by Tanith Lee
He, too, might have some Lowland blood, but then, Lyki would surely have flaunted it. It did not matter.
He had glimpsed representations of this goddess in the Ashara temples of Istris and Ioli, but they were not like the statue before him now, even when Ashara’s fishtail had been transformed to that of a water snake. Nor was the Vathcrian or Vardish Ashkar quite like this. And yet, Anackire Am Ankabek, modeled on the Lady of Snakes, the arcane deity of the Shadowless Plains—some part of Rem told him he had already seen Her, long ago, far away. Before he was even born.
• • •
Above the clearing, but west of the temple, the red trees gave way to oaks, and it was possible to look out between them to the dark blue sea of the long afternoon. Among the grasses stood a small stone Anackire, rough layman’s work. No offerings had been set before Her, for this was Ankabek, and She needed nothing.
Since the fever had left him, Kesarh had mostly slept. The priests of the place had come and gone. Day and night had come and gone. Rem had been at the door, or within call, except when sent away. Val Nardia had remained. Last night, waking, Kesarh had found her sitting on the low stool, exhausted from watching and asleep, her head beside his on the pillow. They had been together only what their blood had made them, brother and sister. And now, brother and sister still, they had come up here to gaze at the innocent sea. There was time enough for a prolonged convalescence. His last order had kept the two ships and their men at Tjis, where they were happy to stay, feted and adored, though the town would probably never recover. Meanwhile, the messengers must have space to reach Istris; the messenger dispatched to the King, and that other messenger Kesarh had dispatched for other purposes, the morning after the snake.
Val Nardia, paler now than Kesarh, sat close beside him. Her eyes on the ocean, she reminded him in swift sentences of their childhood at Istris, the old tower in the lower gardens from which they had watched the distant harbor, excursions into the hills. Or the summer Festival of Masks five years ago, when they had found each other in the crowds and known each other instantly. He drank the wine and water in the flagon and ate the fruits she pressed him to eat. He basked in her love, letting her see the weakness which had almost left him, nothing more. And she, he recognized, was his accomplice in the deception.
Speaking of Istris, however, brought her abruptly, like a slip of the tongue, to mention his departure. Her pallor deepened.
“When,” she said, “will it be safe for you to return? Must you go in fear of your life in Karmiss always?”
“I always have gone in fear. That’s how I escaped worse than a snake. But I had plans for this, the Zakorian sea-fight, the murder attempt. You see, Ulis, such things, or others like them, had to come. To be ready was everything.”
“Then—”
“Then my own men will alert the paid gossips of the capital. They’ll soon be active. My heroism will be paramount, that and the treachery offered me. By the hour of my return there’ll be flowers on the street for my chariot to crush, and he won’t dare try for me again.”
“I shall pray to Her it shall be so. And to keep you in her protection.”
“The goddess was his weapon against me in Tjis. Her sword, Her serpent.”
Val Nardia turned from him, bewildered, at a loss.
“His corruption, not the goddess’ will—But you’re certain it was the King?”
“Who else?”
“Some other enemy.”
“You think I have a variety and may choose?”
“Your ambition,” she said softly, “but more than this—this thing in you which frightens me. This has made you enemies. Is your way unalterable?”
He saw the dangerous path now, and avoided it. He lay down on the grass and told her his head ached.
Later, as he drowsed against her, he said, “I’m glad you came here. You’ll be out of the reach of any harm. Otherwise they might use you as a lever against me. Elsewhere I’m armored.”
“You would sacrifice me with all the rest,” she said remotely, without resentment or distress.
“Ah, no,” he said. “Not you.”
Not you.
• • •
Kesarh had been on the island of Ankabek ten days when the boat came from the Karmian mainland. It was full dark and the Red Moon had risen with the Star. Men ran from the village, and the arrival stood on the beach glaring at them.
“I am sent to the Prince Kesarh Am Xai, by Suthamun, the King.”
By dint of this lie, the man won through at last to the temple hostelry, and the poor cell where Kesarh now stood, healed and ominous in the sullen light.
“Good evening, Number Three.”
The man, one of the ten Threes of Kesarh’s guard, saluted him. “My lord, I have this message for you.”
The soldier recited. Seldom did Kesarh or his guard sergeant commit such things to paper. When the recitation stopped, Kesarh’s expression had not changed at all. He had, of course, no reason for surprise. Matters had run to plan. The riders, pausing for nothing and appropriating new mounts as they had to, had halved the journey time, and the work was well-advanced. Visian Istris seethed on his behalf. To go back now was as wise as it had been formerly to stay away.
“And the ships at Tjis?”
“Have received an order to return, their captains and a few picked men to accept the bounty of the guardian in chariots and zeebas, and to proceed overland to the southeasternmost village on the Istris-Ioli road. Here to await yourself.”
“And thereafter to ride into Istris at my back,” said Kesarh. He grinned.
The ships would be slow. He had had no intention to allow his triumphal re-entry into the city to be marred or delayed. The caviling blond-haired half-blood sops who had jittered on their vessels, scared to fight, then mewling about the rights of slaves—they should run behind him through the streets, his kalinx pack, his dogs, for all Vis-Karmiss to see or to hear of.
“We’ll take the boat across again at first light. Where are the rowers sleeping?”
“On the beach, my lord.”
“You can have this cell. Share it with Number Nine, I’m sure he won’t object.”
The soldier stepped aside as Kesarh strode through the doorway and on up the slope toward the temple. Puzzled, the Number Three wondered if his Prince were going to give thanks to Ashara.
• • •
The little metal discs on the trees fluttered, making an eerie irritation of sound that seemed to burn in his veins.
He by-passed the great doors of the temple and continued along the black running wall. Quite simply, during their many conversations, his sister had mentioned where the novitiates were housed. Quite simply too, as his health improved, she had been less and less with him.
Presently an arch broke the wall. He went through into a courtyard. A single torch in a vase of thin pinkish stone trembled above a doormouth. The wind was rising on the sea. It could be a rough crossing tomorrow.
Kesarh knocked on the door. A grill was raised and a dark face showed in the glow of the torch-lamp.
“Who’s there?”
“I am the Prince Kesarh Am Xai. I’m here to bid my sister farewell. Let me in.”
“You may not enter.”
“Either you let me by or I break in the door.”
“This is a sacred place.”
“Then keep it sacred. Don’t risk unholy violence.”
There was a whispering, and the face went from the grill. Kesarh waited. The strength which flowed in him, which would brook no denial, seemed also aware that denial would not, ultimately, be tendered. After a minute, he heard a bar retracted on the inside of the door, which then opened to let him through.
He advanced into the gloomy passage and a weightless hand fell on his wrist. He looked, and saw a Lowland woman was by him, pure Lowland from the look of h
er, her narrow hand now shielding a candleflame from the snarl of wind at the door.
“You see Val Nardia. She is here. Follow, I’ll guide you to her.”
Something in this astonished him. He nearly laughed. They were naïve, then, or more wily than he had thought them.
Kesarh went after the woman and the flame, both blonde, ghostly on the unlit passages. There seemed a mile of these, serpentinely twisting, sloping up or down, and all lightless. Now and then the candle touched a side-turning, or the recess of a door. He suspected the obscurity was a device to confuse intruders, or profane visitors like himself.
Abruptly the woman halted. They were at another door-recess. She moved about and faced him.
“This is Val Nardia’s chamber. She is in the shrine just beyond. You should not disturb her there. Her meditation will shortly be ended. She’ll return, and find you.”
For a moment, he wondered if that were some trick, but then the Lowland woman said to him: “There are high slots in these walls, open to the sky. In the dusk before dawn you should be able to see quite well. The Princess herself can direct you.”
Kesarh lifted his eyebrows at her impassiveness.
“You imagine I’ll be here all night.”
She merely looked at him. Her face was unreadable. Only the yellow eyes gave any color to it, and the violet jewel depending on her forehead—the Serpent’s Eye, gem of the goddess.
“Well,” he said, “I intend to be off the island by sunrise.”
“Then she will light a lamp for you.”
Kesarh suddenly laughed.
“How much do you want for this? Or is it to be a gift to the temple?”
“My lord,” the Lowland priestess said, “the only gift which is required will be given.”
“A riddle. I said, how much?”
“My lord,” the priestess said. That was all. He glimpsed her leaning toward the candle and heard the snake-hiss as her breath blew it out. In the sheer blackness he did not see her go, nor hear it. No glimmer came from the slots above, if slots there were, this place was turned away from the moon and the Star.
Kesarh fumbled with the door and felt it give. The room beyond was lamplit, and he went into it, slamming the door shut on the black outside. The encounter had angered him. He glanced about, and perceived instantly the other curtained doorway. Ripping the curtain aside he gazed into a fresh lightless passage, which presumably led to the shrine the woman had mentioned. With an oath, he pulled the curtain to again and gave his attention to the empty room.
It was spare and small and, to Kesarh, unbeautiful. At junctures, Val Nardia’s own possessions stood or lay, the chests he had seen piled up at Istris for her departure, a box of Elyrian enamel, the plain mantle she wore here. The bed was low and slender. Lying on the pillow was a dying flower that he had tucked yesterday into her hair. He picked it up. A little of its scent still lingered, but mostly now it was perfumed with Val Nardia, and he crushed it in his hand.
Then he heard the noise of the curtain behind him, and next the long indrawn gasp.
He turned. She was barefoot, and had carried no light through the dark. Now she seemed half-blinded, by the lamps, or by him.
“How did you come here?” she said.
“Your priestesses let me in. I came to say good-bye. I leave tomorrow.”
“But,” she said. Unlike the face of the Lowlander, Val Nardia’s gorgeous face was utterly readable. She had flown here for sanctuary, but the sanctuary had abetted him. She was betrayed.
“There are no windows in this room,” he said. “You can’t see the sky. Or the stars. Not even Zastis.”
She took a step toward him. “You must go. Go now.”
“When you believed I might die, you were full of grief and fear. Now you pack me off, maybe to my death, like a doll you tired of. Is that how you considered me, all those years we were children together? A toy. Useful, comfortable. Made of wood or rags.”
“No,” she said, “that’s how you think of me.” Her honey eyes widened. “Something for your use. Your admiring slave. A game you played. For your use.”
“Let me use you then,” he said. “And you, Val Nardia, use me.”
She opened her mouth, and this time he knew it was to scream. Before she could make a sound, he had closed the gap between them. He grasped her against him. The gauzy robe she wore, the shift under it, made no barrier. He seemed to feel her body and its detail as if both of them were already naked. The hand he had clamped across her mouth he drew away, closing her mouth instead with his own. She struggled, as she had struggled before, but more frenziedly now. Even, she tried to bite him, his lips, his tongue, as they invaded her. But the bites were ineffectual, she could not bring herself to hurt him, even in this. He knew a blazing stab of pity for her, pity which was also love, and could have wept himself as he drew his head away. She was too breathless now to scream. Besides, who would hear her?
Her hands went on beating at him, clawing at him. She tugged at his hair, scratched his throat—but again, strengthlessly. And all the while she muttered her one word of entreaty and objection—No, sometimes his name mingled in it—and he muttered her name, or the pet name, Ulis. It became a litany between them, a song, meaningless.
Soon he lifted her and carried her over to the mean bed and put her on it, and lay down over her.
He could feel the tensions of her flesh, all the agony of Zastis. The fastenings of the robe came undone with ease, and the rough lace beneath. He found her breasts, moulded them, tasted their sweetness. She struggled still against him, her clutching hands now like those of one who drowned. But he thrust her back under the water and drowned with her. The room seemed scarlet from her hair, the hair of her head, and the ulis-petalled hair of her loins.
At the final invasion, her eyes were open, meeting his, her hands fierce on his shoulders, her mouth hungry for his, forgetting at last all words. Almost instantly she became a whirlpool, a whirlpool which clasped him, dissolving him. Her cries came, louder, higher, endless. She seemed to be dying against him, but somewhere in her death there surged his own. He lost her, but not the essence of her, never that.
In the defended stillness of death which followed, he smiled, lying on her hair, her flesh, thinking this too a victory, quite conclusive.
4.
THE FIRST OF SUTHAMUN’S HEIRS, his eldest legal son, waked in his love-bed and kicked the nearer girl into communication.
“What’s that din?”
The girl did not know. Nor did the other, when he kicked her.
Prince Jornil rose from the bed, petulantly furious. He was clear Shansar from both parents, but birth and growth in Karmiss the Lily on the Ocean had caused him to be a twining plant rather than a tree. He had never had a moment’s doubt of himself or his future. Only his father’s wrath could make him blink.
He stood, goldenly handsome in the window, listening incredulous to the uproar out in the streets. He knew nothing about it. It was not for him or his.
When a servitor informed Jornil the hubbub sprang from a crowd, gathering to watch the return of the Prince Am Xai into Istris, Jornil laughed aloud.
• • •
Paid word-mongers had prepared the way. Then genuine rumor and real truth had augmented everything. Making camp in the eastern hills above the city, the returning heroes had paused, sending some ahead to collect and bring them out their finery for a processional entry. Somehow Prince Kesarh had persuaded them that Suthamun would countenance acclaim for the victory. Even the single lost ship would be forgiven. Because he had been clever, the three captains and their ship-lords thought themselves clever, too, and were not difficult to convince.
In fact, Suthamun Am Shansar had had no intention of drawing the public gaze to their achievement. Having received the official messenger Kesarh had sent, the King had had prepared a slight speech of commendatio
n to be delivered in council, by the Warden. The King himself would, after an interval, extend a fairly private audience to the Prince Am Xai, thank him, give him some small gift; upbraid him gently and with magnanimous brevity for the loss the galley. As for an entry into Istris, Kesarh and his twenty men might come in at any time. The ships might also make free of the harbor as they wished.
The going-out had been stagy, to display Suthamun’s excessive care for clean shores. He had himself reckoned the Free Zakorian menace less than it was, or he would have sent his own captains in Shansar-built ships, and under the command of his brother, Uhl.
Suthamun, though, had reckoned without Visian Istris. Men in Shansar had a weakness for show, but it was show of a different sort, magic or mystic often, generally significant. Little events were seldom blown up to gales with hot air. When the crowds came out to cheer him home from a hunt, the King had failed to see it was the pleasure of event they rejoiced in, not his royal self.
There had, additionally, been the touch of organization. Men who, at sun-up, had stationed themselves about, stating which streets should be kept clear, therefore encouraging the crowd to pile up on either side. The women who had gathered or purchased flowers, declaiming on the lord they would cast them to, garlands for his greatness. And there were the others, who had spoken from the beginning—At last, a dark man who would safeguard their honor and their security.
By midday there was expectancy, press of people and loud sound throughout all the wind and stretch of streets and avenues from Istris’ White Gate to the palace. Banners had been hauled from chests and hung out of windows. Hawkers sold colored streamers, bells and squeaky trumpets, with the wine and sweets. Only the Ashara Temple, last bastion on the route before the palace was reached, gave evidence of extreme uninterest.
