The House of Night and Chain

by David Annandale

  And so a Strock comes once again to unseat a Montfor from power. I was careful to keep my thoughts from showing on my face.

  The doors through which we entered were on the opposite side of the chamber from the governor’s throne. The other seats were filled, and the eight nobles rose to greet us, watching us carefully. I looked steadily back, gauging the forces before me. Some I knew from long ago. The others I had researched carefully during my voyage back to Solus.

  Montfor paused with me just inside. ‘Councillors,’ she pronounced, ‘this is a day of rejoicing. The need for the regency has at last come to an end. Once more, Solus has a lord-governor. I present to you Lord-Governor Maeson Strock. Long may he serve the Emperor.’

  ‘Long may he serve the Emperor,’ the council echoed.

  I made my way to my throne, then turned, still standing, and nodded. ‘I thank you,’ I said, ‘for this warm welcome.’ We were all lying to each other. Maintaining the fiction of civility to start with was necessary. I needed to get my footing before I could learn what action I had to take, against whom and when. ‘I thank you, as well, for your long and patient service to Solus.’ It was hard to keep anger out of my voice. ‘I come to this position in gratitude, and with determination. I have been sent to oversee specific tasks that the Imperium expects of Solus.’ I am going to rip your corrupt carcasses from the hills of your spoils. ‘I know that, with your help, I will see these tasks through to fruition.’ I don’t expect you to repent. But if you decide you fear me more than Veth Montfor, I might allow you to survive.

  There was polite applause, and we sat. I looked at two councillors in particular to see how they were reacting to my speech. One was Adrianna Veiss. She was grinning at me. Of everyone here, she was the only one who seemed genuinely pleased to see me. She looked as if she had understood every nuance that lurked behind my words.

  And then there was Zander.

  My son had been small enough to carry when I last saw him. I barely recognised the man who managed to sit indolently in the iron-backed chair. He was watching me with idle curiosity. He did not seem hostile. He did seem disinterested. His clothes, exquisitely tailored, gave the impression of having been chosen with such care that their wearer had little energy left for any other endeavour. His hair and beard were trimmed to fussy perfection. He looked like a man who was actively looking forward to being somewhere that he considered much more entertaining than his current surroundings.

  I called the council to order and made a formal show of deferring to Montfor. ‘I’ll thank the senior councillor to guide us through the agenda for the day. I will rely on all of your expertise to show me what I need to know. I have no doubt you will.’ This was my reconnaissance. I would learn about this battlefield before I stormed it.

  The matters before us turned out to be very mundane. There were the likes of some minor jurisdictional disputes, and a budgetary reallocation towards sewer repair in Valgaast, which I thought was a nice touch. The enemy was anticipating my concerns.

  Throughout the meeting, Zander said nothing. He lounged in his chair, looking more and more bored and long-suffering.

  ‘There is one more item,’ Montfor said as the session drew to a close. ‘As Councillor Trefecht brought this to our attention, I will ask her to elaborate.’

  ‘Thank you, senior councillor,’ said Marianna Trefecht. She was Zander’s age, and with him was the youngest councillor present. She did not look bored, though. She looked hungry. ‘This is, lord-governor, an embarrassing admission for me, and something that I am ashamed that we are only detecting now. We have unearthed evidence of important black market activity in the agri sector of Rosala.’

  ‘Oh?’ I said, doing my best to feign surprised interest. ‘How bad is the problem?’

  ‘We are still attempting to determine that. But I am confident we will uproot it very soon.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it. Please keep the council informed of your progress.’ I stole a glance at Montfor. Aren’t you the clever one? I wondered if this was just an attempt to head off my own investigations before they were properly started, or if it was a warning too. Are you telling me how much you know? I accept the challenge. I will defeat you.

  We adjourned. The councillors filed out, and Zander rose lazily from his throne and walked across the floor of the chamber to me.

  ‘I will leave you to your reunion,’ was Montfor’s parting shot.

  ‘Father,’ Zander said. ‘It is good to see you.’

  ‘And you.’

  There was a moment of silence. Then Zander grinned. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘aren’t we being the awkward pair.’

  ‘It is hard to know what to say after so long,’ I admitted.

  He shrugged. ‘We don’t have to say anything if it doesn’t suit us. We can’t pretend we actually know anything about each other.’ The suggestion was not unfriendly. He seemed simply happy to go along with whatever I preferred.

  ‘We may be strangers,’ I said, ‘but we are also blood. That means something. And I hope we won’t be strangers.’

  ‘That sounds fine, father,’ he said, smiling, with all the force of feeling as if I had said that I preferred one vintage of amasec over another.

  ‘I’m glad you think so,’ I said, ‘since we will be seeing a lot of each other. We have a lot of hard work ahead of us.’

  ‘We do?’

  I was not prepared for the question, and more particularly the way it was asked. It was an expression of pure, guileless confusion and dismay. For the moment, at least, it had the effect of convincing me that unless Zander was an extraordinary actor, he had no knowledge at all of what other members of the council had their hands in. But my overwhelming emotion was a sinking disappointment. We do? With those two words and a frown, he expressed bafflement that anything at all needed to be done, and horror that he might be expected to exert himself.

  I had wondered why Montfor had not found a way to have the representative of the Strocks removed from the council. I had my answer.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, unable to conceal my disgust. ‘Great tasks lie ahead of us.’

  ‘Oh.’ He paused, as if casting about for a better answer, some reason why he could be excused from the work. Then he shrugged. Perhaps he had resigned himself to the inevitable. Or perhaps he had decided to live in the moment. I wasn’t demanding effort from him just yet, so the problem could be ignored for the present. Then he changed the subject. ‘Have you seen Katrin yet?’

  ‘No.’ I was worried that encounter might be much more painful than meeting Zander. I did not have the emotional energy to see both my children on the same day as my return to Solus. ‘I plan to call on her tomorrow,’ I said.

  ‘I know she’ll be pleased you’re back,’ said Zander, mouthing a meaningless platitude.

  ‘That would be nice,’ I said quietly.

  ‘Well.’ He smiled again. ‘Well. I should be off then. Until next time, father.’

  He turned and strode off before I could answer, fleeing to the promise of entertainment. I watched him go. I reminded myself that he was my son, and that he was worth saving.

  Pure indolence is better than corruption, at least. Hang on to that.

  I stayed in the chamber a few more minutes, thinking about the work ahead. Purging the council seemed like the easiest of my labours.

  When I finally left, Adrianna Veiss was waiting for me near the staircase. I was pathetically grateful to see her. She raised a sardonic eyebrow. ‘So?’ she said. ‘Drinks at the great house tonight?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  Three of us gathered in Malveil that evening. We met in the librarium. It was at the end of the east wing, on the ground floor. Its collection was a large one, the shelves of volumes reaching from the floor to the ceiling. The spines of the tomes were still dusty, untouched for decades. But, supervised by Karoff, the serfs had made the great room usabl
e again. I sat with two old friends, looking down the south prospect. We were comfortable in heavy armchairs arranged in a half-circle. The librarium was warm, the amasec excellent, and we watched the night rains of early winter wash down the windows. Just visible through the clouds was the dull yellow glow of the nitrogen atmosphere of Luctus, Solus’ huge moon.

  I relaxed for the first time that day. I don’t think I had felt this much at ease since before Clostrum.

  ‘Your path is going to be a hard one,’ said Cardinal Kalvan Rivas.

  ‘It will be,’ Veiss said before I could answer. ‘But we need you.’

  ‘And I will need all the help you can give,’ I told them.

  ‘You have it,’ said Rivas. ‘All of it.’

  Veiss, Rivas and I had grown up together. Their destinies had been clearly defined for them from birth, much more than mine had been, and both had embraced their duties with fervour. Veiss, the firstborn of her house, had led it with honour since she had inherited its leadership. Rivas, also the firstborn of his family, had followed his house’s tradition into the Ecclesiarchy. I trusted both of them, because I knew them, and no length of separation could change that. Despite the years that had passed since I had seen them, we settled back into each other’s company as if we had only been apart a few days.

  Veiss had startlingly large eyes. They looked upon the world with a shrewd, knowing judgement. Like Montfor, she had no illusions. Unlike Montfor, she did not use that as an excuse to indulge her worst instincts. The one thing she did indulge in was a gaudiness of attire. Her long, black hair, which was just beginning to grey, was held up in an elaborate headdress whose intertwining of gold and crimson complemented the black and scarlet of her high-collared dress. The long feathers of the pataarka bird reached out from the headdress, waving gently whenever Veiss moved her head. Her theatricality was ironic, as if ostentation were symbolic of all the temptations she stood against, and was a visible rebuke to the Montfors, who were her family’s enemies as much as they were mine. The Montfor clan was a foetid swamp. The House of Veiss was a bulwark against corruption. The family had long been rivals of the Montfors for power. When the Strocks had risen to supremacy, the House of Veiss had welcomed our assumption of power, backing us unswervingly ever since.

  I had, over the years, encountered ecclesiarchs who were paragons of faith, and others who were embarrassments, men who had let their souls drown in a sea of political calculation. Rivas was one of the former, though he also knew better than to hold himself aloof from politics. He was not happy about the grubby realities of power. He accepted them, though. He never turned away from what was necessary, always acting to serve the Imperial Creed. He was tall, always leaning forward slightly, as if perpetually in a state of concerned interest. If Veiss responded to the world with wary amusement, Rivas was melancholic.

  ‘How have things gone with your children?’ Rivas asked.

  I stared into my goblet, searching for the answer.

  ‘You have seen them.’

  ‘Not Katrin. Not yet. Maybe tomorrow.’

  ‘Zander was at council,’ Veiss told the cardinal.

  ‘He was… civil,’ I said.

  ‘Better than the alternative.’ Veiss reached for the bottle on the low table before us. ‘What did you think of your first meeting with the council?’ she asked.

  ‘That you’re my only ally there,’ I said, thinking about the closed, wary faces. ‘Am I right in that? Are things that bad?’

  She nodded. ‘I’ve fought Montfor, and I’ll keep fighting her, but she has had the whip hand until now. There was never a chance of toppling her, not with her being senior councillor, and she’s made sure the others have every reason to support her.’ She raised a cautioning finger. ‘She’s dangerous, Maeson. Very dangerous. I cannot emphasise that too strongly.’

  ‘I appreciate the warning. She’ll find that I’m dangerous too.’

  ‘You’ll have to be.’

  I forced myself to ask my next question. It was best to know the worst immediately. ‘Is Zander one of her creatures too?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so. He…’ She stopped. ‘What was your impression?’

  I grimaced. ‘That he was too lazy to undertake the work of corruption.’

  ‘That is my sense, too. He’s wealthy enough to entertain himself as he likes.’

  ‘So why would he lift a finger to do more?’ I said, depressed. Indolence was sad cause for innocence.

  ‘Again, better than the alternative,’ Veiss said softly. ‘Montfor is keeping him at arm’s length from everything, and he is happy with his lot. You might be able to change that. He is still your son. I find it difficult to believe the Strock blood is that attenuated. It isn’t in his sister.’

  ‘That’s true,’ said Rivas. ‘She’s doing well.’

  ‘So I hear,’ I said. Katrin was a history inductor at the schola progenium of the Valgaast sector of Solus. I was as proud of her as I was disappointed in Zander.

  ‘Why haven’t you seen her yet?’ Rivas pushed.

  ‘The last time I heard from her was when Eliana died. She made it clear then that she did not wish to speak again. That was a long time ago.’

  ‘Only it never feels like it, does it?’ Veiss asked. Her wife had died in a lifter crash a few years after I lost Eliana.

  ‘No, it doesn’t.’

  ‘How are you doing, being back?’ said Rivas.

  I sighed. ‘I had hoped that the fact that I have no memories of living in Malveil with her might make things a bit easier. It doesn’t. This is hard.’

  ‘The Emperor will guide you,’ Rivas promised.

  ‘I will need Him to.’

  I bade them goodnight an hour later. When I shut the door, I was alone in Malveil for the first time. In the sudden silence, I braced myself for an assault by the memories of Clostrum. The momentum of the day had served me well. But I had learned to dread nights. I expected sleep to be fleeting and bad. I knew that once I was alone, the cries of dying soldiers would rise in my mind.

  And, as I turned from the door and began to mount the stairs, the dead called to me. The images of Clostrum, of the tide of monsters and blood, rushed forward. Only they did not force me to stop walking. Malveil did not vanish from my perception. I did not begin to drown in the clamorous echoes of my defeat. The memories were present, but they did not have the same power as before, because they were not alone. They were accompanied by other losses. Malveil’s silence pulsed with all the losses of my life. And it was the older grief of Eliana’s death that was the greatest of all. It enveloped me. Every second I passed in this house was a second that I should have had with Eliana, and never would.

  We had been robbed, and I didn’t know why. I did not know how she had fallen.

  By the time I reached the top of the stairs, the silence of the house seemed different. It was not truly a form of quiet. It was a white noise, all of my losses roaring at me at once. This wasn’t silence, it was a wall in the air, drawing around me, tightening until I couldn’t breathe.

  I started down the hall, and vertigo hit. I had not experienced it since the day I showed Malveil to the children, but I recognised the sensation at once. The floor turned into thin ice, and threatened to turn into thin air. I staggered, my body instinctively searching for solid ground. There was none to be had.

  I weaved back and forth across the hall, clutching my head. ‘Stop it,’ I told myself, hoping the sound of my words would beat back the roaring silence. ‘Stop it!’ I shouted, barking with the voice of command, but my psyche disobeyed, and the ­dizziness grew worse. I was about to plunge through the floors of the house and down and down to the core of Solus. Everything was insubstantial. Only losses and grief were real.

  I stopped walking. I leaned against a wall and closed my eyes. ‘Enough,’ I said. ‘Enough.’ I kept repeating the word until I could focus on
the sound, the real sound, that I was making. The white noise receded, and the floor became solid enough to hold my weight.

  I made my way unsteadily towards the door leading to my bedchamber. I was still dizzy, and the choir of loss called at the edges of my mind. I took deep, regular breaths, trying to slow the irregular beating of my heart.

  One thing I was not experiencing was surprise. I had expected something like this.

  You knew this first night would be difficult. Tomorrow night will be too. And the night after that. This is part of your battle. This is part of your penance.

  ‘The Emperor protects,’ I prayed quietly, clawing back my strength. ‘The Emperor sustains.’

  I climbed the last flight of stairs without stumbling and arrived at my quarters. I fell into bed, feeling a small degree of triumph at having fought through the vertigo and the memories.

  The memories were not defeated, though. They were waiting for my defences to lower again. I craved sleep, and I feared it. I took deep breaths again, listening to that sound, grasping hard to that rhythm as though it could drown out all the other noises that crowded around my soul.

  I listened to my breathing so I would not hear the ghosts.

  Then I did sleep. I fell asleep. I fell. I fell down into a nightmare, and it was a nightmare of falling.

  Eliana falling.

  I saw her leap from the tower, and in this vision, she was not alone. She held Katrin and Zander by the hand, Katrin and Zander as children, small children who would never be adults because their mother had seized them and pulled them, shrieking, from the parapet. They dropped with her, and they were screaming. Their three faces filled my sleeping sight. Eliana was expressionless. She fell without sound, her lips tight, her eyes dead of feeling and staring at the onrushing ground. Katrin and Zander howled, their features distorted with terror and betrayal.

  The dream was the most vivid I had ever had. I felt the rush of the wind as my perspective plummeted with my family. The screams of the children pierced my ears. I saw the billowing of their clothes in the terrible, vertical wind of their fall.