Peter Newman - The Ruthless

Harper Voyager

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2019

Copyright © Peter Newman 2019

Cover illustration © Chris Tulloch McCabe 2019

Cover design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2019

Peter Newman asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008229030

Ebook Edition © March 2019 ISBN: 9780008229054

Version: 2019-05-15

To Andrew For being there to catch me

Contents

Cover

Title page

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Acknowledgements

Also by Peter Newman

About the Publisher

She had been elsewhere, between lives, formless and timeless. There was a sense of hanging above angry water, of shapes sliding under the surface, of shadows rising to feed, hungry, yet unable to break through to where she hung. She both feared the shapes and was drawn to them. But when she tried to go down to them, something held her up: unbreakable strands threading around and through her. Where she herself was neither light nor shadow, these strands glowed blue and violet, glimmering like crystal. Together they were a tether connecting her to the world beyond, to a platinum sphere, her anchor. This, she knew.

And so she had watched the shadows swirl and throw themselves against the divide, pressing against it, bending it, but unable to push through. On instinct, she tried to reach out, sure that if she could touch whatever separated them, it would part for her. However, the bands of light that protected her also fixed her in place.

The shadows could not reach her any more than she could reach them, but they could whisper, and the sounds they made walked slow through the non-space, inching their way upwards. Though she had no bones in this place, no flesh, no blood, no limbs, the thing that remained had something of her senses, and she turned towards the whisperers, straining to listen.

Words came, trickling into her consciousness. Secret words, forbidden ones. The kind that excited her. Yes! This was true. Recalling something of her old nature sharpened her resolve. She was a hunter of secrets. She was a hunter of demons.

This time, like the times before, she told herself that she must remember what they said, that she must hold on to what she learned. It was important.

The voices were not as one. Some feared her, some hungered for her, and others made senseless noise that buffeted, making her rock from side to side, like a pendulum of glowing wires, or a hunk of meat on a rope.

But it was not meat that the shadows hungered for. They wanted memories, the very pieces that made up her soul. If they could tear one away, it would leave a space. Tear a second and the space would grow, becoming a burrow in her heart for them to hide inside.

There was a change above her, a tightening of the blue-violet strands, and she knew from experience that she would soon leave this place and become herself again, whoever that was.

The shadows sensed it too, redoubling their efforts, pressing so close that she was able to make out features, teeth and torn edges, ragged holes that allowed glimpses of muscle bunching naked inside.

She could feel a tension now, a pull at her back accompanied by the desire to rise. But a new noise made her resist and hold where she was.

Tucked within the writhing mass of shapes was a smaller, more human one, crushed, crying out, over and over: ‘Pari!’

She knew that name. For it was her own. She knew the voice of the one crying out too. Someone dear, someone she loved. Peering closer, she saw his face bubble up from the darkness, set like a pimple on the back of some great beast.

The features belonged to Arkav, her brother. But that was impossible! Arkav was in a young body, very much alive. He could not be here. Could not be here and there at the same time. Unless some part of him had been lost between lives, bitten from him when he had last hung in this place.

Their gazes met, and he called out again, begging for her help.

She fought to go to him but the strands held her tight, making her feel like a prisoner. This too, was truth. I am a prisoner, she thought, and knew this had long been the case.

Then Arkav’s face was blocked out by the rush of shadows, of hungry mouths and the screeching of something tearing, of the distance between her and the angry dark shrinking in the blink of an eye.

The strands of light grew tight about her, like a fist, and she was rising, as fast as the chasing shadows, then faster, leaving them and her brother behind.

This time, she told herself, I will remember.

Pari came back to the world slowly. Everything was black, muted, unreal, and her mind felt fuzzy. There were things she needed to remember. Something about her brother? Yes, that was it. The details skipped around the edge of her consciousness, still close enough for her to grasp, but other things were fast taking her attention.

There were straps around her arms, legs, body and head, holding her tightly in place.

There was something in her mouth that held it open, and a textured shape was pressing down on her tongue. Somehow she knew it was a mesh, and that it held a Godpiece, the anchor that kept her soul from drifting free between lives.

At first she’d thought she was in darkness, but someone stood over her blocking the light, close enough that the fabric of their clothes fell across her like a veil, tickling her nose as their hands worked at the strap behind her head. After a few moments it was removed and the obstruction in her mouth slipped free.

The other straps remained in place.

When the figure stepped away from her, a room of stone was revealed, windowless and grey, with pillars, well spaced, that spiralled slowly from the outer wall into the centre where she lay. Cool air brushed her naked skin, and she saw there were seven strangers moving around her, their robes whispering as they walked. The sound tickled a memory in her mind of something important. She had recently heard whispers that carried a hidden meaning. What was it?