“He couldn’t risk taking it out through the guard-house,” he said, turning back to pull another brick from the wall. “Not all at once. Only the tiniest bit at a time.”
Lizanne crouched at his side, peering into the hole he had created. Despite the Green it was hard to make out the contents of this hiding-place, then she saw a dim patch of light catch the coarse weave of sackcloth. “Darkanis’s silver ore,” she realised.
“Yes.” Makario grunted as he levered another brick from the wall. “Considerate of him to pile it all up in one place for us, wasn’t it?”
Lizanne reached out and grasped his hand. “We don’t have time.”
She could see Makario’s stricken, desperate face in the gloom. “Krista, there’s enough for both of us. Enough to bribe every magistrate in Corvus. I can have a new name, a new life . . .”
His voice trailed off into a whine as she dragged him to his feet, keeping hold of his arm and making her way back to the grate. “Please . . .”
“Shut up or I’ll leave you here,” she ordered, suddenly infuriated by his greed.
They found Tinkerer standing beside the opened grate, a foul odour rising from the ruined lock. “I don’t know how many constables will be waiting,” she said, moving through the portal, still dragging Makario along. “Most will have been drawn to the fighting, but there will be others who’ll have contrived to stay behind. Leave them to me . . .”
She fell silent and came to a halt as a new sound reached her ears. A deep, rushing sound that made the tunnel tremble from floor to ceiling.
“Run!” She turned and began shoving them both back along the passage. “They’ve flooded the tunnels! RUN!”
It took at most thirty frantic seconds to get clear of the tunnel, Lizanne exhausting her Green as she conveyed her two companions none-too-gently back through the first grate and onto the muddy river-bank. The water came rushing out a heart-beat later, a roaring torrent that sent the three of them sprawling into the mud. For a moment Lizanne entertained the grim notion that they might drown but then the torrent began to abate. She checked to ensure the others were still alive then began to pry herself loose from the mud, grunting with the effort.
“Don’t!”
Lizanne’s gaze snapped up to find Anatol standing atop the outflow pipe, eyes as hard as his voice. He held one of the cross-bows captured from the Scuttlers, the dull gleam of the bolt unwavering as he aimed it at her chest. Still imprisoned by the mud Lizanne could only lie still and watch as a bulky silhouette appeared on the bank behind Anatol.
“To think I was actually starting to like you,” Electress Atalina said.
? ? ?
An expertly placed punch slammed into the centre of Lizanne’s back, sending her face-first onto the hard floor of the basement. Air rushed from her lungs as something large and heavy pressed against her spine, pinning her in place. Lizanne bit down on a shout as the pressure increased, nostrils filling with a thick gust of cigarillo smoke as someone leaned low to whisper into her ear.
“Don’t mistake me,” the Electress said, speaking as if there had been no interval between their capture at the river and the short but punishing journey to the basement of the Miner’s Repose. The inn itself had been ruined by a cannon shell, but the basement apparently remained open for business. “I always knew I’d have to kill you, just not so soon, and long before you contrived to bring the whole city down around us. Still, that’s what sentiment gets you.”
“I—” Lizanne’s breath scattered grit across the floor as she fought to add her voice to the last vestiges of breath the Electress forced from her body, the words emerging in a garbled torrent, “I’m a Blood-blessed Ironship operative I can get you out . . .”
The pressure paused, then relaxed a little. “Ironship? You expect me to swallow that shit, dear?”
“It’s true,” Lizanne heard Makario say. “I watched her kill Darkanis.”
“Your word isn’t worth a rat’s turd to me just now,” the Electress told him. A brief pause for consideration then the pressure disappeared from Lizanne’s back, leaving her gasping on the floor.
“Get up,” the Electress commanded. “So much as twitch and Anatol will put a bolt through your skull.”
Lizanne rose to her feet, keeping her hands out from her sides, fingers splayed. The Electress stood a few feet away in a state of bloody dishevelment. Never particularly elegant she now appeared almost monstrous, her face covered in dust save for the patch of congealed blood stretching from hair to jaw-line. She held a large oak-wood cudgel in one meaty fist. Lizanne saw fragments of bone sticking to the gore covering its gnarled head.
“Constable skulls crack just like any other,” the Electress explained.
The basement roof had acquired a large hole and Lizanne could see Furies peering down at them, most bearing the minor scars and bleached features of those who have survived recent battle. She counted perhaps thirty in total, with one notable absence.
“Where’s Melina?” she asked.
“Lying in front of the Citadel with half her head blown off,” the Electress said. “Where the fuck d’you think?”
I’m sorry. Fearing Anatol’s reaction Lizanne left the words unsaid, even though she was surprised to find her regret genuine. She also saw it mirrored in the slight stiffening of Tinkerer’s posture; she had been the only friend he could claim in this place after all.
“The Learned Damned?” Lizanne asked, returning her gaze to the Electress.
“Holed up on the far end of Sifter’s Corner, what’s left of them. That bomb you had them hide in the ore made a right mess of the Citadel but left two of the cannon intact. They must’ve cut down a hundred or more trying to rush the breach. Then the whole garrison sallied out, shooting down everyone still standing. Your genius scheme has wrought a great deal of havoc, my dear. But I suppose that was the point. A nice big diversion to draw every constable in the gatehouse to the Citadel whilst you and Tinkerer sneak out through the tunnels.” Her gaze shifted to the slender artificer, narrowing in consideration. “What’s so special about him anyway?”
“He’s worth a lot to my employer,” Lizanne said. “Anyone assisting me in securing his safe passage from Scorazin will be handsomely compensated.”
“Which means I may have need of him.” The Electress’s fingers flexed on her cudgel, her wide mouth forming a smile. “But not you.”
“You need me to get you out.”