Ellis did
not like to be woken early. He liked to
lie in bed as long as possible, dreaming whatever dreams would come, slipping
in and out of lucidity to become master of his imaginary world. To be interrupted was to lose control. To be woken was to feel the bubble burst and
find that what once was oil-sheen shimmering on the crystal surface, was now
residue holding you down. The sound of
the door banging - an infuriating rhythm out of step with the music of a party
just a few moments before - came again and Ellis rolled over.
Siren was
stirring beside him, a look of confusion and anger forming slowly on her face,
but even so it was a pleasing sight. He
rubbed his eyes, gave her the least energetic of smiles and then rolled out of
bed to scrabble around for something half-decent to wear.
"Who do
you suppose it could be at this hour?" Siren asked as she cinched the belt
around the waist of her trousers and straightened up her loose assortment of
blades.
"I have
no idea," the knocks came again, even more insistent this time, "but
it's clear that they aren't going away any time soon."
They opened
the door together, staring out into the morning half-light to see a
miserable-looking militiaman standing in the ashes at the bottom of their
steps.
"Markus?"
Siren demanded, "What in Lakhma's name are you doing here!?"
Ellis had to
repress a shudder at Siren's loose use of the elder god's name. He still wasn't sure they had really seen the
last of it.
"The
Former Baron sent me," the young guard said nervously, "he wants you
over at Tentacle Lane immediately!"
"Whatever
for?" Ellis asked.
"There's
been an... incident," Markus replied sheepishly, "Sarah she...
well... Frostfire is..."
"Oh
no," Ellis moaned, "she's done something stupid, hasn't she... this
is all our fault."
"Nonsense,
Ellis," Siren reprimanded, "if Sarah has interfered with the prisoner
then she has no one to blame but herself."
For some
reason Markus appeared to stand up straighter as she said that. Ellis had no idea how Siren managed it, but
she really was a born leader.
"Anyway,"
she continued with a sigh, "we'd better hurry and see what Franck intends
us to do about it. Lead on,
Markus!"
The
militiaman saluted, something which seemed to surprise even him, then did a
parade turn and marched off down the street toward the remains of Tentacle Lane
and the Former Baron's ramshackle demesne.
Sarah and
Frostfire hadn't left the basement of the church since they'd arrived there a
few hours previously. At first they had
been silent. Frostfire leaning against a
wall and eyeing everything with cool suspicion as Sarah made herself busy
shifting boxes and the debris of spare building materials to try to make the
space a little more comfortable for him.
She glanced at him occasionally out of the corner of her eye and
wondered why she bothered. Either
Frostfire was never comfortable, or he was comfortable everywhere. Whichever, comfort did not seem to be his
concern, but Sarah carried on regardless.
Keeping busy was a simple flood defence against the rising tide of
guilt, even if it were like bailing out the sea with a leaky bucket.
Eventually,
however, all that could be done had been done and Sarah was forced to stop,
turn around, and face he former ally.
"Do you
feel better for that?" he asked.
"Not
really, no. Should I?"
"Depends
what you were hoping to achieve."
"And
what about you?" she countered, "What was this all about?"
"You
should know better than most."
"Revenge?"
"Yes. For Spriggan, for Fracture, for the way
Stoneskin kind has been treated by humans since the dawn of civilisation. Balance.
Justice," he paused, as if aware he'd said more than ever usually
left his lips, then added, "it is a reckoning."
"And
the people of the Colony deserve that?"
"Why
not? Your friends unleashed a daemon in
the Silverspire. You abandoned me in Fracture.
No one did anything to save Spriggan."
"Including
you, Frostfire! Spriggan was killed
because you chose your allies poorly.
Has it never occurred to you that all this - all of this - has just been a series of very bad decisions on your
part?"
"And
what about this rescue?"
Sarah opened
her mouth, then closed it, swallowed.
"Fair point, but I was fed up of being left out of the loop."
"So, we
have something in common once again."
"What
happened?" Siren demanded as she swept - the only way Ellis could have
described it - into the Former Baron's dining room. "How did we let Frostfire escape like
this?"
Annabella
and Gulliver were there already, the latter looking extremely sleep-deprived as
he slouched in an armchair. Von Spektr
was sitting at the table, scribbling notes in an ancient notebook whilst
consulting a sheaf of equally decrepit papers.
He looked up with a casual air and smiled, gesturing for Siren and Ellis
to find somewhere to sit.
"What
happened is exactly what I expected to happen," he said with a sigh when
neither moved. He put down his pen,
pushed himself a little way out form the table and gave them a frank
stare. "Don't worry, Siren, my
dear. All is still going according to
plan."
"I'm
not sure I trust this plan of yours very much," she replied, "I don't
like how little we know of where it's going and I don't like it if it turns
allies into enemies. Just what have you
made Sarah do?"
"She's
definitely not an enemy, although perhaps she hasn't worked that out yet. She's going to achieve a lot more than any of
us did in the past few days in our attempts to bring Frostfire around to our
way of thinking, although, of course, we did lay the necessary
groundwork."
"I
don't understand," Ellis interjected.
"Can someone explain exactly what's happened this morning and then
get on to how it helps our situation?"
The Former
Baron cleared his throat, sat up straight, smoothed down the lapels of his
jacket, took a deep breath …and then Annabella spoke instead.
"Sarah
manipulated poor militiaman Markus into abandoning his post so that she could
break into the bookbinder's storehouse and let Frostfire out."
"And
where have they gone?" Siren asked.
"Please tell me they haven't made it over the wall?"
"The
tracks leading away from the scene are rather confused," the Former Baron
replied, glaring at Annabella a little as he did so. "There's no reason to believe that
they've left the Colony, however. I
think it's much more likely that Sarah took him back to her church, indeed my
plan rather depends on it."
"And if
you're wrong?"
"Then
we will all pay for the foolishness of an old Philosopher," the old man
replied wearily, "but I hope you will recall that I am very, very seldom
wrong."
"So
what do we do now?" Ellis asked. "And what, exactly, is your
plan?"
"Well,
mostly we just have to sit and wait.
Sarah is going to be doing all the hard work for us, bless her."
Ellis
sighed. "This just feels
wrong!"
"And
perhaps it is El Jefe, but I am almost certain that this is the best path to
success, and, given what the stakes are likely to be, it was worth the risk,
and the damnation."
"What
stakes are these?" Siren asked, her frustration showing now, just as much
as Ellis'. "I thought this was all
about defending the Colony from the Stoneskins, but surely capturing Frostfire
has only been making things worse."
"It's
certainly true that the attacks on the wall have re-intensified, but then that
was why we built the wall in the first place.
No, no, no, the Stoneskins are just the distraction! They are small fry compared to what is
coming."
"And
just what is coming?"
"Why,
the Ancients of course, isn't is obvious?"
There was a
moment of dumbfounded silence as everyone stared at everyone else. It was Gulliver, lifting his head form his
near comatose state, who broke it.
"Oh
yeah," he said, "of course. I
was just goin' to say the same thing..."
"The
Ancients?" Ellis asked. "As in
the same ones who made the Stonerib Shoals?
The ghosts in Whispercove? The
city beneath the underground canals?"
"The
very same. The signs of their return
have been around us for a long time now, and with Lakhma out of the way once
more, I fear there's very little keeping them back."
"This
is what you meant when you were telling Frostfire that he was being used,
right?" Ellis asked, "By the Ancients?"
"Exactly."
"But
why on Shadow didn't you tell us this sooner?" Siren demanded.
"Oh,
well, it was all very complicated and I had to get my own plans in order first
and, well, I wasn't sure you'd be very interested, to be quite honest."
They stared
at him, mouths open, until the old Philosopher had to ask, sounding genuinely
puzzled, "What? What did I say?"
"So,
what now?" Frostfire asked into the silence.
"I
don't know," Sarah replied, "I'm thinking."
"They'll
find us here soon enough."
"I
know! As I said, I'm thinking."
"If you
can get me back over the wall-"
"And
why would I want to do that, Frostfire?
So you can attack the Colony again?"
"The
armies are attacking now, aren't they? I
can stop them."
"And
then what? You'll just leave us alone,
after all of this?"
Frostfire's
face twisted in what might have been a kind of grin.
"No, I
didn't think so."
The silence
returned, descending upon them like a heavy shroud. It seemed so thick that it even seemed to
penetrate Sarah's thoughts, like should couldn't hear her own inner voice over
its deafening emptiness.
"What
did they say to you, before they took you prisoner?"
"The
same things you did," the Spiketail replied bitterly, "that I had
been used and used again, as if I didn't know that."
"But,
did Franck say something about you being used right now?"
"He was
babbling as always."
"I
don't know... I think... I think there might be more to this than meets the
eye."
"Are
you saying I should still be in that storeroom?"
"No! No, of course not, but... Franck usually has
his reasons for the things he does, even if they do seem callous and
thoughtless at the time. He's not the
best... people person I suppose, and I'm still angry with him for leaving me
out of his plans like this but... but maybe there is something else going
on. Maybe there's a reason behind all of
this."
"Quick
change of heart," the Spiketail said with a hint of bitterness in his
gravelly tone.
"Maybe,"
Sarah said, her voice a softer reflection, "but I've been learning to look
at the bigger picture and... sometimes we need to be shaken out of the moment
to look at it."
She had
barely finished speaking when there was a tremendous bang, echoing down the
stairs towards them, as something battered against the doors of the church.
"What
was that?" She asked.
"Perhaps
it’s something to 'shake us out of the moment'" Frostfire said with a
sneer.
Ignoring
him, Sarah took to stairs, pausing only to call back down to him, "wait
here!", before rushing on up.
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