Stained Glass Monsters (5 page)

It had grown overcast by the time the
carriage drew to a halt, and a fine misting rain was keeping
everything in whatever town this was damp. A far bigger place than
Falk, with a lot of dark stone crawled over with ivy. The carriage
had drawn up in the centre of a cobbled, lichen-spattered square
and when Kendall jumped down she could see the main part of the
town to the right, and to the left a hedge-lined road. Straight
ahead was a stone wall topped with a spiked fence, along which
stood a row of musket-men with their guns trained on the fields.
Guns, even magicked ones, were said to be not very effective
against Night Roamers, but a whole row of them might be worth
trying. A great heap of other people were confident enough to crowd
to either side of them, peering through the fence.

"Thank you for coming," said a round,
elderly woman, moving toward them among a group of town guard.
"They were sighted several hours ago, and went to ground almost
immediately. One we inadvertently flushed while putting up a
cordon, but we did not pursue and have not seen it since, so we do
not think it moved far."

"Fortunate that we reached here before
nightfall," Lady Weston commented, inclining her head to the
townswoman. "If you will tell us the layout of the area infested,
we will decide our approach."

While the old lady proceeded to use a
lot of words to say there were a few fields criss-crossed by hedges
and the occasional line of trees, Kendall watched Captain Faille do
his own bit of preparation. First he took off the coat, revealing a
uniform fashioned of heavy black cloth reinforced with dark
leather. Much more practical for fighting. Then he slid a long,
thin sword from beneath one of the seats and strapped it to his
back. His hair and eyes had gone grey again, and the fine rain spun
about him and turned him into an insubstantial thing, a man of mist
wearing night.

It was the first time Kendall had even
seen the whole of the Captain's face. He was more fine-boned than
she'd expected, the jaw almost delicate, but his mouth was a thin,
harsh stroke bracketed by bitter lines. There was something about
his proportions, a stretching that went beyond long-limbed. He was
very tall, and whip-cord muscular and...wrong to look at. Best of
all, he had claws. Or, at least, nails which projected past the
fingertip and finished in a point which looked sharp enough to cut.
He, far more than Lieutenant Danress, really did look like he'd
been fathered by something out of the Hells.

Not wanting to be caught staring,
Kendall looked away, and felt her jaw sag. A woman had walked up
the hedge-lined road, and had that moment reached the point where
it opened up into the square. She was dressed for riding. Her hair
was long and black and she wore a hat with ribbons trailing off the
back. She saw Kendall staring at her and went still, then turned
her head to one side as if considering a sudden retreat.

Captain Faille had caught Kendall's
change of expression. He pivoted on his heel, gazed at the only
person standing in that direction, and said "M'Lady" in a warning
tone, so that the Grand Magister and Lieutenant Danress turned.
Kendall was very surprised when, after another moment's hesitation,
the black-haired woman began walking toward them.

"Child, is this–?" Lady Weston began,
and Kendall nodded. "No coincidence at all, then." Lady Weston
sounded dangerously pleased. After staving off the townswoman with
a word, she went to meet the person who'd saved them all the
trouble of hunting her down, Kendall and the Sentene in train.

"It seems the adage about no good deed
going unpunished is a true one," the woman said when they were in
earshot. The quizzical look she added sent a sudden rush of heat
over Kendall's face and throat. She hadn't thought about it
properly, but this woman had saved her life. She hadn't gained
anything out of that, had just done it for no reason that Kendall
could see. In return, Kendall had put the Sentene on her trail.

That's what you got for not minding your
own business.

Still, she didn't look too terribly
upset, and was eyeing Lady Weston without any sign of dismay. "You
have something to say to me?"

"I have a great many things to ask you,
young woman," Lady Weston said, and Kendall blinked at the ice in
her voice. "You will not deny foreknowledge of these events, I
presume?"

"No."

"I wonder that you can admit it so
calmly." Lady Weston did not at all resemble the relaxed
gentlewoman Kendall had spent a day watching. Instead, holding
herself very erect, each word clear and clipped, she was truly the
Grand Magister, commander of Tyrland's magical defences, and very
angry indeed. She lifted a hand and one of her bracelets began to
glow. As the air filled with a scent like overheated metal, Kendall
saw there were sigils etched around the circle of silver. A hot
wind swirled around the black-haired woman, who frowned and held on
to her hat, looking none too pleased herself.

"Now," Lady Weston said grimly. "You
will tell me who it is who has cast this Grand Summoning, where
they cast it from, and how they reconstructed the spell."

The woman didn't respond immediately,
her dark eyes narrowed and her mouth turned down. Kendall could see
the faint mist of raindrops turning to a haze of steam as they came
close to her, and tried to guess at what exactly the spell did.
Then the stranger let out a little 'tuh' of breath.

"Solace Ariendal Montjuste-Surclere cast
it," she said, her voice underlaid with irritation. "She cast it
from the Summoning Hall, at the palace in Asentyr. As for
reconstruction–"

She looked at the ground, and Kendall
gasped, rocked back on her heels by a boiling gale which blasted
out from the woman all the way across the square. Suddenly the
horses were snorting and backing, the crowd was gawping inward
instead of outward, and Captain Faille had somehow drawn his sword
and had it at the woman's throat.

The stranger shifted her eyes to him
briefly, but remained facing Lady Weston. "You are over-hasty," she
said. "And are asking questions to which you should already know
the answers. This is no recreation. It is the first, the only Grand
Summoning."

"But Queen Solace was killed," Kendall
protested, when it seemed no-one else would speak. "The Prince
killed her."

"Tiandel pushed her deep into the
Eferum. That could have killed her, but it seems not, since she
keeps coming back."

"Keeps–?" Lady Weston began, then
stopped, and gestured for Captain Faille to move away his sword.
"The White Lady phenomenon has each time been an expression of
Queen Solace's Grand Summoning?"

"At the earliest stage."

"The Summoning starts over?" Lieutenant
Danress asked. "But, then, why has it not gone further until now?
What's different about this time?"

"It's more what was different about last
time," the woman replied, then glanced toward the fascinated
audience along the fence. "You do know there's a Kentatsuki roaming
around over there?"

Both Sentene stiffened, their attention
shifting firmly to the fields beyond the town.

"The breach here was larger than I was
expecting, though only a few Eferum-Get passed through it,"
continued the woman steadily. "The next major one will be in
Asentyr, the Temple District near the Devourer's Shrine. Close to
midnight, the third night from now." She turned, obviously
intending to just walk away.

"Wait." Lady Weston was no longer angry,
but there remained a great deal of command in her voice. "You
haven't told us what your involvement in this is. How do you know
these things? What are you planning?"

"I plan to stop her, of course." The
woman gave the faintest smile, as if she knew how unlikely that
sounded, then added: "I'd appreciate you not interfering."

"Inter–" Lady Weston's head came up, a
combination of affront and amusement. "Where is your sense? If you
speak the truth, then the best course is for us to join
forces."

The woman shook her head, and started
off. "All that would achieve would be to expose myself to attack,"
she said over her shoulder. "I can't risk being too easy to
find."

"M'Lady?" asked Captain Faille
softly.

"Let her be." Lady Weston looked down at
her hand, and Kendall saw there was a fresh burn mark around her
wrist. The bracelet was gone. "Set one of the Ferumguard to follow
her, though I doubt that will serve much purpose. She spoke the
truth before she broke my injunction, so we have the information we
needed, for what little good it does us. Nor can we neglect a
Kentatsuki for a moment longer than strictly necessary. Go."

The Sentene strode off, and Lady Weston
returned to the townswoman, rattling off a string of orders.
Kendall, well aware that she'd ceased to be important as soon as
she'd identified the black-haired woman, returned to the coach.

For some reason she didn't want to
watch, didn't want to try and catch a glimpse of whatever was
roaming around out there. All her life she'd been warned about
Stalkers and Life Stealers, heard tales of Night Roamers rarer and
more powerful, but she'd never seen any. She didn't want to
start.

Now what? Kendall had few illusions
about how much she'd be involved after they'd reached Asentyr. Even
if she was able to learn to be a mage, all that meant was that
she'd be shuffled off to some school. Would Lady Weston pay for
that? Or would Kendall be expected to work off some debt, once she
had the means? That was the trap you fell into when you started
letting people do things for you. They always expected something in
return.

Not that she could go home. Falk was
kindling, and none of the surrounding towns were a good idea. None
of Tyrland was a good idea.

Threats to the kingdom, magic and
monsters; it was all completely beyond the day-to-day worry about
food and savings which had been Kendall's world since Gran died.
What would it be like to be that woman? To be so powerful, to know
what was going on, to be in control. What kind of person could
stare down the Grand Magister, ignore a sword at her throat, dare
even to say they were going to stop Black Queen Solace?

It seemed to Kendall that if that was
what a mage could be, she would certainly have to try it.

"You're going to give that to them?"

Rennyn glanced up at Seb, then finished
drawing an anti-trace casting in a circle around the list she'd
made. "I'm worried about the duration of the first breach."

"The Sentene exist to deal with these
kind of things."

"True."

She could practically hear him deciding
what to say next.

"Planning to just walk up and hand it to
them?"

"I was toying with the idea of sending
it to the Grand Magister in the mail. It's a difficult one. Perhaps
it was always too much to hope to have nothing to do with the
Sentene until the last couple of incursions. They know my face now,
and the more I avoid them, the more they'll come after me. This is
a compromise – hopefully it will distract them."

"Likely?"

"Not at all."

She finished her casting and went to the
kitchen, but was not surprised when he followed her. He was trying
so hard not to criticise, but couldn't quite let it alone.

"How can we justify it?" he asked,
worrying at the point which bothered him most. "Yes, I – I guess
that villager would probably have died if you hadn't sent her off.
How many will die if we fail? We have a duty to see this through.
And to do that we have to stay alive, keep ourselves safe. Now, for
the sake of some random village girl, you're exposed."

"Would you have left her to be crushed
by the expansion, then?"

He flushed and looked down, chewing his
lower lip. "If it put what we had to do at risk. I suppose it must
have seemed unlikely they'd work it out, though," he conceded. "But
you know that eventually–"

"I know." She sighed. "People may have
to die. But she didn't. Yes, just some random villager, but even
knowing it would mark me, I'd probably do it again. I don't want to
be a person who stands and watches. And she at least taught me not
to underestimate the Sentene. Or pure bad luck. Besides, all it's
done is throw off our timing. No-one cut my throat."

For all one had had ample opportunity.
Her great-grandmother had loathed the Kellian, had called them
stained glass monsters, but it was not the right term for the man
of mist and flint she'd met. A creature born of cobweb, dew and
dawn light. And flesh. The cobweb had given strength, the dew an
unusual relationship with light, and dawn brought speed. Who, after
all, could outrun the dawn? The Kellian were a triumph of Symbolic
magic, and immensely dangerous. The originals had all been women,
voiceless and deadly. Bodyguards who would never betray their
Queen. It had been such a gamble, to walk up to a descendent of
one, to trust to her defences. And for all she knew about Kellian
speed, she hadn't quite been able to believe how quickly he'd drawn
that sword.

"Telling the Sentene where the
incursions will take place will make meeting with them more likely,
but I'll accept that if it means not having things like Kentatsuki
loose any longer than necessary. Even with them on the scene, it's
easy to avoid encounters so long as I'm prepared. To which
point–"

Slipping into her jacket, she began
checking the contents of her skirt pockets, making certain she had
all that was necessary before picking up a sturdy stoneware jar
filled with water, which she concealed by draping a coat over her
arm. If she made her move while it was still the middle of the day,
she'd have a better chance of avoiding any watch the Sentene may
have set for her.

"I'll have a hot dinner waiting for
you." There was a hint of apology in Seb's voice, underlying the
worry and frustration he felt having to continually see her off
into possible danger.