Everyone but you can see it.
The augur sighed and retreated. After a moment, Warden beckoned two more voyants from the line.
First was Felix Coombs, one of the other Bone Season survivors. He stepped into the ring and filled a bowl with water for hydromancy. His opponent was Róisín Jacob, a vile augur, whose plaited hair was dark with sweat. Since I had ordered the release of the vile augurs from the Jacob’s Island slum, she had given herself, heart and soul, to the cause, training for hours every day. Warden stood with his arms folded.
‘Felix,’ he said, making him start – he was still jumpy around Rephaim, ‘you are slouching. I assure you, a Vigile will still see you.’
Felix squared up to Róisín, who was a head taller than him.
‘Róisín, strike true,’ Warden said, ‘but give him a chance to attempt the technique.’
‘A small chance,’ Róisín agreed.
Clearing his throat, Felix beckoned several spirits and spooled them. Warden paced around the ring.
‘Turn your backs.’ They did. ‘Now, take three steps away from one another.’ They did. ‘Good.’
He always made combat a duel, a dance, an art form. A train of observers wound around the outside of the ring. As Felix and Róisín waited for their cue, the audience called encouragements.
‘Three,’ Warden said, ‘two, one.’
Felix sliced his arm downward. The spirits wheeled after it in a smooth arc and dived into the bowl of water, making its surface tremble and the ?ther strain. I raised my eyebrows. As the spirits rose again, carrying a chain of sparkling droplets with them, Róisín put a sudden end to the grace period and sprang towards Felix. She knocked his arm upward with her fist and threw him against the ropes before her fingers bit into his shoulder. His body gave a violent jolt, causing the spirits to panic and flee. Water sprayed everywhere as he slid into a heap on the floor.
‘Yield, I yield,’ he yelled, to gales of laughter. ‘That hurt, Róisín! What did you do?’
‘She used her gift against you,’ Warden said. ‘Róisín is a talented osteomancer. Your bones responded to her touch.’
Felix recoiled. ‘My bones?’
‘Correct. They may be enveloped in flesh, but they will always answer an osteomancer’s call.’
Applause smattered for Róisín’s victory. I put my coffee down and joined in. With a little fine-tuning, Warden had transformed her osteomancy into an active gift – something she could use to defend herself. Even what Felix had done was nothing like the hydromancy I had seen before.
‘Told you we should never have released them,’ a whisperer hissed. Trenary, I thought his name was. ‘Vile augurs don’t belong here.’
‘Enough.’ Warden kept pacing around the ring. ‘The Underqueen has forbidden that sort of talk.’
Several people started. Rephaim, as it turned out, had keen hearing. Anyone else would have quailed at his tone, but the whisperer recovered quickly. ‘I don’t have to do what you say, Rephaite,’ he sneered. Felix swallowed and glanced at Warden. ‘I’ll take my orders from the Underqueen, if she ever shows up.’
‘Then listen to this, Trenary,’ I called. Heads turned in my direction. ‘We don’t hold with that attitude any longer. If you can’t let go of it, take it elsewhere. Outside, perhaps, where the snow is.’
There was a pause before Trenary stormed out of the hall, leaving Róisín to grind her teeth.
‘Warden, what can you teach me?’ Jos Biwott piped up, snapping the tension. ‘All I can do is sing.’
‘That is no small gift. All of you have the potential to use your clairvoyance against Scion, but my time is short today.’ Groans of disappointment rang through the hall. ‘I will return next week. Until then, keep practising.’
I watched them disband. On the other side of the hall, Warden reached for his coat.
It had been weeks since we had spoken more than a few stiff words to one another. I couldn’t put this off any longer. Trying to shake off my apprehension, I crossed the hall to stand beside him.
‘Paige.’
His voice had the same effect on me as wine. The heaving, clumsy weight behind my ribs was still.
‘Warden,’ I said. ‘It’s been a while.’
‘Indeed.’
I tried to appear as if I was observing the knife range, but I couldn’t concentrate. I was too aware of the eyes on us, of those who were regarding the Underqueen and their Rephaite instructor with open curiosity.
‘That was very impressive,’ I said frankly. ‘How did you teach Felix to use hydromancy that way?’
‘We call it fusion. An advanced form of spirit combat for certain types of soothsayers and augurs. You saw the Wicked Lady use it during the scrimmage.’ He watched as a medium allowed herself to be possessed. ‘Some voyants can learn to command certain spirits to carry their numen. The art can be used to manipulate fire, water, and smoke.’
This could give us a real advantage. Before the Ranthen had come along, soothsayers and augurs could only really use spooling against an opponent; it was part of why Jaxon thought them so weak.
‘That one has been speaking against the vile augurs.’ Warden nodded in the direction Trenary had left. ‘And, less openly, speaking in favour of Jaxon as the rightful leader of the Mime Order. Apparently he often quotes the more incendiary passages from On the Merits of Unnaturalness.’
‘I’ll ask Leon to keep an eye on him. We can’t have anything leaked to Scion.’
‘Very well.’
There was a brief, uncomfortable silence. I closed my eyes for a moment.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘I have business to attend to. Excuse me.’
I’d already taken a few steps towards the door when he said, ‘Did I do something to insult you, Paige?’
I stopped. ‘No. I’ve just been . . . preoccupied.’
My tone was too defensive. It was clear to both of us that something was wrong.
‘Of course.’ When I was silent, he said, softer, ‘The company you keep is yours to decide. But you may always speak to me, if you ever desire counsel. Or someone to listen.’
Suddenly I was aware of the hard line of his jaw, the caged flame in his eyes, the warmth I could feel from where I was standing. I was also aware of the tension in my back. The flutter in my stomach.
I knew why it was there. What was keeping me from opening up to him. It wasn’t anything he’d done. He had accepted me as the woman who had spent years working for Jaxon Hall without realising who and what he was. Unlike the other Ranthen, he had treated me no differently. He had excused my ignorance.
It was the warning about him that Jaxon had given me. Words that still played on my mind. And I couldn’t tell him so; I couldn’t admit to him that Jaxon Hall, a serial liar, had poisoned my view of him. That Jaxon Hall had made me doubt that he was anything but a vessel for Terebell’s will.