Burned (12 page)

‘That was before Richard came back. Things are different now.’

‘No, they’re not.’

I sighed. ‘I guess to you they aren’t.’

Like me, Shireen and Rachel had been Richard’s apprentices, back when we’d all been teenagers still growing into our powers. It had worked out badly for me, but worse for them. Rachel had Harvested Shireen, taking Shireen’s power into herself and killing her in the process. It had also driven Rachel insane. When I saw Rachel next, she called herself Deleo, and there was very little left in her of the girl I’d once known.

Yet somehow, Shireen’s shade didn’t want revenge. She wanted me to help Rachel, and she’d made me promise to redeem her. On one level, I guess it said something good about Shireen that she could still want something like that. If I were murdered, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be so forgiving. On the other hand, I had absolutely no idea how to do what Shireen wanted. And that was a problem, because Shireen wasn’t going away … and neither was Rachel.

‘Rachel is still there,’ Shireen said. ‘Nothing’s changed.’

‘I
know
.’ I looked up at Shireen. ‘But that doesn’t mean I can fix it. What am I supposed to do, ask her nicely?’

‘You’re the diviner,’ Shireen said. The past times I’d met her here, she’d smiled a lot, but she wasn’t smiling now. ‘Think of something.’

‘Rachel hates me,’ I said. ‘You said it yourself. I don’t think she’d have listened to me even before. And now Richard’s back, and he has ten times the influence over her that I do.’

‘You were apprentices together,’ Shireen said. ‘That counts for more than you think.’

‘Doesn’t make her hate me any less. Actually, I’m pretty sure it makes her hate me
more
.’

‘But she pays attention to you.’

‘She pays a lot more attention to you.’ I twisted around to look at Shireen. ‘Aren’t you a lot better suited to this than I am? You used to be best friends, you’ve got some major guilt leverage going on – oh, and there’s the little detail that you’re in her head and she can’t kill you to shut you up. Wouldn’t it make more sense for this job to go to the one who Rachel
can’t
disintegrate when she gets sick of talking to them?’

‘I can’t.’

‘I know you can talk to her. I’ve seen her.’

‘I … slip.’ Shireen gazed over my shoulder, into the distance. ‘I lose time. I don’t know why. Sometimes I blink, and it’s been hours. Days, even. It happens more often when Cinder’s there. I think something about him … he keeps me away. The other too.’ Shireen focused on me. ‘But when you’re there, it’s easier. I can talk more easily to Rachel too. It’s the connection you have. I think it makes it harder for her to forget.’

‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Any chance I could just hang around somewhere nearby and let you do the talking?’

‘She won’t listen,’ Shireen said. ‘I’ve tried. I’m too close. All I know is what she knows, what she sees. I haven’t got anything else to offer. You do.’

‘And when Richard tells her to kill me for trying?’

‘Richard doesn’t want to kill you.’

That I had to admit was true. Either he just didn’t care, or he had something else in mind, which was something I really didn’t want to think about. ‘Yeah, well, he’s still pulling the strings.’

‘Fine.’ Shireen sighed. ‘I didn’t want to have to persuade you this way, but I guess there’s nothing for it. When I said I wanted you to change Rachel’s path, I wasn’t just hoping. I know it’s possible.’

‘How?’

‘The same way I knew to give you that bit of advice about the fateweaver.’

‘You went to a dragon?’ I said curiously. ‘Do they exist here?’

‘Yes. And before you ask, yes, the same one. It told me that there’ll come a time when Rachel will have to make a choice. Either she stands with Richard, or she rejects him. If she turns against him, the way you did, then she’ll be free of him for ever. It’ll hurt Richard badly, take away his strongest weapon. But if she chooses to stay with him, to follow Richard until the end … then that’s it. Richard wins. And in that future, you die.’

I felt a chill. I don’t know much about dragons – not many people do – but if they’re not actually omniscient, they’re the closest thing you’re going to get to it short of meeting God. The last prophecy Shireen had told me had been from a dragon, and it had been very, very accurate. ‘What do you mean, Richard wins? How?’

Shireen shook her head.

‘That’s it?’ I said. ‘It all comes down to Rachel rejecting Richard?’

‘As far as I know.’

‘Then if it’s true – and I hope it isn’t – we’re screwed. She went all in when she murdered you, and she’s had ten years to double down on that. What am I
possibly
going to say to her that’s going to convince her to turn back now?’

Shireen shrugged. ‘I guess you’d better think of something.’

‘Thanks.’

We sat in silence for a little while. Birdsong drifted down from above, and a warm breeze blew across the balcony. Elsewhere is a dangerous place, but I find it more comfortable than I once did. Shireen once told me that it grew easier to navigate this place the more often you came. ‘There’s something else I need you to do,’ Shireen said. ‘Something I need you to find out about.’

‘Sure,’ I said resignedly. ‘Why not?’

‘I need you to see what you can learn about creatures that grant wishes.’

I blinked. ‘What kind?’

‘Any kind.’

I puzzled over it for a second. ‘Why do you want to know about that?’

‘It’s just an idea,’ Shireen said. ‘If I’m wrong, it won’t matter. If I’m right…’ She hesitated. ‘Let’s hope I’m not right. Oh, and one other thing – I don’t think you’ll find out anything useful from the Light mages. I’ve got the feeling this is something old.’

‘Light mages have histories.’

‘I’m not sure this would be in them.’

‘You’re being cryptic, aren’t you?’

‘Kinda. There’s a reason. Tell you later.’ Shireen got to her feet. ‘You’d better go. Short-term problems and all that.’

I stood. ‘What do you mean?’

‘You remember those adept kids who were after you?’

‘The Nightstalkers?’ I said. It had been the same time I’d been shown what had really happened to Shireen. ‘Kind of hard to forget.’

‘That sort of thing.’ Shireen walked away around the tree, waving over her shoulder. ‘Later!’

I watched her go, frowning.
What do you mean, short-term problems?
The last time she’d said that, it had meant …

Suddenly I wanted to get out of Elsewhere, right now. I focused on calling myself back to my body, willing the empty city to disappear. Wake up, wake up, wake up
wake up wake up wake
—

My eyes snapped open. Above me was my bedroom ceiling, dark except for the faint blurry glow of the streetlights below the window. The house was silent and still … but my precognition was shouting that I was in danger. I looked into the future to see what would happen if I stayed where I was.

In just under one minute, someone was going to sneak into my room and shoot me through the head.

My mind kicked into high gear, and all of a sudden everything seemed to be going very slowly, the seconds ticking by one by one. I held quite still, my future self flashing through the possibilities, scouting and searching. Two men in the house … no, three. Magic, but not an overwhelming amount of it. They were carrying handguns with silencers.

I thought fast, assigning priorities. First, call for help; second, get a weapon; third, fight. I grabbed my phone from the side table, clicked it to mute and typed in a code. The ringing icon appeared on the screen and I placed it back down on the table, then I rolled out from under the covers and landed catlike on all fours before rising to my feet.

When Anne, Variam, Luna and I had begun our surveillance of Richard last year, we’d spent some time discussing contingencies. Out of all the possible threats, one we kept coming back to had been the night raid, with enemies infiltrating our homes while we were alone and helpless. It had happened before: the Nightstalkers had tried to blow up my flat while I was sleeping in it two years ago, and Anne had been attacked in a similar way not long afterwards.

Although we hadn’t been able to come up with a really reliable counter-tactic, one thing we’d laid in place had been a panic signal. The code I’d just typed in would ring Anne’s, Luna’s and Variam’s phones, and would make them keep ringing until they shut them off. All four of us had gate stones to each other’s houses. It was just a matter of time until they showed up.

Hopefully.

I pulled on my trousers, stalking out into the living room, bare feet silent on the carpet. As I did, I looked into the futures in which I went downstairs.
Not good.
The men below were less than thirty seconds away, and they were already climbing the stairs. Coolly I looked through the futures in which I searched the room, looking for a weapon. I wanted something lethal: no concern for overkill this time. The silencers on their guns had established that, even if I hadn’t seen what they were planning to do with them. Unfortunately, I had no guns up here – they were down in the safe room. Should have kept one within reach … too late now. I considered various magical items and dismissed them as too specialised. There was a dagger resting at the back of my desk; I slid it from its sheath, walked to the door, then pressed myself against the wall next to the door-frame.

I still couldn’t see the three men, but from the futures in which I opened the door, I knew they were out on the landing. I held myself quite still, tracking their movement through the futures. The room was dark and silent. Only the faintest whisper of traffic sounded from outside; from my glance at the phone I knew it was 3 a.m. and Camden was as quiet as it would ever be. I waited.

There was a creak from outside: a footstep on the landing. I didn’t move. In the dim light, I could just make out movement as the handle began to turn. I watched silently as it rotated through ninety degrees, then stopped. Slowly, the door began to open, swinging out towards me. I tightened my grip on the hilt of the knife. I could sense the lead man just on the other side of the door, less than three feet away, his gun up and aimed at the bedroom entrance. Couldn’t risk waiting for them to pass and taking the rear man. I’d have to knife the first and use him as a shield. Only seconds now until he’d enter. I tensed, ready to spring—

The futures splintered, changed. I heard the whisper-crackle of a radio. A pause, then— ‘He’s awake!’ The voice was sharp. ‘Back up, back up!’

Hurried footsteps sounded, withdrawing down the stairs. ‘Where?’ someone called.

‘Shoot the walls. Shoot!’

People overestimate how much a silencer muffles the sound of a gunshot. The noise as the guns opened up was an echoing metallic
bang bang bang
, like a set of extremely loud staplers. The internal wall between the staircase and my living room wasn’t reinforced, and the bullets went right through, sending bits of paint and plaster scattering to the carpet.

I’d already jumped back from the door. My precognition had given me enough warning to get out of the line of fire, and I crouched behind the sofa as the bullets whizzed overhead. The men were shooting from the stairs and landing below, and the upward angle meant the shots were going into the ceiling. The shooting seemed to go on for a long time, but it could only have been ten or twenty seconds before the banging stopped and silence fell.

I stayed dead still. My living room was a mess, holes in the walls and bits of plaster covering the floor. Looking into the futures in which I moved forward, I eavesdropped. The men below were whispering to each other.

‘… get him?’

‘Dunno. Ask…’

‘… can’t hear…’

I didn’t move, sorting calmly through the possibilities. They’d been aware that I was awake and waiting. However, they hadn’t seemed to realise that fact until the last second. It had sounded as though they’d only received the message over the radio. Putting that together, the most probable conclusion I could come to was that there was a mage nearby, watching my house from outside with deathsight or lifesight or something similar. I’ve got wards against space magic, but the detection spells used by mages from the living family are very hard to block. If that was the case, the three men below probably weren’t mages themselves, just adepts or sensitives. That also made sense. When you’re scouting a hostile building, you send your pawns in first.

The men were still whispering. It sounded as though they were trying to figure out if I was dead. Working on the assumption that they were being fed information over a radio link, I’d have a small delay between making any movement and the information being passed along. That could be useful.

‘… says he’s still there,’ one of the men whispered.

‘They sure?’

‘… get a closer…’

‘… crazy?’

More radio chatter. ‘You heard…’ one of the men whispered. ‘Dave, you’re on point.’

‘… that,’ the other man whispered back. ‘Cover me.’

I felt the exact moment the pin was pulled from the grenade. All of a sudden the futures were all converging to the same point: in exactly five seconds, there was going to be a shrapnel explosion somewhere in my flat. The only question was where. I heard movement from below as the man rose to make his throw, and I broke cover, darting to the open doorway.

There are a lot of different philosophical and legal positions on the use of force – when it’s justified, how much is justified, that sort of thing. People will often say that violence is only justified if it’s in self-defence, but that’s kind of vague. Probably the most common position I see people advocate is the ‘minimum force’ one – the idea is that in any given situation, you’re justified in using whatever the minimum amount of physical force is to protect yourself, but no more than that.

While I can see the logic behind that kind of thinking, it’s never something I’ve entirely agreed with. I’ll follow the minimum force approach in some situations, but as a choice rather than as a rule, and it’s not my most instinctive reaction. Instead, my philosophy tends to be that you’re justified in using an amount of force that is equivalent to the amount directed at you. So, as a general rule, I tend to think that it’s okay to roughly match the level of aggression and/or violent intent of whoever attacks you. That was why, when James Redman and those two adepts had come after me, I hadn’t killed them, but I hadn’t let them off with a warning either. They’d tried to hit me with sticks, so I’d responded by hitting them with sticks. Equivalence.