They had crossed into another world, one that was cold and dank and slimy underfoot, a vast oval cellar where mist hung in the stagnant air. It looked like the inside of a mouldy old skull and the stink of poisoned, decaying rats made Tali gag.
‘Here you are.’ Tinyhead flopped out his tongue. ‘All your troubles are over, Pale.’
Mama whirled, reaching up to him, but he slammed the door in her face. She let out a whimper.
‘You’re hurting my hand, Mama,’ said Tali.
Her mama crouched in front of Tali, holding her so tightly that she could hardly breathe. Mama’s blue eyes were wet, and Tali hated to see her so sad.
‘We’re betrayed, little one. We’re never going home.’
‘Why not?’ said Tali, looking around in confusion. Why had Tinyhead shut them in? Why hadn’t she told Mama her worries? Was this her fault?
A familiar face carved into the stone high on the wall made her shiver. It was Lyf, the enemy’s last and wickedest king, who had died long ago. She had often seen the tattooed Cythonians kneeling before his image.
To her left, a series of dusty stone bins ran along the wall, partly concealed by tiers of barrels. On the right, hundreds of wooden crates were stacked nearly to the ceiling. In the centre, twenty yards away, stood a stained black bench. The floor was damp and littered with pieces of fallen stone.
Something rustled, far across the cellar. Mama looked around frantically. ‘Over here,’ she said, hauling Tali to the crates. ‘Squeeze into the middle where you can’t be seen.’
Tali clung to her. ‘I don’t like this place, Mama.’
‘Me either. And yet, I feel close to our ancestors here. In, hurry.’
Tali was a good little girl, so she bit her lip and edged into one of the gaps between the rotting crates. The floor was so slimy that her bare feet kept slipping.
‘Don’t cry. I know how brave you are.’ Her mama kissed her brow. ‘Tali,’ she choked, ‘if I don’t come back, Little Nan will give you your papa’s letter when you come of age.’
‘Mama?’ Why would she say such a thing? Of course she would come back.
‘Shh!’ Mama took Tali’s hands in her own and drew a ragged breath. ‘Our family has a terrible enemy — ’
The dead rat smell thickened and grew fouler. ‘Who, Mama?’
‘I don’t know. He’s never seen, never heard, but he flutters in my nightmares like a foul wrythen — ’
‘You’re scaring me, Mama!’
‘When you’re older, you’ve got to find your gift and master it. It’s the only way to beat him.’
Tali shivered. In Cython, magery was forbidden. Magery meant death. Children were beaten just for whispering the word.
At a hollow click from the far side of the cellar, Mama jumped.
‘But Mama,’ said Tali, lowering her voice, ‘if our masters catch any slave using …magery, they kill them.’
‘Even innocent little children,’ said Mama, hugging her desperately. ‘You must be very careful.’
Tali’s voice rose. ‘Then how am I supposed to find my magery?’
Mama clapped a hand over Tali’s mouth. ‘I don’t know, child. Don’t tell anyone about your gift. Trust no one.’
Tali pulled away. ‘Is Tinyhead the enemy?’ She took hold of a splintered length of wood, wanting to jam it through his disgusting tongue.
‘Shh! You know what happens when you get angry.’
‘I’m already angry, and I’m going — ’
‘Forget him. He’s nothing.’
‘When I find my gift, his head will be nothing. I’ll blast it right off.’
‘Tali, never say such things! You must lower your eyes and say, “Yes, Master.”’
‘I won’t!’ Tali said furiously. ‘I hate our masters and one day I’m going to escape.’
‘Yes, one day,’ said Mama, dully. ‘But for now, promise you’ll be a good little slave.’
‘I can’t.’
Mama stroked Tali’s golden hair. ‘You may think whatever fierce thoughts you like, little one, for one day you will be the noble Lady Tali vi Torgrist, but in Cython you must always act the obedient slave.’
It frightened Tali to hear her mama say such things. ‘All right,’ she muttered. She had a bad temper, and knew it, but for Mama’s sake she would try. ‘I promise.’
Her mother looked dubious. ‘I’ll put a little glamour on you. It’ll hide you, as long as they don’t look directly at you. Hold still.’
She put her hands on Tali’s cheeks, whispered a word Tali could not make out, then drew her hands down Tali’s sides, all the way to her feet. Tali’s skin tingled and when she looked down, her body had blurred into the shadows. Magery! She ached for it. Feared it, too.
Something made an ugly scraping sound, closer this time, and her scalp felt as though grubs were creeping across it.
‘Stay here,’ Mama said softly. ‘Don’t look.’
‘Mama, what was that noise?’
‘I don’t know.’ Mama’s teeth chattered. ‘But whatever happens, even if your gift comes, don’t use it here.’
Mama darted away, her pale blonde hair flying. Her bare feet skidded on the flagstones as she passed an ugly tapestry of three jackals fighting over the guts of a nobleman, recovered, then zigzagged between the barrels and the stone bins. She was a beautiful little bird, leading a snake away from her nest.
But as she passed between a pair of stone raptors with flesh-tearing beaks, two masked figures came after her. Tali clutched at a crate, her fingers sinking into the powdery wood.
‘Mama, look out!’ she whispered, for the masks had fanged teeth and awful, angry eyes. ‘Don’t let them catch you.’
Then Mama slipped and twisted her ankle, and the moment they caught her Tali knew they were going to do something terrible.
‘No!’ she whimpered. ‘Mama, get away!’
The big man caught Mama’s arms and held her while his accomplice, a bony woman, punched her in the mouth.
‘Treacherous Pale scum!’ the woman hissed.
Mama sagged, staring at them like a mouse trapped by two cats, and Tali’s front teeth began to throb. Stop it, stop it! Mama, use your gift on them.
They dragged her to the black bench and heaved her onto it. The woman forced an oily green lump into Mama’s mouth, then passed a stubby crystal back and forth over her head until the end glowed blue, scattering brilliant rays across the cellar. Mama moaned and her toes curled.
As the blue crystal glowed more brightly, pain stabbed around the whorled scar on Tali’s left shoulder, her slave mark, and cold spread through her like venom. She shuddered and remembered to cover her eyes.
Born to slavery in underground Cython, she had learned life’s lesson in her stone cradle — obey, or suffer. But the people who held her mama weren’t tattooed like Cythonians, and they were too big to be Pale slaves. Who were they?
Something made an ugly grinding sound. Mama shrieked.
‘Careful,’ the man cried. ‘He won’t pay if — ’
‘It’s stuck,’ said the woman, and the grinding grew louder.
What were they doing to Mama?
‘It’s got to be taken while she’s alive,’ said the man.
‘Do you think I don’t know that?’
Tali peeped between her fingers and nearly screamed. Mama’s arms and legs were thrashing, green foam was oozing from her nose and a strand of hair dripped blood. Mama! Tali could not breathe; for a moment she could hardly see.
‘I can’t hold her.’ The man’s voice was hoarse, his eyes darting.
‘Nor me if you don’t!’
The woman was pressing a metal rod against the top of Mama’s head, twisting and shoving as if trying to force it in. Through the mouth of the mask her grey teeth were bared. She was grunting and her hands were red.