The Nine Read online

  Perry leaned forward, propping himself on his elbows and motioning the others to huddle up some. He spoke in a low voice. “Let’s keep our voices down anyway. Teran, what’d you make out on the way up?”

  She scooted to the edge of the chair as Sagum sat next to Perry on the couch and Stuber sat with his rifle. “Nothing terribly obvious. I saw no other people—mech or human—other than the ones we met out front. A few corridors that seemed like they weren’t meant for guests, but they could just be for the servants. And of course, there’s every place outside of where Venn told us we were permitted.” She looked daunted. “This is big place, Perry. It might take me a while.”

  “How confident are you that you can get around unseen?”

  Teran shrugged with her hands. “Accounting for the mechs’ hearing? Fifty-fifty I get caught.”

  Sagum looked worried. “What do you think they’ll do if they catch us sneaking around?”

  Stuber propped one dirty boot up onto a knee. “That’s going to depend on how forthright Abbas is being about wanting to help us. If he’s being honest, then I’d guess we’ll have another little spat about being distrustful. If he’s pulling our chain, then I’d say they’ll do anything up to and including killing us.”

  Teran shook her head. “That’s if I get caught. But I’m good at two things, and I’ve been doing them my whole life. The first is sneaking around. You don’t grow up with a thief for a father and not pick up a few tricks of the trade. The second thing is running cons. I can run a con on anyone. Including a mech.”

  Perry couldn’t help a shadow of doubt from passing over his face.

  Teran registered it, but rather than argue with him, she straightened in her chair, looked around her with an expression of abject confusion, and then fixed Perry with a doe-eyed stare of innocence. “I’m sorry,” she said in a voice that was completely different, like a child lost in a market. “This place is so big. I was trying to find the lounge again and I got lost. I thought it was down the stairs. I’ve never been in a place with so many stairs!”

  Perry held up his hands in surrender. “Alright. I stand corrected. You can con anyone.”

  “Damn right I can,” she said, her voice dropping back to its normal tone.

  Stuber rolled his head to Sagum and lifted his eyebrows. “What about you, Smegma? I thought you just finger fucked electronics. Can you keep up with her?”

  Sagum huffed, affronted. “I can be stealthy. You forget who crept up on you on that mountain top when we first met.”

  Stuber snapped a finger. “You’re right. I remember I was going to call you Pussy Foot.”

  “And yet you went with Smegma.”

  Stuber smiled and nodded, looking reminiscent. “Yes. I did. But it’s so much better because it actually sounds like your name. Sometimes I forget what your actual name is.”

  Perry turned back to Teran. “We don’t have a lot of time. If we’re going to do this, it needs to be now. Can you get Sagum to a computer terminal or…something?”

  Teran nodded. “We can certainly try.”

  Perry looked to Sagum. “We need information on the East Ruins. But, you know, pretty much any information would be helpful before we sit down for lunch. I’d love for us to know if and when Abbas lies to us.”

  Stuber sat forward over the rifle in his lap, his face serious now. “If you guys get into trouble, scream like all hell and run for the nearest exit. I don’t know if we’ll be able to hear you guys through these stone walls, but if we do, we’ll come out with guns blazing. If we have to bail and get split up…” he pointed out the window at the nearest peak, which had a dramatic, sheer cliff that seemed to glow yellow in the sunlight. “…We’ll rendezvous at the base of that cliff.”

  Perry nodded his assent to that. It was as thrown together as a plan could be, but he had to work with what he had, and the idea of a fallback point made him feel slightly more prepared.

  Teran and Sagum stood up. Teran glanced between Perry and Stuber. “What are you guys going to be doing?”

  “Sitting here and acting agreeable,” Perry answered.

  “And drinking,” Stuber said, taking another pull. “And maybe bathing.”

  “Definitely bathing,” Sagum put in as he stepped past, patting Stuber gingerly on the shoulder.

  Stuber watched them as they moved to the door. Teran opened it a crack and checked the hall, then nodded, opened the door fully, and slipped through. Sagum followed, and closed the door behind him without a sound.

  Stuber relaxed back into his chair, smiling. “That Smegma. I’m actually starting to like him. Maybe one of these days I’ll be able to turn him into a man, like I did with you.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  RIGHT OF VENGEANCE

  Mala stepped out of the glider before it even stopped moving. Before her, two praetors stood at the head of this section of docks, their eyes invisible behind lowered helms. She snapped her cape out from where it still trailed from the seat of the glider and hefted her longstaff.

  She strode for the spot between the two praetors, eyes forward, not even giving them the courtesy of a glance. Until, of course, they shifted. A slight tightening of their stance, aiming to block her.

  The thought flashed through her head just to cut them down, but she let it go the second that it came to her. That would do little good except to maybe ease her own temper.

  She stopped, still not looking at them. “If you mean to stop me, you’ll want another squad. Or three.”

  Their black helms turned inward, looking at each other. A slight shrug, from one to the other, and then they stepped aside. This was the Outer City, where certain select humans were permitted, but it was still The Clouds, and she was still a paladin, and they might be special, select humans, but they were still humans.

  She stormed between them. Dressed in a black battle uniform, except for the helm, which she never had cared for. The battle attire was only lightly armored. Protection would come from her shield. But she could move better in a battle uniform than in her usual courtly robes.

  The dock jutted out in a single column from the side of the Outer City, and all round them was open sky. To either side of the gangway, skiffs hovered. Below was a two mile drop to a sea that glittered in the sunlight like thousands of diamonds on a bed of blue. Squads of praetors stood at the ready on those skiffs, but she gave them no more mind than the two guarding the dock. The object of her attention stood thirty feet in front of her, watching her come with an irritated expression on his face.

  Lux was also in battle attire, his helm under his arm, his longstaff leaning loosely against his shoulder.

  “I wonder what the point of setting guards is,” Lux said as she stopped in front of him. “If they just let anyone walk in.”

  “I’m not anyone. And where do you think you’re going?”

  Lux eyed her, taking in her uniform. “Your outfit leads me to believe you already know where we’re going.”

  Alright. So that much was obvious. No point in trying to hide it.

  “I demand that you stand down,” Mala said.

  Lux’s irritation turned to an expression of warning. “You do not make demands of me. And why would you not want justice for your deceased husband?”

  “I will have my justice,” Mala snapped back. “I will deliver it myself. By Right of Vengeance, you have to allow me.”

  “This is not a spat between houses,” Lux replied, coolly. “So the Right of Vengeance does not apply.”

  “Dammit, Lux,” Mala hissed. “He was my husband. Don’t deny me this.”

  Lux regarded her for a long moment. “These…humans. The ones we’re after. They killed Selos. What makes you think they won’t be able to kill you, too?”

  Mala cocked an eyebrow. “I was always better in the dueling ring than Selos. Better than you, too.”

  Lux shook his head. “This isn’t some silly duel with parameters for fairness. This is actual war. There will be actual death. I do not want it
to be yours.”

  “I don’t need you to protect me. I can protect myself.”

  “And how will you get there? Do you even know where to go?”

  “You will allow me to take one of your skiffs. And I will take it to Praesidium.”

  Lux sighed heavily. “I had a feeling Abbas would leak that information. I’m surprised that he leaked it to you. Of all people.”

  “Abbas would leak it to anyone he felt might be able to reinstate him.”

  “Which is not possible.”

  “Which is also irrelevant.” Mala stamped the butt of her longstaff down on the dock. “Will you stand down?”

  Lux sniffed. “No. I will not. This is a matter for the inquisition. And I will do my duty.”

  “Lux,” she seethed.

  He cut her off with a raised hand. “But we are ten minutes from debarking.” He lowered his chin and gazed at her from under his high, arching eyebrows. “You may take the skiff at the end. And you may have a ten minute head-start. That is all you will get from me.”

  Mala’s heart surged. She snatched her longstaff up. “Ten minutes is all that I’ll need.”

  As she marched passed him, he called to her: “Could I convince you to take a squad of praetors with you?”

  Not a chance, she thought, but called back, “That won’t be necessary.”

  This might be her only opportunity to correct the things that had gone wrong. She wouldn’t let a squad of trigger-happy praetors take that away from her.

  ***

  Luckily for Teran, Sagum hadn’t been boasting about how quiet he could be.

  They’d made it to the stairs and now crept down to the ground level. Ina hadn’t been difficult to get past. She’d been standing, eerily still, behind a bar that occupied one of the walls, facing away from them. Staring out a window.

  Which Teran felt was odd. Why stare out a window? If you were just a machine, what benefit could you possibly derive from such a pastime? Was she actually enjoying the view? Or was this how she’d been programmed to stand while at the bar?

  Teran didn’t put much thought into it. It was a stroke of luck. She’d take it.

  The banister of the stairwell had massive stone spindles in it, which were nearly wide enough to hide Teran if she crouched behind them. It wasn’t perfect—she was sure that her hips and shoulders were visible, but you had to work with what you found when you were sneaking around. A lot of the time it was just a matter of not moving when someone looked in your direction.

  Of course, that assumed you were dealing with humans and their tendency to notice moving objects. She wasn’t sure how the mechs worked.

  But there were no mechs at the atrium below them. Maybe they were all scurrying about in the kitchens, preparing the lunch that had been demanded of them.

  Neither Teran nor Sagum spoke. They’d already agreed to start on the ground floor, as they felt it was as good a place as any to begin their search. And what was it they were looking for? Anything, really. Anything that looked like it shouldn’t be found.

  Teran pictured a room, somewhere on the grounds, filled with screens and monitors and readouts. A control center of some sort. She realized that they probably wouldn’t find anything quite so obvious. She just needed to keep her eyes open.

  She caught Sagum’s eye, and nodded towards the ground level. He nodded back, and they proceeded down the steps without a sound, staying close to the banister and its monstrous columns in case anyone came walking up.

  She paused every so often to listen for footsteps or voices. But all was quiet.

  At the bottom of the steps, they stole over the wide, empty space, to a pair of huge planters, out of which grew a strange shrub of some sort.

  Crouching behind the planters, Sagum eyed the shrubs with a look of mixed interest and disgust. “Who the hell keeps plants inside their house?” he whispered.

  “Paladins,” Teran answered.

  “But why?”

  “I don’t know, Sagum. Because they can.” She peered through hollow in the twisting limbs, eyeing the hall that led to the South Wing. “I think we should try the South Wing. When we were coming in, it looked like there might be a hangar for the skiffs on that side.”

  Sagum raised one eyebrow. “And?”

  “I don’t know. They store the skiffs over there, maybe that’s where they do the mechanical shit and have computers and maps and stuff. You got a better idea?”

  Sagum patted her arm. “Relax.”

  “Don’t touch me.” Sagum seemed to believe that he might rekindle their old childhood romance, if you could call it that. But Teran wasn’t that kid anymore, and his advances were unwanted—particularly when she was trying to do work. Of course, Perry didn’t need to know that.

  Sagum sighed. “When did you get so prickly?”

  “When I realized you’re an asshole. You ready?”

  She slunk to the mouth of the hall and eased the side of her face out—enough for one eye to see down the passageway. It was empty. Gods in the skies, if there was anything in this place worth finding, they certainly were taking no pains to guard it.

  Maybe Abbas was trustworthy after all.

  They moved down the hall as rapidly as could be done without making noise. Halls were dangerous. If someone popped out, there was nothing behind which they could hide. The only way to mitigate this was to move fast and have a ready story if you were caught.

  Noises. From the far end of the hall.

  Footsteps.

  Teran immediately judged that they wouldn’t have time to make it back to the planters in the atrium. A door stood to her left, a few paces away, and she sprung for it. She had no choice. She steeled herself for disaster and seized the doorknob.

  Unlocked. She pushed through, Sagum on her heels.

  They slipped in. Teran saw no imminent threats, and swung behind the big wooden door, thrusting it closed until right before it hit the jam, and then easing it shut with her fingertips. The hinges were well-oiled and silent.

  They stood behind the door, breaths held. Listening.

  The footsteps continued towards them.

  Please don’t be heading for this room.

  She looked over her shoulder at the room. It was dim. Lit by a single light in the ceiling that seemed to be on a low setting. It was small compared to the other rooms she’d seen. About as big as an average mudbrick house in Karapalida or Junction City. There was nothing in it. Just a long, silver tube, suspended from the ceiling, that ran around the perimeter of the room, right about at head height. A few hooks hung on the tube, clustered in a corner.

  It took her a moment to realize what the room was. They didn’t have these where she’d come from, but she could put it together well enough. It was a room for garments. Like a closet, except huge. And not in a bedroom, so probably not for personal garments.

  For guests, she realized. A closet for visitor’s things.

  Except that Teran didn’t think Warden Abbas ever got visitors. But perhaps Praesidium hadn’t always been a place for out-of-favor demigods to be banished.

  The footsteps drew abreast of the door, and Teran prepared to smash herself up against the doorjam and hope that whoever entered didn’t bother to close the door behind them…

  Then the footsteps passed.

  She let herself breathe.

  Silly, actually. Why would any of the servants need to go into an empty coat closet?

  She mentally categorized this room as a good fallback point, if needed, and then began the long, agonizing wait for the footsteps to dwindle and whoever made them to be long gone. They were already on a time crunch. She hated to waste more of it. But she’d hate to be caught even more.

  Partially because you just don’t want to get caught. And partially because Stuber would never let her live it down. And partially because then Perry wouldn’t trust her.

  She winced at her own girlishness and shook her head against the thought. Ridiculous. This was about saving her people. Not some
guy she’d only known for a few weeks.

  Still. She found him creeping into her decision making a lot lately.

  Bastard.

  “Alright,” she whispered. “Let’s try again.”

  She opened the door a crack. Checked this way. Then that. Then moved out again. Down the hall, fleet-footed and stealthy.

  The corridor ended in a T intersection, with a large door standing straight ahead of them. She checked her corners as she had before, and found both ends of the intersecting hall were empty. More doors, similar to the one straight ahead. These were less ornate. More utilitarian. This area was for the staff, not guests.

  A good sign.

  She crossed to the door and grabbed the handle. It moved well enough, but the door didn’t open. A small light above the locking mechanism flashed red. No admittance. An electronic lock.

  Teran slipped out of the way and pointed to the door. Sagum was already diving into his little pouch of gadgetry.

  “Watch my back,” he said, needlessly. She was already doing it. Straining to hear the sound of anyone coming. Planning out escape routes for various contingencies.

  Sagum knelt in front of the door. Her focus was outward, but she saw him placing something small and black over the locking mechanism. Twisting a few things that needed twisting. Tapping some things that needed tapping. Then he was still.

  Teran glanced at him. “What’s wrong?”

  “Waiting.”

  “What are you waiting for?” she hissed.

  “It’s not fucking magic, Teran. I can’t just poof the door open. I have to wait until the slicer matches up with the—”

  “Alright, shut up.”

  Blessed silence again.

  And after a few more moments of that, a nearly inaudible snick of something inside the door shifting. Sagum worked the handle, and this time she heard the latch being drawn back. They were in.

  It was torturous to keep her eyes down the hallway as Sagum pressed the door open a few inches and peered inside. She wanted to look. She wanted to see.