Hollow Empire

by Sam Hawke

  “Enemies of Jovan’s don’t seem to last very long in this city, is what my dear colleague Lazar is saying,” Karista said bluntly. “I’m not saying he had anything to do with those blasts, though we all know he has experience in explosive devices. But what I am saying is anyone who opposes him in person or in business seems to end up ruined or dead. You’ve been his best friend since you were children, Honored Chancellor, do you really think you’re unbiased in this?”

  “I think it’s time we said what a lot of us have been thinking,” Sjistevo added. “Which is that either you’re working together knowingly, or you’re letting your friend do your dirty work and turning a blind eye.”

  There was a sudden, deep silence. For all that the Council was rarely the diplomatic dance it had been in Etan and Caslav’s day anymore, usually the only Councilors blunt enough to directly impugn the honor of the Chancellor were the estate representatives, who had been elected by their regions specifically to be strong in the face of power. Tain had encouraged that. He had never wanted to be free from criticism. But something about seeing one of the old Families, one of the opponents to change and advocates of the old system, make a statement like that … it felt like the end of a social norm that had held up for centuries.

  Karista slapped a fist on her open palm. “Don’t you think it’s just a bit strange that every Oromani in the city stayed home? It’s the only family that didn’t get half wiped out.” She took a shuddering breath. “Do you have any idea how much of my family I’ve lost? My sister. Countless cousins. My little nieces!” On this last, her voice cracked, and despite everything, I felt sorry for her.

  “Karista,” I said, and the din died down. Every head swiveled to look at me. I took a breath and let it out. “I’m so sorry about your family. And everyone else. What happened was—” My voice caught, and for a moment shared grief and shock connected us. Honor-down, everyone was so tired, everyone had lost so much. My body was so full up with emotions there wasn’t any space left for anger. “There are hundreds of people dead. The Heir is dead. The Empire lost its Princess. We lost friends and relatives and yes, Karista, you’re right, I did tell my family not to come because I was afraid something was going to happen, so I was luckier than most. But I’d have had all of you stay home if I could have had the time to convince you to. Please, listen now. I know we’re all exhausted and grieving. But this is only the beginning, and we have to be ready for what’s coming next.”

  “Is that a threat? He’s threatening us now?”

  “Sjistevo,” Eliska said, with the air of a person very close to packing in her self-control, “if you don’t get your head out of your ass, so help me I’m going to make sure you taste what’s up there.”

  I went on before they could start it up again. “This is a campaign. Like the Chancellor said, it started two years ago with Aven and her rebellion and we only slowed it down then, it never stopped.”

  “Are you saying this is a second rebellion?”

  Murmurings, some scared, some angry, sprang up around the group, and Tain scowled round, silencing them with his glower.

  “No one’s saying that,” I said. “For most people, the rebellion was a protest against genuine grievances. But we know some people involved with it had different motivations. What we’re seeing now is those people acting directly. This is what they’re capable of. Not just targeting people with the explosions but also trying to finish off the wounded. The assassin has been working our city for months, targeting the Families, trying to turn us on each other. I believe he killed Bradomir, and poisoned at least a dozen other people across the city over the past few months.”

  “This assassin again,” Karista scoffed, “a convenient story.”

  “You can see him right now, if you want,” Chen interjected calmly. She had been leaning against the wall, resting her leg. “He’s right here. He isn’t saying much, but he’s real enough. A dozen people saw him posing as a physic at the medical area, and he was found carrying poisons.”

  “All right,” Sjistevo said. “And we are led to believe only Credo Jovan saw this man, chased him down, and captured him? And he now stands here unharmed? What extraordinary good luck you must have, my friend.”

  “I recognized him, yes,” I said patiently. “But only because I’d seen him before. Look. I’m sorry I’ve kept things from the Council about my suspicions, but you have to understand why. You do remember what happened two years ago?”

  “I do. A supposed traitor revealed himself—to you two only—and then you defeated and killed him. Another bout of extraordinary luck?”

  I closed my eyes again, just for a moment. The urge to pace itched in my feet, but I battled for self-control. I didn’t like remembering that terrifying fight in the dark, against an opponent we had liked and respected and who grossly outmatched us. Tain, as if he could read right inside my head to the moment I was stuck in, broke in to save me from answering. “My uncle was murdered. So was Jovan’s. His sister nearly died, I was poisoned and nearly died, too. And all of it because people close to us betrayed us. Betrayed the city.”

  I straightened up, looked each of them full in the face. “Habits are hard to break, and secrecy’s been my way of protecting us. But you’re right. I want to learn where this man is from and who hired him, and it doesn’t need to be secret from any of you. It’s in all of our interests to know.”

  Lazar let out his breath, visibly relieved. “Well, I think that’s adequate for my part,” he began hurriedly. “Perhaps—”

  “I appreciate your candor, Credo Jovan,” Sjistevo said. He put a hand on Tain’s shoulder and lowered his voice as if confiding to a friend. “But you must understand how upset many of us are, how much we are grieving. It would be best, just for propriety’s sake, would it not, to have the interrogation of prisoners kept well away from the Council. It would soothe poor dear Credola Karista’s worries, and we have many trained determination council officers, and Order Guards, and military officers, who can conduct interviews and investigations. It is, after all, their job. Notwithstanding Credo Jovan’s habits and bouts of luck, there are doubtless other things he could be addressing that are a more effective use of his time?”

  I could think of nothing to say to it, and apparently neither could Tain. He looked at me, and I shrugged. Honor-down, I was so tired. “That’s fine with me,” I said. “Chen can report to Council later.”

  “Jovan,” Salvea began as the group dispersed, and I smiled at her but quickened my pace. I wasn’t thinking straight. When Sjistevo’s manipulations sounded like sense, perhaps I really did need to get some sleep.

  INCIDENT: Spring hospital poisonings (various)

  POISON: Atrapis

  INCIDENT NOTES: Atrapis supply in hospital mislabeled as common pain numbing agents, resulting in the poisoning of at least eleven patients, including two fatalities. Families concerned would not consent to further evaluation. Physic responsible for mislabeling identified as Credola Sjuli Brook—note and continue to monitor.

  (from proofing notes of Credo Etan Oromani)

  18

  Kalina

  The Talafan began packing their return barges by the end of the day. Though it could hardly have been a worse diplomatic outcome for them to leave our city, there was no time left to repair what we could of that relationship.

  “Short of actually barring them from leaving with force, there’s nothing we can do,” Budua had told me when I asked. “We don’t have the legal authority to require them to stay. And considering what’s happened here I don’t think we’re in a position to ask them any favors, are we?”

  I held no official office with respect to Talafar, and though our family’s involvement in saving the lives of at least the members of the Council and the visiting delegations in the viewing box meant our reputation was publicly stronger than a week ago, I was still not part of the official response team. But I couldn’t let them leave without saying at least one personal goodbye, for all the good it would do
.

  It took a long period of lurking around near the Leaning Lady before I finally caught Ectar out of the building, directing the loading of his cases onto a cart bound for the docks.

  “Ectar,” I said from the bushes at the side of the road, and he whirled around, looking frantically about as if expecting an attack. “It’s only me.”

  He relaxed instinctively, but then a tension came over him, and though he did not call a guard, nor did he look directly at me. He gave one last instruction to the servants loading his cases and then stepped off to the side of the road, checking his pockets as if looking for a piece of janjan to chew. “Kalina,” he said, sounding throaty. “You should not be here. If His Highness sees…”

  “I heard you’re leaving.”

  He nodded stiffly. “At first light. We must return the Princess to her father with much haste.”

  We had sent a specialist physic who dealt with bodies at the hospital to offer her assistance to the Talafan party with storing and transporting the remains of Zhafi and Tuhash, but she had been turned away without even seeing them, apparently on the word of Brother Lu, who considered our medical practices barbaric and blasphemous. I couldn’t think of a polite way to ask how they were storing the bodies. Not that there had been much to recover of the Princess. My throat felt tight. I suddenly realized I had not thought this through. What could I say to Ectar to make any of this better? Coming here had led to the death of two of the Emperor’s relatives, and while the death of a distant relative and Imperial soldier had been bad enough, how could we be forgiven for getting his most beloved daughter killed? Nothing I could say to Ectar, nothing Ectar could say to the Emperor even if he were so minded, would change that. I could tell him it was not our doing, that it was a third party, one we should treat as a common enemy. But they were grieving, and coming here had caused that, and nothing I could say about conspiracies would sound like anything but an excuse.

  “I do not know what to say to…” I searched for honest words. “To convey how sorry I am. It is all so inadequate.”

  He shrugged, staring down at his feet. “Yes. It is a catastrophe. My grandfather the Emperor is in poor health and I do not know what this news will do to him. And the people! The people will throw themselves into the sea with despair at her loss.”

  I took a hesitant step forward but a sharp movement of his hand sent me sinking back. “And you, Ectar? Are you all right?”

  His breaths were short and pained, as if a great weight lay on his chest. He seemed not to be able to bear to look at me. “I grieve,” he said at last. “Not just for my aunt, for even if our lives intersected only rarely, by all accounts she was a fine woman. But for our relationship.” With a kind of raw groan of pain, Ectar met my eyes for the first time, his gaze intense and tortured. “I do not know what will happen now, Kalina. Between our countries. I had such hopes, and now I find them dashed.” He blinked rapidly, looked away, then squared his shoulders in the silence and forced a stiff smile. “I will not forget knowing you, Kalina Oromani. I hope one day we will meet again.”

  And he strode away, with only a slight hitch in his step.

  * * *

  I fought back dismay as I walked away, and the sense I had made things worse, not better. With how we had left things we’d be lucky if Talafar didn’t tear up our treaty; we certainly could expect no help when our enemy made their next move. And yet, for all that it seemed selfish, and foolish, to mourn a more personal loss amidst the greater ramifications, it was the future snatched away from me that kept returning to my mind. Travel to another country, a chance to use my skills without nefarious purpose to improve relations with our neighbor. A chance to be out of the perpetual suffocating scrutiny of being an Oromani in Silasta. All gone. A stupid and petty thing to be concerned with in the scheme of things, but knowing that didn’t make the disappointment and despair any lighter.

  “Shall I get you a litter, Credola?” Lara asked. If she had an opinion about my strange meeting in the bushes, she didn’t offer it. “Not sure what’s operating at the moment but I’m sure I can find someone to—”

  “No, I’d like to walk,” I said. I had a mind to go and see if Hadrea had woken yet. The physics had checked her over and found no sign of anything wrong other than that she had not woken; her heart and breathing seemed strong, and her sleep appeared natural and relaxed. The walk would give me time to think. There were things I wanted to discuss with her, but bringing up anything of this kind with Hadrea required some planning and forethought. Fortunes knew enough people last night had seen her and her friends working to save everyone, and fighting against the rogue Speaker, and no one could doubt her allegiance. But the fact remained that Hadrea had been using magic in a way An-Ostada had not taught, and aided by narcotics. Questioning her about it, even with a view to learning something about the rogue, was likely to trigger all of her usual defensiveness, and more.

  Lara peppered the journey with a long story about her son’s first stay in the hospital with a broken bone, but in her usual way she required no input from me to enjoy the telling of it. I let her chatter on as we walked, my mind elsewhere. Once or twice I thought I glimpsed a pale figure in my periphery, and the first time I thought Ectar had followed me. But when I turned to get a proper look, and to hang back to wait for him to catch up, there was nothing behind me but a river of strangers, going about their business with tense and frightened faces. The second time I worried it might be the woman who had been following us before the arena, but nothing happened and she did not appear again, so perhaps it had been my imagination. I felt too tired in any case to worry about birds and smelly parcels in our garden. Everything dimmed in comparison to what had happened since.

  The hospital was still the central hive of activity for the city, with a constant flow of people in and out of the entrance hall. It took me some time to find where Hadrea was because the hospital was stuffed above its usual capacity and, just like during the siege, areas had been urgently repurposed to keep up with the needs of the injured citizens. I kept being confronted with people I knew and embroiled in small, repetitive conversations in equal parts depressing and dull: colleagues from the Guild, peers from my school days, our favorite spice merchant, the costumer who had sold me my masquerade costume, a familiar banking clerk; half the city seemed to be lining up or delivering something or visiting their wounded friends and relatives or volunteering to assist the physics. Credo Pedrag, the former Craft-Guilder who had suffered a devastating head injury during the battle for the lower city in the siege, was there in his wheeled chair, keeping the children of visitors entertained with stories. Abaezalla Runkojo was even there, helping unload the contents of a carton of supplies onto trays and trolleys for the physics. She stopped her task when she saw me, though, and hurried over.

  “Credola Kalina!” she cried. “I am so relieved to see you unhurt!”

  “Kalina, please,” I said absently, scouring the room for signs of where I might find out Hadrea’s location. “And likewise, Abaezalla.” I barely knew her, but every person unhurt was a blessing.

  “You must call me Abae,” she said earnestly, surprising me by taking both my hands in hers. They were scholar’s hands, smooth and soft. “I am trying to help, but I have no medical skills, and I fear I am no help in shifting heavy blocks, either. This is what they have given me to do.” She released me with an embarrassed shrug. “I wish it were more. It is so dreadful, what happened. I feel so…” She trailed off, spreading her hands and shaking her head.

  “Yes, I know,” I said heavily. It was hard to articulate this kind of deep helplessness, so I only wished her well at the task and found my way to a service desk, where the frustrated clerk managing visitors narrowed his eyes when I asked about Hadrea, and I gathered from his quizzing that many members of the public had simply wanted to stare at her. Being stared at in the street didn’t bother Hadrea the way it unsettled me, but waking up to a bunch of gawping strangers would be unpleasant for anyone.

/>   She wasn’t in a proper treatment area but a repurposed room for patients who needed quiet recovery space without the expectation of further urgent medical care. I pushed open the door. There was a line of pallets set up, with a patient in each; about half were asleep. Hadrea lay in the farthest bed, facing the wall.

  “Hadrea?” I kept my voice low, conscious of the conspicuous eavesdropping.

  She turned at once and sat up, pushing her tangled hair from her face. “Thank the fortunes. Hello, Kalina.” She swung her legs off the bed and gave me a crooked smile. “I am ready to leave. They would not let me go alone, but you can escort me.”

  “Are you all right? How are you feeling?” I passed over her shoes, glancing around for a physic. Beside the bed was a small pile of what looked like nothing so much as offerings at a Darfri shrine. Gifts, it seemed, from people grateful for her efforts. Whatever An-Ostada thought, Hadrea’s actions had only cemented her heroic persona in many people’s minds, I was sure. I looked over them. Posies, mostly, a few loaves of sweetbread, a jar or two of dried fruit, and a heavy-looking box with a formal card. “This is from the King of Doran,” I said, picking it up and reading the accompanying note. “A thank-you for saving his life.” She grunted, tying the bindings on her sandals, apparently unconcerned with royal gifts. I lifted the lid and saw the sparkle of opals. “Are you sure you’re allowed to leave?”

  Hadrea waved a careless hand. “They checked me over when I woke and there is nothing wrong with me. I was just very tired. Someone is supposed to keep an eye on me in case there’s something they missed, but there is too much to be done right now with people who truly need care.” She tossed her head. “Channeling fresken on such a scale takes physical exertion, but does no harm. I am fine.”