by Adam Corby
‘They took me hunting in the hills below Ul Raambar and granted me citizenship in the city.’
‘Is that how you received your scar?’ she asked. A livid scar cut across his forehead, from what must have been a brutal wound.
‘No. That came after Ul Raambar.’ The smile was gone again.
‘You were a stranger to them, and yet they came to love you,’ she mused. ‘I wonder, were they well repaid for their kindnesses, Charan Kandi? Or would you prefer that I use another name?’
‘Your majesty should use the name which pleases her most.’
‘And if none of them please?’
‘Invent one which does. The man before you is the same, even if you do not wholly see him.’
‘Ara-Karn, then,’ she said.
For a while there was silence in the chamber. The two kneeling figures faced each other mask to mask: for the smile affixed to the Gerso’s features was little less stylized than the golden visage of Goddess. Only the lamp-flame moved; only the wind across the outer face of the tower spoke.
Then Niad uttered a long, warning cry and spread his wings. The Queen’s fingers opened, releasing the gerlin’s legs. Niad swept to the narrow window and passed out.
One of the masks moved slightly. It was as if the string of an aliset had snapped.
‘Is it not true,’ she said, ‘that the Charan Ennius Kandi is Ara-Karn?’
‘No,’ he answered. ‘But it is true that Ara-Karn is Ennius Kandi.’
‘And so you smile as if you had won all. Do you not realize, you sorry man, that even if your armies have my city in their grasp, we have you here in ours?’
Deliberately, he inclined his head. ‘When did you learn the truth?’
‘Two merchants arrived after you had departed for the dark horizon. They were refugees from Gerso, and told me of having visited among the barbarians years ago to trade for the pelts of bandars. While the merchants were there, a man was washed ashore in a stolen death-barge. He was a foreigner, a man so vile that even the barbarians held him in contempt. He was spared, however, by one of the barbarians, a man called Kuln-Holn the Pious One. Kuln-Holn was an odd dreamer living off the charity of the tribe, and he prophesied all manner of wonders that this filthy bandit would bring to them. So out of mockery Gundoen, the tribe’s chief, called the stranger Ara-Karn, the Former King.’
The Gerso nodded. ‘Go on.’
‘Before his brutal murder, Qhelvin of Sorne had made a small likeness of you for me. The Gerso merchants knew you at once. In a way it is a wonder you carried the masquerade for so long a time, for you were never born in Gerso. I suppose it is a tribute to your achievement, that so few surviving Gersos are left to wander the shadows of the world.’
She spoke with increasing passion, so that her final words were flung at him like blows. Under that assault, his features did not alter, except that, perhaps, they seemed rather more hollow. When he spoke, it was in an odd, distant way, yet at the same time his words probed delicately.
‘And so you have me, as you say, in your grasp. Why then have you let me roam freely through the Citadel these weeks?’
Beneath the thin folds of black linen her shoulders could be seen to move a little, like an elegant shudder before a chill draft of air.
‘When I learned you had returned I could not credit it, but had to send three of my maidens, one after another, to see you with their own eyes. Your impudence amazed me; I waited to see what you would do. My curiosity was aroused, even though I was well aware of how dangerous you could prove. But you only requested an audience of me, as if this mask-bearing of yours could go on without end…
‘On the second waking,’ she resumed, even more slowly, ‘I hungered for your body and the touch of you beside me, and I all but sent for you. Only Emsha stopped me.
‘On the third waking you sent another message requesting a hearing. I was shaking with fury, I wanted to denounce you to the guards, I wanted to see you bound and ridiculed, I wanted to set you in a cage in the midst of the Tarendahardilites and tell them who you were. But then I thought of my people, and I was undecided whether you were more valuable a tool still living, or less dangerous a weapon dead. The second half of that waking I turned the matter over in my head, but still found no answer when the time of the longsleep arrived.
‘When God rose for the fourth time, I knew I must order your death, and yet – I had had dreams of you, and when I woke—’ Her breath caught in her throat. ‘How little right I have to be named among the Bordakasha! I failed in that which Elna would have demanded of me. My own death would have been better than to know this and live, and be called Queen and Empress. So I kept my chambers, rarely even leaving my dimchamber. I slept much and ate little, and the image of Goddess was strong before my eyes. Dying but not dead, my pulse racing, yet my hands and forehead chill, knowing I should rise and not moving, watching the gloomy hours pass… Only the appearance of Niad, like some sign from Elna, restored me…’
‘You deceive yourself pitifully,’ he said.
The smile was still fastened to his lips, but its humor was gone. From the black depths of his eyes flecks of green glinted as from impure ice. ‘And is that what you do in this garb? Have you found a Path now to the bright horizon? Are you in mourning for your son or for your lost chastity? Where is the legendary beauty, the fabled golden hair of the Woman of the South? Is that passed – are you ashamed to let men behold you now? Only the holy virgin priestesses wear such black robes and golden masks – will you become a virgin again? Yet I recall that once you were not sorry to leave that port – quite the opposite, in truth.’
‘Still your tongue!’
‘Such anger suits your majesty better than false grief,’ he responded. He pushed the jade dagger toward her, turning it so that the blade pointed back upon himself. ‘Now,’ he said. ‘What would Elna demand? Go to, kill me now – I offer no defense. Kill me or strip that mask and robe off your nakedness, and lie before me as you truly are.’
She struck the knife aside.
‘Why did you come here? Why did you journey so far alone into the lands of your enemies and put a sea and many cities between you and your armies, to befoul me with your touch and destroy every man and thing I ever loved?’
He stood up over her. The flame of the lamp bent low at his sudden movement. He stepped past her – for a moment he was so close to her he might have reached down and stripped her of the shelter of the mask and taken her long throat in the hard hollow of his hand. But he disdained to touch her. He stepped upon the dais, turned, and sat in the jeweled throne.
She remained facing the door, her back to him. Underneath the folds of black linen her body trembled softly.
‘Why?’ she asked again.
‘Did Kuln-Holn not tell you?’ he asked calmly.
‘He told me much – of how once he believed you were the messenger of Goddess and followed you, until your madness and cruelty became a thing he could not bear. He begged forgiveness of me, and entered my service in your absence. But even your chief prophet stood in ignorance of your true aims.’
‘He is the greatest fool of all. He dreamed of food and peace for the people of his tribe, and thought I would serve his visions; instead he served mine. Even Dornan Ural, that waste of a man, was wiser than Kuln-Holn.’
The door opened. One of the Empress’ maidens stood in the doorway. She was open-mouthed to see the scene before her.
‘Leave us,’ commanded Ara-Karn.
The maiden hesitated, but at a sign from her majesty bowed and departed.
Allissál turned toward the throne. From the deep shadow of the mask’s eyelets, she gazed upon the man seated above her. By now she knew the shape of that long, lean body so well that it was as if he always went naked before her. With a slight flush of warmth she realized that it must be the same with him.
‘You murdered Qhelvin of Sorne.’
She said it lowly, almost as if to remind herself.
‘Yes.’
> ‘Did he suspect you, or did you simply wish him out of the way so that you might betray the rebellious Belknulean lords to their tyrant Yorkjax?’
‘I could not have them join your cause. But it was both.’
‘You made the foreign ambassadors in my court distrust me, and send false reports to their cities.’
‘I spoke to them of your majesty’s ambitions.’
‘You maddened Ampeánor with desire by giving him that portrait Qhelvin had done of me.’
He nodded, amusement in the shadow of his eyes.
‘Because of you, Elnavis was broken in his soul upon a field by Mersaline, and later died here, a bitter, cruel man.’
‘He broke himself. I but provided him the means.’
‘You betrayed Ankhan and Lisalya to the Madpriests.’
‘I gave the Madpriests bows. What they did with them was their own affair.’
‘What you did to Ghezbal Daan I do not know, but that it prevented him from commanding my armies against yours.’
‘But who was Ghezbal Daan? A man. He followed his own will.’
‘You entered my service, and there betrayed me.’
‘I entered your couch, and there made you party to my treacheries.’
‘It was you who killed Gen-Karn and wrecked the ship which held the bows we bought from Gen-Karn.’
‘It was I.’
‘It was you who dissuaded Orolo from signing the accords I sent him.’
‘It was I.’
‘You betrayed the city-states of Delba.’
‘Yes.’
‘You raised the pirates in the Rukorian Isles; you gave them ships and weapons.’
‘Yes.’
‘You ravaged temples. You butchered Priestesses.’
‘Yes.’
‘You stirred up the barbarians in the far North, and loosed them on the cities of the civilized lands. Without you, your tricks, and your weapon, the barbarians could not have passed the Gates of Gerso. The blood and anguish of scores of thousands lie at your feet.’
‘Yes.’
‘And from all this – the destruction of cities, the violation of holy places, the murders, the treacheries, the thousands slain and made homeless – what gain have you had, Ara-Karn?’
‘Stand upon the rooftop and look in the five directions for your answer.’
‘Did you rape and murder and loot and burn as an amusement, for your depraved pleasure?’
‘There were amusements and pleasures in it for me.’
‘Or was it rather that, in the bleakness of your own heart,’ she cried, ‘in the emptiness of your own pleasures, you could not bear it that others in the world were happy, and prospered, and enjoyed the embraces of their beloved friends?’
The chamber resounded with the accusation.
After it, a curious calmness reigned.
Allissál was bent forward, leaning on her hands. Her robes shook with her trembling body. Her rough breath could be heard through the mouth-hole of the mask. She seemed shaken and near collapse; it was as if she had hurled the accusations at herself instead of him.
The man in the throne shook his head. ‘Do you not know me even now?’ he mused softly.
She bent lower. In anyone else it would have been an abasement. ‘Then inform me,’ she groaned. ‘Enlighten me, O Conqueror of the World. Or else end these futile assaults, slay us or leave us, but accomplish your end swiftly and mercifully. Perhaps mercy is not a word in your tongue. But I am tired of it all. I can do no more. And my people are weary as well. Even your own barbarians long for an end. Whatever you could have sought to gain from it all, power or destruction, surely it is yours by now. I humble myself before you. There is none left to oppose you. There exist no strong hearts in the few cities your forces have not yet conquered. The bravest men of the South lie as corpses on the field of Egland Downs. Gather your treasures and go.’
‘No.’
He walked to the door and halted. Slowly and painfully, the Divine Queen resumed her kneeling position, holding herself upright with trembling arms.
‘You asked me a question, Gold. It is a question you must answer yourself. You know the answer, you need only remember it. Until you have done so, I will see that this war continues. Men will fight and die on the battlements, all for what has gone on here between us. The burden is yours. I will give you all the time you need. This Citadel can withstand a siege almost without end.’
He made as if to open the door, but hesitated, as if even he were for that moment unsure of himself. He turned back and added, ‘This at least I will tell you, though it is more than I should.’ There was for the first time real feeling in his voice, even a trace of tenderness.
‘You have listed my crimes, and there have been more of them and worse than you know. But all that I have done, from before you ever heard the name of Ara-Karn, I did because of you.’
X
Siege
‘IT IS AGREED among us, then.’
Nam-Rog looked about the circle of men seated on chairs set on the earth. One after the other, the chieftains of the tribes of the far North bent their heads to it.
Nam-Rog stood. ‘We will fight on here, and for our final battle of these wars, we will conquer the fastness of Elna, no matter how many years pass in doing it. Gundoen will be given back to us unharmed. And we will capture this Empress, and cut her body open on the peak of Urnostardil.’
The wind rippled the walls of the tents of the great camp so that the sound of it rose like the murmurs of vengeful ghosts. The chieftains spoke no words of farewell, but parted grimly. Then only Gorn-Tal of Orn and Nam-Rog of the Durbars remained.
‘If I still live,’ Gorn-Tal said, ‘then it will be I who holds the knife on Urnostardil.’
‘That is all the same to me,’ Nam-Rog replied.
‘Then it will be I,’ the Orn repeated, and stalked back among the tents.
* * *
The guardsmen walked the battlements. This place had been their station, and then became their home. Now it was their prison.
From the steps leading up from the yard, Kuln-Holn came, arrayed in his armor. The captain looked at the Northerner for a moment.
‘Good-waking, Iocantris. Come closer, stand for inspection. All fast and polished, I see. You’ll be a guardsman yet.’ But there was no merriment in the captain’s eyes this pass.
Kuln-Holn followed the sentries up the spiraling steps of the lance-tower. There, astride a block of stone, looking down over the battered iron with a critical eye, was Ara-Karn. He looked round when the sentries appeared, and saw Kuln-Holn.
When the sentries marched on, Kuln-Holn remained.
‘Greetings, “Little Doughty,” ’ said Ara-Karn.
They had not spoken since High Summer.
‘I have been surveying the Iron Gate,’ Ara-Karn said. ‘If Gundoen gets the notion to set larger fires in winter’s cold, it might open some wounds in the plates.’
Kuln-Holn glanced back at the opening to the stairs. It was as if he wished to go, but could not.
‘Gundoen does not command them now, lord. Nam-Rog leads the tribes.’
‘Ah yes, the parley. But you were not here when we spoke to them. How did you learn of it?’
‘I can’t tell you, lord.’
Ara-Karn smiled. ‘I believe you just did, Little Doughty. Tell me, was Gundoen’s capture the reason why the warriors disobeyed my orders and marched against this city while others lay yet unconquered?’
‘Perhaps, lord. The Charan of Rukor captured Gundoen and took him into a place the guardsmen call the Sontil.’
‘Then it is no wonder they came here. But were the warriors in earnest when they offered peace for gold?’
‘Lord, it does not suit you to ask a fool for news.’
Ara-Karn laughed. ‘Yes, I named you a fool,’ he said. ‘But you are mistaken, O Pious One. Fools are the finest counselors a king can have. Come, sit at my feet and tell me tales of the Divine Queen.’
Ku
ln-Holn turned back to the stair.
‘What, no hymns to chant of Goddess? Kuln-Holn, a moment more: before you leave, I give you a final word. I have heard much of your courage in the defense of this city. That was well: I never meant that this city be destroyed. That was another’s edict, and the breaking of a wave no man could guide or halt. Yet now I warn you, Kuln-Holn: stay away from the Iron Gate when there is fighting. I tell you this on your own behalf.’
Kuln-Holn nodded. ‘Lord,’ he said, his voice heavy and dull, ‘I believe you mean to spare me. But I am not your servant now, but hers. If the guardsmen need me, I will fight beside them.’
Ara-Karn nodded, and watched his erstwhile worshiper leave the battlements. He himself drew his hood somewhat closer about his face, and leaned out across the parapet. He ignored the calls and cries from the warriors in the square, The Hooded Man! The Hooded Man! He studied the Iron Gate itself.
The plates of iron were huge in height, breadth, and thickness. The secret of their forging was long lost. Maybe it was spell-craft that had guided the molten iron and other metals blended within them. It was whispered, after all, that Elna’s Prophetess had been not only immortal and his lover, but a sorceress, one whose blood was poison to the taste.
Ara-Karn shook his head. He turned and mounted the circle-steps of the southern lance-tower. Upon its roof he sat and toyed with his dagger. He held up its hilt to the Moon where He passed overhead; and as ever, the seven facets cut within the round gemstone at the hilt’s end took on the exact shape of the god’s chariot at that moment.
A quiet seemed to settle upon the scene.
In the square below, the barbarian warriors gave off their idle shooting of death-birds. They sat and lay back in the shade. Sleepiness took them and they dozed. Across the battlements also, the same indolence and lazy drowsiness claimed the guardsmen.
All slept there, except the Hooded Man and the gerlins soaring high overhead.
Even the winds slacked and died.
Then he shrugged off the hooded cloak. He unbound his boots, his belt, his harness. He let his sword and pouch fall.
Naked in the faint greenish light of God, Ara-Karn sat cross-legged upon the parapet atop the southern lance-tower.
