12
Fate Foreseen
Silas followed
Dalliah into the house. She had refused to speak any further until
they were inside, and she led him through into a large hall, past
two wide staircases winding up to the floors above, and into a
smaller room lit with firelight.
The heat in there was
stifling after the freezing air outside. The room’s walls were
covered in framed paintings, and some were even sunk behind glass
within the floor, every one of them depicting places that Silas
knew very well. They were pictures of buildings, streets and
landmarks that all stood within the walls of Fume. One was a full
view of the city square with the lines of Fume’s largest listening
circle marked out across it in faint red light; another showed the
sunken lake filled with floating bodies; a third showed the council
chambers completely consumed by fire, the vast buildings reduced to
skeletal remains of charred rubble and ash.
‘I have witnessed
every one of these events,’ said Dalliah. ‘The veil has shown me
many things that are yet to be. I have hundreds more of these
paintings around this house. Many of the events shown within them
have already passed from prophecy into history, but none of the
scenes in this room have happened yet. Except for
one.’
She pointed to a
small picture at Silas’s eye level. At first glance it looked less
detailed than the rest; a swirling mass of grey and black centred
around a single point. Then he looked closer and saw that the mass
was filled with shapes and forms. Shades: drawn within the mist of
the half-life with a figure standing in the very centre looking up
through them. It was a girl with silver eyes, her black hair caught
upon the wind.
‘I painted that
picture many years ago,’ said Dalliah. ‘This year, on the Night of
Souls, it finally came true.’
‘You could interpret
these pictures in any number of ways,’ said Silas. ‘If you wait
long enough anything you see in them will come true.’
‘Perhaps,’ said
Dalliah. ‘But historic events are not as isolated as they appear to
be. Each one only exists as a link in a far longer chain. When Kate
Winters stood inside that listening circle she set in motion a
cataclysmic chain of events that will allow everything you see here
to come to pass. I have watched history unfold in similar ways many
times before. I thought you might appreciate a glimpse into the
future of our world.’
Silas looked further
along the wall and saw a picture of Albion’s monstrous Night Train
– the train that had carried people into war and slavery for
generations. The great engine lay on its side, its wheels broken
and forced from its tracks. Its mismatched panels had been torn
away by scavengers and its front grille was choked with creeping
weeds. Another painting showed rows of dead bodies laid out in the
streets of an Albion town and a third depicted the scene of a
public execution. Scarred wardens watched over cages full of sickly
people who were being released one by one and led into the hands of
their executioner whose silver sword was raised ready to be plunged
into the back of a prisoner kneeling at his feet.
‘These pictures are
not the future,’ he said.
‘The veil has shown
me these events,’ said Dalliah. ‘The veil does not
lie.’
‘Even if it is true,
how could one girl be responsible for any of this?’
‘She has already
caused the first stone to fall. The rest of our world will crumble
soon enough.’
‘Then perhaps it is
better if Kate does die,’ said Silas. ‘She would not want to be
part of this.’
‘Are you sure of
that? You do not know her, Silas. You cannot presume to know what
she wants. She is a Winters, after all. Her family’s priorities
have often proved … unexpected, when placed under
pressure.’
A door at the back of
the room opened. Silas turned and Bandermain walked in, scraping
the tip of Silas’s blue-black sword along the floor.
‘What the girl wants
is no longer important,’ said Bandermain.
‘What is he doing
here?’ demanded Silas.
‘I am protecting my investment. I am here to make
sure that everything runs smoothly, including you. I remember you
being more of a patient man, Silas. If you had waited, my men would
have brought you here themselves. Lady Grey has had us watching for
you for weeks. It is a shame they could not deliver you here as my
prisoner, but you are here nonetheless. I call that a
victory.’
‘Your men could not
even keep one prisoner under guard,’ said Silas. ‘They are
slipping.’
‘They do not know you
as well as I do,’ said Bandermain. ‘I doubt any of them would have
expected a man with your injuries to escape from that room. When I
was told you were gone, I’ll admit, I was impressed.’
Silas turned to
Dalliah, keeping one eye upon Bandermain as he spoke. ‘Do any of
your pictures include an incompetent Blackwatch officer and his
men?’ he asked. ‘I find it hard to believe the future has any use
for him.’
‘Officer Bandermain
is here at my request,’ said Dalliah, walking across the room and
standing at Bandermain’s side. ‘He insisted upon testing you. He
was understandably sceptical about the full extent of your
capabilities and did not know if we could trust you.’
‘I would say no,’
said Silas. ‘Men like us do not trust our enemies. We kill
them.’
‘Not in my house,’
said Dalliah. ‘Bandermain had to be sure the rumours about you were
true before moving to the next stage of our plan.’
‘Your plan?’
‘Yes. Bandermain and
I have an arrangement. One of which you would be wise to consider
becoming a part.’
Bandermain cleared
his throat and walked slowly towards Silas, barely concealing his
hatred of him behind a grimacing smile. It was only when he drew
closer that Silas noticed that something about him had changed
since the last time they had met. His forehead gleamed with a thin
haze of sweat, his lips were thin and bloodless, and his eyes were
shot with red at the edges. His shoulders were hunched slightly,
though he still kept his chin arrogantly high, and every breath
made his chest quiver slightly, betraying a secret pain. He was
hiding it well, but Silas could see that beneath his mask of
strength Bandermain was a very ill man.
Bandermain swung the
sword up smoothly and balanced the flat of the blade on his cut
palm with the hilt laid upon the other. He glanced at Dalliah and
Silas saw her nod slightly out of the corner of his eye. ‘I believe
this is yours,’ he said.
Silas reclaimed his
weapon, taking it from Bandermain and sliding it into its sheath as
Bandermain stepped back. It was obvious he had not wanted to return
the sword. Dalliah had ordered him to do it. The question was
why.
‘So the Blackwatch
take their orders from you now,’ he said to Dalliah. ‘I see you
have a new mistress, Celador. To return the weapon that killed your
own men … I cannot say I would have done the same in your
position.’
‘My men died in
battle,’ said Bandermain, his voice cut with simmering anger. ‘They
were honourable deaths. That is all a soldier can
ask.’
‘There are more
important matters at stake here than war and pride,’ said Dalliah.
‘Sometimes it takes more than one person to complete a task,
Officer Dane. The Blackwatch have proved themselves very useful to
me. You will come to appreciate their efforts once they deliver
Kate Winters to us.’
‘Why should that be
of any interest to me?’
‘The veil has shown
me that the influence of her young life promises to be
far-reaching. If you had known how important she will be you would
never have let her go. The girl’s blood lives within your veins.
You should not have left her behind.’
‘She can take care of
herself,’ said Silas. ‘She means nothing to me.’
Bandermain spoke up.
‘You told me he would try to protect the girl,’ he said, turning
upon Dalliah. ‘If he does not care if she lives or dies, there is
no reason for him to call her here!’
Dalliah held up a
hand to silence him. ‘If he truly feels no responsibility towards
her, his judgement will not be clouded by his conscience,’ she
said. ‘He will not turn away from what must be done.’
‘And what would that
be?’ asked Silas.
‘I am not your
enemy,’ said Dalliah. ‘We are the same. Equals.’
‘If that is true, why
send the Blackwatch to hunt me?’
‘Because I can no
longer afford to leave anything to chance. Do you know how many
people are looking for you? Securing the Blackwatch was a
necessity. If they had found you before I did, they would have
delivered you straight to the Continental leadership. I knew you
would be weakened here and they are very effective hunters. I could
not risk them finding you first, so I made Bandermain an offer. I
secured his services and those of his men for as long as it took us
to find you. As you can see, their efforts were
successful.’
‘We knew where you
were,’ said Bandermain. ‘My men have had eyes upon you from the
moment you left Fume’s walls, but we could not approach you within
your own country. We had to lure you here, where you would be
weakened enough to control. Fortunately, I have an asset posted
within your capital that you and your council have overlooked for a
very long time. One of my agents is stationed within your city
walls. His orders are to gather information about your capital’s
weaknesses, its routines and the people in power. He has been very
useful to me over the years.’
‘Spies within Fume
are nothing new,’ said Silas. ‘I have killed dozens of Blackwatch
agents myself.’
‘You hunt your
enemies in the shadows,’ said Bandermain. ‘This one lives in clear
sight. All I had to do was point him in your direction when the
opportunity presented itself and I knew he would lead you to me.
The right amount of gold placed in the right hands carries a great
deal of influence in Albion society. At first he was just a spy,
but the right opportunities taken at the right time allowed him to
become much more. While you were gathering up your own people to
send to war, he became a trusted friend of one of your High
Councilmen. In time, every decision the old man made was discussed
with my agent first. Through him, the Blackwatch were able to hear
every secret the council had – secrets they never would have shared
with someone like you. I know more about your country’s leaders
than you do, Silas. When the old man died, he had already named his
successor. The indispensable friend who had been so helpful to him
in his final years.’
‘You have an agent on
the High Council,’ said Silas. ‘Who?’
‘Did you not find it
suspicious that a High Council member would arrange a meeting with
one of your known associates at a place you just happened to be?’
said Bandermain. ‘It was a gamble, sending him there, but when he
talked to your friend about Dalliah Grey you took the bait
perfectly. Who do you think has been coordinating the deliberately
incompetent search for you? Do you really believe the wardens would
not have found you by now unless someone was intentionally leading
them away from your trail? My men have been inside Fume for years,
watching your people eat themselves away from the inside. You and
your wardens have done more damage to your country than we ever
could. All we have to do is sit back and watch you destroy
yourselves.’
‘When I return to
Albion, your man will be the first to die,’ said
Silas.
‘I do not think so.
You have already had a hand in the murder of one councilwoman. The
wardens will not let you anywhere near the High Council
again.’
The room flooded with
Silas’s rage. He was about to challenge Bandermain when Dalliah
stepped calmly between them.
‘We do not have time
for your petty disagreements,’ she said. ‘We are all well aware of
Silas’s history, and we know the fate that befell his former
mistress.’
‘Da’ru is dead,’ said
Silas. ‘As Bandermain and his men soon will be.’
‘She and I
communicated many times when she was alive,’ said Dalliah. ‘There
was a time when I believed she might eventually be strong enough to
help me complete my work. You cannot deny what she did was
impressive. She did not have the abilities of a Walker, yet she
mastered Wintercraft enough to bind a soul to her
own.’
‘I was there. I know
what she did.’
‘Da’ru’s death was no
surprise to me,’ said Dalliah. ‘I may not have foreseen it, but I
knew it was inevitable. I followed her progress from childhood, and
it was my research that first allowed her to locate the book hidden
within a Winters grave. At that time, I believed all of the
greatest Skilled families were long dead and that someone like
Da’ru would be my only chance to regain what I had lost, but from
the moment Kate Winters first entered the veil I knew I was wrong.
Da’ru was a distraction. She was not ready for the world I planned
to show her. Kate is different. She is the one we
need.’
‘I do not need
anything,’ said Silas.
‘It has not been long
since your spirit was broken. You may accept it now, but in fifty,
eighty years, when everything you have known has changed, you will
not be so amenable,’ said Dalliah. ‘Only the two of us know what it
is like to be feared by the living and turned away by death. Our
fates are the same. We will be left to walk this world together
long after the last of our enemies and allies are dead and gone.
But fate can be changed. We can reclaim
our spirits and free them from the dark. This is your chance to
make things right.’
‘I am not
interested.’
‘You will be.’
Dalliah reached out to touch Silas’s face and he snatched her hand
away.
‘What are you
doing?’
‘Opening your eyes,’
said Dalliah. ‘The veil will answer us more easily upon my land.
With my help, you can see what has become of Kate for yourself. If
she dies before her time, our hopes will die with
her.’
Silas felt the energy
of the veil gathering around Dalliah and saw frost creeping across
her fingernails and along her eyelashes as the veil closed in. He
had no reason to trust her, but, suspicious as he was, a part of
him was interested in what she had to say. She was the only person
who knew what it was like to live his life, and how much he wanted
to undo the damage done to his spirit. He wanted to trust her, so
he allowed her hand to rest against his face and let his thoughts
lift gently into the veil’s cold mist.
The veil swept icily across the room, allowing Silas to
see the energies of life carried deep within the people around him
as if a filter had been placed across his eyes. Normally, the
spirit carried in a person’s body was visible as a bright
all-encompassing glow that spread from the core of their body into
a pale aura that misted around them. Dalliah’s spirit was very
different. She barely carried any light at all, only a tiny speck
of white focused in the very centre of her chest, offering proof at
least that she truly did possess a broken soul. But Bandermain’s
energy was the biggest surprise.
Instead of the soft light that normally surrounded the
living, Bandermain’s body was shrouded in a sickly glow. His spirit
was there, but it was pulsing weakly, trying to pull away from a
body that could no longer support it within the living world. Only
Silas’s veil-sight could reveal the truth. Bandermain’s body was
weakened to the point of collapse, his spirit eager and ready to
pass into death. With energies like that, he should already have
been dead, yet on the surface he still looked relatively
well.
Bandermain was certainly a curiosity, but Silas turned his
attention away from him and concentrated upon searching for Kate
instead. He did not need to look very far.
The spirit of a living Walker who had not been trained to
control her ability acted like a powerful magnet within the veil,
attracting everything else towards it and shining brightly like a
blazing light. The physical distance between them made no
difference. The veil did not recognise distance or time; everything
within it was connected. When Silas focused upon Kate, the veil
revealed her to him.
Kate was barely alive, her body huddled limply inside an
empty tomb of stone. Seeing her there, so close to death, sent a
pang of guilt coursing through his soul. He had warned her to leave
the city. When he left her behind he had trusted she would be
protected. She was not supposed to be there. Not like that. She was
supposed to be safe.
Aware of Dalliah’s presence close by, Silas could not
afford to reveal his fears for the girl. He focused all his
concentration upon finding her instead. That tomb could have been
anywhere within the maze of Fume’s ancient underground caverns.
There was no way to tell where.
Dalliah’s spirit moved beside him, joining him in the
veil.
‘The Skilled turned against her, just as you warned her
they would,’ she said. ‘They tried to kill her. She and the boy
barely escaped. Now she is overwhelmed. The only knowledge she has
of the veil is that which you gave her, and it was slim at best.
She cannot control her connection to it, and if she does not gain
control soon the veil will claim her, have no doubt of that. Even
death will not find her spirit if it wanders too far, and if she
survives the Skilled will still find her and finish her. You left
Kate to the mercy of the wolves, Silas. This is the consequence of
what you have done.’
There were many things in Silas’s life that he had reason
to regret, but at that moment he regretted nothing more than riding
his stolen horse out of Fume knowing that Kate would be hunted.
Knowing that there were precious few people she could trust. He had
been alone for too long. He had let his own fears cloud his
judgement. Kate had helped him when every other living soul feared
him, and he had abandoned her.
‘Walkers have lived in Fume for centuries,’ he said. ‘None
of them were affected in this way.’
‘That is because none of them lived in times like these,’
said Dalliah. ‘Something has changed. The veil is weakening. The
barrier between this world and the next is coming to an
end.’
‘That is impossible. The veil cannot
fall.’
‘Everything dies,’ said Dalliah. ‘This world will die one
day. Even we, eventually, will cease to live, though it may not be
the form of death that we expect. All it takes is the right
conditions. The correct sequence of events. Five hundred years ago,
the bonemen made a mistake. They experimented with Wintercraft and
changed the course of history. They were the ones who first tore
the veil with their experiments upon the dead and the dying. They
were ignorant. None of them knew what they were doing. History does
not record the darker aspects of their work, but I was there. I saw
the damage they caused with my own eyes. It took great sacrifices
to repair what they had broken. They suffered for their mistakes
and it was well deserved.’
Silas caught the bitterness in Dalliah’s voice when she
spoke about the bonemen, and what was left of her spirit flared in
anger at the memories her time with them had left behind. He was
willing to assume that whatever ‘sacrifice’ the bonemen had made,
she had been a part of it. She had been with them when they
disappeared from history and it had left a mark upon her. He could
not tell if it was rage or fear, but it was
there.
‘What has that got to do with Kate?’ he
asked.
‘When the bonemen tore the veil open, Walkers helped them
to seal it again. The veil had threatened to overtake all of
Albion, exposing the living to the half-life and blending the two
realms into one. Albion was not ready for that, but our attempt to
close the tear was only ever meant to be a temporary solution. As
soon as the tear was brought back under control and the living
world was separated from the veil once again, the seal we had
created started to degrade. In those times, five hundred years was
almost an eternity. The bonemen assumed that those left behind
would have plenty of time to repair the breach fully before it ever
became a threat to the living world again, but the bonemen do not
exist any more – the High Council saw to that – and no one has
risen to take their place. The Walkers are dead and the Skilled
have ignored the threat of the veil for generations. They did not
carry on the bonemen’s work. Recently, one or two of them have
dabbled with the remains of the dead, attempting to rediscover and
understand the old ways, but it is too late. The Walkers knew that
this was coming. They saw the threat from the very beginning, and
now there are only two of us left. Me and the girl. The Winters
family were always the best of us. It does not surprise me that
their descendants were the only ones to
survive.’
‘If you are what you say you are, why do you need her?’
asked Silas. ‘What does she have that a Walker who has lived for
five centuries does not?’
‘She possesses something both you and I have lost,’ said
Dalliah. ‘The power of a soul can be almost infinite when it is
used the right way. We may have lost ours, but Kate Winters’s
spirit carries all the potential of her parents’ family lines
focused into one young life. The book of Wintercraft teaches the
Skilled how to master their spirit; to use its energy as fuel to do
what ordinary people cannot do. With the right guidance, Kate could
bring the restless dead down upon this world with the force of her
will alone. You and I are echoes of the souls we used to be, Silas.
We are revenants: neither truly dead nor truly living. We belong
nowhere and trust no one. Only we know what it is like to suffer
for the mistakes of the past. Kate has not suffered as we have. Her
spirit is still intact. She is the only one who can influence a
falling veil now.’
Silas could see Kate’s spirit struggling to reconnect with
her physical body and knew there was nothing he could do. He could
sense her fear, her confusion and an emptiness that was growing
slowly inside her. She felt betrayed. When Silas had first met her,
Kate’s mind had been clear. Her life had been simple and happy. Now
she was lost. The only thing keeping her connected to the living
world was the presence of a second soul who he had not noticed
before. Someone was right beside Kate; someone who had no
connection to the veil at all, holding her hand as her spirit wound
itself tightly around his, using him to anchor her to the world. It
was a young soul, carrying with it the weight of a tormented past.
It had to be Kate’s stubborn friend, Edgar Rill. At the very least,
she was not alone.
‘If you need Kate’s help to repair the veil, why didn’t
you just ask her?’ said Silas, hoping to draw Dalliah’s attention
away from the girl. ‘Why involve the Blackwatch at all? You will
only drive her away if your men try to hunt
her.’
Dalliah pulled her
consciousness back from the veil. Silas let his mind return to the
painted room and Bandermain stared at them both in surprise as
Dalliah began to speak.
‘There is a sickness
spreading across Albion, allowing ordinary people to witness
aspects of the half-life,’ she said. ‘People have begun to see
phantoms and spirits. Many believe they are going mad and of all of
them the Skilled will soon be affected the worst. I have seen this
happen before. As the veil collapses and spreads, the assault of so
many lost souls upon their senses will prove too much. Many Skilled
died when the veil fell the first time, and more will die this
time.’
‘You did not answer
my question,’ said Silas.
‘Because it is based
upon an assumption,’ said Dalliah. ‘We were both cursed with this
broken life. The veil is our prison, but when it falls everything
will change. The protections the first Walkers put in place will
collapse any day now, allowing the living world and the half-life
to exist as one. Our spirits are both bound to the half-life, and
when it falls they will return to us. We will be healed, and our
lives will be our own. I do not want to repair the veil. I intend to help it on its
way.’
‘How? That cannot be
possible.’
‘If we release Kate
Winters’s spirit in the right place at the right time, we can
control the tear within the veil. We can channel the veil through
her, focusing everything upon one single point. We can be present
at the exact epicentre of the event that will change the world.
Every lost soul will be drawn to Kate before the veil spreads fully
across the world. Our spirits will be there for us to
claim!’
‘ “Release her
spirit”?’ Silas knew too well what that meant. ‘You intend to kill
her.’
‘The veil will fall,
regardless of anything you or I can do,’ said Dalliah. ‘It is too
late to save it now. This way, we can use it to our advantage. We
can take back what was stolen from us.’
Silas saw the spark
of excitement in Dalliah’s eyes and recognised her desperate need
from dark times he had known in his own life. She was talking about
changing the entire course of future history, allowing ordinary
people to see into a world that most of them did not believe even
existed. It would cause panic and chaos. Nothing would ever be the
same if the veil came down. It would be the end of life as everyone
knew it. The new age would not be one of science, peace or
exploration. It would be one of fear, and Dalliah was ready to
murder an innocent girl to make it happen.
Bandermain did not
look at all surprised by what she was proposing. Perhaps he did not
fully understand what could come of countless shades being free to
sweep across the world, visible to every living eye, able to
follow, influence and speak to the living. Dalliah was right.
Everything would change.
The situation was
worse than Silas could ever have imagined. He had travelled to the
Continent for answers and had walked instead into the arms of a
nightmare. The veil was falling, the High Council had a Continental
spy in their midst, and the woman he had hoped might become an ally
was intent upon changing the world for the worse, all for the sake
of two broken souls.
Bandermain watched
Silas closely, waiting for him to say something. Whatever
arrangement Dalliah had made with him had to have something to do
with his illness. There had to be a reason why he was still alive,
and Dalliah was more than capable of extending a human life if it
served her purpose. Until Silas knew more there was no way to guess
how far Bandermain would go to honour their bargain.
Dalliah was staring
at Silas, smiling as if he were her truest friend. She clearly
expected him to see the world the way she did: as something
expendable, something that could be crushed on their way to getting
what they both wanted at last.
‘I am talking about
freedom,’ she said quietly. ‘Death will accept us when the time
comes. We can regain our souls and we will be whole again. Surely
that is worth the life of one young girl, Silas. Don’t you
agree?’