A Crime of Honor

by Tristen Kozinski & Keegan Kozinski

  Chapter 2

  Surr rode through the capital's clogged streets, his passage forcing the kimono-garbed inhabitants to step aside. The people didn’t complain, though, they merely grimaced or touched their forelocks to Surr and pressed themselves against the raised walkways flanking either side of the street. The rich turned to look down upon Surr from these raised walkways, many wrinkling their noses at his travel-stained clothing or whispering questions to a companion.

  A gust of wind brushed past Surr, disturbing the braids of his hair and momentarily filling his nostrils with its accrued scents. A thousand banners flapped all around him, their vibrant colors decorating every available post and edifice with the sigils of their family's ancestry, sovereign lords, and status. Those colors, and their accompanying sigils, were echoed in the kimonos they all wore.

  The deep red stallion beneath Surr snorted and danced in-between steps, forcing him to exert a little more control as children darted back and forth across the road, sometimes slipping through its legs. He soothed it with a pat and then leaned over to pass beneath a low ceiling. Another incense-heavy wind swept past him, causing the ranks of lanterns hung to either side and above him to sway. The buildings around him stood on foundations of stone that dated back to the city's birth, but the cavernous upper floors were constructed entirely of wood. Over time, the architects had begun connecting the higher levels of separate buildings to one another to provide accommodations for the city's burgeoning population. As a result, the city had become like a hollowed out mountain.

  Slightly behind Surr, Baciles crouched on the back of Keira's dark mare. He clung to her shoulders with confident ease, his head turning ceaselessly while his tail flicked back and forth, searching the air for unusual scents. He had grown up here before moving south and knew the city as only an orphan raised on its streets could.

  He had laughed when Surr first confided in him, doubting his sincerity; an assault upon the Emperor was impossible and a death sentence even if one did succeed. But Surr had always been able to speak the truth and have it be recognized, even when every other indication contradicted it. It was a deceptively powerful gift and had pulled the Chiary youth into Surr’s fold with only a few words.

  The nonhuman races had a long-festering hatred for the Emperor and the indignities he heaped upon them. Baciles had leapt at the chance for justice. Moreover, he seemed quite taken with Keira.

  A ray of sunlight gleamed ahead of them, marking their destination and making the ruddy lamplight that enveloped them seem suddenly dim. Surr squeezed his stallion's flanks, urging it into a trot through the thinning crowds. Keira kicked her own mount forward and pushed up beside him. "Should I ride ahead and warn the palace of your approach?"

  "No, I suspect they’re already informed of our coming and have prepared accordingly. In fact, I believe they are coming to escort us now."

  Keira followed his gaze to a knot of soldiers in green armor marching toward them from the palace. Grimacing, she muttered something rude and pinned her mask, preparing for their advent into the Inner Kingdom's noble society. The soldiers ahead of them also wore masks, but theirs were made of bamboo wood and painted with the Emperor's colors: green and silver. All members of the empire wore masks when entering a different level of society from their own, from the nobles wandering the common districts to the commoners visiting the noble quarters.

  As they neared the soldiers, Surr reined in his horse and Keira dropped a pace or two behind him, marking the line that the remaining thirty members of their party shouldn’t cross. The lead solider bowed with the grace of dead wood and greeted Surr, "I have come to escort you to the palace, Your Highness, where Emperor Sarizen awaits your arrival."

  "Then I would not like to keep him waiting." Surr clicked his tongue, and his horse started forward again, riding through the emperor's soldiers as they parted before him and fell back to surround his retinue. The major fell into step alongside him, earning a brief glance from Surr. "Will my servants be a problem, Major, or is this merely a precaution?"

  "Merely a precaution, Your Highness, Emperor Sarizen forbids any foreign soldier from traversing the palace or its environs unaccompanied. Imperial law also dictates that they are restrained to their quarters. Don’t fear for your safety, though; the Emperor shall provide all you need." They broke from the remaining vestiges of the crowd and into a circle of sunlight.

  The palace rose before them, its vast rooms and sections mounted atop one another like a child's building blocks. The perfect white stone flashed in the sunlight as the entrance swung open to admit them.

  They crossed the sunlit space and passed through the entrance into the courtyard beyond: a courtyard filled with shoes. They lined every wall, separated by type with a section of paper tacked to their heels. A small army of servants wandered through their midst, checking the slips of paper and occasionally collecting a pair before scurrying toward the entrance where some lord or lady waited.

  Surr dismounted and passed the reins off to a waiting servant. Keira swung down and followed him. Baciles slid down and slipped off to join with the trailing members of Surr's retinue, his own red mask firmly in place.

  A cluster of sandaled servants approached them and bowed. "We apologize for the inconvenience, but shoes are not permitted in the palace. We ask that you remove your boots and don these slippers instead." They presented Surr and his attendants with an array of white slippers. Surr nodded and began removing his boots indicating that his retinue was to do the same.

  When everyone had donned the proper footwear, the servants led them to the main palace and opened the doors. Sunlight greeted them, merging seamlessly with the light outside. Surr took a little breath and crossed the threshold, his feet making no sound as they sunk into the perfect white sand covering the palace's floor. His attendants filed in after him, many using their feet to play with the sand while other’s paused to gaze at the glass ceiling.

  The major stepped past Surr and bowed. "If you will please follow me, Your Highness, I will take you to His Majesty."

  "Just a moment please, I would like to speak with my people." He turned and gathered his entourage around him. "Keira, you will accompany me to speak with the Emperor. The rest of you will retire to your quarters where you will no doubt be imprisoned. Baciles, as my body servant they will take you to my personal quarters, which is important because every noble room has an escape hatch in the floor or behind the mirror." Baciles nodded with a minute smile, understanding his meaning. "Good. Now, all of you behave." He returned to the major.

  The man led them through a stream of pale, luxurious rooms decorated with swirling pillars and vibrant green curtains. Nobles, servants, and soldiers wandered everywhere, filling the vast rooms with murmured conversation and occasional snippets of muffled laughter.

  After a long journey, they came to a smaller waiting room. The major turned to Surr and bowed again. "Your Highness, Emperor Sarizen forbids anyone to enter his presence with weapons, please pile your armaments next to the wall."

  "Does the Emperor not trust his own High-Princes? His own nephew? What have I done in all the years of my reign to earn his enmity?"

  "His Majesty does not judge the act, Your Highness, but the potential acts; you may not enter his presence armed." A trio of guards emerged from the corridor behind them, their faces marked green with the sigils of the Mantra.

  Surr felt his box of anger stir, less at the Emperor's paranoia and more at the open threat. He heard Keira shift her stance behind him and raised his hand to stall her. "Very well, Major. I acquiesce." Slowly, deliberately, he removed the eating knife he always carried and laid it atop his coat, followed by his belt and the paper sword it carried.

  Keira stepped up to the major and extended her hands in turn; she had no connection to the Mantra but she needed no weapons to kill. The Major snapped a pair of shackles on her, stepped back and pushed the throne room's small door open.

  Emperor Sarizen Judar watched him approach fro
m across the long hallway. He sat in his velvet throne suspended over the ground by the glistening emerald cloth. His watery eyes stared out from a wizened face that bore all the marks from a lifetime of bigotry and hate. He dragged himself up from his reclined position with skeletal arms and slumped in on himself with a dry laugh. He waved his hand, and the thousand soldiers kneeling in perfect ranks down the hallway spoke as one, "Hail, High-Prince Surramad Hakara, King of the Southern Kingdom and all its incumbent territories." The words boomed back and forth across the hallway, battering Surr and Keira with every pass. He ignored them and advanced until he reached the glass stairs leading up to the emperor's velvet throne.

  Sarizen raised a shuddering hand as Surr neared. “Stop.”

  Surr ceased his advanced with a cocked head.

  Sarizen’s hand fell to his lap. “Bind his hands.”

  The command reverberated down the hall, stilling motion and quieting speech as all those gathered turned to look at their emperor. Surr alone moved, taking a step forward as his box of anger rattled against its lock. “Why must I suffer such an indignity?” His voice remained calm, undisturbed by his emotions.

  “Because even royalty must obey the law.”

  The corner of Surr’s mouth gave the barest possible twitch as his box of anger turned hot in his mind. He continued forward, moving with a slow, inevitable grace that drew everyone’s attention to him. Keira stayed behind, unable to approach within twenty yards of the emperor and thus unable to do anything except watch as Surr’s cape slid to the ground.

  Still walking forward Surr undid the ties of his tunic, letting it fall as well. Then his fingers turned to the black buttons of his undershirt, and he undid them, ultimately pulling the garment from his shoulders with a grace that made the normally awkward act seem smooth. The pale silk fell to the ground along with his other garments, revealing the warm, dark skin of his torso to the world. As a final, though far from crowning, act, his slippers fell from his feet without any effort from Surr.

  Thus he knelt before the Emperor’s dais and raised both hands, garbed in naught but his leggings. “In this world, everything is a possible weapon from the tiles underfoot to the clothing on our backs. Would you have all your subjects, all those who seek an audience and even your own family stripped naked, bound hand and foot and tossed at your feet like a criminal?”

  Sarizen leaned forward, his body seeming to tremble from this slightest of efforts. “No, Surramad Hakara, just you and those like you. Guards, bind his hands.”

  A guard approached from Surr’s left and, though his steps lacked any hint of uncertainty, Surr felt the man's embarrassment. Without rising from his knees, he turned toward the man and proffered his wrists. The guard flushed but retrieved a pair of stone shackles from a pack on his belt and snapped them on. A second passed, and then a cold rush swept over Surr's skin. The red Mantra lines that coursed up his arms and across his shoulders flared crimson and then faded in his black skin. He grimaced and rolled his shoulders as the familiar, numbing sensation settled in. The guard bowed to Sarizen and backed away, letting the room descend into a brief period devoid of both sound and motion.

  The emperor slumped back. “Welcome, Surramad.”

  Surr rose from the floor and looked up at the pale, shriveled man without a hint of passion. "Hello, Uncle."

  Sarizen coughed, his whole body shuddering with the force. When he finished, Sarizen wiped his mouth with a handkerchief. "I hear you're still recruiting women and the demi-humans for your military. Have you found any success?"

  "Not as much as I had hoped; the demi-humans all have particular flaws that I am struggling to circumvent." It was an easy lie to tell, any possible guilt stolen by the emperor’s decades of coercion and deceit.

  Sarizen wheezed a laugh. "I told you it would fail, but your aspirations to make use of those creatures is not why you stand before me. Why have you come to the capital?"

  "To deliver the Irat in person."

  "As you have done for the last twenty years? No, do not try to deceive me; my soldiers were transferring the Irat since before you were born."

  "I do not lie, bandits attacked the mine twice in the first months of the year and then again when the miners were transporting it to Sahad. I did not wish to risk a fourth assault."

  Sarizen growled. "This is what comes of arming the demi-humans, Surr; they seek to grow beyond their station. You told them lies of equality and honor, hoping the idiots would join your army and die for you. But now those lies are poisoning their thoughts, leading them back toward their violent tendencies. You will halt your experiments immediately; I will not risk a second Supremacy War."

  Surr bowed his head. "It will be done, Uncle." Inwardly, however, his box of anger seethed and rattled. He knew the bandits were Sarizen's, sent to abscond with the Irat so the Southern Kingdom would have to pay the full tithe in grain.

  Sarizen slumped back into his throne. "Good, how are your wives? Are they finally behaving?"

  Surr's box of anger cracked. He ground his hand into a fist and forced the box to subside. "They have been properly chastised, Uncle, and will no longer give you affront should you visit again."

  "I don't know that I shall, it is a barbaric custom, having multiple spouses."

  Surr felt Keira's temper spark but did not look at her. "It is the custom of my people, Uncle, I would be remiss not to partake."

  Sarizen waved him off. "How long do you intend to stay?" Sarizen's small, evil eyes flashed with something approximating greed or anticipation.

  Surr saw it and recognized the man's hatred for him. "Only for a day or two, Uncle, just long enough to rest for the return journey."

  "Then I shall throw a welcoming party for you tonight, we can't have your stay be unmemorable. Your attendance is mandatory, of course."

  Of course, Uncle." Surr bowed his head and stood. "Is there anything that you would request of me before I depart?"

  "No, just that you have a good time."

  Surr acquiesced with a nod of his head, turned and strode back along the hallway, whispering to Keira as he went, "Be careful tonight, he intends to kill us." Once outside of the throne room, a guard freed Surr of his manacles and then escorted him to his quarters.