by Adam Corby
She smiled within herself, scarcely listening to his words. She was leaned back in the sculptured seat half into the shadows, a subtle red smile playing in the corners of her sensual mouth. She arched her back slightly, pressing her hips more firmly against the contours of warming stone. Her mind drifted idly, until once more its center was there between her thighs. She could feel herself, with a delicious reluctance, surrendering to feelings of sheer animal indulgence.
She gazed into Ampeánor’s earnest devoted face from between slitted, heavily lashed eyes, feeling an urge to laugh. And what would you say about him, dearest Ampeánor, if I told you the truth about him? That he is my lover – even he! – and that he has done such things with and to me as would bring a blush to a harlot’s cheek? Would you be too shocked? The desire to tell him took her, to fling the words into his face. Then with a start she realized what it was she was thinking, and sat bolt-upright on the chair, coloring a little and thankful for the shadows.
‘Yes, of course,’ she said, her expression doubtful. ‘Yet Ampeánor, let us not quarrel now. This should be a time for rejoicing your deliverance.’
‘The task before us is more vital. We should meet with Qhelvin and the others as soon as possible, to fashion new plans now that the North is lost so early.’
‘So early … Ampeánor, does it not seem to you that the barbarians are more of a threat now than they were even in Elna’s time?’
‘Yes. But it is the bow that makes them so.’
‘And you really believe this weapon to be the solution to the wars?’
He nodded. ‘We can counter them to some extent, but in the end there will be no help but that we must either capture, buy or copy them. Had we only archers on the walls of Tezmon, she would be unconquered still; and perhaps poor Elnavis would also be alive. I grieve your loss, Allissál – all our loss. He was a godlike youth. I am sorry I was not present to comfort you after his last rites.’
‘You could not help it. How much gold does this Gen-Karn desire?’
‘As much as he can get: as much as all the wealthy men in the world possess: as much as is hid within the bowels of the earth. But he’ll settle for less, I think. If we can but inflame his hatred of Ara-Karn enough, he might even come to pay us. Allissál, when I was in Gerso I heard talk of the old prophecy that the barbarians might rise again. Yet there they said the barbarians were too divided, tribe against tribe, to attack in force: no tribe would allow a man from a rival tribe to rise to such prominence that he could unify the entire far North. Well, somehow Ara-Karn has done this thing; yet it must be a tenuous unity. If we can but get this Gen-Karn to war openly upon his fellows their whole alliance will dissolve. Still we have every chance to win the wars.’ He paused, looking at the dark earth beneath the trees, and frowned. ‘Yet this Gen-Karn is no more than a murderous savage, a man utterly devoid of honor,’ he mused. ‘I saw a scene there – I will not affront your majesty with the details… Can we join with such a one without ourselves sinking to his level?’
‘Of course we shall deal with him,’ she answered. ‘These are matters of grand design and policy, Ampeánor. Future generations will not ask how we came to conquer, so long as we do so. And to think of Dornan Ural so busy with his sewer-trials!’
She stood up, leading him down the avenue briskly. ‘It is an opportunity we cannot afford to pass by. Oh, Ampeánor, your presence has rekindled all my old ambitions! I had thought them dead with Elnavis, but they have returned. I am the last of Elna’s line – the last of the Monarchs in Tarendahardil – it is too great a trust to betray. Does Ara-Karn believe I have given over all ambition for mere pleasure? It shall not be so. We shall prove him wrong, Ampeánor, you and I, as it was before.’
She came to a halt upon the viewing platform at the far end of the Gardens, on the outer walls of the Citadel. Beneath her sandals the walls of the mountain, immeasurate, unclimbable, steep as man-made pinnacles fell away in breathless beauty. Distantly below was spread the lower, cloud-patched city, and the far-reaching triangle of the Citadel’s immense shadow. The chill of winter tinctured the air, and the few clouds about them were violet with that cold. The Queen shivered slightly and put her arm about Ampeánor’s waist.
‘Soon,’ she said confidently, ‘the barbarian will be forced by this weather to halt his bold advances. And when Spring comes, then he will see! We shall yet live to see the cloudbreak of an age of new glory for this City of ours, the savage hordes scattered to the snows of the far North, and Ara-Karn lying broken beneath us!’
* * *
Above them, in the upper reaches of the Palace, the Gerso entered his chambers. There his servant awaited him.
‘To ship, Kuln-Holn,’ he ordered simply. ‘There are fresh tidings of the wars. Gen-Karn openly defies the rule of Ara-Karn. Go thither, and learn all you may; then return with speed, for winter is fast approaching.’
Kuln-Holn bowed. ‘This should not have been, lord, had you followed our customs.’
‘Very likely. Now I have other things to occupy my mind.’
The servant gathered his belongings and, accepting a small pouch of coins, left the chambers. Within the hour he had found a merchantman, and was sailing for one of the few unconquered ports on the Vesquial coast.
The master did not turn when the servant took his leave. He was standing at the balcony looking down over the dark byways of the lower Gardens far below. There he could see the tiny, vulnerable shapes of two persons, a man in rags and a golden woman, as they stood upon the edge of the abyss. The master smiled, and leaned back against the pillar, so that his face fell once more into shadow.
X
‘Throned Eternity in Icy Halls’
WHEN WINTER CAME to Tarendahardil it brought the rains, like chill lances driven on the stormhorses of the north and dark horizons. The storms swept across Elna’s Sea, transforming the lesser roads into rivers of mud. Water ran in torrents through the empty streets of Tarendahardil; not a rooftop but echoed with the beating, driving, ceaseless, wretched rain. The Circus was closed, the marketplaces nearly empty. Most of the nobles had gone south, to Vapio where the rains never fell. The old, grizzled Guardsman shook the water from his whiskers and cloak like a great faithful dog, eyed the towers of the Palace above him with apprehension, and entered.
‘…Murdered, you say?’
He nodded stiffly. ‘They found the body in a gutter in the Thieves’ Quarter, your majesty. He was recognized by one of the guards, who had known him, and wept at the sight.’
‘Who could have done such a thing?’
He shrugged. ‘It was done in the Thieves’ Quarter. It must have been for gain.’
The Queen leaned back in the shadow of the high sweeping throne, wrapping herself the tighter in a cream-colored cloak. ‘Many were the times we warned him about venturing thither; but his was a soul reckless in its glory. Tell us how it was done.’
‘Your majesty … it was not very pretty…’
‘Your news alone is bad enough: do not censor it. Speak.’
‘His throat was cut. Also there were two deep gashes in his belly, made by a long knife or dagger. The murderer must have crept up behind him in the shadows and ripped him open before he was aware of it. First he cut open the belly – it had bled badly – then the throat, probably to silence the cries of the dying man. Few wounds are more painful than belly-wounds, your majesty.’
‘Yes, that will be enough, thank you. We shall want a full investigation of this, captain: let the Thieves’ Quarter feel our wrath. Give the body to the embalmers. Tell them to spare no art to make it appear presentable. Also send a slave to the Charan Ennius Kandi to request his presence.’
‘Yes, majesty.’
The dank chamber fell silent again, save for the never-ending sound of the rains falling without. Allissál drew the cloak closer about her, her feet drawn up under its hem, huddling. A tear started from her eye, and began to trace a wandering path down her cheek. Without, the sky was a shifting palet
te of gray and dingy green. The winds drew violent veils of mists and rain-flaws forming and rending around and through the perching Citadel. ‘Did you want me?’ said a low voice in her ear. She turned her head and found his mouth upon hers, hungry and forceful.
Gently she disengaged the embrace, not liking the wild lights in his eyes. ‘Now is no time for frivolities, Ennius. Qhelvin of Sorne has been murdered.’
‘How is that?’ he asked calmly, stepping over to stand at the opening, looking out into the maw of cloud. She began to tell him, her voice as controlled as she could manage.
‘This is ill luck,’ he said over his shoulder.
‘Worse than you think. Qhelvin was to ride to Belknule for a secret meeting with the rebels. It is too late to cancel the meeting now, and to send no one would be disastrous. The fear of Yorkjax has made these nobles superstitious as barbarians. You must go in his place, Jade.’
The Gerso shook his head. ‘No, not I. Can you not send the Charan of Rukor?’
‘Ampeánor must return to Rukor until the spring. He has many duties there he has been neglecting. And to send so prominent a man would set Yorkjax’s hackles high; any seen in his company would be suspect. Of the other agents, those not presently engaged are not trustworthy enough. We doubt not their loyalties, just their abilities. Qhelvin always spoke of you as above the others: now all his offices must fall to you. There is only you, Jade. Why did you not wish to go?’
‘I would not wish to miss Qhelvin’s funeral.’
‘We know what close friends you were. Yet there is no help for it.’
‘I repeat, I will not go – unless,’ he added, turning, ‘your majesty has sufficient to pay me for it.’
‘All our gold must go to buy the renegade barbarian.’ She smiled. ‘Yet we still have jewels.’
‘This is the only jewel I have a taste for.’
‘Well, taste it then… What is this on your belt, sir, a spot of blood? Whatever have you been doing?’
‘Deflowering a virgin – what else?’ he said lightly.
She laughed. ‘Was it very pretty?’
‘I enjoyed myself,’ he murmured, bending over her.
* * *
The Guardsmen brought Qhelvin’s body up to the Citadel shortly after the Gerso had left. They bore it in state, silently, as if he had been one of their own. They had felt themselves his friends, even those who had hardly known him: such had been the charm of the man. They laid it upon a slab in the hall of the embalmers, a dusty, ill-smelling abode buried deep beneath the level of the stone, ill-lighted by a few foul lamps. The shadowed walls about were lined with compartments filled with stoppered vials and webs and rusting instruments. The Queen followed them, attended by four of her maidens, their pale robes shining against the patchwork walls of green and gray and purpled rust.
She stood limned in the dark archway. Beside her an old man stood in grief: Qhelvin’s man, who had taught Qhelvin in Sorne when Qhelvin had been a boy. Now he offered her a small golden locket. Within it was a tiny painting of a few confident brushstrokes, obviously done out of memory. Yet even so the likeness of Ennius was skillfully wrought. ‘Had he finished this, he would have offered it to your majesty himself,’ the old man said in a cracked voice. Allissál nodded, and took it from his hands.
Below them the sad-eyed Guardsmen set the body out. The embalmers, wizened slaves in leather tunics whose faces were muffled against the effects of the chemicals of their trade, gathered about the body.
‘Stay,’ murmured the Queen. They bowed in silence, and receded into the lightless corners. She stepped forward, down the two steps, her little satin slippers darkened by the dampness of the subterranean floor. Hesitantly, she reached forth and with her pale beautiful hand laid aside the bloodied rags. The mutilated body was all but naked; only the ripped bloody shirt was left – all the rest had been stripped antlike by the thieves of the Quarter. She looked silently upon the pallid graying flesh, lips contorted in agony, silently beseeching eyes, and eloquent horrors of gutted throat and belly.
‘Dear friend,’ she whispered, in tones so low not even her maidens might hear, ‘did we not warn thee, that thy wanderings there could end in tragedy? Yet still thou couldst not stay away. What was it thou sought there, we wonder? Well, and hadst thou been anything other than what thou wert thou wouldst never have come to offer us thy services and do so much on our behalf. Peistros of Sorne drove thee hither, and all on account of that single love-intrigue – and was any woman’s pleasure worth so much, Qhelvin? Ah, we know that answer now. Sleep now, and forget her and us. Perhaps she will await thee there, beyond those hills her own sad folly drove her to. Well, and Elnavis is dead, and Qhelvin also. Yet before thou fliest, this I will swear to thee, upon the spirits of all my ancestors, upon the very altar of Goddess and this Citadel: that if I live I will see this act avenged.’
Then she leaned forward and tenderly kissed those cold contorted lips, careless that by doing so she bloodied all the bosom of her gown. She issued her instructions to the wordless embalmers, signed to her maidens, and followed the grizzled captain up out of the dampness below, to the greater dampness above.
* * *
The rains fell droning on the rooftops and towers of the Citadel, running down the slick stone sides, and forming arching white sprays below, where the drains from the cisterns’ overflow projected out of the cliffside. Down the spray fell in mists far below concealing the palace dump-heaps. Trade, travel and war were at a standstill. Entertainment was hard to come by, and unsatisfying even then. The nobles all were gone, to their estates or Vapio in the deeper South. Thither Ilal had gone, more the wanton than ever since Elnavis’s death. Only Allissál was confined to lifeless Tarendahardil, sitting miserable in the cold marble halls, with nothing in her ears but the melancholy echoes of water dripping from the vaulted ceilings and the endless droning voice of Dornan Ural.
He had expressed concern when he had first seen her expression. ‘I would be much improved with more freedom,’ she answered flatly.
‘Ah, little steps must go before leaps, your majesty,’ he uttered in banal cheerfulness, drawing yet another armful of scrolls from the bags his clerks bore and spreading them on the table before her. ‘Worry not – Tarendahardil is secure. Your majesty will see that I am right. Ara-Karn will never cross the Taril.’
She affixed the new Imperial Seal upon yet another document and thrust it aside. She did not bother to mock him now. Akrion and Orovil had fallen swiftly, along with the lesser cities; now the entire North was in the hand of Ara-Karn. During the winter he would secure the hinterlands, scouring the wild hills and wastelands to destroy the last ragged bands of resistors; then half the round world would be his.
Dornan Ural continued, as the documents came and went. The repairs to the sewers, the trials of the officials, the mood of the populace – which was only half so irritable as her own. She sat listening, hearing none of it, a sour look on her face. Dornan Ural signed to the clerk, who poured out another pouchful of scrolls.
The stores of grain were running below their accustomed levels due to the numbers of fugitives from the North, Dornan Ural said; and the Prophetess had predicted a long and severe winter. Fighting was reported in the Thieves’ Quarter, and several deaths, Dornan Ural reported: would it not be wiser to call off this fruitless quest for the Sorean’s assassin? There had been another sacrifice at the Brown Temple, Dornan Ural confided; the responses had not, however, been auspicious. An embassy from Pelthar awaited without, Dornan Ural revealed, returning the gifts sent to Orolo; had not he, Dornan Ural, said it was too great an extravagance? Now, the income from harbor-duties, due to the cessation of trade with the North—
‘Oh, to the Darklands with it all!’ she swore, sweeping the scrolls to the floor. She rose, throwing the mantle from her brow and shaking loose her hair. Trampling the parchment with her heels, she flung herself from the hall. Behind her an embarrassed, startled Dornan Ural looked after her, then knelt and began care
fully to gather the torn and dirty scrolls into his bosom.
She strode through the empty corridors of the huge Palace like a prisoned wild beast. Qhelvin’s funeral had been a miserable, sodden affair, making her all too aware of her lack of real achievements up to now. The League was unformed and all hung in suspension, moveless and immovable – was she to be undone by nothing greater than a foul spate of weather? When the slave came timidly to announce the return of the Gerso Charan she did not even answer, but went straight to his chambers in the upper levels.
She found him wearied and mudspattered, but she did not allow him so much as a word. ‘None of your mission, the weather or politics,’ she warned him. ‘It clings to us like a dirtied cloak. Enough of this ceaseless rain! Let bring your gear below as it is: we travel hence. I will be free of it!’
That very waking they departed, journeying the Way of Fulmine toward the dark horizon. Allissál led them, urging on her fierce mare Kis Halá, setting a pace the attendants found difficult to maintain. They turned off the Imperial highway, going northward into the mountains that marched the Empire’s darkward borders, between northern Fulmine and southern Rukor. So in a few more passes of reckless riding she brought them into view of the palace of her childhood. Rising from the knees of ancient snowbound giants the towers of the palace seemed pink fingers against the silvery rocky walls, shining in splendor, eclipsed by neither rain nor cloud.
Allissál spurred on Kis Halá up past the sleepy little village and into the palace courtyard, snow bursting like clouds beneath her mare’s hooves. She came round in a sweeping turn, and the high walls and towers spun before her, and she laughed in little steamy clouds. Gone was her listlessness, gone her melancholy – gone, her pent-up rage.
She cast her eyes lovingly over the old courtyard as the others came clattering in behind her. ‘This was home to me once, Jade,’ she said, gesturing about her at the icy marble and charsonton. ‘Then I hated it and schemed only to escape. Now it is joyous to return; most especially now, in the deep of winter.’
