The Broken God by Gareth Hanrahan (desktop ebook reader .TXT) 📕

snarls in Baston’s face. “My cousin’s blood is the blood of the dragon, and it has been spilled on the streets. This is an unforgivable insult – and an unforgivable failure.”

Vyr sounds a lot tougher when he’s got half a dozen Eshdana backing him up. All Lyrixian by the look of them. Two of them wear black jewels on their foreheads, symbolic reminders that they’re ash-bought.

“I snuffed the bloody Jack,” snaps Baston.

“After it maimed four other men. After it nearly killed my cousin. It’s a miracle he survived. You failed to protect us.”

“It was a fucking Tallowman, Vyr,” argues Karla. “No one’s seen a candlejack in more than a year. They’re all supposed to be gone. How could we have known?”

Vyr’s gaze is reptilian in its coldness as he turns his attention to Karla. “Your absence was noted, too. You should have seen the danger. You also failed the Ghierdana.”

“I’m going to talk to Rasce,” says Karla, stepping towards the door.

“No. The doctors are attending to him.” Vyr folds his hands tightly in front of him. “Your services are no longer required by my family, and neither of you have taken the ash. If you are found on this size of the LOZ border by nightfall, your lives are forfeit. The same applies to any associates of yours.”

“I see what this is!” shouts Karla. “You’re trying to take over!” She addresses the Eshdana standing behind Vyr. “You all see it, right? You see what this shit is doing?”

“If you speak again,” says Vyr, “I shall have your tongue torn out.”

“And how are you going to get to the Fog Yards without us? None of those louts can cross the border!”

“That’s none of your concern.”

“You fucking need us, you idiot!” shouts Karla, loud enough to be heard upstairs.

“Her tongue,” orders Vyr.

One of the Eshdana lunges at Karla. Baston grabs the man’s wrist, pulls him off balance, punches him in the throat, leaves him gasping on the floor. The other Eshdana draw blades, but they hesitate to attack. Baston shakes his head. “We’ll go.”

“No!” Karla protests, but the Ghierdana close ranks. Baston takes his sister by the arm, pulls her out of the room. No one stops them walking out of the ghost-house, although the sniper on the top floor tracks them as they walk down Lanthorn Street in the pouring rain. It’s dusk already, the New City beginning to glow faintly beneath their feet.

“Little Ghierdana shit,” complains Karla. “He’ll have the fucking leeches bleed Rasce dead. What a disaster!” She keeps ranting all the way down the street, but Baston’s hardly listening.

“Where,” he asks, “do you think that Tallowman came from?”

“I don’t know. What, you think Vyr sent it? Where would Vyr get a Tallowman?”

The idea is nonsense. The things were made by the alchemists’ guild, hired out to Guerdon’s city watch. Each Tallowman was human once, a condemned thief. Heinreil’s bargain with the alchemists meant the old Brotherhood paid a secret tithe to the guild – as long as Heinreil handed over a few bodies every month for the vats, the Brotherhood was permitted to continue its criminal ways. But Heinreil’s in prison, and the vats were shut down years ago, the monsters banished from the city. The alchemists are banned from making new ones, too. There are still a few left, Baston’s heard, guarding the new factories, but there shouldn’t be any on the streets.

It was an old Tallowman, its wax thin and flaky. The things had to be remade every few weeks to replenish their waxy bodies. Could this one have somehow survived all those months, rotting in some attic? But why attack Rasce? No, far more plausible is that someone must have activated an old Tallowman, relit its wick and sent it on a new mission. But who else knew that Rasce would be visiting Craddock & Sons? We only require information from you, nothing more. If action is warranted, we have our own resources.

The thought weighs heavily on Baston’s shoulders. He tries to tell himself that it’s not his fight – if Duttin and her cabal want to plot against the Ghierdana, it’s none of his concern. He hasn’t taken the ash, neither has Karla. And any prospect of an alliance between the Brotherhood and the invaders is dead now, washed away into the gutters up on Philosopher’s Street.

The coil inside him snaps. The machine’s finally broken.

To hell with them all.

“Tell our lot,” says Baston, “that they need to get back to the Wash before nightfall. I’m going home to rest up.”

“Are you all right?” asks Karla, face full of concern.

“Just a few cuts.”

“I won’t be back tonight,” she says, “but I’ll see you tomorrow. We’ll figure out what to do next.”

Baston descends, trading the strange, shimmering heights of the New City for what should be the familiar streets of the Wash. The streets of his boyhood, the streets he knew, now turned monstrous. He steps over rubble, passes buildings scarred by claws or bullets or explosion. Skirts around pools of rainwater – the razor-edged water of the Kraken has mostly retreated, but he’s seen unwary travellers cut their feet to ribbons by splashing through the wrong puddle. The Ishmerian temples are crowded this evening – he can hear the chanting of the priests, the ecstatic responses of the crowds. He wonders if there’s some reason behind this intensity. Have the Ishmerians won some victory in some other part of the Godswar or is it one of their seemingly unending parade of holy days? Flames leap from the great sacrificial brazier atop Smoke Painter’s pyramid, hissing and crackling far above, lighting up the rooftops. He passes the former cathedral of St Storm, now a temple to the Kraken. Dark shapes swim on the far side of the stained-glass windows. Kraken-cultists shamble past him along the alleyways that run down to the sea. They look bloated, the touch of the god slowly turning them into something inhuman.

The dockside taverns are busy, too, crowded with people sheltering