower?” he asked.
Eyul tested each step before giving it his full weight. “I was going to kill you.”
“But you saved me instead.” Govnan reached the landing and turned to face him, the darkness of the ways concealing his expression. “You did kill Amalya, though?”
“Not by choice.” Eyul felt momentarily dizzy and pressed a hand against his tunic, sticky with blood.
Nothing more was said as they crossed bridges and ascended more stairs; Eyul heard only Govnan’s laboured breathing ahead of him and the distant sound of boots. He moved with care. He’d never been to the Tower through the ways and he was unfamiliar with the treacherous twists and narrow bridges in his path. For the first time the smell of rot that rose from the chasm filled him with nausea.
“They can’t enter the Tower, can they?” That made sense to Eyuclass="underline" in all the years of the pattern-curse, not one mage had been marked or killed by a Carrier-not until Amalya left the Tower’s protections.
“No. Not yet.”
They traversed the blackness in silence. At last the high mage stopped and said, “This is the last stair. Beyond it is one more bridge, then the door to the Tower.”
Eyul heard the sound of metal touching metal and caught the stink of lamp-oil. There was a sizzle, then the old man’s face was lit in shades of red. In the play of flame and shadow, Eyul remembered Metrishet and felt lightheaded.
Govnan replaced the lamp on the wall. “There are Carriers ahead and behind.”
“I will clear your way,” Eyul said, steadying himself on his feet.
“They think I am the one who works the old magics.” Govnan met Eyul’s eyes, and Eyul understood what was left unspoken: They don’t know Prince Sarmin is alive.
Eyul would keep the secret. He would defend Govnan as if everything depended upon it, as if no one else mattered. He fingered the hilt of his Knife and spoke silently to the young brothers. “I could use your help.”
The Knife was silent a moment, and then Eyul heard Asham say, “We will help. It is almost the end.”
“The end of what?”
“The end of us.”
In the low light Eyul could see a crowd of Carriers, eight of them, standing at the foot of the bridge. Four held hachirahs. Two had daggers, and the others clutched makeshift weapons: a lamp-pole, a sack filled with something heavy-rocks, perhaps. Eyul felt his own blood sticky against his stomach.
Make it good, Knife-Sworn.
Eyul ran at them like a bull, and the first Carriers fell into the dark.
“Good,” said Asham.
That’s two. Eyul steadied on his feet and gripped his Knife.
Govnan had left for the Tower long before, leaving a burlap bag full of bread, dried meat, and olives. It was Sarmin’s first food since Ink and Paper stopped coming, but he was not hungry. The screaming women in the courtyard had brought back the memory of little Kashim, both his cries and the terrible silence that followed. They had brought back his loss and his pain and his futile anger. And just as on that terrible night so many years ago, Eyul the assassin had done the killing. Govnan had called it a mercy, but Sarmin would not hear it. He knew the truth. It is always wrong.
He leaned back against the pillows and felt the blood sinking into the courtyard tiles. And there was more: somewhere below him a battle had been fought, and the blood of many pooled into one. Govnan? He reached out with his mind, tried to guess who had died, but he could not.
Everywhere blood fell he gathered it to him. There was too much, far too much, and yet not enough to make his own design, to write his own will into blood and pictures and oppose the Master.
An anticipatory silence had fallen over the Carriers. The Master’s hand drew their threads taut. He altered his pattern, tightening and twisting the threads until Sarmin felt the breath rush out of him. The spaces and ways he travelled stretched and narrowed; there was nowhere to hide. Sarmin lay trapped, a fish in the Master’s net-unless and until he could step out of it and into his own design.
He thought he would lose this game. He had seen the Master’s work. He had copied it, passed through it, admired its beauty. But now, when he was so close, and the need so strong, he doubted that he could create such a masterpiece of his own. He needed to learn more about the writing of a red pattern, a blood pattern. Grada’s desert journey would help, if enough time remained. Perhaps in that Mogyrk church Grada would find the key.
The pattern writhed around its axis, the centre, where the Master sat spinning his web. They were approaching the endgame. The Master’s power was overwhelming; his plan was without fault. Except that he hadn’t seen Sarmin. And the emperor’s Knife remained unbroken. There was hope. A hidden piece could spoil the Push.