Grey Sister Read online

  “But none with such white and even smiles.” Regol made a half-bow while slipping to the side to pass her, a fighter’s move, and left her in his wake.

  Terra Mensis. Glass knew the family, though the girl had been eleven the last time she laid eyes upon her. Glass had hoped for the child’s sake that she would grow into her nose.

  “Abbess Glass?” A large figure loomed out of the crowd and Glass turned to find herself facing a great lord robed in imperial red with the snow-lion trim that only the head of a Sis household might wear before the emperor.

  “Lord Jotsis.” Glass inclined her head. She should have expected the Mensis to be near the Jotsis in such a gathering. Carvon Jotsis she knew of old. A good man, honest, bold, lacking in the subtleties his forebears possessed. Unfortunately it was those subtleties which court life required if a house was to flourish.

  “It pains me to see you in such circumstances, abbess.” Carvon bowed his leonine head. Brother Pelter hovered in the background, the irritation on his face not quite brave enough to escape as words of reprimand.

  “Holy Mother.” From around the broadness of Carvon Jotsis came Arabella Jotsis, hair a cloud of golden curls, a vision in blue silk and taffeta, neckline plunging, waist tight, presenting a softer aspect to the hard warrior’s body beneath. The girl dropped into the lowest obeisance of the novice, one offered only when at greatest fault or to an archon, high priest, or statue of the Ancestor. Her skirts billowed then pooled around her. All around conversation fell away, Sis heads turning.

  “Get up, Ara.” Glass found her eyes misting. “Whatever are you doing here?”

  Ara looked up, her own eyes bright with tears. But it was Lord Jotsis who answered. “Forgive my niece, abbess. My brother removed her from Sweet Mercy after the recent unpleasantness. Temporarily, I’m sure. I thought it too soon for a return to society, especially here, but the girl insisted and my brother has never managed to stand up to his women.” Carvon coughed and glanced across the crowd, looking for his own formidable wife, no doubt. “Still, it sends a message, no?”

  Glass nodded, and smiled as Ara rose beside her. The message sent—that the Jotsis fear no one—was rather undermined by the fact that many knew Sherzal’s interest in Ara had evaporated on discovering that Nona filled the Chosen One’s shoes still better, and then that Zole met all requirements. Perhaps the true message was one of peace rather than defiance, and by sending both Carvon’s brother had demonstrated some of that necessary subtlety the lord himself lacked.

  “Glass.” Brother Pelter found his voice, staring pointedly at Sera and Melkir.

  Glass ignored him. “Ara?”

  “I came to be of service, Abbess Glass,” Ara said. Although her maids had made her beyond pretty with all the arts of powders and rouge there was still something in those blue eyes that promised a world of hurt to any who crossed her. “You have only to ask. And I am not alone.” She motioned with her gaze, pointing out Darla who towered above her father, the renowned General Rathon, newly promoted and surely just one more victory from his lordship.

  Glass found herself oddly touched that the two novices had contrived to have their family connections move them to her destination as soon as they had discovered it. The delays encountered while Pelter hunted her judges had allowed Darla and Ara to overtake her along the more direct roads.

  “Heretic.” A vicious whisper, close at hand.

  A glance found the source, decked in diamonds and lace. Joeli Namsis. Her whisper spread, giving licence to tongues held still in the moment. “Abbess Glass?” A malicious smile. “Were chains all you could find to wear that would get you past the door to so grand a home?” This girl wasn’t seventeen yet but she could pass as a woman of twenty-one among the gathered heiresses. “And I had heard that you were supposed to be good at these games of empire.”

  “Glass!” Pelter again.

  The abbess turned away from Joeli, nodded to Lord Jotsis, and pushed on before Melkir’s hand quite found her elbow.

  The butler pressed forward, employing some personal magic to forge a path through the assembled aristocracy without causing offence. Ahead the throng thickened as cattle will around a feeding trough, the conversations joining and swelling, each voice raising itself by degrees in order to be heard. Like a marjal water-worker the butler parted the vivid sea before them and, revealed at its midst, Sherzal, in flowing black.

  “Abbess Glass!” Her already-wide smile widened. “Have you brought my daughter to me?”

  “Novice Zole’s whereabouts are unknown to me.” Glass studied the woman. Sherzal looked younger than the thirty-nine years recorded against her name. Nobody would call her beautiful—perhaps striking would be closer to the truth. Undeniably, the energies that animated her created a personal magnetism about the emperor’s sister.

  “A disappointment.” Sherzal managed to hide the alleged disappointment from her face. “And you come to us in chains?” All eyes save Sherzal’s fell to Glass’s wrists. “Are we to have a trial? How exciting.”

  Glass raised her wrists, palms turning upwards, and drew the crowd’s gaze back to her face. “A trial without inquisitors would be impossible, I’m afraid. And it would be remiss of me not to note that Brother Pelter is here illegally, along with Brothers Seldom and Dimeon, and Sister Agika. They have entered a royal palace without permission and must remove themselves immediately to await punishment in the Tower of Inquiry.”

  Two vertical lines appeared momentarily between Sherzal’s brows. “No matter. Their transgression is forgiven.”

  Glass kept herself erect despite the weight of the crowd’s regard. “Forgiveness is admirable in one so blessed with position, but the fact remains that without invitation none of them can be beneath your roof. As law-breakers they lack the authority to hold me and these chains, however silver, become the tools of the abductor.”

  “I invite them,” Sherzal snapped, the violence beneath her skin suddenly manifest. “All of them, welcome guests. We shall have our trial at midnight.”

  A man pushed by Glass, his robes lordly but a faint rankness swirling in their wake. “The trial will be something to settle stomachs after the banquet and before the dancing.” Lord Thuran Tacsis reached Sherzal’s side. He bowed low. “My apologies, honourable Sherzal, for returning in haste and disarray, but I heard our new guest had arrived and I had to greet her.” He turned to direct the blaze of his good humour upon Glass. “I’m glad to see you here, abbess. Or perhaps it should just be ‘prisoner’ now?” A huge grin. He patted the ample belly beneath his robes. “I’ve been attending to that matter we discussed back on the road to Verity, if you recall?” On Thuran’s snow-lion collar a small grey smear of mud drew Glass’s eye.

  Sherzal clapped her hands, suddenly serious. “Enough. Inquisitor Pelter, take the prisoner away and let your jury know they sit at midnight.”

  Glass found herself being bustled back through the press of Sherzal’s guests. She had no eye towards their faces this time, and no care for any jibes. Thuran Tacsis had come to them in haste from wherever Nona was being held. Glass knew the smell he carried. Mud and shit. But more than that. It was a scent she knew from her time beneath Sweet Mercy on the night before another trial. The smell of deep places. Of a recluse or cell in caves far below the ground. Had the Noi-Guin delivered Nona to Sherzal’s dungeons? Glass had known the emperor’s sister was reckless but not so reckless as to allow Thuran Tacsis to flout the emperor’s ruling in her own palace. Crucical had forbidden the Tacsis from pursuing Nona for revenge or justice. He had made it a capital command after Raymel broke the first declaration. Everyone involved in any further contravention could be summarily executed.

  Glass had been sure the Noi-Guin would take Nona to the Tetragode and that if Thuran were to gloat over his prize it would be there. There was perhaps no place in the empire so far from the emperor’s eye. Crucical probably didn’t even know where the Tetragode currently lay. It seldom remained in one place for long: the assassi
ns never stayed more than four years and took almost nothing with them, erasing all evidence that the Tetragode had ever existed. They took only their wealth, rumoured to be in diamonds of exceptional quality, their shipheart, and the Book of Shadows, the list of clients and targets dating back over six hundred years. The Noi-Guin and the Lightless would melt away one by one, regathering at some new location with the most extravagant care.

  “Hurry!” Pelter snapped, and Sera gave a push to encourage Glass along.

  The abbess raised her head. They were far from the great halls now, in a long corridor lined with quarters for the servants of guests. She paused. The others walked a couple of paces before Pelter spun around. “What are you waiting for?” The tone a mistress might use for a tardy novice.

  Glass frowned. “There’s a feeling . . . when you know something is there. You absolutely know it, and yet whilst you have all manner of evidence that implies it is there, you’ve nothing that absolutely demands that it is. Like a case built on circumstance. Or the next stair in a dark cellar after you’ve passed the point that you can see where you’re placing your feet. There’s a feeling you get sometimes in those situations, a crisis of doubt and faith. You step down, feeling for the next stair, you pass the point where you might pull back and still not stumble, and you keep going, with just faith and guesswork to keep you from breaking your neck in a black place beneath the ground.” Glass lifted her foot for her next step. “I just had that feeling. That’s why I was waiting.”

  38

  NONA PLUMMETED THROUGH empty darkness. She wasn’t sure how long she had been falling for or where she had fallen from. All she knew was the terrible certainty that soon she would hit something hard and at a speed that would spread her across it.

  The impact, when at last it came, jolted open eyes she had thought already open. She found herself staring at a wall just inches before her face, all her plunging speed arrested with just enough momentum remaining to jerk her forward and bang her head against the stonework.

  “Bleed me!” The curse came weakly from a raw throat. Her eyes hurt and the world looked to be on fire.

  Keot?

  You’re back. He sounded unsurprised. She left you a message.

  Nona levered herself from the wall and rubbed her forehead, fingers coming away sticky with blood. Scratches covered the surface of the stone block immediately before her. Slowly her eyes found focus and the scratches gathered into letters, the letters into words.

  They’re breaking in. You’ve taken red cure. You’re still sick. I’m coming.

  Nona became aware of distant pounding. Actually, not so distant. Hammers or axes being applied to the door at the end of the corridor.

  Why don’t they just—

  The nun jammed the lock to stop them coming back in. There are many of them out there.

  Nona tried to get up and failed, her muscles too weak and too full of hurt to lift her from the ground. She fell back, one of Clera’s worst curse-words escaping through clenched teeth.

  The manacles on her ankles and right wrist remained in place, the collar still locked around her neck. She appeared to be just inside her cell. Rolling, she saw the Noi-Guin’s sprawled remains. She dragged herself painfully to the cell door and looked towards the far end of the corridor. The first splinters were beginning to break away from the wood around the lock. The door wouldn’t hold much longer.

  Nona considered the door to her own cell, the timber two inches thick. She forced flaw-blades into being around the fingers of her freed hand. With one stroke she shaved off a curling sliver of wood. Then three more. Gathering her strength, she struck down at a steeper angle, muscles screaming, and sliced off a narrow triangle several feet in length, then a second chunk. Panting with effort, she bundled the shaving and chunks of wood into the Noi-Guin’s cloak and shuffled on her hip towards the failing door at the corridor’s end.

  The bright crescent of an axe greeted Nona’s arrival at the door. More blows fell as the weapon was levered out. Nona took a few moments to pit her blades against the pieces of timber she’d dragged with her, dividing them further. Using the wall as support, she reached up for the candle guttering above her, barely half an inch remaining to it. She lit the wood shavings and held the cloak above the flames until it caught. With the lengths of wood balanced against each other above the blazing material she retreated. More pieces splintered from the door. Those beyond would be smelling the smoke now.

  It’s not enough, Keot said.

  The smoke followed Nona back, swirling a pale, luminous green in the altered sight the devil granted her. She heard coughing beyond the door and bit down on a cough of her own. Some heavy piece of the door fell, hitting the ground with a metallic clunk.

  The lock.

  Nona could see the flames, an ethereal scarlet, through the coiling smoke. The scene had an otherworldly beauty to it. It wouldn’t keep the Lightless back for long. Maybe not at all. But it was all she could do. Shuddering and sweating as the red cure fought the blade-toxin in a battle raging all the length of her veins, Nona staggered to her feet to make her last stand.

  “Hey!” A voice behind her. “Quick! Over here!” A woman’s voice.

  Nona turned from the corridor’s end where choking and cursing now mixed with the splintering of timbers. A figure leaned out of the doorway of a cell on the opposite side to Nona’s and three doors further back. A spiky-haired figure with a lantern in hand. In the devil-sight’s skewed colour palette it was hard for Nona to know if she should recognize the person.

  Keot drained from Nona’s eyes, leaving her blinking, stumbling forward. “Kettle?”

  The woman caught Nona as she fell, her strength spent. Back along the corridor the sound of advancing feet, coughing and confusion. The newcomer dragged Nona back into the cell, pushing the door shut, locking it as she struggled with Nona’s weight. “Shit on a Scithrowl! You’ve got fat.”

  Nona managed to look up at that. Only one person cursed quite as colourfully as that. “Clera?”

  “Come on! Help me out, it’s like I’m dragging a whale.” Clera grinned down at her, face pale and mud smeared. Behind her a small square door in the wall stood open. The kind that every prisoner dreams about, stone-clad, perfectly disguised, leading onto a narrow tunnel that stretched away from captivity.

  Nona kicked ineffectually as Clera bundled her backwards through the door, pushing her headfirst along the crawlway. While Nona lay panting on her back, the stone ceiling just a foot above her face, Clera went to get the lantern. She joined Nona on all fours moments later, and reached back to pull the secret door closed behind them, setting several bolts in place.

  “Ssssh.” A finger to lips. “I’ll have to go first.”

  Clera wriggled her way over Nona, a snug fit in the confines of the tunnel. When their faces drew level she paused, her nose almost touching Nona’s.

  “You look awful. You’re not going to die are you?”

  “P-poisoned.”

  “What was it? I’ve got some antidotes . . .”

  “On . . . Noi-Guin knife. Took red cure.” Nona’s ribs screamed protest against Clera’s weight and her breath came in gasps. All of her hurt but it seemed as though she’d been hurting forever and after so long alone in such dire straits it felt good to be with a friend. Even with Clera who long ago had betrayed her to the Tacsis. Just having someone there, albeit on top of her, was a wonderful thing. If there had been space she might even have put her arms around the girl.

  “Red cure? That should work. Let’s just hope your eyes don’t turn red this time.” Clera grinned, licked the end of Nona’s nose, and continued to wriggle past, as if for all the world they were playing some convent game, not escaping torture and death in the bowels of the Tetragode.

  “W-what are you doing here?” Nona whispered, her words largely lost as Clera’s chest scraped across her face.

  Clera ignored the question. “I can’t turn around here so if you can’t follow me I’ll have to go a
head and come back before I can drag you.”

  Legs slithered around Nona’s head and Clera was clear.

  “I . . . I can do it.” Nona braced her heels against a lump in the tunnel floor and pushed. She inched forward, gasping.

  “Too slow and too noisy,” Clera hissed. From beyond the door faint shouts could be heard. “Wait here. I’ll come back and drag you. Be quiet!”

  Nona wanted to ask her not to leave but bit her tongue. She felt weak and tearful. The poison’s doing, no doubt. Clera crawled away, the sounds fading. She had left the lantern, standing beyond Nona’s feet, turned low. Nona hoped no crack of light would show around the hidden door, but she could do nothing about it even if she had the energy—the tunnel held her too tightly.

  You should kill her when you reach a space wide enough that you don’t have to cut through her body to advance. It will be easy if she’s dragging you. Just reach up and cut—

  I’m not going to kill Clera!

  She’s the reason we’re here. If she hadn’t brought you to Raymel then I would still be enjoying his excesses and you would be doing . . . nun things. Kill her and leave her body to rot.

  Clera thought the Tacsis wanted Ara, not me, and not for killing. She doesn’t deserve to die for that!

  The convent would drown her if they caught her.

  Nona closed her eyes. She couldn’t deny that the Ancestor, or at least the Ancestor’s Church, had some harsh rules.

  * * *

  • • •

  THE FORCE THAT pulled Nona back into Kettle’s head allowed no alternatives, but after so many unions of their minds Nona was starting to understand the process. When not half-dead with exhaustion and toxins, and with the sigil collar off her neck, Nona felt that she would be able to exercise some choice in any future calls. It would require her to intercept the process, to cling on to her own identity and the flesh that housed it, and to match Kettle’s excitement or panic with a calm of equal weight. For now though she was plucked from her own head like an unfurled leaf before the ice-wind.