A Poison Dark and Drowning (Kingdom on Fire, Book Two) Read online

  Wonderful.

  Ahead, a pile of rocks fell. Something about the heaviness of the sound made me uneasy. Ravens wouldn’t make so much noise.

  Three riders on horseback emerged around the corner of the building, the light of dawn at their backs. A man and two women, they had been fully skinned and were slick with blood from head to toe. Their mounts were no different; the beasts had slick, equine heads with no ears, and blood dripped from their snouts. They snorted, pawing at the earth and chomping on their bits. The saddles had been tanned and fashioned from some kind of pink flesh that I didn’t think was leather. The power—and stench—that wafted from them made my stomach turn.

  So these were R’hlem’s personal riders. This was what he’d wanted to do to me.

  The creatures paused, assessing us. The rider on the left turned in her saddle and whispered to her friends. They seemed rather baffled by our appearance.

  Then again, it wasn’t every day four young sorcerers strolled past the barrier to court danger. Few were that stupid.

  One of the Familiars, a man, trotted forward with his hand extended. As a unit, we backed away on instinct.

  “Come with me, lady, and we will not harm your friends. The bloody king gives his word.” The muscles of his cheeks contracted, revealing more of his gums and teeth. He was grinning. “The bloody king wants you alone.”

  The bloody king. I’d heard Gwen refer to R’hlem by that title before.

  “I’m not a lady,” I replied, taking my dagger by the hilt. “I’m a sorcerer.”

  The skinned rider laughed. “You’ve brought this upon yourself.” He raised one bloody hand to the sky and closed it in a tight fist.

  As if on cue, dark forms erupted from the shattered windows, swarming in a deadly mass into the air. Ravens came for us in a screaming black cloud of bristling feathers.

  As the Familiars swooped, we panicked and blasted them with fire, forgetting the new weapons to fall back on sorcerer techniques. Billows of flame roasted some of the birds, but not all. They met in the air, congealed, and formed into hideous, manlike creatures with hooded faces and razor-sharp claws. They dove for us, coming in low. We were about to be outnumbered.

  “Get the flute!” I called to Dee. He slipped it out of its muter, resheathed his stave, and played.

  The exploding sound carried over the battlefield. Ravens plummeted from the sky, littering the earth. For a brief moment, the fighting stopped.

  But the four of us had also fallen to the ground, ears ringing, and the three skinless Familiars seemed better able to shake it off. They galloped for us, drawing out long swords carved from bone.

  One of the women tried to grab me, and I swiped with my dagger, fending her off as best I could. The blade whined and vibrated heavily in my hand, twisting my wrist and making me swear. Magnus and Blackwood attempted the corkscrew swords, but the riders easily knocked the weapons from their hands. The boys barely survived. Blackwood launched a quick spell that shook the earth beneath the riders’ feet. Magnus followed it with a blast of wind, toppling one of the skinned women off her horse. Blackwood took the opportunity and stabbed her with his dagger. He pierced the rider through the heart, yes, but with an explosion of light that flipped him onto his back.

  The ravens began to regroup and circle overhead. God, was no one at the barrier going to help?

  I put the whistle to my lips and blew. Not a damned thing happened. The riders and the ravens didn’t even blink.

  Bother the new weapons. I grabbed Porridge and burst into flames, shooting fireballs and crisping the bastard ravens as they dove. Good. That was progress, at last. I managed to get to the boys, signaling Dee to join us as we regrouped. I kept burning, though my fire faltered a bit—I was using too much energy too fast.

  “Knock her unconscious,” the lead rider yelled, galloping by on his horse.

  Dee unlooped the whip and lashed at him. Violet light erupted from the weapon’s tip, stinging my eyes. My nose began to gush blood, my mouth flooding with the coppery taste. The two remaining riders wheeled their horses and prepared to charge us.

  “Bother the cursed weapons, Dee. Fight back,” Blackwood shouted, dropping his sword to the ground. He summoned stones from the rubble and launched them in a projectile attack. The stones slowed the riders, who had to dodge and weave to avoid them.

  Dee and Magnus stood back to back, creating a vortex of wind. The raven Familiars swooped, flashes of white faces and fanged mouths visible beneath their hoods. But they couldn’t withstand the force of the wind and were sucked up into the sky.

  I could feel my energy draining. Thinking quickly, I ran from the boys and slumped to the ground in a faint. Hoofbeats drew closer, and closer, until…

  I rolled onto my back and sent a last burst of flame at the rider above me. The woman fell off her frenzied horse and landed heavily. She curled into a ball and died. I lay still, my cheek pressed against the cold ground, unable to tear my gaze away from her charred body. I’d killed a shadow Familiar before, and Korozoth, but not something that looked so…human. The smell reminded me of roast pork.

  My stomach rippled, and I managed to get to my knees before throwing up.

  The lead rider roared. He broke free from the rubble and wheeled his horse toward me, his sword high over his head. Before he could attack, Blackwood rose up behind him, brought his stave down in a whipping arc, and stabbed the skinned man between his shoulder blades. The rider fell, and Blackwood, with two more swings of his stave, kept him down for good.

  Blood streaked Blackwood’s pale face, but he didn’t even wipe at it.

  “Are you all right, Howel?” he asked. He was breathing heavily. Looking down at the now-dead Familiar, he kicked it for good measure and came to help me up.

  “I’ll be fine,” I grunted. The nosebleed had stopped, though dark spots wavered in my vision. I spit the taste of copper and ash out of my mouth. “We didn’t do much with the new weapons, did we?”

  His pained expression gave me my answer.

  Now, when the battle was practically done, sorcerers came flying over the barrier to chase the ravens and finish the slaughter. The ravens were in a tizzy, circling and cawing as they sped over the rubble and back toward the horizon. I felt we’d got stupidly lucky, catching them off guard.

  We returned to the barrier. Once there, it took us two tries to fly back over the thing, where we found Valens waiting on the other side. Considering we’d failed, he appeared smugly pleased. I wanted to shake him.

  “Thank you for watching while we nearly got ourselves killed,” I said, beyond respect at this point.

  “I’d orders to let you display your so-called abilities.” He dusted his sleeves, as though he’d somehow been doing all the work. “I’d be surprised if you are allowed another experiment like this.”

  “We need more time,” I said. Valens turned flashing eyes to me. There was anger in him, seething below a thin layer of civility. It startled me.

  “Ask the people of Liverpool for more time,” he snapped. Liverpool? The four of us exchanged glances, the silent question passing among us. Huffing, Valens contained himself and said, “It’s over. Go home and rest. After tomorrow you return to my squadron.” He turned on his heel and stalked away, leaving me uneasy.

  “Can’t say we didn’t try,” Dee said softly. He took the whip from his belt, slid the flute off his shoulder, and offered them to me.

  “Keep them,” I said shortly. “We’re not done yet.”

  Blackwood, however, accepted Dee’s weapons, then nodded to Magnus. “I’ll take yours.”

  “Think I’ll hang on to mine for the time being.” Magnus saluted us as he strode away. “Souvenirs.”

  Dee followed Magnus, while Blackwood and I headed home. Despite being laden down with the failed weapons, he appeared pleased. Really, he looked gleeful to have been disgraced before the entire Order. I let my annoyance boil over.

  “You had nothing to say to Valens?” I snapped.

/>   “Perhaps these weapons were always too dangerous to play with.”

  “We can make them work with proper instruction,” I said. Where that proper instruction was to come from, I’d no idea.

  “We were almost killed today.” Blackwood held up a hand still covered in the rider’s blood. “Please. I don’t want trouble from Whitechurch or Valens or anyone else but R’hlem.” His voice was quiet but firm. We said no more, and I turned over what Valens had said, his anger. Why had he brought up Liverpool specifically? What had happened?

  When we arrived home, I walked straight into the obsidian room, taking up a bowl of water and swirling the liquid into the air. I wasn’t particularly skilled at scrying, unfortunately, and my water glass resembled a rather limp rectangle instead of the customary square. Footsteps whispered behind me. Blackwood waited in the doorway, arms crossed.

  Bother him. I returned to scrying, badly. Blackwood didn’t need to be told what I was about. Edging in gracefully, he took up his stave and straightened my mirror into a perfect, glittering square.

  I’d never been to Liverpool, but I tried to envision the streets, the port, the clatter of carriages and call of voices, and then—there.

  It appeared before us, a smoking ruin.

  Blackwood nearly dropped the water glass in shock, and I bit back a horrified cry. Buildings had been ground into rubble. Fires dotted the wreckage here and there, like hideous signatures. Pulling back further, I caught sight of a great lumbering lizard crawling across the destruction, a forked tongue the length of a carriage horse tasting the earth lazily. It looked rather like an iguana, with spikes of red and electric blue fanned out along its ridged back.

  Zem, the Great Lizard, opened his mouth and spewed a stream of white-hot flame, roasting the side of a building. It collapsed, and there was movement as people—yes, they were people—fled. Zem’s gullet bulged, and he opened his mouth again….

  Blackwood swore, swiping his stave at the water glass to change the scene. But I spied something and grabbed his arm. Letters had been carved into a broad avenue, scorched by fire, darkened by ash. The words read:

  Give Me Henrietta Howel

  Coldness planted itself in my gut as I took over the water glass, moving from Liverpool to York. We’d more sorcerers stationed there, but Familiars still carpeted the area surrounding the city. They were a sea of cloaks and talons and fangs. With so many at the gates, waiting for an opportunity to strike, the sorcerer ranks had to be exhausted. And sure enough, when I went looking at the surrounding area, I found those four ugly words sliced into a green hillside.

  “Don’t,” Blackwood whispered, but I couldn’t stop. Hands shaking, I forced the mirror to show me other areas. Kent, Manchester, Surrey, Devon, and on and on. Some areas were less devastated than others. But if I searched the populous towns, I would find the words once more:

  Give Me Henrietta Howel

  “He’s punishing them.” My voice was dull.

  I knew enough of this war to understand that R’hlem didn’t mindlessly destroy. What goods and people he could preserve, he did. Canterbury had been the base of his operations in the east for years, after all. This, however, was sick and wasteful.

  He was trying to force the sorcerers’ hand to give me over.

  “Why does he hate me so much?” I’d destroyed one of his monsters, yes, but why this?

  “Because he thinks you’re the chosen one,” Blackwood said quietly, dissolving the mirror and returning the water to its bowl. He leaned against the table as though he couldn’t stand properly on his own. “If you’re the only one who can defeat him, he won’t stop until he destroys you. So he blasts the country until we’ve no choice but to give in.”

  “Maybe you should.” It was a childish, mad thing to say, but I was on the verge of sobbing. This was where I’d got us all: a monster rampaging through the countryside, and a chosen one who was not truly chosen. “At least if he has me, he might stop—”

  “Don’t think that!” Blackwood snapped, swiping the silver bowl to the floor. It struck with a clatter, water splashing onto the black stone. He grabbed me by the elbows, looking desperate. “I know your mind, and I swear to God if you take it upon yourself to go to him, I will drag you home even if it kills me. Do you hear?” His eyes shone with panic. “I’ll never let him have you.”

  He was shaking now. I’d truly scared him. Gently, I extricated myself and picked up the bowl, sweeping the water back inside before setting it in its proper place.

  I nodded. “I won’t go to him. But,” I said, “don’t you see? We need those weapons. If only—”

  “No, Howel.” He cut me off with a look and then stalked out of the room. Apparently he thought that was all it took to settle the matter. He was wrong.

  Bother the headaches and nosebleeds, bother that these weapons had been created by a magician: if we were willing to throw something away because we didn’t understand it or it made us uncomfortable, then R’hlem deserved to win.

  I went right upstairs to get out of my bloodstained clothes. Lilly struggled to keep a calm expression when she saw me, but she did an admirable job. I scrubbed with soap until my skin was raw, and reluctantly let Lilly take my soiled gown for the rubbish after she swore it was beyond saving.

  Finally, I pulled out Mickelmas’s trunk and tried the Ever what you need spell once again. I thought of the weapons; nothing happened. I thought of slashing R’hlem’s throat. Still nothing. Groaning in frustration, I thought of Mickelmas, his laughing dark eyes, his gray-shocked beard, his stupid multicolored coat. Above all, I imagined throttling him out of sheer frustration.

  That seemed to do the trick. The chest thumped beneath my hand, and I threw open the lid.

  Inside was a flyer. Mystified, I picked it up. It appeared to be a carnival poster, the type that advertised the strongest man alive and such. The woodcut letters were blocky, and beneath them was an illustration of a man with a top hat and a curling mustache.

  SEE THE WONDERS OF BEGGAR’S CORNER, the poster read. MEET MEN AND WOMEN OF MARVELOUS MAGICAL REPUTATION. CHILDREN WELCOME, PETS PREFERRED. BURLINGTON ARCADE 59, AT PICCADILLY.

  The man with the hat held a bubbling potion of some kind, and sparks flew from his open hand.

  Definitely a magician. I squinted as I read it over again. Burlington Arcade? But that area had been beneath the ward for over a decade, since the magicians had been driven out of London proper. This poster looked to be much older; the paper was yellowing, and there were coffee stains on the edges.

  It must have been from before the start of the war, making it all but useless. I nearly balled it up and burned it but reconsidered. The ward had been gone for months. Suppose the magicians had found a way to move back into the city undetected? Suppose there were now magicians in the heart of London who could help me? Suppose one of them knew about these blasted weapons?

  My mind raced. I couldn’t tell Rook, not when stress would speed the poison. I couldn’t bring it up to Blackwood, since he had a barely concealed dislike for the weapons. Magnus and Dee would be enthusiastic, but perhaps overly so. I imagined Magnus gallivanting into a den of magicians and being turned into a ham. But I needed to tell somebody.

  And I knew exactly who that person should be.

  The stairs creaked beneath my feet as I hurried to the top floor. I knocked lightly on Fenswick’s door, and Maria opened it. Her face and hands were dusted with flour.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked, wiping herself clean.

  “Look at this.” I waited until she was neat, handed over the paper, and sat. She scanned the flyer, a wondering expression stealing over her face. She began to grin.

  “Mam used to tell me magicians’ abilities were grand and strange. Can they turn your hair blue, do you think?”

  “Oh, they can do much more than that.” Clearly I’d told the right person. “I want to go tomorrow.”

  “I’ll come with you,” Maria said right away, sitting beside me. My heart leaped at
how easy it was to trust her. Then she frowned. “Have you the time?”

  “I’m excused in the afternoon for an outing. Come with me then and we’ll slip away afterward.” I smoothed the paper, excitement coursing through me. I’d often wondered if all magicians were like Mickelmas. Now I’d have a chance to see.

  “Shall I bring my ax along?” Maria grinned again. “Just in case?”

  “Yes. Though it’ll be a bit out of place at our first stop.”

  —

  MADAME VOLTIANA’S SHOP WAS STILL FULLY operational, even with the ward down. People might need to barter on street corners for grain or tobacco, but high-society ladies couldn’t be expected to do without exquisite tailoring. Dressmaker dummies clothed in elegant, headless fashion waited by the door to greet customers. There were fewer seamstresses working at Voltiana’s now, but the purple-skinned faerie was all smiles and enthusiasm when Eliza, Maria, and I arrived, and all business as I was measured for a new gown.

  Madame Voltiana clapped her bony hands while she admired my reflection. “You will look as marvelous as I can make you. You’re too tall, of course, and not shapely enough, but with my design no one shall be able to tell!”

  Lovely. The faerie pinched me while she measured my hips and waist and adjusted my posture. Eliza sat on a plush sofa, choosing between two brightly colored swatches of silk. Maria, who’d been plopped down beside her, studied her surroundings as if she’d stepped onto another planet.

  For all of Madame Voltiana’s cheerful insults, the shop was a welcome bubble of femininity. In here, it seemed, the war had not come.

  “Wait until you see the color. It will be a confection of molten red and rich Indian orange. You will look like a tongue of flame,” Voltiana cooed. “I could make your gown like the phoenix, so that at midnight it would burn. Of course, you’d be walking around naked afterward, but we all must suffer for art.”