“So that leaves you and me. If someone dies, maybe they can ask that the gap be closed. We could have it both ways. We’ve got rid of the disir. Now we have a chance to close the Pass behind us.”
Mercy took a deep breath. Then she nodded. “I’m vowed to the Library. I swore I’d give anything to protect it, including my life. This counts as that. I’ll do it.”
At first, she thought that Shadow was going to protest, but then a change came over the woman’s face, rendering it unreadable. She said, “If that’s your choice.”
“I’m sure,” Mercy said, thinking, Fuck. All the things that she couldn’t now be able to do… but if they let the swarm through, she probably would have died anyway. “Let’s get it over with. See if it works, for a start.”
She ducked out from under the veil and began to walk across the ledge. The hot stone baked up beneath the soles of her feet and the air scorched her lungs. She opened her mouth to say, Take me…
… and the world disappeared beneath an enveloping blue. For a second, she thought that this was death: an azure drowning, sky fall. Then she realised that Shadow had thrown the veil over her head.
“No!” Mercy cried. She fought the veil, pushing back the cascading folds, but it tripped her and she fell, bruising her palms against the hot rock. The fall tore the veil from her face and she saw Shadow walk forward towards the fiery sword.
“If I die,” Shadow said, “will you let my friends through and close the Pass?”
The angel looked at her, his head on one side.
“If I do that, it’s not just your life,” he said. “It’s your soul. You’ll have to stay here, until someone else comes along. You’ll have to become the gap.”
“Shadow,” Mercy whispered. A favourite debate among Librarians involved the nature of the ultimate story. Is it the person who triumphs over insurmountable odds? Is it the child who seeks and finds their own destiny? Watching Shadow now, Mercy thought she knew the answer: the greatest story involves willing sacrifice, the person who gives up their life for others. Christ. Ishtar. Aslan.
Shadow began walking forwards and did not stop. Mercy saw the fiery sword come down and bathe her in light. She was a silhouette, and then she was gone. Around Mercy’s kneeling form, the blue veil shimmered and disappeared.
“Get in the sleigh!” Mareritt cried. The demon hauled Mercy up and bundled her over the lip of the vehicle. She tumbled down among the heads, blinking as the brightness of the light that had encompassed Shadow started to fade.
The angel stepped aside. Mercy looked up as they sped past his standing form and he was now a statue, changed to silent stone like the bird-faced spirit that had once stood vigil above the Library. Mareritt cracked the whip. The sleigh shot over the edge of the column into the Pass. Mercy struggled to her feet and looked back over the rear of the sleigh. Behind them, the two basalt columns were grinding together. The Pass was closing.
“Come closer, Deed,” the wolf sang out and Deed found he had little choice. His dragging feet took him unwillingly forwards, a zombie shuffle through the snow. “Not too successful, were we?”
“No,” Deed croaked.
“I tell you what,” the wolf said, in Loki’s voice. The long lupine muzzle twisted around the human words. “I’ll give you a sporting chance. After all, there were a few unforeseen spanners in the works, weren’t there? So this is what I’ll do. If you unchain me, we’ll see if you can outrun me. After all, I’ve been chained up for a very long time. Haven’t had the exercise I should. Bit stiff.”
“Very well,” Deed managed to say. If he declined, the god would simply order the wolves to kill him where he stood.
“I’ll even take the wolves away. How about that?”
Next moment, both the animals were whisked up into the air. Deed blinked. The wolves were hanging on the whalebone arch, sheaves of bloody meat and fur.
“Didn’t like them anyway. Now. Unchain me.”
The god pointed to a nearby boulder. Set into it, in a runnel in the rock, was a rusty iron key.
“It didn’t look like that originally, of course. Changed with time.”
Deed tugged at the key. Even disir talons couldn’t make much impact on the imprisoning stone.
“A little joke on the part of my captors, putting the key so nearby. But no one’s been able to get it out. You see, you need magic for that.”
Gritting his teeth, Deed infused the rock with power. It was hard, harder than any natural stone but at last, when he was almost drained, the rock burst apart and the key fell to the ground.
“Oh, well done, Abbot General.”
Deed took the key across to where the old god stood. He moved cautiously; there were eyes in the shadows, yellow and shining. If he just made a run for it, there were more wolves waiting.
He fitted the key into the lock that secured Loki’s chain.
“I’ll count to ten.” The old god closed malevolent eyes. “One… ”
But Deed was running, disir speed, leaping through the grove. He brushed aside ancient rotting corpses, thrust away skeins of necklaced bones. And then he was on the road itself, the stone hard beneath his pounding feet.
He made it as far as the crossroads before the god pounced. His last thought was that this was at least appropriate: crossroads had always been a place of sacrifice. Loki’s long talons closed around his throat and ripped it out, releasing a gush of blood and magic, steaming into the winter air. Deed’s spirit, sinking down into the earth, listened to the god’s laughter and saw no more.
Fifty-Three
The Shah crouched on slippered heels, looking inside the cage. This one was not made of meteorite iron, but of steeclass="underline" a substance unknown to its occupant.
“Well, well,” the Shah said. “So this is who’s been causing all the havoc. I’m rather glad we’ve finally tracked you down.”
The disir hissed at him. She clasped the bars with the talons of her remaining hand and spat.
“Now that really won’t do,” the Shah said, admonishingly as if to a naughty toddler. “You won’t be getting out of here any time soon, so you may as well behave.” He turned to the milk-eyed girl who stood behind him. “What do you see, Soraya?”
The milky eyes began to fill with light. It overspilled the sockets and ran down her face in dribbles of illumination. She opened her mouth and breathed it out in a glowing stream.
“I see a cold place. Death. Much death. I see the woman I followed into the Khaureg and she is triumphant.”
“Is she?” the Shah said, mildly displeased. “Oh, dear. That probably means she’s lost my ifrit.” He wondered whether Shadow would be coming back to the Eastern Quarter. He hoped so. An enterprising young woman. He had plans for her.
Fifty-Four
The sleigh was racing over a calm sea, into twilight green. Mercy could see the prickle of stars above the horizon and they were familiar: the constellation known as the Wain. When she looked back into the sleigh, the heads had drawn to the sides and Shadow’s body lay there, bareheaded and barefaced. Her arms were crossed over her breast. She would not have liked the heads to see her naked face and Mercy stripped off her coat and stepped forwards to cover her. She was just about to lay the coat over Shadow’s face when the corpse’s eyes snapped open.
“Shadow?”
“Oh!” Shadow said. “There’s no one here.”
“Shadow, you’re alive! I’m here, and Gremory and Mareritt and Perra.”
“No.” Shadow sat up and the veil was back, billowing about her, untorn. She tugged it into place. “The spirit that was in me. He’s gone.”
“Where has he gone?” Gremory asked, sharply.