“If we recover the shipheart the abbess will pardon your crimes, Clera.” As Kettle spoke the shadows thickened around them, pressing the lantern’s light back towards its source.
“But you won’t recover it,” Clera said, hand straying towards her hip. “At best you’ll die. If you’re captured they’ll get my name from you, but it will be obvious enough who helped you even if you’re killed quickly.”
“Get me close to the shipheart.” Nona remembered the awful power of the thing, seen and felt through Hessa. “If I lay hands upon it nobody will stop me.”
Kettle frowned at that, almost spoke, but bit back the words. “We have to get it back. Any price is worth paying.”
Clera made to skip away but Kettle proved too fast, seizing her arm.
“Please, Clera.” Nona fixed her eyes on her friend’s face. When Nona had shared Kettle’s mind she’d felt the strength of the compulsion Zole used. Being twisted like that by Zole’s will had woken in Nona an understanding of how to better use her own touch of marjal empathy. “We need to do this.” Nona’s guilt at manipulating her friend stood in the shadow of their cause and the memory of betrayal in another cave years ago. She let the strength of her conviction flow through the cracks in Clera’s personality, cracks that she knew of old. Ambition, pride, and a need for challenge.
“I don’t know where the shipheart is . . .” Clera started to weaken. “And Yisht might be with it. I don’t want to meet her.”
“We need you, Clera,” Nona said. “Aren’t you tired of being a tool for these people? I want you back.”
Clera frowned. “Sherzal probably keeps it in her treasury.”
“And you know where that is?” Kettle asked.
Clera’s frown vanished. “Of course!”
* * *
? ? ?
HAVING GIVEN CLERA some semblance of conviction Nona found her own fading as they approached the palace. She couldn’t reach the Path again so quickly. It would be many hours before she would be able even to see it. How they could hope to penetrate Sherzal’s stronghold so deeply without being overwhelmed by her guards Nona had no idea. And without the shipheart there was no chance of saving the abbess.
“We’re close now,” Clera said. “There will be guards up ahead. They know me. You two they’ll put chains on.”
Nona frowned. She felt a little better, but hardly fighting fit. Pain and sickness had been replaced by tiredness, hunger, and a fierce thirst. Her ribs still troubled her but were perhaps only bruised rather than broken. Her nose stung where Lano Tacsis had cut her. That particular sting made her angry though and anger chased tiredness into the background. “How many? I don’t want to kill them unless I have to.”
What? Keot had held silent ever since the aftermath of Nona’s Path-walking but now he spoke up. Kill them! They’re the enemy!
“Normally four on duty with twenty more close at hand. They’re quality too, veterans. Sherzal doesn’t trust the Noi-Guin any more than she has to. There are sigils on the walls that they say can be used to collapse them if there’s an attack.”
“So we make our entry unseen,” Kettle said.
“Because with all the Noi-Guin in the whole world connected to her palace’s basements Sherzal won’t have defences against stealthy intrusion?” Clera rolled her eyes. “It can’t be done. I just brought you here to prove it.”
Kettle and Nona exchanged glances, their faces shadowed, just the edges caught in the glow of Clera’s lantern. They shared a nod. Even without a thread-bond Nona knew they both would have understood.
“We’ll just have to kill them all,” Nona said.
Yes! Keot flushed across her chest, rising along both collarbones. Yes!
Clera snorted. “You’d be lucky to take one down before they got you, Nona. And Kettle will be lucky to reach them at all.”
“Did the Noi-Guin not teach you all that shade-work can do, Clera?” Kettle closed a pale hand into a black fist, night running liquid from her fingers. “I may be wounded but my shadow can still rend.”
Clera shrugged. “Pray too, if you like. You’ll still both be dead before the reinforcements get there.”
Nona knew it to be true, and knew that Kettle shared the understanding. It didn’t matter. With the abbess and the shipheart both in reach, no sister, Grey or Red, would abandon them. The nun took Clera’s advice and bent her head to pray.
Nona resisted the urge to join Kettle’s devotions, instead looking around the bare tunnel for inspiration. “What we really need,” she said, “is a diversion.”
Whatever Clera had to say about that Nona never had the chance to find out. The echoing thunder that reached down the tunnel from the palace above took the words from both their mouths.
41
ABBESS GLASS
“YOU PROPOSE TO torture a confession from me? In my own house?” Sherzal’s neck burned red above the white froth of her collar. She looked furious rather than scared.
“There are serious charges against you, Sherzal.” Sister Agika aimed her dark-eyed regard at the woman, slowly warming to her new role. “Your employee stole an object of incalculable value, exploiting a position that she was only able to obtain at your insistence. Your implicit guarantee of her good conduct demands that you answer our questions. The same investigation would be carried out in any other case.”
“You had best vote upon it then. I have pressing matters to attend to.” Sherzal waved Agika on as if impatient. “A great many more guests are expected . . .”
“You’ve nothing to offer in your defence?” Agika raised a brow.
“No, and I don’t plead guilty either.” Sherzal leaned across her rail to look past the judges at Glass. “Nor special dispensation!”
Sherzal looked entirely too self-composed for Glass’s liking, though she suspected that the woman’s self-confidence was, like the colour of her eyes, a thing that could not be dimmed. Glass thought that Sherzal would wear that same look of utter confidence were she to topple from a cliff. She’d be staring down the rocks even as they rushed up to greet her.
“We will consider our verdict then.” Sister Agika pushed back her chair. “This court can find you guilty, innocent, or require that you be put to questioning.”
To either side of Agika Brothers Seldom and Dimeon rotated their chairs so that all three faced each other. They leaned in close, heads almost touching. Agika began to address her two fellow judges, leading to a swift exchange of heated whispers. Glass had some sympathy: she had put them in a difficult position. Either follow their obvious duty and risk the ire of the empire’s most powerful woman within her own walls, or ignore their duty and deal the Inquisition a crushing blow before the assembled leaders of the Sis whilst simultaneously losing the chance to recover one of the Church’s most treasured possessions. Even arguing over their decision was a loss of face and authority. Dimeon would most likely opt for “innocent” whatever evidence was presented to him but thankfully a majority was all that was required, and there was no way that Agika and Seldom would not require further investigation.
Glass watched and listened, catching only the occasional word but getting a good sense of the direction of the discussion. As expected, Agika and Seldom were incredulous at Dimeon’s refusal to agree to subjecting Sherzal to questioning and both sounded as if they were getting exasperated by their failure to persuade him otherwise.
Then something unexpected. Pauses from Seldom. Interjections where he seemed angry at Agika. And from her, disbelief.
A cold crawling sensation advanced up Glass’s spine. Could Seldom somehow have been bought off? He’d always seemed the perfect inquisitor. No family to pressure, an ascetic’s disdain for money . . . She’d staked her life and more on the man’s integrity. How could he—