The Sleeping God

by Violette Malan

  “Is there anything more?” Alkoryn said.

  Fanryn considered, her head to one side. “There’s seventeen Brothers in the House,” she said. “Eleven of those from the Carnelian Guard who were out in the streets overnight. They felt their oaths were to Tek-aKet Tarkin, rather than the Carnelian Throne, so when he Fell, they came Home.”

  “Did any die in street fighting?” Dhulyn asked.

  “None. In fact, they saved some of the other Carnelian Guardsmen, and we’ve got them hidden around the quarter, some in the Old Market. None in the House, of course.” Fanryn looked over at Thionan when her Partner cleared her throat. “Besides the children you sent us, we do have a guest, however, who was visiting in the House when your orders came to shut the gates.” Fanryn waited to be sure she had both Dhulyn and Alkoryn’s attention. “Cullen of Langeron is here,” she said, “an intimate of Yaro of Trevel, and a Racha man, no less. Seeing that Yaro was once of our Brotherhood, we gave them sanctuary.”

  “That may turn out to be very lucky.” Alkoryn leaned back in his chair, folding his hands over his stomach. “How many Marked have we in the tunnels?”

  “Including the Mender’s children Hernyn brought us, seven.”

  “Delay no longer. See that they go now, before the day is out. Send also our own youngsters, any waiting for Schooling and any not ready for their badges. Let them go with the Marked as far as the Tourin Road, then to Nerysa Warhammer. The Marked to Pompano, unless Cullen would like to take this opportunity to return to his home, in which case he may want them to accompany him to Langeron. Who is scheduled for the task?”

  “The sisters, Jenn IceSea and Jess Riverhorse.”

  “Let them choose two others to help them and go with the group to Nerysa. If Cullen of Langeron decides to go, ask him to have word with me before he departs.” He nodded twice and looked up at Fanryn. “If there is nothing else pressing, I’d like a few minutes with Dhulyn if you would, my Brothers.”

  Both Fanryn and Thionan straightened to their feet. “I’ll have some food and drink sent up,” Thionan said.

  “Considering we may need a place to hide the Tarkin Tek-aKet and his family, it’s a very lucky thing indeed that the Racha man is here.” Alkoryn spoke half to himself. “No one would think to look for them in the Clouds.”

  Dhulyn stayed at her perch by the window, consciously relaxing each muscle group as she waited for Alkoryn to turn his full attention to her. She could think of only one reason Alkoryn would have sent both Fanryn and Thionan away. He’s going to ask me to See, she thought. That’s the reason I’m not in the caves with the Tarkin.

  “I must say, Dhulyn, my Brother, if the reaction of the Tarkin and his counselor is any indication, I am not at all surprised that you tell no one of your Mark.” Alkoryn sat up straight and laid his hands palm down on the map of Gotterang that still covered his table. “But I would fail in my duties as Senior Brother and Commander of this House if I did not ask you, despite what you and Parno have told me of your experience, is there no way you can look for a Vision that may be of help to us?”

  Dhulyn looked at him for a long moment. He was asking her in the same way he would ask a swordsmith how many weapons were ready for use. No judgment, just a request for the kind of information that would help him plan his strategy. A tightness she had not been aware of loosened in her chest. Whatever she said now, he would take her at her word. She was still among Brothers. In Battle or in Death.

  “It’s worse than Parno told you,” she said. “Worse than I knew myself. Only very recently I have learned that some of what I See is not the future at all, but the past. If I cannot even tell which is which, the Visions I do See are useless to us.”

  The knock at the door was soft, almost as if the person outside wanted the room to be empty. Karlyn-Tan’s “Enter” was so automatic he did not even look up from his lists of work orders. A moment passed before he realized that someone had indeed come in, and that she was waiting for him to speak. He glanced at Semlin-Nor’s face and he sat back, lowering his pen to the tabletop. Born in the House, Semlin was the most unflappable of the House Stewards, and not even the fall of the Old House had given her that gray skin, that tremor in her clasped hands. Seeing her face, Karlyn had the feeling he was going to be sorry to have answered the knock. Maybe even that he’d got up at all today.

  “Word has come from the Dome,” Semlin said, and cleared her throat. “The Tenebroso is on his way.”

  “Sit down, Sem.” Karlyn shoved his paperwork to one side. There would be time to do it once Lok-iKol had come and gone. Both he and Semlin-Nor had received messages from the Dome in the twenty-four hours since Lok-iKol had taken the Carnelian Throne, asking for one thing or another that the new Tarkin had decided he wanted from his own House. A levy of men from Karlyn-Tan, a favorite chair from Semlin-Nor. There were only two things the Tenebroso could not send for, Karlyn thought, and they were both in this room.

  Semlin had shaken her head and remained standing, her hands on the high back of the chair across from him. “Which of us do you suppose he wants?” Semlin’s voice was steady and true, but Karlyn-Tan had an idea from the whiteness of her knuckles on the chairback how much that steadiness cost her.

  “I can think of no area in which you’ve failed the House,” he said. “And I shall say so, should I have the chance.”

  “As will I for you,” Semlin said, nodding.

  Karlyn looked at her carefully, but there was no insincerity in her face. “No.” Karlyn leaned back in his chair, tapping his lips with the fingers of his right hand. “I have reason to believe it will be me. Don’t try to shield me, you can’t know the cost.”

  The woman across from him took her lower lip into her teeth, shot him a glance from under her brows before focusing once again on the papers which layered the top of his desk. Karlyn raised his eyebrows as awareness dawned.

  “How long did you know?” he said, sitting forward again.

  “The House knew, and told me.” The words tumbled from her mouth. “She’d been looking for the golden-haired one, the Lionsmane, for some time. As for the rest,” she spread her hands, “I keep the Keys, man, how could I not know when food was prepared, when rooms were cleaned and light taken to them? Heat? Bedding? As for the rest…” Semlin lowered her eyes, the corners of her mouth turning down. “I gave the Fallen House my solemn oath to make no mention of it, nor of her plans. The next I knew, she was Fallen, and the Mercenary Brothers were gone.”

  “That going will be on my head. As well as the going of the Scholar, and the Lady Mar-eMar. As Keys is your function, so mine is Walls.”

  The tightness in Semlin-Nor’s shoulders relaxed, but her face did not regain its usual color.

  “You’ll see I’m right,” he said, getting to his feet, and taking his sword of office down from its bracket on the wall near the door. Might as well be formal, he thought, it may remind Lok-iKol of his obligations to me, as well as mine to him.

  When he looked up from the silvered clasp of his sword belt, Semlin was already at the door. Her smile was a mere baring of teeth and her nod set her earrings swinging. There was little that his reassurances could do. She knew as much as he did about what had gone on in Lok’s rooms when he was just Kir. Maybe more.

  They walked without speaking from Karlyn’s tower rooms to the main doors, silent even in those portions of the corridors where they knew they could not be overheard. Semlin-Nor came as far as she could with him, stopping in the outer courtyard, at the lowest steps of the House.

  “The Caids bless you,” she whispered through barely moving lips as he stepped off onto the stones of the yard. “The Sleeping God keep you in his dreams.”

  “And you.”

  He could feel her eyes on his back as he crossed the outer courtyard to the gates to greet his House, the new Tarkin.

  “Tell me again of the escape of the Mercenaries.”

  It was as he’d suspected. It was only Karlyn-Tan that the Tenebroso had asked
to accompany him to his workroom. Lok-iKol sat behind his worktable, staring at the sharp nib of a pen as he rolled it between thumb and fingers. For the first time in many years, he had not invited Karlyn-Tan to sit.

  “With respect, my lord,” Karlyn said, “I remind you that they were not in my keeping, and that I know nothing of their leaving.” It was safe for him to say so, as he knew that the keys for Dhulyn Wolfshead’s shackles never left Lok-iKol’s own hands. “Mercenaries do not require assistance in these matters. It is known they cannot be held, if it is their own wish to be gone.”

  “And the Scholar, and the Lady Mar-eMar? Were they assisted?”

  “Once more, I remind you, my House, that neither I nor any of my men had orders to prevent any members of this House from proceeding about their affairs. We knew of no reason to prevent them from leaving.”

  “You remind me.” Lok-iKol pursed his lips and straightening in his chair, dipped the pen into the open bottle of ink lined up perfectly with the piece of parchment waiting to be written on.

  “My mother, the Fallen House, often said that as a young man there was no hunter as skilled as you. You will find my Scholar. You will find the girl, and you will find me the Mercenary woman, the Wolfshead.”

  “My hunting days are past, my House. I am Walls now.”

  “I know you cannot leave the House,” Lok-iKol said. “But you will direct the hunt.”

  “Let me speak more plainly, my lord. No, I will not.”

  Lok-iKol looked up, lifting the pen from the paper. Karlyn-Tan watched the ink gather into a large drop at the tip of the nib, grow large enough to shiver for a moment in the morning sunlight streaming through the window and fall onto the page beneath. Still he said nothing, waiting for his House to speak.

  “I am your House,” Lok-iKol said finally. “And now I am your Tarkin as well. You are my Walls, and you will do as I ask.”

  “I am the Walls of House Tenebro, my lord.” Karlyn-Tan nodded, looking directly at the man seated at the worktable. “I am neither yours, nor mine, but Tenebro’s. As I have said to you before, I serve only the House, with my own obligations, and my own judgment. It is my judgment that pursuing these Mercenaries will bring danger to the House. As Tenebroso, you may discharge me, but you cannot overrule my judgment.”

  “Then you are discharged.” Lok-iKol looked down at the page before him, twisting his lips when he saw the stain of ink. “Be gone by sunset. Take nothing that belongs to me.”

  Karlyn fought to keep his knees locked, to keep his hand from reaching for the support of the chairback next to him. It was as though he suddenly found himself on the edge of a chasm, and only firm control would keep him from plunging down. The chasm had always been there, but he had grown so used to it, he had forgotten it could harm him. As he managed to forget, most of the time, that this man was his half brother. A voice inside him, the voice of the boy who had never known any other home but this one, cried out that he should submit, that he should agree to anything, and his lips parted, but the words that came out…

  “I’ll give you a piece of advice,” he said. “There’ll be no need to hunt for the Mercenaries, Lok-iKol. They will come hunting for you.”

  Afterward, Karlyn was unable to recall whether he passed anyone on his way back to his rooms. He remembered thinking that he should have been surprised to find Semlin-Nor waiting for him when he got there, but he was not. She was, after all, the closest thing to a friend he had. She did not speak, but he answered the question on her face.

  “I am Cast Out.”

  She put out a hand for the edge of the table, lowered herself into a chair.

  “Do nothing. Say nothing. You are not safe here. Go, we never spoke.” He could not endanger her. He, at least, had seen the outside world, even if not for fifteen years. She had been born in this House, and had never left it. If she were Cast Out, guilty by her association with him, it would destroy her.

  Still, he could not help feeling hurt when Semlin ran from the room without further word. The touch on the hand she gave him as she pushed past was not much consolation. He sat down in the chair behind his worktable and let his face fall into his hands. He had until sunset. Until sunset to decide what, if anything, he was allowed to take with him. He had a little money of his own, saved up over the years. A ring and a dagger the Fallen House had given him. They could be considered his. Surely not even Lok-iKol would put him into the street naked, but was there anything in his rooms that was not of Tenebro colors, or which didn’t bear the Tenebro crest?

  Karlyn took a deep breath and looked up. From the angle of the sunlight on the desk, he’d been sitting here the better part of an hour already. And he had not given any thought to where he would go, once he’d found clothing. Was the Blue Dove Tavern still in business, he wondered, thinking of the last place he had stayed before coming to Tenebro House, and did it still rent rooms cheaply?

  Leave the House. The fiery heat of his anger had finally died away, leaving a tightness in his throat and chest. He forced himself to take a deep breath, and then another. A sound made him get to his feet just as the door to the hallway opened. It was not, as he’d expected, Semlin-Nor, or even his assistant Jeldor-San, having just learned of her unexpected promotion, but the Lord Dal-eDal.

  His hands full, Dal-eDal kicked the door shut behind him. In his right hand he carried a bulging saddle pack, and in his left, held by the scabbard, a sword. Both of these he put on the table in front of Karlyn.

  “I did not knock, since I have learned that these are no longer your rooms.”

  Karlyn-Tan inclined his head.

  “I have further learned that you have been told to leave with nothing that the Lord Lok-iKol has given you. Therefore, I have brought you clothing and a sword.”

  By the tone of his voice, and the expression on his face, Dal-eDal might have been passing Karlyn the bread at a communal table and not the tools that might save his life.

  “I may need to report that they come from your hand.”

  Dal-eDal shrugged. “Consider it reported. My cousin has returned to the Carnelian Dome, and I am the heir.”

  Karlyn nodded his understanding, feeling a tightness in his shoulders relax. It was to find Dal-eDal that Semlin-Nor had left in such a hurry. “In that case, I accept.”

  It was Dal-eDal’s turn to nod. He straightened his cuffs as if searching for something more to say.

  “Did he want you to find the Tarkin?”

  “You mean Tek-aKet Culebroso? The former Tarkin?”

  Dal smiled. “Yes, that is what I meant.”

  Karlyn took a deep breath, found further tension releasing. “No,” he said. “The Scholar, the Lady Mar-eMar, and the Mercenary Dhulyn Wolfshead.”

  Dal leaned against the doorframe, folding his arms across his chest. “What is it about this woman? He tricks Mar-eMar into bringing her to Gotterang, and now, with all that must be occupying him in the less than two days he’s been on the Carnelian Throne, he finds time to leave the Dome to ask you to find her?”

  “The Scholar would know.”

  “And if we had the Scholar,” Dal said, “we would know.”

  We? Karlyn thought. Dal presumed much on the basis of clothing and a sword. Karlyn believed he could put his hands on both the youngsters pretty easily, thanks to Jeldor-San’s fast thinking in having them followed and to his own tracking skills, but he saw no need to tell Dal-eDal as much.

  The two men exchanged a long look.

  “If you would,” Dal said finally, “once you know where you are, send me word.”

  “Why not?”

  Dal-eDal’s parting smile was more than half grimace.

  “Just as soon as I figure out who you’ll tell,” Karlyn-Tan said once the door had closed again.

  Parno was using the sharpening stone he’d found in the underground chamber’s weapons kit to put a better edge on one of the knives he’d been given from the Tarkin’s armory. As soon as he could get upstairs, he’d be able to r
ecover those of his own weapons-including his best sword-that had, along with the rest of his pack, been left with their horses at Mercenary House. He scowled at the knife, moving it this way and that as the light caught the edge. Was it really only a week ago?

  Parno looked over the edge of the blade to find Bet-oTeb looking at him. The Tarkin-to-be looked very solemn, her eyes huge in the chamber’s uncertain light. “My father wants you,” she said. “If you would be so good as to come with me.”

  Parno bowed to her, put the knife back into the sheath he wore at his belt, and followed Bet-oTeb to the far end of the room, where the Tarkin sat with his wife. Tek-aKet smiled his thanks to his daughter and indicated that Parno should seat himself on the next bed.

  The Tarkin looked tired, as well he might, having slept only a few hours after being up most of the night. Parno doubted he would have recognized the man had he merely encountered him on the street, any more than his second cousin appeared to recognize him. There was a world of difference between the seventeen year old he had been and the bearded, tattooed, and heavily-muscled Mercenary Brother he had become. The last time Parno had seen Tek-aKet, back when he himself had still been Par-iPar Tenebro, Tek had been thirteen, gangly and round-shouldered from study. Fourteen years later, Parno could see the old Tarkin in the shape of Tek’s eyes, the breadth of his shoulders, and the firm set of his jaw.

  Tek-aKet now leaned forward until their heads were almost touching.

  “Zelianora and I have been taking thought,” the Tarkin of Imrion said. “Am I correct in my understanding that you can speak for your Partner?”

  Parno nodded. “We are the same person,” he said.

  “Can you tell me, then, whether she will use her Mark to help me?”

  “More than she has already done,” the Tarkina said, acknowledgment and gratitude in her voice. Her husband flashed her a smile and nodded.

  Parno looked down at his hands, clasped between his knees. The man thought he had a great tool, and who could blame him… Parno had once thought so himself. Experience had taught Parno differently, but how was he to convince Tek-aKet? Did Dhulyn escape from Lok-iKol only to fall into his cousin’s hands? Parno looked at Zelianora Tarkina, who was watching her husband’s face with steady dark eyes. Composed, almost serene. He looked back at the Tarkin. This man was not like Lok-iKol, he thought. Nothing like.