only what they could do for him, the money they could make him, the prestige they could give him. You think you know that, Petri, but you know not even the half of it. I suspect that Eneko has Ikarans in his pocket too, provides them with slaves and guns despite the embargo, and he was using Vocho to assassinate strategic people to help his cause. He has plans of his own, that one, and he’s dangerous because of it. Yet the guild could be of great use. Once Eneko’s destroyed – making sure of course, that no suspicion falls on us, because you’re the prelate’s man – and you’re installed as guild master instead, we’re almost there. We thought you’d like that, after what they did to you.”
Chapter Thirteen
Vocho followed Cospel up a rickety stairwell that hugged the side of a steel mill. The clockwork hammers thundered underneath them so unrelentingly, Vocho’s heart started to pound in time. Kacha and Dom brought up the rear as they edged out onto a rooftop thick with shacks made of anything available, homes tied to each other by washing lines full of rags. Little gaunt faces peered out to watch them as they passed, and whisper about them to their backs.
These places hadn’t changed much, Vocho thought. He’d not been in one for an age, that first time always lingering in his head with the scent of blood and the screams of the crowd as they were trampled underfoot. The shacks were still as full, the faces just as thin. The prelate had promised change, but not much had happened. Vocho had got a hell of a shock the first time he’d seen the prelate and realised he was the man who’d started the riot at the execution, who he’d last seen being dragged up the steps of the Shrive.
So many rumours had flown about after Bakar had taken power, it was hard to know the truth of anything. The only thing Vocho was sure about, because he’d seen it with his own eyes from the dorm where he and the other youngest were hiding, was that the prelate had threatened to shoot Eneko, and Eneko had backed down. They talked of that in whispers after lights out, until the sergeant-at-arms caught them and gave them six lashes and a stern lecture on how Eneko had had to back down if they all wanted to live. Saving them had seemed good to him; did it seem good to them? Just to top the punishment off they’d each had to produce an essay on why the guild being flexible had meant it had managed to survive since before the Great Fall.
Things were hazy in Vocho’s head after Eneko’s retreat. At some point Bakar had brought the king to the square in front of the Shrive, had bounced his head across the cobbles before having him strung up by his heels from the ancient clock tower. The prelate had taken control, but not just for himself; he had proclaimed equality for all in accordance with the Clockwork God’s instructions.
Only it hadn’t worked out that way, had it? These poor bastards were still poor, still ate what scraps they could find. The smell of watery fish-head soup reminded Vocho painfully of his ma sobbing over a pan and the sensation of a hole in his stomach big enough to fit his head in. Vocho smelled that soup in all his worst nightmares.
He clutched the papers tighter with the hand he’d stuffed inside his tunic. He was never going to be that poor, that hungry, ever again. Neither was Kacha. These papers and what they might be worth to the right people would be enough to make sure they were never hungry.
Cospel ducked under a last washing line and pointed at a shack that looked just as tumbledown as the rest.
“Are you sure?” Vocho asked. “It doesn’t look like the home of a scholar.”
Cospel shrugged. “Got her flaws, like. Bit of a nutter, if you ask me. But she knows her stuff all right. I checked. Ten years teaching languages and cryptology at Ikaras University, another three working for the prelate. She works for herself now. Fell out with him about the Clockwork God, so I hear. He reckoned she was blasphemous.”
“The university, eh?” Dom said. “Maybe I’ll know her then. Mind you, languages weren’t my subject, and I’m not sure what cryptology even is.”
Vocho stifled the question – what was Dom’s subject, exactly? Trying not