Chapter 20

POWER

It didn’t take long for me to realise the problem with power is that once you claim even the smallest scrap of it, you constantly want more. Now, don’t tell me it’s not true, reader, and if you insist, then I believe you are either some sort of saint or, once again, a liar.

My first week in the Dark Harbour was spent working furiously. Well… let’s be honest: Grothu and the lackeys did most of the working. I, for once in my guttersnipe life, did the ordering about. Me. If you’ve ever been in a similar position, you’ll know how damnably marvellous it can be. No wonder I took such an immediate liking to it. But fear not, I made sure to haul my weight here and there just to show them I was no cruel layabout like their previous boss. Not a lot, mind you. However, within days, I also began to see what Do Larasta had suffered before I came strolling in, and how his sluggish and stone-hearted ways had come about.

How? Because there was not one under my employ that wasn’t a fucking idiot.

And I’m being kind there, trust me on that. Listen: I had to tell one of them that a mop was not meant for a ceiling. Grothu painted the walls as if he attacked them for insulting his mother and got more paint on the floor than where it was supposed to go. Another smashed so many different objects with so many different angles of his body that I put him outside to watch the door for two days straight until the Dark Harbour was only darkened by my presence, and not dust, grime, rotten food, and dirt trodden in by my lumbering morons.

The cooks of this so-called alehouse were the worst of all. Sloppier than the regurgitated shit they served and called food. I won’t tell you what I found in the larders. Some details are too gruesome even for a story like this one. What you should know is that I cleaned them to the sheen of a swordsaint’s armour and silenced some of the grumbling lackeys with food I wagered the Dark Harbour hadn’t served in decades. I resuscitated old recipes I had learned in Wrekham’s mansion and stole others from market cooks in Turrow and the Fadings. Herbed salamander stews. Scarlet melon and a strange black cheese similar to Canarva rind. Soups of fried fish and kelp. Snake eggs mashed with scalespice. Stuffed snail boiled in wines. I could go on, but I know many are bored by some kind of lengthy description of a feast. I happen to like them in my tales, I’ll have you know.

Within two weeks, I created what Malyka called a fine business. She was right. I felt like a baron of my own making. Curious patrons began coming to eat my food rather than drinking alone. Shells began to trade hands. The cathouses Do Larasta owned were of no interest to me, and so I let them run themselves for a fee of protection. It seemed the smart thing to do, and it made the Dark Harbour a dozen idiots lighter for most of the day. The locked trunk Grothu had broken his way into was soon filling up with gems once more.

And yet, at the end of those days, I still found myself on a rooftop overlooking the Academy of the Prophesied, impatient and unfulfilled as ever. Distractions have a habit of wearing off, and I drummed my fingernails on the roof tiles with one hand, and in the other, I thumbed the intricate surface of the godgear shard. I was glad it was Augur-made and not of the Realms; I would have worn it into sand already.

I stared at the painted glass of the Academy’s walls with a deep scowl. Malyka had told me how power had emanated from a swordsaint or alchemage. I had scoffed and yet, ignore it as I might, my skin tingled whenever I stood near the building.

‘I thought I would find you up ’ere,’ said a voice behind me. Malyka’s voice: soft and slurred as though she had been at the Canarva rum I’d bought once again. ‘That’s four times this week. This brother of yours must be pretty bloody dire.’

‘You have no idea.’

‘You ever going to tell me about it, Dwellin?’

‘Maybe I will, one day once I’ve won,’ I replied. ‘But for now, do you think there’s more power in there?’ I gestured at the Academy before sliding my hand across the cityscape to the obnoxiously large Venerance temple and the marble warehouses that the Venerance stored their blightpowders that came in by the cruiser-load. ‘Or in there?’

‘What you chattin’ about, Dwellin?’

‘I’ve been thinking.’

‘Watcher. I’ve come to learn that’s a dangerous thing to do.’

She wasn’t wrong. ‘Who would win in a battle between a swordsaint and an alchemage?’ I had spent many hours wondering which one Aberan would turn out to be.

‘Bloody good question,’ Malyka pondered as she took out a glass bottle of rum. ‘Both are powerful. Both are prophesised. Prosephied. Prophesied, I mean. Damn rum. Always goes straight for the lips and tongue.’

I clapped my hands. ‘Focus.’

‘Right. Well, one gets a godgear weapon and one gets magic through that special Venerance powder. Both as rare and as few as each other,’ Malyka said. ‘I don’t know, seeing as nobody’s seen one fight the other.’

I had, and yet I wanted a different answer to the question. ‘So you’re saying they’re equal?’

Malyka grinned. ‘I suppose I am. What’s in that drake’s nest of a mind of yours now?

‘I’m wondering where you find Blight in this city. And if there’s somebody who knows about godgears that isn’t Venerance. I have more questions that need answers. Ones I’ve been waiting to hear since I left Canarva.’

‘You know you’re in Bashkar, right? This city is infested with the Blight and its powders. Dor’Jiri, Phaeta, or Barcalos are the ones to go to. And if you want those who know about Augur stuff, then there’s the Dinge, I suppose. Clangtown Carnival. But that’s Anvilskin territory…’

She noticed my smile.

‘Watcher’s cock, I know that look. I shouldn’t have said anythin’, should I?’ she groaned. ‘Should have just kept quiet.’

‘You come to join me in my scowling, or was there something you needed?’ I asked.

Malyka clicked her fingers. ‘Yes. Chaos Club. They’ve answered your message about the shells Do Larasta owed them. Dor’Jiri’s captain’s coming to the Dark ’Arbour at nine bells.’

I eyed the rising moons and the dying sun. I had an hour. It would take that much to worm through the Guttervale. ‘Good,’ I said, even though it took me much to pull myself away from my scowling.

‘Oh. Almost forgot. The idiots managed to find what you asked for, by the way. Only took ’em a week.’ Malyka held up a bundle, unwrapping it to show off a soot-grey mask that covered half the face, leaving only the mouth. The metal was carved with faint scales. ‘Why do you want a mask, anyway?’

‘Adds to the whole aesthetic,’ I muttered.

‘What?’

I wanted to tell her it was that Lectra knew my name and my face. That I didn’t want her interfering with my plans until I was ready for her to do so. If she was so connected to the Vale as I suspected, nobody could know me yet.

‘It’s a signature. A mystery that throws them off.’ I said my excuses. ‘Besides, if I’m playing the game, why not have some fun with it?’

Malyka dribbled rum down her chin as she tried to nod while drinking.

*

I don’t know what I expected from the name Chaos Club. Part of me expected them to walk in with live fire burning on their shoulders. Another part expected something distinctly and unimaginatively spiky. Perhaps an outfit of red and black.

I was entirely wrong. As I sat there at my table, risen above the floor, with my mask on and Tasparil perched on my shoulder, Scramp and Malyka either side of me, the minions of Dor’Jiri The Brute entered.

The Chaos Club were clad all in green and copper. Those that wore armour looked to me as if every piece had been stolen from a different suit. Every one of them looked as though they’d spent decades working mines or factories, or some kind of work that involved lifting heavy things over and over. Each of the dozen that approached me showed off some kind of swollen muscle, from arm to leg to a tree-trunk neck, to one man who had decided to cut holes in his trews to show off an arse that was frankly disturbingly vast.

I watched my own lackeys bristle and try their best to look intimidating. I’d made them all wear black for the occasion. Cliched, you might think, but black is uniform. Ominous. Good for sneaking about. And slimming, too, but most importantly, the complete opposite of the Venerance.

The lackeys had obeyed. All except one of them, who had forgotten completely and wore overalls of a pathetic faint blue and a shade of red on his cheeks as he was faced down by a hillock of a Chaos Club member.

It was easy to spot Dor’Jiri’s captain. The muscled lout wore finer armour than the rest, covered in sharp studs and rivets. Hoops of metal adorned his eyebrows and jaw. Despite my orders, he had kept ahold of his weapon. It was a doubled-ended spear that he spun on the floorboards, drilling a little hole as he did so. I kept my half-smile. Not too welcoming, not too sour.

‘Message said you had an apology for us to collect,’ he said gruffly.

‘If by apology you mean shells that Do Larasta owed you, then yes.’

‘Where is Larasta? You his new bitch?’

Tasparil squawked on my behalf. ‘Larasta’s gone. The Dark Harbour’s under new management.’

‘Whose?’

‘Mine. I was the one who sent the message, and the shells are a gesture of goodwill. I want to make friends, not enemies, and your master Dor’Jiri sounds like a good friend to make.’

The Chaos Club captain bared teeth that had been sharpened into fangs. ‘And who are you behind that mask?’

I tapped the covering that clung to my face. The metal was cold and refusing to warm. ‘Midnight,’ I said, harking back to the name I’d given Voldo in Shrewn. Much more suited than my fake name of Yver Brokenshell. I had a part to play in this underworld of the Guttervale and I would play it well.

‘Midnight,’ the captain repeated.

‘And you? You have a name?’

‘Kost, first captain to Dor’Jiri,’ he said, idly picking at his teeth. ‘Where are these shells then?’

‘All business, I see,’ I said.

‘We aren’t paid to wag our tongues, Midnight. We came here for shells. Give us the shells.’

‘Maybe your boss will be more talkative.’

Kost snorted. ‘You want to talk to Dor’Jiri?’

‘That I do. I want to trade. And I only want to trade with him, not his captain.’

Kost slammed his spear into the floor. I had half a mind to charge him for the damage. ‘The Brute’s got more important people to deal with than you,’ he said.

‘Do Larasta didn’t deal in Blight, and he was stupid for that reason alone. I’m quite the opposite. Plenty of people in this part of the Vale want the powder and I’m happy to give it to them. Doesn’t your boss want to make some extra shells?’

Kost rubbed his nose, looking about the Harbour. ‘I’ll bring him the message. See what he says.’

‘I’d rather go see him now. My time’s precious,’ I answered.

Kost grumbled. ‘You’re demanding for a smalltime brat. The Brute could crush the wind out of you with his finger and thumb.’

I sighed as if he bored me. ‘I’ll take my chances. You going to take me to him or not?’

Kost made a big show of sighing and tutting. ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘Shells first.’

‘Grothu,’ I spoke.

The big Ashlander came huffing and puffing from the adjoining room. He and another idiot dragged a small chest between them. They barely made it into the room before the Chaos Club muscled in to take over. Kost looked at the contents, counting a dozen shells before he got bored.

‘Keep up,’ he muttered before leading us out of the Dark Harbour. I left Tasparil behind to guard my seat. Grothu had a habit of sitting in it. I swore the little bastard was growing bigger from all the food he was getting since Catacrone.

Complaining amongst themselves, the brawny dozen led us between the Turrow streets. They were sullen guides, but they were true to their word. Malyka and Scramp were the only ones with doubts.

‘Midnight?’

‘Don’t you like it?’ I grinned.

Malyka wagged her head back and forth. ‘So remind me, why are we doing this again? I have to warn you, I don’t think your silver tongue will work on Dor’Jiri the same as Do Larasta. The man’s a moron and unpredictable. Dangerous. And dealin’ Blight isn’t what I expected from you. It’s a dangerous trade and sure to get the Venerance noticin’ us. That what you want?’

‘Good. And I should warn you to stop expecting anything from me, Malyka.’

‘Yeah, I’m learnin’ that.’

‘It’s just like I said to Kost. The Dark Harbour needs friends to stop somebody from doing the same thing I did to Do Larasta. Dor’Jiri could give us some safety while I work on the rest.’

‘And what about the powder?’

‘Something to lure him in. Business.’

‘Hmm,’ replied Malyka. Scramp gave me a burble of doubtful noise. ‘If you say so.’

I paid attention to our path instead. We emerged from the Fadings and burrowed down into the Dinge, skirting the waterfall that delved into the dark earth and turning a sharp right in between the pillars. Stairs led us further down, out of sight of the mighty roof and into cramped streets full of cloth and patterned rugs. Beyond, the dark welcomed us. Blightlamps and candled lanterns lit our way instead of sunlight.

Kost kept looking over his shoulder to make sure we were still close. Perhaps hoping we were lost. I saw Malyka and Scramp stiffen the deeper we went and the closer to Dor’Jiri’s lair we drew.

Our first sign that we’d arrived were the battlerings. Before Malyka told me their name, I had already figured out what they were from the baying crowds milling around them, and their occupants beating the living shit out of each other with either fists or weapons. Cheers rang out with every wet smack and splash of blood. Bodies that were either unconscious or with their faces smashed in were hauled off into tunnels burning with torches.

‘Dor’Jiri runs every battlering in the Guttervale,’ Malyka informed me. ‘And if he doesn’t, it isn’t a ring worth watching. He makes vaults of shells off the bets.’

I watched, absorbing every swing and blow from the rings as we passed. Each battlering had a domed cage of metal wire and wood stretched over it. There was no escape except through victory or defeat, and because of that, I knew how the fighters felt. I paused briefly to watch a thick Esfer fellow beat a dozen colours of pain out of an Ashlander before I followed on.

Dor’Jiri’s lair was an open pit full of tables meant for betting. It looked like a theatre back in Canarva, which was to say it was no more than a large bowl set into the streets. Fifty tables or more must have been spread across its tiers. People massed around them from every angle. They waved shells and writs of promise at arm’s length and yelled their bets at workers who somehow looked at home in the chaos.

Dor’Jiri himself held court at the lair’s highest point, sitting in a throne of metal and battered wood. A queue of fighters gathered in front of him, and he painted them different colours with a long paintbrush as they passed by.

I had been told Dor’Jiri was called the Brute, but as I laid eyes on him, I realised the description was severely lacking. The man was a giant, and like Midge, he must have had some Orka blood in his Drola veins. He must have been six feet tall just sitting and was easily three times my width. His green-scaled arms alone were thicker than the pillars of the Dark Harbour. They strained against the copper bands that ringed his limbs from shoulder to wrist. A green tunic was taut over the rest of him.

Judging by the way the Brute snapped at and struck the fighters and his constant jowly frown, he was a fellow of little patience. But it was his hands that occupied my stare. At each wrist, his flesh stopped dead, as if his hands had been sliced off at some point in his past. In their place were metal replacements. A savage steel hook protruded from one wrist. The other held a pincer that clutched the paintbrush.

The man was so fucking impressive I had a moment of doubt. I felt the same as I had when Forince pinned me up against the wall in Canarva. Powerless.

I waited trepidatiously amongst the calamitous tables for Kost to slink up the steps and approach Dor’Jiri. I saw the captain point at me, and I saw Dor’Jiri’s frown deepen for a moment before clearing like a dawn sky, presumably – and hopefully – at the mention of blightpowder. With his sharpened hook that was larger than my face, he beckoned us forwards. Kost retreated with a huff, looking cheated of his violence.

‘Dor’Jiri,’ I said in a loud voice meant to rise above the commotion and tell the Brute I wasn’t scared. It wasn’t quite a lie. I hadn’t suffered a lot of fear between the water-witch and the nightmares of Catacrone, but approaching this monster gave me a knot in my gut and prickled my skin.

‘Dor’Jiri,’ Kost introduced us, ‘Meet Midnight. She’s taken over Do Larasta’s ground.’

The Brute’s voice was the sound of thunder trapped in a barrel. ‘Kost say you want to be friends.’

‘If it’s worthwhile for the both of us, then yes. That I do. You seem like a good friend to have in the Guttervale.’

Dor’Jiri daubed a particularly dangerous-looking fighter with a distinct lack of ears with red paint before answering me. ‘What is worthwhile? What you want?’ boomed the monster.

I looked around at the fighters and the milling people behind us. Dor’Jiri understood and waved his giant hook to dismiss his fighters. The Chaos Club muscled the gamblers and their tables closer together. Curtains of chainmail and green cloth were drawn. Dor’Jiri spent the moments with his hand out straight, letting a withered woman as grey as ash change his paintbrush hand to one of steel and moulded like a pointing finger. The woman placed the old attachment in a case and bowed as she retreated.

The Brute waved us closer still, within reaching distance of his hook. ‘Spit it out,’ he ordered.

‘A simple offer for you,’ I said in a quiet tone. ‘You provide me with fine green blightpowder and I’ll sell it on your behalf in Turrow.’

‘You Venerance? You try to trick Dor’Jiri?’

‘Hardly. I have no love for the Venerance.’

The Brute scratched at his pointed ears. ‘We already sell in Turrow.’

‘Not like I could,’ I replied. I could feel Malyka looking at me.

‘And who are you, Midnight?’

‘Somebody better for business than Do Larasta. Somebody who wants to make something of themselves.’

‘This, Dor’Jiri understand. Do Larasta fat and lazy. No dreams,’ the Brute nodded. ‘And how much you give Dor’Jiri?

‘One in every ten shells comes back to you.’

Dor’Jiri laughed like a storm would laugh. ‘One? You insult Dor’Jiri. Seven.’

‘Four.’

‘Six.’

‘Five.’

‘Hmph,’ grunted Dor’Jiri. ‘I like this one. You big creature in puny body.’

Although I didn’t like the insult, I appreciated the compliment. ‘Half and half.’

‘Who this beside you?’ Dor’Jiri grunted.

‘Malyka Horu’s Daughter. My captain.’

‘No,’ Dor’Jiri said as he pointed past Malyka to Scramp. ‘What is that?’

Scramp gargled something.

‘Not for sale and not for fighting,’ Malyka said sternly.

‘Shame. Would do well in rings.’

‘What do you say, Dor’Jiri?’ I pressed him carefully.

The Brute clacked his teeth together several times. ‘Dor’Jiri give you powder. Half and half like you speak. But if you deal with Dor’Jiri, you deal with Dor’Jiri. Not Mother Phaeta. Not Blightlord. Understand? No tricks.’

‘Impeccably,’ I told him.

‘And you pay for first powder. No loss for Dor’Jiri if you liar. One thousand for hundred vials.’

I had expected that. I reached within the folds of the long coat I had stolen from Do Larasta, before his ex-wives had come to loot what remained of his belongings. I had no use for his overly patterned and sickly coloured vests and shirts, but a single grey coat with red stitching was quite the pinch. There was nothing like having a wealth of pockets. Pockets are good for all manner of wicked things. In this case, it was a swollen leather bag of coloured gems. The colour never mattered with gems, but I’d made sure to pick the brightest and least scuffed.

Kost snatched the bag from my grip and took it to Dor’Jiri. He hooked it open and poked his pointed nose in to look. After much inner grumbling, he brought his wild eyes back to me. ‘Tomorrow, we bring it to you.’

‘Tomorrow?’ That was irritating, and I let it show. ‘And how do I know you’ll be true to your word, Master Dor’Jiri, and not just keep my gems?’

Big and stupid, he might have been, but he was no slug. The Brute rose from his throne in an instant, crashing his metal hands together in front of my face. ‘Dor’Jiri no liar. No cheat!’ he boomed.

I tried my hardest not to flinch. That’s all I’ll say about the emotions that raced through me.

‘Tomorrow you get what I promise. No sooner. You new face in Guttervale, Midnight. You take powder now, you probably get caught. You not know Vale like Dor’Jiri does. Don’t know Venerance patrols like Dor’Jiri does. You think so little of Dor’Jiri? Should take gems just to teach you lesson!’ he bellowed.

I bowed my head. ‘That’s not it at all. I don’t doubt you, and you shouldn’t doubt me either. You and I?’ I said. ‘I think we’ll be good friends once you see the shells I’ll bring back to you.’

Dor’Jiri’s rage vanished in a flash. A fearsome grin broke across his huge face and he dug his hook into the arm of his wooden throne. ‘You caught by Venerance, you don’t know Dor’Jiri. Understand? You snitch. You die.’

While the name Quintessi crossed my mind, I made my exit. I like to think I know when a good moment to say goodbye is, and after a moment of uncomfortable staring, this seemed like one of those perfect times. Turning on our heels, the three of us made for a gap in the curtains.

‘They come see you yet?’ Dor’Jiri yelled after us.

I looked to Malyka but she gave me a shrug. ‘Who?’

‘The devoter.’

‘And why would a Venerance devoter come to me? I run a lawful tavern,’ I asked with a sly smile. ‘And my food is good, I’ll admit, but not that g—’

‘Toll,’ Dor’Jiri chuckled. ‘All who make something of themselves like you say, and not want trouble, they pay his toll.’

With that warning echoing in my head and Kost waving us out into the mess with a wiggle of his gloved fingers, he left Dor’Jiri lounging in his throne, looking just as pleased with himself as I’d hoped.

‘Well that went better than I expected.’ Malyka breathed a sigh of relief.

That it had. ‘I’ll tell you one thing. The Venerance can go pleasure itself if it thinks I’m paying any toll, legitimate or otherwise.’

Malyka took another sip from her bottle, sighing as if she were relieved to be out of the Brute’s presence. ‘I’m with you on that. I’m startin’ to get used to havin’ a pocket full of gems instead of barterin’ for crusts.’

Malyka’s gaze didn’t leave me while we prowled the busy battlerings. ‘Tell me this is still some trick,’ she asked of me. ‘That it’s all a ruse and you aren’t really goin’ to do this.’

‘I’m guessing you mean selling powder.’

Malyka waved her hand across the crowds. Between the rings, the sorry figures of the Blighted could be seen. Some had hands raised for shells or food. Others slept like the dead. Others fidgeted, green smears across their faces. Wherever you looked, you couldn’t avoid the poverty.

‘Contributin’ to all of this,’ Malyka said. ‘Last thing we need down ’ere is more Blight and sufferin’.’

Scramp chattered in agreement.

‘I don’t need you to doubt me, Malyka, I need you to trust me. Count yourselves lucky. If I told you what I have in mind, I’d have to kill you. Trust. I’m looking out for you,’ I said with a wink.

My humour was lost on the both of them. ‘Just not what I agreed to,’ she muttered, gargling some more rum. She would learn if she trusted me long enough, I told myself as I watched Scramp take a swig and rasp as if it burned him. Strangely, he took another, bigger drink.

‘Shit me!’ Malyka said, slapping my arm. ‘It’s the bloody Scripture.’

She motioned to a man standing before a battlering with a white robe over his shoulder, as if he were a servant of the Venerance. The crowd around him were yelling madly as they swapped writs and shells as if they were trying to pelt each other.

‘He’s Phaeta’s bodyguard, isn’t he?’

‘You got a good memory, Midnight. You want to see the finest sword-hand in Bashkar? Come see this.’

Cheers erupted as the Scripture removed his cloak and showed off a naked torso. The man was hairless and paler than an Ashlander. Covering every inch of his white skin was black script. Some of it was tattooed, other parts looked carved with a knife or brand. From scalp to sole, the writing dominated him, and I guessed that was how he’d earned the name of the Scripture. All he wore was a pair of half-trews. A sword hung from a belt, bare grey steel and no scabbard.

We were jostled as we tried to get closer. The fighter the Scripture was pitted against was a blue-scaled Drola with a heavy frill running from snout to neck. He swung a flail mace in a circle at his side. An old man massaged his shoulders, whispering in his ears. Whatever the man was telling him didn’t seem to shake the quiver of the Drola’s empty hand.

‘To the death, right?’ I asked.

Scramp yowled as somebody trod on his claws. We got a wide berth after that.

Malyka nodded. ‘The highest stakes get the highest bets.’

The Scripture stepped into the cage with a thud of his bare feet. Judging by his muttering, he seemed to be praying, growing louder with every word.

The Drola was shoved forwards to the slam of cage doors. Hands hammered the bars in an increasing frenzy. The swing of the fighter’s flail increased to a blur. It was almost beautiful to watch, if something so deadly could be beautiful. The chain began to screech as he spun it beneath his feet and under each arm. I stared, wondering how in the nether I would go about defeating him. I imagined only a bullet could do it.

‘Scripture’s going to have a hard time getting through that,’ I said.

Malyka scoffed. ‘Watch.’

The Scripture was still reciting his words, standing statue-still while the Drola advanced. His sword was still on his belt. I couldn’t hear what he said over the noise, but I saw the cords stand out on his neck as he began to shout in the Drola’s face.

The Scripture acted so quickly that I would have missed it if I’d dared to blink.

‘…For the Great Watcher’s glory!’ the Scripture bellowed at the crescendo of his prayer. As he roared, the Scripture shifted to the left, dodging the path of the flail by an inch. The sword left his belt in the same movement, and as he shifted back to centre, the blade swung in a wide arc.

The flail fell to the bloodied dust of the battlering. The Drola stood still, one hand rising up to his neck. A bloody line was drawn across it. The Scripture was already walking away, wiping his sword on the back of his hand and raising the blood to the ceiling of the tunnels.

By the time the Drola sank to his knees, and his severed head had fallen into the hands of the old man rushing to his side, the Scripture was already back in his robe. The stunned crowd erupted in an almighty cheer.

‘Watcher’s balls,’ I breathed.

‘Told you.’

I’m not going to lie: I thought twice about testing Mother Phaeta if that was the company she kept.

‘Let’s go,’ I told them, as my stomach chose a strange time to grumble.

It took a while to extricate ourselves from the busy battlerings. Malyka led us through a road of billowing silks, with merchants trying to drag us in every direction. A sharp look from me and Malyka drawing a curved blade made them scurry.

We were on the cusp of delving down a broad burrow in the earth when a deafening crash came from above us. I whirled to see a withering balloon, entrailed in smoke and flame, crashing through a bridge and on top of the Dinge rooftops.

‘Watcher!’ yelled Malyka, as a spar of metal came spinning through our group and carved the face from a particularly unlucky merchant. As I stared at the mess of blood and bone, she pointed upwards, where light exploded across another bridge.

‘Blightfight!’

Scramp seized me by the shoulders. I was about to shrug him off with a curse when a chunk of wreckage slammed into the wooden walkway inches from my feet. I stared into his bulging eyes and nodded my thanks.

‘Agaraka!’ Scramp snapped at me as he scuttled after Malyka.

‘What is happening?’ I hollered.

‘Rawcerers clashing with the prosecutors. It must be Barcalos’ crew!’ Malyka yelled at me. ‘They don’t give a fuck for the Venerance’s presence in the Vale!’

I hunkered down as the fight spread downwards into the Dinge where we were. Over the edge of a wall, I glimpsed a Blight-scarred woman wreathed in rings of light, hurling what looked like miniature suns across a bridge. The crackle of rifle-fire came from the other side, bringing her magic to a grinding halt. As white armour flooded the span, the rawcerer summoned one last blast of magic and seared the Venerance prosecutors into screaming dust before a bullet tossed her head back.

My hands wouldn’t move from the wall until Malyka dragged me away. I was far too fascinated by the magic. I ran with my head over my shoulder, watching more of Barcalos’ rawcerers wield their power. Before we ducked into a lower level of the Dinge, I saw a man with glowing green eyes ripping chunks from the railings and walls around him. He spun the splinters around his body until their hail speared the prosecutors like pincushions. The Venerance fell back with screams, and for a brief moment, it looked as if the rawcerers were winning.

Malyka yelled at me. ‘This is worse than I’ve ever seen it. Broad daylight and all. We can’t stay here long!’

I had other ideas. I crept closer even though stray bullets hammered the rooftops and debris fell in all directions.

‘Dwellin!’

To the deafening roar of blightcore engines, a white-armoured aircraft blasted through the smoke and dust. Glowing guns on its underside unleashed a stream of death at anything that moved in pounding concussions. The rawceres banded together behind shields of steel. On the aircraft’s underside, a dark hatch unleashed a shape of shimmering white that fell to the bridge with a loud bang. Smoke swirled around the figure as she rose to standing, hair streaming behind her, one eye glowing with a fierce emerald fire.

‘Fuck me! They’ve summoned a chosen one!’ Malyka shrieked in my ear. ‘An alchemage!’

I was riveted to where I stood. I was back in Canarva, staring at the gleaming shape of Orzona with a gawping mouth. Malyka was irritatingly right. I could feel the power: the pressure popping in my ears; the heat on the breeze.

Another storm of wood and shrapnel was hurled in the chosen one’s direction. The alchemage became a blur, letting every piece slide past to pierce prosecutors behind her instead. She crossed the ruined bridge in great strides, hands outstretched. What looked like black vines exploded from her fingers and surged towards the enemy. I watched them run a rawcerer through and lift him into the air. The vines started to glow as if forge-heated, and the shriek of a grown man burning from the inside was something I’d never forget.

The alchemage did not halt there. She ripped the crew apart limb by limb until the pounding guns fell silent. An eerie silence fell before the wailing of the injured filled it. White-masked prosecutors poured from the tunnels above, crowding every stair and level. Every bystander they encountered was seized and hauled aside for questioning.

‘We should make ourselves fuckin’ scarce, I reckon. The Venerance won’t be very cheery about this. They’ll be out for blood at the deaths of their own. Somebody will pay ’eavily for this, and I’ll bet it won’t be Barcalos. The Venerance are too afraid to touch him.’

‘Who then?’

‘Anyone sorry enough to get in their way or offer them an ’arsh word. And always the poor Blighted. They always pay the toll for anythin’ to do with powder in the Vale, as if they’re the ones pushin’ it. Trust in the Venerance to prey on easy targets. That ain’t what the Watcher wants.’

Even though I let Malyka pull me away, her words were a distant mumble. I stared as long as I could at the chosen one, standing framed against fire and smoke. I had wanted power, and there it was, standing on a Guttervale bridge. I hated that I had to wait until tomorrow to find out if I could grasp the same power.

‘Where are you goin’?’ Malyka called to me as I took a turn for a stairwell going up, not down to the Fadings and Turrow.

I tossed her my cleaver, trusting in a small fish-knife that I kept in my boot just for safety. I blamed Malyka. ‘You head back to the Dark Harbour and make sure Grothu hasn’t burned it down. Or flooded the place. Or both at the same time, somehow. I’ve got something else to do tonight.

‘Let me bloody guess. Lurking on a certain rooftop.’

Scramp rolled his bulging eyes.

‘You know it.’

‘You’ll never get in there, but suit yourself, Midnight.’

‘You stop that,’ I told her as she and Scramp went her separate way, raising their almost-empty bottle to the metal rafters.

‘This brother better be worth seeing!’

So I hoped.

*

The night was thick with ocean cloud when I found my way back to my usual roof. One of those nights that turns every light into a hazy star. A lone blue moon balanced on the horizon, staring at itself in the water. A faint smoke was rising in the east where the Guttervale reached for the city lights. Balloons floated between the buildings, warning those of the upper city to stay inside and obey the Venerance. Obey. Obey. The words spread across Bashkar like an echo that refused to die.

I stared at the Academy windows and balconies. Shapes shifted between glass and blight-light. Raucous music seemed to float into the night air from within its walls. I rubbed my forehead, wary of the wrinkles all this frowning would cause me. I ground my knuckles into the roof tiles instead and settled in to keep watch.

Before I could get uncomfortable, I saw the kitchen doorway swing open with a bang, much to the protestations of the prosecutors standing guard. A small wagon was dragged out of the Academy by a single tall feathered creature with a muzzle and a grumbling man in a white tabard. I couldn’t hear their conversation, but it seemed the man had much complaining to do. Working in kitchens will do that to you.

Gesticulating as if flies mobbed him, the grumbling old bother worked his way down the street, heading to the dockland districts I had yet to explore. An urgency seized me. I was already working my way down rooftops and drainpipes before the worker had turned his first corner. The hunt was on.