Silence of the Soleri

by Michael Johnston

  Sarra had allies within the imperial cults. The high priests of Bes and Sen were loyal, but the amaranth trade had made a different sort of ally in the house of Chefren, the kind that grew wealthy and prosperous. Kihl was chief among those men, but the trade had allowed her to forge bonds with at least half a dozen other houses in the White-Wall district. With Kihl in place, it was time to call upon those other houses. There were appointments to be made, positions that could make a man wealthy, or wealthier, if he knew how to use the influence that came with the post. When Arko Hark-Wadi was named Ray, many of the great houses had declined their family titles, leaving the posts open or unattended. Mered Saad had refused to continue his work as the Overseer of the House of Crescents. She needed to appoint a new master of coin, and there were dozens of other posts that needed filling.

  Mered was first citizen. He’d won a victory of sorts. He’d carved out a new position in the empire, and half the city stood at his back. But half was still only half. He’d given himself a title, but Sarra was the master of a hundred different titles. For two centuries, the Rays had ruled Solus. Their reign could not be unmade in a single day. Already, Mered’s hold on the city faltered. The bastard king, Ren, had dealt the first blow. Mered had all but declared him dead, but the boy lived. He’d set fire to the Night Market, turning a centuries-old structure to ash in a matter of minutes. He’d raided the house of Re, desecrating one of the city’s oldest temples. The gods themselves were offended; that was the talk of the city. Rumors abounded. There was news of a run on the granary, and someone had looted the armory. It seemed the Harkans were everywhere, but no one could find them.

  She tapped on the bronze knocker that hung from the door of House Chefren.

  No one answered.

  Sarra tapped again. At her last visit, a guard had stood at this door. Odd, she thought.

  Ott approached, escorted by a cadre of priests. He was late. In fact, he had been late the last time she saw him. He was always hurrying about and covered in dust—completely occupied by his studies. It was as if he’d fallen into some abyss and she had to drag him out each time she wished to speak to him.

  His guards carried weapons, clubs studded in bronze. Priests were forbidden to bear such implements.

  “You’ve hired mercenaries and put them in the white?” she asked.

  “One night in Mered’s dungeon was enough for me,” said Ott. “I won’t chance a second.”

  It was blasphemy. Only an ordained priest of the Mithra cult was permitted to wear the white, but Sarra had committed her own share of sacrilege. She could hardly begrudge Ott for doing the same.

  “I’ll ignore this,” she said, appraising him. Each time she saw Ott, he was a new man. His hair was longer and he stood a bit taller despite the crutch. Sarra pressed her back to the wall. “Apparently, the guards are on break.”

  “Odd,” he mused.

  “That’s what I thought.” Sarra looked again at the door. “You’ve been acting a bit odd yourself, always missing. What are you up to? What discovery has captivated your attention?”

  Ott swallowed bitterly. “Academic matters. The history of the gods. The Soleri and the Pyraethi.”

  “Yes, what about them? What have you learned about those statues?”

  “Nothing. Nothing yet, but I’m close…”

  “To what?”

  Ott stumbled over his next syllable. He went quiet and she saw a drop of perspiration on his brow. He was lying. She was almost certain of it. The boy was terrible at such things. He was honest to the bone and could hardly suppress his nature.

  But why is he deceiving me? In recent days, she had assigned several priests to a covert task. She’d asked them to follow Ott through the Hollows, but they were not yet certain what he was doing down there. Time would provide an answer.

  Sarra tapped on the door again. This time she hit the bronze a bit harder, trying to make a sound loud enough to bring the guard. It made a brassy thump and the door gave way, squealing faintly on its hinges as it swung open.

  “Gods, what’s going on here?” she said, stepping past the door and into the garden. Ott followed, his guards quickly encircling the two of them. “Call the yellow cloaks,” said Sarra. The city guard waited just outside the white walls of House Chefren. She preferred to approach the house alone, to show that the Ray needed no protection. But when real danger was present, she walked with sharpened iron at her side.

  A gray-cloaked man dashed through the garden, trampling what she guessed was the midday portion of the flower clock. He carried a great urn of some sort, gilded in electrum and sparkling in the morning light.

  “Thieves?” she asked. “What’s happening here?”

  “We should go,” said Ott. “Leave now, there’s something amiss.”

  “No, not yet. These are our allies. Where are their guards?”

  Sarra hurried down the garden path, past the great flower clock, which had been trampled more than once, perhaps even on purpose. All those delicate flowers, drawn from the farthest reaches of the empire, had been uprooted or mashed. The whole thing had been desecrated, the clock, the garden. The doors of the great house stood open, revealing a pair of bodies.

  “Kihl’s house guard,” said Sarra.

  “And they both died fighting,” said Ott. “Look at the cuts. There was a battle here,” Ott said, leaning hard on his crutch. “Why haven’t we left?”

  “Because we have guards. Perhaps we can be of assistance.” Her alliance was too important to allow harm to come to this man. Where are you, my friend?

  The house was built around a lavish pool with fountains that sprinkled water into the air, only now there were three dead men floating in the water and the pipes were clogged with viscera. Overturned jars sat atop smashed urns. Heaps of ivory lay in piles. Shards of glass dotted the marble floor. There was no sign of Kihl or his personal guard, so they went deeper, around the pool, following the faint sounds of what she guessed was a battle.

  They passed the shrine, smelled the sweet scent of this morning’s offering, laid out fresh beneath the statue of some ancestor. The idol was knocked aside, but the offering was still in place, the smoke of the incense winding upward from a censer. There were lavish halls with lotus-topped columns, and stele depicting the great flower clock. It was a place of beauty, but it echoed with the sounds of distant battle, the cries of men, the clash of bronze and iron, wood and leather. Guards littered the floors; waiting women lay with their throats slashed. Dancers, scribes, and cupbearers all lay dead before them.

  They scurried through the menagerie, where baboons sat limply against the bars of their cage, where an ostrich roamed freely, wandering, lost and looking for something to do with itself. They chased the roar of the battle, Ott growing more nervous, his men gripping their clubs. Beyond the pool, in the wide hall of House Chefren, a great conflict raged between men in kohl-stained robes and the guards of the house. Her allies were easily outnumbered, perhaps three to one. The house guard fell quickly, one after another, the thieves drawing ever closer to Kihl.

  Are these the Harkans? she wondered. Had they turned to raiding the houses of the wealthy? It was possible. It was said they wore gray, oil-stained robes and disguised themselves as beggars. These men certainly fit that description, and they fought with the fierceness of soldiers. Beggars and thieves hardly had the skills to cut down the personal guard of one of the great houses. Kihl employed the best.

  He stood with his house guard, but they were few in number, and there were at least sixty or seventy attackers. The assassins moved with astounding speed, cutting down the guards and quickly dispensing the last of his men.

  Kihl Chefren stood alone.

  For a span, the room was quiet.

  Sarra caught his eye.

  I’ve brought this man his death, she thought.

  A sword rippled through the air, catching a bit of red as it crossed Kihl’s neck.

  Before the father of house Chefren hit the stones, the assas
sins were fleeing, rushing this way and that. They paid Sarra no attention.

  She went to Kihl and lifted his head, but his eyes were turning gray, the skin growing cold to her touch. His chest did not move. He was dead. Everyone here was dead. She saw his wife, dead. His children, dead. All of his servants were dead, everything smashed. Potsherds littered the ornate tiled floor, an ostrich feather drifted through the air.

  “The Harkans, of all the houses, why pick this one?” she asked.

  “This wasn’t the Harkans,” said Ott. “Their intent was to murder Kihl. You saw it yourself. When the man fell, they fled. This was an assassination. The Harkans steal food; they don’t murder innocents.”

  “What do you know of the Harkans and this Bane of Solus?” she asked, suspicious. In recent days, the boy had earned a reputation for looting and burning. The common folk had given him a title, calling him the bane of their city and assigning him an almost supernatural ability to slip in and out of the great houses and temples.

  “Ren is…” Ott stuttered.

  “What? Your brother? You think because you share a dead father that you have some kinship with that boy? The Harkans destroyed my best chance at restoring order to this city.”

  “This was not the work of the Harkans.”

  “You may or may not be right. Those men could easily be Mered’s soldiers disguised as the black shields, or they might be the genuine article. The truth is irrelevant. That is what you fail to grasp. The kingsguard have made Solus into a lawless city. Mered knows this and takes advantage of it in more ways than one. Whether or not he committed the crime, Ren is the cause of our troubles!”

  At her fury, Ott shrank, his hand shaking.

  You lied to me, she thought, and it has something to do with the Harkans. He’d defended them far too quickly. What are you up to, my son? He’d always been loyal, but the boy had grown into a man. He had his own ideas, his own thoughts and agendas. As a slender plume of smoke rose from House Chefren, Sarra wondered if those goals aligned with her own.

  36

  Ren leapt from the pipe, bounded onto his feet, and dropped a pair of urns on the stone floor of the temple. One shattered, sending golden crescents tumbling in every direction. After his conversation with Noll, he’d needed to clear his head, and a night raid had seemed like a good way to do it. He’d welcomed the priest into their ranks and then he’d gone off with his friends, roaming the streets of Solus and looking for trouble. He’d found his way into a white-walled palace and pilfered a bit of food, some coin.

  “Bane of Solus.” Edric repeated the name the people of Solus had given to Ren. “While you’ve been out looting, we did some real work.”

  “What’s more real than gold?” asked Tye. She held two urns full of crescents, which she set down on the floor, coins clinking as the clay thumped against the stones.

  “Yes,” said Kollen, picking up the conversation. “What is better than a heap of crescents? I’ve never owned a single one and now I’ve got thousands. You do realize we can buy things with these little pieces of gold, don’t you?” Kollen had no jar, but he held a sword. He’d been their guard as they looted the house.

  “Well,” said Edric, “we plundered the cellars of some wealthy bastard, snuck behind his white walls and took every bit of grain in the house, took their bread too, but I don’t think they’ll mind. I’m sure they’ll have more by tomorrow.”

  “More for us to take?” said Ren.

  “Something like that. We ran afoul of some guards, but we managed to slip out without much trouble.”

  “How much trouble did you run into? We’re only in it for the grain. We’re not killers,” said Ren.

  Edric shook off the remark. “You’ve said as much, and we did as you asked,” he said as he picked up a gold crescent and held it to the lamplight, his face a wide grin. He walked off with the crescent, returning to the company of the kingsguard.

  Ren studied Edric as he stood among the men, slapping one soldier on the back, uttering some joke Ren could not hear, laughter echoing in the chamber.

  Are you lying to me, Edric?

  Ren could not be certain. He could not follow every raid, so he had to trust the men would obey him, that they weren’t out there murdering the house guards. Such folk were often pressed into service. They hardly deserved the point of a sword shoved in their face.

  “Why so glum?” Kollen knocked him on the chest. “We did well. We’re doing splendidly and your brother’s going to find a way out of this place for us. Stop your worrying. You think too much.”

  “That’s what Tye always says.”

  “It’s true enough.” Kollen knocked him again, harder this time. “I mean it, man. Thinking’s a symptom of laziness. Sit around too long and you’ll fill your head with all sorts of dreadful thoughts. I try not to think at all.”

  “That much is plain.”

  “I’m talking about you, Ren. When I see a boy staring at the wall I assume he’s deaf or dumb.” Kollen tried to slug him a third time, but Ren caught the blow midstrike.

  “You know, I always hated you,” Ren said. “I mean it. In the priory, more than once, I nearly cut you open with my shank, and now you’re my friend. What sense does that make?”

  “Well, if it’s any consolation, I was a complete ass. I arrived at the priory when I was twelve, not three. I was heir to the throne, a fucking prince of Rachis. I was a freeman, so don’t blame me for not savoring my time in captivity. If pain makes the man, it made me into a terrible one. You, on the other hand, that pain never seemed to bother you. You were always defiant. Annoying, but defiant. I envied that—ya little bastard. Thought you were a fool, a total fucking fool, but I envied you.”

  “How touching,” said Ren. “Did you come here to confess your deepest emotions?

  “No, didn’t plan on saying any of that. In fact, do me a favor and forget every word of it. The darkness does strange things to a person’s mind. I came to you with an entirely different purpose. I want to know a bit more about this fellow Noll, the priest that arrived with your brother. He speaks to no one, eats little, and spends his days meditating like he’s off in some other world. Edric wants to lop off his head—thinks he’s a spy. I’m inclined to agree. You’re the only one who’s spoken to him, so what did he have to say for himself?”

  Ren heaved a mighty breath, uncertain of where to start. In truth, he wanted to confide in someone, to tell them everything Noll shared. Unfortunately, Kollen didn’t seem like the sort of fellow you told such things. Still, it was a burden and Ren had enough of those. His head was still buzzing, driving him mad, and he needed the distraction so he told Kollen what Noll said.

  The older boy was oddly quiet as Ren spoke, and he said nothing when he finished. He just sat there in silence, the well looking dark and empty, that dot of sunlight hovering somewhere in the distance. The chamber was cold and Ren felt a shiver; he had only his threadbare tunic for warmth.

  “Say something,” said Ren. “I’ve just shared with you the whole history of the empire. That ought to elicit some response, don’t you think?”

  “Well, it’s obviously horseshit. The whole point of the twelve was the interbreeding, five boys and five girls. That was the way of it. The blood stayed pure. Now you’re telling me some other story. You claim the blood is in all sorts of folk, everywhere. There are bastards in every kingdom. Two of them in this chamber! Horu’s eight hells, Ren, how does someone hide such things?”

  “How can an empire exist for centuries without an emperor?”

  “Well, you’ve got a point there,” said Kollen. “Hell, maybe I’ve got a bit of that blood. My old man is the king. Wonder why Noll hasn’t come knocking on my door.”

  “It’s been a while since the mountain lords left their homes. You might want to venture down from the clouds if you want to mingle with the rest of us,” said Ren.

  “Why?” asked Kollen. “The moment I get out of this lightless well, I’m heading north and never looking bac
k.”

  “I don’t blame you.”

  “Wasn’t expecting blame from you. I simply want out. You were practically a newborn when you showed up at the priory—am I wrong? As I’ve said, I was ten and two when I arrived. I can still picture Zagre, the palace at Musket, the onyx columns and gilded fretwork. There are eight frozen waterfalls that surrounded the courtly palace, and each is as tall as this temple. I want to see them again.”

  “You will,” said Ren. “I’ll make certain of it.” He’d gotten into the habit of making promises he wasn’t certain he could keep, so he saw no point in stopping. He’d dug himself into more holes than he could count. He figured he’d find a way out or he’d be buried. Either was just as likely to come to pass, or maybe that buzzing in the back of his head would simply drive him mad and that would be the end of it.

  Ren drew one of the gold coins from the pile. This one was a perfect circle and it held the face of the Sekhem Den at its center. Ren hadn’t seen the emperor’s likeness among the living statues. For that brief moment when they’d come alive in the garden, he’d witnessed their true faces, but he had not glimpsed Den’s. There was only one grown man among the twelve, and it wasn’t the one on this coin. This was a revelation of sorts. It meant that the statues in the garden were the Pyraethi, and the figures he’d seen in the temple were the Soleri. It was a guess, of course, but he trusted it. There were two families of warring gods in the city. Once, they’d fought each other to a standstill. And for two hundred years after that, the gods lay frozen and inert, dreaming in some strange sleep while they waited for their return. That wait was at an end. He sensed it. The sons of Pyras had tried to put an end to this empire, and he guessed it was time for them to finish the task.