Chapter 111. A Weapon That Was Also a Hostage, Drafted by Someone at a Desk

Chapter 111: 111. A Weapon That Was Also a Hostage, Drafted by Someone at a Desk

Sharon had already turned her attention to the woman by the desk. She pointed her sword at Varn without raising her voice, and that was somehow worse than if she’d shouted.

"You’re... the director," she said.

"Ysolde Varn... Lady Sanford, I’m honored to meet you."

"I’m sure you are... I’ve got a question, and I’d like a name." She gets closer. "Whoever signs your orders... the one at the top... I want it right now!"

"I’m afraid I can’t give you that."

"Can’t, or won’t? Be specific."

"I think those are the same word, in this case." Varn picked up her cup and took a sip. "I do apologize..."

"I’ve always found it ill-mannered to refuse a guest... But I have a duty, and it doesn’t include being rude to my employers."

Sharon’s grip tightened on her sword.

For a second, I honestly thought she’d throw it.

"You’re drinking tea," she said.

"It’s Eastern Black... Very good for the nerves."

"I’m going to feed you that cup."

"I’d be interested to see you try." Varn set the cup down carefully on its saucer.

Then, without any hurry, she reached out with her left hand and pulled a short iron lever beside the stove.

It was a small thing, the kind of handle you’d use to open a vent. "In that case, I’m afraid we’ll have to finish this in the Core Chamber."

The wall behind the desk groaned. A long section of plank and plaster slid sideways with a sound like a dragged coffin, and behind it, a tunnel opened.

It was wide and sloping, with a floor of black stone and walls lined with blue crystal lamps, and from deep inside it came a swell of sound that rose and rose until it filled the room.

A siren. A huge, wavering howl, like a hundred hunting horns blown at once.

"Run along, children," Varn said, over the noise. "You’ve got a lot of stairs to climb."

And the four black knights beside her drew their swords.

The Core Chamber was a cathedral that somebody had built for a god of machines.

I don’t have a better description... It was an enormous cavern, easily two hundred yards across, hollowed out of the heart of the mountain and finished with ribs of black iron that arched up into the dark like the inside of a whale.

Blue crystal lamps hung from chains along the walls. Catwalks ran across the open space at three levels, joined by ladders and steep stairs.

A cold wind blew up from somewhere below, carrying the smell of hot copper and ozone, and the floor under my boots trembled in a slow, steady rhythm.

In the middle of it all, rising out of a ring of black stone, hung the Resonance Core.

It was a sphere of crystal about twice the height of a man, spinning slowly on its axis, and it was beautiful in a way that I didn’t like at all.

Half of it glowed a deep, bruised blue. The other half burned red.

The colors swirled together at the middle in a slow, constant churn, like two kinds of weather meeting over the sea, and every time they touched, a flicker of white lightning ran across the surface.

Around it, in a perfect circle, stood nine tall pillars of dark metal, each wrapped in coils of copper, each humming at a slightly different pitch.

From the head of every pillar, a thick rope of pale light ran to the core.

And from the base of every pillar, a second rope ran outward, across the floor, to a tall iron frame at the edge of the chamber.

There was a person strapped to each frame.

Nine of them.

Men and women in the torn remains of knights’ uniforms, bound upright with leather straps and crystal bands, with their heads hanging and their arms spread.

They were the ones that Bram and the others hadn’t been able to tell us about, the ones the Black Knights had been dragging down from the lowest level since the first bell.

I’d never seen any of them before, and I’d never forget their faces.

"The conductors..." Laura whispered. "They’re part of the circuit."

"What does that mean?"

"It means the energy goes through them."

Varn had walked out to the edge of the platform as calmly as if she were stepping onto a balcony.

She put one hand on a brass control panel set into the rail and said in a clear, dry voice that carried all the way across the chamber, "Core, defensive mode... Full draw."

The nine pillars screamed.

I can’t think of any better word. The coils on their sides blazed white, and the pale ropes running to the frames turned bright violet and began to throb in time with the siren.

The nine people on the racks arched their backs as one, and a long, high, dreadful cry went up from them, and a smell like burning hair filled the air.

"Stop it!" Alicia shouted. "You’re killing them!"

"Not yet," said Varn, in an almost gentle tone. "But they won’t last the hour, and I’d advise you not to cut the lines..."

"The energy returns along the same path... If any one of those tethers is severed carelessly, the surge will go straight into the knight on the other end of it."

I’d been halfway to the nearest rope with my sword out, and I stopped so fast that I nearly fell on my face. I stared at the pale tether pulsing at my feet.

I could see the energy racing down it, in quick bright waves, toward the screaming woman at the far end. I understood, with a dreadful clarity, that this had been designed.

Somebody had sat at a drafting table and worked out exactly how to make a weapon that was also a hostage.

"Every single piece of this place," I said, "is built to make somebody choose."

"It’s efficient," said Varn.

"No, you’re fucked up! It’s fucking evil."

"The two aren’t mutually exclusive."

"Roland," Alicia said sharply. "Behind you!"

A door slammed open on the far side of the cavern, at the end of a long catwalk, and a man in black armor walked through it as if he owned the mountain.

I knew him by the walk.

I’d seen it at Greywater Ford, through smoke and flying water, when he’d come down the road like a falling tree. Corvane’s armor had been repaired.

The dents were gone, and the plates had been polished to a dull, oily sheen.

The crystal in his chest was bigger than I remembered, and it burned a steady, steely gray with none of the flicker it had shown before.

It looked stable. And it looked finished.

He’d taken the lesson from our last fight, and he’d built something to answer it.

He stopped about fifteen yards from me and gave me a small, formal bow.

"Sir Ravenshield," he said. "You’re annoying, as promised."

"I haven’t done anything yet."

"I’ve been told you’re good at that."

"By whom?"

"By everyone who’s tried to kill you." The visor of his helm swung toward Alicia and Laura and came back. "Let’s be quick... I’m on a schedule."

"So am I," I said, and drew my sword.

The first thing that went wrong was the resonance.

I’d been counting on it, to be honest. I’d walked into that chamber with a hundred percent of whatever the curse measures and a free resonance in my pocket courtesy of the token.

And also a plan that went roughly to get close, link up, and hit him very hard.

So when Corvane started across the catwalk toward me, I reached for Alicia and Laura through the link in the usual way, and nothing came.

Well... it’s not nothing. But the noise.

It was like trying to hear a voice in a room full of rattling pans.

I could feel the shape of them, golden and steady on my left, quick and cold on my right, but when I tried to push Aether toward them, the connection frayed and spat sparks and fell apart.

The panel jumped up in front of my eyes, flickering.

[WARNING: Static interference detected.]

[Source: Chest crystal, modified.]

[Effect: Bond resonance efficiency reduced at distances greater than one arm’s length.]

[Recommendation: Stay close to your friends. Or become better at making plans.]

I’ll admit I said something unprintable.

"What’s wrong?" Laura called.

She was already moving, her bow slung across her back and her sword drawn.

"He’s jamming it! The Resonance won’t carry!"

"How far?"

"About an arm! Maybe less!"

"That’s absurd!" Alicia snapped.

She stepped sideways to avoid a blow from one of Varn’s knights, parried it with her own sword, and put the pommel into the man’s visor with a ringing crack. "Roland, think about it fast!"

"I’m thinking!"