Last to Rise(3)

I took a deep breath and clenched my fist. First the pain came, familiar and unwanted, a silver-red line of agony in my hand, my arm, my head. After that, from the pain came the juice, the surge of magic that would show me the way, and that also tempted me, taunted me. Pain was the least of my worries when I cast a spell, because the black was always waiting, watching, hoping I’d fall in and never get back out. It scared the crap out of me, if I’m honest, because part of me wanted to fall in, into warm comfort and fearless wonder, to be free of everything, to care about nothing.



The face, I concentrated on the face. I’d been getting a fair bit of practice at find-spells just lately, cast more in the last week than I’d done in the previous decade, as my poor hand could attest, and I was getting better, honing it. A face wasn’t much to go on, but I could feel a pull, a tug on my arm. A raised voice echoing in my head, another against it, though I couldn’t tell if it was the guy I was after, not yet. Better than nothing though, so I followed the tug of my throbbing arm, the pulse of the juice and the knowledge in my head that this way was the way to go. My magic, at least this part of it, had rarely steered me wrong before – it was almost the only thing I could rely on.



The tug led me down a leprous gap between two vats, one I’d never have noticed on my own. I’d never have gone down there even if I had noticed, if not for the pull, because being sandwiched between two of the vats, sideways because my shoulders wouldn’t fit, gave me an extra special blast of stench. Probably a good job I’d not been able to find any food for breakfast. I held my breath and squeezed through.



The other side opened out into a dark and grimly dripping tunnel that perhaps had once been an alley before someone built over the top. That was the thing with Mahala: someone always built over the top – there wasn’t anywhere else to build, not any more. The tunnel wasn’t much wider than the gap between the vats, but at least the smell faded a touch as I went in. I kept my good hand on the butt of my pulse pistol, just in case.



The echoing voices became louder and I was thankful I’d not have to use any more magic for now, though the aching throb of my hand meant at least I’d have plenty of spare juice if I needed it. The tunnel wound on, a glow flickering along the damp walls. Not Glow, but the subtler light of a rend-nut-oil lamp, last chance of the poorest of the poor – the smell of day-old farts and rotting fish mingled with the more pervasive smell from behind.



I was getting close, the tug told me. A last corner and the tunnel opened out, became a wide corridor, well lit by stinking lamps and with walls that looked like patches of damp held together by mould. A series of doorways lined with ragged drapes opened off the right-hand side.



Stenchers lived whole lives down here, rarely ventured anywhere outside their little domain. The voices became clearer – a man and a woman arguing violently, though their words were still indecipherable. I didn’t need to know what they were saying to get the gist though. Things seemed to be at the “Bitch!”, “Bastard!”, “My mother always said —”, “Your mother is a —” phase, and I hesitated to intervene. Caught in domestic crossfire is never a good place to be, because like as not they’ll both turn on you. I have the scars to prove it.



My hesitation – all right, craven sense of self-preservation – flew out of the window at the unmistakable sound of an open hand cracking against a cheek. The woman screamed like hell had just opened up a portal at her feet and Namrat had leapt out and started eating her face. I had my pulse pistol out and was round the corner of the doorway before the scream had a chance to die away. I may be self-serving, and I may try to avoid responsibility at all costs, will do almost anything to outrun it, but I have this other little failing, one that annoys Erlat no end.



I was round the corner in a heartbeat, pulse pistol out and ready to zap the guy in the head, short-circuit his brain with a concentrated blast of magic. He might be a mage, might be the guy I was after, but even so —



I didn’t get any further than that thought before he slammed into me, knocking us both out into the corridor and up against the wall in a tangle of limbs and knocked heads. I landed on my bad hand, naturally, and bit back a scream. Bit back too the surge of juice that rattled my brain and made me want to flail around with my magic. I didn’t quite hold on to all of it and it went wild. Without direction it did what it wanted to. A pair of rags serving as curtains in the doorway morphed into two rippling puddles of brown gloop on the floor before they grew stubby, gooey wings and half flew, half flopped off down the corridor. Oops.