by Tad Williams
Raemon Beck squeezed his eyes shut and gasped for breath, waiting to die. When he had stayed unmoving long enough to become aware of his aching back and ribs, of the pounding of his head and the countless cuts and scratches on his skin, he opened his eyes once more. The fog was gone. He was in the shade of a deep dell, but he could see bits of blue sky above him through the leaves.
He sat up and looked around. The dell was empty.
Beck dragged himself to his feet, wincing but doing his best to remain silent, then crept back along the path of broken branches left by his horse’s flight from the road. There was no sign of the horse. There was no noise from any animals or men. Beck braced himself for the terrible scene he knew he would find.
He reached the road. A horse—not his own, but one of the caravan’s—stood there as if waiting for him. Its sides were heaving but it was otherwise unharmed, cropping grass by the roadside. As he walked toward it the horse startled a bit, then allowed itself to be stroked. After a moment it quieted and returned to grazing.
Other than this one animal, the road was empty. Of the dozens of men and horses and mules, the wool wagons, the armored soldiers, and the prince’s daughter, not to mention whatever army of nightmares had attacked them, no sign remained. Even the fog had vanished.
Terror and disbelief squeezed him like a brutal hand. Raemon Beck felt his stomach convulse, then he brought up the remains of his morning meal. He wiped his mouth and clambered hurriedly into the horse’s saddle, grunting at the pain in his ribs and back. His companions had disappeared so completely there was nowhere he could think of to begin a search, and in any case he did not want to search, did not want to spend another instant in this haunted spot. He only wanted to ride and ride until he reached a place where people lived.
He knew he could never come into these hills again. If that meant he must give up his place in the family venture and his wife and children must join him begging for coppers in the street, there was no help for it.
He kicked his heels against his new mount’s ribs and started east, huddled low against the horse’s neck and weeping.
It was early in the morning and she couldn’t sleep—had not slept all night, despite immense weariness. Briony lay in her bed staring into the darkness, listening to the slumber sounds of Rose and Moina and three other young noblewomen who were staying in the castle on this night before Kendrick’s funeral. How could any of them sleep, she wondered. Did they not know that everything was in danger—that the entire kingdom tottered?
If Shaso was the murderer and had acted alone, there could be no comprehensible reason for it, and so how could she trust anyone ever again? If somehow he had been suborned, or if someone else performed this terrible murder and painted him with the blame, then the Eddons had been purposefully struck to the heart by a terrible enemy, and struck as they slept in their own house. How could anyone ever sleep again?
Her heart had begun beating swiftly even before she realized what the new sound was: a quiet knock at the door of her chamber. There were guards outside, she knew. Even that careless fool Ferras Vansen would not leave her unguarded at a time like this. She pulled a cloak over her nightdress—the room and the stone floors were cold—and started toward the door.
But Kendrick had guards, she remembered, and her skin took a deeper chill. He would have thought he was safe, too.
“Princess?” The voice was quiet, but she recognized it. Now she was frightened for a completely different reason. She hurried forward, hesitated again for a moment.
“Chaven? It is you? Truly you?”
“It is.”
“We are here, too, Highness.” It was one of the guards. She recognized the gruff voice, although she couldn’t remember the man’s name. “You can open the door.”
Still, such had been the terror of the last days that she had to force herself not to flinch when the door at last swung open. Chaven and the guards stood waiting in the pool of torchlight outside. The physician’s face was serious and haggard with exhaustion, but the terrible look she expected to see was not there.
“Is it my brother?”
“It is, my lady, but do not fear. I come to say that I think his fever has broken. He will not quickly be himself again, but I strongly believe he will live and recover. He was asking for you.”
“Merciful Zoria! Thank all the gods!” Briony fell to her knees and lowered her head in prayer. She should have been delirious with joy, but instead she was suddenly dizzy. This one terrible fear allayed, it was as though the rigor with which she had held herself up now ended in a moment. She tried to stand, but instead swayed and began to collapse. Chaven and one of the guards caught at her arms.
“We will survive,” she whispered.
“Yes, Princess,” he said, “but tonight you will go back to bed.”
“But, Barrick . . . !” The room still spun around her.
“I will tell him that you will come with the first light. He is probably asleep now, anyway.”
“Tell him I love him, Chaven.”
“I will.”
She allowed herself to be helped onto her own bed—for a moment she could not avoid thinking of poor Kendrick in the hands of the death-maids of Kernios at this very moment. But even this horror, or the walls that seemed slowly to revolve, could not keep exhaustion at bay.
“Tell Barrick . . .” she said, “. . . tell Barrick . . .” but that was all she could manage before weariness finally breached the stronghold and conquered her.
11
Bride of the God
THE BERRIES:
White as bones, red as blood
Red as coals, white as clay
Are none of them sweet?
—from The Bonefall Oracles
IF QINNITAN HAD THOUGHT the autarch’s throne room would be a more intimate setting than the cavernous Temple of the Hive, she would have been very wrong: the majesty of the Golden One’s entourage was even more overwhelming here, the white-and-black-tiled hall packed with hundreds of soldiers and servants and the representatives of dozens of noble families and of trade and bureaucratic interests, all joined together under the eyes of the watchful, wide-eyed gods painted on the ceiling. The autarch himself sat at the center of it all on the great Falcon Throne, an immense bird’s head covered in topaz feathers, the eyes red jasper; Sulepis Bishakh am-Xis III himself was seated beneath the awning made by the upper part of the giant raptor’s gaping golden beak. The autarch was surrounded by his legendary musketeers, the Leopards, and the Leopards were surrounded in turn by an almost equally famous troop of Perikalese mercenaries, the White Hounds. These Hounds were all second or third generation now, their forefathers originally captured by the current autarch’s grandfather in a famous sea battle. Few of them could still speak the language of Perikal, but the master of much of the continent of Xand had more than enough pale-skinned women at his disposal to keep the present generation of Hounds as white as their forebears. They were strange-looking men, these northerners, even to Qinnitan’s frightened, confused gaze, built more like the bears she had seen in pictures than like hounds, hairy and wide-bearded, broad of back and shoulder.
From behind the Perikalese mercenaries, one of the Leopard soldiers was staring at her—an important soldier, judging by the long black tail on his helmet. He had a frown like a gash, and his elaborate armor only emphasized his own broad shoulders. Terrified she had already done something wrong, Qinnitan dropped her eyes.
When she looked up again, the knot of courtiers was moving away from the Falcon Throne, shuffling backward with many bows and flutterings of hands, and she could see the autarch once more. The young god-on-earth leaned back and gazed up at the stretching beak above his head as if the room was empty but for himself, and briefly scratched his long nose. His gold finger-stalls glittered, tiny guardians of the safety of all creation: it was a truth as powerful as the blueness of the sky that the autarch must not accidentally touch something impure.
Qinnitan’s mother was
weeping again. Qinnitan was frightened, too, but she still couldn’t understand such behavior. She bumped her mother’s side with an elbow, a piece of impertinence that would have been unthinkable in most families. “Hush!” she whispered, which would have been thought even more inexplicable.
“We are so lucky!” her mother said, sniffling.
We? Even through the terror at being singled out, the overwhelming strangeness of it all, and even an unavoidable tingle of pride at having somehow caught the eye of the most powerful man in the world, Qinnitan knew one thing: she didn’t want to marry the autarch. There was something about him that frightened her very much, and it was not simply his matchless power or the things she had heard about his cruel whims. There was something in his eyes, something she had never seen in another person, but might have seen once in the eyes of a horse that had bounced its rider off his saddle and then, when the man’s foot caught in the stirrup, dragged him to his death through the crowded marketplace, smashing the rider’s head against the cobbles for a hundred paces before a soldier brought the beast down with an arrow. As the horse lay gasping out its last bubbling red breaths, she had seen its eye rolling in the socket, the eye of something that was not seeing what was really there.
The autarch, although calm and apparently amused by what he observed around him, had such an eye. She did not—did not—want to be given to such a man, to go to his bed, to undress for him and be touched and entered by him, even if he truly was a god upon the earth. The very idea made her shudder as if she had a fever.
Not that she had any other choice. To refuse would be to die, and to see her father and mother and sisters and brothers die before her—and none of the deaths, she felt sure, would be swift.
“Where are the bee-girl’s parents?” the autarch asked suddenly. The room fell silent at his voice. Someone let out a little nervous cough.
“They stand there, Golden One,” said an older man wearing what looked like ceremonial armor made out of silver cloth, pointing a finger toward the place where Qinnitan’s mother and father huddled facedown on the stone floor. Qinnitan suddenly realized she had not abased herself, and put her head down. She imagined the man in silver cloth must be Pinimmon Vash, the paramount minister.
“Bring them up,” commanded the autarch in his strong, high voice. Someone coughed again. It sounded loud in the silence that followed the autarch’s words and she was terribly glad it wasn’t either of her parents.
“Do you give her up to be the bride of the god?” the minister asked her mother and father, who still cowered, unable to look up at the autarch. Even through her own misery, Qinnitan was ashamed of her father. Cheshret was a priest, able to stand before the altar of Nushash himself, so why should he be unable to face the autarch?
“Of course,” her father said. “We are honored . . . so . . . we are . . .”
“Yes, you are.” The autarch flicked his glittering finger at a wooden casket. “Give the money to them. Jeddin, send some of your men to help them carry it home.” The Leopard soldier who had been staring at her earlier murmured a few words and two of the autarch’s riflemen stepped forward and lifted the chest. It was clearly heavy.
“Ten horses worth of silver,” the autarch said. “Generous payment for the honor of bringing your daughter into my house, is it not?”
The men with the money chest had already started back across the throne room. Qinnitan’s parents scrambled awkwardly after it, trying to keep it in sight but not daring to turn their backs even slightly on the autarch.
“You are too kind, Master of the Great Tent,” her father called, bowing and bowing. “You bring too much honor on our house.” Qinnitan’s mother was crying again. A moment later, they were gone.
“Now . . .” said the autarch, then somebody coughed again. The autarch’s lean face writhed in annoyance. “Who is that? Bring him up here.”
Three more Leopards sprang down from the dais and out into the room, their polished, decorated guns held high. The crowd shrank back from them. A moment later they returned to the dais, dragging a frail young man. The crowd drew even farther back, as though he might be carrying a fatal illness, which in fact he probably was, since he had drawn the angry attention of the god-on-earth.
“Do you hate me so much, that you must interrupt me with your braying?” the autarch demanded. The young man, who had fallen onto his knees when the Leopard soldiers let go of him, could only shake his head, weeping with terror. He was so terrified his face had turned the color of saffron. “Who are you?”
The youth was clearly too frightened to answer. At last the paramount minister cleared his throat. “He is an accounting scribe from my ministry of the Treasury. He is good with sums.”
“So are a thousand merchants in Bird Snare Market. Can you tell me any reason I should not have him killed, Vash? He has wasted too much of my time already.”
“Of course he has, Golden One,” said the paramount minister with a gesture of infinite regret. “All I can offer in his favor is that I am told he is a hard worker and very well liked among the other scribes.”
“Is that so?” The autarch stared up at the famous tiled ceiling for a moment, scratched his long nose with a long finger. He already seemed bored with the subject. “Very well, here is my sentence. Leopards, take him away. Beat him and break his bones with the iron bar. Then, if he is to survive, these so-called friends of his in the Treasury may take care of him, feed him, so on. We shall see how far their friendship truly extends.”
The large crowd murmured approvingly at the wisdom of the autarch’s sentence, even as Qinnitan suppressed a shriek of horrified fury. The young man was taken away, his feet dragging on the floor, leaving a wet track like a snail. He had fainted, but not before emptying his bladder. A trio of servitors scurried to wipe the flagstones clean again.
“As for you, girl,” the autarch said, still angry, and Qinnitan’s heart suddenly began to beat even more swiftly. Had he tired of her already? Was he going to have her killed? He had just bought her like a market chicken from her parents and no one would raise a finger to save her. “Stand before me.”
Somehow she made her legs work just well enough to carry her up the steps and onto the dais. She was grateful to reach the spot before the Falcon Throne, grateful to be able to slump down onto her knees and not have to feel them quivering. She put her forehead against the cool stone and wished that time would stop, that she would never have to leave this spot and find out what else was in store for her. A powerful, sweet scent filled her nostrils, threatening to make her sneeze. She peered from half-opened lids. A group of priests had surrounded her like ants on a crumb of cake, blowing incense on her out of bronze bowls, perfuming her for the presence of the autarch.
“You are very lucky, little daughter,” said Pinimmon Vash. “You are favored above almost all women on the earth. Do you know that?”
“Yes, Lord. Of course, Lord.” She pushed her forehead harder against the stone, felt the area of cold spread on her skin. Her parents had sold her to the autarch without even a question as to what might become of her. She wondered if she could hit her head against the tiles hard enough to kill herself before someone stopped her. She didn’t want to marry the lord of the world. Just looking at his long face and strange, birdlike eyes made her heart feel as though it would stop beating. This close, she almost thought she could sense the heat of his body coming off him, as though he were a metal statue that had sat all day in the sun. The idea of those thin-fingered hands touching her, the gold stalls scraping her skin as that face came down onto her own . . .
“Stand up.” It was the autarch himself. She got to her feet, so wobbly that the paramount minister had to put his dry old hand under her elbow. The living god’s pale, pale eyes moved over her body, up to her face, back down over her body. There was no lechery in it, nothing really human: it felt as though she hung on a butcher’s hook.
“She’s thin but not ugly,” said the autarch. “She must go to the Seclusion,
of course. Give her to old Cusy and tell her that this one must have special and very careful treatment. Panhyssir will tell her what is expected.”
To her astonishment, Qinnitan found herself raising her eyes to meet the autarch’s, heard herself say, “Lord, Master, I don’t know why you’ve chosen me, but I will do my best to serve you.”
“You will serve me well,” he said with an odd, childlike laugh.
“May I ask one favor, Great Master?”
“You will address the Autarch Sulepis as ‘Living God on Earth’ or as ‘Golden One,’ ” the paramount minister said sternly, even as the assembled throng murmured at her forwardness.
“Golden One, may I ask a favor?”
“You may ask.”
“May I say good-bye to my sisters in the Hive, my friends? They were very kind to me.”
He looked at her for a moment, then nodded. “Jeddin, send some of your Leopards to take her back for her farewells and to bring with her anything she needs from her old life. Then she will enter the Seclusion.” His pallid eyes narrowed a little. “You do not seem happy with the honor I have given you, girl?”
“I am . . . overwhelmed, Golden One.” Fear had gripped her now. She could barely make her voice loud enough for him to hear a few paces away; she knew that to the rest of those assembled in the vast room she would be unheard, not even a murmur. “Please believe that I do not have the words to describe my happiness.”
The contingent of Leopards marched her through the long passages of the Orchard Palace, a labyrinth that she had only heard about but which, it seemed, would now be her home for the rest of her life. Thoughts swirled in her head like choking incense.
Why does he want me? He had scarcely even looked at me before today. “Not ugly,” he said. That is what one says about an arranged marriage. But I bring nothing. My parents—nobodies! Why on earth should he choose me, even as one new wife among hundreds . . . ?
