The Mirror Empire

by Kameron Hurley

  Zezili was a brutal mistress; demanding, violent. She entertained herself with him until his vision was hazy, pain and desire twisting his insides, turning his voice to a high-pitched wail, begging for release. Yet when she finished with him, he felt somehow obscene, disassembled. She knew him for what he was.

  And he loved her for it.

  He sat awake nights and cut himself while she was away; the insides of his arms, his thighs. He spent time examining the big blue veins in his wrists, wondering if Zezili would mourn him if he died, or simply have him replaced, as she would her dog, or one of her dajians.

  But he always put the knife back down, and stored it at the back of the drawer of his dressing table behind a box of white powder, among the kerchiefs. He hoped Daolyn would find it someday, or Zezili, and ask, “What’s wrong?”

  When Zezili came home for her week of leave she dragged him to bed – twice a day at least, during leave.

  After, he bathed. She attended her guests.

  He sat at the end of his bed and began the old ritual, the simple cuts. The knife was comforting in his hand. The knife was something he could control.

  He concentrated on the lines, the perfect symmetry. It calmed him.

  As he cut, the air around him stirred. His vision blurred. Blood welled down his thigh. A strong wind knocked him back. Bloody haze crept across his vision. The knife slipped, plunged deeply. He cried out.

  The world opened.

  He fell against the bed, knocking his head. But then the bed was gone. He continued to fall back into… nothing. Darkness. He screamed, and scrambled back toward the light. Cold bit at his skin. The air around him swarmed with a fiery mist.

  As he groped back into the room, the door opened. Daolyn stood there. Her face contorted. She put her fist to her mouth.

  Anavha sat on his knees. Began to shake. His ears popped. The black portal winked out. Half of his bed went missing with it, and the red gauze across his vision lifted. The floor was scorched. Something tickled his lip. He wiped his face and saw his nose was bleeding. The terror was so deep he could not move. Could not think.

  Zezili shook him.

  His wife was shaking him.

  He told her, about the door.

  She slapped him.

  Anavha began to cry in earnest.

  “But he’s not a sorcerer,” Zezili said. “He was tested as a child, just like anyone else.”

  Anavha had washed and dressed. He stood now outside the sitting room where Zezili met with their local priest and barely-gifted tirajista, Karosia Soafin. The other guest had been sent to bed in the quarters across the courtyard. Anavha should have been asleep as well, but the fear and terror of what had happened still coursed through him. He spit out the draught Daolyn had given him to soothe his nerves.

  “It’s possible to miss one, here and there,” Karosia said. “My concern is not that he is gifted. My concern is the manifestation of his gift.”

  “I requested a commonplace husband,” Zezili said. “If he’s gifted I won’t have him in my house. Those boys go to the Seekers, not the mardanas.”

  Anavha wanted to claw open the door and beg her to reconsider. Surely it was some kind of fluke. An accident.

  “Is it possible it was someone else?” Zezili said. “Some untrained itinerant passing through who attacked my house?”

  “It is… doubtful,” Karosia said.

  “It must have been an outsider.”

  “Syre Zezili, my deep concern here is that the ability your husband has manifested has all the hallmarks of a skill we haven’t seen in thousands of years. This is a matter for the Seekers. We should call Ryyi Tulana.”

  “Rhea’s bloody bit,” Zezili said, “I have no time for this. He was tested. He isn’t gifted. And what kind of gift is that? Opening spaces to nowhere? Disintegrating furniture? Who ever heard of that? All I need to know is if he’ll harm himself or others again.”

  “Without assessing his abilities, I cannot say. If you’ll allow me to bring him to the local Seeker escort for an assessment –”

  “He’s not gifted.”

  “Syre Zezili, I must humbly disagree. He may even have a very special talent. He may be able to draw on the power of all satellites, perhaps even, well, the dark star… It’s uncommon, but the astronomers say -”

  “An omajista? No. That’s all myth and nonsense.

  Anavha pressed his palm to his fluttering heart, trying to calm it. Some part of him hoped to be taken away, to ease the monotony. But hearing Zezili insist that he stay comforted him. Somewhere, beneath all the anger and rage, she loved him very much.

  “I’ll have my dajians keep a close eye on him,” Zezili said.

  “If you are to keep him here, I suggest that one of my order come to check on him, especially if, as you say, you are to be deployed on a long campaign.”

  Anavha heard a rustling. Someone standing. He moved away from the door.

  “Thank you for your council,” Zezili said. “I will take it under advisement.”

  Anavha hurried through the morning light streaming into the courtyard and hid in his room. Daolyn and the house dajians had removed his old bed, and set a temporary mattress in its place. He toed the scorched floor. They had not been able to scrub the marks out. The stones themselves had melted.

  He sat in front of his vanity mirror and scrutinized his face. Zezili was right, of course. He wasn’t gifted. It had to be some accident. Some trick. Zezili had many enemies. He opened the drawer at his side. Stared at the bloody knife and kerchief there. Perhaps he just needed to be more careful, for a while. There was no telling who would want to hurt him to strike at Zezili.

  When the door opened, his heart leapt. He expected Zezili. But it was just Daolyn. She closed the door and came up behind him. She began to unplait his hair.

  “Where’s the usual girl?” Anavha said. It had been many years since Daolyn took the time to do his hair.

  Her strong fingers loosened the tiny plaits. He watched his dark, twisted hair come free, one strand at a time.

  “You’ll need to be careful, now,” Daolyn said.

  “Why?” Anavha said. “Zezili will take care of me.”

  “Only so long as you are useful to her,” Daolyn said. “Only so long as she believes she controls you.” She began to knot the front of his hair up, to create a crown that ran from his left ear to his right.

  “I am hers,” Anavha said. “She knows that.”

  “Perhaps,” Daolyn said. “But perhaps things will change.”

  “They won’t change,” Anavha said.

  “The only constant is change,” Daolyn said. “Be ready, child.”

  “You don’t understand what it’s like,” Anavha said. “I’m all alone here. All I have is Zezili.”

  Daolyn tied off his braid and began forming a new one, her face neutral. She smoothed the back of his head, like his mother had done when he was a child. “It must indeed be difficult,” she said, “to be so alone.”

  “It is,” Anavha said.

  She completed the rest of the hair styling in silence, the perfectly obedient dajian Zezili always said she was.

  But her words unsettled him. He wanted to take the knife from the drawer and throw it away. What would happen if he cut himself again? What would happen if Zezili was wrong?

  Zezili’s week of leave was compounded again by the arrival of her near-cousin, Tanasai Laosina, as Zezili and Monshara completed their plans for their assault on the largest of the dajian camps.

  Tanasai was returning from another foray around the islands selling off dajians to pay her gambling debts. Her arrival was heralded by pounding on the door and the screaming of Zezili’s name. It was her usual greeting. She enjoyed getting drunk and blaming the hardships and shortcomings of her life on Zezili.

  Zezili had given Daolyn permission to admit near-kin, but even Zezili was surprised when Tanasai burst through the estate and pounded directly into Zezili’s chamber where Zezili sat astride Anavha.


  Tanasai shouted, “Why did she give you this campaign? I was up next for a grand campaign and you gutted it!”

  Zezili pushed herself off Anavha and stood, naked. “What’s this about?”

  Tanasai’s dark eyes were wild, red-rimmed. She sounded as if she’d been drinking. She pulled off her helm, letting loose her matted mane of stringy curls.

  “I come home and the whole city’s talking about it, her giving you some secret campaign. Is she having you take over my legion, too? Is she trying to take off my title?”

  Anavha was reaching for his clothes, making little ducking motions, as if hoping Tanasai would not see him.

  “She said nothing of the sort,” Zezili said. “Go sit down. I’ll dress. Daolyn will bring you some… tea.”

  “I want answers, near-cousin,” Tanasai spat.

  Tanasai trudged into the courtyard.

  Zezili dressed and met Tanasai in the sitting room. Tanasai had already broken the lock on the liquor cabinet and acquired a flagon of wine.

  “So, what’s this business?” Tanasai asked.

  “I’m fucking my husband,” Zezili said. “What’s your business?”

  “You know what I’m asking.”

  “It’s just an errand for the Empress. Not a campaign. We won’t invade Aaldia or Tordin without you,” Zezili said.

  “You better not.”

  “I’m on my week’s leave.”

  “And making the most of it,” Tanasai sneered.

  “I don’t have to pay for sex,” Zezili said. Zezili had shared Anavha with her four blood-sisters, but not Tanasai. She couldn’t abide the idea of Tanasai touching anything that belonged to her.

  “She always favored you best,” Tanasai said, and Zezili wondered if Tanasai meant her mother, or the Empress. Likely, both. Zezili’s mother had hated Zezili, but when Zezili’s mother’s sister died, she had hated the burden of caring for wild-haired Tanasai more.

  “You know what you came to know,” Zezili said. “Go tend your pasture of drunks.”

  Tanasai’s face flushed a deep red. She shoved her helm back on. She sputtered something - maybe something in Tordinian - that sounded like a curse, and stepped abruptly out of the sitting room, carrying several bottles of Zezili’s liquor. She marched through the courtyard, screaming at dajians as she went. Tanasai had good reason to want to lead a legion against Tordin. It was the only way she would make a name for herself that wasn’t synonymous with that of a drunkard.

  Zezili followed her to the door. Daolyn locked the gate behind her.

  “Do I have to let her in anymore?” Daolyn asked.

  “No. If I’m not here, don’t let her enter. She won’t be happy until this campaign is over, and the Empress sends us to fight the people we should actually be fighting.”

  The rest of her leave passed uneventfully. Anavha cried a bit over some perceived hurt or other, and Zezili ignored him until he became docile again. He had no more… episodes. She chalked up the business in his room to some outside anomaly. On the day of her departure, he threw himself at her feet, and cried and begged her not to go. Zezili curled a lip in disgust. She made Daolyn pull him off.

  She dressed in a clean tunic and newly polished armor, and cinched on her skirt of metal and dajians’ hair. Daolyn checked all of her straps and knots, and Zezili took her leave. Daolyn closed the door behind her. Zezili patted Dakar in greeting, fed him a treat, and mounted.

  Monshara already waited there, sitting atop a massive black and white bear.

  “There’s been enough fucking in your house for eight women,” Monshara said.

  “I fight better than I fuck, if that’s any consolation,” Zezili said.

  “I look forward to finally seeing it.”

  They traveled northeast, to the city of Cholina, and met Zezili’s second, Syre Jasoi, and three hundred of the five thousand members of Zezili’s legion. Jasoi had cleaned up for the occasion, and smelled heavily of pomade. She had knobby knees and a pinched, fox-like face, but she was good with a blade and smart on the field, for a Tordinian.

  Monshara inspected the lines of women for nearly an hour before finally reining up beside Zezili. “They’ll do,” she said. “Some are very drunk, however.”

  “We’re only killing a few dajians,” Zezili said, “not invading Saiduan.”

  Monshara barked a hollow laugh. The laugh went on and on, far more laughter than Zezili thought the joke warranted.

  “Will you introduce me?” Monshara asked, when she recovered.

  Zezili grimaced, but spurred her dog forward and called to the line, “This is Monshara, my co-general. You will obey her as you would me. Disobeying her is disobeying me. I will personally mete out punishment to any woman displaying insubordination. You’ll be stripped and lashed to start, and hung if necessary. Our duty in the coming months is a simple but critical task. I received it from the lips of the Empress herself.” Zezili paused for effect. Tried to think how she’d have responded if her own superior told her what she was about to propose.

  “For centuries the dajians have been a plague on our country. Cannibalistic parasites whose cheap labor keeps you all from cozy jobs in your old age. You spent your youth on patrols, putting down petty dajian insurgencies instead of conquering land for the Empress. You’ve wasted the better part of your lives policing a people that are little better to us than pack animals. Now the day has come to put our country in order. Our Empress has tasked us with their removal. We free our country from their tyranny. We free ourselves. We march to the Saolyndara camp to the north, and we offer their blood to Rhea. Today we take back our country.”

  The cheer then was more exuberant than Zezili expected. She plastered a grin onto her face. I’m Dorinah, she thought. If there was any doubt, today will prove that.

  The killing started not long after. They purged three small camps of half-starved dajians near Saolyndara, rounding them up from the local farms that rented them for day labor. Zezili killed at least forty herself, with her own hands. It was a strange, senseless sort of killing that drove Zezili to drink, after. She had no trouble killing people for a cause, but this was a waste of her talent, and the talent of her women. There was no honor in it, no satisfaction. It was like murdering litters of puppies.

  What was the Empress trying to accomplish? She had to know how much this would disrupt the harvest next year. Half of Dorinah would starve if the dajians were dead. Zezili wanted to ask Monshara, but feared the answer. Do as you’re told, the Empress would say. Don’t you trust my love for you?

  Then they cleared the big camp inside Saolyndara proper. They murdered eight hundred and forty seven dajians there.

  As Zezili sat in her tent that afternoon, penning a long, laborious letter to the Empress, the muddy blood of the dead caked her boots. The day was clear and warm, but the blood had turned the field to mud.

  Monshara met her in the tent after the count was made. She removed her shiny armored helm and regarded Zezili with gray eyes.

  “What?” Zezili asked.

  “You were right,” Monshara said.

  Zezili grunted.

  “You are better at killing than fucking,” Monshara said.

  “You best consult with my husband before making that judgment.”

  “I could consult, or know for myself.”

  Zezili snorted. “Not interested. I don’t rent him out.”

  “Not him.”

  “I’m still not interested.”

  “A shame.” Monshara put back on her helm, so when Zezili finally looked at her, she could not see her expression clearly. She half-thought the woman was joking.

  “It’s a week’s travel to the next camp,” Zezili said. “If you’re itching, Cholina has a good mardana.”

  “It’s not that kind of itch,” Monshara said, and left the tent.

  Zezili frowned. She heard something drip onto the page, and saw a spot of blood. She looked up. Someone had tossed a bloody, severed arm onto the top of the tent.
Blood had soaked through the thin hide.

  She grimaced and moved to the other side of the table.

  Saolyndara’s done, she wrote. Eight hundred and forty seven dajians dispatched at the main camp, at your order. We begin our march to our next camp tomorrow. I will update you at its end. I do hope you will give me a more challenging campaign. My women make better fighters than butchers.

  She sealed the letter.

  Outside, she heard someone keening.

  The cry was cut short.

  She scratched out “forty seven” and wrote “forty eight.”

  Monshara ducked back into the tent. “Are you coming?”

  “For what?” Zezili asked.

  “We’re opening a gate,” Monshara said. “My sovereign wants to meet you, and I don’t want all this fine Dhai blood to go to waste.”

  15.

  Two weeks after his sister’s death, Ahkio took the title of Kai. He stood at the center of the great Sanctuary at the heart of Oma’s temple, bathed in the crimson light of the double suns streaming through the red face of Oma represented in the domed glass above him. The elder Oras were all in attendance, as well as the temple’s full Oras and their assistants, but as Elder Ora Gaiso bathed his hair in his sister’s blood, he saw that just half the country’s clan leaders sat in attendance. Nasaka had told him that before the ceremony, but hearing a thing and seeing it were different experiences. Fear and horror gripped him suddenly, powerfully, and he could not shake it. Nasaka had offered him a way out of taking up this burden, and he’d refused it. Now he was alone amid a sea of faces who saw an ungifted boy given a sacred title that few, if any, believed him capable of holding for any length of time.

  He glanced over at Nasaka. Her face was, as ever, unreadable. She sat at a table with Elaiko and the clan leader of Sorai - Hona Fasa Sorai - her assistant, and another young woman, very fair, in her mid-twenties who Ahkio took to be Hona’s daughter.

  Eight letters to Meyna had gone unanswered. Still, Ahkio searched for her face among those sitting behind Nasaka at the great yellow adenoak tables. The only kin he saw were distant cousins, twice or three times removed. Only Liaro had written him, a letter of sympathy for Kirana’s death. He kept it under his pillow where he slept now, in Kirana’s large bed behind the Kai study, at the very top of the temple.