by D. J. Butler
“Hell, yes!” Charles Donelsen shouted.
“Memphis and Shreveport aren’t the only cities in distress.” Thomas rose. “I am but a poor star-addled numbwit,” he paused to let a low chuckle ripple through the Electors and proxyholders, “but I find that I can hire reasonably good advice. And my advisors tell me that the Ohio suffers, as well.”
“You want the Ohio to stop suffering, raise the Pacification!” Calhoun thumped his table again.
“That motion has already failed, Andy.” Thomas deliberately used the intimate form of the man’s name, raising an instant scowl on his craggy face. “There’s too much concern for rebellion. The assassination attempt at the Walnut Street Theater—”
“Assassin himself dead, imagine that!” Charles Donelsen whooped. “No one to interrogate, how inconvenient!”
“It is inconvenient,” Thomas agreed. “I would very much like to have learned which of the Ohio princelings sent him—”
“Twice wrong, Tommy!” Calhoun snapped. “We have no idea who sent that assassin! For all we know, it could have been you yourself who did it, and we certainly don’t know he was on the errand of someone in the Ohio.”
“He was Ophidian!” the Memphite proxyholder snapped. “I have seen the body. Do you think Memphis sent him?”
“You may always exhume the corpse,” Thomas said mildly, “and if you’re willing to undertake the necromancy, you may interrogate him yourself.”
Calhoun stared at Thomas, fury in his eyes. “I have no truck with necromancers, as well you know.”
The barb was pointed. Did Calhoun know something about William Penn’s Presence in Shackamaxon Hall? Thomas frowned.
“Well, then!” The Memphite threw up his hands.
Calhoun was undaunted. “And second, the rulers of the Ohio are kings and queens. Their thrones are older than yours by centuries, which you know good and goddamn well.”
Thomas shrugged, an open, inoffensive gesture that would only further enrage Calhoun. “I concede with all my heart the antiquity and dignity of the seven thrones of the Ohio. That doesn’t justify their attempt to rise against Imperial order.”
“‘Imperial order’…is that what you call stealing all their food?”
“The Ohio Company doesn’t steal anyone’s food,” Thomas said. “It operates efficient, safe markets throughout the Ohio, precisely to ensure that residents of the Ohio can still procure food even as Imperial troops—inadequate and ill-equipped though they may be—hunt down the rebellion.”
The Ophidian proxyholders—none of the actual Electors dared participate in the Assembly, which was not, frankly, unreasonable—rolled their eyes or groaned in protest.
Adriaan Stuyvesant exploded from his seat, finger wagging fiercely even before he opened his mouth. “What you say about the Imperial Ohio Company is half a lie, at least! You know very well,” the Dutchman’s strong Vs made it sound as if he said fairy well, “that Imperial traders have forcibly excluded Dutch Ohio Company traders from markets, have sunk our people’s boats, and have even killed them!”
“I know no such thing,” Thomas lied smoothly. “I’m aware of your lawsuits, and once we can consolidate the two proceedings into one, we’ll get to the bottom of the allegations!”
“The Dutch Ohio Company will never get a fair hearing in your Philadelphia court!” Stuyvesant was nearly spherical, and under his white perruque he had the cherubic pink complexion of a youth.
“Can the Imperial Ohio Company get a fair hearing on Wall Street?” Thomas returned. “But surely, you can see that any conflict in the Ohio is the result of the princes’—pardon me, the kings’—inability to keep order within their bounds, a fact I’ve been lamenting for years. Surely, the right answer is to approve the measure before us, to modestly increase Imperial tariffs and tolls, as well as troop recruitment. Once I can establish order in the Ohio, I’m sure your traders will bring you glowing reports and enormous annual surpluses.”
Stuyvesant sputtered.
“Point of order,” Donelsen cracked. “It ain’t regular to say you’ve ‘modestly’ increased somethin’ when it’s been tripled.”
“That’s not a point of order,” the Memphite proxyholder said. “Though it’s a fair point of language. Or mathematics.”
Thomas shrugged again. “The absolute amounts are small.”
Stuyvesant found words again. “The forkedness of your tongue knows no bounds, Penn!”
“Mr. Emperor.” Thomas smiled gently, never so happy for the timid form of address as in that moment.
Stuyvesant wagged his finger again. “You’re telling me to give you money so that your right hand can have the resources to stop your left hand from choking me and picking my pocket.”
“Another point of language,” the Memphite said. “One hand cannot simultaneously choke a man and pick his pocket.”
Stuyvesant threw up his arms in exasperation and snorted.
“I’m not asking anyone to give me money at all,” Thomas said in his most placating voice. “I am inviting all the Electors—including the Electors of Pennsland, whose exaction I will pay out of my own revenues—to pay an increased contribution to the collective, in gold and in men. This contribution will defend His Highness Prince Machogu’s lands, and Memphis, and Cahokia, and any other land in the Empire threatened by the current rampaging of the beastkind. Whether or not,” he added, “the rampage has anything to do with the so-called Heron King.”
“Which it clearly does,” said the ambassador from Adena, holder of her king’s proxy.
“You of all people should be happy I wish to send more troops.”
The ambassador, a woman with short white hair and a deeply lined face, spoke without standing. Her face snarled in an expression of contempt. “You besiege us. Your Company burns our warehouses, and then sells weevil-infested flour to us at rates that amount to murder, and now you suggest we should be grateful to have more of the same. Your Martinite bigotry blinds your reason.”
“You believe the Heron King is assaulting your lands, and you embrace him?” Thomas frowned.
The ambassador was unflappable. “I believe Peter Plowshare is dead, and I look elsewhere than to Philadelphia for aid.”
“I don’t invite you to look to Philadelphia,” Thomas said. “Look rather to all the Electors. Look to the Empire, which is us, and the things we do together.”
“Sophist.”
“I call the question!” Stuyvesant yelled.
“Seconded,” the ambassador from Adena said softly.
Thomas nodded his acquiescence. “The question has been called, and it is time for a vote. The Clerk of the Rolls shall call for a voice vote and shall report the result.”
He had them. The Dutch would vote against him, and Ohio, and most of Appalachee, but others—the silent ones, the ones who were more afraid of assassins and beastkind and revolts than of Thomas—would give it to him.
And then the Ohio would be his.
“Somewhere, there is a cotton cow,
who wonders what ghost it is who milks her.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
“So you fellas don’t like handlin’ dead bodies, I guess.”
Of the three Irishmen working within the stone mausoleum in Navarre Cemetery, not far from the Pontchartrain Sea, the speaker had the biggest head. Abd al-Wahid had the impression they were brothers, though they hadn’t said so—they just looked similar, and they interacted like men who knew each other intimately.
The Irishmen spoke English. After their weeks here, Abd al-Wahid’s men understood both English and French fairly well, though speaking the languages was still a challenge.
“Only dead bodies we make,” al-Muhasib said.
“Heh heh, that’s a good one. Eoin, did you hear the man? Dead bodies they themselves make.”
“He’s funny alright, Téodóir. Now get your crowbar under the lid there and let’s lift.” The Irishman in charge wore a leather coat that clanked as if it contained steel plates
.
“Roibeard, don’t you let Eoin lift, with his bad back and all.” The joker with the big head, Téodóir, wedged the tip of his crowbar under the stone coffin lid and turned back to Abd al-Wahid. “It isn’t often a resurrection man gets to work with so much light, is it?”
He meant the fire. New Orleans was burning, from three days of rioting, and light from the flames shone through the mausoleum’s open door to illuminate the graverobbers’ work. They’d brought a darklantern, but it sat unused in the corner.
The destruction of the cathedral had eased the chevalier’s sickness somewhat. Now the mamelukes had come to excavate this tomb because the chevalier’s pet witch told them that doing so might allow her to heal the chevalier completely.
“Thank the Lafittes,” Eoin said. “The one’s a pirate, the other’s a blacksmith…fire comes natural to both trades, I s’pose.”
“Fire comes natural to any rioter,” Téodóir said. “A good riot is an invitation to arson and burglary, at the very least.”
“Would that make you Jews, then?” Roibeard asked, beginning to lever up the lid. “I heard that Jews don’t like to touch dead bodies.”
“Nobody likes to touch dead bodies, Robby,” Eoin said. “Some folk are just more willin’ to do it than others, given the right circumstances.”
“The poet says, what shall I say, O Muslims?” Abd al-Wahid smiled. “I know not myself, I am neither a Christian, nor a Jew, nor a Zoroastrian, nor a Muslim.”
“Yes,” Ravi said. He stood with Abd al-Wahid outside the mausoleum door, with the girl. “We’re Jews.”
Abd al-Wahid let the quip stand. What did it matter what some gutter-drinking Irish graverobbers thought of him?
“No,” Téodóir said, “that’s a joke, and they’re not Jews. They’ve come from the Caliphate, Robby. They’re great warriors from the Caliphate, everybody knows that, which might make them mamelukes. Except they’ve got that witch with them. You know what that makes these fellas, Robby?”
“Jews,” Robby said stubbornly. “Jews plus a witch.”
“No, lad. They’re…mambolukes.”
Téodóir stopped to laugh so hard at his own joke that he almost pulled the stone lid off the coffin and onto his foot.
“Ah, your witch was right,” Eoin called. “Come on in and have a look, there’s nothin’ here that’ll pollute you.”
The leader of the three Irishmen picked up the darklantern, unshuttered it, and shone its beam down into the stone coffin.
“Would you look at that?” Téodóir said. “Someone’s buried a dolly. Some little girl loved her dolly so much, she buried it in Navarre Cemetery.”
Abd al-Wahid looked to the mambo, who stood shivering outside the tomb beside Ravi with a wool blanket wrapped around her like a cloak. The other mamelukes remained with the chevalier, protecting him against possible attacks from the bishop’s men. Her face wore a stricken expression, and she looked at the stone angels and crosses about her as if she were seeing the spirits of the dead.
“Someone’s gone to a lot of expense for just a dolly,” Roibeard said. “Maybe it’s a child.”
“Too small. Besides, you don’t go to the trouble of a full-sized coffin for a mere baby. And look, it’s made of clay.” Téodóir scratched his face. “Maybe it’s meant to be a soldier. Someone’s dressed it in Imperial blue and gold.”
“No, Teddy,” Eoin said. “That’s not Imperial blue and gold, the Emperor uses horses and a ship and an eagle. That dolly’s got a lily on its frock.”
The mambo grabbed Abd al-Wahid by the wrist and nodded frantically. His shoulder, still bandaged and healing from the wound the houngan’s man Armand had inflicted on him, ached.
“Ah, the chevalier. How did I miss that?” Téodóir grinned. “Some girl loved her gendarme dolly so much, when it was killed in the riots she gave it a proper burial. I wonder what drunk-arse priest she got to pray over a gendarme dolly. Bet he was Irish.”
“Give me the doll,” Abd al-Wahid said.
The Irishmen emerged from the tomb whistling, and Eoin handed the simulacrum to the mameluke. It was a simple clay figurine wrapped in a rough imitation of a gendarme’s uniform…or the chevalier’s own clothing.
The sky grew pale in the east, not from the fires, but from the arriving dawn.
Ravi laughed. “It’s a golem, only without the names of God.”
The mambo hissed. “God has nothing to do with this. It is a curse.”
“We’ll take the second half of our pay now,” Eoin said.
“You were to be paid to dig up a corpse,” Abd al-Wahid reminded him. “This isn’t a corpse.”
“We did the same amount of work.” Eoin’s smile was affable, dimly lit by the fires of New Orleans. “It’s not my problem the tomb was as empty as Jesus’. Well, almost.”
Abd al-Wahid handed the doll to Ravi, who examined it with interest. “Then you can consider my sparing your life as the second half of the payment.” He rested his hand on the hilt of his scimitar.
“Just our lives?” Téodóir laughed. “Why, I have it on good authority those have never been worth shit.”
Eoin nodded, his face bitter. He and his brothers retreated several steps. Finally, Eoin spat on the earth, and the Irishmen turned and trooped away behind the tombstones.
“This must be a curse on the chevalier,” Ravi said. “What happens if we burn the doll?”
“The chevalier burns,” the mambo said.
“And if we throw it in the river, he drowns? And if we take off its cloak, he’s naked?” Ravi grinned. “What do we do with this, then?”
The mambo shuddered. “Give it to me. I will take it to the loa, and they will help me undo this hex.”
“Will the chevalier heal?” Abd al-Wahid asked.
“If God wills it.”
“No,” Ravi said, “you were right the first time. God has nothing to do with this.”
* * *
Luman found Director Schmidt in the middle of the morning. She sat under a tarpaulin stretched over four poles to make a pavilion, beside a brazier of embers, at a light table. Around her pavilion stood ammunition boxes covered with canvas to keep off the snow, stacked dried goods, water barrels, and various other supplies. She had set aside whatever papers she’d been reviewing to speak with a newcomer.
The new arrival was the red-headed Lazar.
The Company traders and militia gave Schmidt and her guest a wide berth. Men looked at the ground and signed themselves with the cross or clutched protective amulets rather than looking at the dead man.
Something had happened to the Lazar; the pale dead skin of his cheeks was scorched, and his red hair, fingernails, and toenails all looked as if they had been cut short, and were now regrowing.
Luman felt weary, even more fatigued than his night of sleeplessness ought to warrant. He deliberately circled the pavilion to enter from a side where he’d be visible to both Schmidt and the Lazar.
The Lazar turned to acknowledge him first. Hedge-wizard.
“Wizard enough to summon you.” Luman straightened his coat, mostly to be sure he heard the reassuring crinkle of the new himmelsbrief inside the lining.
Not thine intent. Thou didst open a gate, and I found it convenient.
Luman nodded at the short nails, and the arms hanging at the Lazar’s side. “You’ve had a rough night, Lazar.”
The Lazar chuckled. And also thou.
“Not at all.” I saved a church, Luman almost said, but then decided against it. “I was attacked by beastkind raiders, but you know how it is. A little hedge magic, and I was fine.”
“Well done, my Balaam.” Schmidt settled back into her chair. “I’m glad you’re returning now. I require your professional opinion.”
She pushed a canvas camp chair in Luman’s direction, but he remained standing.
“Tell me how I can help, Madam Director.”
“The Emperor sends no word yet of reinforcements. In the meantime, Mr. Hooke here has offere
d us a novel source of new troops.”
“He promises to raise our dead men so they can fight again.”
“You’re not surprised, then?”
Luman shrugged. “This is Robert Hooke, Madam Director. What else would he offer you?”
“And here is where you tender me your professional opinion, my Balaam.” The director smiled.
Luman felt tired. She had already accepted the Lazar’s help. What did she really want from him? If he acknowledged that the Sorcerer Hooke was the better magician, would he end up subordinate to the walking corpse?
He might learn magic that way.
On the other hand, it had felt good to protect the basilica.
It had felt like a step in the right direction. He had offered the rampaging beastkind the chance to repent, and they had taken it.
Had he repented? Was he repenting now?
Maybe, with a few more such steps, he might convince Mother Hylia, or someone else like her, to open the door of Cahokian esoterica and invite him in.
“No, Madam Director,” he said, “here is where I tender you my resignation. You only need one magician in camp, and Hooke is your man.”
Schmidt didn’t even look surprised, damn her. She rose to offer her hand, and Luman shook it. “And where will you go then, if you must be your own Balaam?”
Luman laughed, suddenly feeling relieved, as if a burden had fallen from him. “Some place where I can steal more magic, I suppose.”
Hooke hissed, a sound that approximated laughter.
Luman didn’t look at the Lazar as he walked away.
* * *
Ma’iingan rode the star-horse of Nathaniel Makwa down a steep hill. Suddenly, the inverted bowl of stars above him expanded through itself and then contracted again, becoming the stars he knew, in their correct places—
and he saw the camp of his people.
He knew he was back on the earth because his arm, bitten by the draugar and then sung over by Nathaniel Makwa, began to hurt again. So did his twisted knee. While crossing the plain of the stars he had felt uninjured.
