Worldsoul

“Shadow!”

“I need to talk to you,” Shadow said. Sephardi had melted away into the Medina, pleading urgent business, and she had been relieved: it was not precisely that she did not trust him, but he conveyed rumours. It was his job and she did not begrudge him that, but she thought the news of what she had been shown in the desert needed more careful handling than being scattered around the Medina like blown leaves. And not much stayed in the Medina, either: fermenting in its crucible, information became alchemically transformed, eliding and changing, until, released, it sprang forth into the city. Had Sephardi gone straight to the Shah? Quite possibly so.

Mariam, however, knew how to keep her mouth shut. When they were behind her locked door, and Shadow had, with some gratitude, accepted the ritual of tea, she told Shenudah what had happened. She had some concern that Mariam might not believe her, but the other woman listened without expression.

“I’ve heard of the Pass of Ages once. It’s in a very old text that was brought with the Library when it came from Alexandria. It’s said that Eden fell into it after Adam was thrown out.”

“Eden apparently did.”

“The story of Eden has many variations. Some of the oldest say it was born from the desert. Historians are starting to think it was a real place, a forest that formed a wild garden for the early peoples of the Fertile Crescent. There would have been areas they’d seed and tend: the Fall came when they gained knowledge and tried to control it. They destroyed the balance and the Garden died.”

“That doesn’t account for the Pass.”

“But if what the angel told you is true, it’s part of the overlight.”

“Who are the Storm Lords?”

“In legend they are the children of Lilith, who is herself many entities-the Lilitu. They’re bird demons, storm devils. They came into being when Lilith, who was Adam’s first wife, left Eden on her own because Adam tried to control her. Who can blame her? She danced with demons in the desert and bred with them to produce the storm children.”

“So Lilith left Eden of her own free will, and when Eden fell, her children came back to make use of it?”

“Perhaps. Someone’s attacking this city, after all, and the Storm Lords are ancient enemies of mankind.”

“How do we stop them?” Shadow asked.

“I think you need to pay a visit to the Library,” Mariam Shenudah said.

That night, Shadow had a dream. She was back in her own rooms, with mingled reluctance and relief. Mariam had offered her a bed for the night, but given that so many things were trying to kill her, Shadow was unwilling to place the older woman in further danger. Shenudah was the closest thing remaining to family, and she’d lost too much already. So she had come home, to spend a weary hour re-warding the laboratory, followed by a bath- essential after three days in the desert, it had been amazing that Mariam had let her in through the door-and finally going to bed.

In the dream, she was once again out in the desert, and she knew despair at the realisation that the return to Worldsoul had been the illusion, and this the reality. She had not escaped, but was once again in that unknown place, where the tides of time shifted like the dunes. Elemiel’s beehive hut, undamaged, stood before her. It was night, with the stars thick overhead.

The man came up the path towards her. She had a curious rush of feelings: hope, resentment, desire, shame. The young man was tall and wore black robes. His face was beautiful: symmetrical, with high cheekbones and liquid dark eyes. His skin was the colour of gold and it shone. He wore no headgear and his hair fell to his shoulders. He wore a short black beard.

“Who are you?” Shadow said. He touched his brow and she saw a fillet of gold around it. She was sure that this had not been there before.

“I am a prince,” the young man said. His face was grave. He reached out and Shadow stepped back.

“Do not touch me,” she said.

“I know you are a virtuous woman. I mean no disrespect. But I am within you.”

“You’re the spirit who is in my blood?”

“Yes.” He bowed. “I did not intend to possess you. But I have to hide.”

“In me?”

“A human is the best hiding place. They’re surprisingly difficult to see into.”

“What are you hiding from?”

“Everyone.”

“Why?”

The spirit drew his right hand up and in it was a scimitar. It shone in the moonlight, fire-bright.

“I am the scabbard and the blade,” he said, and before Shadow could stop him, or say anything, he raised his arm above his head, reversed the hilt in his hand and plunged the scimitar into his own skull. It vanished and at that moment Shadow understood that both scimitar and man were part of the same thing, just as Gremory was both girl and beast and both, and all demon.

“How do I get rid of you?” she said to the spirit, and he-the Prince of the Air-began to spin, whirling around in a dervish-wheel of dust and air. Then he was gone, winking out. A single drop of blood fell glistening to the desert earth. And Shadow woke up.

Forty-Seven

The disciplinary committee hearing was remarkably tedious, and a waste of valuable time. Eventually, since Mercy herself could not, Nerren took issue with the Elders.

“You don’t have any proof that she was even there. Deed was lying. He said they kept her in a chamber, but there’s no record of it. She’s here now, isn’t she?”

Mercy, sitting in the interrogation chair, forced herself to stop staring out of the window and look helpful.

“Then why undertake such a rigmarole?”

“Because the Court is trying to make trouble. That’s what it does. They’re magicians. They’re tricksters.”

“With the Skein gone”-and you lot dithering-“they’ve seen that there’s a power vacuum and they’re trying to take advantage,” Mercy said.

“But why do they think you were trying to burgle their premises?”

Round and round it went, but in the absence of proof, and with Nerren backing her up, they eventually placed Mercy on a three-day suspension.

Good. Now I can do what I want.

Back in Nerren’s office, the other woman looked at Mercy. “What did you think you were doing?”

“I can’t tell you.” That much was true. She could feel the geas binding her tongue. Presumably it would only be over when she delivered the book. “But it’s to do with that business with Section C.”

Nerren rolled her eyes. “I might have known.”

“And I’d like to say that I know what I’m doing, but I don’t. I wish I did.”

“That’s very reassuring, Mercy.”

“I’m off for three days. That means you won’t have to worry about me.”

A snort. “As if. What are you planning to do?”

“Some light reading,” Mercy said.

Darya’s purloined book was about the disir. It was old, though not nearly as old as the text from which the thing had come, and it was both in English and surprisingly informative. Mercy read it over tea in her office at the Library, paying close attention. She could tell that a lot of it was conjecture, and yet more of it, legend. But the kernels of the story were there, the seeds of truth from which the myths had grown.

The old god, chained.

Poison dripping from a serpent’s mouth.

The Ladies, who came from before the ice.

And a name: Mareritt. The Ladies’ enemy.

All of these things were connected to the disir. What had become of the one who had leaped through a story-