The Sah'niir

by Kim Wedlock

  "Which means we would both know if it had already happened."

  "Unless it's about to happen. But if I can manage that, we will move our attention and efforts onto Salus instead and eliminate him in the king's place."

  "...You will?"

  "Of course. I said I was inclined to believe you, I never said anything about trust. I have to cover my backside."

  "But you said you believed that we weren't involved!"

  "And yet you have eyes and ears on the inside and are remarkably perceptive yourselves. You may not be involved in the execution of the misdeeds, but you are not unsuspicious."

  "And in the mean time--"

  "You will be detained."

  Rathen darkened. He spoke through clenched teeth as fire danced in his eyes. "If you do that, you may as well go ahead and kill the king. The country will collapse either way, and you will have painted a glowing target on your foreheads."

  "Come now, you can't honestly suggest that we let you go--"

  "It's that, or Salus destroys your god-forsaken country as well as ours. You won't be able to get to him - you might have gotten a few over on him already, but your luck is going to run out, and quickly. You will not get near him."

  His eyes narrowed. "You seem rather sure of that."

  "Oh I am. And I can be certain even without numbering in his ranks."

  "Mm..." Once again the captain descended into silent contemplation, his gaze fixed to each of their faces in turn. His thoughts, however, were impossible to decipher. He was secretive and tactical, considered and receptive. He was clearly suited to his post. He would probably be in line for a promotion if all this worked out. Or, Anthis thought, more likely court-martialled. And yet he was prepared to break orders anyway. Here was not a villain, but a man trying to do the best for his home and people - and those even beyond his charge. Perhaps that was where Salus's problem stemmed from: Turunda was his world, not his country. But Doana, to this man, was a part of something bigger, and while that 'something bigger' had its dangers and differences, and while informing Kalokh of Turunda's deception was probably little more than a tactic to strengthen their own position rather than any kind of camaraderie, he did not immediately view anyone unlike himself as an enemy. And if he did, he was open to being corrected.

  "Very well."

  Anthis blinked in surprise despite himself.

  "If you're telling the truth - and you're as capable as that vengeful, malevolent glint in your eye would have me believe - you could solve our problem for us and save us a great deal of Doanan blood. Assuming you are truly so brave, or so foolish, as to move against a group like the Arana yourselves. And that you are, indeed, to be trusted. In which case, I release you and wish you luck. Know, however, that should you fail or be lying, we will kill your king, kill Salus, and kill you, for whatever part you play in it, deliberate or not."

  Anthis suddenly found himself a little less sure of his conclusion.

  Rathen, however, was unrattled. "If you truly believed we couldn't be trusted, you wouldn't be entertaining us."

  "Unless I was knitting out a read on you."

  "Knitting out?"

  "Ah - pulling a thread until it's long enough to take shape."

  "Or be forced into one."

  "Perspective."

  "Then it's just as well we're telling the truth." To their surprise, Rathen's shoulders relaxed fractionally and he sat a little more easily on the edge of the cot. "Your superiors will find out you've interfered."

  "Of course they will. Which is why I will begin drawing up a report immediately afterwards in the hopes of softening the punishment."

  "If you know you'll be punished, why help us?"

  "Mister Koraaz, are you always so disagreeable? For the moment, we have a shared interest, and I am confident enough in your...attitude...that you are genuine, and could quite possibly see the matter done. There are fewer of you, you know the lay of the land and the Arana itself better than we, and that opens the avenue for an alternative strike. But we will not be sitting idle. And if that mutuality turns out to be false, then your punishment will be far more severe than my own. I am not known to be as hard-headed as my colleagues, but I am also not known to make an uninformed judgement. And as time is of the essence, this is the most informed I can be. But I may only be able to manage days - two weeks, at most - before your throne sits bare."

  "Will that be long enough?" Anthis asked worriedly.

  "It will have to be." Rathen extended his hand. "Thank you, Captain...?"

  "Kemba. And I am not doing this for you, understand. My country stands to gain from it."

  "And mine stands to lose a little less. The gratitude remains."

  "Fair enough. Oh," he added, rising to his feet, "if I may, perhaps you might consider introducing more restrictions over your magic-wielders. If all this has come from magic, then a lock-down on freedom would go a long way to quietening tirades and delusions of grandeur."

  "Thank you for your advice. May I also suggest that you watch your fingers? Those who are treated as dogs are likely to bite."

  Captain Kemba regarded him for a moment, and the slightest smile crept across his face. "Very eloquently put. Mister Koraaz, Mister Karth." He nodded to the rest, and left.

  They were allowed to leave once they'd eaten, and were escorted back to their campsite by the messenger who had interrupted the night before. Rather worryingly, it was quite close by.

  "Now what?" Anthis asked as they packed up their tents and supplies, which had either been investigated by a fox or torn through by a small, silent hurricane.

  "There is no 'now what' - we do what we've been doing all along. Because you're right."

  "I am? About what?"

  The single, heartfelt look Rathen gave him set a familiar if unintentional edge of guilt through his bones. "We owe it to her."

  Anthis's heart hardened. Resolutely, he nodded, and finished strapping their things to the horses. Tying the reins of the riderless dun to the back of his saddle, they set off out through the August morning light. "He let us go too easily," Anthis said after a while.

  "No he didn't. We're being followed, you can put your life on that." But Rathen then cast him a thin, weak smile. "But what's another tail?"

  Chapter 62

  Few corridors of the palace were ever empty. On every floor of every wing, servants and caretakers hurried about, carrying out their tasks with the utmost urgency as though their lives depended on it. Every member of staff seemed to be eternally busy. And for the footmen in particular, that industriousness was genuine. Their tasks - the petty things the valets were able to shuffle off onto them - would bring the palace to a stand-still if they weren't seen to. After all, who would open doors or serve the prepared food if they didn't? Such was below the valets, and the cooks and pages were under strict rules and forbidden from many areas of the grounds.

  Footmen were the valets' whipping boys, in truth, but as menial and thankless as the work was, they also had the greatest freedom. Free from the short leash of the master a valet was so often tied to, they were sent all over the palace day to day to tend to whatever routine emergencies might arise. They did, after all, still outrank the majority of servants in the king's employ, and aside from the Palace Steward, were the highest subservient ranks to wander the halls unaccompanied.

  Striding in his livery of fern-green and ivory, one such footman moved through the large, opulent halls with his nose held suitably high, given way by every servant who passed him. Guards, formidably trained and exquisitely dressed, stood as still and shiny as empty suits of armour beside doors and within recesses, ignoring him at the immediate sight of his uniform. Cinnamon wafted through the halls, punctuated by coriander and cloves, though the kitchens were at the furthest end of the wing, and the Yuletide decor was equally in keeping with the aberrant frost that penetrated the summer air inescapably.

  He paused for a moment to straighten up a vase beside the staircase; burgundy tulips, baby's brea
th and twigs of red summer berries all bunched into two diverging groups with a few stems of stragglers standing out on their own. Tutting and shaking his head at the disarray, he jostled and fluffed them into a presentable state for the benefit of the next nobleman to come along, before proceeding with satisfaction up the stairs.

  Servants continued to melt out of his way without even a glance as he moved through the gallery and into another labyrinth of corridors, through which he wove confidently by way of identical doors and matching portraits. Like so many of the servants, he was so intimate with the palace layout that he could have navigated with his eyes closed.

  Before too long he was winding through the private apartments and making for the small breakfasting room, when a young woman approaching from the opposite end steered directly for him. Her head was bowed, but with a glance at her kirtle, her position among the general staff was clear. Individual identity didn't matter.

  She extended a silver tray, its load hidden beneath a draped silken cloth, and thrust it into his hands. "For the Good King Thunan," she said with an uncertain half-curtsey, so intimidated by the footman as she was. But that was not unusual. Any who served the king and royal family directly were awed and feared by those denied such a presence.

  With the slightest nod of his head, he took it, and deduced immediately by the shape and weight of the tray where it was to be taken. The king, it seemed, had broken his usual morning routine. He adjusted his path, continuing along the corridor, but turned past the breakfasting room and on instead towards the royal bath chambers.

  Two guards stood like stone sentinels outside of the door. Immediately, he dropped into a walking bow and approached low, as was expected when the king was on the other side. One must always enter subservient.

  The guards didn't move. They would only have done so to bar his way. They had observed his livery and the tray in his hands through their visors, and hadn't seen need to impede him. The footman opened the door and stepped inside, still stooping, the miasma of peppermint, rose and mallow so dense as to hang as steam by itself.

  King Thunan lay in the tub of cedar wood, and only raised his lightly greying head from the velvet cushioning for a moment. A young groom was washing him, who paid the footman even less attention as the king settled himself back down and closed his eyes again.

  The footman shut the door behind him and removed the silken cloth. "Fresh undergarments, Your Majesty. Steamed and pressed."

  "In the corner on the stool, thank you, Lynel," he said perfunctorily.

  "As Your Majesty wishes."

  "And have Elandé treat Danai's burgundy gown. She's finally made up her mind."

  "Right away, Your Majesty."

  "Oh - and have the guests housed in the north wing's third floor, garden side - I want to keep Countess Creo's eyes away from the riding grounds...Anten? Why have you stopped scrubbing?" The king opened one eye when the groom failed to move or respond, and found him sitting quite still, staring with glazed, daydreaming eyes across the room, one hand remaining about the king's wrist and the other absently holding the steaming cloth to his arm.

  "Anton," the king said again, shaking his wrist to reclaim his attention, but the hand did not move with him. The grasp was as constant and unbreakable as stone.

  Alarm set in rapidly. He sat up and began attempting to tug himself free in confusion, reprimanding and threatening him as he splashed in a panic. But his voice slurred into a weakened gurgle before he could complete the first curse, and his body slipped limp back into the water.

  A vaguely metallic aroma rose with the steam and laced into the herb-choked air; the trickle of crimson joined beads of sweat, clouding and seeping through the water.

  Old eyes wide and bulging, his voice lost and strength slipping away, the king watched helplessly, deliriously, as Lynel moved into view, a fine, bloodied knife in his hands and void of any sentiment. But his face was not what it should have been.

  The footman walked, calm and collected, to stop beside the boy. He was still frozen, but a silent, desperate scream invaded his motionless eyes. But Lynel didn't respond to it. He drew the knife across his throat and waited for just a moment, for his blood to run freely and stain his spotless livery. Then the spell was released. With a gurgling sigh, he slumped forwards and draped over the edge of the wooden tub, out of the line of the king's empty stare.

  Calmly, he removed a kerchief from his sleeve, red with an ochre hem, and tied it about the late king's wrist. Then he rose, moved backwards towards the door and bowed to the sodden corpse. "Of course, Your Majesty." His volume was just right, tone firm and unshaken.

  He left the room, stooping just as he'd entered, and closed the door behind him. He resumed unhurried along the extravagant corridor. The guards did not react, and he did not let the victory touch his lips.

  He made discreetly for the staircase. The palace would be in lock-down within half an hour.

  The footman walked without the slightest urgency through the foyer, an elegant box in his arms that could only contain a noble's personal effects being toted out to a waiting carriage. There wasn't a trace of regret, fear or doubt in his proud bearing.

  The image within the golden frame hazed in Teagan's eyes.

  He stood frozen before the wall of mirrors, countless trivial scenes playing out in blissful ignorance of the Arana's watchmen and spells, and their movement too was lost to his sight.

  His thoughts were spinning. His pulse raced and thundered through his veins; sweat beaded and dampened his shirt.

  It had happened. Soon, every authority would turn upside down, morale would plummet, Doana would make their move...and Vastal knows who else...

  And it would be his fault. He'd seen what was happening. He'd seen where it was going, and he had done nothing. He had let this happen. King Thunan was dead by Salus's hand, regicide of the most extreme order, executed by the reach of his own royal arm.

  His hands were shaking. He could feel them trembling. He dug his fingers into his folded arms and squeezed them closer into his chest. His heart was rattling his bones, and his eyes, he could feel, were unnaturally wide.

  He recognised the emotions - feelings and sensations, he realised with growing horror, that had been present for weeks, guiding his forgotten dreams and compelling him to speak out against his superior, but that he had turned a desperate blind eye to in the hope that they would disappear, or that it was a fluke, or that he was simply unwell and that all would fall back into place in a few days' time. But it had happened too often, and for much too long, and only now had it seen fit to click into place.

  But he could hazard a guess at when it had started: right when Salus had begun poking into magic.

  And now he was pierced with dread. Panic. A desperate compulsion boiling up inside him to escape the situation, to reverse time or flee and wrap himself in ignorance. But most of all, he'd been speared by doubt - the most crippling self-indulgence of all.

  It shouldn't have been possible. It was supposed to have been trained out of him; he was supposed to be untouched by emotions, focused entirely on the matter at hand. These states should have been beyond him.

  Just as anger, frustration and love should have been beyond Salus.

  But the fact that he was still capable of considering his state rather than succumbing to it entirely as Salus had revealed something else - a point that gave him some hope. His training was slipping, but it hadn't broken; cracked, not crumbled - which meant that it could be fixed.

  It wouldn't be quick. Salus would notice his absence, and perhaps even find out what he was doing. He had pointed out his lack of faith, but had done nothing about it - perhaps he'd gotten away with it. But it wouldn't last. And he couldn't let him find out for certain. Perhaps that was another creeping indulgence: pride. Or was it shame? It didn't matter; they were two ends of the same stick in a bundle he was already forbidden to touch.

  Forbidden... Taliel. She'd been gone for six days. She'd be back soon, if not that ver
y day, and Salus wasn't likely to send her out again in a hurry. She would keep him occupied. With her around, he wouldn't notice if Teagan was missing for a few days... He wouldn't notice a lot of anything.

  His composure stormed back in place and crushed his confusions with a steel fist. His back straightened, his eyes hardened, and he turned with resolve from the mirrors, leaving the room and the portian mage who had been assigned to oversee it.

  He would regain his control, and with it Salus's trust. And then he would be able to step in and advise the keliceran the moment it was needed. And the keliceran would listen to him again. A rational hand was all Salus needed, an unbiased, uncompromised point of view delivered in the least offensive manner. It would take a portian, nothing more, nothing less. Only then could Salus be steered back onto the right and honourable path.

  And he had to be. And it was Teagan's job to do it.

  The sky was dark and overcast. Soured with salt, the air was doubly coloured with the aroma of fish and the squawking of swooping gulls, never to be discouraged from their scavengery by even an anomalous winter.

  Salus pulled the sleeves of his livery down even further against the chill. He hadn't stopped to change; the need to regain control from all that was slipping away from him forbade any waste of time. But he had, at least, turned the jacket inside out.

  There was no time, either, for deliberation. With the greatest caution, his fingers formed a spell - the same caution and the same spell that he had in Whitemouth just days ago, cast with the same perilous attention. Then, with a deep, saline breath atop Bear Bone Cove's highest point, he lowered his hands and stepped out into the thin, sea air.

  His heart thudded in apprehension at that first step, but his doe-skin boots immediately found a peculiarly soft surface, neither truly solid nor incorporeal, and he walked on with the vaguest relief, descending a flight of delicate, crystal-clear stairs. He gave himself no opportunity to contemplate the fact that he was indeed walking over nothing at all.

  The sprawling sea grew nearer, and he soon saw that what waves and ripples should have disturbed its great grey surface had been overpowered instead by a violent vibration, as though thousands of tiny needles were being pushed up repeatedly through the underside. He'd witnessed the same phenomenon at Whitemouth, and could guess just as easily at the cause.