A Conspiracy of Truths

by Alexandra Rowland

  “No. Stay. It is necessary to prepare for an unpleasant eventuality.”

  “Oh, gods above and below, you’re going to throw a tantrum about paperwork?” Consanza shook her head.

  “No,” I said. “I’m going to teach my apprentice all I can, because in a few weeks I might be dead.”

  “There’s no way to know for certain yet,” Ylfing was quick to say. “Consanza will think of something. Won’t you?”

  She shrugged. “I did hire an assistant for your case, Chant. I’m doing what I can. But as I said, what happens to you when you get out is a fate of your own making.”

  “Ylfing, lad. We have to get to work. There’s things I haven’t even begun to teach you yet. There’s things I won’t be able to teach you—”

  “Consanza, do you have paper with you?” Ylfing asked. Rude child. He didn’t understand how serious it was. “I have to practice my handwriting anyway. I’ll write everything you say down—”

  “You can’t just write things down! You have to learn them! Memorize them! Remember them! What good are bits of paper? You can lose them, they can get burnt or stolen! If they get wet, the ink runs!”

  “Yes, that’s true. But if they’re just in your head, then if you die, they’re lost. If you get old and senile, they’re lost.”

  “That’s why you tell them to other people. If lots of people remember them, they can’t ever be lost.”

  We bickered while Consanza unpacked some blank paper for Ylfing and left, and I abruptly tired of the argument. It was an old one, and we’d had it many times before. Once we settled into the work, I was surprised to find what a comfort it was. Hours passed, and I could see that Ylfing was getting tired. He stopped writing several times to shake the cramps out of his hand, but . . . I couldn’t stop talking. I couldn’t let him leave. I hungered for the work in a way that I hadn’t hungered for it in years.

  Brought me right back to my youth, you know. I was just about Ylfing’s age, or a little younger, when my own master-Chant tumbled into my life. I don’t often think about those earliest days, and I never think about my life before I met her. Not that there was anything particularly terrible there, but why would I spend even a second dwelling on what I left behind, when what I gained that instant I first laid eyes on my Chant was so much more, immeasurably more?

  There’s moments in your life when something suddenly clicks into place in the clockwork of fate. Sometimes it’s a moment that seizes you, that thunders within you, unheard by anyone else, and makes you think, Ah! Yes, this, this, here it is! And sometimes it’s a moment, like when I met my Chant, when the noise fate makes as its mechanisms engage is no louder than that of a single grain of sand dropped onto a sheet of copper, and in the moment you pause and think, Hm? and then forget about it. And it’s only days or weeks or months or years or decades afterwards that you look back and say, Oh, now I see. That was the moment it all changed, the moment the river of my life diverted its course: it was when I first heard your name spoken aloud.

  I’ve never regretted my river’s diversion for a moment, even when I was lying in a filthy cell waiting to be either sentenced to death or released and assassinated.

  And so I talked and talked until my voice cracked, and then I talked some more, until both of us were trembling with exhaustion and hunger, and Ylfing could not even muster the strength to grip the pen anymore.

  He left for the night, and when the guards brought my evening slop, it was accompanied by a familiar gold-edged calling card.

  We had determined that pyromancy would be the best course of action—we had the brazier already there, and there’s something romantic and primal about fire, something that makes people in big cities and thick-walled stone houses remember that there is a wilderness out there, dark forests, hungry beasts.

  The other part of it was that there are interesting things you can do with fire that require no magic whatsoever, fortunately for Ylfing and me. He brought in a little bag of arcanum duplicatum, bless him, all ground up into a rough white powder the texture of salt. There was a fresh pile of sticks to add to the brazier, and another bag of an odd variety of incense, which Ylfing had found in a dusty back-alley shop, staffed by an ancient man of Arjuni descent, like our Consanza.

  The sun was setting so early those days that it was already twilight when Taishineya Tarmos arrived in the middle of the afternoon, resplendent in rich plum silk. She had brought a smaller retinue this time, no lunch or dish of candied apricots, and no sign of that odd fluffy creature from her first visit.

  “Master Chant!” she cried, as if we were old friends reunited for the first time in years. “Delighted to see you again, dear, just delighted. So pleased we were able to find your apprentice, too—is this him? Charmed, young man—and what is your name?”

  “Ylfing, my lady,” he said, and bowed a little awkwardly. I made a note of that; the Hrefni don’t bow to each other, and we hadn’t had much truck with persons of authority in the time since he’d begun traveling with me. Just one of the thousands of things I’d have to teach him before they killed me.

  “Ill—how did you say it? Elfin?”

  “Ylfing.”

  “Ill-thing!” There was that tinkling-bell laughter. “What a funny name. I’ve never heard it before.” She settled herself on the cushioned stool and folded her hands. “Shall we begin?”

  “If you wish.” I nodded to Ylfing, who began to build up the fire. I sat cross-legged on the floor, with the horse blanket folded under me for a cushion. “Would you like to send your guards out of the corridor? It is uncertain what knowledge the spirits will impart, but it often has . . . private significance.”

  “No, no, it’s fine, just get to it.”

  “Are you sure?” I dropped my voice. “I don’t wish to alarm you, madam, but you never know who you can trust. You never know who might be . . . taking your portraits from someone else’s hand, if you understand me. Some people can get their ears into the oddest places.”

  She ended up sending her guards away after all—far enough down the hall that they could hear her if she called, too far away to hear us speaking in normal tones.

  “Now focus on your question with all your will.” I nodded to Ylfing, and he threw a handful of incense on the fire and heaped twigs atop it. The thin smoke took on a heady, dark perfume. I let my eyes drift half-closed and stared into the fire. Ylfing added more sticks until the flames were licking high and the heat on our faces became uncomfortable, though my back was still tense with cold.

  I groaned suddenly, throwing my head back. Ylfing, right on cue, scattered the bag of arcanum duplicatum over the flames. They turned a ghostly violet, and Taishineya Tarmos gasped.

  In a rough fisherman’s dialect of the language of my homeland, in a gravelly rumble, I intoned: “These are just random words. Sunflowers. Mountain. Turquoise. Seventeen. You think they sound very mystical. You’re a bigoted twit who would rather believe gossip than get the facts straight for yourself. I hate the way you laugh and I think it’s ridiculous that you don’t know how vapid it makes you sound. Fire. Brazier. Prison. Thirty-eight. Awkwardly. Maritime. I have no respect for people who pretend to be stupid. Uphill. To dance. Fish knife. Complaint. Ambitious. Quickly. Shuggwa’s Eye is watching you.” Then, in Nuryeven, “The future is in flux. There is still time to decide your fate. A day will come when the people will choose a great leader, and that leader will bring the nation into a time of prosperity and fortune the like of which has never been seen in this realm before. That is a certainty. It is carved in the stone tablets of destiny. There is a blank space to carve that leader’s name. Pick up the chisel. Pick up the chisel. To win the election, you must pick up the chisel.”

  I fell backward, sprawled across the floor, and I stared at the ceiling and twitched slightly, muttering, “Sandwiches, sandwiches, sandwiches,” in that same dialect of Kaskeen.

  The violet flames gradually faded back into their usual yellows and oranges and slowly died down. “Is he a
ll right?” Taishineya Tarmos whispered.

  “I hope so,” Ylfing said. “It’s very hard on him, reading the future. He’s not as young as he used to be.”

  I made a mental note to scold him about that later.

  “Shouldn’t you get him something?”

  “I can’t help him when he’s locked up in there. He’s not twitching too badly, so he’ll probably be okay as long as he doesn’t swallow his tongue.” I heard him shuffling around. “Did you see the flames go purple? That’s a good omen.”

  “Is it?”

  “Purple’s your color, isn’t it? Your dress.”

  “It’s just the color of my office,” she said absently. “All the Primes wear the colors of their offices. What did he mean, pick up the chisel?”

  “Oh . . . I’m just an apprentice, I don’t know all the ways of interpreting the visions. He said there was a blank space on the stone tablets of destiny—you have to carve it yourself.”

  “But it was a chisel,” she said. “Specifically a chisel. And stone tablets. Why is destiny recorded on stone instead of on paper? Stones and chisels . . .” I heard her stand up. “It’s odd. I think it means something.”

  “Good! Keep it in your mind. Many times the spirits speak through us in ways that we speakers don’t quite understand. Sometimes it’s only the asker, like yourself, who can truly understand the symbols the spirits use in their answers, because those images are only meaningful to you personally. It’s quite usual. If stones and chisels are ringing a bell for you, pursue it.” Ylfing managed to say this with great earnestness—because he actually believed it was true, I supposed, even if the prophecy itself was made up.

  “I will.” There was a soft jingling. “Here. This is for you—or your master.”

  “Thank you, madam!”

  “I suppose I will see you at the hearing in a few days.”

  “If they will allow me in the courtroom, certainly.”

  “Good day.”

  “Good day!” I waited until the rustling of her skirts had disappeared down the corridor and then I cracked one eye open. Ylfing was sitting by the brazier, poking through a palmful of coins. He looked at me when I sat up. “A generous tip from the Queen of Commerce,” he said, all smiles. “I’ll be able to pay Ivo back.”

  “I’m sure he’ll be delighted.” I pulled myself up off the floor and got comfortable on the bench. “Is there water or food?”

  He winced. “I brought some, but not enough—the guards took all of it.”

  “Never mind.” I leaned back against the wall. “So, you like Ivo.”

  He blushed immediately. “Oh, you know . . . Sort of.”

  “And,” I said quietly, “you know that if I’m set free, we’re leaving immediately. We’re running far, and fast, and we’re not stopping to say good-bye.”

  “I know,” he whispered, not meeting my eyes. “I’m prepared for it.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.” He nodded. Then, with more confidence, “Yes. I like him very much, and his handwriting is beautiful, but I wouldn’t give this up. For anything. For anyone. This is what I was meant to do.”

  I was probably having a heart attack again, and it was the smoke from the fire that was making my eyes sting and water.

  I went to the hearing. The details don’t matter, and I didn’t pay very much attention anyway. They didn’t let in any of the crowd except Ylfing and some young man accompanying him, whom I assumed was Ivo of the much-revered handwriting. They came in with Consanza—I suppose she said they were her assistants. Her real assistant was with them too, a harried-looking woman of Consanza’s age or slightly older.

  Consanza did her best, I suppose, making arguments about how association was no proof of malicious intent, but Justice was just as set on their accusations as ever they had been, and chillingly, Anfisa Zofiyat’s tide had turned against me too. She asked me several sharp questions—don’t remember what they were in reference to, and she gave nothing away in her expression or her tone, but I knew . . . I knew. Something was happening, something was in flux, and it was my fault. The scales had been tipped out of their delicate balance, and I was no longer a useful tool, but an outright enemy.

  Well, they voted on my guilt. The ballots were secret but the results were easy enough to read: Law, in compliance with tradition, publicly abstained; Pattern and Justice called for my head; Commerce recommended mercy. There was another abstention, which could only be Order.

  I was to be executed in one month’s time.

  Ylfing did me proud. Didn’t cry, didn’t interrupt, just sat there with Ivo, still and pale.

  The three of them—Ylfing and Ivo and Consanza—came to the House of Order that evening after I was safely locked up again. The guards were a little more lax about the things they could bring me, now that I’d been sentenced—or maybe they’d just pulled together enough of a bribe to have the guards look the other way. Consanza had a basket with a pot of tender stewed goat, a whole roast chicken, crispy with salt and rosemary, seven or eight steaming potatoes baked in their skins, and a mincemeat pie for each of us. Ylfing had another basket, this with three sweet fruit pies, still molten hot in the middle, a paper bag of monk’s-puffs, two bottles of a surprisingly fine white wine (only Echareese, rather than Vintish, but it made no difference to me), and four sets of cups and plates. The treasure of the feast, however, was a few tablespoons of fragrant, fresh-ground coffee in a little silver pot, ready for brewing. I couldn’t imagine how expensive it must have been to buy it this far north—it would have had to come all the way from Tash or Zebida, at the very least.

  For a meal like that, I wouldn’t mind being sentenced to death every day.

  “Coffee or wine?” Consanza said while Ivo carved the chicken and Ylfing served up a little bit of everything onto each plate. The lad—Ivo, that is—had been openly agog as they unpacked the baskets. I couldn’t blame him—I too have rarely seen so much food in one place. The only really surprising things in the basket were the wine and the coffee (and I now suspect Ivo had never tasted the latter before in his life), but it was all good, hearty food of quality that any moderately well-to-do family would have been unashamed to put on their table.

  “Coffee later,” I answered. A treat that fine should be saved for the end. “Wine now. After today, I need the fortification. Don’t you have a family or something?”

  “Sure do,” she said. “My two wives, one husband, all our children.”

  “How many?”

  “Four. Fifth on the way, coming in late winter or very early spring.”

  “To their health,” I said, taking a draft of the wine. “Why aren’t you with them tonight?”

  She pulled up a chair next to the brazier and took a plate from Ylfing. “Don’t much feel like going home yet,” she said, after a long pause.

  “Why?”

  “I’ve never lost a case before. Well—there’s still time for an appeal or two, so technically I haven’t lost it yet. Haven’t lost it until you’re . . . you know. But that’s not proper talk for dinner. I’m not going home yet because I don’t know how to tell them.”

  “What are you worried about?”

  “Wouldn’t say I’m worried,” she said, picking at a piece of chicken. “Helena’s going to come up to me when I get home, and she’ll kiss me and say, ‘Did you win all your cases today, darling?’ like she does every day, except today I’ll have to say that I didn’t. And I’m not quite ready to do that yet. It’s none of your business, anyway.”

  “You sound like you’re very fond of her. Helena.”

  “Very fond of all of them,” she muttered around a mouthful of food. Her Arjuni skin was so dark that I couldn’t tell if she was blushing, but there seemed to be a bit of blush in her voice. “Particularly fond of her, though.”

  “Tell me about them. All of them.”

  “Miriana and Velizar were married first—primarily a business match, but they get on famously. Always taking each other
’s side, always plotting something. They go everywhere together. The three of us are all the same age—I knew them when I was just a student, and they married me a few years after I received my license.” She smiled a little wryly. “They thought it’d save them some money to have a live-in advocate. And then I met Helena six or seven years ago and brought her home, and we’ve been married for five. That was purely a love match. Turned out she wasn’t too bad of a business match either. She’s a schoolteacher.”

  “And the children?”

  “The oldest is fourteen, the youngest is two. Two girls, two boys, and I guess we’ll be breaking the tie one way or another with the baby. Radacek, Inga, Nedyalka, Andrei.”

  “All Velizar’s?”

  “Radacek, Nedyalka, and the new one definitely are. Inga is from one of my former lovers—before I met Helena, that is—and Miriana isn’t sure about Andrei.”

  “You don’t differentiate between legitimate children and bastards?” Ylfing asked.

  “Inga and Andrei aren’t bastards,” Consanza said, blinking at him. “They were born within wedlock.”

  “But they’re not Velizar’s?”

  “No, why?”

  “Oh, I just thought that was interesting. Where I’m from, you wouldn’t have children with anyone but the person you’re married to. But we only have love matches. People don’t get married for business like you do here. People don’t have other lovers, generally, and when they do, everyone’s angry about it.”

  “What a backwards way to live,” Consanza said, then laughed. “Sorry, no insult intended. You probably think we’re backwards too.”

  Ylfing shrugged. “People are the same everywhere.”

  “What!” I squawked. “I drag you across this godforsaken earth for three long years while you hang off my sleeve or the sleeve of some smelly shepherd boy, and that’s the big conclusion that you come to? ‘People are the same everywhere’?”

  “Well, they are,” Ylfing protested. “Even in somewhere like Map Sut, where love matches are almost unheard of, they still understand love stories. Everyone does. And everyone understands stories like the ones about Sappo.”