Page 15 of The Malevolent Eight

Damn me for a fool. I really should have paid more attention to the third Infernal, the one pretending to be comatose at the back of the cell.

‘Let me guess,’ I said, working out how best to subdue him, ‘you consider it your patriotic duty to die rather than allow one of your comrades to give up any secrets.’

The spy, a Guilish diabolic, judging by his slender form and twin sets of horns, dropped the severed hand before wiping his own on the filthy rags that were all that remained of what must once have been an elegant frock coat. ‘Me?’ he asked innocently. ‘Nah, fuck patriotism. I just figured once you made the deal with this prick you’d kill me to avoid leaving witnesses.’

‘We never stipulated that only one of you could leave here alive,’ Galass said, horrified. ‘You could both have been freed so long as we’d got the information we needed!’

‘Really?’ asked the diabolic, whose voice was now sounding disturbingly familiar. He stepped over the body of the demoniac he’d killed and into the light Shame was shedding to reveal ivory skin that had been battered black and blue. ‘Geez, Cade, you goin’ soft in your old age or something?’

It was that snarky, self-satisfied smirk beneath all the seeping wounds and swollen flesh that made me recognise the bastard at last.

Of all the torture joints in all the hidden Auroral enclaves, why did it have to be him?

‘Tenebris?’ I asked.

My former Infernal agent spread his arms wide, grinning. ‘The one and only. Come on, buddy, bring it in.’ He grabbed me in an uncomfortably intimate hug. ‘How’s my best client doing?’ Just as quickly, he released me and shot me an appraising look with the scarlet eyes I’d seen so many times behind the aethereal smoke of a spell circle when we were negotiating for spells. ‘Not too good, I’m guessing.’ He patted my shoulder before adding, ‘You look like shit, Cade.’

Chapter 9

Strategy

With the help of Aradeus’ rodent scouts, we zigged and zagged our way along a maze of narrow passages punctuated by apparently random sets of stairs. Occasionally, we were instructed to just stand still in the middle of a corridor.

‘Does this guy let his rats get into the sauce or something?’ Tenebris asked, miming someone drinking from a very tiny beer stein.

‘They’re notmyrats.’ Aradeus corrected him with somewhat less than his usual politeness, making me like him a lot more. ‘These rats are sovereign beings, assisting our escape because theirs is the noblest of species and they recognise the urgency of our mission. Daring adventure is in their nature, as is the raw, unbridled heroic instinct that—’

Okay, that cured me.

‘Time to go.’ Aradeus resumed our labyrinthine escape.

We were about two turns away from a back exit when two guards caught up with us. From the lack of any Glorian glow about them and the desperate way they were clutching their truncheons I could see they were only recruits.

Sparks of Tempestoral magic were already igniting around Corrigan’s fist and Alice had her whip-sword out when Galass gave me that look meant to arouse feelings of guilt over the possibility of killing our fellow human beings.

‘Let me handle this,’ I told Corrigan and Alice. I think I managed not to sigh. Maybe.

‘Stay where you are,’ one of the guards warned me as I approached. The second one raised his truncheon and reached behind his back to draw a dagger with his other hand.

‘That dagger isn’t regulation, son,’ I informed him. ‘You’ll wind up digging latrine trenches for the next five years if a Glorian Pareval catches you with a contraband weapon.’

‘H-how. . . how would you know?’ he asked.

The first guard was getting the look on his face that suggested he was considering what a smart soldier would do in this situation. He’d soon conclude that would be shouting for other guards or trying to delay the eight of us from escaping.

‘Strategy,’ I said.

‘W-what?’ he asked, then, because young soldiers hate sounding anxious, said it again, only more forcefully. ‘What?’

‘Strategy,’ I repeated. ‘It’s the one skill they deny soldiers. They teach you to think tactically, like, for example, “Let’s delay these dangerous, magic-wielding infiltrators long enough for the rest of our troops to find us and then we can overwhelm them and win commendations and maybe even a promotion from the Glorian commander.” See, that’s atactic.’

The second guard attempted a smirk, but just looked constipated. ‘Sounds like good advice.’

‘No,’ I corrected him, ‘it’s a goodtactic.The problem is, sometimes goodtacticsmake shittystrategy.’ I gestured to the others. ‘Here’s what’s going to happen. Because I’m a nice guy at heart, one of these lunatics is going to blast the two of you into oblivion. That’s nice of me because the alternative is we let the kangaroo have his way with you.’

‘K-kan. . . gooro?’ asked one of the guards.

Temper, helpfully, hopped a little closer, raised his paws like a boxer and showed the guards his fangs.

---