"You have marred my beautiful face! I should have you whipped!" The other smiled slyly.
"Spoken like the queen. Truly. That is why I say to please hold still so that I can finish. . ."
The play started with a scene in the desert. A king, dressed and painted like a barbarian tribesman - only some tribesmen painted themselves but this custom had come to symbol all people of the desert, who were, naturally, barbarians. He and his men climbed the city wall and fought against the corrupt and weak city fathers, the kushimen and the kushigyar and killed them, overrunning the city. The barbarian king then took the throne. The red paper palace in the background drew forward and then the shadow puppets against the back wall showed the king taking the head of the kushigyar, to the jubilant cheering of the gathered crowd. Ephron himself played the king, sitting upon the throne. He raised his short sword in triumph and then they set a crown of bones upon his head. Then the next scene showed him fighting off the king of Zapulia in shadow puppets, his chariots racing across the desert to Zapulia with more hoots and epithets hurled about Zapulians from the audience. Then, a rat-faced looking man dressed in black with long, curved horns sticking from his head came and approached the king, bowing low before him.
"I can promise you great things, for I am a sorcerer."
"And what is your name, sorcerer?" Asked the king.
"Bakku. I can make your greatest dreams come true."
"And how will you do this, sorcerer?"
"There is a young princess, more beautiful than even your queen. She is a daughter of the gods and can give you many sons to raise up in your name. To raise your blood up to the heavens themselves!" The audience hissed and threw bones on the stage.
"Devil!" Someone yelled.
"Jinn!" Others cried. All in good fun.
"Bring me this woman and I shall marry her and then I shall be the greatest king who has ever lived!"
"Yes, Your Great Majesty!" He said with grand flourish, sweeping his black robes back like great bat wings. The king left the stage and the sorcerer danced. A group of demons danced with him around a fire pit as he sang how he would help get rid of the king. Then a few Ainash priests came in, all wearing horns and danced around with him and then their white robes were turned inside out and they had black robes like him. Shukala was one of the dancing priests. This was the end of the second act, and judging by the sounds of the audience, they were enjoying it so far.
The actors all came running in to the back rooms to get ready for the last two acts or, separations, as they were called by the acting-manager.
"I heard something like this was played in Jhis and they were impaled for it." Said one of the actors. Rapheth listened quietly, still nervous about his role. He dabbed at the blood spot at his eye.
"This is not Jhis. We are far away from that hellhole."
"Even if we were not, it is exciting!" Said Shukala.
"Except, if our families knew we had lowered ourselves to be actors. . .I shudder to think what my father would do to me if he knew I was here instead of out hunting with my uncle." Said Ephron.
"I promised that this would be the first and last time I did this. Still, it feels like we are taking part in some great experiment. I hear theater is very popular in Zapulia, and even beyond."
"I would like to go there one day. Perhaps we can see how it is really done there." Said one of the others in the troupe. The actor-manager came in.
"The next scene is set up so the next act is about to start soon!" He walked off. Rapheth got up and peeked behind the curtain of their musty dressing room. It was a whirl of activity behind him. His make up artist was out there. By Injep. Injep had come to see them! Rapheth was delighted. The youth handed something to Injep. Something white. They suddenly turned and happened to see him. Rapheth smiled and waved at them. The boy at first looked horrified, but then recovered himself and then smiled weakly. Injep smiled broadly and waved back. Rapheth hurriedly slipped his head back behind the curtain in case other patrons might see him.
"Rapheth! You are next! You are the queen, the center of the play. Get back in here before they see you!"
The play began with the next act with the Egian queen. Dressed in a gaudy silver robe and white veil and some fake baubled rings and bangles he looked like a queen - of harlots, but their cheap costumes would have to do. Being carried in a sedan chair with paper images of Nimnet and Elyshe glued to the top of its back the queen was carried in with her father walking in front with the sorcerer. Rapheth felt the buzz of excitement as all eyes were upon him. He hoped he looked the part instead of just a youth in a gaudy dress. If only they could see him now. Then a horrified thought slipped through his mind as he imagined Ilim being out there watching him. But Ilim would have nothing to do with "such frivolities" as theater. Deep in his thoughts he'd almost forgot his lines. The sedan chair was set down and a train of servants dressed in Egian garb and some in only loin cloths and tattooed with slave tattoos followed behind while the king stood on the other side of the stage with his own servants and two actors dressed in the leather and copper kilts of generals with ceremonial swords at their sides. Shukala now played the queen's father who handed the queen's hand into the king's.
"I do take you as my queen for you are the most beautiful of all women." The flail and khepesh was handed to the queen. and Rapheth clutched them to his breast. A crown was put upon his head and this signaled the new marriage and the end the second act. They cleared the stage and the shadow puppets came again. This time with a voice narration of how the second queen murdered the first. The air was crackling with a dangerous, fevered silence now. It had gone deadly silent as the shadow puppets played out what many people had suspected for years - that the present queen had killed the first queen. She chased the first queen through the palace and into her rooms and choked her and threw her off the balcony.
Then there was the last scene. The new queen appeared again.
"I am the snake, the serpent queen of Egi and I shall rule alone." Two moons rose over her as she spoke. The sorcerer crept in and he danced around her.
"Sorcerer! Make me queen of Egi and Hybron and you shall rule beside me forever! Together we shall kill all who oppose us and hang them on stakes!" The sorcerer bowed low.
"Perform your secret dark arts so that the prophecy of the serpent may come true." Again the shadow puppetry against the back wall told the story as they left the stage, of Bakku the sorcerer, throwing in animals of paper and rag dolls to stand in for the numerous sacrificed beasts and children. And she threw other potions into a pot and a great bloom of smoke rose up as the puppet shadow of the sorcerer danced and sang around the shadow of the queen. Then she took a goblet and drank the potion and went into convulsions - Rapheth thought this would be a great, comical effect but the people in the audience began to murmur dangerous words against the queen and her councilors. Others had ugly things to say against Egians in general but another unexpected thing happened. Rapheth thought he heard quite a few comments about his own appearance and realized, to his great dismay, that some people who knew him were in the audience. When he had come out to the last act of the play, being crowned ruling queen of both lands with the rest of the players dressed as winged demons dancing at her coronation with the sorcerer standing behind the throne, the cry grew more insistent. Rapheth's stoic, marmoreal look was far too real for some.
"I swear that one looks exactly like the queen!"
"The queen, Taliat is there in our midst!"
"An apparition of the queen, her very image!" It disturbed him but he thought that once he washed the cerussa off and took the costume off this would stop. While he was on the stage he noticed along the shadowed corners of the room that there were men he had not seen before intently watching him. They were standing - there was only standing room left in the little theater - near Injep.
After the actors had all exited the stage and the play was done they all congratulated each other for work well done. Rapheth vigorously cleaned the cerussa and khol from
his face. The water bowl had grown cloudy and white with cerussa. He then wiped it from his hands and arms. A strange fear gripped him. He was suddenly afraid to be seen. He peeked out from behind the curtains again, this time only enough for his eyes to sweep the main room. Injep was nowhere to be found and neither were those evil looking men. He was relieved but his happiness in the performance had been deflated. Parso and Zigal had warned him to stay away from people he did not know, that he did not yet know who could be trusted and he had meant to, but he only just wanted to finish this project!
"Why so glum?" Someone slapped him on the back. He nearly jumped out of his skin.
"Ah! Well, I just wonder if I did well enough. This being my first time as an actor."
"You were magnificent! We all did! Did we not?" He shouted to the others.
"They love us!" Said another.
"We should set to work immediately on another!" Said the actor-manager. They were all clearly happy with the result and he should have been as well but he was now keenly aware that he might not be among friends. He could not tell if this were so or not and he could tell no one. So he put on a smile. And beat himself inwardly for taking his elders' advice lightly. The others joined the crowds in the main room as the reveling started. Shukala was nearly ready to join them when Rapheth held him back.
"Shukala, where is Ephron? I think it is best if we go. . ."
"Why? On the very night of our celebration? Rapheth, you must relax. It is all in good fun."
"I know but I saw something odd out there. Did you not hear what the people were saying about me?" Shukala stared at him for a long time, as if he were studying him.
"Well, I have never seen the queen. I did hear it but you were dressed as a woman with white makeup. Is she not an Egian noblewoman? They practically bury them underground until they are ready to marry. Which is why they are so pale. Now you simply look like yourself. You are bleeding a bit there." Shukala pointed at his eye. Rapheth remembered his wound that the make up artist made near his eye and the blood-flecked cloth. His stomach began to twist in knots.
"What is the matter?" Asked Shukala. Rapheth clutched his belly.
"I think we did something very dangerous tonight, Shukala. I think the queen has spies here." Shukala's dark eyes widened in fear.
"Please tell me you are overreacting! Why would they be all the way down here?"
"Why not? She rules the whole land, not just Jhis!" Shukala seemed afraid and flustered.
"It is just one night, Rapheth. Perhaps it is nothing to worry about. All kinds of people go to see theater, I would guess. Not just the high and learned."
"And all kinds of people can be spies. Not just good-for-nothing men. I feel strange, like people are watching me. I am leaving."
"Rapheth!" Rapheth grabbed his clothes and put them on. "Rapheth! Come back!" Shukala called after him but Rapheth had left through the back entrance through an alley and like a ghost he was gone in the night.
. . .
The black falcon reached the palace within days of the discovery. She plucked the small package from Bakku's hand and opened it, a greedy light in her eyes as she fingered the blood spots on it.
"He is sure this is his blood?"
"Sure as the sun, my queen. It is the boy."
"The high priestess will know for sure. I will go to her."
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The Month of Yin, Near High Summer, 1700 A. T. V.
Rhajit and Injol had agreed to stay in the city to fulfill the primary mission, come what may. Zarhaz now had a holy commission which interrupted the plan and he took his other supporters with him into hiding, but the plan remained. Everyone in the city was bolstering their confidence on the city's defenses, that its strong wall would hold and that Teraht would fail. Whatever horrors would come during the siege or after it, Rhajit and Injol had sworn oaths to free Ilim and Rhajit was deadly intent on getting his revenge on Shishak.
"God is with his people!" Was the call sent out from the Golden Temple, or: "The gods are with us!" According to the priests of Hec. It was a great babel of voices, godly and human, it seemed. Rhajit was not so sure. The throne was thoroughly corrupt and from what he had seen so far, inept.
He was in the house of Shishak readying himself to round up "private tariffs" from certain merchants and shopkeepers for the month, who had received through trade foreign luxury goods to sell, another thing that bothered Rhajit. Especially with all the talk on trade, especially from Egi, having drawn up. If anything, Jhis was, moreso than any other city in the land, a vast sinkhole; that famed black hole of wantonness, avarice and constant need. A city built in the wrong place. If the siege lasted too long none of the ladre the nobles, merchants, officials and priestly classes extracted from the populace and foreign traders with increasing greed would matter. It would all be throne into the streets. Who could eat gold or silver or minted coins? Most food had to be imported to Jhis while many other cites and towns had irrigated farmland, garden plots surrounding the houses or the forest that helped lessen their need for foreign food exports. If there was a long siege, longer than six months, there would be great trouble in Jhis.
He slung his money bag over his shoulder, ready to make his rounds. Shishak helped run the biggest protection racket in the city. Rhajit had once again landed in luxury through no fault or design of his own, through the pain of others. He remembered it well. Years ago many working people had been run out of their homes and businesses for not paying the burdensome tax to the Golden Temple. Much had been done to stop it but in the end, after much calculated patience, the priesthood had gotten their way after the death of the king. If the king had lived things might have looked very different. But he did not live. The queen supported the priesthood and they, until recently, supported her. Those that worked for this ring received plots of land within the city, property such as houses or shops or ladre and positions at the court, for which some then also became spies for the queen.
He was ruminating on all this when he received an alarming message. Injol had received it early this morning by a human messenger as to not cause too much attention. The queen's spies were looking for unauthorized falcons. Hers were black, bred specifically for her use. Injol, silent and brooding as usual, gave him the letter and simply left the room but not without speaking briefly.
"I must speak with you. I shall come to your house later tonight."
"Shishak is not likely to allow you to go anywhere without permission."
"We are not in Egi, my friend. Slaves here in Hybron have rights. Besides, I have my ways. I shall meet you then?"
"I will be waiting."
"Make sure no one sees the letter." Injol said under his breath and left on the business of his master. In the letter was news about a deep matter in Rhuctium.
The queen's son has been found. In Rhuctium. It is undeniable. He will be captured and taken to Jhis. Anyone found with him or who may know him is in great danger. They will be killed. His family must be warned.
X
Who is X? Rhajit wondered. This and fear for the boy would plague him throughout all the day until the night. Would this fail? Had they already seized him? They couldn't know. They can't. Not yet!
Later, the plan was on the move. Injol had come just before High Night.
"About the letter. If you can find a way to send a letter back - can you write well?"
"I can scratch well enough."
"Then send a message as soon as possible. Drajah, a trusted man I know in Rhuctium knows of the boy's caretakers. I have told him to keep an eye on the family's whereabouts and the movements of anyone around them but Drajah has been discovered by one of the queen's spies and is now on the run. So, he cannot warn them. Send it by falcon. The boy has been discovered."
"I wonder how they found out so soon?"
"This woman has a sorceress on one side and a sorcerer on the other. With them, people can know things others do not. She has other supporters too, who act as her spies. The
only thing that surprised me was that they had not found him sooner."
"The problem is how do we get the message out without getting caught? I have falcons but. . ." Injol brought out a small bag from his side and took out a bottle. He glanced at Rhajit slyly.
"What?" Rhajit grinned.
"This is a bottle of black paint. Khol mixed with crushed black stone. You are well off enough to have a falcon or two. I have noticed."
"Now why did I not think of that myself? This will not hurt the bird?"
"I do not know. Hopefully it gets the message to where it needs to go. That is all I am worried over." Said Injol. Rhajit wrote a short warning, a new letter, and sealed it. Injol held the bird firmly in a massive hand, putting a cloth around its head to calm it while Rhajit dunked the bird repeatedly in the black until it was dark as night. It was a well trained and well fed bird for it did not fight against this indignity. Putting the letter in a small cylinder they attached it to the bird's pack, tied to its leg, and went to the roof, lifted the cloth and gave it the proper hand signal-instructions and let it fly. Then they went back inside.
"Now what?" Said Rhajit.
"I have something else for you. Something that leaps the plan forward." Said Injol, wiping his hands on the cloth. "We are invited to the palace tomorrow. Our plan will have to be executed then. Are you ready?"
"I am ready." Said Rhajit.
"She is holding a private banquet. My master has been invited. He has some business with her regarding the tariffs he collects. I am not sure what he thinks to accomplish but he is one to always hedge his alliances here and there, not just in one place. Anyway, it gives us a way into the palace sooner than we thought."
"How many allies?"
"I do not know an exact number. I do know that one has regular access to the prophet. Ochorus is coming with us. His daughter, I have found out, has been captured by the queen too. She will be a sacrificial offering." Rhajit shook his head.
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