“He’ll be fine,” interrupted Farris, nodding towards Fionn, who was awkwardly packing sheets of notes and documents into a leather shoulder-pack. “You have enough on your hands right now to be worrying.”
“That’s true,” said Nicole. “Argyll needs me more than ever.”
“You think so? He seems to be doing very well without our help for now.”
Nicole gave a defeated sigh. “You’re far from understanding what’s going on inside that mind, Farris. All of us are. We need to trust him.”
“Oh, and letting innocent civilians burn to death is the best course of action?”
“Yes,” said Nicole, lowering her voice to a whisper. “It may very well be so.”
She went to leave, and Farris stepped aside. She walked with the same resigned tone her voice had carried.
Does she really believe that?Would she really do the same if—
“Chester? Can I ask you something?”
Farris turned abruptly to see Fionn standing by him.
“I told you before, call me Farris,” he said, making little effort to hide his frustration.
“But we’re alone,” said Fionn. “Since when does a Simian care what he’s called?”
Farris grabbed the collar of Fionn’s shirt, bringing the Human’s face close to his own. The lad shrank back with fear, a muffled groan escaping his lips.
“You listen here,” said Farris. “You’re wading through a pit of vipers here, lad, and it’ll do no good checking which ones bite. Keep your head down, and your questions to yourself, and you won’t get hurt.”
He let go. Fionn immediately straightened himself, fixing his shirt with that grotesque, over-sized hand.
“I’m a fully-fledged Firemaster,” he said, only letting his voice quiver a little. “I could burn you from the inside out. You threaten me with your strength, but I could kill you in an instant.”
“You could, but you won’t,” said Farris, pushing past Fionn to leave. “You wouldn’t dare do something like that.”
“How do you know?” called Fionn.
“Because you’re afraid,” said Farris, without turning back. “Just like the rest of us, you’re afraid of what you’re really capable of.”
Chapter 19:
The March of the Dead
We’ll build our numbers. We’ll take the Seven Seachtú. We’ll claim the power of the Academy. Then we’ll march on the capital, and I’ll claim the king’s power for myself.
They called my father Yarlaith the Black, but I shall be known as Morrígan the Godslayer.
***
Fionn sat alone at the bar of The Ferryman, a tavern in a far better state than implied by the gruesome sign outside. It was in the heart of Penance’s market district, attracting a wide range of customers from Simian merchants in the city to Human travellers from the south.
But none from the Shadow of Sin, Fionn reminded himself, taking a deep drink of red ale. People from that district prefer to keep to themselves.
A moon and a half had passed since he has last spoken to the Simian now named Farris, who had practically threatened Fionn for questioning the Silverback.
So much secrecy. How am I supposed to council a Triad that won’t let me be part of their work?
I’ve told you before, interjected Sir Bearach. The Silverback no longer has the welfare of the city among his priorities. There is too much he keeps hidden from us.
Us. That was the way Sir Bearach had been referring to them as of late. Stranger still, Fionn agreed with the knight.
It was true: the others of the Triad kept mainly to themselves. Even where their own was concerned. When the Simian named Garth—Farris’s brother—had returned from the Glenn, he had barely acknowledged his tardiness. It was Nicole who had pushed for an explanation, but the scout dismissed her queries just as he had everyone else’s. ‘I was delayed,’ was all he said. ‘Nothing major. Nothing worth discussing. We have more important work to do.’
What this ‘important work’ was, Fionn had no idea. So many meetings were carried out without him, with only rare inquiries into the nature of Pyromancy or Crystallography enough to make Fionn’s presence amongst the Triad even remotely relevant.
I wish Earthmaster Seán would return from Dromán, thought Fionn, taking another deep drink from his pint. He’d know what was going on. He’d know what to do.
Seeing Borris’s corpse the night he died was what spurred most of Fionn’s doubts. The scene itself had been a shock, with Borris’s wife inconsolably hysterical by her husband’s side, and Sir Bearach roaring commands at Fionn inside the mage’s head. Apparently, it had been one of the Seletoth’s Wraiths that killed the Simian, but how the City Guard came to that conclusion, Fionn didn’t know. After all, they had spent little time investigating the scene.
Fionn stared out through a dusty window across the bar.
Could the Silverback be lying? Could it be some kind of bid for—
A quick shape darted across the window, followed by another. Then another.
“Did you see that?” said the absent-minded bartender, looking up from his newspaper. “Some folk running?”
“Seems like it,” said Fionn, as three more Simians sprinted past the window. “Headed in the direction of the Rustlake.”
The bartender laughed. “Might be that they’re late for the ferry. People are dying to leave the city ever since what happened down by the Basilica.”
