But oh no—she’d gone pale, swaying where she stood. Then she’d begun to babble like a lunatic, spewing statistics and calculations like one of her own machines gone mad, darting from one end of the room to the other, gathering up sheets of transplas, putting them down again. Shouting at him, by Shaitan!
He had to close the palazzo immediately. Right now! Her equipment, her records, her data. How could they be moved safely? The Technomage Tower would know, she said. They’d told Nasake—
She’d bitten the words off, her face going a ghastly shade of gray, but it was too late.
The Necromancer had smiled, inhaling the sour-sweat stink of fear. “My dear Dotty,” he said, “I own Nasake, soul and body, in this life and the next. Whatever made you think you could bribe him to run your silly messages?”
The Technomage had braced herself, one hand on the back of her chair. “How do you expect me to work in isolation?” she demanded. “They don’t have to know about you.” Her eyes blazed with the intensity of her feelings. “But they could help, with the seelies, with the Magick reservoir. With everything.”
“No.”
“For Science’s sake!” She thumped the chair with her fist. “Why won’t you listen? I was right about the seelies, wasn’t I? I told you so!”
Not the wisest thing to say to any man, particularly a tired, aching Necromancer at the end of his tether.
He’d very nearly killed her, there and then. As it was, he wasn’t entirely sure she’d be in her right mind when she came around.
Poor, foolish Dotty. She’d meant well.
The Necromancer tipped his head back and closed his eyes. How old had he been the day the original Dotty brought the healer for his mam? Seven, eight?
Slowly, his hand closed and the thick silk of the coverlet bunched under his fingers. Much good it had done, she’d died anyway—because neither of them could read the healer’s instructions on the drug vial. Between them, they’d dosed her to death. The smell of poverty and damp assaulted his nose. And he was there again, lost down the dark tunnel of the years, mired in memory, his life divided into before and after.
He gritted his teeth. As always, he was grateful for the reminder of what ignorance truly was, what it meant—fiercely, bitterly grateful. Without it, without that pivotal moment, he would never have become what he was—a usurper whose very existence threatened the gods. His smile grew grim.
“I cain’t let you stay here, lad,” Shima had said, all those years ago. “Not less’n you earn your keep.”
When at last he’d raised his gaze from his mother’s limp body to meet the innkeeper’s eye, Shima took a step back, sucking in his breath. In his thin treble, the boy had said, “Teach me to read an’ I’ll do whatever you want.”
But Shima had shaken his head. “I ain’t good enough. Anyways, I ain’t got the time. You need a man who knows his letters. Lemme think.” His face cleared. “Tolaf’ddo it. He’s a drunken sot, but he’s clever.” He hesitated, but only for an instant. “You know what he’s like. He’ll want you fer his bum-boy.”
The child shrugged. It would hurt, he knew, but nothing came free in the slums.
The Necromancer shuddered, and a silken pillow slipped out from under his arm and flopped to the floor. He sank deeper into the soft embrace of the mattress.
Casting a final look at the still shape on the ramshackle bed, he’d trotted out of the room, hugging his treasure box to his chest. Knowledge was the key. The cost didn’t matter.
Once he knew everything, everything there was to know, there would be no more mistakes.
Inside the box was a pretty pebble, the skull of a cat and a live scuttleroach. It was quite a big one, blue brown and shiny. The day before, he’d touched it, cold and smooth and wriggly, and snapped off one of its legs to see what it would do. As it blundered around the box, careering off the walls, he’d come to the conclusion that scuttle-roaches were not very bright.
By Shaitan, he could still hear it!
The Necromancer shot bolt upright, his heart thumping.
Someone was tapping at the door. “Master? Master, you said you wanted a report.”
“Come in, Nasake,” said the Necromancer grimly. He had a bad feeling.
Frozen with horror, his balls still pulsing with the last spurts of pleasure, Erik stared down into Prue’s vivid eyes. The richness