by S L Farrell
I will meet you on the day after Gschnas where we first met, on the river below the chateau, once we know that you’ve done your part.
Edouard had followed the instructions, abandoning his horse at a small village, then stealing a small boat to take him down the River Vaghian to the A’Sele, where he traveled once more through Nessantico, passing under the Pontica Mordei and the Pontica Kralji in the night before leaving the walls behind for the last time.
Now he sat on the bank with his sketchbook open on his lap and a stick of charcoal in his hand. A dove sat on the branch of a willow bending to the water near him, and he quickly sketched the outlines of the bird and the tree. The drawing came easily-and as the charcoal flowed around the shadows of the bird, he closed his eyes, whispering the words that opened that place deep within himself, the place the old teni had shown him. .
“The Numetodo. .” the ancient had told him, his voice blurred by the few teeth still left in his gums and the phlegm in his throat. But that face: Edouard had come across the man in a run-down inn far from any of the cities, and he’d been fascinated by the lines, by the great hooked nose and the complexity of the channels running from the corner of his eyes and his mouth, the strands of white hair wisping from the spotted scalp. There was great beauty in the man’s ugliness, and Edouard was striving to capture it in his painting.
“They almost have it right. I discovered it myself. It’s not faith in Cenzi that controls the Ilmodo. No. .” The man had shaken his head. “I was once an o’teni. Did you know that? I was in the service of the temple in Chivasso, and I found out the truth of things before I’d even heard of the Numetodo.” The man spit on the floor, a huge splotch of mucus that darkened the sawdust on the boards of the floor. He went silent then, for so long that Edouard had wondered whether he was asleep with his eyes open.
“What’s this truth?” he’d asked the old man at last. “What happened?”
“There was a girl there,” he said. “Arial, her name was. Just a ce’, one of the servants there in the Temple. But she had a fair face and a full figure, and we became lovers. It was wrong, but we didn’t care. I learned that her family was from Boail and-like them-she didn’t believe in Cenzi at all. They worshiped some minor Moitidi, who they were convinced was the only god, She would watch me use the Ilmodo-it was my task to light the temple every night-and she’d ask me to show her how I did it. I told her what I’d always been told myself: that it was impossible, that to use the Ilmodo required much training and a deep faith, that it wasn’t something that those not blessed by Cenzi could do, that the sorcerers and witches who claimed to be able to use magic were liars and abominations who had been seduced by the Moitidi who survived Cenzi’s purge. She nodded and said she understood, but she was listening to me and watching me, and one night I saw her. She was using the Chant of Light, and there was cold fire between her hands as she spoke, and I knew then, even as I called for the a’teni, even as I betrayed her, that what I been taught was wrong. There were those who could shape the Ilmodo without believing in Cenzi, and that. . that shook the very foundations of my faith and tore them down.”
He went silent again for a time, then licked his lips and began again.
“They cut off her hands and took out her tongue as the Divolonte requires, so that she could never use the Ilmodo again. I watched as they tortured her, trying to convince myself that I’d done what Cenzi had wanted me to do, but my faith. . my faith was already shaken, already failing. But every night, I could still light the temple, even though the words to Cenzi meant nothing to me, even though I doubted my faith and my beliefs. I told myself that Cenzi was showing His mercy, that He wanted me to come back to Him and that was why I could still shape the Ilmodo, but my faith continued to fail, until I found I didn’t believe at all. I left, finally, because I couldn’t stand the hypocrisy and the lies I spoke every day. I left, and Cenzi has punished me ever since.”
The man’s voice was a bare whisper when he said that, and he glanced at the canvas before Edouard. “You’ve the Gift,” the old man had said. He touched Edouard’s head, then his hands. “You’re using the Ilmodo even though you don’t know it. It flows from you out onto the canvas. Not many can do that.”
“Show me what you showed Arial,” Edouard had said suddenly. “Show me the truth.”
The ancient had protested and argued, but in the end he’d agreed. He’d taught Eduoard how to open the place inside so that he could feel the Ilmodo, and Edouard in turn had learned that his Gift was indeed special. The old teni was dead when Edouard left, but the painting, the old man’s portrait. .
It was the best painting he’d ever done. The face that stared out from the canvas was so genuine, so compelling. .
The old man was dead, but it was not the last time that Edouard would see him or hear him. Oh, no, not the last time at all.
Edouard let the Ilmodo flow uninterrupted: out from his fingers, through the charcoal stick to the paper, and from there radiating out to the bird. He could see the bird in his mind, snared in the radiance of the Ilmodo. He could feel its heart fluttering and its shivering body, and he let that pass through him onto the paper.
He heard the soft fall of the bird onto the grass, and opened his eyes to see its perfect form captured on the paper.
“It’s gorgeous, as I would expect.” He heard the voice from behind him, the man’s approach masked by the sound of the breezes in the willows and the rush of the A’Sele.
“Vajiki,” Edouard said, placing the sketchpad on the grass next to the bird. “I was beginning to wonder if you would come.”
“Exactly as promised,” the man said. Edouard didn’t know his name; he’d first approached Edouard when he was painting a commissioned portrait in a chateau near Prajnoli. Even his face was common and unremarkable, his hair a nondescript brown, though the eyes had irises of the most saturated grass-green. But the money he’d offered had staggered Edouard-enough that Edouard would never have to touch a brush again, not unless it was what he wanted.
Maybe then they’ll leave me alone: the voices of those I’ve taken. .
He hoped it would be true. They haunted him at night-the faces of those he’d painted, those he’d killed. They came in his nightmares, tormenting him. They were still alive, all of them, alive in his head.
He didn’t know who the man worked for, nor how they had discovered the “gift” he bore-though he wondered if it weren’t Chevaritt ca’Nephri, since it was his chateau that overlooked the river nearby.
Whoever it was, Edouard didn’t know how they’d arranged to have him paint the Kraljica. He knew very little beyond the fact that his purse was far heavier when the green-eyed man had left, and that it would be much heavier again today.
That was enough to know.
“You have my final payment?” he asked the man.
“The Kraljica’s not dead,” the man answered.
Edouard shook his head. “That’s not possible. I finished the painting. I tied her spirit to it.”
“She’s been stricken, but she lingers,” the man said. “That’s not what you promised, Vajiki. It’s not what was wanted by my employer.”
Edouard was still shaking his head. There was no explanation for it, and he was frightened. Panic surged through him as he tried to fashion an excuse. “Sometimes. . sometimes it takes a few days, Vajiki. Perhaps a week, even. But she will die; they always die.” He licked his lips, staring at the man’s eyes of spring grass and hoping he saw belief there.
It wouldn’t matter once he was paid. He could disappear forever then, and even if the Kraljica somehow lived. . He forced his voice to sound angry. “You still owe me the solas you promised. Where are they?”
“I have them,” the man said. “You’re certain she’ll die?”
Edouard poked the body of the bird with the toe of his boot. “Yes.
I’m certain.”
The man nodded, staring down at the bird and the sketch. “Then let’s give you your reward. I
have a horse right over here.” He waved a hand toward a path leading to a stand of trees farther up the bank, and Edouard stooped to pick up his sketchbook. The man gestured again, and Edouard stepped in front of him.
Edouard heard the sound, but failed to understand its significance until it was too late. He had a moment to contemplate the strange feeling as the blade entered his body from behind and thrust entirely through him. Strangely, there was very little pain. He stood there, im-paled, staring at the blood marbling the steel of the long blade that emerged from just under his rib cage. He tried to breathe, and coughed instead, and blood sprayed from his mouth. The blade was withdrawn in a sudden, ripping movement and he fell to his knees.
The world seemed to move as if underwater. He could see the fluttering pages of his sketchbook as it fell from his hands. He could hear the birds in the trees and the crystalline water and even the hush of the clouds sliding across the sky. The colors were impossibly bright and unreal, as if painted with pigments mixed by Cenzi Himself.
The weapon sliced at him again, a blow to the side of the neck this time, and he toppled. He fell to the ground, eyes open, and the grass was an emerald like the man’s eyes and a ruby river flowed between the blades. He could see the dove’s body, only a stride away, and he reached out his hand to touch it, but his arm refused to move.
Something golden-a shell? — flashed in front of him, and he felt his head lifted and a cold chain placed around his ruined neck.
“Here’s your reward, painter,” the man’s voice said, and there was laughter in the gathering darkness, the laughter of all those he’d painted, and their faces came to him and carried him far away as he tried in vain to scream.
Ana cu’Seranta
The Kraljica was a husk wrapped in white linen. For a moment, Ana wasn’t certain she was breathing at all, but then her breath stuttered and the folds of the linen lifted with a breath. A sour odor hung in the air despite perfumed candles that provided the only light in the draped and shuttered room. Renard ushered them into the room, obviously weary from having stood vigil over the Kraljica during the night. A healer was there with his assortment of medicines and instruments, and a trio of servants were emptying bedpans, keeping the fire lit in the hearth, or changing the leeches placed on the Kraljica’s body under the direction of the healer.
The Archigos ordered them all out of the room except Renard.
As the servants slid away with low bows and the healer packed up his implements with obvious irritation, the Archigos placed a comforting hand on Renard’s arm. “You’ve been up all night?” Renard nodded.
“How is she?”
“No better,” Renard said. “After you and O’Teni cu’Seranta visited her-” this with a swift, appreciative glance at Ana; she smiled in return despite her own weariness, “-she seemed to rally, but then slowly slipped back. I fear. .” His lower lip trembled and he closed his mouth.
He wiped at an eye with his sleeve. “I’ve served the Kraljica for nearly thirty years, since I was a young man myself.”
“And you’ve served her well,” the Archigos said. “You have been
her crutch and her support, Renard. Don’t give up hope yet. Cenzi may still hear our prayers.”
Renard nodded, but Ana could see the despair etched in the lines of his face. “Leave us with her again,” the Archigos said to him, “so that we might pray with her. In the meantime, get a bit of sleep. You’ll be no good to her if you’re exhausted.”
“I will try,” Renard said. He looked back at the bed and gave a long sigh before moving toward the door. As he came near Ana, he stopped for a moment. “Thank you for your efforts, O’Teni,” he said quietly.
“May Cenzi bless you.”
He bowed and clasped his hands to his forehead. He left the room, leaving them alone with the Kraljica’s erratic breath.
“He knows,” Ana said.
“He’s hardly a stupid man. And he loves the Kraljica.” He was standing beside her and his fingers brushed her hand. She jerked her hand away. His eyes regarded her with what she thought might be pity, but he didn’t touch her again. “He suspects, but he doesn’t know, Ana,”
he said. “And he’ll say nothing to anyone, no matter what the Divolonte states. Nor will I.”
She wasn’t certain that she believed this. She wasn’t certain she trusted any of them. Ana could imagine the Archigos betraying her to save himself, and she rubbed her hands. They would cut them off, and take your tongue as well. . She shuddered.
“Ana. .? Are you all right?”
Ana blinked. The Archigos was staring at her. “I know you’re tired, but this may be our last chance to save her,” he said. His voice was rushed and quiet, and she realized that the Archigos was frightened himself-afraid of what might happen to him if the Kraljica died and the A’Kralj became Kraljiki. In that moment, she glimpsed how fragile was the Archigos’ hold on his position in the church, and thus how precarious her own situation, tied to his standing, was in turn. The realization made her stomach turn uneasily.
She nodded to the Archigos and went to the side of the bed, looking down at the white, drawn face of the Kraljica: her cheeks sunken, her skin draped loosely over her skull. She looked half a corpse already.
She doesn’t deserve this. If Cenzi gave you this ability, then He didn’t intend for you to ignore it.
Ana clasped hands to forehead for a moment, taking deep breaths.
Then she opened her hands wide and let them move in the pattern she felt in her head, and she spoke the words that Cenzi sent her.
Eyes still closed, she shaped the power of the Ilmodo and let it rush into the Kraljica. Faintly, she heard a gasp from the old woman on the bed. “Ana. .” she heard the woman say aloud, and the word echoed in her mind as well. Ana. . The painting calls me and I can’t resist. The stream of the Ilmodo cascaded from Ana into the Kraljica and back out through that terrible rent in the Kraljica’s very being, the awful wound nearly as wide now as it was last night. Ana found herself in the Kraljica and in the painting at the same time-the painting where most of the Kraljica’s awareness seemed to reside now. The body on the bed was largely an empty shell.
Ana found herself marveling again at the spell that had done this: no teni could enchant an object this way. A teni could place a nonburn-ing glow within a lamp that would remain for several turns of the glass, but to do so required the proper chanting and hand motions, which must be performed at the time the spell was cast. But there had been no one chanting to ensorcell the painting-the spell had been cast with Ana’s pull of the cover: instantaneously, without words of prayer or gestures.
Ana had no idea how that had been accomplished, and it made her wonder again if ci’Recroix had been Numetodo. The rumors she had heard about how they twisted the Ilmodo. .
But she couldn’t think of that now. She could not spare the distractions.
Ana reshaped the Ilmodo, wrapping it around the Kraljica and trying to pull the woman back into her body and away from the painting, but the spell within the painting resisted, tearing at the Ilmodo and shredding it so that it couldn’t hold the Kraljica. Where her spell touched that within the painting, it was as if claws raked her body, dragging deep furrows that tore muscles and ripped ligaments from bones. Ana screamed with the pain, not knowing if she did so aloud. She could feel the spell, could glimpse how it had been shaped and constructed. . and there was nothing of Cenzi in it. She could not feel Him in it at all.
The shell on its chain under her robes seemed to be glowing whitehot, burning her skin.
Ana pulled at the Kraljica desperately, dragging the old woman’s awareness back toward her body as much as she could and trying to close off that awful hole within her once more. Slowly, it began to heal itself, but the effort cost Ana. She screamed again, her body and her mind aching from the exertion. .
. . and she could hold the Ilmodo no more. It slipped from her, and she was back in the Kraljica’s room, on her knees on the carpeted floor,
her body soaked in perspiration, the front of her teni-robes stained with vomit, her hands curled and as stiff as if she’d been outside unprotected for hours in winter.
“I tried. .” she managed to husk out to the Archigos, who was kneeling alongside her. She looked at him, stricken. “I did all I could, and I almost. . almost. .”
And that was all she remembered for a time.
Mahri
The room was chilly even in the late afternoon sun, but Mahri hardly noticed. He was staring at a shallow, battered pan set on the wobbly table in front of him, in which he could see the distorted reflection of his own ravaged face. He heard the teapot over the fire in the hearth begin to sing, and he went to it. Wrapping the sleeve of his ragged clothing around the handle of the pot, he lifted it from the crane and poured the steaming water into the basin, then sprinkled leaves from a leather pouch on his belt into the water. He sat back.
“Show me,” he said softly, and the steam above the basin writhed and twisted and coalesced. There, in the mist, was a shimmering image: the figure of the A’Kralj, his jutting chin unmistakable even if he hadn’t been dressed in his usual finery, and seated across a small table from him, the Vajica Francesca ca’Cellibrecca. “A’Kralj,” the woman said, a bit too loudly and forced, obviously for the benefit of someone else within earshot. “You do us a great honor by coming here, and I know my husband will be displeased that he missed you. We were both so shocked by your matarh’s collapse at the Gschnas. How is she?”
“No better, I’m afraid, Vajica,” Mahri heard the A’Kralj answer. His hand moved on the table, sliding a few inches toward the woman’s. He glanced away to his right, as if looking at Mahri, and his eyebrows lifted slightly. The Vajica glanced that way also.
“Cassie, would you go to the kitchen and see if Falla still has those cakes from the morning? A’Kralj, some tea also perhaps? Cassie, have Falla make some new tea as well, and bring it here.”
