Rats And Gargoyles - Rats and Gargoyles Part 31
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Rats and Gargoyles Part 31

"I can't believe that anyone-"

The siege-engine shook, motor roaring.

The White Crow gripped the jutting shield-wall. Plessiez's warm body brushed hers as he grabbed at the same support. She twisted to stare over her shoulder. The Lord-Architect had vanished: the engine-trapdoor stood open.

"NoI permit it!" Plessiez snapped an order; the Guards remained at their stations. The motor coughed a cloud of blue smoke and groaned as the wheels gripped the cobbles. Noise increased, plateaued. The beaked rams swiveled as the siege-engine ground to point north-aust.

The White Crow regained balance, the weight of pack and sword heavy on her. "You'll allow this?"

The siege-engine thrummed, gathering speed. Streets flowed past. She rocked with the velocity. Ahead the sky turns ashen with the first finials of the Fane-in-the-Twelfth-District.

"It is no great detour. I have the timeand, possibly, I admit, the necessityto indulge my expert engineer. I regret," the Cardinal-General's voice rasped, pitched to carry over the metallic clash of gears, still with a mockery in it, "I regret what you will find when we leave you, madam. It has been so for five days, for all of us; even for your kindthe Fane is closed to all entry now."

Zar-bettu-zekigal pushed past Andaluz, dodging the Boat's speechless passengers; and he shaded his eyes against the glare. A Katayan woman of medium height and in her middle twenties walked down the gangplank, peacock-blue satin coat and white breeches gleaming in the sun.

Her shadow lay on the plank, sharp-edged and blue.

"Elish? Oh, what! What are you doing here? How come you're on the Boat? You haven't been through the Night!"

"I did die, little one. I'm back now."

Short black hair fell in curls over her pale forehead, a lace cravat foamed in ruffles under her chin; and she whisked a tail as black as her hair through the slit in the satin coat. "Father told me the courtseers predict ill fortune for you. I came to do what I could. How else could I get here and not spend a year traveling, except on the Boat?"

"Elish!"

Zar-bettu-zekigal flung her arms around the older Katayan woman, hugging her violently. The older woman patted her back. She raised her head, and Andaluz saw her smile as she met his eyes. He straightened his doublet and executed his best formal bow.

"Madam, I take you to be from the South Katayan court? May I, on behalf of the Candovard Embassy, welcome you here, and offer you any assistance that you may need?"

"Sir, I thank you. I-" The Katayan woman pried Zar-bettu-zekigal's head out of her lace ruffles. "Zar'! Behave. What have you got yourself into now?"

Still with her arm about the woman's waist, the young Katayan faced Andaluz. "This is my best full-sister, Elish-hakku-zekigal. Elish, this is Ambassador Andaluz; he's Lucas's uncle. Oh, dirt! You don't know Lucas. Or messire the Cardinal. We have to talk! I've been working as a Memory. Messire Andaluz, may my sister come in the coach with us?"

Andaluz smiled. "Of course, child."

"We'll have to take Charnay up to the square with us. Charnay! Get over here, you dumb Rat. And then there's the HyenaElish, you have got to meet her, she's wonderful!"

The black-haired Katayan smiled tolerantly.

"Another one of your true loves, Zar'? Messire Ambassador, I apologize for my sister. I would be extremely grateful for your hospitality; there are matters that I wish to discuss. I have some informal status as plenipotentiary envoy from South Katay."

Andaluz lifted his head, scenting on the breeze something at once sweet and nauseous. It faded. He looked around at the sun and the sea and the white marble of the docks, deserted now but for the last travelers on the Boat, walking away into the city. The brown Rat had her snout lowered, listening to something that the clerk explained with short abrupt gestures. Andaluz saw both of them glance up the steps towards the airfield sands.

"You've walked in on a critical moment, Madam Elish-hakku-zekigal. I think the wisest thing that I can offer you and your sister is the protection of the Embassy Compound."

"Oh, what!" Zar-bettu-zekigal stepped away from her sister, planting her fists on her narrow hips. "I have to find the Hyena and Messire Plessiez. I've got work to do!"

"I really would advise-"

A screech ripped into his ear. Andaluz jerked around, one hand automatically clapped over his left ear, blinded by the sun off the lagoon-harbor. A blaze of red and yellow flapped in his face. He stumbled back.

A new voice called: "Careful! You'll frighten him! Here, Ehecatl; here, boy."

The brilliant-feathered bird scuttered in the air, circled, and fell to perch on the shoulder of a woman who stood halfway down the gangplank. Andaluz brushed furiously at his guano-spotted doublet and breeches.

"Madam, I really must protest!"

"Really? Then, please don't let me stop you." The woman tapped her way down the gangplank, leaning on a bamboo cane.

Andaluz looked down at her as she approached. Skin shining a pale ochre, braided hair shining white, she stood barely as tall as his collar-bone. Lines wrinkled about her eyes as she smiled up at him, a woman some years short of sixty.

"Sir, I apologize. The journey's been hard, and I fear I've not arrived in time. Elish, help me with my baggage, please. I have two trunks on deck. Can you and yoursister, is it?fetch them down here?"

The young Katayan gaped, then followed the elder with trepidation up the gangplank and leaned over to grab two cases, careful not to set a foot on the deck of the Boat. Andaluz rubbed his mouth thoughtfully, managing to conceal a chuckle.

"Sir, I don't know who you are." The parakeet clung to her shoulder, guano spotting the crimson, purple and orange-patterned linen robes that swathed her. A small humming-bird hovered around her head, brilliant blue; and from a fold in the robes at her breast a dusty sparrow peered out.

"Candovard Ambassador, madam. My name is Andaluz. Welcome to-"

"An ambassador? How marvelous! Just the man I wanted to see." She snapped her fingers. "Elish, help your little sister, will you? Those cases must not be damaged, and they're heavy. Now, messireAndaluz, is it?kindly call me a carriage, and make sure that the horses are lively. I've much to do."

The woman tapped past Andaluz, his clerk and the brown Rat. Andaluz caught a glimpse of gold sandals under the trailing robes. Sprays of scarlet-and-blue feathers had been braided into her long white plait. Now three bright humming-birds hovered in the air around her.

"Make haste!" She snapped her fingers again, and the two Katayan women fell in behind her, each with a small brass-bound trunk on her shoulder.

"Madam, I-" Andaluz moved forward, and found himself running up the quay steps to catch up with the woman. "I don't think you understand. It's dangerous to be on the streets today. If you'll come with me to my Residence . . ."

Breath failed him at the top of the marble steps. The small woman paused, looking up at him with eyes bright and amber as the parakeet's. Laughter shifted in the lines of her round face. Shadows fell across her: high and distant, circling wings. Andaluz glanced up into an empty sky. When he looked down, the shadows remained.

Speaking with an inborn respect for magia, he asked: "Lady, may I know your name?"

The older Katayan woman shouldered her trunk, sweating in the heat, and said: "Messire Ambassador, this is the Lady of the Birds."

"Luka to you, young man. Now . . ."

She smiled, disclosing crooked but white teeth, and rested her light hand on Andaluz's; a smile of such sweetness that he forgot his breathlessness and concern.

"First," the Lady Luka said, "I need to find my son. I believe he's here in the heart of the world. You may know of him. He's a Lord-Architect. His name is Baltazar Casaubon."

The acolytes swarmed, their flight warping sky and light.

Warm dust skirled about the White Crow's ankles, blowing across the lichen-covered steps. Heat slammed back at her from the stone. Swinging the backpack from her shoulders and squatting, frog-like, she rummaged for a strip of paper written over with characters.

"C,mon, girl, come on; you haven't got all day-"

Echoes of her mutter clicked back double and triple from the Fane of the Decan of Noon and Midnight. Arches, pinnacles and buttresses reared above and around, blackening all the north-aust sky. She irritably rubbed the hair out of her eyes; pinned the thin strip of paper in a tight four-way loop about the hilt of her rapier.

A cracked elderly voice called: "Here's another fool! Another one as mad as you are, young Candia!"

She risked a glance down the steps. The abandoned scaffolding shimmered in the heat. The path ran back between pyramids of bricks, gleaming like black tar under the sun; vanished among abandoned piles of halfdressed masonry. At the foot of the steps of the Fane a man stumbled as he walked, supported by the arm and shoulder of a white-haired woman.

The White Crow stood. "Get up here. No, don't argue; get up here in the shelter of the arch. I don't know who the hell you are, but if you want to stay alive to regret this, move!"

She slung the pack up on her shoulders and gripped the hilt of her sword. The corded grip fitted her palm easily, smoothly; with the hard feel of something right and fitting. She raised her head.

High above, circling, swarming, no larger than birds or insects at this distance, acolytes flew restlessly up from pinnacles, gutters, high Gothic arches. One beast swept low, gargoyle-wings outspread, bristle tail lashing the air. High-pitched humming chittered in the heat.

"Oh shit . . . move!"

A small old woman in a blue dress limped up the steps, one arm tightly hooked about a fair-haired man in his thirties. The White Crow grabbed the man's arm, thrust him under the overhanging carving of the great arched door; reached a hand to the old woman and dodged back with her, eyes still fixed on the sky. The acolyte hovered, wings beating, raising up dust.

"Saw you on the road behind me. What in gods' names possessed you to come here?"

"We might ask you the same thing, missy."

The man's voice, amazed, said: "She's a Scholar-Soldier."

Heat reflected back from the dizzying heights of stone above, and from the great brass-hinged wooden doors. The White Crow coughed, smelling a sweetness of roses. She risked an eye-watering glance at the sun. Overhead: closing fast with noon.

"Not fast enough. Now, there's an irony." Her pulse thundered away the minutes, beating in her head. She fingered the talismans with a sweat-slick hand, magia protecting against heat, not against fear. "And if the damn place is closed anyway-"

"Where were you?"

Startled at the man's intensity, she backed a step or two into the archway and glanced up at him. Fair hair flopped across his bruised-looking eyes. With one hand he made an attempt to pull a stained and stinking doublet into some kind of order, a gesture that degenerated into helplessness. His blue eyes glared.

"Why didn't you come to the university a month ago?"

Warm alcohol-stinking breath hit the White Crow in the face. Turning, eyes on the wheeling gargoyle-shape now riding an updraught, she snapped: "Should I have?"

"We sent out messages for a Scholar-Soldier! We tried to contact the Invisible College for months!"

"Damn." She stopped dead. "Are you Candia? I've been asking Evelian about you-"

"Now wait just one moment." The old woman's face creased into a frown, smoky-blue eyes darkening with anger. "Do I understand you, Reverend Master? You've been in contact with these vagabond scholar-mercenaries? In direct contravention of university regulations? And just who are we?"

The man lurched forward. The White Crow grabbed his shoulder one-handed, found herself supporting half the man's weight. Now four shadows wheeled and skittered across the stone steps.

"Get back, rot you!"

Her left hand throbbed. She thrust him back, gripping the rapier, eyes never leaving the movements above, point mirroring flight by instinct and long practice.

His voice came from behind her. "We prayed you'd come in with the new intake, a month ago. When I told Bishop Theodoret there was no one . . ."

Something that might have been a sob or a gasp of pain interrupted; his voice picked up after a second.

"I have to rescue him or kill him now, lady. Where were you?"

"Me? I've been here all along. The Invisible College never has been the best-organized-"

Cold air screeched across her skin; she whirled, thrust upward, darted back. The blade sank home, ripped free. A bristle-tail lashed the steps. White stone chips flew up, stinging her cheek. The lichen on the steps began to glow with a yellow luminescence. The beat of wings hissed in the air. Dark bodies dropped down from the soaring flock.

"We're going to miss noon by minutes." Frustrated, she stared down at the heat-soaked abandoned building site; seeking cover, seeing only temporary salvation. Feeling through the soles of her feet the magia in the depths, necromancy boiling to crisis, that stirred the servants of the Fane to bloodlust. "Minutes, unfortunately, will be enough. Damn, I think he was right: the Fane is closed."

A spot of blood dripped from the rapier to her bare foot. She winced at the caustic impact. Waiting: waiting for the circles of Time to slide and interlock, mesh into the Noon that will open the Fane-of-the-Twelfth-Decan to mortals. Eyes running water, she stared up through circling wings at the sun still minutes short of midday.

"Girl!"

The White Crow swung round. The old woman stood at the great carved doors, one veined hand just leaving the bronze ring. At her touch the black wooden slab swung open a yard, and another. Sun-dusty beams of light slanted into the interior of the Fane.

"It's not time!"

Above, the chittering rose to shrieking-pitch. Dark wings tumbled across an air suddenly yellow and sere.

"Heurodis," the woman said, folding a thin strip of metal and secreting it back in her cotton sleeve. "Reverend Mistress, University of Crime. I have no intention of waiting out here to be attacked."

The White Crow wiped her sweating face, pushing the silvered red hair back behind her ears. Aware that her mouth gaped open, she shut it firmly; caught the blond man's elbow in her free hand, and stepped smartly after the old woman, shoving the door to with her heel as she crossed the threshold into the Fane.

Silence shattered.

Raggedly at first, then in a roar, a hundred thousand men and women began to cheer.

"And now!" Falke gripped the loudspeaker microphone tightly. "The Feast of Misrule's truly started! With our strike-carnival!"

The square rippled.

His silk eye-bandage blurred Fourteenth District's great square with black. Textures of cloth overwove the sunlight, snared the blue sky in threads. Falke blinked, strained vision.

The mass of people seethed.

He clenched his own hand at his side, seeing so many arms flung up, so many hands waving. Sweat ran down between his shoulder-blades; the heat of his mail-shirt robbing him of breath. Cheering racketed back from the distant facades of buildings.

"Listen to that!"

"I hear it." The Hyena jostled his elbow, steel vambrace hard and hot in the sun. Through his shielding silk the visor of her helm flashed as she slid it up; red-brown eyes sharp. "I see it. Now?"

"Now." He wiped the sweat from his forehead, grinning. Abruptly he signaled.

Shadowless heat hammered him from the north-aust.

All this fifth side of the square lay demolished. Mansions torn down, ragged edges of brick and masonry and dug-up foundations cast aside in great heaps. Cranes and earth-movers rested, poised. He rubbed the silk tighter against his face, through blurred vision making out the sixty-acre clearance, the scaffolding at its entranceand the great block of granite held in a cradle of rope and steel wire.

"Now, my baby . . ."

He shook his head and chuckled. A wind blew from the square behind him, carrying the smell of human sweat, of beer and sharp wine and the powder from muskets.

"Now's our time."

The rope cradle creaked, inching round. He squinted at the cranes, unable to see the workers. Only the yellow-and-white Salomon colors. He paced four steps along, four steps back, booted heels kicking.