Peter Newman - The Deathless

Harper Voyager

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

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London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers 2018

Copyright © Peter Newman 2018

Cover design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2019

Cover illustration by Chris Tulloch McCabe

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: 9780008228989

Ebook Edition © March 2018 ISBN: 9780008229009

Version: 2019-08-21

For my friends,

who I really should see more often!

Contents

Cover

Title Page PETER NEWMAN The Deathless

Copyright

Dedication

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

Preview of The Ruthless

Acknowledgements

Also by Peter Newman

Keep Reading …

About the Publisher

Vasin Sapphire had risen long before the three suns, unable to sleep nor act, waiting, like the rest of the castle, for the drums of the hunt to begin.

He wished it were otherwise, that experience had taught him how to be calm, allowed him to conserve his strength, but it was always the same, his nerves as much a part of the ritual as everything else. How many times had he participated in the hunt? How many lifetimes? To his surprise, he was hazy on the exact number.

But his body knew. An instinct made him tense, the muscles bunching as he held his breath. And sure enough, on the next beat of his heart, the first drum was played, a single, thunderous strike. Housed at the very centre of the sprawling castle, its reverberations were felt at every corner, through the stone and in the guts, echoing throughout as the note faded to make way for the next. This was the deepest drum of the set, and its beat would steadily quicken as time passed, signalling all to prepare for the hunt.

Vasin exhaled. Some of the tension he had been holding in his limbs released. He kept looking out of the window. The darkness remained, starless and black, a greater emptiness that echoed the one inside.

Clearly he should be getting ready now, but the motivation simply wasn’t there. It was all he could do to resist lighting some Tack and inhaling its aroma of sweet oblivion. He’d been eking out his dwindling supply over the last year, taking just enough to bury his troubles.

But for all of his lack of motivation he didn’t dare. The honour of House Sapphire was in his hands, and no matter his misery, no matter how far he had fallen, he was a Sapphire, blood, bones, and soul.

The deep drum sounded a second time. Servants would be flowing down corridors, their measured steps at odds with their excited faces.

Hunting was at the heart of everything. The road-born supplied the castles of the Deathless, and the Deathless kept them safe from the demons of the Wild. If the hunt failed, then all Vasin’s people would suffer, the road-born from attack and the sky-born from starvation.

Though only he and his hunters would take flight, the whole castle would be present: the quality of the send off, it was believed, affected the hunt’s chances of success. Everyone had their part to play, especially Vasin.

But am I ready? It was a question he asked each time he led a hunt, but rarely with such uncertainty. A memory of his first life arose, him in another body, younger, nervous, his mother coming to his rooms to—

He dismissed it with a growl. He would not think of his mother. Not now and especially not today.

One set of feet stopped outside his open door and a man’s voice began singing for permission to enter. Without turning from the window, Vasin waved him in.

‘May I, my lord?’

‘Yes,’ replied Vasin.

A moment later, he felt the teeth of a brush in his hair. It started low, at the small of his back, banishing tangles from the tips, and worked up, each pull of the brush growing longer. There was a symmetry between the brush strokes and the drum beats that pleased Vasin.

‘I didn’t send for you,’ he mused aloud, and the brush hesitated halfway down his back. ‘Continue. I’m not displeased. Who sent you?’ he asked, curious. Who would know he had not requested assistance, and come to the conclusion that he needed some?

‘Your brother, my lord. Lord Gada bade me aid your preparations and tell you that he is on his way.’

It was unusual to meet before a hunt. Whatever was bringing him here it was unlikely to be good. They’d barely spoken in the last year, but clearly his brother was still keeping an eye on him, enough to know that he wasn’t grooming himself as he used to anyway. Vasin wondered what else Gada had seen and felt a twinge of shame as he regarded his room. The knowledge that a member of his family was arriving shortly threw the state of his quarters, and himself, into stark relief.

Vasin groaned, his brother always thought he knew best. ‘How long do I have?’

The servant, who looked familiar in a way that suggested Vasin had seen him before, and if not him, some ancestor who looked similar, chose his words carefully.

‘Lord Gada did not share that information with me, my lord.’ The servant made an apologetic face. ‘But if I were to guess, I would say he has already left his quarters.’

‘In that case we had best get to work. There is no time to bathe, but I must be scented and dressed before Gada arrives, and all of this clutter must be gone.’