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  “You like that, huh?”

  “Yes.” No other reply was possible, not without making this worse than it already was.

  Both hands now grabbed the sides of his thighs.

  “I didn’t hear that. Can you say it again?”

  “Yes!”

  “Beg me.”

  Carro pushed his eyes shut.

  Jono hit him hard on the back of the head. “Beg, I said.”

  “Please!”

  Jono came up from behind and rammed hard into Carro’s arse. Carro couldn’t restrain a moan. His whole backside was on fire.

  “You like that, huh?” Jono’s breath tickled in the back of his neck. Warm fluid trickled over his shoulder. Blood, from Jono’s nose.

  “Do I have a choice?” Carro snarled, with one cheek pressed against the wall.

  Jono grunted and pushed deeper.

  Goosebumps broke out on Carro’s skin. The pain had subsided and now he was starting to go hard. It always happened. They’d fuck him, use him, and leave him, sore and aching for release. He hated how his body betrayed him. He hated everything.

  Carro clamped his jaws. He would not scream or cry. Next time, he would hit harder and in a more delicate spot.

  Chapter 6

  * * *

  “THE CITY of glass,” Tandor said, gesturing at the horizon.

  Since stopping at the cave early that morning, the sled had skirted the frozen bay, cutting across points and peninsulas. Now at last, the sled had crested the last hill on their path and they had an uninterrupted view of the point where the snow-swept white bay joined the southern ocean. To the right, fluffy clouds hung over the foothills to the mountains forming the border with Arania.

  Straight ahead, where stacks of ice floes met the bay, the jagged peaks of the City of Glass reached towards the heavens, tall structures that reflected the light of the low sun. The palace tower protruded from the cluster like a broken stick. That was where Queen Jevaithi looked down upon them all from her rooms with the soft carpets, the ruffled curtains, the stuffed armchairs and the huge bed. Oh yes, the bed.

  To Tandor’s eyes, the City lay at the centre of a golden web of icefire that spread out over the plain, always moving and shimmering. By the skylights! He had never seen it as strong as this. In days to come, it would get stronger, and that was all his doing. It was the sign of power returning to the Thilleian clan.

  Myra sat straight, wincing. She had stopped complaining but kept casting Tandor angry looks. Tandor alternated between finding it annoying and not even noticing. He had made it here without mishaps. Loriane would probably scold him for taking Myra, but now the women could worry about the women’s things.

  “You’ll soon be warm in mistress Loriane’s house.”

  “The cold isn’t why I’m shivering. There’s something creepy about this place.”

  She let her eyes wander to the jagged outlines of the city. Tandor wondered how much icefire she saw.

  Ruko was pulling a hooded cloak from the luggage, the type worn by carriers of disease. Good boy.

  Tandor nodded his appreciation; Ruko glared back and sent Tandor images of an infirmary ward.

  No one will bother you, Tandor said by way of excuse.

  Covering up avoided risky situations. If people saw a driverless sled moving by itself, there would be panic or, worse, arrests and questions.

  A rush of images flashed through Tandor’s mind: the same infirmary ward, but the patients bloody and injured in their beds. Red sheets. Some people decapitated, some with their bellies slit open and their intestines spilling out. A madman looking like Ruko, with a knife in his hand—

  Tandor clamped down on the visions. He gathered icefire in his hand, and threw a loop of it around Ruko’s legs.

  The images faded, except for one: that of the girl Tandor had seen in Ruko’s mind before.

  Ruko’s inaudible angry howl rang through Tandor’s mind.

  You love her? Tandor asked.

  The girl smiled, and reached out.

  If you do what I say, we will free her from the palace. If you disobey me I will turn you back into a mortal. . . . Tandor cast a glance at the chest strapped to the luggage rack. Ruko’s heart was in there. Returning it to his body would not only return Ruko to a weakened, mortal state, it would make him Imperfect, and persecuted in the city.

  Ruko pulled on the hooded cloak with jerky movements that oozed anger. While he stepped back up onto the driver’s seat, his eyes met Tandor’s. They both knew that Tandor’s threat was useless. He needed Ruko to be a servitor for his plan to succeed.

  Ruko flicked the reins. Even that simple gesture made Tandor’s skin creep. With every step the bear took towards the city, the boy’s power grew.

  The bear started moving again.

  The Outer City lay on a hillock to the right, a jumble of snow-covered humps, houses built by those exiled from the city after the Knights had taken power. Initially, it was nothing more than a camp, frequently razed by Knights to weed out the last remains of Thillei blood. These days, the settlement was a decent town in its own right, a gathering of buildings that had been thrown together without plans or foresight. It was the home of commerce and crime.

  The traditional festival grounds were a temporary town made of colourful tents on the plain separating the Outer City from the City of Glass proper. It was busy; the breeze brought shards of music and clapping, and grumbles of bears from the sled parking area. A line of fences marked a course for racing Tusked Lions. They even had igloos for the animals. Tandor spotted the flapping wings of an eagle, and the grey and red uniform of a Knight. Yes, they would be out here in force, too.

  Newlight meant free unlimited girls, most of whom were throwing themselves at the Knights, so most of those Knights wouldn’t be looking too closely at what went on in the Outer City.

  Ruko steered the sled along a track that was worn smooth by passing traffic, no doubt made by Lion-catchers returning to the city with the first of the animals to be slaughtered.

  Soon, they had reached the ramshackle collection of houses, with Ruko negotiating the twisty streets. Getting lost was easy in the Outer City. No street was straight and the houses, structures locals called limpets, all looked the same from the outside: large conical shapes of ice. The ones that had just been resurfaced were pristine white, while the older ones had gone dirty and grey. At normal times, different colours of the doors distinguished the individual houses, but during the Newlight festival, most doors were yellow.

  There were people everywhere: talking on street corners, watching artistes in colourful clothing juggling balls while standing on each other’s shoulders, and lining up to get into their favourite eating houses.

  The sled progressed at walking pace. The people would see a noble and a girl heavy with child and would see them as a man from the city’s nobility with his breeder woman, nothing out of the ordinary.

  A juggler performed an act with a set of burning coals and a huge butcher’s knife. At his feet lay a stuffed pillow made from bear fur, symbolising the animal that would be ritually killed at the height of the celebrations. Newlight celebrated the end of the long, dark winter, when the sun first rose above the horizon after having been absent for months, and hunting trips were again possible. It was the start of a time of plenty, of new life, and of fertility.

  The sled had gone past the juggler before the man got to the part of his act that involved stabbing the stuffed bear and ripping it apart. Usually, there was something inside for the children. Chevakian sweets, or bits of saltmeat. Tandor could taste it on his tongue.

  By the skylights, the memories. His mother used to take him here for visits almost every year.

  Myra looked wide-eyed at the scenery sliding past. For a short time at least, she seemed to have forgotten to complain.

  They crossed the markets, with busy stalls and roaring fires, where people were eating hot food and warming themselves. Tandor felt the pull of icefire from the merchant who usually
had his stall in the very corner. To the common people in the street, he sold crockery and bits and pieces he scavenged from old estates, but under his benches, he held forbidden items from the past. Little portraits of the King, a piece of cutlery with the Thillei emblem, scavenged from the palace storerooms. Today there was no opportunity for Tandor to see the man, but he’d come back later. First he must deposit this complaining child in mistress Loriane’s hands.

  Ruko halted the sled in front of a newly covered limpet with a blue door—just like Loriane to ignore the seasonal yellow-door decoration. The blue door was so familiar, down to the white snowflake patterns on the blue paint—Tandor had painted them—and the mark on the door which he had made trying to manoeuvre a chair inside. So many times had Tandor stepped through that door into Loriane’s soft arms. He could taste her lips against his, he could feel the softness of her breasts under his hands. He could—

  “Is this it?” Myra asked, frowning.

  Tandor shook himself out of his memories. “Yes.”

  He jumped off the sled. A young couple came past and stared at him as he lifted the knocker and let it fall on the door. Why would a noble come to mistress Loriane’s house? Good question.

  Tandor ignored the gazes. He imagined the big round stove that was the centre of the limpet, where Loriane would make her heavenly soup. He could almost see her determined face, the cheeks red with cold, the slightly crooked mouth and the way one of her eyes always seemed to squint. No, Loriane wasn’t pretty either. Her beauty was on the inside.

  Why had no one opened the door yet?

  “Well, your woman obviously isn’t at home.” Myra’s voice sounded peevish.

  Tandor wanted to snap at her. Yes, he was sore and tired, too—and how was he to know that Loriane would be out?—but he bit on his irritation.

  “She might be at the festival,” he said.

  The remaining Imperfect boy would be fifteen. He might take part in some of the competitions. Loriane’s brother was a butcher. He would have an important role in the festivities. Yes, that was it.

  He climbed back into the sled.

  Ruko’s questioning mind touched his.

  Tandor forced his thoughts back on the snow-covered field where the crowds and the tents had been. And the eagles. The place crawled with Knights, since a lot of them would be competing. Well, that was not to be helped.

  Ruko steered the sled away from the house, and they went back through the same busy streets, drawing annoyed glances from pedestrians.

  When they reached the festival grounds, the sled could go no further. The designated parking area was already full and the igloos occupied with bears. But never mind; they wouldn’t stay long.

  Tandor jumped out, after which Myra pulled up her legs and settled sideways on the bench. “You go and look for her. I’ll stay here.”

  “No, you won’t.” He couldn’t risk losing her now.

  “I’m tired.”

  “No, you come. I promised your father I’d look after you.” And I didn’t take you to play a stubborn adolescent either.

  Her face scrunched up briefly, but then she pressed her lips together and rose. “I don’t know why you wanted me to come. So far, you’ve only been disgusting and nasty to me.”

  “You’ll find out.” He held out an arm. She took it, clambering awkwardly from the sled. A man walking past shot him a look that might have been disdain. Noble men of the City of Glass paid their breeder women to have their children but did not, ever, fall in love with them. He wanted to scream at those curious people, the child isn’t mine.

  A man walked past pulling a sled full of barrels. Bloodwine. That load was worth a lot of sore heads tomorrow morning.

  To his right, at the bottom of the slope, stood several brightly coloured tents. Clouds of steam rose into the air from food stalls.

  A bit further away over the plains, a group of eagles were coming in. This was the tail end of the long-distance race for Apprentice Knights, Tandor picked up from a shard of conversation.

  A couple of youngsters were walking in the snow in bare feet, with bare legs protruding from blankets. Ah, the swimming. Didn’t they make that race harder every year? Jump in the water, swim to the ice floe, climb on, get the token, jump back in and return to the start? By that time, most of the competitors were so cold that they needed rescuing, to loud jeers of the audience. Oh, the memories were coming back.

  Soon, they were amongst the thick of the activity. Tandor wanted to run from tent to tent. Now that he was so close, he hungered for Loriane’s touch, the twinkle in her eyes and the caress of her hands.

  Loriane had once said she manned the drinks booth, so they looked at the food stalls. It was so busy that Tandor had to hold Myra close for fear of becoming separated in the throng. She shuddered under his touch.

  The crowds at the swimming were so thick that even he, tall as he was, could only hear the splashes and the shouts. Further past the tents, nurses’ sleds marked with green were doing a brisk trade shipping contestants off to the various Outer City healers.

  Ah. As midwife, Loriane was a healer of sorts. Maybe she was on duty in the medical post.

  A huge queue lined up there. Tandor pushed past the line. People glared, but said nothing at the sight of the golden curls on his cheeks. The advantages of being a noble.

  In one tent, a couple of frazzled nurses were treating a young man with cuts all over his upper body. Tandor guessed he had fallen on the ice.

  In another tent, a group of young men continued to brawl while Tandor tried to make himself heard. Where was Loriane? The young nurse thought maybe in the main post. Where was that? Her reply was interrupted by a loud burp. The next thing, one of the brawling youths projectile-vomited bloodwine all over his mates and collapsed face first onto the floor. Then everyone started yelling.

  Tandor retreated. The smell of vomit made him feel sick.

  “Have you seen anything that might look like a main medical post?” he asked Myra.

  She didn’t reply. Her face was pale; she seemed not to have heard anything.

  A stab of irritation shot through him. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “What’s wrong? Well, you’re so good at being crude. In case you haven’t noticed, having a child inside you puts a lot of pressure on your rear end. In case you don’t understand that: my butt hurts and I feel like pissing myself with every step. I want to use the outroom.” Her voice spilled over.

  “But you did only just before we came here.”

  “Didn’t you listen to what I said? I feel like that. All. The. Fucking. Time.”

  People were stepping back, leaving a small circle around them, keen expressions on their faces. At Newlight, fights were entertainment, no matter who was fighting.

  He grabbed her arm. “Come. You’re making a spectacle of yourself.”

  “No, I’m not coming anywhere. I’ve had enough.”

  She yanked her arm out of his grip and ran, shouldering people aside. Oh, by the skylights!

  Tandor pushed between curious onlookers, but she had vanished. Great. That was just what he needed.

  He stood there, gnashing his teeth when a shiver of icefire crawled over his arm. A brief golden thread snaked through the air. That had to be from Myra, but the thread had not come from the direction of the sled. Where was she going? Was she lost already?

  Women.

  He pushed through the crowd. The sensation grew stronger. Golden threads shivered and dissolved into sparks. At that point he realised that this icefire didn’t come from Myra: the boy was here.

  Stupid. He should have realised that. Myra had Thillei blood, but it wasn’t half as strong as the boy’s. Isandor had turned fifteen and would be out here looking for girls, maybe drinking if he had money, or taking part in a competition or two.

  All Tandor needed to do was follow the tug of icefire and collect another of his children. Except the strand led him . . . to the eagles’ pens.

  Tandor spotted Myra
before he found Isandor. She was at the fence, staring into the pen where at least thirty eagles were tied up on bars. She was even leaning her Imperfect arm on the fence. By the skylights, get away before anyone sees you. The place was crawling with Knights. There were at least ten of them in their distinctive red tunics with grey cloaks.

  “Myra, come,” he hissed at her. “I promise we’ll go back to the sled now.”

  She didn’t move, but stared ahead.

  Tandor followed her gaze. In a group of a few young Knights stood a distinctive young man, lean and quite tall. His skin was milk-pale and his hair black as a low-sun night. Since Tandor had seen him last, his face had become more mature. He even sported a dark fuzz of hair on his chin. But his eyes were the clearest, darkest blue, the colour people called royal blue. It was Loriane’s boy Isandor, and he was wearing an Eagle Knight uniform.