INTERLUDE I

Grigio put his quill back in his pot and stretched the ache out of his scaled hand. He had never written so many words in such a short space of time. Ink stained his short claws and fingers. Already a thick sheaf of hide lay before him. Beyond the stained glass window of his chamber, the warm daylight was beginning to die. Shadows of encroaching evening clouds moved across the carnage in the room. The glow behind the glass had become rosy.

Dwellin Dorr had stopped speaking at last. In the silence, the blood-spattered woman was busy staring with a scowl into the dying fireplace, as if she watched her memories burn. At least she’d had the decency to drag the prosecutor’s corpse from the fire several hours ago, and pile him with the others in a corner.

Grigio’s gaze wandered over the dead and the pools of blood. His expensive rug was now utterly ruined, one half of it stained crimson. Inch by inch, his eyes crept to the doorway. It was ajar. A pale, dead hand missing several fingers lay in its gap. Grigio contemplated the distance, and how quickly he could cross the room, open the door, and reach the corridor beyond. It was a deadly gamble, and one that made his chest pound. The woman had dispatched his guards in half a dozen brutal heartbeats. Beneath his chair, Grigio turned his slippered feet to face the door, but that was all the effort he made. It wasn’t just the threat of Dwellin’s cleaver to the face that held him back. It was a damnable curiosity. A scribe’s curiosity. The tale was not over, and the crafty woman had hooked the writer within him.

When his stare shifted back to the murderous individual sitting hunched on his bed, Grigio found Dwellin’s lavender eyes now upon him. There was a smirk on her thin lips.

‘Oh dear, Grigio. You wouldn’t be thinking of trying to escape now, would you? Tut tut. You were doing such a fine job of keeping up as well. Tell the truth, and that’s something I don’t often dispense to just anyone, I was just starting to warm to you. But, if that’s what you wish, you’ll be thrilled to hear there are quicker ways of setting you free,’ Dwellin informed him. For the first time, she shifted the grey cloak and revealed a rust-red pistol at her side. ‘Much, much quicker ways.’

‘Not at all… I…’ Grigio trailed off, watching the smile spread across Dwellin’s face. To the relief of his churning gut, she hid the pistol away once more.

‘Probably for the best. Besides, I don’t think somebody of your sheltered lifestyle would be happy to see the mess I’ve made of your tower.’ Dwellin made an awkward face, lips pulling to her jawline. She put a hand to her cheek as if she was whispering. ‘And trust me, it’s quite the mess. Your guards were very keen to keep me out.’

Grigio gulped as he agreed with a nod. ’According to you, you’re used to mess.’

‘Ha! You have no idea. The entire Holy Realms are a mess, and no thanks to me.’

‘So, what happened after Aberan betrayed you? Did you follow him? Is that it?’

Dwellin snorted. ‘What kind of tale would this be if I left it hanging from a cliff’s edge? There is plenty more to come, don’t you worry, my fidgety Grigio. I’m surprised you haven’t worn a hole in that chair with your arse-cheeks yet,’ she said. ‘Go on: indulge me, what do you think? What does the Realms’ finest scribe have to say about my story?’

‘It’s quite the story, I’ll admit. A fine fantasy.’

Dwellin beamed. ‘You don’t believe it, do you?’

Grigio knew better than most the power of words and their order. He knew the wrong ones could slit his throat just like the piled prosecutors. ‘To speak honestly, I have never heard anything of what you’ve spoken about. The Ashlands, yes. I’ve seen Canarva on maps. Reverent Lectra I know. But of godgear shards, that Riveno’s uprising, and a prophecy of the end of the Holy Realms? Nothing.’

‘Fantasy,’ Dwellin chuckled. ‘The difference between fact and fantasy is faith. Believe in something enough and it can come true.’

She got to her feet, making Grigio cower into his desk. She sauntered past him, running her long nails across his desk.

‘You can relax. Keep your backside on that chair and keep a quill in your hand, and you’ll live to see the end of this. Hopefully,’ Dwellin sighed, standing at the stained window. The day’s dying light cast a kaleidoscope of yellow, blue, and green across her pale face. ‘How long have you been in this tower, locked away serving the Venerance?’

Grigio bowed his head, rubbing at his inked hands. ‘Forty years.’

‘A long time, even for you long-lived Drola,’ Dwellin mused. She shoved the window pane open, letting in the wailing of gulls and the squeak of cliff-bats. Far beneath the tower, the thrumming of ocean waves could be heard. The breeze was chill compared to the muggy heat in the room. ‘Fuck me; at least this prison has a view.’

‘This isn’t a prison. I’m not locked up in here, I’ll have you know. I can leave when I want.’

Dwellin had a glint in her eyes. ‘Then why haven’t you?’

Grigio had. Several times, in fact, when he had first come to the tower as a child. The governesses and minders that were now long-gone had always brought him back, plopped him down on his stool, and put his snout back in his books, time and time again. Even now, the prosecutors followed him on his cliff-top walks. Never was the tower out of sight.

‘My uncle tells me it is for my safety and protection. That there are many people who would like to hurt me,’ Grigio answered her, finding enough confidence to scowl. ‘And apparently he was right.’

‘And why is that, scribe? Why would anyone want to hurt little old you?’

Grigio sat straighter, quoting the reason he had heard far too many times to recall. There was pride in his calling and he wanted this woman to know it. ‘Because of who I am and what I do.’

‘I’ve cut the throats of many an important person, but never was one of them a scribe. Never a quill-pusher who pens propaganda for the Venerance in the form of fables and fairytales. Curious, if you ask me.’

‘Call it what you want, murderer. It’s important work,’ Grigio whispered, feeling the heat in his scaled cheeks. The excuse had lost its meaning over the decades, but he had no other.

Dwellin showed her teeth again. ‘We’ll see, my scaly friend. We’ll see.’

Grigio’s stomach rumbled quietly, but not quiet enough to go unnoticed.

‘Important and hungry it seems!’ announced Dwellin. ‘You’re not alone. I’m bloody famished. Murdering is hungry work, you know. What have you got to eat in this spire of yours?’

‘I… I don’t know. The cooks brings my meals to me.’

‘Of course they do. Not any more though. You can’t cook for shit when you’re lying in a pool of your own blood,’ Dwellin said, wagging a finger. She slammed the stubby point of her cleaver into the floor, leaving it to waggle back and forth. She strode to the door, kicked the corpse out of the way. Grigio caught a glimpse of a red-painted corridor and the curled or sprawled figures of guards and servants he had known for years. One of the slain had been pinned to a wall with his own spear.

‘Be right back,’ Dwellin informed him before slamming the door. ‘I’d stay here if I were you.’

No sooner had the door slammed than Grigio burst from his desk and ran to the door. The narrow view of the keyhole showed him the woman disappearing down the stairwell, whistling to herself. She was right: the corridor was a kind of carnage he had never seen. The bile rose up in his throat at the sight of a half of a prosecutor. As for where the other half was…

Grigio stumbled from the door to vomit in the corner. Wiping his lips, he dashed to the open window instead. ‘This is no prison,’ he repeated to himself, as he stared out at the view he had spent years examining and watching between the lines of his tales. He had watched ten thousand sunsets fade behind the sharp rocks and endless ocean. He had seen the waters eat at the cliffs in tiny morsels with every wave that crashed with thunder and spray. He had watched the rolling grass swathes change colour, bloom, and die with the passing of a hundred seasons. But never had he considered how high up he truly was.

Grigio stared down at the sweeping brickwork of the fifty levels beneath him. Specks of corpses dotted the scorched dirt around the tower’s base. Before he could look away, he felt his eyes cross with vertigo. Drola do not do well with heights. That was the domain of the birdlike Esfer. The breeze buffeted him with its salt air as he reeled backwards and clung to the window pane. His choice was simple: spending another moment with the murderous woman, or taking his chances out of the window. But just because it was simple didn’t make it easy.

With muttered blasphemies and trembling claws, Grigio put one foot on the window sill, and then another. That Dwellin was right about one thing: desperation is a mighty powerful force, and it pushed him onto the ledge beyond his chambers. With the wind ruffling his frills and tugging at his silks, Grigio stood with quivering legs, claws scraped against the stone as he forced his stare from the ground and to the sky instead. Gulls wheeled around him, or perched above and squawked mockingly. His entire body shook with the pound of his heart.

Grigio didn’t have to climb down the whole way, only to the nearest window and dash through the tower. But before he could force his nervous legs to move more than a few feet, the birds above took flight in a hurry, screeching with fear. Grigio flinched, almost peeling himself from the wall. He soon spotted what caused the commotion.

An obsidian shape came tearing through the sky from the north, scattering the swarms of bats. It was headed straight for him like a winged arrow. A shriek split the evening air. Eyes stretched so wide they hurt, Grigio shuffled back to the window as quick as he could. With a cry, he tumbled over the sill and fell back into his chamber. Scrambling across his prized rug, he ran for the door, fear ruling him.

Grigio whipped the door open to find the dark maw of a pistol in his face. Dwellin poked her head out from behind it. ‘Why does nobody ever stay still when they’re told to?’ she asked.

‘I—There was a—‘

Another shriek cut through Grigio’s stammers. He turned to see the black shape fill his window. It was a drake, but larger than any he had ever seen. It spread its grey wings and emitted a strange, ululating chuckle from its needle-toothed jaws.

‘Great Watcher!’ Grigio cried, stuck between a bullet and a beast.

But neither touched him. When he had finished cowering, Grigio looked up to find Dwellin taking a bite of a pink apple. She spoke around her mouthful.

‘What’s gotten into you?’

‘What is that?’

‘You haven’t been paying attention, have you?’ Dwellin replied. ‘Grigio, meet Tasparil. Tasparil, meet our good scribe Grigio.’

The drake whined as it flicked a long tongue in Grigio’s direction.

‘He likes you,’ Dwellin said. With the pistol still in his face, she shut the door behind her and tossed Grigio an apple. He caught it awkwardly.

‘Riveno’s drake?’ he gasped. If he were human, he would have been drenched in sweat. Instead, he slumped to a heap and tried to breathe.

‘The very same,’ Dwellin informed him as she moved to pat the drake’s head. ‘Pull yourself together, scribe. There’s more writing to be done, and sadly for you, stories don’t write themselves. You author types would be out of a job. Unless of course you’ve changed your mind?’

‘No,’ Grigio admitted, defeated.

Dwellin tapped the desk with the butt of the pistol. ‘Good man. Now pick yourself up and let’s get back to it. We’ve got a long way to go.’

Grigio felt like weeping, but he did as he was told: sitting at his desk and seizing his quill. The hunger had fled his stomach. The apple perched on his desk, untouched.

‘Now, have you ever heard of the Witchfell Marshes, Grigio?’

Grigio shook his head.

‘Then allow me to introduce you to the foulest place in the Holy Realms…’