The Lost Heiress #2 Read online

Hauling the horse up over the slippery pebbles, she wiped her face and scowled at Braylwin’s back. He came here every year for his winter quarters, warm and dry. Here they’d stay—until she had word from Galen. Irritated, she shook her head. She should have warned Galen.

  It took an hour to clamber up to the outer barbican, and another half hour to satisfy the searchers, fill in identity forms, get their papers and permissions and passes to the inner courtyards.

  Trailing behind Braylwin across the cobbled yards and under the porticoes, she was amazed at the crowds of people: scribes, clerks, scriveners, translators. There were men dragging great trolley-loads of papers, long lines at doors, crowds around notices pinned to hundreds of boards. Most of them were sleek and well-fed; only a few were field agents or post-riders, looking far more weatherworn. Climbing one vast staircase, she looked down and saw an endless miserable line disappearing under one porch—not Watch, but tired-looking men, haggard women, a few lounging Sekoi.

  “What are they?”

  Braylwin paused long enough to glance down. “Petitioners. People looking for their families. Criminals. Nohopers.”

  He climbed on clumsily. After a minute she ran after him.

  His apartments were about a mile into the labyrinth of rooms and corridors they called the Underpalace; she realized after a while that even with all her training she was hopelessly lost. When they got there he went along a narrow passageway, banging doors open, tutting over dust, fussing at ornaments that weren’t where he’d left them. She knew the men-at-arms would sleep outside his door when on duty, otherwise in the endless dormitories all Watchholds had. She was expecting that for herself, but Braylwin beckoned her coyly to the end of the corridor and flung a door open. “For you, sweetie.”

  She peered in.

  A tiny room, with a bed and an empty hearth and a chest, and rain dripping into a pool, but when she’d crossed to the window and looked out she smiled, for the room was high in some turret, and it hung out into the sky over the tangle of lanes and courtyards and alleys far below.

  She was glad it was up on its own. She was already beginning to dislike the Tower of Song.

  “It’ll do,” she said, turning.

  Braylwin smirked from the door. “Yes. For keeping an eye on you, Carys.”

  It took her three days even to find a map of the place. In the mornings Braylwin would dictate long reports of the summer’s tax-gatherings to a harassed clerk who had been ordered to work with him.

  The man deserved a medal, Carys thought darkly, watching the sleek Watchleader tease and flatter and make a fool of him. Harnor, his name was. Once she saw him give her a quick, exasperated glance, but he never lost his temper, and Braylwin smirked and preened and invented endless imaginary accounts until he tired of the game and sent one of the men-at-arms to fetch his dinner. After that he spent the long, wet afternoons sleeping, or entertaining the gaggle of unpleasant cronies he called friends.

  Carys was rarely needed, but he kept her hanging around; only in the afternoons could she vanish without suspicion. “Take a tootle around,” he said once, filing his broad nails. “This place is a labyrinth, Carys, you’ll never find anything you need in it. Your friend Galen will love it, when we bring him in.” And he winked at her, so that she wanted to spit.

  One thing she realized soon was that the rain here was eternal. The weather must have changed since the Emperor’s time, because now the tower loomed constantly in its cloud of drizzle; all the long afternoons rain trickled in runnels and gutters and spouts, spattering through gargoyles of hideous beasts and goblins that spat far down on the heads of hurrying clerks. Always the roofs ran with water; it dripped and plopped and splashed through culverts and drains, or sheeted down, a relentless liquid gurgle that never stopped, until she started to imagine that this was the song the tower sang, through all the throats and mouths and pipes of its endless body.

  At first she wandered without direction, just trying to find her way back to the nearest courtyard, but she soon realized that was hopeless; once it took her three hours to find Braylwin’s rooms again.

  As she climbed the stairs wearily, Harnor was coming out.

  “How do you find your way around this warren?” she snapped.

  He looked at her in surprise. “The maps. How else?”

  “Maps? Where?”

  For a moment he glanced at her. Then he pushed the thick folder of paper under one arm. “I’ll show you.”

  He led her down three stairways and along a gallery that had once been painted with brilliant birds. Now only the ghosts of them lingered, and great damp patches of lichen were furring them over. At the end he stopped and opened a small door. “There’s one in here.”

  She went in after him warily, but through the door was nothing but a balcony, and looking down from it, she saw she was above a great echoing hall, full of desks and the murmur of voices. Coins were being counted down there, millions of them. She grinned, thinking of the Sekoi.

  “This is the map. There are many, and they’re scattered around the Underpalace. Would you like some paper? You could make a copy. It takes a while to find your way around otherwise.”

  As Harnor riffled through the file for a clean sheet, Carys watched him curiously. He looked pale, as if he never went outside. He found a piece and gave it to her.

  “Thanks. How long have you been here, Watchman?”

  “All my life.” He smiled sourly. “Forty years and more. Once I hoped I’d be a field agent, but not anymore. Too old.”

  She nodded, looking up at the map: an immense sprawl of rooms and courtyards painted on the wall, each with its name in silver. “This isn’t Watchwork.”

  “It’s from the Emperor’s time. There are many remnants of those days scattered around. Most have been destroyed, but the place is so huge . . .”

  “Have you ever explored it all?” she asked quietly.

  He looked up, a strange, almost frightened look. “Of course not. No one has. There are places that are not allowed.”

  Carys had turned and begun to draw; now her pencil stopped. “What places?”

  He looked uneasy. “The Great Library . . . and others. I’m not sure, really.”

  She looked at him. He was small, his hair graying early, his beard clipped. He looked away. “Is that all?”

  She nodded, thoughtful. “Thank you. Yes, that’s all.”

  Watching him hurry out, she knew he was afraid of her. That was normal. Everyone in the Watch spied on everyone else; it was their strength. But there had been something else; she had felt it, that sliver of danger. She’d always been good at that. “Top of the class again,” old Jellie had wheezed, back in the cold hall of the Watchhouse on Marn Mountain, and all the others in the class would stare, spiteful and envious and friendly, all the ones who had lived with her there, all the children the Watch had stolen . . .

  She bit her lip and went grimly back to the map.

  It took her an hour or so to make a copy, and even then it was rough and hasty. The names of the rooms enchanted her: the Gallery of Laughter—what was that like? And the Corridor of the Broken Vases—what had happened there? Even when she’d finished she knew this was only the Underpalace. There was far more than this: secret rooms and whole wings that needed extra passes even to get to. And above that the Overpalace, totally unknown. But it was a start.

  Back in her room that night, chewing dainty filled rolls left from Braylwin’s latest party, she lay on the bed and pored over the map, ignoring the relentless rain plopping into the filling bucket. Then she leaned back and gazed up at the ceiling. Where to begin? First she needed to find out about herself. And then—she frowned, because this was treachery, and if they knew it she’d be in deep trouble—then she had to find out if Galen was right. He said the Watch was evil.

  And what did they do with all the relics they found? Destroyed them as abominations, she had always been taught; but since then, not only from Galen, she’d heard other things. That the relics
were stored here, great rooms of them. That they held real power. She scowled, knowing she’d seen that for herself. And another rumor, never spoken out loud, only hinted at. That the Watch had a Ruler; that somewhere, above all the sergeants and castellans and committees and commanders and Watchlords there was someone else, someone secret, who knew everything. She shook her head. She’d never told this to Galen or Raffi, and even now she doubted it was true. But she had to find out.

  Rolling over, she put a finger on the map, on a small corridor that ran north. That was the way. Higher up, there would be fewer people. She had a high clearance, she could certainly get that far. The corridor led to a place called the Hall of Moons. Under that, in Watchletters, was the word Births. Tomorrow she’d try there.

  It was as she sat up and reached for another roll that she saw the eye. It stared at her out of the wall, unblinking, and for a second an ice-cold fear stabbed her, and she half grabbed the bow, and then breathed out, and laughed at herself.

  The eye watched her, clear and sharp.

  Carys got up and crossed to it. Taking a small knife from her pocket, she reached up and hacked at the plaster; it was damp and fell in lumps.

  Slowly the figure appeared, gorgeously painted in golds and reds; a great bearded man, carrying a black night-cub that struggled in his arms. She knew who he was. Tamar, the Maker who had made the animals. The one who had been the enemy of Kest.

  She lay back on the bed and gazed at him. Two months ago, in Tasceron, Galen had spoken to these Makers. She had heard them answer him.

  Or thought she had.

  Long into the wet night, she stared at the figure on her wall.

  9

  In the form of an eagle he flew over

  Maar, and saw how a great pit had been dug, its maw smoking, full of strange cries.

  Then Tamar felt fear, and he knew this was in defiance of the Makers.

  Book of the Seven Moons

  “GOING SOMEWHERE?”

  Braylwin smiled at her sweetly over Harnor’s shoulder.

  She paused at the door. “For a walk.”

  “Ah, but where? Tell Uncle.”

  She scowled, but turned. “I thought I’d do some intelligence gathering. About . . .” She glanced at the clerk’s back. “About that person Galen is looking for.”

  “Ah!” She saw his face change. “Good idea. Why not.”

  But halfway out he called after her. “I’ll hear all about it when you get back.”

  “I’m sure you will,” she murmured, and stalked down the corridor.

  Five minutes later she knew he was having her followed. He wasn’t using his own people, but a woman in a red dress—that was the one she was supposed to see—and a thin boy, the one she wasn’t. She grinned. He was clever, but it was standard stuff. Maybe training was better these days.

  She lost the woman in the Square of the Rainbow Fish, where there was a tatty scatter of stalls and food-sellers. The boy was more difficult. She knew she had to pretend she didn’t know he was there, that he’d lost her by accident. She tried ducking through doorways and corridors, but he obviously knew the ways of the place more intimately than she did. Then she had a better idea. She’d let him follow.

  Finding the Hall of Moons was bewildering, even with the map. She passed through endless halls, one so dark it was lit by candles, another piled with broken chairs, thousands of them, in some bizarre toppling structure, all interwoven, with a tunnel for passersby through the middle. The Passage of Nightmare, which she’d looked forward to seeing, was painted entirely black, and had no lights in it from one end to the other. She unslung her crossbow as she padded through it, and only three people passed her there, as if it was avoided. The Gallery of Tears ran with rain, dripping from the vast golden roof, so that the name still seemed right. She turned and climbed through whole labyrinths of corridors, always upward, and once or twice when she passed through a wide square or long room, she glimpsed the boy far back, clever, never obvious.

  The Hall of Moons was barred by two great doors and two guards, the first she’d seen. A few people went in before her; her papers and insignia were scarcely glanced at. Being a Watchspy has its moments, Galen, she thought wryly.

  Inside she stood still, utterly astonished.

  The Hall of Moons was enormous, so vast the other end was barely visible in the gloomy light. Great windows reached from floor to ceiling on one side; on the other the wall was painted with seven gigantic images of the moons, the features of their surfaces, craters, humps, hills, and valleys. And holding these, as if they were toys, were the seven sisters themselves: Atelgar, Pyra, Lar, all of them, painted ten times life-size in gold and cream.

  Cautiously she moved to a desk in the corner. A tall man looked down at her. “Yes?”

  “I want to see the records for a Watchhouse. Marn Mountain. Five forty-seven.”

  “Your clearance?”

  She gave him the insignia, pulling the silver chain over her head. He glanced up, surprised. “Your own house?”

  “Yes.”

  “This isn’t usually allowed.”

  “Even for the silver rank?”

  He handed it back slowly. “For what reason?”

  Carys looked up at him. All at once she was angry. “The reason is secret. If you’re not able to help me, perhaps I should speak to your Watchmaster.”

  The man almost winced. “No need. I’ll see to it,” he said quietly. “Please take desk two forty-six. I’ll bring the record.”

  She turned and stalked away, keeping her head up. When she found the desk she lounged there, looking around moodily. Maybe he’d report it. Maybe not. She didn’t really care.

  When the records came, they were in three enormous red books. She signed her name for them, then leafed through eagerly, but was soon disappointed.

  Each year had the name of the children brought in, and their age, but that was all. No villages, no family names. All the children in Marn Mountain that year had the same surname—Arrin. It had been the castellan’s name, that was why. Briefly she wondered about Carys, but there was no way of finding out.

  When she found her own name and number she stared at them coldly for a long moment, as if they belonged to someone else. And in a way they did. It surprised her how bitter she felt then; the Watch had taken everything, her family, even her name. But the Rule said, “The Watch is your name and your family.”

  She slammed the book shut and tapped her fingers on it thoughtfully. She’d been stupid to think she could find anything here. They covered their tracks too well; they didn’t want anyone to know too much. As for the Interrex, that would be hopeless.

  Abruptly she got up, walked down the endless hall, passed the clerk without a glance, and went out, into the labyrinth.

  Braylwin was not impressed. Smoothing the sleeves of a new coat he watched her closely in the mirror. “The Hall of Moons? I went there myself once, years ago. Were you looking for the Interrex, sweetie? Or something else?” His eyes were sharp in his plump face. “Has little Carys being looking for her mummy?”

  She ignored him. Instead she said, “Have you ever been to the Overpalace? To the library?”

  He shrugged. “Never. It’s not an easy place to get to. And there are no maps of the Overpalace—the place is almost unknowable. The Higher Watchlords may go there, maybe.” He grinned at her. “All those delicious secrets, Carys.”

  She nodded, thinking. “It’s guarded, of course.”

  “Three bastions, each with a metal door. Once you get inside . . .” He turned, interested. “Do you know what I was once told? Deep under the whole of this mountain are tunnels, a great network of them. Kestcreatures lurk down there, and some of them find their way up through to the passageways and corridors of the Overpalace. They’re allowed to. They crawl about at night. Eat the odd spy, I suppose, or any fanatical keepers who get that far.” He was smirking, enjoying himself.

  Suddenly she stared back at him, dubious. “Stories to scare child
ren, Braylwin.”

  “Ah, but are they? Who knows what goes on in the Tower of Song—isn’t that a proverb?” He turned back to the mirror and adjusted his sleeves. “Even we in the Watch, beloved, don’t know the half of this place. When it was first taken, patrols often got lost. One group starved; their bones were found days later. Bones, mind. Something ate them. And then there’s the legend of the Lost Hall . . .”

  “Go on,” she said drily, peeling a slim-fruit with her knife. She knew he was teasing her, that it might all be lies.

  He examined a spot on his chin. “It’s a famous story around the tower. A captain called Feymir was drunk one night, wandered off and got lost. Next morning he put in a report about a great hall he’d found, chock-full of Maker-gadgets. When he tried to find it again he couldn’t. No one ever has. Whatever he’d been drinking, it must have been good.”

  Outside the open window, the rain was crashing on a roof.

  Braylwin fiddled with his skullcap and stood back. “What do you think?”

  “Charming,” she said, eating peel.

  He picked a pair of gloves off the table and swished to the door. “Don’t wait up!”

  When he’d gone she hurled the knife after him in disgust. It embedded itself in the wood, vibrating. Then, head on hands, she stared grimly out into the rain. What was wrong with her? She’d never felt so useless—as if she were some rat in a maze, going around and around and getting nowhere. Calm down, she told herself furiously. Think! The tower worked on everyone like this; already she’d seen how the people who tried to find out anything in it went away hopeless, baffled, dulled into despair.

  But it wouldn’t happen to her!

  For the next two days she read files, pored over reports, waded through endless, useless paper. Next she tried to get into the Overpalace. The first set of guards turned her back, despite arguments and passes and bribes. As a last resort she explored restlessly, walking for hours deep into quarters she’d not seen, once into a district not even on the map, a deep warren of disused kitchens and sculleries, down so many stairs they were probably underground. It was dark and empty, and it was down there, at one turn in a corridor, that she stopped, listening, the crossbow in her hands.