by David Hair
‘For several years we wandered all over Rondelmar, teaching Johan’s version of the Sollan faith. We slept in fields or under trees, on the outskirts of those towns where the authorities had turned us away, but others welcomed us, and Johan’s following grew. Soon we were dozens, then a hundred, and by the following spring we were nearly two hundred-strong and growing daily. A new word was being whispered everywhere: “Messiah”, which means “saviour”. Corin became “Corineus” and people said that he’d come to lead us to a better life here on Urte. The legion commanders became frightened of our numbers, and when trouble flared and several of us were killed, Johan personally intervened and persuaded the legion commander to stop the violence. From then on we started to hear all these stories of miracles and great deeds – all nonsense, of course, but by midsummer we numbered more than a thousand. Johan – Corineus – began to speak more and more pompously, of visions sent to him from Sol and Luna. Selene announced that Sol and Luna had transformed Corineus and her, making them brother and sister, and she began calling herself “Corinea”.’ Meiros shook his head. ‘It’s almost funny now. Beware, Wife, of people who claim to speak the words of God. They will be lying. Most of the world’s biggest liars claim to speak for God.’
‘But priests—’
‘Especially priests! Never trust a priest – and never, ever trust a magi who claims his gift comes from Kore or Ahm or Sol, or anyone else.’ He waggled a finger at her. ‘Never!’
‘But you got magic from your god, that’s what Guru Dev taught me.’ In fact, Guru Dev had told her the magi got their powers from demons of Hel, but it felt unwise to repeat that, just in case.
Meiros laughed. ‘Ha – yes, well … the Kore have done well out of that little myth.’ He leaned forward. ‘The secret of the gnosis is contained in a thing Baramitius made called the Scytale of Corineus. Baramitius was a great one for secrets, and for potions. He was Corin’s oldest disciple, an alchemist – he was the true miracle worker. He discovered the liquid he called “ambrosia”. Any who survived drinking it gained the gnosis-power to manipulate nature. I did not see any god that night.’
She looked up at him, confused, wondering. ‘Did you see demons of Hel then?’ she asked without thinking, then she almost swallowed her tongue in fright at what she had said.
To her vast relief, Meiros only laughed. ‘No, nor angels either – I have never seen any demon nor angel, Wife, and nor do I expect to.’ He chuckled heartily. ‘The gnosis has nothing to do with any god, do you understand?’ He jabbed a finger for emphasis and then paused and stared at it, as if amused by his own animation. Ramita felt a curious warming towards him. He reminded her of Guru Dev.
‘No, the Scytale had nothing to do with religion,’ he went on. ‘Johan Corin intended the drink to open our minds to God – he got the idea after taking Sydian opiates, which ought to tell you much of his state of mind. Baramitius laboured to make Johan’s vision a reality – he even tested his experimental brews upon fellow disciples – some died, but Johan concealed this to protect him. I only found out about his experiments years later, and I was appalled. Anyway, Baramitius eventually found what he sought, and got permission to administer it to the whole flock.
‘On the chosen night Corin told us we were to imbibe the wine of the gods and ascend to greet them. A legion had surrounded our camp, sent by some alarmist townsfolk, but Corineus was adamant the ceremony would go ahead. We gathered in north Rondelmar, on a balmy day in late autumn. The wolves were beginning to howl in the wilds, but we all went about garlanded with flowers and dizzy from drink. Corineus made a slurred speech about sacrifice and love and salvation as the ambrosia was shared out. We each got just a drop, and at a sign from Corineus we raised our cups to our lips and drank. Outside the camp, the legionnaires were closing in.
‘The fluid moved slowly from the belly to the heart. It was truly debilitating: we all collapsed. It left us conscious, but unable to function. To me, everything was frozen and magnified; I could even see the separate colours of the rays of light that showered down from the face of Luna. Deeper and deeper we all sank and as light ebbed away, a shimmering opalescence seeped through the air and clung to our bodies. I heard someone cry out in an incredibly slow, deep voice for their mother. Mother? I thought, and suddenly I saw her, my own mother, as clear as daylight, sitting at her table hundreds of miles to the south, and she looked up, seeing nothing, but calling my name. All around me, voices murmured, invoking parents, siblings, children, all the loved ones they abandoned when they joined Johan’s flock, and perhaps they all saw them, as I saw her.
‘But then everything changed again as our languor became infected with pain. As one, the whole thousand-strong flock cried out as agony took us and it grew in intensity, like talons ripping our innards apart, until we could bear no more. Some lost consciousness, some expired. I clung to the hand of a girl beside me, ripping at the turf with my free hand, but that girl’s hand was my lifeline, keeping me grounded, keeping me sane. It felt like the earth was fraying and we were falling through it, into darkness – but we were not alone in that emptiness for long. Now the faces of the dead were surrounding us, people I knew: those who had died on the road with Johan, others from my childhood. They said nothing at first, then they howled at us, and came at us with their spectral hands clawed. I called upon Sol to protect me, and somehow armour appeared on my chest and a sword in my hand. I held the girl behind me and chopped at the ghosts, driving them away. All around me I saw others doing the same, or similar. Some burnt the spectres with fire, others blasted them away with pale light or gusts of wind. But many of us perished, helpless, unable to find the means to defend themselves like I and others had. I fought like a mad thing, hewing and slashing in desperation … and then suddenly the ghosts and the darkness were gone and we were cast up from that dreadful sea onto the cold shores of daylight, naked in a sea of corpses.’
Meiros shuddered at the memory. ‘I came to myself lying with an arm around that girl, the woman who became my first wife. Beside me, a young man, a good friend, lay dead, his body twisted, his eyes wide open, his face frozen in a silent scream. Beyond him lay another, and another. Then I saw a living man, and other survivors gradually staggered upright: maybe half of us at most. The rest were dead or insane. Our eyes were drawn to the centre of the dell, where our leader had been. Johan and Selene lay immobile, and even from where I was I could see he was covered in blood. Someone began to wail, and Selene sat up. She lifted her hands, bathed in blood, and turned to the prone form beside her. I will never forget the sound of her scream. In the midst of her transformation, beset by some vision, she had slammed a dagger through her lover’s heart.’
Ramita was beginning to feel nauseous, and she rather wished Meiros would cease his tale now, but he was caught up in the past, barely seeing her. He went on, ‘I remember someone tried to grab her and she swung her hands at him and her fingers became knives, and she slashed his throat open. Then she ran, before any could think to stop her. Our Master was dead, his lover fled, and we thought we had lost our minds. I saw one man hold up his hands to implore Heaven and fire bloomed from his fingers. I saw another with tears streaming from his eyes which floated up to form rings about his head, a halo of salty water. A woman drifted upwards, panicking as she left the ground. For myself, my only concern was to keep the girl with me safe. What we’d shared had bonded us for life. I was surrounded by light and a barrier of stone was building up at my feet. Everywhere, every survivor was performing uncontrolled miracles, and in the mayhem some killed with accidental thoughts; others lost control and destroyed themselves, bursting into flame or petrifying themselves. It was chaos – Hel on Urte.
‘And in the middle of all this, the legionaries, five thousand fighting men, charged out of the mist. Some six hundred of us had survived Baramitius’ potion. Maybe a hundred of those had gone completely insane, and another hundred had not manifested any powers at all. The four hundred-odd who had attained power had almost no
control; all we knew was that if we thought something, it seemed to happen. But when the legionaries attacked we found the focus and will to resist.
‘We destroyed them with pure elemental power: Fire and Earth and Water and Wind, and pure energy – that was all we had then; the refinements came later. That first battle was just slaughter, and I was not alone in being nauseated by the carnage; a number of us swore never again to use such powers to kill. But Baramitius and Sertain, who became the first Rondian emperor, they revelled in their victory: for them, this was the Purpose, the salvation Corineus had promised. They saw themselves as young gods, and they vowed to destroy the Rimoni and rule the world. And so they did, but by then I and many others had left them.’
Ramita remembered to breathe. ‘What did you do?’ she whispered.
‘I walked away. I had never been a violent man, and I was truly sickened by what we had wrought, even though we had not attacked first. I took the hand of the girl beside me and when someone asked where I was going, I said, “Anywhere there is no blood”, and some followed me. We stumbled through the carnage, the burned soldiers, dismembered limbs, headless torsos, and everywhere there was death. Johan Corin’s peace-preaching flock had become a savage mob with horrendous power. So we left, and close on a hundred came with me. The hundred or so who had manifested no power were ostracised, and they also left, but not with me. The remainder went on to overthrow the Rimoni Empire and establish their own. The “Blessed Three Hundred”.’
Meiros sighed deeply. ‘For those with me, our only choice was flight. We marched through the Schlessen forests and over the Sydian plains. Of course we had to fight along the way – wherever we went the local tribes saw only helpless wanderers and tried to take us as slaves. Non-violence is a pretty ideal, but it’s virtually impossible in this world. But at least we weren’t part of the butchery that Sertain inflicted upon the Rimoni. At least we were better than that.’
He looked up at her and said, ‘Wife, I do not wish to speak of this any more. Not for now.’ He looked for a moment like a tired old man, whose spirit was long broken, kept moving only by the empty promise of continued existence. She had a momentary desire to hug him, to try to comfort him.
‘I don’t need your pity, girl,’ he suddenly growled. ‘Go back to your wagon. I would be alone.’
They reached the northern edge of the desert the next evening. After exchanging the camels for horses their pace increased dramatically and the days blurred as they rattled along endless hard, stony roads, often pressing on even through the night. Ramita made slow progress in her language lessons with Meiros. He did not visit her bed in the way-stations but locked the girls in their rooms with a tracery of light about the doors and windows: wards, he called them. They were supposedly to keep them safe, but other than making the doors give off sparks when opened, they had no other effect she could see.
For three weeks they travelled in this manner, circling the major cities, sleeping in the countryside. But one afternoon, Ramita was awakened from her slumber in the carriage by Huriya, who was shaking her excitedly and crying, ‘Mita, Mita, look! Jos says it’s Hebusalim!’ She pulled aside the curtain and they gazed out over a wide valley, a fairytale sight: all lit up with house fires and lanterns and torches, with a massive Dom-al’Ahm rising amid the spires of palaces. They could see huge city walls, and wide roads lit with glittering white lamps, and everywhere, the tiny shapes of people, like ants scurrying about a disturbed nest. It was breathtaking.
‘Hebusalim,’ she breathed. Her new home.
Huriya wrapped her arms about her. ‘We’re here – we’ve arrived! By the gods, I thought we would never end this journey. I’m so happy!’
Ramita looked at her flushed and animated face and thought, Yes, my sister you really are. I wish I was. I would happily just turn around and go home … But she tried to look pleased.
The winding roads through the city were choked with people, and Jos and his men were watchful. The clamour of the markets was deafening. There were Rondian soldiers everywhere, dressed in red and white uniforms with golden sunbursts on their tabards: imperial legionaries from Rondelmar, Meiros said shortly. They looked grim-faced and hard, and Ramita saw a local man shoved aside brutally when he got in the way. Some of them recognised Captain Klein; when they called out to him she recognised Rondian words Meiros had taught her. The recognition sent a small thrill through her, a tenuous sense of connection to this alien place.
‘Look! We’re nearly at the gates to the city!’ Huriya exclaimed. ‘I wonder if this is the very street where my father fought the magi and Ispal saved him?’
Ramita tried to see it in her mind’s eye, but it was too dark and the mounted soldiers were blocking most of the views. She could make out lean, bony Keshi and the rounder, paler visage of the local Dhassans, who called themselves ‘Hebb’ to differentiate themselves from their rural cousins. She particularly studied the white-faces of Rondian traders walking the souks with armed guards – mostly local men, she noted – at their backs. Everyone she could see was male. ‘Are there no women here?’ she asked Huriya.
‘They’ll all be at home, cooking,’ the Keshi girl answered. ‘But look, there’s one!’ She pointed to a black-shrouded shape scurrying into a doorway. ‘Bekira – ugh!’ Both girls groaned, already missing the light cloth and colourful hues of Lakh. In Baranasi Huriya had dressed as an Omali most of the time. Here, they would both have to be bekira-robed – the Amteh’s cover-all public garment, named for the death shroud of the Prophet’s wife, had originated in Hebusalim. It was a dismal prospect.
It was well after midnight when they rolled up a wide boulevard to the Eastern Gate, but they were waved through with no delay, into the closer-packed streets of the inner city. They began to see Hebb women more frequently, still shrouded, but with bared heads. Their faces were pale gold, their black hair luxuriant, curling. Many were clinging to tipsy Rondian soldiers. There were many taverns and the air stank of ale and rang with strange songs. Huriya called out to Klein, ‘What is that racket?’
‘Schlessen drinking songs – welcome to Hebusalim, the cesspit of Urte!’ He laughed as they pushed through a crowd of bawdy soldiers and local women, one of whom had her caramel-coloured breasts bared. She was laughing uproariously as two lurching men held her upright.
Ramita was shocked. ‘This place is a den of vice,’ she remarked disgustedly. ‘Did you see that woman? This is a holy city!’ she shouted out the window. The men turned and the woman burst out laughing. To her alarm one of the soldiers took a few steps towards her, but Jos Klein yelled, ‘Make way for Lord Meiros!’ and everyone backed away.
They fought free of the crowds after that, rumbling into a side street. A tall white tower appeared ahead of them, illuminated by the waxing moon and filling the sky, gleaming like an ivory tooth. Chains rattled and they heard heavy gates swing open. Faces peered out from the windows of houses lining the street, then vanished again as the caravan rolled forward into a small courtyard. Marble walls glittered in the moonlight; gilt gleamed coldly in the torchlight. Their carriage stopped before steps ascending to imposing gates of wood and iron. Servants and stable-hands swarmed around them, darting between the irritable horses.
Someone opened the girls’ carriage door and helped them out. Meiros was already out and was talking to a small bald man. Both turned to the girls as they stepped unsteadily onto the ground.
‘Ah,’ intoned the bald man obsequiously, ‘this must be the new Lady Meiros.’ He spoke Keshi with an oily accent. Ramita stared at him dazedly, wondering for an instant who Lady Meiros was before she remembered and thrust her hand towards him. He kissed the air above it, not quite touching her with either lips or hand. ‘An Indran beauty, my lord,’ he commented to Meiros, as if appraising a broodmare.
‘Wife, this is my chamberlain, Olaf. He will show you to your rooms.’
Olaf simpered at her, then he looked at Huriya and licked his lips. ‘My lord, did you purchase two? Do the Indrans ma
rry in pairs?’ He gave a small laugh.
‘Her maid,’ replied Meiros shortly. He turned as a tall shape in a dark blue robe detached itself from the shadows. ‘Daughter.’
The blue-robed figure curtseyed. ‘Father,’ came a cool, deep voice. ‘I see you have returned from your shopping expedition. Did you get any bargains?’
‘Don’t be rude, Justina,’ sighed Meiros. He looked shockingly weary to Ramita, who hadn’t seen his face for three days. It was as if returning to Hebusalim had erased the youthful vigour he had shown in the deserts. ‘I have a new wife. Her name is—’
‘I don’t care what her name is!’ snapped Justina. ‘You old fool, have you finally gone senile? I’ve been half-crazy wondering what you were doing. Slipping away with no word, no contact, and now I find you’ve been courting? For Kore’s sake, Father, an Indran – what on Urte are you doing? Have you gone mad? The Order has been in uproar.’ Her face, glimpsed beneath the hood of the robes, was ivory, her mouth a vermilion slash, contorted in scorn.
‘Peace, Daughter. I will not—’
‘Ha – dotard!’ Justina whirled and stamped away into the shadows.
Meiros let out a heavy sigh and turned back to the girls. ‘I apologise for my daughter,’ he told Ramita. ‘She is highly-strung at times.’
