“The Emperor’s cartographers would burn their children for five minutes in this room,” Lin said. “Providing it is accurate.”
“We should move on,” Sarine said. “Zi said this place would have answers for what’s coming.”
Lin and Yuli both hesitated, each lingering over different sections of the map. She could have done the same—studying new lands, or recognizing familiar ones. But they had a purpose here, and however curious the relics, they brought her no closer to understanding.
“What are we looking for, Anati?” she said as they left the chamber. The smooth stone and concave walls persisted into the hallway, offering left and right paths that curved out of sight.
My father said it was time for you to visit the Soul, Anati thought. It is here. Close.
She glanced left and right. The pathways seemed identical. The Soul, Anati had said. Which way would it be?
I don’t know. I haven’t been here before, either.
Well, that stood to reason. She led Lin and Yuli down the rightward path, following its curve around the corner, revealing another series of winding turns. Easier to retrace their steps if she followed a consistent rule, so she kept right wherever the opportunity presented itself to change. Wherever they were, it gave every sign of emptiness and cleanliness at once. No sign of dust or dirt, nor even the slightest chip or rough patch in the stone. The hallways should have been dark without torches, lamps, or windows, but they were lit evenly, a soft light seeming to come from all directions. Apart from the three of them the halls were empty, but more than once she stopped to look behind or second-guess a turn and thought she saw movement at the corner of her eye.
They began to pass chambers, each as strangely appointed as the map room. One was covered in animal furs, with woven blankets and what appeared to be freshly shorn pelts piled in place of furniture. Another could have been lifted from New Sarresant, with ornately carved wood chairs and chaises upholstered in the most fashionable patterns, racks of scrolls and books, and a darkwood desk at its center. Still another looked as though it had been recently destroyed, its low couches and tables covered in wood splinters and down from its pillows, though only parts of the chamber were broken, with the rest immaculate, as though they’d interrupted a cleaning partway through.
The passages continued on, and she began to feel a pulsing energy as they walked. A sense of rightness, growing with each turn, some of it mirrored by the Veil’s emotions, but the better part of it seemed to come from her. A sense of familiarity.
The hallway opened into a vast chamber when there were no more turns to take. She stepped inside, and for the first time since coming here, they were no longer alone.
The chamber was wide and empty, an amphitheater without seating or a stage. At its center a torrent of energy burned, the same column of pure white light she’d seen in their passage here. Echoes of memories washed through her, looking at it, and most of those came from the Veil: revulsion, anger, hate, betrayal. Her attention was directed to the two men standing beside the column. One a hulking giant, head and shoulders taller than the largest men she’d ever seen, and the other was Reyne d’Agarre.
D’Agarre turned to notice her before the giant did, and they stared at each other in mutual shock. It was him. The same sand-colored hair and blue eyes. The same red coat. The same smug surety in his face, despite the signs of surprise overwriting his usual veneer of confidence. Even his long knife hung at his belt, the weapon he’d used to kill dozens of innocents. Everything about him was frozen, exactly as it had been on the day of the battle in the city.
“Sarine,” Reyne said, and her name earned the giant’s attention, the massive man whirling to lay eyes on her, Lin and Yuli with even greater shock than showed in Reyne’s face.
“No,” the giant said. “No, it isn’t time.”
“Wait,” she said. “I’m here for answers, not to fight.” She could feel a hundred tethers between the giant and the leylines running beneath the room. So far none had materialized as Entropy, Body, Mind, or Shelter, but she kept Death strands at the ready all the same. Any moment he could erupt into a dozen copies of himself, hurling fire and putting barriers up to halt their advance. The giant stared death at her, as though the slightest word or step could set him in motion.
“Sarine,” Reyne repeated. “It’s you, isn’t it? Not the Veil.” He said it as though he meant to reassure his companion, but the giant had already turned his gaze on Yuli, looking between her and Sarine.
“Erris d’Arrent,” the giant said.
“No,” Sarine said, at the same time Reyne shook his head, laying a hand on the giant’s arm.
“That isn’t d’Arrent,” Reyne said. “The High Commander is shorter. I’d know her on sight. This is … someone else.”
“I am Yuli Twin Fangs Clan Hoskar,” Yuli said.
“Clan Hoskar,” the giant said. “And the other one: a child of the East. Together. With the Veil.”
“I am Lin Qishan,” Lin said. “Captain, and scion of a great house.”
“A great house,” the giant said. “A Great and Noble House, more like.”
With that the giant erupted into deep laughter. It echoed through the chamber, made all the more strange by his laughing alone.
“Fools,” the giant said. “Axerian warned me it was bad, but I never imagined … this.”
Suddenly Axerian’s stories clicked in her mind. This was one of Axerian’s companions: the strategist, the foremost among them, who touched the leylines and led their armies in battle. The central figure in more than half the holy texts, the man who had accepted the Nameless’s surrender after the Grand Betrayal. The Exarch, whom Axerian had called by his mortal name.
“Paendurion,” she said.
Hearing it seemed to sober him. “So, you remember that much at least.”
“I came here to learn,” she said. “I have a part to play in what’s coming, and I need to know what to do, to face the shadows, when they arrive.”
Paendurion stepped back from the column of light, moving toward her cautiously, as a hunter might stalk prey.
“How much do you know, of what lies ahead?” Paendurion asked. “How much do you know of what happened before? And how is it you come to be in the company of two of the Regnant’s magi, here, in the Gods’ Seat?”
He’d switched tongues to a stilted, clipped manner of speech. Anati translated it for her; d’Agarre’s kaas would do the same, though Yuli and Lin wouldn’t understand.
“I journeyed through the Divide,” she said. “I faced the shadows there. I thought, if I could reach his champions, I could end the fight before … the ascensions.”
“You attacked the Regnant?” Paendurion said.
“No,” she said. “Well … yes. He attacked us.”
“And you survived?”
Of course she survived, Anati thought to the room. She’s here, isn’t she?
Paendurion laughed again. “Fairly said, serpent,” he said. “But I gather you didn’t slay the Regnant in your travels?”
“No,” she said quietly. “And not all of us survived the journey. Axerian …”
“I know,” Paendurion said. “He’s dead.”
“I didn’t mean for it to happen,” she said.
“Of course you didn’t,” Paendurion said. “The consequence of poor planning. I warned him. And Ad-Shi. And now I am alone, facing the enemy with untrained fools, with the fate of our world on my back.”
“There is learning to be done, here,” Reyne said. “A great library, a store of all the world’s knowledge. I know we had our differences, before, but we want the same things. I’m certain we can find whatever answers you seek, if Paendurion doesn’t know them already.”
His words grated on her; the very idea of listening to him speak was vile. Part of her wanted to reject even a library full of knowledge, if it came from d’Agarre’s hand. But the better part of her had been taken by fear. Fear of what was coming. Fear of what she had to know ho
w to do.
Lin had separated from them, pacing around the chamber, eyeing the column of light. Go to the Soul, Zi had said. He had to mean this chamber, the light that spanned both the physical world and the strange place she’d found with the blue sparks. She had to use whatever she found here, whether it sickened her or no.
“What is this place?” she asked, forcing herself to speak to Reyne. “You came here … after?”
“Yes,” Reyne said. “Only when I got here, the light was trapped, imprisoned in a crystal.”
“She doesn’t need to dwell on the past,” Paendurion said. “She needs to learn how to turn the Soul, in case we lose. A secret we never learned. A secret we never needed. Perhaps it is here, somewhere, but—”
He cut short in a spasm and a wail of pain, and for a moment Sarine tensed, preparing for an attack. But no—instead glass shards protruded from his back, a spray of icicle-length daggers stuck deep in his skin. Paendurion whirled around, the hundred leyline tethers she’d sensed around him suddenly snapping into place. But instead of fighting, Paendurion wove a mix of every type of leyline energy and vanished, leaving a cloud of gray mist, green motes, and white pearls hovering where he’d been standing, as though the leylines had erupted into the physical world.
Lin let slip a cry of victory, then sprinted toward the center of the chamber.
Red came, and lakiri’in, and Body. Too slow. Lin touched the column at the center of the room, incinerating herself in a dazzling flash of light.
64
ERRIS
Fontcadeau Green
The Royal Palace, Rasailles
Trumpets blared a too-loud herald of her arrival as her coach rolled to a slow stop on the edge of the green. Voren—Fei Zan—looked her over as the footmen dismounted, taking up places to open the door and reveal her to the world. An Empress required an entrance, a formal reception, and a ceremony of investiture. A reminder that she might never be entirely free of the hurdles in her path, when all she’d ever wanted was to find victory over her enemies. Well, she’d reformed the army well enough. Perhaps she could do the same to the state, in time.
“You almost look the part, High Commander,” Voren said. “Are you ready?”
“Better if it was finished an hour ago, and better still if it were done last week.”
Voren smiled. She wasn’t sure why he’d returned to wearing the old man’s features, but she found she drew a perverse comfort in them, even knowing what he was. “The people must have their symbols,” Voren said. “Easier to lead a battle wearing a general’s uniform with battle standards and aides-de-camp than as a peasant shouting orders from the sidelines.”
The door swung wide, revealing sculpted grass and hedges along the winding path through the green. One of the footmen stepped to try to offer a hand, which she dismissed. Perhaps if she’d agreed to wear the ridiculous dresses the clothiers had tried to push on her—the height of fashion in Old Sarresant, so they’d claimed—she might have needed assistance for something so trivial as dismounting a carriage. Instead she’d decided on full military dress, embellished to make a new rank above High Commander: six stars on her collar and sleeves, a gold-embroidered sash to match her epaulets displaying the blue-white-blue of the Republic. Empress. And let it be a military rank. Fuck the trappings of Kings, Lords, and the nobility.
“Better if you stay behind,” she said to Voren. “They’ll have plenty enough to talk about already.”
Voren inclined his head. “As you command, Your Majesty.” He said it with a touch of mirth, and she felt none of it.
“Head back to high command,” she said. “See to it we’re prepared to move my flag across the sea.”
“More than enough support staff with the ships,” Voren said. “Anyone else in particular you want with us?”
“Vassail,” she said. “Even if her leg isn’t up to it, I want her at headquarters, if not in the field. Acherre, and the Yanjins.”
Voren bowed his head again, and she turned back toward the green. Easier by far, to make her way in a world of soldiers, logistics, and strategy. But then, politics had its own battles. She’d been plunged into it like a sword in a forge, hammered by the deaths of twenty-seven priests in her reconquest of the city. Now she was ready to be drawn and used, a cutting edge to be deployed against her enemies. Power gave her the means to reform the haphazard apparatus of the Republic, rewarding merit above all else, a state where ability propelled excellence, instead of miring decisions in blood and favors.
She held her place at the center of the path while her soldiers fell in, and they began a march, so similar to the exercises she’d been drilled on as a child. The thrum of their steps echoed through the green, all the way to the palace walls, where their true audience awaited. A gathering of the prominent, such as was left of them in the Republic. Former assemblymen, hopeful of kissing the right sets of asses to find themselves a place in the new Imperial bureaucracy. Priests, those who had already submitted to Need to prove their loyalty. Artisans and merchants, even the few remaining nobles who had managed to survive the terrors following the first revolution. Generals and envoys from Villecours, Lorrine, l’Euillard, and every corner of the country. Red-coated Gandsmen, and Gand nobles, too, since she was meant to be Empress over them, the same as her countrymen. They watched from the steps leading into the palace receiving grounds, rows upon rows of eyes extending from the first platform all the way into the cathedral at the palace’s heart.
The way through the grounds was empty, save for more binders, each one also bound by Need. Her procession made its way around the winding garden path, receiving salutes from each man along the way, until they reached the base of the palace steps, and traded the admiration and love of her soldiers for a solemn quiet from the rest.
A chilling reminder of the attempted coup against her. The crowd was silent, watching her approach with due reverence and reserve. But neither was there any love in the tradesfolk’s eyes, nor in the Gandsmen who had been placed with them outside the church. They gave her the awe and deference due a conqueror. A double row of onlookers watched as she climbed the steps, her binders moving ahead to clear the path and keep a circle of scarred hands around her, their marques serving as a warning as sure as their blue coats and insignia of rank.
A herald stepped in front of her procession as they made way across the receiving grounds, bringing her to a halt in front of the church’s wide double doors.
“She approaches,” the herald called, and a wave of boots and footsteps sounded as those inside the cathedral rose to their feet. She could see inside: a hall packed as tight as propriety allowed, with shows of fashion and wealth from gold and jewels to furs and velvet. A row of priests stood around the dais, their plain brown robes in stark contrast to the rest of the attendees. And the way forward was empty, an aisle cut through the center, barred only by her herald and another priest.
“Who comes forward to lead the Republic?” the priest spoke, loud enough to be heard even outside the doors.
“Erris d’Arrent,” the herald said. “A woman of common birth, who has saved our country thrice over from its enemies.”
The weight of every eye had turned to her. Thank the Gods she hadn’t allowed Essily to stuff her into civilian couture. Hearing a litany of her exploits while dressed like something she was not would sting as deep as any wound she’d earned in battle.
“By what right does she claim the mantle of leadership?” the priest asked.
“By right of conquest,” the herald said, “and strength of arms. By the divinity invested from the Gods, through whom she wields the gifts of the holy lines. By the will to protect us from our enemies, without and within.”
“Let her come forward, then,” the priest said, “and be seen.”
The cathedral thrummed again, as those already standing moved to crane their necks toward the doors. Essily had drilled her on her steps in the ceremony, but she saw Voren’s touch, and Tuyard’s, in the words already spoken
and the pomp of the crowd. She waited as her binders went before her, forming a double column on either side of the central aisle. Then the herald beckoned her forward, and she stepped inside.
The interior defied any expectations she’d had of the cathedral’s size. High arches rose overhead, hung with blue banners striped with gold, twenty handspans above the floor where they dangled the lowest. The main hall forked in three directions, each one packed full of attendees, clustered beneath stained-glass reliefs depicting each of the three Gods. The central dais sat beneath a depiction of the Exarch, clad in heavy steel, raising his sword and shield as though he were pointing the way for all to follow. The Oracle and the Veil’s wings were lined with lookers-on, but at their heads two conductors led two choirs in a ringing hymn the instant her feet touched the tile. The song took her by surprise; a booming men’s chorus on the left, and peals from their counterparts in a women’s chorus on the right. The whole interior was on its feet as she came forward to their accompaniment, and it was all she could do to keep her steps steady as she made her approach.
Again she saw Voren’s hand, and Tuyard’s, in their choice of the Rasailles cathedral—private worship hall for the nobility, during the Duc-Governor’s rule—and in the priests standing above the central dais. The ceremony had the trappings of the faith in every aspect, save her choice of a military uniform for attire. Clothe her in robes and give her a gem-encrusted broadsword, and it could well be a scene put on by the Basilica, a heraldry on a feast day to celebrate the Exarch’s Triumph, the Nameless’s Surrender, the Oracle’s Acceptance, or the Veil’s Sacrifice. For her it served instead as a reminder of the resistance she’d encountered in the streets on her march into the city. But there was no sign of that defiance here today.
The crowd’s silence had maintained, only now with the trappings of faith it played as reverence, rather than awe. There would be resentment, at home alongside ambition and greed. She meant to see to it they all counted for nothing. And much as she understood Voren and Tuyard’s nod to the faith, it had never been her way. What was a throne, if not a means to shape the world according to her vision? The hymns punctuated her thoughts as she covered the last steps. She was here to harden the Republic against its enemies. Religion, politics, and ancient blood counted for nothing against the power to wage war. In the worst times, it was the only power that mattered.
Blood of the Gods Page 59
