Lord Sunday by Garth Nix

the Piper or Saturday. Then a Gun-Sergeant, his sleeves resplendent with gold stripes and crossed cannons, gestured to the other Denizens, who lowered their weapons a little, though not so much that anyone in the elevator would have a chance to break out. The gunner with the slow match near the cannon also lifted this burning fuse away from the touchhole, but not enough for anyone to get comfortable.
    “Stay there, ma’am, and you others,” the Gun-Sergeant called out. “Marshal Dusk commands here and we are under orders to take no chances. I saw you at the Citadel fight, ma’am, but seeing ain’t always believing, so if you’ve no objection, we’ll send word to the Marshal.”
    He made a sign with his hand and one of the artillerists towards the rear slid out around the heavy ironbound door on the opposite side from the elevator.
    “Good idea,” said Suzy. “Um, where is here? We’re not at the Citadel?”
    “This here’s the Cannon Arsenal,” said the Gun-Sergeant. He was about to add something else when he was interrupted by three distant horn blasts from somewhere outside.
    “You might want to block your ears,” said the Gun-Sergeant, though neither he nor any of the other gunners made any move to do so.
    Giac promptly obeyed, and the Will thrust its head under its wing. Suzy however was about to ask why when there was a sudden titanic blast outside. The stone walls of the guardroom shook and the elevator canted over even more, till it was almosthorizontal, and Suzy was sitting on what used to be the wall.
    The Gun-Sergeant said something, but Suzy couldn’t hear it over the ringing in her ears. As the tinnitus subsided the Gun-Sergeant spoke again, and though Suzy couldn’t really hear it she could work out what he was saying by watching his lips.
    “Told you so,” he said.
    Suzy grinned and mimed cleaning her ears out with her fingers. It actually helped, so she kept at it and looked in surprise at her blackened fingertips. “Must be quite a while since the Bathroom Attendants washed between my ears,” she said proudly. “I don’t reckon they’ll get another chance.”
    “I think it very unlikely,” said Part Six of the Will. It hopped on to Suzy’s shoulder and peered at the artillerists. “Tell me, Sergeant, why are you all wearing black armbands? And what was that explosion?”
    The Gun-Sergeant narrowed his eyes. “I’m not answering questions from a bird of dubious background,” he said. “You look like some kind of Nithling.”
    “I beg your pardon,” said the Will. “I’ll have you know that I am Part—”
    “Shush,” said Suzy, clasping the raven’s beak shut. “The bird’s all right. Marshal Dusk will vouch for it, as well as for me.”
    “What about him?” asked one of the other gunners, pointing at Giac. “He’s one of Saturday’s, isn’t he?”
    “Well, he was,” said Suzy. “Only now ’e’s not, orright? He works for Lord Arthur, same as the rest of us.”
    “If you say so,” sniffed the gunner, but he maintained a ready stance with his sparkizan, and kept a thin blue spark sidling along the blade of the halberd-like weapon.
    “So why the black armbands, then?” asked Suzy, repeating the Will’s question. “And what was that boom? Someone smoking in the Nothing-powder store again?”
    A chorus of irritated voices answered the last question first. It was a commonly held belief in the rest of the Army that the Moderately Honourable Artillery Company’s artillerists and engineers were always on the verge of blowing themselves up byaccident and that only good luck spared them. It was a completely unfounded belief, but that didn’t make it any less irritating.
    “Quiet!” roared the Gun-Sergeant. The ruckus died down, and the burly Denizen turned back to Suzy. “Now General, presuming you is who you say you are, you know that there ain’t no artillerist who smokes, even if we could get the makings, which we can’t since the fall of the Far