Page 76 of The Bone Season

‘Yes.’ He blew out smoke. ‘Nashira wanted to know about some criminal, the White Binder. If I will it hard enough, I can sometimes invoke a vision. The æther must have known I really needed something. It sent me a picture of a pillar. I passed it to her.’

‘Did you recognise the pillar?’

‘No.’

I tried not to show my worry. The sundial pillar was very distinctive.

‘Carl was asked to find the same man,’ I said.

‘They can have my visions,’ David said. ‘I’m more concerned about the Buzzers.’ He tapped his cigarette. ‘I spoke to someone who fought them.’

‘A red-jacket?’

‘A former one. She’s a trapeze artist these days, after getting her yellow streak. Her test was ten years ago, so it could be different now.’

‘Tell me anyway.’

His gaze became distant.

‘Gallows Wood is where the second test takes place,’ he said. ‘My informant had to work as a team with three other pink-jackets to track down a Buzzer and herd it back into the Netherworld.’

‘How?’

‘They come through portals.’ He drew on his cigarette. ‘First, a cleromancer made lots from stones. When she cast them, they pointed west, so the group set off. After a while, they’d found nothing, so the cleromancer tried again. With each casting, the lots indicated a new direction. The Buzzer was on the move.

‘The pinks changed tactics. First, the rhabdomancer made a dowsing rod, and that got them a bit closer – but they had been out in the dark woods for hours, in the middle of winter. They stopped to rest, built a fire, and did a séance, calling the nearest spirits to help them.’

I leaned against the balustrade. ‘Are there many out there?’

David nodded. ‘Over all those decades, more than a few people risked the minefield.’

I hid a shiver.

‘As they sat by the fire,’ David continued, ‘the sound of flies came from the woods. And then, out of nowhere, a monster appeared – giant, bloated like a corpse, letting out these horrific screams. It had scalped the rhabdomancer before anyone could so much as flinch.

‘The fire was going out, but my informant could still see it. She watched it rip the cleromancer limb from limb, then behead the medium. All the while, she felt like there was an oil spill in the æther – as if it was congealing around her, stopping her from using her gift. An augur threw a knife at it, but nothing happened.

‘About then, the fire went out. My informant could hear the last of the other voyants screaming. Even though it was dark, she rushed to help. She grabbed the Buzzer, smelled the decay on it. Next thing she knew, she was on her back with a shredded arm.’

I thought of the strange wounds on Warden.

‘Using the last of their fire, she lit a dry branch and warded off the Buzzer,’ David said. ‘She ran for her life. The last thing she heard was her teammate, screaming as he was eaten alive.’

We stood in silence for a while. What a way to go.

‘I think fire repels them, and that’s why she lived,’ David said. ‘She was lost in those woods all night, but made it back at sunrise. They stopped joint testing after that. We’ll be out there alone.’

Now I understood why some of the red-jackets carried flamethrowers. I had a feeling I wouldn’t have one when I took my test.

‘I assume she failed,’ I said.

‘Yes. Her keeper gave her a yellow tunic. She passed the second time, but she lost her nerve twice while she was a red-jacket.’

‘The Rephs are clearly stronger than us. Why send a bunch of puny humans to fight?’

‘Sometimes a keeper does go, apparently, to observe from a distance. They don’t want too many of us to get eaten,’ David said. ‘But keeping us terrified keeps us in line. Why not let a few people die horribly every so often?’

He dropped his cigarette and crushed it out with the toe of his boot.

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