even they couldn't protect the Abraxus children from the horror of Legion. The never-ending scream, rasping in their minds and souls like the scrape of bone on bone, or the tearing of living meat. No one knew how the children experienced it, but the look on their small faces as they mewled despairingly and twisted in their blankets was enough to keep anyone from asking. Chance pleaded with the Council to let him sedate the children, but the answer was always no. They were too useful.
A few espers teleported in and out with important messages, appearing and disappearing in puffs of disturbed air. Static sparked around them, discharging painfully through the nearest metal. They were risking their lives with every jump, and everyone knew it. Legion's scream was interrupting their concentration. Some never arrived. Just blinked out in one location, and were never seen again. Some arrived at the inn in pieces, or horribly rearranged. One materialized half inside the tavern wall. He was still there, protruding from the brickwork. No one could figure out how to remove him without tearing the wall apart. Luckily he was dead, so they just draped a cloth across his face to hide the staring eyes and contorted mouth, and pretended he wasn't there.
And one man fell out of midair and slammed to the floor in a sticky mess of spurting blood and exposed organs. His journey had turned him inside out. Horribly, he wouldn't die. In the end, Donald Royal cut off the head with one merciful stroke of his sword.
The Council members and the esper union reps struggled to put some kind of planned defenses together, but things were happening so quickly all the time that all they could really do was react to the Empire's actions and provide damage limitations. Raised voices were getting hoarse, and tiredness showed in everybody's eyes. Cyder kept hot coffee and mulled ale moving among everyone in the room, and supplied a steady stream of information from her own network of informers, people she used to work with in the past, before she became respectable. She tried not to worry about what had happened to Cat. And overhead, the roar of passing gravity barges shook the inn like thunder, never knowing how close they'd come to the heart of rebel resistance.
Kast and Morgan dragged their prisoner through the chaos and fury of battle to see Investigator Razor, as he stood thoughtfully in the rubble of what had been the northeast boundary, watching his troops press deeper into the burning city, sweeping aside all opposition. He waited till the marines and their captive were almost upon him before turning and acknowledging their existence. His dark face was calm as ever, but there was a hot and brutal fire in his eyes that made even Kast and Morgan nervous. They bowed quickly to the Investigator, and hit their prisoner till he did, too. Razor studied the man in silence for a long moment. The prisoner dressed well, though his fine clothing was currently rumpled and torn and stained with his own blood. His face was bruised and battered. It seemed that Kast and Morgan had not been gentle in persuading him to come along with them.
'And this is?' Razor said finally.
'A traitor and informer, sir,' said Kast cheerfully. 'Name of Artemis Daley. Something of a mover and shaker in Mistport, if he's to be believed. He's promised us useful, not to say vital, information if we'll just avoid destroying the properties here he has interests in. He's even volunteered to give us a map showing those properties. Isn't that helpful of him? Under a certain amount of pressure, he also volunteered to draw us another map, showing exactly where the city Council is currently hiding out. In return for his life and continued well-being. So we brought him to you, sir. If he is who he says he is, and knows what he says he does, he could be very valuable. And if you were to see your way clear to giving my friend and me recommendations on the strength of that, sir, or even a raise in rank, well, we were just doing our duty.'
'But we'll still take the raise,' said Morgan. 'Or any medals, if they're going.'
'You have done well,' said Razor. 'Now be silent.' He smiled slowly at the prisoner, who if anything seemed even less reassured than before. Razor stepped closer, studying the man's face. 'I know you, Artemis Daley. You're in our files. A deal-maker, money-lender, and leg-breaker, as necessary. Medium-sized fish in a very small pond. You've sold us the odd bit of information in the past. Nothing terribly important, but enough to make you as one of ours. Talk to me, Artemis. Tell me where my enemies are.'
'We… have yet to agree on a price, your honor,' said Daley, trying hard to keep his voice steady. 'I am, after all, just an honest businessman, trying to make a profit in difficult times. I have no interest in wars. But a man in my position can't afford to just give away valuable information. Word would get out. My reputation would be ruined. You understand, I'm sure.'
'Quite,' said Razor. He looked at Kast. 'Kill him.'
'Wait! Wait!' Daley tried to back away, but Kast and Morgan held him firmly. They forced him down onto his knees. Daley shook so hard that drops of sweat fell off his face. 'Wait, your honor! Allow me to… give you a little something, as a sign of good faith. The Council can be found at the Blackthorn Inn, in Thieves Quarter.' He looked anxiously at Razor. 'I'd be happy to draw you a map, your honor, showing exactly how to get there, but it's a little hard to draw when you're on your knees…'
'We have our own maps,' said Razor. 'And we have all we need from you.' He nodded to Kast and Morgan. 'Make an example of him.'
Kast and Morgan nodded cheerfully, and dragged Daley away. He kicked and struggled, but didn't even slow them down. 'You can't do this! I'm an important man here! I told you what you wanted! I told you…'
He kept shouting till Morgan hit him over the head with the butt of his gun. He was still mumbling protests when Kast and Morgan strung him up from the nearest lamppost and stood back to watch him dance in midair. Razor's smile was bitter. He had no time for traitors. He watched the hanging man die, and wondered when Clan Chojiro's agents here would make contact with him.
The first the people in the Blackthorn Inn knew of its targeting was when the disrupter beams began hammering down from the gravity barges hovering directly overhead. The slate roof blew apart, and the upper floor of the inn was suddenly a mass of flames, sweeping rapidly through the private rooms, burying the few inhabitants alive and swallowing their screams in the roar of the fire. The energy beams plowed through the upper floor and plunged on into the main barroom below, where they rebounded from a psionic screen erected at the very last moment by the espers within. Chance's children had come through with a last-second warning. The espers in the barroom were representatives of the esper union, and some of the strongest minds in Mistport, and together they held off the disrupter cannon. But even they couldn't save the Blackthorn.
The upper floor was a raging inferno. The barroom's timber ceiling began to blacken and smolder. The whole inn was shaking from the pounding it was taking. Bricks cracked, and fine streams of dust and mortar began to fall. The barroom quickly became stiflingly hot. The espers could do nothing. It was all they could do to fend off the disrupter beams. Donald Royal barked orders, getting people organized. He had them block off the back stairwell with tables and other furniture, in case the flames from above broke through the closed door. Cyder produced buckets of water, in case of sudden flash fires. Chance's children were screaming almost continuously now, but he still didn't dare sedate them. They might yet have to run for it.
A few people cracked and ran for the main door. Random yelled after them, but they wouldn't listen to him. They ran outside, and energy beams blew them apart the moment they appeared. More gravity barges drifted overhead, adding their firepower to the onslaught raging down on a single building. Every building around the inn was already a mass of flames and pulverized rubble. There were dead men and women in the streets, their bodies blackening in the growing firestorm.
Inside the Blackthorn, a timbered beam broke away from the ceiling supports and slammed down like a giant hammer, crushing Lois Barron beneath it. The heavy weight pinned her to the floor, and blood gushed from her mouth as she beat feebly at the wooden beam with her hands. It was obvious she was dying, but the others continued to try and lift the heavy beam off her, until she finally lay back and was still. The dwarf Castle sat beside her and held her dead hand, oblivious to everything. McVey and Royal couldn't allow themselves time to mourn. As the only remaining Councillors, they had too much to do. If anyone was going to find a way out of this trap, it would have to be the two of them.
And that was when the psionic shield began to weaken and break apart. Even the strongest minds in Mistport found it hard to function with Legion's endless scream in their heads. Their power was burning up, and so were they. Blood trickled steadily from their noses and ears. The greatest esp-blocker the Empire had ever made beat against their minds and, inch by inch, it shut them down. Cracks appeared in the shield. Thin bolts of energy stabbed through the barroom ceiling, transfixing people here and there like insects on pins. And then one energy beam hit and killed the strongest esper, and the screen collapsed.
Immediately Jenny Psycho reached out with her mind and pulled the screen back together again. She had hoped she wouldn't be needed. Once she revealed her presence, she had no doubt Legion would turn all its attention to her, and she wasn't entirely sure she could beat the unnatural thing. But she did what she had to do,
