Unless . . .
A dark thought swam up from the depths of my mind. The War Rooms were impregnable; everyone knew that. There was no way Morden could touch them. Except . . . what if he could? I already knew that Richard had abilities I couldn’t match, maybe ones I’d never even heard of. Maybe he did have some secret plan that actually could take down the nerve centre of the British Council.
In which case, did I really want to stop him?
I thought about Anne, and what had been done to her by the Crusaders. About the attacks by Levistus’s men on me last year, and how I’d been forced to flee the country just to survive. The winter before that, a Council Keeper had tried to assassinate me over White Rose; the year before that they’d expelled Anne from the apprentice program and left her to die; the year before that they’d stood by and deliberately stayed their hand as the Nightstalkers had done their best to assassinate me. Most of all, I remembered what the consequences had been . . . or at least the consequences for them. Nothing. They could outlaw me and break their own treaties and even sponsor outright assassinations and kidnappings, and somehow they never paid any price.
Maybe it was time they did.
Standing up there in the twilight, looking at the lights of London as the city lit up for the coming night, I had a sudden feeling of power. For once, I knew what was coming and the Council didn’t. All I had to do was stay my hand and watch them fall. I’d spent so long struggling against the Council, feeling helpless and hunted. Now for the first time it felt as though I might be able to hurt them. And I liked it.
Maybe this is how Dark mages feel all the time.
That thought came as a jolt, and with it my castle of dark thoughts crumbled away. All of a sudden I felt foolish. I wasn’t some sort of avenging angel—I was just a pawn for Morden to sacrifice. And even if his plan did have some chance of bringing down the Council, why would I want to replace them with Richard of all people? Hadn’t I learnt anything?
No. I shook my head. If I was going to survive this, I had to think. Right now, I didn’t know enough, so the first step was to learn more. I turned and walked away off the bridge without looking back.
| | | | | | | | |
“So what did you find?” Luna asked.
“Nothing good,” I said.
It was later that night and we were in the Hollow, sitting in a loose circle of four. I was on a packing crate; Luna and Vari were sharing our log bench, while Anne was a little farther away, arms wrapped around herself and dark eyes watching. Our tents and storage were a little way back; there were plans under way for a proper building, but we were still having trouble with the logistics. The sky above was filled with brilliant stars and nebulae, and set low on the ground, three sphere lamps provided light. Electricity wasn’t an option in the shadow realm and was likely to stay that way, so we’d been forced to fall back on magical illumination. I’d spent much of the evening gathering what information I could find. Now we had to decide what to do with it.
“I’ve looked into all the futures I can easily reach where I just sit around and wait,” I said. “There are some variations, but generally speaking, someone working for Morden or the Council comes looking for me. It’s too far away to get any details of the conversation, but it’s a safe bet they aren’t there to discuss the weather. Second point: I’ve tried contacting—or at least hypothetically contacting—all the Dark mages I know who are connected to Richard in some way. Cinder, Deleo, Onyx, and all the others. Deleo and Onyx aren’t going to talk to me, but I get the vibe that they’re busy. The only one I could get in touch with was Cinder, and he pretty much confirmed that something was going down.”
“So it’s not a bluff,” Anne said quietly.
“Not unless Morden is planning the biggest practical joke of all time.”
“So he’s really going to do it?” Variam said. He was frowning. “He’s going to attack the War Rooms?”
“Slow down,” I said. “We know he’s going to do something. He could be attacking some other place, or going after the Council of another country, or maybe raiding somewhere that has nothing to do with the Council at all.”
“But why?” Luna asked.
“We don’t even know why he’d attack the War Rooms, much less somewhere else,” I said. “So your guess is as good as mine. The one thing I’m willing to bet on is that he’s not telling the whole truth.”
“Maybe not,” Variam said. “Landis was telling me just a few days ago about some adepts the Keepers picked up who were telling some crazy story about how Richard was going to lead an army of them to take down the Council. Everyone was just laughing, but . . .”
“Maybe tomorrow they won’t be laughing,” Luna said.
“Even an army of adepts wouldn’t do it,” I said. “The War Rooms are a fortress. Numbers aren’t going to mean shit.”
“It seems weird, though,” Luna said. “Why do it at all?”
“Because he wants to take down the Council and set himself up as Dark Lord Look-How-Scary-I-Am,” Variam said. “Seems pretty obvious to me.”
“But that isn’t what he’s been doing so far,” Luna said. “Morden’s been worming his way in to the Council all the years we’ve known him. And it’s working. Why would he mess up a good thing?”
“Because this was what he was planning from the start?” Variam said.
Luna rolled her eyes. “You sound like those Guardians. ‘Oh, you can’t trust Dark mages; they all want to take over the world.’”
“It’s possible that Morden’s political position is worse than we know,” I said. “Everyone knows the Council hate him. Maybe they’ve managed to manoeuvre him to where this is his best option.”
“Do you really think that’s true?” Anne asked.
“No,” I admitted. “Honestly, I’m with Luna. For years now, Morden’s done the softly-softly approach. He always stays at arm’s length from anything that’s too risky. This feels out of character.”
“Unless there’s something he knows that we don’t,” Luna said.
“Which I’m pretty sure there is,” I said. “But right now, we have to decide what to do, and I can only really see two choices. Option one: we tip off the Council. Warn them that the info might be wrong, but that it’s a threat. If nothing happens, well, they’ll live. But if Morden does go through with the attack, it’ll be huge.”
“Doesn’t sound so bad,” Variam said.
“Yeah, except there’s a catch,” I said. “If we do that, and we don’t show up to the attack, then we might as well be hanging up a big sign saying, ‘HEY EVERYONE, WE BETRAYED YOU.’ On the other hand, if we do show up, then when the Council comes down on Morden like a ton of bricks, we’ll have the Council shooting at us from one side and Richard’s lot shooting at us from the other.”
“I don’t really like option one,” Anne said. “What’s option two?”
“We play along,” I said. “We join Morden and take part in the job—whatever the hell it is—and do as we’re told, on the theory that the consequences for us can’t possibly be any worse than what he’ll do if he catches us selling him out.”
“So we’d be hoping he succeeds,” Anne said.
“And if he doesn’t,” I said, “then we’ll have to find a way to get the hell out before Morden’s goons decide we’re being insufficiently loyal and shoot us in the back.”