"He's doomed."
Arlen took a moment to realise that someone had actually said it, rather than it being another echo of his thoughts. The guard beside him was staring down at the Assembly platform, where Silas knelt to give his testimony. It had been a piss-up in a brewery from start to finish; since the otherworld girl had managed to wriggle out of the noose, and the acolyte had nothing substantial to prove his innocence, no witness except the Angel slave, who was categorically against him, there was no hope of him winning. It was really only a case of what his punishment was going to be.
And, unknown to anyone else in the Assembly hall, including Silas himself, a case of how Arlen was going to get him out of it.
He had set off early that morning. His preoccupation with tracking Jordan and his habits – not hard, since the boy had rarely left Yddris's house in the past week – had meant that finding a mark for impersonation had been a rush job, and he had wanted to establish early that the guard he was impersonating was feeling off colour. The real guard was probably floating face down in the Aven's reservoir by this point, but no one would have found it yet. He had successfully fitted his story around a raging hangover from a convenient bender on his victim's part the previous night.
"He knows it," Arlen muttered. He glanced up at the high table and wasn't surprised to meet Yddris's eye. He had no intention of letting the witch man spring a trap on him this time. He had picked a door guard, all the easier to get into the main body of the castle and hatch an escape for himself and Silas.
"Eril's never going to forget this, is he?" his companion said. They turned their gazes to the Orthanian Head sitting on Lord Harkenn's right, who was an odd shade of grey and giving a convincing impression of struggling over a chamber pot under the table.
"If I were Harkenn, I'd be more worried about Ethred."
The baron sat in the Assembly stands close to the high table with an expression like thunder. He had come out in ostentatious finery and was making the attempt to look as intimidating as possible, though any effect it may have had on Lord Harkenn was negligible. In fact, the high lord looked in unusually high spirits despite the setting. At Harkenn's shoulder, standing just behind his chair and looking less delighted, was the slave, trussed up in chains and just having returned from the witness platform. Her face was unreadable, but her gaze didn't move from Silas.
"Oh yeah," the other guard said. "He's a favourite of the baron's, isn't he? Well, damn. Don't envy his Lordship the job of dealing with that fallout."
Before Arlen could respond, Harkenn's hand came down with a bang on the high table. The room had been quiet before, but the sudden and total absence of sound left Arlen reeling a little.
"The sentence is hanging," Harkenn said. He fidgeted as though he very much wished to be somewhere else. "The date will be set after I have consulted with the Houses."
Arlen moved forward with the other guard to retrieve Silas as two others swung the vast doors wide behind them. The gathering in the stands began to get up and leave. The acolyte had fallen to his knees, staring up at the newly-vacated seat at the high table where Harkenn had been sitting with an expression of numb shock. Before he bent down to grasp Silas by the arm, Arlen looked up and locked eyes with Yddris before the Unspoken swept away.
He had to confess himself surprised that the witch man hadn't tried anything yet, but he wasn't going to dwell on it. He grabbed Silas's arm, and his lip curled of its own accord at the skin and bone limb under the prisoner's robe. There was nothing to work with; no strength, no evident common sense, no grit. Why Marick had wanted him to take Silas on, when the acolyte would be of much more use under one of the Devils' forgery artists, he still couldn't quite understand.
Still, he had been commissioned to save the boy from the noose however useless he was, and that was what he was going to do.
As he and the other guard led the boy out, a near dead-weight between them, four more guards closed in, two in front and two behind, all equipped with a spear and a sword at their hip. Arlen rolled his eyes behind his visor. It could never be as simple as knocking out a single guard and making off with Silas. Not that he had expected it to be, but it would have made a nice change.
Two guards joined the back of their procession as they marched towards the dungeons. Arlen kept his ears trained on the others and a hand on the sword at his belt.
Two more had joined them before the corridors became drab and undecorated, long halls of unbroken stone that sloped gently downwards before they reached the dungeon's steps. All around him he heard the faint whine of swords loosening in their scabbards. When all the guards drew, pointing the blades out flat towards each other, Arlen did the same.
Silas convulsed in his grip, looking around frantically at the bristling forest of swords that had suddenly appeared around him.
A long, comically awkward pause ensued at the realisation that nobody had been caught out.
"What's the meaning of this?" a guard said, though his sword was pointed firmly at another man's breast plate. "I was told what to do here, I wasn't told why."
"That's because it would have given the game away," another one said. His voice was uncertain. "One of us isn't who he says he is. There's been a tipoff."
And I bet I know who from, Arlen thought sourly. It had been too much to ask for Yddris to keep his nose out of it. It was almost laughable to go to all this effort to keep hold of a prisoner who'd simply botched a murder job on a kitchen grunt, and he suspected things might have gone more smoothly if it hadn't been for the Unspoken death the previous week. The ruling houses wanted to keep up appearances and make it look like criminals got caught and punished, of course, in an effort to ease public distress and dissuade a second attempt. But hanging all that on Silas, who could barely keep his feet for shaking, seemed ridiculous.
"Well, what now?" said another guard. "Clearly all of us knew what to do. False alarm, I'd say."
"Hang about," said the guard on the other side of Silas, "You." He pointed his sword at one of the guards who had led the procession, "Remove your helmet."
The accused did so, revealing a face of almost comical indignation. "And why's that?"
The first guard lowered his sword, but only so far as to leave it pointing at the man's chest instead of his face. "Just checking."
Only the whistle gave away the movement of the blade as it swept outward and cleanly severed the man's unprotected head from his neck. Tinny gasps of surprise and outrage echoed from behind several other visors. Three swords whirled to point at the attacker as the head hit the floor. Silas threw up at Arlen's feet and he stepped away with a grunt, lowering his sword.
It took the three who had turned on the attacker a long minute to realise that the other standing guards had not also raised their swords to the defence. Uncertainty was an opening; Akiva ripped off his helmet at that moment with a cackle and wrenched the helmet off a real castle guard, cutting his throat with one fluid move. Jesper, his sword still covered in blood, did the same for another guard who had turned to face Akiva. The third turned to run, but a well-aimed blow from the pommel of Arlen's sword stunned him long enough for Raziel to step in and snap his neck.
Arlen laughed and took off his own helmet. "You bastards."
Akiva snickered. "Weren't going to let you steal all the fun."
"Marick sent us to make sure you bothered with him," Raziel said, already halfway out of his armour.
All four assassins looked down at Silas, who had fainted in his own puke. With a long-suffering sigh, Jesper pulled him out of the puddle by his arms and then hoisted the boy over one shoulder. Dangling there like a ragdoll, he looked even more pathetic.
"Can't tell me you wouldn't be tempted," Arlen muttered, eyeing the boy in disgust and then averting his eyes. "Just look at him."
"Eh, well, you know Marick," Raziel said. "He doesn't like leaving debts unpaid."
"How much firepower did you bring, Raz?" Jesper interrupted. "We're going to need a hefty distraction."
Raziel was not so much an assassin – that implied subtlety – as a munitions enthusiast with a penchant for getting away with murder. Physically, he was fairly unassuming; short, bald, dirty and missing most of his teeth from decades of drinking heavy spirits like water. He wore clothes several sizes too big and which were rarely cleaned; under the constant smell of smoke and booze, Raziel smelled like a sewer. Still, he was one of the more sufferable members of the Devils and one Arlen would never complain about having on side in a fight.
And he really was very good at making things explode.
"Right, you're the expert on this place, Arlen," Akiva said, as Raziel rattled off the bombs and flares he had smuggled inside. "How are we getting out of here?"
"You were the ones with the bright idea to have us all holed up in the same place," Arlen muttered, but he was grinning. "And now you want to me to coordinate three people I didn't expect to be here?"
"You knew Marick would send someone."
"I didn't think he would send three someones."
He looked around, taking stock. There were several entrances to the castle that he used irregularly to avoid anyone noticing a pattern, and it would be daft to have them all trying to get out the same way if Yddris suspected there were more Devils. Whoever was carrying Silas would be at a disadvantage, and so should be given the most straightforward route out. It couldn't be Raziel, who would be planting distractions, or Akiva, who couldn't be trusted not to do something abominably stupid. Jesper was a good candidate, but almost never entered the castle.
Arlen scowled. "I'll take the boy. As soon as this gets out the place will be swarming, so I'll have to take him some way that eliminates the need to fight ourselves out. Raziel should go to the clerks' wing and let off something bright and noisy. The clerks won't look twice at anyone who shouldn't be there, they're too cowardly, and it's on the other side of the castle to where Silas and I will be going." He thought for a minute. "Raz, do you have smoke bombs?"
"One," Raziel replied, "Haven't had time for making more. Got three bottles of smoking belladonna, though, and a special present I was saving for Harkenn himself."
Arlen cocked his head, and Jesper answered in Raziel's stead, "He has a shit bomb. I saw him making it fresh this morning."
"Scummer," Arlen said, laughing, "You filthy scummer."
Raziel just grinned with five teeth and tipped an invisible hat.
"The Heads of House will be having their meeting in Harkenn's study, in all likelihood," Arlen said, "Jes can plant the smoke bomb outside, and the belladonna if things get messy."
"You can give Harkenn my gift, as well," Raziel added in undertone.
"I want to plant some bombs," Akiva said, indignant.
"You can," Arlen said, "You're going first to gas out the barracks so they can't call reinforcements easily when they find this lot." He gestured to the mess of bodies around them. "If the barracks empty into the castle before we're clear of it, we're screwed."
Jesper laughed. "How did you expect to do this without us, Arl?"
"I'd have managed," Arlen replied curtly. "But I'm adaptable, see. Get lost, Akiva."
Akiva saluted and ran off, stowing his prizes in his trouser pockets as he went. Jesper propped Silas against a wall and helped Arlen gather up all the bodies and parts of bodies and pile them at the bottom of the dungeon stairs. The rapidly browning puddle of blood they had left on the flagstones couldn't be helped, but they might get a slim head start. In risky operations the smallest advantages needed pressing for everything they had.
"We'll give him ten minutes," Arlen said, heaving the last body onto the pile and wiping his hands on his trousers. "Then Raziel will go, then me, then you." He grinned at Jesper. "Make sure Yddris gets some of that shit, will you?"
"Aye, sir," Jesper said with a mock salute. "What've you got against him? None of the others bother you."
"You've already said it," Arlen muttered, taking the steps back up two at a time, "Yddris bothers me. He gets in the way of everything. The others leave me alone, at least."
"You sure you don't know him from somewhere?"
"Course I'm not sure," he snapped. "Never seen his face, have I? Willing to bet his name isn't as old as he is, either."
"He seems to know you."
Arlen offered a sour look. "Thanks for pointing that out, Jes, I hadn't noticed."
When the time came to leave, Silas still hadn't stirred. Arlen was content to let him pretend he was still passed out, though several times he'd caught the boy watching him under a cracked-open eyelid that had fluttered shut again when Arlen turned his way. Without saying a word, he stepped over Silas's legs, hooked him under the armpits and slung him over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. An outraged squawk followed, quickly stifled. Arlen chuckled, nodded at Jesper, and the two took off in opposite directions just as the alarm bells tolled.
"Morning," he said cheerfully, as Silas beat his fists against his back. "Hang on tight, won't you?"
He took a sharp left through a narrow servants' corridor behind a hidden door in the wall, taking a particular vindictive pleasure in the sound of Silas's body thudding against the sides with each step. The acolyte at least had the sense not to cry out, but his gasps of pain were tinged with outrage.
Arlen stopped after a while and put him down. The bells were still tolling, and very distantly he could hear soldiers shouting. In the close quarters of the corridor it was dark and airless, and the smell of the nearby dungeons was stifling. Silas's breathing, echoing through the dark, was quickly escalating into panic. Arlen cursed.
"Get a grip, kid," he said. "Not enough air in here for you to be panting like that. Get on my back, we're going up."
"No," Silas hissed, forcing it out between his teeth.
"You seem to think you have a choice." Arlen stared at the patch of darkness where the boy stood. "Get on my back or I'll loop the noose around your neck myself and have done with it."
A short, seething silence; and then, "Where are you? Help me up."
"Here." Silas jumped under his hand as he laid it on his head. "I'm turning around now."
Silas's hands felt their way up his back and clamped on his shoulders. Arlen crouched, hooked the boy's knees around his middle, and let him settle for a moment before launching up the ladder he knew was there by memory alone. A chink of light ahead betrayed the hatch above. He climbed rapidly, aware of the boy's weight dragging on him and the grip tightening as they gained height, but though the rungs were crusty with rust under his gloves, they were sturdy and each hand- and foothold was certain. When the gap had grown to the size of a silver Cert, he reached for the latch and swung the trapdoor open.
They were hit with a cold wind as soon as they emerged over the top. The trapdoor opened onto the castle ramparts; it was a derelict service tunnel from the days of the war with Caelum. The castle was the last bastion if the city fell; the ramparts enclosed the building itself and three of the five streets below it known as the Fingers. During the war, guards had always been patrolling the wall, communicating across the vast distances by torch signal, but since the treaties had been signed the only ones to patrol the ramparts were assassins, thieves, and the odd melodramatic courtesan who'd had their heart broken and fancied themselves a poet.
Until today, that was.
"Nict's balls," Arlen muttered. He clambered out of the hole and let Silas down none-too-gently against the wall, and then turned to face the Unspoken sweeping towards them.
"Arlen," Yddris said, as if this were an ordinary meeting that could have happened anywhere, between anyone, at any time. "Well met."
"Speak for yourself," Arlen replied. He cocked his head. "You not important enough to be privy to the Lord's decisions?"
Yddris chuckled. "I know the Lord's decisions already. The meeting was pretence and your bomb full of shit just made a very nasty stain on the rug. He wants your head for that, by the way."
"Does he." Arlen scowled. He wondered if Jesper had made it out or not. "You come to collect it, by any chance?"
"No. I'm not stupid."
"Could've fooled me."
Yddris let it pass without comment. "Stay away from my apprentice, Arlen."
Arlen laughed. "Oh, I see. You're threatening me."
"No, I'm warning you." The air tightened with crackling power, and Arlen's hair stood on end. His hand crept to the dagger concealed in the belt line of his trousers. "He deserves more than the horseshit you're trying to feed him."
Arlen smiled. In the distance, he heard armour rattling, coming in their direction. He gestured for Silas to stand.
"And if he chooses to come to me? Will your oaths let you stop him?"
Yddris's silence was an answer in itself. Arlen grinned, hand moving from his dagger and down to the hook in his pocket.
"Promising him a way home that doesn't exist is a new low even for you," Yddris murmured finally. "I won't stop him if it's his choice. Only his choice. Watch your back if I ever find out it isn't."
Arlen's grin didn't leave his face, but a shiver went through his core. He shook it off. He wasn't scared of the witch man or what he could do – he was sure of that. The gifts were unnatural, that was all.
That was it.
The sound of armour was getting close. A line of soldiers was on the ramparts, marching towards them. Arlen pulled out the hook and latched it onto one of the crenulations, testing it for tautness. He grabbed Silas, swung the boy over his shoulders again, and got up onto the wall. Yddris watched him and smoked his pipe. He didn't move to cut the line. He didn't move at all.
"That's not a threat, either," the Unspoken said, "Before you get smart with me again."
Arlen's heels slipped on the ledge. Behind him, dangling over the drop, Silas was screaming, but he still heard the last words as he abseiled at speed down the rampart wall.
"It's a promise, Blackheart. Remember it."