The Interminables (24 page)

He didn't.

“You're afraid of me,” he mumbled.

Edmund closed his eyes. Oh boy. Of course trying to stifle his dread over the whole affair hadn't been enough. The prospect of facing the Susurration alone, of dealing with Grace alone, of piecing together the case alone... he hadn't flown solo on something this big since the relapse. Since some idiot had woken something up beneath Lake Erie in '82.

“Sometimes,” he said.

“I'll leave, then.”

“No. Don't.” He steeled himself, then stepped through the obstructing wing. The shock of the cold was jarring and ugly, and he hoped it wouldn't make things worse. “Istvan, I can honestly say that I don't know where I'd be without you.”

Istvan froze, wing still outstretched.

Edmund set his pasta on the table. “I don't know what the Susurration said or did, but it's wrong. We may not have started out on the best foot, granted. We might have our rough moments, granted. You are what you are, fine, but Istvan, you're a doctor. Before everything else. Before anything else. In these thirty years I've known you, you've worked miracles. I'm one of them.”

“Edmund–”

“I'm glad I took you up on coffee all those years ago. I'm glad I was brave enough to show up. I'm glad I made such a friend out of such an enemy, and after what I've found… Istvan, Barrio Libertad was built by a would-be machine god who killed Shokat Anoushak and is looking for any reason to pull the trigger again. Grace wants the Bernault devices so she can delay him. The Susurration, whatever it's after, knows the situation isn't survivable – and Mercedes won't talk to me about any of it.” He sighed. “It's a mess, Istvan. Whatever happens, I'm going to need help, and I can't think of anyone better to have at my back.”

“Not even Miss Wu?”

“No.”

Istvan drew back his wings, slowly, folding both behind his back. He brushed away a new line of wounds across his chest. Not a word.

Edmund swallowed. He hadn't brought any of it up earlier. It hadn't been the time. He wished it still wasn't. She needed him, she'd said – just not like that, not anymore, he drank too much. “We talked.”

Silence.

Edmund pulled out his chair and sat in it. “It's over. She made that very clear. You were right and you're the one I want to have around right now, more than ever, because nothing past this point will be easy.” He looked down at his pasta, left over from an earlier battle. “Not for either of us.”

A chill brushed his mauled left arm, brief and hesitant. The ache receded.

Istvan drew his hand back. “I'm sorry.”

Edmund rubbed his arm. “So am I.”

Breakfast suddenly didn't seem appetizing. It wasn't the noodles. He would have felt the same if it were anything else.

He picked up his fork anyway. He had to eat.

“I'm sorry,” Istvan repeated. He pushed his chair back, one of those things he could only do if he wasn't paying attention, and stood. “Edmund, I... I've work to do. With the earthquake, and the ice monster, and God knows what else. I was expected back long ago. I shouldn't have stayed here so long as I have.”

“You're always welcome here,” Edmund said, and he meant it. He hoped Istvan could tell that he meant it. “In fact,” he continued, “I'll be heading to the Twelfth Hour myself shortly. I have an archival backlog that I've been meaning to take care of. Probably some books to re-shelve. I can take a few moments to eat and go with you, if you'd like.” He stabbed a noodle. “Unless you feel like flying. I wouldn't blame you if you did.”

Istvan wavered. He flickered, still, but less – only the shadow of wings, flesh more often than bone. More himself. “Oh, Edmund,” he said. He sat down again, dropping his head back in his hands. “Edmund, what on Earth am I supposed to tell them?”

“Nothing you don't want to.”

T
he infirmary went
quiet when Istvan walked through the doors. The dust and chips and flakes of fallen ornamentation were gone, swept away soon after the earthquake, and toppled monitors and partitions stood once more where they belonged – newly secured, in most cases, with bolts or lengths of rope or tape. Fewer patients now, only the more severe or stranger cases remaining. It was still ostentatious, still a grand meeting hall, but nearer and nearer to his old battlefield haunts with every disaster. He wondered when the roof would fall in.

Edmund had promised that he would be around. He wasn't going anywhere. Never mind that he could finish in a matter of minutes what took other men hours; no need to waste time like that now. A check revealed that he was puttering about the library, trying not to worry. Not going anywhere, like he'd said. His presence was unique among all others, damaged and fearful and so very old, and Istvan wished he didn't find it such a comfort. Wished he had possessed such powers when it might have mattered.

“Doctor Czernin.” Someone he didn't recognize, a long-haired woman with a sharp nose, locks pulled back in a braid. Not one of his people. She was afraid of him, too. “I'm Doctor Orlean. I was called in to help with the shortfall.” She extended a hand, hesitantly, then withdrew it. “I'm sorry, I don't know how you–”

“Where's Roberts?” he asked.

“Coming,” she said. She dropped her hand to her side. “I'm told you usually work every night.”

“I do.” There was an official infirmary hierarchy of some sort, he knew. He'd never bothered with it. He was the Devil's Doctor. If he was present, it was his infirmary, with Roberts as preferred liaison. He hadn't missed a night like this, so soon after an emergency, in....

Oh, it was depressing to contemplate. And now they'd brought in some woman to replace him?

“How was your Fourth?” she tried.

He checked on Edmund again. Still there. “Not enough mortars.”

He did usually enjoy the Fourth. It was a celebration of Independence, after all, which meant it commemorated a war and the men who'd fought in it. Any holiday of that nature was the best sort of holiday, especially when it included fireworks – explosions that everyone could enjoy without fear for their lives, a small taste of how all such things were to him. Look at that! Long might the night blaze in fire! Long might sacrifice be remembered!

Not this year. Not for any reason he could explain, not in generalities to the public and not in specifics to anyone.

He took off his glasses, rubbing a hand across his face. “How soon is ‘coming'?”

“Doctor!” Roberts rounded a corner with surprising speed for his bulk, clipboard in hand. “There you are – the Magister came down herself and told us you'd be indisposed until further notice. I'm glad you're all right.”

“I'm fine,” Istvan said. Then he realized he sounded like Edmund. He put his glasses back on. “Rather, I'll be fine once I've something to do. That will be all, Miss Orleans.”

“Orlean,” she said. “
Doctor
Orlean.”

Istvan meandered over to look at Roberts' clipboard. Surely one woman hadn't attended to everything, or even several things. Who else had been brought in? “Regardless.”

A huff. Sharp irritation mingled with the fear, a green and pungent hurt at being dismissed out of hand. The sensation had a smoothness to it that suggested it wasn't a new one, that she was tired of it, that she'd almost been expecting it from the likes of him...

He sighed. Sometimes he wished that sense were more selective. “My apologies.”

Roberts cast him a worried glance. “Sorry, he's... not usually like this.”

“I'm usually far worse,” Istvan muttered.

Orlean backed away, shaking her head. “I can imagine.”

Disappointed. She was disappointed. What kind of legend was he, anyhow? The Devil's Doctor himself, oldest and greatest surgeon in the world, slouching about like a lovesick idiot, betrayed and pining over a friend who always preferred not to know. Who would turn his back if he did. Who would never be a true replacement for the one so long gone, never mind the similarities, the wit, the patience, the kindness.

Istvan found himself checking the library again. Oh, they were so similar. As if one curse wasn't enough.

He took the first step of a mock charge.

Orlean quadrupled her speed of retreat, tripped over herself, recovered with startling agility, stammered something about being relieved of duty, and ducked behind one of the partitions. Rather less disappointed, now. Terror had a way of clearing one's priorities.

Roberts stared at him a moment, then let out a belated chuckle. “You must not be doing too badly, then.”

Istvan inspected a hand gone skeletal. Fresh bone. It was always fresh and glistening, newly flensed, his fingers bloodied. “Doesn't it bother you?”

A shrug. “It helps if I pretend every day is Halloween.”

“Oh.”

He knew that holiday. He rather liked that holiday.

“By the way,” Roberts continued, “you might want to have a look at that ice monster you brought in day before yesterday. It's awake, it's stopped trying to claw people, it's eaten probably two tons of meat and meat-like products... and it talks.”

Istvan startled back to flesh. “Anoushak's beasts never talked.”

“This one does.”

T
he beast
in the holding cell lay broodingly on its stomach, a bright orange rain poncho draped over its prone form. What remained exposed were its head, its enormous paws, its neck and shoulders. Flecks of ice tipped each hair of its thick coat. Clouds of its breath rolled through the open bars, coating them in frost. Even the floor around it, bare concrete, shimmered.

A small portable heater and a keyboard lay before it. Wires snaked out of the bars and connected to the back of a small screen positioned some distance away, black with green letters.
Can't type fast
, it said.
Please be patient
. A white bar blinked at the end.

“What is this?” asked Istvan. “You said it talked.”

Roberts shrugged. “Near enough. Vocal cords like that aren't really built for human speech.”

The beast growled low in its throat, a raspy, forced sound. Its eyes were brilliant yellow against blue-striped white, and it gathered its great paws as Istvan watched. Rising – slowly, haltingly – to a crouch. It reached one massive paw to the board, tapping out letters one clumsy stroke at a time.

Remember you. Sorry about attack.

“That was my own bloody fault,” Istvan said, feeling faintly foolish. Talking to a beast. A tiger. “If I'd come alone, you wouldn't have been so lucky.”

The line jumped downwards.
Maybe
, the beast typed.

“He's fine, I'll have you know. Edmund. The Hour Thief. You did nearly break his arm and he won't be healed for weeks, but he is fine.”

“He knows,” said Roberts.

Istvan crossed his arms, a strange desperation rising in his throat. “It's a he, now?”

The beast bared scything canines. Keys clacked, one by one.
Call me William Blake.

They didn't talk. Shokat Anoushak's creatures didn't talk. They didn't have names, they didn't remember any shred of human identity, and they certainly didn't have the intelligence to use a typewriter. All those that Istvan had killed – he didn't know how many, he'd never counted – had been utterly lost. Transformed and mindless.

Or so he'd thought.

He turned away, tugging Roberts to a safe distance. “It can't be a survivor, Roberts. It isn't possible. It must be the victim of a spellscar, or a Conduit, or something. Not one of Anoushak's.” He gestured at the contraption before it. “Whose idea was this... this typewriter business?”

“That would be mine,” rasped a voice from the stairs. That lizard. That giant lizard, in its purple parka, propped awkwardly against the wall, its cane hooked over one arm. It bobbed its head at the ice-coated holding cell. “He seemed lonely.”

“He,” Istvan said tightly, “is impossible.”

A shrug. “There's a lot we still don't know about what happened.”

Istvan spun around. “You're proposing that all of those creatures were slave soldiers! Thinking minds, trapped inside monsters! That death wasn't a mercy, that they could be… that I–” He hurled his knife at nothing in particular. It spun, bounced off a wall with a clatter, and skittered into a corner. “Oh, I couldn't have been permitted one guiltless massacre, now could I? Just one!”

Roberts raised his eyebrows. “Doctor–”

“Don't! Not a bloody word!” The lizard flickered its tongue. Istvan caught at the fastenings at the creature's throat. “And don't you dare put your tongue out at me!”

The tongue vanished.

A growl from the cell. The keyboard started clicking again.

Istvan half-drew his knife, back where it belonged through means he could never determine, and then realized what he was doing.

Pietro wouldn't have approved at all. No, he would have been terrified, appalled, utterly disbelieving; his Pista, so willing to start a fight, or finish one, showing up at the door bruised or bloodied over one slight or another,
Ah, but you should have seen the others!
; his Pista, foolishly combative but not cruel, no stomach for even the idea of hunting; his Pista, so very changed, rabid as the beasts he'd thought he dispatched.

Not Pietro's Pista at all. Not anymore.

Istvan let go.

The lizard adjusted its parka, tugging the furry hood over a head too long-necked and frilled to be fully covered. “We think he was frozen, all this time,” it said. Its affect was distant, muted, inhuman. Like the beast itself. “Maybe something changed. We don't know. He doesn't remember. But, since he is what he is... ask him about Anoushak, eh?”

Istvan flinched. The Susurration hadn't wanted to kill her. It had been compelled to end the Wizard War – chosen, not choosing – and had delayed as long as it could, mourned the loss of her armies even as the weapon fired. All Pietro had wanted to do was help. Save them. Redeem them.

Oh, that voice.

Istvan sought out Edmund again, a convulsive reflex like a hand closing on another's wrist. Still there. Real – very real – and still there.

“Doctor?”

Roberts. Dear, faithful Roberts.

“I'm fine,” Istvan lied. It was an easy lie. He supposed that was the reason Edmund so often used it. “I'm... tired, is all. The, ah, earthquake, you know.”

The nurse didn't believe him – he was too unnerved for that, knew Istvan's proclivities too well – but he did stay where he was, turning his clipboard in his hands. He was... he was married, wasn't he? Worked grueling hours. Seemed proud of his position, but sometimes resentful. Why? His work? His treatment? His schedule, or rather lack of one? Had Istvan never been appreciative enough of his help, never told him how grateful he was that he always seemed to be around when needed?

That would have to change.

“Mr Blake's trying to talk to you, Doctor,” said the lizard. It sounded wary but faintly disappointed, just like Orlean. This dangerous, distractible idiot was the War to End All Wars? “In a manner of speaking.”

Istvan turned. The beast crouched in its cage, its speech glowing green before it.

I am right here
, said the screen.
Please be civil
. And, below that, the line blinking at its end:
The Immortal was interested in your friend.

Istvan swallowed, trying to keep his mind from straying to boiling hordes and bloodied hands. “What do you mean? What do you mean, ‘interested'?”

New talent leads to new methods.
The beast fixed him with a yellow eye.
All she ever needed was enough time.

E
dmund meandered
through the glittering shelves. He had returned all the fallen books to their places after the quake, more or less, and the rest was the usual maintenance. Correcting mis-shelvings. Making sure all that belonged was still present, and that what didn't was properly examined. Noting any new arrivals. Reinforcing the wards. Checking some of the more notorious books for victims.

The greater part of the work that needed doing was in the vault, but he doubted Istvan's senses could reach across dimensions, he didn't want to risk another panic, and asking about vault permissions would be testing Mercedes' fragile patience with him. Best to stay in the main stacks, all around.

He started up the next ladder. It was a slower climb with one bad arm, but it had to be done. Inexcusable Mathematics almost always had something in the wrong place, as of late.

“Edmund!”

He paused, one foot halfway between rungs. “Istvan?”

The faint clamor of guns came in reply, barbed wire slithering across wooden floors.

Edmund turned, still on the ladder, some four feet in the air. No cape to flick out of the way: he'd learned his lesson about capes and ladders years ago, and it hung on a well-worn peg three aisles over. “Istvan, what is it?”

The specter stood at the foot of the ladder, breathing hard, as though he'd just slid to a stop and still breathed. he said in German,

Istvan replied miserably. His voice cracked. He took hold of the ladder.

Edmund concentrated on balance. A ladder wasn't the right place for this sort of news.

Grace had said that the Susurration didn't want his magic. It was interdicted. It wouldn't be able to use it. Why bother?