The Tower Broken(115)

Another sword-son neared Nessaket, with Grada close behind. He lifted his hachirah to strike. ‘No!’ Sarmin cried, and the sword-son dropped his weapon and grabbed her wrist instead. The pattern-thread cut his hand and shoulder and his blood rose in a crimson arc. Didryk wrapped an arm around her from behind, putting a hand over her mouth, and Grada and the sword-son managed to push her palms behind her. Blood rushed between Grada’s fingers – hers, or Nessaket’s?

Sarmin made a quick assessment of the damage. Mesema had hidden behind the Petal Throne and was safe, but she had now lost two guards: Sendhil, and the man who lay across the steps with his throat cut open. General Merkel was dead. Others pressed hands over deep cuts.

He ran to his mother, still struggling in Didryk’s arms, her eyes blank and wild. He could see the black pattern that controlled her, rising from the floor and wrapping itself into her mind and her skin. But he could not purge her of it.

He hit his fist against a pillar. ‘Can you help her, Didryk?’

Didryk frowned and pressed a hand against Nessaket’s forehead. ‘She has been with the first austere for some time,’ he said, ‘and the patterns run deep. Still …’ He drew his thumb across her skin, up, down, around and across, and waited. ‘No,’ he said with a frown, ‘my work is too simple.’

Sarmin crouched down before his mother. Behind the web that trapped her, behind her skin, he searched for her, his mother, the woman he remembered from soft nights and song, from garden sunshine and laughter, and from hardship, loneliness, loss. He searched for her grief, for her love, for her anger – and found her at last, buried deep, a flame flickering against the storm that was the first austere’s lunacy. ‘Mother,’ he called, and she stirred, the flame growing brighter. He pressed his hand against her heart, and her arms thrashed; her head moved from side to side as she tried to free her mouth and loose the pattern upon him. But Didryk and Grada held her firm, and the mother who existed inside the body grew stronger, pushing back at the darkness.

Mesema knelt beside him, adding her hand to his.

‘Mother,’ he said, ‘I know you are there, because you took care not to kill me.’ In this world there were three people who could never be persuaded to harm him, no matter how powerful the magic: his mother was one, Grada and Mesema the others.

Nessaket opened her brown eyes and looked at him. ‘Sarmin!’ she breathed, and Didryk let her go and stepped back. Sarmin watched the webs that had trapped her die away and shrivel into the floor.

It was not over; the first austere was seeking more people to entrap. But Sarmin could see the path of the first austere’s intent, dark against the tiles, and he knew now that he could find him.

‘That is twice the first austere has tried to kill you, Your Majesty,’ said Azeem, his voice straining for his usual calm.

Only twice? But he had failed. Sarmin could not deny feeling disappointment. The first austere was nowhere near as powerful as he had thought. Yes, he had some unusual tricks, but that was the whole of it. Of all the mages in the desert and the city there was nobody who came close to what Sarmin once had been. Only Mogyrk could match him, and Mogyrk lay in the Scar, caught between life and death. But, as weak as the first austere might be, Sarmin could not defeat him alone. He needed a working of many parts, pieces of a design, but not the Many. He needed allies.

He looked over his shoulder for someone to command and found one, a guard standing wide-eyed over Dinar’s body. ‘You: get Austere Adam from the dungeon. We will need his help.’ No sooner had he spoken than he saw the pattern-ward flash blue on the guard’s forehead. When the guard turned, unharmed, to retrieve Adam, Sarmin breathed with relief. The court was protected from pattern-work, just as he had planned. But then the ward flashed red on the forehead of an old captain and he exploded in a spray of blood and bone, the buttons of his uniform falling against the floor like Settu tiles. With another flash, yellow, a palace slave fell upon the cushions, holding his neck, unable to breathe. The first austere was searching for a way past their wards and succeeding – but not completely. Not yet.

Sarmin stood, helping his mother up with him. The first austere must not be allowed to pick off his courtiers one by one. He must be killed, and it would be Sarmin who killed him.





51



Didryk


Didryk let go of the Empire Mother and stepped into the corridor. Now that she was recovered she would not want to find a Fryth man grasping at her. He did not know the spells the first austere had used – he had never used such things in Fryth; he had not needed to. The surprise, Yrkmir’s advantage, had been complete. The first austere did not care about killing his fellow Mogyrks, and he certainly would not hesitate to kill every Cerani if he could find more ways around their wards. Didryk found that he did not want that to happen.