‘We had best hope Kargrin lives,’ said Clariel. ‘Or Mistress Ader.’

If Mogget answered, it was lost in Baazalanan’s howl, a terrible sound of glee and bloodlust. As it howled, the door broke and the creature grabbed a stunned guard on the other side and pulled him through the splintered hole. Still howling, it obeyed Clariel’s instruction not to kill, instead breaking both the man’s arms and legs as if they were kindling for a fire. Tossing him aside, it tore at the timber to make the hole wider still.

‘No!’ shouted Clariel. She ran to the door, stepping over the guard who had fallen unconscious to the floor. ‘No unnecessary harm! Hurt no one unless I tell you!’

Baazalanan and Aziminil turned back towards her. Everything became very still. Clariel could feel her heart pounding, feel the beat of it echoing inside her head, as if it were amplified and reflected by the mask.

‘Harm no one without my permission,’ repeated Clariel.

‘No,’ whispered Baazalanan. Aziminil laughed her horrid laugh. They turned away and went through the door.

‘Obey me!’ rasped Clariel, holding out her hand as if she might physically claw them back. But she could feel them breaking free of her, could feel their minds turning to some other purpose. They had wanted to come here for their own reasons, some great ambition that excited them. They had always intended to rebel.

Clariel turned to Mogget, to ask him a question, to ask what she might do, but he ran past her and through the door. With his departure a sickening feeling came to Clariel, the dreadful realisation that she had brought these terrible creatures to the Palace without knowing what they truly wanted. All along Aziminil had helped Kilp for a reason. Even now she might join forces with the Governor again …

‘No,’ growled Clariel. Holding her sword high she ducked through the smashed open door, out onto the musician’s gallery, a long balcony that occupied one end of the Great Hall. Aziminil and Baazalanan were already at the top of a staircase leading down into the hall, but here they had stopped.

One of the guard sendings, the leopard-like creatures, had surprised them. It had its jaws locked around Baazalanan’s neck and had borne him to the floor of the gallery, white sparks blazing as Charter-Magic fangs rent Free Magic flesh. But Baazalanan had its thin fingers about the leopard’s throat, and Aziminil was hacking at the great cat with her bladed feet, white sparks geysering up with every blow.

Mogget was perched on the railing of the gallery, looking down into the hall. Clariel looked too, trying to take in everything she saw. A dizzying sensation of recent death rolled across her, the result of many violent deaths in so short a time. There were dead guards everywhere, guild and royal. The Royal Guards were fewer by far, but they had killed many more of their foes. Only strength of numbers had overborne them in the end. Most of their dead lay around the dais at the far end of the hall, where they had formed a shield ring around the throne.

But that ring was broken, and the King they had sought to protect was slumped on his throne, with Kilp and Aronzo and a half dozen of their Goldsmith guards around him. A moment before they had been laughing, relieved to have survived a hard-won victory.

Now they were all staring back towards the gallery, at the creatures battling there and the strange bronze-masked apparition that returned their stare.

The rage came unasked as Clariel saw Kilp and Aronzo for the first time since they had killed her parents. It rose in her like a vast wave capsizing a ship, complete in an instant, with no possibility of turning it back. She howled, white smoke issuing from her mask like steam from a kettle. Her sword burst into hot, red flames that sent a sickening metallic stench across the hall.

Ignoring the battle on the stair, Clariel jumped over the railing, down the fifteen paces to the hall below. Her ankles turned as she landed, but the pain was simply taken up by the fury as additional fuel, adding to the rage and hatred that already stoked it high. Striding forward, Clariel called out in a voice that could never be recognised as her own.

‘Stand away from the King or die!’

Three of the guards stood away from the King and fled. Of the remaining three, one began to slot a bolt in his crossbow, his fingers trembling. When it fell on the floor, he also ran. But the other two were made of sterner stuff. They edged forward with Aronzo, very slowly, their swords held high.

Kilp drew his dagger and stayed by the King. Orrikan swayed back on his throne and lifted his head, his old nose sniffing the stench of Free Magic in the air, his eyes wide.

chapter thirty-two

revenge, not so sweet

Clariel stormed towards the closer trio, a hooded figure of flame and smoke, her bronze mask gleaming. The first guard tried to parry her sweeping cut but his sword broke and Clariel’s weapon cut him in two. Even as he fell she withdrew the blade and engaged the second guard, who stumbled back and turned to flee. Clariel sprang forward further than anyone could possibly jump and took his head from his shoulders. That left her open to Aronzo, who cut at her shoulder, but through fear or weariness the stroke was short. Clariel whirled and the very point of her sword nicked him on the neck, just above his mail hauberk.

‘Father!’ screamed Aronzo, stumbling backwards. He fell over a corpse and landed heavily. ‘Help!’

Kilp threw his dagger. It struck Clariel in the side, easily parting the protective robes, long since threadbare and bereft of Charter marks. The hunting leathers beneath slowed the dagger a little, but not enough, the blade sinking deep. To Clariel, consumed by rage, it was no more than a pinprick. Ignoring it, she stood over Aronzo. He wasn’t smiling now, and she was pleased to see his cheeks were badly sliced, the wounds not healed.

‘For my mother,’ she said, striking down. Her sword pierced Aronzo’s mail with a thunderclap, flames licking across the metal. Aronzo screamed again, a bubbling scream that became the choking, rattling cough of death.

‘For my father,’ said Clariel, and she struck down again for the heart, killing him instantly. Clariel felt Aronzo die, felt his spirit cross all uncomprehending to the cold river that would bear him away beyond the Ninth Gate. For a moment she even had a vision of those implacable, rushing waters and once again her hand twitched as if it should be holding a bell.

Withdrawing her sword from Aronzo’s chest, she turned towards Kilp. He stared down from the dais. His mouth worked and his eyes bulged, as if he could not comprehend the ruin of his grand plans and the death of his son.

‘Who are you?’ he shouted, his voice high. He looked over Clariel’s head, towards the minstrel’s gallery. ‘Aziminil! We agreed, I said you could have the King! There is no need for this!’

‘Have you killed so many parents that you cannot remember their children?’ asked Clariel. She wished she could take the mask off, so Kilp could see her face before she killed him. But that was not possible.

Kilp turned to run, but he did not go far. Clariel cut him down at the King’s feet, stabbing him t

hrough the body. White surcoat and gilded mail offered no protection against her ensorcelled sword.

Kilp died, the look of disbelief set permanently on his once-handsome face.

Clariel looked at the blood spreading across the pure white cloth, at the tumbled bodies of a father and son. What had killing them achieved after all? It had not mended the pain in her heart. She knew it had been foolish to think it would.

She felt the rage beginning to ebb away from her, like the wash of a wave retreating from the sand. But she knew she must not let the fury go. Kilp and Aronzo were dead, but this had brought no ending. She could feel the fierce, strident thoughts of the two Free Magic creatures. They had dealt with the leopard sending and were once more intent on their greater purpose, whatever it was.

Clariel had to regain control over them, and quickly.

‘Who are you?’ asked Orrikan, his voice shaky. ‘Do you serve Tathiel? Where is my granddaughter?’

Clariel ignored the King and looked towards the gallery.

Baazalanan and Aziminil were stalking towards her, with Mogget a few paces behind. All that was left of the leopard sending was a smattering of fading Charter marks upon the gallery stair.

‘Stop!’ ordered Clariel. She had hoped the fury would give her the power to reassert her domination, but she was already out of the full berserk rage. It had begun to fade the moment Kilp hit the floor.

The creatures did not stop. They continued to advance, Baazalanan going to one side and Aziminil the other, as if they hoped to avoid Clariel entirely. Both were circling around to get to the King, Clariel realised. She raised her sword and backed towards the throne, darting glances towards Orrikan. He did not look dangerous, and he had not defended himself against Kilp. But he was a powerful Charter Mage, or he had been once.

‘Who are you?’ repeated the King.

‘I am Clar—’ Clariel began to say her name, then stopped. What use was that name now? She felt like her old self was gone, destroyed by her own hand, by her own mistakes. ‘I am no one. Run, Highness. I will try to stop them here.’

Tags: Garth Nix Abhorsen Fantasy
Source: readsnovelonline.net