Not as much trouble, though, as Noetos. His anger at the Undying Man’s presence among them constantly threatened to boil to the surface. During that afternoon he had engaged in a shouting match with his own children, accusing them of betrayal for not telling him of Kannwar’s true identity. After that he’d sat alone brooding, no doubt trying to think of a way to revenge himself on the Bhrudwan lord. Don’t waste your time, Lenares wanted to tell the red-haired man. He’s far too powerful to be wounded by your sword arm. There was only one person sitting around the fire who was capable of wounding the man, and she sat alone, as she had done earlier that day, head bowed, her black hair hanging over her face.
So much sorrow.
Seemingly heedless of Stella’s dark mood, Kannwar went on to explain they ought to strike out for the coast. The inland plains were densely populated, he said, and had likely been sheltered in part from the storm and the quake. The sheer numbers of people living in the Malayu Basin ensured there would still be many alive. There were, by contrast, only a few fishing villages along the coast.
“Oh yes,” said the small, rotund man, Bregor. “Fishing villages are expendable. “
Kannwar sighed. “I have done nothing to deserve your ire,” he said testily. “The villages are likely devastated by the storm and the great waves that followed the earthquake. Short of turning south and inflicting more damage on areas already devastated by this conflict, I see no other option.”
“You’ll be wantin’ us to leave then, great lord?” said one of the locals.
A few villagers had returned to the wreckage of their houses from whatever place they had holed up in during the storm and quake; most had borne injuries of some sort. Heredrew had not offered to heal them. Saving his energy for the final conflict, no doubt. Lenares approved of the man’s practicality.
“Yes, you ought to get as far away from here as you can. Go south and west.”
“Cravin’ your pardon, great lord, but there’s nothin’ but jungle and savages south and west. We’d be safer under your wing, so t’ speak.” The woman who spoke was the same curly-haired woman who had been in favour of romantic love earlier in the day.
“When the battle comes, none of us will have anything to spare to protect you,” said Kannwar. “You’ll be crushed like insects, and no one will notice your passing. Certainly a few more lives lost in the context of what has happened means very little, though perhaps it might do to you. Come with us if you wish,” he concluded, and gave the woman a lopsided smile.
“Ah, no, great lord, you have commanded us to leave. Leave we shall, at sunrise.”
“Can we be certain that Keppia has been dealt with permanently?” asked Seren. “My apologies, all, but I’m only a simple miner, a digger in dark places. I know nothing of gods and magic.”
“You know a great deal more now than you did,” said Noetos, who was, through circumstances Lenares had not yet enquired about, the miners’ master. “And more than most other people do, or would want to.”
“Aye,” Seren said. “Doesn’t stop me wondering, though. Or lying awake when I ought to be sleeping. So is he gone?”
“Lenares said so, and I believe her,” Kannwar said.
His words brought a rosy glow to her chest.
“I saw him, you know,” Noetos said. “Just before the earthquake. He tried to get me to set him free.” The big man described his encounter with Dryman’s corpse in the beachfront forest. “All the while I thought I was outsmarting him, he was tricking me into releasing him. But the hole in the world was at that point not sufficiently large to admit him fully into the world. I hacked at Dryman’s body until it could no longer sustain the presence of the god, but Keppia did not achieve freedom. The earthquake followed within minutes. Provoked, no doubt, by an angry and frustrated god.”
“We have been fortunate,” Moralye remarked. “We came far closer to disaster than we knew.”
“We must be much more careful,” Kannwar warned. “To that end, I believe we should appoint Lenares the leader of this expedition. More than anyone else, she has the sensitivity to see Umu’s attacks before they arrive. She has held the god captive before, and still has a link to the void. We need to follow her.”
There were words spoken after this, many words, but Lenares could later remember none of them. All she could remember were those Kannwar had spoken, placing her right at the centre of the world.
Finally, for the last time, her counting could stop. She had no need to orient herself with regard to some fixed point. She was herself the very centre of everything. Wherever she chose to go, the centre would move with her.
Yes, she said to herself. Yes. This is who I was born to be.
QUEEN
CHAPTER 14
DEATH OF A CAPTAIN
STELLA KEPT HER FEET moving, her arms swinging and her face expressionless as she and Robal slowly drifted further behind the other travellers. It did not matter what he said or how he said it, she would not reveal how deeply torn she was.
She had known this agony before, of course. The Arkhos of Firanes had been a man she could have given herself to, heart and soul, had she not ignored her heart and remained loyal to Leith. And even her relationship with Leith himself had not been simple: far from it. Phemanderac had loved the Falthan king with far more passion than she had ever been capable of generating, much as she’d grown to love him. Moreover, she and Phemanderac had grown closer over the years, until the regard she held him in was similar in every respect to that in which she held Leith. A perfectly triangular relationship, unrequited but energised, enabling them to achieve great things together. Faltha had never enjoyed such a golden period in its history.
Yes, she had known the bittersweet agony of loving more than one man. And, given the never-ending future stretching away from her, she would know it again.
Knew it again now.
She worried that all she had done was to replace Leith and Phemanderac with Robal and Kannwar respectively. Robal’s passion, energy and naivety for Leith’s, and Kannwar’s wisdom and experience for that of Phemanderac. But whether or not this was what she had done was irrelevant really. She had been about to give her heart to Robal, until it had been taken by Kannwar.
Both men were manifestly unsuitable. Robal was insufferably arrogant, ridiculously overprotective towards her and foolishly outspoken. Kannwar was far worse with his genocidal morals and his constant dissembling. Yet she loved them both, fool that she was. In this, and only this, aspect of his discourse on love was Robal correct: the heart could seldom help where it gave its affections. But what she had learned, what she knew more completely than anyone else alive, was how the heart could be overridden. How, in fact, it must be overridden if anything beyond momentary pleasure was to be achieved.
So as Robal walked beside her, his hand on her arm, cool fingers whispering secrets that ran along her nerves and straight to her brain, she fought to reveal none of her feelings to him.
“Are you going to give me any hope at all?” Robal asked her. He had remained silent all morning, at the risk, it seemed to him, of one or more of his internal organs bursting, but her closeness and her silence could no longer be borne.
She turned to him and, as always, he found himself overwhelmed. She was beautiful, of course, none would dispute that, but beautiful women were common, more common than men realised. Certainly in his career as a soldier he had romanced his share of beautiful women. No, what captivated him about her was the sheer intensity of her gaze. It was as though she made every second count, as though time itself mattered more in her presence. He wasn’t entirely sure he understood what he meant, but he knew it was as a result of the life she had lived, a long and painful one, filled with suffering and discipline. It made her all the more precious, a singular jewel, unique; and should such a jewel shine only for him, ah! He would be envied by all men.
“I have said all I wish to say, Robal, back in Mensaya town square. You spoke plainly, expressing your hopes of me, and I r
eplied as clearly as possible. I cannot prevent you taking hope from my words, but I intended you to have no such hope.”
Robal glanced down the road: the travellers had turned a corner and were hidden from view by a row of poplars, their upper branches sheared off by the storm.
“Fair enough. You said your piece, Stella, and I don’t need to hear it again. No one for you, not now, and not in the immediate future, which for you could mean years. I don’t agree with you, I think you’re in denial, but I must respect your choice. For now, Stella, it seems we must travel separate paths.”
This got the reaction he intended. He would have said anything to break down the wall she’d erected to keep him out. She loved him, he knew it. Knew it. The despair on her face at his words confirmed it. It was all he could do not to smile.
“You will no longer guard me?”
“You need no guard. I would guard your body with my own, but your immortal flesh needs no guard. The only person to do you harm since this adventure began was me, your guardsman. I would guard your heart, but it seems I am, in fact, the chief enemy of your heart. I plot to capture it. But you have placed a guard on it so strong, so impenetrable, that it is proof against all would-be conquerors. Body and soul both safe. So what need do you have of me?”
Something in her face broke at his words. “Robal, Robal, don’t force me to make a choice.” Her voice had grown small and carried a note of desperation. “Remain with me, dear one, or leave me, but do not make it my decision.”
“You’re the queen, Stella. I am merely your guardsman. You are responsible for me. You must send me away. If I leave you of my own volition, I could be tried as a deserter.”
Cruel, what he was doing, but love sometimes had to be cruel.
“That is fiction. You deserted your post to protect me in the first place.”
“Nevertheless, I am now in your service. Do you dismiss me?”
Robal watched her face as they walked together, booted feet crunching on the gravel road. She didn’t cry, but her cheeks reddened and her eyes grew moist. Her throat worked away as she swallowed again and again, keeping her emotions under control. Woman of iron.
Robal’s life hung suspended as he waited.
“Yes,” she said, after many minutes of silence. And again: “Yes. I dismiss you.”
Stella may have guarded her heart, but Robal had constructed no such defence. Her single word laid him open from throat to groin, as deeply and effectively as a mortal sword blow. He had gambled, he had lost, he was dismissed. She would turn to him, the dark temptation, of that Robal was now certain. She would give herself to the Destroyer.
He turned and walked swiftly away.
“Robal. Robal!”
He refused to halt, to turn, to acknowledge her in any way. It was the only counterthrust he could make, the only wound he could inflict.
No, he thought, his own darkness drawing closer. Not the only wound.
He could have tolerated her rejection. After all, she wouldn’t be the first girl who’d turned him down, and not all of them had continued to resist him. He could be patient if he had to be.
What he could not tolerate was Kannwar’s continued interest in her. The man’s every glance sullied her. She had little choice in the matter, he realised that now: the Most High himself had appointed the Destroyer as the leader of this expedition, and Stella had decided this time through to be obedient to her calling, no matter the cost. He certainly didn’t want to see her suffer like she’d suffered the first time.
But it was clear that Kannwar was not to be the source of their salvation. That task, it seemed, had been given to the strange southern woman, Lenares. The Destroyer himself had anointed her as their leader.
What further use then for Kannwar?
This interesting thought occupied him as he walked on.
A night passed, and a day, and a second night. Robal barely noticed the passage of time. Did not stop for food and only reluctantly for water. Spoke to no one, ignored the increasing numbers of people he encountered on the path to Corata Pit. Refused to answer their welcoming hails, their requests for news, their desperate enquiries about loved ones.
What further use for Kannwar?
“He left without another word?”
“I tried to call him back,” Stella said bitterly. “I have no idea whether he even heard me.”
“You cannot blame yourself.”
“Perhaps not, but I believe you are right. We have all been drawn together by the design of the Most High. Every person we lose makes it harder, if not impossible, to do what he wishes us to do.”
“That is my fear,” Kannwar said.
Noetos, who had not strayed far from the Undying Man since learning his true identity, leaned towards them. “Send someone to fetch him back,” he said.
Another man of action, Stella thought, another man who speaks to find out what he thinks.
“Are you volunteering?” Kannwar said.
“You’ll not be rid of me that easily. Delayed, I remind you, not denied.”
“Indeed,” the Undying Man said, inclining his head. “And when the time comes I will gladly be held to account—by your daughter.”
“By Alkuon, you will not! You have done her more than enough harm already. I will not stand to one side and watch you destroy her again!”
“No, you will not,” said the Undying Man, and Stella heard the Wordweave in his voice. Obey me, it said. “I will converse with your daughter in private. What I have to say to her is for her ears, not yours.”
To his credit, Noetos shook off the Wordweave. “We Dukes of Roudhos have made a habit of disobedience,” he said.
“Ah, now. You are making formal claim to the title?”
And so the trap opens wide, ready to swallow this man.
Noetos stepped into Kannwar’s path, forcing him to halt.
“I make claim to nothing. The Duke of Roudhos is what I am. If some day I want the title as well as the reality it will be because I believe it to be in the best interests of those who live in Roudhos, understand? Those who live in Roudhos, not those who see it as a buffer state between Neherius and Jasweyah.”
His face hovered a hand’s span from that of Kannwar, and if the fisherman was at a slight disadvantage in that he had to lift his head to stare into his lord’s eyes, the stare did not show it.
Stella nodded. The trap is sprung, the mouse avoids it, and may well yet get the cheese. She was getting to know Kannwar and this was the sort of backbone he approved of. Could work with. Was, in fact, she reminded herself, exactly how she had behaved during her captivity and what had drawn him to her.
Ahead of them the rest of the travellers continued on, Lenares at their head, bless her, taking her role seriously. Not even a backwards glance.
Stella caught a glimpse of a white-faced Cylene peering out from behind Noetos. This was a courageous girl, yet she could only believe she was about to witness the destruction of her beloved. After all, he was confronting the man who had destroyed her family.
“The dukedom is mine, fisherman, mine to distribute as I see fit. As a reward for service, as a bribe, as a plaything, as anything I want. Be assured of this: it will be given to the one whom I believe will serve the best interests of Bhrudwo. I applaud your speech, but am wondering if your years in that tiny village might have left you more parochial than ought to be the case in the duke of such a large duchy.”
“What do you know of Fossa?”
Kannwar turned to Stella. “You see?” he said, his hands spread wide in an exaggerated gesture of helplessness. “Mortals simply do not understand the time at our disposal and therefore the breadth of our accumulated experience. I spent some time in Fossa a few hundred years ago. You were lately the Fisher there?”
Noetos nodded warily.
“Then you live in a house that I helped construct.” His eyes narrowed. “If you want to escape my influence, better go and live on some other continent.”
Another tr
ap, one that Stella, for all her statecraft, hadn’t seen, closed around the fisherman. She could almost pity him. If you remain in Bhrudwo, Kannwar was saying, you will forever be dependent on me.
“Hope it wasn’t you who did the mortaring,” Noetos said, his look indicating that he understood perfectly what was being said. “Poor job, that. We’ve got leaks all along the cliff side of the house. Could do with a real builder.”
Clever man. Trap avoided, message sent.
Kannwar laughed, just as Stella knew he would. Say what you like about the Destroyer, he had a breadth of soul greater than anyone else she had ever met.
“It may have been me who did the mortaring, at that,” he admitted with a smile. “One man can’t be good at everything.”
A breathtaking invitation.
Turned down.
“No, but there are some things he must be good at. Nations need mortaring together. What I see is Neherius allowed its head, to the destruction of Saros and Palestra.”
“Old Roudhos is a building that must be torn down, and Neherius is undertaking the demolition. I am sure you will not appreciate this, but I intend something greater to be built from the rubble.”
Bregor scuffed a foot on the path. “Forgive me, great lord, but I don’t see why Old Roudhos needed to be reduced to rubble. Couldn’t the blocks have been taken apart carefully and reassembled without hurting anyone?”
Consina put a hand on Bregor’s shoulder. “He is about to tell us that Neherius is not a sophisticated instrument, but that their armies were all he had. That his sincerest wish is that this could have been achieved without bloodshed, but that had it not been attempted, the loss would have been far greater.”
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