Alchemical symbol: Nickel [https://i.imgur.com/SX7htXR.png]

The patrol climbed the crumbling stair from Wall Street in single file. Nevin led with Jerard at his shoulder, followed by the three common soldiers. Drizzle misted the air. The charred walls smelled of ashes and wept soot.

‘Scared, Gram-boy?’ The tall sothron, Vil, cleared his throat noisily and spat. ‘Never seen a real fight, have ya?’

Nevin glanced round. ‘Quiet. This isn’t a pleasure stroll.’

Shanra patted Gram’s arm in a motherly way. ‘Don’t worry, lad. You may be young, but I’m sure you know where to stick your weapon.’

Vil laughed. Gram blushed crimson to his ears.

‘Something funny?’ Shanra said.

‘Enough,’ Nevin snapped.

They rounded a corner. Ahead the steps ended in open space. Nevin signalled the men to halt and went on alone.

He stopped at the top of the steps, taking his first look at the square. The pavement undulated, lifted in places and dropped in others as if a wave had passed beneath. In the centre stood one of the old city water cisterns, cracked and lop-sided. On the far side, the ground had collapsed into the undercity, leaving a crevasse and sheared-off buildings teetering on the brink.

The chapel Thea had described was to his right. Only the pillars flanking the entrance remained to mark the roofless broken shell as a place of worship.

All was quiet, even the background noise of the city seeming distant, softened by the rain. No one was in sight.

He didn’t like it.

According to Thea, they could expect only two men. Two men armed with knives, against his five, all with short swords. Even the common soldiers were decent fighters, more than a match for the average slum thug. The fight should be no more than a scuffle.

But even in a scuffle, a good deal could go wrong. There was too much cover, too many ways to flee into rat-runs between ruined buildings. Now he saw the place, Nevin wished he had more men, another patrol at least — but there had been no time. Thea’s meeting was midday. They’d never have another chance like this.

Nevin and Jerard had removed their conspicuous red cloaks, but they were all armed and armoured, instantly recognisable as a patrol to anyone who saw them. If they’d been seen, and the targets had been warned — the chapel would be empty when they got there, their birds flown.

Nevin gripped the hilt of his sword. His palms itched, his mouth felt dry. He beckoned to Jerard.

The young officer joined him. His long blond hair straggled, curling with the damp. He looked tense. Perhaps this was his first time walking into a real fight, not a practice yard match or a duel.

With hand signals, Nevin gave his orders: take one soldier, circle round behind the chapel. Jerard nodded. He gestured to Vil. They slipped past Nevin into the square and, following the righthand side, vanished into an alley.

Nevin leaned against the wall. Waiting, he always thought, was the hardest part. For the men’s sake, he had to look calm. If he were confident, they would be confident. And he was confident — it was only the usual nerves before action that had him sweating, his mind racing through every possible way this could go wrong.

It wouldn’t go wrong. All they had to do was capture two unsuspecting men.

‘Sir,’ Gram whispered. ‘Are we going to kill them?’

Nevin eyed him. The boy had terrible acne. His gangly frame was too big for him, like the uniform he might grow into. Good enough with a sword in the drill-yard, keen to please and dumb as a tree. ‘I hope not. We want them talking.’

Gram nodded. He looked terrified.

‘Keep your head, remember your drill,’ Nevin said. ‘You’ll do fine.’

Shanra waited patiently, scanning the ruins. Like many norther women, she was built solid and had the attitude to match. A good man to have by you in a scrap.

He drew his sword. With his heart running fast, it wasn’t easy to judge time, but Jerard must surely be in position by now. He beckoned Gram and Shanra to follow.

Quietly, they approached the front of the chapel. From this angle, he couldn’t see through the doorway — which meant whoever was inside couldn’t see them either. He paused by the righthand pillar. Shanra met his gaze steadily and Gram nodded.

Nevin took a breath, and stepped round the pillar into the entrance. Empty glass vials littered the roofless interior. On one wall, a burning angel raised a fiery blade. Two men stood before the picture: one short, wearing a faded blue coat, the other tall and bulky, his face horribly scarred.

There was an instant of frozen shock, of mutual recognition. Then the Snake charged.

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

Nevin stood his ground in the doorway, his sword angled at the big man’s torso. A blade flashed in the Snake’s hand. Nevin ducked. The knife clattered off the wall, but the Snake was already on him, punch after punch giving him no chance to raise his sword.

Forced back, he staggered between the pillars.

‘Phylaxes!’ Nevin yelled.

A giant fist slammed the side of his face. He stumbled, somehow found his feet. A roundhouse punch swept over his head.

Gram appeared behind the Snake. He swung wildly. With eery grace, the Snake side-stepped, grabbed the boy’s arm and twisted. Gram cried out.

Seeing an opening, fire lanced through Nevin’s veins. A lifetime of training seized his sword and lunged. The blade bit into the big man’s side.

The Snake grunted.

‘Blues,’ someone yelled. ‘Blues!’

Bodies swirled round him. Metal clashed. Grunts of effort, thumps, yells of anger and pain. Where was Shanra? Where was Jerard?

‘Phylaxes!’ Nevin shouted. Where was everyone?

His head buzzed; struggling fighters blurred into a rain-smeared mass from which the Snake loomed. Snarling rage contorted the fresh scars across his crumpled face. He had Gram’s sword, gripping it like a dagger.

Nevin slashed, high-to-low across the body. The Snake parried. Steel struck steel, slid and locked. The Snake wrenched free of the bind and hammered the sword hilt into Nevin’s forehead.

He hit the pavement hard on hands and knees. Surf roared in his ears.

Gram too was down. He lay an arm’s length from Nevin, eyes staring without seeing. Blood ran from the boy’s mouth. Beyond, Nevin glimpsed Jerard and Shanra fighting, hemmed in by ten or more Shepherds. The gang members had clubs.

It hadn’t just been two men in the temple. Nevin’s ambush had been ambushed.

Damn. He’d really screwed this up.

The big Snake towered over him. He drew back his foot. Nevin rolled, shielding his head with his arms.

Two crunching blows later, the lights went out.

.........

Consciousness seeped in slowly, like damp.

Nevin groaned. Pain spiked through the balloon that was his head. He lay on his side, face awkwardly pressed against a hard surface: floorboards. Body ached. Wrists hurt. His hands felt strange.

Because his wrists were bound, the rope painfully tight. Too tight? He wiggled his fingers, found the soft linen of his shirt.

Shirt, not breastplate. No armour. His legs — his ankles were tied too. His boots were gone.

He strained against the ropes. They didn’t give. Strong cord and good tight knots — he wasn’t going to free himself easily. His stomach churned and a wave of dizziness washed over him. He closed his eyes until it passed.

Struggling wouldn’t help. He had to think.

Light. Sunlight came in stripes through a shuttered window. Afternoon? He felt it was late afternoon, some hours since the fight, anyway. So the window faced west. The room was bare except for a couple of crates. Exposed rafters overhead. Everything covered with a thick layer of dust. An attic room?

He must have been knocked out.

He remembered the fight. They were ambushed, and the big Snake with the scarred face... Jerard and the others, they had been fighting, outnumbered by Shepherds. Were they dead now, or had they escaped? If they got away, people would know Nevin was missing. They’d search for him.

The House would rip the slums apart to find him. That was the one unalterable law: the House defended its own. Even the dumbest slum thugs knew each drop of Phylaxes blood spilled was another neck for the gallows. They didn’t dare lay a finger on a noble.

Or so he’d thought. Clearly something had changed, because the Shepherds had dared; they’d dared with a vengeance.

And Gram — he was dead. Poor kid. Only a boy, not yet twenty. He’d only become a soldier so he could pay for his younger siblings to go to school. The last wage packet they’d get would be his funeral payment.

Another wave of dizziness rushed in. Nevin shut his eyes and sagged, resting his aching head on the floorboards. Voices drifted up from below. He focused on the sound.

‘Kill him. Why not? Can’t talk if he’s dead.’ A low voice he might have heard before. The big Snake?

‘The others got away. They’ll know it was us.’ The second voice was reedy, nasal.

‘So what? We got nooses round our necks already. You want to make a statement? What’s Black Crow about, if it isn’t this?’

‘We’re not ready.’ A third voice, deep and patient with a strong sothron accent. ‘Start killing nobles, it’s war. They have the soldiers and magic men and weapons. We cannot win a war, not on our own.’

‘Why on our own?’ Big Snake said. ‘The city will rise up. People are hungry, they’re angry, they want change.’

‘No,’ said the deep voice. ‘Not hungry enough. Not angry enough. Not yet.’

Nasal voice chimed in: ‘So what the hell do we do?’

‘He could disappear,’ Big Snake said.

Muttering followed, too low to hear.

‘… angel blood?’ Reedy Voice said.

Silence.

More indistinct muttering. ‘The girl ratted,’ Big Snake said.

A door slammed.

Silence.

Nevin blinked at the cobwebby ceiling. He twisted his wrists against the ropes. The knots still didn’t move.

So. What did he know? The rest of the patrol had escaped, which was good. And the Shepherds weren’t going to kill Nevin, which was nice to know — but whatever plans they had for him, he doubted he’d enjoy.

With difficulty, he wriggled to his knees. The attic room contained nothing obviously useful in his current situation. There was a door, closed, which might or might not be locked. He heard nothing now from downstairs, but he guessed he had company below.

The window was the better option. But before anything else, he needed his hands and feet free. Yanking at the rope only hurt his wrists — the knots were tight and going nowhere. Something had to be done about that.

He crawled to the nearest crate, ploughing a furrow through years of felted dust. His eyes stung. Sneezing made him dizzy again, and he leaned on the crate until his head cleared.

The crate had been nailed shut, but sloppily. He wedged his fingertips under the lid and pried it up a half inch. Patiently he worked his way around, loosening the nails until the lid could be removed.

He peered inside. Between lack of light and the spinning in his head, it took a moment to make sense of what he saw. Oh. He bit on the rope binding his wrists to stop himself laughing out loud. Well, could be worse.