The Key to Starveldt (28 page)

‘You’re clear on the task?’

Glide nodded. ‘Find the guardian who rescued Solace. Report back.’

‘Do it.’

The floor was rough stone, but covered by a rug so thick and deep that it was like lying on the pelt of a giant angora rabbit, a luxury Glide appreciated. Shutting out the presence of Mikhail Savarin as best he could, he concentrated on the softness beneath him, trying to sink away from the reality of one world and into the swirling torrents of the multiverse. Mercifully, he had not been required to speak to Grief or Professor Lukin – Mikhail was intimidating enough – and was therefore about as emotionally stable as he was capable of being. Drifting through random worlds was one thing, but searching for a specific incident required precision. He’d heard it said that the threat of death helped to concentrate the mind wonderfully. Whoever had said it had never worked for the Bloodkin.

None of that
, Glide told himself fiercely.
Concentrate. Look for Solace.

As starting points went, he couldn’t have picked a stronger one. He was a traitor, yes, but for all his betrayals and lies, the thought of kissing Solace Eleuthera was still enough to bring him to his knees. As though his Trick were a motorbike engine, the strength of his memory acted like a kick-start, so that he swooped abruptly out of himself. The rug, the room, Mikhail: everything vanished, replaced by a hovering, bird’s eye view of himself and Solace on the edge of a bed, her pale fingers twined through his hair.

Steady
, he thought, but it was difficult. His distant body throbbed with the desire to linger forever in this one memory, and it was only by reminding himself of the cost of failure that he was able to wrench away, pushing the vision forwards.

Guardian, guardian, show me the guardian
. Scenes flickered past him like butterfly wings, some of them relevant, most of them not. He winced to see Sharpsoft answer Evan’s summons in the playground, coming as it did when he, Glide, had already been chained underground with a sucking wound in his side. Forward to Solace in an alley, fainting under the strength of the sun, his former housemates clustered by her side when, of all things, a little cat appeared. Glide was on the brink of skipping away again when, to his utter astonishment, the cat
spoke
, directly into Solace and Manx’s heads. Her communications registered oddly in his Trick, like words spoken underwater. The vision shook beneath the burden of his shock, teetered and broke, replaced by scraps of Sydney during World War II, a flash of Jack the Ripper’s knife, a parliament of pale, owl-faced beings decrying one of their number en masse – all irrelevant, all fragmented – but
cat
, he told his Trick,
it was the cat, show me
!

With unusual reluctance, his visions returned. This time, he saw the little cat haloed in light, glowing green-gold with such tremendous energy that even through the distance of time and space, the echoes of it shivered on his skin. Skipping forward again, he saw her asleep on a lounge, devouring a swan, curled on the seat of a van and then – nothing. It was like running into a brick wall. Glide had never encountered anything like it. Wherever the cat – and, presumably, Solace – had gone next, his Trick was unable to follow.

The past, then
, he told himself, moving backwards to the moment where he’d first heard the little cat speak.
Where did you come from? What are you
?

There followed a blur of images, so swift and similar that it was like being blizzarded with snowflakes: cat on a wall, cat asleep, cat prowling,
cat cat cat
. Nothing extraordinary; nothing that explained the power he’d felt or the creature’s ability to mind-speak. Frustrated, he began to push further back, blocking out the lure of irrelevant visions with a desperate sense of purpose, heading on through deeper time, further away,
further, further.
In a sudden rush, he felt that same distinctive power brush his mind, a single feather swirling through a storm. It was enough. Glide plunged after it like a diving hawk.

Scraps of vision whirled him around, buffeting his consciousness like thermals of disruptive air. Somehow he stayed on track, chasing the scent until, in a blur of colour, a new scene threw itself at him, so saturated with magic that he screeched to a halt and forced it into clarity.

Before him was an open stone hall, perfectly square, with a different carving scored into each of the myriad flagstones comprising the floor. At one end, a man Glide half-recognised stood with a stern expression on his face, surrounded by a collection of equally serious men and women. Closest of these was an equally familiar dark-haired woman, whose strong, steady gaze, tempting mouth and curving figure would’ve looked right at home in a medieval gown, the kind with a low-cut bodice and dagged sleeves. Instead, she wore a pair of sleek black trousers tucked into knee-high riding boots and a loose white shirt. Around her neck was a long, linked chain, from which dangled a green-bronze key.

The key to Starveldt.
Distantly, Glide felt his heart speed up. He realised why the man and woman looked familiar: these were Aaron and Morgause Eleuthera, whose dead bodies he’d once glimpsed in a different vision. Was this the interior of Starveldt? Given what Solace’s infamous tripwalk had shown him of the outside, it didn’t seem an unreasonable conclusion. As he watched, Morgause brushed a hand against Aaron’s arm – a gesture of comfort. Aaron glanced at her and looked as if he might speak, but at that moment, the door at the other end of the chamber opened, revealing three figures.

Two of the newcomers were guards, walking on either side of the third, an alien woman whose neck and wrists were bound with cold iron. She walked proudly, her pace measured. Power bled from her in waves, strongly enough that her whole body was suffused with a bright green glow, making it impossible to tell if her skin were naturally green or merely tinted that shade. She was neither tall nor short, but although somewhat human in shape, her bones were elongated, stretched to an unfamiliar length, so that she appeared sinewy. Below the knee, the woman’s legs were sloped backwards into an extra curve of bone and ending on the balls of two broad, clawed feet. A prehensile tail, long and slender, twitched behind her, its tip moving parallel to her middle back. Her eyes were solid blocks of colour, over-large and almond-shaped above the barest suggestion of a nose, while her small mouth was nearly lipless. Even her hair wasn’t hair at all, but a mane of ever-lengthening feathers sprouting from her scalp and neck. Her only clothes were a wrap of stitched leather concealing her breasts and a split skirt of the same material extending from hip to mid-thigh. Spiralling tattoos covered both her arms, ending severely at the shoulder.

She was wild and haughty, fierce and beautiful and defiant; and she was also, beyond any doubt, the exact same cat-creature currently guarding Solace.

Crossing the stone floor, her guards brought her to a halt within metres of Aaron, Morgause and their assembled companions. A silver-haired man, with eyes to match, stepped forward and addressed the captive in a heavy, regretful tone.

‘Worldweaver Vivari, you stand accused of murdering one Chyre Ko, a woman living under the protection of Aaron and Morgause Eleuthera of Starveldt, worldseekers of the Guild. Accordingly, you will be tried here and now, by the laws of the worldweavers and in the presence of our hosts. If found guilty, your rank within the Guild will be stripped, and punishment metered out in accordance with the level of your guilt. If found innocent, you will be set free. Do you comprehend the terms of this trial?’

The worldweaver woman – cat –
Vivari
– lifted her head and spoke. ‘I do.’ Her voice was soft and clear.

The silver-haired judge sighed. ‘So be it. What is your plea?’

‘Guilty in the first degree.’

The assembled worldweavers murmured among themselves, clearly shocked, while Aaron reached across and took Morgause’s hand. The judge blinked, taken aback. When he spoke again, there was a note of pleading in his voice.

‘You mean to say that there was no motive to your actions?’

‘No motive that would serve to ameliorate my guilt in the eyes of this court.’

Please
, the judge wanted to say – Glide could see the word written in the old man’s eyes, almost taste the breath of it on his tongue. Instead, the judge went hard and blank.

‘You offer no defence. Is that correct?’

‘It is.’

‘In accordance with your plea, I am forced to enact the steepest penalty, with no recourse to the judgement of your peers. Do you accept the consequences of this verdict?’

Throughout the scene, Vivari had not so much as flinched. ‘I do.’

The old man steeled himself. ‘Then I have no choice. You are hereby cast out of the Guild. Your powers will be stripped and, in accordance with the length of your lifespan, you will enter into three centuries of servitude to the wardens of Starveldt, currently Aaron and Morgause, but including any who succeed them. Will you submit willingly to this process?’

‘I will,’ said Vivari, her voice flat and soft as ever, ‘but if it pleases the court, I do not think the traditional methods for the revocation of power will work in this instance. I am Aer, and half a child of the elements. My abilities are not an individual quirk of blood, but part of the flesh and fibre of all my kind, as much as my limbs and breath. You cannot contain me. I know the law. If the worlds cannot be taken from a weaver, then the weaver must be taken from the worlds. Your verdict is death.’

So absolute a silence greeted these words that it was like the hall and its occupants had been frozen. Glide felt a sting of sympathy for Vivari. He didn’t know why she’d committed murder or why she seemed so hell-bent on destroying herself, but he felt a twisted kind of respect for her courage.
I wasn’t brave enough to die. If I was, I wouldn’t be here now, spying through time for Mikhail Savarin.

All the strength seemed to leave the judge. His hands trembled. ‘So be it. We cannot drain you, and without a limit placed on your power, you cannot exist in servitude. Death it must be.’

‘Wait.’ Aaron held up a hand. Vivari’s gaze flicked to him. He addressed his words to her and the judge both. ‘There is another way. True, the worldweavers cannot utterly deprive an Aer of her powers – by their very nature, the Aer are living conduits for the ambient power of the universe. Is that not so?’

‘It is.’ Hope flared in the judge’s silver eyes. ‘What do you suggest?’ ‘

A physical transformation. Bind Vivari’s essence into a lesser flesh, and she will live, but with diminished access to the power around her. Such a body would become stronger over time, but even if a new form was required from time to time, it would still be a suitable solution over three centuries. Starveldt is happy to accommodate such a compromise.’

Given her earlier insistence on death, Glide half expected Vivari to protest this suggestion. But she still existed in his own time; she must obviously have lived. The worldweaver fell to her knees, head bowed.

‘Thank you,’ she whispered.

The judge’s voice was hoarse with relief. ‘The verdict is passed, then. Vivari will serve House Eleuthera for three hundred years, in penance for murdering Chyre Ko. Until then, her body is forfeit. Such is the will of the Guild, on whom the pale moon gleams.’

The bystanders echoed his final words.

As the guards led Vivari out, Glide felt his control over the vision sway. Hunting down such a distant scene from so little and then staying focused had drained him. Surely, he had seen enough to ensure that Mikhail would not kill him outright. For all a part of him wanted to die, he had no desire to experience any of the painful, disturbing ways Sanguisidera’s acolytes might have of making that wish a reality. Slowly gathering himself, he swam back up through a fog of tattered worlds to his physical home, blinking as the deep carpet of the Bloodkin room reappeared before his eyes.

His body felt stiff and unresponsive, his mouth fuzzy. With unexpected gentleness, Mikhail Savarin crouched by his side and helped Glide into a sitting position. How much time had passed? He had no way of knowing.
Jetlag and time zones have nothing on this.

‘Tell me.’ The mage’s voice was insistent, his expression hard. Glide had managed to lie to him before, but somehow, he knew that was no longer an option. ‘Tell me everything.’

And so, with a leaden heart, he did.

T
hey had almost made it back to the suite when Sylvia hailed them, striding up with her silver rifle slung across one shoulder. Manx’s eyes lit up on seeing her, and it was all Solace could do not to laugh out loud. Evan, having resented Manx’s teasing, sniggered suggestively.

‘It occurs to me,’ said Sylvia, gracefully choosing to ignore Evan, ‘that we have been remiss in our hospitality. Would you care for a tour of the markets? They are vast, and many of their wonders easily missed.’

‘I don’t see why not,’ said Manx, at whom the question seemed foremost to have been directed. He turned to glance at the others, only the slightest touch of colour in his cheeks. ‘Any objections?’

‘No!’ said Jess, so eagerly that Evan scowled.

‘What are you planning, sister dearest?’

‘Nothing that concerns you,’ Jess replied sweetly, linking arms with Electra. ‘Coming?’

‘No,’ Evan muttered, just as Electra said, ‘Yes.’

‘Me, too,’ echoed Manx, seemingly without thought. Evan gave a half-amused, half-irritated snort. The shapeshifter’s eyes were set firmly on Sylvia, a fact to which the guard did not appear oblivious.

‘Very well,’ she said, almost smiling. ‘Anyone else?’

‘Not me,’ said Laine. The psychic looped some hair away from her forehead, pushing her shoulders back. ‘No offence to anyone, but if we’re going to sightsee, I think I’d like to explore a bit on my own.’

‘You’re sure?’ asked Jess, surprised.

‘I’m sure.’

‘We might head out, too,’ said Paige, twining her hand with Harper’s. ‘Spend some time together.’